by Geoff North
“You… You liked me all the way back then?” He was stalling for time.
“Yeah. Seems like I’ve loved you even longer... Forever.” She stroked his leg. “It opens up further down. Nowhere near as scary as this.” She pulled him gently. “Let me show you. Come on, not much further.”
Abe closed his eyes and slid around the corner on his butt. Becky didn’t pressure him to move any faster. They descended twenty more feet—it felt like twenty miles to Abe. Becky whispered in his ear. “Take a look. We’re here.”
The first thing he saw was Boo, his face shoved impossibly full with cooked meat. He grinned at Abe. “Hoghe!”
“Home,” Abe repeated. “Sure.” A dozen more humans were milling around them. They came closer, touching Becky’s hair and running their hands along the exposed skin of her shoulders and arms. A woman touched Abe’s cheek. He pushed her hand away and looked around. The room wasn’t as small as the old straw forts his father had built, and nowhere near as dark. Light flickered from torches set into the ice walls. Fur blankets and hides were spread across the floor and folded up neatly along the walls.
“It is a home,” Becky said wonderingly. “They live here. They sleep here. Forty feet under the snow in the shadow of a glacier.”
Abe swallowed hard. “I thought you were going to help me through this.”
She was about to say sorry when someone else spoke. “You know English.” A young woman with red hair spilling past her fur-covered shoulders entered the room from another passageway. “The people here have learned it… in a way. I taught them myself. Who are you? Where did they find you?”
“They?” Becky repeated. “The men that captured us?”
The woman saw the two men that had brought the strangers in. “Anouth, Cale... my brave old friends. Where are Goos and the others?”
The one called Anouth stepped forward and shook his head.
“Say it,” the woman instructed.
“Black Eyes took Goos and Skeeg. Aton and Sedge were… lost half a day out.”
“So close to home after searching for so long.”
“What were your people searching for?” Becky asked.
“People of course. Children especially—like the ones with you. Those too small and weak to fight the savages.”
“The Neanderthals,” Abe croaked.
The woman’s eyes widened. “Nee-an-der-tall. It’s been a lifetime since I’ve heard them called that. I’ve taught the people here to call them what they are—savages, animals.”
“How can there be people here?” Abe asked. “Who are you?”
“My people call me Illee. We travelled north two decades ago when our numbers became too small to defend against the savages.”
Illee didn’t appear any older than Becky or Abe. If there had been an exodus to the north twenty years earlier, Becky couldn’t see how the young woman was able to remember. How was she even here? Her red hair, green eyes, and freckled cheeks were out of place amongst the rest. “Why travel north? It’s nothing but snow and ice. How could you possibly sustain yourselves here?”
“It hasn’t been easy. Food’s hard to come by, and when the parties aren’t travelling south on hunting expeditions, they’re gathering more survivors.” She waved Becky and Abe forward and started back through the passageway she’d come through. Becky took Abe’s sweaty hand and nudged him along. “It’s been over a year since they’ve returned with humans. Our kind has been pretty much wiped out by the sav—by the Neanderthals. What you see in these tunneled out rooms is about all that’s left of our species.”
They went from room to room, some filled with people, others occupied by smaller families. Illee told more of her story as they passed through connecting passageways and low tunnels. “There are roughly two hundred of us here now. We started out as a small gathering of three dozen living south in the forests. The Neanderthals kept attacking, forcing us farther north. But they couldn’t adapt to the extreme cold like we could. When we crossed the snow plains, they stopped following. We had originally travelled much further north, safely out of their reach, building these homes beneath the snow in front of the ice sheets. The ice above grows and moves.” She stopped against a wall and tapped at the hard snow with her knuckles. She traced an outline with her finger tip indicating a buried tunnel. “The weight above eventually crushes everything beneath. As the glacier moves south, our home moves with it. This passage was abandoned six months ago. If you could burrow through this and keep digging north, you would find the remains of passages leading to older homes stretching back for miles.”
Abe wanted to scream, but his fear of a cave-in kept him silent and frozen to the spot. Becky spoke for him instead. “The ice will force you back south. It might not happen for another hundred years, but sooner or later these people will have to face the Neanderthals again.”
Illee nodded. “Or the Ice Age will wipe them out in this part of the world. That’s my—that’s our hope, anyway. I know we can’t stay hidden down here forever. Eventually we’ll have to abandon the snow and take our chances in the open again. But our numbers have grown. Our… expeditions south to find survivors have paid off. When the time comes, we will be ready for them.”
“Where are you really from, Illee?” Becky asked. “We speak the same language… a language that won’t be spoken for tens of thousands of years. You’re one of us, aren’t you… sent back in time.”
“There have been others over the years. They’re all dead now. It doesn’t matter where I came from or who I was. All that matters is now. All I care about is keeping these people alive.”
“My God,” Becky whispered to Abe as Illee started to lead them back. “I thought she looked familiar. Who does she remind you of?”
A song came to him. You are My Sunshine. A blonde-haired man slaughtered before their eyes—spears piercing his neck, chest, and stomach.
“Greely… She looks like Edwin Greely.”
Becky shook her head. “That can’t be. Edwin Greely said he was sent back here with his daughter during the Cuban Missile Crisis.” She had to think a moment for the name to come to her. “If this is Jillian, she would have to be at least seventy-years old.”
Abe was having enough difficulty trying to remain calm. Becky whispering math problems in his ear wasn’t helping. He wanted to push Illee, or Jillian-whatever-the-hell-her-name-was aside, and scramble back up outside before all the snow fell on top of them. He closed his eyes and breathed slowly. “Edwin would have been eighty or ninety when we met him. He didn’t look much older than forty.”
Illee spun around. “Edwin? You’ve seen my father?”
Becky winced. The girl’s hearing was as enhanced as their own. “Is your name Jillian?”
“My father…” Illee pushed her up against an icy wall. Tears had started to well up in her eyes. “Did he travel north with you?”
Becky didn’t know where to begin. She gently removed the woman’s hands from her shoulders. There was no easy way. “I’m afraid we have some bad news.”
***
The five sat outside around a small fire the following evening. The glacier loomed over them, black and silent. Boo and Ann chewed contentedly on cooked seal meat. Abe wasn’t hungry. He was more than content just being in the open again. He hadn’t slept the night before, feeling trapped in the suffocating silence of the snow labyrinth. He was certain sleep would elude him again if he had to spend another night below. Becky was next to him, studying Jillian through the wisps of smoke, wondering how it must feel to lose a parent twice after so many years. Illee—she no longer went by the name Jillian—stared into the glowing embers. She stirred them about slowly with a stick until the final remains of the supply sled sank another inch into the melting snow beneath. “The thing was holding a soccer ball. My dad and I both saw it. We both wondered over the years why it was holding a stupid soccer ball against its chest.” She looked at Abe, puzzled still. “You say you threw it? That doesn’t make sense. How could we see it holding a ba
ll you wouldn’t throw for another fifty years?”
Becky sighed. “How could it send us half way around the world and into the past? Why are our bodies the way they are now? How did we become almost… immortal?”
They couldn’t answer each other’s questions. Perhaps they would never be able to.
Abe spoke after another full minute of silence. “The only chance of ever finding out isn’t here, that’s for sure.”
Illee tossed the remains of her stick into the fire. “You still think going farther north and trying to reach North America is the way to go? It’s insane.”
“And living under the snow isn’t crazy? Yeah, maybe someday there’ll be enough of you to head back south and challenge the Neanderthals, but that day is still a long way off… and there are a lot of Neanderthals.”
Becky nudged him with an elbow. “Go easy, Abe. She’s been through a lot… we all have.” The two had talked it through the last twenty-four hours. They were heading north again. Illee and her people had agreed to keep Boo and Ann. Becky was against it at first but Abe had made his points well. They had travelled too far to abandon everything. They had found a home for the children. It wouldn’t have been their first choice, but Abe and Becky hadn’t been able to provide one better. The people here were immune to the disease, Illee’s presence among them proved that. Boo and Ann’s best chance for survival—anywhere in the world—was here.
“I crossed the land bridge once eight years ago,” Illee spoke again. “It was difficult. There were twelve of us, the strongest volunteering to see what lay beyond.”
Abe leaned forward, anxious to hear more.
“We made it as far as the Rocky Mountains. Everyone died. I could have kept going. There were no Neanderthals. There was no one. I could have gone further south… across North America and all the way into prehistoric Mexico. My Dad and I used to talk about that. He lived there for a couple of years after World War II ended, building houses or something like that in a town called Puerto Aventuras.” A distant smile fell over her pale face. “He told me stories what it was like there, along the Yucatan Peninsula. He was going to take me there… before we were separated.” She went silent and stared into the last of the flame.
“Why didn’t you keep going?” Becky asked. “Why did you come back to… this?”
“Why wouldn’t I come back? I’d lost everything and everyone—my father years before, the eleven brave men and women that travelled across the land bridge—they were all gone. What was there to accomplish on a new continent with no people? Even the Neanderthals were company of a kind… There was nothing to stay for… so I came back.”
“You proved it could be done,” Abe said a little too quickly. “I’m sorry if that sounds cruel, Illee. I’m sorry for the people you lo—”
“I’m going with you.”
They looked at Illee in surprise.
“Three super-conditioned humans have a better chance than two. Now that I know my father is truly gone, and with our population growing,” she looked at Boo and Ann as she said this, “I think it’s time to try again.”
Abe raised an eyebrow at her. “Try what again—head for Mexico?”’
“No, the farm from my childhood. I can barely remember it… so long ago. That thing in the woods, it’s there, isn’t it? I’ve dreamt of it for decades… waiting… I can feel it.”
Abe shrugged. Boo and Ann had found a home with their own kind. Illee— although not from the generation he and Becky had grown up in—belonged more with them than she did the two hundred plus ice-dwellers. She shared a bond with Becky and Abe that transcended time. She had seen the thing. It had changed her. How could they turn her away?
Illee nodded. “We leave at first light.”
***
Abe spent the rest of the night outside. Becky stayed with him through the cold hours, as did Boo and Ann, wrapped in an abundance of heavy furs and hides. It was warmer below but they knew it would be the last time the four would be together. Ann woke during the short night and squeezed between the older couple. Boo slept on his side and watched them until a dull pink smudge rose in the eastern sky.
Illee appeared from another tunnel entrance further away dragging a primitive canoe filled with food and other supplies needed to begin their journey. Ann awoke and started to weep at the sight of her.
“It may not be that big but I guarantee you its rugged. We used four like it on our first crossing. When the snow gets heavy we can save a lot of time following land by ocean.”
Abe and Becky were outfitted in the heaviest clothes the snow-dwellers could provide. He clapped his mitted hands together and studied the northern wall of glacial ice hanging over them. “We head east first?”
Illee nodded. “The sea is less than a day away. We’ll be spending a lot of time on the water, hunting seal and fishing as we go.”
Becky had resigned herself to the journey for a second time. This hardest, most treacherous leg was now upon them, and she felt more tired and resigned than ever. “How long?” She felt like a child in the backseat of a car asking are we there yet?
Illee moved her head in thought, halfway between a nod and a shake. “Three or four months to the Rockies, maybe longer. I can’t be too sure. It’s colder, there’s more snow and ice.”
Abe was determined to set off. “There won’t be anyone to slow us down. We can do it in under three months.”
A crowd had started to gather, ascending out from under the snow to bid Illee well and take charge of Boo and Ann. Abe rested a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “You gonna be okay?” Boo nodded solemnly. “I’m sorry for what happened to your people… to your family. It was our fault, Boo. We brought the sickness with us.” He had never spoken the words, even though he suspected the two had always known.
Boo’s bottom lip quivered. Abe half-expected the boy to lash out, but Boo hugged him instead. “You… loved us.”
Abe kissed the top of his head and rested a cheek against the mop of black hair. “Yes. We loved you. We always will. These people will love you now. They’ll take care of you.”
Becky held Ann as Abe took hold of the canoe and started east. She whispered promises into the girl’s ear they both knew probably wouldn’t come to pass. “We’ll come back to you, someday. I swear. We will find you again.”
Illee pulled them apart. Ann wailed and clawed the air for her but Becky turned away. The girl’s tear-streaked face was the last thing she saw before heading after Abe.
Becky walked on, one hand resting against her abdomen and the small bulge under the fur. Allan had said three months. She might make that.
Chapter 22
It is human. It will never finish the journey. Its system isn’t enhanced like yours and the mother’s. It will freeze. You all will. Turn back. Go to those yet living. Seek them out. Spread the disease. Leave the infant in the snow. It will perish soon enough. Go back.
“His name is Adam—it sounds like Allan, after my best friend.”
Abe was dreaming of the alien again. The visitations were more than dreams. He had come to realize that a long time ago. A better name would be intrusions—brutal thought-rapes he was defenseless to fight off. They had come more often in the last few weeks—the further east they travelled, the closer to home they got. Abe couldn’t see it this time, but he sensed the alien presence deep in his brain—calculating, scheming… laughing?
Some friend.
“Adam is like us. He is strong. And he’ll make it across. We all will.” He wouldn’t let the thing’s lies make him second guess. Less than two months had passed from the time Becky had told him she was pregnant to the day she gave birth. That had been two weeks ago. Adam not only survived, he thrived in the harsh environment. His development from howling baby to toddler in mere days only strengthened Abe’s belief that he had inherited their unique qualities. Against the wishes of the alien invading his every sleeping moment, Abe knew their son would live.
They had travelled across the vast majo
rity of ice separating continents on foot, and canoed even further south along the edge of rocky cliffs when the snow became too deep and treacherous. They had lost half a day digging Illee out from a thirty foot drop into fresh powder. They had survived three more bear attacks. The distant tips of small mountains were now visible to the southeast. The Rockies were somewhere beyond. They would cross the western and central plains after that.
They would return home.
You give yourself too much credit. You won’t make it. You have travelled almost three thousand miles since leaving the village of humans under the snow. You still have two thousand to go. The conditions are harder in North America. It is colder. There is no one. Nothing. Turn back while there is still time. Go back to your people.
“Go to hell.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Abe opened his eyes. “Sorry. Bad dream.”
“Our friend under the poplar trees again?” Becky asked.
Abe nodded and stretched, working his way out of the furs at the same time. Their son made a small snoring sound and curled up into a ball between them. “We’ve made it so far. It’s afraid… trying its best to turn us around.”
“Or it could’ve just been what you said… a bad dream.”
“Not this again.” Abe was frustrated. Maybe it was the constant cold making him irritable. Maybe it was the stress of caring for Adam, and the lack of sleep. They had been through so much together, defied a hostile world that wanted them dead. “Why do you keep fighting me about this?”
“I’m not fighting you.” She tried to keep her voice low. “But I have every right to be mad. Ever since we came here it’s been about you. Abraham’s quest into the frozen north—his boneheaded obsession to return home. And for what? We have a child now, Abe. Where are we taking him? What do you think we’ll find? The alien? It’s seventy-five fucking thousand years in the future!” Illee was sitting up in her blankets. Adam had started to cry. Becky kept going. “I’ve stuck with you through it all, crossed half a world that keeps getting colder and colder. We should’ve headed south—or at least stayed where we were in the beginning and fought for a home. I would’ve been happy with that. But no—I had to play along with you and this… this fantasy of yours. So don’t accuse me of fighting you. Be thankful I’ve come this far.”