Exodus (The Domus Series Book 2)

by Spartan Kaayn

  30thMarch 2020

  Alex stood resolute on the bank of the river Nile. The blue waters of the Nile sparkled in the flickering moonlight, light that flickered not through clouds but through plumes of dark smoke from the numerous fires that burnt throughout what was once the bustling and lively city of Cairo.

  The river alluvium felt wet and moist under Alex’s feet. He stood in the dark shadow of a monolith that had been bared by the receding waters of the river. Susan was tied to Alex’s back, his fever keeping her tiny body warm in the cold of the night.

  Sienna had gone upstream, looking for a boat. The roads were dangerous to take, always on the radar of some or other drone. They needed to get away from Cairo; the river seemed the best and the fastest bet at that time, heading north and then to Ismailia, and then on to Port Said.

  They had decided to start out in the night. They had to leave if they wanted to make the rendezvous at Port Said in a couple of days. The only weapon of substance with them was a ‘Hellraiser’ with twenty odd rounds worth of lasing remaining in it.

  That was seriously not enough ammunition to get them through to Port Said.

  Alex winced at a sudden stabbing pain coming from the bandaged wound on his abdomen and lifted pressure on to his other leg. He looked around himself. The scene around him was lyrical. The sparsely lit blue waters of Nile, upon which played hide and seek a flickering moonlight made for a most beautiful romantic evening, save from the fact that they were running for their lives from bloodthirsty, marauding aliens.

  The war had changed their lives.

  The war had taken its toll on Sienna. She was way out of her comfort zone as a professional stargazer. The last few months had been mayhem. The telescopic controls from under her hands had been replaced by the trigger of the XM214, and the music of cosmic solitude was replaced by the tut-tut of the machine gun. She had been through hell in the past six months and yet had not given in, standing by Alex’s side, sharing the hardships despite her pregnancy. Before her African sojourn, she had started a new life in U.S, a life when she knew him to be dead and had moved on. But circumstances had snatched that from her and she had landed besides him in the hellhole of Africa. She had repeatedly told that she did not regret being with him, that she would choose hell if it meant that she would be by his side.

  Alex wondered sometimes if that indeed had been the best for her, being with him here.

  Once in Africa, she had learned quickly, and taken to the war with a vengeance. He was surprised at how well she had adapted, and even thankful at times, that notwithstanding her misery, she was here for him.

  Alex was a decorated marine before having been booted out of the Corps on a flimsy charge of racial abuse, and realized that fighting the war here in Africa was nothing short of a vindication for him in his own righteousness; vindication in the face of the fact that most of the US forces had surrendered, and were not part of the war effort anymore. Moreover, there was no escaping the war for him, after being dumped right in the middle of it by the Daiit harvester.

  He was brought back from his reverie when his eyes caught some movement along the bank coming from his left flank. He instinctively hid behind the boulder. It was a canoe being paddled by the thin silhouette of Sienna. She was keeping close to the bank to avoid detection.

  ‘Smart girl!’ thought Alex.

  He let her draw closer to him and then tiptoed to her. She looked absolutely gorgeous for her age, a few wrinkles showing at the corners of her eyes, adding to the graciousness of her timeless beauty. She was wearing an army issue pants and a deep green army tank top with her gun slung across her front, her hair made into a loose knot behind her head. Her eyes sparkled on seeing her husband and see gave him a warm smile. She paddled the boat towards him and took his hand to get down from the boat.

  ‘Where did you get this Si?’

  ‘I don’t know. It was just abandoned a couple of a hundred meters upstream. I did not see anyone there. It was not even anchored to anything. So I took it. I just hope I did not just steal someone’s means to safety.’

  ‘I do not think so dear. Someone who meant to get back to it would not have left it untied.’

  Sienna nodded and put her arm around Alex. He was injured and she was worried how they were going to make the trip to Port Said with him like that. Alex hobbled on to the boat, limping, holding Si’s hand and then untied Susan from his back, handing her over to Sienna.

  The wooden bottom of the canoe was cold and wet. A shiver ran up Alex’s spine as he set foot on the canoe, his body hurting from the yet unhealed bruises.

  Si pushed the boat away from the bank and set course downstream. The current was strong enough to carry the pithy canoe but she had to keep paddling it away from the center of the river, to keep it close to the bank. They rode on in silence, the currents doing most of the work as the tiny boat glided on in the tranquil waters underneath a horrid sky filled with smoke and the rancid stench of death. Alex lay down with his head on the side of the boat.

  ‘Si, can we make it?’ Alex asked, still struggling with the hurt in his bruised bones.

  ‘I don’t know hon but, when it comes to that, I would like to remember that we tried.’

  Sienna had a way with words, poetic to a fault and always soothing to Alex. They held a meaning in them like the sonnets she played with her violin in her spare time.

  Alex tried not to remember about his daughters. It was impossible now not to, looking at their likeness in Sienna, rowing the canoe, sitting a couple of feet in front of him. Yet, he consciously tried hard to suppress those memories. Those memories were for another time, when he needed the passion and the hurt to whip himself into a blinding rage, to get to the shot of adrenaline within him to fuel him during the most intense of his battles.

  Grief and rage had some use after all.

  They had barely covered a couple of miles downstream before the drone fired the first volley of shots at them. It had sneaked up on them from the far end of the bank and had immediately spotted them across the river. The first shot had missed and the following one had smashed the boat. Alex had grabbed Sienna’s hand and had immediately rolled off the boat into the frigid waters of the Nile. His heart pumped hard as he tugged on his wife’s hand dragging her through the currents upstream, away from the shots being fired by the drone. He knew he could hold his breath underwater for a long time, something he found out he was good at during his Marine Corps training and something that had saved his life aboard the Alien mother-ship some time earlier. However, he was not sure Si could do that for long. And their two-week old daughter would definitely not make it.

  The hurt in his body had disappeared in the heat of the moment and he pulled on Sienna’s hand with all his might. Laser shots flashed all around him as they whizzed by him in the water, the water searing and sizzling in the heat of the shots. It took Alex a while to realize that but Si was not swimming with him. He knew that she was a good swimmer and her not swimming seemed a bit odd. He dragged her to the bank and pulled her out of the water.

  The horror of what he saw made him recoil in disgust and he instinctively withdrew his hand from Si’s hand, grabbing hold of Susan’s still breathing body and yanking it off Si’s dead trunk. One of the shots had found Si right in the middle of her head, and all that remained was just some mangled brain fragments within a tattered skin and bone shell. There was just a big ragged hole, where her eyes, nose and mouth used to be. The currents immediately dragged her lifeless form away as Alex immediately turned away and vomited on the bank.

  The drone was fixated on Sienna’s floating body and fired a couple more bursts on the lifeless form. Alex groaned in agony and then, there was a sudden flash of light that tore into the sides of that drone and it wobbled and then spiraled down into the river before detonating underwater.

  Alex recognized the flash of Hellraiser fire coming from somewhere behind him. The other drone turned to the source, but it was too late for it. It was caught unawares
and the Hellraiser fire caught it right in the middle of its underbelly, punching a big hole in it. Alex held on to the wet and shivering form of Susan as he felt himself slowly slipping into unconsciousness, hunkering beside a rocky outcrop on the banks of Nile, the figure of a crying Aslam silhouetting the moonlight over Alex.

  Chapter 30

  The Journey

  Cairo Suburbs, Egypt

  31st March 2020

  Alex came to, jerked into consciousness, when the vehicle convulsed over a broken segment on the rough roads leading from Cairo to Port Said. Alex opened his eyes to find himself sprawled on the back of what looked like a truck. Moments later, he identified it to be the middle row of a General Motors HMMWV, High Mobility Multi-Purpose Wheeled Vehicle, commonly known by its distorted acronym, the ‘Humvee’. He tried wriggling himself up into a sitting position and banged his head on the door knob on the inside.

  The noise made Aslam turn around on the driver’s seat and he slammed on the brakes, throwing Alex off the seat

  ‘Sorry. Are you okay? I didn’t mean to do that. You startled me back there.’

  Before Alex could respond, Aslam continued on

  ‘How are you feeling now? You were unconscious for half a day almost.’

  Alex looked up and smiled at Aslam

  ‘Thanks for saving our lives’ and then realized about Susan,

  ‘Where is my daughter Susan?’

  Aslam pointed to the rear of the vehicle and Alex propped himself up on the seat to look behind. There she was, tucked under sheets, sleeping next to a lady, or rather a girl, who could not herself be more than fifteen. She was fast asleep, her hands cradling around Susan in a protective cage.

  Alex turned to Aslam,

  ‘Who is she?’

  ‘Someone who needed help and protection and needed to get away from all this… I don’t know if that is what we are doing now, running away. The war is going on all over the world. So there is no getting out of it. But you wanted to get to Port Said. So, here we are, on our way to port Said.’

  ‘What is her name?’

  ‘Nilofer’

  ‘Where did you get this vehicle?’

  ‘Found it abandoned on the road. It’s a UN vehicle that was being used as an ambulance. I found some medicines and some food packets in it and was coming back to get you guys but I am sorry I was late’, he touched Alex’s hand and continued,

  ‘I am sorry about Sienna. We could have saved her had I reached earlier.’

  Alex shook his head

  ‘Not your fault, my friend’ and then looked away, out of the window into the distance. There was grief and sadness in his eyes but months of conflict and loss had changed the way Alex processed grief now. Hs grief and his pain was internalized now as he needed to project a braver face in his new leadership role. But to what avail? Was he really going to get something out of all that bravado? He had already lost the three most important people in his life. His wife Sienna was perhaps the most important person for him in the whole world. She had been the pillar of calm in his turbulent life, an oasis of succor within a vast desert of desperation in his life. He will never feel any worse that this and looking at how things were going, they might not get any better anytime soon.

  They were still in the Nile delta, a patch of green in the barren wilderness of the North African desert. Green fields planted with a standing paddy crop and lined by rows upon rows of coconut and palm trees met the eye in every direction. There were small hamlets, which were probably deserted by now. The war had reached here and had forced people out of their homes. The machines were still focused on the humans and had probably not had to turn to plants and trees of the region.

  Alex looked back inside at Aslam, who was busy opening a meal packet for Alex

  ‘How long before we reach the port?

  Aslam grunted, not looking up from his labors and after half a minute, turned to Alex, handing him a plate of cold bread and peanut butter, two shortbreads and a fig bar.

  ‘We started a couple of hours ago. It has been difficult to find drivable road and I am sticking to the interiors, afraid of sticking our neck out on the highway. We must have covered a good hundred kilometers by now, but we need to do another hundred twenty to hundred fifty, depending on which route we end up taking’

  After Alex’s meal, they set out again, passing through villages and hamlets. Alex found himself thanking Aslam’s fortitude to have stumbled upon a Humvee which was just about adequate to tackle these off-track roads. They reached Port Said by evening that day. Susan had woken up, had milk from a tetrapak, and then went back to sleep, snuggling in Alex’s arms this time. Alex had found a medicine packet in the truck, and loaded himself up with antibiotics. The fever had settled by evening and the throbbing in his abdominal wound had subsided by then. He had helped himself to a couple more meal packets and felt much stronger than what he did in the morning.

  They could not risk taking their Humvee into the city. They could not just let go of the vehicle either, lest they needed it again. They ambled through the outskirts of the city till they found a large abandoned villa. It had taken a bombardment in the shelling and two-thirds of the structure had already caved in. The villa had a standing garage on its east end and they decided to park their Humvee there. The port was three kilometers to the west and they decided to walk from there.

  Susan was back in Nilofer’s care. She made a baby hammock of her long scarf to carry Susan on her back. Aslam cast a disapproving glance on Nilofer, seeing her bare head without the ‘hijab’ but she stared right back into his eyes, daring him to say anything. Aslam held her gaze for a moment and then shrugged his shoulders and looked away. These were the end times and there was no God or Godly Holiness now. To each his or her own till the judgment day, which was possibly not very far from now.

  Alex saw the mute exchange between them and kept a mental note to talk to Aslam about that in the future. Aslam had had years of training and indoctrination and it would be futile to expect him, despite his decent college education, to let go of his hardened beliefs so easily. It was sheer madness that they were today fighting on the same side. In another timeline, Alex could have been the fighter pilot on a flying sortie to bomb a hideout of Al-Fateh and not have realized or cared much, about killing Aslam by triggering that small missile release switch under his fingers. Whenever Alex mulled on the esoteric, he remembered Sienna and her profound explanation about the Universe being too big. Why do humans ignore the scale and the perspective of our place in the Cosmos? Why do we need to create boundaries and divisions amongst ourselves, when any logical being would instantly believe that it was us against the nature in the prehistoric days and that it is us against our exploitation of that same nature, and us against the Universe in the current times? As humans overpopulate the Earth, which was literally bursting at its seams and changing itself to our adversity, we humans desperately need to take concerted steps to stem our disastrous slide into ecological doom. Moreover, we have to devote considerable amount of energy and efforts towards finding an alternative abode for us and the means to get there. These initiatives cannot be local and we have to set aside our petty and meaningless disputes to form a global coalition to tackle global concerns. Alex often wondered what was the relevance of being a religious bigot in the present times? What was the need in fact to invent all these religions in the first place? Once invented, why did these religions metamorphose into being defensive, guarded and scared as shit cults, perennially afraid of losing their following and their relevance, afraid of being overrun by a rival cult? Were they always meant to be like this, even by the great teachers and ascetics who founded them and probably never meant them to be organized into such globally pervasive and commercial institutions? Were they not about being relevant to change? Why do religious beliefs continue to be held so fast and why do those who hold them do so rigidly in the face of overwhelming science and logic against them? Sienna had hope; hope that more and more people would see the re
ason in thoughts and ideas similar to hers. She believed that the truth was so logical that it will come out sooner or later and that people will not have to be told to be rational. Alex held her belief in earnest and hoped that the bigots and the fanatics will stop yielding the blind devotion of millions around the globe; that the millions would see reason before propaganda and tolerance before jingoism.

  Alex knew that the only religion that mattered now was survival and to take measures to ensure the survival and continuity of humanity. Any other religion did not matter. In fact, humanity has been fighting this war right from the beginning. It was the war against irrelevance, the war against time and scale of the Universe around it. Humans occupied such little of it that they were bound to be wiped out, sooner or later. Our only expectation was that let there be someone out there who will know about us and recount tales of our existence long after we were gone. But, this definitely here was not the way to be gone and this was not the way we deserved to be remembered by a marauding alien race. We were not just walkovers who surrendered to pillage and consumption so weakly. Alex had to continue the fight against this end for humanity because he believed that we deserved a better one.

  Having started in late afternoon, they made the cautious walk to the Port in two hours, reaching there as the Sun was setting. There was no one there and Alex found his way to a covered boat hangar. Amongst the rubble, they managed to find and salvage a Back Cove yacht that Alex decided to use to reach the rendezvous point about three miles off the coast into the sea.

  They waited for nightfall and under the darkness of the night, ventured out into the sea. The submarine was supposed to make a scheduled call that night, bringing arms and ammunition. Alex met with the Captain of the submarine as often as he could. The Sub, in addition to being the munitions supplier, also was the bearer of news from across the world and Alex kept himself abreast of the status report on the Global effort against the aliens. Today, there was only bad news to report from his side. His war effort, the Devil’s offensive was one of the largest war efforts in Northern Africa. Their defeat was a big blow to the war effort on the continent. Alex was sad that the defeat of his group freed up enemy resources, which will now be directed against his comrades in another theatre of war.