Then the other thing… Ed. Prayer finished, swords held high, he stepped up to the entranced Sleepers and slaughtered them with orchestrated eloquence.
The Sleepers were unsuspecting of the death sentence about to be delivered to them. Ed walked up to them as if he’d rehearsed the dance. Impale, swing, decapitate, slice, spin, crouch, kneel, strike, repeat. He pivoted and turned gracefully and the music from the player resonated as a backdrop soundtrack to the only beautiful Sleeper slaughter I had ever witnessed.
As the song reached its powerful crescendo, Ed sliced through the remaining Sleepers and Beck lowered his weapon.
I was so engrossed in watching, I didn’t notice Alex was standing next to me. Both of us were astounded.
The final Sleeper teetered and fell. Ed lowered his weapon, then after a pause, brought them back to his chest, did that prayer looking thing, bowed his head, and turned to us.
We all stood on the porch astonished at what we had witnessed. Except for Mera. She had a proud mama look on her face. Apparently, she had seen him do that before.
“Where did you learn to do that?” Beck asked in astonishment.
“Me,” Danny proudly boasted. “Guess that two time division fencing champ thing paid off.” He scratched his head. “But I don’t know how.”
“My brother taught me,” Ed said, giving an acknowledging nod to Danny. “I perfected it after my wife died and I lived to die. Danny always said I had to feel it, and it took a tragedy to bring out my ability. Most of it comes from the fact that the Palers do not even see me.”
The Alex asked, “What about the music? Is that just your thing or does it have meaning?”
“It’s amazing what the music does to them. It makes them stop. Almost as if they become hypnotized by a beauty they recognize. Danny discovered that.”
“Dude, I am so cool in the future.”
I think the most ‘in awe’ of the group was Beck. The expression on his face showed it. “You came back in time to stop an event that happens to your mother. That was your main goal and, what? Maybe bring to light the Michael situation? Keep the Reckoning going? Ed, waiting until you had aged, coming back to this point in time, I just witnessed a game changer. You are the game changer. How can you doubt that you can’t keep her safe?”
“I want to believe that, Beck, I do,” said Ed. “But I can’t protect her fully. The only way to keep her one hundred percent safe is to go to Vermont. Can’t you see that?”
“No,” Beck replied. “No, I can’t. I’m baffled. I’m looking at twenty dead Sleepers, all by your hand. In less than three minutes, without blinking an eye, breaking a sweat, you took them out. How can you stand here and say you can’t keep her safe if one of us isn’t around?”
Ed walked by Beck and into the house. Without saying anything he grabbed his sword sack and put his weapons away.
Beck followed him.
Ed looked at us all. I had a bad feeling in my gut and it wasn’t the salami talking back to me.
After moistening his lips, looking humbled, Ed spoke, nearly defeated. “One of the main reasons we never came back to this point in time is…” he exhaled, “because people die. You’re not around, Javier gets killed, and something unspeakably horrible happens to my mother. It happens on the first of March. I can’t protect her, you can’t protect her, no one can because we don’t know what we are protecting her from.”
Alex’s hand shot up. “Excuse me? You don’t know.”
Ed shook his head. “That’s why my plan was to move her. Whatever happens at the Haven is so unspeakable no one would discuss it. We deduced it was the moment we gave the edge to the Sleepers, when Beck gave up the Reckoning and we become runners instead of survivors. We lost that day. Thirty years later we’re still trying to catch up.”
It was a staggering revelation that Ed delivered. He had come back in time on a whim, it was no wonder his only plan was to get Mera, because he was in the dark on the actual events.
It was obvious Beck was not letting Ed’s newsflash dampen his optimism. “It was a Sleeper attack, we know that, right?”
“We believed so.”
“Then that’s what we plan for. We fortify, we follow the plan. We have a date. We will cut this off at the pass. That unspeakable event will not happen,” Beck stated emphatically. “Of that I am certain.”
SEVEN – ALEX SANS
It was a five hour trip back to Haven, barring any problems. We figured it was best to wait until morning to go. The sky was kind of cloudy and any guidance by the moon would be minimal. One more night wouldn’t hurt, although I started thinking about Randy, Michael, Bonnie, and the others that were wondering where we were. They were probably worried and Michael more than likely had held a service. He was good for that stuff. Poor guy didn’t have a clue he was about to become Super Shredder.
A lot had happened in a short span of time. Beck had returned from the Reckoning, beat my ass, and I ran off. By the time I woke up to a world of pain, Beck and Sonny had arrived. Heck I don’t even think we got the scoop on what all happened out on the other side of the Great Divide. Had they won, lost? Retreated or planned another attack? All that information, I guess, was being saved for when we returned to the Haven.
One thing I did know was when we did get back, things were going to be different. The fence would be safeguarded, and I would resume something I had stopped doing— calling out for survivors.
In world overrun by Sleepers, we needed people. Long before Beck stopped the Reckoning, according to Ed, I stopped calling for people. The more people we found the better shot we had. I was sure of that.
Also, with the knowledge that Michael was a doorstep future Sleeper baby, something told me that Levi and our ‘I escaped from the future for a better life’ people would have guidance and answers.
When we first arrived at Grace, Levi told us he and the others came to our time as the last of humanity from a world that was primarily Sleepers. Going back in time was their only hope to live.
There was a weird Superman aspect to the whole Michael thing. Superman was a doorstep baby from a dying world and helped humanity; Michael was a doorstep baby from a dying world and destroyed humanity. Unless we figured out how to turn those tables.
All those were things we’d deal with on our return. Until then, we were on a reminiscent vacation of sorts. Complete with wandering Sleepers.
Sonny took the evening watch while we had dinner, then Beck grabbed window duty while Mera pulled out dusty board games from the hall closet. It was a good evening, peaceful. Though I was still in pain and wasn’t much good to move quickly, I perched on a stool in front of the upstairs bedroom window and kept a watch on the street. Danny would be my relief so I could get a few hours’ shuteye.
Sleepers coming into Mera’s backyard weren’t a big concern. She had a high privacy fence and the good old Pennsylvania backyard had a pretty decent slope on the other side of the fence. A Sleeper climbing up a hill was pretty funny. It was like watching a kid roller skate for the first time; legs going all nuts but going nowhere fast.
Ed gave me his little music player, a digital battery run box loaded with music. I asked him how he got it working. He told me batteries were easily made and not a thing of the past. All the tunes were opera pieces in Italian or something. It got me thinking that maybe the language had something to do with it. Perhaps blasting Italian at Sleepers triggered something in them. Then in the far off reaches of my brain, I envisioned Italy as a safe zone.
Just before midnight, I could have sworn I heard Sleepers approaching, crying out in attack mode. Wanting us, looking for a meal, maybe even cries of agony. Then I realized that it was only Sonny throwing up again.
He slept in the living room for easy access to run outside and heave out over the porch.
I lifted the window. “Can you yack a bit more quietly?” I yelled down.
I caught glimpse of a pathetic looking Sonny. He lifted his head, cast scolding eyes at me, then
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br /> retched again. Or tried. I think his geyser of a stomach was empty.
The cause of his illness was evident. He’d chomped on that old salami like there was no tomorrow. The rock hard Twinkie was missing as well. I’d bet he tested the theory that Twinkies last forever.
I whistled to get his attention. “You okay?”
“Kill me,” he pleaded. “Kill me now.”
I laughed. “How’s that salami taste now?”
“Alex!” Mera’s whispering scold carried in her room, causing me to jump back. “Be nice.”
“Sorry.” I wiped the smirk from my face and shut off the music player.
Mera walked up and stood next to me, peering out the window. “Poor guy.”
“Poor guy was warned to stop eating that salami.”
She shot me a glare.
“What are you doing up?”
“I couldn’t sleep.”
“Damn Sonny and his throwing up.”
“No, I just couldn’t sleep.”
“And coming up here in the cold helps?”
“No.” Mera smiled and nudged me. “Talking to you helps.”
“So knowing I’m not some boring guy who will put you to sleep, I’ll assume something is going on in that head of yours.”
“This whole uncertainty thing.”
“Mera, if Ed didn’t come back, you wouldn’t know either.”
“But I do.” She sighed. “Something happens. Alex, what would happen that we would never tell our children? Danny and Ed are obviously close, yet he doesn’t tell him. This worries me.”
“I have a theory.”
“I was hoping you did,” she said.
“We screwed up.” I kept my eyes out the window, knowing Sonny was hanging outside waiting on his next round of regurgitation gave me a little leeway to be lax. I shifted my eyes to her. “Somehow, someway, something we did caused the tragedy. The whole lot of us screwed up, and were too embarrassed to talk about it.”
“What could be so horrible that we couldn’t talk about it?” she asked.
“I would think me and Danny knowing that Ed was coming back, we’d tell him. We wouldn’t be vague. I’d be like, look, this, this and this happens, take care of it.”
“So you don’t think Ed knows?”
“No. Then again…” I reached out and laid my hand on her cheek, “it could very easily be so traumatic we never want to speak about it again.”
After laying her hand over mine, Mera said, “I can’t lose this baby.”
“You won’t.”
“But the time—”
“You won’t,” I repeated. “I will give my life to protect this baby. And obviously that’s something I don’t do in Ed’s future. I’m around to bitch at him. That changes this scenario. I promise you this: if I have to strap you to my body on the first of March, I will.”
“Unless that changes, too.”
“Nah, makes sense. If the Sleepers slow down and hide in Texas, they ain’t coming anywhere near us in the dead of winter. In March, the weather gets warmer.”
“I bet I get attacked.”
“Mera, stop. You have to have faith in us. In Ed’s time, we didn’t have the foresight. We have it now. Him coming back here changes everything.”
“It didn’t save Jessie.”
When she said Jessie’s name, my heart sank and my face tightened. “He tried.” My voice cracked. “He did, and that wasn’t even part of the plan, was it?”
She shook her head. “He didn’t know when it happened so he couldn’t stop it.”
Immediately, I was overwrought with emotions, my eyes glossing over. Jessie was a tough subject for me. Sonny, too. Both of us took her death really horribly.
“I’m sorry,” Mera whispered.
“No, don’t apologize. It’s not easy, as you know. I remember when I first met you guys. Bill was sitting at my kitchen table with all those things he took from my shop. I would not have imagined then that we would all be like this.”
“What made you come, Alex?” she asked. “I mean, you had it all at your place.”
“Except people. The world ended, Mera. We all need a cause and goal in life, even if it’s just to get to the next day or through the moment. You had a cause. Well, two. Jessie and Phoenix.”
“You knocked me out.”
“I didn’t mean to. But, had I not, you wouldn’t have been in that room when Phoenix was born.”
“True.” She sighed. “What a journey we’ve been on, huh?”
“Yeah, and according to our son, it’s not over yet.”
“Good and bad ahead.”
“It’s living, Mera.”
She looked around the room. “I never would have thought I’d want to live again. After… after Jeremy died. This was his room.”
“Yeah, I figured. I was admiring his video game posters.”
She smiled at me. “Can I tell you something?”
“Sure.”
“A part of me doesn’t want to leave here. To go to Haven or Vermont. I want to stay here. So much of my life was here.”
“Yeah, but now you have so much more to your life. And I understand. We’ll come back.”
“Will we?”
“Yeah, we will,” I said. “And we won’t wait eleven years.”
“Do you think we will ever have this?” she asked. “A home? With walls? Freedom?”
“I hope. Until then, why can’t we make the Haven into what we need? It’s a safe location, with potential to grow food, and if we make it through this March thing, it can be a home. The world really is our home improvement store. We just didn’t have a need to take advantage of it because we were at Grace.”
“I have a lot of things I want to bring. Beck says take it all.”
“Beck knows best.”
She gave me a closed mouth smile.
“Beck doesn’t know best?” I asked.
Mera gave a single nod of her head. “Come on. He has his moments though.”
“I’m telling.”
She playfully smacked me.
“On this he’s right. You take what you want including,” I reached out to the little zippered sweatshirt she wore that wouldn’t go around her stomach, “cute little jackets like this.”
“It’s too small.”
“For now.” I glanced out the window, all was clear, the Sleepers were probably sleeping.
“Thank you, Alex. Talking to you always helps me.”
“Ditto.” Still holding the edges of her jacket, I pulled Mera in to hug her. Her arms wrapped tightly around my neck, holding on to me.
I hated to do it, but I got lost in that moment. Cupping the back of her head, I treasured that embrace. It was one that wasn’t out of missing or hurt, it was an embrace between two close friends. Holding her to me, the hardness of her smaller stomach hit against mine and when it did, I swore I felt the baby kick. No, I know I felt the baby kick. Closing my eyes tightly, I jumped back.
“Did you feel that?” Mera asked.
I turned to look out the window. “Feel what?”
She laughed. “The baby kicked. It was a really big one. You jumped back. I thought—”
“No. My ribs hurt,” I said, not looking at her. “I’m sorry I missed it.”
“Next time.”
Telling myself to get it together, I took a breath and faced her. “Yep. Next time.”
“Well, I better try to get some sleep.” She leaned in and kissed me on the cheek. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah, yeah. Fine. Just sore, damn you for hugging me too tight.”
Mera cringed. “I didn’t mean to.”
“It’s fine. Go to sleep.”
“Night, Alex.”
“Night, Mera.”
I didn’t watch her leave. I returned to watching out the window, hoping that I’d see Sonny emerge again for another round of regurgitation. Not that I wanted him to be sick, I needed to get my mind off of Mera and the baby.
Against everyth
ing I had promised myself, I was caught up. The baby was making it worse. Growing inside of her was something she and I created. A child created not from a mistake but from genuine feelings, at least on my part. I had to stand idly by and pretend it was honky dory for Beck to lay daddy claim on it. In fact I had to pretend it was fine for Beck to have Mera when the truth was, on both accounts, I wasn’t fine with it at all.
Despite my best efforts, the situation was emotionally defeating me.
There was nothing I could do but focus elsewhere, and even that was getting more difficult by the day.
EIGHT – MERA STEVENS
It broke my heart to pull out of my driveway and to leave my street. I sat turned in the back seat watching my house fade from view out the back window. Sleepers arrived just before we left and instead of battling them, we left, taking only two of the three vehicles. Ed, Alex, the babies and me were in one. Beck, Sonny and Danny in the lead.
It was funny and strange how the Sleepers only tried for them and not us.
They had things strategically to discuss. I was perfectly fine with Ed and wished they didn’t leave Alex out of the loop.
Beck stated it as too long of a drive to let Alex sit in an uncomfortable military vehicle. I hoped that was the case and not a lack of trust in Alex. He was still injured and hurting, I saw that. However, his spirits were getting better, I could tell that from the way he kept throwing ‘Alex style’ digs at Beck.
He was joking around, but I knew it had to bother Alex, both emotionally and physically, that Beck had beat him up. Not only was his body bruised, I was betting his ego had taken a slam as well.
According to what Sonny told me, Beck had laid him out pretty good and had Sonny not intervened, taking Beck down, Alex may have been killed.
Thank God Sonny had the strength to knock out Beck.
I didn’t say anything to Alex about what Sonny told me.
Truth was, it bothered me what Beck did to Alex. I needed to speak to him about it. Beck, however, was consumed with Jessie’s death. That was the only thing he wanted to talk about. He needed to process it. The fact that he’d beaten Alex to a pulp was something he felt bad about, but not enough to carry the burden.
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