Children of the Kradle (Trilogy Book 1)

by Alexa Hamilton

  Her skin tingled as if she were lying on top of sand. While the others snuggled beneath their sheets, her cover lay flung to the side, not an inch touching her hot skin.

  Madness. That was the only explanation for why anyone would think of staying on this island. Madness or ignorance or perhaps apathy, all were possibilities and none were excusable.

  Sandra was a hypocrite. She talked about their tribe being a special family where they lived and worked together in peace, but by staying on this island, wasn’t she putting a place before a people? Which was more important, a house or the family inside?

  Yes, maybe she was right in saying that once everyone reached the mainland they would break apart and go their separate ways, but surely some would stay together, not her personally, but others. Henny, Dila, and Lin maybe.

  Sandra and Thomas were healers. They could do so much good on the mainland. They could join up with one of the outer-Sphere nomads that were said to exist, hidden among the trees. Surely they needed a doctor and a pharmacist. There had to be lots to do: babies to be delivered, broken legs to set, wounds to bandage. Why would they limit their kindness to themselves when they could help save the world?

  Their love for the island was understandable, and maybe she had a point about discovering the reason behind the GovCorps sending them. After all, there was a purpose to this place. Mevia could feel it in the salty air, the rhythms of the sea. Yes, she too loved this land, this precious jewel. Never could she have predicted this change of heart, but Sandra had stepped in and healed her. If Mevia had simply escaped and never met these people, had roamed the island alone, it was very unlikely she would have ever found herself again, gotten her sanity back. Yes, these people, these beautiful tribesmen were far more important than the entire island.

  These people were now her people and she couldn’t leave them to be tortured and killed by Slit. The idea of Grunt’s hands around Sandra’s neck made her throat feel like it was collapsing. What were they thinking? The problem was they didn’t know. They didn’t truly know how horrible the Poachers were, what they were capable of, what they were hungry for. No one knew but her.

  She sat up in bed and stared at the rock wall at the far end of the cavern for a minute and then crept over to the fire. Staring down into the flames, she absorbed its warmth while visions flashed through her head. She watched the images, a passenger within her mind, taken on a ride through flares of colorful pictures and scenarios. It had been a long time since her mind spoke to her this way, and she was rusty, but when she looked down, her fingers were twitching, ready. Removing a burning stick, she used it to light a torch.

  She searched the sleeping room until she found the bowl of goat’s blood in the corner, set aside for making bait. She removed the lid, looking down into the red soup swirling over the uneven clay. Back at the cave wall, where there was no one sleeping, she set the torch in a perch and prepared to work.

  Standing before the massive rock, hands on her hips, neck craned, she surveyed the blank slate. She held the clay bowl in the crevice of her elbow, dipped her fingertips into the cold blood, and watched the ooze running down her digits. It’s high time I bombed something around here.

  She worked, feeling like a child, as if this were her first piece. Every curve, every line was slow to create, painful even as she rubbed her fingertips over the rough, jagged wall, but soon she figured out tricks and shortcuts like using the side of her palm to imprint lines and curves. She used soot from the fire to draw forms and outlines.

  Deep into the night she worked, losing herself as the art unfolded, forgetting where she was, that she wasn’t alone and even that she was a human being and not a figure in her piece, or the actual piece itself. Like with every mural, this one came alive before her eyes. No matter how much she planned, it always took on a life of its own and changed from her original vision.

  When she ran out of blood, she used the soot and when the fire died down hours later, she almost took a knife and used her own blood, her mind so saturated in the work that for a moment it seemed logical, but then she caught a glimpse of the mural in the glow from above and stopped.

  She stepped back and surveyed the piece. The pale morning light was creeping into the cavern and for the first time she became aware of herself.

  Her arms and dress were smeared with red and black. Never had she walked away this dirty after a spray. Usually there was just some paint on the fingers and palms, but this, this was a baptism. If she turned and stood with her back pressed against the wall, she would blend in and become one with the work.

  She stretched her back feeling the old familiar aches from painting all night. She smiled. This was how real urban art was done, in the dead of night, while the world was asleep, and then when the sun rose, the first thing the city would see, was her work, her words, her soul. This way, they couldn’t shut their ears; they couldn’t un-see what she made them see. She was inside of them, and whether or not they were aware, she had made them listen.

  Mevia let out a sigh, so long and deep it was if she’d been holding her breath the entire night, and with it went the adrenaline that kept her awake. Exhausted, she stumbled over to her bed and nestled in, dirty and snug with the aroma of pine needles, warm and sweet.

  Just before falling asleep, she rolled on her side and looked again at the finished product. She stared at the images: gruesome yet frank in their reality and their hope.

  The first picture was of the island: black outline with palm trees and lapping waves, there was the mountain and the Clearing, but she had taken a handful of blood and smeared a dripping red palm across the wall. Over the red island there were soot drawn figures of the Poachers with their weapons and hunger and gnashing teeth. They were flaying primitive figures of the Tritons. While the men lay in the dirt beheaded and staked, the women were bound in chains awaiting their hellacious fate. The images were graphic and personal, each one identifiable as one of the Tritons—Kurt with his muscles, Cree with his coco-dark skin—however no drawing could ever be as graphic as the reality of what they were facing.

  In the middle, above the images she had used a long, burnt stick, and, pressing down hard, made the clear outline of a tern. She started with the curve, of its baby-like head with feathers so smooth it appeared to be bald. Then that line leveled off into the needle sharp beak used for slicing past the ocean’s surface and picking off shallow fish. After shading in its distinctive markings, the black hood and bands, she finished by adding the most important part: its outstretched wings as it soared mid-flight, unhinged and free.

  She lay facing the wall from the sweet comfort of her bed until her eyes grew heavy and the drawing blurred and everything turned black.

  By morning the rain was coming down in buckets, collecting upon the thousands of divots within the rocks, over flowing, and spilling over. One of such spills landed on Mevia’s neck.

  “Whaa?!” She sat up, positive that she had only just shut her eyes. The cavern was empty. Everyone was already up, out and most likely halfway through their morning chores. The Guineas were clucking and the goats were calling. Alarmed that she had overslept Mevia rose to her feet in a flash, but the blood rush sent her grabbing the wall. Then she saw the red and black smears up her arm.

  Thunder grumbled in the distance, its thick throated voice filled with the promise of more rain to come.

  She checked out her overnight project and her eyes widened. In the fresh daylight the drawings looked different. Everything seemed larger, more graphic. After studying the severed heads and the chained women, she understood. They had left her to oversleep on purpose, but not out of courtesy.

  She looked down at her hand and arms again.

  Outside, breakfast was eaten and cleaned, and it didn’t appear that they had saved anything for her. All that remained were footprints in the wet, putty sand. The rain was finally slowing to a thin mist and everyone was out working. Over in the distance there were the bobbing heads of those in the garden. Two of them,
where there should have been three.

  Mevia felt of her sticky arms. Hating to leave the gardeners waiting, but not wanting to walk around like a painted clown, she decided to wash off in the ocean before joining them. Keeping her head square, she hurried to the beach.

  When she got to the tree line she peeked through, and found the beach vacant, except for Thomas, Lin, and to her relief, Cree who must have arrived sometime while Mevia was asleep. They were out, waist deep in the surf, clutching a precious net. Cree’s trip must have been successful.

  She left the trees and headed toward the ocean. The water was cold and busy, taking her breath away as a wave lapped up and splashed her. Sitting down with her back to the sea, she scrubbed quickly, using both her nails and the sand, so intent in her task that she didn’t notice Sandra approaching.

  “Hello.”

  “Hi.” Mevia looked up, shivering, her teeth chattering.

  Sandra stood there gazing down, her hair hanging loosely around her face, billowing in the wind. She was barefoot, standing calf deep in the water, the waves splashing her potato dress leaving behind dark, wet spots, dripping with froth as the water rose and fell. The two of them remained that way for a moment until Sandra tilted her head to the side. “Are you done?”

  Mevia raised an eyebrow. “With washing? Or with painting?”

  “Both.”

  Mevia didn’t answer for a moment. “I still have to scrub my knees.”

  Sandra sighed and then squinted out into the ocean, shielding her eyes.

  Mevia found herself wondering what she was thinking. Was it loving thoughts for Thomas? For the sea? Maybe she was angry, but her face didn’t reveal any emotion. It was only heavy with contemplation. “Have I ever told you,” Sandra asked, “the story of how I came to this place? To the island?”

  Mevia stopped, her hand still cupped around her knee. “No,” she said quietly.

  Sandra crossed her arms and looked down at her feet. Then she was quiet for so long Mevia thought she wasn’t going to continue.

  “I was a doctor. I don’t know if I ever told you that I used to be a doctor, but I was, and I was there on the frontline when Medusa broke out.” Her voice was low, not soft, but steady, like a tenor’s. “It was a difficult time. A terrible time.” She shuddered, her eyes still turned down, searching the water. “As you can guess, we saw many deaths, old, young, infant. But the deaths, when they came, when they finally came, they were a blessing.” She looked back out into the distance, her eyes glistening. “I’m sure you heard about all the symptoms. The sweating, vomiting, bleeding. The seizures so violent they exploded joints.”

  “I know,” Mevia said standing up. She was shaking from the cold.

  Sandra met her eye. “Yes, I know you saw what it did to your mother.”

  “And my father.” She stood beside Sandra, but facing the opposite way, toward the island.

  “So many. So many, many.” Sandra shook her head. “Well, I was a member of a team. Actually, I was more like the lowest rung on a totem pole of geniuses. All of my colleagues had come from wealthy, privileged families. They came from the best schools and were members of all the right clubs, and me?” She let out a short laugh. “I was at least a decade older, from a working class family and fresh out of residency. I felt like they could smell my mediocrity from a mile away. I suppose that was silly wasn’t it?” She shrugged. “Anyway, my team was assigned to treat those that we classified into Triage 2, which at the time referred to those patients whose symptoms had gone past flu-like and straight into Medusa. Well, after just a few days, the entire hospital looked like it was blown inside-out by a bomb. The rooms became packed. There were people lying, two and three abreast in the hallways, seizing, sleeping, dying. It was like we were at war. We were at war.” She stopped abruptly, her voice failing, and she pressed her palm to her mouth before continuing. “It was hard on us too, the doctors, my team. We felt like sailors on a sinking ship. There was nothing we could do for these people, we knew that, and yet, we tried. We couldn’t stop trying. We ran around from dawn until dusk, giving IV drips to some, draining limbs on others, distributing drips of lorazepam like it was candy, some we even fully anesthetized, their convulsion were so bad.

  “Well, after a week at this pace, traumatized and sleep deprived, it got to a point where I was shutting down. My mind, my body, were failing. Sleep was impossible.” She pressed her fingertips over her eyes. “Every time I closed my eyes all I could see was them, and in my mind I was back at the hospital.” She dropped her hands and then looked at Mevia. “That’s when I went into the hospital pharmacy and got a hold of the pills. At first, only to sleep, but then of course I needed something to keep me awake.” She crossed her arms and looked out into the ocean. “That’s when things started spiraling. At first, I was fine. I was great, actually. Picking up slack, solving this problem and that, covering for my exhausted colleagues, I was doing it all. I was the best. I was the doctor, and that felt good.” She slowly shook her head. “Well, when you cheat on life, things always even out. The more I did, the more everyone depended on me, and the harder I worked, until finally one day, wired on pills and sleep deprived, I made a mistake.” A wave crashed, sending an icy spray up their thighs. “I left out some contaminated tools in the lab, which I still can’t comprehend. I was always so careful.” She took a deep breath. “Eight people on my team died because of me. I don’t know how I was spared, but I was.” She wiped her eyes, and then stood there shaking her head for a long time. “Then after Medusa passed through and killed everyone it decided to kill, there was a hearing over my error and of course after studying the pharmacy logs it came out that I had taken the drugs.” She looked at Mevia. “Some of my colleagues even testified against me in the trial. That was…it was painful, very painful listening to what they had to say.”

  They were both quiet. A gull screeched from above. A goat brayed from somewhere far away on the mountain.

  “Anyway,” Sandra shrugged, “that’s how I ended up on the island. After they issued a very long prison sentence, I requested to be brought here. They approved and so I gathered my life savings, paid the fees and that was the end of my life on the mainland. I can honestly say it was the best, most heartbreaking decision of my life.”

  They both stood there quietly listening to the indifferent waves crashing this way and that and to the voices of the fisherman muffled by the roar. Mevia’s feet were sinking deep into the restless sand. “I can’t believe they did that to you,” she said, breaking the silence. “The other doctors, I can’t believe they would testify against you. They sound like a bunch of spoiled Corp-brats.”

  Sandra kept her eyes on Thomas. “They were upset. Their friends died needlessly. It was a difficult time.”

  “I don’t see it that way. I can’t.” Mevia said sharply.

  Sandra turned to her. “What about the way they saw it? There were a dozen other things I could have done besides what I did. I could have taken a break. I could have asked for help, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to be the guy, or girl. I wanted to save lives, save my hospital, be the hero. But I didn’t. And I didn’t get any of those things.” She knuckled a lone tear from her cheek. “I messed up and cost a lot of lives not because of incompetence or lack of ability, but because I forgot who I was working for.” She reached over and touched Mevia’s arm, the warmth of her hand seared into Mevia’s cold skin. “The reason I’m telling you this story is because I don’t want you to make the same mistake I did. I understand that you want to help the people on the mainland, but you have to make sure you’re decisions come from a place of intelligence and reasoning and heart. Not blind anger. You have to remember who you are working for.”

  “I do know,” she said tightly. “Everything I do is for the good of our country.”

  “Is it? Or are you doing it for yourself? Or for your mother?”

  Mevia pulled her arm away and stormed off.

  Sandra followed. “You can’t change your
past with a fire, Mevia.”

  “I’m not trying to,” she snapped, but her voice came out weak.

  “Ok, let’s just say you are successful and you take down the factory. Free the people.” Sandra was just behind her. “What next? What then?”

  Mevia stopped, but didn’t turn around. She looked down and noticed a ghost crab crawling across her foot, its lumbering pinchers dangling just above her toes.

  Sandra stood beside her. “We are at war. If you tear down our government then Eurasia will take over. And then what? Will their rule be any better? No. They are just like our leaders. They live under a Sphere, they have drones and I’m sure they drug their food too. It will be trading one devil for another.”

  The crab was dancing back and forth, poking her skin with its needlelike feet, its translucent membrane standing out like a swollen blister against her tan skin. “So, I’m supposed to do nothing?”

  Sandra moved beside her. “There are different ways of bringing about change. Don’t let your actions come from a place of selfishness and narcissism.”

  Mevia wiggled her toe and the crab dug in with one claw, the other waving mid-air, preparing for strike. The tiny fissures sent a sharp stab of pain. She let it linger. How could Sandra, after all she went through, be defending the same government that issued a ridiculous prison sentence to a person who was just trying to keep her head above water and do her job? How could she be so forgiving? Brainwashed was more like it. Brainwashed, just like Eli, like all the children of the Kradle—children who grew up under its watchful eye, too afraid to break free and risk surviving on their own. “Do you really think I’m capable of taking down the GovCorps?” she asked, keeping her eyes on her foot.