“Wow,” I say to them. I’m genuinely impressed. I didn’t think this was the kind of sanctuary that my father would have sent us to, but I understand now why he did it. Of course it would make sense to send us here. I can’t help but think that if Jason was on the verge of this discovery, then there has to be others out there who figured it out. But maybe not. I think back to everything we experienced to this point and decide that if others had to go through a fraction of that, saving the world wouldn’t have been on their list of priorities. “It looks like he had it all figured out,” I say to them.
“A shame he disappeared,” Lexi says optimistically, but I’m pretty sure that everyone in this room knows better than that. Lexi stands up, pulling her now milk-drunk baby from her breast and heads for the nursery that I’m assuming they set up somewhere throughout the house. “I’m going to go put him down for a nap,” she tells me as she goes out. I catch the lingering glance that Greg and Lexi offer each other before she leaves. It’s full of meaning and purpose and it ruins the mood. I hate seeing them like this now that I know the truth and actually pick up on it.
The moment she’s gone, Greg turns and looks at me. “I’m sorry, Valerie,” he says to me with a defeated, remorseful tone to his voice. I don’t know what to say in return. I’m not ready or willing to forgive either of them. There are certain facts to what has happened and I’m not denying that they exist, but that doesn’t mean that I have to accept them and be happy about them. I can still hold them accountable and feel infuriated about it. I won’t act upon it, but I’m not willing to surrender it just yet. The pause seems to last forever. I don’t know what he’s expecting but after a moment he clears his throat. “We weren’t able to find that oasis that we had hoped for, but I’m pretty sure we can make one. He’s got it all right here, in these notebooks.” I feel like I’m talking to a newborn idealist who has been completely reformed from the man who wanted to stay lurking in a beach house on the dead coast of Florida because it was the sensible thing to do. It’s strange seeing him like this.
“So,” I say finally, breaking my silence, “you actually think that you can do this?”
“Yeah,” Greg says with a huge grin on his face. “I mean, we’re going to have to start with the greenhouses to protect the plants from the storms, but once we get a little more established, we can try and find the equipment to build the compound. With the right ratio and process, I think we can get enough healthy soil to build a whole new world.”
“So what happened to everything?” I ask him. “Why did the fertilizer kill everything?”
“From what Jason has written on the walls and in his notebooks,” Greg turns around and pulls down a poster, revealing hidden writings and rantings that look like they belong to a madman, “He thinks that the fertilizer was stable until it was ingested. Once it was re-deposited as waste, or even in contact with digestive acids from waste on the ground or in manure, all nutrients were stripped from the soil and either absorbed by the plants or washed down to the bedrock. So the soil was stripped of everything healthy and sustaining from the plants, and crippling the soil from being able to bond to other nutrients. With no nutrients left in the soil, and the inability to fertilize to add new nutrients, everything just withered up and died. His compound will essentially ensure that the new dirt is resistant to the super-fertilizer and acts as a means to replace the soil-nutrient bond. All we have to do is create the new soil and add minerals and traditional fertilizers.”
“Sounds like a lot of work,” I tell him honestly. I don’t know how they’re going to be able to do all of that, but I hope they get started on it soon.
“Yeah,” Greg shrugs. “We’ve got pebbles and gravel that we’ll mix with the fertilizers from the bags that Jason stockpiled and then mix in the compost. I’m sure I’m going to need to find a hammer and start breaking some rocks, which will be a ton of fun, I’m sure. But in the meantime, he suggests hitting a bunch of locations that he’s marked out on the map. I never even thought of some of the stuff he came up with. He suggests hitting farm supply stores, gardening centers, and nurseries to find a lot of the supplies we’ll need. He even marked out a chemical plant about fifty miles away that should have everything he could possibly need to mix the compound. He had it all planned out, Val. Step by step.”
“Until something went wrong,” I caution him. I’m glad to see him so excited about all of this, but Jason is dead or gone. Unless he’s taking a very long time getting to and from that chemical plant, something bad happened to him. I don’t want the two of them to get killed following in his footsteps.
“Val, I know there’s a lot of history between us,” Greg says to me with a pleading tone in his voice. “But we’ve got to get you better. The moment we start building these greenhouses, the cat’s out of the bag. People will find us and they’ll start coming to us in droves. Word will get out. We’re going to need all the help we can get and we’re going to need you for certain.”
I smile at the thought of that. To think that they’re already building an imaginary future with me in it is a bit comforting, if not a little horrifying. I smile and shake my head. “Don’t worry about it,” I lie to him. “I’ll be fine.”
“Glad to hear it,” Lexi says from the doorway. “I’m going to go prep the truck. We’re making a run to one of the supply markers he has on the map. Jason scouted it out and said that it’s abandoned and only locals would have known about it. I’m sure any previous looters will have left behind the sorts of things we’re after.”
“If it’s still stocked,” Greg tells me as he stands up, “then we’ll have everything we’ll need to get started on the work Jason has lined out. He’s already completed one of the greenhouses out back by the shed.” He puts a concerned hand on my shoulder and I feel slightly less repulsed by his touch now than I did a few days ago. “Rest, we’ll be back in a while.”
“I’ll be here,” I tell them as they leave the room. I listen as they gather up Charlie and head downstairs for the door.
They aren’t gone longer than a few moments before I can no longer resist the urge to cough. I lean onto my side, fighting the pain in my stomach as my whole body shakes and jerks. Covering my mouth, I feel the specks of liquid hitting the palm of my hand. As I pull my hand away from my mouth, still coughing, I see the dark specks. I’m not sure how much longer I have, but it’s only a few more days and that’s being lenient.
Chapter Nineteen
I look out the window, taking in the few moments that I have alone before Lexi kicks in the door and tries to take advantage of my few moments of lucidity. Snapshots of memories or dreams flicker behind my eyes for a moment, and I try to recall the amount of days or weeks that have passed. How many times have I been awake? How long have I been unconscious? I relish the silence, taking in my moment of life and stare out the window of my room upon something that’s so extraordinary that my mind reels, telling me that it is a delusion or another dream. I feel like there’s a weight that’s been on my shoulders for so long that I wouldn’t know what to do with myself if it’s gone. It’s been there longer than when we first took to the road in an attempt to find an Eden that never existed. It’s been on my shoulders since the moment I saw the first news report telling us that the end of the world was upon us and that all hope should be abandoned. But as I stand here, alone in the room, savoring these seconds on my feet, I can’t help but feel so light. I don’t even feel like I’m alive right now, like I’m just a spirit passing through an alternate dimension of what might have come to pass had I done better.
Looking down at my bandages, I see they’ve been changed. There is no telling when or by whom, but my bet is on Lexi. Peeling back the tape and gauze I’m surprised that I’m even alive right now, my fingers are so thin and boney. I was so certain that I was going to die, but here I stand. My wound looks worse than ever. I’m definitely not on the upswing, I’m just on a slower descent than I could have anticipated. The flesh around my injury is discolore
d, a dark bruise that’s fringed by yellow and green on one side and a ring of red, inflamed tissue around my wound. I reach down and press around the edges of the wound, hardly able to feel a thing as I watch puss boil out of it. Lowering my shirt, I’m tired of even trying. My frail-looking hands are pale and shaking, and I can only imagine what my face looks like right now. I have to look like a walking corpse. No, I’d rather look out the window. It’s much more peaceful not worrying about the fact that I’m dying. It’s better to bask in the glory of what’s to come.
“Val?” an excited voice cries from behind me. “Val, my God, they said that you were awake! Val, it’s so good to see you!” I don’t turn to the voice. I know my sister well enough that I don’t need to turn and look at her. Instead, I keep my eyes on the sunny world beyond the window. Taking it all in. I can feel her hands on my shoulders, wrapping her arms around me and embracing me, hugging me. It’s nice to feel her touch. It’s nice to feel wanted. That’s a good feeling to have at the end of everything. Knowing that you’re going to be missed is a pleasure that few actually have the chance to savor. I’m glad I’m given the chance.
“How am I alive?” I ask her.
“We’ve been feeding you medicine cocktails,” Lexi tells me. “Greg has been flushing out and cleaning your wound every day to try and get rid of the infection. We use as many of the antibiotics as you told us to when you were sewing up Greg.”
“How is he?” I ask her.
“Almost to a full recovery,” Lexi tells me with a beaming smile on her healthy, happy face. I’m glad to see her smiling. I’m glad that darkness and gloom has not settled over this house forever. I don’t want the sins of the past haunting the living. I’ll take my hurt and my heartbreak to the grave with me, rather than spread it around up here. “He’s out on the lawn with Charlie right now.”
I know. I can see them standing there. He’s cradling Charlie close and pointing toward the west, telling his son something. It’s an adorable sight no matter if it is real or imagined. It swells me with sadness and pride seeing him talking with my nephew like the way he might have talked to our son, if things had been different. I try not to dwell on that and look at the rest of the world.
“How many of you are there?” I ask her, looking at the flourishing lawn below me.
“We found a radio that worked.” Lexi begins a story that seems vaguely familiar, as if she’s told me before. “At first we started picking up transmissions from a lot of people, but we didn’t talk. We just listened long enough to figure out which were killers luring others into traps and which were genuine people looking to try and survive. When we told them about the sanctuary, we sent them to a safe location so we could watch them and see if they were worth trusting. We found a group of five that were trustworthy and we invited them to come with us. We combined resources and they came to help us. After that, it’s been a fairly steady influx. When we come across good people, we invite them to stay. Those who aren’t good get mixed in with the fertilizer. There are three dozen of us here now.”
I look at the dozen greenhouses that are all branched out, connected to the shed in the back of the house. I can see the plants blossoming inside and the multitude of colors flourishing inside of the houses. I’ve been clinging to life for weeks, maybe months. I’m not sure. There’s no way to tell other than the fact that I’m looking at a lawn of emerald down below me, like an island of green spreading out for maybe a hundred yards around the house.
“We’re well armed,” Lexi tells me. “We raided the chemical facility once the first five joined up with us. We got everything we needed for the first batch of infused soil to set up the greenhouses. Once they were built, Greg and the others went back and brought back twice as much, while Bert and a couple of guys got a chemical sprayer working. Now, everywhere we spray, we plant the grass. We’re going to build a green road all the way to Dayton to lure people out to us. We think that we’re secure enough now that we can start getting more and more people to come to us.” Lexi pauses for a moment while I take it all in. I can’t believe that they actually did it. They saved the world. They did exactly what our father had intended for us to do. I look at Lexi and feel the sting of pride inside of my chest.
The island of green stretches forever and there are men and women out on the lawn, tilling up the new soil and planting rows and rows of vegetables. The rows that they’ve already dug are sprouting little tiny plants with tiny little leaves. I look at it all and can’t help but feel like I found the Eden that my father had promised me. At the perimeter, I see men with guns and binoculars, watching the horizons to make sure that danger isn’t coming for them. Like I had thought when we were first looking for Jason’s sanctuary, this was the perfect place. They can see in every direction for miles and miles.
“We’ve picked up reports from the people coming in of other large groups of survivors that haven’t turned to cannibalism or hunting other survivors,” Lexi tells me with a quiet, calm voice. “We’ve sent word to them. We asked if there were any chemists among them and if they could decipher the blueprints for Jason’s compound and strategy of rebuilding the planet. This isn’t it, Val. Three other camps have used the formula that Greg has shared with them and they are having success too. We’ve never met them, but we’re hoping that they’re doing as well as we are. We’re going to steal a play out of those religious fanatics’ handbooks and send out a colony group west in a few weeks, once we have food growing. We’ll set up trade and hopefully more colonies in time. It’ll be something beautiful, Val.”
“It’s already beautiful,” I tell her honestly. I turn and look at her before a burst of coughing racks my body, nearly breaking me to my knees. I feel so fragile, something that I never wanted to experience before in my life. My whole body feels like it’s failing, but I can hardly sense the pain that bites at the fringe of my nervous system that seems to be fading, shutting down slowly and quietly. I look at Lexi who is holding me up, an expression of concern on her face. “You’re a crazy woman, Lexi,” I tell her as she helps me to my bed. I notice that there’s a planter pot on the chair next to my bed holding a tomato plant. I smile at it. Fresh air. “You’ve done something incredible here,” I tell her. “It’s amazing. They’ll write books about you when this is all over. They’ll talk about Lexi Duwain, savior of the world. Are you ready for that?”
“I’ll make sure there’s a footnote about you in there,” Lexi teases with a smile on her face. I try to laugh but it catches in my too-dry throat and explodes into a series of coughs that make me feel like I’m more of a nuisance than ever. I’m broken and there’s nothing I can do about it anymore. There’s no staving it off, no hiding it, and no trying to escape it. This is the end and I know it. The moment I close my eyes, I’m certain that they won’t be opening again. This is the real end. I’m glad it is a happy one, whether it is a hallucination or not. “Val,” Lexi says tenderly to me. I look at her with unexpecting eyes. “I’m so sorry about everything.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I tell her honestly. “You two will be fine without me. I don’t hold it against you. You’ll find one day that at the end of everything, the hurts and heartache don’t really mean much. We always had a higher purpose hanging over us, and getting bent out of shape and letting emotions get between us was never something we should have given fuel to. I’m sorry I made you feel the way I did. Don’t think that I hold any of this against you.” I pause for a moment and look at her, knowing that this is the end. I feel tired already, wispy, like I’m floating away, like my eyelids are heavy sandbags trying to give in to gravity once and for all. I look at her with a stern expression on my dying face. “Promise me you’ll survive this. There are bad people still out there, Lexi. You have something they’ll want and they’ll try to take it from you. Don’t let them. And you raise Charlie to be strong, because after you and Greg are gone, he’ll still be fighting to fix the planet our generation killed. The world needs a Charlie who is strong and noble, not harde
ned and cruel. Raise him right. Promise me that, Lexi.”
“I promise,” she says and for once, I don’t feel like Lexi is lying to me.
-End
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LEFT ALIVE (Zombie series Box Set): Books 1-6 of the Post-apocalyptic zombie action and adventure series Page 99