“Wow, I honestly didn’t imagine it like this.” She was looking up and down, left and right. He didn’t remember the last time he’d seen someone so affected by nothing.
“You didn’t strike me as the type of girl that was easily impressed.”
“Who said I’m impressed?” She kicked at a c-shaped piece of black rubber protruding from the ground.
“What would you call it?”
“Fascinated.”
“Fascinated? That’s a new one.”
“Fascinated by the fact that people are born and raised in such shit.”
“We are. Some of us even manage to find happiness. Would you believe it?”
She gave a pitiful laugh, as if he’d just told a bad joke. “The power of the human spirit.”
“Sister, I was born and raised out here. It might not look like much, but we’ve got ourselves a little something you might have forgotten about while sitting up there in daddy’s lap, having everything fed to you through a straw.”
“Oh yeah, do tell?” She draped a hand across the tops of her eyes, trying to get a better view of what lay before them.
“Freedom, down here we’ve got freedom.”
“Squalor is not freedom.”
“You call it squalor. I call it people making their own way, with their own two hands.”
“Their own two hands? Scraping through the dirt and the filth with their fingers? That sounds lovely.”
“At least it’s their dirt, their fingers, their decision.”
“Yeah, their decision because they don’t have any other option. Don’t you think if they were offered something better they’d take it?”
“What’s it gonna cost them?”
“Huh? Cost them? This isn’t a transaction. I know you think everything is about money—”
“Of course it’s a transaction. Hause is a showman, he sounds great, but he’s as power hungry as any man I’ve ever met. He’s extending an open hand, but lady, the other one is holding the bill.”
“You don’t know him. The Lord Marshal is a leader. He’s noble. He cares. He has given us—”
“And what have you had to give him in return?”
“We don’t have to give anything in return! Listen, Genesis works as a family—”
“Did you choose to become a soldier?”
“Stop cutting me off!”
“Just answer the question, did you choose to join?”
She stormed ahead. Little wisps of dust kicked out behind her. She took up her canteen, plucked the top off with her teeth, and began tugging at the contents.
“You might want to lay off that a bit. We got a ways to go before our first stop.”
“Do you ever shut up?”
“Not when I’m with company. Seems like a hell of a waste.”
She sealed up the canteen and let it dangle from her hip.
“So, are you gonna answer my question?” He squinted against the sun as he looked at her, sporting his best good natured smile. She didn’t see it. She was pumping out her steps, doing her best to outpace him. If she kept it up she’d burn out, then he’d be carrying her. “Slow it down. We’ve got to move smart. Especially you, you’re not used to this shit. This whole deal is gonna be as hard as you make it.”
After a few more steps she dropped the gears back, submitting to reason.
“There you go, let’s try to be civil. I’m not interested in fighting you all the way to Reeman.”
“That makes two of us,” she spoke as if the words were broken glass.
They were trekking uphill, throwing their weight forward to keep their balance, their feet slipping out behind them with each step, leaving deep, drawn out indentions in the sand. Beyond the crest there was just more nothing, just blue sky, mixed with streaks of green and pink, meeting with a flat expanse of red and brown.
“You sure we’re going to make this place by sundown?”
Dominic nodded. “Aye, we should make it in plenty of time. I’ve been through here before. I’d say we’re slightly ahead of schedule.”
For a time they walked on in silence, crunching across beds of gravel, steadying themselves over patches of powdery sand. Gradually the silence became thinner, until it was practically translucent. Lerah poked the balloon first. “I didn’t have a choice.”
“Come again,” He was busy pulling a chunk of bread from his pack.
“Being a soldier, I didn’t have a choice. It’s something my father did. It’s something his father did. It chose me. When I was born that’s the profession that was handed to me by the Union. Some people work in mechanical, some people clean, some work the gardens, I’m a soldier. We fill the holes that need to be filled.” She sliced the air with the blade of her hand as if laying a series of cards across an invisible table. “We work as a team. As a family. We all sacrifice and we all benefit. Tell me, what’s so bad about that?”
Dominic tore off some bread and offered it to Lerah. She accepted silently. “Doesn’t sound bad, it sounds damn near inviting. But there is something to be said for being free to forge your own path. If your belly is full at the end of the day, if you’ve got a roof over your head, it’s because you went out there and you made it happen. You live and you die by the fruits of your labor. It’s pure freedom. It’s hard but it’s pure. Like I said, there’s something to be said for that.”
“And there’s something to be said for being a part of something bigger than yourself.” He watched her speak from the corner of his eye; sweat was gathering on her face and the heat was beginning to lay her spiky blonde hair flat against her scalp. “Don’t you see the beauty in a world where no one has to struggle? Where everyone sacrifices equally, pools their resources, and in the end, no one has to worry about things like food, water, and shelter? We can have Genesis Towers everywhere; a new beginning for all of humanity. How can you not want that?”
“Yeah, Hause pitched me the pamphlet, remember? He’ll be the captain steering the ship. That’s what bothers me.” It came out harsher than he’d intended, his emotions were meant for Hause.
“You barely know him. If you got a shit impression, that’s on you. You were the one shooting people.”
“Well, when you’ve got a point, you’ve got a point. But I fought in the war. I saw a picture of the Union, and it sure as hell ain’t the one you’re painting.”
“So why the hell are you here?”
“You’re really asking me that?”
“Oh yeah, excuse me, I forgot; the paycheck.”
He snapped his fingers. “You got it!”
She shook her head, opened up the front of her jacket, and began flapping either side as if they were wings. Dominic’s eyes were drawn to the curve of her waistline: a flat board of muscle, outlined beneath a cut off shirt that ended just below her breasts. The sweat worked like glue, plastering the shirt tight against her body.
“What the hell are you looking at?”
“What? Nothing, just checking to see that you got your rifle fitted properly, want you to be able to raise and squeeze if you need to, no fiddling around.” He didn’t see a rifle, all he saw was a captivating roadmap of abdominal muscles.
“Uh huh,” she turned away slightly and did her jacket back up.
The sun had reached its crescendo. The temperatures rising from the earth were officially as hot as those falling from the sky. The sand felt like hot coals burning through the soles of his boots. Flocks of blackbirds flew past overhead, screeching at them, mocking their plight. Lerah’s posture was worsening. Her balance faltered and Dominic reached to steady her. She shoved him off. “I’ve got it. I’m fine.” But she wasn’t fine. She was wearing a brave face; soldiering on, digging into her training. Perhaps, trying to prove she didn’t really need him. They drank sparingly from their canteens as sweat rained from their brows. Lerah finally relented. She stopped and dropped her back against the skeleton base of an old tree stump. She slid down the side, resting her butt against her heels. “I just need
a minute.”
“Take two. But no more than that, we’ve gotta make time.”
She nodded and took another drink from her canteen, pouring a little water across the back of her neck.
Dominic looked up at the sun and then out across the landscape in front of them, calculating the time and distance between them and their destination. “You see that shadow way out there?” Dominic pointed at a black dot to their extreme west.
“I think so,” Lerah panted.
“That’s a piece of the old superhighway system. I dug around over there once; just passing the time between jobs. I found a whole graveyard of old cars and trucks. They’re all twisted and burned up. Maybe I’ll take you through on the way back.”
She nodded, not really agreeing or disagreeing. “We learned about the old transport systems; roads, bridges, tunnels. After everyone is united and we’ve started building the Towers, that’s Hause’s vision.”
“Vision?”
“To bring back the transport systems, to build roads and cars, he told you about the car we’re working on, right? It’s almost ready to go.”
“Yeah, he told me. Bet you wish we had one right about now.”
“A car?” she looked up at him, holding the canteen between her knees.
“Or a truck, if you prefer.”
She smiled at him, kind of. Not a full on teeth baring grin, a small tug at the corners of her mouth.
He’d take it.
He held out a hand. “Come on, it gets easier. I promise.”
She stared, for a moment, as if accepting any sort of nicety from him locked her into some inescapable contract. Finally, she locked her fingers through his, jumped to her feet, and then escaped the hold just as quickly. “Well, I suppose we should get on with it.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
9
People greeted Blake heartily as he passed them by. But the niceties always seemed to come with a price.
“My baby has a rash.”
“Grandma June has a cough.”
“Who’re you thinking is next up for the Fall?”
He used to view the barrage as just another part of his job description. But now he’d been given a new lens to view the attention through: paranoia. “I have eyes everywhere,” Mother’s words had found a nice comfortable bed in the back of his mind.
Were they watching? Listening? Mother’s eyes and ears?
He’d do as Mother commanded. Talk to Colton, get a read on him. With any luck it would all come to nothing, just another one of Mother’s paranoid delusions. The kid would exonerate himself, Blake would return with a blank page, and be back home in his chair before the sun went down.
As he approached the back of the pump house he could hear the grind and squeal of metal working against metal and the throaty grunts of men laboring. He turned the corner and found a garden of industry. Men with dirt crusted beards and overalls, battling the hard earth with shovels and picks, their round faces beat red, their mouths expelling labored breaths. It wasn’t hard to find Colton among the grizzled gathering. He was by far the youngest of the bunch, lacking the callousness that came with old age and a lifetime spent beneath the sun. He was shirtless, sawing away at a well screen, a glistening sheen of muck peppering his torso.
“Colton, my boy, how are you?”
Colton looked up at him, his bangs sticking to his forehead with a thick paste of dirt and sweat. He dropped the saw and stood, extending his hand. “I’m doing well, thank you for asking.” Colton had always been a polite boy. Even as a baby, when Blake delivered him, he hadn’t been much of a crier.
“Oh, I’m good, just an old man, out for a stroll. I swear everyday is hotter than the last. Do you notice that? Or am I losing my marbles?”
Colton laughed and slapped a little of the dirt off his hands. “I reckon it might be, sir. But I’m out here in it every day, so I might not be the best one to judge. Say, are you looking for my daddy? I think he’s out collecting more scrap.”
“No.” Blake shook his head. A wave of guilt washed over him. He scratched at the back of his neck and looked around for anyone that might be paying special attention to their conversation. Nothing caught his eye. Just men hunched over, digging holes, and capping off metal pipes. “I was just strolling by. You know, not much going on at the clinic today. I realized that you and me have never really talked. I figured I’d stop in, see how you’re doing.”
“That’s kind of you, sir. It’s just work and more work for me. How about you? How’re things?”
“Slow, but that’s a good thing, I suppose. How’s the digging coming along?”
Colton puffed his cheeks and released a gush of air through his lips, looking around at the plastic caps, the various lengths of pipe, and the perforated metal sheets littering the ground. It was all an unsolvable puzzle where Blake was concerned. “It’s coming, that’s about all I can say.”
“Well, my cup has yet to run dry, so you guys are doing something right.”
“Thank you, sir. That’s kind of you to say.”
“How about that Fall the other day? That was something. Your first one, right?” Blake didn’t want to jump right in with both feet. Keep it natural. Don’t alarm the kid.
Colton looked as if he’d been punched in the stomach. Blake knew the feeling. “It wasn’t… well, it wasn’t like I’d pictured it.”
Blake nodded. “The first one is tough. I was twice your age when I saw my first one and it still sits with me.”
Colton seemed relieved to have found a kindred spirit. “That’s the thing, it’s been sitting with me. I haven’t been able to talk…”
Blake signaled for him to lower his voice.
“… I haven’t been able to talk to my father,” Colton whispered, glancing backwards as if he expected his father to somehow magically appear over his shoulder. “During The Fall he was… cheering. He kept looking at me and I was just standing there… shocked. I didn’t expect it to be like that. He grabbed me up, sort of shook me, and said, ‘Get with the program, boy’. So I clapped with the rest of them, but… inside,” another quick glance over his shoulder, “I felt bad for those people. I still do.”
“It’s okay. I felt the same way the first time too.” I still do.
“You don’t think Mother saw me, do you? You don’t think I’m gonna get in trouble?”
Blake shook his head. “Of course not, I’d have heard something.”
Colton gave a sigh of relief. “Oh, that’s good news, sir. Good news. I’ve been living on pins and needles. I barely slept last night.”
Blake reached out and wrapped his hand across a sun-beaten shoulder. “It’s important that you understand something.”
“Like what?”
“The reason for the Fall. Yes, you may have felt bad for those folks, but you understand why they were standing there, right?”
Colton looked slightly befuddled. Not the reaction Blake was hoping for. “I mean, yeah, I know what Mother says. That the Curse is our punishment and that if we’re not able to multiply—”
“You know what the Scriptures say. We all know what they say. But do you believe it?”
Colton wiggled his jaw back and forth, scraping his teeth together.
Come on kid, there shouldn’t be a pause here.
He scuffed his feet across the ground and stuffed his hands deep into his pockets. “I understand it.”
No, you believe it. Say you believe it, you dope.
“It’s normal to have doubts sometimes, right?”
Blake shook him once to get his attention, to get him to look up and meet his eyes. He spoke low and slow, his voice stern, trying to drill every word through Colton’s skull, like a nail through a stubborn piece of wood. “Whether it’s normal or not, you cannot let anyone else hear you talking about doubts. Do you understand? If it gets back to Mother… you keep that to yourself and you work it out. You work it out fast.”
“Yes, sir. I understand.”
“They
took the Fall because they broke their oath. We’ve all taken an oath, including you, Colton; an oath to maintain celibacy. That’s important. You cannot break it. Do you want to be out on that ledge?”
The tension was back. Colton’s face went rigid. The slack went out of his shoulders. A nerve had been struck. “I’ve got to get back to work, sir.” Colton turned away and retrieved his saw from the ground.
Mother was right. There was a problem.
Damn it, Scroggins. What have you gotten yourself into?
Mother was at her desk with her pencil, paper, and thoughts.
She was crossing off notes as quickly as she scribbled them.
We’ve inherited this Curse. But we’ve also inherited this earth. So we must fight. There is hope. Hope in Multiplication. We find ourselves our true selves in the will of our Creator.
There was a pounding at the door.
Room shaking.
Ear splitting.
Only two people had the courage to interrupt her so abruptly. She threw down her pencil and took in a mouthful of liquid from the chalice. “For the love of our Father, come in! Come in, you simple animals!” She stamped her feet against the floor and clawed at the papers before her.
Zach and Toby. Bless them. Bless their simple minds. Effective? Yes. Meant for one purpose. Enforcing His will.
“Hey there Ma’,” Toby poked his head in first and gave her a clueless wave.
“You call me Mother. Just like them. And how many times do I have to tell you not to pound on my door? How many times, Toby?”
“I didn’t mean nothing by it.”
“That’s the problem, isn’t it? You never mean nothing by anything you do. You’re a sideshow act. You’re just going through the motions.”
“Well… yeah, I guess so.”
She’d lost him. She always lost him. Three or four words in and his eyes glazed over. He’d stand there, slack jawed, drooling, listening to her speak, and then he’d just agree.
Such a simple animal.
“Both of you, get in here, and shut my door… gently!”
Zach rolled in after his brother, closing the door as if he were setting an infant to rest in its cradle.
The Fall of Man: The Saboteur Chronicles Book 1 Page 9