Her mother’s shape was just as holographic as it had been in The Program. Cassie could see through her mother’s body, and her voice seemed to be inside Cassie’s head. Was she still dreaming? Her mother led her down the dormitory hallway and through a maintenance exit into the bowels of the dome. Cassie could see all the pipes and wires that kept the water and electricity flowing to the dorms, classrooms, and other structures in the small city.
They came to a sealed door that required a security code. Cassie’s mother spoke into her mind and told her what numbers to enter. Cassie’s fingers pressed into the keypad, and the device beeped and turned green.
“Turn the hatch now,” her mother said.
Cassie obeyed and walked through the open door, which she closed behind her. It led to a room of computer terminals. Cassie and her mother moved through the room and into another hallway. Eventually, they came to a second sealed hatch.
Cassie followed the instructions whispered into her mind. When the security lock buzzed green, she opened the door and walked through. Outside the dark night fell around her. Strange smells overwhelmed her senses. Above, the night sky gleamed with vivid stars.
“I’m outside!” she screamed. “I need to go back. I’ll die.”
“Be quiet. There is no radiation anymore. You must go now.”
Fear gripped Cassie’s chest. She’d let a dream lead her out of her safe haven. How could this apparition be trusted? How could anything be trusted? She took a deep breath and ran.
Chapter 3
Cassie found herself in a wide-open field bathed in moonlight. No radiation storms raged. No toxic air choked her lungs. It was a night like any other, before the wars. As she ran into the darkness, the dome became progressively smaller behind her. It dawned on her that she was leaving everything she’d known. Sharp fear sliced her heart, and she wanted to go back.
Cassie almost turned around, when the vision of the creature holding Lindsey’s unconscious body like a limp rag doll, flashed across her mind. She cringed. What in the hell was that thing?
Professor Weston had said they would participate in a genetic rehabilitation project. What that meant slowly bubbled up into Cassie’s brain. Those monsters were breeding with human girls, and Pyramid Corporation was helping them. Bile rose in her throat, and she doubled over to vomit in the tall grass.
Nothing was as it seemed. She’d lived inside the dome for five years, ever since the Great War swept away the last of human civilization. The lucky few who remained lived in domes like hers, run by Pyramid Corporation.
She wiped the bile from her lips with the back of her hand and continued to run, questioning everything she knew, until her stomach contracted in a painful ache. She slowed to a stop and caught her breath, doubling over to suck in air. Inside the dome, they exercised on equipment in a gymnasium, but she hadn’t run on the hard earth for quite some time.
In the distance, the glow of the moon glinted silver off the tops of trees. She made her way to the forest, trying to suppress the memory of the frightening wolves that had inhabited it in The Program.
Once under the cover of the forest, Cassie felt fatigue grip her body. She had to rest, or she would collapse. Finding a soft mound of leaves, she lay down and fell unconscious.
In the morning, the light streamed through the treetops, and her stomach growled with hunger. She hadn’t eaten since lunch the day before and had vomited that up last night. Groaning, she stood. She had no choice but to continue. Going back was no longer an option. Unless she was going crazy, something was terribly wrong there.
During the five years she lived inside the dome, she’d had it drilled into her head that going outside would cause instant death from radiation.
Cassie was still alive and felt absolutely fine, except for the gnawing hunger in her belly and growing thirst in her throat. The realization that she had been lied to for all this time sent a shiver up her spine. She had always thought of people like Professor Weston as surrogate parents. She’d felt safe in the dome. She didn’t want to think. All she could do was keep walking.
Cassie wondered when someone would notice she was gone. What would they do? Would they come after her? What then? She knew the air was safe to breathe. She could tell everyone else back at the dome. But then, she reasoned, they must already know. The Pyramid Corporation employed the finest minds of the world to work for them, and they used the most advanced technologies on Earth. They had to know it was safe outside.
She walked for hours, feeling hungrier and thirstier as time drew on. She heard birds singing in the trees and watched them swoop down to bushes growing on a rocky hillside. She inspected the ripe, red fruits and realized they were wild raspberries. She used to go camping before the war. Hunger surged, and she grabbed at the berries, shoving them in her mouth as fast as she could before moving on.
When she crested a hill, she could see the valley below and the dome far in the distance. She longed to go back to her old life, the one she understood. Too much had happened: the vision of her mother and the vision of the horrible creature raping Lindsey. The air was safe to breathe, and healthy, living birds flitted from tree to tree. It all meant she could not go back, no matter how much she wanted to.
She walked until dusk settled over the forest, and her feet ached. She found a fast-moving stream and cupped her hands to shovel water into her mouth. She knew it wasn’t safe to drink untreated water, but she was far too thirsty to care. Once she’d had her fill, she sat on a rock and removed her shoes. A terribly large, bubbling blister rose on the back of her right foot. She inspected the sore and then sank her feet into the cool water.
“You’ll have to pop it,” said a deep voice behind her. Cassie twisted her head around to find an old man standing just behind her. His gray hair shot out in all directions, and his scruffy gray beard looked as though patches were missing. He smiled at her, showing several gaps in his front teeth. His clothing was faded and worn.
“Hi!” she exclaimed. Even with his disturbing appearance, seeing a living human outside the dome was a revelation.
“Hi, there. I’m Tanner. What’s your name, little miss?”
“Cassie. I came from the dome. I can’t tell you how thrilled I am to meet a living human outside.”
“Is that so?” he said, moving closer.
“Are there others?” she asked excitedly, drying her feet and pulling back on her shoes.
“Yeah. There are. Haven’t seen many in a while though. I chose to be independent. Not interested in no factions. I heard rumors that aliens were keeping kids in those domes, but I didn’t believe it.”
Aliens? Was that strange creature an alien? It had reminded her of a vampire from books she used to read. Except way less sexy and much taller.
“There were hundreds of children in my dome,” she said, standing. “But no aliens.”
“Is that so?” he said as she stood. She had her jumpsuit open at the neck to keep her body cool while she hiked. The opening exposed the soft pillows of her cleavage. Tanner’s eyes burned the bare skin of her breasts. Cassie quickly pulled up the zipper, embarrassed. No one acted so lasciviously inside the dome. She was put off by his behavior, but still, he was a living human outside the dome! She needed to know more.
“Can you tell me what happened after the war?” she asked.
“Oh yes. I sure can. Come right this way, and I’ll tell you everything I know. I’ve got food too.” He was the last kind of person she would ever go anywhere with before the war. But he was the first human she’d seen outside the dome. He had answers and food. She followed him, swallowing down her apprehension.
The hill descended into a grassy wetland. Tanner pulled a trap from a pond. It had two little fish inside. He licked his lips with an absurdly long, wet tongue, eyeing the fish hungrily. Cassie’s stomach growled. She hadn’t eaten fish since before the war. Food inside the dome was mostly processed glop.
Tanner carried the dripping cage with the flopping fish as he led Ca
ssie through the wetland, through another stand of trees, and around a hillside. A small cabin with gray smoke billowing from the chimney came into view as dusk fell.
He led her through a narrow door into a dimly lit, cramped room. Her heart thumped as alarms went off in her mind. She should go, but she could see a pitcher of water, and her stomach demanded food.
There was a bed, table, and stone fireplace with a flickering fire. She went to the fire and soaked in the heat. Being out of the elements for just a little while wouldn’t hurt.
“Have a seat,” said Tanner, pointing at one of the two chairs at the table. He pulled the other chair to the fire and grabbed one of the fish from inside the cage. With a quick motion, he smashed its head against a rock in the hearth. The fish went limp. He proceeded to cut its belly open and pull out its guts before skewering it with a stick and positioning it over the fire. He did the same with the second one.
After a few minutes, the smell of the cooking flesh drifted to her nose, and her stomach cried out in hunger. Tanner slid a plate of cooked fish to her, and he poured her a tall glass of fresh water. He then sat across from her to devour his own meal.
“Thank you. I haven’t had fresh fish in forever.”
“What do you eat in the dome?” he asked with a full mouth.
“Mostly processed nutritional stew.”
“Meh, that ain’t food. This is food,” he said, pointing at the fish on his plate.
The flavor burst in her mouth as she chewed, and she gobbled up the fish until there was nothing but bones and skin left on the plate.
Tanner chuckled, showing his missing teeth. “You’ve got a good appetite.”
“I haven’t eaten much in the last few days.”
He picked up the plates and threw the leftovers in the fire then rinsed the plates off in a bucket of water. After he was done, he handed Cassie a pin.
“For your blisters,” he said, sitting on the bed behind her.
She pulled off her shoes and stuck the needle into the biggest blister on her heel. Clear liquid ran out, relieving the horrible pressure. She did the same with the others, breathing a sigh of relief.
“Thanks.”
“Now get over to the bed and take off your clothes.”
“What? No.” She grabbed her shoes and shuffled toward the door. He caught her by the wrist and tugged her backward until she was sprawled over his little bed. He jumped on top of her and held her down with his greater strength. The stench of his rotten breath blew in her face as he licked her cheek with his disgustingly long tongue. Visions of Lindsey’s limp body raged through Cassie’s mind. She pushed at him, but he pinned her down.
“Stop it!” she shouted.
“I fed you, little girl. You owe me.”
“Get off! I don’t owe you anything.”
She flailed violently. As he let go of one of her hands to violently rip open the top of her jumpsuit, her knee jerked upward and connected with the tender flesh between his legs. He doubled over in pain, long enough for Cassie to jump out of his grip and grab her shoes from the floor.
Shouting, he stumbled after her as she lunged toward the door. Cassie bolted outside before he could grab her again. Running, heart pounding, she continued up the ridge behind his house. She could hear him yelling in the distance.
“I don’t want no alien whore anyway!”
Crazy old pervert. She never should have gone with him. She ducked behind a tree and put her shoes back on, vowing never to ignore her intuition again.
She hiked through the thick, lower-alpine forest and didn’t stop until the predawn light glimmered on the eastern horizon. She came to a clearing on the edge of a cliff. Pink light grew over the valley below, casting the world in an eerie radiance.
The Denver metro area sprawled across the landscape. Hope surged within her that her hometown still thrived with human life. Someone would help make sense of everything there.
She carefully climbed down a steep hill and onto a freeway leading from the suburbs into the city. Empty, rusted vehicles and overgrown weeds littered the freeway. The buildings she passed stood like worn-out shells, silently keeping their secrets.
She scavenged a gas station along the highway, finding bottles of water and a few stale candy bars. Not a single human soul greeted her, but she kept up hope that she would find someone in the city. She knew it was stupid. The city had most likely been bombed. With a gnawing need to know, she kept going.
Chapter 4
Amongst the giant skyscrapers, a deer lifted its head over the grass growing from the sidewalk. It spooked and scampered down a deserted street. A flock of blackbirds burst upward from a long silent telephone line. Windows were shattered. Buildings had been blow apart. In one section of the downtown, an entire street looked as if it had been melted. Desperation gripped Cassie’s chest. Humans no longer inhabited the city.
Just as she decided to leave, she spotted a massive black disk hovering above the suburbs in the distance. Her heart leapt into her throat as her body went numb and cold. Awareness slowly surfaced––an alien spacecraft. She gulped, still not believing her own eyes. Tanner’s accusations, the visions of morbid vampire-like creatures, it was all real, and she could see their craft right in front of her.
She ran into the nearest building, wanting to get undercover and out of sight as quickly as possible. There was no way she wanted them to find her and take her back to one of their sick breeding domes.
She found herself in a reception lobby strewn with papers and organic debris. Rationally, she didn’t know why, but her inner senses demanded she get below ground. Determined to listen to her intuition, she passed the shattered reception desk, searching for a way into the basement. At the end of the darkened hall of sealed elevator doors, she found a door to the stairs.
Cassie quickly slipped inside, letting the door close behind her. Darkness enveloped her senses. She climbed downward, using her hands to guide her along the cool concrete wall. When she came to the bottom of the stairs, she fumbled around for the door and turned the knob.
On the other side, a dim light glowed at the back of the basement. Following the light, Cassie crept through the toppled filing cabinets and piles of paper. She found a window from a shaft that lead to the ground level. It let in just enough light to see.
A sleeping bag lay across the dusty floor under the window. She looked around her feet as her eyes adjusted to the dim light. There was a backpack, a hard plastic bottle, and cans of baked beans and ravioli. Judging by the thick layer of dust covering everything, she assumed the owner had left it quite a long time ago. Digging in the backpack, she found a water filtration device with a spare filter, a can opener, flint and steel, a plastic plate, utensils, a hunting knife, and a length of fishing line with a hook.
She sat on the sleeping bag, taking an inventory of the items. It would help her survive until she could find other people she could trust. Someone had to know what had happened. It couldn’t just be her and Tanner out here in the world.
She heard the squeak of rodents coming from somewhere along the wall and decided it was time to leave. After putting the tools back in the backpack, she rolled up the sleeping bag and strapped it on the backpack.
Tentatively, she climbed the dark staircase back to the lobby. Peering out a window, she affirmed that the spacecraft had crossed the city and was now gliding away into the distance.
Cassie stepped out into the heat of late afternoon, wondering what to do next. Since the spaceship had gone southeast, back toward the dome, she would go northwest, toward the mountains.
She continued on foot along the highway, her feet aching more with each step. As the sun rose high in the late afternoon sky, she found shelter from the heat under the cover of an aspen grove by a fast-moving stream. She cooled her blistered feet and filtered a bottle of water, which she quickly drank.
Birds sang from the branches, and squirrels hopped from limb to limb. With such a proliferation of wildlife, there had to be hum
ans somewhere. There had to be. She opened a can of baked beans, eating it cold. The sweet flavor of the beans slid satisfyingly into her stomach. She followed it with one of the candy bars she’d found at the gas station.
Fully satiated, she filtered another bottle of water, dried her feet, put back on her shoes, and hit the road. Questions swirled through her mind, none of which she had any good answers for. For the first time, she sensed a kind of emotional numbness that she hadn’t noticed before. She suspected it had been there for a long time. When she tried to examine it, she couldn’t quite understand what she was feeling
It was easier to focus on placing one foot in front of the other, headed toward the mountains. She didn’t know what she planned to do once she got to the wilderness, but she felt guided by some invisible force to continue.
As dusk settled, she passed through a small highway town and decided to find a place to sleep in the shelter of an abandoned building. A low rumble of a guttural groan startled her into hyper alertness. She ran to a McDonald’s just off the highway and shimmied through the already broken glass door. Ducking under a table, she watched out the window as several men walked through town dragging something in a blanket behind them. They stopped near the gas station across the street.
She fought the part of her that wanted to jump out and greet them. Peering through the window, she noticed the men did not look quite right. There was something strange about them. They didn’t have cancerous growths on their bodies, like in textbooks about radiation poisoning. Yet there was something distinctly wrong with them.
Their skin seemed to glow green, and their faces looked gaunt, as if they’d been starving. Their movements were jerky and awkward. One of the men dropped the load and started to pull it out of the blanket. The distinct form of a human hand emerged from within. The man who had stopped bit into the soft tissue of the hand, ripping away the flesh with his teeth. Blood dripped down the man’s chin, and Cassie felt her stomach contract. Terror bubbled in her throat.