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About the Author
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Seeking Eden
Megan Hart
Chaos Edition, published March 2012
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Copyright 2003 Megan Hart
Chaos Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you’
re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
-1-
“There was no apocalypse. Just a slowing down.”
The peddler’s words rang in Tobin Winter’s head as he walked his bike slowly through the rubble. What he knew of the apocalypse he'd gathered from old television shows and movies he'd watched on Old Pa's ancient eTablet before the batteries had finally died, leaving nothing but a frowning icon struck through by a lightning bolt and a blank screen. From reading books he'd found in the library's science-fiction section. From stories Old Pa and Old Ma had told him about how things "used to be."
This expanse of cracked pavement with its rusting hulks of cars and trucks still parked in neat rows, along with the weeds growing up in their wheel-wells, sure looked like an apocalypse to him. Like some giant hand had reached down and taken up all the people, leaving only inanimate objects behind.
This was different than Eastport, which had been as empty as this wide stretch of buckled concrete but had never felt as abandoned. Nor had any of the empty towns he'd passed through along the way. All of them had shown evidence of human occupation at one point or another, even if it was something as simple as a ring of charred wood showing where a fire had burned, or the cleared-out shop windows proving that people had picked them clean.
It was different, too, than the tiny communities through which he'd edged, uncertain enough to be cautious and with Old Pa's warnings about other folks ringing in his memories. People could be conversation, they could be trade, they could be lots of things. They could be danger, too. They must've thought the same about him, because fires winked out and doors closed the few times he'd ventured into a small town, searching for any sort of supplies to supplement what he'd taken with him. He’d taken the hint. If he wanted company, and he did, he wasn’t going to find it there.
He’d spent two weeks on the road, one full week picking his way along battered and sometimes completely overgrown local roads before reaching the nearest entrance to the Transcontinental Highway. A full day climbing the crumbling ramp, hauling his bike and gear along with him. Another week since then traveling along the road that had once connected Maine to Delaware.
He’d seen other big buildings from the Transcon, but they’d all been broken down and mostly destroyed, either by time or human interference or both. Nothing to attract him from leaving the high-rising concrete highway that bypassed everything below it. But then he’d spied this place, white walls shining in the late spring sunshine. Curiosity, if nothing else, had made him turn the tape-patched handlebars of his ancient and rusting bike toward it. A convenient exit ramp, curving and full of potholes but still sound enough to take his weight, had led him straight to it. Faded letters on the building's side said WAREHOUSE. It easily stretched several miles in each direction. The asphalt lot surrounding it looked bigger than Moose Island and all of Eastport’s buildings put together. The immense structure looming up in front of him now was definitely abandoned but showed no evidence of destruction other than normal wear and tear from the elements.
Tobin shivered, not from the cool breeze, but in anticipation. He’d been avoiding buildings, wary of what might be inside them or of structural damage that could make them dangerous. He should probably head back up the ramp, get back on the Transcon. Keep going. He had enough food and water to last him another few days, and by then he might find another town or a rest stop that hadn’t been fully plundered.
Or, he might not.
Tobin studied the parking lot again. No sign of movement. No sign of life, not human life anyway. The big glass doors in the front were stuck open. Grass grew in their tracks.
He stepped through them and into paradise.
There was more stuff in that building than Tobin had ever seen in his entire life. Furniture, most of it springing stuffing but some of it intact. Glass cases, many still unbroken, filled with jewelry and eyeglasses. Televisions and computers, their monitors forever blank. Batteries still in their plastic wrapping lined shelves reaching all the way to the ceiling.
Skylights let in enough sun for him to see the length of the store, and back there was more of the same. And food! Glorious cans and jars and boxes of it. Some were opened, crumbs and fluids leaking out to stain the concrete floor, but most of it, an incredible amount of it, looked untouched. He ran toward it like a child, incautious.
If he believed in a god, Tobin would’ve fallen to his knees right there and offered thanks. As it was he fell to his knees and began scooping up armfuls of packages. He checked only haphazardly for signs of spoilage, dents or bulges, mold. Years of lessons about food poisoning flew out of his head, and he gorged himself until he was fuller than he’d ever been. He ate things he'd privately thought to be as much fiction as the stories in which they’d appeared. Things with names like Oreo and Hershey’s, cookies and candies of indescribable sweetness. Old Ma had spoken longingly of white sugar, soft white flour, sweet butter and something she called pizza delivery. All things of the past, gone for many years when nobody was left to cross the causeway to Moose Island and bring them to Eastport, or to make them at all.
Tobin ate until sickness forced him to stop. Then, again ignoring every safety rule Old Pa had ever taught him, he passed out in a pile of torn paper and gutted cans. He slept hard and woke, stomach still bulging, teeth and tongue coated with sticky sweetness. After resting for a while, he explored some more. He found an aisle marked “camping goods” and stopped, mouth hanging open. It was only when he tasted salt, the flavor bitter after so much sweetness, that he realized he was crying.
He’d started his journey on a battered bike with a faded quilt rolled up and tied with fishing line on his back, his last pair of socks on his feet, and a loaf of bread and a hunk of smelly goat cheese bound in a square of fabric. Before reaching the Transcon he’d spent hours peddling along roads in various stages of disrepair, some so bad he’d had to get off the bike and walk it around rusting ca
r wrecks and potholes deep enough to break a leg. He’d slept, shivering, in roadside grass and washed his face with water he dipped from puddles.
Now, he stood in front of piles of unused gear, dusty but in perfect condition. It was too much. Tobin sat down on the cold concrete floor and put his hands in his face and cried until he thought he might throw up.
After awhile the tears stopped, leaving him drained. For the first time since the peddler had visited, then left him, Tobin felt as though his journey might succeed. He’d found enough to set him on his way, at least. Plenty of food. New clothes. New gear. It was a far cry from the poverty he’d known in Eastport, though he hadn’t thought of himself as poor until he entered this building. He'd simply never known there to be such wealth in the world.
For Tobin, as it had been for Old Ma, Old Pa, Auntie Heather and Auntie Francie, life meant constantly making do. When your socks wore through, you patched them, because there were no more to be had. Not at either of the two small stores, which had been empty since before Tobin’s birth. Not in any of the empty houses, either, because anything of use had been stripped from them just as long ago. When Tobin outgrew his clothes, new ones came from old ones, rolled and pinned to fit until he grew into them and then out again.
Food came from the ever-shrinking store of cans in the community storeroom, an old building Old Pa had scornfully referred to as a “church,” or it grew in small garden patches. Aunties Heather and Francie had been proud of their gardens, always producing cabbages bigger than Tobin’s head and cucumbers as long and thick as his arm. After Auntie Heather fell and broke her hip, dying soon after, Auntie Francie had never been able to make the earth yield such bounty. She said it was because the garden missed Heather too much. After she died of a fever when Tobin was ten, the three who were left tended the plots haphazardly.
Old Ma and Old Pa, who'd been ancient and wrinkled as long as Tobin could remember, kept chickens and a few goats. Old Pa made cheese and leather from the goats, and the chickens provided eggs, feathers and an occasional meal. Old Ma made bread and cake from some of the sea grass and the small crop of potatoes they managed each year. There was always plenty of fish and seafood. They’d never gone hungry, and if sometimes their mouths cried out for something sweet to take away the bitter taste of the sea grass bread, Old Ma doled out a few drops of precious honey to quell their appetites. What couldn’t be grown or salvaged from stored goods had to come from one of the rare peddlers who sometimes made their way across the causeway.
The peddlers men and women who usually traveled solo but sometimes in small groups, could be counted on to bring all manner of wonderful things. Kitchen tools. Cans of exotic and interesting delicacies, like “creamed corn” and “frijoles negros.” Sometimes clothing, never new but usually in decent shape.
Nothing like what was in this place.
He found a soft, warm sleeping bag that rolled into a ball so small and light it made his faded quilt seem like a boulder. He picked out a lantern, snapping the battery to start the power flowing. These batteries, fully charged, could likely last for the rest of Tobin’s life, but he took another set just in case. The lantern itself, small enough to fit into his hand, was more powerful than the ones back home in which the batteries had been fading for years with no replacements available. It, too, folded up compactly so he could carry it in the backpack he found on the next shelf. A small camping stove was next, also powered by the super-charged long-life batteries that had once run everything from televisions to automobiles. Tobin tucked that into the backpack without snapping the batteries into life. Until he did that, they were dormant and would last forever. A small set of collapsible dishes and utensils also went into the backpack. Tobin hefted the weight. He could ride for hours with all this on his back and hardly notice, it was so light. He found a large canteen, which could be battery powered to keep the contents cool or hot, as desired.
The next row of the store outfitted him with new shoes, deliciously unworn, and socks. Greedily, Tobin took a dozen pairs of the soft, cushiony socks and stuffed them in the pack. He’d never worn a pair of socks or shoes that had not first fit the feet of at least a dozen other people before him.
New pants, new shirt. A lightweight coat that would keep the sun, wind and rain from his back. A hat to shield his head. Best and most useful of all, a large book of maps that would guide him on his way. He flipped through them quickly, amazed at the size of the world. California, once just a fairy tale land, became real. And far away, much farther than he’d ever imagined.
The knowledge sobered him. Looking around at the wealth, Tobin faltered. Did he have to go to California? He could live like a king here until he died. He didn’t have to risk his life to find a place that might no longer even exist.
But he’d still be alone. The lack of damage inside this building and the abundance of goods made it obvious that few people passed through here. Tobin thought of the babies the peddler had promised and knew he would not stay. An hour later he was back on the road, riding a new bike and carrying new supplies, but with an old purpose.
“New York City,” the peddler had said. “That’s where you’ll find most of the folks left here in the East. Sure, there’s some in Boston and Hartford, but New York City’s where most people went. Likely you’ll find someone to go along with you out to California, if you want someone.”
Oh, he wanted someone.
So Tobin packed up all his new gear and got back on the Transcon. According to his new maps, he was maybe a week’s ride from New York City. There, he’d find what he was looking for -- and if not, he’
d just keep going.
-2-
Elanna loved the rooftop gardens. She loved the smell of the earth and growing things and the feel of young seedlings against her fingers as she plucked out the weeds threatening their growth. Working in the greenhouses and garden beds gave her a sense of peace she usually felt only when nursing one of her babies.
Today she’d spent hours in the honey house, cleaning the hives and tending the flowers forced into the early bloom necessary to keep the bees producing. The constant humming from the hives had hypnotized her into forgetting the passage of time. It felt good to work with her hands and distance her mind.
It wasn’t until she glanced up and saw that the morning light had become slanting, late afternoon sun that she realized she’d been there all day. She didn’t want to leave, but she did have other duties. Appointments to prepare for and keep.
She rinsed her hands in the basin by the door to the honey house and went out onto the rooftop. She shivered in the cooler air. The cooing, fluttering pigeons scattered out of her way as she passed the dovecote, but she didn’t have time to stop and feed them today. She didn’t even pause to peek into the small row of cages where the chattering, bushy tailed squirrels romped up and down the special wooden ramps and ladders built to keep them happy in place of the trees they’d normally occupy.
“Not going to help clean out the veal pens today?” Gideon asked as she passed him.
“I’m sorry,” Elanna said. “I ran out of time. I have to get back…”
“Deigeh nisht, Elanna. Don’t worry about it,” the old man replied in Yiddish and flapped his hands at her. “You’ve done enough today. Gai avek!”
Go away. She could do that. Elanna waved and headed for the heavy metal door that led to the stairwell. She reached for the lantern she’d left waiting for her and twisted the knob. The light flickered slowly into life, barely illuminating the dark stairs. She fiddled with the knob some more, without real hope. The batteries on this lamp were almost dead. She’d have to get another from the storerooms.
She didn’t need the light, really. She’d been up and down these stairs so many times she knew exactly which ones were cracked or hazardous. Elanna took the stairs two at a time, thinking of all the things she still needed to do before her first appointment. She hated rushing, but her time spent in the gardens was worth it.
How nice i
t would be, she thought as she rounded another landing, to simply get in a box, push a button, and ride all the way up and down the way people used to. No use in wishing for what would never be. It was better to concentrate on navigating the old and crumbling stairs without falling.
She made it to the last landing and burst out into the old lobby in less time than she’d expected. Intent on getting back to the Main Hall, she didn’t even notice Job until he stepped out of the shadows to confront her.
“Getting your hands dirty again?”
Without stopping or turning, Elanna answered curtly, “Yes.”
“C’mon, Elanna.” Job caught up to her as she headed for the door to the street. “Don’t be like that.”
“Like what?” She navigated the series of tall columns dividing the room.
“You know.” Job stretched his gait to catch up to her. For a minute, until he reached her, he had to take two steps to every one of hers. “Not so friendly.”
“Watch out for the pits,” she tossed back to him, stepping around one of the deepest ones. The carpet had long ago rotted away, exposing the buckled concrete that could easily trip the unwary.
“Damn it, Elanna!” Job yelled, sounding really annoyed now. “Wait up!”