Twenty
Duncan slept through the parties celebrating Jim’s return and his and the girl’s arrival, and for two more days afterwards. He slept hard and dreamed. He was running down a hallway, surrounded by armed men, while fireballs and lightning bolts thundered around him. He didn’t know where he was, in the dream, but he knew that he was being chased and his life, along with everyone else on the planet. In the dream, a nightmare really, he was frightened and exhausted, afraid for his life. He felt the rush of a lightning bolt by his ear, singing his hair, and heard the rattle of a machine gun returning fire.
The dreams continued to be dark and frightening. He dreamt of his parents back in New Dallas plunging to the earth below as the magic holding the city aloft failed. He dreamt of the Centaurs at war again, seeing them in the streets of Shreveport, laying waste to the town and its residents. He dreamt of the Creeping Death eating him, starting at his toes and crawling slowly up his legs and torso. He finally awoke, screaming, as the Creeping Death made its way up his face and down into his throat.
“Are you okay?”
Jessica was starkly different than she’d been at the camp. The dirt and grime was gone from her face and skin and she wore a clean, though very old, dress. Her bright red hair was tied back behind her head and the puffy bruise was gone from around her eye. She smiled at him and he was relieved to wake up to her at his bedside.
“I think so. How long have I slept?” Duncan asked.
“Two, almost three days. Jim said you needed it, that you were exhausted from everything. They put all of us to work, but I talked them into letting my job, for now, to be to watch over you.”
“That was very sweet of you.” He felt awkward telling her that she was sweet, but she smiled brightly in return. There was something there, between the two of them, that he’d never experienced, not even with Marissa, his longtime friend. She was something very special.
“I was worried about you. After everything that happened to us, and then you and Jim rescuing us…I could bear to see something happen to you. I know it’s silly. I just met you, but…” She left unsaid what appeared to be the same thing he was thinking.
“I didn’t actually have anything to do with the rescue,” Duncan admitted. “I was just sort of there. Jim was…he’s like a lightning bolt.”
He stood and went to the large walk-through window. They were on the third story of a large building overlooking a quaint, plant-filled street packed with people. He heard laughing and singing, and watched, transfixed, as they pushed carts laden with vegetables and fruits and led animals up and down—cows, horses, goats, and chickens. The people were motivated and busy, but they were happily chatting away. Children played games he didn’t understand with round balls in the street, kicking them back and forth. The game didn’t resemble any of the violent games he’d seen the boys of New Dallas playing, and he couldn’t fathom the point.
“You were there, that’s enough,” Jessica said, joining him and looking out over the town. “It’s pretty amazing, isn’t it?”
“Your home wasn’t like this?”
“Well, it was sort of like this, before the Creeping Death. Hackberry wasn’t nearly as big, of course, but we had our own gardens and stock animals and stuff. There weren’t nearly as many people, and we had boats, which saved us for awhile. I remember growing up seeing the Creeping Death just a half mile from town. It would only move a couple of inches a year, and, though we knew it was out there, it seemed like a problem for years down the road. Everyone always talked about moving, but ever since our people came up from the ground, Hackberry was our home. No one really wanted to leave. We never saw the Magicians and the raiders back then as really a problem.”
“What was it like living underground?”
“I don’t have any idea. We came out a hundred years ago, when my grandmother was a child.”
“You never went back?”
“No, it was a long way from where we lived and no one saw the point.”
“You said you lived with the Creeping Death.”
“I don’t know that you could call it living, but we survived. It sped and moved over the town in the span of a month, killing off our gardens and even creeping into the water. We’d have to go out farther and farther every day to find the fish, but we got by. I spent most of every day cleaning the ash and dust from the house. People got sick breathing it, a baby even died, but we survived.”
Duncan couldn’t imagine the horror of living in the Creeping Death, trying to eke out some existence. It wasn’t that everything was dead, so much, as the areas affected by the plague were absolutely devoid of any life.
“And then the raiders came,” Duncan finished for her.
“They were always out there, I guess. They lived on what the Mayor called ‘old oil platforms’. I don’t really know what they are, but I’ve seen them a few times. They’re just these big, rusted hulks sticking up out of the water. There were hundreds of them, but the raiders came from just a few. They came in like a storm, showing no mercy.”
“You lost family,” Duncan said, and she nodded and they left it at that.
They watched the people go about their business in the streets in silence for a while and Duncan tried to put his finger on the way he felt. He finally decided it was a combination of being safe and being with Jessica. Things here, in Shreveport, were perfect, and if he didn’t know what was going on outside the serene city, he could stay here forever.
“We’ve both been assigned to Jim’s shop, once you’re able to work,” Jessica told him. “I don’t know quite what that means, to be honest.”
“I have an idea,” Duncan told her and was suddenly excited. Jim had already showed him an affinity for ancient technology and things powered by science. He’d seen him fly in the helicopter and drive the Jeep. What other sorts of wonders did he have access to? He could only imagine there being things in Jim’s shop that made his attempts at what the Lord Probate had called science look like children’s play.
“Let’s go. I can’t wait to see this,” he said excitedly.
“You’re sure? You haven’t even eaten breakfast yet. You have to be hungry.”
“There’s food in the streets, it looks like. We can eat on the way.”
Jessica smiled and nodded, sharing in his excitement, though she didn’t know why. Like him, she enjoyed his company. They headed out of the room and down the stairs.