Afterland (44 page)

I wonder why they keep the lights on anyway. It’s not like anybody lives here. Most likely, nobody ever walks these streets. Perhaps a lone CGB member. But maybe they keep them on as a tribute to the city that once was, not a city that now is. I’ve never thought of the CGB to be sentimental, but they are human too, I remind myself. They had pasts too. Pasts in big cities where the streetlights always hummed at night and the future was golden.

We keep walking. I never realized that lights hummed so loudly.

              “There,” Mike whispers suddenly. “See that drop? That’s it.” We inch closer, a new spring of urgency in our steps.

              The crater is surrounded by bushes. We all crouch behind a section of them and look. The base is a large metal structure. It is oddly beautiful. It gleams with a strange light that looks deceptively inviting. At the front stand two guards. They are slumped against the wall and look more asleep than awake. But they still pose a threat. Mike nods at Emily and Emily pulls out her crossbow. She is the only one of us who is completely at peace with the notion of taking somebody’s life.

Two bolts whiz through the air in rapid succession. In two seconds, both of the guards lie on the ground, dead. Just like that. Two people gone without making a sound.

Mike pulls his dark glasses down, his silent battle cry.

“All right, gang,” he begins, “let’
s
–
” He is cut off mid sentence by a shout.

All of us freeze.

Oh no…
Somebody has come out and noticed the fallen guards. After a moment of frozen horror, the figure reacts.

“Ben!” he calls. “Ben! Get your ass out here! We have an emergency!”

His shouts echo in the crater and rebound to us, so that we hear every word with crystal clarity. All of the blood drains out of my face. Every syllable he says is another step closer to failure.

The man who I assume is Ben hobbles out of the door. He walks with a limp and looks slightly drunk, a fact that is supported by the half empty bottle in his hand.

“Oh will you shut up,” he begins. His speech is slurred. “If this is another false alarm, I swear to Go
d
–
” he stops when he sees the bodies. “Holy shit!” He yells, sobering up. “We’re under attack! Where are those bastards? They couldn’t have gotten far…”

He begins scanning the edges of the crater. None of us dare to breath. He can’t see us all the way here, I assure myself. We’re behind bushes and camouflaged. There’s no way he can see us.

“There!”

I was wrong.

“At the hill!”

Ben and the other man pull the machine guns off of the guards’ dead bodies and begin shooting in our direction. We drop all sense of cover and begin to run. The bullets don’t reach us yet, but they will if we don’t move soon. I take several steps out of the bushes, but a strange magnetism pulls my gaze back towards the tower. Time slows for me. I look at the rest of the Rebellion and at the CGB headquarters. I look at Nathan with the main explosive gripped tightly in his hand. I look back at the building downhill and at the two men running towards us. The bullets practically skim our heels. They could reach us at any moment. People could die. My friends could die.

I throw the building one final glance.

We’ve come too far, I decide.

I can’t give up on this, not now.

“Nathan, give me the bomb!”

“What?”

“Give it to me, now!” I see shock cover his eyes as he realizes what I am about to do.

“Molly, no, wait!” He shouts, but I rip the explosive out of his hands and turn around. He tries to pull me back, but he doesn’t make it in time. His fingers grasp empty air.

I begin to run downhill. The two men see me.

“Her, get her!”

I pull out my gun and fire two shots, not stopping to see if they hit. I hear two shouts and two thuds, so I assume that I made it. I think somebody is calling my name, but it could just be the wind rushing through my ears.

My legs push me forward in a surge of adrenaline. I’ve never run this fast, never felt this strong. The only thing I see is the door. All I have to do is make it inside, set off the bomb, and get out before it explodes.

I run up to the door and without missing a beat, take an access card hanging from one of the dead guard’s waists, smacking it into the sensor. The door opens. I run inside. I don’t know what I’m counting on, but so far, nothing’s gone wrong. I press against the wall and click the timer on the bomb.

Two minutes.

Just enough time for me to get out.

And then it will all be over.

I turn around to leave, but my path is blocked by the barrel of a gun. I freeze, bomb still in hand. The time is ticking down.

1:57….1:56...1:55…

“Well, well,” the voice holding the gun says. It’s an unfamiliar male voice. “Look who’s trying to stir up trouble.” I stand still. After a moment, several more people rush in, one of them Ben. I see that his right shoulder is bleeding, but he holds his gun with his remaining good arm.

“You tried to kill me,” he says. “And now, I’m going to kill you.”

“Kill me and this place goes up,” I say. I am surprised at how steady my voice sounds. The three guns pointed at me mean nothing when I set a two minute countdown to my own death. And even that seems insignificant now.

“Oh?” the man says.

“See this? This is a bomb. See the count? It goes off in one minute and thirty seconds. And then this place blows.” I feel very calm too. I’m not at all fazed by the certainty of my impending death.

“And if we don’t kill you?”

“I can turn it off.”

“Then turn it off.”

“No.”

“No?”

“No.”

“You die if you don’t turn it off.”

“I know.” I stare Ben straight in the eye. “You have one minute.”

“Goddamit,” Ben shakes his head. “Alright, you two, evacuate the building. Get as far away from here as possible. Go. Go! Hurry!”

The two men run off, I assume to get anybody else who is still in the building. Ben turns to me. I watch the timer count down. It’s at fifty seconds.

“Any last words?” he asks.

“I don’t regret this.”

“Good. Enjoy your last seconds.” Then he shoots me in the leg. I try to suppress the urge to cry out, but the pain is too sharp and too sudden and the scream escapes me. I collapse to my knees and watch Ben’s feet run away. I gasp for air as pain shoots up my leg. I begin to shake, still clutching the bomb tightly. Part of me is oddly relieved that nobody else will go up with the building. They will make it.

But I will not.

All the calmness I had before disappears and I am filled with explosive panic. I am rapidly filled with desperation to live, with the insuppressible desire to live, to survive, to see a tomorrow. Every second, every breath is a golden moment.

I want to live.

That’s all I can think.

I don’t want to die. I want to live.

I watch blood flow out of  my leg in a stream, collecting in a puddle around my quivering palms and I know that I want to live.

Twenty seconds.

I want to live. More than anything in the world, I want to live. I haven’t lived enough. I haven’t loved enough, hated enough, done enough. I try to shout something, anything, to make my last mark on the world, but all that comes out is a gasp.

I want to live.

There is so much I haven’t done, so much I haven’t seen, so much I haven’t said. I don’t have enough regrets, enough memories, enough marks, enough scars, enough words, enough breaths.

I want to live.

I need to live.

For the first time, I see the true value of life and I want to live. I’m ready to live like never before, in colors more vivid. I’m ready to live a life where every breath has meaning.

              My body shakes from the life leaking out of me.

I want to live.

Please, I want to live.

Five seconds.

In a last, desperate attempt to save myself, I let go of the bomb and throw it into the air. It curves slowly above me then explodes mid arch. And then, everything goes dark.

CHAPTER 31

I wake up somewhere dark and warm. I don’t feel pain, but there is a dull ache all over my body that is particularly sharp in my leg and arm. After I regain feeling in my fingers, I move them a little, groping around at my surroundings.

Bedsheets. A mattress.

A spark of fear jolts through me. Where am I? I clearly remember what happened.

And I should be dead.

Why am I not dead?

Could it be that I survived?

It is dark, so I can’t see where I am or if I’m alone. I see two options. Either I was taken captive by the CGB and everything failed or...could it be? I’m safe back at camp and we succeeded. I am afraid to find out for a moment, but my curiosity bests my fear. I try to call out. My voice is weak and sounds more like a rasp than anything else.

“H-hello?”

“Molly!”

“Nathan...is that….is that you?” His voice is full of relief. I try to prop myself up, but it sends jolts of pain through my back. “Nathan, where are you? I can’t see you.”

“I’m right here. Shh, don’t move. I’m getting a light.” I see a spark and then the light of a candle. I look around. We are in a tent and I am lying on a cot. It’s the infirmary, I think.

“Nathan…”

“I’m right here,” he says pulling a chair up to my cot. “This is the infirmary.”

I laugh.

“And I’m alive?”

“Yes, you’re alive.”

I laugh again. A thousand emotions flood through me. These are all the motions I was afraid I would never feel, but now I have a chance to live them all. I don’t even ask how it’s possible that I survived ground zero. I can find out later. The important thing is that I made it. I made it.

I made it.

For now, I just revel in the miracle of my survival.

I’m alive. I have the chance to live an entire life. I’m going to live the most beautiful, wonderful life, and it begins today, and all I can do is laugh. I repeat the words again.

“I’m alive,” I laugh. “I survived. I can’t believe it, I survived.”

“Yes.”

“And the base?”

“Gone.”

“Everyone else?”

“Is safe.”

I laugh again.

“So we won.”

Nathan smiles.

“Yes, we won.”

“Mh,” I say. I’m suddenly extremely tired again. I look at my arm, trying to locate the pain. I see that it is bandaged. I must have been hit by shrapnel. I look back at Nathan and feel something I’ve never felt before, stirring deep inside my stomach. It’s a strange mix of extreme happiness that he’s here now and worry for...something. I look into his eyes and all my insides boil. I stretch out my good hand and he takes it. I want to tell him everything. I want him to know how I feel.

I want him to know that I love him,

For the first time in my life I love somebody and it’s him, but all I can say is, “Nathan...you look terrible. When’s the last time you slept?”

“Three days ago.”

“
Three days ago?
Are you nuts? You have to get some sleep.
Now.
”

“You’ve been out for three days,” he explains. “I’ve been...Molly, you scared me to death. Never do that again, you promise? Never.” His eyes begin to tear up. “I thought you were dead. I thought I would never see you again. I thought…”

I can’t take it any longer and I can’t bear to see him cry. I take my other arm, even though it sends a jolt of pain through my shoulder,  and pull him toward me in a kiss. It’s the only way I can think of that will get him to shut up. But it feels so natural.

His right hand ends up on the back of my head, our other hands still locked together. I don’t feel pain anymore, only him. A passion boils deep inside of me, as if it has been waiting all this time to be fed. The entire world disappears until it is only us. Only me and him, here, safe together.

The places where our bodies meet tingle with energy. My mind explodes with sparks. I wrap my arm tighter around his neck. Nathan presses me tightly to himself. I run my hand over the muscles on the back of his neck, the soft hair on his head, the coarse stubble on his cheeks.

              I survived death. And Nathan stayed here by my side waiting for me to come back to life.