Author’s Note: I finished the first chapter at long last! Tee hee. Took me a while… it’s a bit long. Sorry. I was going to split it up, but I couldn’t find a good middle point. So you get it all in one lump sum. So anyway. Yeah. Here it is! Please leave reviews! I always take critism and compliments!

Lordess

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Chapter 1: Recap -

Shout Across the World, the End is Near the End is Near,

Two Horsemen, Come and Gone, Third Horseman Here.

I was told that in the Christian religion (one of the formerly dominant religions on Earth) that God created the universe in seven days. The first two humans, Adam and Eve, left the Garden of Eden and began living and evolving on Earth, sin and chaos close behind them.

It is also said in their bible that the third world war will be the end of humanity. That wasn’t entirely true, but World War III definitely started humanity’s decline.

I wasn’t alive during World War III, but I have heard many a fearful things about it. No one used nuclear weapons (those were disposed of long ago), instead a chemical named ‘morticain’ was used. Morticain is a deadly chemical that kills a person by rotting them from the inside out. Once exposed, the person has 48 hours to live, but probably will die from shock before then.

Morticain, thankfully, was not used too often. It really didn’t have too much time during the war to make as great of an impact as it could have. This is probably because the war lasted only three months. On April 25, 3000, the third month anniversary of the start of the war, one of the countries released a virus through the world wide web causing a crash in technology. There was always a dispute over who really did it, but knowing the offender didn’t change the results. They were devastating.

In the year 3000, everything was reliant on the internet. You couldn’t start your car without the internet. Clocks, stoves, grocery stores, research, banks; all were run by it. Life itself revolved around it. So as the virus caused it to crash, everything crashed with it. This included the war. What followed was a 30 year depression. It took people that long to start rebuilding what they had lost. Many died of starvation, but many more survived and began a new world.

Then the second post-war disaster hit in the form of disease. Morticain remains had been found and accidentally released. All those within a thirty mile radius of the morticain blast were killed by it. Winds swept the morticain further, however, and many more in the surrounding areas began to die. The plague (which came to be known as the Morbid Death because of the gruesome effects it had on the body) remained out of control for eleven years. Science began to strongly resurface and an effective cure and reversal of the Morbid Death was found. It took a few more years after that to completely wipe out any traces of mortician, but it was finally defeated.

Humanity began to learn from its mistakes.

On August 27, 3065, a great celebration was held all across the world. At 9 a.m. in the land that was once known as Italy, the greatest treaty of all time was signed. It was a treaty enacting the start of a council of leaders. It was the first time in history that humanity, all of humanity, was united under one government. This council was known as the S.U.W.C., or the Standing United World Council. Under this council, humanity found peace and, in our eyes at least, was able to return to Christianity’s Garden of Eden.

I was born on September 31, 3197, many years after the S.U.W.C. had been formed. Life in between had grown and expanded. People became less worried about survival and competition and turned their eyes to things far more important. Rules were strict, but everyone knew the rewards of following them, and did so. Machines were developed to work efficiently enough so pollution was downsized. Huge habitats were restored or created to care for the endangered species of the planet. Science bloomed and many diseases were conquered. Then, the only things close to extinction were chaos and weaponry.

Perhaps it was that loss of our fighting spirit that caused the real downfall in the year 3203. I remember that day, as all those who survived it do. I was at a bus stop when it happened. My older sister and I were waiting for the bus to go to mom’s house. Dad wasn’t there, he was busy at work that day, but he had made sure to go late enough so that he could give us both big hugs and wish us well. Mom and Dad weren’t divorced, but still lived in separate houses. It didn’t make it any less uncomfortable, even if they thought it did.

Rhea, my sister, was eight at the time and a regular know it all. She had gotten quite an aptitude for talking and laughing, always smiling. She had been keeping balance on the curb, humming to herself while I was sitting on the bench, still drowsy from sleep.

I had been watching her lazily, my eyes drooping a bit. She just stopped walking suddenly, one of her feet landing on the street. Her eyes looked upward, above the towering buildings in the distance. She didn’t move. Curious, I followed her gaze and I saw them. The Keilics.

The next few moments were filled with chaos and disruption. There were many explosions from the Keilic’s weaponry firing upon us. Humanity as a whole panicked. We had no weaponry to fight back with. We had no defenses to keep us safe. So those of us who survived the initial attack ran. The rest of what I remember of those moments was running and hiding.

Those moments turned into hours. Days. Months. Years. The entire force that had come to invade Earth had all landed by the start of the second day. That’s when the round up began. The blue skinned warriors and their misshapen slaves were released upon the grounds of Earth to capture the living humans. Millions of people were captured and enslaved. My sister and I managed to hide, with a small group of others, and we watched as the slaves were forced to build a large, central base for the Keilics that stretched a mile wide.

With the completion of the base, huge domes were erected and the slaves were forced into them, the door swiftly locked behind, only to be opened by a Keilic password. Inside these domes, humanity was forced to work; farming, crafting, or aiding to whatever need the aliens had. All those inside were tattooed with a barcode-like symbol to mark them and recognize them by. Many became experiments and lab rats of Keilic scientists.

After the domes were completed and stable, the Keilics sought a way to destroy the remaining stragglers who had not been captured. Into the air they released a mixture of toxins they called Fweterhin. It tainted the sky red and everything changed after that. Three days after Fweterhin was released, one of the survivors in our group died.

By the time I had reached about eight years old (there was no way of telling time any more, just vague estimations), half of our already small group had died from Fweterhin exposure. The rest were sick, growing closer to death with each passing day. Rhea and I didn’t seem affected by the toxins. At first, the older people saw it as a good sign, that perhaps things weren’t as bad as they at first seemed. That warmth changed into suspicion.

They grew infuriated with us, claiming us spies of the Keilics. “So many have already died from this sickness. We die more by the minute and yet you two remain so healthy!” I remember one woman screaming at us. She had been a mother of three. One had been killed in the initial attack, another taken prisoner, and the third recently killed by the Fweterhin toxin. I felt so sad for her, even as her and the others of the remaining group chased Rhea and I away.

The next few years were spent traveling. Rhea and I were both surprised at the number of people who had actually survived both the attack and the Keilic collections. The natural instincts of the survival of man had apparently stayed with us even after years with the pampering of technology. Some of us were learning to stay safe and live. However, wherever we went, we saw the deadly effects of Fweterhin all around.

Rhea and I refused to say in one place too long. We traveled from surviving group to surviving group, with sometimes months in between times of contact with other humans. We were so afraid of being driven out again that we made it a point to keep moving as often as our bodies would let us.

Death didn’t always hang over our heads however. Many a times we saw places that were, relatively speaking, very happy, where death was but a distant fear. Places like these made Rhea and I wish to stop traveling, but then we would see someone start to get sick and our own fears would over take our comforts, forcing us to move on.

Years passed us by like fleeting nightmares. The Keilics would send occasional waves of soldiers on search and destroy missions for survivors. Rhea and I were able to avoid them, thankfully enough. We watched as their forces established complete and unquestionable dominance of Earth. The red skies were soon covered by darker red clouds.

I think it was around ten years after the initial attack that we were found by a small force of Keilics. I don’t remember much of the incident, only a lot of struggling against the blue hands, screaming for Rhea to get away before they caught her. I heard her scream as they got a hold of her too.I struggled madly to be free of these aliens, but to no avail. Their arms were much too strong. My eyes squeezed themselves shut, wishing this to only be a nightmare and for the horrid dream to fade away into reality.

I remember hearing a quick noise, almost like a dart. The arms that held me fell loose and I was dropped to the ground. The limp body of the Keilic slumped over me, black blood slipping out of it’s neck from a small, neatly burned hole. I gasped in surprise and pulled myself out from underneath the creature. I heard more dart sounds and two of the remaining five Keilics dropped to the ground.

The remaining three, one of them still holding Rhea, shouted at each other angrily. I was stunned to hear their speech. Originally, during the invasion, I had heard the Keilics speaking to one another. What I heard now was vastly different. It had English in it now. The Keilics were adapting and learning our language.

I heard them shout something about ‘ambush’ and ‘fire’ and the two empty handed ones pulled out these gun-shaped things and pointed them, ready to shoot. More dart noises sounded and the three remaining Keilics fell to the ground.

Rhea pulled herself free from the alien’s grasp and ran over to me, pulling me into her protective arms. Both our eyes were wide and scared. We looked for the source of the dart-like noises, afraid that we too would be shot. We, however, were not.

Three figures emerged from their hiding places, returning their weaponry to their leg attachments. Our fears resided themselves as the three smiled at us as they approached. They were human. They were here to help. One of the men seemed to smile the widest. He extended a hand towards us in friendship.

“I’m Janus Dawson,” he said, looking very proud. “Welcome to our home.”

Rhea and I were astonished to see humans with weaponry. That was positively unheard of, even with the invasion. We welcomed the idea however, and felt a swell of pride knowing that defenses against the Keilics were strengthening. Janus and the other two, Spencer and Nova, lead my sister and I through the mess of rubble to a large building that, even though was in desperate need of repair, looked like it was from a dream of long ago.

The black haired Janus turned and smiled broadly, stretching his arms to motion towards the building before us. “This is Ronwell High School,” he told us. “Now home to the most welcoming little community of survivors lead by dear Mama Abby.”

The Ronwell-Community was an utter shock to Rhea and I.

There were fifty-seven inhabitants living in the high school, using the inner, center classrooms as bedrooms and the outer classrooms as lookout posts. Never before had we seen a group of people so large. Most groups that the two of us had run into had twelve people at most. Having this many was a mind blowing change.

There were the old, the young, the sick, the healthy. Anyone and everyone. And each had their place and job. Some went looking for food. Some went looking for clothing, warm and otherwise. Some went for bedding. Some for weaponry. Some stayed in the perimeters to keep the place safe. Some scouted the surrounding areas to drive Keilics away. Some cooked, some cleaned, some did nothing but smile. And atop them all, in her unofficial position as leader of this community, was Mama Abby.

Mama Abby’s real name was Abigail Fenrir. She was an elderly woman (probably the eldest there aside from ‘Old Tom’, who was on his last legs anyway) in her sixties. She was short, stout, wrinkled, but kind faced and kind hearted. Her hair, for the most part, was gray and she tied it back into a bun to keep it from her face. The woman was always on the move. Whether it was helping cook, helping coordinate, or helping the sick; she always seemed to be right where she needed.

Somewhere in this rush of business, she managed to see us come in and welcome us to her ‘home’.

Mama Abby insisted we not leave immediately. She actually invited us to stay permanently, but I voiced my argument against it, saying that it was better if Rhea and I leave in a few days time. The elder woman smiled warmly and nodded in understanding.

“I can’t force you to stay,” she said in a tone that sounded like a caring grandmother. “But please stay here for a while. It’s safe here. Spencer, Nova, and Janus are very good at scouting the area and we’ve got many more on constant lookouts for danger. Rest here as long as you like.” She paused, looking between me and my sister. “Who knows, you may change your mind. And if you do, there are plenty of rooms available for you.”

I didn’t realize it then, but Mama Abby knew something that I didn’t. Rhea knew it too, but was even better at hiding it than Mama Abby.

We did stay there for a while. A long while. I watched the Ronwell-Community operate, amazed at it’s efficiency. It wasn’t really organized and definite, but what I noticed (and this was probably the most important part of the stability of the community) was that everyone seemed unified in one thought; we survive, and we do it together.

It was really astonishing to see so many people working together, working for one another, without complaint (aside from joking comments to one another). I hadn’t seen this kind of peace, felt this kind of unity even from the time before the Keilic invasion. It made me feel good.

It made Rhea, apparently, feel good too, for whenever I made as if to tell her we were leaving, she’d beg me to stay even before I got the words out. I could tell that Rhea felt both safe and happy here. I didn’t blame her at all. I was beginning to feel at ease myself.

I think it was three months later when I found out the real reason why Rhea wanted to stay. I remember that a week or so before both Old Tom and a younger girl named Kirby had died, both from Fweterhin exposure. It had sent chills through me to think that Fweterhin and death could come even to this safe place. The entire community was a bit darker in tone, but the unity did not falter. It almost seemed to grow.

Mama Abby stayed optimistic and smiling. Most everybody else tried their best to smile as well. But that day, I remember well, because of horrid expression that hung on the face of Chloe (one of the inner caretakers) as she came to fetch me from my quarters one morning.

“Mama Abby wants to see you,” she said. That expression of hers bothered me. I couldn’t pinpoint it right away, but it nagged me so. I looked over to the bed where Rhea was supposed to be in. She wasn’t there and I assumed that she had gotten up to get a small midnight snack during the night and had just neglected to return. She had been doing that a lot recently.

I followed Chloe out of the room and down the halls. The expression continued to bother me, for it didn’t fade from her face. I followed her into the ‘Nurse’s Office’, where anyone wounded or under-the-weather came to get something from the limited supply of available medicines or sometimes just to rest. Mama Abby was there with a stone serious look, the smile gone. I could see in her eyes, though, thoughts that mimicked Chloe’s expression.

And as I looked at Rhea, sitting on the worn bed, breathing heavily and sweating profusely, I suddenly understood. I understood why my sister didn’t want to travel. I understood why my sister wanted to stay here. I understood the look on Chloe’s face and in Mama Abby’s eyes. I understood what both Mama Abby and my sister had known from the moment we arrived.

The expression was one of pity.

Rhea was beginning to get sick from Fweterhin.

My sister was going to die.

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I woke up to the sound of conversation as it passed by my door. It was one of the few things I couldn’t get used to here. Conversation. Normal talking. I remember the time when my sister and I traveled when no one would talk. The only exchange was of glances. There was always too much fear of being heard by the unwanted to really think of speaking, or making any noise for that matter.

It had been a few years since Rhea and I had made Ronwell our new home. I think I was about 20 then, meaning Rhea was 22. Since then there had been five more additions of people and a loss of three. That made fifty-nine. At least half of them, however, had shown signs of deadly Fweterhin exposure. I was not one of them.

Still, even though I was healthy, I found it hard to get out of bed in the morning. I never slept well, even with a wonderful place such as this. I was always much to worried about Rhea to fall asleep at night and when I finally managed to drift, before I could begin to dream, morning would be upon the Community and I would be forced to awaken.

It was Saturday, as I recalled. Mama Abby had made it a point never to forget what day it was. She had been a secretary before the Keilic’s invasion, making dates, times, punctuality and all around organization very important to her. She had told me privately of how she had hidden out for a few months in an old cellar while the Keilics marched above her and the only way she stayed calm was by keeping track of the day. Continuing to do so just seemed so natural to her.

I pulled myself from the bed and stretched, letting every joint in my body crack as I moved. I grabbed a ribbon (really more of a rag now) from the small desk and used it to pull back my long blonde hair and keep it from my face as I continued about my room.

I adjusted my dark pants and pulled out a shirt from the pile of folded clothes in the corner. The shirt was getting about as old as the ribbon. The search parties hadn’t been able to find any new clothing or cloth, so we all had to continue repairing what we had and hoped it lasted. We hoped strongly that more clothing would be found soon, for winter was on its way. No one had figured out how to turn on the heaters yet, so clothing and fires were all that we had, and wood was running low.

I slid on the old pair of hiking boots that had been recently given to me, since the former wearer had passed away. I barely bothered to lace them up as I grabbed a small bucket with some items inside and exited my room.

It was still very early in the morning. The two people who had passed my door stood at the end of the hallway. It was Tabitha and Ian, the two main Night-Watch guards, probably leaving their posts and heading to their bedrooms to sleep. The two waved at me and I nodded a sleepy reply before heading the opposite way.

“Guy!” Tabitha called. I paused, turning back towards the two again, though I still kept walking backwards. “Mama Abby wants to see you in the kitchen!”

I frowned and arched an eyebrow at this, now stopping my walk. “Why?” I called back. I felt a deep fear that something was wrong with Rhea, but the calm look on Tabitha’s face told me my fears were nonsense.

“Spencer found a straggler last night and brought him in,” Ian replied in his light voice. “Mama Abby wants you to show him the place.”

I rolled my eyes and groaned, but said nothing and continued on my way, switching my routes to take me to the kitchen. I took the stairwell down as quick as I could, jumping the last few steps, before setting a slow, leisurely pace out a pair of double doors and out into the central courtyard.

I never had a main job assigned to me. I realized that many of the people rotated jobs anyway, but most had a specific, main task they did for the majority of the time. Mama Abby had yet to assign one to me. It might have been that she pitied me too much to give me a job, with Rhea ill. It might have been she didn’t think I’d be up to a permanent thing. It might be that she didn’t think I could do anything and just gave me assignments to keep me busy and out of the way.

Anyway and either way, I didn’t have a scheduled work, I just did as I was told when I was told. That included taking over watches every now and then, going out in the search parties, cooking, helping the sick or elderly, and even being the one-man welcoming committee for new arrivals.

I shuddered from the cold morning air and pushed open the doors to the dinning hall, leaving the rising orange sun and the blood red skies. I nodded to the few people who occupied the dinning hall at this hour. More people would come as the day progressed, but for now, just the early birds.

From the large mess hall, I moved through a door on the side that led back behind the serving counters to the kitchen. Mama Abby was waiting there, her and Chloe and a boy preparing breakfast. The new arrival was there too. He was an intimidating sight and I would have fallen over from the shock of him, but refrained out of respect.

I flipped the bucket over and set it down in one quick motion so the open rim rested on the counter, the small items inside made clinks as they fell and hit the counter. I then leaned my arm on the flat bottom and rested there, choosing to dismiss the new arrival for the first few moments. Mama Abby smiled at this, knowing it as my unsocial way around things. She never had said anything against it, and I could tell it highly amused her.

“I figured the grapevine would get you soon,” she said, slicing the potatoes to make hash browns. “You’re a bit later than I expected you, though.”

“Does that mean I actually got some sleep last night?” I asked with a dark sarcasm. Mama Abby merely laughed.

She motioned to the new comer. “Don’t be rude, Guy. Introduce yourself.”

I turned my back to Mama Abby, resting my back against the counter as I took in the new arrival. He was about seven feet tall, if I judged correctly. His skin was exceedingly dark, though it was hard to see though his thick clothing and wild, thick hair. His left arm was pulled across his chest in a sling-like fashion and the other rested lightly atop of it.

“Guy Macaulay,” I stated.

“Quinlan Zeke,” the man replied in an almost frighteningly deep voice.

Feeling that was enough of an introduction, I turned back to Mama Abby. The old woman gave a smile of amusement as I asked, “What’s my agenda for the day?” She didn’t answer right away, sliding the potatoes into her hand and moving over to the stove to drop them into the skillet.

“Your first priority is to show Mr. Zeke around Ronwell and find him a room,” she explained. “Your second priority is to come back here, enjoy a nice breakfast, then bring some over to the infirmary to feed those who can’t come here.”

“And after that?”

“If there’s anything more, I’ll be sure to tell you when the time comes.”

Mama Abby smiled and I gave a thin, forced one in reply. I slipped the bucket around the edge of the counter, pushing the items back into the bucket as it made it’s way upright again. I then turned to Quinlan Zeke and told him, “Follow me.”

He did so, silently, back through the cafeteria and out into the courtyard. I headed the way I had originally wanted to go when I woke up and decided everything else could wait. Important things needed to be done first.

“So where have you been hiding?” I asked the tall man who trailed me.

“Here and there,” he replied.

“And what happened to you arm?”

“Broke it.”

“I figured that much.”

Quinlan paused before speaking again. “I had an encounter with the Keilics,” he said. “It was a while ago. Only one of them. He twisted my arm until it snapped.”

“What happened to him?”

“I crushed his skull into the concrete.”

That caught my full attention. I stopped, turning so I could face him. He stopped as well. My eyes narrowed as I studied him. He could be lying. He could be exaggerating. Which was it? From his expression, neither fit just right. It looked as if he were telling the truth. To clarify, I asked him to repeat what he had just said.

“I crushed his skull into the concrete.”

My jaw twisted itself as I thought. “That’s what I thought you said,” I muttered. I didn’t think this man was lying, but what he said couldn’t be true. It just wasn’t feasible. I pushed off the subject and moved through the double doors into the gym. Quinlan followed.

“This is the gym,” I said as I walked quickly through the empty, indoor basketball court. One of the basketball hoops had fallen down long ago, leaving an empty space in between. Three others were all electronically managed and, without electricity, were stuck in their reclined position. The last one, one at the end, was the only one down and available for us to use. “Basketball court here, in case you couldn’t tell-”

He interrupted in a quick, but kind tone. “I could, thank you.”

I smirked a little, unseen by him. I could sense the small amount of either sarcasm or exasperation in his voice. He definitely would be an interesting character to have around. Especially if what he said about the Keilic he killed was true.

I continued through another set of double doors into a long hallway. I waited till Quinlan entered the hallway before continuing. “Those doors are the men’s locker and shower rooms,” I said, pointing to the correct direction. “We don’t really use the lockers for personal use, because all the locks don’t work since we can’t get the electricity work around here. Down there are the women’s locker and shower rooms, not that you’ll need to know that.”

I pointed to the hallway that was connected to this one. “Down that hallway to the right are the weight rooms.” I waited until Quinlan gave his nod of understanding before I moved straight towards the men’s locker and shower rooms. Quinlan watched me move, but did not follow.

“Isn’t there more for you to show me?” he asked, wondering if this was the end of his little tour.

“Yes, but later,” I replied, holding the door opening. I gave a dark smirk. “But do you really want to keep that hair on your head longer than you have to?”

His eyes glared out from under the nest of hair on his head. He gave a small grunt of agreement and followed me into the locker room. I let the door shut behind and moved towards the row of lockers on the far right side. “We do use the lockers for extra storage of supplies,” I told him, stopping before the row. Each locker had a piece of paper stuck to it, labeling what was inside. I scanned it for razors and, upon finding it, opened it up.

I smiled. “You’re in luck,” I said, tossing him the only thing that was inside. He caught it in his free hand and looked at it curiously. “Battery operated razor.” I closed the locker and move to another. “The rules for nice things like that is that you have to share, so you’ll have to put it back when you’re done with it. The only thing you’ll keep is the razor blade. We have more blades for others.”

“For the end of the world,” Quinlan started, following me slowly. “This is pretty nice.”

“There are a lot of us here. There are teams who go out specifically to look for this stuff to make life a bit easier,” I explained. “We’re in a shortage of clothes, cloth, and wood right now.” I opened another locker and scowled. “As well as shaving cream or lather of any sort.”

Sighing I moved to the janitor’s closet (which had become yet another storage room). I pulled out another bucket, similar to mine and held it out to Quinlan. “This is for your bathroom supplies,” I told him as he took it from me. I continued to talk as I moved to other lockers, pulling out things that he would need; toothbrush, brush, comb, his own soap and sponge, etc.

“This place is really clean, isn’t it?” he asked. “Shouldn’t you be more worried about staying safe, than staying clean?”

“We have enough trouble with Fweterhin. We don’t need other diseases going around too.”

“Good point.”

I turned to him as I finished getting his supplies. “You have everything you need, so clean up,” I ordered. “Showers are that way, sinks and mirrors that way, toilets that way.” I motioned to each direction in turn before heading towards the sinks. “If you need towels, they’re in the closet behind the showers. After I’m done, I’m going to head back up to the kitchen for a bite to eat. Meet me back there.”

“Alright,” he said, his eyes still gazing about in a sense of wonder as he took his bucket towards the shower area. Once he disappeared from my view, he disappeared from my thoughts as well. I stopped before the mirror and looked at my reflection.

I gave a sigh, looking away and pulling out my old fashioned, non-electric razor and soap. I turned the water on and splashed it on my face, grabbing the soap and lathering it up. I massaged the cleansing bases into my skin before splashing the water again and washing it all away. I took my razor and let the water soak it before turning the water off. I then returned to my reflection to watch myself as I shaved away the stubble on my face without mistake.

I had always hated facial hair and made it a point to shave whenever I felt even the slightest bit there. I knew that by human standards I was young and that facial hair actually wasn’t too much of a problem at my age. Still. It bothered me.

When I finished I washed off the blade and threw it and the soap back into the bucket and giving one last look at my reflection before leaving. I paused, however, staring. Something was different. Something about me. I couldn’t pinpoint it, however. I wasn’t any thinner than normal. No scars. No apparent abnormalities. But something was abnormal.

Finding nothing different left me frustrated. With that frustration, I left the locker rooms quickly. I dimly heard the showers running and I hoped that Quinlan Zeke was enjoying his first warm shower in probably a long time.

I dropped off my bucket back in my room before heading back towards the kitchen. Mama Abby took a moment to scold me jokingly, asking where I had left poor Mr. Zeke. I retrieved my plate and promptly took it out to a table, sitting down and starting to eat the delicacies that Mama Abby and her helpers had prepared.

There were more people in the cafeteria by now. People were starting to wake up and move about. No doubt Quinlan wouldn’t be alone in the showers for long. Showers were always crowded in the morning. That’s why I bathed only at night for more privacy.

I stabbed a forkful of hash browns and shoved it in my mouth. I never really liked hash browns, even as a kid. Nowadays, however, it was like a cuisine. Food was another thing that the Ronwell community had a bit of difficulty with. The majority of food was grown in the cellars, nourished by a few of the healthier members who could put forth the effort to maintain it. That basically left us with a lot of vegetables and practically no meat. Occasionally we would stumble onto something edible, like a rabbit, but only a few of us would dare to eat them. No telling what the Fweterhin had done to the wildlife.

I had barely swallowed my second forkful when Michael, the youngest inhabitant of Ronwell at the age of nine, came bounding up to me. “Guy! You gotta come see! You gotta come see!” he exclaimed brightly while pulling strongly on my arm. Knowing that refusing the boy would only cause him to become more persistent, I dropped the fork and let myself be pulled.

“See what, Michael?” I asked, frowning and missing my breakfast immediately. As nice as it was to see the kid happy, it did little to sate my appetite.

“It’s a dog! There’s a dog!”

I blinked as I was pulled out into the open courtyard again and frowned. Was the boy seeing things? There hadn’t been any dogs around since… well since the invasion. At least none that I had seen. They had been killed or left behind by their owners when the Kelics came. People had been too concerned with finding safety for themselves that they abandoned their pets. There couldn’t possibly be a dog.

I was proven wrong. Standing in the middle of a small crowd of Ronwell inhabitants was a husky, ruffled, slightly dirty black and white fir and sharp blue eyes.

No. One sharp blue eye.

As Michael dragged me towards it, the dog flicked its ears, hearing us and tilted its head in our direction. Its right eye had been damaged by something. The healing around the eye looked to be good and well enough, but the eye itself had gone deep red, as if it had filled up with blood. It stared at me, as if sizing me up. Apparently I was accepted by it, for it seemed to smile as it panted, and wagged its tail, going back to the attention it was receiving from the small, amazed crowd.

“It’s the new guy’s,” said one man, Shuji, as he gave the dog a scratch behind the ears. “Mama Abby said that this dog has been the new guy’s companion for years and years, since the invasion.”

“I didn’t think a dog would be able to survive through it all,” I mused, tilting my head.

“Max is different from most dogs.”

I internally jumped at the deep voice from behind me and turned around to look at Quinlan. I couldn’t manage to hide my amazement at the change. He had completely shaved his head, so I could finally see the strong looking face beneath, tight jaw and calm, calculating eyes. I wasn’t sure whether he was more intimidating before or after. Seeing him made me think again of what he had claimed to have done to the Kelic who broke his arm.

“You were able to keep your dog with you?” I asked. If the dog hadn’t died, there was always the idea of it running away. After all, it wasn’t on a leash and it wasn’t as if Quinlan could keep him in a house. Most of those alive were always on the move. Quinlan didn’t seem like the ‘stay indoors and hide’ type.

“I didn’t keep him,” he said, leaning over to stroke the dog’s head as it trotted over to him. “He kept me.”

I frowned, tilting my head so that my blond bangs moved out of the way of my vision. “Alright, then.” I took a step back, meeting Quinlan’s gaze before turning around. “Let’s get you and your dog some food.”

---

Quinlan Zeke didn’t know it, but I was evaluating him. I tended to do that now a-days, subconsciously. Mentally I was trying to figure out who would live to see the next day. Who could handle themselves in a fight if the Kelics showed up at Ronwell’s doorstep. Who would run and save themselves.

I still wasn’t sure if I believed what he claimed, however there was something about him that I trusted. I think, perhaps, it was because of his dog, Max. In that moment that he had patted the dogs head and all during breakfast, I sensed a bond between them. There was true loyalty there. Quinlan and Max considered each other equals and friends, and would stay together because of that.

If Quinlan could make that bond with one creature, he could make it with another. His loyalty was an admirable trait and I knew that in a fight, even despite his broken arm, I would have him at my back. I could say that about only a few people in Ronwell.

Though he would probably never know this. All the better though. Wouldn’t want it to go to his head.

Mama Abby sent Quinlan to relax for the rest of the day. Explore. Meet people. Seeing how awkwardly he treated this idea made me smile. I was sent to my next task, pushing a loaded cart with pre-made plates of food to the infirmary.

One of the regularly scheduled nurses, whose name I could never remember, was waiting for me and helped me pull the cart in the room. She immediately began moving about, taking the plates to the resting figures in the beds. I took a moment to look at the men and women around me, all in a variety of states. A few looked very bad off. No doubt at least one of them would die tonight.

I picked up a few plates and walked over to the other side of the room, setting up the plate on a tray for the healthier ones, then moving to the weaker ones who couldn’t feed themselves. I had done this often at Mama Abby’s request, I knew the routine. Be calm, gentle, patient. Smile, because they needed to know that something in the world was going right. Listen, talk, and assure them. And when you finished, help them lie down again and tuck them in and tell them to get their rest.

Even if I smiled, even as I talked to them and told them everything would be alright, I felt hollow inside. It didn’t feel right, telling this to them. I felt like I was lying. Because inside I didn’t think that it would be alright. I didn’t think there was anything worth smiling for.

When the last patient had been fed and tucked in, the nurse came up to me. She smiled as if she believed everything good she had just told the people here. I mentally grunted. “Anything else I need to do?” I asked.

“As a matter of fact, yes. There’s one more person who needs visiting,” she said. I saw a shadow of some emotion pass through her eyes and I felt a twinge of bitterness at it. But she kept smiling. “I figured you would want to attend to her.”

My eyes drifted to one of the closed doors to my right, visibly frowning. I knew exactly who the nurse was talking about. That girl behind the door was the reason that Mama Abby sent me down here so frequently. Mama Abby knew I wanted to be with her as much as I could, but would never say it out loud. I needed to be with her.

But I hated coming down here all the same. Seeing all these other people suffering from Fwerterhin made me realize just what a terrible position that girl behind the door was in. Seeing people die from the toxin lessened my hope, bit by bit.

Hope. Yes. It was still there. Some smidgen of it that I had kept locked away. Even if it looked desperate, there was hope that these people wouldn’t die. That the girl behind the door wouldn’t die. Maybe, just maybe, if I believed hard enough, we all would live to see better days.

Maybe.

I moved away from the nurse and pushed open the door, gazing inside to the single bed where my sister lay dying.

Hope.

Rhea had gone into a bad state a few months ago. Most of the time, she slept through what seemed to be either horrible nightmares or extreme pain. Her breathing was mostly ragged and she would sweat a lot, occasionally moan and whine, but never forming any words. She hadn’t opened her eyes since entering this state, but we could occasionally manage feed her through coaxing. Whether she was actually awake or not, no one had any clue. But she had gone terribly pale and thin.

Every time I saw her like this, I had the horrible thought that she would be the next to die.

Gingerly, I sat down next to the bed and stared at her exhausted expression, her lips curled into what seemed like a permanent frown. I pulled the wash cloth off her head and dipped it into the metal basin of cool water on the table next to me. I wrung the excess water out, folded the washcloth as it had been and eased it onto her forehead again.

My fingers lingered on her face. I could feel her pulse hammering through her thin skin. She looked so fragile, so weak. I leaned over and gently kissed her forehead, making a small wish that she would get better. I pulled away, turning to the door to get her food in hopes that I could get her to eat something.

“GUY!”

I gasp was caught in my throat at the sound and a surprisingly strong hand grabbed my wrist. My head jerked back around to stare in amazement into my sister’s open eyes. The wash cloth had fallen off in her quick movement to grab for me and her breaths were short and almost painful to listen to. But she was awake.

“Guy, don’t go. Don’t leave me. Guy,” she whispered, her voice sounding like she had spent the last few hours screaming. Her eyes were wide, afraid. “They’re coming, Guy. Don’t leave me.”

I stared at her, half of me so glad that she was awake and talking again, the other half of me frantic to know what she meant by that. Bad dreams. That was it. Just nightmares, right? Then maybe that was the problem. Maybe the Fweterhin hadn’t affected her as much as they all had thought. Maybe it was just bad dreams.

I tried to focus my thoughts on what she had said, but I suddenly took note of her eyes and my mind wouldn’t concentrate on anything else. Those eyes, those bright blue eyes, the same ones I had. They weren’t blue any more. The thoughts that the toxin wasn’t getting to her vanished as I stared into those purple eyes.

I watched as Rhea’s face contorted and tears started streaming down her cheeks. Numbly, I sat down on the bed and pulled my sister to me, wrapping my arms around her shaking form as she sobbed from some fear I couldn’t conceive of.

I had my own fear as another piece of my hope went missing. I thought back to when I looked in the mirror this morning, how I swore something about me had changed but couldn’t pinpoint what. Now I knew, and knowing it made me feel so cold inside.

My gaze drifted to the metal basin at the side table and stared at my reflection.

My eyes were purple now, just like Rhea’s.

The Fweterhin had gotten to me too.