A Depraved Blessing Read online

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Groundwork

  The world was not the better when the Towers made their leave. According to the dreary intelligences coming in, no weapon fired or defense raised was recurrently effective against our invisible foes. Every once in a while, it was said someone somewhere managed to disable an Injector, which would have been highly commended, if each time it did not come at such high a cost. Suicide bombers were becoming a more common option, especially in areas absent of a military shield. Dozens of the desperate, either wearing explosives or driving vehicles laden with them, would charge an Injector, or at a spot they believed an Injector occupied, leading to certain death for all but their adversary. Some commanders were ordering the bombardment of entire regions, with no regard to civilian casualties, no matter the expense to the number of lost souls, including their own.

  Even after the rare times someone incapacitated an Injector, there was seldom an opportunity to obtain its fallen figure. One of three events would usually happen. The most common deterrent was the presence of another Injector or two, not to mention their infected thralls. Otherwise, even if it was unaccompanied and in the process of being taken to some base or facility, the advanced apparatus was adept at restoring itself—likely using a similar process its massive caretaker used—and would reawaken as lethal as ever. The third occurrence sounded as though they used a type of self-destruct mechanism to dissolve their frame if they were beyond saving, leaving only a smattering of undisintegrated scraps to be studied.

  Through all that was being done to stop them, the Injectors were only half of a two part quandary. The infected, both people and animal alike, compounded an already challenging fight. No matter where they were or what they were, they were unrelenting in their tenacious pace, covering dozens upon dozens of miles in a single sun’s emergence. Hunger, thirst, and sleep did not appear to exist in them, at least, not in their familiar forms. The microtech that possessed them had evidently staved off the merciful grasp of death for not merely a short period of time. Therefore, the idea of waiting for them to perish on their own accord seemed a poor prospect. The greatest nations this world had ever seen were barely capable of holding back this onslaught alone. Inevitably, there were those who resorted to wielding our most supreme of weapons to oppose these mass of bodies, however, ever since the attempted bombings of the principal spacecraft, military bases and silos that held a nuclear weapon were relentlessly besieged by Injectors, with resounding success. Overwhelmed was too insignificant a word to describe what our defenders were going through over a daily and nightly basis. The numbers of the infected and the precision assaults by the Injectors were two obstacles that combined to be a virtually insurmountable dilemma. Whether a military concentrated on evacuations or on confronting the enemy directly, planned or not, they made themselves the aims of corruption.

  Keeping ourselves busy in our presently ignored home seemed to be the only remedy for the fretting disease we could not cure. We knew we could not be in a military base where soldiers were risking their lives at every moment and we stood by doing nothing, apart from taking up precious space. As often as we were able, Siena, Eloram, Dayce, and the remaining men joined some military personnel and other refugees to help build shelters, allocate supplies on the adjoining islands, or simply go wherever we were wanted. We didn’t feel as though we belonged among them, but they never made us feel unwelcomed. Meanwhile, my mother and Delphnia stayed on base to cook and clean for our proprietor’s behalf. We did not expect, nor did we receive, any gratitude.

  The days passed on and I dare say they started to become routine. Some bonds were made and others reinforced. Enjoyment of the little things was now the only foundation of any pleasure we had. It was in these days that I was able to see the not so subtle companionship between Eloram and Dayce. Not a day progressed when they were not in each other’s presence for no less than half of the sun’s appearance. It was not uncommon to see them helping around the base with the very few, but very well done, tasks they undertook. They also spent a decent part of their time playing instruments they found in a small music hall, which Eloram was teaching Dayce to play. Eloram undeniably understood the composition of the musical instrument. I could hear from fifty yards away the strings melodically move with the careful meticulousness of her fingers swinging through them, one by one, or dancing from key to key. I could not say the same about Dayce. I could also hear him from fifty yards away, but for a different reason. He was not a musically gifted child, as Liz and I learned early on, but there was an even bigger reason Dayce was not grasping it as effortlessly as he might have been capable of. My son couldn’t hide his growing innocent emotions for Eloram, and everyone saw right through it, including Eloram herself. His strengthening crush had him vying for her attention whenever he could, even attempting to steal her away from his idol.

  Their conversations characteristically ran along the lines of Eloram proclaiming, “Dayce, I’m like your older sister now!” Then Dayce would reply with a variation on the lines, “Just give me a couple years and I’ll be a real man, then you’ll see!”

  I would ache for Liz more than ever during these interactions. I would imagine what she would say to me; such as our boy was growing up too fast, or he was just too young, but I was never able to guess what her words would have been. Nothing I said sounded like her.

  For the first time in our life together, I sensed Dayce was not the same. Not only in appearance and age, though I did believe the clothes he used to wear would not fit him anymore, and not only in wisdom, for what could force a child to grow up faster than tragedy? It was in his attitude toward me. In the life we originally held, never before would he have stowed even his most covert thoughts away. Even in the few times that he did, it was never something a mere glance by me wouldn’t make him pour out in a cascade, if anything, that’s what he wanted. Now, as I explored the features of his face, looking for any part of his old self, it was a statue. He sought me out less and less to ask questions or give a comment. The worst part was knowing I was doing nothing to stop the growing gap between us. I couldn’t envision this is what I truly wanted… unless it was. Could it be I was wanting for him to feel less for me? So that if I was killed it wouldn’t hurt so much for him? What horrible thoughts ruled my mind in the brightest hours of the day!

  Sleep was becoming impossible to catch respite in. Peculiarly, it was no longer the nightmares that were the dissenters of my slumbers. No, those familiar confidantes I could more or less handle. It was the robustly vivid dreams holding my old memories. Whatever they pertained, the brightest moments or the gloomiest of days, it didn’t matter. I would awaken and my mind would linger on those memories, unable to let go. I wasn’t alone. Talking to Bervin and Siena one hot day, they too stated they were having an abundance of lucid memory-dreams. I doubted stress on its own could explain why we were experiencing this same phenomenon, but it was not as if we had any chance to solve it. If we could not explain what was happening in our reality, how could we explain what was transpiring in each of our unconsciousness? Beyond taking sleeping pills to alleviate some of the pressure, there was little else we could do except sleep with the nightmares we were accustomed to.

  Our barracks fell under a commotion on the forty-first evening since the Towers were last seen. In one of three rooms that contained a reverent satellite television, an assembly gathered in front of one of these last links to broadcasted news from around the world. I, along with my mother, Bervin, and Siena, fused with the crowd a few doors down from our own to enter the crowded rec room and stare at the screen set in the far upper corner.

  Placed sinfully on the monitor was a live image of a Tower taken from a soaring kite’s vantage point. I expected their return, not that I felt any gratification at being proven correct, but what I could not predict was what they would do in their resurgence. On first spotting the miniature monolith, I saw it was already partly shrouded by its incalculable microtech fog. The darkening gray
ish cloud persisted to take up a greater sphere of influence, ominously publicizing how much more of the micro-machines were being expelled compared to the times I had previously witnessed the performance. The Tower was soon obscured beneath its own haze. The image began to wobble as the helicopter, already about a mile away, had to retreat to a safer distance, being sensitive to elude the madness of the expanding vaporous hand. I felt the hand’s ire as its quarry fled from its grasp. As the camera became more distant from the notorious miasma and revealed more of the backdrop, I was able to glimpse a bulky lake behind it. Farther beyond, I observed the vague constructions of a city, matching in proportion the adjoining body of water.

  A couple of fleeting hours later and most of the Towers were confirmed to have returned, once again presenting themselves on any gathering of significant populations, each one exhibiting the same updated distribution system.

  Everyone on the islands knew it was only a matter of time. Some didn’t risk for Time’s blade to mercilessly overtake them and felt compelled to leave the massing sanctuary. They stayed long enough to gather the supplies they could obtain and left on their boat, or any boat, for that matter. More commonly than boats being shared were them being stolen, or there was an attempt at the bold coup, at any rate. Many sailors left alone, sometimes leaving their families behind, wanting to provide only for themselves. Where they were sailing to, no one could answer, and I wasn’t completely sure the mariners themselves had a clear destination in mind. I did hear from a few refuges that somewhere in the currents of the sea, shortly before we had arrived, a cruise ship had set off with about a hundred people and would try to survive purely on the assets of the seas for as long as it was possible. Others, acting out similar concepts, headed for more ambiguous islands, electing to strand themselves in the middle of nowhere, going against all former reason and in contradiction to the warning in our bodies.

  While I was grateful to what the military had done for me and my family, a growing part of me felt remaining with them would encumber my struggle for survival by making us targets in the long run. The constant anticipation of an attack was twisting every nerve. The sun continued to ascend and descend leisurely, teasing our suspense, however, the mother star gave no challenge to the mistresses of the night. The sibling moons somehow gleamed more terrible as they leered down upon us, surrounded by their droplets of admirers, glowing with guiltless relief to the fact they were not suffering in our evils. The underlining threat was always there, and I knew it could come at any hour, but if felt so much closer underneath the night sky.

  Each day followed the last and I learned what could be worse than relentless bad news. One after another, the few airwaves and radio waves we still held, the only reminder to prove to us that we were still somehow connected to the rest of the world, were becoming hushed, the kind of silence that ardently struck my ears more than any other message could have done. The base personnel believed the Towers must have sent out a new wave of Injectors, ending the little control we still had of our air with incursions occurring more and more frequently. The infection itself was more potent, more callous. The time was cut in half, maybe more, of how long it required the infection to take hold of one’s body. It did not matter if it was inhaled through the sordid air or impelled by the tap of a needle, the surrender was quicker and greater. I couldn’t stop myself from thinking that the faster subjection was more merciful for its victims in the end.

  A week came and left after the return of the Towers, and another was about to leave with it when I noticed the port and bay had several new occupants. New warships had decided to settle not only near our island, but on many islands of the chain. They were part of a considerable group retreating from the mainland. The line between warrior and refugee was waning away. The option of arising victorious from this takeover was beginning to be seen as more and more futile in this part of the world. The future of our species became the military’s only aspiration. Their only goal they had left was to make certain we had a chance to somehow outlast our unbreakable adversary, no matter how infinitesimal that chance may be; that was the last hope we had.

  Preparations for the unavoidable onslaught were being made every minute. They included surrounding the islands with mines both above and below ground, and I was sure they would have floated them in the air if gravity would have allowed them to. As it was explained by a soldier I spoke with, the mines were not positioned with the purpose of deterring the Injectors from these lands, since they were not powerful enough to hinder them from doing so. Instead, they made a decent alarm system, as the intruders seemed to take no heed of them and set them off indifferently, granting us a precious few seconds of warning. Trucks were parked just outside the barracks and other facilities to be ready for the command to take us to the ships, who were anticipating our arrival five hundred yards away. The roadway was, in turn, protected by a succession of tanks and other assorted military vehicles. It worried me that they did not look as menacing as they should be. Radios were given to most refugee groups so they could listen and report any possible emergencies at any time. They also handed out guns to some of us, for, regrettably, there were more of them than there were trained combatants who could make use of them. When we could, we started saving as much canned food and bottled water as we judged suitable to carry. The bags were packed, the route was set, and now all there was left for us to do was wait, which I knew very well how to do by this point.