“I’m not staying,” Ben finally said.
“What?” Ethan replied, his eyebrows twitching upward.
“Staying here? None of us are, Ben. We’re moving on later today,” Maria said, not really getting what Ben was saying.
He stood up, brushed the dirt from his now-tatty-looking uniform and took a breath. “I’m leaving you. I mean here with Charlie and Denver. I can’t do this; I’m just not cut out for it.”
“I don’t understand,” Ethan said. “What is it you’re saying?”
“Explain, Ben. You’re not making much sense,” Maria added.
“Like I said, I’m not cut out for this. I can’t survive out here. Not like you two. I don’t belong here. I’m going to do a job for Charlie. I’m returning to the croatoans on a farm run by a human called Gregor. Charlie and Denver have explained everything, and it’s the right choice for everyone concerned. I’m doing this for me but also for you two. You’ll stand a better chance if I do this. We all will.”
For the next ten minutes, Charlie and Denver briefly explained the plan to Ethan and Maria, leaving out certain important pieces that could get them into trouble if they were to be captured, such as the bead and the location of the decoy shelter.
“And there’s no changing your mind?” Maria said.
“None.”
“Well, that’s that then,” Maria said. “I understand and respect your decision. But I hope we’ll get to see you again soon. I’ll miss you.”
“And I’ll miss you too,” Ben said, moving to her, leaning down, and hugging her. He broke away and hugged Ethan. “And you too, Ethan. But you’re young enough that you’ll soon adapt out here and thrive. I’m not so adaptable.”
“This might be what a funeral felt like,” Ethan said. “Like the ones on the video recording. I never knew it’d feel so bad. It’s worse than losing Jimmy.”
A hush descended on the camp as people processed that thought in their own way.
For Charlie, it was the picture of hundreds of graves he had personally dug in order that those who had perished would at least get some kind of sendoff.
Even if almost all of them were strangers, given the state of the world, having to bury anyone, even someone with no personal connection, still felt like a loss. Every human counted for so much more when there were so few.
“Denver, be a sport and get Ben’s pack ready.”
“Sure thing.” Denver stood up and moved to the shelter, Pip following right behind him like she was his shadow.
“Before I go,” Ben said, “Can you tell us what it was like before all this? How did it happen? The knowledge might help me on the farm.”
Charlie looked at the three of them staring back at him with the rapt attention of children at story time. With the fire burning to embers and the morning’s chill burning off, he thought it as good a time as any. Once Ben was gone, it’d be one less thing to go through for the others, and Ben was right. The more he knew, the stronger position he would be in.
“Okay, let’s start at the beginning.” He leaned back and crossed his legs and began his tale. He filled them in about how society was back then, how he’d worked for a production company, and that fateful day when he went down into the sinkhole.
“How did you survive that?” Maria said, her mouth gaping with surprise.
“Pippa was on the surface looking down. She saw the alien craft before I did. She got the firemen and the police to haul me and the boy up, but he perished as the great metal orb climbed out of the hole and crushed him into the sides. I managed to land on the front of it and use its momentum to ride up and out.
“When I got to the surface, everyone ran. Once I was clear of the ropes and harnesses, Pippa and I managed to get into my truck before the croatoan orb dispensed the gas.
“That’s what killed most people on their first surfacing. We don’t know what it was exactly, but later, talking with some guys from the Army who had tried to fight back initially, it seemed it was some kind of neurotoxin.”
“What did it do?” Ethan said, not understanding the term.
“It paralyzed people. But it didn’t stop them from feeling pain. Most of the afflicted died through starvation and thirst while others died from heart attacks and other blood-pressure-based illnesses.”
“That’s terrible,” Maria said. “I can’t imagine how scary that must have been to be paralyzed and know you’re going to die but not being able to do anything about it.”
Charlie shook his head at the memories. “If only you knew the half of it. It was a terrible time. Numbing. No one could truly comprehend what was happening. The croatoans’ orbs came up at the same time and continued to surface for a week all over the world. There must have been hundreds of thousands of them.
“Pippa and I estimated they were in the ground for thousands of years. Before even humans fully evolved. We should have known it sooner. The signs were there. Over the ages, many societies and cultures had experienced them in some way or another.
“We discovered cave paintings that in hindsight were obviously early croatoans. When you go back through human history and look at some of the strange reported events, it’s clear the aliens were involved. I can show you in more detail when we reach our destination. Pippa and I researched a lot of this once that initial phase was over.”
“Initial phase?” Ethan asked. “What else happened?”
Lighting a root cigar, Charlie took a long drag and exhaled the orange smoke. The root made his brain tingle, and a warm sensation crawled over his body, clearing away the tiredness, making him feel alert and a little high—an energetic high, one that he had come to rely on to keep him vital and healthy.
“When the military initially resisted, they busted open one of the orbs. It had one of those smaller aliens inside. Shriveled up and aged but still alive. We carbon dated one. They’re essentially immortal as long as they maintain their chemical composition. Within the pod were a number of tanks filled with this root compound.
“Additionally, there were other tanks filled with the toxin. That initial attack crippled humanity. They destroyed our satellites and jammed our radio signals. Our computers stopped working as each orb acted like an electromagnetic pulse station. Together, they networked, increasing their capability and reducing us to using flags to communicate.
“The second phase was when the mother ship arrived. It altered our atmosphere and brought on the ice age. Along with the gas the orbs emitted, they did something to drastically shift the temperature of the planet.
“Those that weren’t killed by the gas were killed by the extreme weather. It took six months for the ice to take hold. During that time, the mother ship sent down thousands of raiders—ships that bundled humans together and took them up there for whatever reason. Testing, experiments, food. It didn’t matter. All that mattered was hiding, staying alive.”
“That’s when you met Gregor?” Ben asked.
“A few years later, yeah. I stayed in North America, joining up with some military friends.We retreated to their Army base with Pippa and formed a group of survivors.
“We were forced south where we found a cave system that we used as our new base of operations. We would go out and search for survivors, bringing them back and helping those that we could. One day, Gregor and half a dozen of his Armenian brethren turned up. Somehow, they’d travelled all the way from Europe.
“They brought tales of the thawing and the harvesters. Within a few years, the thaw came to America, but Gregor was long gone before then. He and I didn’t mix well. He had certain ideas I didn’t agree with. He wanted to join with the croatoans, co-exist with them.”