Epoch Earth; the Great Glitch Read online

  My attention turned to the area between the woman’s legs where a fleshy blob hung. Steeling myself, I ran the afterbirth through my fingers, searching for rips or holes. It felt like a slimy fishing net in my inexperienced hands. Howie, taller by at least three inches, took the mass from me and held it up to the bare light bulb. He examined it closely for a minute then wrapped it in a plastic bag from his pocket. “It looks good, Mom. I’m gonna go outside and bury it.”

  //Bury it?// I chipped as I followed him to the door.

  Once outside, I inhaled the first lungful of air since arriving at Howie’s. It was nothing but smoke and dirt dust, but decidedly better than the horror inside.

  Howie answered out loud, “Mom thinks it will help the garden, so I’m gonna do it.” He shrugged. The glob of tissue hung between his fingers, dripping too close to my feet.

  “She was right about boiling the water.” I agreed.

  “Yeah, can’t hurt anyway.”

  As we knelt by the piddling garden in Howie’s back yard, digging in the soil with our hands, I was reminded of the times we’d spent just like this as kids. Playing in the dirt, side by side. Only, I became acutely aware that we weren’t kids anymore. With everything that had happened to us with the Glitch, and Howie before the Glitch with his father. I knew those innocent days were long gone.

  Especially now, as I was doing my best not to notice that Howie was still sans shirt, and the patch of brown chest hairs were staring me right in the face.

  I stood, muttered something about checking on Brooks, and took off.

  Howie chipped, //Thanks!// at the back of my head as I picked up speed.

  The stopwatch app still ticked away in my mind as as I darted across the dry field, wondering what mess awaited me at my house. Probably nothing weirder than this.

  BOY WAS I WRONG.

  My mom, who hours earlier couldn’t get out of bed to help deliver Howie’s baby sister, sat on the couch with Brooks curled up in her lap. Dad’s ornate glass chess set was on the coffee table, almost fully set up. As I passed behind them toward the kitchen, amazed that I could be hungry after what I had just witnessed, Mom explained to Brooks how the bishop moved. He swatted it away and said, “No I wanna be the horsey. You be the pointy guy.”

  Mom laughed and said they both got to be every one of the guys. This elicited a gasp from Brooks and a groan from me.

  Forgoing food, I tried to sneak past them and run upstairs. But Mom’s ‘mom hearing’ hadn’t been damaged as much as the rest of her in the Glitch.

  “How’d it go with the baby?” Mom asked over her shoulder.

  I silently made an ‘aww shucks’ motion with my arm and answered. “It’s a girl... Mrs. Anderson named her... Evelyn.”

  Mom’s head snapped around, as quickly as possible in her physical state. I knew any movement at all pained her dearly, and maneuvered myself around the couch so we’d be eye to eye. She stared at me for a moment, waiting for me to take it back, I guess. Then her hand went to her mouth and the black queen fell to the floor. Brooks dove out of her lap after it, and I scooped him and the abandoned queen up.

  She stammered a bit, no actual words forming, then whispered, “Dear Stone.”

  As if by command of the spoken name, my hand instinctually dropped into my pants pocket and clutched the two stones, mine and Dad’s. Mom did the same, although hers was hanging around her neck on a black nylon cord.

  After gathering her strength Mom asked, “Why would she do such a thing?” as if I’d have the answer.

  “I don’t know.” I stood Brooks at the coffee table and motioned for him to finish setting up the chess board. He proceeded to tip the pieces over, one by one, instead. I continued, “Howie wasn’t happy about it. That’s for sure.”

  “No I should think not. It’s unwise, especially after...” Mom didn’t finish.

  Rumors has been circulating since day one of the Glitch that it was an inside job. Nobody had ever believed the lunatic Truthers who stood on street corners ranting about corruption and the end of the world. Until it happened. Now they were everywhere, and harder to ignore.

  Mom shook her head and snapped back to the present. “Well, join us for a game of chess, will you?” She motioned to the board where Brooks had started trying to stack the castles on top of each other.

  “No way.” I headed for the kitchen, deciding my stomach wouldn’t wait any longer. “Besides, he’s only four.”

  “Your dad started with you when you were four.” We both flinched at the mention of him, but it was getting easier to slip him casually into conversations now.

  “Yeah,” I called back to her as I raided the fridge, “and I hate it!”

  After loading my arms with scavenged junk food, and the one apple because Mom said so, I ran upstairs to the glorious silence of my room. It took about thirty seconds for that silence to be too much, and I turned on Dad’s radio.

  Fox sounded different. Hollow. And he wasn’t talking about the Glitch. At least not directly. I turned up the volume to investigate.

  “This is not the time for finger pointing and name calling. It’s a time of mourning. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, until you people get the message. We don’t have all the facts. You can’t go around screaming about conspiracies and murder just because it makes you feel important. Or funny. Whatever kick you get from it. Real people lost their lives in the Glitch. People! Mothers and fathers. Sons and daughters. That’s what we should be talking about.”

  //Howie, are you listening to Fox? Something’s wrong.// I didn’t expect an answer and I didn’t get one.

  Fox’s voice cracked and he took a moment to compose himself. “We owe it to everyone who lost their lives that day... everyone who’s lost their lives since... or has a life barely worth fighting for now. We owe it to them, their memory, to bring this nation back to what it once was.”

  The sun had dropped below the horizon and my eyes wanted to follow it. I noticed that I wasn’t quite sitting up on my bed anymore. I was slipping lower and lower, getting comfortable. But I was mesmerized by Fox. I had to figure out what was wrong with him. I bit into the apple and leaned back against the wall. I started to shove the pillow behind my back, but decided against it. I needed to stay sharp.

  //Howie?// I tried again just in case. Still no answer.

  “When will it end? Will you muckrakers not stop until you’ve caused a second uprising? And then what? Haven’t we lost enough loved ones already?” Fox nearly choked on the last words.

  Even in his obvious distress... grief? Whatever it was, his voice still had that soothing quality about it. Soon I found myself slid back to a prone position, the apple long since fallen on the floor and rolled to Stone knows where. Fighting sleep, I raised my eyebrows high and forced my lids open.

  It was pitch black outside, which didn’t give as much of a clue about the time as it used to. High noon was barely brighter than dusk with all the haze in the air. My exhaustion was a better timekeeper, and I gave myself permission to slip into oblivion.

  The last thing I heard, somewhere between falling asleep and landing, was Fox’s voice cracking one more time as he recited lines from a poem.

  “For death and life,

  With ceaseless strife

  Beat wild on this world’s shore;

  And all our calm is in that balm,

  ‘Not lost, but gone before’”

  Chapter Fourteen

  January 20, 5AG

  “Shame.” Guard Two shook his head. “I grew up listening to Fox.”

  Synta held her breath so a ‘me too’ wouldn’t make it out.

  Guard One stared at his partner. “Yes,” he drew out. “It’s a shame about Fox and his son. But I believe you’re missing the point of the story.” He turned toward Synta and leaned in.

  Her lips sucked in on themselves and she bit down hard. I bet he did, she thought.

  Guard Two stiffened. “I didn’t miss it. There was an unauthorized birth and
the mother was foolish enough to thumb her nose at the Council with that ridiculous name.” He let out a sigh. “But it’s still a shame about Fox is all.”

  Guard One ignored him. “Who are these Andersons? Why do they go by two names? How are they connected to The Rebellion?”

  Synta laughed right in his face. “Whoa, calm down. Does it even matter anymore?” She raised her hands, accentuating the manacles. “It seems you guys have learned your lesson so well.” She sneered.

  Guard One balled his fists on the table. Through gritted teeth he turned his head toward Guard Two. “I want a full report on this Anderson family.”

  Guard Two stared blankly into the space in front of him. His eyes flickered as he put the boss’s orders into his chip.

  Synta huffed and shrugged her shoulders at Guard One. “You’re wasting your time. Now, do you wanna know what I’m doing at your precious launch pad, or what?”

  Part IV: Ten Months AG

  Chapter Fifteen

  The tiny apples felt like sponges in my hand. A slick film stuck to my fingers. I squeezed, hesitating, then raised my head to look him in the eye. I got as far as the bridge of his curved nose. “I’m sorry, I can’t trade a whole gallon of water for these. They’ll rot before I get home. My mom would be so mad.” I drug those last words out, sweetening my voice to the childlike timbre that matched my undeveloped form. Then I dropped the offending fruit on the folding table. They didn’t roll away. I turned, hoping I hadn’t just made a huge mistake.

  A thick hand grabbed my shoulder and spun me back around. “Half a gallon, and I’ll throw in this lovely tomato.” The dirty face belonging to the dirty hand raised an imploring eyebrow.

  “Deal,” I said, swallowing the excitement. “But you can keep the tomato.” I made a face that expressed my hatred of the red devils.

  “Suit yourself,” the merch said as he poured a level half gallon from my water jug into his measuring cup. Satisfied that the transaction was fair and counted, he handed me the two dead apples and smiled. “See you next week.”

  “Nah,” I lied, turning again to leave, “my garden’s coming along great. We’ll be eating good next week.”

  “And I’m Emperor Chen,” he laughed.

  He was right and we both knew it. Nobody’s garden was coming along. At all. There hadn’t been rain in months. The entire planet choked in a thick layer of dust. Crops and cattle died off faster than they could be harvested.

  When Howie and I had first started going to town, after the grocery stores dried up completely, people had lined the street selling their wares. They offered up meats, cheeses, everything you could imagine, to put it to good use before it spoiled. Back then I could get an entire basket of ripe fruit with that half gallon I’d just spent on two lousy fermented apples.

  People still lined the streets these days. Only they had their hands out, empty and covered in the same dust as their lungs. Each week we swore would be our last, but Sector B was the only place left with even the barest of essentials. We would get in and get out as early as possible, before the Truthers woke up for the day and started shoving pamphlets in our faces. Or worse, those filthy patch modifiers. Like anyone in their right mind would link to a Truther’s chip.

  The municipal buildings all stood empty, looming over what would have been considered highly illegal activity just months prior. Any semblance of local government had fled in the early days. After looters hollowed out the usual victims; grocery stores, hardware and clothing chains, they’d moved inward. To the heart of Apollo.

  With rumors running rampant about the true cause of the Glitch, city officials abandoned their posts in fear. Sure there were cops left, sort of. They still patrolled the streets as best they could, but the nefarious types knew where to hide. In plain sight as it seemed.

  That morning we’d had to crawl through three different barbed wire blockades to get to B. The checkpoints had long since been forgotten by the volunteer force when they realized our neighborhood had nothing left to trade. Didn’t bother to tear down their false walls and take them with them.

  Lost in those thoughts of how far we’d come—in the wrong direction—as a community, I strolled through the winding merchant tables on Hawthorne. Autopilot stopped me at the foot of St. Cajetan’s statue. Before the Glitch, I’d made fun of my parents for tossing money into a fountain in the name of an archaic and long forgotten god. Throw money away to ask for more. It made no sense.

  Dad had confided in me one day when I was probably being especially teenagery about it, that they didn’t toss the money into the fountain expecting a magical being to bring them good fortune. They did it because their grandparents and parents before them did. And now they were doing it with us, because the summer days walking along the streets with his mother and sister were some of his best memories, which always ended with a quarter tossed into the fountain and them making a special wish.

  He’d asked me not to spoil that memory for Brooks, who was still young enough to see and feel and taste the magic in the air. From that day forward I obediently made some insipid wish and tossed my quarter into the fountain with a bright smile on my face for Brooks’s sake. But then the Glitch happened. And magic died.

  I pulled the quarter out of my pocket and stared at it through my tears. I knew damn well that St. Cajetan wasn’t going to make my mom better. I’d seen her decay in front of my eyes over the past few months. Still, hadn’t stopped me from wishing with all my heart every week and dropping a quarter into the fountain. Each time I’d run home, leaving Howie behind, only to find her sprawled on the couch or up in her room. Sometimes, if I was lucky enough... maybe wished harder than others I suppose, she’d be sitting up playing a game with Brooks.

  Once I even came home to find her watering the flat dirt we still called a garden to humor ourselves. I thought for sure my wish had come true. But she paid for that wasted energy with spasms and wheezing the next two days.

  I shuddered and squeezed the quarter as if it had caused all of my mom’s pain. I didn’t bother to wish any damn thing as I slung the quarter across the street in the opposite direction of Cajetan.

  He must have wanted that quarter badly, because instead of landing on the blacktop and rolling off to be forgotten under a table somewhere, it struck a gnarled old man in rags right on cheek. He spun around and glared, eyes instantly finding me as if I had a neon sign saying “She Did It!” pointing right at me.

  My first instinct was to hide, jump in the fountain. But for an old man, those scrawny legs moved like lightning. He was on me in no time. Thankfully, the initial spark of anger had dissipated, maybe sensing my fear. I cowered in his rough hands.

  “I’m so sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I was...” I searched for the right words.

  The old man smiled out of one side of his mouth only. A dark cloud of reek floated out. He held up the quarter between us then let it slide into one of his many pockets.

  I wanted to tell him those coins were useless now, but thought better of it after the way we’d met. Instead I lowered my eyes and tried to look sorry.

  He grunted something I couldn’t make out and grabbed my shoulder again with his shriveled claw. He pulled me toward his table, a small wobbly thing with no cover. Just bare faux woodgrain on thin stilty legs – much like his – off to the side. Away from the other merchants.

  My skin prickled with cold. I skidded my heels, tried to make myself heavier.

  The old man began mumbling something about my future on this planet, or was it off this planet? I couldn’t tell. Half his teeth were probably in one of those many pockets, and the ones he had left smelled like actual shit. So, I didn’t listen too hard to what they had to say. Instead, I focused most of my attention on trying to catch the eye of one of the other merchants.

  But there weren’t any. All I saw around me were people dressed in similar rags; robes of former cream and crimson glory, turned gray and dusty.

  How long had I spaced out at the fountain?

>   The people milling around noticed us, as much as one would notice an insignificant movement in your peripheral vision. But exactly what this filthy old man was doing dragging a child through the streets didn’t register to them as something to bother themselves about.

  “Please,” my voice cracked. “Please, my friend... he’s waiting... I have to...” Panic closed my throat. Dust kicked up around us as I slid across the pavement, trying desperately to dig my feet into any rough spot, but finding none.

  “Hold still!” The old man demanded. Or at least that’s what it sounded like. I couldn’t understand one word. It was like he’d slipped out of sync. His lips moved, and words came out, but they stopped making sense.

  I froze.

  He mumbled something about upgrades, a patch? If alcohol hadn’t been purged from every town just days after the Glitch, I would have assumed he was drunk. Then again, I told myself, old people probably remembered how to make their own booze. But no, it didn’t sound like he was slurring his words. They flew past me, low and fast like an insect buzzing by.

  The raggedy man pointed at my ear, my chip, and raised both eyebrows in a question. One I hadn’t heard.

  Was he going to rip my chip out? I shook my head furiously, struggled against his grip. How could such a feeble looking old man be so strong?

  “No!” In my head it was a fierce scream, a warrior’s cry. In my ears, it was more of a child’s pitiful cry.

  A wide grin spread across the wrinkled face, well past maniacal, into blubbering idiot territory. I half expected drool to fall on my shoes.

  My eyes darted around for someone to come save me. No one did. Fear bubbled in my stomach, turning my legs to jelly. Just in time for the old man to plop me down in a rusted brown folding chair.

  Then I saw it.

  On the table in front of me sat a curved matte black machine, smaller than my gravball. It had a keypad on the left side and a small oval screen on the right. Two tiny holes, one yellow and one red, lined the top. An ePatch. I’d only seen one in books. Where in Cho’s Hell did he find that thing?