A World Beyond

A WORLD BEYOND

JAY CONTINUED pulling wires from his solar panels to the array of batteries he had cobbled together in the basement. Like most everything they acquired, the panels and batteries were ‘borrowed’ from now-abandoned homes and businesses around Jackson, Wyoming.

He knew the urgency of getting electricity operating before winter; they had barely survived the last. Adding solar to their collection of gasoline generators was key with gas being in uncertain supply. Rationing was required, with priority reserved for the vehicles.

Last winter was extremely harsh, the first since the ‘pandema-clypse’ as Jay called it. Everything now was focused on survival – with emphasis on preparing for winter.

To say that life since Zeta was challenging would be a colossal understatement. The virus was believed to be under control after the vaccines handled the Gamma, Delta & Epsilon variants. So the world lowered its collective guard and returned to normal. But when Zeta came around, turns out she had different plans.

Jay felt satisfaction using his engineering and farming knowledge. But using his hands provided the greatest joy, crafting an ever-improving life for Reza and himself. Had he become a lawyer like his mother wanted, well today that would be ‘as useless as tits on a boar hog’ as the farmers used to say.

Hindsight suggests the Universe must have given Jay a heads-up to prepare for what was coming, yet he certainly didn’t feel lucky. Anyone completely disconnected from all other known humanity could never use the word “lucky” again. That chance meeting with Reza? Well, that goes in the miracle category, he’d decided. But lucky?? Please! Scrounging out an existence in this dystopia kills that notion.

But – there is Reza, he smiled. Reza Noella DeCastro, MD – the striking Persian-Italian beauty whose path he crossed at the Grand Teton overlook on Signal Mountain. Jay and his father had gone together every spring, so he went last year to uphold that tradition and to honor his Dad. Reza went to seek understanding from the all-knowing Tetons, wondering why Zeta spared her of all people, and whether this meant she was blessed – or cursed.

When they spotted each other, about two football fields apart, they both gasped with astonishment at seeing another live human being. For both it was part exhilaration, part trepidation, each wary of the other. Jay finally broke the staredown ice with a slow wave. She hesitated, then reciprocated the gesture. He deliberately waited a long moment before slowly moving toward her, hopefully signaling he posed zero threat.

He stopped when he felt he was in range to talk without shouting. She had not moved an inch, her gaze glued to him unblinkingly from the start, yet relieved he had the presence of mind to consider she might not want him to get too close, too soon.

After some introductory banter, he asked if it would be ok for him to come a little closer; again reassured by his demonstrated awareness, she nodded yes. He slowly came only about half that distance and stopped. From here they held more of a conversation, and indicated that they each had something to eat and drink to share with the other. He removed his backpack and slowly sat cross-legged beside it, hoping that she would see this too as a gesture of peacefulness and choose to close the remaining distance herself. She did.

Their relationship grew slowly, Jay always wanting Reza to regard him as nothing but an absolute gentleman. They had agreed to stay together out of practical necessity, and slowly yet steadily became friends – learning things about the other; learning to trust and like the other; and gradually, learning to care deeply for the other. This was truly a beautiful thing – one of the rare benefits this new order provided: all the time in the world, literally, for an old-fashioned courtship to bloom.

Reza had just finished organizing the medical supplies she had collected from their last run into Jackson, her sterile space taking shape. With electricity, she could use the equipment they had retrieved from the hospital where she had been an ER trauma specialist; she had left her successful OB/GYN practice to assist with the overwhelming influx of patients the virus brought – just choosing to do her part.

As she came outside to check on Jay, she saw him stretching from atop the extension ladder to readjust a panel, then lose his balance on the overreach. His fall to the ground was in slow-motion, and her ear-piercing scream unheard. When she reached him there was no blood, but Jay was completely unconscious.

She struggled getting his tall body to her new space. Without the hospital’s facilities, her diagnostic assessment would not be as thorough. Her best determination without the benefit of radiology was that he had suffered a subdural hematoma – blunt force trauma to the brain causing swelling inside his skull. Pressure would be building around his brain stem, yet she had no means to physically relieve it.

She decided the best course was to immediately place him in a medically induced coma, shutting down his brain’s activity load, reducing the energy required for its functioning. This would mitigate the swelling and pressure buildup, allowing the natural healing process to take over at its own measured pace.

The main risk was that his overall blood pressure could plummet. Not having electricity, she thankfully had an old-school mercury manometer to track his BP, and meds to stabilize it. She prepared the IV and administered the coma drug Diprivan, also known as milk of amnesia, as it typically results in temporary memory loss. Diprivan remains, however, one of the safest barbiturates for managing this type of procedure. All she could do now was sit… monitor… and hope…

When Jay finally came to, he heard all sorts of beeps and clicks and busy background noise, including voices of several people talking in the distance. He heard someone say to contact Dr. DeCastro immediately, but none of this was making any sense to him. There were bright lights that hurt his eyes – and they were clearly electric. What the hell was going on?? He struggled to get up, but firm hands held him in place as he was told to just relax – the doctor was on her way.

When Reza came into the room in her full hospital attire – stethoscope draped about her neck, clipboard in hand – Jay felt an uncertain mix of joy and confusion, and was speechless as he tried to make sense of what was happening. “Sir,” she said, “I am Dr. DeCastro and I’ve been your attending physician since you arrived. You’ve been in an induced coma to treat the head trauma you presented, but there’s good news – it appears you’ve healed enough for us to have awakened you.”

Bewilderment spiraling, he remained speechless – mainly wondering why Reza was speaking to him in such a cold, detached manner.

“Can you tell us your name, sir? You had no ID when you arrived. You’ve been here for over a week, and we’d like to notify somebody for you – surely someone must be worried sick.”

“Reza…??” is all he could manage.

“Yes,” she says, pointing at her name tag. “That is my name, although I do prefer Dr. DeCastro while I’m on call,” she says smiling that playful smile he had come to love.

“My head is really foggy, and I can’t even remember my own name – but why are you acting like you don’t know me?”

“Memory loss is temporary – a typical side effect of the medication we used to induce your coma, so no worries. There are also mild hallucinatory effects, which is why you think we know each other. Again, this is normal, so not to worry.”

“But Reza – ”

“You’re clearly a bit stressed, so I’m giving you a mild sedative to relax you, and I’ll check back with you when I make my late rounds tonight.”

“But I do know you,” he fought to say as the sedative began taking rapid effect. “Your middle name is not on your tag – it’s Noella, named after your grandmother in Milan…,” he drifted off.

Stunned, she looked at the nurse, and he looked back and shrugged. She left to finish her early rounds – but something definitely felt strange.

When she returned, she was alone in the room with Jay – awake but still groggy from the sedative. She leaned close and asked how he came to know her middle name. “You told me that story, Reza,” Jay deadpanned.

“That’s not possible – I’d remember you,” she said in a low voice, not wanting to attract any of the night nurses while trying to get her head around what was happening.

“Ok – what if I told you that you always wear a silver, heart-shaped locket around your neck?”

“I’d say you probably saw it when I leaned over to listen to your lungs.”

“I didn’t – but would you start to believe me if I told you what was inside it? There’s no way I could know that, right?”

“If you could tell me that…,” she tailed off.

“On the right side is a photo of your Persian mother, Anahita, holding you as an infant in Tehran.” Reza gasps, but struggles to remain quiet. “And on the left, only a number is inscribed: #129.” Another gasp. “That number refers to a lesson from a metaphysics text your mother studied: Beyond this world there is –”

"…a world I want,” Reza finishes with Jay. “How can you know this?” she begs, a tear streaming down her cheek. “Where have we met??”

Over the next hour, Jay describes the world he lives in: how ‘Armageddon’ happened, life with his Reza, and the last thing he remembers before waking up here – falling off a ladder. After listening intently, but still unable to grasp it all, she says, “Well I don’t know what to say about any of that. I’m a scientist, and what seems to be happening here doesn’t work for —”

“—And I’m an engineer, Reza – an applied scientist. And I can’t explain it either.”

“Well, it really doesn’t matter – you’re fortunate to be in this world now.”

Jay gives her a stern look, then says, “I can’t be here – I’ve got to get back! My Reza is waiting for me. She needs me. I need her. There’s just the two of us, and winter is coming... Please, there must be something you can do to get me back! Please!!”

Reza pauses, then leaves the room. She returns making sure that no one is approaching. “This is all I can do,” she says handing him two syringes of Diprivan, “but you must do it yourself. You’ll need to inject the first into this heparin lock here on your IV line. It will take about ten minutes to re-induce your coma. So, no more than five minutes after the first, inject the second one, which ensures you don’t re-awaken here...you do understand?! But to protect me, wait a couple of hours so I can leave, and deposit both syringes in this red biohazard bin before you go under.”

“I will, Reza. Thank you! Would you please tell me something that I can tell my Reza so she’ll believe that this experience was real – something you'd never tell anyone?”

Reza thinks for just a moment, then pauses to consider whether she really wants to reveal this, even now… Then she leans over and whispers in his ear. They then just look at each other expressionless for a long moment before she rises to leave. She stops, turns to Jay, and says, “How can I meet ‘you’ – here, in this realm?”

After another short pause, he says, “Be at the Jackson Lake Overlook on Signal Mountain at sunrise on the next vernal equinox. My name is Jason O’Mega – I go by Jay. Video me now on your phone so I can introduce you – to ‘me’; I really hope we meet!”

THE END