Saving Grace

There was a time when this city was so vast that a person could not walk across it within two days’ time. The buildings were so tall that they pierced the clouds. It was amazing. Now they are just rubble. The air is full of smoke and ash. The rain, when it comes…if it comes… burns the flesh as it lands. I remember the rain from before. I remember the soothing feeling of the rain. And the smell. Oh, the smell. I still remember it. It was the smell of a fresh new start. Like everything was going to be okay. Then came the end. The world ended, just as we knew it would. The rain would not smell the same again.

We thought it wouldn’t be in our lifetime. Only it was. We thought everyone would die from a nuclear war or the world would become unlivable from too much pollution. Some even thought a meteor would hit us and destroy us like the one that killed the dinosaurs. But none of that happened. We became too smart for our own good. We relied too much on technology. We didn’t know how to live without it, and we kept trying to come up with new ways to have it help us in our everyday lives. And now we sit on the edge of annihilation. It was our own hubris that did us in. This is a warning for anyone reading this.

Entry #1:

Today I was woken up by screams. I don’t know from what. The screams woke up just about everyone in the camp. I’m frightened. Would I be next? I don’t know what they do to the people, or where they take them. I just hear the screams. I am writing this entry as a diary; in case something happens to me. Gotta go. Write more later.

Entry #2: No screams. Today is okay. I wish I could write and draw every day, but I have to be really careful not to get caught. These entries might not make sense, but I’ll do my best. We’re fed our daily rations. We’re kept inside so we don’t die from the smoke and ash that’s in the air outside. I still don’t why they keep us alive. They don’t need us. I miss Grace. She was my wife. She got taken awhile back. I don’t know how long ago, maybe just a few weeks. They don’t keep calendars or clocks in here, so it’s hard to keep track of time. She gotten taken in the middle of the night. She was screaming. I tried to grab her hand, but they stopped me. She threw something at me. I couldn’t tell what it was at first. They pushed me to the ground and held me down until I could no longer see her. I cried and screamed for what seemed like an eternity, but they would not let me up until I calmed down. I got up. They left. I tried to straighten out the room. It was a mess. Then, on the ground, next to the bed that I had kicked over, was a locket. It was a heart shaped locket. It was the one her mom gave her as a child. She kept a picture in it. It was one of me and her when we first got together. We were holding hands and smiling. She said when she first held my hand and looked into my eyes, she was in love. This picture reminded her of that. It reminded me of that too. Someone’s coming.

Entry #3: Not much to say today. I keep the locket with me, in my pocket, out of sight. We aren’t allowed to have personal possessions or things to remind us of our past life. We were told we couldn’t have anything like that because it makes us rebel. We’re lucky some of us get to have paper and pencils. It’s supposed to be to take notes to make technical advancements. I help in the lab, but I don’t know what we’re making. They always want to become more advanced. But they don’t want the youngsters educated. It’s very strange. Those of us who can read and write are kept separate from the younger group. The younger group are not allowed books or pencils. They want them to stay uneducated. My guess is it’s so they can be controlled easier. Still, I have to wonder. Why?

Entry #4: Today, I asked where they took my wife. The head of the camp told me he will look into it and give me an answer within the next few days. Something about how he replied makes me feal uneasy. If someone is reading this. If something happens to me. Find Grace. Give her this locket.

Entry #5: If you are wondering how the end came, let me explain. We didn’t go out and talk to each other anymore, we relied on computers to talk to each other or talk over the phone. There was no human contact. So much false information was online that we didn’t know who to trust. We only did what we were told. Then someone built an artificial intelligence that was so smart, it could figure out the next 50 moves before we could guess the next one. It was embedded into everything. It wasn’t self- aware. It wasn’t alive. It just gave someone the tactical edge in everything. The guy in charge, no one knows for sure who it is, sent a message to the world governments that world is getting too big. More tomorrow, someone’s coming.

Entry #: I was put in lockup. They didn’t find this journal or the locket, but they wanted to know why I was asking about Grace. I told them I missed her, and I wanted her back. They told me she was separated from me for our own good. We cannot have attachments to our old life. It makes us rebel. That means she is still alive. Somewhere.

Entry #6: It’s been a while since I wrote in this thing. Couldn’t find Grace. Got put in lockup again for asking other people questions. This time they poured cold water on me and put electrodes on me. Then they ran electricity through my body. It was excruciating. I screamed until I passed out from exhaustion. Then, when I woke, they took me outside in the searing sun and left me there. The rain came. The burning was almost more than I could bare. I banged on the doors, but no one came. Then as I lay in a heap, they came and brought me inside. They tore the garments from my body and gently washed the rain from my body. It stayed burning. It would not go away. I burned for days on end and the only sleep I could get was when my mind and body could no longer handle the constant pain. I would fall asleep for short periods of time. Then I would wake and burn some more. There were no blisters, but my skin was bright red. I would guess it was radiation or chemical burns. I don’t know how I lived through it. Finally, it subsided. I could sleep much easier now. I didn’t ask about Grace any longer. My guess is that I am a warning to others about what happens if you don’t follow the rules.

Entry #7: More screams. I wonder what they asked about. None of my business. Better to stay safe.

Entry #8: More of my earlier story: The head guy talked some countries into slowing their population growth. They did. They did it drastically and they became a place where there were so few people in the new generation that they couldn’t support the previous generation economically. Their governments collapsed. As he was doing this, he sent out fears about diseases and had us take medicines to prevent them. Some medicines were necessary, but others were used to weaken our immune system. A lot of us died from the flu and diseases we couldn’t fight it off anymore. He gave us a way to make more food, but it hurt our environment. We went over the threshold for what the environment could sustain, so the vegetation started dying off. Then some maniac from a country whose government was collapsing sent nuclear bombs to all the countries he could, including us. We tried to stop them, but we couldn’t stop them all. The fires razed the Amazon. There wasn’t much left. The bombs created deserts where there was once vegetation. The ash in the air, the burning rain, that is what we got after the bombs came. So many people died. They say the guy who controlled the computer is still alive. In his building. Somewhere. The leaders of the camp work for him.

Entry #9: I am tired. More screams came last night. I miss Grace. Oh no, someone’s com

*****

Dirt and ash covered everything in the rubble. The building collapsed. It looked like it had been hit by a bomb. Alpha Team 1 arrived within hours of hearing there was a group of humans inside. Their orders were to gather up the people and take them to safety.

When Sean and David arrived on scene, they started digging through the rubble to look for survivors. The found a little boy and girl with their arms wrapped around each other. They were sitting next to a wicker chair. They were covered in soot. Their eyes were closed. Sean was unsure if they were alive. David knelt next to them and stretched out his thick, calloused hand to see if he could shake them awake.

Before he could touch the children, they fell over in a heap. They were dead. David could not help but let out a whimper. Tears came from his eyes. He stared at them for a few moments then asked, “Do you think they suffered?” Sean stood still. Then he looked to his left, then to his right. Then he looked up to the sky and replied, “It looks like they died before the building came down. It doesn’t look like they suffered. It must’ve been that damn chemical we’ve been trying to find. Same as the last time we came across it. It only kills kids.”

Just then, “Over here! I found something.” Sean and David jumped up and ran over to the other officer. “What’d you find Phil?” Sean tilted his head sideways to look at the notebook Phil had found.

Phil flipped the pages and when he got to the back pages he said, “No way. No way! I think this is it. Look here!” He pointed at a page with diagrams showing the location of holding cells and torture chambers. He flipped another page, and it showed the map that led directly to the main hub and to the testing lab. Then, with one more flip, they found the page for the chemical formula of the child killer. They now have the tools to stop the leader and his machines.

Sean closed his eyes tightly. “Let’s not get our hopes up. Let’s first find out if it’s all true.”

Sean and David led the armies to the torture chambers. They rescued 143 men, women, and children. Then they blew up the chemical building.

As they were ready to storm the main building, Sean remembered the journal. He must’ve read it 20 times by now. He looked at David and said, “Grace sent us to find her husband John and his journal. But, all we found was the journal and this locket and, so far, it’s given us what we needed to win. Let’s make sure she at least gets her locket back. I have a feeling he’s still out there making more journals for us. In time, we’ll give him back to her too.”