After Moon

“After Moon”

“There has to be another way!” Cousin held tight to Shama as she kicked and clawed to reach me. “Luna!! We can find another way! We’ll figure it out!”

Sadly, I feared..no I knew, there was no other way. I was what the world had been waiting for, and part of me already accepted that. The rest wanted to throw that damned stone into the endlessness of space, run into big sisters arms and cry until my eyes dried, but this was nothing more than a childish fantasy.

“Cousin, take care of her..and yourself too, from time to time,” I joked.

He smirked back, a mournful one.

“You take care of our world, and we’ll try to handle the rest.”

With a nod, accompanied by Shama’s hollering, I closed my eyes and fell back. The weight of everything melted away, all thought, all desire, all feeling. It seemed this was the end of my journey....But as I’d learned, life is a complicated lesson of balance, push and pull, lose and gain. And as one half of a thing is a waveless ocean, so is the ending of a story with no origin bound to it. This is not my story. This, is a story of humanity, a story of survival, a story of....After Moon.

Luna Akhani

2221

In the year 2115, our moon simply vanished. There was no warning, no indication, no salvation. We were thrust into an era of endless chaos. Continents shifted, oceans flooded the lands. Our very brain chemistry was altered. About sixty percent of the world had already died before the earthquakes stopped, leaving the other forty to pick up the pieces. Technology was the first to go. Then, when the crops stopped growing, currency fell, along with all international commerce that remained after the “Tremble.” Governments stashed necessities while the masses went hungry, and it stayed that way, for a while at least. By the year fifty of “After Moon,” nearly thirty percent of what was left had rebelled in some way…and the uprisings never stopped.

I was born in 2200, eighty five years into After Moon. The world had somewhat stabilized, as Mars was pulled closer to us, serving as a new moon. There were even rumors of the first Martian colonies, though it was nothing more than hearsay. It was, however, common knowledge that only three continents remained, and were regarded as the Three Great States: Eden, Amessia, and Akhanoa.

A new form of government was birthed, in which a council of twenty one was formed for each State. Those sixty three representatives were one of the sixty three remaining ethnicities on Earth. Most candidates were selected young, and reared to become such, “so as to reflect their ancestral culture and preserve traditions of what once was, in order to guide us into what can be.” At least that’s the way mom used to describe it. She wanted me to become the first Council Member chosen after the teenage years. My sister Shama wanted to be a rover like dad, so I kinda got stuck with it kinda young.

“We will see case 774: Ahkanoa VS Shama Akhani.” Sister stood with her usual purposefully nonchalant expression, no one able to read her thoughts.

“Eleven years, Ms Akhani,” the chubby shrewd began. “Eleven years, yet the insurrections you and your Mother caused still affect the Sta-.”

“The insurrections are because the Council refuses to give them truth! Until then, the madness will never stop.”...Sister was never one to not speak her mind. The judge was quite baffled, but the second magistrate chimed in this time. He was a pale skinned, middle aged Amessian dunce. He chuckled, regained composure and said, “Again with the ‘hidden colonies.’ If Mars was habitable, do you think anyone in the Three States would be on this burning rock? Akhani, the simple fact is, your parents raised you on fairy tales, and those can be very dangerous. You know what’s real? The unmarked graves of twenty eight enforcers that she burned alive, beyond recognition, those are real!”

I was only ten, so I don’t know much about what happened. They took Shama that day, and I only see her in court. So all I know are the rumors , never able to decipher the truth for myself.

Shama spoke up again.

“Yes, those are real. But neither my mother, nor I are responsible for that! The only thing we were guilty of is opening people’s eyes, and you killed her for it!” She glanced back and acknowledged me for the first time that day, before returning to the white Amessian. The last magistrate sat forward. She was a stern, dark skinned Edenian sitting in the central position.

“Young woman, you have learned nothing. I see your time here was a waste. With my colleagues’ agreements, I would like to correct this error.” She glanced to both sides of her, then finished....”You will meet the same fate as Xahna Akhani, your treacherous mother. I hear-by banish you to the Dead Zone!”

It was unanimously decided that sister had a month to live, in which I would only get to see her twice, including today. I had never actually spoken to her in those eleven years, and today was the eve of my twenty first birthday..so..yay, I guess.

It’s so strange to know the face of a person, their temperaments and their past, but to stare into the eyes of a complete stranger nevertheless. The first few minutes were quiet, but Sister finally broke the silence.

“What made you decide to grow up on me?,” she joked.

“You’re one to talk, old lady,” I cracked back, though gray hairs were beginning to line her head. She was only thirty two, but I’m sure a stranger would not believe it.

“Luna, you probably have a lot to say to me. And a lot to ask me, too. But, first..are you ok?”

I know she had no idea what I’d been up to for the past eleven years, but the question seemed so futile, so I ignored it.

“Shama, when they took you, you gave me something. You gave me a necklace, and you told me to hide it..Why?” Her weary expression grew calmer.

“Yea. Mom’s locket. It’s sort of a family heirloom from dad’s side. Do you have it?”

“Mhm. I buried it before they took me to the orphanage and it took me until eighteen to get back to our district and get it.”

She was saddened, probably feeling responsible for everything.

“It’s not your fault, idiot. And I’ve had a good life, childhood aside.” I’m almost certain she didn’t see through that lie.

“Anyway,” I continued, “I have to ask..what happened with mom?”

“Luna, I don’t have long to talk and there’s a more pressing matter at hand……….the matter of my escape.”

By weeks end, I found myself in a distant land, heart shaped locket gripped tight in my palm along with my horse’s reins. Both were very dear to me, as not many horses still roamed the fields of Ahkanoa. I was sure there were even less here, in Amessia.

Shama’s instructions were clear, but quite puzzling. She told me to go there, to District Nine deep in the West, where “the stars burn dim.” She wasn’t wrong. My first night in the foreign territory was spent gazing at them from the local rent-out’s roof. Something about it was so alluring, seeing the color behind the light, the star beyond the shine.

Just then my thoughts were interrupted by a fit man not much older than Sister, but with the same heavy eyes. He climbed up and plopped down in my view, completely ignoring me. So I did the same, and mother’s heart shaped locket began growing warm in my hand, probably the gem protruding from its center. Whatever Shama meant by “heirloom” had much more to do with that than the gold necklace itself.

“So,” he finally said, “Where are you from? It certainly isn’t Amessia.”

I was irritated already. “And how would you know that, strange man?”

“You stare at the stars as if you have never seen them from this angle. And your fur coat tells me you’re from somewhere hot, not yet accustomed to our weather. Also, there’s a beautiful horse tied downstairs, and your awkward sitting position says you’ve been on its back for a while now. So, why Amessia, why District Nine, of all places?”

The irritation lessened..slightly!

“I’m not impressed,...?”

“Lonzo. And you are?”

“Here to find my family, or at least what’s left of it.”

“Hm,” Lonzo sympathized. “I am in a similar predicament.”

“But..aren’t you Amessian?”

The olive skinned man nodded. “I am, but my family is Ahkanoan, like you, I would imagine. They always used to tell me the stories of our lineage, though. Great blood flows through these veins,” he snickered and boasted.

“Tell me,” I smirked. Honestly I could use the distraction right now. I was no closer to finding our cousins and freeing Shama than when I left home a week and a half ago.

“Tell you what?”

“About the stories. About your family.”

Lonzo happily agreed, and began his spiel.

“So, long before our time, long before our parents’ parents’ time, there were many Travelers. These Travelers would go from place to place, guiding tribes and giving knowledge, until they happened upon a young world called…..”Earth.”

My first reaction was to laugh, but I was already curious, so I kept quiet.

“Earth was filled with similar beings of a like mind and body, but set astray by their own philosophies. And just as the Sun burns to live, and lives to burn, Earthlings were consumed by the ever present thought of a Divine Power, one that ignored or controlled their lives. After generations of cultural assimilation, it was time for our cousins to move on.”

“Our cousins,” I thought. How ridiculous it would be if Sister sent me on a mission to find aliens.

“We were not yet ready to part from them, and so they gave us a gift. Man became one with the Travelers, and vice versa. But these “hybrids” were a threat to humanity, not in their actions but in theory of their power. They were hunted and murdered, down to one. last. hybrid. But right now, his story isn’t what’s important.”

“Then, do tell, whose story is this, exactly?”

Lonzo’s grin grew and he started back up.

“Well, I suppose you could say it’s about his great great grandson, the man who sacrificed everything to save us. This man ventured to the stars, and brought back a celestial saviour.”

“Wait, you’re talking about Mars! Are you saying that one man is responsible for an entire planet coming into alignment? I doubt it.” My intellectual criticism was taking control.

“I assure you, every word is true. And this man, this man was named Okanna Akhani.”

“What?! How do you know that name?!” I stood in outrage, the lockett growing even hotter.

“I told you, your father..my uncle, he saved us. And as his last of kin, it’s our duty now to save humanity!”

I was already climbing down, nearly falling just to get away. The stone’s heat was unbearable, so unbearable I let out a scream that was heard all across District Nine, and when I opened my eyes, there was no city lying before me. There was no Lonzo, there was no night sky. There was only blueish, white light, the same light that emanated from that damned stone. Just as the night sky was red, so too was the realization that everything I’d ever known was a lie, and nothing made sense, nothing but the desire to see that which I’d never laid eyes on, something that abandoned us, something that slaughtered us...In that moment, all I wanted was to see the Moon.