I was born in Zion. I spent most of my childhood just learning how to

survive. But, when I had a little free time, I searched. I searched for

something my parents and my aunts and uncles told me about over and over

again. They told me about these wonderful things as if they were legends,

something their parents had told them about when they were children and much further back. Back before the Peace and then the Destruction. Books, they called them. They talked of the adventures their ancestors had found in

books.

So when I was about five years old, I decided to look for these books. My

cousins told me that books were just the stuff of legends, just fiction and

nothing else. That was all just a motivation to me, to prove them wrong.

And indeed I did. I was careful, hid in boxes, old shells of buildings,

looking all the while for these "books". It wasn't until I was nine years

old, and had been all around what used to be a city, that I found an old,

desecrated building with many of these so-called "books". I grabbed a few

off the shelves and ran back home, exhilarated with my discovery.

I had learned how to read from old computer manuals and vacation brochures.

I can't say I was self-taught but, after my first few words I taught myself. After my discovery of the books I brought back so many that our dwelling was practically a library within itself.

I learned of times so long ago that I couldn't count the number of years on

the hands and feet of all the people in our settlement. About pyramids, the

creation of stars, nuclear fission, and the "hidden pleasures" of chocolate.

Of penguins, "mice", and scuba gear. I had read every book that I had

rescued from the old crumbled structure by the time I was fifteen. I

started to teach the younger children to read from books, instead of how I

had learned, via manuals. I found pride in teaching them words and concepts

I had not discovered until I found those books at age nine.

I taught myself how to read Latin, German, Portuguese, Czech, French,

Hungarian, and Japanese, but none fluently. Unfortunately I can't speak any of it, because everyone around here only speaks English, when they speak at all.

When I was eighteen our settlement was discovered by those awful machines.

My whole family was killed while I was at my book cache deep within the

city. The only person with me was my cousin Adam (Pi), who was looking for a

story he had heard when we were both just little children, by word of mouth.

When he ducked under a shelf he heard many voices crying out in pain

suddenly silenced. Our settlement was not within hearing distance and I didn't hear it. He brought his head up slowly and said to me in a monotone voice, "They're dead. Every last one of them, Eva. All of

them are dead."

"They can't be! What happened? Why, God, Why?!"

"I don't know why, Eva. I don't know why. I don't even know what."