I'm not big on swearing even if it seems necessary, so I've done a little sensoring.
Ch. 5
18 Yrs. Old
" This birthday bites," Seamus snapped. His words were muffled by the cloth covering his head, which was lowered over a bowl of hot water misting him over in a cloud of steam. With each breath he took he coughed in liquid gurgles as phlegm slapped against his burning throat.
Cassie placed both hands on his shoulders and squeezed. " I know, kiddo. But try to keep things in perspective. At least you're not vomiting this year."
" Oh, yeah, not being able to breathe is such an improvement…" he coughed and hacked again, then leaned to the side to spit phlegm into the bucket.
Cassie reached under the towel to feel her son's forehead.
" Still hot," she mumbled. Seamus caught the worry undertone of her voice, and he shivered. He had been sick for a week now, and his lungs felt as though a pool of led had settled at the bottom. He could not take a deep breath without coughing something up. But at least he had yet to cough up blood. Blood usually heralded the point of never returning to any kind of health again.
Unlike pain, sickness was something that was difficult to brush aside. There were some illnesses that could be ignored for a time, but sicknesses such as the one Seamus had now tended to be all consuming. It brought about bouts of dizziness, and made it difficult to move about. He could barely move from one room to the other without support.
Seamus shivered again, this time from cold. The weather had been wet and freezing for nearly a month now, and even sitting so close to the stove glowing bright orange with a fire, and a blanket wrapped tightly around his shoulders, Seamus could still feel the chill air leaking into his bones.
" Need another blanket?" Cassie asked.
Seamus sniffed and cleared his throat. " Yeah, probably."
She patted him on the back before leaving. Seamus' head throbbed and felt as though it was swimming in a heavy liquid. He closed his eyes and took careful, shallow breaths. When he opened his eyes again, he pulled back the cloth to stare at his reflection in the water. He looked as he usually did, bony faced and pale. His eyes, however, were surrounded by shadows, and his normal pallor was taking on a gray hue. He took a deep breath to sigh, only to end up coughing fitfully until his chest ached.
" … the water isn't working. He's not getting any better."
Seamus jerked his head at the sound of his mother's voice.
" He's burning up, Eli. It usually doesn't last this long."
" He'll pull through," Eli replied. " He's done it plenty of times before. Seamus is good at surviving. He's survived interrogations then he can survive this."
" But he barely eats and is barely able to stand…"
" Look, babe. Ike's making some of that brew of his, the one that helped clear up Amber's cough. Seamus'll be all right. He's a Harper, and if a Harper is good at one thing it's surviving."
The conversation died down to low murmuring that Seamus could not understand. Heaviness settled on Seamus' heart. He had never cared much whether he lived or died, mostly just on what manner of death occurred. Of course he would never want to be Magog food, but whether beaten to death by a Nietzschean or wasted away by a disease, at least the pain would be over. But death was easiest on the one dead, since they felt nothing after. It was the living that suffered the most, and no matter how little he valued his own life, Seamus could not do that to his parents. They needed him to survive, and it had given him a reason to keep going, even when he was crawling home after another uber interrogation, blood dripping from him like a leaking faucet.
Seamus wished they didn't care so much. There were times when he was tired of holding on and just wanted to let go.
There came a commotion from outside the door. People were shouting, and harsh voices were barking orders. Seamus knew these sounds, and his emaciated body went taut enough to snap. He snatched the towel from off his head and pushed himself out of the chair. The moment he did his knees started to buckle and he slowly began sinking to the floor.
" Mom, dad!" he called, his voice high with terror. His parent's came running out as Seamus tried to pull himself back up using the table, while also trying to back away from the door. Cassie hurried over to her son, throwing his arm around her neck and lifting him. Eli went to the door and pressed his ear against it.
His breath came quick and unsteady. " Ubers. Oh man, not a slave run, please not another slave run."
He suddenly took three swift steps back. Cassie tried to haul a weak Seamus to the sleeping room but barely made it to the hall when the door burst open. Cassie yelped in alarm, and she and her son fell against the wall, sliding to the floor. Eli moved to stand protectively over them.
Two burly male Nietzscheans stalked in, flanking each side of the door. They were dressed in the sleeveless black uniforms, their arms thick with bulging muscles. Following after them was a young female uber, twenty or so perhaps. Seamus' eyes widened in surprise. She was beautiful for an uber. Most of the female soldiers he had seen tended toward an appearance more like the males. This one seemed to pride herself in her amber hair that fell past her shoulders, her lithe figure, and bright blue eyes. Her uniform was spotless, with sleeves that ended at her bone blades. She kept one hand on her blaster tucked in the holster about her waist as she entered. Outside, the din continued as other ubers broke down doors and snapped more orders.
" Inspection," the woman said in an annoyed voice. Seamus' heart clamored in his chest. Inspections usually preceded the slave runs.
The uber female looked Eli over at a glance, then grabbed him by the collar of his jacket to practically throw him toward the flanking males. The platinum blonde male on the right grabbed Eli by both arms to restrain him. Eli's gaze was to the floor, but his features twitched with intense anger.
Cassie wrapped her arms protectively around Seamus, and mother and son shrank away from the female who slowly approached them. The lady uber moved quick, snatching Cassie by the front of her shirt to lift her onto her feet. She looked Cassie over, grabbing her by the chin with one hand to study her face. She then shoved Cassie aside and turned her cold eyes on Seamus.
Seamus cringed when her hand shot out to grab his arm and force him onto his feet. He tried to stand on his own but his legs refused to cooperate. His wheezing breath came quick, and he could not hold back his need to cough. The female narrowed her eyes.
" What's wrong with him?" she asked harshly.
Seamus glanced over at his mother. Cassie was in the corner, her eyes to the floor and her shoulders quaking.
" He… has a cold," she lied in a quiet, subdued voice.
The uber woman looked Seamus up and down. The scrutiny seemed to take longer than it had with his parents. She even quirked an eyebrow as though peeked with interest.
" He's scrawnier than the parents," she said with a slight hint of disgust. She looked him over again.
When she spoke again, it seemed mostly to herself. " But he is young."
Seamus' meager frame convulsed. The female uber shook him roughly.
" Stand up straighter kludge!" she growled, her cold eyes flashing with fury.
Fear gave Seamus the strength he needed, and he was able to at least keep his legs from giving out. The woman grabbed him by the hair to turn his head painfully about until his neck creaked, studying his face. She then shoved him toward his mother, who caught him and held him tightly. The woman stared at Seamus for the longest time. She was thinking carefully, Seamus could tell. The look frightened him, and he cringed against his mother, quaking.
The woman said nothing else, but turned and strode from the room. The uber holding Eli shoved him roughly to the floor and followed after. Eli scrambled to his feet, rushing to the door and slamming it. He then turned to his frightened family, though he said nothing at first. He simply stared at them as though trying to memorize them or keep them locked in his sights forever.
Seamus' legs finally began to weaken, and the room began to spin.
" Hey mom…" he said, his voice low and weak. He began to sink to the floor, but was caught up by both Eli and Cassie. They moved him quickly to the sleeping room, gently laying him on his bed and covering him with all the blankets they had. Cassie stood and hurried from the room to come back a moment later with a wet rag. She began mopping her son's sweaty brow with one hand and gripping his shoulder with the other.
" They can't take him, Eli," she said.
" We don't know that they will," Eli replied.
" You saw the way that uber bch looked at him. They always go for the younger ones."
" Seamus is sick. They won't want him."
Cassie's breath sounded convulsive, then Seamus realized that she was laughing and sobbing at the same time. He found it unnerving until Cassie spoke again. " They'll take him just because he is. They'll take him just to kill him. They like killing the weak ones, the sick ones, so they don't contaminate the others," she spat bitterly.
They fell silent for the longest time.
" Even healthy he wouldn't survive," Cassie said. She began brushing back his hair.
" I won't let them take him Cassie," Eli said with a hard edge tone of utter conviction. " I won't let him die."
But then you'll die, Seamus wanted to say, but could not get his mouth to move. He fell asleep against his will.
AAAAAAAAAAAA
Seamus awoke with a start when someone began pulling on his arm. He opened his bleary eyes, blinking several times to look up into the intensely frightened face of his father.
" Come on, Seamus, get up," he hissed in a trembling voice. " We have to get you out of here now."
Seamus took a breath and coughed. He felt so tired that he could barely even move one arm. He just wanted to sleep.
" Seamus get up!" Eli pulled Seamus from the bedding. The urgency in his voice chased away some of the sleep fog but could not give Seamus the energy he needed to stand.
" I can't," he moaned. " I can't move dad."
" You have to, son. They're coming. Don't you hear them?"
Seamus listened. He heard screams, wailing, all distant like a memory. His father knelt to wrap his son's arm around his neck and pull him up. He then dragged him to the corner of the room where the trap door to the escape tunnel lay hidden beneath several blankets. Eli kicked the blankets aside, then knelt to the floor, feeling along the seams of the door until he found the hidden latch. He pressed it and the door dropped down. Eli gently lowered Seamus into the darkness, following soon after.
" What about mom?" Seamus asked, looking nervously back.
" She wanted to stay, Seamus. She's going to distract them."
Seamus pulled back, but the action was more in his head than a reality.
" But…"
" She wanted to do it, Seamus. She wanted to."
The tunnel was blacker than a starless midnight, but never veered. When Eli stopped Seamus knew that they were at the ladder that led to the surface. Eli moved his son around to his back, wrapping both of Seamus' arms around his neck.
" Hang on tight as you can kid," Eli said. Seamus clutched the collar of his father's jacket as he began to climb. It was an arduous ascent with Eli breathing heavily and each step slower than the last. Then there came a thud, whine, and creak. Faint light spilled into the tunnel, followed by foul smelling air. Eli climbed out into a frigid night filled with the sounds of screaming, blaster fire, and wailing pleads.
Once out of the tunnel, Eli practically carried his son to the junk heap that surrounded his home. He moved along it, kicking at metal sheets in search of the 'rabbit holes' used to hide items and people. To both their terror, the search was taking them around to the front where the ubers were coming and going. Eli climbed the pile in a mad, clamoring dash until he was hidden on the other side. They were on the other side of the building when Eli finally heard the hollow thump of one of the doors. He pulled it aside and helped Seamus to climb in.
" Stay until they're gone," Eli said. Seamus struggled to turn himself around.
" But dad…"
" Seamus stay here and live! You understand me? Whatever happens you have to survive!"
Seamus was taken back by this outburst of passion. Tears blurred his vision and he wiped them away angrily so that he could see his father's face. Tears fell freely from Eli's own sunken eyes.
" You have to live, Seamus. That's all we care about. That's all that matters."
Seamus felt suddenly small, as though he was five years old again and the Magog were beating at their door. He nodded numbly, and Eli smiled a sad smile.
" You'll be all right kid. Whatever happens, if it happens, you'll be all right. I know you will."
Eli closed the panel and Seamus was lost in patchy darkness. He stayed crouched where he was, the sharp metal bits of the pile and the makeshift girders that held the tunnel in place digging into his back. The weariness had left his mind but not his limbs. He wanted to go after his father but could hardly even sit up. Instead, he lowered himself onto his chest and crawled forward to the other end of the tunnel where it narrowed. He could not get out that way, but he could see through the junk to what was happening outside.
He watched as people were being dragged from the building, while others trying to chase after them were either beaten back or shot. It made him angry and sick to watch it, and he automatically reached for his shriller hidden in his jacket. Then he froze.
He saw his mother being dragged out, struggling and screaming, by the two ubers who had come just the other day. They were being led by the same uber female. She walked with an angry but haughty air about her like a disdainful queen.
When they were several feet from the building, the two males pinned Cassie down. One of them pulled her head back by her hair, and the female knelt before her.
" Where is your son?" Seamus heard the woman ask. Cassie did not answer. The woman struck her hard across the face with a balled fist. " Where is your brat you worthless kludge!"
Seamus could see his mother clearly. Blood dripped from Cassie's mouth. Her eyes became hard as steel, her jaw tensed, and as a response she spat blood and saliva in the female uber's face.
" Where you can't touch him you bch!"
The female wiped her face, then spread her bone blades.
" Nooooo!" Eli screamed, charging the male ubers holding his wife down. He was brandishing the metal pike he used to hunt rats, and collided into both ubers, thrusting the pike at one of them. All three tumbled back, but the pike went through the black-haired uber. Eli then pulled the pike free just as the platinum-headed male scrambled to his feet to charge the lighter weight kludge.
" Run Cassie!" Eli screamed.
" Run mom," Seamus feebly pleaded. Cassie pushed herself to her feet at the same time Eli struck the male uber across the face with the pike.
Cassie did not go far. She barely made five paces when the female pulled a knife from her belt and threw it. The blade sank deep into Cassie's back and she fell.
It had all happened in a blink. Seamus had barely even seen the knife until it had been thrown. His heart thudded and seemed to stop, and the breath caught in his throat.
" M-mom?" he whimpered, shivering. Someone screamed, and for a moment he thought it was his own voice screaming in his head. Then he saw his father push himself to his feet, mouth gaping open, the scream ripping from his throat to make the air vibrate. The scream was like a knife burrowing into Seamus' heart to lay him open for the cold to come rushing in.
Eli fell to his knees by his dead wife's side and gently, as though picking up a small child, gathered her into his arms. Seamus wanted to go out there, to hold his mother as well. He wanted it so badly that he did not care about anything else. He tried to move the junk so he could squeeze through, but could not, and he cursed himself bitterly for being so weak.
Then he saw the blonde male stand and stalk toward Eli. Seamus tried harder to move the junk that blocked his way and go help his father. The female followed behind the male, and the two stood over Eli like demonic giants from the stories Cassie used to tell.
Eli took no notice of them. His eyes were fixed on Cassie as though she were the only thing he could see. Then he looked up, not at the ubers, but in the direction of Seamus' hiding place. Their gazes met, though Seamus was certain that his father could not see him. Then again, perhaps he could in some way.
" Run dad," Seamus pleaded.
Eli began to laugh. He lowered his wife to the ground reverently, then looked back in Seamus' direction. He's eyes gleamed with mirth, with triumph, and his laughter grew louder, even hysterical.
" I killed one," he said, laughing so hard he could barely breathe. " Now I know why my son liked it so much."
The tears fell in rivers down Seamus' face, yet he found that he could not help a small smile. He did not know why. Some say that laughter was infectious, but Seamus felt it was something more. Something had been done, been accomplished, though he was not sure what. Maybe his safety, maybe the death of an uber, he could not say. But he felt it, and for a brief moment that was less than a second but more than an eternity, Seamus felt free, and knew his father felt it as well. They may not have won anything, but they had fought; they had tried.
The female curled her lip in contempt. She moved behind Eli with her bone blades spread. She placed them against his throat, and with one jerk of her arm slit it open. Eli's laughter ended in a way that made Seamus flinch and bring reality crumbling in around him. His father fell face-first over his mother's body, and both lay motionless.
Not when the twins died, or when Mark died, had Seamus felt such pain. It was so powerful that it consumed every part of him until he could not even think. It was a pain he could not brush aside to deal with later. It made him tremble, and kept his breath from coming and going. He watched the bodies of his parents, and silently pleaded with them to get up, yet knowing good and well that they never would.
The female wiped Eli's blood onto the back of his clothes. The blonde male snickered, and nudged the bodies to ensure that they were dead. Pain became rage for Seamus, the most powerful he had felt. Images of him running out, blowing his shriller and stealing the ubers' weapons to blast them into dust poured from his thoughts like rivers of venom. He wanted to tear them open, let their blood soak the ground. He wanted to hurl explosives and turn them into body parts. He wanted to do so many terrible things that his body ached to move. But all he could do was clench his fist until his palms bled.
The ubers left, and Seamus still had not moved. The world went deathly quiet. Seamus stared blankly at his parents. He suddenly could not understand why they saved him. He was sick and dying, absolutely useless. There was no reason to save him and die for the trouble. There was no point to it. They had been fools, risking their lives for a pathetic, dying kludge.
So many thoughts and emotions battled it out in Seamus' heart that he could no longer think clearly. Sorrow, rage, anger, guilt, confusion all buffeted him like a terrible storm. It swelled within him to send him spiraling into darkness, making his mind whirl and the world spin. It grew and grew creating the most excruciating pain he had ever felt. He thought his heart would burst with it. Then they congealed into one solid emotion that left him sobbing and shivering fitfully. He felt alone, utterly empty and alone. It exhausted him until he felt nothing at all, and fell asleep.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAA
The morning was gray, as it had always been. Seamus had never known a morning that was not gray. It was also bitterly cold with a biting wind, but he did not care.
He crawled from the hole like a wounded rat, crumpling beneath it and huddling against the junk surrounding it. It was as far as he could go, as far as he wanted to go. The effort had worn him out too much for anything else.
He did not know how long he was there, staring blankly at the ground, feeling nothing except lost in something unreal. He watched unthinking as his tears stained the dusty ground. Then a shadow fell over him. He looked up without a care whether it was kludge or uber that towered above him. It was Ike, his forehead bloody, his face white, and his eyes red and wet. He stared at Seamus sadly for a moment, and Seamus stared back.
" You poor kid," Ike said in a strangled voice. He knelt, reaching his hand out toward Seamus. Seamus flinched, suddenly loathed to be touched. Touching, feeling anything, would make everything real again, and he did not want that.
" It's okay, Seamus. It's okay."
Ike placed his hand on Seamus' shoulder, and Seamus cringed with a shudder. He took in a shaky breath and coughed fitfully.
" We best get you inside, kid. You'll die out here."
Ike gathered Seamus up as one would a sleeping child to take to his bed. Seamus was so skeletal thin and light that Ike lifted him easily, and was startled by it. He carried Seamus quickly over the junk and then indoors to the Lahey home on the other side of the hall. The rooms were in shambles, and Ike's wife was huddled in the corner, weeping. Brenden was by her side trying to comfort her. Both looked up when Ike passed them, but something seemed to be missing, though Seamus could not fathom what, nor did he wish to try. Ike took Seamus into the sleeping room and laid him down on the blankets, wrapping him up in them.
Seamus lay there, caught between sleep and waking. He was so tired, yet every time he closed his eyes he saw it all again, and the pain stabbed him.
" He's sick," he heard Ike say.
" … his parents…"
" … need to hide the bodies… ubers can't get them… then we'll bury them…"
Seamus heard the conversation in a detached way. Then Brenden walked in and sat down beside his cousin with knees drawn up to his chest.
Seamus turned his head to look up at his cousin. Brenden's face was wet, and his eyes red like his father's. Then Seamus looked around the room, and knew then what it was that was wrong.
" Amber?" he asked in a small voice.
Brenden wiped his eyes with one hand. " They took her."
Seamus dropped his head back to the floor. Reality slipped away from him again, and his body went numb. Then he felt Brenden's hand on his arm. Seamus looked up at him, and Brenden looked back. No words needed to be said, or could be said. Words had no meaning for them, only tears.
Seamus had not realized he had fallen asleep. He recalled vaguely being given something to drink, but that was all. When he awoke, the room was dark except for a wan light spilling in through a tiny window. Morning was coming, and Seamus had feeling in his limbs.
Bleary-eyed and half-asleep, he still managed to push himself up. He swayed, stumbling toward the door to collide with the wall on the other side. He leaned against this wall as he made his way to what had been the kitchen. He was thirsty, and hungry, but he was used to hunger.
When he came into the ramshackled room he found himself to be alone. Dread seized him as he listened into the silence for voices that weren't there.
They came again, Seamus thought. Fear gave him strength as it always did, and he moved quickly out of the kitchen and into the corridor. He hurried as best he could, tripping and falling several times, slow to get back up. He did not even acknowledge how it was he could move at all.
When he burst outside into the cold gray day, he finally heard voices coming from his right. He turned suddenly and saw a mass of people standing in a half circle. Confused, shivering, he stumbled toward them, his momentum carrying him forward. But he was unable to stop, and stumbled on the verge of dropping.
Many familiar faces turned in surprise to see him moving toward them. When he came to the crowd, falling once again, he was caught and lifted upright.
" Seamus, what are you doing? You shouldn't be out here," Brenden said, helping his cousin to stand. Seamus paid no attention to him. His eyes and his thoughts were fixed on the massive but shallow grave the people surrounded.
" Why didn't you wake me up for this?" Seamus asked hoarsely.
" You were sick, man. You were asleep for almost two days. We were going to bring you out later, when there weren't so many and after we were sure you were all right."
Seamus heard Brenden's words distantly. Ike, who was standing at the head of the grave, went on with his eulogy. People turned back to listen. Seamus, however, heard little of it. He felt detached again with old emotions trying to resurface, but hovering back as a distant memory. It was still unreal to him, and he still could not understand why he was alive and his parents were not.
It was what his parents had wanted. Seamus remembered that now. His father had said it was all they had wanted. He did not know why. He could not understand how it was they could leave him alone, drowning in his own pain. But he was alive. Sick as he felt, he was moving again. That meant something important. That meant he would live after all. And if that was what they wanted, then he would give it to them as best he could. He did not understand it, nor saw any point to it, but he would do it. He would try.
When the eulogy had ended, people began to leave. Seamus, however, hobbled toward the grave. He stood as straight as he could, looking down at the pale bodies of his parents. They looked alseep, but seemed cold. Seamus took a quick breath without coughing. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his shriller.
" I still wish I'd used this," he quietly said. The pain stabbed again, but he had run out of tears. He tossed the shriller into the grave and it landed between Cassie and Eli.
" I'll live as long as I can."
He then turned and walked away from the grave as the diggers began to replace the dirt. It was not the only grave, there were others that had been dug and filled. There were markers as well, for the dead, and those that were alive but gone and soon to be dead.
Seamus had made no promises to survive, just to try. The pain stayed with him, but diminished to become a burr in his soul to always remind him. He found the means to ignore it, to go on living, to quell all his anger as best as he could. He lived dangerously. He stole, he aggravated the ubers, he plotted, planned, and schemed. He became used to coming home and never seeing or hearing his mother and father.
Life went on for Seamus, with no real purpose except to be a nuisance to all ubers he came across. He wanted revenge but never saw the female uber again. He became so used to pain that he hardly felt it, yet continued to fear its coming. He lost other friends, mourned them, then went on. His mother had told him once that one never knew what might come. Seamus thought back on those words often with fondness but never really believed them.
Then, one day, he met a man. His name was Bobby Jensen. He had a girlfriend called Becka Valentine who owned a ship called the Eureka Maru. They took him away from earth, from hunger, cold, and emptiness. For the first time in his young life, the small, frail boy's feet had left the ground, and Seamus Zelazny Harper was flying to the stars.
End of Part One
