Jesse and I slept in the back of my mother’s van with the seats lowered. I woke up in the middle of the night, hair and dust finding their way into my mouth. When dim blue poured in through the windows, I gave up on returning to sleep—I never made it deep enough to have a dream, and it felt like I was sitting awake in the vehicle the entire time as the night passed us by. My knuckles rubbed against the glass. It was cold outside, likely dewy and stagnant, and I wished I felt safe enough to go outside and walk carefully around the surrounding gradient, smelling flowers and picking weeds. I also wished that we could make some sort of a grave marker for Keegan, but I’d broached this suggestion more than once and it always, more often than not, made Jesse irascible. I hadn’t mentioned mourning Keegan for two days now; I said it when we were packing to leave, and Jesse refuted me by being preachy. Something about having faith, something about denial. Either way, Pastor Kalburn’s teachings in Reddell had cemented themselves in his brain, despite the fact that it was nearing a year since our last service.      

          “Don’t talk like that. Tonight, we pray for his return,” he answered the last time.

          "Like last night.” He prayed every night and his words would keep me up for hours.

          “I know it looks stupid, Aaliyah, but there’s a lotta people out there who need His assistance, His guidance. A couple three prayers don’t hurt anybody.”

          “And hopefully, He will notice my mom’s van moving across the somewhere-nowhere that we’re in. He’ll lead us to Keegan, and he will be perfectly fine and healthy and alive. I am so with you.”

          Still, I was never sure I believed, and despite my cynicism, Jesse just carried on driving down the blank, sloping expanse of Montana, without yelling at me. It was partially comforting that there was nothing out here left for people to touch and destroy, like they had with populated cities and towns.

          Jesse was better at driving through the valleys and up through the mountains, especially since there were light flurries. Nothing stuck; everything melted within a few hours. Back in Minnesota, I never drove much despite living in the suburbs and having my license. We had a close bus stop or we always biked in Saint Paul. Driving through it with my family was like crossing into several different towns, and I had no real reason to ever leave North End, where all of my classmates’ houses, churches, parks, and clubs were located. I left the upcoming difficult roads through the Anaconda Range in southwest Montana—or as Jesse called them, the Pintlers—all for him. In the morning, the peaks were graceful and welcoming. At night, the giant blackness of the valleys were like holes to the center of the Earth, and I imagined myself crashing through the guardrails, straight over the cliffs. I feared falling forever.

 

          Jesse’s father was a hard-ass and shoved him around the ranch at dawn, but if he took naps or slept in, it was impossible to reach him. Jesse, with his pioneer spirit—as his father called it—and gentle features, slept quietly and soundly most days, and I couldn’t help but occasionally look at the way his chest rose and fell, and how his eye twitched. Incredible eyelashes, brown eyes like a doe, and hair the color of black cherry stained wood, he was pretty and never acknowledged it, but the local girls at school did. A boy so popular in church, who only worried about the water in his father’s chicken coop, now stuck with me in a dirty van looking for our lost friend.

          When he woke up, or at least when he decided to speak, I had already been driving a few hours west through Idaho, and according to the interstate signage, we passed Coeur d’Alene, or whatever was left of it, and were headed through the remnants of Spokane. The mountains had withered into unnatural rocky formations, emerald pines, sparkly rivers, bare bushes, and big industrial bridges. All of these were scenic sights we wished for Keegan to see with us. Because we both had no endurance for long distance driving—often getting lost, taking stress naps, and stopping to siphon gasoline from idle cars into my mother's not-so-fuel-efficient van—there was no certainty in how long this should have taken had we just gunned it. Perhaps half a day. I cried a little to myself when we saw the main riverfront roads, with the water still rushing gorgeously, but no spectators. The streets were littered with debris.

          Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Jesse in the rearview mirror, checking the paper calendar we stole from Keegan’s room, the day the entire family stopped returning phone calls: July 3rd, but it was nippy and dewy. Many other Reddell residents left for bigger communities and better resources, but it was too abrupt in nature with his family, the Hawthornes. I never believed that the swelling cold front in summer would be the cause of their pivotal moment to leave. The last reported location we had on him was Olympia, Washington, because his cousin lived there and volunteered to take them in. My defeated mother, too tired from our own flight from Saint Paul, decided not to join in the movement and lent us her car with the promise that we would return safely with everyone. Jesse asked if we needed a gun for safety and my Mom sobbed until we left.

          Jesse crawled over and slowly tried to weave himself over the middle compartment and into the passenger seat, as he preferred over pulling to the shoulder. He fell hard into the chair and buckled the stubborn seatbelt and took a bottle of water from the little red icebox we kept on the floor, besides a bag of toiletries from my house. There was a half-empty plastic bottle, the water inside now two days old, and travel-size Listerine. He rinsed his teeth with a mouthful of water thoroughly. I watched as he spat out the window, the trail of water and saliva flying out into nothing in the wind of the interstate. A rush of cold air made my back and arms prickle. He quickly rolled the glass up, because even though it was July, it was around forty degrees outside.

          “I had a dream about Keegan,” he said, unprompted. “People were cutting him open.”

          “Christ. I don’t want to hear about that right now,” I said.

          I missed his usual levity, the jokes, the joy. A lot of the radio stations we scrolled to were static, and it was difficult to find one of those channels without live morning talk shows that only played pre-recorded slogans and the same twelve songs throughout its daily run. We definitely tried avoiding the Reaver broadcasts—once they took over as the leading entity for law enforcement, they spread over every commercial, online article, and radio station possible. Within these last few months, there were not many casual shows about life advice and cash prizes. Abysmal broadcasts, either automated warnings from the state, filled the van, warning us to not intervene in anything beyond what we were allowed to do. The same retail and restaurant breaks advertised a sale for businesses that ceased to exist.

         Jesse shrugged and turned away. “Sorry. You’re gonna hear about it later anyway.”

          I could tell he was frowning. We had over 300 miles before we hit Olympia.

 

          Keegan once told me that he had actually been to Saint Paul. His family visited the Mall of America after having all these notions about it standing as the most luxurious thing in the whole country. There were magazine articles and brief cable commercials about the shopping center. In trying to locate it, however, they passed Bloomington and drove twenty minutes into the heart of my hometown. He was seven, in awe of the industrial landscape, and it was the first place he saw pedestrians feeding ducks bread, which he had heavily been against for all of his life. He mainly tended the mallards by the creek and invited us to bring bowls of peas with him.

          He had never returned to the city.

          I had not lived in Saint Paul for over three years now, but I still used it as a point of reference whenever I entered another city rather than Reddell, where Jesse and Keegan were born. There was more greenery, even in the cold. Algae bloomed across bodies of water, all surrounding the capitol building. Its enormous dome was littered in spray paint, graffitied with cryptic symbols and love letters and signatures and illustrations of genitals and other nonsense. There was little white left on its surface, and some windows were broken into, looking like hollowed eyes. Outside of each entrance, there was a myriad of blue and orange tents, sleeping bags, and coats, clumped together with the tent variations making them look like jagged, multicolored teeth.

          Jesse was the one to drive into Olympia in the final hours, all the way through to the edge of the water, where this building towered over all others. The parking spots in the circle immediately in front of the main doors were sparsely occupied by cars. We only encountered about twenty cars in total upon entry into the city, and because the majority of streetlights were off, he didn’t struggle navigating the urban roads. He parked the car, opened the door, and swung himself out to stretch his legs in front of the grassy center of the circle. Three flagpoles stabbed upwards into the clouds: one banner for America, one banner for Washington state—the third one had no flag.

         The sky overhead was darkening. The blue deepened, hugging the gold that slowly faded into orange and red. There were spotlights on the ground that should have turned on to illuminate the flags in the wind, but they most likely have been shut off for a while now.

         I threw on my anorak and left it unzipped as we paced around the car. Everyone in Reddell made fun of me for having this coat, commenting on its faux fur and how it divulged the secret that I was from a big city, as if my lack of accent and melanated skin weren’t the giveaways.

         Jesse called over to me. He was leaning on the driver side headlight, with his elbows propped on the hood. His eyes focused in toward the sundry of tents at the capitol building.

          “What is it?” I asked.

          “You see that fella?” he said, pointing at one of the red-yellow tents. A man, adorned with patched clothing and stubble, had climbed out of his shelter and into the open, already wearing a backpack on his body. He cleared his throat loud enough for us to hear and kicked at the surrounding tents next to him, causing others in them to stir and yell. A white flashlight beam flickered on and the man waved it over his neighbors’ faces once they emerged from their tents. The noise caused another throng of people to emerge from the other side of the building, and the sight pushed people out of the cars we were parked nearby.

          “What do you think he’s doing, Jesse?” I said.

          “I don’t want him bothering us or nothing. Look at him messing with everybody.”

          We were close enough to the steps to hear his voice, as well as the disgruntled chorus of older men, snappy women, and whiny children. An alarming number of people arose from hiding, all gripping something they had left over from their previous life. Most of the children were young enough to still clutch onto their toys with their whole arms, wrapping their teddy bears and stuffed farm animals in chokeholds.

          “It’s Friday, ladies and gents,” the man announced. “You know that the medical centers and hospitals are showing their folks to the big men. I have a source from the hospital that says Providence St. Peter patients are coming today.”

          Everyone’s grumbling turned into musing.

          “Saddle up. They’re walking this way,” Jesse said, urging me into the van. Before we could sit down in the car and drive away, he shouted at us, descending the steps.

          “Hey, you both! Have you been sleeping on the south side or what?” he called. “I’ve never seen your face before. Are you guys here for the showing?"

          I entered the car, but Jesse didn't have it in him to ignore someone when spoken to. He exchanged glances with me, hoping to jointly concoct a lie, but nothing came to me. I was used to running from weird men in Minnesota. I was used to running from anyone that posed a threat. Jesse whispered in a low voice to me, "Should've brought a gun."

          Heat prickled the hairs on my back and snaked up my neck. "No," I hissed at him. "We're not shooting anyone. Goddamn you!"

          "Hey!" he warned.

          The man hit the pavement in front of us and strolled up, shielding himself with the parking meters between us. The crowd followed closely behind him.

          "Again, are you two coming to the showing or what?" he asked.

          "No, sir," Jesse managed. "Just resting."

          "Where are you guys from?"

          "Why?" I said, getting out of the car. I was already heated by the topic of firearms, and I didn't believe that Jesse could come up with anything false in good timing.

          "Alright, alright. You don't have to tell me. No one does." He raised his arms up in some sort of surrender, but his lips were curled in amusement. "If you're not from here, or if you've been living under a rock, some hospitals here do presentations to get us to live there, or to show us what they're doing now that life as we knew it is over."

          "Then why don't you live there?" Jesse asked. "So you don't have to sleep on them stairs."

          "Well, it looks like hell," he said. "We're protesting it, because that’s not actually what they want. It’s something else.”

          “What is it?” Jesse pressed.

          The man shook his head. “I think you should come see for yourselves.”

          A woman behind him held her daughter by the shoulders. She had dark, curly hair and beady black eyes. She stepped forward. “And after the showing, we’re going into their conference room in the Visitor’s Center and stealing the food from their event. They’re rich as hell, they leave it all like it’s garbage, anyway.”

          Jesse and I looked at each other once again, unsure of how long we were going to be stuck in Olympia, searching for Keegan endlessly in a labyrinth of glass buildings and abandoned cars. There was too much ground for only the two of us to cover. At the very least, we needed more food. Mom couldn’t provide us with enough.

          “We’re in it for the food,” I said. “Do anything weird and we’re leaving.”

          “Good. Henry, give them a sign.” The man motioned vaguely to the group and a wide and tall black man came forward, with flowing dreadlocks and a hardened stare. We had the same coat and the same bright eyes. His grimace turned into a gentle smile as he handed me and Jesse a sign. It read NO INHUMANITY AT THE END OF HUMANITY.

          “Don’t try to walk by yourself here,” Henry told me. Jesse and I read the sign curiously as he continued talking. “Stay with the group, in case they start gassing us, and let Walker do the talking.” He gestured towards the assumed spokesperson for the group: the man who confronted us.

          Before we could change our minds, the group walked through us and swept us into their current alongside a mass of children and coats. I made Jesse hurriedly click the fob and lock the van doors.

 

          While the conference room was located in the Visitor’s Center a few blocks from the capitol steps, the actual event everyone was protesting was centered in front of an administrative building. The signs were still somewhat intact and legible, so the only words I was able to read were Social and Health Services. Jesse and I were smothered in the wave after wave of mothers and men, all flocking to the front courtyard of the building with their signs and two cents on some matter. We huddled shoulder to shoulder to ensure that we would not lose ourselves in the swarm. Some part of me found it refreshing to be in the midst of people once more, in a cityscape, to give me the illusion that everything was still lively and inhabited.

          Ahead of Walker, who charged us through the entryway vestibule as the leader, there was a square grid arrangement of metal folding chairs farther down in the main lobby, occupied by a handful of well-dressed men and women. Their chairs were parted in the middle, and down the carpeted aisle, there was a dais with spotlights, curtains, a podium, and a projector screen all situated in the center. It was unnatural and a bit dirty, as it was obvious that some reception desks and lobbies were refitted to be an assembly hall. Multiple partitions and double-doors were smashed and purposed into barricades, but not well. Walker had us push through them with ease into the building, tall ceilings and flat flooring swallowing us whole.

          A tall, intense-looking woman stood before the podium. Her long auburn hair cascaded in ribbons down her chest, covering the lapels of her white jacket. The man next to her looked the same, only taller, donning the same coat but with his black name tag visible. Their squared shoulders, clenched jaws, and small smiles were synchronized and allowed for me to distinguish that they were related.

          “Is that Walker?” the woman said into the microphone. “You must have been napping, ‘cause you missed the first half. We’re going to show the patients off in a minute.”

          There was hesitation before he responded. It sounded like some surprise, as if he didn’t expect these people from Providence St. Peter to begin their presentation when they did. “...Enough, Vitri. We outnumber you. Whether we come later or not, this ends this week.”

          “It’s been weeks,” she said. “There are Reavers stationed behind this stage. Keep it civil.”

          “Unlike you, we have a commitment to nonviolence. See the people you’re hurting?” Walker waved at us, and the people in front started roaring with demands and primal grunts, shouts, calls. We stayed quiet, afraid of the sudden change in atmosphere. I hadn’t seen a public speaker other than Pastor Kalburn at church in a long time.

          Instead of setting the Reavers loose upon the group, the word nonviolence seemed to amuse Vitri, who continued smiling up on the stage. The suited men and women in the audience shared her expression as they watched us, like we were an opening set for a main show. Without rebuttal or any other warnings, she walked over to the side of the stage and grabbed at something behind the curtain, tugging harshly at the ropes. The curtain rose.

          We advanced forward, still hiding our chests and neck with the sign that Henry gave us. By the time we were right at the back row of seats, I got a clear visual of what was on stage. A line of sickly young adults and teenagers stood in pale blue hospital gowns, defeated and shaking in fear at the light. Another row of burly, helmeted men were behind them, to ensure no one would leave or disrupt this event. Part of our crowd started to howl and cry, Jesse being one of them.

          All of them had some sort of deformity. Mangled antlers sprouted from one boy’s head, and tears streaked his freckled face, and the stitches on the side of his head were still fresh and visible under closely shaven hair. A girl’s eyes were completely black, with her corneas an inky black as if they emptied a pen into her head. She had spiked horns angled out of her temples in rough spirals, reminding me of antelopes. Some of them were completely covered in stitches, as if they were quilts of skin and not beings. I looked at the far-right patient, with long sandy brown hair to his collarbones, broad shoulders, and an enlarged mold of duck beaks grafted around his nose and mouth, open holes allowing him to breathe. There were bands around his arm, connecting what seemed like yellow foam pads to his forearms.

          My chest welled up and I screamed. It was Keegan.

          “No!” Jesse cried, looking close to vomiting. “No, no! God Almighty, no!”

          “Keegan!” I yelled. I yelled until my throat stung. I yelled until Jesse gathered himself enough to join me. “Keegan, oh my God!”

          Vitri raised a fist at the podium and slammed down, the impact reverberating through the microphone and silencing the room. I breathed heavily, tears blurring the hall, and I screamed his name a few more times. His head was lowered, but once he heard me in the moment of quiet, his head flew up and his eyes were wide. A few suited individuals grunted, clapping at the sight.

          Vitri gestured towards Keegan. “Our intern, Rukan, reports to us that this boy loves ducks, having cared for swans and mallards back in the day. He came to us for help and expanded his beauty.” She pointed to another one, randomly. “Her horns can defend against whatever is out there, now. We do this in their interest. This is consensual. These are members of the human race in this age.”

          Jesse and I quivered against one another. I could feel the tension in his body. I could feel that we both went cold with disgust and horror. My mouth was dry and my heat pounded, a thundering cacophony in my skull. Henry materialized next to me and held the both of us under his wingspan, setting his firm palms on Jesse’s left shoulder and my right one. He stood over us protectively as we watched the Reaver officers march to the sides of the stage, shifting their firearms in hand. I cried harder, hearing the clicking in the room above all other noise.

          “No inhumanity at the end of humanity,” Vitri said after a brief pause, reading our sign. “This isn’t the end of humanity, please. If anything, wouldn’t you say this is an advancement of humanity?”

          Henry leaned down, bringing us closer together. I shivered, meeting eyes with Vitri, the devil.

          “We will stop this,” he whispered between my head and Jesse’s. “I don’t care what she believes. Humanity stops advancing tonight.”

 

About the Author: Leiz Chan

          My journey in writing started in primary school, paired with a love for visual art. I was a bookworm and had a fascinating imagination, experiencing sights and sounds with incredible depth. My writing process is a jumbled, ambitious one, with too many characters to count and different storylines that all end up interwoven with one another. I wrote this piece to create intimate profiles of two characters, and how they grapple with faith and friendship. It's a chapter of a larger work that will be a novel-in-stories: a book-length collection of stories of how so many different lives converge and connect, during their world's downfall.