They walked through half the morning. Through dust and rubble and blazing sun. When Charlie would slow down she would yank on the binder strap to hurry him up. She was apparently not only in better shape than him, but she was faster. And his throat was cracking from dehydration.
"I don't suppose you have some water." He croaked at her. "Or if I do. I can't reach around to the pack to find out with my arms bound."
She let out a groaning sound before stopping, turned around and yanked something off his back. She handed him a container that he just stared at. This prompted another sigh from her as she snatched it back and screwed the top into the underside of his mask.
There was a sharp hiss and a small silver tube rose out of the bottom of his mask. Charlie took a sip and said, "that is ingenious."
"It's a water bottle." She said, screwing one into the bottom of her mask. "Didn't you have water bottles in your time?"
Charlie finished another long sip and replied, "of course we had bottled water. But they didn't have built-in straws and we didn't have to drink through masks." Charlie thought for a moment and added, "though it would have been handy in twenty twenty."
He unscrewed his bottle and handed it back to her to rehook on his pack and started out again. They walked for at least half an hour before she suddenly spoke.
"What happened in twenty twenty?" She turned her masked face back to him.
"A pandemic." He said. "A disease that spread around the world in just a couple months"
"That is silly." She commented, still pulling him along. "If people were sick they should have stayed home till they got better. Were the people in your time stupid?"
"Sort of." Charlie replied. "But some people couldn't afford to stay home. They wouldn't have gotten paid and they would have died."
She stopped now to face him again, "what is paid?"
"You don't have money," he said with a chuckle, "of course. We worked in my time and we received money we used to buy food, housing, clothes, well pretty much everything we needed."
"Why?" She asked, "people need to eat. You can't not give people what they need. What use would they be if you didn't?"
"You say people need to eat to work, they made sure you had to work to eat. The people in control made sure it was the opposite. That's how they became the ones in control." Charlie realized this was the first real discussion they'd had. She didn't want to even talk to him at first, now they were interacting.
"These people in control, they were men, yes?" She asked.
Charlie measured his words and made sure he was being honest. "There were women too, but yes, mostly men."
She took a step closer to him, "what you describe is slavery. People having to work for another just to live is slavery."
Charle sighed for what he felt was the hundredth time since he awoke, "yes, I believe you are right. But I ask you, how do you make sure things get done in your world?"
"Why wouldn't it? If you want society to move forward you must do what you can, share the burden. The rising tide lifts all boats or we all drown. How can a civilization have pride if you have to make people suffer to do anything?"
Charlie's silence gave her the opportunity to start walking again, dragging him after her. Finally he roused his thoughts enough to try re-engaging with the woman.
"You keep saying my time. Do you still keep the same date? What is the date now? How long have I been asleep?." He prodded. "What is this year?"
She stopped again but did not face him. She hung her head. "I don't know how long you have slept. Much of history has been lost due to the war. But as near as we can estimate this year is twenty-five ninety-seven."
The numbers whirred through Charlie's head, "five hundred years! You mean I have been asleep for over five hundred years?"
Charlie's legs gave out from under him finally succeeding in pulling her along with him for once. She landed in his lap and immediately struggled to get back to her feet. As soon as she was upright, she pulled one of those complicated pistols out from behind her and pointed it at him.
Charlie calmly sat there and looked at her through his breathing mask. "Going to shoot me now?"
"As I said, I don't trust you." The gun drifted down as she grew calmer. "I thought you were trying to take me." Her voice trailed off in the end, from what he suspected was embarrassment. Charlie had a fleeting thought that it might have been disappointment. But quickly decided that was stupid.
He slowly made his way back to his own feet fast as his restraints would let him. "How exactly was I going to take advantage of you, wearing this," he asked indicating the bulky suit he was still wearing from the cryogenic tank, "and my wrists bound?"
"Somehow, I don't know. I…" she paused, confused, "I'm not sure how it works really." She holstered the gun and began to examine the suit. It was bulky but tight like a wetsuit. It was also fastened with zippers and many buckles. It looked to her like it did not go on or come off easy.
"What, you mean sex?" He asked, trying not to snicker. "Do you not have sex in the future?"
"I am not really sure of the definition of that term." She shook her head.
"Two people get together, naked and make each other… feel…good. It's how you get babies." Charlie fumbled.
She looked at him disbelievingly, "when you want a child you go to the medical center. You use one of your eggs to fertilize another, or one of your significant's. Then it is implanted in one of you and the baby grows until she is ready to be born."
"Sounds like fun." Said Charlie sarcastically.
"The other part you described, " she continued, "we have intimacy. In fact I have a significant waiting for me back in the citadel."
"I'm happy for you." He replied in a solemn tone, "I'm sure you two are great together."
"Butterfly and I are quite happy." She said with a huff before once again yanking him to go faster.
"Wait," he said, slowing down again, "Butterfly?"
"What?" She said turning around. "What are you asking?"
"Nothing," Charlie relented. "She sounds beautiful. And your name would be?"
She turned back and began pulling him once more, "still not your concern."
She refused to answer him for the next few hours, still pulling him along. A cliff face blocked their way that forced her to stop and ponder how to proceed. Charlie stared at the red skeletal object half covered in rock and sand sticking out of it.
"It's an oil tanker or maybe a container shipper." Said Charlie.
"Whatever." She replied. "What it is, is in our way."
"I don't think so." Smiled Charlie. "There has to be a way to climb up the superstructure and get on top of the cliff. Inside the aft section there are ladders and floors." Charlie pointed out parts of the ancient vessel with both of his bound hands. He could see an antenna and a smoke stack at the top. "And the top of the bridge is sticking out on top of the cliff. It would have a ladder up the side."
"How would you know all this?" She asked.
He sighed again, "again, I am an engineer. I design things like this."
"You made this?"
"No, other people built them. I just showed them how."
Her stoic blank mask turned to him again, "what would you need something this big for anyway?"
"Transporting things across oceans."
"How big of things?" Came her reply.
"Not so much big things as lots of things."
Her head cockedn to the side, kind of like how a confused cat would have looked to Charlie. "Why would anyone need to transport that many things across the world instead of making it themselves?"
"People were busy. And there were seven billion people to supply with stuff." He said.
"Seven billion people!" She cried. "Why would you ever need that many people?"
"Wait, how many people are left now?" Charlie was suddenly realizing how bad this war must have been.
"The five citadels only have around a hundred thousand each." She said, shaking her head.
Charlie didn't know what to think. Humanity's population hadn't been that low since prehistory. He wasn't sure how to answer her question. "Well, we needed people to do things. Make things. Grow food and prepare food for other people. Transport things to people."
"But you just have to feed the people who feed others. People need to support themselves. We have communal gardens where we pick our own food. Every citadel supplies food for its population. We have our experts, those who grow the food but that is it. You feed yourself or you feed people you want to feed. We keep our population balanced."
"We should have in my time but we didn't." Charlie admitted, "we did a lot of things wrong. And if you all have learned from our mistakes I'm glad. But my point was I think we can climb up that boat to get on top of the cliff."
She looked at him through the annoyingly blank mask for several minutes until finally responding, "fine, we will try it your way." And once more was dragging him along.
The darkness inside the shipwreck cooled Charlie's skin from the beating the sun had given him. Still the cryo-suit stuck to his skin, threatening to pull out body hairs as he moved and white flakes of the dried suspension liquid drifted off him like dandruff. Charlie began to worry about how bad he must look to her but quickly realized it didn't matter since she detested him already. The center ring on the little sphere on her pack expanded outward and with a whirring sound it once again took flight, shedding light around them.
They entered the crew section of the aft of the ship. He was right, the wreck sat at a twenty two degree angle that made some stairways difficult but not impassable.
As they made their way up the floors of the ship a noise made her stop and hold a hand to his face. Her masked head slowly rotated back and forth on her neck.
"We need to move." She stated finally, and the dragging began anew.
"Is there something we should be concerned about?" He asked. "Another thing I'm unaware of?"
"Trogs." She said curtly, with no hint further explanation was coming.
She shoved him ahead of her and Charlie began to hear the skittering sound. Like a dog's nails on a linoleum floor. As he looked down the stairwell he could see forms moving in the darkness below, just outside the perimeter of light her little ball drone shed. The ones in the dark seemed to move faster only to bunch up as they approached the light.
Charlie and the woman rushed up the steps as fast as they could, only as they reached the bridge the path ended.
The hatch to the outside was blocked by dirt and rubble. The female warrior looked back down the stairwell, back to the hatch and then to Charlie, "you've killed us," and began to dig at the stones.
Charlie immediately bent down and began to help with his bound hands. After a minute or two she told him to get back, pulling him out of the way. He could hear the hisses and shrieks of mysterious creatures slowly climbing the stair well, braving the light for a chance of prey.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
The staccato pop of her side arm prompted more shrieking but Charlie noticed it wasn't at the creatures. Rapport after rapport slammed into the rocks, sending fragments of rock and dirt flying.
"What does that thing fire?" Asked Charlie, not seeing any kind of ammunition collecting on the ground.
She looked at him once more with that blank mask that still left him with a feeling that she was annoyed with him. "It fires pulses of infrasound." Charlie could swear it was said with an exasperated sigh.
"I have an Idea, let me see it." He said as he stepped toward Her.
She took a step back and held the pistol away from him, "You think I'm handing you a weapon? Are you insane, male man?" She asked.
"I'm not… I don't want to…," Charlie stammered. "Fine, you keep hold of it. I just want to try something that could get us out of here. I have no intention of hurting you. I have nowhere to go! I have nowhere to run to"
She paused at first, but the renewed shrieks from below convinced her Charlie was less dangerous than the approaching trogs. She held out the pistol as he examined it. It had some kind of touch screen like a smartphone. Charlie fumbled through the menus as quickly as he could, mumbling as he went, "amplitude, modulation, ah! Duration!" He dialed it up as high as he could and stepped back. "Alright, point it at the rubble and hold the trigger down."
The woman did as he asked and the room began to vibrate. Soon dirt then smaller ricks and then finally larger stones rolled out of the hatchway. The sound of scrabbling up the stairway prompted Charlie to start scooping rock and stone down the steps to slow them down.
"I can see it!" She exclaimed, "I see the ladder!" As dust filled light suddenly flooded the bridge deck from above. "Well, climb you dolt!"
She shoved Charlie onto the ladder and pushed at him to get climbing. He struggled with his restraints to quickly scramble up the rungs. She followed closely behind when a thrown rock took out her remote plunging the room below into darkness.
"Charlie, hurry up!" She cried, "they're coming!"
He flopped out onto the packed dirt and crawled around to peer down the hole. The warrior turned the pistol below her and fired, unfortunately the no longer compacted sound annoyed the creatures but didn't harm them. She dropped the weapon as their clawed hands grabbed for her armor. Charlie could make out emaciated human forms, noseless and earless except for bare holes on pinkish skin that glistened with reptilian scales in the dim light that filtered down the hole. Dead, doll-like black eyes squinted up into the light. With a shriek it tugged the woman backward down the ladder. Charlie reached down the pit as she tumbled backwards, grabbing her wrist as her full weight and the weight of the trog fell on one of her legs still tangled in the rungs with a snap. The feminine warrior screamed as Charlie pulled with all his might to keep her from disappearing into the inky blackness. Panels on her armor gave out against the creature's weight and it fell out of sight into the dark. Charlie struggled with all his might to pull her up and out of the hole.
She hit the ground with a scream, her left leg at an unnatural angle below her knee.
"It's ok, it's ok," he tried to console her. "Do we have first aid supplies in the packs?"
"No time," she groaned. "Sun… is setting. They will… come for us. Have to move."
She wrapped her arms around his neck as he helped her stand. The two of them hobbled off across the plateau as fast as three legs could carry them.
She had fallen for the third time since the sun set with a lip biting scream. With his wrists still bound Charlie was nearly incapable of catching her when her grip on his neck slipped. He squatted down again to help her up for the fourth time when a boom on the horizon caught their attention.
Lights lit the sky in the distance, highlighting the black clouds.
"Storm is coming. They won't be pursuing us through it." She explained, "but we need shelter."
She pulled the key device out of her belt pouch and touched his bindings. Once more the metal snapped out straight and his wrists were free. She tugged her pack out from behind her and produced a rounded box the size of a Bluetooth speaker. She handed it to Charlie pointing to a spot ahead of them. He placed it on the ground and pushed the only button on it he could see in the dark. The device hissed and a section of it opened up to allow a material to unroll out of it. The box began to emit a buzzing noise and the material began to inflate. Within moments it resembled a hi-tech igloo. Charlie unzipped the first door into the smaller section that resembled an airlock. He walked over to her and lifted her up, trying to be careful of her leg. Once inside he set her down and turned to re-secure the hatchway. As soon as the zipper was closed there was a hiss. Charlie's ears popped and inside the inflatable walls a light shone green. She nodded at the second hatch and Charlie undid it before carrying her inside. There were four inflated ledges inside that resembled beds so he put her down gently on one before closing up the hatch.
He removed their packs and began looking them over. In one of the removable sections was a familiar red plus sign. Pulling it off and setting it on the floor he accidentally discovered pushing down on it caused it to pop open. Charlie rummaged through the pod and read over labels. He found what he hoped he needed and returned to the warrior just as a boom right above him heralded the sound of rain pouring over the shelter.
Charlie removed his mask as nervous breathing fogged his faceplate. It was more pleasant breathing without it and aided in calming him. After an examination of her armor he figured out how to remove it and freed her injured leg from it. Underneath she wore what was essentially a unitard that he could tell through the material how swollen her leg was. A thin pen-like instrument was labeled a scalpel and when Charlie pushed a button on it a short blue light appeared. He ran the light gently down the leg of her clothes and it left a long slit in the cloth. He took the ends and tied them together above her knee.
The skin was puffy and bruised but not penetrated. She winced in pain as he felt around for the break. The swelling proved to be problematic so Charlie made a difficult decision, "I'm sorry. This might hurt." She cried out as he pushed the scalpel into her skin and cut an inch incision. Blood ran out of the leg. When he could feel for her bones he sprayed some kind of dermal spray over the wound that stopped the bleeding and seemed to dull the pain.
"Better?" He asked her. When she nodded he smiled in an expression he hoped would be soothing. Charlie had no idea how to be comforting, but he was trying nonetheless. "Good, because this now, this will really hurt."
He felt his way along the bone and found the fracture.
"Ok, " he said, calmly and softly. "I have to set your bone back in place. You'll feel the pain on the count of three. One…two…" She screamed, sat upright suddenly and fell back still and silent. Charlie quickly put something he guessed was a brace of some sort around the fracture. He strapped it tight and pushed another button on it that all this futuristic equipment seemed to have. Like the shelter, it buzzed and the brace inflated. The bruising was visible through the clear plastic. He looked up at her face obscured by the mask. He couldn't tell if she was breathing but she was quiet and she didn't move. It began to worry him. Charlie reached up and disengaged the locks on the mask and lifted it off her face.
Every celebrity, fashion model and beauty queen Charlie could remember, every gorgeous girl that dangled from the arm of his friend Todd, paled in comparison to the girl before him. He had never seen someone as lovely as her. She wasn't even made up. No makeup, no jewelry, her hair in a bun under the back of the mask, and to Charlie absolutely perfect.
He coughed for three straight minutes after his body reminded him he had forgotten to breathe. He felt with his hand in front of her nostrils and felt her breathing. When he was sure she was fine, just passed out from the pain, he slowly and gently removed the rest of her armor and found a thermal blanket to cover her up and let her sleep.
Charlie undid the buckles and straps of the cryo-suit and unzipped it to his waist. He put his mask back on and exited into the airlock. When it cleared him he carefully stuck his hand out of the hatch into the pouring rain. It felt like water. It didn't burn or feel different. He stepped out into the storm and rubbed down whatever skin he could reach. By the time he was done his feet had sunk into the mud the ground had become. Charlie was forced to stand just in the hatch to remove the mud leaving a mess in the airlock. By the time he crawled in the rain was finally subsiding, and he lay down on one of the other beds to get some sleep.
"You're all wet." She said in a quiet voice.
Charlie turned his head to see the girl looking at him with brilliant green eyes from the opposite bed. Charlie wasn't sure if it was from the spray he used on her leg or just from pure pain, but he recognized the unfocused look of a girl a little out of it.
"Yeah," he said with his usual lack of confidence when talking to women. "The fluid I was in was getting itchy as it dried. But now we are in the middle of a mud hole. So I guess we are trapped here together."
"That is how the wastes get when it rains." She said, with a slight smile toward him, "that's the reason the trogs gave up the pursuit. They aren't afraid of water, they fear getting stuck in the mud and being trapped with the sun rising."
"Makes sense." Charlie replied, "I'm sorry I made a mess of the shelter."
"It's fine, it can be cleaned when we reach the citadel." She said with a beautiful laugh. "Thank you for getting me out of the hole. And for fixing my leg."
"I couldn't leave behind the only person I know, could I?" He chuckled. "What kind of gentleman leaves a lady in distress?"
"Don't know what a gentleman is. Is that a male man that isn't a bad guy?" She asked blearily.
"Supposedly." He said, "but a lot of guys learned to fake it to get what they want. So I guess there aren't many of us left." He snorted a short laugh. "Well it's really true since I'm the only man left."
"I know you didn't ask for this," she said, in a tone softer than any he had heard out of her yet. Her eyes were sparkling from near tears, "but you are going to be our salvation. We need you to prevent the end of the human race. So again, thank you Charlie."
She turned over to face the wall with an audible wince from her leg. Charlie closed his eyes, figuring she went back to sleep when suddenly, "Rose," she whispered, "My name. It's Rose."
The next day Charlie helped Rose put her armor back on and supported her out of the shelter. While the shelter was folding itself he looked about the area and found some spare parts among the building rubble, enough to craft Rose a make-shift crutch. Lacking tools he could only finger tighten the few rusty bolts nuts and screws he could but it was stiff enough to support her.
"It's not padded but it should help you support your weight and keep it off your leg." It was just a piece of rebar long enough to lay across the back of her bicep and a pice of angle iron to let her support herself with her forearm as she walked. But she was definitely slowed now and Charlie didn't need to be dragged along.
"Which way, my lady?" Charlie said with an over dramatic bow.
She opened a panel on her left forearm plate and looked around, "that way," she pointed. "About another day of walking…" she looked down as she started hobbling, "plus a bit I suppose."
"You go however fast you can," he said, picking up her pack, "I am right here with you." Charlie smiled at the blank faceplate of her mask, now able to imagine the pretty face behind it smiling back. "I am at your command." He said, and followed beside, carrying her pack to keep the extra weight off her leg.
The journey quickly warmed as the sun rose in the sky. The ground had quickly dried after the rain and looked like a smooth run of beach stretching into the distance. But with the rising of the temperature the cracks began to reappear and the blowing dust returned. The breathing masks they wore were a blessing only in it kept them from breathing the whipping dust.
There were spots too unstable for her crutch. Charlie immediately put his arm around her waist and her arm around his neck to steady her till the ground leveled out.
They walked through sunset, trying to ignore growling stomachs that had only received water in the last few days.
"There." Rose pointed out a dark shape tall enough to blot out a line of stars to the horizon. "That is Enlightenment Citadel. We are almost there."
'Almost home', thought Charlie. 'Her home, at least. With her girlfriend waiting for her.'
'What did you expect?' Said that voice in his head. A voice that often sounded like Todd giving him a talking to when he didn't seal the deal. 'She is not just out of your league, she's on another planet, Charlie. Here you are playing the nice guy, again. Doing everything for a girl you have no chance with. Isn't that what got you into this mess you're in now?'
Charlie pushed the thoughts down until their echo faded into memory. But the thought of Tessa and his five hundred year nap prompted him to look back the way they came, toward the lab where he woke up. The dark shape around a kilometer back caught his attention. It was the size of a car by his estimation, and it was moving toward them.
"Crap," said Charlie, "I think our friend is back."
Rose turned her head, "we need to move," and doubled her pace. Even at full speed she was still slow enough for Charlie to keep up.
She let out a squeak as he scooped her up in his arms and picked up speed. "I'll run. You shoot." He told her as he pounded across the parched plain.
"The gun is still modified by what you did in the ship." She said as she jostled along in his arms. She could see the beast that killed her squad rapidly approaching.
"Try it anyway!" He shouted, already panting for breath.
His chest and arms burned from the exertion as she aimed and squeezed the trigger. The beast roared but kept running after them.
Charlie managed a glance over his shoulder and could see that the monster's ears were folded down and it shook its head with its eyes closed as it ran.
"Again, do it again." He said.
As Rose took another shot Charlie quickly turned to his right just as the mutated animal thundered past them like a locomotive. Charlie tripped and fell, dropping Rose on her behind.
The beast stopped, shaking off the annoying sound of the sonic weapon and turned to face them again. It looked kind of like a bear to Charlie but its head was half boar looking as well with large tusks that did not look gentle. Armadillo-like scales ran from the bridge of its nose down its back ending in a long rat-like tail.
The beast charged again, not giving Charlie much time to respond, "keep shooting at it!" He grabbed her crutch and as the beast again reacted to the blasts of sound, Charlie rushed to one of its sides and began to poke at its hide with the repurposed rebar. Enraged further by the painful sounds and the poking by the metal rod, the monstrosity threw itself up to its full height on its back legs and roared. Shovel sized paws with six inch long claws swiped maddeningly at Charlie.
A back swipe took Charlie off his feet, sending him hurtling away over five meters onto a pile of rubble.
"Charlie!" Screamed Rose as the beast charged once again, leaving the sonic pistol's range and bearing down on him with all its rage.
At the last second Charlie wedged the back of the crutch into the pile of rocks he landed on and lifted the other end into the charging leviathan's chest. The bar burst out of its back and blood poured out of the gaping maw. With a gurgling intake of breath the beast rose up with both paws above its head to bring them both down on top of Charlie. The rebar was jerked out of his hands as it stood when suddenly an impact on the side of its head staggered the monster. Two more pops slammed against it, sending it toppling over onto its side.
There stood a figure in the same armor worn by Rose that stood over six feet tall. This warrior was muscled like a bodybuilder to the point she barely looked female. She was covered in bloody cuts and scrapes where several of her armor's plates were missing.
"Discorda!" Rose yelled. "Sister, you are alive!"
"Rose!" The giant shouted in a deep but muffled sounding tone, as she moved her hands in a pattern in front of her.
As she rushed over to Rose Charlie pulled the makeshift crutch out of the beast. As her sister looked Rose over, Charlie made his way over to the two ladies to return the crutch to its owner.
The large woman had her hand around his throat and lifted him into the air before he could blink.
"No!" cried Rose. "Charlie is not a threat! He saved me from trogs and protected me from that mutation." Her voice grew softer as the warrior's grip lessened on Charlie's neck. "Charlie is our friend."
She set him down and placed the fromerly threatening hand on his shoulder firmly as she squinted at him and gave a nod.
"Charlie," Rose began, "this is my big sister, Discorda."
Charlie rubbed his throat before replying, "she is… impressive."
The large woman picked her up in her impressive arms, "she's a little overprotective," Rose added as Discorda began walking toward the citadel.
"Come on Charlie," said Rose, in a pleasant and inviting tone, "let's go home."
Once more, even burdened down with her injured sister, Charlie was struggling to keep up.