I am curious.
Anxious.
Petrified.
I will have to face Archer Crone.
I can’t stop thinking of what is to come.
Three hours later, I still stand at the taffrail on the deck and stare at the horizon through the fogged plastic shield that covers my face. I want to tear off the respirator that makes my face all sweaty and breathing shallow, but I can deal with this for a chance to leave the mainland.
We are zipping off the coast of Georgia, which is now the most southern point of the states, since Florida is underwater, when the captain motions to us with the big glove of his hazmat suit.
Two years since the Change and the coastal areas are still flooded, deserted, and quarantined. Except the military ports. Public access is denied except to those who can buy their way in or out.
Though there is nowhere to go.
Borders are closed.
So is the rest of the world that survived. They don’t want us. No one wants us anymore. The land of the free is now a prison.
Except for Zion Island. It’s an exception in every sense.
There are seven of us, the lucky winners. All in protective suits. Shuffling toward the stern of the boat where a man hoses us down with decontamination solution. They take this seriously, it seems.
“Off!” He waves the familiar signal.
I struggle with the zipper under my chin that will let me out of this gray monstrosity. By the time I take off my face shield and respirator, Katura Ortiz next to me has already pushed the suit down her legs and kicked it off to the side.
“Damn! Finally!” She exhales loudly, lifts her head to the sky, and inhales deeply.
We’ve been acquainted for only three days since the orientation, and already I feel like she’s become the closest person to a friend.
“Ka-too-rah,” she introduced herself back on mainland days ago.
“Can I call you Kat?” I smiled.
“If you are family or a close friend.” She cocked her arrogant brow at me.
Her bronze body is lean with muscles. The black tank top hugs her torso beautifully. Her cargo pants are full of pockets. I know she has a knife hidden in one of them, among other things that are not allowed—there will be a thorough search at the arrival to the island.
Katura shakes her thick dark hair, braided halfway along her scalp and loosely cascading down to her mid-back. She smoothes it, rips off the protective plastic from her backpack, and makes her way back to the deck.
I struggle to get the protective suit off me and inhale deeply.
The sea breeze feels liberating. This is perhaps the first time in a while when I can breathe without having the fear of radiation. But then, what do I know?
The sea-gulls ka-kaw in the sky as if nothing changed in two years since the war.
The ocean smells salty. Waves crash against the hull of the motorboat that speeds toward the horizon, to the only place that might be the actual change.
The water is deep blue-gray, shades darker than the stormy sky. The wind blasts into my face, but I smile. The open sea makes the bad memories go away. If only for a short while.
I watch everyone getting rid of their suits. They glance around, smiles chasing each other.
They know it too.
This is our ride to freedom. To the place that escaped the war that destroyed half of the world. The Western world, that is. But that’s semantics. Because the developing world and the surviving nations want nothing to do with us anymore. Or yet. Even the developing world is better than the Western countries that crumbled like houses of cards. Cities leveled to the ground. Radiation killing the survivors. The rest struggling to get back to semi-normal. Though nothing is normal.