HMS Valediction

Chapter 2

The stretching shadows grin along the deck, grazing the toes of my boots. I slide along the bulkhead, my fingers splayed against the metal siding. To my left, a door slips open.

I rush into the room and lean flat against the inner wall, listening for the creature to emerge from its hiding place within the darkness. It's quiet. Still. The only movement seems to be my chest heaving and sweat dripping from my forehead to the floor.

For long seconds, nothing appears. I peek around the corner and realize the halls are vacant. There's nothing out there except inky emptiness capturing my nightmares in its crevices — nothing to show that the thing following me was anymore tangible than my odious memories.

This empty room I've stumbled into seems like a place as good as any to lie low until the creature or the craze abandons me again. One last check informs me I'm clear. I'll wait here anyway.

I spin around to face my sanctuary.

Looks like I found where the Heapists decided to put the chapel.

It's as dreary as the original structure of Our Lady of the Impenetrable Heap, but more empty and cold without the candles. The benches are also absent. The only identifier that this place belongs to the Lady is the painted portrait on sheet metal hanging high in the back of the room. Her serene face is the same cream and brown color as wilting orange blossoms. There's a rounded beauty to her that was not apparent when she was made of stone but is fully fleshed now. The rich color of her brown hair framing her cheeks adds a profound humanity I never noticed before.

Odd. I always assumed she had brown hair, but seeing it curve around her sweet face makes her more real to me, like she's existing in three dimensions despite being flattened against the wall. I notice the artist added a pink ribbon under her breasts and brilliant blue light shining behind her. She's cradled by stars.

She's beautiful.

"Sister Janika!"

I flinch.

"It's so good to see you! Praise the Lady you've come to visit today. I prayed to see a friendly face and look who she sends. Thank Her, indeed!" Roy's words pummel my brain that's still fizzing from my anxiety attack two minutes before. A headache smacks me right behind the eyes. I pinch the bridge of my nose to try and keep it at bay.

"Hi, Roy," I say. "Did you paint this yourself?"

"No." He chuckles from his gut as he faces the image. "No, I was not blessed with that talent. This is a painting donated by one of the congregants of the Heap. She said it was an image she remembered from her hometown when she was a little girl. If I remember correctly, she told me there was a whole church dedicated to this image." He wanders away to stare lovingly at the woman gazing demurely at him.

"I like it."

"She's with child."

I snap to attention.

"The story of this version of the Lady is special. Hundreds of years ago, it was said that an impoverished Before Days Agriculture worker saw her. Just like this. She came to him on a barren hill and told him to gather roses and build a monument to her. No one believed him. Her image appeared in his clothes and no matter what destruction fell on the monument, her picture always remained perfectly in-tact. She survived atomic blasts, war, fire — everything. Fascinating, isn't it — how much She can survive?"

I nod, barely listening, my terror in full-swing.

"Like the Lady took her son away from harm in all the stories we have of her, the ARC10 will take us to a safe place to give us life. Perfect imagery." He approaches, occupying the space directly at my side. Our elbows graze.

Too close. I check my jacket—there's no bump, no crease, no tight spaces to show that I'm hiding anything at all. How could he know? It's either stay here with this anxiety or go out in the halls to face the other one head-on. The fear cracks my calm. "That's a fucking weird thing to think, Roy."

He startles, stares at me with his wide buggy eyes and open mouth in a shocked oh before dropping his head. "Oh, I'm so sorry."

"What for?"

"This must be a difficult subject for you. I didn't mean to bring it up."

What the hell is he talking about?

Roy becomes grim — his color drains, smile fades, twinkling eyes dim until he's as gray as the Lady in her stone state. He takes my hand in his and taps it lightly. "Consider yourself blessed, Sister Janika. The Lady may not have wanted you to be the mother to one soul. Maybe She needed you to be a mother to more." He taps my hand again.

With each touch, I swear his eyes water, becoming mistier and mistier.

"You'll never be forced to say goodbye to your child," he whispers. "You'll never have to watch them ascend a different platform and know that the next time you can hold them, they'll be five years older. They'll be all grown up and you missed it all. I won't even meet the one Lucy is pregnant with until—"

"Your family isn't on ARC10?"

He furrows his brow and cocks his head to the side, his hand mid-air over mine. "No one's family is."

"What do you mean?"

"All families were separated. My partner and children were assigned to ARC2. The other Brothers of the Heap are here alone as well. Tom's partner and children boarded ARC3 and I'm fairly certain Francis' are on ARC8 or—"

"Why were the Heapist families separated?"

He tilts his head to the other side and ponders my question. "All families were separated. Haven't you noticed? There are no children here."

That can't be right. I back out of the room, pulling my hand from his. There's no way that huge detail escaped my notice. In the two weeks we've been floating through space, there is no way I happened to completely miss the fact there is not a single child on my ship.

Running back through the passageways, the heavy reverberations of my footfalls build immense drag behind me. I rush in slow motion, like sprinting through mud. I strain, pushing my body to its limits, fumbling through thick air to the Marketplace where I stumble into its bustle. There must be kids somewhere.

It's as if the two-thousand souls are in this room at this very second, talking, bargaining, swearing, gesturing, purchasing, going about their usual business. Adults. All of them. I walk up to the nearest vendor selling produce.

"Where are your children?" I ask her, trying to control the note of desperation in my voice.

"I'm un-contracted." She throws a sneer my way before turning to address the customer again.

"You!" I point to a woman my age within the booth. "Where are your children?"

She pauses mid-movement, lowering her hand that was reaching out for a piece of fruit. "I never had any. I wasn't right for the HHP." She addresses her shoes instead of telling me to my face, her cheeks flushing with embarrassment.

"This isn't possible." I try to control the new bit of panic overriding the earlier anxiety.

Unconsciously, as I do sometimes when in the mess of the Marketplace, I squint up to the Nest, searching past the glare of the Marketplace's enormous pendant lights, and try to see Coodi through the black glass. There's no way she'd have an answer to this if I don't have one first, but I need her clear-headed thinking to walk me away from my ledge.

Murry. Murry O'Deea has four children and a partner. Shawna has to be here.

One more quick scan around the room provides no more comfort.