The shift in the air startles me awake.
Not that you could tell, because I’m careful to keep my breathing steady and mimic the soothing rhythm of REM sleep. I make an imperceptive move and slide my hand underneath my pillow then wrap my hands around the object hidden there.
The intruder lunges and I launch into action, sliding my thumb along the lever to release the knife. I flip off the bed and land on bended knees, but not before slamming my ankle into the dresser. I curse and hear my knife drop to the floor.
It’s too dark for me to find it.
Fuck it.
I bolt for the door like a coward but the intruder is close behind. They grab my ankle and I throw back my elbow until it makes contact with bone and skin. I feel them grasp for my swollen ankle as I sprint out of the basement and run for the kitchen.
It’s still pitch black in the house but I feel my way into the kitchen. My bare feet dance across the floor and before I can reach the knife block I’m thrown to the floor, I clench my teeth and try to wrestle the attacker off me. I reach for the nose, trying to go for suffocation, my attacker backs off just long enough for me to scramble up and over the counter.
I open the drawer and grab one of the contraband guns hidden there. I cock it in the dark relying on muscle memory. I count to three and then stand.
The kitchen lights cut on and blind me. I blink a few times and come face to face with the barrel of a shiny white gold pistol.
The intruder on the other side of the gun has a fresh wound on her face from my elbow and blood dripping down her nose. She stares at me unblinking with the cold blue eyes that are synonymous with the Queen of New Aeterna.
“Tie ?”, I suggest with my gun still held in position, “My hand is really getting tired.”
She doesn’t move, so neither do I. She stands a little straighter and fingers the trigger.
“How about—“
The loud wailing sirens drown her out. Our eyes meet and we both drop our guns. Because I’ve learned from last time– I quickly grab a bottle of orange juice and a box of leftover Chinese out of the fridge and follow Sera downstairs.
We move quickly into the basement level where my room is and then through a door that leads to the underground cellar. Seraphina punches in the security code as the door closes. The cellar has enough space for us to stretch out. There is a small desk, two bottles of liquor and two weeks worth of MREs. I splash some water on my face in the tiny bathroom. Luckily nothing is too swollen. I braid my dark red hair back and twirl it into a bun. My usually bright green eyes look dull in this light and I rub the flecks of mascara still on them from my least favorite lessons.
When I go back to the main room Seraphina is already waiting by the call radio. The back and forth is like background music to me, but I can’t bring myself to relax until we’ve checked in.
“Sigma45”
“Sigma45, Present.”
Delta34”
“Delta 34, Preset.”
“Gamma 23”
“Gamma 23 Present.”
“Alpha 21…Alpha 21…Alpha 21…Fort. Callihan ? You read me ? Fort. Calihan ?”
Seraphina leans further into the radio. She picks up the transmitter
“Alpha 21 ?” She calls breaking protocol, “Are you there. Alpha 21”
“Major”, A voice says, “You can’t—“
“Someone in Norway pick up the damn frequency”, She cuts the communications officer off. She easily hides the emotion in her voice but I can see the shine in her eyes
There is a long silence. A long silence that could mean the world as I know it is about to change.
“…Alpha 21 Present.”
“What the hell”, she mutters.
“I-I-I’m sorry. I thought it was a drill. I –“
“Enough”, the communications officer says then continues down the call list, “Alpha 20.”
“Alpha 20, Present”, Seraphina says and turns down the radio.
I sit on the floor behind the three overstuffed bookcases and start in on the orange juice and pick at the kung pao. Out of all of the things I could have grabbed ?
Seraphina heads to the bathroom and washes the blood off her face, she takes off her bloodstained gray robe and returns to the desk in a black t-shirt and pink shorts. She turns in the chair to face me. Appraising me. Judging me.
“One of these days you’re going to have to learn to pull the trigger.”
I flash back to moments ago when I had that gun in her face, my finger shaking on the trigger.
I shrug it off.
“I think I won that one.”, I say, “Besides no one has guns in New Aeterna.”
She turns back in her chair to hear the rest of the call signs. When they’ve finished she switches over to another station. I pretend to be really interested in a teen magazine from five years ago.
What starts off as a comfortable silence stretches on way too long. Sometimes I convince myself I can hear the bombs but I know that’s impossible.
I flip through the box of magazines I kept down here and pick up last year’s Vogue. For the past two years the full-sized fall issue had won the bid for the King’s annual letter from Fort Calihan in Oslo. It was 94 pages that year.
I skim it for the umpteenth time, trying to get a feel for the man whose house I lived in. The seemingly sculpted, ever smiling and poignant King who I’d only known for a few years before he was dragged from his bed in the middle of the night and taken to quarantine.
I hadn’t been following orders that night. I was supposed to keep quiet in my basement room no matter what. But all the noise and Seraphina's screaming had made me curious. There was so much chaos no one even noticed me scamper up the steps and hide in the shadows.
I’d just gotten used to living in the glass box, which was how I’d come to think of the cubed glass home I’d been brought to as a child. Compared to the hell I’d lived in before–it looked like something from another world. It was far from the cramped apartment I’d shared with twelve other orphan girls and the woman I now understood would have been my pimp.
The masked men were towering over the King as they led him to the waiting truck. Seraphin was following behind, holding the bloodstained handkerchiefs he kept around his eyes, which had started bloodletting weeks ago. The fever he had been able to hide but the blood letting and thinning skin had officially marked him as one of the plagued.
ReiElla, a boundlessly energetic and beautiful internet model, had been one of the first well known Angels to be quarantined. I remembered stealing a tablet to watch her inspiration videos cataloging her journey. After a while her videos and post became sparse. I’d been curious what happened to her. In one of his annual letters, the King had assured us that she was alive but it was easier to live in quarantine if you let go of the outside world.
Next to the box of Vogues were a pile of private letters from Oslo. Long rambling letters he wrote for his wife.
There had been a time when he e-mailed, I remembered feverishly sending e-mails with questions about Oslo and The Plague. He just gave boring answers. The bombs started falling shortly after that. The internet would be out for months and letters became more reliable.
I’d lost count of how many times I’d watch Sera gracefully slice through the envelopes with the sharp knife she always kept on her. She would read and re-read the letters dozens of times. Sometimes I’d find her up reading them late at night while in bed with her revolving door of lovers. After a while all the letters were placed in the bomb shelter of all places. I discreetly take the most recent letter. I wedge it in a magazine to hide it from her view
Dear Sera,
There was a cake for my 7th anniversary here. It was such an odd thing to celebrate but the director told me it wasn’t a celebration of my time. It was celebrating my commitment to the journey to finding a cure. I’d thought maybe he was under the impression we were all here by choice, but I think he’s just deluded himself into thinking that.
I have a new suite in the wing of the research center, there is a window just like I requested. It's closer to the lab so I can be first in line for blood draws. It’s farther from the cafeteria than I’d like, but I’ve started taking meals in my room. Eating around us gets less and less pleasant everyday.
I’ve been watching the news, I’m shocked Bless is still holding the line. I don't like all these sanctions being placed on New Aeterna. They are eventually going to starve us out of independence. The U.S.would probably make the best ally but Sheridan is more like a fascist than a real socialist.
Not that we can trust any of them for obvious reasons.
Writing has been getting difficult. It’s hard to explain but I may start dictating my letters so I won’t be able to say the filthy things I want to you anymore, please don’t take it personally.
My Love, I’ll end this letter in a cliche
At night I dream of you and a day when this godforsaken war has ended. When bombs no longer go off in streets and mass shootings are a thing of the past. I pray for the day when a cure is found for this wretched plague and I can come home to you
“Major ?” a voice crackles from the radio.
“I’m here. Callum. What’s the damage?" Sera says.
“They hit Riker’s Island…the entire armory. They must have thought an attack was planned. The general moved troops to the borders in case the Americans are planning to invade.”
“Any casualties ?”
“3 men. They are going to lift the Shelter In Place.”
I gather up the orange juice and kung pao chicken. I follow Sera to the first level. She picks up the guns we’d abandoned on the counter.
“It’s time”, she says.
“Huh", I say like an idiot.
“it’s time to see if all the time invested in you was worth it.”
“I am worth it”, I said because I had to be. This was all I had.
“We’ll see about that. Your mission starts now.”
I nod as seriously as I can in my pajamas.
“What’s my mission”
“Wouldn’t you like to know.”