The Savior

The Savior

With my neck sticking to the thin plastic pillow and sweat beading on my forehead, I’m in and out of memories merging from indistinguishable dreams.

Feeling a surge of adrenalin, I try to figure out what’s real by focusing on the sparse surroundings. I think I’m in one of the glaring-white hospice rooms under a thin white sheet, with one piece of bleeping equipment and a lonely steel chair.

Pushing my brown, straggly, damp hair from my face, I pull myself up to sit with my back against the frail pillow. As though detecting my activity, Jake, my old friend and leader, arrives, likely ensuring I’m comfortably sedated.

“Not long now,” he says, taking my frosty hand.

My palm retracts as though plunged into boiling water. His narrow eyes scrunch, and a firm line replaces his calm smile. I barely recognize my gentle friend, who saved us all on that abysmal day.

***

It was one of those mandatory job rotation days on a typical frigid January day in Vermont. Perfect day for gardening! I remember standing miserably at the exit, where I zipped up my blue thermal coat, put my feet in fuzzy black boots, and comforted my hands with fleecy blue gloves. But my hat was missing from my locker. Grumbling, I braced and opened the metal door to The Outside. It was as bad as I anticipated. Stepping tentatively onto the icy cement, an arctic blast watered my eyes while an angry wind stabbed my ears like a thousand tiny icicles. Of all days to forget my damn hat.

With the glittery, iced mountains in the backdrop, I slipped along to the greenhouse and entered the long green plastic tunnel called the “corporate garden.” The gaping holes in the plastic allowed the biting wind to infiltrate, so I took my gloves off only to update Central from my wrist Communicator. I rewarded myself by sipping sweet green tea from my blue metal flask and funneling my warm breath onto my numb hands.

Finally, at 16:00, as the dark clouds descended, I finished with the blueberry seeding and sat on the metal stool, ready for the final congratulatory sip. But I was rudely interrupted by a siren that made me jump from the seat and cover my frostbit ears. What an annoying time for a fire drill. Friday at 4 pm. Really? I had been ready to take my middle-aged body home for a scalding bath.

The siren stopped after a few seconds, replaced by a crackle and a familiar voice. “Code Red. This is not a drill. This is NOT a drill. All personnel proceed to the bulkhead...”

As the rest of the words tumbled through the static, I rubbed my translucent face while panic strangled my throat. It’s my friend Jake’s voice over the loudspeaker. Calm, intelligent, level-headed Jake. We’ll be okay.

In a clumsy walk-run-slide across the icy path, I rounded the corner to find a school bus that likely brought kids to Sunset on a field trip to learn about software programming. This morning, Sam took Madeleine on a custom field trip, playing hooky from his teaching job and her needless mid-term makeup day to go skiing. Unlike me, they loved winter.

I checked my Communicator, preparing to contact them, but the screen blinked as though… I’d never seen that before. It’s probably a gas leak. I’ll call them later. I don’t want to worry them needlessly.

Following emergency protocol, I reached the red bulkhead, where my friend Jake held the steel door open at the side of the building. As our Director of Security, Jake was always commanding, with an air of authority to accompany his six-foot, broad stature. But that day, his dark, calm face was pained, and he stared past me like he barely knew me.

“Olivia, come in quickly. You’re the last one. Follow me.”

Panic paralyzed my voice.

Dazed, I barely remember descending the bulkhead steps and reaching one of many white hallways contrasting to above-ground, bright, open-plan space. Sunset took its name too literally, with yellow and orange paint assaulting our shared desk areas from all directions.

The steel door slammed on my final step to the ground. I jumped around as the afternoon light disappeared. The Outside was closed.

Jake wordlessly marched ahead of me.

My rubbery legs followed in shock from all the fast-paced walking, contrasting my usual sedentary comfort.

When Jake stopped abruptly at the double doors, I almost walked right into him.

“We’re entering this restricted section.” His ex-military voice resounded, echoing along the desolate, anemic hallway. 

The dusty air caught my dry throat as I entered the final white cement hallway. I wished I’d brought my flask. Recovering from a daze, questions start to pop out.

“Aren’t you taking this emergency drill thing too far for a gas leak?”

“It’s not a gas leak,” Jake spat, continuing along the corridor.

“What is it then?” The clandestine thing was getting old.

Jake’s face scrunched as he stopped at an unnamed door and entered a code. Before proceeding, I poked my chin forward to peek into the mysterious room as though it was a choice to stay in the hallway. It was a long, wide hallway with hundreds of people, primarily colleagues in our standard black jumpsuit uniforms and sunset logo, and a spattering of kids in colorful clothing. The space resembled a sterile airport wing, used in the early 2000s before travel was canceled. Folding steel chairs framed each side of the room, and a raised cement stage occupied the right corner. 

Like the parting of the sea, Jake effortlessly moved through the center of the crowd to the stage. I followed, recognizing colleagues along the way. I passed my team of programmers and nodded with fake confidence while my stomach gurgled.

On stage, Jake patted an old-fashioned microphone that crackled, interrupting low whispers and chatter rising in the crowd. 

“Your attention, please,” Jake announced. “Thank you all for remaining calm. This is an unprecedented day, and I’m afraid I have tough news.” His kind, brown eyes flitted around the room.

It felt like my spine iced and shriveled at that moment.

“The good news is that all Sunset employees and field trip visitors from Edwards High School are safe.”

Safe from what? As the crowd mumbled, a low squeak escaped my throat. That’s Madeleine and Sam’s school, but they’re skiing. Did they find safety on the slopes?

“At 17:00, we expect Russia to launch a simultaneous nuclear attack against Europe, Asia, and the US. The 532 people in this room will be the sole survivors,” Jake said warmly, likely sensing the room.

Murmurs accelerated into anger and despair, and then various indistinguishable voices assaulted Jake with questions from the crowd.

“Maybe you’re wrong.”

“Is this some kind of sick drill? An elaborate simulation?”

Jake shook his head and sighed. “I wish I was wrong. Twenty years ago, before his death, our founder, Brian Laughlin, spent almost a billion dollars building simulations, early warning systems, and this shelter space. You will remain alive only because of those measures.”  

After a moment of brittle silence, more voices exploded.  

“We need to tell someone.”

“If it’s real, we still have fifteen more minutes to leave and try to get to our families.”

Jake shook his head again. “When we detected Russia’s nuclear plan just twenty minutes ago, we alerted the skeletal police force, who said they’d investigate, which likely means they didn’t believe us. Since mainstream media collapsed in the mid-2000s, we could only send fragmented alerts to social media platforms who ignored our posts or accused us of pushing a conspiracy theory.”

“Some people might have believed you.  They can find a safe space, right?” A screechy voice asked.

Jake shook his head again. “Sorry, but I don’t know anyone in Vermont or the entire country with this level of advanced shelter protection.” He pressed a button on the side of the stage, and a large screen descended with an aeronautical view of an undisturbed US.

More exclamations ensued.

“See, nothing is happening.”

“This is bogus.”

A timer with fourteen minutes appeared on the screen. It was like watching a New Year’s Eve countdown, but unlike waiting for the ball to drop in New York, we were waiting for a bomb to fall.

Nervous, loud chatter erupted when the timer showed the seconds evaporating.

“I want to get out and find my family. I’ll take my chances.”

“Let us out.”

Others agreed.

“The door is designed to be permanently closed in such an emergency,” Jake said sternly.

In a fog, I thought of Sam and Madeleine. Is it possible they’re safe?

“I know this is a lot. Please remain calm. Grab a chair. Give me a few minutes, and then you can ask more questions.”

Jake descended the three cement steps from the stage and roughly grabbed my arm.

“Come with me,” he demanded.

Following him and over the screeching sound of chairs on the cement floor, I yelled to the back of his head, “Jake, my family…”

He turned coldly. “I know.”

Hours earlier, we had lunch in the cafeteria, joking about a pointless meeting. The contrast was severe.

In the far-left corner of the room, Jake stopped beside a group of teenagers and chaperones, nodded curtly at me, and then quickly headed for the stage again. 

Feeling abandoned and angry at Jake for dumping me, I numbly found a chair and carried it over.

On my way back, like a mix of having a seizure and seeing a ghost, I rubbed my eyes, recognizing a head of messy, curly hair hovering above the crowd. I held my breath as the head turned around.

“Sam! How?”

“Thank God you’re here,” he sputtered.

“Madeleine?” I asked.

“Mom?” A voice from the crowd came closer.

I held Madeleine’s freckly face, caressed her long, brown, wavy hair, pulled Sam’s hand, and hugged tighter than ever.  

“But how?” I asked.

“Your friend Jake insisted on this field trip today,” Sam said.

As we sat together, I waved at Jake.  

He nodded, revealing a slight, quickly disappearing smile.

Sinking into the steel chair, tears of relief rolled down my face as I looked at Sam to my right and Madeleine to my left. Looking for a tissue, my hand burrowed deep in my pocket, finding blueberry seeds from earlier. “Who needs The Outside? I’ve got life in my pocket,” I said to no one.

Sam and Madeline looked at my tear-stained face with confusion.

We held hands, watching the countdown until the numbers vanished, then the screen flickered, and smoke puffed and destroyed all the states of America.

With a deathly silence, we stared in disbelief at the now-blank screen and then at Jake.

Our savior.

A person for whom I would be forever grateful. Or so I thought.

***

In my fevered state, my eyes widen. “Sam? Madeleine?”

Jake’s eyes sear through me. “They’re gone. Remember?”

“You took them.” With the sedative temporarily worn off, I swing my legs over the side of the bed.

“They had to go. They were toxic.” He smooths his tight black curls, covered with snowy speckles, like the after-picture of a president in office.  

“When you created this society, you told me my family would be safe.”

“But you all stopped following the rules, trying to escape, and putting us all at harm…” He laughs almost maniacally. “Ironic since you hated the outdoors.”

 “You saved my family, and then you took them away. Power changed you.”

Jake shrugs and presses a button on the white bleeping equipment.

Pulling my laden legs back on the bed, I flop, returning my head to the sticky pillow.

“Now you can drift to The Outside.”

The room fades under my heavy eyelids.

I dream of blueberry seeds.