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  The most interesting and frustrating thing they found was the following message etched into the cave wall beside the boat. The title “The Fire” was underlined with a deep crack in the wall and below, the following was chiseled: “A way of providing purpose and keeping you focused until a time when the world is ready for you again.”

  To that the two fire guards had nothing to say.

  All Jerome did was laugh.

  Chapter Six

  Year 2066, South Pacific Sea

  The fellowship headed northeast and left in May. Staff Captain Sarah Hendricks left pages of notes explaining the weather patterns of the Pacific Ocean, and these helped the team plan the best departure time and set their heading. The eastern Pacific’s weather was benign all year, but Polynesia’s humid season ran November through April. This was when tropical storms ravaged the ocean, and cyclones spiraled across the sea with winds of up to one hundred and fifty miles per hour. Some on Respite believed these patterns could be outdated because without humans to disturb the ecosystem, man-made climate change would reverse itself, altering many of the Earth’s cycles, but they had nothing else to go on.

  Tye hoped to grab the southeast trade winds that pushed up the coast of South America and back out across the mid-Pacific toward Indonesia. A brief dispute erupted about who should command the Jolly Roger. As owner of the ship, Milly ceded her command to Tye. He was the most experienced with boats and the sea, with the gone world, and with just about everything because he was the oldest. His support also helped sell the mission to the island council because his warnings about population control and depletion of island resources were becoming recognized.

  With Tye and Milly went Peter, Jerome, Vera and Robin. The fellowship of six would try to reach New Austin, Texas, the origin point of the message Milly heard, and explore and document as much of the gone world as they could along the way.

  The call from nowhere had become legendary on Respite. Tye’d heard it recited many times, pondered its meaning and analyzed the words, trying to discover hidden clues. After keeping the call secret for two years, Milly told the council while making the argument for her voyage to the gone world. She said a female voice repeated the same thing three times through the static of the ear: “To anyone who can hear this, you are not alone. We’re rebuilding. Come join the world in New Austin. We have food and supplies. All you need to bring is an honest heart and a will to work. We hope you find us at the end of your journey.”

  The boat was packed with sixty days of provisions: water, fresh and dried fruits and vegetables, nuts, coconuts, boar and fish jerky. They could always catch rain and pull food from the sea if needed. Both sails were out, and they moved at a steady ten knots, tacking back and forth through the choppy sea, trying to catch a consistent breeze. The trade wind hadn’t materialized, so they fought due east and would turn northeast when the winds picked up.

  Despite having instructions to reassemble the launch’s outboard motor, they’d chosen not to try. Even if they’d managed it, and found gasoline in the gone world, it would be bad just like their supply. Plus, the fuel tank looked rusted, the prop and driveshaft were bent, and all the motor gaskets had deteriorated to nothing because they’d been exposed to air for so long. If Rocco Sereggio lived perhaps things would have been different. Instead they constructed long oars, and as the days dragged on, the fellowship rowed for exercise and fun even when the winds favored them.

  The helm consisted of a traditional gimbal compass which still worked and spun freely, and a watch, which was one of two synchronized wind-ups that allowed the fellowship to stay time synced with Respite and attempt sending a message should they find a device capable. The Weiss field watch also assisted with navigation and approximating their location. They estimated speed using a one-hundred-foot length of bark rope with knots tied every ten feet, and a dried log tied on its end. Drop in the log, and count the number of knots on the rope as it’s pulled into the sea, compare it to elapsed time, and they could estimate the Jolly Roger’s speed. Tye’d learned this old seaman’s trick from Sarah’s notes.

  The launch’s steering wheel was still mounted on the front console, but didn’t work. The rudder broke along with the prop and driveshaft while getting the boat out of the caves, and a new, larger rudder had been constructed and its bamboo control arm stuck through the back of the launch. One of Respite’s two pairs of binoculars hung from its neck strap on a peg nailed into the bulkhead.

  Tye called up to Jerome, “How we doing up there?”

  “Good. Need me to trim?”

  Milly looked over the side and shook her head no.

  “Stay steady for now,” Tye said.

  Tye watched Milly study the chart laid out on a stack of food. Though the Oceanic Eco utilized GPS, radar, and computer autopilot to navigate, Captain Shaw kept a paper set of ocean charts showing depths, markers, and tidal patterns for the sea he sailed, and Staff Captain Sarah Hendricks grabbed them when she’d fled the bridge on The Day. In addition, they had three travel maps showing the Pacific islands. Both were small and provided tourist information, but they gave Tye and his crew a solid understanding of how far away they were from land, how long their sea voyage would take, and a bigger picture of the world at large.

  The tourist maps were a source of great debate back home, but Tye hadn’t taken part in the bickering. He’d foreseen the resolution, as the two opposing groups jumped into their pre-dug foxholes. One side claiming the maps were definitive proof that the gone world existed as described to them, and the other saying the maps were no different from the sacred texts, made up bezoomny talk. On one hand he understood that people who hadn’t seen the gone world were like the ancient tribes that lived in the Amazon. They lived a life based on what they saw, what their forefathers had taught them. They knew nothing else.

  Tye thought it amusing that their travels would take them close to what had been the greatest rainforest on Earth. A jungle that after forty years of man not constantly trimming it back had probably taken over every inch of the continent except the shorelines where the salty sea and sand provided a natural wall cutting off the stifling green. There were bound to be tribes in that jungle still. Like Respite, they’d been self-quarantined.

  The sun was almost touching the horizon and Milly said, “Now?”

  Tye nodded and Milly threaded her way through the supplies. Vera and Robin slept on the benches which lined the side of the launch. Milly trailed her hand across the orange safety floats strapped to the ceiling. They were frayed and falling apart, but still something from the lost world, which made them fascinating to islanders. Tye chuckled. Perspective. The clothing Milly and the others wore was proof that what he said of the gone world was true. Regular cloth would be threadbare, but synthetic fabric, while it may lose its color, remained usable much longer, yet they couldn’t understand this. They had no frame of reference, yet to Tye that was no excuse. Vera wore an old pair of Nike Pros, and there was no way to explain them away, no matter what you believed.

  When Milly reached the front of the cabin she leaned forward, squinting through the gaps in the logs that covered the opening on the bow that had once been the front window. Tye watched her mark the aluminum bulkhead with a thin line next to eleven others.

  They’d finished their twelfth day and there was no land in sight.

  The wind turned overnight and died to a song bird’s fart. So they floated, one person on the rudder and two on the oars so they didn’t go in the wrong direction. It was times like these when Tye asked himself what he was doing out here with these kids. Robin, Vera and Jerome were young, and Milly and Peter had broken their fire guard oath to serve on the Jolly Roger. They’d turned in their sacred rings and left their spouses and children. None of them had ever been off Respite, except for Milly who had been two and had no recollection of anything before The Day.

  As they cut through the still ocean, Tye pictured the old world, his old life. He had trouble seeing his mother’s face, and
a day didn’t pass without him wondering if she was alive. It was possible, but unlikely. He’d never know. Those two weeks leading up to The Day, the tsunami, and the hardship and death that followed, had stripped him of most of his hope, and the rest had worn away over the slow death march of time.

  It pained him to think of the old world and what he’d abandoned there, as if his old life had been deficient. He still cried sometimes, the vague blurred faces of his lost friends, the distant events of his past nothing but confused fragments of a broken life. Haven would hold him, and rock him back and forth as he wept. She was the only person who’d ever seen him cry. Haven and Tye still loved the people they’d left behind, but had accepted their deaths. If his mother and sister were alive, he hoped they’d moved on. Tried to find some kind of life.

  Tye constantly questioned his decision to leave Haven behind. It was like a splinter in his mind. While everyone in the party believed they’d return to the island after they completed their mission, Tye felt he had a fifty-fifty chance of making it back, at best. He’d abandoned the woman he loved because the pull of the gone world had been so great.

  The sun came up like Sauron’s eye and the south Pacific became a desert, heat pressing on everything, the sea breeze an inconsistent nothing that slowed them to a crawl. It was a good time for Tye to take a break, so he ate some jerky, forced himself to hide among the supplies with the shit bucket, then washed himself up with sea water. Then he lay down, his eyelids heavy with sleep. The ocean lapped against the boat, the sea breeze sang its mournful song, and in moments he was asleep.

  At forty days out, no land in sight, Tye started to worry. Dark clouds filled the horizon, and the crew put out the rain catchers. They’d agreed to ration the food a little harder, and with some rain they could extend their supplies ten days. Depression had set in and other than Tye shouting the occasional order, nobody spoke. Mostly they were in good health, but hunger, thirst, and the rocking sea made everyone uncomfortable.

  “Heave the log, Robin,” Tye said.

  Doc Hampton’s daughter noted the time on the watch, then tossed the log into the water. Thirty seconds later she yelled, “We’re barely moving. Five knots maybe.”

  “OK,” Tye yelled. “Take down the sails and batten the hatches.”

  The storm was coming straight at them and the wind picked up. The sound of waves slapping against the hull got louder, and white caps marched toward them across the boiling sea. It grew dark, the black horizon filling the sky. The rain came in weak bursts, then became a deluge. Waves pounded the Jolly Roger as Tye fought to keep the boat turned into the breakers. The gimbal compass spun as they were tossed around, the supplies shifting and slamming into the bulkhead.

  Milly and Peter tried to lash the supplies down, while Robin and Vera collected the watch, binoculars, and other important breakables. Jerome folded up the maps and stowed them, being careful to keep them dry, which was no easy feat. Gaps in the window boards, leaks in joints, and deteriorated seals left the Jolly Roger leaking badly topside. “Jerome, you’re my pumper.”

  Jerome grabbed the large bamboo bailer and opened the floor hatch. “Oh no.”

  “Shit don’t mean shit,” Peter said. “Get to it.”

  The water was almost as high as the hatch, and soon the sea would overflow into the cabin. “I need help here,” Jerome said. He had brought the water level down a few inches, but there was still a long way to go.

  Vera grabbed the second bailer and went at it, the two working in unison as though they’d practiced, she behind his dip and then he behind hers. Over and over, powered by the fear of death. Tye laughed to himself.

  The storm pounded them for a day and a half, and when they opened the hatches, they found that both sails were gone. Out went the oars, and after a few days the trade winds picked up, but without sails they couldn’t take advantage of them. Instead they fought the currents and tides northeast, toward the old world country of Mexico.

  The good news was they’d refilled the water jugs, but on the seventy-third day out of Respite, they ran out of food. They’d had the trolling poles out almost every second since they’d left, but had caught little.

  As Tye had anticipated, after three days with no food, his crew got scared and foul. Along with that came an honesty that justified Tye’s harsher thoughts about his young companions.

  “How do you know we haven’t just been going around in a circle?” Vera asked. She was a short, full figured woman with striking hazel eyes, and silky brown hair. Tough, smart and beautiful, she was on the quest because her father was Ashley Pendaltine’s son, and the Pendaltine clan needed a pair of optics so the old matriarch Ashley could see again. Doc believed they’d find usable lenses.

  “Jerome, take the helm,” said Tye.

  Jerome grasped the bamboo tiller and Tye led Vera to the front of the cabin. “Do you see that?” He was staring at the compass. “That’s how we know we haven’t been going in circles.”

  “Assuming it’s working right, and it is what you say it is. How long are we going to go before we turn back?”

  Milly overheard that and said, “We’re not going back.”

  On day seventy-eight, Tye scanned the eastern horizon with the binoculars and a dark line cut through the thickening fog.

  He yelled, “Land ho! Land ho!”

  Chapter Seven

  Year 2066, Pacific Ocean, off the coast of Mexico

  Turned out land was a little farther away than it looked. It took six more days to reach the shoreline, but as they drew closer, the water got shallower, and they were able to catch fish. Initial euphoria had been replaced with stark determination. With land in sight the crew stroked harder, fighting the current and wind that wanted to take them out to sea. It rained, and the storm blew them closer. When the sky cleared, they were a mile offshore and rowing north along the coastline.

  Milly peered through the binoculars, but didn’t see much. The beach was deserted save for a few birds dive-bombing fish. The dunes were covered in green foliage, and as the ground rose away from the shore, spidery trees with small oval leaves formed a wall of green that extended into mountains. They’d seen several river mouths, but Tye said it would be too difficult to fight the current upstream. He’d also expressed concern about being exposed to attack while on the river. When Milly asked who would attack them, Tye didn’t respond.

  Tye held the rudder-arm and hung his head out the back window. The sun shined bright, and all the window coverings had been removed and the tangy-sweet scent of fresh sea air pushed out old smells and rotting thoughts.

  “You ready for this?” Milly said to Tye.

  “As much as I remember about the old world, it’s been a long time. Most of what I remember will be gone. As to the people we might encounter when we make landfall? I have no idea at all,” he said.

  “That a no? You sounded convincing when you argued that you were most qualified for command based on your experience,” Milly said.

  “That’s proof of how screwed we might be.”

  Milly didn’t get it. “Are you going to lead this crew?” Everyone watched them now, Mr. Smee confronting Captain Hook.

  “I visited Mexico once in my former life, but didn’t venture out of the resort. Unfortunate because I think Acapulco is south of here. I’m ex-military, and I’ve fought in the jungle, on the desert, and in the snow. I’ll lead, but I don’t want to make all the decisions. That was our deal. You confused?” Tye said.

  “No. It’s just…”

  “Yeah, I get it. Feels like a lifetime ago. The sea has a way of doing that to you. Stripping you of yourself. Laying you bare with no protection, no help, but you have help, and we’re getting off this boat now,” Tye said.

  “So you figure we’re about halfway up the western coast of Mexico?” Jerome asked.

  “Yeah. The sun, stars, charts, and compass all say we’re around there,” Tye said.

  They entered a large bay boxed in by green mountains on three side
s. Crystal blue water swirled, and the mountain peaks on the horizon made Milly think of going home. Is this how it will be? Except with the beach packed with all of Respite cheering? She frowned.

  Tye issued no orders, and none were needed. Everyone took their positions around the Jolly Roger as they had many times before. They hadn’t discussed the next step because that part of their quest had been predetermined by the council. The entire western portion of North America was off limits, which didn’t affect them because they were heading to Austin. Tye said radiation from The Day might still be at dangerous levels and based on what they’d read in Alas, Babylon, plus Tye’s stories, none of them wanted to chance radiation poisoning. Contamination clouds could spread thousands of miles and changing weather patterns could alter their range and direction. They’d trek across Mexico and try to locate the remnants of Mexico City and then continue on to the gulf where they would turn north and follow the shoreline.

  Milly felt her mother’s Glock 19 pinch her back where it stuck from her jeans. She hung the binoculars on a peg and went about checking their supplies again: water in skins, food, and their personals all wrapped into packs. Two bows and arrows, six club-swords with steel points, and Tye’s rock and bark rope bolas. With the voyage done, Milly packed away the watch, binoculars, and Jerome and Vera unscrewed the mounted compass.

  Milly taught the others how to use the Glock, but she had no intention of giving it up. Tye said the bullets might be bad, so she’d tested the weapon right before they left with two hundred people looking over her shoulder. She’d pulled the trigger, and the gunpowder caught, and expanded, unleashing a crack the likes of which hadn’t been heard on Respite since the night Ben found Peter’s condom. There were twelve bullets left in the magazine. The weapon was the Hendricks’ family heirloom and her mother had taught her how to clean and care for it.