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  Progenitor

  Book One of The Earthside Trilogy

  By: Sherri Fulmer Moorer

  Copyright 2016 by Sherri Fulmer Moorer

  Smashwords Edition, License Notes

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

  Thanks to Tatiana Villa for the cover art. Check out her cover art at http://www.viladesign.net/home

  Thanks to Melissa Manes for helping to make this the best book it can be. Check her out at www.scriptionis.com

  Dedication: For the outcasts, the maligned, the misunderstood, the alienated, the forgotten, the ignored, and the ones cast aside. This one’s for you.

  Prologue

  There’s no way to mask the fact that people die in hospitals. It happens with a regularity that a disinfectant can’t wash away. Souls enter and leave the world in hospitals with such consistency that it’s nothing more than another day for the people working there, or passing by on their daily business.

  It’s different when it’s someone you know. It’s not just another death. This time, it’s Uncle Carson.

  Kalea blew out a sigh as she fanned herself in the stifling room. “Why is it so hot in here?”

  No reply. Just the hiss of the air conditioner and Uncle Carson’s rattled breathing. The same as the last two hours: a machine that wouldn’t cool below eighty degrees, and that awful death rattle. The nurse called Aunt Tabitha and her cousin, Avery, out of the room for a “conversation” five minutes ago, leaving her alone to watch Uncle Carson just in case–of what? Maybe he could still hear, but if his demise was inevitable to everybody else, then surely it was inevitable to him. He was the one stuck in the bed. He was the one hooked to machines. He was the one rattling. She heard a muffled sob escape her aunt in the hallway.

  “Geeze!” she leaned over to unlatch the thin, stabilizing rubber mesh wrapped around her left foot and ankle. “It’s a hundred degrees outside, and this broken foot is so swollen that it’s almost the size of the pumpkins you used to grow. Remember the pumpkins?”

  No response. So much for reminiscing over the good times.

  Kalea leaned back in the chair, propping her foot on the edge of the bed. “I’m sorry, Uncle Carson. I’m sorry the cure came too late.” She raised her water bottle in a mock salute. “Here’s to the world’s best technological advance in the world’s worst timing.”

  Rattling–from the air conditioner and from Uncle Carson.

  Kalea sat the bottle on the table and leaned back in the chair. “This is crap,” she pressed her hand over her head where she felt a migraine coming on. Great, one more problem. Her uncle was dying because the nanotech that could have reconnected his neural pathways was put on the medical market too late to help him. She was hobbling around on a broken foot because she couldn’t afford the same tech that could have healed it in a matter of hours. And now her head hurt, and her medication was in her office, forgotten in the “your only uncle is dying” haste of picking up Avery at the airport and rushing here, just to sit and wait. She pressed harder, trying to press out pain, the rattle, her aunt’s sobs in the hallway, the deep murmur of Avery’s voice; all of it.

  Kalea groaned as she squinted at the late afternoon summer sun streaming through the window. She reminded herself that whatever chaos reigned in here, the world was going on as normal out there, and she’d be part of it again as soon as they got through this. Tomorrow would come and they would make it through that day, and the next, and every day after that, until they faced this moment themselves.

  That was the Chaplain’s logic an hour ago.

  “Uncle Carson,” she studied his thin face, “Mom and Dad are on the way. Remember that I told you Mom is teaching the advanced physics class in Tennessee for the fall semester? They’re living in the mountain cabin until the semester is over. She’ll sing in the church choir at Christmas. You always enjoyed hearing her sing.”

  More rattling. Kalea fanned her shirt, pulling it away from the sweat. “You like The Canticle of the Turning. She’ll do it again this year. She’s probably singing it already for Dad. He laughs about how she sings a Christmas song year round.”

  Kalea thought she heard him stir, but couldn’t perceive movement. She looked toward the sunlight shifting through the window. “I can’t sing as like she can, but I remember your favorite verse. It’s the third one, isn’t it?” She closed her eyes and sang.

  “From the halls of power to the fortress tower,

  Not a stone will be left on stone.

  Let the king beware, for your justice tears

  Every tyrant from his throne.

  The hungry, poor shall weep no more,

  For the food they can never earn;

  There are tables spread, every mouth be fed,

  For the world is about to turn.”

  Kalea relaxed, sinking into the chair. Peace seeped into her––a quietness that told her that everything would be all right. Tomorrow wouldn’t come for Uncle Carson, but it would for everybody else.

  A hand grabbed Kalea’s foot. She jumped, her brown eyes widening to see Uncle Carson sitting up on the bed, grasping her broken foot

  “Kalea?”

  Kalea tried to pull back her foot, but his grip tightened. She whined.

  “Kalea, it’s going to be all right.”

  “What? “

  Carson smiled, his own brown eyes glinting. “We’ve been chosen.”

  Kalea stopped fighting his iron grip on her foot. “For what?”

  Carson stared at her with a strange glimmer in his eyes. “You’re right. The world is about to turn.”

  Kalea resumed her struggle, pulling harder on her foot against Uncle Carson’s grip. His fingernails pierced into her skin, causing blood to seep from the small piercings in her skin. A shock went through her as she jerked free from his grip, leaped out of the chair, and dashed out of the door. She ran down the hall to the nurse’s station where Aunt Tabitha and Avery had retreated with the nurses, her left foot leaving bloody prints on the linoleum. They stopped as they saw her approach, her long, brown hair flying behind her. Avery hurried to meet her, catching her in his arms. “Kalea, what is it?”

  Kalea gasped, staring at Avery. “He’s awake.”

  Aunt Tabitha turned from the nurse she was talking to. “What did you say?”

  “Uncle Carson is awake!”

  “That’s impossible,” the nurse pushed past them. They followed her to Uncle Carson’s room, where they found him sitting up and calmly removing the morphine IV from his arm. He smiled at them.

  “Hello everybody. Isn’t it a beautiful evening?”

  Aunt Tabitha and Avery rushed to Uncle Carson, engulfing him in a hug.

  The nurse pushed her hair out of her face, her shaky arm exposing a phoenix tattoo. “I don’t understand.”

  Aunt Tabitha looked up from her embrace, tears dripping down her cheek. “It’s a miracle!”

  Kalea sagged against the wall, smearing the blood trickling from foot over the floor. “The world is about to turn.”

  Chapter 1

  Kalea rushed in the restaurant, pushing down her hair in a futile attempt to smooth out the damage from the hard hat she had to wear on her last job inspection. There’s nothing like mid-August heat in Columbia, South Carolina, to undo hair and makeup. She pulled herself as straight as she could at five feet tall as she approached the greeter. “I’m here to meet Avery
Kerner.”

  The greeter stared at Kalea with wide eyes. “You’re Kalea Kerner. You’re the ‘miracle girl!’”

  Kalea took a deep breath, trying to keep her face from getting any redder than it already was from the heat. “I think you have me confused with my Uncle Carson. He’s the one that came back from the dead.”

  “But he healed your broken foot, didn’t he?”

  “Kalea!” Avery’s tall, lanky frame swept past the greeter to hug her. “I’m glad you made it. Our table is back here.”

  Kalea followed Avery to the back of the restaurant, where he led her to a table next to a window. “Thanks for the save.”

  “Does that happen a lot?” he stared at her with concern in his brown eyes. Everybody swore the “Kerner kids,” as they had been called since they were babies, looked alike. Kalea and Avery’s fathers were brothers, and all the children in the family had dark brown hair and eyes. Avery was lucky to have some height to him, at six feet tall. Kalea and Annaliese, Avery’s sister, were short. They were lucky to grow up together on the two hundred acre family estate that housed their families just outside of Columbia, but jobs had taken Avery and Annaliese out of state.

  “It’s better than the doomsday crowds. There was a group of them gathered outside the last school I inspected.” Kalea shrugged. “I guess it’s better to be the ‘miracle girl’ than the herald of the end times.” She sighed as she laid down her menu. “Actually, it’s irritating. I’m not the one that came back from the dead.”

  “He wasn’t dead. And you were the one that limped in the room on a broken foot, and ran out healed two hours later.”

  “I know. Leave it to me to make a bloody dash down the hall of a hospital in plain view of a security camera.” She had been heralded as one of the youngest business owners in the state of South Carolina at age thirty-six, after taking over the Presidency of Kerner Electrical and Mechanical Engineering from her father, who started the firm when she was five years old and retired the previous spring. It had been her claim to fame until that footage of her mad dash down a hospital hall trumped her professional integrity.

  Avery waved it off. “They’ll move on soon.”

  “I don’t know. I hear there have been more cases like it in the past week. I was the only one stupid enough to get caught on video.”

  “You’re also the only one not talking to the media. What gives?”

  Kalea paused as the waiter appeared to take their orders. She smiled as he walked away with their menus, hoping the interruption was enough to change the subject. “When do you go back to Houston?”

  Avery stared at her. “Tomorrow and you never answered my question. You haven’t been around since Dad recovered a week ago, and you won’t talk about it. What’s going on with you?”

  Kalea took a sip of her water. “I’m busy. I’ve missed a lot of work since Uncle Carson went in the home and I broke my foot last month.” Kalea was helping her Uncle Carson in the house after a doctor’s visit on a rainy afternoon in mid-July, and they both slipped on the porch steps. He hit his head on the wall of the house and suffered a subdural hematoma; while she twisted and broke her foot. “You and Annaliese aren’t here, and Mom and Dad have been at the mountain house in Gatlinburg since Mom agreed to teach summer and fall classes at the University of Tennessee. I’ve been the only one here to help out Aunt Tabitha on a regular basis, which has been difficult with a broken foot.”

  “I realize that, and I’m grateful. It’s not fair that you have to play the role of the daughter since Annaliese is too sucked in her own little world up there in D.C. She’s married to a Congressman, for goodness sakes. It seems she would be able to break away for her dying father, especially since it’s been hard for you to get around on that foot that’s no longer broken.”

  Kalea pointed at Avery. “But as you just pointed out, he isn’t dying anymore, and my foot isn’t broken anymore. Don’t be so hard on her. I know she’s busy with her psychiatry practice.”

  “But you’re a business owner too, and you made time for Dad.”

  “I’ve also known the partners my whole life. We have personal connections. Annaliese moved up there with no connections and had to build everything up herself. I had it easy compared to her.” Kalea took another drink of water. She was shocked to find her glass empty already. “Those two school inspections this morning must have dehydrated me more than I realized.” She raised her hand to motion for the waiter, who nodded and brought a refill.

  Avery’s brow scrunched. “I thought you weren’t doing inspections until your foot fully healed.”

  She smiled. “It did heal, remember? Everybody that watches any national news stream knows that.”

  Avery shrugged. “I thought you might take some more time to make sure you’re really healed. Don’t bones usually take a while to heal?”

  “The orthopedic said six weeks in the splint, and three months after that for the bone to set.”

  “When did you break it?”

  “Three weeks ago.”

  Avery raised an eyebrow. “There’s no way you’re completely healed.”

  Kalea sighed. “It hasn’t hurt since Uncle Carson grabbed it. I don’t know what happened. My doctor thought it might have been adrenaline.”

  “That’s temporary. It doesn’t completely heal something that usually takes months to heal without nanotech.”

  Kalea shrugged. “It isn’t even swollen. I’m not asking why. I’m just glad I don’t have to struggle to get around anymore, especially in that splint. They’re lightweight, but you still can’t wear a shoe with them. That’s uncomfortable.”

  “This isn’t like you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You usually like to understand things. Aren’t you curious as to how a broken bone healed instantly? Are you even sure it’s completely healed?”

  Kalea looked down. “The doctor did an X-Ray and didn’t see the break anymore. Yes, I’m surprised. But no, I’m not going to beat it to death with questions. Frankly, I’m ready to move on. You weren’t in the room when he grabbed me. Nobody was, and there were no cameras in there. Nobody has any idea what it was like to have a dying person sit up and grab you.”

  “I understand you’re traumatized, but don’t you care that Dad recovered?”

  “Traumatized?” Kalea said, indignant. She crossed her arms. “I’ve never been so insulted in my life. Of course, I care! I’m the one that’s had a front row seat to watching him slip away with Alzheimer’s for the past seven years while you were at your fancy job with the Space Exploration Society that your larger than life brother-in-law got for you.”

  “All right, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply that you don’t care.”

  “I know you and Annaliese are busy with your jobs and families and lives, but I am too. We’re all busy professionals, but just because I’m not married doesn’t mean that I don’t have a life. I run a business, I’m a sponsored and assistant coach with the archery team at our old high school, and I’m on the property committee at church.” She pointed her fork at Avery. “In fact, I’m surprised you stayed for a week. Elise must be frantic running after a three and five-year-old. How are Skyler and Susanna?”

  “Skyler’s starting kindergarten, and Susanna is in pre-school. The neighbors are helping Elise. Stop trying to distract me. It’s no secret that you’ve been avoiding us. I know work is busy, but school’s out so the archery team isn’t an issue and the church just finished their renovations. What gives?”

  “You’re imagining things, that’s what gives. I’m not avoiding anybody. Work really is in peak season right now with school renovations. I talk to Mom and Dad at least twice a week, and Annaliese called me last night.”

  Avery raised an eyebrow. “What did she say?”

  “She’s the only person outside of the media and doomsday hounds that sincerely asked me how I’m doing. It was nice for somebody to care about me for a change, and not a disease or a story.” Kalea stared at
Avery. “You haven’t talked to her?”

  “Only for five minutes when Dad woke up. Mom’s talked to her a couple of times since then, but never for long. All she says to us is that her schedule is full and she’s trying to clear it so she can come home.”

  They sat in silence for a moment, Kalea munching on her salad and Avery cutting his steak. Finally, Kalea spoke up. “I don’t mean to be dismissive, but this is overwhelming. It’s easier for me to dive into my work than to bat off calls and e-mails looking for another sound bite. I’m embarrassed by that video. I hoped I could ignore it and it would go away, but now I’m not so sure. Have you seen these news stories breaking since they started running that video a couple of days ago?”

  “I’ve been too busy getting Dad moved back home and settled in to watch the news.” Avery paused. “He wants to see you. One of the national networks is sending a reporter to interview him for a special on Friday, and we hope you’ll come.”

  Kalea raised an eyebrow. “Come, as in to watch him do it?”

  “You’ll be interviewed with him.”

  Kalea laid her fork down and leaned back in her chair. “So that’s why you wanted to take me out to lunch.”

  “The family is asking, Kalea. It’s just one interview. Who knows, maybe talking to them will get everybody off your back. You’ll be able to go back to being an engineer and practicing your archery on our old tree houses. Dad does want to see you. He’s asked about you every day since he woke up.”

  “I know, and I meant to go by sooner, but you know how it is.” Kalea sighed. “What time on Friday?”

  “They’ll be there at six o’clock to set up. Mom has a cleaning service coming to fix up the place. The interview starts at eight.”

  Kalea raised an eyebrow. “It’s going to be a live stream?”

  “Of course.”

  Kalea took another drink of water and wiped her mouth. “Fine, I’ll do it if it’s the only way to put this to rest. I’m ready for life to get easier and go back to being boring again.”