| Episode 094 | |
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“So I walk up on high
Slate dips her finger tips into the pool of water, then licks the drops that cling to her digits. She thinks for a moment, then looks back at Patrick and I. Patrick is watching the darkness behind us, while I’m anxiously waiting for Slate. She looks at the water, then shrugs uncertainly. “It tastes okay.” She says with hesitation. I’m not so hesitant. I’m too damn thirsty. I drop to my hands and knees and just dunk my head underneath the clear surface. I start to gulp in the water. It’s dusty and tastes metallic but for the love of god, it’s wet and it’s cool. I want to just jump into the center of it. When I pull my head out, I look down into the water and I see the stains of dirt floating around inside. I draw back up and scrub my face with my hands, able to see the filth coming off. I almost laugh, then dunk my head back into the water, a little bit to the right. “Pity it’s not deep enough for a bath.” Slate says as she drinks as well. “God, I could use a good bath.” I nod and glance back at Patrick. He’s still guarding the dark tunnels behind us, the pistol held down, but ready. “Drink up.” Slate says to him, as if reading my mind. “We’ll take turns.” He says. He takes just enough time to spare both of us glances before looking back into the darkness. “You guys said to trust my instincts. Well, mine are telling me we need to get moving soon.” “He’s right.” Slate says, looking across at me. I look from her to the ladder that reaches up to the edge of the steel world above us.
With a stomach full of water, my hunger seems to magnify. But I can tell I’m more alert now. I don’t really doubt that I was dehydrated, but it had crept up on me so subtly. Now that I’ve drunken to the point of bursting, I feel so much better, so much more alive. And even though all I did was scrub my face, I feel a lot more refreshed. Slate leads us up to the edge of the metal cylinder that we’re climbing out of. Making our way up to the sky, we head towards the stars, the rungs of the metal ladder encapsulated against the steel our only friend. As we climb, I take note of the destruction opposite us. The metal is torn away from the otherwise-smooth wall of the cylinder climbing up with us. And I can see into the dozens of layers of the mechanical world that was above us. Floors and crawl spaces between floors. Each one, filled with lifeless machines and dimmed lights that shine no more. Technology that abounds, but has been rendered useless. But all too soon, Slate reaches the edge of the ladder. And she stops. I watch her expression for the slightest indication of what’s beyond. And I wish I hadn’t. Slate, the ever-imperturbable force that she is, gasps in horror. “What?” Patrick asks from beneath me. But Slate doesn’t answer. She just climbs up farther onto the ladder and swings her leg over the side. “What’re you doing?” I ask. But she straddles the jagged metal edge of the once pillar of steel, still staring out. And so I climb. And when my head reaches past the metal edge, I look out. Two giant eggs have cracked on the desert floor. Metal forms larger than any human structure I think has ever existed lay splayed out on the desert’s red-dusty surface, the glass structure fractured open beneath the twilight of the stars. The supports that held them were torn from the ground and they collapsed onto their sides, rupturing open like a Champaign glass dropped from a hundred feet up. I turn on the ladder, looking up past us. And I see the sight I never would have dreamed. I see the shadows cast over the world of the three standing eggs. I see the three remaining bio-domes standing against, towering over, dominating, the desert sky. The impossibly large structures reach up into the cloudless sky, blocking out the moon itself. |
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