Rainer grins. “That’s all really cool,” he says. “I love that you’re all so different and… just…” He shakes his head. “I don’t even know what to say. Perfect sounds a little cheesy, right? But that’s what it is. You’re all in such perfect harmony within your own skin.”
I can’t help but note that if humans had thought the way he did back when they were prevalent, the world would have been a better place. Maybe they’d have organized better and more would have survived the Silence-driven apocalypse.
At that time, such cooperation didn’t exist. Some humans were so determined to believe that they were simply the apex of all living things that they couldn’t fathom the truth of what we’d put in front of them. They were so set on disbelieving science despite physical and visual evidence. They were so narrowly focused on trying to force everyone into a single fucking moldthat they let their entire species nearly become wiped from the Earth.
On the one hand, all those idiots died because the idiots in charge didn’t know how to survive an actual disaster. They didn’t know how to live off the land. Their billionaire status didn’t guarantee them shit when the beasts came for them. You can’t wave around a bank card to fend off a beast.
Everyone died equally. Monsters, humans, animals… Everyone simply died at the hands of insane monsters. Those who survived were organized. They were ready to fight back, to hide, to bide their time before venturing into the world again.
“There are days like today when I think that maybe what happened was always supposed to happen,” I admit. “Otherwise, would you exist? Would I have ever gotten to the point where I stopped fighting with Notto? Would Drys exist? Like it or not, the world itself is at peace. It’s regenerating from the destruction that humans had laid on it. The air is clean. The water is clean. The land is reclaiming what had once been suffocated by concrete. But most of all, we have you. A world without you would not be worth living in.”
Rainer huffed. “That was the corniest thing I’ve ever heard you say.”
“Oh, precious, I’m just getting started. I’ve readthousandsof books. I’m going to make your insides melt.”
He laughs, but I cut that laugh off when I begin stroking his dick.
RAINER
Mama said memories can make you feel happy, but they can hurt more than any mortal wound if you let them. Choose to remember the good over the bad. The bad can consume you, and you’ll become nothing but a memory yourself.
They left as suddenly as they appeared. One minute, we were chasing deer in the woods, screaming like children, and the next, they were off on their surfing stones, heading into the sunset. Literally.
Keary was right. They seemed to like me more by the time they left. They no longer glared or looked at me suspiciously. If for no other reason, I wanted to point out that I wasn’t alive a century ago. It wasn’t me who hurt monsters, though I couldn’t say with any confidence that my ancestors hadn’t. That’s not the kind of information I have. I knew my parents. My grandparents were killed before I was born. That's all I know about my family.
Everything we talked about while sitting on the shore the other day continues to move through my mind whenever there’sa quiet moment while we walk. The cruelty of humans just for the sake of it. The cruelty of monsters with the purpose of total domination.
I’m not sure which is worse, if I’m honest—torture because you can or torture for the end purpose of more easily killing off entire species. The fact that these Silence people succeeded in sending some monstrous species into extinction is chilling. Truly and utterly chilling.
Human history isn’t all that different. The 1940s saw an attempt at mass extinction of Jews. They’re not a different species, which I think might be worse. That wasn’t even the only or the most recent attempt in human history. It was just the one that everyone knew. The horror that lingered in the backs of minds. The one that was recounted by hundreds of books.
Before my parents were killed, I spent a lot of time at the library. There was a really nice one about forty-minute’s walk from the place where my small family group lived outside Nyc City. There were several years when I spent hours a day reading history books, primarily because it was the only way to know my own species. To know where we came from and how we got here.
The problem was there werenomention of monsters at all. None. Not in non-fiction. Certainly not in history. It meant that there were no recorded accounts of what took down human civilization. What I’d found was that the human population was once at nine billion people worldwide. I doubt there are even a million left alive now.
I suppose when all the people died, there wasn’t anyone left to do something as frivolous as record the events. No one left to print a book. No one to make a record of the events when it was such a struggle just to survive everyday.
We spent the last few days walking through our mornings, heading northeast. This morning, I saw the sign telling us thatFillee was approximately ten miles away, the better part of a day’s walk, so we’re pushing to get there today.
That means Nyc City is about a week or so beyond that. We could come upon the pod that killed my parents at any time.
A hand slips into mine, and I look up from where I’m watching the ground, noting that I could use some new shoes already. When you walk all day, it doesn’t take long to wear out your sneakers or boots. These are better than pairs I’ve had in the past, but my feet already ache far sooner in the day than they had when I first put them on.
“What’re you thinking, husband?” Drystan asks.
My heart stutters when he uses that word. Husband. It’s the second time I’ve heard it since the girls were here with their wild antics.
I shake my head. Since we’ve been walking in companionable silence for quite some time now, I figure I can ask a question. “You call me husband like we’re married or something,” I say, trying to keep my voice light instead of letting it reflect how breathless it makes me.
Drystan’s smile climbs. “We use it in place of partner or lover or mate,” he says. “The word conveys the relationship between us without having to explain anything.Everyoneknows what husband, wife, or even spouse means.”
“The structure of marriage collapsed when society did,” Notto says. “That’s not to say we can’t have our own little ceremony if you’d like.”
“Did your parents consider themselves married? Did they have a wedding of sorts?” Drystan asks.
I shake my head, shrugging. “I don’t know. I’m not sure if they…” I close my eyes and pull up memories of my parents. I think about everything I observed about them and compare it to what I’ve now experienced with these monsters. What I’ve observed with other human families and couples.
“I don’t know,” I repeat. “I guess I don’t remember them ever being affectionate with each other. I was their center of focus, you know? They made sure I was safe, fed, and had a smile on my face.” A smile lingers on my lips as I remember them.
