“Hello.”
I glanced up to find a young woman in UF fatigues, one empty sleeve pinned up neatly.
“I hope you don’t mind. I needed something to do,” I told her.
“Appreciate the help. Even better if you could do some hoeing for me. Hard to hold yard tools with only one hand.”
I stood and brushed the loose dirt from my hands and knees. She handed me the hoe, clearly a woman with a plan, and Ifollowed her to where she wanted me to break up the root system on a plot of land that had gone fallow and was now in need of replanting. With pale skin, brown hair, and freckles, she had a manner of speaking that I’d noticed was common enough in the military–short and to the point, at least at first. Her name was Audrey and she’d been in the service for two years now.
“Do you like it here?” I asked, curious to see what her experience had been.
“It’s okay. Mostly I stay on base, tending the garden and feeding the animals. I could do more if I had two hands.” She looked at me with envy. I didn’t take it personally.
“I have a friend who could make you a prosthesis customized to whatever you want. My friend Artemis has a bow attachment and uses it to hunt,” I told her.
“Really?” she asked, sounding interested.
“But aren’t there doctors here?”
“They don’t specialize in prosthetics. Most of our medical workers are devoted to trying to cure the virus.”
It was understandable and I was grateful for their work, but there were still a lot of survivors who needed help too.
Once we’d finished hoeing, Audrey handed me little paper bags marked with “cucumber,” “squash,” and “melon.” Seeds for planting. My mom had a really good pickling recipe. There was nothing like a crisp, tangy pickle in the summertime. If I were still there in a couple weeks, I could help build a trellis for the cucumbers to climb. Cipher would be good at that too, with his carpentry skills, but he might still be in the lab then. How long would it take for him to recover? I didn’t know much about the virus at all, other than what I’d been told or heard on the radio. As it turned out, Audrey was a good listener, and it wasn’t long before I was telling her of the events that landed me there on the StarChem base.
“Sounds like you’re still pretty mad at your brother,” she said.
I may have gone off a bit about how unreliable Santi was, starting with his behavior throughout our childhood and ending with my most recent disappointment. “Yeah, I am. I’ll have to forgive him eventually. I mean, he is my brother. I’m mostly mad at myself for letting it happen.”
“But did youletit happen? Seems to me like the whole thing was out of your control, out of anyone’s control.”
“That’s what everyone keeps saying.” Cipher had been unlucky. Wrong place, wrong time. Still, I couldn’t help but feel responsible.
God has a plan for everyone,my mom used to tell me, but if that was true, why would He let so many of us get sick with the virus? Rabids weren’t a reflection of His creation, were they? To be Rabid was a miserable, wretched existence. Was it our penance? Did we deserve this plague? It was hard to imagine anyone, especially innocent children, doing anything to deserve such complete devastation.
It was too much to grapple with myself, so I asked Audrey what she thought about it all.
“I stopped believing in God for a while after this happened,” she said and lifted her amputated arm. “But then, I’m still here aren’t I? I’m here when so many others aren’t. And your friend, Cipher, he’s still here too, despite everything. So maybe that’s God’s plan for us. To survive when so many others haven’t.”
“I guess I sound a little ungrateful,” I said, feeling ashamed.
She shrugged. “We all have our moments. It’s hard for me too sometimes, being stuck here on this base day-in, day-out, but I’m safe here and well-fed, and even though I wish I had a husband and children, I think, maybe one day I will have that. If I keep working hard and praying for it.”
“I should pray more,” I told her, not just for myself and my loved ones but for those who suffered daily under the toil of the plague, even the Rabids. They needed our prayers most of all.
“Would you like to pray now? For your friend Cipher?”
I nodded and took her hand in mine. Audrey said the words for us both. “Dear, God, please heal our friend Cipher who is afflicted with Rabbit Fever. We would be eternally grateful for your help here, God, if you would banish the virus from his body and bring him back to my new friend Joshua, healthy and whole, so that he might be a servant of yours, God, here on earth and in your everlasting kingdom.”
“We pray for the Rabids too,” I added, “that they may know peace and love in your grace and an end to their suffering here on earth.”
“Amen,” we both said. I heaved a big, cleansing sigh.
“Feels good to let it go, doesn’t it?” she asked.
“Yeah, it sure does.”
I’d never know if there was a greater purpose to all of this, whether this plague was part of God’s plan or just some random blight on humanity, but I believed I was meant to be here, to meet the Assholes and make them my family, to love Cipher with all of my heart.
