Earthbound (The Reach, Book 1) by Mark R. Healy

Author:Mark R. Healy
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2015-07-01T04:00:00+00:00

22

Knile decided that the chemicals and the toxins in the air that he’d inadvertently consumed over the years were messing with his head. Those ubiquitous poisons that got into the water, into the food, into everything, had finally gotten to him, and now he was hallucinating. He had become too sick to distinguish fantasy from reality. What other explanation could there be for this absurd vision before him? How could he possibly be seeing what he was seeing?

He turned back to Ursie and it was clear that, if this was some kind of trick of the imagination, she was sharing it. Her eyes met his and she could only shake her head in response to the unasked question that hung between them.

Knile looked back to the boy, fully expecting him to be gone this time, dissolved into a cloud of dust and blown away by the wind, but this was not the case. He was still there. Knile got slowly to his feet. The boy was grubby and emaciated, naked from the waist up and wearing only rags for pants. His hair was dark brown and almost shoulder length, clotted with dirt, and he wore no respirator. His feet were bare.

The boy’s face betrayed no emotion as he regarded Knile and Ursie a short distance away.

“Hello?” Knile called out. The boy did not move or make any response. “What are you doing there?”

The boy continued to stare at them, seeming neither threatened nor surprised by their presence out here on the ledge. Knile turned to Ursie, who shrugged, dumbfounded.

“Are you okay?” Knile persisted. “Did you get locked outside?”

Knile took a few steps along the ledge and the boy finally made a response of sorts. He turned calmly and began walking the other way, around a bend in the wall and out of sight.

“Wait!” Knile called. “I’m not going to hurt you!” He quickened his pace as he moved along the ledge.

“Knile, what are you doing?” Ursie called after him.

“Just wait there,” Knile said. He took hold of the rope trailing after him and slung it over his shoulder to prevent himself from inadvertently tripping over it, then slightly quickened his pace. The edge of the precipice was disconcertingly close, but Knile had never had a problem with heights, and he did not allow it to slow him down. He made it to the place where the boy had stood moments before, but, finding him gone, continued further around the bend. Glancing over his shoulder, he discovered that he had lost sight of Ursie, and this caused him to slow his pace and show more caution, knowing that the rope wouldn’t stretch forever.

He came to a narrow cleft that led to a hatch much like the one that he and Ursie had emerged from below, and there he stopped. His puzzlement grew as he surveyed the area. There was still no sign of the boy, but something else inside the cleft captured his attention instead.

There was a garden here.

It wasn’t much of a garden, Knile had to admit.

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