After the End

11 JUNEAU

WE SPEND THE NIGHT ON THE TOP OF THE RIDGE, watching, waiting. I want to understand this city before I set foot in it. The sleeping dogs heat the tent with their warm breath, and I lay half-in, half-out with the tent flaps tucked in around me to keep in the warmth. I am not cold. There is a flame burning inside me since my clan disappeared, and this new mystery has made it burn hotter.

I chew on a piece of venison jerky as I watch the city. Near the waterfront a forest of tall buildings crowd together, growing sparser and shorter as they spread outward from the city center. On the edges of the town are groups of houses dotted with small parks and supply centers. I try to remember what they’re called… shops.

During the few hours before dusk, a number of cars leave the city and head toward the outskirts. I watch as some drive directly to the houses and others stop first at the shops. The people—tiny as ants from my vantage point—emerge with rolling metal carts full of supplies, pile them into the cars and, once home, transfer them into the houses.

My mind struggles with what my eyes are seeing. People—regular people—are going to work and then coming home to their families. Children play happily in front of their houses, bundled in brightly colored snowsuits. There seems to be plentiful fuel (I count at least ten gas stations), and supplies appear to be abundant.

I try to push my emotions aside—confusion, shock, fear—and use every ounce of rationale I possess. I cannot let myself panic. If I can’t keep a cool head, I might not be able to find my people. And the thought of being alone in the world is one that I’ve had to repeatedly dismiss. The idea is too frightening to consider. I have to remain focused on my goal: finding Whit. Then—together—we will find our clan.

Too many questions are darting through my head. How can this one city have escaped the nuclear catastrophe of World War III? Could it have completely rebuilt itself in three short decades? And if this city survived, did others, too? I watch boats enter and leave the port. They have to be going somewhere.

What I’m seeing is an impossibility: a thriving metropolitan civilization only three days away from our village. I pull my fire opal from my neck and hold it in my palm against the ground. Still no connection with my father. And the wind is giving me nothing at all.

I push away a rising sense of alarm. I’ve never been away from my father—my clan—for more than a day or two on the odd camping trip with my friends. And those times, I enjoyed the solitude, knowing everyone was safe and sound in their yurts. Unlike now. I breathe deeply and try to shed the alarming thoughts crowding in on me.

I change my focus to Whit. I imagine that face I know as well as my father’s, and the Yara shows me his emotions. Fear. Confusion. If I can’t feel my father and I can feel Whit, maybe it means he’s still nearby.

Although the tiny people below don’t look threatening, I don’t want to draw attention to myself. I’d rather watch them like I do my prey when hunting. Observe their patterns. Understand them before making a move. I don’t dare light a fire here on the ridge, else I would use the firepowder to ask the Yara where Whit is. I must wait until tomorrow to use a less conspicuous way of Reading his location.

I scoot back into the tent, securing the flaps tightly behind me, and settle between my layers of furs, listening to the sound of the huskies’ sleeping puffs and the alien sound of civilization in the distance.

The sun has just risen. The city sleeps. I have hidden the sled and bulkier supplies on the outskirts of the city, taking only one large rucksack that I carry strapped across my back. Beckett and Neruda walk protectively on either side of me as we cross through the outlying housing areas.

As we approach the city center, more and more shops appear until we are walking along a broad road lined with businesses on either side. I hear a noise and freeze as a car approaches us from behind. The dogs’ fur bristles and they nudge in closer to me as a man steps out of the car and walks up to one of the shop doors. He takes something out of his pocket and begins wiggling it in the door handle.

Opening the door, he stomps the snow off his boots, glancing briefly up and down the street before stepping inside. Catching sight of me, he smiles politely, nods his head, and calls, “Morning!” And then he disappears into the shop. I remain frozen for another ten seconds, and when he doesn’t come back out with a loaded gun or other deadly weapon, I breathe out my relief in a cloud of warm air.

In my seventeen years I have known only forty-six people. The same people, every day, each of whom I know everything about. And I just saw a man who I will never speak to and will never know. I walk past the shop and see him inside bustling around and—poof—I continue walking and he no longer exists to me. I can hear Dennis teasingly chiding me in school. “Juneau, give us all a break and save the existentialism for our philosophy discussion group.”

A few minutes later, a woman with white hair steps out of a doorway, and once again I am petrified with alarm. Her face is wrinkled, and although I’ve seen pictures of old people before, this is the first time I’ve witnessed one with my own eyes. I feel like I’m looking at an alien—someone from a world away. My spine tingles with the newness of the experience.

She turns and catches my gaze but, after casting a curious glance at me and the dogs, ignores us as she goes along her way. I spy a fenced-off area of grass and trees, make a beeline for it, and take refuge on a bench. I sit there with the dogs as the city comes alive. Until I can watch people come and go without my heart racing.

A man sits down on a bench across from me, sets down a steaming white cup next to him, and pulls out a newspaper. I tell the dogs to stay and walk over. He looks at me, and his eyebrows shoot up in surprise. I can tell I look odd to him. No one else I’ve seen is dressed in furs and skins. “Can I help you?” he asks.

“Where are we?”

He looks around us and back at me. “In a park,” he says, shrugging.

“I know we’re in a park,” I say, “but what city is this?”

“Anchorage,” he responds. He narrows his eyes like he thinks it’s a trick question, and then his expression changes to concern. “Are you lost?” he asks.

“No,” I say, and whistle for the dogs, who flank me in seconds flat. We begin to leave the park, but I hesitate. When I turn back around, I see the man is still watching me, and I have to ask.

“Tell me—how did this city escape the war?”

“What war?” he asks, intrigued.

“World War III. The Last War. The War of 1984,” I reply, identifying it in every way I know.

He opens his mouth and out spill the words that, since last night, I have suspected were true. “There hasn’t been a World War III,” he says, “knock on wood,” and he raps his knuckle against the park bench.

I feel a wave of nausea wash over me. I have to sit down. My face and palms feel clammy, and I think I’m going to throw up. I return to my park bench and put my head between my knees until the nausea passes. I see the man leave, throwing a worried look my way before pushing through the metal gate and disappearing. I try to reason through what he told me.

There was no war. I still can’t believe we were so close to this city, yet we knew nothing. How could my father and the other elders have been so mistaken?

There’s no way they could know what happened, I realize. They’ve been isolating themselves for thirty years.

I push these thoughts aside. I have to find my clan. Even if their kidnappers aren’t brigands, they took my people and killed our animals. And I still have to find Whit. I need a clear sign to know what to do.

And suddenly the right person comes along. Someone whose thoughts are free of the restrictions of reality. Whose mind is open enough to access the collective unconscious shared by all humans past, present, and future.

She is an old woman dressed in a coat of rags. She pushes her way through the iron gate, dragging behind her a metal cart piled high with strange objects: old shoes, stacks of paper, aluminum cans laced on a string that clatter as they drag behind her.

She crosses the park and, seeing me, approaches. Beckett and Neruda glue themselves to either leg but don’t growl. She stops at the other end of my bench and slowly lowers herself to sit. Stowing her cart next to her, she pats it lovingly, like it is a baby in a carriage instead of a mountain of garbage. Then, turning, she looks vaguely in my direction. Her expression is glazed-over. Opaque.

“The men—they put a movie camera inside my television and watched everything I did,” she says matter-of-factly. “They even put a camera in my shower.”

I ignore her disheveled appearance and paranoid speech and see her for what she is. A gift from the Yara. “Can I hold your hand?” I ask. She hesitates, and suspicion flashes across her face. Leaning forward, she holds my gaze in hers. Then, finding what she is looking for, she gives a satisfied nod and pulls her right glove off. Removing my mittens, I take her gnarled, chapped hand in my own and hold my opal in the other.

“Thank you,” I say, “for being my connection to the Yara. I need to ask you some questions. Very important questions. Are you willing to answer them for me?”

“Of course, dear.” The woman’s eyes begin to look more focused, and a serene expression settles upon her face.

“I am looking for a friend. His name is Whittier Graves. I am picturing him in my mind right now. Can you see him?”

The old lady closes her eyes abruptly and then, opening them slowly, focuses on a spot in midair to the left of my head. “I see your friend,” she says.

“Where is he?”

“He is on a boat. Leaving our harbor.” She lifts her free hand and gives a distracted wave toward the invisible boat floating over my shoulder.

“What!” I exclaim, and then quickly control my emotions before I pass the shock on to my oracle. “When did he get on the boat?” I ask, my heart pounding painfully, but my voice as steady as I can manage.

“Moments ago.”

“Was he alone?” I ask, my already-cold face turning numb with fear.

“No, he was with a group of big men. Bad men. Two went with him and the others stayed.”

I fight to stay calm. “Do you know where his boat is going?” I ask. This is asking a lot of the woman. Using her to see the present and recent past is well within the bounds of realistic expectations. But from the oracle-reading exercises that Whit used to practice with me, I know this question verges on divination. The woman has to see into the future or even tap into Whit’s subconscious to give me an answer. The response I get will be cryptic at best. I focus on her, ready to catch every vital word.

The woman’s face crinkles in concentration. “Say it another way,” she responds after a few seconds.

I consider that, and finally ask, “Where must I go to find Whit and my clan?”

“You must go to your source,” she answers immediately.

“My source?” I ask, confused. “Denali?”

“No.” She shakes her head, frustrated by my incomprehension. “No, before that.”

“But I was born in Denali,” I respond.

Her frown deepens. “Aren’t you listening? You have to take a boat.” She is getting upset, and I know that her link with the Yara is fading if not already gone. I have so many questions I still want to ask. I flail around for the most important.

“Can you see my father? Do you know if he’s okay?”

“I have no idea what you are talking about,” she says stubbornly, and tugs back the hand I am holding.

Disappointed, I take her glove and fit it carefully back over her fingers. She has returned to the mad world in her mind. She blinks, as if surprised, and I clasp her gloved hand until she is oriented.

“Thank you for your help,” I say, standing. The dogs are at my side in a flash.

“They’re watching me. They know everything I’m thinking,” the lady says.

“Tell them to go away, and maybe they’ll leave you alone,” I respond.

“Now that’s an idea,” she says, her lips forming a surprised smile. Her smile broadens as her mind recedes into some pleasant memory, so that when the dogs and I leave her, she looks almost happy.