Hearts of Chernobyl

"Sooo… basically, you're a scientist?", the young boy finally chimed in after a long silence. He sat there, eyes still fixed on the small campfire between them, a little tin of thin bean soup resting on his knee, untouched.

Kendra nearly choked on her cactus juice. It was only 5 years ago that she was finishing her graduate thesis in genetics at UNM… seemed like a lifetime. Back then she was more worried about getting by on Ramen and a meager work study wage. Ramen. She'd kill for a good bowl of Ramen, right now. She pulled the bowie knife from her boot and sliced off a few tender shreds of the roasting hornrabbit on a stick at the fire's edge. Plopped the lean chunks of meat into her soup.

We're running out of beans… Gonna need to go foraging again-

she thought to herself, plucking a few more strips and offering them up. He raised his hand in polite refusal. She looked down at the hornrabbit. It reminded her of taxidermy jackalopes in all the little tourist shops. Those were fake, of course... the current reality was a bit more frightening. "What's wrong?", she asked, pointing to his untouched soup with the knife, "You've barely eaten anything… you're usually on your 3rd bowl by now."

He shuffled his ratty sneakers in the dirt, nervously. "My stomach hurts," he lied. She eyed him the way her mother used to eye her when she was obviously bending the truth. "That's not gonna fly, my guy, you know we're down to one decent meal during the night. Otherwise, it's just H2O and prickly pear jerky on the long hot walk tomorrow… you don't want to throw up like last time, do you?" She wasn't really the maternal sort, but, in a way, she was kind of glad for the company. The long journey from the rez to Sandia Labs would be murder, otherwise. "That's not it", he muttered, digging a little into the freshly kicked dirt with a stick. He wrinkled his nose at the rabbit, "We're not supposed to eat those." She scoffed, "I already told you, it's clean. I checked it with the Geiger counter and everything. I didn't invite you to come with me to insult my cooking!" "You didn't exactly invite me!", he retorted, "You caught me following you and didn't have the time to turn bac--"

Just then, a high sharp howl echoed through the canyon. Carlos jumped with a gasp and shuffled over to sit next to Kendra. He was shaking. "I see now," she whispered, patting his back. "You're worried that the smell will attract them. Don't fret, pet. Coyote tricks us. He can make his voice sound close, even when he's far away. They're probably miles away. Don't be scared, my little lefty." Just to be safe, she built up the fire. The smoldering embers of a page out of a dirty magazine flew out as she tossed more black locust branches on. Blushing, she quickly swept it in, not wanting the impressionable youngster to see. She hated having to use it, it was one of the most viable forms of lightweight currency on the road, except maybe uncontaminated water. The afternoon shower had wetted all the kindling, though, and she daren't use the other papers in her bag.

"Little lefty?! Speak for yourself, Yazzie!", he laughed. He had her there. She called him little lefty on account of his last name, Cly- from the Navajo 'tłʼaaí', meaning 'left handed', which he was. Her own surname, Yazzie, was from 'yázhí', meaning 'little one'. Kendra was about the most white girl name you could have, so being half native, it suited her. At five foot nothing on her tiptoes, the moniker was fairly dead on.

Not wanting this moment of levity to devolve back into the fear of the circling pack, she quickly changed the subject. "What were we talking about, again?", she pressed. "You were saying you're a scientist," he mumbled through a mouthful of the slightly burnt gahtsoh. He greedily slurped the soup and ladled out another cup. She mused at the thought. A greenhorn grad student wouldn't have been called a scientist back then, so she never really thought of herself that way, but that was before the Great Dying. Most of the scientists… indeed, most of the people in the world had been reduced to stinking piles of ash, now. She supposed she was the next best thing.

"I guess you could call me that, sure." "So spit some science at me, Einstein!", he teased. "Einstein was a theoretical physicist, I studied genetics. A better joke would be to call me Barbara McClintock." He stared at her, blankly. "Nettie Stevens? Ruth Sager? Not ringing any bells? Geez, Mendel? Watson and Crick? Ugh. What grade are you in?" She rattled off in frustration. "7th," he said, meekly, "I've heard of the last three, I'm not dumb, we just started learning about them. Watson and Cricket, the DNA guys, right? And, Mendel...he was...um…", he trailed off. "The father of modern genetics?! Wow. And, it's Crick, not Cricket. What else you got?" He thought for a moment, then blurted out, "The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell!" She laughed. She had to hand it to the rez schools- even in times like these, they were still feeding them the basics, at least. "That's true. This is what I was researching." She pulled a Manila folder out of her bag, stuffed to bursting with research papers. Right on top was her thesis, The Effects of Radioactivity on Germline Gene Editing. "Germs?", he said, leaning in quietly like it was a secret, "Like what made everybody sick?"

She paused. She didn't really want to get into the actual definition, as that would involve discussing sexual rreproduction- the prospect of having 'the talk' with a middle schooler was outside of her comfort zone. The same could be said for discussing a global pandemic, but, on reflection, she chose the latter. Another howl rang out. It wasn't like thunder and lightning, where you could count the seconds to determine the distance. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up, because it sounded like it came from another direction.

They were definitely circling.

"Sorta..." she started, not wanting to show fear, "... that's not really what Germline means- but, yes, germs are microorganisms and some can make you sick. What all have they told you about it?" He got a thoughtful look on his face and whispered, "Just that, some germs made people sick and they all died. The elders say it was… a Chindi." He lowered his voice even more at the end.

Upon hearing the word, Kendra's mind went immediately to the heart shaped locket. It wasn't far from the truth. In Navajo culture, a Chindi (or chʼį́įdii) is a type of malicious spirit, created from the last breath of someone dying. It's said to be a concentration of all their bad thoughts and deeds, all rolled up into a dark energy. Chindi bind themselves to the deceased's bones and possessions. Contact with those possessions causes immense sickness. That's why cremation of the body and their things was common. Of course, the entire world had become a giant crematorium since the incident.

"Why?", he asked with an air of conspiracy, "What do you know about it?"

More than most, she thought. Too much.

"A fair bit. You see, it all started in Prague. That's this big city in Eastern Europe. There was an exhibit put on with items from Chernobyl. Uhh… it's hard to explain." She took his stick and started to draw a crude globe. "In Ukraine is the city of Pripyat. In the mid 80s a nuclear power plant called Chernobyl had a huge meltdown, it claimed dozens of lives from radiation exposure and thousands had to be evacuated from the area. The wind could carry this radiation out pretty far, so nobody wanted to take any chances. Since then, very few people have been let back in, because the risk of radiation is too bad." "Because they might turn into superheroes?", he asked, in earnest. "No, Jesus, kid, you read too many comic books." She flustered momentarily, then got back on track. "No, radiation exposure can make people very sick; it can cause cancers and a whole bunch of other really bad symptoms. A high enough dose is lethal."

"But, what's that got to do with us? I thought they evacuated everyone." "I'm getting to that. So, about a decade ago, folks started getting in, anyway. Mostly urban explorers and such, but a group of researchers went in and got a bunch of artifacts to showcase at this exhibit. They took photos of the decaying city to display. They took soil samples. They were pretty thorough about making sure everything was well contained so the public wasn't exposed… it just wasn't enough."

"What do you mean? What's this gotta do with your paper?" He was following along surprisingly well for a twelve year old. "Well, in it, I postulated… theorized- that an extremophile- a microorganism adapted to extreme conditions could mutate to adapt to and even feed off of radioactive material. A virus could infect living subjects, making them sick with symptoms of radiation poisoning, and even create extreme mutations in their offspring." "Well, then, you were right!", Carlos said, pointing to the hornrabbit. "Unfortunately, yes," Kendra frowned. "One thing, I don't understand though. How'd they find it? How'd it get so bad, so quickly?"

"That's more than one thing. The researchers didn't realize they had the virus on their clothes, their hazmat suits, their equipment. They tracked down the source to a small heart shaped pewter locket with the name Anya engraved in it. They named the virus Anya's Heart. They worked hard to try to find a cure, but, by that time, they were too late." She drew lines from her badly drawn Prague all over the globe. "The researchers and the attendees were from all different countries. The virus mutated, infected people through supply chains. Through food and water. People got severely ill. Some died quickly, but for others, it was excruciating. The virus consolidated and concentrated radiation from even low level sources. Batteries and electronics. Even fruits and vegetables and soil."

"Is that why we survived? Because we live on the reservation?" "For the most part. Small, self sufficient communities were probably unaffected. Can't say for sure, the grid's been down a while."

She lied. She already knew there were survivors out there. She'd encountered them on the road. Some friendly, some not so much. Some out there would just as soon gut them for their measly bit of food and supplies rather than barter for a few dusty pages of smut.

Their conversation was cut short by a rustling in the darkness. Growling. Into their small circle of light crept four large coyotes. Mutated. Larger than timber wolves. Lefty screamed immediately. Kendra jumped to her feet and grabbed a flaming branch from the fire. Fishing the knife out of her boot in one swift motion, she crouched into a defensive position. "Grab a branch, stay behind me!", she yelled. He quickly obeyed. They stood back to back, waiting. The alpha leapt into the air at Kendra, only to be met with a hard blow to the side of its snout. The yelp of a kicked puppy and the smell of singed fur filled the air. A flurry of gnashing teeth and blood ensued. In the commotion, Kendra's bag was kicked over, and out rolled a small acrylic case. Inside it was a heart shaped locket with the name Anya engraved. The burned and wounded dogs ran away into the darkness.

No sleep tonight.

They both stared at each other in silence. She picked up the case and shoved it back in her bag.

The next day was a scorcher. The heavy masks and goggles didn't help. They walked, wordless, against the hot dust and wind. When the storm finally calmed, the young man couldn't take it, anymore.

"Kendra?", he chimed

"Yes, Carlos?", she grumbled.

"Why do you have the locket?"

"That's not your concern…"

"Okay…. But, Kendra?"

"Yes, Carlos?", her patience wearing thin.

"Who's Anya?"

"You don't wanna know," she choked, as her heart jumped into her throat.

"Kendra?"

"Yes, Carlos?", she sighed.

"Will you find a cure?"

She stopped short at the top of the hill, looking down into the valley at the smoking husk of Albuquerque.

"We'll see, buddy…

We'll see."