Rayen

The early afternoon sun blazes down on the asphalt on the Don Valley Parkway, or what used to be the highway before The Great Devastation, a world barely familiar to Rayen now. The highway, which was once surrounded by lush forest, is now barren as if she was walking along a Nevada road devastated by fires and drought. To her surprise, she sees tiny new growth and hopes that the rumors that rains have returned to the city are true, or else this mission was for nothing. Rayen has been walking for days, scouring the abandoned rusted cars, searching for anything edible left behind. Sweat drips down from her brown curly hair as she brushes her forehead with her hand. She thinks about stopping, finding shade and relief from the heat, but she knows she’s close to the city, to Toronto, the place she once called home.

She can see the city skyline now as she nears the top of the valley and recognizes the CN Tower, which once was the tallest building in the world, now looks like a concrete needle as the top had been bombed during the Water Wars. Rayen remembers her father took her up to the top of the tower when she was six years old; they climbed all 1776 steps just to get the best view of the city. Her mother didn’t come with them and stayed safely planted on the ground with Rayen’s baby brother Adonis. Their mother feared heights, and 553 meters tall was not for the faint of heart. Rayen remembers looking for her mother from the glass floor at the top of the tower, but everyone looked like ants from that height. She seemed to think she saw a spec of yellow, which was the rain hat her mother was wearing, and the only thing she has left of her parents. The same hat she is wearing today to keep the sun out of her eyes, her green eyes. Rayen smiles. She got her green eyes from her father and her light brown curls from her mother. Even if she loses the hat or someone steals it from her, they can’t take those genetic gifts away from her.

At last, Rayen reaches the end of the Don Valley Parkway, overlooking one of the industrial harbor fronts of Lake Ontario, part of the Great Lakes, which were drained during the war by the United States. This is the first time Rayen sees the drained lake. It was hard to imagine that the Great Lakes could be drained due to their vastness. But greed will always find a way, especially during desperation and the survival of other nations. The Great Lakes became the center of the Water Wars, as they were one of the largest surface freshwater systems. The harbor now sits empty, cracked mud, but Rayen spots what could possibly be a wet puddle in the bay outside of the harbor. Excited but uncertain, she jumps off the highway ramp onto a dock and lowers herself into the harbor, not sure if she is just a mirage from the heat and exhaustion.

It was not a mirage, but it was not a puddle of freshwater either, which was becoming a dire need to find as Rayen’s water rations were less than a quarter cup. But she knew the risk when she started her journey seventeen days ago. There was a high chance of her dying before even reaching Toronto, but it was a risk she had to take to find Adonis.

The puddle was pure muck, undrinkable, but cool to the touch and proof that the rains have returned. Rayen kicked off her shoes and sank her swollen, blistered feet into the mud, and sighed with relief. She thinks about rolling in the mud, and for a second, she hesitates, but the cool mud is inviting, so she plunges in, covering herself. For the first time in ten years, laughter escapes her, and she lays there thinking back on the last time she laughed. It was her eleventh birthday, about one week before her parents fled Toronto with her and Adonis. Rayen has trouble keeping track of the days, but she knows it’s July or August in the year 2041. Rayen is now 21, or 20 depending on what day it is. She was born during a global pandemic in 2020, which many people now say was the start of the Great Devastation that led to the Water Wars.

It was shortly after the pandemic that the weather in North America started to change. There were many warnings of climate change, but the pandemic seemed to heighten the awareness of social injustice and the injustice we had created in a capitalist world. Many people were waking up and realizing there needed to be a change. But we were too late. The first heatwaves started on the west coast. Regions that had never seen that level of heat before and were unprepared, killing thousands, devastating crops, lakes, and forests. By the time it reached the Midwest, people were starting to panic. Governments enforced climate lockdowns for civilians in Canada and the U.S., but they were secretly mobilizing for a 20-year war to secure the Great Lakes water for the years of drought ahead. Water was now more expensive than gold, and every nation wanted to get its share of profit.

Rayen, who was lost in thought of the last 10 years, came too; she knows she must get closer into the city, but not too close. The heart of the city is now controlled by the U.S. Military, abandoned by Canadian civilians, who, if captured, would be taken as prisoners of war. There are still Canadians living in the city underground, mainly rebels called The Six, compromised of six different Canadian rebellion groups coming together from other provinces. If Adonis was still alive, he would be here in the city and possibly a prisoner.

Rayen looks up at the decaying buildings of Toronto, some in complete rubble, others still standing but in rough shape. Glass windows were blown out from the bombings, blue tarps covering what used to be windows flapping in the wind. Vines covering most buildings where nature tried to take over the abandoned city but dried up with the droughts. Something catches Rayen’s eye, a shimmer of light in one of the nearby buildings, about twelve stories high. Unsure, she watches and waits, and she sees it again. It would likely be impossible, but Rayen swears someone is secretly trying to get her attention with some type of light. The city has no electricity, and batteries were nonexistent since the war, yet she can still see this light shining in an on and off in a pattern.

It could be a trap, but if it was the U.S Military who had seen her, she would surely be ambushed and arrested by now. This reminds her that she needs to be more careful, stay in the shadows of the city and out of the open harbor. She grabs her knapsack, her water bottle, and the yellow rain hat covered in mud, which will help her camouflage in the barren city. Rayen feels that she must head towards this light in her soul, so she does, taking cover under ruble whenever she hears a helicopter above.

As she nears the building, the light disappears, only reappearing when she is standing directly beneath it on the sidewalk. She desperately looks for the light when she notices movement from the same balcony. An object catches the light from the sun and shines down to her. Rayen walks to the front doors of the building, but they are boarded up, so she continues to walk around the building until she comes to a small hole in the side of the building. There is barely enough room for her to fit through, but she makes it inside and climbs twelve flights of the decaying stairwell.

Rayen reaches the twelfth floor and sees a fragile woman in her 90’s standing in the hallway, ushering Rayen inside her apartment. With caution, Rayen follows her. The apartment is alive with vegetation and barrels of rainwater. Rayen marvels at the plants that completely consume the apartment. Her eyes fall to the floor and tables covered in textbooks on Chinese medicine. Rayen recognizes many of the plants as she has also studied herbal medicine over the last 10 years. With the Water Wars still active, no modern medicine is available for civilians, and Rayen has been a healer in her village that is north of the city.

Rayen looks up at the woman and points to herself, “My name is Rayen,” and then points to the woman. The woman points to herself and says “Xiuying” and hands Rayen an object that she has been holding. Rayen recognizes that this is the object that was catching the light and guiding her towards this apartment. When Rayen opens her hands, she sees that it’s a golden heart-shaped locket, quite large, about half the size of her hand. Xiuying makes the motion of opening it with her hands. As Rayen opens the locket, she finds a picture of a young man, possibly Xiuying's grandson. Confused, Rayen looks at her, and Xiuying takes the locket, places it in Rayen’s short pockets, and says, “Find him.”

Suddenly, they both hear the helicopters circling above, Xiuying goes to the balcony to look below, and she confirms that the U.S soldiers are below trying to break into the boarded-up doors. Rayen knows they must have followed her to the apartment, and panic sets in. She has come so far to only be arrested the day she arrives, and now she has endangered the life of this woman. But Xuiying is prepared. She removes a rug on the floor that opens to a trap door leading beneath the apartment. Rayen climbs in and looks back at Xuiying to see her motioning with her hands to be quiet. She shuts Rayen alone in the hideout. Before Rayen can scream to her to come in, she hears the soldiers break through the apartment door.

Rayen hears yelling from the soldiers, “Get on the ground now!”

But she also hears Xuiying whispering on the floor above her, “Look in the locket, find him, please,” before she hears the soldiers take her away.

Unsure of her next move, she remembers what Xuiying whispered through the cracks of the floor and takes the locket out of her pocket. When she opens it, this time, she realizes that the photo of the young man is loose, and she removes it. Rayen finds a map engraved in the locket behind the picture. The map looks familiar, but it takes her a minute to realize why. It dawns on her that the map is the underground pathway in Toronto, and in the center of the map, it is the number VI. This must be the location of The Six's headquarters, where Adonis is.

Rayen looks around the apartment for food. She knows that she needs to eat and rest tonight before heading out to find The Six’s headquarters. She is also unsure how long that journey will take, so she will prepare enough food and harvest as many of the plants for medicine.

Tomorrow she will head out to find Adonis, to find Xuiying and her grandson.