The Locket

The Locket

By Samantha Harken

Everyone knows the real world ended in the year 2000. The crash of the electronic world came in the form of an EMP burst which is hotly debated even now: was it the Y2K bug or an attack from an otherworldly species trying to curb the chaos humanity was embroiled in? Small towns that were agricultural in nature lasted the longest after the fall of technology, and why not? They had the means to keep themselves going, the skills to protect their land and family, and the heart to keep going as the darkness closed in on them.

It has been almost two-hundred years since the fall of humanity. Africa became the new hotspot for rebuilding culture; who better to teach the soft citizens of the world the true meaning of survival? Yet, even in those dark days there were those who sought to gain power and influence over the world. They learned the hard way that there was no easy path to success. No, in this new and budding world the only way to live and thrive was to get dirty, work hard, and remain honest. Complicated law systems were the first thing to go out the window with the technology. There was simply no room for them in this world any longer.

Now as we look back, the question arises…what have we learned from history?” Professor Andrew Malone stood at the front of a lecture hall staring into the bright faces of his new class. Yes, things were growing now along a decidedly better path than the ancients had chosen once upon a time. No longer did electricity rule the world. It was his job to educate future generations so that they did not fall into the same pits. Afterall, history has a way of repeating itself, and this is one of many mistakes that must not be allowed to happen again.

A small girl in the back of the class raised her hand, her violent red hair and bright green eyes marked her as a genetic anomaly; but this was not something that ever seemed to change her outlook on life or her thirst for the answer to every question that popped into her head.

“Yes, Miss Therry?” Malone smiled at her and silently hoped he would be up for the challenge of answering her in front of this class without looking the fool or countering his own material.

“Professor Malone,” Isabella Therry stood up from her bench. She was small in stature and seemed frail, but her voice was strong and clear. “While it is obvious that Africa has become the most hospitable place on this planet, and there is a large percentage of the population that lives here while other places in the world seem to wither at even a hint of human colonization, I would pose a question. What proof have we that there were ever truly civilizations outside of this land? Even the records found from long before the world fell said the north-east of Africa was the cradle of civilization.”

Malone cleared his throat and searched his mind for answers. She knew how to put him on the spot and he was almost regretting his acceptance of her into this class at all. However, her bright mind challenged him, and he was never one to back down from a challenge. “Well, Miss Therry, to tell you the truth, I have never seen evidence of these other civilizations, myself, beyond artifacts that I have no hope of understanding. However, the theory behind learning of these civilizations stems more from the desire to teach us how to avoid the mistakes these civilizations made. It would, therefore, be better to view this class as more of a philosophy than science.”

Satisfied with his answer, and annoyed at his ability to find one, Isabella sat back down and thought on his words. She did not want to view this class as philosophy. She wanted to find proof of the past. Definitive proof that would do more than sway the hearts of women, children, and academics. No, the proof she wanted would have to show the people in power that there was absolutely no way they could turn back to the dark times humanity had survived.

A dry and angry wind blew across the plains that seemed to stretch in all directions. The grass rustled and swayed in the breeze, otherwise there was an overwhelming silence that even now Isabella was not entirely used to. She had come to this continent as part of a reconnaissance team to search for settlers who had believed this land was rich for farming and would be able to sustain them. So far, they had found the supplies. There was exactly no evidence that humans had ever walked on this land at all other than the supplies.

Drawn by a strong sense of intuition Isabella set off across the field towards a stand of trees that towered high over the dried grasses and their chaotic dance. It seemed as if only yesterday she had been in Malone’s class, learning about these lands that had supposedly once been towering cities and busy thoroughfares. It had been years, of course, and Isabella now wore the long leather cloak of a research and reconnaissance officer. Her dream of finding proof had only grown as she aged. Finally, she had found a way to cross the ocean and see the land for herself. It was only a matter of time until she found the proof she needed. Hopefully, time was on their side.

Halfway to the trees Isabella stumbled over a rock and fell hard to her hands and knees. She glared back at the rock as she brushed dirt off her knees. How had she missed this? The rock, or rocks rather, formed some sort of barrier about a foot high in the grass. Their crumbled red composition seemed very out of place here in the middle of a field.

A breathless young man caught up to Isabella, doubled over panting, and gasped out, “Isa? Are you alright? I saw you fall down-“ his words caught in his throat as he spotted the wall. “Is this a wall? What is it made out of? It can’t possibly be natural, look at how straight it is!”

Isabella nodded enthusiastically at him, unable to voice her own thoughts as her mind raced ahead by leaps and bounds. Not natural? That would mean, it would have to be, something built by the ancient people who lived here! She fell to her knees in front of the wall and began digging with her hands, ignoring the fact that this type of manual labor was scraping her fingertips bloody. “Augie? A spade? Shovel??” But the man had already run off – probably in search of exactly what she sought. Her excitement didn’t give her the time to wait. She continued to dig with her hands.

Several minutes later Augie returned with two other men and another woman. They all had shovels, spades, and other digging tools. One was handed to Isabella in her delirium she didn’t notice who, she merely continued digging feverishly. For hours the team dug along the wall, some moving back to dig the trench wider as the wall went further down.

“This is amazing,” Isabella spoke softly to Augie later that night. “I don’t know how I’ll ever sleep.”

He smiled at her, put his arm around her shoulder, and pulled her tight. “Don’t worry, you’ve pushed yourself so hard today that I’m sure you’ll fall asleep as soon as Rassa finishes cooking and feeds you. Your name will go down in history as the first person to find proof of the ancients outside of Africa.”

“Our names,” Isabella said softly, still staring off into the distance where the wall was quickly disappearing into the dark night. “Our names.”

Augie was right, as soon as Isabella finished eating, she crawled into her leather tent and was asleep so fast she hadn’t even removed her clothes for sleeping. This had the happy result of her being the first up in the morning. She stretched as the first rays of the sun crested the horizon and added some fuel to the campfire, which they had banked well the night before. After a while she was boiling water for tea anxious to get back to work.

Just as she was getting up to head back to the wall Augie and Donovan rolled out of their tents with noses set to getting themselves some breakfast. There was simply no talking to men before they had their morning tea, so Isabella tromped off across the now trampled grass so she could look at the work from the previous day.

Sure, this had started as a rescue mission. There was no sense in wasting the chance of exploration while searching for the missing settlers, though, so Isabella had demanded that the proper gear be brought for such an expedition. She was very glad she had now that they would have some proof to take home with them.

Several days of digging and they had gone down about 6 feet, careful not to hurt the wall. The trench was 4 feet wide and followed the length of the wall at least 10 feet. There were some windows in the wall, filthy from years of being buried, and Isabella was uncertain if she longed more to open the windows and explore the inside of this hidden building or to keep everyone safe if the air inside happened to be as poisoned as history books would have everyone believe. “It is said,” she could hear Malone’s voice echoing through the lecture hall, “the air was so toxic at the time the world collapsed that we could not survive in that type of atmosphere. There were many diseases of the lung and respiratory system that came from the very poisons humans put into the air. Our planet has healed itself since that time and our air is now much cleaner and safer than the ancients could have ever dreamed possible.”

Had it been long enough, perhaps, that the air inside this building had been healed as well? Was it worth the risk? There were some masks they had brought in case they had found a pollution area that would likely keep them safe no matter how the air ended up being. Another risk was what they would find within this building. Who knew what it had even been used for? Perhaps it had been a medical building and would be filled with death and decay. Even then she would risk herself, she knew, because a medical building would be filled with a great deal of evidence to take home.

Isabella broke the window with her boot, holding a mask over her face with one hand and holding herself balanced against the wall with the other. The shattering glass didn’t make as much noise as she had expected. The fetid cloud of air that came from the building, however, was just as rank and disgusting as Isabella had imagined even through the mask.

Quietly she eased through the window and cautiously stood up in the room. There was a table, and several smaller tables, each with its own chair. The walls were covered in strange art, words that seemed to make no sense at all, and the chairs held nothing more than dust, bones, and the remains of clothing. All relics of a civilization lost to time.

Finally, Isabella thought, proof.

The first table she came to had a necklace still tangled in the bones of the previous owner. Gingerly she examined it until she found the charm: a golden heart-shaped locket. Her heart nearly stopped as she rubbed the grime from the surface and found but a single word etched in the surface: Isabella.