An Uncertain Future

Laura looked up at the sky and wondered for the billionth time what things were like before the event. She shook her head, she couldn’t think like that, she had to focus. They needed to find food and get to shelter before the heat of the day really began to get bad. Her mother had been young when the event happened and most of what she talked about was the heat and how it hadn’t been this hot back then. Scientists had warned of the potential risks if mankind did not find an alternative to fossil fuels in the next 5 years. Their timeline had been a bit…optimistic. Not that many people had believed them anyway. She liked to think she would have believed the scientists if she’d lived before the event. Laura didn’t much care for the heat and wished she could have experienced the times her mother reminisced about to her. She liked to think she could have done something, if she had just been there, to preserve those wonderful times so many had taken for granted.

Laura turned the corner and found the rest of the scavenging group. She saw her best friend walking out of a beat-up store front grinning with a huge bag raised above her head victoriously.

“Jackpot!” Ava yelled as she got close.

“Why do you always say that?” Laura asked. “What does it even mean?”

“I don’t know” Ava replied. “My father used to say it all the time when he found something good.” Ava was a few years older than her and had been an infant when the event happened, Laura thought it made her tougher than most people she met.

“So, what did you find?” Laura looked curiously at the bag Ava was still holding over her head.

“Cans! “No one thought to check the basement of this old country store and I found SHELVES of homemade canned goods. No sludge tonight! Whooo!”

The rest of the group wandered over drawn by the noise Ava was making yelling and waving cans above her head like a crazy woman.

“Keep it down, Ava!” Jason warned walking closer. “You never know who could be within earshot.”

“I found a bunch of cans in the basement!” Ava exclaimed in a half-whispered yell.

“Great!” Jason looked relieved, they had been scavenging for almost a week now and he was determined not to return to the camp empty-handed again. “I’ll have them grab the wheelbarrows and meet by the entrance, can you guys bring some up?”

“Yeah, there’s not many in boxes, they’re just stacked on shelves so we’ll have to find a way to carry them.”

Jason nodded and started walking towards three guys who had gotten distracted by a liquor and cigar store they had noticed on the way to the girls.

“Guys! Stop messing around. This is a serious trip and Ava found something, we don’t have room to carry alcohol back to camp.”

“What if I carry it in my backpack and it doesn’t interfere with carrying food?” Caleb responded grinning as he had already jammed three bottles of whiskey in his bag and was trying to fit another.

“Fine” Jason conceded, “but if we need space in your bag to put cans then you’re going to have to get creative.”

That got everyone’s attention. “Cans?!?”

Caleb’s grin got even wider and he dropped the bottle he had been trying to squish into his bag, letting it crash to the floor and shatter as he ran off.

The other two guys looked after Caleb wide eyed, they hadn’t seen cans in a few months. The group had been starting to wonder if they’d ever eat anything other than the awful sludge again. The sludge was the nickname the group had given to this tasteless green goo the camp’s scientist had developed to help stave off hunger as food supplies had become rarer.

The girls were already in the basement trying to find a way to move the cans efficiently. Laura was looking in an old dusty stack of randomness trying to find a box when she saw it, a small silver heart-shaped locket, somehow it was still shining in the dust. Laura leaned down and picked it up, examining it closely. It looked like it opened but she couldn’t get the clasp to move. Laura put the locket in her pocket and continued her search for containers.

“I found boxes!” Laura heard Ava say, her voice was muffled and Laura looked up to see her coming out of a closet that had been hidden in a dark corner next to some bookshelves.

After packing everything up, the group headed back towards camp, feeling cheerful and at ease.

“So, did anyone look at the cans?” Caleb asked.

“They weren’t labeled.” Ava said. “Most of them look like vegetables and we found a couple packs of seeds down in the basement as well, maybe we can find a way to get the garden back up and running so we don’t have to scavenge so much.”

Jason looked at her. “You didn’t tell me you found seeds!”

“Yeah,” Ava blushed, “everyone was so excited about the cans, I just stuck them in my bag and figured I’d bring it up when we were sorting through stuff at camp. We don’t even know if they will grow yet.”

Jason looked thoughtfully down the path. “Anyone else find anything they haven’t mentioned?” He looked around at the group. All of a sudden Laura felt guilty, she had no reason to but she did. She knew if she didn’t say something about the locket now and Jason found out later, there would be hell to pay.

“I found this heart-shaped locket”, Laura said.

Jason turned, “Can I see?” No one saw jewelry around much anymore. It had been about 20 years since the event and the first thing people had done, for some reason, was loot all the jewelry and electronics. They had only seen signs and pictures left hanging abandoned in the stores they scavenged.

Laura held it out to Jason.

“Pretty.” Jason inspected it as she had, fought with the clasp, and gave it back to her. “And I think Caleb managed to jam three bottles of whiskey into his bag before we packed up the cans.”

Caleb shot Jason a look.

Jason just shrugged, “You have more than enough to share.”

“Says you!” Caleb exclaimed, a joking grin on his face.

Jason started laughing. “Whatever man, let’s go, we’re getting close to camp and it’s almost dinner time.”

They had dinner around noon since the heat of the day made everyone stay underground and nap. The best time to travel was night when the light from the sky could guide the way. The stars shone bright at night, the moon was like a searchlight in the sky. Her mother said it was because of all the damage to the atmosphere and the lack of electricity. They could see stars much better now than before the event.

They got to the tent and everyone went inside. Jason leaned over and gave the grate cover two hard knocks, paused, then knocked again.

They heard a voice from inside, “Who is it?”.

“Liam! Open up! We brought gifts!” Jason yelled.

The door opened and a small, boyish face looked back at them. Liam was the youngest. “Jason! We were starting to worry! It’s been almost a week.”

“Yes, it has,” Jason nodded as he pushed his way through the grate into the cool tunnel behind it. The tunnel led down underground, they had found the grate one day by pure luck a couple years ago and had jumped in blindly thinking it led to the sewers. It had been a particularly bad day when they were rushing to find shelter before they all died in the heat.

“Sharon!” Jason yelled as he entered the underground bunker they used as their main meeting room.

Sharon looked up annoyed at her brother as he burst in, but it was obvious she was relieved. Laura smiled to herself. Sharon always tried to act tough but when it came to her brother, she was a softie.

Jenny was giggling at the table; it was no secret she liked Jason but everyone pretended not to notice for his sake.

“SHARON!!!” Jason yelled again, more loudly this time.

“You know I hate when you do that!” Sharon said annoyed, they were the only two old enough to understand the reference. Her and Jason had been teenagers when the event happened. They had found Laura and her mother wandering around not long after Laura’s father had disappeared. The four of them had wandered as a group, collecting random lost teenagers for years. Now the teenagers were all but grown and they were close like a family.

Jason grinned. “We found cans.”

Sharon’s jaw dropped. Everyone rushed up to help the last of the group bring in the cans with pillowcases.

“Ok everyone, everything found on the table!” Jason called out, gesturing Caleb to the table before he could sneak off to his room. Caleb looked displeased but complied.

Laura leaned forward and placed the locket on the corner of the table hoping no one would pay much attention to it and she could get it back soon.

No such luck. Sharon had already noticed it and was eyeing it with curiosity. “What’s this?”

“I found it in the basement where we found the cans.” Laura said, “it was just lying there. I tried to open the clasp but I think it’s broken.”

“It’s pretty,” Sharon said absently, fiddling with it. “Jenny, pass me that tiny screwdriver.”

Jenny brought over the tool suddenly interested in the locket. Laura groaned inwardly; she’d never get it back now.

Sharon put the screwdriver to the clasp and had barely pushed when the locket clicked open. A tiny chip fell out.

“Well, that explains why it was stuck.” Jenny said, she had leaned forward in excitement. “What is it?”

“It’s a microchip.” Sharon whispered in awe looking at Jason. “Does the scientist still have that computer?” The scientist’s name was Jennifer, but they called her the scientist since there was already a Jenny with them when they had found her. Laura thought she liked it better anyway. The scientist was always tinkering away with something. She had only been with them 6 months and since then had made life a lot easier but many still found her a little weird and off-putting.

A few minutes passed before Jason came back. He was followed closely by the scientist carrying a laptop computer. After they had all arrived back at the bunker six months ago, she had started unpacking and they couldn’t stop staring. A lot of the stuff she carried in her bag none of them had ever seen in real life before, just pictures in stores like they had jewelry.

The scientist held out her hand for the microchip and Sharon handed it over quickly. Her fingers moved swiftly over the keys; the scientist kept her computer charged with a generator that provided them all with limited power. Another goody she had brought with her.

Suddenly she stopped typing, “Do you guys know what this is?”

“What?” Jason asked, he had been leaning over her shoulder the whole time but couldn’t get a good enough angle to see the screen.

“It’s blueprints and pages upon pages detailing alternative fuel sources and a potential way to reverse some of the damage to the ozone layer.”

“What?!?” Jason asked again.

Laura was just staring stunned at the locket laying empty and open in the middle of the table where it had been forgotten. She reached over and picked it up. Had she accidentally, impossibly found a way back? A way to make her dreams of living in times like before true? She held the locket up to her face looking at it as it shined in the dim light.