RIGHT BEHIND
Sheela walked home, her arms burdened with vegetables. Today she’d also caught some sort of small creature, which hung off her belt. She didn’t know what it was called—it was long like a weasel, but had large ears and a blunt nose. She and Lam would have meat tonight.
Which was not so uncommon now. Moving away from the city had been the right decision. Sure, it had put them closer to The Rapture, the enormous structure which supposedly was filled with Right people. Yet for as long as Sheela had been alive, it hadn’t caused trouble for anyone. No one went in; no one came out. The others were wrong to fear the old legends. You gained nothing by living in fear.
It was still wise to get home before dark. Sheela hurried, and was soon pushing the door open with her hip. Lam was immediately there, dropping his weapon once he saw it was her. He ran his fingers eagerly over the vegetables. “Good haul today!” he said.
She kissed him, then patted the still-warm animal on her hip. “And this too!”
“Excellent. I have the fire ready.”
He hadn’t lit it, though, and it was nearly dark. Lam saw her look and got busy with his flint.
Soon the room was warm, firelight flickering on the dark walls. Sheela skinned the animal and broke its body into chunks, snapping the little bones without gouging her hands. She added the meat to the pot over the fire, where the vegetables already simmered. Lam had rigged the pot-shelf himself, bracing the thick iron ledge sturdily into the fireplace. He was very handy.
“Would you say grace?” Sheela asked Lam.
They both bent their heads as he recited the litany in the ancient tongue. Neither of them understood the words; what was important was the saying of it.
“I pleja leejuns, tuda fag, uhva yoo-nye-did-skates, uhva merica. Untoodary public, four itchit scans, won nayshin, undaga, in the bisibull, forlitery anjastis foral. Amen.”
“Amen,” Sheela asked, and they ate.
After dinner, Lam stoked the fire, and they snuggled in front of it a while before settling into the sleeping room. This house was a good one; the fire kept both main rooms comfortable. It was near fresh water, with a creek running year-round in the woods behind. Sheela and Lam had considered many houses before deciding on this one. She knew that lots of the other folk, those who stayed closer to the city, would have grabbed the biggest house they could find. But that was foolish. Who needed so many empty rooms?
Of course, those who remained behind were foolish, she already knew that. Which was why there were fewer of them all the time.
Sheela was washing last night’s dishes in the creek when a noise caught her attention. She looked up, saw nothing, and went back to her work.
She heard it again, and stopped, setting the dishes down on the bank. Had it come from the house? Lam was there, making a better seal around the windows in the sleeping room. But it didn’t sound like anything he could be doing. It seemed louder, and more remote.
She walked down the creek a ways, where the trees were thinner and she could see farther. Then she heard the noise once more: a loud thudding crash, but at some distance. Like a muffled explosion, though nothing had exploded in a very long time. Not since the earliest days of her youth, when the city fell and the world changed.
Over the treetops, she could just see the far-away roofline of the monolith that was The Rapture. Was the noise coming from there?
A chill went through her at the thought. If so, there was nothing she could do about it. Sheela went back to the creek and finished scrubbing the dishes.
Up at the house, Lam was still fiddling in the sleeping room, muttering happily under his breath as he worked. “Did you hear that noise?” she asked him.
“No,” he said. “What was it?”
“I don’t know. Like in the olden days, when things blew up all the time.”
Lam laughed. “I remember that.”
That afternoon, after the heat of the day had let up a bit, she went foraging in the opposite direction from yesterday. Now she was being the foolish one, but she didn’t feel like going near The Rapture. The enormous structure had always made her uncomfortable, with its monochromatic surface, no windows, no doors, nothing. Just a big blank closed nothingness. And the low, constant hum, almost too deep to hear, but always...there. In this new house they heard it more clearly. It was nice to get away from the hum, she realized; she walked farther than she’d intended to.
She did well enough out closer to the mountains. She didn’t catch any game, but she’d kept the bones of yesterday’s animal, whatever it was, so she could add them to tonight’s pot. When her sacks were full of root tubers and greens, and the sun was low in the sky, she started on the long walk home.
She was almost home when she realized something was missing. The noise—the hum of The Rapture. It had stopped.
Sheela froze on the path, listening intently. But she heard only silence.
She started running, and didn’t stop until she got to the house. She burst in through the door, surprising Lam.
“What is it?” He looked at her with wide eyes.
“The hum—it’s gone. The Rapture is silent.”
“The noise you heard earlier?” he asked, puzzled.
“No! The noise it always makes, it stopped. Maybe it broke.”
“What do you mean, broke?” But he didn’t seem very concerned.
“Well—it’s a building, but it’s a machine, isn’t it? And it’s always humming?”
He shrugged. “I guess. But I have no idea what it is. It’s always been there.”
“No, it hasn’t! What about the legends? Don’t you remember anything?”
“I remember I’m hungry. Did you catch another animal today?”
“No, only vegetables.” She started unpacking her sacks.
“I think we should go check it out,” Sheela said the next morning. “I’m serious: something’s wrong, and I want to know what it is.”
“Fine,” he said, but kept oiling and honing his weapon.
“I said we,” she said.
Lam looked up, eyes amused. “I heard you.”
“Well, come on then.”
“Don’t you want me to bring this?” He lifted the sharp weapon, letting the light from the window glint on it. “I’ll be finished in a few minutes.”
Sheela broke into a grin, then ran over and gave him a kiss. “Thank you,” she said. “I know you think I’m crazy, but...”
“Don’t mention it,” he said. “I know I won’t get a moment’s peace till we check it out.”
“True.”
Ten minutes later, they walked up the road, then the wider street that led back towards the ruined city, and towards The Rapture. This street in turn joined a larger street, and so on, as they wended their way out of what used to be an expensive suburb.
“So you never heard the hum?” Sheela asked him, as they walked.
Lam shrugged again. “Sure, but I never thought about it. It was just what it was.”
“And now that it’s gone?”
“So now it’s something different.”
Sheela shook her head. She loved Lam with all her heart; he was a good man, strong and sweet and capable; but sometimes he could be a complete idiot.