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This is a story I wrote- The very thing we ought to overcome |
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Leon looks to his left and then to his right, then darts across the abandoned street. He slowly advances in the direction of the pharmacy. The building is painted a shade of sky blue and a some-what sickly color of ivory. The only indication of civilization is the city, which now lies in ruins. It feels like the city has been neglected by the absence of mankind; it’s like a huge void and the only way you can fill it is now extremely impossible. It felt this way to Leon for exactly 39 hours, because 39 hours ago, Thursday, Feb. 15, 3001, the great disaster attacked nearly the entire human population and all was wiped out. Only a few survivors remain, Leon is one of them.
The question still sticks in Leon’s head, What made this terrible tragedy come in to reality? It was caused by deadly incurable disease; no one knows why it happened, how it happened, or what caused it. All Leon knows is such a horrible thing, as this shouldn’t have happened. It killed his lovely wife, and newborn daughter. As for Leon, his only hope he has left is making it to the pharmacy. That is if he can overcome the fight of him vs. his instincts, and his instincts are telling him that his stomach is aching and has a strong desire for food and water. If he takes a single bite of food, he will with no doubt surely die from the disease that killed his beloved wife and child, but if he doesn’t get to the pharmacy on time he will die of starvation and thirst.
His body is weak from the lack of food within him. With each stride he takes he grows closer and closer to the blue and white building and feeling of relief sweeps over him. He finely makes it to the door, which is boarded and locked up. Leon knocks rapidly. Then all of a sudden, a flash of light meets his eye. The door opens to reveal a lady wearing glasses and a long, white coat.
“He’s clean,” she says, then lets him in the small room. Six or seven people are sleeping on the ground, all crammed together, and lined up looking in a strange way like sardines. “You look terribly hungry, do you want something to eat?” says the lady in the plain white coat. Leon nods. She begins to speak again, “Ok then.” She goes into a freezer and pulls out something resembling bunny pellets and hands them to Leon. “They are not much but they will have to do.” Leon looks at them in disgust and bewilderment.
“What are they?” he asks.
“Eat them and find out,” the lady says, with a grin on her face. He eats one or two of them because he can go on for another moment without food. To his amazement it actually doesn’t taste as appalling as he thought. He looks up and smiles.
“Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it. By the way, my name is Cathay Fletcher, and your name is….?”
“Leon Conanary.”
“Well, Leon Conanary looks like you need some sleep.” Then she hands him a sleeping bag. Leon lies down next to the others and shuts his eyes.
He wakes up to find someone shaking him out of his deep sleep. “Get up!” a distant voice yells. As he opens his eyes he realizes Cathay was the one to have the nerve to wake him up. “Ughhhhh!” he yells, “what did you do that for?!”
“Sorry to wake you, sleeping beauty. But it’s time to eat,” Cathay says. She forces the bowl of the bunny pellets into Leon’s hands. “Sorry but you need to eat three bowls of this a day. It’s the only way to make it accurate for my experiment.”
“Sorry, but I’m not going to be your guinea pig!” he shouts as he shoves the bowl back into Cathay’s hands, almost spilling it.
“Hey! You need to be more careful! And you are going to cooperate and you are going to be my testing participant whether you like it or not! Or you can just leave and catch the disease and die just like your wife! Would you like that?!”
“Wait! How do you know about my wife?!”
“You were whining about her in your sleep.” Then she starts to talk in a mocking tone, “ Awww…Poor little Leon watching his wife die before his very eyes!”
“Don’t talk about her that way! Do you know how bad I feel right now?! How would you feel if your wife and daughter died in front of you?!” He says in a raging tone, tears fill his eyes and salty streams run down his face, “I will regret that I didn’t take the drink of the water instead of them. I will regret it every single day until I die.”
Cathay replies in the kind of voice that means, That’s sad, I only wished I cared, but sorry I don’t. “Wait. You have a daughter?”
“No I...had a daughter,” Leon’s says correcting her.
“Ohhh….Leon, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”
“It’s ok.” But the tears that stain his face say differently.
“I’m sorry about what I said. I didn’t mean any of it,”
“I know,” he says even though he’s not quite sure of it.
“Ok…but you should really eat some of this.” She hands the bowl of pellets to Leon. This time he shoves a handful in his mouth and says thanks, but it come out more like, “Fthaks,” but that’s good enough for Cathay.
“You’re welcome,” then she starts to walk away.
“Wait.”
“What?”
“What do you call these things anyway?”
“Inba-shouts”
“Ok…? Hey, did you…”
“…Name them? No, my father did.”
“Your Father?”
“I think that’s enough questions for one day,” The she gives Leon a little grin and disappears into the other room.
 ThePerpetualMotionMachine · Sun Feb 24, 2008 @ 08:15am · 0 Comments |
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