Barren Waters - The Complete Novel: (A Post-Apocalyptic Tale of Survival) (19 page)

“When don’t I? That’s what San Diego is all about, Sam.”

She rounded her shoulders and briefly nodded her head, but he hadn’t missed the fear that shone in her eyes. It couldn’t have been a mere trick of the candlelight. She knew firsthand what would happen to her without the medicine. She’d seen it before. With Peter. Jeremy felt a pang of remorse for having told her the truth, but supposed it was time she start taking her health seriously. Hers would be a life of constant struggle, a never-ending quest for viable pharmaceuticals in a world with a limited supply. She’d never know rest.
Could
never know it, he thought ruefully, lest she allow herself to die. Or unless San Diego worked out the way he hoped it would, he thought suddenly. Yes. It was time she join the fight, time she begin to see the importance of staying on the move and searching the stores
with
him instead of hanging outside with her nose in a book. Jeremy wouldn’t be around forever. She’d eventually have to do this by herself.

Okay. It was enough morbid talk for one night.

“So where were we?” he encouraged. “I think Sirius Black just escaped Azkaban. Right?”

Seth pouted like a boy much younger than his nine years. “No. That’s not where we were. I asked you a question and you haven’t answered it yet. What was the ocean like? Did you see fish?”

Jeremy crossed his arms and rested his head against the cushion. “Nope. No fish. The fish were long gone. Even back then.” He narrowed his eyes. “And I’m an old man! No. No fish, no ocean birds, no seals or porpoises. No life at all.”

“So then what?” Seth pressed. “What was there?

“Water,” Jeremy answered casually. “Blue-black water skimmed with oil and peppered with small bits of trash. Lots of trash.”

Seth scrunched his nose. “Trash?”

“How were you even there?” Sam added. “I mean, why on earth would Grandma and Grandpa take you to the ocean? All the way from Tennessee? Which ocean was it? Did you go to Florida?”

He shook his head. “Nope. Not Florida. California. The Pacific Ocean. Back then Grandma and Grandpa were scientists. Scientists who were pretty well respected in their fields, I might add. They’d been called to the Pacific to investigate a situation there.”

“Was it big? The ocean I mean. Could you see the end of it?”

Sometimes Seth’s questions were so childlike that Jeremy had to remind himself that he had no true concept of what an ocean really was. He’d never attended school nor seen any photos. Seth’s parents had created a sheltered existence for their son. They’d stocked their house with ample supplies, had thought to plant gardens and place rain catchers on rooftops. They’d done more than some had, and less than others, which was why Seth was here at all, but they’d obviously spent most of their money on supplies, on necessities. They’d furnished needs-not wants. Jeremy hadn’t seen a book or encyclopedia in the house when he and Sam had been there, and he had to remind himself that Seth may have no idea of the true size and scope of something as large as an ocean.

“No, you can’t see the end of it,” Jeremy said patiently. “It’s much larger than a river or a stream. I guess you’ll just have to wait and see.”

“Wait,” Sam said slowly. “California? But that’s where we’re headed now. You said the ocean there was spoiled and full of trash? Then why are we going there of all places? Shouldn’t we try the Atlantic or the Gulf of Mexico?”

“Pike, we’re not
trying
anything. There’s nowhere left for us to try. There’s no life in any of the oceans anymore.”

“So then why California?”

He shrugged his shoulders. “There’s something else we need to see there.”

He fumbled for an answer and faced Seth again, a silent encouragement for more questions. He didn’t want to raise Sam’s hopes prematurely, wasn’t ready to tell her the truth just yet.

Seth’s face was scrunched in thought. “I don’t get it. You said your parents were sent there to investigate a situation? What situation?”

Jeremy sighed and folded his hands. “Back then, that area of the ocean was called ‘The Great Pacific Garbage Patch.”

Seth’s imagination was clearly running wild. He was amazed. “Wow,” he breathed. “So it was like the ocean was covered in garbage there? Like you couldn’t even see through to the water?”

“Not like that, Merlin,” Jeremy countered. “The term ‘garbage patch’ is just a catchy name. The trash is there, yes, but it’s more like a garbage soup beneath the water.”

“So there’s nothing on top? You can’t see it?” He seemed almost disappointed.

“Yes,” Jeremy ceded, “You can see some of it. I
did
see some of it. Plastics mainly. There were many factors that contributed to the death of the oceans, but the Western and Easter Garbage Patches became a large part of it. Particularly after they converged.”

Sam had perked up. “So there was more than one Garbage Patch?”

“
Are
more than one. They’re still there. Plastic, for the most part, is not biodegradable. It’ll take millennia to fully break down the sheer quantity of plastic in the ocean.”

“But what did it
look
like?”

Seth clearly wanted a visual.

Jeremy took a breath. “Well, if you squinted your eyes and faced the sun, you could almost imagine that the ocean looked normal. It wasn’t until you looked very close that you could even notice the garbage at all. But after time, as my father explained it, you no longer needed a microscope to see it. And that’s when he took me. Most of what I saw consisted of small bits of visible trash that floated atop the surface, but the real issue was the water beneath. It was filled with tiny bits of plastic ranging in size from larger particles and bags that weaved in the water like ghostly seaweed, to smaller pieces that we found when we dredged it up.”

“Dredged it up,” Sam repeated numbly. She closed her book with a soft creak of binding and folded her hands atop the cracked cover. “Okay Carp. I think Harry Potter can wait. I think we have another story to listen to tonight.”

For most of history, man has had to fight nature to survive; in this century he is beginning to realize that, in order to survive, he must protect it.

—Jacques-Yves Cousteau

Representatives from the environmental agencies of four different countries, including the United States, had been summoned to this most private of conferences. It had been a long day at sea for all of them, a long day of disappointing tests, contentious arguments, and tense discussions. And this was about to be the worst one of all. The international team was collectively battered by the severity of the information they were about to relay. They were gathered close, an intimate group of scientists, called forth to diagnose and offer treatment protocols for a critically diseased body, a body that had begun to show symptoms some hundred years prior. The room was an energy field that throbbed with anxiety as all leaned forward in rapt attention, their foreheads creased with deep lines, eyes focused on the center of the table. From there, a voice crackled from a small communications unit.

“Have you concluded your tests Dr. Colt?”

All eyes darted to Liam. He pulled deep from his glass of water.

“Mr. President, Sir. I have…Um. We have…Sir.”

Liam felt too warm, almost as if the temperature of the room had increased ten degrees in a matter of seconds. He was about to deliver the worst of news to none other than the President of the United States of America.

“Sir, the situation here is dire to say the least.”

An electronic sigh filled the room, and Liam could envision the President sitting back in his chair, the members of his cabinet clustered tight around the comm unit. “Okay Liam. Let’s have it then. And don’t spare the details for those of us without PhD’s.”

Liam froze. Where would he even begin? He was quite sure this was his final mission for the offices of the D.C. Institute of Marine Sciences and he wanted to be thorough. Thorough, yet compassionate. But there was no sugarcoating this. This was it, the end of the line. The situation in the North Pacific was the same as it was in the South Pacific, North Atlantic, South Atlantic, and Indian Oceans respectively. There was simply no turning back from this.

It wasn’t that he was fearful of detailing the news to the highest office in the land. It wasn’t even a fear of staining his professional reputation. He
had
no reputation. At times he hadn’t understood why he’d been chosen for this committee in the first place. It was simply that this was likely to be his very last assignment at all, and the thought of
this
as his final professional act was nothing if not depressing.

People wanted to leave a legacy behind them, to retire with a sense of pride and accomplishment. Liam, on the other hand, would be tendering a resignation without any kind of closure. He’d be abandoning the pursuits of a lifelong passion as one who’d failed, one who’d given up. It was ridiculous, of course, and none of it was true. But it was just the way he felt.

Before they’d made the trip to California, he and Olivia had both agreed that this would be their final excursion from the cabin. They both knew what they’d find in the Pacific, and knew that once confirmed, what little remained of civilized society would fall to shit, so to speak. They just wanted to be back home when it did.

Just several days prior, at San Francisco’s Pier 45, Liam and Olivia had reluctantly boarded the
Nomad
. He’d watched Olivia zip their adoptive son’s parka around his neck and pop the collar up around his ears. That morning she’d gripped Jeremy’s small shoulders and peered up at Liam with trepidation.

“Are you sure about this? You want to take him with us?”

“It’s not so much that I
want
to take him with us. It’s more that I refuse to leave him behind. This isn’t a short trip, Liv. The Patch is over seven hundred miles offshore. It’s not like we’ll be there and back within a day. Plus, I have a sneaking suspicion that they’re going to want us to examine the Convergence Zone after that. So what’s our alternative? In all of San Francisco there’s virtually no place safe enough to leave him, and no one we trust enough to leave him with. There are too many people roaming the streets, too many refugees, too many looters, and too many thieves. Everyone is jockeying for position in this overcrowded city. It’s like people here are beginning to settle into a strange kind of caste system, like it was in medieval times. Those who had the wherewithal to notice the signs and make appropriate plans, have assumed the roles of nobles and dukes, while most others have been relegated to the status of peasant or serf.”

He ran a hand through his hair and tucked errand strands behind his ears. “We can’t risk leaving Jeremy with anyone. It’s not safe. People are starving in alleyways and dying on street corners here. We have to take him aboard.”

Olivia had somehow found the dark metaphor endearing. She stood on the tips of her toes and kissed his nose. “Then I suppose you’d be the King in this strange caste system of the twenty-second century, because no one is better prepared than you.”

He’d slipped his arms around her waist. “A King needs his Queen.”

“Gross,” Jeremy called up at them. “You guys kiss too much.”

Liam had laughed at that, and swept his son into his arms.
Son
. It felt so good to say that, and Jeremy really was like a son to him now. The three had become a family in every sense of the word. The adjustment period, if one could even call it that, hadn’t taken long. Jeremy was six years old now, and Liam still wondered at the ease with which they’d connected. He marveled at the comfort and satisfaction they’d so quickly found in one another’s company, supposed that perhaps a secluded life at the top of a mountain could do that to a family. Big love grows in small spaces.

He swung Jeremy around to stare out at the expanse of sea before them. “So. Are you ready for this big guy?” Jeremy’s hair lifted with the coastal wind as his eyes followed the rise and fall of the cresting waves, and then focused on the Coast Guard’s large vessel. Reflexively he’d tightened his grip on Liam’s neck. “No reason to be scared, son. The boat we’re taking is enormous. It’s as big as a small city! You won’t even notice we’re on the water.”

Jeremy’s small hand cupped Liam’s neck. “Will I see any fish?”

“Probably not. Perhaps an albatross though.”

“An albatross?”

“A large bird.”

He’d laid his head against Liam’s shoulder. “Kind of like a stork? Like the stork that delivered me to you and mom?”

“Yeah,” Liam replied softly. “Kind of like that.”

He’d hugged his son closer against his body then, and cradled him against the blustery winds. Strangely, Jeremy had somehow blocked all memories of his natural parents from his mind. Perhaps it was a rather unusual, yet fortunate coping mechanism that his mind was utilizing to spare him the pain of that terrible day. Or perhaps he was just pretending. Sometimes, Liam noted, if you pretended something long enough, it could almost seem real. But whatever it was, Liam was grateful that things had worked out as well as they had. He and Olivia never pressed Jeremy to recall any of the events of that day. It just didn’t seem to matter anymore. None of it mattered. What mattered now was the real love that existed in their family.

Though a scientist, Liam had come to believe that it was either fate or the intervention of some supreme being that had brought Jeremy to them. Olivia had miscarried their child a mere handful of weeks after Jeremy’s unexpected arrival, and because of it, had nearly sunk into a deep depression. More than once, Liam had considered Jeremy a blessing. Prior to the stillbirth, Olivia had begun to make preparations for the baby’s arrival. They’d decorated the nursery and purchased a crib and bassinet. She’d painted the room a soft green and had even ordered a rocking chair, which arrived too late and had been the impetus of yet another bout of near-debilitating depression.

Liam knew that Olivia loved him. He’d never doubted that. Not for a second. But he’d been deeply troubled by her emotional withdrawal those first few weeks. In the depths of that deep pit he’d been unable to reach her, and was quite sure now that Jeremy had been the only one capable of shining a warm light into that dark cave.

He was a lovely child, curious and observant about the world, and patient when learning about it. He followed Liam around like a puppy, and Liam and Olivia both agreed that they’d never withhold information from Jeremy about his past. They’d tell him everything when he was ready and help him make sense of information that had somehow become jumbled in his own mind. He had a right to know about his roots, his parents, and even the macabre circumstances of their deaths. Liam always believed that when knowledge was withheld from children, even if it was for their own good, the results could often end up being as detrimental as the knowledge itself.

So they’d taken Jeremy with them on this final delegation. Liam had long decided that he’d not allow anything to split up his family. Not even a reconnaissance mission for the President himself. A 140-foot Cutter class ship named the
Nomad
had been chosen to take them to the Patch
and he hoped to get into the designated Patch Zone, take his samples, and get out quickly. They had set up their belongings in one of the crew cabins, and though it was small, Liam had insisted they share a room. Theirs contained two small beds, bunked one on top of the other, and Jeremy had quickly chosen the top, scrambled up the ladder and planted has small backpack in the middle of those pressed linens as if he were staking claim on a portion of the moon’s surface.

They’d met with the Captain first, a tall, reed-like man in crisp white. He was friendly yet succinctly professional.

“Captain Bernard Walden. Welcome to the
Nomad
,” he’d greeted them with a warm handshake. Liam thought he’d seen the man frown when he’d sighted Jeremy, but he hadn’t voiced a complaint. He’d walked them about the ship and pointed out the galley, dining areas, and seaman’s quarters, and they’d agreed to meet for a briefing after the initial samples had been collected and tested.

The ship was impressive, one of the newest line of Cutters outfitted with stations lower to sea level for the collection of scientific samples. Out on the deck, Liam had glanced around with a sense of nostalgic finality. A sidelong glimpse at Olivia’s face had confirmed that it was much the same for her. She’d stood at the railing, her pale hands slender and delicate as they gripped the metal. The muscles in her face were taut as she inhaled the salty air. She’d thrown her head back and peered at the sun through squinted eyes, its rays casting liquid diamonds and sapphires across the shimmering surface of the sea, which glinted off her hair. She and it were breathtaking.

This was likely to be the last time either of them would ever lay eyes on the ocean again. It was the end of an era, as the saying goes, and a painful end, if ever there was one. In their own way, they’d each made the ocean a central figure in their lives. They’d committed to her, both professionally, and personally. She’d been like a mistress to them, an alluring siren of mystery and intrigue. She held endless secrets in her uncharted depths. Without her, life on this planet would end. Without her, life on this planet
was ending
. It would be a tearful goodbye for he and Olivia both, but a necessary one.

They’d both decided that this would be their final excursion into the outside world. In Tennessee they’d created a safe haven of their mountain cabin. They’d spent their time and almost all the money they had to create it, and he didn’t want to risk their ability to get back. Society had fragmented and crumbled to such a degree that upon landing in San Francisco, Liam had fought the instinct to turn back the moment he’d left the hangar. The city looked like a war zone. California weather was temperate for the most part, and so it attracted refugees from the North in droves. They wove about the city in swarms, mothers and fathers and children mixed in with dangerous gangs. Liam shuddered to think that this was what would have awaited Jeremy had it not been for the auspicious intervention of fate.

Stadiums and large public buildings were transformed into refugee stations with food and drink available to the recent thousands who’d found themselves homeless. People hadn’t realized the degree to which oceanic trade affected industry and commerce. Millions of jobs were lost. They’d simply become obsolete. No longer needed. The fall of China and Japan had reduced trade significantly, and there were such fewer imports coming in from that region that many industries with no ties to the sea at all had been adversely affected. Crimes against persons were at a historical high. The first night of their arrival, they’d been whisked to a government facility, but had been awakened repeatedly by the sharp report of guns firing in the distance. Yes, Liam wanted out of here. Fast. And unfortunately the quickest way out of any situation was directly through the middle of it.

So here he was. He faced his international colleagues, and a small comm unit in the center of the table, and tried to decide where to start. Rounding his shoulders, he spoke into the unit as though the man were present.

“Mr. President, as I said, the situation is dire. The Patch has expanded to debilitating proportions. The refuse on the surface is visible, yes, but it’s the microplastics beneath that are causing the most damage. I’m afraid they won’t ever biodegrade. Over time they’ve simply broken into smaller and smaller pieces and will continue to do so. Photo-degradation and wave action has broken the pieces into tinier fragments the size of fish eggs. These fragments mix with the water to form a kind of cloudy soup.”