Reclaiming Earth

Rael felt the cold grass under his shins as he knelt by the pond. There were a few stars still out. The Eastern sky was beginning to change from red to silver, and he had come out into the garden to get the early light into his eyes. Goosebumps rose on his bare torso as a breeze caressed the mountainside. The flowers he had planted were beginning to bloom as spring began to give way to summer, and they now opened one by one as the dawn approached.

"Rael!"

He turned and saw Blaide walking down the path through the trees toward him. Her youngest child was wrapped against her chest, asleep, and her dark hair hung in a heavy braid over her shoulder, swinging with her long strides.

"A bit early for a visit? Where is your man, wench?" He made his voice serious.

She threw a stick in his direction and grinned. Rael stood up as she approached, standing a full head and shoulders taller, and met her with a sideways embrace and a kiss on the crown of her head. Her hair had the pleasant scent of rosemary and geranium and her face was hot against his side, after her brisk walk over the ridge.

"I want breakfast or I won't have milk for this one." She pointed at the sleeping baby.

"Your wish is my command. Sit down and rest. And seriously, where is Jared?"

He offered her a seat at the wooden table in the courtyard, and a tall glass of cold spring water. She downed it in one go and then gasped for breath. He poured her a second, and she admired the pristine, factory-made glass. It had been in the house before he renovated it, one of a set of six, wrapped in a 2028 newspaper inside an airtight cedar chest. There had been no human remains in the house, so it had seemed safe to convert it to atmospheric-electric and move in on his sixteenth birthday, 9 years before.

He picked berries, baby tomatoes and young leafy greens from the kitchen garden as she cheerfully explained that her husband had taken their five elder children hunting, little number six had wanted to stay with her grandparents, and number seven was still too small to be away from her mother, so Blaide had decided to take her for a short walk in the forest, and at the last moment turned down the path to his house.

Rael excused himself to put on a shirt and rescue a loaf of hot bread out of the oven in the kitchen.

He placed the steaming bread, some soft goat's cheese, ripe tomatoes and berries on the table and took her hand. They bowed their heads in gratitude for the food, then fell to. Rael remembered just in time that a nursing mother should not have mint and took the herbal tea he had made back into the kitchen, fixing her a separate pot of chamomile. The bread was heavy and good, full of seeds and raisins. Blaide ate six pieces, and Rael couldn't help but smile.

She wiped her mouth, looked down at the baby beginning to stir, and absently unbuttoned her tunic to feed her in her sleepy state. The sun rose, tinting everything golden, and Rael admired the little dark-haired girl drinking peacefully, happy in her mother's arms in a completely different location than where she had gone to sleep.

Blaide seemed to read his mind, sensing his longing for a family.

"We'll find her, you know."

Rael looked down, and then locked eyes with her across the table. He briefly clenched and unclenched his jaw and shook his head ever so slightly, a microexpression of subconscious pessimism.

"Will we, though? Will we be able to keep her alive and healthy, let alone able to have kids? The smart-city inmates are barely human any more, what if this doesn’t work? What if the AI drones come to reclaim her?"

Her gray eyes looked steadily back into his. He seemed completely comfortable sharing his fear and vulnerability with her, which somehow contributed to his attractiveness, rather than detracting from it.

"Rael, look at reality. Your testosterone levels are clearly good.”

He looked down at his hands, now mildly embarrassed.

“You know how to care for a woman, your father taught you boys all the right things, if your brother is any indication to go by. The Earth under our feet is full of magnetic and electrical energy, we have healing plants, the sun, the moon, the stars, the mountain spring water, even the fresh air we breathe is at our service. All things will combine to heal and restore her from the shell of a girl she is now, living wherever she might be, among toxic chemicals and disruptive electro-frequencies. We can help her, if we can just find her. The Hackers will help us. If we help them get a girl for their tribe, they'll help us get ours. The elders are even talking about convincing them to let us keep their girl here until she’s of age and in better health. You know how they treat their women." Blaide contorted her face in disgust.

The Hacker tribe the next mountain range over, had managed to save a wide array of technological devices from the Great Disaster of 2030, but they retained almost no knowledge of the natural world, they had no connection to Whomever made it, they treated their women and children disgracefully, and Blaide had boldly forbidden the elders to help them obtain a girl for their gene pool unless she herself were permitted to educate them first.

"We couldn't help Sophie." Rael's voice was quiet. Blaide dropped her gaze.

Rael’s eldest brother Seth had lost his wife after miscarrying for the fourth time. Blaide and the other healers in the tribe had tried to help her recover, but despite all the healing concoctions, poultices, compresses and balms, she had passed away 21 days after losing her child.

"She wouldn't listen to me, Rael. I told her to wait, but she was desperate to be a mother, to prove her worth to Seth and to the tribe."

Rael replied, "I know you tried, we all did."

Blaide leaned back in her chair and switched the baby over to the other side.

Rael had wanted Blaide as his wife from the first moment he saw her, but they were too much alike, with dark hair, slate-gray eyes, long limbs and deep, intense personalities. There had been fears that they shared genetic similarities which could affect the gene pool, and the elders had asked Blaide to marry Rael's older brother, Jared, instead.

His build was a little less intimidating than Rael’s, who towered over everyone with the musculature of a creature from another world. But when not standing next to his younger brother, Jared was tall and broad-shouldered in his own right. His green eyes, dusty blonde hair and easy-going nature reassured everyone somewhat, that he and Blaide would be genetically compatible and able to have children and contribute to the tribe's numbers, which had been dwindling for years. Rael and Blaide had agreed to remain friends, and Rael forgave his brother, encouraging their union for the good of the tribe. There was never a prouder uncle than when their first boys were born 11 months later.

As he had gotten to know Blaide, he realized his attraction to her was more intellectual than physical. Jared often complained good-naturedly that she was the female version of Rael. intense, dark, passionate about learning and knowledge, a walking library of information, physically strong and hard-working to the point of exhausting those around her, mentally hard as a rock, though warm and emotional much of the time. She and Rael often shared psychic moments, said things at the same time and bumped into each other trying to do the same thing.

It had turned out for the best. The seven strong, intelligent children who were now in the world because of this wise choice, were evidence.

Jared’s sanguine temperament was the perfect counterpoint to Blaide’s intensity. He had a way of bringing order to her wild thoughts and plans and he provided the emotional ballast that Rael had also grown to appreciate. He was closer with Jared than with his other brothers, and realised that their differences contributed to that closeness.

Rael was lightening, Jared was soft rain. Blaide was a swift river, Jared was the solid bank.

There was no discernible competition within their marriage and Jared seemed to employ a soft strength with Blaide, like a python. He tamed her gently and firmly, made her bend to his will with the sweetest smile on her face, and drew femininity from within her by virtue of being her polar opposite. He had nothing to prove to her, no need to control her, no reason to feel inferior to her. He reacted with quiet confidence when faced with her fiery nature.

Over the years of observing their relationship, Rael reluctantly began to understand that a female version of himself was not what he wanted, or something the world could handle. Their love and admiration for Jared kept their friendship platonic and amiable, and it was enough for them both.

Blaide had surprised everyone by having twin boys at eighteen, followed by an unplanned single baby at nineteen. Feeling as though this short respite between babies had taken a toll on her health, she had insisted on keeping a good gap, and fell pregnant with twins again at 21, two exquisite fraternal girls who had been celebrated for a full month in the tribe. She had another girl two years later, and now she had little number 7, a dark-haired, fair-complexioned baby girl, the uncanny image of her mother, at the age of 25. The children were perfect copies of either Blaide or Jared, with no mixture of any of their physical traits.

The youngest baby was nothing like any of her six siblings though. They had all been strong and intense from birth, lifting their heads from a young age, hating sleep, not wanting to miss out on anything. They all walked and talked early, and enjoyed being with their father and going on adventures.

Little number seven was different. She was soft and calm, she almost never cried and was content to be in her mother's arms, observing the world through wise eyes which still hadn’t changed color, and Blaide thought they might stay that deep cobalt blue, rather than turning gray or green as she grew up.

Rael offered to walk back over the ridge with them, but Blaide declined. She asked for some of his holy basil, as hers seemed not to be thriving. He pulled up a few plants and wrapped their roots in a wet handkerchief, suggesting she plant them under her tomato plants, where his had been doing well. She thanked him, and would have kissed him on the cheek, but he stood straight, hands thrust deep into the pockets of his linen pants, feeling the need to keep his face away from hers. He had made peace with being her brother-in-law and trusted friend, but some days he walked a fine line. He watched her as the hiked up the ridge and disappeared into the trees with the baby on her back now, wide awake, taking everything in. She strode into the woods without a backward glance.

Rael followed as soon as she was out of sight, and tracked her silently through the pine forest and over the ridge. He stopped in a thick clump of trees with a large boulder behind him. He kept their homestead in his sight, while watching her walk down the steep path on the far side of the ridge.

As she reached the front door, a tiny figure almost too small to distinguish, she turned and stared straight in his direction. His heart skipped a beat and he felt his palms sweat. She looked intently up into the thick trees, and although he was sure there was no possible way she could see him in the shadows, behind a veil of leaves and branches, a mile away, he knew she could feel his presence somehow. It felt like her eyes were locked with his across the gulf of air between them. She scanned the ridge, her hand up to block out the sun. Then she abruptly turned away and walked into the house, shutting the door behind her.

Rael blew out the breath he had been holding and closed his eyes for a moment. Then he pulled off his shirt, tied it around his waist and took off at a sprint, barefoot through the undergrowth.