Greg Krojac - The Schrödinger Enigma

Jason didn’t really know what he might see upon opening the door from the stairwell at the thirty-third floor, but it didn’t really matter. He knew from checking the list of tenants in the lobby that the floor had been occupied by a large multinational insurance company’s sales division, so he wasn’t expecting anything other than a commercial environment. The centre of the floor space was taken up by the reception area, the elevator lobby, a file room and two copy work rooms. The rooms that each of the survivors were most interested in, however, were the lunch room and the restrooms – that was where any comfort lay. An outer ring of thirty-six workstation areas gave way to an outer perimeter of thirty-five small individual offices, broken only by two conference rooms on the eastern side of the building. It would probably have felt more welcoming if it had been a little more open-plan, but at least this way everybody could find some privacy if and when they wanted it.

The rest of the group exited the stairwell and half of them made a bee-line for the restrooms, bladders desperate for relief, before gathering in the reception area to agree on their next step. Once everybody had returned, Jason sat on the reception desk and addressed his small congregation.

“The main reason I wanted us to find a high-altitude refuge was so we could see if any Argons are approaching. It’s a centuries old strategy; the defenders in the old days always looked for a high geographical location, as it’s much easier for us to defend a higher position point than for them to attack one. That gives us an advantage.”

John, his daughter Jasmine having dozed off on his lap, was understandably worried about the future; he was the only one who, if it came down to the wire, had to think about someone else other than himself.

“How long do you see us staying here, Jason?”

“Maybe two or three days. I don’t think it’s a good idea for us to get too settled here. I’m thinking of this place as a temporary stepping stone, until we decide where to go next. The views will give us a good opportunity to check out which is the safest direction. I don’t think it’s a good idea to stay in the big city too much longer.”

The group seemed OK with that. Enak also had a strange but valid point to make.

“I think that we should be prepared in case we are attacked again, before we leave. I suggest that we unplug the electrical equipment.”

One of the Marines quipped.

“What are we going to do with them? Throw them at the Argons?”

Enak nodded.

“I sense that you are making a joke, but that is exactly what we will do. A computer monitor or computer is a primitive weapon, but it may afford you valuable seconds of life.”

The night was peaceful, as was the group of survivors. They hadn’t been able to relax for days, and even now the sense of calm that appeared to run through the group was but a mask, hiding the true feelings of trepidation. What did the future hold for them? Could the Argons be defeated? Were they simply postponing the inevitable, trying to eke out the last vestiges of life?

Little Jasmine was the lucky one. She didn’t understand the recent events and could only take them at face value – those which her mind allowed her to remember, that is. She had seen her mother ripped apart in front of her eyes, and had almost suffered the same fate herself before being rescued by Eled. She didn’t need to remember those experiences and her young mind had taken a decision to blot out the memory. All that she was fully aware of was that her daddy was with her, and if daddy was there, then everything would be alright. He’d look after her.

Others were not so lucky. Jasmine’s father John was wracked with guilt, questioning himself as to whether there was anything he could have done to save his wife, Annette. She had suddenly gone into mother tiger mode, prepared to die in order that her daughter might live. She had put her own body between the Argon and Jasmine and paid for it with her life. To her, it wasn’t a choice and nor was it a duty. It was just Nature. Her daughter must survive, no matter the cost. John had had problems of his own, having been thrown against a wall, stunning him momentarily, and had come back to full consciousness to see the final seconds of his beloved Annette’s life as her head was ripped from her body. The next thing he remembered was suddenly seeing his daughter flying through the air towards him and his instincts took over as his arms unconsciously moved into position to catch the young child. It was only when he dived into a side room and sat down against a wall, cradling his crying daughter in his arms, that he realized that it was Eled who had hurled her away from certain death.

Samuel and his sister Miriam were struggling with their own forms of guilt. They were suddenly free of their Amish constraints, the invisible ropes that had bound them ever since their return from their respective rumspringa. Samuel had loved the enormous rumspringa parties in the woods that he had attended and was missing the opportunity to drink a beer now and again. He’d got really drunk on a couple of occasions but had certainly not enjoyed the hangover the next day, learning quickly to drink in moderation. He wasn’t craving beer, but he did like the taste, and quite fancied a cold beer after climbing all those stairs.

Miriam felt double the guilt of her brother. She hadn’t experimented with alcohol or gone to any woodland parties, but she had entered into a sexual relationship with Hannes, a young lad from the Geauga County community of Ohio. Nobody knew about this relationship – not even her brother – and nobody could ever know about it. The couple knew that it was a sin, that their parents would never have accepted the intensity of their relationship, but they couldn’t help themselves. They hadn’t intended to fall in love, much less to have suddenly found themselves exploring and enjoying each other’s bodies, but their emotions and feelings had somehow managed to ride roughshod over their strict Amish upbringing, an invisible mutual connection and desire that couldn’t be denied. Although they had both returned home to their individual communities, they’d kept in touch by using fake accounts on Facebook and WhatsApp, using cell phones that were kept hidden well away from prying eyes. They chatted at least twice a week via video call and had even tried having video-sex a couple of times.

Miriam had been trying to sum up the courage to tell her parents that she wanted to leave the community and the religion for some time, and now she had been robbed of the chance to be honest with them. She hadn’t wanted to hurt them, but she had to think of her own life, her own future. Added to that, she now had no idea if Hannes was dead or if he was still alive. She had no idea what his blood type [41] this may be a British term? in the US we always use “blood type” was; it wasn’t the kind of thing that you talked about while making love. She prayed – she still believed in God, even though it wasn’t in the way that her parents would have approved of – that Hannes was alive, that his blood group was B Negative. She hadn’t had the chance to fetch the phone from its hiding place before they left the farmstead, not that it would have helped much even if she had it with her. There was no electrical power and, ipso facto, the cell phone networks were down. Plus, the phone battery wouldn’t have lasted forever. The group had passed a few shops in their travels where she could have stocked up with spare batteries, enabling her at least to look over past messages and the dozens of photos of the couple that were stored in the phone’s memory, but it would also have meant admitting the tryst to her parents and almost certainly led to a full-scale argument [42] I’m not sure how to address the use of British terms when in the POV of someone who is an American character. up to you – something she wished to avoid. She would have told them about Hannes when the time was right, but the right time had never arrived. Now it never would.