Pure -- Lyda extra material

Lyda

The armor woven from wire hangers sits on the cracked cement floor like a broken cocoon. Lyda stares at it as the pain starts again, the tightening of her belly, harder than a fist. She feels like an animal, letting out small grunts. She wants to crawl away from the pain, but she is the pain. Her hair is wet with sweat. They are in a basement. She is on a makeshift cot. There's a pile of blood-soaked cloth in the corner. Her blood. It smells like metal.

They gossip around her.

"One was holding a golden candelabra, holding a cloth over their mouth so long that the upper half of their face was ashen, the bottom still white."

"I saw one a family of them with suitcases, like they were headed on vacation."

"Groupies have gotten to them in the Black Market. Dusts in the Rubble Fields having their fill too."

Lyda might recognize these face ... from within the dome.

"They're going to die, you know. All their bodies are going to line these streets."

"Hush." It's Mother Hestra. "Let the girl labor in quiet. Don't you know what's coming?"

Lyda , soaked in sweat, suddenly feels chilled. Her body starts to shake. "Don't," she whispers.

"What's that?" Mother Hestra asks her, putting a cool wet cloth on her forehead. She leans in close, but it's her child, his head bobbing at her hip, who locks eyes with Lyda, the child who will always be a child, stunted and fused to his mother's leg. Syden is the boy's name. Once upon a time, Mother Hestra was in labor – long ago, before the detonations, probably in a sterile hospital room.

Partridge should be here. Partridge might be dead. Once, he was a boy at a dance. They had a secret. She will probably never see him again.

The pain has lulled, but this peace won't last long. Lyda says, "Don't take the baby."

"What is she saying?" another mother's voice pipes up.

"She doesn't want us to take it from her once born," Mother Hestra says.

"But we'll hold it! We get to! It's one of ours! Even thought it's a Pure."

"It's not just a Pure. It's of the line. It's a Willux baby," Mother Hestra says and then she tells Lyda the truth. "You can't raise that child here. Not anywhere close. You know that."

The next pain rises up so quick and sharp that Lyda rolls to her back, grabs her knees, and screams.

Mother Hestra holds Lyda's hand. "Hold tight. Won't be long now." She asks another mother, "What's there? Crowning?"

The mother says, "Yes, yes. She can bear down with the next pain."

"You hear that?" Lyda's eyes closed. She sees only blackness. Mother Hestra's voice is close to hers. "Bear down with the next pain. You understand?"

Lyda can't answer. There's only a few seconds of rest and then the next pain flares inside of her.

"Push," Mother Hestra says.

Lyda is afraid. She doesn't want her baby to be brought into this world. Her breath flutters in her throat.

"Lyda," Mother Hestra says, "it's time!"

Lyda opens her eyes and looks at Mother Hestra's face, the blackened burn of words. She sees this basement, this world so stripped down and bare. Where will she take the baby? Where will they go?

"You aren't alone. You will be one of us," Mother Hestra says, knowing Lyda's fear. "A mother among mothers. We'll take care of you. "

The pain recedes but she knows she doesn't have long. Lyda pushes herself up. She has to get on top of the baby, the belly. She has to bear down. She grabs Mother Hestra's shoulder, balances on the balls of her feet, knees bent, and as the next pain shoots through her, she takes a breath, holds it in her lungs, and she pushes.

Time is a blur. There is no sound. The sun comes in through a crack in a board nailed to a window. It lights the ash so that each is like a lit planet, a spinning universe.

And then a ripping from within, a force like no other.

Voices, their words smeared.

A squalling cry.

"Look at this child. Whole and sweet!"

A whisper, "Pure."