The Masked Girl

The Journey

I walk out of the room that I slept in last night. The door adjacent from my room opens and Joe walks out with a disappointed look on his face. I try not to look at him when he gets to my pace.

"Listen," he says. "I know that you want to find him, but you need to know that it's not like this in the other cities. They are broken down. After the technology war we were the ones that did better than them."

"I don't care," I say and I think back to a history book that I read. It was about the technology war in the year 2138. All the technology was burned and destroyed. It was the worst war ever. States became one city, and countries were torn apart. The world was left in ruins, and only parts recovered, it was only till thirty or so years ago when the world became civil again. But even now that we're in the year 2214 we're left with little or no technology, people were left to live like it was the Middle Ages again.

"Are you ready?" Marget asks.

"Yes, but where am I going?"

"Not far from here. It might take three or four hours to get there."

"Come with me and I can get you the proper passes to get out of the city," Joe adds.

We walk out of the cottage and head to the rich part of town. We get to where the cars are with silence, which kills me to know that my newly found brother won't even talk to me. I bump into a car when he cuts me off turning right angrily. I look at the car and see a metal emblem that says the year that the car was made: 1920's.

That's a stink'n old car, I say to myself.

I run up to where Joe is and stop short to see that he's talking to a woman the nods her head and walks to the car the I bumped into. She gives a piece of paper to him and he gives he a kiss then embraces her in a hug. I turn away not wanting to intrude, I get a hand on the back and see that Joe signals me to go over to the car.

I open the right side door and get in, presuming that someone will drive because I have no idea how to control this strange contraption. Luckily the woman gets in the driver's seat and we're off leaving Joe behind.

"So you're Joey's sister? He never told me about you," she says as she starts up the car.

"Joey? Yah, I'm his sister. We just met last night. If I may ask why do you call him Joey?"

"We went to school together. I never stopped calling him that, but he hates it now. I think I keep calling him that just because he hates it," she answers.

The car goes past the town and I see the middle class houses and the farms then we head down a ramp and suddenly we are underground. "Why are we down here when we're going to go to another city?" I wounder out loud.

"Safety. That is, from us getting out of the car and into the wild. So they have it underground so we can't run. It's been like that forever," she says as we keep driving.

I slowly fall asleep from the poorly lit tunnel. Unable to keep my eye open I get consumed from the endless journey.

"Hay, we're almost there. Wake up," I hear in the dream. I soon realize that it's not the dream but reality, and I slowly open my eyes.

"I didn't get your name," I ask.

"Angela. And your Josephine."

"That's too easy for you, you know my brother," I say and she nods. "Back at the city you—um—"

"Kissed your brother. Yah, he told me everything last night and so that's why I know so much about you."

"You saw him last night? Did you sleep with him?"

"No, no we spend time—around the city when it's dark," she says dishonesty.

"Okay? Oh, I see the city!" I say enthusiastically.

We get in the city and all I see is bodies and bones. It looks like one huge open cemetery that smells like everything in the world gone rotten. We keep driving till we see living people. We park the car and get out to see sickly people in the streets.

"Wow. Now I know why Joey didn't want you to come, it's a living nightmare," Angela says as we walk.

"Why are they like this?" I ask.

"It's from the war," someone say beside me. "Radiation. It destroyed a little more than two thirds."

"Just from the radiation?" Angela says trying not to throw up her breakfast.

"Who are you looking for?" says the man.

"My father, but I have no idea what he looks like or what his name is," I answer.

"Can't help you there. Sorry. You might want to ask your mother about that. But I know you have a father," he jokes.

"Thanks, thanks a lot," Angela says.

I walk back to the car and get in following Angela. She starts the car and we start to drive back not wanting to see or smell the dead bodies. I look back the way we came and see a man with a lousy made bow that looks like it couldn't kill a fly.

"That place is—is awful. With all the dead bodies, I can't even think how other cities are," Angela states.

We drive the three hours back to our city with no idea whom my father is.

"Do you think he was in that city?" I ask.

"If so he was either dead or dying."

"Ya, I see why Joe got depressed.  But Marget makes it seem like he's a live."

"What I've been told it seems like he might be back home too."

We get back up to ground level and drive to where we park the car. We get out and Joe is right there leaning up against a tree and I walk the other way avoiding him. I walk to Ethan's house and without knocking on the door I walk in. I startle the woman that raised me and I can't even call her "Mother" anymore.