“They came to me in my dreams. The people we left behind, I mean.”
“And what did they say to you, Mallory?” Dr. Russell tilted her head, paper and pen in hand as she took notes.
“My friend, Zora spoke to me. She told me that I should never come up again.” I refused to look the doctor in the eye as I spoke. “Or else.”
“Or else what?” Dr. Russell stared at me and let the silence fill the room as I deliberated whether or not I should tell her. Finally, the silence became too much.
“They’d eat me.” I lowered my voice before continuing. “She'd eat me.”
The doctor nodded as she wrote something down. “Tell me what happened?”
“It all started at six fifty seven a.m. when the announcement was made to exit the shelter. Then my dad woke up and we had the last of our rations while everyone celebrated outside.” I chewed my fingernail for a brief second, too nervous to go into too much detail.
“What happened next?” She watched me carefully.
“They opened the doors anyway of course.” I shrugged my shoulders. “And they were there. Only they weren't the people we left behind, they were... monsters.”
“Mmm I see...” The doctor started writing something down again.
“My dreams come true, you know.” I stared at her as she stopped writing and looked up at me.
“I know.”
ooo000ooo
“The supplies are running low, I'm not sure how much longer we can hold out.” Mr. Perkins' voice made the metal walls vibrate in our tiny shelter.
“But has enough time passed? Can we be sure?” My dad's voice was lower than usual, quieter. I had to push my ear up to the metal door to hear him.
“Five years? That should be plenty of time for the chemicals to have left the atmosphere. You're one of the best scientists we had on staff and even you said it would only take three years. We only decided to stay a few years longer to be safe and because we had the supplies.” He paused for a moment. “And now we are running out.”
I remembered the day of the explosion, though the science behind it made very little sense to me. I was only nine years old back then. Being out on this planet by ourselves, we couldn't get off in time. The natives, like my friend, weren't able to join us. No one would tell me why.
“Mallory is having dreams again.” My ears perked up at the mention of my name.
“Yes? And so what's that supposed to mean? We starve because a little girl who's had a few dreams coincidently come true in the past is telling us to stay here?”
My dad started to say something, but was interrupted by Mr. Perkins' fists hitting the table. “That's bullshit, Tom, and you know it. We can’t let everyone down here starve to death because of some little girl's ridiculous dreams.”
I couldn't step in and remind him that the dreams I had, the very dreams he now called ridiculous, had saved our lives. My warning came long before the sirens had sounded, a whole night before. I was able to alert dad that morning and we were able to pack everything up and get underground just in time. I was sleeping on site for that very reason, they knew I would see danger before their engineers ever could.
However, none of that mattered because we needed food and we needed it soon. Even I knew that. News of the impending food shortage spread like a virus through our underground community. Panic followed swiftly behind and people were starting to push for action. Mr. Perkins was now feeling pressure to do something, anything. No one wanted to starve to death and he was the one in charge.
