ERA EMILIA: A Novel

By I. I. Mendor

Strange creatures appear on the doorstep of Emilia's house, when the fourth reactor of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant explodes a few kilometers away. They remain in the town which is empty from the radiation and fear, raising the child as a Superhuman, and revealing to her the knowledge, which could change life on Earth forever.

But what happens if the creatures disappear as suddenly as they appeared? What happens if the Earth desperately defends its secrets? Will Emilia build a new Babylon?

When the apocalypse becomes yesterday, when the religion blesses sinners, and science – dreamers, when a miracle becomes commonplace, when birth becomes the end, and the end becomes the beginning, a new era will come. Era Emilia...

• Language: English
• Publisher: MM Publishing
• Release date: Apr 23, 2019
• ISBN: 9781912894260

Book preview

24

Chapter 1

It was the twentieth year of my life and the tenth anniversary of my one-soldier war. The 3395th day since they disappeared as suddenly as they appeared. They called me Era. However, I distinctly remember how Mom kissed both cheeks of her ‘little Emilia’ every morning. And I called them Heavens because there was not a single day when they did not freeze on the spot, raising their bald heads with their narrow-eyed pupils skyward. Those were the funniest thirty-two minutes of each day – you could check your watch by them – because for me, a little girl, every time, every single day, it seemed that every one of the seven Heavens emanated an array of coloured rays way up into the sky beyond view. When a random bird flew through it, its feathers shone with a green light for a while! Or blue, or red! But none of the Heavens shared my admiration – they didn’t make a single sound, they didn’t move, their chests did not rise and fall, and even the pouring rain did not make them shut those miraculous deep eyes of theirs even for an instant. Later, while all seven rays of colour vanished forever, the Heavens were still visible after rain. I ran to look for them but couldn’t find them. I returned home to cry out my distress and take care of my fresh wounds. I remember how after my clumsy children’s games Mom took care of them. She got up from the table, leaving Dad alone, washed my scratched knees, applied something thick and smelly from a white tube, dressed them with a bandage and then returned to the table. That table was a big mystery ... My parents sat at it as if charmed, during the long evenings. When they sat down, they were sad and kind, and when they got up, they were already jolly and wicked. Sometimes, I spent the whole afternoon sitting at that table alone, when nobody was at home but did not understand why my parents’ eyes became blurry, and their words muddled. My little Emilia... You do not need so much... And that is why you are so strong, my little one… And your father and I are so weak... Weak... And in half an hour, with a sharp and stern voice only a mother has, she commanded me to go to bed. Until the sun went down, I invented names for the clouds outside my window and counted the new voices in our kitchen. How many people could such a small house hold? When the clouds and roars of laughter had disappeared into the dark, calm, soothing dreams came...

Chapter 2

When, like flies on a hot day, airplanes swarmed over the town, I was four years and four days old. Suddenly, the creamy taste of festive cakes, which remained on my lips, was mixed with something cold and metal, like the rusty pipes in the backyard that we used to lick as a bet with the neighbouring children. Mom told me not to imagine such things... For a few odd seconds, the concern showed on the face of one or another of the almighty adults and just as quickly disappeared, leaving only a shade of shame for such inappropriate thoughts. We watched the evening news, but not as we usually did - tension made the backs of my parents unnaturally straight as if some unknown force was pulling them by the top of their heads upward, and their feet were firmly pressed to the floor - as if ready to instantly carry them away from unknown danger. My dear Emilia... This is just a little trouble at the big Station… They cannot deceive us… The TV tells us, Dad’s friends say... Why do I tell you that…? Why do I tell you that? Mom was talking to herself. And I believed her, but still tasted the metal sourness of the rusty pipes on my tongue and lips.

That night I saw the Heavens for the first time. They stood near our house, brushing the tops of their hairless heads on the lower leaves of the tree. That particular tree was not very tall, but neither Dad, Mom or I could reach its branches, even if we jumped. I saw the Heavens by chance because I came to the window to watch the lights of the busy planes pierce the sky. And those two strange creatures, it seemed, deliberately did not avert their eyes from me. Their pupils were narrow, like a cat’s, when it blinks in the sun. In the artificial light of a distant lantern, I could easily see the perfectly flat but greyish skin of the Heavens, their narrow, almost invisible lips and even smaller, nearly absent, noses. I remember how I wondered why they had such big heads with such small eyes, noses, and mouths. What a waste! Dad would exclaim. But he slept, so I had to be surprised alone. It seemed that I saw one of the two strangers smiling before I left. When they quickly vanished into the darkness of the night, I returned to my bed, and I did not see either them, the planes, or dreams that night.

---

On April 27, 1986, they announced the general evacuation in my dull and quiet Pripyat. Here we have a little trouble, my dear Emilia… Mom mumbled wildly, closing the front door behind a familiar militiaman.

The floor littered with sheets of paper did not want to accept Mom’s prayers and curses – finding the right documents among the jumble was a task worthy of gold seekers. They were ordered to take only the most necessary things – and who in the world knew what a Soviet citizen needed most outside his unchanging home? But… what is it... What is it? Dad repeated, indiscriminately pushing random clothes into bags. We can live without it for several days at least… Luckily it’s almost summer and yet that we never took a cat! Mom was somehow distracting herself. I was sitting on the floor in the middle of our small kitchen staring at a huge human carousel of fear. It was as clear as day to me that Mom was afraid in a different way, then when the old kitchen refrigerator broke down, buying a new one seemed a biblical miracle. Dad’s high forehead frowned all the way down to his eyes, and I was afraid that they would soon become invisible or so narrow like those of the two strangers beyond my window. The two of them ... A persistent knock on the door brought my parents to their senses. I was forbidden to listen to what the adults said, so I was still sitting on a single island of calmness in the middle of the kitchen floor, which always smelled of fried oil and onions. A deep, quiet voice seemed to sweep like a tide across the entire apartment. It could sing lullabies to children or read the train schedule at the stations. Its sound lulled me for a while into a daydream –the one where you can sleep sitting up. I caught a few words and some phrases. ‘Chornobyl’, ‘you must go’, ‘radiation’, ‘Emilia will stay here’, ‘you have no choice’... How so? How could I be here without my Mom and Dad? I knew too well that that day would be a few good dozen years away! I am still too young and unable to cook for myself three times a day! Maximum – twice: once to pour boiling water onto my oatmeal, and the second – to break eggs in a frying pan... And who would kiss me on my cheek every morning? And whose forehead would frown down to his eyes if I were naughty?

---

I did not understand what that pleasant voice was rambling about and waited for Dad to kick the living daylights out of him! Why did Dad stay silent? Mom? How could it happen that Mom was silent too? I was distraught and dashed for the door – there were only two people there, and I did not know either of them. Your parents had to leave town for a few days, they asked us to look after you because all your toys that you just cannot live without are here, so you will be able to play all day long and go to sleep whenever you want. And you will eat ice cream as much and as often as you wish. We will not abuse you, and we will teach you everything that we know. I recognised them, those people who had one voice for two – they watched my window, touching the trees with their heads.

Just don’t kiss me on my cheek, because I don’t like you, I agreed, realising that my Dad and Mom had decided everything without me.

Deal. May we call you Era?

Weird strangers, I thought and nodded.

The Whole Era, they said and smiled.

Chapter 3

My home town knew neither peace nor people anymore.

A powerful blast at one of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant reactors had become the greatest catastrophe in the history of nuclear energy, but the world was still unaware of the danger. The invisible deaths over a few days covered half of Europe and Ukraine. Just a few kilometres away from my quiet home, the human-made concrete volcano silently threw out radiation that would have sufficed for three hundred Hiroshima. Hundreds of buses in an uneven nervous chain carried the inhabitants of my town away to safer places. I wondered if anyone had guessed that there were no more safe places? The thirty-kilometre contaminated area around the reactor, which would soon become my only decent home, was still inhabited and people were not warned about the danger for a further two weeks. In private gardens and main squares, thousands of people celebrated the spring, and several dozen kilometres from them, forests and woods became brown from radiation, and firefighters fainted forever under the walls of the Station. Hundreds of liquidators of this terrible catastrophe were convinced by the supreme authorities that they were extinguishing, at any rate, a massive but quite ordinary fire. They received lethal doses of irradiation within a few minutes of their last in their lives work. Many tons of uranium dioxide, iodine, cesium, tellurium, and inert gases emanated from the anthropogenic hell, descended to earth and penetrated forever into the ground, the water, and settled on the wool of animals, and infiltrated every cell of any weak human body. Thousands of them would become dust in the first months and years following the catastrophe. Hundreds of thousands of others would remain disabled until the end of their suffering days. And millions, upon millions of people for hundreds of years to come would feel in themselves and their children the presence of a quiet, invisible killer.

The Heavens told me not to be afraid of the airplanes and of those people who almost always came to ask why during the evenings when our house lights were still turned on. I learned the phrase that worked without fail on those people in uniforms.

We need to be here. You will go away and never remember that you came here.

The response was never noticeable, and only the dead sound of the closing door proved that the supervisors of the alienated area had allowed us to stay in our home.

---

Every day I woke to see that the Heavens were not sleeping and went to bed when they still did not even yawn before the night sleep. There were seven of them, and I am not sure that I knew which two of them had compelled my parents to leave obediently, without money, and without their little Emilia. Good morning, Emilia, Good night, Emilia, I told myself every day so as not to forget my name. Era will have a happy day, Era will have good dreams, said one of the Heavens, so that I had no doubt about the carelessness of my easy-going childhood. I drank a cup of milk and took a sweet green triangular pill, which the Heavens carefully placed on the table every morning. Now you have nothing to fear, they said, and I had no fear.

We lived on the second floor of an ordinary five-storey Soviet ‘khrushchoba’ – ‘Khrushchev’s’ concrete-block house. They built thousands of these concrete slums, weak, loud, grey, ugly, and unreliable - as if they were only temporary...

It seemed that the whole town was built only to perish gloomily, cursing the entire world. The rooms of our apartment, like everyone else’s, were so small that any Heaven could touch both walls at the same time. In the largest country on this vast planet, there was no more room for a man than a hen in a chicken coop. Mom and Dad loved the Soviet Union so passionately that they did not want to know about those who lived elsewhere. It was a strange love – like that of an abandoned child to his never-known gone-astray mother...

The Heavens told me to believe that my parents were safe and still remembered me, and I believed. I did not know sorrow or despair. The disappearance of neighbouring children and their parents did not disturb my peace – I gained more instead – every day as if on cue, the dogs gathered around me – those poor sweet things left by their owners for several days at a time, which became an eternity. I touched their wet noses, and they nuzzled my wet cheeks ... We brought calmness and peace to one another.

I had no idea where the Heavens got all the delicious foods that they nourished me with and told me to share with my new friends. For hours, I fed dogs with meat, bread, and sweets, played games with them and stroked the fluffy coats of those who were tired and needed a nap. Occasionally, I fell asleep with them under the shade of barely living trees, and sweet tenderness was born somewhere deep in my throat. I felt how it warmed through my chest and fingertips and itched my eyes to tears. I loved those dogs as much as they loved me. Since then, nothing more honest happened in my life...

---

Today Era will go for a walk. It sounded so convincing in my ears that I was surprised why I was not there yet.

If we are seen downtown, they will force me to leave my dogs and go away, I tried to object.

Why does Era think about what she does not want to think of?

"I think about what can happen! - I was angry but not in a childish way.

Only what you let happen will happen.

The indignation was boiling in me like potatoes in a saucepan. How could such adult, self-assured, persuasive creatures not see the obvious things?

The obviousness is an illusion, Era will understand.

What was that trick? I did not say anything; how did they hear that! Could Heavens like dogs, understand me without words being spoken?

Words are optional. Era will learn.

Miracles ... Nevertheless indeed - I never noticed that the Heavens ever communicated with each other. At least not out loud. It sometimes happened that two of them stared at each other for a long time, but none of the muscles in their faces showed tension or play. It seemed like the whole world was born in their narrow, deep-set eyes – now they lightened, then darkened, or they exploded in bunches of colours that I did not even know the names of. It was my personal mute theatre.

Era gets acquainted with Nature, a Heaven stirred me from my thoughts.

Era has already got acquainted. I monkeyed him and froze in anticipation of the punishment.

Era sees only the shell.

For Era, it is enough.

Era will go for a walk.

Goodness gracious! I remembered how my Mom always ended difficult conversations and gave up.

It was on that very day that the true magic began.

Chapter 4

Seven Heavens and one little human strolled along a dead Pripyat street in the opposite direction to the one leading to the Station. I never walked it to the end, but I knew that if I walked a long way, the city would finish, thrusting the empty outermost houses into a thin etiolated forest. Strange stray dogs joined our weird group, but as they did not get any attention or food, they quickly lost interest. There was no one around. None of those tired and annoyed souls who traipsed their boring route back and forth twice a day. Behind us, from time to time, we heard a loud roar of the machinery, desperately pouring concrete and loading sand onto the damaged nuclear reactor. The sky above it was always a dull grey from the smoke, dust, and fear, even on a fine day. The Heavens walked softly and confidently, so I only heard the noise of my own steps. I honestly, and in a human-like manner, tried to elicit their names, but it did not make sense trying to distinguish them one from another. They considered their appearance perfect, honest, fair, and irrespective, but I considered it incredibly nauseating. The only certain thing was that they all were male. Their mutual voice was low and deep - like that of the handsome old musician who used to live in our neighbourhood. Now, only an old dog with an annoying hoarse bark was left in memory of him.

Now and then, I rubbed my teeth and tongue with my fingers, because something invisible with a sour metallic taste settled on them. It bunged up my nose and penetrated my lungs, so to inhale properly, I had to make a considerable effort. Eventually, I got accustomed to the pattern of two small and one deep gasp, and I felt much less dizzy. The farthest house could be seen a few hundred metres away. It seemed that the Heavens and I smiled unanimously when we passed it. Then they rushed forward so abruptly as if some invisible device had enabled them to maximise their acceleration. In the next instant, the Heavens scattered imperceptibly and froze, pressing their heads against the trees – each one of them with their own tree. Their metal skulls pushed the trunks so powerfully as if they were competing in a strength contest. I saw their small narrow eyes closed for the first time. Their long hands with equally long fingers hung down next to their bodies and twitched a little as if they slept. Their usually straight backs bowed somewhat from their strange postures and even appeared weak and spasmodic.

The answer to my discomfort was instantaneous – in sync, they released themselves from the trees and, with pleasant smiles, invited me to come closer.

You are born with the same power, you are equally brought into this world, and you get sick and die the same. Come and greet your brothers, the tender Heaven’s voice carried away all my fears.

I have no brothers, I thought but did not dare to deny it.

Era does not know yet how many she has, the gentle Heaven’s voice intrigued me.

Ah, you heard everything, I think... Sorry, I felt awkward and unappealing in front of them with my now completely naked thoughts.

I had to run for a while before I could catch up with the Heavens. One of them gestured me to my tree. When I approached, he advised me to close my eyes and touch the tree with the back of my head.

Well, they did not die of this ...

And Era will not die!

The Heavens became much more fun after they left the town… I once again mentally asked them for forgiveness and pressed my head against the tree. The rough oak-bark crushed into my skin, and I was afraid that dozens of furrows would be imprinted on my forehead forever. Feel the smell, feel the texture, and feel where it comes from the earth and where it enters the sky… What I felt was only a hard grating on my forehead. Era can hug a tree and listen to how energy flows through it. I embraced the tree without further hesitation, feeling some sort of bitter despair and hiraeth for my mom's gentle hands on my face... Hot tears rose from my chest instantly and burnt my long-not-kissed cheeks, but my silent giant immediately drank them to the last teardrop. The rough bark became softer than the silk wool of my dogs, and the earthy odour came into my nose, completely filling my lungs. Seemingly, I would not be able to breathe forever... A Heaven put his hand on my head, and I felt a strange vibration under my fingers – as if thousands of small birds were flying, fluttering their wings under the bark. I leapt back and saw something that, apparently, if I were older, I would have run away from – the brown trunk of the tall tree was covered with thin electric-like wires which pulsated like waves from the foot to the top of the tree and back again. They emerged from the very soil, from the very roots, and by thousands of nearly invisible thin blue rivers, which went upwards – through each branch and leaf, carrying something that was breathing and moving...

Now Era saw the very life, the gentle Heaven’s voice made me happy.

That’s what it is like... But Dad said that it was disgusting and sticky like tar, I mumbled and again crouched to the tree. The gentle waves rolled through my hands, and it seemed even through me.

---

I woke up at