Whisper of the Sycamore

By Steve Sagarra

In the aftermath of a devastating conflict that nearly collapsed society, Nate Flemyng is attempting to live a normal life as the world rebuilds. He soon meets a woman who shifts that circumstance, forcing him to simultaneously reconcile with the past. Meanwhile, in the shadow of a renewed space program that has energized the global population, the government tracks down collaborators and war criminals in the pursuit of justice. Everyone has their sins, everyone their own truths and lies. For Nate Flemyng, what secrets are yet to be uncovered?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Steve Sagarra
• Release date: Nov 25, 2020
• ISBN: 9781005293604

Steve Sagarra

Steve Sagarra is a freelance writer, journalist and historian from St. Louis, MO. A former opinion columnist, he is a proud alum of the University of Missouri where he obtained degrees in history. Additionally, he has contributed to several encyclopedic projects, scholarly journals and websites, and his short story fiction and poetry has appeared in various online and print magazines. Over the years, he has held a colorful variety of jobs – dishwasher, delivery driver, substitute teacher, archeology technician and bartender. In his spare time, he enjoys watching movies, sporting events, the company of his dogs and playing golf.

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Whisper of the Sycamore

By Steve Sagarra

Copyright ©2020 Steve Sagarra

Smashwords Edition

All rights reserved

ISBN: 9781005293604

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Chapter One

Despite the years, scars conspicuously linger from the global civil war that had erupted a quarter century after the millennium. Short of conventional and encompassing worldwide wars of preceding eras, regional conflicts stayed localized in common cause, to varying degrees, against progressively corrupt and overburdening bureaucracies throughout the international community. Initially, it began as isolated peaceful protests seeking to change the situation. People were angry and upset, though; they soon escalated to violent measures, consolidating and expanding their reach to accommodate in loosely coordinated alliance, under the banner of the little-known, ultra-reactionary Uchronian militia. Due to an interdependent, and increasingly precarious, globalized system inadequately prepared for the massively widespread turmoil, this became devastating on a grand scale.

Entire governments, economies, and societies - one after another, like tumbling dominoes - broke down and collapsed under the strain. Only now, decades later, have they categorically progressed toward recovery and stabilization. As such, infrastructure overall is healing for better rather than for worse. Small businesses and shops, reinvigorated by the absence of pre-war regulations that had bankrupted them - both a consequence of and, one of many, catalyst for the uprisings - again thrive in open commerce.

Prodigiously, humanity always seems to have the capacity to rise from the threats to its existence out of the despair and ashes it creates - with no shortage of difference this time around.

Nate Flemyng, semi-retired, has lived in his current district for nearly ten years amid this backdrop, although never having considered the longevity of that residency. Nor has he fully embraced, or even appreciated, the pleasant mix of urban and nature of his environs that has coalesced, genuinely unaware of the diverse vegetation and wildlife that calls the area home.

Not until he expands beyond reclusive inclinations by undertaking a daily walk, typically around sunset, does his perspective shift toward the realization.

As conifers and hardwoods continue to mature, small plants and shrubbery grow in their shadow; birds perch among them to announce their own return. Bee populations have rebounded, while butterflies and dragonflies once more flit alongside. Frogs again croak their hypnotic songs, as ducks swim in rhythmic unison. Such things had been a rarity in his previous sector, and otherwise nonexistent in the blighted and ravaged zones still to this day.

Undoubtedly, animals, at one point, possibly believed humans went extinct given wholesale population decreases caused not only by the decimation of war but also its secondary factors, disease and famine.

Having frightened a handful of nocturnal critters, particularly when depositing trash in the waste disposal unit, he purposefully signals his approach near known habitats or other areas of activity. Anything to indicate he means them no harm, perhaps even kinship - a soft whistle or simple clicks of his tongue. Yet, he wants the scurrying animals to be afraid. From first-hand knowledge, he well knows they should continue to fear humans in all their unabated grotesqueries and malfeasances.

Occasionally on his evening stroll, he encounters a young neighbor, Thulsi Robinson, accompanied by two small terrier-type canines. Another rarity, such creatures once again walked as beloved pets rather than sacrificed to relieve hunger by those with no other means.

By far, not the worst measure he had witnessed during the war.

Thulsi herself, college-age with an obsidian glow and athletic build, is a rare beauty. He glances no further at her, however, than with a polite smile, perhaps a sociable greeting. As she bashfully responds in kind, he is conscious that his actions in those moments could be misconstrued by any puritanical scandalmonger as perverted, or even sexist, leering. Rather, it