Dwellers of the New World Chapter Sixteen ( Pt 3 ) Easy Does It

Back at Lena and Addie's apartment, their son Luke had now also awoken from his sleep absolutely starving, he was tucking into nut and jam sandwiches in almost pitch darkness, apart from the small spot lights dotted around the rooms, having no idea how long he'd slept, only knowing all he could think about was the need to eat. As he was about to take a bite, there was a click and the door to their apartment began opening. Luke put down his sandwich and went to investigate, creeping through to the living room area he was nervous, thinking there was an intruder and was ready to put up a fight, when standing pensive by the door was Lena. Luke relaxed but was surprised and shocked to see her there. “Mother! What are you doing here? You're supposed to be in hospital.” He noticed she looked as if she were about to collapse and hurried over.

Lena, feeling weak began to explain. “Oh! Son – It's awful, everyone's asleep, all the doctors and nurses are completely out of it, the corridors are strewn with bodies, I couldn't breathe in there and just had to come home.” She looked around their apartment as Luke lifted her frail body. “Please Luke! I need food and a drink, that'll revive me.”

He carried her to the kitchen, she was light as a feather, then he noticed her ribs were obvious through her skin tight jumpsuit and felt a shudder of sadness sweep over him. Setting her down at the bar. Luke decided she needed the sandwiches more than him. Lena gazed at the plate of food in front of her, it had been so long since she'd eaten, she could hardly bring herself to put the sandwich to her mouth; she began to nibble at a corner of the bread, finding its flavours mouth watering and so began feasting until all that was left were the crumbs, which she began hoovering up with her tongue, she'd never enjoyed a sandwich more in her entire life. Sipping the lemonade her son brought over, the bubbles made her squint, causing her to hiccup, though the sugar was now replenishing her energy.

“You know son!” She declared, “I shall never go without food again, this has been a lesson I won't forget in a hurry.” Lena had no intention of landing herself back in hospital, but knew she would have to learn about how to eat properly while on her own – all she really needed was to have Addie home, that would put her back on the straight and narrow.

Luke made himself some more sandwiches and took them over to the bar, sharing them with her while talking gave him a sense of connecting as mother and son, which had been lacking recently.

As they finished eating, Luke announced; “I'll need to go down to the control room, find out what's been going on – will you be okay while I'm gone?” He finished his drink and took the plates and glasses over to the worktop.

Yawning, Lena stretched. “I'll be fine Luke, just need to sleep some more, that walk home has completely tired me out.” She came to standing, the light headedness had cleared. Walking towards her bedroom, Lena uttered. “You go and do what needs to be done, I'll see you later.”

Luke stood up following and gave her a peck on the cheek, he felt glad she was better and thankful for their chat. The fact that doctors and nurses were under the influence of sleep, brought back to him the danger their planet was in, he wondered what kind of physical and mental damage had been caused.

Leaving the apartment Luke was surprised to see water trickling down the corridor walls, which was a real worry, he was amazed there'd not been a fire, though he knew the electrics would have turned off automatically, which was why there were no lights apart from the emergency spot lights. Coming to the stairs leading down to the control room, he tried to use his telek port button behind his ear, but that was out of use too. Making his way down, it was all far too quiet with not a soul around.

The door to the entrance of the control space had been blown away and was completely ripped apart laying on the other side of the room. Luke stepped over the damaged controls, gazing at the ceiling that had large gaps and was exposed with wires hanging and water dripping, it was an utter mess, which would would take a while to clean up.

He made his way up the stairs to the landing port, a flood of water had soaked everything in sight, including the bodies of engineers which lay half way in, obviously they'd tried to struggle off the landing stage, but not succeeded. Crouching down, Luke shook the man laying at the top of the stairs. “Wake up – I need you to wake up.”

The man moaned, not realising where he was as he opened his eyes. “What – where am I? What's going on?” He was in a delirious state and feverish.

It was all too much for Luke to manage on his own, none of the communications were working which was a problem. Luke looked further along the landing stage and saw one of the ships docked. Getting up, he quickly made his way towards the craft, waving frantically in the hope that someone would see him. It was then that Captain Owen noticed the figure coming towards them. Recognising Luke, he ordered the outer door to be opened and went to meet his colleague.

“Luke! What's going on? Why are there bodies lying on the launch pad?” The Captain knew that if Luke was here, then whatever the danger was must have passed.

“Captain Owen! Am I glad to see you!” Owen had been a friend of his father's for many years. “I have no idea what's been going on, apart from the fact everyone on Obsidian has been in a deep sleep for many days, including myself, it's all so mystifying. The control room is a right mess and there's water everywhere. How did you manage to get back?”

“We came through a wormhole!” Said the Captain; “it was a chance I took that paid off, though we could have ended up anywhere, but...as you know my ship has saved us on many a journey and this was no exception.”

“I need your help!” Luke declared. “There's so many engineers in trouble, I can't get them in on my own.”

“Of course!” Replied Owen. “Their lives are paramount and their safety is a number one priority. I'll send my crew to help out, I'm sure we'll get things back to normal soon.”

Many of the engineers were paralysed and unable to walk or move their bodies straight away. Stretchers on wheels were brought and the bodies were removed to the hospital, where doctors and nurses had already awoken. They were now over worked with people coming in having been incapacitated for so long.

As soon as engineers that had been off duty had woken up and revived themselves, work began almost straight away repairing damage that had been done, they were soon able to get back to the job in hand, getting the room back in order. Within days communications were up and running. Water had been cleared and the old wires removed and replaced with new ones.

Minister Lewington went on air and was pleased to announce the up and running of their ships once more, also thanking the people for their help in getting back to normal. Even though they'd never faced a catastrophe like this one before, with everyone pulling together it wouldn't be long before order was restored.

Dwellers of the New World Chapter Seventeen ( Pt 1 ) The Return | ABCtales