Walking the Ruins

Wiki and the Amazimu

Anna seems to dislike Jan, the blond president-general of the bunker folks. I like her better for that.

"You're calling him an asshole. Why?" I ask.

Anna stays silent, her face like a shuttered window, giving nothing away, her gaze on the ground of my night camp.

"Look," I add, "you don't have to answer."

She reminds me of that roe deer, the one I killed in winter. She looks vulnerable.

"You know," I say, "what I did before ... with the knife I mean ... I shouldn't have done it. Shouldn't have threatened you. I ... I won't let you leave. But you don't have to talk if you don't want to."

There's the flicker of a smile on her face in response to that. The first smile I have seen on my hostage.

"It's ok," she says and shrugs. "I do understand you. I think ... I guess I would fight, too, for my friends, or for my brother."

For a moment, her dark eyes search my face, scrutinizing me. "I don't think that ... that you are what President Jan said. What he said about your friends."

"What did that... president say about us? What ... are we?"

"When he locked your friends in, he said that they are ... enemies. They're Africans."

"Africans?" I laugh. We seem to be from different worlds, that girl and I. "Why should they be Africans? Do you know what Africans are?"

"The Africans ... they've destroyed all of this," she says, her hand waving at the walls of the ruin surrounding us.

"I'm not from Africa," I answer, shaking my head. "And I haven't destroyed anything here. Well, at least not much of it. I don't even know what has happened here. And, anyway ... the people who were there ... when it happened, I mean ... the people who did this, if it was people at all, they've probably been dead for centuries."

She nods, looking out into the forest, where evening is approaching. "Yes, they've been dead a long time."

My heart is pounding, excited at the prospect to finally get some answers. I have to force myself to stay seated. "Do you know what has happened, then?" I ask. "Why did all the people die? What has happened to civilization?"

"Amazimu," she says, in a tone telling me that anyone should know this.

"Ama ... what?"

"Amazimu," she repeats. "Don't you know about Amazimu?"

"No," I answer. "What's that?"

I feel like an ignorant savage, wondering if she feels the same about me. But she just closes her eyes, as if searching for words. Then she starts talking.

"The nations on Earth were many. And they were strong, angry, and at war." Her voice reminds me of the preacher in the church that my mother sometimes took me to, especially after my father's death. He recited from the bible, and I was astonished how much of it he knew by heart.

"To give voice to their anger," she continues, "the nations created weapons more and more powerful. The last one and the mightiest of all these weapons was called Amazimu, created in Africa as the final menace. Under its bane, eternal peace was to come to Earth. But peace did not arrive. The nations of the north united, in an attempt to keep Africa in subjection, as they had done with her for centuries. And in their plight and defense, the Africans unleashed Amazimu. And Amazimu ended all strife. And it did not only end all strife, it also ended its cause. It purged humanity from Earth. Only the elected ones survived, deep in the tunnels of the everlasting and holy Reduit."

Only now, Anna opens her eyes, looking at me expectantly.

I feel like a savage facing a missionary, wondering if I should pray to her or chase her off the premises.

"Uh ..." I guess I should say something now. Amen does somehow sound appropriate, but I decide against it, knowing that religion and beliefs can form treacherous ground. "What ... what was that? I mean that text you've just cited."

"Cited?" she says, confusion in her face.

"I mean, what you said ... it is not from you, I guess. Where's it from? A book?"

"That's from the holy Wiki." She frowns at me. "You don't know the Wiki?"

"I've ... I've heard of it." I say, trying to suppress a grin. I strongly doubt that the Wikipedia that I know from that life before has much to do with what she calls the holy Wiki. But the resemblance in their names does not seem random to me. Do these people pray to Wikipedia? Well, that might explain their loss of moral values.

"You're strange", she says, with a voice somewhere between curiosity and pity.

You're strange yourself, I think. But she may be right, somehow. I may be the strange one. I'm the one who does not belong here. But I decide to go for a—hopefully—less complicated topic, a safer one.

"The elected ones that the ... Wiki ... is talking about," I ask, "those who live in the everlasting and holy ..."

"Reduit?"

"Yes, the elected ones in the everlasting and holy Reduit. Is that you? Are you, you people in the bunker, the elected ones"?

She nods, her face now serious and solemn.

"And what have you been elected for?" I ask, trying to keep any trace of derision out of my voice, unsure if I succeed.

"We have to settle earth again when Amazimu is gone." She is still solemn.

"And, is it gone, Amazimu? And who or what is Amazimu, anyway? A human? A bomb? A disease?"

Anna shrugs. "I don't know what Amazimu is. The Wiki says she's dark and evil, but it doesn't explain her. But we believe Amazimu is gone. The people in the village, they've been living outside now for more than a generation, and nothing has happened to them."

"But you're still living in your tunnels. Don't you have to settle the earth now?"

"It's Jan's decision. We stay in the Reduit, for now. To be on the safe side ... he says." The last words are intoned with apparent disapproval.

"Is that the reason why you think he's an asshole?"

She is quiet for a moment. Then she shrugs.

"And why else is he an asshole?" I ask, before I can stop myself.

Anna says nothing and lowers her gaze.

I decide to leave that topic be.

"Hey, listen," I say, feeling nature's call. "I must go to the bathroom, and I want to wash. And we need some water. I can't leave you here ... by yourself. You have to come with me."

That's awkward.

"You have a room with a bath out here?" she asks, frowning.

It takes me a moment to understand what she's talking about. "No. What I meant is ... I need to pee."

"You're talking strange," she notes.

"So do you," I reply.

We leave the building, heading for a branch of the river close by.

After washing, I look at my face, mirrored in the still surface of the water. It's the face of a pirate.