Hope and Undead Elvis - By Ian Thomas Healy Page 0,16

not serious."

"I am. Either it will show you're pregnant, or it won't. If it does, will you believe me?"

"Fine. I'll pee on the stupid wand." She took one more defiant sip from the pool and then went off behind a tree out of view of Gabe and Undead Elvis.

"Can't believe I'm doing this," she muttered. "Pee on the wand. I'm not pregnant. He's just… just a crazy man." She rummaged through Mrs. Shepherd's purse until she found the white cardboard box. She tore it open and pulled out the plastic wand. In the past, when it mattered, she would have just let the plastic wrapper fall to the ground to be taken by the wind. Now, when it didn't matter, she put the crumpled wrapper back into the purse. It had been made by people, a remnant of the world gone by, and she didn't want to let it blow away.

She read the directions twice to make sure she understood what to do. Although she was still a little dehydrated, she managed to squeeze out a trickle of urine to bathe the end of the wand. Then she held it up and watched as her urine traveled up the fibrous material inside the stick and into the results window.

The little cottony tab inside it showed two blue lines, a positive result.

To be sure, she looked at it from various angles, but there was little use questioning it. The lines were solid, unyielding in their insistence that she was pregnant. Hope set the wand down and took a shaky breath. Maybe it was wrong, but somehow she didn't think so.

On numb legs, she returned to where Gabe sat at the pond's edge. "How did you know?"

"I was told, señorita."

"By whoever sent you to find me?"

"Yes."

"So who did that then? God? This whole virgin pregnancy thing is a God kind of thing, right?"

"If you like."

"I don't even believe in God. I never did."

"Does that matter? How else would you explain what happened to the world?"

Hope sat down and trailed her fingers in the pond water, watching the ripples spread outward in concentric circles. "I don't know. I figured it was some weird science thing, like a wormhole or something."

"No."

"Sometimes things happen that defy explanation, Li'l lady," said Undead Elvis. Hope hadn't noticed when he returned. "Like me being here, for example. I'm supposed to be dead, not up and about."

"You ever mess around much with computers?" asked Gabe.

"A little," said Hope.

"You know how after a computer's been running for awhile it starts to get buggy? Data gets corrupted. The hard drive fills up with meaningless file fragments?"

"I guess."

"When that happens, you have to clean things out and reboot the computer."

"Are you saying that's what happened here? The world got… got rebooted?"

"Not yet. This is when it's all locked up. Nothing's working right. Rules have been suspended. It requires a reboot, and that's where you come in."

"Me? Am I supposed to heal the world or something?"

"No." Gabe. "You misunderstand me. The world doesn't need healing. It was broken beyond repair. It must be started anew. The child you carry within you will be instrumental to that task."

"God, you mean I'm Mother Mary?"

"After a fashion."

"So what am I supposed to do?"

"You must carry and deliver the child safely, and raise him or her the best you can, señorita."

"I'd be a shitty mother in the best of circumstances. I smoke. I drink. I'm a goddamn stripper! And look at the world, Gabe. Until we found this place, I didn't even know where my next meal was going to come from."

"And yet, you made it here alive when so many others in the world didn't."

"I didn't ask for this!"

"No, but it was given to you, as was a protector to help see you to the journey's end."

"Uh-huh," said Undead Elvis with his trademark twang.

"But where am I supposed to go?"

"Graceland, Li'l lady."

"Why there?"

"It's a safe place to raise a child in this broken world," said Gabe.

"Safe from what? Those birds?"

Gabe lowered his voice. "There are things roaming the land far worse than the birds, señorita."

Hope leaned back to stare into the sky. "Of course there are. It can't be easy, right? I've got to be tested." Her temper arose again and she shouted into the sky, "Well, you know what? I reject you! I don't want to be a mother! Pick somebody else who believes in you and gives a shit about the world. It never did anything but shit all over me, so why should