Lee watched their unlikely looking rescuer in the flickering candlelight. Maybe it was the flame reflected in his eyes, but he seemed to stare straight through them. The filthy bed sheet flapping in the breeze outlined his spindly naked frame underneath, and his wild grey hair gave the impression of a mad prophet from an Old Testament story. “Leave this to me,” he knelt on the edge of the concrete slab.

“Greetings and thank you for rescuing us. My name is...”

“Are you pure?” the old man interrupted.

“Yes, yes we are pure. We are refugees seeking assistance. Can you help us?”

“That one.” The old man said pointing a bony finger at Odetta. “That one is not pure!”

“She... she is seeking purity, she asks your help attaining purity,” said Lee.

“Like fuck I do!” exclaimed Odetta baring her steel teeth.

“Please, can you take us to safety?” asked Lee in a reasonable tone.

The old man seemed to be staring straight through them with such intensity Raymond looked behind them to see what was so captivating. “You may board my ship,” the old man said. “You can all be made pure.”

They clambered over the side of the crumbling building and into the wooden dingy. Lee was the last to get in and as his blistered feet touched the slippery deck the entire dingy sank to almost water level. “Heavier than you look,” observed Raymond.

They carefully balanced themselves in the small boat as the old man struggled with his pole. Soon they were gliding silently through the oily water. The candlelight was the only illumination; it cast an eerie spectral light as they drifted past husky shadows of dead buildings. Odetta looked questioningly at Lee. “Who is this old codger?”

Lee looked around and whispered, “He's harmless, deranged but harmless. Don't worry.”

They passed the wreckage of the VLR. It was too dark to see much but there was no chance of survivors. The nose of the ship was completely caved in and the fuselage was a wreck of broken metal. A human form lay in the doorway, legs buried in the crushed fuselage, head and shoulders under the water. Big dark shapes were circling in the water nearby.

Lee's burnt skin was still healing; gelatinous white blood cells were visibly multiplying over the raw scorched flesh. His face was looking more intact but the hair on his head had not grown back. He was not aware how pathetic he looked. Naked, skinny, bald and covered in seeping blisters.

“Excuse me, sir,” Lee said loudly. “These ships, did you have anything to do with their demise?”

The old man looked around at the wreckage, made a horrible gurgling sound in his throat and spat out thick mucus in the direction of the wrecked VLRs. “My name is not Sir. My name is...” He looked up at the sky as if seeking inspiration. “Enoch! My name is Enoch,” he repeated.

“Enoch.” Lee tried again. “Did you shoot down these ships?”

“Tho thou exalt thyself like the Eagle! Tho thou make thy nest amongst the stars! Thence I will bring thee down! Sayeth the Lord!” Enoch waved his pole in the air to emphasize his point. The boat rocked, and water splashed in almost capsizing the small craft.

“This sounds familiar,” muttered Raymond, clinging to the side.

“The evils of tech-nology,” Enoch said the word as if it was poison in his mouth. “Will not be tolerated in this holiest of places. But you.” He yelled waving his dripping pole in the general direction of Odetta. “You can be made pure.”

Odetta was about to grab the pole from the old man and batter him with it but Lee made calming gestures with his hands and spoke again to the him. “Thank you, thank you, Enoch. We can all be made pure. We appreciate being rescued. Where are you taking us?”

“Babel,” Enoch replied simply and with a worried look at the dark shapes moving closer, began hastily poling the boat through the water.

“Babelists,” whispered Raymond. “I never thought I would meet any Babelists again.”

They drew close to a concrete car parking building and Enoch moored at a set of stairs that appeared out of the water. He steadied the boat with his pole as they climbed onto the stairs and made their way up the darkened staircase. Enoch struggled up the stairs behind them carrying the candle in the jar. Eight flights of stairs later they reached the top of the building where it levelled out into a wide concrete expanse.

Ahead of them, two large structures were taking shape in the darkness. Triangular wooden frames. The structures were three meters high, each wooden frame on a rusty old trailer with rubber wheels and a heavy pole sitting on top of the axis. A large mesh pouch made of thick rope hung off the long end of the pole while at the other end a metal drum was suspended. Heavy looking chunks of rubble were piled around both the structures.

“Trebuchet,” said Lee.

Raymond and Odetta exchanged questioning looks.

“An ancient weapon, it works like a catapult, hurling things through the air. In this case chunks of concrete.” He turned to Enoch. “This is what you used to bring down the gunships?”

“God’s wrath is mighty.” Enoch looked up at the stars. “He does not tolerate insults.”

Lee nodded his head. “I am sure he doesn't. These trebuchets are impressive, Ingenious and effective. No power needed, no detectable heat source, just wood, rope and concrete. Enoch, did you build these to protect your community?”

Enoch walked to the nearest structure and put his hand on the wooden frame. “The impure sometimes send their flying metal machines. We try to break them.”

“Enoch, why don’t you like modern technology?” asked Raymond.”

The old man rounded and glared at Raymond, their noses almost touching. Raymond backed away from the smell of his rotten breath and body odour. “Look around you. This is what your modern technology has done. Too many people, too many machines. We have moved too far away from God. The world needs to be made pure again.” His wide eyes stared at Raymond psychotically. “You all need to be made pure again.”

There was a stench of burning hair as Enoch held the candle directly beneath his dreadlocked beard. He held Raymond's gaze as the acrid smoke rose between them until he finally he looked down and noticed his beard catching alight. He looked back up at Raymond through the rising smoke. “Follow me,” he said as he stumbled off into the darkness leaving a smoky trail behind.

Lee exchanged bemused looks with his companions then began to follow, leaving enough distance not to be overheard although it seemed the old man was more than partially deaf. “Babelists,” he said. “You have come across them before Raymond?”

“Yes,” said Raymond quietly. “Religious fanatics, Luddites, hate any sort of modern technology; want to take us all back to the Dark Ages.”

“I looked into Enoch's brain. He is partially senile with a bad case of obsessive-compulsive disorder and rapidly approaching Alzheimer’s.”

“I thought people with OCD had obsessive personal hygiene as well,” said Odetta.

“Not necessarily. He is insane but harmless.”

“Harmless!” exclaimed Raymond. “They almost blew up Lago's orbital elevator and they took out the VLR.”

“Their primitive methods can be effective, modern warfare relies on modern surveillance and modern technology. They can literally fly under the radar with their crude and uncomplicated approach. Effective on the VLR. They would not have been expecting to be attacked by bricks and lumps of concrete.”

“He has not asked us who we are or where we came from,” said Raymond.

“No, and it seems he has little interest in us, in his head, there is no link between us and the VLR, we are just some random refugees placed here by his God to become potential converts to Babelism.”

“He wants to make me pure,” scoffed Odetta. “Good luck with that!”

“I wouldn't worry, he only intends to try and convert us to Babelism, but he has no idea how. He thinks because we are here we must be willing disciples.”

“Nuts,” was Odetta's assessment.

“Yes, well hard to disagree,” said Lee. “But there is something to be said for a return to a simpler and more peaceful time. It could be argued the industrial age then the technological age has done nothing but harm to humans and the planet we live on. These Babelists might have a worthwhile cause, just the wrong motivation. This old man, Enoch, used to be an accountant would you believe.”

“Is that what you intend to do, Lee? Return us to a simpler time?” asked Odetta.

“No, we need to embrace the technology, but I believe a change in mentality is needed. I am not sure how I can change people’s attitudes yet, but I am getting closer to a solution.” Lee ignored Raymond and Odetta’s sceptical glances.

They followed the flickering candlelight through a dark passageway, up and down several flights of stairs until they came out onto the top of another car parking building. Raymond noticed forty or fifty tent structures of various shapes and sizes dotted the surface, illuminated by a few smouldering fires which produced a hazy smoke that hung above the camp. The night sky was framed by towering wrecks of crumbling concrete. Following Enoch, they picked their way through the campsite. A few Babelists were awake but they did not seem overly interested in the visitors.

They came to a glowing fire, three men and one woman were sitting on dirty mattresses, they were reading from tattered old books. There were large bones with slowly roasting morsels of meat suspended above the fire. Raymond immediately felt hungry. He had not eaten for a long time and the barbeque smelled good. He wondered what the meat was then he saw a huge smoking alligator skull in the middle of the embers. The red heat glowed through the blackened eye-sockets and teeth giving it a grinning demonic appearance.

“Are these people pure?” One of them waved a rib at the three visitors.

“They can be made pure,” Enoch replied. “What does the book say?”

The Babelist squinted in the dark and quoted from his book: “So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.”

Enoch nodded with satisfaction. “So sayeth the good book.”

Raymond squatted down and gestured towards the alligator barbeque. “Do you mind?” he asked.

“What does the book say?”

The Babelist frowned and randomly flicked through pages. “Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the Earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the Earth.”

Enoch nodded his consent as Raymond helped himself to some charred alligator and joined the circle around the fire. Lee and Odetta stood behind Enoch and listened to the Babelist’s conversation.

“Are you sure they are real?” came another question. “Sometimes I see things that aren’t real.”

Enoch frowned and looked hard at Raymond. “I can’t tell, what does the book say.”

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.”

Enoch was not convinced. He tentatively picked up a charred alligator rib and poked Raymond in the leg with it. “This one is real,” Enoch looked satisfied. Still brandishing the alligator rib, he walked around the fire gently touching everyone with the rib. He came to Odetta and nervously prodded her a couple of times in the leg with it then looked at the rib in awe as if it had miraculously become a reality-defining appendage.

“You are real.”

“You’re damn right,” said Odetta.

“Thank you for rescuing us Enoch,” said Lee. “Now we will go and meditate upon our purity.”

Enoch nodded and looked pleased with himself. He handed Raymond a plastic covered bible and waved them away. Raymond had been listening to the conversation trying not to laugh, chewing on his tough hunk of meat. He stood up but drew no reaction from the Babelists.

“Thanks for the alligator.”

“Thank the Lord for the alligator,” said Enoch.

“Ok, thanks for the alligator... Lord.” Raymond looked up toward the horizon.

“No, he's over there.” Enoch waved his rib in the opposite direction.

“Don't you want to stay Raymond? You would fit in perfectly around here,” said Odetta.

“You're the one who needs to be made pure,” Raymond replied.

As they got up to leave Raymond noticed Lee kneel close to Enoch, put his arm around him and whisper something into his ear. The old man looked scared and confused at this intimacy, but then he relaxed and nodded, smiling contentedly. There was no reaction from the Babelists staring into the fire as they made to leave. “What was that about?”

“Tell you later,” Lee replied.

“How did they manage to operate the trebuchet?” Raymond wondered as they left the strange campfire behind them.” They don't have a single brain cell to rub together.”

“They all have varying degrees of mental illness, they share a common paranoia and fear of modern technology, it's the one thing that unites and mobilizes them. Some have a shared dementia which involves lucid hallucinations, hence the conversation about us being real or not.”

“The Babelists we encountered on the elevator platform seemed slightly more capable,” Raymond remembered. “Still quite insane but they managed to plan and execute an almost successful sabotage mission. If they had used a more modern explosive the platform would be at the bottom of the South China sea by now.”

They walked off in the direction they had come from across the top of the carpark and back towards where Enoch had tied up his boat. They found the wooden dingy where it was left and quietly slid back out onto the dark waters. Raymond put the Babelist bible in his pocket and controlled the dingy with the pole. The water was not deep, but it was dark and turbid and the large alligator skull on the Babelists fire made Raymond nervous about their mode of transport which sat heavy in the water.

“Where are we going?” asked Odetta.

“Back to the crashed VLR. I detected a radio still operative on the way past before,” said Lee.

Raymond could hear splashes echoing down the watery boulevard long before they could see the VLR emerging from the darkness as their eyes adjusted. There were rippling bubbling sounds as large beasts moved and heavy splashing noises as armoured tails thrashed through the water. Raymond stopped the dingy with the pole and they watched as two huge alligators fought over a human corpse. Both creatures were at least three meters long and each of them had clamped their massive toothy jaws around what remained of the corpse. It was torn to shreds in seconds.

The pitch-black night added to the air of menace. As they peered through the gloom they saw the shadow of another alligator, it had its snout buried in the broken fuselage of the VLR. It started rolling in the water, trying to free its victim caught in the wreckage. The beast soon tore another human corpse away from the ship; a ragged bloody torso appeared briefly in the monster’s jaws before it disappeared underwater and languidly swam away.

“I can hack into the radio frequency from here,” said Lee. “I should be able to project my thoughts.”

He went quiet as Raymond nervously watched the dark water around them.

“I contacted John,” said Lee after a minute. “He wants to meet us at the end of Dodge Island at sunrise, better get moving.”

They floated through the empty streets in silence, only the sound of the pole gently guiding them through the murky waters. The derelict city had a haunted air and Raymond felt as if they were being watched. The odd splash or squawk from a crow punctuated the gloomy silence. Raymond looked around with suspicion. Lurking Babelists, leftover human dregs still wandering the watery city, alligators, birds and who knew what other creatures were probably eyeing them with various intent. Odetta was oblivious to the oppressive atmosphere, curled up sleeping in the bow of the dingy making soft snoring noises. Lee was sitting cross-legged behind him, still naked, his wounds had healed, and his hair was growing back. Eyes closed, a skinny little meditating Buddha.

“I visited Miami once when I was young, on holiday with my father,” said Raymond as he pushed the dingy along.

“What was it like?” asked Lee with his eyes still closed.

“It was like a giant theme park, full of sun, fun and activities. But the people were desperate; they knew then their city was doomed.”

“Miami was once a glorious city,” said Lee. “It had everything. Beautiful beaches with tropical temperatures, unique architecture, and a wealthy, vibrant multicultural society.”

“It was the people in charge that did nothing, the city was run by climate change deniers who thought they could build a few sea walls and stop their city drowning. I remember the sewage being forced up onto the streets,” said Raymond

“The low topography was the problem. Miami was built only a couple of meters above sea level. They built sea walls and canals to try and redirect the rising seas, but the tide was relentless. Water will always find its own level. Eventually, it was the smell and the return of old diseases like diphtheria and dysentery that drove the people away. It happened quickly, land value plummeted, investors disappeared and everyone else followed. The city's governors and the police force abandoned the city leaving this post-apocalyptic watery wasteland behind.”

“I guess the Babelists think it’s God's wrath.”

Raymond guided them past the wrecked husk of the old American Airlines arena and out towards Dodge Island. Looking south, the massive white skyscrapers of the old city waterfront looked impressive although they were crumbling at the top. Buildings still in denial, defying the elements, forcing themselves up out of the swampland below. There was a faint purple hue on the Eastern horizon as dawn approached, illuminating the towers like broken teeth. Dodge Island was originally man-made and used as a port facility for Miami. Now it was almost completely submerged. Rusty skeletal cranes grew out of the water like dead trees and the odd organic building broke the surface, covered in rust, green algae and guano. An expanse of dry concrete appeared, and Raymond could make out hundreds of sleeping alligators beached on the edge of the water. He took a wide berth so as not to disturb them and made for the eastern end of Dodge Island.

They drifted on the outgoing tide in the old shipping lanes. Once Raymond's pole lost touch with the sea floor they were at the mercy of the current. The first shards of sunlight broke the surface of the Eastern horizon and flocks of seagulls worked the ocean, hovering above then diving into the water. The feathery missiles barely broke the surface and reappeared seconds later with a silvery fish flapping in their beaks. They drifted out past South Point, there was no beach left, just water lapping up against the discoloured towers and once grand hotels. Raymond was growing concerned about their aimless drifting when a dull droning noise caught his attention. A launch was powering towards them across the calm seas, its silvery hull glinting in the early morning light. Raymond prodded Odetta with his foot and she sleepily groaned and scowled at him. Lee was in the same position, but his eyes were open, watching the rapidly approaching launch.

It was a streamlined silver bullet, barely creating any wake as it flew over the ocean surface. The throaty roar of its inboard engines coughed and spluttered as it drew alongside their tiny dingy. A step ladder was thrown over the side and they climbed up into the launch. Standing in the middle of the deck with his arms folded over a barrel chest was John. Dressed like the captain of a cruise ship he seemed to have gotten fatter and his hair was blown in all directions by the salty breeze. It had more grey in it than last time Raymond had seen him. He stood there taking them all in, black wraparound sunglasses concealing his eyes, before breaking into a smile and charging towards them.

Odetta! My darling good to see you again!” he exclaimed, wrapping his arms around her in an all-encompassing bear hug.

“Uggh, get off me. You smell like fish,” she objected.

“Raymond, good to see you again too, my friend.” Raymond was glad all he got was a firm handshake.

“And you must be Lee Xiang, our mysterious visitor from the Moon that has bought the wrath of Benevolent Progress Inc. upon us,” he said looking Lee up and down. “Don't you wear clothes where you come from? Very enlightened I must say. Come inside we have much to discuss.”