Part one
Part two
Part three
Doug gave the rising brow of
the storm a stern glance and plodded on
in the biting wind. His genetically thickened legs and toughened mutant
skin being keys to his survival in this blustery part of the northern Canada.
Other men with lesser powers would've already been blown away, thrown like
straw into the void of wilderness. And it felt cold - Arctic cold. Temperatures
dropping down the scale like they did a hundred years ago.
He could not turn back as flash floods
raced in the south and forest fires raged to the east. The west existed
as a bizarre swampland he didn't want to think about. There wasn't any
place where he could hide from the roar of an angry earth. He always ended
up on the edge of the storm.
Doug tightened bitter lips against
the settling frost. Grimly he imagined himself lucky in that his intelligence
hadn't been greatly enhanced. Not having the ability to calculate the odds
against him seemed a blessing.
Three hours more of steady walking
brought him to a long rise and a banked depression partially sheltered
from the wind. Looking up he saw endless chunks of ice and colored stone
sprinkled across exposed tundra. A large part of the glacier had melted
here and due to his view at the last peak he knew that this weird spread
of land stretched on for a few miles.
He'd seen some sort of log structure
near the top but couldn't spot it now against the dark background of clouds.
They rolled up like smoke in howling wind, creating ferocious effects that
would make demons and giants seek shelter.
As he began the climb he studied
the ground at his feet, amazed at the things poking out of the tundra.
Glacial ice had buried it for ages and it seemed unfair that such a find
would only be uncovered in a time when few men were left who could study
it or even reach it.
Shells of extinct sea creatures,
lizard skeletons, preserved feathers -- strange greenery and ferns sprouted
here and there from ancient seeds. In places the tundra ran like seaweed
in rounded rocks, forming faces as it rippled in the wind.
Near the top he looked up and spotted
the structure a couple hundred feet away. A cabin built of huge petrified
gray logs that had been pulled from the glacier bottom. Stretched around
the slope in a V shape, it was more than a single cabin and he supposed
it had been put together that way to provide maximum cover from the ceaseless
blow.
Doug had to turn into the open wind
to get to the door; and from there he caught a glimpse of the other slope
and the unusual forest covering it. Squat trees bit into the ground. Their
branches shaking like tentacles. Some had gnarled limbs covered with large
black cones, others sported huge needles nearly wide enough to be leaves.
Climbing roots wound in the rotted carpeting, and in places they sat on
soil and tundra that looked like quicksand. Boughs overarched and coiled
where the trees were densest, creating a dim and partially sheltered world
below. Strange lighting tinted pools of icy water here and there; and as
a whole the place seemed like a tiny forest world in microcosm - an ancient
hideaway that had been uncovered after ages of burial and was sprouting
again.
The heavy door was open and banging
in the wind. Doug stepped into the dark interior thinking that perhaps
it'd been open in the blow for years. As far as anyone knew, there were
no survivors up in this part of the world.
A brief look told him the place was
about as solid as a vault. Forcing the door shut he drew the sturdy bolt.
Then he found himself in darkness for a moment before he pulled his ball
lantern from his pack.
It detected the dark room and brightened.
Shadows swept across the walls as the room lit up, and what he saw was
Spartan to say the least. Simple tables and chairs had been fashioned out
of a grainy sort of pine. There were a few crude tools and a Remington
rifle on the back wall. A heavy chest stood bolted to the floor near the
center table so he stepped over and opened it, finding a dog-eared handwritten
notebook and nothing else inside.
Doug was dog-tired and cold. The
cabin had a small fireplace but he rarely used fire. He took the notebook
and a blanket, sat down on a heavy chair and began to read; feeling relaxation
settle in as the first paragraph flowed into his mind.
--------
Welcome, mutant son of man.
My name is Joe London, and since
I'm the last survivor hereabouts you can call this my survivalist's notebook.
I lived as a gambling man in a world
that gambled its life away; another roll of the dice and everything might've
have come up right. But there is no second roll of the big dice, so we
got snake eyes and a dead world in fate's toss.
Men always were thieves and robbers;
most of us worked to destroy nature. There were a few higher tribal cultures
that coexisted well and perhaps history could've rolled one of those into
dominance. Instead the axes kept coming up every time and we cut down the
world - we talked of new worlds and planets while we murdered and poisoned
the species and systems on our own. Like cowards most of us robbed the
people of the future, talking grand and never considering that they couldn't
fight back. They could just be our victims.
Welcome to my cabin, fellow predator.
You like the gun-slit window?
I'm always amazed when I consider
how people from seventy years back could've turned nature into a raging
bull today - and put the undeserving and unborn on the receiving end of
the sucker punches and hurricanes. Keep in mind that I wasn't one of the
stupid ones, though.
Remember the old gasoline engine?
I was a top official in one of the key auto companies of the day. It was
my job to know and in the end keep it secret. We had the ability to transfer
to hydrogen and electric engines all along but we wouldn't do it because
we didn't want to spend the money on retooling the plants. We believed
in an ever rising economy and it rose to the top and choked the world in
its gasses and hidden environmental horrors.
We did nothing as the ice cap melted;
or should I say that what we did was get China to embrace a policy of a
car per person to make sure the entire world would choke on greenhouse
gases.
I spoke out on the issue about the
time the meteorological system began to collapse. Making a public statement
to the effect that the planet was destined to become a sulphurous hell
-- a place more like Hades than Earth. We had taken the Biblical Armageddon
and turned it into Thermageddon -- an ecological catastrophe on a biblical
scale. And it spite of what was clearly happening to us, corporations and
governments were continuing to encourage air pollution, nuclear waste,
burning, over-fishing, clear-cutting, strip-mining, super dams, excessive
drainage, paving of wild lands, dumping and a population explosion.
As it was happening the visionaries
were preaching our survival as though we were living on another planet.
The technologies they plugged like terraforming, nano technology, genetically
enhanced food and humans, tinkering with the atmosphere and so on were
to be the miracles to ensure our survival -- not on Mars, but here on Earth.
And what it really added up to was
another grand dream of the robbers. The reality being waves of nightmarish
weather sweeping the world. Our biosphere undergoing a complete transformation.
The Arctic ice cap melted yet they were still telling people that ice that
was long gone still existed up here. The planet's temperatures soared because
the huge sink of dark water absorbed heat from the sun while the shield
of ice used to reflect heat back into space.
Rising tides swept in like oily giants
to drown places like Florida. Overpopulation and burning killed the Amazon
rainforest. Salmon disappeared from the Pacific Ocean -- food grew scarce
as the world's population hit 9 billion. The last of the coral reefs were
winking out. The Everglades were drowning. The Gulf Stream was switching
off. Parts of the world like Texas were becoming total deserts. Super-hurricanes
and floods became regular news, along with forest fires and droughts. All
of it creating billions of environmental refugees in a world already composed
of billions of poverty-stricken people. It didn't take much to kill off
their meager food supply. The reek of the dying billions in torched cities
replaced the stench of dying marine life and forests in the end. And even
then we thought we would be safe in North America.
But we weren't and for a last blow
the great stores of Arctic methane got released through melting and severe
atmospheric feedback loops locked in, leading to a runaway greenhouse effect.
The combination of biotic impoverishment, rising air and sea temperatures,
the crumbling ozone shield, an altered planetary skin and the accumulation
of carbon dioxide finally tipped the balance and put an end to life as
we knew it.
We couldn't act to save ourselves
as corporations had turned our world institutions into tools of profit
and suppression. Speculators were largely in control and governments geared
to Band-Aid solutions couldn't act in a fast rising crisis.
As things collapsed, those who'd
profited from bringing about our death adapted and profited from death
and the industry of extermination itself. But I was on the outside then
and I'd been there for a long time.
Shortly after my conversion to environmental
causes I became unemployable and eventually an outlaw survivalist - a transformation
that happened in degrees. The old feature films used to display wonderful
heroes and they conquered all. In real life there is no such animal. When
I lost my financial means through speaking out, it led to a run on my assets
and then divorce. Even my two sons abandoned me as a lost cause. Family
breakup of some sort happened to nearly everyone in the end.
It happened to me early and that
was important - a personal catastrophe long before the end came. It led
to my survival in the long term. In the early days I nearly vanished from
the face of the Earth, drifting about Canada as a homeless man. During
that time I slowly made connections and built an underground survival network.
Of course there were thousands of survival networks later, but they were
all high profile while we remained invisible. Our group never made a public
statement or kept open addresses of leaders and camps. If we had done so
we would have died as the others did - attacked first by the desperate
masses and then by the forces of the 2nd World Order Government.
The so-called Global Village lost
it true global nature when the fast transport of goods and people ended.
Once that went to hell everyone other than military organizations got isolated
in various pockets of the raging world storm. We could still get news from
around the world but the technological means to do things at an international
and national level were nearly gone.
My group managed to gather in an
area of Northern Ontario and duck much of the disaster. A year after we
dug in Canadian cities began to collapse. Our two hundred members were
still quietly camouflaging structures in deep forest, and when we'd set
up our forest network completely, I found myself foolishly unhappy. My
sons were grown and I wanted to see them one last time before the end came
for them.
--------
I
left on my own; telling the others at camp
that it was just a scouting mission. A few of the toothless and bearded
looked at me with suspicion, but they didn't oppose me.
Following established trails I began
the journey. Emerging from cool pine forests in the North I entered heavy
mixed forest on the long run down to the moraine that borders the City
of Toronto. This was rough going as years of high winds had blocked roads
and created a jungle of deadwood and stumps. The older forest was strewn
with enormous fallen logs; rising temperatures seemed to have spurred the
growth of deciduous trees, undergrowth and vines. The tougher customers
of nature were surviving while the weak died. Bears were plentiful and
their hungry roars often spooked me.
When the forest got too dense or
dangerous I worked my way down following the shores of small glacial lakes.
A reek of dead fish rose on these shores as some species were dying in
the warmer water. But there was no shortage of food as I could see schools
of fish swimming in the clear flow and was able to catch sunfish with my
bare hands.
Before reaching the moraine I stumbled
onto a huge abandoned farming complex. A rich moth-fluttering meadow suddenly
ended at endless fields of scorched earth, stubble and lumpy clay. Empty
observation towers told me it had been an experimental farm.
Land that's been burned off quickly
rises with new growth and this area was dead, so my guess was that mutant
crops had been grown. The sort of stuff that is genetically programmed
not to seed, because if it did it would spread and choke all other plant
life. It looked like the government had failed here in one of its attempts
to feed the population with new storm-resistant crops - the result being
a strip of odd desert in Northern Canada.
I avoided main roads and towns. Beyond
the dead lands, I followed a long winding valley, walking down the mostly
overgrown track bed of a freight line. Rail had been another victim of
the weather - mostly wind and flooding. This trek took to me to another
survivalist settlement - large and obvious. The camp had been constructed
out of old rail cars dumped along the valley and converted to storage sheds
and housing.
The first person I encountered was
a skeleton. He rested in the parched weeds outside one of the bigger rail
cars. The tattered remains of his clothing fluttered in the breeze and
his bones were clean, indicating death had taken him quite a while ago.
Looking inside the car I found little other than darkness, cobwebs and
empty food tins.
Moving on I found many more skeletons
in random locations. It was like death had come suddenly and no one had
lived to clean up later. A white powder like lime sprinkled the ground
near the bones at the shore of a pond. Nearby I found spent canisters of
some sort of chemical. In the central section many rail cars had been huddled
together into a sort of shantytown and there were a lot of skeletons and
more of the canisters. Some bore the 2nd World Order marking and from them
I got the picture of what had happened - a chemical weapons attack. 2WO
had been created out of the remains of NATO and it was a ruthless military
outfit involved in survival through sheer power and the genetic mutation
of humans and plant life. A decision had been made by that organization
to exterminate this survival group with chemical bombs. Which probably
meant 2WO planned to eventually resettle this land.
Sunset fell with great brilliance
that day. I remember sitting out front of one of the tilted rail cars nibbling
on my rations. The dead grinned back at me as long beams swept the land,
and I decided to enter Toronto under cover of darkness. My people knew
from radio transmissions that most of the other survivalist groups in the
countryside had been done in and the last of the survivors were being herded
into the cities by the government. The herding was supposed to make food
rationing easier by concentrating most of the survivors, but I didn't believe
that story, as I've never trusted government.
My son was in the city center; I
knew that. My guess was that he would know the real reason for concentrating
people in the cities. One possibility was segregation. Word on the grapevine
was that 2WO planned to populate the countryside with the hardier mutant
breeds of man. Perhaps those of old mankind would be kept and fed like
weak sheep in the cities. It would make it easier to control them and their
birth rate - if nature wasn't already doing the job well enough.
Fearing the highways and arrest I
entered Toronto following the rails. It seemed incredibly dark on the edge
of the city. Occasionally the moon slipped out of the clouds and revealed
blocks of vacant suburban houses and scarred high-rises. Weeds and maples
had overgrown much of this property, creating a densely forested city.
The night wind seemed inhumanly
hot. It riffled the boughs like they were a dry musical instrument, and
added to that sound were eerie howls and bangs from the gusts swinging
down the empty streets and through the hollow buildings below.
Near the central city I began to
spot military vehicles and pedestrians, but I stayed out of sight, not
wanting to be seen till I was well inside where I wouldn't immediately
be asked to identify myself. I had no idea what would happen if I were
arrested and didn't want to find out.
Coming out of a long ravine trail
I cut through the shadows in Summerhill Park and walked out on Sumac Road,
heading down the lit street to my son's apartment building. This part of
the city was still populated and a few people loitered out front of the
building. The buzzers didn't work but the door stood open so I went up
to the fourth floor and knocked. I didn't get an answer; instead a pretty
woman of Oriental extraction opened the door of the apartment next door.
I stepped over and ask her if Jimmy
London was still around.
"No. That guy went with the military
to one of the domes. He was signed on to work for them in electronic skills
so it's likely a high access dome."
"Domes? What are they?"
"Since the earthquake they've been
moving people from damaged areas to the central domes. Now they take people
from undamaged areas, too. They are a racist sort of thing that go in order
of importance. Most people don't want to go there but there isn't anywhere
else to go."
"I see," I said, thanking her before
I left.
Out front I questioned two thin black
men smoking rolled cigarettes beside a battered Star newspaper box. "I
need information from the military. Do you know where the nearest station
is?"
One guy took a drag and puffed out
smoke. The lit end highlighted his lumpy nose. "The stations are mobile
mostly. And you don't want to find them unless you're planning on disappearing."
"Disappearing, what do you mean?"
"The domes my friend. People who
go there never come back. Rumors are that some of the big trucks headed
out of town are loaded with people being taken off to work as slaves for
the mutants."
"It doesn't sound good. But I've
got nowhere else to go and I'm looking for my son."
"That's the story everywhere."
As I turned away I saw pity in his
eyes. With little to do I took a late night walk on some of the main streets.
The lamps and some of the building lights were on and people milled about
here and there in front of buildings that had stood up against the quake.
A semblance of order existed and I saw no real threat of crime. Litter
and dust flew in the warm wind rushing out of cracked alleys and I could
see fast rolling clouds on the skyline. Toronto was actually one of the
safest places in the world; most of the damage having been done by one
devastating earthquake and a hurricane that hit shortly after.
Of course there were other facets
of the nightmare. When the food distribution systems collapsed the cities
were the first places in chaos. The initial wave of crime and death had
been tidal, but it did subside and things came back together. Now it was
a bit it was easier to survive in city centers than in the countryside.
Small survivalist groups could vanish in the city jungle, while in the
countryside they were open to attack. If we hadn't been so far north we
wouldn't have had a chance against other groups and forces of law and order
bent on destroying every outlaw organization.
I'd drifted deeper downtown on Dundas
Street when I finally came upon a military checkpoint. Metal barricades
blocked further passage on the street and I could see through to a huge
dome rising in the dark. It was immense, like a stadium the size of a city
block.
Ten heavily armed guards at a post
and an armored personnel carrier held the point. There weren't any citizens
trying to pass late at night. In order to see my son I had no choice other
than to chance talking to them. After ditching my hidden weapon in an alley
waste bin, I approached them.
Cool air drifted from the checkpoint
window. The guard staring out at me was unshaven with mutant green skin.
"What do you want?" he said gruffly.
"I've been living in my son's apartment,
thinking he would return. Now a neighbour tells me he is working with the
military in one of the higher security domes. I want to know if there is
anyway I can visit him?"
"You got identification or a chip
implant?"
"None. But he can identify me if
he sees me."
"Not good. You'll have to give us
his name and your name. We're going to hold you until we verify your identity.
Any objections to that?"
"No objections."
They held me in a jail cell for three
days. The window allowed a view of the street and I could see the military
personnel entering another large checkpoint near the dome. Some men had
small Canadian flags on their uniforms, and sprinkled among them were many
boy soldiers with greenish faces and 2WO outfits. Without a doubt NATO/2WO
had bred a huge army of mutants that were presently reaching the 16 to
18 age. Their youth was apparent in their faces, yet their bodies were
well developed - stocky and strong like those of older hardened men. Since
the troops were mixed I got the notion that the mutants were to be integrated
with the general population.
When Jimmy was ready to see me they
had me hauled into the dome. Two burly mutant soldiers were my guides and
they took me down a long passage lined with windows giving a one-way view
of the ragged crowd milling in an open concourse below.
We arrived and found Jimmy waiting
outside his office door. My son was large, healthy and rugged - not at
all like the other shattered men of the period. His dark hair seemed to
be getting thicker and wavier with age and his brown eyes were intense
and youthful. He also had perfect teeth, which was rare. It surprised me
that he looked so good in a military outfit as he had been an electronics
engineer and not a military person.
He greeted me with a strong embrace
and led me into his office. A wave of happiness consumed me at that point.
I felt that my son finally believed in me. Then I noticed the combination
NATO/2WO insignia on his shoulder and my joy began to evaporate.
Jimmy sat on the edge of his desk
while I took a chair.
"I guess you want to know what happened
to Mom and Dave?"
I nodded.
"They're gone. They survived the
worst of it only to die two months ago from a pandemic virus that hit the
city. I saw to their burial. They're in the cemetery on York Road in the
old neighbourhood."
"That's too bad. But I suppose I'm
lucky just to find you alive."
"I made it but it wasn't easy. Believe
me, it surprised me when they came saying you were here. I thought it was
an impostor. You were part of the survivalist movement - they're all dead
now. You must be just about the last one."
"I am. On the way into the city I
found a lot of corpses. 2WO and not outlaws killed them. They were just
pockets of people trying to survive on their own little pieces of ground.
What's 2WO's reason for such atrocities?"
"Panic and resettlement are the likely
reasons. The Canadian Government and 2WO feared the survivalists would
band together and form a guerrilla army in the countryside. I think the
attacks were based on paranoia over something that never would have happened.
Then there is resettlement. The people in these domes are going to be moved
onto that land."
"Something big is going on here,
isn't it?"
"Yes. That's the reason I waited
so long before seeing you. What I have to explain is very delicate and
hard to accept."
"Nothing surprises me these days.
We are accepting things we wouldn't have accepted before."
"True. The environment has changed
totally. 2WO leaders have realized that man and society also have to transform
themselves completely. Mutants like the guards who brought you in are one
of the ways of the future."
"Ah, I see. So we are the old boys
now and flawed mankind is on the way out."
"Not entirely. You can see how strong
I am. It is due to a new kind of gene therapy. I'm one of the few people
with the physical makeup to respond to it. My stamina, base intelligence
in certain areas and life span have been prolonged."
"You mean man has been recreated
as a new master race. I have to admit that I'm impressed, even if it means
I am obsolete."
Excitement rose in his voice. "It's
a new beginning. Only last year we believed that only the mutants would
survive over the long term. Now a miracle has happened. Mankind will live
on in a slightly enhanced form. Two master races - mutant and man will
live side by side in a newly harmonized world environment. The days of
man the predator will end, we'll govern nature itself, and survive on this
planet and others."
"I don't quite understand how enhanced
humans are different from the mutants?"
"You wouldn't. Mutants look quite
human but they are much different on the genetic level. NATO's project
in that area that runs years back. Most of the old reports of aliens had
to do with the mutants. When the world started to get hot they accelerated
the process and bred a small army of them."
"If they are that different, then
it's likely that they won't have any place in their world for people like
me."
"No need to worry. You can live on
in comfortable retirement. As a matter of fact, I've already put your application
through. There's no need for you to meet the same fate as the others."
"Are you saying that the others are
being eliminated?"
"Sorry. I didn't mean to let that
slip. I guess I had to tell you sooner or later. You may hate us for this
but simply put - most of those in the domes won't live on. Only those who
respond to the gene therapy and some of their immediate family will."
"And the rest?"
"They think they are leaving to work
on farms. But they never get there. Be assured that it isn't a painful
end. The transports are set up to gas and put them to sleep instantly.
Unfortunately I'm one of the people making the life and death decisions."
"God help you!"
"Our reasons aren't cruelty or fascism.
We have a dream and a goal. Just as you saw the end coming long ago, we
now see a new beginning. Yet this new world can't work if the old race
breeds and damages the environment again. We are doing it in a way that
seems cowardly. Yet it isn't because we knew that few people would believe
in us or in the truth - just as few people would believe in you when you
warned them of the end."
"Yes. They wouldn't listen and now
they've earned this. It's a horrible end and appalling to me - yet I understand
it. Outrage and clinging to the old ways won't in any way change things.
I can only hope to see the curtain of horror lift and the new people entering
a humane future."
Jimmy nodded and I sighed. I could
see that my apparent acceptance of 2WO and their politics of doom had moved
him on a deep emotional level. In spite of his health he had thumbprints
of guilt bagging his eyes and up close I detected a haunted look. I saw
that look soften to relief as I said a few more resigned words. Then we
ended up talking about other things - memories of family life long ago
when the world was a better place. When my wife and children were beautiful.
I embraced him and departed holding a ticket granting me a small apartment
in one of the domes. Some time in the future I was to be resettled with
Jimmy, being allowed to live on in retirement until I died. There would
be no attempt to apply gene therapy to me. Jimmy knew I wouldn't want it
that way.
Jimmy knew a lot. His intelligence
had been enhanced. Yet he'd failed to detect my lies. I had no intention
of accepting his new order. It gave me visions of a future that would continue
into a new realm of the vile and the disgusting. Mutants and genetically
enhanced humans would be at war. It was certain because man had not ceased
being a predator - monsters exterminating the old race could only be worse
than it.
Meeting Jimmy really did establish
me as one of the greatest of the survivalists. No other father could have
faked his way through that interview. Swimming through quicksand would
be easier. Emotions and inner pain would've choked them all. Their reactions
would've drawn in the 2WO guards - and then they'd have been put to death
with the rest.
I had suffered all of that before.
My family had abandoned me years back. The second time around with my son
it hurt even more. But I knew that the world was at a dead end and that
loss and desperate emotions were a big part of it. If my son could abandon
humanity I could abandon him.
--------
Two
days later I escaped the dome and headed out of the city
on
the same route I had used to enter it. Armored helicopters buzzed the trees
at the edge of town, but I managed to keep out of sight and work my way
North. At the camp of skeletons, I stopped and picked up a rifle and ammunition
and was leaving on the rail bed when three 2WO mutants emerged from the
pines to confront me.
These were soldiers with thick green
skin, heavy armor, laser weapons and high-speed Glock guns much more deadly
than my own rifle. One of them called for my surrender and I responded
by swinging the rifle off of my shoulder and firing. The shot bypassed
body armor and got the center mutant - the leader - in his unarmed throat.
Blood spurted grotesquely as he fell, and this frightened the others enough
that they ducked back.
They could have drawn and finished
me if they were smart. The window of a couple seconds their fear created
allowed me to roll down the bank and break for the trees. I burst through
sumac and into the pines, seeing bullets rip up the branches all around
me.
From there it became a stalking game
- kill or be killed. Cold-force laser beams and more bullets saturated
the forest around me and for about five minutes I remained behind a tree
trunk. When I moved I ran fast. I could hear them crashing through the
sumac to the pines so I made a dash through the smoke toward a shadowy
path and worked my way down a slight incline to heavier forest. I found
a large granite boulder partially curtained by vines, got behind it and
listened.
They came down the soft slope with
the cunning of foxes. I heard them whispering as they approached, then
they split up - one mutant heading past me while the other veered off to
the north.
Keeping my breathing light, I let
him pass. He poked around in the thorn bushes near another boulder then
he went through the trees toward a tiny clearing. A misplaced shot would
be the end of me so I didn't fire on him. Instead I crept up behind him
and got behind an oak. He looked into the clearing then turned back, and
when he passed I stepped out and planted my hunting knife in his back.
The soft forest duff muted his fall.
And I simply turned and hurried through the clearing. I kept moving at
a near run for a couple of kilometers then I fell winded on the bank of
a stream. Fortunately I didn't encounter the third mutant. About two hours
later I saw a helicopter pass and circle to head south. He was returning
to their base to report.
Dense forest became my accomplice
as I moved north. Sometimes the helicopters passed but they never spotted
me. A few days later the storms moved in and grounded all aircraft, making
it possible for me to move on at leisure.
Near home base I came upon a mutant
military encampment. There were hundreds of them dug in with special tents
and they had several all terrain vehicles. Surveillance told me what I'd
suspected - these soldiers didn't keep prisoners. The dead they abandoned
as food for the storms. At night I moved in, disabled their fencing of
sensors and stole some of their rations. Circling back I took a longer
route home.
Gunshots and artillery fire echoed
in the woods as I approached home base so I halted and did some poking
around. I crawled on my belly to a cabin on the perimeter and burst in
the door with my rifle at ready. Bodies littered the floor inside. They
were gore-spattered and riddled with bullets. All of them were friends
of mine and after seeing the blue face of Jack Bonon, one of our best fighters,
I knew it was over for my people. My last home would be gone in a few days.
The urge to shoot it out and die
rose in my blood. For a long time I sat under a tree cradling my head in
my hands. Perhaps too long as blue smoke was drifting in and I was in danger
of being found.
It would've been over for me then.
But as I looked up at the haze of sun in the treetops, an inner voice spoke,
telling me to move on and survive. And I did just that.
--------
A power far removed from survival
instinct drew me north. During that journey
a distant sun often broke through the brow of angry clouds and glared down
at me like the evil eye of some underworld god. Near Hudson Bay I walked
on in a hypnotized state while bear-paw gusts from a gale shattered nearby
trees. Nature brought up the rear, striking against the human enemy with
its own artillery blasts, yet I felt nothing and drifted forward with the
wind at my back, following the rippling grasses and waters.
I crashed through brush like a crazed
moose and barely noticed fly bites and the lashing of branches and thorns.
On the cloudiest days my head would clear and I would set up camp and do
some fishing or hunting. Even then I did little thinking on the human race
and what had become of it. I was more like a grunting cave man, content
to gnaw at his meat.
It was a bleak world, devoid of men
and their guns and mutated hatred. Only I existed, looking out of eyes
blackened by the rings marking an evil time. I had no use for society and
it was a good thing to be in the wild. Other men I would've simply shot,
had I encountered any.
My arrival at this slope had biblical
overtones. A huge flood subsided before me and I walked through a swamped
forest. Spooked wildlife fled in all directions in these woods, escaping
ghosts of the rain. Higher dry land brought me to the hilltop and from
there I looked down at the slope and the ancient forest sprouting in the
glacial melt.
A pale sun glowing with mystic light
sent beams streaming down. The chunks of ice glittered like scattered gems
and the whole scene took on a divine aspect like I was looking back into
the beginning of time. Days later when I'd done a detailed study of the
uncovered bones, minerals and plant specimens, I knew that I really was
looking back through millions of years.
The forest was quite dense in the
center and when I descended to it tall ferns gave me the feeling of being
lost in a maze. Deep in the twisted trees I found a small clearing. The
petrified logs I used to construct the cabin were heaped there beside a
glacial brook. I could see that a long dead river had carried the logs
to this spot and then over time they'd been buried in ice.
While perched on the logs, I decided
to build. Over the next few days I cut a path then I began to toil like
Sisyphus, using a slow technique of vines, small logs, stones and levers
to roll the big logs up the hill. Once there I notched them and fitted
them according to my plan. Two months passed as I did this work; I grew
dirty and callused and must have looked like a wild man. I also had the
feeling of being watched and often looked back to the forest, seeing nothing
other than fleeting shadows or rustling boughs and ferns.
It seemed impossible, but I finished
the cabin, and once inside I had plenty of time to rest and stare out the
gun slit window. I found that I really was being watched, as it was then
that the others came - and by others don't assume that I mean other survivalists
or mutant soldiers. These others were creatures emerging from millions
of years of hibernation.
When I first saw them sunset rays
were brightening the trees and creating glare. From a distance the creatures
resembled strange apes. They continued to move in the long shadows below
as twilight softened the sky. Near dark they began to walk up the slope,
and I seemed to awaken - the strange calm lifting and my scalp tightening
with fear. I did have a rifle, but for some reason it never occurred to
me to arm myself against them.
As they drew closer I noticed that
their fur was patterned and matted - a mathematical or puzzle-like effect.
A key symbol stood out on their chests. Belts of fur covered their genitals.
Light seemed to emit rather than reflect from the round eyes of these creatures.
And in place of a nose and mouth they had an orifice and protrusion resembling
antennae. A glow of darkness edged them, forming an aura of biological
energy I'd never seen before.
They shuffled up past the window,
and their strange eyes glowed in at me - passing an instinctual knowledge
of their being into my mind. I became aware of them as natural creatures
and not man-made mutants. Other thoughts passing in my head were unexplainable,
existing in a blur beyond my comprehension. I ended up gaping and drooling
like an epileptic as they moved around near the window.
A while later they left and my head
cleared. When I opened the door to look they were fading into the twilight
and the clawed roots of the ancient trees.
In the night they returned to haunt
me in my dreams. Feeling incredibly light I dream-walked out into a forest
salted by faint rays. Ferns brushed me as I passed through to the clearing,
and once there they emerged from crooked trees and surrounded me.
They spoke to me telepathically,
using inner voices that reminded me of the speech of beautiful children.
Images of understanding rose in my mind as they told me that the end had
come - that all men would perish as they had perished.
I knew they lacked hostile intentions;
they were the messengers of some nameless other. A being that granted awareness
of its existence but not clarity as to what it was in reality.
Long before the birth of man, the
creatures had ruled on Earth. Like us they'd abused nature and earned extinction.
The other destroyed them and buried them; not a trace was left for man
to find in his new beginning.
Yet the other did not forget his
mistakes; nature itself existed as this being's memory. Some of the creatures
had remained and lived in a bubble at the bottom of the ice. And in the
same way they had chosen me to live on as a memory of mankind.
In the dream they forced me to reveal
secrets I did not want to reveal - that I was a survivalist, that I didn't
want to live on as a specimen, that I would kill them if I could.
I awoke with a fever - sweaty and
mumbling in my bed. The morning sun was up and I could hear the faint whistling
of the wind in the cracks and chinks. Bars of shadow were sweeping over
the window and in my state I saw ghastly images in them.
Managing to rise, I went to the door
and looked out. Fresh air rushed to my nostrils with the power of an oxygen
charge. A beautiful day enveloped and uplifted me. I looked up at the racing
white clouds, and then I heard voices.
My eyes went to the slope, the forest
and ferns and finally settled on some dark patches of quicksand. Heat shimmies
rose from the gases bubbling up and for some reason I felt drawn to the
spot. A powerful force tugged at me and I started to move . . .
--------
Tomorrow,
morning comes again and I know I won't be able to resist.
I will hear the creatures calling and I will walk down the slope and into
that quicksand. It will consume me, suck me down to that bottom of all
bottoms; down to that great inheritance mankind passed on to me. There
I'll exist in the eternal memory of the other as the last remnant of man.
We have come to the end, mutant son
of man. So tell me - is it fair? Should Joe London live on forever in this
way? Bearing the weight of mankind and his evil on his shoulders?
Yes, you must think it is right.
You did come here to exterminate me, so it's certain that you won't weep
or shed so much as a single tear for me.
Yet if you can't weep for my kind,
perhaps you can weep for yourself and your own. Recall that the end has
come and that you are doomed as well. The other will work to fix his mistakes
and he will give the new world to a being that deserves it.
So in one sense the ending here in
this notebook at this cabin is your ending. It will be made in your mind.
The morning will come and you too will step out on that slope.
What end awaits you, mutant son of
man? Will you be crushed under clouds of doom or will the voices call and
bring you down to quicksand and to me . . .
--------
Doug
closed the notebook and thought about Joe London.
He'd been an admirable person, the hardiest of his kind and a bit of a
prophet. Joe had at least tried to warn the others. The leaders of the
old world had no excuses when people like London had clearly told them
what would happen. They were criminals, deserving of death penalty they'd
received.
Even London's son had lacked his
father's wisdom. Genetic improvement had broadened the scope of abilities
in some. Yet like those of old mankind, they failed to see that mutant
man would have no use for them. Like fools they'd herded inferiors to their
death and then met the same fate themselves.
Madness of a different sort had taken
Joe in the end - visions of creatures and the godlike other. Now he lay
at the bottom of the slope and at the bottom of the quicksand. Joe London
remained as a symbol of the fate the masters of his kind had prepared for
everyone.
In a way it could be seen as tragic
and comic - humorous to a degree. The notebook left Doug with an odd smile
on his face as he drifted off to sleep.
--------
Mutants have never dreamed
and
Doug's night passed in an instant. Bright morning sunlight streamed in
the window and his eyes were opening. Hunger ached in his belly so he pulled
out a rations square and boiled some hot tea.
Images from the notebook came to
mind as he sipped the hot liquid. A quick report on it seemed in order
so he got his handheld out and sent in a quick text file on the find.
Half an hour later he received new
instructions from 2WO. They wanted him to search the slope and forest to
verify that London really had died. Samples and photos would also be in
order.
"This is going to be great," Doug
thought as he walked to the door. "My find of London and the portion of
ancient forest will establish my name world wide."
A wonderful breeze swept his face
as he stepped out. Soft sunlight illumined the slope and the scene below
glowed like a mirage. The ancient trees quivered gently, tall ferns rustled
and clear blue water bubbled up in one of the melting pools. His eyes were
drawn to dark patches and he supposed them to be the quicksand containing
the remains of London.
Evaporating ice created areas of
drifting mist at the edge of the forest. This effect seeming to be almost
magical. Doug studied the glittering droplets, and then he spotted something
more and halted. A ghostly image moved near the water - a man. Doug nearly
gasped at the sight - had London fooled him? If so the notebook was an
elaborate trick. The old survivalist's intention had been to put him off
guard and ambush him.
Doug pulled a pistol from his side
pack, and when he looked again he saw the image of London fading in and
out like a strange holograph. It caused him to blink. Damned if he wasn't
seeing a ghost - and it was beginning to shimmer as its face and arms opened
to the sun.
Melting to mist, the glimmering phantom
rose, and Doug's eyes followed it. He expected to see it fade into the
pale northern sun, and it did. Only this sun had a huge solar storm at
its center - the pupil of an eye looking back at him.
Beyond the sun hostile clouds cloaked
the horizon. They were rolling in like some dark scroll of the end. Fear
charged him then his head began to whirl - another form of chaos and sunspots
had
blackened his thoughts.
Doug felt his legs giving way. He
could hear Joe London whispering something strange . . . and as he fell,
the voice of a child passed on a message he couldn't quite understand.
--------the
end---------
