Post-Human Trilogy Part 28

"Dear G.o.d," Old-timer uttered as he, Rich, and Djanet peered inside the room.

There wasn't anyone in there-at least not anyone recognizable. What appeared to be the organic material that once const.i.tuted a human being was splashed all over the room. It looked as though someone had taken several buckets of blood and hair and used them to paint the bed, carpet, and walls. A fetid odor of blood hung in the air. It briefly crossed Old-timer's mind that he was breathing the remnants of Katherine Keats. Suddenly nauseated, he covered his mouth and nose and turned away.

James was now on his knees, having removed his helmet, trying to get his breath. Thel held him, but she was as horrified as he.

"What the h.e.l.l happened?" Old-timer asked to no one in particular.

James struggled to speak as he continued to gasp for air. "The nans. The nans are the only thing that could have...liquefied a person like that. You need to get to your homes. This wasn't an earthquake. You need to get to your homes and see if this...if this h.e.l.l is happening everywhere."

"Oh my G.o.d," said Djanet, as she began to think of her family in Trinidad.

"Are you saying you think our families might..." Rich began to ask of James, the question too horrific to finish.

James looked up at him, desperation in his eyes. "I didn't see anyone out there. I didn't see a single person other than us."

"But how do we find our way home without the Net?" Old-timer asked. "It could take hours."

James sat and pondered this for a moment. "Maps," he said, still gasping. "Follow me."

7.

James and his four companions lifted off from his front lawn and ignited their magnetic fields. They raced toward the downtown core of the city, a sickening desperation seeping into each of their hearts as they began to accept that what they were dealing with was not just some scary virtual experience enjoyed late at night with a friend-this was real. Real.

As the group neared their destination, they slowed their approach, hovering just above the rooftops. There were no people. Usually, downtown flight was controlled by the A.I. One couldn't enter downtown airs.p.a.ce without inputting their destination into their mind's eye and giving over control of their flight to the A.I.'s highly organized transportation system. It was the only way to avoid thousands of collisions as millions of people buzzed around the downtown area every day, running errands, partic.i.p.ating in meetings, and generally partaking in the great business of the hive. Destinations had to be input like phone numbers, and then the inputee would be guided like a phone signal to wherever he or she desired to go. Tens of thousands of people buzzed around the core every hour of every day. And yet today, there was no one. The sky was empty. James could not help thinking that it was as beautiful as it was horrific.

When James looked down to the street, he saw where all those Icaruses had gone.

Red splashes stained the streets as far as the eye could see. Small, robotic street-cleaners were working furiously to wash and scrub the streets clean. It wasn't litter, coffee or latte spills that the robots were trying to wipe away; it was the inhabitants of the city.

"Oh no," James said to himself, the bottom of the world falling away and splashing to the pavement below alongside so many souls.

When they reached the Vancouver Public Library, James disengaged his magnetic field, and the rest of the team followed suit. Their eyes were wide as they absorbed their surroundings, aghast at the implacable stillness. Vancouver was a ma.s.sive mausoleum for the dreams and potential of millions of its former inhabitants.

"They're all gone," Thel uttered. "Can this possibly have happened everywhere?"

"We need to find out," Old-timer replied as he looked to James for instructions.

James turned and let himself float down to the main entrance of the old library, the others following as if in a shared trance. The library was one of the oldest buildings in the city and had been protected as a museum and an important historical artifact as other buildings were razed around it to make way for the new world. It wasn't practical like other modern-day buildings; it had been built to look like a coliseum that had spun itself until the gravitational forces caused its outer sh.e.l.l to peel away from the building. It gave the library the look of a spiral, like pictures of the Milky Way, with the walls reaching out like so many teeming solar systems-or, perhaps more appropriate to the current situation, like the spiraling water in a toilet after it had been flushed, humanity circling the bowl.

Modern buildings would never waste their time on architectural wonderment-things like walls that went nowhere; they were functional and practical. Usually they were tubular in shape-some cylindrical while others were squat like bees' nests. The outsides of the buildings were dotted with large circular entrance ways, each protected with its own magnetic field that would function as both a door and a window. The rooms in the buildings, whether apartments or offices, were always accessible through the exterior of the building or through the hollowed-out core in the interior of the building. There were no stairwells, no hallways, no elevators.

The inside of the library was archaic. After walking through a ma.s.sive lobby that stretched several stories into the sky, James led them into the main body of the building. The floors were connected to one another by escalator systems that had been shut down for decades and were rarely turned on now, so as to save wear and tear. To get from one floor to another, one had to ascend the frozen escalators like stairs, a task that required a willingness to indulge in embarra.s.sing atavistic behavior. James began to climb the stairs first, followed closely by Old-timer. The others stopped for a moment at the foot of the stairs and watched the strange movements of the two men's bodies.

"They look so...odd-like monkeys," Djanet observed.

"Everyone used to go between floors in buildings like that," Rich replied. "Can you imagine that? Being trapped on the ground, having to make a fool of yourself to get from one floor to another?" He shook his head at the demeaning thought.

"Well," Thel replied, "there doesn't appear to be anyone around to laugh at us." She shrugged and began climbing the stairs and rushed to catch up to James and Old-timer.

Djanet and Rich hesitantly began climbing as well, but after a few awkward moments, both lifted off the stairs and began to carefully fly, skimming along the surface of the metallic stairs to the second floor.

When they reached their companions, James was smashing the gla.s.s display cases that contained several maps and atlases. He flipped through them furiously, making sure they contained the needed information. Each atlas that pa.s.sed the test was handed off to one of the team members. "These old atlases will help guide you home."

"How?" Rich asked, taking an atlas from James. "I don't get how to use these old things."

"You'll have to get into s.p.a.ce, high enough above the stratosphere so you can generally see where you're going. Take your best guess and then head toward your home. When you get close to the surface you'll be blind, unable to navigate because you're too close. That's when you'll need these. They contain street and road names, and many of these old roads still exist. You can use them to guide you the rest of the way. If you find people, do everything you can to disconnect them from the Net, even if it means giving them a mild electric shock. When you're done, rendezvous back at my house and report to the rest of us. If you find no one, the order is the same, rendezvous and report. As horrible as this is, none of us has time to mourn. Is that clear for everyone?"

"What are you going to do?" Old-timer asked James.

"I'm going to New York with Thel to check on her sister," he replied. "Go as quickly as you can."

And with that, each member of the team made his or her way out of the building and into the air. James shared a last look with Old-timer before the centenarian activated his magnetic field and darted upward like a flash of lightning striking back at G.o.d.

Thel and James darted upward too, up into s.p.a.ce, up above the world that had cradled humanity from the beginning to what appeared to be the end.

When Old-timer and James shared that last look, Old-timer's eyes had said what James was thinking. "We're the last. We're the Omega."

8.

James followed Thel's lead as they streaked out of the atmosphere and eastward, above the continent. There was no way to communicate other than with hand signals, but Thel's extreme speed was making it impossible for James to stay within range of her. For most of the trip, Thel was just a little green star, at times more than a kilometer away from him. He understood her mindset: She had to get home. But with each pa.s.sing moment, James was becoming more and more sure that there would be no one to greet her when they arrived.

Thel slowed for a moment over the eastern seaboard of North America before plunging downward at several times the speed of sound. Most of the east coast was completely clear of cloud cover, and it made it easy for her to eyeball her home. James lost sight of her as she darted downward, but he figured it would be easy enough to pick her up again, as he guessed for himself where the city was. Nevertheless, he estimated a little too far to the south and found himself traveling up the coastline. Before long, he reached Manhattan and was slowing down as he flew over the Brooklyn Bridge.

He'd visited Thel in New York countless times, including that fateful night last New Year's Eve when he'd started to have the wrong thoughts-the ones that were recorded by the nans and reported to his wife-reported to everyone. The message e-mailed to everyone on his contact list, neighbors, co-workers, relatives, was simple: High s.e.xual Arousal in Presence of Thel Cleland, Sat.u.r.day, December 31st.

The thoughts were reported because he was married. The nans didn't report regular s.e.xual attraction to members of the opposite s.e.x, even if those feelings occurred outside of a marriage. They only reported the strong feelings-the ones strong enough that they might cause the subject to act. People were reported all the time. Most people were reported several times in their marriages, but it was the first time that it had happened to James-and James was supposed to be special.

Despite the number of times James had been to New York, he'd never visited the Brooklyn Bridge. Like the Vancouver Public Library, it was a relic, even more so in fact, but unlike the library and very much like modern architecture, it had been practical in its time. It wasn't very functional anymore; no one had need for a bridge now so it was preserved as a keepsake of an earlier time-an odd time when the bridge was a lifeline to the rest of the world. Crude petrol-fueled vehicles had once rolled over the bridge on crude rubber tires; nowadays, the only people who visited it were those curious about a bygone era. One could walk over the bridge and pretend they were like those sad creatures who were locked to the ground, slaves to gravity like most mammalians.

A closer inspection of the bridge revealed more red stains. Icaruses all over.

New York, the second biggest hive in North America, was deserted. Just like Vancouver, there was no one flying above the ma.s.sive skysc.r.a.pers and famous skyline-no one but James.

James darted toward Thel's apartment. She lived in a skysc.r.a.per near the Empire State Building. Her building dwarfed the old relic and stretched over 300 stories into the sky, but even it was nowhere near the tallest building in the city. Thel lived on the 193rd floor, but with no automatic guiding system, it was extremely difficult to find her apartment among the thousands in the building. He guessed the general proximity and disengaged his magnetic field. "Thel!" he called out.

"James!" Thel sobbed in return. She was above him, leaning out of the entrance to the apartment she shared with her younger sister. She looked faint and, with no nans to prevent her from falling victim to shock, she stumbled off the ledge.

James raced up to catch her in his arms and then guided her back into her apartment. It was luxurious inside, as all homes were now. With no limits to the size of new buildings, it became possible for ma.s.sive numbers of people to live in s.p.a.cious apartments, even in places as densely populated as New York City. James put Thel down on her couch as she sobbed and held her hands to her head.

"She was...she's...in her bedroom," she related to James in a weak voice. "There's...almost nothing. Oh G.o.d."

James didn't say anything in response. The pain was beyond words. He'd experienced it too. Everyone was gone. Everyone. The loss was complete-inescapable-blackness.

"I'm gonna be sick," Thel uttered before holding her hands to her mouth.

"Don't!" James responded, holding her head back as the vomit rushed into her mouth. "We don't have any food. You need to keep it in, Thel. I need you to swallow it down."

Thel did as James asked her, choking back the vomit and wiping tears from her eyes.

"You'll need those calories. We don't have a replicator. There's no way to eat."

"James, what's happening? What could have done this...and why?"

James stood and walked to the entrance of Thel's apartment. The magnetic door was still disengaged, and the wind blew through his hair as he reached the ledge. Like Vancouver, there were fires in the city and robots fighting those fires and cleaning the streets, but other than that, there was nothing-not even people. No people. That was the future. But in a way, it was also like looking back in time.

"It was definitely the nans, but other than that, I'm not sure yet."

"Is it everywhere? Is there...anyone left besides us?"

"I'm not-"

"James, tell me what you're thinking! I know you have an idea. I can see it in your eyes!"

She could see right through him.

"I think something went wrong with the download." He turned to Thel, who was still sitting on the couch, ghostly white and streaked with tears and sweat and vomit. "I think there was a virus in the upgrade."

"How? There are so many safeguards. It's impossible...isn't it?"

James shook his head. This he really did not know. "Thel, we need to rendezvous with the others as quickly as possible. We're not safe. None of us should be alone."

9.

Rich Borges sucked his lips back against his teeth, a habit he'd had since he was old enough to experience stress for the first time. Stress became a frequent visitor when the Governing Council identified you as a gifted scientist. Decades of trials and tests were all one had to look forward to before they finally deemed you fit to partic.i.p.ate on a real project. Rich was fifty-four years old before he was chosen to replace another scientist during the Martian terraforming project. That was over fifteen years ago. Ever since then, his life had been far less stressful. He got along beautifully with Commander Keats and, as a result, was handpicked to partic.i.p.ate with the small group who were working on Venus. Added to that, the nans usually regulated his mood enough to keep his anxiety problems in check. But now, without their a.s.sistance, he was coming apart at the seams, reverting to that old familiar sucking and the grinding of his teeth that used to accompany every exam situation. A twisting feeling roiled in his stomach as he wondered if he knew all the variables.

As he traveled up the west coast of North America from his home in San Francisco, past Oregon and Washington State, right through Seattle, he wondered what those variables were. He hadn't seen a soul. His huge family was gone. He was a great-grandfather, the patriarch of a family with nearly one hundred members, but they were all gone. He'd checked on them all. Some of them were erased completely, no sign of them. Others were just red stains on carpets or couches, impossible to identify, the sickening smell of blood permeating everything. He was a patriarch no more.

During his training days, Rich developed a wicked sense of humor. It was a coping mechanism. Being funny made it easier to deal with stress. If you always focus on making people laugh, you're less focused on your own fears-on your deficiencies. It also put other people at ease. If they felt less threatened by you, by the clown, they wouldn't look as hard for your faults. Rich felt riddled with faults. He was Swiss cheese.

All those faults were coming to the surface now. He could barely keep his eyes open as he headed north past Seattle. He would be in Vancouver soon, a city he'd seldom visited before today. He didn't know the city well; all he had was his atlas. Thank G.o.d my city shares a coast with Vancouver, he thought. He would have been hopelessly lost if he'd had to travel a more complicated route. He was totally dependent on the automation of daily life and he knew it. And now he was left to his own devices. Completely free. Terrifying.

Rich was relieved when Vancouver appeared in the distance. Soon the rest of the group would return, and he wouldn't be alone anymore. It was too quiet. Disconnected from the Net, disconnected from millions of voices, it was like being dead. Was he dead?

It wasn't as easy to find Commander Keats's house as one might have thought. Rich had noticed that James often believed the people around him were as perceptive as he. Most of the team members had never been to James's house, yet he expected them all to know the way back. How? Was Rich supposed to notice something about the Commander's street that made it different from the thousands of other city streets? The house looked like all the rest of the houses-metallic, an igloo shaped bunker with some gra.s.s out front and a few big trees in the backyard. Not much to go on. Was Rich supposed to know the types of flowers in the front garden? James would probably notice that type of detail. He'd know all the Latin names. Having a photographic memory must be wonderful. But what about everyone else? Rich, like almost everyone else before today, had a 149 IQ-he was brilliant. But not that brilliant. Not brilliant enough to think his way through this. Not brilliant enough to stand over the remains of his whole family, his children, his grandchildren, his great-grandchildren, and comprehend it all.

And now he had to find that one G.o.dd.a.m.ned house. One house! And I can't even do that! He stopped in a neighborhood that looked exactly like the fifty neighborhoods he'd just been in and sat on a tree stump. He disengaged his magnetic field and took off his helmet and gloves and struck a pose reminiscent of Rodin's Thinker. It was sunny outside now, and the subdivision he was in was built on the side of a mountain. He was looking over water that sparkled like he'd never seen water sparkle before. He'd thought San Francisco was the most beautiful city in the world, but he had to admit now that it couldn't hold a candle to Vancouver in July. Why hadn't he come here before? He thought that maybe if his family were still alive, he might have brought them up for a vacation. The camping must be amazing.

They're all gone.

Suddenly, the silence was replaced by something else. A hum-electrical-not far away. He turned to his left and saw the source: a street-cleaner. But it wasn't cleaning the street. He'd never seen a street-cleaner that wasn't cleaning a street before. It seemed to be coming toward him.

Alarmed, Rich stood quickly. "What the h.e.l.l?"

The street cleaner stopped. What was it doing?

Suddenly, another hum. This time it was to his right. The same thing. A street cleaner coming toward him. He'd never noticed how ugly they were before. They must have weighed a couple of hundred kilograms with all of the equipment they had to carry-all of the cleaning fluid they needed to transport. They were modern-functional. The A.I. had designed them. Aesthetic appeal was apparently not one of the parameters in their design. They looked like robotic hunchbacks. A large head was always close to the pavement, held by a skinny, giraffe-like neck-always, except for now that is. Now, the neck held the head and its glowing red eye two meters into the air, craning it toward Rich.

"What do you want?" Rich took a defensive stance and the second robot stopped as well. They didn't leave. They stood to either side of him while their electric hum sent chills throughout Rich's body. Never had a robot approached him. It was unwholesome. Suddenly they were alive. No longer invisible machines. "Are you watching me?" Rich asked.

A third hum joined the fray. Another street cleaner began to approach from behind the first robot.

"It's starting to get a bit crowded in here, don't you think, fellas?"

Then salvation came. Two green b.a.l.l.s of light cruised overhead.

"Oh thank G.o.d!" Rich put his helmet back on and lifted off into the air. "I'll be seeing you guys around, okay? Say hi to everyone else in Freaky Robot Town for me, will ya?"

He ignited his magnetic field and blazed through the sky in pursuit of his two companions.

10.

James and Thel set down in his front yard in the late afternoon sun. Old-timer was already there, looking pale and extraordinarily grim but relieved to see the safe return of his friends.

"Where's Rich?" James asked him, concern in his voice. "He should have been the first one back."

"He's right behind you," Old-timer responded.

At that very moment, Rich was disengaging his magnetic field and pulling off his helmet. "Had a bit of trouble finding the place."

"I'm just glad you're okay," James replied, putting his hand on Rich's shoulder.

"Screw that! I'm not okay!" Rich exclaimed, his lip quivering as he felt himself coming apart at the seams, his anxiety overwhelming him. "I'm not even close to okay! Everybody's dead! Everybody's dead!"

Thel pulled Rich close and let him sob on her shoulder. "We know, Rich. We know. Everyone's gone."