The Apocalypse Seven
Page 38
“I want to know what you tell them about what happened.”
“Oh, that. We all agreed—”
“I know what we agreed.”
“We agreed on a version of the truth,” Touré said. “I tell them we were taken off the planet by an extraterrestrial, then came a great plague, and now the danger’s over and it’s time to rebuild. I mean, it’s close. Enough so they don’t dig too much further.”
There had been a number of doctors who came through, heard this, and wanted to know the details of the plague that never actually happened. They were told not to worry about it, but at least a few would probably keep looking for an explanation. It couldn’t be helped, but it wouldn’t matter, since they weren’t going to find anything where they were looking.
“Is that exactly what you tell them?” Robbie asked. “In those words.”
“Maybe not those words, exactly.”
“Rescued,” Robbie said. “You tell them we were rescued. Don’t you?”
Touré sighed.
“These people are scared, Robbie. Their world just got upended, and . . . they want to believe something good happened and that now they’re okay. They need a good story; it gives them hope.”
“We agreed to never tell them what we did, because they wouldn’t understand,” Robbie said. “That’s fine. But do not make him a hero. Okay? Promise me.”
“I don’t think that’s what I’m doing.”
“That’s exactly what you’re doing.”
“Okay,” Touré said. “I promise.”
“Thank you.” Robbie stood. “I have a meeting with the council. Come by for dinner, you and Win.”
“Love to.”
They shook hands.
“See you around,” Touré said.
“Yeah, see you.”
Robbie walked off. He was intercepted by Bethany, who gave him a quick hug on his way by. Then she gave Touré a What’s his deal these days? shrug, and went back to what she was doing.
“It wasn’t your fault, Robbie,” Touré said. “We all did it together.”
Robbie couldn’t hear him, but it wouldn’t matter if he had, because Robbie wouldn’t have listened anyway.
Touré sighed and checked his watch again.
It was time.
A dark patch opened in the middle of the lawn, expanding quickly to the size of a school bus. Several of the people near the tables, even people who had seen this all before, gasped at the sight.
Then the shadow bubble popped out of existence, leaving behind ten people. They were spread out on the grass, asleep, unaware that their entire life was about to get turned upside down.
Touré jumped to his feet and picked up his megaphone.
Let’s get this show started, he thought.
“WELCOME, EVERYONE!” he said. “IT’S THE YEAR 2129, AND BOY DO I HAVE A STORY FOR YOU!”
Acknowledgments
I had to lean on a number of people in order to get this story out of my head. Some provided expertise I didn’t have, some acted as a sounding board and/or quietly put up with me, and a few did a little of both.
For the technical stuff: John Blackwell, who provided me with answers to my many astronomical questions; David Wallace-Wells, who does not know me, but who wrote the invaluable and terrifying The Uninhabitable Earth; and the Friends of the Blue Hills Reservation—specifically the ranger whose name I have tragically forgotten, but who was willing to answer a long list of rather outlandish questions during what was supposed to be a company outing.
For putting up with me: my coworkers Nikki Durand, Kevin Wong, Noam Katz, Shane Dwyer, and Hongshuang Li. Specifically, Kevin for mentioning the wild boars of Fukushima, Nikki for talking me out of a half-dozen titles, and Noam for confirming that MIT really does have a tunnel system. You guys let me rant on about the apocalypse on the company’s time and nobody called HR or anything, so thank you.
Thanks to my editor, John Joseph Adams, for thinking “it looked like Robbie slept through the apocalypse” was a decent place to start, and Jaime Levine of HMH, for answering every random question with a sincere “Let’s go find out.”
And finally, thanks to my wife, Deb, who has spent years walking around Cambridge and Boston with me, little knowing that half the time, in my head, I was saying, What if ALL these people were just . . . gone? And just for putting up with me, in general.
About the Author
© Leanne’s Studio of Photography
Gene Doucette is the author of more than twenty sci-fi and fantasy titles, including The Spaceship Next Door and The Frequency of Aliens, the Immortal series, Fixer and Fixer Redux, Unfiction, and the Tandemstar books. Doucette lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
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