The Boy at the End of the World

by Greg Van Eekhout

  “That’s very interesting,” said Fisher. “I’ll remember that while they’re eating my guts.”

  But Fisher and Click weren’t their prey. They wanted the larger source of protein. Three parrots leaped from their perches.

  This was Fisher’s chance to flee.

  Instead, he bolted into the open. “Run,” he screamed, smacking the mammoth’s rump with the shaft of his spear. Squealing, Protein thundered across the clearing, into the relative safety of the dense plants. Fisher ran after him.

  Then, a fresh rush of wind and shadow. An earth-pounding thud and a puff of dust. Towering over him, a crimson-plumed parrot spread its wings and unleashed an ear-gouging squawk. Fisher turned. Another parrot loomed behind him, green and blue and equally massive.

  This was the price he paid for not obeying his impulse to escape. He’d let some other feeling he couldn’t name make his decision for him, and instead of listening to the no-doubt horrible sounds of the mammoth being eaten alive, in a few seconds he’d be listening to his own horrible sounds. He couldn’t blame the mammoth for this. He couldn’t even blame Click. His own weakness was at fault. This was what he got for not thinking of his own survival first.

  Well, some of this was Click’s fault. He should have given Fisher a smarter personality profile. If he survived the parrots, Fisher would make sure to yell very loudly at the robot.

  The blue parrot thrust out a claw. Fisher met it with his spear and buried the point between two of the monster bird’s toes. The parrot shrieked and beat its wings to get away. Fisher ducked as a wingtip swept over his head.

  He backed away, only to have his path cut off by yet another parrot, this one orange and green. He was now surrounded by a trio of terror birds.

  If he died, nobody would be around to ask what had finally killed off the human species. Which was a little bit of a good thing, because the answer—“They were eaten by parrots”—was not the kind of legacy he wanted to leave behind.

  A rhythmic pounding pushed through all the bird squawks. Another bird? Something even worse? Fisher glanced around, looking for the next attack. But it was Protein in full charge.

  Why hadn’t the mammoth sought safety? Fisher wondered, astonished. Was it as stupid as Fisher?

  Protein rammed his head into the orange parrot, striking it low. The parrot let out an anguished cry and hopped backward on a now-crooked leg, flapping its wings to stay balanced. It hunkered down with puffed feathers, no longer interested in the kill.

  Fisher didn’t hesitate now. He raced for the cover of the thicket, the mammoth at his side. He did not look back. He didn’t have to. He could hear the red parrot on his heels. Its shadow curled over his head, and through the corner of his eye, Fisher caught sight of a sharp beak coming down.

  Protein drew ahead and crashed into the brush, and with a desperate leap, Fisher dove across the last several feet. He smacked into saplings, snapping wood and scratching his face. Even then, he didn’t stop. He crawled and scrabbled and gained his feet and slalomed around the trees until the growth was too thick for the giant bird’s wingspan to get through.

  Enraged, the parrot shrieked behind him. It bit at the trees. It beat them with its mighty wings. It pushed and squeezed to get its head into the brush, but it was no use. The bird was simply too large.

  Fisher found Click and Protein in the striped shadows of the thicket. Breathing so hard he nearly threw up, he sank to his knees.

  “You jeopardized your own life for the sake of the mammoth,” Click said. “You cannot continue if you are dead.”

  “I thought you said the mammoth could help me survive,” Fisher rasped, struggling to catch his breath.

  Click whirred. “The animal’s presence does offer some advantages, but you must weigh those against the risks.”

  “Let’s get some distance from the birds now,” Fisher said.

  They crept through the plant growth beneath the ruined towers, Fisher’s eyes darting everywhere, watching for the next danger.

  “I still might eat you later,” Fisher told Protein.

  The mammoth walked beside him, its own thoughts hidden behind its eyes.

  CHAPTER 7

  They walked for days. Fisher’s neck hurt from constantly watching the sky for parrots. He kept a relentless pace despite his blistering feet and the gnawing stomach he couldn’t fill. He just wanted away from the parrots, away from the wreckage of his Ark, away from a place and a past that had nothing to offer him.

  If only getting away didn’t involve trudging through so much rain. At first there was just a wispy curtain of drizzle, but toward the end of the long, soggy afternoon, the weather began to punish. Rain drilled down hard enough to sting Fisher’s face. The drops made thousands of tiny craters in the mud and plinked against Click’s body like pebbles. Only Protein seemed unperturbed. If anything, the mammoth moved with more purpose, leading the way down animal trails that were rapidly becoming rivers.

  “Why is there mud?” Fisher called to Click over the din of the rain.

  Click took a moment to process the question. “Because … it is raining.”

  “I know that. I can tell from all the water falling on us. What I mean is, why is there mud? What’s it for, other than to slow us down and make us miserable?”

  “Worms and fungi and many insects find mud a hospitable environment,” said Click. “Mud stores water for absorption by plants. Large herbivores use mud to—”

  “That’s not what I’m asking. I’m asking …” Fisher trailed off. What was he asking? “Why is nature like this? Why is it so hard to find food? Why do things hunt us? Why is it so hard to survive? Who made it this way? Why did they make it this way?”

  “Humanity struggled with such issues for nearly its entire existence. Your brain evolved to ask questions. By seeking to understand your world, you attempt to control it, and trying to control your environment is a survival strategy. You see trees and wonder how you can use them to build shelter. You see a rock, and you seek to make a tool out of it. You see mud, and you ask how and what and why.”

  Fisher trudged along. “You still haven’t told me why the world was made this way.”

  “It is a question that cannot be answered. But it is good to keep asking.”

  Fisher growled profanity at him.

  Lightning cracked across the sky. Thunder smashed like a fist. Then came the sound of giant bones snapping and something like the moaning of an ancient, dying creature. Ahead on the path, a massive tree fell. Roots tore from the ground and flung up flaps of earth. Birds exploded into the sodden sky. Hundreds of small creatures raced for safety. With an explosion of leaves and bark and dust, the tree struck the ground.

  If Fisher had been just a few more yards further up the path, he’d have been squashed flat.

  Why had he bothered asking Click all those questions about mud and nature? He knew what nature’s purpose was. It was there to kill him, just as it had killed a squirrel Fisher found beneath a branch. He picked the squirrel up and stowed it for later in Click’s dorsal compartment.

  “We need to find shelter!” he shouted to the robot over the downpour. In addition to the danger of falling trees, there were also lightning strikes to fear. And from the way the water on the ground was pooling above his ankles, there was also drowning.

  Protein used his trunk and tusks to drag some big, broken branches out of the way and began making his way around the fallen tree. He moved with such purpose. Fisher remembered what Click had said about elephants, and possibly mammoths, knowing their environments, and so far Protein seemed to be proving the robot right.

  Plodding through the mud, the mammoth made good speed and didn’t look back. He was just a big gray shape in the curtain of rain, and Fisher struggled to keep up as the mammoth climbed a path and squeezed between two huge boulders. Just past the boulders was the opening of a cave. Fisher and Click followed him inside. The mammoth’s eyes gleamed in the dark.

  The air was damp and cold, an
d the ground squelched beneath Fisher’s feet, but at least the space was protected from the rain.

  Protein moved further back into the cave, where there was not enough light to see. Meanwhile, Click slumped against the wall and whirred softly.

  “I have set power-saving mode to start in five minutes. If you require me to be operational after that, nudge me.”

  Fisher wished he had a power-saving mode himself, because he doubted he could sleep in here. Only dim light filtered in through the mouth of the cave, and who knew what lurked in the dark?

  Fisher drank a little bit of pooled rainwater and decided to explore his environment.

  Grooves scarred the cave walls, as if something sharp had scraped away rock. And from further back came a distinct grinding noise. Judging by the fresh mounds of dung on the floor, Fisher had a good guess what was responsible for the grooves and grinding.

  He found Protein gouging the wall with his tusks. Gray-white chunks of mineral broke from the wall, and the mammoth lifted chips into its mouth.

  Fisher picked up a small flake and touched it to his tongue. Salty.

  “This is consistent with elephant behavior,” Click said, his creaky joints announcing his approach. “Salt is a necessary part of all mammal’s diets, and elephants have been known to return to locations rich in the mineral. It’s possible that Protein’s ancestors have been coming to this cave for generations.”

  Fisher knew salt could be used to dry and preserve fish. That way, one could carry food for long distances and not worry about it spoiling. Rotten meat would threaten Fisher’s survival. Maybe he could skin the squirrel he’d found beneath the fallen tree and preserve its meat with salt.

  “Pop open your hatch for me,” Fisher said, gathering up handfuls of the rock salt and stuffing them around the dead squirrel.

  Protein grunted, curled his trunk around a huge chunk of rock salt, and tenderly placed it inside Click’s hatch.

  “Don’t overload me,” Click said, wobbling. “Tipping over backward will interfere with my ability to walk.”

  “Just a couple more chunks,” Fisher assured the robot as he reached down.

  His hand came to a stop, hovering over the ground.

  He’d uncovered something else.

  He had never seen such a thing before, but he knew instantly what it was.

  A human skull.

  CHAPTER 8

  Fisher picked up the skull. He tried to imagine what it would look like blanketed with muscle and flesh and skin, with a nose and eyes gazing back at him.

  More human remains lay nearby. A few more skulls. A scattering of ribs and vertebrae, a pelvis.

  It took Fisher a while before he found his voice. “Did they come from the Ark?”

  “No,” said Click. “These remains are very old. They must belong to Stragglers, those few living humans who were left outside once the Ark was sealed.”

  “What? Why didn’t you tell me about this before?”

  Clicked whirred. “Is this useful information to you? I do not see how it helps you survive.”

  Fisher turned back to the skull’s gaping eye sockets. Of course, there must have been people still alive on the outside when the Ark was shut tight. That only made sense, but Fisher hadn’t really thought about it. Until now. He could imagine himself as one of them—one of these Stragglers. He imagined shivering before a dying fire, starving, being picked off by stronger animals.

  What would he do if he knew that, somewhere, there was a protected shelter with technology that might give him a better chance of survival?

  “Did Stragglers ever try to get into the Ark?”

  “Yes, but they didn’t succeed. The builders provided defense systems to prevent just such a thing. There were electrified barriers and automated guns. Any potential intruders were dealt with.”

  “You mean killed.”

  “Yes,” said Click. “If let inside, they would have scavenged the Ark technology. They would have eaten the preserved specimens. The Ark was designed to protect itself from such threats.”

  Maybe Fisher was imagining it, but the machine seemed smug.

  Fisher set the skull back exactly where he’d found it.

  Nearby, scratches marked the cave wall. They were shallower than the mammoth-tusk scrapes, and made up of short vertical and horizontal lines. Unlike the questionable markings on the smoke-coated ceiling of the ruins, these were unmistakable.

  “This is writing,” Fisher said. “The Stragglers.”

  Click didn’t deny it. “I am somewhat surprised the Stragglers could write.”

  Fisher leaned in closer. The carved letters were faint and hard to read. But making them out seemed important. To read the thoughts of long-dead people seemed as crucial a part of being human as building a fire.

  “Few of us left,” Fisher read. “We are sick, and we fade. There is light in the Ark, and warmth, and food, but we cannot get in. The guns killed many. Even now, gadgets chase us and kill more.”

  “Gadgets?” Fisher turned to Click. “The guns could chase people?”

  “No, the defense systems were fixed into the Ark’s entrance. They could not pursue intruders. The Straggler must have been confused. Perhaps illness damaged his or her brain.”

  Fisher scowled and continued reading. “Our hopes lie now with the legends of the other place. Tomorrow, we leave our dead behind and make our way due west to the Great Arch. From there, we take the Whale Road south, past the City of Ghosts, to the Southern Ark.”

  Fisher remembered the partial message from the ruins: “Wha … D.” Fill in the missing letters, and it spelled “Whale Road.”

  He turned to Click. “Southern Ark?”

  Click whirred and clicked for a while. “I know of no other Arks,” he said. “But it is possible that others were built.”

  “Click, do you know what this means? There could be people there. Living humans. I might not be the last one after all.”

  Click released a small hydraulic gurgle. “Even assuming a Southern Ark exists, even assuming you could find it, it may well have suffered the same fate as your own Ark. And the odds of you reaching it alive are remote. A journey of such a distance would expose you to predators, or injury, or starvation, or hypothermia, or heat stroke. You would face dangers from these so-called ‘gadgets.’ You would be putting your survival at great jeopardy. You would be risking yourself without knowing what you have to gain.”

  Everything Click said was true. Fisher’s job was to survive, not to launch himself on dangerous missions. But what was the point in struggling to keep himself alive if he really was the last person left? Wouldn’t that be just a lot of stupid running around, waiting to die with no purpose?

  Another Ark offered a true promise of life. Life with other people. Continuing the human species.

  He looked into Click’s expressionless, cracked face.

  “Will you come with me?”

  “Do you know how to change my programming so that I am no longer required to assist you?”

  “No,” Fisher said.

  “Then I am coming with you,” Click said with a pneumatic hiss that sounded very much like a sigh.

  CHAPTER 9

  They started out when the sun broke and the wet earth breathed steam, and they kept walking, for hours, and days, and weeks.

  First there were forests of maple and ash, and then lower lands with seas of swaying grass. The days were filled with the electric buzz of bees and the raspy whisper of the mammoth pushing through stalks of wild wheat and barley.

  Fisher’s blisters bled, and he limped, and the blisters healed and formed calluses. He robbed birds’ nests of eggs, and insects stung his neck and formed maddening welts. He ate small bony fish and flowers when he could, and some nights he found nothing and dreamed of salmon leaping into his arms. He nibbled on his salted squirrel only as a last resort. He built roaring fires on some nights, and on other nights he could find no fuel and he shivered, curled up against Protein’s sleeping bulk
. There were days of rain, and days of wretched heat, and he carried on.

  They followed the sun west, hopefully toward the Great Arch, but Click had no idea how far they’d have to go.

  “I was never programmed with detailed geography,” he explained. “The builders never intended for me to range far from the Ark. This was a job for other units. But even with advanced geography programming, my knowledge would be out of date. Rivers change course. Seismic activity changes the shape of the land. What was once a lake could now be a salt flat. What was once a desert could now be marsh.”

  Fisher occupied his mind with thoughts of food. Not just how badly he wanted food, but how to get it. Finding the crushed squirrel had been a stroke of luck, and he stopped to check every fallen log for another smashed animal. He found none, but he began to wonder if he couldn’t make his own luck. Of course there was no way to bring down a tree, at least not with his spear. But what about the rocks he often found among the undergrowth? The best meal he’d had since becoming born was the crayfish, and he’d killed it with a rock.

  Grunting, Protein lowered himself for a rest. Whenever this happened Fisher had no choice but to stop as well, for no amount of poking and prodding and profanity could get the mammoth moving again once it decided to stop. As Click went into power-saving mode, Fisher decided to use the time to experiment.

  He gathered a twig and a flat stone about the size of his face, stood the twig up, and gently placed the stone on the twig’s end. The twig toppled over and the stone tumbled with it, but Fisher wasn’t discouraged. He wanted the rock to fall. Just not yet.

  He gathered more twigs, and after an hour of trial and error, managed to get the rock delicately balanced on a tripod-arrangement of three thin sticks. The slightest movement would bring the rock down. Which was exactly what he hoped for. He baited the trap with a few wrinkled purple berries and snuck off to hide in the bushes.

  He knew from his imprinting that patience was the most important skill in fishing, and he figured the same must be true with trapping. And yet, after only a few minutes of silent crouching, a slender, brown-furred rodent crept near his deadfall trap. Fisher held his breath. He glanced quickly at Protein and Click, hoping his companions wouldn’t move or make a noise to scare away his furry little quarry.