Death's End

by Cixin Liu

  “I need to contact Sophon,” she said.

  The mayor shook his head, but her unexpected request had chased away some of his exhaustion. He looked serious. “That’s not possible. First, this department is too low level to directly establish contact with her. Even the provincial government doesn’t have such authority. No one knows where on Earth she is now. Also, communication with the outside world is extremely difficult now. We’ve just been cut off from the provincial government, and we’re about to lose electricity here.”

  “Can you send me to Canberra?”

  “I can’t provide an aircraft, but I can dispatch a ground vehicle. However, that may end up being even slower than walking. Ms. Cheng, I strongly urge you to stay put. There’s chaos everywhere right now, and it’s very dangerous. The cities are being bombed—believe it or not, it’s relatively peaceful here.”

  Since there was no wireless power system, flying cars were not usable in the resettlement zones. Only self-powered aircraft and ground vehicles were available, but the roads had become impassable.

  * * *

  As soon as Cheng Xin left the city government, she heard another explosion. A new column of smoke rose in another direction, and the crowd turned from merely anxious to genuinely agitated. She pushed her way through and found her bike. She would have to ride more than fifty kilometers to reach the provincial government and try to contact Sophon from there. If that didn’t work, she’d try to get to Canberra.

  No matter what, she would not give up.

  The crowd quieted as an immense information window appeared over the city government, almost as wide as the tent itself. This was used only when the government needed to broadcast extremely important news. Since the electric voltage wasn’t stable, the window flickered, but against the dim sky of early dawn, it showed images very clearly.

  In the window was Canberra’s Parliament House. Though it was completed in 1988, people still referred to it as the “new” Parliament House. From a distance, the building appeared as a bunker nestled against a hill, and on top of it was possibly the world’s tallest flag mast. The mast, over eighty meters in height, was further elevated by four gigantic steel beams. They were meant to symbolize stability, but they now resembled the frame of a large tent. The UN flag flew from the building: The UN had moved its headquarters here after the Sydney Riots.

  Cheng Xin felt a giant fist close around her heart. She knew that the day of the Last Judgment had arrived.

  The view shifted to inside the House of Representatives, which was filled by all the leaders of Earth International and Fleet International. Sophon had called for an emergency session of the UN General Assembly.

  Sophon stood at the dispatch box, still dressed in camouflage and a black scarf, but without the katana. There was no trace on her face of the glamorous cruelty that everyone had grown used to in the past year; instead, she appeared radiant in her beauty. She bowed to the assembled leaders of humanity, and Cheng Xin saw again the gentle hostess practicing the Way of Tea whom she had met two years ago.

  “The Great Resettlement is over!” Sophon bowed again. “Thank you! I’m grateful to all of you. This is a tremendous accomplishment, comparable to the walk out of Africa by your ancestors tens of thousands of years ago. A new era for our two civilizations has begun!”

  Everyone in the House of Representatives turned their head anxiously as something exploded outside. The four lighting beams hanging from the ceiling swayed, and all the shadows along with them, as though the building was about to collapse. But Sophon continued speaking: “Before the magnificent Trisolaran Fleet arrives to bring you a happy new life, everyone must endure a difficult period lasting three months. I hope humanity will perform as well as it did during the Great Resettlement.

  “I proclaim now the complete severance of the Australian Reservation from the outside world. Seven strong-interaction space probes and the Earth Security Force will enforce an absolute blockade. Anyone attempting to leave Australia will be treated as an invader of Trisolaris and be exterminated without mercy!

  “The defanging of Earth must proceed. During the next three months, the reservation must be kept in a state of subsistence agriculture. The use of any modern technology, including electricity, is strictly prohibited. As everyone present can see, the Earth Security Force is in the process of systematically eliminating all electricity-generating equipment in Australia.”

  People around Cheng Xin looked at each other in disbelief, hoping that someone else could help explain what Sophon had just said.

  “This is genocide!” someone in the House of Representatives cried out. The shadows continued to sway, like corpses dangling from nooses.

  It was indeed genocide.

  The prospect of keeping 4.2 billion people alive in Australia was difficult, but not unimaginable. Even after the Great Resettlement, the population density in Australia was only fifty people per square kilometer, lower than the population density of pre-Resettlement Japan.

  But the plan had been premised on highly efficient agricultural factories. During the resettlement process, large numbers of agricultural factories had been relocated to Australia, and many of them had been reassembled and put in operation. In these factories, genetically modified crops grew at rates orders of magnitude above traditional crops, but natural lighting was insufficient to power such growth, so ultrabright artificial lights had to be used. This required massive amounts of electricity.

  Without electricity, the crops in the growth tanks of the factories, dependent on ultraviolet or X-ray light for photosynthesis, would rot in a couple of days.

  The existing food reserve was enough to maintain 4.2 billion people only for one month.

  “I don’t understand your reaction,” Sophon said to the man who had yelled genocide. Her confusion appeared genuine.

  “What about food? Where are we going to get food?” someone else shouted. They were no longer terrified of Sophon. All that was left was despair.

  Sophon scanned the hall, meeting the eyes of everyone present. “Food? Everyone, look around: You are surrounded by food, living food.”

  Her tone was serene, as though reminding humanity of a storehouse they had forgotten.

  No one said anything. The long-planned process of annihilation had reached its final step. It was too late for words.

  Sophon continued. “The coming struggle for survival will eliminate most of humanity. By the time the fleet arrives in three months, there should be about thirty to fifty million people left on this continent. These final victors will begin a free and civilized life in the reservation. The fire of Earth civilization will not go out, but it will continue in a reduced form, like the eternal flame at a tomb.”

  The Australian House of Representatives was modeled on the British House of Commons. The high seats of the public galleries were to the sides, and the benches for the Members of Parliament—where the leaders of the world now sat—were down in the pit in the middle. Those sitting there now felt as if they were in a tomb that was about to be filled in.

  “Mere existence is already the result of incredible luck. Such was the case on Earth in the past, and such has always been the case in this cruel universe. But at some point, humanity began to develop the illusion that they’re entitled to life, that life can be taken for granted. This is the fundamental reason for your defeat. The flag of evolution will be raised once again on this world, and you will now fight for your survival. I hope everyone present will be among the fifty million survivors at the end. I hope that you will eat food, and not be eaten by food.”

  “Ahhhhhhh—” A woman in the crowd near Cheng Xin screamed, slicing apart the silence like a sharp blade. But a deathlike hush immediately swallowed her scream.

  Cheng Xin felt the sky and earth tumble around her. She didn’t realize she had fallen down. All she saw was the sky pushing the government tent and the holographic window away, filling her entire field of view, then the ground touched her back, as though it had stood up
behind her. The dawn sky appeared as a dim ocean, and the crimson clouds, lit by the rising sun, floated over it in bloody patches. Then a black spot appeared in her vision, spreading quickly, like a sheet of paper set aflame by the candle underneath, until murky shadows covered everything.

  She recovered from the loss of consciousness quickly. Her hands found the ground—soft sand—and, pushing off it, she sat up. She grabbed her left arm with her right hand to be sure that she was okay. But the world had disappeared. All was enveloped in gloom. Cheng Xin opened her eyes wide, but she could see nothing but more darkness. She had gone blind.

  Noises assaulted her; she could not tell which were real and which were illusions: footsteps like a tide, screams, sobs, and indistinct, eerie cries like a gale passing through a dead forest.

  Someone running crashed into her, and she fell. She struggled to sit up. Darkness, only darkness remained before her eyes, thick as pitch. She turned to face what she thought of as the east, but even in her mind she couldn’t see the rising sun. What rose there instead was a gigantic dark wheel, scattering black light across the world.

  In this endless obscurity she seemed to see a pair of eyes. The black eyes melted into the murk, but she could feel their presence, could feel their gaze. Were these the eyes of Yun Tianming? She had fallen into the abyss, where she ought to meet him. She heard Tianming call her name. She tried to push the hallucinatory voice out of her mind, but it persisted. Finally, she was certain that the voice came from reality, as it was a feminized male voice that could only be from this era.

  “Are you Dr. Cheng Xin?”

  She nodded. Or, rather, felt herself nod. Her body seemed to move on its own.

  “What happened to your eyes? Can you not see?”

  “Who are you?”

  “I’m the commander of a special team in the Earth Security Force. Sophon sent us to retrieve you from Australia.”

  “Where are you taking me?”

  “Anywhere you want. She’ll take care of you. Of course, she said that you have to be willing to go.”

  Cheng Xin noticed another sound. She thought it was another hallucination at first: the rumbling of a helicopter. Although humanity had learned anti-gravity technology, it consumed too much energy for practical use. Aircraft still mostly relied on traditional propellers. She felt gusts of wind, proof that a helicopter was hovering nearby.

  “Can I talk to Sophon?”

  An object was pushed into her hand—a mobile phone. She put the phone next to her ear and heard Sophon’s voice.

  “Hello, Swordholder.”

  “I’ve been looking for you.”

  “Why? Do you still think of yourself as the savior of the world?”

  Cheng Xin shook her head slowly. “No. I’ve never thought of myself that way. I just want to save two people. Please?”

  “Which two?”

  “艾 AA and Fraisse.”

  “Ah, your chattering friend and that old Aboriginal? You wanted to find me just for this?”

  Cheng Xin was surprised. Sophon had met AA, but how did she know who Fraisse was?

  “Yes. Have the people you sent bring them away from Australia so that they can live freely.”

  “That’s easy. What about you?”

  “You don’t need to be concerned about me.”

  “Can’t you see what’s happening?”

  “I can’t. I can’t see a thing.”

  “You mean you’ve gone blind? Haven’t you been eating properly?”

  Cheng Xin, AA, and Fraisse had always been provided adequate rations during the last year, and Fraisse’s house had never been taken away by the government. And once she and AA had moved in, no one had harassed her. Cheng Xin had always thought it was because the local government was protecting her, but now she realized that it was because Sophon had kept watch over her.

  Cheng Xin understood that it was a group of aliens that controlled Sophon from four light-years away, but she, like other humans, always thought of Sophon as an individual, a woman. This woman, who was in the process of slaughtering 4.2 billion people, cared about her welfare.

  “If you remain there, you’ll be eaten by the others.”

  “I know.” Cheng Xin’s voice was calm.

  Is that a sigh? “All right. A sophon will stay near you. If you change your mind or need some help, just speak. I’ll hear you.”

  Cheng Xin said nothing. Not even thank you.

  Someone grabbed her by the arm—the Earth Security Force commander. “I’ve been given the order to retrieve those two. It’s best that you leave with us, Dr. Cheng. This place will turn into hell on Earth in no time.”

  Cheng Xin shook her head. “You know where they are? Good. Please go. Thank you.”

  She listened for the helicopter. The blindness seemed to make her hearing especially acute, like a third eye. She heard the helicopter take off and then land about two kilometers away. A few minutes later, it lifted off again, and gradually flew away.

  Cheng Xin closed her eyes, satisfied. Whether she kept them open or not, there was only darkness. Finally, her broken heart had found some peace, bathed in a pool of blood. The impenetrable shadows now became a kind of protection. Outside the darkness was more terror. What had manifested there made even coldness itself shiver, even darkness itself stumble.

  The frenzy around her intensified: sounds of running, clashing, guns firing, cursing, screaming, dying, crying … Have they already started to eat people? It shouldn’t happen so fast. Cheng Xin believed that even in a month, when there would be no more food, most people would still refuse to eat other people.

  That’s why most people will die.

  It was not important whether the fifty million that survived would still be considered human, or become something else. As a concept, “humanity” would disappear.

  A single line could now encompass all of human history: We walked out of Africa; we walked for seventy thousand years; we came into Australia.

  In Australia, humanity returned to its origin. But there would be no new voyage. This was the end.

  A baby cried nearby. Cheng Xin wanted to wrap her arms around that new life. She recalled the baby she had held in front of the UN building: soft, warm, such a sweet smile. Maternal instinct broke Cheng Xin’s heart. She was afraid that the baby would go hungry.

  The Final Ten Minutes of the Deterrence Era, Year 62

  November 28, 4:17:34 P.M. to 4:27:58 P.M.: Gravity and Blue Space, Deep Space

  When the klaxons announced the droplet attack, only one man aboard Gravity felt a sense of relief: James Hunter, the oldest on the crew. He was seventy-eight, and everyone called him Old Hunter.

  Half a century ago, at Fleet Command in Jupiter’s orbit, a twenty-seven-year-old Hunter had received his mission from the chief of staff.

  “You will be the culinary controller aboard Gravity.”

  This position was just a glorified name for the ship’s cook. But since AI programming did most of the cooking on a warship, the culinary controller was responsible only for operating the system. This meant, for the most part, inputting the menu for each meal and choosing the staples. Most culinary controllers were petty officers, but Hunter had just been promoted to the rank of captain; in fact, he was the youngest captain in the fleet. But Hunter wasn’t surprised. He knew what he was really supposed to do.

  “Your real mission is to guard the gravitational wave transmitter. If the senior officers aboard Gravity lose control of the ship, you must destroy the transmitter. In unexpected situations, you may use whatever means you deem necessary to accomplish your goal.”

  Gravity’s gravitational wave broadcasting system included the antenna and the controller. The antenna was the ship’s hull, impossible to destroy, but disabling the controller was enough to stop transmission. Given the materials available on Gravity and Blue Space, it would be impossible to assemble a new controller.

  Hunter knew that men similar to himself had served on nuclear submarines in ancient
times. Back then, in the ballistic missile submarine fleets of both the Soviet Union and NATO, there were seamen and low-ranked officers serving in humble posts who also had such missions. If anyone had come close to seizing control of a submarine and the missiles it carried, these men would have emerged, unexpectedly, to take drastic action to stop such plots.

  “You must pay attention to everything happening on the ship. Your mission requires you to monitor the situation during every duty cycle. Thus, you cannot hibernate.”

  “I don’t know if I can live until I’m a hundred.”

  “You only need to live until you’re eighty. By then, the degenerate matter vibrating string in the ship will have reached its half-life, Gravity’s gravitational wave transmission system will fail, and you’ll have completed your mission. Thus, you just need to stay out of hibernation for the voyage out, but may return asleep. However, the mission will essentially require you to devote the rest of your life to it. You have the right to refuse.”

  “I accept.”

  The chief of staff asked a question that commanders in past eras would not have bothered with. “Why?”

  “During the Doomsday Battle, I was a PIA intelligence analyst stationed aboard Newton. Before the droplet destroyed my ship, I escaped in a life pod. Though it was the smallest kind of life pod, it was capable of holding five. At the time, a group of my crewmates were headed toward me, and I was alone in my pod. But I released it—”

  “I know about that. The court-martial results are unequivocal. You did nothing wrong. Ten seconds after jettisoning your life pod, the ship exploded. You had no time to wait for anyone else.”

  “Yes. But … I still feel it would have been better if I had stayed with Newton.”

  “I understand how our failures haunt us with survivor’s guilt. But this time, you have a chance to save billions.”

  The two were silent for a while. Outside the window of the space station, the Great Red Spot of Jupiter stared at them like a gigantic eye.