by Jason Ayres
Global Cooling
By Jason Ayres
Text Copyright © 2014 Jason Ayres
All Rights Reserved
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Cover art by
SelfPubBookCovers.com/Daniela
For Ollie
Contents
Prologue
Chapter One – 12th April 2029 (9.00am)
Chapter Two – 12th April 2029 (11.30am)
Chapter Three – 12th April 2029 (3.30pm)
Chapter Four – 12th April 2029 (5.30pm)
Chapter Five – 12th April 2029 (8.30pm)
Chapter Six – 12th April 2029 (9.20pm)
Chapter Seven – 13th April 2029 (8.00am)
Chapter Eight – 13th April 2029 (12.02pm)
Chapter Nine – 10th October 2029 (11.30am)
Chapter Ten – 19th October 2029 (12.00pm)
Chapter Eleven – 19th October 2029 (3.30pm)
Chapter Twelve – 20th October 2029 (6.30am)
Chapter Thirteen – 20th October 2029 (2.30pm)
Chapter Fourteen – 21st October 2029 (7.00am)
Chapter Fifteen – 21st October 2029 (1.00pm)
Chapter Sixteen – 21st October 2029 (2.30pm)
Chapter Seventeen – 22nd October 2029 (9.00am)
Chapter Eighteen – 23rd October 2029 (11.00am)
Chapter Nineteen – 25th October 2029 (12.30pm)
Chapter Twenty – 25th October 2029 (3.30pm)
Chapter Twenty-One – 31st October 2029 (2.00pm)
Chapter Twenty-Two – 1st January 2030 (1.00am)
Chapter Twenty-Three – 14th March 2030 (10.00am)
Chapter Twenty-Four – 30th March 2041 (6.45am)
Epilogue – Summer 2049
Prologue
Astronomers had known about asteroid Apophis for nearly a quarter of a century. There was a minor panic back in 2004 when a news story broke claiming there was a 1-in-60 chance that it would hit Earth in 2029.
These claims were soon discounted. It was categorically stated that the asteroid would miss Earth by a distance of 18,600 miles. This was a mere hair’s breadth in astronomical terms, but far enough for the planet’s inhabitants to breathe a collective sigh of relief.
There was no need to disbelieve the claims of the astronomers. After all, the sun rose and set every day when it was supposed to. Tide tables could be calculated centuries in advance, as could solar eclipses. In short, the solar system was a very ordered and predictable place.
Collisions with sizeable asteroids were rare for modern Earth, unlike the early days of the planet when huge objects crashed into the surface on a regular basis. In fact, Earth was living through a comparatively balmy period. There had been no catastrophic volcanic eruptions, ice ages or major disasters of any kind for thousands of years.
It was a major contributing factor as to why, after millions of years on the planet, humankind had made massive advances in an extremely short space of time. Technology now ruled supreme. Everything from communication to the food chain was completely automated, completely reliable and extremely efficient. Apart from a few war-torn and famine-stricken areas, by 2029 the majority of the world’s population led an extremely pampered and comfortable lifestyle.
On the downside, the vast majority of that population possessed very few skills of their ancestors. They had no need to. Who needed to know how to mill wheat, fashion tools, or make a candle anymore? Such skills were no longer necessary. It was all done for us. Collectively the human race knew how to do everything – individually they knew very little.
The thought that basic services everyone took for granted such as running water, electricity and lightning-fast internet access might one day not be available never even crossed anyone’s minds. If it had, they might have been better prepared for what was to come.
But they had no reason to prepare. The astronomers had said Apophis would miss us, and the astronomers were never wrong. So people got on with their daily lives, and apart from a few cranks parading around with banners proclaiming “The end of the world is nigh,” the whole thing was pretty much ignored. The end of the world had been wrongly predicted countless times over the years. By now, everyone was completely blasé about such proclamations.
Unfortunately, the astronomers hadn’t taken into account a random element that could not possibly have been predicted.
Out way beyond the solar system, millions of comets are ploughing lonely, long-term orbits which bring them close to the sun only very infrequently. The vast majority are unknown to astronomers and are only discovered when they approach the inner solar system and become visible. About ten or so are discovered each year.
In the spring of 2029, one such comet was heading towards the sun after thousands of years in the cold, outer reaches of the solar system. It was a relatively small comet, and wasn’t even spotted until it had passed the orbit of Jupiter. By this time it was only a few weeks from Earth.
Its discovery went almost unnoticed by the general public to begin with. It wasn’t until it came within a few days of Earth that it became visible to the naked eye. But there was nothing to worry about. Astronomers tracking its orbit noted that it would pass relatively close to Earth, but would miss us.
But there was one crucial factor they had failed to notice. Or if they had, they certainly hadn’t let on to the rest of the world’s population. The comet was on a collision course for asteroid Apophis, and that was about to change everything.
Chapter One – 12th April 2029 (9.00am)
As Charlie Adams drove into work on Thursday morning he was in a happy and contented mood. The radio was playing an old noughties classic, the sun was shining, and it was already nearly 20 degrees Celsius. Such temperatures would have seemed remarkable at this time of year even a decade ago, but global warming meant they had become the norm.
With the driverless car handling all the hard work for him, he was able to sit back, relax and enjoy the view.
Life was good for Charlie. As the end of the decade approached, he had plenty of things to feel positive about. It was over ten years now since he’d got together with his childhood sweetheart, Kaylee, and they’d been inseparable ever since.
Some had said that it wouldn’t last, that they would grow apart when they went to university, but they got around that problem by going to the same one.
Whilst Kaylee studied Physics in pursuit of a career in meteorology, Charlie had taken a degree in Business Studies. After a year of sneaking in and out of each other’s rooms at night, by their second year they had set up home together in a tiny flat in the Clifton area of Bristol.
Combining studies with working in a pizza restaurant, they spent three blissfully happy years together.
Once graduated, they returned to their home town in Oxfordshire. Charlie went to work as a graduate trainee for a big marketing company in Oxford, whilst Kaylee was lucky enough to land a dream job with the Met Office. Although based in Exeter, huge advances in telecommunications allowed her, like most of the population, to work from home most of the time.
The icing on the cake had come the previous summer when they’d married in the very church where they’d played Mary and Joseph in the school nativity play over twenty years ago.
Now they lived in the modern house Charlie had once shared with his mother. She had begun a new relationship with Kaylee’s father following his divorce. They had moved abroad to live in the Canary Islands, leaving Charli
e and Kaylee to take over the family home.
With a booming economy, good job prospects and an increasingly agreeable climate, the future was looking bright. Had he known of the global events about to unfold, things would have seemed distinctly less rosy, but, like almost everyone else, he was blissfully unaware.
He and Kaylee had been quite late getting to bed the previous evening. They had gone outside to get a glimpse of the amazingly bright new comet that had appeared in the night sky. Comets visible without a telescope were a rarity in the modern, brightly lit world, but this one was spectacular. The ball-shaped head had an impressive tail spread out behind it. Kaylee had remarked that it looked like a peacock strutting its feathers.
Despite it being only early April, they had been quite able to sit comfortably out on the patio and share a bottle of wine. The weather was so good that they were planning to invite their old friend Josh over for a barbecue at the weekend.
Charlie didn’t have to worry that the weather might turn. One advantage of having a wife who worked for the Met Office was that he had his own personal source of weather information to hand at all times.
He was only a mile from his turning off the A34 when the traffic began slowing down. Despite huge improvements to the road system, smart, driverless cars, and more people than ever working from home, one thing never changed. The traffic around Oxford remained unremittingly awful.
It was getting warm in the car. One downside of all the good weather was that wearing a suit and tie every day could get quite uncomfortable during the warmer months. He looked in the mirror, noting small beads of sweat forming beneath his short, dark hair. His green eyes looked tired – he really ought to get to bed earlier in the evening and lay off the wine for a few days.
The traffic continued to crawl along, and he knew he was late when the 9am news came onto the radio. Most days it wouldn’t have mattered, but his boss insisted on the team having their “Thursday morning huddle” each week at quarter past nine. He’d be lucky if he could grab a coffee and get there on time now.
Not that he was particularly bothered. The Thursday morning meetings were a tedious waste of time. He and his colleagues would sit in a room listening to the boss spouting endless marketing verbal diarrhoea. Then they’d each have to report on the current sales position with their clients.
The whole thing went on until at least 11am, by which time Charlie was usually losing the will to live. The irony was that, whilst they were wasting time sitting in the conference room listening to the boss admonishing them for not hitting their sales targets, they could actually have been out there selling.
As Charlie listened to the radio, the first couple of stories didn’t make much of an impact on him. They weren’t things that affected him directly. Had he known what lay ahead, he might have paid closer attention.
The first story on the news was about how the last of Britain’s nuclear power stations had been successfully shut down. Over the past decade, the Government had pursued a relentless policy of sourcing energy from abroad whilst switching to renewable energy sources at home.
Britain was now almost completely dependent on gas imported directly from Russia via a giant pipeline. There was more than enough to go around. There was a lot less energy being used in recent years than there had been in the past. A succession of exceptionally mild winters and warm summers had meant that the amount of heating needed for homes, shops and workplaces had fallen dramatically.
Global warming had been good for Britain. The temperature across the country as a whole was estimated to have risen by two degrees Celsius over the past two decades. It didn’t sound a lot, but in practical terms it was huge.
Vineyards were springing up in Southern England, the weather was warm from March to October, and the mood of the nation had improved as a whole.
Of course, global warming was not good for many places in the world, and most people in Britain would adopt a politically correct front when the subject was brought up. “Oh, isn’t it terrible about global warming?” was a popular conversation opener.
The reality was that most were secretly delighted about the long hours they could spend sitting in their deckchairs in their gardens soaking up the sun. They didn’t even have to fly to Spain on holiday anymore; they could get all the sun they needed here. The fine weather had brought a renaissance to Britain’s seaside towns, which holidaymakers flocked to once again after decades of decline.
The people eased their conscience by giving generously to each new disaster fund, of which there were many. Devastating events such as Hurricane Katrina back in 2005 now happened with increasing regularity. Barely a week went past without news of some new natural disaster somewhere in the world. Typhoons, floods and famines, once the exception, were now the norm.
It was one such story that was the second item on the news bulletin. A tropical cyclone had made landfall in the Bay of Bengal, causing devastation and the estimated loss of thousands of lives. That this story was only considered important enough to be the second item on the news behind the power station story said it all.
Such disasters were so commonplace now that they were barely considered even newsworthy. The average Brit’s “I’m alright, Jack” attitude whilst sticking a tenner in the charity bucket would doubtless be extremely distressing to those in the disaster zones if they did but know.
The news bulletin concluded as always with a light-hearted item. Today it was about the upcoming close pass of asteroid Apophis. This was something that Charlie was interested in, and he turned the radio up to catch the story.
“Well, for those of you who were out last night comet-spotting, I’m sure you’ll know we’ve another heavenly object passing close by this week!” gushed the newscaster rather overenthusiastically.
“It’s not me, is it?” interrupted the somewhat egotistical breakfast DJ, who liked to consider himself something of a local sex symbol despite the fact that none of his listeners did.
“No, it’s not you,” continued the newscaster. “Now, I’m sure you’ll be aware that tomorrow is Friday the 13th – unlucky for some! And we’ve got a great big asteroid heading our way. But there’s no need to worry – it’s going to miss us by at least 18,000 miles, so it’ll be safe to get out of bed! And now, it’s time for the weather. Here’s Kaylee.”
One of Kaylee’s jobs working for the Met Office was to provide weather bulletins for the local BBC station. Charlie smiled as he heard his wife’s voice.
“It’ll be another fine and sunny day across Oxfordshire with temperatures soaring to 25 degrees Celsius, well above the average for the time of year. Right now, here at our Oxford studios, it’s 19 degrees Celsius – that’s 66 Fahrenheit.”
“Thanks, Kaylee,” remarked the DJ, “and I must say that’s a gorgeous summery outfit you have on today. And now, here’s an old classic from Pharrell Williams.”
Charlie had to chuckle at the DJ’s inane attempt at flirting. He knew Kaylee couldn’t stand him, and not only that, she was giving the weather forecast from home, so there was no way he could possibly know what she was wearing. What an idiot.
Finally the car turned into the car park. There weren’t many spaces, but the car soon found one and positioned itself precisely between the painted white lines. It was twelve minutes past nine. If he hurried, he might just make it to the meeting on time.
The sun bore down brightly from the clear, blue sky as he made his way into the gleaming glass building. It was already feeling hot.
Chapter Two – 12th April 2029 (11.30am)
Lauren Watson turned the key in the lock of the front door of The Red Lion and let herself in. It felt pleasantly cool in the old building as she walked across the large flagstones that led to the bar.
Being rather diminutive in stature, she didn’t have to worry about banging her head on the exposed wooden beams. They had caught out many an overenthusiastic Friday night drinker, despite the “Mind Your Head” notices attached to each one.
Lau
ren enjoyed her life. With her pretty face, cheeky smile and low-cut bob of black hair, she had no problem attracting male attention. Working behind the bar, she got plenty of it. And if that wasn’t enough, she also ran two nights of entertainment in the pub: karaoke on Thursdays and a Saturday night disco.
She was the only female DJ in the town and had a never-ending string of admirers flocking around her at every gig. She rarely went home alone on those nights.
Unlike Kaylee and Charlie, her best friends from school, she hadn’t gone to university. Her boyfriend, Josh, had gone to read Mathematics at Oxford, but after a year or so they split up. Their lives were moving in different directions and she just couldn’t get on with his college crowd.
She returned to the town and tried a variety of jobs – hairdressing, shop work, beautician - but none of them really satisfied her. She was out drinking most nights and inevitably drifted into bar work after getting sacked from most of her other jobs. Getting into DJ’ing was a lucky break.
One night the DJ the pub had hired to run the karaoke was so drunk he couldn’t operate the equipment properly. Lauren, having attended enough karaoke nights to last a lifetime, knew enough about how it all worked to step into the breach and save the day. From then onwards the job was hers.
She was annoyed to see that the bar area had been left in a complete mess. There were empty glasses and crisp packets scattered everywhere and also a large, silver trophy on the bar with some sort of strange, purple residue in the bottom of it. It stank of strong alcohol. No doubt the landlord and his friends had been up late drinking again.
There was no sign that a cleaner had been in and clearly no one from upstairs had been down yet either. Lauren sighed. She had been looking forward to having an e-cig and a coffee before opening up the pub at midday. Now she was going to have to clear up the mess.
