How the World Ends

by Joel Varty

  The water rushes over my head just before I can get a breath and I suck murky, gritty coldness into my nose. I struggle for a moment just to overcome the momentum from the slide and start to kick my way upwards. There is a moment, when I am caught in the water, that seems to last an eternity, and I wonder if this hole will be my watery tomb. I don’t stop kicking though, and when my face breaks the surface I immediately cough and splutter out enough water to clear my lungs and gasp a few breaths in. Wet, cold and utterly exhausted, I manage to swim to the far side of the river and climb up to the bottom of the equally steep crater-hill on the far side.

  Muttering to myself miserably about how commuting to the city had never had it so tough, I take a look over my shoulder to see what has become of the ancient Land Rover. Miraculously, it has rolled to a stop and stalled about halfway up the far side of the crater, with its rear-end pointing back down to the water.

  For a fleeting moment I feel the urge to swim back over to it, just to see if I can jump start it in reverse and make it back up the way I came, but I pull myself away from minor miracles and lucky landings and continue to climb out of the pit. As I do, I hear a rush of water, and I turn just in time to see a huge crest of water smashing through from the other blast holes further down the river as the lake-water rushes backwards towards me. I just manage to reach a hand up onto solid ground and haul myself out as the wall of water crashes down behind me.

  Chapter Twelve – Finding

  Rachel

  The sun of the morning touches the uniform rows of houses in the suburbs. It touches the grand houses first and eventually makes its way to the smaller ones in the shadow of the monsters. It touches the pond at the end of street, and the muskrat blinks with glassy eyes before it slips through the reeds in search of darker shadows and more certain safety.

  The blue house with the apple trees out front is particularly splendid, Rachel thinks as she stands with her hands on her hips on the step of the front porch; the blossoms have appeared with fervour, and the bees will soon be transferring pollen from one tree to another with restless abandon. Like a threesome, she thinks, wondering, not for the first time, at the mysteries and vagaries of nature that confound us regularly.

  Her companions, little Jewel and Gwyn rush past her feet, having consumed the last of the milk and juice in the warm refrigerator. The power is still off and the water did not turn on this morning either, so the worry about food and other basic necessities is a strong one. She thinks briefly about the car and its dwindling quarter-tank of fuel; it wouldn’t take her far, but would it take her to wherever Jonah was? Her worries about her family include her husband out there and the abhorrent thought that he might have abandoned them at this difficult time.

  He had been acting strangely, though, and it is yet another cause for concern that furrows her brow. She cannot stop the smile from creeping onto her face, however, as she is infected by the glee and wonder that the children feel and radiate outwards as they dance and play, chasing each other, in the warm spring sunshine that seems to have a life all its own. For Rachel it is a reassurance, if only a small, imagined one, that the world is connected and held together by particles stronger than any normal force. She does not think beyond the need to wait for Jonah, to give him a chance to return.

  Then, she thinks, he’ll have some explaining to do. She smiles inwardly as she walks over to check on the family next door, who also have small children. But he probably won’t even try; he doesn’t have to.

  I’ll know.

  …

  Lucia

  One of the beautiful things about being alive, Lucia Hadly thinks to herself, ruminating, is wondering why. Why why why why I am I still alive? Where is that death that I was promised, that I was doomed to? How is this possible when so many things were just pieces of a puzzle that fit rather neatly together?

  She tries to smooth out her hair and clothes as she steps into the sunlight of early morning. Some who had shared the stairwell with her last night also blink their way into the daylight, while others choose the safety and uncertainty of darkness to the possibility of daylight. Lucia thinks only of escape. She knows it is just a matter of time before the terrible reality, which is euphemised by “depopulation,” begins.

  The small crowd is joined by others from buildings nearby, and they walk slowly, almost aimlessly together down the street. The size of the crowd grows as others seek the safety of numbers, and the anonymity that only the throng can provide. The silence is hushed, breathy, and full of tension. All seem somewhat stooped, or at least awkward in their motions. Hunger is evident, and the flow of the footsteps is marred by the shuffling of tired, dragging feet.

  They are beaten before they even have a foe, thinks Lucia as she walks with them. We haven’t even seen any opposition, no enemy at all, and already we are defeated. The mental shift from “they” to “we” does not escape her notice, even immersed as she is in her own thoughts. She wonders at the weakness she has allowed to creep into her consciousness. Despicable, really, to find oneself so alone, so powerless, so aimless that wandering has become her only alternative to despair – unless the admission of the thing itself could be construed as despairing.

  Lucia feels the energy drain out of her as the mental gymnastics capture all of her awareness. She drifts with the crowd, listing and directionless.

  …

  Jonah

  I feel the eyes upon me immediately as I gain the surface of the road from the climb up the side of the blast hole. I must have attracted some attention, and I hope it isn’t someone who wants to shoot me or blow me up. I try not to wince as I straighten up, picking out several sets of eyes watching from the shadows of the outlying buildings of the city as I do so.

  I wait there for a moment, at the edge of that great blast-hole by the river, on the perimeter of the city that was meant, I believe, to die at the hands of evil men, and I wonder what I should do. I can’t think of where to begin – I can’t even imagine what I am trying to achieve by being here. I only know that I am meant to be here, that I have been called here.

  And then it comes to me, and without another moment’s thought, I begin.

  …

  Herb

  My name is Herb Wiseman. It is a struggle to remember that sometimes.

  A crowd of us formed this morning out of the basic safety that numbers provide, but several folks have drifted off while others join us. With somewhat feral eyes we stare at each other, or worse, avoid one another’s faces. The fear that we share is universal – we are all afraid. Even me – a homeless, hopeless beggar, by all accounts, although it never used to be that way. I was one of these once, just like they are one of me now. I almost smile – a wry gesture with my ragged beard changing the angles on my face as my nose tries to influence my eyes to crinkle up a bit. The irony, the sadness, the pain of this life is my mine to share – not to escape from, as once I may have hoped.

  When we hear the crash, a group of us run to the area where the noise came from. We see the hand reach over the edge of the hole. We watch the man crawl out of where the bridge used to be. The sun rises behind him and a corona seems to form around him as he rises slowly to his feet. He sees us. He seems to see right through us; indeed his very being seems to shine with purpose and determination: everything we do not have. He knows. Those eyes seem to latch right onto mine and hold me there, transfixed until he is ready to proceed towards us. We all freeze as one – too frightened, or perhaps too mesmerized, to move.

  He walks directly past us, turning his head when he goes by and smiling with a white, toothy grin, like he knows something and wants to tell us. I want to hear it – we all want to, it seems – as we move slowly but surely behind him as he walks. I wonder at it – I am filled with questions – I am filled with awe that someone, one of us, by all accounts, would have such a direction, a purpose, a choice to make in this forsaken place where we are trapped. I need to know that purpose – I need to share in it.

  We follo
w in silence.

  As we walk, we don’t take much notice of the numbers as they grow from a few, to ten, to twenty and thirty. By the time we have gone more than a few blocks there are nearly a hundred people following this strange, bedraggled, harried and wet looking fellow, who nevertheless looks precisely like someone I desperately want to follow. I can’t explain why, but it seems to have affected us all.

  We form a ragged gaggle behind him as we try not to look like we are following, and we must look quite a sight to the many hundreds who linger behind tinted windows, or nearly-open doors, in fear of the soldiers who most certainly are gone. I hope.

  The man we follow stops eventually in front of a plain brick building a few blocks from the train station. I remember when I used to ride those trains, when I used to work at the stock market. I was nearly a millionaire once. My successes still outnumber my failures, I think to myself with a certain pride. The failures just happened to have occurred most recently. One day, the train brought me to this city, and it would not take me home again – no matter how hard I tried to make it on, they kept throwing me back. It didn’t matter that my wife had moved in with her mother; that our house was gone and the neighbours had shut their doors to me months before. That train was supposed to take me home.

  After a night in a cell, and a good many more in a homeless shelter, I had claimed my corner of a shanty-town. My box: my new castle. Even that sturdy container – once made to keep a five thousand dollar television safe from harm – could not withstand the pressure of a forty-storey apartment building. A bargain in the low three hundreds, the advertisements had read. That’s when it got really tough. That’s when the streets really meant the streets. That’s when frostbite numbs your fingers and the cold eats the wits from your very skull. How did I make it through the winter? How do I keep going? I still have to ask myself, since nobody else does.

  But now it is the springtime, and a time of warm days and the promise of sunshine. These should be easy days for a bum’s street life.

  That’s all shot to hell now, and met with the smell of death in this forsaken place. No cars left to clog the street – all who could drive have driven away, or had their cars burnt in the riots last night. No fancy suits or shiny shoes. We all look and smell like me now, or we will soon, once everyone else has had a chance to ripen up.

  Eventually we stop in front of the plain brick building.

  I watch the man watch the building. I watch the crowd watching him. We turn and watch each other watching him. Some of us turn away. I smile. I almost miss him step forward and place his hands on the solid brick wall of the building. He pats his hands around for a bit – as if he were searching for a door, or something, but there is nothing. We still stand and watch – held there by the lack of any other activity, I suppose.

  He backs up a few steps and looks up to the roof.

  “Gabe!” he yells in a booming voice. “Gabe! Where are you?” His voice is powerful and somewhat demanding. He seems to be in a hurry. I start to wonder what he is doing here in the first place.

  “Gabe! You can tell them now – they’re here, they’re listening.”

  Nothing. We all stand there listening for this Gabe to speak up. It all seems a little surreal. The crowd continues to gather as more and more people wonder what the disturbance is. We are all wondering if anyone else has an answer, and all we do is watch silently while this man yells at thin air and pounds on brick walls.

  He turns and looks at us. We stand there, shuffling about and staring at our feet. I don’t look down. I keep my eyes on his – I recognise him, finally, from the train. Just a regular guy – like I used to be.

  He catches my eye and smiles.

  “How’s it going, man?” He asks, as is if we were standing in line for the five-thirty ride home. I smile at the pure joy of such a normal thought.

  “Not bad,” I reply, astounded at how my voice carries so well across the absolute stillness of the city. The fear, which has been palpable in the crowd up to now, abates a little, and a few other people smirk. “I think I got fired last year, but it might have been the year before.”

  He smiles. It’s that same toothy, silly grin that seems to affect everyone, and some of us reciprocate.

  “My name’s Jonah,” he says, simply. “If any of you want to come with me, someone showed me how we can get out of here.”

  And with that he turns and walks straight back through the wall of the brick building and disappears within.

  …

  Lucia

  Lucia Hadly watches her brother-in-law from the back of the crowd. Her feet hurt. She wants to scream out in the agony of her frustration, yet she is silent, as the silence of the entire group is stifling, so is her anger stifled by... something. She feels the tension of the silence, its exuberance at being finally triumphant in this noisy city. The silence has opened her ears, though, to the palpable state of anxiety in the place, closed-in yet exposed. Trapped, yet missing that layer of comfort against the chaos of anarchy.

  Is this it? She asks herself, her mind buzzing with different permutations of outcomes, a skill she has acquired naturally from her associations with high levels of government. Is this where it ends? Do we stand here silently and let it happen?

  She watches, still not moving, still not speaking, as Jonah smiles that silly smirk of his and speaks in that voice that seems, as always, but somehow differently now, to carry over the tops of the everyone’s heads to reach all ears. Mr. Truth speaks, she thinks. What a load of crap.

  Lucia watches as Jonah Truth turns from the crowd and steps directly through the brick wall behind him.

  Lucia cannot move. The silence is hushed further by the instant sucking in and holding of breath from an ever increasing number of people as all start to collectively wonder if they have finally, irrevocably, lost their minds.

  Then another man, somehow scruffier than the rest, probably a bum, steps forward as if called, and also moves through the wall and vanishes.

  Now the voices start. A few more people rush forward and, in turns, walk through the wall. Some approach slowly, and feel their way forward towards the wall. Some move forward with ease, while some are stopped short, groping along the solid brick for entry into the beyond.

  Lucia turns away, somehow embarrassed at the sight of such ridiculous behaviour. She stares at an old black man, standing back in the shadows, smiling at her with impossibly white teeth and staring at her with sightless eyes. She is filled immediately with a combination of fear and affection for his unwavering warmth that radiates from the smile, coupled with the coldness of his watery blind eyes. He backs further into the shadows until she can no longer see him.

  The crowd is becoming more agitated. Some people, obsessed with getting through the wall, have begun pounding their fists on the brickwork, and streaks of blood have begun to appear. More and more people, some with eyes closed tightly shut, are disappearing through the mysterious wall. Lucia feels herself exhale in a kind of a frightened whimper. It is not a sound she is used to making, let alone admitting to herself that she is capable of making it at all. She is afraid, again.

  She is afraid that she will be left behind with those who cannot get through. Afraid that this fate, this ‘being left behind’ feeling that has plagued her for the last twenty-four hours will be with her forever.

  Chapter Thirteen – Serving

  Herb

  We stand there silently at the wall for a few long moments. No sound aside from the slight whine of wind through the skyscrapers a few blocks over. The city already has the feel of a ghost town. I feel changed along with it. It’s a strange feeling to have nothing in front of you, nothing sure or certain. When what used to be sure was misery and failure, anything else is surely a blessing.

  I follow the strange man. I figure that anyone who has returned to us when all others have run away must have something worthwhile to provide. Either that or he’s totally delusional, but I must be too, since I just watched him walk thr
ough a wall. I walk forward to it, and find that it isn’t a wall that comes up to meet me, but rather a set of steps up to an old-fashioned church. I climb the steps, pull back the door, and step inside.

  The room is indeed a church with wooden pews in rows, and a small dais at the front. The man, Jonah, he said his name is, is sitting on the edge of the dais with his hands open in front of him. His lips appear to move slightly, as if he is speaking to someone, or counting in his head. I walk slowly towards the front of the hall, admiring the way the sunlight glints off the dust suspended in the air to make golden bars of light that seem to bounce gleefully around the room. I can’t help but smile in this place. It feels sort of like a place I remember, but I can’t situate the memory of it in my mind.

  A few whispers behind me cause me to start at the noise, however quiet.

  “This place is unbelievable, where are we?” asks a woman near the door.

  “I don’t know,” says another woman just behind her, looking up and turning her head as she moves further in. “It’s like something out of dream. I can’t quite believe that it’s real, myself.”

  “It has to be real,” says another voice, a teenage boy, behind her and to the side. “If we’re all here and talking to each other, how can it be anything but real?”

  A good question, it seems, since none of us attempts to answer, even as more people step through the doors. We all seem to walk slowly forward toward the dais. I wonder if I should sit down, but I feel that I need to say something, to speak to those that have just entered, to tell them what I feel; that this place is ours, a place that seems to have waited here for us to enter, waited until we had the courage, or perhaps the need, to step inside.

  I find myself standing in front, indeed almost overtop, of the man Jonah, who is looking up at me with a wry grin and sad eyes.