Doctor Benjamin Franklin's Dream America

by Damien Lincoln Ober

  But now it seems like maybe they have—outrun The Death. Gibson, at least. Hewes may survive the plague, but not the time of the plague. “The Death,” the boy says. “It’s caused by the Internet.” And he holds out a sheet of paper for his master to take, an actual sheet of paper! “Says that The Death is spread over the Internet and that Congress is working on measures to stop further outbreaks.”

  Joseph Hewes reads a moment. “Seems the plague went global,” he says. “A world‐wide ban on Internet access.” He looks up from the paper, suspicion mixed with disgust. “What? We think if we don’t go on the Internet, the Internet is going to just vanish? It’ll still be out there whether someone’s using it or not. And so long as there’s an Internet, there’s going to be The Death too, some echo of its code, buried in some busted file somewhere.”

  Gibson is looking into the bones and veins that hint through the tops of his hands. “Don’t know how the Internet can have an effect on my god‐given body,” he says. “Maybe it’s divine. God telling us, ‘Don’t use the Internet. No more.’”

  “Some other species will stumble upon this planet a long time from now. And they’ll think the Cloud was all there was,” Hewes ponders, continuing in thought: Once the humans are gone, the Cloud will be just like this old plantation, a system that could no longer operate. It’ll linger on a bit, corrupted to its smallest pieces. “Well, at least it means Congress is still out there, at least trying to do something.”

  A few weeks ago, a single traveler passed on the road out front, way out on the other side of the overgrown grounds. Hewes was sitting in the same chair he’s sitting in now, fogging that same glass he’s fogging. Seemed like the traveler was going to lead his donkey and his cart on past without even a pause. But then he did stop, probably saw the smoke from the fires Gibson keeps always lit throughout the house. And the traveler must have seen Joseph Hewes, too, because he raised a hand to wave. But that was as much as he dared. Poked his mule and off they trotted. It was the first human they’d seen in five months. After watching a few others pass, headed who knows where, Hewes and Gibson agreed that the boy would head into town to see if maybe somewhere in this vast continent things were finally getting pulled back together.

  Now Gibson has returned from a half‐crowded town square, fliers tacked up on storefronts, stuck on the doors of those known to be left living. Gibson relates it all, swallowing hard. “Seems like a calm has finally begun to settle, Sir.”

  “Maybe that’s because there aren’t enough humans left to muster a respectable panic. And without the Internet, how would such a panic spread?” Hewes shakes his head. “Here we are,” he rattles the page, “actual paper. The Death has beaten us. From this point forward, man is frozen in time.” Hewes looks into his own semi‐transparent reflection in the glass, feeling exactly that much there in the world. “I still can’t help but think of The Death as something living. A nightmare beast loose in the Cloud, reaching down to snatch up users, suck their souls right off the planet.”

  “Now that The Death is over, maybe if we can get you into Charleston, Master. Maybe a bit of bleeding and some purges, a whole mess of leaches and straps, maybe they can break this fever and you can still come stumbling out.”

  Hewes is shaking his head. Sweat has matted his hair to the lumpy surface of his skull. It leaks dark down his face like spilled paint. “No, I’ve waited long enough. Nearly thirty years. And still I’m not sure… if all this time I’ve made the right decision in not joining you.”

  Gibson knows this tone of voice his master gets. When he talks like this, his words are not for anyone in this world any longer but for that ghost he sometimes talks to. Must be somewhere up there in the air, Gibson thinks, mixed in with that Internet that’s getting the whole world sick and dead.

  Hewes lifts the smartphone from his pocket. Didn’t realize his hands were shaking until he sees how much the phone is shaking. These last six months, he’s been wishing she could be there with him to watch the world die. The strange beauty of it grinding to a halt. But now that The Death has passed, or seems to have, the thought of the world rebuilding without her is too much.

  “Wouldn’t mess with that cell phone,” Gibson says. “The Death get in your device as easy as it can any Internet.”

  Hewes’ lips and whole face are wet now with fever. “Will heaven be heaven?” he asks. “Or just one more of these worlds I’ve wandered through alone?” Gibson is waving a hand in front of his master’s vacant eyes, but his master can’t see a thing. Hewes presses that call button, puts the smartphone to his face.

  “Hello?”

  George Taylor :: February 23rd 1781

  When they hit the edge of Easton, PA, Francis Hopkin‐son takes out that modified smartphone of his, peels off and starts a gallop around the perimeter of town. Thomas M’Kean keeps his horse pointed straight, down to a trot through the outer edges and onto Main Street. They’ve come because of the rumor that hit Philadelphia the morning before. Being said there that George Taylor has started feeling those stomach pangs that are always the first sign of The Death. The rumor must be real, a real rumor at least. No businesses open, the windows and doors all closed and latched, not a soul on the street. For M’Kean, it’s a flashback to how towns all across Pennsylvania looked during the outbreak. More than a year without a reported case and they’d begun to think that maybe the pestilence was passed.

  When Congress first reconvened, M’Kean was put atop a sub‐committee charged with investigating how an Internet‐bound plague wiped out sixty‐five percent of the population. In these efforts, Hopkinson has become his right‐hand man; the inventor/ poet turned patriot shifted the focus of his vast left hemisphere onto unraveling exactly how The Death was spread. He and Doc Bartlett have speculated that some corruption in the feed may have caused a screen refresh rate capable of changing the physiology of the brain. But speculation is as specific as they’ve been able to get. As frightening as the news is, Hopkinson’s actually a little excited.

  For the first time, they might be able to get some new data on The Death. As Hopkinson circles town, taking readings, M’Kean is reaching George Taylor’s home.

  The woman who answers the door gives M’Kean a hateful look, then steps aside. Over at the kitchen table, George Taylor sits with a glass and bottle, both half‐empty. “Thomas M’Kean,” he says, “Chief Justice of Pennsylvania. In my house.”

  “Don’t be a dick,” his wife tells him.

  Taylor uses the wine glass to wave her suggestion away, gestures for M’Kean to have the chair opposite, wine sloshing as close to the rim as possible without spilling. The table around his elbow is dotted with stains of ages impossible to tell. “Word is you’ll be up for president of Congress. And me here with The Death. Worse off than the day before I started.”

  M’Kean eyes him, a glance at that gut, The Death inside. “How sure are you?”

  “You must be. Must have left Philadelphia the second you heard.” George Taylor nods toward the front door and the town beyond. “Only in the last weeks had they begun to venture out. At first, seemed like only one in ten, but they’ve been eking out more and more. First town‐wide count has the death rate just under fifty percent. Now this.”

  “Fifty percent is a lot better than some places are reporting.”

  From her spot at the sink, Mrs. Taylor clears her throat. “Got our daughter, Mr. Chief Justice.”

  “Now every door in town is bolted. People running from me in the street.” George Taylor leans, wags a finger at M’Kean. “But you, you’re not scared of catching it?”

  M’Kean sips calmly. “We may not know what The Death is. Not yet anyway. But we do know you can’t get it by sharing a wine bottle. Question becomes then, how did you get it? You haven’t been on the Internet, George? Not even a little?”

  George Taylor looks at his stomach. Concentrates a moment. It was an hour earlier than this time three days ago that he felt the first twinge. He’d collapsed in his wife�
��s arms and cried and cried and cried, but when he looked up at her, her face was dry and her eyes distant and he hated her then.

  There’s a knock at the door, and before any of them can move to answer it, Hopkinson comes in, holding that smartphone up for all to see. Onscreen is an app he programmed, and if you look into the touchscreen while the app is running, you see the world through the phone’s camera but with the Internet visible. He shows them the ghosted, flickering, mechanical structure that pokes and vanishes its way through the room around them. “Getting wild readings all over town.” Hopkinson takes off his hat, shakes his head so that long ponytail flops onto his shoulder; it sits there like another of those wild ideas half‐escaped from his brain.

  “I haven’t been on the Internet,” George Taylor finally says. “Not since they first told us that’s how The Death was spread.”

  “Taylor is correct,” Hopkinson says. “No one seems to be accessing, but there sure is activity. Something is on the Internet. And it looks like more than just some old ad drones.”

  Taylor nods at the smartphone, there in Hopkinson’s hand. “That thing of yours connected, Frank?”

  A smile. “I wish. Still not safe.” He shows the Taylors a wire that comes out the bottom of the device and goes up his sleeve, hooks a thumb to indicate his backpack. “Wired right into some plug‐and‐play harddrives. A little portable Internet, in miniature, of course, but not connected to anything outside itself.”

  “Frank here has some weird idea,” M’Kean says. “Thinks if we can figure out how The Death spreads, maybe we can use it.”

  “Use The Death?”

  M’Kean pops his eyes. “I know. He’s nuts.”

  Hopkinson’s shaking his head. “Not use The Death, but perhaps some element of it. If we can pin down exactly how it spreads, harness that technology to spread something worth spreading, something beneficial for the country.”

  “Something like what?”

  But Hopkinson doesn’t answer. Says instead, “With your permission, George, I’d like to record some readings when it happens.”

  “When what happens?”

  Mrs. Taylor spits a laugh, “Can you believe these guys from Congress?”

  George Taylor looks around, trying to get the energy, or the inclination to be offended. “Well, now I feel weird. Like you two are here just waiting for me to die.”

  M’Kean fills all their glasses, even Hopkinson’s despite his protests. Ms. Taylor too, finally comes over from the sink. They break into a few hours of almost normal behavior, the three Signers swapping stories about their initial trip to Philadelphia, back when the Second Congress was first assembling. Seems like a world ago now.

  They’re telling stories about John Witherspoon, The Father of the Founding Fathers, when George Taylor stops mid sentence. A pained look tightens into a scowl. A moment later, it loosens and his whole body slumps forward. M’Kean rushes around to help Taylor to the floor. His eyes have gone wild, scanning the air as if seeing through the faces leaned over him, off into that semi‐visible Internet from Hopkinson’s phone.

  And there it is, that smartphone and its dedicated Internet, hovering George Taylor’s face. It’s the last thing he sees: Hopkin‐son cracking a grin, staring into fresh data on The Death.

  Richard Stockton :: February 28th 1781

  Richard Stockton is asleep in bed when the door splinters apart. A hand into his hair yanks him to the cold wood floor. He looks up and sees it’s not the British, but other Americans—Loyalists—and him, the prize of a long hunt. Their leader kicks him in the back so hard that Stockton will never stand up straight, not ever again in his life. “And here’s one for the King, a Signer!”

  Stockton is dragged out front where the beating continues. Around him on the lawn, the family that had been hiding him is slaughtered. The wife of the house raped right there under the open sky as dirty men stand around open‐mouthed and gazing. Nearby, some British soldiers watch as the slaves bash in the head of the overseer, their black skin all slimy with blood. A few Loyalists have found the little plot of headstones, the family members taken by The Death. Their piss steams the air as they saturate the graves.

  Shackles and cuffs are applied. A rope tied to the cuffs and the other end to a horse. The horse is whipped and rides from the property with Stockton rolling over and over on the ground ten yards behind. The human sounds fade. Just the thunder of horse hooves. He opens his eyes, sees through the kicking mud, another man being dragged.

  The next day they arrive at Morven, his abandoned estate. The place is crawling with Redcoats. All the furniture has been moved onto the lawn, where it burns in several crooked piles. Chunks of his life float in the cool air, one edge ash and the other still embers. He has no idea what’s become of his wife or his remaining children. Through the windows, he can see officers making themselves at home. Just as he’s wondering about his cherished databases, Stockton sees them, his harddrives, all the information he’s gathered throughout a lifetime of meticulous collection, piled up and blazing. Men are emerging from the house just then, tossing more and more of the plastic shells on top. Stockton realizes that with no Internet and no prospect of its return, he may be witnessing the actual eradication of information, never to be recovered.

  He’s told he will swear loyalty to the King, and when he refuses, they only smile. Stockton calls the soldier in charge a savage, and the guy knocks him out with one clean blast in the mouth. They reattach him to the horse and drag him off for the coast.

  Stockton is thrown into the hold of a leaking boat, which bobs in the harbor. Vomit and shit and blood slime the floor and most of the way up the walls. Every morning they come in to dump the dead into the bay and ask if there’s anyone who has changed their mind. And there always are, men who will now swear loyalty. These are taken up into the light.

  The prisoners are no longer dying of The Death. They starve or cough themselves away instead. There is no food. The only water is rain dripping between the planks from above, has the taste of rotted cabbage. Some men come in and beat Stockton unconscious. It takes a while, Stockton actually asking out loud for that guy who could do it with one punch.

  They pile him limp into a cart that overflows with other unconscious men. The ones who survive the trip are put in cells in a freezing prison complex. At sunset Stockton is dragged outside where he lays naked until they drag him back in at sunrise. Each night, as he shivers under the stars, he dreams of Morven, his home. Stockton imagines it as it was before the Revolution, before The Death. His family is there, his databases all intact. In the library, while the fireplace crackles low, a child plays Afghani music on the grand piano, her fingers twittering consecutive keys to expertly pluck notes the instrument was not designed to reach. Stockton has a smartreader in his lap but has paused to gaze lazily about the room.

  Stockton is not sure what’s happening when he’s taken to a cell that’s just another cell but with a desk and a fire and some royal officers drinking tea and chatting as if he’s not there. They tell him it has been six weeks, and he can’t remember having eaten once. They give him a smartphone and tell him to press his thumb on the touchscreen; and when he does, they tell him he has just sworn loyalty to King George 3.

  But Stockton doesn’t care.

  He and a hundred others are marched off to Trenton. There, given to a band of colonial troops, a little scavenger club hiding out in the woods. But it’s not just a club. They come over a hill and there it is, the Continental Army. And so it is true: George Washington is still alive. Stockton is driven back to Morven, where his only surviving daughter waits for him. The entire family is gone but for her and her new husband, fellow Signer and patriot Dr. Benjamin Rush.

  Stockton doesn’t talk much, if ever. He never asks what happened to the rest of the family because he knows he won’t survive hearing it. He has his meals chosen and his clothes laid out, spends his days sitting in his desiccated library, the drive stacks hulking empty to the ceiling. The
wires have all been cleared out, but there’s no way to keep Stockton from remembering the harddrives. He can’t get that image out of his mind, the melted plastic and metal, leaking from the fire in a few feeble rivulets.

  One afternoon, Rush comes into the library to find Stockton seated upright, his eyes and mouth hanging open. In the days leading up, even his footfalls had ceased to produce sound. Rush summons the new servants, has the body taken away, quickly, before his wife returns and has her father’s defeated face seared into her mind forever.

  Caesar Rodney :: June 29th 1784

  Through the layered films of Caesar Rodney’s veil, only the general shape of his face can be seen. Slightly translucent, the veil hangs from the front of his skull, tucked into the collar of his shirt so not even his neck is visible. He wears the veil to hide the fact that beneath it, his face is falling off, has been since just before the First Congress. His sister has never seen what remains of Caesar Rodney’s face because he wears the veil all the time, even while he sleeps. They’ve been locked alone together inside this house since the first days of the second outbreak. Flesh pieces hang in the veil. His damp breathing haunts each and every stillness she can manage to carve out.

  Until about a week ago, Caesar Rodney would spend each day on the top veranda of his mansion, musket in hand. The wind would kick up and his veil would flatten to the jagged remnants of his face. Then the wind would change and the veil would billow, making his head look lopsided and swollen. Throughout all his watches, no one has ever tried to get on the property. In fact, neither of them has seen another soul since the second outbreak began. It was then that Caesar Rodney took all their computers and all the smartdevices too and smashed them to pieces with a wood ax. He promised his sister he would never let The Death get her. That he would keep the Internet away, kill any intruder, with no hesitation, with no questions asked.