by James Smythe
Mark Kirkman, unemployed, Boston
On the news – and this was anchors-at-a-desk news, not the frantic stuff that had taken over the days previous – they were talking about the damage caused by bombs at nuclear power plants, how DC and New York had been evacuated because of temporary exclusion zones, though nobody was willing to put a time limit on how temporary they actually were. The government isn’t making a statement at this time, we were told, and they showed maps with outlined areas where we weren’t allowed to go.
We were still parked in the lot, but the Target was shut, along with the Starbucks, the McDonald’s, the Jamba Juice, the Subway, the TGI Friday’s, the Barnes & Noble. They didn’t show any signs of life for the rest of that day, well into the next. We were all waiting for the next load of bombs, I guess, just waiting and waiting, because there’s nothing else you can do when it’s that far out of your hands. You needed the terrorists’ heads to prove it was all over, I suppose. We needed a real enemy, to hate, and to let us know that it was alright to breathe again.
Tom Gibson, news anchor, New York City
I don’t know how I got out of the city, I really don’t. I remember being there, in the smoke, broadcasting to the end. That was how it started to feel: To the end! I remember thinking, and then my producer dragged me away from it. Run, she shouted, because if you don’t run, the footage won’t last, won’t survive, and that would be it. Your legacy, she said, and I know she was just massaging my ego, but it worked. It worked. We ran … I want to say that we ran to the Brooklyn Bridge, but I can’t remember if it was that bridge or another entirely. But I filmed and filmed until the drive was full, and by that point we were crossing the bridge, and then we were heading toward New Jersey. New Jersey? I think it was New Jersey. I passed out, and I woke up on the interstate headed toward Philadelphia, my producer driving this van that looked like something out of The A-Team. We’re going wherever we can, she said, and I said, No, take us back. Take a look out of the window, she said, so I did, and all I could see was the smoke, nothing but.
She drove straight down 95 until we got to Philly, and the offices there. They let me take a shower, gave me a change of clothes – wasn’t in a position to argue, but the shirt … Jesus, I would never have picked that shirt – and they let me on air, to tell people that I was alright, to do the update. Being Senior Anchor on the network gets you certain privileges, even in other broadcast areas. There hadn’t been a report of a bomb in hours; no more threats, either. The terrorists? No idea why they stopped. We had a call-in, and the woman said, It’s because they knew that they had lost. You try saying that God isn’t real, that He doesn’t exist, you’re going to lose that argument pretty damn hard, you hear me? You hear what I’m saying? We hear you, I told her.
Simon Dabnall, Member of Parliament, London
Piers drove most of the way, because he told me that I drove like an old woman. (His words; I have nothing against elderly women. They were my primary constituents at one point.) We chugged along until, I don’t know, Newbury or Swindon, and then we were in a jam and some people in the car next to us put their window down, leant out, shouted to us. It was a woman, her entire family seemingly crammed into this two-door matchbox, eight of them, maybe, on laps, total disregard for seat-belt laws. (I joked about that to Piers, but he didn’t get that I was joking. Tough sense of humour on that one.) Where are you going? she asked, and we said, Wales. Right, she said, we’re going to Manchester. If they could do that to New York, imagine what they could do to London! I smiled and nodded; I didn’t fancy telling her that Manchester would be the second target, if there was such a thing. Twenty miles down the road – and that was hours of travelling – there was a man on the hard shoulder, just him and his kids. We didn’t ask where his wife was, because we knew, I think. His engine was gone, and Piers offered his services, set to work, shirt rolled up to the elbows. We left London because the kids were scared, he said. Where do we go? asked the man whilst Piers tinkered, and I said that I didn’t know. I don’t know very much, I’m afraid, I told him. Piers got the engine working, of course, and as we were leaving the man asked us about God, and I swear, I had almost forgotten. Do you think that, if we had prayed, He might not have gone, and then none of this would have happened? Isn’t this all our fault, that we let Him go? And I said, I think it’s our fault anyway, and I don’t think it’s got anything to do with God. Whether He was here in the first place; whether The Broadcast was Him or not; whether He left us; whether He came back; does any of that really matter now? He looked like he was going to argue with us about it, or make a case for something, so I stopped him. I’m not going to argue this point, I said. We don’t know. We just don’t know, and, chances are, we never will. Either way, we did this, and we’ve made our beds, and now we really have to just damn well lie in them. We started driving again, but he sat there, engine running.
Five minutes later, on the radio, a very-tired sounding lady announced that there was – her words – reason to believe that the sickness that had plagued the world in recent days was ended. Wonder if they found out what it was? Piers said, and I hummed and hawed along, all the time thinking about my pills, and about how lucky I was. I hadn’t died, and, really, if God had anything to do with it, I probably should have.
Peter Johns, biologist, Auckland
I felt like we were forgotten about here. We had a funeral for Trig, days after he kicked it, and people came from all over. We didn’t have the curfew, because we weren’t scared of anybody doing anything against us. Stay out of the way, that was our motto. Even when you got over the Ditch, they kept their noses clean just as well as us. We had the service, some of the people from the Church of the One True God dealing with it, and it was just like the old service, essentially, a few different words, but the same sort of thing. Trig would’ve liked it, I reckon.
Afterwards we went to the pub, and we sat and we drank him under, and we got into this whole thing about why we were left alone. We don’t interfere, they forget about us, I said. Nah, nah, said Trig’s brother, it’s because we’re in Godzone, eh? (We called it that sometimes, because of God’s Own Country.) Fucking Godzone, I said, and we drank to that.
María Marcos Callas, housewife, Barcelona
The Church of the One True God said, We need more priests, and we need to decide who can become a priest. I stepped forward, and I told them that I would like to offer my services. One of the criteria, I said, is that the priests should know that our Lord never left us; that this is another of His tests. I quoted the Bible at them, the King James version, because I had learned the English: this is a trial of our faith, I said, being much more precious than gold that perisheth, and though it be tried with fire, it will only help us praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ. Amen, they all said, and Amen, I said.
I went home after that for the first time in days. Roberto, my husband, was on the kitchen table, lying on it like he passed out from eating his soup. He was dead, but that would be because he had not gone to church when called, because he had continued as he wanted. They spoke about this for years, years and years: what saved those people who were saved? And I maintain, it was: and always will be, their faith.
Simon Dabnall, Member of Parliament, London
We ran out of petrol somewhere near Bristol, just after we saw the sign suggesting that we visit Bath for the day. Rather not, Piers said. We ran on fumes until we got to the mouth of the Severn Bridge, and then – at Piers’ suggestion, I hasten to add – we walked – trudged, in hindsight – along the side-path of the bridge. Luckily, Piers was quite willing to carry the majority of the things we’d brought with us, so I let him. At the other side we saw the signpost – Welcome to Wales! it said – and I faux-kissed it. Piers rolled his eyes. I rested against a hillock, and he sat next to me. You know it’s about another thirty miles, right? he asked, and I lay back. I didn’t even know Wales was that big, I joked.
It must have been something that he pi
cked up in the army, but Piers’ ability to stay awake was formidable. The walk took us all the way through the night and well into the early hours, and I was, honestly, at the point of no return from about the five-miles-in mark. My eyes were sagging and tired, even with my glasses off that they might get rested a tad; Piers’ were prodded wide open as if they had those old cartoon matchsticks underneath the lids. I couldn’t tell you how many times I nearly nodded off as we walked up those ghastly little roads, and even off-road, on trails and paths. I know a short-cut, Piers kept saying, which invariably meant hills and shrubbery and a distinct lack of light other than that from the moon. I’ll catch up, I said at one point, lying flat on a short wall. If we don’t do it together, we won’t get there in one piece, he said. He was right; I persevered (mostly because he threatened to walk off on his own, and I realized that I didn’t have a damn bloody clue where on Earth I was).
When we reached the house it was morning, and we were halfway up a mountain without a proper road on it, just a tarmac path between two hedges. I looked down at Wales, the clearest day I could remember, the most beautiful view out over the sea, the hills, the city – Cardiff? Newport? I couldn’t tell which – twinkling away in the distance. Piers’ parents’ house was at the top of the hill, so we ploughed on. It was quaint, but better than that word suggests; all the luxuries of the modern age, along with some older touches. And an Aga! It was quiet in there, and cold, so Piers went and fetched logs and set the fire going, and we turned the Aga on, sat in front of it, boiled water to add to the tea bags that Piers decided were one of the emergency provisions we had needed to bring with us. How long has it been since you’ve been here? I asked him, and he said, Too long.
In the garden there was a hutch, for chickens, and a bit of cornered-off soil for veg. Nothing growing there, of course, but, in time. And, an hour after we turned up, a cat appeared on the doorstep, so Piers fed her some of the tuna we’d brought along. Really, I couldn’t believe my luck.
Meredith Lieberstein, retiree, New York City
We drove up to Rochester, because it was away from any danger. The town was next-to-normal, apart from the people in the streets. We still, even though we all have a TV, we still do that thing of standing around the outside of shops and watching their sets, as a community. What’s happened? I asked a group of girls, and they said, It’s all over, we guess. What is? Everything, they said. The bombs have stopped, the war is over, the illness has stopped. David didn’t react, but I started crying, because it felt so solid. We had a drink in a diner, opened (the owner told us) for the first time in days. I bought David a Coke, and we watched the news, that awful anchor from Fox that Leonard used to hate having uprooted to Pittsburgh or Pennsylvania, another city, same awful, arrogant man; but he had the best news. He spoke about how there were six or seven places across the US that were designated as exclusion zones, said that nobody could go near them. One of them was New York City, one of them Washington, DC. He spoke about how many people were estimated as having died, but clarified the numbers with provisos – There are numbers still coming in, especially from abroad, and many of those people were sick prior to the sickness – and he spoke about landmarks that were destroyed. He showed the last video from the terrorists then, saying that it just arrived in the studio. He looked so scared before they played it that I even believed him.
Tom Gibson, news anchor, New York City
The DVD arrived, hand-delivered. Security here was nothing like it was in New York, so nobody saw who dropped it off, and they didn’t have cameras on the drop-box out front, so it was anybody’s guess. It was that same terrorist, same cave, same camera, and he spoke slowly. We have been told to stop attacking you, he said. We have punished you for your sins, and you have learned your lesson. The next time you parade false Gods to the world with your science, your tricks, we will strike you from the face of the earth. He looked serious, but scared, as scared as we were, and ill; his eyes were almost black, and not in an evil man way. In a tired, not sleeping, pained way.
Ladies and gentlemen, I said, we have clarification that it’s over. It didn’t matter that the video didn’t mesh with what the government had said, that they had killed everybody, or captured them; it didn’t matter that the video didn’t say who had told them to stop attacking us, their government or their terror cell or, you know, The Broadcast, maybe; what mattered was that it was all done. We had that relief then, across the country, both that it was over, and that he was definitely confessing to the sickness, to whatever was causing it. Because, it ended when he said that it was over, so that made sense; they caused it. You need a confession, because it’s as good as proof, right?
Meredith Lieberstein, retiree, New York City
When we had finished the drinks – and watched nearly an hour of interviews with people on the streets around the country, all so happy, so glad that this was all over – we left the café. We should just drive for a while, I said to David, and so we set off out of the town. I asked him questions as we went, but he wouldn’t answer them properly, darting around them. Do you have a family? I asked, and he said, Yes, but then didn’t offer any more. I didn’t want to push him.
After a fashion we were at the edge of the lake, and I said that I wanted to see it. It feels like a new start, I said, and David smiled. I’ll be along, he said, so I went to the shoreline. There was a boat out, bobbing on the waves; some people on the deck. Hello! I shouted, Hello! It’s over, I yelled, because I thought that they might want to know. They waved back, and I saw the woman beckon me aboard. The man climbed into a little rower that they had tied to the back, started to come toward the shore, so I shouted for him to hang on, ran back to fetch David. But David was gone; his bag, his placard, everything. I don’t know where he went. I locked the car, took my bag with me, went back to the shoreline, and the man introduced himself. I’m Andrew, he said, and you have no idea how good it is to see you.
Andrew Brubaker, White House Chief of Staff, Washington, DC
Livvy and I sat on the deck and watched the cloud mingle with other clouds that had started to form around it, and we listened as an automated voice – like something from the Second World War, sometime back then – as the voice told us where we could and couldn’t go. Six areas across the US had been declared as uninhabitable for the foreseeable, including New York City and DC. What’s that they say? Livvy said, You can’t go home again? Well, we really can’t. I know, I said, this is it, I think. This is where we’re staying.
Then we saw Meredith, on the shore, and she told us that it was all over, that it had ended, and we were safe again. Didn’t change anything: we weren’t going anywhere.
RECONCILIATIONS
Mark Kirkman, unemployed, Boston
When they knew there was no way they were going to land in New York, all ships – there were four of them on the Atlantic, making their way over from Europe – were told to dock down the coast, in Norfolk, Virginia. We arrived there a few hours before the ship did, and Joseph and I waited on the dock, watched the waves. The supervisor there said that it hadn’t been used for ships as big as ocean-liners for years, because everybody used to go in through New York. They wanted to see her as they arrived, he told us. We used to be US-only, schooners mostly, so we’re undermanned. And we lost some of the crew as well. I didn’t say anything to that, because everybody had lost somebody. It had become this thing where we all knew that everybody else was grieving, but moving on; the usual stuff you said when people had relatives or family that were dead. No more, Sorry for your loss; it was just taken as a given. When the ship appeared – amazing day, because we’d had a run of them, a run where there weren’t clouds in the sky, where you could see for miles and miles – we watched as the crew ran around to get everything ready. We both helped, along with a few others who were waiting for the ship. The crowd of relatives and loved ones went back to the diner, just off the road, and they all cheered when the ship pulled in. They lowered the cargo entrance, because that was
the easiest way to dock it, and we watched as the passengers slid off, thousands of them, but none of them pushing, probably because of tiredness, hunger. Joseph said something about how dirty they looked – I didn’t know they could look that awful after only a week! he said – but I barely noticed. I was trying to find Ally and Katy, and I knew I’d be mostly relying on them to recognize me, because all I’d ever seen of them was that small picture Ally sent me before they got on the ship. Katy saw me first, and I caught her waving as she walked toward me, and then Ally, who looked horrified that we were there. I haven’t got any make-up on, and look at me! Jesus Christ! She kept hiding her face away and making this, like, this growling noise, embarrassed, because, I don’t know, she was nervous. We hadn’t met, and we’d only spoken a few times, but there was … I don’t want to call it an expectation, but that’s what it was, I think. That we would get on? That we’d connect?
Ally Weyland, lawyer, Edinburgh
I looked like absolute shit. Actually, no, I looked worse. Shit would have been a step up. You have no idea. No make-up, the remnants of week-old vomit caked on my shirt, in my hair, and the last thing I wanted to do was meet Mark there and then. I wanted to have a shower first, at the very least. On the ship Katy had asked me if I liked him – You know, she said, like like – and I said that he seemed nice, but I didn’t know. I wasn’t going to give her anything like gossip, because it was one thing to chat on the phone, but it was quite another to actually meet somebody, aye? But, he seemed nice.
