2000 A.D.

The following story was conceptualized by Kurt Vonnegut as a fictional manuscript in his book, Cat’s Cradle. As a fan of Kurt Vonnegut, I’ve created my rendition of the story, based on his brief description of it:

“The novel was about the end of the world in the year 2000, and the name of the book was 2000 A.D. It told about how mad scientists made a terrific bomb that wiped out the whole world. There was a big sex orgy when everybody knew that the world was going to end, and then Jesus Christ Himself appeared ten seconds before the bomb went off. The name of the author was Marvin Sharpe Holderness, and he told [Dr. Hoenikker] in a covering letter that he was in prison for killing his own brother.” - Vonnegut, 1963.

The Covering Letter

To all legal entities, the following paragraph is not to be taken as an admission of guilt, nor is it meant for your peering eyes. Kindly mind your business should this manuscript surreptitiously end up in your possession.

This paragraph is meant to inform the famed Dr. Felix Hoenikker of who I am, as well as my purpose for sending him my manuscript. I am Marvin Holderness. I am currently incarcerated for the murder of my brother. I stabbed him forty-seven times in the chest. My therapist has told me that what I lack in empathy, I make up for in extreme attention to detail. It is because of this extreme attention to detail, that I seek your advice in writing my magnum opus, 2000 A.D. It is a story about mad scientists who blow up the world using a bomb. I have no science background, however, and therefore haven’t the slightest idea what sort of material could be used to make such a capable explosive. This is what I am asking of you, to tell me what I should put on paper as the ingredients for my fearsome bomb. I have attached the unfinished manuscript for your reading pleasure. A response would be very much appreciated, but do take your time. I won’t be going anywhere anytime soon.

2000 A.D., by Marvin Sharpe Holderness

This is how it began:

It was New Year's Day in New York City. Normand’s brain was still thumping away in response to the unconventional amount of alcohol he had consumed the night prior. He sat at his cubicle, nursing the thumping with a nice, cool ginger ale. The cubicle was open to the office on one side, and Normand had a view of the reception desk from it.

At the desk was Normand’s coworker, Katie. Katie was, as one could guess, the receptionist. She wrapped and unwrapped a strand of her black hair around her index finger, a note of boredom on her face. Between Katie and Normand were a bunch of streamers and four balloons. The four balloons were shaped like so:

“2, 0, 0, 0”, respectively

Both Katie and Normand had attended the New Year’s Eve celebration the night before. Not the big one in Manhattan, but a little one, in Josh’s apartment in Queens. Josh was an accountant.

Katie had come to America from The Philippines with her mother as a teenager in 1969. She had lived in a few different places along the west coast before moving to New York as a young adult, cajoled by the city’s alluring lights, and the captivating stories that emerged from it.

Once in the city, Katie tried her hand at acting. She took some cheap courses, unable to afford a prestigious theater school. She auditioned for the roles that she could audition for (there wasn't much work in theater for a woman from The Philippines at the time), but never successfully landed anything. What was intended to be a temporary gig while she found her footing in the industry, turned out to be a twenty-five-year career in answering phone calls and scanning documents. She was forty-six now.

Normand knew all of this about Katie, because he was obsessed with her. Voraciously obsessed.

Normand was a man in his mid-twenties. He, for one, could afford a prestigious education, and he got one. He was now a software engineer because of it.

In the cubicle across from him was Deborah. She was enormous. He couldn’t see her from behind the big, gray wall of his cubicle, but he could hear her poor chair straining with each subtle movement she made. She was polite, though.

By the coffee maker, stood Normand’s second-best friend, Danny. Danny was the other software engineer there. The poor sap had a shiny bald spot, even though he was only twenty-seven. Danny smirked and nodded a hung-over nod to Normand, who was fixated on Katie, and didn’t notice.

Some work got done at a minimal pace that day, until the boss, Mr. Abernathy, came trudging out of his office. He had a sickened look on his face like he had just seen a dead body. His eyes were moist and reddened, the aftermath of tears.

“Okay, everybody, listen up,” he said, before releasing a long, drawn out sigh, “I just got off a two-hour phone call with my cousin in the special forces-”

“Oo, the one with the houseboat?” Danny interrupted.

Everyone looked at Danny sternly. He glanced down at the floor in embarrassment.

“As I was saying,” continued Mr. Abernathy, “My cousin informs me that a couple of scientists have accidentally set off a bomb. It’s a big bomb, and I don’t know how else to say this, but we have approximately ten minutes before we’re all dust. This bomb is made of [TBD], so it’s explosion will destroy the whole world. Essentially, we’re all screwed.”

There was an eerie pause among the office workers.

“What?”, said somebody in the back of the room.

“What is it saying about this on the news?” said another, “Can we check the news?”

“Get the big TV from the conference room. The one we use for movie lunch parties!”

Danny and another employee ran to the conference room to get the big TV. Mr. Abernathy slowly walked back toward his office, his hands in his pockets.

“Mr. Abernathy,” called Katie, “Where are you going?”

He kept walking away.

Without looking over his shoulder, he hollered back, “I’m going to call my parents and tell them I love them. If there’s time, I’ll call my wife too. I suggest you all do something similar with your loved ones.”

Panic was beginning to break out in the office.

Mindy, a small, blonde accountant most known for her positive attitude, screamed “Fuck!” at the top of her lungs, and sprinted for the door, tossing aside a full coffee mug as she did so. The mug bounced once, and then shattered, sending hot arabica-blend flying all over.

Danny and the other employee came out of the conference room wheeling the TV over on its wooden stand. They rolled it to an outlet, and Danny plugged it in. The other guy tossed the remote to Katie, who understood how TVs worked. She flicked it on, and shuffled over to channel 5 local news. Static. Nothing more.

She tried the next news channel, and got the same result.

She continued to flip through news channels, until finally, she found one that was airing. It was a show that usually consisted of spoof stories, and satirical political rants. The head anchor, Chet Burnstein, was talking. The chair next to him, which was usually occupied by his foxy co-anchor, Jill Crawford, was empty.

“...and so that's why I’m still here,” he said, “I know I rant a lot on this show about all the things America does wrong. I know I seem to hate this place; but the truth is, I love this stupid country like a father loves his angsty teenager. I criticize America out of love, because I know it can be better, and I know it can have a brighter future, if it applies itself.”

He paused and looked away in thought, then looked back and continued:

“I love you as well, all of you who listen. That is why, as our world comes to an end, I’m going to live my last minutes here in the studio, with you. For Jill Crawford, though, I’m Chet Burnstein signing off…”

“Jesus Christ,” somebody said.

“Oh my God, it’s really true,” said another.

Katie called her mother from the reception phone. Deborah picked up her phone to call her sisters. Normand had nobody to call. He looked over at Danny, his second-best friend, who was already looking at him.

Danny shrugged and straightened his lips in a manner that said “Now what?” Normand got up and walked over to him. There was coffee all over his white, button-up shirt from the mug incident earlier.

“Why aren’t you calling anyone, Dan?” he asked him.

“Only person I’d call is my Dad, and he’s in the Bahamas with his new girlfriend right now. They probably don’t even know the news. How about you? Don’t you want to call someone?”

“Who?” Normand asked, “My cat?”

They both shared a melancholy laugh (The cat was Normand’s first best friend)

A circle began to form in the middle of the office. There was Josh from accounting, Cecilia from quality control (who they rarely ever saw), two interns named Riley and Joe, and now, Danny and Normand.

“Shame we can’t go home for this,” said Joe.

“Right?” replied Josh, “This damn commute, man. Ten minutes isn’t enough time for me to get all the way back to Queens.”

“Especially not today,” chimed Cecilia, “I bet the traffic is worse than it’s ever been.”

“Look at us,” Josh cut in, “It’s the last few minutes of our lives, and we’re talking about fucking traffic.”

There was a brief pause.

“You’re right,” Cecilia said, looking Josh in his eyes, “What’s your darkest secret?”

“What?” he replied, taken aback by her question.

“You’re going to die, Josh. What’s your darkest secret?”

“I don’t really…”

“I got the clap from the cleaning guy,” she said confidently.

“Woah”, said more than one person simultaneously.

She laughed and continued, “My husband cheated on me a month ago, and I told him that’s why I did it, but that's not true. I just really wanted to fuck the cleaning guy.”

Everyone laughed.

“Okay, okay,” Josh began, red-faced, “Um, oh. I shit my pants at the party last night. Nobody knew about it. I went and changed right away.”

The circle erupted with laughter again.

“You had a party and didn’t invite me, asshole?” Cecilia teased.

“I just learned your name two seconds ago,” Josh replied. He then looked at the two interns. “And I don’t know anything about you two.”

“I slept with my pottery professor for a grade boost”, Riley said.

“I pretended to be mentally handicapped one time to skip the line at an amusement park” admitted Joe.

Joe was meek and had thick, prescription glasses. Riley had dyed blonde hair, a nose piercing, and fake breasts.

Danny joined in now, “It’s not embarrassing, but I need to get it off my chest. A week after my mom died, my dad had a new girlfriend already. He bought her a car– a damn car! He never even bought my mom flowers! I’ve never talked bad on my parents before, but I hate that douche! I hate him, and his bitch girlfriend!”

The circle was fired up now. They were drunk on impending doom.

Danny nodded at Normand. It was his turn.

Normand’s immediate thought was of Katie. He pictured her naked, splayed out on the reception desk.

“Um…” he started.

“Hi, what’s going on?” a voice interrupted. It was Katie, just now entering the circle. She had tear streaks down her face, presumably from the phone call with her mother.

“We’re telling our darkest secrets!” exclaimed Josh. An excited smile spread across his dumb face.

“Oh, well…” she started, “Fuck it, I suppose.”

She inhaled preemptively, about to spilling her secret.

“Hey everybody,” came Deborah’s voice, interrupting Katie, “our building is right outside Central Park, and I don’t know about you all, but I want to see the outside one more time before I go.”

The whole office followed Deborah outside.

The streets were chaotic. Traffic was, as Cecilia predicted, just awful. A man in a suit was fighting a homeless woman and losing. Windows were being broken into for some pointless looting. A street performer was hugging his tin drum, pouring muffled sobs into the top of it. A young girl in a miniskirt was lighting her tiny car on fire, joyful as can be.

The group of office employees walked down the street in unison and stepped onto the expansive lawn of Central Park. They could see a beautiful hill beset in front of impossibly tall skyscrapers, which stood like beguiling soldiers in the background. It was the New York City they loved.

On the hill, there were other people, probably around one-hundred other people, and they were all naked.

It was an orgy the likes of which none had ever seen! Something in the ancient genes of these New Yorkers had activated an unquenchable appetite for sex. Something in their bodies was telling them, “Reproduce now! It’s your last chance!”

Deborah was not immune to it. Without skipping a beat, she advanced toward the mass of nude, undulating skin, unbuttoning her cardigan (which was being stretched to its absolute limit anyway). Normand was paralyzed, and elated, and absolutely terrified all at once. Josh and Cecilia went happily into the orgy next, their hands interlocked.

Joe, the spectacled intern, reached for the hand of his fellow intern, Riley, but she was already sprinting towards a large, muscular, meatball of a man, who looked like he ate sports for breakfast. The man smiled and opened his arms for her to dive into them. She obliged.

Danny tossed his shirt and pants aside and marched onward as well, gesturing back at Normand to follow him.

Normand stood still, watching it all unfold, until he felt a set of fingernails caress his upper spine. His stomach tingled. His back muscles twitched. He could sense that they were Katie’s fingernails.

She sauntered in front of Normand to face him, her hand running over his shoulder to his chest.

“You know,” she said, her eyes still moist with fateful tears, “You look a lot like this guy I did an acting class with once”.

Normand mustered up the best line he could think of, and produced this: “Really?”

“Yeah,” she replied, “Like ‘a lot’, alot”.

“Great”

“Yeah. Only, you’re probably like, way smarter than him, ‘cause you work with computers all the time.”

Katie had never been the brightest, but Normand did not fault her for it; and now, at the denouement of human existence, where seconds of life were becoming exponentially more valuable, he did not give an inkling of a shit about her intelligence.

He looked into her eyes, which peered back into his as she pulled him closer. Behind them, way off in the distance, a ball of deadly, smoking, human creation soared towards the Earth. It was turning the sky behind it a dull, fiery burgundy. Bursting conflagrations trailed behind the bomb as chemicals reacted in the air, creating God-shaped fireworks for the doomed race below.

At this very moment, an impossibly bright beam of magnificent light sliced through the fabric of spacetime, opening a void, a portal to Heaven itself. Out of this portal floated Jesus Christ, the Savior of All Mankind: dark beard, golden crown, robes of pearly white, and believe it or not, black skin. He looked out over Central Park to see hundreds of his children, diddling one another in every sinful way possible.

The portal to Heaven tinted Katie’s brown eyes, turning them a fiery, seductive orange color. Normand grabbed her collar with both hands and ripped her shirt open. Her head craned back in enjoyment as his lips descended down her neck.

Jesus Christ let out an exasperated breath, placed his hands on his hips, and shook his head in disapproval.

Finally, the bomb came crashing into Earth.

It was a silent explosion, because by the time the sound waves had caught up to it, every ear in existence had been obliterated, and there was nothing left to pick up the sound signal.