Above the Dark Sky

Despite being almost 500 miles south of the Green Zone, The Stellman Tower in Oslo was still the seventh tallest building on earth. It was 948 stories tall.

Oslo had no known ground dwellers, as the heat and radiation had forced even the subterranean communities to abandon Norway in order to seek the cooler, survivable climates further north. The nearly 400,000 residents in the Stellman Tower were the last remaining humans to populate any area outside of the Green Zones.

The only two inhabitable regions on earth were 10,000 miles apart.

There were far taller buildings in the massive North Zone metropolises of Reykjavik and Helsinki. In the South Zone, the Antarctic boom towns of Alhamd Albarida and New Hope boasted towers well over 1,000 stories.

Still, the Stellman Tower had stood the test of time and was considered the pioneering standard for hemispheric habitation. It was by far the largest man-made structure when construction was completed 300 years earlier. The Tower was hailed as a miracle of engineering that would save humanity. It was dubbed “Stellman’s Arc” and the Stellman family won the admiration of a desperate population on the brink of extinction.

With that admiration came unimaginable wealth and power. Generations of Stellmans built upon the family empire and inside two centuries, the Stellman family, by all measures, controlled every aspect of life on one Earth.

Myron Stellman stared blankly through the 36-inch glass window on the 948th floor. Despite the temperature on the other side the thick window standing at 184° F, Myron’s wool suit and silk scarf did little to warm him from the 64° climate-controlled penthouse on the inside.

The Stellman penthouse suite was, by 26th century standards, the safest and most luxurious place on Earth. Soaring nearly two miles above ground, the well-appointed office space was, on most days, about a quarter mile above the “dark smog” and rarely even encountered the “gray drift”, which typically floated above the darker smog layer.

Myron had never been below the 920th floor. He had only left the security of the tower twice since being born in the Tower Hospital 48 years earlier. Both excursions outside the tower were to oversee development projects in the South Zone. The Solar Glider in the hanger on the 940th floor was the only craft that could provide successful transport between the Zones.

Myron had never even seen the surface of the earth, much less stepped foot on it. From his office, he could see the sunshine. At night, he could see the moon and stars.

By contrast, very few people had ever seen the sun or clear sky above the dark smog. Since the first black rains began centuries ago, almost no one ever had a chance to see unobstructed sunlight, much less the moon and the stars at night.

After several generations under the dark sky, many had begun to doubt the stories about the days of light. Younger generations denounced the stories of a warm light from the sky and could not comprehend any rain other than the black rain.

Books that spoke of a different kind of rain were denounced as fables written for children. The notion that the hydro reservoirs were provided by some different kind of rain hundreds of years ago was often met with violent protest by those in the Stellman-run hydro reservoir protection industry. Those dedicated to keeping the black rain away from the hydro reservoirs had extraordinarily little patience for fairy tales that the hydro came from the sky.

Everyone knew somebody who had been killed by the black rain. Most people had scars from the black rain. A few drops could scar you for life. If you didn’t have your Stellman Suit, a downpour could kill you in less than a minute. If the black rain hit the hydro supply, it could wipe out the human race inside of a year.

Perhaps more importantly, nothing above 1,000 feet had ever recorded being hit with the black rain. The 36-inch thick windows that encapsulated Stellman’s Arc were embedded with a silicon exterior lining and were composed of a mercury-based polymer, HG-237, which was developed by Stellman Industries and had proven to be the only manmade solution for protection against the relentless radiation and the deadly black rain.

Some had argued that HG-237 and hundreds of other products developed by Stellman Hydro International were part of a conspiracy and that although the products did protect against the black rain, they may have caused it. Most of those theories were considered nonsense and dismissed as wacky conspiracy theories.

Myron looked down through the window and saw lightning exploding inside the dark smog a quarter of a mile below his bright sun-lit perch far above the darkness. He opened his desk drawer and pulled out a weathered envelope and set it neatly on his desk. His blank gaze remained with the intensifying lightning in the dark smog below.

Myron barely averted his gaze as a soft series of pings was followed by a pleasant robotic voice that echoed throughout the cavernous office space.

“Myron, your brother Damion wishes to speak with you. Please advise.”

Myron winced.

“Very well.”

Another ping.

“Hey, little brother, are you watching this? You see what these idiot ground-dwellers in the South Zone are up to?”

Myron swung around his chair slowly and looked at a wall of news coverage next to the video feed of his brother. The news footage was from Antarctica. Ground-dwelling rebels were gaining military traction in the larger settlements and there was a serious threat that they could soon overtake any number of Stellman hemispheric towers. They owned all thirteen of them on the continent.

“Looks like they are trying to survive, Damion.”

“Ok, sure little brother. Let’s get serious, here. We’ve got some hydro rights down there. If these morons in New Hope keep this up, we could lose that entire South Zone investment.”

Myron looked at the weathered envelope on his desk.

“I’ve got to go, Damion.”

“You’ve got to go? Little brother, have you lost your mind? Do you know how much hydro is on the line here? Man, you have been out of it, lately! We’ve got to talk to our guys down there like right now.”

“Sorry, Damion. I’ve got to go.”

Damian was furious and it was impossible to hide as his face became noticeably flush. Stellmans and other cloud-dwellers were classically attractive for the period. Ground and mid-level dwellers tried to mimic the stylish look of the cloud dwellers. Damian’s skin was so fair it was nearly transparent, exposing a distinctive web of bright blue and red blood vessels. The pale skin was even more pronounced by jet black hair that most cloud dwellers wore long and straight.

“Are you still reading that ancient history garbage, Myron?”

Myron took another glance at the footage of the rebellion in Antarctica. He clutched the envelope and walked back over to the window. He looked down at the lightning popping inside the dark smog thousands of feet below.

He opened the envelope.

Damian persisted.

“You have to stop reading that nonsense from these ground-dwelling vermin.”

“Vermin?” Myron asked. “Are they vermin?”

“They are lying about our family, Myron! We saved them. We built the technology to keep them alive. They owe us their lives, and this is the thanks we get?”

Myron was unphased by his brother’s passionate pleas. His ghostly pale face remained expressionless as he continued to gaze at the storm brewing below.

“I’ve got to go.”

“Myron, seriously, this is not the time for your juvenile delusions…”

Myron swiped his hand over his brother’s video feed, ending the call.

He opened the envelope. He had read the letter many times before. He never stopped thinking about it. When he had discovered it years earlier after his Grandmother’s funeral, it had spurred him to start the research that would change his view of everything he thought to be true.

Myron began to consider things that were simply unthinkable to any cloud dweller, much less a Stellman.

As he had done hundreds of times before, he pulled out the tattered folded letter and set the heart-shaped locket tucked inside on the desk. Although the words were trapped in his memory, he read them once again.

To my Sons and Daughters,

I must say goodbye to you but want you to know the truth.

The water was good.

Not so long ago the rain was a gift. The genius that is our family has been a blessing to us, but we have committed unthinkable crimes. Our family’s work is a protection from the new hell the rain brings. But we created the darkness in the rain. Our work was a thing of greed. The drop I leave you in my Grandmother’s locket is maybe the last of the good rain.

I hope it is not the very last.

Hold this water, and God-willing make the rain good again.

-Abagail Stellman

Myron folded up the letter, and for the first time in his life, he didn’t put it back in the drawer. He put it in his back pocket as he stared down at the lightning once again. He clung to the locket, rubbing it nervously with the tip of his thumb.

Nobody could have predicted what one of the most powerful men on earth would do next.

Security had never even considered planning for a Stellman trying to reach the first floor, much less walk outside. So, Myron made it all the way down to the first floor unnoticed.

For the first time in his life, Myron set foot on the surface of the earth.

The deadly rain reeked of sulfur and the violent flashes of lightning revealed hellish clouds of steam coming up from the pools of the black poison forming at the base of Stellman’s Arc.

Myron was unsure of the actual consequences but was willing to risk his life to step into the darkness to shed light on the truth. He stoically walked into the rain, arms open to the attacking rain.

The downpour cut through his clothes and flesh instantly, scorching his skin on contact. The security detail was too late. From the lobby, they watched in horror as the most powerful man on earth was swiftly reduced into the steaming puddles of darkness, leaving nothing but a heart-shaped locket with a single drop of ancient water.