Staring into the Abyss

Long ago there existed a world dominated by hairless monkeys. They created a great and terrible civilisation of kindness and cruelty, connection and isolation, war and peace, freedom and slavery, hope and despair. For as long as they existed, they were consumed with the question, ‘Are we alone in the universe?’ And never, even for a moment did they think to ask that most obvious and terrifying of questions, ‘What if they’re like us?’

* * *

Will clutched forsakenly at the locket, weeping bitterly for happier times as he tried to ignore his circling thoughts amidst the daily commotion of people hunkering down for the day in the old university building.

“It won’t be long now – any day now they’ll come and save us!” Poor child, she’d been saying the same thing for weeks now. But, no one was coming. If he remained here, it was only a matter of time, either they’d run out of food or they’d return to finish the job. Could he really let it end like this? Hadn’t he promised her? Sure, the journey by foot to Coomera would be hard and he’d likely die on the way, but he had to try. For the first time in a long time he felt something other than despair and knew he couldn’t wait and allow the resolve to fade. He had to act now!

He placed the locket back around his neck, picked up his backpack and headed for the exit. The others barely glanced at him, all lost in their own private miseries and so he left without saying goodbye. The once busy streets had become a wasteland of abandoned cars, crumbling buildings and fractured roads. He gingerly stepped down through the rubble, joints creaking from age and disuse as he made his way to the highway.

“Where are you going?” He turned to see the optimistic child, Candice, making her way towards him.

“To keep a promise.”

“Can I come; we might find the resistance?” With her childlike features and gangly limbs, she couldn’t be older than 14 – no older than one of his students. He couldn’t take her knowingly into danger, no matter how messed up the world, but the stubbornness of adolescence shone in her eyes – she would follow regardless. Sighing to himself, he turned and continued on his way.

Upon reaching the highway, Candice screamed in delight and ran ahead towards the sight of people. The people were standing still, almost too still. Something didn’t feel right so he ran to catch up, wincing at the hot flash of pain searing his shins. One of them grabbed her as he closed in, but she managed to free herself, taking the arm with her, exposing the vines that had held him upright. Wheezing, Will pointed towards a path off the highway, letting her run ahead shaking the arm loose as she went.

They didn’t follow – humans were beneath their consideration. Safe on the walking track, amidst the soothing scent of nature, Candice seemed to calm, but couldn’t stop the tears. He wanted to help, but years of training prevented him from comforting her.

“They’re using our dead, like puppets!” She stammered. Yes, they were more like us than I thought. He nodded in reply, letting her vent, and continued along the path. “But, they’ll come soon – someone will save us! The resistance will come,” her voice strengthened as she spoke, her desperate hope calming her in a way he could not. Perhaps hope wasn’t useless, even in the apocalypse. However, ‘her hope was of no comfort to me,’ he thought forlornly, clutching at the locket, ‘only returning her locket, could bring me peace.’

The woodland path was so peaceful and untouched, one could almost forget the horrors of this dystopian world. But like all things, the sense of peace, came to an abrupt end as they reached the end of the path and were faced once more with abandoned wrecks, crumbling homes and blasted roads. The obstacles ahead, forced them to return to the highway and its terrors.

The destruction on the highway was worse than before. Light posts and guardrails littered the road whilst, a litany of cars were strewn across its surface in a cacophony of positions, collisions and explosive remnants forming an obstacle course populated by a puppetry of the dead. The dead paid them no notice as long as they kept their distance which they did as they navigated the road trying not to look at the desperate faces or inhale the acrid, eye-watering stench of ash and death. The child’s eyes were tear-stained and her fists clenched, but she continued on in silence. The montage of destruction and death continued for hours until a whirring from above threw the puppets into a frenzy of motion. Grabbing Candice, Will ran and hunkered down in the grass as far from the road as possible.

The whirring materialised in the shape of a pyramidal aircraft. BOOM! A shockwave of force radiated out from the road with deafening alacrity. The ground shook, cars flew and exploded, and the people vanished in a wail of incineration. But that, couldn’t have been the target, humans were unworthy of consideration in this new world order. As if in answer, the green humanesque puppet master emerged from the earth, and the earth shot up around her in long mountainous spikes that collided with the aircraft, knocking it out of the sky.

Will trembled, his mouth parched, and bile burned his throat as he shuddered in the grass overwhelmed by the power of the true masters of this world. But, the child fuelled by righteous rage charged madly at the creature. Her dream of salvation shattered by reality had stripped her of reason. Somehow, he found a shimmer of courage he didn’t know he possessed and chased after her knocking her to the ground just before a glacier of ice shot forth from the ruined aircraft combined with the heat of the explosion and blasted him off his feet into darkness.

He awoke in a field of flowers under a heart shaped moon to the most beautiful sight he had ever beheld – his wife shimmering in the distance. He ran to her, but no matter how far he ran she grew no closer. He clutched at the locket, still around his neck, and knew he could not face her, not until he kept his promise. A rhythmic thumping seemed to fracture the world making craters in the once smooth field.

“Huaaaaggh,” he lurched awake, wincing at the pain in his ribs, and everywhere else. The child knelt over him, crying, amidst the wreckage with the sound of explosions fading into the distance.

“Why do they do this to us?” He smiled in spite of himself at the teachable moment.

“Who can say, perhaps they think like John Locke that people can only own land if they enclose it. After all we don’t enclose our planet in a forcefield, so you could say we brought it on ourselves.”

“That’s stupid – can’t they see our towns, cities, homes, families? How could they think that we don’t have the right to live?”

“So, think all who are oppressed and yet the oppressors always find a way to believe it. Help me up, we need to keep going.” They continued on for hours, their pace ever slowing until they finally reached the place of the promise. The once neatly manicured grass had begun to become overgrown combining with the dim moonlight to disguise the messages inscribed on the evenly placed stones. As he walked through the lanes his pace slowed both from the pain of the journey and the sorrow of journey’s end. Ungraciously he fell before one stone in particular and placed the locket upon it.

“I’ve returned to keep the promise I made to you 11 years ago, to live out our days until death do us part. I am grateful, that I was allowed to make it this far and to live out my last days with you.” He glanced back at the child sitting morosely amidst the gravestones and sighed. If he gave up now he’d be abandoning a child. Placing his hand upon the stone he whispered, “wait a little longer,” and stood, the locket entwined between his fingers and walked back over to sit beside Candice.

“There’s no hope is there – no one’s coming?” He smiled at the irony of her saying the words that had pervaded his mind for so long, and somehow not believing them.

“Yes, no one’s coming, but that doesn’t mean we have to give up. You just need to find something to keep you going.”

“Like what?”

“Eventually, they’ll either kill each other or leave, and when that happens, survivors will return. So, let’s focus on preparing for that day. This land is fertile, let’s make a garden so we can provide a feast to any survivors that we meet. After, all Candide, Voltaire said that is the only point to life.”

And with that he ceased, giving her time alone with her thoughts as he stared out into the moonlit night free from aircrafts and puppets, earth beasts and ice monsters, hardship and fear. As close to a utopia as humanity had ever reached and yet the grasping, clawing parting of clouds seemed to lead the sight into oppressive and immeasurable darkness…

* * *

The End