Kat’s smile was like a mother’s watching a favourite child. She was sixty, grey and thin and twisted like a length of wire. There was something shattered in her pale eyes which spoke of tragedy in her past, or knowledge of the future, and Danny loved her with a tender, touching concern.
He jabbed a finger at the map. “There’s the trench, right there, just north of the African coast. I’m sure if we drill deep enough…”
“We could use some fresh stuff,” I said. “I’m tired of drinking recycled piss.”
Danny smiled. Edvard raised his glass and examined the murky liquid, smacking his lips. “I don’t know. As victuals go, this is a fine drop. Good body, a hint of mustard.”
I watched Kat as she ate, which she did sparingly. She’d given herself a small portion, and didn’t eat all of that. Before the rest of us had finished, she pushed her plate away and left the table, limping to the door of the berth she shared with Danny. He watched her go, then followed her. I looked at Edvard, as if for explanation, but his eyes were on his food.
After the meal I moved outside, taking my rifle with me, and in the spill of light from the truck I had a bath. I sat naked in the sand, taking handfuls of the fine grains and rubbing them over my body. I felt the grease and sweat fall away, leaving a fine covering of sandy powder. I dug deeper, finding the cooler sand, and poured it over my belly and thighs.
I thought about Kat, and told myself she’d be fine. Minutes later, as if to confirm that hope, the truck began rocking as Danny and Kat made love. I found myself thinking how Kat must have been good looking, way back — like the naked women in the old magazines. But I stopped those thoughts as soon as they began, stood up and pulled on my shorts.
I was about to go inside when a door opened along the flank of the truck and Edvard looked out. “Pierre?”
He stepped from the truck and climbed down. We sat in silence for a time and stared into the night sky. The storms were starting high above the far horizon, great actinic sheets of white fire.
At last I said, “Is Kat okay?”
He flashed a glance at me. “She’s ill, Pierre. We all are.”
“But Kat–?”
He sighed. “Cancer. I don’t know how advanced it is. There’s nothing I can do about it, apart from give her the odd pain-killer. And I’m running low on those.” He paused, then said, “I’m sorry.”
I said, “How long?”
He shook his head. “Maybe a year, two if she’s lucky.”
I nodded, staring through the darkness at the dim buildings. I wanted to say something, but the words wouldn’t come.
“You think Danny’s right about the Med?” I asked at last.
Edvard shrugged. “I honestly don’t know.” He was silent for a time. “I do recall when there was sea there, Pierre, and magnificent towns and cities. The rich flocked there.”
Not for the first time I tried to imagine the great bodies of water Edvard had described, water that filled areas as vast as deserts, and heaved and rolled… I shook my head. All I saw was a desert the colour of drinking water, flat and still.
He looked into the heavens as the night sky split with a crack of white light. It was Edvard who’d explained to me why, despite all the storms that raged, we never experienced rainfalclass="underline" the little rain that did fall evaporated in the superheated lower atmosphere before it reached the earth. I thought of the storms, now, as mocking us with their futile promise.
I stared around at the buildings. “You think we can rebuild? I mean, make things like they were, before?”
Edvard smiled. “I like to think that with time, and hard work… Like Danny, I’m an optimist. I really think that people, at heart, are good. Call me a fool, if you like, but that’s what I think. So, if we could band together, always assuming there were enough people to feasibly propagate the race… then perhaps there would be hope.”
“But to get back to where things were… civilised?” I finished.
“That’s a big call, Pierre. We’ve lost so much, so much learning, culture. We’ve lost so much expertise. So much of what we knew, of what we learned over centuries of scientific investigation and understanding… all that is gone, and can never be rediscovered. Or if it can, then it’ll take centuries… even assuming the planet isn’t too far gone, even assuming that humanity can reform.”
I thought about that for a time, then said, “But with no more oceans, no more seas…”
He smiled at me. “I live in hope, Pierre. There might be small seas, underground reserves. I heard there are still small seas where the Pacific ocean was–”
“Couldn’t we…?” I began.
He was smiling.
“What?” I said.
“The Pacific is half a world away, Pierre. This thing might get us to the Med, if we’re lucky. But not the Pacific.”
I considered his words, the barren vastness of the world, and the little I knew of it. At last I said, “If we’re the last… I mean, I haven’t seen another human for years.”
“We aren’t alone, Pierre. There are others, small bands. There must be.” He was silent awhile, and then said, “And anyway, even if life on Earth is doomed…”
After a few seconds I prompted him, “Yes?”
“Well,” he said, “there’s always Project Phoenix.”
He’d told me all about Project Phoenix, the last hope. Forty years ago, when the world governments had known things were bad and getting worse, they pooled resources and constructed a starship, full of five thousand hopeful citizens, and sent it to the stars.
Towards the east, where the sky was blackest, I made out a dozen faint glimmering points of distant stars. I thought of the starship, still on its journey, or having reached its destination and the colonists settled on a new, Earthlike planet.
“What do you think happened to the starship?” I asked.
“I like to think they’re sitting up there now, enjoying paradise, and wondering what they left behind on Earth–”
He stopped and looked up into the night sky, then fitted his hand above his eyes to cut out the glare of the magnetic storm. “Dammit, Pierre.” He scrambled to his feet.
I joined him, my heart thumping. “What?” Then, as I scanned the sky, I heard it — the faint drone of a distant engine.
Edvard pointed, and at last I made out what he’d seen.
High in the air, and heading towards us, was the dark shape of a small plane.
I reached out for my rifle, propped against the side of the truck, and shouted at Danny and Kat to get out here.
“It’s in trouble,” Edvard said.
The engine was stuttering as the plane angled steeply over the distant buildings, a dark shape against the flaring storm. We watched it pass quickly overhead and come down in the desert perhaps half a kilometre beyond the truck.
Danny and Kat were out by now. “What was it?”
I said, “I’ll go and check it out.”
Edvard’s hand gripped my arm. “It’s no coincidence. A flyer doesn’t just drop out of the sky so close. They knew we were here. They want something.”
We all looked to Danny. He nodded. “Okay, I’ll go with you. Edvard, Kat, stay here.”
Kat nodded, moved to Edvard’s side. Danny entered the truck and came back holding a rifle. We set off across the sands, towards where the flyer had come down.
“Jesus Christ,” I said, bubbling with excitement. “Wonder who it is?”
Danny flashed me a look. “Whoever it is, chances are they’re dangerous.” He raised his rifle.
I could see he was thinking more about the flyer, and what might be salvaged from it, than who the pilot might be.
My mind was in turmoil. What if the pilot were a woman? I recalled the images of models in the magazines I’d hoarded over the years, their flawless, immaculate beauty, their haughty you’re-not-good-enough gazes.