After the Machine Stops

"What we are seeing—and bringing on ourselves—resembles a neurological catastrophe on a gigantic scale. Nonetheless, I dare to hope that, despite everything, human life and its richness of cultures will survive, even on a ravaged earth. "

Oliver Sachs, "The Machine Stops," The New Yorker, 4 February 2019

The Crash

From ten thousand meters, the life pods clustered along the Chesapeake Basin looked like so many fish-eggs floating among the rushes. As the last of the airships traced its steep decline from the heavens, ripples of iridescent oils sent aftershocks into the last days of the anthropocene.

Gyre and Gimble stared out across the waters.

“Choose something, like a fallen star...” intoned Abba Gyre, speaking from the stern of their log canoe.

“...at sunrise,” answered Gimble from the bow.

“Good one, Gimble. Hopeful. We need that right now. Especially if there were any passengers on board. Now let’s have another twist on an old favorite.”

“Oldest force, bend the heavens back...” shot out the young voice over the sound of oars striking the waves. Clouds of black smoke billowed now from the airship cabin.

“Seething fate!” answered the teacher. “Certainly stirring things up, that oldest of forces.”

Gimble grabbed for the rescue gear from the space around their feet.

Abba and their apprentice picked through the marsh to the wreckage.

“Eden sank,” they recited together from The Book, “dawn went down to day, our grief stays.”

The Critical Care Unit

Hopkins: What've we got?

Mercy: Five neophytes, barely holding on to their life packs. Vitals are critical, oxygen deprivation, multiple injuries from crash.

Hopkins: Any others?

Mercy: Strangely, no. Seven more just like them on the ship, unresponsive monitors. Intake unit went back to bring them in.

Hopkins: Get these little ones some blankets from the lockers. The good woolen ones with silken linings.

Mercy: You think this plan will work?

Hopkins: You have a better idea?

Mercy: Maybe find some older youth or adults who didn't die when the Machine stopped. See if they can help us out with...with carrying on.

Hopkins: We’ve tried that, Mercy. All the subterranean layers of condos cum catacombs, it's always the same. Just members of the Hierarchy with no breath left in them, just heartless data repositories, bleached and bloodless.

Mercy: I just thought, maybe one of the Yielded Ones, someone like you, might be able to…

Hopkins: They cast me out with the rest of you to take our chances on this god-forsaken globe. They left us to die, left us with no hope of giving life to a new generation. If it takes 20 years to get life established again, then that is our best hope. Only they can multiply, but only we can show them how to live.

How about those blankets now? And can you send Laurel in here to lend me a hand with these little ones?

Mercy: Sure thing. I’ll be right back. Laurel, Hopkins needs you...

Hopkins: Laurel, I need you to do something for us. Can you check on the intake party? Just let me know if Gyre and Gimble have found any other signs of life.

Laurel: Out at the crash site? I just came from there. The Lumbee leaders were carrying away the dead for their ceremonies, along with the Queen.

Hopkins: What Queen?

Laurel: The large woman with all the jewelry, not the skinny man hiding in the luggage -- I dragged him here with me.

Deep Breath

The heart hanging from the necklace was anatomically precise, an intricate design crafted in silver to reveal the inner cross-section of the chambers. Where the crista terminalis traced at arc along the left opening of the superior vena cava, there was a divot. Perhaps a smooth pearl had rested there and been lost. The chest of a woman, pale and weary in years, rose and fell in shallow breaths beneath the chain.

“Where am I? Who are you?”

“Ace. Beth. Cesar…”

“Where have you taken my son?”

“Dawn. Eve.”

“Are you listening to me?”

“Shh. Six. Seven. Eight.”

“I’m talking to you.”

“I’m listening. Nine. Ten. Eleven.”

“Where am I?”

“Twelve. You’re in Druid Park, the Gates of Prayer Synagogue at the corner of Auchentoroly Terrace and Liberty Heights. My name is Mercy. I’m listening, are you?”

Blue light from stained glass windows filled the space between nurse and patient with an aura of stillness. In the canopy above them, the vaulted rotunda echoed the dome of the heavens beyond.

“The Machine stopped. Everything went dark in the violent wind, the earthquake. My son and I found each other in the passageway. We were dying, we were bleeding. He dragged me to a platform, found a transport.”

“Your son must have disconnected the lifelines to those seven children, so you could take their oxygen, their nutrients. I suppose he sent you here on that airship.”

“The next thing I remember was a fire, then this silence -- and your voice.”

“There is no drinkable water, not here. I’ll take you to the Reservoirs, that’s where the young are being raised. Ace and Eve at Prettyboy and Beth, Cesar and Dawn at Liberty. I traded your gold for safe passage and goats.”

“Goats? Is there milk?”

“Yes, and some yogurt. Have some. You’ll need your strength.”

“Where is this heart come from?”

“It belonged to my grandmother. She was a cardiac doctor. She taught me how to care for those the Hierarchy marked for death, the Yielded. She was the Rabbi's daughter.”

“Forgive me, but the only thing I know of the Jews is their persistence through the rise and fall of so many human civilizations, their absolute refusal to follow the rules of any historian who tried to grasp the patterns of human history, from Toynbee to Quigley and Hagger.”

“Forgive me, but the only words I know from Toynbee were tiles pressed into the pavement of Baltimore: “Resurrect Dead on Planet Jupiter!" They’re far beneath the flood waters now. I do remember one song from the Passover, the only upbeat tune, the Dayenu.

“Dayenu. I do not know that word.”

“It refers to all the miracles that led to their deliverance, that only one would have been enough.”

“I’m not sure why I was placed on that transport, why I am alive and my son is lost, not sure why those babies died, but I am here and so are you, Mercy. Perhaps that is enough.”

The Crannach

Two figures emerged from the mist and rain, leading and cajoling two goats up a tow-path along the banks of the reservoir. The tiny animals were yoked to a small raft weighed down with supplies and a lump of rags that emerged into light as a pale face and hands hanging on to a wide-brimmed hat.

Stretching out from the bank was a long pier, narrow pylons driven into the water as it deepened toward a round enclosure, an island crafted of logs and other materials, dominated by a communal roundhouse with a thatched roof. The Crannach offered shelter from the elements, sustainable living conditions along the trade routes with the city and the Amish farms, some protection from those who might threaten the fragile web of existence. There was storage for dried corn, gourds, Timothy hay and even some apples.

A small party had gathered around the moorings where the pier met the mainland, curious to witness what Mercy and Hopkins were bringing. The goats would benefit the young ones, but what would they do with this woman who could not care for herself? Could they trust her? How would she fit in?

The little ones were doing well, adjusting to the open air and the freshest water in the region. There were signs of nature renewing itself: a pair of swallows diving and weaving over the face of the water.

Hopkins turned to Mercy, a strange expression on her face that Mercy could not read. “I need to tell you something, a secret.... I’m pregnant.”

“You and I both know that isn’t possible, Hopkins. Not after how the Machine poisoned our people.”

“Your people, Mercy. I was one of the Hierarchy; so was he -- hidden in the airship.”

“The Queen’s son.”

“Yes. But I think it’s best if she not know. He, he’s gone.”

“Gone? Where did he go?”

“I’m not sure. I don’t think he knows the dangers. He is accustomed to living life by himself.”

“Apparently, not completely.”

“Yes, well. At least some good will come of this, right?”

“Maybe. So much for your plan of waiting 20 years.”

The Christening

“Earth’s crammed with

Heav’nly bush aflame --

Why the shoes?”

“I love it, Gimble. That one is definitely worth writing in The Book. Of course, we will have to give some nod to Browning, not to mention Moses. Have you secured the rigging to the life pods? Set a course for Prettyboy Crannach and we will test this out in the currents. The Captain will soon be able to set eyes on his son for the first time, and be reunited with his mother. I think he is still below decks. Ho there, have you brought some provisions for Christening the vessel? I have the name -- "Alebrijes” -- we can paint it later, with plenty of bright colors!"

Hopkins was pacing the shoreline. An active toddler drew voltage from her legs with each passing twirl of his chubby arms. Her efforts to contain him only seemed to increase the volume of his squeals and the velocity of his plummets into the wet grass. It was full-tilt summer, dragonflies buzzing and dipping among the reeds. In the distance, she could see the clumsy catamaran making its way up the waterway, green hull and white sail, wooden decking with two people on board. Where was the third?

Mercy readied the Queen in her chair, balanced with rugged wheels, for the short journey to the docks. The Queen clutched her heart necklace as she tilted and rocked her way to the reunion. The sound of Ace and Eve could be heard in the background, trying out their first words.

Up the footpath, pushing past briers, breathless, Laurel ran to the Crannach. She had been running ever since The Captian had come to visit the children at Liberty. At first they thought there had been a misunderstanding: Ace and Eve are at Prettyboy, to the north. Only the other three are here -- Beth, Cesar and Dawn. No, he wanted them all to be together, he said, he insisted. Put them on board the ship, now!

Hopkins could see someone running, could sense something was wrong. She could see a familiar face approaching over the water -- Gyre standing still, his face absent, with a pale man just behind him. She could hear Mercy and the Queen approaching the landing.

Now she could hear a voice, hoarse and shouting, "Not your son, not your son." Hopkins froze until the truth registered who was speaking and what she had to do.

Hopkins thrust her son into Mercy's arms, "Take him to the Crannach. Run! Shelter the others." She grabbed the Queen's chair and, pointing to the Captain, whispered in her ears, "Is that your son?" As the two women looked up, Gyre fell to the deck and into the reservoir, his body sending ripples into the water as it sank. The Queen, eyes downcast, voice wavering, "No."

In a fountain of spray and scaly flashes of deep purple, a creature spiraled from the deep, Eyes of flame fixed on the lone figure standing on the deck of the ship, claws clamped him in place. In a series of snaps, the rows of jaws mangled and minced the murderous Captain, capsizing the vessel and thrusting it to the shore. A flash of tail signalled the end.

An escape hatch opened, Gimble visibly shaken, motioning for help. Hopkins ran, leaving the Queen slipping helplessly closer to the water's edge. Laurel joined in as three pairs of arms reached upward for help.