Microstory 2604: Some Will Stay and Some Will Go, and Each Will Decide Their Fate

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August 18, 2526. By the time the Breckenridge Folk completed their caucus, and decided on Amos Bull as their new Merchant Prince, the Levins were ready to go. They had no real emergency plan for a community-wide domaquake, but they did have one for tornados. All they had to do was announce a new congregation area near North Exit. Over the course of the last few days, they met here, and began the trek through the long spine on foot, which led them to Breckenridge’s South Exit. When the gates were officially opened, all they had to do was continue walking into the refuge dome. There was no pushing and screaming. The Levins understand what is at stake, and they want all of their remaining population to survive. Not all of them did. The quakes have been happening for years, and generally intensifying each time, and a few people met their ends during that. But since the last event, no one has succumbed. There are a few holdouts, though. Statistically speaking, there always are. While the refugees are trying to get settled in, Tertius and Aeterna are back in Leviss.

“I don’t think we should be doing this,” Tertius decides.

“What? Saving people?”

“Saving the stubborn ones. They made their choice, they’re scattered, and we’re not teleporters.”

“We have to try,” she reasons.

“This isn’t our job, or our forte. One of the Levin leaders should do it, if anyone.”

“If the next quake hits,” Aeterna begins, “we will survive, no matter how bad it is. We can keep trying and trying until the last skyscraper falls, and the last curmudgeon dies. We may as well.”

Tertius stops, forcing Aeterna to stop too. “We should be focusing on the people who want to be saved. They need us.”

“They’re already saved,” she contends.

Tertius shakes his head. “You think Breckenridge is safe? Breckenridge is a pit stop. They are marginally better off, not just because of their limited infrastructure, but also their distance from the fault line. Make no mistake, this is only going to get worse, and they will have to be evacuated too. We should be coordinating those efforts instead.”

“Are you sure about that?” she questions. “The Breckenridge Folk say it’s not bad at all. There have been zero casualties. That doesn’t sound marginal to me.”

He shakes his head again. “I’m telling you, it’s not going to last. That’s why I warned the other equatorial settlements. Everyone’s got to go.”

“Go where?” Aeterna asks.

“Preferably, outer space; not even in orbit, but far away. I put in a call to the Master Megaengineer, and her assistant said that she would look into it, but I’m not holding my breath. They don’t want to evacuate the whole planet, but they should.”

“Why would they have to leave orbit? Can domaquakes get so bad that they’ll spew matter into orbit, and—I don’t know what you mean by this. I’ve never heard of such a thing, on any world.”

“I don’t think it’s the planet. I think it’s the host star.”

“You’re just making that up, you don’t know.”

He stares at his daughter, afraid of what he has to say, but he does have to say it. “Before you were born, I spoke with a seer, who said the son will one day flip out, and annihilate everything.” He pauses, even more nervous, but he must go on. “I thought that she was talking about you. I was surprised when you were born a girl, but maybe you were transgender, and I just needed to wait. But it’s been hundreds of years, and unless you have news for me, you still identify as a woman. I don’t think she was talking about my son, but the sun.” He points to the sky with his thumb. “The best seers don’t talk in riddles. She wasn’t the best seer.”

“You’re just telling me this now?” Aeterna complains. “Who is this seer?”

“They mostly prefer Earth. I didn’t tell you because it might have led to a self-fulfilling prophecy, and truthfully, I kind of forgot about it, because I thought it had already come to pass. It didn’t seem relevant anymore. I’m only now wondering whether I had misinterpreted it, and it’s all about what’s happening now. Or maybe I was right the first time, and the prediction was just about our falling out two hundred years ago. What does flipping out even mean? How bad does it have to be to count?”

“What does flipping out have to do with a sun?”

“I don’t know anything.” He looks around at the destruction that the domaquakes have already caused. “But this...isn’t gonna get better. Did you notice, it wasn’t difficult to convince the Levins to leave? They’ve not shared their data yet, but they must be picking up on something. I firmly believe that we can’t let them stop moving.”

“Okay, okay. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to save the stragglers. If anything, it makes it even more vital. They probably think there’s hope!”

“And how are we gonna convince them that there’s not? I just tried to do it with you, and you immediately pointed out that I don’t know what the hell I was talking about. We can’t exactly tell them that a magical lady with special time powers told me 300 years ago...in a riddle.”

“Maybe we can cheat,” Aeterna suggests.

“How would we do that?”

“You still have the ability to erase people’s memories?”

Tertius winches. “Yeah, of course I do. Oh, that was rhetorical.”

“If we erase their memories, we can tell them whatever they need to hear to get them through that tunnel. Then, once they’re on the other side, we lock the gates behind us, and restore their memories.”

“Two hundred years ago, you would have balked at that kind of subterfuge.”

“If it’s to save lives,” she reasons, “I don’t mind it.”

Tertius considered the proposition. “All right, I’m in. There’s one problem, though. As I said, they’re scattered. They may wake up confused, but that doesn’t mean they’ll randomly walk over to us.”

“I believe I have that covered.” Aeterna reaches into her pack pocket and pulls out a spent match.

“The muster match? That can only summon one person. And it’s used. You used it to bring me!” he reminds her.

“It’s not the match,” Aeterna tells him. She looks around until she finds what she’s looking for. “It’s the flame.” She manages to restrike it against a rock, and then set the bush on fire.

Fervor: Sandlot (Part X)

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I’m standing in front the mirror, staring at myself. I still look like me, but also not really. This isn’t the first time I’m seeing the new me, of course. I got some good hard looks yesterday, soon after Jesimula Utkin rapidly aged me, but I just can’t stop. We discussed it a little, and estimated that I was maybe twenty years old at this point. A part of me feels violated, but I can’t honestly say that I’m upset about the results. I’ve always been mature for my age, so maybe this is my outside finally reflecting my inside. My biggest problem always been people not taking me seriously, and this could solve all that. Then again, she technically stole six years of life that I could have lived. If I’m to die at the age of eighty, I’ll now have only experienced seventy-four years of time. Perhaps later on, once I’m starting to feel self-conscious about my wrinkles, I can call Jesi back, and have her do the same thing in reverse. Hell, is there any reason she can’t just keep doing that for me? If this doesn’t prove that immortality is possible, I don’t know what will. Maybe there’s a limit, I don’t know. I would at least like to live to be two hundred. I guess that’s just an arbitrary choice, though. No, this is all stupid anyway. It was difficult enough to explain why my father, Serkan was only five years older than me. Now I’m meant to be the older one? Then again...

“Paige, we’re going to get you fixed,” Slipstream says to me when I try to start brainstorming over breakfast. There aren’t supposed to be such thing as a bad idea.

“I thought this was a safe space. I don’t need you yelling at me,” I complain.

“She wasn’t yelling,” Hogarth says.

“No, she’s right,” Slipstream says. “I’m sorry, Paige. Your feelings are paramount here, but I want you to understand the ramifications. You can’t go back to high school, so your only option would be to get your equivalency. It may not be right, but employers perceive that to be an inferior education. This is all assuming someone can create for you yet another identity after the first two, because everyone beyond this room, other than your fathers, thinks you’re fourteen.”

“That’s a lot to assume, yes,” I counter, “but it’s not as bad as assuming we can get Jesimula to reverse this. Everyone needs to be prepared for the possibility that this is my life now.”

“Oh,” Slipstream says as she starts to tear her toast into little strips—there’s probably a story behind that behavior. “I’ll get her to reverse what she did. Don’t you worry none ‘bout that.”

“What are you going to do?” Leona asks.

“I’ve already called my tracers. We’re taking a little field trip to Independence. I don’t want you to have to come with us, Paige, but you’ll have to be closeby.”

“No, you can’t involve the tracers,” I say, remembering something Serkan told me back when.

“Why can’t I?”

“It’s the tenth of April.”

“So...?” She doesn’t know why that’s significant, nor should she.

“Serkan starts to run with you today,” I explain. I don’t want to say too much about what I know of these people’s futures, but this is important.

“I thought he was stuck in another dimension,” Slipstream says.

“I’m not talking about that Serkan,” I tell them. “I’m talking about the original Serkan; the one who doesn’t know a thing about time travel yet.”

“Isn’t he still a minor?” Leona asked. “New Gangs are only for adults.”

“The tracer gang makes exceptions for Frenzy winners,” I clarify.

“Is this true?” Leona asks Slipstream.

She doesn’t answer right away, but keeps her eyes on me.

“Slip,” Leona presses.

“Yes,” Slipstream finally says, eyes still on me. “It’s true, even before I met Paige here, we had our eye on Serkie. He’s a force.”

“If he doesn’t go on probation in your gang starting tomorrow,” I begin, “after today’s audition, everything he does after that is ruined. You wanna talk about reversing, this decision could prevent me from ever coming to the 21st century. Jesi releases a virus, Keanu freezes the real Kansas City, dogs and cats living together.”

“I get it,” Slipstream says shortly. “Your father has to join the gang. But the longer we wait...”

The longer we wait, what?” I ask. “The unobtanium in my quantum injector solidifies, and there’s no longer a way to reverse the time polarity? I can wait a few days. History can’t. And remember, just because it hasn’t happened yet, doesn’t mean it’s not history.”

Slipstream considers her choices, but ultimately relents. She recognizes what’s top priority here, so she finishes eating, and heads out to the gray district, so she can meet my future father, and close the time loop. We all have to make it to July 17, 2026, which is the day after the ninth annual City Frenzy, before we can stop worrying so much about altering the timeline.

For an hour after Slipstream leaves, I’m once again in front of  the mirror. I’m not just staring at myself anymore, like a creepy ghost-child in a Japanese horror flick, though. Little Brooke the other day discovered a magical closet behind one of the normal bedroom closets that’s the size of a clothing store, maybe even larger. I’m trying out new clothes. This is more than just a safehouse for time travelers. The clothes I normally wear are pretty loose, so they don’t fit too badly, but I still need something better.

I’m currently wearing a cute little blue dress with a daisy pattern when I hear a voice behind me. “That looks perfect on you.”

“Jesimula,” I say with a sneer.

“You can call me Jesi.”

“We’ve decided you need to put me back as I was.”

“Back as you were?” she echoes. “As a scared thirteen-year-old girl in 1972?”

“Not that far back,” I correct with a roll of my eyes.

“I see, so you’re looking for the ideal?”

“I’m asking you to reverse everything that you’ve done to me; nothing more, nothing less.”

“Is that really what you want, or is that what your friends told you that you need?”

I don’t hesitate. “It’s what I want, and it’s what is right. If I want you to change my age, I’ll ask for it, which is what I’m doing right now.”

“I’m afraid I can’t do that. It would be unethical for me to send you on this mission as a child. I had to age you up.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, but what you did is already unethical. You’ve violated my body, for one, and you haven’t even matured me. I’m still a minor; the difference now is I can pass for an adult. Barely.”

“I don’t see it that way. Don’t you want to know what the mission is?”

“It doesn’t matter, because I’m not doing a single thing for you.” I know it’s dumb as soon as I say it it, because I obviously have no choice. Jesi is here on behalf of her own agenda, and it’s irrelevant what anyone else wants. I dart my eyes toward the exit, but she’s blocked it.

She almost frowns when she notices, but does not doubt her plan. She sprays some sort of odorless, tasteless something in my face. Then she creates a bubble around me, and disappears. I expect everything around me to start changing, but it doesn’t. I’m stuck in the bubble for about twice as long as the clinic was last time, and when it finally dissipates, and lets me out, I see that the closet is still just as it was before. It must exist in some other dimension, because I seriously doubt Jesi created a bubble for me that didn’t do anything. I cautiously walk over towards the door, and open it up.

Before me is a darkened and empty hallway. On the opposite wall, however, is a bright light. At first I think it’s just a lamp, or something, but then my eyes adjust, and I can see the truth. It’s the sun. It’s the sun as viewed from space. I step closer and admire the view. Yeah, I’m definitely in the future. I can’t tell whether I’m in a ship, a space station, or something I can’t even comprehend, but the sunlight illuminates a few structures to the side of me that all look exactly the same. I suspect that I’m just in another one of whatever they are. Oh, and there’s also a little planet below called Earth.

I can hear what sounds like sand being sifted to the side of me as the lights inside the hallway turn on. I look over and see a figure forcing itself out of the wall; or more like part of the wall is becoming something else. Tiny little pieces come together to form the general shape of a human being, and eventually rearrange themselves into more and more detail. In the end, there’s a person standing there. “Our sensors indicate that an entity has suddenly appeared in this sector. What is your designation?” she asks of me.

“Paige Reaver-Demir.”

“Species.”

“Human.”

“Species of human.”

“Uhh...regular?”

“You are short for a regular human.”

Not really. “Am I?”

“You clothes, anatomy, and wonderment in your surroundings better resemble the average teenage human girl from early 21st century.”

I don’t say anything.

She lifts her head to examine me from a slightly different angle. “Right. Well, you are not authorized to be on the bubble relay. I can return you to anywhere on Earth that you would like.”

“Um, does Kansas City still exist?” I ask, knowing whatever this thing is, she already has the whole woman out of time thing figured out about me anyway.

“It most certainly does,” she replies. Then she starts walking down the hallway, expecting me to follow her.

We board a small ship, and drop down to Earth. I ask to land on the edge of civilization. I don’t tell her this, but I want to do some recon before I run into anyone else. Jesi wants me here, and she’s not a good person, which means I shouldn’t be here. I could hardly ask her to let me go to, like, a moon of Jupiter, or something, though. The only thing I can do is investigate.

“Wait,” I stop the sand entity before she takes off. “This may sound strange, but—”

“It’s April 10, 3117, by your calendar.” she interrupts.

“Oh. Thank you.”

“What the hell am I doing here?” I ask out loud after the sand creature flies away.

“You’re helping me build this fire,” a young man answers from several meters away.

Startled. “What?”

He stands from his crouch and draws closer, but not threateningly. “My parents put me in this program that teaches you how to do things the way people used to. Maybe you know how to start a fire with nothing but these tiny pieces of wood?”

I look down at his fire, and at the box of matches he’s holding. “How did you know I would be here?”

“I didn’t,” he says, laughing. “You just fell from the sky, like an angel, right on top of my solo lot. I was going to ask how you knew I would be here.”

If all Jesi wants me to do is help this poor kid light a fire, then I guess it can’t be too bad. Then again, this could start a fire that ravages the entire continent, for all I know. I decide to risk it. I step over and take the matches from him, and prepare to light the fire. “What the hell is this?”

“It’s my woodpile,” he says, like I’m the stupid one.

“Where’s your tinder?”

“My what?”

“Have you been trying to light these big sticks and logs?”

“Bigger sticks, bigger fire,” he starts off confidently, but clearly starts questioning his own logic by the end of the last word.

“Oh, dear. Let’s go get some bark. You got a knife?”

“Yeah.”

I have him shave tinder strips off the bark, then place the remaining pieces of top to act as kindling, so we can get the fire going. “Start small, and let it grow. You can’t just light the whole thing at once.” I pull a log off, and toss it across his camp lot. “This one is wet, it’s useless.” I continue the lessons, as needed, until we have a pretty good fire going that will be able to sustain itself for a good long time. “Did they teach you anything, or just throw you into the deep end on day one?”

“They threw us into the deep end on the second day,” he says.

I laugh, but realize that he isn’t. I think that his instructors literally threw him into a pool of water. Science and humans had both presumably advanced so much that people weren’t even swimming anymore. Not knowing how to light a fire from a match is one thing, but swimming should be an essential skill in any time period.

We watch our creation for a few minutes, at which point I abruptly turn around. “Kay, byeee.”

“Wait, can’t you stay?” he begs. “I’m supposed to make mores.”

“You mean s’mores?”

“See? I still need you.”

I suppose I won’t be able to get home until Jesi shows up, and sends me back through one of her sliding bubbles. “I guess I can stay a little while longer, Smalls.”

“My name is Asuk. I told you.”

“You’re killin’ me, Smalls. We make s’mores, but then I have to go.”

“Great.”

I help him with his cute little history project, then I proceed to stay with him for almost an entire year.

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Microstory 308: Fire

Click here for a list of every step.
Shelter

The first time our ancestors saw fire was the first time they looked to the sky during the day. There is a bunch of science going on that makes fire burn. But at the core of it, all heat is the same thing; excited atoms and molecules moving around so fast that energy is released. The faster these atoms move, the more energy they release, and if you excite them enough, fire will be created. This is why friction can assist in the creation of fire. You don’t need some kind of liquid fuel; you don’t need matches; you don’t even need flint and steel. If you want to build a fire, you’re going to need something that’s really good at burning, and then apply intense friction to it. Wood is a good option because it’s rather abundant, and even though it requires a lot of effort, it doesn’t require much knowledge. Fire is one of the most useful elements in existence. It cooks food, which burns off possible pathogens, releases certain otherwise unrealized nutrients, and makes meals taste better. We have yet to encounter evidence of a civilization that did not cook food. Fire also produces warmth, and discourages dangerous animals. Modern humans have innovated further with fire and combustion to make their lives more efficient and convenient. Experts have uncovered evidence, however, that primates first controlled fire nearly two million years ago. This means that one of the first things we did after deciding to stand upright was to recreate the sun and forest fires towards our own end. Fire is not only a personal need, but a cultural one. It was an early step in the advancement of the human race; an undeniable sign of intelligence. If you ever meet an alien, the first thing you should do is demonstrate your basic comprehension of fire.

Instinct

Microstory 56: This Thing on Fire (first verse + chorus of a song I wrote)

I wrote this last year. But I didn't really write it. It's by a musical artist named Peter Fireblood. I've mentioned him before.

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We’re gonna light this thing on fire!

We’re gonna set this place ablaze

We’re gonna watch as all the people come

just to see how much hell that we raised!

We’re gonna wait for the cops to roll in

And bind our wrists and legs

We’re gonna look the judge right in his eye!

And persuade him to throw out the case!

We’ll return to the scene of the crime

And fix what we had done

Then we’ll light a single wondrous match

And burn that place right down again!

Oh I love, how I love, to see the world transform from red to black

Oh I know, I know that they can’t understand how we fell out of whack

Soon the day will come to pass when you and I live on no more

I hope that before that day comes we leave a mark they can’t ignore!