You had to learn to become afraid of the dark, if you were not afraid of it already. That was when everything happened. If there were any tumbulations taking place, they would occur during this time. It was better to be on the alert for them. As for the day time, it was taken up with avoiding the worse effects of the radiation, due to the absence of any ozone. We stayed indoors and covered up, mostly using the blankets that had been left over from prisoners' stays in Chikirubi. They were not the most sanitary. If you didn't like lice or the faint aroma of shit, you were advised to get them washed somewhere down the river. This river had dried up and was unlikely to appear until some unspecified time.
Grass continued to grow outside and that was a relief. It normalized our sensibilities with a recollection of the past and its sense of assurety that it would go on forever.
I had to stay in my lab and figure things out. Never mind that my lab was its own source of the manufacture of shit, a lavatory rather than a laboratory, but one made do. I slept all day and I worked all night, creeping into the corner when I was done. It wasn't exactly unrewarding work as we did make some progress, getting at least one "ape" into the sky, It had been a glorious, moonlight night. We'd researched and strategised the tumbulation and it was underway. All the evidence pointed to the fact of the glorious ascendency of humans, through one ape in the sky. In fact it seemed humorous looking back at it now, but this was our view. It almost seemed determined, like fate has prescribed it. There was something cold and hard and impersonal about our resolution, never mind that it was an ape that would be floating around among all the gadgetry. The blood, sweat and tears of humanity had gone into this and it was our last cry. We didn't want to die alone like this.
Then suddenly gravity exerted its pull. It is a free-born object, created to be carried up into the universe, but something horrid and malicious was pulling it downward. I cried out in alarm, all too aware that heavenly objects could only meet the ground with a sense of complete annihilation. It was unthinkable --- yet there it was, before our eyes. It was like seeing the only love of one's youth torn apart by razer blades. It was like seeing what ought never to have been done,.
It kept failing to resist gravity, but its trajectory into decline was painfully slow. We couldn't believe it. It kept trying to rise but failing to resist the general gravitational pull. I shuddered visibly.
Then it was no more and everything was flat, much flatter than before. Instead of the dense, intense night that enabled us to do our work, it almost seemed there was no night and no day. Everything had ended in this way. And from the broken crystal installed in the machine I suddenly heard the loud and tinny cry of Earth's annihilation, as the imagery beamed and thousands of World War One soldiers, stuck in the gravelly streets began singing, "Give my regards to Broadway..." And I was beyond tears.
I learned at that point to be afraid of the dark, very afraid, and as if like a coy cat in the mode of subtle reward, she clawed herself back to me, and night became night and day became day again, and I was able to sleep throughout the light.
Grass continued to grow outside and that was a relief. It normalized our sensibilities with a recollection of the past and its sense of assurety that it would go on forever.
I had to stay in my lab and figure things out. Never mind that my lab was its own source of the manufacture of shit, a lavatory rather than a laboratory, but one made do. I slept all day and I worked all night, creeping into the corner when I was done. It wasn't exactly unrewarding work as we did make some progress, getting at least one "ape" into the sky, It had been a glorious, moonlight night. We'd researched and strategised the tumbulation and it was underway. All the evidence pointed to the fact of the glorious ascendency of humans, through one ape in the sky. In fact it seemed humorous looking back at it now, but this was our view. It almost seemed determined, like fate has prescribed it. There was something cold and hard and impersonal about our resolution, never mind that it was an ape that would be floating around among all the gadgetry. The blood, sweat and tears of humanity had gone into this and it was our last cry. We didn't want to die alone like this.
Then suddenly gravity exerted its pull. It is a free-born object, created to be carried up into the universe, but something horrid and malicious was pulling it downward. I cried out in alarm, all too aware that heavenly objects could only meet the ground with a sense of complete annihilation. It was unthinkable --- yet there it was, before our eyes. It was like seeing the only love of one's youth torn apart by razer blades. It was like seeing what ought never to have been done,.
It kept failing to resist gravity, but its trajectory into decline was painfully slow. We couldn't believe it. It kept trying to rise but failing to resist the general gravitational pull. I shuddered visibly.
Then it was no more and everything was flat, much flatter than before. Instead of the dense, intense night that enabled us to do our work, it almost seemed there was no night and no day. Everything had ended in this way. And from the broken crystal installed in the machine I suddenly heard the loud and tinny cry of Earth's annihilation, as the imagery beamed and thousands of World War One soldiers, stuck in the gravelly streets began singing, "Give my regards to Broadway..." And I was beyond tears.
I learned at that point to be afraid of the dark, very afraid, and as if like a coy cat in the mode of subtle reward, she clawed herself back to me, and night became night and day became day again, and I was able to sleep throughout the light.
No comments:
Post a Comment