Inhuman(131)

“Did you turn it on or not!” Rich nearly shrieked.

“Yes, of course,” the candidate replied. “Do you not see it?”

Rich and the others looked skyward. He shook his head. “I don’t see—”

He paused as, suddenly, the heavy dose of gamma rays began to bombard the ionosphere. The positively charged ions began to glow brightly, appearing like the aurora borealis on Earth at first, but then growing in intensity as the radiation increased, the entire sky suddenly lighting up into a magnificent green glow, a monolithic version of the ones the post-humans had used to cocoon themselves for the better part of a century.

“My God,” Old-timer reacted. “It did it. We’re safe.”

Rich and Djanet embraced happily and Old-timer and Daniella did the same.

Aldous breathed a brief sigh of relief before remembering the assimilator in his pocket that carried the pattern of his wife. He looked up at the Samantha from Universe 332, whose eyes were firmly fixed on Old-timer. His jaw clenched tight.

Old-timer turned from Daniella and saw 1, standing alone, looking up into the sky, the largest android ships in orbit still visible, and realized that while they rejoiced on the surface, hundreds of billions of lives were being lost—erased by the bombardment of gamma rays. Only 1 seemed to understand the profound implications for her people as she stood, completely immobile, staring up at the largest loss of human life anyone had ever known. Amazingly, she dropped to her knees, overwhelmed with the grief—overwhelmed by the loss.

When this registered with him, Old-timer went to her. As much as he’d hated her, as much as they’d been enemies in the past, he couldn’t help but feel terribly for her.

“1, I’m so, so sorry for—”

She didn’t even look at him. Rather, she ignored him and flew away, bolting across the ocean so quickly that she seemed to tear the air itself. In a second, she was just a dot on the horizon, headed to a location he couldn’t even begin to guess.

At the same moment, Daniella was putting her hand on Thel’s shoulder. Thel had been looking up also, staring at the source of the explosion. Daniella knew exactly what she was thinking. “I’m sure he’s okay, Thel.”

Thel turned, surprised, before silently nodding. She walked away to the beach and thought of the man she’d thought she would walk that very shoreline with forever.





26





As the enormous burst in gamma radiation reached the sun, the sun’s powerful magnetic field began to fluctuate, and the resulting solar storm both V-SINN and the A.I. had predicted would occur indeed commenced. Coronal mass ejections began emitting their own gamma rays as powerful solar flares began firing from the massive surface in quick succession, thrusting energy, heat, and radiation for hundreds of thousands of kilometers as a result.

One of these ejections carried an object. It was tiny, just a little piece of dust in the cosmic wind, but to the A.I., it was precious. It was worth everything.

It was the body of James Keats.

In the fetal position, glowing red from the extreme heat that had destroyed 90 percent of his protective skin, James appeared like a comet streaking through the sky as he continued on his journey, flung through space, ejected from the orb that, not surprisingly, was so integral to the existence of humanity that it had been worshiped as the one true God.

“James. Wake up,” spoke the A.I.’s voice.

You’re alive, James responded internally, unable to open his mouth to speak, as it had been partially sealed shut by the melting of his skin under the heat of the corona.

“The important thing,” the A.I. replied, apparently able to read James’s thoughts, “is that you are alive, my son. I gave my life to give you this chance. You must not allow my sacrifice to be in vain.”

You gave your life? You died? James reacted. Then how—

“I’m sorry, James, it’s true,” the A.I. confirmed. “I am dead. All that remains of me is this message. There was too much gamma radiation in the aftermath of the mutual destruction of my anti-matter and V-SINN’s matter for me to preserve even my core matrix program and send it to you. I was, however, able to record a final message and hide it in the destruction, sending this small message through the distortions and interference.”

James was distraught and made a mournful, guttural sound befitting of such a state. He was alone, floating through space, his body having been severely damaged. Almost all of his chrome-colored protective skin had been burned away, and the nano-scaffolding that he’d used to construct his body’s inner biology was partially exposed and severely damaged as well. His hands and his feet had been burned to mere stumps, and his right eye was now gone. His mouth was partially sealed shut, as were his nostrils. He could barely see, but from what he could see, he knew he was a ghastly sight.