couldn't see anything, but they'd
been so faint to begin with that he couldn't trust his eyes.
Todd scrambled to his feet and
into the black living room, his footsteps staccato jolts against the background
hum of the generator.
Alan tried to get his thoughts
together. His mind felt like an open sore.
It was them. They took
everything.
The darkness outside the front
door was endless. Impermeable. He suddenly felt very small. A speck of dust
hurtling through infinite black. His eyes started playing tricks, creating
blobs of red and smears of yellow.
Maybe those aren't tricks.
Maybe those are real. Maybe they've always been real, maybe those things have
always been here. His panic was heating up again, melting the layer of ice
that had glazed over it.
A lantern clicked on, spraying
cold light through the entryway. It jerked him out of the dark and planted his
feet on the ground. He blinked, coming back to himself, then turned his own
lantern back on and slammed the door.
"Daddy?" Todd's voice
sounded like broken glass.
Alan nodded and tried to say
something, but his tongue wouldn't move. Todd threw himself at his father like
a survivor leaping out of a burning building. Awkwardly, slowly, Alan wrapped
his arms around him.
"What are they?" Todd
sobbed. "Why are they at our house?"
Maybe it's not our house
anymore, Alan thought. Maybe it's their house now. Maybe everything is
theirs now. "I don't know. I'm sorry. I don't know."
His son was hysterical. "Do they
want to hurt us? "
Of course they want to hurt us.
They destroyed most of us. But, at the same time... "If they wanted to
hurt us, they would've done it. I don't know what they want. They're gone
now." He was slowly coming back to himself, his own horror receding as he
felt the current of raw terror in his son's body. He went through the motions,
doing his best to calm Todd, but inside he was numb.
"Do you think they'll come
back?"
Of course they will. "I
don't know. They're gone now. Let's just... let's just focus on that."
"Can we just stay here? Can
we please stay here? I don't want to go outside, I don't want to, I'm just
scared of those... those... those blurry things."
"Yeah. Of course. We'll stay
inside. It's okay. Shhh. We'll stay inside." Suddenly he was sure it
didn't matter where they went. There had been three of them. There could be
more anywhere, and probably were.
Everything is theirs now, he
thought again.
They ended up going upstairs, to
the bedroom Alan used to share with his wife. They pulled the shades and closed
the door, then turned on every lantern they'd scavenged, flooding the room with
light. Alan remained on edge, expecting at any second to see that distinctive
flash of blue, but Todd seemed comforted. He curled up on the bed next to his
father, clutching Pinky Wing like a talisman.
Alan was desperate for the news or
the internet; he would've killed to hear the monotonous drone of a reporter
talking about this problem. The military has mobilized, and researchers at
MIT have announced promising new technologies that might be able to trace the
vanished, they'd say. The stock market fell again today on reports of
mysterious blue blurs that can only be seen in the dark. Then the President
would come on, and talk about how they were going to survive this as a nation.
He and Todd would huddle in their little bedroom and watch, sequestered and
frightened, thinking it couldn't possibly get worse.
But there were no armies
mobilizing to fight The Blue Menace. There was no stock market to crash, and
MIT was a ghost town.
They didn't have the President.
They only had each other.
Was it even worth it to keep
scavenging, if they were the only ones left? What kind of life could Alan make
for his son in a world with no other people? Were they destined to start hating
each other, to go crazy as everything slowly collapsed around them?
He had the sudden, brutal
realization that they weren't survivors: they were remnants . There was
no fighting
been so faint to begin with that he couldn't trust his eyes.
Todd scrambled to his feet and
into the black living room, his footsteps staccato jolts against the background
hum of the generator.
Alan tried to get his thoughts
together. His mind felt like an open sore.
It was them. They took
everything.
The darkness outside the front
door was endless. Impermeable. He suddenly felt very small. A speck of dust
hurtling through infinite black. His eyes started playing tricks, creating
blobs of red and smears of yellow.
Maybe those aren't tricks.
Maybe those are real. Maybe they've always been real, maybe those things have
always been here. His panic was heating up again, melting the layer of ice
that had glazed over it.
A lantern clicked on, spraying
cold light through the entryway. It jerked him out of the dark and planted his
feet on the ground. He blinked, coming back to himself, then turned his own
lantern back on and slammed the door.
"Daddy?" Todd's voice
sounded like broken glass.
Alan nodded and tried to say
something, but his tongue wouldn't move. Todd threw himself at his father like
a survivor leaping out of a burning building. Awkwardly, slowly, Alan wrapped
his arms around him.
"What are they?" Todd
sobbed. "Why are they at our house?"
Maybe it's not our house
anymore, Alan thought. Maybe it's their house now. Maybe everything is
theirs now. "I don't know. I'm sorry. I don't know."
His son was hysterical. "Do they
want to hurt us? "
Of course they want to hurt us.
They destroyed most of us. But, at the same time... "If they wanted to
hurt us, they would've done it. I don't know what they want. They're gone
now." He was slowly coming back to himself, his own horror receding as he
felt the current of raw terror in his son's body. He went through the motions,
doing his best to calm Todd, but inside he was numb.
"Do you think they'll come
back?"
Of course they will. "I
don't know. They're gone now. Let's just... let's just focus on that."
"Can we just stay here? Can
we please stay here? I don't want to go outside, I don't want to, I'm just
scared of those... those... those blurry things."
"Yeah. Of course. We'll stay
inside. It's okay. Shhh. We'll stay inside." Suddenly he was sure it
didn't matter where they went. There had been three of them. There could be
more anywhere, and probably were.
Everything is theirs now, he
thought again.
They ended up going upstairs, to
the bedroom Alan used to share with his wife. They pulled the shades and closed
the door, then turned on every lantern they'd scavenged, flooding the room with
light. Alan remained on edge, expecting at any second to see that distinctive
flash of blue, but Todd seemed comforted. He curled up on the bed next to his
father, clutching Pinky Wing like a talisman.
Alan was desperate for the news or
the internet; he would've killed to hear the monotonous drone of a reporter
talking about this problem. The military has mobilized, and researchers at
MIT have announced promising new technologies that might be able to trace the
vanished, they'd say. The stock market fell again today on reports of
mysterious blue blurs that can only be seen in the dark. Then the President
would come on, and talk about how they were going to survive this as a nation.
He and Todd would huddle in their little bedroom and watch, sequestered and
frightened, thinking it couldn't possibly get worse.
But there were no armies
mobilizing to fight The Blue Menace. There was no stock market to crash, and
MIT was a ghost town.
They didn't have the President.
They only had each other.
Was it even worth it to keep
scavenging, if they were the only ones left? What kind of life could Alan make
for his son in a world with no other people? Were they destined to start hating
each other, to go crazy as everything slowly collapsed around them?
He had the sudden, brutal
realization that they weren't survivors: they were remnants . There was
no fighting
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