Commander Stanner fixed his eyes on a point at the rear of the stuffed press room, coughed lightly, and waited for quiet. The reporters were called to this press conference a half an hour ago, but had not been told what it was about. They were informed that they would be given unprecedented levels of access to secure information, and that it was of the utmost importance that the reporters that attended had the ability to distribute the information as quickly as possible. Initially, such a requirement was treated with surprise; in the modern era news was so easily and widely distributed that everyone had this capability. However, it emerged that this same message was communicated to every country in the world. Suffice to say that in countries that had a different interpretation of freedom of communication, such a statement was tantamount to a revolution.
Stanner coughed again, this time to clear his throat, and began to address the associated press. “Ladies and gentleman of the media. You have been invited here today because something has happened, that will affect the entire world. I will make a small statement describing the situation, and then I will take questions.”
“For the past several months, astrologist all across the world have been tracking the movement of an asteroid roughly the size of Mount Everest that was bound for Jupiter. Late last night, the situation changed. The asteroid is no longer on course to hit Jupiter. It is now on a direct course with planet earth. It is expected to collide with the planet sometime within the next 30 days. Ladies and gentlemen, this is an extinction level event.”
Stanner wasn’t sure what he expected from the room, but it wasn’t this. The silence was thick and daunting.
“I will now take questions” Stanner said. Hands raised, and Stanner pointed to the first one he saw go up.
* * *
The sun rose, the moon waned, and all over the world, the news spread. In bustling city streets people stopped and stared at their phone screens, not believing what they saw. In cabins, with no internet the radio buzzed with updates. In fields and farms, people cycled and trekked to neighbours to make sure they knew: the world is ending, most won’t make it out alive. The few who escape the immediate death of the initial impact will only live to experience the dust death, the ice age, and potential earthquakes that the force of impact will cause.
It became apparent rather quickly that, for the vast majority of the almost 10 billion inhabitants of the world, the survival rates would be in the very lowest percentage; 0.0001 was the current estimate being advised in the media. Even that would take a massive amount of luck. And surviving past the fallout of the asteroid would be just as risky.
Faced with this almost certain death, people reacted in various ways. Some went mad. Some killed themselves. Some found religion, some lost it. Some went to work everyday until the lights turned off, some sought comfort in solitude. Some got sober, after years living wet. Others looked for comfort in excess – they ate what they wanted, drank freely, developed a rigorous drug dependency, safe in the knowledge that they would be cured in less than 30 days.
There was a section of the population who had been preparing for just such an event for a long time. Doomsday preppers, and the vastly wealth. The doomsday preppers who chose to horde food, build shelters, skill themselves in survival techniques, and store as much of modern human information as they could. The vastly wealthy had a different mind set. Though both hoarded, the wealthy were more interested in power and influence, in what they called ‘greatness’.
Geraldine McNee was both a doomsday prepper and a vastly wealthy person. She had risen to astronomical wealth in the mining world through innovative techniques in finding precious metals. She used this initial fortune to fund various enterprises which, for the most part, produced grand fortunes of their own. She was known to the public as a prudent spender, and a deep thinker, though she rarely granted the public access to her private world, or business techniques. In private, she spent a great deal of time preparing for any eventuality.
When she first heard the news, she consulted her board of advisors, which consisted almost exclusively of her former lovers. This was by virtue of the fact that she ensured to make love to anyone that she trusted and found interesting, which was not very many people. It was this board that had calculated the survival rate of 0.0001% and distributed that information via the world’s media. Having assessed this risk, they began discussing the options.
“We must realise that billions are to die, no matter what we do. The earth will be uninhabitable. Those that are left will be lawless, and they every day will be a struggle to live. The way of life that we have known, that all of human history has known, is over for now. We must leave”. This was the consensus of the group.
Geraldine, who already knew this to be the path forward before her concubines confirmed it, allowed her gaze to drift across the cityscape from her sky-high, floor to ceiling windowed, office. She could see smoke in the distance, and noticed that there was a lot less traffic. Otherwise, the world seemed unchanged by the news. She nodded slightly, and sent a quick message from her smart watch.
* * *
In a small fishing village in the west of Ireland, the news was received in a similar way to the rest of the world. However, there is a very particular sort of atmosphere that exists in a small village that one does not find in larger populations. There is something about a village of roughly five hundred inhabitants that allows for a very particular type of individual to exist. It is the type of person who thinks long and slow on things that others find quick answers too. It is the type of person who, having thought long and slow on all manner of subjects, becomes adept at thinking, and becomes endowed with wisdom the extent of which is such that others believe they are born wise. It is the type of person who knows that you are not born with any special ability, you earn it through hard work. Some villages have a handful of them, some villages have none; this village had two, and they were married to each another. When two people of this nature become married, they rarely have children, though they are great lovers of children. It was this way with them. Their names were Oran and Sestina.
When they heard the news that humanity was doomed, they were greatly saddened. They felt that they had great lives full of love and joy ahead of them, and it was to be taken away now. They were not long married, and their lives were becoming filled with everything they had wanted. Being this special sort of person, they thought deeply about what they could do. And, being married, they used the special sort of communication that only people who have been in close relationships for extended periods of time know about. That is, not with words, but with small gestures and movements that, to an outside observer, were unintelligible. The day after they heard the news, Sestina made them a large traditional breakfast, served on the good plates, and left Oran to sleep late. Normally, Oran rose early and had a small breakfast, and Sestina slept late and didn’t eat any breakfast. Throughout the day Oran flirted with his wife, and they made love after lunch. It was rare that they would make love during the day, and rarer still that Oran would chase for it. In the evening they lit a fire, opened the good whiskey and the birthday wine, and listened to their favourite music. They rarely listened to music together. Though each appreciated and respected the other’s taste in music, their musical tastes rarely overlapped.
“I don’t know what to do”, said Oran, stretched across the sofa, his chin nestled into his chest.
“I don’t want to… I don’t want it to end” said Sestina, her feet curled under Oran’s legs.
“Well,” said Oran, sitting up slowly and pouring another drop of whiskey, “there is only two ways out that I can see. We can go up, or we can go down.”
“ I don’t like the dark”, said Sestina, draining her glass of wine.
“It will be dark wherever we go, my love.”
“It will be better to go up. If we go down we are just clinging on to the old, and there will be no freedom. If we go up, it will be risky, but there will be something… new”.
They looked at each other, and both new that they would live.
The next morning, they packed essential items into their small suitcases, and drove to the nearest port town. At the docks they found a boat that was sailing to America, and they talked their way onto it. They found a space to put their bags and lay their heads and tried to ignore the nausea that the gently rocking boat sitting in the dock sent creeping across their stomachs.
* * *
“Commander Stanner, for services to the United States, and loyalty to this office, you have been selected to be a member of the security detail of an essential mission in what may well be humanities darkest hour. We understand that the decision to dedicate yourself even further to the cause is one that may not be taken lightly. However, we would impress upon you the importance of movement and secrecy at this time. I know that I can trust you, son. If I have not heard from you by 7 pm tonight, I will respect your decision. This is your right, and if you choose to do so, I wish you the best of luck on this gods forsaken rock.”
The voicemail ended with a beep, and Stanner placed the phone on his coffee table, screen down. In the three weeks since the press conference in which the world discovered its destiny Stanner had rarely left his apartment. He looked at his old kitchen clock that his mother gave him when he had moved in. It was a quarter past four. Plenty of time to think and get back to the General.
Then he realised he didn’t have to think. He had given his whole adult life to this army, to following orders, and to being part of something important. He wasn’t about to die and give up now. He picked up his phone, called the General back, and agreed to be one of the few who will ascend into the skies with the most powerful people on the planet and ride out the apocalypse in a tube in space.
* * *
In the distance, Geraldine McNee could see the space ship start to reveal itself to her. In this flat arid land, it emerged shimmering from the distance, hazy in the mid-day heat as her car approached. Geraldine was not easily impressed, and having spent the last three weeks researching rocket ships, space flight, potential travel systems, and generally preparing for this moment, she remained calm as her home for the immediate future revealed itself, mirage like, into existence.
She sat in the back seat, wearing what she considered to be ideal spacefaring clothes. They were self cleaning, smart clothes. Entirely experimental, and decades away from being ready for the public, these are the clothes that she would ascend beyond the stratosphere in. One of her companies had been funding the research and manufacture of a futuristic clothing line, and she had a suit case with three more identical outfits in the boot.
She was being driven by a stern and confident member of the US army who had introduced himself as Commander Stanner. They hadn’t spoken much since they several hours earlier. She appreciated his focus, and expected that his ability to remain silent for long periods of time while in company would be beneficial if they were to survive in a small space ship for a long period of time.
When they reached the facility headquarters about a mile or so away from where the rocket was being prepared for launch, they were greeted by another member of the Army, who introduced himself as General Greyson. Stanner offered a sharp salute, while Geraldine smiled and nodded hello. Greyson led them to a dining hall that was closer to a school cafeteria than a military mess hall. There were children of various ages playing with tablets, eating, and talking to each other, watched over to mixed degrees of intensity and concern by parents and guardians, who also ate, checked their screens, and talked in low voices to one another. Geraldine recognised some of these parents as powerful men and women in politics, technology, and entertainment.
Greyson cleared his throat and Calle for their attention. “This is Geraldine McNee, and Commander Stanner. I am sure you have heard of Ms.McNee, and you will all make her as welcome to our group as possible. You may recognise Commander Stanner from being the one who first announced the crisis to the world.”
The assembled group greeted the two newcomers in cordial fashion, and Greyson continued: “Our group is now complete, and there will be no more new arrivals. The cleaning and training rota will be updated this evening. A reminder people. We have 6 days, 4 hours, and 37 minutes until this rock impacts the Pacific ocean and begins a chain reaction that will end human life as we know it. We will launch 4 hours before impact. It will be close, but we will get you off this rock. I will see you all at Dr.Xiao’s lecture before dinner.”
Greyson left the room, and McNee and Stanner moved between the tables, introducing themselves and trying to pronounce everyone’s name correctly.
* * *
They landed in New York, as so many Irish migrants had for centuries before them. After spending almost ten days in close quarters on rough waters, Oran and Sestina were almost as sick of their boat-mates as they were of the ocean. A few pounds lighter than when they left Ireland, they were in need of a shower, solid ground and a good feed. Before seeking transport, they sought to resolve these issues.
After two burgers, and a shower in a hotel that was letting people pass through for free, they were firmly in awe of the mindset of the New Yorker. There were whole swathes of people who were continuing with their working lives; cooking up burgers, taking money, and checking credit cards. The damned yanks were just crazy enough to think that money might matter in a month, because someone would figure a way out of it.
Oran and Sestina were fully sure that there would be no way to avoid an asteroid on a collision course with the planet. Having just crossed the Atlantic, they planned to hitch, cycle, bus, drive, and use whatever means necessary to follow the coast of the great ocean to the south, and find their way to Florida.
* * *
The control room for what was expected to be the final space launch in the history of the human race was quiet as the key technical assistants prepared the final stages of the launch. There was to be twenty people crammed into a rocket that was intended to house twelve. They would fly to the International Space Station, meet with the astronauts that currently resided there. The rocket ship would be put into a tailing orbit, and become a sanctuary in which the residents of the base could take a sort of vacation from one another. Of course, it would take months of delicate and dangerous work to fully renovate the ship in space while it rattled along at almost thirty thousand kilometres per hour, but they had plenty of time.
Much of the operation was automated, including the countdown timer, and various remedial launch protocols. Five minutes prior to an automated action taking place, the computer would state the time to launch in a soft but insistent voice. Every member of the expedition knew what each time stamp meant.
“Launch in 47 minutes”, the lucky few who would survive into space entered the lift that would bring them to the docking level. In five minutes the hatch would open and they would enter the rocket.
“Launch in 39 minutes”, the door would close, and the ship would begin depressurising in anticipation of the launch.
“Launch in 26 minutes”, the final check process is complete, with the pilot, and co-pilot, manually confirming.
“Launch in 5 minutes”, the thrusters would engage, and they would launch from planet earth. In two hours, the asteroid would strike the planet somewhere in the Pacific ocean. This would lead to tidal waves and earth quakes that would kill almost every single human being living on planet earth.
As the ship’s digital clock counted through the final five minutes, most of the passengers secreted sweat, tensed their toes, and tried to breathe smoothly. Stanner, who had experienced jet flight before, concentrated on relaxing every muscle in his body, to make the take off as easy on his body as possible. McNee was in a deep meditation, as she had been since she took her seat on the jet. She believed that she would survive this.
* * *
Sestina and Oran did not make it to Florida. They got stuck in a small town just south of Savannah, South Carolina, where the busses didn’t run, and the gas didn’t pump. They found a room in an abandoned hotel that, loaded up on good food, drink, and what other comforts they could scavenge. They sat on the balcony, watching the stars, waiting for one to fall.
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