These last days of ours

Roy wasn’t sleeping well. If and when he managed to drift off he was plunged into dreams so vivid and anxiety inducing that he’d wake in a jolt, covered in sweat.

He could not recall the details save for one, a looming ball of fire headed right for him. 

These dreams left him feeling on edge and sapped of energy, as if some kind of strenuous activity were taking place in spite of his rest.  Most of all they imbued him with a sense of urgency in response to a crisis that he was unclear about, he didn’t know why, just that he needed to hurry.

Work was a drudging slog of weariness, and as he clocked out for the fifth time this week an idea occurred to him, an idea that made him smile wide and lunatic.  

His boss sat behind a dingy desk piled with various detritus and nearly inhaled the stub of a cigar as the door slammed open.  Roy entered and unloaded his vitriol before saying in calm venomous tones that he quit.  The boss, unable to employ his usual big dog approach simply nodded, most likely relieved that this now former employee wasn’t so disgruntled as to bring, say, a shotgun to end their arrangement. Feeling better than he had in years Roy sauntered out with his last paycheck and cashed it immediately.  His next stop brought him to an electronics store that he walked by often, but never had any reason to enter. He was surprised to see his next door neighbor also perusing the isles of this place as he examined a soldering iron.  They did not speak to each other or question each other’s motives for being there.  It did not seem odd to him that they were buying similar items, copper wire, component boards, sulfuric acid, and various packages full of resistors, capacitors, transformers, and all manner of electronic guts. For all intents and purposes, it seemed totally natural.

The cashier was not accustomed to this sort of business. It was clear he wanted answers, and anytime he would ask casually or otherwise he was met with an odd smile that quite frankly, gave him the willies.  To which the cashier muttered frequently to himself – these people are giving me the willies.

In fact these people all lived in Roys apartment building which to any observer resembled a large cake with one slice removed.  Or a concrete pacman devouring its tenants as they filed in. 

Roy had never experienced a sense of purpose, he sort of floated through life doing the bare minimum ever expected of him.  He had almost been married once, but that was just after highschool.  He had even thought of starting his own business, upon realizing the immense effort it would require he instead settled into his warehouse job, seamlessly blending into the background like wallpaper. Ambitions, hopes and dreams diminished as time wore on, mitigated by television shows, microwaved food, and liquor.  Until this point Roy had never felt a shred of inspiration, until now Roy had never felt wonder.  Until now, Roy had never felt important.

With every fiber of his being he knew that what he was doing was important. 

For hours, days or even weeks he sat under a single lamp at a desk in a haze of solder smoke.  Empty boxes  and packaging littered the floor, whenever he felt done for the day he would stand back and admire this thing he was making.  A part of him seemed to know what it was. But the Roy that had let himself be led through life by mediocrity had no clue to its purpose and could only admire its form.  If he dreamt he could not recall, such was the extent of his exhaustion. The lack of alcohol and bad food also contributed to a sense of clarity he had not felt for a long time, but that was nothing compared to the luminescent mindset that took him over when he was working.  His vision saw nothing but coils of copper, pathways of conductive material wormed across green panels connecting innumerable components combined to make a cage of sorts that looked as if it would fit on his head.  Separate from the main device was a ring, composed of an iron core wrapped in copper interspersed with crystal capsules veined with tungsten filaments.  He thought of the thing as a crown which made him, Roy, a king.

Every day he would find a box of rations outside his door, sometimes seeing his neighbors doing the same, just poking out of their units like hermit crabs emerging only for sustenance.  None of this seemed strange, and Roy only wondered how his device compared to theirs as he chewed a bite of his nutrient bar.   

Whatever these were, they eliminated any need to defecate, in fact the bathroom was the only room not littered with empty packaging from either electronic components or his oddly enriching meals.  He thought he must smell awful as he had not bathed in weeks which didn’t particularly matter as all he could smell was the constant perfume of hot melted solder and copper shavings.  

Nearing completion of the project did not imbue Roy with any comprehension, and upon seeing the finished device under the solitary lamp he merely stared with fascination.  He had made something, something incredible, something fantastic. His eyes followed the lines and patterns of it to the back where a thick cable ending in a sturdy three pronged plug.  This detail left him puzzled as he only saw such plugs on heavy machinery, which his apartment was not furnished with as far as he knew.  

As he laid down to sleep his sense of accomplishment became dogged by doubts and his sense of inferiority that he had for years tried to drown in alcohol and mind numbing distractions returned.

What was he doing? What were all of them doing for that matter?

Was this just as meaningless and routine as the rest of it all, the constant churn of humanity always moving, never really going anywhere.  He decided not, and trusted this thread that pulled at him, inexorably towards an undefined yet glorious destination. His last thought before falling away into dreams was that this must be how people feel when they find god.

He awoke with a start, it was the fireball again and heat, and terrible pain. He went to his door and found not a box of rations, but a small black case. The same black case sat in front of every door that he could see.  There was no obvious way to open the case as there were no latches or seams or any feature at all save for a small depression in its surface. He set this case near the device that sat complete and utterly baffling to him. Roy knew that whatever was happening would be happening soon as the lights in his unit began to dim and pulse softly.  Above his work desk was a metal panel caked in several layers of paint, it opened with a little effort and there he saw the numerous little switches that directed electricity to the various outlets  on the walls.  He switched a few of them off and pried open a slot at the bottom.  It was the exact shape of the plug on his device.  He waited for a few moments before inserting it. The ring went on first, it hung like a bejeweled spike collar that was much too big for him. Next came the crown which felt heavy but perfectly fitted to him.  Finally, the black box with slight depression on it, which he knew was meant for his thumb, as his thumb settled into the groove a razor thin light transected the box and it opened with a hiss.  Nested in foam was a capsule which he removed and popped into his mouth and swallowed.  The lights flickered in alternating patterns with increasing frequency until they seemed to resonate and once aligned the lights went green.

Roy reached out automatically to the circuit box and pulled the lever that would send power to the device he was wearing. He could feel the grip of it like a hand pulling at the threads of his entire nervous system, forcing him to stand rigid, shoulders back, hands at his sides, fingers extended pointing at the floor.  The ring around his neck hovered at his jaw line and began to slowly spin. As the ring gained momentum a humming began deep in his skull, and more distantly, a second hum followed.  The two sounds were gradually merging into one perfect note gaining volume in his head as the ring spun faster.  Thoughts that were not his own flooded his mind, words like “synchronization” and “resonance” pelted his brain like the first raindrops of a coming storm.  Then images of a world lit in red hues, desolate cityscapes, massive open graves filled with bodies and a sense of profound loss, desperation and something else… gratitude.

The ring was a blazing halo in front of his eyes as if the very materials had been converted to pure energy and then it was gone.    

His body, released from the paralysis, slumped, and then Roy fell to his knees onto the carpet, disoriented and exhausted but aware of himself in what seemed like years.

The crown tumbled from his head into a brittle mass of shapes that crumbled when it hit the floor, and he noticed that the color of the carpet was unfamiliar. 

In fact, everything was unfamiliar, the very air here was somehow different.  He stumbled to a window and pulled the heavy curtains back to see with his own eyes the wasteland in his nightmares.  At the horizon, a crimson sliver waxed into a full red face of lurid anger.  Roy squinted his eyes as the dying star rose, immediately feeling its heat through the thick glass.  Despite this discomfort he marveled at how the skeletal city in the distance danced in the heat distortion.  From narrow vents in the concrete ceiling, cool air breezed out but there was a waning sickness to its sound, an intermittent lull as the systems motors struggled to keep turning. 

Blast doors slid shut like vertical eyelids leaving his vision spotty in the now dim unit,  the outside hellscape quite literally burned into his mind.  When he could see again he noticed words stenciled in white on the inside of the blast doors. 

  “These last days of ours now belong to you.”