THE END OF THE WORLD - AS WE KNOW IT
by
GAIL GARDNER
Harriman Nelson looked out of the large picture window of his office. It often framed the reassuring sight of his brainchild, the great grey submarine, the Seaview. The only thing that greeted his bitter stare was the dark wind-whipped waters of the empty sub pen. The wind rose a notch achieving a nerve wracking high note that quavered and died.
The soft chimes of the Navy regulator cut throught the unnatural quiet. Eleven strokes. The clock had been a Christmas gift from the crew less than a week ago. It was now New Year's Eve, the time to ring in a new year, new beginnings - not the expectation of disaster.
Last New Year's they had all been so prepared for YK2 - primed and Institute Staff had been there to repair any damage, to meet the challenges that might come. Tonight, as the world seem to fall apart around him - he was alone.
It seemed that the small minority of people who said that the millenium would begin in 2001 were right. He had mentally relegated them to the category of Flat Earth Society members and X-file fans.
The unexpected, a solar flare,had been a nasty post-Christmas gift. It had burned half of the world's communication satellites into cosmic toast and had thrown the world's population, dependent on satellite communication for everything, into chaos. It had also affected the weather in unpredictable and uncomfortable ways. Massive storms pounded coastlines, snow fell where snow had never been seen before.
Instead of concentrating on only rescue work, Admiral Nelson bent his great intellect and good sense to finding solutions to many of the problems that the world faced in this disaster. He found himself almost single-handedly orchestrating a re-launch of communication satellites. Six satellites that would hardly replace the hundreds that were lost. Six launched from various positions around the globe. It remained for the Seaview to launch the last critical link from a precarious position near the North Pole.
Communications were at best fragile and unreliable. The Admiral's only contact with the powerful nuclear submarine was a shortwave radio that had been ressurected from the bowels of the storage facilities at the Institute. Every now and then it would crackle into life relaying desperate messages from frantic people around the world. He recognized many of the languages, some he didn't, but the tone was the same - a plea for help.
The last message from the mighty submarine had been critical. In order to communicate, they had to surface in heavy seas to raise the fragile whip antenna. The GPS navigation system was no longer a possible aid in course setting, so Captain Crane had to navigate by shooting stars and "the seat of his pants" he had reported. The closer they came to the polar region the thicker the cloud cover had been and the more erratic the compass readings. It was only the supreme skill of the Captain and his crew that kept them on course for this vital mission. The next communication from them should be from the launch site or...
Nelson shook his head wearily. No use thinking the worse. The wind had begun to blow again whistling mournfully around the building, making the windows shiver and waver. The uncertain light reflected from the subpen shimmered and splintered on the window like a mad display of New Year's fireworks only to fade away and reappear.
A sudden chill brushed across Nelson's back. He went to the closet and pulled out an old faded pullover. Edith had been giving him a new one every birthday for the last five years, but he found the old sweater comforting and familiar. As he pulled it over his head he heard a small 'clink' as something fell from the folds of the sweater and on to the floor. He bent over to pick it up. It was a pendant in the shape of a snowflake. It was gaudy and cheap looking. For a moment he stared at it, then he remembered. Last year. Last Christmas. A time that seemed impossibly distant...
"This is really fine work, Admiral." The small woman smiled at Admiral
Harriman Nelson who was looking out of the large picture window of his
office.
"State of the art." Nelson said gruffly."Miniaturized. Easy to use. The
signal is virtually undectable." He studied his guest carefully. She was
not in the prime of youth, hair obviously died a rather gaudy unnatural
red to cover the gray. Her figure is what in by-gone eras would have
been called "comfortable". Her eyes were her best feature, a brilliant
blue that sparkled with inner confidence and humor. She was wearing a
green velvet dress with a large snowflake pendant resting on her ample
bosum.
"This will get you past any of the defense systems that the US and her
allies have set up. Now, I can't make any guarantees about the other
side..." Nelson warned.
"My dear Harry," the woman laughed, "You know my boss. He has that
covered, too. And stop worrying, you know this is only going where it
belongs." She shook a finger at him.
"You know me all too well." Nelson smiled wryly. The little sonar, radar
deflection device would have fetched millions on the open market. Even
knowledge of its existence would cause havoc in the balance of power in
the world. If he didn't have the degree of confidence in his customer,
the buyer of the powerful little device, this meeting would never be
happening.
The lady put a small envelope on his table. "The price, as was agreed, I
believe."
Harriman Nelson picked up the embossed envelope with his name written by
hand in the boss' flowing script.
"You know last year..." He looked more sad than angry."It wasn't worth
much..."
"Harry, even the boss can't predict what will happen. Market
fluctuations, greed, bad luck, bad weather, bad TV. It brings the value
of things down." She had tears in her large blue eyes." He tries and he
knows you try too." She suddenly took off the large gaudy snowflake
pendant and pressed it into his hand.
"Call it a Christmas bonus, my dear." She stood on the chair, pulled his
head down, and gave him a kiss on the cheek.
He looked at the trinket in his hand. It was made of cheap metal covered
with peeling silver paint. It was studded with little chips of paste
rhinestones and was altogether rather tacky.
When he looked up she was gone. He shook his head and then picked up
the envelope again. Inside it was the payment for betraying his country,
for selling the secret of the little device to the little woman's boss.
He pulled out the simple engraved card. On it read:
PEACE ON EARTH
GOOD WILL TOWARDS MEN
As he read the card he could hear the faint sound of sleigh bells
overhead.
As he held the small object in his hand he felt a glimmer of hope. As he did the snowflake began to glow faintly.
"All it takes is a little faith, Harry."
He was somehow not surprised to hear her light cheery voice. The little woman was perched quite precariously on the edge of his desk. She was stuffed into a rather tight purple plush dress with froths of lace at the throat and cuffs that made her look like an overstuffed Victorian sofa.
"We don't seem to have much more than that going for us." Nelson said tightly.
She laughed. The lights on the window danced and twinkled with her. "Oh Harry, dear. Faith is the greatest power in the world. Your faith in your submarine, in your knowledge, your science and your friends is so strong. But do not forget the strength that is in your heart and in the hearts of all men. It is that faith that will carry us to the end."
"So, is this the end? The great catastrophe? Armegeddon?"
"Well, yes!" She hopped off the desk and pulled rather ineffectually at the dress that was rather rucked up in the back. "It is quite a show," she finished brightly. "I've been looking forwards to it! You have no idea what an honor it is to spend the last moments of this world with you."
"Honor! Last moments!" Nelson felt the sharp points of the pendant dig into his palm as he crushed it. "Then everything was for nothing. No! I won't believe it! We have come so far, we can do it. I am sure." He felt the a sudden heat in his hand as the pendant flared once more with light. It pulsed and then began to burn. He dropped it hastily. It lay on the floor and began to glow brighter.
"You see, Harry!" she said excitedly, "It is beginning!"
"How can you be so happy about all of this?" Nelson ran his fingers through his hair and then gestured angrily outside to the dark storm. "People are hurt, dying, in trouble."
"Yes dear. And in their time of darkness, they are turning once again to the light. See!" The pendant was now glowing stronger and stronger. It began to rise from the floor and filled the room with a warm strong light.
Her voice filled the room like a great choir with the wind singing a high descant. "Let us greet the dawn of the new century with our hearts afire with faith and love of man."
The light from the snowflake splintered and then shot through the window to make a bright highway of light that seem to illuminate the whole heaven.
"Admiral...Admiral...This is the Seaview. Come in." The voice from the radio cut through Nelson's reverie and fascination with the coruscations of light eminating from the snowflake.
Nelson went over to the little radio and picked up the mike. "Yes, Lee. What is your position?"
"Not too sure. The weather topside is foul, we got ten meter waves and the cloud cover is pretty thick." Crane said tensely.
Nelson could hear the sounds of the storm in the background and the voices of the crew shouting out orders over the din.
"Lee...you have to get that satellite launched..." Nelson began.
"Wait a moment sir!" The Captain interrupted him, and started speaking to someone else. Nelson could still hear his voice. "I don't care if it's a UFO or some other celestial phenomena - get a fix on our position and prepare to get that satellite up into orbit" His voice came back louder, "Admiral, you aren't going to believe this but there is some bright star or something that just burnt off the cloud cover, Chip will have a fix in a moment...I'm sure we'll get the job done."
"Lee, I have all the faith in the world that you will. We all do." Nelson said with a sigh of relief.
"We are pretty much on target, sir, just about three miles from your optimum launch window. Shall we wait till we get there?" Crane asked.
"No, Lee. I think you are in the right place at the right time. Go for it."
"Aye, sir! Begin countdown !" he ordered.
Admiral Nelson could hear the orders flying around the control room as the men of the Seaview worked to launch the vital satellite. He could almost taste the tension, hear the click and whirr of instruments that were adeptly handled by able men. It seemed to him that the solid floor of his office shuddered in sympathy when the satellite was launched.
"Now, Lee. Take her down out of that storm and head for home." Nelson said half sternly.
"We could run topside for a while...stay in radio contact." The Captain offered.
"No, it'll be at least an hour before the satellite is in position and then, well, then we will know." Nelson chuckled for the first time in days, or since the last century he realized as the regulator chimed twelve. "I'll call you."
"Aye, sir...and sir?" Crane hesitated a moment.
"Yes Lee?"
"Happy New Year." With a scrape of static the radio reception began to stutter and fade.
Somehow, when he looked up, Admiral Nelson was not surprised to find himself once more alone. The wind was still blowing outside, the subpen lights reflecting off the big window. There was no sign of the snowflake pendant. He stood pensively staring out of the window for a long time. Then he heard the whisper of a voice...
"...nous....aidez..." The television monitor set into the wall began to flicker. Radios and the computer began to hum and blip into life.
"We will help...vi kan hjälpar deg...nous vous aidons...auttamme teidät....pomogayam vas...sawfa nusaáidukum..." In many of the world's languages the message was clear. The peoples of the world were working together to help each other.
It was the end of the world - as he had known it, but it was also the beginning of the new world.
Author's Note: I wrote part of this story last year. It was called the Chistmas Bonus and was posted on the Seaview and Captain's Log lists. I had always thought that the "bonus" deserved a story of what it truly was. Now we know.
"So strong is the light of unity, that it can envelop the whole earth." -Bahá'u'llah