Outpost Gamma, Escape Route Number 68

Outpost Gamma. Escape Route Number 68

December 15, 2035

Escape Route Number 67 in T minus 20 minutes. Escape route number 68 in 428 hours.

“Thanks, Clysta,” I mutter to our onboard AI. She woke me out of a dream. I was back on Earth, a child laying between the rows of tomato plants, Mom’s big rubber boots on my little feet.

“Please take me back there,” I beg of my own brain, now wide awake. The moment is gone.

I haven’t decided yet if I’m taking this escape route, but seeing as it’s in less than fifteen minutes and I haven’t prepared, I guess I’ll stay for a couple more weeks. The ship is safe, clean, has food and breathable air. The escape routes are full of the unknown. When I leave, I’ll probably never see any of my fellow survivors again. Most residents, well, they’ve been referring to us as “guests”, have partnered up with escape buddies. I don’t want a buddy. I don’t know what I want. For now, I’ll settle for the soy-based egg substitute in front of me and head back to my berth to contemplate my future.

They found me eight months ago. I was half starved, had buried my entire family, and was working on a plan for my own demise. I thought I was the last person on Earth – and maybe I was. They haven’t found anyone since.

May 1, 2035

“Happy Birthday, Izzy,” I whisper to myself. I’m still alive. I haven’t laid eyes on another living creature save for bugs and beetles in over four months. Today I turn 17. Today is a good day to die. I drag myself out of bed anyway, wondering how I am still breathing while everyone else has expired.

The power had been going on and off for almost a year, but it went out for the final time in February; I’m not sure of the date. It doesn’t matter, anyway.

The fire I lit last night is nothing but embers. It’s easier to keep it going than to start a new one, though, so I toss a stack of old bills on it. Dad’s filing cabinet is almost empty now. I’m sure he would be happy to know that the property deed and his life insurance policy came in handy after he passed away – at least for a few minutes. I could go in search of kindling, but I’m feeling pretty weary and depressed. A chair will do. I’m not having dinner guests over anytime soon.

I raided yet another farm house a few miles east yesterday. At first these escapades were easy – I took the car, cleaned out pantries, ignored the corpses. I found it easiest to stay out of bedrooms; that’s where most of my neighbors laid their heads for the final time. It didn’t take long to run out of gas. I stole a car after that. I was in a camper trailer looking for supplies, but all I found was a few half empty bottles of booze (which I took) and their keys.

I knew no one would see me – there was no one left, but the grand theft auto racked me with guilt. I took it anyway. It had a terrible stench, but everything does these days. Sewers backed up; people and animals had dropped dead where they stood, left to decay, fridges and freezers lost power, rotting food permeating the air in each home. I just ignored it this time – until I didn’t. There was an infant in the back seat. Bugs had devoured its eyes and created caverns in the remains. I can’t tell you if it was a boy or a girl. This wasn’t my first cadaver, but it was the one that shook me out of my alternate reality, reached my core, opened my eyes to the state of the world. What was left of it, anyway.

I buried the body. Then I buried the parents. I left the car.

I could have found another vehicle, but decided to use my bike from then on.

This morning... is it morning? I have no way of telling anymore. The sky is always red, morning, noon and night. There is just enough light that the hardiest of plants have stayed alive, but the majority have withered and died, just like humanity. I have Dad’s watch, but it’s no longer ticking. Anyway, today I head to the backyard. Mom’s garden has fallen on hard times, but the potatoes and carrots keep coming. And the tomatoes.

“Plant a marigold flower between each tomato plant,” Mom had coached. “They are the guardians of the garden. As long as the flowers are there, the bugs will leave our tomatoes alone.” She was right; even in the end of the world, her tomatoes are flourishing. I pluck one and eat it like an apple, not caring about the pulp and juice flowing down my chin, staining my clothes. I don’t bother saving the seeds anymore – I don’t stand a chance of making it past this summer.

Ever since I was a little girl, I’ve loved laying in the garden. The grooves between the mounds of dirt are the perfect place to lay flat, be hidden and stare up at the sky. I used to watch the birds and planes, dreaming of far-off lands that I’d one day see. The marigolds would sway in the breeze, sometimes blocking my line of sight, making a golden filter for the sky. Today, the filter doesn’t thwart the red. It’s getting darker. I can smell the flowers and it reminds me of Mom, even though her scent was more apple pie and these flowers stink of dirty wax rolled in moldy lard. I laugh at the mental image, then break out in sobs as I consider that these flowers are probably what have kept me alive for the last few months.

I’ve been cycling out to the highway almost every day. It’s less than half an hour in each direction and the line of abandoned vehicles is a veritable treasure trove. The only problem is that almost all of the cars and trucks have a body or bodies in it. I avoid anything with children, even though I did see an iPad with a solar charger in one of them. I can’t imagine that the internet is still active, but I’m betting there’s a decent music library. I keep on riding. My destination today is a transport that I visit often. The driver, George, it said on his permit, had walked out into the woods and never returned, so I appropriated his CB. The first few times I turned it on, there was chatter. It waned, then disappeared altogether. No one ever answered me.

“Hello? Is anyone out there? It’s Izzy… again. It’s May first. I haven’t seen anyone for months. I hope you can hear me. Someone? Anyone.”

Sometimes I sleep here. It’s weird, but I feel less alone when there are vehicles as far as the eye can see. I can pretend I’m on a road trip with my family. As a sign of respect for George's privacy, I've never looked at his cargo, but he’s gone and I’m here and today is my birthday, so I’m breaking in. Maybe it’s a thousand pounds of chocolate chip cookies.

Nope, not cookies.

It’s seeds. Hundreds of thousands of seed packets for every imaginable fruit, vegetable and flower. Probably enough to feed the whole country. But there is no one left in the country except me.

“Hello again. This is Izzy…again. If you’re out there, anyone, I found something. I found seeds… maybe millions of them… on a truck headed north. I’m in Missouri, on the 35 near St. Joseph.”

I tried. I know there’s no one to hear it.

I take my time biking home. I snagged a pink teddy bear from George’s cab – let’s call it a birthday present - he won’t mind. And a handful of seed packs. The red sun seems a lot brighter today; tonight; this morning… whatever time of day it might be. It looks like it’s setting behind my house.

It’s not the sun. It is a motorized vehicle with huge red lights; hovering. I should be scared, but it’s so out of the ordinary that all I can do is stare.

December 16, 2035

“Come in,” I respond to a light knocking on my door. My cabin is small – only six feet wide and ten feet long. I didn’t bring anything from Earth with me except a few items of clothes, some family photos, George’s pink bear… and the seeds that no one knows I poached. When I leave, I plan on growing tomatoes and marigolds in memory of my mother. And in memory of my planet.

“Hi Izzy. How are you doing today?” Agatha is the ship's counsellor, for lack of a better word. I don’t think she’s had any formal training.

“Okay, I guess?”

“I was wondering, and no pressure here, if you have given any thought to an escape route? I only ask because, well you know, there aren’t enough supplies for our colony to survive forever.”

“What about the seeds? I found the truck – doesn’t that buy me some more time?” It must!

“Yes. Of course, dear. I’m just here to help you make a decision for the future.”

“But… where do these escape routes even go? How do you know where I’ll end up? Why aren’t YOU using an escape route?” All of the questions that have been building up in my mind have spilled out, breaking the dam that has been my armour since I arrived here.

“I am. I’m on the next one. Come with me.”

January 2, 2036

“Happy New Year, Izzy.”

“Happy New Year, Agatha”

Escape Route Number 68 in T minus 20 minutes. Escape route number 69 in 652 hours.

“Thanks, Clysta,” Agatha and I say in unison. We are holding hands, standing outside of the pod that is going to facilitate our desertion. I don’t know where it’s taking us and either does Agatha. The program was designed and operated fully by the CLYSTA program. Celestial Light Year Space Travel Algorithm. We are told that once ejected, contact with the ship is impossible and we are on our own. We’ve each been given a bag of supplies that are supposed to maintain us until we reach the outpost in just over a day. I also have the seeds, but I haven’t confessed yet – even to Agatha.

“This is the sixth discharge to Outpost Gamma,” the captain had advised us yesterday. “Assuming all travelers have survived, there should be thirty-seven residents including both of you. Good luck and fare thee well, ladies.”

There are three other “guests” in the pod with us as we are jettisoned. All are clamoring for the best view of outer space and our destination. The only window is an eight-inch-wide porthole. I’m last to look, and first to see our target. From here, it’s red. It’s hazy… there is an invisible aura, reminiscent of wiggly heat lines coming off of pavement. I can see water, but it, too, is red.

Earth. Clysta is sending us back to Earth.

We are the survivors of Apocalypse round one. Maybe there’s hope. Maybe we’re expendable.