Lights Out

Lights Out

My mother had just died.

The doctors said that she went peacefully, in her sleep, like that was supposed to matter. All I knew was that my mother, the woman who raised me, was there for me no matter what, supported me through everything, was gone and she was never coming back.

And no one cared.

They didn’t care that she was gone, that she would never smile again, never laugh again, never sigh in exasperation as she looked at my tornado struck room and politely tell me that one day I was going to break my ankle wading through ‘that minefield’.

“Why?” I asked myself as I stared desperately into the mirror. My shoulders were slumped in despair as I grasped the sides of the sink for dear life, my soot black hair was greasy, limply hanging to my shoulders and my sea smoke eyes shown with confusion and devastation. “Why didn’t I visit more? Care more?”

In a blink I was sneering at myself, shoulders tense like a feral animal readying to pounce. “Because you were thinking about yourself.” My eyes rolled and I scoffed. “Too busy being all high and mighty over at that school of yours to remember the regular people like dear old mom.”

I gasped. “N-no,” I stammered, my eyes dropping to the grimy sink drain. “No, I remembered her. And she understood. I’d gotten into MIT. It was the chance of a lifetime. I-I couldn’t just throw that away!” My gaze once again shot desperately to the mirror.

My face smirked back at me. “Do you hear yourself? Your mother is dead. D-E-A-D. And you hadn’t seen her in-oh two years?”

“Five,” I whispered.

“Oh, yes, my mistake. Five years.” I leaned closer to the mirror, my eyes seeming to search for something in their depths. “And you know what the best part is? You knew she was sick. You knew she didn’t have much time left and you ignored her.”

“No! No I-I didn’t,” I tore my gaze from the mirror and scurried back. “No, no we-we talked! On the phone. I didn’t-I didn’t ignore her!”

My lips curled in disgust as I stared myself down. “I’m you. I know when you lie.”

“I’m not. Not lying, not lying.” I grabbed my hair and tugged, the slick strands knotting around my fingers.

I sniffed the air dramatically. “I smell smoke, liar, liar pants on fire anyone?”

“No!” I shuffled backward even further until my back hit the wall. “I loved my mom! I did! I loved her!”

“I know.”

Looking up I saw that my face was soft and sad, the tear running down my cheek tickled until it dripped off my chin. “I know you loved her, we both did.” I took a deep breath and wiped my face. “Which is why we need to make her death mean something.”

“Mean something?” I blinked in confusion. “Mean what? And who would care?” I shuddered and looked to the floor as if it had the answers I sought. “I was all she had left.”

“Yes,” my gazed snapped back to the mirror where I saw my eyes blazing with determination. “But think of all the other people who treat their families just as you did. Of how it feels to be forgotten, ignored, abandoned.”

“I don’t want to.” I whispered, shame churning my insides.

“What if we fixed that?”

“What?” I took a small step closer to the mirror. “What do you mean?”

“Our problem was that we lost track of what was really important to us.” Another step. “There’s no doubt in my—our mind that others in the world have too.” Step, step. “We just need to remind them what truly matters.”

I once again grasped the sink and stared into the mirror. “How?”

Watching myself intently I asked. “What exposes people’s priorities?”

My shoulders rose and fell in a quick shrug. “I don’t know. Fire?”

“Yes, but less specifically?”

My gaze drifted as I thought, then snapped back to the mirror eyes wider than ever. “Fear.”

I nodded with a small smile. “How we react to danger. When you are threatened or afraid you immediately think of what is most valuable to you and what you need to do to protect it.”

“Okay.” I said. “That makes sense, but how do we scare an entire country? Let alone the world?”

I gave a crafty grin. “Who isn’t afraid of the dark?”

***

It took ten years but I was finally ready. Finally ready to pull the plug on the world’s lamps and tv’s and anything else that kept the darkness at bay. I checked my email and was disappointed to see there were no new messages.

I looked around my condo trying to keep myself from worrying by taking in the white walls and furniture. The couch I sat on faced the door with a coffee table equipped with a flat screen tv in between. Behind me to the left was the kitchen, behind me to the right the bathroom and behind that the bedroom. On my right was a desk pushed against the wall loaded down with two monitors and a tower underneath. Though it was my condo and my desk a friend of mine was currently manning the station.

“Ayjay, is everything in place?”

Ayjay had tan skin, earth brown eyes framed by square black glasses and a small afro of black hair. He also had the mind of a genius and had been my friend since I’d saved his twin sisters from a kidnapper by hacking the information the police needed to find them. Not that the cops knew how I’d gotten the information.

He shoved his glasses into place with the back of his hand and checked his monitors.

“Yeah Ash.” He finally answered. “According to your contacts all the parts you prepared have been delivered and installed.”

Perfect! We’re so close, almost there.

“I know,” I muttered. “Almost done. Almost there.”

Ayjay ignored me having grown used to me mumbling to myself. I checked my inbox and let out a frustrated noise when I saw no new emails. It was the last piece but everything hinged on it.

A decade ago after losing my mother and deciding to save the people of the world from themselves, I did some research. Apparently the United States gets its electricity from three major sources: fossil fuels, nuclear energy and renewable energy. Shut those down and keep them shut down and there’s no more electricity.

To that end, I made friends and got jobs at several of the factories that produce the parts that make up the generators. The wrong alloy here, a missing screw there and hundreds of inspectors paid off along the way and we’ve got electricity generators on the fritz or out of commission completely. Not only in the US but everywhere that part is supplied to worldwide.

But the email I’m waiting on is bigger, much bigger. It’s not enough that the world’s electricity is on the fritz. It needs to be out. Forever.

My phone vibrated, shocking me out of my thoughts, I frantically snatched the brick of technology off the couch next to me and checked my email.

One new message

I clicked on it.

It’s done. Final package delivered.

My breath caught in my throat. It was done. Everything was ready.

Yes but don’t freeze now!

I jolted. Right. Of course. I still had to paunch the program. I still had to activate them.

“Get ready Ayjay. We’re almost at the finish line, we can do this.” I threw open my laptop and logged in faster than I had in my entire life, blood pumping through my ears as I spoke. “Almost there, almost there, almost there.”

When I looked up Ayjay was frozen in his chair, his twin monitors casting him in an icy blue glow that was at odds with the sweat beading on his forehead and dripping down his temples.

“Ayjay?” I looked up from the program I was launching but my friend of six years wouldn’t meet my eye.

He instead stared at the door. “I’m sorry Ash.” He finally whispered. “I owe you more than I can ever repay but when I figured it out—”

My stomach dropped and my gaze swung to the door and back to Ayjay.

“No, no, no Ayjay tell me you didn’t. Tell me you didn’t!”

“My mom’s on a ventilator Ash, she needs it to live and you want to take that away from her. I’m sorry but I can’t let you do that.”

His words hit me like a punch to the gut and all the air whooshed out of my lungs. Was I doing the right thing?

Yes! You are! Would he have cared about his mother at all if he hadn’t thought she was in danger? No! We showed him! We made him care again! Keep going!

BANG, BANG, BANG! “NYPD! Open up! We have a warrant for Ashlyn Barnet! Open the door!”

I stared at the shuddering door in horror. This couldn’t be happening, I was so careful and Ayjay was my friend and-and—

Grab your laptop and get to the bathroom! You can launch the program from there!

“Okay, okay, okay.”

Jumping from my chair with my laptop clutched in my pale, trembling hands I dashed around the couch into the bathroom, slammed the door and pushed the medium sized white cabinet in front of it.

“Ash don’t do this! Just give it up! It’s over!” I barely heard Ayjay beg over the Boom! Boom! THUMP! Of the cops smashing through the door and into the room shouting orders about hands.

With time running out I dropped my laptop to the floor to the right of the toilet in the small space between it and the wall. At this angle they wouldn’t be able to shoot it with the toilet in the way, though they could hit me. My fingers flew over the keyboard in a frenzy of commands, some that I had to quickly retype as the police began throwing themselves against the bathroom door causing the cabinet to jerk and shake.

I was entering the launch command when the cabinet fell, crashing into the sink on my left and sending glass shards flying everywhere. One of them nicked my cheek and I gasped at the pain and the feel of warm blood trickling down my face. The bathroom door slammed open, thudded into the wall and a man in SWAT gear raced into the room pointing his rifle in my direction.

“Get her away from the laptop!” Barked someone behind him. “Stop her!”  

Kick!

Without thinking I kicked some of the debris from the cabinet in the man’s direction, the jolt from hitting the heavy wood sending a bolt of pain through my left leg. The hunk of wood slammed into the man’s shins and he fell on his front landing on what was left of the cabinet. I turned back to my laptop and furiously finished typing the command all I had to do was press ente—

Strong hands gripped my outstretched left leg and dragged me back from my laptop.

“No!” I screamed, nearly hysterical.

I kicked as hard as I could with my free leg over and over again and used my arms to drag myself back to my laptop. Uncaring of the stinging in my chest, arms and hands from the glass shards I was driving into myself.

Just a little closer! Just a little more!

My fingertips touched the corner to the right of the mouse pad leaving a bloody smear and I pulled, shifting the laptop so it was facing to the left. The enter button was close enough, I reached out and slammed my hand into the keys praying that one of them was the right one.

Another pair of hands grasped my other leg and jerked me back. Before I knew it I was across the floor out of the bathroom and someone was kneeling on my back cuffing my hands behind me.

“Check it!” Ordered the voice from earlier.

I heard footsteps head in the direction I was dragged from but couldn’t turn my head to see with SWAT guy’s knee on my back so I just closed my eyes and focused on my breathing.

It’s okay, we did it. Mom’s death means something now.

My breathing slowed from frantic gasps to deep even breathes. Yeah, we’d done it. I’d done it. Everyone would value their family now. I helped them see what was most important.

“Sir!” A gruff voice rang out. “It says ‘Launch Successful’.”

“No!” I heard Ayjay breathe behind me. “No, no it can’t be.”

“What’s happening?” The voice demanded.

I kept my eyes closed but smiled with relief.

Before the voice could order someone to answer his question a soft whooomph filled the air. Then I heard it, what I’d waited years to hear.

The lights of an entire world going out.

It cut through the room like a scythe. The lights went out, the air conditioner turned off, the dishwasher stopped running.

Everything that ran on electricity was dead.

“EMP’s,” I murmured. “They’re incredible inventions.”

***

“How are we doing today Ashlyn?” Asked Dr. Wendy Arlow as she opened the door to my room and closed it behind her, white coat drifting gently around her knees. She was a petite woman with dramatically curly red hair and brown eyes who was always dressed as if she were on her way to court in neutral blouses cover by a fitted blazers and pencil skirts.

Doctor Arlow had been my doctor ever since I’d been arrested three years ago. While many had pushed for my death after I’d managed to knock out the world’s power, she had convinced them that I was not mentally stable and could help undo my work if I had proper therapy. Which I had, a little.

I can’t believe they still don’t think we are mentally stable. The whole idea is just ridiculous.

I nodded. “You said it.” I muttered before smiling to Dr. Arlow. “Good morning doctor, we are doing fine. Though I was wondering if I could have todays paper.”

She nodded and held it out to me but pulled it back when I went to grab it. “What’s our deal?”

She asks us this every day. Does she thinks the answer’s going to change?

I shrugged to myself. “Read it for five minutes then talk.”

“Very good.”

This time she didn’t pull back as I grasped the paper and read the front page. It spoke of the how the governments around the world had still not restored power except for in one city per continent. Which I had told them how to do so that medical equipment could be powered on in those locations, but there was no mention of me or how the power was restored.

Typical. Take all the credit for our genius.

“That’s ok,” I whispered. “I don’t need credit.”

I felt doctor Arlow’s eyes on me as she studied me but paid it no mind. An article spoke of the increased death rate in the US since the power had been cut while another told of how communities were coming together to support each other. In one section was a quote taken from someone in a small town.

‘I used to think I was alone in the world,’ it read. ‘But now everyone checks in on me and help me when I need it. I’ve never had this connection to my community, we’re like a huge family and I’m grateful for it.’

I smiled.

And that’s why we did it.

“Alright Ashlyn that’s your five minutes. What do you think?” She reached out a dainty hand and I returned the paper.

“I think this is great. People are pulling together and are focusing on family like they should.”

Dr. Arlow pursed her lips for a second before answering. “Did you see the article about the death rate? How they’ve climbed drastically in the last three years?”

Well duh. It was on the first page.

I couldn’t contain a small snort but quickly recovered. “Of course I saw, but that is just how life works. During any major change there is death, but the survivors will adapt and be better off. It’s already started.”

The doctor studied me carefully. “And what would your mother say to that line of thinking?”

“It doesn’t matter.” I told her neutrally. “My mother is dead, she can no longer form any sort of opinion.”

“But if she was alive,” the doctor pressed, “how do you think she would take this?”

I cut my hand through the air dismissively. “It doesn’t matter. I did what I did to help the living. The dead don’t think so the hypothetical questions are meaningless.”

Neither of us spoke for a moment.

“You say that the dead don’t think,” Dr. Arlow broke the silence. “But your hands are clenching and you seem to be becoming more irritated. Are you sure you’re at peace with your choices? With your belief that the dead don’t judge? Or are you denying it and ignoring the more drastic articles from the paper because you don’t like what your answers would be if you didn’t?”

I stared at her.

Well that was annoyingly deep.

When I didn’t answer, because really what was I supposed to say to that, Dr. Arlow went to the door.

“I’m going to leave you to think about that Ashlyn and maybe you’ll have an answer for me tomorrow.”

She left and I sat on my bed thinking about what I’d done to the world.

Maybe she was right. Maybe I’d broken it and was refusing to admit it.

Don’t be absurd. The world was broken long before we called for lights out.