Prologue
This had once been a lake, nearly a sea's worth of clean blue water where people would go boating and fishing during happier times. People had once called this cabin country, the type of place which people would leave the nearby cities and come visit when they wanted to get away from the hustle and bustle and enjoy something a little more relaxing for once.
Though never far enough away that they totally left the comforts of the modern world behind. This landscape once had telecoms; it once had running water, roads, restaurants, hair stylists, and much more.
But time had marched on.
It was probably close to ten thousand years ago when the sun had started to expand, growing within the sky until it became the entire sky itself. In such a short timeframe, it had pushed well into its red giant phase.
Within a few short years, cabin country stopped being paradise.
First the fish had all boiled in the water, then the birds stopped coming to visit. Soon, the trees began to die and with them came the harsh fires that had destroyed all of those modern amenities that people had come to enjoy. The roads then cracked and buckled under the heat, leaving nothing behind but rubble and ruins.
Within a thousand years, the waters were gone, leaving nothing but a barren lakebed. And with the waters gone, no human set foot within these parts again. Not that many humans were left by that point.
All that was left was the blackened husks of once mighty trees, the dried and cracked dirt of once fertile fields, the rocky bottom of a truly mighty body of water. In a few fleeting centuries, paradise had been turned into wasteland. In four hundred short years, it was all over, with nothing but a desert lingering behind as a reminder.
It was a story told on a global scale, as every little paradise was turned hostile, every ounce of life extinguished. Billions of humans turned to small collectives of thousands to desperate bunker dwellers numbering in the dozens to well... nothing, the flame of progress finally extinguished as the last of the radios went silent more than eight thousand years ago.
Though time was not done with its ravages quite yet, the endless march not interested in letting up even as its victims lay dead.
The sun continued to grow, robbing the moon from our planet, tearing it away under the strain of relentless gravity. Not that such a body had many uses left as the last of the oceans turned to steam, the very depths of the trenches having become nothing but vapour, ensuring that there were no more tides left for our closest neighbour to regulate.
And soon night itself was removed as the sun was so large that its lights were now unavoidable. Night was more like twilight than true darkness anymore.
This was how things were ten thousand years later, that ball in the sky still growing, still broiling, and still baking the planet that was unfortunately located third in this forsaken solar system. Not that any other position would be safe nowadays.
This landscape had been left untouched for over eight thousand years, almost as long as humanity's brief civilization had flourished upon this planet. Eight thousand years was the time between Jericho's first walls and the rockets that landed upon the moon. It seemed like such a long time but in terms of the cosmos it was but a blip, the snap of godly fingers, the blink of an immortal's eye.
Eight thousand years was a hundred human lifetimes without so much as a footprint, the flap of some wings, hell even the feeble wiggling of a single cell organism upon this truly dead terrain.
And after eight thousand years, the calm was finally disturbed as a boot pressed down upon the dried loam.
A figure walked ahead, placing one foot before the other as they traversed a world that wanted them gone, a world that had tried to kill them repeatedly over those eight thousand long years. A world that had inflicted brimstone and fire, spewing doomsday on the regular.
But in the end, what was something as mundane as the apocalypse to the likes of an immortal?
Chapter One
The sun glowed a vibrant red, casting an unnatural glow upon the world before me.
The glow shouldn't have been so unnatural. After all, there was nothing more natural than the sun's daily light. Though when I had grown up, that light had been yellow and the sun that brought it was far smaller than the current domineering position that it held within the heavens, seeming to fill the entire cosmos from its monopolistic vantage point.
The change in the sun had likewise had an ill effect upon the planet that orbited it, the planet I had known my entire life.
When I'd been a girl this had been a forest with wildlife and endless streams with a lake right in the middle. The trees were now dead and turned into black husks that cracked under the unbearable heat. The wildlife were little more than bleached skeletons that barely held on. The water and lake were both gone with their vapours stripped away from this planet.
It was a climate hostile to life. Yet, I continued forward as if it were just another sunny day. That was the thing about immortality; it took the hostile, the lethal, the destitute, and made them a thing that could be endured. The temperature was enough to boil cells within a normal body yet I barely even broke a sweat.
In the distance was a chapel. Thankfully it was one that was made of stone and brick, materials that would take far hotter temperatures to roast than timber and plastic. It was also a familiar landmark to me. I had been married in this very chapel. I had been to the funerals of parents, relatives, children, great-grandchildren, great-great...
Regardless of my reason for attending all those years ago, it was still a point of comfort for myself, a relic of a life that felt so ancient that it was like it had never existed in the first place.
So, I hiked towards it, putting one foot in front of the other as I walked across soil that was as dry as the deserts of my youth.
The distance wasn't that great and I soon found myself inside of the structure. It protected me from the sun above and put me within an environment that was slightly more temperate.
Slightly.
There was moisture that clung to the inner walls and husks of mushrooms that had once grown in the crevasses and cracks. The first sign of life in quite some time even if it was just as dead as the rest. I think that Michigan was the last place that I sampled water and that was so many years ago.
The moisture felt nice against my fingers, the coolness licking against sunbaked digits. The sensation warranted a smile.
The condition of my person made me remember the before times, when the world was still alive. I used to spend so much time on beauty and now I could only wonder how weathered I must've looked in my current state. Even an immortal had to bend to the whims of a world that seemed dead set on removing them from it and the sun had worn into me, marking my flesh and body with a leathery quality.
I went over to one of the pews and took a seat, looking to the front where holy men used to deliver sermons.
Did they ever make it to heaven?
There was a hope that on the other side those I cared about would be there to greet me. Hopefully, I would one day see the many family members who had passed, the many friends lost to time, and the ranks of lovers who held no hope of standing strong against the reaper's scythe.
Those who were not cursed with immortality like myself.
I shrugged off my bag and reached inside, looking through the paltry items I still had. There were so few foods and drinks that remained unspoiled. Though it wasn't like I required sustenance to survive. The act of eating and drinking were just kindly reminders that I had once lived like everyone else.
I grabbed a package wound in cloth and started to unwrap it, revealing my phone. Much like food and drink there was also a shortage of trinkets and gizmos that still worked and it was a miracle that this one did. It held memories and fond little stories that kept me sane on my endless walk. There were photos taken that were millennia old, videos from voices that were just as extinct.
This small brick was sacred but even I knew its holy text was set to expire eventually. Not even machinery was as immortal as myself, not even copper and silicon could endure a hostile world as well as I. All I could do was maintain it the best I could and hope to have it last just a little longer.
Though as I looked at the gadget, I noticed something peculiar. It had a signal that was three bars strong.
Strange... didn't the last cellular companies go up in flames many eons ago?
I brushed my thumb across the screen, trying to figure out what to do with this new information. For some strange reason my knee jerk reaction was to punch in 9-1-1 to see what would happen.
So, that was exactly what I did.
My heart nearly leapt from my chest as the phone started to ring. I held it against my ear, my eyes wide, my throat dry, and anxieties mounting. How many years had it been since I'd heard another human voice?
Yet, the phone continued to ring and ring and...
My heart fell just as promptly as it rose. Of course, this was probably just a relic of the past, some sort of hardware bug that had resulted in the local towers remaining attached to some sort of phantom network. A glitch that God had overlooked and had been left behind to annoy me.
That happened a lot in this world. There were plenty of little acts of magic that had taken until humanity's departure to come to life. And it was rare that those little cantrips didn't peeve me off with their unexplained mystique.
``Hello.''
That hadn't been my voice.
I looked down at the phone, seeing that my call had connected.
Little acts of magic...
And just as quickly, I scrambled to get the phone against my ear again.
``Hello?'' I tried myself, feeling my lips crack against a lack of moisture.
``H-hello,'' the voice repeated.
It was obvious that the person on the other side was just as stricken with shock as myself.
Neither of us spoke for a moment. I was simply too stunned to even think about it and I had an inclination that my new companion felt the same.
``Are you really real?'' the voice asked.
It was a harsh voice, sunbaked much like my own. But there was a distinctly feminine edge to it, faint and rosy, filled with a far-off accent that I couldn't quite place. Somewhere from well across the country for sure or maybe even farther than that.
``I am,'' I replied. ``I'm Megan.''
``Megan,'' the voice whispered before repeating, ``Megan...''
The voice inhaled and quivered though I could hardly blame them, my own body was trembling as well. I let out a burst of emotion though it was impossible to place it as either joy or misery, it was simply a raw emotion, the purest form of humanity spilling out in a harsh bark.
``I'm Zara,'' the other woman said, ignoring my sudden bout of insane laughter.
``You have no idea how good it is to hear someone else,'' I said as my hand trembled and body shook.
I fell back into the pew and tried my best not to giggle like an absolute mad woman. Though I knew this was going to be impossible as the first hints of crazed amusement leaked free.
Zara actually chuckled at that. ``Believe it or not I might have some idea.'' She sighed. ``It's been close to five hundred years since I found someone else.''
``Five hundred years,'' I whispered, shaking my head in disbelief. ``You're one of the lucky ones then. I've gone close to a thousand without seeing another person.''
There was a tick, a moment of silence as we both came to terms with that.
``Where are you?'' I asked.
Zara drew in a breath. ``Where are you?''
``The church near Lake Micawa,'' I answered.
``Do you know the old ranger's lodge down Red Road?'' Zara asked, her voice wavering slightly.
I nodded but realized that gestures didn't transmit across phone lines. ``I do. I... I used to live around here a long time ago.''
``I'm staying there,'' Zara said. ``I managed to salvage a few solar arrays and enough ancient electronics to etch out some kind of life for myself.''
I looked towards the door and lifted myself out of the pew.
``I'll make my way over,'' I told her.
She drew in a breath. ``But it's day time?''
``So...'' I paused.
Was this girl not immortal as well? It seemed like only the immortal few should've been able to cling to life out here.
``I have my ways,'' I answered. ``I'll be there as soon as I can.''
There were no goodbyes as the call came to an end. That was strange but manners had a way of fading when you were in isolation for so long.
I moved towards the exit though paused, noticing that there were a couple guests tucked away in the corner. Two skeletons barren of clothes loitered right there, holding onto one another in the afterlife. They must've passed a long time ago as their bones looked brittle and bleached, almost like fossils in a museum.
A tragedy but at least they had spent their last moments together and hopefully being this close to God had brought them some comfort.
Though I was out the door before I could lament their fate for too long.
