I whimper, pull the sleeping bag tighter over my head. His arms around me are strong, secure, but nothing feels safe when the world beyond our green canvas tent is exploding in light, sound, and heat. The familiar warmth of down and the soft rasp of microfiber against my cheek are an odd comfort when I know, if I open my eyes, there will be nothing familiar left. Gradually the sounds subside; the heat fades; but I remain motionless, barely letting my chest rise and fall.
“You have to open your eyes,” he whispers, though his grip does not slacken.
“Or maybe the world is immaterial. Maybe it doesn’t exist without being perceived,” I argue, “and if we stay here, with our eyes closed – we won’t have done this.”
“Mine are already open,” he admits, and I wince. How could we have been so naive – how could we have ignored the signs? We were so close to something, so near to touching greatness…. Good God. What have we done?
“What does it look like?” I beg. He lets me go; I can hear motion, imagine he’s waving a hand in front of his face. I am ashamed that I’m still hiding. I’m a scientist, damn it! I should be staring at the world with eyes wide open, drinking in the consequences of my actions, observing the new world order. Instead I tug the sleeping bag more firmly over my head. Let them be alive… let the world still be alive…
I hear him stand, cautiously open the zipper of the tent. A wave of icy air hits the top of my head, the only unprotected bit of me. I imagine the toxins in the air, the tiny chemical particles… but it’s not like the tent was air-tight. We’ve already been exposed; it’s much too late for us, here at ground zero. In my head I track weather patterns, cloud disbursement. I wonder how long it will take before the world is covered… Days? Weeks? I wonder if they’ll come for us. What the punishment will be.
Finally my legs start to cramp and I know I can’t lie here any longer. I let go the sleeping bag, stagger to my feet. Some twisted impulse makes me grope for the tent-flap in the dark, staring at nothing but the insides of my eyelids until I stand, take a step onto the grass outside… and open my eyes.
It’s just after noon. The sky is black; not like midnight, but a true dark, with hints of brown instead of blue in the inky air. The white birch forest glows in the shadows; dark blues and muddy purples, almost phosphorescent. They seem to give off a subtle light, and I see they aren’t the only things.
David is glowing – so bright that at first he seems like nothing but a splash of colour, a spill of paint on the perfect velvet background. He is a shifting blend of purple, fading to light pink or dark mauve, pulsing with his heartbeat.
In the trees I see similar pools of light, which resolve into birds, and flies turned into fireflies by the strange chemical reaction.
“Oh brave new world,” David quotes quietly, marvelling at my luminescent skin. Everything is oddly two-dimensional, the air thick and black but the glow of other objects cutting through, so they stand out. I wave an arm through the air, experimentally, marvelling at my soft blue skin.
“We are so screwed.”
Image courtesy of April Milne. April is a fantastic illustrator and fine artist. See her work at her website, or check her out on Our Contributors Page.