Extinction Point: The End

was having none of it.

He’d escorted his father-in-law to the viewing gallery and the attendant pulled back the sheet covering the corpse on the gurney. Thomas broke down, collapsing into Jim’s arms at the sight of his wife’s decimated body.

Now here she was. Remade. Looking just as she had years before she had died. It truly did seem to be a miracle.

Jim was still too stunned to comment.

Thomas had walked her into the living room, sat her down, poured them both a drink and insisted she finish hers before he sat down himself to explain what had happened. He explained to her about the accident; how she had been gone for so many years and how, every day he had prayed it would be his last. That he would be able to join her, so the pain that her absence left could end — because he loved her, he loved her more than he could ever possibly say.

“I told her that something wonderful had happened. That God had brought her back to me,” said Thomas.

“I don’t know if it’s a miracle or something else,” Jim replied finally finding his voice. “There’s so much death and destruction out there, that I have to believe that this is probably man-made rather than divine intervention.”

“Of course it’s a miracle. James, don’t you understand? Don’t you realize what this means?” said Thomas, a broad smile rising on his face.

Jim shook his head. “What are you getting at?”

Jessica reached out and took his hand: “Jim, if I’m alive then what about all the others who died between now and 2042?”

“What about Lark?” said Thomas.

The realization hit him like a hammer blow to the chest. “Dear God, almighty,” he whispered. “I’ve got to try and find her. What if she’s out there? What if she’s alone?” Jim was instantly on his feet. The panic that overcame him was total and choking. He was going to fail his kid again. She was out there somewhere in the night and he could do nothing to help her.

Jessica was with him in a second. Her arms enfolded him pulling him to her. “It’s okay — Lark’s okay,” she said, the words spoken with such sincerity and certainty that he found himself believing them too. This event was too big, too huge for it not to hold some kind of cosmic meaning. To be just a random act of an uncaring universe beggared belief. The universe could not be so cruel — could it?

“I have to find her,” he said.

“We know, and we are going to help in any way we can but the best thing you can do right now — the only thing you can do — is wait here,” said Jessica, holding him tightly. Her voice was adamant and strong, a lifeline for him to grasp and hold onto, to ease him back to the shore of sanity away from which he was inexorably drifting.

“But what if she’s out there alone? What if she’s running around those streets lost… or worse,” his voice a panicked bleat.

Thomas joined in, laying a reassuring hand on his back: “James, you know she’s with her mother. It’s Saturday, where would they be? You checked the house; you know she wasn’t there. Was her car in the garage?”

Jim thought back to the garage. “No it was empty.”

“Then you know that Simone was not home when this happened. Would she leave Lark on her own in the house? Would she?”

“No.”

“Lark is with her mother and you know that she will do her best to keep her safe. Don’t you?”

“Yes,” was the best answer he could muster.

“What we need to do is stay calm,” Thomas said. “Stay calm and just wait for her to come to us.”

Jim just looked at him. “But what if—” he started to say.

“No ‘what ifs’. They are going to be just fine.”

Jim did not think that his father-in-law sounded convinced.

* * *

It felt good to be clean again. Jim hadn’t realized how disgustingly filthy and smelly he was until he’d caught sight of himself in the mirror of the Shane’s entertainment unit. His face looked like it was painted with camouflage, blotches of black and gray, with streaks of white where sweat had dripped. His clothes stank worse than he did and he felt a pang of shame at having spent the last hour in the company of his ex-wife’s parents in such a state of dishevelment. But when he stepped out of the shower, he found a pair of Thomas’s jeans and a fresh tee shirt neatly laid out for him on the guestroom bed. His own clothes had disappeared but he could make out the faint rumble of the washing machine from elsewhere in the house.

Everything feels so normal, he thought.

Catching sight of his rejuvenated body in the mirror hanging on the back of the bedroom door, he reminded himself of just how abnormal his world had actually become. Gone were the wrinkles and gray hair. Back was the muscle tone and, he noticed approvingly, his hairline.

Slipping into the slightly oversized clothes, Jim made his way downstairs.

* * *

“Has anybody tried the TV?” Jim asked as he walked back into the living room.

Surprisingly, they had not.

“You know,” said Thomas, “We hadn’t even thought about trying it. The day has been so… earth- shattering.”

The first few channels they surfed were nothing more than movie channels, reruns of old sitcoms, wildlife documentaries, a pre-recorded infomercial for cutlery, and one that just played cartoons.

“Try one of the local stations,” Thomas said. He told Jim the station’s channel number but when the screen flicked over, an unrecognizable picture filled the screen.

“What’s that?” asked Jessica, tilting her head to her shoulder as if that might give her a better idea. “Looks like some sort of fabric.” The screen had filled with what looked to be fur under magnification. As they tried to understand what they were looking at a low, sobbing filtered from the TV’s speakers.

“Is that someone crying?” Jim said.

Faintly, as if from a distance, Jim could hear what sounded like the sorrowful sobbing of a woman. He reached over and turned the volume up and the woman’s weeping filled the room.

“It’s the back of a chair,” said Jessica suddenly after she had switched her head to the other shoulder. “See?

It’s fallen over on its side and I guess the camera must be zoomed in really close… but it’s definitely a chair. You can just make out the back support up there.” She pointed to the top of the screen but her excitement wilted as another wave of mournful weeping filled the room.

It felt to the three of them gathered around the TV as though they were the unwitting witnesses to a terrible tragedy; it was at once fascinating and repulsive.

“The poor woman,” said Jessica after a minute had passed, and then she reached over and changed the channel.

“Are you hungry,” asked Jessica.

Jim hadn’t even given food a thought. At the mention of it, his stomach gave a low grumble. How long had this day been? Jim gave Jessica a look of thanks. Jessica smiled and headed towards the kitchen shouting back over her shoulder “Ham and cheese sandwiches okay for you two boys?”

“Sounds great,” he replied and as she disappeared into the kitchen he took the time to ask Thomas a question: “How you holding up?”

Thomas took just a second to consider it before answering. “I’m afraid,” he said candidly and continued to scan the channels for signs of life.