basement ruins, and daylight. He had to hurry. Von der Stadt wouldn’t last long.
He grabbed the rock, pulled himself up, hung on desperately as his other hand scrambled and found a hold. He pulled up again.
He was almost there, almost at the platform level, when his weak lunar muscles gave out on him. There was a sudden spasm; his hand slipped loose, his other hand couldn’t take the weight.
He fell. On the flashlight.
The darkness was like nothing he had ever seen. Too thick, too complete. He fought to keep from screaming.
When he tried to rise again, he did scream. More than the flashlight had broken in the fall.
His scream echoed and re-echoed through the long, black tunnel he could not see. It was a long time dying. When it finally faded, he screamed again. And again.
Finally, hoarse, he stopped. “Von,” he said. “Von, can you hear me?” There was no answer. He tried again. Talk, he must talk to hold his sanity. The darkness was all around him, and he could almost hear soft movements a few feet away.
Von der Stadt giggled, sounding infinitely far away.
“It was only a rat,” he said. “Only a rat.”
Silence. Then, softly, Ciffonetto. “Yes, Von, yes.”
“It was only a rat.”
“It was only a rat.”
“It was only a rat.”
WAITING FOR THE
by Tobias S. Buckell
Tobias S. Buckell is the author of the novels
A native of the Caribbean, Buckell lived for a time aboard a boat powered by a wind generator. As a result, he has long felt it would be natural to bring wind power to a flat, desert-like area, and when he began speculating about a fossil fuel-less future he looked to his own background for an alternative.
Buckell says that post-apocalyptic SF is often a way of doing literary penance for all our imagined or real modern sins. This story, however, is perhaps the most optimistic in this volume.
An audio version of this story is also available for free at Telltale Weekly.
The
Wind lifted the dust off in little devils of twisting columns that randomly touched down throughout the remains of the town. Further out beyond the hulks of the Super Wal-Mart and Krogers Mara stood and swept the binoculars. The platform she stood on reached up a good hundred feet ending in the bulbous water tank that watered the town, affording her a look just over the edge of the horizon. She strained her eyes for the familiar shape of the
The old asphalt highway, laid down back in the time of plenty, had finally succumbed to the advancing dirt despite the town’s best attempts to keep it out. The barriers lay on their side.
Mara still knew the twists and turns of the highway she’d memorized since twelve, when she’d first realized it led to other towns and people.
“Mara, it’s getting dark.”
“Yes Ken.”
Ken carefully put the binoculars into their pouch and climbed down the side of the tower. Pushing off down the dust piled at its feet she trudged down to Ken, now only a large silhouette in the suddenly approaching dusk.
“Your mother still wants to talk to you.”
Mara didn’t respond.
“She wants to work it out,” Ken continued.
“I’m leaving. I’ve wanted to leave since I was twelve, come on Ken… don’t start this again.” Mara started walking quickly towards the house.
Ken matched her pace, and even though she could see him wondering what to say next, she could also see him examining the farm out of his peripheral vision. Their farm defied the dust and wind with lush green growth, but only because it lay underneath protective glass. Ken paused slightly twice, checking cracks in the facade, areas where dust tried to leak in.
“Their wind generator is down. They need help, Mara. I said I would go over tomorrow.”
Mara sighed.
“I really don’t want to.”
Ken opened the outer door for her, stamping his boots clean and letting it shut, then passed through as she opened the second door. Dust slipped in everywhere and covered everything despite precautions. Brooms didn’t quite get it all. Although Ken thought them a useless necessity Mara thought the idea of a vacuum cleaner quite fetching.
“I need you help Mara, just for an afternoon. You wouldn’t feel right leaving someone without electricity, would you?”
Ken was right, without the wind-generator her parents would be without power.
“Okay. I’ll help.” Ken, she noticed, ever the wonder with his hands, already had a dinner set for the two of them. Despite being slightly cold from sitting out, it was wonderful.
The
Mara shimmied up the roof and joined Ken. He already had parts of the wind-generator laying out on the roof. She had just managed to brush past her father without being physically stopped. Mother stood around, looking wounded and helpless.
Ken made a face.
“The blade is all right. But the alternator is burned out.”
Simple enough to fix. The wind generators consisted of no more than an old automobile alternator attached to a propeller blade and swivel mounted on the roof. What electricity the houses had depended on deep cycle batteries that used the wind generators to recharge. Solar panels worked in some areas, but here the dust crept into them, and unlike wind generators, didn’t work at night. Plus, it was easy enough to wander out to a car lot and pick an alternator out of the thousands of dead cars.
Mara half suspected her father had called them for help just to get her out to his farm. Damnit.
“Mara,” her father said from the edge of the dust gutter. “We need to talk.” Mara looked straight out over the edge, out at the miles and miles of brown horizon. “Mara, look at me. Mara, we spoke harshly. We’re sorry.”
“We like Ken,” her mother chimed in from below. “But you’re young. You can’t move out just yet.”
“Come back honey. We could use your help on the farm. You wouldn’t be as busy as you are with Ken.”
Ken looked up at that with a half-pained grin. Mara swore and slid off the low end off the roof, hitting the dust with a grunt. Her father started back down the ladder but Mara was already in the cart, pulling up the sail and bouncing out across the dust back towards the relative safety of Ken’s farm, leaving her mother’s plaintive
