My name is Tanner, and as far as I
know, I am one of the last six people living on the planet.
The rest of the world, the part with
contiguous land and registered travel and regular shipping routes,
experienced an event. I do not know exactly what the event was,
because of the spotty signals and static in my part of the world.
I'm sure the slipshod reporting and government censorship in the rest
of the world played a part, too. The rest of the world called it
"the event," for guinessakes!
In my part of the world, though, they
call it "the second event." The first event was the rapid
capsizing of a luxury vessel. To my knowledge, only thirteen
people on board survived. Adrift, six of us reached this little island.
I feel it must be the most isolated bit of land on the whole planet.
It was once a volcanic hotspot, but it cooled long ago.
The stories I've read say that this
island was once much larger, and that that it was only the last in a chain of
many. The stories make it sound like it was a nice place at that
time. I guess it's a nice place now, too. Especially when you
compare it to the alternatives. Our coming here and the things that
led to it are known here as "the event," because we need no
other name.
Whatever happened to the rest of the
world is called "the second event" because we know no other
name for it. Most of what we do know about it is no more useful than
the name. We know that it seemed frightening at first, and then it
seemed like nothing, and then it was rapidly destructive. This is
from the spotty signals Jaysin managed to pick up on the radio. We
know that scientists in our area concluded that it was the will of
Jahweh. This is from the last leaflet that somehow blew its way out
the window of a superluxury cruiser and onto our little island. And
we know that it destroyed the nearest branches of the civilization we
left. This we know from the fact that the spotty transmissions and
the leaflets don't come anymore.
I guess that there are other people in
some other isolated part of the world who survived the second event.
I know we all hope so. None of us are willing to admit any hope
that we will meet those people, not anymore. But we hope they live
anyway.
To be honest, I never did hope to meet
them.
That isn't because life here is
perfect. For one thing, this island is not all that big. Surely
it's far more space than the six of us need by civilized standards,
but it's surprising how quickly I became acclimated to the elbow room
and started to feel crowded. Plus, everyone works three jobs, although the hours are
surprisingly reasonable. Jaysin and Lee are hunters, carpenters and
shoemakers, though Jaysin is just learning shoemaking now that his
electronics business is obsolete. Morgin, Alex and Emma all spend
most of their time gathering things, but Alex is our elected
president, and Morgin and Emma are both clothiers. Alex and Emma are
responsible for our rainwater system, and Morgin is the closest thing
we have to a chef. As for me, I am our toolmaker, our fire-keeper,
and our veterinarian.
That last career choice was pretty
unpopular with the rest of the people here. I guess that's not
surprising. We don't have a herdsman or a dairy farmer. And when
they found that I was pilfering food to feed a small flock of magpies
and the feral cats on the island, I thought they were going to kill
me. They probably would have, but Alex stepped in.
That surprised me a little bit. I
thought Alex was pretty disappointed with me. I'm non-reproductive.
There haven't been any children yet, but the two couples are trying.
I've been intentionally avoiding any attempt. I was offered Alex,
the president, as a mate. Though not quite attractive enough to be a
screen star, Alex is the best-looking of us. I did notice that. At
first, they assumed I am a homosexual. I let them assume.
Eventually, someone asked. I am not.
It's just that out of all the species
on this island, I don't have much interest in seeing humanity
survive.
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