The Last Satellite | Martin Feekins
Ash was lying in the long grass gazing at the sky when Grandad found him.
“And what are you doing over here on your own when everyone else is enjoying the barn-raising party?” asked Grandad.
The barn had gone up in a day and was big enough to store the harvest that would soon be brought in by Ash’s family and the families that ran the surrounding farms. Grandad said in the old days, before the Virus, all farms would have had their own barns, and he supposed it would go back that way in time, but he was glad to see people working collectively while it lasted. Grandad also said the barn-raising was like something out of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. Ash had no idea what that meant.
Now everyone was celebrating with food, drink and dancing, everyone including Mary-Ann Baker, who lived on the next farm and who danced like an angel. She would be dancing now to the music that drifted across the fields.
Ash turned to his Grandad and in answer to his question said: “Looking at the stars.”
“OK,” said Grandad. “But I bet you’re thinking about Mary-Ann Baker.”
“No!”
Ash knew his response was too quick and too loud. Grandad chuckled and with his familiar old man moan at the state of his joints lowered himself to the ground beside Ash.
“You should ask her to dance.”
“I can’t dance.”
“Of course you can. Everyone can.”
“Not like Mary-Ann. She’s …” Ash felt colour rise in his cheeks. He hoped Grandad would mistake it for a glow from the setting sun.
“She’s a pretty girl,” said Grandad.
“Yeah, so she won’t dance with me.”
“I’m not so sure.” Grandad gave Ash a mischievous grin. “I’ve noticed how she looks at you.”
Grandad was teasing, but that didn’t stop Ash’s heart leaping.
“Oh yes, Mary-Ann looks at you just the same way you look at her. And why not, you’re a chip off the old block.” Grandad preened.
Ash returned to looking at the stars. He knew them well, thanks to Grandad. Before the Virus, Grandad has been an astronomer. He said that at least the stars were bright now there were so few people to light up the planet.
“How’d you like to show Mary-Ann something special?”
Ash came out of his revelry.
“Up there.” Grandad pointed to the sky. “Can you spot it?”
Ash saw nothing out of the ordinary, but he didn’t want to let Grandad down, so he kept scanning, until…
“There! Is that is, Grandad, below Orion?”
“Good boy.”
“What is it?”
“That might just be the last satellite.”
Ash knew what that meant to his Grandad. While Ash didn’t fully understand what Grandad’s job in the old world had been, he knew that Grandad had played a part in putting satellites into the sky.
In his fifteen years, Ash had seen a handful of satellites fall out of orbit and burn up as they entered Earth’s atmosphere, providing brief but spectacular light shows. This was a phenomenon that had been repeated around the world as thousands of pieces of now useless equipment had crashed down. But could this really be the last?
“I can’t be certain,” said Grandad. “But after twenty years there isn’t much left up there.”
Twenty years since the Virus. Ash had heard the story of the Virus many times, from Grandad, who was his mum’s dad, and from his parents, but he always struggled to understand it. It was a story of a world teeming with people and technology, a world that seemed to belong to the imagination, yet was entirely real only five years before Ash was born. It was so easy to confuse that world with the worlds of the science fiction novels Grandad gave him, novels written before the Virus.
Ash liked the way Grandad told the story, the awful wonder he felt at what had been done, and he was about to ask to hear it again, but didn’t have to.
“Twenty years,” said Grandad. “Just twenty years of this new world. It’s your world, Ash. It belongs to you and Mary-Ann and all the other children.”
Ash lay back in the grass to listen and gazed at the last satellite. It was moving fast and, he thought, getting bigger.
“Perhaps it’s the new start the world needed, but whether or not it is, we’ve got it. And who do we owe it to? A madman – a childish, selfish, paranoid genius. You know he was barely older than you, Ash. He was of the sort who all too often in the past had armed themselves to the teeth, gone to school and massacred their classmates and teachers. But that wasn’t enough for our Douglas Witt. No, he was angry at the whole world for some long-forgotten slight, and the whole world had to pay. So he created the Virus, a piece of technology as stunning as it was deadly.”
Ash knew computer viruses had been common, but they were one of the things he struggled to understand. A virus that destroyed information, what was the point of that? What Witt had done made more sense.
“An electronic virus, sent to every networked computer in the world – and beyond.” Grandad glanced briefly at the sky. He was talking mainly to himself now. “And every infected computer broadcast a subliminal repeating pattern that sent a message to the user’s brain. And that message – oh my god, what might Witt have achieved for humanity in another life? – that message caused a chemical reaction in the brain that reactivated every virus that body had ever fought.
“And Witt told us what he had done. He was pleased with himself. He wanted us to know who he was and what he had done before he shut down every computer system in the world, including those that kept our satellites in orbit.
“His motivations were insane. It came down to the fact that his mummy didn’t love him and the big kids at school called him names. Little tosser. Genius tosser.
“Once activated, every virus imaginable tore through the population. People died, and the more people died the worse conditions became, until… ninety-five per cent of us dead, Ash, billions of us. For a year, pyres of bodies blackened skies around the world, Ash. We don’t know if Witt burned on one of them or if he’s still out there somewhere. I’m not sure which would be the more fitting justice.”
Grandad lapsed into silence. He and Ash watched the sky together.
Mary-Ann found them like that.
“Ash, I thought you might ask me to dance.”
Ash hadn’t heard her approach. Neither had Grandad, judging by the way he sprang to his feet.
“Sorry, Mr Brighouse, I didn’t mean to startle you,” said Mary-Ann.
“No apology needed, young lady.” Grandad tapped his chest. “The odd startle is good for someone my age. Keeps the old ticker going. And talking of going, I should be.”
“No, Mr Brighouse, I didn’t mean to interrupt,” said Mary-Ann.
Grandad waved the comment away and set off back to the party.
“Show your friend the sky, but come and join the party soon,” he said.
When Grandad was more or less out of earshot, Ash said: “I wanted to ask you to dance, but I’m rubbish.”
“That didn’t stop the other boys.” Mary-Ann sat in the grass beside him. “But I’m glad it stopped you. It shows you want things to be right. What are you doing out here?”
“Watching the sky.”
“What can you see?”
“Look.”
Ash leaned towards Mary-Ann as she leaned towards him and he felt a thrill at the soft touch of her hair. Impulsively, he took her hand in his and pointed it towards the satellite.
“There. See?”
The satellite had shifted position and it was definitely bigger and closer. It was coming down.
“What is it?”
“A satellite. Maybe the last one crippled by the Virus.”
Mary-Ann was silent for a moment. She didn’t take her hand from Ash’s or move her head away. He was happy to let the moment stretch, but eventually Mary-Ann turned to him. She brought their hands down, but didn’t let go.
“The last remnant of the old world,” she said. “After that, everything will be new.”
The night was cool around them, the grass a secret place, the sky an open book. They sat close in silence and watched the satellite grow bigger and brighter. The sun was down now, but the night was lit by the blazing satellite.
Ash had expected it to race across the sky, trailing a fiery tail before exploding like a firework as it broke up in the atmosphere. But it wasn’t crossing the sky, it was coming towards them. It might pass right overhead. How spectacular would that be?
“Ash?” said Mary-Ann.
Her tone was questioning, and Ash understood.
“No,” he said. “It’ll be all right. It’ll pass over us.”
But as he spoke he heard doubt in his voice and was sure Mary-Ann did, too.
He looked at the satellite with fresh eyes. It was difficult to judge its distance, several hundred miles, perhaps. But he knew from Grandad that it would be travelling at several thousand miles an hour. It was probably only a minute away.
What to do? There was no way to know accurately where it would crash down. It could miss them by many miles. But instinct took over. Ash pulled Mary-Ann to her feet and they ran, hand in hand.
The long grass whipped their shins. Up ahead, people scattered from around the new barn. Grandad waved his arms and shouted, but Ash couldn’t hear him. The rumble in the sky was too loud.
Their shadows lengthened before them, the only dark spots in a field of light, then began to shorten rapidly. The noise was deafening. Ash risked a backwards glance. The fireball was terrifyingly close and unbearably bright. Molten streams flew from it as it disintegrated.
Ash looked away and almost stumbled, but Mary-Ann’s firm grip kept him upright and they ran on.
Something flew between them. A hunk of metal thudded into the ground yards ahead, singeing the grass. The next instant they were slammed to the ground, pushed flat by the wake of the satellite. The air was hot on Ash’s back. Its roar threatened to split his ears. The roar ended in an explosion that shook the ground.
Ash and Mary-Ann pushed themselves up. Their hands were still joined – perhaps in fear, certainly in mutual support – and as he saw this, he saw the wounds. Across both his left forearm and Mary-Ann’s right was a deep slash, the cut already cauterised by heat. The chunk of satellite that had passed between them and was now smoking in the earth had sliced into each of them. It was only as Ash studied the wound that he began to feel pain. Mary-Ann was also looking at the wounds.
Still reluctant to let go of each other, the couple stood and looked at where the satellite had crashed. Where the new barn had stood there was a smouldering crater. Family and neighbours cautiously approached its rim.
“It’s like the Virus is still attacking us,” said Ash.
Mary-Ann shook her head.
“No. We’ve both been marked by the past.” She tenderly touched the skin around Ash’s wound. “But that was the last piece of it and we’ve survived. The future is all ours. We can build whatever we like. We can do whatever we want.”
“Can you teach me to dance?”
“Oh yes, I can do that.”
They looked to the sky and saw only stars.
“And what are you doing over here on your own when everyone else is enjoying the barn-raising party?” asked Grandad.
The barn had gone up in a day and was big enough to store the harvest that would soon be brought in by Ash’s family and the families that ran the surrounding farms. Grandad said in the old days, before the Virus, all farms would have had their own barns, and he supposed it would go back that way in time, but he was glad to see people working collectively while it lasted. Grandad also said the barn-raising was like something out of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. Ash had no idea what that meant.
Now everyone was celebrating with food, drink and dancing, everyone including Mary-Ann Baker, who lived on the next farm and who danced like an angel. She would be dancing now to the music that drifted across the fields.
Ash turned to his Grandad and in answer to his question said: “Looking at the stars.”
“OK,” said Grandad. “But I bet you’re thinking about Mary-Ann Baker.”
“No!”
Ash knew his response was too quick and too loud. Grandad chuckled and with his familiar old man moan at the state of his joints lowered himself to the ground beside Ash.
“You should ask her to dance.”
“I can’t dance.”
“Of course you can. Everyone can.”
“Not like Mary-Ann. She’s …” Ash felt colour rise in his cheeks. He hoped Grandad would mistake it for a glow from the setting sun.
“She’s a pretty girl,” said Grandad.
“Yeah, so she won’t dance with me.”
“I’m not so sure.” Grandad gave Ash a mischievous grin. “I’ve noticed how she looks at you.”
Grandad was teasing, but that didn’t stop Ash’s heart leaping.
“Oh yes, Mary-Ann looks at you just the same way you look at her. And why not, you’re a chip off the old block.” Grandad preened.
Ash returned to looking at the stars. He knew them well, thanks to Grandad. Before the Virus, Grandad has been an astronomer. He said that at least the stars were bright now there were so few people to light up the planet.
“How’d you like to show Mary-Ann something special?”
Ash came out of his revelry.
“Up there.” Grandad pointed to the sky. “Can you spot it?”
Ash saw nothing out of the ordinary, but he didn’t want to let Grandad down, so he kept scanning, until…
“There! Is that is, Grandad, below Orion?”
“Good boy.”
“What is it?”
“That might just be the last satellite.”
Ash knew what that meant to his Grandad. While Ash didn’t fully understand what Grandad’s job in the old world had been, he knew that Grandad had played a part in putting satellites into the sky.
In his fifteen years, Ash had seen a handful of satellites fall out of orbit and burn up as they entered Earth’s atmosphere, providing brief but spectacular light shows. This was a phenomenon that had been repeated around the world as thousands of pieces of now useless equipment had crashed down. But could this really be the last?
“I can’t be certain,” said Grandad. “But after twenty years there isn’t much left up there.”
Twenty years since the Virus. Ash had heard the story of the Virus many times, from Grandad, who was his mum’s dad, and from his parents, but he always struggled to understand it. It was a story of a world teeming with people and technology, a world that seemed to belong to the imagination, yet was entirely real only five years before Ash was born. It was so easy to confuse that world with the worlds of the science fiction novels Grandad gave him, novels written before the Virus.
Ash liked the way Grandad told the story, the awful wonder he felt at what had been done, and he was about to ask to hear it again, but didn’t have to.
“Twenty years,” said Grandad. “Just twenty years of this new world. It’s your world, Ash. It belongs to you and Mary-Ann and all the other children.”
Ash lay back in the grass to listen and gazed at the last satellite. It was moving fast and, he thought, getting bigger.
“Perhaps it’s the new start the world needed, but whether or not it is, we’ve got it. And who do we owe it to? A madman – a childish, selfish, paranoid genius. You know he was barely older than you, Ash. He was of the sort who all too often in the past had armed themselves to the teeth, gone to school and massacred their classmates and teachers. But that wasn’t enough for our Douglas Witt. No, he was angry at the whole world for some long-forgotten slight, and the whole world had to pay. So he created the Virus, a piece of technology as stunning as it was deadly.”
Ash knew computer viruses had been common, but they were one of the things he struggled to understand. A virus that destroyed information, what was the point of that? What Witt had done made more sense.
“An electronic virus, sent to every networked computer in the world – and beyond.” Grandad glanced briefly at the sky. He was talking mainly to himself now. “And every infected computer broadcast a subliminal repeating pattern that sent a message to the user’s brain. And that message – oh my god, what might Witt have achieved for humanity in another life? – that message caused a chemical reaction in the brain that reactivated every virus that body had ever fought.
“And Witt told us what he had done. He was pleased with himself. He wanted us to know who he was and what he had done before he shut down every computer system in the world, including those that kept our satellites in orbit.
“His motivations were insane. It came down to the fact that his mummy didn’t love him and the big kids at school called him names. Little tosser. Genius tosser.
“Once activated, every virus imaginable tore through the population. People died, and the more people died the worse conditions became, until… ninety-five per cent of us dead, Ash, billions of us. For a year, pyres of bodies blackened skies around the world, Ash. We don’t know if Witt burned on one of them or if he’s still out there somewhere. I’m not sure which would be the more fitting justice.”
Grandad lapsed into silence. He and Ash watched the sky together.
Mary-Ann found them like that.
“Ash, I thought you might ask me to dance.”
Ash hadn’t heard her approach. Neither had Grandad, judging by the way he sprang to his feet.
“Sorry, Mr Brighouse, I didn’t mean to startle you,” said Mary-Ann.
“No apology needed, young lady.” Grandad tapped his chest. “The odd startle is good for someone my age. Keeps the old ticker going. And talking of going, I should be.”
“No, Mr Brighouse, I didn’t mean to interrupt,” said Mary-Ann.
Grandad waved the comment away and set off back to the party.
“Show your friend the sky, but come and join the party soon,” he said.
When Grandad was more or less out of earshot, Ash said: “I wanted to ask you to dance, but I’m rubbish.”
“That didn’t stop the other boys.” Mary-Ann sat in the grass beside him. “But I’m glad it stopped you. It shows you want things to be right. What are you doing out here?”
“Watching the sky.”
“What can you see?”
“Look.”
Ash leaned towards Mary-Ann as she leaned towards him and he felt a thrill at the soft touch of her hair. Impulsively, he took her hand in his and pointed it towards the satellite.
“There. See?”
The satellite had shifted position and it was definitely bigger and closer. It was coming down.
“What is it?”
“A satellite. Maybe the last one crippled by the Virus.”
Mary-Ann was silent for a moment. She didn’t take her hand from Ash’s or move her head away. He was happy to let the moment stretch, but eventually Mary-Ann turned to him. She brought their hands down, but didn’t let go.
“The last remnant of the old world,” she said. “After that, everything will be new.”
The night was cool around them, the grass a secret place, the sky an open book. They sat close in silence and watched the satellite grow bigger and brighter. The sun was down now, but the night was lit by the blazing satellite.
Ash had expected it to race across the sky, trailing a fiery tail before exploding like a firework as it broke up in the atmosphere. But it wasn’t crossing the sky, it was coming towards them. It might pass right overhead. How spectacular would that be?
“Ash?” said Mary-Ann.
Her tone was questioning, and Ash understood.
“No,” he said. “It’ll be all right. It’ll pass over us.”
But as he spoke he heard doubt in his voice and was sure Mary-Ann did, too.
He looked at the satellite with fresh eyes. It was difficult to judge its distance, several hundred miles, perhaps. But he knew from Grandad that it would be travelling at several thousand miles an hour. It was probably only a minute away.
What to do? There was no way to know accurately where it would crash down. It could miss them by many miles. But instinct took over. Ash pulled Mary-Ann to her feet and they ran, hand in hand.
The long grass whipped their shins. Up ahead, people scattered from around the new barn. Grandad waved his arms and shouted, but Ash couldn’t hear him. The rumble in the sky was too loud.
Their shadows lengthened before them, the only dark spots in a field of light, then began to shorten rapidly. The noise was deafening. Ash risked a backwards glance. The fireball was terrifyingly close and unbearably bright. Molten streams flew from it as it disintegrated.
Ash looked away and almost stumbled, but Mary-Ann’s firm grip kept him upright and they ran on.
Something flew between them. A hunk of metal thudded into the ground yards ahead, singeing the grass. The next instant they were slammed to the ground, pushed flat by the wake of the satellite. The air was hot on Ash’s back. Its roar threatened to split his ears. The roar ended in an explosion that shook the ground.
Ash and Mary-Ann pushed themselves up. Their hands were still joined – perhaps in fear, certainly in mutual support – and as he saw this, he saw the wounds. Across both his left forearm and Mary-Ann’s right was a deep slash, the cut already cauterised by heat. The chunk of satellite that had passed between them and was now smoking in the earth had sliced into each of them. It was only as Ash studied the wound that he began to feel pain. Mary-Ann was also looking at the wounds.
Still reluctant to let go of each other, the couple stood and looked at where the satellite had crashed. Where the new barn had stood there was a smouldering crater. Family and neighbours cautiously approached its rim.
“It’s like the Virus is still attacking us,” said Ash.
Mary-Ann shook her head.
“No. We’ve both been marked by the past.” She tenderly touched the skin around Ash’s wound. “But that was the last piece of it and we’ve survived. The future is all ours. We can build whatever we like. We can do whatever we want.”
“Can you teach me to dance?”
“Oh yes, I can do that.”
They looked to the sky and saw only stars.