Ralph Essen
I silently looked through the casino, as employees gathered their things, collectors bought trinkets and picked over the corpse of the dying casino and gamblers tried their luck for the last time. I saw a Republic of Chinese soldier and walked up to him. I moved my fingers and cast a simple translation spell.
"What brings you here?"
He looked at me with a thousand yard stare.
"Mage."
I nodded.
"Figures."
He pulled a lever and frowned as a coin vanished forever.
"RnR, was back there for awhile looking for surviviors, refugees, anyone we could save."
I gave him a look of sympathy.
"Find anyone?"
"A few, just kind of wandered through what was left, so many died, and the dying just continues, the Russians."
He took a deep breath.
"Need a drink on me?"
He shook his head.
"If I started now I'd never stop."
He went back to his gambling, and I went around measuring everything I could, trying to make use of this doomed casino. When I was finished I wrote my notes into a book and went to Tom, he looked at me.
"Need to get out."
"Job finished?"
"Yeah, going to go to base, get out of this place."
We got in the van and drove off into the distance. I popped a few more tums, that feeling of sickness fading as we got further from town. I looked at a homeless man.
"The end is neigh, motherfucker the end already came."
I put a hand on Tom's shoulder.
"We're all coping the best we can."
Tom sighed.
"I know, and shit could have been so much worse, thank god for magic, thank god we had the old bird looking after us."
I nodded.
And we drove on my stomach settled as we drove into the sunset and we looked at the sky, our new sky.
"Remember when the sky had one moon."
Tom's voice was haunted.
"Yeah I do too, but Phobos and Demimos are beautiful tonight."
He took a deep breath.
"Hard to belive its all gone, what were those Russian assholes thinking? I mean WHAT THE FUCK!"
His breathing was heavy.
"They destroyed the world, the entire motherfucking world, what the fuck were they thinking?"
"Don't know Tom, they're talking about turning it into a holiday."
"Why the fuck would anyone want to celebrate Bloody September?"
I stared at the two moons in the sky.
"Because we survived. There were what 170, 190 countires on Earth before the end? Now it's just us, the lucky few who survived the war, who got raptured. If the russians had gone crazy just a few years earlier those countermeasures wouldn't have been completed, and that would have been it for the human race."
Project Rapture, a centuries long countermeasure the old bird made just in case, a hundred years to grow the 108 seedlings, a hundred years for those seedlings to terraform 108 planets and moons from Venus to Pluto.
"We could have saved more."
Toms words echoed through the van as my sickness left me, his hands on a map. The map that determined who did and didn't get saved. If you were in blue your country was allied to america and in the event the world ended would be transported to another world, hopefully in time to save your entire country.
If your country was in green you were a fencesitter, the president and the president alone had discression over whether you lived or died, if your country was in red? You died, tough luck kiddo, you picked the wrong side.
It did.
"We're at the base."
We got out of the Van and Tom frowned at a statue of Reagan, the statue of Reagan looked horrified.
"Fucking Asshole, you could have saved more."
I put a hand on Toms shoulder, Reagan had been a hardliner, and took quite a few countries off of the safe list. If you tried to play both sides your ticket on the lifeboat was officially removed. If you tried to stay out of it but had an under the table deal with the US you got to live.
Most countries in Europe and the Americas got the message, Europe got the message, Africa and the middle east? Not so much.
"YOU COULD HAVE SAVED MORE!"
I let him take a couple breaths, three days after the rapture Reagan took a small gun out of his desk and blew his brains out, It was for the best, Bush was decent enough at his job.
We looked at the list 70 countries
The survivors, I traced their names with my finger
Africa
Angola, Liberia, Nambia, South Africa, Rhodesia, Mozambique.
"Six countries in Africa, we could have saved another 38 if Reagan wasn't a fuck up."
Tom whispered the words, the issue was a sore one, thankfully there werwn't any officers around as we traced the list with our fingers.
Europe
Iceland, Ireland, United Kingdom, France, Spain, Portugal, West Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxemburg, Italy, Austria, Czech Republic, Poland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Greece, Turkey.
The 20 european countries that survived.
In the Americas I saw 33 names, Cuba and Honduras had been left behind in that world of nuclear fire.
In between Europe and America Israel sat in its former frozen wasteland, can't believe they once called in Greenland.
India, Thailand, New Zealand, Phillipines, Japan, Korea, Republic of China, Singapore, Australia, and finally Papua New Guinea.
These were the survivors the ones who lived.
"Fuck Reagan."
Tom wasn't diplomatic about his feelings on the matter.
I silently looked through the casino, as employees gathered their things, collectors bought trinkets and picked over the corpse of the dying casino and gamblers tried their luck for the last time. I saw a Republic of Chinese soldier and walked up to him. I moved my fingers and cast a simple translation spell.
"What brings you here?"
He looked at me with a thousand yard stare.
"Mage."
I nodded.
"Figures."
He pulled a lever and frowned as a coin vanished forever.
"RnR, was back there for awhile looking for surviviors, refugees, anyone we could save."
I gave him a look of sympathy.
"Find anyone?"
"A few, just kind of wandered through what was left, so many died, and the dying just continues, the Russians."
He took a deep breath.
"Need a drink on me?"
He shook his head.
"If I started now I'd never stop."
He went back to his gambling, and I went around measuring everything I could, trying to make use of this doomed casino. When I was finished I wrote my notes into a book and went to Tom, he looked at me.
"Need to get out."
"Job finished?"
"Yeah, going to go to base, get out of this place."
We got in the van and drove off into the distance. I popped a few more tums, that feeling of sickness fading as we got further from town. I looked at a homeless man.
"The end is neigh, motherfucker the end already came."
I put a hand on Tom's shoulder.
"We're all coping the best we can."
Tom sighed.
"I know, and shit could have been so much worse, thank god for magic, thank god we had the old bird looking after us."
I nodded.
And we drove on my stomach settled as we drove into the sunset and we looked at the sky, our new sky.
"Remember when the sky had one moon."
Tom's voice was haunted.
"Yeah I do too, but Phobos and Demimos are beautiful tonight."
He took a deep breath.
"Hard to belive its all gone, what were those Russian assholes thinking? I mean WHAT THE FUCK!"
His breathing was heavy.
"They destroyed the world, the entire motherfucking world, what the fuck were they thinking?"
"Don't know Tom, they're talking about turning it into a holiday."
"Why the fuck would anyone want to celebrate Bloody September?"
I stared at the two moons in the sky.
"Because we survived. There were what 170, 190 countires on Earth before the end? Now it's just us, the lucky few who survived the war, who got raptured. If the russians had gone crazy just a few years earlier those countermeasures wouldn't have been completed, and that would have been it for the human race."
Project Rapture, a centuries long countermeasure the old bird made just in case, a hundred years to grow the 108 seedlings, a hundred years for those seedlings to terraform 108 planets and moons from Venus to Pluto.
"We could have saved more."
Toms words echoed through the van as my sickness left me, his hands on a map. The map that determined who did and didn't get saved. If you were in blue your country was allied to america and in the event the world ended would be transported to another world, hopefully in time to save your entire country.
If your country was in green you were a fencesitter, the president and the president alone had discression over whether you lived or died, if your country was in red? You died, tough luck kiddo, you picked the wrong side.
It did.
"We're at the base."
We got out of the Van and Tom frowned at a statue of Reagan, the statue of Reagan looked horrified.
"Fucking Asshole, you could have saved more."
I put a hand on Toms shoulder, Reagan had been a hardliner, and took quite a few countries off of the safe list. If you tried to play both sides your ticket on the lifeboat was officially removed. If you tried to stay out of it but had an under the table deal with the US you got to live.
Most countries in Europe and the Americas got the message, Europe got the message, Africa and the middle east? Not so much.
"YOU COULD HAVE SAVED MORE!"
I let him take a couple breaths, three days after the rapture Reagan took a small gun out of his desk and blew his brains out, It was for the best, Bush was decent enough at his job.
We looked at the list 70 countries
The survivors, I traced their names with my finger
Africa
Angola, Liberia, Nambia, South Africa, Rhodesia, Mozambique.
"Six countries in Africa, we could have saved another 38 if Reagan wasn't a fuck up."
Tom whispered the words, the issue was a sore one, thankfully there werwn't any officers around as we traced the list with our fingers.
Europe
Iceland, Ireland, United Kingdom, France, Spain, Portugal, West Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxemburg, Italy, Austria, Czech Republic, Poland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Greece, Turkey.
The 20 european countries that survived.
In the Americas I saw 33 names, Cuba and Honduras had been left behind in that world of nuclear fire.
In between Europe and America Israel sat in its former frozen wasteland, can't believe they once called in Greenland.
India, Thailand, New Zealand, Phillipines, Japan, Korea, Republic of China, Singapore, Australia, and finally Papua New Guinea.
These were the survivors the ones who lived.
"Fuck Reagan."
Tom wasn't diplomatic about his feelings on the matter.