ALLISON WUNDERLAN

Chapter 5. / The Future's Not What It Used to Be

Light Between the Trees / Photo / 2022 / Russell C. Smith

In Rayne’s bedroom I changed into the black jeans, a shimmery gray top, black socks, and heavy-soled black boots. I glanced at my new look in her full-length mirror and barely recognized myself. Evil twin with an undercover spy’s fashion sense, anyone? Clearly, I wasn’t in Berkeley anymore. No reason to be dressed for a day in the park.

A few minutes after I was dressed Miles knocked on Rayne’s door and escorted me to his lab.

As we walked along the corridor I said, “Rayne told me you’re going to fast forward my knowledge. Does that mean you’ll fill me in on the past 162 years?”

Miles shrugged. “It’ll be an ongoing process.”

Miles’ lab was cluttered from floor to ceiling with bizarre electronic devices. One wall, was filled with five large VidScreens of all different sizes. Half a dozen TyperPads were scattered on desks and work benches. He told me ‘personal technology’ leapt ahead in the late 1990s, and kids my age had very similar electronic devices in their own rooms. When technology made its next leap just a few years later, handheld devices made it possible for kids to connect with friends down the block and communicate with kids worldwide, while sending photos and video feeds. By comparison, Uncle Alex’s garage workshop was a cave cluttered with scattered bones and animal skins.

Miles gestured for me to sit next to him so we faced the five VidScreens. He inserted a thumb-sized clear disk into a slot in a buzzing metal box. A wide-angle image of San Francisco appeared on the screen. The photo looked as if it had been taken from a tall building – showing how much of downtown was submerged under at least 50 feet of the Pacific Ocean.

“This is us,” Miles said. “San Fran Island.”

The next picture was taken from much higher up, and I understood why it was called San Fran Island.

“Jumping Jesus on a pogo stick,” I said. “The city’s completely changed! When did…?”

Miles processed the phrase, and made a “hmmm” sound. “Colorful phrase, that,” he said.

“Thanks, I think,” I said.

“Can you teach me how to swear in mid-Twentieth speak?”

“Why?”

“Looks like an enjoyable activity—seen in all the classic movies from your historical era.”

I glanced at him sideways. “Sure. I can do that. What can you do for me?”

“What I’m doing now. Fastforwarding your mind with history snippets so you won’t be as confused as an Internal Fixation Replicator trying to mate with an IdentiChip Stabilizer.”

“I have no idea what you just said, but filling me in on everything that’s happened sounds good. You’ve got a deal.”

“It’s going to take some doing to get you caught up to our time. But let’s get back to the immediate now.”

“Wow,” I said. What caused that?” I pointed at the view from space of San Fran Island.

“During the earthquake of 2071 a massive crack opened in the earth just south of the city, eventually forming the Strait of San Fran, separating San Francisco from the rest of the mainland,” he said. “Large sections of the West Coast were sheared off—from Tijuana on up to San Diego, and from Marin Country up to Eureka, the coastline’s been transformed into a jagged pattern of steep rocky cliffs dropping directly down into the Pacific. Up north, coastline towns were left mega shattered and broken. Communities everywhere badly shaken up—some turned into half livable FreeFall zones. Most of the buildings were irreparably damaged in the East Bay Area. San Fran Island is still considered to be a major city in the Unified Society of States, but Oakland and Berkeley weren’t so lucky.”

I felt a coldness in my belly, like I’d just swallowed a brick made of ice. “Meaning what?” I asked. “Define ‘not so lucky.’”

“The Gov saw the quake as a Biz opportunity,” he said. “A way to reclaim cities always considered to be part of the radical fringe—or forward thinking, depending on your mindset. So GovTroops were sent in to help survivors, quell the looters, and relocate docile USS citizens. Trouble is, the GovTroops stayed, built a huge new GovBase in what used to be downtown Oakland, and the Gov has systematically pushed former BizOwners and landholders out of the picture. We here in San Fran Island, alongside with Revolution Evolution Underground L.A., and pockets of resistance in Portland and Seattle are West Coast holdouts... ”

I stood up and turned away from Miles, wanting to run away, through the time machine, and return to my life in 1970, grab onto what I’d had and never let go. I wanted the wonderfully uncomplicated life that had been mine. Hanging out with Carly-Barley and Jim in the Golden Gate Park, laughing ourselves silly, just glad to spend time together and explore our city. It was only yesterday we’d spent Earth Day together, but now I was in an upside-down world gone crazy. I wanted to go back and I knew I’d hold onto my corner of the world and wouldn’t ever let it go. Knowing what could happen to everything, I’d dedicate myself to making sure it never did. But there was just one problem. Without a functioning time machine going back home was just a lovely dream. And it seemed all the hopeful dreams had faded away long ago in the future version of the United States.

This beat up and bruised future, close to the exact spot I was in, had held a vibrant city full of happy shouting voices – making art, poetry, and swirling colors and loud rock music – people who had hopes, dreams, and lives. I wiped away a solitary tear and moved myself closer to Miles, feeling the shock of where I was washing over me again. “Jeez Louise. Damn it! What other kinds of awful things happened?” I asked.

He shrugged and blinked at the screen. “Unfortunately, lots damn else of…things.”

The next aerial view of the Unified Society of States was of the East Coast, from a satellite view. It showed the entire coastline—from Florida up to Maine—except not much of Florida was left. As I’d already noticed on the future maps in Rayne’s room, Jacksonville and Tallahassee were the southernmost cities in Florida. But seeing a photo is far different from viewing a map.

“After the Global Sea Rise Event of 2099, the oceans of the entire planet became elevated within a matter of four months. Severely impacting every coastal city. On our East Coast, Boston, Washington, and Newest New York are halfway submerged under the Atlantic Ocean. Out of necessity, the machinery of the Gov moved inland to Pittsburgh.”

Miles zoomed in on an aerial view of what used to be New York City. “Newest New York is an intricate network of tower dwellers, and it maintains a free flow of commerce, capital, and ideas, as the city always has. Only now it’s a trickier place to navigate. In Newest New York, long streets like Broadway and Fifth Avenue are used as natural canals, and if the high-rises hadn’t been made completely wireless back in the early part of the last century, the tower dwellers would be CyberSpeaking by candlelight.”

“Once again, not sure what you just said, but keep going,” I said.

More photos of Newest New York flipped by. In the pictures taken during the daytime you could clearly see the canals in the lower sections of the city. In the nighttime photos the city was lit up like a crazy carnival ride. “It’s beautiful,” I said. “In a glitzy and damp kind of way.”

Miles blinked several times at the four VidScreens. On every screen was a photo of a line of half-human and half-machine-looking soldiers. The soldiers were shooting at people who seemed to be doing nothing more than bringing crops in from a field.

Miles said, “The Grocery Store Wars began in 2072 and tore up the USS for five years. Intense battles for land were fought—in suburbs, and in small patches of fields and woods, and on Gov farmland. Progressive CongressPersons tried to add the Homeland Survival Planting amendment to the Constitution, but it went nowhere.

“The United Front of Urban Farmers joined forces with the Free Peoples’ Planting Brigade, and guerrilla planting squads grew in numbers all over the country. For a while it looked as if the Gov was going to back off, as the Free Peoples Planting Movement gained popular support. Then, BackwardsLooking factions grew restless within the halls of power in Pittsburgh, and GovPolicy changed overnight. Next day, the crackdown began. RoboSoldiers began massacring large groups of protestors representing the Free Peoples’ Planting Movement…”

I stared at the image of RoboSoldiers shooting at farmers who’d only been guilty of planting seeds. Maybe I could’ve imagined such a horrible future if I’d eaten some spoiled food and woke up sweating from a delirious nightmare, but it sure wasn’t what everyone back home collectively imagined on Earth Day. We’d come together for the future of the planet, envisioning a better life for everyone. Not this terrible world created by one rotten event stacked upon another…

“Oh!” Miles said, while slapping his forehead and reaching into a cabinet behind us. He pulled out a gun-like device, small enough to fit in the palm of his hand. “Before I forget, Rayne wanted me to inject a ClimatePurification BioChip in you.”

I eyed the device. “Do I really need it?”

“You do. But don’t worry, it won’t hurt.”

“What’s it for?”

“To regulate your system to NewestNormal air quality, and inoculate you from future viruses your body couldn’t tolerate.”

I rolled up my sleeve and let Miles inject the ClimatePurification BioChip into me. Unlike when doctors back home used the ‘won’t feel a thing’ Miles was telling the truth. It was as if someone puffed the merest hint of a breath on my arm. Something in the future to feel good, or at least relieved about.

“And now, previously mentioned on GovNews, and to make history more up-close and personal,” Miles said. “One of our East Coast operatives recently verified a stolen GovDocument outlining a program the Gov is planning to force on every kid born in the USS. Called the FearChip Directive.”

“More bad news?” I asked.

Miles shook his head. “Worse than bad. Every kid will be under stricter GovControl from first breath until they’ve been fully conditioned and are absolutely compliant.”

“That sucks. So is the idea to make fun illegal here, or just completely deaden kids’ minds?” I asked.

“Close, on both counts,” he said, then turned and blinked at the screens. “The Gov thinks kids are becoming too smart and too much in control of their own thoughts. By installing FearChip, fearful images and thought patterns would run as a constant background program, eventually taking over the entire limbic system, making Free Thought and especially Fearless Thought a thing of the past. But the super news is they’re at least six months away from being able to fully implement the FearChip. If all goes well, we’ll take over before they can begin.”

The next picture on the screen was of a classroom of perfect-looking kids, staring directly ahead at an unseen object with glassy-eyed expressions.

“You already know about the PlugIns implanted into our heads. This began back in the early 2040s.”

“They look like mesmerized robots,” I said, pointing at the vacant-eyed kids in the photo.

“At first, PlugIns seemed like nothing but super news. Everything—every bit and byte of music, ComSys functions, MindGames, and anything on the GlobalWeb could be accessed by using the PlugIns. We became used to having a small chip hardwired into the back of our heads, under our brainstems. Annoying at first, but easy to overlook and just concentrate on the benefits. The PlugIns made listening to any Fave music as easy as thinking about a Fave song. And connecting to the GlobalWeb and CyberSpeaking was as easy as blinking your…”

I glanced sideways at Miles. “Oh, you’re plugging into it now, aren’t you?”

“Um, yeah,” he said. “Rayne wanted me to pretend as if I couldn’t do something so odd to you, since you’ve already taken in so much all at once. Rayne wants us all to stay off the grid at all times, and she’s got a good point since…”

“It’s like you’ve got a computer in your head!” I said. “Or, to officially begin your swearing lesson, ‘Holy shit!’”

“I like that,” Miles said. “Would ‘Spiritual Feces’ work as well?”

I shook my head. “No. Definitely wouldn’t have the same effect.”

“OK, I’ll try to remember that. Anyway, on to the NanoBots,” Miles said. “After parents agreed to have GovSanctioned NanoBots installed in all their kids from the age of one, every kid old enough to think a single independent thought sensed something had gone wrong. Especially after it became common knowledge on the GlobalWeb these Gov NanoBots could be programmed by either the Gov or their parents. Word spread super quickly and circled around the GlobalWeb until kids in every country found out about the intricate rewiring being done to their brains.”

“Weird news travels fast,” I said.

“Forgetting the upgrades that had already been installed, the Gov hadn’t considered how much smarter they’d already made kids. The network of inventor kids I belong to created programs to leave the PlugIns intact, but rewire them so they could be used for our own communications, altering the GovCurrent, and installing a second network within each kid. Wired kids could download rewiring programs to alter the NanoBots and any Tracker or GovOfficial doing a random scan would find all programs functioning as usual, since a part of the Sys was. Takes time to rewire a whole planet full of kids, but we’re almost there.”

Looking up at the photo of robot-like kids in the classroom, I felt queasy. The rightness behind what this band of rebel kids was doing became clearer to me. Miles put his hand on my shoulder and was about to say something when an alarm sounded, making a piercing whoop-whoop noise. I shoved my fingers in my ears to block the sound drilling into my brain.

“What the hell’s that alarm?” I shouted.

“Is this part of my swearing lesson?”

“Consider it your second lesson!”

He stood up. “Come on! We’d better find out what the hell’s happening!”