SOFIA WALKED INSIDE THE house, her hands covered with soil.

“How’d you get so dirty?” Rick inquired.

He knew the hydroponic gardens, the business that sustained their existence on leased reservation land, included no dirt per se. In fact, the vertical garden buildings they had constructed were comprised mostly from scrap materials collected over the years.

The gardens business was a livelihood in which they both were engaged. Sofia managed the gardens, the choice of crops, and the irrigation systems, while Rick focused on the business aspects like selling to local retailers in the Navajo community and shipping their products to distributors via drones or other transportation.

It worked out well for them and the profits were enough to live on as supplemented by the monthly inducements from the oligarchs running the Westrich government. Everyone considered those payments more as a loyalty bribe than a real attempt at a universal basic income.

The Great Debacle of 2037 annihilated over half the population on Earth, and things were far from ‘back to normal’ in 2065. Despite the extensive, finely threaded oversight of the oligarchy’s AI planning mechanisms, commerce was slow to resume at a pre-Debacle level for a variety of reasons. The 2037 event changed many things, including the levying of additional taxes to support allocations for the multiple new requirements of the day.

The front burner of government spend was directed at defensive systems to protect citizens against another genetic disaster. And there were so many ways another disaster might occur, given the widespread use of gene editing.

The government could hardly control the legitimate gene research and development taking place, much less the surreptitious and malicious. It was this threat more than any other, the threat of another global pandemic, that brought humanity to its knees in the years following the Debacle. This democratization of lethal tech forced the oligarchs to take and maintain control of matters in the midst of the chaotic governmental and societal disarray in the aftermath.

Alone, any single individual might create the next genetic horror. Alone, no individual had the ability to prevent that horror from happening again. As a result, humans were not only lenient toward extensive government control and intrusion into their lives, many expected and even demanded it.

And so began the impetus for the enhanced surveillance state of the oligarchs, aided in substance by myriad new technologies available to them. These included highly evolved artificial intelligence systems; monitoring devices and systems in businesses, homes, and streets, but also in the remotest territories. Drones were extensively used across the oligarchies to efficiently deliver payloads ranging from subsistence food and living essentials to knock-out mists or lethal missiles.

In a small way, the spark of this societal dynamic of control started much earlier in the century after two jet planes crashed into the World Trade Center towers in New York. With a mandate to prevent similar terrorist attacks, governments across the globe gradually and increasingly instituted active surveillance of their citizens.

As social media grew to become the de facto repository for storage aberrant ideologies and radicalism, some of the responsibility for monitoring citizens naturally fell to large corporations. They were already doing it anyway to enhance advertising revenue and profit, using algorithms to predict purchase behaviors. It was an easy reach to extend this tech to monitor and control individuals.

After the Debacle, previous distinctions between corporate entities and governments became further blurred. A typical person never knew or cared much about who had what data on them or how it was being used, as long as they continued living without the threat of a Debacle repeat. Many considered these controls rational and just, given the alternative.

When the obelisk crash-landed on a Saskatchewan farm in August 2037, just before the Debacle, humanity took on additional burdens. It was an eighty-ton platinum-gold object from space, and many considered it a legitimate warning from an extraterrestrial race. After the Debacle, people demanded that their oligarch protectors develop systems to protect them from any presumed alien invasions. To others, however, it seemed ridiculous that any government in its post-Debacle state would waste resources on developing defenses against an interstellar race of beings or machines.

In addition to these societal burdens, the Great Debacle created a punishing climate of paranoia and surveillance among the new nation-states. Whereas pre-Debacle annihilation tech was primarily composed of nuclear armaments, post-Debacle tech layered the additional threats of genetic weapons, offensive AI systems, robotic soldiers, and multiple systems of personal and organizational intrusion.

The list of such protective and controlling tech investments went on and on. And investments they were, draining the coffers of the numerous oligarchic technocracies that controlled most of the world’s resources, assets, and people.

***

Sofia shook her hands, and some dirt fell to the floor. “Don’t worry,” she grinned. “These six dogs track with them more dirt than that whenever they run inside.”

Rick smiled. “I’ve been watching the news feeds this morning. I know you’ve been outside and didn’t hear the latest.”

“Hear what?”

“Hang on a second,” he requested, bounding up from his chair. He ran to check on a few small devices at the corners of the room. “Any of these plugged in?”

Sofia sighed. “Rick, you are so paranoid! Do you seriously think the government or any AI listening on the other side of those devices cares about your opinion regarding what you just viewed on the vidscreen? God help us if they find you that interesting.”

“And?” he grimaced with raised eyebrows.

“Of course they’re unplugged!”

“Okay, then. And no baby drones flying around here that you can tell?”

She rolled her eyes. Though she loved Rick dearly and appreciated his concerns, she knew he was often unreasonably vexed by the thought that someone, whether a government or a commercial entity, would attempt to gather information to control him.

“Yes, dear. No drones; no nothing. I’m sure the perimeter cameras would have warned us of any flying visitors, including those sweet little nanobot bees or insects, of which there are none here because it’s too damn cold for them to operate in this Northern Arizona autumn.”

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

“Thanks, sweetie. Thanks for putting up with me. But today is a big day. A sad day.”

Sofia’s brow furrowed. She brushed her hands together again and pulled her hair back, grabbing a rubber band from her pocket to tie it in a ponytail.

Sofia was half Native American, but she never cared to delve into her ancestry. ‘I’m from a long line of New Mexicans back to the 1600’s and long before that,’ she’d recite.

Noticing Rick’s solemn face, she sat down on a chair as the dogs fought to jump on her lap. Pete and Molli made the leap, being the smallest and quickest.

“You know the protests that were happening around the globe, at least in certain countries?” he asked.

“Why do you say ‘were happening?’” she wondered. “These have been regular occurrences for months.”

“Not anymore.”

“What?”

“You don’t want to know what just occurred. I should warn you first to prepare you for the horror.”

“What horror?”

“The horror in the streets. It’s the Great Debacle all over again but applied only to these protesters. It’s as if everyone protesting just collapsed and went to sleep.”

Sofia’s brown skin paled and her eyes sank. “How many?”

“The news reports ‘millions.’ I guess this was so big that the state-run media outlets couldn’t keep it off their networks. Hard to hide that many deaths. It’s on social media now, too. You’d have to believe the oligarchs finally pulled themselves together for once and agreed to stop the global protests, the complaints about their power mongering and entitlements for the ruling classes. One might call it the reverse of the French Revolution, except in this case, the royalty have their heads intact and the revolutionaries all died.”

“God help us oppose this wretched scum,” she pleaded. She bowed her head and whispered a silent prayer, then looked up, smiling at Rick.

“For me, though, I’ve had a good morning. The gardens are wonderful, strong, and healthy. We have a great crop to sell for winter. You know, we’re having a cookout tonight in the empty garden shell with Rodney and others. All is good with our little world, as good as is possible given the circumstances. God, I hope none of our friends or relatives were hurt. Regardless, things are getting steadily worse, it appears.”

Rick’s head sunk backward to rest on the rear of his chair. “Just another harsh message from those in control; harsher than the previous. They red-flagged a few million protestors and wiped them from the planet in an instant with some godforsaken new tech. Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

“You’re serious on this plan?”

“I need to let this event stew a bit. I don’t know if I’m mentally prepared to go through with it. But this is another signal in a long line of similar ones that points to the dissolution of our species. Oh, hell, you don’t want to hear my preaching again on the topic. We’re approaching the end of the experiment, our human petri dish. It’s been twenty-eight years since the 2037 event, and we could have so much going for us. Just no ethical construct to guide us beyond the dish.”

Rick thought of his old friend Peter Scott, who often used this petri dish metaphor.

“I’ve seen too much, Rick.” Her hands were shaking as she petted the dogs on her lap, and tears dropped from her gray-blue eyes. “We do the best we can, of course. That’s our Stoic way.”

Sofia looked up at a picture of her home in Farmington, framed above the fireplace. Her mother and two sisters were standing outside. The photo was taken in 2011, long before the Debacle. She was a millennial baby, born in 2000. Her mother always told her she was a gift to universe and would do great things in her life to help many.

“Funny,” she mused, “I always thought my mom was right about that.”

“About what, honey?”

“About ‘doing great things for many.’ Maybe she intentionally didn’t say the word ‘humans’ or ‘people’ in that sentence. Maybe she had some prescience that what I’d do, what we’d do, would not be for humanity at all.”

“Hmm,” Rick grinned. He seldom got the chance to sit and talk with Sofia about her childhood in New Mexico anymore, since they were so busy with the business.

“Shall we proceed?” she inquired.

“It needs soak time, so let’s see what passes. The plan is fraught with risks, and it obviously disrupts our lifestyle entirely. It means I’ll be outside the country for a long, long while.”

“I have my girls and boys,” she reminded him, wiping the tears from her eyes. “They’re better company than you most of the time, after all these years of being together.”

Rick rubbed his chin. “I admit, we’ve had many fine children along the way.”

Sofia was rocking back and forth in her chair, contemplating what life might be like the next five years without Rick. “It still makes sense to me. I prefer to go out warning somebody than having considered but never executed the plan. Even if ours is a violent death in the end, who cares about the pain after you’re dead and gone?”

“Uh-huh,” Rick responded.

“Things are finite, Rick. We know that. Everything comes and goes. I prefer an exit with a bang of an ethical and forthright life versus a whimper of complaint and victimhood. I want to do this plan to make my mother proud that she raised a daughter so independent and fearless. I miss her every day of these last twenty-eight years. Every day, but she remains with me. And God only knows if I get to see her and the rest of my family again.”

“I understand. The cascade of cataclysms is upon us, and I too fear that if we don’t act now, we’ll never execute our plan. Worse yet, we may run out of time. Some stupid, intransigent part of me hopes humans will suddenly change. That we’ll finally begin treating each other with respect and kindness, unconditionally. Isn’t that bat-shit crazy? Anyway, I still think we should let it soak. I’m not sure I’m over the edge yet. It may take one more vicious action.”

“I’m require no more vicious, my dear. If you choose to proceed, I’m already there with you. No need to ask my opinion.”

“Then you’re okay with me disappearing in Bolivar while you gather more materials? I’ll pull it all together once I’m back.”

“Certainly.” She paused for a moment. “Still think you’ll go ahead with them?” she grimaced.

His eyes opened wide. “The anti-aging shots, you mean? I’d hate to be out in the extremes of the southern hinterlands for five years feeling sixty-five to seventy. You always have that option as well.”

“Dear, if you do it, you’ll return as a younger man, but don’t make it too young. I still need to recognize you. And no teenage versions of Rick! I couldn’t tolerate your angst and constant sexual advances, if you get my drift. Either way, as soon as the Westrich or Vista governments discover our little indiscretion, we’d be separated forever or instantly annihilated by God-knows what drone or hybrid mech in hiding. Rick, if my intuition serves me as well as it always does, we’ll die in the end. It doesn’t take an AI wizard to come to such a conclusion. I’m okay with that and have always been.”

“I know,” he conceded.

“The hardest thing will be to convince myself and others that you never made it back from your trip to Bolivar. That you’re missing; an MIA. It’s not so uncommon in that land these days, I suppose. I’ll need to evade that government mind-reading tech, however, which will be tough when I go into town. I’ll hide disrupters in my hair or hat, and that’s fine. And I’ll do my best to steer clear of those ex-corporeal signals that force me to do things against my will. I hate those prying signals.”

“Right, per the plan. Will let you know when I’m ready.”

* * *

That same evening, Rodney didn’t make it to the cookout.

Rick and Sofia both knew what Rodney’s unplanned, unannounced absence implied. The government possessed numerous arrows in its quivers to selectively target any individual, even someone far out on the reservation. Nobody previously red-flagged for being too outspoken would likely survive after such a red-letter day. It was the vicious action tipping point for Rick.

Both began executing the plan the next morning. Rick would disappear in Bolivar for five years, and Sofia would file a missing person report. Going missing or never being heard from again while in the oligarchies was not uncommon, so they expected little to no government inquiry. When five years passed, Rick would return incognito, crossing the border undercover and making his way back home. If all went as planned, the monitoring snoops of Vista and Westrich would never find out.

Unlike the nation-state of Westrich, Bolivar remained bereft of substantial surveillance tech. The large oligarchy formed from most of the former Latin American states was therefore a haven for anyone not wanting to be found or remembered.

For Rick, however, it still wouldn’t be easy. He’d need to minimize traces of his existence once he crossed. No DNA left on restaurant glasses or utensils. Face putty. Gloves. Wigs. He’d avoid cameras, speaking, people. And his eventual return to Vista would be long and arduous, using his military survival skills to cross the four hundred-plus miles on foot, evading border security, and sneaking back to the reservation without getting caught.