The World Gives Way: A Novel Read online

  Myrra was right. She was right. He understood that, even though he still couldn’t grasp the full cosmic consequence. It was impossible to see it all at once. His brain took it in in pieces. First he thought of the mechanics of the thing—it was something solid and mathematical to grab on to. She said there was a rupture in the hull, was that right? It wasn’t something he could see—not on the sky, or the ground, or the walls of the horizon. Ipso facto, it was something on the outer shell of the world, somewhere past the walls and gears and insulation. He realized he didn’t even know what existed between the inner and outer walls of the world—was it gears? He’d always imagined an impossibly dense thicket of wires, belts, and gears.

  He had a fundamental knowledge of how it was all put together; they’d taught a basic summary in elementary school. He’d been made to memorize certain phrases: outer hull, inner hull, solar sail, rotary axle. Why had he never endeavored to learn what these things meant, beyond the names and their placements on a diagram?

  Next his brain started calculating how long it had been, when the crack had first manifested. Myrra said the problem had been discovered over a year ago. When had the earthquakes started? The uncountable tiny earthquakes, so common in the past year that they’d begun to feel normal, like just something to adjust to. Six months ago, Tobias had taken the time to reinforce the floating shelves on his wall. It was amazing what people could excuse away.

  These were all logical thoughts. The scarier ones, the more emotional ones, would come soon enough, Tobias knew. For now he stuck with what he was good at: detecting.

  How long did they have left? Hard to tell.

  How would it happen? No, don’t go there yet.

  He couldn’t picture himself dying, or anyone he knew dying, but he pictured other, small things dying. He pictured the world absent grasshoppers or house cats. He pictured other, less frightening things careening through space; tablets, straws, a New London lamppost, a street cart. The hotel espresso machine, still processing coffee in the vacuum of space, so that each little droplet came out as a perfect sphere and floated away on its own through the darkness. Barnes’s wood desk, still pristine, almost emitting its own light as it drifted farther and farther away from the world. The paintings that had once belonged to his family, ones that he’d never seen and now never would see, spinning through the black, never losing momentum. He thought again of the Roman Opałka painting, the one that was just numbers counting to infinity. He didn’t know why he was thinking about these things.

  Official-sounding chatter came blaring through the speakers bolted to the hotel wall, and the bright-blue light of the television suddenly assaulted Tobias’s eyes. Simpson had turned on the news.

  “The news is just coming in, regarding the, uh, phenomenon that we’ve all experienced. We’re receiving an announcement from Parliament now—” The newscaster was doing his best to sound as if he had it together. This is it, Tobias thought. The announcement. Tobias had gotten to know the secret ahead of everyone else, but only by half an hour. It felt like a lifetime.

  Tobias sat down on the bed next to Simpson and Charlotte, who was bouncing on his knee. They both watched the screen and waited.

  There were a lot of diagrams. That was when the newscaster’s voice sounded the strongest, when he was able to explain the minutiae of a diagram. Other times, when he was using words like cataclysm, future, and inevitable, his voice wavered. Tobias noticed that all the talking heads were dancing around certain words and phrases. Apocalypse and end of the world were never said.

  The newscaster rambled on for over an hour with charts and statistics and interviews with experts. His eyes looked glassy. Tobias could see he was slowly winding down—he had started to repeat himself and stumble over numbers and population percentages.

  “Those are the facts as we have them, currently, but stay tuned”—the man looked bewildered at what he was saying—“stay tuned for further updates. This has been Gary Meacham for News Four.”

  He made an odd noise after the canned speech, something between a squeal and a cough, then added, “Good luck.”

  The broadcast then cut to a pretaped segment on the results of the Troy football final. Simpson raised the remote in his hand and shut off the screen. He didn’t speak for a long time.

  “There must be shuttles, or escape pods…” he said.

  “You don’t bother with escape pods when there’s nothing to escape to. Telos is still fifty years away,” Tobias said.

  “So they never even built them?”

  “I guess not.” It seemed strange to Tobias that they hadn’t, but he also recognized the term escape pod for what it was: a perfectly useless security blanket.

  “Can’t they send an engineering team out to fix it—?”

  “That’s what they’ve been trying to do for the last year or so,” he said, thinking back to Myrra describing Marcus’s correspondence.

  Simpson had been bobbing Charlotte up and down on his knee to keep her quiet. Tobias noticed his knee moving a little faster now, the movement becoming more of a nervous tic than a parenting tactic. The baby was starting to look perturbed.

  “You’re taking this very calmly,” Simpson said.

  “I’m not. I just don’t feel like screaming.” Tobias added, “Yet.”

  “Yet,” Simpson said, parroting him.

  They stayed where they were, on the edge of the hotel bed. They were very still, save for Simpson’s frenetic knee. Charlotte Carlyle, as if sensing the heaviness in the air, kept quiet and looked at them both, uneasily, from one face to the other.

  “We need to go home,” Simpson said finally. He stood and handed Charlotte to Tobias. He walked over to his bag, pulled his tablet and earpiece out of a pocket, and began searching for numbers on the touch screen. There was no way he’d get a call through to the bureau, Tobias thought—now, after the news broadcast, it was only going to be more difficult to get in touch with New London Security.

  “Hello, my love; no, I’m OK—” Simpson made a beeline for the bathroom and closed the door behind him.

  Of course. Only Tobias the Automaton would assume that a person would call headquarters at a time like this. Tobias considered whether he could call Barnes at home, but no, he would be working right now. Probably mapping out plans for crowd control, bracing for the ensuing panic. He couldn’t call Barnes at headquarters, and suddenly he desperately wanted to hear his voice.

  Tobias held Charlotte up in the air, gripping her under her armpits. This was the first time he’d held her. Her feet dangled and swayed. She looked back at his face and reached out, trying to grab his nose. She hooked a single finger into his nostril and tugged at his face, like a fisherman reeling in a catch. Tobias cried out in surprise, and in pain; Charlotte was much stronger than he’d expected her to be. Were all babies this strong? He always felt as if he needed to treat babies the same way one would treat fine bone china, as if they were apt to shatter at the slightest gesture. But Charlotte had heft to her; she’d grown considerably since the last picture he’d seen, the family portrait that Barnes had brought up on his tablet. Babies grow fast, he thought. He’d never spent much time around kids.

  He lowered Charlotte so her feet balanced on his knees. Charlotte took her finger out of his nose and waved her arms around, trying to balance upright on her own. Her eyes were wide and black in the dim room. Tobias still had both hands around her torso, but now he pulled them back and let them hover just a millimeter away from her on all sides, just close enough to catch her, but far enough that she had the freedom to balance if she was able. She teetered one way, and Tobias’s left hand bolstered her. She teetered slightly the other way, and she was saved by Tobias’s right hand. Then she swayed, cautiously upright, in the middle.

  Tobias smiled at Charlotte and nodded at her to give her a physical gesture, to let her know how well she was doing. He counted the seconds, how long she stood on her own: one—two—three—four—five—six—

  Her left kne
e buckled, and Tobias caught her and held her tight. His first incongruous thought was, I’ll have to tell Myrra. Myrra will be so excited.

  He stood up, raised Charlotte above his head, and spun, just as he’d seen Myrra do. Charlotte giggled and laughed. Tobias laughed too. This wasn’t what he should be doing, but it was all he wanted to do. He knew, logically, that his senses weren’t reliable right now, that he was probably in a panic state, but from where he stood, it looked as if Charlotte’s face was glowing.

  He flopped back onto the bed, still holding the radiant Charlotte in the air, her feet dangling above his face. He kept laughing, and then all at once he was crying at the same time. Crying and laughing and crying, until he could barely breathe.

  He wondered how many people had heard the news and how many were still ignorant. Everyone would know in the cities, and, thanks to gossip, everyone in smaller towns would know within an hour or two. Tobias wondered if there was anyone out there more isolated, someone who might just wake up one morning, and, without warning, end up sucked up into the sky. What if someone was on a long camping trip right now—somewhere in the outer Kittimer range, or in that big forest park between Troy and New London? Could it be possible to go on not knowing, right up until the end? Would that be preferable?

  Charlotte pointed one of her toes and kicked him in the chin, as if to say, Pay attention to me, you doofus. Tobias smiled a half smile and looked up at the soles of her feet, and the tiny creases in her skin between the ball and arch of each foot. Her skin would never wrinkle or age. Then he thought of himself in the same way: he would never get wrinkled, would never get fat, would never go bald or gray.

  The tears subsided; Tobias took deeper breaths and felt a little calmer. Charlotte kicked him in the chin again.

  “Hey,” Tobias said, feigning annoyance. He lowered her until she was sitting on his chest. She rose up with every inhalation and down with every exhalation. Charlotte pursed her lips and pushed them out, almost as if she were getting ready to blow a smoke ring.

  “Whooooooooooooo,” she said, letting out a high-pitched singsong tone. She seemed satisfied with the result.

  “Are you an owl?” Tobias asked her. He wondered if Myrra had ever taken her to the zoo, back when she still served the family.

  “Whoooooo!” she sang out again, much louder this time. This girl had pipes. She would have made a good singer, Tobias thought.

  The bathroom door opened again and Simpson came out in a rush.

  “We need to charge up the rental car and head out before anybody gets the idea to steal it. There’s no way we’re going to be able to get back to New London by train.” Simpson had a fistful of toiletries in his hand from the bathroom, a toothbrush, a miniature tube of toothpaste, a comb, and a razor. He chucked them all into the open bag, along with his tablet.

  “How is Ruth?” Tobias asked in a small voice. For some reason Simpson’s tone sounded angry, demanded submissiveness.

  “She’s scared,” Simpson said. “Everybody’s scared.”

  “How are the kids?” he asked.

  “They don’t really understand. They’re scared because Mom’s scared.” Simpson’s face was crumbling. Tobias wanted to fix it. He sat up, readjusting Charlotte on his lap.

  “OK—OK, we’ll take the rental and just drive it back. We’ll go now, like you said, while everyone’s still in a panic haze, and get out before any riots start. We’ll pack Myrra and Charlotte in the back seat, and—”

  “Why would we take them with us?” Simpson interrupted with an incredulous look.

  “What?” Tobias wished he had a more coherent response. He hadn’t thought of a scenario where they wouldn’t be bringing Myrra Dal back with them.

  “As far as I’m concerned, whatever trouble she was in—she’s cleared. With what’s going on, we’ve all got bigger things to worry about now. She wants us to let her go, she wants to take the baby—I say we let her. They’ll just slow us down on the way back.”

  “But—” Tobias was searching for words. He suddenly felt very frustrated. “No. We still have a job to do.”

  Simpson looked at him as if he were absolutely insane. Tobias knew, in some part of his brain, that what he was saying made no sense. But something made him say it anyway. He wasn’t sure if it was stubbornness, or if he still felt the specter of Barnes’s disappointment—but surely Barnes wouldn’t be disappointed in him now, not with mortality looming in front of them all, inescapable. He didn’t want to investigate why, he just knew that he didn’t want Myrra Dal and Charlotte to leave.

  He said none of this to Simpson, just let his absurd protestation hang in the air between them.

  Simpson zipped up his bag and reached out for Charlotte. Tobias held on to her a little tighter and didn’t move.

  “We can talk about this later,” Simpson said. “Right now, go back to your room and pack. We’ll give the baby to Myrra Dal to take care of. I have to go see if there’s any available charging ports in the hotel’s garage—that rental’s fairly new, a full battery should get us back home in one go.”

  Simpson stood over Tobias and waited, his arms outstretched, to take Charlotte. He was lying, Tobias could tell. He wasn’t just going to give Charlotte back; he was going to let them go. Tobias had officially lost Simpson’s trust with his crazy argument—Simpson was going to act on his own now. Tobias wanted to punch him, wanted to run with the baby, wanted so many things. He wanted to talk to Barnes. He wanted the world to make sense.

  Instead he deposited Charlotte into Simpson’s waiting arms.

  “OK,” he said.

  “I’ll be coming back here once it’s charged. Pack. Get whatever supplies you think you’ll need. Meet me back here in an hour,” Simpson said. Tobias wondered if he could believe him on that at least. He sounded sincere.

  “OK,” he said again, and headed toward his own hotel room to pack a bag, already wishing that Simpson would return, not wanting to be left alone with his own thoughts.

  Inside the hotel there had been a cocoon of quiet, but outside, the world was officially ending: people wandered the streets crying and shouting, every other second a car horn honked or tires screeched as families sped out of town. To go where?

  Lots and lots of bells, coming from the various temples and places of prayer. Hopefully spiritual leaders could keep the town relatively calm. Riots had broken out in New London; Tobias had made the mistake of checking his tablet for the news. Barnes was out there.

  He had a vague notion that he should buy water bottles.

  The walk to the convenience store down the street shouldn’t have felt dangerous, but on the way he had to dodge two cars that hopped the curb in a vain attempt to escape traffic. A woman in a gray business suit knelt weeping a few feet from the store door.

  The shelves of the store had mostly been ransacked. There were only a dozen or so bottles of water left. Tobias opened the empty backpack he’d brought and swept the remaining stock into his bag. There was still an untouched box of protein bars at the sales counter. Tobias loaded them into his bag as well.

  Improbably, there was still a cashier in the store. He didn’t pay attention to the empty shelves at all, or to the people running in and out the door with merchandise in their arms. Instead his eyes were glued to a news broadcast playing on a screen above the register. Tobias heard the name “Nabat” and stopped to listen.

  “Due to a combination of quakes and the world’s recent state of weightlessness, the small tourist town of Nabat has suffered a devastating cave-in. Nabat, a cavern community situated in the cliffs just off the coast of the Palmer Sea, had incurred a considerable amount of structural damage in the wake of recent quakes. The collapse occurred just minutes before the hull breach was announced—” The newscaster’s voice sounded high and tense, like that of someone desperately clinging to an official script in order to keep together.

  Tobias tuned out the rest of the broadcast. He didn’t want to hear any more. He said a prayer for the beaut
iful collapsed pillars and carved walls, for the people living in the catacombs and the refugees sleeping on floors, washed up from Palmer. How many people had been in Nabat when it collapsed?

  More haunting still was that Tobias knew he’d never find out. They’d all be dead before an account of the bodies could be made. It was possible there weren’t even enough resources to try for rescue or cleanup. With everything collapsing at once, authorities might have to leave them all entombed in the cliffs.

  The cashier gave him a blank look when he handed over his account card.

  “What’s the point?” he asked.

  Tobias didn’t know a logical response to this, but he couldn’t fathom not paying.

  “Call it courtesy,” Tobias said, and forced the card into the man’s hand. He charged it with a short humorless laugh.

  Back on the street, Tobias felt his tablet buzz in his bag, and he scrambled to reach it underneath the box of protein bars. The call was coming through from New London Security Bureau Headquarters.

  “Barnes?” Tobias waited to hear his gruff voice, maybe the crunch of him eating biscuits in the background. Only Barnes would bother to call him in these times. He’d been friendly with the other guys on the force, but he’d never made any real friends. No one who would call him in a crisis. It was hard for Tobias to know what he ought to do with himself, now that he was facing down the end of everything. He felt like an actor who had been thrown onstage to improvise a scene with no context. The world was ending: What should he do next? What should he do with his hands?

  But Barnes felt like a good answer to all those questions. It was what people did, in times of crisis. They stayed with their families. They supported one another. Simpson was right. It was time to head home.

  The voice on the phone was not Barnes’s voice. A young voice, as young as his own, maybe younger, responded. “Agent Bendel?”

  “Yes, this is Agent Bendel.”

  “I’m afraid I have some terrible news.” The young agent seemed shaken and eager to stick to the official bureau script. It was something to hang on to, in uncertain times. Tobias knew that as well as anyone. Tobias waited on his end of the call, allowing silence to be his response. He was too worried about what came next, too worried to say anything that would coax the conversation along. The young agent waited for a few more wordless seconds. Tobias could feel his uncertainty.