—Any idea what’s behind the black spots?

—Whatever it is, someone doesn’t want us to see it.

—With everything that’s happening, I think we can assume this isn’t a naturally occurring phenomenon.

—It could be whatever brought the robots all the way here.

—It wasn’t here before. Maybe it’s…Goddammit!

—What?

—I think they brought in the big guns.

—Why? We weren’t putting up much of a fight.

—No, Dr. Franklin, we weren’t. But we’re dying slow. I keep wondering why they’d send a dozen robots to wipe out a whole planet. It doesn’t make sense to do it one small circle at a time. There’s too much ground to cover. What they’re doing, that feels more like a surgical strike, like they were looking for something. I thought: Maybe they just don’t have anything better, but anyone who can build these things, make that gas…They’d have to be able to hit us a lot harder.

—The gas is denser than air. If they spread it around from high atmosphere, it would mix—

—It would be over pretty quick.

—Yes, sir.

—Any thoughts?

—I don’t like it.

—Any thoughts on what we can do? We don’t have anything we can fire at them.

—What would we fire at? We don’t know what’s there. We don’t know how big or how far it is. I’m not sure there’s anything we can do.

—Then, Dr. Franklin, I suggest you go back to bed. That’s what I’m gonna do.

—I don’t think we have a lot of time.

—When’s the last time you slept?

—…

—That’s what I thought. Go to bed, Rose. I’ll have you meet some folks from the UN in the morning. They’re working on plan B in case this all goes to hell.

—Can’t you meet with them? I have a lot on my plate at the moment.

—I could…But then again, I’ll be dead if it comes to that. The point is they’d like someone who’ll survive the gas to be at that meeting. They wanna build some global infrastructure, so those who make it can get help, find other survivors. The first step is to create a network of two-way radios that can run on dynamos. We’d like to have some every couple miles across the country, help create pockets of survivors. They want to have some sort of blueprint people can follow to build communities. I’m sure they could use your thoughts on the matter.

—If we’re all exposed to the gas, and the ratio of survivors stays the same, there’ll be about 150,000 people left alive in the United States. That’s one person per twenty-five square miles on average. They’ll have to deal with over 300 million dead bodies decomposing everywhere, rats, bugs. Most people will be concentrated in urban areas, but so will the bodies. Disease will spread faster than people can imagine. First step has to be dealing with bodies, find medicine. Hospitals would be a good place to start a community from. There’ll be food around for a while. We can worry about that later—

—Stop. Stop. Like I said, they can use your help. But you won’t be useful to anyone if you don’t sleep.

—Sir?

—Yes?

—I don’t think I…I’ve seen enough death for two lifetimes. Apparently, I’m supposed to play a role in stopping this from happening. If I can’t…If I fail, I’m not sure I have what it takes for what comes next.

—Well, I’m sorry the apocalypse isn’t convenient for you. Now go to bed.

FILE NO. 1613

LETTER FROM CAPTAIN KARA RESNIK, EDC TO VINCENT COUTURE, CONSULTANT, EDC

Recovered on her body at EDC Headquarters, New York, NY

Hey Vincent!

I plan on destroying this letter when I get home so, if you’re reading this, chances are things didn’t go according to plan. I’m in Haiti. I know, I’m wondering how I ended up here myself. But I found her, I found our daughter. I should start from the beginning; you probably don’t know about her yet.

Her name’s Eva. They’ve been keeping her from us. That psycho Alyssa put our child inside another woman when we were in Puerto Rico. Another family had our baby. From what I saw, it was a good family, but they’re dead now. Some very bad people killed them so they could get their hands on our daughter. The Russians think she can pilot Themis. I don’t know that she can, but it doesn’t matter. They have her now. They’ll take her far away and they’ll experiment on her. I don’t even wanna think about it. I have to stop them. I have no idea how, but I’ll come up with something. Doesn’t matter how, I’m taking her with me. I’m bringing our daughter home.

That didn’t take as long as I thought to explain. I was sort of hoping it would take all night. I’m sleeping—not sleeping, really—in the shittiest car you’ve ever seen. You’d like it. Everything holds together with duct tape. And it stinks! Like a dead animal. I smell like it now. I smell like roadkill. That and old, dirty engine oil.

That pretty much sums it up! Everyone lied to us. Alyssa cooked up a baby in a lab. Some other woman gave birth to our child. Russians are after her. I stink. I think you’re up to speed.

That’s a lot to digest, I know. We’re parents! How scary is that? I know you’ll be fine; you’ve always been good with children. But I’ll have some adjusting to do. Somehow, I get the feeling taking down Russian mercenaries will be the easy part. Kicking and punching is something I’m good at. Meeting her first boyfriend…I’m not sure how well I can deal with that. You might have to stop me from punching his lights out for no reason. You know, like a vetting process. If he comes back, then he might be worthy. I know I’m getting ahead of myself. I’m not sure we can even adopt her. One thing I know: I’m not giving her up to anyone. She wouldn’t be safe. They’ll keep coming for her, Vincent. They’ll chase her to the ends of the Earth. We have to keep her safe. Maybe, with everything that’s happening, no one will give a shit about adoption laws. First things first. I have to make it out of here.

I keep forgetting if you’re reading this, then it’s a good bet I’m dead. It’s hard to write as a dead person. What can I tell you? Hi! I’m dead! I hope you’re not! Best, Kara.

When I left, you were missing with Themis. I hope you’re OK. You have no idea how much I want you to be OK. I don’t think I could live with myself. And I hope you don’t hate me for leaving without you. I just didn’t know what more I could do. You know I’m not good at sitting around. I couldn’t help you, and I thought I could help her.