N. White: The End - Visions of Apocalypse

Chapman shrugged. “I had the support of family and friends, and the guidance of some great professors, but for the most part, yes. All me.”

“Excellent! You’ll do nicely.”

“I will?” Chapman said. “For what, exactly?”

“I’d like you to tell everyone that I’m leaving.”

It took a few moments for the words to sink in. The crowd went silent, the praying ceased, and every news anchor stopped talking as they mulled this over. Even the papal entourage halted their prayers in shock. “Leaving?” Chapman finally managed.

“Yes. Retiring, actually. There’s a lovely spot just a few million miles off of Alpha Centauri I’ve been keeping my eye on. Esther moved there last year and just won’t stop going on about it.” Her voice bubbled with cheeriness, and daisies spontaneously bloomed all around the edge of the Rift. “Oh, it’ll be just lovely, I know it. So it’s off to Alpha Centauri for me.”

The Pope and his cardinals began their praying once more, this time joined by those in the crowd who were among the faithful. The rest of the onlookers burst into thousands of simultaneous conversations, while every news network in attendance scrambled to describe what was happening with as many adjectives as they could muster.

“But… that’s not possible,” Chapman said. “The gravitational pull of the Sun… everything from Copernicus to Newton to Hawking…”

“No,” Mother Earth said, considering, “I don’t think I spoke to any of those chaps at the agency. It was this rather nice gas giant, what was his name…”

“So, wait, you can just leave orbit whenever you like?” Chapman asked in disbelief.

“Oh, of course not, dearie. There’s a dreadful amount of paperwork, you wouldn’t believe—”

“Excuse me,” Chapman said, “I don’t mean to interrupt, but if you’re leaving, what happens to us? What are we supposed to do?”

“Well, you’ll just go wherever it is you’ve been flying in those wonderful little spaceships of yours, I expect.”

“The moon?” Chapman asked.

“The moon?!” Mother Earth gasped, inadvertently raising her voice and shattering windows all throughout the little village of television vehicles. “That’s as far as you’ve managed? Just what have you been doing all this time? You’ve been hurling yourselves up into space for how long now and you’ve only gotten to the moon?”

“Space travel isn’t quite that simple,” Chapman said. “Besides, we didn’t realize we had so little time.”

“Well, I won’t say I’m not disappointed. You’ve got eight other planets right in your own back yard and here you are still clinging to Mother’s apron strings. Well, seven really, the less said about Mercury the better…”

“Actually, we don’t count Pluto as a planet anymore,” Chapman muttered, lost in thought.

“Ooh, listen to him now, getting to say who’s a planet and who isn’t! I’d like to see you pop round to Pluto and tell him that to his face. He’d let you have what for, believe you me.”

“I’m sorry,” Chapman said, running a hand through his hair. “It’s just a lot to take in at once. We’re only just coming to grips with you talking to us, then you tell us you’re dooming our civilization just so you can take a vacation.”

“It’s retirement, sweetheart. You come back from vacation.” She lowered her voice. “It’s not that I’m unsympathetic, love. But it was a non-refundable deposit, you see.”

Chapman spread his hands. “But this is all we have.”

“What’s that they say about eggs and baskets?” Mother Earth chided. The prayers were growing louder now. “I say, what are they going on about?”

“They’re praying for deliverance,” Chapman said, lowering his arms with a sigh.

“Pray for some spaceships, that might be useful.”

“Actually, they’ve been waiting for this. They always believed the world would end and they’d be whisked up to Paradise.”

“Ooh, that sounds nice,” Mother Earth beamed. “Is that one near Alpha Centauri?”

Chapman laughed ruefully. “No. If you ask me, it doesn’t exist. But it’s funny. All my scientific knowledge has just been thrown out the window, yet their faith endures.” He looked down and shook his head. “So how long do we have?”

“Oh, not very long at all, I should think,” Mother Earth replied.

“As bad as that, is it?”

“Well it’s not like I can keep them waiting, dearie. I should be off in two, maybe three hundred thousand years at the most.”

Chapman’s jaw dropped. “Three hundred thousand years?”

“It’s not much notice, I know, but if I don’t go soon, I’ll lose my spot. And Esther will be so put out.”

Chapman threw his head back and laughed, long and hard, until tears ran down his face and his sides ached. “What’s so funny, love?” Mother Earth asked.

He wiped his eyes with his sleeve. “I think I might just believe in miracles now,” he said, and continued laughing.

Tristis Ward lives and writes in Fredericton, New Brunswick. After a degree in English at Dalhousie University, she worked for years in community radio as a producer, station manager, and national lobbyist. She has written comic book scripts, short stories and plays as well as producing both stage and radio plays. She has long participated online in the SFFWorld.comforum and is a multiple winner in their flash fiction contests. Her first graphic novel, Bones of the Magusis available from Broken Jaw Press.

Mother and Childis a prelude toBones of the Magus, but is a great stand-alone story presented in a unique format. It will take you into a strange new universe where worlds fall at the hands of wizards and science, and nothing is safe — not even your soul.

Editor’s note: Ms. Ward writes in a unique format designed best for print. Though we have included her story here in the digital anthology, we were forced to modify the sizes of the images to fit the format of the anthology. If you view the pages on a small screen, it may be difficult to read. If this is the unfortunate case, please contact the editor and a PDF version will be emailed directly to you. Thank you.