Hopeless Doom

Chapter 17 Ash and the Altitude

Nancy pushed open the library doors. A metal trash can sat in the center of the room, cradling a hungry yellow flame. Three men stood around it, huddled like primitives. One held a cooking pot over the fire with a iron poker. The water inside—dark and smelling of copper—was beginning to hiss.

A fourth man was on his knees, tearing the guts out of a leather-bound book.

“Stop it,” Nancy said. She dropped her candle; she didn't need it. The fire was enough to see the mess.

The man looked up, soot smeared across his brow. “We need the heat. Two more minutes.”

Nancy didn't argue. She lunged. She reached directly into the trash can, her fingers closing around the scorched spine of a textbook. The heat was a white-hot scream against her knuckles. Blisters bubbled instantly, but she didn't let go. She yanked the book out and stomped it into the carpet.

Fundamentals of Botany.

“Are you out of your mind?” the man yelled, scrambling back. “You almost flipped the pot!”

“You’re burning the reference section,” Nancy snapped. Her voice was thin, vibrating with a rage that eclipsed the burn on her hand.

“I’m boiling water, lady!” The man pointed at the pot. “My wife is upstairs puking blood. If she drinks the raw rust from the pipes, she’s dead by morning.

“Then take the fiction.” Nancy pointed her blistered hand toward the back. “Burn the romance novels. Burn the travel guides to cities that don’t exist anymore. They’re cheap pulp—they’ll burn better anyway.”

“The hardcovers last longer,” the man with the poker grumbled.

Nancy stepped in front of the shelf, her back pressed against the mahogany. She spread her arms, guarding the spines like a shield. “No.”

“Move, Nancy. It’s just paper.”

He grabbed her shoulder to heave her aside. Nancy didn’t stumble. She reached for a heavy brass bookend—a solid anchor. She swung it with everything she had, slamming it against the side of the metal bin.

GONG.

The sound echoed like a funeral bell. The men flinched.

“Aisle Seven,” Nancy raised the brass anchor, her eyes locked on the leader. “Take the paperbacks. You touch the science section again, and I’ll use your shirt to put out the fire. Try me.”

The man looked at the brass in her hand, then at the raw, peeling skin on her knuckles. He saw the look in her eyes—the look of someone who had already decided what was worth dying for.

“Fine,” he muttered. “Get the small ones.”

Nancy didn't lower the weapon until they disappeared into the shadows of the back aisles. She stood over the fire, clutching the scorched botany book to her chest, guarding the future with a piece of brass and a burnt hand.

On the upper deck, the air was sharp and clean.

Bevis sat in a folding chair, looking at the stars. Four teenagers sat around him on the deck boards. They looked small against the vastness of the Atlantic.

“The satellites are dead,” Bevis said, tapping a pencil against his record book. “The GPS is a ghost. If you want to know where you are, you have to ask the sky.”

“Does it matter?” a boy asked, shivering in his jacket.

“It matters what happens after,” Bevis said. The island is a cage if you can’t navigate the sea. “Hold out your arm. Straight. Make a fist.”

The kids obeyed, their silhouettes mimicking his.

“Line the bottom of your fist up with the horizon,” Bevis instructed. “One fist is ten degrees. Now, stack the other one on top.”

“Three and a half,” a girl whispered.

“Thirty-five degrees,” Bevis noted it down. “That’s your latitude. Thirty-five degrees north of the equator. No batteries required. Just your bones and the light.”

“My phone used to just do that,” the boy muttered.

“Your phone is a paperweight,” Bevis said. He showed them his notebook—a hand-drawn map of the heavens. “The stars don’t flicker out. They don’t need a software update. If you know Orion’s position, you know the time. If you know Polaris, you know the way home.”

“Why teach us?” the girl asked. “The adults are all downstairs fighting over crackers.”

“Because the adults are trying to save a world that’s already gone,” Bevis said. “They’re trying to carry their luggage onto a life raft. It won’t fit. The only things that matter now are the things you can carry in your head.”

He pulled a scrap of wood from his pocket—a homemade quadrant with a string and a metal washer. He handed it to the boy.

“The ship goes dark tomorrow,” Bevis said. “The world gets very big, very fast. Learn to look up. It’s the map that doesn’t lie.”

The teenagers passed the wooden tool around, their fingers tracing the rough edges. Bevis watched the Milky Way—a silent, clockwork engine turning over their heads, indifferent to the sinking steel beneath them.

Sarah wrapped a strip of torn pillowcase around the woman’s calf. The cotton was frayed and stiff with dried fluids. She pulled the knot, but her fingers were too slick with sweat to hold the tension. She gritted her teeth, jammed her thumb into the center of the fabric, and forced the knot to seat.

Oscar Lamb stood across from her, his white coat yellowed by three days of human misery. He held a pair of shears that had long since lost their edge.

“Tape,” Sarah said. her voice was a dry rattle.

“We’re out,” Oscar said. “Alice used the last of it to seal the vents. Trying to keep the rot from drifting in.”

Sarah didn't answer. She tucked the frayed ends under the bandage. It wouldn't hold. The moment the woman stood up, the cotton would slide.

She stood up, and the world tilted. She gripped the edge of the cot until the metal bit into her palms.

“Sit down, Sarah,” Oscar said. “You’ve been on your feet for forty-eight hours.”

“I’m fine,” she lied. She looked at her hands. They were vibrating. She shoved them into her pockets, locking her elbows. “Who’s next?”

Alice walked in, dropping an empty bucket. It hit the tiles with a hollow, metallic ring. She didn't say a word; she just slid down the wall until she was a heap of blue scrubs on the floor.

“The corridor is full,” Alice rasped. “I told them to lie on their sides. I told them to pray. I don’t know what else to say.”

Sarah looked at the door. The moaning had stopped. Usually, the hallway was a wall of noise. Now, it was silent. The silence is worse, Sarah thought. The pain hasn't stopped. It just moved.

On Deck Four, Arthur stood on a luggage cart. The air was a humid weight, smelling of unwashed skin and stale copper. Two hundred people were packed shoulder to shoulder—a wall of frantic eyes.

“The radio’s out!” someone yelled from the back.

“The radio isn't the problem.” Arthur pointed into the dark. “A ship this size goes missing, they send the cavalry. But look out the window. Nothing.”

The crowd shifted—a low, rhythmic growl.

“They aren't coming,” Arthur said. “Because there’s no one left to send. We’re floating on a dead rock. And while we’re down here drinking rust, Jeffrey is behind an oak door on Deck Twelve. He’s got the beef. He’s got the water. He’s feeding the guards so they’ll keep their boots on our necks.”

He looked at a man in the front row holding a brass table leg. “They’re thinning the herd. Tomorrow, the water ration goes to zero. You want to wait for tomorrow?”

The man with the brass leg didn't answer. He just tapped the metal against his palm. Clink. Clink.

Arthur didn't give an order. He didn't have to. He just stepped off the cart. The crowd moved as one—a slow, heavy tide heading for the stairs.

Nelson stood on the landing of Deck Five, the fire axe heavy in his hands. He heard the boots before he saw the faces. It wasn't a panic. It was a march. When the crowd rounded the corner, Nelson stepped into the center of the stairs.

“Go back,” Nelson said. His voice cracked. He hated the sound of it. “The upper decks are restricted. Infection protocol.”

“The protocol is dead, Nelson,” Arthur said, taking a step up. “We want the vault. We want the food.”

“It’s rationing!” Nelson raised the axe. “If you storm the vault, it’s gone in an hour. You’ll starve by Friday.”

“We’re starving now,” the man with the brass leg said.

“Step back!” Nelson barked, holding the axe horizontally. “I’m the Deputy Captain. One more step and I swear—”

The man with the brass leg didn't wait. He swung low.

The brass caught Nelson’s kneecap with a sickening, wet crunch. Nelson didn't scream; the air just left his lungs in a sharp wheeze. He hit the railing and slumped.

The crowd didn't stop. They didn't even look down. They just stepped over him. Boots hit his ribs, his shoulders, his broken leg. Nelson felt like he was being buried by a human landslide. He watched his yellow axe—the symbol of his authority—get kicked down the stairs like a piece of trash.

He dragged himself into the corner, pressing his back against the cold steel, making himself small as the starving world surged past.

Sarah heard the glass shatter.

“They’re in the atrium,” Oscar said, looking through the fire doors. “They’re climbing the scaffolding. Bypassing the stairs.”

Sarah didn't look. She walked to the supply cabinet and opened the doors. Empty. Not even a bottle of aspirin.

“Close the doors, Oscar,” she said.

“The hallway?”

“Everything.”

Oscar bolted the heavy fire doors. The vibration of the riot rattled the floorboards—a low-frequency thunder of four thousand people reclaiming the right to eat.

Sarah sat on the edge of a cot. Her trousers were stiff with blood that wasn't hers. She had spent two days fighting a war with no ammunition, and she was done.

“We should barricade the door,” Oscar whispered.

“Don’t bother.” Sarah rested her head in her hands.

“They’ll kill us, Sarah.”

“They won't even see us,” she said. “They’re looking for bread. They’re looking for water. There’s nothing here but pain and empty cabinets. We’re safe, Oscar. Because we have absolutely nothing left to take.”

She closed her eyes. The ship groaned—a deep, metallic moan from the bowels of the hull. The rules were gone. The uniforms were rags. She just sat in the dark, listening to the boots overhead.