Neverending

15

'JESUS!'

I damn near crash the car right into the guardrails as something god-awful heavy hits the roof of my car.

'Please mind your speed, Tinder.' Unhelpful.

I'm busy looking in the rearview mirror like a crazy man, trying to keep my eyes on the road at the same time. Even if I could stop on a Y road and even if it wasn't insanity to even think about it with traffic averaging 140, I'm not sure stopping somewhere where heavy things are falling from the sky is a reasonable idea. Moving targets are harder to hit, right? Right?? I consider checking my theorising with Delta but decide that not only will she probably not understand my question but also that I need to be focussing on two things at once, not three.

What the hell was that?

Because I'm going so fast, I didn't really stand a chance seeing what hit my car, assuming it bounced off and rolled past the guardrails. My mind has been busy accessing my back catalogue of things that happen during an apocalypse. Against all logic, my brain is certain that remembering all the right things to do may just save me. But, of course, there's never actually been an apocalypse: we've only ever experienced them through the cinematic lens of directors and show-runners. But still, I can't help but find myself behaving like Columbus. I've already ticked off rule #17 by attempting to be a hero and I have been checking the back seat of my car (rule #31) every time I get in. For what, I don't know. This isn't a zombie apocalypse (or, at least, it better flipping not be). The truth is, I don't entirely know what type of apocalypse we have in store here.

I need to rewind a little.

So I've alluded to the fact that we were slowly killing the planet. To be fair to humanity, we've known this since my great, great grandfather and my great, great grandmother were making out at drive-through movies (or whatever – ok, they weren't that old, but you get the idea). It's actually hard to believe that anyone ever thought that it'd be absolutely fine to carry on consuming and burning and dumping and... well, you get the picture.

But I'm not here to go on an eco-rant. We did what we did (and by 'we', I mean some people. And maybe some other people who could've actually used their influence and basic behavioural science to try to halt what everyone could see was happening. But they didn't. Anyway, the point was that it wasn't every single person trying their best to ruin everything. I don't especially want to be retrospectively blamed for whatever crappy shacks future gens are having to survive in, tiptoeing around in case aliens with laser-emitting eyes/overly-sensitive hearing/grumpy dispositions are on the constant hunt for the delicacy they consider to be human brains. Or whatever. But the thing is, I just know that that's what's going to happen. And I suppose, ok, by taking part in the world as it was, by buying over-priced coffee and non-printed bread, I was doing my insidious little bit, even if I was doing so relatively innocently) (Of course, this is assuming that there will be future gens. Right now, I'm not sure where I'd put my money).

And, of course, the consequences: everything, everywhere getting hotter and wetter. Hardly anyone can remember when Britain was more than just Scotland. Places just started disappearing. Under water. Obviously, this was just about enough to make whichever governing group at the time take some action. Equally obviously, at least in retrospect, it was very much too late.

Fortunately - if we can use any derivative of 'fortune' here – science and tech helped us to compensate in other ways. Globally, we had enough food. Every country could pretty much create its own plentiful and therefore stable economy. People had enough and society stopped focussing on obtaining things. Because we could have almost anything, at any time, that inherent greediness borne from – boredom? Envy? Hard to say - but whichever external factors had caused it slowly disappeared. Once consumerism slowed down to an almost standstill, things evened out, more or less.

It seemed like we'd reversed a lot of the damage that had been done. Temperatures settled. Flooding stopped being a regular thing. Three million species were brought back from the edge of extinction (though, all things being equal, I think we could use a few less bugs here in Everridge). And humanity rolled along like this for quite a long time, relief that started in the forefront of their minds drifting further and further back towards the cortex where it was gradually, and mostly, forgotten.