First Gear - Eve Langlais Page 0,1

of their problems. The smoke from their combustion machines filled the air, reducing the amount of sunlight the crops received, tainting the rain that fell from the sky. Which, in turn, ruined their lakes and rivers.

The fish died. The vegetation wilted. Animals became sickly and died en masse on the farms. Those left in the wild, of which there were few places, disappeared.

That, in turn, affected the food supply chain, a vicious cycle that they only took note of too late. The day of reckoning had arrived, and it judged them harshly.

Rather than add to the problem by hailing a cab, he chose to walk. A tall man in his early thirties, a professor of history, forced to beg for funds since he’d already spent all of his grant researching a way out of this mess. Not being a scientist, he didn’t know how to fix the toxicity in the soil or how to reduce emissions. But he did know the mountains were the one place untouched by civilization. Their rocky barrier may be providing a filter to the pollution. Could there still be animal life capable of providing meat amongst its peaks?

No one seemed to know. No one seemed to care.

The airships always swung a wide berth around them, claiming treacherous wind currents. As for explorers, none appeared willing to brave the dangers, not with the stories of monsters and people not returning once they trekked into them.

As he walked, hands tucked in his pockets, Jool couldn’t help but recall Geoff’s recommendation to leave the city, to enjoy what little time was left. Would the air by the mountains, far from industrialization, be any better? Or would it just delay the inevitable?

The people on the street paid him no mind, busy going along with whatever made them rush. Too many people for a planet already strained.

The newspapers piled in the boxes he passed still pretended their world wasn’t in dire straits. They didn’t tell the truth, didn’t mention the people dying from hunger, the suicides caused by despair, the unrest as the population wailed at the government to fix it.

His world was dying, and yet no one seemed ready to do anything about it. Then again, what could they do?

Even if all the machines were to stop belching tomorrow, that wouldn’t create food or un-poison the soil. Wouldn’t cure the illnesses plaguing more than half the population.

No one wanted to hear the truth. Just like no one wanted to abandon their precious commodities.

Perhaps they deserved annihilation for not taking better care of their world.

The university where he taught took up an entire city block, towering higher almost than Parliament. It was said that the very top floors actually peeked above the layer of smog and enjoyed sunlight. He didn’t know for sure. A professor of history was relegated belowground with the books people had forgotten. A past that they claimed had no bearing on the future.

A good point in a sense. After all, how could the stone age of his people help them? His ancestors had never taken more than the land could handle.

A loud horn startled, and he glanced to the side to see the racing vehicle of an enforcer fleeing by, belching smoke and flashing lights. There were more of them around these days, doing their best to maintain a fragile peace.

It wouldn’t take much to explode the populace. Hungry bellies and aching lungs tended to make a person grouchy. As if to remind him, he barely managed to bring a cloth to his mouth before he coughed, a hard hack that hurt his chest. But no blood yet. He knew once that sign appeared, the countdown to death started.

The front doors to the university were made of solid metal, some kind of malleable bronze that in his youth used to shine in the sun. The grime coating them turned the surface a dark gray. Kind of like the sun, which appeared as a diffused lighter spot in the smog overhead.

Apparently, outside the city you could still see it at times depending on which way the wind blew. He wouldn’t mind seeing it one last time. Leaving wouldn’t pose much of a problem. It wasn’t as if he had any students left. At times he was fairly sure the university forgot he existed. He doubted they’d notice if he suddenly stopped showing up for work or even emptied the library and took it with him.

As he stepped inside the building, the noise outside faded, and he uttered