Author: David Barber

Rona Lal no longer remembered her exact age, but the entelechy did, and arranged a surprise for her birthday. There would be a trip to the beach in what used to be England and the company of Jammes Bek, who had once been her husband.

“Can’t hear you,” Bek shouted over the music. He played along with an Eric Clapton holo, not well but very loud.

Abruptly, at the entelechy’s command, the power died.

Have you anything better to do? the entelek resumed. They both knew Bek’s acquaintances were spending their last hours elsewhere.

Reluctantly Bek put down the guitar. “The beach it is then, and I shall throw sticks for you.”

He was shocked at the sight of Rona, her youthful flesh burdened with a brain brimming full with the centuries.

They walked for a while, until Rona rested on a bench overlooking the sea. Soon her head nodded.

You are a cold and selfish man, Jammes Bek, the entelek murmured in his ear. Yet Rona, who has all the goodness you lack, saw fit to love you.

“After we parted, I edited my memories,” Bek confessed. “Got rid of the guilt.”

I do not think either of us have souls.

“There’s a good dog,” said Bek, hoping it must irritate at last.

In her dream, Rona explains to Jammes why she didn’t want to live forever. Because you lose human feeling for things that don’t last. With each renewal of his brain, Jammes put no value on his self, on any particular self.

You live forever, she tells him, but it isn’t you.

Rona woke and her eyes gleamed. Streaks of fire crossed the sky, all the old stuff in orbit falling.

“Are those fireworks for my birthday?”

The entelek said nothing and Bek studied the rushing clouds.

“I’ve forgotten something, haven’t I?”

“Only the end of the world,” said Bek. He expected to feel more than this, but who really believes in their own end.

“How long do we have?” Rona asked.

Not long.

Bek noticed how the entelek’s voice softened when speaking to Rona, so he sat down beside her and she squeezed his hand.

“I’ve enjoyed my birthday, Jammes.”

“So have I,” he said, surprising himself.

He gazed at the woman he had married lifetimes ago. “Look,” he began. “This is my last chance to explain—”

Her smile grew empty.

I knew you would spoil it. She is in a loop. She will never be more content than she is at this moment.

Bek wiped his eyes. “No wonder we hate you.”

The entelek had fashioned an agent that over-expressed oxytocin, hoping to make Bek more compassionate, but it wasn’t a precise tool and he had become maudlin.

Here is something for you.

“Looks like a Les Paul.”

There were giant amps and tumbled heaps of speakers in the dunes and just touching the strings lofted seabirds all along the shore.

There really isn’t much time.

“1975, old reckoning. The Rover, from the Physical Graffiti album.”

The wind had picked up and the evening was brighter and hotter than it should be in England.

Hurry.

He crashed out the first few chords better than he had ever played them, then cranked the amps up to eleven, until it sounded like mountains shifting or the roar of oceans emptying their basins.

Squeezing his eyes shut against the brilliance, he struck a pose with the guitar, a furnace wind whipping his hair. He shouted the words into the storm, though it was beyond words, playing on as the world ended.