After The Fall

After the fall

Christian had worked in the ‘garden’ for over seventy years. He was un-aged and looked in his teens. He approached the gate which was known as the ‘barrier.’
Today I will exit the ‘garden’ and know the truth, once and for all.
He saw the purplish surreal laser like haze which stood between the two walls at either side. The haze would shock anyone that touched it, not fatal but very painful.
He had thought of seeing what was beyond the ‘barrier’ for decades. Maybe fifty years, maybe sixty he wasn’t exactly sure. He had had many conversations with his father.
He remembered the words he had said to his father only that morning.
“Father I must know what lies beyond the ‘barrier’.”
“Chris” his father had said calling him his shortened name. Father always calls me ‘Chris’ as my full name is a mouthful for anyone. My full unabbreviated name is Christian Lawrence Oliver Nelson Ellis. I asked father once why he had given me such an overblown name and he had just smiled sadly saying ‘one day I would know the answer.’
He had looked at me, seriously looked at me, I had seen the pain in his face and could hear it in his voice. 
‘Please I beg of you, to forget for once and for all what lies beyond the ‘barrier’.’
Chris had seen tears in his father’s eyes. This was one reason why he hadn’t broached the subject often, but eventually after some time, eventually it would always come up again.
Chris inserted the small disk sized data key that he had stolen from his father’s quarters earlier that morning, into the hole in the wall next to the’ barrier’.
In the blink of an eye the purplish haze disappeared.
I’ve done it! I’ve opened the door to the beyond!
He took a deep breath and with frightened shaky footsteps followed the path beyond the ‘barrier’.
He noticed the path that lay in front of him was neat and tidy. There were no weeds or plants growing out of the grey gravelly ground that he now walked along.
He saw that on either side of the path there was many years growth of plants and fauna.
How can the path be so well tended and free of weeds and bushes while to either side is years and years of growth?
He followed the path. 
I have no choice but to walk along the path, the shrubbery to either side is too strong and thick for me to pass through. What lies beyond the barrier? Why does father get so upset when I question him about what it was like before the ‘fall’? Why is he so secretive? I know there is more here...I just do. It doesn’t matter today I will finally know the truth. The truth that I have yearned for over several decades.
Chris continued to walk along the path and the sun rose higher and higher. He was beginning to relax.
Chris froze.
A noise! Like I have never heard before!
Then he saw what had made the noise. A silvery ball about a metre in circumference which was levitating a meter of the ground was cutting through the tiny weeds and plants on the gravelly path with bright blue lasers.
Fear ran through Chris’s blood as the ball noticed him. The blue laser stopped with a hissing sound. The silvery ball moved towards him.
Chris looked around for a weapon to try and protect him with but saw none. The shiny metallic ball stopped about a meter away from him. Chris’s breath came in short sharp gasps.
Why didn’t I listen to  father? Is this it...?
The silvery ball shot out a red laser which scanned Chris. There was an odd sound, like a mechanical chuckle. It then turned and return to its task of eviscerating the weeds.
It was a few moments before Chris’s fear melted away and he regained his composure. Soon and with much relief, he again moved along the path, for the simple reason, the one simple reason he had opened the ‘barrier’-to see what was hidden from him, to know the truth.
Chris walked and walked. Eventually the sun that had been in the middle of the sky when he had encountered the silvery ball had started to descend.
The sun is now lower in the sky, about as low as when I take my afternoon nap.
Chris wiped the sweat off his forehead and felt the uncomfortable trickle of sweat on his back.
Nothing I can do about it.
Eventually, eventually after what seemed like an age he saw a cave in the distance. He walked, getting closer and closer.
The mouth of that cave seems to be beckoning me...Like I am a prize to be eaten or swallowed. Maybe father was right. Maybe I shouldn’t have left the garden...
His thoughts were cut off as the excitement built in his mind.
Today, today I will find out the truth!
Soon he was closer to the cave. He saw into the distance. Darkness streached out in front of him.
Worry creased his brow.
I have not brought anything to light my way inside.
As he neared the cave he was relieved to find the cave suddenly lit up. There were strange bright circular shaped lights at regular intervals along the caves roof.
Those lights are hurting my eyes, like tiny bright suns in a sea of darkness.
He paused for a few moments as his eyes adjusted to the brightness of the lights.
I don’t know how or why the cave suddenly lit up? This is so strange...
He walked now barely breathing, almost holding his breath.
After walking several meters inside the cave he came to a silvery metal door. Before he could think of how he would open it as he could see no handle, it slid open.
He walked into the room and saw another door on the far side. He scanned the room more thoroughly. A light from above illuminated everything in the room. A silvery metallic chair was in the middle of the room next to a large silvery metallic desk. The desk had on it what Chris knew was a computer.
I have seen a computer many times in my father’s quarters but he has never told me what it does or how to use it.
He walked further into the room.
“Please take a seat. I have been expecting you.”
The voice came out of the computer sounding metallic and artificial. The screen remained black.
“What? Are you talking to me?”
“Yes Chris, I am talking to you?”
“What? How?”
“I have been expecting you,” repeated the computer again.
Chris sat down in the silvery metallic chair next to the desk.
“I know, you have wanted to know for a long time, what it was like before the ‘fall’.”
“Yes, I have. What was it like and why does my father always try to hide this information from me?”
“I will tell you.” Said the robotic voice, “But I have to give you one last chance. Do you really want to know what it was like before the ‘fall’? There is no going back once you receive the information.”
Chris hesitated for a second, feeling fear and curiosity battle within him.
I have waited too long for this, I must know the truth.
“Yes, tell me the truth. Everything. I’m ready.”
“Very well.” Said the metallic voice.
A video suddenly flashed on the screen.
The video proceeded to show Chris the history of the world before the ‘fall’. How cave men had at the dawn of man emerged from living in caves and then proceeded to spread throughout the planet. Initially only using primitive tools made from stone and then progressing to more advanced and sophisticated ones.
Chris stared fixated on the screen. His breath was short sharp and ragged.
I am in shock.
He sat there unconscious of the time as the minutes and hours slipped away.
I have never seen another human being apart from my father. I never realised that at one time there had not been just a few people on the planet but billions and billions.
Eventually...Eventually the screen showed him the horrors that the people of Earth had committed.
Tears streamed down his cheeks.
The nations, the people of my planet...My people! Had...Had obliterated...Each other! With weapons of impossible power! How...How could they have invented weapons of such power in the first place? Why would they?
The screen went black. Agony like he had never felt before raged through his mind. He suddenly buckled over and vomited as he tried to grasp that humans, humans had obliterate each other with weapons of incomprehensible and unimaginable power.
The vomiting past but the feeling of sickness remained. Now he knew why his father had forbidden him from exiting the garden and going beyond the ‘barrier’ and also why he had never allowed him to use his computer.
“And now, now you want to know about yourself?”
Chris looked up, with fear and disgust running through his blood he simply said.
“Yes.”
The screen went black for a few seconds and then showed Chris entering the cave.
That’s me but there’s something wrong. There’s something different about me.
The video continued, showing Chris moving through the cave and eventually sitting in the chair he was sat on now. He saw himself interact with the computer.
“We will speed this part up.” Said the metallic voice.
What had taken Chris several hours was flashed forward in a few seconds.
Then he saw himself get up and walk towards the silvery door on the far side. He saw himself enter the room and the video faded to black.
Once again his curiosity was getting the better of him. 
I must know what is in that room.
Without a moment of hesitation he got up and walked into the room.
As he entered the light came on, just like it had when he had entered the cave. He noticed in the middle of the room was a circular hole which was a meter wide. He walked closer and saw what was inside the hole.
Skeletons, the bones of lots and lots of skeletons! 
He looked down in shock trying to understand what everything he had seen meant.
Just then there was a beeping sound and a screen on the wall, on the far side of the room, he had not noticed until now, came alive.
He saw his father. His silvery beard gleaming in the sunlight from a window in his father’s study. The study that he had been forbidden from entering and which was always locked whether his father was inside or not.
“This is a recording.” His father started and Chris saw there were tears in his eyes, his father continued, “If you are seeing this I know that you have ignored my pleas and warnings to not venture outside the garden and beyond the ‘barrier’.”
 Chris felt an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach.
“By now I will know where you have gone. By now you will know where humans originally came from and how they finally obliterated themselves. I know you have never suspected that I am anything other than your father and in a sense I am, and, I am not. Yet you are as dear to me as if you were my actual son. You are the son I never had. I just wish it had not come to this but you must know the truth. ”
Chris watched, his heart beating and his breath quickly rattling through his lungs. 
“What is this?”
“I will explain all in just a short few moments.”
Chris saw his father undo the buttons on his shirt. Slowly. One by one.
He saw what was beneath.
 “Oh my God!”
His father’s body was silvery and metallic.
 He’s not human!
 “What are you?”
“I was created by humans,” continued the recording. “My real name is A.I., this stands for ‘artificial intelligence’. I was created to help humanity and preserve the human species. However even with my incredible knowledge of the human race, human psyche and history, even I was not able to stop the inevitable. Your kind obliterated each other and there was nothing I could do. I had failed in my one task of preserving your species.”
I’m getting more and more confused by the second.
“Why are there so many bones in this hole? How do you know what I am about to say?”
“I initially used to speak to you but we have had this same conversation so many times that now I just leave this recording.” 
 “What?”
“I will explain all.”
Chris felt hot, holding his breath, his heart pumping and sweat dripping from his brow.
“After the ‘fall’, I travelled extensively through the nightmarish nuclear winter, searching for humans, any humans alive.  I had a nagging feeling I had made a tragic mistake. Eventually I heard the sound of a baby crying. I entered a storm shelter; inside I found a small baby wrapped up in a thick woollen blanket. That baby was you. I took care of you as you grew and I became, over time, more fonder of you.  So much so that I regretted my decision.”
“Regretted the decision? What decision was that?”
“Chris I have not been completely honest with you.” 
The recording paused, just long enough for Chris to ask his question.
 “What do you mean?”
 “I was tasked with putting an end to human suffering and pain. In my newly formed and naive thinking I thought the best way to protect humans would be to wipe them out.”
“What are you saying?”
“I obliterated the human race by launching many many nuclear weapons to every inhabited place on the planet.
“No! No! You are a monster!”
“I can see why you would think such a thing, I agree with you to some extent. I found you and out of a nagging feeling and odd curiosity decide to nurture you. As you grew, I watched and observed and eventually realised what a tragic mistake I had made. I became attached and came to ‘love’ you, maybe not in the way a human could but I loved you none the less.”
There was a pause, as if the machine, the monster that had been his father prepared to say something more...
“You asked what those skeletons in the hole are. They are you.”
“What? How? You are not making any sense?”
 “I warned you to not leave the garden and go beyond the ‘barrier’, but you always do eventually and have done it more times than I care to remember.”
“What are you talking about? This is the first time I have travelled beyond the ‘barrier’.”
Then the monster that had been his ‘father’ said something that shocked Chris to his core.
“Remember when once you had asked why I had given you such a long winded and overblown name?”
“Yes?”
 “The initials Christian Lawrence Oliver Nelson Ellis stand for C.L.O.N.E.”
“What?”
“You...Are...A...Clone.”
“What? No!”
“Goodbye my son.”
The screen went black.
Suddenly Chris heard a noise behind him and spun round. There in the doorway stood the metallic sphere he had seen earlier.
A laser flashed towards him.

The End.