Remember Not To Forget

Today is April 31.

For most of you alive, those words read like a typo, or at best, someone who hasn’t grasped how the calendar works yet. But for a handful of us, that date still means something. Everything. On that date twenty-five years ago, the world ended.

The person who had sent me that message obviously belonged to the latter group. But it wasn’t the first anonymous message I had received from the sender. The reason for my stay in the arrivals hall at Palma de Majorca airport today was the message that preceded it yesterday.

April 31. 14:30. PMI. Arrivals. Zone C

A little ditty came to mind which is sung by children and adults alike – to call it a rhyme would be generous. ‘Thirty days have September, April, June and November. All the rest have thirty-one – except for February which is a leap-year.’ Whoever wrote that started well, but they seemed to lose their way as the piece progressed.

A fitting picture for what led to the end of the world.

* * *

Those who had started the internet also started well, but just like that so-called rhyme of today, they lost their way.

The world as we knew it changed overnight with the availability of the internet: instant access to people, images and information on the other side of the world – for me, guitar tablature to accompany my teenage kicks. But as the decades rolled by, the ‘information superhighway’ became more accessible – from your car dashboard, your hand-held phone and even your digital watch. No one was left behind – even senior citizens were taught to become internet savvy.

In the run up to the end, it was continually joked about robots taking over. AI bots were thanked at every opportunity to curtail the impending wrath of the machines when the inevitable eventuality of an uprising came to be. But in reality, what led to the end was much simpler than that.

Thirty years ago, the internet plummeted in price, costing almost no more than air. It became as important as breathing. But that was no accident.

Across the globe, after the internet’s invention, a group of five men – known as The High Five – had been curating the world to make it dependent on data. In the beginning, it was just business. But soon after, they realised their shared role in the breakdown of society.

But it was too late.

The market had already exploded. The boom was due to supply and demand. Who was at fault? The suppliers or the consumers – those demanding the product? There would be no demand if there were no supply; but there would be no supply if there was no demand . . .

With an increase in demand to constantly stay connected with people and bots, new global networks were continuously supplied.

But demand culminated on April 30. A global transmission of a sporting event required a next-gen network. In layman’s terms, a malfunction led to a mass blackout; it was followed by a surge of power to everyone connected to the network or in proximity to it. I don’t intend to patronize, but it could be compared to when water flow suffers an unexpected outage, when the supply is switched back on, what can follow is ‘water hammer’ – a violent burst of water.

It’s not the purpose of this article to detail the amplified levels of electromagnetic radiation which was spat out during that high-intensity transmission; nor explicitly outline how the microwave frequencies robbed unsuspecting people of their all-important senses – sight, hearing and touch.

The point is, before a post-mortem of the cause of the chaos could be carried out, The High Five cowardly went into hiding. In time, their disciples re-booted under the name The Fist, removing April 31 from the calendar and the event from everyone’s mind. May 1 marked an international holiday – a day remembering the newly awoken season. But I now remember the day for what really happened and my role I had to play it in. It did happen. And it will happen again.

* * *

The airport’s arrival hall was flooded with tourists. There really was nothing like an international holiday to get people to travel to a Mediterranean island – the perfect place to disappear. I knew all about that.

It has been said that the best place to cure a bout of sadness is at the arrival hall at an airport; the overwhelming expressions of joy provide a chance to recalibrate your own problems.

But little is documented about the impact it can have on an individual if the passengers of that airport had come out of the other side of a global, mass-culling at the hands of reckless tech warlords.

Until now.

Blurred sight and flashes of light once limited their vision, distorting everyday details; yet I watched them navigate the passenger traffic with zero visual prejudice, now guided by a new instinct, and deep awareness of more than superficial appearances.

Tingling and burning in their fingers had disrupted their normal touch, turning a banal sensation into an intense sensory overload; but with a new heightened perception, they profoundly appreciate the smooth texture and the quiet warmth of that person’s face who they’ve longed to meet.

Buzzing and clicking sounds used to fog their hearing, interrupting the capacity for peaceful thoughts; however, now attentive to the vibrations of that long-awaited passenger’s speech, they find meaning behind the noise.

The previous generation of handicapped survivors merged before me with a crowd of fresh-faced hopefuls. While my levels of guilt had ramped up, so did my hope. As I contemplated their united refusal to let a tragedy hamper their need to connect with other humans, courage grew within me to face what I knew to be inevitable.

Emerging from the crowd, two young men. Carrying briefcases and wearing the same seasonal t-shirt sharing the same slogan. The letter ‘R’ was faded.

MAY THE FIRST BE WITH YOU

The Fist.

They clocked me.

Slowly, they walked towards me with unreadable smiles. I stood up straight as one of them held a phone and appeared to be typing a message.

We remember not to forget.

You are the last of The High Five.

Today you will finally help usher in a new world . . .