Chapter 7

(IF YOU HAVE PREVIOUSLY READ CHAPTER 6 BEFORE THIS WAS POSTED, PLEASE SKIM THROUGH IT AGAIN, THERE HAVE BEEN SOME MAJOR ELEMENTS CHANGED)

“Excuse me folks, but we’re not open yet,” a middle-aged man behind the cooking area said.

“Actually, we’re just here to talk to Mr. Fisher.” Anna replied.

“Fisher? You’re looking at him.” The man replied.

“Uhm, are you the only Fisher? I was told that Mr. Fisher was an old man.” Anna indicated.

“Nope, definitely the only Fisher.” He said.

“Alright, Mr. Fisher. Are you familiar with a doctor named Sienna?” I asked.

“Sienna? Sure! Oh… you’re the ones she was talking about! I’m so sorry, my mind forgets things easily nowadays.” He said.

Mr. Fisher walked out from behind the cooking area and shook our hands.

“Pleasure to meet you all! I’ve heard a lot of things, all good I assure you! Haha!” he said, casually. “So, what brings you to my restraunt today?”

Jonathan and I looked at Anna. To be truthful, it never dawned on me to ask Anna why we came here.

“Well, Sienna thought it would be a good idea for us to learn about the history of the dome and us. She said you were the best person to ask.” Anna informed him.

“Did she now? Well, I’m not sure whether I should be honored or insulted! But I guess I’ll ignore that for now, for old time’s sake.”

I wondered just what kind of old times Sienna and Mr. Fisher could have had, since she only escaped to the camp a year earlier. I didn’t bother to ask right then, though.

“Well, if you want to hear the story of City Eternal, you might as well take a seat.” He said, directing us to the stools in front of the cooking area.

As we sat down, Jonathan spoke up and asked, “So why does Sienna consider you to be so knowledgeable in the history of the dome?”

“Well, I guess that’s a good place to start. I have an intimate knowledge of the history of City Eternal because I was there from it’s conception.”

“That’s impossible, the dome was built over a hundred years ago!” Jonathan exclaimed.

“Quiet! Are you going to listen to my story or are you going to psychoanalyze it?” Mr. Fisher replied, annoyed.
Jonathan apologized, and Mr. Fisher continued with his story.

“I used to be a scientist working at the US fusion reactor plant. I wasn’t high up in the ranks, but it paid the bills and the work wasn’t too hard. Anyway, one day, I had just finished my shift. I was in the chamberlock, which was an airtight secure checkpoint between the inside of the plant and the outside. While they were performing the usual checkout procedure, there was a loud explosion and numerous alarms sounded off.”

“You were there at the beginning of the reactor failure?” I asked.

“Yes,” he replied. “After a few minutes, I heard an announcement that the emergency egress hatches had been opened. Unfortunately for me, there were no hatches in the chamberlock. I was trapped. Minutes continued to pass, and I could hear the sound of the uncontrolled fusion reaction eating away at the infrastructure of the plant. There was a few more loud explosions, and finally a part of the chamberlock gave way, allowing me to escape.”

“I ran my ass off to the parking lot. There was hardly a soul in sight, everyone had already taken off. I looked back for a moment, feeling the immense heat of the reaction. That’s when the reaction finally hit the fuel deposits at the bottom of the plant. Those idiots could have prevented such rapid destruction if they had followed the emergency guidelines. Those fuel deposits were supposed to be neutralized in case of a reactor failure. Instead, in the heat of the moment, they were left alone. As I was running, I heard a rumbling. Rather, I felt a rumbling, deep in my chest. It shook me right to the core, and made it hard to think. I looked back again, to see the color of the reaction change rapidly. I knew then it had hit the fuel deposits. In the next instant, I was hit by a massive shock-wave of air from the rapid increase of heat.”

“I’m not sure how, but I woke up a few hours later, miles away from the plant. I was lying on my back, all my clothes burned off, but my body was in perfect condition. The radiation from the fusion reactor had given me eter-nal life. That, my friends, is how I can tell you this story better than anyone else.” Mr. Fisher said, with a shallow smile on his face.

“Eternal life? That’s impossible!” I said in disbelief.

“Impossible? This is coming from a girl with superhuman speed?” he replied with a smirk.

“I, uh, right.” I shut up quick.

“Anyway, after the explosion, the country was a mess. And that wasn’t all. The other reactors similarly exploded over the next couple months. The uncontrollable reactions continued to grow, causing incredible devastation to the world, not just to the ground near it, but to the air, and the weather patterns. The sky slowly blackened with soot from everything burning. Temperatures dropped dramatically.”

“So what did they do?” Anna asked.

“At first we thought the reactions would burn themselves out. But it became obvious that they no longer needed the fuel deposits to sustain themselves; they had become self-sustaining. The massive size of the reaction had enough surface area to draw material to burn right from its surroundings. The governments, what was left of them, formed a pact to destroy all the reactions with an experimental nuclear detonation.” He explained.

“Nuclear detonations? How in the world would that solve anything?” Jonathan questioned.

“It was a bit ironic, looking back. The one thing we all were sure would result in our eventual extinction would come to be the last hope for our survival. Unfortunately, this last ditch effort was not without it’s own side effects. What would happen is the explosives would separate the reactions from the earth, which would remove the reactions’ fuel supply. It took a lot of nuclear explosives to pull it off, but they were able to finally starve the reactions. By that time, however, most of the planet was a wasteland. What wasn’t irradiated by the reactions or nuclear deto-nations was frozen solid from the cold.”

“So that’s when they built the dome…”

“Yes. And it wasn’t a smooth political process either. Despite the fact that most countries were reduced to popula-tions smaller than some individual US states, they all believed they deserved the right to the remaining world re-sources to build the new dome shelter. Months of bickering and more lost lives finally resulted in New York City being the prime location. Not because they agreed, but because it was the only place left on the planet that was hospitable enough to build such a structure. Their bickering had dwindled their options down to only one city. New York City, like most of the planet, was also frozen over, but it had the most building material that could be recy-cled, it was close to the ocean, and it wasn’t too irradiated yet.” Mr. Fisher explained solemnly.

“What? Politicians arguing even at the cost of human lives? Color me surprised!” I said sarcastically.

“So then the dome was built. But there’s only one government now. What happened after the dome was built?” Jonathan asked.

“Hold on, there. That’s a whole ‘nother story. Let’s leave it at that for now. There’s something else I need to talk to you and Yukari about.”

“And Anna?” I said, curious.

“Just you two. She can listen in but it concerns your future here at the camp, and the resistance.” Mr. Fisher said ominously.

Jonathan and I nodded, and I rubbed Anna’s shoulder.

“You want to go out and play some of the festival games?” I asked Anna.

“No thanks, I wanna listen.”

“Alright then, it’s settled. Before I start, could I interest any of you in some Monjayaki?” He said with a grin.