There were only six of them left. Not that they ever were numerous, of course; at their best, there were sixty-two people at the Round Table.
Some died facing right-wing fanatics, madmen or the few crazed monstrosities -- "shamblers", they were called -- generated by the desires of a mind too insane to be cured by the Essence. Some changed their mind under heavy peer pressure when the new species became the majority. Most, however, were forcefully converted when some of the Keepers felt strong enough to break the treaty and overrule the tolerant party led by Lustatia and Raven, second- and third-generation Keepers respectively.
The experiment, begun in Cuba after its rather peaceful recruitment, was progressing nicely. Using a mixture of alien, conventional and secret technology such as that given to Reverend Rush and others by whoever pulled the strings back then, the island had been cleaned, refertilized, and made completely self-sustaining.
The 62 came from every culture of the world, and pretty much managed to keep the best of each. A government wasn't really needed of course, but a simple direct democracy with limited private ownership had been decided for when the population increased.
The deal was free electrical energy in exchange for control over the Caribbean area, a solution Lily managed to negotiate with the first Keepers shortly after the fall of China. However, when two reborns -- the famous Halloween Harry and Chiara, who had wished to be recreated as a mermaid -- decided to transfer there to see what was coming up, Mega-Cock decided that to allow Homo Sapiens to continue existing was too dangerous, also because the Round Table was far too left-wing in his eyes.
Andrej couldn't help blaming himself; it was his fault to be too trusting. Sure, Steven did say that there were more urgent things than defense, but as a former Red Guard officer (and then mercenary, for a while, because he didn't know what else to do) he should have known better.
Six of them as they were, Andrej was more prone to call this home. Maybe for the labels in Russian and the hammer-and-sickle symbol everywhere. Or maybe it was because what was under Space Station Mir was going to become an alien world very soon.
For the first time since their fortuitous landing on the battered space station, they were all awake instead of taking turns. A big television set, certainly too big for the room, was connected to a broken satellite that Steven repaired and was now working as an antenna. With a minimum of distortion, three men and three women could see a large arena full of people -- full of Keepers, actually. In the centre, a robed woman was about to speak.
"Homo Coitus, I Georgette Hooper, last of Homo Sapiens, bids my race good bye and looks with trepidation at the future. You Keepers are the bringers of this change, I am the last voice apart from your order. I ask this one thing. Remember us with kindness. We weren't perfect, we had our flaws, but we did bring the world this far without destroying it completely. I leave my old life behind. The new life, the new me, will think, act, look, and feel different. Remember the old me." She then went to the center of the stage, pulled a blindfold from the pocket of her robe and tied it on. She then nervously let her robe slowly slid off. "Good bye, world. All right, Sexxony, do it."
Lily was using her back breasts, filled with all the fresh orange juice they still had (they proved out to preserve food perfectly) as pillows. Therefore when the transformation occured, she was the only one not to hit the steel walls with her head. Nobody said anything. They were too astonished by the totally alien being that came out of the amber dome.
What was more frightening were the last of its first words.
"Madre de Dios... they're going to do this to the whole universe?"
"They have both the technology and the organization, so it's likely."
"I say we bomb the place for good!"
"Guys... please. I know it's hard for us all, but we're still here right? That - thing over there means that the generation-based hierarchy of the Keepers will change."
"Lily, you mean there will be a revolution? They don't care about that stuff anymore."
"No, comrade, I tell you what she means, she's been with them all along!"
"Are you out of your mind, Francisco?"
"She's been recruited! And she had the idea of coming here!"
"WHAT WERE WE SUPPOSED TO DO, KAMIKAZE?!?"
"I didn't-"
"Oh, don't play the innocent. We're here in the middle of nowhere, in a zombie space station, with food for a month and not even space to stretch!"
The discussion kept going for a while. Giulia knew it was only a reaction from seeing the last human being on Earth disappear under a flood of Essence, and just let it die. It was nothing stoppable, six persons in a small place with nowhere to go were bound to have such outbursts.
As always, Steve was the first to leave the room. Work to do on the new module they got from an old LEM, he said, but he was crying. Lily was in no better condition, and soon followed. In times of crisis they were enough for each other.
The remaining four were more adult, so they calmed down somehow. Ponchi, the Japanese young lady, didn't say a word other than a sarcastic comment in her native tongue. For Francisco and Andrej it took some more time, but Giulia was used to these things; being a psych major, it was normal.
"Let's talk about something more serious, shall we? You heard that."
"Si, entonces? It's all over. They won and we lost."
"Francisco, we still have five bullets in our cartridge."
"Oh, here comes Karl Marx. Now look, I-"
"ehm..."
"Oh, sorry Giulia..."
"It's ok. The problem is that we have been able to identify at least three tendencies of the Keepers..."
They knew what she was talking about: those who wanted to take over the universe, those who wanted to coexist with others if they really wanted to, and those who just didn't care. Mega-Cock, the most influential, belonged to the first group; the second just stopped existing. The third encompassed most of the higher-generation Keepers and some elders.
"...but the Avatar, as we might call it, expressed itself very clearly."
"Do you expect some kind of internal turmoil?"
"No, unfortunately. The so-called Pax Erotica will probably endure its first crisis, and all the subsequent ones."
"So what's your idea?"
"I say we land, get an engine and head for another planet. We can probably restart on the Moon; I heard about the water. Or maybe Mars."
"Hmm..."
"Excuse me." The often-silent Ponchi raised her hand, knowing that this was the best way to get attention. "I think that, if we can remove Mega-Cock and this Avatar, it will be possible for group Two or Three to tolerate our presence."
"Tolerate?!?"
"Yes, Ponchi's right. Face it, Andrej, we're only six and we don't need much room now. But to kill them altogether..."
"It's impossible. They will be protected too strongly, we'd have to act within fifteen minutes or never! Which means never!"
"Good idea, devotcha. I say nuke them."
"Good news and bad news, which one first?" asked Steven, dashing through the open blast door.
"Bad." "Good." "Bad."
"Ok. Bad news is that the recycling system I installed won't hold for more than three months. Good news is that we have enough fuel to reach the Moon in nine days, I think."
"So that is it? The Moon?"
"Forgive me if I ask.... but why not all at once?"
This was Lily, coming from who knows where, as usual. Five puzzled faces turned to her.
"I mean, one of us could go ask the Avatar if there's room for six. And we could go over there" and she pointed to the silver disk, visible from a small glass "and rebuild... I remember where the water patch was."
"It's got to be a guy, you saw how Georgette got caught."
"I'll do it."
Lily looked deeply at Andrej's eyes and took his hand in hers.
"Promise me you won't kill anyone."
"I... uh... yes, I promise."
To everyone's surprise, Andrej already had his gear packed. It took a moment for him to get in the Soyuz lander, but before leaving he took a big sip of orange juice directly from Lily's slightly pendulous living backpacks, which the spacesuit just couldn't fit. She couldn't help blushing.
"Aah, thanks so much."
"Good luck! Hasta la victoria! Sayonara! Buona fortuna! Go Red!"
And before the echoes died, the capsule was launched.
Later that day, while the others were working on the trajectory, Giulia took Lily aside.
"Why did you said that to Andrej?"
"Why I asked him not to kill? Well... this, all this, there have been too many deaths already. At least a quarter million."
"You don't really think that he will, do you?"
"He promised!"
"Yes, he did, but... hey, where are you going?" Perhaps I made a mistake, Giulia thought.
The only thing left of Lily was a note on Steven's bed. She would use a coil suit and ribbon chute, neither of which had been properly tested yet, to land and stop Andrej's assassination attempt.
Steven felt like it was a nightmare. He remembered two years before, when the future was bright and blue. Now what? His best friend and the only one he truly loved in life, against each other and an alien world. He knew he couldn't leave the station, he knew that nothing he could do was going to help. A new beginning never started so gloomily, he thought as he gave the final touches to the engine.
The celebrations lasted a whole day, and among the fireworks nobody noticed the cosmonaut landing in the snowy plains of his Ukraine: it was just another bright dot in the sky. Silently, the first thing he did was to load the steam-driven sniper pistol. "For the People!" he yelled. An abandoned Volki truck was right there for him to reach the first town and make a serious plan.
Thousands of kilometers away, in the depths of the Caribbean, a small probe balloon landed into the ocean. An observer could have noticed that it was actually Lily, almost invisible between the four hydrogen-filled globes that ensured her a good reentry; however, nobody was around except for a couple of young lovers who wondered "what exactly was that?"
Chiara and Nemo raced each other playfully to the UFO (unidentified floating object), and soon the mermaid and her companion reached it. They both came from the newly-founded Ilea, the underwater city built for all those whose transformation involved aquatic life.
Chiara's 38D (not that those bra things were made anymore) breasts hindered her speed a little, but webbed feet a la Waterworld can hardly be a match for a green, smooth tail. She made the most surprised look when she saw the nipples being licked by the waves.
"Lily?!?"
"Chiara?!?"
"Thought you were..."
"No, I'm alright" Lily replied as she slowly deflated "but what are YOU doing here?"
"Same thing I was going to ask you."
By the time Nemo got there, Lily had already explained what was going on.
"Do you want to have dinner with us? We have an air chamber at home, just in case we have guests."
"Sure, wonderful! But how do I get there? I don't have gills, you know."
Chiara giggled and Nemo smiled in a friendly fashion.
"I'll breathe for both, if you allow me, of course."
Lily was just fascinated... a city under the sea, like in fairy tales! She was so happy that the kiss she gave Nemo didn't just involve air as the three descended.