A story about salvation in the wrong hands.
The TV showed what was now a recurrence on main land. The sand storm was the same height as the Empire State building, a structure it would never meet, or would it? The winds now roared much faster and for much further than before, who was to say it wouldn't reach the opposite coast of where Queen Mary now stood? There it was, twenty kilometers away from shore, unfazed by the end of the world happening on main land. It wasn't long after that the TV would show only static, announcing no one was left to broadcast a single thing.
The cruise ship was the only thing standing between the people who managed to board it and the destruction on shore. It was the only boat docked in the bay big enough to save the hundreds of people that hurdled, kicked and punched their way inside, running from the elements that now wished to end their lives. However, there was plenty of reasons for it to be sitting there as it was, as if waiting, but for what exactly?
It was seen as a safe container for all, but no one knew its secrets. Deep within the server rooms, the only thing that still functioned, quite poorly, if I may add, was an old Windows XP computer with a basic navigating system program installed.
The operational system had been idle for many years, and once it was turned on it did not respond as expected. Most passengers and the few experts who managed to climb on board tried to understand its workings. It connected to everything, which made no sense, but none could figure out how, so the boat just floated through the coast.
Since the vessel didn't start, they had front row seats from a relatively safe distance to the horrors they had escaped. They watched as the lights on the coast flickered once or twice and when they turned off forever. In the dead silent evenings they could hear the screams and moans of those who were too injured by the accidents caused by rain and winds to move or survive. They wailed in the night like wolves, calling out for help that would never come.
"They watched as the lights on the coast flickered once or twice and when they turned off forever. In the dead silent evenings they could hear the screams and moans of those who were too injured by the accidents caused by rain and winds to move or survive."
The computer, stashed beneath the cockpit worked in an automatic way, providing the passengers with whatever it wanted, whenever it wanted. Sometimes there would be heat and sometimes people had to bundle up together with duvets to keep warm inside. Sometimes it turned on the lights and sometimes it kept the structure in complete darkness for days. Whenever someone ran under to check whatever it was doing at the time, the screen would only show the classical green hill and blue skies with cotton candy-like clouds background. Some people started going there only to watch the fake landscape created by Microsoft, to feel a nostalgia for the weather and the world that was now gone.
No one asked or commented on the fact that the computer never turned off. No matter what power outage was going on, the machine kept going, performing hidden tasks and surprising the mass of people with its tricks. Life led by the XP was filled with excitement. No one knew what would work on any given day, and it distracted the minds of those who had abandoned everything or lost someone before boarding. The children played games inside the empty pool on the lead deck and the twinkle lights that hung over it would flicker for their amusement. The freezer, that kept on working, was seen as a miracle by most. The gas pipes that fed the stoves also worked perfectly and there were cylinders a plenty beneath the kitchen area. On more than one occasion, the crowds gathered for a huge meal and were gifted dim lighting and ambiance by the system, which turned it off as soon as the gathering faded.
The signs, according to the believers, were all there. God was working through the old machine to help them make a new, rather comfortable life aboard. Others believed the system mocked them, since it wouldn't provide hot water for showers nor show how to start any of the machines in the obsolete casino lounge. A third group believed the system was old and random and what they should be doing was figuring out a plan to turn on the engines and set off through the coast to find better places to dock and look for food and supplies, since the ones on the ship were running low and would end soon.
"And as fate would have it, one by one, the systems connected to the server, and by definition, the computer itself, started to wither away one by one. The lights that would turn on and off in espetacular occasions now flickered incessantly in a disturbing way, causing people to sleep outside to avoid the luminescence bursts (...)"
Unfortunately, the last group was outnumbered and the crazed mass of emotionally constipated people that wouldn't realize the obvious took control of the area surrounding the XP and would neither try to understand its workings nor let anyone else try. The man that stood at the door, guarding the system, had a spider for a best friend. Word around the ship was that George, the nickname given to the arachnid, actually controlled the man and whispered in his ear the best course of action to be taken to ensure everyone's safety.
And as fate would have it, one by one, the systems connected to the server, and by definition, the computer itself, started to wither away one by one. The lights that would turn on and off in espetacular occasions now flickered incessantly in a disturbing way, causing people to sleep outside to avoid the luminescence bursts constantly peaking through their eyelids, keeping them from a good night sleep. The heat turned off one morning and never returned. A combination of the cold night air and children`s poor immune systems caused half the people to fall ill with influenza. The medicine stash on board was depleated to keep the disease from spreading, but the contaminated food, prepared by sick people, no less, caused most of the ship to fall ill. The healthy, those who believed they had to 'set sail', tried to stage a coup, but the group led by George The Spider overpowered them with fire extinguishers and machetes from the fire defense system. Their bodies were served as offerings to God and thrown overboard.
Elders and children also started perishing from the ongoing flu that spread to every corner of the metaphorical sinking ship and, in a craze, people blamed George and its vessel, the man who guarded the computer room. In a last attempt to reason with the machine, the group of insane insurgents tried establishing a conversation with it through the note pad, begging it to restart the failing systems around the ship. But the machine offered nothing in return.
In a desperate attempt to create a positive form of communication with the Microsoft Gods, they gathered around with candles in a sort of vigil inside the computer room and, from time to time, would write a good vibes, positive reinforcement in Word. They would save it, hoping that the file would be read and responded, and resumed chanting.
Nobody knows if it was the weakness brought on by hunger or disease that led one of the participants to drop a candle and set the room ablaze, but before they all burned to the ground, taking the computer along with them, they saw a small system box open on the computer's screen, with a message that read 'type YES to restart all systems. Type NO to continue' and a smiley face written with an equal sign and a parenthesis next to it. The huge boat became a flaming torch on the shore, before sinking slowly, taking all passengers too weak to swim to shore along with it.
A spectacle of ignorance and desperation, seen by no one.
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