Did my heart love till now? Forswear it, sight!

For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night.

- William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet

DECEMBER 25, 2749

JEREMY

"Another coffee, sir?" a voice says from above me.

I look up at the young waitress hovering above me, a timid smile balanced tentatively on her almond-shaped face. The golden hue of the rose-shaped lamp above my seat falls like snow on her purple-dyed hair, though the light from the dimly-lit train turns it slightly grey.

"No," I say hesitantly to her, but my throat is so clogged up that I can barely make my voice work. I have to cough, clear it, before I can speak clearly. "No, thank you."

She turns away and walks up the aisle as the train gives a jolt, tossing me up and down like a boat on rough waters. I sink back into the soft, sagging seat and sigh, watching her slim, petite frame move away from me.

A mother and daughter sit a little away from me, the woman with red hair bouncing over her oversized coat, a spurt of fire against a moon-like face. The girl is ten or eleven, about three years younger than I am, her face sweet and innocent and strangely mature for her age, with an unearthly wisdom twinkling in her grey eyes like starlight. Her hair is midnight-dark, the golden glow falling on the black locks, turning it chestnut interspersed with white and gold, as if she were backed by the sun, shining like a halo around her heart-shaped face.

The train rattles again as it rushes into a tunnel. The lamps do little to light up the compartment, leaving the world a dim shade of rose and gold, flashing across the girl's face like the shadow of a phantom.

The girl's mother says something to her, and gets up. She walks down the swaying corridor and out of the compartment, sliding the door shut.

I pretend to read my newspaper, taking a sip from the cup of coffee that has long since been finished. Over the black-and-white print, I watch the girl. She sits still, dressed in a soft violet cloak with her hood up, lined with silver, staring out the window, her hands folded in her lap.

After a moment, I give up the pretence of reading my newspaper and move over to sit in front of her, setting my newspaper down on the table between us. She looks away from the window at me, her grey eyes alert but unafraid.

"What's your name?" I ask her.

"Why should I tell you?" she asks me. Her voice is slightly husky, but clear as a bell.

I laugh a little, careful to remove the strictness and malice from it. "I'll tell you mine," I say. "My name's Jeremy Brooke. Will you tell me yours, now?"

Her face is decidedly, determinedly uninterested. "Lenore," she says.

"That's a pretty name."

"It's alright." She looks back out the window, uninterested, the red light and black shadows passing over her face fleetingly, as if dowsing her in blood and darkness.

"I wasn't always called Jeremy, though."

Her face betrays her surprise; she turns to look at me, clear grey eyes curious. I catch on the chance.

"When I was born, my mother wanted to name me by the name of an angel," I tell her. "Jeremiel, angel of divine visions. My father wanted me to have a normal name, like my brother. So I use the name Jeremy around here."

"My mother tells me I have another name, too." The words seem to burst from her lips before she can stop them. She looks down at her lap, perhaps in regret.

I smile encouragingly.

Her gaze flickers upwards. "I'm not supposed to tell."

"Hey, it's okay," I urge. I glance at the compartment door. Almost time. Her mother will be coming back. "Just between you and me, right?"

Her head tilts sideways, like that of a curious robin, her eyes dewy and filled with light and curiosity. I feel like those eyes can split me right down to the core of my soul and my being.

The tunnel is ending; we're coming towards the sunlight beyond. A flash of light burns across Lenore's face, lighting up her dilated pupils and turning her grey irises white.

The compartment door slides open. Her mother comes down the aisle, her hair dancing like fire across her shoulders. Lenore turns away from me.

I slide off the mother's seat and move back to my own, lifting the newspaper so I don't have to see the mother's gaze burning a hole in the middle of my forehead. The train rumbles out of the tunnel, and a soft pattering comes from the roof. Rain falls, light as feathers, glistening like crystal and glass, powdering my skin with a snow of light as it drips through the window.

When I feel safe from the mother's fierce, protective gaze again, I turn to look at Lenore. Her mother is looking down at the table, inspecting something, but Lenore is no longer looking out of the window. Her hood has slipped back a little, so that the rays from her twilight eyes are uninterrupted by shadow; her gaze meets mine.

When our eyes meet, her soft voice, wavering like the warbling note of a songbird, reaches my mind.

My name is Lark.

~

AUGUST 19, 2750

Jeremy Brooke stands rigid before his window. Cool mist presses against the glass, kissing the cool pane, its icy fingers trying to reach through the window towards him.

Brooke stares out into the night in front of him. Another five bridges collapsed, a couple of highways, dozens of houses. But those aren't his priorities. It doesn't matter if the Washington Monument itself was destroyed, Brooke thinks to himself. Our country is dying.

The world is dying.

A knock on his office door. The very mansion he is standing in is the only standing structure left in America, and the survivors are gathered there, huddled in blankets in the last room. Brooke grimaces before turning to face the comer.

"Enter," he says, hoping his voice doesn't waver.

His old friend comes in, his handsome suit tattered, his brown hair disheveled. His eyes have the same hopeless look Brooke feels, weighing him down. His shoulders are slumped with tiredness.

"The survivors?" Brooke inquires.

"Safe for the moment. They are resting in the hall."

"Alright. Let them do so. There's no use scaring them now."

"Brooke..." The other man's voice seems to waver, with fear? Uncertainty? Most likely it is the lack of confidence, the deadened look that he feels himself.

"Say what you need to, Steele."

"Do you think... Do you think we will last?" whispers Steele, and Brooke feels a twinge of pain to hear his voice. It is the voice of one who has already accepted his fate.

"There is very little hope, Steele," says Brooke, turning back to the window. "But where there is life... there is hope. If we fall, we will leave behind the foundations of humanity to carry on the line. We will not let the human race go extinct. Do you hear me, Steele?"

"Brooke..."

"We have been brought to our knees, Steele," Brooke says, turning to look at his friend fully, "but not to our deaths. Britain, France, Italy, Australia, Africa, China, Russia... all down. Burned to ashes. I am the last. We are the last."

He steps forward, grips his colleague's shoulder. Brooke's eyes burn with some fiery spirit; and Steele before straightening up, the fiery gaze passed to his eyes as well. The thirst, the instinct for survival. To carry on the human race.

"Salvation," whispers Brooke.

"How?" says Steele.

Brooke turns away, towards his desk. It is a finely crafted piece of furniture, made of mahogany wood, handsome. He leans on it, stares down at the documents that scatter the surface of the table. Both men are silent for a few heartbeats.

Outside, the wind whistles, whispers through the trees. Brooke can feel death drawing up to him, slowly, quietly, footsteps softer than the wind but approaching all the same. The imminent approach of doom...

Then, suddenly, his head jerks up, his eyes filled with a light that burns, keenly, fiercely, as he looks at the other man.

"Get the scientists," he says. "The bio-scientists, the doctors, every one of them!"

Steele starts out of his silence, looking upon his friend's new mantra. The man's eyes seem to gleam with a new hope, a hope of survival, and yet despair is within his face, for his hope is not for his own salvation, but for his species. Steele feels it too.

"The scientists, sir?" he says feebly.

"Yes, yes!" Brooke says impatiently. "We create the last living humans with the potential, the physical capability, to survive this epidemic! We let them live, so when we die, they do not!"

"It seems very unlikely, sir," says Steele doubtfully. "How do you wish to accomplish that?"

Brooke is hardly listening. Striding around his desk, he seizes up a letter. It seems to have once been rolled up to a tightly furled scroll, but now lies quite flat, worn and tattered. He unfolds it, his eyes burning with new light.

"Everything..." he whispers. His eyes smoulder, and he seems to gaze off into another world, another dimension, into the past; his eyes glaze with hope and despair, burn with sorrow and joy.

"Go, Steele!" he hollers. "Go get the scientists. Seek out the ones with potential, bring them here, we will save our race!"

"How - how?"

Brooke waves the paper in his hand triumphantly in the air. "The formula - the way out! It has been there all along!"

"You mean..." Steele says in a hushed voice.

"Yes, Steele," says Brooke, a terrific grin spreading across his face.

"And... and the others, sir?" Steele says weakly. "The ones... the remaining survivors?"

Brooke smiles at him, a little sadly. "Steele," he says, "it is not myself that I intend to save."

Steele staggers back; his eyes bulge from their sockets, and he seems for one moment at loss for speech. His face is filled with horror.

"Yes, my friend," says Brooke. He looks upon his colleague, and his face, unlined and filled with youth, gleams before Steele. "I am sorry. But this is the only way."

The other man's eyes are filled with tears. The tears trace his cheeks.

"Go," whispers Brooke softly. "If I cannot save myself, I will save humanity."

The other man stares at him, hand over his mouth.

"I will save humanity," says Brooke again, steadily. His blue eyes meet Steele's.

Slowly, slowly, Steele nods once. He backs away, one step, then another, his eyes never leaving Brooke's.

Brooke turns away again, towards the window, his hand still clenching the worn piece of paper as if it is a priceless treasure. And at that moment, it is. It is the embodiment of the survival of the human race, the last remaining hope and way for salvation.

Jeremy Brooke smiles as he looks out of the window, looking down at the unfolded piece of parchment in his hand. The numbers and symbols crisscross across the page, written in that familiar spidery handwriting. James's hand runs over the ink, thinking of the warm hand that had once traced this same page, moved across it, delivering humanity's last remaining road to a new dawn to his son.

"Seems you were right, Father," says Jeremy. "There is always a way. You left me a way."