[Short Story (SF)] The End and the Beginning, and a Beautiful World (4000 characters)

[HL: Starting something is akin to a curse for those who end it]

I gazed at the starry sky through a small gap.
The sky had become terribly clear ever since the various smokes that people exhaled and blew upward had disappeared. It looked a little like the starry sky I once watched with Caille in the deep mountains.
But this is the last time I will be able to look directly at a starry sky like this. As expected, there is no wind today, and no clouds. As a result of many winds intersecting around this plateau, it has been almost windless for the past two weeks. However, by noon tomorrow, the westerlies will strengthen, and the wind will reach this land at the end of the world. That will be the end.
"Caille, I am aware that I am not sane. So if you don't like it, we can stop. We can still stop now."
Caille smiled suddenly. That usual soft, gentle smile.
"There are no people left who can judge what sanity is. Besides, you are the only one who can decide. I will follow whatever you choose."

With slightly dark skin, long beautiful white hair, and transparent, light-blue, gentle yet insane eyes, Caille looked down at me through the small gap. By the very fact that Caille agreed to this, Caille is already insane. And so are the other 99 people who decided to remain in this land.
Centered on the branches and leaves I see above, this 3-kilometer square of land is the land I can protect. The mere 100 people here are the humans I can protect.
However, that small-scale status quo is the maximum, and there was already nothing but death in any other option. Even so, I know this choice is the worst.
"It really is like a religion, after all."
"Indeed. To think Armageddon would arrive so quietly."
The words that spilled from Caille were also, as expected, apocalyptic.
The poison will likely arrive on the wind to this plateau soon. Even though the world that brings death to humanity remains so beautiful. Joshi says the half-life of this poison is infinitely long. Noah's Ark reached land in less than a year, but we have no choice but to continue to be swayed by the waves of time and decay. That ending was the conclusion I ultimately had to accept.
Yes, the poison.

In the spring of 2182 AD, about eight weeks ago, a meteorite fell to Earth. That meteorite contained a very fine, unknown poison.
As if the trumpets of the apocalypse were being blown one after another, the Earth, through its rotation, carried the poison on the wind and spread it across the world, and all living things in the lands it passed through perished. As a climatologist, I measured the global wind patterns and sent the location information of this plateau, predicted to be the last place the poison would flow into, to various scientists. The scientists entrusted with the fate of the world worked sleeplessly at this last fortress. As a result, it was impossible to prevent this overly fine poison, and just as this land had been spared from the poison by convenient winds until now, we could only prolong our lives by making convenient winds blow.
"Kitri, if you don't like it, you can stop even now."
Caille's voice is very gentle. But even if we stop, we will just die tomorrow at noon. Even if we don't stop, eventually. That is why I...

As I was thinking that, my arm was pulled out from the casing, and I heard the sound of nails being clipped, click, click.
"I'm sorry for making you do even that."
I had already been packed into this narrow, coffin-like casing for two weeks, investigating the world through this tree, which is the observation medium, and spending everything on future adjustments.
"It's nothing. Is there anything else you want me to do?"
The word 'last' was surely hidden on purpose. Because we ultimately decided to abandon the end. So I speak in as bright a voice as possible.
"I don't regret this, even now. But, well, if I had to say, I wanted to walk outside with you one more time."
"We can walk, if you come out of there."
Caille's palm, supporting my fingertips, was trembling so slightly that I wouldn't have known if we weren't touching. I let out a small sigh at that. Isn't my choice ultimately not benefiting anyone?
"Caille, what do you want to do in the end?"
I asked that, but it's no use thinking about it anymore.
"Come to think of it, you said before that you wanted to climb the Alps together."
The Alps.
Memories suddenly come back at that voice.

Caille and I climbed mountains every vacation. It wasn't that we liked mountains. It was just that it was a perfect excuse to align our vacations. No matter how safe a mountain is, there are dangers. So it's better to go with multiple people. That obvious fact finally justified going out with Caille.
Even calling it mountain climbing, we didn't plan for large-scale climbing like the Alps. At most, it was safe mountains within the country. One night for travel there and back, two nights for climbing. Come to think of it, just like I'm looking up now, when we climbed the mountain, we watched the stars together. Just that, nothing more.
Caille and I are childhood friends. We grew up in the same commune, got jobs as we grew up, and each married an appropriate spouse determined by the country. I didn't have children, but Caille should have had one. However, since children are raised in the commune once born, Caille says they have never met. The genes of my wife and me, who couldn't have children, were also combined, and children were likely born without us knowing. That is how the world is.
"I wonder if everyone is doing well."
There is no meaning to those words that just happened to slip out. Everyone except the 100 people here has surely died from the poison. But for us, who never faced life or death directly, the death of someone is only known through electrical signals. It's hard to even imagine the death of someone somewhere who doesn't even have that.

"Kitri, we couldn't decide anything. So, really, it's okay to stop."
Decide or not, I am the only one who can take this method. So, Caille and the others have no responsibility.
"Let's talk, Caille."
"Talk? About what?"
"Anything is fine. Is there any meaning in continuing this world?"
"Meaning... I see. If we could escape fate, I would like to see flowers once more."
"Flowers."
Come to think of it, the altitude of this plateau is high. It is far above the timberline, a place where plants shouldn't grow. I saw Caille looking up at the sky through the small gap. This large tree was genetically improved by Caille, a botanist, and grown to this point in a short period.
"This tree, actually, it blooms. Very beautiful peach-colored flowers. But there is no room to let it bloom. All of this child's power is used for you to blow the wind. I built it that way."
"Then if you and the others can overcome everything and create a future, you should see the flowers with this tree."
"I want to see them with you. Otherwise, there is no meaning."

A voice stronger than I expected echoed. Flowers seen together.
"...Come to think of it, there was a small flower garden near the commune."
I remember a gentle-looking boy I met at that time. He was watering the flowers with a watering can.
"You tore the flowers off roughly, so at first, I didn't like you."
"At that time, I thought you would be happy if I gave you flowers."
So I bought seeds with money earned from joint work. I don't remember what kind of seeds they were, but those seeds withered quickly. Apparently, the area around the commune was often cloudy, and there wasn't enough sunlight. After that, we became adults and left the commune separately at the country's recommendation.
"Come to think of it, is this tree the tree from that time?"
The tree I sent shouldn't have been this big.
"Originally, yes. I used the tree you gave me as the base."
Fortunately, I seemed to be smart, so I left the commune, studied meteorology, and became a scholar. That's how I met Caille by chance in the research city. Caille, whom I hadn't seen in a long time, was looking at a tree that bloomed.
"Hello."
I remember Caille's eyes opening incredibly wide when I said that.
"Nice to meet you. I don't recognize your face, but do you belong to this research building?"
"No, I came for a research presentation this time. This tree is rare. It's a species that doesn't grow in the institute where I am."
When the stage of life rises, it is separated from the life of the previous stage. So, originally, we shouldn't have met. A very rare coincidence is surely synonymous with fate. Caille turns to me.
"Nice to meet you. My name is Caille. I am researching plants in the West District."
"I am Kitri. I am researching meteorology here."
"Meteorology?"
"Yes. Geoengineering is my specialty. If research progresses, flowers will be able to bloom anywhere. If you like this tree, I will have one transferred to your facility."
"Is that okay?"
"Yes. You might have been notified, but the environment there will change a little next month. If we plant the same type of tree, we can observe the differences in the environment."
While talking about such things without any emotional inflection, our eyes were never averted.
I forcibly joined the transport procedures, saying it was for checking installation conditions and setting up observation equipment, and thus we became friends, and occasionally on vacations, I would tell people around me that I was researching high-altitude plants or observing environmental changes, and we climbed mountains together. We just climbed mountains and observed plants, terrain, and climate. That was all.

The leaves I looked up at rustled softly. The wind will start blowing soon.
"Caille, let's start soon."
Before I knew it, my mood had calmed down. There is nothing else I can do, so let's do what I can.
"Kitri, I liked you."
"I know."
A drop fell onto my trembling palm, and then it was returned to the casing.
"But I hate you for leaving me behind."
"Hate me, Caille. Even so, I wanted you to live."
The machine makes a clattering sound. The space between my body and the casing is filled with a soft liquid.
"There is no point in living in a world without the real you."
"It's okay. I will always be here. Besides, you will forget about me soon anyway."
Memories shouldn't last that long.
This is just like a curse. Thousands of years, tens of thousands of years. Until the poison decays and they can breathe again, Caille and the others will continue to live through regenerative medicine. The organic air conditioning system centered on this tree, which Caille crossed with my genes, controls the wind in this land and prevents the fine-particle poison from reaching here. There was no other way. I am the only one who can synchronize and control this tree. If the synchronization is cut for even a moment, the poison will invade this small world. And the brain will eventually not be able to withstand that continuous load. So in this world, only I die. Instead, my clone, which is born, synchronizes with the system I created and continues to protect this small world. Hoping that Caille and the others will reach somewhere.
"Someday, I want to walk outside together again. The fresh green, the snow-covered landscape, the many blooming mountain flowers. And then..."
And so, my consciousness gradually fades away. The fading starry sky. In ten thousand years, the arrangement will surely have changed.
"Goodbye, Kitri. Our King."
I heard such a voice faintly.

End

I remembered on the day and wrote it in a hurry. Hehe. This is a prequel to the story below.
Since it's a first draft, I will probably revise it after some time (the usual flow). My first drafts are written by atmosphere, so the level of completion is low and very hard to understand.

One future several thousand years after this story.

★Theme

"Flowers", "Nail clippers", "I hate you! But I love you❤️"

★Yufu's Ark Series

- Yufu's Ark Series Introduction
2182 AD. A small meteorite named Yufu fell, and poison was scattered on Earth. From there, the appearance of the world changed greatly. Therefore, the year Yufu fell is called Yufu Year 0.
People were trying to deal with that excessive transformation in various ways.
This is a story of one country among them.

★Short Story Magazine

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