Lights1

When The Lights Go Down


	The small room in the Berkeley university was in a deathly pall of silence. Sixteen men and women, all similarly clothed in lab coats, some with ties, were crowded around a single computer monitor. They stared at it. None could speak. Not even a whisker twitched for several seconds.

	Finally, the head researcher, a raccoon named Dr. Alexander Ichini, cleared his throat and spoke: "Run the gravimetric analysis again. Once more, please."

	All of them knew it would not make a difference; computers did not make mistakes, did not deviate from programming, did not alter results just because one wished it to do so. A computer did not care how badly one wished it. But the calm, unwavering tone of his voice commanded their respect through seniority and authority. The feline, seated at the chair, trying to restrain the tremble in her fingers, typed in the commands.

	The computer hummed, and then immediately displayed the results, along with a graphical representation of the data played over time. Everyone watched, hoping beyond hope, as the line spiraled around the center once, and then again a little further out, and then suddenly hooked left and then looped dramatically straight up and out of the plane. It shot up and up with only a slight curve, off into the black infinity. The tension in everyone's shoulders, the stiffness in their tails, let out at once into a slump of defeat.

	Despite the ramifications of the data, the following conversation was stilted and technical, cold logic with little emotion. This was, after all, how furs of such studious nature coped with fear.

	"It DOES have a curve," noted one of the juniors.

	"Irrelevant," said another. "It equals one. The path is hyperbolic. We're never coming back, and that's that. Escape velocity."

	"Perhaps the variables are too large," said a rust-colored older lion. He always mistrusted computers, still preferring to solve mathematical problems with a slide rule and sometimes a paper nomogram.

	Dr. Ichini shook his head, saying: "Perhaps if we hadn't completely solved the three-body problem decades ago, you could be right. This isn't merely a high probability; this is a guarantee. If I remember correctly, you were part of the team that cracked it, right Doctor Marillo?"

	"I was, but now I wish I hadn't," he said with a sigh. "Some uncertainty would ease the burden on the public."

	Two of the scientists had a quick back-and-forth argument: "What can we do? We have two full years," said the first.

	"There's nothing we can do," said the other.

	"What about a mass driver."

	"We don't have nearly the technology."

	"A gravity tractor...?"

	"Are you kidding?!" He threw up his paws in annoyance. "We'd need a craft the mass of the moon to make a difference!"

	"Fine! Then we can laser the polar ice cap from a satellite and let the jet of gas alter the course."

	"We all end up the same way. Maybe it's enough to bring the orbit back to elliptical, but it wouldn't matter. A bit of freezing and then a bit of frying, instead of just freezing. It probably would not even have an effect."

	The two of them crossed their arms and turned away from each other, the discussion over. However, their words had echoed the thoughts of everyone else present. Nobody had a plan that could hope to succeed.

	So that's it?" said the feline. "We've done it? Guaranteed it?"

	Yes," said Ichini. "The NASA team simply made a mistake."

	A big mistake," said the feline.

	The mistake of the century," said someone else.

	The mistake of all time," came a soft voice from the back, a teenage-looking grey fox, clinging to his clipboard like a protective charm. "Because... you know, it's going to be the end of time."

	That brings up something important," said Ichini. "How on EARTH we going to tell the public?"

	A slight chuckle, more of habit than amusement, came from Marillo. He shook his head so slowly it didn't even ruffle his mane, and said: "We don't. We tell the President, and he will tell the public. I'm already putting together ideas for a briefing — in my head of course. Ichini, you will lead it. Take Doctor Tarrish with you." Tarrish was the timid young fox.

	Except for the chosen raccoon and fox, who headed into a private office with Marillo, everyone else stood in place for a while. Then, without much purpose in their step, they filed out of the room.

																	* * *

	Three weeks earlier, the world had been united in celebration. It had been a tense few months, and many had been expecting a doomsday prediction. The team of high-level, high-pay-grade scientists — the greatest minds of the generation — came together at NASA to calculate the fate of Earth. They used supercomputers to augment their combined intellect; a multitude of instruments, telescopes, satellite feeds, and all sorts of other data; and they sequestering themselves for several days. When they emerged, they told the world in an official announcement what they had found.

	It contained a lengthy explanation, but the first few words summed it up: "Earth is safe."

	They called it a rogue star. Even though that wasn't technically a correct definition, it sounded cool, and the public latched on to it. This star, officially 'Gilese 550' (but later named 'Perigrinus' by someone with a flare for the dramatic), drifted close to the solar system along its own slow trek around the galaxy, close enough to disturb the orbits of all the planets very slightly. After the analysis, however, it was determined that nothing terrible would happen. After a century or so of slight instability, Earth would settle back into a stable orbit around the same distance from the Sun. There might be cooling or warming trends of a few fractions of a degree each decade or so, and there might be added a few more leap-years and a plethora of leap-minutes and leap-seconds, but nothing more. There would be no mass extinctions, no huge crop die offs, no threat to global civilization or the various intelligent races of furkind. Earth was safe.

	There was the equivalent of a worldwide party, and the scientists were lauded as heroes, despite having merely acted as reporters. As reporters, who were in fact later proven false.

	It was Doctor Tarrish who first discovered their error. Although a low-level researcher who hadn't even graduated university due to laziness, his actual talent (and his big canine penis) had been discovered by a geneticist and professor by the name of Ichini several years prior. With access to decent equipment, he used a computer program written with the help of a close friend to redo the analysis done by the team of NASA brains. He had no idea what kind of mistake was made, or who had made it, but their conclusion was simply, factually wrong. He told Ichini, who told an old friend with political pull: Dr. Claude Marillo.

	Marillo got them a better computer, better equipment and data, and together they got together their fellows and ran the program. The end result was even more horrific than Tarrish's original prediction. It was, to be brief, the end of the world. The lion then tapped a few favors to get him and Ichini a private audience with the President of The United States. Only his efforts made this possible.

																	* * *

	The President adjusted the tiny glasses on the end of his fat canine nose, and watched the screen, which displayed a graphic similar to the one the group of scientists had watched before. The only difference was, instead of a small picture and a large bank of numbers, there was a large picture and no numbers.

	It was a week after their chilling discovery, and Ichini and Tarrish were ready to begin their presentation. Somehow, none of their team of scientists had run to the media with the biggest scoop in history, selling it to a news station for a fortune. This was either due to a strong moral character, or not expecting to see much use out of the money. Either way, the world writ large as of yet knew nothing of the incredible brevity of the rest of their lives.

	In attendance for the presentation alongside the President (a kindly-eyed and pot-bellied old Saint Bernard), was the Vice President: his antithesis and a sharp-faced, sharp-tongued jackal. Also there was the Secretary of State, and of Defense, and of the Interior, and a few others. The Secretary of War had a cigarette in his muzzle but it wasn't lit. Nobody would be allowed to leave the room until the President made the public announcement, to ensure secrecy. In the back, an unconvinced and defensive grizzly bear sat in a chair leaning against the wall. He was the lead from the NASA team.

	"We are ready," said the President.

	Tarrish started the simulation, running it at about 10 years per second, while Ichini narrated: "As you can see here, the star drifts past the Solar System, as we have known it would for a century. This dotted line indicates the path as had been predicted in nineteen-seventy-two, and the solid line the path as was revised last year." The solid line appeared to dip only a tiny distance closer to Sol, but the actual distance was nearly a light-year.

	"We took that into consideration," said the NASA bear. "You have brought nothing new to the table." As he said so, however, he was looking at a computer pad that did display all of the numbers behind the simulation.

	The Secretary of Defense whispered to the man next to him: "This is ridiculous. These kids have nothing. Why did Marillo allow this?"

	The ears of the ferret twitched, and he said: "Shut up. I've known Doctor Marillo since university. He wouldn't ask me for this favor unless he was sure."

	Ichini continued as the simulation then zoomed in and slowed down to about one month per second. "Now, here is the corrected version." As before, the Earth zoomed once around the sun, then again, but then it stopped. Ichini said: "I halted the simulation because this is where the discrepancy was found. The original calculation involving the gravitational attraction of Jupiter was not correct; it was off by an order of magnitude." He restarted the simulation, and Earth suddenly, as if attracted by a magnet, approached Jupiter, then arced around it and straight up out of the plane of the Solar System.

	The Secretary of War dropped the unlit cigarette right out of his muzzle and onto the floor, smart enough to understand what he was seeing.

	"My God," said the President.

	"The gravity assist from Jupiter accelerates Earth to over 30 kilometers per second. This is enough to achieve escape velocity from the Sun. In four years we'll be further from it than Pluto. Earth will drift into interstellar space, and then millions of years later into intergalactic space, probably never meaningfully interacting with another body until the heat death of the Universe."

	Everyone, all at once, turned to the NASA scientist, whose fur seemed to have gone ghostly white in seconds. "The numbers... check out...," he struggled to say. "Our original prediction was based on false data."

	"It was a mathematical error, nothing more," said Ichini.

	"H— how long? How long do we... have left?" asked the Vice President.

	"Our orbit will remain about the same for two years, though it will be a little colder the second year. It will then take roughly a year to reach Jupiter, due to slowing down as the Sun tries to pull us back, then speeding up as we fall into the Jovian gravity well. The temperature on Earth will rapidly drop to several hundred degrees below zero and stay about there for a long time. Due to various factors, such as the molten mantle, magnetic field, and activity of radioactive elements, it will take billions of years for the Earth to 'die' and cool to near absolute zero. However, still, nothing besides perhaps some bacteria and small crustaceans at the bottom of the oceans near geothermal vents can survive temperatures that cold."

	The NASA bear added: "When we pass Jupiter, it will most likely strip Earth's atmosphere completely, as well." He, too, was attempting to spout rational facts to distract himself from his existential terror.

	"Is there anything we can do?" asked the President after a pause.

	"I am glad you asked, sir," said Tarrish. "As you might have guessed from our somber attitude, nothing can save us, nor any other mammalian life on Earth. We will all die in less than three years. However, we have put together several proposals for how our LEGACY can survive. Our technology will allow us to preserve extensive records of our civilization and our beings, so that if extraterrestrial life ever comes to pass by, they will know of us."

	"Is that all?" asked the Vice President. "It's like leaving a book in a library when nobody will probably ever come to read it."

	"We simply have no other options," said the President. "The world will want us to do something. Alright, Doctor Tarrish. Proceed."

	"The basic idea is simple," he started. "A 'time capsule' to preserve ourselves, with content chosen by each country. We can store exabytes in even a tiny space, so any data is possible. The only question is how we store it, and where we send that storage device." He pointed back to the monitor, and said: "Now, this is our first proposal. A hardware computer powered by quantum-tunneling..."



	The two men, the raccoon and the fox, sat on the couch in Tarrish's apartment. They were dejected and appeared almost deflated, slouching down into the cushions. In the space between them, they held paws. On both sides of the couch, there were small tables, on each one sat a tall glass filled with liquor. They were both planning on getting shitmuzzled for the night, but neither had yet taken a single sip.

	In the end, the President and the others had settled on a three-prong plan for preserving the records of furkind. The first was a satellite that would be launched into a solar orbit, sending out periodic bursts of radio noise in an attempt to attract alien attention. With nanorobots used to maintain onboard systems, especially the solar panels, it could be expected to power the radio generators for a billion years. It was hoped that the wide orbit (nearly as far out as Neptune) would keep it from being destroyed by the Sun's death throes.

	The second was a similar probe, except launched toward a nearby star system, the one that had been proven the "best candidate" for conditions to harbor life, particularly the third and fourth planets of the system. It was precise enough to be able to enter orbit around the star and then receive a gravity assist from one of the system's gas giants to slow it down into a stable orbit. The simulation of this looked exactly like what was going to happen to Earth, just in reverse. The probe would then begin similar bursts of static to attract any intelligent creatures down there. Because it would travel between stars, solar panels would not provide even enough power to allow it to stay on standby. Because it would take millions of years to traverse the distance, radioisotope thermoelectric generators would not last long enough. Only an experimental (and extremely expensive) power system based on quantum tunneling and zero-point energy could manage it. This power source theoretically would last until the entire Universe went dark, but in practice would only last until the parent star of the system expanded into a red giant and annihilated the probe, in a few billion years.

	The final one was a system that would be based on Earth, itself. It would be considerably larger, able to preserve both digitally encoded genomes and physical DNA specimens of every major furry race (from canines to felines to vulpines and everything in between), many nonintelligent animals and plant life, as well as the other data. There was no way this would ever manifest on the frozen Earth, however; it was merely a static record. It would be powered by an extensive system of geothermal generators: enough power to keep the liquid nitrogen freezers running for a hundred million years. It would also emit a veritable SCREAM of radio noise, programmed to point in a rotation of several thousand precise directions, at every system in the galaxy predicted to harbor the right conditions for life. Hopefully, before the Earth went cold and dead, someone would hear it who had the technology to catch up to a planet zooming out of the Milky Way.

	All of the three "time capsules" were encoded with many zettabytes of other data such as cultural notes and historical records; pictures and video of fursons and life on Earth; millions of books, both fiction and nonfiction; scientific theses; and varying works of other media such as music, films, artwork, and even some award-winning video games. These were all stored through multiple methods for redundancy, such as in computer diskdrives, and also nano-etched into gold and diamond plates that could be read by a modified scanner contained in each capsule.

	These all had one major thing in common, however, and that was that they were physical, non-living machines. The reason the two men in the small apartment were so depressed was that their proposal for a biological storage medium had been summarily rejected by all those present. They had favored it mostly because it had been a project of theirs, and also because they believed in the superiority of life over that of machines, being primarily a geneticist and biologist. However, none of those who had been there to listen thought that it sounded practical.

	"You have to admit, it was a long shot," said Ichini.

	"They didn't even bother to listen to the whole proposal. They're just a bunch of idiots. They think computers will save us all. Well... WOULD HAVE saved us all, y'know, before all this shit," said Tarrish. "It's that transfurryism bull. It's always coming from the technical side: we all put our brains into the Internet; it's never the life sciences doing anything—"

	"Jacob, you aren't being fair."

	Tarrish didn't hear him, continuing a rant that he'd had stewing in his head for hours, his tail whisking around his side in anger: "—If they had the tiniest idea of the kind of power of a truly custom-designed genetically engineered individual, we might not even need to worry. For ten years, ten fucking years I tried to get funding, and YOU did too! And nothing. Not even after we produced a viable sample. We might all have been genetic gods by now if they'd jumped at the chance. But no! It's because I was a dumb fucking child that failed out of college and you were only a professor two years older.

	"It's the same thing today! Did you hear the Secretary of Whateverthefuck? He was whispering — talking about me, I know it! Thinking I was some stupid KID that couldn't program his way out of a brown paper bag, and I wanted so much to claw out his fucking eyes, bu—"

	Ichini leaned over and practically smacked his muzzle into the younger man's, his small tougue easily penetrating into Jacob's open mouth. After a moment of shock, Tarrish leaned back into the kiss, his much larger canine tongue slopping around against his partner's. They embraced and closed eyes, continuing to kiss. After nearly a full minute, they parted, gasping.

	"Goddamn, Alex. You haven't shut me up like that in years," said Jacob.

	"Not since you broke up with me," he said with only a slight tone of wistfulness.

	"If I recall, we parted on mutual terms, citing irreconcilable differences."

	"Yes, and then got together again on mutual terms, citing the end of the world. How did you put it? 'We won't have time to date anyone because we'll all freeze to death in a couple years' or something?"

	Jacob looked down at the carpet, his ears folding miserably onto his head, all the humor of the conversation having evaporated. He reached for his glass of booze and took a swig.

	A clock on the wall ticked for several minutes, then chimed the hour. It was dinnertime, but neither of them were hungry.

	Finally, Alex said: "I missed you."

	"I love you. And I missed you. I made the wrong choice. All that time we could have spent together, and now we only have a little bit of time. Nuclear war could start tomorrow, even before the big chill."

	"Even before it gets so cold that the lights go off in all the cities."

	Jacob's ears perked up with a flash of recognition, and he asked: "Do you remember our song?"

	"You know I don't care for that sentimental garbage. That was probably the biggest reason you said we couldn't stay together."

	"...that was a lie," said Jacob. "That wasn't the biggest one."

	"Oh, what was it, then?"

	"N— no, I was just a kid. It was a stupid reason."

	"Come on, I really want to know," he said as he squeezed the other man's paw tightly. "We're not kids anymore. I can take it."

	"Well, I couldn't take it. It HURT inside me."

	"What?" He leaned back and blinked several times. "You mean my...?"

	"Yes," said Jacob with a dramatic sigh. "Your damn spindly 'coon dick. It hurt when you fucked me. There, I said it."

	Alex sat back into the couch, covered his face with a paw, and just when Jacob expected him to moan, he started laughing.

	"It's not funny! It really hurt. Especially because you always did it for an hour and came like five times. I just didn't want to say anything because you were enjoying yourself so much."

	"That's not it, shit, sorry Jake," he said while he tried to stop laughing. "I mean, it was the same for me, you know. The exact same. You always asked me if I was okay with knotting, and I always said yes. But it hurt every time."

	"E... every time?"

	"But I was okay with that. It wasn't your fault that you had such a big knot. I mean, for a fox anyway."

	"For a fox, wh— what's that supposed to mean?!"

	Alex laughed. "I mean you have a big dick, Jake. That's all."

	"Oh..." And his ears flushed brightly.

	Both men took a drink from their glass. Alex almost emptied his.

	"It's funny," Alex said, "not a humorous kind of funny, but an ironic kind of funny, you understand what I mean?"

	"Yeah."

	"It's funny that we broke up because we thought the other was being selfish, but we were both doing our best to please each other, even when it wasn't completely pleasurable for ourselves. We just never..."

	"...talked about it. Right. Well, we can talk now. I'd say we have plenty of time, but we really don't have much left at all." He looked over at Alex, who seemed deep in thought about something. "Unless you don't want to."

	"Oh, that's not it," he said, drinking the rest of his liquor and licking his muzzle. "I was just remembering something."

	"Oh?"

	"Yeah, I think it went like this." He started humming, not very well or on key.

	Jacob quirked an eyebrow, his ears turning back and forth as if trying to decipher what that was about. His mouth gaped open when Alex started to sing.

	"When the lights go down in the city
	And the sun shines on the bay
	Do I wanna be there, in my city.
	Oh-oo-ohh, ohh oo-ohhh oh-ooh-woa~
	So you think... you're lonely..."

	Jake cut in with his soft voice:
	"Well, my love, I'm lonely too-ooo~
	I wanna get back to my city by the bay-e-ay."

	And they sang together: "Whoa, ooooh, oh-ooo-oh~!"

	Alex:
	"It's sad, ohhh, there's been mornings
	Out in the lab without you
	Without your chaaaa-arms.
	Oh-ooo-woa-oh, my my my my my my."

	Jake:
	"Whoa, ooooh, oh-ooo-oh~!"

	Alex:
	"When the lights go down in the city
	And the sun shines on the bay.
	Do I wanna be there, in my city
	Oh-ooo-oh-oh, oh-oo-oh, oh-ooh-ohhh~"

	Alex hummed the instrumental while Jake dramatically played air guitar, his eyes closed and his muzzle gaped open in a stupid grin.

	And they sang the last part together:
	"When the lights go down in the city
	And the sun shines on the bay.
	Do I wanna be there, in my city
	Oh-ooo-oh, oooh-woo-oh, oh-ooh-ohhh~
	Mmmm, oooh-woo-oh, oh-ooh-ohhhhh~"

	They laughed and hugged like little kids for a few minutes, stealing kisses and having fun for the first time in years.

	Jake said: "You did remember. The whole thing! I knew you did."

	"How could I forget? You made me listen to it a hundred times after we heard it on our first date. I even got to memorize all the 'oh-woo-ooh's."

	"It's been too long. I want to spend forever with you."

	"Me too. Until the lights all go down, in the cities and everywhere else."

	They sat in silence, still holding paws and hugging, for a few minutes.

	"It's really going to happen. All of it? We're going to be dead in three years, and there isn't any way to stop it," Jake said.

	"Yes."

	He was starting to tremble. "Tell me... it's just some kind of stupid joke. Some kind of dream. Tell me that my calculations were incorrect."

	"You know they aren't. The computer cannot lie."

	"I— I...," he sputtered, bursting into uncontrollable sobs, collapsing onto Alex's chest, claws digging into his shirt, "I don't... I don't want to die! I don't wanna leave you! I don't want there to be nothing left of me and you!"

	Alex wrapped his arms around the younger man, squeezing tight, nuzzling him into the fur on his neck. "It'll be alright. We still have time."

	"How can you always be so strong? Y— you never even cry."

	"That's not true. I'm not strong. Before I met you I was nothing, and I haven't really been since we broke up. I can't live without you. I won't be able to."

	"I need you. I need you. Fuck, so much..."

	"I want you to breed me."

	He sat up, blinking in confusion. "...what? Now??"

	"Of course now. All we have is now." He shoved the younger man off roughly, knelt down over the edge of the couch and started undoing his belt, removing his pants.

	"I couldn't possibly do it. This is..." But when Alex arched his back, stuck out his rear end, and lifted his ringed tail, Jake's body reacted immediately, his penis pushing out of his sheath and spurting pre into his own pants.

	Without another word, the fox pulled off his own pants and mounted Alex, growling and panting and chewing on the fur on the back of his neck. He penetrated him violently, spraying pre all over his rear and then jamming it deeply inside, knot and all. Hanging on tightly, scratching Alex's sides, he cried out with his immediate climax, his knot swelling to full size. It was enough for the other man, though, his slim penis poking out of the sheath and spurting onto the carpet.

	"Mrrf, unf, fffuck you smell so good," Jake moaned into his neck fur, still throbbing and spurting inside. Several minutes passed before his grip even slackened, his trembling arms releasing their desperate hold. After a time, he finally said: "I'm sorry. I didn't even ask. Does it hurt?"

	Alex said: "No. It's, uhhh better than anything. These are tears of joy."

	"You were always a terrible liar."

	"Joy AND a sore ass, then."

	After nearly thirty minutes of being knotted, they finally separated. Tossing away their disarrayed remaining clothing and shoes, they cuddled on the couch, touching and kissing and remembering what it was like to be in love, and what it was like to be much younger.

	"You must have been pent up," Alex said.

	"Of course. I haven't cum in weeks because of all this shit. Presentations, computer simulations, late nights with pages and pages of calculations. It's terrible being a fox sometimes; I can't even have a quick one in the bathroom because I'll end up swelled outside my sheath and spraying on everything in front of me for half an hour. I just... fuck, haven't had time. Fuck, everything is about time, now. How much time we have, how much time we DON'T have!

	"And in the meantime, All The President's Men are going to take care of the rest of the preparations. Our ideas, and we can't even be allowed to implement them because of some security precautions. We can't do anything."

	"About that," Alex said, scooting backward so he could sit up a little. "I've been thinking."

	"You tend to do that often," said Jacob in perfect deadpan, but his tail was still wagging in anticipation.

	"Well, you were right that I was lying about being sentimental. I've been... holding onto something."

	"For God's sake, what sentimental thing could possibly help in this situation?"

	"Well, do you remember that pretty cheetah boy I knew back in our university days, the one who worshipped the ground I walked on and pined for my cock like Elle used to pine for yours?"

	"She didn't," Jake said. "But go on."

	"I don't know if I mentioned, but he interned at — and is currently managing — a facility storing champion-breed racehorse sperm in liquid nitrogen. Since the whole mess went down with the dean back then, I've had him keep something on ice for me. It's our little project. Our son."

	Jake sat completely up. "Darling, I'm all ears."