Last Man Standing
By
Elton Gahr
Metzger fondly remembered the fanfare as his ship was prepared for launch from Earth. There had been crowds as deep as he could see to watch him leave and the press had updated humanity daily as he approached the speed of light.
The message came often in the first month then as he had reached ninety nine percent of the speed of light they stopped.
That had been expected but with most of his sensors off-line since the fire on the third day hadn't known when it would happen so had been surprised.
Time seemed to go on forever on the tiny ship. There was no spare electricity, due to the fire, so he couldn't even afford to run the videos sent to entertain him.
He knew the basics. He was going nearly five thousand light years. And while he was so near the speed of light he didn't age everyone he had ever met was dead. Gone for a millennia by now, but he had faith in humanity. They would still exist and he could report a successful trip.
The report its self would take almost as long as the trip to return, but that was the only part of the plan he understood. He was a living time capsule. The ship had been filled with all the information of humanity.
Then without any of the fan fare Metzger had expected the ship to decelerate and the space outside of the window began to become more clear.
The stars looked the same way though Metzger couldn't find any of the constellations visible from Earth. The ship continued to slow for the next day but Metzger was more interested in the ships systems which lighted up as the sun he was now circling allowed the ship to recharge its batteries.
With the new supply Metzger tapped the power up button on the keyboard for his computer and said "Approaching Earth orbit.
Metzger was excited but unsure what to expect. He would return to Earth something he hadn't expected he would actually survive to do."
Metzger ordered the ship to scan the surface of Earth, not wanting to land until he knew what to expect. But as the ship used every bit of energy it could get from the solar wings to scan the information began to become disturbing.
At first Metzger was just convinced he was getting the readings wrong, because while plant and animal populations were right there we no signs of civilization.
But as the readings continued to come in he became more convinced he was right. No radio waves, no buildings. The ship couldn't even find the heat that would prove campfires.
"Computer what is the year?" Metzger ask no idea what else to do. He wasn't going to land if everyone had been killed. There was just no point and it was dangerous.
"According to the stars positioning it is 7327 AD." the computer said. The computer had been built with a much more conversational than any computer he had ever dealt with. The programmers had decided that since Metzger was on his own it would be best to have a more conversational computer. Something to keep Metzger company during the long trip.
It had been a good plan, of course with the trouble on takeoff had made it impossible, but within minutes of the massive engines slowing the ship and the solar collectors operating he had already grown to appreciate the effort.
"What planet are we orbiting?" Metzger ask. It was a long shot but he had to check to make sure there wasn't a mistake. He was almost praying for a mistake. Perhaps they had sent him to the wrong solar system on accident, and the computer assumed this was earth because it was the only possible choice.
"This is clearly Earth. The only thing to suggest otherwise is that there are no artificial satellites or signs of humans."
Metzger cursed silently to himself. He couldn't be alone, it didn't make any sense. And he didn't know what to do so he said "Computer prepare for the backup meeting spot." It was another long shot, but a colony ship was to be sent to System 2354 only twenty years after he left. If they did they might be there when he reached it.
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Time went faster on Metzger's second trip. The computer began to filled him in on the shear amount of storage on the ship. The entire library of congress had been downloaded into the ship computers, as well as all the top secret documents of the eight country that had helped to build the ship.
He spent days reading everything he could find. He couldn't break the encryption of the top secret documents, but he was able to study computers, medicine, and do searches on everything that could have destroyed civilization.
The list of those things were staggering. By the time he was done with the search he began to think it was a wonder anyone had every survived on earth. Asteroids, dust clouds, nuclear war, solar flares, massive radiation, were just a few of the dozens of things which would wipe out earth.
When he limited it to things which would leave plants alive the count when down a few. He would have liked to assume there were animals on earth that had survived too, but since he hadn't landed on the planet he hadn't been able to establish any life besides the forests he could locate from orbit.
Then the ship fell out of near light speed, and the yellow sun he had located appeared. It looked so much like the sun that Earth circled he had to ask the computer to confirm he was in the right system.
The computer confirmed it. This system had only four planets and only the outer gas giant and the planet the colony was to land on had any moons.
It took only a day to reach orbit of the Earth like planet, but when he reached it he was disappointed. There was again no sign of civilization on the planet.
Metzger began to check the planets surface. There had been more than enough time for a human civilization to have advanced and disappeared for the surface of the planet, but if it had no sign remained.
There were any number of explanations, but the most likely in Metzger's mind was that the ship had never been sent. There had been problems with the space program when he left earth and for there to have been more in the next twenty years seemed inevitable.
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Metzger continued to make short jumps around Earth for nearly A year searching for any sign of humans then one day for no particular reason he decided he was alone and so said "Computer, set a course for a point two hundred million light years from here and speed up enough we will reach it in a week in our time. Make sure there is enough resources to refuel when we get there."
The computer set the course Metzger had ordered and Metzger pushed the button to order the flight unable to mutter the words out loud. If he was a time traveler he would travel a long way.
The ship made the jumps quickly. Metzger listened for any hint of intelligence in each trip, but he never saw anything. Either he was simply missing them or life was more rare than people gave it credit for.
He never found anything intelligence on the trip. with each stop we would ordered the computer to take calculations. There were questions about the universe that he could sell, if he ever found anyone who was able to buy it.
With each trip the universe changed dramatically. There were explosions, novas, collisions. Everything changed, including Metzger.
He began to understand the vastness of the universe. The vastness of time, and he became more aware of how small everything was. But he also became obsessed with seeing it all. He wanted to be the last one alive. The only man able to see it all, to see the end of the universe.
And so with every trip he pushed the ship closer to the speed of light. He went longer and longer distances, millions of years passing in minutes.
Stars began to become less common. The points he could safely reach got less. Finally with no other choice he left the ship at light speed and hoped something would happen and he could find something, anything that would allow him to recharge the ship.
He went until his supply began to run down. The ships lights were powered by the remains of the plants that they had allowed to grow. But the ship couldn't keep that up forever, and Metzger began to believe he would freeze and die out like the universe seemed to be doing.
Finally with no other choice he ordered the ship around the last of the tiny balls of head that were left and hoped it would be enough to recharge his engines once more.
He didn't look for any intelligence this time. There was no point. There was hardly enough energy left in the universe to heat a planet, let alone for intelligent life to evolve, and even if it could it would have no place to go.
But as he watched the tiny gas cloud Metzger saw something that seemed odd. It moved the wrong way. It acted as if it were actually growing backwards.
It struck him almost at once. "Computer explain the Arrow of Time theory." he said.
The computer answered "A human theory that when the universe began to collapse in on itself time would actually go backwards as entropy began to decrease." the computer answered.
"According to the best calculations you can make is there a big crunch happening now?" Metzger ask, referring to what the collapse of the universe had been called in his physics classes without even thinking about it.
"All signs point to the universe beginning to fall inward on itself." the computer said.
"And what will happen if we continue to travel at light speed?" Metzger ask. He might have a chance to get out of this yet, though the odds were tiny.
"The universe would appear to run in reverse." the computer said.
"And would we be able to continue to do travel in the ship in a normal manner?" Metzger ask. Would his ship travel backwards or would the universe force it to go in its direction? Could he even gather solar energy if it was running backwards.
"The ship should operate normally, though all interaction with other things in the universe would be difficult." the ship said.
It didn't matter. Metzger had a plan now. The odds were millions to one of it working, but he had to try.
"Plot a series of courses that will allow me to go forward in time until the universe reaches the big bang and starts over. And ensure we are far enough out of range as to not be dragged in." Metzger said. Even with time drastically cut back due to the ships speed it would still be hard to reach far enough back in humans life span.
The ship agreed and within a day it was flying through space to where according the old records there would be a star several thousand years before that they could supply at.
The star was there exactly where he had expected it. The ship stayed well out of range, but still got enough heat and radiation to recharge and start off again.
The first few weeks were like that, stopping at a sputtering or dying star, filling the engines as much as possible and starting again, but each time the universe was more alive. It repaired itself, fixing the injures it allowed over the last few billion years and he may be the only one actually able to see it.
Time passed quickly now. The fuel supply was ample and there were actually something to do, something to look forward to. He could watch the universe return to the way it should be. He could watch humans and try to see what had happened.
The problem was if he spent time watching humans they would see him. So all he could really do was zip in and out of the earth solar system trying to narrow down the time that humans had disappeared.
Then one day there were there. They appeared on the screen for the first time. "Computer could you replay their radio and TV images backwards so I could watch them?" Metzger ask, this could be it. If time was moving backwards he could watch what would happen on the news.
The TV seemed wrong as he was watching it. Like a picture of people walking backwards being played forward and the words were garbled though they made some sense. But he got the point quickly.
It wasn't what he expected, nothing like what he thought he would find. Everything had been perfect, then a man landed on earth in a strange craft any within months he had scared enough people that the wars started, and in a decade earth was completely gone.
He had seen enough. He had no choice now. He couldn't effect it going the direction he was going, so he ordered the ship on another series of jumps designed to take him to the big bang and back.
The universe continued to collapse. The stars grew brighter, and more of the short lived but impressive stars appeared, and then even they began to combine forming masses of loosely packed stealer material that would eventually form everything.
Metzger couldn't be sure, but no matter how much he looked he couldn't find anyone else who was trying the same thing. He was alone again. This time he had become the first man.
And then there was the explosion. Even at as far away from it as he was the violence of the explosion still shocked Metzger.
He took several light year trips until galaxies began to form then he ordered the ship to travel towards the milky way.
It took longer this time as he slowed more often to watch stars form and planets appear. Longer as the first signs of life appeared on Earth and humans finally came to existence.
But then as he neared the time he realized he couldn't go back before he left. If he did he might not be sent. He had to wait and stop the man who had destroyed Earth.
He was almost astonished as he stepped from his ship onto earth. He had made it. He had flown around time and returned home in time to see his sisters children still as children.
The timing was almost perfect. He had aged nearly the same amount everyone else had. And people listened to him as he warned them of humanities downfall. They would be destroyed, obliterated by their own fear.
He shouted on the street corners until he was on TV, and people listened, and the one day, as he gave a massive rally, still unsure why the man who had destroyed earth had not arrived he said something he remembered hearing before.
He finished the speech without thinking much about it, but then as he left the podium he remembered where he had heard it before. He had heard the man who had destroy the Earth say it long before he had returned to earth. Long before he had destroyed it.