Post-Human Trilogy Read Free

detail, interrupted only occasionally by the interference in the atmosphere. “Are you...serious?” she asked, her eyes unblinking.
    Craig pressed the red ACCEPT button on his phone so his wife could see him too. He nodded sincerely. “I can hold my breath for four hours apparently.”
    “I can’t believe it!” Samantha replied, astonished as she held her hand up over her face. “It’s real? They’re really using them in the field?”
    “Well, you knew that already,” Craig said, smiling.
    “I did, but...well, it’s different when you’re not limited to test subjects anymore—when it’s someone you know. It’s amazing to think they’re really out there.”
    “They are.”
    “I have to tell Aldous,” Samantha suddenly blurted, instantly jarring the smile loose from Craig’s face.
    “Aldous? Since when are you and old man Gibson on a first-name basis?”
    Samantha’s attention snapped back onto the eyes of her husband. “I’ve worked in his lab for three years, Craig. I think it’s about time he finally asked me to stop calling him ‘Professor . ’”
    “I don’t like that,” Craig replied. “The way he looks at you—”
    “Stop it, Craig. You’re being ridiculous. He’s a sixty-year-old man.”
    “I still don’t like it.”
    Samantha smiled. “You can’t possibly be jealous of a man twice your age, Craig.”
    Craig’s train of thought changed as he looked into the eyes of his wife, so clear and bright that he felt as though they were right there next to him. In reality, hundreds of miles separated him from Sam, and that distance would be far greater in just a few hours. “I’m sorry. You’re right. I don’t know what I’m thinking.”
    “I’m sure you have a lot on your mind,” Samantha replied understandingly. Her thoughts quickly moved to speculation, and her voice lowered. “Why did they give you respirocytes? Where are you going where you won’t be breathing?”
    “You know I can’t tell you,” Craig replied.
    Samantha quickly began putting the equation together in her mind. “Wait a second. They’re not sending you into fallout, are they?”
    “Sam—”
    She could read him like a book. “Oh my God! No! Craig, no! Tell them you won’t go!”
    “They don’t exactly ask.”
    “You can’t go! Respirocytes aren’t going to save you in there!”
    “Sammie, baby—”
    “Don’t ‘baby’ me, Craig! I’m not a child!”
    “I know, but sweetheart, listen—”
    “What can you possibly say that will make me okay with you heading into nuclear fallout?”
    “I never said where I’m headed,” Craig began, “and I promise that you don’t know the kinds of precautions that are being taken. You and Aldous aren’t the only scientists inventing new tech for this war, you know.”
    “This shouldn’t be happening, Craig,” Samantha replied, her disapproval cemented. “We don’t support this war. We don’t support this ridiculous Luddite government. I’m sick of this! You shouldn’t be there.”
    “I’m here to help people, Sammie,” Craig replied. “I’m not brilliant like you.”
    “Not brilliant? Craig, you’re a doctor!” Samantha retorted, nearly aghast at her husband’s self-diminishment.
    “But I don’t have your inventive mind,” Craig continued patiently. “I can’t help the world the way you can. I can’t help the whole world with brilliant inventions. I can only hope to use the technology people like you invent to save one soldier at a time. That’s the only way my life can be meaningful—like yours.”
    “This is wrong,” Samantha answered, holding her head in her hands. This was how almost every conversation ended ever since Craig had enlisted. Tears were forming in her eyes as she became further exasperated. “Risking your life for a mistake won’t give your life meaning. Competing with me won’t give your life meaning.”
    Craig was at a loss for a moment. His wife had never openly acknowledged what they both knew: They