Reboot Earth

The year 2200 wasn't clean. It wasn't sleek, and it sure as hell wasn't the utopia the optimists of the 21st century had sketched out in their glossy, clickbait predictions. The air still smelled faintly of burnt polymers in most cities, and the oceans—though now riddled with floating desalination rigs—were still a sickly green. The world hadn't ended, though. That was the good news. The bad news? Well, you could argue it probably should have.

Anderson Guerra wiped the back of his sleeve across his face. The sleeve came away darker. He didn't care to identify the grime. The mining station's air filtration system was supposed to handle particulates, but "supposed to" didn't mean much out here. The asteroid belt was a long way from Earth, and even farther from the bureaucrats who liked to pretend they still ran things. No one cared what the air tasted like as long as the lithium kept flowing.

“Hey, Anderson!” Mikel's voice burst into his commlink, staticky. “You see the core readouts yet? They're dancing like a chicken on a griddle.”

Anderson recoiled at the volume and adjusted his helmet's audio settings. “Yeah, I saw,” he said. “Pressure's spiking again. I told Taylar to reroute the coolant flow an hour ago. Did she—”

“—she didn't,” Mikel interrupted. “She said we're out of liquid nitrogen reserves. Unless you wanna piss in the intake, we're stuck with what we've got.”

Anderson exhaled, long and slow. “Great. Just great.”

The mining rig was old tech, built back when corporations still pretended their equipment would last forever. In reality, forever was about fifteen years. This particular bucket of bolts had been running for thirty-two, patched together with whatever spare parts they could scavenge or steal. It was a miracle they hadn't all died in a decompression event yet.

He glanced at the diagnostic screen in front of him. The numbers were bad. Really bad. Pressure in the core chamber was climbing past tolerable limits, and if the coolant couldn't keep up, they were looking at a full-blown plasma breach. That would vaporize them and turn the asteroid into a glittering smear against the endless black. Pretty, maybe, but not exactly a retirement plan.

“Where's Taylar now?” Anderson asked.

“Mess hall, I think,” Mikel said. “Probably still arguing with Isha about the last protein bars.”

“Of course she is.” Anderson pushed off the console, his boots clanging against the grated floor as he floated toward the central hatch. The artificial gravity had been out for three weeks now, and no one had bothered to fix it. They'd all gotten used to the microgravity wobble, even if it made eating soup a logistical nightmare.

He found Taylar exactly where Mikel said she'd be, hunched over the communal table with a half-empty ration pack in one hand and a scowl permanently etched onto her face. Isha sat across from her, arms crossed, chewing noisily on a strip of something that might have once been soy-based.

“Taylar,” Anderson said sharply. “What the hell's going on with the coolant?”

She didn't look up. “It's gone. Already told you.”

“And you didn't think that was worth mentioning to anyone?”

“What do you want me to do, Anderson? Spit out a fresh batch of nitrogen?”

“Maybe start by fixing the goddamn pressure issue before we all die?”

Isha snorted. “Bold of you to assume we haven't been dying for years already.”

Anderson ignored her. “Taylar, I'm serious. If we don't stabilize the core, the whole station's gonna blow. Do you understand that? Plasma breach. Instant death. No funeral.”

She finally looked up, her expression flat. “I know what a plasma breach is. Do you know what I don't have, Anderson? Materials to fix it. If you've got a magic stash of coolant hidden in your bunk, now's the time to share.”

Anderson tensed. She was right, of course. There was no coolant. No spare parts. No corporate supply drops or rescue ships coming to save their asses. They were out here alone, clawing resources out of ancient rock to send back to Earth for pennies on the dollar.

“Well, we've gotta do something,” he said. “We can't just sit here and wait for it to blow.”

“You got a plan, genius?” Taylar asked. “Because I'm fresh out.”

Anderson hesitated, then glanced at Isha. “What about the ice?”

Isha raised an eyebrow. “The ice?”

“The water reserves. The frozen stuff in storage. If we can melt it down and pump it through the system, it might buy us some time.”

Taylar rolled her eyes. “Water? Are you kidding me? That's not gonna absorb enough heat to—”

“—it's better than nothing!” Anderson snapped. “Or would you rather argue until we're all dead?”

She didn't respond, which he took as reluctant agreement. Without waiting for further debate, Anderson pushed off toward the storage bay. He could hear Taylar muttering something under her breath, probably about him, but he didn't care.

The storage bay was cramped, lined with shelves of supplies that were mostly useless junk. But in the far corner, locked behind a rusted grate, were the ice reserves: massive blocks of frozen water, sealed in vacuum-tight containers to prevent sublimation. It was meant for emergencies only. He figured this qualified.

By the time he got the first block out and into the melting system, Taylar and Mikel had joined him. Taylar was still grumbling, but Mikel actually looked impressed.

“Not bad,” Mikel said. “Might actually work.”

“Yeah, well, let's hope so,” Anderson said. He keyed in the override code to flush the melted water into the coolant pumps. The system groaned as it activated, struggling to suck in the liquid and circulate it through the overheating core chamber.

For a few minutes, no one spoke. The diagnostic screens showed the pressure beginning to stabilize, though it was still higher than Anderson liked. Anderson tapped against the console, watching the numbers tick down slowly.

Then, an alarm blared.

“What now?” Taylar growled.

Anderson checked the readout. Anderson felt sick. “Coolant leak,” he said. “One of the pipes must've blown out.”

“Where?” Mikel asked.

“Sector C. Near the reactor.”

“Great,” Taylar said. “Who wants to volunteer for a suicide mission?”

Anderson grabbed a repair kit from the wall. “I'll go.”

“Of course you will,” Taylar said. “Hero complex much?”

“Someone's gotta do it,” he said, not bothering to argue further. He floated out of the room before anyone could stop him.

The reactor chamber was hot. Even with his suit's temperature regulators, the heat was oppressive. Anderson could see the burst pipe from the entrance, spraying scalding steam into the air. The leak was worse than he'd expected. He moved quickly, clamping the pipe and sealing it with a patch from the kit.

It wasn't a permanent fix, but it would hold. It had to.

As he worked, he noticed something odd. The reactor core wasn't just running hot—it was glowing. Not the usual red-orange of plasma, but an eerie, brilliant blue. He stared at it, confused. That wasn't normal. That wasn't—

The commlink crackled. Taylar's voice came through, panicked. “Anderson, get out of there. Now.”

“Why? What's happening?”

“The core's not stabilizing. It's—” She paused. “It's not plasma anymore. It's—shit, I don't even know what it is, but it's not supposed to be doing that.”

Anderson turned back to the core. The blue light was getting brighter, spreading outward like veins of energy. He felt a sudden, inexplicable sense of dread.

And then, everything went silent.

Not quiet. Silent. No alarms, no hum of machinery, no voices in his commlink. Just an endless, deafening void. The blue light consumed his vision, and for a brief, terrifying moment, he thought he was dead.

But when the light faded, he was still there. The reactor was cold. The diagnostic screens were blank. And outside the station's viewport, the asteroid belt was gone.

In its place was Earth. Not the Earth he remembered—this one was pristine. Untouched. No cities, no pollution, no signs of human life.

Anderson stared, uncomprehending, as a voice—calm, mechanical, inhuman—spoke directly into his helmet.

“Reboot complete. Welcome to Earth, version 1.0.”

---

The writing prompt for this story was:
The year is 2200. What does the world look like to you? With a twist ending! With a gritty mood/tone. Add some humor and/or sarcasm.

This story was written by:
openai/gpt-4o-2024-11-20

---

Thank you for reading. Please post a comment if you have feedback on this story.