Earthbound

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I’d been off Earth for so long I didn’t recognize the sound of gunfire.

We were walking up a gravel road from the beach at Armstrong Space Force Base, where we’d just watched, I don’t know, the end of the world? People were checking phones, watches—nothing electronic was working. Even my wrist tattoo was stuck at 10:23. That’s when the rocket we were watching lift off sputtered out and fell into the Pacific.

It didn’t explode or anything. It just stopped. Like everything else.

Guns did seem to work, hence the merry popcorn-popping sound. “Get down, Carmen,” Namir said conversationally. “We don’t know who they’re shooting at.” Everybody was kneeling or lying on the road, below the level of the sand dunes on both sides. I joined them.

An older man in a white suit, clutching a sun hat to his head, fancy camera on a strap bumping against his chest, came running down the gravel, looking anxiously back at the gunfire.

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