Sun Patrol

HEAT

It was hot. Everything seemed to be melting and my world was hidden behind vapors. The ground which was once hard was now turning into mud with my every step. I was moving, I wanted to move but there was no direction. What I sought was some cold and I would soon melt if I could not reach it. I felt my fever rising and my skin burn. As my vision diminished, the air I breath was burning my nose and lungs. I wished to run amok, there must have been a building with air conditioning somewhere, but I did not have any energy left for even for a single step. Even the numbness of heat did not reduce the pain I felt. My feet were a part of the mud now and I was falling and falling and falling...

It was hot. I woke up. The clock showed that it was not evening yet but I knew I could not go back to sleep. My pillow and my bed were drowning in sweat. Quickly I rose up to shake off the stickiness on my body. The energy depletion crisis seemed to be unsolved, as the tired breath of the air conditioning died down earlier day by day. I drank one fifth of my entire daily water ration at once to make up for the dehydration of all that sweating, and honestly, with hope of a little bit of cooling. It was early to take my nourishments, I could not disrupt the schedule. I went under the air shower and rinsed off the sweat, then just sat and wait for time to pass. I tried to remember my dream but all I knew was that it was bad. I stared into nothingness for a while, at least to rest my mind, time did not fly but crawled away.

It was hot. I took my nourishments. If I had awakened at the scheduled time I would have been in the air shower now, so I had that time for myself. The air conditioner shut down completely as the exit time neared. I prepared my panty but did not want to put it on. In this heat, even my skin felt too much to wear. I wanted to take it all off: My skin, the fat tissue underneath, even my muscles... I just wanted to cool of for a little tiny bit. I was sweating even when I did not move at all. I did not have any energy to move, not even to carry my own body even though it was weakened by constant sweating and undernourishment. The sweat from my scalp was making its way into my eyes and disrupting my sight. I was losing my patience for the exit time and the doors to open. It was impossible to go on like this.

It was hot. With two minutes left to depart, the breeze left behind by the air conditioning was all gone. I put my panty on and stood by the door, getting impatient to leave. I hoped for a cold night.

It was hot, and it was getting hotter.

X

As the door opened, a wind of heat has slapped me. My hopes instantly shattered, all my energy left me. Life was just one disappointment after another. I stepped into the wasteland that waited for me, if I thought any longer, I might have returned to my room. I did not even need my brain to walk the same roads I walk every night to go to the workplace I go every night, but my body which was already spent from the heat took every step as a torment. My ankles whined under the weight of my body and since I had no energy to keep my head up, my eyes were looking down to the path I walked on as if I could see anything new. All I saw was my machine-like legs going left and right on the gray-brown sandy soil that rose up with my steps.

Life was just an eternal struggle to keep on existing, not knowing to what end. Same agony every night, same fatigue. I was born, I am waiting, I will die. I did not know how much time would pass before the finish line struck my face, neither how far back the start was. I came from obscurity and I moved towards obscurity. Nothing belonged to me or I was all that existed.

There was too much darkness for a single sky.

As always, I entered my workspace right on time. I observed the machines that prepared the nourishments. I had to detect and correct if any errors occurred.

No errors ever happened.

Everything was perfect. The preparation of the nourishments was perfect, the consuming of the nourishments was perfect, the defecation of the nourishments was perfect, following the recycling line into the sewage treatment facility and being used again for production was perfect.