The alarm went off at six. I turned it off. The room was cold. I put on my coat. The room was still cold. I put on another coat. The room was still cold. I gave up and went to work.

That was Ohio. That was 2019. That was my life.

My name is Frank Kowalski. I am forty-five years old. I used to work at the steel mill. The mill closed ten years ago. Now I work at the Engine. Not a real job—more like a favor. They need bodies, I need money. We both win.

The Engine is big. It is hot. It smells like burnt rock and ozone. I walk through the tunnels every day, checking pipes, tightening bolts, writing numbers in a book. The numbers don't mean much to me. They mean something to the engineers. I just write them down.

My father used to be a scientist. He worked on the Engine Project before it started. Before the sun thing. He never talked about it much. When I asked him what he did, he would say "numbers" and change the subject. He died two years ago. Old age, I guess. Or maybe he was just tired.

The sun thing started when I was a kid. My father told me once, over a beer, "Frank, the sun is changing. It's going to get bigger. Bigger than you can imagine."

I said, "Okay."

He looked at me like I was stupid. Maybe I was.

"Okay?" he said. "That's all you have to say?"

I shrugged. "What am I supposed to say? It's far away."

He didn't argue. He just drank his beer and looked at the wall.

The Engine Project is the biggest thing in the world. Everyone talks about it. The politicians talk about it. The news talks about it. The people in the underground cities talk about it. The people on the surface talk about it. Nobody talks about anything else.

I don't talk about it. I talk about beer. I talk about football. I talk about my son, even though I barely see him. His mother remarried. She's happy. I'm not happy. But I'm not unhappy either. I'm just... here.

The Engine pays me two hundred dollars a week. Not enough for much. Not enough for a apartment. Not enough for a car. But enough for beer. And that's what I need.

Every day I walk through the tunnels. Every day I check the pipes. Every day I write the numbers in the book. Every day I go home and drink beer and watch TV and go to sleep.

This is my life.

The rebellion started in the underground cities. I heard about it on the radio. Something about the government. Something about the Engine Project. Something about people being angry.

I turned off the radio and turned on the football game.

My son came to visit me once. He was sixteen. He looked at me like he didn't know what to say. I looked at him like I didn't know what to say either.

"How are you?" I said.

"Okay," he said.

"School okay?"

"Yeah."

We sat in silence for a while. Then he left.

I didn't stop him. I didn't ask him to stay. I just watched him walk out the door and then went back to my beer.

The Engine Project is two thousand five hundred years long. Two thousand five hundred years. That's a long time. That's one hundred generations. My great-great-great-great-great-grandchildren will be working on the Engine. And their children after that. And their children after that.

Does it matter? I don't know. I'm not working on it for them. I'm working on it because they pay me two hundred dollars a week.

The sun is getting closer. I can see it from the surface. It's smaller than it used to be. Smaller and dimmer. Like a baseball hanging in the sky.

My father said the sun would explode. He said it would get bigger and bigger and bigger and then—boom. Everything gone.

I said, "Okay."

He said, "You're not worried?"

I said, "What can I do?"

He didn't answer. He just looked at the wall again.

The rebellion got worse. People were protesting in the streets. Some people were violent. Some people were not. The government sent soldiers. The soldiers stood in lines and watched. Nobody did anything about it.

I stayed home. I drank beer. I watched TV.

One night, my neighbor knocked on my door. His name is Ray. He's a good guy. He works at the Engine too. We're the same age, same job, same life.

"Frank," he said, "you hear about this?"

"Hear about what?"

"The Engine. They're saying it's not going to work. They're saying the sun is going to explode sooner than they thought."

I shrugged. "Probably just rumors."

"Maybe. But what if it's true?"

I thought about it. Then I said, "Ray, if the sun explodes, I'm not going to do anything about it. So why worry?"

He looked at me like I was crazy. Maybe I was.

He left. I went back to my beer.

The rebellion reached my city on a Tuesday. I was at the bar, playing poker with some guys. The alarm went off. Everyone looked at each other. Then nobody moved.

"Should we go?" Ray said.

I dealt the cards. "Nah. We've got a game going."

The alarm kept going. Then it stopped. Then it started again. Then it stopped for good.

Nobody knew what was happening. Nobody cared.

I played poker. I won three dollars. I bought another beer.

The sky turned white on a Thursday. I was at the bar. I looked out the window. The sky was white. Not cloudy white. Bright white. Like someone had turned on a light.

"Huh," I said.

Ray looked out the window too. "What the hell is that?"

I shrugged. "Maybe the sun."

"The sun?"

"Yeah. Maybe it's doing something."

"Doing what?"

I don't know. I'm not a scientist. I'm a pipe checker. I check pipes. I don't check suns.

The white light got brighter. The bar got bright. The tables got bright. The beer glasses got bright. Everything was bright.

I looked at my cards. I had a pair of eights. Not a good hand. Not a bad hand. Just a hand.

"Should we go outside?" Ray said.

I looked at my cards again. "Nah. This hand isn't done yet."

The light kept getting brighter. The bar was so bright I couldn't see my cards anymore. I couldn't see Ray. I couldn't see anything.

I sat there in the bright light and thought about nothing.

That's what I do best.

--

Objective Tensor Code (OTMES v2): Name: Cold Engines Variant: V-03 TI: 45.0 (Regret Level) Dominant Mode: M4_Death, M2_Violence Direction: 180° (Zero Redemption) N: [0.50, 0.50] K: [0.30, 0.70] Code: OTMES-v2-COLD-03-F9A2B7-E0450-M4-T045-C1F7 E_total: 4.5