Complicated Times

The wind was already picking up again when they stepped outside, and the air was still thick with moisture.

Audra shivered as they crossed the threshold of the shop. Her freshly laundered, oversized coat was wrapped as tightly around her as it could be. She pulled up her hood and tucked her hands into her pockets, trying to ward off the chill that seemed to seep through her clothes.

Zephyr was similarly bundled up, though he didn't seem quite so affected by the cold. His eyes were fixed straight ahead, scanning their stormy surroundings. He was alert, and for good reason, she supposed.

He tossed something—a bag of sorts—in the back of the pod truck before he started it up, then motioned for her to climb inside.

"You ready to head out, Audra?"

She nodded and clambered in beside him, taking a glance at the bag before huddling into the passenger seat.

They drove in silence for a while. The winding streets were mostly empty. The only sounds were those of the rain drumming against the roof, the crackle of gravel and pavement beneath the truck's tires, and the occasional roll of thunder rumbling in the distance.

Eventually though, Audra got tired of scenery watching, and her curiosity got the better of her.

"Zeph, what was in that?"

"Hm?"

"The bag. The one you tossed in the back."

"Oh. That's the stuff to set up the shutters. Most of it are my tools, though I also included a little present for Minerva to apologize for putting this off for so long."

Audra's brow raised, intrigued by the information.

"What kind of present? Something romantic?"

He awkwardly coughed and shook his head.

"No, just some small things: a vintage radio that I found, a couple of books, some wine, and a tin of those fancy tea cookies she loves so much."

Audra hummed with a nod.

Those sounded like some pretty thoughtful gifts. They weren't exactly extravagant, but they were certainly notable. If anything, it definitely showed that Zephyr had taken the time to think about this.

"You must care a lot for her, huh? What, are you two like old friends or something?"

"I guess you could say that," he mumbled. "We've known each other for a long time. We were both some of the first people to arrive on The Bygone…"

Zephyr's voice was tinged with nostalgia and something else as he trailed off.

Audra went silent for a moment. Zeph and Minerva were some of the first people to arrive on The Bygone? That was wild information. Though, it was plausible seeing that The Bygone wasn't even fifty years old, and the island itself was still relatively new in the grand scheme of things.

"…You know, it's kinda weird to think about," she said, staring out the window as a different curiosity took hold.

"What is?" Zeph asked.

"The Bygone being an integral part of the world, more specifically, I can't imagine a time where it didn't exist. What was that like? Being here from the very start. Did it look different?"

His eyes lit up slightly.

"Do you mean the world or The Bygone?"

"Both, I suppose. I mean, the world in the 2070's must've been pretty crazy."

He nodded. "You could say that again. It was a… complicated time. Lot of fancy tech and innovations that could only be dreamed out a decade or two before that were being made, yet there were a lot of problems. Political tensions were pretty high because of the trade wars in the 2060's, the climate and environmental crisis was only just starting to be fully addressed, and fission was being slandered like usual since fusion was just 'another thirty years away'."

"That's… a lot to take in," Audra commented as the rain pattered around them.

She'd learned about the past in school, but it'd always felt like a series of disconnected events. So to hear it from Zephyr who'd supposedly lived through all that…

"I knew the world had problems back then, but I didn't think they were that bad."

He chuckled.

"We're always going through unprecedented times."

The roll of the gravel turned to asphalt as they joined the main road and Zephyr continued on.

"I wasn't alive for it, but I heard the 2020's and 30's were a complete mess for the world. The 2040's, when I was born, was also a pretty turbulent era. But hey, that's ignoring the fact that we've gone decades and decades in the past of people saying 'the world's going to end in 5 years, or 10, or 20!' and somehow we're still here, aren't we?"

"I guess we are," Audra agreed with a smirk. "Do you think the world's gotten better or worse?"

"Better by a long shot, generally speaking. You could say the same for most of human history. We've got a long way to go, and there's a lot of things that are wrong, but we've also solved a lot of issues. We haven't had a global-level war since the twentieth century, the wealth inequality gap has been significantly narrowed, and life expectancy has ballooned. A lot of people in the past would have killed to live in this age."

"You sound pretty happy with how the world's turned out," Audra remarked. "…I don't hear many people talk like that."

She thought back to her own life for a moment. There'd always been a sense of unease and uncertainty around her. Her old teachers hadn't exactly helped either. They had always made it sound like they were living on borrowed time and that any day now everything could come crashing down. That the past was always better.

"Well, I try to be both optimistic and realist," Zephyr said. "Even though I think we're making progress, we can't forget about the struggles that still remain. That's part of the reason why I'm here."

"Isn't that an oxymoron though? Optimism and realism?"

"Bah, don't listen to all those uninformed ignoramuses that confuse realism and pessimism. I can acknowledge the world as it is and still hope to improve it."

"You really do sound like an old man." Audra rolled her eyes, but she couldn't help but smile at his words. "What does 'ignoramuses' even mean?"

"It's a nicer word for idiot that I use to make myself sound smarter than I am."

Audra snorted.

"You love to play up that 'wise old man' shtick, don't you?"

"Maybe," he replied, smiling. "I can tell you a bit about The Bygone's history to continue the shtick—if you're still curious that is."

She paused to think for a moment, then asked, "How did it all start? The Bygone creation?"

Zeph's eyes suddenly ignited with fire as he started, like an excited professor about to give a lecture.

"Back in the early 2050's, the United Nations held a conference on the global waste crisis and proposed an idea: a centralized location where nations could ship their trash, recyclables, and e-waste to for recycling. At the time, the world produced around 8 million tons of garbage a day, which was far too much for any one nation to handle."

She tried picturing 8 million tons in her head.

"…That's a lot of trash."

"You bet." He nodded. "The proposal was met with resistance at first, as the cost of transporting and recycling was seen as a massive expenditure. However, as the years passed and the problem became more apparent, the UN finally managed to pass a resolution for its construction in 2062. The plan was to build the largest artificial island ever conceived out smelted slag, repurposed concrete, other durable trash, then house an array of facilities on it to recycle incoming materials. It would also process and contain hazardous substances like nuclear or chemical waste that weren't already being handled on site of their respective plants."

Audra briefly remembered seeing notices of those waste sights when initially researching the place. They were the reason why some parts of the island were off limits to the public.

Zephyr gestured off in the distance as he continued, having not lost any steam.

"Anyways, once the island was completed in 2070, it was christened The Bygone, alluding to how the world's trash crisis would soon become a thing of the past."

She blinked confused.

"Wait, that's how it got its name? Sounds a bit corny."

"Well, you can't discount the name. It really did help. The sheer size and scope of this place allowed nations to send a large portion of their waste here."

He proudly motioned toward a few yards off in the distance.

"When combined with the prototype atomic-deconstructors, deconstructor nanomachines, and material printers that came out around the same time, it was a huge success. Within a decade, the amount of garbage piling up in the environment had dropped to a mere fraction of what it was before."

Audra leaned against the side of the podtruck as she continued listening, drawn in by Zeph's passion. She wished her teachers had spoken with such enthusiasm. It would've made history class a lot less dull.

"Of course, it wasn't all sunshine and rainbows," the young-old man continued. "There were several accidents and incidents over the years, and plenty of people still saw it as a giant waste of money. There was also the problem that we're smack dab in the Northern Pacific, so getting waste here from areas like Europe and Africa is hella expensive. That's why we mostly service the Americas, Asia, and Oceania, and why there may soon be another version of The Bygone in the Atlantic."

He concluded his overview with deep breath.

"Well? How was that? Did I satisfy the old man shtick for you?"

She nodded, still trying to digest what he'd said.

"Definitely. I've never heard anyone talk about this place that way before. Most people just see it as a junkyard from where I'm from, if they even remember it exists."

He shrugged as they settled again.

"I mean, in a sense, they're not wrong. Though, I don't think people here mind being forgotten that much."