Aftermath: Population Zero Page #4

---

Year after year,

our grip on the land is loosening.

It's been thirty years

since humans disappeared.

At night, the only light comes

from the moon and the stars.

Once, Earth was so well lit

it was easily seen from space.

But thirty years after

the lights went out,

Earth's inhabitants watch

a new kind of light show.

Hundreds of strange shooting

stars fly through the sky.

A few even make it to the ground.

The fiery wreckage contains clues

that these are not normal meteorites.

These shooting stars

are some of the last

survivors of the space age.

Humans left 25,000

objects orbiting the Earth.

Most of it was junk,

clamps, pieces of rockets,

remnants left from our 50

years of working in space.

And without us

there's nothing to keep it from

falling back where it came from.

When solar storms erupt

on the surface of the sun,

radiation expands the Earth's atmosphere

and slows orbiting

satellites and space junk.

Gravity does the rest.

Satellites in higher

orbits have been slowly

spiraling closer to the

Earth for the last 30 years.

Now, with dead batteries,

they plummet to the ground.

Back on Earth,

the world continues to change.

Human homes slowly collapse.

Plants and animals help

speed up the process.

For three decades

animals have gnawed

through roofs and walls.

Dirt and seeds have blown into houses.

Living rooms have

become homes for trees.

Rain falls into dining

rooms and kitchens.

Ceilings and floors rot and fall apart.

Schools once taught about

human triumphs over nature.

But in just thirty years,

nature reclaims much of

what humans took away.

Changes are especially obvious

along the world's coastlines,

where we built many of

our cities and homes.

Now, hurricanes wash them

away as if they never existed.

From Miami to Halifax,

mansions and cottages are destroyed.

Man-made global warming still

affects the world's oceans,

even 30 years after people

stopped polluting them.

While houses collapse on land,

remnants of the human world

create new homes for marine life.

At least 50,000 ships

are strewn along seashores

or rusting on the sea bottom.

These shipwrecks are a

magnet for sharks and fish,

and they provide thousands of

places for fish to live and breed.

Above the waves, nature's

advance continues.

Humans used one third of all

dry land for farms and pastures.

But now, fields originally

planted with single crops

have been invaded by a variety of

fast-growing weeds and wildflowers.

Every year, forests

expand their territory,

growing closer to meadows

of bushes and shrubs.

It took us 10,000 years to

force our will on the planet.

Carve our mark on every continent.

Now, nature is invading

civilization's citadel:

the concrete jungle.

Welcome to a world thirty

years after humans disappear.

There is no power.

The screech of cars and jets

will never be heard again.

But cities are still filled with life.

Wild dogs hunt in packs,

roaming the roads and

sidewalks we once roamed.

Plants and trees are taking over.

New York's Central Park

is actually getting bigger.

Dirt and seeds blow through the

city and take root everywhere.

Manhattan turns from grey to green.

Times Square once was a hot spot

for millions to celebrate

the start of a new year,

now, it's being engulfed

by a blanket of green.

Nature is reclaiming the world,

city by city.

In London, young trees

sprout in Trafalgar Square.

In Berlin, a forest surrounds

the Brandenburg gate,

once the division of

East and West Germany.

Thirty years after we disappear,

glass tumbles onto deserted streets.

Once, glass-covered office towers

symbolized the modern age.

There was more glass

in one skyscraper than

all of the glass made

during the Roman Empire.

But most skyscrapers

were built using caulk

and metal clips to keep

the windows in place.

After thirty years,

the clips are rusting.

The caulking cracks.

Water gets into the cracks

and the frames get weak.

The era of the gleaming

skyscraper is ending.

High above them, hawks and

other raptors are on patrol,

keeping an eye out for scampering prey.

The concrete jungle is born.

Relics of human existence

slowly disintegrate.

After years of neglect,

paint peels away.

Raw metal is exposed to the elements,

rust spreads.

The steady advance of

nature also damages concrete.

This was once a train station

crowded with commuters.

Now its concrete roof is falling apart.

Concrete is strong,

but extremely porous.

Rain washes away the

limestone used to make it.

Stalactites grow a centimeter

every year and then break off,

slowly weakening the concrete.

This roof will collapse

in less than 20 years.

Humans may be gone,

but we're still contributing

to this destruction.

We burned fossil fuels and

pumped tons of carbon dioxide

into the air for more

than a hundred years.

Now, the planet is slowly

getting rid of our pollution.

As carbon dioxide returns to earth,

it mixes with rainwater

and produces carbonic acid,

which eats away at the world's concrete.

Much of our modern

world rose from concrete.

Now, these soaring buildings,

engineering marvels,

are ready to fall.

Cities all over the

world face the same fate:

a slow disintegration.

Without windows, high-rise offices

are now occupied by birds and animals.

Exposed to the elements,

ceiling tiles and drywal are no match

for more than half a

century of wind and rain.

Rust is everywhere.

Moisture has penetrated

the walls and doors,

and paint peels off every surface.

But the damage goes deeper than that.

A city like Paris gets up to

25 inches of rain every year.

Now that the windows are gone,

nothing can stop the rain from

flooding the concrete skeleton

of this office tower

and creating cracks.

The cracks are caused

when carbon dioxide

penetrates the maze of

microscopic pores in concrete.

Then, it winds in until

it reaches the rebar,

metal that gives reinforced

concrete its strength.

Rebar is usually hidden

from the outside world,

but now, the carbon dioxide

is causing the bars to rust.

As the rust radiates out

from the steel, it expands,

splitting and cracking the concrete.

The building is under attack

from the inside out.

Cracks are appearing all over the world,

and there's no one around to fix them.

When people were on the planet,

problems like this would be repaired.

But now, cracked concrete

can't be reinforced or replaced.

The damage runs unchecked.

And the changing seasons

only makes matters worse.

As water turns to ice

it expands and puts more pressure

on the crumbling buildings.

The constant freezing and thawing

makes the cracks grow.

In just one hundred years,

the concrete becomes too fractured

and brittle to support its load.

The upper floors collapse

and their combined weight

crushes the floors below.

The building crumbles to the ground.

Our cities are disintegrating.

The planet is absorbing

what we left behind.

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes