Ragnarök

He reached across the table and handed her the locket. She pushed his hand away and shook her head demurely. He was being ridiculous again. He nudged at her hand insistently with the golden, gleaming locket. Red and blue lights flashed behind them. A siren wailed in the distance. She frowned at him, feeling heat welling up in her chest.

“Stop it, Frank, this is stupid.”

“Oh, come on, take it. We love each other.”

“Have you looked around and noticed the world ending?”

The wailing siren got louder. There was an explosion in the distance. Fire and smoke erupted. The open-air bistro where they dined was off the street far enough to keep their privacy. A woman dressed like kitchen staff burst out of the front door screaming in Spanish about El Diablo. She came screaming towards them, eventually racing past Frank's seat.

“Tessa. Stop it. That the world is ending is exactly why this matters so much to me! I love you. I know for a fact you love me too. This locket was my great-grandmother's and now I want you to have it!”

She blinked. Her heart raced. She looked at the gleaming golden locket. It was a family heirloom worth six figures. She sighed deeply. She wasn’t ready for a commitment. Her last relationship had left her needing lots of time alone.

At least that’s what she’d thought until Frank came along. He was always sweet to her, always complimented her, and most importantly always forgave her. She spoiled him back, but she'd never realized he was actually in love with her!

Another explosion, much closer this time, rocked the entire block. The shockwave blew past the bistro. Empty tables nearby spilled their napkins and place settings. The sounds of glass breaking were unmistakable.

Frank clung to the locket. Nothing could ever make him let it go unless he chose to give it away. He gazed into her eyes. He summoned his love for her. He felt awkward like his lips were pooched out, but he dismissed it as nerves. She still hadn’t responded.

“I just… Frank… I didn’t expect to fall in love with you. I’m not saying that’s what this is for sure, but I care about you very much. I just… this locket has been in your family since…?”

“My great grandma, back during the First Taiwanese Skirmish in 2039.”

“See? It’s not something you just give away Frank. I know you think I’m “The One” or something right now, but I don’t know that I can ever really be anyone’s “The One” again. My last relationship hurt me. It changed a part of me that was happy. I don’t feel like the me I once knew anymore, and the truth is I worry I might hurt you.” She looked away, shame forcing tears to well up.

“I love you as you are, not as you once were. If I could say the right words to ease your pain you know I would!”

“Nah, no words Frank. I heard a thousand words a thousand different ways. I just want you to hold me. I just want you to keep being sweet to me…” She was cut off by a burst of automatic weapons fire. A second burst, much louder, returned fire from the other direction. A whistling noise followed the exchange that drowned out all other sounds.

Tessa paused to wait for the carnage surrounding them to quiet. She sighed. He thinks I’m saying this as some normal girl. He doesn’t understand that he wants to marry the broken girl, and she's not really that into lockets and true love.

“I want to spoil you with crazy lovin' and special times! You can trust me, and I know I can trust you. That’s the real reason I want you to have this. I know in my heart I can trust you.”

She looked at him, as the tears rolled from her eyes down her cheeks. A bomb exploded across the street, followed by a grenade. It shattered the storefront, sending glass flying into the street. Screams filled the air as bloodied people with glass fragments protruding from them poured from that side of the street only to be gunned down by the automatic weapons fire coming from both directions.

The “Whomp-whomp” of a helicopter drowned out the screams of the dying. It hovered overhead for long moments before moving to the road for a strafing run at the incoming enemy infantry. A laser-guided shoulder fired surface-to-air missile flew into the sky and hit the Red Hawk dual VTOL directly in the cockpit. It plunged from the sky like a rock. Cheers emerged from the soldiers nearest the bistro. The attack helicopter had been downed.

“Frank, you’re not getting this. I like things between us how they are right now. If I take your family’s locket it means I’m yours just as much as if this were an engagement ring,” She held it between her fingertips showing him. “I’m just not ready for that right now. I mean, I know the future is bleak, with Ragnarök happening all around us, but I still have to think about my needs and my ability to give constructively in a relationship. I can’t have you save me from myself that’s not fair. I have to do it.”

Soldiers passed behind them dressed in standard corporate navy blue uniforms. The patches on their shoulders looked like they were Sony-Samsung-Honda forces (SSH), but she couldn’t be sure. Frank’s back was to them, he turned momentarily when one of the soldiers grunted at them but glanced back to Tessa quickly, uninterested.

“Tessa, I love you truly. I don’t know how to say it any other way. I don’t care what’s fair and what isn’t as long as we both agree, and I don’t care how long it takes you, if you ever do ‘feel married’ to me, I just want you to have this because it’s been special to me my whole life and you are the most special person I’ve ever known. I want you to have it because it suits you. You don’t have to take it if you don’t want to, but you’ll break my heart. I know my great gramma would want you to take it.”

She took a deep breath. The soldiers that passed them opened fire on other forces down the street. One of them fired some kind of Gauss cannon. The odd metallic twang in the air that preceded its firing spread through the air around them.

“GAUSS!” Frank yelled, reaching for Tessa and pushing her to the ground. They ducked just in time, as the anti-magnetic force spread out around the weapon, sending shrapnel flying in all directions. These older models had been outlawed for uncontrolled anti-magnetic venting, but here they were dodging metal fragments anyway. SSH was supposed to be better.

They stood up and looked deeply into one another’s eyes. The Corp squad moved out of listening range. A lull in the fighting brought sudden silence to the area near the bistro. A waitress came out of the front door holding a tray with their food. Tessa took a deep breath, kissed Frank, and took the locket.

“Fine stupid, I’ll keep it.” She said in a soft, teasing voice.

“Sandra Bullock had that little number in that rom-com she did,” He said as he softly imitated the movie star, “You really love me, you wanna kiss me, you wanna hug me, you really love me!”.

“Omg stop it goofy!” Tessa said grinning from ear to ear.

The waitress sat down their plates and smiled at the happy couple. She glanced up the street to avoid looking directly into the man’s eyes. She saw an armored personal carrier headed their way. It was a busy day with the Corporate Wars!

“I hope you enjoy your meal. Meat products are still scarce, but you’ll find the mushroom veal to be perfection at its finest and the spinachghetti to be world-class. The green sauce has been honed to perfection and is an excellent complement.”

The couple sat at their table and sipped wine while smiling at one another. The sounds of small arms fire broke the night once again. The sky had turned pink. Dusk hinted at a restless night ahead. Acrid plastic smoke from the burning Red Hawk helicopter blew toward the bistro.

“Thank you, ma’am, this looks perfect, just as we ordered!” Frank responded.

“Excellent, sir. Enjoy your meal.”

“We will dear,” Tessa said with a knowing grin “Thank you so much.”

"Ma'am," The waitress said with a nod as she departed. The pair sampled their dishes with nods of approval toward one another. The rumors about the food here were true, even during the Corporate onslaught ravaging the city, they served the best food Denver had to offer.

“You know Frank, I get that the world may be ending, that the Corporate Wars may rage out of control until civilization is destroyed or most of us are mutated by radiation into something barely resembling human beings, but right now in this moment… the world is perfect, Frank. It's God damn perfect!”

“I love you, Tessa, more than anything. We can always leave Ford-McDonalds-IBM-Boeing if things don’t get better. You know for a fact that Wendy’s-Daewoo-Saudi Government-Microsoft will take us both in two seconds flat! We can do anything we want love!” He smiled sincerely at her.

“Oh Frank, you’re such a dreamer. I like FMCDIBMB (Fem-Si-Dib-MiB), I hate changing corps it’s such a big hassle. You have to get all new email, and new pcd (Personal Communication Device) codes, plus we’d have to move where the WDSGM (WidSegMe) bureaucracy places us too. That could easily be Vladivostok for all we'd know!”

“Oh, honey they’d send us to Paris guaranteed! WDSGM needs me for their new tactical nuclear drone program, and they’ve been courting me very hard. They are promising me a month’s paid vacation, triple my salary, and corporate home staff if I accept! Plus, they’ll move all our things at no charge due to some deal with Southwest-Planters-Luxembourg Government-Keebler (SoPlaLuxGovKeeb).”

“Ok Frank, I don’t want to move to Paris. I love it here in Denver, it’s nice. The locals still call it a cow town even though they’ve had the dual spaceport for the last thirty-five years. They’re so funny here!”

“Ok, let’s put a pin in it though! If not Paris today, maybe Berlin next year?”

“I hate moving Frank, it sucks. Especially crossing Corporate boundaries! I just told you that”

“Ok that always sucks, you’re right about that.” They both chuckled and fell quietly into one another’s gazes. On the street outside the bistro, a tank began shelling everything near the downed Red Hawk helicopter. The shockwave from its 244 mm cannon shattered windows for two blocks. Frank’s shirt was blown off. Tessa’s dress flew up over her head as she tumbled to the ground. Despite the suddenness of the shockwave, she clung tightly to the locket.

“Well, it was fun while it lasted Tess, we knew this place was probably going under sooner or later.” He reached his hand out and picked her up off the ground. She was dirty but unhurt.

“Yeah, that was close enough, let’s leave her a good tip, it’s not her fault we didn’t get to finish our lunch. I like her.”

“You want me to see if she moonlights? We could use another house servant.”

“No, just give her a good tip, we don’t need anyone else darling.”

Frank left the waitress a hundred and forty FMCDIBMB Corporate Credits on the table. It would more than cover the bill, and probably double her salary this week.

He placed some of the broken plates on the pile of credits to keep it from flying off. They took one another’s hands and left for work. Their second lunch was nearly up, and they had hunter-killer drones to finish designing.