The observatory at the top of the mountain has changed since we were here last spring. Some animals have moved in and the computer now runs slower and the NASA logo on the wall is flaking away like the patch on your old coat. Signs have fallen or disappeared along dark corridors leading to dark rooms. I cleared all the dirt and debris from the solar panels on the roof and yet they still only produce enough energy to power the most essential things. I built a fire on the concrete floor because the lights don’t turn on anymore. 

It took a few hours, but readings from our satellite began to trickle in through the radio dish creaking and groaning overhead. Numbers signifying death, as you would say. I wonder if our satellite gets sad spinning around in space, all cold and lonely, with only me to talk to. I know our satellite has a name, some letters followed by a number, but I can’t remember what they are or what they signified. Besides, I like calling it ours. Something that belongs to us out there where nothing belongs to anyone. 

I wrote every reading down carefully just like you showed me so you can plot them on your graphs and tables. The micrograms per cubic meter of black and brown carbon particles are slightly lower than before. Does that mean the wildfires are dying out? Have they run out of things to burn? 

When I finished, I hiked part of the way down the mountain and made camp along an outcropping away from the trees so I could watch the sunset. Then, the moon rose from behind the mountain and the stars came out and I found the Great Bear and Orion and I remembered looking for our satellite with you on clear nights when I was younger. On our backs, waiting for little silver specks to sail across our patch of sky. Like stars, but dimmer. 

I had nearly fallen asleep when I heard a noise nearby like the cry of a fox or a bobcat. An animal I’ve never seen before appeared out of the shadows. It had big eyes that glowed and a coat that rippled and changed color in the moonlight.

I thought of the story you told me about the first man. How the animals came to him in a beautiful garden and he named them one by one when everything was still new. 

You said, The last girl ought to know about the first man. 

Am I really the last girl? 

I shouldn’t talk like that, you said. No, probably not. 

The animal moved among the rocks, appearing and disappearing from view. The shadows played tricks and the animal’s small body seemed to change shapes and colors. I thought about how this creature with no form must have had a name once but there’s probably no one left who remembers it. I suppose many more things will lose their names when the last of the computers fail and the last of the books burn or rot and the last of us forget. You’ll tell me not to think about things like that, but it doesn’t make me sad. 

The animal climbed onto one of the rocks and sat back on its haunches, looking at me. We stayed there with nothing to call each other and then it lifted its nose to the moon and the satellites passing above and scurried off into the dark valley below. 

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Jacob Dimpsey is a writer living in Central Pennsylvania. His work has previously appeared in Qu and the SFWP Quarterly and Wigleaf.