Click here to read part 2.

Morning light leaks into Jonah’s condo through UV-filtered smart glass. Rising out of downward dog, he rolls off his yoga mat, his AR yoga instructor blinking out of view as he pulls off his goggles and wipes his face with a small towel.

In the bathroom, Jonah slides his AR goggles back on and steps into the shower. Steam rises around him as the screen flickers to life, projecting his task list, news streams, and a window with Ren’s immersive article about Pops, still receiving hundreds of views an hour.

The Last Man Offline.

Jonah doesn’t really want to watch it again but taps the file open anyway as the water runs over his shoulders. The world around him is slowly replaced with Pop’s living room, window open, the breeze rendered as a faint vibration through the goggle’s nodes at his temples.

Pops’ voice fills the small space,layered over audio of insects and ocean waves:

“I just didn’t want to trade my mental peace…”

Jonah hasn’t cried in years, but something in the calm, grounded, familiar sound of Pops’ voice tugs at a thread he’s been holding tight for too long. His throat chokes up. The water pounds down, but all he can hear is the wind and waves and that damn voice, steam and tears blurring the inside of his goggles until the anti-fog kicks in and briefly shrouds Pops’ house in clouds.

Turning off the shower, Jonah steps out and dries off, wrapping the towel around his waist. AR goggles still on, Pops’ face sits frozen in a half-smile lingering in the corner of the overlay. Jonah swipes the article away and opens the SimpliCity messaging panel, clicking on Ren’s name and typing on the projected keyboard:

You were right. Maybe he did need this.

He clicks send, a chime confirming delivery. The message dissolves into a stream of other pings, one of them drawing his eyes, a headline hovering in the corner:

SENIOR UNPLUGGED: National Debate Over ‘Offline Rights’ Grows.

Below it, a thumbnail of Pops tagged with a journalist’s name Jonah doesn’t recognize.

Jonah blinks it away, pulling off his goggles.

He dresses in simple, loose clothes for the day, AR fibers in the fabric pulsing with Jonah’s breath as the color adjusts to a warm blue. He walks to the bed and picks up the package lying there, weighing it in his hands before sliding it into his backpack. His bag’s internal sensors confirm the package’s ID with a ping.

Package secured, the bag announces.

Jonah tightens the strap across his chest and heads to the door.

Outside, the drone car is already waiting, door sliding open with a hiss as he approaches. He climbs in and the door seals, the car lifting into the morning haze.

Jonah leans back and flicks off the overlay as the skyline drifts by, the city outside reflected in the dark window, his own face superimposed over the shifting landscape.

Closing his eyes, Jonah listens to the drone car hum beneath him, the package heavy in his bag.

_____________________

Larry moves slowly, carefully, carrying the old palm-sized camcorder to the coffee table, its plastic casing warm from sitting in the sun on the windowsill. He sets it on a stack of books, angling it toward his chair by the sliding glass door, where the garden is a blur of green in the background.

Sitting with a small grunt, Larry wipes sweat from his brow and adjusts his glasses, smudges on the lenses catching a glint of light before he wipes them on the hem of his vintage Miami Dolphins t-shirt (from before they moved the team to Orlando). He leans forward, finger hovering over the red button. Then he pulls away suddenly, looks out at the garden, the silence pressing in.

He thinks of Jonah, the enigmatic affection he feels for the boy.

Finally, he presses the button, the small light on the camera blinking to life.

Larry sits back, breathes slowly. He wipes his damp palms on his shorts.

Then, finally, he speaks.

“If you’re watching this,” he says, “it means I’m gone. Or close enough.” He pauses, motioning towards the camera. “Funny, me using one of the very things I never trusted to say what matters. Maybe because this isn’t for the world. Just for you.”

He smiles, hanging his head. Takes a deep breath.

“I’m asking you. Whoever ends up with this, but I’m guessing it’s you, Jonah — Don’t upload me. Don’t make some AI mimic my voice. Don’t archive my face and turn me into a ghost. Let me fade. Let me have an ending.” Larry rubs his hands together, feeling the dirt still caught under his fingernails from weeding earlier. “I don’t hate the world we’re in, Jo. I know it’s easier for most people to just stay connected, flow with the rest of society. I know your mom and dad are there. That’s why your mom and I drifted apart after your grandmother passed and I refused to — ” Larry’s voice catches. He takes a breath. “Your friends, the rest of your family, your whole world, they all live in that place. But I won’t do it. I can’t.”

He sits back, folding his hands in his lap.

“It’s not because I hate progress, or tech or the future. I just…I just believe endings should be the end.”

A smile crosses his face.

“When you plant something, you know it won’t last forever. But you plant it just the same. And you take care of it, and you watch it grow. And when it’s gone, you don’t download a new one. You can plant again, sure. Or not. But the old one, it both rests and lives on, in the memory.” Another slow breath. “That’s the natural order of things. And that’s what I want, Jo. When it’s time, let me both rest and live on in your memory.”

Larry leans back, looking outside and wondering if there’s any more to say. He notices a couple of errant petals in the garden sprouting around the okra.

He smiles. “Funny how fast the weeds grow back.”

After another few seconds, Larry stops the recording, the light on the camera blinking off. He sits there in the hush of morning looking at the black screen, his reflection faint in the plastic.

_____________________

The drone car drops Jonah in front of Pops’ house. The afternoon heat is thick, the sky above Perrine a washed-out blue. Clouds gather on the horizon. Jonah adjusts the strap of his pack on his shoulder, the package inside vibrating faintly against his spine.

Walking up the path to the front door, Jonah glances over the fence. He hasn’t seen Pops tending the garden in a couple of weeks, but the soil looks fresh, turned. Still growing.

Jonah knocks on the front door and Larry answers a moment later, wiping his hands on his faded jeans, a smudge of soil on his cheek. His glasses catch the light, scratched lenses flashing as he looks Jonah up and down.

“You look tired,” Larry says, stepping aside to let him in.

Jonah wipes sweat off his forehead as he crosses the threshold. “Long night.”

Inside, the house is cool, a faint breeze moving through the cracked windows. Jonah slips off his shoes, dropping his bag by the couch with a thud.

They don’t say much at first. Larry moves to the kitchen to pour two glasses of water, his hands steady enough today as he drops one in front of Jonah. Jonah picks it up, sips.

“So what kept you up last night?” Larry asks.

Jonah runs a hand through his hair, scalp nodes glinting faintly before going dark again. “Had a chat with Ren.”

Larry raises an eyebrow. “Really? How’s fame treating her?”

“Good.” Jonah says, looking down at his glass.

Larry smiles, sitting on the couch. “I like her.”

Jonah grabs a chair to sit across from him, and he’s barely in his seat before Larry reaches beside his chair and picks up a camcorder. He stares at it for a second, running a thumb along the edge, then ejects the memory card and holds it out to Jonah.

“This is for you,” Larry says. “But you can’t watch it ‘til I’m gone.”

“Gone?” Jonah says, looking at the small one inch square of plastic. He doesn’t take it. “What do you mean? What is it?”

Larry smirks. “Don’t tell me you’ve never seen a memory card.”

Jonah still doesn’t take it. Looks like he doesn’t even want to touch it. He stares at it like it might burn him.

“I know what it is,” Jonah says. “I mean what’s on it? And what do you mean I can’t watch it ‘til you’re gone?”

Larry’s hand wavers, a slight hesitation. “Take it, please.”

Slowly, Jonah reaches out and takes the memory card from Larry, the thing feeling particularly tiny and fragile in his hands.

“What’s on it, Pops?” Jonah asks.

Larry leans back in his chair, looking out the window, scanning the garden.

“Just me saying what needs to be said,” Larry says. “Last will and testament and all that.”

Jonah sighs. “You know they have other ways of doing that.”

Larry gives Jonah a side-eye glance.

Jonah looks away. “You’re not doing the implant, are you.”

Larry says nothing.

“Pops,” Jonah says, hanging his head. “I know you and Mom don’t talk much these days, but this is going to break her heart.”

Larry lets out a breath. “She’ll understand one day,” he says. “We weren’t made to live forever, Jo. There’s peace in being forgotten. You ever think about that?”

Jonah slips the memory card in his pocket. Larry sets the camcorder down gently beside the water glass, like it might break. The silence settles again throughout the house. Ocean scent drifts in.

Jonah grabs his bag.

Larry looks over, watching as Jonah reaches for the zipper, then stops, swallows, then unzips the bag, the package’s hum growling louder, resonating through the quiet.

He pulls out a sleek, white box, no bigger than a hardcover novel. The box’s surface glows.

Jonah sets it on the coffee table.

Larry stares at the box, fingers tapping on his armrest. He looks up at Jonah, then back at the box.

“What’s that?”

“The implant kit,” Jonah says.

Larry doesn’t say anything, just stares, though his fingers stop tapping.

The quiet thickens.

“After everything I’ve told you,” Larry says.

“Pops, I’m not trying to force you to do anything. I just— ” Jonah pauses, fingers tightening around his knees. “I don’t want to lose you and wonder if I could’ve done more.”

“Jo — ”

“Just think about it, okay? I’m leaving it here. You can toss it if you want. Just please, consider it.”

The corners of Larry’s mouth twitch. Then he sighs.

“Fine,” he says. “I’ll think about it.”

Jonah leans back with a measure of relief, the implant kit glowing faintly on the table between them.

Outside, a gust of wind whistles through the garden.

They don’t say anything else for a while, just watch the light shifting through the curtains, the distant waves whispering closer and closer.

_____________________

The drone car’s hum fades as Jonah leaves, the front door clicking shut with an echo.

Larry sits on the couch, staring at the implant kit, hands resting on his knees, fingers drumming lightly in rhythm with the kit’s pulse. He glances at his book collection, a small fortress with the comforting scent of old pages. He thinks of the video on the memory card Jonah just took.

Just let me fade.

Leaning forward, Larry takes a deep breath of the humid air, the weight of it grounding him. He can hear Jonah’s voice repeating in his head: Just think about it.

Larry places his hand on the kit. Doesn’t move. Just rests it there, his fingers still faintly stained with garden soil.

Before he can think too much, Larry opens the box then places the packaging back down. He brushes the tiny device resting in its slot. Half an inch of plastic, meant to root in his neck. Cool. Vibrating. Steady.

Shadows stretch. Curtains stir.

Still, the pulse continues.

Larry looks out the window toward the garden and thinks, somewhere in the dirt, the okra’s pushing up toward the light. A light that now dips lower on the horizon, purple smearing into orange like someone erasing the day in slow, quiet strokes.

Larry picks up the instruction manual, and starts reading.