The plane, a Learjet 35A, flew gracefully over the skies of New Jersey. The weather was overcast, and on the ground in New Jersey, it was drizzling lightly. In the cockpit was Joshua Marshall, also known as Jay-Ma, the multi-Grammy-winning rapper. Josh reflected on the past hour. It had been a dramatic one. The past three days had been Hell itself, Josh thought. It was just after winning the MTV music awards of 2005. Josh reflected on the current date, September 5, 2005. His watch said September 2nd, but Josh knew it wasn’t right. It had stopped, just like everything else with an electronic chip did in the destruction in Detroit. But Josh was alive, and his goal was simple: Reach New York City alive. His mind raced back to 90 minutes ago. It was 9 AM, or at least, that was what his watch said. In reality, he had no way of knowing the time, as the effect of the bombs had turned the sky a dusky, dark gray day and night.

"C’mon, Josh, we have to get to New York. I just heard on the radio that they have been spared somehow." his friend and pilot, Dylan Skagway said. Josh was in the basement of his mansion in suburban Detroit. The basements were the only safe place now that the fallout had begun coming down like black snow.

"How are we going to get to the airport?" Josh asked.

"I have a Learjet. If we drive fast, we can get aboard it and get to New York."

"Hasn’t New York been destroyed as well?" Josh asked, even though he could not swear under a court of law that any city besides Detroit had been erased from the surface of the Earth. But, for all he knew, Dylan and he could be the last two humans alive.

"I heard on the radio. It’s still in existence. It somehow got spared in the chaos of the past three days."

"I always loved New York. How fast can we get to the airport?" Josh asked. Josh once did a song about New York. It was called "The Big A", and was on his CD "The Jay-Ma LP". It was one of his bigger hits, he thought. A member of the New York City Council denounced the song as "a vile, hateful piece of garbage, and not something to be proud of." Well, now he had to rely on New York for kindness. He didn’t mind.

The drive to the Detroit airport had been a short one. They got there in a limousine, that being the only car they could get to work. On the way, Josh looked out into the darkness. It was like night out. It then occurred to him, for the first time, that many people had died here in Detroit. The skyscrapers were all gone, except for one, which was a mere skeleton of what it had been. All the rapper saw left of the building was the floors and walls. He looked through it, and saw the same dull darkness that covered the rest of the sky. Several buildings were still on fire.

The car roared down the street, where so many charred skeletons of cars remained, with the bodies of people burned so badly you couldn’t tell which side was their front and which was their back. Josh looked forward and saw a massive line of cars burned black.

"Hang on." Dylan said. He turned the car onto the sidewalk, and drove there, hitting a phone booth and several parking meters. No good to anyone anymore, Josh thought. A few minutes later, they were on the airport tarmac, and ten minutes after that, Josh felt the G-force on him as the Learjet 35A glided into the air.

Twenty minutes later, as Dylan was sitting in the cockpit of the Learjet, Josh began thinking about what he would do in New York. He would start over, perhaps try to live in the only city left. Suddenly, he heard a choking sound. It came from the cockpit. He ran up there, and saw Dylan slumped over, dead. He had splotches all over his face, and was bleeding in many places. Radiation exposure was Josh’s best guess. Dylan had dared to drive out in the fallout-infested landscape, and had paid the price for it. Josh had no choice but to take over the plane. He took Dylan’s body out of the cockpit, and placed him in the aisle. He sat in the pilot’s chair. And then it occurred to him that he had no idea how to fly a plane, especially a Learjet. He assumed what was going on was fine, and that he could call to an airport once he got in the New York region. He hoped.

And now, Josh thought, I am almost there. Josh concluded that he was over New Jersey, as evidenced from the little orange dots below, each one representing an oil tank catching fire. New orange dots appeared every minute or so. Josh could only imagine the smoke this must be producing. He thought about trying to call an airport on the radio. He picked up the transmitter, and spoke.

"This is Joshua Marshall to any airport in the New York region. I need clearance to land a Learjet 35A at any available airport. Does anyone read? Over."

No response. Josh repeated his request. Still no response. Josh decided to wait a while. His mind zoomed back again, this time to three days ago, on September 2.

The day had started like any other one. Josh woke up in his huge mansion overlooking Lake Erie. He went outside wearing his Speedo, and swam. (In his pool, not Lake Erie, of course.) After an hour in the pool, he went inside, and put on his clothes and watch. It was 8:34 AM. Josh was a morning person, he enjoyed being outside and believed in what Ben Franklin had said, "early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise." Except that Josh had stayed up until 2 AM partying and having sex with various groupies who came to his concerts. Josh was a rap superstar, and his ego was still tripping from winning 4 awards at the MTV Music Video Awards. Before that, he had won several Grammys.

Josh Marshall was born on February 17, 1978 in the slums of Detroit. He lived with poverty, struggling with a job as a cashier at Sack n’ Save, until 1997, when he released "Cutter", his debut rap album. The album did mediocre, but still earned Josh enough money to get by, and a spot, albeit small, in the rap scene. Rap was Josh’s life. He had been listening to it since he was 5. To him, rap was a kind of magic, a loud and beautiful way to express feelings, or the desire to rise from poverty like a Phoenix and achieve success. This was what Josh wanted. And he had it. But today, September 2, 2005, would be the end of that.

Josh turned on the flat-screen TV in his living room. He flicked past MTV, BET, Cartoon Network, the Golf Channel, finally ending up on FOX News. They showed a map of the war between China, North Korea, Japan, and South Korea. Ho hum, more nonsense in Chinkistan, as Josh called it. Josh was far from politically correct, though he wasn’t a racist by any means, as being racist against blacks or whoever is a good way to bring a rap career to an end. Josh thought about how this all happened. It started some time ago.

The flash of light came without warning. Like the flash of a camera, a gigantic white light absorbed everything within Josh’s sight. Josh stumbled outside to see what had happened. He stepped out onto the pool, but the hedges blocked his view. He then climbed up the diving board, and stood, like a giant, 15 feet in the air. He could not believe what he saw.

The cloud was bright orange, and rose from the ground. It was a mushroom cloud. Josh had not noticed the roar until now. It went at him with force equivalent to the head given by some nameless girl the night before. He slipped, and found himself back in the pool, his clothes all wet. He was ready to dismiss it as a hallucination or his imagination until he reached the surface. He looked up, and there was the mushroom cloud, as orange and breathtaking as ever. He got out of the pool, and went inside, only to find the TV was out. He recalled learning about this in high school, it was something called electromagnetic pulse. When you detonated a nuclear bomb, an electromagnetic pulse shot out that shut down all electronics in a certain radius of the explosion. He sat in the living room and panicked. He got out the corded phone, which he hoped still worked. It did. He called his agent. No one picked up. He called his girlfriend. There was no one there, either. Finally, after about ten calls, he called Dylan Skagway, a friend of his, and a licensed pilot.

"Hello? D-Dylan?" Josh stuttered. It was something he hadn’t done since he was 7.

"Let me guess. You are worried about the nuke going off?" Dylan said.

"Yes. What happened? I haven’t exactly been following the news lately."

"Them wacky Russians again. And I said this wouldn’t happen after the Soviet Union fell."

"I wouldn’t know, I was only 12 or so."

"Anyway, what I’d recommend now is that you get indoors, and stay that way. I won’t be doing that, since I have to get to my family. Good lu-" The phone went dead.

Josh had been inside his basement ever since, at least until Dylan arrived in the limousine.

Josh continued flying the plane. He got a childlike urge to fly in a barrel roll, but thought better of it. He tried the radio again.

"Hello? Does anybody read? This is Joshua Marshall on a Learjet 35A radioing for any assistance landing at any available airport. I am in desperate need of help. Does anyone read? Over."

"Grnnnng—" A response. All right, thought Josh. "Gnnnnnn-clear--Guardi--gnnnn--land. Over."

"Could you repeat that? Over."

"This is Kim Gallager at La Guardia airport. Josh Marshall, you are cleared to land at runway 5. Over." The voice said. The voice was a loud baritone, with a slight Kentucky backwater accent.

"Can you tell me how to land this plane? Over." Josh asked. Another flashback filled Josh’s mind.

The date was August 24th, 2005. Josh was sitting with his girlfriend Kelly on their big black leather couch, watching TV. It was 10 PM at night. They turned on the TV, and were watching South Park. Kelly was checking an Internet message board during the commercials.

"Josh! Turn the TV to CNN. Someone just posted a thread about a nuclear attack!" Kelly said.

"The hell? Are they serious?" Josh asked, understandably.

"I don’t know. They just said something about a nuclear attack on CNN. Let me go to " Kelly went there, and saw the huge red banner that paints during a major news story. The white text read:

"MASSIVE NUCLEAR ATTACK IN JAPAN AND SOUTH KOREA. DETAILS SOON."

"Holy shit." Josh said. He flicked on over to CNN. Two anchors were sitting at a desk.

"-and we have just lost contact with our Japan correspondent, and we are bringing you back to Atlanta. For those of you just joining us, three nuclear explosions have gone off in Seoul, South Korea, Tokyo, Japan, and in Beijing, China. We do not know the source of these explosions, though North Korea is suspected to be behind this. A week ago, North Korea tested 3 nuclear bombs, so we have good reason to suspect they are the cause." The anchor said.

"But why would they attack China?" Kelly asked.

"Why would they do this at all? I thought North Korea didn’t want this. No country wants this." Josh said.

"Some people don’t know that a nuclear war cannot be won." Kelly said. As if to dodge this, Josh went back to South Park. They watched the double-episode feature. (It was the one where the boys curse a lot and Kenny dies.) They then went to bed, but neither of them slept a wink.

The next day went by in a blur. North Korea claimed responsibility for the attacks on Japan and South Korea, but admitted that the attack on Beijing was a mistake. This didn’t matter. At 5:16 PM EST, Japan and China launched nuclear weapons on North Korea. In 24 hours, over 40 million were dead. On August 30th, Russia launched nuclear weapons against China and Japan. It turned out that Russia had made a secret deal with North Korea to defend them from neighbors. On September 1st, a nuclear bomb mysteriously went off in Moscow. And on September 2nd, nuclear bombs went off in every major city in England, Canada, the United States, France, Israel, and Germany. But for some reason, New York City was spared destruction. Perhaps it was in the memory of 9/11, perhaps it was simply overlooked, perhaps a missile was launched against them but it was a dud, who knows.

And now, Josh thought, New York City would be the last beacon of civilization after a full-scale nuclear war. He continued talking over the radio.

"Kim, this is Josh. Can you tell me how to land a Learjet 35A? Over." Josh said.

"Let me look it up. Okay, I got it. First, try to keep the wings level with the yoke. You’ll be landing at runway 5, so try to get positioned there. Just turn the heading to 95. Got it? Over."

"Yes. Over."

"Good. Now find the tachometer. Do you see it? It should be labeled. Over." Josh looked around, and found it.

"I have it. Over."

"Good. Reduce power to the bottom of the green. Over."

"Done. Over."

"Now, keep the nose level. This is done with the elevator trim. Over."

"I can’t find it. Over."

"Look on the dashboard, to the right. It should be there." Sweat beaded down Josh’s cheeks and armpits. He was clearly nervous. He found it, and moved it, sweat accumulating on the dial.

"I found it. Now what?" He noticed they had stopped saying "over" to each other.

"Extend the flaps to their full setting. Once again, it is labeled. If the nose drops, don’t worry."

"Okay. What do I do now?"

"Has the runway moved up or down on the windscreen?"

"No."

"Good. Wait until you are at 100 feet from the runway." Josh waited. Seconds seemed like decades. He almost had another flashback, but he repressed it just in time. He looked at the altimeter, and it said "100".

"I’m at 100 feet." Josh said.

"Okay, pull the red mixture knob out to kill the engine and flip off the red master switch. Don’t worry if the nose drops again. After that, close the fuel shutoff valve."

"Done, done, and done." The altimeter went from 100, to 90, 80, finally reaching 20.

"Now, slowly ease back on the yoke."

"Okay, what now?" The plane was going fast, and Josh was getting worried.

"Touch down as slowly as possible. The nose will be a bit high." After a millennium of waiting, the landing gear hit the ground, and Josh felt himself rolling along the runway. He zoomed down the runway at what felt like warp speed, at least.

"Now, retract the flaps, and turn on the brakes. You should have a very easy ride." Josh did that, and the plane began to slow. It continued slowing down, and finally it stopped, about 300 feet from the end of the runway.

"Good job, man. You did it! You landed the plane. You’re in New York now. Josh, you’re safe."

Josh was soaked with sweat. He had done it. And then Josh Marshall, Jay-Ma, laid his head down on the controls, and for the first time since he was 8, he sobbed.