30 MAY 79 AU. 1115 HOURS.
DESIGNATION: 00007125-ALEPH.
UNIT: ASURA-00 PNEUMA

Surely enough, the R&D people are taking as much advantage of my changing body as they possibly could. I never even knew I had this much blood. In fact, I can barely imagine what tests they’re even running on me at all. I guess there’s nothing I can do.

I have been watching TV more. A sort of morbid curiosity struck me after I woke up, concerning what the hell would even happen to everyone and everything after the combat with the KING. From the news media coverage, I suppose “hell” is a good way to describe it.

It might be difficult to notice from Area-X02’s picturesque view of middle-of-nowhere Baldpate, New Jersey, but the world is on fire after Manhattan died. Maybe half a million people died, something like a million were turned into those bizarre animals, and so many people were hunted down by the Byakhee. The 1st Air Support Team hunted maybe 100 of them down successfully before being forced to retreat, which left many more to attack and spread throughout North America. After the death of the Enemy, the silence was lifted, and emergency airforce response quickly followed, but even then, it has been spotty. The Byakhee are strong, sturdy. They're taller than most people and have kevlar for skin, according to testimonials. The projected impact on nature and inhabited settlements is enormous.

Many people who lived in Manhattan were not native to that place. The ones that turned into beasts, that were immolated alive, they left behind masses of families elsewhere to mourn and despair over them. Many of the ones who survived drowned when the inverse rain fell over the island and flooded the ruins. Most of the buildings in the city were brought down — by PNEUMA, by the Enemy or his corpse, by the flood, or by the crystals falling to the ground after it was all over. Specialists — architects, urban designers, engineers — all basically agree that Manhattan is completely unrecoverable. The infrastructure? The financial district? The company headquarters for a good portion of Fortune 500? All gone. Insurance companies are in abject horror. There isn’t enough money to cover this. Even if there was, payment processors are in crisis, and credit, well, might not exist anymore now that the financial market has been maimed beyond comprehension. Many major companies are closing down. They’re saying that unemployment is going to surge in Zone 1 soon, maybe up to the double digits. It’s a disaster.

The government is trying, of course. The Zone 1 parliament is already moving to nationalize private banking to attempt emergency maneuvers before we hit the greatest recession in history. They’re telling people to move to Chicago, Toronto, Austin, places that already had major financial centers, so that with a few years of public works and concerted effort, a decentralized substitute for Wall Street could be created. This is optimistic, of course, but it might also be stupid; telling desperate, horrified people to flood major urban centers without migrant capacity is a fast way to cause enormous issues in the near future. Chicago, Toronto, Austin, Seattle, Vancouver, Mexico City, São Paulo — tens of thousands are already traveling there right now, especially to the ones with big financial markets and away from the coasts, as climate activists attempt to turn this calamity into a “we told you so” because of the flooding. They’re thinking that New York State is going to become a ghost territory soon, emptied of all its elderly rich folk, with its population dispersed throughout the more vacant continental interior.

My understanding of these things is limited, of course. Having been raised in PROVIDENCE, most of my knowledge of politics and economics comes from watching the news in the mess hall, and occasionally picking up a book or another between obligations. But even I know that this is a catastrophe. A catastrophe that I’m responsible for. That I could’ve stopped faster, better, if I had only been a bit stronger. If I had steeled myself and helped the pilots. If I had responded faster. If I were better.

God, everything hurts, still. So much pain.

So much.

> Majko Kruzeto, signing off.