No longer at this address
The box wasn’t addressed. No one had ordered it. The world had long stopped asking. The drones kept delivering.
The drone came down slowly, like it was trying not to disturb anyone.
The rotors rasped a little, just a slight whisper over the hushed evening. Its casing was matte gray, dented, pitted and scratched, but the shape still pretty much intact. The kids have taken to calling them bugs, but most of us still call them drones. People used to use them for shopping.
It hovered for a couple of beats, oscillating slightly as if orienting itself, and dropped a parcel on the ground.
…no one had asked for it.
But that’s how these things seem to to work. We’re not sending a signal, but somewhere there’s a system still running.
I watched it lift back into the air, undercarriage blinking a faint blue. It headed off west, veering slightly it was nearly, but not quite, sure of its next destination.
The package was sealed and taped. Creased and dusty, but unbroken. It still had a few marks that might have been logos once. Nothing legible, though. No names or notes.
We’ve seen them before. It’s not a common occurrence, but it happens enough that nobody’s surprised any more.
There’s been boxes of half-broken tools, weird synthetic fabrics, some bags of shiny powder that we threw away. One time there was a bundle of wrapped up toothbrushes. Most of the time it’s useless, but occasionally someone will salvage it.
Whatever these systems used to be, they’re not for us.
I didn’t have anything better to do, so I sat near the package for a while.
Some kids passed on their way to the well, slowed down to take a look, kept going. One little girl threw a pebble at it. Nothing happened, so she didn’t do it again.
I know that people once had phones, although I’ve never seen a working one. They used them to make requests. They connected and people got deliveries on demand. You’d tap a screen and a drone would bring some food to your door. Or clothes. Or a toy. Or whatever you wanted.
I don’t remember it myself. Just scraps of stories, couple of arguments I overheard. I saw a half-corrupted old video one time.
Now those machines are just delivering without anyone asking. Looks like it happens at random - they drop along roads, in fields, on rooftops. And then the stuff just sits there for a while, until someone tosses it out, or burns it, or finds some use in it and takes it.
Sometimes the drones even come back and pick them up. But then sometimes they don’t.
I’ve seen packages circle back and get delivered two, three, four times. We mark them to be sure. Sometimes feels like the system knows if something didn’t get delivered, and sometimes not. Or maybe sometimes it just doesn’t care.
It was getting darker, and the moon was giving off more light than the remnants of the sun. Made things look paler.
I went over and picked up the package. It was light for its size. I shook it…didn’t hear anything.
Some kind of code, mostly rubbed off, on the bottom, something something 93A.
I didn’t open it.
Instead, I carried it to the edge of the village. There’s an old half-collapsed warehouse where we leave things we don’t want. The drones seem to know the spot. Some of them, at least.
I put the box down on a flat concrete shelf, next to a snapped wrench and some cracked plastic tubing. Remembered to scratch a little “X” in the corner with a nail. Then I walked home.
It’ll get picked up again, most likely.
There’ll be a passing drone that’ll recognize the shape, and decide it belongs somewhere else. Or maybe they’ll know somehow that it didn’t get to its destination. Maybe it’ll carry it to the hills, over the lake, back to some of those big ruins by the coast.
Maybe it’ll be dropped back in the same place in a week, sealed again, still unclaimed.
The system that drives them, whatever it is, hasn’t stopped.
We ordered from no-one.
But they keep delivering.