Madison’s Last Podcast

by Luke Brett

WANDA:
Welcome back to “View from the Horizon,” the only literature podcast in Portland Oregon completely dedicated to speculative fiction. I’m your host, Wanda McBride and today we’ll be chatting with Madison Cook, the author who writes for a not-too distant future. Welcome Madison.

MADISON:
Thanks Wanda! It’s great to be back. I-I mean, it’s my first time on the show. I just love listening to it. I’d missed the last few episodes, so it feels like I’m coming back to the show, but in a cooler, big way.

WANDA:
Are we- are you redoing a time loop right now? (laughs) In your novels, you frequently have characters traveling back in time from the future. Did you already do this interview, and you’re coming back for a redo because it went so badly? (laughs)

MADISON:
(Sarcastically) Yes, oh my God. You caught me. Yeah, I had to get in the time machine and come back Wanda. The first interview was awful. I meeeean, I kept hitting on youuuuuu, I threatened the President, I gave my home address- it was, it was a mess.

WANDA:
Oh my. Well, let’s talk about your upcoming novel, “Out of Next,” which is a fantastic title for a book about time travel, by the way.

MADISON:
Oh, thank you.

WANDA:
Of course! And I wanted to ask, is it...is it getting harder to write apocalyptic fiction in the year 2022? Because it feels like every time we get used to the staggering amount of human extinction events that we have piling up...

MADISON:
(laughing) Yes, yes.

WANDA:
...we get, like, another new one. Like, you’ve just gotten used to the wildfires and the flooding and the droughts, and then suddenly-

MADISON:
(finishing the question) You find out that you can’t drink the rain water anymore?

WANDA:
We can’t drink rain water anymore!! Oh, my God. When I read that...

MADISON:
(as a sad but true joke) Didja freak out for like, a minute, and then just go to work?

WANDA:
I freaked out, for like, a minute and then I just went to work.

MADISON:
Yep.

WANDA:
Ugh. Hwuff. Okay, so. Madison. As the fiction writer, how do you come up with an apocalypse that’s...new?

MADISON:
Well, in my book, “Out of Next,” you find out that the world is going to end...not long from now. And that it has almost ended millions of times. Every time it gets close to ending, a time machine gets built and resets us back to the Big Bang. A secret order of time travelers leave behind messages all over the world explaining what happened, but once people find those messages...well, they decide they don’t have to save the world! If there’s going to be a time machine eventually, we can just go back. So it kind of turns into, like, when you were a kid and there was a big test coming up that you didn’t study for...and then you get a snow day! But then it’s still snowing so much, you don’t study. Because you’re pretty sure there’s going to be another snow day.

WANDA:
So humanity never learns.

MADISON:
We never learn, Wanda. But then, because the Earth has lived out its lifespan so many times, the last girl to build a time machine finds out that time has gotten too unstable. She can’t go all the way back. She can travel back in time a few years, maybe ten maximum, but going any further than that will destroy everything.

WANDA:
So what does she do?

MADISON:
Sheeeeee, um...goes back to everyone she’s had a crush on and finds the right time to tell them. And she writes a book, I guess. Because that’s what you do when you’re... “out of next,” you just make art and flirt with people.

WANDA:
...what?

[Sound of crackling energy, a zap of a time machine appearing, electronic doors and a ramp extending]

MADISON:
So, um, Wanda...do you wanna come along with me? We’d probably have two really good dates before I’d ruin it.

WANDA:
…I mean hey, what are we waiting for?