The Ministry for the Future

the way.
Then the sound of the air conditioners cut off. More cries of distress. His phone no longer showed any bars. Electricity gone. Brownout, or blackout. Sirens like the wails of gods and goddesses, the whole Hindu pantheon in distress.
Generators were already firing up, loud two-stroke engines. Illegal gas, diesel, kerosene, saved for situations like these, when the law requiring use of liquid natural gas gave way to necessity. The air, already bad, would soon be a blanket of exhaust. Like breathing from the exhaust pipe of an old bus.
Frank coughed at the thought of it, tried again to drink from the jug by his bed. It was still empty. He took it downstairs with him, filled it from their filtered tank in the refrigerator in the closet there. Still cold even with power off, and now in his thermos jug, where it would stay cold for a good long while. He dropped an iodine pill in the jug for good measure, sealed it tight. The weight of it was reassuring.
The foundation had a couple of generators here in the closet, and some cans of gasoline, enough to keep the generators going for two or three days. Something to keep in mind.
His colleagues came piling in the door. Hans, Azalee, Heather, all red-eyed and flustered. “Come on,” they said, “we have to go.”
“What do you mean?” Frank asked, confused.
“We need to go get help, the whole district has lost power, we have to tell them in Lucknow. We have to get doctors here.”
“What doctors?” Frank asked.
“We have to try!”
“I’m not leaving,” Frank said.
They stared at him, looked at each other.
“Leave the satellite phone,” he said. “Go get help. I’ll stay and tell people you’re coming.”
Uneasily they nodded, then rushed out.
Frank put on a white shirt that quickly soaked up his sweat. He walked out into the street. Sound of generators, rumbling exhaust into the super-heated air, powering air conditioners he presumed. He suppressed a cough. It was too hot to cough; sucking back in air was like breathing in a furnace, so that one coughed again. Between the intake of steamy air and the effort of coughing, one ended up hotter than ever. People came up to him asking for help. He said it would be coming soon. Two in the afternoon, he told people. Come to the clinic then. For now, take the old ones and the little ones into rooms with air conditioning. The schools would have A/C, the government house. Go to those places. Follow the sound of generators.
Every building had a clutch of desperate mourners in its entryway, waiting for ambulance or hearse. As with coughing, it was too hot to wail very much. It felt dangerous even to talk, one would overheat. And what was there to say anyway? It was too hot to think. Still people approached him. Please sir, help sir.
Go to my clinic at two, Frank said. For now, get to the school. Get inside, find some A/C somewhere. Get the old ones and the little ones out of this.
But there’s nowhere!
Then it came to him. “Go to the lake! Get in the water!”
This didn’t seem to register. Like Kumbh Mela, during which people went to Varanasi and bathed in the Ganges, he told them the best he could. “You can stay cool,” he told them. “The water will keep you more cool.”
A man shook his head. “That water is in the sun. It’s as hot as a bath. It’s worse than the air.”
Curious, alarmed, feeling himself breathing hard, Frank walked down streets toward the lake. People were outside buildings, clustered in doorways. Some eyed him, most didn’t, distracted by their own issues. Round-eyed with distress and fear, red-eyed from the heat and exhaust smoke, the dust. Metal surfaces in the sun burned to the touch, he could see heat waves bouncing over them like air over a barbeque. His muscles were jellied, a wire of dread running down his spinal cord was the only thing keeping him upright. It was impossible to hurry, but he wanted to. He walked in the shade as much as possible. This early in the morning one side of the street was usually shaded. Moving into sunlight was like getting pushed toward a bonfire. One lurched toward the next patch of shade, impelled by the blast.
He came to the lake and was unsurprised to see people in it already, neck deep. Brown faces flushed red with heat. A thick talcum of light hung over the water. He went to the curving concrete road that bordered the lake on this side, crouched and stuck his arm in up to the elbow. It was indeed as warm as a bath, or almost. He kept his arm in, trying to decide if the water was cooler or hotter than his body. In the cooking air it was hard to tell. After a time he concluded the water at the surface was approximately the same temperature as his blood. Which meant it was considerably cooler than the air. But if it was a little warmer than body temperature … well, it would still be cooler than the air. It was strangely hard to tell. He looked at the people in the lake. Only a narrow stretch of water was still in the morning shade of buildings and trees, and that stretch would be gone soon. After that the entire lake would be lying there in the sun, until the late afternoon brought shadows on the other side. That was bad. Umbrellas, though; everyone had an umbrella. It was an open question how many of the townspeople could fit in the lake. Not enough. It was said the town’s population was two hundred thousand. Surrounded by fields and small hills, other towns a few or several kilometers away, in every direction. An ancient arrangement.
He went back to the compound, into the clinic on the ground floor. Up to his room on the next floor, huffing and puffing. It would be easiest