PostApoc

PostApoc is the chronological label used to date events in the novel’s post-apocalyptic world. Its references place Bartek’s story across widely separated points in the era, from 23 PostApoc to 10231 PostApoc, while the evidence gives no definition of the calendar’s zero point.

Dated Moments in Bartek’s Story

The earliest of these dated moments is 23 PostApoc, when SoulEater39 recruited Bartek at a meeting at Wrocław Expo. The meeting took place the day after Bartek’s awakening in Vladivostok, anchoring the date to a specific turning point in his life rather than presenting it as an isolated calendar entry.

On day 847 PostApoc, Bartek was working in a garage workshop beneath the forty-storey Aiko Tower apartment complex in Tokyo. He was making himself a replacement limb, with hundreds of surplus robot parts stacked around the workshop. The date accompanies a scene in which the fading lights of Tokyo answer the irigotchi in blinking Morse code, as Bartek faces the prospect of an apparently immense future.

A much later reference appears when Bartek picks up a signal from the Mothernet. Its date reads 10231 PostApoc, and thirteen days have passed. The novel places this moment at the MIT campus, after Bartek has lowered the Morpheus potentiometer and lifted the shell of his Honda from a rain-wet roof.

Chronology and Narrative Scale

Together, the dates establish that PostApoc functions as a continuing era-marker across Bartek’s changing circumstances: recruitment soon after his awakening, survival and improvised repair in Tokyo, and a later encounter with the Mothernet. The references do not explain how the era began or how its dates are calculated, so its starting point remains unspecified.

The large numerical span contrasts with the precise intervals and circumstances attached to individual dates. The 23 PostApoc reference is measured against Bartek’s awakening the previous day; the 10231 PostApoc passage notes that thirteen days have passed. By setting these local measures within a calendar that reaches into the thousands, the chronology gives the story both immediate temporal bearings and a far-reaching post-apocalyptic scale.