"I am all-powerful Time which destroys all things, and I have come here to slay these men. Even if thou doest not fight, all the warriors facing thee shall die."
-Krishna
Oblivion. Unholy, screaming oblivion. No one saw it coming. Not the men in Washington, sitting high upon their hill. Not those who claimed one sex was better, for they engaged in their own war. Not the people who held in one hand a crucifix, and in the other a child's hand. Not those who were protecting us, for they were not prepared.
They all watched, all silent eyes and gaping mouths. Some cried, but most gaped. They watched as cities were consumed by this oblivion. That silent, screaming, dark oblivion, surrounded by a wall of fire. It roared and all before it were struck down dead. Its eye scanned over the landscape, and flames engulfed the hills and the farms and the woods. Its breath went far and wide, and all life in its wake fell down dead. It was unfeeling, could be not reasoned with and would only consume more.
People feared and when people fear, people become animals. We as a species know this, but we still fall back on old habits. Men and women rose for causes they did not even understand. Many became angry. "Why had not anyone done something?" "They could have stopped this!" Anger leads to violence and violence only leads to death. Modern Robespierre's snuffed before they snapped. More bodies burn. More funerals to have. More chances to blame something. More chances to get angry. More chances to be violent. More bodies to burn. It repeats.
Some time later, men go to the beast's lair. They tell of great pyramids of bones, roads of burning cars, pimples of the earth like the skin of a cancer victim. They tell of the survivors. Aberrations, they said. Don't go back for them they said. People feared, angered, fought, lost and burnt. Just more numbers on a steadily rising list. Rain on the pond. More people are found. Someone takes pictures. A mother and child. A man and wife. An old patriot holding a flag. A school. People see these pictures. Fear, anger, violence, death, ash. Rain on the lake.
Eventually the boxes stops talking to us. The final editions of everything are released. We can't talk to our friends in Venezuela, or Serbia, or Ireland. Only one channel, a woman with an inviting smile talking next to a slowly raising death counter. We mourn it. Our eyes are covered by wool. We become afraid. Fear, anger, violence, death, and ash. Rain on the ocean. Men with guns walk the streets like roving hornets. "For the people" said the men of the house, with smiles made of plastic.
The masters of the beast let us out from under their Tungsten fist. We ran like frightened deer. Men came back from the former lines. Aberrations they said. Don't go back for them, they said. Fear, anger, violence, death, ash. A trickle over the dam. Camps were set for the creatures. They wanted to see their families. Their families did not want to see them. Death ran though these camps, spreading his influence around like a cloud of mushroom spores. Thousands die. A stream over the dam. More pictures come. Deserts of corpses, fields full of a rotten crop, streams of bodies. None fear this time. They rejoice.
Death spreads his wings and flies over the country. His spores fall to earth. One death leads to two more, two to four, four to eight, so on and so forth. Cracks in the foundation. The men on the hill try to stop the deluge of bodies. For every town killed, ten thousand feet of yellow tape are used. The men come up with programs that all fill the same function. Cover our Asses. All of them are acronyms because news people apparently cant say Department for the Disposal of Human Remains or Radiation Protection Agency. Stories come in. Footage of a city deserted, nothing but bodies and crows. Still that women just smiles. She can't do anything. She is the news. She says so.
More deserted cities. More crows. More bugs. More footage. Fear, anger, violence, death, ash. A waterfall over the dam. Everyone wants to stay protected. They want to become those things in the street. People lock their doors. They die. People buy medicine. They die. People stop drinking tap water. They die. People buy canned air. They die. Two dead for every living, says the news. They changed presenters again. Where did those other presenters go?
More people go to the lair. Few come back. He tells of more terrible children from the beast. Corpses that act alive, puppets of deaths construction. Trees that can eat humans whole, Gia's fury. He is laughed off. Put in an institution. The government takes notice under the radar. Sets up some yellow tape. Nobody comes back from exploration missions. A hurricane is seen above the dam.
Everyone stops talking about the things that used to matter to him or her. Dinner conversations consist of "When are we goanna get milk again?" or "They changed curfew again" or "Maybe its better in Europe". A priest hijacks the news. He screams at the camera that you should fear the government, and love the lord. We got see him get shot by some solders. Fear, anger, violence, death, ash. Five dead to one alive. The dam finally bursts.
We now await our own oblivion. We were all corralled into one of the deserted cities. Easier to aim a beast at us. We all shuffle around the streets where people once walked. We all look like the men who returned from the lines. I sit here, in an abandoned house, writing this, hoping that someone will find it. That someone will read it. Know why we were led to oblivion. Read the story of our downfall. And now I wait. Wait for the sweet warm embrace of oblivion. I hear the birth screaming of the beast now. It flies down to this city, ready for its fiery first and final meal. Sweet, singing oblivion. Oblivion.
