Some kinda story

[A Can of Man]

Hey guys I began to write some kinda story... something I do now and then. It's about an Army helicopter pilot whose two ship formation is hit by a psychic attack. He is the only survivor and in that psychic attack is a message that will change the future of human beings forever.
(oOOooOOoOooohhh....)

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[FONT=&quot]1 The Crash of Light[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] It is the year 2007. I’m writing this on a typewriter I managed to find in the wreck. I found it in one of the thousands of warehouses I broke into. No, I didn’t get grabbed by cops. No, the alarms didn’t go off. Not any of those times, none. I don’t know who’s going to read this and when, but in the year 2007, the computer has long since replaced the typewriter as the means for writing but there’s no electricity, no running water… other than the falling rain from the heavens… tears of the deceased perhaps. One morning I woke up to a new reality. The world became sick with some kind of illness. I was sick too, just like everyone else. But the difference was, I woke up in a tent full of corpses. I got up, feeling quite close to fine other than my stomach trying to belch out food that wasn’t there. But by this time, I was prepared. I took a car (after pulling out the dead driver) and went to an airfield nearby and took a plane back up to Base 1 in Alaska.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] I’m not sure when to start exactly… so I’ll start in June 5th of 1997. It was a Thursday night. I was an Army Chief Warrant Officer 2 with the 6th Squadron, 6th Cavalry, the “Six Shooters”… flew the OH-58D Kiowa Warrior reconnaissance helicopter. We were on a tour in Bosnia Herzegovina at the time involved with Operation Joint Endeavor. We were assigned to support the First Brigade Combat Team of the First Armored Division. That Thursday night, something happened. I saw a vision. Actually, I think all of us saw a vision, I was the only one who managed to walk out of it alive. We were a few miles west of the town of Foca in a two ship formation. Captain Richard “Hardy” McKenna was leading. I followed.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] Bosnia is a very mountainous place. A challenging place to fly, especially in low visibility, but the more likely terrain to keep you alive when the possibility of taking fire are present. But it just doesn’t work for you when your people have a sudden psychic attack. One moment I was flying straight and level just above the tree tops, Captain McKenna’s bird Zebra 1-1 to my eleven O’clock and Warrant Officer Tom “Lego” Kovac, my copilot by my side, his eyes glued to the MFD showing images relayed from the Mast Mounted Sight… and the next the Captain was trying to talk to me when I heard him scream. I think it was him screaming. Or it was me. Or it was Tom. Or all three of us and then I was smashing my head into a padded wall, restrained by a straight jacket screaming, “You’re all going to ****ing die!” All of a sudden I found composure. I looked at the space below the door to the padded room. People were walking by, I could see the shadows. “Nurse? Anyone? Where am I? What happened?” I sat back, leaning against the wall telling myself that it was probably a waste of time. Since I was officially in the crazy room, chances were that no one was going to listen to me. To my surprise someone did walk over to the door.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] She was a pretty black nurse. “Do you remember who you are?” she said.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Chief Warrant Officer 2, Alexander Meinhart,” I blurted out automatically.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Very good, Chief Warrant Officer.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] In fifteen minutes I was out of the crazy jacket and sitting in a chair behind a coffee table with the nurse with a great view of a garden. I had to talk first. “How did I suddenly end up in the Walter Reed Army Medical Center?”[/FONT]​

 

[A Can of Man]

[FONT=&quot] “How did you know where you are?” No sign of any surprise though.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Well, it’s written on a lot of things around here.” Brochures, information pamphlets, cups… you name it.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “If I’m not wrong though, you probably want to know how you got here.” Bingo. She was good. I nodded. “Two weeks ago you were in Bosnia with your unit when you got involved in a very strange accident. It occurred during a combat reconnaissance patrol. I don’t have the full picture but when rescue teams arrived, you were not the only survivor.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Were?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Yes. Initially your copilot survived the crash and according to the combat medics on the scene, he was in better shape than you were.” I was covered in slight burns and some superficial tissue wounds. Heck, he must have walked out pretty clean![/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Then how the hell did he die?” I demanded.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Calm down Warrant Officer or I will pull rank on you.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] Damn officers. “Sorry, Ma’am.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Anyways, your copilot, according to this record, allegedly hit the ground and started shouting about a vision. You were unconscious at this time and in fact, at this point, you weren’t even there. They didn’t get a good recording but he screamed about how the world would die in high fever and that of what remained eleven Chinese sisters would restore order to the chaos.” What the ****? The Nursing Corps officer called over a junior enlisted man and ordered two coffees. She turned to me. “How do you like your coffee?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Black.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Make that two beautiful ones, Specialist.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Now why on earth would you mention something like that to me?” No one mentioned stuff like that. Then I thought, maybe it has something to do with the past two weeks…[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Normally I wouldn’t. Except that exactly at that moment when his heart beat stopped, you started going on about a vision. The same thing. In fact, Warrant Officer, you said it the same, word for word.” She stressed that last part. “We even have a recording of your talk. We’ll play it back for you later incase you can provide us with some kind of explanation for this.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “But how did we crash?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “That’s the funny part. The report I read says you were flying straight and level, no fancy stuff, when crews on both choppers lost control and hit the floor. And you know what?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “What is it, ma’am?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Captain McKenna’s last words were said just seconds after the crash. It actually transmitted. They were, ‘eleven Chinese sisters.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “We must have seen something.” Goosebumps were forming all around my body. We must have seen some kind of vision which took over our nervous system and forced us to crash.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “I see you goose bumps are forming on your skin.” How observant. Are you a detective? “I got goose bumps over the whole thing too. If that **** about Chinese sisters ruling a world after a high fever isn’t enough, it’s the fact that you haven’t slept, haven’t eaten and haven drank anything other than perhaps this coffee that’s just about arriving too late for my liking,” she gave a hard look at the unenthusiastic Specialist, “and you are looking as bright and as active as someone just before noon on a regular work day.” She took a sip after blowing a few times. I just looked at my cup.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “How did Lego die?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Who?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Warrant Officer Kovac, my co-pilot.” It didn’t make any sense.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “After he completed broadcasting and spooking the beJesus out of the soldiers who found him, he fell silent and died. Severe brain hemorrhage. But it’s funny because we didn’t see any signs of trauma to his head at all. Your crash was actually quite smooth.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Jesus…” Tom Kovac was a new guy, just a few months out of flight school. He was a good and eager kid. “Can I find out more about what happened?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Actually we can do something better than that. We have someone coming over from Military Intelligence and they’ll be piecing together what exactly happened. The Military Police were adamant about coming but I convinced them that none of the men involved were drunk or under the influence of drugs. Took me a while but did manage so.” She stood up with her coffee, about to leave.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “What do I do now?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Get something to eat.” She handed me twenty dollars. “The MI guys will be here in about three hours. Shaving might also be a good idea. And brush your teeth."[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Wait, ma’am. What if I need you again?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Just ask for Captain Francine Smith and I’ll be happy to answer your call in the order of loonies that have been assigned to me.”[/FONT]​

 

[A Can of Man]

I don't have a title for it yet.
"Crash of Light" is just the chapter 1 title.

 

[A Can of Man]

Made some edits... Jesus... some of the new stuff I wrote is giving me the damn goosebumps.

 

[major liability]

I'm not scared yet, but keep going, it could turn out to be a real thriller, with such an introduction. Wow what a run-on sentence that was.

 

[Missileer]

[FONT=&quot]“Just ask for Captain Francine Smith and I’ll be happy to answer your call in the order of loonies that have been assigned to me.”[/FONT]

13th, it's pretty good reading. This sentence needs some rewriting but, unfortunately, I can't put my finger on it. It is a "Hitchcock" type ending where the last sentence is the grabber. Maybe a mention of Capt. Smith's title of being some type of "head of psychiatric wing" of the hospital or Meinhart notices a diploma on her wall declaring her to be a Dr. of Psychiatry.


Just an idea:
(cheerfully), "I'll return your call in the order received from the other loonies assigned to me."

Press on.​

 

[A Can of Man]

All good ideas but I haven't made the change yet. I think I'll actually get rid of the very first paragraph but we'll see...

(CONTINUED)

[FONT=&quot]2 Psychic Intelligence[/FONT]​

​

[FONT=&quot] ****, shave and shower. I was set for the interview with those Intel spooks. Wondered what all this **** was about. Eleven Chinese sisters? A world dying in high fever? What the hell?[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Chief Warrant Officer 2 Alexander Meinhart, please report to conference room 14. Chief Warrant Officer 2 Alexander Meinhart. Please report to conference room 14.” Gotta love the intercom. I headed over to the conference room where Captain Smith in her Hospital Duty Uniform stood with two Army Majors in blue service uniforms.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] I saluted the shorter of the two Majors (just to keep the short guy happy). “Chief Warrant Officer 2 Alexander Meinhart reporting as ordered, sir.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] The short one returned the salute. Always turns out the short one outranks the tall one. Strange logic, but it works. “At ease, son.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] Captain Smith started the introduction. “Warrant Officer, this is Major Malcolm Gerard (the short one) and Major Kevin Oakes. They’re with the Military Intelligence Psychic Research Section.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] Never thought I’d actually meet one of these guys. The Captain was excused and we were led into a small conference room with a friendly looking table, chairs possibly designed in Scandinavia and a small coffee table. After all, this was not an interrogation room. “Have a seat Warrant Officer,” said Major Gerard pointing at a chair. I sat. Major Oakes took out a fat folder of files, broke out tapes and a tape player.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “So, where do we begin?” asked Major Gerard.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Personally, sir, I don’t even know what to tell you. I don’t know what happened exactly and I’m honestly surprised the psychic people from Military Intelligence showed up.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Son,” Major Gerard found a direction to point this ghost ship, “Let me show you why we’re here.” He picked a tape from the selection on the table and played it. “This what you’re about to hear on this one is purely Captain McKenna’s broadcast.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Zebra 1-2, Zebra 1-2, this is Zebra 1-1. I got… ARRGGH!!!” No sound of any kind of explosion, even with the scream. Several seconds later, “Eleven Chinese sisters.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] Major Gerard stopped the tape. “Now normally we would think he saw some kind of bad porn the previous night but then what we have is this.” He pulled out a document with the descriptions of Warrant Officer Kovac’s last words. “The medic treating Warrant Officer Kovac reported that your co-pilot seemed fine. Not even signs of shock. Then he hit the floor and started going on about how the world would end in a high fever and that eleven Chinese sisters would rise from the cold to rule the world.” He ejected the tape with Captain McKenna’s recording and slipped in another one. “This one has you talking while on an ambulance. You were unconscious just before this happened and the first seven seconds or so of your conversation were not recorded because another medic was fumbling his audio recorder he keeps around to record audio war diaries. But it doesn’t matter because you were saying the same **** over and over.[/FONT]​

 

[A Can of Man]

[FONT=&quot] It was my voice. “… a high fever. Out of the ashes of the dead, eleven Chinese sisters will rise from the cold and rule the world. The nature of humanity will be changed forever. The world will end in a high fever. Out of the ashes…”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] The short Major stopped the tape. “And when we played this to the medic that found your co-pilot, he ****ing shat his pants. He says the words are the same. Absolutely. No deviation. And we couldn’t find this on any kind of damn script of some kind of bad movie, Hollywood, Bollywood or Blue Ballsywood.” He then pulled out a photograph. It showed my Kiowa on the ground with the rotor blades missing and a tree nearby heavily damaged. He pulled out another photograph that showed a Kiowa completely obliterated. I was still speechless, trying to get in all this new information that supposedly made sense. “Now this photograph of this helicopter, seemingly undamaged except for the messed up rotor blades is your helicopter. Heck, actually I checked and the damages were repaired and it’s probably going to be cleared to fly at the end of this month. At least that’s what the mechanics are saying. Your burn wound on your ass happened when somehow your lighter caught fire for a short while. Your scrapes and bruises… well those morons dropped you while moving you to the ambulance and you rolled quite a distance. Woops.” The Major fought back a chuckle.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] My turn to talk. “And how did Kovac die, sir?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Big mystery my friend. Looks like your crash was very low impact. So when the medic found your co-pilot unhurt, he wasn’t really surprised. He was surprised that you were unconscious but in his report he said he figured you just passed out, out of fear. Then, Warrant Officer Kovac hits the floor, says some weird stuff and his brain starts to bleed. Then at that same time, you wake up in the ambulance, say the same things, go utterly apeshit, don’t eat or drink or sleep for two full weeks and then seemingly return to normal. Hell, you tell me how he died.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] The taller and slimmer Major Oakes broke his silence. “Basically there was some kind of psychic connection at this time between you, Captain McKenna and Warrant Officer Kovac. There is no evidence to suggest that Warrant Officer Casey (that was Captain McKenna’s co-pilot) was also connected in this way during the crash. It appears he died instantly.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] The short, fat one returned to the limelight again. “Investigations have concluded that Captain McKenna’s helo crashed hard and that it’s most likely that both the Captain and the co-pilot died almost instantly.”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] I still didn’t understand what these people could get out of this. “So what is it that you need me to tell you?”[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “What is this message about? Do you have any idea how these ideas got into all your heads?” Major Oakes seemed more of the to the point guy.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “I have no idea,” I replied honestly.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Is this some kind of thing from some porn you guys watched together?” the short one had to ask.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] “Hell no, sir.” I ain’t watching no porn with the Captain. Hell no.[/FONT]​

 

[A Can of Man]

[FONT=&quot]3. Triggers[/FONT]​

​

[FONT=&quot] I think the Army closed the case after that but they grounded me anyway and soon had me honorably discharged. I wasn’t really planning on quitting but it was either this or medical discharge so I took this way instead. I convinced them that I wasn’t crazy but the Army didn’t want to take any chances.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] I tried the best I could to leave the strange events of that day behind me. After all, some crap about eleven Chinese girls coming back from the dead, or out of nowhere after people have partied too hard didn’t really make any sense to me anyway. Damn metaphors and imagery. Why can’t anyone ever talk straight? For the most part, I was successful. I refused calls from well meaning people trying to cheer me up or listen to what I had to say but anything associated with them just brought back the nightmares.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] So I just lived in my apartment in Queens, NYC, the place I was born and grew up in, looking for a job as a helicopter pilot after taking a few months off. I was sure I’d be alright. Winter was here and New York was in full gear for Christmas. The streets were lined with snow and the cotton ball decorations on shop windows provided reinforcements. I was buying some groceries this one night on December 11th, that was a Thursday I believe when my efforts to forget and move on failed miserably.[/FONT]​

[FONT=&quot] My apartment is old and with it comes a very old elevator. Not that it’s unreliable. It’s very reliable. I always called it the AK-47 of elevators. But it’s got this small window that lets you see what’s on the floor that you pass by. Then it passed me. It was an Asian woman in her mid 20’s (though you can never tell), maybe Chinese, maybe Japanese… who knows… wearing a Santa hat. There was a guy next to her who at that moment chose to sneeze. This image was exposed to me for a total of maybe a quarter of a second at most and I had this sharp pain in my head as the world went white. The noise in my head was deafening. “The world will end in a high fever. Out of the ashes of the dead, eleven Chinese sisters will rise from the cold and rule the world. The nature of humanity will be changed forever.” I woke up from the vision, saving myself and my groceries from hitting the floor. The elevator doors opened and I walked out, hairs on the back of my neck standing and my forehead covered in beads of sweat. What the **** was that?[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] I entered my apartment wondering what the heck was going on. I thought for a second that perhaps I should go see a shrink but I knew that could result in the revoking of my rotary wing aircraft pilot license. I didn’t know who to turn to. The answer came in under a minute. The phone rang.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Hello?” I had long converted to the civilian way of answering phones.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Mr. Alexander Meinhart?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Yes?” The voice sounded vaguely familiar.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Listen, I know you’re not in the Army anymore…”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Who is this?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Can you meet me at Queens Coffee Shop? The one at Queens Plaza. As soon as you can get there.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Sure.” The other guy hung up. I was already dressed to go outside but I changed my coat to a brown trench coat and tucked in my Glock 30 with a ten round magazine. I had no idea who I was going to meet but apparently the other guy knew who I was. Not going to be taken alive if that’s what the whole thing is. The only thing that got me to even listen was the episode on the elevator just a few minutes ago and the mention of the Army. I had a feeling that maybe Military Intelligence hadn’t closed the case after all. Maybe they had some answers to what had happened. But my piece would sort out any misunderstanding if that wasn’t the case.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] You can always recognize military people in their civvies but he recognized me first. Major Kevin Oakes, the taller of the two intelligence officers who saw me at the hospital.[/FONT]

 

[A Can of Man]

[FONT=&quot] “Mr. Meinhart?” His demeanor was polite and cautious as the day at the hospital.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Major. What brings you here?” Rhetorical question.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “I’m not one to brush aside such phenomena like the one you witnessed so easily.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Jesus, is that how you greet people? You pull me all the way out here and no coffee?” No need to add sir anymore.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Ah, right. Just find a spot and I’ll be over with two. How do you like your coffee?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Black with sugar.” But if he’s anything like me he’ll add a touch of organic mucus as well. So the Army hadn’t closed the case after all! I was really surprised with that fat Major making stupid remarks.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Here you go,” Major Oakes was back.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “I’m surprised the Army didn’t close the case.” I looked down at the steaming darkness to look for signs of uninvited organic life. I found none.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “They did.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] Shock, surprise, but not quite horror. “Then why…”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “I feel that what you presented to me that day is something very real.” He took a sip of the coffee. For the first time I noticed that he looked awfully old for a Major. His close cropped blonde hair was thinning at a few places and there were more wrinkles around his brown eyes than the usual Major. “Unlike Major Gerard, the other man you met that day, I actually believe in real supernatural mental phenomena.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “You think I’m a psychic?” If I was, I sure as heck could have used that back in school.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Not necessarily. I believe that under the right conditions, regular people like you and me can witness a narrow but acute vision that reveals a truth or fact about something.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “The future?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Possibly.” He took a sip. “Most experts believe that when non-psychics see a vision, it is skewed by personal bias, love, hatred, whatnot. But you… what can you tell me about 2012?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “The year?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Yes.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Well… it’ll be here in fifteen years. That’s what.” What a strange question.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “And this is why I believe that in this case, your vision has merit. You don’t believe in this stuff. You don’t have an opinion about these things. I’ll tell you what 2012 is. 2012 is the year that many people profess to be the end of the world.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Really? I thought it’s supposed to end in 3 years. Y2K and all.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] The Major frowned. “That is a stupid, arbitrary date with no substance. An idiotic belief of amateur doomsday theorists. This date I’m telling you about could just about be the real thing.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] An end of the world believer who didn’t believe in the Y2K stuff. I decided to give him a chance. “Tell me more.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Let me tell you what’s so special about 2012.” He cleared his throat. I geared up for a long explanation. “2012 is the year in which the thirteenth Baktun cycle in the Long Count of the Mayan Calendar ends. Whenever such things end, a great change in the world order is supposed to occur. There is also a Hindu following that suggests that an Avatar, a God in human form, will come to earth to lead humanity into some kind of new age.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]“Hmm… that’s not very convincing.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “The message you gave came not only from you, but from two other people who had no serious belief about end of the world stuff, as far as we know that is. And today I just found out that you never even heard of the 2012 matter. It means that this message did not come from within any of you, but from the outside. It was a signal. So that’s clue number one. A psychic signal from the outside. These don’t happen to tell you what to pick up at the supermarket.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “My coffee’s getting cold Major.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “How well do you follow topics on how the world can end?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Never. I mean, why should I? Until this matter with the damn psychic whatever you call it…”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Right, which brings me to the next point. The message you relayed consists of the following, great heat, ashes of the dead and great cold. And of course a new order. Do you realize that heat, ashes and cold are in fact central elements to many theories on how the world can end? Asteroid impact for one. It will appear as though a hot fireball will fall from the sky, hit the surface, kick up dirt… ashes if you will… and the ashes and dust will rise to the higher atmosphere, blocking out the sun and bringing in an era of extreme cold. Nuclear war is another. I’m sure you know the destructive power of the atomic weapon?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Who doesn’t?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Those things bring temperatures that rival the surface of the sun right onto planet earth, again, kicking up dust and ash into the upper atmosphere, blocking out the sun yet again and bringing in the infamous nuclear winter. What do you know about global warming?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] I was starting to get the idea. “It’s getting real hot because of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gasses that we emit?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “That’s half the story. The other theory is that this increase in carbon dioxide will in fact cause a massive reproduction of algae and phytoplankton which in turn will create an excess of oxygen which will lead to a major global chill of ice age proportions. Heat, chill…”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “No ashes though.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “The dead naturally become ashes.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Oh yeah.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “What I’m saying here Mr. Meinhart, is that your flight may have stumbled into some kind of supernatural beacon foretelling about the future. And if that is the case, it sure as heck won’t be the first time it’s happened.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “And what about this new world order thing?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Ah, that. 70,000 years ago, the human race faced near extinction. You wouldn’t have heard about this would you?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “No.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]“But it’s true. There was a population bottleneck 70,000 years ago.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “So how low did the population get?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Estimates are around about two thousand.” The Major’s sitting angle was now at an acute angle.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Two thousand?” That’s crazy. “And what were the consequences?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “The consequences? After that event, human beings became social creatures and began to live together in tight, better coordinated groups because only groups that exhibited these behaviors during these times of extreme mortality had a pin prick of a chance of survival. It was the beginning of cultures. This was the birth of the roots of civilization. It separated us from other animals. Communication, courtesy, rituals, rites, religion… they were born from the ashes of the dead.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “So if something else happened…”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “It would change the way human beings live, forever. A massive, reorganization if you will.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]“You said it’s not the first time such things happened. Name me some others.” I needed supporting evidence.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “A regular, poor peasant girl, not unlike any other suddenly had a vision from God and saved her country from a vastly superior foe, a hundred years after all the best warriors in her land had failed. A convicted murderer in Egypt fled, received a message from God and became a man revered by billions of people. Do you know who they are?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Who?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Joan of Arc and Moses.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] Christ… I may have known those if I paid any attention during bible class as a kid. “So what, you’re saying I’m some kind of messenger of God?”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Not necessarily. You just relayed a message. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you will be the one to change the world."[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “But I may be required to do some work.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “Maybe so.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] Or maybe this Major guy thought he was guided by some divine power to hear me say this stuff. I got a queasy feeling in my stomach and wasn’t sure if it was the coffee or the news.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] He took out a thick looking manila envelope. “Here, these are copies of what I found in my personal research. Read them over. It’ll save you the trouble of spending hours at the library.” He then gave me his business card and left.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] By opening the envelope I knew I was agreeing to dive deeper into the whole end of the world and eleven Chinese sisters business but the image of light and the message from a voice which was neither male, female nor accented… maybe not even spoken at all… it wasn’t going to leave by itself. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]I brought it back to my apartment and ripped open the envelope, staring down into the darkness yet again. I dug my hand in. It was time to see how deep the rabbit hole really went.[/FONT]