Three stories about a major world changing event.
Lion’s
The Devil’s Workshop
It was the end of it. And some say that they don't know if it will be good for the end to be forever, or if it will cause more problems than it will solve. But one thing is for certain; all the tension built up over generations in the shoulders of men was released that day.
The celebrations were propelled by joy and music and drinks. Everyone, and I mean everyone was elbow deep in gratitude. The women, well, they could not really help themselves. It might have been forced upon the women, or coerced, but after the decision was made and carried through with that Devil, all that was forced from the women never seemed to be forced. Now, all that was just omitted.
There was a big movement before the change. Signatures were gathered, on petitions, from all the citizens in town. The women too. It's a funny thing about women: most have such a hate for other women that you could tell them some piece of gossip while asking for a signature and they'll sign whatever you have in your hand just to pay you off for the dirty news; others are just so nice and naïve that a man doesn't even have to ask for a signature just be pleasant and tell them "Everyone is signing this here petition. Your name belongs on this line, here." They always oblige, usually never asking what it's all about. Just trying to fulfill their duty, I guess.
And all the women in town were this way, all of them except Helena. That woman, well, she wouldn't give a petitioner the hour of night. She had the will of a camel with, the heart of a lion, and the sharpest of all the tongues in town. It was because of her husband the petition had been started.
It was because of me that she signed it. The only door she opened was to the pub, but once in there her defences developed a crack. In the pub Helena was a valve that had no off switch and once the flow started the only thing that stopped it was the floor. I was there, next to her, when she met with the floor. I got her to the can. Holding her hair back and all, pen in hand, and when she was done and I told her "Sign here." She let lunch go having already released her dinner, turned around and signed. I walked out of the john looking sombre. Then with a smile raised the petition and the bar crowd — all men — cheered.
It was a long walk to get to that Devil's workshop. I was the one to do the deed because I had gotten the hardest name of all on the petition. They figured if I could handle Helena then I could handle that Devil too. It was up in the mountains out of town and the once I got there there was line of young women waiting outside of the cave he called “The Devil's Workshop”. I didn't wait in line because my mouth needed not alteration; I walked right in. there were about fifty grinding stones each with the name of a town above it. I saw the name of our town and took the placard off the rock wall and continued down the line of stones to the current town he was working on.
He had the young girls tongue pulled out, further than natural, and spun the wheel with his foot. He was about to lay the young woman's tongue on the wheel for sharpening when I interrupted.
"I've got it. It's all over. And this erases your previous work too" I said. I gave him the petition and the placard with our towns name on it.
"That's what we said." He looked over the petition "Helena too?" he said.
"It's all in writing and it's all over," and I started walking out.
"You might as well take this," and he handed me the placard.
And I, without weight and the placard in my hand, ran. I got back into town and hooted and hollered posting the placard above the entrance of our community building and the celebration began. "The Devil's not sharpening our women's tongues no more!" I yelled, and all the men cheered.
Ceahorse’s
Twisting
“Sit down, gentlemen.”
There were murmurs across the table.
“Listen up! I want to know what the hell is going on. Someone please explain to me why in the hell there has been 3 earthquakes 4 hurricanes and 5 tornados, all over the world in a span of 2 days.”
“Mr. President, we have complied a report. There is it, in front of you”
“Peters Shut up! Look at this shit. It’s the size of a phone book. I don’t have the convenience of sitting down to read this. Someone, please explain it to me, simply so we can figure out what the hell to do.”
“Mr. President, I believe I can do it. It’s quite technical but it can be summarized as the world is off balance.”
“What you mean off balance?”
“Well, our analysts have foreseen this, but not so soon. We figured we had about 5-10 more years before any signs would show.”
“If you knew about it, why wasn’t I told about it…Never mind that right now, what did you mean by off balance”
“Well it’s a physics problem. The earth spins as a sphere on the north south pole axis, normally. However, the spinning has been affected by population densities”
“Are you for real? Does anyone confirm this?”
“Ah, yea”
“Yup”
“Yes sir. That’s what the report shows”
“So you all telling me that the there are too many people?”
“Yes sir, but it’s not the conventional problem of resource consumption and waste production. It’s a mere factor of weight”
“Weight? Are you saying that man has knocked the world in whack because we are too heavy?”
“Simply said, yes. Mr. President, the problem isn’t the amounts of people. We solved the amount problems already, or are in the course of correcting them. It’s the densities.”
“Yes, Williams. You mentioned the density already.”
“Think of it like this. The heavy parts, or the heavily populated parts of the world are causing the lighter parts to seem lighter and the world is tilting”
“Ok, I get it. Too many people in small spaces. What are the trouble spots?”
“North America is pretty much ok. However, our north eastern seaboard is a small problem as is our south western. Canada is not a factor and neither is South America. Africa and the Middle East seem to be spread quite evenly, as does Europe, with the exception of Germany and Italy. This leaves us with the major contributors. India, China and Japan.”
“What are our solutions? Have we spoken to these problems areas, or informed the UN?”
“No sir, we have not, as of yet”
“Why not?”
“We thought it wiser to display ignorance for the time being”
“Ok, so what solutions do we have?”
“There are two choices really, sir. One, we tell the problem areas to fix it. And two, we fix them once and for all.”
“What are you suggesting?”
“China has know, as has India of their population problems, yet they have failed to correct them in more than a decade. They seem to just be letting it get worse.”
“I see what your insinuating, what do we have for plan two?”
“Based on the areas of problems we have separate solutions.”
“Europe, is on the decline, their problems are forecasted to be corrected within 2 years. As for Japan, we suggestion Projects, Saltfire, and China and India, Project Beaconpod.”
“What the hell are those?”
“Saltfire is described in your reports as is Beaconpod”
“Just tell me what they are”
“Beaconpod is nanobot extermination program Saltfire is virus. Basically, with India and China, we deploy a beacon which releases nanobots which kill every human within a set radius from the beacon. For Japan; Saltfire is a low airborne virus with is contained by saltwater.”
“Then what?”
“We wait them out then repopulate”
“Won’t the rest of the world take offence to action of this nature?”
“Not if they don’t know what has happened. The virus will disintegrate and the nanobots and the beacon will self-destruct.”
“What kinda of time span are we talking about”
“Three days, after 5 days we can begin to repopulate.”
“Hmm.. Do it!”
Beetle’s
my 9-11
“It’s a hoax,” I said coldly, as I walked away from my crying sister. She was planted in front of the television, a box of tissue on one side of her, a white mound of soaked up tears on the other. I didn’t know if the day could get any shittier. I had been up all night doing things that I knew I shouldn’t have. It seemed like such a good idea at the time. It is a great idea, until you find the thing that you’re looking for, but hoping not to find. Her email was littered with the oh-so-common conversations with friends and family. “How is life away from home?” “We miss you here.” “Hope Rhode Island is treating you well.” And then there it was, just as casual as all the other emails. So casually stated that I had to read it multiple times for it to sink in. “Hey Mom! Rhode Island is great! The boys are awesome, I’ve got so many chasing me, I can’t decide which one will be my new boyfriend.” New boyfriend? What an awesome way to find out that your girlfriend has moved on. I read the email over and over, sulking in hate, regret and remorse. I finally went to bed at five in the morning. It was September 11, 2001.
My sister woke me up around 10 am to take me to the television. It was all very surreal. So surreal, that I didn’t believe it. I went back to bed, more concerned about the newly found problem in my relationship than the catastrophic event plaguing the airwaves. When I finally woke up, I called her. She was responsive as usual, the same almost fake, loving voice at the other end of the line. “I just can’t believe how close it is to me,” she said. “That’s it? That’s all you can say? Thousands of people have just died. People jumping out of buildings. An attack on American soil. All you react to is the proximity of your city,” I replied. I was bitter with protection. Putting up walls with every word I said and with every sound wave that entered my auditory canal I found a new reason for hate. I was so nervous that I was shaking. I didn’t know how to bring up the email. Finally I just did. “I checked your email last night,” I said. “You checked my email?” “Yeah. Saw the one you wrote to your mother about your new boyfriends.” CLICK. So that was how it ended. I sat on the front porch and smoked another cigarette. I could feel the numbness creeping into my brain. The beautiful sunny day had become grey and my Technicolor life had fallen back a few decades and turned into a silent film in black and white. I got ready for class.
The drive to school was bizarre. It was like the entire United States was standing still. Everywhere you went people were vulnerable, lost without any sense of direction. Like their star quarterback had just broken his arm. Like they had just found out they had been lied to for their entire lives. America was not as safe or as strong as they thought it was. The lines to the gas station were a mile long and gas prices had skyrocketed five times. When I got to school, the classroom was nearly empty. Students were huddled around televisions, hugging and crying. It might have been the only day in American history that complete strangers felt comfortable hugging each other. I didn’t hug anybody, I was trying to be numb. I wanted to protect myself. A tidal wave of reality hit me that day. A reality that would take me years of painful acceptance to digest. A reality that told me that I was not as great as I had thought myself to be. I was not as strong as I had anticipated. I was vulnerable. That day I walked hand in hand with America, we cried together as we recognized our weakness and vulnerability.
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