Jul 15, 2008 15:25
It’s amazing what can be found in an eyeblink. It can damn a witness. It can make a person miss a road sign. It can change a train of thought quicker than a punch. As sure as reasons have colours, an eyeblink can end a marriage. It nearly ruined a contract but I was too stupid to realize it.
I’m on the other end of the gear change. I’m backstage having a cigarette. I’m under the carpet. The cleaners are done with my hotel room. I checked out ten years ago. There’s only one way to ground level that’s quicker than the elevator or the stairs. It’s a little risky.
Let’s talk about circles. In 1978, a government consortium known only as ASDAM held a conference in Baltimore. It was attended by two extra-terrestrials, an Old One, a Norse god, and six humans, including Zombie Edison and the ghost of Edgar Allen Poe. The destiny of our planet was decided then. A schedule was laid out that takes us up to the year 2078.
That document is called the Century Break.
It’s a footnote in what passes for a constitution on Centauri Prime. The off-worlders promised us safety for a hundred years in exchange for a number of our resources.
In return, we need to achieve space travel within a hundred years of that signing and clear out. In 2078, our planet goes back on the market and the hordes descend in a free-for-all claim-jump orgy that will leave our planet gutted and desolate.
Turns out that they’re a bunch of liars. Advance-wave alien survey teams are trickling in right now in a small but steady stream. They have permits. I found this out and brought it up to the consortium. They were less that sympathetic. I’m being hunted now.
I was one of the humans present at the signing. Along with the Norse God and the Old One, we represented Earth. I’m the last one that’s still alive. The rest have been executed.
All of the Zombie Edisons have shown up decapitated in different American rivers. Unless he had any super-secret backup copies that he was keeping hidden, he’s out.
Any psychic medium who attempts to reach Poe ends up on fire. The Norse God is hiding with his people. The Old One is on the ocean floor.
The three other humans are in drawers in the morgue. I’m running for my life.
I remember sitting across from the aliens at that table in 1978. I had a handlebar moustache and a yellow pantsuit. I remember that the alien across from me was blinking rapidly with its six eyes. At the time, I thought that the air here was giving it allergies.
I realize in hindsight that it was chuckling. Their race blinks when they laugh.
We are the American Native Indian First Nation Peoples. The aliens are the Colonizing Europeans. We need to mobilize now.
tags
human,
alien,
space