[austintorn@aol.com]

(The future told me about the log cabin—that you're going to move there. I just copy it down and post it here.)

Part 3

The shards of early man now appeared, formed, and then shattered—as the primitive brain stem began failing in its task to sort out human-radiated reality from all else that was out there. She was no longer totally Sapiens, but Homo Habilis, then Erectus and Handyman.

Taken aback, she fell to her knees, overwhelmed, and began to focus on the outlines of the trees and branches, desperately attempting to bring her mind to attention—an old trick she’d learned to quell panic attacks, but this was the last frontier of horror, even considering what she’d been through in her life.

Somehow she got up and continued walking, now privy to all of earth’s invisible radiation, but soon adapted, learning to put much of it out of her mind. She could even hear the noise of thermal vibrations as she moved on.

Mikal next felt the actual emotion of death and dying via suffocation, but, again, through previous practice, noted that she was indeed still breathing in and out—and so she waved death’s ebon form aside. Waves of adrenaline now swept her body from head to foot, and she nearly fainted, and sat down, in case she did, not wanting to bang her head on a rock.

She arose slowly, to avoid the hypotension of quick-rising blood pressure. Her heartbeat had to be around 180 now, and this actually helped her along—but too much of this and she would be no more. 20 minutes left.

Mikal stopped and meditated, trying to focus on nothing to quiet the intrusive thoughts—as she’d learned to do. It didn’t work here as well as it had elsewhere, so she switched to another, alternate method—which was to watch the maddening thoughts go by as if in a parade, but not watching or entertaining any of them. They appeared, marched across, and exited stage right, all unattended to by the witness, her, for she was sitting in the audience way back in the back row. As for some thoughts that wouldn’t leave at all, she colored them them dim and grey—and as such they dissolved into a fog.

She got up, her heartbeat perhaps now down to 140, but many night-mares and their foals were still passing on by as wide-awake dreams. It was almost too much, now. Her very self was beginning to disintegrate, she desperately trying to hold on to that last bit of logic in a back corner of a mind somewhere—a mind that was being overwhelmed with unreality. She stumbled on, heading in the direction of increasing sickness, her only means of navigation. What’s that?

She turned off her light, for there was a glow in the distance. That was it. Ten minutes left.

The pressure upon her sense of self grew worse as she approached the glow—logic’s last gleam was fading, for life’s last light was now upon her. She was only ten feet away when waves of confusion washed all thinking away. She fell forward a few more feet and collapsed. So close.

She didn’t know it yet, but she had entered a zone of safety, that perhaps the device itself needed to be free to function unaffected by its own emanations.

Her head spun round and round as consciousness returned, another familiar sensation, but one that was never very pleasant. Four minutes left. The mental disturbances were gone now, but she still reeled from their ravages. She felt cold for the first time—then freezing. Her body had been overloaded, its thermostat not functioning anymore. It took her a minute to regroup—she’d known cold Canadian winters before. She willed her body to function.

She stood up and faced the alien device. There was a switch. She turned it off. The glow-lights dimmed, and the machine began to fade, then to oblivion went. Was it really happening or was it hallucination? She reached out her hand to where the device was—and felt nothing. She lay down to surrender to the night and fell asleep in the crystal palace—her tomb.

Back at the TOE Center, all looked to the clock: there were 3 minutes left.

As the countdown neared zero, nearly everyone tensed.

East looked at West. “It’s been fine—this life.”

“Indeed.”

At zero, nothing happened.

The CIA called and reported: The tremors have stopped, but for the earth settling back in. All emanations have ceased. It’s over.

Mikal awoke, her cheeks flushed and pink with bloom, but she knew, she knew, that it was but endorphins flooding her brain and body—one last gift from the Angel of Light that is given to the dying—so that the darker Angel of Death would not soon approach one so fair…

She closed her eyes, drifting back off towards the netherworld, but then felt some snowflakes falling on her cheek. But it can’t snow in her, she thought…

The Ninjas above were hacking through the ice canopy with pick-axes, showering her with a cooling spray where she lay in her crystalline cathedral.

A bright light shone through the hole above and a rope came down, followed by some black forms. They wrapped her in blankets of warmth, then placed her in a harness, and she was lifted up and into the heated heaven of the helicopter.

The TOE Center erupted in cheers, having watched on screen.

What happened? inquired the CAI Chief a few minutes later.

“She turned it off with three minutes left—and the alien thing just evaporated!”

Just evaporated? That’s it?—she just turned it off, three minutes early, not even near zero?

“This was not an 007 movie.”

Ah, but you only live twice: once when you’re born—and again when you stare death in the face.

“Perhaps mankind will take some pause from this, valuing life more,” said East or West.

Yes, indeed. Perhaps it has scared the Hell out of everyone. I’m still not sure what to make of all this.

“Not all things are knowable. We looked for the device—it was gone—there was no trace, but you do have a video of it.”

Well, thanks for your help. I don’t know how you did it, but you sure pulled this one out of your butts.

“Great anal-ogy. I’m afraid we don’t really know how we did it ether.”

It’s beyond me. Now, about the news media and that alien thing—it never happened.”

“Ha, yes, I guess it never did, for it’s no longer there.”