2 Minutes to Midnight (14 page)

"Mama, no!" Bethany growled.
"You killed our mama!" barked Toby.
Rosebud felt her life energy quickly drifting into the ether as she
fell hard to the ground trying to say something, anything to
comfort her cubs, and in the end she prayed Gerome would honor his
word.
"Run for your lives, cubs," cried Gerome.
"Let's go!" Ranger yelled.
The remaining pack turned on the three cubs, snarling, as Gerome
choked on his own blood.
"Leave them be, we have the mother." He recalled the pack, and for
now, they paid attention, but he would be gone soon too. Gerome
could see the shock and bitter rage in the bear cubs’ faces as his
pack ravaged their mother. This was a scene none of the cubs would
ever forget, or forgive.
That had been hours ago, and now as the last of his energy waned
Gerome thought about how beautiful his life had been, even in the
most difficult times. He had been a proud warrior, and had taken
care of his pack for longer than he could remember. It was time for
his spirit to move west, and as his soul drifted like a feather on
the wind he could feel the white light of peace envelope him.
Gerome and Rosebud--now nameless--were together in this new place
at the end of the rainbow, each of them knowing they had fought the
good fight.

dark planet

A marine biologist cleaning an endless sea
of plastic junk is abducted by an advanced race, but where are they
taking him?

A continent sized island of plastic drifted
into the middle of the ocean, choking aquatic life, and driving
animals like the albatross to the brink of extinction. Majestic
birds that had once soared gracefully through the sky on large
wingspans allowing them to glide motionless for thousands of miles
had fallen on dark days, and were very near extinction. Todd Bender
was talking to his intern, Michael Dean, who had working on his
Biology degree from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
They were floating through the great Pacific Ocean garbage patch, a
toxic ocean of humanity’s discarded trash.
"We're going out here to try and stop the spread of this plastic
soup that's choking the sea life. Well, that's the plan anyway, but
first we have to gather data. Did they tell you anything about our
mission at the university?"
"Not really. The ad said you were looking for someone to help in an
oceanic cleanup effort. College credits would be awarded for
selected participants. I was the only one who applied, and now I
think I see why." Michael answered.
"Lucky you, now you're that much closer to graduation." said
Todd.
"So, what got you out here, really? This is a long way to travel
for a small crew just to clean up some plastic." Michael
asked.
"What got me out here was the albatross."
"OK, what about it? It's a big bird, but I don't see what it has to
do with this."
"The albatross has evolved for fifty million years, having lived
almost its entire life in the air, while only coming down long
enough to have babies. These floating plastic particles--to their
eyes--resemble shiny fish scales and, they assumed that it's food
for their chicks. Once pristine coastlines are now lined with the
corpses of thousands of baby albatross whose tiny digestive systems
are clogged to busting with indigestible refuse." Todd
explained.
"Jesus, that's terrible," said Michael.
"I knew about the plastic because I watched a documentary on it
when I was a kid, and it's what led me into the field of marine
biology. I wanted to help, but I didn't know about the albatross,
not until I saw their bodies washed up on shore, bursting with
indigestible plastic lighters and candy wrappers."
"I get why you wanted to come out here, but how are you going to do
it?" Michael asked.
"I'm not one hundred percent sure, but an engineering student named
Boyan Slat devised a way to clean this all up by using passive
plastic collection devices linked together around trash patches.
His idea is currently being built and tested, but our primary
mission is to explore some of this trash, and work together for a
solution, and to create greater public exposure."
Michael nodded. Todd was always up for a good adventure, and had
joined a scientific team concerned for the future of earth’s
oceans, but there was such an overwhelming amount of waste that the
puzzle seemed endless. Todd, his intern, and five other scientists
had been out at sea for five weeks. When Todd first volunteered he
had had no sense of the enormity of the problem facing his team,
and their planet, but after multiple weeks of sitting in the soup
he had started to get a more real understanding of the dilemma.
Their research was complete for this trip, and they would return
home in the morning. For Todd, the trip’s outcome had been
frustrating, because whatever their intentions, they were going
home and the toxic plastic trash still remained.
Their research vessel,
The Sweet
Marie
sat motionless on a still and windless sea. Her
crew was sleeping soundly in their racks below deck when a
spotlight shone through one of the portholes. Todd woke up
irritated at the bright intrusion on his slumber. The others were
fast asleep, but he had never gotten used to the ocean's
unpredictable rise and fall, and therefore he was a light sleeper.
Todd needed to know what the source of the light was, and shuffled
groggily above deck. A moment later, Todd realized that he was
staring at a hovering disk off the port side, but as bright as the
light was it did not hurt his eyes, and instead only obscured his
view of the intruding craft. He stood alone on the tiny floating
craft in the center of a gigantic ocean, panicking, with nowhere to
run.
"Holy shit..." Time stopped in that instance as his terrified mind
struggled to process what he was seeing.
Todd wanted to scream and run, and he considered diving over the
side, but before he could do anything rash, an invisible tractor
beam enveloped his entire body. It froze him in place, lifting him
off the deck. Todd was unable to move a muscle, and felt frozen by
shock to the point of blacking out as he rose from the boat.
"This is for your safety." A voice spoke into his mind, and then he
lapsed into unconsciousness.
Sometime later, Todd woke up on a metal table still fully clothed,
but effectively paralyzed. A voice inside his head began to
speak.
"You are in excellent physical condition, and will live a long
life."
A door slid to the side and a man walked in who had eyes a little
bit larger than his own, but otherwise looked human. Todd found
that he was able to move again and sat up on his table.
"We are here to help your people," The man telepathed.
In his mind Todd saw images of great wars, famine, disease, vast
desserts where were once lavish fields of green grass grew, now
barren, and many more disturbing prophesies.
"That's not real," he said.
"No, not yet. There are a number of scenarios that could play out
on your planet. One of them is that none of these happen, and you
solve your problems before time runs out. But, our random number
generator picks that scenario most often."
"What do you mean? Are you going to hurt me?" Todd asked.
"No, we mean none of you harm. Certain political and geological
events over thousands of years have been calculated to bring about
these predictions for the future of earth."
Todd remained silent, still unsure exactly what was
happening.
"Where are you taking me?"
The alien said nothing more and left the room. Above him the solid
ceiling began to fade, displaying a panoramic view of the star
filled sky as they hovered far above the tiny
Sweet Marie
. Todd looked down and for the last
time in his life he lamented an ecosystem in danger of extinction.
In a microsecond the craft left earth's atmosphere and launched
into deep space. Todd was electrified and overwhelmed by the
novelty of the experience and noticed that there were many other
similar craft near him. They had arrived at an intergalactic
highway bustling with mysterious travelers on their way to and from
mysterious destinations. It all seemed like a sci-fi movie to him
or an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000, only in this reality
there was no Crow T. Robot, or Tom Servo, or Grolsch beer, and he
was an active participant in the freaky presentation.
Starlight twinkled in from all over the cosmos, and then it was
gone. The craft was approaching a very large dark orb backlit only
by the sun shining on earth, and it was so big that it dwarfed
anything he had seen before. By the amount of starlight it blocked
out he judged its size to be close to that of earth by his best
educated guess. His heart began to beat rapidly, thumping like a
double bass drum, when a portal on the side of the massive black
object opened, allowing stunning white light to shine through, and
then they passed beyond the door. What he observed on the other
side stole his breath. Within the orb was a blue sky, marshmallow
clouds, flocks of birds gliding together in formation, and far
below them vast expanses of beautiful landscape. The flying disk
bobbed and weaved through the sky as Todd looked upon massive
waterfalls feeding flowing rivers below, secluded by green,
untouched forest canopy.
"This is beautiful!" Todd exclaimed.
"Welcome home." The words were spoken from within his mind.
The ship hovered over a small town where Todd saw that there were
other humans looking up at them, some of them smiling and waving.
The alien landed the craft, a door slid open and after Todd walked
out the ship quickly departed. A woman and man approached Todd,
arms outstretched and embracing him as he accepted their gesture.
They were both dressed in hand stitched leather clothing that
reminded Todd of frontier movies he had watched as a child.
"Welcome to New Earth Space Station! I'm Ellen." The woman
said.
"I’m Todd. Any idea why we're here?" Todd asked, more abruptly than
he had intended.
"All of us are here because we tried to help out back home. The
Pleiadian people are giving us a second chance by bringing us to
the NESS. Rick, my husband," she crooked a thumb to the man
standing beside her, "was a park ranger in Yosemite, and I
was--am--a doctor." She said.
“What was your profession, or better yet...why do you think
you're
here?" She asked him.
"Well, I'm not sure, but I'm a marine biologist, and I was trying
to figure out how to clean up the plastic junk in our oceans. My
team and I were headed home in the morning, and then I woke up to
lights in my eyes. Next thing I know, they sucked me into their
ship and we were headed here."
"Marine biology, nice we could sure use your help. The colony keeps
growing daily and with Pleiadian technology we've been able to
accomplish some amazing things, but there's nothing like having
good old human ingenuity.” Ellen said.
She walked with him a short distance to an overlook and in the
valley below he could see a pyramid under construction. Tiny
machines were zipping about levitating large stone blocks and
placing them one atop the other in a step construction on eight
sides.
"That pyramid is a communication device and power station,
operating much like the Giza pyramid in Egypt used to a long time
ago. Soon, and with more pyramids we’ll be able to talk to anyone
on the NESS with unlimited power generation no matter how far they
are from this colony, and we’ll have electric light again." Rick
told him.
"You've had to start all over?" Todd asked.
"Mostly, yes. They have been studying our strengths and weaknesses
for a long time, ever since the last deluge on Earth. It was not
until they saw the necessity to step in and help that we were all
brought here, one by one."
"Have they ever said that earth is doomed?"
"Not in so many words, but they are giving us the ability to
rebuild, guiding us where we need direction, leaving us be where we
know what we're doing. This place is more than just a space
station; it's a living biological entity."
It was amazing and Todd was overwhelmed.
"Did they ever tell you why this planet is completely black from
the outside? I mean, this is amazing and the sun shining above us
is unbelievable, but..."
"How does is all work, right?" Ellen asked.
"Well, yeah, uh... essentially." Todd nodded.
"This biosphere is programmed to allow the human race to repopulate
as conditions worsen on earth. The shell of this place is actually
alien technology that is capable of deflecting and absorbing
enormous amounts of heat, and protects the ship when it has to
refuel. It pulls plasma directly from the sun and only needs to
charge once every hundred years, give or take. That’s all we know
about it, anyway." Ellen smiled.
"Are we ever going to return to earth?" Todd asked.
"Someday." She trailed off, thoughtfully.
"You ready to meet everyone else?" Rick asked.
"Let's get started," said Todd, and they walked toward the
village.

thanks given

Three friends take to the woods for a
Thanksgiving getaway seeking adventure, but one of them will find
much more than he bargained for.

Two days before Thanksgiving three
friends, Sean, Tony, and George decided to cut ties with the
traditional family get together and head up to Linville Gorge,
North Carolina for a weekend away. Sean brought a twelve-pound
turkey, and dressing for the festivities, and the others brought
their own favorite side dish. The three of them lived in Charlotte,
North Carolina, so the drive did not take long and soon they were
among thousands of acres of wooded beauty.