Travel Bug (42 page)

Protection of the environment…

A mountain of skulls…

Diversity training…

A mountain of skulls…

Tolerance counseling…

A mountain of skulls…

Reparations…

A mountain of skulls…

No child left behind…

A mountain of skulls…

They hate us for our freedom…

A mountain of skulls…

The heroes…

A mountain of skulls…

The villains…

A mountain of skulls…

The haves…

A mountain of skulls…

The have nots…

A mountain of skulls…

The hypocrites…

A mountain of skulls…

The… consistent……

A mountain of skulls…

The religious…

A mountain of skulls…

The non-believers…

A mountain of skulls…

Anti-Capitalistic propaganda…

A mountain of skulls…

A new understanding of the U.S. constitution…

A mountain of skulls…

Meeting ordinary people with ordinary (and extraordinary) problems…

A mountain of skulls…

How dare you question whether this war is constitutional…

A mountain of skulls…

Oil is the only fuel…

A mountain of skulls…

Do not seek alternative forms of fuel…

A mountain of skulls…

It’s okay for church and state to occasionally mix…

A mountain of skulls…

Trust the police to stop crime…

A mountain of skulls…!

Trust the elite of faith to make moral judgments…

A mountain of skulls…

Put college professors in charge…

A mountain of skulls…

Some speech is too offensive to be spoken…

A mountain of skulls…

If a religion is called a religion of peace, that’s all that needs to be said…

A mountain of skulls…

Universal government healthcare…

A mountain of skulls…

Celebrities support this candidate…

A mountain of skulls…

All things are equal…

A mountain of skulls…

The promise of utopia…

A MOUNTAIN OF SKULLS INDEED!

“Men are fools and actively seek their own destruction, Andrew.”

“Yes they are,” I answered him.

“Volunteerism, altruism, helping the poor and downtrodden and health care for all with a lot of social justice… You know, American doctors take the Hippocratic Oath way too seriously…”

“Yes,” Flick answered the beautiful woman, Elizabeth.

“Okay, you know best,” she answered him, sarcastically.

I don’t know if they actually spoke these words but somehow in a dream or in my mind or perhaps to evade myself of the visions of this possible future… I indulged, no I enveloped myself in all of this……

“Health care?” asked the stupid, pretentious actor.

“Yes,” she answered him.”

“I can see that.”

“No you do not, not.”

“What?”

“Health care, offensive speech… you have so much to learn.”

“Okay,” he said.

“No, tell me you understand. Please I can teach you.”

“What do I understand?” asked the empty shell of a man, in other words a politically active actor in Hollywood.

“Ian, you don’t see no matter how many predictions I make as your personal psychic. No matter how many people’s volunteers I get or how many blow jobs give you!”

“Oh,” he said, blushingly.

“Ian, you need to understand.” She looked at him like a parent looks at a one year old playing with his new teeth.

“I do understand,” Flick said.

“Good.”

“Honestly I do,” he said to her. “You know I have depth to my personality.”

“No, please listen. People are stupid. They need guidance because this so called freedom is pointless. They need…”

“Guidance?” asked Ian.

“No. It is something more, actually, Ian, something wonderful.”

“What then?” He looked at her like a deer in the headlights, handsome, confused and feeling like he was being used…

“Dictation…”

“Oh, wait, isn’t that like a dictator?”

“Ian, are they always bad?”

“No,” Ian answered Elisabeth, bewilderingly.

“Name some a good one, Ian. There must be at least one you admire.”

“Oh, my Christ, there is lots, I mean there are many, Castro, Chavez, Pot and even Stalin got a bum deal and a bad reputation he didn’t deserve.”

“Yes,” said the woman in disguise, formerly the woman who was the time traveling white witch… the woman from…… …… …… … Rapture…… ……

“That’s why only right wing dictators are evil…”

“Precisely, that’s why you are such a great thinker who deserves to be celebrated for your deep thoughts and acting skills. You have won the greatest award for an actor that is offered? Have you not?”

“Yes,” he said, blushingly.

“Why did they give you that?”

“Well…”

“Come on, be honest, why?”

“Damn, this Ian Flick is a fool,” Harold said. He was looking either down at his shoes or the ground. Then he sighed. “How could one of the greatest societies ever fall for such nonsense?”

“Great grandfather, I don’t know,” I said, desperately trying to sound both sophisticated and philosophical. You see I was going mad, bit by bit, piece by piece and so was this old man that nature never intended for me to meet in the first place.”

Insanity ran with us both…

A mountain of skulls…

Hollywood leftist ignorance…

A mountain of skulls…

Pol Pot…

A mountain of skulls…

Stalin…

A mountain of skulls…

“Andrew, what are you thinking about?”

The Rapture woman… disguised… as Elizabeth… on TV worldwide… was speaking for the new world order, the government……

“On this most lovely Christmas, let us give the ultimate gift… health care insurance for all, thanks to you the people and to the people’s president,” she said.

The audience in the TV studio wept with tears because this was the new world vision. We were all the same; everyone would be equal, finally at last. No more homophobia, racism, sexism, prejudice, just a simple world united once and for all… the dream at last was about to be born.

The millions watching all over the world and especially in the United States were glued to the televisions.

“The time is now…”

She was so lovely, sensuous and remarkably intelligent without being offensive or condescendingly intellectual. Her beauty was… rapturous…

“The time is now!” shouted the television audience…

“The time is now!” shouted millions at home at their televisions.

The thing, that beast, that monster, the bug, a damned unspeakably big insect, the ancient creeping thing, the unnamed species would die someday. It could not hibernate in a perfect state of hallucinations and dreams (or revelations… ) forever. Like everything on this wicked planet, it would draw its last breath, its heart would stop and it would cease to exist; it would die…

Oh yes, it would die…

Now… who would find its remains? Would it provide an obscene unnatural surreal encore after its physical life was dead? If not then it was just another skull? Granted, an enormous skull, a prehistoric one…

The giant skull of a bug (if bugs have skulls and if this thing was a bug… ) And a mountain of human…… …… …… …… skulls…… ……

One must eat the meat to travel through time…

Nothing learned…

Except what is forgotten…

What does history forget?

A mountain of skulls……

What does time teach us?

A mountain of skulls…

What have all the real time travels shown us?

A mountain of skulls…

The king once said that going on with suspicious minds was a bad idea. The suspicious minds that now existed between these two ladies were quite extreme!

“Interesting title,” blurted the old woman.

“Yes,” she said, nervously.

“Where is the doctor?”

“Now is not the time,” said the doc.

“I don’t think that I quite understand.”

“Do you ever feel like your life is not worth living?”

“Sometimes…”

“I see. Let me write that down.”

“Please sign this form…”

“What does it say?”

“That’s not important, madam. Please put your trust in the Q.O.L.H.C. that has been selected.

“What?”

“It’s easier if you don’t fight it…

“Look, I know this is no ordinary checkup…”

“You got that one right…”

“I need to know my rights…”

“You need to know your rights?” asked the life and death counselor.

“Yes,” she answered.

“Well, that is certainly to be expected.”

“I have rights…”

There was a pause.

“What do rights do you believe you have?”

She scratched her head in almost disbelief. Then she knew what was really going on, simple formalities. She had lives a full life but that was no excuse for putting her down like a cat with kidney disease.

“The constitution…”

“I see,” the death counselor said, almost laughing out loud.

Out to lunch…

“Perhaps, you should have read the fine print, Lillian.

Out for good…

“Perhaps…”

“Let’s just get this over with, Lillian. Shall we?”

A skull… the first skull…… of a mountain of skulls…

That wretched woman enjoyed this ultimate joke on the people. She smiled for the television cameras once more. A smile that was desperately trying to show her actual hand, not poker chips or playing cards; tarot cards and death was the winner……

“Imagine… everyone having coverage, a return to old fashioned values but still values of the people, the common ones. Doctors making house calls…”

“Yes!”

“Imagine no more nonsense about life’s meaningless nature but instead being able to pursue knowledge with your own personal educator…”

“Yes!” they shouted.

“It’s a whole different ball game in this formerly imperialistic country now…”

The Rapture woman smiled. She knew she had them…

“My God,” said Harold. “She’s going to take everyone to the edge… to death… to the love of death for its own sake…”

“We will stop her,” I said. I looked into Harold’s eyes and saw instant agreement. We had to put a stop to this love affair with death.

“I know we will, son,” he said, massively smiling.

There were no zombies but the current American voting public bore a striking resemblance to them…

“We will win,” I said.

“Yes we will,” Harold answered.

There were no vampires but the current oligarchy sure wanted the blood of the ordinary citizen for its survival… and cruel domination…

I saw these things… these visions all at once.

A mountain of skulls…

The people continued to listen to their speakers at what was once the place where the president addressed a free nation. Flick wasn’t done with his insanity yet, not by a long shot…

“Well…” He paused to cough and looked, well somewhat insecure, which many actors, even the great ones often seemed to be. Then he spoke his…… mind.

“Can’t wait for this, Andrew…”

“Shush,” I said.

“There are those who selfishly call themselves libertarians or liberals or patriots and they question… the new truths. Flick smiled shamelessly at his world audience. “You see, anyone who would question the people’s pastor is now the antichrist… can I get an Amen from you guys, please?”

“Amen,” shouted the ones who were impatient for bondage.

“Now, you see folks, there are others who have the audacity to question the president’s volunteers who brought this country to where it is today… the Civilian Socialist Volunteers…”

Shouts of boo……

“I don’t wish for them to be respected…”

“No!” shouted the vast majority of the crowd almost as one voice.

“I certainly don’t want them to be equal to this new order…”

The audience was dead silent now.

“I don’t even want them to be…… …… … heard.”

There was huge applause from the ones watching.

“Don’t them put into prison or some type of work camp, hell no!”

Dead silence.

“I simply want them…… to die…”

There was huge applause from the ones watching. Two real loud gasps from the two unseen spectators here courtesy of a very large bug.

“He’s insidious,” Harold said.

“Yes… and he’s not acting…”

“No, he is not,” said Harold.

The cheers were dying down like freedom and sanity would be in the ominous future that was just around the curve.

“Perhaps I was not being specific enough, I want them to die horribly… like Cancer or AIDS or something like that… screaming in unspeakable pain…”

The people’s reaction was screaming with unspeakable applause, it was so loud it sounded like the end of a rock concert where a great band played their final song.

“Let them die!” exclaimed the narcissistic actor.

“Let them die!” They repeated.

“Let them die of bone cancer!”

“Let them die of bone cancer!” They repeated.

“Don’t let them die soon!” Ian Flick said.

Dead silence again.

“Let them die now!” he shouted, proudly.

“Yes! Let them die now!” said the crowd, damn near almost in unison.

“Let us pluck out their eyes!” Flick shouted.

“Yes,” said one triumphant voice.

Now one could look into the dead eyes of the ones who looked at him like baby birds needing to regurgitate what they were fed… and would be fed… again and again…

“Let them die from oral cancer!”

“Let them die from oral cancer!” said the crowd, triumphantly.

“Let them die from brain cancer!”

“Let them die from brain cancer!” repeated the masses…

“Let them die from anal cancer!” said the vain actor, righteously.

Long pause.

The crowd looked around, almost in unison, the collective; after all, we’re talking about. Smiles and a few cowardly frowns were launched like deadly missiles at their overzealous leftist host. Then they…

“Let them die from anal cancer!” shouted the collective……

“What the fuck!” Harold exclaimed.