Pralaya (An Anticipatory Story) 1:8

SEASON 1, EPISODE 8

“conservation of momentum” from Robert Couse-Baker

Courtesy of the Creative Commons license. No changes were made.

From Christopher L. Fici, Ph.D

It was 2pm by now. Signal still largely out. Frantically sending texts to my wife and family but they are not going through. I’m weeping weeping. I told her I would never abandon her again.

I always prided myself on being a little aloof with my devices. Oh sure, I tell myself, I could do a silent retreat at a nice Catholic monastery without my phone for a few days. The woods, the sky, the smells, the silence. Who needs anything else? I don’t watch a million shows. I’m surrounded by actual books all over the place!

Let me tell you, when this happens to you, when the actual apocalypse appears to be happening, when all of the signals go down, you will panic. The thought of not being able to immediately be in contact with the people you love the most…it is a feeling I would never wish on anyone. The void. The dark night of the soul. All at once. Yes there is a physical withdrawal that appears to happen when the signal goes out. I felt nauseous and dizzy. I didn’t know what to do with my hands. I kept staring at my phone every four seconds (I started to count at one point). I spent twenty minutes just staring at the TV screen weeping weeping begging God or the government or anyone for the signal to return.

I didn’t dare go outside again at this point. I’m not quite sure why I didn’t tell my housemates that I had also been kidnapped then released then given a strange document by some quasi-NSA group a couple of hours ago. I must’ve figured it was strange enough to be talking to the people I literally live in the same house with for the first time after eleven months of living there.

The only thing I can do (the only thing I can do when I’m depressed) is go to sleep. My body drains itself of utter exhaustion when I lay down. I doze for an hour, wake up weeping again. I take a few deep breaths, pray to Krishna, and brace myself.

Rose is softly knocking at the door again. “Chris? We have a signal. Come up quick.”

I put on my hoodie and join Rose up the steps. The house smells different up here. More lived-in, garlic and houseplants and lavender. We go into her apartment, where Jack and Shola are there too. We all actually share a quick hug, which is nice! I appreciate these people being so un-awkward in such a shitstorm. Maybe we won’t all eat each other alive after all. Everyone looks like they’ve been weeping and going through withdrawal themselves.

But indeed there is a signal. Immediately my phone pings with texts.

Wifey (Sonia): Baby! Are you safe! Oh my God!

Before I even read the rest of the texts, I try to call her. The signal isn’t strong enough for a Facetime call. I text her back immediately.

Me: Sonia I’m here what is going on are you safe?? I’m safe in my house! With the other flatmates trying to figure out what’s going on. The signal isn’t strong enough for calls…

She has seen the bubble showing I’m responding

Sonia: Chris! Are you okay baby?

I send her the text I was writing. The bubble from her side… … … … … … … 

Sonia: Baby thank God! We’re okay! The police and the military are here and things are under control for the moment. I love you so much I thought you were dead!

I start weeping uncontrollably again. I don’t even have the time or the energy to be embarrassed. Rose places a hand on my shoulder. I nod graciously.

Me: I love you baby I’m going to try to call you again!

Sonia: I love you too!

I try to call but the signal goes out again. Nothing.

“It’s out again. I’m sorry,” I say. “You guys I don’t want to take up the signal if it comes on again, especially if you have loved ones you’re trying to reach. It might still come in downstairs.”

Rose looks at me with a lot of concern. “Chris, please don’t be silly. We know exactly what you’re going through.”

I feel a pang of good ol’ Catholic guilt that I haven’t even begun to get to know these people. They remind me of my good friend Salona and our friends from our divinity school circles. Our circles, where for the past few years, we have been spiritually preparing for the tumult and changes of a century of climate catastrophe-to-come. Just like them, it seems like these folks are a little prepared too.

I check my family’s texts to see if they are okay. They are holed up at my sister’s house in Royal Oak, safe for the moment, and with a constant signal! My sister is terrified since my brother-in-law is a first responder and is out in the maelstrom facing God knows what.

“My wife said the weirdest thing. She said the cops and the military were out in London…”

Jack is standing at the window and chuckles to himself. “What a damn coincidence! I told you Rose! This is the fifteenth time I’ve experienced deja vu today.”

He is obviously looking at something out the front window, onto to Warder St. We hear it before we see it. Tanks! Fucking huge tanks! Rolling up Rock Creek Rd where they have room to maneuver. Smaller jeeps roll up Warder, and what looks like Army soldiers get out at each corner of the intersection. We’re kind of instinctually waiting for some kind of loudspeaker announcement telling us what to do as the tanks roll by, like in authoritarian countries, but there is nothing. The block of tanks go by, the soldiers stand there, one starts smoking a blunt.

“Chris, I think I have to tell you something”, says Rose. I look back at her and all of a sudden she starts to shimmer. She becomes a paradox. There-not-there. Her solidity becoming a vibration of kaleidoscopic colours. I wasn’t shocked more so than bedazzled at what I was seeing.

“Rose! Not again!” says Jack. It was the strangest thing. He was embracing her as she seemed to be weeping, but he wasn’t embracing her, because she was shimmering in and out of reality. Ten seconds felt like ten minutes (there was some kind of pulling effect on spacetime like in vertigo or within the insanely strange nightmares I used to have as a kid when I was sick). It felt really intrusive to be witness to such a strange, intimate moment. It was hard enough being away from your beloved. Yet to have your beloved literally shimmering out of reality in your very arms?

After a long minute, Rose solidified again. Jack and Rose sat quietly in each other’s arms for another long minute. Then Rose quietly broke away, walked over to me, and told me this.

“You have to call that number that they gave you.”

My mind swam for another long fifteen seconds (strangely enough the reality-pulling effect was still going on. It wasn’t comfortable but it wasn’t uncomfortable). The number?

“When they took you in the van.”

How could she know that? The pulling tightened. The phone appeared in my hand with a sharp cut, like at the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey, when the years pass in an instant edit. 

(Cut)

I pull the pamphlet out of my pocket.

(Cut)

Jack and Rose looking at me beatifically, like an icon.

(Cut)

I dial the number

(Cut)

Three more tanks roll by. Copters overhead. Then three jets rip by, rather low

(Cut)

The phone is ringing

(Cut)

Rose is shimmering again. Jack is shimmering too.

(Cut)

The call is answered. 

“This is Luther…Dr. Fici, we’ve been waiting for you”