Not With A Whimper…

“I cracked it! I finally cracked it!” shouted Dr. Gloria Phanblomb, leading light of the physics department at M___ University. Her usual dry, scientifically detached demeanor shed, but only briefly, in her moment of triumph, “Come see, Pete!”

Pete Postelwharton, Gloria’s live-in barbecue adviser, heaved himself off of the couch where he’d been absorbed in a fascinating article about using a blend of pine and redwood chips instead of hickory. 

“What is it now?” he said, coming down the stairs of the split-level home and into the den where a bizarre and complicated contraption blocked the patio door so that Pete had to go out the front and around the house whenever he wanted to use the grill.  In the center of the machine, the air rippled like on a hot day and beyond that, a bottomless hole spiraled off into the unknown.

“I have perfected my Time Tunnel! I have opened a doorway to the year 10,000!”

“Nice.”

“Any minute we’ll have our first contact with the future!”

“Ask them if they have any new kinds of meat. I want some Future Steaks.”

“Steaks? But think of all the things we could learn from them! Why, they might have solved global warming! Invented a clean, free energy! Bred a dog with the self-reliance of a cat! Perhaps they’ve discovered a source of ribs without all the gross ligament-y bits!”

“Maybe they built a time machine!”

“…God damn it, Pete.”

Just then, a noise emitted from the vortex, strange, inhuman, but with the cadence of words. As the sound grew louder, there was no mistaking it. It was a voice. Gloria strained her ears and soon heard the first words from the future.

“OH FUCK OH WHAT THE FUCK FUCKING SHIT SHITTY SHIT BALLS BASTARD FUCK AAAAAAAAAA-aaand we’re here.”

Something materialized from the Time Tunnel unlike anything Gloria had ever seen before. It was humanoid, but barely, riddled as it was with half-formed, mal-formed appendages as though inside it was a legion of other creatures trying to push their way out. She struggled to appear calm, despite the turmoil inside of her.

“…So.”

“So,” said Gloria, “Welcome to 1984.”

“Fool! This is Year One! The first year of my reign over this pitiful world! Which one of you is in charge?”

“I’m in charge of the grill,” said Pete.

Blinding rays lashed out from the thing’s eyes and Pete was lifted up, his body beginning to burn.

“Barbecue me like one of your French grills!” he screamed, dying.

“What the hell?” said Gloria.

“I only eat boiled food!” the thing said, “Now, before I wipe you and all your kind from the Earth, I give you a chance, a very small chance, to prove that some of you may be useful to me. Perhaps as servants. Or cattle.”

“Well, what do you need in the future?” asked Gloria, hoping to at least stall the creature long enough to devise a plan to defeat it.

“Thanks to stupidity of your race, the world in which I live is a blackened waste, an unending cinder where the few lasting cities are but monuments to the dead, and the only living things claw at each other for a share of the ever-dwindling resources.”

“It sounds like you could use some entertainment,” said Gloria, “I know just the thing.”

She took it to the movies. Fortunately, one of the most singular achievements in film history was currently playing. As they waited in the theater for the feature to start, Gloria noted with horror that the thing mixed its candy into its popcorn like the nightmarish beast it was.

105 minutes later, as they were leaving the theater, the creature said, “Yes, that was…amusing.”

Gloria felt a surge of relief. Perhaps the Earth could be saved by loaning the monster a VCR and some tapes.

“And yet,” it said, “And yet there’s a lingering unpleasantness…a voice maddeningly echoing in my head, saying that if I’ve had a dose of a freaky ghost, that I should call…? No! It’s too horrible!”

The creature opened its mouth wider than seemed possible and, with a deafening silence, an anti-roar, inhaled the entire theater complex along with the shopping mall surrounding it.

“What now?” it said. 

Gloria’s heart sank, but at least she was being given another chance. After some thought she said, “Perhaps some paintings or sculptures would liven up your barren hellscape.”

Fortunately the Louvre in P___, France was only three blocks away. After touring some of the exhibits and visiting the Virgin record store so the creature could buy a Rage Against The Machine t-shirt, Gloria decided to pull out the big guns and show the thing one of the most famous paintings humankind had ever produced.

The creature studied it for a moment and said, “Is that supposed to be a smile? What kind of half-assed smile is that? Bah! She’s not even that hot!”

It muttered a terrible curse and the museum, with all those centuries of human inspiration, was ripped from the Earth and hurled into the depths of space.
Gloria was ready to give in to despair when something caught the creature’s attention.

“What are those two humans doing?” it asked.

“Why, they are kissing,” said Gloria.

“Kissing? What makes them behave in such a way?”

“They are in love.”

“Love? Tell me about this thing you humans call…love.”

Gloria’s heart leapt. If she could just teach this monster about love! She was prepared even to force herself to love the creature itself if it meant saving humanity.

“Love is an intense attraction between people. It’s like a special power that humans have that allows them to look beyond themselves and give all to the those they feel this love for.”

“And this…love, it causes them to push their faces together like that?”

“Well, I suppose you could say that, yes.”

“Are they at least married?”

“Um, I don’t know. I don’t see any wedding rings…”

“Ew, Sick!” the creature screamed.

And with that, it summoned all of its dark powers and a tide of death swept over the world, extinguishing all life in a few terrifying minutes, including mine. Yep, I’ve been dead the entire time I’ve been telling you this story. But you thought I was alive! You should’ve seen the look on your face.

But guess what? You’ve been dead this whole time, too! Just like the end of ***spoiler*** Jacob’s Ladder, ***end spoiler *** it turns out you’re dead. Sorry.