The Fourth Ending
Flash fiction
Now Dreaming… The man continued to climb. Age made it harder and his breath was becoming ragged, but the sense of being hunted had continued to grow and made the hairs stand up on the back of his neck. Impending. Ominous. Inevitable. He paused to catch his breath, turned around and his washed-out pale blue eyes, squinting in his deeply tanned wrinkled face, took in the vista before him. The ocean, nearly 400m below looked at peace now, blue on blue and languid, giving no hint of the power it unleashed just weeks before.
As had become his habit, he took his time to count the group that he now reluctantly led. Eleven in total, including Mary and the three kids she had drawn to her. Mary was beginning to slow, and the two younger men had stopped to take an occasional arm and offer what help they could. Julie and Fred, the older couple, came close behind them. He was still amazed that despite everything that had been thrown at them, these two had come through it all, together. The two older men rarely spoke, preferring to keep their own quiet company. The group was still trying to find something in this new life that made sense, something they could hang on to.
The sense of foreboding cut the old man’s rest short and he turned his attention back towards what was left of their climb. They had nearly reached what they thought of as the high water mark. It was a tangle of logs, rubbish, cars, buses, and shipping containers. Humanity’s flotsam. It stretched out in both directions along the entire escarpment but most importantly, it was going to slow them down. That realization brought with it a heightened sense of urgency, the weight of it was crushing and he knew they had little time. It was coming. He turned back, cupped his hand around his mouth, and called to the group to hurry. He climbed onto the first of the logs and waited to help the others over. He could see in their eyes and feel in the urgent grip of their hands, that they felt it too. It was nearly upon them.
There was a forty-foot shipping container just the other side of the high tide debris. Caught on a log, it sloped slightly uphill from where the doors were hanging open. I was wearing a coarse brown robe, and sitting quietly on the floor at the far end of the container, waiting for them. The old man appeared at the open door first and ushered the rest of the group inside. The two young men came in last and frantically pulled the doors closed. Just as they did something began pounding on the doors, bending them inwards with every blow, the entire container booming and lurching as it was struck. Suddenly it stopped and there was silence. Un-cued, the group quietly came to sit cross-legged before me.
I asked of them, “Would you know a truth even if it brought despair?”
Mary, who was gently rocking one of the younger children on her lap said,
“We would know your truth.”
I told them my truth. It took only a few minutes. When I had finished, Mary tenderly wiped a tear from the cheek of the child she held and then placed her on the floor next to the others. She stood up, walked to the doors, and opened them.
What I told them was this:
I have been shown something and, for a while, I was simply aware.
I was suspended in the cosmos, both infinitesimally small and at the same time, all-encompassing. Gargantuan. I had no size, I just was. I became aware that I was not alone. I was shown millennia, epochs, and eons. I witnessed rises and falls. I had no time, I just was. The Universe swelled and shrank, pulsed and glimmered. It rolled and swirled. Cold, distant, and uncaring. Breathtakingly beautiful.
I was told, “This is the fourth ending” and I was shown the previous three.
Dream ends but I do not quite wake yet. Somewhere between the dream and waking I become aware that plants are builders and makers. We and other animals, are doers. Plants are ‘in the loop’ and form part of the greater awareness. Oblivious to this awareness, animals, and humankind have been put here to do something. We have failed three times before and it looks like we are failing again.
We look to the heavens and wait for the second coming that the Bible promises, completely unaware that it is God who waits for us.
I ask myself “What will I do with the time that I have left?”
