Acts of God

by James Beauseigneur

  Decker paused a second to compose himself before answering. "First of all, you've got to promise me that if you tell anyone else about this that you'll say you heard it from a psychic. Don't mention my name at all."

  "Of course not," Tolinson assured him, a little offended that Decker felt it necessary to even say it. In the fifteen years he had been responsible for upkeep of the Hawthorne house, he had never told anyone of Decker's comings and goings, and he didn't need to be reminded now of his responsibility for discretion.

  Decker sensed his offense but launched into his explanation without apology. He would use the insulation, he told Tolinson, to cover the walls and ceiling and door of the laundry room two layers thick. The tape and staple gun were to hang the insulation. One air conditioner he would put in the laundry room window and the other two he would mount in holes he would cut in the laundry room door. The two-by-fours would serve as braces to help support the weight. These two would draw the pre-cooled air from the rest of the house and cool it further. He would use the extension cords for the two air conditioners in the door so that he wouldn't overburden the circuit in the laundry room. The third cord was an emergency backup. The plastic tub would catch the condensation from the two units mounted in the door. The ice and the coolers were just in case everything else failed. Decker admitted that it was probably overkill but after everything else that had happened, he didn't want to take any chances.

  "What about food?" Tolinson asked.

  "With what you brought me, I have enough for about two weeks," Decker answered. "I'll keep a couple days' supply with me in the ice chests. I figure that no matter how hot it gets during the day it's got to cool down at night, so I can get more food and ice from the refrigerator in the kitchen then.

  "What about the lamps and flashlights and all those batteries you had me get?" Tolinson asked.

  "Oh, well," Decker said, trying to hide the fact that he didn't have a good answer for that question. "The . . . uh, well, I just thought it might be a good idea to have some flashlights around. And you can never have too many batteries."

  To Decker's relief, Tolinson simply nodded agreement. Then looking around the room again at Decker's inventory, apparently running mental calculations of his own requirements, Tolinson thanked Decker for telling him and then quickly left to buy what he needed for his own house.

  4:51 a.m., Sunday, June 28, 4 N.A. (2026 A.D.) — United Nations Research Station at Mount Erebus on Ross Island in the Ross Sea of Antarctica

  Though it was the middle of summer in the north, in the southern hemisphere it was the dead of winter. The temperature on Ross Island, 700 miles below the Antarctic circle, should have been well below zero, but it wasn't. Instead, Brad Mulholland, the lone scientist assigned to the U.N. research station, sat on top of a table, dressed in just his first layer of long underwear trying to radio the U.N. World Meteorological Organization to report his situation. There was no response. Outside his shelter, the stars of the four-month-long night sparkled down and were reflected by a large and growing lake of water that had been ice only twenty-four hours before. Inside the shelter, the water had seeped in around the door and was now four inches deep.

  Setting the radio down on the table, Mulholland again faced the question which had thus far eluded answering: what to do next. He checked the outside temperature again. It was 47 degrees Fahrenheit, up another three degrees in the last hour.

  In the starlight, except for the outlines of Mount Erebus which was 18 miles away and Mount Terror which was even farther, all he could see was water. There was no way of knowing how deep it was but he assumed that for the most part, it was not much deeper than the water in his cabin. Whatever the current depth though, it was getting deeper and would continue to do so as long as the heat continued.

  Beneath the station was about 91A feet of ice between him and the true surface of the island, at least there had been when the station had been erected. Now there were a few inches less. He could try to make it to McMurdo, the permanent U.S. base camp; at least there were other people there. But he had radioed them earlier and they were having the same problems staying dry that he was. Mount Erebus in the distance offered higher ground — or rather higher ice — where he might wait out the thaw, but that would mean wading through 18 miles of ice water with everything he could carry and no way of telling how long he'd be without shelter before he was rescued or could return to the station. Still he knew he couldn't just stay there and wait while the building slowly sank into the melting ice. It was not deep now, but if the heat continued the station would be under water in a few days.

  6:07 a.m. — Queenstown, New Zealand

  Two thousand, two hundred and seventy miles almost due north, nestled in a valley east of the Richardson Mountains near Lake Wakatipu on the South Island of New Zealand, the people of Queenstown awoke to the shrill wail of police sirens. Like Ross Island, New Zealand was in the middle of winter, and though the warm oceanic winds generally made for mild weather, Queenstown's location on the eastern side of the Southern Alps made it one of the coldest spots on the island. It had been colder than usual this winter. Frequent and heavy snows blanketed the mountains with a thick coating of white, and the cold temperatures had frozen Lake Wakatipu with ice 14 inches thick. Yet, overnight the temperature had risen

  dramatically and it was now 68 degrees. The sudden heat was melting the snowfall on the mountain, resulting in growing torrents of water cascading down the mountain in flash floods, threatening the city.

  9:18 a.m. — north of Monrovia, Liberia

  Thirty-five hundred miles still further north and halfway around the world, on the west coat of northern Africa, warm weather was the norm. Located just seven degrees north of the equator, winter was little more than a story told by immigrants and tourists.

  In a small nameless community on the northern outskirts of Monrovia, Elizabeth Lincoln, an elderly woman of eighty years, removed the white cloth from the kitchen table and draped it over her head for protection from the sun. Under her arm she held a half dozen old bed sheets and assorted rags. The temperature was over a hundred degrees inside her small but immaculately kept home. Outside it was worse. Still she knew she had to leave her house and go outside to tend her garden. If she didn't water the plants and cover them with the bed sheets to protect them from the intense rays of the sun, many would wither and die and she would have nothing to eat. She had refused to take the communion so she could not apply for assistance from either the government of Liberia or from any of the United Nations agencies.

  She did not actually own the small plot of land or the house in which she lived. She had at one time. In fact, the property had belonged to her family for 160 years. Her ancestors had been among the first of the freed slaves from the United States who had come here to build a new life. Because she had refused the communion, she had been officially evicted and the property now belonged to the government. But because her nephew was the local constable, he had thus far turned a blind eye to her being there.

  After giving the garden a thorough soaking, she covered the lettuce, peas, potatoes, and other plants she thought were least likely to survive the intense sunlight. Sweating profusely and panting for breath, she returned to the house, sat down in a rocking chair that had belonged to her great-great grandmother, and passed out from heat exhaustion. She never opened her eyes again.

  11:34 a.m. — Derwood, Maryland

  In Derwood, Maryland, the temperature was 128 degrees. The streets and highways around Washington were virtually empty. No one ventured outside, and even in air-conditioned buildings and homes temperatures were as high as 115 degrees with almost none below the century mark. Decker, however, was relatively comfortable with the two door-mounted units running, drawing the pre-cooled air from the rest of the house. To replace the moisture being pulled out by the air conditioners, Decker kept a steady stream of water running onto a splash pan in the utility sink.

  Though he was glad to have avoided the heat, he
took minimal pleasure in his foresight. Instead, his thoughts were tormented by the ubiquitous spectacle of suffering and death which he saw on television. There were none of the usual man-on-the-street interviews: the few reporters and cameramen who were working outside would not leave their air conditioned vehicles. This gave the reports a rather cold, inhuman quality, as cameras captured the silent anguish of homeless people — some panting for breath as they lay in pools of sweat under whatever shade they could find, others already dead. Studio newscasts were shot with the least possible lighting to avoid making the studios any hotter than they already were. And there was really only one story to cover. Everything that happened was either the result of, or an attempt to deal with, the oppressive heat.

  Decker flipped through the channels.

  "I pray every day for the death of Christopher and for the destruction of all 'Humankind,'" the man sneered through the bars of his cell. "Yahweh is a righteous and holy God. He demands payment for your evil ways," he ranted as sweat dripped from his chin. "Humans were not made to rule but to serve. Repent!" he screamed, though he gave no indication what he wanted his listeners to repent of.

  Decker paused from his 'channel surfing' long enough to watch for a few moments as the incarcerated man railed at the interviewer. It seemed that no matter what the interviewer asked, the man's answer was the same: fear God and repent. How different the man seemed, Decker thought, from the people he had met in Petra. But this was not the only fundamentalist leader who made such comments. At least half a dozen others who were interviewed made similar pronouncements, and the news media said that there were hundreds of others as well.

  9:00 p.m., Sunday, June 28,4 N.A. (2026 A.D.) — Babylon, Iraq

  As evening set in Babylon, Christopher again addressed the world as he had with each of the previous tribulations.

  "Thousands of innocent men, women, and children are dying," Christopher said, "and there can be no doubt it is the cult of Yahweh — the KDT and fundamentalists — who bear the guilt for this atrocity. This cannot go unanswered.

  "The time has come to employ more forceful measures to separate from society those who by their own actions and words have proven their inability and unwillingness to take part or even co-exist with the rest of Humankind! For our own survival and for the survival of our children, indeed for the survival of the planet itself, we must have the courage of our convictions. Humankind must be free.

  "We must separate from the rest of society those who insist upon such regressive tenets. We must reject those whose karma it is to be rejected, to free them from their own blindness so that the slate may be wiped clean and through rebirth they may once again join Humankind on its bold evolutionary journey.

  "As it has been with their leaders, so their sentence shall be. It is my hope that this form of penalty will be dramatic enough to bring many to their senses and that the death of a few will spare many more, who will realize the futility of their ways, and will cease their crimes against Humankind.

  "Ultimately, however, their fate rests entirely with each one of them. No one will die who does not of their own accord choose to die. Each will be asked a simple question: 'Are you willing to relinquish your belief that your way is the only way; that your truth is the only truth; and to acknowledge that the beliefs of others may be equally as valid for them as your beliefs are for you?'

  "If they will answer 'yes' to that question and demonstrate their willingness to peacefully coexist by denouncing their allegiance to Yahweh, they will be allowed to go free and will be welcomed back into society.

  "If, however, even this simple and reasonable requirement is too much for them, then we will have no choice. We must deal with regressives or we doom ourselves and our children to a life of subservience to Yahweh.

  "Now, as to our current situation: this wretched curse of heat that has been heaped on us by the one who claims to be a god of love. The true measure of Humankind's fitness for the New Age is our ability to rise above our situation, to take that which seems to be a weakness and to transform it by the sheer force of our own will, into strength. The trials that face us today are a test of that fitness and I am confident that from our current suffering shall spring our strength — a strength so steadfast that even Yahweh must yield before it.

  "We must turn our suffering not into sorrow but into anger, not into surrender but into defiance, not into acquiescence but into hatred of the one who has caused our pain: Yahweh, himself!

  "We must make it clear that we will never go back. We, as individuals, must free ourselves from any residual love or respect we might feel for the one we used to call 'God.' We must rid ourselves of any quaint myths of Yahweh which may have been implanted by well-intending parents or grandparents. For we have seen the real Yahweh: we have heard his hatred and invectives; we have tasted his indiscriminate cruelties; we have felt the suffering that comes from his sadistic temper.

  "We must make it known by our scorn that we are no longer his slaves. I urge you, I plead with you! For your own sake, for the sake of all Humankind, for the sake of this planet. The universe itself awaits your decision. We must go forward; we cannot go back. Raise your voice in anger and outrage at Yahweh! Curse him and curse his name! Rid yourself of the final vestiges of respect and fear of this sinister menace."

  After Christopher's speech and the standard banter from the network commentators, Decker switched channels to a public affairs report advising viewers of how they could stay cooler. Most of it was just common-sense things like staying inside, out of the direct rays of the sun; moving into a basement; drinking lots of water; taking cold baths; wearing clothes that were lightweight and light in color. "One other item," said the young female reporter — chosen as much for the fact that her face was free of the sores as for her abilities in front of a camera — "as we reported earlier, most life completion clinics are closed because of the heat." The screen shifted to a scene of half a dozen bodies, killed by the heat and baking in the sun as they lay outside a life completion clinic. "Officials say that even if you have an appointment, you should call ahead to be sure the clinic is open."

  "Well, I can certainly see why the completion clinics would be very busy right now," said a male reporter, commenting on the scene of crumpled bodies still on the screen.

  "Yes, Bill," the woman reporter responded, "especially when you realize that they will come back to a world that is much better than the one they left. Still," she pointed out, "as the pictures we just saw indicate, a trip to a life completion clinic right now may end your life, but it might be in a manner far less pleasant than you had intended."

  10:05 a.m., Tuesday, June 30, 4 N.A. (2026 A.D.) — Derwood, Maryland

  Decker slept fitfully and awoke to find himself in a sweat. The air conditioners were not running. He checked the light switch. Nothing. He checked the circuit breakers in the fuse box. Everything seemed okay and yet nothing was running. The power to the house was out. The thermometer read 92 degrees. He turned on the portable television, which had a battery backup. The answer came quickly: the primary power company that provided electricity to Decker's house was using a "rolling blackout" to cope with the tremendous power drain caused by the heat. Ordinarily, other suppliers on the power grid would have stepped in to cover the demand — that was supposed to have been one of the benefits of the break-up and deregulation of the power companies. The other companies, however, were experiencing the same problems and were themselves using rolling blackouts. The bottom line was that the electricity would be off for another two hours. By then, even with all the extra insulation, the room was likely to get pretty uncomfortable. Decker opened one of the ice chests and scooped up a few of the remaining pieces of the ice and put them in his mouth.

  6:45 p.m.

  The blade of the guillotine sliced quickly through the air and with similar ease cut through the neck of the fundamentalist, severing his head from his body and dropping it into a large plastic barrel.

  "Oooh gross!" mewled B
ert Tolinson's youngest daughter, Betty, who was watching the executions on television with her two older sisters.

  Without pause, the body was removed and another fundamentalist was brought up to take the place of the one before. "Will you disavow your allegiance to Yahweh, take the communion, and save your own life?" an officer of the U.N. Department of World Justice asked.

  "I will not," the man answered.

  "Then you leave us no choice," the official said, as he pointed toward the guillotine. "In your next life, you will thank us."

  "I told you not to watch that," Martha Tolinson said to her daughters, and then paused long enough to watch the next blade fall. "Now change the channel."

  "Oh, Mom. It's not as bad as watching people die from the heat," the middle daughter, Jan, said as she amused her sisters by pretending to collapse in a manner imitating a homeless person they had watched die on television.

  "Besides," Megan, the eldest added, "it's so boring being stuck here in the basement with nothing to do."

  "Just be glad your father had the foresight to prepare the basement so we wouldn't be out in the heat with everyone else."

  "But you said the fundamentalists deserve to die," the youngest chimed in.

  "That doesn't mean you have to watch it. Now, isn't there something else on?"

  10:09 p.m. — north of Lexington, Kentucky

  It was a miserable night. The cloud cover, which would have been welcome during the day to block the sun, had waited until night to roll in, making the night all the hotter by blocking the release of the heat absorbed by the earth during the day. North of the city, against the blackened background of night, occasional whispers divulged the presence of creatures alien to this dark world where rats and roaches ruled. The lure of fresh garbage had brought them — the men, the rats, and roaches — for all had empty bellies. A veritable mountain of waste — old tires, bed springs, broken appliances, and other household debris — hid secret caches of nourishment: table scraps, rotting fruit, and vegetables.