Don't Fear The Reaper

by Lex Sinclair

  *

  Not once in the two weeks since it had swept the UK was it ever forecasted that there would be fog. No one could quite believe that none of the weather reports on any of the channels had predicted it. Initially, the first day or two, average people thought nothing amiss; presumably the fog had gone undetected on the radar and satellite. However, as the fog moved its way from coast to coast, north and south, even the most ignorant citizens started to question why this was the case.

  Perplexity rapidly evolved into anxiety when the U.S. was experiencing the same troubles, as were Canada, and southern America. Predictably Europe suffered the same strange, unannounced weather. Yet when countries such as Japan, China, Australia and New Zealand also reported severe, unpredictable weather patterns the world over began to conjure up all kinds of paranormal theories that only ignited their worst fears.

  Strange, unexplainable acts of random madness ensued. Husbands shot wives. Wives stabbed husbands with sharp kitchen utensils. Pets attacked their family members. Children killed other children, and the number of suicides became innumerable.

  At first the U.K. and the U.S. both believed this to be the work of terrorists, leaking toxic substances that induced mad hysteria. The origins of the fog remained a mystery. The governments ordered studious scientific examinations of the drinking water and oxygen, assuming that an increase in pollution and global warming was affecting people and causing bursts of uncharacteristic behaviour. Their attempts were futile.

  *

  At Larry Moretz’s funeral Rev Anthony Perkins felt out of place seated alongside his snivelling, heartbroken sister in the front row of the pews. The pinewood box was glossy beneath the many lights in the church. An arrangement circled the coffin tapering the wreath that spelled LARRY at the head of the box. The vicar spoke kindly of Larry Moretz’s sincerely, as though he’d known him personally. Anthony had performed the funeral service for many of his parishioners and always felt uncomfortable speaking about them to all who knew the deceased; never knowing how accurate his words were that represented the departed.

  Anthony’s adopted parents also sat in the front row on their side of the aisle. On the opposite side Anthony chanced a glance at Larry’s weeping parents. He may have been unsure if he believed in God anymore, but it was at these times he had the urge to console with all those grieving family and friends just so he could eradicate or at least abate their pain and suffering.

  After listening to Larry’s brave father recite a story of his son when he’d been no more than six years old and singing a hymn, the vicar thanked everyone for attending, informing them where the wake would be held and the place of the burial.

  The pall bearers hoisted the pine box onto their shoulders and, arm-in-arm headed down the aisle to the outside. Anthony, with his arm wrapped around Nadine, took his cue and followed. He quietly thanked the other mourners for attending on Nadine’s behalf. Funerals were always the most peculiar ceremonies, he thought. The loss of one soul brought so many strangers together they were as entwined as close brothers. It was as though Larry was present and aiding their recovery by bonding them together, giving them strength they’d never have mustered themselves.

  Yet as he thought this, in the last pew on the right-hand side two rows away from the other attendees, Anthony’s gaze found that of a man seated in the far corner, next to the grey stone pillar wearing a raincoat and hat pulled down, concealing his brow.

  The man appeared incongruous for two distinct reasons that rose in Anthony’s mind immediately. One: he wasn’t wearing anything that resembled funeral attire. You could argue that the man was unprepared and was fortunate enough not to have attended many funerals of people close to him he’d lost and hadn’t needed one until today. Two: he was seated two rows away from any of the other mourners. There was plenty of room in all the rows, save the first four. If he didn’t know anyone else that too was insignificant. Funerals weren’t about sitting next to a friend or relative so you could discuss quietly. Weddings maybe. Funerals never. Also, in the brief glimpse Anthony got of the strange man it was palpable that the man in the raincoat didn’t look the least bit upset.

  As Anthony folded himself into the funeral car and buckled himself in, the incongruous sight of the strange man took centre stage. Everything else, the motor starting, Nadine’s weeping, and the car pulling away from the church was secondary. What unnerved Anthony was why the man – who he deemed strange – had taken residence in his think-box, deliberately pushing out the imperative aspects that should have concerned and preoccupied him?

  He supposed the man himself wasn’t strange. However, his presence at the church during a funeral service was unprecedented. Also, Anthony believed it to be extremely disrespectful.

  *

  The wake took place in the Moretz family home. Larry’s mother had put on a beautiful spread of ham, cheese, tuna sandwiches, sausage rolls, chipolatas, and sticks of cubed cheese, bowls of different flavour crisps and chocolate fingers. Bottles of Coors and Budweiser lined a separate table and glasses of red wine.

  Anthony cursed himself inwardly for being famished. He hadn’t eaten anything all morning, and now it was already three-forty. On the way to Larry’s parents’ home he could have died when his stomach grumbled loudly in the confines of the car. He was only slightly relieved when Larry’s father said, ‘Larry would be laughing if he could see us now – what with your protesting stomach.’

  Anthony, put on the proverbial spot, didn’t know how to respond and said, ‘Oh, would he?’ Then he silently chastised himself for sounding like a knob.

  Graciously, Larry’s mother came over with a paper plate filled with food and proffered it to him. ‘There you go, love. And thank you.’

  ‘I should be the one thanking you,’ he said. ‘And I’m really sorry ‘bout the stomach thing. I assure you I’m gonna have words with this gut of mine later.’

  Larry’s mother smiled amiably and shook her head. ‘I hope you retract that silly apology. You made my husband laugh on the worst day of our lives. Thank you,’ she added, emphasising the words the second time.

  Anthony didn’t think, he simply leaned forward and gently hugged Mrs Moretz, endeared by her cordial gesture when he wouldn’t have been at all surprised if she cursed God for His selfishness. For Anthony it was people like Larry’s mother who impressed him more than God Himself.

  He sat back down next to Nadine who was nursing a glass of red wine, staring despondently as he swirled the scarlet liquid close to the rim, threatening to spill over her. He rested his hand on her wrist, ceasing her motion.

  As he sat on the arm of the sofa, Anthony traced the room, seeking the man in the raincoat. He was nowhere in sight. He hadn’t attended the burial or the wake. Perhaps he felt embarrassed for not making an effort to dress accordingly. Or most likely, he wasn’t there for the funeral. He was there for something else.

  The mystery plagued Anthony for the rest of the evening, so much so that he fell into a quiet solitude.

  11.

  December 10 2006

  Daily Mirror

  METEORS THREATEN MANKIND!

  Meteors headed for Earth!

  Paul Radcliffe

  THE AMERICAN PRESIDENT announced yesterday that a meteor is headed for Earth. The announcement came when rumours and speculation caused a panic in the U.S. The president confirmed that there is a meteor on a collision course with our planet.

  The sudden, harrowing news threatens to create a widespread global panic. The discovery itself occurred on December 7 2005 when teenage amateur astronomer, Kyle Freeman, discovered an unusual “object” near the stars Mizar and Alcor at a Star party in his hometown of Franklin, Tennessee, with his high school’s astronomy club.

  Kyle’s high school teacher, Patrick Furlong, who organised the Star party, alerted professional astronomer, Paul Horner, who realised that the object was a meteor on a collision course with Earth.

  Horner (41) died on December 7 2005 in an automobi
le accident prior to his being able to alert the world.

  The largest meteor is suspected to be roughly a mile or two in diameter when it enters the Earth’s atmosphere in twenty-one days’ time. The effects cataclysmic. However, meteorologists and scientists are in agreement that life on planet Earth will not become extinct.

  *

  Crestfallen by the global news of pending disaster, Rev Perkins folded the newspaper and left the One Stop convenience store in a daze. The ambience in the queue where townsfolk usually made pleasant chat (the weather, sport, etc.) was filled with melancholy so profound the store’s walls seemed to close in on him.

  The Christmas tinsel and colourful bulbs that came on in the evening snaking around the lampposts caused a pang of sorrow in his chest. This time of year was supposed to be about the Lord Jesus. A time of celebration and for families and friends who hadn’t seen each other all year round due to working commitments to gather around in front of a hearty fireplace and rejoice. Children would wake early with fervour and excitement at what gifts lay under the tree bestowed to them as did the three wise men in the biblical yarn.

  The card shop across the road in front of the pelican crossing should’ve been bustling with customers, purchasing cards in abundance for those they cared about. The pavements at this time of year were overcrowded with shoppers and commuters hoping to make a healthy profit.

  Yet there was none of that. The roads weren’t jammed with vehicles. No one jostled from one store to the other. No one shook hands with friends who would be travelling to see relatives, wishing them a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Instead the frostbitten roads and pavements were empty, forlorn in appearance, and Perkins couldn’t help think that this was merely a prelude of what was to be the future if anyone managed to survive.

  Scalding tears pooled in his eyes, blurring his vision until they mercifully spilled out and trickled down his cheeks. He dried his eyes, relishing the cold fingertips on his eyelids, cooling them.

  A discarded newspaper was swept down the main road of the small town, coughing pages and pages of the story that made all other news trivial in comparison. Shops had been abandoned. There was no point to doing anything ordinary anymore. The townsfolk’s spirit had been destroyed since soon the land they lived upon would be in destroyed in the ensuing weeks. No one had any urge or need to want to celebrate the birth of Jesus.

  And who could blame them, Perkins wondered? What had they done as a planet to deserve this pitiless demise? Individually there were bad and evil people prospering when they ought to have been suffering, but as a whole for all the sins and mistakes the population made on a daily basis, Perkins truly believed that there were still too many genuinely good people to forsake.

  Or was this merely coincidence that some of the astrologists and scientists were claiming that asteroids and comets had been entering the Earth’s atmosphere ever since the dawn of mankind and before, and that it was only a matter of time before something like this transpired.

  Perhaps God didn’t really exist, and they’d been fortunate as a race in the first instance to have lived for so many centuries without mass destruction. Perhaps they ought to be grateful for the time they’d had and accept their fate (which there was nothing they could do to prevent anyway) without complaint.

  Shaking his head in utter disdain, Rev Perkins walked home.

  When he reached the grey stone-walled vicarage and fished out the key to unlock the front door, the reverend had the sudden urge to hurl the two bags of shopping into the tall grass and bellow to the heavens in rage at what he used to believe in. His rage he knew was induced by his foolishness for believing all his life that God had saved him as He would save all those that lived by His example and were good to others and kind to themselves.

  The familiar layout of his one-storey home welcomed him. He closed the door on the world outside, hoping to close the door on the world’s problems and his outside too.

  He made himself two ham and cucumber sandwiches, selected a Bounty chocolate bar and poured himself a glass of Diet Coke. Using the remote device he turned the TV on and leaned back in the one-seat sofa and went through the mundane motions.

  The rugby match which according to the week-old TV guide was due to be on had been replaced by a special news programme titled ASTEROID HITS EARTH!

  Perkins couldn’t quite understand the BBC’s logic of drowning the enervated hope of those poor souls who still prayed and crossed their fingers that they would be spared and that the prophecy wouldn’t be as cataclysmic as predicted.

  Why, he wondered, could they not just show a film?

  His equanimity was forever duelling with his vexation, and details – although trivial – such as striking more fear into the hearts of the nation and the world was the reason if Perkins was a gambling man would wager vexation would win.

  Knowing my luck if they did put a film on it’d probably be Armageddon!

  He couldn’t be bothered to change the channel. Other programmes listed had most likely been altered too; it wasn’t singularly the BBC, he supposed.

  In the newsroom the presenter was facing a man in a dark suit with spiky grey hair wearing expensive looking spectacles. Perkins used the remote to turn the volume up, chastising himself for doing it, but doing it anyway.

  ‘What viewers want to know above all else, is there a chance of survival?’

  The man in the suit who worked for something called the PDA, an analogy for Potential Devastation Asteroid, shifted in his seat.

  ‘I wouldn’t like to say for certain, as no one quite knows what the impact will have. However, I am an optimist by nature and truly believe that as long as we take proper precautions then a great number will survive.’

  Gail Summers, a dark-skinned, anchorwoman with high prominent cheekbones gave her full, undivided attention to the expert. ‘But this is an unprecedented occurrence, wouldn’t you agree? I mean, no asteroids have ever struck the Earth before, have they?’

  The gentleman shook his head and raised his index finger. ‘That’s not true, actually. Lots of asteroids have been detected to have entered the planet’s atmosphere, but most aren’t anywhere near the size of the largest one now destined for Earth. They usually break up into smaller pieces. However, the most renowned asteroid ever known is the one that hit the Earth 65 million years ago. It is believed that the asteroid threw so much moisture and dust into the atmosphere that it cut off sunlight which lowered temperatures worldwide and caused extinction...’ He left what he stated hang in the air not for effect but due to its imperativeness.

  ‘Two-mile wide asteroids are set to hit the planet’s surface at about 30,000 miles per hour. The asteroids are so large and travelling at such velocity the energy is equal to that of a megaton bomb. It is probable this would wipe out most the planet,’ he went on. ‘This type of impact would be disastrous. The amount of debris and dust thrown up into the atmosphere, blocking out the sun and natural daylight would cause most living creatures to perish.’

  Gail had grown still and silent all of a sudden, lost for words.

  ‘If the asteroid is the size of a house that hits the Earth at 30,000 miles per hour it’d possess enough energy to flatten reinforced concrete buildings up to half a mile from Ground Zero. If the asteroid is as big as a twenty-storey building (200 feet on a side) it has the amount of energy equal to the largest of nuclear bombs made today between 25-50 megatons. This asteroid would flatten reinforced concrete buildings up to 5 miles from Ground Zero.’

  Gail picked up her tall glass of water with trembling hands and took a much-required gulp. Then put it back down on the desktop harder than she intended. No one noticed, or if they did, they didn’t care.

  ‘A half-a-mile wide asteroid would wipe out the U.K. and if it struck the ocean it’d induce massive tidal waves hundreds of feet high that would expunge coastlines in the vicinity.’

  The PDA scientist’s brow gleamed with sweat beneath the lights in the studio. ‘All we can hope for
is the asteroids are relatively smaller than the largest one is predicted to be and hits the ocean as far away from the coastline as possible, thereby reducing the damage and loss of lives.’

  Struggling to find her voice, Gail was glad the gentleman sitting alongside her had finished his analysis with the word “hope”, if not for the viewers’ sake then her own.

  Unnerved, Perkins killed the TV and sat, still holding a half-eaten sandwich, not at all hungry in spite of his protesting stomach.

  From what he gathered from the news was that there would be life after the asteroids; although how much life and in what capacity was left to the worst fear of all – the unknown.

  *

  In the ensuing days, Anthony Perkins had read the newspapers and watched more shows on TV regarding the asteroids and Doomsday. However, the prophet of the Vatican church, bishop John Hayes had told him about, persistently clawed to the forefront of his consciousness.

  The conflicts in Israel and Afghanistan, the third world countries dying of starvation, and the mysterious fog and the mad hysteria that it apparently induced, plagued the world with misery and suffering. None of that mattered now. No race was greater than the other. No sex was the superior of the two.

  No nation dominated the others. All the aspects of the world and life itself were forgotten. Everyone was equal. Everyone alive faced the same harrowing fate.

  St John’s Church was empty, save himself. He had arranged to meet with John this morning at the church instead of at the village café. That was another pleasure enjoyed that seemed like a thousand years ago.

  When his friend and colleague arrived he looked as Anthony felt – harried. They were so constrained with anxiety – scarcely containing the panic raging within; instead of sitting in the vestry they positioned themselves on the back row of the pews.