A NEW DREAM OF ARMAGEDDON

By Dan McNeil

  “Is this purgatory?”

  “No.”

  “Well...what then?”

  “I’m not sure myself,” said God, introducing himself as thus.

  “You’re God?”

  ‘Yes.”

  “But that’s incredible! I mean...you’re really God?”

  “The very one.”

  “Jesus Christ! Sorry, I mean...I’m here and I’m meeting God. Wow! 

This is fucking incredible! Shit...sorry.”

  “Listen, don’t overrate me. I may be God, but I just run things around

here and-”

  “-but why am I here?”

  “As I was going to say before you interrupted me. I’m not all knowing

and powerful, you know. All I do is make things work, grease the bearings, that

sort of thing. I’m just a mechanic. OK, I’m a bit more special than an

auto mechanic, or even a space shuttle mechanic, I mean it’s the universe I run -

this one anyway. Unfortunately, there’s a problem. I’m uploading all of

you as intended, but something’s gone very wrong and I’m dying. When I die,

the universe dies as well.”

  “Jesus Christ - stop it - stop the fucking process then.”

  “Can’t, it’s set in motion. Happening. Non-reversible. You’ve gone

through my firebreak - sorry, firewall - deary me me, this forty billion

percent increase in entropy is really fucking with my terminology. Listen, I’m

quite sorry, but we’ve got less than ten minutes. Then it’s all over. 

Everything that ever existed, whether you believed it to have existed or not.”

  “Oh Jesus, oh God...please...”

  “Sorry.”

  “But I’ve been good, so many of us have been good, we’ve-”

  “-kissed and loved our kids. Sorry, I can’t save the universe, but I

can second guess you. I’m God, remember. Yeah, you’ve loved your kids,

billions of you have, but it’s all collective. One guy gives an order, or presses a

button - as happened yesterday - OK, it was several guys - and billions die,

these caught in the blast vaporised, these that survive it decompose after

their bodies have been eviscerated by the radiation, whatever. Eichmann,

Mengele, Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao, Nixon, Kissinger, it makes no difference what

century, what side, these psychos all had more people exterminated in five

minutes than you’ve had hamburgers. The thing is, their behaviour neutered your

goodness. By the way, that double S in Henry’s name has always reminded me of

the SS, in a subliminal way, of course. I’ve always considered Kissinger a

Nazi.”

  UPLOAD engines roar smoke artillery fire blood slow death corpses no eyes

just flies dusty road 1941 hot sun Barbarossa Einzatzgruppen civilians

children massacred burned lebensraum ENTROPIC ACCELERATION OUT OF CONTROL

  “But I remember so much, I remember my daughter being born, my parents,

the mountains, the ocean, smells of cornflower, the leather seats in my

Cadillac...oh Jesus fucking Christ, it can’t end...I remember too much, we’ve all

got too much to remember...”

  “Well, not any more. What’s the opposite of remember, hmm?”

  “Wha...I don’t - I mean, I think...I don’t know.”

  “Neither do I, but that’s the way it’s going to be. Whatever the

opposite of remember is, then that’s what you’re going to be doing. Or rather you

won’t, if you see what I mean. There won’t be anything to remember, and there

won’t be anybody to remember what’s no longer here.  I think that’s how

it’s going to be, this metaphysical shit is kind of confusing. I told you, I

can’t stop this.”

  Sobbing from the man now.

  “You all thought that when you died it was heaven or hell, but it

wasn’t. Death meant stasis, the big freeze, the final destination held in abeyance

until the human race was no more - forget purgatory, that’s just a fantasy

world invented by a bunch of pious nobodies - the reality was that when you died,

your soul just stayed around. The final destination was collective, you see.

 How selfish of you all, thinking of number one - ‘Now then, let me see, have

I been a good boy or a shithead, will I go up or down? Well, let me see.’ 

You stupid fucking bastards. Heaven or hell for all of humankind, all of you

uploaded or downloaded as one item, to one place or the other, that’s the

fucking story.”

  UPLOAD blood from mouth of dead child cigarette burns lice tower bloc

urine smell decay social worker police gutter vomit grey sky cold east wind

public inquiry repetition of promises consistent pattern no end brutalisation

primitives no end FIREWALL BREACHED INITIATING SYSTEM COLLAPSE

  “Well, I’ve tried to be a good God and give you all the benefit of the

doubt and I got it wrong. You’re even more revolting than I ever imagined, all

of you. Your psychosis, depressions, murderous impulses, short sighted

narrow minded and utterly primitive barbarism is tearing into me. I thought I was

uploading some good, some bad, but basically a balance in favour of the good

that allowed me to justify doing it in the first place. All I’ve taken up is

mass hate and bovine stupidity.”

  “But you’ve made a good choice, you’ve taken us, the Devil

didn’t...where is he?”

  “The Devil lived on earth - he died in the apocalypse. He was just a

mechanic as well. Nothing special.”

  UPLOAD B-52s incursive high level covert Cambodia Kissinger Cambodia

Nixon napalm speedrush year zero torrential rain mud beheading mass graves one

million human skulls year zero year zero year zero SYSTEM COLLAPSE IMMINENT

  “But this...this means...does this mean...what’s going to happen to all

the others in the universe?

  “Nothing. Because there aren’t any others in the universe. Not this

one, anyway. The only sentient - or otherwise - creatures in this universe were

you lot. And me, of course. Other universes may have sentient life and

they’ll certainly have Gods. I was so hoping to be able to explore and meet them

one day, but you’ve put paid to that. Do you fucking get it now? - I can’t

stop this from ending. Well, I can, but I’d have to be around to do that and

I’m dying, so it’s bye bye time. When it ends there’s nothing. Terribly

sorry.”

  Sobbing uncontrollably, the man started calling for the soul of his

daughter, who had drowned in a lake at the age of seven, twenty years before. But

of course, even if the universe were not about to end, he had no chance of

ever finding her.

  UPLOAD Taiwanese situation repel mainland invasion incident Vatican

taskforce escalation Russian impartiality compromised airbursts simultaneous

strikes ground zero intense heat fear hatred burning death SYSTEM COLLAPSE MEMORY

DISPERSAL

  He awoke drenched in sweat. Kicked aside the tangled quilt. Staggered

to the window. Above and beyond St. Peter’s Square, the dawn sky was drenched

gold and vermilion by the rapidly expanding composite fireball of multiple

nuclear detonations. As death approached, His Holiness George W. Bush sank to

his knees and began praying to the merciful Jesus Christ.

Copyright ©2002 Dan McNeil.