The Third War [Fancanon]
[This is FANCANON. And initially canon that I wrote for TM preston. It's easily adaptable to Milliways. Rated for Angstyness and mention of things that happen in our own reality. They say are immitates life-or is it the other way around?]
"I fear we have awakened a sleeping giant"
-Japanese General. World War 2.
"This life's dim windows of the soul
Distorts the heavens from pole to pole
And leads you to believe a lie
When you see with, not through, the eye."
-Wiliam Blake "The Everlasting Gospel"
"The dissenter is every human being at those moments of his life when he resigns momentarily from the herd and thinks for himself." -- Archibald Macleish
Thanks to Rue for the Quote
First there was Death.
That's how the cycle begins in Preston's world. Death begets life which begets death again. His is a morbid place.
Suffice to say that towers fell and buildings crumbled. People died and a giant was awakened once again.
And once again the Giant Demanded Blood.
However the giant would not be sated with the blood of it's attempted murderers. Nor would it be sated with theri supposed allies black gold blood. Oh no.
The people later saw the error of their ways, but by then it was too late to back down. They were the defenders of democracy and freedom yes? How could the defenders of pure and righteous human idealogy falter?
That would be like mankind faltering.
So the people continued and enemies that were once allies appeared on the horizon. Sides United. The Giant Formed an Alliance with A dragon and a Bear. Enemies turned allies across the universe. The Giant's former friends, the Former fathers of the giant itself turned against them and banded together with The sleeping snake that was the east.
These personifications had names, but it was easier to think of them as animals. The people of America could not accept that Britian had somehow allied itself with Iraq and Iran. Home of multiple human rights atrocities. Home of the first chemical weapons to utilize Ebola as an agent.
So it begins.
The first battle is the one that remains the most important. Japan. Formerly a world power was devestated by the continuation of the "Arabian" conflict. Ebola bombs were dropped on a suicide run.
People literally melted in the streets.
America sallied forth and was met with resistence on Britan's shore. The same shore they fought to defend from the Nazi's ages ago.
No one wanted to say the word "nuclear" but it just sort of happened.
An accident it would later be determined by Liberian sources. A wrong coordinate was taken down.
The United States would never admit that they were stupid enough to...blow themselves up.
Not themselves of course, only the east and west coast leaving a rather large gaping desert where the former Breadbasket, the golden west once the land of so much promise lay.
Alot of people died.
It was right about then that the soon-to-be citizens of Liberia revolted and took back their government. An end to the war soon followed. Each time the citizens taking those out of power who had caused damage and or harm. The dragon fell back asleep. The snack was dead. Destroyed totally and utterly. Britan ran back to lick it's wounds and the bear ran away to hopefully fix an almost fatal situation.
A writer of the period summed it up accurately, saying, "Maybe we need to take a time out from being human."
They were tired of metaphors. Tired of dragons and things not making sense. Tired of each other, if that were possible. They were tired of leaders being lied to.
But leaders will always lie.
So when a new leader arose the people delivered a collective Sigh.
They'd seen dictators before. They could bring him down with ease.
But this new leader promised them rest. A reprieve of the hatred and death. No longer would they have to see the rotting faces of children plastered across the news. No longer would they have to protest over children killing parents because of "movies" and "video games"
So They stood back and let him take it.
They let him take his men into the libraries and kill the librarians. Reports would say that some fell trying to defend their books-or their patrons who tried to defend their books. They let him take the malls (who needs them anyway?) tearing down rich leather and candy factory alike-crushing chocolate into dust with their black steel-toed boots after ripping it from children's hands.
They let them take their theaters. Why watch or rent/download/pirate (which is illegal anyway) a film or a working image of a play? These are painful to watch.
They take their music and the people twist nervously. Perhaps this wasn't such a good idea after all. But the Tetragrammaton is careful to remind them that for every Bach, there is a Manson. There is a Beatles. There is non-conformity
The children protest, the parents aquesice, somewhat greatful.
They pause when they come for the books. There was scoffing. "I don't need to read", or "It's for class" but when it comes down to it and the black gloved hands are reaching out for the paperback copy of "Catcher in the Rye" or "1984" The students hesitate.
They give reasons.
"But-but-Brave New World has lots of Sex!"
"...Heart of Darkness has...Um...like-it was based on Apocalypse now!"
"...TS. Eliot speaks to my soul!"
But they take them anyway. They take them anyway and some of the adults mutter openly now.
And the tetragrammaton listens, and it responds.
"You cry when Romeo and Juliet die in each other's arms. You tear your hair out trying to figure out the plot of each dimestore novella that sits in the grocery stores. You live through these fictional personas. These are not healthy.
These people do not exist.
But when the people start to talk about Temporary escape the tetragrammaton stops them.
"Your lives are truly not worth living?"
So they give them up.
They give up the television shows at the same time. Law and Order, Twenty Four Hours, Emergency Room, Judging Amy, SpongeBob Squarepants, Nickelodeon, TNT, Drama, poetry, theater-
But not without a fight.
The name of the actual day is lost to memory. The day they burned the amusement parks and confiscated the cars.
The day they shut down the internet.
People knew by then. They couldn't just take this one down with ease. But they didn't care.
Because they'd hurt. Because more then half the population suffered from post traumatic stress disorder. Because the entire population had fathers, brothers, sisters, wives, co-workers, cousins, family, friends, jobs, places they hated, things they hated, people they hated. Because they were too soft or too hard or flawed and declared so by the state or those around them.
And the psychiatrists had sat back on their couches in Preston's world and prescribed the All-knowing panacea. The slayer of ex-wives, the murderer of ex-husbands. The defeater of depression, the end of Manic Behavior, the end of the mental cycle that was humanity. For what is a creature so powerful as man if he can be controlled by such a...ungoverned force like emotion?
It started the war. It started the pain. The Rotting faces and the rich desert in the middle of the United States was emotion's fault too. But prosium was there.
So when culture was destroyed right before them the people struggled to find the will to rescue their books and knowledge, their fictional characters and words about rivers and lakes and roads diverging. They wanted to stand up and say "NO" when the television stations were taken off the air replaced by a droning face they didn't give two cents about. To Fight.
But they didn't.
So they let the philosphy die. They threw their gamesystems out the window and so bid farewell to horror and shooting and girls with sad eyes who implored you to "save them" from whatever terror was around the next corner. They threw out their history and magic and dreaming in favor of logistics. Logistics were easy to understand. Harry Potter was Avada Kedvara'd into nothingness thanks to them. Sin City, Anime, Whedon, Bond, Batman, Robin-they all went the way of the Dinosaur.
And so there was death again.
And Liberia was born. The people had a purpose.. They did not need escape or entertainment. By father they understood why they were there. They didn't need heroes, they were whole on the inside.
No one needed to save them.
It wasn't that they didn't "Want" to. They wanted to pick Romeo and Juliet up again and bring them back to life. They wanted James bond to wink at them roguishly and they wanted Star Trek to "Boldly go" again.They wantd Yeats and Byron, Shelley and her monster to talk to them again. It began to grow inside of them. Masking their real needs.
The need to retrieve the family pictures from the fires.
The need to touch a child who was crying.
The need to help another, to offer a kind word of advice.
The need to kiss a wife or a husband or a friend.
Touch me. Love Me. Tell me I'm good, Hate me, hit me, I'm here-I'm here-
The truth hit them. It was only logical that they'd now see it.
They'd made life too hard. Too complicated. In Preston's world they'd sacrificed family meals for bags from macdonalds. It was too hectic, too fast
So fast that it was now gone.
There was a saying, scrawled on a wall in the Nethers far off and away.
"You don't know what you have until it's gone."
They didn't know what they had, these liberians. This different species of human. They didn't know what they had in the Classics. In Bach and Mozart. They didn't know what they had in Nickelodeon too, in Family guy and the simpsons.
They didn't know what they had in the turn of a loved one's face, or the smile of a child on the first day of school. They didn't know what each tear over missed opportunities and weddings meant.
But now they did.
So they wanted it back. The fictional personas and the fire. The music and the leaves and the diverging roads. The war and the hatred and the pain. A heavy cost! we pay it gladly. Save us from the most base of human nature, the truth that we are part of a great machine, a reality too difficult to comprehend. They wanted to take such feelings and and family and creations back into their bosom with joyful arms.
But they just couldn't muster the will to do so.
How do I change?
If I feel depressed I will sing.
If I feel sad I will laugh.
If I feel ill I will double my labour.
If I feel fear I will plunge ahead.
If I feel inferior I will wear new garments.
If I feel uncertain I will raise my voice.
If I feel poverty I will think of wealth to come.
If I feel incompetent I will think of past success.
If I feel insignificant I will remember my goals.
Today I will be the master of my emotions.
-Og Mandino, “The Greatest Salesman in the World”