I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Even though I have been forgiven of my sins and had my soul washed white as snow, still, so long as I live in this life, I just can’t seem to break the bonds of sin that hold me – for I am a mere human and thus I am tainted with the blemish of Adam’s Sin.
But, that doesn’t change the fact that I have been a sinner in the past and I fear that I am doomed to continue to sin again.
It’s not that I WANT to sin – I really don’t.
And I’m not merely giving up and giving in – I DO resist temptation when it comes my way.
Understand that, now that I have been born again (to use an apt cliché), I truly strive to be a righteous man and walk in the ways of Jesus Himself. Unfortunately, I continue to fall short.
For Temptation is a sweet, irresistible fruit and sadly it is not until AFTER you take a bite that you realize it wasn’t what you expected.
Too late, Ron
You know as well as I that Satan doesn’t give refunds on the fruit we buy from him, neh?
So why am I telling you all this?
Because it just so happens that upon this day I was about to sin again – I KNEW it and yet I just couldn’t help myself!
Don’t you just hate it when you KNOW you are going to sin, but you do it anyway?
I usually try to come up with some logical reason why it would be all right for me to accept the temptation.
But, friends, I can tell you from 2,000 years of experience – sin is NOT logical and it IS evil – and if you succumb to your temptation, essentially you are reducing yourself to a loaf of bread and you’re letting the devil eat his fill of your soul.
It’s not good.
It’s wrong.
And yet, I continue to do it!
Why? I just don’t know.
And so it happened that this day was like so many in the past when I just couldn’t help myself…
I wanted to sin.
Let me remind you of what Gabriel told me when he last visited me: “…Now is NOT the time for you to act. Now is the time for you to accept God’s Plan and let events unfold on HIS time.”
It’s not that I forgot what he told me – I remembered it all too well.
And yet made the conscious decision NOT to obey.
You see, for the last couple months, I really was repenting and rebuilding my faith:
I was doing all of the things that Gabriel wanted me to do – like a good little student.
Unfortunately, I was also engaging in another, more covert, activity…
I was renewing my Brotherhood of EArth ties in an effort to find out about my friends.
Now I don’t believe that contacting a few of my Brothers to get some news was in and of itself a sin (let’s call that more of a grey area). And yes, even though I believed it when Gabriel assured me that all would be well if I simply waited for the right time to act and then merely did my part; in my mind, Gabriel was referring to the grand scheme of things and even though I knew this is what mattered most, I could not shake the terrible guilt that gripped me over Lazarus and Mary.
For whatever reason, I got the urge to flip on the tube again (well, like I said, I was addicted).
Oh, I knew there was no chance of a baseball game – for all sporting events had long been cancelled. Furthermore, I had heard that most cable stations were now defunct as well – after all, people no longer had time for watching The Travel Channel or QVC – instead only a few national networks were left, and those were now solely devoted to delivering news and propaganda public service announcements related to Covid Health Safety requirements, the need for more Climate lockdowns, and the importance for everyone to spend their monthly UBI credits before they expired.
Locked down at home again and now without television shows as their opiate, people were just trying to survive to the next catastrophe.
Everybody knew it was coming, they just didn’t know what ‘IT’ would be or when it would occur.
(Would you be surprised to learn that churches the world over were filled with suddenly devout believers? Of course all the services were ONLINE since live worship had long since been banned back in 2022 for pandemic safety purposes).
In any case, there I sat, on my recliner (WITHOUT a drink, mind you), and with the TV remote gripped nervously in my hands.
<CLICK>
“….refugees moving from China into India,” said an announcer, as the TV panned over a limitless line of forsaken wanderers in dirty masks moving along a dusty road, “There is nowhere for them to—“
<CLICK>
“…join the National Relief Effort,” pleaded a young lady in full hazmat gear on a public service commercial, “come to Nevada, help us make—“
<CLICK>
“…Help is on the way. So remember, if you are—“
<CLICK>
“Ah, it’s meaningless!” I turned the TV off again. Yet, even as I was about to get up and go back to bed, something pulled me back.
<CLICK> <CLICK>
I turned to Channel 13 – thankfully it was still on the air. Once again I saw nothing more than an ordinary newscast – talking about still more destruction. For nearly thirty minutes I watched, appalled at the devastation.
“Why, Lord?” I began to cry. “Where is the Good Shepherd?”
And then, even as the signal blurred on my TV, I realized what was coming — The Two Witnesses.
Once more I watched Elijah and Enoch as they languished in their dank cell.
By now they were even more disgusting looking than the last time I saw them, but as they lay there in apparent sleep, I was certain that an awful new prophecy was about to come forth.
Time dragged by in the moments that preceded their resurrection.
And then, suddenly Enoch opened his empty eye sockets and began to groan as he raised himself upright, slobber running from his toothless maw, “We are the Olive Trees.”
His words seemed to revive Elijah and, as if on cue, he thrust out his hands, “The Two Lampstands – giving the only true light to the world.”
“The Prisoners Of Chillon” By Ferdinand Victor Eugene Delacroix
“Today is the day.” Enoch smiled.
“It has been 1,260 days since we returned.” Elijah confirmed.
I knew what was about to happen.
“Revelation 11.” I gasped at the implications. “ He’s going to murder them. And worse yet, he’ll be a hero for it!”
The scene on the TV couldn’t have unfolded any more scripted than if I had been the director: for at that moment the camera panned over to the prison door.
Silently the portal opened and in walked a lone man. Clothed all in white and armed with a scimitar – the curved blade polished to a blinding brightness– the man’s face was shrouded by a heavy turban, one which covered his entire face, and even though his eyes looked familiar, I could not make out for certain who he was.
(Benedict? Bates? Marrollo? I just didn’t know. Yet one thing I was sure about – this was The Beast!)
The prophets must have sensed the presence of the intruder as well. And, surely they must have known what was about to happen, for I watched as Enoch raised his arms protectively…
…only to be viciously cut down!
For his part, Elijah did not resist, instead he simply lay back down, smiled, and waited to be destroyed.
The Beast kindly obliged — splattering Elijah’s blood across the walls.
For this was a holy war and, although I knew that the world over was likely rejoicing at the pseudo-deliverance just provided by this mystery man, in reality, I retched at the sight.
Don’t you realize what this means?
Satan’s Son had taken one step closer to Victory!
<CLICK>
I couldn’t bear to watch any more. For I realized something else…
The next day I was sitting in my living room, trying to relax.
It wasn’t working.
I think it’s pretty damn unfair that not only am I over 2,000 years old, but worse yet, I FEEL that way too.
Can you even imagine what I have to go through?
Of course you can’t – you’re probably still in your first CENTURY of life – talk to me when you reach your first millennium – then we can compare war stories. Until then don’t even begin to think you know me.
At a time like this, the only thing that gives me solace (besides my booze) is remembering my friend Frankie.
Amuse me for a moment as I try to explain.
Frank Stoppa
Back in Book I, I told you Frankie died about a decade ago – that was years before the Covid scam – although I’m sure they found a way to classify Frankie’s passing as one of the many inflated Covid deaths and I know that he was one of the many thousands of dead people who somehow voted from the grave during the PA Election Steal fiasco of 2020 – I’m sure Frankie’s turning over in his grave about being on record as voting for the puppet that was Joe Biden (read: Obama’s 3rd Term), because I know how much Frankie always loved Donald Trump, but what can you do? What’s done is done and like I told you before, there was no chance in hell President Trump was going to be re-elected – no matter how many votes he got from his rabid fans, the Great Reset, The Brotherhood, Big Tech, and the rest of their cabal were always going to be able to produce more votes to get rid of The Donald and his America-first, anti-globalist agenda.
Thank God, Frankie didn’t have to live to see the madness of our current times – I only wish I could join him!
But enough about Frankie’s death – let me tell you about his life – perhaps you’ll learn a thing or two…
Frank Stoppa was born here in Williamsport back in 1924 to a pair of Polish immigrants. He lived a good working man’s life – retiring from a factory job at Bethlehem Steel in 1987 after 33 years on the job.
A life spent making parts for plane engines.
After leaving the factory life, Frank served as a park ranger at The White Deer Golf Course – if only because he needed something to do. I tried to join him there for a job but quickly realized I wasn’t cut out for the whole working man thing – it was just too much of a grind.
But where Frank really came alive was when he wasn’t working — at least not at his official job. For Frank Stoppa was also known as “The Mayor” – oh not of any city or township, but instead of pretty much every bar and club in a 50 mile radius of Williamsport. On any given night Frankie could be found at one of his many hangouts (and I with him) – we were members of the VFW club, The Keystone League, The American Legion, The Sons of Italy Italian Club(although a pollock Frank was an honorary member here for ‘services rendered’ – but that’s another story), his beloved Polish Club, The Park Cafe (his son’s bar), and (my personal favorite) the Gesang Verein Harmonia Club.
Harmonia Club
The Park Cafe
VFW Club
(Hey, you want to go to a place where you can get soused? Go the Harmonia – if you’re lucky enough to get in – which by the looks of YOU probably isn’t happening – sorry).
Although I didn’t know him in his younger days, Frankie always said he was quite a hell raiser. After a rough and tumble childhood, a teenage Frankie and his buddy were at the wrong place at the wrong time when a treasured antique plane ‘mysteriously’ caught fire in town — rather than stick around to endure the heat, a then 17-year old Frank left high school and his family to join The Marines.
During World War II he was a sergeant in The Corps and spent 19 months in the South Pacific – becoming known as a Good Time Charlie wherever his wings touched down.
After surviving the Guadalcanal campaign, I remember Frank telling me about how he nearly died when a bomber plane he was on crashed in the South Pacific due to mechanical failure – I also remember him telling me that HE was the chief mechanic! (Yup, that sounds like the Frankie I know).
Ever the ladies’ man, Frankie claims he had women lined up at every port along his travels. And while the phenomenon of children of American GI’s from WWII is nothing new, I think we might know who is behind the unsolved mystery of why so many people from the Solomon Islands have ‘Polish’ features – after all Frank was stationed there for a good bit of his tour and ever dreamed of going back to the beaches there where he claimed he enjoyed the best years of his life. I wonder why? Hmm…
Frank’s Island Children?
Although he later wed a saint of a woman and remained married for over 60 years, that marriage almost didn’t happen because ol’ Frank nearly outsmarted himself on one particular occasion. If I recall the story correctly, I remember him boasting to me about a time when he was near the end of his military service and he had so many women around the world that he was ‘communicating’ with that he couldn’t keep track of them all. To save time, Frank said he used to just write the same love letter to all the girls while merely changing the name of the girl at the top, yet still signing Love, Frankie at the bottom.
There was just one problem – Frank actually had the gall to send that same letter to a pair of girls who lived back here in Williamsport and who, unbeknownst to him, had become friends while he was away at war.
Imagine the scene then when these girls were at the local beach (which in Williamsport was a hangout on the shores of the Susquehanna River) and they excitedly shared with one another a letter from their boyfriends…
But there was a bit of a problem – when comparing letters the girls realized it the same boyfriend and worse yet the same letter!
Amazingly, Frankie was still able to convince one of these girls that the letter was really meant just for her and that SHE was the only one for him. (As I said, Frank was quite charming).
Indeed, that girl was Pauline Taddeo and smitten with the Frank Stoppa Bug, she welcomed him home after WWII and the pair quickly wed.
Frank & Pauline 1944
Beyond his romantic escapades, I was also continually amazed at how Frankie cheated death — whether it be that plane crash in the South Pacific, the multiple times he rolled his car down the side of a mountain here in Williamsport (usually the result of a drunken incident), or even the fact that he had smoked and drunk well more than his fair share for nearly 70 years – I’d always considered Frankie as a cat who had nine lives (but who actually used TEN of them).
Eventually I just figured that Frankie was an immortal like me…
As usual, I was wrong.
Frankie died — just like all the rest of my friends over the centuries.
Oh, I don’t remember exactly what got him.
It could have been the heart condition, the emphysema, liver cancer, complications from deep vein thrombosis, or any of the other host of ailments that he suffered from.
I don’t know and it doesn’t really matter.
But what I do know — what I remember as if it was yesterday — was this one fact…
Confident of his chances in the afterlife, Frankie was not afraid to enjoy life. He also wasn’t afraid to die.
Despite his sins (and they were many), before he passed, Frank had made his peace with God and Pauline (who’d passed away back in 2004) and he was ready to move on. When he went, it was on his own terms – like always.
His stubborn confidence in spite of the odds against him was something I will never forget. He was a good man.
Frank taught me how to enjoy life again or at least how to forget about my problem – if only for a short time — and for that I was grateful to him.
And yet, Frankie was ravaged by the effects of age – just like me. The problem is, unlike Frankie, I can’t get relief from my ailments.
I too have aches.
I too have pains.
I have a host of undiagnosed diseases that I carry with me as well. (What – you thought just because I’m immortal, I’m completely healthy? Hardly).
I have the body of a man in his eighties and I am forced to live within this decrepit husk every day of my horrible life. My friend Frank was able to pass on – yet I can’t do the same and it’s killing me from the inside out!
Look, I don’t have time answers to those questions, right now.
All I can tell you is that Christ made me immortal shortly after his return from the grave and later my body stopped aging when I lived on Patmos and wrote Revelation.
Exile
Whenever I get injured my body eventually recovers back to the condition it was in when I was on Patmos – which is that of an 80-something year old, complete with all the problems of a man that age.
Does that sound fun to you?
My point in telling you all this is that it’s no fun to be this damn old!
I pouted for a couple days — tinkering around in the garage working on my… project.
As I told you before, I’m currently living in upstate Pennsylvania – in a town called Williamsport to be exact.
Now if you’re wondering what there is to do in Williamsport, let me answer you – not much. I migrated here over fifty years ago because I wanted to live in a secluded town where I wouldn’t be bothered. For the most part, that’s still the case.
The city (if you can call it that) is located in the northern part of Pennsylvania, a little east of center. When I moved here back in the 1950’s it was still a pretty small town, but since then it has grown to about 30,000 or so – some of that started with an influx of supposedly rehabbing criminals that were shipped from Philly in the last couple decades of the twentieth century and then even more came after the various Covid Health Rezoning and Racial Equity Redistribution Plans that started back in 2021 and 2022. To encourage Williamsport to accept these fine new citizens, the state paid the city a bunch of money for so-called sustainable community projects; it wasn’t a fair exchange. This place used to be a decent country village with respectable people who lived in harmony with police and other first-responders, but that all went to pot when they let the BLM and Antifa agitators take over.
These ‘peaceful’ protesters (as the #FakeNews always called them) were naught but goons too stupid to realize they were being used as pawns to support the higher agenda of The Great Reset. The new regime was never going to give BLM and Antifa the equality they claimed to be fighting for, but most of the protestors didn’t care about that anyway – instead, because they were allowed to do what they loved best (loot, pillage, and spout their madness at all hours of the night), they happily played the part assigned to them – spreading terror as part of the 2020 Election-Steal campaign in order to try to make our people vote against President Trump.
The hard-working, blue-collar people of this area knew Trump wasn’t really responsible for the anarchy and thus we voted in droves to reelect President Trump and his ‘law and order’ policies. Unfortunately, like people in other other swing states, we learned too late that our votes didn’t really matter. President Trump was never going to be re-elected, no matter how many votes he got because a cabal of well-funded powerful organizations from around the world had worked together behind the scenes to decide the matter beforehand.
In PA we witnessed the stolen election first hand. On election day, President Trump was the clear winner by an overwhelming majority – just like he was in Michigan, Georgia, and other swing states. After watching President Trump wipe the floor with Biden on Election Night, I went to bed certain of Trump’s relection. Oh how foolish I was. Like many others I watched in horror as the fine folks in Philly and Harrisburg assured their overlords not to worry about the overwhelming support for Trump in rural communities like Williamsport, and true to their word the cabal and their agents ‘found’ all the mail-in votes and computerized ballot dumps they needed to steal the state of PA for their candidate instead – taking as many days as they needed to change the result in their favor – just like their partners did in other swing states.
And that, my friends, is how you steal an election in the twenty-first century.
Unfortunately they left the ‘peaceful’ protesters to continue to plague us. Worse yet they also defunded the police and other social services. As a result, the Antifa goons have pretty much taken over the city proper and they’ve continued to cause havoc as part of the new socialist government’s agenda to keep the people cowering in fear and begging for martial law to protect them. Williamsport, as it once was, is now a thing of the past – like so many other towns across The New CCP America.
I’d prefer to think of happier times instead.
Hey, did you know that in the late 1800s Williamsport was actually known as The Lumber Capital of the World? Or that Williamsport once had more millionaires per-capita than anywhere in the United States at the time?
I guess I should say it USED to be the home of the LLWS – like so many things Covid cancelled that event (in the name of public safety, of course). There was talk about it trying to make a comeback in 2022, but with youth sports destroyed by the pandemic Health Regulations (especially in uber-socialist states like PA) and with domestic and international air travel so severely limited by vaccine passports and the like, The Little League World Series never really had a chance.
It pains me to remember what once was and what the plandemic’s public health policies stole from us.
Seeing a baseball game in person is one of the things I miss most.
I love baseball and while I never played (the game didn’t even exist when I was in my youth), for whatever reason I could never get enough of watching this pastime. Sure my favorite team is the Phillies, but being that they are three-plus hours away by car, and given all the Covid Health Regulations you have to comply with to see a live game, I don’t have the option anymore.
Prior to Covid, if I wanted to see some live ball, I had a couple options – I used to be able to drive into town and watch the local minor league affiliate of the Phillies called the Williamsport Crosscutters, or I could have gone to any number of local Little League games and see the sport in its purest form.
All of that is gone now – again in the name of public health.
While the government still allowed for professional sports (they were after all the modern day opiate of the people), everything below that level has pretty much become relics of a bygone era. I still remember the time when nobody cared about viruses or ever considered snitching on their neighbor for not wearing a mask. I remember life before mandatory vaccines or Freedom Passes. I even remember the pre-Covid age of neighborhood cookouts and fun. And little league baseball was a big part of that.
Believe it or not, I wasn’t always a crotchedy old man. I even used to volunteer as a coach at the Brandon Little League that played in a local park across the street from my friend Frank Stoppa’s house (yes it’s true – I really did have friends in my life). I enjoyed my time as a little league coach and I was a stalwart at the Brandon Little League for over two decades. Unfortunately, in the late 80’s, I started to feel under-appreciated by some of the parents, and later on I started to get questioned as to why an old geezer like me was so interested in helping out with young boys and girls who were not related to me. Eventually it just wasn’t worth the trouble anymore. (Gee whiz, it’s not like I was recruiting some kid to be my catamite. I simply loved the game – is that such a crime?).
As for my friend Frankie, he was quite a pal. With a shock of black hair ever-filled with Brylcreem, he was a greasy-haired Italian-Pollock who was one of the few people in the world I’ve ever met who truly got it.
It was Frankie who introduced me to my faithful friends Jim and Jack (Reeves and Daniels that is), as well as to such beer classics as PBR, Genesee, and Yuengling. And it was Frankie who also turned me on to country music. Many a night it was that the two of us would put away a case of beer or a few fifths of whiskey listening to Jim Reeves, Conway Twitty, or Hank Williams.
Yes, Frankie understood that life was pretty much pointless unless you could find some way to enjoy it.
He was quite a character – as gregarious as I am quiet – and for over forty years we made quite a team. Unfortunately for me, Frank passed away back in 2009 and things haven’t been the same since.
He was my last real friend. He knew my secrets – and he took them to the grave. Funny enough, I was there at his funeral mass when his grandson gave what I consider the most fitting eulogy of all time – not only was the talk filled with humorous stories about Frankie’s life, but at the very end, (right there in a Catholic Church mind you), his grandson cracked open a can of Pabst and sent Frankie off with a toast of ‘one for the road!’ I can’t imagine the balls it took for his grandson to stand up in a catholic church and make a toast with a beer can. I heard after the fact that the priest was none too happy about it.
And yet, I don’t have such a luxury — I’ll never get a eulogy like that because I’m stuck here. Despite the fact that I still enjoy my baseball, and my booze, and my music, I’d gladly give it all away if I could only die like my friend Frankie.
I’m just oh so tired of being alive. Can you understand that? I doubt it.
There’s a section of King Solomon’s Book of Ecclesiastes (Chapter 12) which comes close to what I’m feeling. Let me read it to you,
“…The years approach when you will say, ‘I find no pleasure in them.’ When the sun and the moon and the stars grow dark. When old men rise up at the sound of birds, but all their songs grow faint. When even the grasshopper drags himself along — for desire is no longer stirred. Then shall the dust shall return to the ground it came from, and the spirit to the God who gave it. [But for me] Meaningless! Meaningless! Everything is meaningless!”
If you open your Bible and read that book, you’ll notice that I did NOT add that last section about Life being “meaningless” – Solomon himself wrote those words and he was supposed to be the wisest man who ever lived so if you got a problem, take it up with him. In any case, his words sure as hell apply to me.
But, what more can I do?
I can’t die, and yet I don’t want to keep on living. And so, I am forced to suffer a meaningless existence – unless I can figure out a way to change my fate. Covid couldn’t kill me, neither could the mRNA vaccines that killed so many others. But not to worry, because that’s what my Project is all about.
I’d love to finally tell you about something IMPORTANT – like my Project – but alas, right now I’m supposed to talk about my visions… again.
Oh, where should I start? Well, to begin with, I guess I should tell you that she is currently calling herself Miriam Magdala. I suppose that is adequate since she is originally from Magdala – but that is a different story…
Are Miriam and I friends?
Well, let’s just say she is a long time business associate.
OK, to be truthful, at one time she, Alan, and I were inseparable. We all had the same mission to work on, we were all very gung-ho, and of course, we were all blessed with the same…condition.
What do I think about Miriam?
I can tolerate her – when she doesn’t get all high and mighty on me. You see, the problem is that Miriam is very passionate about The Commission – still. She has no other real interests; everything she does is about The Commission – even after all these many years, and all our MANY failures.
Don’t you find that a bit odd? I did. And I got tired of all her badgering. That’s the main reason why I left her and Alan and went off and did my own thing.
Since we parted ways I’ve lived all over the world, but I migrated to my present home in Williamsport, PA, oh I’d say about fifty years back – give or take a decade.
Because of his willingness to get vaxxed and chipped, and given his academic status, (and because of his various Associations), Alan has enjoyed freedom of movement and thus lived all over Eurasia. Given that he is a scholar and I fancy myself as a scientist, we’ve always maintained at least a professional association.
As for Miriam, I really haven’t kept track of her these past couple centuries; oh, I’ve seen her time and again, but it was always work-related and always with negative results. I remember her telling me previously that she’d spent most of her time in the Far East and I know she said something about “being a student of world religions,” but I didn’t really pay much attention – so long as she had something to occupy her other than MY whereabouts then that was fine by me.
Which brings us to today — June 11.
To be honest, I was not that surprised to see Miriam in my visions – once I saw that Benedict was up to something, and that Alan was in trouble, well, I figured that news of Miriam would pop up next.
As usual, I was correct.
A new day, a new revelation from Him – and this time it was all about Miriam. And wouldn’t you know it – I caught her writing another one of those damn secret notes!
(Boy, this woman really knows how to make me steam!)
1492 is coming for you – MM.
“Please do something, John.” I saw Miriam whisper – even though she was alone and her intended receiver (me) was on the other side of the globe.
(Who the hell is she talking to? It also steamed me that she was wearing a face mask despite being by herself – but then again she always was a rule-following virtue-signaler (something else I hated that about her).
(What the hell — why can’t she just leave me alone?)
I then watched as Miriam fell back into her chair and allowed the tears to take over. (She always one for the dramatics). She cried as quietly as she could, soiling her masks but apparently trying not to be heard through the paper thin walls of the palace.
Now, you’re just going to have to trust me on this next part as to how I know what I know, but for the time being, just take my word on this, OK?
So after my assailant confirmed I was dead, he held his blade up, watching my crimson-grey blood cascade down the metal. That’s when he did something that might shock you – in spite of not knowing my Covid-status, and even though he was definitely NOT socially distant as he continued to straddle my body, my attacker took off his face mask! (Oh the horror, right?)
Yet what he did next might make you run for the hills.
“I wonder…” The goon said as he brought the knife to his mouth and licked his tongue along the shank. “BLAH! PLUFF! Why, it tastes like… dusty moth balls? Baron, don’t tell me you’ve been crazy enough to experiment on yourself too?”
Unfortunately for him, I was in no condition to reply. However in a rather ironic twist, the record player hadn’t been disturbed by all this commotion and was still playing the Jim Reeves Anthology — now softly sounding Guilty through the speakers…
Dufus that he was, the intruder never noticed this cruel coincidence. Instead he put his face mask back on and then continued the task that he came here for – ransacking his way through my home, he pulled down rows of dusty books from built-in shelves, broke open my dilapidated cabinets, and cleared my closets of rummage, whiskey bottles, and even my dirty laundry — looking anywhere and everywhere for but one specific treasure.
It wasn’t gold, food, toilet paper, my stash of counterfeit Immunity Passes, or anything that held worldly value – for even though I plenty of those rare commodities, my intruder as after… something else.
(Fool! He has no idea what he’s about to do. But, whatever happens, YOU are here to witness that it wasn’t my fault, right?)
For a moment the masked brute paused in thought as he stood among feathers still floating in the air after slashing my mattress (yeah right, like I would hide It in there?). “C’mon, I know it’s here somewhere.” And he scanned the room, until finally, “Aha — the TV!”
And in a flash, he bounded back into my living room.
I still lay motionless in an ever-growing pool of blood, yet the murderer paid me no mind as his eyes searched for something specific – for it wasn’t really the TV he was after.
When he couldn’t readily locate his desire, he took a step back behind the Laz-E-Boy and retraced the steps of his intrusion; throwing a shadow punch or two to mimic his previous assault, and then following along the path of his destruction, finally he came to, ”Yes, I’ve got it!” Kicking the Roku aside, he hungrily grabbed the rectangular box that my rabbit ears had previously sat upon.
“Ha, Antennae Stand my ass,” he ogled the smoke-scorched caisse as he took a seat in my chair, caressing the 10×6” black box. “So this is one of The Three, eh? Oh, my lord is going to be so happy with me — I wonder what kind of reward I’ll get?”
He scanned the sides, trying to see how to open the box. When he located the tiny s-clasp, “What the–? John, you don’t even have this locked?” And flicking off the clasp he then began to open the box “Is that any way to protect one of Jes—“
<Rrraboom-boom-BOOM!>
Thunder shook the house, and the temperature suddenly plummeted – surely sending chills tingling over the man’s body — yet still he looked into the box.
He began to hyperventilate in his mask and his body became gripped in a cold sweat — yet still he looked into the box.
Removing his mask, he took a risk and tried breathing in fresh air, yet his lips began to crack from a sudden parchness and his tongue became as dry as the desert sands — yet even still he looked into the box, totally captivated by the object inside.
Minutes turned to hours while the intruder sat motionless, maskless, and absorbed by what was once my most prized possession.
Until at last, the man began to reach a meaty paw into the case…
<RrraBOOM-BOOM-BOOM!>
Yet, even as he griped the cold relic, he must have realized it was a deadly mistake.
“YAAAWWWPP!” He wailed in agony, flying backwards over the chair. Unable to let go of that which he came for, my murderer’s screams continued for but a moment more, and then he collapsed in a heap, bleeding from ghastly holes in his hands and above his ankles. After only a moment, his shirt began to fill with blood, and I knew that his side had been ripped open as well — allowing his punctured lungs to let flow their contents. Even his hair became matted from the blood that also pulsed forth from the multitude of tiny punctures that wrapped a picket-fence around his scalp.
Oh, please don’t be surprised by any of this, after all, this is the way it always happened – as another would-be burglar died a death infinitely more gruesome than that which he had inflicted on me.
In fact, I myself could tell you this, for I had witnessed the man’s demise.
Rising from a pool of my own blood – and feeling older than ever — I frowned as I looked upon the new mess in my living room, “Hrmpf. I suppose I have to clean up another one.”
I could have checked the man’s IdentiChip to learn more about him, but I didn’t wanna risk activating any 5G sensors in the area by turning on my biometric reader – especially when I knew why the man came anyway. Like all the others he only wanted one thing and that was all I needed to know about him.
Taking a quick breath, I hoisted my intruder-turned-corpse over my shoulder and carried him out through the kitchen door and into my backyard. You might be shocked that I didn’t put on a face mask or that I dared touched another person without knowing their Covid-status, but I’m not a sheep like you so I knew that masks didn’t work against Covid. More importantly I knew the truth about the Covid – it’s a scam! –so complying with a bunch of regulations that were always more about population-control than actual science was never my thing. I’d been around long enough to know a fascist power play like The Great Reset when I see one, and this was wasn’t even hard to recognize because the globalists behind this version of the New World Order didn’t even bother to hide their agenda.
So the technocrats had a new idea to control the world – what do I care? Do what you like, just leave me in peace.
I live on the outskirts of Williamsport, PA – the name of the township is actually called ‘Cogan Station’ – I doubt if you’ve even heard of Williamsport and I KNOW you haven’t heard of Cogan Station – and that’s fine by me. I bring it up now just so you can get an idea of my lifestyle.
I prefer to be alone.
I live in the woods and while there are a number of other home sites nearby, I don’t have any neighbors within shouting (or snitching) distance and that’s the way I like it. My place is located about ten miles off the main road and it’s a good ways into a wooded glade. I have the land cleared out around my house, but there’s still quite a bit of woods that surround me.
All of which means I get to keep my privacy – usually.
Besides the mail (read: spy) drones, every so often I get a visitor – someone from a elderly outreach center (read: contact tracer), or a neighbor who forgets that I don’t like to be disturbed, or perhaps a group of courageous kids who are looking to mess with a known anti-masker like me.
And sometimes I’ll get a visitor like the fellow I got today — which is always a bit of a nuisance.
After I hefted the goon to the yard, I had to catch a breather – thankfully this was easier without a mask to block the fresh country air.
Ahh – I can’t believe this is illegal, I chuckled to myself at the absurdity of all the “New Normal” Covid rules allegedly designed to keep us safer but in reality accomplishing nothing but destroying our freedom.
Now if you saw my lands, you noticed that the rear of my ten-acre property has quite a few dirt piles scattered around; to most people these mounds would probably look like mere compost heaps for my garden — and on the surface they are.
But dig a little deeper and you might be surprised at what you find.
I spent the next hour and a half going digging yet another grave. After I dug the IdentiChip out of his forearm, I gruffly tossed the man into the grave and hauled a bit of compost from another pile to cover the site – burying yet another secret in my yard.
“Hell, I’ve got more skeletons than Dr. Flipflop.” I wiped my forehead with a handkerchief. “I’m gettin’ too old for this crap. God curse your soul, scoundrel. You made me miss my Phillies. Amen!” Then I threw down my shovel and stormed back towards my house. “Hey, maybe I can catch the postgame?”
Yet even as I said it I knew it was a pipedream. First I had to get out my own drone and fly the attacker’s Identichip to a location far away from my house – that took me another hour.
Then I had to drink a beer (or three) to calm down.
Finally I had to clean up inside the house.
When I came to the object that had caused the death of my attacker, I casually picked it up the thin piece of black iron and placed it back into its case.
Too bad this thing couldn’t kill me too, I lamented.
After that I set about the task of trying to get the TV upright again – things didn’t go well at first and I started to let the expletives fly as my anger rose, but just then a new Jim Reeves’ song came filtering out of the stereo speakers – Adios, Amigo.
It was Jim who finally saved my day – for I couldn’t help but sing along with his song, in good cheer at last, “Adios, Amigo. Adios, my friend. The road we have travelled has come to an end…”
Few have seen but a glimpse of Hell, a tatter of Revelation, yet for me it was my Daily Bread; well, that and a good bottle of Jack, and maybe a PBR or two…
My name is John and I’ve got a major problem – again.
Just a few minutes ago I went down to check the mailbox. As always, I waited until the delivery drone was gone – I can’t stand those little spies and I don’t like risking The Eyes seeing me without a face mask on (the last thing I need is another do-gooder from the Elderly Outreach Center paying me a visit to teach me about the benefits of wearing a face mask, how it’s my patriotic duty to keep getting vaxxed against the latest Covid variant that fear-mongering media keeps pushing, and other nonsensical hogwash).
Since the mail delivery location on my farm was down the drive about a football field away from the house, even a casual walk like this caused me to sweat, and I by the time I reach the box I could feel my hair begin to stick in stringy mats to the back of my neck – just perfect.
Worse yet, as soon as I looked down at my stack of mail, I knew I had a problem, because peeking forth from all those damn propaganda flyers about the benefits of the Identichip was an otherwise nondescript piece of airmail — the sight of which sent me into a coughing fit.
Now I wasn’t expecting any letter from overseas and there was no return address, yet even before opening it, I knew who it was from.
“Damn her for doing this to me.” I dropped the rest of the mail and proceeded to tear open the small note. And as new rivulets of sweat poured down my back, I read the following…
1492 is coming for you – MM.
For a moment, a chilling force gripped me – turning my spine to water and causing me to cower down in fear. Yet, the moment quickly passed and when it did my blood began to boil, “She should know I don’t need this crap.” I spat at the letter, before ripping it to shreds and tossing them into the yard.
When I got back inside, I briefly considered changing clothes – I stunk and I knew it. However it had only been three days in these overalls so I wasn’t about to toss them in the laundry pile just yet.
Now, lest you think this I’m just lazy, think again.
OK, OK, it’s true, I always was a bit lazy and laundry was never my thing, but even if it was, it’s not like I had much choice – we were in the middle of another detergent shortage and I wasn’t sure when my next supply ration would be delivered, so rather than worry about washing my clothes I instead got a six pack from the fridge and proceeded to park myself on the raggedy Laz-E-Boy in my living room – thanking my stars that there wasn’t a beer shortage this month.
Off in the corner, my turntable was playing a Jim Reeves’ record – the tune Welcome To My World was presently on, yet the volume was turned down low so that it didn’t compete with the TV since I was still waiting for the baseball game to start (thankfully the government still allowed us peons to have our sports – at least for now).
My electric rations had been reduced again because of the on-going ‘save the planet’ climate battle, so I had the shades pulled down to try to get some measure of relief from the sticky heat that still clung to the evening air. Sure, I could have used some of the stored energy from my solar panels, but I preferred to save that for my tv watching and music – after all, you gotta prioritize right?.
And so, sitting in that half darkness, I picked up my copy of The Williamsport Sun Gazette. Why or how the newspaper was still being printed I couldn’t say – I’m sure it was to try to influence old farts like me who didn’t go online much to believe in the government’s propaganda, but that didn’t work with me because I simply tossed aside everything but the sports section – since that was the only part that could tell about my beloved Philadelphia Phillies.
As I read, I took a sip (or three) of my beer – good ol’ Pabst Blue Ribbon — and settled in to watch the upcoming game. But then, just as the local news was about to end, suddenly the station was interrupted by one of those God-awful, fear-mongering, #FakeNews Special Reports…
“Good evening, friends. We interrupt your local programming to bring you an update on today’s landmark speech by Bill Bates.” The anchorman spoke in that silky baritone they all seem to be born with. “Who is like Mr. Bates? That is the question on everyone’s lips as the world continues to praise perhaps the greatest philanthropist and mental genius of all time!”
“What do I care about Bill Bates?” I screamed at the set, pissed at the interruption.
I supposed I could have just ignored the news and focused on my paper instead. Or maybe you think I could have changed the channel – but let’s not get carried away here – we’re talking about an off-the-grid ’68 Zenith, so changing the channel required getting up to fiddle with a manual dial, and that’s not for me.
Oh don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I still live in the Dark Ages – I know all about cutting the cord on cable and I briefly tried using a Roku for streaming but I didn’t like it – first off because I’m not about to use my UBI credits for a subscription to streaming services that are full of a bunch of programming I don’t watch, and secondly because streaming is just another invitation for Big Tech to monitor me and I’ll pass on that.
That’s why I kept my rabbit ears – sure they’re illegal but who’s gonna know? I get all the local programming I want with that old-time antennae and since nobody ever visits me before I have time to hide them, I had those ears presently perched on a black box that sat atop the tv, next to that unused Roku.
At first I tried tuning out the TV anchorman, but his voice just kept droning on, “As everybody knows, The Bates Foundation’s vaccines saved our world from the Coronavirus pandemic that started back in 2019, and their Vaccine Passports have given us many of our freedoms back.”
What a crock. I thought. Does anyone really believe this nonsense?First off, I never understood why a vaccine was necessary against a coronavirus like Covid. Didn’t people realize that we’d been living with coronaviruses for centuries? Why would someone want to take a vaccine that has a higher chance of giving them a side effect than it did of actually preventing them from getting the virus? And why did we need to take a vaccine to ‘get our freedoms back’ when we should have never lost them in the first place? No thanks. I’ll pass. Call me an anti-vaxxer if you will, that’s fine. While all the sheep believed the media’s lies and rushed to get their vaccines so they could virtue signal on social media, I chose to follow the real science and let herd immunity get me through a bout with Covid. After all, the with it’s 99%+ infection-survival rate, the virus was never a threat to me (unfortunately) and even it had been, I wasn’t about to take one of Bates’ mRNA vaccines because they only thing they did was turn a bunch of people into Covid factories and spread the virus faster through the planet. Call me crazy but I’m not one for having my body used in a science experiment – at least not by someone else.
Meanwhile, the news reporter was still droning on. “The world still mourns those who had negative immune responses to the early vaccines. It’s important to remember that The World Health Organization has assured us that those who passed away back then didn’t die from the vaccines, but instead from other comorbidities that may have been plaguing them at the time – unfortunately their immune systems were so weak that not even the vaccine could save them. Thankfully for the rest of us, the Bates Vaccine Program saved us from the pandemic – that’s what The Science tells us and if there’s one thing that the pandemic taught us it’s to Follow the Science, right?” But then, turning serious, the newsman warned. “Unfortunately I regret to report that not all is well with the world – the illustrious Dr. Flipflop has warned again that many supporters of our shameful ex-president Donald Trump are continuing to refuse the latest Covid Vaccine – believe it or not, some people have never even had their first dose! It’s shocking, I know. That’s why the good doctor is sounding the alarm – don’t you see, friends, the actions of these insurrectionists are endangering us all and if–“
“Bah!” I cursed, feeling the wrinkles cut deeper into my face. “Who cares about Doctor Flipflop peddling his never-ending vaccine programs against all his made-up variants? Tell me about my Phillies!”
<SMASH!> Glass shattered across the kitchen floor behind me, followed by the sound of someone banging against the door.
“What the hell,” I sputtered to get up. “If those Robinson twins are trespassing again…”
Yet even before I could turn around, suddenly rough hands were upon me; and before I knew what was happening, a black-clad intruder pounded a hard right into the side of my face – knocking the Phillies cap from my head and filling my mouth with blood.
“Umpf!” I moaned, even as another blow sent me crashing into the TV, where I became entangled by those god-forsaken rabbit ears.
Unable to stop my attacker from jumping onto me, my efforts to ward off his blows were futile.
“It’s taken me too long to find you, Baron.” My intruder straddled over me, his face completely covered by a heavily tinted Nano Mask. “You may not know me, but you sure as hell know what I’m here for.” And with that, the goon unsheathed a nasty-looking dagger from his belt, “As fish are caught in the cruel net, and the bird taken in by the snare, so men are trapped by evil times that fall unexpectedly upon them, eh…Bruder?”
My eyes lit up for a moment at his quote from Ecclesiastes, not to mention his reference to The Brotherhood, but most of my attention was captured by that blade. Yet I never got a chance to reply, for just then my attacker stabbed me!
Again and again and again the intruder forced his knife into my torso — seven times in all — leaving me a mangled mass of blood and pulp.
Death was NOT a fun experience, let me tell you — it never is…
The Last Temptation of John 