The Book of John

I hadn’t been glued to a TV like that since 9/11.

How did it end so quickly? On December 3, 2027, or as we now call it, one-two-three, it showed up. Something like three skyscrapers long and four skyscrapers wide and looking like, well, about what you’d expect a spaceship to look like if you watched movies—metal and such.

It just parked itself in the air, hovering in northern Arizona. After the first three days the news people ran out of new things to say about it and had to fill the live footage with their own thoughts—you can imagine how much those sucked. What to do about it? That’s what we all were thinking. Everyone thought an alien spaceship showing up would have meant something intense. Maybe an intergalactic war, maybe cool new technology to share, something, anything but not nothing. It just sat in the air, why?

Three weeks after one-two-three, which felt like three months, the military flew black hawks up and sawed into the side—I wish I had had that job, having no idea what’s on the other side and about to find out. Just some guy fixing tank armor the month before, now cutting into a spaceship with probably the same oxy-fuel welding torch. Must have been something else.

The live feed from their vests once inside was, well, odd. A lot of normal looking plant life on the floor and up the walls, some light from the ceilings, and then a guy. Yeah, just some guy. Looked almost like my buddy John from the body shop in my old town. Just a thin man with dark but graying hair.

He was brought down to Earth. That’s when things got weird. Everyone wanted a piece of John, literally. He landed in America so it was hard to argue he didn’t belong to the US. An asteroid lands on your lawn, it’s yours. Sometimes light bent around John in odd ways making it hard for cameras to capture him. His DNA test came back full human but something about him was different and plenty of other countries wanted to be the one to discover what.

Coming up empty, the US finally brought on scientists from all over to study John. One of which was a female scientist that seemed to reach him. From her interviews I could tell she didn’t want to inject anything or extract anything from him but wanted to find some way of communicating as if he were a guy from work, which to her, he technically was.

Like when the Unabomber sent the newspapers his typed-up manifesto—every FBI agent wanted to pour over it for fingerprints or a loose hair that may have fallen between the pages. Just one, maybe two (it’s been a while) were interested in actually reading the pages for insights. She wanted to read John and unless I am much mistaken, he wanted to be read. The few moments when the TV would give us a glimpse of John with her, he looked like he wanted to be there.

She wore a small heart shaped locket, this scientist. Every day the same locket around her neck. That’s how I remembered her under the masks and protective gear. Somehow it didn’t make her look like a kid the way heart shaped jewelry often does on adult women. It was elegant, the way it sat just below her neck. I don’t think I was developing a crush on her. I’d say it if I were. It had been some time since my wife had moved back in with her parents, I think I just enjoyed seeing a woman I hadn’t let down.

It didn’t take long for the lack of new information to cause most to lose interest. John and his odd self weren’t top stories after two months. There are only so many ways to say, “Boy, he’s mysterious.”

Lucky me. I got to watch it start. Seven months after one-two-three I flipped to the news broadcast dedicated to new information about John. Tonight it was a scientist at the lab telling a reporter that John seems to like salmon but he was interrupted by echoing thuds in quick succession. At this point in my life, I had heard so many different kinds of echoing thuds. I knew what these thuds meant—the salmon scientist didn’t but that reporter interviewing him sure did. When the people on screen move but the camera no longer moves to follow them because the camera man has hightailed it to the door, nothing good is coming. I watched until the signal cut out.

I liked John. I hoped for the best for him but I was mostly worried for her. Even if she had never heard echoing thuds like those, I think she’d figure it out and do something smart—maybe not, maybe she’d do something heroic.

Some say it was the Chinese making a break for John. Some say it was a private company using a mercenary unit to grab him. I’ve even heard it was the US pretending it was the Chinese to have an excuse to retaliate. I’ll tell you this much, when you see twelve white lines of evaporated water in the sky trailing behind twelve objects moving a lot faster than an airplane an hour after watching a gunfight in a lab holding an Alien, I’m not sure it’s all that important to us on the ground who exactly it is to blame.

As fast as possible I packed my truck with the stuff you pack when you’ve got a feeling money’s not gonna matter anymore: food, water, sleeping bag, and given how ugly I knew it could get for those of us who survive the faster-than-planes, all the ammunition I owned.

It has been so many years since the day I said goodbye to my house—not the hardest goodbye, it had foundation problems I was never gonna afford to fix but I’ll always miss having my own four walls.

Some blame John and I guess if he hadn’t shown up the world would still be something like what it was but he didn’t fire those guns and he didn’t launch those nukes. If you and your bud find a briefcase full of cash and you stab him to keep it all for yourself, unless the brief case sprouted an arm and joined the fray, it isn’t evil. It only revealed evil. You’re evil. I won’t give details but I will say this, I’ve had my evil revealed to me more than once since the fallout of one-two-three.

From area to area the stories I hear range from unbelievable and true to unbelievable and untrue. How do I know what to and what not to believe? I’ll get back to you when I have an answer. I’ve heard warlords have taken over John’s spaceship and live on it like kings with his technology. I don’t believe that one. I’ve also heard John got out before the lab was fully overrun. I’ve heard she got out too, that they escaped together. Those who believe this wear a metal heart around their necks. It was comforting to learn I wasn’t the only one who watched her and knew her by her heart locket.

Walking in the mountains where the air is cleaner, I came across a small village. The people were kind, not broken by the broken world. Nightfall had come and as I inquired upon a place to rest, I was shown to a home for travelers. The white-haired man who led me to my room required no trade. Lucky, for I had nothing with which to barter but he asked me to do a chore for him, something within my abilities. I obliged, not knowing what I’d do.

As I laid my head down on the pillow a woman with a heart around her neck entered to start a fire in the fireplace. Her heart necklace was well made. Most I see have clear signs of effort and whatever craftsmanship the wearer could manage yet still hampered by a lack of tools, good metal, and knowhow. But not hers. Hers was—I don’t know—something special. It was not just heart shaped but an actual locket like the original. The flames of the fire bounced off it as I faded to sleep. Peace. For the first time in so many years.

A dark-haired child brought me breakfast. Three eggs from their chickens. He asked about, to use his words, “Long ago.” What was so good about it? Was pizza everything everyone says it was? My answers seemed to satisfy him, like I passed some kind of test. He told me I should write it down. All of it. Long ago, the final days of that world, the beginning of this new world. All. He said that records were important. He said living and walking were not enough to fill a life, that I needed to do more with my remaining time. A remarkable child. Wise far beyond his years.

As I left the white-haired man gave me a blank book and a pen. He told me he’d count my record as the deed I owed him. I told him I’m no writer but I’ll do the best I can. He smiled and gave me a nod.

I’ve got a lot to fill. So, let’s get on with it.