The Start

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They took the bait.

A white van glinted in the distance before turning onto their farm road. Rose

looked at it through the yellow lacy curtains and then placed the small table exactly right. It was where she and John would sit when they came in. She went to the kitchen and poured hot water into her mother’s blue tea pot and put it and four mis-matched cups on a tray and placed it on the table.

John came in and saw her sit on the worn-out wing back.

“Everything is set,” he said and he, too, sat down on a square stuffed chair. They were both facing the door. Both put on glasses and bent over, waiting. They put wraps over their legs to complete the illusion.

They heard the scrunch of tires on the drive and heard boots hit. They waited until the visitors made it to the porch and looked through the screen door. They peered over their glasses and John put a cupped hand up to his ear, the one that could hear a birthing pig in distress from half a mile away. The men at the door smiled to each other and entered when John motioned them to come in.

“We made some tea for you,” Rose said, pouring a cup.

“Sorry, Mam. We aren’t allowed. We are here from the Universal Health Organization to administer the Vaccine. You violated the Meeting and Safe Distance Rule.”

“Oh, I know. Alright then.,” Rose said and put her arm on John’s. “We are ready for you, but I am afraid we need you to stick us here at our chairs. Come over here by this little rug and I will move the table.”

The two men rolled their eyes at each other.

“Yes , Mam. Right here?”

“Yes, right there, where that spot is,” Rose said pointing to a blood red spot in the middle of the rug. They both stood there for a moment as Rose and John rolled up their sleeves slowly.

Rose looked up.

“Forgive us.”

“Mam?”

“Forgive us. We didn’t know you.” John pulled a lever hidden under a wrap by his chair. The two men disappeared with the rug, screaming “Whoa hell!” as they plummeted. Sounds of squealing and screaming soon came from below as the hungry pigs ate into their flesh. John moved the lever back and the floor closed up. He fixed the rug which had been tacked onto one corner.

All was as it had been.

Rose called her grandson.

“Is it happening? Good. Best to disappear for now.”

John went out to the porch and rang the bell. It sounded somber but definite.

Soon men showed up and stood for a minute nodding at him, some shaking his hand.

“You did it,” one said, his hat in his hand.

“You are all a part of it. Rose and I wouldn’t have done it without you.”

They stood looking at the van. It had UHO on the side. It was very modern, windows darkened so nothing and no one could be seen inside. It was started by an identity switch so they had to push it with a crawler. It slid and almost toppled over before they could push it into the pit.

It fell into the pit straight down and then leaned on its right side. A man with a dozer pushed dirt in until it was covered over and the pit filled. Then they slid back the shed which had been there before.

“Like nothing happened, John.”

“Yup. But they aren’t fooled. They probably see what we are doing from overhead.” They stood around for a while and then were gone.

John went back to the house. Dinner was on the table.

“It is being played now,” Rose said. Billy did good. Putting it on the Net and all.

“Well, I guess we can expect more visitors pretty soon.” They held hands and prayed. Both knew the sacrifice was worth it but hoped for all the guidance they could get.

~

Around the table the men were tense, jaws clenching. The monitor was

where their rage was directed. Sounds of pigs and crunching and screams filled them with horror and revenge. Most of them had had only one part of the vaccination, so they still had emotions. It was part of the UHO plan. Some still had to get mad.

“Men, men, men. Relax,” said a man at the head of the table, on the opposite side from the monitor.

“This too shall pass. You should not feel this much sympathy or hostility. Our men made a mistake, that’s all. “He smiled benignly at his troops of executives.

“There are pockets of unvaccinated mostly in rural type communities who still harbor hope of…freedom, they think. Our job as you know is to protect them from unhealthy conditions. We learned from the Great Pandemic that no man deserves to adversely effect another and nothing that could lead to that false idea should be allowed to exist. The Great Vaccine handles the physical body and protects it and lovingly guides the individual to a more relaxed attitude towards living. Why strive to want to understand when the only understanding is - I Am Healthier Alone and We Are All In This Together.

What they give up in striving for more is a beautiful acceptance that their problems have been solved.

When people congregate as these people did, it results, as you see in horrible things. Their meetings, religious or social, none of it is allowed for just this reason. And whoever put this up for others to see will be punished and those two will of course be punished or corrected as an example for all to see.”

One of the tenser men spoke out, veins in his neck bulging.

“Sir, did you see how many people have seen this atrocity. Millions and growing every second.” He leaned forward, his face red.

The man at the head of the table laughed. “I did. And we will, we are, sending a team to handle it as we speak. But there will be no rebellion. Universal Health Organization is here to lead the world ahead into Peace, Health and Safety From Others. Calmly, deliberately. Soon those two will speak to the world about how they were wrong. Prayers are empty things. Freedom is only arrived at when you surrender everything. Even economic striving. They will realize this.”

The man stood up and chuckled on his way out at the monitor still playing. The others leaned back and waited for what was next. None of them spoke.

~

The children ran out of the small chapel, their faces excited, dogs following them. Parents looked at them and several mothers cried.

“They should be playing, not going to war,” one said. Her husband held her.

“It may be the most important game any child has ever played.”

“I know, but... “She held her daughter’s doll tightly.

The adults walked towards a pasture beyond where the huge chicken coops were. It was a good landing place. A good place to seem to surrender.

John heard it first. It sounded to him like a giant bee humming. It came up over the horizon and swung towards them. He could just make out the tiny pilot and co-pilot. It was impressive.

On board were twenty UHO trained tacticians and room for up to fifty prisoners. There were fifteen chairs for quick vaccinating. There were ten separate cages for those who may resist. It was the pride of UHO executives for quick strike operations in out of the way areas. Cooperation could be gotten quickly.

The pilot flew over the chapel and the many large coops and saw the assembled group standing in a pasture.

“This should be easy,” he said to the co-pilot. The co-pilot nodded and refrained from reminding his senior officer of the warning they gotten from the Boss.

“Don’t underestimate the Unvaccinated. They think they are, free to choose, free to improvise. Watch out.”

The co-pilot had seen some desperate unvaccinated but at that time their order was to extinguish. Easy peasy. Puff. His finger rested lightly on that control despite orders to not use it.

The pilot flew over the coops once again this time slowly. He looked over and saw that the coops appeared to have no roofs.

“Hey, did those…” he started to say to the co-pilot but objects hurtled towards them in a great volume. He saw many children and dogs running inside the coops. He couldn’t process what the objects were until the copilot shouted-

“Chickens! Friggin chickens everywhere! Thousands of friggin…”

Then they heard the sounds of the engines missing and computers trying to compensate and then the emergency alerts and voices.

“Sir, we are…”

“I know dammit! Ditch it on top of those damn kids.”

The co-pilot tried to use override to control the craft onto the coops and the children but it slanted away, right over the adults and then slammed into a hillside. The craft sat there for a minute and children and dogs ran up to the adults in the pasture. Everyone stood, mothers grabbing children, fathers standing with various weapons held out in the direction of the craft.

Then, with a flash, the craft imploded, and a flame shot up into the sky. There was only a large smudge on the hillside and something that had landed near them. It was a hatch which still had the UHO on it, pristine.

Sam Gilbert, the farms media man, ran towards the craft’s remains with his camera. He had filmed the whole Event, running with the kids, taking shots from the coops, getting hundreds, thousands of chickens soaring upwards towards the craft, propelled by the fear of dogs and yelling children and then pulled by the updraft and the vacuum from the engines. He felt bad about the loss to the farms but he had never liked chickens.

Sam had run the Event live and his tiny TV station had played it. Rose and John’s grandson had, once more, broadcast it live. Sam’s usual viewing numbered in the hundreds on a good show.

This one went to seventeen million in two hours.

But he didn’t know. He went home after interviewing John and some of the others and a few kids. He told his dog about what a hero their kind had been today and about another story he had been part of, of a jet being knocked out of the sky by a few geese. Then he took a bath and went to bed.

~

In the Annals of the Free Days the story of what happened at Rose and John’s farm varies author to author.

One section, written second hand, unattributed, was left at the back of the Annals. It was written by someone who was watching Sam’s broadcast three days after the Glorious Flight of theChickens. He or she was bedridden a few towns away. He was watching the Farms TV channel, MOO. He had felt the vibration of hundreds of vehicles go by in the middle of the night and had left MOO on, captivated by what was unfolding.

Sam had filmed several men disassembling the chapel and burying it. He then drove towards bright lights, stationary, all pointing at Rose and Johns farm. Sam had a Media sign on his truck which was a pyramid so it could be seen on three sides. He drove towards the lights and parked next to a barricade of farm vehicles of all types parked to stop the invasion.

At dawn hundreds of farmers and young males stood or revved their engines. Sam filmed them looking surprisingly cheerful with a few exceptions. The barricade was dwarfed by huge vehicles with six to ten foot UHO decals on them. As they finally started to pull forward the farmers advanced and the shouting and sounds of weapons firing roared.

And then there was deathly silence.

In the Annals the bedridden watcher couldn’t believe what he saw or didn’t see. The UHO vehicles advanced and there was almost nothing left in a matter of minutes. It was quiet except for the sound of tires rolling over farmland, fences, wire, anything. Soon the live feed went dead.

He got up to try to get the signal back, but it was gone.

He went to other channels which followed the events from the victor’s perspective. The news showed children and women being loaded into vehicles. Rose and John’s house was surrounded and destroyed. The Annals have many accounts of what happened to them. The bedridden’ s account seemed to indicate that Rose and John were upfront at the barricade. On foot and leading the way.

But there are many accounts from other authors of them being in many other places.

In the Annals the most fascinating part of the story is that, though they didn’t know it, UHO with all its power was doomed to fail.

The top executives, not vaccinated in the anti-emotion, Perfect Mental Heath combination watched the early butchering and overwhelming by UHO of the rural areas. One of them, in a meeting with the CEO, strangled him in front of the others who did not stop him.

Many of the executives were arrested by UHO police but some escaped and managed to contact Rose’s grandson. They then broadcast their agreement with the struggling rebellion of the millions of people everywhere who, even while vaccinated, were woken up to their true condition of slavery.

The Annals talks a lot about the Goodness and Trueness of Man and Woman. The little chapel that was buried was found and reassembled as a symbol of the biggest real rebellion. The rebellion of people to be together, when they want, about what they want. The Annal of Lyle, attributed to Rose’s grandson, makes the simple actions of what people do when left alone, holy. But many writers have tried to say that he was just writing what he lived and thought. Nothing more.

As for the Great Pandemic, it being the fourth to hit the world, turned out to be really the Pandemic of Hysteria, the name most teachers refer to it as. The early pandemics were real but governments being governments, became fascinated with absolute power and control. And experts joined with them whose main purpose was the same. The Mental Health Party, started after the second pandemic when society’s fabric was severely tested by a two-year complete lockdown, became the party in power and then morphed into the Universal Health Organization whose tentacles reached into and strangled every aspect of societies, particularly those where people had freedom to work, to mingle, to meet, to practice religion in any fashion. It was easy for them to take control. The button of disease, un-controllable and everywhere, like god, was easy to promote. So, they became the god Fear and then provided the cure, a vaccination against long gone diseases and a nearly debilitating mental drug which had been used for centuries to control people and cause them to be compliant.

And with the media almost all bought into it.

~

She heard the children cascade into the front hall, a pause as they as their had their snack in the kitchen and then a back-door slam as they spilled out into the back yard.

It is amazing how much noise those little bodies make, she thought to herself.

She sat up and touched her short grey hair. On the bed side were several pairs of glasses, a cup and two volumes. The Analysis of The Book of Lyle and a very tattered Annals of The Free Days, Bedridden. Passed down to her from her great grandfather.

She stood up and put on her slippers and went to the window. Outside was a perfect street, tree lined, houses similar but with little differences, porches on the opposite sides, windows on second stories facing different directions and of course, tress and gardens arranged differently, different colors.

Her daughter had told her she when she suggested she move in-” Mother, it is a perfect Artificial Twentieth Century”.

She had thought about the word “artificial” for some weeks but then decided to move in. She loved her grandchildren and her daughter worked a lot. And neither of them had husbands anymore.

She had also discovered a secret about the house.

She padded downstairs holding onto the railing, cup in the other hand. She could hear the children playing. She turned toward the kitchen and then a voice startled her.

“Good day.” She spun around and almost dropped the cup.

“I am so sorry. The door was open so I….”

“Oh. It’s okay.” Her heart started to pound. She smiled at the “person” and tried to calm herself. It was called a “Friendly” and was from Friendly Life. They were in all the magazines and TV shows but she had never met one. Artificial.

“Should I come back?” She was about to answer it when her daughter came in singing-

“I am early Mom! “She threw down a package and then walked up smiling to the Friendly.

“Hello!” she said and held out her hand.

“Good day, Mrs. Newburn,” the Friendly responded, charmingly. “I am…”

“I know! I have seen you on TV! Call me Molly, though, please.”

“I will do that. I have met your mother.” It smiled graciously but she was already moving to the kitchen.

“I will fix some tea,” she said, not looking back, her heart not calmed at all.

“Ok, Mom. Would you like to…”

“Oh, no. This is just a quick visit to….”

“Do the health screening and that cool stuff…” she said excitedly.

“Yes. That is correct. We found that this time of day is most convenient for families. “

“Do you want me to gather the children?”

“Yes, that would be prefect. And I hope they like Super Heroes.”

“Oh, yes. Particularly the ancient ones.”

“Ancient ones it will be,” he smiled.

“Do you need to get out some equipment?”

“No, we are now fully self-contained. Amazing, huh?”

“Oh, yes. I will go get them.” She hurried off to the backyard.

“Exciting isn’t it, Mom? So advanced.” She said as she went out to round up the kids.

She did not say anything. She made the tea and went out to the sitting room and sat.

The kids all ran to the living room and stood in front of the Friendly who bent down and smiled at them.

“Are you really real, Mister?” the youngest girl asked, half hiding behind her mother.

“Oh, yes. Here. Sit on my knee. You’ll see.”

She came forward and sat on its knee. He ran one hand in front of her and then above her head and then magically printed a decal of a Super Hero on her left shoulder.

“Wow! Look Mom!”

“I see, I see. Wonder Woman!”

And each child did the same except for the oldest girl who didn’t want to sit on its knee. She watched him do what he did and then asked-“Is this permanent?” rubbing her shoulder.

“Well, eventually not to your eyes but to our eyes, yes. It will keep track of all kinds of helpful information about…”

“Our health.”

“Yes, yes. That is right, young lady. Now two more and then I will leave you to enjoy the rest of your day. Molly?”

Molly stepped forward glowing and he was done. She rubbed her shoulder. Lois Lane! Perfect.

“Mom? Mom!”

“In here. In the sitting room.”

Molly and the Friendly walked into the sitting room. She had arranged a small table to face them and placed a wrap over her legs and one arm was covered. She sipped her tea. The Friendly paused.

“Our newest program includes the elderly.” She nodded, sipped again.

“Molly. Go get me some cream, would you? And make yourself some tea,” she said and looked at the Friendly. Her heart was now calm.

“Stand here would you," she said," on the red mark there on the rug? I have very creaky knees.”

The Friendly looked where she had indicated and smiled and she smiled as he moved to the spot.

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