The
sky was thick with ash as I made my way through the ruined streets of the
city. I could hear the sound of gunfire
in the distance, the intermittent popping always startling. Just a few months ago, I was nobody, just
some guy living on his own, worrying about bills and getting wasted with my
friends. Now I was a survivor, a filthy,
haggard excuse for a human being. My
clothes torn, my shoes unstuck, and my body perpetually covered in sweat. I lived life on the run, fearful of violent
looters and rape gangs. Life had changed
so much since the bombs fell, though I dare not call it life. Every day was a struggle for survival, hiding
during daylight, only moving under cover of darkness. Food was scarce, and I had long since
swallowed my pride, rummaging through trash for the smallest morsel of
sustenance to keep me alive for one more day.
The
once busy streets were empty, save for the burning cars, smashed in shop windows
and the occasional dead body. Many of
the city’s residents had fled months ago.
Those who had remained were either brutally beaten to death or had died
of starvation. Hungry and alone, I
searched the city at night, hoping to find my friends, unwilling to accept the
truth I most feared.
Everyone
was dead. Everyone I had ever
known. My parents, my co-workers, even
the old man and his son who ran the milk bar down the street. They’d be dead as well. Soon it would be my turn, and I was determined
to spend my last few remaining days alive doing something productive. The cough I had developed was steadily
getting worse, no doubt caused by the amount of ash I had inhaled. It was everywhere, on my clothes and in my
hair. It rained down upon the ruined
city like grey snow, blanketing the streets and buildings like a horrid death
shroud.
Sleep
never came easily, my mind beset by nightmares of the day everything
ended. In my darkest moments, I would
close my eyes and think of the life I had before. My job, my apartment, Owen and Mitch. As tears rolled down my cheeks, I hoped that
my family had gotten to safety, though I knew even that was unlikely. Like a half remembered dream of heaven, the
faces of my loved ones danced before me like images on a screen. If only I hadn’t taken my life for
granted. If only people had listened to
me. If only people had woken up – this
could have all been avoided. But now I
lived in hell, always afraid and welcoming the cold embrace of death.
These
truly were the last days, and this was the end of the world.
Imagine
living out this scenario, day after day, played like a movie on a screen again
and again. As improbable as it sounds,
this was the world Mitch and I inhabited.
Together, we had become conspiracy theorists – individuals often mocked
by society, regarded as crazy – and with good reason. Our obsession had steadily grown from a
passing interest into an all-consuming passion which poisoned our waking
thoughts and populated our nightmares.
Our every conversation, rife with indignant commentary on civil liberty,
genocide and the hideous state of world politics.
It
had all started months ago with a short film called Zeitgeist. The title literally translating as ‘the
spirit of the times’, this online film reached millions worldwide with its
heretical tales of false religion and secret societies bent upon nothing less
than world domination. Mitch and I had
watched the film with great interest, its content stoking an intense and deep
seeded fear in us both. We began to
question the laws and systems of society, searching for a way to imbue meaning
to our empty lives.
Needless
to say, marijuana played no small part in this, Mitch and I often watching
conspiracy related material while high.
Fairly soon, both of us branched out into our own respective fields of
research, Mitch intent upon exposing a fraudulent monetary system, and me,
enthralled by alien entities who controlled world governments in secret.
It
wasn’t long before our interest in this rarefied subject matter began to take
its toll on our lives in the real world.
Owen seemed vaguely interested, but never subscribed to any of our
fearful theories, patiently tolerating Mitch’s angry rants on the subject,
while I quietly printed out pages of information on the so called illuminati
and pinned them to the notice boards at work.
Many
of these conspiracies resonated with my deepest fears, a loss of my loved ones,
a loss of control and a painful and protracted death. None more so than the teachings of British
writer David Icke who vehemently insisted that a race of 6 foot shape changing
reptilians had infiltrated the highest levels of government. I read volumes of unsourced material on the
internet, fearfully digesting far-fetched accounts of individuals who had
encountered such beings and fought them tooth and claw. According to established lore, these
reptilian beings consumed human blood and existed outside of our visible
spectrum. Literally feeding off fear and
terror, these invisible enemies hated humanity, viewing us as nothing more than
a plentiful food source.
Our
crazy beliefs were also likely the result of perfect timing. Smoking weed was slowly becoming less
enjoyable, and Mitch and I did it more out of a sense of routine more than
anything else. Our weekly sessions had
begun to poison our brains and foster feelings of paranoia.
Both
of us were staring into an emotional abyss, and we used weed to cushion the
blow. Mitch, still living with his uncle
in Glenroy faced an existential crisis.
While I had a job that took up the lion’s share of my time, Mitch did
not and spent his weekdays playing video games and getting stoned by himself. With no direction and no girlfriend, Mitch
had begun to question his own existence, filling his days with needless
busywork in an attempt to stave off cabin fever. It was at this time that Mitch adopted a
persona that I like to call “The Wanderer”.
Dressed
in a weather beaten jacket and carrying a backpack full of emergency supplies, Mitch
grew a wiry beard and allowed his hair to become long and unruly. With his backpack, he would go on long
walking tours of the surrounding suburbs, looking like an extra from a
post-apocalyptic film. As I pulled into
my driveway one evening, I saw Mitch standing by my mailbox, the wind in his
hair and a thousand yard stare in his eyes.
I rolled down the car window to enquire as to what he had been doing.
“I
walked here” he replied.
Operating
under the outdated mode of masculinity my father had provided, I had tried to
suppress the pain of losing Callum, but the results were devastating. He was after all, the catalyst for getting my
own apartment. Without him, my attempt
at independence seemed hollow. I
struggled to find any fulfilment at work, and in spite of the support of Owen
and Mitch, I found myself despondent, often without any real reason. I remember telling myself that I was simply
grieving, that it was normal to feel this way, but no matter what I tried,
hopelessness was never far away.
The
unavoidable conclusion to most conspiracies is the end of the world. Even during my lifetime, many prophets have
foretold of a coming apocalypse only to be proven wrong. I have often wondered why so many people
subscribe to these beliefs, and it appeared I had my answer. Fear and loneliness found effective metaphor
in conspiracies of reptilian humanoids.
No one could save me from the end of the world, just as no one could help
me with the responsibility of living alone – a responsibility that even though
I had managed to shoulder effectively, still scared me intensely. To make matters worse, I now felt the weight
of expectations even more keenly than before.
I was cast adrift in my early twenties, trying to find happiness and
establish my identity. What kind of man
did I want to be? What values would I
stand for? Who would I be when the world
ended?
Psychologically,
people who subscribe to conspiracy theories feel as though their lives are out
of control. There also had to be no
small amount of ego involved – after all – Mitch and I were custodians of
secret knowledge.
If
these rumours of the end of the world were factual, then why wasn’t everyone
else as afraid as I was? It was a
paradox which kept me awake for many a night, but not the only one. I couldn’t deny that I had seriously begun to
research this subject matter around the same time that I had begun to smoke
weed regularly. Did my drug use enable
me to make connections that I was previously unable to, or did my altered state
simply make connections that weren’t there at all. There was correlation, but was there
causation? Years later, I still don’t
have an answer to this quandary.
It
was during this time that Mitch and I became quite co-dependent, each one of us
counting down the hours until we could see each other again, exchange manly
hugs and excitedly trade any pieces of alternative news that we had
absorbed. Our belief in conspiracies
became a shared faith, each one bolstering the other in his beliefs. In truth, there were times when I wondered if
Mitch was in fact a real person. I would
sometimes watch him while he slept, wondering if he was a bizarre hallucination
of the result of my drug fucked mind conjuring up the perfect companion to keep
me sane.
I
settled into a grim routine. Work, weed,
Mitch and alien life forms. I tried
desperately to silence the tiny voice in my head that told me that something
was wrong, that life didn’t have to be this way. I put on a masterful performance for my family
and colleagues; they never suspected my double life of drug addled alternative
inquiry, but I knew instinctively, spiritually, that I was broken and would
need fixing. I wouldn’t be able to
ignore it forever. Where would this
end? When would I feel happy again?
Though
my fantasy life was rich and fulfilling, the real world would often rudely intrude
– this time – more bad news. Unable to
afford city living any longer, Owen was moving to Ballarat to live with his
parents.
Our
group was breaking up, maybe forever, but I was far too stoned to care.
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