Rant-casm : World War III 1/2

Half way into the dream state, I’m awakened by the echoing of a voice inside an empty space where my mind once lived.

The universe:  The next world war will be won by bio-weapons and cancel culture.  Everyone will be too sick to fight, and no one will be able to communicate a truce since it will be against the law to speak to another person for fear of disrespecting him/her/it/her-him/ho-hum…

Me:   It’s 4 in the morning.  Why can’t you throw this anxiety attack into my brain two minutes before I die?

The universe: (sighs)  What would you like to know?

Me:  “How do you build a space ship?”

The universe:  (Throws an equation the size of Texas onto my eyelids).

Me:  “I’m not a rocket scientist, and…isn’t that what I click on to sum a row of numbers in Excel?”

The Universe (laughing):  “Ask and you shall receive.  You didn’t ask to understand the answer.”

Me:   “Can’t you just give me the Cliff notes?”

The Σ became bigger.  

Me:  I don’t read shorthand.

The Universe:    Aldke Aldke gwleidhenbg.

Me:  What language is that?

The Universe:    The one spaceship builders speak.

Me:  Can you tell me, in English, how to build a space ship?

The Universe:    Very, very carefully.

Me:  Why do I live in a universe that likes to play with the humans?  You’re just the type to throw an equation at me, and put the answer into poetry for a mathematician.

The Universe:  Yes.

Me:  Should we call the next world war “3 and a half?”

The Universe:  All of you are dead, not matter what you call it.  You’ve been around 100,000 years.  How long did it take you to go from caves to rockets this time?

Me:  5000 years?

The Universe:  Close. Divide that into 100,000.

Me:  Okay….100 divided by 5 equals…20 times?

The Universe:  Not quite, but I need a species that isn’t going to shoot itself in the foot and blame the gun.

Me:   Let me know when you find a species that doesn’t have to kill something to live.

The Universe:   Anything else I can do for you?  Move Earth a bit closer to the sun, perhaps?

Me:  Send 1000 space ships to Earth.  Announce that if we don’t find a way to get along we’ll all be destroyed.

The Universe:  Ah…you want a 21st chance to avoid annihilation?

Me:   I thought that was obvious.

The Universe:  The way to do that is in the books I gave you to write. 

Me:  Destroy humanity and create something worse?

The Universe:   It wasn’t worse in the end.

Me (grumbling):  Not for you.

And so, I returned to sleep, only to dream of cleaning a house haunted by a hoarder that kept bringing it all inside again.