The end began with a monster at an airport.
From my hiding place I overheard many expected noises. Uniformed men blowing whistles at lovers kissing long goodbyes. Passengers changing money for overpriced drinks from underpaid workers. Incredulous guards demanding answers for full-sized toothpaste tubes as if they had been filled with napalm.
And then I heard something unusual. A security announcement roaring through the terminal. A high-pitched warning asking everyone to be on the lookout for anything suspicious. I knew from experience that a flashing message on eye-level screens accompanied the notification. A calculated misdirection. A distraction.
These sounds disguised the ratcheting groans of an ancient elevator. Two voices–a girl and a man–arguing, echoed up from the underground. I knew the owners of those voices. At times I would come to think of them as friends; and at times enemies. By the end, neither term applied.
But then a child, perhaps six years old, heard the voices, too. He had to have been perfectly positioned at baggage claim number 23, perhaps staring through the rubber slats, watching for a piece of luggage that contained a favorite toy.
“Where does that go?” the boy’s voice echoed.
“Nowhere,” a female voice replied, presumably his mother. “It’s a circle. A loop.”
“For sure?”
“Of course!” said the woman. “Where else could it possibly go?”
“Could it go down? Like, way, way down? I hear people. And it sounds like they're underground!”
“Honestly, I have no idea. But it’s no concern of ours. Look, there’s your suitcase on the other end of the belt. Come on!”
The security alert ended, but the noise continued. It was nearly more than I could take. I had prepared to endure a loss of tranquility by hiding here, but listening to the discordant babble grated on my spirit. This wasted generation. These sniveling people driven to the brink of insanity by ignorance and greed. Coveting what they thought they owned. What could never be owned. “Things” more dangerous than they ever imagined.
But they persisted. Never thinking. Never guessing how easily they could be erased from the memory of the earth. All it would take is one spark to ignite a reckoning.
I saw the reckoning on the horizon. I went into hiding because of it. I became a ghost, a whisper. Content to live in solitude. But then I was discovered. And I knew they would not relent to leave me in peace.
They created the spark.
I became the reckoning.
It began with a monster at an airport.
The end began with me.