It Was 2020
Explaining Theoth - E.R.S.

“Come. Follow me. I would like to explain a few things to you. You are different and an explanation may be helpful.”

Kay reluctantly leaves her friend, and those standing in line, to follow the leader. How appropriate.

He takes her to the basement cafeteria and stands on the brass medallion that is embedded in the granite flooring. He motions for Kay to stand on the medallion alongside him. She is wary, and untrustful, but if she wants answers she must do as she is told.

Once they are both situated on the bronze medallion, they start rotating counterclockwise and descending into, what looks to be, a sub-basement. The room is extremely dark and looks like it goes on forever. Without windows or doors, it could very well cover the same 400,000 square feet as the Capitol Building itself. The main thing Kay notices are a series of long shelves along the wall. On these shelves are individual pots with a plant that resembles Maranta leuconeura, the prayer plant, growing in them. The differences in color are anything but subtle. Whereas the prayer plant has green leaves, this plant has luminescent blue leaves. The prayer plant has red veins, but this plant has light blue colored veins. The only thing they have in common is they can both thrive in dark areas, like this sub-basement.

“I shall give you a brief run-down of what is going on here. We are not a ‘greedy organization’ as you so eloquently stated. We are…different. We answer to a higher power. A higher power that has decided your planet has been brought to the brink of destruction and wants to eradicate the invasive species that is ‘human’.”

Kay stares at him incredulously. “What kind of higher power? Where is it from? Where are you from? This is ridiculous. Yeah, humans have screwed up a lot, but we also try to make things better. Has your higher power thought about that?”

The leader looks at her with disgust. Anger broiling beneath the surface of his cool exterior.

“You dare to question the higher power? You humans have more deities than any other species in the cosmos and you have the audacity to question one greater than your kind?”

He stops, seeing the look of fear on Kay’s face, takes a deep breath, and continues calmly.

“The higher power I speak of created everything. It is not your God, Buddha, Satan, or anything so paltry as that. The higher power evolves and intervenes when planets are near destruction. We were sent here to cull the human race. The culling will be successful. Some may be spared, but we can not guarantee who, or how many. If you have great fortitude and a strong constitution, you may well survive. That is all I can say.”

Kay is beyond flabbergasted. She has so many questions, but doesn’t really want any answers. What she wants is to have never seen these ‘beings’ in suits. To have never seen the leaves and what they can do. She decides to ask one burning question. “Are you responsible for Covid-19?

“I am not responsible for anything except following the orders of the higher power. We came here with one goal. Cull the human race. If this Covid-19 is a happy biproduct of the abbattimento di potenza superiore, then so be it.”

He pauses and, ever so slightly, tilts his head to one side. He seems to be listening to something that only he can hear. “I am needed above ground. I must attend to my duties. We are done here. I do know where to replace you if I should feel the need.”

He turns, walks towards the medallion in the floor, looks up, and jumps through the hole in the floor! All of a sudden Kay is glad she is in the dark and alone. Haunted houses and ghosts are nothing compared to whatever these beings, and their higher power, are. She collapses to the ground in a heap and starts crying.

After what seems like hours to Kay, her tears stop. She dries her eyes and picks herself up off the ground. She’s never been so emotional in her life and now is not the time to let herself fall apart. Kay ascends the same way she came down. As she leaves the Capitol building she replaces there are no people at all outside. At least an hour has passed. The suits are gone, as well as everyone that was standing in line, and there are no leaves to be found.

Perhaps the culling is over? Maybe the higher power changed its mind? Kay doesn’t know. What she does know is that she is going to do some serious investigating into the probability of intelligent life existing in the cosmos.

First things first, have dinner and call Alan. Before he decided to pursue a BA in English Language and Linguistics at the University of Wisconsin, he went to the University of Kansas to study extraterrestrial life as an undergraduate. Kay knew that Alan had an affinity for the unusual and studying extraterrestrial life from an astronaut definitely qualified as unusual.