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Journals: Book 1, Entry 17 “Second Wave” Quatrain 34, Century 2. "A vision of destruction appears near the throne / And the struggle to reign supreme begins / An approaching storm unchecked / To test the mettle of all men" The Paranoid Times Web site is set up to warn people of imminent danger we face from the alien race that has infiltrated this planet. People are starting to take notice. One e-mail came from a Sheldon Lamott, who said he had pictures of a UFO floating above Columbia, Maryland, just 20 miles outside Washington, DC. I was skeptical the photos were legit – in my experience, spaceships weren’t the Gua’s style. But this seemed to relate to a quatrain Eddie found, so I checked it out. Met Sheldon and his wife Pauline at their suburban home. I figured out what the tension was between Sheldon and his wife when Sheldon showed me his UFO pix in the basement darkroom. There were other photos – not of UFOs, but of Pauline’s tryst with their neighbor, Boyd Hackett. This wasn’t about the Gua, it was about a cheated husband getting some attention. I’d walked into an episode of Melrose Place… I left with worthless photos of some out-of-focus lights. Then to add insult to injury, the car wouldn’t start. Another neighbor, Dale Moody, offered to help. But Sheldon interrupted – he said to come in the house quickly, something was happening on the TV… A newscaster announced that a large force of alien ships had attacked Washington DC. They were moving out towards the suburbs, towards where we were. The electricity went out. Maybe Sheldon wasn’t making his UFO story up. Maybe the Second Wave was here. A few neighbors gathered on the front lawn to decide what to do. I told them about the Gua and how I had been tracking aliens for some time. Now the invasion was upon us. The only thing we could do was to fight back. The rest of the group wasn’t convinced until an orange ball of flame shooting across the sky moved everyone quickly inside, into Sheldon’s reinforced basement – to hide, to make a last stand, to hope… From the outset, arguments among the neighbors, old grudges, and the affair that Pauline and Boyd were having made a bad situation even worse. Orange flashes and the sounds of distant bombing reminded us of how close the aliens were getting, but that didn’t make anyone get along better. Accusations flew back and forth, naming each other as alien imposters. The arguing almost turned physical, when we were interrupted by a knock at the basement door. There was someone outside… We hauled John Tran into the basement and gave him some water. Exhausted and bloody, Tran had run from the aliens’ attack in DC. He told us about the ships flying down the highway melting cars and burning people where they stood. Moody was suspicious of Tran, but this had more to do with his own prejudices than anything else. The situation was tense. Boyd and Sheldon’s arguing rose to such a pitch that Pauline ran out of the basement. I followed her outside to talk her back in. It was pretty easy to convince her – out of nowhere, a giant alien ship appeared above us. We got inside, though the rest of the group hadn’t wanted to let us in. There was no unity here, and the aliens were upon us. What kind of stand where we going to be able to make? Was this really the Second Wave? Or was it an experiment by the aliens to see how united we’d really stand. I hate to admit it, but in both cases the outlook wasn’t good… “Second Wave” Writer: Chris Brancato & David Wilcox Director: Gilbert Shilton Executive Producers: Francis Ford Coppola, Larry Sugar Created by: Chris Brancato Guest Stars: Kathryn Anderson, Gerard Plunkett, Gary Chalk, Peter Bryant, Brenda Crichlow, Hiro Kanagawa. |
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