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Journals: Book 3, Entry 06 “GULAG” Quatrain 83, Century 7. "The traitor sits in a hidden world, waiting for the man Twice Bless'd. Joined in desperate moments, to push the rock over the peak of time."  I believed the traitor Nostradamus spoke of in this quatrain was Joshua, an alien who has helped my cause on numerous occasions. The Gua build hidden worlds known as "quantum pockets" - Eddie's learned to penetrate them. Recently, I busted into a pocket, believed Joshua was to be found there ... and if he was alive, I had to get him out. Everything in this particular false reality suggested the aliens had been defeated, my wildest dream come to life. But I knew it wasn't real. Out in my world the alien leader named Mabus seeks to enslave humanity. The key to his defeat could be Joshua. Found my sometimes ally in a desperate situation. Joshua believed the aliens had launched a neutrino bomb toward earth - a final desperate move to cover their humiliation at having been defeated by humanity. Joshua had the code to abort the mission and wanted to get to the deactivation site. I had to convince him to come with me instead. But how do you tell a desperate man that his mission isn't real? That it's all an engineered delusion? Knew first hand why Joshua wouldn't listen, guess I was along for the ride. Joshua had a gun on me at first sight. Told him we were in a QP and I was there to get him out. Eddie'd found an exit point and Joshua and I had to be there in exactly 24 minutes or we'd miss it. Joshua believed he had less than 19 minutes to save the earth and whatever Gua remained there from total annihilation. Joshua didn't trust humans.  He took off, but human authorities quickly picked him up. Pulled a gun on the "cop"- told him Joshua and I had to be going. The cop knew I wasn't Gua, figured I was worse than alien - because in this world it looked like I was helping the Gua scum escape. There was no second chance out of there. The cop pulled a gun ... so I shot him. I killed a human cop‹even in virtual reality it felt wrong Tried to convince Joshua that Mabus was on his way in the real world, that we needed to get out of the pocket and back to the real fight. Joshua didn't buy it, asked me how I didn't know I was the one in the delusional pocket? He reminded me that in a false world I'd believe in a fighting chance and I wouldn't give up either. Again, he had a point. Helped him hot-wire a car and made a deal. I'd help Joshua stop the bomb and then he helps me by getting the hell out of there. He agreed. High speed chase got us away from the authorities and into an abandoned barn. Joshua said it was a regional command post for the western sector before the war. He wanted to find the launch command console for a wormhole and close it before the Gua bomb made it into Earth's air space. The console was in a white room - we had forty seconds. Ran into a Gua following old orders to protect his post. Joshua and I were shot. The bomb was headed this way. It was over. Earth was destroyed. Or was it? That's when things got really confusing. Everything seemed to start over. But this time I was having vague premonitions of what was about to happen. Felt like I was living the moment ... but not. It was eerie, couldn't explain it, something just wasn't right.  At the command center we noticed a flickering monitor outside the white room. In the image, Joshua and I were dead. A Gua entered, we tried to reason with him and this time Joshua was ready for the Gua who shot him before. But we couldn't seem to stop the launch ... again? And then we were back for more. This time I knew Joshua needed my help right away. Something told me I had to stop the launch or we were never getting out of there. I remembered the quatrain, "joined in desperate moments to push the rock over the peak of time." It was based on the myth of Sisyphus, we were stuck in a loop, trying to accomplish the same objective over and over - repeating time. And Joshua was feeling it too, starting to remember things. He told me he suspected the Gua put him in the pocket intentionally - some warped alien version of a gulag. He suspected it happened during his trial - when he was tortured for helping me and branded a traitor to his own kind. The Empiricists had erased his memory and doomed Joshua to live out his failure for the rest of his days. Again we weren't sure how to get out, but knew we had to stop that launch. And that's when there was a new wrinkle. Something we were sure hadn't happened before. Cain was in the quantum pocket. Wanted to take me in for dissection. Too bad I wasn't up for it. Joshua and I were getting out. And there was no way Cain was gonna stop that. “Gulag” Writer: David Wilcox Director: Holly Dale Executive Producers: Francis Ford Coppola, Larry Sugar Created by: Chris Brancato |
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