But it didn't matter -- because, suddenly, we woke up and it had all just been a dream. But when we sat up in bed and looked past our feet, there were the unexploded dummy RPGs on the floor.

So maybe it hadn't ALL been just a dream, but, even so, we'd still never know which parts of it WERE just dreams and which WEREN'T, so why have even fucking bothered either having had them, in the first place, or trying to figure them all out, in the second place?

Clearly, despite everything pointing to exactly the opposite, we were at a turning point.

So we could opt for World Revolution.

Or we could opt for one or more of the many perfect masters who were all clamoring to come on our radio show -- and we didn't even HAVE a radio show.

Or we could opt for the endless watching of and the eventual joining in with the cruelty that victims unloaded on each other by the shit- or boatload.

Or we could opt for Xtreme Sainthood, which notes pinned to the dummy RPGs shot through the windows told us we were now eligible for, thanks to both all we'd been through and the gracious manner in which we'd handled it all, especially the parts with blood, torn body parts, or human cultural choices.

We took a vote.

Will there even be a momentary stop off at the 15th century, on our hurried way back to the 10th?" someone asked.

Will this sainthood really just be a new kind of Mcdonalds -- for the soul? someone else asked.

The trick was, if we wanted to be canonized, a chopper would appear overhead and snatch us off our roof on a rope ladder. We had 5 minutes to decide.

What the fuck. We didn't bother deciding, just went up on the roof. The chopper was late and lifted off too soon so the last person, me, had to leap for the last rung of the ladder with everyone else still scrambling up it.

But I only caught it with a finger and dropped off into a lake after just a few minutes of stupid hanging on.

The lake was surrounded by woods on all sides and I spent the night on a small island at the center of it, with small water rodents that no human had ever seen before slapping around all the time like they fucking owned the place.

In the morning I could hear the sound of chain saws as the Army and National Guard were cutting down the trees to get to me. Apparently one of the many video cameras that were always running somewhere and pointing in all directions so in the end most of the planet was covered, had caught my descent from the chopper rope ladder and now it was just a matter of time.

I dove into the lake and fortunately found an underground cave where I could suck enough oxygen out of the fish to stay alive until I got to the other end which was still underground but no longer under water.

I started clawing up and as I poked through the surface into daylight there was a truck sound and my hands caught onto an axle and I was dragged out of the hole and kept my legs bent so they could grab hold on the bottom of the pick up truck and keep me flat against the drive shaft as we headed up what was clearly a long narrow winding mountain road doing abt 65 so I couldn't drop off.

I was facing up so most of the flying dirt and pebbles weren't hitting me directly in the eyes nose mouth etc. but they were still bouncing off the underside of the cab, so I was still getting hit in sensitive destructive places, but in much smaller numbers than maybe I deserved.

"Deserved," I thought. "What does that even mean?"

Eventually we were heading back down and then the inevitable transition to paved road and the first stop light after days at freeway speeds.

I dropped off and scampered away. Things looked familiar and I realized I was back in my home town, even though when I'd started all this a month ago, I was on another continent.

Actually I'd been born here but we moved away when I was 8.

So no one recognized me, and things had changed enough in the intervening years that I barely recognized the town.

But I had to act fast cause the police were already onto me. When they came up and asked what I was doing I said I was here doing a survey.

They agreed to be my first subjects.

My survey question was, like: OK, so like, you know, there've been all these films and books and songs and shit about the end of the world. You know, the end of the world this, and the end of the world that. Blah blah blah. You can't turn around growing up without hearing about the end of the world.

So, I mean, after hearing all this advertising for the end of the world, will you be disappointed if you die without ever seeing the end of the world.

The cops had to think about this. And as I went around town asking everybody the same question -- because what had started out as a cover-up had become a life's mission -- they all had to stop and think too.

And then, at a rate of 95 to 1, they virtually all finished thinking and looked up and said, Yeah, you know, I kinda WOULD be VERY disappointed if I didn't see the actual end of the world in my lifetime. I definitely WOULD feel cheated out of something I'd been promised.

So, it turns out, if you ask the question the right way, everybody, EVERYBODY, wants this fucking old shitbag world to end. And the sooner the better -- cause we damn well wouldn't wanna all die tomorrow and then have the world end the day after tomorrow.

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