The Second Coming

The end of the world didn't happen the way people were saying it would.

It may come as a surprise to you, but the end wasn't fiery. It wasn't hurricanes, tsunamis or tidal waves destroying whole countries. It wasn't a volcano erupting and burning cities to ash, vaporizing everyone within reach. The governments - which were always corrupt - aren't even trying to hide it anymore. People are more or less slaves to the system, like we always have been but it's been worse the last couple of years.

Religious nuts around the world rant and rave about the second coming of their Christ and the story usually goes the same way: bad people are sent to burn in hell and good people (Christians) get to go to heaven for eternity. When the end was happening (not that anyone noticed it) Christianity was a minority in the world of religion and spirituality. Much older religions had taken hold of being the new normal. Of course this caused a lot of problems, lots of hate crimes and violence in general surprisingly mostly coming from the Christian group.

I'm not one to judge, but it seemed like the large median of Christians preached a lot of bullshit. They referenced the bible but only parts that they wanted to pertain to their specific problems. Many of the Christian churches and organizations had finally put to rest a lot of the issues that once were the deciding factor of who was good and who was bad. Gay marriage - which was never referenced in the bible in the first place - became accepted as a human way of life and it was finally clarified that it was actually pedophilia that the bible mentioned. (Sorry pedophiles, this story still doesn't hold you in a good light, and you never will be.)

Tattoos, alcohol, weed, sex before marriage and a plethora of other dumb rules that used to exist got thrown out the window. In essence, Christianity made the move to become more accepting in an attempt to keep the religion relevant. As the world was ending they lost many followers who, as we started to say, became enlightened. Nothing quite took its place, but there were definitely more popular options. Druidism, Satanism and atheism became the most practiced which left little need for churches and other religious meeting places. Lots of people petitioned for those buildings to be taken down and before those petitions could become anything, angry people burned them down or vandalized them. This hostility didn't last for a very long time as churches strangely started getting demolished during the night.

Conspiracy theorists believed that aliens were behind the destruction of some of the largest and most well-known Christian churches. Grainy videos of lights in the sky above the buildings quickly popped up all over the internet and spread like wild fire. For a while, at least in the United States, that was the biggest problem on the news which I found funny because of all the war and ruin happening between our country and many others. Of all of the topics to cover, they pick destroyed churches?

When the end of the world came, no one was expecting it. Things were actually starting to turn around for the better which made it even worse. The wars had pretty much come to a stop, the global warming was being healed thanks to some really smart scientists, crime was still relevant but not as bad as before. It was really confusing when the end happened...

Everything became dark in the middle of the day, much like you would see during a bad thunderstorm except there was no rain. The wind was so dry it seemed to suck the humidity right up like a sponge. Booming thunder shook the ground, but there was no lightning. Everything got really quiet: no cars, no music, no talking, just a ringing silence that made everyone really uneasy. After that, all of the technology died. Inexplicably. For me, that was when the panic started. I couldn't get a hold of anyone. It was like family and friends had fallen off the face of the earth and, with my luck, I was completely alone.

I decided it might be smart to try and find some other people and ask them what they knew, so I went to my car to drive around town. The car was dead. All the cars were dead. As I walked up and down abandoned streets filled with dead cars, I really started to get worried. There was no sign of life to be found. Hours had passed and it should've been dark but the sky looked exactly as it did when the clouds rolled in, like a thunderstorm in the middle of the day. I made the decision to keep walking, just to see if I could find something or someone.

I swear I walked for days.

It was strange; I didn't get hungry or thirsty, I wasn't tired or in pain. I felt confused but I wasn't panicked anymore. I barely felt that I existed. I just kept wandering.

After weeks of walking I had left any civilization. I wasn't sure exactly where I was, but I saw a big hill with a solitary maple tree on it. I climbed it and as I got to the top, saw another figure already there, dark and stagnant. At first I was excited to finally find someone else! The last few weeks had been lonely. As I got closer I exclaimed and reached my hand out to give a hand shake or touch their shoulder but then they turned around.

This was not a human.

I hadn't seen anything like this before. The humanoid shape dissipated and left a strange-looking creature with large black eyes indicative of the void. It had a halo of light above what I guessed was the head, three long legs with black greasy fur and cloven hooves, four wings protruded from its back that were larger than me by five times.

As it spoke to me I felt my heart drop into my stomach.

This is the end.

I felt confused but couldn't quite bring myself to speak back. Realizing the reply came in my head, I just looked at it and let my thoughts run rampant.

Many of you have failed to do the work you were sent here for. There were many chances to fix the course of your history.

Am I going to hell? You must be the Satan everyone has spoken of... But I haven't done anything wrong!

I am not Satan. There is no being by such a name.

What about heaven? What about hell? What about Jesus, everyone said he would come here to fix things?

Heaven and hell are human constructs. They simply aren't real. And as for Jesus, well, he won't be coming.

What about God?

As I asked this final question, all of the light began to quickly fade from existence. All I could feel was helplessness and fear as my own body dissolved at the foot of this creature, my last vision being of it's empty eyes looking down upon me and the light from its halo blinding me while darkness consumed me.

I am God.