The launch was confirmed. The missiles had already reached the very edge of the atmosphere and were positioning themselves to fall on targets across the entire continent. The meticulously designed and carefully tested contingency plans for nuclear attack went into effect. The bombers disperse, the silos opened, and the warning the end of the world was 13 minutes away went out. There was a break somewhere in the domino chain of orders and automated response mechanisms, and suddenly 42-year old Robert Blake found himself tasked with informing North West Indiana, Chicago, and Milwaukee they were about to be vaporized. Despite his career in civil defense, Robert was an upbeat guy and couldn’t stand being the burden of such a catastrophic message that was bound to cause people horrific panic and anxiety. He was also having plenty of trouble coming to terms with this abrupt end of life news. There was no time to become acclimated to this news of imminent mortality through the grief proce
This is a collection of anecdotes from the fringes of reality, a tapestry stitched together from our dreams as well as our nightmares, from the fears that haunt the collective imagination. These are the symptoms of the sickness known as the human condition.