Abduction

I look around; no one’s there. I’m alone. My vision narrows; breathing slows; exterior limbs are frozen; everything’s in slow motion; my legs no longer hold me…. I’m falling….

Conscious, I find myself looking upon the world from the stars and basking in the beauty of the earth. Also, in my awareness is the devastation, poverty, and hatred that abounds. Contemplating, is humankind salvageable? “Wait a minute! What?! Where am I? Where is that voice coming from? There’s no one around…” The sudden realization: I am circling the earth and speaking with beings I can’t see. Aliens who whisper, “Whisperers!” Do they want dominance of the world, or are they here to save the world? What’s their agenda? Before landing in space, I was admiring the sounds of nature while on my daily walk. Suddenly I’m here in space, earth far below. The why eludes me. There’s a curiosity about how they managed to transport me from earth intertwined with a fear of why I’m here. Having no answers, I return to the viewing earth from within the confines of the spacecraft. My thoughts wander as I reflect on the pain we place on one another. Is there a way to tap into the humanity that resides within regardless of race, beliefs, status, religion, or lack thereof? Even if humankind is salvageable, is the effort worth it or should we just start anew? In my internal musings, I review my family and my role within it. I have lived a life of chaos and chronic stress. My experiences are a mix of my own choices and the result of the lives my parents lived, and their parents' lives before them. I embed the ancestral epigenetics not experienced by me through my physiology; it colors my view of the world, influenced by the biological genes of my heritage. This family is one of resilience, determination, perseverance, kindness, and acts of love intermingled with anger, fear, violence, and control experienced as physical, mental, and sexual anguish. Loyalty abounds to those who have been hurtful through their misguided beliefs, beliefs around sexuality, religion, and the politics of the times. Each has the potential to splinter my relationship with those I love. Though I identify with my own truths, I ask of myself “who am I to say my world view is right, and their world view is wrong?” I realize an inability on my part to listen to the various views of others and turn a deaf ear recognizing I can be as rigid in my stance as they are in theirs. I acknowledge if one of us doesn’t show a willingness to listen, there will be no negotiation or finding common ground from which to build. When I do as they do, judge as they judge, how am I any better than they? By engaging in turning a deaf ear and clinging to my beliefs and way of life, I invite the same abrasiveness and disdain. Lost is the opportunity to transcend beyond our differences, to heal the wounds of our ancestors and our wounds. Instead, we become more polarized and resistant to those whose beliefs are different. The whisperers are listening to my internal musings. I sense pressure in my skull, dull yet palpable.

The thoughts run together and consume me though I try to control my mind so they cannot listen in. A slight wind caresses my back indicating my father’s presence. I turn and look; no one’s there. My father is dead, yet his presence permeates the space I am in. He was charismatic, whether navigating life through his positive energy or that negative energy we called psychosis. In his wisdom, he’d find the thread between two opposing forces in such a manner that no matter what, people listened to father’s words. He taught me how to hold true to my own beliefs while remaining open to what was being relayed by the opposing side. One of the last times I spoke to my father my complaint was one of frustration with how people get stuck in their ways. “Carol, consider all options on the table before choosing your course. Listen, learn, and review your own beliefs and biases for cracks. Listen with both your heart and mind. Is your chosen path founded on emotions or on facts? Is there a collaborated balance in your decision between heart and mind? Consider other’s views as well. Then choose the best course based on the core values that drive you from within so you can leave your own imprint upon this world.”

I turn away from the view below me and take in the surroundings of this foreign spaceship full of whispering beings I can’t see and can only sense. Somewhere I learn I’m here to serve these alien Whisperers in a manner that intertwines with humankind. My mind hears a request to help these “Whisperer” beings connect with planet earth. The Whisperers describe how they’ve traveled far looking to settle in an unknown land. The responses I give will determine the fate of the world. There’s an underlying threat to their request, the answers will lead to death and destruction or freedom for me and peaceful negotiation. Their presence remains though there doesn’t seem to be anyone. There is an additional sense of father’s presence nearby. Hoping to ward off a catastrophe, the story of how father connected to people offers the possibility for shared dialogue, paving the way for humans and aliens to cohabitate without force or brutality. They’re intrigued, but they dash any hope of release as it becomes apparent by the excited whispers father is someone they’ve interacted with. I’m stunned! “Who are you?” then “who is my father?”

Doubts creep in. Is he dead or has he transcended into a realm where these Aliens exist? Were his psychosis and mental illness a result of the intelligence work he did? Was the work he did so “out of this world” the military kept it secret because it would terrify humankind? Did his work cause a crisis of his psyche? What was the true purpose of his work in intelligence? Thoughts race through my mind at warp speed, looking for the link that binds me to him and thus to them. Hope emerges; that father’s mental illness was something other than a psychiatric diagnosis…he wasn’t God in his psychosis but had the ability to communicate with beings in the universe beyond the constraints of earth. Maybe it’s we humans are abnormal with the need to put those that aren’t like us into a box. His mental illness could be earthbound because of trauma experienced growing up in a household with chronic financial stress, an alcoholic father, and a depressed mother who attempted suicide. His military service started when he ran away from home and joined the military at age 15. He was among the first recruited to serve in this unit to keep tabs on the Soviet Union, the Iron Curtain countries, and their allies. Where did he go on those temporary duty assignments while we lived on foreign soil? How was it his security clearance level as a

Non-Commissioned Officer in Command was higher than that of his superior officers? My father has always been an enigma because he couldn’t talk about his work; it was treason to do so. But he frightened me and intrigued me simultaneously when immersed in the psychosis of delivering decrees as God walking this earth.

I’m questioning my entire life with him; submerged in secrets and sudden departures to parts unknown as part of his security service work. I now wonder if his psychosis was the human label of something we can’t comprehend, and he was speaking as an emissary for these Aliens. I wonder as part of his military work if he co-mingled with the beings on this spaceship where I am being held hostage. Father’s passports show travel to enemy countries of the Free World. Listening to the whispers of invisible hosts, I’m hit with the realization that my father was not someone I knew; he was a shell, cloaked in invisibility on the inside, protective of his core self. Flooded with memories, fearful of reprisal, there is an urgent need for me to escape; to find a way back to mother earth. If my father interacted with these otherworld beings, those interactions may have contributed to the psyche plunging him into the dark realm of mental illness. I need to maintain my sanity and maintain a sense of internal balance and awareness. Do they use mind control or are they peaceful and are trying to transcend the multidimensional aspects of aliens and humans to coexist? Fear moves into the realm of terror as I realize my father knew the Whisperers. Nothing overt but subtle; the voices don’t come from within, yet they are heard within. Are they mind readers; telepathic? There is no obvious means of communicating; it shows up as a whisper on the edge of my consciousness teasing me. Out of nowhere “Carol, tell us more about your father’s writings. How was he received? Why did his military service end? He intended to serve another ten years, retire, and join the National Security Service. He was being recruited. We are aware….”

“Why? He lost his mind.”

 Silence.

I look around; no one’s there. I’m alone. My vision narrows; breathing slows; exterior limbs freeze; everything’s in slow motion; my legs no longer hold me…. I’m falling. “Where is that voice coming from?”

I’m lying on my back. Nothing is as it seems. What I’m lying on is comfortable, nothing like the interior of the spaceship. “Whoa! Now where am I?” Moving my hand there is no metallic wall or restraint. The whispers have ended. There’s no sense of anyone nearby. Cautiously attuning to the environment because they never make sounds; they just appear with their questions caressing my mind and no physical presence. Even with their questions, the answers are already known. A strange metallic taste is in my mouth, but I didn’t bite my tongue. I must have fallen but from where? How far did I fall? Though afraid, I open my eyes, take in my surroundings. I’m home alone. Was it a dream? Have I just been trying to find a solution to my father’s 15-year slide into the depths of mental illness where we anxiously waited for the ‘next relapse’? Questions, oh so many questions. I discern as I’m lying in bed that I’ve let my imagination have free rein, but this time was much too vivid even for me. Of course, what comes to mind is my mother’s view, “exceptional stories don’t come from actual life.” But for me, they do; ah, father’s words come at me again. “Listen, learn, and make your own decisions and interface with your own experiences.” Though I shake off the vividness of the dream, it lingers. Throughout the day they whisper, “Can she do what her father couldn’t…do the women of this planet who bend others to their will. Therein lies our hope for survival.”  More whispers, “She is our only hope, or we destroy her planet before we vaporize.” I shake off the whispers as if a shaggy dog continuing with my day.

Time has stopped for me. Days pass me by though my clients are oblivious; I can be present for them. My friends look at me with concern. They tell me I make plans but never show up. They wonder about me. I wonder too. “Is this how he lost his mind? Losing track of days as the Whisperers invaded his mind, using him as a vessel through which to communicate?” I’m never alone. Whisperers stalk me through telepathy. If I tell, I’ll be hospitalized and ordered to be psychiatrically evaluated. I must outwit these beings, find a way to prevent them from invading my mind. Who will believe I’ve been abducted by whispering aliens and am telepathically being followed? Determined to block them out, I find it hard to trust anyone. If the battle is lost and my death results, those who have knowledge of my history will knowingly nod their heads and sadly share their worries that someday I might just give up hope. They would be wrong. Oh crap! Epiphany! “Father didn’t commit suicide! They exterminated him, crushed him as one would an insect when they realized his message was not being integrated into the lives of people”  The Whisperers took over his mind and through invading his body caused him to drive the car into the median, around the huge water embankment, and into the concrete beam. Whisperers are capable of many things. I’ve read my fathers’ last letter, the “Letter to the World, from God” describing dire consequences if humanity didn’t change course. No one listened this time. I wonder if they became impatient and eliminated him, not because he didn’t do their bidding, but because his voice and predictions fell on deaf ears. In my fugue state I overheard discussion around exterminating humans if they cannot

cohabitate or conjoin with us. The Whisperers live as a conquering force, not a peace delegation.

The strain is breaking me. Reaching out to two trusted friends who can stretch themselves into the metaphysical world I ask for help. They have ideas on ways to block communication from the aliens and stop access to my mind. I am fighting for humanity and our continued existence of this planet. I’ve concluded they will not treat us as equals but as the conquered. They didn’t ask permission to invade my mind so there will be no collaboration and cohabitation. Even as I plot to escape these otherworld beings, I question my sanity. Who’s going to trust that I, and my father before me, communicated with alien Whisperers? The whispers are dreamlike; inviting me to give in, to do their bidding as my father did for them. I’m not on the spaceship, but they surround, invade my whole being, consume my mind. Whispers are the lullaby, just stay here a little longer. Wait. We warrant your sacrifice. You are not your father. Stay….” The BLARE! The BLAST!; a flash of the train as it barrels toward me. There’s frantic screaming, “Push on the gas/flee, get off the tracks! MOVE!” But it muddles the mind; whispering, “Stay. a sudden lurch of the car as it jumps off the tracks. Sweat runs down my forehead; heart pounds; hands clutch the wheel as the train roars by behind me. And then a soulless gut-wrenching screeching pummels my brain, blinding me, leaving me gasping for air. Frenzied volumes of the whispering crescendo indicative of anger and despair. “We own you! You cannot win! You are nothing to us!”

Silence again; I’ve won; beaten them at their own mind games! They’re locked out of my world. There’s clarity. The sun shines brightly above. I’m back in control, grounded and am, once again, whole. The punishment planned by the Whisperers for my resistance has been squashed! Energy abounds; I’m alive, vibrant, and refreshed. A breath of fresh air settles into my soul as I take in the surrounding view. I look over the vastness of my world, sigh contentedly as my gaze moves down to my feet.

But Alas! Beneath me in all its majesty I look upon the outlines of the oceans, slivering of the seas, and the many landscapes of our world as seen when in orbit. “What the…?” There it is again, caressing the edges of my mind…whispering, invitational, “Carol, what will you write to introduce us to your world? In what ways will you influence the masses to welcome our ways? When will you join us?”

I look around; no one is there. Seemingly, I’m alone…