16. STALIN’S DAGGER REBORN IN CHINA 2084

I like magic! Early next morning I was dreaming. That is I believed I was dreaming. As on the previous days, some early morning birds were chirping so I am not sure. When I turned around in bed, the small box was there once again. Nothing rattled inside. I opened the box. There were some sheets of paper. I wanted to read chapter 16.

16. STALIN’S DAGGER REBORN IN CHINA 2084

China. A tingling of metal bells in the early morning. Green rice paddies. Shreds of morning mist drifting and evaporating in the rising sun. The time traveller was standing upright in water to his knees like an egret waiting for fish to come close.

-          What are you doing, John had to ask.

-          I am waiting.

-          Waiting for what?

-          Just waiting. Waiting for calamities to occur, maybe. Of all things someone in China started producing copies of Stalin’s dagger without knowing of its curse. This time the curse came in disguise of a tiny virus, which spread like wildfire. As everybody should know, wisdom is like diamonds hidden from the eye. In 2084 wisdom was scarce, and people were many. Plagues had ravished humanity before, but they were long forgotten.

-          What are you talking about?

-          About the forgotten viral tsunami that hit areas in China in beginning of 2020. Communist China locked up millions of Chinese to fight a surging virus, and then thought they won the war. Later the second wave hit more devastating than the first one. This time all over the world. Instead of acting sensibly, the world panicked. Instead of upscaling medical equipment to help victims of the virus, countries shut down hoping that sealing borders and people from each other would help. It did to a certain degree, but mostly only prolonged the lockdowns.

-          How could the world forget something like this, Jill uttered.

-          What happened in the years around 2020 was that leaders in power found out how much pressure they could use to fight the virus. In China the communist party started to monitor everything it was possible to monitor. Other countries followed China step by step. This happened especially in countries which had a history of being ruled by dictators, as Germany with Adolf Hitler, Italy with Benito Mussolini, Spain with Francisco Franco, and Russia with Josef Stalin just to mention a few.

-          How did people react to this?

-          In many countries dissent was crushed, but only on the surface. Disrespect of authorities started to grow like cancer, and wielding of the sword of power did not work very well. In fact abuse of power took away the foundation of what should be the building blocks of nations. In China the production of mini replicas of Stalin’s dagger, and the worldwide distribution in the years before 2084, was the beginning of the demise of authority. First and foremost this was the case in China. However, the real serious issue was the appearance of a new virus caused directly by the miniature daggers. The properties of Stalin’s dagger had changed to the worse, and the virus led to disastrous numbers of fatalities. As the last pandemic of this size was in 2020 and the following year, was almost forgotten, the world was not ready. United Nations had dwindled into an international club of talkative politicians, and had no power. Imbecile presidents in the USA from the so-called Grand Old Party had led the once powerful nation almost to oblivion helped by many lost wars around the world. The slogan “America First” had turned into “America Last”.

-          The new virus upended the world, and the USA was hit harder than any nation except China.

-          Is there any reason why we are standing here in a Chinese rice paddy in the early morning, John and Jill asked.

A huge red sun was in the east. Birds were chattering in the bamboo groves around. The green was as green as green can be. Metal bells were tingling set to move by a light morning breeze.

-          The reason, the time traveller pondered, scratching his head. – Ask the wind. Ask the birds. Ask the farmer who is coming there.

Then he disappeared without a trace in the rays of the rising sun.

End of chapter 16. To be continued in chapter 17.