by Douglas Falk
William did not flinch. “He really said so.”
“That’s…that’s crazy.” John wandered around and nervously fingered the astrophysics books he went to look at just before. He walked off to the window and looked up the sky, which had blackened considerably before his eyes.
Gosh, the Sun sets quickly this time of year. Or have we been in this study for multiple hours? I can’t even tell any longer.
As John gazed up the starry skies, a blinking object flashed up above. A pale red and green light faded in and out.
An airplane.
He spun around and addressed them both. “Where do all the rockets go? The ones launched by NASA, SpaceX, and the rest…if this is true?”
Celeste smiled. “Where do they go, indeed? Let’s just say that the only thing NASA ever sent to space is your imagination.”
“What do you mean?”
“That you should pay attention next time you view footage of a rocket launch, whether it is from NASA, Roscosmos, JAXA, SpaceX, or any other space agency. If you look closely when the rocket is air bound, you will notice that its trajectory is not vertical as you would expect—the rockets always, always arc in a parabolic curve. The rocket dips slowly until its course is completely horizontal and…”
“And?”
“And poof. Out of sight.”
“Where?”
“Where indeed. Davy Jones’ locker would be my best guess. I know this is very hard to absorb, but those rockets do not reach outer space. They make sure that the rockets are launched out of sight, at which point they simply land the craft somewhere far away from prying eyes in the Atlantic Ocean, next to Cape Canaveral. Every NASA launch the past sixty years follows this same pattern. If you don’t believe me, watch the videos yourself.”
“You’re telling me that every rocket, satellite, and probe ever launched have been purposely crashed in the ocean…all part of a grand plan, a generation-spanning deliberate ruse?”
“That is exactly what I am saying. The Atlantic Ocean is NASA’s very own dumpster. A cemetery, a graveyard for sixty years…reserved for their fake rockets,” she said.
John was numb at this point.
“That’s an insane theory,” he exclaimed without conviction in his voice.
I should be upset by this onslaught of incessant lunacy. But can I really dismiss this without looking in to it further? I can’t. I can’t. I’ll do my research.
Celeste walked up to him gently and gave him a pat on the shoulder.
“It is insane, for sure. But once in a blue moon, there is that one rare occasion when the truth leads you places that at first sight looks like the craziest thing you have ever seen. We were all deceived, all of us. Once you start going down this rabbit hole, there is no way out. You will be inclined to go deeper down the cavern, wherever it takes you.”
“And where will it take me?” said John.
“You will have to come to that conclusion yourself. Will you walk the paved road of comforting lies, or will you dare treading down those windy steps into the dark alley that leads to an uncomfortable truth? When you go home, I would like you to look in to the shenanigans going on at the International Space Station, the ISS. Ask yourself this…are those videos recorded from a craft in space orbiting at seventeen thousand miles an hour? Or is it perhaps much more likely that they are shot somewhere safely on ground, here on Earth? That craft has been up there for nearly two decades now. It never gets hit by any micrometeorite, it never malfunctions, and all the astronauts come and go as they please. They seem to have a ball up there…if they are up there. Look at the space walks and you will see bubbles floating upwards regularly.”
“Bubbles?” John asked. “What bubbles, like water bubbles?”
“Yes. They are clearly shot under water, in an underwater tank. NASA runs a facility called the Neutral Buoyancy Lab, where they prepare the actors for space by having them swim around under water with scuba divers aiding them. Did I say actors? I meant to say astronauts…Freudian slip,” she said.
William nodded. “It’s not exactly too far-fetched to suggest that those space walks are in fact filmed right there, where the alleged astronaut training takes place. Filming under water is a neat way to simulate the weightlessness they need to sell the public when they put out their fake spacewalk videos. Like she said, you can see water bubbles in every single one of these space walks. I’m sure the naysayers will say that those bubbly things are just ice particles or space debris…yeah right! If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, then it probably is a duck. Those are water bubbles, no question about it.”
“While the spacewalks are filmed with submerged actors in a pool, I don’t doubt that they use every trick in the book to fool us. That’s what I would do, if I would orchestrate a deception on this scale. Keep the methods versatile, lest prying eyes stay locked in a state of confusion,” said Celeste.
“The powers that be who govern these space agencies are most likely ten or twenty years ahead of the rest of society when it comes to technology. Historically, it has always been the military and the government having first dibs on the latest tech. It is no stretch at all to suggest that the tech they use for fakery is many years ahead of what is known to the public. Unbeknownst even to the sharpest minds in the technology field, not just the average Joe…” said William.
“I agree. Most of their trickery is rather old school, though. The International Space Station interior is a good old-fashioned studio with the astronauts strapped onto wires and harnesses so that they can perform somersaults and jump around on demand in a reasonably convincing manner. For the extended sequences, they most likely use a so-called vomit comet, which is a parabolic flight used for that exact purpose—achieving weightlessness for a couple of minutes, due to its rapid descent. The vomit comet’s been around for many decades too,” said Celeste.
“But the ISS has a 24/7 camera on it filming Earth. I know that because I watched it myself, a couple of years back. Are those videos just computer generated?” asked John.
“They might be. But it’s more plausible that they are simply flying a craft mocked up to look like the ISS, like a spy plane, at a high altitude with a fisheye lens camera strapped onto it. As you can clearly tell from the footage, NASA uses GoPro cameras on the ISS. The cameras are pointed straight downwards as the craft flies at seventeen thousand miles an hour, providing the public a visual of our blue and cloudy home.”
“What the hell is a fish eye lens? Camera lenses shaped like an eye of an aquatic creature?”
“The proponents of a fish eye lens are to distort the video into making everything look curved. If you strap a camera on a high-altitude balloon and send it straight up, Earth will appear to curve like a ball from a mere hundred feet up in the sky. Why? Because the fish eye lens will bend everything—rivers, lakes, houses, mountains…Earth. They will all show curvature that isn’t real. You may recall Felix Baumgartner’s Red Bull jump from a couple of years ago, if that name rings a bell. Most people are completely unaware of this, especially the mainstream media. There was an instance last year when the University of Leicester in Great Britain launched a balloon with a fish-eyed camera lens, and it capped out a couple of thousand feet high. And lo and behold, there was planet Earth below. The whole ball, in one frame! Viewed from a balloon launched by prepubescent children! I think not. Yet, every big paper in the UK and the rest of the world just ran with that story. Students capture the curvature of the Earth! Awe and behold! The ignorance is astounding.”
“Yes…I guess you’re right,” murmured John deftly.
His words echoed in the spacious study of Celeste Wood. The room became dead silent, and the post-debate exhaustion felt palpable for everyone.
It’s like the eerie silence after the eve of a great battle, when the sound of trumpets and cannons fade, and you try to make sense of it all as you sit on the porch and watch the Sun rise through the haze.
“Well, my friends. Enough for one day. I should r
eturn to my duties,” announced Celeste.
John gave William a nod, who snapped out of his slumber and went for his coat. John did the same.
Yes, I think it is time.
Celeste opened the door and extended her hand. John shook it.
“I am not sure what to make of all this, professor. It’s all a mist right now. I need to let it sink in. But what I can tell you here and now already is that this has been one of the most memorable debates I have ever had in my life. An astrophysicist attempting to convince me that outer space is fake and that the globe I have called home for twenty-six years isn’t real…not exactly something you can anticipate happening. Have you always been conspiratorial, or did you fall down through this pit recently? You don’t strike me as the type.”
“Alas, I have not always been this cynical. The cynicism and pessimism towards humanity is an understanding that took me many years to grasp. I was once as blissfully unaware as any Jane Doe, and I would have not only dismissed these conspiracy theories instantly—I would have been angered and outraged by such twisted, illogical thinking. Whether it was John F. Kennedy assassination theories, September 11th, or Sandy Hook theories…I would have dismissed them all. But when you are faced with the fact that we do live in an utterly fabricated world, ruled by a sociopathic power elite, then everything is possible. Every single piece of history that matters needs to be looked into closely and re-evaluated. The shadow elite, the powers that ought not be, will pull absolutely no punches when it comes to establishing control over the masses.”
“So you became a believer in disguise,” said William. “Slowly but steadily. Well, it’s a good thing you didn’t go off and announce it to the world. You would have been ostracised and sacked before you could even blink.”
“Yes, quite. Or attended the Flat Earth conference in Denver last year.”
William shuddered. “Or even worse…joined the Flat Earth Society.”
“What’s the Flat Earth Society?” asked John.
“Oh, it’s a ridiculous disinformation page about the flat-Earth theory which somehow makes it to the top of every Google search. It’s a farce that nobody takes seriously—the problem is that they do mix in some real information there and blend it together with absolute horse manure, forming a diluted, soggy mess of a cocktail indeed,” clarified William.
“The Flat Earth Society claims that the Earth disc is constantly rising upwards, as some kind of kindergarten explanation for the force we call gravity. It’s a childish page set up to muddy the waters. An old ploy, it is—misleading people is easiest if you blend true information together with absolute falsities,” said Celeste.
William nodded. “It scares the newcomers away. And very efficiently so.”
“Either way, I enjoyed this audience a great deal,” said John.
“Audience! Again, I’m not the Pope. I told you as much. Did I rattle your cage today? I would be disappointed if not. The winds of change are in the air, and who knows what the future will bring. I don’t know how many years this thing will keep brewing unchallenged, how the power elite will deal with an awoken mass of people. I shudder to think of it, in fact. What I do know is that we walk the Earth in a most curious of times, and I am lucky to be alive.”
“I agree,” said John and walked out the door. “Farewell, professor.”
Out by the courtyard, the two of them shivered in the cold. It was four o’clock, and it was pitch black outside. Guided by the dim lanterns glowing in the dark, they made their way off the university grounds.
“How about a drink, old friend?” stuttered William.
“I don’t know if we are old friends, my friend, but I wouldn’t say no to a cold one, especially not after this lecture of our lives. Lead the way.”
They walked Valhallavägen for a minute or two and turned left at the crossing towards Odengatan. It was bone-chillingly cold, and John couldn’t wait to get into the warmth.
Just pick a place already.
After making their way even further down Odengatan, William finally settled on a place. He nodded towards a murky joint called The Flying Horse. The place was half empty, and finding empty seats was an easy task. A jazz song was playing deftly in the gloomy locale, and the bartender didn’t even look them in the eyes as they ordered two large India Pale Ales.
There’s more cheer in a graveyard…
William took a large sip of the beer and breathed a sigh of relief.
“A warm place, at last. I guess we’ll live to fight another day. A few more minutes out there, and I would have keeled over with hypothermia.”
John made an approving gesture.
“I will never understand why our ancestors settled down up here instead of just going south. Why did they not set up shop in France, or Spain?”
“They must have come here at summer time, which deceived them. Maybe they were completely unaware that the polar opposite, pun intended, would be upon them in just a couple of months.”
John made a vague attempt of a knowing grin and fell into silence. He drifted away from the pub and contemplated. His mind wandered back to the study of Celeste Wood.
Where are we? Where are we, and where did we come from? I…I had never thought of that until I got caught up in this. How do we really know what’s underneath our feet, thousands of miles below?
“Clever as a fox, wasn’t she? Professor Wood,” said William.
“Yes, I am still shaken up by the whole ordeal. And it’s Celeste. She wanted us to call her Celeste.”
“I know. I thought of something she told me, at the end. Celeste.”
“What did she tell you?”
“You had already walked out of the room. Before she bade us farewell, she halted me on the doorstep.”
“Yes, and? What did she say?”
“They are the few, and we are the many. But we cannot reshape this world until it is unequivocally proven. Until then, the sheep will stay dormant, and the deception will continue. Someone needs to wake them up.”
“Interesting. Well, I can see her point. If the Earth is truly flat, then maybe what this movement would need is something game-changing that rocks the status quo. Because until then, my friend, the population of Earth will continue dismissing this movement, however large it may grow. The vast majority, anyway,” said John.
“What you just said…it’s old news to me. I came to the realisation that something truly remarkable needs to take place if the old powers should one day fall.”
John said nothing.
“So, are you convinced, then? Surely, you are at the very least on the fence? If you are being intellectually honest about this, there is no way in hell you can dismiss the preponderance of evidence in favour for the fact that we have in fact been lied to about the very nature of our reality. You have a million questions still left unanswered, I know, but one day, I hope all will be answered.”
John stared down the glass of beer and watched the tiny bubbles rise to the surface of the yellow liquid.
What do I believe? I feel like I don’t even know myself any longer.
“I don’t know, William. That is the ugly truth. I honestly don’t know. What I do know is that there are questions that I had until now never posed that I do want answered. I demand to see them answered, in fact. The impossible idea has become possible. Gosh, I can’t even believe that I am talking about this…the most notorious idea ever conceived, the most hated, ridiculed world view a person might have…but here I am, lost in the maelstrom. The Earth might just be flat. Jesus! But I still cling on to the hope that there could be another reason as to why they are deceiving us. I hope the Earth is a sphere.”
“Oh, I hope so too. And I would gladly go back to the globe if presented with undeniable evidence in favour of the ball. If a moment like that would emerge, I would have to accept reality and confess that I was wrong. I am not in this game to be intellectually dishonest, nor do I have some kind of urge for being contrarian.”
“Maybe just a little b
it, though?”
“What do you mean?” asked William.
“There might be a sliver of truth to the notion that you like being a contrarian, that you cherish the feeling of being special,” said John with a hint of a smile.
“Maybe a sliver. But like I said, I am not in this game for that. I want the truth. And I’m glad you refer to the Earth as a sphere, and not round which the imbeciles do. The fact that supposed geniuses like Tyson, Cox, and Kaku refer to the Earth as round is embarrassing. An item can be both round and flat at the same time. However, those are just semantics and pesky nit pickings. Like I said, I am not in this game because I want to feel edgy or try to police semantics for that matter. I am a truth seeker, and I am completely serious about it. I want change…real change. And I seek to achieve just that, on my own, or if fate so wills it, with a companion. I have a plan, John. A plan I’ve mused over for quite some time, well before I brought you to Celeste.”
As William was prone towards theatrics, he paused dramatically before continuing.
“As you may know, I am more or less financially…”
“Independent?”
William chuckled.
“Yes. More or less. Which means that I have the opportunity to achieve certain things that most people could only dream of. And I intend to use them.”
“Spend all your money? On what?”
“John, you are my friend. We haven’t known one another for long, but despite the element of brevity in our friendship, I still feel more attached to you than I do towards most people I have known for years. Those people are nothing to me…lemmings, the whole lot. Over the past couple of years, I have drifted through life aimlessly with a numb feeling in my heart. Luxury and materialistic possessions mean little to me now. Those are empty pleasures. I mean, gorging away on the finest lobsters on New Years Eve is fine and dandy and all, but at the end of the day you need something to strive for to get you out of bed in the morning. I have that little something in sight now, and I intend to make my mark on the world.”