Chapter 16
.
On Saturday night, March 26th, Adam and Eve were watching a special, discussing whether this was really the end of the world. Kendall was probably at a bar. Zack was allegedly at work, Eve was suspicious. He was suppossed to be at a conference in a few weeks,making an alliance with the Saudi royal family for oil for their Arks. Eve wondered if Karen would be with Zack for this. Some of those interviewed in the special believed this was foretold by Nostradamas. While Nostradamas seemed to have predicted terrible catastrophies, he also seemed to have predicted the world surviving until at least 3997. Whether this had been predicted in the Bible was also debated. Eve's parents said they remembered a numer of people in their lifetimes predicting the end of days. Y2K, one preacher made four predictions of the end date, and was proven wrong each time, and some had believed the ancient Mayans predicting the world would end in 2012. All these predictions were proven wrong, but then none of them had ELE to back them up. There was no denying that there had been an increase in violent crime since 2/4, yet some feared it was only the beginning. There had been wars and rumors of wars for all of human history. How much worse that could get was anyone's guess. Israel and Pakistan working together was an encouraging sign, but some still feared that all efforts at peace would ultimately fail. Some in this special feared the rising of a world dictator, called the "anti-christ" by some. The closest candidate, some believed, was president Cheng of China. Before 2/4 Cheng was a hard-liner, taking harsh steps to suppress religious activity in China. After they began building Arks the government tolerated some religious services, recognizing that people were in-curably religious. Some in China were threatening to strike, refuse to build Arks, unless Cheng officially granted them religious freedom. What happenned might be anyone's guess. Others claimed George Mason might e the anti-christ, appearing to be peaceful but decieving many. Since 2/4 there had been price-gouging, the stock market appeared to be collapsing. Congress was considering giving Mason the authority to institute wage and price-freezing. Some feared that could only be the first step in Mason taking absolute power. Only time would tell.