The past of my planet is painful one, but maybe our story will be of use to those who are still entangled in wars.
Thirty-four years have passed since we ended all wars, but when I close my eyes, I can still see the devastations our nations inflicted upon each other.
I lived in a progressive city, a haven in a small neutral country — until the night when my country declared war, too.
Apparently the declaration had been expected. My city got bombed within a few hours and much of it was turned to rubble. This is how advanced we had become in warfare.
I lost twelve friends in the first days of the assaults, and I was trapped in the city, hiding in something that used to be a cellar but was little more than a hole by then.
For days, or maybe weeks, I felt like I was dead: unable to move, unable to think, unable to weep.
The bombing and shooting— always present, sometimes closer, sometimes farther away. The sleepless nights. The dreadful days. The hunger. The thirst. The rats. The smells— the reeking smells of blood, decay, urine— penetrating everything.
I was found by two people who brought me to an underground factory, which served as an open plain emergency hospital.
As I recovered some strength and sense, I watched the nurses and patients, and a resolution took shape in my mind: These wars have to end, and I need to do my bit to accomplish this goal.
There were whispers about thinkers who researched how to end all wars. These thinkers were said to have roots in different countries, but no one knew where they were.
One of the few known statements by this group was that all wars are the result of a failure. A failure to communicate, a failure to cooperate, a failure to be rational, a failure to create, a failure to explore, a failure to empower. But the initial failure had been that we had never tried to end all wars — even though it is obvious that the only way to end one war is to end them all.
The thinkers added: Curiosity is a key to end all wars because curiosity will allow us to explore instead of walling ourselves in, to open to the other instead of killing them, to evolve as a species instead of destroying ourselves.
It was well known that anyone who was so much as suspected of searching for the famous thinkers would be killed. Ten-thousands were already dead.
But I didn’t care. I knew I had a good mind. I knew I could be useful in a group of thinkers. I had to try and find them.
© Charlie Alice Raya, The end of all wars, planet one, the roots of war
AUDIO
Continuing with the story above, my first attempts at audio files. The separate files aren’t an elegant solution, but all I could make work quickly.
© Charlie Alice Raya, The end of all wars, planet one, the roots of war
Readings available
As the first book of the collection The end of all wars, planet one, the roots of war, is about to be published, I am looking for locations in Berlin who would like to become part of the book release events.
The end of all wars
The end of all wars is a collection of stories, each featuring a planet in the universe and a testimony of how its people ended all wars.
The end of all wars is part of a bigger collection called Views from around the universe.
Author’s notes
Author’s notes on The end of all wars, planet one, the roots of war.
I thought the other day, what if something sees the title: the end of all wars and thinks it’s a joke?
This is my kind of rebellion
ripples publishing is to be the home of the collection The end of all wars.
However, ripples publishing doesn’t exist. So far, it’s an idea, waiting to be picked up – by rebels.
Why rebels?