(Atlanta, GA) A few weeks ago we received word from one of our correspondents that a woman in the north Atlanta area kept calling the local Eritas office there. She said that she had seen something in her compost and that we needed to come see what it was. We tried to ask her more questions but she just hung up on us and texted us her address a few hours later. Unsure of other options, we sent a team of interviewers to the location she appointed us. They told us that they say what she had seen. They had seen the death of the universe in the Atlanta woman’s compost.

 

Let’s start with the bugs. They don’t tell you about the bugs when you go to composting school, but the bugs emerged from the compost almost as soon as our team arrived. The bugs were extinguished by our skilled interview team, using their note pads and ten gallon hats to squish each individual bug.

 

Then came the worms. Now, they do tell you about the worms in composting school, but no description can even compare to seeing the worms in the flesh. They took much longer and higher powered weapons than the bugs had, but still the interviewers moved forward into the compost. Only once they had fully given in to the compost were they allowed to see what the Atlanta woman had seen.

 

The team saw a sea of tiny, intersecting spider webs. All of these spider webs contained even more, tiny intersecting spider webs. This continued all the way to the microscopic level and the interview team saw all of it. One of them told us afterward, “I saw nothing but spider webs all the way down and that was when I knew life was meaningless.”

 

However, realizing life is meaningless is only act one in this compost saga. Once the entire team had accepted this fact and only then were they allowed to sink further.

 

In this sunken place was nothing but void. It was a void that was familiar to some, but unknown to more. The team quickly communally knew what they had to do to continue on. They each, in unison, drew their ceremonial knives from the pouch they carry with them, cut a deep wound into the side of their leg (like smart people, not those fools in the movies that cut their hands. do you know how many tendons and whatever are in hands?) to pool enough blood to satisfy the void.

 

The final act of the compost debacle of ’17 was when the interview team witnessed the death of everything in the world. Only, the world they were seeing was merely a replica world that was created somewhere within the spiderwebs of time. This replicant world was destroyed in a violent and indescribable way, leaving the interview team stunned.

 

The only thing that the team can’t understand, and we’ll be honest, we have been stumped too, but was that simply showing how small we are in the universe or an omen of things not yet come to pass?

 

The interview team has been quarantined and debriefed, although none of them remember their security passwords. Some are claiming amnesia, while one member of the team claims that they are the replicants come from another universe that we watch come to a close. Not likely, but we’ll keep on eye on them just in case.

 

 

 

 

 

This article was written by Nathan Ellwood, who knows the worms better than any living man. Follow him for more worm-talk on Twitter @NPEllwood.