THE KILLING SPIRIT: EPILOGUE (143-144)

EPILOGUE
PROPHECY OF THE DREAMERS



In the days following 11 September 2001, the dreamers buried Jerico Whitehorse in the same manner that Crazy Horse was buried in September 1877: With much grief and little fanfare, in a place where none would ever defile his grave.

They sought no vengeance against the strange little white man who sent an arrow into Jerico’s heart. They never spoke to him, refused even to acknowledge him, and took a vow never to speak his name.

Jeb Morgan returned to his cabin in northern Idaho, where he hanged himself. His decomposing body was found by a casual acquaintance seeking his services as a hunter. He was buried in a pauper’s grave.

The dreamers returned to their tribes where they told the story of the killing spirit and the Lakota warrior chosen to oppose him. As their followers grew, they prophesied coming years of darkness and gloom, even as they unfolded before an awestruck and weary world.

They foresaw a great war in the land of the ancients. They saw hundreds of thousands dead. They saw the ancient rivers red with the blood of indigenous peoples. They saw mushroom clouds and desolation so complete only scorpion, vermin, and rodents could survive. They saw the revenge of the earth: tidal waves, hurricanes, tornadoes, wildfires, flood and drought. They saw the decline of the world’s great powers, civil unrest, poverty, hunger and disease. They saw poisoned waters and poisoned skies, the four legs and two legs searching for land that could breathe and sustain life. They saw the great glaciers melt, the oceans rise, swallowing the coasts and pushing the people inland. They saw masses of people, homeless and destitute, neighbors fighting neighbors in cities of squalor and chaos. They saw governments in retreat as mercenary armies erected walls around enclaves of greed.

They saw religions rise and fall, a desolation of the soul, as hopelessness turned to despair and the baser nature of the human animal moved to the fore.

The prophecy of the dreamers was not without hope for they knew that it was written on parchment, not stone. They foresaw a new generation of enlightened leaders emerging from the four corners of the earth. Like Prometheus, they would bring light to what only seemed eternal darkness and lead a new and final confrontation with the killing spirit.

From diverse cultures, races and religions, the chosen ones, the beings of higher consciousness, the wise ones would reunite the scattered tribes of the human family and rekindle the flames of hope. They would break down the forces of greed, hatred and the need for vengeance to attack the disease at its source.

How would it end? They did not know. They could not see beyond that horizon. They could not see past the dream of a new civilization, the armies of peace and beings of light that led them, but they saw one thing clearly:

The spirit of Crazy Horse would walk among them.