Rivers of the Mind Season 1.5--How John's Face Ended Up At The Center of a Massive Internet Conspiracy Theory

Where to Listen:
iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/rivers-of-the-mind/id1278391177

YouTube.com https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeYjgM3dOQk

Google Play: https://play.google.com/music/m/Dn5vuu4txtzhtjggj6r277tjlay?t=Season_15_How_Johns_Face_Ended_Up_At_The_Center_of_a_Massive_Internet_Conspiracy_Theory-Rivers_of_th

Hello and thank you for listening to Rivers of the Mind Season 1.5. If you really hate listening to these introductions, just go ahead and skip forward about a minute fifteen seconds. Rivers of the Mind Season 1.5 is like the DVD bonus content where I can include information that doesn't fit in Seasons 1 or 2, but that still might interest people who have enjoyed the series so far. But just to be clear, before we begin, Rivers of the Mind is not meant to promote or encourage knowing the truth behind the deep state's insidious lies, or uncovering said truth in any way, shape, or form. Rivers of the Mind is also not intended to encourage listeners to eat at either Carl's J.r. Or Arby's, and does not mean to suggest that either of these companies are front organizations for the deep state. All events portrayed in this series are strictly fictional, and any resemblence to [interference] is completely coincidental. Now with all of that said, please enjoy episode D of Rivers of the Mind Season 1.5 “How John's face ended up at the center of a massive internet conspiracy theory.”

            Dusty knew the truth. He had seen the alien spaceships being towed in inconspicuous looking white semitrucks down the highway, he had seen the men in suits claiming to be from some vague company entering the local Arby's or the H. E. B. in Fredericksburg, he had seen the mysterious cave outside of Mason, pouring out carbon dioxide from some unknown source—a ventilation shaft for the massive underground military base he was confident existed  deep under his town. And they knew he was onto him. Every night, when he got off work managing his Carl's Jr., he would inspect the underside of his car for bombs. They were, after all, less than a block away from the foul Arby's. At home, he made sure all of his phones were unplugged, and that his blinds were drawn shut whenever he was home. He accessed the internet through a virtual machine called Tails, only on the deep web, which he used to maintain his anonymous column, dedicated to exposing the truth. Only a handful of people ever read it. Six this week. But his work was important—he knew that. He didn't need recognition. After spending a few hours on reddit, Above Top Secret, and commenting on other blogs, he would turn in for the night, downing a handful of flouride detoxification tablets. He'd taken measures to soundproof his house so that the high-frequency-mind control waves could not penetrate the windows.

            That afternoon, sometime around four o'clock, he sighted a manager from the Arby's crossing the parking lot, his head down, eyes filled with a sinister gaze. Dusty pushed aside the high school kid who'd just clocked in on the register. “I'll handle this.”, he muttered.
            “Ugh, whatever.”
A deep suspicion overcame him as the rival manager entered—staring at him—an intimidation tactic no doubt. They knew that he knew the truth. It was all a plot, a psywar tactic, to make him feel insane, to make him look crazy as he grew ever more paranoid—after all, any of the ordinary sheep in this town wouldn't see anything wrong—clearly the manager from the Arby's was stopping in for his dinner break, and he was just staring at the menu. But Dusty knew the truth.
            “What do you want?”, he asked.
The manager from the Arby's flinched, surprised that he'd dared to challenge him. “Oh, I'm just looking.”

            “Sure you are, buddy. Just keeeeeeeeeeeeeeep looking. Take your time. All the time in the world. I see what you're doing. Just...looooking. Surrrreeee buddy. Surrre.”, he muttered under his breath, jotting down notes with one hand, taking note of the managers facial features to see if he could identify any scars from past brain surgery. None. They'd done a good job covering it up. Admirable. “So your ½ pound guacamole bacon thick burger, what does that come with exactly?”
            “Well. You've got a half pound, grass-fed beef patty, pepper jack cheese, two strips of bacon, lettuce, tomatoes, and onions. And guacamole, of course.”
“Huh. Well which one do you like?”, he asked. Dusty squinted at him, trying to figure out exactly what he wanted. “Listen buddy. I know what you're up to.” The manager smirked. “Trying to order a burger, is what, Dusty.”
            “No, no, I see you over there. I see your little so-called “Arby's” with its so-called “King's Hawaiian Fish sandwich” and its “limited time offers.” I know you're a front for the deep state. I know who you work for.”
The manager grimaced, and clearly feigned amusement. It threatened him, it clearly threatened him, that Dusty knew so much. “Listen”, whispered the manager, “If you really knew...what we did...in the Arby's...it would blow your mind...I'm gonna let you in on a secret...We have...and you have to promise not to tell anyone. We have the meats.”
            “What?”
            “Shh. Don't tell anyone. Now I'll take a half pound guacamole bacon thick burger.”
He slid money over the table, urging Dusty again to keep quiet. Dusty stared at him, trying to assess his motives, to decrypt his underlying message. They have the meats. He thought to himself Maybe I was right. This whole time, I've been onto them. Hand shaking, he keyed in the order placed by the mysterious stranger from the “Arby's.”
            “Did you want fries and a drink with that?”
“Oh, yeah, sure.”, he winked.
            “Alright.”
Dusty slid back change to the suspicious interloper from the Arby's, and turned around to help assemble another customer's order. Behind him, the manager of the Arby's turned to his girlfriend, who'd come out of her uniform, and was silently filming her boyfriend's interaction with Dusty. All of the employees at the Arby's, basically, thought Dusty was super weird, and from time to time, they liked to go into the Carl's Jr. to see how he'd react to them. Incidentally, this was one of the main drivers for business at the Carl's Jr. between four and six pm; Dusty's labor costs were always relatively low and his sales higher than the other managers mainly because his extreme paranoia provided the staff of the neighboring Arby's with unending amusement.

            As Dusty got to his car and started inspecting it for explosives, he caught the manager of the Arby's staring out the window at him with a mop in his hands, almost like he was taking notes. A handful of employees joined him, forming a line to watch him—surveilling him—seeming to take note of his routines. His heart started pounding. They have the meats, he mumbled to himself, But what does that mean? What does that mean? He got into his car, and plugged his aux cable into the phone so he could listen to Alex Jones. But he hardly paid attention to the words—all that he could focus on was the mysterious message from the manager. It was obviously a psychological warfare ploy, a decoy statement. But what message did it conceal? Was this the closest he could come to getting a confession? No one would believe it would they? Or perhaps the Arby's was an alien slaughterhouse—yes—they had the meats alright. Alien meat. Perhaps the experiments who did not cooperate were sent there for termination. It would explain the men in suits who entered, but did not leave. It would explain...many things.

            When he got to his house, a little ways off the highway, the gate was swinging open—the chains that normally bound it to the fence post dangled absently from the chainlink fence, the combination locks all rotated to display an odd sequence of numbers—02-11-2017--a date, seemingly—this coming Saturday. Shaking, Dusty reached for his handgun, and enterred the premises. A rattling came from the nearby dumpster. He moved closer to inspect it. Seemingly, though, nothing was there—just pale splotches of unevenly trimmed grass, littered with bottles and cans. But something was there. Something was present. He pulled out his phone and started recording a video. “Hello—my name is...Dean Heyerdahl—some of you may have read my blog Hill Country Secrets Uncovered, where I discuss what I believe to be a secret underground base created as part of project MKUltra in the 1950s, still operating to this day. I'm filming this right now because—well--I just got home from work and—I want to document this so that people know I'm not crazy. I just looked at my fence—at the locks—all of the chains have been cut. Now, earlier today, I noticed a...a strange person, who I believe to be connected with the deep state, come into my place of business. I am in sales, now, and this wasn't all that...remarkable, I guess you could say, not that remarkable at all, except that he seemed to be studying me. And when he came to talk to me, he whispered something I couldn't quite understand. When I left the office, he was watching me. So I—Phew. I don't know what exactly is going on, but I'm about to go into my house. Anyway, as you can see, these combos are all spelling out the date February 11, 2017—seems like it was done intentionally. Maybe they are trying to send me a message. I haven't entered the house yet but...”, a strange crashing noise came from the backyard.

            Dusty ran around—not seeing anything but a trash can that had been suddenly turned over, “I—I'll have to play this back, but I am assuming I'm not crazy and you all heard that. Well there's no wind around here. There's nothing that would have knocked that down. Sure it could be an animal, I know that's what a lot of people will say, but anyway. I'm going to enter the house now and see what's going on...”, as he opened the door, he revealed that all of the drawers in the house had been opened, all of the files in the file cabinets had been spread over the floor, and all of the furniture overturned. “Shit. Holy shit. Someone definitely broke in...but...” he pointed across the room, “Didn't take the safe—look over there, they left my wallet on the table, left my television—computer equipment—although it looks like—look at that. Somebody tried to log in, and now its frozen against any attempts for the next few hours. I think this is definitely not your run of the mill--” Suddenly, the house began to shake. Dusty clutched his ears and dropped his phone to the ground—it landed against the side of the computer desk and pointed upwards, leaving the manager barely in the shot.

            Dusty's mind began to spin, almost dissociating from his body—the ground shook and the light fixture flickered on and off. He backed up against the wall and reached for his pistol, trembling. “I don't know what the hell is going on—but--” The door suddenly sprang open, interrupting him. A shadowy figure entered the house, pacing away from Dusty down the hall with its back to the camera. It looked...almost like a homeless person, wearing camoflauge pants, disheveled clothing, and heavy camping gear on a large pack. Dusty stood up, pointing the gun at whoever it was. “Hey! Stop right there buddy.” The figure turned, revealing a pair of glowing white eyes—its face was dark, and indifferent, it's hair shaggy and covering up part of its eyes. Cocking its head at Dusty, it leaned in. Dusty's mind became filled with a vision of a vast underground government laboratory, connected by tunnels to others just like it across Texas. A wormhole opened up over a tiny brick ranch house—a sinkhole spread through the earth.“What—what are you trying to—to tell me?” It came closer to him, projecting the same image into his mind, speaking in booming and omnipresent telepathic voices that sounded like disjointed alien languages. The creature held out its hand and telekinetically forced Dusty to drop his weapon. Dusty began floating off the ground. “What do you want?”, he begged, “What do you want?”, slowly, Dusty lost consciousness, enterring a foreign world of the strange entity's own making.

            The creature crept closer to the cellphone, still running on the floor, and picked it up. It studied its own image in the camera feed, marveling at itself, pointing the camera at different objects in the room—the computer, the files on Dusty's floor, the bathroom—before it set the cellphone back where it had found it. The creature then vanished—a few second passed before Dusty, in a half-sleeping trance, started to speak, muttering under his breath in a strange, alien language—before choking out the words “Horizon. February 11. 2017. Watch the skies. Watch the skies. Watch the--”

            The cell phone ran out of recording space... Waking up in the morning with a pounding headache, and no memory of the night before, Dusty trembled as he watched the video, none of which he remembered. He'd already called the police—little as he knew they could help—just to have some kind of record of his break in. He knew what he had to do. He knew the truth. He knew that they would think he was crazy, he knew they'd think it was a lie, but he had to do it—he had to post the video. Once the police left, he spent a few hours of figuring out how to set up an account on the fascist illuminati spy service known amongst the sheeple as “Google”, he posted the video to youtube, and then shared it to all of the communities he could think of. At first, the story was lambasted as faked—although even they conceded an interesting video—but then, someone connected the dots to another story, almost a throwaway. Monday night of that same week, a kidnapper reportedly turned himself in after spotting “an angel”, at a gas station in the hill country—only a few days remained until the eleventh, they noted—over the course of Dusty's shift that night, dozens of those in the know, especially around Austin, began clearing their schedules on that Saturday to make time to watch the sky out in the hill country.