(AYEP63PT3) I HAVE AN ETERNITY AHEAD OF ME VOL. 2 VICTORY!: AUNTIE YONNY EPISODE 63 Part 3

 

 I HAVE AN ETERNITY AHEAD OF ME: VOL. 2 VICTORY!

(Intermittent Waves Recorded From The Transformed Heart Of A Woman)

AUNTIE YONNY: EPISODE 63 Part 3

EVEN THE SAD TIMES DON'T BRING SADNESS, BUT, VICTORY! 

2 Samuel 23:12
But he stood in the midst of the ground, and defended it, and slew the Philistines: and the Lord wrought a great victory.

1 Chronicles 29:11
Thine, O Lord is the greatness, and the power, and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty: for all that is in the heaven and in the earth is thine; thine is the kingdom, O Lord, and thou art exalted as head above all.

When Natalie pulled up at the hospital parking garage gate, she saw two cars bearing The Tribune logo pulling up behind her. She knew she had a fantastic group of employees. Her dad had always told her that they were the reason The Tribune continued to survive. They were The Tribune, he said. Each one was dedicated to his/her profession and passionate about delivering accurate and quality news.

President Willard Graves had tried to kill the media and especially the newspaper industry. He hated bad press, but, he was extremely good at giving reporters bad things to write about him. Like his life, his presidency was a disaster. His campaign to disseminate false, or, fake news, offering an alternate reality to confuse people soon back-fired. Instead of silencing the press, there had been a resurgence of people returning to read newspapers which offered the most recent and accurate news. 

Willard Graves' lies were exposed one by one and people were just sick and tired of being poisoned by his sick and twisted mind. Throughout his life and throughout his presidency, he had broken every one of God's commandments hundreds, if not thousands of times. His followers began to see that his lies and misdeeds only benefitted him and not them. When they too were affected by his lies, they knew that his lying was self-serving, while only hurting or destroying those who attached themselves to him in any way. However, sadly enough, one cannot help but to point out that they were willing to go along with the lies as long as they thought they were benefitting from them, which makes them just as guilty as Willard Graves.

Having exposed Willard Graves his enablers, his supporters, and a multitude of conspiracy theorists, newspapers began to compete on a grander scale of professionalism and academia. Journalism students benefitted from the lessons of that decade, in that they learned what not to do, such as, trying to persuade or brainwash the reader, instead of giving accurate information that allowed the reader to come to their own conclusions and form their own opinions. 

Tex Tiledeler had backed Willard Graves in the 2016 presidential election campaign and The Tribune took a huge hit when everything came tumbling down around Graves and the Republicans. The Tribune was never restored to her full glory, but, the employees were loyal. New blood arrived, when he hired journalists straight out of college who had a different mindset true to good journalism. Slowly, the stories took on a different flavor, one more palatable and newsworthy. With employees looking out for one another and making sure no one strayed off of the forged path, The Tribune became like a family again.

Natalie got out of her car and the sound of ambulances pulling up to the hospital was deafening and intolerable. She tried covering her ears with her hands to block out the sound. Walking out of the garage to cross the street, an ambulance whizzed right by her, making her realize that there was no escaping the noise outside. Picking up the speed of her walking, she hurried into the hospital for relief.

When she got inside she headed towards the emergency room. She figured that's where she'd find Roy. As soon as she walked into the lobby, she saw Roy waving his arm for her to follow him. 

"Hey, Natalie! Glad you could make it. The party is in here. The guests keep arriving in all kinds of shapes and forms, covered with blood."

"I saw part of the crew pulling up behind me. Anybody else make it here, yet?"

"The Chief called me, shortly after I got off the phone with you. He told me that you asked him to send some crews down here, but, he wanted to know where the bodies were coming from to get the real story. I managed to get an ambulance driver to show me his tablet and found out where he picked up his stiff. The gun battle is on the west side of town. He said that it was his second pickup that night and when he picked up the first body, bullets were still flying, so, he had to hurry up and get out of there because it was like a war zone.

"So, Garrett and the rest of the crews are going down there?! It's too dangerous!"

"The medic claims there's nobody else left alive to shoot. There's just a bunch of dead bodies. Some were even thrown out of the windows. INCREDIBLE! I said that it must have been the Russians. They have that take no prisoners kind of mentality, ya know."

Natalie saw a bloodstained sheet being brought in on a gurney. A blood-soaked hand attached to a body underneath the sheet stuck out partially from the side. Roy turned his head to see what Natalie was gaping at. It was clear that she hadn't seen many bullet-riddled bodies in her short lifetime. Roy, who had grown immune to the trauma and drama of emergency rooms chuckled and began to joke.

"Hey! They must have found a live one, or, they ran out of body bags."

Natalie rolled her eyes at Roy.

"That's enough, Roy, you're being insensitive. Come on, let's get to work."

"Well...actually, Natalie, I was waiting for the new crew to come and relieve me. All they have to do is try to get names, pictures, condition of the bodies, and try to get as much info as possible to follow the story. Garrett said he needs me on site. I know that neighborhood. I used to live there. People I know might trust me to tell me what happened."

"Okay, get going! I'll wait for the crew to get inside. Keep me informed of everything going on and I mean everything! I can't have my reporters getting killed."

"Okie doke! I'll call as soon as I get there to let you know that we're safe."

******************************************************

Darla wanted to get Hal's mind off of his father and carrying the burden of being responsible for his death. She felt that she should get back to the nursery to check on Little Tanya.

"Do you want to see your daughter, Hal? Let's..."

"No...uh...I mean, yeah, but...but, not...not now. I'm all dirty and filthy from..."

Hal began to turn over in his mind the terror that he had been through that night, but, he didn't want Darla to know about it.

"...from being outside and running. I don't want to meet her like this. I might give her germs or something and make her sick. I...I...I'll go in after I get cleaned up. I need to go check on Zenobia, too."

Realizing Hal was extremely nervous about seeing his daughter, Darla made a suggestion.

"Well, how about I bring her to the window so you can see her? I'll tell Rachel that you're out here, too."

Hal waited nervously at the window of the nursery, feeling very guilty as he watched the nurse still trying to quiet one of the babies that he had disturbed. He could have sworn that he saw her glare at him for an instant, probably swearing under her breath. Then, she started talking to the baby and nodding her head toward the window, as if to say, "Over there, that's the bad man who woke you all up." Hal tried to not look in her direction.

Darla rolled Little Tanya's incubator to the front of the nursery beaming like a proud grandmother carrying her grandchild. Hal was afraid to look at the baby. -Afraid that somehow, he had damaged her and ruined her life. He felt that he was responsible for her coming into the world too soon. He was responsible for her mother being close to death. 

"Yes," he told himself, heartache and pain gripping his chest and searing through his body, "I'm responsible. I sinned. I got my family into this mess. I brought this upon everyone, " he muttered to himself with conviction.

In a tormented state of mind, Hal continued to persecute, convict, and condemn himself. In his mind, he alone was responsible for breaking up his child's family, and now, she would have to go through life without her father in her home. Hal harbored all of these things in his heart, believing them to be true, making it impossible for him to move on and create a better future for her, himself, or, anyone else. He had allowed guilt, shame, fear, and sin to define who he was and who he was destined to be. Even more, he had allowed it to define the life and future of his child.