"What do you mean by something else is making it look like the end times?" Hikaru asks. She points to Jeanette. "It was Jeanette who said we should be in the end times by now." Hikaru pauses. "Actually, when everything started happening, we thought it was the end times. That came and gone. Forty years later, we're still here. Christ hasn't returned yet." Hikaru thinks. "I know you are a time traveler. Are you saying you didn't know about any of this?" Hikaru pauses again. "I want to be clear. When you said you would straighten this crap out, what exactly do you mean? So many things have happened. Also, what do you mean by left alone?"

"As far as I know, certain events were supposed to happen. The Earthquake and Tsunami in Japan, Java/Philippines , India and other places were supposed to happen as no one can stop natural events. But the war was not supposed to happen. The economic problems were supposed to happen to Europe and the collapse of Euro first, not the US and it's Dollar. Terrorism War in the Middle East as not to get to a nuclear level. Something is not right and I smell interference by these so called spirits. But since we are here, we need to do something with what is left. I'm not here to play baby-sitter or put bandaids on scraped knees and kiss foreheads saying 'You'll be alright.' Like I told her in email, if Jeanette wants my help, I'll do what I can. But this, this is something big, and it stinks like dead fish in a polluted lake. I'm not doing this clean up job alone. Especially when I've been pushed into the dirty water - hell no! I'm punching out some lights first! So those damned crows better know their place around me."

"Fernando, I respect the fact you are a time traveler and know things I don't. It was the elected officials in Washington who drove the United States over a financial cliff. Also, the Spirits hate destruction. Therefore, they couldn't be responsible for the war."

Hikaru lived though the happening, the years of chaos and the forty years of rebuilding. She has seen what happened, what the Spirits have done and are doing. She knows Fernando is a time traveler and therefore she knows Fernando knows things she doesn't know. "Fernando, you as a time traveler should know what has happened during the past fifty-six years but you don't." Hikaru pauses. "History has been changed, hasn't it? Anyone with even a fundamental understanding of time travel probably knows that changing history is dangerous. Isn't changing history again also dangerous?"

Chihiro finishes another bite of her mouse and wipes off the blood on her mouth with the back of her hand. "Fernando-san, Yubaba is a mean spirit and I have seen her use her power but I don't know if she is powerful enough to alter history."
 
Jeanette Isabelle