"- not negotiate with terrorists! And she's clearly a terrorist! She's poisoned our water supply, she's personally responsible for thousands of illnesses and deaths, she's already cost the economy billions in lost man-hours. That's all rounded out with some crackpot eco-manifesto demands -"

"- from Alberta met with the Prime Minister yesterday to discuss -"

"- call it magic? What she did was by any other definition literally impossible. Controlling all electricity and electrical devices around the world simultaneously, and with that level of precision that she could isolate just the screens and speakers so she could talk to us is simply beyond our ability to comprehend. Wasn't it Asimov who said really advanced technology would be indistinguishable from magic? Same thing. And the fact that -"

"- absolute heresy! God gave man dominion over all nature -"

"- or if any such representatives or so-called ambassadors have stepped forward, the government is so far keeping quiet about it. In the meantime more and more communities in Alberta are reporting cases of the mystery illness as Gaia's war on mankind continues unabated -"

"- called for an emergency summit of the G7 group of nations -"

"- have been warning about the realities of climate change for years! The polar ice caps are melting. The permafrost is melting! Do you know why it's called permafrost? Because it used to stay frozen all year round. Not any more! Gaia isn't saying anything scientists haven't already been telling us for years. She's just making sure we can't ignore the message any longer -"

"- can't just turn our backs on oil. It's ridiculous! The economy won't -"

"- agreed to speak before the United Nations today, and is expected to appear at half past one Eastern, ten-thirty Pacific. Our live coverage of Gaia's UN speech will begin in less than thirty minutes from now, so be sure to stay tuned."

It felt like I'd been channel-surfing for days, and in fact that wasn't far from the truth. It was early afternoon on Friday, and I'd been pretty much stuck to the sofa since Gaia's big announcement Tuesday night.

The TV news went absolutely crazy after the power came back on, and it really hadn't settled down since then. There were a few big announcements, like the Prime Minister said we should all keep doing things as per usual for now while world leaders figured out how to respond.

That didn't last long though, it was literally a matter of hours before human greed had people trying to cash in on the situation.

Some folks were trying to hoard stuff, others set up scam websites claiming to deliver 'guaranteed safe drinking water' to your door for some exorbitant fee. Grocery chains even started hiking up the prices on any beverages people thought might be safe, like milk and soda and juice.

Then on Wednesday the government put some emergency laws into place to counter all that racketeering with extremely stiff fines and penalties, but it didn't seem to do much to control the situation.

Meanwhile oil companies began an aggressive ad campaign to highlight all the good they were doing, all the ways they'd improved in the last fifty years. They were trying to beat Gaia with marketing and public relations, by painting her as out of date or out of touch. They portrayed her as though she was some hippie from the nineteen-sixties who just stepped off the commune for the first time and didn't realize that Big Oil was 'good for the environment, actually'.

At the same time politicians the world over were running around doing press conferences and speeches and generally scrambling to keep the anarchy at bay while they desperately tried to get a handle on the situation.

Some countries had already pledged to work with Gaia and even started taking steps to ban the use of fossil fuels within their borders and territorial waters. Just as predictably, other nations had vowed to ignore her demands while calling for her immediate arrest and trial. Or execution. A few of the big oil-producing nations even vowed to step up production, to make up for any shortfall that came from other countries cutting back.

Here in Canada the two biggest hot-buttons were the Athabasca oil sands in Alberta, and the ongoing pipeline controversies. There was also talk about our continued use of fossil fuels for electricity. The bulk of our power actually came from hydro-electric plants, and we used a lot of nuclear power too, but a chunk still came from burning coal or natural gas or stuff like that.

And of course everyone everywhere was up in arms at the thought of having to give up their car. It was a sad testament to humanity, but I saw more angry fist-shaking on social media from people who were outraged at the thought of losing their beloved SUV or sports car than posts condemning Gaia for threatening to purge a quarter of the population.

The other thing nobody was really talking about was how lenient and forgiving she seemed to be, all things considered. It almost went completely unnoticed by the TV news people, I only saw two brief mentions, but despite that big global power outage Tuesday night there were a number of electrical devices that were unaffected.

Like all the airplanes currently in the sky at the time continued to fly normally. And hospitals lost some power but all their critical systems continued to function, so anyone on life support was fine and operating theatres currently in use were unaffected. Nuclear power plants that required electricity to keep their safety equipment running were also spared, which probably prevented a few catastrophes.

Basically she had an opportunity to cull the herd a tiny bit more Tuesday night and she went out of her way not to do it, but nobody was talking about that. It was all about money, jobs, and cars.

"Tori?"

The quiet voice pulled me out of that spiral of depressing thoughts. I looked over and asked, "What's up Lia?"

At the same time Soneya finally looked up from her phone. She was probably doom-scrolling social media again, trying to stay ontop of the news coming out of the States the same way I'd been surfing the TV news channels.

Our small sister was sitting in front of my computer where she'd been streaming cartoons since breakfast this morning. Her ears were drooping and her tail hung down listlessly behind her, while she gave me a sad pleading look.

"I'm bored," Lia whined. "I want to go outside. I want to see trees and grass, I want to chase something. I want to run, I want to get my feet wet, and I want to get my nose dirty."

I sighed, but the wolfgirl spoke before I could say anything.

"It's not safe Lia," Soneya replied in a quiet but sombre voice. "We stand out because of our ears and tails. We look different, and the way people have been acting since Gaia's announcement means we'd probably get attacked if we went out. Or at the very least we'd be stopped and questioned."

We didn't actually know that for sure, mostly because we hadn't tried going out yet. Unfortunately that meant the three of us had been cooped up in my little one-bedroom apartment since Tuesday, and I was positive all three of us were starting to get a bit stir-crazy.

On the other hand I understood our pack leader's concerns. There was loads of speculation on the news and online about who Gaia's representatives were, and it was pretty easy to imagine folks would assume we were involved due to our animal attributes.

My parents already figured it out, they called right after the big announcement on Tuesday to ask if I was one of Gaia's representatives. I told them none of us were, but I did admit we'd been given the offer. We just hadn't accepted it yet.

Lia pouted as she whined again, "But I want to go outside!"

"Maybe we could go to my parents' place?" I asked quietly as I looked to Soneya. "If we can get down to the parking garage without running into anyone, we can stay in the car for the drive. My folks' backyard is kind of private, we could chill out back there and hope the neighbours don't bother us?"

She sighed, "I don't know Tori. That's a few too many ifs and maybes..."

Our attention was pulled back to the TV at that point when one of the news anchors suddenly announced, "Breaking news from New York City, where officials are claiming Gaia was killed by police this afternoon. We're cutting now to a live press conference that just started a few minutes ago."

That had all three of us on edge as we stared at the screen, while the image switched from the Canadian news anchors to a press conference in some official-looking office. A banner on the bottom of the screen identified the person talking as a spokesman for the New York Police Department, while two other serious-looking guys in dark suits were standing to either side.

"- from the seventeenth precinct spotted the suspect walking eastbound along East 42nd Street near Third Avenue. The officers called for back-up while tailing the suspect at a discreet distance. Four additional units moved into position just west of First Avenue, and the suspect was confronted there."

The police rep continued, "The suspect was ordered to identify herself, which she did. She told the officers that she was the Gaia who issued the terrorist ultimatum Tuesday evening, and was subsequently ordered to surrender herself into custody. The suspect refused, there was some sort of altercation, and the terrorist known as Gaia was fatally injured. An ambulance attended the scene and the suspect was pronounced dead at just past twelve-thirty Eastern time today."

At that point another man stepped up to the podium and microphones, while the text at the bottom of the screen changed to identify him as the New York City mayor. He stated, "We're already in contact with the FBI and the White House, but I'd just like to commend the brave men and women of the NYPD for their heroic actions today -"

The scene abruptly switched back to the anchor desk in Canada. The news guy looked a little confused as he apologized, "Sorry for cutting away from that press conference. We've just received word that Gaia is in fact at the United Nations and about to address the General Assembly, so we'll be going live in a moment to the UN General Assembly Hall."

"We'll continue working on that other developing story from New York in the meantime," the other anchor commented as she read something off her teleprompter. "Hopefully we'll have some clarification about that incident with the NYPD after Gaia's UN speech is concluded."

Soneya and Lia and I all exchanged a glance, then our wolfgirl shrugged. "I don't imagine Gaia's actually very easy to kill. If she represents the whole planet I doubt a few little bullets are going to do anything to her."

"Yeah," I nodded slowly, before we all turned back to the TV again.

The image on the screen cut again, this time to the interior of a big auditorium-like building. There were rows and rows of government officials all in their seats, while up at the front of the room Gaia stood below the big UN logo.

She looked exactly like she did when she visited us on Tuesday, and when she appeared on TV for her world-wide announcement Tuesday evening. She even did the same awkward little wave as she spoke into the microphones, "Hello again humanity."

"Some of you might have heard that I was just killed a little while ago," she stated after a brief pause. "A few of you are probably even scratching your heads wondering how I'm here when you've also got me on a slab in a coroner's office not too far away. I figure I should get this out of the way right now? To be clear, the flesh and blood entity standing before you now is just an avatar, and destroying this fragile human-like body does not harm me in the slightest."

She continued, "I am The Earth, shooting my avatar is about as effective as shooting the ground beneath your feet."

"Having said that," she added as her expression hardened, "I don't appreciate it and I will take drastic measures if it happens again. You have been warned."

There was a brief pause and her expression became neutral again. Then she continued, "On a related note, I would also like to make it very clear that I am not a god or a goddess and I've never claimed to be such. I'm not a demon or a devil either folks. Like I just said, I am the living Earth. I am the planet upon which you are born, the world where you live out your lives, and I am the ground you are subsequently buried in or scattered over when you die."

"I do not want your prayers, they mean nothing to me. All I want from humanity is for you to start getting along with the rest of my children," she stated in a firm but neutral tone.

Gaia paused again and took a deep breath then sighed as she gestured vaguely around, "I know some of you folks here believe that I'm a terrorist. A lot of people outside these doors say the same thing. I don't agree with that assessment, but I won't deny it either. Instead let me try and put it into perspective?"

"According to a UN biodiversity assessment published two years ago," she added with another hard look, "Out of an estimated eight million species as many as one million are currently threatened with extinction as a direct result of human activities. I'm not talking about individual deaths, but a million entire species going extinct, never to return again. According to your own scientists my world is either on the cusp of or has already entered another mass extinction event, driven entirely by a single organism. You."

She continued, "In twenty-twelve a list was published detailing the one hundred most-threatened species. Every single species on that list, from a fruit bat in Papua New Guinea to a porpoise in Mexico to a rhino in Indonesia is on that list because of you. These species are threatened by climate change, habitat loss, and hunting. Over and over. So you tell me, who is the real terrorist?"

"Bear in mind that I'm not threatening humanity with extinction," Gaia added in a firm voice. "I just want you to stop destroying my world and everything else in it."

She paused again, and this time there was a long sigh. Then she stated, "I don't enjoy this. I don't want to see any of my children suffer, not even you. What else can I do though? You've seen the warning signs, your own scientists keep telling you over and over what's happening. Yet you do nothing."

Gaia started to sound emotional as she continued, "I'm sure you've heard of the Great Barrier Reef? It's lost more than half its corals since nineteen ninety-five, as a direct consequence of climate change. For those of you who don't know, coral is made up of countless tiny animals called polyps. That reef has been around for over six thousand years and spans an area of over twenty thousand square kilometres, but in the last twenty-five years your activities have managed to kill half of it. And that is just a single example, a single threatened habitat."

"I can hear you whispering," she added as her expression and tone hardened once more. "Who cares about a polyp. This is the problem in a nutshell, isn't it? They aren't cute and they don't put money directly into your pockets. Well I care about them, just like I care about all the species you've put on the endangered list. And I mourn all the species you've already exterminated."

There was another sigh as she shook her head, and she sounded almost weary when she spoke again.

"I'll be reaching out to my representatives and ambassadors soon," she stated. "I'm willing to work with humanity, but only on my terms. You know where I stand, everything I said three days ago remains in effect now. Thank you for your time, I will not be answering any questions."

At that point Gaia simply vanished into thin air, which left half the government dignitaries stunned while the other half erupted into shouting. Some of it sounded like questions, while others sounded angry.

Either way Gaia had already left the building, so it didn't really matter.

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