Lethe alpha literally means "un-forgetfulness" or "un-concealment". Lethe, the river of forgetfulness, was one of the five rivers of the Greek underworld, the other four being Styx, Acheron (the river of sorrow), Cocytus (the river of lamentation) and Phlegethon (the river of fire). According to Statius, it bordered Elysium, the final resting place of the virtuous. Ovid wrote that the river flowed through the cave of Hypnos, god of sleep, where its murmuring would induce drowsiness. The shades of the dead were required to drink the waters of the Lethe in order to forget their earthly life. In the "Aeneid", Virgil
The Brief History of the Dead itself expands and contracts to accommodate the recently dead or the death of the last people to remember them. On earth things have continued on the trajectories predicted at the beginning of the century: The polar ice caps are melting and biological terrorism is a major societal concern. However, the Coca-Cola Company is trying to make the best of both developments by planning to use water from Antarctica in its soft drink; they use publicity stunts which exploit people's fears in order to build brand interest. As part of their latest publicity stunt, they send a team of scientists to