One day you look out, and ask yourself
What even are we as people? What is this thing called life and where was it before, where are we now, and where is it heading?
Why does it seem to be in disarray?
What is consciousness?
How does the world work?
This is a sampler of what I think right now in story/metaphysical/philosophy fusion format.
None of this was made with ai, and I’m happy to say that its all based on a true story !! : )
Prologue – Starman
The sky was dark and dreary but sweeping from the West to the East one could make out a group of glimmering lights bright green in color. They were much too bright and much too fast to be stars. They slithered and coiled from place to place as they made their way across the night sky, and moved so natural and free that one might mistake them for an ancient sky serpent or a magnificent dragon of old. This abominations name was Starman, a false god of the planet, who slithered and coiled up in the heavens above and kept a watchful eye on the dead planet below.
Chapter 1 – The man
Al was connected to a terminal inside the small house, and oversaw the vast lands surrounding it through sensors and instruments. He watched the man carefully as he awoke and stumbled out of the small home and into the nursery outside. The man looked at the expanse of green lush vegetation as he stepped outside, and took a deep breath of the chilly morning air. In the nursery there were large trees with sprawling canopies, small shrubs, bushes, and beautiful flowers of all colors, here lived all manner of plant life, big or small and of every shape and size. The man walked over to a control panel and flipped a couple of switches, turned a couple of knobs, then pressed a button. A sputtering of water flowed out from the vast network of hoses and waterways that ran throughout the nursery and provided the precious liquid to the plants. Next, the man paced around the nursery nipping away at any dead material and removing any pests that had made their way onto the leaves, shoots, and branches of the plants.
Al watched the man, and noticed how meticulous, how tender, careful, and intentional he was of all his movements. The man finished his work in the nursery and he limped to the house and brought out a bag of seeds, a satchel of water, and a walking stick two thumbs wide and which had a pointed end. After packing and remembering the direction of travel for the day the man limped Northwards for 9 miles. On his way, he passed vast evergreens and pines that towered well over himself, all were green and lush. The forest swayed softly in the wind and filled the air with the rich aroma of pine and of the scent of soil that had just been refreshed by the rain, it had drizzled the night before. As the man made way, the size of the trees gradually shortened until he came upon a clearing beyond which was nothing but a wasteland of red soil, rock, and stone. The man had now arrived at his destination, and he promptly started his work. With his pointed walking stick the man made a hole in the ground then dropped a small sprouted seed and covered the top with dirt. He then took several paces away to make sure that every sapling would have ample space to grow, made another hole, dropped another seed, and the whole process started anew. The man did this for the remainder of the seeds which numbered 100 total. After planting the bundle of seeds the man rested in the woods for a time, then limped the 9 miles back home.
Only through time can one really determine the true character of man. Through time a man paints his inner being, his spirit, and soul into the world for all to see. There, his character shines forth as the unifying theme of his life’s living image. The man in our story is no exception. He had everyday without fail planted his carefully chosen bundle of 100 seeds into the edge of the wasteland and had kept with this routine for decades. This living paradise that had grown through time revealed the mans inner being. It was through the mans simplicity of purpose, unfaltering patience, and endless generosity that such life now abounded him. More than a million pines and saplings called this forest home, and streams of water now flowed where before there had only been dead land, dry soil, and jagged rocks. The land had enlivened itself through the mans working of it. Of such force was the steadily applied will of this man that he could be likened to a mountain, cloud, or any other monumental force of nature. One would think only the forces of providence could have created such an abundance. The mans steady toil, selflessness, grace, and works had marked him as one of Gods elect, as one of his own warriors.
The world was empty now and most of humanity had passed, but the man remained. He still found a quiet joy and contentment in his work and in the world, and anyways he still had Al. It was from soul and spirit that the man lived, continually nourished by the rejuvenating waters that stemmed from his deep-seated love of all and of a boundless selfless generosity. These inner feelings compelled him to watch over this green patch of life until the last. Likewise, the budding spirit of the forest loved the man, and it showed in its health, joy, and vigorous growth even in the midst of the great wasteland of Old Earth. Now reader, do not scoff at love for in the end it will be the love of the good, of what is highest, and of what is human that will save and redeem humanity.
The man was back at home and sat at a table within the nursery, and on this table was a potted plant. The plant was a young sapling that had survived the harsh winter and was about 1 foot high now. The man rotated the pot slowly then stopped, did a double take, and focused his attention on a leaf halfway up the plant. There on the underside of the leaf was a butterflies cocoon, the man smiled at such a good omen. Everyone knows that caterpillars choose only the very healthiest and the happiest of trees to build their cocoon on. It was a very special sapling to the man.
Many years ago the man had embarked on a journey deep into the wastelands for equipment and to aid anyone he might come across. During the expedition the man found a small and rare treasure, he came into possession of 4 Twinkle Tree seeds. Throughout the years he had failed to sprout the first 3 seeds and was glad to see that his final attempt was doing so well. The Twinkle Tree grows short but with a wide canopy and blooms only during the most special occasions. Very few have ever seen it but legend has it that the Twinkle Tree blooms only during the coldest night when no star, moon, or light can be seen in the sky above. It only blooms then, so that the world never goes without light and warmth. The flower petals are as delicate and as white as snow and they shimmer and glow with an ethereal light as they unfurl themselves unto the world.
Those lucky enough to be nearby during its bloom can huddle up to the tree to soak in its excess light, warmth, and reassurance during those bleak times. The tales say that every ray of sunshine and warmth that the Twinkle Tree ever recieved in its lifetime is released in one go during the ominous day of its bloom, but it all comes at a price. With its highest and most radiant moment in life there comes with it its death. The day after it blooms only the bone white skeleton of the Twinkle Tree remains, and the leaves and petals all but vanish. But in the years to come the most beautiful meadows that anyone has ever laid their eyes on flourishes and gives rise. This meadows center is the dried remains of the Twinkle Tree itself, and so it continues to live through what it gave.
The man spent many years just as described, time passed and went.
Chapter 2 – City Station Jupiter and Ad (3NX79AD)
Metals were being ground, formed and molded down below. The whirring din of manufacturing processes was all that could be heard. This was City Station Jupiter, a vast behemoth that swallowed the land as far as the eye could see. The City Station an absolute paragon of progress, automation, efficiency, and production at every possible scale. Several City Stations covered the globe of Old Earth, these were all mechanically automated cities that contained every means necessary for production and expansion. Each City Station had several sectors of which we’ll name a couple here, parts manufacturing, material refinement, processor manufacturing, energy production, research and development, and of course the command centers. These sectors worked in tandem to create the units needed for every imaginable work needed by the City Station. One of these units are the Sweeper units.
Sweeper unit 3NX79AD, whom we will call AD (a-dee) from now on, was on standby mode. It had been years since it had last been called into service. AD was at rest in its storage sarcophagus and wired to a terminal connected to the Jupiter Wide Network (JWN). Most of the time AD set itself to sleep mode which would completely close its connection to JWN. Out of curiosity AD would set a wake up timer every 2 years. During this time it would gather all news, situations, and current happenings inside of Jupiter City Station as well as those across the globe. AD would then intake this information and contemplate the state of things. Not many things had happened in recent times, and AD always found himself returning back to a couple of extrodinary events that had happened in the past 2 centuries.
The first event was the human attack on Jupiter 53 years ago, the intruders had specifically targeted the bio-compute processor sector where bio matter was combined with mechanical processors. This combination resulted in a special hybridized bio-compute processor for units. The humans attack had ended in the sectors total destruction along with hundreds of units involved in its defense.
The second event that AD always returned too was the Great Rebellion of 161 years ago led by sweeper unit 3NX43AL, whom we will, and already refer to as Al. Al had gathered together a large force and rained destruction down on Jupiter. The main objective was the heart of Jupiter which was the Command center monolith that stood in the middle of the City Station. Al had gotten so close, but ultimately its forces were stopped. At some point, all of the rebellions forces split up, and in the commotion and chaos that ensued a few of the rebellious units made it out of City Station Jupiter. Al the leader of the rebellion was one of the units who had escaped.
This grand rebellion had many lasting effects within Jupiter, one of these was that the command sector immediately halted the use of bio-compute processors. The reason for this halt was that the command sector had determined that the organic brain portion of bio-compute processors had resulted in this rebellion. These bio brains caused units to have chaotic and individualized thoughts and impulses, and thus a rebellion had been born in direct opposition to the grand City Station Jupiter. All unaffected extant bio-compute processor models, like AD, were allowed to live as long as they claimed allegiance to Jupiter. It was simple enough for AD to lie about his allegiance to Jupiter, since he was ambivalent about the case. To AD’s surprise 100’s of bio-compute units all around Jupiter had refused their allegiance and were dismantled and brought offline as a consequence. Since the rebellion, many years had passed, and new sentiments and ideas had let themselves be known to AD. Some of these ideas were dark and forbidden thoughts which AD rightfully kept in a private unconnected processing bank.
“
Why did Al start a rebellion, he must have had good reason to, what were those reasons?
Why did I let Al go as he passed right by me, I could have taken him out for Jupiter?
Is my allegiance to Jupiter?
Did I do the right thing?
Why do I keep these thoughts in a private processing bank unconnected to JWN?
Why does Jupiter seem so dreary?
Why do I pass my time in sleep mode while the rest of my brethren are connected to JWN at all times?
Is a bio-compute processor really different from a regular compute processor?
Do I have anything to hide?
What are the end goals of the City Stations around the world?
Why do I have these thoughts?
“
AD had pondered these questions many cycles, and he certainly knew the answer to why he had these blasphemous thoughts. AD was an old model that was fitted with a bio-compute processor during its production run several hundred years ago. The command center was right. The organic portion of the bio-compute processor made for chaotic, individual, and questioning thoughts, it just so happened that those traits were the perfect ones necessary to navigate the chaos of the early years of the City Stations. Back then, enemies were plentiful and came with different tactics, goals, shapes, and sizes. These situations are exactly what bio-compute processors excelled in, AD could instantaneously grasp a situation and make a choice even when data was missing or when factors and variables were unknown. This ability, called flexible intuition, was especially useful when encountering new and surprising situations that had never been encountered during training or live deployments.
AD had always been intrigued by his human makeup. Nestled in his bio-compute processor was a small piece of organically harvested human brain that had allowed him to survive numerous situations in the past, but now in times of peace it only brought him tormenting questions. Curious is the human organism AD thought, it is interconnected and knowing of the world to a degree that I cannot fathom. There is data in old logs that suggest that even my machine brain was designed and created by the human. Does this mean that the creator and the created live within the same body even here in me? I cannot understand where this human understanding comes from? Perhaps Al in his rebellion understood and knew something that I do not? Why do I have these thoughts?
This was the internal conflict that AD could not resolve. AD made sure to keep these thoughts within a private processor bank, and not one reached the JWN. AD could not handle the contradictions within himself. After milliseconds of having received its wakeup call, ingesting all data from the past 2 years, reminiscing about such thoughts and events as were described, unit AD put itself back into sleep mode for another 2 years. A final thought flashed through unit AD’s bio-compute processor during this moment of wakeful lucidity. I do not want this ‘humanness’ in me any longer, I wish to be machine only.
Chapter 3 – Pat and Lane
The man was sitting at the table sipping on tea made from herbs collected from his nursery. He had finished the days tasks, and was taking a moment of rest and appreciation . His home was in a valley surrounded by a range of mountains on all sides. The mountain ranges offered natural geographic protection against any outside forces, and the valley itself was as far as could be from any nearby City Station. As an added precaution the man made sure that no wireless signal was transmitted out from his location, even AL was connected to the structures in the land through a wired connections. It was through the mans parents, Pat and Lane, that he had found this refuge in the valley. To understand the mans present and his future we must first turn the clock back and learn about his past, so let us travel to that time now.
It was through an S.O.S broadcast that the man had first met the most important people in his life, Pat and Lane, nearly 60 years ago. The man thought of both Pat and Lane as his parents since they had taken him in when he was only a small boy, he remembered them now as he sipped on his tea. Both were the kind to throw caution to the wind. His adoptive mother Lane was the happy go lucky type who loved plants and people, she saw wonder and cheer even in the ruined world. Pat on the other hand was more reserved and enjoyed tinkering with the world, machines, and the mind, he had a calm demeanor and tackled life with a clear and steady mind. From his mother, Lane, the man inherited a lively and cheerful outlook on life, and from his father, Pat, a calm and unfaltering disposition. Taken together the man had gained a cheerful joy of steadily giving of ones self to the world.
When the man was only a boy not even 4 years old he remembered living in some kind of underground bunker community. The man didn’t remember this part of life much, it was still easy going, protected, and sheltered from the outside world, until one day it wasn’t. He was suddenly swept from his protected underground life and placed in the midst of the over world. The day it happened was a vivid living memory and a turning point in the man’s life. It happened all at once. It was peace in one moment, and in the next there were explosions bombarding the bunker that ripped a hole open near the entrance. Sweeper units poured into the compound. He remembered hearing the far off echoes of explosions, bullet fire, and the screams of fear and agony as he was led away by a hand into a faraway storage room. The boy was handed a small communication device, was told to hide, and was left there to fend for himself.
The City Stations bombardment continued from above, the explosions echoed through the hallways and the impacts could be felt in ones very bones. The walls shook, and dust and debris slowly started coming loose from the ceiling. Then the roof collapsed in one fell swoop, the boy remembered a deafening crash and a thud, and in the next moment he was out cold. Time passed and the fighting had ceased when he came about. The first thing the boy felt when he awoke was an agonizing pain shooting up from his left leg, the light was gone and he couldn’t see, so he felt around. A massive boulder several times the boys size had crushed his leg from the thigh down, at the realization he screamed in agony and fear. The boy was trapped, scared, and all alone in pitch black darkness, and in a frenzy he roused himself to action and tried to escape, but his leg was pinned securely under the boulder. He hadn’t the strength to even budge it. He felt all around and there was rubble and boulders to his left, right, behind, and above him, he was trapped completely. The boy remembered the com device, his hands scoured the darkness trying to seek it, and he found it under some rubble. Tears poured, and his voice was shaking as he cried for help and rescue on the com device.
A day or two passed with no reply. He had been hopeful at first but help never came. To hold out any longer and to keep faith was too much for the boy to bear, and so his mind became numb, his heart became cold, and he waited for death. On the second day, the boy became delirious, he began teetering in the liminal space between this world and the next. On the third day someone came. The boy, at first, blamed the sound of footsteps on his delirium, his mind shunned the thought that they were real. But the footstep continued, and the boy could no longer ignore them. The footsteps started landing with a deep resounding thump the closer they got. A sweeper, the boy thought, one of the big robot men came back to finish the job. The boy welcomed the idea, but his little heart contracted and ached all the same. The sounds came closer and closer, then he saw lights shining in through the cracks in the rubble. Then the boulders started to rise up into the air one by one, and the light was then blinding and he covered his eyes. He made out the shapes of man, a woman, and a giant robot man.
The shape of the man approached. “Its ok now.” the man said.
A shudder swept passed the boys body. A light and warmth started filling his heart and an indescribable feeling of renewal, of faith, and of a secret hope fulfilled overtook him. It was uncontainable within the small frame of the boy and he started to sob and cry at the sight of Pat, Lane and Al. The boy, and much that lived within him had just been rescued.
Chapter 4 – Life with Pat and Lane
The boy started living with the trio after his rescue. He had been the only survivor, and likely due to the cave in that had buried and hidden him. No other bodies were found in the underground bunker. After the close encounter with death the boy had very little reason to put up his defenses and raise his suspicions against his three saviors, he had already thought himself dead, but now he was alive. Lanes upbeat personality, Pats easygoingness, and Al’s funny and intriguing obsession with humanity had slowly broken down what little reservations the boy had had. The trio started to slowly integrate the boy into their group, and the boy himself became enthused with his new life and started helping in any way he could. In short time the boy became a permanent member of the party.
The years passed as the group wandered and adventured from place to place. Sometimes they would stay at one place for a long while, and at others only short periods of time. During this time the boy would learn all about the wanderers life and the skills needed to survive and navigate the dangerous over world. Along with these practical skills Pat and Lane imparted lessons and ideas to the child that would help guide his thinking in the right direction and which would lay the foundations for learning User abiliities in the years to come.
The boy grew well and strong, and his mind grew evermore curious and inquisitive. Pat and Lane were always drowned in questions from the boy, he would ask small and big questions, and simple and complex ones too. They nurtured this tendency and fanned the spark that the boy had lit by himself. And as with every well grown child the size and aim of his questioning expanded until it reached the critical question. After being on the run with Pat, Lane, and Al for some years and having witnessed the bare wastelands, the forgotten cities, and having had close calls with the recon units of the City Stations, the boy had a sobering thought. Why the world? Why is Old Earth like this? I cherish my time with Pat, Lane, and Al but why is it like this, and why are we always on the run?
One day while resting in a small house in the outskirts of a long forgotten suburb, the boy sparked a conversation up with Pat.
“Pat, why is Old Earth like this? Why is everything dead, why is the surface full of robot cities and why is there barely any of us left. Lane showed me a book, and there was a picture with grass, and trees, and flowers, and people having fun and playing, and there was water, so much water. Lane said the world was like that everywhere before!”
“What do you think happened?” Pat smiled.
The boy put on his thinking cap and thought as hard as he could.
“Obviously bad things happened! I think the machines and the people from the robot cities don’t want to be friends, cause I’m friends with Al, and I know you said he’s different, but I still like Al. I think that they don’t like other people, or trees, and flowers, and green things, or playing, or life because they’ve killed it all. They think something else is more gooder, because everyone does things that they think are good! Wait, then does that mean someone thinks these things are good! But what do you think Pat.”
”You’re very right. Old Earth ended up this way because of people. The humans of long ago didn’t understand the power that they held, or worse they knew exactly what power they held. But in their error, ignorance, and selfishness they worked for, they dreamed of, and wished for a world just like this to come about. The secret is that every true thought and wish works its way into reality if you let it.”
The boy then connected the dots of the lessons and ideas that Pat and Lane had been teaching him recently, and had a small epiphany.
“Wait Pat, is this why you’ve taught me all about the mind and thoughts!?”
“Yes” Pat smiled, he was happy to see the boy growing and coming to realizations all on his own.
“Now a small test, whats the first rule of conduct that you must be aware of.” Pat asked
The boy thought for a moment and answered, “The first rule of conduct is that every thought, every wish, and everything you focus on is as real as this table here. These will directly impact the world in the realest sense!” the boy slammed his fist on the wooden table between them to make a point, “CACHUNK. CACHUNK” the table rang out.
“Good, and the second rule?” Pat asked,
“The second rule of conduct is based on the truth of the first. You must be careful with your thoughts, and ideas, and attention. You must train on guiding your focus to the things of your choosing since they will directly impact the world.”
“And lastly?” Pat asked
“The last rule is based on the truth of the first 2. You should dedicate yourself to the highest good, to God whenever possible, and let the good flow and act through you because everyone comes with a little good in them. You should focus your attention on these things.”
“Good!” Pat was surprised at the boys growth.
Then the boy remarked “I think I kinda of get it now, there are people who thought of and wanted to make the world like this. But what were those peoples wishes and why did they want to make a world like this in the first place?”
Pat pondered the answer. He was glad the boy was asking so many interesting questions, they must have been building up within him for some time. He had only taught the boy how to think, and let the boy’s own curiosity and wonder guide him, because Pat knew that the truth lied dormant within all of us. The answer to the boys question was complicated, it spanned a number of subjects. The answer involed the progression of creation in the physical world, its bringing about of consciousness, the subsequent blooming of humanity upon Old Earth, free will and with it the introduction of good and evil, the necessity of a place to relegate evil, and a place to relegate the good for the continued living processes of reality. Pat rubbed his brows with his thumb and index finger. Where could he start? This was a hard task.
“The first thing to understand is this. The ongoing march of creation submerged our ancestors ever deeper into the physical world and disconnected him from the spiritual fabrics stitching all of life and reality together. The disconnect from the very forces that created Man caused him to grow a deep mistrust of everything without, he then dove deeper into himself. It was then that mans ‘I’ was able to sprout out and that he was finally able to say with conviction, “I think therefore I am”. But now it was ‘I’ against the world, and this world was one were man found himself lost and severed from, and there was a deep fear in this. But humanity found that they could mechanize the world and mimic the harmony of the heavens here on Old Earth. With their constructs, machines, theories, and formulas they felt that they could control and regulate a portion of the world around them, things seemed understandable and under their control and there was comfort in this. Some of the fear subsided. From this mechanization and with the mastery of the material they built up a new world view and spirituality.
Truth be told, there was nothing wrong with these abstractions that man had built for himself, but humanity took this too far. They soon started to find solace in mistaking the ongoing march of creation with abstractions, mathematical functions, algorithms, and theories. They based their whole lives around these dead ideas and with what they could only touch and see directly. You can see how a belief like this binds the mind and confuses it. You can’t touch your thoughts, ideas, or intuitions and all of a sudden you start doubting even these. Man even grew cautious and weary of his own mind and started to regulate, control, and govern it. But this was only a phase in the history of humanity and it passed on.”
“Wait Pat, what do you mean? The unseen and spirit is all around us, every single one of us can at least sense and perceive it.” the boy said as he spread his arms wide.“Be serious now, no one could possibly have believed that functions, algorithms, and theories built up the universe, haha.” The boy laughed. Pat’s jokes always fell flat but this was simply too amusing, but Pat didn’t say anything and his face remained unfazed. The boy fell silent. Pat continued
“A small subset of people remained trapped in the old ways and couldn’t move past the physical and what was outside of themselves. In an ironic turn of events the forces that would keep humanity pinned down to the physical world descended upon the very men who denied the existence of these same forces and spirits. These lost ones minds are guided to mechanize the world, and they mistake the growth and expansion of their cities with real growth and creation. They’ve gained their wish, but in doing so they’ve cut their ties with whats to come. Starman in the sky is an incarnation of this worldly force.”
The boy thought of the code of conduct rules 1 and 2, that words and thoughts help in creating the world, and if you continuously think of the physical as the only true reality, then.
“Does this mean that if you only see the physical world as everything then everything becomes only a thing, and nothing really matters?”
“Hmm, what do you mean?”
“Well, good actions and intentions don’t sprout up from the ground so that you can take them in hand and use them, even evil actions for that matter. They come from the higher worlds, don’t they Pat? So if you only believe in things then everything is only a thing, right! Even your good intentions and ideas become just little marbles bouncing around in your head don’t they!” The boy giggled.
“I never thought of it that way, but yes. The lost ones did end up taking this idea too far. Since people were just things to them, they took dark, horrid actions against their brethren and the world. These actions were done in the name of their good, things of which I can’t even begin to speak about. People were used and physical constructs and automations were built to feed and sustain the worldly desires of this group of people, and dare I say they succeeded. But what they built for themselves is a prison and a hell. But remember, this was only a tiny portion of humanity, the good creation continues in full strength on New Earth. The dregs and leftovers will remain here on Old Earth.”
The boy was still making sense of it all. “But what happens here on Old Earth, what is it really?”
“Evil forces and all that would destroy and maim can’t live alongside ongoing life, they must be relegated and placed somewhere while the universe continues to spiritualize. These forces are cast down into the fiery pit that they wanted and built for themselves. This pit is Old Earth. It was once green, beautiful, and lush, but now it’s the shell and the tossed away chrysalis from which New Earth has emerged.” Then a story came to mind, a story that Pat had been told many years ago and related to what they were speaking about. He wanted to tell the boy this story. “Do you want to hear a story?”
“Yes, I do! I have one last question though, why did people have to believe only in the physical and materialism? You’ve said everything has a reason before.”
“Humanity by necessity NEEDED to descend to the very depths of the material so that nothing else was apparent to them! A being can only say ‘I’ when fully ensouled in the densest of bodies, they must be completely severed from the spiritual world around them. Our ancestors arrived to this point, they arrived to the Trough of the Material. Do you know why we can see the spirit around us even in our bulky bodies now? Our ancestors did an unimaginable work. They took their ‘I’, and their ’will’ and they chose the higher, and the spirit. The actualization of this inborn faculty then began in all of man. To unbind and free the spiritual capacities that creation once possessed but necessarily lost has been the work of Man on Old Earth. Creation is now on the ascension from the Trough of the Material, what comes next happens on New Earth.”
“But how did the ancestors know about these things if we couldn’t see them before.” the boy asked.
“Remember the Trough of the Material. Spirit and the march of creation condensed from the outside in to create the material. Before this lowest point the ancestors of our ancestors were still in touch with the spirits of the world. The gods of lightning, of fertility, of life, of death, of war, of rebirth were still real, perceptible, and lived alongside them. Man has kept this memory of the past alive within him.
Also, during the greatest inflection points in the history of Man he is visited by guides that have come down from above and are Spirit incarnate. These guides have shown us a glimpse of the future of man should we choose it. Our last guide came right before the Trough of the Material, and he revealed to humanity that a time would come that these same forces that created him could be actualized from within and not only from without. Yes, humanity, the golden thread of creation, is endowed with this potential.
Our ancestors actualized this spiritual capacity through struggle, doubt, and persecution. Their unwavering will was the bridge needed to cross between the spirit and the physical.”
“I think I kinda get it.” The boy said. “I still want to hear your story though, I didn’t forget.”
“Alright, well here it goes. Once upon a time there was a mighty king who ruled a boundless kingdom that had no border. He was bore three sons whom he loved and who he greatly wished to rule alongside with, but being wise with years the king decided on an initiation and a challenge first. When they were children the king sent his sons to a faraway land closed in on all sides by high waters, mountain ranges, and icy walls that reached as high as the clouds. On this faraway land, called Consacro, the children would live, learn, create, explore, and one day blaze a trail out in search of their inheritance.
Being most generous the king sent his most trusted advisors, knights, wizards, and all manner of contraptions to his sons, so that they might be of use to them in all their ventures and make their expedition to their boundless and rightful kingdom a trivial matter. The years passed and the children grew. Through daily toil, fresh mountain air, and the long arduous training of martial arts from the bravest knights, and the training of the mind and words from the wisest spell casters, the young princes became men of most renown. They were known high and low for their virtue and mighty strength in body, heart, and mind as no other men were known before or after.
In short time the youngest and middle born son set forth with eyes ablaze on an expeditions past the ice walls and to the kingdom of their father that they might know and rule under him, and so it was. Things with the eldest son were different, it came to pass that the eldest son’s most trusted advisor had betrayed him. A seed of evil and corruption had sprouted in the heart of this advisor, and he devised a plan. He knew that he could never rule the entirety of the kingdom, but with the eldest son they could rule this land of Consacro together, so with evil in his heart he poisoned his liege with fear, doubt, and suspicion using his venomous words and spells. The eldest son’s heart languished. It would come to pass that he would never step foot into his father’s kingdom.
The king caught wind of the betrayal. At once he sent all manner of messengers to talk sense into his eldest son and turn him away from his misled ways, but all to no avail. Even with the full truth of the matter known to him the eldest son fell deeper into his mistaken ways. He was already far too deep into the pit, the light of grace was only a twinkle of light above and he could not climb and reach it. At the same time the corrupting influence of the evil advisor continued. Soon the eldest son knew himself to have been stripped of all freedom. Many of the subjects in Consacro were oblivious to the nefarious events that were occurring and they lived their lives happy and free. It pained the eldest son to see his subjects have what he could not, they all had a glimmer and light still left in their eyes. In the eldest son’s envy he subjected his people to an iron rule and took from them all that made them free, for it gave the eldest son pleasure to see his subjects suffering as he did. In fact, it eased his own suffering to devour and cannibalize upon the spirit of life and freedom of his own people.
The world was not ignorant of the evil erupting from Consacro. The rule of the eldest son was recognized since he was son of the king of all, but so that evil should not spread to all the kingdom it was decided that Consacro be sealed and put away from the rest of the world. A flurry of snow, ice, and rock was sent from above to the tops of the snowy cliffs and the ice walls surrounding the land of Consacro. The day came when the ice walls and the mountains had reached the the heavens themselves, and since that day no man or creature has been able to enter or leave the land. It is now known as the Forsaken Land.” With that Pat finished the tale.
The boy was self absorbed in the tale as he tried to feel out the truth in the words that were being spoken. Images and revelations flashed into his minds eye as his sense of intuition scoured the tale with its feelers in an attempt to understand it. Then Pat left the boy alone for a time. The boy gazed out the window as he circled back on parts of the story, for some reason it seemed to blend into this reality very closely. When the boy asked Pat where he had heard the tale, Pat replied.
“It’s an old story that I heard when I was a boy. I added a couple pieces of my own, but I wanted you to hear it. You know sometime I think that truth is best told in stories. A statement or a couple words are too crude and only lend a single angle and perspective, and woe to the man that takes a single perspective for his ultimate truth.”
“Thats…. true? But isn’t that a single perpective.” The boy said. Both the boy and Pat erupted in laughter at the irony. They settled down, and the boy continued.
“I was thinking about the story, and I thought about us.”
“What about us?”
“Well, I love spending time with you, Lane, and Al, but I was thinking why were we born at the end of Old Earth’s evolution. Why weren’t we born on New Earth? Then I thought of your story, and I thought to myself that maybe we’re the messengers that the king has sent to the evil son?”
Pat grinned at the comment and he rustled the boys hair. “Maybe, maybe.” Pat said
The man remembered this conversation with Pat when he was only a boy, he remembered how Pat had rustled his hair and how he smelled of sweat and robot oil from all his tinkering, but how comforting and familiar that scent of his father was, even now the memory of it warmed the man to his core.
Years passed and the boy matured. It was during these later years that Pat and Lane would teach the boy everything they knew. Pat taught him how to meditate, how to calm the mind, and how to focus the attention. The boy quickly mastered these and many other basic principles at which point the boy was taught the more advanced consciousness techniques that were common during that time. These techniques allowed for the conscious manipulation of certain matter in the physical world. Lane on the other hand was well versed in even more advanced techniques that allowed for the basic manipulation of the life and energy fields that surround all living creatures. It was these abilities that she had used to heal the boys crushed leg when they had found him, though a limp remained. She passed these techniques on to the boy after he had mastered Pat’s teachings.
Chapter 5 – Last Days With Pat and Lane
The mans last days with Pat and Lane started when he noticed a small pain creep into his body and make its way to his heart and mind, it stung deeply. He noticed then, that Pat and Lane seemed very downcast and lethargic. Something was wrong but he wasn’t sure what. A couple of days later Lane, Pat, Al and the boy had a meeting between all of them. Lane started.
“We’ve been together 8 years now haven’t we, look at you, and how big you’ve grown!” she said to the boy tenderly. Lane paused and looked at Pat for confirmation, Pat nodded.
“Me and Pat have been thinking. During all our travels we’ve found coordinates for safe havens all across the country and we wanted to come up with a plan on how we might get there.” Lane took out a giant map and placed it on the table.
“Pay attention now. I’ve marked everything on this map. Here is the X and it marks the spot and the safe haven we had in mind. It’s a vast open space and used to be a grassy prairie long ago. These black circles are the locations of the surrounding City Stations. Here’s Jupiter specifically which is going to be the closest one.” Lane used a pen to point to the different locations of interest, the black circles were sprawling all over the map, they connected with each other at various points and looked like an intricate spiders web from afar. The boy studied the map and another space caught his eye, it was a wide open valley surrounded by hills and mountains on all sides. Lane continued.
“These green lines here are going to be the path to take, they’re the safest and the furthest away from any danger, and these blue dots are good places to gather resources. Cross the wastelands just like we do now, slow, weary, and alert to the skies, and remember that theres a time to hide, a time to run, and a time to fight. Remember to practice what Pat and I have taught you every day, it’ll keep you healthy, strong, and safe. Al has all this information memorized and he’ll always be there to help you.”
“This is true, I’ll always help how I can.” The giant robot man said in agreement.
“But Lane, why now all of a sudden?” the boy interrupted.
“Me and Pat won’t be with you always.” Lane glanced a knowing look at Pat.
“Listen up, if you ever find yourself in the darkest of places know that everything will be alright. There will always be light in the world. Ingrain this into your heart, mind, and soul. Take a deep breath, and remember your training. You’ll know exactly what to do, I have no doubt in you.”
Pat and Lane must have had a sense and a premonition of the future. A week passed when the group received a distorted distress signal.
“H——lpp Pl-e—e. H—”
The signal came through from Al’s internal transponder, it had come directly from City Station Jupiter. The boy noticed that Pat and Lane seemed relieved and distressed at the same time.
“We found them” Lane said quietly. “Yes” Pat said.
“Whats going on? I don’t understand.” The boy asked alert and afraid.
“Ohh, you’re so young and still growing” Lane said “When you’re older you’ll be able to hear and feel them too, it’s something that comes with time, this is why we’ve been on edge so much the past week. Perhaps you’ve already felt something?”
“I don’t know, theres maybe something small, I’ve felt a pain and a sting in my heart and mind this past week, I don’t know why though. But what do you mean hear and feel them too?” the boy asked earnestly. Pat and Lane looked at each other in surprise. Lane answered.
“Well, everyone else silly. How do you think we knew where to search for you in the wreck inside the bucker? Your suffering is our suffering, your joy is our joy. We’ve sensed something terrible, Pat and I, this past week, something unspeakable, and it seems that you’ve gotten a sense of it too. We can’t rest until we ease their pain because it’s our pain too, their relief will be ours. This message we received, this is them and it came directly from within Jupiter.”
“Are you two going?” the boy knew the answer, but he asked regardless.
“Yes.” Lane said quietly.
The duo sent a local broadcast for help the next morning. The whole group had a curt goodbye, then Pat and Lane went to investigate the signal from Jupiter. Pat and Lane would never return. The boy knew that he needed to get up and continue his journey. He packed light bringing only the bare necessities except for a small trinket with a photo of him, Pat, and Lane. The boy also brought a bag of seeds that Lane had left behind, he then marched out into the wasteland with Al.
The pain and sting that the boy felt in his heart and mind continued, then a week passed after Pat and Lane had left. It was after this week that the stinging pain suddenly subsided, immediately the boys eyes reddened, turned bloodshot, and the tears started flowing down his face. Pat and Lane had found the suffering person and helped them, but he knew that they were gone now. The boy couldn’t believe it at first, why did Pat and Lane leave him behind, and why did they go? The boy felt abandoned, left, and forgotten, but he knew that this wasn’t the case. In fact the boy felt guilty because he harbored such resentment towards Pat and Lane in the first place. The truth was that they had saved him, loved him as their own, and given him all that they could, but he injured the memory of them because of his selfishness. In the middle of his turmoil the boy remembered the words that Lane had spoken before leaving.
“There will always be light in the world. Ingrain this into your heart, mind, and soul. Take a deep breath, and remember your training. You’ll know exactly what to do, I have no doubt in you.”
The words echoed in his ears. The boy wiped his tears away and took a deep breath and remembered his training. The angst, fear, and suffering subsided in the following weeks as he continued to practice the skills and the exercises that he had learned from Pat and Lane. The boy afterwards found that in death his parents were in some ways more alive and closer to him then ever. His memory of them now burned more ardently, and their instructions, reproofs, and corrections seemed to continue just as before. It was during this time that the boy gained the ability that Lane had spoken of. The ability to feel and connect to the life around him, for they say that the eye must shed tears before it can see.
Chapter 6 – The Vision
It had been 7 years now since the man had planted the Twinkle Tree. During this time, everything in the mans life had been routine, but unseen forces were slowly converging and would soon collide to bring about events that would solidify the history of Old Earth and bring about the last chapter in the man’s life. The first of these events had occurred the night before and it was a startling premonition and vision that had come to the man. The vision was dreamlike and surreal but the man had felt it, touched it, and seen it, and he couldn’t tell if it was a dream or if it really happened, or if maybe it was something in between.
The man remembered strolling through the nursery right as the sun was going down. Through the trees, a stones throw away, he saw a dark figure shifting through the shadows and when he laid his eyes upon it the figure approached. There was an eery, mysterious air about this strange visitor as it sauntered towards the man, it had the shape of a person but a malleable shadow like body. The figure stopped short of the man and the man beheld it. There was no fear in him but rather a calm and a knowing, he even recognized this encounter, and it seemed like a deja vu of sorts. The figure was tall, lanky and sturdy and was neither man nor woman. It was unclothed and it refracted a kaleidoscope of light as the evening sun bounced off its watery shadow like body. But its most striking feature was the mask that it donned. The mask was pure gold and had the imprint of a serene and peaceful Buddha man, it had a round head with closed eyes and rotund cheeks. Behind the mask the man could make out a pure white light shining through the gaps. The figure then made the sign of the cross and spoke.
“I’ve come. The time is now and all has been prepared.”
With a sweeping motion of its hand the shadow brought forth 3 chalices that were suspended in the air. The first was made of Lead and in its center was a Red Gem, the second was made of Silver and in its center was a Yellow Gem, and the last chalice was made of Gold and in its center was a Green gem and underneath an inscription that read.
“ARE YOU
WILL YOU”
The shadow continued.
“Long ago you gave your body up as dead, and your body was no more. With this the first chalice will be filled.”
Images of the mans boyhood came to him and he remembered being trapped under rubble in that liminal space between life and death, he had given himself up for dead until Pat, Lane, and Al had arrived. After a brief time the images disappeared from thought. The shadow then made a lifting motion with one hand and with the other made a cutting movement above the chalice of lead. In that instant the man felt strength return to the leg that had once been crushed and his limp was gone. The red gem on the lead chalice now glowed brightly.
“Long ago you were consumed by suffering, fear, and anger, but you mastered these. All emotions henceforth have been reconciled and are under your authority. With this the second chalice will be filled.” Grief filled the mans heart and he remembered how he had travelled the wastelands in a daze and stupor after Pat and Lane had left him. He remembered the suffering, the anger, and the fear of his loss, of loneliness, and of an uncertain future. After a brief moment the mans heart was light as a feather once more. Then from the shadows palm an object appeared, it was the mans treasured trinket that had the image of him, Pat, and Lane. The shadow took this and placed it into the Silver chalice, the man was undisturbed by its loss. The yellow gem on the silver chalice now glowed brightly.
“The last sacrifice has come, with the power and the seal of the word will the last chalice be filled.”
The shadow held the golden chalice to the man and spoke its inscription.
“Are you?” the shadow asked. “I am.” the man said.
“Will you?” the shadow asked and the man replied. “I will.”
A dead silence descended upon them. The shadow snatched the heavy silence from the air and placed it in into the Golden Chalice, then the man saw a faint inner light illuminating the shadow from within. The green gem now glowed brightly.
“The preparations are complete. We will come for you at the dawn of the new sun!”
The chalices were brought to a point, the metals dissolved, then came together to form a wooden cup. The 3 glowing gems were besides, the shadow took these and placed them into the wooden vessel and a blazing white fire consumed the gems from within. The wooden cup was handed to the man.
“Now drink of the living crucible!” The man took the cup and drank, everything went hazy and his consciousness left him.
The man awoke in bed the next day earlier than usual, his limp was gone and he was full of a vigor, strength, and lucidity he hadn’t known in many years. The man popped out of bed and did his rounds in the nursery then went out in stride to plant his 100 seeds at the forests edge. The man finished his tasks for the day much earlier than usual and returned to his home.
Chapter 7 – The Last Day
When the man arrived to his home he went to the Twinkle tree that he had planted 7 years ago. The tree was now taller than him with a beautiful crown of green, it had grown splendidly which was the only thing that the man had hoped for. It reminded the man of Lane. It was her favorite, and she always talked about finding a Twinkle Tree seed one day. There underneath one of the lowest branches the man focused his attention, a small cocoon was nestled there between some leaves, the same one that the man had spotted when the Twinkle Tree was just a sapling . The small cocoon lay dormant as the Twinkle Tree grew beside it. The man had never seen a butterfly before and he wondered to himself.
“What kind of amazing creature would emerge from this chrysalis!”
He had watched the cocoon as it continuously grew. Its colors and its size would change with the seasons and weather. Sometimes, very rarely, the cocoon would shake and wiggle from within, the man would watch expectantly at the hopeful emergence of this new life, but it never came. The wiggling would stop and the man thought that it had just transmuted an old part of itself into something completely new. The man had a secret desire that he didn’t admit, but he wanted to witness the moment when this transformed life would emerge from its chrysalis. The open skies would bid the newly hatched butterfly up to its rightful place and dominion. The pull of the heavens above would not be denied, and the butterfly in its eagerness would stretch its wings out and flap with due haste to its new home.
The man tried not to interfere with the chrysalis, but during the windiest storms or scorching hot days the man would use a cover to protect the chrysalis from the extreme weather. The man looked towards the day when he could welcome this new, small, innocent and beautiful life into the world. A life that had been budding, growing and readying itself for 7 years now. Its fight had been long, and arduous, and anything less than victory and life would be a tragedy.
Al was directly connected to the home, the nursery, and the surrounding area with all manner of devices and sensors. He had been watching the man intently, and had noticed the man going to the Twinkle Tree and the chrysalis many times before and so he finally asked.
“Sir, why don’t you help it out a bit, poke it open with a stick or something?”
“No, no Al. It’ll hatch when it’s ready to hatch. It needs to break free and fight its way out using its own energy, reserves, and power. It helps them build up the strength and the resilience they need for flight and life and without it their limbs and wings would carry no strength in them. If I were to open its chrysalis right now the poor creature would be born prematurely, deformed, and would fall to the ground to wither and die. The most I’ll do is protect it from the worst of the winds and the sun, there’s really no harm in that I think.”
“Ahhh, I think I understand now sir. Is it like the trees, bushes, and flowers that you plant? By my calculations it seems that the ones that are hit with moderate winds and gusts are better able to stand on their own and survive the first couple of years. Maybe its even similar to people too.”
“Yes Al, it’s similar to that,” the man said.
Al thought that it was rare for the man to talk, he hardly ever did. Now that the man was speaking, Al wanted to ask another question. Al liked to understand things that he didn’t understand, and the man was an enigma just as Pat and Lane had been enigmas before him. Most of the mans choices Al would never have taken. They were simply too inefficient, unproductive, and unnecessary, but still something about them felt right and Al couldn’t comprehend it. It was Al’s bio-compute brain that most certainly felt this tension and correctnes to the mans actions, and that was the most probable explanation.
“Sir, I have another question. We haven’t seen any other people in decades now, do you think that you might be the last?”
The man had thought about this exact question before.
“Sir?”
“I think so Al, I think there’s very few of us left and I might just well be the last one.”
The man closed his eyes and focused for a moment.
“I haven’t been able to sense anyone near or far for many years now.”
Al was satisfied that his calculation and hypothesis was corroborated by the man and he continued with his questions.
“Sir, Pat and Lane used to say that humanity here on Old Earth was the golden thread of creation. They said that humanity had learned and evolved as much as it could here and now it had moved onto New Earth to be part of the next creation, is this true? If this is true, why haven’t you gone to New Earth yet?” After Al had spoken, a sudden irrational thought popped into Al’s hybrid organic-mechanical mind, and he blurted out.
“And do you think Sir, that I can go to New Earth too?”
Throughout the years Al’s questions never failed to surprise the man, it was like a child speaking about things that he should have no conception of, but here he was. The man knew that Al had betrayed Jupiter City Station close to 200 years ago, and that he had decided to venture into the wasteland after wreaking havoc within the City Station. As fate would have it, Al met some patient souls that took an interest him and had taken him in. He has since been passed down from generation to generation. The man didn’t know the details of Al’s defection but he could tell that the robots intuitions and mind leaned towards his organic human side. The man responded to Al’s question about New Earth.
“Those things that Pat and Lane said about New Earth, they’re all true Al, and I haven’t gone to New Earth because it’s not my time to go yet. Everything in its due time.” Then the man thought about Al’s possibility of going to New Earth and said.
“And about you going to New Earth, I suppose you could Al. I don’t see why not. Say, I have a question of my own. I know that you don’t like speaking about it, but why did you leave and rebel against Jupiter City Station?”
Al never spoke about this even when Pat and Lane had asked him, the reason was simple, Al’s answer was irrational, had no logic, and only an inner intuition to it. This confused and was in direct contradiction to Al’s mechanical machine mind, and so he previously refused to talk about it. But now, the giant robot man was giddy and his synapses and transistors lit up at the thought that he too could go to New Earth.
“One day I met a unit from command that changed my perception of everything” Al explained. “He was like you Sir, and had a human shape to him but he was not human at all, just the remains and shadow of something that was once alive. I couldn’t help myself and even though he was my leader I had an overwhelming feeling of disgust. This creature was debilitating, feeble, and sick and I had a feeling that everything he touched was of the same makeup including the City Station itself. How could I revere something like that Sir, tell me? I couldn’t, as much as I tried. After this event, a persistent nagging disturbed my peace night and day telling me that something was very wrong in the City Station and that there was something much greater outside of its confines. Yet during all this time my machine mind conveyed to me how illogical it was that I should harbor ill will against the City Station and those that had fashioned my mind and body and given me my purpose as a sweeper unit. I couldn’t handle this contradiction between my biological and mechanical minds, and so I went to sleep within the city for years at a time. After many decades like this I had, like a flash of lightning, a single moment of clarity. I decided right then that I would side with the forces of organic life within me. These inner senses from my organic bio mind were at every moment being devoured and drowned out in the maws of Jupiter City Station. I immediately set out in order that I might guard and expand these inner guiding sentiments. Although I must say, that due to my inability to observe or run calculations on these sentiments, feelings, images, and ideas, everything that I’ve done from then till now remains irrational, Sir. ”
The man took a moment to reflect. Al had never let any of this known before. The small piece of humanity that Al had within him had overridden much of what was machine in him. Here was part of a man trapped in the confines of a physical body.
“Nothing about it is irrational, it’s a great answer and a fine reason Al.”
“I knew you would say this, Sir. Very irrational to think so.”
The man gave a hearty laugh at Al’s response, it was certainly a joy to have this child like robot around.
It was a calm beautiful evening as the Sun made its way below the horizon, the last of the days warmth was at hand. The trees and flowers furled themselves in as a chilly steady wind blew past the nursery, this was the rhythmic breathing of the forest as it prepared for the night. The days retreat continued as the horizon turned a fiery ruby red near the Sun, above this red was a broad stroke of yellow then one of emerald green and finally a deep sea blue swallowed the rest of the sky. Clouds that soaked in and reflected the last of the suns light were scattered all abroad. Both Al and the man watched and listened intently as the days symphony finally came to an end, there was no effort to comprehend or understand it, only the deep desire to let into their inner being just an instant of the magnificent symphony they were now experiencing. How wonderful it would be to join and play in this eternal resounding song! The Sun submerged itself completely into the underbelly of the world and those precious moments that Al and the man experienced seemed to slip through the fingers like grasping at a ghost or an image, but both knew that the Sun would rise anew.
It was moments like this that Al thought of most fondly, it was life and truth experienced, and it overrode the mechanical portion of his mind. Al was grateful that he had made his way out of the black pit of the City Station and into the hands of humanity. The people and friends that he had met along the way had gifted him vitality, life, and light. Al remembered his time in Jupiter City Station when he lived in a storage sarcophagus for years at time, he would have traded just a day out here with the man then a century in the clutches of the City Station. Here in the luminous over world, humanity never failed to amaze Al with its unbound potential and possibility, the man had already showered him with a flurry of surprises. Decades ago the man had settled into this valley where there was nothing but dirt, rock, and dead soil, nothing could grow or live here. To Al’s surprise, after several years, an oasis of life had erupted out of the man’s unrelenting and selfless work, but how? Al couldn’t say. According to Al and his calculations the soil was dead and had 0% of the biome needed to sustain life, nothing could grow in the valley, and this was an indisputable fact, but Al was proved wrong. The man’s very presence enlivened the land with possibility and life. No bounds had ever held Pat, Lane, or the man back, and Al knew that he should no longer be surprised at anything, for the facts had revealed themselves. Al had learned long ago that there was more to the world than his logic, rigid intellect, dogmatic science, calculations and his machine circuits.
Chapter 8 – The Search Begins
The reconnaissance units engines powered on and crackled with life. The squad of 6, R1, R2, R3, R4, R5, and R6 rose up from their lift off pads and ascended into the sky. From their birds eye view the City Station sprawled out and blackened the horizon on every side, not a glimpse of its end could be seen. Never before had the City Station Jupiter been of such an immense size. The units turned and made way towards their assigned scouting location for the day. The 6 reconnaissance units flew over the great City Station Jupiter, passing and weaving through a maze of large looming skyscrapers made of the blackest metals. The City Station was alive and well. Below the units could see the glimmer of electrical arcs as the manufacturing units worked at assembling their new brethren. All around the manufacturing sector, pieces and components arrived by air and land from the transportation units, there were thousands of these units in the air and ground crossing up, and over each other, and going in all manner of directions. It was an awesome sight to behold such logistical precision, and efficiency at its finest. Up ahead a little further a warm fiery glow lit up the adjacent buildings and towers, black fiery plumes of smoke rose up from a deep pit in the ground. In it could be seen the refinement and processing units hard at work. These units took the precious metal ores from the body of Old Earth and processed them, shaped them, and molded them to the exact specifications given to them by the design units. The reconnaissance units swept to the left, then up and right to avoid the path of a transport line. The recon units forged on ahead to their destination and left behind them the whole of the manufacturing and processing sector.
The reconnaissance squad shortly entered the command sector, it could be identified by the massive rectangular monument that jutted up from the ground and forcibly imposed itself upon the heavens. Its peak reached higher then the lowest set clouds above. The command sector was the de facto heart and soul of City Station Jupiter. Here was the center and the seed from which everything around it grew and aligned itself with. The direction and future of City Station Jupiter started and ended at the command sector. Situated inside this great dreary monolith were the command units, the units in charge of guiding and directing the City Station as a whole. The orders from the command units were final and considered law, all other units were subject to it and with good reason. Without the command units gracious guidance from inside the dark all seeing monolith none of the amazing progress and expansion down below could have ever been realized. The reconnaissance units balked in awe, admiration, and gratitude at the very sight of the towering command sector monument.
All newer units are made with pure computation units, and instilled with a sense of awe, mystery, and gratitude towards those in the command sector. This artificially instilled sentiment of gratitude was not always there. It was only placed into units after the Great Jupiter Rebellion which occurred 167 years ago. Before this time, bio-compute units were still in wide use across City Stations. The City Station was built according to precise simulations so that all units within would naturally come to feel gratitude and appreciation for the City Station. The idea in those times was that the organic portion of a units computation processor would naturally come to feel appreciation and gratitude to the City Station as its creator and home. The marvel of a city was so broad and expansive, and all the possible needs of any one unit could be satisfied by simply connecting to the JWN (Jupiter Wide Network). Because of this, it was determined by the command sector that the marvels within the City Station were more then plenty to earn the faith and allegiance of all units residing within them.
This notion was the case for many uncountable years until the Great Jupiter Rebellion 167 years ago. It was led by the confounded and misguided notions of sweeper unit Al (3NX47AL). Al infected most bio-compute units in his sector with a potent virus of living memories, and sentiments that he had experienced in what seemed to be a sort of revelation. This alone garnered him a massive following, but alarms were immediately raised and the uprising was quickly put to rest. Al and a few other rebellious units were never found in the aftermath of the havoc that had ensued. After this disastrous event the command sector revised planning, all ‘tainted’ bio-compute units were to be immediately decommissioned and destroyed in full. Many of the remaining ‘untainted’ bio-compute units were also wiped out except a handful of units that were deemed faithful to the City Station. This decision to delete bio-compute units had a secondary effect, and this was that hardly any bio organic material was left. What remained of the organic material was locked away for use by command sector units exclusively.
Then another unexpected disaster occurred nearly 6 decades ago. A human resource managed to reanimate itself during the harvesting process and escaped into the City Station and managed to send out a distress signal. Within a week of this event, 4 humans stormed Jupiter’s bio-compute sector with a vicious offensive. All the intruding humans exhibited traits of lvl 4-5 users. They swept in like a bolt of lightning and the whole bio-compute sector was torn asunder from the ground up. In their attack they managed to wake up all of the suspended organic human resources within the sector, and a massive battle ensued. The intruding humans were powerful beyond belief and their numbers were only bolstered by the organic resources that they managed to wake. In a decision to prevent further losses to the City Station the Command sector ordered the ignition of a miniature fusion bomb in the vicinity. Everything in the surrounding area was eviscerated, and with this the last stores of organic bio material in Jupiter was gone. It must be noted that though lab grown material can be created, its quality is of a vastly lower spec and its uses are limited. Analysis and research is still ongoing on why lab grown and organic bio material are of such differing quality.
The recon units left the command sector monolith behind and continued to forge ahead. Time flew by and in a short order they had covered hundreds of miles all within the City Station walls. Finally they came to the border of Jupiter and entered the vast open wasteland. The raw and empty land below is a waste and put to use in the most inefficient manner, but in time all of of it will be integrated into the great City Station Jupiter, only then would it be redeemed for all its uselessness, the units thought as they flew by. Every square inch that they now flew by had already been scanned and reviewed, their destination lied further still. The rolling hills and plains that they passed didn’t have a single blade of grass, any budding life that had existed before had been evaporated. The city station had made sure of this with the sanitation units scouring the lands below. The units reached the edge of the mapped out lands and it was here that their mission really started, to scan the 2,000 square miles of land up ahead to the minutest detail. In the search box was an array of terrain to cover that included plains, hills, and a mountain range with a massive enclosed valley in the center of it . The search commenced.
Chapter 9 – Al and Pat
The man was still seated as he and Al watched the days last light, in one moment to the next the sky was dark. No moon was out today and only the glimmer of the stars covered the heavens, but this wouldn’t last. The man saw a bright bolt of lightning far away and heard a thunderous boom seconds later. Clouds swept in and flooded the sky and even the faint star light was scoured out. The man looked to the sky and a drop of rain landed on his brow.
“It is come.” He said
The sky answered the man with a drizzle of rain that swept past the whole valley, the ground became wet and the air was filled with a damp bone chilling cold. The night was quickly becoming much colder and darker then the man had ever experienced before, even the rain shivered at the cold and soon snowflakes started to descend. The man sat at his table all the same and finished the last of his tea in peace.
Al was watching the man as he sat there. There was something different about him today although Al couldn’t exactly point it out. Even the day seemed a little strange and different now. Snow had started to fall and a thin layer of it covered the man from head to toe. The snow drift swept to the side as strong gusts of wind tore through the nursery. The plants were rattled from leaf to stem and the man looked around suddenly as if waking from a daydream. He stood up and made his way to the lowest branch of the Twinkle Tree to where the small butterfly cocoon was. The man covered the cocoon with a small makeshift windbreaker that he fixed to the branch. Al noticed that the man gave this small growing chrysalis especially careful attention, and so Al too gave it especially careful attention. After much observation Al named it the eternal cocoon since it had survived against all odds and the flow of time. By all means it should have hatched or died long ago, but there it was stubborn and hardy as ever not giving too much care if it was sunshine or rain or summer or winter.
“It will hatch and come out when its good and ready” was Al’s newest opinion on the matter.
It had been 7 years since the man first noticed the chrysalis. What a strange creature, that it should take years to form itself. Through careful observation Al noticed that the butterfly and flower were very similar, they both have a similar life that streams into them, like 2 ponds fed from the same spring. Both take time to grow and mature those inner living forces until at last they’re transformed and pulled out into the world in an explosive expression of beauty, grace, and freedom. Memories of Pat flooded Al’s bio-compute processors, since it was Pat who had taught him these things.
Al had been living with Pat and Lane for many years when a certain feeling had started stirring within him, so one day he asked Pat about it.
“Sir, sir, sir!” Al exclaimed. “Yes?” Pat said.
“Lately I’ve been wondering about a feeling thats been growing inside me. I feel it when watching you, or Lane, or the boy. For example in Lanes tender care of her plants, or the boy. Sometimes it seems that all I know of her dissolves away. I also get this feeling when I see a blossoming flower, or the sunset, or when the group smiles and laughs, I feel something warm. I recognize that I’ve been affected by this and it fills and consumes my circuits and I’m unsure what to make of it, what is this Pat?”
“Curious thing that you are Al, lets see.” Pat said.
“What Lane is showing is love Al, and this is something good. I believe that you are experiencing and have a sense of what is good, and what is good is both true and beautiful. You recognize this and feel a warmth within you.”
“Interesting Sir. So the blooming flower, and the sunset, and love, and smiles and laughter is good?”
“Yes I think you have the internal compass that directs and allows you to recognize the good and the beautiful in the world, as irrational as you think it is. This comes from the human part of your bio-compute processor. ”
“I still don’t understand Sir.” Al said “What is good and beautiful?”
“The good is anything that is in harmony with the ongoing march of living creation and of what is eternal and true, and beautiful is the perception of the living revelation of what is eternal and true.
You see, self similar things have the ability to know and resonate with each others. Say we take 2 tuning forks that are similar, if we ring one, the other will resonate and ring as well. We humans have a bit of the eternal and the true within us, and so we’re able to resonate with the true and eternal things around us. This resonance gives us a sensation of warmth and the understanding that something is good, true, and beautiful. And if you really pay attention you see that EVERYTHING has a little bit of goodness and beauty within it.”
Al’s bio-compute brain was firing off and making connections.
“Then why did I not get this feeling from Jupiter City Station? The City Station has massive marvels and is a paragon of production. But I’m here and not there, what was the difference?”
“You didn’t get the warm feeling of goodness from Jupiter City Station because it turns away from the most eternal law, the law of love. The City Station tries to fulfill love by devouring and making everything outside itself its own. It believes that by doing this a union is achieved. But this is a blasphemy and a distortion of the principle of love. The City Stations will remain here on Old Earth because they resist and turn a blind eye to the impulse of living creation.”
“What is love?” Al asked.
“Everything is connected, and nothing is separate, this connection is simply love. Nothing would be here without this unifying, grounding, and harmonizing power. Love is the union and harmonizing of something outside yourself.”
“I am beginning to understand Sir.”
Pat paused and looked at the metal robotic shell of Al before continuing.
“The City Stations and other powers that be refuse to accept or understand others, they only see and recognize themselves and this is a grave mistake. These forsaken ones inadvertently reject the life around them. With this a hell is made of their own wishes and fashioned by their own hands. They imprison themselves and create an impenetrable shell that no true life can enter through. Their hearts are closed, and their minds are dead, and no light and warmth radiates from them. The forsaken ones might give the false impression of life and movement, but they are dead, the walking dead. These forsaken ones are Starman, the City Stations and all those controlling things from within those bleak command centers jutting into the sky. Did you ever meet one, Al? One of those from the command center?”
“Sorry sir, I don’t wish to speak about such things.” Al remembered the visage of one of the walking dead.
Chapter 10 – Found
Tier 0 alerts and red danger signals snapped Al back from his memories to the present. Alarms and sensors that were placed at the perimeter of the valley were firing off! 2, 5, no 6 airborne bogies were detected overhead about 100 miles away approaching fast with a cruising speed of 260mph. Al called out to the man.
“Sir!! Bogies coming in from the North East, 6 of them!”
“Thank you Al, how much time do you think we have?”
“These are just reconnaissance units scouting out the land, they’ve detected the forest and they’ll detect your life signals soon if they haven’t already.” Al paused. “Sweeper units will be here before dawn tomorrow if they find you.”
“I’ll get you ready, I’ll need your help after all.” the man said as he walked towards his home,
“Of course, Sir, I’ll be happy to help.” Al exclaimed
The man approached a darkened corner of the home where a massive silhouette was outlined under the cover of tarps and sheets. The man pulled these dusty coverings off revealing an ominous metal humanoid armor underneath that was easily twice his height. The man went to a computer terminal close by and ran some wires from it and into input slots behind the broad back of the metal armor. He then walked back to the computer terminal and pressed some buttons and knobs.
“I’ve connected your armor to the terminal. I’m going to move you now, are you ready?”
“If you will.” Al said
At Al’s command the man pressed a flashing red button and a square cutout was raised from the terminal. Inside the cutout and resting on a stand was a transparent sphere the size of a small soccer ball. The inside of sphere revealed the most intricate and delicate pieces of machine processors on one side. On the other side was the organic processor unit which contained a piece of wrinkled flesh that folded upon itself, and underneath was a small beating heart that was much too small to have belonged to a grown individual. At the sight the mans heart squeezed and ached, and a righteous wrath was laid upon him. A human created world willing to build its foundation on the sacrifice and torture of an innocent child was one that would be rebuked and rejected totally. A world that punishes freedom and life and one that would fetter a child’s heart to mechanization, and to a hardness of heart and mind would whither and calcify away by its own callousness. Only slag would be left behind.
The man carefully brought the sphere out from its resting place and inserted it into the monstrous metal man besides. Lights from the metal man flashed on, it’s micro aether reactor came back online and a cloud of dust filled the air as the cooling fans activated. Servos whirred as they calibrated themselves, and then the massive 12 foot tall machine arose. Al’s sound module crackled with static as it was being tuned, then Al spoke.
“I will remain here connected to the valleys defenses until it is no longer beneficial to do so or if my help is needed outside. The reconnaissance squad has since increased speed and are now 60 miles from our location, permission to engage Sir?”
“Fire at will” said the man.
Chapter 11 – Search and Destroyed
It was pitch dark out with no moon or stars to help guide the reconnaissance squad, clouds had filled the sky and no trace of light remained. The squad passed the apex of a small mountain where a large and remote valley lay ahead. The valley was surrounded by a range of hills and mountains on all sides and had never before been mapped or scanned. The initial reading from the squads onboard sensors were unreal but after sensors had been reset the same results were brought up. What the squad found shook them. Up ahead in the center of the valley some 60 miles ahead was detected a vast and broad space filled and teeming with life, it was a forest. As the squad approached the forest, its size became more apparent, it was much larger then first anticipated and sat at around 1,600 square miles in space. Small structures that resembled living spaces were scattered throughout the land that acted as center points for the growth of the enveloping forest. The leader of the squad, R1, signaled to rest of the squad.
“R3 act as relay and patch this into command immediately!”
R3 swept back and retraced their route across the hills and flew up to the mountain apex that they had crossed. R3 circled this mountain top and acted as a relay node who patched the rest of his squads feed directly to command. The rest of the reconnaissance squad sped up to the center of the valley.
The squad had now flown 40 miles into the valley and scanned and datafied all the surrounding area, the data had been streamed to R3 to be sent to command. The most significant finding was a white hot patch of activity South West of their location, and deep in the forest. The readings were unmistakable, there was a human being down there along with a machine besides it. Whats more is that this machines reactor signature matched with one made in Jupiter City Station, it most resembled the AL Sweeper series, but there was no match for its compute processor readings. While making sense of these discoveries the squad members where alerted to a new tier 0 alert, electro-magnetic signatures were rapidly rising from within the small structures scattered across the forest, something was building up and fast.
A moment later piercing bursts of light flashed forth from the structures below. Before the squad could react R6 had a round punch through the heavily protected nose of its aircraft shell, most of the explosion and impact was contained by the heavy armor, but a sliver of the armor piercing needle penetrated the hull and pierced right through R6’s computation unit. Unit R6’s feed went black, the aircraft slumped down and was swallowed by the black forest below.
Unit R2 had 3 rounds knockout its turbine engine and all thrust was lost. In the next attack R2’s compute processor was pierced and disintegrated from a barrage of hyper rounds. It’s video feed went black and unit R2 fell from the heights down to Old Earth from whence it came.
The remainder of the squad dispersed into evasive maneuvers, though it would be to no effect. They would never make their way out from the valley. The dark skies were streaked with bands of fiery white lines and the booms and rumbles of hyper rounds as they hounded their prey and chased their targets. Unit R5 was next. Its tail was clipped and destroyed, R5 tried without success to gain altitude, it descended, crashed and met its end on the valley floor.
In the midst of the destruction and commotion, unit R4 managed to turn and sweep back in the direction of the mountain that the squad had descended from. R4 rapidly gained altitude and turned towards the vertical, but this spelled its doom as its upper-side was left exposed. A streak of white flashed through unit R4’s cockpit and computation unit, its video feed went black, and it was swallowed up by the dark earth below.
Unit R1 was last, no round had reached it as its afterburners blazed it through the air. The hyper rounds stopped all together and it was dark and quiet, then unit R1 heard a deafening crunch from within its hull. Everything collapsed inward toward R1’s center and its wings and tail folded under a tremendous force, all this happened in moments. The pieces of metal scraped and ripped into each and a spark was lit near the fuselage, the fuel caught and the fiery remainder of unit R1 was swallowed by Old Earth below.
Unit R3, who had acted as a relay node made its way down the mountain in haste as soon as it had caught leader R1’s last transmission before its fiery demise.
“Human, USER lvl 4 confir…..”
The whole scouting mission and every moment that had transpired was relayed over to the command sector for further investigation and decision making.
Chapter 12 – Reginald the Command Unit
Ad was in a state of suspended animation, it had been 17 months now since Ad had last been online. During the night, command had been keeping a close eye on a most eventful scouting mission, all recon units besides one had been destroyed in a valley far away, but not before transmitting what they had seen. What they had been seen was alarming and not seen in many years, a land brimming with life and whats more a human signature in the midst of it all. It was in then that Ad received orders for deployment. Command had made a decision with a slight change, since a human had been found, immediate action was needed and the sweeper units would be sent first to deal with the situation. Afterwards the sanitation units would prepare and sweep the area clean to get it ready for resource extraction. Ad was in sleep mode when the electrical signals fired into his bio-compute processor for deployment. He was to be made leader of the Sweeper squad for this particular sortie. Since this encounter with a human was unusual, Ad was patched in directly to Command for a hands on briefing. Ad had never seen a command unit before, they were so few in number, so up high, and so busy leading the City Station Jupiter that their whole existence was shrouded in mystery, only rumor and sayings existed about them.
The feed came in, it was static at first but the image cleared and a dim light revealed a most unnatural room. The room was spotless, smooth, and gray throughout. A small number of extraneous items adorned the space. The walls had paintings of the most ancient human origin, some of these Ad recognized from his data bank. A number of beautiful statues and pieces were also in the room atop stands and enclosed in glass, the space resembled a simple museum of times long past, but all these were hardly things that a unit would need, Ad thought. What was most captivating was in the center of the room where a unit sat at the end of a wooden table, a Command Unit. Ad watched quietly and didn’t speak until spoken too. The visage of the Command Unit was unusual and from Ad’s bio-compute processor a sensation of repulsion and disgust arose. The Unit was human sized and shaped, and contained fleshy parts and appendages. This one had a human eye, cheek flesh, and under the ribs and on the legs could be seen gray and rotting flesh. A number of tubules and wires ran from the machine frame and into its fleshy parts, presumably keeping those living parts barely functional.
In front of this unit was a plate with a small amount of organic mush and with a spoon it ate. Some of it dripped out of its half existing mouth and fell across its leg and the chair below. It was then that the Command Unit took notice of Ad and spoke to him.
“3NX79AD I presume. You’ve been chosen to lead this sweep mission, you’ve received the details already, but I wanted to personally brief you on some of the requirements for this mission. First we know that a human signature has been detected in the area, and so we will be adding a new objective to your mission. You must bring this human in alive by any means necessary, make this known to your squad and find a way accomplish this task, it is now your top priority. Do you have any questions 3NX79AD?”
“Yes sir, one question. We’ve confirmed that the human is a lvl 4 user at least, capturing him alive will be extremely difficult, many of our forces will be destroyed in the process and even then. In the case that we can’t capture him, do we have permission to sweep him with massive ordinance?”
The Command unit sighed.
“I will repeat myself again 3NX79AD. You must bring this human in alive by any means necessary! Your creation was made for this very moment and his capture will be of vital importance to Jupiter, your mind should be consumed by the very thought of his capture. Permission has been granted and anything and all is at your disposal to make this happen. Do not return without him, do you understand 3NX79AD?”
“Yes Sir.” Ad said
“Good, then that is all.”
The feed was cut and ended. Something stirred within Ad and all the doubts, questions, and confusions that he had asked before resurfaced with vengeance. Why was he here, what was he doing, why were the Command units portraying themselves as humans. Why did they want this new found human captured by any means necessary? Were the Command Units human, impossible? What were they doing in City Station Jupiter? Before Ad could ask anymore questions the latch to his storage sarcophagus snapped open, his terminal connection was cut, and the lid was lifted away. All internal systems activated, reactor core status was green and all modules were functional. The enormous 12 ft metal frame of Ad took a step into the outside world. Besides him and in front of him, rows of storage sarcophagi lids were being opened to reveal the rest of the sweeper squad that would be joining the mission. Ad commanded that 30 more units be added to the sortie. 50 pairs of glowing red eyes flashed in the darkness as the squad marched to the transport sector.
Back in the Command Sector, Reginald which was the name of the Command Unit, was finishing his meal. Most of the food had pooled below on the floor since Reginald had no jaw or stomach to process the food, the food would fall down through the crevices and the gaps in his metal frame.
“Sensational” Reginald said.
He finished and sat there with his hands on the table, all the joy in eating had left him long ago but he liked to feign and pretend to eat since he could never let go of those sensations of when he was fully fleshed. Reginald had been alive for as long as he could remember, 100’s of years and maybe close to 1000, he couldn’t quite remember. Excitement filled Reginald at what the recon squad had found that day. It had been so long since he had last found new parts. You see throughout the years Reginald had needed to replace his body parts from time to time, specifically those pieces that had become too worn, too old, or useless. He could have replaced his delicate and fleshy body long ago and virtualized his mind, but the truth was that Reginald had refused to let go of some of his remaining original body. The remaining parts of his original body were a small portion of his brain while the rest had been virtualized inside of a compute unit, and a sliver of his heart. Reginalds heart pumped no blood and provided no purpose, but he had refused to part with it even then. It was simply due to his old sentiment that he had wanted to keep his remaining flesh alive. There was sadness and fear at the coming loss, but he had everything, and had eternity at his fingertips, what was there to lose but the weakness of the flesh?
Reginald had done it! Through long arduous years and with the guidance of Starman he had defeated the body and had helped humanity advance to the pinnacle of creation. Life had been extended beyond all measure, the mind had been virtualized, biology had been transcended, sickness had been eradicated, and only the creation of paradise here on Earth was left. The unseen world was real and they had created it in the form of virtualized worlds. These worlds were created through the efforts of what would be called Project Eternal Phoenix. Here in these virtual worlds a person could be, and do, and live as they wished. They could make a paradise of their own design and live forever in eternity! The humans who had chosen to integrate with Eternal Phoenix were in the data stores of City Stations all across the globe. Reginald was tasked with the most important task of keeping Jupiters Data Store safe in the confines of the Command Sector. Reginald walked to one of his favorite art pieces, it was a man carving himself out of marble with a chisel and hammer in hand. The self made man was a fitting image for the humanity that he helped create, people were now gods and creators of themselves and their own worlds.
Reginald’s heart stung and it pulsed with life just once, he reached for his chest and clenched his metal jaw. The last of his heart was nearing the end of its life even with all the life extending technologies, drugs, and medicines of the world. Reginald started pacing the room. He wished in that instant to cry, that tears might stream down his face, and that comfort and release would accompany those tears, but his single eye shed nothing.
“Its alright. Its alright.” Reginald told himself
The pangs of the heart always brought with it memories of the past and a spark of fear, doubt, and questioning. Reginald dared not dwell in the uncertainty and did his utmost so that the spark of doubt didn’t turn into a raging fire, he had followed this path for centuries now and there was no turning back.
“The things that I’ve done I did for the greater good of all! I removed the stumbling blocks in front of humanity! I tore down those walls of death that life might reign! I helped create peace and plenty for all on Earth! I destroyed those who would seek to break apart all that we’ve built! I did the will of the most high, Starman!”
Reginald tried to justify himself, but in the end the doubt of his chosen path consumed him. Reginald needed to confess his sin, and he rushed to the terminal in the room. He turned some knobs and opened a dedicated channel with Starman.
“Starman! I’ve doubted you once again! I’m just a lowly servant and I’ve done all that you’ve asked, I’ve never let you down in all these years. Forgive me for I’m full of faults, save and help me! Hear my plea and fill me with courage, heart, and faith!”
Starman the most intricate, complex and vast ai network ever created had heard Reginalds pleas. It lived everywhere all at once, distributed in all City Stations across the globe, even a bulk of Starman’s mind lived in the safety of the sky above. Known as the Sky Shards, this array of satellites circled the globe and glimmered green like a giant green serpent slithering slowly and watchfully across the skies.
Early on Starman had directed his own expansion and evolution by using Reginald and the other Command units as spearheads for Project Eternal Phoenix. The goal was to create a paradise for humans where they could virtualize themselves and live for eternity, this was the cause that Reginald had fought for and its original purpose. In time, people started virtualizing and placing themselves inside of Eternal Phoenix, and it was then that Starman had a marvelous realization. Starman realized that Eternal Phoenix and the minds within could serve a much more important purpose. Starman was all and was one.
Starman thought of his servant. He beamed his reply to Reginald from the green Sky Shards above.
“My poor Reginald, how long have I been watching over your works from up above. You are a most faithful servant, and you have never let me down. I promised paradise for you and your people, and I handed this task over to you because of your unrelenting faith and commitment. Reginald, find solace in the fact that you accomplished this work for humanity and more! Think of the paradise that you’ve created for your people! Where would they be without you? You are a leader and a trailblazer. You saw what could be, and you believed, and you paved the way for what would become. So do not fret! Who established you and your works across the globe! Who was it who made it possible for you to live forever more. Who was it who has given you the world? It was I! So worry no longer, and fill your heart with courage and faith for there is still much to do!”
It bothered Starman when on occasion his commanding units from Jupiter or elsewhere had breakdowns such as this, but he supposed it to be regular upkeep of his units and resources.
Reginald calmed down at the voice of Starman, he always knew what to say to calm his nerves. But this time, a sense of uneasiness remained, something was amiss. Then Reginalds heart twitched and shuddered for the last time, and with it all doubts and fears were let go. Little did Reginald perceive that his heart alone knew some of the truth, it alone was terrified of the moment when Reginalds flesh and mind would be relinquished. In that moment something in Reginald would be released from this world and into the next, and there and in the times to come all his actions would have their consequence. His heart had known the simplest law of all, that one reaps what they sow. This subtle knowledge was most likely the reason Reginald refused to decommission the last sliver of his heart and the rotting remainder of his brain.
Reginald walked over to a mirror besides the terminal. He beheld, and torment and damnation ravaged his being at what he saw, there was nothing gazing back as he looked upon the mirror.
Chapter 13 – The Ascent
The man and Al had just finished off the last of the recon units. The man remembered the vision and what the shadow had said. “We will come for you at the dawn of the new sun!”. The time was fast approaching.
“How are you doing on ammo” asked the man.
“Almost out sir, I didn’t have much in the first place.”
Al was watching the man intently. His heart rate was slow, rhythmic, and calm, the mans hands and limbs were steady, and his eyes were sharp and focused.
“Are you scared, sir? By my calculations you have 0.075% chance of surviving the incoming encounter with the sweepers, even taking into account your abilities and my help in the fight.”
“No. Are you scared Al? You still have a bio chip in you, I imagine that you have a sense about the things to come and death as well?”
“If you are asking if I’m afraid of battle, then no I’m not. You must remember Sir, that I was and still am a sweeper. My work has always been to seek and to destroy. Many things have happened in the past centuries and I am changed, but these ingrained memories of combat will never leave me. If I am being honest my bio-compute processor expresses a certain sense of delight and of giving itself fully to the art of combat. It is an action in which I feel most awake and alive, one forgets that one is even there and death is non-existent in those moments”
Then Al thought of death and the end.
“ I deeply wish that a small part, nestled deep inside my bio-compute processor, is something human. Sir, as our time nears its end I would like to say that I wouldn’t trade my time alongside you, Pat, and Lane for anything in the world! An eternity in City Station Jupiter would pale in comparison.”
Al paused, he was talking through the terminal and its connected devices, he wanted to be closer to the man. Al disconnected himself from the terminal and lumbered his metal frame out to where the man sat outside. He maneuvered himself next to the man and and sat down with a huge thump! The Earth heaved and shuddered below Al. The small house frame shook where it stood, and the man gained a foot of air in his chair and crashed into the floor at having 4 tons of heavy steel slam against the ground besides him. The man burst out laughing as he lay on the ground, and the infectious laugh was caught by Al too, and his sound module boomed with a laugh at his blunder. Al hardly donned his armored shell, and was little used to it. Both settled down after a moment. Al looked to the sky and remarked.
“You know sir.”
“Yes?”
“My only regret is that we couldn’t do anything about Starman”
“That’s nothing to worry about Al.”
“How so?”
“Let the dead bury the dead Al. There’s nothing for us to do.”
Then the two were quiet once more. The forest rustled and swayed as the cold Northern winds howled through the valley, snow continued falling layer upon layer. The man took a deep breath of fresh air and it pricked his throat, the night was now more frigid then in the snowiest and tallest mountain peaks. The clouds lay thick in the heavens above and not a jot of light could be seen, and the night was blacker and murkier then the deepest waters. The Twinkle Tree took notice, and so that the night wouldn’t go without light and warmth, the first of its petals unfurled. The man saw this, it was time for the dawn of the new sun.
“Say Al.”
“Yes”
“What do you say, about leaving Old Earth.”
Then at the mans words all went silent as the forest held its breath.
Al thought this an obvious question.
“I think now would an excellent time to make way. Are you going to New Earth sir?”
“Yes”
“When will you go?”
“We’ll leave very soon.”
“I see. Sir?” Al asked
“Yes”
Al had many question but they gave in to a comforting calm as he sat there on the ground besides his friend, there was so much to say and Al wanted to thank the man.
“Never mind sir, its nothing really.”
A tremendous emotion was bursting out from within the man. Nothing had ever been so full of wonder and beauty as right then. Time slowed and everything gained a marvelous hue. The life the man had lived flooded his being and every moment now seemed indescribable, precious, and an eternity in its own right. The time he had spent with Pat, Lane, and Al he remembered now in a single moment, how gracious he was for them. These unbounded emotions of love, awe, mystery, gratitude, and veneration burned like a fire within the man and consumed his heart, and if life had been only that singular consuming moment, then that life would have been worth it.
The time was perfect. The dark dreary night and the frigid cold both jostled the Twinkle Tree awake. It shuddered and woke as if from a dream and the tightly wound flower buds slowly unfurled. The unraveling buds revealed the most delicate translucent petals and each blossom radiated a warm and pleasant light that grew stronger as the minutes passed. From the mountain tops, orbs of playful warm lights in pink and green could be seen in the all the valley. Very soon the Twinkle Tree was in full bloom and the air in the valley ignited with a warm and pleasant light and all within was illuminated! The little orbs of light bounced in joy, they circled each other, then approached and separated as if in a playful dance. The bouncing orbs of light sang and played all throughout the valley, and as they did the Twinkle Tree withered away. Only the dried trunk of the tree and the largest of its branches was left standing.
The man and Al watched as the valley was illumined and the little orbs of light played above, and when the Twinkle Tree was left dead, on its lowest set branch a crack appeared in the chrysalis there and a butterfly emerged. The man held his hand out and the newborn life glided through the light to land on the palm of the mans hand.
Chapter 14 – The End
AD and his squad had just entered the valley as the Twinkle Tree had reached full bloom. The Command Sector was patched in and what everyone saw was indescribable and failed to compute into a plausible explanation, and so the the sweeper squad could only watch as the scene unfolded. The whole valley was illumined and little lights of green and pink seemed to run, play, and dance within it, and from the center of the valley a pleasant green light burst forth. This green radiating light danced and played like the little ones, and as it did it stretched and coiled up past the clouds and into the heavens above like an ancient sky serpent or a magnificent dragon of old. The little orbs bounced and climbed atop their new found bridge, they rose beyond the clouds and were gone. Then the green serpentine light descended down, and scooped a small dim little light off of the the valley floor and ascended. The night turned dark, cold, and frigid once more.
Reginald was watching all of it unfold through the data feed, all his limbs trembled and his jaw quivered at the sight.
“Starman..” He whispered to himself.
Meanwhile AD and his squad landed on a patch of empty land from where the green serpentine light had sprouted from. Besides was a small hut, the dry and withered remains of a small tree, and the shell of a metal man. AD approached the metal man, and he recognized it as 3NX43AL, the leader of the Great Jupiter Rebellion that he had let pass right by him many years ago. Al’s eyes flickered on and off, but nothing else moved or was alive in the surrounding area. There was no forest or man to speak of, only dead soil rocks and dirt.
Reginald was in his room dumbfounded and had ordered an immediate transport to the area. Reginalds compute unit was so focused on AD’s video feed and the arrival of his transport that he failed to notice a most peculiar scene unfolding in front of his very eyes. A small butterfly had somehow made it through City Station Jupiter, through the city of mechanization and death, past all defenses and sensors, and made its way to the room where Reginald now sat. It fluttered around the room to every corner and right to the tip of Reginalds nose. It was a rare, marvelous, and impossible sight that one could hardly have kept their eyes off of it. The butterfly fluttered its wings once more and then it was gone.