by Gary Foshee
wore a white lab coat that halted at the knees. Skinny specta-
cles rested mid way down a stout ebony-hooked nose. A thick,
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heavily beeswaxed mustache, curled underneath and a blue and
green polka-dotted bow tie spread wide under his portly black
beard that tapered at the end.
“Flat,” he said to the class who were bored out of their minds,
most resting with chins in hands looking out the window into the sky or at the trees down by The Redmadafa.
“The world is flat,” he continued. “On page 97 in your text
books, you will see that our best and brightest scientist have
concluded that the world is flat. And if our brightest minds have concluded that the world is flat then we consider that to be fact.
So, I can boldly proclaim that it is a fact that the world is flat. If you were to travel in a tree floater out into the vast blue ocean, you would come to a point where the suction of the gravitational force of space pulling against the water would slingshot you off into the galaxy and you would drift around forever lost in the
universe.”
He stroked his beard several times with his hand and walked
down the aisle toward Pepper, snobbishly looking over his spec-
tacles. She focused from her doodling, turned the page, and slid her book over her drawings.
“Now you wouldn’t live very long because there is no oxygen
in space,” he said, looking down at her desk. He reached down
and slid her parchment out. He gazed at the drawing of himself,
looked her in the eyes, and continued. “And if the lack of oxygen didn’t kill you first, you would probably smash into a star or some other floating object drifting around in space. Or of course you could get sucked into a large rotating vortex that would catapult you through an immense black hole sending you back in time
into another dimension when aliens ruled the world and built
the pyramids.”
The students all perked up in their seats and looked at him.
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“Real y, Mr. Haggo?” said Jabin, sitting close to the front,
enthralled with the extra-terrestrial account. He flipped the
pages in his book looking for the elusive data.
“Wel ,” answered Mr. Haggo, in light-hearted banter and a
smile on his face. He stuck his hands in his lab coat and looked up toward the stars. “That’s not in the book, but many leading
minds believe it must have happened that way. People living long ago were primitive and ignorant. There is no way they could have built them. There is no other logical explanation. Aliens…” he
shook his head, his beard brushing his coat. “Aliens.”
Pepper shook her head. He gets paid to teach this stuff, she
thought to herself.
The bell rang signaling lunch.
“Tonight, I want you to read chapter seven and be ready to
discuss the origin of the platypus,” he said, while everyone gathered their things and pushed in their chairs.
“The platypus,” laughed a student walking out the door. “I bet
he’s going to tell us its mother was a quacker and its father was a water slapper.”
“No” said another student laughing. “He’ll probably say it
came from rain…raining upon the rocks for millions and bil-
lions of years.”
They both busted up laughing.
Pepper walked down the hal way with her friends. They opened
the doors to the lunchroom and sat down at a long square table
with wide wooden benches. Pepper took out her lunch and took
a bite—a wheat bread sandwich with greens, cucumbers, and
yellow squash, topped with herbs and a special blend of spices
passed down to her mother by her grandmother.
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“Can you believe that guy?” she said to her friend Zelophy
setting next to her.
“Who?” asked Zelophy, popping a brussel sprout in her
mouth.
“Mr. Haggo,” said Pepper. “‘The world is flat.’ You know, I
wonder if anything in the textbook is actual y based on facts. Sun Day at the Temple, we read from the ancient scroll of the prophet Isaiah. Isaiah already told us that The Augur sits above the circle of the earth. The world is not flat, it is a circle,” she said taking another bite.
“What is he going to tell us next? That the earth is not the
center of the universe or rotating around the sun?”
“So, you don’t think Caboose stowed away on a Tree Floater
and fell off the end of the earth?” asked Zelophy, with a confused look on her face.
Pepper’s face turned cherry red.
“Is that what everyone is saying now?”
Zelophy stuffed her mouth with a few more sprouts, shrugged
her shoulders, and looked away wanting to change the subject.
“If I hear one more ridiculous story about my brother and
what happened to him, I think I’m going to scream for three days.”
She stuffed the rest of her sandwich in her mouth, stood up,
and walked outside.
Zelophy looked at the other girls. “So, we probably shouldn’t
say anything about the little green men at the end of the rainbow holding him ransom in the clouds?”
Her friends shook their heads and quietly continued eating.
* * * * * * *
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The gorge was clear of gargoyles when they exited the cave.
Although the sun never rose over the valley, light from the moon lit up the horizon. The gargoyles used the light to hunt and carry out their mischievous ways—you could see the relief in Caboose’s eyes that they were gone.
They didn’t go back the way they came. They continued North
out of the gorge and into Blindman’s Despair. Blindman’s Despair was where Slithler sent his servants who had disobeyed or failed to carry out his orders to satisfaction. Great agony lurked in the land. Servants walked the foothil s blinded, tormented by their
failures and disappointments. Gogs, creatures, and beasts, stole, ravished, and killed each other, just to stay alive. They answered to no one; the only rule: kill or be killed.
“Here take this.” Urium handed Caboose a small clear bottle
with diamond-cut groves encircling it.
Caboose looked at the bottle. Smoke danced around inside,
enticing him to open it and let it loose.
“What is it?” he asked, squinting into it, while shaking and
turning it upside down.
“Dragon’s breath. Be careful, this bottle never runs dry. Open
it, but not for too long or we will be lost for days. It will hide you from harm and mask your scent. You’ll need it in there.”
“But, isn’t everyone blind?” said Caboose. “How will
this help?”
“They are. But they can see up close, about twenty feet. Their
sight though is not what I’m worried about.”
“It’s not,” said Caboose, wondering what else could possibly
go wrong.
“No. Their hearing and sense of smell are their greatest weap-
ons. So, try to be quiet and watch where you step,” referencing the 174
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close call back in the gorge when Caboose stepped on a gargoyle
and almost got him killed.
“Do we have to go through? Why can’t we go back and use
the tunnels?” remarked Caboose regretting the choices he made
back in town and at the Scorpion Pass Gate. He felt a familiar
“I know you are tired Caboose, but now is not the time to
give up. The journey before you is long and hard, but you must
press on and not be overcome by the evil of this land. People are counting on you. I don’t know what will happen when we reach
the Sea Throne, but Seven believes The Augur has something spe-
cial planned for you. The majority of the souls that get trapped in here are not because of Slithler and his many servants.”
“It isn’t?”
“No. It’s because they gave up believing in themselves and
His ability to save them from the Shadow of Death. You have a lot to live for Caboose. Your Papa wouldn’t be here looking for you if he didn’t believe that too.”
Just hearing the name ‘Papa’ brought renewed strength and
comfort. He nodded his head and sped up his pace.
They ventured through the pass and further into Despair.
They stuck to the high country determined to stay undetected.
The slopes were steep, loose gravel threatened each step. They followed a small Alpine trail for days, over some of the most rugged and uncharted terrain in the land. Caboose remained quiet for
the most part. He wondered what would be waiting for him at the
Sea Throne and if he would have the courage to face it.
He nonchalantly studied Urium walking in front. He watched
his wings jostle back and forth like a pendulum. He noticed how
his head moved forward and backward, not side-to-side. His
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stature was tall and straight; there was no hunch in his back, no slump of timidity. He noted the confident swagger in his step. It boasted of a mighty warrior, strong and powerful, marching into
battle with no fear. That was a walk Caboose had yet to discover, although he practiced it secretly from behind.
“So, what is like being an angel?”
“Do what?” replied Urium, busy watching the path and rocky
plateaus ahead.
“What is it like being a celestial being? Flying back and
forth in the universe and through the stars; that must be pretty awesome.”
“It is. There’s nothing like it. Remember when I told you that
I was assigned to you when you where conceived?”
Caboose nodded his head in agreement.
“Wel , once we’ve been assigned to someone, we never leave
them or we only leave them in case of an emergency or a special
assignment. But once the person we’ve been assigned to passes
from this life, we are free for a while to explore the universe. After every seventh person, we all have to do a 250 year post somewhere in His Majesty’s throne or a post in one of the outer realms.”
“Explore the universe in the outer realms…Wow. I can only
imagine what that must be like. So…what’s out there?” inquired
Caboose. “Are there big green aliens waiting to come and
destroy us?”
“Wel , now that you mention it, that might be one way to
describe the Northern celestial guard—but no. The most won-
derful things anyone could ever behold are out there waiting
to be explored. I haven’t explored all the galaxies, but the ones I have, are absolutely amazing—cosmical paradises, each with a
beauty unseen or unknown by mortal man or beast. Each galaxy
has its own unique purpose in the universe. They contain vast
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storehouses of wisdom about how His Majesty created all things
and some even contain the plans themselves. The stars actual y
tell his story too, you know.”
“Real y, how?”
Urium stopped and searched the sky and then pointed. “Do
you see that cluster of stars over there?”
Caboose searched hard. He looked back at Urium’s finger
and then looked again. “I guess so—he was lying, he didn’t see
anything.
“That’s Virgo the Virgin. If you start with it and circle ‘round, you end with Leo the Lion.”
“Ok…” Is that supposed to mean something, thought
Caboose? “So, what is the story?”
Urium lowered his hand and started walking.
“Don’t know. But talk is, is that we’re all about to find out.
Whatever it is, it’s ‘gonna be a good one.”
He cocked his head to the side. “No…it’s gonna be a great one.”
Caboose kicked the whole idea around for a few moments.
What did he mean by ‘storehouses of wisdom’? Are there large
libraries in each galaxy filled with books and ancient scrol s? Are angels up there filing them and checking them out when needed?
“Storehouses of wisdom. I don’t understand.”
“Wisdom is how he made everything. It’s how he laid the
earth’s foundations and it’s how he set the heavens in place. You see, after he created the stars and the galaxies, he stretched them out with his own hands—he even gave each one a name. And
no, I can’t name them al . No angel can even get close, only His Majesty can. He did this to destroy the wisdom of the wise and
frustrate the intelligence of the intelligent. This is why the wise can never figure out his plans, nor can they duplicate his myster-ies. He made foolishness the wisdom of the world.”
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“But my teacher told me that the stars are billions of light
years away, and that it takes billions of years for the light to reach us. She said that proves our planet is billions of years old and not thousands like my Sun Day school teacher at the temple used to
teach.”
“Your teacher at school is presenting ‘ A False Triad.’”
“My Sun Day school teacher; a false triad…what do
you mean?”
“No, not her, the other: A False Triad takes two objects that
are known and then inputs an unknown which produces the false
triad—Known x Known x Unknown = False Triad (K x K x UK
= FT). The false triad pul s two positive elementary truths into an equation for validity. Then it inputs one unknown elementary object which causes the negative and false result—Positive
x Positive x Unknown = Negative (P x P x U = N). This triad is used to deceive the pupil into believing the false triad because two elements of truth are present.
Let me explain.
Stars and light are both visible and measurable objects that
no living creature can deny; as a matter of fact, in the future, man will figure out how to stop the speed of light all together. For those who do not believe in His Majesty, when they look up at the stars, all they see is the aftermath of his works. So, when they try to measure the distance of the stars by the light they generate and by their distance from the earth, they interject the known—only
that which is visible and that which is visible is not relative to the original—the unknown. This gives them A False Triad because what is visible today does not represent the original creation
before he stretched it out.
Thus, the question is not ‘How does the light get from the
stars to us?’ The question is or should be, ‘How did the stars get to 178
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where they are in the first place?’ His Majesty made the stars and then stretched them out. Believe me I know. I was there when he
laid the foundations of the earth—what you call ‘The Circle.’” I was there when the morning stars sang for joy and all the angels shouted at the work of his hands. I was there when he set the
&n
bsp; boundaries of the sea, when he made the clouds their garments
and when he ordered the dawn to take the edges of the earth and
shake the wicked out of it. I was there when he made the first
man and woman and placed them in the garden.
Caboose, I was there when he knit you in your mother’s
womb. I watched each stage of your growth as you tumbled and
tossed within her bel y. I saw your arms and legs stretch like mud bugs building chimneys after a midday shower. I watched your
fingers and toes take sprout like lilies in spring. I watched your nose creep from your face and your lips blossom round. I even
watched as His Majesty placed a soul inside your heart. That’s
always my favorite part—his fingerprints upon the souls of cre-
ation. He does that to everyone,” laughed Urium.
Caboose stopped in the middle of the trail. A puzzled look
canvassed his face as he processed the information. “But my
leg? What about my leg? Why is it shorter? Why did I have to be
different?”
Urium hesitated to answer. He knew Caboose wouldn’t
understand. He paused for a moment and then looked straight
into his eyes.
“To bring you here Caboose: to bring you here.”
“Here?! Here?! Why would he want to bring me here?!! Is this
some kind of a sick joke? Does he enjoy watching me suffer pain
and misery? Ok, I’m done; I’m ready to leave. Is the lesson over?
That’s what this is right? A lesson from the elder to the young
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‘inexperienced’ apprentice? Wel , you can take me home anytime
you like, because I’m done. I’m real y done.”
“It doesn’t work like that. I know this is hard to understand,
but, this valley, for some, is the only way. It’s the only way for them to realize they can’t make it without him. It’s in this valley, a valley of bones and death, that many final y solve The False Triad.
Once solved, the truth rises to the surface revealing the lie. When that happens, you’ll discover your real name and purpose in life.”
“Wel , I already know my name and my purpose in life is to
get out of this place.”
Small rocks jumped down the slope just above them. Small
rocks turned into medium rocks right before Urium shouted,
“Avalanche!”
Caboose ran by Urium like he was a croaker stuck in the