The First Ones

by Michael Weinberger

  “Right, now who these creators were called differs from culture to culture, but what is similar about all of them, do you think?”

  “Omnipresence?” He offered.

  “Well, in some cases, but a far more encompassing way to include all creators would be to simply say that every one of them had to be a supernatural being, or deity of some sort or another.”

  “Agreed.”

  “Good, now for the purposes of this conversation let’s call these beings ‘The First Ones’ and they helped this world create all life. They also have powerful allies that assist them in the watching over their creation. An example of this in the Judeo-Christian religions would be the angels and archangels. In the mythology that concerns us, the indigenous people called them ‘the Ancients’ and were usually manifest as animal spirits. Are you following me so far?”

  “I think my Grandfather spoke of this a time or two,” Jet felt quite nostalgic in the moment as this tale was shaping up very much like the stories his grandfather had told him throughout his childhood. Jet had loved those stories then and, although time and reality had jaded him to the magic the stories held, he was once again at rapt attention to every word.

  “The First Ones left their four most powerful allies on the world to protect creation as well as maintain a…” Ursula stopped and searched her mind for the right word, “…balance within the forces of nature.”

  Jet was so enthralled that he couldn’t help but cut in, “You’re talking about the Ancients that gave up their spirits to become human aren’t you?”

  There was another flash of shock in Ursula’s eyes; however, this time it vanished almost as quickly as it had come, as she was readily getting used to the apparent depth of Jet’s knowledge.

  “Yes exactly. Now up to this point all the other spirit animals lived on the land, in the seas or even soared through the skies, along with all of the life that the First Ones had created. It was after the final battle against the rogue Ancient, Kaylanna, that the First Ones called out to all of the remaining Ancients who had survived the carnage and lifted them up and into the heavens. Unfortunately, the four Ancients, those who were Spirit Bears, had sacrificed their spirits and could not ascend. They had to remain forever on Earth.”

  Ursula went quiet for a moment, and when Jet glanced in her direction he saw a sadness that seemed out of place with the telling of tales.

  “Well I, for one, happen to love a happy ending.”

  Ursula smiled, as she came out of whatever funk she had fallen into, “Is it normal for you to use sarcasm as levity, in order to avoid awkward silences?”

  “Actually… Yes.” Jet flashed Ursula a quick smile, “Did it work?”

  Ursula’s eyes seemed to sparkle, as she gave Jet a sideways smile, “Maybe it did.”

  Jet felt a tiny tingle go up his spine as Ursula breathed the words, and he quickly glanced in her direction, and then back to the road, as he caught a flash of the look on her face and in her eyes. Suddenly the dangers of the evening vanished and a different kind of awkward silence filled the interior of the Range Rover. When Jet tried to steal another glance in her direction, Ursula had turned away and was looking down to the small child sleeping in her lap.

  Jet shook his head at himself as he brought his eyes back to the road. He was traveling with a woman and child who were strangers, with “strange” being the operative word. They were also being pursued by vicious mythological monsters, the brains of one still sticking in his hair, and who would likely catch and kill them all before the end of the evening, if their luck didn’t hold out. Yet, being a pathetic male of the human species, he was suddenly aware of butterflies in his stomach after just a one word utterance and a sideways glance from the, admittedly beautiful, stranger.

  Jet cleared his throat before he broke the latest awkward silence.

  “Ok, so how does this all pertain to the Akhlut, and what we are dealing with tonight?”

  “Do you remember any of the stories about the Ancients that remained on earth?”

  “Not so much?”

  “The former Ancients were not normal humans. Even though they no longer possessed the spirit, or perhaps soul is the more common word used these days, they were still of the spirit animal they had been. Each possessed immortality, and they can transform themselves from human into their spirit-animal, or even into a hybrid of the two.”

  Jet sighed, “Look Ursula, I don’t mean to be rude, and I really do have a soft spot for this kind of folklore, but could we get to the point of all this?”

  “I’m almost there so please be patient for a little longer. Remember how the story spoke of Kaylanna and her surviving children having disappeared after the final battle?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, what if I told you that Kaylanna had been biding her time, regaining her strength, and all in preparation for trapping these immortals and robbing them of their immortality?”

  “And what would be the point of that?” Jet rolled his eyes, “I thought Kaylanna was already an immortal ‘Ancient’.”

  “True, but you have to remember that immortality is more about power than eternal life.”

  “And?”

  “And, if Kaylanna manages to steal the power of another immortal, then combining that with her own, she could conceivably wield enough power to threaten the First Ones.”

  Jet thought about that for a few seconds and then asked, “So, if I understand what you are telling me, Kaylanna would become… what? A god?”

  Ursula shook her head, “Not exactly a god, as that would require omnipresence. What I am saying is that there will be an entity on Earth with god-like power, and her only desire is to rid the world of humanity.”

  Jet looked away from the road and into Ursula’s eyes, and saw the seriousness in her expression. As he turned back he could feel his head start to swim as he momentarily considered what Ursula had described.

  “He still doubts,” Aurora’s high-pitched voice rose up to his ears from Ursula’s lap.

  “What?” Jet jumped at the sound of Aurora’s voice, “Well… I don’t doubt it, exactly… I just…”

  Ursula couldn’t hide the incredulity from her voice as she spoke to Jet, “After all that you know, and all that you have seen so far tonight, you still have a doubt?”

  Jet let out a long sigh, “I get the fact that something weird is happening tonight and, so far, the only explanation that comes even remotely close to explaining what is going on has some correlation with a story I always thought was just a campfire fairy tale.”

  An uncomfortable silence filled the interior of the vehicle as the three rode for the next couple of miles without speaking or even looking at each other, before Jet spoke up again.

  “All right, let’s assume for one second that everything you told me is true. How will Kaylanna go about stealing the immortality of these Ancients?”

  Ursula nodded, “When an immortal’s body is destroyed it creates an imbalance in the world that…”

  “Whoa, wait!” Jet suddenly shouted, “Are you telling me that this has already happened?!? Kaylanna has already managed to kill one of the Spirit bears?”

  Ursula answered calmly, “Yes, just under eight hundred years ago.”

  “Eight hundred?” Jet began to relax slightly, “well, I guess the First One’s aren’t in any kind of hurry to fix the problem.”

  “Actually, in the face of eternity,” Ursula shrugged, “eight hundred years is an almost instantaneous reaction time.”

  Jet rolled his eyes, “Well that was deep. Please go on with the story Ms. Socrates.”

  If Ursula understood the joke she gave no indication of it, “When Kaylanna destroyed the Spirit Bear eight hundred years ago she took that power and was able to finally restore herself, which left the world… imbalanced. In response to this, the First Ones would send one of their own to undo the imbalance that Kaylanna created.”

  “One of their own?” he thought.

  “Yes, and the
essence of the First One was to be placed inside the form of the one who wears a mark of being Gifted.”

  Again the interior of the vehicle went quiet, and when Jet turned to look at Ursula he found both her and the small child staring intensely at him. Jet eyes darted from Ursula, to the road and then to the little girl so quickly that he thought he might become dizzy.

  “Don’t look at me that way you two; I’m not this Gifted one!”

  “What? You?!” Ursula exclaimed and suddenly began laughing. Initially, Jet felt a spark of insecurity knowing that Ursula was laughing at him, but then the richness of the sound of her laugh began to resound in his ears. It was so pure and heart-warming in contrast to the darker events of the evening that Jet found himself begin to laugh along with her. Aurora had put one hand over her eyes and was shaking her head back and forth as she giggled along with them. It was almost as if the small child was laughing at how cute Jet was in his ignorance, which was a bit surreal coming from a toddler, but it didn’t break the frivolity of the moment.

  Once Ursula finally had regained control of herself, she said, “No Jet, the Gifted One would be someone who was surrounded by those who would understand what was happening, and be able to protect him or her from the various dangers within the world.”

  Jet screwed up his face, “You mean like a group of bodyguards?”

  Ursula nodded, “Yes, but we call them ‘Guardians’.”

  At first Jet didn’t make the connection and he merely nodded absently as Ursula and Aurora watched him. Jet could feel their silent stares on him when the fog suddenly began to lift from his brain.

  “Wait,” Jet could feel his breath come in a rush as understanding fell upon him like a ton of bricks, “the kid?” Looking to Aurora, “You?”

  “You got it,” Ursula said with a smile, as Aurora continued to watch Jet in silence.

  Skepticism entered his mind quickly, and he turned toward his passengers to say as much when his eyes met Aurora’s. Suddenly Jet was unable to speak, or breathe, as he found himself locked in the child’s gaze. The feel of the SUV, and its connection to the road faded away, and Jet felt as though the vehicle was floating, yet in the periphery of his vision he could see that the outside world had frozen in place. He returned his full concentration to Aurora, and felt himself being pulled into her gaze until the entirety of his vision was trapped in the girl’s eyes. Jet felt a violent wrenching deep inside his mind, as his consciousness was ripped from his body and pulled into the darkness of the toddler’s tiny pupils. When the darkness lifted he could see the SUV as if he were hovering above it, while everything remained motionless all around him on the two-lane highway.

  Then the landscape began to move underneath him and Jet could feel himself flying over the forest, where despite his speed, he could take in every detail of every life within those trees. From the largest mammal to the smallest insect, he could feel it all, as if he were one with the entire forest.

  Then the ground seemed to drop away, as he rose higher and began to fly over the ocean. His speed increased a million-fold and he watched as the continents and then the entire world, and then the solar system, and then the galaxy, falling away under his gaze and still he felt the connection, the understanding, the symbiosis to just everything under his vision, as he still continued to move further and further out and away…

  And then, he suddenly stopped…

  In a micro-moment everything reversed itself, and speed beyond comprehension sent him hurtling back, until just before what would have been an amazing impact, his world went dark, once again. Jet felt himself shooting through the blackness, and then back out of the child’s eyes, until he once again was within his own body, sitting in the driver’s seat of the SUV, as his breath returned to him.

  It was then Jet realized that he had begun screaming.

  Ursula’s eyes went wide with shock and fear at the sight and sound of the scream as Jet lost control of the SUV, which veered out of control, threatening to tip over and send them into a deadly roll. Somehow, he regained control of himself and then the vehicle by gently applying the brakes until the Range Rover came to a skidding and rocking stop. Immediately, Jet opened the door and tried to jump out, but his seatbelt jolted him back into his seat. Ursula and Aurora watched him curiously as he cursed, and made multiple attempts at jumping from the vehicle, each time thinking he had freed himself from the seatbelt, and yet each time having failed to do so. Jet continued to flail around as he desperately worked his fingers into the seatbelt buckle, managed to finally release it and jumped out of the SUV to walk slowly around toward the rear of the vehicle, mumbling to himself as he went.

  Ursula and Aurora watched him go in silence, until Ursula asked her, “Just how hard did you hit him?”

  The child continued to watch Jet, as he paced around outside the car, by the rear bumper, and she said, “Hard enough so there would be no doubt in his mind. We don’t have time for anything less.”

  Ursula looked with incredulity at Aurora, then rolled her eyes sighed.

  Gently she lifted the small child off of her lap and set her on the console between the seats before opening the door and exiting the vehicle. Carefully she walked around the passenger side of the SUV until Jet came into view and she could hear him talking to himself.

  “…not my shift! All I had to do was say, ‘No, I’m going home’ and she could let the local law enforcement take care of it.”

  Jet was pacing and repeating five quick steps, back and forth, along the rear of the vehicle when he noticed Ursula, and he continued to speak as if she had been standing there all along.

  “My shift was over and I should be home in bed, catching up on some much needed sleep! Or I could have just stayed up, watching whatever shows I missed on the DVR!”

  Ursula was about to say something when Jet’s voice raised a few decibels in volume, “Or I could even have taken Nadine up on her offer and endured the great unknown as she literally, and when I say literally, I mean LI-TER-AL-LY, tried to suck the life out of me in the best of all possible ways.”

  Ursula had been reaching a hand out to Jet, until he mentioned Nadine. Upon hearing the woman’s name, she froze, retracted her hand as her eyes narrowed, and she asked, “Who’s Nadine?”

  Jet either didn’t hear her, or he disregarded the question, as he continued his rant.

  “All I had to do was drive on home and I wouldn’t be running away from monsters straight out of my Grandfather’s bedtime stories. I wouldn’t be driving around with a gun-toting Amazon who threatens to shoot me every few minutes.”

  Ursula was still wearing that intense frown on her face when she tried again to interrupt, “Who’s…” then her face softened and one of her eyebrows went up, “…Amazon?”

  Jet continued his rant unimpeded, as if he had now forgotten all about Ursula standing there, “And I wouldn’t, I ABSOLUTELY WOULD NOT, be escorting some ancient being with god-like powers that still needs her ass wiped on occasion because her poo-poo diapers haven’t been changed.”

  Sensing the rant coming to a conclusion, Ursula just watched as Jet worked himself toward the climax.

  “But nooooooo, what do I do?” Jet finally turned and faced Ursula with wild eyes filled with emotion, “WHAT DO I DO?!”

  Ursula spoke in an emotionless, matter of fact tone, “You stopped.”

  Jet pointed a finger at Ursula then raised it to the heavens before slashing it down as he exclaimed each word with emphasis, “I… Stopped!”

  Neither one of them moved as they looked at each other. Ursula was trying not to give any indication that her body was tensing, ready to defend herself in case Jet had completely gone off the deep end, while Jet simply stood there, finger still extended, as his breath heaved.

  Then his arm dropped to his side and his body relaxed as he looked down at the ground by his feet. When he looked up again his eyes were filled with tears, but tears devoid of sadness. Instead he simply looked as though he was drained from hav
ing been so overwhelmed by whatever Aurora had shown him.

  “I…I just saw…I felt…My God what was…?”

  Now Ursula did extend a hand out to Jet, and he took it without hesitation.

  “I know. It’s something overwhelming and terrifying. To be thrust into understanding so quickly, but I can tell you that someday what you saw will give you nothing but peace.”

  Jet looked dumbly at Ursula, desperately wanting to ask questions, but something inside him knew that answers would not be forthcoming.

  Okay,” Jet spoke in a low whisper, “maybe you should drive for a while.”

  “Probably a good idea,” Ursula gently took Jet’s arm and led him around to the passenger side of the SUV, where he opened the door and climbed into the seat. Ursula closed his door for him, ran around to the driver’s side and made her way behind the wheel, pulling the vehicle back onto the highway as they continued their journey.

  “So…” Ursula asked while trying to keep an air of nonchalance in her tone, “...who’s Nadine?”

  Chapter 10: Private Planes

  A clearing holding the airstrip seemed to materialize out of the forest, as the SUV navigated through a particularly dense patch of foliage. Jet was amazed that the entirety of the airport consisted of one small tower, several parked propeller planes and one long runway.

  “So, which of these death traps are you guys planning on using?” he asked.

  Ursula didn’t respond as she scanned the area while the girl scrambled up from the back seat and placed herself onto Jet’s lap.

  “Hey!” Jet almost screeched, as Aurora tried to balance herself by pressing all of her weight down onto one of her knees, which just happened to be finding purchase on Jet’s groin.

  “Quiet!” Ursula spun her head from the window, glaring at Jet with a fierce look that made him hold the rest of his yelp deep inside his lungs, “I can’t see our people and they should have been waiting here for us.”

  Jet looked around the airstrip, and despite the darkness of the early morning, realized that Ursula was right. The place looked as though it was deserted, which shouldn’t have been surprising as the early hour was most likely prior to their normal operating time. There was something else though. Something just didn’t feel right about the place, but whatever it was that seemed wrong was beyond Jet’s comprehension.