by J. K. Haugen
“So you have all the memories of the real Ayden now?” asked John.
“No Johnny,” said Sarah, “it’s more than that. Can’t you see? It’s him. It’s all of him, not just memories but his actual being, his… soul.”
“She’s correct John,” said Ayden, “I have cheated death and I have been given a second chance at life…a new life.”
“Boom!” They all heard a large explosion outside.
“What the hell was that?” yelled Sarah.
“I don't know.” said Ayden with a surprised look on his face.
“We better go check it out.” said John.
The three quickly ran to the front door of Ayden’s house. John opened the door and peered through. He yelled and quickly ducked, as he heard what sounded like a shot fired and a piece of shrapnel from a ricochet barely missed his head.
“Whoa!” he screamed. “Somebody’s shooting at us!”
“That’s impossible John,” said Ayden, “there hasn’t been anyone in the city for millennia.”
“Well that wasn’t a bee buzz'n my head!” he said with a scowl. “Hold your fire!” he yelled.
He slowly walked out from behind the doorway with his hands held high over his head, “I am a friend!” he exclaimed. As he walked two steps out the door another shot was fired, nearly missing him once more. He saw a bright stream of blue light coming straight toward him.
He dove back into the doorway, raised his arm and slammed his hand onto the control panel, closing the giant door with a whoosh! “Haven’t they ever heard of...We come in Peace?” he said with a nervous grin.
“Ayden,” asked Sarah, “who could be out there, and why are they shooting at us?”
“It wasn’t like any gun I have ever seen before,” said John, “it was more of a blue laser or plasma type round, it nearly took my head off.”
“That sounds like a Delvin officer’s weapon, but how could that be?” said Ayden with a puzzled tone. “Those weapons can only be fired from a Delvin officer, they are encoded with the DNA of the user when they are assigned to duty, and no one else can fire their weapon.”
“So you’re telling me there’s a couple-hundred thousand year old soldier out their shooting a ray gun at us?”
“No.” said Ayden.
“Oh good!” said John with a smile of relief.
“No, you were right the first time, they are plasma weapons, not ray guns.” said Ayden with a straight face as he watched John roll his eyes back at him.
Sarah hid next to Ayden underneath one of the emerald colored desks by the door.
“Looks like you got a new life, just in time to see ours end.” she said to him, with fear in her voice.
“We need to find out who's shooting at us and why.” said John, looking over at Ayden.
“I believe they want the child, or the lost pages, or both.” Ayden said, with a stone cold expression on his face.
“Child? What child?” Sarah yelled. They heard more gunfire and explosions against the front of Ayden’s home.
“Follow me!” said Ayden. He began running towards the garden where John had picked their breakfast from.
As they entered the garden, the ground opened up in front of them and they saw a large circular doorway that had been hidden underneath the dirt and camouflaged. As they approached the opening they heard an enormous explosion behind them, and John yelled, “Juuump!”
Sarah and John grabbed each other’s hands and jumped down into the hole. Just before Ayden disappeared, he turned back to see a familiar figure stepping through the flames and smoke that covered the doorway into his house. “Masco.” he said under his breath, with a vengeful and determined look in his eyes. The circular cover closed back over the entrance to the tunnel and Ayden’s projection quickly disappeared.
Chapter 11
~Joshua~
Falling, for what felt like an eternity to them, Sarah and John tumbled. Sarah thought it seemed like the rabbit hole in the Alice in Wonderland story. When they finally hit the bottom, they were happily surprised that the landing seemed quite soft. They landed in a pile of leaves and clippings that had been collecting there for centuries.
“What is this place?” asked Sarah.
Ayden’s voice surrounded them as they heard him say, “This is where the waste from the garden is processed and then gets recycled.” His voice filled with excitement as he continued, “as the end seemed to get closer and closer, it became ever more dangerous to go against the Council. They had even made it illegal to have a laboratory that wasn’t controlled by them. So I came down here and hid my work where no one would look. This is my secret lab.” Ayden then appeared in front of them and said, “Follow me this way!”
They brushed themselves off and followed Ayden down a long corridor to a brightly illuminated white room. As they entered the room John couldn’t quite believe his eyes. The room was enormous, about the size of an indoor stadium.
It was broken up into individual work stations, each with its own work bench and glass or acrylic-like cubicle walls, and each with what seemed like, their own experiment or purpose. John looked around and one station in particular caught his eye as he walked up to it.
After several minutes of looking at it, his voice was trembling when he yelled to Sarah, “Wow, Sarah, come look at this!” Sarah was still standing in the doorway in amazement. “Sarah!” he said again, breaking her stare and finally getting her attention, “Come look!”
Sarah ran over to John with her eyes still wide and her mouth still open in disbelief. “I thought we had finally seen all there was to see,” she said, “but oh my God John, did you ever imagine in your entire life, that you would see such wondrous and magnificent things?”
As she got up close to the station where John was, he was smiling. In front of him was a large bright blue hologram of the earth. It was so realistic looking that it appeared as if they were giants looking down at the actual earth from space. “This is how God must have felt on the 7th day when he looked down and saw the miracles that he had created.” John said, still mystified. “Watch this!” he said to her.
John touched the globe in front of them and it began to turn. “Wow that’s pretty cool Johnny,” she said, “but what’s the big deal?”
“Here, try this.” he took her hand and placed it on the globe. “Can you feel that?” he asked.
“It feel’s cold… like the wind!” she said.
“Yeah, now put your hand in a little farther.” he told her.
“Wow, I can feel the water, the ocean, how is that possible?” she asked as she moved her hand back and forth through the Pacific.
“Now,” he said, “think really hard, about your dad and about how much you love and miss him. Put all of your heart’s emotion into that memory of him and envision him in your mind.”
Sarah closed her eyes and John saw a tear stream down her face. The globe began to move and change, which startled her. Her eyes opened just in time to see the earth begin to grow around them. As it zoomed in close over North America they both grabbed onto the desk in front of them for balance. It seemed like they were falling from space to the world below, even though they had actually never left the lab.
They both bent their knees when the ground came up fast and hard, and then, just as fast as it started, it was all completely still.
They found themselves, standing once again, in her father’s lab where their adventure had first begun. Sarah almost fainted, as her father stepped into the room from his office. “Daddy!” she cried out, “I’m here daddy!”
“I’m so sorry Sarah, he can’t hear you,” said John, “but it is him, right now, at this very moment in time.”
She walked up to her dad and reached out for his face. She began sobbing as her fingers ran down along his cheek. She could even feel the scruff from his unshaven chin. His eyes looked older and worn and like they were filled with sadness and worry. He was holding a picture of the two of them from their last expedition together.
He was talking but she couldn’t hear his voice. In fact, she couldn’t hear anything.
As her focus was drawn to her hearing and away from her father, the room and projection quickly zoomed back to the original globe. Sarah dried her eyes and smiled over at John. “How did you know it would do that?” she asked, “Who were you thinking of?”
“You,” he answered softly, “I saw you… right there. I was thinking of how much I care for you, and there you were.”
She got close to John and wrapped her arms around him, hugging him tightly as she whispered into his ear, “I love you too, Johnny!”
Holding hands, they walked out from the globe station. They called out for Ayden, looking at all the incredible technology around them as they walked by it.
“Over here.” Ayden’s voice echoed from the other side of the room. As they walked up close to him they noticed he was standing next to long cylindrical glass pod. The glass was clouded and they could not see what was inside.
All around it were tubes and controls with flashing lights and gauges. As John looked close, he noticed that it wasn’t the glass that was clouded, but that the inside of the pod was filled with some kind of gas.
“This is Joshua!” said Ayden. There was a loud hissing noise and the air inside the pod began to clear. Sarah gasped as she saw what was inside.
“It’s a baby John!” she exclaimed. “It’s a baby!”
“Is he alive, Ayden?” asked John.
“Yes John.” he answered. “This is Joshua, the savior of my people…and my son.”
“But he looks like us,” said Sarah, “like a normal human, not like your people at all. How could he be your son and how has he survived all this time, and not grown? Why is he still a baby?”
“It would be incredibly difficult to explain to you, without you understanding the basic knowledge of the technology.” he answered. “However, this pod has kept him in a suspended animation or a stasis-like state since he was first conceived. His cells, are in essence, frozen and will not age or grow until he is released from the source capsule. He is not my biological son. He is, what you might consider to be, a clone.”
Sarah touched her hand to the glass, as she listened to Ayden’s explanation.
“He does not look like me, because he is what you are, human. We all were human just like you once, when my people first began. Over time we had evolved into what you now see when you look at me. He is the very basics of my DNA… The source code…The true beginnings of my people, and now, he will be the last… and the cycle of life continues.”
He looked down at the pod as his eye were filled hope and pride. “We must keep him safe. They can never be allowed to take him or hurt him. He must survive, if we are to continue to survive. Contained In his mind, is all of the knowledge of my people. He will be capable of using and recreating all of our technology. He will just simply know who we were, where we came from, and where our future will lead us.”
“He is beautiful!” said Sarah, as she gazed down at the baby.
“Not just beautiful,” said Ayden, “he is perfect in every way. He will be kind and loving, loyal and brilliant, wise and honorable. He is the best of us, better than any man who ever walked this earth.
He will teach the new world how to achieve those traits and be good to one another. He will be our savior. In his mind, programmed in his DNA, is all of the Holy Beclay, including the lost scrolls. The pages that you have been looking for, are here...in Joshua!”
Sara and John could not believe what they were hearing. “Were Ayden's people, actually just a higher evolutionary form of humans?” Sarah asked herself. “Could this one small child really be the one to save all of mankind?”
They had seen so much since they first fell down the hole and found the well. “But was Ayden right?” she wondered. “Was Joshua really mankind’s only hope for survival? Had it really come down to the two of them to protect him and help him save the world and all humans from extinction?”
It was all so much to take in. Sarah stepped back and held her breath as she ran her fingers, with both hands, through her long red curls...
“Wow Johnny!” she said. “What do we do now?”
Chapter 12
~The Great Escape~
Ayden told John to step up to the pod's control panel and put his hand over the display. John heard a loud beep and felt a vibration under his hand like it was being scanned.
A female, computer-like voice came from the control panel, “Blood identity sequence confirmed.” it said. “Please verify voice print.”
John looked at Ayden with a puzzled look, as he heard Ayden’s voice speaking slowly and firmly, “Ayden 01141976.”
“Identity Confirmed.” the voice said. “Thank you, and good morning Ayden, it has been a long time. Your last access was…”
“I know how long ago it was!” interrupted Ayden. The voice stopped speaking immediately as soon as Ayden spoke, as if they were really having a conversation.
“What can I do for you today?” she asked.
“Cynda,” said Ayden, “I would like you to meet my friends. This is...”
“I'm Sarah,” said Sarah with a smile, “and this is Johnny.”
“Uh hum,” John interrupted with a fake cough, “just John.” he said.
The voice greeted them by name, “Hello Just John and hello Sarah.”
“No…” started John. “…Oh never mind uuugg...got me again Sarah very funny.” he sighed.
Sarah giggled and stepped back up toward the machine. “Cynda,” Ayden continued, “Sarah and John are now going to watch over Joshua, they will be the ones to protect him.” he said, with his voice sounding full of hope and pride. “Please wake my son now!” he requested.
From the very moment that those words escaped Ayden’s mouth, the pod made a loud hiss as if air was escaping from a tire. The top cover of the pod began to get clearer and clearer and then in an instant, it disappeared altogether. As if it were some kind of force field instead of glass like the two had thought.
A few seconds past and Joshua began to move his fingers and toes. Sarah was in awe of how tiny and perfect they were. He began to move the rest of his body and began to coo a bit, but to John’s surprise, he never let out a single cry.
He opened his eyes and looked up at John who could not stop starring back into Joshua's beautiful blue eyes. John felt an instant bond with Joshua. It was an unexplainable feeling of peace that he felt over his entire body as he watched the baby begin to smile at him.
Sarah could feel it too She reached out for him and scooped him up into her arms. “Hi Joshua,” she said softly, “I’m your new mommy. We are going to take very good care of you and give you all the love we have in our hearts. You, my son, are a very special and important baby boy!” she said, slightly bouncing him up and down.
Ayden looked at the control panel and said, “Come with me we do not have much more time. Masco will catch up to us soon. Right now he is at the garden and trying to open the vault door. It is strong, but he will succeed shortly...unfortunately my power cell was damaged and I will not be going with you on the rest of your journey. So I must explain what you will need to know, in order for you and for Joshua to fulfill your destinies.”
“Who is this… Masco?” asked John.
“He was once a dear friend, and a colleague of mine.” Ayden answered. “He helped me to design the laboratory and helped me to give life to Joshua.”
Ayden spoke with the sound of sadness coming from every word. His heart seemed heavy as he continued to speak, “When my wife Anmora died, I was stricken with the weight of a thousand worlds falling down on me.
My whole life seemed pointless and unbearable. Masco gave me comfort by creating the holographic technology that you see before you. He designed this new body of mine, as well as the world viewer that you two were using earlier. He also gave me this pendant that I wear around my neck. Whenever I missed her, I could simply open it and not only would she again be s
tanding in front of me, but I could even touch her, hold her hand, or even kiss her lips. He saved me from myself. Without the pendant I would have joined her in the afterlife, where her and my daughter, now wait for me.”
“It sounds like he was a great man,” said John, “so, why is he trying to kill us?” he asked.
“And how did he survive?” asked Sarah.
“I do not know for sure how he survived after so many years and through the devastation that the world above must have seen.” said Ayden “However, I can tell you that near the end, he did not believe in the work I was doing. He worried that I did not know or could not understand the consequences of playing Agodah and creating life by creating Joshua.”
“So what happened to him after your disagreement?” asked John.
“A decision was made by Delvin Compania for a few Council leaders to try to leave the planet.” Ayden answered. “He thought there would be a better chance for his own survival if he asked to be a part of that team. He joined them and told them of my work to gain favor. They tried to stop me but it was too late for us all. The end of the earth’s great cycle was too near, again, like it is now. He must have convinced them that I was not going to be successful, or that they didn’t have enough time to stop me. Until today, I had not seen or heard from him, not since the day he left to join that project.”
Ayden looked puzzled and yet determined, “If that really is Masco,” he said, “and he did in fact somehow survive all this time down here alone. Then he most surely, would have gone mad, many, many years ago. He may also still be convinced that Joshua is an abomination. If so, he will stop at nothing to prevent you from giving Joshua to the world.”
Ayden motioned for them to follow him and continued to tell them his final story. “The pendant that Masco had made for me was comforting, but it still was not my Anmora. And so I had begun to work on a new artificial mind that would combine all of her personality, her memories, her morals and values, her likes and dislikes, everything from her life.”