Rumi's Field (None So Blind Book 2)

by Timothy Scott Bennett

  The being looked out the window, up toward his waiting ship. He looked back at Mary. Then he nodded once.

  Mary's restraints lifted and she pushed herself up to a sitting position.

  14.6

  "The Element didn't agree with The Families' decision to take me out, so you rescued me and brought me to Mars." She gestured toward him like it was his turn. "Why did you do that?"

  William nodded. "The relationship between The Families and the aliens has always been two-pronged, Madam. On the one hand were the scientists and engineers, the security forces and the politicians. For them the aliens were a source of information and technology. On the other hand was the Element, most of whom now are descendants of the legendary First Circle, that original group that met in Germany. For us, the aliens were a source of understanding and wisdom. We found and trained gifted individuals who could communicate with Spud and his colleagues mind-to-mind, and who began to learn their techniques for transcending the physical. The Life only answer the questions they wish to answer, which are not many. When they do answer, it is often in riddles. So we know much less about them than we would like to. But it was we in the Element who've been able to learn what little we do know, about their history, their motives, and their projects."

  "Agent Rice and his group were with the Element?" asked Linda.

  William shook his head. "Rice trained with us early in his career, Madam. As did Roberta Reese. As did Mary, who now works for you. But as so often happens, other factions within The Families put our efforts to a different use than we had intended. The People were not aligned with the Evolutionary Element. They reported directly to the Directorate, the central governing board for The Families as a whole. Rice and his people were tasked with safeguarding the Plan, monitoring Astral-level activity, and maintaining secrecy, which they achieved by telling lies, like that fairy story they sold you about the Life. While they used our techniques for Astral-level travel and manipulation, they used them in the service of wealth, power, and control. Perhaps it was his attempt to serve two masters that drove Mr. Rice insane."

  Linda sat for a moment and breathed, resisting the lure of painful memories. "So you guys are a breakaway group inside of a breakaway group," she said at last. She wanted to stay on task. The Fisherman had not yet answered her question.

  "You don't know the half of it, Madam. In some very real ways, we in the Element are different enough from the dominant human society and paradigm that we constitute a different consensus meta-reality. We are almost as alien as the aliens."

  "You seem like a normal human elite overlord to me, William," said Linda, smiling at her joke.

  William flashed his eyebrows. "Born and raised in captivity amongst you, Madam. I learned your language well."

  "Embedded, were you?" asked Linda.

  The Fisherman nodded. "My father, perhaps to get distance from my grandfather's rather forceful personality, left our family's estate in York and moved to London, where he got into broadcasting. Had a fairly distinguished career as a news presenter, at a time when The Families' interest in shaping the content of mass media was growing by leaps and bounds. I was raised in the comfortable, established middle class lifestyle that fit my father's position, though we all understood who our real people were."

  "I see," said Linda. "So, again. Why did you save me?"

  William nodded and sighed. "About the time of your first election, the Life received information which, in their minds, changed everything. They've been acting on that information since. They insisted that you be 'brought in' very soon after your inauguration. They aided your escape from the People. They dismantled their vast system of underground facilities and withdrew themselves from the Earth. Then they installed the Grid - what they call the Interdict."

  "And is the Grid keeping us in, or other people out, or something else entirely?" asked Linda.

  "Yes," said William with a wry smile. "But let me continue. Because all of their actions were leading somewhere. Unbeknownst to everyone but themselves, you see, they had been working on another program: they had carefully crafted a new being, someone who might create new openings for choice-making in the rapidly unraveling situation on Earth. When the new information arrived, the decision was made to awaken this new being, to shake things up such that new choices might be made. We in the Element aligned with this as best we could."

  Linda frowned. "So... this new information was what, exactly?" she asked.

  William smiled. "The Life said very little about this before they departed," answered the Fisherman. 'The Fathers are returning,' is how Spud explained it. We take that to mean the Fortunate, whom you met earlier."

  "Okay," said Linda, nodding. "Whatever that means. So who's this new being? One of those hybrids? Some sort of super-alien with fantastical powers that can save us right before the end credits roll?"

  The Fisherman flashed his eyebrows in surprise. "Why, you are, Madam," he said, as though it were obvious. "Linda Travis. The Choicemaker."

  14.7

  He stood before the Conclave.

  You are returning with freedom and clarity? asked the Architect.

  The choice is mine to continue the work, he answered.

  And your commitment to the First Law holds steady? asked the Builder.

  And the One Goal, Builder, he responded.

  You know the promise of pain you face? asked the Artist.

  And the possibility for failure? added the Scientist.

  There can be no failure where there is choice, Scientist. And pain is often the companion of learning, he said. Who can know this better than I?

  The Artist nodded in agreement. Still, it must be spoken, she said.

  Yes it must, he said.

  This will likely be your last time, said the Mathematician. For good or ill, the time is now here.

  May you leave with our thanks and blessings, said the Mother.

  I will take them with me to my new life, he said. With that, he bowed deeply. When he stood back up, the Conclave was gone. He turned and walked into the light.

  14.8

  Linda, unable to contain herself, had stood, and was pacing back and forth behind her armchair. "So you saved me because I'm some alien-bred savior?" she asked, her hands on her hips. She stopped and grabbed the chair back with both hands. "Really? That's your plan?"

  "Have I not made that plain from the beginning, Madam President?" said William, using her title to remind her who she was.

  She shook her head in disgust and started pacing again. "But how...?" she said, raising her hands in supplication. She stopped and peered at the distant pyramid, then turned to face the Fisherman. "How did they...?" Linda exhaled loudly and shook her head.

  "We don't have time to explore exactly how it was that you were 'crafted,'" said William. "Some of it you already heard from your brother-in-law. The rest will have to wait for a better time."

  Linda blinked in disbelief. "In my staff meetings, we call that 'tossing a bomb and running,'" she said.

  The Fisherman nodded. "Fair enough," he said. "As I said earlier, I look forward to a time when we might have that discussion. For now, suffice it to say that, in the eyes of some, you are now one of the most important forces at work in the Earth/Human matrix. And different enough to warrant my declaring you a separate layer of leadership unto yourself. I imagine you feel some resistance to such statements. I understand why you might, and regret any pain this might cause you."

  "And yet necessity compels you," said Linda, a bit of scorn in her voice.

  "Assuredly," said William, nodding slowly.

  14.9

  Nicky pushed through his cat door and stepped out into the dark and stormy night. His man human was snoring away in his soft, warm bed, but Nicky couldn't sleep, his dreams filled with fears of darkness and fire and falling. He ducked quickly to the left, crossed the paving stones, and took his secret path to the freight elevator, the one that hugged the cottage's foundation. His heart filled with excitement when h
e rounded the corner. There were soldier humans carrying boxes and shoving them hurriedly into the back of a truck, their work lit by flashlights. And there was a door left open! In a flash, Nicky slipped past the soldier humans and through the open door, disappearing into the darkness. He found a stairway leading downward, lit by tiny lights on the wall rather than the regular overhead fixtures he was used to. As quickly as he could, Nicky raced down the stairs.

  At the bottom was another door, this one shut. Seeing no way to open it, and seeing nowhere else to go, Nicky hunkered down in the darkest corner and waited. Soon enough, another soldier human opened the door and came through, carrying another box. Nicky darted through the door before it could close, into the empty corridor beyond. There were more of the tiny, dim lights, spaced at long intervals along the hallway. Slowing, Nicky began exploring.

  This was where he'd been before when his man human caught him earlier in the day. He could tell by the smell. Chemicals in the air, like a hospital, but something dead now as well. It was cold down here, so different from the warmth above. He moved along the dark hallways, peeking through the open doors, sniffing under the closed ones, pushing against the latter to see if any would open at his touch. At last he came to the source of the smells: a room with windows to the hallway. The door was closed, but the windows had a small ledge, so he jumped up to get a better view. The room on the other side of the glass was empty and dark, but there was another set of windows on the opposite wall, and in the room beyond that was a strange bed, with a woman human body lying on it, and another of those tiny lights overhead. Nicky knew that this body was important to his man human, though he wasn't sure how or why. He remembered seeing her when she was first brought in on a helicopter. All wrapped up in a bundle then, but he knew it was her. She was the whole reason they'd come to live here on this island, his man human and himself.

  She was also the source of the dead smell.

  14.10

  Mihos was falling. He was sure of it now. First he'd thought he was being pushed by somebody. Then pulled. Then pushed again. Now he was falling. What made it worse was this: he was beginning to suspect that he could actually see what it was he was falling toward.

  It was difficult to be sure. It might have been just another mental game, a bit of random imagery, occasioned by his fears, perhaps, or left over from some other life. But maybe not. It was faint, to be sure. Dim, like stars could be dim in the physical bands, where you could only see them when you weren't looking at them. But it was still there, every time he looked. And it might be less faint now than it was before.

  What it was he was seeing he could not yet tell. If he was falling toward something, then he was tens of miles above it. A spot of light. Maybe yellow. Maybe orange. Maybe round. A blur. A round blur of orange, right there at the edge of his ability to see. Far below him, and he falling toward it.

  Maybe it was the ground. Maybe he was in the sky, falling like he'd jumped from an airplane. Or a flying carpet. He just couldn't tell.

  Wherever it was he was falling to, Mihos hoped very much that he would land on his feet.

  14.11

  Linda sat for a long time, just looking at the Fisherman and thinking. William waited, then leaned forward and spoke. "Every bit of consciousness on the planet Earth will be cherished, Madam," he said, "no matter where the future takes it."

  Linda shook her head. "I, uh..." she said, blinking repeatedly. "Could you say that again?"

  The Fisherman nodded. "You were thinking that people will be lost. Left behind. Left out. You serve them all. I understand that. I'm telling you that no one will be lost. Every bit of the human experiment as it has played out on the planet Earth exists already in the Mind of God, adding to it, serving the evolution of consciousness. Evolution is for all, because All is One."

  "Okay..." said Linda, warily. "Keep going. What's your point here?"

  "I want you to think more expansively about human beings, Madam. In the eyes of the Cosmic Community, the human species as it exists in the physical band of reality represents a marvelously self-reflexive training ground for the evolution of consciousness. The particular suite of senses, abilities, potentials, and experiences contained within the human species is exceedingly novel, and the consensus meta-reality we have created amongst ourselves is thus greatly cherished amongst other sentient groups."

  "And that's why the aliens are so interested in helping us?"

  "They've acted as both goad and guide to human beings for millennia," said William. "Many individuals have already joined the larger consensus meta-meta reality, like bubbles rising from the boiling cauldron of human experience."

  "But now they're only helping The Families get off planet."

  "Their focus is two-fold, as I have explained. They work to aid some small portion of us to carry on the human experiment elsewhere in the physical universe. And they continue to offer their invitation to everyone on Earth. Their hope is that the human species as a whole will soon join the Cosmic Community, consciously, openly, and freely.

  "But only a 'small portion' of people get a ticket on your magical spaceships."

  "Only a small portion will leave this planet in their current physical bodies, yes. To start colonies elsewhere, as I showed you, so that human bodies can continue to exist on the physical plain."

  "And the rest of us poor slobs?" asked Linda.

  The Fisherman smiled. "Many will leave physicality behind altogether, as your friend Pooch did. Some will reincarnate in human bodies in the new colonies. Some will live subsequent lives on other planets in the same general meta-reality. Some will remain stuck in highly individualized realities of their own creation. Some will choose to forfeit their individuality and dissolve back into Mind-at-Large. And we must remember that we cannot yet predict the final outcome on Earth, Madam. Perhaps some will survive the bottleneck, and some may live subsequent lives on a future Earth we cannot yet see."

  "But nothing gets left behind, you say," said Linda with a frown. "It all works out eventually..."

  William nodded. "All of reality is on the sacred journey: the evolution and expansion of consciousness. The process simply proceeds at different paces for different bits of that larger Whole. Some graduate and move ahead quickly. Others plod along more slowly. Others get stuck in loops for a time. Others go backward. Some start over. But all of us are moving somewhere, as Mind-at-Large itself is in motion, and contains the whole of reality. So while the alien medics offer a hand to some few of us, inviting us to consciously take our rightful place in the consensus meta-meta-reality and the Cosmic Community, inviting us to join them in the conscious advancement of consciousness from our physical realm, it remains true that every other bit of mind is a necessary part of that sacred process. Self-reflective awareness is a great and rare thing in the Cosmos, something to be noticed and cherished and put to use for the evolution of consciousness. But it is not the only thing that is cherished. It’s all cherished. Does that help?"

  "It doesn't sound much like a 'continuation of the human experiment,' William," said Linda. "I mean, space colonies on other planets and moons? That sounds like a pretty different experience."

  William nodded his agreement. "It will certainly be different, Madam. Yet the human body will continue, and with it its shared meta-reality, its vast collective unconscious." He leaned forward in his chair. "This is a time of triage, remember. The limitations of circumstance are more demanding than ever. It is thought that a different experiment is better than no experiment at all."

  "Okay," said Linda. "So The Families are jumping into their lifeboats before the whole planet sinks. The aliens helped build those boats, but they're also throwing out life preservers for the rest of us. Does that about sum it up?"

  "Quite colorfully, Madam," said William. "Behind the scenes, unbeknownst to most humans on Earth, we in the so-called 'breakaway civilization' put the vast resources of the global industrial machine to the task of designing and building the various ships, transport
containers, terraforming equipment, and off-world habitats needed to achieve this end. This explains where so much of what has been referred to as the 'missing wealth' or 'black budget' actually ended up. It also explains why the global economy remained intact as long as it did, which was much longer than many outside observers predicted it would. We kept it going on artificial life support for as long as possible while we finished building our first colonies and our fleet. And the continued burning of fossil fuels, along with the additional particulates from the chemtrail project, kept global dimming in place while we worked, putting off the inevitable greenhouse spiraling we are beginning to see now. We thought of the process as analogous to an unborn bird using up all of the resources in its shell before hatching, or a caterpillar gorging itself on sustenance before transforming into a moth and flying away."

  "All the while laughing at the rest of us as you vacuumed up the Earth's wealth to save your own skins," said Linda, her nose wrinkled in disgust.

  At this the Fisherman pushed himself forward to the edge of his chair and reached out again to take Linda's hand. "I truly wish it had been otherwise, Madam," he said, his voice soft and gentle. He let go of the President's hand and sat back. "The Families, alas, have been blinded by their own cultural assumptions. After centuries of winning, after having broken away from the dominant global culture, most of them have lost all sense of kinship with the rest of the human population, and have acted out a great deal of contempt and disgust toward the 'unwashed masses' and 'useless eaters.'"