by Ralph Rotten
I was not sure how to respond to that. On one hand I felt like I'd been accosted by some church nut in a gorilla costume, but on the other hand...I'd been carrying on conversations with dead people my whole life so who was I to call anyone a nut for their odd religious beliefs. I sat there for a few moments before I asked the only coherent question I could think of.
"I thought we went to heaven or hell?" I was a little disappointed; they'd promised me chocolate for all eternity if I was good.
"Heaven and Hell are just different conditions of the Guf. You fill it with too many bad souls and it'd be hell, or a prison movie. Fill it mainly with good souls and it'd be heaven. This is why we socially engineer our galaxies, to ensure the quality of the material filling the Guf. You're gonna spend all eternity in there so you wanna make sure it's not a ghetto in there." He shrugged before sliding into a new spot on the floor.
Sitting down on the ground cross-legged, I posed my next question.
"Bad souls go to heaven too?"
"Yep." He nodded.
"Idi Amin and Stalin and Hitler all go to Heaven?" I was dismayed.
"Yep." Again he agreed.
"That's bullshit, why would murderers and sociopaths get to be saved for all eternity? Why the hell did we all follow the Ten Commandments and all that crap if we're all going to the same place anyhow?" I was floored, it just seemed patently wrong.
"Lemme ask you another question. Was Audie Murphy a bad man? How about Alvin York? Congressional Medal of Honor winners, good Christian men, yet they both murdered dozens of men in combat." Bara rubbed his armpits as he gave me a moment to consider the question before continuing.
"Murdered?" I let a hint of irritation creep into my voice. Bara ignored me and continued on with his explanation.
"See, those guys had a dark side, and they knew how to call upon it when it was needed. Then when the shooting was over, they put it back in a little box, nice and safe. If they hadn't had that ability to call upon their dark side they woulda been pussies, and the Germans woulda wiped 'em out like every other GI. Audie and Alvin were not axe murderers, they were just men who knew how to call upon that darkness when it was necessary, and lock that shit up tight the rest of the time. Look, once you wrap your head around the concept that your galaxy is just a womb for a baby god, you come to understand that we want that extracorporeal child to be strong, yet compassionate, the kind of deity that knows when to call upon its dark side, and when to keep it in a box. As a Timelord you have to balance the good against the bad in just such a way that you are creating a benevolent being that can stand up for itself, but not be a complete axe murderer. I mean you wouldn't wanna give infinite power to a sociopath would you? Figuring out the right mix will be your job. That's why you were chosen, because you are the true prophet for the Milky Way Galaxy, the one who can not only hear the Guf, but talk back to it, sense what's in its mind. With your finger on the pulse, you will know exactly which way the embryo needs to be steered. This is why only a true prophet can be a Timelord. For anyone else it'd be like driving blindfolded. You're here to be a god's embryonic nanny, and raise that kid right."
As my mind raced at the speed of light I absentmindedly finished off that glass of milk. Pow, zoom, to the moon, the Cree hit me like a truck...but a clear-headed buzz. Cree doesn't make you stupid like Earth booze. But it does a really great job of calming your nerves. Mmmmm, Cree...
Even with the power of DuNai processors in my brain running at full speed, I was having trouble taking it all in. I'd been raised in a Church family, but I hadn't attended since I moved out on my own. Still, I had been programmed with basic Christian values and beliefs. It was hard to be told that most of what I had learned was wrong. But then again, humans were essentially cavemen compared to the DuNai. Homo Sapiens were only ten thousand years out of a loincloth. Most Dunai lived three times that long.
"What'd you mean that I created a wake as soon as I got here?" I tried to focus.
"Hmmmph." He gave a pleased grunt before answering. "True prophets cause a wake when they enter a galaxy, like a disturbance in the Force. Y'know? See, anytime you approach a living being, it'll tend to react one way or another to you. The Guf is alive, and it will react to those of us who can converse with it. The reason you felt like the voices were different since you died is because they are. Kid, I don't know if the old man told you or not, but not only are you not in Kansas anymore, you're not even in the same galaxy. For the last few years you've been chatting with a strange Guf."
"...and this place...?" I asked, gesturing to the cave around me.
"Is another galaxy entirely. Different Guf than the Boss' place" He finished my sentence.
I took that in for a few moments before asking my next question.
"Shanti made it sound like I had a big wake, am I flawed or something? Does it mean I have a big ass?" I was always waiting for the third shoe to drop.
"Nothing wrong with your wake, it's just immense. Even as a plebe your chi is off the charts, girl. I've met trained Lords who didn't have the kinda abilities you have right outta the box." Bara nodded a reassurance. "Did you know the Boss was in the Sombrero galaxy when you were born. He felt your wake clear out there. Granted, the old guy is waaaaaay more sensitive than I am, but still, the Sombrero galaxy? That's hell and gone from Earth. Kiddo, I've met 'em all, from Jesus to Mohammed, and none of 'em had the amperage that you do."
I sat back, pleased to learn that not only was I not crazy, but I was powerfully sane...or something like that. After a lifetime of hiding my shameful secret, it turns out to be my only ticket home from the grave. Well, whooda thunk?
"So you're saying that Jesus wasn't really..." I trailed off for the right words, "the son of God?"
"Of course he was, we're all sons and daughters and saughters of God." He shrugged to accent what he was saying.
"Saughters?" I asked quickly.
"Non-genderal species have children too. Looksee, Jesus and Muhammad and Moses and all those guys you learned about in Sunday school were just like you, they were prophets of the Guf, they had the voices in their head too. But unlike you, they could only hear the Guf. You can talk to it, converse with it, even command it to some degree, and that makes you the True Prophet. Kid, you're not just one in a million, you're one in an octillion. Even among the DuNai, abilities like ours are extremely rare."
Didra held out her hand over my empty glass. Immediately more milk poured out of her fingertip until my cup nearly ranneth over. I had so many questions to ask that they were running into each other and causing a traffic jam in my brain.
"So I'm gonna be God's nanny?" Something didn't make sense about the whole thing.
"God? Hell no." He snorted. "A god, yes. But not the God. More people have landed on your moon than have seen the face of God. The Boss is one of 'em. All we know is that the creator made this multiverse, and planted these galaxies like eggs in a clutch, but no one has seen the guy for eons. Some DuNai scholars believe he's dead, they say he spent his entire essence creating the universe, and when he was done there just wasn't nothin' left of him."
"You believe that Nietzsche crap?" I asked him, feeling a little defensive for the Christian God I had grown up believing in.
"Nah, he's still out there, waiting for his children to mature and join him...wherever the hell Gods live." Another nod and a swig from his glass. "But that's somethin' none of us is gonna know for sure until our galaxies reach ascension."
I woke up the next morning in my own bed. I vaguely remembered being carried home over a big, hairy shoulder, but nothing explained the taste of dead rat in my mouth.
"Good morning." The Boss said with a strange smile. "Did some exploring, did you?" Stooping over slightly, he eyed me closely.
My head was throbbing as I opened a single eye to scowl at him.
"Yeah, met Bara, had my entire religious belief system smashed on the rocks, turned off my auto-systems and got a little drunk." I grumbled as I tried to drag the blanket
over my eyes. Okay, mebbe I got a lot drunk.
"But now you seem at peace with what you learned." He said as if he were reading my mind.
It was true; I had somehow come to terms with the things my brother Bara had revealed. Now if I could just visualize the command that would get rid of this hangover. The Onkx took focus to control; something I didn't have in my current condition.
"So, no questions on that topic?" He raised an eyebrow.
"Yeah," I agreed, sitting up on an elbow. "Tell me about when you saw God." It had been something I had been dying to ask. Bara had refused to elaborate, insisting that it was the Boss's story to tell.
Sitting back with a little surprise, he gave a quick smile. "Mere words fail to paint the image. You cannot explain God, it can only be experienced." With that he silently touched me on the arm with a single finger.
What happened next, or really what I experienced next, was known as MoTi, the art of sharing experiences. This wasn't some video clip, or a clever story he was telling. With MoTi you don't just see the memory...you live it. Everything he felt that day, I felt today. Every sensation, every thought. Think of it as walking a light-year in someone else's shoes. The DuNai used MoTi extensively as a training technique, and really it was a helluva way to impart a lesson. Although I would take on thousands of memories in later years, this was my first time.
As I was pulled into his MoTi, I found myself diving backwards through time at an alarming rate. Farther and farther back I went, travelling so damned fast. I could feel so much of what he felt, of the hunger to find out what was at the bottom of the well, the struggle to go deeper towards the very origin of all creation. Intently focused, I was on a collision course with day zero, the beginning of the universe. There was so much happening all around me, it was as if I was diving deeper and deeper, fighting temporal waves and eddies as I fought my way closer to absolute zero. It was unimaginably difficult, like swimming upstream thru a firehose. To this day I have a lotta respect for the Boss because of the absolute fortitude I felt in that memory. He only looked like a little guy on the outside, but inside he was Aslan.
We were so close to absolute zero. I could feel the tremendous forces that repulsed us the closer we got. It was as if the entire universe were exploding outwards while we were diving inwards against the tide. Then finally, our Onkx hits a brick wall and we careen diagonally. It takes every bit of energy left in our body to stabilize. That's when I finally get the chance to look around at the absolute nothingness around me. No galaxies, no matter, no universe, not even the vacuum of space. The clock in my Onkx is stalled at -.000000000001ps, and I am getting alerts that I am outside of the temporal plane of existence. I'm just realizing that without the very fabric of space, my Onkx was dead in the water. I'm essentially stranded like a car in the ocean. All I can do is hang there in nothingness hoping that my backup systems can keep me alive long enough to figure out how to get back where I came from.
And that's when I see God. Or more specifically; Gods. Don't ask me how I know this; you just feel it, like you're programmed to recognize your manufacturers. I know it makes no sense...how do you see something when light hasn't even been invented yet? Still, it was unmistakable; I was in the presence of the very beings who created our universe.
There they were; two newlyweds of cosmic proportions in a sea of nothingness. Even at this distance I could feel the love between the entities, their energy bathing me like a thousand suns. There was so much joy, so much happiness, that it wiped out all memory of the world I had come from. No Pain, no indecision, no fear. There was only love and desire without end. It was like this thick, warm blanket that I wanted desperately to wrap myself up in for all eternity.
I don't know how long I was there, really I don't. Coulda been a thousand years for all I knew, but there was no way to tell since time didn't exist yet. I was stranded there without a temporal tide to carry me home, but I didn't care. I would have gladly stayed there forever.
Then they touch like a pair of great gaseous nebulas, and a single spark flies out. There is such an intense feeling of love and affection for the little burning ember as it flitters about before finally igniting. My eyes widened as I watched the flame growing bigger unimaginably fast. As I watch the universe unfold like a tidal wave rushing towards me, I can't help but give a smile of wonderment as creation washed over me in an instant.
The memory ended there, but its shock and awe left me stunned. Taking a moment to run it all through my mind I was at a loss for words. With MoTi the experience is so complete that you have few questions afterwards. But for me there was just something about the beginning that I didn't understand.
"Why were you so damned intent on getting back to zero? It felt like you were rabid for this." I could still remember the almost maniacal feelings that drove him so hard against the temporal flow.
"Think of it as a midlife crisis." He gave the barest hint of a smile. "More than a few editors have felt the thirst for knowledge, to know with absolute certainty that there is purpose to our sacrifice. When I collected that memory I had been a Timelord for twenty-nine of your millennia. I had done a great many distasteful things in the course of my duties. All necessary, but these things weigh on your conscience nonetheless. I was beginning to have doubts; there were questions that even the DuNai could not answer. And like many before me, I took the plunge. When I reemerged, I was revitalized in my mission, ready to continue my life's work." Standing up, he gave me a serious look. It took a minute to realize that while he was imparting the memory, he had cured my hangover too.
"Come. We have more students for you to play with."
My first impression of the new students was a solid WOW! At least when I saw the guy, anyhow. Oh wow, oh wow, was he pretty. Well built, but not like a bodybuilder. More of a natural fitness, with broad shoulders and thick arms for holding a woman all night. Oh yeah he was dreamy.
Then I saw her, the other new student, and my hopes just crashed. She was beautiful, and I don't just mean pretty. She was movie-star beautiful, absolutely gorgeous. It was like we weren't even the same species. Even if McDreamy was gay, she could turn him back. That kinda hot.
I musta just stopped there in the doorway like an idiot, my jaw hanging open as I realized I had no chance of scoring the hunk with her around. Not that I'm ugly, or even unpleasant. I was just terribly ordinary when compared to the she-goddess (whose name turned out to be Veena). What guy would settle for me when he could have Christina Aguilera?
I don't mean to sound too school girl about this, but you gotta remember I'd been alone in my new life for a few years, and again, I was running around the universe in a brand-new nineteen year old body. What can I say; I was lonely. Back then Didra made lousy company, so I was totally starved for human interaction. When you've been stranded on a desert island for as long as I'd been, even a one-night-stand looked good.
But as I found out later, the whole meeting was really one of DorLek's lessons. He knew I would come to all the wrong conclusions. It was like that old saying about judging a book by its cover; I had leapt to conclusions before taking the time to use my abilities to really assess the situation.
Firstly, they were not really human; they were both Saik; native morphs. Why the hell is that important? See, when your species can control its appearance with just a casual thought, being beautiful means nothing because everyone was pretty where they came from. Although I didn't understand it at the time, my plainness made me the exotic one. Can you believe that?
The chick named Veena was training to become a Korpah. Essentially a planetary manager, she would command an army of operators and cut-outs, all doing the Timelord's bidding as per the master plan. It was a top management position.
Pretty boy was a guy named Aldoo; Galactic Engineer. He'd be the go-to-guy for all your hardware, special effects, and major construction projects. Need a planet moved a little to the left? Installing a stable trans-temporal wormhole for the employee entrance? Aldoo would be yo
ur boy. He could build anything, and I mean anything.
Both of them were recently implanted with their Onkx, so they were in the same boat as me as far as using the damned thing. Sure, we'd mastered the basics, but the Onkx is a vastly capable device. There were features that I didn't even understand yet, let alone able to use them. While my Onkx had the full Monty, namely every feature enabled, theirs were incapable of temporal relocation. They could not travel dimensionally. Only a Lord had those abilities. The DuNai regarded time travel as the greatest potential weapon in the universe and limited its use severely. Most galaxies were shielded to prevent the invention from ever occurring in the first place. The effects of two people tampering with the timeline simultaneously could be devastating. Like Highlander, there could be only one.
"Has he introduced you to MoTi?" Veena asked with a smile on her pretty face. We'd been hanging out in the library under Skylab. The Boss had harvested the old space station as a trophy and kept it suspended above the room. The whole house was filled with stuff like that.
"Yeah, once. It was something else, that's for sure." I nodded enthusiastically, remembering that morning that I had witnessed the Big Bang. "Did you have to go through Devices training?"
She rolled her eyes at the memory. "Don't get me started. Me and Aldoo are from the same planet, but about a thousand years apart. He got to skip to advanced courses while I had to take the ultra-beginner courses for hillbillies." The devious smile on her face told me it had been excruciating.
"Me too." I held up a hand. "Back where I come from we don't even have flying cars. I didn't even know how to use a veule" I shook my head sadly.
"Me too." She opened her eyes wide, "I lost three fingers on the mazer. Zzzzt!"