Clarion: The Sequel to Voyage (Paul's Travels)

by C. Paul Lockman

  “The designers think long-term,” Garlidan explained. “They looked forward to a time when Clarion might play host to millions.”

  “Well, it pays to think ahead,” Paul joked. “You know, in case your planet gets some good online reviews.”

  Garlidan finished gathering his possessions in a small, leather satchel and slung it over his shoulder. “I enjoy your sense of humor, Paul, but I have to warn you.” They heard docking latches connecting and the ship shuddered slightly as it was captured in a hard-dock. “Clarion is a unique place, one to which retreatants often journey across thousands of light-years. There’s a man here, I won’t tell you who,” he said, “who has come from a place further from here than any I have visited.”

  “And I know you’ve gotten around, Garlidan,” Paul said. “Where is he from, if I may ask?”

  The airlock hissed open and Garlidan ushered Paul into the access tunnel beyond. “Your astronomers call it the Andromeda Spiral.”

  Paul stopped and blinked a few times. “He’s from another galaxy?”

  “That,” Garlidan explained, “is the kind of attraction Clarion can have. For some, it is the only answer. One worth any expense and any effort. With that in mind, consider how fortunate you are to be here, yes?”

  Paul nodded and followed Garlidan through the tunnel. It led into a lobby very much like that of a five-star hotel’s upper floors, with an elevator and various decorations.

  “There will be some formalities, and then we’ll take the elevator to the surface.” He pressed the elevator’s button, just as one might at the Holiday Inn before heading out for a night on the town.

  “Why not just Relocate?” he asked, glancing around the lobby. He was strongly reminded of that first morning on Takanli, when he’d awoken in a hotel suite which offered a view of his new home. Of his new life.

  “Clarion has a great many rules. One of the most important is that there can be no Relocation. There is no network here, anyway. Replicators are also banned.”

  “Why?” Paul asked as they waited for the elevator.

  “Because the guardians of Clarion, those who designed this place, believe that if something is worth doing, then it must be a worthy expenditure of time. Simply put, you’re going to be made to wait for things. Rather a contrast to the societies you’re familiar with, eh?”

  “No Amazon Prime here, then,” Paul noted. “It’s better to anticipate than to instantly receive. Is that the idea?”

  Garlidan gave him a smile. “Something like that.”

  The elevator arrived and the doors opened with a familiar ping. The only occupant of the elevator car, which could have accommodated thirty people in comfort, was a single brown cloud, hovering near the ceiling. It did not move, but Garlidan seemed happy to see it. Rather than speaking, he closed his eyes and directed a stream of thought at the strange, amorphous creature. In return, the cloud emitted a thin, blue spark which connected with the crown of Garlidan’s head.

  “He’s an old friend,” Garlidan said. “Despite appearances, he’s absolutely thrilled to see us both.”

  “An old friend?” Paul said, recalling the group of such cloud-beings he’d seen on Takanli during that head-spinning journey through the arrivals hall. “What’s his name?”

  Garlidan gave him a strange look. “Brown Cloud, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  The doors slid closed and the elevator began to descend, slowly at first. There were no windows, and therefore no sense of speed, so as far as Paul was concerned, they may as well have been standing still.

  “Good, we’re underway. Now, we’ll have some time for orientation before we reach the surface.”

  “Orientation?” Paul asked. “How long is the journey?”

  “Not long, but have plenty to do,” Garlidan assured him. “And Brown Cloud is a wise and experienced meditator. We couldn’t ask for a better guide.” The dark, slowly shifting mass seemed entirely impassive, hovering near the ceiling of their elevator car. “But first, take this,” Garlidan said, offering him a large, red pill. “After you swallow it, though, we’ll both be fasting.”

  “For how long?” Paul asked, popping the pill into his mouth. It melted open on contact with his tongue, and he swallowed a viscous, vaguely lemony mouthful.

  “Until you achieve what you’ve come to achieve,” Garlidan said cryptically.

  Paul was tiring of Garlidan’s tricks. He’d accompanied the old man, whose own background remained an utter mystery, to this remote place known only to a few. And he was unable even to get a straight answer on their dinner plans. “You’re going to starve me until I become a Buddha, or something?”

  A warm sensation reached his forehead and spread back into his skull. It was sudden but not unpleasant, like standing under a heat lamp. “Woah.” As the sensation passed, a message seemed inscribed in his consciousness.

  HE’S AN OLD MAN. AND A COMPLETE SON OF A BITCH, I KNOW YOU’LL AGREE. BUT GO EASY ON HIM. HE’S TRYING TO BE HELPFUL.

  “By lying to me all the time?” Paul countered, out loud.

  The warmth continued. IMAGINE FOR A MOMENT IF HE’D TOLD YOU EVERYTHING ON DAY ONE. YOU’D HAVE COMPLETELY LOST YOUR MIND.

  “I would,” Paul admitted. “Even if he’d told me five percent of it.”

  TRUST HIM. BESIDES, THIS IS GOING TO BE FUN.

  Garlidan grinned happily as he watched this exchange. So far, all of his carefully planned arrangements were having the desired effect. “He’s right,” Garlidan said. “Relax and let’s try a few new things.”

  “Wait, you could hear him?” Paul asked. His mood was swinging rapidly between annoyance and acceptance, all as he descended toward a planet which presented more unknowns than any step of his journey.

  “Paul, old friend, do me a favor, would you? Put a hold on your questions. I realize that this is all complete madness to you, but I implore you to just go with it.”

  Paul took a sequence of deep breaths. “Alright. I’ll do as you say. And your friend, the cloud, seems a reasonable guy.”

  YOU’RE NOT TOO BAD YOURSELF.

  Paul felt his anxiety begin to melt away. He gave Garlidan a guarded smile. “So, how do we begin?”

  ***

  Chapter 29 – Clear Light

  On Clarion

  Brown Cloud escorted them to a rectangular, covered platform which stood by a lakeside. It was empty except for two thick, black cushions in the center of the floor. The platform was surrounded by a dense forest which was at once familiar – it could have been in Bavaria or Canada – and strangely alien. None of the leaf shapes were known to Paul, and the trees were a mix of tall, thrusting trunks, and gnarled, ancient shapes which could have been thousands of years old.

  “Tell me a little about this place,” Paul requested.

  I’D RATHER YOU SIMPLY SAT DOWN AND BREATHED IT IN.

  Paul was slowly getting used to Brown Cloud’s idiosyncratic style. He found it impossible to get a straight answer from their enigmatic guide, but as the day wore on, Paul slowly learned more about him, and his kind. Brown Cloud was not, in the strictest sense, an individual, but a representative of a gigantic, inter-galactic ‘hive mind’, shared by each of his species. Their combined intellect was incalculable. It occurred to him, as Brown Cloud led them through the forest, along a tidy path to the platform by the lake, that his questions must have seemed childishly simple. Matters of where they were, what they were doing there, and what might come next were inconsequential to such a great mind. Brown Cloud, it transpired, was there to help Paul focus on something altogether more important.

  THIS IS YOUR PRACTICE SPACE. YOU’RE GOING TO SPEND A LOT OF TIME HERE.

  “How long?” Paul immediately asked.

  Garlidan answered. “Years.”

  There was a splutter of disbelief. “I don’t have years! I’ve got to stop Julius. He’s going to destroy everything I’ve been…” He squared up to Garlidan. “Don’t you understand why I started this journey?” Pa
ul demanded.

  TRUST HIM, PAUL.

  “No!” Paul raved. “He’s been tinkering with my life for years! I’m sick of it. I want to know exactly what’s going on. Why can’t I go straight to…” He paused for a second, his frustration boiling over. “Shit, no one’s even told me where Julius is going to be!”

  HOLDRIAN.

  “How the hell do you know?” Paul raged. “And if he’s at Holdrian… Wait, holy shit! That’s where he gets hold of the Chrono Vortex technology! This is just the moment I need to stop him!”

  PLEASE CALM DOWN. TRUST THAT WE UNDERSTAND YOUR NEEDS AND WILL MEET THEM.

  “Brown Cloud is right,” Garlidan said. “You’re actually in the perfect place right now.”

  “But how will I get there?” Paul asked. It was the question which had nagged at him since Hal and Garlidan had conspired to insist on these sideshow journeys. Neptune, then Araj Kitel, and then Clarion… Julius was at none of these places. He was preparing, perhaps even now, light-years away, for his murderous jaunt across the galaxy which would ruin Paul’s first meeting with the Lawrence.

  HOW DO YOU THINK I TRAVEL FROM PLACE TO PLACE?

  Paul almost laughed at the floating creature. “I don’t know, Brown Cloud. Perhaps you precipitate out and then flow along some river until you evaporate again. On earth, we use bicycles, but I guess you get around by water-cycle,” he chuckled, then poked Garlidan in the ribs. “Water cycle, get it? Eh?”

  DO ME A FAVOR AND SHUT UP FOR A SECOND.

  This was sufficiently new to bring Paul to a stop. “Sorry.”

  SIT DOWN ON THE CUSHION.

  Atop the square, black cushion, Paul now saw, was a soft cylinder on which he guessed he was supposed to sit. He did so, crossing his legs, just as he had when practicing with Garlidan onboard Phoenix and in the elevator.

  ISN’T THIS A BEAUTIFUL PLACE?

  “Sure,” Paul said. The lake glistened in what seemed to be afternoon sunlight. Hints of reds and violets were leaking across the sky, as though the sun might set in half an hour or so. He saw, though, that the lighting had changed almost not at all since their arrival, which must have been two hours earlier. Surrounding the lake on all sounds was dense forest, a luscious carpet of green. It was not unlike a mix between a south-east Asian jungle and the deepest parts of an old, European woodland. “Very pretty.”

  YOU’LL GET TO ENJOY THE VIEW AGAIN IN A LITTLE WHILE. FOR NOW, CLOSE YOUR EYES.

  Paul did so. He shifted his weight, as he had been taught, so that his spine was a tall, straight stack of coins within his back. His head was balanced at its summit, and his chin was tilted slightly down, while beneath, his weight felt equally distributed between his left and right legs. Nowhere was pinched or under too much pressure. This, he’d found, was the ideal sitting posture. Especially for the extended meditation sessions aboard the Phoenix.

  NOW BREATHE.

  Focusing exclusively on it for the very first time, Paul found the air to be wonderfully fresh and sweet. Each inhalation seemed nutritious to the mind.

  THOUGHTS WILL COME. YOUR WORRIES ABOUT JULIUS AND HOLDRIAN. YOUR CONCERNS ABOUT EARTH, THE DAEADALUS AND FALIK, ABOUT MARCUS BEASLEY AND EVELYN TANNER AND HOW THEY WILL REACT TO AN INCOMING SPACECRAFT. ABOUT ANNE, ALONE ON TRITON. ABOUT HALEY AND KIRI, BEING TUTORED ON ARAJ KITEL IN PREPARATION FOR THEIR OWN JOURNEYS. ABOUT WHAT THE HELL GARLIDAN TRULY IS, AND WHAT HE’S DOING TO YOUR LIFE.

  “No kidding,” Paul muttered.

  LET THEM GO.

  THEY WILL COME, AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN. BUT LET THEM GO, EVERY TIME. DON’T LATCH ON AND START DOWN AN AVENUE OF THOUGHT, A CHANNEL OF SPECULATION, A GREAT, BROAD BOULEVARD OF MEANINGLESS, POINTLESS WORRY.

  “But what should I think about?”

  ABANDON THOUGHT.

  “Easy for you to say.”

  NOT THINKING IS EASIER THAN THINKING. JUST BREATHE. NOTICE EVERY ASPECT OF EVERY BREATH. TRY FOR TEN BREATHS IN A ROW, THINKING PURELY OF THE BREATH ITSELF. NOTHING ELSE.

  Paul got as far as the middle of this third exhalation before he pictured Julius in orbit around Holdrian, scheming and plotting on his weird, one-man ship.

  “Fuck,” he breathed.

  IT’S OK. GO AGAIN.

  This time, it was on the fifth breath that thought interrupted his silent contemplation of the breath.

  “Damn it.”

  AGAIN.

  It happened on the fourth breath. Then the seventh, which felt like an achievement. But he simply couldn’t get to ten. “I’m trying to not think about it, but it’s always at the back of my mind.”

  LET ME ASK YOU A QUESTION.

  “Sure.”

  IS IT NOW?

  Paul opened his eyes for the first time in ten minutes. The lake was glimmering, unchanged and exceptionally beautiful in that range of colors which seemed to rain down from the clouds. “Is it now? When do you mean?”

  NOW.

  “Now,” Paul said, his forehead wrinkling, “is now.”

  I AGREE.

  “Great that we’re on the same page.” Paul shifted slightly in his sea; the few moments of sitting had not yet taxed the patience of his body. But he knew that an hour of this would be a different prospect entirely.

  NOW IS THE ONLY TIME YOU ARE ABLE TO INFLUENCE THE OBJECTS AND EVENTS AROUND YOU. DO YOU AGREE?

  Paul blinked. “How do you mean?”

  IT IS ALWAYS NOW. NOW IS THE ONLY MOMENT IN WHICH ACTION IS POSSIBLE.

  “But I just took action. I spoke to you and shifted my position.”

  THOSE THINGS ARE PAST, ARE THEY NOT?

  “Yes, just narrowly. By seconds.”

  Garlidan spoke from his own cushion, next to Paul’s. Until that moment, Paul had been unaware of the old man’s presence. “Five seconds, five minutes, five hours or five millennia ago… It doesn’t matter. Those actions and events, those thoughts and emotions, those recollections and plans and desires and regrets, they’re all gone, dear boy.”

  THEY ARE AS GONE AS IS THE MOMENT OF YOUR BIRTH. THEY ARE AS PAST AS IS THE DEATH OF THE DINOSAURS. THE BEGINNING OF THIS SENTENCE IS SO COMPLETELY BEHIND US IN TIME THAT IT MAY AS WELL HAVE BEEN A MOMENT AFTER THE ORIGIN OF THE UNIVERSE.

  “All that matters,” Garlidan continued, “is now.”

  Paul was nodding very slowly. “I think I understand.”

  “If I may address a question of yours from many days ago, Clarion exists so that people may study now in all of its glories.”

  FOR IT IS INDEED TRULY GLORIOUS.

  “Now – this present moment, the moment of all action, thought, motion and… well, everything – now is all that there is.”

  Paul found this problematic. “But what about the future? Not all action is now, because some of it has yet to happen.”

  IT IS NOT YET. IT WILL BE, BUT IT IS NOT PART OF WHAT IS.

  “And so, thoughts of it can be safely discarded. They are not real. They are mere speculation,” Garlidan told him.

  LET’S PRACTICE SOME MORE. FOCUS ON THE BREATH. MAKE IT THE ONLY THING WHICH IS TRULY NOW. EVERYTHING ELSE IS A CHARADE, A MENDACIOUS GAME ON THE PART OF YOUR MIND. IT WILL SHOW YOU THE PAST – REGRET, MEMORY, LITTLE MOVIES OF EVENTS – AND IT WILL TRY TO SHOW YOU THE FUTURE, IN THE FORM OF SPECULATION, FANTASIES AND CONTEMPLATIONS UPON THE PROBABLE. IGNORE ITS CHATTER AND BE ONLY WITH THE PRESENT IN ITS WONDROUS ENTIRETY.

  Paul closed his eyes again and, one after another, took ten deep breaths. No thoughts intervened. His focus was on his breath, how it passed in and out of his body. The sensation of sitting on the cushion. The very slight but very welcome breeze on his skin. The elements that made up those given moments. And he found them to be utterly perfect.

  “Wow.”

  ***

  They slept in a small hut by the lake, and returned each morning to practice. The routine was so exceedingly simple that it did nothing to detract from the work itself. Paul was permitted a few moments’ rest between sessions of sitting, during which he would walk by the lake, or si
mply stand in the forest and breathe it in, as Brown Cloud had advised. The beauty of the place seemed to increase with each day, even each hour. He noticed things more, saw more detail, drank in yet more of its textures and colors. The lake, placid and calm, revealed itself to be a dynamic, shifting body of water, subject to a billion tiny interactions every second. Paul’s perceptual faculties became more and more like a high-speed camera, soaking up every single detail of a droplet falling into the lake from the roof of the platform, or every nuance of a leaf turning slightly in the breeze.

  He was never hungry. The red pill took care of that, supplying everything he would need. He simply sat, and breathed. The sessions become longer, with less commentary from Garlidan and Brown Cloud. Eventually, they would spend the whole hour-long sit in silence.

  Then the sits became two hours, but Paul barely noticed the change. What is a collection of moments, he found himself wondering, when each individual moment is so superbly crafted as to demand complete attention?

  After eight months, he was sitting for three and a half hours at a time, sleeping for only four hours a night, and finding that hundreds of breaths would pass before a thought might attempt to barge its way into his consciousness.

  He let it go, like all the others.

  ***

  He spoke with Garlidan.

  Paul was learning to ask the right questions, and instead of railing against what truly was, began to explore it.

  They talked for hours, late into the evenings, during lunchtime walks in the forest, and while swimming in the lake. Brown Cloud was never far away, and contributed sage wisdom when he felt it necessary. They returned to one topic more than any other: the present moment. Each discussion of its depth and potential, the intensity of experience available within it, was like a booster shot for Paul’s meditation practice.

  And then, occasionally, Garlidan was in a position to simply eliminate worries with a few words.

  “Do you still find yourself worrying about the Daedalus?” he asked one evening as they sat by the lake. Three parrot-like birds were hooting softly to each other in a circling, tripartite antiphony.