In
stories like this, you need to be careful not to reach the end before the end
reaches you.
Immortality
removes the need for duplication.
It
is the not the destiny of mankind to rule the universe. Its destiny is to
explore and understand it. The universe runs itself.
Habbynook
was an out of the way place in 1799. It was still an out of the way place in
1966. The years had not been kind to Habbynook. Not that Habbynook didn’t try
to be a hot commodity. Over the years, the Chamber of Commerce came up with
slogans like ‘Take a Look at Habbynook’ and ‘You Won’t be Forsook in
Habbynook’. Real catchy, right? Now Habbynook had a few things going for it.
For one thing it was out of the way. But out of the way places didn’t catch on until
the hippies were old (they were still young in 1966) and had disposable income,
and by that time Habbynook was no more.
What
happened to Habbynook? It saw the light. To be more exact, the light engulfed
it and Habbynook was not only out ot the way, it was invisible to human eyes.
Habbynook had colors but it was the colors on the invisible side of the
spectrum.
I
knew all this because my FTL friend, Lighty, had revealed it to me at a Waffle
House in Covington, Georgia in 1969. FTLs had the ability to control and
manipulate the color spectrum on earth. Just for fun, they had made several
earth cities invisible. I could tell you which ones they were, but you wouldn’t
know them because as far as you were concerned, they never existed. Sort of a
Mandela Effect before the Mandela Effect was in effect.
But
I had an idea that would put Habbynook on the map and change the course of
history. To get the ball rolling I went to see the editor of the Habbynook
Hollerer, the local weekly newspaper. The editor’s name was Harold Hisaxon and
he proudly traced his heritage back to 1066 A.D. when his Anglo-Saxon ancestors
fought and lost to William the Conqueror. The Normans might have conquered
bonny England, but they didn’t conquer the Anglo-Saxon spirit. Harold was
living proof of that.
The
Hollerer was a three-person operation. The typesetter was Harold’s young
cousin, Maurice, and the roving reporter was his 16-year old daughter,
Guinevere (or Gin for short), who covered the exciting goings-on of Habbynook
when not otherwise occupied by her high school studies, club activities, phone
calls with friends, etc. In other words, she spent about forty-five minutes a
week working on reporting the excitement that was Habbynook.
I
think Harold was glad to see me. He had been trying for the last couple of
hours, unsuccessfully I might add, to come up with a stirring front page
headline. This was his lucky day. I had come to Habbynook for that just that
specific purpose.
He
invited me to have a seat.
Harold:
“What can I do for you?”
In
my best used car salesman tone of voice, “It’s not what you can do for me, it’s
what I can do for you.”
Harold
straightened up in his desk, “I’m intrigued, sir. Please proceed.”
Me:
“I’m a poor wanderer along life’s highway. Because of my itinerant lifestyle, I
have been to places far and wide, near and narrow, high and low, vertical and
horizontal, and of all the places I’ve been,
there’s no place quite like Habbynook (this was a true statement)."
Harold
beamed, “I like where this is going. I gather you have some kind of proposal to
make?”
Me:
“Indeed, sir, I do. I propose that Habbynook become the City of Light.”
Harold
looked a little deflated, “Doesn’t Paris already have that nickname?”
Me:
“Paris is known as the City of Lights. Habbynook can be the City of Light. Do
you see the distinction?”
Harold
started to mutter something, I interrupted him, “I see that you have your
doubts. Let me ask you a few simple questions to show you where I’m coming
from.”
Harold:
“OK.”
Me:
“What letter does the word left begin with?”
Harold:
“L.”
Me:
“What are the last four letters of the word right?
Harold:
“ight.”
Me:
“Now put those five letters together and what do you have?”
Harold
did not hesitate, “Light!”
Me:
“Harold, we live in a time when a cultural earthquake has split society. Some
are on the left and some are on the right. When they try to peacefully meet
each other in the middle they fall into the political abyss created by the
cultural earthquake. I believe Habbynook can cure the crack, fill in the hole,
build a bridge, etc., ad nauseam. (I didn’t really say the ad nauseam part).”
Harold
really looked confused now, “How can little old Habbynook do all that?”
Me:
“As a man proud of his heritage, and historically literate, you must be aware
that down through history religions have been disguised as political movements
and political movements have been disguised as religions. If that’s true, and I
know that you know that it is, why not disguise a small, nondescript town’s
promotional campaign as a socio-economic, inspirational, cultural movement that
purports to promote harmony and heal the country by bringing the disparate
factions together in a lovely setting that just happens to be Habbynook and oh,
by the way, please feel to spend your money at our motels, restaurants, miscellaneous
stores, and convention center. And that’s just for starters. I see ski lifts,
water skiing, fishing, hunting, beauty contests, country music shows, maybe
even a casino or two in your fabulous future.”
Me:
“That’s the main thing. You’ll have to do a little work, but at least you’ll
have something to work with. Right now, you’re on the road to oblivion.”
Harold:
“How do you know that?”
Me:
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. Look here, it was nice meeting you.
Thanks for your time.”
Harold
was a nice guy, but as it turned out, he didn’t listen to me and as a
consequence the town didn’t give my ideas a shot. Don’t believe me? Find
Habbynook on a map. While you’re at it, look on the same map for Chedwalton,
Mistless Morning, and Zayzay Gemore. Now if you really want to find them,
you’ll have to do a spectrum analysis, but who has time for that?
Since
I had the time, and because my aura was still working at maximum power, I
decided to try a few things I wouldn’t ordinarily do. Over the course of a week
in 1966, I skydived, mountain climbed, bungee jumped, scuba-dived, and ate
Brussel sprouts.
I
also had one last meeting with Lighty. As you know, I met with Lighty at a
Waffle House in 1969, but in the wacky world of time travel, that was before
this time in 1966. FTLs do not travel through time, so the Lighty of 1966, had no
recollection of our meeting in 1969. But it didn’t matter anyway. The 1966 meeting
was for the sole purpose of pumping Lighty for information on the TLBs
(Telepathic Light Beings).
We
met again at a Waffle House, this one in Daytona Beach, Florida. A destructive hurricane
had just passed through and Waffle House was about the only place open. It was
hard to imagine a Waffle House not staying open, no matter the magnitude of the
emergency. As might be expected, under the circumstances, it was crowded as
could be, but we were lucky and were able to sit in one of the narrow two-seat
tables.
I
told Lighty about my efforts in Habbynook. He laughed, then I got down to
business.
Me:
“What’s the relationship of FTLs to TLBs?”
Lighty:
“We tend to leave each other alone. They claim to be our natural superiors, but
they’re not even real.”
Me:
“What do you mean by that?”
Lighty:
“They’re personified abstractions. Whatever world they visit, they tend to take on a rough approximation of that
planet’s dominant species.” I remembered the TLB I had encountered who appeared
as a human torso with head, arms, and legs.
Me:
“Any clue why they do that?”
Lighty:
“Many FTLs thank they do it as a joke. But that can’t be true because they
don’t have a sense of humor.”
Me:
“Are they faster than you? Is that even possible?”
Lighty:
“They don’t travel, per say. They reassemble. When they are ready to re-locate
somewhere in the universe, they shed whatever atoms and molecules they are
currently using, then utilize atoms and molecules of the new location they want
to be in to reassemble themselves.”
Me:
“But if they have atoms and molecules, how can they be abstractions?”
Lighty:
“Because the atoms and molecules lack a DNA sequence. The TLBs, as you call
them, have no substance of their own.”
Me:
“What do you call them?”
Lighty:
“We call them Thoughtcasters, because they, for lack of a better term, travel
at the speed of thought.”
All
I could way was, “Wow!” Not a very sophisticated response, but the
ramifications of an entity moving at the speed of thought was not calculable in
human terms.
Lighty:
“But as impressive as that is, they do have a couple of limitations.”
Me:
“I’m all ears.”
Lighty:
“Number one limitation is they can only reassemble where there are atoms and
molecules that follow the laws of physics as we understand them.”
Me:
“But aren’t atoms and molecules everywhere in the universe?”
Lighty:
“The universe is big, really big. There may be some areas where the natural
laws that govern us do not apply.”
Me:
“What’s the second limitation?”
Lighty:
“They can thoughtcast only to places they can visualize. That means to cross
the universe they must follow a hopping pattern. Once they see a galaxy, they
can travel to it via thoughtcasting. But even at the speed of the thought, the
universe remains elusive. It keeps expanding.”
Me:
“The definition of infinity.”
Lighty:
“That’s right. FTLs are more than satisfied just to circulate in the Milky Way,
Andromeda, and a few other nearby galaxies. We’re strong believers in
propiquinity.”
It
suddenly struck me that was something was missing in all this. Neither the FTLs
nor the TLBs had the final answer for enabling mankind to explore the universe.
The FTLs were the key to the near, the TLBs to the middle, but who or what was
the key to the far?
That’s
why I asked, “But you aren’t leaving something out?”
Lighty:
“The Holy Grail? The end of the rainbow? The key to heaven?”
Me:
“The end of the universe.”
Lighty:
“Dammit, I knew you were going to say something like that.”
Me:
“It’s the only logical conclusion to where the story is headed.”
Lighty:
“Time travelers have no business talking about logic.”
Me:
“That’s a fair statement but it doesn’t mean what I said was wrong.”
Lighty:
“The only problem with the end of the universe is that it doesn’t end. Or you
could say it has an endless end.”
Me:
“An oxymoron and a paradox. I like it.”
I
paid for the meal and we left. In a few hours, Lighty would turn into a light
beam and spend the night relaxing somewhere in the heavens. A coruscation in
the sky. While he was doing that, I would once again be walking down a dark highway
or by a stream through a forest. I had begun to dimly understand two of the
reasons for my mission in time. The toughest nut to crack, the third one, was
still out there.
Sometime
the next morning, I approached an abandoned farmhouse. At one time it had been a
solid and comfortable family residence. The front porch was big with wide,
concrete steps leading up it. Many of the windows were broken or busted, and
the roof looked ready to cave. There were a couple of oak trees in the front
yard and some small patches of grass were struggling to grow. To one side of
the house were more trees, including a chinaberry tree. Chinaberry trees were
lovely to look at and the blooms had a pleasant aroma but the chinaberries
themselves could be poisonous. Behind the house, at a proper distance I’m sure,
was an outhouse. There was a barn, but it was abjectly dilapidated. Broken
fences completed the scene.
