by David Larson
“I see that,” Mike said, “and it makes sense. But I don’t have anything relatable in my mind. I’m trying hard to change that.”
“I can see that you are,” she said.
“What about children?” Mike asked. “Obviously there have to be children here. Although honestly, I don’t remember seeing any. Have you found a way around children? Do you just start out at 21 and move on from there?”
“Actually, we start out at 18,” Tawny said, “the learning curve from there is pretty impressive.”
Mike just stared at her wide-eyed.
“I’m kidding,” she said, as she patted Mike on the knee.
Mike exhaled a breath he had been holding in anticipation. That concept would have been way too far out there, had it been real.
“We realize that this planet can only sustain so many people. Especially when we don’t kill each other in wars, or as a penalty. And we have excellent healthcare, and cutting edge medical technology that would amaze you.”
“I’m sure it would,” Mike said.
“So having children is kind of a community thing,” she said. “You don’t really have to be an actual parent to raise children. Just look at all of the stepparents in your own country. Most of them love their stepchildren just as much as they love the ones that actually carry around their DNA chain. Of course some don’t, but then I’m sure that you’ll agree that some biological parents have no business being allowed around children at all.”
“I certainly know that’s true,” Mike said. “So what about children here?”
“If two people decide that they want to have children they check the allotment schedule for their area.”
“Allotment schedule?” Mike was surprised
“Yes,” Tawny said. “There’s a schedule posted for every area we have here. There are spaces that open up due to a death or change in conditions in that area. Maybe some people relocate to another area or whatever. The people that want to have a child put their name on the list. It’s kind of first come first served.”
“Just like that?” Mike asked. “No license, or blood test or genetic testing or whatever?”
“No,” Tawny said. “If two people have already had a child they know that it would be wrong, and selfish to put their name up on the list again so that is never a concern. And as far as blood or genetic testing, there really is no point.”
“Why do you say that?” Mike asked.
“Because we’ve perfected gene and embryo manipulation. We can ensure that every pregnancy will go to full term, and end in the birth of a healthy baby.”
“Isn’t that like playing God?” Mike wanted to shove the words right straight back into his pie-hole, even as they were escaping.
“Really?” Tawny said.
“Yeah, that was kind of a stupid comment,” Mike said.
“So, what about you?” Mike said. “Never felt the need to be a mother?”
“Oh,” Tawny said, “but I am.”
“You have a child?” Mike asked. He wanted to throw up, then he wanted to shoot himself in the face, then he wanted to shoot himself in the face while he was throwing up. The girl of his dreams had been spoken for. No wait, that didn’t exist here, did it. He still had a chance. Maybe she had a child that was at home with the baby-sitter all the time and she wasn’t still with…whatever it might have been she was with. Some sort of husband, or partner, or something. Jesus, he was so instantly confused.
“Yes,” she said smiling at Mike warmly. “I have a son. His name is Axel and he’s three years old now.”
“A three-year-old boy?” Mike said. “Where is he? Does he live with you? Who’s the father? Is he still involved?”
“Where is he actually answers the question you had earlier, about where are all of the children,” She said. “Children stay with their mother here until they’re 2. Naturally the father is involved, but then everyone is involved in raising our children. It takes a village, you know.”
Tawny stopped and waited for Mike to catch up.
“Wait,” Mike said when the realization hit him. “You mean…she was here?”
“Not here Mike. You know you’re the first one here. But she was on a ship. Fascinating woman really.”
“What about him,” Mike asked.
Tawny laughed that beautiful lilting laugh. “No, of course not. Can’t you tell?”
“Where do these kids go when they’re three?” Mike asked.
“They go live in the children’s complex. It really is a beautiful place Mike. I’ll have to take you there. I really think it would be mind opening.”
“I’d like to see that,” Mike said showing genuine interest.
“If you think about it it’s not much different than the way you do things in your country on earth.”
“How’s that?”
“Your children spend all day at school starting around the age of 5. Then they come home and stay with their parents. At night they’re sleeping in their own rooms. So the only real contact the parents have with them after they start school is for about five hours in the afternoon.”
“Think about how much time you spend on Earth, thinking about how horrible parents are. Or if you see a child that is acting up, what you would do if you were responsible for them.”
Mike thought about how many times he had been in a restaurant or at the movies, and wanted to beat parents to death with their petulant child.
“Quite a lot,” He said.
“Exactly,” She said “I spend time with Axel every day. So does his father. But these kids are constantly learning. Constantly being creatively reinforced. They learn the concept of community from the time they enter the children’s complex, and every single member of that community spends time nurturing all of those children. Think of how well-rounded people would be if they had the availability of every single person’s knowledge, and experiences, from which they could constantly learn and grow. It makes for a very stable person.”
“Who’s the father?” Mike asked, and Tawny was a little concerned with his tone.
“Well…Bob is,” She said. “Is that important?”
Mike wanted to physically reach up and pull the lightning bolt out of his forehead. Bob, the guy who had become his best friend on Hale. Hell, Bob was his best friend on either planet. Bob had been dorking Mike’s girl, and he never had the slightest intention of mentioning it to him. Were they still doing it? Did Bob just stroll over to Tawny’s place in the middle of the night for a booty call?
He had the horrible image in his head of Tawny and Bob naked, rolling around on a giant feather mattress covered with white mosquito netting. Tawny moaning in the throes of ecstasy, as Bob made sure that she reached a climax. Over and over again.
Then he caught himself. She had given him the answer to everything that was important. Of course they weren’t still together. There was no such thing as together here. Well, except for in certain cases. But Mike was sure that this wasn’t one of those cases. So what if they had a son together? That didn’t mean anything. She and Mike could raise Axel together. He was willing to be man enough to let Bob be a part of that. After all, if he hadn’t learned anything else during his stay here he had certainly learned to be magnanimous. And that was exactly what he was going to need to be here, so that he could have the life that he desperately craved.
Mike was plodding through the desert of irrational justification on the worn-out camel of denial. His camel was dangerously close to death, and soon the angry horde of Bedouin reality was going to overtake him, and beat the shit out of him with a club, as he hung from the lone palm tree of a broken heart in a secluded oasis.
“Are you ok?” Tawny asked. “Maybe this is all too much for you.”
“No, really,” Mike said, snapping back into his Hale persona so fast he should have been in a cervical collar for a week. “I’m fine. I just never would have guessed Bob. I should have I suppose. He’s a great guy. Funny too. And plays a mean keyboard.”
&nbs
p; “He is all of that,” Tawny said felling a little more relaxed.
The tram came to a stop in the now typically beautiful pasture and the door whooshed open.
“Here we are,” Tawny said brightly. “You are going to love this.”
“I could be standing neck deep in a shit pile and be deliriously happy as long as I was there with you,” he thought.
“I’m sure I will,” He said as they stepped off the tram.
Fifteen:
Mike and Tawny walked to the back of the tram pasture and through a white arched trellis that was covered in what seemed to be wisteria in full bloom. As they walked down the winding pathway, other people passed going in the other direction. No one really said anything; only nods and smiles were exchanged.
“This seems to be a pretty popular place,” Mike said.
“It is,” Tawny answered. “Only the children’s center has more people visiting it. It’s really kind of ironic when you think about it.”
“I guess it would be if I had any idea where we were.”
Tawny motioned to a bench near the path, and they both took a seat.
“You’ve asked me about every aspect of life here on Hale,” she said, “and I know we’ve only touched the surface of your understanding about how we live here. We talked about child birth and raising children, about music, relationships, and work. But you never asked me about death.”
“Wow,” Mike said, a little surprised. “I guess I never really thought about it.”
“Most people don’t,” she said. “But if you do think about it, death and the way you handle death on Earth encompasses almost everything about life.”
“If someone dies on Earth people take comfort in knowing the person that is no longer with them is in heaven, or heaven’s equivalent, looking down on them and still being a major part of their lives. Most people will be adamant about the fact that they don’t believe in ghosts, and yet those same people believe that the spirit of dead loved ones are all living someplace beautiful, and blessed with powers that can help or hinder life on earth.”
“It’s a coping mechanism,” Mike said. “I would guess that most of those people really don’t think their ancestors are sitting on a cloud someplace, watching their every move.”
“I think you’re talking about the difference between what humans will admit to the public,” she said, “and what they think in their hearts. People say they don’t believe the cloud thing, but in their real subconscious…in the place where the real them lives, most people are completely superstitious, and believe they’re being watched by people that have ‘passed on’.
“And that’s the other part of this equation,” Tawny said. “The euphemisms that people use to describe death should tell you everything you need to know how people really view it. Passed away, gone home, called home, is with the lord, gave up the ghost, called to a better place. None of those things speak to the finality of death. None of them allow the grieving to grasp the fact that the person they loved is gone and is never coming back.
“On the other hand, how do people describe someone they hate dying? Dead, gone, wasted, kicked the bucket. Those people are comfortably cast on the trash heap of unwanted bodies,”
“And what’s the difference here?” Mike asked. “Do you know what happens after you die?”
“The better question is, ‘what happens after the body dies,” Tawny said as she took both of Mike’s hands in hers. When she was doing that she could have told him that a snake could play the piano with its penis and he would have believed it.
“You have to understand, every single thing that takes place after a person dies on Earth is for the wellbeing of the people that are left alive. The wake, the funeral, memorials, even the entire burial process including the grave marker, is for the benefit of the people that are left alive. When it comes right down to it, the only thing that is going in the ground is an organic vessel that was used to transport around the essence of your loved one.”
“That is actually a pretty easy concept for me to grasp,” Mike said. “I know the person that dies no longer cares what happens. I guess I also believe deep inside that the entire idea of a soul going to heaven is to make us feel better.”
“That last part,” Tawny said, “is not entirely true.”
“How do you mean that?”
“I mean, it’s not entirely true that there isn’t a soul and it doesn’t go to heaven. There is something like that…after a fashion.”
Mike was amazed. It seemed as though this entire society was based in black and white, right and wrong. Anything that would be faith-based would be cast off as unprovable. Was he about to find out that there was such a thing as a ghost? Were homes really haunted?
“Have you ever thought that the real essence of what makes you who you are, is something that is more electrical than physical?” Tawny asked him.
“Yes, I have,” he said. “But there isn’t any way you could prove that unless you die.”
“There actually is though. If you and I are sitting here talking, you understand my speech patterns, my mannerisms, everything that makes me who I am. If I were to fall asleep here for some reason I wouldn’t change at all. There would still be movement, reactions to touch, or sound. But if I died there would be nothing; just the organic vessel that carried around what I was. The question on everyone’s mind should be, ‘where did she go?’.”
“I get the feeling you have the answer.”
“Well yes we do. But it’s a little shocking.”
“I think I’m getting used to that by now.”
“Maybe,” Tawny said. She was looking deep into his eyes now as though she were searching for something. “You know that when two people have been together long enough, they start to act like one another. For that matter if the relationship has lasted for decades, and the couple is really in sync, they even start to dress alike. I’m not talking about a relationship psychosis where one of them makes sure they’re wearing the same colors, or identical outfits, just to be cute. I mean that they both get ready for a night out and without talking to each other about it they end up wearing the identical colors. Or when two people start finishing each other’s sentences, or answer a question before it’s even asked? That thing is real, Mike, and it’s measurable.”
“You have a spirit measuring device?” Mike asked hesitantly.
“Not in the way I’m sure you’re thinking.
“Take that connection between two people,” Tawny went on, “and extend it to everything else that you’ve ever been connected to, in any way. If you go into a forest you have a specific feeling. It might be awe of the majesty, or a feeling of security. Let’s say you have a co-worker that’s having an issue. That issue casts a feeling of uneasiness over the entire group.”
“Herds of animals like horses, sense things in a group. Of course, there are audible or visual alarms, usually. But if one of them is insecure then they all are. Humans have intellectualized all of that common sense out of their everyday lives. The part that amazes us here, is that while you dismiss the connection, you still believe in the spirit. You just see it in the singular form.”
“I suppose that’s true,” Mike said.
“I can tell you, Mike, that every single thing is connected by that subliminal thing that animates the organic vessel that we are.”
“When you say everything,” Mike asked slowly, “how far does that go?”
“As far as you can imagine,” Tawny said, “and even farther than that.”
“Every single organic living thing is connected by whatever energy that we have inside us. We always suspected it here, and we’ve had teams of specialists working on it for quite a long time. We’ve developed equipment that can detect, measure and photograph that very energy.”
Mike was just staring at her with his mouth hanging open. She reached up and gently pushed his bottom jaw shut.
“I’m sure that you’ve seen aura photography on Earth,” she said. “Haven’t yo
u?”
“Sure,” Mike said “but I never really put anything into it.”
“Most people don’t,” Tawny said as she stood up to face Mike on the bench. “People that do this kind of photography on Earth have recorded some pretty amazing things. People have been photographed both before, and after surgery. The before photo shows an aura surrounding that person. The after photo shows an entire light show, going on around where that surgery had been performed. That is the essence of what is you, repairing the vessel that is carrying it.
“We have been able to photograph that very essence as it leaves the body. It’s not the way you see in the movies. Then, a replica of that person floats out of the bodies and hovers above it’s dead self and either cries or makes some humorous quip. Instead. it’s like an amazing light show of vapor rises out of the body and just evaporates into the rest of the organic auras that are near it, and being emitted by things that are still alive.”
“Wait,” Mike said “when you say ‘things’ that are still alive’ are you saying that this essence, or aura, or spirt, or whatever mixes with anything organic?”
“That is exactly what I’m saying,” she said.
“The hard part of capturing this essence on video, was the rest of the essence that is always surrounding us. It’s always there, and separating what was leaving an organic life form from the rest of the energy was nearly impossible. We had to have terminal people volunteer to be placed in a room that was mostly devoid of anything else that was organic. Once they died and the essence left the vessel we could actually see it start to diffuse into the room. Then we put several people into a room next to the person that was dying and as the terminal person died, the aura in the room with the living got slightly brighter when that essence combined.”
“We still don’t understand if there is only so much energy here, or if new energy is created. But we do know that when anything becomes pregnant, that energy pinpoint starts to show up on our instruments. We also have records of energy leaving plant life when it’s cut down or killed.”
