“They mean us no harm,” I replied.
He took a deep breath and looked away. “I...I didn’t know where to go. We can’t survive out there alone.” His voice grew defensive. “They were going to kill Baldy so I brought him and came here,” he blurted.
“You’re both welcome here. And no, we don’t kill old friends,” I said. “Everyone has their own cycles and needs. They are not sacrificed because of age and want.” The symbolism hit me, and Eli spoke.
“My doubts. I ... I couldn’t stay any longer.”
“Your doubts are your best friends now. Let them roam. Here, you’ll find ideas are entirely different than anything you’ve been used to. When something offends you, it may be from what you’ve been taught or have accepted. It may not be true. When something isn’t right, you’ll know it - a gut knowing.”
“No unemployment?” Benson had escaped from a food camp outside of Houston and made his way to Flagstaff after dreaming a Great Teacher would come from that area. He, being a Christian, assumed it was the Second Coming. “What am I supposed to do now?”
Victoria walked up. “Grandpa Charles wants to see you, Dad.”
“Victoria, will you show Eli around and get him settled? Derek will see to Baldy.”
“But she is so young.” He swallowed and looked at Victoria. “No offense meant,” he added quickly.
“None taken. Victoria is on our Housing Council. Trust her and me.”
I started back to my house to speak with Charles. He was one of those people with a lively cast of mind that constantly thought outside of the box. New ideas bubbled out. I never knew what might come. I liked the guy immensely, but always wanted that little distance.
Later that morning I excused myself and walked down to Faculty Flats to say the words over Phyllis McDonald. We gently laid her in her burying hole wrapped in a torn white sheet. Madge stood with us and somber Brad, her husband. Others gathered around. I could see Tom and Phyllis radiant beside the grave. Whiskey sat wagging his tail at Phyllis’ feet. “Phyllis,” I said, “you are happily free of an old body. Now you begin a new life. Lots to do, but from time to time remember your old family here. Come visit to comfort and make them aware of your presence for they have need of that.” I nodded. “You’ve done good, and should be pleased with this life. Every life has its seasons, as does every family. We move effortlessly through them with the benefit of time and circumstance. We need to learn to be kind to ourselves and each other for our time here can be fleeting, and we don’t get a second chance.” There were a few words of hope and comfort spoken by others. Then we saluted her with a drink and covered the grave.
Entering the Main Gate of Cheshire I heard a strange sound, faint at first, beat the air. One I hadn’t heard for many years. I looked toward town and saw an Army helicopter move gracefully over the pine trees and set down next to Mark’s airplane barn. I walked back to the landing area to see General Carson, Derek Randolph, and another man step from the craft, blades whining to a halt.
“General, welcome,” I said. He nodded. We shook hands. “Derek, I see you finally made full colonel. Congratulations.” I turned to the man with the clerical collar and extended my right hand.
“You’re a Jew.” His hands remained limp at his side.
It struck me instantly. Running images of a auto de fe. Me chained with others to stakes. The restless crowd waiting. The terrifying knowledge of what was going to happen, helpless with limitless fear, rage, and grief. All mixed in a jolting cry for help we knew would never come ... The fire. Licking flames ...
I made myself look at my silver ring with the star of David. “Will someone introduce me to Torquemada Junior?” His lips curled, reminding me of a feral dog showing his fangs.
Carson laughed and gestured to Derek who said, “John Hensley, Catholic priest, assistant to Brian Muldower, Advisor to the President on internal security matters. Jamie’s grandfather was a Jew.”
The young man’s face was red and belligerent. “I’ve heard about you. Some sort of strange wizard. You see the future. Heal the sick. Travel out of your body. Control the weather. Raise the dead. Are you going out to convert the ignorant to your world view?”
“Sorry to disappoint, but there is no Sunday School anthropomorphic God with a black book that keeps score.”
“And you know this for sure.”
“This offends you?”
He pointed to the alien spacecraft. “And you know these Beings. Do you deny this?”
Difficult creature. “I know them,” I said.
“And these other things.”
Idiot. “Not raising the dead.”
“O’Banion.”
I pointed. “He’s buried over there.” This wasn’t going anywhere good. Have you ever met someone for the first time you have an instant dislike for and want to strangle? John Hensley, narrow-minded bigot. Part of me wanted to bait the guy, another part of me sent out alarm bells. This wasn’t just me, but a hundred good people depended on what I said and did here. “We have people of many religions here; Catholics, Protestants, Jews. We have our own little Pale at the end of North Roberta where two Jewish families live. Not by choice, but coincidence. We have a couple of Muslims too.”
“Wicca?”
“Another religion. The old Earth religions where everything was considered part of a larger whole, and was respected, cared for, and considered sacred.”
“Without a God?” Hensley eyes challenged.
“Their idea is the larger whole with everything in it is God or Source. Since everything is a part of God, or the larger whole, everything has a sacred nature and needs to be honored as such,” I said.
“Where does Evil and the Devil come into this?” Hensley eyes squinted, lips tight. “There is Evil.”
“Many of this belief system believe ‘evil’ is simply ignorance, and the ‘Devil’ a mental personification of this ignorance,” I said.
“But you, with all your powers, say you know these Beings.” He turned to stare at the circling spacecraft. “You say you know them as intimately as your own people.” He dropped the words like deadly venom. “How can they be defeated?”
“They have not come in violence or for conquest. You assume that superior technology means the need and want to dominate and control. No machine of war can defeat them, but no machine of war is needed. They have come for a different purpose.”
He looked at me blankly. “You’re not making sense. Surely they have come to control us. Why else would they come?”
“Mr. Hensley, it doesn’t necessarily follow that superior technology has an end in violence. This is not Hollywood. They have come to assist us in creating a better world,” I said. An idea he’d never accept.
“Who are they really, Jamie? Everyone calls you Jamie. The Wizard. Do you even have a last name?” Hensley’s lips curled. “Who are they really? Are you their agent?”
The truth would be beyond him. A modified version might work. “Mr. Hensley, I’m not sure how to put this. There was a time before recorded history when people from other star systems came to Earth. Distorted legends of Super Beings as Gods have come down in various cultures about these people. Some of these Beings left Earth, and now have returned. Those that stayed warred and reduced the Earth to a wasteland.”
Hensley smiled and then shook his head. “You’re crazy. That’s impossible.”
I shrugged. “Suit yourself, Mr. Hensley.” I turned to General Carson. “General, to what do we owe all this?” I waved to the helicopter.
“Mr. Hensley wanted to come to exercise his prejudices. Colonel Randolph could use the visit, and I got a tanker car full of fuel for our chopper.” The General was very pleased.
“Three down.” I chuckled. Hensley went red. “You got the best of the best with Derek. Glad to see he is finally being placed where he can reach his full potential.” I surveyed my friend of so many years. “Damn good to finally have you back. May you stay a while.” We hugged, pounding each other on th
e back. Mike Roseman came up from securing the larger daytime perimeter. “I need to borrow the General for a few minutes. Mike can show you around our wee community, Derek. Mr. Hensley, you might want to go with them. General?“
Hensley took a deep breath. I could see the conflict within him. “What would you do, Jamie, if you could live any way you wanted?”
I smiled. “I’d live in a lighthouse overlooking the sea surrounded by pine trees with a library filled with books to be left alone to learn. But I’d live close to a college town for the bookstores and cultural activities, and maybe take a course or two as the moment fancied me.”
Hensley shook his head in disgust. “You’re a Freak of Nature, Jamie. With your abilities you could do so much to bring people to Christ.”
I shrugged. “He may or may not have existed. I don’t know. In my travels to the other side, I’ve never seen or heard of him. I think he did exist, but I suspect he was far different than you or any of us imagine. Heck, you might even want to poke him with a pitchfork.”
Hensley bristled, mouth crumpled with rage. He left with Mike and Derek.
Carson shook his head, lips curved in a smile, and walked with me back toward the houses. “You needed to ‘borrow’ me, Jamie?”
“Yep, very active morning here.” We walked back toward my house.
Benson came out of the Dining Hall with Victoria. Carson pointed. “He quit cold after O’Banion died, determined to leave. We sold him an old mule we were going to have to put down. His nasty sidekick Nick Ryan took over. Not controllable like Eli. Eli has manners. Had Nick taken aside and told to stop his preaching or I’d run his young ass out of the fort on the first train back east.” He paused. “You know what you’re getting into with Benson?”
“No, sure don’t.” I laughed. “Good symbolism. An old broken-down mule and an old broken-down man. We’ll rebuild both.”
Carson grimaced. “Remember we’re all about the same age here. There can’t be more than a couple of years difference between the three of us.”
“True,” I said. “But he thinks of himself as old. So he looks and acts old.”
“The mule’s worthless. He’ll only eat you out of house and home,” Carson said. “If Benson causes a lot problems, we can send him back east, too.”
“Thank you. Hope it won’t be necessary.”
“Dumb to antagonize Hensley. I don’t know how much power and influence he has.”
“You’re right. I’ll make amends. The man is a jerk,” I said. “One day you will hang him, Will.”
Carson stopped and faced me. “I’ve never known you to predict the future, Jamie.”
I shook my head. “Just came to me, Will. As sure as morning will come. Don’t know why.”
He studied to me for a long moment. “Until then a man we have to work with. Where are we headed?”
“I’ll show you.” We walked into my house. Charles and Mary Bareton sat at the dining table freshly showered with clean clothes enjoying hot tea. Mary jerked, jumping to her feet, face white. Charles placed a huge hand on her arm.
“Mary and Charles are my parents,” Judith said, coming out of the kitchen.
Carson stopped. “I didn’t know. Salt Lake Prison Camp. I know who you are, Mr. Bareton.”
Charles said, “After Salt Lake we stayed here a couple of days reprovisioning. Judith stayed with Laith and Jamie.”
“Uniforms scare us, General,” Mary said, sitting down. Judith mopped up the spilled tea.
“Sorry day in the United States when uniforms scare a citizen. Major Lee Wok mentioned you’d transformed Sky Haven into a model community. I had no idea you were coming.” He looked at Judith. “How long is your stay?”
Charles ran his tongue over his lower lip. “Permanently, we hope.”
The General walked over to an old wood stove we used for a planter. “Will there be changes in leadership here? You’re both strong individuals?”
“I didn’t come here to lead,” Charles said quietly. “Patterns of leadership are well established here. We only want to live quietly, fit in where we can, enjoy our last years here.”
Will didn’t comment. He caught my eye. “You still lead?”
“Yes.”
He set down the wolf carving Laith had made. “These are peculiar times. I need stability now above all things with these aliens showing up.” He shook his graying head. “Who’d ever thought aliens really existed.”
Talker strolled in, surveying everyone. Fourteen years and going strong. She padded up to Will, voiced herself speculatively, arched her back, and rubbed up against his leg. Will bent down, running his calloused hand across her back. “Madame,” he said gravely, “I’m truly honored.” A loud purr erupted.
Laith walked in, saw the proceedings. “General, I see you’ve been accepted into her select circle of admirers. Sometimes I’m not sure if we’re enlisted or unknowingly coerced. Anyway, I’ve never known her to show bad judgment.”
The General chuckled. “Thank you, Laith.” He traced a forefinger down her back almost absently, and looked at Charles. “Stay, Mr. Bareton.” But his smile was a warning, and he turned to me. “You lead.” He nodded toward the door.
We walked out in silence. “I had a dream,” he said at length. “The strangest dream of my life. You know my son, Luke.” He swallowed, jaws tightening, eyes bright with unshed tears, and anger at his sudden weakness. “My son was killed south of Salt Lake two days ago in a firefight with jay hawkers.” He looked up at the pine trees, mouth shaking uncontrollably. “Christ,” he swore.
“Your emotions speak the truth,” I said. “Do not deny them.”
“I’m a military commander. I can’t afford to do this.”
“You can’t afford not to. Public displays trouble you and rightly so,” I replied. “Do your crying in private. If you don’t acknowledge your emotions, and let them run their course, you’re asking for trouble - public embarrassment and physical problems. You are needed here. We can’t afford to be without you. Stability. You mentioned a dream,” I finished quietly.
He continued to stare at the pine trees. “In the dream I met some people. Like an appointment. I knew it was all prearranged. We got into a vehicle and drove to this fantastic garden.” He knitted his brow, concentrating. “More like a fantastically landscaped botanical garden. The buildings - never seen anything like them - they fitted into the ground and seemed a natural part of everything. Then they took me to this place set in back and below a waterfall. Inside were many spacious rooms and Luke was sleeping in one. I was so overjoyed I started crying and woke up.” He looked at me. “Damn dream leading me on.”
“Not hardly,” I cut in. “Arthur Luke is quite alive and you dreamed true. What struck you about the door knocker on the building your son was in?”
His eyes grew wide. “Describe it,” he said.
“A sunburst that moved. More than three dimensional. It was alive and tingled to your touch.”
“You were there.” He stared at me, stunned.
“I want you to know your son lives, and it is a true dream. Yes, I was there.”
“You must be the forerunner you told me of,” he said.
“Nope.”
Carson studied me excited. “Luke looked like he was sleeping. I could see him breathing and he turned over muttering. Couldn’t catch what he was saying.”
“Your son.” I stopped for a moment. “In violent death great psychological shock can occur, especially where the personality believes there is no life after physical death. Often the personality will set up a state of simulated oblivion, and then relive the death over and over as a dream or nightmare if you will. The muttering you saw is this. There is an order of guides or helpers that work with this problem. They will insert themselves into his dreams to help bring about the change needed.
“Now Luke has conflicting ideas on death and survival so it may not take too long for him to wake up so to speak. Any rate, he’s in good hands. I understand he is
responding nicely.” Will looked as though a great weight had lifted. “You’ll dream of him again.”
We turned up Fremont Boulevard toward the Main Gate and Carson’s chopper. The pilot stood drinking tea and talking with a couple of boys who eagerly looked at the machine. The alien spacecraft now seemed oddly part of the landscape. Then it hit me. Their movement never deviated. After a while they seemed to belong. This was not an accident.
Derek and Hensley walked up. Derek struggled, trying not to laugh. Hensley looked about to explode. “He met Joanne and Gary Hartman.” Oh, crap. Joanne and Gary are an ex-nun and priest who left the Church and married. They had three children.
“I don’t believe what’s going on here,” Hensley said, voice hoarse. “This is a place of deviants. A renegade priest and nun. A wizard that doesn’t believe in God. I met a gang of women chanting around a pine tree. Worshiping a damn tree. Then there was this skinny kid teaching a class in what he called Essence Memory. What the hell is essence memory?” Carson sat in the doorway of the chopper, an interested light in his eyes.
I laughed. “As simple as possible, people are created by powerful source entities some called souls. Each person is brand new.”
“So there is no reincarnation,” Hensley said, a triumphant sneer on his face. “I heard you people believe in reincarnation.”
“True. But it is the energy of the soul that reincarnates. Now, each new person has the essence memories of its source or soul. Lessons learned from other personalities in other lifetimes and other nonphysical experiences. That’s why everyone has different likes, dislikes, interests. Many of which seem to have no basis in living experience. Attitudes and aptitudes that seem to have no point of reference in your current life. This is essence memory.”
“So,” Hensley said, “no reincarnation and no karma. It’s all a bunch of hooey.” A triumphant gleam ruled his brown eyes.
“Whoa Nelly, Mr. Hensley,” I said. “Karma simply means action. Like attracts like. Karma is spoken in your Bible as ‘you reap what you sow’. So it is there.”
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