“Your loss is still too recent for you to feel able to concentrate, but I ask that you try anyway. Meli will narrate our story to you. In between her telling of our story, Wendy will sing for you of our feelings, interpreting what you have heard. At the end of it I will explain anything you still need explained.”
1431
Most of us sat on the carpet, leaving space for the girls and our two visitors. Meli started with my heartbreak at losing my Dominique, telling of my morose withdrawal from the world. Then she told of this bright magical little girl that appeared in my garden and of how I became her monster. Wendy was humming to herself as Meli spoke and I found tears wetting my cheeks as I wandered within my mind back to those first days, weeks and months. As is usual with these tellings, either Cherine or else Cherine and Dommi sit by me. Tonight it was Dommi and little Wendy. Meli knew how important I felt this telling is and took her time, putting in details she sometimes leaves out.
When she got to the part of our meeting Wendy she had to stop, for the humming took over and Wendy painted her emotions over us with her voice. All the horror of her life was brought straight to our hearts and the joy of finding love that does not hurt, that only brings joy and light, a miracle to her poor heart, these were all made a part of us. Two hours later we were all still sitting there enthralled by their voices. When she got to the part of Eddie opening my mind to his powers I saw the two Eddies glance at each other. The two wives kept on stealing short glances, but avoided looking each other in the eyes.
Meli finished off the story at the point where I brought our two visitors into our home. Wendy sang her last song. She sang of my needs, of my dreams to unite and bring these two over and make them part of us, to see their love grow and one day have them become Cherinians. She sang of my pain when I saw that only superior power could convince them of the futility of fighting on. She hesitated a second and finished off with a note that asked the question, leaving it for our next actions to answer.
We all sat in silence for a long time.
“Kori mou, both of you, tonight you have made our story a thing of beauty. You have touched my heart.”
“Alki, that is a good idea. Cherine, the golden circle please?”
She took from the heart of little Candy and sent her sweet innocent love flowing out to touch each of us. Everyone was able to feel that special quality of her childish love and devotion and it sufficed for a long moment and then she brought in the two Wendy hearts and so it grew until each and every Cherinian heart was included. I thought she would now swell it, let it grow and circle us in a swirl. She did not. Gently she reached out and brought in the love of Edward for his wife and then her love for him and made it all a part of our love. Now she began to make it swirl in a golden glow until we felt we could die from too much love. As it reached the peak of what she was able to control she let it go and we must have hit the neighbourhood with so much love they must have all been stunned. Luckily people do not go around saying, ‘wow, last night I suddenly felt so much love for my wife and children it had to be unnatural’. They just accept and usually enjoy it.
“Edward, Hettie, it is time for us to take you to the void. Some day you will die, as will we all. I would like to know that you will join us then. Will you come dance with us?” I knew they would be too dizzy to think logically and wonder how our World can save their souls in their own reality. I was right, they did not question me.
“You are going to make us suffer further?”
“I have made you suffer Hettie? It was not my intention.”
“She is right Robert. This has all been painful. We are not used to feeling so many emotions, nor are we used to them being so strong.”
“Our dancing, it is a softer sweeter feeling. More joyous. Please come.” Cherine pleaded.
They stared at Cherine and nodded their agreement.
Whereas our souls, those of Rob and myself, Cherine and the others who have their alternates with us, were not as similar as they were different, those of the two Eddies were almost identical. We danced and gradually brought them in, after ensuring they first danced and exchanged motes with their own Robert and Cherine - that way, maybe their World will recognise them should they die and keep my promise for me. Once they had exchange kissed with us, we asked everyone to join us on the emerald isle. I invited Adam to join us too.
“Edward, when you return to your world I strongly urge you to search out the alternate of our Mama Jo. She will help make your life a lot more interesting. She will speak in ways that are suggestive, but make no sense, and that will give you treasures to hunt. Whether you end up understanding her or not will not matter so much, it is the pleasure you will get in trying that matters.”
1432
“So my young friend, you have seen through me!” She laughed, delighted by my game playing.
They were both courteous to her, not quite knowing what to make of this emerald gigantic woman. I saw his eyes light up with interest when introduced to our Adam. They talked for a time, even walking off by themselves. The girls seemed a teeny bit anxious about this, but did not say anything when they saw I was smiling.
“Don’t worry, he is probably telling Edward what an arsehole I am.”
My protector warned me that the others have reached close to the end of their endurance, that it is time for us to return to our bodies. I called to everyone and they gathered around.
“It is time to return home. I have the feeling that our guests would like to spend more time here. Edward, Hettie, would my promise to bring you again tomorrow suffice for now?”
“I would like to have a moment to look at the Sparklers before we return. I was too overcome by all that was happening to notice them properly.”
“If they can come, would you like to meet Solomon and Ordinx?”
“It is not necessary for you to call them, I am certain they have more important things to do.”
I looked at my girls in dismay. “God, but I must be so callous at times! It never crossed my mind that they could be busy, I just called them whenever I wanted. Surely one of you should have pointed this out to me long ago?”
As I’d expected, Sam had called them and they came to meet our guests. After the words of introduction, I asked them.
“Would you mind if I change the energy levels so that you can all come closer again? I miss the sight of your people and Worlds filling our sky.” They agreed and I called the protector to me, melding with it we blazed forth and then vanished as I became the void. I adjusted the energy patterns (streams) and we returned. Having suitably impressed our guests we were now able to return home.
“Edward, a large number of these people you see are actually infants. They need to go to sleep. Tomorrow we can talk and we would also like to take you to visit the world of Meli.”
“I was interested in that. It sounded almost like a fairy story.”
“It is, for the time being. Cherine love, do you recall something I told you about myself in our early days? Do they qualify as friends?”
She gave me her naughty grin. “Then you will be forced to tell them the truth?” She was doing a good job of hiding the fact that she did not know what lie I had told.
“Do any of you recall what I said when I decided to burn out all those thousands of people when we fought the first Doris?”
“You said so many things Roberto, are we supposed to recall all your words of wisdom?” Socrati was teasing and he got his laughs.
“I spoke about amputation and the suffering?”
As they began to understand, the worry that spread could almost be felt as a physical thing. I turned to Edward and Hettie B.
“What I told Cherine long ago was, ‘I never lie to friends and only sometimes lie to the others.’ The truth is that I love a good lie now and then. It is unfortunately not possible for one Cherinian to lie to another, so I do not get many opportunities to do so. It was one of the reasons I loved the fight with you, it gave me so many opportunities to lie or bluff.
1433
The second point was about the guilt I felt at taking away the powers of others. I know that for me to lose my gifts would be worse than losing my eyesight.
Hettie, both of you, Edward, I never burnt out your powers, I only blocked them. I am now removing the blocks. We are all going to sleep. You may either accept my invitation freely and stay, we have prepared a bedroom for you, or you may leave. I hope you stay.”
My Cherinians could not help letting their fears inundate me, only my girls and Alki not doing so. I do not doubt that the two of them felt it, but they were too stunned at feeling their powers return to them to really pay it much attention. Edward sat down suddenly and put his face in his hands.
“Why?”
“Why did I lie or why did I return them?”
“Why return them? This is crazy!”
“Granted. Tell me Edward, how do you like me more, sane or crazy?”
Our Eddie has never roared with his sudden burst of laughter. It was infectious and soon had them all laughing too. “As an enemy or a friend Robert? As an enemy it is scary - I can never guess in which direction you are going to jump. If you are a friend, then maybe it is scarier!”
I felt with his laughter he’d warmed a lot of hearts to him. I had been right, he is the same as our Eddie. My loved ones, all my Cherinians felt the glee in my heart.
“I was never an enemy Edward, never!”
“Is that why we lost?”
“You had to so that you could win.”
“There he goes again!” That got another round of laughs.
“I give up, Hettie love, there is no point in trying to fight him.”
“It took you so long to understand that love? I realised we had lost the battle the moment I saw what he had done for the other Hettie.”
I quickly explained about the effects of dancing, helped adjust their appearances and age so that they became their original selves of the time they met and without giving them time to react said goodnight and disappeared into our bedroom.
“Now that that is over, who feels like a bit of loving?”
It was perhaps indicative of the inability of my beloved Cherinians to truly believe our hostilities were over so soon, with such ease, so they all appeared at our home the next day - as soon as their kids told them we are up and about. It was not long before our guests also came out to join us for a late breakfast.
Edward sat buttering his toast deep in thought. As I passed him the honeycomb he waved his hand at me and chose instead some cheese. I had a feeling he was going to upset my girls and all the others, but I hid my amusement and waited for him.
“Eddie, does he really believe everything he told us yesterday?”
“Something in particular is puzzling you?”
“Yes. You claimed he was grieving because he had to use force to stop us, that he expected love to be his only weapon.”
“That is true.”
“Ach! Even you do not see he is only deceiving himself?”
“We all deceive ourselves brother. In which particular way are you speaking of?”
1434
“Love! Pah! Utter English sentimental nonsense. He never tried to win us over with love.” He was waving his toast about as he got excited. “I am sorry Robert, but if we are to accept defeat at your hands, then it should at least be with honesty.”
“I will answer part of that later, I would rather you first make your point.”
“You would never have dared to come expecting victory if you did not have power. Power to fight us and the power to offer us a bribe we could not refuse.”
I nodded my agreement. “Correct Edward. I am not that far gone that I do not realise it.” I felt my loves getting upset and decided to rub a bit of salt in while I had the chance. “You saw some of my gifts and powers, in accordance with your outlook, would you say I should have displayed the full strength of my abilities so as to thoroughly dissuade you from harbouring any thoughts of trying to overthrow me at some later date?”
“You are bluffing, what further powers could you have shown me that would so terrify us?”
“The human mind is a terrible thing Edward. All it needs is to know that a thing is possible and it finds the way to do it. My claim will have to remain a bluff, I cannot chance having others acquire such powers of total devastation.”
I don’t know why, but he was suddenly angry. “I demand you show me at least one or else brand yourself a liar.”
“I thought I admitted last night that I was a liar?” At this there were distraught calls of ‘Robert’. I waved my hand at them. “Concede the man what is due to him loves. May I ask you something Edward? Your wife grabbed me from space where you had left me, and threw me into the sun. Do either of you have the ability to survive something like that?”
“I thought you somehow managed to evade it! You mean she succeeded!!?”
“See Hettie, now he doubts you too. He is just as sceptical, a cynic, as our Eddie is - not to mention a few of our Cherinians.” Jonathan blushed so I smiled at him. “Edward, it is not a bad trait, I wish I could be a little more like you, unfortunately I tend to take everything at face value. It leads to heart-breaking disappointments. For instance, if we agree a truce and I am attacked, that betrayal hurts more than the attack itself. That may explain why I reacted so strongly yesterday.”
“There was no truce agreed. You imposed one upon us, it is not the same.”
“May I revert to an earlier point you made, perhaps even without being aware of it? You said I did not defeat you with love. You are in a sense wrong. Edward, if there was no good in either of you, I assure you we would not be sitting here talking. I would have either really disabled you permanently or else killed you. You talk of bribery. How did I bribe you?”
“You offered to return us to our original bodies and give those bodies almost eternal life.”
“I see. That is all you saw?”
“What else was there?”
I leant forward and stared deeply into his eyes. “If you had accepted for the sake of having your own body, of eternal youth, I would have killed you.”
“What are you saying! I do not understand.”
“I am glad you do not for then it means your love was so strong you are not able to see how it influenced you. It is too much a part of you and you do not notice when it forces you to take certain decisions. Edward, you accepted the bribe of my giving your wife her original body. To see her as she originally was, that was a dream you could barely believe in, but you wanted it at any cost. You have managed to continue loving her in all her other bodies because you love the person she is, but for your love to feel complete…you needed to look into those eyes you had originally fallen in love with. Am I wrong?”
He did not answer me.
1435
“You too Hettie, you were caught up in the dream of seeing him as he was. With you it was slightly different. You felt the need for your original body, but it was also because you knew how it would please him. Would you claim I misunderstood?”
She shook her head.
I sat back, glancing over at Aganthi. She read me correctly and brought me a cigarette, lighting it first and taking a few puffs. I grinned at her.
“Even with our healers they are still damn addictive aren’t they?”
She only smiled and answered in Greek, “You been busy selling them flowers, I think you need a cigarette eh?” I was not expecting her answer and broke out in a loud laugh.
“Don’t get so prickly Edward, I was not laughing at you, she made a comment making fun of me and I was not expecting it, so I laughed.”
“I have been wondering about that. You speak of love and love and love, yet during all the time of our hostilities I never saw you consult with the others. Even when they did not approve of what you said or did, they did not dare to oppose you. Their silence spoke loudly of your dictatorial ways.”
Perhaps my own fears made me susceptible, but for the first time his needling got to me. I did not answer and he took that as an admittance of my guilt.
“Do you remember who I am?”
Impatiently he replied, “You are the daughter of the doctor?”
“That is right. I am not of the family of Robert. I have not even been very friendly to him, I still feel a little frightened of him. Do you know why I accept him as my leader?” She waited for an answer, but he did not reply. “I will tell you anyway. I accept him because I know that I also am his leader. It is true for all of us. He keeps on trying to find one of us to take over as leader because he does not enjoy it. He says he only wants to do his painting and love his wives and daughters.”
“If he says so, then you believe him? Since he is the one with all the power, how could any of you take over? Do not tell me you all fall for his apparent humility.”
“If I were to offer the leadership to someone like you it would be different? You would have the power to handle any crisis.”
“That is true,” he laughed, “not that it is likely to happen.”
“Why not, I did ask our Eddie to take over. Would you agree to?”
“And they would all agree? You may be crazy, but I cannot believe all of them would be that stupid.”
“Ask them.”
“You are wasting my time…”
His Hettie spoke, “He challenged you Eddie, so ask them.”
“You too?” He shrugged. “Alright, would you all agree?”
I cut in, “Ask if any object.”
“Well, do you?”
Alki came forward, on behalf of everyone.
“He has asked most of us at least once. If any of us had been stupid enough to agree, the rest of us would have accepted it. If he offers the position to you, then there will be no voices of dissent. You do not understand us yet. We all stand behind him because we love him. He has done many crazy things, to which we objected to at the time, and then he would be proven to be right. At least if you become leader we will have the pleasure of being able to argue with you - I doubt you will be right all the time.”
1436
His wife put her hand on his. “What is wrong my love, why are you trying to provoke a fight? Can’t you see you are going about it in the wrong way?”
“Damn them!!” He shoved the chair back and stalked out of the house in anger. I sent Irene after him. They were gone for hours, but I took the opportunity to catch up on my sleep a little - there is only so much I should ask of my healer after all.
When I woke up my girls all came to me, some sitting on the bed, others lying down next to me. It was quite a sight, strange that there are so many females in one family and yet they do not gang up on me - unless it is for my good.
“I am puzzled by something. They are the exact opposite of our Eddie and Hettie. With ours, she was the tough cookie while he is all sweetness.”
“It is not strange Robert.” Dommi smiled as she spoke. “Her husband did not abandon her to go hide in the jungle. She has been cared for by him and had no reason to become hard.”
“Robert, you really were unfair. He has not even become a Cherinian yet and you ask him to become our leader. You didn’t give us a chance to make a bet with him.”
“Cherine love, why do you only enjoy betting on sure things, take a chance now and then.”
“I took all the chances I need to for my whole life, by loving you.”
“Thanks a lot!”
“You are welcome my love.”
Dommi was smiling at us indulgently so I pinched her bum. “You too Dommi?”
“No Robert, she took a chance on me also.”
“Sam, do you know why I love all our Cherinians so much?”
“Because they don’t fight with you?”
“No. Because they always lose. I can never win an argument with any of you! Somehow you lovely ladies manage to keep my heart soaring like an eagle while keeping my feet on the ground - usually stuck deep in the mud.”
“I think he meant that as a compliment.”
As we were talking I was running my hand up and down the inner thigh of Dommi. I now moved it to her belly, thinking of the treasure she carries in there. “Why didn’t she join us at the dancing, Dommi?”
“I think she is still unsettled over what happened. She also sensed Hettie and I felt her trying to hide from her.”
I sat up, angry. “You should have told me Dommi.”
“I just did.”
“Don’t play word games on something like this. Dommi, we are going to the void now and you make her come out to us.”
“Don’t try to force her Roberto.”
“Force!? What are you talking about, I want to love her. I will not have her live in fear.” She thought about it a moment and sighed. I made space for her and she lay down next to me.
The girls and I danced with Dommi, making her the centre of our love. Every now and then we could just about see the tiny flame of our daughter and I managed to catch her with a mote of love. A little while later she peeped out again and Wendy gave her a sweet mote of her love. In our minds we heard Wendy begin a soft crooning and we were immediately surrounded by little green stars flitting around us in a dance.
1437
*Do I intrude Robert?*
*No my friend, you do not. We have a frightened little baby and we are trying to get her to come out and be loved.*
*May I suggest we then all withdraw? She is the one Hettie displaced?*
*Correct. Dommi, Solomon may be right. What if we go further away and you try to get her to dance with you?*
*Leave Wendy with me.*
We all kept away, even the Sparklers, as we waited and watched from a distance. The song from Wendy was a simple but beautiful song of tenderness and love and the little one was soon peeping out and letting the two of them send her exchange kisses. Every now and then she would hide again and the song would seem to bubble with laughter, Wendy turning it into a game.
*You are suffering Robert? There is no reason for you to do so, she will recover. Young ones of all species are very resilient. We have recently been bringing out some of the younger Anadir and it is a joy to see how they respond to the love of their own people. You would not believe it, but one of them, a small child, actually tried to play with us. That little one was a source of great joy for us.*
*I would like to meet that soul, it must be very special.*
*It is playing now on the world of Meli, go visit her Robert.*
*Aha! You only suggest that because it is a young female!*
I got the girls to join me in a dance around Solomon and we all sent him our motes. He seemed nonplussed for a while and then sent back tiny yellow motes, sparkling like miniature suns. I darted in and grabbed the first one and then let the girls do likewise. There was a sense of love coming from a vast multitude of souls and yet at the same time, it had the signature of our Solomon.
*Solomon. I sense you are no longer just the sum of all your parts. You are becoming a personality on your own?*
*There is a distinct possibility of it happening. It is for that reason I spend most of my time as part of my people and only come together when it is necessary to be with you or Ordinx.*
*You and your Thinkers fear you becoming a distinct personality!?*
*No. I do. Where would I belong then, an alien to even my own people?*
I laughed, delighted at the notion. He seemed upset at my laughter, so did my girls and they showered him with their sympathy and love.
*Solomon, I am not laughing at you, I am laughing at the Universe, at life. You thought your species had reached the end of the path of your evolution while right under your non-existent noses a new turn in your evolution was happening. Solomon, you are the first child of a new mutation, same as us Cherinians. That is what fills me with joy.*
That set the cat amongst the pigeons!! He trembled and flew off, probably searching for comfort within the centre of his people. Soon it became evident that all the Sparklers were in a turmoil and Ordinx with others of his people appeared.
*What has happened Robert? Is this because of you?*
I fear that may be so. Not intentionally of course.
*Sam?*
*He welcomed Solomon as a mutant of his people, told him he is the same as us, a new…something about evolution.*
It took a moment for them to understand and then that set them off ! I called out to the girls. *It seems I better stay away from everybody, I’m causing too much trouble.*
1438
*Perhaps you are, Robert, but at least our baby is now playing with Wendy.*
I felt guilty at forgetting her for a moment, but was soon overcome with delight at seeing her play. All of us remained still, just watching her. My girls gradually drifted in, till their souls were joined to mine. We must have appeared to be one glorious soul of many. They truly are my soul mates. Gently I began to spin us around until we were one ball of a multitude of streaks of colour and I danced around our World in joy. The girls were giggling within me and we became a ball of joy that scintillated and sent out love mixed with our joy. We did not realise what we were doing and we caused a misunderstanding. Our alien friends thought our dance was because of Solomon and this caused them to wonder at our joy, could it be that we see something so wonderful in what I said is happening? This made them all start to examine the matter under a different light - our light of joy. The Sparkler Thinkers, as is normal of them, will need a long time to ponder and question each and every aspect of this new happening within their species and will probably take years, but at least, at the moment I think, they are now willing to consider aspects they had not been willing to think of before.
Dommi was calling so we slowed and returned to her. *She saw you and wants to join in, she must think you were playing.*
*I guess you could say we were.*
I sent out a tendril filled with love and she let me brush against her tiny soul. She recognised me and soon was nestled within me. We played around again, zooming at high speed far over the surface of our World, making her scream in our minds, crying out for more every time we slowed. She wanted to go play with the Worlds of the Anadir, trying to urge us to go there, but that I could not do, I did slow down though and take her within the Sparkler cloud. She was silent, absorbing the sight. We made certain she felt our love, the motherly love of Dommi a presence in her heart at all times. The Sparklers kept a tunnel open for us as we travelled through them, till we found ourselves cocooned within a sphere.
The sphere went hazy and I heard the sound of surf and we found ourselves standing on a beach. I fell to my knees at the sight of my baby girl sitting on the sand, her finger in her mouth as she stared at us.
“Thank you Solomon. This is a wonderful gift.”
A hazy shape began to form in front of us. “I regret I am not Solomon. It has been decided he should not be formed again until our Thinkers have considered the matter you brought to our attention and have made a decision.”
We were all stunned, I had not expected this. The girls were almost crying, but I was angry. Sam tried to stop me, but I was not in the mood to listen to common sense. “Your Thinkers have the right to do as they see fit. You are not the same species as us and think in different ways. You may convey to them that I am angry and disappointed in them. I do not wish to communicate with the Sparklers any further. Any species that would kill or stifle a new form of life cannot be considered friends of mine. Girls, we are leaving now.”
I scooped up my baby daughter so as to leave. Without a word exchanged I looked at my girls. Our feet stayed fixed to the sand - we were unable to leave.
“You are declaring yourself our enemy Robert?”
“I did no such thing. I just said we do not consider you friends. We will continue to help you, but that is purely a decision based on the need to help the souls you still hold. Whatever help we give you as a species will be based purely on political decisions. I trust you understand what I mean.”
“Your friendship then was based purely on your liking for Solomon, not for us as a species?”
“Do not put words in my mouth. Solomon would never have deliberately misunderstood me as you do. I have already explained why I find your friendship unacceptable. It has nothing to do with our liking for Solomon, it has to do with your treatment of him. We too are mutants and face daily the fear of being discovered and the prejudice that we would be met with. How do you expect us to accept that same prejudice from yourselves!”
“Daddy, are they keeping us prisoners?” Tina spoke their fear in a small voice.
“No. To do that they would have to declare themselves our enemies.”
1439
“You already speak of enmity with us!?”
“Do you have a brain or were you made with the little that was left after making Solomon? A child asks in fear whether you are holding us as prisoners and you only react to my answer, again almost deliberately misunderstanding us.”
“You may leave.”
“I did not ask you for permission, your granting of it was not a friendly gesture for it leaves with it an insinuation that till now we were not allowed to leave. You will ensure from now on that your people do not approach us. Girls, come to me.”
They came closer and the protector formed a shield around us and we headed in the direction of our World, even trapped here in what seemed physical bodies, we could sense where it was. As we travelled, Sparklers quickly got out of our way and we were soon out of their cloud. I took us directly down to the emerald isle and released the girls. We stood out - we were still as we had been on the Sparklers beach. We did not know how to change back into our soul forms. Adam and Mama Jo came to us.
“This is a first, I do not believe even the Anadir Worlds, with their long history, have ever been hosts to physical bodies.”
“Do not be fooled by our appearances Adam, these are not real bodies. According to Solomon they are created out of our minds. We just need to work out how to get rid of them.”
“You cannot return to your bodies?”
“Mama Jo, we cannot even travel in the void, our protector had to carry us here.”
The only thing that prevented fear was my anger. I tried everything, using the healer and the protector, but we could not get rid of the bodies - it made me feel as if they are not really trying, for my faith in their abilities has grown very strong.
“Let the protector take me back to the Sparklers Robert, I’ll ask them to change us back.”
“You will do no such thing Sam! We are thinking of this in the wrong way. I will not give them the satisfaction of thinking they can trap us. We have to change this around to our advantage.”
“How?”
“Well, first of all, if these are bodies, they sure feel real, what if we try to leave them in the same way we leave our real bodies?” I sat down and closed my eyes. I found myself back in the void. Elated I returned to our World as a soul. I took on the normal emerald green body I use when there. They all stared at me and then down at my pale body that lay at their feet, as if asleep.
“So now our problem changes. What do we do with the body?”
“I wish I could take it to my world.”
“Meli, that is a great idea. Think of how we would impress all the Cherinians if we bring them dancing and then we all appear amongst them in our bodies!”
“Do you mean we could leave these bodies here and use them whenever we come to the void?”
“I don’t know. How do these bodies eat, what do they eat? How long can they survive without us in them?”
“We can’t keep coming here every day Robbie!”
“I know love. Quite honestly, I’m stymied. What do you think of us calling Ordinx in to help us?”
“Robert!!!”
I grinned at my excited Bernie. “What love?”
“They have so many of them who want to have a body. Why not let them use them. That is if we can find food for them.” She ended, losing her enthusiasm.
1440
“That is the last problem. Mama Jo, do you ever eat?”
She smiled at us. “A soul eating? What an idea!!” She laughed at our dismay. “Look at me Robert, do I look as if I am the type of person who would be willing to stay here for so long if I could not eat? The island is full of fruit.”
“I did not know we could eat it, or that it would provide any nourishment.”
“It provides me with whatever I need.”
“You’ve done it Robert!!” Claudia was excited and looking at me with pride.
“No my love, I did not. We did, our ideas growing out of ideas from all of us. Dommi, how do we explain to our baby that she should leave her body and return with us? By the way, what name have you given her, I can’t keep calling her the baby.”
“You choose her name, love.”
“For this once, no. You give her a name.”
“Alice?”
“Of Wonderland? Fine with me.”
“Dommi, mummy?” she hesitated, waiting for her mother to look at her. “Could we change her name to Alicia, it sounds more exotic.”
“You haven’t had enough of exotic?” We all laughed.
“Adam, can you call for Ordinx or should I send Sam?”
“He is coming.”
“Thank you. I suppose you would like us to transfer our memories before we leave?”
“I was hoping, it has been a long time since you last did.” I dissolved my emerald body and met him/her and gave freely.
*Adam. Fair is fair. Why are you not transferring to us?*
That upset him so I left with a quick laugh, just to piss him off of course. As I returned to the isle, Ordinx was arriving. He was quick to pick up that something had happened, our pale bodies betrayed the fact. I let Sam and the girls explain to him. I did not entirely agree with their interpretations, but wisely kept my mouth shut. If I keep correcting them they will never speak freely in front of me.
“This is very bad news Robert.”
“It was suggested, more by omission than by statement, that the release of souls will continue Ordinx. Before we speak further, I suggest you should go speak to the new entity. I hope you will be more diplomatic than I was.”
“You wish me to try and repair the damage in your relationship with them?”
“No.”
“But even for the sake of…”
“Ordinx, I said no and I mean it. Solomon is just as much a human being as you and I are. I will not sacrifice him to expediency nor to politics. You can tell them their bad manners in stranding us has been turned by us into an advantage for us. We now have physical bodies we can use in the void. All I need do is engineer the space around our bodies and they will be quite comfortable. A suggestion by the girls which we hope you will like, while we are on Earth in our bodies, your people could take turns using these bodies to enjoy the sensations of having a material body - even if they are alien to you. Mama Jo will be here to watch over them for the time being I hope.”
Αλέξανδρος Ζήνον Ευσταθίου
(Alexander Zenon Eustace)19th July, 2019
- posted on Steemit: 19th July, 2019