The Long Road to Gaia Read online

  He turned, and walked back to his casual time chair, showing the fatigue which came with complicated magic being performed. But he did not sit.

  "My Lord?" asked his son. "What did you see that has you so somber?"

  "Gather my council, immediately."

  "Yes, Lord," said a bowing son, who quickly cast a summoning spell.

  The two of them, son leading his Mage-King, left the private chambers, and walked at a measured pace to the council chambers.

  All were present when they entered. The son took his place to the left of the Mage-King, who sat, signaling all others to sit.

  When all were not only seated, but completely still, the Mage-King spoke.

  "Tell me of prophesy," he asked his first counselor.

  "When…"

  "Stop!"

  Most of the council looked shocked. The Mage-King looked around all their faces, one by one, by rank. None of them showed any understanding.

  "We know what prophesy says. I do not need reminding of what it says. You are all magicians. Have you not been scrying the future of our race?"

  The son bit his tongue, having a glimpse of where this was going. The pain gave him something to concentrate on.

  There was silence for a few moments, finally broken from the bottom of the table.

  "The future Lord? Why? We have seers for that. We know when our doom will come. What is there to check for ourselves?"

  Lightning arced down the table, striking the young councilor in the chest. He was thrown backwards to hit the wall behind, where he slumped down in death.

  The table was silent once more, no-one daring to even look at the punished carcass.

  "You will all skry the future every day from now on. You will supervise the seers, and exhort them to see further ahead."

  "Yes Lord," said his first counselor.

  "How far does the current head counselor see?"

  "Two generations Lord. In the fifty generations since prophesy was made, no-one has seen further than two full generations."

  "I have seen three."

  There were gasps of shock.

  "What did you see Lord?" asked his son carefully.

  "Hope."

  "Hope?" repeated his son. "For fifty generations we have known our race ends in three. My son's son will not be born. How can there be any hope?"

  Instead of being blasted from his seat, his father's hand touched his shoulder.

  "Something has changed. I was given an extra level to the scrying enchantment which has shown me the third generation from now."

  "Lord?" asked the first counselor.

  "Our doom comes for us. Nothing has changed. But I saw hope that we might outrun it."

  "Run? Lord? Where is there to run?"

  All eyes turned to the new voice, and the one who spoke visibly quavered.

  "We will run to the stars," said his Mage-King. "The race must change. A way must be found for us to leave this planet, and travel to others. We know other species exist on other planets. We must devise ways to skry on them, and learn their secrets for travel. We have two generations left for this task, or we go meekly into extinction."

  He looked around the table.

  "We will NOT be going meekly into extinction."

  No-one was game to speak.

  "Leave. The race must be re-tasked for survival at all costs. I will see your progress at the next scheduled meeting. Go."

  He looked at the first counselor and his son, biding them stay. He waited for the room to empty.

  "We need a new branch of Seers."

  "Their task Lord?"

  "I have seen a new species. We must keep track of them."

  "They can help us?"

  "No. But when our doom comes for us, it also will come for them. By watching them, we will have a last warning. And perhaps, the secret of our escape can be found in how they attempt theirs."

  "Who are they?"

  "Humans."

  1969

  One

  The room began to take shape around me.

  We don’t meet very often, maybe once a millennium, but this wasn’t one of the scheduled meetings.

  The form the room takes always gives me a clue as to what we're meeting about. The routine meetings are usually held at Buddha Amitabha's Pure Land. Lush green settings, with ultra-high comfort, but ultra-low tech.

  This wasn’t even remotely on the same level. Four walls in a beige colour. Floor with bad taste carpet. White ceiling. Long thin wooden table, with twelve uncomfortable looking chairs on the other side from me. Single even more uncomfortable chair on my side.

  So, a mission. I hadn't had one in a few hundred centuries, and wasn’t really wanting one now. Something was wrong somewhere, or they wouldn’t be calling me in.

  I activated recall to figure out the planet.

  Irk, Earth.

  Twentieth century at a guess. The room could loosely be described as 'early grunge'. Painted plasterboard walls. 1960's perhaps. Construction materials requiring some technology, but still relatively early. Pre space flight for sure.

  Not my favourite species, or period. A century in which they kidded themselves they were civilized, while systematically slaughtering more than at any time before in their history.

  Last time I’d been there, I'd developed a dislike for the species as a whole. The only thing I agreed with was the saying, 'The more I see people, the more I prefer my cat.' Cats were easier to deal with. If they'd become the dominant species on that miserable planet, it wouldn’t have been so miserable.

  I already knew I wasn’t going to be accepting this mission. Unless it was to save the cats from extinction. I'd go in for that. Most of the big ones were still around in that century, although heading for oblivion already. I knew the smaller variations made it into the next century, but I’d deliberately not cared where humans were going. Cats were worth checking on, humans were not.

  Of all the species in this galaxy, humans rated down there with cockroaches as far as I was concerned. They had very few redeeming qualities. Loving cats was one of them.

  I looked at the chair. Nothing was going to happen until I sat in it.

  I focused my will on changing the chair into something more comfortable. Nothing happened. Not a good sign. It meant the meeting was time locked.

  Correction, something had happened. Two more chairs had appeared, on each end of the table. These were completely different. Larger. More impressive. Bordering on thrones. Another bad sign. Obviously some higher entities were taking an interest.

  There was no point in delaying. The only time being wasted here was my own.

  I floated over to the chair, and 'sat'. Sitting is a relative concept when you have no actual form.

  Contact with the chair, solidified my form. As I suspected, human male. I know some of my brother and sister avatars loved the primitive forms, human especially. Their form enjoyed a level of experiential awareness which wasn’t common in this galaxy. Personally, I could take it or leave it, and I intended leaving it this time.

  The council of the twelve appeared, all in various human forms. Their appearance didn’t matter. We knew each other regardless of how our avatars looked.

  On the council, names were not used. They were One through Twelve.

  I was Thirteen.

  The order of the numbers was in terms of actual physical size. Humans would call us a 'celestial event'. Size was relative. A sun was tiny in comparison to us, even though their avatars tended to think they were the most important of all. But all they had were numbers. All their real size put together, wouldn't place them collectively at this table.

  We came into being with the galaxy itself. Space time kept us too far apart to interact directly. A good thing too, as most of us were incompatible. Our power allowed us to create these avatars of ourselves, and we did so every time we needed to interact with each other, or the mundane species below our level of existence.

  Fourteen and Fifteen were continually pressing to
expand the council size to include them. Personally, I couldn’t think of anything less desirable than sitting on a council. There was too much to do. I always opposed the motions. The millennium meetings were quite enough for me.

  The last two joined us at the table. They were larger avatars than our own, and not fully human. Both had four arms instead of two, and the male had a trunk instead of a nose.

  "We welcome Kali the Destroyer, and Lord Ganesha to our meeting," said One.

  It was going to be worse than I thought. Those two only turned up when galaxy wide consequences were at stake.

  I couldn’t think how such an insignificant species as the humans could have anything to do with galactic wide consequences. In fact, the only reason for me being here I could think of, was they wanted me to stop them destroying themselves. And as far as I was concerned, they could do so, and good riddance. All it needed was a button press, somewhere on that world, and life would cease. The only reason for not letting it happen, was the cats. Although I could rescue some I guess, and give them their own planet.

  I was suddenly aware I was being stared at, by all of them.

  "Are you with us Thirteen?" said One. "Or are galactic events not worthy of your interest these days?"

  One looked like a stern grandmother. Small female figure with steely grey hair, and a perpetual frown. So unlike One's normal appearance. Maybe this was more serious than I thought.

  "What events?" I asked. "Humans in the twentieth century weren’t going anywhere, except perhaps to their own doom. How do they effect galactic events?"

  "When were you last there?" asked Two.

  "You know perfectly well my last visit to that benighted place was in 1945, their time."

  "Not their finest hour," said Five. "Why haven’t you been back?"

  "Why would I? You judge a species on how they treat their children."

  "So?" prompted Eight.

  "Throwing them into a gas chamber, and then burning them, isn’t my idea of an enlightened species worth surviving."

  "Auschwitz?" asked Ten. I nodded. "I can see why you think that. But judging a species on the basis of their darkest hour, isn’t the best approach."

  "Even at their best, they weren't much better."

  "That’s because you haven’t bothered to ride the time line fully," said Nine.

  Kali cleared her throat noisily.

  "We chose you for this intervention Thirteen," said One, "precisely because you haven’t seen what's coming along the human time line."

  "Intervention? What could possibly be going to happen where we need to intervene with them? Or do you really expect me to stop them from blowing themselves up?"

  "Others are doing that," said Kali.

  "So what do you want of me?"

  "You have a journey to go on," said One.

  "Journey?"

  I looked at them all one by one, giving them my 'surely you can't be serious' expression. I’d spent enough time in human form to establish a good number of expressions for all occasions.

  Four laughed.

  "Honestly Thirteen, you are so human yourself sometimes. Perhaps it's part of you being the closest to them spatially of all of us."

  "Which makes it all the odder you haven’t been following their timeline," said Three.

  One stopped me responding.

  "The intervention required," One said, "is not for some six hundred Earth years. But to understand it when it becomes necessary, you need to follow the events leading to it very closely. Twelve will be your supervisor for this task."

  Twelve nodded to me.

  "You all seem to be assuming I will agree to this," I said.

  "You have no choice," said One. "Your personal future is intermingled with the fate of the Humans."

  "Really? How can you know that when I do not?"

  Ganesha stirred. All eyes turned to him.

  "You know as well as anyone," he said, "that the future is hidden when your own fate is involved."

  "How can my fate be intertwined with theirs?" I asked.

  "That is the road you must walk to find out," said One. "The road will lead you to a planet named Outback. Groups of humans are praying for it even now. Their descendants will get what they seek, but the journey is a long one, for Outback is at the end of their arm of the galaxy. You must go with them on the journey."

  "You're serious? Won't they find it a bit strange I don’t die for six hundred years?"

  "They will not notice you. There is no need to be present for all of the time, just the important events along the way. You can take on different personas at different times. And sometimes will only require you to monitor without being seen."

  "What has the 1960's to do with any of this?"

  "The story begins there," said One. "Twelve will take you there when this meeting is complete."

  "I haven't agreed to it yet. What if I'm content to simply wait out the six hundred years? It's my choice, as it is with all of us when asked to intervene."

  "You didn’t come here to make a choice," said Kali. "The choice was made at the moment of your coming into being. You are here now to be shown the path you must walk."

  "Must?"

  "Must."

  There was a silence as I looked at all of them, and they looked at me.

  Twelve broke it.

  "Perhaps I should show Thirteen the beginning now, and let some reality flow?"

  "Good idea," said One. "Do it."

  I started to object, but the room dissolved.

  Two

  Twelve and I stood at the rear of a typical 1960's living room. In front of us, a family of four were watching a black and white television set. Mum and Dad seemed to be in their thirties, while the boy appeared to be ten, and the girl, seven. The boy had a Siamese cat in his lap, and was idly stroking it while he was totally engrossed with what was happening on the television.

  The grainy, not particularly distinct picture, was of two spacesuits bouncing around in the dirt, with a strange looking vehicle in the background.

  I turned to twelve.

  "1969?" I asked. Twelve nodded. "The first moon landing then." Another nod.

  The picture ended, and returned to a news desk. The man rose, and turned the television off.

  "One day," said the boy, "I'm going into space. And I'm taking my whole family with me!"

  "That's nice dear," said his Mum.

  "I don’t want to go into space," complained his sister.

  "You don’t have to if you don’t want to honey," said her father.

  "Nobody's going into space," said her mother. "At least not in my lifetime. Bed young lady, now."

  Her protests fell on deaf ears, as her mother gently bundled her out of the room. Her brother continued to sit where he was, still stroking the cat.

  "You believe me Dad, don’t you?" he asked his father.

  "Sure son. Anything is possible in your lifetime. If they can reach the moon today, it's only a matter of time before they reach the other planets as well. Maybe even other stars. But son, not everyone is going to be able to go. Only the best will be picked."

  "I'll be the best, I know I will."

  "We'll help you son. But the work is up to you. You need to get good grades at school for a start."

  "I know Dad. Don’t I get good grades now?"

  "Sure you do. But you saw those two men on the moon just now?"

  "Yes?"

  "They are the best of the best. Men have been looking at the moon and wanting to go there, since man first looked up and saw it. But in the end, only two of them got there. Others will follow, but of all those who want to go, only the best of the best will achieve their dreams."

  "I'll be the best Dad, but I'm not going to the moon."

  "Where then?"

  "The stars Dad. I'm going to our closest stars."

  "Dream big son."

  "I already am. I know I won't be young when it happens, but I know it will happen."

  "Hold that thought.
Bed soon."

  "Yes Dad. I want to sit here with Max for a while first."

  "Sure. But not too long."

  The father left the room, leaving his son looking out the window at the moon.

  I felt the need to test this family, to see if they were different to my expectations. The father had been oddly supportive, and I hadn't expected it.

  I allowed the cat to sense my presence. It immediately rose to its feet, arched its back, and its fur stood on end. Its claws came out, and sank into the boy's leg.

  "Ouch! What's wrong with you Max? That hurt."

  The cat was looking right at me. It spat in my direction. I stopped letting it sense me, and watched to see what the boy would do.

  The boy cuddled the cat, talking to it as if it was a person. He stroked it, and soothed it, until it sat down again. Boy and cat resumed communion. Stroking resulted in a loud purr.

  I hadn't expected this reaction. The boy obviously loved the cat, and even though it had hurt him, he hadn't lashed out in anger. Instead, he'd been genuinely concerned about the cat's reaction. Mystifying.

  I left the room and found the mother reading a story to her daughter. It was uplifting and positive, with no fear or negativity of any kind. The story ended, mother kissed daughter, turned the light off, and left, leaving the door a little ajar.

  I followed her back into the living room, where the cat had jumped off the boy's lap.

  "I'm going Mum," he said.

  She nodded and smiled at him.

  As the boy went past a display case near the door, I pushed against him, and he stumbled into it. A large vase on the top crashed to the floor and broke.

  "I'm sorry Mum," he cried. "I didn’t mean to do that."

  "Careful of the sharp pieces dear. I know you didn’t mean to. If I didn’t know better, I swear you were pushed."

  "I can't explain it Mum. Something spooked Max as well. He dug his claws into me."

  "Come into your room and show me. We better check if he hurt you or not."

  I watched them leave, broken pottery left on the floor. No anger. Again I was surprised at the reaction.

  I looked at Twelve. The human face was grinning.