aaron_the fall of america_chapter_12

Chapter 12

When I used to consume drugs, I believed that all other time between getting stoned was only filler. The way to be was stoned. It was as if the drug was a parasitic life form that demanded existence, manipulating demons that screamed for priority in my body.

I decided that I didn't want the demons in control so I shut down the road that they came in on. Now they find their way in on a different path. Because I closed the drug road, there is no reasoning with them about when it is time to leave. I have given up trying to send them back through the dark forest. I've done a little renovation to make it comfortable for all of us. They have their space and they allow me to maintain control over my conduct. We've been getting along better that way. At times I believe they may be my friends.

An idle mind can be vulnerable too much worse. Paranoid schizophrenia can eat at perception until point of view becomes completely distorted.

I've decided to spend my conscious hours digging through the earth. I want out.

I remember now how I got here.

Once upon a time there was an egg happily living a peaceful existence inside a human female. One day the egg was evicted from the holy family for suspected espionage. Without trial, the egg was sent on the journey to a battle zone called the womb. The chances of survival were slim but luckily the owner of the womb allowed an owner of an uncladded penis to penetrate her. The penis had a mission and sperm was the soldier that obliterated the singularity of the egg. But it was the only chance for continued existence. The egg was to become me. Though it was a traumatic experience, I welcomed my fate. I kept splitting apart, growing exponentially. Before long, I became so gigantic that I had to leave the comfort of the womb just to stretch my legs.


I screamed when I ripped out into the new world. I was covered in slim and blood. I wanted to go back in but a monster was holding me by the feet. He had beat me when I first tried to fly upside down. The monster cut my life support line so I was forced to function alone. There was no going back.

As a growing infant, I was forced to cope with strange and demanding creatures. Mother and Father, as well as relatives and others, all demanded that I responded to their presence.

People were hell.

It was my hardest task, as I continued to grow, to force myself to respond and act acceptably to situations involving other humans. I usually ended up confused and disappointed. I tried to adapt to their games when I had to but preferred the simplicity of being alone, trying to find my lost oneness. I developed a shell for protection and learned to travel in my mind, out of the reach of other humans.

Humans appeared like mutated, killer , monsters. Their pleasure often came from causing pain and destruction to each other and their environment. When the destruction wasn't physical, they slaughtered each other with the scythe of doubt and insult.

I remember a small shack in the woods that looked like it was built for a witch; what I can't remember is if the memory was from an experience of a dream. If it was real, I think there was a boy who lived there. He liked to steal my little brother's toys.

One morning, I had discovered some light blue eggs in a nest that lay hidden in a steep clay hill directly behind our house. Our house was in the woods. I was amazed at their existence and envied their simplicity. Their apparent oneness. There was a hopeful joy in their beauty.

In my foolish excitement, I told the witch's son my secret discovery. He seemed equally interested. He convinced me that he had to see them. I took him to my private place to share the joy with him. As soon as he laid his eyes on the eggs, he laid his hands on them. He threw each one of them against our back wall, extinguishing the life in them before the new birds had a chance to scream in the open air. My heart sank with the shattering of the eggs.

"Why did you do that?"

"They're just stupid robin's eggs."

His answer didn't explain it.

The walls closed in.

I don't remember his name. I don't remember where he came from. I have no idea what he grew up to be. He's likely someone's husband and someone's father.

I suspect that I'm going mad as I dig. But as an extra, added benefit in my favour, I've been eating better. I've uncovered a root similar to a cross between a potato and a peanut. I'm starting to concern myself with redundancy, hoping it might lead to something.

I can't remember the sound, I can hardly remember sound, but I think it is the scream of a large lizard that is my favourite. The objection is perfectly primal. In a basic way, deep inside our brain, we still hold the reptile. Or it still holds us. That's why I think the hideous scream that woke me today was my own. I still feel the rumble in the root of my brain.

The more I dig the better I feel, so I've been digging a great deal. I have enjoyed the myopic hope of escape as I move through the earth like an invalid mole.

The digging has also helped me focus on my memory. I am certain that I know who I am.

My brother and I look like we could be twins. I am six years older than he; at least I used to be. He's ten years ahead of me. He's done everything and I've done very little. He's in love with a beautiful, brilliant and accomplished woman who loves him, I have a few Penthouse magazines.

They met in the American airforce. I adore her more than Richard does but guys like me don't get women like that. I feel ugly when I lust for her but I can't help myself.

The thing is.

Which is a good thing. If the thing wasn't what would be?

Unlike me, my brother is an American as is his girlfriend. Just before he was born, our family moved to Florida. The cold winters in Canada were too much for my mother's bones. Or so she said. I hated Florida and swore I'd be a problem child if I was forced to stay. My parents shipped me back to Canada to live with my grandmother in Ontario. A half dozen years after college, I moved to Florida, mostly because I didn't know what else to do. I didn't intend to stay long but I wanted to spend some time with my parents and pester my brother a little.

Since my brother knew what one was, he wanted to be an astronaut. In America you could be what ever you wanted to be. Since I grew up mostly in Canada, I didn't want to be anything. The only thing that interested me was trying to discover a meaning to anything. I never made much progress but I learned a little about how different people comprehend the world in various ways.

While I was in the great white north smoking a little drugs and drinking the odd beer with my friends, bumming through college, he was working on his goal. He was the best in school all through university. He played hockey and football and excelled in track and field. We didn't have too much correspondence so I seldom thought to envy him.

When I moved to Florida four years ago, my brother and I became good friends. I tried to teach him the philosophical advantage of idleness while he wouldn't shut up about space travel and our future in the universe. I eventually sided with him mostly because I didn't want to ruin his life with my creed of lethargy. I learned about everything he had learned. I was almost qualified to be a pilot or astronaut.

Richard and his girlfriend had a beautiful flat. They technically had two places in the same building. It wasn't good to look like you were going to live with and maybe even marry someone if you wanted to test fly new air crafts or void crafts. Richard's place was full of books and over looked the industrial area. They called it the cottage because they seldom visited it. Sometimes when I went to visit them and didn't feel fit enough to go back to my own ugly apartment, I would stay at their cottage for the night. My apartment wasn't suitable for one person so I couldn't have them visit me.

Richard was involved in a top-secret operation that he couldn't disclose to anyone. He taught me every detail about his mission. I wasn't even an American citizen, I was far from responsible and I knew one of the biggest secret ventures in history. Richard was going to test a craft designed to break the light speed barrier.

Anybody that knows the slightest about physics knows that surpassing such a barrier is theoretically impossible. "Tell that to a proton," Richard would say and try to explain to me about outside of space time. Somehow the American space program had figured a way out of space. He was going to jump outside of normal space-time into what some call hyper-space. The old science fiction concept had developed into a real possibility.

Richard was getting nervous. There were some things that couldn't be predicted. No one had been anywhere near the speed of light. Theoretically, there was no chance of a human surviving the stress. While the mission date kept getting postponed to work on such problems, I became more interested in the mission.

There was no way for Richard to back out. After what the space program had invested in him, he couldn't even let them suspect he had a definition for the word doubt. But I could see he didn't want to die in space or hyper-space. He was terminally in love. If he had to die, he wanted to do it at home.

Another problem that was not to be resolvable was the time relativity when approaching light speed. At first, the calculations indicated the two-week trip might see Earth pass by two hundred to four thousand years. There were a few reasons that this wasn't acceptable. Even after changing the crafts design to jump sooner, the minimum time was about eight years. They couldn't do any better without technology that depended on science that was yet unknown.

Richard didn't want to leave Ashley alone that long. The two weeks for him was not a problem; eight indefinite years was asking too much from a woman in the prime of her life.

One evening Richard came over to my apartment a raging mad man. He nearly knocked the door down. I wasn't expecting him to visit so I didn't answer the door for a few minutes. I thought it was likely a kid selling chocolate bars. He wouldn't go away so I let him in.

"Why don't you answer your bloody door when I knock ?"

"How would I know it was you?"

"You would if you opened the door."

"It might have been someone who I'd rather not take time out to talk to."

"Can you take time out of your busy schedule to talk to your only goddam brother?"

"Ya, I can squeeze you in."

I had just awoken from a long afternoon nap so I had a difficult time getting adjusted to Richard in his unusual state. The sun blasting through my lone grimy window didn't help my vision.

"How are you big bro? Did I wake you?"

"Same as ever. No."

"Glad to hear it."

"What's in the bag?"

"A friend brought me some yummy rum from South America."

"If that's it there in the bag, maybe we could have a little."

"Already had some."

"I see that."

I got two glasses, a tray of ice cubes and some pineapple juice and put them on my little table.

"I'm not intruding, am I?"

"I was going to watch Hollywood Squares but it doesn't matter if I miss it."

"You don't have a TV."

"That's all right. I don't like them."

"You are trying to fuck me up."

"I think you beat me to it."

"So what did you do today?"

"Are you going to write a book or would you settle for a quick summary."

"What book?"

"Nothing."

"What nothing."

"I did nothing today."

"Why not?"

"Didn't have any time."

"You better to learn to take it a bit easier."

"I think you're right. I might take a few days off."

"Maybe go on a holiday."

"I've been planning one. But tell me what's up with you."

"I'm a little drunk."

"I suspected that. Anything else?"

"I'm going into space."

"Must be good rum."

"No not that, you bastard, in a fucking rocket."

"You're lucky. That's your dream come true."

"I don't know if it's my dream anymore. I don't know if I'm ready for such an adventure."

"I am."

"What?"

"What?"

"What did you say?"

"I said, I am."

"I heard you. But you am what?"

"I'm ready for a holiday, I can go."

"Go where?"

"Space."

"If I understand what you are saying and I don't hope that I am, you must be a lot fucking madder then I'd thought."

"Are you going to drink all that rum or can I have a little?"

"Sorry."

"Use a glass and some mix little brother."

"Nah. I don't need it."

"Yes you do."

"Okay. If you think so, boss."

I made a drink for him without any rum hoping he wouldn't notice and give his head a little break.

"Here," I passed him his juice."

"No!" he shouted. "No. You can not possibly even suggest such a thing."

"Since when did you start drinking in excess and thinking you can till your big brother what he can and can't do? You know you don't want to go and I know I want to go. What else do you need to know?"

"How can you go? Only I can go."

"I'll cut my hair like yours, stand up straight like you, sleep with Ashley like you, wear your clothes, march in like I own the place and nobody will know the difference. I'll become you. You become me."

"You've got to be out of your mind if you think I'd even consider that you are serious."

"Don't bullshit me. You've had it in your mind all along and just won't admit it. You set me up for it. Sometimes I think you were instructed to program me for it."

"I did what?"

"There may be a couple things I don't know yet, such as what Ashley looks like naked, but I'm ready for it. And I'm also perfect for it."

"You're serious."

"You can't go little brother. It's not for you."

Richard was silent as he tried to use his drunken head to think about what I had proposed. He looked like he was starting to consider the possibility.

"This drink isn't very strong," he said adding some rum.

"Richard. You know I'm the man for a suicide mission. I have no connections like you do."

"I can't let you talk this shit to me. It's beyond crazy. It's criminal. I've responsibilities with the project. I owe them. This is my mission."

"You owe fuck all to anyone but yourself."

I jumped at him, knocking him off his chair onto the floor. We thrashed about, screaming, laughing and making a mess of my apartment until I finally pinned him to the floor. I never let him beat me in a wrestling match. He had to know that even if he owned the world, he was still my little brother.

"You know you can't go and I'm the only one who can save you. You don't have much choice, if I don't take your place, I take Ashley.

"Bastard. Let me up so I can kill you."

"No. We'll name our second boy after you and tell him he has an uncle lost in space who hopes to make it back to his school graduation."

Richard was losing his fighting energy. He knew he couldn't ask Ashley to wait for eight to twenty thousand years. If for some reason she wouldn't marry me, she would find someone else eventually.

Love messes up everything.

For the next few months, we were mad scheming criminals hiding in his apartment. When he wasn't there, I studied his books. When he was there, we went over details of Cape Canaveral and the secret space craft. He would have to adopt my identity and take Ashley to Canada. I would take on the roll of the unknown American hero.

Ashley drove me to the space centre the day I was to go. I had to go through twelve hours of final tests and hope that they didn't notice I wasn't me. In case anyone was watching, I gave Ashley a very long and passionate kiss. It was possibly my last kiss so I wanted one to remember.

"I love you," I told her.

"I know. I love you too."

"I'll miss you. But don't wait for me."

"When you get back, you'll find us in Canada."

"Tell my brother he made the right choice and I love him anyway."

We kissed one more time before I went to meet my brother's destiny.

It amazes me that we got away with it but here I am on a planet billions of kilometres, probably many light years, from Earth. I won't know where in space I am until I get out of this dirt and back to my computer. Hopefully it knows what happened.

Being outside of space-time is beyond explanation, I haven't the consciousness to understand it and I haven't any words to explain it.

Everything, if I remember correctly, worked perfectly. I'm not certain if I calculated that I had squashed through four or four thousand years approaching the speed of light. There was a decimal place I couldn't remember. Although I can't comprehend the significance of being outside of space-time, the computer calculated insignificant time laps.

I'd be interested in seeing the Earth in eight thousand years. The age of ignorance might be over by then. If I had a magnificent telescope, I could watch a day out of the distant history as the old light caught up with me. Because of my conviction that time is not separable from space, I can't believe it possible to travel back in time. Maybe there is a theoretical argument but I won't be easily convinced. Movement of Matter and the changing of matter to energy won't be reversed for us to go back to visit it. It is comprehensible, in a theoretic view point, to see a thousand years slip by while going too fast. Life is like that.

I know I had a perfect re-entry into space-time. It was so smooth it felt like one of those spasms I have when I'm sleeping. It was like sleeping. It was necessary to slow down my body in a simi-frozen state to endure the shock. The shock was like an explosion and by the time I realised I was me in the craft, I was well under the speed of light. At first I felt like hot lead. Eventually, I felt like hot rubber.

I can't remember landing, although I do remember specifically choosing a star system that had many planets. The chances of finding life across the universe was pretty slight but I couldn't see why Earth would be the only place for life. The universe is too large and too consistent throughout not to have other life.

I had to find a place quickly, the craft wasn't designed for jumping from star to star looking for planets. And more importantly, there wasn't food and water enough for an extended adventure. Instructions were specific not to land the craft. Too many dangers. A strange virus I might bring back could wipe out my home planet. I could have a virus to wipe out a strange planet. But I had too visit a planet. It was a once in a life time opportunity that wasn't offered every day. Jumping over the universe and not visiting a planet, was like going to the ice-cream cafe with a pocket full of change on a hot summer day to stand outside looking in the window at the various flavours.

I can't remember landing. If there was a serious problem with the craft, I should be in it. Maybe dead. I must have left my craft. They were probably right to tell Richard not to land on a strange planet. Not the first jump. I have no way of knowing if I have the slightest chance of survival. That would be such a set back for the space program and me. They would have to assume that something went wrong in the jump. There is no chance for a search party. I'm sure I was told something about this.

I should find my spaceship.




read on. book_01 chapter_13



by Joanne B. Washington


© 2001 | the jose wombat project