Chapter Thirty-Four
THEBE
1
It was Friday, May 7, 2010. The easterly long-period swell, being generated by the powerful low-pressure system that was centred just south of New Caledonia, had not abated at all overnight and, if anything, had actually cleaned up somewhat to break along the five points of Noosa even more perfectly than the day before. It was going to be another surfing ‘insane-a-thon’ for the lucky surfers that were there that day.
Under normal circumstances, Slater would have taken his inflatable boat out to Granite on a day like that. On that day, however, circumstances were anything but normal. For one thing, he couldn’t stop thinking about the time-shift experience he had the day before, and for another, he couldn’t stop thinking about her, the pretty, young-American, surfer girl. In fact, she was mostly all he could think about.
He rolled up in the National Park car park early and immediately spotted her standing in front of a vacant parking space. She was waving him in. He smiled as he parked his (ex-Adam’s) exquisite, jade-coloured VW Kombi and thought to himself,
‘How did you know I was coming?’
He heard her thought reply as clearly as if she’d spoken it to him.
‘A little birdie told me.’
Her name was Thebe. She was an extra-terrestrial hailing from the planet Rama, from the Andromeda galaxy. She was a volunteer in a grand plan to save as many of the Earth’s species as possible before the impending, catastrophic, extinction-level event, which was going to be caused by the collision between Earth and a rogue comet. The Rama have known about the coming disaster for nearly six thousand years. Slater was her project. She chose him because she loved him. All volunteers from Rama chose their Earth humans out of love. That was always their primary criterion.
He stepped out of his Kombi and walked around to where she was standing. She was wearing her short-sleeved, long-legged, all-black O’Neill wetsuit. Slater tried not to stare but her absolute beauty overpowered any self-control he tried to muster. She was tall, about 5’10” he guessed, lean and muscular. Her hair was sun-bleached cerulean, cut short, shorter than his, exposing her long, slender neck. Her childlike face and the parts of her body he could see were deeply suntanned. Her eyes, which looked like two deep sapphire pools, shone with an iridescence as if they were powered by batteries.
‘God, she looks like a goddess from the future … God … like she came from another planet … so modern and cool!’
She smiled a broad smile, stuck her hand out to shake his and introduced herself in her American accent.
‘Hi, my name’s Thebe. So nice to meet you properly.’
He shook her hand, smiling, and commented,
‘Phoebe, that is a nice name.’
She laughed, ‘Phoebe is a nice name, but it’s not my name. My name is Thebe.’ She spelt it out. ‘T-h-e-b-e, and what shall I call you?’ She already knew his name but thought it better to have him formally introduce himself.
‘Slater,’ he replied.
She smiled a warm smile, the kind of smile one smiles after one has reached the end of a long and difficult journey. ‘We finally meet, Slater.’ ‘Finally?’ he queried.
‘Yes, finally. Our meeting is no accident, but now is not the time to venture into that conversation. Where are you surfing today?’
Feeling slightly confused by her reply, he answered, ‘Er … I thought I’d go for some bigger ones out at Granite. How about you?’
‘Granite sounds just fine, Slater. May I walk out with you?’
‘Are you joking? Of course you may,’ he laughed. ‘Have you surfed Granite before?’ ‘No, I haven’t.’
‘Well, it will be my personal pleasure to show you some of the ins and outs of the place.’
‘Ooh, I’m getting all excited already,’ she said as she pulled her McTavish pintail out of its bag.
‘Whoah, that is some weapon you’ve got there,’ he commented as he untied his Dragan off the Kombi’s roof racks.
‘Yeah,’ she replied, ‘I bought it in Byron Bay while I was visiting there a couple of months ago. Bob made it for me custom. See, he even signed it for me.’ She turned the spear over and showed Slater where Bob wrote, Shaped by Bob especially for Thebe.
2
Granite Bay was the outermost bay on the long Noosa peninsula. To get there one had to take the half-hour walk along the narrow foot trail that wound its way past the Boiling Pot, along a cliff edge, through a tea tree forest, around Teatree Bay and up a hill to Dolphin Point.
Granite tended to be less crowded than the other breaks because it was so far away. It also tended to break bigger as it was more open to the easterly swells.
The day was clear and sunny with not a cloud in the sky. The twenty-knot south wind that blew directly offshore across all the points had an autumn chill in it, which made it a day for wetsuits.
As they rounded Dolphin Point, she gasped in awe as she witnessed, for the first time in her physical (as distinct from telepathic) life, the absolute majesty of eight-foot Granite on a perfect day. The huge swells smashed over the rocks on the tip of the point then peaked and walled up to break in a long tubular vortex for six hundred yards with the strong offshore wind sending a huge plume of spray billowing behind each wave.
She had heard many stories about Granite from her Rama cousin, Ambriel. She knew that Ambriel had already been to Earth as a volunteer. While here, Ambriel went by the name of Liberty. She chose Adam as her personal project. He was her small contribution to the grand plan. Thebe also knew Adam, who was, at that time, living with Ambriel’s family on Rama. He was Ambriel’s husband and father to her Earth-born, fully-telepathic son, Ben. Ben, who was born in October, 1980, lived on Earth for the first ten years of his life, at which time he and his mother were required to return to Rama so that he could begin his compulsory training in the telepathic arts. When Thebe met him, Ben had just become ‘Master’s Apprentice’ to Iapetus who was revered amongst the Rama as the ‘Master of Time’. Iapetus had spent, some jokingly liked to say misspent, the last twohundred years of his life being a surfing beach bum with a space ship.
Slater was selected for relocation when he was born because he was a rare, natural, Earth-born full telepath. Being a full telepath meant that he could, although not very well, slide into the telepathic mind plane, the mind space where just about everyone in the universe communicates with one another. Being a full telepath on Earth meant that he was permanently surrounded by non-telepaths. It was like being the only sighted person in a world full of blind people.
3
They sat down on a large boulder, on the edge of the sea cliff, on the tip of Dolphin Point. Dolphin Point was bathed in warm, morning sunlight. Granite Bay, which stretched out in a long crescent before them, glistened like a living, azure crystal as a million diamonds shimmered. Beneath them, the large swells smashed over the rocky point and sent up huge plumes of sea spray.
‘I know Adam,’ she said.
‘Adam?’ he mumbled surprised.
‘Yes, the older guy you used to surf with out there. I know him, and he told me all about you and how you two became such good friends.’
‘Adam’s been gone a while,’ he said in an awkward tone.
‘I know all about how Ben picked him up and took him home,’ she focussed her gaze across the bay at a small beach half way out along the point, ‘from that small beach, I reckon.’ There was a silence. She continued, ‘I know it’s meant to be a secret, but Adam told me all about it and he told me of a letter he wrote you and how he mentioned me in that letter. I am the one he wrote about.’
‘So … ah …’ Slater smiled, ‘you’ve come to look after me?’
She laughed, ‘Is that what he wrote?’
Thebe had already fallen in love with Slater through a telepathic link she made with him via the Earth-born, full-telepath program. The Rama fall in love with each other from the inside out, telepathically. It’s kind of like two people falling in love with each other through the Internet. When they meet in their physical life, they are already in love. Thebe was aiming at marriage and an Earth-born child, fully telepathic of course.
‘I’m not sure that I am sure what letter you might be referring to,’ Slater replied, attempting to keep the secret requested by Adam.
‘Look, I’m going to go quiet for a moment. Don’t speak to me, just look out there.’ She pointed about a mile out to sea.
He felt his brain calm and his gaze become firmly fixed on a point in the ocean. He then observed everything turn into shades of blue. He felt his brain frozen because he couldn’t generate any thoughts. He then noticed a smooth, round, polished, blue-metal object break the surface of the ocean and rise silently into the air. It was almond shaped and it radiated a beautiful, blue light all around itself. The space ship flew up to them and hovered about fifty feet in front of them for about thirty seconds, in total silence. It then flew back and re-entered the ocean in the same place from which it emerged. The full spectrum of colours returned to Slater’s vision and he was able to think again. All he could say was,
‘Wow!’
‘Nobody else could see that,’ she whispered, ‘because I vibrated my ship in the ultraviolet part of the spectrum, just out of sight of the non-telepath’s view. That’s why everything looked so blue. I tranced you out to see it. You could do it yourself with just a bit of practice, which is part of the reason why I’m here.’ She closed her eyes and declared, ‘My ship looks absolutely magnificent in full-spectrum light.’
‘You don’t say. It looked pretty impressive in UV, I gotta tell you.’
‘Yeah, I just love it. … So, you see, I’m the girl Adam wrote about … shocked?’
‘Are you kidding?’
‘It is unusual for us to reveal our true identities to Earthlings, but we are in the final phases of our work and final-phase protocol includes full disclosure.’ She turned toward him, smiled a broad, cheesy smile and spread her arms wide,
‘Ta-daaaaaaaaaaa, I am an …’ she brought her hands forward and did the quotation marks hand sign with her fingers, ‘alien!!!’ ‘Cry… key!’ he replied in a faltering voice.
She looked out to sea again.
‘Check out the set,’ she exclaimed pointing to a large set of five, perfectly-barrelling waves rolling into Granite Bay. ‘We should take off and get into some of that.’
He re-focussed on the surf and, agreeing with her, said,
‘Oh yeah, let’s go.’
As they walked along the narrow foot trail, around the perimeter of Granite Bay, he told her,
‘You know, I love your blue hair, and the way you cut it.’
‘Thank you.’ She smiled. ‘You know, I can make my hair any colour I like, at will. It’s something some of us Rama can do. Have a look.’
He turned around as he walked ahead along the narrow track and had a look at her. He saw that her hair had changed into a shiny, candy-apple-red colour, almost like metal.
‘Wow, that’s stunning,’ he commented, and as he watched, her hair changed back to the original cerulean blue with sun streaks.
‘I can feel my hair,’ she said. ‘This ability is rare even amongst my own people.’
‘My poor little brain,’ he whimpered.
‘Aahhhh, you’ll live,’ she replied cheekily.
After about a minute of silent walking, he thought to her,
‘Thebe is a really nice name.’
She thought back,
‘Thank you, and it’s even my real name. Slater is nice as well. I like Slater.’
4
They arrived at a point on the track from where a narrow foot trail led down a steep hundred-foot cliff to a small beach hidden amongst the rocks and boulders. The beach, which was located about half way out along the point, was a favourite place from which to launch into the water. The place was lush with subtropical vegetation interspersed with large boulders and rocks.
‘Don’t ding the back of your board going down these rocks, Thebe.’
‘I’ll be careful.’
They climbed down onto the small beach and placed their boards on the sand.
‘This is the spot that Adam left the Earth from,’ he said.
‘It’s very special,’ she replied.
They surfed for three hours. Thebe’s surfing was something to behold. It was power with style and poise. He thought it was high art, perfectly understated, a kind of minimalism. Slater was Mr. Deep. He took off deep and he rode them deep. She liked his purity. It was all about the barrel for him. She also began to notice what a handsome young man he really was. He was tall with scruffy, sun-bleached, medium-length, black hair. He had bright, iridescent-blue eyes that were slightly overlarge and subtly Asian shaped. They could bring a young lady to total submission with just one penetrating look. It was impossible to know his real skin colour because he was so tanned. He was very lean and superbly muscular; his body having grown in the midst of a surfing lifestyle. The iridescence in his eyes represented his telepathic ability, as in all telepaths. It became brighter as he got older and became more proficient in the mind plane. Most telepaths wore tinted contact lenses over their irises when they needed to conceal the brightness of their eyes.
After their surf, as they walked back along the track, she asked him,
‘Would you like to have dinner?’
‘Dinner? Oh God … yes.’
‘Peachy.’
‘Peachy?’ he laughed.
‘A great chef and fine wine?’ she asked.
‘And a view,’ he replied. He thought about it for a moment. ‘On second thoughts, who needs a view, I’ve got you to look at.’ ‘And I you,’ she said warmly.
They ended up having fish and chips, and a couple of ginger beers, on the lawn by the river in Noosaville, just over the road from Elvis’s, bathed in warm afternoon sunshine. She asked him, ‘How old are you, Slater?’ ‘Twenty,’ he answered.
‘How old do you think I am? Go on, have a guess. I bet you never get it.’ She laughed playfully.
‘How old do you look like, or how old do I think you are?’
‘How old do you think I am?’
‘Well … you don’t look like a day over sixteen, but I reckon you keep your age well, so I reckon that you’re about nineteen.’ He watched for her reaction. There was none. She just matter-of-factly revealed that,
‘I’m one hundred and twenty-eight.’
Slater choked on a chip and began coughing and wheezing.
‘One hundred and twenty-eight?’
She gave him a couple of hefty slaps on the back and laughed,
‘I am Rama, and Rama can live to nine hundred years. Some are older than a thousand. So, in relative terms we are about the same age, although I think that I am coming out of this with the better end of the deal.’
‘Oh no,’ he coughed a couple more times, ‘I’ve got the good end, trust me.’
She changed the subject. ‘I’ve brought some herbs with me, from Rama.’
‘Herbs?’ he replied, surprised.
She carried with her an ethnic-style shoulder bag. She took out of it a small, golden box. They were sitting close to each other. She held the gold container between them. He noticed the infinitely-intricate carving in the gold. She opened the top and showed him the brown crumble inside.
‘We call it Mana. It is for health and longevity. I’ve been smoking it since I was seven.’
‘Seriously?’
She closed the gold box and put it back in her bag. She then brought out a smaller, hexagonal container, the surfaces of which looked like facets of a crystal. She brought it between them and opened the top.
‘This is Fish,’ she whispered. ‘This is a much more powerful herb. It is used for initiations mainly, and for deep healing.’
‘Why do they call it Fish?’ he enquired.
She looked him in the eye and smiled,
‘Because it makes you feel like a fish.’ ‘A fish?’
‘Yeah. No arms, no legs and no brain.’
Slater laughed out loud,
‘Now that sounds like a trip.’
‘You’ve got no idea.’
She put away the crystal container, then leaned toward him. She placed her arm around his left shoulder, gazed across the river at the far shore and said,
‘This is nice … this place is really nice. … Thanks, Slater.’
She then kissed him lightly on his right cheek. As she backed away, he turned his head, leaned over and, bold as bold can be, planted one right on her lips. After he kissed her, he cleared his throat and mumbled,
‘Oh … so sorry … it must be something in this ginger beer.’
She kissed him back and whispered,
‘Yeah, I can feel it too.’
5
After dinner, they took a long, sunset walk along the shore of the river. They started hand in hand but ended with their arms around one another. There was no doubting the chemistry. As they walked, they revealed more about their lives to each other. He asked her,
‘Are you sleeping in your van?’
‘Yes, for four months now. It’s perfect.’
Thebe was driving a pre-loved, modified, metallic-blue Bedford van with a 186 cubic inch, six-cylinder, Holden motor, hooked-up to a four-on-the-floor transmission. It had wide wheels, sports suspension and a custom, stainless steel exhaust. The best thing about the Bedford, she thought, was the fact that it was a full six-feet wide inside, meaning that she could have her bed set across-ways at the back of the van. This left more room in the front. There was a pop-top roof with a set of Rola roof racks bolted to it. The best thing about the roof racks was that she didn’t have to remove her surfboard from them when she raised the top.
‘Where do you park?’ he asked.
‘Anywhere,’ she replied.
‘That doesn’t sound too safe.’
She smiled at him warmly, appreciating his concern, and replied reassuringly,
‘I am Rama and I’m always safe.’
‘Still ….’ He thought for a while, then asked, ‘Look, Thebe, it’s still early, would you like to come over to my place and meet my Nana? I reckon she’d love to meet you. I’ve told her a bit about you already.’
‘I’d like that very much, Slater.’
She followed his Kombi back to his house, which used to be Adam’s old house, and parked the Bedford in the driveway.
…….