WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD
I see trees of green, red roses too. I see them bloom, for me and for you. And I think to myself, what a wonderful world—Louis Armstrong
Monroe escorted me to a smaller craft, parked outside the mother ship. It had only two seats. It was a much smaller version of the mother ship.
I waved to the sexy female warrior, hoping that with a bit of luck, under different circumstances, and in time, we would cross paths again. I could tell by her smile and the twinkle in her eye that she had the same thoughts.
The smaller craft had a date panel similar to the one on the mother ship, only on a smaller scale. According to Monroe, the smaller craft could also zip in and out of time quantum’s. When observed, that might explain why UFOs sometimes appeared to be in one place one minute and then suddenly accelerate and disappear the next. That might also explain why they were usually invisible to radar. Monroe never hinted as to why they had to fly in a formation of three.
With Monroe at the controls, our craft rose through the top of the volcano and headed to our destination. The cockpit window provided a 360 degree range of vision. I could see two other craft similar to ours, tagging along. Before long, I observed the sun rising, as we approached a huge transparent dome that shielded an entire city.
Monroe explained that there were only seven such cities on the planet, each on a separate continent, and each under a similar dome. The one we were approaching was located in the central part of what used to be called the United States of America. We were to land right smack dab in the heart of Kansas.
Each city had a population of approximately one million citizens. There was only one government, one language, one race, and one creed on the planet. Everyone sang the same song. Imagine that. Maybe there was hope for mankind after all.
Outside the dome, I observed a barren wasteland. According to Monroe, it was the result of pollution and one too many wars, before mankind got their act together.
The city appeared to be approximately a hundred miles in diameter. Inside the dome I saw a Garden of Eden paradise, with greenery flourishing everywhere. Fountains and waterfalls galore were spouting sparkling colored water into the air. The streets sparkled with gold. There was no litter in sight.
I saw small automotive-type vehicles scooting around. They had no visible wheels, as they were suspended in the air about a foot above the ground. I thought it strange how man had invented the greatest invention of all—the wheel—and then had no use for it in the future.
I saw structures of different sizes and shapes that were impossible to describe. All I can say is that the city looked to be something you would see on some planet in a galaxy far far away. I had to remind myself we were still on Earth.
As we approached the dome, an entryway materialized. Just as our craft was about to enter, I heard a loud thump and felt a violent jerk. The craft vibrated and suddenly pitched downward, slamming my head into the flight console in front of me. Warning sirens blared within the craft as it spun out of control. It was losing altitude fast. My chair began to spin out of control. It was like riding a wild roller coaster. This immediately brought to mind one of my dreams. Only I knew I wasn’t dreaming.
I heard a blood curdling scream escape from deep within my throat as I blacked out.
When I awoke I saw myself. I seemed to be outside my body looking in. I had on different clothes and was looking rather ragged. I was in need of a shave and a haircut. It looked like I had been put through the ringer. It didn’t help that it felt like someone was pounding on my head with a hammer.
There were others gathered around. Humanoids of diverse colors, sizes, and shapes that I had never seen before. I thought that I had to be having another one of those dreams. Nothing seemed real.
Where am I? I thought. Who are these guys?
No one answered. I then realized that none of them were wearing a helmet. I felt my head and noted that mine was gone too.
“We removed your helmet. You won’t be needing it anymore. They can’t hear you now,” myself said to me in a loud and clear voice.
“We also removed the tracking device from your toe. They can’t track you now. Before you start freaking out, I’m Tom-Tom, your cloned brother,” myself said to me.
I recalled I had suffered a blow on the head in the crash, so I figured I had to be hallucinating.
Did this guy just say he was my cloned brother?
Yeah, okay. Monroe told me about you. I just need to figure out if this is a dream or reality, I thought.
He didn’t respond to my thought, so I said out loud.
“This ain’t real, I got to be dreamin’.”
“Perhaps feeling some pain is believing,” Tom-Tom said, as he slapped me upside the head.
“Feel that. Think you’re still dreaming now,” he added.
That snapped me back to reality. It also pissed me off, and I jumped up, ready to fight back.
Everyone present jerked to attention and took a defensive position.
I quickly calmed down, when I realized I was outnumbered.
“So what the hell is going on?” I asked.
“We sensed you were in the aircraft with the alien, so we shot it down and rescued you,” Tom-Tom said.
“In an aircraft with an alien? Rescued me? I’m confused. I wasn’t with an alien and I didn’t need rescuing. What in heaven’s name are you talking about? I was coming to rescue you,” I said.
“Rescue me? I don’t need rescuing. Brother, you have been deceived,” said Tom-Tom.
“Deceived? For Pete’s sake, what are you talking about?”
To make a long story short, my cloned brother revealed a completely different history of mankind than what I had been led to believe by the alien called Monroe.
According to my brother, the abductors were in no way, kinfolk.
“How in the world can aliens be our kinfolk?” He asked with a chuckle.
He and the others had a hardy laugh, knowing I had fallen for a tall one. Come to find out the abductors were not mankind’s future generation, as Monroe had led me to believe. They were actually aliens from another world. It seemed I had been misled, and had fallen for his story hook, line, and sinker.
How embarrassing. How could I have been so gullible?
Bet you’re thinking the same thing, huh?
According to my ‘brother’, the aliens had attacked and destroyed much of planet Earth twenty years earlier. Humans had put up a good fight, but were no match for a superior being. The Earth was scorched during the battle and made a wasteland. The aliens built the dome cities and enslaved most of the humans that survived.
Because of pollution and disease, plus the alien atmosphere inside the domes, their human slaves soon lost the ability to reproduce. The aliens ran low on slaves to handle their dirty work, so they would travel back in time to collect human sperm. Whatever it was they had in mind didn’t work.
They then tried assimilating with humans. That didn’t work the way they planned. They then decided to clone, but the clones were found to be sterile. They were soon fit to be tied.
Apparently the aliens hadn’t read up on human history. Man always had and always will rebel against slavery. Clones were no exception. They, after all, were human too. Up until just a few months before, the human and clone rebels hadn’t been much more than a thorn in the aliens’ side. At least not until my clone, Tom-Tom, escaped the Dome.
He led a rebellion, and most of the clones, half-breeds, and humans escaped to the wastelands. They joined up with other surviving humans who were living in underground caves beneath the wastelands.
The aliens had to find another plan. It involved traveling back in time to convince me to help them find Tom-Tom and put an end to the rebellion.
They tricked me into helping them find my clone, the rebel leader. They knew clones were on the same wavelength as their originals. We felt each other’s presence, even through time warps. They figured I could lead them straight to him. Problem solved. They were right, too, but Tom-Tom foiled their plan and saved the day and maybe mankind, too, when he rescued me.
I know, you’re probably thinking this is starting to sound like another one of those science fiction novels. Hey, I am just telling you like it is. No need to go rogue on me. I had no idea what I would be getting myself into when I decided to melt the memory blocks.
So here I was, suckered into believing in government conspiracies, UFOs, abductions, a sibling from the future, cloning, and now aliens. Not only that, I was now stuck in the future, right in the middle of a rebellion, in no man’s land, with a major war on the horizon. The plot couldn’t get much thicker.
Want 'a bet?
Move aside Buck Rogers, the Kid was about to come to the rescue, or discover he stepped in a bucket of shit and was stuck in the middle of some elaborate fairy tale. Question is, can he come out smelling like a rose?