Danika and I had some very interesting conversations, about the end of time on Origin. She was born in a later day than I, and she was there till the end. And she looks back at my time period as being when it all changed. My era was truly the era of revolution and awakening. It started slowly. Small miracles that subtly influenced society like Star Trek’s first interracial kiss on prime time television. Did you know Star trek not only had the first Black officer in a recurring leading role, but she was a female! Uhura was going to quit the show, even turned in her notice, and then she had a serendipitous meeting with Martin Luther King, and he sent her back. Star Trek also gave birth to the first “Conventions.” Trek conventions evolved into Cosplay Conventions. Trek generated the first true Fan Fiction movement. And Rodenberry loved it and encouraged it. It didn’t matter if it was LGBT fan fiction or not, and there was a lot of that, with a good deal of episodic evidence that Kirk and Spock were a couple. Rodenberry embraced it because he knew there was hunger for more “Star Trek, for more shows that revealed humanity had all grown up and everyone is truly accepted. Because of Star Trek, people began making uniforms and their on sets, and by the year 2000, utilizing computer technology and raw, untapped talent, youtube production of fan movies started to rival studio productions.
Some of the fan stuff is hard to watch, but in their defense, some of the original episodes of Star Trek, are hard to watch. It’s not an accident that ‘50 Shades of Gray,’ a fan fiction, got published in mainstream. It was originally rejected by the publishing companies, because, well, it really needed some help with editing. I so relate to that. But the author had a vision and it was a good enough that Hollywood stumbled on it and said, hey, let’s make this a movies, and she got her reach around and got a book published. And I really think the publishers were cruel to her by not helping her edit the book to increase readability, but quite frankly that was the old guard being petty and trying to ‘prove’ some point about the public at large.
Anyone who knows anything about war will tell you, you can’t stop ideas. Fighting to squash fan fiction only increases the number of people wanting to do it because now, not only is it about my emotional and intellectual need to survive, it’s about showing you ‘see, I can do it, and it didn’t kill me, and my story is actually better received than the stuff your force feeding us, and you can’t stop my brain.’ Fan fiction doesn’t diminish the original product, but brings new people to it, and increases the demand. The only way to truly win, is to join the enemy! Fan fiction is a right and a privilege, but the old guard was scared. (Is scared?) CBS initiated a lawsuit because someone wrote and produced “Prelude to Axanar.” CBS would be insane not to be scared! This thirty minute clip was better produced and better written than the last three Trek movies. It was better written than the last Trek television series. Had Enterprise led with that shit, it would still be on the air! And the tech to make fan fiction visually entertaining is getting better and the masses are hungry for more, and they are tired of getting crap served to them.
Hollywood is dying and resurrecting old movies to try and keep the money coming in, but the audience has grown up, and they don’t want the old crap serial full of sugar, they want real food, and if they can’t get it at the store or from Whole Foods, well, they’ll grow vegetables in their back yard, and eat eggs from pet chickens, and they will make their own creation myths and connect with their God on more intimate level than any other time in history, and it’s not just individuals, its whole communities join in a vision! The Church is Dead, Hollywood is dying, and the masses are awakening. Hello, Universe. I am here and I want to engage you.
“I once read something of yours, John,” Danika said “What happens when everyone suddenly wakes up, satisfied with who they are and what they have? The economic system as we know it crashes. What happens when you give people 3D printers and replicators? Markets crash. By 2012, the markets were so impacted by direct shipping that retailers were going out of business, and Malls had become empty wastelands. Book stores were going out of business. This heralds the end of the world, but only for the old guard. The old guard, in their efforts to keep the status quo, to keep the money flowing in, tried to rewrite the laws on fair use and public domain, but it fails, because people will always simply ignore stupidity, and you can’t put everyone in jail for having ripped songs on their phone, because, believe me, everyone by 2012 has stolen music on a computer or a phone, and ripped DVDs somewhere in their collection. Even the people arresting people have at least one ripped DVD, and they will say, well one is okay, but you can’t look you’re distributing, that’s wrong. Whatever! LOL! They also tried giving corporations people status, thinking this will allow them to better hold to their intellectual and property rights, but it only sped their own demise, because communities of likeminded people incorporated, and their persons fought the old guard’s person. People want to participate in their lives, in the fictions of their lives. Even before holodecks, virtual reality was allowing people to create and star in their own fictions, and Hollywood had lost. The outside productions became so more important, so rich in possibility of showcasing talent; even actors and actresses were going off to participate with fringe work. Actors don’t just want to act, they want something that will push them, and ping the depths of their souls.
“People like participating, they like creating, they like being part of something, and the mainstream old guard can’t have it, because they can’t survive in this new world order that they themselves wanted to create!” Danika said. “When everyone is fed, when every is clothed, and when the wars stop, the songs of the many will start. It doesn’t matter who started the song. It will be taken up by the masses, and they will sing it, and it will change, and grow. It will still exist in its true form, and we will remember the originator, because that’s important, and understanding context is important. ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’ is the most beloved song of all time. Judy will never be forgotten. This song has been downloaded more than any other song in history of songs. It has more versions than any other song. It has more rips than any other song. But even you can see, Judy wasn’t lessened because of this, she was immortalized. If she was robbed and or mistreated, it wasn’t from the fans who loved her, but from the Old Guard who used her, raped her, and when she was used up, abandoned her.
“The cat is out of the bag, John. They gave us life, they gave us Songs! And humanity is running with the torch and there is nothing going to stop us,” Danika said. “Let freedom ring, without caveats, without restrictions, but with only love and watch us fly! The Universe will ring with love. It can’t be any other way. Star Wars my ass. Star Love.”
OMG, you can’t spend any time with Danika and not be caught up in her energy. And she knows when she has you and she is not afraid to embrace that and truly love and share. I remember reading something once, and I can’t track it to the author or how I know it, but one scene revolves around a dispute with the neighbors, because the protagonist doesn’t want to rake his leaves. And why would he, fallen leaves are beautiful, and ‘God’ put them there on purpose, right? No. Neighbors came at him as a group, and he refused. They got the city involved, and, so he capitulated. He raked the leaves. And then he brought the bags in his living room and dumped them on the floor and rolled in them. Danika reminds me of this energy, this wanting to connect with nature, but also with what is, with love, without surrender to the status quo. And if you read even only this book, you know I probably love writers that try to expose the illusory nature of reality. I love David Icke message, for example, I love listening to his lectures, but I don’t like how he sometimes sounds arrogant, angry, and or in your face about how if you aren’t with him you’re part of the system keeping people down. That last part is the same kind of thinking that keeps people down. The only way to unravel it is with love, and Danika embodies that love, and she is about embracing the walls, bringing them down only when they are ready, because it’s scary being as open and loving as she. Because being open means someone might take something without contributing. And people will, if you let them, but that’s the message, right? It’s okay. Take it. Because I am connected to source and I am renewed and refilled and there is enough love for you to take this. In the presence of true giving, the takers will grow in your presence and participate, or they will run away. People who believe they are truly giving but then angry and mad because they aren’t getting something back in return, well, they aren’t truly giving.
“After all this time, the sun never says to the Earth, you owe me,” I quoted.
“Look what happens with a love like that,” Danika picked it up. “It drives a Starship!”
I laughed. It felt good to randomly laugh. These days of cycling, I was finding it easier to give into laughter. No, not giving in. I had no choice. It was laugh, or cry, and I prefer laughter. Giving into war, that was easy. Giving into fear, that was easy. Loving has always been the harder way. Oh, I am the old guard! I am holding onto stuff, too, but I am getting better.
I became aware that Danika was watching me. A person not tuned in would have interrupted, asking what. You might have thought I was staring at her breast at first, and in the beginning, I am sure I was, but I was seeing through her, trying to realize something. I met her eyes, connecting.
How many times have I asked: ‘Why now?’ ‘Why am I here?’ ‘Why did it take so long to get here?’ ‘Why am I only now finding you?’ ‘Where have you been all my life?’ ‘How do I sustain this?’ When I finally spoke, it wasn’t a questions. It was a statement of intent. “I have to do something,” I said.
“Good for you,” Danika said. “Please excuse me,” I said.
She extended her palms, an open gesture, and delivered it with love. I got up, thought better, kissed her, and ran. Yes, I ran. You would think the older you get, the longer you live, you wouldn’t want to run. So, when you watch Doctor Who, he’s like a thousands of years old, but he is still child and running! The older I got, the younger I got. I slid to a halt in front of Captain Marwa Tamman’s quarters. She answered her door.
“Are you busy?” I asked. I knew she wasn’t, but conversation always go much easier when you don’t seem presumptuous.
“No, come in,” Marwa invited. “Would you like a tea?”
“Oh, yes, please, whatever you’re having,” I said. “You’re from Egypt, right?” Marwa seemed amused. “You know that I am,” she said.
“Have you seen the probe’s data of the fifth planet?” I asked.
Marwa pointed to the table in her living area. Instead of a couch, she had a large rectangular table and one chair. She summoned a second chair, and it materialize by transporter beam. The table surface was a map of the 5th world. She had already been scrutinizing it.
“Would you educate me?” I asked.
Marwa handed me a tea. “Based on the probe’s count, there are four million people living on this planet,” she said. She highlighted the world population of people, showing the concentration. She showed a couple anomalies where small wondering nomads had pushed off away from ‘civilization.’ “By everything we know about science, this planet should be an icy planet, but it seems to be a normal Earth. The continents are still recognizable.”
“Are they Egyptian?” I asked.
“Can’t tell from here, precisely, we will have to see them up front. Their structures, are Egyptian styled. I would say this is way before the Old Kingdom. This could be Early Dynastic period, but the structures aren’t lining up quite right,” Marwa said. “John, if you went back in time and teased out all the people that you think are Egyptian, and you put them here, they would not truly be Egyptian. It would be like going to 21st century America and teasing out only the white people and saying this is America. It’s not. This has got to be a new civilization. They’re smart people, based on their architecture. And either they been here long enough to make these monuments, or they were provided these monuments. We really need to put people on the ground and go talk to them. That’s the only way we’re truly going to know what’s going on there and what their experience of what’s going on is. So, for example, if they were really ripped from Earth, these people are clearly more advanced than any culture I can think of, and if they remember Earth, they are going to know the sky has changed. Most cultures would know, because most cultures orientated by the stars and planets, but the Egyptian lined up pyramids based on stars, which meant they had a level of sophistication that rivaled modern technology.
Not saying aliens. I am just saying, they were more sophisticated than we were in the 21st century.”
To prove a point, she highlighted pyramids, and showed how they were aligned with this planet’s true north south, but also the data of the probe was able to zoom in on the pyramids close enough that you could watch an ant move across a brick. Using a holographic interface, a virtual image rose above the table; she recreated the three most prominent pyramids. It could be shown that once a day, at 22:00 hours, the first pyramid would be pointing directly towards the heart of the Milky Way Galaxy. The second pyramid, the large one, seemed to be aimed towards Crossover One. The third Pyramid was aimed at the Earth cluster.
“The problem is, they shouldn’t know this stuff, John,” Marwa said. “The light from all the stars of the Earth Cluster hasn’t reached here yet. The Milky Way galaxy, its light is here because we were dropped into its light stream already in progress. The light from Crossover one has reached here, and at 22:00 once a year, its light will touch this pyramid and shine through this shaft, and touch the reflecting table in this chamber. And if the Heart of the Earth cluster was shining, at 22:00, this one time a year, it would light the reflection table inside this chamber. This 22:00 once a year thing, coincides with out arrival on this ship at Crossover One. They are marking astronomical time based on us! And thanks to warp drive, if they had a telescope sensitive enough, they would see the starship being launched. We arrived here before the light from Crossover one. This is where we were, Milky Way, this is where we are, Crossover One, and this is where we are going! The Earth Cluster and all of humanity plus.”
Wow. Exciting stuff. And more information than I bargained for.
“Can you identify a Temple for Isis?” I asked. I didn’t have the heart to tell her, that’s all I came for. She was so excited about this and she so wanted to visit. I could see it in her eyes.
Though all humanity could trace their lineage through Egypt, she could claim being a direct descendent.
Marwa erased the hologram and zoomed in on an island that housed a temple. The island itself seemed made, with only one place to come ashore, while the rest of the island was sheer cliffs. There were to small pyramids on the far side, connected by a wall with a walkway bridging the two pyramids. Before the pyramid was a temple, grander in scale than anything I could imagine, and leading down to the beach were statures and obelisks, with a purity of stone that suggested they were machined by computer precise tools from one stone, or were materialized from a transporter beam. Marwa highlighted the hieroglyphics and statures that confirmed her opinion that this was devoted to Isis.
“You’re going there, looking for Isis?” Marwa asked. “I am,” I said.
“Alone?” Marwa asked. I nodded.
“I would really like to go,” Marwa said.
“You have my permission to take an Away Team,” I said. “And when the Stargate is finished, if you want, you can use the Ship’s gate to come back here anytime.”
“Thank you,” Marwa said. “Are you open to some advice?”
“Of course,” I said.
“Don’t beam directly into the Temple. Definitely don’t land a shuttle on this island,” Marwa said. “You come to this island by a Barque. There is Barque Station devoted to Isis here, across the way. If you go there, go through the normal channels and if they want you to do rites, you learn the rites. They may have old customs or new customs but you have to respect whatever it is they practice.”
“Absolutely,” I said. “I wouldn’t have it any other way. If for any reason I don’t come back, you will know where to find me. Um, others will too, when they open the right envelopes, but I have to go. I need to find Isis.”
“Of course,” Marwa said. “But what if she’s not there?”
“How could she not be there?” I asked.
“She is probably on the ship somewhere,” Marwa said. “I’ve looked,” I said.
“It’s a big ship, John,” Marwa said.
“That it is,” I agreed. “Alright, I haven’t technically looked everywhere, but this feels like the right tangent at this time.”
“Don’t go armed,” Marwa said.
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” I said. “I am the Captain of Peace and Love.” Marwa laughed.
“Honest,” I said. “I tried the war thing. I don’t like it.”
Marwa sighed. “I am glad I met you.”
“May I hug you?” I asked.
“It would be setting a precedent,” Marwa said. “I might expect future hugs.” I hugged her.
Captain Stacey Collins, Officer of the Deck, met me after dispatching a shuttle. She looked sharp in a Uniform, her hair professional, military style. She ran the flight deck like no one’s business. I was dressed in cotton clothes, kind of Indian in style, black trousers and boots, and white, long sleeve shirt that hung to past the belt line, and had nice big pockets.
“Captain,” Collins said. “What can I do for you?”
“I would like a shuttle, personal, single seat,” I said. “Okay,” Collins said.
“Wait, wait, wait,” I said. “Can I have a preference?”
“You are the Captain,” Collins said.
“I want it to look like a Colonial Viper,” I said. “From the Original series, not the fancy new one.”
“You want to go, Battlestar Galactica style?” Collins asked. “Yes, please,” I said.
“Nice,” Collins said. “You just going for joy flight? What range and time duration do you need?”
“I am going to the 5th planet,” I said. “I don’t know how long I will be gone.”
“Okay,” Collins said. “Siri, I need a functioning Colonial Viper, original series, range 5 AU’s, 48 hour clock.”
The ship’s construction began, as if it were being materialized out of a transporter beam, from the ground up. Photonic energy swarmed the area where the ship was being constructed.
Smart photons! A swarm of bees made of light landing and solidifying. It was amazing to watch. “Collins, how do you do it?”
“Do what, sir?” Collins asked.
“You served in the Navy. What was your longest tour?” I asked. “The USS Enterprise, 9 months,” Collins said.
“How do you do it?”
“Serve?”
“9 months at sea, on a small city with mostly men, away from family,” I said.
“I serve because I love,” Collins said. “It enabled me to pursue an education, I got to fly, I earned rank, and respect, I learned discipline, and my family had money and food and shelter.”
“They missed you,” I said. “Of course,” Collins said.
“And you missed important events,” I said.
“I did,” Collins said. “Your father was navy, and gone most of your life. What was it like for you?”
Loxy entered the scene. “Going somewhere?”
“5th planet,” I said. “Alone?” Loxy asked.
“Yes, single ‘seater,’” I said, pointing at the ship that just finished. “OMG, tell you’re not flying in that,” Loxy said.
“It’s fully functional,” I assured her.
“It’s just as safe as any other ship,” Collins said. “However, I much prefer the Eagles.”
“From Space 1999?” I asked.
“That was a spaceship!” Collins said. “Please don’t encourage him,” Loxy said. “I have to go,” I said.
“Right now? Dressed like that?” Loxy asked. “What? Too casual? I can’t go in Uniform,” I said. “Do you even have a phaser?” Loxy asked.
“I have decided never to carry a weapon,” I said. “I am going with you,” Loxy said.
“No, you’re staying here and monitoring the store,” I said. “You don’t understand!” Loxy said.
“I understand more than you think I do, and I have to do this,” I said. “I have to know.
Loxy. Trust me.”
“No, screw this, and screw this envelope game, you need to know…” I embraced her and whispered in her ear. “I know.”
When we were able to connect eyes again, she had accepted. “Come back to me?”
“Always,” I said.
Loxy turned to Collins, “Did you perform a walk around?”
“Checking out the ship now, Mam,” Collins said.
We all approached together and I paused at the ship’s name. ‘Amassakoul ‘n’ Tenere,’ was written in an alien script.
“What does it mean?” Loxy asked.
“Traveler in the Desert,” I said. “A very random, but very appropriate song title. ‘In the desert, where nothing is given, flat and empty, my heart is awake and alert.’ I wonder if Siri is cycling, too, or it’s just serendipity.”
“Serendipity is just saying we don’t understand,” Loxy said.
OMG, she was so right. I sang a little verse, “These worries are my friends. I am always on familiar terms with them and that gives birth to the stories of my life…”
“What’s happening to you?” Loxy asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “But it’s not just me. It’s happening to all of us, all the time, at different rates of speed. Here we all came and here we all go.”
Collins came around the other side of the ship. “Everything checks out, Captain.”
“Well, got to go,” I said.
“You’re not going to sing leaving on a jet plane?” Loxy asked.
“Nope,” I said, and then smiled. “Because I am leaving in a Colonial Viper!”
“You are such a child, Daddy,” Loxy said.
“OMG, you’re not going to start calling me that, are you?” I asked.
“Daddy?” Loxy asked. “Well, you’re the baby daddy. And, as my Tulpa-master, you’re also technically my Daddy, Daddy. So, kind of fits.”
“That seems wrong on so many levels,” I said.
“Family Guy would have a field day with it,” Loxy pointed out. “You are so Quagmire.”
“Yes, I am Quagmire.”
“And, it’s why I love you,” Loxy said.
“Because I am Quagmire?” I asked. “Surely there is a better metaphor for us. Like, maybe the Avengers.”
“Oh, I would so be your Emma Peel,” Loxy said. “We need to get you a top hat an umbrella.”
“When I get back, we will star in our own episode on the holodeck,” I said.
“It’s a date,” Loxy said. “Better not stand me up. And when we exhaust those scripts, you can be the Doctor and I can be Tegan Jovanka.”
“I was thinking more of Perry Brown,” I said. “Oh, of course you were,” Loxy said.
“We could do both,” I said.
“Um, have we done that yet?” Loxy asked. “A threesome?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Loxy said.
“Does Safe haven count?” I asked. “Oh, good point,” Loxy said.
“I love you,” I said.
“Should I give you two a moment?” Collins asks.
“No, everyone knows I love her, and I love you, too, Stacey,” I said. “I am glad you’re here with us.”
Without further ado, I mounted my horse and headed for the desert. My horse had a name. Why would anyone travel on a horse with no name? And how can you remember your name but not the horses’ name? Oh, wait, the river told a story, too. But was it really dead? Science call is dead and covers the earth with cities, but underneath it all, a heart of gold! The earth is a heart of gold! And I am getting so old, searching for a heart of gold, and it’s been the earth all this time, hidden beneath my feet.
I held non flirting conversations with Siri. She played music for me, even pulling up random youtube videos that she thought I might like: Alina Gingertail singing Pokemon in Russian, and she has a ferret in the video! I laughed so hard. I had forgotten all about ferrets, and I love ferrets and I recalled playing with ferrets. She also played NYUSHA/НЮША Где ты, там я, which considering I was headed to Egypt, I was all about chakra colored energy, this song was dead on accurate.
I asked Siri to play ‘Amassakoul ‘n’ Tenere,’and we played it until I could sing it myself in the original language of Tuareg. This song is considered Bob Marley meets Bob Dylan meets 60’s highest inspiration of moving beyond time and space and love, and was considered be the most dangerous of all ‘rock and roll,’ a form of desert blues meets Burning Man before there was a Burning Man, and even if you throw in the shrine dedicated to Leonard Nimoy, Spock, that was burned along with an effigy at Black Rock, with a full concert and people holding candles, you would still be this side of the overall meaning. You know it, you can almost always touch it, but it is teasingly always outdistancing you but drawing you ever onwards, because this is the dance we need to grow.
Yeah, so most of my flight time was engaged in song and thought and random diatribes.
And every flight, yes, more than one, it was new thoughts and old thoughts and connections made and forgot and reinforced and newly forged. I took Marwa’s advice and landed outside the city limits and walked in. Was it fortunate that I arrived near the Temple of Isis in the light of day?
Expecting I would just walk up, like just another tourist might, and pay for passage across to the River, was truly naïve of me. I landed a reasonable walk from the Station, tossed my helmet into the cockpit, shut the window, and patted it three times. The ship disappeared. I figured, if spending the night on the fifth planet broke the cycle of rebooting, well, the crew knew where to find me. I proceeded to walk through golden fields of grain, and when I was lost, I orientated to the sun, and I when I was really lost, I looked at my sleeve and utilized the compass APP. Making the APP ‘light up’ was as simple as looking at the sleeve, and moving your wrist a certain way, and the APP opened like turning a holographic picture and making the image shift to a secret image that was hard to find because the angle had to be just right. The tech imbedded clothes responded to specific flexing of muscles, which was learned behavior, and I had my suit ‘magic’ down to a science by now. The APPs never lit through an accidental movement of muscle movement. It was always specific, deliberate, muscle movement while looking at it.
I came through the field and out into the open near the village, where a good deal of people were engaged in everyday life and play and commerce. I hesitated. I had a renewal of spirit and I was excited at the prospect of entering an alien culture. Yes, these were humans, from Origin, but they were so far removed culturally from anything I understood. I boldly moved to the street and proceeded down towards the Station.
The noise of the street drew quiet, and slowly the quiet caught everyone’s attention and all attention drew towards me. People nearer me fell to their knees.
“Oh, please don’t do that,” I said. “Stand up.”
Two people approached me, a male and a female, and they knelt, eyes to the ground. They were clean, and their clothes as white as white can get. Simple clothes, form fitting, but flexible and free. They both had gold sashes around their wastes, and sandals, the straps wound round to the knees. They wore gold jewelry, arm bracelets, and gold shoulder pads that was separate from their clothes, and gold headbands. His was simpler than hers. Her belly was bare, and I am not quite sure how her top piece stayed in place, but it was designed to draw your attention to her bosom, just as the skirt accentuated the narrowness of her waste, and the slit teased the eye with bare thigh, daring you to come closer and inwards.
“Please, stand up,” I said.
The male said something to me. At first I didn’t understand, but then the tech in my clothes connected with the universal translator implant, and I got an echo of the translation. From that point forwards, I heard everything in English and when I spoke, I heard English, but I was speaking a really old, obscure dialect of Egyptian. It was weird, as if I was channeling a spirit in a foreign language. And I do believe in spirit possession. I mean, really, how else do you suppose your spirit moves your body if you don’t ‘possess’ it?
“I am not a god, I am a person, like you,” I assured them. “Stand and see.”
They both looked up, and with th