The Aurora City

THE AURORA CITY

E.R. Mason

The Aurora City

E.R. Mason

All characters in this book are fictional

and any resemblance to persons living

or dead is purely coincidental

ISBN:978-0-615-81218-2

EDITOR:

Joe Summars

FLUXFAZE Creative Enterprises, LLC

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COVER ART:

Futuristic City 2

Scott Richard

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art by Scott Richard visit:

Chapter 1

They looked like the men-in-black. Shadowy individuals you only hear about from people who claim to have witnessed UFOs. Their ivory skin was sharply contrasted by dark, precisely cut hair, coal black suits, and dark sunglasses. They were disproportionately tall. All along the jog route they had been occasional ghosts in the shadows, feigning disinterest in Scott Markman’s passing, but at the same time seeming to want him to notice.

Markman cruised past the horse head mailbox on Bradbur Avenue, grabbing at the stop watch dangling from his waist. Twenty-four minutes at the four-mile mark. The Florida sun was now above the treetops, back dropped by clear blue. Pristine green lawns and well-trimmed flower gardens offered pride for the middle class neighborhood. The morning air was losing its cool. Markman turned the corner back toward the home of Professor Cassell where his cold, home-brewed energy drink waited.

Even from a distance, the Professor’s place was a mess. The home was being expanded to almost twice its size. Lumber and brick were everywhere. Carpenters were beating on things as trucks came and went. A chain saw was grinding away. The smell of sawdust met Markman as he ran. Two more MIB were waiting a short way down the street, parked in the shade of a giant elm. They sat in an unmarked black sedan. Markman decided to slow and take refuge behind a pest control truck, his back against the rear doors. He bent over to catch his breath and then dared to steal a glance around the side. They had not seen him approach. They were not speaking to or even looking at each other. Markman tugged at his black jogging pants, and unzipped the long-sleeved sweat jacket. Subconsciously, he touched the center of his forehead, checking for the bruise that had been there, an injury now fully healed. It would be easy enough to sneak up on these guys and surprise them. Years of growing up near a Tibetan monastery in Lhasa had impressed those kinds of talents on Markman. Perhaps in this case discretion was the better part of valor. These guys had been popping up for weeks now with no indication of what they were after. Maybe it was time to force the issue. Markman jogged out from behind the van to discover the mysterious sedan had somehow disappeared. A solitary, odd-shaped puff of cloud drifted by overhead. The roadway was clear of cars as far as the eye could see. There was no sound of traffic anywhere, only the busy hammering of the carpenters.

At the Cassell’s, no one was home. Markman’s life companion, Cassiopia Cassell, and her father, Professor Cassell were on travel to a conference concerning the use of autonomous machines in war. Only the Professor’s TEL robot and its beloved adopted beagle were inside.

How many months had it been since the devastating airplane crash that had left him and Cassiopia on a frozen mountain top with no hope of rescue? How long since Cassiopia had somehow dragged his unconscious body down that mountain and into the hands of rescuers? There was unfinished business left from that. Intimate personal commitments had been made. Lifetime devotions implied. It was possible he was expected to ask her to marry him now. At the same time, it was impossible to anticipate what was going on in her high IQ brain. It did not bother him that she was so much smarter than he. Women always matured more quickly than men. It was nature’s way of preventing men from accidentally killing themselves before reaching maturity. It was only natural that women were generally smarter about some things.

But, marriage was not something Markman had ever considered. What did it mean, really? Was it simply a contract between two people to secure personal finances? It seemed like that was what it meant to some. What would it mean to Cassiopia? Would he have to take orders? Would there be a schedule of sorts? Attend dinner parties? In some ways Cassiopia was even more a recluse than he. She had said their plan would be to have no plan, but he couldn’t recall where or when she had said that, or even if she really had. Fortunately this was not something that had to be decided right away. In fact, if he was careful, this could probably be dragged out for a very long time.

Markman abruptly stopped in the middle of the street, dumbfounded. A stark realization set in. It was frightening. He suddenly realized he wanted to ask Cassiopia to marry him.

An oncoming car honked. Embarrassed, he waved and hurried to the sidewalk. In a daze, he looked around and down at his stop watch. That twenty-four minutes at the four-mile mark meant he was now fully recovered. He could have run further. He headed for the front door and slowed as he approached, pulling the blue cloth key strap from around his neck. At the door, he took pause. Something felt out of place. The banging of construction continued. Maybe that was it. Or, maybe the thought of proposing to Cassiopia had instilled a certain fear. Instincts suggesting danger could not be ignored, however. They had saved him too many times. Markman backed out and headed for the rear entrance.

The back door was unlocked. It should not have been. He twisted the knob, pushed it open, and took a step back. The Professor’s home had been broken into before. With all the construction going on, that would make an intrusion even easier now.

He waited a few moments outside the door. No assault seemed to be forthcoming. He edged in sideways and listened, mentally blocking out the noise from outside.

The place was quiet. He switched sides in the hallway and brushed one hand along the edge of the hall table as he went. He stopped and listened again, but picked up nothing. The door to the basement was directly across from him. It was shut and locked. From his position, he could just see out the windows of the front door. To his amazement, the black sedan with the men in black had returned. Its two occupants were reading folded up newspapers. Markman shrugged off his apprehension and walked to the front door window, peering out at the mysterious figures. A voice from the living room startled him.

“They are waiting for me, nothing more.”

Markman lurched back and raised his hands in defense, then sidestepped to get a better look into the living room.

A strange man sat on the couch, the silver TEL robot stood glistening beside him. The man’s dress looked Victorian, a single-breasted dark-brown morning jacket over a striped light-brown vest with a starched white shirt and narrow bow tie. He wore light brown plaid trousers covering deep brown boots. A pocket watch and chain were attached to a button on his vest, and a dark derby hat sat on the cushion beside him. He paused to sip something from one of the Professor’s antique tea cups, holding the saucer in one hand and the cup in the other.

“Your TEL robot was kind enough to prepare this for me. I asked him to bring me your favorite, as well,” he said. He gestured toward a second cup on the coffee table.

“How did you get in here? Who are you?”

“My name may as well be John Paul. Won’t you sit? It will be a discussion of some length, I think.”

Markman held his place and searched for others. There was no one. “How did you get in here?”

“Your most amiable TEL robot invited me in. There’s something peculiar about this machine, have you realized that?”

“The TEL is programmed to stay out of sight and not to let anyone in. How did you get in here?”

The intruder remained casual and sipped his tea. He winced in delight and held up one hand. “They all have a global password built into one of the BIOS routines. They came from the factory that way. Few people are aware of it. I used it to assure the TEL that I meant no harm. By the way, the organization I represent is the real reason Professor Cassell was allowed to keep this robot after the TEL Corporation was destroyed.”

“I don’t know you from Adam. Why shouldn’t I call the police right now and have you arrested?”

“Because you and I need to have a long talk about the world and our places in it.”

“What?”

“Please, Mr. Markman, won’t you sit and try your drink before it cools?”

Markman sensed no aggression. He had been thinking of confronting those following him, anyway. Clearly this was an opportunity to find out what was going on. He entered the living room and slowly took a seat facing the strange man. The man’s expression was slightly weathered, but content. Dark brown eyes complimented the antique suit. His face and hands were heavily lined but had good color. He seemed to be in his fifties or sixties but unusually healthy and vibrant for that age.

Markman sat back and folded his hands. The TEL robot continued to stand passively by. “Okay. Let’s have it. What do you and your friends want?”

“That one is easy. We need your help.”

“Who is we?”

“That one’s not so easy.”

“So start at the beginning and stop when you get to the end.”

The man smiled at Markman’s impertinence. He stared and sipped, in no hurry to reply. Finally, he began. “Because of some of the federal agency affairs you were exposed to before your recent accident, along with your own quite exotic knowledge base gained from your unorthodox upbringing, I am allowed to offer you access to some very sensitive information about the world around us, its myths, and its subversive reality. You understand that the world is a collage of paradigms built atop larger paradigms?”

“What?”

“Pictures hidden within pictures. The real world is made up of them.”

“Personally, I tend to take things at face value.”

“And that philosophy has served you well, Mr. Markman. Nevertheless, the world you know is supposedly managed by its governments, governments that in reality have little influence over the course of society. Most people feel protected by their elected governments, but the truth is they are only superficial paradigms that hide the true nature of this world. That is, governments are the most visible, most widely believed illusion, one that conceals the real truth.”

Markman lifted his cup, sipped and waited.

“The top layer of this reality paradigm I speak of, would be those world governments and the misconception that they regulate the world. In reality, world governments are merely a means for the peoples of the world to interact with those who actually control it. Even in democracies, people are allowed to vote, but only on the choices permitted them by the groups who are really in power.”

“I’m not liking your view of the world very much, Mr. Paul. Are you trying to say that a shadow government controls the world? And why am I having this conversation with a stranger who entered our home without having been invited?”

“It is not my view of the world, Scott. It is only the truth. And, I would not use your choice of words. Shadow government suggests a unified organization. The global tier we are talking about that is one step above the world governments could not be construed as any form of government at all. You might call it the aristocracy tier. It consists of groups or conglomerates of wealthy, powerful people. Not all the wealthy are a part of it, just those concerned with their own enrichment and power first, and the welfare of the world and its people second, if at all. Many of them believe that the law of the jungle is the natural way of things, and that the world is a place provided for ambitious people to practice their skills by accumulating wealth and control over others. These people are just as disloyal to each other as they are to the general population. You can visualize this higher tier of power by imagining a weather radar map. Storm cells form, divide, break up, and reform continuously. It is the same with the conglomerates who manipulate the world for their own ambitions.” Paul paused to take a drink. He replaced it on the table very slowly and very precisely and watched Markman for reaction. Markman sat silently and returned a skeptical stare.

“And now for a leap of faith that should not be too difficult for you, Mr. Markman. There is a third tier, above and invisible to the two tiers below it, and far more powerful. You could call this third tier the Celestial tier. Where the first two tiers consist entirely of humans, the celestial tier is comprised of both very evolved humans and non-humans as well.”

“You’re beginning to lose me, Mr. Paul. You may have the wrong address and the wrong person for this talk.”

“Oh come now, Scott. After your spiritual upbringing in Tibet? The things you were taught and witnessed there? And, you seem to subscribe to a belief in the current version of the Bible, as well. In it, do not angels visit the Earth quite often? Are not demons cast out repeatedly? Firmaments in the heavens? Chariots of fire? And of course, there’s your last involvement with Ms. Ann Rogers and her federal agency. You discovered an early invasion of Salantian creatures who were using extraterrestrial vortport technology to enter Earth. How can you possibly deny the existence of alien, nonhuman life forms, if that’s what you’re implying?”

“You seem to know an awful lot about me, Mr. Paul.”

“My group is an operating arm for the Celestial tier. We have access to technology and resources that are beyond those you are familiar with. We know more about you than you do, Scott.”

“And why are we having this conversation again?”

“As I said before, we need your help with something extremely important. Something you are more than familiar with.”

“It amazes me that this is the second time I’ve had to say this to someone, but why would people at your level need my help with anything?”

“Call it a curiosity of destiny, if you like. In life, occasionally only one specific, unique equation will fit a problem. In this case, you are that equation.”

“Tell me something, if you represent a level of authority so high and so advanced it is secretly managing the world, why are such terrible things allowed to go on down here? I could mention 9/11.”

“We operate apart from and above the laws of any government. The rules are very different for us. We fall under the umbrella of the non-interference tenets. Do you know what the most basic law in the design of this world is, Scott?”

“Live and let live?”

“Not bad. But what I meant was, what is the most underlying tenet that life here is based on. The answer is, free will. This world is fundamentally designed around the theme of free will. That is why there is so much suffering. You can tell a child a thousand times that if he touches the flame he will harm himself, but sooner or later that child will try it. It’s the same if you tell someone something they desperately want is bad for them. If you refuse to let them have it, they will spend their lifetime thinking you’re wrong. So in the larger scheme of things, there has to be a vehicle, a realm of experience where free will is allowed to rule. And in the multitude of mistakes that follow, both the victims and those who err learn. So why do we not intercede when terrible things are about to happen? That would be overruling the very reason this short-term world of experience came to be. Our job is to preserve the system, not interfere with it.”

Paul studied Markman as he paused for another sip from his cup. “The worst problems occur when people firmly believe they are right about something even though they are not. They have the maturity to reason out that the action is wrong, but either they do not think it through or they are so overwhelmed with desire they cannot. For one reason or another, they believe their idea is correct and no friend, enemy, or teacher can change that. In those cases, nothing will ever change their mind except the consequences from actually making the mistake. They will not advance beyond the misconception until they do. They will not understand until they touch the flame.”