Crystal (Episode Three of Farther Than We Dreamed)

By Noah Mullette-Gillman

The Universe is impossibly vast,
Even with warp drive, teleportation, & worm holes,
There are places you could never go.
But you could broadcast a signal out across forever,
You could tell the distant molecules and atoms to create new people on the other side
And send them off exploring.....

Trying to take command of his crew and understand the world-ship which he has been given, Charlie and his team wander outside of the Marble City in search of a missing crew member. Their journey takes them to the second of the cities on the U.U.S. Shamballa, where they discover they are not alone in their world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Noah Mullette-Gillman
• Release date: Dec 11, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311077486

Noah Mullette-Gillman

Noah Mullette-Gillman was born in Montclair, New Jersey. He spent his childhood there, as well as in the town of Manly, Australia, and the woods of Upstate New York. He earned a multidisciplinary degree in Philosophy and Creative Writing at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. His favorite color is blue. His favorite number is 8. His favorite song is currently Moment of Surrender. He thinks better and more clearly as the day goes on, arguably climbing to his intellectual summit in the middle of the night, when the world has gone to sleep and he can think without any interfering broadcasts from other brains.

Book preview

Crystal

Episode Three of Farther Than We Dreamed

By

Noah K. Mullette-Gillman

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2014 Noah Mullette-Gillman

The moral right of the author is asserted.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Cover design and photography by

Noah K. Mullette-Gillman

Edited by Michael Poirier,

Noah K. Mullette-Gillman, and Ken Gillman.

Twitter: Noahlot

Mailing List: [e-mail]

www.facebook.com/fartherthanwedreamed

www.fartherthanwedreamed.com

www.noahmullette-gillman.com

Also by Noah K. Mullette-Gillman

THE WHITE HAIRS

THE SONG OF BALLAD AND CRESCENDO

LUMINOUS AND OMINOUS

MAGIC MAKES YOU STRANGE

THE CONFESSIONS OF ZEUSPATER

THE DEAD HAVE RULED EARTH

FOR 200 YEARS

THE SECRETS OF THE UNIVERSE (FARTHER THAN WE DREAMED EPISODES 1-4)

CLAY (EPISODE 1)

WAVES(EPISODE 2)

COSMIC SHAG (EPISODE 4)

GOLD (EPISODE 5)

All available in paperback and for digital download.

The following is episode three of Farther Than We Dreamed.

All content in this volume was previously published in The Secrets of the Universe, which contains episodes 1-4 of Farther Than We Dreamed.

If you enjoy it, please don’t hesitate to download or order your copy of the longer, 108,000 word, book.

EPISODE THREE

CRYSTAL

Music is liquid architecture. Architecture is frozen music.

Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

The Universe is impossibly vast.

Even with warp drive, teleportation, & worm holes,

there are places you could never go.

But you could broadcast a signal out across forever, you could tell the distant molecules to form new people on the other side and send them off exploring…..

1

Charlie picked up his guitar again. He started wailing. A new song burst out of him. He didn’t plan it. He didn’t write it. It just showed up when he picked up his axe:

We are the people born by radio

Way way way way

Radio

We are the people born by Waydio

Way way way way

Waydio

We are the people made of sound

And we are round

Ups as good as down

He played for a few minutes, just shredding on his guitar, playing one of the heaviest songs he’d ever written. Wu Gwei had been watching at first, then he joined in with a bass riff which blew Charlie’s mind.

They jammed for about ten minutes. Charlie sang those lyrics maybe a dozen times, but never wrote any others. They would be the only words in their sci-fi epic.

When they took a break, Charlie said to Wu Gwei, You’re amazing. Umbra said you played guitar, but-

"You know. Just because I am a warrior doesn’t mean I don’t have a soul."

Yeah. When I was at war, I just wanted to get back and get into a studio.

The war was not an interruption or a distraction for your art, Wu Gwei explained, very seriously, It was your fuel source. You would have been a mediocre musician if you had never learned to fight.

Prince never fought anybody. Paul McCartney didn’t get in a lot of fist fights.

Yeah, but Ze’ev Cohen had a black belt.

Who?

"Heh. Rock N Roll was nice, but you were born before the Age of Nightmares. From the paper days; you’ve never even heard real Meat-Metal. I’m going to expand your consciousness." Wu Gwei smirked.

The cyborg-dictator, currently without any cybernetic implants or victims, picked up a guitar and began playing the most incredible hard rock Charlie had ever heard. Wu Gwei played with a speed and an aggression he’d rarely heard, but more than that there was an intricacy to the performance. It was generations more sophisticated that any guitar-work he’d ever heard. Charlie felt like Jimmy Hendrix and Steve Vai had an Asian son and he was standing just three feet away from him, giving the performance of his life.

For a long time, Charlie just watched. He felt his knees swaying, as if his body were going to dance whether he wanted it to or not. His neck wanted to mosh. He wondered what a pilgrim on the Mayflower would have thought if he’d seen Led Zeppelin play. And he felt just like that Pilgrim. He wondered if he had found a new favorite band. He wanted to download Wu Gwei’s work.

For a long time, neither of them noticed that there was anyone else in the garden. But then Kalligeneia’s screams grew too loud for even Wu Gwei’s guitar to drown.

Fock, no! Fock, no! He’s not what you think! No!

Wu Gwei Lifted his guitar up at the last possible moment and partially blocked the strike as a huge blond man with a crew-cut swung Avraam’s mace at the guitar god.

Wu Gwei stumbled backwards over an amplification monad and the blond man struck again, this time hitting the side of Gwei’s face directly.

Kalligeneia fell upon Avraam and wrapped her arms around his right fore-arm, to try and stop the man from hitting him again.

It’s not that world anymore. He’s not your enemy. There are no enemies here, Kalligeneia pled. Her long black hair flew up into the air all around her. Her red skin was much brighter than Charlie remembered, and he found himself thinking that she looked like Mew Tse’s opposite. Her face was twisted from the screaming, and she sounded like she was hurting her throat.

Avraam looked at Charlie. He was Avraam. This was what the Russian looked like when he regenerated. He looked about fifteen years younger. He was all muscle, without an ounce of fat. His hair was cut short like a marine’s, except for a flourish in the front which made Charlie think of a young Travolta.

Avraam? Is that you, Avraam? Charlie said.

The big man seemed to forget about his victim. He smiled a big warm toothy grin at Charlie. President Charlie Daemon, he said, with admiration. You, I can trust. You, call me Avi.

What the hell are you doing? Charlie asked, holding his guitar like a weapon he was ready to use.

"I am fighting The Machine, Mr. President, just like you did. That man was just like the bad computer you put down. Wu Gwei is The Machine. Don’t you get it? They represent the same thing, and in a dream things are what they represent."

The Machine? Charlie muttered, thinking through the ramifications of what the young version of Avraam was saying.

Kalligeneia was leaning over Wu Gwei and trying to take care of him. Charlie couldn’t hear what she was saying, but she was talking to the wounded man. Wu Gwei didn’t look like he would be getting up again anytime soon.

You think this is a dream? Charlie asked.

Avraam nodded enthusiastically. Yes, well not a dream because I’m asleep, but it is Wu’s final trap, a simulation. He is in my mind, the same as he is in the minds of all the Lowmen. He is trying to jizzzack me. But, no, I am not so easy to fool. I cut through lies. He hefted his mace. I smash them.

So, I’m not real? Charlie asked.

Everything you can think of is true, Mr. President. You represent the man who could defeat the machine. You are my ideal. My ideal is real, I assure you.

Avraam began to turn back towards Wu Gwei.

Charlie reached out and grabbed