The Time Healer

By Russ Mitchell

In the year 2024 an ailing eighty year old man stumbles upon the ability to Time-travel. During his first experience he is transported back to the year 1950 to the Pasture of a farm on the plains of Eastern Colorado. There he encounters a six year old boy who to the shock of both of them, discovers is himself as a child. The Old man soon realizes that he is being guided by an unknown entity. Not only has he been given the ability to Time-Travel he is also blessed with several abilities and powers. Foremost the ability to heal the most deserving of people. He uses these powers selflessly for the ultimate achievement of a very special quest, this quest being instigated due to a scientific discovery made by a young teenaged boy genius in the year 1960. Due to a certain element created as a side effect of the old mans Time-Travel, this young genius discovers a method for developing an Artificial Weather System inside a test tube.

In the year 2024 the planet is on the verge of an environmental meltdown. If Things cant be reversed; in another twenty years Mankind will cease to exist.

The Quest therefore is to reverse the future decimation of the planet.

During this quest he encounters a myriad of colorful characters, each with a heart felt story. Wanny, his passionate soul mate is always by his side, body and soul. Only time will tell what can or will be reversed

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: May 30, 2012
• ISBN: 9781477109656

Russ Mitchell

Russ Mitchell has lived the past twenty years in Bullhead City Arizona, across the Colorado River from The small gambling Mecca of Laughlin Nevada. He worked there at a gambling casino for eighteen years as a bartender where he Accumulated a wealth of literary material and ideas for stories, from dealing with a variety of unusual people. Always having been a movie freak from the age of four and an Avid reader most all his life he developed a very colorful imagination, this suited him well as a writer of Fantasy and fiction. Throughout His life he has been involved as an Actor, a singer and a song-Writer. His immediate family consists of a Son, Brandon Jon, Two Grandsons, Josh and Nate and a very special lady that has been by his side for twenty Years, Wanda Brasier (His little Polish Canon) Previous to moving to Arizona Russ spent the majority of his life in Santa Maria California where he has an extended family from a previous marriage, while none of Those children were his biologically; he continues to love them each as if they were his Own.

Book preview

Prologue

December 1950

T he six-year-old-boy was shuffling along the dirt path leading to the pasture of his grandparents’ farm. It was an early summer morning on the plains of Eastern Colorado. There was but a light warm breeze just enough to move the air and bring all the scents of this rural area into play—the smell of lilacs and freshly mowed alfalfa, and from the pasture up ahead was the smell of sagebrush and tumbleweed. The child had always loved the smell and feel of this land, especially in spring and early summer. There was no place that he felt more at home. He so wished that he could live here always. However, this was his grandparents’ farm, and he was only allowed to live here with his grandparents, aunt and uncles for a few months out of the year. His parents had a house in a small town ten miles away, but lately they had been traveling the western states looking for work or a more profitable place to live. The boy was the only grandchild, as his mother’s sister and four brothers were yet to get married and have children. Therefore, he was often the center of their attention as well as their love. They all showed him how to do his chores and what chores were his to do. One of his chores every day was to take the dairy cows out to pasture after the early morning milking then to bring them back in for the night and the late milking.

On this particular morning, he was walking behind the last of sixteen cows with a switch in his hand to smack their rumps to keep them moving. He was pretending to be a cowboy, taking his herd of cattle to market when he was attacked by cattle rustlers who were trying to steal his cattle. He would fight them off and shoot them in the butt with his trusty rifle (which happened to be the stick he was carrying), and being the brave cowboy he was, he would once again save the herd of cattle. The boy stopped daydreaming. They were entering the beginning of the pasture area, and all of a sudden the cows took off on a dead run over the hill and went out of sight to the back end of the pasture. The boy decided to climb to the top of the hill to be sure that everything was all right. Just as he was about to reach the top, he could see that there was a strange purple haze, like a curtain through which he could not see. Suddenly, there was an extremely bright flash of light, temporarily blinding the child. When the spots cleared and his sight returned, the boy was shocked and unable to speak. For before him stood an old man wearing nothing but some strange form of undergarment, looking every bit as shocked as the child before him.

The boy, of course, was scared and about to run away when the old man spoke in a soft melodious voice. He said, Please don’t run away, child. I will not hurt you. I need your help for I am lost and don’t know how I got here or where here is. My mind is very foggy, as foggy as this strange haze that surrounds me. Although, I must admit that this place and you yourself seem very familiar. Can you please tell me what this place is and where it’s located?

The child stopped in his tracks, and although still scared, the warmth and softness of the old man’s voice was very soothing and put him somehow at ease. The child could not tell if the old man was from another world, for everything that was happening was definitely otherworldly. As he stared into the man’s deep hazel eyes, he began to feel a very strong connection and almost a kinship to this very strange person.

The child looked up through his own hazel eyes and said, This place is my grandpa’s farm, and it is located in Eastern Colorado near a town called Sterling.

The old man gasped, Oh my god! This surely can’t be true! Then memories started flooding his mind of his own childhood and the wonderful times he spent on his grandparents’ farm. Of the days wandering their pasture and tending to their dairy cattle so much like this very place. But that must just be a coincidence. There must be hundreds of places like this. Then he thought, Sure, near a town called Sterling in Eastern Colorado. He looked once again at the child, and now he too could feel the connection, and the kinship. He asked the child, Can you tell me your grandparents’ names?

The child said, Why do you want to know their names? Are you going to steal our cows?

The man didn’t know where the hell that came from, but he said, No, of course not. I just might have known them when I was a little boy.

The child said, Their names are Alma and Ernie Simmons. But you couldn’t have known them when you were little, because you are older now than they are.

The old man thought to himself, I must be losing my mind. None of this is real. I must be in the midst of the most graphic dream in the history of man. However, at this time and in this place he knew, in his heart of hearts, who this child standing in front of him was. He said, Son, I think I know who you are and what your name is.

The boy looked at him with doubtful eyes and said, You are a man who popped out of the air. You can’t know me. I don’t even think you are real, and if you are, why are you standing here wearing nothing but silky underwear, with pictures of snakes all over them?

This was the first that the old man realized what he was wearing, and while it wasn’t strange to him, it must have looked absurd to the young boy. He would sort that out later; right now he had to confirm what he thought to be true. He said, to the boy, Do you have a nickname, one that a great aunt gave you when you were born? A name that you think makes you sound like a baby but that everybody in the family has always called you, even though you do have another formal name?

The boy looked at him, astonished, and said, Yes.

The man said, And is this nickname ‘Rusty’?

The boy stammered, How, how do you know that?

The man said, Is that your nickname? Also, can you tell me what year this is? You are in the first grade of school, aren’t you? So you should know what year it is.

Once again the boy was shocked, and he said, Yes, and the year is 1950. How do you know these things? Are you a witch?

The old man said, No, son, I am not a witch. I don’t know how I came to be here. But I do realize now that I know all about this place.

Once again, the child shouted out, How do you know?

The old man approached the boy and knelt down beside him. He said, "What I am about to tell you, you will find hard to believe, but I think I will be able to prove it to you.

You see, when I was a young boy, my name was also ‘Rusty,’ and I hated that as I grew older. I also had a formal name which I preferred and that I went by since I was eight years old.

The boy was holding his breath and then softly asked, Is your formal name Russell?

The man looked warmly at the child, realizing how difficult it would be for him to accept this. He smiled. Then he said, Yes, Russell is the name.

The child questioned, How can you know all about me, and how can we have the same name? I don’t understand! Who are you?

The man once again felt affection and a bond toward the child, one he had never felt toward another human being. He looked into the boy’s eyes and said, "The reason I know these things is because I am you, you are me, and we are one."

The boy was shaking now and said, That can’t be. I can’t be you. You’re old, strange-looking, and wear funny underwear with snakes all over them. I don’t even like snakes.

The man laughed and said, "Yes, I am old, and I suppose somewhat strange-looking, but, child, what I am now, you once will be, and what you are now, I once was."

The boy said, I still don’t believe it. You said you could prove it to me. Tell me how.

The man said, All right! Last year when you were five years old, you were in your backyard, playing on the backyard fence where your mother had told you not to play. You slipped and ran your leg down a length of barbed wire, tearing your leg open. Your mother had to take you to the hospital to have your leg sewed up. It left an unusual-shaped scar, from just below your left knee down to just above your left ankle.

The boy said, That doesn’t prove that we’re the same. It’s just one more thing you happen to know about me.

The man replied, The scar is in the shape of the letter Y. At the junction of the Y, there is a deep purple spot that never changes unless you press it with your finger, and then it turns a bright yellow.

The boy said, This just can’t be. It’s something you somehow found out. But deep inside he knew that was not true.

The old man said, There’s one last thing we can do to prove this.

The boy said, What?

The old man said, Stand here next to me.

The boy did so.

Raise your pants’ left leg above your knee.

The boy did this also. Then the old man put his left leg (which until this time has been obscured by the purple haze) next to the boy’s. The boy was once again shocked to see that they both had an identical scar. The old man said, Now the final test. Take your hand and push the purple spot on my scar. At the same time I’ll push the spot on yours.

The boy wasn’t sure he wanted to do this, but then his curiosity and his need to know got the better of him and he said, OK.

The man said, On the count of three.

The boy nodded his head. The man said, One, two, three, and they both pushed the spots on their scars. Both scars turned a bright yellow and a blinding white light flashed in the boy’s eyes. He saw that the old man was absorbed into the bright light.

He was mesmerized as the light shot across the sky, shrouded in a deep purple haze. The last thing the child saw were pulsating red spots in front of his eyes, and then there was total darkness.

Chapter 1

The Void

I am in complete darkness. I can’t see or hear a solitary thing. I am in a seemingly total empty void. The only awareness is that of existence; because I have thought, therefore I do exist. But wait! With these thoughts, I begin to experience sensations. The first being that of movement, of extreme speed. As though I am being transported at millions of miles an hour. I feel as if I am an unknown entity! Now I begin to see that I am surrounded by a soft purple glow. I am engulfed in a vast empty darkness. At what would appear to be the endless bounds of this darkness, I begin to discern microscopic points of light. I blink, and the lights are upon me. They are no longer points of light but long colorful streaks flowing at ultra speeds, past and around me. I notice that the lights are not only coming toward me but that there are lights also traveling in the same direction as I am. And oh the colors, the magnificent explosion of colors! Variation upon variation of the color spectrum. Each streak of light having its own color signature. It seems as if each light is its own entity.

As I continue on, I begin to encounter spheres of various sizes. At first I can’t make out any details, but shortly, I begin to notice different colors and the basic topography. I become aware that these are not just spheres, but are, in fact, stars and planets. As I progress, they become more familiar. I note the rings of Saturn, the giant Jupiter, the red tint of Mars, and, the most beautiful of all, the blue jewel of the planet Earth. And dwarfing all others, the magnificent star of this system, the Sun. As I approach the sun, I feel as if the speed is increasing, that I will fly right past it out into infinity, but instead, I shoot around this star, orbiting it thousands of times, each orbit taking but a fraction of a second.

After what seems to be hours, but which in reality are mere seconds, I feel the speed diminish. For the first time, I see a florescent diamond-like silver cord emanating from the center of my being. It flows out in front of me into the distance. As I slow down, I stop circling the Sun and head toward the Earth, with the silver cord preceding me down through the atmosphere to the surface of the planet. I travel through ceilings, through doors, and through walls. I am in a bedroom. I stop moving and begin to hover. I look down and see a being lying in bed, asleep. The silver cord traveling from my center is connecting to the center of the being lying below me.

Now I know where I am. I have returned from where this journey began.

I am home!

Chapter 2

Awakening

Date: 2024

I awake with a tremendous start! It feels as if a bolt of lightning has flooded my entire body. My heart is beating so fast that I’m afraid it might burst. I sit up in bed and look around me. Nothing is amiss. Moonlight is shining through the window. I see the clock on the dresser; it reads 2:00 a.m. Everything is quiet.

I lie back down and begin to catch my breath, trying to calm myself. I close my eyes, hoping to bring my thoughts into focus. Memories of actions and places start to flood my mind. Things that seem abstract and make little or no sense. Then I realize that these must have been dreams. Dreams more vivid and totally realistic than true life itself. What is even stranger, the more I concentrate, the more I remember until each and every detail is clear. It’s as if it were all happening right now.

I have read articles about dreams. They claim that you can analyze your dreams. How each portion can be attributed to things that occurred the previous days or even weeks. How these occurrences get locked away into your subconscious. While you are asleep, your subconscious releases this hodgepodge of impressions and sends them forth as dreams.

The thing is, I have always dreamed almost every night of my life. However, I have never had a dream so concise and the information imparted so direct and organized from point A to point B to point C and back again, a total progression of events. Nothing helter-skelter, but this had a feeling of a true happening. I tried to remember going to bed and what I was thinking about and doing before I went to sleep. I was in the bathroom getting ready for bed. I had brushed my teeth and caught my image in the mirror. I saw a man who had deteriorated over the years and become an overweight, crippled old man, pretty much useless to those around him.

I had put on my silky knee-length Arizona Diamondback baseball pajamas, with the snake logos all over them. These had been a gift to me from my loving wife, Wanny. We had been, for years, avid baseball fans, but for the past few years, we had been physically and financially unable to go to the games. We had to be satisfied with watching them on TV whenever possible.

I had gone into the bedroom and turned on the night light so that I could see during the night, when I had to get up to go to the bathroom. At my age and in my condition, this happened frequently. Out of habit, I had checked the clock on the dresser; it read 10:00 p.m. I had climbed into bed and proceeded to try to relax, physically and mentally, so that sleep would come. I often have trouble falling asleep, so I have developed some mental exercises to put me into a fugue state. It just consists of relaxing and thinking of being in a calm, soothing, and rewarding place, one that warms my heart.

To reach this state, at times I have to produce somewhat of a chant. This chant is very simple. It consists of only one word, repeated over and over again, each time softer than the time before, Serenity, serenity, serenity… I had begun thinking of when I was a healthy young child, living on my grandparents’ farm in Eastern Colorado. How beautiful and peaceful it was! How totally happy it made me feel, roaming the pasture with my grandpa’s dairy cows, feeling the love and connection to that place and to all my family from that time. How I longed so much to return to that time and place.

And that point is where my dream must have begun. I remember a bright silver cord flowing from my body and transporting me into the time and place that had been in my mind during my fugue state. The dream then began to unfold.

As I sit here, reflecting on the dream I had just experienced, once again I am amazed at how real it appeared to be. I admonish myself for being a foolish, fantasy-minded old man. My zodiac sign is Pisces, and all my loved ones have always claimed that I am a dreamer and not just when I am asleep. Now that I have calmed down, I feel a light chill. When I reach down to rub my arms, I notice that my pajamas are soaking wet. The totality of this dream must have given me the night sweats. I get out of bed and go to the dresser to get an old pair of flannel pajamas. I take them into the bathroom to dry off and change. There is also a nightlight on in the bathroom. When I grab my top to take it off, I feel something sticky. I take off my pajamas. I have never had this happen from night sweats. I turn on the overhead light. I can’t believe what I am seeing. My pajamas are completely covered by a light purple mist. A sheen of this mist is covering my entire body. I look in the mirror and see a spot on my chest the size of a baseball, silver in color and shining like a diamond. How is this possible? Didn’t I wake up? Am I still dreaming? I go into the bedroom and look at the clock; it now reads 2:15 a.m. The time is what it should be. I return to the bathroom, thinking that I am losing my mind. I feel my left leg throbbing. I reach down to rub it. When I look, I see the bright spot at the junction of the scar on my leg. I watch in awe as the bright light begins to fade away, back to the original dark purple. I look once again in the mirror, and I see that the diamond-bright silver spot on my chest is also fading away as is the purple sheen that had covered my body. In a matter of seconds, all has faded away. All but the memories and the knowledge that no matter how insane, how illogical, somehow, someway, I had gone back in time and met the child I was at the age of six and to the place I so loved. Although I may be doubting my sanity somewhat, I know deep down in my soul that I will find out how I did this and I will, by all the powers that be, do this again.

Chapter 3

L ast night when returning to bed, I fell fast asleep. I slept a solid eight hours of peaceful dreamless sleep. When I awoke, I felt wonderful. Better than I had felt in forty years. I was totally invigorated. I went into the bathroom to check myself out. I looked in the mirror, expecting to see a miraculous change, but looking back at me was the same deteriorating old man that I had been seeing for years. Oh well! I might not look different, but compared to the way I have felt every other morning, I felt like a new man. I was actually looking forward to facing a new day. I shaved and brushed my teeth, and then I was ready to go get dressed.

I turned to grab my crutches, which I have to use, because of my debilitating arthritis, until I can put my leg braces on. I then hobble around with a cane, although with considerable pain. However, my crutches weren’t there. Then the reality set in; I had been standing here in the bathroom for a half an hour, unaided, not even leaning against something. I further realized that since returning from my journey last night, I had made two or three trips, back and forth, from the bathroom to the bedroom without any aid from the crutches or cane or braces. At first I might have been able to attribute that to adrenalin due to the excitement of what I had experienced, but not after this much time had passed. Very gingerly, I took a step, expecting to crumble in excruciating pain, but felt no pain! I took three, four, five more steps. Still no pain came. I walked into the bedroom, then out around the living room and quickened my pace back to the bedroom. Still no pain. I sat down on the bed and lifted my legs up to check them out. I stared in disbelief for what I saw didn’t resemble the legs that I had suffered with for quite some time. My knees, which were knobby and tender to the touch, now looked and felt normal. My ankles, which had been twisted and deformed with large bones protruding out the sides due to my arthritis, were now completely smooth and healthy-looking. I felt as if I could run five miles. Of course, I couldn’t or wouldn’t even try. Although I felt fantastic, there was the reality that I was an eighty-year-old man with a bad heart. I had already had a quadruple bypass surgery some ten years ago and was now winding down. But now being blessed, with all the arthritic pain having been eliminated, I knew that I would last awhile longer and with a much better quality of life.

I would spend the remainder of my life pursuing the ways and means of recreating my fantastic journey and hopefully go on many, many more.

Chapter 4

Date: 1950

W hen Rusty woke up, he was lying on the ground, on top of the hill, in his grandpa’s pasture. He could see the purple haze fade away into sunlight. The old man was gone. Now the boy thought he had been dreaming. He stood up and noticed that his left leg was throbbing. He raised his pants’ leg and he could see the bright yellow spot on his scar. As he stared at it, the color began to fade back to the dull purple spot that it had been before. He had no doubt that his encounter with the old man had truly happened. The touching of each other’s scars had caused their connection to be broken and sent the old man back from where he came.

Rusty went to check on the cows to be sure they hadn’t disappeared with the old man. He found all sixteen of them, just lazily wandering around, eating scrub grass and chewing their cud. So he decided to head back to the farm. When he turned to leave, all the cows stopped where they were, trotted over to the boy and began following him back. This wasn’t normal behavior. Normally, they hated going back to the farm. The only time they were ready to go back was when their udders were full and they needed to be milked. That was when he looked closer and could see that their udders were so full that the milk was dripping out of their teats as they walked.

The boy didn’t know how this could be. It took eight to ten hours of constant grazing for them to produce that much milk. He wondered, Didn’t they just get here maybe an hour ago? The boy looked up at the sky to check out the sun. It wasn’t in the east as it should have been, but it was beginning its descent into sunset. The boy had been in the pasture all day long. Rusty started back at a brisk pace. He would have run, but he remembered his grandpa telling him to never run the cattle when bringing them back in for milking. It could hurt them and cause them to lose half or all their milk. After what seemed like forever, they finally reached the corral gate. Just as he opened it, his grandparents, uncles, and aunt came running out to greet him. At first they were all hugging and kissing him. Then they were hollering at him. Rusty, where have you been? We have been looking everywhere for you. When we got back from working the fields we couldn’t find you. Your uncle John was just going to head out to the pasture. The rest of us were going to check the neighboring farms, when John yelled that you were coming into the corral. You scared us half to death. Here it is, almost dark, and you come strolling in with the cows following you like you were some damned Pied Piper! Where have you been and what have you been up to?

The child didn’t know what to say. He knew that if he told them what really happened, they would never believe him. He wanted so very badly to tell them. He decided to tell a half-truth for he loved his family very much and couldn’t stand lying to them. Rusty said, I’m so sorry that I worried you all so much. I didn’t mean to. What happened was that when I got the cows to the pasture this morning, there was a strange purple haze hanging over the hill like a curtain. When the cows saw it, they ran into it and over the hill to where I couldn’t see them. So I ran after them. While I was running through that haze I started getting real dizzy. Everything was swirling round and round. I fell down on the ground, and everything went dark. When I woke up I could see the sun was starting to set. I had been asleep all day. I don’t know why. Maybe I bumped my head when I fell down. There is a sore spot on the back of my head. Anyway, as soon as I got up, I hurried back with the cows. Don’t worry, Grandpa, I didn’t run them, like you told me not to. As a matter of fact, they followed me with no urging at all. Grandpa, look at how full their udders are. They look like they’re about to burst.

For the moment the attention shifted from Rusty to the cows. His grandpa went over to one of the cows, reached down, and gently squeezed her udder. The cow let out a loud mooo, swung her tail around, and slapped his grandpa right in the face. Normally if one of his cows did that, he would cuss a blue streak and smack her a hard slap on her rump, but this time, all he said was Let’s get these girls into the barn and relieve them of their milk. They’re so full, they are in pain. I’ve never seen anything like it.

Everyone started tending to the cows except grandma. She said, You all can take care of those fool cows. I’m going to look after the boy. You seem to forget that he’s been asleep or unconscious lying in the pasture all day. I’m going to get him cleaned up, feed him, and put him to bed. Then I’m going to call Dr. Jeffers and have him come out and check him over.

Rusty said, I’m all right now, Grandma. I don’t need no doctor.

She said, Hogwash! How do you know you’re all right? What happened ain’t normal.

Rusty thought, Boy, if you only knew!

He knew that there was no use in arguing with grandma when she had her mind set. So he just said, OK, Grandma, and did as she said.

When the family finished milking the cows, which took about three times longer than usual, they returned to the house. They were astonished at the amount of milk they had gotten out of the cows. On a normal day after two milkings, these cows averaged thirteen liters each total. When they milked these cows that morning they had gotten about seven liters each. The milking that they had just completed yielded eighteen to twenty liters each, for just that one milking. More than two times the normal yield, and although they had just started the separation process, the first four liters that had been finished was 60 percent cream. This was absolutely unheard-of. Normal was 15 percent to 20 percent. Grandpa said, that they were going out to the pasture in the morning to check out every aspect of it—the grass, the air, even the salt licks to see if there was any explanation for what had happened with the cows and hopefully repeat tomorrow and in the future the production numbers of today. This seemed truly to be a blessing. They had barely been getting by financially and were about to lose the farm. If this kind of production continued, they would be able to take care of all their bills and pay off the farm. Then grandpa turned to grandma and said, When Dr. Jeffers gets here, be sure he checks the boy from toes to nose. I want to know if Rusty has any unusual ailments or symptoms after lying out in the pasture unconscious all day. If he is displaying any strange side effects like the cows seem to be.

Once again Rusty objected, I’m OK, Grandpa. I feel fine. I’m not a cow, you know!

Grandpa laughed and said, No, I guess you aren’t. Although the way you scamper here and there, you do resemble a two-week-old calf. At that, everyone laughed, except Rusty. He wanted so much to tell everyone what really happened. But they already thought he might have some weird ailment. If he told the truth they’d lock him up in a room filled with crazy people. Something else that bothered him was the whole business of the cows. Was that just a coincidence or had the old man done something to them? His mind was running in circles trying to understand. As he headed off to bed, he wondered if anything would ever be the same again!

Chapter 5

Date: 2024

T here were so many things to do that the old man didn’t know where to start. Eventually he would have to come up with some kind of a cover story to explain the fact that he was no longer crippled up.

Fortunately his wife, Wanny, was off visiting her sister, Bett, in New Hampshire. She would be there for six more days; although, she wasn’t his main concern. Both of them had been believers in most forms of psychic and spiritual phenomenon, her more than him. Although he didn’t exactly know the mechanics of what had happened, he had no doubt that it was a form of psychic phenomenon. In fact, he had no doubt that she would want to experience it with him, and, if possible, that would be great. He had a strange feeling that this was something he was called upon to do. That he must do it alone; of course he wouldn’t know this for sure until he experimented with it and became aware of his capabilities, if any.

He decided that his first step was to get on the computer and research everything he could find on time-travel, theories and fantasy, anything at all that he could use or relate to. Before he got started, he had to get something to eat. He was a fat old man who had been on a strict, bland diet for two reasons: First, to help him lose weight and second because his stomach was always in a state of acid reflux, for which he took medication to enable him to bear the pain. However, this morning he was starved. He felt like he hadn’t eaten for a week, and stomach be damned! This morning he was going to eat like a man! So he proceeded to fix himself a breakfast of three eggs, fried in butter; four pieces of toast; hash browns; six slices of bacon; four pancakes with peanut butter and syrup; orange juice; milk; and real coffee. When he finished eating, he felt totally sated. He had loved every bite and had eaten all of it. So now he sat back and waited for the terrible burning pain that he knew would be coming, but he didn’t care. It had been wonderful and well worth it. He sat there! Fifteen minutes, twenty-five minutes, forty minutes, and there was no pain, absolutely no burning sensation. He got up and walked around, but not only was there no pain of any kind, he didn’t feel stuffed or sluggish like he should have. Instead, he felt completely rejuvenated, full of energy and mental acuity. It was as if his body had taken every bit of the food he had consumed and turned it into pure energy.

Now he was ready to start researching. He sat down at his computer and logged on to one of his favorite search engines. He typed in Time Travel, hit search, and was overwhelmed at how many sites came up, everything from Einstein’s theories of relativity and the time-space continuum to alien abductions. He was researching everything that seemed remotely possible or similar to his experience, but everything that he brought up was ridiculous or bordering on the absurd. One such Web site claimed that its leader, a character named Demna, was actually from a planet named Sucarah and that, periodically, he and his alien brothers would abduct hundreds of human beings and would transport them back in time to his planet at a time when his planet was in its infancy, mostly in a semisolid state, and he would turn these abducted humans into a type of swamp gas. They would remain in this state until they eventually evolved into a myriad of ungodly creatures called Zephapods. They would stay in this state until they were fully matured. Then they would automatically time-transport back to Earth and the future, where they would morph themselves back into humanoid beings and start the process all over again.

After the old man read this last Web site, he was ready to quit. He had been reading these wacko Web sites for eight hours straight and thought it was a lost cause. Just when he was ready to log off his computer, a Web site that was flashing with glittering colors caught his eye. It was called Mystical Mysteries and Transportations. He figured he might as well check it out. It couldn’t be any worse than that last absurd Web site.

This started out talking about thought processes and mental states. It talked of clearing your mind of conscious thoughts and how to go into a meditative state. When you reached this meditative state, you could go on to a wondrous new world filled with limitless possibilities. The old man felt that now he was on the right track.

Chapter 6

T he old man, who, by the way, had gone by the name Russell since he was eight years old, threw himself wholeheartedly into researching this mystical Web site. He spent hours investigating everything within this realm, such as the extreme meditative states and when you were deeply into one, you could make yourself impervious to pain. Like lying on a bed of nails or walking on hot coals barefoot without any unpleasant side effects. These sideshow kind of exhibits were just a minor example of what could be accomplished through extreme meditation. He found that the entire realm of psychic phenomenon was full of examples of abilities that could be tapped with the mastery of the meditative states.

Russell found all this to be very interesting, but he still wanted something more relative to what he had experienced. He went to the next page of listings under this Web site. At the top of the page was a subtext called Astral Projection. Something in Russ clicked, and he knew that he was getting close to what he was looking for. He, of course, had heard of astral phenomenon, but he had never given it any credence, mostly because he didn’t know any of the beliefs and principles involved with it.

In this area of psychic phenomenon, it is believed that during sleep, at times, everyone travels outside the physical body, often unencumbered by physical limitations such as gravity. These out-of-body experiences (OBE) are then remembered as dreams in which the dreamer floats and flies. This is a minor form of astral projection.

The next item of interest was a description of the astral plane, which states that there are seven planes that take the form of planar surfaces. The higher planes have bright colorful patterns; lower planes are far duller. These act as a portal to different planes and realms. All time is one long day. In other words, there are seven psychic dimensions (planes). These can be accessed by attaining a deep meditative state, at which time you enter into what is called an etheric projection. This is the conscious effort to separate from the body. The etheric body stays on the physical plane but separate from the physical body. This projection finds people lying next to their body or floating above it. Subjects report the ability to move at speed across rooms, streets, cities, counties, and even planets.

Russ became very excited as he read this because it was beginning to fit in with his own experience. He read on: "The Etheric Body, like the Astral, operates at a higher frequency. This enables it to move through solid objects such as doors, ceilings, walls. This is similar to ‘OBE.’ The difference is that etheric projection is achieved by a conscious effort to do it. In other words, while in the advanced meditative state, you decide where you want to go. Then if you are one of the strong-willed, the etheric projection will begin