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Nearly two months after Miss Annabelle's inaugural class, Jake woke up enjoying a memory from that beautiful day. He lay in bed, smiling and remembering...
When the class ended, the Patterson anchorwoman interviewed Miss Annabelle and several of her new students. Then the anchorwoman gathered Miss Annabelle and her former students for a powerfully moving look back. Afterwards, Miss Annabelle, who now looked about twenty years old, walked over to Angie and Jessie.
"You guys know what this means, don't you?" Miss Annabelle asked while swooping her hand across the front of her body. She looked straight at Angie and said, "We can now have children!"
Angie and Jessie broke into the most wonderful smiles accompanied with an expression Jake had never seen before. Then he realized why those smiles were unlike any other. They were reflecting the rebirth of the most precious part of their souls they had to, in the anticivilization, let die: that most precious part of the soul that gives life.
"Oh, Jessie," Angie cried, "let's do it. Let's have lots of children!" Having lots of children was very feasible now because the cost of living was so low, and the fetus was now grown outside the body. And becoming young and fertile again was not the only option. A business in California had just begun cloning babies for parents who could not fertilize an egg. Nevertheless, Angie liked the idea of being physically young again with children. Jessie liked that idea, too.
"Yes!" Jessie rejoiced, "Let's have a dozen. Let's have six boys and six girls!" Mr. Melbourne had joined them, and the four of them laughed together -- that same hearty laughter Miss Annabelle loved to hear 35 years ago. Although no one noticed, Jake could not stop himself: when he watched the four of them laughing like that, he was just so touched, he could not stop the tears from blurring what he saw. ...Ah, what a memory, he thought, feeling the dampness in his eyes returning again. He loved those four people so much, to see them happy like that, after all they had been through, just really moved him.
He smiled and rolled over. He looked at his beautiful wife sleeping, and he took the quiet moment to simply enjoy watching her. The more he watched her, the more she looked different, younger. What a woman I have, he thought. What's this? She's smiling in her sleep?
"That's so beautiful," Jake whispered.
At that moment, Jasmine opened her eyes. She said she felt really good, inside and out. Then she realized she woke up smiling and could never remember waking up with a smile already on her face.
"I feel so happy, Jake." Yet, her happy feeling had a familiarity about it. She lay still, trying to attach it to its pleasant source.
After a minute, her eyes widened, and she said, "This was how I felt when I woke up every morning as a little girl, after spending three beautiful hours with daddy the evening before." Her thoughts were racing back to her childhood. "Oh, yeah...I used to always wake up with a smile on my face when I was little!"
After a hesitation, she dared say it, "It's almost as if daddy visited me last night."
Then she shook her head and scoffed at herself, "I almost sound like those mystics in that forgotten anticivilization!" Then she laughed.
When she laughed, Jake tackled her in bed, and rolled her on top of him. "I love it when you laugh!" he chuckled.
She bent down and kissed him passionately.
As they felt the electricity flowing back and forth between their bodies, a sound interrupted them.
"I'll get him," Jasmine said, slowly getting off Jake and leaving the bed.
A moment later, she returned, nursing Little Jakey. Jake laughed when Little Jakey stopped nursing and twisted his happy head back to see his dad. Jake felt like laughing a lot when he was with his three-month-old son.
It was Saturday morning, their family day together. They really enjoyed their Saturday activities together -- not because of the activities per se, but for the feeling of being together. Together, they would feel the happiness they built and earned through their value creations.
But, as Jasmine sat on the bed with the baby, Jake noticed an unusual look on her face.
"What is it, my love?" he asked.
"When I picked up Jakey, I all of a sudden felt there was something we must do. ...I'm not sure why, but something is telling me for us to get to the Space Library."
The Space Library was Ian's creation. It was similar in concept to the old Library of Congress for books, but for data collected from space. Nearly all data collected from space was sent to the Space Library. Some "garage" entrepreneurs and some large companies on a rapidly progressing, specific commercial course did not feed their data to the Space Library, but Ian established a very attractive incentive to get all other data captured from space: he set up a generous sliding scale of a finder's fee royalty on any end commercial product that originated from one's data fed to the Library. This was extremely conducive to feeding data to Ian's Space Library, for he had several hundred full-time scientists working around the clock examining the massive accumulation of data, always driving toward commercial value creation.
"Can we start tomorrow?" Jake asked, looking at her curiously. "You know Ian's in the Space Library on Sundays."
Something was driving Jasmine to get to the Space Library immediately.
"I can't wait, darling," she said, almost in a panic.
"Great! Let's get with it!" Jake said, doing a western roll off the bed. He loved challenges and mysteries. He loved making discoveries and creating new values that did not exist before. And when Jasmine could not wait one day more to go, he figured her creative right brain was on the edge of a big puzzle that her logical left brain could not quite snap together yet.
The two of them rushed to get ready as though they were late for catching a plane. Ian's Space Library, however, was just a few blocks away.
*
Ian saw them come in, Little Jakey dangling against Jake's stomach in a baby wrap. Whenever Jake walked in the Space Library, he thought how inappropriate the term Library seemed. Inside the "Library" seemed nothing at all like a library. This "Library" was stuffed with hundreds of computers with hundreds of men and women intensely studying and working on them. The inside of the Space Library seemed more like the inside of a software company.
"You guys are really behind!" Ian yelled from the loft overseeing the large computer-stuffed front room upon seeing Jake and Jasmine. And Ian meant it. "A week is just too long to be away from this place. This is the epicenter of almost everything reaching out into the Civilization of the Universe. We find it first here. So much has been found this past week!"
Jake looked at Jasmine. Her gut sense was absolutely right. They needed to be here.
"Ian," Jake said, looking back at the great scientist, "can the Patterson Group set up a small office here. Jasmine and I will track progress day by day."
"An office? You need more than that -- you need 24/7 coverage. You'll see what I mean, come on." Ian turned around and led them into another room filled with what seemed to be hundreds more computer terminals. Some were manned, some were not. But all had a series of charts on them.
"What's all this?" Jasmine asked, not remembering all those computers here a week ago.
"That's what I'm telling you. Every computer in here contains several Overlay Charts revealing Zons at work out there in every imaginable area. We've uncovered hundreds."
"Why all of a sudden?" Jake asked.
"Lot's of reasons...from my data, my physicists, my techniques, my computers. But today you see hundreds, perhaps next week you'll see thousands of demonstrations of Zons."
Jake knew now that Patterson needed 24-hour coverage here, seven days a week.
"But Jake, here's what I must show you. We found it last night." Ian led Jake and Jasmine to a computer that had several physicists around it.
"Step back for a minute, guys," Ian said. As they did, Ian also said, "Anything new you can tell me?"
"We have determined the date of the event. It happened eleven years ago. If a temporary or continuous beam was sent, our guys will find it either in the archives or on a dish before today's over."
Ian's eyes opened wide. "Good work."
Jake looked at Jasmine, then back at Ian. Jasmine pulled out her pad and automatic pencil. Little Jakey was smiling at everybody, sensing the excitement in the air.
"What's going on?" Jasmine asked.
"It's not happy news," Ian answered, "but it's very important. Look here," he said while pointing at two charts on the computer screen. "The first chart shows the nonconscious course of mass and energy in a specific planetary system in a nearby star system only ten light years away. The second chart shows the actual course of mass and energy that took place. Now," Ian said while leaning over and pushing a few buttons on the keyboard, "let's superimpose them. ...There!"
Jake and Jasmine saw one chart consisting of many irregular squiggles.
"As you know, those squiggles represent conscious interference altering the nonconscious course of mass and energy. Now, I'll bring up several superimposed Overlay Charts from other planetary systems about the same age as this one," Ian said, leaning over the keyboard. Suddenly, the chart they had been looking at reduced in size right in the middle of the screen as eight other charts appeared around it.
"Look!" Ian said, pointing at the nine charts.
Jake and Jasmine leaned close to the screen to study the charts. The other eight had squiggles that looked very consistent to each other whereas the one in the middle looked quite different.
"What does it mean?" Jasmine asked.
"We have in total over two thousand Overlay Charts of planetary systems with conscious control," Ian said. "They all have a correlation to the eight consistent charts here. Over two thousand Overlay Charts with this correlation demonstrate the peaceful, borderless, business dynamics of the Civilization of the Universe with open-ended value creation. ...I believe this chart here demonstrates an unbelievably tragic event: the culmination of the anticivilization ending in nuclear holocaust."
Jake and Jasmine both gasped and sat down. The thought of conscious death now seemed bizarre and barbaric, from a quickly forgotten, distant past. But the idea of mass death...they could not fathom it and had to think about it in disbelief for awhile before talking. Little Jakey, sensing the horror in his parents' expression, started crying loudly.
"Was the entire conscious race obliterated?" Jake finally said, hoarsely.
"We don't know," one of the competent-looking scientists answered. "We're searching through our data gathered over the past year for a beam, and we have every dish we own aggressively trying to locate a beam."
Jake nodded, and his eyes glazed over.
"Thank you, guys," Ian said. That was the scientists' cue, and they swarmed back to the computer.
"Come with me," he said to Jake and Jasmine.
They walked through the massive Space Library building into another room with just as many computers, and all were manned.
"I'm directly feeding my archives and all my dishes into these computers," Ian said. "If anyone survived and sent a beam in our direction within the first year after the nuclear destruction, then it would've reached us by now, and we'll find it soon."
Jake knew that he must jump all over this story and feed it through Patterson's web TV station and get a full-scale article in the next morning's paper. But, he and Jasmine never faced death like this. Even though they did not know the people who were obliterated, they could not come to grips with the notion of conscious life -- an entire conscious civilization -- being eliminated from existence.
"In order to approach this story right, I need a half hour to cope," Jake told Ian. Jasmine nodded in agreement. Little Jakey was sucking his thumb for comfort. "Then Jasmine and I and the whole might of the Patterson Media Group will give this full coverage."
Ian expected Jake's reaction, for Ian had gone through the same thing upon the grisly discovery.
*
Al Patterson put his web TV station on full, 24-hour coverage at the Space Library. Jake and Jasmine were intensely at work trying to pull together the full story and the enormous number of details for their front-page story to go Sunday morning in all Patterson Papers. Ian set up a large room at the Space Library for the Patterson Group, including a sleepover room that Jake requested.
A little after 10:15 p.m., Ian announced over the PA system for everyone in the Space Library to gather in the large front room. When Jake entered, hundreds of scientists already stood waiting; all were talking to one another. A moment later, Ian addressed them from the loft area so they could all see him.
"When I announced for you to gather here, less than ten people knew. By my quick calculations on how fast people can talk, I figure that by now, five minutes later, about half of you know." The crowd chuckled. Then, Ian shouted, "A beam was isolated!"
A great cheer exploded from those who did not know as well as from those who did, for a beam meant conscious life. Someone had survived!
"It's a simple radio beam with a brief message that repeats over and over," Ian explained. "The syntax is strikingly close to English and is now being decoded by our language decryption computers."
At noon Sunday, East Coast time, Ian addressed the crowd again. The decryption experts were able to crack the message's meaning. Ian would now read it over the PA system to his scientists and the Patterson Group, which was sending his presentation live through web TV.
Much of the world was tuned in thanks to a new technology that gave a color code to all the web TV channels in regards to what was currently showing. Many factors went into the color code, from newsworthiness, historical importance, intellectual importance...to entertainment value, but the highest color rating of purple had never shown up before.
Since Patterson's web TV coverage began the previous afternoon at the Space Library, however, the color glowing next to the Patterson Channel, for first time since the rating service began, was purple. Thus, nearly every person around the world who turned on his web TV turned to the Patterson Channel. Hundreds of millions of people around the world were eagerly waiting for this moment. ...Ian began his announcement:
"Ladies and gentlemen around the world: it seems so hard to believe that an entire civilization eliminated itself from existence. Although our civilization once came very close to the same end, now it seems impossible, like it could have never happened.
"I have over two thousand Overlay Charts here at the Space Library that show the Civilization of the Universe exists in pure peace, pure honesty, pure business, pure love. Yesterday, we discovered one anomaly. That civilization was destroyed by violence, dishonesty, government, and envious hatred of value creators. The nuclear destruction of an entire civilization occurred on a planet ten light years away. The nuclear holocaust occurred eleven years ago."
Ian paused to let viewers recall the nearly forgotten concept of hatred.
"We have received a radio beam sent from that planet a few months after the event that killed its civilization.
"The language spoken was close to English, and we have decoded it. ...I will now read to you the translation."
The Patterson Channel had been covering the discovery for nearly 24 hours now, so the viewers had time to brace themselves and grasp the magnitude of the loss. They were able to listen now, and concentrate. Ian picked up a piece of paper and read the translation:
"They did it. The master neocheaters let the plutonium bombs fly, and I believe everyone died, but me. Yeah, those humanoids -- those leaders -- thought they would be safe in their bunkers built by their own scientists. Ha!
"My name is Beorapparaus Tink. I'm 29 years old." Ian paused and explained his astronomers had calculated his age in Earth years and that his name was not translated -- he was actually called Beorapparaus on his planet. Then, Ian continued reading the translation of Beorapparaus:
"I'm sending this message after a personal epiphany. I was a wealthy geologist, and for years I used my wealth to build a large underground bunker that would survive the predictable holocaust. I could see it coming and refused to let those humanoids destroy me.
"But here is where my plan went wrong: I built a bunker large enough and stocked enough to hold 300 people. This post-war civilization would be the rise of the honest civilization on our planet.
"Of course, the carefully selected 300 people lived normal lives. They were to arrive at any serious warning signs of a confrontation. ...But there were none. One night during a week when I was in the bunker running pressure tests on the caliche walls, the bombs flew. Every government that controlled nuclear bombs launched them all in the most unbelievable yet predictable act of our dishonest anticivilization: total self-annihilation.
"For a few months in my bunker, I could not comprehend what it must be like outside. Not until I emerged did I realize the horror. I cannot go near the cities again and see the deceased. By my measurements, no one else survived unless some others built bunkers of my caliber. However, sending radio messages around my planet has not drawn any indication of life.
"I've gone through something far beyond what psychologists called clinical depression. With everyone dead, I cannot even feel right about feeling bad about myself or my emotional needs. For months, I asked myself: What difference does anything I do now make? What difference do I make? What difference could I make? None!
"A few nights ago, I lay in my bed, suffering from the loss, every moment of every day, yet I could not even acknowledge my emotional suffering because of the magnitude of the loss around me -- all the little children are dead!"
Ian put down the paper from which he was reading Beorapparaus's translated message, and said, "The next several lines did not resemble English or any language known on Earth. Its tonality sounded like a mix between a sad, sad emotional outburst and a battle cry of some sort. Our expert translators speculate that Beorapparaus emotionally broke down at this point, thinking about all the death, especially the innocent children destroyed by the forces of the anticivilization, and yelled out either some generic form of damnation against the leaders or some generic expression of sorrow for the victims. ...Now, I'll continue with the direct translation:
"Although I didn't allow myself the luxury to contemplate my feelings or my fate, I was far, far below clinical depression. The horror, the magnitude of the loss caused me to vomit continuously. Although I never let myself think about myself, I knew the next day I would end my life. There was no physical or psychological sense to continue suffering.
"During my final moments, I felt relief that my suffering would soon be over. For the first time, I didn't feel nauseous.
"As I carefully fixed my fatal drink, I felt my first state of physical equilibrium since the event. I started thinking clearly for the first time. I was the last of civilization. When I go, I thought, there'll be nothing more. While thinking about the end, I started wondering, how did it all begin...how did we get here in the first place? I started thinking about the massive Universe. One thought led to another, when suddenly a picture formed in my mind: I envisioned conscious life not just on my devastated planet, but all throughout the vast Universe. Of course!
"As that picture formed in my mind, I felt some relief. Then I started to see color in that mental picture. Of course...those civilizations even a little older than mine would have to leap past their evil ones. Their growing power could only exist in pure rationality, pure honesty...as my planet demonstrated at the cost of hundreds of millions of children."
Ian said the same nontranslatable cry of sadness and anger occurred again here. Then Ian continued Beorapparaus's message:
"That means, civilization not only still exists, but exists all around me. I now have a reason for living, for I think I can, somehow, make a difference. I can be productive again. I just don't know how to put values into the civilization that surrounds me. To learn how to do that has given me reason to live."
Ian put the paper down and looked at his audience, and said, "That's it. Apparently, just one man survived the almost unimaginable event. His beam reached Earth just a couple of months ago. Of course, we will continue feeding it into our computers in case he started using his beam to communicate his progress. Also, we'll continue searching in the event he's sending a separate beam reflecting his progress.
"If we can determine that he has discovered Nature's Quintessential Secret and is on a vector of open-ended value creation, then the odds are very high that Beorapparaus is happy and, therefore, alive today, ten years later. He would be just 39 years old now. If we can demonstrate he has learned, in his situation, how to become a value creator, then I believe we should send him a beam to let him know we're coming to get him."
The crowded room burst into cheers.
*
The Group stood in the conference room in the Space Library late that night. Travelling across the country took just a couple of hours now in the new planes that exited and re-entered the atmosphere. Miss Annabelle had to teach the next morning, but pulling all-nighters was no problem now with her 20-year-old body.
Theodore's and Ian's company Beyond had just opened up the capacity for multi-decade, manned deep-space missions, largely because of recent breakthroughs in controlled nuclear fusion and matter/antimatter energy sources.
"Thank you so much for coming; I knew you would," Ian said to The Group, looking around at his closest friends. "About one hour ago, we found another beam. My computer experts on translations and encryption are working on it right now. I looked at what they have, so far, just before this meeting. I'm excited to announce that Beorapparaus has discovered Nature's Quintessential Secret -- he has become an aggressive value creator and is moving in an open- ended vector of value creation. He is sending all his progress through the second beam we found. ...That means, to me, the odds are that he is now, ten years later, alive and happy. ...Ladies and gentlemen, let's go get him!"
"Let's go get him!" The Group yelled back with a thrust of sheer glee. Jake yelled it too and felt that thrust of glee. Wow, he thought, to save one life, one life, is everything to that conscious being. He realized, Beorapparaus is like Martin. He needs us to bring him to civilization. We are his Zons. Suddenly, Jake grasped the big picture: there's many, perhaps infinite levels of Zons. Then Jake remembered Jeremiah's Church of God-Man definition of a Zon: the God-Man who creates new realms of consciousness, through creating new realms of existence. This is our initiation into Zonhood, Jake thought, chuckling to himself at the idea of Zonhood. We are not creating a new realm of consciousness, but we are reaching into another realm beyond our own to save consciousness. Doing this, he thought with great satisfaction, lifts us from God-Man to the first-level Zon.
Jake became aware that The Group was talking quickly, passionately, putting together their next great superpuzzle since the Operation. This reminds me, Jake thought, of the morning after the reunion in the morning room when these great people started their first superpuzzle. Jake sat back in awe, watching The Group, together again, their extraordinary Neothinking in high gear, building their first great Zon superpuzzle.
As Jake listened to them talk about saving Beorapparaus's life, he felt polar feelings yanking each other back and forth within him, fighting for dominance: the trauma of the destruction of an entire civilization of billions of people, including hundreds of millions of children versus the electric-like charge of saving life beyond our realm of consciousness, leaping into the honor of Zonhood.
"What time frames are we dealing with?" Jasmine asked The Group, digging for details for the article she and Jake would be writing until 2:00 a.m. -- the latest time the Patterson Papers could hold its presses. Of course, she and Jake would continue expanding this article all through the night and into the next day because the Patterson Papers were all on the Internet, and the Internet edition was updated continually around the clock.
"We're still in need of several technological breakthroughs before we can launch," Ian answered. "But technology is advancing so fast now, we can begin production of the ship immediately. I'd say we can launch her in five months."
Five months! Jake could not help himself, "Yes!" he shouted. He thought Ian would say a year. "And you're calculating into that time those several needed technological breakthroughs?" he asked.
Ian nodded confidently.
"Oh man, I love the supersociety!" Jake said with an incredible grin. Knowledge, technology, values were advancing lightning fast each day, each hour. The supersociety brought forth thrilling news every day, throughout the day. The nature of technological breakthroughs had completely changed in the supersociety. In the anticivilization, a technological breakthrough came first, then entrepreneurs would need months or years to figure out how to apply it commercially and create a demand for it. In the supersociety, by contrast, superpuzzles formed quickly, and during their formation, several technological breakthroughs were often needed to complete the superpuzzles. Therefore, such Neothink formation of advanced, commercial products put forth great marketing pressures to make the necessary technological breakthroughs. The specific breakthroughs needed were known before they were made. They were, in essence, made "on schedule", quickly and efficiently.
A rapid, urgent knock on the glass door stopped the meeting. Ian waved in the attractive woman.
"Sorry to interrupt, but I thought you needed to know this right away. Sir, tens of millions of people from all over the world are electronically filling our cash accounts." Her voice was throttled with emotions, feeling the compassion of the human race. "They say it's to go toward Operation Save Beorapparaus. Sir," she gasped with tension, for she was so proud and so moved, "we have already surpassed a trillion dollars and the money just doesn't stop coming in." She put her hand over her mouth; tears filled her eyes. "I'm sorry," the young woman said; some tears escaped and bounced off her cheeks, "it's all just so much to take in. I'm just so sorry for those who perished, and just so proud of our people."
Ian nodded, and then everyone stopped for a moment. In the midst of absorbing the horrible loss, they felt the compassion, the love of their fellowman. In the heat of the unraveling discovery, everyone was brought to a stop because they were so moved.
Jake noticed that Miss Annabelle, who felt deep, eternal love for her twelve students, was looking closely at Sally. Sally was looking down at the floor, and her eyes looked busy, like she was searching for something within. Jake glanced around the room; everyone seemed to be searching within. Then Jake looked at Jasmine. She, too, was searching.
Sally gasped. She had found what she was searching for. Miss Annabelle smiled as Sally's eyes were flooded with peace of mind. Sally looked up, directly at Jasmine, but didn't say a word. As if Sally had spoken, Jasmine's eyes suddenly stopped searching and were filled with peace of mind.
One by one, Sally looked around the room at her former classmates. Not a word was spoken. As Sally looked at each of her former third-grade classmates, disarray seemed to be put into order, and they seemed to be filled with peace of mind. As these great people sat silent, Jake could see the love and trust as they looked at Sally...and Sally, one by one, looked back at them. This seemed like a magical moment. They all looked so young and innocent -- like children. They all looked so beautiful.
All at once, Jake could see something he had read about eight years ago in Miss Annabelle's diary: he could actually see the faces of these great people, who were in their 40s, as young children. And when he did, his love for them swelled, and he thought, this magical moment happened once before...yes, I remember Jessie and Angie telling me about it: In the third grade, Sally looked at her classmates silently, one by one, the morning after she learned her mother had cancer. That moment gave her strength, Jake remembered. Today, as Sally looked at everyone, her eyes now sparkling with excitement, putting peace into her former classmates, Jake felt as though this was the mirror image of that magical moment in third grade. He looked at Miss Annabelle. The overhead lights were reflecting off her glassy eyes, and she was smiling...watching her students, filled with pride and love for them. She, too, remembered.
Finally, Sally looked at Jake, and he, too, suddenly knew and was filled with peace of mind. Her eyes explained it: this phenomenon, this unrestrained, worldwide outpouring of energy in the form of money spent toward saving a conscious life beyond our own realm of existence was concrete proof of how God-Man behaves in the Civilization of the Universe. And that outpouring gave us good reason to hope that our loved ones -- Sally's mother, Jasmine's father, and other precious loved ones lost to the anticivilization -- were saved by Zons.
The room was silent as these thoughts reverberated throughout the God-Men. After awhile, Jasmine broke the silence.
"If our loved ones were saved," she said, "we must earn their return. To get our great value back, our loved ones, we must put a great value into Zon's creation, our Universe. This is our opportunity! This project is our opportunity to earn it -- to put our most advanced knowledge, nuclear power, and newest technologies toward freeing and saving life as opposed to ruling over and destroying life. Human consciousness is the supreme value. Going outside our realm of consciousness to save conscious life is our opportunity to add value to Zon's house. This is our test. Once we launch the rescue ship, proving our ability to control the cosmos through pure love and compassion for conscious life...putting a great value into Zon's creation...then we will have earned the title of Zon and the return of our loved ones."
She's right, Jake thought. Zon is an advanced conscious being who controls the cosmos through pure love and compassion for conscious life. When we do that too, we become Zons and put great values into his creation, our Universe. Although the idea of spending the immense wealth and efforts of an entire planet to save one conscious being may, for a moment, seem like an act of selfless sacrifice, it absolutely was not. The effort would be made out of each person's love for values, and human consciousness is the supreme value. No material effort was too great to save that supreme value.
Jake pondered the pure love he felt within versus the fools love of the leaders in the nearly forgotten anticivilization, which was brought back to his memory because of the horrors expressed in Beorapparaus's speech. Jake then became aware that he now naturally felt inside his soul the same emotional level Miss Annabelle expressed in her diary that stunned him eight years ago.
Upon that revelation, an earth-shattering, big-picture understanding of the Universe filled Jake's mind, pushing everything else out. The Neothink puzzle that filled his mind at that moment had to be shared with The Group before moving on.
"Jasmine's right," he said. "And when you understand what she's saying, that the ultimate test of Zonhood is controlling the cosmos through compassion and love for conscious life, then something wonderful happens. ...Ian," Jake said, looking at the great astrophysicist who, along with the others, was smiling after hearing the term "Zonhood" for the first time, "we must add the final piece to your predictive description of Farmer Zons creating new realms or `fields' of existence. You say, like a Farmer John on Earth, Farmer Zon `seeds the field' with existence, then lets the forces of nature take their course as life springs up and evolves to human consciousness in those new realms or `fields' of existence. The rising conscious civilizations eventually become `ripe' and join the Civilization of the Universe and contribute advanced value creation...as our civilization on Earth is now doing. The Universe then `harvests' those magnificent value creations. Now, the final piece to complete your description is to realize that the ends for the Farmer John is the collective, maximum crop output for minimal outlay. But, the ends for Farmer Zon goes beyond -- goes to the individual, because the individual is the supreme value in the Universe. Whereas a Farmer John does not feel compassion and love for his crop, Farmer Zon feels compassion and love for his individual conscious beings, more compassion and love for that supreme value than for anything else. Therefore, the Zons of the Universe -- their actions -- will always be directed by love and compassion for conscious life."
Mr. Melbourne looked at Jake and nodded.
"Jake, of course! That makes so much sense," Ian said, amazed at Jake's widescope insight. "In fact, their actions, directed by love for conscious life, should be provable by Overlay Charts, especially now that we know to look for it. Fantastic, Jake!"
"When you realize that," Jake continued, "then a wonderful understanding evolves about Beorapparaus's lost civilization: wouldn't Zons at higher levels than us who function through love and compassion for conscious life, wouldn't they have saved the spirits of those billions of obliterated people just as we -- Zons at the first level -- will save Beorapparaus?"
"And you know what's exciting?" Ian added, "Soon we won't have to speculate. I've put nearly 200 astrophysicists searching for overlay data to find a way to get the answers. And I don't think it'll take long!"
Jake quietly, privately had another insight: If Zons did save our spirits when we died before, they would not want us to know or even consider that they saved us...not before we achieved the Civilization of the Universe on Earth. They would not have told us they saved us because that knowledge would have taken the edge off of our motivation and determination to drive our civilization into making the leap to the Civilization of the Universe. Like a parent with his vast range of experiences beyond his children, who properly keeps certain things from his children...a Zon would have kept the saving of our spirits from Earthlings. But now, we have achieved the Civilization of the Universe on Earth. ...Jake quietly predicted that Ian and his teams of astrophysicists would be able to quickly discover the answers, one way or the other.
Jake pondered a little longer about the idea of Zons saving us. What about those leaders responsible for killing millions of people, like the leaders on Beorapparaus's planet? Would they have been left behind to die, like pulling out weeds from the crop? Is that the ultimate, universal justice? ...Jake had so many questions, and he knew Ian would soon get the answers. As he looked at the intense scientist before him, Jake smiled and was glad that Ian worked seven days a week with just a few hours of sleep each night. ...I can't wait, Jake thought, to get the answers!
Refocusing on the meeting, Jake realized The Group, like himself, was a bit stunned from the meeting's discussion. The timing of the revelations was profoundly perfect. Now, they resumed the biggest superpuzzle ever undertaken on Earth with explosive feelings of happiness and pride bursting within them. They were entering the realm of Zons. Ah, how wonderful life was in the Civilization of the Universe!
*
Two days later, The Group gathered again at the Space Library.
When Jake came in, he overheard Ian telling Theodore that he had finally adjusted to three hours of sleep at night. And Ian told him how he has to make his scientists go home to sleep. They were all so excited about the discovery and the initiation of Operation Save Beorapparaus that they did not want to leave the Space Library. After hearing this, Theodore told Ian he had just helped him identify perhaps the supersociety's greatest common-denominator need next to biological immortality: a sleep-reduction machine. That time-saving invention would be the most in-demand product today. Everyone was so excited by their Friday-Night essences and by building their competitive creations and spending time with their loved ones that everyone would love to eliminate sleep or at least cut it back 80%, Theodore was saying. The sleep-reduction machine would be his next project. Ian asked Theodore if he could be the first customer. They laughed, and then Ian began the meeting.
"I have some interesting information for you about the second beam," Ian said, looking around at his soul mates, then resting his eyes on Natasha. "Beorapparaus can envision the supersociety. He can ingeniously predict the phenomenon that we discovered in the supersociety: the superpuzzles. From that, he realizes that without being able to snap his Neothink creations into larger superpuzzles, he cannot move forward fast enough to bring competitive, meaningful values to his Zons. So, interestingly, he decided to turn to art. He has devoted himself to capturing the contrast between the dark, everyone-dies anticivilization and the bright, everyone-lives Civilization of the Universe, which he knows is `out there waiting for me'."
Oh yes, that would be a wonderful value Jake thought, remembering his own thoughts about how he and Jasmine, coming out of the anticivilization would always have an added shine of appreciation for the Civilization of the Universe that Little Jake never would. But with Beorapparaus's art, if done successfully, Little Jake and every generation thereafter, forever into the future, could also have that added shine of appreciation for their world of pure good, free from purposeful bad. Yes, Jake reflected, that would be a powerful, eternal value to Zons everywhere. In fact, Jake realized, Beorapparaus may have come upon one of the most unique values in existence: it would be the only value to which the more advanced level of the Zon, the more valuable the art becomes, for it would give that advanced Zon a unique experience, a unique appreciation of the beauty around him. No Zon could create this value -- only a survivor of the anticivilization.
"I want to deviate for a moment to acknowledge something I find amazing," Ian continued, looking again at Natasha. "Natasha's story 35 years ago in our third-grade Breakthrough News really affected me back then. Last night, I went back and read her story called Sole Survivor about Sergio, the great scientist. Natasha, it is amazing how your story written when you were just a child so parallels this unfolding discovery of Beorapparaus, especially your identification that Sergio turned to the arts...in your story, he turned to classical music."
"That is amazing," Miss Annabelle injected. "Neothink accurately predicts or creates the future. I pull out and read through your Breakthrough News every few months. I've done that for 35 years. I do that because your booklet is the beginning of the Civilization of the Universe on Earth. Ian, when you get a chance, read through the whole booklet. As children, you and your classmates were writing about the supersociety stimulations, as Jake identified in his articles, of the Civilization of the Universe. You grew up and developed those supersociety stimulations that obsoleted the spiral-of-death stimulations of the anticivilization. The human race leapt to the new stimulations the twelve of you along with Bruce Salinski and my husband and Jake and Jasmine created. This group created the future we now live in. You created the Civilization of the Universe on Earth, and you can see the blueprints in Breakthrough News. ...Of course, now your time has come to reach beyond Earth, beyond our realm of consciousness."
The exciting meeting continued. The Neothink puzzle pieces to the superpuzzle Operation-Save-Beorapparaus were snapped into place. The former students were going to create the future, again. Jake, now 29 years old, felt eruptions of happiness going off inside him. What will the next five month's bring?
*
The inside of the massive hangar in New Jersey was dark, except for the lighted bleachers. Two hundred VIP guests stood on the bleachers. They were too excited to sit down. They would be the first, outside of the creators, to witness on site the grand creation that the whole world threw itself behind, financially and emotionally, for the past four-and-a-half months.
Beautiful classical music suddenly filled the air, and the lights clicked on. Everyone gasped, people swayed. The ship was so large, towering over the crowd, it threw off the onlookers' equilibrium, and they sat down in awe.
No one spoke for ten minutes. The creators decided to keep quiet too. They were the only people who could talk, because they saw the great ship every day of its creation. The others could only look and breathe.
After ten minutes of silence inside the massive hangar in New Jersey, Theodore and Ian walked onto the stage at the mouth of the great ship. They would address the silent crowd.
Theodore and Ian looked like two tiny mice while standing before the giant ship. The ship was round and covered the ground of ten football fields. But what made the ship so huge and the onlookers speechless was how high the dome rose from the ground. The ship was built in forty layers -- it was forty stories high!
Wrapping around the front of the pewter-colored ship in giant white letters was the ship's name: Operation III. The VIP crowd knew what the big white letters spelled only because of the ten-foot model next to the stage.
"Thank you citizens of Earth for contributing the funds to make Operation III possible," Theodore began. This presentation was being seen all over the world. The color purple glowed next to the Patterson Channel. "We named her Operation III, for she's the third Operation to save a conscious life from the everyone-dies anticivilization. During the first Operation, we lost Martin Castlebury. Operation II saved Andy Konosovic. Operation III will save Beorapparaus Tink."
The crowd stood up and roared for a full five minutes. They had recovered from their initial shock upon seeing the massive ship, and they were now releasing their appreciation of that great accomplishment.
"Monitoring the second beam," Ian finally said when the crowd quieted down, "reveals that Operation III will bring back with Beorapparaus an eternal value to citizens of Earth...priceless expressions of art, especially for generations to come, not as reminders of the horrors...but as appreciation of the beauty."
The crowd cheered again.
"Beorapparaus will know we're coming to get him about five earth years before Operation III arrives," Ian continued. "We've sent a beam that'll reach him in ten earth years. Operation III will reach him in about 15 earth years."
"One-hundred families will make the journey," Theodore announced. "Those one-hundred families have already been carefully selected and trained. They're ready to go!"
The crowd roared. No one had, as of yet, sat back down. As the people around Jake cheered wildly, his thoughts zoomed in on the word family. Children now became so integrated with their parents' exhilarating value creations that children became part of that value creation at very young ages, for it was the most exciting thing to do! Family units were inseparable now. The love among parent and child grew more powerful with each passing year.
"Two surgical teams are going," Theodore continued. "They'll perform the Operation at times during the 30-year roundtrip journey and are equipped with the proper medical equipment."
The Operation was now a relatively low-cost procedure with nearly no risks. With the latest technological equipment, two doctors could perform the Operation in less than four hours. Cloning stations had become relatively inexpensive and extremely expedient. Nevertheless, as safe, inexpensive, and risk-free as the Operation had become, it was soon to be obsoleted by Sally's renewed work on controlling cellular growth. Very soon, through her breakthrough work, she would end the ultimate disease of aging. She had already succeeded in laboratory experiments. Very soon, she and Theodore would take the ultimate consumer product to the marketplace. Her original medical masterpiece -- the Operation -- would still be valuable for accident victims.
"Our travelers in Operation III will enjoy going to the beach with real, beachlike atmospheric conditions including sunny days with blue skies, overcast days, and even rainy days. The ocean will have calm days, and stormy days with large waves, just like the beaches on Earth. They'll enjoy a large Nature Center that contains a balanced ecosystem, food, and several pleasing-to-look-at wild animals that will breed...and die, just like on Earth. I've personally enjoyed going aboard and taking my morning runs through the Nature Center."
The crowd laughed. They would love to go on board for a tour, but the ship was too large, and it would launch in six days. There were still four major breakthroughs needed before the launch, but knowledge advanced so fast now, the breakthroughs would easily be made and in place in time.
The "tour" would start soon. The inside of the ship, room by room, would be shown directly before their eyes, as a three-dimensional, true-to-life-color hologram.
As the hologram tour began, Jake felt himself filling with enormous pride, witnessing the apex of human achievement.
*
Everyone for hundreds of miles around would be able to see the launch. At 8:00 a.m., day zero, every facing window of every office building and skyscraper, nearly every yard of every house, every playground of every school for hundreds of miles was occupied by citizens of Earth to witness their launch into Zonhood.
The Group stood together in a glass booth near the hangar. The roof of the hangar had been removed. Patterson was sending the live event throughout the world on the Patterson Channel.
Jake heard a gentle hum and saw a soft light suddenly escaping through the cracks and hinges of the massive hangar. A moment later, there it was! The people in the glass booth let out sounds of awe as the top of the huge dome slowly rose out of the hangar, like a giant conscious being coming up for a look around.
Then the body rose, very slowly, growing bigger and bigger. It seemed to rise forever, like the giant ship was stretching longer and longer as it rose out of the hangar, revealing its unbelievable size. The great ship now blocked the Sun and cast a humbling shadow over the glass booth, dwarfing everything beneath it. Yet these people, who looked like tiny mice next to the giant ship, created it.
While looking up, Jake could feel his mouth drop open. Then, the bottom of the ship appeared. Beneath it was a beautiful, bluish-white cone of light. The huge ship seemed to rest on that beautiful pillar of light as it slowly, steadily lifted the ship.
The emerging cone of light filled then quickly eliminated the shadow with an unusual, cool light. Jake glanced around the room at the faces of Jasmine, Sally, Theodore, Cathy, Ian, Miss Annabelle, Mr. Melbourne, Rico, Reggie, Natasha, Jeremiah, Al, Debbie, Jonathan, Robert, and Bruce. This phenomenon was their creation.
As the gentle light glowed upon the creators' faces through the glass, Jake saw, for the first time, not the faces of the innocent child, not the faces of God-Men...he saw the faces of Zons.
Jake looked back at their creation. It seemed surreal, something so big, levitating...and in such total control, so slowly and steadily rising. Citizens of Earth had never seen a controlled fusion lift off. It was beautiful: a quiet hum, a soft, cool cone of light beneath the great ship.
The great pillar of light lifted the ship toward the cosmos, like it was citizens of Earth's first great offering to the Civilization of the Universe. This was our first contribution of love and compassion beyond our realm of consciousness, our first contribution to Zon's house -- his value creation...our Universe.
Indeed, Zon's house of values will now harvest this first universal value creation from planet Earth...the newest citizens to the Civilization of the Universe.
Jake was bursting with pride. This is what it takes to become a first-level Zon, he thought...to create and inject a value of love and compassion beyond our realm into Zon's house. We're doing that! We're earning our place in the Civilization of the Universe.
In the presence of the overwhelming size of the ship and the enormous energy needed to lift it, Jake could barely believe he heard only a gentle, soft hum and saw only a gentle, soft light. Jake realized this was energy captured in gorgeously efficient use. Nothing was wasted. It was the ultimate demonstration of man's mind, his bigger-than-life creations, his complete control over mass and energy.
As Operation III rose from Earth to begin its journey beyond our realm of consciousness, those adults he loved most, standing shoulder to shoulder next to him, changed before his eyes...from citizens of Earth to controllers of the cosmos. As the great ship slowly rose higher, Jake did not know what he wanted to view more -- the creation or the creators. His eyes swept back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, and all he could think of was the beauty that filled his sight.
As the great sphere rose on its pillar of light, further and faster until it looked like a little coffee saucer in the sky...and then a speck...a speckle...gone, Jake knew his soul mates started the day as God-Men, but now they were Zons. Together, they reached out to control the cosmos through pure love and compassion for conscious life.
"Beorapparaus, your Zons are coming to get you," Jake whispered. "Your Zons."
Sally, still looking at the sky, her face radiating with beauty and power, a beautiful Zon, said, "We did it. We put every bit of our brains, power, and technology to the supreme test: to free and save the supreme value. Now, if they're out there, we have earned the return of our loved ones!"
Jake felt a surge of adrenaline from Sally's command. Patterson was feeding Sally's passionate command, live around the globe. People around the world felt that same surge of adrenaline, and then they shuddered in anticipation of what tomorrow would bring.
*
Early the next morning when Jasmine opened her eyes, the first thing she saw in the twilight was Little Jakey sleeping in front of her, between herself and Jake. She scooted forward, against Little Jake. She wrapped her other arm around Jake's chest.
"God, I love you guys," she whispered passionately yet very quietly so as not to wake her precious Jakes. After a few minutes of quiet reflection, she very softly said, "I cannot forget you, Daddy. I love you so much, and I really, really miss you."
Jasmine did not know Jake was awake. Before he could tell her, the phone rang startling them both.
"Hello." Jake said without getting out of bed. Phones now worked by voice command anywhere in the house and could transmit and amplify voices while blocking out other frequencies to carry on clear conversations while standing, sitting, lying, or walking around, anywhere in the house.
"Jake!" Ian shouted, oblivious to the time of day.
"Hi Ian."
"Hi Jake. Jasmine...you there too?"
"I'm here," she said.
"You must come and see this. The Overlay Charts...they're revealing all the answers! Our decryption experts have, through the Overlay Charts, cracked a code of activities by conscious minds...a code of consciousness you might say. Essentially everything conscious beings have done or will do can be charted and predicted. And that's what I mean by we're getting all the answers. It's like discovering the Periodic Table for consciousness. Jasmine, we can figure out what happened to our loved ones after they died."
Jake and Jasmine were already out of bed running around, getting dressed while Ian was talking.
"This is beyond description...beyond beauty," Ian cried out. "Everything has rhythm and rhyme and harmony. It's the music of Zons! See you soon, guys!" Ian hung up.
As Jake and Jasmine raced about, opening and shutting drawers and closets, putting clothes on, little eight-month-old Jakey sat in the middle of the bed watching them, laughing and laughing as though they were putting on a show for him.
That sound, Jake thought, that amazing sound! He stopped and looked at Little Jakey. His brown eyes were wide, brilliant and his chubby cheeks were rosy red. The corners of his mouth were curved up high, a smile so full of glee that it was crooked and out of coordination. He looked back at his father and cocked his head, looking almost as if he knew something and was wondering if his father was figuring it out. Little Jakey laughed again.
That sound, the antithesis of the anticivilization, the epitome of pure good...the ultimate sound, like some kind of comforting music. The small child's laugh, Jake realized, was the most soothing sound to a conscious being...the music of Zons? Yes, the music of Zons.
A small child...a million-year-old Zon -- they're the same...the same innocence. Jake looked into this son's eyes again, deeper this time. Suddenly, Jake's skin began to fill with goose bumps. The answers are right here, he realized.
When he looked deep into his son's eyes, Jake had a eureka experience: while looking into his son's eyes, Jake suddenly knew the Unified Field -- the single source that every event in the Civilization of the Universe linked back to: it was LOVE.
"Zons are the omnipresent love that fills the Universe, forever watching over us, forever protecting us...forever saving us," he whispered. Then he paused for a moment, and added, "And now, we are Zon rookies on our first mission to save conscious life out there. We are watching over Beorapparaus; we are saving him. We are Zons; we are part of the omnipresent love!"
With that realization, an unprecedented feeling flooded Jake. He looked stunned.
"What is it?" Jasmine asked him.
"A new feeling," he said, "beyond anything I've felt before. Jassy, it's like electricity going through me...but it feels good! ...Oh man, you know the exhilaration we wake up to every morning as God-Man?"
"Yes," she said. "That feeling is what drove our civilization to eradicate death."
"Darling...this feeling goes far beyond God-Man," Jake said, still stunned. "I think this is the feeling we'll wake up to every morning as Zon."
Jasmine stopped moving about and reflected on the great accomplishment the day before. After about a minute, her eyes suddenly opened wide as though something had shocked her.
"Oh my...Jake, I feel it too. I feel it too!"
Little Jakey laughed at them again. Jake and Jasmine looked at their baby and suddenly knew that he felt it, too. In fact, he had felt it all along.
"That's what he's been trying to tell me," Jake uttered.
*
When they approached the entrance to the Space Library, Jasmine had no idea what the charts she was about to face would reveal about her father. She did not know if she would be eternally reunited or eternally devastated. She shuddered at the thought. The stakes were so high.
At the door she stopped. She looked down at her son in Jake's arm, her little Zon, who looked up at her with every bit of love his little body could muster. Jasmine gasped, for she suddenly knew what her father saw and felt 28 years ago...when he looked down at her.
She reached out to rub Little Jakey's hair. Her hand was trembling. Little Jakey burst into one of his uncoordinated smiles of glee, which filled Jasmine with beautiful happiness.
She then realized why her daddy loved her so much...she filled him with beautiful happiness.
And now, she knew Jake was right: her father's last moment, while looking up at her, was filled with beautiful happiness.
She took a deep breath and put her hand against the door and then stopped. Sensing her hesitation, Jake reassuringly put his other arm around her. He wanted her to take this step at her own pace.
She looked into Jake's eyes and softly said, "Only someone emotionally in the Civilization of the Universe could have felt the kind of connection with a child that my dad felt with me. He was really special."
"He really was," Jake said, remembering the look on her father's face whenever he saw Jasmine. ...In this tender moment, Jake held her tighter. She took another deep breath, looked at Little Jakey, and smiled.
"Your granddaddy belonged in the Civilization of the Universe," she told him. Seeing his mother addressing him, Little Jakey took charge of the moment and started robustly and noisily blowing bubbles to reciprocate and attempt to please his mother. She started laughing at his commotion while, at the same instance, she started crying, knowing her father once looked at her this way.
Encouraged by her big reaction, Little Jakey flapped his arms and legs wildly and put his entire might behind his foaming bubbles. She shook her head and smiled. She realized, now, that every joy Little Jakey brought to her, she had brought to her father.
She leaned over to kiss her little boy on his cheek, which was flush red from his gallant bubble-blowing efforts.
"I love you, sugar pie," she whispered in his ear.
Then she wrapped her arm around Jake and, together, the little family walked through the doors, into the Space Library.
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