8:30 pm
I panic that my phone is flashing even more frantically as I near home. I pull up on my gravel driveway–brakes screeching, tires swerving. It’s a good thing that my husband at the time repairs phones as I try calling him to ask what could be wrong until I realize my phone is now inoperable, flashing more as I attempt to press any buttons.
I open the car door, slamming it behind me, running to the front door of the house, opening, then slam that one, too. I rush to my computer, awakening it from “sleep mode” to search for possible explanations on the internet. What if my phone explodes?
I open my browser, clicking on the spam folder, seeing that’s where the e-mails are dropping.
There are strange subject titles, back-to-back, more creative than the ones that usually lay siege this folder. I see one titled “please read: not a random e-mail. SPACE SOUND CLIP ON RADIO… YOU LISTENED!” I click. My eyes stare, unblinking.
I hover my cursor over “open”, feeling a lurch in my gut as I click. The following is revealed:
This is not an ordinary letter and its contents will soon disclose the reasons why. Any individual who receives a letter from us will have it personalized to their level of receptivity. Thus, we can easily forgo the formal procedures in introducing oneself and intent and arrive straight at the heart of the matter.
The circumstances of this letter may understandably appear strange and unbelievable to you. Therefore, we will begin by explaining why and how you’ve received this letter.
Earlier, you had filled out an application unknowingly. Actually, it has been an application you have been in the process of filling out for some time as you seek to answer the question, “Who Am I?” The truth is, your essence is timeless for you are a multi-dimensional being.
Time operates as a continuum. Therefore, it must not be entirely shocking when we say that, as the Inter-Routes, we emit radio sounds from the future. In your time-period of 2014 AD, there are underground internet cables. The Wi-fi adapter on your computer/cell phone device connects with these underground cables through radio signals while your mind’s signals connect with ours.
You’ve been exposed to a sound clip of the universe through one of our radio stations and how dimensions work. You’ve processed the radio signal in your brain, and in turn, have connected to our cables like a device. The internet cables of your day contain fiber optics, whereas our cables of the future, called the Inter-Routes, contain exotic matter.
The Inter-Routes are actual cables installed across the globe, just as the internet cables of your day are buried in the ground and beneath the ocean. (Please see the following email attachment, though your friend Alex has explained to you the details.) One can access the physical locations of these cables by tuning carefully into the signals we send.
Our cables send up signals into the ionosphere, which strike the third dimension you inhabit. As your brain responds to the signals we send, an electromagnetic field is created.
The Inter-Routes enable interaction among the 10 dimensions of Physics, often categorized under the more popular term, “string theory”. These are the “wormholes,” the points that fold onto other dimensions. One is allowed access to locations above these cables if they fulfill one of 11 categories. (Axis of Unity)
The 11 categories of authorized travel to the Inter-Routes through its Axis of Unity are: purposes related to scientific discovery; official business of government or foreign governments; artistic endeavors; spiritual and philosophical pursuits; educational activities; historic research; environmental research; humanitarian projects; purposes related to societal development and historic innovation; and certain authorized trade, or transmission of information.
Essentially, the Inter-Routes serve as experiential grounds for endeavors likely to alter the course of human affairs, history, or one’s own time-period.
Being able to detect and concentrate on the sounds we send is an indication of one’s candidacy for fulfilling one of the above criteria.
When one tunes into our signal(s), their brain signals connect with the Inter-Routes cables.
Though these cables were installed in an unspecified time period AD, in the future relative to your time, we are still able to communicate with you. Similarly, we have communicated with those who’ve arrived centuries before you.
One does not need a radio or antenna to receive our signals, as the sounds we emit can interweave with and be carried through those that already exist.
Such is the case with the Native American with his bow and arrow in 1632 AD, who hears the signal carried by the rustling of leaves and runs in the darkness of the wood to trace its source, a sound so different from the cry or whimper of an animal at that time of night. As he runs in search of this sound, he emerges into an open field, and by the call of intuition, looks up to be led by the constellations of the sky.
Sometimes the sound will be carried through the flowing currents of a brook, where a discerning maiden can detect the sound and follow it without any distraction.
Other times, it can be carried through the sound of one’s own breath or prayer. For others, it may even blend with the internal rhythm of their heartbeat.
We always send signals, yet seldom few individuals hear them.
Hearing a signal and being allowed access to the Inter-Routes are two separate things. The individual who hears is examined by being sent more signals. In periods preceding yours, potential candidates were sent a messenger or letter explaining these very details in ways they could understand. In your circumstance, a friend of yours served as an unconscious messenger to explain our workings.
Please note that if you’re looking for credentials, you won’t find any. The sole marks of legitimacy are this e-mail itself, the Inter-Routes bearing existence, and your own belief in their truth.
Due to the laws of the Universe, one’s consent cannot be violated. Thus, request for further examination of one’s brain is required to assess whether your, “Teahouse” fulfills the necessary criteria. A contract explaining the details has been attached.
Inter-Routes Terms and Conditions
This contract is personalized for you, because you hate reading long contracts. You don’t even read them. Do not worry, this is only an assumption, we’re not at the stage to “crack open your brain” fully. That’s what this contract is for; however, it is safe to assume you don’t like reading contracts. How? Upon reaching Phase II, you’ve begun to recount a narration, a qualitative account of the effects of these signals on the brain—or in other words, a story. Our cables conducted algorithms allowing us to decode your preferences.
Phase II marks when the brain is activated just before noticing a signal consciously; that is just when you began to recount details relevant to the unfolding of your mission while being unconscious of doing so.
Our signals can appear to you in the form of Sound, feelings, thoughts, taste, scents, body-rhythm, dreams, guides. (For more information see index on Category of Signals.)
You, or more specifically, your inner narrator is currently in the process of capturing your response to these signals, though your conscious self is unaware.
By consciously allowing my anonymous narrator to continue dictating my story, I, the undersigned, hereby solemnly authorize a mysterious group from the future, called the Inter-Routes, to directly contact me and continue compiling my thoughts into a dossier to be delivered as a signal to others while simultaneously being under consideration for advancement on the Inter-Routes.
Though I recognize it would have been ideal that the contract be delivered before my dictation, the 4th dimension here applies as time is not linear.
Blah, blah, blah. The rest is fancy legal stuff that doesn’t matter, because the Universe has its own rules.
Reading this will mean I have provided my signature. Buh-bye.”
A silence permeates the room as the text remains on the screen.
You –you–, reading this; No, not the one with the mouth–she has fainted, her hair appearing more electrocuted than usual given the way her tips stand up. Horrid.. Her subconscious has transitioned from the first point of view to the second. As you stand behind your monitor, page, or whatever means you use to read these words, an Inter-Routes Carrier Wave shoots into your reality, carrying one of your many points of observation as your physical self remains in the reality where you are, the wave continues sweeping you past the monitor or the barrier of a page, monitor sound of audio, or whatever means into her living room. You now on her couch, agreeing and questioning some of her décor choices, watching her as you continue reading this on the Inter-Routes—, hypothesizing that you’re looking at her monitor, reading the rest of this message. Her phone is off.
Calmly retreat from the monitor, pass the living room connected to the dining room, open the door, now close. No need to take the computer with you that won’t be necessary with the instructions we provide. Once you shut the door, you’ll magically be equipped with a backpack, this manual, a compass, and other tools and forms of documentation. Pull out the manual and compass from your bag upon closing the door.
The door slams and you walk down the front steps. Good. We shall proceed. As you read this, remain holding the compass in the center of your palm, fingertips around the rim, antique-like and gold. Notice before you a road that stretches and seems unending. From your perspective, you can’t see where it ends; in fact there is a fog that blocks your view. You can’t even see the intersecting routes–all you see is the gravel, a long and empty road. There’s even a chill that makes you want to wrap yourself. On the other side of the road you can see a sign, slightly smaller than a billboard, that says, “Inter-Routes Axis of Unity Border Control.”
Inspect your body in this reality to notice that you’re equipped with all limbs and senses required to undergo an upcoming journey.
The purpose of the compass you’re holding is to assist you in locating the trails between four stories to better understand how missions in North America are connected on the same network. As websites are the entryway to the internet in 2014, the Interface, stories serve as the interface to the Inter-Routes. Each of the cardinal directions—north, south, east, west– on your compass points to the story’s direction geographically relative to the last one.
Meanwhile, the white house you’ve stepped out of has disappeared as have the steps in the permeating fog. You will find your way back here once you learn to navigate your Inter-Routes compass.
Now take a few steps ahead on the road–that’s it. The compass is guiding you North. Walk on the gravel. Look to the sides of the road. The arrow on your compass is pointing right. Are those woods on both sides?
Before you even consider going in, an invisible force pokes your back like a needle. You look at the compass– the arrow’s tip –realizing that is just the sensation of the orienting arrow of the compass that sits unassumingly in your hand, (a disconnection between the Visual and your sensory feelings; pointing you where to go; albeit with the force of a kind kidnapper holding a weapon. As you march into the woods, do you hear twigs crushing underneath you and the cracking of shrubs? Do you feel the bumpy roads? Can you see the branches of leaves above you and smell their verdant scents? The arrow releases your spine, like a needle, upon which you fall, stumbling into the footprints of a large animal, shallow craters reminding you of bear paws. Rise and keep going, follow them one step at a time. You feel like a child trying on an adult-shoe, your feet lost inside each print, attempting to walk one step at a time. Do this until you arrive at a hedgerow of bushes.
Now, take a deep breath in case any of this might be over-whelming.
The first trail you’ve found has led you out of a story set inside a surburb of Washington DC in 2014 to a new story in the Eastern Woodlands in 1632, 419 miles from each other, 382 years apart. To find the document allowing you to get here, rummage through your bag. You pull out your Special Authorized Reader’s Visa, a hard, glossy card, 2 × 2 inches, in place of a photograph by your name is a mirror with your reflection. You drop the Visa again into your bag as the orienting arrow looms behind you, prodding you to move through the bushes. Your foot stumbles on a red mushroom with white polkadots as you trip.
On your knees, past the shrubs, you see Otetiani, an Iroquois, at a distance. You’re invisible to him just as the hands of your bully-compass are to you. The footprints reappear. Follow these prints through the clearing. Sit beside him on the log placed there for you, fitting “just right,” and also invisible to him. Don’t worry about making any noise; no one will be able to hear you as your visa has a silence chip, hushing your electromagnetic field.
Continue to read this manual, while looking at Otetiani shut his eyes, the tattoos on his chest weaving above the muscles of a finely-honed body. Listen to the chant he sings that’s entwined with a ring of sadness. The colors from the fire cast against as if he were painted. Touch his arm, (no worries, he has subconsciously consented to being touched for educational purposes. see contract). Upon your brush against his arm, he opens his eyes, startled. He can’t see you; thus surmising it’s a breeze and goes back to his chant. You progress at reading this manual, its pages transitioning from a second to third-person narration, to explain how Otetiani is about to become conscious of his signal for the first time.
Otetiani retreats to this clear patch of ground alone at sunset, parting from the men he’s come with for the annual hunt to scout a spot teeming with game, rejoining his party the latter part of the night. Before he sets out on his search, he reflects on a dream burning inside, a purpose he can’t reveal yet covets in secret around the fire. Three nights before the Hunter’s Moon reigns the sky, just as the moon is preparing for fullness, he tosses a twig into the blaze; frustrated at his hopes of uniting all Native Americans in a confederacy (like that of the Iroquois—or in his language, the Haudenosaunee, The People of the Long House– with its Five Nations—the Seneca, Mohawks, Onondaga, Oneida, Cayuga and a century later, what would be a Nation of Six with the joining of the Tuscarora) being dashed before he could ever share them out loud. As a stranger sits beside him reading his story, unbeknowest to him, dark wafts of smoke rise, curling, and it is just then the sound begins to murmur in Otetiani’s ears above his chant–a rustle, distinct from the crackling fire.
Otetiani goes silent, his eyes dart to the trees skirting the campsite, finding the sound emanate from the wood. He slings bow over shoulder, anticipating the source of sound to be an animal, an encounter likely to involve a hunt. Remorse runs cold inside him, as it had since childhood, more so than the brisk, autumn chill; having never grown immune to a shriek and cry of pain in an animal he lifts by the neck at a shot of an arrow, and helpless look in their eyes, the panicked motion of their legs, worse is when they have young; yet the belief in the spirit of animals being eternal, journeying from one phase to the next, like the moon transiting in cycles was what propelled him; as did the distinction in lore between the good hunter and the bad; of animals never begrudging a good hunter providing for his village if his purpose was to survive; and who dedicated ceremonies in honor of these animals crossing over to the last phase of the cycle of life.
As the sound of fists pounding on wood accompany the rustle, he tunes his ears suspiciously; the noise resembles too closely a human’s striking knuckles to be caused by hooves or paws of the ordinary kind.
Bred as a warrior from birth, knowing every track and sound of the forest, he creeps towards the noise, perplexed at not being able to identify the source for the first time. The sound of rattling branches loudened, approximating the sound of leaves shaking, falling, as if knocked by a horde of animals, like the antlers of elk or bears scavenging for honey; though the greater likelihood is a brigade of men preparing for ambush.
Otetiani steps back, blinking, then opening eyes sharp as arrows, seeing the leaves still fixed on their limbs, the fall leaves gleaming under moonlight –red, orange, yellow and emerald. All look serene before the forest entrance. Only through sound does something make its presence clear, rising over crickets’ chirping their last songs before the coming of frost in a day or two’s time, even quieting the owl and brother coyote’s call.
The second, third, and fourth night, the sound come at this time, following the same order of events; a rustle sparking at the forest-edge, tree-trunks being pounded, the stirring of leaves– the guise of a peaceful night. A discrepancy between sight and sound.
At sunset, Otetiani lights the fire, and like his dream keeps what he’s heard a secret lest he isn’t believed. At dusk, he creeps towards the forest, mingled with the scents of pine, oak, moss and hickory, tiptoeing past the leaves into the shadows where autumn colors are concealed.
Amid the shade, the rustling, pounding, stirring transforms into foot-stomps stomping once.. twice… charging in the opposite direction.. actions that Otetiani perceives as a dare. He pounces, trying to grab the source but misses; tripping with the grace of a mountain lion, scraping his knees, and bolts, sprinting after thudding steps. A chase begins, unclear of who, what, the hunter or prey is as this all could be a ploy luring Otetiani into a trap–or pray–, as instinct knows the sound is not of this world.
Never does Otetiani find a trace or outline, any indication of body or shape. Just the footsteps of something or someone outpacing him; an enigma threatening to tip over the forest, pounding in his ear drum, amplifying with each stride; footsteps he can’t see feeling closer; the shattering of ground and crunching leaves sounding clearer. Goosebumps rise on the body, as do the strands of his mohawk. A presence so near that if it possessed a tail or any hint of a physical body, Otetiani could grab it but each time he’s tried his fists have clenched air. His attempts at trying to feel that which can’t be seen lasting throughout the night..
As the cracks of dawn seep through the branches, the steps of a mysterious force cease, leaving Otetiani to the sound of the birds and his own defeated steps returning to camp. He whips around every few feet to see if there are prints, any heads peeping from behind trees, tracking him with hungry eyes but sees none. He treads to camp, extinguishing the fire he’d left burning, then rejoins the men, meeting their reproval for failing to report a site, though they overlook his shortcoming on account of his skill as a hunter and warrior.
On the fourth night, the Hunter Moon is out, beaming its fullest glow, fueling the energy to run, casting the light to find. The moon’s red-stained color surges the blood in his veins along with the wisdom in him to surrender. Otetiani shuts his eyes. If his eyes continue sensing dark maybe the sound won’t leave at the first glint of light. As the sound consumes him, his feet harmonize with the rhythm of these steps. He’s fearless of crashing into trees, of falling, of branches stabbing his eyes as they do the rest of his body. Senses are heightened, attuned to the direction of motion, allowing him to maneuver, swerve, jump with his eyes closed. His own scampering falls silent as the power quiets. Otetiani freezes and the spotlight is left to the one or two crickets’ last performance, as the moon is able to shine through the branches tonight.
The Warrior opens his eyes, facing a wiry thicket; the sound creeps through it like footsteps sweeping on brush. He follows, swatting branches, hearing a low growl quieting as the sound of steps pace into silence. Otetitiani gently pushes the last branches aside, tiptoeing onto an open field.
He stops and listens intently, darting his eyes for some cue, feeling the grass brush against his thighs.
And then the sound charges again. The Warrior chases it, now barefooted, the moccasins having worn off his feet. He slips into the grass whose stalks rise above him, his knees rested in a crawling position, listening, head turned skyward to the sound of stomps leaping towards the stars. There’s a transition of silence, marked by Otetiani’s breathing as his eyes scan the skies.
At once, he steadies them at finding the Constellation of the Great Bear, tuning his ears to the sound of new breaths echoing from there—deep and raspy. The four stars trailing behind her resemble the long tails the Haudosaunee say had belonged to ancient bears, but according to lore are the hunters who’d chased bend her from land to the skies. The White Man knows her as “Ursa Major,” in Latin meaning the “Great She Bear” her origins based in Greek mythology; but to the People of the Longhouse, she’s Nyah Gwaheh—a magical, monster bear.
Again, there’s no change in sight as all change occurs through sound alone. The celestial bear whose body comprises the Big Dipper for her hindquarters glimmers as she’s done every night this season. Blue and black shades—dark as a raven– permeate the sky as the Hunter’s Moon has risen further above the horizon, flushing the scenery in its glow.
The rise and fall of breath from the heavens is not reflected in the bear’s chest given that its stars shine still, but in the sound of murmurs falling one-by-one to Otetiani’s ears. Otetitani clutches the grass, his heaves drumming through his own chest, flaring through the nostrils, the heavens seeming to breathe through him.
Having always tuned his ears to sounds at every range, he disregards for the first time since becoming a hunter any sound ranging on the fainter scale on which his own panting now falls. All sound, including the grass-stalks and trees swayed by wind is drowned by snorts and breaths thundering from above— that is suddenly interrupted by new noise.
Otetitani darts up like an arrow at the sound of one being shot swiftly through the skies. The sight of an arrow is absent, though its sound corresponds with a red meteor, much like a firebolt, darting into Nyah-Gwaheh, dipping through the empty space of her chest—upon which the sound of her breath ruptures into a roar. The meteor fades into a void, as does her growl dwindling into a low grumble; yet the effects of the combined sounds reverberate, shaking Otetiani at his core. Like the ripples of a stone casted into water, a pulse spirals in his gut as he recalls stampedes of buffalo, noting Nyah-Gwaheh’s volume was louder.
And now it’s silent.
Otetiani catches his breath, reorienting himself; his feet planted as his head remains in the clouds—spinning while swirls of them drift in the sky, especially above Nyah-Gwaheh. He takes time tempering each breath as his dilated eyes steady on the Bear, regarding her with awe. Nyah-Gwaheh hovers above the horizon in the distance, just above trees cloaked in shadows; closest to the point where sky meets Earth, a position she’s been in since the arrival of fall after being shot by the hunters who loom behind her, looking much like a tail.
In her proximity to the trees during this time of the year, Nyah-Gwaheh’s blood drips onto leaves at the beginning of the season, garnishing them with colors that characterize fall. A red one stirs from a nearby tree, drifting to join the dead ones in the grass. Soon, as the great bear is roasted by the hunters, her fats will drip as snow. The appearance of the Hunter’s Moon signifies it will be soon; appearing right as the first slicks of frost begin to stick, and the last crickets have sung and as the nights are to go quiet.
The presence of blood in the moon is a reminder of the continuation of life in the perceived stillness –or death—that comes with winter. Though Nyah-Gwaheh’s story illustrates the beginning of autumn Otetiani surmises the story was reenacted through sound these past nights to mark the moving of one season into another; as stories themselves are in transit, cycled from beginning to end, repeating for as long as there is a listener.
This story is one which the arrows do not kill the great bear; her spirit always escapes, unrestrained to a body or collection of stars; perhaps off into slumber for the season, or the realm where all animals go when honored by good hunters. Upon returning from hibernation in the spring, Nyah-Gwaheh’s spirit rebounds to the sky, occupying the constellation again, resuming the chase in a circle around the North Star. She moves in this loop as the hunter’s follow–having their chance to recapture her body in autumn.
It’s a story Otetitani will read when looking at the sky with all the Haudosaunee, discerning which phase the hunters are in, when Nyah-Gwaheh is awake, leading the chase. In the meantime, as the bear’s body has dipped toward the horizon, allowing her spirit to escape from sky to land, he’ll listen for her intently on ground as one of the few hunters who’ve ever sensed her trail. The others who have are the band of hunters behind Nyah-Gwaheh’s body, having located her path during the time they lived on land. Yet why has Nyah-Gwaheh appeared to Otetiani?
Trails are often seen not heard, through the clues of a footprint or scraps of a meal, though now he must listen for one, developing a new skill in pursuit of the legendary bear whose path he may or may encounter again. Will he hear her in spring or have any chance of finding her den in winter? He lifts his arrow hanging by his side, regarding it– will there be any use? He’s doesn’t know, for he’s never hunted a spirit before.
As a Hunter, scout, and Native American, Otetitani knows the importance of cycles; of the moon, seasons, stars, and days. Cycles are, afterall, the main component to finding trails. Most importantly, to Otetitani and his people cycles are the essence of life. Now, under the fullness of the moon pulsing life and blood, he listens. Having caught up to his breath, “He is prepared,”; the meaning of his name.
As you stand there, watching Otetiani return to the forest entrance on your left, you hear a buzz, thinking it’s a bee until your compass stings you at the spine. Again, the compass arrow points SW and like a pirate prods you to move across the field as if you were walking the plank to face your final moments before submerging to sea; that is exactly how you feel as you are pushed into the other forest entrance, stumbling on another mushroom upon the arrow’s release, “off into the jolly roger yeh go, yeh scallywag.” From the other side, a crack of light casts through the darkness of the wood, revealing a trail of moss, looking and feeling much like seaweed, as you step and slide on it and are led out onto another field on a sunny day.
You continue reading, hearing a door shut, watching a girl of about 11 in the year 1856 from across the green fields. She walks down a hill after being ordered to fetch water in Minnesota, having recently moved there with her family from the Sweden. She is on her usual trek to the stream, a short distance from the log cabin where they’ve have stayed with relatives for close to three weeks—a visit that will last until the completion of their own home next door. She sways the pail absent-mindedly, wearing her cotton dress and bonnet. It seems to be just an ordinary day since arriving there as she hears it–that sound, whereupon she shuffles her feet to a stop.
It’s an all-too-familiar sound, though one she doesn’t expect to hear in the grasslands of Minnesota; though to her surprise, it’s the second time. The first was just last night, as she was drifting to sleep, hearing the ocean waves crash against a ship’s hull in her bedroom which she surmised was just her mind’s way of lulling her to sleep.
Here, out in the open with her blue eyes widened and awake, she looks to the left and right, seeing the dandelions and wild flowers. She roves her head around to the skirts of the woods; then to the window of the log cabin behind her to see whether Mama is frowning at her for idling. To her relief, the curtain blows against an empty window, containing no disapproving spies at its ledge. She’s alone in this sea of grass, or more literally the stretch of meadow. Lara has an impulse to close her eyes, to follow instead of question; quieting the adult-like worry that she just might be losing her mind—ignoring it only briefly, pleased that she can, as she’s not fully an adult— yet.
She wobbles in a zigzag pattern, mimicking the way she’d moved on a ship that buoyed its way from Sweden to New York; marking the first phase of her journey before embarking across the new country on train, steamboat, and wagon. Having trodded in mud for months, she and her family arrived at their homestead safely, facing the threat of cholera and bandits; now she traces the path of sound, the mystery of these ocean waves in a lush, green land. Her braids brush each cheek, shaded by her bonnet, skirt swishing, evoking the motion of waves as the warmth of sunlight casts through the sky, a crisp, breeze engulfing the scene. Her eyes shut amid the sound of robins chirping, replaced by the squawks of seagulls. She also remembers the spray of salty mist as she ambles through thatches of berries in the grass; the feel of the ship rocked by a rising wave.
So entranced by the pull of this sound, of a vast ocean she can’t see–crashing, swishing– that she tips over the edge of the creek. Uh-oh. Drenched to her waist Lara opens her eyes, having toppled onto pebbles and stones. Her bucket bobs away upon which she rises, dashing after it like a wet cat. The sound of ocean waves weave through the gentle flow of the stream– the tributary of this invisible ocean. Lara catches up to her bucket, water seeps into it, she bends, grabbing its handle. She looks eagerly into the creek to find some visible hint of the ocean as one might when hoping to see water at the bottom of a well. Maybe there’ll be some foam, a seashell, or seaweed mixed in with the moss between the stones; but she only finds a reflection of herself, a familiar ripple, a frown at the sound of ebbing tides, disappearing and flowing away with the brook.
You watch the pail bouncing at a bend as it disappears from view–no different in the eyes of Lara as you are invisible to her, too. The compass arrow turns N then goes haywire. You watch it spin uncontrollably, its tip sneaks up from the back, tingling, scratching your spine—up and down; you get goosebumps, shaking your hips, dancing the boogie-woogie to shake out your nerves. Your feet begin to lift off the grass and the arrow does you a favor by stabbing you —yes it stabs your back—you feel it stretching, piercing through your chest like a hook, giving entirely new meaning to “True North” as it flings you in the direction of the skies. You spin (on this hook..) until you’re reoriented upward like an arrow; a magnetic pull keeping you afloat at rocket speed.
You find yourself amid the clouds, flying.. razing directly underneath the sun as the already read pages from the manual fly away… floating.. floating.. until you suddenly realize that you’re positioned below an actual rocket ship, looking through its window at the bottom, immune to the puffs of fuel from its engine.
Bobbing along with the ship, you’re ever-so-invisible among the stars. The pages of the manual have drifted from Earth with you; the absence of gravity causing them to float around you. The compass arrow follows along, the compass still in your hand though, its hook stabbing you, reorienting you to ensure you continue soaring on the proper trail, further assisting you by poking through the pages, handing you the ones you’re supposed to read.
Peering through the window you have yet another story to observe of the astronaut you see.
In 2051 A.D. a man is pressed in a spacecraft, squished, experiencing a rattling tug of war in his body, one of many, conflicting sensations that his ribs will snatch as the pressure mounts on top of him like toppling boulders. The rocket roars while a crew of six whiz past the clouds of Earth into space; ears popped, innards twisted inside out, “And they’ve made it, Houston.” Frazzled, Gerardo Flores is relieved he can breathe; the humidity of his breath is recycled into water running through a purification system to be used later by the crew.
He floats dizzily, past the window below him, seeing the clouds they’ve transcended, the oceans of cerulean covering the Earth; the continent of the Americas; one mass of green, encapsulating the tropics, desert terrain to snowcapped peaks cities and quiet towns, swirls of clouds hover above it; the ship moves further and further away from the view at blistering speed; rotating its star trekkers on the exterior to mark two stars– happening to belong to Ursa Major, or who we know as Nyah-Gwaheh, another pair of stars, then the next; a method used to spot their location in the universe.
On the surface, Gerardo looks calm as he looks out that window, observing the passing darkness and pinpricks of light–; though internally, something stirs, enough to take his attention off the racketing of the ship as Commander Mort talks at the control panel. “Houston..,” the other crew members listening to the exchange. Trying to focus, Gerardo’s eyes press shut and he listens, but hears his heartbeat and breath instead, thump, thump; on his way to find life on Mars, he feels the pulse of life beating in his chest– a discovery; his feet tapping to the rhythm en route to the red planet.
As you watch Gerardo’s performance dance, the compass arrow stabs you through your back, dragging you, your hands slide down the window (if you were left to yourself, you’d be floating around all day, you know). You go down, down, approaching Earth’s brilliant, almost spherical shape; descending past the atmosphere, defying the laws of atmospheric physics as you dip through each of its layers, falling. A parachute pops out of your knapsack as you shoot down into the ionosphere, where the Inter-Routes’ signals interact, and as you hit the toposphere the compass slips out of your hand. Clink. From a bird’s eye view you see below you the grey, asphalt road with the compass shining on the ground, appearing larger, or closer in size as you keep falling. The orienting arrow spins frantically, but where is it directing you? As you are seconds from landing, the arrow points up in the direction of your tush. You think the arrow will splice through you, from your bottom up through your head, but instead you feel a nice cushion upon landing, as if you were seated on the mats in the tea ceremony. Ahh.. that’s nice. Why couldn’t the compass have always been this accommodating?
Now that you are situated, take the compass from underneath you, where you feel the.. asphalt.. and a quick look around your environment. You are on the road again in the dark, the stars of space that you just visited glimmering above you, and you’re reading again, the missing pages of the manual raining from above and restacking in your lap. Pull out the Visa from your bag, the one you.. before Otetiani’s story, and have a closer look at it this time…After you do..
The sign across from you reads..
Now, put these two together: the Visa and the Sign.
This Visa has enabled you access to the border between the Inter-Routes and “reality” which the characters you’ve read about do not yet have.
They are still in their fourth-dimensional realities, (yes fourth, all with the exception of the primary node, the one with the mouth, who remains in the third), everyone’s visas yet to be issued after hearing their first signal consciously. As a reader, you are waiting for them to realize our existence. Once you meet them at the border, they will resume their journey their journey with you to the actual Inter-Routes; the conditions of your own visa being contingent on their discovery.
Their stories are all on the same network due to the nature of their missions and being located on the same continent of North America, (or in the case of Gerardo, right above it). Oh, and not to mention, being different aspects of the same self, just as you are another of these selves, in the event you may be finding yourself indistinguishable within the altering points of view (assuringly, you’ll get the knack of it).
Like data flowing between the devices of a home or office in 2016 on a Local Access Network, through the assistance of your compass, you will flow through the stories discovering the connections between their missions on this border.. connection to the internet.. and the workings of the Inter-Routes. Like any journey, it will require patience.
Take a deep breath..The compass points .. you feel its arrow patting your shoulder like a sympathetic hand, marching you to the edge of the Black Forest to embark on your next trail.
Are you ready to go back to the first story?
Oh, and when return inside the house, help yourself to a cup of tea, will you? No one in the house will even know you’re there.