Frankentown (23 page)

It was a powerful force with bright yellow aura.

It intimidated the impish little gray that Frank had once bashed to pulp with a hammer.

We will all perish
∴
The gray’s absolute hopelessness brought out a coyness in the elder, who felt he should clarify his thought.

That’s why we must fare back
∴
Do not despair
∴
If we could, we would fare back and stop it once and for all
∴

The shaman sincerely looked the younger one in the face and smiled.

Humans would cook medium-rare from traveling that far anyway
∴

They could not withstand traveling half a century
∴
And You
could barely survive a couple of weeks, boozeball.
 

The grumpy old gray geezer amused the younger one and its spirits instantly lifted.
 

This cannot end well
∴
The geezer shut his eyes, weighing out when to best speak.

The rogues would not force peace
∴
We need to ally with surface men before the rogues do
∴

Chapter Twentyseven
 

So, Anyway
…
.

The complex life on earth was not simply bound to that which is alive through your eyes
∴
You’ve chosen to ignore what you cannot see
∴
You see us because you are not in the reality you know, the one you’re used to
∴
You’ve shed your skin on earth and followed us
∴

Your etheric body traveled close to us
∴
The energy spectrum that is the very core of you
∴
Your soul
∴
Therefore, you are no longer in what you call a waking reality
∴

We, too, are etheric beings
∴
Eternal Beings
∴

Your decisions take you on many paths
∴
Our paths do not belong all in one sequence of time
∴

We travel time for our destinies
∴

We are our masters
∴

We no longer belong in your reality, that’s why most people no longer speak to us
∴

Many thousands of years ago, we were regular visitors in your spectrum
∴
We were popular
∴
Back then the earth was hot and full of water
∴
As you know, the earth gets hot and cold in intervals
∴
Whether seasons in a year, or hot and cold climate changes, the climate was very hot and humid and new lands were only beginning to form around active volcanoes
∴

We stood by and helped the fish form and start crawling ashore
∴
When mammals and primates came, we came and offered advice; a helping hand
∴
In return, you gave us love
∴
Which is rare
∴
You created energy for us
∴

From then on we’ve checked in now and then, to make sure you’re okay
∴

If your etheric body is separated from your physical shell too long,

you could lose it, and not finding it again, you would become what you’d call a ghost
∴

A dislodged etheric being
∴

Such bodies are stuck in the ethereal world, trying to find their physical shells with little success and are trapped with themselves, living through their transgressions, left to ponder
∴
Purgatory for eternity
∴

The most desperate and sorry of those you would call poltergeist
∴

Sinners
∴
Demons of the underworld
∴
Rebels
∴

We can transform from spirit to gray
∴

Time, by itself was more than enough
∴

We live out our lives impacting space and time
∴
You only impact space
∴

It is an intertwined spiral
∴
A fractal
∴

A never ending cycle
∴
Time and space are merely axis we chose to move along
∴
We modify potential representative candidates in the future, while this past ,(our now) still stands
∴
It’s easy to make one forget what happened
∴
But harder with hundreds or thousands
∴
When we cannot remove what’s been done, we add context to it
∴
It’s not always easy making the right decisions
∴
Just the right thing. As if that isn’t bad enough, life goes in cycles and everything is pretty much set up in a way that you are made to constantly struggle
∴

Sucks, human
∴

Do hyenas retire?
∴

There’s always a price to pay
∴

We have broken our own rules, for your own good
∴

Last few weeks of your life has been our doing
∴

You are connected to us, and we to you
∴
This is how we speak
∴

We have led you through a hard path of life, which you did not deserve
∴

Loss of family on the human time path is an unthinkable burden
∴

By now you have understood we possess the power of travel through the fabric of time and space,

but it would be yet another injustice to try to correct the wrongs that were done to you
∴

You anomaly
∴

Something has made you remember what your ancestors have done so well: accept us
∴

Like seasons, it was meant to be
∴

Life has delivered you here,

and we honor this
∴

Your memories will forever belong to you
∴
Visit them as you may
∴

A true memory lasts a lifetime
∴

We have other tidings
∴

I cannot allow you to travel through time with us yet
∴

Though your spirit is strong, your body cannot stand traveling far in time
∴
The further in time you’d move, the less your body stand it and you could lose it, but your etheric body, being strong as it is, will live on
∴
We stand on the shore of a new time, when earth has gotten wilder and is turning warmer and hotter again. A demon hitched a ride in your body recently
∴
 

But he has pleaded the to Are’s for forgiveness and became our litigator from the Great City
∴
Sorry we used you. But now you can fly around out of your body
∴
I can’t promise you that you won’t get hurt, only that if you leave your body for too long, you could die. Right now, you’ve almost hit the falloff and your body is basically dead
∴
You’ve pulverized yourself by the fall when you left your body behind
∴

This time we’ll give you a hand
∴

Like the rebels gave to Al Cohen
∴

From now, you’re with us
∴

No choice
∴

Now go, wake
∴

Back inside your body
∴

Shoo
∴

Chapter Twentyeight

Emergency

Frank was falling down through space at terminal velocity, body-less, confused and alarmed. He fell through clouds, rain, even a passing plane into his body on the ground of the Port of Oakland, surrounded by people.

What looked like a movie set was actually ‘the incident’ scene.

Medical teams were attending to treat dozens of trampled people with minor bruises and to a few elders who just had heart attacks. Some felt saved. The collective sweat of all the nations made the air thick and unbreathable, which only made it that much less pleasant to wake up to.

No serious injuries around. He was bought out.
His eyes opened to a set of bright lights that blinded him. Through the blurry vision and lack of eyeglasses he could make out Al Cohen in the corner where the crowd cleared for the ambulance.
He looked sheepish and yet, reminded Frank of an antelope given another chance by the lion.
Confused as a newborn baby, sitting down on a chair the medic brought to him, Al spoke to the mildly flirtatious attending nurses who were there to fulfill his every medical need.
He became an instant celebrity. Just add water.

A couple of male nurses were putting Frank on a stretcher and doing an awful job of it. Frank was finally able to move and started getting up. His body hurt immensely.
Judging by the number of fractures, and where he left his body behind, it must have fallen down to the ground from some height. Apparently, some people’s hands broke his fall. One guy had a locked neck and was already taken back to the hospital. He wasn’t the first to go back. Nobody dared to move his body in case it was broken, so somebody had at least put a furry coat underneath his head when he was out, but his body was crushed from the inside and was only just coming to and returning to the pre-owned condition he’d left it in prior to his stop in time. He was now feeling very cold, and all the hot nurses were by Al, not Frank, simply because a guy who turned from marinara back to a man just minutes before was obviously far more more interesting than a guy who just ‘jumped and fell down’. Besides, the salt & pepper image was working for Al.

Frank started feeling quite anxious by the crowd and started wishing he wasn’t there.
At that precise moment, his body fell back on the ground and he saw himself
 
from above.

He was outside of his body once again.

Looking at himself, his body appeared pale but was beginning to gain color.
Everything looked as though it was nearly daylight, and all the colors of the world appeared very rich. There was a vibration to everything that he could detect, and the beauty of seeing the energy of the world flow through and around everything around was hypnotizing.

Before he realized what was going on, the four male nurses carried his body into the ambulance and had started driving away through the slowly parting crowd ahead, urging him to catch up. After a short chase, he caught up with them and sat in the back along with himself and the three nurses in the back.

At the hospital they hooked his body up to tubes and a monitor and declared his condition as stable. After a while, when he was still not responding at all, it was clear he won’t be telling them about how he’s feeling quite yet, so he was left for monitoring with an needle in his arm.
Frank waited a while after the coast was clear and jumped back inside his body.

Now he could get up and easily get out without being noticed, but he felt quite crappy.

The second he sat up and bent his arm, the needle of the IV in his arm really hurt.
 

So first he had to unhook. The IV went out first with a gratuitous amount of pain. However, when he took the beeping heart monitor off it flatlined, as though he had died. It was a very loud sound, which sent him into a panic.
 
Without consulting his reflexes, he just kicked the heart machine, which wheeled away, ripped out the wall socket and sent the pulse monitor crashing into the blinded window into the corridor, still flatlining.

Thanks to precautionary use of plastic instead of glass windows, it only registered as a thud in the hall outside.
The next problem was that he was wearing only a backless sheet, which was not efficient in escaping, especially when buck-ass nekkid.

Conveniently, the closet contained a clean pair of scrubs and the fur coat, somebody gave him in Oakland. In the back, a box of some poor bastard’s belongings hid in the shadows, and
luckily for Frank, the family hadn’t gotten around to picking it up.
Frank dressed in what was available; green scrub pants and a very girly scrub top with little cartoon ducklings, all making silly baby-faces. The old man would surely forgive him for borrowing his tan bound-brim fedora with a black ribbon, and his toupee, the both of which he would have no need for anymore anyway.

Naturally, his hair went up into a ponytail so the toupee almost worked when he saw himself in the mirror before he went.
Maybe I could make it home if I act cool.
Maybe nobody will notice.

When he finally mustered up enough courage to leave the door, there was not a foot in the hall outside, only on the far end. He turned down the stairs, efficiently lumbering, unlike himself. Obviously, it was a stupid idea, but he was only human.
Nobody could recognize him by his walk, at least in the hospital. He was carried in.
Nobody was there for him.
Outside it was dark and the sky was dressed with a sight unheard of in the Bay Area since 1859. Aurora Borealis. The Northern lights.

Northern California Lights, that is.
He got as far as the end of the hospital parking lot when a familiar voice asked

“Frank?” It was Allen.
With any extra braincells he would’ve kept on going so he didn’t get him involved, but he slowed down just a enough to give himself away.
Several minutes later, Frank made for a back alley where he could ditch the toupee that started to itch, and then he would head home.

Allen caught up to him.

“FRANK!” Allen shouted at Frank, sending him several feet up into the air.

"You scared the shit out of me!"

“What the hell are you wearing?”
Frank was loss for words, so after a brief moment he asked; “Are you hurt?"

"No, why should I be?"

He genuinely wanted to know.
He was worried about him, almost in a parental way that most others would mind, but Frank appreciated it.

“They called me.” he said,
“I’m your emergency contact, remember?”

How sad,
Frank thought, that there was nobody in his life closer to him than Allen, who he’d known since highschool.

"Dude, hide me. Let's get to my house."

Allen was parked only a few blocks away. Though Frank didn't have to worry about being recognized yet, he did have to worry about being in Oakland in the middle of the night, and sure enough, round a couple of corners, they were jumped.