The Good Reaper (17 page)

We took as many side streets as we could while we slowly
meandered our way to the interstate. “I feel guilty about leaving Cooper there
to take the rap,” LeAnne said.

“There wasn’t much we could do to help.”

“What will happen to him?”

“Well, we are a civilized society back home. What we have
done will not be considered much of a crime by average citizens. I think he
will be sentenced to a minimum security prison. Perhaps they will sentence him
to house arrest or probation. Naturally he will be expelled from CIPE.”

“I guess that’s not too bad,” LeAnne said. “You mentioned
minimum security prison. I assume you also have maximum security prisons on
Ranjisan and you do have violent crime.”

“Of course.
There will always be
crimes of passion in any society and of course there will always be greed.”

“What is there on Ranjisan to be greedy about? You mentioned
that some people are better off than others but you don’t have the extremes in
rich and poor like we have here. How does money work there? How do you pay for
things? Do you have taxes?”

“We do have taxes, or something like taxes. Things that are
needed that are not profit driven need to be paid for.”

“So Ranjisan has a capitalist government, like we have
here?” LeAnne asked. “You have poverty too?”

“I don’t think it’s as extreme as here on Earth but there is
poverty and homelessness, although homeless people don’t live on the street.
They live in government sponsored camps. The camps have their own police
forces, construction crews and chefs. Homeless people can become part of the
various camp crews where they can learn working skills.

The Aegiala have basically wiped out poverty and
homelessness. We have people there studying and observing how they accomplished
what is close to being a utopian society. They are amazing, highly intelligent
people.”

“I guess you can say that Ranjisan is in a period of
illumination or enlightenment. They’ve been talking about splitting everything
into two categories, one for governing profit-driven enterprise and one for
anything that is for the good of everyone.
For a civilized
society to flourish you have to have money to build public structures but
without the incentive for profit, business becomes anemic.
So we are
learning from the Aegialeus how to build incentives for philanthropy into
profit-based businesses. It’s all pretty boring I guess but I’ve already seen a
difference. The most famous celebrities back home are philanthropists, kind of
like your Bill Gates here.”

“But he wouldn’t be able to be a philanthropist if he wasn’t
already rich,” LeAnne argued.

“Yes, I know. I don’t have all the answers. I guess the
Aegiala do. That’s enough talk of government and politics. My head is starting
to hurt.”

“Mine too,” LeAnne said.

On our trip north, we never ran out of things to talk about.
Mostly we talked about Ranjisan, Aegialeus and Tellus. It was a conversation
that could continue on forever. LeAnne was fascinated and I couldn’t blame her.
At that point in time, she may have been the only human with knowledge of other
races on distant planets.

“So how does time work on Ranjisan? Do you have months,
days,
years
?”

“If you think your brain was going numb talking about
government, wait until I explain how the Ranjisan calendar works. Are you
ready?” LeAnne nodded.

“Ranjisan is larger than Earth but its spin is faster so
days are not much longer than here on Earth. Days are called
iots
and
they are about 27 hours long. A year is called a
Maia
. There are 684
iots in a Maia. Hours are called
ciots
. There
are 38 iots in a month. Months are called
dschubbas
. It takes 18
dschubbas for Ranjisan to rotate once around our sun. We don’t have weeks. We
just refer to the day by number, like day 1, day 2, etc. Any
day
with the number ‘4’ or the number ‘8’ are
like your weekends and a lot
of people don’t work those days. But it’s not mandatory. A lot of business
people will work some of those days. So in a 38 day month, a typical person may
have 8 days off. What you refer to here as the weekend, we call the ‘4s and
8s’; got it?”

“
Hahaha
.”

***

The lights of Las Vegas greeted us around 1:00 AM. “Do they
have anything like this on Ranjisan?” LeAnne asked.

“No. I don’t believe the concept of gambling has ever
occurred to anyone on Ranjisan. I guess people on Ranjisan are more reserved.
They are less animated and less exciting. They would never pass an audition for
those wild TV shows like “The Price is Right” or “Let’s Make a Deal.”

“So you would be an oddity back home? You are certainly
exciting. Look at what we’re doing now. You’re a fugitive on the run,” LeAnne
said.

“Yes and someday I’m going to play in a rock band and I can
sing about being a fugitive.”

“Yea right,” LeAnne said with a smirk. “But you’ll probably
be one of those musicians who just
stands
there
playing without moving.”

“Probably.”

We drove past several wedding chapels with blinking neon
lights and checked into one of the glittering hotels on the strip. We had
shared a room back at the airport in Harrisburg but LeAnne was very sick and I
was really there to watch over her. Back at Cooper’s we had separate rooms so
when we stepped up to the desk I asked for two adjoining rooms. I knew at some
point we would share a room and at some point we would explore intimacy, but
something didn’t feel right about Las Vegas. Even with all the wedding chapels,
somehow the Las Vegas strip did not seem very romantic. It was not how I
envisioned our first intimate experience. After checking in we continued our
ongoing conversation about Ranjisan as we
strolled
the
strip until late in the night.

“Do Ranjisi marry like they do here?” LeAnne asked while we
watched two people emerge from one of the wedding chapels.

“Yes. I guess love, bonding and fidelity are literally
universal, I mean probably throughout the universe. I suppose the ceremonies
and the commitments are different everywhere but I think even prehistoric
beings of all races developed family bonds. I know both the Ophiucha and
Aegialeus marry. I’m not sure about the Tellus.”

“So how does it work on Ranjisan?”

“Well, that’s a big question because, to understand it, you
have to understand our spiritual beliefs. We don’t have hundreds of different
religions with different gods and different beliefs like you have on Earth. We
did millions of years ago but at some point, people evolved. I mean if there
are 100 religions and each one thinks all the rest are wrong, isn’t that
naïve?”

“Of course, but people are evolving slowly here,” LeAnne
said. “But what do people on Ranjisan believe? Do they believe in god?”

“No one will ever know where intelligent life began. But
here are a few things to think about: Ranjisan is billions of years older than
Earth. We have scientific proof that life on Ranjisan was seeded by another
race that we believe was billions of years older than Ranjisan.
So intelligent life has been in existence for perhaps forever.
Thinking about the beginning will just tie your mind in a knot. But it is all
too spectacular to think it was all an accident and there
lies
the seed of spiritual thinking.”

“So do you believe in god or not?”

“We neither believe nor disbelieve. We believe in nothing
and everything. We don’t know if there is a purpose to life and we don’t know
what happens when we die. We don’t pass judgment on the beliefs of others but
we don’t see how anyone can know the answers to these questions. But we have
learned through millions of years of living that a society is happier,
healthier and more capable of progress when we live by some form of code or
belief. If we do not continuously move forward than we are doomed to stagnate
and slip back into chaos. So our code is simple, flexible and informal. Our
society is a circle and philanthropy is at the heart of the circle. It is our
way of life, but what will seem unusual to humans is that philanthropy for us
does not begin close to home with family. For us, we begin at the outer edge of
the circle. Philanthropy begins with our race and planet and then moves into
our larger provinces and then to our communities and finally to our families.
The human concept of family first doesn’t work on Ranjisan. For us, our entire
race is our family. That’s it in a nutshell. I guess in some ways we are more
like a big dolphin pod than we are like humans.”

“Okay, my head is spinning and you still haven’t explained
how marriage works.”

“Are you familiar with
Mehndi
?”

“No, is that something from back home?” LeAnne looked
confused.

“No. It’s from right here on Earth. It’s a tradition carried
on in India, Pakistan and just about anywhere in southern Asia. The tradition
consists of painting beautiful designs on parts of the body before special
events. Since marriage is the biggest event, that’s when it is especially
beautiful and meaningful. In
Mehndi
, they use the
natural coloring that comes from the Henna plant. The designs may consist of
flowers and other beautiful designs. The paintings wear off after a couple of
weeks but they signify love, affection and a long happy marriage.”

“On Ranjisan, we don’t exchange rings but we do something
similar to
Mehndi
. Our version of
Mehndi
is less elaborate but the paintings are permanent and they are matching for man
and woman. Professional artists are solicited and each design is registered
like a copyright so that they are never repeated. Each design is unique. For
that reason the artists get paid well.”

“Wow, I like it. It all sounds too beautiful.
Your
spiritual beliefs, your culture, your version of
marriage. Do people get divorced?”

“People do get divorced but it isn’t a legal quagmire like
it is here. If there are children involved, families go to counselors who help
establish financial needs. Child support is not mandated by law. People
generally do what is right. Occasionally, people don’t do what is right. On
Earth people say things like, ‘we are only human.’ It’s the same back home.
People say things like ‘we are only Ranjisi.’ But when someone does something
disgraceful like not taking care of their own child, they are shunned and
disgraced until they make things right. These people cannot hide. They are
listed on a special broadcast channel and new additions to the ‘disgrace list’
are listed each night on the regular news broadcasts.”

We walked the Vegas streets until late into the evening,
before finally returning to the hotel. In the morning we were up and out early.
We had nothing but time so instead of traveling straight up State Road 93 we
took the detour to Valley of Fire State Park to see the sandstone arches and
rock formations. We continued talking, mostly about the differences between
humans and Ranjisi. When we got closer to the park property I began wondering
where we would sleep. The nearest hotel cluster was in Mesquite, a few miles
away from the park.

“Naos, can I ask you something?” LeAnne sounded a little
reluctant to speak so it was easy to figure out what she wanted to ask about.

“How does sex work with Ranjisi?”

“Ah yes, another reason to consider the
possibility of a Supreme Being.
It seems as far as we know, no matter
where you go in the universe, survival of a species is the same. All
intelligent life forms experience some form of sexual drive. There is an
enormous variety of rituals but the end result is the same. A male must
penetrate a female.”

“You make it sound clinical and not much fun,” LeAnne said
with a giggle.

“Of course it is fun, if you are with the right person, and
if you aren’t with the right person, it’s probably still fun. But of course if
there is love and affection, there is greater passion and the whole experience
is that much greater.”

The conversation seemed to be moving in sync with where we
were driving. We were approaching the center of Mesquite where the hotels were.
Mesquite is a beautiful small town set in a valley surrounded by blue sky and
mountains. I think we were both wondering the same thing. Was it time to stay
in one room together? We weren’t yet lovers but there was a blossoming love
between us. We were friends but we both knew we were more than friends. I
already knew that LeAnne was the kind of person who was aware of other people’s
feelings and emotions. I always thought that heightened awareness was a sign of
intelligence. LeAnne had it so I wasn’t too surprised when I pulled into a
hotel parking lot and she jumped out of the car. “I’ll go register Naos. Wait
here a minute.”

“This was good,” I thought. “I’m a coward. Let LeAnne make
the decision. Just like back home, it may be better if it is the woman who sets
boundaries for a relationship.”

“Room 201,” was all she said when she came back to the car.
It was the first room on the second floor facing the rugged peaks of
Parashant
National Monument. I immediately wondered if the
room would have two double beds or one king. We were both silent as we carried
the few belongings up the stairs to the room. I was relieved to see two double
beds when I opened the door. LeAnne did the right thing, I thought. She took
some of the awkwardness out of the situation. We would sleep separately and let
the possibility of romance and
intimacy develop
naturally.

The Mesquite Lodge was a combination of deep woods hunting
lodge and traveler’s hotel. The lobby and breakfast area were pure hunting
lodge with natural wood beams everywhere, a large fireplace with the dear head
overlooking the room and huge leather sofas scattered about. But the walk-up
room on the second floor was a typical roadside traveler’s room. It was the
best of both worlds with a private bath and a small balcony that looked out
toward the
Parashant
National Monument.