The Forever Man - Book 1: Pulse

Seth Hil-Nu lay on his camp bed, arms by his side. He had fasted for three days and, after intense meditation, had now entered the objectless stage of existence having passed through gross, subtle, bliss and I-ness stages. He was now part of the vast stillness of the universe.

  And through the vastness of forever he wandered, letting the pull of the Life-Light find him. He knew that Ammon had placed a guard outside his tent so that he would not be disturbed. So he lay. For two days he traveled the cosmic infinite, encompassing his spirit in a protective ball of Life-Light, speeding through time and space like a comet.

  On the third day, all around him coalesced into a pageant of light and sound and he opened his eyes to find himself hovering above a world of blue and green. He let the Life-Light take him closer. And closer.

  Suddenly the air around him was torn apart with explosions of fire. He allowed the Life-Light to keep him away from danger and he concentrated, letting his mind meld with the creatures below.

  What he heard he did not understand. Phrases flashed through his mind. February the 25th, 1942. Unidentified Flying Object. Anti-aircraft battery. German aircraft. Japanese bombers.

  And then he was gone. At peace. Wandering again. Crossing the barriers of time and space. Encapsulated in Life-Light.

  The same blue-green planet. In the sky below him some sort of animal. Bird? Massive. No, not bird. Mechanical. He melded. June 18th, 1963. Look…an unidentified flying object of some sort. A ball of light, maybe a flying saucer. Air traffic control. Can you see this? Can you frigging see this?

  Peace. Traveling again. The forth day of meditation and voyaging.

  Buildings. Some sort of homestead. A farm. Seth drifted down. Closer. A door opens and two beings walk out. One dark skinned, one light. They see him. He melds. They are called Betty and Barney Hill. He can feel their fear. He wipes their memories. But they are a species that he has never worked with before and the memory wipe doesn’t take properly. Instead they are left with a mélange of fact and fiction. For the rest of their lives they claim to have been abducted by gray-skinned aliens from the Zeta Reticuli star system.

  He leaves. The Life-Light is close. He realizes that he is now traveling only through time and no longer space.

  Power surges through him. Heady and exhilarating. All around him the Life-Light coalesces and separates. Swirling and diving. Its beauty is indescribable. But he cannot use its full power, as he is not actually there. He is still in his body, in a campaign tent in another time and place. But, even in his diminished state, he can garner enough power to do what he needs to.

  He sinks closer to the surface of the planet. A city. Massive beyond belief. Buildings as tall as mountains. Many of them are burning. Sentient beings, the same ones that he has seen before, walking down the roads in their thousands. It looks to be some manner of evacuation. Are they fleeing a war? Disease? He melds. But all that he gets is fear. Panic. The end of days. Such is the collective horror that it scalds his mind and he withdraws.

  For a while longer he revels in the Life-Light. He absorbs it, for the Life-Light is strong in this time and place. And he marks well both the time and place, for the Life-Light is all important. Nothing else matters.

  Moments later he is awake in his tent. Elated. He now has a way to save his people. The Fair Folk will persevere. He has found a place for them to go.

  Chapter 17