Chapter 5.
Pa crouched nearby gathering a few dry sticks and tying them into small bundles. He had listened carefully, if secretly, to all his son had said from the morning until now. His heart swelled with pride that his son had handled the confrontation so well. There were very serious differences being spread about. There were even accusations. But Amon had found a way to find reconciliation while maintaining love and respect for the people involved.
“My son! What wisdom you display,” Pa thought to himself. “Anxiety was so high within the group, but you found a way to redirect it; to turn it from a gnawing in the gut into a burning in the heart. All with a few gestures and some understanding words.
“From the time of your birth I have watched you. I have held you in my arms when you cried in the night. I have healed your bruised and naked skin of countless injuries you inflicted upon yourself in your childhood.
“I have seen you grow to manhood, a member of a race that is almost incomprehensible to me. Were it not for the ‘darkness,’ I’m not sure what would have come of us. Even now, though I believe I understand you, still there are times when the things you do are completely beyond my comprehension.
“So often I have wondered, when will be the time? How will I know when the time is right? What will be the sign?
“I remember what the man in the ‘darkness’ said. ‘You will know. You will know.’ Back then when I asked, I didn’t understand the answer. But now, now it is different. Now I know as well as I know myself, that my son is ready. Everything that I have learned from the ‘darkness,’ my son has now learned on his own. It is time that he learn more.”
Pa wrapped the bundles in an old hide and tied it onto the end of a stout stick, the way he had learned from his son. Hoisting it on his shoulder, he began making his way slowly around the camp, collecting unused kindling and covering it to keep it dry. Amon and the others were busy at other tasks, so they didn’t notice the old simian as he slipped out of sight behind some dead fall.
There, well hidden under a tangle of broken branches, were two stones, one propped up at an angle by the other. It looked as though some small animal had used the space between the rocks as a nest.
Pa pushed aside as much undergrowth as he could and then got down on his belly, inching his way forward until he reached the stones. He pushed the angular one aside and rolled the other one over.
There, in a small cavity, sat the ‘darkness.’ No dust or debris of any kind had accumulated on or near it. It looked exactly the same as it did a few weeks back when he hid it there the day the clan made camp here.
By now the old simian was used to seeing this. It had been the same, move after move; year after year. For some reason unknown to him, nothing would stick to the thing. It always looked the same, whether in daylight or in darkness. It was hard to see, unless you knew what to look for. In the place where it looked like there was nothing, that was where it was. The man in the ‘darkness’ (Evander was what he called himself) said it was called ‘phase shifting.’ Pa preferred to call it ‘darkness.’
An instant before Pa touched it, the transceiver activated. It took on a faint blue glow, making it much easier to see. He picked it up carefully and began inching his way back out of the brush. When he was clear, he placed the transceiver on the ground, and looked quickly about, insuring he was still invisible to the rest of the camp.
Then, convinced that he had not been seen, he turned his attention back to the ‘darkness.’ The red glow was gone. In it’s place a gray, roughly rectangular object sat. Above it a half-size three-dimensional image appeared. It showed the upper torso of a man.
“Hello, my old friend. It’s been a long time since we’ve seen each other. How have you been?” Evander signed.
“All is well. And with you, my teacher?”
“Much have I learned from being your mentor.”
“That is as it should be.” Pa signed the ritual, as he had done countless times before.
“It has ever been so.” Was the final reply.
The old simian’s memory flashed back. Back to the beginning. Back to that steamy, oppressive night when he awoke in a near panic. His memory flashed to the dark object that hovered above him. Next came the pleasant, tickling sensation down the back of his neck. And then the morning. His life had never been the same from that moment on.
“My teacher, the time has come.” Pa felt a welling in his heart as he signed the words he had wanted to do for so long.
“Ah! And so it has, my dear friend.”
The image looked the same now as it ever had. The man’s hair hadn’t changed, in length or color. There were no new wrinkles around the eyes. The nose. The mouth. All was the same. Even after all these years. Pa felt old, seeing how he had aged, but that Evander had not.
“My teacher, my son is truly a man of wisdom. He has learned all that I can teach him, and still he yearns to learn more. Daily he surpasses me in all that he does. I cannot but hold him back if I withhold you from him any longer.”
“That truly is as it should be. There comes a time in all men’s lives when they must pass the torch, so that others may not stumble in the darkness.” The use of the word ‘man’ did not go un-noticed.
“Alas, my teacher! What am I, if not a man?” The old simian sat wilted on the ground, head held low.
“You are my father.” a voice behind him said. “You are as much a man as I ever hope to be.”
Without flinching, his father responded. “Somehow I knew you would be there.” He turned slowly, a smile on his face. “It used to be strange, when you’d sneak up on me like that. But now, after so many years I’ve just come to expect it.” A smile filled his eyes as his hands brought forth his words.
“And so, my father. Will you finally tell me what this thing is that you’ve been dragging around for all these years?” Amon came around and sat down beside his father, a wide grin on his face. From where they sat, the hologram appeared at eye level.
“I remember you.” Amon pointed to the image before him.
“It was when I was a child.” He looked more closely.
“I remember your eyes . . . but they were younger then. Your face hasn’t changed.”
Pa sat in amazement. He had expected something else from his son. Something. Anything! Some sort of reaction other than what his son was displaying. He was acting as though this sort of thing happened every day. Talking to this, this apparition!
“Don’t be surprised, my father. Many are the times I’ve watched you sneak away into the darkness. Sometimes I’ve even followed you, fearing for your safety, but also wanting to learn what it was you were doing.”
Amon paused, then gestured toward the holo-image.
“Many times I watched as you spoke to each other silently. I saw your gestures. I watched your hands. I learned.” He moved back toward his father. Taking him by the hand, he said:
“Many times I wanted to surprise you. To let you know that you had been discovered. But the more I watched, the more I thought No. Better to let him tell me in his own time. Then we will BOTH be ready!” Still holding his father’s gaze, he continued:
“And now, Evander, if that is your name. I know you are real because you can respond to me. But are you here?” Amon had come up with so many questions over the years. It was now time to get some of them answered.
“Yes, I’m here, or at least my voice is, and my ability to see and hear you, also. But the image you see before you is not the real me. This image came from that small box below me there on the ground. It is a device I use to speak with you.
“I’m in a place very far from where you are now. I will teach you more about this at another time if you so desire. But for now my desire is to answer any questions you may have.”
“The first question I have is for my father.” Looking deep into his father’s eyes, he continued: “I think I know why . . . no. I KNOW why you waited. There is no question now. You wanted to do all that
you could do first. Then, when you knew there was nothing left for you to give, you admitted to yourself that it was time. Time for your son to know of the ‘darkness,’ and the truth it holds within it.”
Evander added quietly as father and son commiserated: “This is the time when each of you share all that is known between you. This is the time when a ‘Link’ is formed. It is a bond which can never be broken. Nor can it be seen, even by those here to witness it. And yet it prevails.”
“It has ever been so.” Amon turned to face the image squarely. “There is much that I must learn . . .”
“And much that I must teach you. . . .”
“But now cannot be the time. Our camp is in disarray. After we have moved. When things have settled. Then will be the time when we speak again.”
“Spoken well, young Amon. Soon we will speak again.” The image dissolved.
Pa reached for the gray box and stuffed it into one of the bundles he was carrying. He shoved a few more small branches and twigs around it to better disguise it’s shape, and then slung it back over his shoulder, the way it had been before.
He looked up to make sure his son was watching, and then signed: “Let’s us go then. There will be time enough for this later.”
With that, the old simian trundled off in the direction of camp, leaving his son standing alone.