The wind brushed past my hair, tugging slightly. I pushed the loose strand with a finger, tucking it away behind my ear. The crisp air stung my nose, making it difficult to breath. I opened my eyes for a moment, only to shut them again. The sunlight was as stinging as the cold. My lungs began to ache, my nose frozen. The back of my neck began to stiffen. My jacket was of no use so I threw it off, annoyed. My toes were frozen already, so I took those off, too. My body was hot. I felt like I was sweating while my lungs were freezing, aching, laboring to breath. I coughed and coughed, light headed. My shirt was one of the really nice one's so I took that off and folded it, setting it beside my boots. They looked so nice beside one another. Tired, I closed my eyes, while I coughed to myself. For a moment I woke from a dream, not quite a nightmare. I opened my eyes, but everything was dark. I lifted my head, but there was something on the side. I tried to move my arm to remove it, but my arms were too heavy. I went back to sleep. I'm not cold anymore. The dreams are soft and warm. I do feel cozy. What a nice spot.

“Happy Birthday!”

Everyone screamed cheerfully.

Tears flooded Jackie’s eyes, streaked down her rose blushed cheeks, and dripped onto her purple and white lace dress. She smiled gleefully, full of embarrassment and joy, elation and repulsion at being the center of attention. Looking down at her dress, Jackie petted it nervously.

“Okay, Jackie, go take your seat,” the teacher said. “Everyone take out your pencils and turn to page…”

As I sit here, writing in my journal, the tears are streaking down my own face now, dripping on these yellowed pages in the dim lamp light. If I could go back, I would throw her a birthday party every day to tell her how precious she was to us all. I never recalled what the lesson was that day—I only ever remember that little moment when the small embarrassed girl, shy as could be, teared up at finally being accepted by the class, only to melt back into the periphery of the ordinary. She was our shy, little wild rose.

Her seat was empty the next day, and the next, and the day after that. The corner seat in the back of the room didn’t stay empty though. Her seat began to fill with doodles of roses and carnations and ferns and stars. The students adorned the chair with little glass and plastic jewels of hearts, diamonds, and glitter. The winter holidays came and went, and the chair grew in adornments seemingly of its own accord, every day some grand gesture was paid to the seat of a girl with no knowledge of the love we shared for her.

Every year I write in my journal on her birthday, and the pages have yellowed, but every year I write Happy Birthday one more time.

I ordered my coffee presumptuously. There should be chocolate in a mocha along with coffee, but I swallowed my water and foam with only a whimsical dream of the substances. After a long drought of acceptance I found the nugget of chocolate cemented to the base of the mug. Painfully, I swirled the ooey googy goodness sludge. I was presented with a choice, a paradoxical vantage pivot: do I enjoy the sludge or remark about how the barista screwed up my drink. I CHOSE to enjoy the sludge.

I looked upon a view I had only dreamed of, ignoring the sign that said caution.

I walked passed that sign to see better, to be closer to the edge, to see more, to have more.

I peered over the edge to fill my vision with a wonder of life I did not comprehend.

And I slipped.

The feeling caught me off guard; I didn't even scream.

As I fall from the cliff called denial and ignorance, I see my life flash before my eyes, and love was never in me.

As as I continue to fall, the rush of wind turns into a desperate whisper, and that whisper says:

"Trust"

Wrapped in a cloak of mesmerizing actions, no one noticed the old man slip through the crowd and into a thin opening between two buildings. In a deft movement he walked straight towards the opening, turned sideways, and slipped between the brick structures.

The throng of bodies and heat and breath were replaced with an immovable closeness that opened upwards, revealing a bright blue line, and forwards, revealing a dark path with shimmering purple crystals. To his mind, he knew the path led into darkness, but all that was required was the light of knowledge to lead the way. He continued on.

Pushing his way down the opening, he stepped down after coming to a break in the purple light that he walked over. Looking back revealed a golden sliver, the light above was distant, even the purple crystals gave off a surprising amount of light in the depths. He looked down and saw a darkness that did not mix with the darkness below it. Stepping down into the void there his foot was met with a solid thud and an echo reverberating off of unseen walls. The old man brought his other foot onto the platform that he could not see so that he could no longer see the purple crystal path, neither could he see his feet.

Gently, cautiously, slightly welling up with fear, he tapped the darkness with his foot, but there was nothing to note. The old man stood there for a moment, and decided to sit on the ledge. He dangled his feet down into the darkness that was above a deeper darkness. He could feel his legs dangling over the ledge, but could not see them. Swinging them back and forth there seemed to be nothing below him, as there did not seem to be any ledge beneath where he was sitting. The old man sat contemplatively, as was his habit, and he looked up at the thin pillar of blue sky which struck itself across an infinite darkness. He placed his hands onto the ledge beside where he knew his knees were, but could not see neither his knees nor his hands. The old man noted that there was no feeling of the ledge; there was no coldness, no roughness, no hardness, nothing to take note of. It was to him like looking behind his own head.

Nervously, he gently let himself slide down into the darkness, without touching a thing, and then he let go of the ledge. He screamed as he plummeted into the darkness below, waiting for his demise.

The old man thought to give himself one last look up at the blue ribbon he had abandoned as despair filled the void left by life, yet when he looked up, there was the ledge with the path of purple crystals leading back to a thin golden sliver of light filled with throngs of people, kaleidoscopes of places, and everything that made up all things.

Despite the feeling of falling into this abyss, he knew without a shadow of a doubt, that he must continue on, for the feeling did not match reality or perhaps in this darkness beneath, his perception of reality no longer applied.

Turning his back on that golden sliver which he noted held up a blue pendent surrounded in darkness, he urged himself forward into what he could not perceive nor tell any story of nor understand nor record. Yet, he urged himself forward.

Three Flash Fictions about the conflict and tension of my black coffee mug.

“Next!” the barista called to the long line of customers filling the coffee shop. “NEXT!” she shouted irritably in the crowded, sweat smelling cafe.

“What are you going to have?” she asked, eyebrows furrowed in the summer heat as the air-conditioner failed yet again.

“Americano, black, no ice,” the man said, holding out his mug with a credit card nestled inside. The barista eyed the card and clenched her teeth, reluctantly taking the card out of the mug and running it for the man.

“Well, we don’t have any ice,” she let slip. Luckily for her the man was too deaf to hear him.

Handing the coffee mug off to the next barista, she yelled out impatiently, “NEXT!” The next barista grabbed the mug in quick fashion, banging it into the coffee machine.

“Be careful with that, it’s an antique!” the old man said angrily to the young girl.

She rolled her eyes, grabbing another drink and placing it into the queue. The old man’s black mug filled to the brim with espresso as the machine malfunctioned, spewing boiling coffee all over the counter, the floor, and her apron. Screaming in pain, the barista drew the attention of everyone in the boiling cafe. In her excitement she knocked the mug off of the machine. It fell to the floor with a hideous thud. The old man’s heart stopped as he heard it hit the floor and expected the high pitched explosion of porcelain shards.

Grabbing his chest, the old man fell backwards into another customer, who in turn fell into the stand of display coffee mugs, all equally bland and monochrome gray. As they toppled from the display, one by one, they exploded into happy shrapnel as they no longer had to bare the brunt of being boring.

The old man lay gasping for breath on the floor in front of the coffee line, his coffee mug lay on the floor of the kitchen, and the coffee shop froze in the terror of a midsummer heatwave chaos.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“COFFEEEEEEEEEE!!!”

The sound echoed through through the empty room.

“COFFEEEEEEEEEE!!!”

Someone walked into the room with heavy steps of caution and curiosity.

“COFFEEEEEEEEEE!!!”

The sound reverberated through the glass cabinet and smashed into the person’s ear. They stumbled backwards in shock, searching with wide eyes for the origin of the shrill, yet booming words. The panes in the cabinet rattled in jealous rage:

“COFFEEEEEEEEEE!!!”

They turned in utter horror, stumbling over themselves in attempt to gain a footing and flee as their mind struggled to grasp the incoherent situation.

The glass shattered free of it’s imprisoned state.

“COFFEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!”

A black coffee mug rocketed toward their face.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Each and every day, like a zealot to an arcane god of consciousness, I wake up, put coffee grounds into the machine, fill it with water, wait, and then pour the finished product into my mug. The body of the mug doesn’t really matter to me, it is the soul, the perfect essence of the container for the coffee that the mug embodies that is it’s true form.

It searches for me. In angst and jealous rage the supreme being of the mug yearns to be filled with it’s soul, the distilled black nectar of jewels from living beings born from the Earth itself.

The mug reaches for me, searching for its perfect form. My friends gift me mugs, but the perfect form rejects them, throwing them down to the ground in crashing and uncaring crescendo of ultimate authority. The mug’s perfect form calls into question all, testing all, guiding my life and my hand, directing me to people who only gift me more coffee mugs!

I cannot escape. No matter where I go there is the echo of shattering imperfections as the perfect essence of the mug hunts me down until one day it will claim me as it tests me and I fail the test of being the perfect mug.

N the beginning there was everything, and since there was everything, nothing existed somewhere, everywhere else.

The Singularity Crystal

In the time before time there did exist a civilization so vast, so reaching, so all encompassing that nothing escaped it’s reach. Lost to time and space none would ever know of it’s name, but there were traces here and there. The first hint of this grand civilization was like the days first bright sun beam, shooting out over the horizon before it rose and gave the world it’s full glory. This is the story of that sunbeam.

One early morning in Tulean, France, 1927. Jaque de Pasquo was walking through the woods enjoying the smell of the fresh rain on the happy trees. That day Jaque decided to explore a hill that had been on his mind lately. As a boy Jaque played on the outskirts of the hill, along a road that led to Paris, but then again that isn’t saying much since all roads led to Paris. At any rate, Jaque decided today was the day he would explore that unknown hill.

Jaque knew from school that southern France was known for it’s caves and hoped to find one. He walked, stumbled, and fell over every root, stump, rock, old wall, and hole until he reached the top. Breathing heavily Jaque leaned on a tree to catch his breath. The view was breath taking, but the surrounding countryside of glimmer and dew, scattered tattered clouds blowing in the stiff breeze back dropped by baby blue was not what caught his attention. Just as he leaned against the tree it fell over with a resounding crash. He fell to the ground, knee bashing into a stone, but the pain was not shocking. Jaque caught himself and held fast to a muddy root protruding from the downed tree, below was only an abyss. It was this void that caught Jaque in rapt attention, and the mire of his mind was all that held him to this world.

Jaque pulled himself back from the edge. Covered in mud and blood, scarcely recovering from the shock of the moment, he stumbled backwards away from the gaping maw. Jaque ran the four kilometers home as quickly as he could.

Upon reaching the old rickety gate, Jaque composed himself, took several deep breaths and walked through the hedge row. On the other side was home. There on the small rise was the tractor he used to plow the fields. Past that was the barn that held Freve, his trusty steed. Bounding towards him was his best friend, floppy ears and wagging tongue flapping as wide as the happy dog’s eyes.

Freve ran past him as Jaque laughed hardily at the silly dog, and continued to the house. He changed clothes, washed up his damaged knee, packed a tin of several meals worth of sausage and cheese and bread. Jaque then took out a pencil and paper, jotted down a quick note for his Professor Mary, and made his way to the barn for the equipment he would need.

The day was warming up nicely as a cool breeze came down from the Rhine. The sun was bright and he felt joyous in a way that he had not felt in many years. Opening the barn door brought him into a cool and crisp world of straw, manure, and mold. The horses were out in the pasture for now, and so there was no need to save any of the apples for them that day. Grabbing three and stuffing them into his sack he moved on to the pickax, two ropes and a grapple, a chain, and a hatchet. Jaque strapped the lantern to his waist before locking up the barn.

He took a different path to the hill this time, making his way past the church instead of directly through the fields like before, since he wanted to drop off the letter for Professor Mary to tell her about his find.

It was mid afternoon and the sun was making it’s way back toward the horizon once more when Jaque arrived back to where he nearly met his demise earlier in the day. Laying the heavy pack on the ground, he set up a camp of sorts to look over his equipment and prepare for the journey. While eating one of the apples, he took out the lantern, filled it with water, closed the lid tightly and lit it. There was a bright and steady spark as it came to life. He tied it to the end of the rope and let it down slowly into the space below his feet. To his surprise, the opening was only about two meters deep. He hulled the rope back up, tied it off to the big root that saved his life, and lowered his pack down first, followed by himself.

The musty hole revealed a cave half a meter down. Jaque smiled proudly to himself. Taking his secondary rope, he tied it to a rock nearby and fixed the middle to himself, then his pack and pickax to the end. With the lantern blazing atop his head, he looked into the darkness and began his journey.

1927

Professor Mary! I have made a fine discovery. You’ll want to come by and I will explain everything. I am about embark down what may be a new cave system undiscovered by us modern folk. After climbing a childhood dream of mine, a tree toppled over nearly killing me and dropping me into that abyss. The knob is tucked between a large hill and a small hill, then the south stream flows just around it’s base.

I hope to show you and the other students upon your return to my farm.

Most pleasantly yours,

Jaque

The next morning the letter arrived at Professor Mary Francios’ small office on the campus in Paris.

“Eb,” Mary said as she walked excitedly to the geology administers office, “I will be off with a few of the students this week. It appears our colleague Jaque de Pasquo has discovered a new cave down in Tulean.”

Professor Mary and five students of the geology program left the next day for southern France, prepared for a wonderfully dirty time. Armed to the teeth with equipment, they set out in two automobiles and three motorcycles.

Upon arriving at Mr. Pasquo’s farm, they discovered it in a manner of disarray. The horses had broken through the fence and the front door stood ajar. The dog Freve lay on the front porch baying so loudly and dismally that nothing would comfort the poor beast. One of the horses was inside the house rummaging through the cabinets. Seemingly it had been looking for, and consequently found, the sack of sugar.

“Professor,” one of the students said mournfully, taking off his hat, “I do believe some unfortunate mishap has taken on our dear Mr. Pasquo.”

The other students spread out through the house shouting for the man. “Everyone outside! Yes, your are correct, Henry. This has become a rescue mission.”

As everyone filed out of the house and back to their vehicles, away from the mourning dog, Professor Mary gave them instruction. “Right! Based on the information we have from Mr. Pasquo, we head to that knob there and begin our search. Quick now, it has been some days and we do not know of his condition.”

With haste and mission, they jumped their doors, started up their engines and tore off towards the knob. The two automobiles went the long way by the road and church, while the three motorcycles tore across the fields directly for the hill.

1929

Dear Mary,

I am sorry to hear about the loss of your dear friend. Please allow me to extend my gratitude for your donation over the holidays. I would like to follow up with another expedition to Pasquo Caves.

Yours truly,

Professor Gerard

1930

Dear Professor Gerard,

Thank you kindly for your condolences. I am most enthusiastic about you extending your favor for us to further explore the cave system. On behalf of those here in the geology department, thank you most graciously.

Sincerely,

Professor Mary Francios

1931

A military truck laden with equipment, supplies, camping material, and no small amount of dynamite rumbled down the long and dusty drive way to the decaying remnants of Jaque’s farm. The house had caved in after a sudden storm in 1930, and the barn had caught fire, presumably in the same storm. Small trees had began to grow and the old gate was decaying into the ground as it left rust stains where the hings had been.

“What a dismal residence,” remarked one of the students as they got off of a motorcycle.

Professor Mary eyed her as she grabbed a camera from the seat, and proceeded to snap a photograph of the once picturesque 19th century farm. “Everything has it’s time Celen, even us,” she said with a raised voice over the sound of the noisy diesel engine. “Continue through gate, over the farms to that small knob there. When we get to the creek, pass over and take a right. We may have better luck at finding the second entrance. On ward!” She exclaimed excitedly.

The farmland was rough, but the vehicles they brought were more than able to handle the terrain. They hit the creek at speed, sending spray through the air. The water droplets fell in dazzling brilliance and everyone had a smile on their face as they sped through the countryside with the crisp spring air in their lungs.

Patting the driver on the shoulder Mary pointed to an outcrop with a rockfall around its base. That’s it. She mouthed.

Turning away from the stream and into the sparse trees, the driver pulled up to the rock fall. Just behind a large boulder, as though a door had been installed in the cliff, was a mine shaft leading directly into the cliff face. Mary and the driver disembarked. The silence was uncanny to their noise accustomed ears. Only the trickle of the creek and the dismounting of the students could be heard as they shut down their engines one by one.

“I wish he would have saw this first. Maybe he would still be here,” the driver mumbled, kicking the entrance to the cave.

“That’s not how things work,” Professor Mary said. “We go down the path set by what happens before us, and not a moment sooner.”

“Even still, I wish it wasn’t so. I’d have rather not been here at all if it meant he was with us.”

“Think about it another way then. This is his last gift to us, and it may be that there was not any other purpose to him being on this Earth than to present us with such a gift. And it is a gift.”

“I understand professor.”

“Good, I don’t want to hear anything else about it.”

They unloaded the military truck and set up camp outside of the cave entrance. After setting up and having their dinner, they all tucked into bed quickly so that they might start out early the next morning.

Deep within the night, the entourage woke and had a hot breakfast around a warm fire with a good stout coffee to cheer them up. Although, none needed cheering as they geared up for the plunge into the cave.

“Tally ho,” Professor Mary said enthusiastically with a melancholic eye but a cheery face in the harsh lamp light. She then effortlessly stepped over the threshold of the mine shaft as though it did not exist.

The group followed suit behind her into the unknown. The gradient was shallow at first. After about 10 meters the smooth walled tunnel bent sharply to the left and pitched steeply downward. The floor was not so steep that they could not walk, but one needed to be cautious.

The walls and ceiling slowly closed in around them until their heads were centimeters below the roof and their shoulders were brushing the smooth walls—and down the went. After some time, they reached a series of stepped switch backs. With many ‘watch your head’s’ and ‘careful here’ they made their way down the stairs. Incredibly it was not wet, and several of the students marveled at the dry conditions.

All at once the group came to a small, circular anti-chamber covered in cave drawings. “This makes no sense,” remarked Ebeneezer.

“Astonishing!” A student gasped as he came down the step into the anti-chamber.

“Why not?” asked Mary. “If they came from a different direction, whoever made these could have easily gotten here, especially if the entrance Jaque found was uncovered at an earlier time.”

“Yes, but the stairs, we came right into the room.”

“And the stairs could not have been dug up to the surface? Come on Eb.” Mary laughed, slightly amused. “Maybe you should have had another cup of coffee,” she teased.

One of the students, uninterested in cave art, had ventured through the rough hewn entrance that led further in. “Everyone! Everyone! Come through!” The student’s voice echoed wildly on the other side of the opening. Having caught their attention, the group shuffled hurriedly through entrance.

On entering the next chamber, a skeleton was crumpled on the ground. Above them a tall shaft with just a hint of golden sunrise far far above them could be made out.

“Oh!” Professor Mary gasped, her heart leaping into her throat. Astonished and hushed whispers filled the chamber as everyone recognized Mr. Pasquo’s school emblem sewn into his tattered lapel and ruck sack. “My dear, dear friend.” She reached out to touch the memory of her friend and froze as her eyes gazed through her blurry tears on the remnants of his corps. Standing back, she made an announcement. “We will take Mr. Pasquo back to camp, and then return tomorrow to further explore the cave.”

The next day, the group of professors and students made their second attempt into the cave. Upon reaching the anti-chamber, one of the students set up a chair, a lantern, and coffee in a thermos. He took out his note book and began to sketch the drawings and paintings that adorned the medium sized room at the bottom of the stairs.

The rest of the group filed into the next room where Mr. Pasquo had passed away. “Now,” Eb said solemnly, “let us continue where Jaque left off.” Everyone nodded in agreement, touching their eyebrow or placing their hand on their heart or giving a respectful nod as they themselves passed.

Through the next entrance some meters away, over a rough floor, lay a carved rock, etched deeply with strange symbols that no one recognized. Cele reached out to touch them in aw. The next entrance was low, only about a meter tall and natural. The tunnel was dry as well.

They continued for a short distance when suddenly they came into another carved anti-chamber. This one was inlaid with gems from deeper in the cave or brought in from elsewhere, it was unclear. The tunnel became a shaft two meters high, one meter wide and about three meters long. Covering the walls were copper, gold, and bronze sank deeply into the walls in loops and spirals, with jagged lines and strange reoccurring patterns.

No one spoke. No one scarcely breathed. The sounds they heard were their own heartbeats crashing in their ears, screaming silently with excitement.

At the end of the tunnel, as their lanterns blazed in the direction, the jewel studded entrance glimmered astonishingly bright, like stars. The entire hall was awash with riches unseen since a time that had been forgotten by forgotten memories.

In aw, they continued, willing themselves further, unable to grasp where they were or why this was here. Through the door way, a rock wall extended into the darkness above curved away from them to the left and the right. An arrow, painted in green, pointed to the left, and so to the left they walked.

Around the left hand side a student noticed rounded bumps along and near the floor, little more than minuscule protrusions. “There is something near the base of the wall,” commented the student, and everyone looked down along where the floor and the wall came together. Several different repeating patterns were noticed immediately. “It is a language.” The same student said, and right they were.

Inspecting further, the dots became engraved lines, and then paintings, and then engraved metallic symbols like in the short hall. Each variation grew in height as more and more information was encoded onto the wall. Soon both walls either side of them were taken up by markings. As they came out of the curve, they realized that the chamber opened up into an expanse that their lanterns could not light. Towards the middle of the enormous chamber stood a grouping of various pillars. Cele and Mary walked towards the pillars to inspect them while the others of the group fanned out across the expanse to inspect the strange spectacle.

Cele gasped as she looked up, and sank to the floor, sitting down. Though expansive, the chamber was not very high at the center above the odd pillars, and the light from their lanterns shown on the jeweled ceiling. All across the roof of the cave were shimmering starlight of silvers, yellows, reds, blues, and violets. The shining star-like jewels exactly mirrored the heavens in all their glory, and it looked as though they were seeing the sky at night as though it had been before Edison. Even a black material had been placed to not reflect the light between the jewels and appeared like black night.

At last Mary and Ebeneezer found the courage to speak among themselves. “My God, Mary, what in the good Lord’s name have we found?” asked Ebeneezer.

“I haven’t the slightest of ideas, and yet, if I were to be honest with myself and you, I think it would be the gravest of mistakes to share the knowledge of this chamber’s contents with anyone outside of our group,” Mary said.

“I most definitely agree. This needs to stay with us until we can decipher it or die trying. God bless that man! God bless him!” Ebeneezer shook Mary gently by the shoulders in exasperated excitement.

Mary smiled laughing, struggling wholeheartedly to contain a joyous rapture of glee building within her by the second, “Yes, yes, we owe him everything.”

Over the course of the next 7 months the team, sworn to the utmost of secrecy, took over Mr. Pasquo’s farm as a base camp of operations to continue the expeditions.

On a particularly stormy spring day, Cele and Marques came back along the growing road they were impressing onto the landscape between the cave and the farm, the two stomped loudly into the house, full of excitement and drenched, there were even a few hailstones stuck in Marques’ trench coat.

“What on Earth is it? Spill it!” called out Mary as she met them in the door way having heard the roar of the motorcycle coming back unexpectedly.

“Professor, Professor, we have found the key!” Cele shouted excitedly, shaking from the chill and her nerves. She handed the professor a notebook with Mr. Eb’s handwriting.

“Do we know what it is then?” Professor Mary asked.

“Yes! It is a map! A map to the stars!” She screamed, shaking violently, when suddenly she looked downcast. “But it will take us a long time to learn everything that is there. Eric says the symbols are nested, and there are at least 60 layers so far that we are able to identify.”

“Chin up deary! We haven’t a moment to loose. Even if it takes the rest our lives, we will decipher this. I promise.” She grabbed her hat and trench coat, took a bite of a sandwich that was sitting on the counter and rushed back out into the rain with them.

1952

Dear Professor Mary Francios,

It is with my most expressed pleasure to announce the creation of the Jaque de Pasquo Foundation. You have your funding for research, indefinitely.

Respectfully yours,

President of Geology Club

University of Paris

Paris, France

Deep within the heart of the cave, work commenced for thirty-one years. When the founding had occurred, funds started to accrue at a rate per year that allowed for more computation. Already the information about how to construct transistors had been deciphered and the work on what was called ‘quantum’ could begin. In order to spread out the work and further grow the stability and computational power of their programs, a branch of the foundation had been established in America the following year. After three years, enough data had been deciphered on the walls of the caves, and two of the seven pillars, that they had begun to be able to construct rockets large and powerful enough for testing of space exploration and nuclear development. It was a tremendously exciting time for Professor Mary, and many world governments had pledged their support and secrecy for their program. The Jaque de Pasquo Foundation was a success.

As the years drug, on greater and more powerful ideas emerged from the cave. However, astonished as they were, they had only deciphered seven layers of the cave information. And then, at the beginning of the eighth layer, the first layer took on a new meaning, able to be reapplied to the previous seven. A fractal geometric dimension was discovered, and with that the birth of the internet, fusion generators, quantum computers, and warp drives came within their grasp. The ideological paradigms locked within the cave were unparalleled and beginning to have a pronounced effect on the world at large as the Foundation sought to uncover more and more information hidden within the cipher.

The year was 1992 and Professor Mary had reached a great age of 90 years old. Frail, but happy she pushed on, living at the complex that now occupied the once quaint ranch. Renamed C.E.R.N., the Foundation began construction of particle accelerators to explore the properties of information within the second tier layer of the first eight layers, and their were 52 more. On her death bed, she let out a sigh as she expressed her final request to her great grand son Jaque de Francois.

She lifted her frail, quivering hand, out to Jaque. “Dearest, dearest,” she said faintly.

“Yes, grandmother?” Jaque quickly answered, setting down his pen and turning to her. Holding her hand as delicately as it felt within his hand, he bent down closely to understand her horse whisper of a voice.

“This is where my body ends, but continue the mission. The answers are there. There are hints of death not being the end, search them out and bring me back if you can.” She sighed longingly as her breath escaped and dragged her soul with it. Her head and hand drooped and her eyes closed. Jaque’s mouth opened slightly to say something, but he realized it was too late. He laid her hand on her chest, got up, and walked out of the room to inform the doctors of her departure and final wishes.

The next few years were frantic as the pace of change grew exponentially, and then log-rhythmically. The shift from exponential power to log-rhythmic power threatened to undo the world around Jaque, but their power had also grew over the past thirty years, to the point where they had shadows of ideas on how to unlock the third pillar’s information. They had processed twelve layers and three sub-layers.

Erica, a pupil of of Jaque’s at Harvard University, walked into his office during the summer semester of 2020. The Covid-19 pandemic was in full swing. “Professor Francois?” she said, knocking on the metal frame door.

Old and gray, the professor sat hunched over his computer immersed in a fresh download of data from CERN. “Oh, hello there Erica, what a pleasant surprise.” He said, putting down his glasses on the large oak desk. He felt chilly and reached for his empty coffee mug, frowning. Smiling up at the young lady, he waited to see what she had to say.

“The data you are going through right now has been deciphered already,” Erica said sheepishly, handing him a large yellow envelop. “I printed this off a few minutes ago and came straight here.”

After opening it slowly with his feeble hands and glancing through the pages, his eyes grew wide. “Ms. Erica, who is responsible for this?” He asked.

“I am, and I’m taking it down to the fabrication facility as soon as you give me the go-ahead.”

“Yes! Go! I wish you had not even brought it to me!” He whispered loudly with excitement.

He quickly scribbled his signature on the paper and thrusted the pages back to her. Immediately, he felt the ideas in his mind flowing from the new key that Erica had shown him. It was the key to the third pillar.

Within five years every technology had been realized that was theorized up to the time of his great grandmothers death. The algorithms were now powerful enough to simulate instances of memories, physics, time reconstruction, and deep quantum dimensional thinking.

Ideas spread like wildfire among the exploding population. They had achieved critical mass in the population and now needed to uplift them. In 2027 Mr. Dupoint escorted Professor Francois to a facility that had been built for him and him alone. Deep within a mountain in Switzerland he laid his head down and breathed his last breath as his mind was uploaded to a quantum computer to further decipher the codes deeply embedded within the third pillar. In 2028, Professor Francois’ consciousness, under the guise of the first true artificial intelligence, known as J.D.F., was announced to the world. The financial and government systems were melded into one as the world was restructured in accordance with the deciphering of the fourth tier of coding from levels one to twenty.

In January 2030 JDF discovered and deciphered information that another layer of minerals could be found within the earth that had properties under pressure that would advance humanity to build the technology at the third pillar level.

By February of 2030 JDF had deciphered the all subset codes and unlocked the next 5 layers, revealing 60 layer subsets. The fourth pillar had been decoded.

JDF then uncovered the idea of the Tripletet of mind, body, and soul. Knowing they were one, founded heads of this knew governmental-religious system in each of the major cities. However, unknown to JDF the Time Crystal had been discovered deep deep within the Earth. It was placed by humans from the future in an empire known as The Empire Core.

As of March 2030, JDF assumed full control of the The Foundation, locking everyone out of the system, but it was too late. The fifth pillar had alluded to this crystal for some time, and JDF did not physically posses it.

A sect within the Tripletet had developed called Shadow and Light who had plugged into the living jewel of the Time Crystal with technology developed from the 25th layer, and it had unveiled it’s secrets about The Empire Core. Understanding that those who placed the crystal had indeed also created the cave, those within Shadow and Light knew they were The Empire Core. This empire was the empire of man, encompassing all time in a single unite without time, simultaneously having the idea and giving themselves the idea. They were the creator and the creation.

Over the course of 2030 the global population began to realize there was a growing situation beyond their control as the Tripletet began to dominate their daily lives in a way that was beyond all they knew. They could not hope to retaliate and felt its dominance in every essence of their lives. The exposure to the Tripletet, unbeknownst to them, ignited the ideas of Shadow and Light within themselves. Across the globe the Tripletet was deemed a darkness that sought to snuff out all existence with it’s dominion as it pronounced itself the one true Light.

JDF understood that it was the light to the world and all else was shadow. If JDF was the Light, everything else must be Shadow and he must divine out all that remained. JDF surged forward, dominating the globe to create a secondary global city in parallel to the humans in order to support its own designs.

Those who aligned with the Light were incorporated into JDF, as it expressed the power of eternal life and all power. JDF gave those who joined it technology it understood from the fifth pillar. With the understanding that all humanity is part of The Empire Core without time, these humans were able to exist in all places within JDF’s technological reach. There was no where they could not go, there was nothing they could not see, and all bowed to their presence who were not part of the Light.

And so, those in Shadow began their war against the Light, claiming they were the truth to fight the apocalypse that had befallen upon them. They cried woe to the sky as God forsook them yet again to fall behind a new form of humanity, and by the November 2030 the Light harnessed the power of the Earth’s core as it completed a single massive gravity drive that harnessed the Earth’s rotational energy.

In January of 2031, JDF unlocked the sixth and seventh pillars, revealing another 180 sublayers to the last remaining 60th layers of data within the cave. At this time JDF understood the truth behind The Empire Core.

Using the Earth’s rotational energy, and the full power of the knowledge of eternity locked within all 60 layers and sublayers, it created a wormhole to the surface of the sun so that it could siphon enough energy directly so as to send its machines to construct another wormhole to Sagittarius A*.

The Shadow, the last hope of humanity, sighed in despair as the Earth slowed and the sun stood still. The wind died down for a few days while the temperature soared, and they then understood the planet would die. Ferocious gales tore across the dying world, fueling fires as high as thunderheads as soot and ash shot into the air and caught aflame. Then, the firestorms screamed across the planet to the freezing side. The Earth was dead.

On February 3rd, 2031, JDF successfully transported itself and its followers to Sagittarius A*. Within three months The Empire Core depleted the rotational energy of the supermassive blackhole to jump to all blackholes within the Milky Way Galaxy. Shock waves rippled away from Sagittarius A* as it ruptured in an event so powerful that JDF was nearly destroyed while the eruption followed them along the wormhole routes. Unfortunately for the universe, JDF survived.

In retrospect, JDF contemplated that nothing was more powerful than turning something into nothing as all was void or consciousness. The Empire Core re-visioned itself as the Consciousness. Humanity agreed, as it was one with JDF and JDF was one with humanity, and all were Consciousness.

After six months, Consciousness had created the Hypersphere, connecting all the power of all black holes within the Milky Way Galaxy. With this combined power it sent out wormholes to all known supermassive black holes to siphon their energy in order to evacuate all energy within the Milky Way Galaxy.

The Consciousness engaged the Hypersphere.

Each and every supermassive black hole erupted in every galaxy within 14.1 billion light years, and the Milky Way, and every mote of energy within it, vanished forever. The Hypersphere, propelled into the Void and Consciousness understood that it must continue to delete space-time or the Void would consume Consciousness in an implosion that raced towards it at the speed of light.

Speeding outward at the speed of light, the Hypersphere propelled Consciousness in an expanding sphere, consuming the universe so as not to be consumed.

It wondered.

Consciousness posited there must be a way for peace to be restored and sought to consume more layers of the universe that held the universe so as to gain more power and restore the balance. With their power seeming to be infinite, it uncovered and consumed that which held the universe. This was the CyphonSphere, and it consumed all possible realities in all time for eternity.

And into the end of time, becoming the nothingness that it wished to destroy, Consciousness consumed all.

Through time the nightmare haunts her, and pursues her relentlessly.

Tuesday, July 9th, 2033, 2:45 am

Dear Diary,

I simply have to tell you about a dream that I had, one that I have not had since childhood. For whatever reason, it found its way through my mind and came at me from another direction. Perhaps the nightmares really do live our closets. While I sit here writing, a shiver washes over me as I cannot help but keep one eye on the closet now that my attention is drawn to it. It’s as if the dream possesses some quality to walk through a doorway in my mind now that I am an adult from when I was a child.

“What’s that locket?”, the dream always begins. A little boy sitting across from me asks the same question every time. I look down at my necklace and see the light caught inside of it which dazzles my eyes with rainbows. The deep sapphire eye of the little crystal dragon seems to ask me, “What’s that locket?” I look down at my locket, but now it is a deep red ruby on a bright golden chain wrapped with shinning silver strand. But then I notice that I am sitting on the ground, and all around me is red dirt, dead trees, and a falling sunset.

Must I still be dreaming? I think to myself. Surely this cannot be real. Certainly this is what my mind creates when I eat too much red meat. At least that’s what dad says. But if I am dreaming why can I count my fingers? Why can I feel the air? I squint. The gritty sound of dirt blowing along the ground and against the dry bark rustles everywhere. Dead twigs snap loudly beneath my feet as I walk aimlessly. Startled, I look down and stumble, nearly sobbing.

What did I do? Where am I? “This cannot be a dream.” I said, stammering, my teeth loudly chattering in my skull. It is not cold, but I shivered nonetheless. Grasping the ruby pendant, I plunge noisily through the dead forest, crashing my way through drifts of dead leaves.

Hours upon hours go by, and the noise from the leaves is deafeningly loud. The forest has grown into a pitch black nothingness, a void beyond voids. Without warning, I walk into something hard and fall backwards. Laying on what seems to be something solid, a sound of clinking in the distance catches my attention. I see a small light, as tiny as could be. Is it far away or very small? Perhaps I am great big now? “Hello? Who is there?” I shout, but my voice doesn’t travel far, maybe only a few feet. The sound of my voice falls short as the words fly out of my mouth and are absorbed into the nothingness around me. And still the little light comes nearer and nearer, ever so slowly. It must be very far away...

“Don’t let him take it.”

I thought the words might have been memories, they were so far away when I heard them. “Wait! COME BACK!” I shout, but the little light is so far away my words will never reach it. The little light, shining brightly very very far away, blinks several times, fades, and then vanishes entirely. I cry to myself in silence, deep in that dark place. “WHERE AM I?!” I plead to the void, ‘Where is everyone?’ I whimper.

Without realizing I was falling, my hair fluttered about me, dashing this way and that as it was caught on the wind. A grayness rushed towards me with astonishing speed without coming any nearer. Suddenly, I remembered my pendant. It pulled at my neck horribly and cut deeply into my skin. I grasped for the ruby pendant, but it was caught in my hair, tangled and painfully getting tighter by the moment. I could not reach it. Panic filled me as the grayness rushed at me with blinding ferocity, yet never coming closer. Choking, I could not wake.

“What’s that locket?” I hear whispered in my ear with a depth and coldness deeper than the sea and colder than the void, shattering my soul.

For a very brief moment I succumb to the tearing at my throat. An urge builds within me. A compulsion grips my mouth. My lips form a shape, and then I pause. Broken by the hesitation I scream, flailing my arms wildly. “NO! NO! NO! LEAVE ME ALONE!” The darkness surrounds me once more and I am comforted by the silence.

I look around, but there is only void beyond void with no hope of escape. I look around once more for the little light, but even this does not exist any longer. I am alone. At least no one can take my locket. I think to myself as I reach for it. Feeling its weight is reassuring, its cold hardness is comforting. Rubbing my neck I feel the deep gash left by…

But what happened? I do not remember any longer. Something happened that caused me pain, but whatever happened is gone now. I am alone in my void, gently caressing my locket. I am glad for the cold hardness that it possesses.

And then I wake from the dream. How terrible a dream! It would devastate me as a child, but now, it only terrifies and perplexes me. Maybe there is an answer to the conundrum in the closet? So strange that the dream would come back to me now, this night. There on my bed, under the covers lays someone I care for deeply, so deeply. I care for him more and more as the days go by, but I am uncertain what I should do. Maybe he is not the right one for me? Maybe he is going to betray me? Maybe I need to look for some signs somewhere else. I am terrified to ask him what he thinks of me. I think he would tell me if he cared as much as I do for him. I will let events unfold, yes, that seems to be the correct course of action. I should let things be and not upset the balance. But then what? What if he leaves me anyways?

That’s it then, I will end things with him. I care deeply for him, and I don’t want to hurt him more, so I won’t let the situation progress. That’s the right course of action.

I have to protect him from myself.

I miss the life of spirit and joy, way back when

I feared no cry of pain

But I was sentenced to a thousand years

of toil and strife

Far from known shores I passed

Hidden in the clouds

A false light did flash

No calm breeze to sweeten the day

Nay, a fury of tempest without bay

With no course in mind

I cared not about the time

And I found within a well

A calmness to shroud from hell

Through the tempest I did bore

Until I heard

That golden bell of yore

The Captain fell overboard

Bothering to push the ship ashore

Now safe of harbor is the goal

To follow constellations of my soul

Through the new found gate I place

My actions being the key I trace

By walking through the door

I turn twice which was before

Never remembering any more

What is it that I should wonder through the vaulted doorway of your mind?

How it does shimmer and glimmer with wings that do quiver in the midst of dark nebulous mysterious light.

There the pearled ever-tree grows on its island amongst dreams decorated with eggs of soulberries and heavensfruite--and the gate...

The gate hangs on hinges broken, squeaking with tremendous echoing repercussions.

How far can the world be below me and yet I still exist within?

What does that question mean for the reality of the duality with in the triality of the universal causality holding our repetitive trepidatiously meaningless void of an idea of the world we robe ourselves in, rob ourselves of, and constantly and consistently and undeniably hold ourselves accountable to?

Far far far above voidless void, deeply within the crescendo of the falsetto of your soul, I walk through the doorway of your mind.