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  3037 Peggy Holloway

  3037

  BY

  PEGGY

  HOLLOWAY

  This is a work of fiction. Names characters and incidents are figments of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real.

  Copyright 2011 by Peggy Holloway

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author.

  INTRODUCTION

  Technology had reached its peak at the beginning of the 27th century. Humans had become like robots. Cell phones and computers had become a thing of the past.

  Humans had wanted higher and higher technology and had wanted it to be smaller and smaller. After everything became thumbnail size, it was harder to remember where they put them and they lost more and more of their toys.

  In the 27th century a company was founded by a fifteen year old genius whose designation was P24Q. He named the company BioGen.

  By this time all disease had been wiped out due to the health and exercise craze that had reached almost obsessive proportions in the 25th and 26th centuries. Because of this, doctors had very little to do.

  When P24Q came up with his ideas he decided he could make himself rich with the help of the medical profession. After using some of the lower animals to experiment on, devices were implanted directly into the human brain.

  Little had been known about the brain before the 24th century but now that it was fully understood they were able to move ahead with P24Q’s invention. They were able to implant technology directly into the parts of the brain to use it to the full advantage.

  Most people thought this new idea was the best technology ever. Operations like the pacemaker were a thing of the past by then and there was no more cancer. They had developed the technology to program robots tiny enough to be put into a hypodermic needle. They would essentially go in and search out and eat all the cancer cells and return to the needle site and exit where they would be destroyed.

  Most medical technology had developed faster than communication technology until P24Q came up with his invention.

  By the beginning 27th century the most important things for humans were to be healthy and to be able to communicate and learn. P24Q’s timing couldn’t have been better.

  Getting your head shaved and your brain implanted with all this tiny equipment was the thing to do. As this caught on, more and more people were getting their head shaved and the implants done. Because technology was still advancing so fast, they kept their head shaved.

  As more advances took place there came a time when these implants were done on newborns. By the end of the 27th century all you had to do was think of a friend or family member and they were there in your head talking to you. Mothers could communicate with their babies from miles away, singing to them or offering comforting words.

  The system was perfect, or so it seemed at the time.

  CHAPTER ONE, 1973

  The simple appendectomy ended up with complications. I remember being in recovery and a nurse waking me up. I didn’t want to wake up, I wanted to sleep. Then my chest hurt really bad and I heard her say, “We need a crash cart over here!”

  I must have blacked out because the next thing I remember was what felt like someone jumping up and down on my chest. Someone said, in a panicky voice, “We’re losing her, we’re losing her!”

  All of a sudden nothing hurt anymore and I saw the very brightest light I’ve ever seen in my life. It was whiter than white and brighter than bright, but didn’t hurt my eyes.

  I went back and forth between the wonderful light to someone jumping on my chest and yelling about losing me for what seemed like hours. I wanted to tell them to leave me alone but I had something down my throat and couldn’t talk.

  Suddenly it sounded like a very strong wind gust at the same time as the white light appeared and I could hear a man’s voice in the distance saying, “Chart the time of death at 2:26 p.m.”

  I was in complete darkness for I don’t know how long after that until I heard the voice of a small child.

  “Pretty lady, pretty Lady? Wake up pretty lady.”

  When I opened my eyes I saw a bald-headed child stooping over me. She was wearing a long white cotton gown that went to her ankles. I wondered how I had ended up in the children’s wing of the hospital.

  I noticed scars all over her head. “She must have had some kind of brain cancer,” I thought, and my heart went out to her.

  “What is your designation?” She asked.

  She was adorable with eyes the color of an aquamarine sea. “I don’t know what you mean,” I said in confusion.

  She laughed, “They must call you something.” She reached over and felt my hair like she hadn’t seen hair before. “Why do you have hair? It’s very beautiful but so impractical.”

  “Where am I?” I knew now I was no longer in the hospital. I sat up and looked around. I was in some sort of garden and I was lying on thick grass.

  “What is this place?” I asked her.

  “Why, it’s section P. Did you think it was section Q?”

  “What are you talking about? Am I still in St. Augustine?”

  She stood there frowning like I was speaking a different language. “Come on,” she said and I realized she was trying to limit her words to just a few in case I didn’t understand her.

  She took me by the hand and I noticed she wasn’t wearing any shoes. I also noticed I was completely naked and remembered a male voice telling someone to chart the time of death. Now I thought I understood. I must be dead and this was some sort of afterlife.

  The little girl didn’t seem to notice I was naked and I was surprised I wasn’t embarrassed about it at all. I was usually so modest.

  I looked down at the little girl, “How old are you? I have a daughter about your age. She’s five years old. Her name is June. What is your name?”

  She again looked at me like I was speaking a foreign language, “Come on,” she said again.

  We walked up a slight rise and there was a field of flowers in every color. The grass was so green. Then I noticed something I hadn’t noticed before. Everything grew more lush than I had ever seen and I knew I was in a place I had never been before.

  “Is this earth?” I asked.

  Again she looked confused, “Come on.”

  We finally came to the most unusual building I have ever seen. There were no sharp edges or corners. It looked almost soft like it was buily out of silly putty and it was the same pinkish color. I walked up and felt it and it was hard but so smooth I could have felt it all day long.

  “Why are you rubbing the dwelling?”

  She looked at me with a questioning look but I was too absorbed in examining it to answer. There were no seams. The windows were every color in the rainbow and that’s what they looked like. Like they were reflected and refracted light picking up all the surrounding colors of all the flowers and green grasses and trees.

  The windows looked more like clear plastic than real glass and I thought they, like the rest of the house, were made of a material I had never seen before.

  I didn’t see a door but before I could ask she said, “Enter,” and part of the wall disappeared. What was inside took my breath away.

  The furniture was a bright array of colors. There were no sharp corners or edges here either. In fact everything looked like different sized balls. The floor felt wonderful and I stood rubbing my feet on the floor. It looked like the same material as the windows and felt very smooth to my feet.

  Again I saw no doors and the wall had reappeared when we entered. I assumed this was the only room but then a wall on the opposite side from where we had entered disappeared and a bald-headed woman appeared. She was tall and th
in with eyes the same color as the little girl and I concluded she was the little girl’s mother.

  “No, you have to talk verbally. She has no implants,” the little girl said to the woman.

  “What is your designation?” The woman yelled like I was hard of hearing.

  “I don’t know what that means,” I yelled back.

  “Why is she yelling?” she asked her daughter.

  “Probably because you were,” the little girl said in a normal voice.

  I laughed and they joined in. Pointing to herself the woman said, “P42R,” and pointing to the child, “P63G.”

  I pointed to myself and said, “Ashley.”

  The woman looked at her daughter, “That doesn’t tell us anything. That sounds more like what you would call a pet.”

  When the woman told me to have a seat, I felt grateful that it sounded like my language but I didn’t see any place to sit. Was I supposed to sit on one of the balls?

  Then P42R saw me looking around and led me to one of the balls and told me to sit. As soon as I sat down the material shaped itself to fit to my body and it was the most comfortable seat I’ve ever had.

  CHAPTER TWO

  I must have dozed off but the smell of food woke me up. If I had thought about it I would have expected some kind of futuristic food with no taste but they brought me a bowl of plain old vegetable soup and a piece of ordinary bread, the kind that’s crusty on the outside and soft on the inside.

  I thanked her and started eating. It was the best food I had ever had. The food was what I was used to but the spoon and the bowl were made out of the same silly putty-like material as just about everything else.

  As I ate the soup, the bowl got smaller and when I was finished it became a sphere. They smiled at me and handed me a glass of liquid. It wasn’t really made of glass but of the same material the windows were made of.

  I realized I was thirsty and I drank it down. It tasted like some kind of fruit juice. P42R and P63G were using their hands and I realized they were communicating but not verbally. They both looked worried.

  “We need to take you to the implant station,” 63R said. I had shortened their names by leaving off the common P. The P must represent the area or sector since 42R had told me this was sector P. So, I was on earth in sector P. But how did I get here I kept asking myself?

  “What’s the implant station?”

  “Why, that’s where you get the implants so you can communicate.”

  “What does it entail?”

  “They will shave your head and make incisions and implant the devices, according to what you want. Here take the catalog and see what you want.”

  As I looked through the catalog I was horrified. The diagrams and pictures looked like something out of a horror movie.

  “No way,” I said as I handed back the catalog.

  “Yes there is a way. Perhaps you didn’t understand.” She tried to hand the catalog back to me but I shook my head.

  “There’s no way in hell I’m going to let anyone do this to me.”

  “Mommy, what are we going to do? She has to do this or they will lock her up with the deviates. I don’t want her locked up. I like her.”

  “I like her too sweetie but you know the law.”

  Without thinking I embarrassed myself by saying, “I won’t let anyone shave my head.” I put my hand over my mouth.

  Just then the outer wall disappeared again and a man walked in. Even with the shaved head and the long robe he wore he was the best looking man I have ever seen.

  63G kissed him on the cheek and the three of them stood like they were talking but didn’t say anything. They were gesturing and shaking their heads and shrugging their shoulders.

  I realized they were communicating through the implants in their brain. I was getting worried. I had to get away from here because I definitely didn’t want to have my head shaved and some foreign objects implanted.

  “I want to go home,” I said and realized how crazy that sounded.

  The man looked at me, “Hello, I’m P65G. You must be as confused about us as we are about you. Do you know how you got here and where you came from? Maybe that would help us get you back.”

  ”I went into the hospital for a simple appendectomy and I think I died from a heart attack. Then your little girl woke me up here.”

  He frowned and held up his hand and I noticed his hands were beautiful. They looked smoother than mine.

  “I don’t know what all these things are you mentioned. Hospital? Appendectomy? Heart attack? No one has heart attacks anymore. I’ve read about them in ancient history books, but they were done away with centuries ago.”

  He hesitated then asked, “When are you from?”

  “1973, what year is this?”

  “But, that’s over a thousand years ago. That’s impossible.” He looked at the other two and they communicated silently and nodded like they all agreed on what he had said.

  He then did something that both shocked and surprised me. Up until then he had been kind. They had all been kind. But now he walked over to me and grabbed a big handful of my hair and yanked so hard it brought tears to my eyes.

  “Ouch! Why did you pull my hair? Oh, you thought it was a wig? You think I’m lying?”

  “It’s real,” he told the other two. “I don’t know how but I think she is telling the truth. If so, we have to hide her. If the museum authorities see her she will be put in one of the cages and made to perform. Unless that’s what you want,” He said as he looked at me.

  “That sounds horrible. Can’t you just help me get back to where I was? I have a little girl back there. She thinks I died.”

  “You did die. But you didn’t reincarnate like you were supposed to for some reason. You should have been reborn as an infant and not remember any past lives.”

  “How could you possibly know this?” I asked.

  “Well, I don’t know it for sure just like you never know any belief for sure, but it is what we believe. It is the thing that makes the most sense.

  “It was once believed that time was linear. We now know that’s not true. We have proven that time wraps around on itself. I could die today, for example and reincarnate in 1973. I would be as confused as you are if I didn’t reincarnate as a newborn.”

  He looked at the other two and they left the building by again making the wall disappear.

  After they left he continued, “There’s a wise old woman named Irene who we will talk to.”

  “Wait a minute, why does she have a name like me instead of a designation?”

  “Irene is unusual. She may have come here like you did. She keeps to herself and not many people know she exists. I met her by accident one day while hiking in the mountains.

  “I saw a cave and went to explore it. She was sitting on the floor with a fire burning in front of her and she was brewing some sort of tea. She had long white hair and offered me tea in exchange for not telling anyone about her.

  “She didn’t tell me much but she had some interesting things to say. Why don’t we go see her?”

  “Yes,” I said with excitement. I needed to meet this woman like me very badly.

  They spent the rest of the day and evening showing me around. This place was really beautiful. Toward evening we went back inside and again had soup and bread with the fruit juice.

  They put the little girl to bed early and then we relaxed on the balls that melded to fit the body. I noticed that if I grabbed a handful of the ball and squeezed it would mold to fit my hand.

  They watched in silence as I squeezed the stuff between my legs and between my armpits and everywhere else I could think of.

  “This is the most remarkable stuff,” I said, “What do you call it?”

  They looked at each other and then back at me. “It’s not alive,” said the man, “You don’t need to call it.”

  I laughed and they joined in, I think out of politeness, because I don’t think they knew why I thought it was funny. I could see w
e were going to have a communication problem.

  I pulled part of the ball across my body and I think they thought I was trying to cover myself. I had quite forgotten I was naked. The woman got up and left the room. She came back with a robe like what they were wearing.

  “For a place so advanced, they sure like simple food and clothing” I thought. I wondered how they traveled. I had not seen any roads or any kind of vehicles, not even bikes.

  “How do you get from one place to the other?” I asked.

  “Where do you want to go?” she asked.

  “Well, wherever,” I shrugged.

  She looked at him, “Is there such a place? I’ve never heard of it.”

  Again I laughed and they joined in out of politeness.

  “I guess you’re tired after the day you had,” The man said. “How long do you need to refresh?”

  “Well I need to brush my teeth and take a shower.”

  They again looked puzzled.

  “Don’t tell me you don’t bathe or brush your teeth.”

  “You’re talking about cleansing. When you walk into the dwelling you’re cleansed. We were asking about refreshing. You see, we only need a few hours to refresh because of the implants. They give us long rest in short time.”

  “I only need about eight hours.”

  “Eight hours? You’d better get started then.”

  But no one moved to show me where I was supposed to sleep. I sat looking from one to the other and they closed their eyes and leaned back. The balls now became horizontal. I was going to have to wake them up because I had to use the bathroom and I didn’t know where it was.

  I thought it was mighty rude of them to not even show me where the bathroom was. I was thinking maybe I would go outside and find a bush when she opened her eyes and looked at me.

  “You have already refreshed?”

  “No, not yet, I need to find the bathroom.”

  “You are already cleansed.”

  “I have to pee.”

  She woke up the man and communicated silently and I could see when he understood what I needed. He got up and led me outside and sure enough found me a bush to go behind.