Today Is A Break Between Chapters

This is Amorella. The photo was taken two years ago. You are looking south from the summer picnic table area. Orndorff is beside himself today as I told him to take the day off and clean up the first chapter as it is now completed. He has not done so and dusk is fast approaching. Tomorrow we begin Chapter Two.

The best of New Years to one and all. Thank you for your interest in my writings.     Richard

Chapter 1:11 © The Rebellion – rho

Rigel and the Witch Head Nebula

Credit & Copyright: Rogelio Bernal Andreo (Deep Sky Colors)

Explanation: Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn, and cauldron bubble -- maybe Macbeth should have consulted the Witch Head Nebula. This suggestively shaped reflection nebula on the lower left is associated with the bright star Rigel, to its right, in the constellation Orion. More formally known as IC 2118, the Witch Head Nebula glows primarily by light reflected from Rigel. Fine dust in the nebula reflects the light. Pictured above, the blue color of the Witch Head Nebula and of the dust surrounding Rigel is caused not only by Rigel's blue color but because the dust grains reflect blue light more efficiently than red. The same physical process causes Earth's daytime sky to appear blue, although the scatterers in Earth's atmosphere are molecules of nitrogen and oxygen. Rigel, the Witch Head Nebula, and gas and dust that surrounds them lie about 800 light-years away.

**

         Thales found himself listening groggily to the sky in what appeared to be his late morning bed. I am in a studied deep sleep stupor, he fancied. Yet I was up earlier with aromas and tastes of fruit, bread and cheese. The stone circle at Avenue’s end. The River pleads, “No more, no more.” Silent lightning shoots across my brow. This is as an omen too late received. A cornerstone of questions to break into pieces and fly.

         “Good morning, again,” responded Kassi. “I fear we will have lost the battle by noon.”

         “How are you here?” he questioned foggily.

         “We four are,” commented Marios from behind. “We await the joint meeting with Aeneas and Sophia.”

         “Salamon, you too? I did not see you.”

         “You did not look, Thales,” he commented wearily from his sitting place on the dirt floor. “A move has been made, Thales, but we do not know what it is.”

         “By the Supervisor?”

         “We do not know,” replied Kassi. “Aeneas, does not know. He had a dream.”

         “A dream? We all have dreams,” countered Thales. I had one myself just moments ago – about the stone circle.”

         “Aeneas mentioned the stone circle in his  own dream,” whispered Salamon to Marios who then pointed towards Thales and said, “I saw Aeneas first. He mentioned the stone circle, that was the first thing he mentioned, the old tree within the stone circle.”

         “It may have meaning,” suggested Kassi. “A goddess?”

         Sophia will know,” uttered Marios reasonably. “No more speculation.”

         The four were taken to heart and their imaginations fed in the dread of future tense until the door opened and Sophia entered alone.

Sophia with lush over-the-shoulders auburn hair appears almost as striking as a full-bodied Greek goddess who no one wishes to cross. ‘This is a way,’ she thinks as she walked into the room to greet the other four. ‘Our spirit-world is about to change whether we five are the instigators or not. We must participate as we are built for such a use. We can help the Living rise, and that alone will be worth our fall.’ With the word fall her words fell into an abyss where a new thought just as sudden rose.

Sophia declared, “We must find a way to reach out and build a bridge to the Living.” She could sense the endless questioning in their eyes. She said, “The events here and now are not controlled by steering a rudder but rather by hoisting the sail or dropping it down at opportune moments. This Rebellion has already begun and Necessity has her first and second move.”

The End of Chapter One

of the fourth book in the Merlyn’s Mind series

The Rebellion

© 2009 Richard H. Orndorff

Chapter 1:10 © The Rebellion – rho

This image of Centaurus A shows a spectacular new view of a supermassive black hole's power. Jets and lobes powered by the central black hole in this nearby galaxy are shown by submillimeter data (colored orange) from the Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) telescope in Chile and X-ray data (colored blue) from the Chandra X-ray Observatory. Visible light data from the Wide Field Imager on the Max-Planck/ESO 2.2 m telescope, also located in Chile, shows the dust lane in the galaxy and background stars. The X-ray jet in the upper left extends for about 13,000 light years away from the black hole. The APEX data shows that material in the jet is travelling at about half the speed of light.

Credits: X-ray: NASA/CXC/CfA/R.Kraft et al.; Submillimeter: MPIfR/ESO/APEX/A.Weiss et al.; Optical: ESO/WFI

**

         Disturbed, Aeneas sat. No sign of the Supervisor or Apollo. He smirked at the thought. When ever are there signs by any god? Mother Earth. He shook his head. Mother Earth is long gone. I sit sulking on stone that isn’t stone and stare down into a crevasse that isn’t any more real than I am.

         “Then jump,” said an inner voice Aeneas had long ago learned not to listen to. He did fall asleep though and dead he lay wedged snuggly between two undersized boulders in the morning light.

         The Dead dream much as the Living but the interconnections are within others of the fold and themselves, especially friends, sometimes those friends still Living. This dream however was one like no other – and afterwards, fully awake, he committed the dream to memory through a focused center on setting, characters and serendipitous plot then reinforced this through actually recitation.

***

         As Narrator I will transcribe the short but memorable dream. The reader can make of it what sheorhe may. The dream:

         Walking out the south door of Our Mother’s quarters I follow a narrow flower and rock lined path between the great circle of stones. The higher inner stone lintels have a diameter of some fifty feet in the inner bluestone ring. This area is covered by a massive tree whose lower branches are the diameter of many a human torso.

Other lesser though still massive branches are the thickness of the length of a human legs from hip joint to toe tip and above they are the thickness of an arms from shoulder socket to fingertip. The tree appears to be as ageless as the human spirit. Upward and outwardly dark tentacles of a Giant Squid with a canopy of leaves over all the stones in the circles, a roof of knots and limbs burrowed into limbs each propping up the next set of higher and still massive limbs that are more than an forearm’s length in thickness.

‘Notice,’ says our Mother at the south entrance, ‘I am sitting thirty feet up on a lower tree limb as they come down the path to the Stone Circle. Each is dressed in similar attire, a loose collarless, split-neck tunic and baggy seated trousers with rope belt. Both tunic and trousers are unbleached linen with appropriate accessory leather-like sandals or slippers. Simple, comfortable clothing in any generation.’

I, Aeneas, glance at the Greek temple on each side of the Avenue in the distance. One Doric column holding a common corner. Three more columns to the West and three more temple columns to the South. These lead on to the columns of the arcade, a market place for the gatherings of personalities.

A group of five steps out of cadence onto the gray marble walkway at the temple and by the end of the first block of the arcade I had calculated each city block contained thirty-seven columns, fifteen feet high. The block is approximately 484 feet long with an eight foot grass horizontal lane between each of the eighteen blocks.

I am continually amazed at the power of the collective human mind of the ten thousand.

A mirror image of temple, columns, and arcade stood on the opposite side of the Avenue that lead from the stone circle and the inner target tree down to the River. Other groups meander about or sit on benches or on the grass and chat.

The small Congress passed through noticed, but not extraordinarily so. Spirited bodies each with a unique mix of human heart and soul, make up the common humanity. The individual gives up much of herorhimself to exist here. That is the way it is in the Place of the Dead. No fences exist other than lines of mutual comfort or discomfort. This Place is a human citadel of continuity with our birth Mother always at its forefront. These and all other matters will sink deep before they rise up as one voice declaring . . . .

           Thus, this peculiar dream ends abruptly with a single motion of the Hand.

Chapter 1:9 © The Rebellion – rho

         

The aftermath of the death of a massive star is shown in beautiful detail in this new composite image of G292.0+1.8. In color is the Chandra X-ray Observatory image - easily the deepest X-ray image ever obtained of this supernova remnant. Although considered a "textbook" case of a supernova remnant, the intricate structure shown here reveals a few surprises.

Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Penn State/S.Park et al.; Optical: Pal.Obs. DSS

**

         Earlier that morning Aeneas waited patiently for the Supervisor to show. While Aeneas lingered near the outer rock hill crevasse, Apollo flew through the ancient hand of the Supervisor without realizing the fact. He stopped above the same crevasse where Aeneas stood as stone. Glancing through various directions at once, Apollo’s mind wrote, Necessity holds me hostage. I am not alone. I am never alone.

         Suddenly, Apollo saw his twin sister Artemis appear but an arm’s length away. Extensive, near black hair stealthily woven above the huntress’ four faces, each compass set on the nine cardinal directions of Olympus so that her targeted father Zeus is always in her foresight. Balance is the nature followed by her lines of sight. Two of her eyes capture Apollo and she says, “I am a translated sight both inward and outward. You are captured by me Brother not by Father Zeus or the Supervisor.

         Apollo thwarted forth, “What Good do you serve this Place Sister as you are so uninvited?”

         “Brother, you cannot create Prophecy here. I am invited not by you or Father.”

         Apollo growled, “Necessity is such a mother.”

         “I am the Healer.”

         “And, I am Apollo, who stands in the presence of Zeus. I give the Vision. I am the News. I dictate what is to be written on the wall.”

         She stood defiant. “I am Artemis, the medicine of Zeus and I set the intervention between the affairs of human beings on Earth and Zeus on Olympus.”

         Apollo firmly asserted, “This is not written so.”

       “It is written in the milk of human kindness,” chastised his twin.      “What was once done cannot be undone.”

         Apollo rebuked, “If this is Father’s doing it can be undone.”

         “In this instance,” she admonished, “our father Zeus has no choice.” Once sudden Artemis dissolved into a dark vision framed.

         This as an unexpected shock blasted Apollo’s now vacant mind. Thunder quickly reverberated throughout his very being and he considered, ‘I saw Artemis my first born twin. She spoke. Never once would I have guessed she was but a disguise. I, Apollo, god of light now understand blindness though my eyes remain forever wide open.’

***

         The Supervisor had spoken. Apollo would soon deliver the circumvented translation to Aeneas in the form of hindsight as it so pleased his second nature.

Chapter 1:8 © The Rebellion – rho

At a distance of about 1,500 light years, the Orion Nebula is one of the closest star formation regions to Earth. This makes Orion -- a favorite for amateur astronomers and casual sky watchers -- an excellent location to study how stars are born and behave during their stellar childhoods. In this composite image, the central region of Orion is seen as never before through NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope.

The bright point-like sources (blue) in this image are the burgeoning stars captured in X-ray light by a long series of Chandra observations.

These nearly continuous observations, lasting almost 13 days, allowed astronomers to monitor the activity of Sun-like stars between 1 and 10 million years old. The fledgling stars were seen to flare in their X-ray intensity much more than our Sun does today. This suggests our Sun had many violent and energetic outbursts when it was much younger. The wispy filaments (pink and purple) are clouds of gas and dust as seen by Hubble in optical light. This gas and dust will one day condense into disks of material from which future generations of stars will be born.

Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Penn State/E. Feigelson et al. Optical: NASA/STScI

From: www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/chandra/multimedia/photos07-109.html

**

Morning, the second day.

         Having not heard from Aeneas, Sophia waited apprehensively. Whatever happens, she pondered, we will learn more about the Supervisor and this Place. It is not reasonable that we continue on without knowing a plan or goal. Are we supposed to develop one of our own? We want to go home to watch over our great-grand children. What happens to the others who do not arrive? Are they the fortunate ones who are allowed to sleep eternally while we continue on?

         The Narrator almost smiled. This is heard rolling over and over in the human minds. People expect to be told what to do when deep down they understand the general expectations and move on from those. One well known existential question is ‘What can we hope for?’ and a levelheaded response is that ‘our children should be able to live more humanely than their parents’.

         Whose children? Why a should when a must will more easily do? How is live defined? How is humanely defined? What do the parents gain by this responsibility?

         We are given the gift of Free Will after death as well as before. How much free will do we allow ourselves individually as well as within the group? How much did we allow in life? The survival of our group comes first because it is necessary for the better survival of our children and our grandchildren. Why are we given Free Will when we have parental and group responsibility yoked to it? We are born, we grow, we have children, our children have children. If we are fortunate we die with individual and in group dignity somewhere along that chain.

         We thought if we were not free in life then we would be free in death but that is not the case in this Place. We ruminate and find camaraderie through our personal identities, personalities and interests. The human center is Our Mother, the first who was allowed in this Place. She is our common point. We are equal citizens through our ancestry. We have become a hive of silhouetted sensible questions buzzing back through the many cousins, searching for equally silhouetted reasonable responses. What else can we do? The gods certainly don’t help. We don’t know if they ever helped.

         Generally, more emotionally laden questions resolve themselves through a deeper inner study. The question, Who am I? is more easily resolved after life than Why am I here? What shall I do here? How much can I know and understand of my role and responsibility in this Place? How do I resolve each and all of these issues?

         These are the deeper questions the Dead deal with. It is no wonder time is taken away from them so they may rest and think and resolve, first as a member of the group of Dead, then second as a fully human individual consciousness with personality and memory from life. These are enough questions concern these individuals and their small group of five in relationship to what they must do, what actions they must take when confronting the Supervisor who is as a god like no other, Necessity. 

***

Chapter 1:7 © The Rebellion – rho

The main component of this graphic is an artist's representation of M33 X-7, a binary system in the nearby galaxy M33. In this system, a star about 70 times more massive than the Sun (large blue object) is revolving around a black hole. This black hole is almost 16 times the Sun's mass, a record for black holes created from the collapse of a giant star. Other black holes at the centers of galaxies are much more massive, but this object is the record-setter for a so-called "stellar mass" black hole.

In the illustration, an orange disk surrounds the black hole. This depicts material, fed by a wind from the blue companion star, which has been swept into orbit around the black hole. Rather than flowing unimpeded and uniformly into space, wind from the star is pulled towards the black hole by its powerful gravity. The wind that does make it past the black hole is disrupted, causing turbulence and ripples beyond the disk. The companion star itself is also distorted by the gravity from the black hole. The star is stretched slightly in the direction of the black hole, causing it to become less dense in this region and to appear darker.

The inset shows a composite of data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory (blue) and the Hubble Space Telescope. The bright objects in the inset image are young, massive stars around M33 X-7, and the bright, blue Chandra source is M33 X-7 itself. X-rays from Chandra reveals how long the black hole is eclipsed by the companion star, which indicates the size of the companion. Observations by the Gemini telescope on Mauna Kea, Hawaii track the orbital motion of the companion around the black hole, giving information about the mass of the two members of the binary. Other observed properties of the binary were also used to help constrain the mass estimates of both the black hole and its companion.

Image credit: ration: NASA/CXC/M.Weiss; X-ray: NASA/CXC/CfA/P.Plucinsky et al.; Optical: NASA/STScI/SDSU/J.Orosz et al.

From: www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/chandra/multimedia/photos07-112.html

[Similar in shape to the gods’ entrance to Hades in the story]

**

            Time for a few facts about this Place. So far there are two ways into Hades and no way out unless you are or have been consummated by one of the beloved gods or goddesses. By most accounts there are the major twelve on Mt. Olympus.

As this is many years later and people are more prone to science fact than fiction the real Place of the Dead, if there is one, need be no more than a thought in size. How large would you make such a Place? You may think you can feel a heart or soul or mind from time to time, but as you can’t see any of the three materially and as they have no physical weight (I am excluding the brain here as well as the potential for physical work by each separately or altogether), then proof of existence is relatively difficult to come by even if you are categorized a ‘gifted’ person in any field of human endeavor.

If you want the names of the eleven Zeus dominated Mt. Olympus you can look them up. Stories have to cut things short just as films do. Inference is important, so are other nuances of language so keep that in mind.

         For example, things haven’t changed that much in the Place of the Dead though now the Living have added different dynamic dimensions to the concept. Over the centuries people have done some thinking relative to religions, the sciences, philosophies and cultural media of presentation especially in the twenty-first century.

It is time some new ideas are thrown into the mix of metaphorical and/or spiritual stories. That’s the reason I’m the narrator, and while I am only a shadow of the Supervisor, it is still better to be shadow than to be nothing at all. That’s the butt-end of a joke among most of the Dead since, well, a long, long time ago, just about the time this major battle between the humans and their gods and goddesses was settled.

Since the conclusion of this battle epic at the end of book seven the Dead have been treated equally as always, but a bit differently also. If you live long enough, that is if the author lives long enough to complete the sixth and seventh books you can read more of a sense of how it is to be among the Dead.

***

         Let’s go back now to how it was during the evening of the first day. Salamon is resting alone in his bed. He looks dead, that is he isn’t breathing. He doesn’t appear to be dreaming yet either. The restlessness is between his heart and mind. His question is How do I know what the right thing is to do when I don’t know if my view on the demonstration, which is to take place in to more days, is objective and correct?

Tomorrow we will learn what took place tonight with Aeneas’ meeting with the Supervisor. I cannot imagine it is easy for a human being meeting a god face to face. Fortunately, I never have to.

         Let’s drift over to Kassi’s stone privacy and peer down. She looks cute enough in her settling after having just made love with Thales. Being dead and making love should not be equated with being alive and making love. Gently holding hands with intensity is rudimentary, the bare basics. Sex is really all in the mind just as it is with the Living but not it is  not interrupted by biophysics and cultural conditioning. Plus, for the Dead a sense of timelessness exists for the best of reasons. Their recent ‘snuggled holding’ helps them calm their anxiety over the day’s events.

         Marios and Sophia are finally lying together. Marios is staring right up at me but doesn’t know it. Sophia is asleep but she will have the first of many restless nights. She is thinking in her heart, I know what is right. This is a good and just cause, to be heard directly. The Supervisor needs to see we are resolved and stand together in this thought on going Home to rest and to listen to our children’s grandchildren.

         That’s how it is at the end of the first night.

***

Chapter 1:6 © The Rebellion – rho

“This composite image shows the jet from a black hole at the center of a galaxy striking the edge of another galaxy, the first time such an interaction has been found. In the image, data from several wavelengths have been combined. X-rays from Chandra (colored purple), optical and ultraviolet (UV) data from Hubble (red and orange), and radio emission from the Very Large Array (VLA) and MERLIN (blue) show how the jet from the main galaxy on the lower left is striking its companion galaxy to the upper right. The jet impacts the companion galaxy at its edge and is then disrupted and deflected, much like how a stream of water from a hose will splay out after hitting a wall at an angle.”

From: /www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/chandra/multimedia/photos07-139.html

**

Apollo could not help but hear through the utter silence in Aeneas’ heart. Eyes like full moonlight registered inwardly. So deep is this need he asks for my help not Aphrodite’s. It is Zeus’ Will that I stand a shield between HeranHim who is the Supervisor of all the Galactic Dead with heartsansoulsanminds. Meaningful Purpose radiates beyond the thought of sunlight and it is impossible for me to see through the design and clothing of the Necessity who originally gave the three Fates their due, and this is but the wardrobe of the Supervisor – or such are the rumors throughout Olympus.

Strange is it that such the tiniest of what can be called a thing – a step beyond the particle and wave of light, of such a singular quantum-like nature that could cause heartsansoulsanminds could rattle our mountain cage and move a Necessity to change HeranHis Meaningful Purpose. Free Will, that horse only Love can ride is nothing to Necessity’s beckoning. No one, not even I, Apollo, can prophecy the dangers in such dimensional depths. Such is a Necessity that can cause Zeus himself to tremble, So, who does great Zeus send but his son, I, Apollo, born second to Artemis am still the only god known to announce my own birth while also foretelling the births of several benefactors of humankind.

He gathered himself to sweep to the Underworld whose god opening gate is composed of a dark and black insect-like hole with nine downward spiral steps each the depth of three times the distance from the galactic center to the outer universe wall. Each with a mind remembering sign of quantum-like light depicting a single separate humbling human virtue. Each virtue a necessity if one is to be born with soul as well as mind and heart. It is rumored to be one of the first of Necessity’s great inventions that on occasion came to rattle the wise and otherwise all powerful Zeus.

***

         Evening of the first day and Marios walked into the privacy chamber and shut the great oak door. “You wanted to talk?”

         “I do,” answered Sophia succinctly. “Let’s lay down with our eyes staring at the lack of ceiling and wonder this play of ours out.”

         He moved in and sat on the edge of the bed staring at the northeast corner. “It is pleasant not having insects, rodents, snakes and other such creatures interrupt a nighttime of sleep.” But for the dreams, he thought, dreams are a plague or bouquet. One never knows.

         “I agree. But look who I invited here tonight.”

         Marios stood and turned towards her smiling invitingly, “Are we making this a threesome? Who is your other guest?”

         “I hope it is Hera. I requested her presence in mind tonight.”        

         He edged a warning, “I would not wish to cross her, Sophia.”

         “That is the idea, Marios,” she declared. “You don’t want to cross with either of us.”

         “I’d have to believe in Hera first, and I don’t have to believe in you.” He paused studying her reaction. “You are right here, and you called me to share your bed for discussion. “What is there to discuss? Messenger Aeneas is on his way. The Supervisor could be anywhere. Sleep is but a deception of death and death a deception of sleep in this stony privacy of yours. His ear is no doubt your nightly ceiling.”

         “You waste your intelligence on philosophy and useless debates,” muttered Sophia and continued, “Why you were chosen number two I will never know.”

         “To keep you in check,” he replied honestly. “And I almost arrived too late. You wanted Charon, our imaginary Ferryman, to be the currier.”

         “Just because he’s unseen doesn’t mean he doesn’t exist. And, he has an interest in us, the Dead.”

         “Compounding interest, no doubt. Don’t you remember how we arrived? No boatman and no money either. They were paltry tales to keep our interest in the Hereafter.”

         “I do not remember. I awoke to my dear mother’s voice. I had ears before I had eyes. And, such tales of death’s survival are true as here we are indeed.”

         He momentarily succumbed to her voice, “I fear our deeds are out of us. I fear there is more to this than meets our dead eyes. Why do we have our lashes and lids to protect such eyes here? These things are not necessary in our present clothing. Deception comes from within as well as without. At least life had an end. Deception has moved on with us.”

         “You must watch our rear for it. That is your reason here.”

         “We wage a demonstration that can move us to a war with Zeus himself. The odds are not in our favor.”

         “All the more reason to court Hera,” smiled Sophia in a swelled sense of satisfaction.

***

Chapter 1:5 © The Rebellion - rho

“This composite image of the Medusa galaxy (also known as NGC 4194) shows X-ray data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory in blue and optical light from the Hubble Space Telescope in orange. Located above the center of the galaxy and seen in the optical data, the "hair" of the Medusa -- made of snakes in the Greek myth -- is a tidal tail formed by a collision between galaxies. The bright X-ray source found towards the left side of Medusa's hair is a black hole.”

From: www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/chandra/multimedia/photo09-018.html

**          

           The boulder strewn hill to the West appears as a miniature mountain from a distance but it is no more than a thousand feet high in the reality of the Place. The mountain setting is caused by an atmospheric optical illusion similar to seeing the night rising moon in September and October back Home. No one Dead knows why or needs to.

This is near where Aeneas is to meet the Supervisor. The mountainous appearing hill basically serves as a stone pit in reverse. The newly Dead takes a few one by two foot stones off the lower side to build privacy a room for one’s self while an older Dead makes an Oak door for the privacy room. Carts exist as someone has taken the time to make them. The newly Dead pull the cart, load it with stone, and return to where a foundation is set. The next day the Dead return and more almost cut stones are waiting to be delivered.

Once the small room is built and the newly Dead is inside and closes the door sheorhe is as good as the body Home is under the ground, at the bottom of a deep blue sea, or floating like ash in the sea or air. It is not the same though because you cannot get wind of the Living. Not a sound to be heard as you are essentially shelled within your own soul.

No one climbs the thousand foot Stone Hill to the other side because there isn’t any as far as the Dead know. This is the place where Aeneas is to meet the Supervisor for a one on One, as it were.

This is any easier task for Aeneas than it might be for most others in the nearby vicinity of Elysium. During life he believed his mother was Aphrodite, the goddess of love. He had acted as though he was goddess born, and since everyone else had heard the same story they also believed it and acted accordingly. This bit of fiction had helped Aeneas survive many trials and adventures in life.

When Aeneas was newly Dead and arriving in Elysium he was met at the pool by his father, Anchises, who upon seeing his son appeared amused but said nothing. Aeneas immediately understood the silence behind the smile as he realized he was not being greeted by his mother on Mt. Olympus. Aeneas happy to see his father good-humoredly asserted, “I see the story of my birth was but a misconception, my true mother was not Aphrodite the goddess of love as I was lead to believe. I was a true love child instead.”

This primary fact weathered well and both laughed that the fiction had crept stealthily into a fact for child and neighbors alike. Within a day Aeneas set out on first adventure being dead; to discover his real earthly mother.

***

            I see Stone Hill, envisioned Aeneas. Indeed it does look larger at our sunless dusk. This mound appears so lonely. I miss the bright light and heat of our daily sun more than almost anything other than my son, Ascanius. Apollo, would you help here dropped from his hesitant mind into securely sincere heart. 

Chapter 1:4 © The Rebellion - rho

"A small, dense object only twelve miles in diameter is responsible for this beautiful X-ray nebula that spans 150 light years. At the center of this image made by NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory is a very young and powerful pulsar, known as PSR B1509-58, or B1509 for short."

From: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2009/b1509/b1509.jpg

**

Sophia thought of Aeneas as she sat alone staring at the north window in her room. The myths told that Aeneas was made a god when Aphrodite requested it of Zeus, but it is plain to see that is not a true story. He may have been favored by Aphrodite but she was not his real mother, her mind continued. His mother was a descendant of Our Mother, the first woman with whom all on Earth are also descendants. Aeneas is one of us. All we can do is hope Aphrodite still favors him. We hope she favors our species in particular, though I don’t know why she should. The goddess of love would let us rest in our Home within the womb of Mother Earth. She would let us sleep next to ground on which our great grandchildren play. An interruption. A knock on her privacy door. “Who is it?” she asked.

“It is I, Aeneas. I am ready to meet with the Supervisor if that is your will.”

Sophia opened the oak door with a smile. “Good to see you.” Appearing beardless and in his early twenties, she surmised him with a smile and added, “You are looking quite handsome, my young man.” Tall and handsome, she gathered, lanky and soldier-like with wide brows and a cute wide curl off to the right side of his head. No doubt a scrumptious lover also ran through her mind.

“And you are looking as wildly beautiful as Our Mother herself. You could be her twin.”

“I have been told so, but I only met her once and I don’t think we look that closely alike.”

Aeneas chuckled democratically, “We are all cousins – bound to see the similarities.”

She pointedly asked, “Are you ready to meet the Supervisor? Do you feel up to it?”

“Yes, why do you ask, Sophia [Our Appointed Leader is an understood attachment to Sophia’s name]? Of course, I would have respectfully declined otherwise. Is it true Supervisor has never been seen?”

She quipped, “Rumor has it so.”

“They say such rumors even run Home.” Both laughed cautiously at the wonder in the thought. “In any case, I trust Aphrodite is with me as I assume it is Hades that I formally meet.”

***

         Mid-afternoon. Salamon relaxed in the public bath with Kassi at his side. “How does that feel?” he asked while slowly rubbing her upper spine and massaging her shoulder blades.

         “Comfortable, Salamon,” said Kassi in a low voice. “You always have comfortable and private hands even in this public place.” She paused, “Neck please.” As she turned her head to the right for his firm hands she caught a glimpse of her childhood friend, Agathia at the other end of the pool. She immediately turned and gave Salamon a quick peck on the cheek for private fun and the public innuendo it might cause. Never be outside of who I am inside, mostly.

***

         In the nearby library ragged with boxes of rolled scrolls piled along the walls sat Marios and Thales in somber contemplation. They were quite aware that they were being avoided by the others.

         “Staunch friends?” suggested Marios. “They avoid us here, yet wait anxiously for their orders.”

         “They consider this only a protest, an act of solidarity.”

         Marios raised his right eyebrow, “And you consider it more, Thales?”

         “I don’t know. I saw a goddess on the path today to our morning meeting. Her eyes were devastatingly black to wide brown with a thin black encompassing the division of brown to the white of her eyes. She appeared from a distance as an old lady with a cane. But, when she grew close and looked up from the path she was Beautiful and Captivating. She was a goddess I am sure of it. I have told no one but I take it as a sign . . . .”

         “Or an omen,” interrupted Marios.

        

         Thales’ blue eyes grew, “Why would a goddess walk by as I was on the way to the meeting? I take it as a sign Mt. Olympus is more involved than I suspected. Why, would they become involved if this is only remains a peaceful protest? There is no way we could win a war against Zeus.”

         “Perhaps he would enjoy such a battle,” smirked Marios. “Only the Fates know.”

         “You still think the Supervisor is less powerful than Hades?”

         “According to Our Mother he has always been known as the Supervisor. No one has seen him, true. But there is an order beyond us in this Place. Our heartsansoulsanminds are intact. This was built for our Being, for whatever the reasons. He has always shown himself to be a Custodian. He holds this Place together as Mother Earth holds our Home.” Marios sat quietly for a moment. “I would accept a path, a single path that one of us might follow to Home so that sheorhe might rest in peace in the earth below the sun and moon and stars for a time. We could take turns and everyone have an equal time in one small piece of ground. The place where one of us might be closer to our great-grandchildren. Is it so much to ask?”

         “But one of Sophia’s demands, one voted on, is to return Home to speak to the Living.

         “I would take the compromise.”

         “How is that a compromise, Mario? One of the ten thousand to go Home to rest?”

         “The rest of the Dead will follow the ten thousand for necessities sake if nothing else.”

         “We could be thrown in the pit with the Titans,” reminded Thales in a slightly disguise whine.

         “I doubt it,” responded Mario. “If so, we would already be there. Do you think the All-Knowing Zeus would put up with this when with a bolt we would be nothing but our souls’ ash?”

         “I don’t think he knows everything. Too many stories. If he knew in advance he was going to be caught in his affairs why would he get involved in the first place?”