Mysteries solved, expanded

“Sure, yes. I’d be interested.”

The old man smiled. “You sound unsure, like maybe you’d be curious. I’m always amazed. Global religions develop out of a few simple miracles. Water/wine, turn the other cheek, etc, and the world changes. I offer dramatically more, and I get such petty requests.

“To a young guy, I always get some variation on, ‘can you wangle me a blowjob from a supermodel?’ To a young woman, I tend to get, ‘can you get me to lose weight so I can get an elite person to love me.’ And then maybe money and control. Yawn.”

“Sid, seriously. Who are you?”

“Is that a wish?”

“Yes.”

“Ha,” said the old man. ”That whole “gotta use the word wish’ and ‘Are you sure’ thing... Mark, all of that is bullshit.“

“Wha? Why?”

“I cooked it up just to slow you down a little.“

“Jeez, Sid, you’re some weird genie.”

“As I’ve said, I ain’t no genie.”

“Right.”

“Can I continue?”

Sid waited until Mark nodded. “Okay, here’s the scoop. We arrived on your planet a few thousand years ago.”

Mark nodded.

“Kiara and I share a consciousness with each other and with the other 3 People who came with us, and with all the People where we’re from. We share a consciousness, but the connection gets attenuated with our home group when we’re very far apart.”

Mark held up his hand. “You traveled all this way just to do the bidding of people like me?”

The old man laughed. “If we have a mandate at all, it’s to the People we left behind. As for you, we don’t have to do anything. As we’ve tried to explain, we aren’t some sort of endentured servants.”

Mark looked dissatisfied but nodded.

“Anyway, People are curious, and we like to observe and study science, and we like to experience the internal worlds of other beings.

“Many of us go directly to star systems. Others study what we call small biology. What it’s like to be inside what you call atoms. Or what it’s like to be one of your frogs or one of your tigers.

“The universe is brutal and surprising. The surprises have led some People to become extinguished. We share a consciousness, so we still “know” them, but their individuality is kaput. It’s the rare moment when we mourn, but even our People mourn the Heroes who have approached black holes, and suns, and supernovas. From those losses, we’ve learned some limits.

“Our travel takes much time, but we are patient. Sometimes we find civilizations that can do something that we can’t, and so we take the technology. And if that civilization is potentially a threat to ours, we destabilize or simply remove the technology, but that has only happened a couple of times.”

“So you’re studying us for our tech?”

“We’re observing your science, but the 5 of us aren’t science types. Our colleagues are hard core. They want to understand how the universe really began. Gravity. Comparative evolution. Blah, blah.

“But, regardless of the details, while they’re cozying up to a planetary ring or a single cell organism that is threatening to destroy the lives of that planet’s conscious beings, our People are relentlessly focused on what might eventually kill us.

“Even us humanities types have a mission of self protection, but that’s not our focus. You guys have your bio threats—and you tend to handle them very badly—but they could never hurt our People.

“But we do have actual problems. At home, we can do almost anything, but we lack some things that give an edge to experience. In our culture, no one gets sick, but no one feels better. Hardly anyone dies, and few actually experience the sort of real risk that is so pervasive elsewhere. None of us recalls being young. We take big chances, sometimes, like when we spend tens of thousands of your years getting to an isolated place like earth, separated from our larger consciousness, but we all know we’ll get back and be able to catch up with Everyone.

“We have our version of culture and art, but without ****, sex, hunger, frustration, and commerce, our efforts are dry. In other words, we’re bored at home.

“The 5 of us have a special interest in consciousness. It seemed this planet had potential, and so we came. Since arriving, we’ve mingled, mostly, but we sometimes step in and connect with a motley assortment of folks. Offering magic usually speeds the process, and it gets at vulnerabilities and desires that are usually hidden.”

Mark and Sid sat at a bench and watched the students walk.

“What do you get out of it?”

“The experiences, my boy. We record the experiences, the feelings, the surprises. It’s been a great run.”

Mark shook his head. “And what have you done with the experiences?”

“We package the experiences and send them back to our People. It takes us a while to get here, but packages arrive quickly.”

“Where are your People?”

The old man laughed. “If there’s one thing we’ve learned, it’s that we don’t want earth humans to know the location of the People. At the moment, you could never get there, and your technology is obviously pitiful, but if you don’t blow each other up for a few thousand years, you’d be dangerous, perhaps even to us.“

“How many of your People are there?”

“Well, there’s one basic consciousness, but it can subdivide into what you’d probably call individual people. Once we get back to our home area, we can plug in and catch up, but while we’re far away, we get more individualized.

“It’s that individualization that has made earth humans—and the five of us—so popular back home with our People. Frankly, that’s why I dropped by your dorm room yesterday.”

“Huh?” Mark was jolted that the sci fi had shifted to him.

“You know, Mark, I think I’ve said enough. No hard feelings, but I’m going to go.” They stood and shook hands.

“Go? You’re leaving? But I have lots of questions!”

“Excellent! I want you to have lots of questions.”

“When will you be back? When can I ask my questions?”

The old man smiled. “I can’t say if I’ll be back, but you can always ask.”