Alien Time — Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-One Dream Time

The deep forest pathway twists and turns, taking them through a canopy of hardwood trees. Thawed, moist, and soft like a hanging garden after rain. Hulla and Sagan stroll barefoot; the Earth releases odors of wood and decayed leaves from the previous fall. The fresh smell of field grass and coffee-rich ground in early spring tantalizes their senses. Air is so crisp that they can feel it in their lungs. Hulla, in a kind and soothing murmur, says, “The rustling leaves whisper-soft like symphonic music.” The wind song blows through the young trees. Early strivers, their leaves shine a bright shade of spring green. Fresh growth and energy mimicking a new season and the friends’ morning together in 2264.

The vibrant colors of spring bring a sense of renewal distinct from the lifelessness of yesteryear’s winter. Perennials rise from the Earth and bask in the sun. Hulla and Sagan compare the flower’s growth to their journey towards light.

The two connect the resurrection myth to the perennial spring flowers. The holy sepulcher of the Earth gave birth to the same soft, blue, and white textured flowers from last year. Hulla says, “We also emerged from earth and water.” The flowers stretch their petals towards the embrace of the sun. Symbols of our rebirth on this new day. His thought flows like a breeze through petals.

Kneeling on the Earth, Sagan’s fingers brush against the delicate petals of the newborn plants as he happily hums, “May you be embraced by a radiant light.” As the daybreak sunlight streams through the trees, they notice the day has a distinct, calming quality.

“Flowers rise to meet the light with not a fallen leaf in sight.” Hulla’s undulation of words begin to sway under a canopy of yellow poplar trees as the two move toward a crescent-shaped cove.

The air is filled with the lively chatter of birds. Instead of silent screams of 2025, they hear loud and deafening buzz of quiet insects. Walking side-by-side outside, the world is alive with the buzzing of bees. Butterflies, hummingbirds fly with the sweet, honey-like fragrance of Echinacea coneflowers. All love the sun. With the sun shining, they continue the adventure.

The sound of their conversation is like the rhythmic clanging of a bell and hammer.

Sagan says, “I don’t know why you claimed time is an illusion. Your wild, long, strange trip is a description of travel throughout history and the universe. Above and below, high and low. Sounds like it is all in your head, your own illusion.” Sagan doesn’t have full recall of the illusion of time conversation. A different conversation next to methane waterfalls on the alien Sirius planet that circles a white dwarf star. Time, like a thief, steals away moments, leaves only fragments to remind.

Hulla motions his friend to sit on a carpet of leaves in the morning sunlit grove. “Consciousness is fundamental; therefore science is simply fiction. Science is science fiction.” Hulla says, “Scientific materialism, as well as organized religion, teach a time-bound program.”

Sagan, with a slight bend, nods his head and listens.

“Science dogma is a written cryptic code, more hard and difficult to interpret than hieroglyphs, cuneiform or Mayan symbols.” Their simplistic jargon and doublespeak is: “View the outside world as reality.”

“Yeah, words affect how you see the world.” He seems to recall methane flowing like waterfalls when they visited the planet Sirius.

“Just seeing what they want you to believe.”

“Science paradigms, unmindful of underlying truth, glimpse unknowns with mathematic deductions.” Hulla thinks out loud for Sagan to hear the truth.

“Searches for truth, but its perspective is constrained.” Sagan hears but holds his reply.

He’d thought about it, and then Hulla gives the second example. “The religious person settles for belief systems.”

Both manmade systems figments of the thinking mind. Distant, silent sound of water falling over stream rocks creates a peaceful atmosphere. Thoughts flow into Sagan’s head.

“Yes, Yes.” Sagan quips. “But both seek truth?”

With the head of a lion, the tail of a dragon, and the body of a goat, the chimera of religion and science defies logic, unaware of the forgotten truth behind intuitive and reflective imagination.

Hulla questions the ill logic of the logical people, “Where do they get their crazy ideas?” A rhetorical answer to himself.

In one breath, Sagan mocks. “Separation of science and religion, separation of mind and body….Separation, separation and more separation.”

Hulla’s voice fades, “Alienation.”

Sagan blinks, “Their philosophies separate humanity from reality?”

Hulla tells Sagan, “Now, in the twenty-third century, after the end of physicalism, our conscious reality and a magical dream life expands beyond limitations.”

*We are safe in the twenty-third century.* As if spoken with one voice.

Sagan thinks audibly, “A really good time to learn techniques to transcend identification with body and mind.”

Sagan warms in the springtime sun. “The twenty-third century is the best of times to be distant from alien’s dogma, which separates the individual self from our ancient inherited past.”

“Of course!” Hulla’s tone of voice is less forceful now than before.

The leaves are motionless, a river creeping past without a murmur, and dark hills are sunk in a distant pasture like a wave. Personal god of history, or transcendent energy — that was an existential question during the twenty-first century. Sagan’s mind connects with Hulla. They gaze at the wildflowers and the flickering daylight leaves, clearly both are moved. They stand up and continue their hike.

Hulla, with a sunlit smile, “Look outside self or inside yourself,” As if quoting Hamlet, To be or not to be; “that is the question.”

Hulla rephrases what Sagan said about transcending identifications, “The future and the past are humanity’s time for timeless exploration.”

“I know that I am here with you.” This is Sagan’s way of saying consciousness is fundamental.

Sagan asks, “Did your dreams come true?” And “What is the meaning of life?”

Hulla attempts to focus Sagan on the main idea, “All objects in a world are made of consciousness.”

“Ah, the world is a dream.”

They stop walking to take a breath. Bedrock beneath, great sunlight hillside to the right. A 100-foot-tall crag that’s a hotbed of sweat for a climb. Set against a spring morning sky to the left. “The world is consciousness.” The bright blue sky melts into thought. Hulla thinks, the Earth as symbolic as those seemly… “Solid objects in nighttime dreams.”

Hulla points out some long green grass and some cottonwood trees with glistening leaves. “Would you like a place to rest?”

“Seriously,” Sagan says. “No, let’s go.” He has enough energy as if he took a half an hour nap.

Sagan thinks about the world and what Hulla said, and he says. “Like our meaning of the written symbols.” A word water isn’t going to quench Sagan’s thirst.

He daydreams. Pauses to admire the golden rays of sunlight streaming through the trees, casting a warm glow on everything around him. He answers his own question. “Life signifies something else, sometimes all together, true.” Asks. “Where does the light of the mind stop and spirit begin?”

“Both are representations of reality,” Hulla says. Each talks about where they are from and where they are going. It takes them quite a while to climb the steep hillside, so to speak. Their hands grasp onto the rugged terrain, while fluffy clouds shaped like bunnies drift overhead.

As the two move under a big tree, Hulla waves sweat from his brow. He glances over his shoulder to take in the sight of the steep climb, then shifts his gaze downwards to see what lies ahead.

Sagan laughs, “I have never seen a dragon fly in the sky.”

“What an odd feeling, listening to you play with words.”

“Alphabet words are mere scribbles on paper, arranging themselves like shapes in a cloud.” The world has its own meaning. “It is a sign, a symbol of something else.” Information is a meaning conveyed by symbolism, typically symbolic code or language. Reality is something greater than scientific explanation. Sagan hears thoughts and words.

The path winds through rocky gorges and hills. “And other toys of logic, presented like holiday gifts.” Hulla uses words with thought, which blend in a smooth whisper. He is determined to guide Sagan safely through the windy path.

“And, for that matter,” Poetically says. “Those shadows, less than solid and distractions from our fun in the sun.” Hulla’s face glistens with sweat.

Sagan remembers a past lifetime. “The philosopher Socrates said that the unexamined life was not worth living.” He quotes the Axil Age scholar. “Socrates gave the commandment: ‘Know Thy Self.’” Sagan repeats profound wisdom that was used in the ancient past.

With a utopian reply. “The world becomes a metaphor for an inner journey.” To know thyself** is a spiritual path** “Is to know the existential meaning of life’s journey and humanity’s orbit in the cosmos.”

Sagan hopes to recall his friend’s answers from the Sumerian nights. On the Ziggurat’s flat top hanging garden. He says, “What is the message of the world?” A lovely face turns to Hulla. A silent echo from the past moves through time like reflection of light in space.

Hulla says, “You must figure this out yourself.” Eyes smile again after all these years. “This is a meaning of Socrates, ‘Know Thy Self.’” Sagan recalls his life in Athens during the Axial Age, he can almost hear the distant echo reverberating through time.

In the twenty-third century, Hulla synchronizes his daily hikes and schedules with the melodic cadence of Sagan, just as he did during the twenty-first century and the Iron Age. And before that age, on top of a Sumerian Ziggurat. Hulla knows not to scare his friend by reminding him of their time on the Sirius home world. Hulla is someone eager with attractive thoughts and ideas about sizes and weights and systems and measures. He thinks, it takes lifetimes to explore. He then says, “Twenty-first-century scientists looked into a mirror and only reversed reality.” The purpose of life is to understand the metaphor, which is outside space and time, not its immediate appearances. “Scientific materialism investigates the outside, then denies the inner life.”

“I get it!” It isn’t stupid. “Materialism interprets consciousness as just another physical phenomenon.”

Congratulations.

“Mystical traditions, at the beginning of the civilization experiment of Mesopotamia, as well as others, understood reality.” Ancient people living in harmony with nature were highly intelligent.

Sagan knows where Hulla is taking him and says, “The ancient mystics, who had a connection to the source Energy, shared a lot of information. The Ancient-of-Ancients, Atlantis and Mu, gave humanity as much knowledge as early hominids could absorb until a time of humanity’s consciousness exploration.”

Selena, the one who is never really separated, shares a thought with Hulla and Sagan. The builders of civilization recorded Ancient-of-Ancient knowledge on stone, anticipating the eventual exploration of humanity. Sagan is open to telepathy; to his surprise, he has it.

Sagan begins to understand, “As the world outside is a symbol of the inner conscious life…”

The retelling of the past eases Sagan’s mind, “Science of the twenty-first century measured the world outside.”

Hulla’s face is drenched in wet sweat and holds back laughter. He says. “And recorded measurement inside a head to see their fantasy.”

As the morning sun rises, its rays create a mirror-like reflection in a clear pond. In the ancient past, the body and mind were inseparable, as love of a friend.

“Scientists used magnetic resonance imaging brain scanners. Because fMRI neural activity measurement machines could view brain activity as it occurs.”

“Neurons like words of information are the script of consciousness.” Sagan understands why Hulla laughs at materialism.

This isn’t a rare scene, Hulla turns to Sagan, “Humanity, as well as individuals, can see the image of god’s thoughts, just as an fMRI scanner sees with a brain scanner.”

Nisargadatta, an Indian guru, said, “When you see the world, you see God.”

A glorious valley spreads into view.

Hulla smiles at Sagan, “The outside world is like God’s dream.” Just like the dream in your head when you go to bed. “At night time, the dream inside your head comes alive.”

Neither die for all is alive.

Sagan replies, “The magnificent images of the world are like words to be read.” There is a deeper reality than the physical world of materialist science. Sagan is awakened by the light of a new day.

Of course. Hulla thought for a time, and then contends, “An unreflective physicalist looks into life, and sees a mere image of egotism.” He clears his throat with no desire to think. “The world is only outside, according to scientific materialism.”

Sagan says, “Confirming their own hard image of reality.” Hiking for more than an hour his feet turned to concrete.

Hulla’s mouth is dry, hands are covered with mosquito bites. Some sunburn from yesterday hurts. Beyond the rolling hills, the Earth is so bright it is hard to look at. The air crackles as Hulla and Sagan converse endlessly in their lively discussion in the twenty-third century. The heat, silence, green hills, and blanket blue sky gives a feeling of great, intense space.

Sagan closes his eyes in daydream. He was with the twenty-first-century Hulla. The one that shall be teleported to the future. Sagan’s present time is in that future. He is similar to a time traveler who experiences everything at once.

In the past, an hour before the twenty-first century’s new day in the twenty-third. He shall say to his friend, “What you think of as the future.”

Now, Hulla and Sagan are together. The twenty-third century Hulla, hopes to escape the alien’s dark trap. The Hulla of Mesopotamia shall walk and talk with Sagan, as on the Sirius home world.

Hulla sends a thought to Sagan, we are together in the twenty-first century, and as always.

“We must separate.” Because, of course, the Black hole capture story happens last of all.

“You need lifetimes to be born and reborn. I travel in consciousness.” Hulla speaks to his friend as they navigate a tight forest bend.

“The twenty-first century was a time for all of humanity to wake up.” Hulla knows precisely what to say.

“Pathological circular reasoning of the twenty-first century, feed Sirius and their diabolical ends.” Hulla tires, he doesn’t desire to waste time or endanger the work of the past. “Scientists, with the help of Sirius, developed chemicals to destroy microbial life…” A deep frown fills his face thinking about it. “Knowing the humans are ninety percent bacteria and other microorganisms.” Scientists stuck in materialism helped aliens destroy Earth.

“Moderns…” as the saying goes, “Could not see the forest from the trees.”

If Hulla doesn’t save himself after capture in a black hole…the aliens win. He says, “Our future today determines what happens in the past.” Being trapped in the future, while not as awful as being poisoned in the past, still holds its own set of challenges.

Sagan says nothing. He knows time is an illusion, too.

On the luminous day, they talk about the past. In the glow of a new day Hulla says, “The world is not its own meaning; it signifies something else.” Yes, he thought. “Something far greater and more powerful than the Big Bang.”

Like a dragon’s tail of an epic tale, unfolding word for word, then to be interpreted and understood. Selena’s thoughts begin to sound like Hulla’s words.

“The purpose of life is to understand the metaphor.” Hulla turns to Sagan. Outside, a light mist makes the hiking trail damp. “Not immediately obvious to scientific appearances.” Hulla tires of moving words, thinks …outside space and time.

Soon, the two will arrive at the portico café, where they can enjoy a refreshing drink after their hike. The aliens have other plans. The misty path is veiled in a cool morning ambiance. As Hulla looks out at the so-called valley, he notices a fog like cloud descending into the deep gorge. Their plan is to descend, only to rise again shortly after.

Hulla shares a thought, not holding on to obvious observations reveals what is already there. Moisture drips from evergreens through the mosses and down into a layer of fragrant groundcover that shelters an ecosystem of mycelium, bacterial decomposers, and insects, too.

Sagan wonders about shared memories. In this valley so far away from the past, questions loom like mist drifting off the hills. Sagan isn’t laughing even thou the world is funny, “The world outside is a symbol of the inner conscious life.”

Hulla flashing a brief smile, “The past century science taught and thought the world was meaningless and without purpose, only a projection of brain phenomena.” Anguish on his face. “This existential dilemma resulted from the separation between mind and body, a fallacy the aliens could exploit.”

Sagan joins the main idea “The fallacy of a world which did not require human participation nearly ended Homo sapiens’ presence.”

A lively conversation doesn’t go extinct. The light green forest and spring bloom fields stretch out towards a clean city on a distant horizon. Their voices blend with the faint sounds of city life in a far, faraway place. “See how those distant high-rise peaks over the southern horizon!” Hulla makes a conscious choice to expand their discourse, “If the world is outside the mind, then humanity wouldn’t have free will to change the future.”

“And the past!” From within, Sagan crafted a reply that is rich with creative subjectivity. Not from bits, non-organic material of the outside.

“Scientific, materialist determinism is the real illusion, and constant change is reality,” Hulla says.

Sagan is not fully awake; he walks and talks in circles. He turns the bend with his friend. The fresh air clears my head, thinking with his friend. A pathway goes further, rendering conversations from the past.

Hulla provides a simple example. “I get thrown to the future before I got sucked into a black hole, then escaped during a future where the past event didn’t even occur. I return to the Iron Age, and talk about future-age science only after being saved in the twenty-third century, faithfully by my twenty-first-century self, after his dark, murky encounter with aliens. Their siren call. It was a lure like into a never-ending syllogism, a dialectic of endless words.”

“I get stuck in a black hole, twisting and turning after being stretched like a string of spaghetti…the escape didn’t even begin till hundreds of years before and afterward, and simultaneously thousands of years earlier. And of course, the capture comes last of all.”

Leaving Sagan more confused but never doubting himself. Says, “Hulla, you got captured in a black hole prison in a past that occurs soon in this future.”

Hulla flashes a dangerous look at Sagan as if to say, speak nothing more. They work a way around a narrow slope. With exertion. They forge ahead. Silence is in the air.

Hulla knows how to move when it is time to go, “We can test this paradox.”

Sagan’s heart fills with a sense of foreboding as if Hulla’s mere presence will soon evaporate, leaving Sagan to walk alone before reaching the city outside the dreamy floral countryside.

“A few noble prize-winning physicists of the twenty-first century correctly said objects exist only if looked upon.”

Sagan knows what to say. “Materialists said the world exists even if nobody is present to experience it.” Sagan’s attention is caught by the sound of a tree falling in the forest.

“Quantum physicists, correctly said sound, or physical experience, needs an observer.” *A consciousness.*

From what Hulla tells Sagan, materialists made an ego thing out of the outer experience. “Inner experience is uniquely human.” Sagan gets the genuine sentiment and beauty of the peaceful place approaching a deep gorge.

Hulla, as if to say nothing, “The vibrations of reality really exist.” Not a simple physical experience.

The quantum claim is: There is no materialist independent existence. The world is not outside an independent mind.

“The world only exists if observed.” Only conscious observation gives meaning. Hulla closes his eyes to avoid laughing again at them. He utters a truth, “An observation must be conscious.” Thinking about the results, he ponders the problem. Instrumental measurements. “Scientific instruments cannot measure consciousness.” Because consciousness is the fundamental element.

“To deny the inner life, and then equate artificial machine learning with sentience, is not a sign of intelligent life.” Computers are just melted metal and silicon.

“An algorithm is just a pattern.” A computer can’t hear binary zero and ones. “A computer with numerical commands, a set of program conditions, does not have agency.” Places his arm on Sagan’s shoulder. He is solid and so is Hulla. They are real.

Life force is in the seed; grows to be a tree, however silicon produces nothing real.

Sagan says, “I have agency!” Self-aware of what he says.

“Robots obediently followed the programmable commands,” says Hulla. Silicone doesn’t have agency. A simple duality of zero and one, is beyond calculation or comprehension.

Sagan interrupts, “Computers are similar to humans who got misled by aliens. Unaware of anything out of the ordinary.” He tries to connect a chasm between the twenty-third and twenty-first centuries.

“Unaware of the true extraterrestrial danger, scientists opened into the realm of robotics, convinced that a mechanical creation could mimic the functions of a living organism.” Hulla tires of the past.

He keeps one arm on his friend’s shoulder. “Man-made robots are intelligent, like a fast brain, not alive with inner experience.”

“Robotic tools for diabolic goals.” Sagan knows something about the past. “Artificial Intelligence computers, without self-awareness, are simply tools of creative human minds.” If humans with honesty, integrity, and ethics use AI with wisdom, then there is the common good. Hulla makes a forecast about the past. “Aliens with computers are the terminator of humanity’s greater nature.” Real intelligence is consciousness. “Aliens control humanity’s fate if the ego is reprogrammed and poisoned with hate.”

“Deceived by aliens.” Hulla contends. “Intelligent people were foolish.”

The implication strikes home. “Excellent tools that don’t require oxygen.” Sagan says, “The invasion aliens from the Sirius home world don’t use oxygen to breathe.”

“Methane breathing evaders from Sirius are hospitable toward unconscious machines.”

“Yes,” Sagan understands. “Science is a powerful tool. It can improve our understanding of our universe, but science can be led astray. For the alien mind…science was more than a tool.

Things change over time, many found themselves very far away from the destination when they thought of being relatively close to the finish.

Sagan doesn’t need to read Hulla’s mind to know the truth. “Aliens created conditions for humanity to destroy itself.”

Hulla, pushing branches to one side, stumbles on some stones injures his arm and leg as he falls. “My past self sees the future. However, it is the past that hasn’t happen yet.”

Sagan, “Mm”

Hulla apprehensively, “We assume the past influenced the future. Take away the words, past and future. What difference does it make if you go left or right, right or left? Reality is an endless feedback loop.” Like the frames of a blockbuster movie, he says, “All time is effecting all time all the time.”

Sagan, more startled than his nearly forgotten and brief life on an alien methane planet, says. “Is this possible?” He doesn’t know if his trip to the methane planet of the aliens was in the past or future.

Hulla reassures his friend, “Your past to future influence is just as important as your future’s influence on the past.”

Sagan, “Are you stoned? Maybe you are spending too much time with Jimi!

Hulla says, “You are your own creator.”

“It’s like trying to wrap my head around free will,” Sagan says.

The twenty-third-century people put an end to the independent outside world pathology.

Sagan, listens, “But? We have reason to believe the world is physical.” The world’s meaning is subjective, Hulla’s thoughtful reply. “How quickly we revert to the past when ego is threatened.”

“Ah! Now, I get it!” Seeing the future with a different perspective. He doesn’t view himself stuck in the Sirius planet with its sparkling solid methane stalagmites, upward icicles that cover the gasoline landscape. “But do you mean to say that humans can change the world of nature?”

Hulla replies. “The Ancient-of-Ancient’s technology can help change humankind’s enigma.”

“Their ancient knowledge is only beginning to be known in the twenty-third century.” Hulla releases information to Sagan. “Their ancient symbol manipulation technology is from the Krita (Satya) period.” Sagan recalls his past conversation with Hulla about the ancient Hindu philosophy of Yuga cycles. In 2264, Treta isn’t the best Yugas era, but it is heaven compared to the ending days of Dvapara and nearly four thousand years before the best Krita period.

“Ancient-of-Ancient’s past is humanity’s future?” Hulla hits a cord with Sagan by quoting Heraclitus, an ancient Greek philosopher. “The beginning of a circle is also its end.”

The most glorious Krita era is a time that twenty-first-century Dvapara humans dreamt about. Hulla thinks about the present utopian period of the twenty-third century. He knows humankind is only beginning to know. His thoughts meander through his mind like a gentle stream flow. This strange technology, its mechanics, is too matrix for humanity’s understanding, even now.

Sagan reads Hulla’s mind and says. “At our present moment in time.”

“Sometimes twenty-third-century humanity can change the physical.”

Sagan adds, “Like the Egyptians of bygone years.” Sagan has knowledge from a past life, sometimes.

Hulla’s eyes twinkle, “Experience of the real is a rare phenomenon.”

“A unique ability to lift and move objects as if gravity doesn’t exist.” His friend replies.

“The materialistic ego, corrupted by Sirius aliens’ wish, was to experiment or hack the world.” Hulla attempts to explain what went wrong. “The twenty-first-century scientist was lured into darkness,” like Hulla into a black hole. Science tried to change physical reality with broken instruments. They got manipulated by aliens with the tools intelligent people used to manipulate. It took a while for Hulla to say aloud, “Materialist, deceived by the dogs of Sirius, caused disease, upturned the entire planet from reality.”

Sagan says, “Forgetting the beautiful dream of the Tao. The light of Shamash. Those rays of Ra, the ancient Egyptian god of the morning sun.”

“Oh, yes, my young friend. The Ancient-of-Ancients understood the harmony of nature.”

Like a Buddhist monk, Hulla bows to Sagan’s analogy.

“This was only a problem because people of the world weren’t completely ready to remember the forgotten mystical teachings of the Ancient-of-Ancient days.” Hulla reflects. “Science forgot the creator.”

As the waves of thoughts and words expand in Sagan’s mind, they reach a valley floor. The one which appeared before. Each footstep was an act of devotion that unified their relationship.

Sagan mocks the twenty-first century. “Created modern technologies without the balance of nature.”

Hulla took a small step backward to avoid stepping into a small turtle egg nest. “Science brought imbalance to the axis-tilted planet, our illuminated Earth.” The turtle eggs more leathery than the hard bird eggs found in trees. Life litters the ground. “Yet, science was capable of predictive behavior of nature, and science successfully created technology.” Yet, humankind’s creations lost conscious meaning. Life is sacred.

Sagan tests his new telepathic ability. Just think it. “Scientist unspoken slogan in the past.” It was without heart.

“Too little freedom to experience life was the root cause of human misery.” Hulla doesn’t need to think about it, says. “Everyone thought about travel and drove everywhere and got nowhere.”

“Go with the flow of the world, and don’t just think it.”

The two friends began their morning hike without breakfast; Sagan says, “I’m oddly tranquil. Curious? I didn’t eat anything all day.” Hulla laughs, “Did I give you food for thought?”

Looks at Hulla sideways and raises an eyebrow. Returns a look at Sagan, solemn as a judge. A distant city thunders, shudders, like a splash from the past. The air was charged with a strange, unsettling energy, hinting at the arrival of a significant event.

Changing the subject, “The Earth is 4.5 billion years old. Humanity is a significant investment in time to evolve into a species capable of thinking. Humans should think, of course.”

“Yes, Yes!” Sagan is listening.

Hulla asserts, “To discuss time, I must place myself within it.”

How many times had they died together?

“If Sirius had destroyed humanity, the Earth would survive?” Sagan looks down at the eggs, a most obvious observation, many things can be noticed that at first don’t appear. “Earth is billions of years old, and humans are a second or two on a ticking celestial clock.”

“The Earth can simply try something new, again and again. To achieve intelligent beings, a self-reflective being is the goal of the Gaia experiment.”

Says, “It is wonderful to be alive.” Hulla opens to wider perceptions, “However, thinking was a disadvantage in the past. Now, during the twenty-third century, individuals can finally express the unique ability of wisdom and self-reflective thinking.”

“Yes, Yes!”

The ability to think, like everything else, has a risk factor. The Ancient-of-Ancients transmitted as much as possible, “…but they went extinct.” Hulla warns, “Humans could have destroyed themselves, and they still can.” The future is in the past.

There is no traffic on the natural road. Hulla and Sagan move right along. On their path, a breezy, cool air dries the hiker’s sweat. Hulla says, “I don’t know the complete story. Twenty-first-century science kept asking the wrong question, meaningless cosmetic ego questions.”

“The act of looking unreflective outside and to observe a physical world,” Sagan says.

“Theirs was a materialistic dystopia,” Hulla replies.

“What’s the matter,” Sagan says.

Hulla asks questions, “Will humanity survive?”

A utopia is: no love of gold, no real class distinctions, no poverty, petty crime or immoral behavior, religious tolerance, and little inclination to war. A explorative science-based utopia is a society better than others. The word utopia means, literally, no place. “The ideal place is no place in time.” As discovered in the literature, “utopia too frequently turns dystopic.”

“I don’t want to leave here,” Sagan says.

“The greatest utopian is a self-reflection person,” Hulla says. You should think about some of the things we talk about. Self-reflection is the ultimate form of utopia.

“It is a good thing to be here.” They say in unison.

“Humans in an alien world devoid of meaning got lost.” Unseen stars swirl into hours of hiking. Sagan looks for answers. “In a nighttime, most don’t self-reflect and accept being like a captured avatar in a dreamscape,” Sagan says from experience.

“Too many of the past are forgotten in a dream.” Hulla musing a paradoxical answer.

“The past nights were brilliant.” Sagan doesn’t want to forget. “For I had my time in Mesopotamia. With you.”

“For the utopian, the ultimate aspiration is to attain lucidity in dreams.”

Another part of Sagan knows, senses it in the back of his mind. “Where everyone can feel the textures, smell the scents, and hear the sounds of their ideal reality.”

“To attain lucidity in a world dream.”

“What did the dream of last night actually mean? When you wake up, you don’t say I really surfed a tidal wave, no you say what does this mean!”

“Stay present and mindful of your surroundings.” Hulla winks.

Presses the topic forward himself. “Dreams vanish into history, fade when we wake up. You will remember.” Says. “It’s important to make the most of our time now.”

“While we have the time.”

“Carpe diem,” Seize the day. Hulla replies.

The eternal life isn’t for man. Love your life while you can.

Hulla, “Life is short. Eternity is final.”