Bill the Techno Wizard
Chapter 1: And Jax his Unwitting Accomplice: 10 Minute Read
“Mission Control, the Condor has landed.”
Colonel Jaxon Franklin released the transmit button on the control panel and waited for Capsule Communicator, CAPCOM’s time-lagged response. It should have been the happiest day of his life. A dream fulfilled. His brother should have been here, but he wasn’t. The culmination of their lives was for them to join the manned Mars landing together. Had his twin brother been there and seen the disappointed look on his face, Alex, or Lex as Jax called him, would indeed have smacked him on the back of the head. A gentle smile erased the usual stoic features he preferred to portray as a quite professional. Mission Specialist and Pilot Patricia Henry looked positively giddy, causing Jax’s smile to grow even more expansive.
“Wow.” Mission Specialist and Engineer Don Roberts chuckled.
The excitement was infectious since he could sense the emotions boiling over in the two astronauts.
The last manned mission to the moon was sixty years ago. As long as he could remember, Jax and Lex envied those courageous individuals who left Earth’s orbit and stepped on something not of this Earth. That envy drove them to pursue a career in space exploration, leading to this place in time. The Mission Commander for the first manned mission to Mars, it was almost too much to believe, tempered by devastating sadness a year ago when Lex died during a training flight of the new x-45 jet fighter.
The two brothers spent years flying fighter jets in the Air Force, moving on to test piloting some of the most advanced aircraft in the world, and after years of applying, they were finally accepted into the astronaut program. The powers that be wanted to split them up, but the brothers wouldn’t have it. Once they were officially members of the astronaut community, the road ahead meant more training and waiting for a manned mission. They trained together, spent their off time together, and dated the beautiful women Florida offered, always together.
They didn’t care where that mission would take them. They only wanted to go to space and explore. So yes, Jax’s good luck held, that and twenty-plus years of training and preparation. The only time Jax’s focus wavered was when his brother and his experimental plane went down in the Pacific Ocean. The aircraft and Lex were never recovered. When Jax heard the news, he couldn’t believe it. He still couldn’t. Like many other twins, the two twins knew what the other was thinking and could finish each other’s thoughts. Even when separated by hundreds, even thousands of miles, they had a connection that was hard to explain and harder for others to believe. It was a sense of closeness, togetherness that neither could explain, but it always felt deep down like the other was within arms reach. Regardless, it had always felt like their relationship seemed deeper than that of other twins. That was why Jax wouldn’t believe Lex was dead. He would have felt it. When the plane went down, Jax felt a lessening of their connection, but not a complete disappearance. It was like watching his brother walk away into the distance. Lex got steadily smaller the farther he walked until he disappeared, but Jax knew he was still out there, still walking away. The curious thing Jax couldn’t explain was that once Lex disappeared, Jax found it easier to read people, not only their emotions but more profound than that, it was like they emitted signals transmitted seemingly only to him, and he had the decryption software in his head, making most people an open book to him. It was something he took for granted with his brother. With anyone else before Lex’s disappearance, he needed to concentrate on getting even a modest interpretation of their innermost thoughts.
“Okay,” Jax said, dropping his smile. “You two head back and get everyone moving. You know, the drill, landers unloaded, communications array, prefab housing, etc., all out and ready to go.” He glanced at the digital readout on the control panel. “CAPCOM should be answering in about four minutes. Once I’m done with that, I’ll join you.”Jax drifted into consciousness. The more he woke up, the brighter the light bored into his closed eyes. He rolled over to his side to avoid the intensity of the overhead light and tried to get his bearings. Concentrate, he told himself. What happened? A soft sponginess supported him. A mattress? Lifting his hands slightly, he noted two things: a thin sheet covered him, and he was naked. An angry red welt two inches long crossed over his heart. It didn’t hurt, and as he watched, it quickly faded to nothing. None of it made sense. What also didn’t make sense was he couldn’t remember how he got here or why. All of a sudden, every part of his body felt tingling throughout. It was slight, barely perceptible, but something he’d felt his whole life. A huge smile crossed his face. It was the same feeling he’d felt with his brother. They’d both felt it. The tingling felt normal, though faint, but there was something else. There was more to it. Something some energy or force or something Jax didn’t understand, but he felt better than he had in a long time.
The light made it difficult, but he squinted enough to see a man seated at his feet. It wasn’t easy to make out his features, but Jax swore a dull golden aura emanated from the man. Whatever it was, he chalked it up to the light and what happened that put him on his back. His brother was here? How was that possible? Lex was gone, and Jax was on Mars. The joy at finding his brother quickly diluted his emotion. There was no way this was Lex.
“Ah, you’re squinting.” A man said. “Let me turn the light to a lower setting.”
Metal chair legs scrapped across the hard floor, and the man took a few steps, and the intensity of the overhead light dropped to a more tolerable level.
“How’s that? Better?”
None of this is right. Jax felt the same tingling he’d always felt with Lex. It was almost easy to forget the prickling sensation it was so light. But, they’d both felt always. And, whoever was at the end of his bed, he was not Lex. None of this made sense.
The last thing he remembered was that they were a month in on their mission to explore a dry lake bed. Something caught his attention, something shiny. Jax walked to it, about 50 meters from the others. It was circular, metal, with what appeared to be a pin resting in a small hook. It looked like a button you might attach to your shirt. There was no way this could be here, but it was. He’d turned it over. The front was yellow with two black dots and a half crescent. It was a smiley face button. That’s when the ground dropped from below him, and he started falling. It wasn’t as fast as falling on Earth, but it wasn’t exactly slow. He was able to get a quick look up and see the ground around the rim of the hole falling in behind him.
“I know, it’s a lot to take in.” The man's voice was soft and concerned. “Don’t worry, and you’re in safe hands.”
Jax took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and slowly opened them. He was in a hospital room. IV bags on each side of his bed were connected to his arms. Various medical machines surrounded his bed, two doors out, one to a bathroom, one out of the room, he assumed. And, at the end of his bed in a folding chair, a man he’d never seen before sat rather confidently, staring back at him. If Jax were to describe him in one word, it would be average. Everything about him shouted ordinary. I fit in everywhere. His skin tone was a fair olive color, his eyes were brown, and his hair dark brown or black. Jax couldn’t decide. From his posture, Jax guessed he was about 5 foot ten, maybe 160 lbs. He could have been born in any part of the world and been considered one of them.
“That was quite a fall you took there.”
“Uh.” What was going on? Was he back on Earth? How?
“My name is Bill. It’s great to meet you finally. I can’t tell you how happy I am to have you here.”
“What?” Jax coughed and swallowed. “Where are we? Earth?”
A low chuckle escaped from Bill’s mouth. “Earth, no. We’re still on good old Mars. You are in my humble little home.”
Jax’s brain kicked in a little. “Where’s the rest of my crew? Are they alright?”
“Of course they are. They are all continuing, grieving your loss but steadfastly continuing the mission.” Lifting his shoulders into an almost shrug, Bill grinned. “I only wanted you.”
“Ah.” It’s nice to be wanted, but this was beyond that realm.
“If it makes you feel any better, they all think you died in that sinkhole buried under tons of rock and dirt. They were very sad.”
“No, actually, that doesn’t make me feel better.” Jax paused, catching up. “Wait, what do you mean you only wanted me?”
“Yes, that’s right, I only wanted you. I’ve been watching you for most of your life. You are the sum of an experiment. You and a few others. And like any experiment, sometimes variables are introduced that lead to unexpected results. You are a one-in-a-million. Again, as in so many long-term experiments, the results sometimes vary. There have been others like you. But, they were born at the wrong time or grew up in an environment that wasn’t conducive to reaching their potential. Some died in wars, some accidents.”
Bill pushed a button on the bed's frame, and Jax’s bed lifted him into a sitting position.
“Me?”
“That’s correct. I’ve been breeding the human race, and you are the culmination of that breeding program.”
Science fiction was one of Jax’s great entertainments in life. Indeed, it was kind of a prerequisite for all astronauts. That was part of why people wanted to be astronauts and join the program. So, he was an open-minded guy. He read books far more outlandish than what Bill told him. Otherwise, he might have curled up into the fetal position and started drooling on himself. But, he had to admit, he was close. Science fiction was just that, fiction.
“By your silence, I’m guessing you think me a madman, and you’ll wake from this dream sooner or later. I’m neither mad,” Bill stopped momentarily as if to say something more on the subject but continued. “Nor a dream. Or perhaps you think you’re the luckiest man alive to be in my presence and want to know everything that has transpired since you fell in that hole and what I have planned for you.
“I haven’t decided, but I’m leaning toward the former.”
“Of course.” Bill smiled. “Maybe consider your circumstances.” He raised his arms for Jax to take in the hospital room. “Does anything about this feel like a dream?”
Jax let the madman part go and looked around the room at the medical machines, their digital readouts scrolling across screens, all making beeping or other annoying noises. “Let’s start by telling me what I have been bred to do.”
“Now, that is a great question. You might not understand the answer, but in a nutshell, you can travel from realm to realm without cost to yourself or those who travel with you without mechanical aid or the aid of magic.”
“Okayyy.” Definitely a madman.
Bill cocked his head and shrugged.
“I’ve changed my mind. How about you tell me who you are? And, somehow, I doubt your name is Bill.”
“Another question you may not grasp the answer to.” Bill stood and bowed. “My name is in a language you can’t understand or pronounce, and for that matter, it is so advanced your feeble brain would never come close to fathoming, let alone appreciating.”
“I see.” Feeble brain? Insults, what a great way to meet an alien.
“But, no matter, of all the names in your many languages, I liked Bill, so I chose it.”
“So, Bill, you’re an alien with your alien base on Mars.”
“You’re half right. My home is on Mars. That’s true.” Bill paused, glanced at one of the machines, got up, and fiddled with the dials. It was calculated to draw his attention to the medical device to distract him. Maybe Bill needed time to come up with a good answer. But Jax watched nonetheless.
“But, alien? Not as you understand it.” Bill spread his arms. “Everything you see I constructed. You don’t really think I have a human hospital room in my home on the off chance someone might show up, do you? With a wave of my hand, I can…”
Both palms met. As they moved, everything began to dissolve, fad away, melt? Jax couldn’t decide what he saw, only that the only thing that remained in his room was the bed he lay in.
“Everything was a projection?”
“No, it was all solid matter. Electricity flowed through the different devices that required power, the monitor that spits out paper with medical information on it, that was real. It was a simple mathematical problem. I converted energy into matter to make this room and then, as you saw, converted matter back to energy inside me. It’s quite simple.”
“Obviously,” Jax quipped.
Wait, he was taking all of this rather well. The sinkhole, who knows how much of his life is missing, an alien living on Mars, and the energy/matter conversion thing. He was somewhat stoic, but this should have pinged some intense emotions. Fear, rage, sadness, awe, anxiety, confusion should all have taken over a part of his psyche. Well, he did feel confused. That was a certainty. But the rest, nope, weren’t there. He was capable of them, but they were nowhere to be found, another oddity to add to the rest.
“With your limited grasp of technology, it’s nearly impossible for you to guess what I am or am capable of. But, I think I prefer to be known as a Wizard.”
“A fucking Wizard?” Jax barked, trying not to choke on his spit.
“What?” Bill said, a big grin on his face. “If you flew your spacecraft back to Earth 500 years ago, they would take you to be a wizard.”
His finger came close to poking Jax in the chest.
“Everything you showed them would appear as magic to those simple people. In my eyes, you’re no better than they are. A simple primitive who couldn’t understand what I was showing him even if he tried. Maybe technically, I’m more of a techno-wizard as you’re a techno retard.”
Jax knew he should have been pissed off at the insult, but it struck him as unimportant. But he did recognize it had happened several times now. Breed for a specific purpose, like a beast of burden to be spoken down to. The emotions that should have risen were somehow quelled. Another thought hit him. Was he a slave?
“Again, as with the name Bill, I like Wizard. I am a Wizard.”
Thank You for Reading!
Bill the Techno-Wizard is a serial story. It is ongoing even as you read. The table of contents, with links to existing portions of the story, can be found at the link below.
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