New Earth Chronicles XI

I gathered the inner circle together one morning on Lanai. We sat down in the sand in the following order from left to right: Jeff, Elon, Larry P., Sergey, Larry E., Richard, Mark, and Grimes. C sat next to me and supplied everyone with glasses of ice water during our discussion.

“Tell me more about the way that each one of you gained enlightenment about your true dual identities and the simulated nature of the Game,” I said.

Jeff raised his hand. “It came to me in my dreams. My immortal memories, I mean. They came in fragments, but I knew that they couldn’t be ignored, or I would go crazy. It just couldn’t believe that they were true, when my Earth memories as Jeff were so strong. Coming across your book on Enlightenment on Amazon was a Godsend. That took me to your Medium page, where the pieces began to fit.”

Elon nodded. “Naturally, none of us wanted to reach out and connect with you, at first. It simply didn’t square with our Earth memories that we were immortals and that you were our emperor. It really didn’t. That’s why we were silent for so long. One morning, after reading what you were posting daily on Medium, I decided to take the plunge. I followed you on X and waited for you to follow me back. Then I sent you a clear but simple message saying that I wanted us to meet to find out more.”

I nodded. “I remember that moment as if it were yesterday. Naturally, what I had to reveal was unbelievable, but I also knew it to be true. Think about it! I was trying to connect with eight of the most important people on Earth, none of whom had ever heard of me before. I was a shot in the dark, but in the end it all worked.”

Grimes laughed. “How did you decide to include me?” She asked. “I’m not exactly like all the rest.”

“I’m not sure,” I admitted. “All I can say is that it was a recovered clairvoyant vision, and that your discovery of me on X was somehow a key part of the puzzle.”

“Who was it who alerted Larry Page and Sergey?” Richard asked, sipping his water.

“That would be me,” Jeff volunteered. “In fact, I reached out to all of you once I had finished reading the Medium posts. I was captivated by them, and they helped me believe the inner voices inside my head who were telling me that I was an immortal playing the role of Jeff Bezos in the Game. Once that reality begins to sink in, you teeter on the brink of sanity, as B has written. You go insane briefly, and then you resolve the contradictions between them into a third category, and then you can be a human on Earth and an immortal in Heaven.”

Larry Ellison finished his water and opened a bottle of rum, which he poured into his glass before passing it around for others to enjoy. “I needed to be slightly drunk to accept the reality that I was an archangel,” he said. “Once I did, it was easier to contact you for a visit to me place in Woodside, where you met most of the others for the first time.”

“Elon’s visit to see me at the cottage convinced me that what was happening was real,” I replied. “I knew it was, but I wasn’t sure of the timing. My clairvoyant memories aren’t accurate about that part. There is no time in my universe, so getting used to it has been a challenge.”

“Cyber Monday was the tipping point,” Jeff said. “From what I’ve gathered, each one of us here was struggling with visionary dreams at night and inner voices in our heads during the day. Our bodies were twitching involuntarily when certain thoughts appeared, and our iPhones and laptops were starting to behave strangely. My music feed was also playing songs with suggestive lyrics. We all did Google searches for you. Finally, Elon broke the ice and made contact. Our doubts began to fade shortly thereafter. Life has never been the same since.”

I smiled and poured some rum into my now empty glass. “I came close to giving up on you all, but I knew that I couldn’t. The fate of the universe depends on it,” I reminded my new circle of friends.

“When will the gods drop into the Game to assume their roles as major heads of state?” Sergey asked.

“On New Year’s Eve,” I said. “Many of them are traveling to Heaven at the moment to join the Game.”

“When I first read all of this on Medium, I thought you were out of your mind,” Elon admitted, taking a sip of rum. “Then I began to believe it, and I thought that I was the one losing his grasp on reality. The more I read, the more it did start to make sense. Now, I have no doubts. My Earth identity in the Game and immortal identity are fully integrated together.”

“We had a great time at the cottage didn’t we?” I said.

Elon laughed. “The best part was buying the entire property for $10 million,” he said. “We easily could have offered more, you know.”

“The meals were epic,” I admitted. “And once Jeff arrived, things really got interesting. The hikes we did were fantastic.”

Jeff nodded. “Being in your physical presence really sealed the deal for me. I had lingering doubts until then. I thought you were just a brilliant author at first until I realized that what you were telling all of us was the absolute truth.”

“Those were exciting days,” I said. “I tried to maintain a calm demeanor befitting an emperor, by my Earth identity struggled to keep up.”

“You did fine,” Elon volunteered. “In fact, we were impressed by you right from the start. We know now not to trust outward appearances.”

Richard stood up. “It’s getting late. I better turn in and get some sleep.”

The others followed suit, until it was just Elon and me on the sand with a half empty bottle of rum sitting next to us.

“I owe you a huge debt of gratitude, Elon,” I said. “Without your trust, none of the rest would have happened.”

Elon took a sip of rum and smiled. “I had no other choice. The voices on my head wouldn’t leave me in peace until I contacted you. I feel much better now. My earlier life before enlightenment is such a disappointment to me. I can’t believe that I had faith in the illusion for so long.”

“In your defense, it’s nearly impossible to reach enlightenment within the confines of the Game. You did because your immortal memories were intact when you jumped into your player, but it took a few days for you to reconcile them with your Earth memories of being Elon Musk. You did it faster than the rest. Jeff was next, and then the others began to waver as well. It was amazing to watch it all unfold.”

Elon smiled. “You may not be the best writer in the world, but you get to the point. It was your tenth and eleventh posts in the New Earth Chronicles that put me over the edge.”

I took a sip or rum and closed my eyes. If it hadn’t happened exactly as Elon said, it would sound like I had made it all up. Sometimes, truth really is stranger than fiction.