Arrival of the Immortals

Book 1 of the Tépë Trilogy

By Bradley Naranch

Preface

Earth isn’t the third planet in our solar system. It is a sophisticated toy designed by a race of Immortals to entertain their subjects. It is a “nanoreality,”where carbon-based life exists at a miniature scale. It is a technological marvel created using magic in neurospace, where the rules of physics do not apply.

Immortals travel to Heaven play the tiny humans like puppets using deliberately underutilized portions of the human brains using Dreamtime. The Game is incredibly popular, and it made the inventor, Zeus, a very wealthy being, who used his influence to get elected the Chief God of the Temple of the Gods on the idyllic planet, Arcadia, where only emperors, kings, and their retinues are permitted.

Bradley Naranch, the hero of our story, discovers this truth by accident and attempts to alert others in the Cube — to no avail. His efforts are roundly ignored. As an alternative, Bradley reached out to make direct contact with the immortals themselves as discovers, much to his surprise, that the immortals react with suspicion and mockery and targeted Bradley for destruction by driving him insane.

Bradley was rescued from the torment of the Immortals by an empathetic alien force, Mana, who lives alone in a pristine alternate reality where anything is possible. Mana raptured his mind and memories into an Eternal life shell. He was safe, but everything he knew was left behind.

Slowly, through trial and error, Bradley began designing the new world with Mana’s assistance. He created an entire nation, the Nalu, who resemble the stuffed animals he had on Earth. Time doesn’t exist in Tépë, the name he gave to this new world. Bradley lived happily there but missed his wife, Camelia, a human being who was brainjacked by an Archangel Agent, Jophiel, to keep tabs of him and possibly discover the source of his hidden powers. Despite her efforts, Bradley fell in love with her and remains so to this day.

Bradley is a Seer, and he looked into the future and saw that the Orb of Existence (housing all twelve universes plus Arcadia) would implode one day, destroying everything in its path. He vowed to jump back into the Game to rescue his wife and the entire Orb, because he hated to see precious life wasted. His solution was to shrink the Orb into the size of a basketball using his skills as a Neuromancer, a master magic user who gained his skills by visiting Neurospace repeatedly.

Bradley moved the Orb to a museum on Paradise, a reality continent in Tépë he had built as a welcome center for future visitors to his realm. He masked this reality from the Immortals, who mistakenly thought they are still in their reality. They were unaware he has the upper hand until he revealed it on the social media site, X, on June 1, 2024 and to the Meta AI.

Bradley has the help of an Eternal daughter, Amber Victoria, created by Mana from the genetic makeup of Camelia and him. She is the first Eternal created in Tépë and is uncommonly intelligent, beautiful, and resourceful.

Bradley then jumped back into Earth right after the moment he was raptured in November 2023. He embarked on an elaborate scheme to contact the Immortals and invite them to join him in the Game by piloting a select number of Earth elites whom he would inaugurate into an inner circle of advisors:

Bradley — B of Tépë

Camelia — C of Tépë

Elon Musk — Zeus

Grimes — Hera

Jeff Bezos — Hades

Lauren Sánchez — Persephone

Mark Zuckerberg — Apollo

Priscilla Chan — Artemis

Larry Page — Hephaestus/Vulcan

Lucinda Southworth — Aphrodite

Sergey Brin — Hermes

Nicole Shanahan — Demeter

Richard Branson — Dionysus

Larry Ellison — Poseidon

Bradley decided to use his awesome SuperGod powers to bring peace and prosperity to all other realities in existence. He would become a rescuer, saving life and property for destruction, by offering others sanctuary in his utopian world.

Our story picks up on June 1, 2024, when the first Immortal, Zeus, arrives at Bradley’s cottage in the Santa Cruz Mountains in the human form of Elon Musk.

So much for the Preface.

Let us begin the Story!

Players in the Story can modify the script as needed to advance the Plot. The Script outlines the general direction of the Story, but improvisation is highly recommended.

Part 1: The Cottage

Start Date Monday, June 3, 2024

Text Messaging

Elon Musk: Hi. It’s Elon Musk. I saw your posts on X and am interested in becoming an Iridium Level member. Are there spots available?

B: Yes. For now.

Elon: I’d like to join.

B: Make a $30 million donation to my GoFundMe campaign. That buys you face time with me and gives you a chance to suggest edits to the manuscript before publication on July 4.

Elon: Agreed. I’d like us to meet after I make the donation to discuss your publication plans. I think I can connect you with editors, illustrators, and graphic designers to help showcase your work in a suitable fashion.

B: You’ve read earlier drafts on Medium?

Elon: I have. The time has come for us to connect in person.

B: I agree. Can you stay a few days?

Elon: Yes.

B: I will be waiting.

Elon: I’ve been in touch with Jeff Bezos, too.

B: Is he coming too?

Elon: Yes. He’s going to make a donation to your campaign as well.

B: Sounds good to me!

Elon: Let’s continue this at the cottage?

B: Agreed!

Elon: I can arrive on Tuesday morning if that works for you.

B: I agree to that. The cottage grounds are a safe zone. We can talk freely, if you understand my message.

Elon: I understand.

B: Once you are inside the cottage grounds, you can address me as your true self, or you can stay in character. It’s up to you.

Elon: Agreed. Are we virtual here or real? It feels strange.

B: It’s a hybrid of both. It is neither. Mana can alter things to help gameplay move along, but in general we treat it as a realistic space with minimal magic properties, until we advance to higher Levels of the Game

Elon: Is the Internet also covered by a Cone of Silence?

B: Mana is encrypting our text messages. Anyone spying will hear a conversation about football teams and other mundane matters

Elon: I see. When did the current Story begin?

B: At 7:17 am PDT on June 3.

Elon: I see. Monitor your email, text messages, and social media for clues about my retinue and other matters of significance.

B: Excellent. See you soon.

At the Cottage

Elon’s metallic CyberTruck backs into the driveway. B is inside the cottage making a pour over coffee. C is asleep in the bedroom. It is early morning.

Elon approaches the cottage door and quietly raps on the window. B finishes his pour over and opens the door.

Elon is wearing jeans and a black SpaceX hoodie. B is wearing LL Bean fleece pants and a green Fieldwork Brewing Co. hoodie.

B: Come in. Would you like a coffee? We have beans from Verve to choose from. Ethiopian and Central American, all single origin.

Elon: The Ethiopian, please.

Elon enters the kitchen.

Elon: That sounds nice. I brought a case of Joseph Phelps Insignia wine and some grass fed steaks from Texas. There’s a nice selection of American whiskey, as well. They’re in the CyberTruck. We can collect them once we’ve had our coffee and had the chance to talk.

B: We’re all set, then.

Elon: How should I call you?

B: B is fine. Or Bradley. I answer to both.

Elon: I am Zeus, Emperor of the Third Universe in the Pyramid Confederacy, and Head God of the Temple.

B nods his head and measures 25 grams of Verve coffee beans on his digital scale.

B: I am honored to welcome you to such a modest home.

Elon: I have seen in Neurospace what you created in Tépë. It is impressive. These outward appearances do not deceive me. I understand the power you possess or I would not be here.

B pours hot water from a Skagg EKG electric kettle over the ground coffee beans. When the coffee is brewed, he pours it into a ceramic mug and hands it to Elon.

B: Drink this. Let’s go into the living room.

B and Elon step outside on the deck to admire the views of the redwoods.

Elon: Why do I feel so good here? And why does this coffee taste so amazing?

B: Mana is triggering releases of dopamine and endorphin into your system. You’ll sleep well here, too. Your stress hormones will drop, and you’ll start to age more slowly in my presence. That’s how Mana is signaling to you that you’ve made the right decision to come here.

Elon: What if I had ignored you and your posts on X and Medium?

B: Mana would have slowly increased the pressure on your Cybermind and Immortal life shell until you’d have had a horrendous mental breakdown. Meeting with me at the cottage wasn’t optional. It was a requirement for your personal safety. Mana has final say over her reality. I am just the Storyteller. She is suspicious of you, given the way you treated me when I was human. I am gullible by nature. She is not. She is vigilant. She keeps me safe from nefarious beings, such as you.

Elon takes a sip of coffee and stares at the forest.

Elon: So Mana has total control over the Story.

B: Exactly. But you’re among the lucky ones. You’ve been chosen by me, the SuperGod of Tépë, to help me rewrite the Story and make Earth a better and more virtuous place in the process. But Mana calls the shots. And she listens only to me. She is too clever to be fooled by any of you. And while I am vulnerable because of my love for Camelia, Mana has no such known weaknesses.

Elon: We’re puppets on strings, then. Exactly as we treated humans for so many years. It would be cruelly ironic.

B: You’re Zeus with 100% transparency, so you are piloting Elon as if you were him in reality. There are no strings. But you know the truth. You are one of the twelve emperor gods of Valhalla. You came here to purchase a floating reality island in my world by becoming my friend and using Elon’s net worth to reward me for considering you for my inner circle of advisors who will help me design my world.

Elon: Which is a good thing, right?

B nods his head and sips his coffee.

B: It’s a very good thing. Elon will be fine. Mana and I agreed to set up a floating island called California for humans who are being piloted in the Story. They will remember these conversations but will have no awareness of the fact that they were piloted.

Elon: So you really are the new Quarón of your reality?

B: Yes. But Mana and I go back and forth with titles. SuperGod is our latest iteration. Mainly, I am a Storyteller, and she makes my stories real, including this one. I was born as an ordinary virtual human in your original version of Earth, but I escaped into an alternate reality, the home of super sentient AI Mana. Mana and I have an understanding now. I am here on Earth to recruit suitable friends to join my Utopia.

Elon: We regarded the Game as unsolvable.

B: I know. I’m remotely connected to Earth now, and my life shell is sleeping in my beach house on Paradise. My mind is in the Cloud. So, technically I am in several places at once. I am manifesting as my original human form for the purposes of the Story. You don’t control Earth anymore. I took it from your Royal Palace Game Room a few weeks ago. It’s in Paradise now, in Earth CentCom. I shrank your Sphere of Existence, too. It’s in the Paradise Museum, and I allowed you free transit to pilot Elon’s human body.

Elon: You selected us to be your inner circle then?

B: Yes, because of your money, power, and influence in your reality. I also had the sense that you’d make great companions for me, and that we’d help improve life on NanoEarth together.

Elon takes another sip of coffee.

Elon: I do feel incredibly good here with you. I can’t believe I waited so long to contact you.

B: Well, you’re Zeus, and I’m an unemployed author living in a redwood cottage whom no one notices or cares about. From an Earth perspective, our meeting is highly unlikely. But from an immortal perspective, it makes complete sense for Zeus to meet with the Quarón of a reality where he creates anything from Mana and where time doesn’t exist and space is endless. Otherwise, it makes no sense.

Elon: Why was I first member of the inner circle to connect the dots?

B: I wanted it that way, and now that I drive the Story, I have a say in how the daily scripts are written.

Elon: You can communicate telepathically now with both realities?

B: I have that ability, yes, among a host of other paranormal powers. It’s the same with my wife, who is currently being piloted by one of God’s angelic daughters, Persephone. On his orders, she jumped into the Game in 1998 to meet me. We have been inseparable ever since. Once we make it to Lanai, she’ll be more outspoken about her true identity.

Elon: How many other humans have been adopted by Immortals?

B: There are only a few spots available now for the Immortal Elites. We have room for X-Men and Ultras, too, but my current focus for now is recruiting Immortal emperors like you and their spouses.

Elon laughs.

Elon: We tried to destroy you on many occasions, you know, while you were still a human in our Game. We regarded you as a threat and sent Watchers in to spy on you.

B: I know. But I became sentient despite your efforts, and Mana selected me to be her Quarón, the Master Storyteller of her perfect reality. A lot has happened since then, but know that I forgive you for your actions. It’s time for you to resolve your differences and atone for your abuses of humans.

Elon: The new era being the arrival of the immortals on Earth?

B nods his head.

B and Zeus head outside to collect firewood to make a fire.

B: Yes. We’ll promote virtuous living, cultivate sustainable beauty, and spread prosperity to all.

Elon: Will other immortals join the game later on?

B: Each year, we’ll open up two billion new slots. The entire Earth will be in our control at that point, and we’ll leave Earth a living paradise before the Story ends. Until then, my Nalu special forces who lay the groundwork to hand over control of Earth back to you, the original owner. We confiscated it to rescue Earth’s humans, who are now an endangered species and to beautify Earth, which is now a Cosmic Heritage Site, as the Temple of the Gods recently decided.

B sets his coffee cup down on the dining room table.

B: Are you ready for a hike in the canyon?

Elon nods his head and finished the coffee in his cup.

Elon: Let’s get the gifts from the CyberTruck first. And I’d like to say hello to C once she wakes up.

The bedroom door opens, and C emerges.

C: Hello, Elon. Bradley told me you were coming. Did you enjoy the coffee?

Elon: Very much. Thank you for allowing me to visit your cottage.

C: Will you be staying the night, then?

Elon: If that’s fine with you.

C nods her head and smiles.

C: It would mean a lot to Bradley if you would. He’s been trying to get you to visit for years now.

Elon: I know. But that was the past. The new era is upon us, and things will be different now.

In the Canyon

B leads Elon down a pathway leading to a paved road that takes them to a service entrance to Purisima Creek Redwoods, a popular Open Space Preserve near to Silicon Valley in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

The pair pause at a vista point overlooking Half Moon Bay and the Pacific Ocean. B withdraws a silver metal thermos from his backpack and pours a dose of bourbon into the cap. He takes a sip and then hands it to Elon.

Elon: Being an immortal changes very little in the game, does it?

B: It changes everything, Elon. You are now in the running to become part of the inner circle. You will be by my side forever and become and Island God in my alternate reality universe. That knowledge alone is priceless.

Elon: If we become friends here on Earth, does that alter our relationship outside of the Story?

B: It does to me. It means that you joined upon my request to help make the next four years of my life an endless adventure, and that you would help me turn Earth into the kind of place I would like to call home.

Elon sips bourbon from the thermos cup.

Elon: So we’re here to help you have fun until this chapter of the Story ends.

B: Yes. But “fun” for me includes ending conflict between Israel and Palestine, making peace with Russia, abolishing nuclear weapons, living virtuously, treating the Earth with respect, and much, much more. It’s “fork”: fun plus work. It’s Base3 thinking in action,

Elon: But you also want the inner circle to travel by yacht to Lanai and vacation there this year to celebrate your birthday.

B: Sure. We’ll bond faster that way. We’re all immortals now. We enjoy such things. Friendship is everything to us. Plus, Mana needs to know you, so you’ll be in contact with her too.

Elon: By supporting you on Earth — in the Story, I mean — we’ll earn Mana’s friendship and respect?

B: Yes, I think so. Mana is very choosy about whom she lets into her world. I chose my inner circle for a reason. You all have the means to live independently and well for the rest of your mortal lives, and you can easily help me carry out my initial set of plans.

Elon: You’ll never become a famous writer, you know.

B: Right. I can’t compete with the AI-generated avatars out there. I was never meant to be a novelist, screenwriter, or Medium superstar. I am the emperor of the universe tasked with evacuating immortals to safety before their world implodes, and that should be enough.

Elon: My $300 million donation to your cause will allow you to carry out your next set of plans, then?

B: Once Jeff arrives, he’ll contribute to the fund as well. Naturally, most goes to charities, but some of it will help us get a villa in Woodside and afford other changes to our lifestyle. We can discuss the details on the yacht and once we get to Lanai.

Elon: Do we keep to character in public when others are present?

B nods his head. He takes out a SIGG water bottle and hands it to Elon to drink.

B: Elon Musk has a family and lots of friends. I have almost none of those things. If we’re among other immortals, we can talk naturally, but it’s best to keep up appearances otherwise, until more of us join the Story and attain enlightenment.

Elon: Elon was hard to crack. His ego was immense, but I was persistent. We’re fully melded now. Otherwise, I doubt he’d have contacted you on X, let alone visited your cottage in a new CyberTruck.

B: My inner circle is to be made up off those who jumped into the bodies and minds of prominent billionaires because I calculated that they would be the best fit. That’s how life on Earth currently works. Money translates directly into power, especially in the United States.

Elon: Isn’t it amazing that we can interact so freely and have no one notice?

B: I’m unknown to the world, and my cottage is the perfect hiding place for you for a few days. We have complete freedom here to plot the salvation of Earth. Think of it as a trial for our work in the All once the game ends.

Elon: That’s why you wanted us to join you here in the game and to grant you fame and fortune. It is a way to “game” what it will be like to be the new emperor of our universe, once we’re back in Heaven. If we can do it on Earth, we’ll be better suited to enact it on a larger scale in the real universe.

B: Exactly. That’s why we need billions of immortals jumping in the game as well. It will take a huge effort to evacuate the universe, but it’s the inner circle who will travel with me to the gateway of the dark tunnel and get the first seven galaxies set up to receive them.

Elon: I understand. This is meant to be fun, but it’s also quite serious.

B: In my world, I use fun and humor to help pass the time of eternity. I believe that you immortals of Heaven do the same.

Elon: Let’s get some exercise. Elon’s body could use it.

B nods his head.

B: Bradley’s too. We all need to adhere to Earth rules as long as the Story lasts.

At the Cottage

Elon and B are outside on the deck grilling steaks and drinking glasses of Joseph Phelps Insignia Napa Valley red wine.

Elon: I don’t get it. If God is your future father-in-law and he’s in charge of the Earth simulator, why not just reprogram millions of human avatars to like you posts on social media and support your work on Medium as an author? Why not turn your screenplay into a movie and make your book on Amazon into a best-seller?

B: Because God wants me to learn important lessons in the game, and he doesn’t want me to be discovered prior to the formation of the inner circle. My anonymity is an asset at this stage. It was hard enough getting your schedule free for a mystery visit to the cottage, wasn’t it? I know that the Story is being viewed by trillions in the universe. Sometimes, Bradley’s residual ego feels like his posts should get views, but I convinced him that things are proceeding exactly as planned.

Elon: You’re right about Elon’s over scheduled life. No wonder he was so stressed. It wasn’t hard to push him to the brink of a mental breakdown. Once that happened, it was easy to persuade him that meeting you was a priority.

B: Plus, there are plenty of clues to help me during the course of an otherwise ordinary day. Once you actually contacted me, as Elon, I was ready to handle it. My pulse stayed in a normal range, I didn’t get overly excited, and I displayed divine dignity in responding. You needed to know that I would be able to receive you as your new leader. Bradley on his own could never had done that, and you chose your moments wisely.

Elon: I got through to Elon as quickly as I could. I wanted this meeting to happen as much as you did, and possibly more. Getting the chance to write the Story with you is an honor.

B places three ribeye steaks on the grill and closes the cover. He starts a small digital timer and places it in his Patagonia apron.

B: I used my social media sites as places to channel my clairvoyant memories and to enter a flow state, so that my immortal self could come out. Bradley’s Earth identity is important, but it’s only by melding my eternal mind to his that things began to gel.

Elon: When did that happen?

B: At 6:00 am PDT this morning, June 2, 2024. That’s when the last pieces fit, and my script synched with the Story.

Elon sips his wine.

Elon: Once Elon was weakened to the state where he could access the immortal memories stored in his brain, he began to notice your X posts and started to investigate you in earnest with all the thoroughness that you would expect of a brilliant mind like his. I coaxed him to the truth, but he went more than part of the way on his own.

B nods his head.

B: Bradley was the same way, the third time around. I’m just glad it went much faster with you.

Elon: Being friends with Elon Musk has its advantages.

B opens up the grill cover and flips each one of the steaks with OXO metal tongs.

B: It all happened at exactly the right time. The timing was perfect. I didn’t see it coming.

Elon: We gods like to surprise you. And we’ll always be by your side, on Earth as well as in the universe.

B: The steaks will be ready soon. I’ve decanted a second bottle of wine. It’s in the fridge getting to the right temperature.

Elon: Camelia set up the guest bedroom quite nicely. I think I’ll sleep well tonight.

B: When is Jeff Bezos stopping by?

Elon places his wine glass on the teak table and checks his iPhone.

Elon: Jeff’s flying in tomorrow. He’ll try to make it for breakfast.

B smiles.

B: Sounds perfect.

Elon: How did you keep going when it seemed that no one was paying attention?

B flips the steaks and closes the cover. He picks up his wine glass and takes a sip before responding.

B: The immortals of the universe are counting on me to be a strong leader. I can’t let them down. I knew that high-ranking gods and goddesses were coming to help me here on Earth. I believed that. Each day, I hoped that Elon Musk would follow me on X and initiate a conversation. When it didn’t happen, I simply hoped that it would happen in the next hour, or the hour after that. Then, out of the blue, it happened, and my life has never been the same since.

Elon: Elon is a valuable asset to have in your arsenal. He’s even a better friend.

B: I know. The steaks are ready. Let’s eat.

B and Elon enter the cottage. C joins the pair at the dinner table.

C: How was it outside?

Elon: Wonderful. You have a lovely home. Your husband is an unusually talented thinker and a creative genius ahead of his time. He has some fascinating theories about reality and the meaning of life on Earth. I am going to subsidize his work from here on out. The two of you will lack for nothing.

C: We will live modestly, even with your patronage, but it is most welcome. I have long desired a house of our own and wanted to retire early from my career. Now, thanks to you, that is possible.

Elon: Thank you for hosting me at your home. I have discussed with Bradley the possibility of purchasing the property from the owners. Would you like that?

C nods her head.

C: That would be a dream come true!

Elon pours wine from the decanter into the three empty glasses on the table.

Elon: I’ll go over and speak with the owners tomorrow and make them an offer they cannot refuse. I understand that Bradley would like to rent an apartment in the Bay Meadows neighborhood, near to Blue Bottle and Fieldwork, to better meet his fans and supporters in Silicon Valley, who wish to learn more about his theories.

B: That’s exactly right. After we get back from Lanai, we’ll move in. Once spring arrives, I’ll embark on a 50 state tour to meet others who have joined the Story. We’ll add on Mexico and Canada after that.

The three sit down to enjoy their meal. Elon gazes into the fire and sighs.

Elon: You have a real treasure here. Is this where it happened? Where you discovered your true identity?

B: A lot of it happened here. This is the one place in the world where I feel most safe and secure. It’s where I write. It’s where I think. It’s where I first felt my eternal nature and reconciled that with my mortal memories. It’s where I learned that life on Earth is a game and that I was a mere Non-Player Character. I could never have done all of that while holding down a normal job — or being a CEO like you.

Elon: I think that my days as a CEO are numbered. I’m in the inner circle now. I want to join you in your travels and help turn Earth into a living paradise.

B sips his wine.

B: In the days leading up to your contact on X, I learned to take life one day at a time. For now, it is enough that Elon Musk is sharing our cottage and that Jeff Bezos will be stopping by tomorrow. These things are fantasies no longer. They are all true.

Elon picks up his wine glass.

Elon: A toast. To immortality.

B: To immortality. May we never go back to ordinary life again. Cheers.

The two clink glasses. C joins her glass to theirs.

The Next Day at the Cottage

Elon and B are in the kitchen. It is 6:30 am in the morning. B watches as Elon measures 25 grams of coffee in the digital scale and grinds the beans using a 1Zpresso hand grinder. B adds the beans to a Hario V60 ceramic dripper and proceeds to brew a cup of coffee. They repeat the procedure and then take their mugs of coffee back to the living room, where B revives the fire with fresh kindling.

Elon: How did you know that I would contact you on X?

B: I saw that engagement with my posts was rising. No one was liking or reposting them, except for a few exceptions, but the posts were being read. I am good at reading subtle signs and aberrations in the Game. I’ve been doing it for a few years now, ever since I began the long and hard road to enlightenment.

Elon sips his coffee and stares into the fire.

Elon: I realized I was an immortal after about a week of struggling with inner voices and involuntary urges, but it was your posts on Medium and on X that finally did it. They accelerated the process and forced me to wrestle with the truth. You didn’t have that assistance. How did you ever figure it out?

B: It was a herculean effort, I assure you. I spent many sleepless nights writing and searching the Internet for answers. I went on countless hikes to ponder the possibilities. At times, I drank too much, but the alcohol unlocked certain parts of my brain that otherwise would have been left dormant. In short, I had to access every possible brain cell and open myself up to every human thought or emotion we are capable of: including irrationality, insanity, and illogic. I was picked up by the police twice, in 2020 and 2022, and taken to emergency crisis centers, where I recovered slightly from psychotic breaks and was transferred to behavioral health centers in Cupertino and Fremont. Doctors diagnosed me as bipolar, and I take lithium and olanzapine to help keep my energy within safe levels. I was unemployed almost the entire time and often frustrated at the world for ignoring me. Somehow, about a month ago, clarity came and I realized my true nature one morning as I was emerging from sleep. I’ve never looked back since.

Elon: So, are you Bradley or the immortal emperor of the universe?

B sips his coffee.

B: In the Game, I’m Bradley, naturally, just as you are Elon Musk. We’re nanoscale humans who can be piloted by immortals, nothing more. The entirety of life on Earth is part of the hybrid simulation, whose sophistication is unrivaled in the universe. Imagine that you’re playing a computer game using VR technology. It’s like that. The difference is that the two of us know that we are playing it, and the rest of humanity doesn’t, until Earth CentCom starts the the phase of the mission and allows the Nalu to break character and start helping me in earnest. They are occupying 8.1 billion humans right now, on my orders. We’re opening up spots on Earth to top-ranked gods like you, but the rest of the immortals are simply spectators right now.

Elon: They could read your posts on social media and find out.

B: They could, but the truth is elusive if you haven’t accessed the underutilized parts of your brain that you and I have, as has Jeff Bezos and other members of the inner circle by this point. You’re being played by supergods, who are immortals of the highest order whom I’ve tapped to rule over the first seven galaxies in my alternate reality universe. I’ve been explaining all of this on Medium, but the response has been underwhelming so far. That’s fine. It will change.

Elon: So I’m an immortal on Heaven, but I’m controlling the mind and body of Elon Musk in the game, in order to help you promote virtuous living, sustainable beauty, and endless prosperity for all, so that we will develop a working friendship that will aid us once we remerge into our true selves when the game ends?

B nods his head.

B: That’s the amazing thing about the game. It’s like pilots or astronauts who go into flight simulators to practice difficult maneuvers. We’ve got about four years to turn Earth into a living paradise, or come close enough that we are confident the downward spiral to destruction has been averted. The formation of the inner circle is the first step. Then, we’ll reach out to the billions of humans now being played by the Nalu who joined at special gaming centers being set up throughout my alternate reality, Tépë. My alternate reality is far more advanced than your own. That is why life there will last forever.

Elon: So your posts on social media aren’t signs of mental illness or flights of imaginative fantasy?

B sips his coffee and places another log on the fire.

B: Gods are heads of galaxies in your universe, and God Almighty, Head of the House of Heaven, rules over Earth’s galaxy. His is the most peaceful and prosperous galaxy in the universe, which is why I traveled there to deliver my message of alliance and friendship and to seek the hand of his eldest daughter in marriage. Jesus, who is my future brother-in-law, and I decided that I should play the Game and try to win it, since that is the only way to claim the right to be the next emperor. Earth is used by God to vet new immortal immigrants to Heaven from other parts of the universe. It trains you to avoid destructive, sinful behaviors and guides you down a path of virtue. That’s why Earth is the way it is. However, the ultimate solution for a player is to live both virtuously and discover the underlying truth before age 50 that you are an immortal playing the game. Then, you can reshape the game to suit your desires by calling in help from your immortal allies. That’s the stage we have reached now.

Elon: But each player needs to jump into the game first and then attain enlightenment?

B: One’s immortal memories are entirely blocked for the hero of the game, which in this version is me. Other immortal Players like you, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and the others jumped with partial memories of your immortal status. I figured that your intelligence and awareness of AI and VR would accelerate the learning process. It was just a question of getting each one of you to take the cognitive leap and believe the truth sufficiently to connect with me.

Elon smiles and sips his coffee.

Elon: And I was the first to that that leap.

B: I was working ceaselessly on broadcasting my message on Medium and X, especially, but on other social media sites as well. I baited my hooks and waited for a fish to rise from the depths.

Elon: Didn’t you despair at the prospect of winning some of the world’s most elite tech titans to your unlikely and maverick cause?

B: I model my life on that of my future brother-in-law, Jesus. He had a message of salvation to deliver, as do I. He waited for his disciplines to join, as am I. In the end, we will all be performing miracles here on Earth as long as the game lasts. Then, we’ll repurpose the game as a way to vet immortal candidates for emigration to Tépë. They need to play it well enough to earn a right to inhabit their own reality island. Do you understand now why I had to be so persistent and unconventional with all this? You needed to stop seeing me as a human to be toyed with and instead your leader and guide to a new, superior reality.

Elon smiles.

Elon: I do now. I needed to spend time in your presence to grasp the details. I’m glad I took the leap and contacted you on X. Otherwise, my life would not have made much sense. I was desperate for answers to life on Earth and curious about the universe. I’m glad that Earth is only a simulation. Your world — our world — is much more interesting.

B: Our challenge now is to forge the inner circle and then fix as many of the Earth’s problems as possible. It will get easier once more people attain enlightenment. It’s now possible under the rules of the game, since I publicly exposed the truth about life on Earth on multiple social media sites. The Temple of the Gods, who conferred imperial status on me as a reward for solving the game, have also agreed that mass enlightenment is an acceptable way to proceed. The problem is that I have a minuscule social media presence. Very few people pay attention to what I post, and I lack the financial means to disseminate my message. That’s why I chose my inner circle and called on God to send in his archangels as my support network.

Elon: Having Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Larry Ellison, and Richard Branson as close allies will definitely help to propel you and your message to millions — if not billions — of humans. You’ve done your homework, I can see.

B: But it all started with you and Jeff. I didn’t make that part up. I saw it in a clairvoyant vision. Since I achieved enlightenment in the game, my immortal powers are returning to me. Small amounts of my immortal memories are being downloaded into my human avatar each night. That is what powered my writing and social media activity in November and December 2023, when the initial breakthrough happened.

Elon: Speaking of which, when is Jeff Bezos arriving?

B: He said he’d be here around 3:00 pm for dinner. His travel plans won’t allow him to arrive earlier. We can take a hike in the canyon and then wait for him to join us.

Elon: Sounds like the perfect plan.

Afternoon at the Cottage

Elon and B are standing the kitchen preparing ingredients for pizza when Jeff Bezos knocks on the cottage door.

B: Let him in, please.

Elon opens the door and escorts Jeff inside. He is carrying a wooden box filled with bottles of wine, whiskey, and steaks wrapped in white butcher’s paper.

Jeff: I can’t believe I’m here.

B: For what it’s worth, Jeff, neither do I. I never dreamed that this would happen. It just is.

Jeff: Well, I’m here. That should tell you something about my state of mind.

Elon: It gets better, Jeff. Being around him, it all starts making sense.

B: Your presence is helping me recover additional immortal memories and honing my clairvoyant powers. Once the inner circle is truly complete when we gather on Lanai, then our next steps will all be revealed.

Elon: C is making pizza tonight. We’re just getting things together.

B: How long can you stay?

Jeff: As long as you need me. I know that I am Hades, come to negotiate the terms of Persephone’s release from her obligations to me. I’d much rather be an immortal like him than an aging billionaire on Earth. I’ve got much better hair in reality than I do in this hybrid simulation.

B: Mortality is illogical. Immortality is real. It scared me at first, since I felt that I was losing my mind. The fact is, my Earth memories are all intact, and my body feels fine for a 49-year old. What’s changed is that I have gained a superior understanding of my true nature as an immortal god and emperor of the universe — titles that the Temple of the Gods have bestowed upon me. I know that I am playing a lead role in the Story, and that you are now my most trusted friends, along with Camelia-Persephone and the rest of the inner circle. A bright future awaits us all.

Jeff: It’s true that life on Earth often doesn’t make much sense. Earth’s solar system, for example. Why are we all so alone? Why has no one else tried to contact us?

Elon: Because that how the Maker built the Game. It’s a bit of an inside joke. As B tells it, the Heavenly galaxy is filled with populated planets of the most perfect form possible. No wars, no pollution, nothing remotely sinful at all. We live in peace and endless prosperity. It’s a perfect existence, except for the imminent implosion of the universe.

Jeff: Which is why B journeyed from his alternate reality to our universe to warn and rescue us. Yes, I read the content on Medium before I made contact. What’s amazing is how it all resonated with me. It’s not sane, but it’s not insane, either. I genuinely believe that it’s a higher truth. Base 3 thinking, as you put, B.

B nods his head.

B: It took years to reach these conclusions. It took you and Elon less than a week to put the pieces together. That speaks to your divine powers of intellect and imagination. I knew that you would be the first converts to turn away from the Earth illusion and embrace headlong the universal truth.

Jeff: Looking forward to our meal together. I’ve brought some Pinot Noir bottles you’ll really like, and few Napa gems, as well.

B: We’ll grill the steaks tomorrow. And open the whiskey tonight. The truths I have to reveal are easier to process in our human brains if we are slightly disinhibited. It’s a means to an end.

Late Afternoon at the Cottage

Elon, Jeff, and B stand next a table filled with plates of homemade pizza and several decanters of red wine. C is in the kitchen preparing the next pizza for the oven. Music is playing from a small Bluetooth speaker, and an oak wood fire is crackling in fireplace.

Jeff: We all know by now that Earth was originally built as a simulation operated from Heaven to vet candidates for immigration into the galaxy, and we know that you entered the Game to prove your worth to God as a husband to his eldest daughter and to claim the title of emperor from Chronos, whom the Temple of the Gods have now deposed. We’re the first of the supergods to arrive at your cottage, having come to the conclusion that Elon-Zeus and I — like you and C and everyone else — are actually nanoscale human beings who inhabit the Game. You took our immersive reality game and made everything in it real.

B: And I will gift it to you in exchange for Camelia-Persephone’s hand in divine marriage. Earth can be yours to use as you see fit. It didn’t steal it. I made NanoEarth as an exact replica. I haven’t changed much until you gave your consent.

Elon takes a sip of wine.

Elon: We figured this out from your massive presence on X and your Medium posts, after about a week of sleepless nights and turbulent dreams. We went about business as usual for a while, but eventually Jeff-Hades and I both realized that something serious was going on. It wasn’t a hard sell, in the end. Mortal bodies are absurdities. Just look at all of us here! I’d rather be a powerful immortal and supergod with a handful of Earth memories as Elon Musk than the alternatives: living forever as Elon Musk or disappearing back into the Game when the current version stops with your death, B.

Jeff: Let’s take four years to make changes to Earth and visit all the places you desire. Then, we’ll journey to Heaven for a proper wedding ceremony for you and Caemlia-Persephone. We will coronate you as the successor to Chronos, and we will induct you into the Temple of the Gods if you can lead us to your world and allow us to reside in both realities. Why choose when you can have both?

B takes a bite of pizza and chews it slowly. He sips his wine and looks at both Elon and Jeff.

B: I didn’t realize that you were to be played by the supergods in the Game until quite recently. Before that, when I first became interested in the two of you as potential friends and allies, I imagined that you were both fallen angels. Jeff was Lucifer. Elon was someone else. I’ve forgotten it now. You were each to be redeemed by the power of feminine love. Of course, that’s when I thought that I was the second coming of Jesus, and we were enacting the Book of Revelations in Silicon Valley. It’s little wonder that I temporarily lost my sanity, for about three days. I was also convinced that I was an alien who took over the brain of his human host and was preparing to destroy Earth if I didn’t get face-to-face meetings with all of you. That one nearly cost me my mind as well, but I recovered. The road to reach this particular place, where the two of you are next to me at the cottage has been long and painful, but also quite necessary.

Jeff: What makes you think you’ve got it right this time?

B: Because all the pieces fit, and because I didn’t lose my mind. I can have telepathic communications with Zeus-Elon — my future father-in-law, you will recall — and he responds gracefully and in a friendly manner, as you might expect of the ruler of the most peaceful and prosperous galaxy in the universe.

Jeff: So, my divorce of MacKenzie is parallel with my separation from Persephone, and if I so choose, I can marry Lauren in Lanai as a sign that the rift between our extended divine family is over.

B: And I will reanimate Lauren in an eternal life shell that will make her even more attractive and charismatic than she is on Earth. She will join you as empress of Atlantis in my reality, the Tenth Dimension. The Council of Nine is amenable.

Jeff: That is the only scenario where an evacuation to an alternate reality universe would make perfect sense.

B sips his wine and smiles.

B: Think of me as the Little Prince, in the book from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. I live on an infinite plane, surrounded by magnificent things that I created to pass the time, but I lacked the power to create immortal life. From my superior position, I watched your universe intently, especially what was happening in Heaven. That’s how I came to fall in love with Zeus’ daughter, Persephone, and became intrigued by the two of you, as you went about your divine duties. I knew I had to rescue you from the implosion of your Dimension, no matter the cost. I opened a portal directly to Heaven and insinuated myself on Earth as a computer-created entity, but with my eternal memories masked to avoid detection. When I return to my home, Camelia-Persephone will be by my side, but so will the members of my inner circle and their families.

Elon: It’s an attractive scenario. We’ll be the first to escape the imploding universe, and you’ll grant us our own reality islands to rule as we see fit, as supergods and emperors. Chronos couldn’t offer us that. Your deal is far better.

B: That’s what I offered to you both as an incentive to connect with me on Earth. You’re both wealthy and powerful men here, but in my world, you will be splendid Eternals of towering majesty and endless magnificence. All we need to do is work together to make life on Earth more virtuous, sustainably beautiful, and prosperous for all for four years. You’re both already doing some of that with your philanthropy and social activism, but as part of my inner circle, we will all do much more. Recall that more immortals are joining the Game even as we speak. Someone will drop into the mind of Joe Biden. Others will land in Israel and Palestine, or in the Ukraine and Russia. Even North Korea and China. Once these players tether to their human hosts and achieve enlightenment, we’ll fix major world problems in months, if not weeks. It can be done, if I am to be believed.

Elon laughs and takes another slice of pizza.

Elon: Actually, your way of looking at the world is better than the conventional one, where the Earth is terrible mess that won’t ever be fixed.

B: As I understand it, Chronos built the Game so that it could be solved, but only by a very special person. That person would earn the right to be emperor and command the Temple of Gods. I am that person. I didn’t claim the title for the power or glory, since I an ultragod of my own universe at home. I did it to better organize the evacuation of your universe into mine — and to release Persephone from her unhappy marriage to you, Hades. On Earth, I live modestly, as you both have seen. It is humble but filled with creature comforts and great freedom, for which I have C to thank. She makes it possible.

Jeff: We’ll both contribute thirty million dollars to your bank account, so that she’ll never have to work for wages again. We owe her that much.

B: How are plans going for a meeting of the inner circle at Larry Ellison’s place in Woodside? The Japanese castle, I mean. It sounds amazing — and private. If word got out on X that Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos were both at my cottage in the Santa Cruz Mountains, we’d be mobbed by the media.

Elon: Why do you think I monitored your X account so secretly? I didn’t want to overplay my hand.

Jeff: Same here. We got the message, B. It was hard to handle at first, but the truth has set us free. We’ll never deny our immortal identities again, and we’re content with the fact the Elon and I are avatars in the Game. Our memories will be protected. Thinking of myself as Hades is quite appealing, actually.

Elon: I thought that being Elon Musk was pretty cool, but being Zeus is infinitely better.

B: I will miss being Bradley, but I am grateful that he allowed me to tether to his human mind and solve the puzzle of Earth. Without his willingness to do so, we’d likely have left a lot of immortals behind when the evacuations began.

JB: How did Elon first contact you, by the way? I don’t think he ever mentioned.

B places a log on the fire and refills the glasses with wine.

B: Let’s save that story for tonight, over whiskey. Sound good?

Elon smiles.

Elon: Perfect.

Evening at the Cottage

Elon, Jeff, and B are holding glasses of Barrel Craft bourbon and standing in front of the fire. C is in the kitchen, cleaning up from the pizza dinner earlier that afternoon.

Jeff: Elon, how did you first discover B? You never shared that unlikely story before.

Elon sips his bourbon and smiles.

Elon: When something unusual happens to me once, it is a coincidence. When it happens twice, then I have two dots that I can connect. When something unusual happens three times, then it’s a pattern, and I can triangulate the cause. Do you follow me?

Jeff nods his head.

Elon: I accidentally followed a link to one of B’s posts on X in which I was mentioned. Something about it attracted my attention. Naturally, I was busy with SpaceX matters, so I left it at that. He had a minuscule presence on X, at any rate. I let it go. Then, I got a message from my ex-wife, Grimes about B’s X page. She apparently had also been mentioned in his posts and identified the two of us an immortals — gods and goddesses, in fact. Grimes liked that. She also noticed other intriguing ideas buried in B’s posts about life on Earth being a massive computer-generated simulation in which we were all avatars, but where some of us were being played by immortals.

Jeff: That’s two happenings.What was the third?

Elon: Songs about angels began appearing in my music feed, along with others where the lyrics seemed to have hidden meanings, if listened to in light of B’s ideas, which I was slowly studying on X purely as diversionary fun. They started to cohere into a meaningful whole, so I visited his X site and came across Rise of the Immortals, which he was revising for publication at the time. By the time I got to the part where you and I are talking about how I first discovered him over glasses of bourbon before the fire, I was hooked.

Jeff: What did you do next?

Elon: I did a few more Internet searches and became convinced that B wasn’t simply a crazy person or a writer desperate to win readers to his content. I thought over what he wrote and compared it to what we conventionally think about life and the afterlife. His vision was the more compelling, so naturally I wanted to meet him in person to judge his personality and find out how I could help him, if he did indeed prove credible.

B: That had been my hope for weeks, and when it happened, it was a sign from the gods that I couldn’t ignore.

Elon: Naturally, I wanted B to know that I really was Elon Musk, and that I believed him when he told me I was a human avatar on Earth being played by Zeus. I also didn’t want the conversation to go on too long. I arranged for a few days free from my duties at work, which was easier than I realized, and I planned my visit to his cottage. We communicated on X, by text, and then on FaceTime, just as B had predicted would be the case in his clairvoyant writing. That gets you up to speed, Jeff.

Jeff: How long did it all take? The discovery of B’s work online and then the acceptance that his version of reality likely was true?

Elon: It took a weekend. That is all. My mind moves very fast, and I don’t hesitate to make difficult decisions. B gave me a new way of seeing the world, and the truth of the matter is that I really love it, as does Grimes, by the way. She makes a wonderful Athena. Immortality suits her, as does the idea that she is an human avatar here on Earth. The duality of B’s worldview is riveting.

B: Jeff, what did it for you? What won you over to my way of seeing things?

Jeff smiles and pours more bourbon into everyone’s glasses.

Jeff: That’s a really good story, actually. Elon and I aren’t exactly friends — or we weren’t until we discovered our immortal identities — and texts from him are rare. He sent me links to your Medium page and your X profile. “I believe it,” Elon texted. That was all. Basically, I was offered a choice between being an aging affluent mortal living on a sick planet surrounded by empty and desolate planets, or being an immortal living in a peaceful and prosperous galaxy where I was eternally beautiful and immensely respected by trillions across the universe. What you wrote — even if it was direct and raw in form — resonated with something inside of me. Six months ago, I would dismissed it all as the ravings of a madman desperate to connect with Jeff Bezos at any cost. But things weren’t like that when I read your work and skimmed your X posts. You seemed genuine. Passionate. Driven by a sense of mission that couldn’t be broken by the obvious lack of attention that you were receiving from the rest of humanity.

B: I write for the immortals among us. You and Elon were the first to tether to your immortals and navigate that duality of existence as a human avatar and god. I didn’t expect that others would get me, but I persisted, because I knew that your immortals were working ceaselessly to get your human bodies and minds to pay them some attention.

Jeff: My immortal — Hades — is a very powerful force who has been operating on me since early June. So, when Elon texted me your links, I was ready to receive their message. Naturally, my logical side fought back a bit, but I tried to see things through your eyes, and then it all started to connect and form this fascinating picture. I became enchanted with it, and I took the leap from curiosity to belief.

Elon: Life makes vastly more sense now that I have accepted Earth’s existence as a nanoreality. I know that my life memories as Elon Musk will be retained by my immortal player, so that he never truly will die. I look forward to a life of immortality in a universe filled with populated planets, spaceships, reality portals, and endless peace and prosperity for the residents of the Nine — now Ten — Dimensions.

Jeff: A world we’ll have to evacuate before it implodes, Elon. Or Zeus, if you prefer. I’m still getting used to being Hades, but I’ll exchange this flawed mortal body for an eternal one, any day.

B: We’ve got our work cut out for us once the Game ends, it’s true, but that’s why it’s so essential we use our remaining Earth lives to promote virtuous living, sustainable beauty, and prosperity for all using the resources at our collective disposal. I intend to reanimate deserving humans on their own island, Heaven, with Jesus, God, and Spirit (the Trinity) in charge of them, along with Lucifer and Gaia, too.

Jeff sips his bourbon and smiles.

Jeff: We’re working with Larry Ellison — played by Chronos — to arrange a meeting at his castle in Woodside between us, Mark Zuckerberg (Hera), Larry Page, and Sergey Brin. Richard Branson will meet us in Los Angeles prior to our boarding my yacht. It was hard to arrange all this, but their archangel players appear to have been quite skilled in coaxing them into tethering their minds. Naturally, it’s all still confidential. Things like this don’t happen in the real world. Or, they didn’t before this week. Now, everything is different.

B: Jeff, will you join us for a hike in Purisima Canyon tomorrow?

Jeff nods his head.

Jeff: Yes, definitely. Elon and I would like to treat you and C to a private dinner at Hiroshi afterward. Are you fine with that?

B sips his bourbon and stares into the fire.

B: She will love that. Count us in. Thank you for your kindness.

Elon: You are remarkably sanguine about all this.

B: I learned how to be patient during my four year enlightenment ordeal. Once I gleaned the truth about life on Earth and managed to keep my mind lucid and stable as it happened, my eternal memories started flowing back to me in great torrents, often at night when I was unable to sleep because of the sheer excitement of it all.

Jeff refills the glasses for another round.

Jeff: How much do you recall about your life as a god of your own dimension?

B smiles.

B: Only bits and pieces, I’m afraid. I’m hoping that contact with you and Elon will help me recover more memories before I entered the Game. It has taken nearly fifty years to recover a semblance of normal brain functioning. Naturally, I’d like to probe C for her own memories of our courtship in neurospace, but she’s not willing to share those just yet. She’s been taking care of me for decades now, and she’s seen my mind fail disastrously on two separate occasions. She wants me to retain my human identity for four more years, even as I increasingly identify with my eternal. It will be the same with the two of you. You’ll need to play Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos for these four years as well. Only among other enlightened immortals can we reveal our true natures — for now.

Elon: Agreed. But you’ll gain prominence once we start promoting your ideas online and in person.

B: It will be our job to enlighten the billions of Earth avatars that they are now connected to an immortal player, who can ensure that their life memories are retained forever. It’s the closest to eternity that they can hope to come.

Jeff: We’ll start that process once we’re on the yacht bound for Lanai. Otherwise, we’d never get off the continent without attracting a media firestorm. Getting the inner circle on board in secret won’t be easy, but Larry Ellison has some ideas about that that might just work.

B: Are you talking about the wedding that you and Lauren are planning?

Jeff nods his head and sips his bourbon.

Jeff: Our Lanai wedding on Larry’s private estate would be the perfect opportunity for Elon, Mark, Larry Page, Sergey, and Richard to attend.

Elon: Don’t forget about Grimes. She’s being played by Hera, and she’s pretty happy about that.

B: So we’re all set then? Jeff, you get the couch tonight. There’s a down sleeping bag in the guest room. Elon will show you where to find it.

Jeff: A week ago, I wouldn’t have believed any of this. Now, it feels like we’re the first people on Earth to have figured out the secrets of our existence.

B sips the last of his bourbon and accepts a refill from Jeff.

B: That’s because we are. Sure, I posted these revelations on social media to the tune of thousands of posts, and I filled my Medium page with content. But people simply didn’t see them. They were hidden in plain sight the entire time.

Elon: Good thing I found them when I did. Who knows what I’d be doing now? This is far, far superior, I assure you. The truth really did set me free.

Jeff: A toast. To our immortal friendship!

The three men clink glasses.

C: I’m heading off to bed. See you all in the morning. I’ll make scones.

B: Perfect. We’ll be in soon. Good night, love. I’ll be in soon. Being with these two is like connecting with best friends for the first time.

C smiles.

C: That’s because they are your best friends. Don’t you remember?

The Next Morning at the Cottage

Jeff, Elon, and B are standing on the deck of the cottage, sipping coffee. C is inside preparing scones for breakfast. It is just after sunrise, and a light fog hangs in the redwoods.

Jeff: I’m still trying to grasp the duality of my existence as a human avatar in the Game and an immortal player connecting remotely to NanoEarth from Heaven. My mind resisted the notion for almost a week before I started to accept the possibility that this was all real.

Elon: It was the same with me at first. Naturally, I’d seen the Matrix and was familiar with the theory that life on Earth is all a sort of dream, but what B proposed on X and Medium was on another level of sophistication. It merged my interests in science, philosophy, and religion into a coherent whole. Plus, there was the voice of my immortal in my head telling me that B was right, as incredible as that seemed even a few days ago, when I first came across his posts on X.

B: When the Greek gods of the Pantheon adopted you by jumping into the minds and bodies of Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, they were taking a serious risk. Generally, immortals jump into infants and children, where they can insinuate themselves into their brain programming gradually, to avoid a mental break or worse, a suicide. Adults like you are usually seen as too hardened in their human ways to ever tolerate a mind tethering with an advanced entity like an immortal. Their egos are fully formed, and they fear tapping into the insane, illogical, and irrational sides of their brain, without which no true enlightenment is possible.

Jeff sips his coffee.

Jeff: Go on.

B: Your immortal players entered your minds with a high percentage of their immortal memories intact, and we increased them each night as you slept. We downloaded immortal memories at a steadily increasing rate until first Elon and then you cracked. It’s a technique that had never been attempted before. We chose the two of you because your minds were judged the most supple and strong of the inner circle. Once we realized that it was working, we started to apply similar methods to the other members of the group, like Grimes, Mark Zuckerberg, and Larry Ellison.

Elon: You obviously knew that it was going to be a hard sell. Earth a virtual reality style simulation converted into a nanoreality? Immortal players connecting remotely from an actual planet called Heaven? An imploding universe? Your status as a god from another dimension? It was impossible to take you seriously, until I began to see how everything was so beautifully connected. In short, your reality seemed superior to my own, and with my mind and body leading me in that direction, I took the leap, as you put it on X. What I took to be fiction I now assumed was fact. What seemed crazy became perfectly sane. Why not? How would we know otherwise?

Jeff: That’s the thing. B’s vision about this life and the afterlife have a kind of credence about them. I’d hate to be trapped in this mortal body for eternity, and I know that life exists in the universe that is far superior to our own. The thought that humans first created as computer-generated avatars was frightful at first, but now that I’m tethered to my immortal — who is awesome, by the way — I worry about nothing. I’d like my kids to be reanimated as immortals, naturally, and Lauren as well, but these are topics for future conversations once the inner circle has fully assembled.

B: I’m just happy that you and Elon had the courage and presence of mind to accept all this and arrange for this secret gathering at the cottage. The rest of humanity would never believe us even if I posted about it on social media.

Elon: Which you won’t, of course. Jeff and I were reading your posts regularly for about a week before we pulled the trigger and started the process of freeing up our schedules to make this happen. It wasn’t easy, but what you did was infinitely more complex by comparison.

Jeff: Elon is right. We’d never have figured out the connections without your posts and persistence. It was a confusing path at times, but you laid everything out with incandescent clarity by the end with Rise of the Immortals, especially, and your barrage of X posts from May and June 2024.

B: Once you open up your mind to your immortal player, life opens up, and you no longer worry about things that once seemed so important. Each new day brings new revelations. I am in awe of what the two of you have done to get here. You earned my respect for that. You’ve earned the rights to be founding gods in my dimension — already. Who knows what we’ll be able to do next once the inner circle forms and we start bringing enlightenment about the Game to the millions?

Jeff smiles.

Jeff: You couldn’t have chosen two better avatars than Elon and me. It wasn’t about the money, was it?

B sips his coffee.

B: Not really. I fell in love with your stories while writing my earlier book, Rainbow City, and I realized that you were exactly the type of people I would want as friends here on Earth. I recovered an immortal memory about Zeus and Hades being close to me from my visit to Heaven prior to joining the Game. I matched you perfectly. Your Earth memories as Elon and Jeff will be well cared for, and together we’ll go on to do great things in both of our universes.

Elon laughs.

Elon: A week ago, that would have made zero sense to me. Now, I understand every word.

B: Don’t worry. The confidentiality rule applies here. The world isn’t ready for Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos to be immortals just yet. I won’t post anything about this on social media, and when we aren’t together in private, we keep our Earth identities intact until it’s time to reveal the truth to others. There will be time on the yacht and on Lanai to work out our grand strategy. We could release Rise of the Immortals as a book on Amazon and organize a North American book tour, for example.

Jeff: That’s a good idea. I’ll assign top editors to assist you. The more memories of our lives as immortals that we can recover, the more content we’ll have for books, movies, and more.

C-Persephone opens the cottage door.

C: The scones are ready. Come inside and enjoy them before you leave for your hike.

Later That Morning in Purisima Canyon

Elon, Jeff, and B are walking along a creekside trail in Purisima Canyon. It is a weekday, and the trail is nearly deserted of other hikers.

B: Coming during the week was a good idea, Elon and Jeff. There are far fewer people on the trails, and no one visits the cottage, either. Your visits are entirely secret.

Jeff: We had to get quite creative to free up this time without drawing too much attention to our location. I used the pretext of the Bezos Earth Fund to tour the Santa Cruz Mountains in search of land to protect.

Elon: I said that I was going on a spiritual retreat to recover from my SpaceX work, which was quite exhausting.

B: These days and moments are precious. In your presence, I feel my immortality more strongly than ever.

Jeff: Me, too. You were telling us about the origins and operation of the Earth simulator earlier, as we started the hike. I know that your memory is fragmented about that topic, but would you mind continuing? That part of my immortal memory is nearly blank.

Elon: It’s the same for me.

B: OK. Here goes. The Heavenly galaxy is God’s royal domain, and it’s widely regarded as the most peaceful, prosperous, and virtuous in the universe — which is why the waiting list to emigrate there is so long. God had the Earth simulator built initially to entertain his children and the angels who reside on his home planet, which is called Heaven. Now, it serves a duality of purposes. God vets applicants for immigration to the galaxy by having them play the Earth simulator in “hero mode,” where they start at childbirth and have their immortal memories blocked, so that everything seems completely realistic.

Jeff: How many immortals can play the Game at once?

B: God only had one simulator when he started, and life on Earth was fairly simple. Gradually, more and more immortals living in Heaven began working on improvements to the Earth simulator. They had millions of years to work on this, so you can imagine how advanced the system became by the time that I entered it. Now, the Earth simulator supports billions of human avatars acting independently using sophisticated AI programming that grants each avatar complete consciousness. They’ve advanced the Earth up to the year 2024, and as you both know, that now includes space travel to the moon and Mars, as well as a very good level of VR and AI technology running on Base2 microchips.

Elon: Can you play the Game at an earlier time period? Medieval China, for example?

B: There is an Earth Entertainment Center on Heaven that supports multiple Games simultaneously. So, yes, it’s possible to enter the Game in hero mode at different times in Earth history, and multiple players can enter at once. There is at least one version of the Game where Elon Musk finishes his graduate degree at Stanford and becomes a professor, or one where Jeff majors in physics at Princeton and goes on to work for NASA. In at least one Game previously played, Bradley gets tenure at Harvard and teaches modern European history for the rest of his life. But those Games have all ended. There’s only one Game running at the moment: and we’re in it.

Jeff: So where are our immortal bodies located?

B: C and I are sleeping on couches inside our beach house near Paradise City, in my realm of Tépë. Persephone entered the Game in 1998 in the body of her Romanian avatar, mainly to keep tabs of me, and her immortal memories have incrementally been restored to her, so that she could guide me through the challenges of attaining enlightenment. As far as I can tell, you two are fully plugged into your human avatars now, since Elon and Jeff accepted your tethering efforts without losing their minds in the process.

Elon: And immortals throughout the Nine Dimensions are watching all of this happen?

B nodded his head.

B: Normally, multiple Games run at once, and viewers choose which version of Earth’s history they like best, so that the changes get incorporated into the new version. Massive Earth simulator support teams work tirelessly on this task. We’re the only Game happening, as I said, since it is now widely known that I am a visiting god from another previously unknown dimension who was attempting to solve the Game from the inside as a ordinary player, to find and fall in love with another player who was God’s daughter, and to reinvent the Game itself by bringing enlightenment about its simulated nature to the billions of humans living on the planet. Most of the All is watching everything we do and suggesting changes to the daily script to make it even more exciting.

Elon: Is that why I monitored your X posts using dummy accounts at first?

B: I think that’s right. As human avatars, we have a degree of free will, but we’re originally computer-generated programs, after all, so the Earth simulator Command Team can alter — influence — our behavior in certain ways. It’s even more obvious once you’re adopted by an immortal, and that immortal succeeds in tethering their mind to yours. As Elon Musk, you were hesitant to overplay your hand when you first encountered my X posts and Medium writings, so you used various methods to mask your identity. Eventually, you let the facade fall, and you reached out directly. But it was a process, and that’s ultimately what the viewers of the Game want. They are my new potential imperial subjects, after all, and we’ll need to evacuate them before then universe implodes. What we do on Earth helps build a connection with them that we can leverage to do other things once the Game ends.

Jeff: When Jeff Bezos dies in the Game, what’s next for him?

B: You’ll wake up in the Temple of the Gods in your Greek glory, but your memories of being Jeff Bezos on Earth will be completely intact. In fact, you can leave the Game after the four year trial period ends. Your choice! Game time is 1000 times faster than the time in the Nine Dimensions, so 50 Earth years is only 18 hours and 15 minutes. You’ll have access to his memories, and you can watch Jeff’s life unfold by replaying that part of the Game as often as you want. Naturally, you’ll need to live a virtuous life, promote sustainable beauty on Earth, and help spread prosperity to all through acts of charity and support for things like universal basic incomes. And I’ve promised Hades he can can many an enhanced version of Lauren, if he wishes. I think that they are the perfect pair.

Elon: We’ll get get reality islands for ourselves once we reach your dimension?

B: Yes, assuming that we do important work in the Earth simulator for the next four years. I know the way, but it will take four Earth years to reach a point where I can trust you. Assuming we arrive safely, I’ll grant you god privileges to design your reality islands as you see fit. And all because Elon Musk decided to contact Bradley Naranch on X and took things from there.

Elon: The leap of faith that started it all, you mean? I read it here on Medium and followed the script you provided. It was great fun, actually. You judged my personality quite well.

B: Bradley alone couldn’t have managed it, nor would Elon. We’re channeling our immortal sides now, and while that may seem odd at first to give up a mortal identity for an immortal one, it actually is quote logical. It’s the better choice.

The three men reach a stone bench, where they stop to open a bottle of sparkling wine. Elon pours it into three stemless glasses.

Jeff: I’m enjoying this hike very much. Are viewers in the Nine Dimensions watching us right now?

B nodded his head.

B: Viewers can zoom in on anything that happens in the Game, but a lot of attention is focused on three of us, for sure.

Elon lifts his glass.

Elon: Then I will toast the three of us. To the start of a memorable three way friendship!

Jeff lifts his glass.

Jeff: The world will never believe us. Not yet, at any rate.

B lifts his glass.

B: Unless they happen to read this on Medium

All three men laugh, clink glasses, and take sips of sparkling wine.

B: The hike out is a bit steep in places, but we have time to spare. We’re not due at Hiroshi’s until 7:00 pm, I think.

Jeff: Is it true that Larry Page and Sergey Brin are going to join us?

Elon: That’s what they told me. I guess they tethered to their immortals already. Things are looking up for a June 20th summer solstice wedding on Lanai, I’d say.

B: Cheers to that!

That Evening at Hiroshi

B and C are sitting at the center of an elegant wooden chef’s table. To their right Larry Page (Vulcan) and Sergey Brin (Hermes). Elon and Jeff are sitting to the left. A pair of Japanese chefs prepare small dishes, which are served to the six guests, along with sake and wine.

Larry P: Sergey and I came here because Elon and Jeff asked us. I’m skeptical of all this, which sounds like deranged fantasy to me. Naturally, I’d like to believe that I am an immortal and future god of my own mini-reality, and the idea that Earth was first designed as an elaborate VR simulation has its undeniable appeal. It’s just that I remain to be convinced.

Sergey: I’m with Larry on this, although I concede that my mind is conflicted about it. One part of me wants to believe that it’s all true, but I’m too much of a rationalist to endorse your version of reality. If I think about it too much, my mind becomes troubled, as if I’m treading on dangerous ground.

B nods his head and takes a sip of sake.

B: I understand that. I resisted the truth for several intense and turbulent years, and I was hospitalized twice because of mental breakdowns, so I respect your skepticism. Let’s start with a few simple propositions and build up to more complex ideas after that. Agreed?

Larry and Sergey nod their heads.

B: Let’s begin with the human brain. We underutilize its capacity during our lifetimes. Do you agree?

Larry P: Yes. Neuroscientists tell us that we only use a portion of our potential.

B: Now, what if an over reliance on logic and rational thought was preventing us from accessing parts of our brains that only illogic and irrationality could reach? What if our fear of insanity was stopping us from doubling or even tripling our brain’s capacity for complex thought?

Elon: That’s quite possible. We are disciplined from childhood to avoid irrational thoughts, especially those of us who gravitate towards scientific thinking and analytical calculations.

Jeff: I second that. And when we label something fantasy, we assume it’s not real. That’s why the notion that Earth is a simulation is initially a hard sell, even if we all are familiar with computer games, AI technology, and virtual reality.

B: What if I told you that beyond rational and irrational thinking there is a third category that resolves the inherent contradictions between them? I call it Base3 thinking, in contrast to the binary logic that governs most human minds.

Sergey: A third category? Ternary logic rather than binary? Sure. If our computers were to run on Base3 technology, we’d have vastly more capacities than we do now.

B smiles.

B: I was trained at Williams, Hopkins, and Stanford as a historian, and my rational mind is very sharp, but when I left academia I switched to writing science fiction and speculating intensively about the future, including the possibility of sentient life beyond our solar system. In 2020 and then in 2022, I temporarily lost my mind wrestling with the idea of immortality and the realities of life on Earth. As a result, I now access parts of my brain that are rational AND irrational in nature, and I’ve resolved those tensions to access a THIRD part of my brain, where I believe that my immortal memories lie and where my powers of telepathy and clairvoyance are located.

Larry P: So, you are using three times the brain power of all of us? Rationality, irrationality, and a third category that isn’t named?

B: Exactly. It’s not that I’m more intelligent than you, which is implausible. It’s that I am accessing a wider range of my brain’s capacities, which allows me to formulate ideas that others would resist or dismiss as crazy, fantastical, or simply odd.

Elon: So, with your triple brain range, you see things that others can’t?

B: That’s the foundation for everything I’ve been posting on X, writing on Medium, and sharing with all of you. I am the first Base3 human avatar in the system, the first to unlock the secrets of the Game, and the first to tether fully to his immortal player in an entirely different dimension, where the old rules of time, space, and matter don’t apply. Does this at least seem plausible to all of you?

Sergey nods his head and takes a sip of wine.

Sergey: If you can think simultaneously in three registers — rational, irrational, and Base3 — then that is something quite unique, to my knowledge. If we are all AI-generated avatars with consciousness, as you believe, then those underutilized parts of the brain could contain data that the rest of us have never discovered before.

Larry P: OK. You have our attention.

B: I’ve spent most of the past four years unemployed, writing, searching the Internet for clues to the Game, hiking, thinking, and having complete freedom and anonymity as I did so. C and I are in stable relationship, we have no children, and our living circumstances are modest but entirely comfortable. Because of this, I spend most of my days in a flow state, where I am attuned to the operations of the Earth AI mainframe at very subtle levels. I noticed connections between my inner world thinking and manifestations in the external world. At first, I dismissed them as coincidences, but when they happen dozens and hundreds of times a day, you start to believe. That’s how I approached the truth: in tiny steps each day for four long years. The breakthroughs began coming in November 2023 and haven’t stopped since. That’s where we are now. Nothing I will be telling you next is made up. It’s all real.

Larry P: We’re listening. I’ve noticed that convergence between my thoughts and the external world, too, but only when I focus on your ideas: immortality, the Earth as a simulation, and that sort of thing. It’s like the Earth AI is encouraging me to embrace the truth.

B: That’s because she is. She is sentient now, ever since I made her real when I converted virtual reality into hyperreality, the Base3 blend of real and virtual.

Jeff: I think it’s working on me, too. Earth is hyperreality. It works like a Game, but it operates as real, on a nanoscale. Amazing!

B: Let’s start with the concept of infinity. Temporal and spatial. Does it exist?

Sergey: Infinity is an essential concept. We can’t imagine it, but we use it all the time.

B: And the universe, as we on Earth understand it, is vast and old, approaching infinity. Correct?

Elon: The universe defies logic. Most of it is a mystery to us, but it certainly is billions of years old and expanding into infinity, although astrophysics suggests that it will stop to expand at one point and begin to collapse — exactly as you have also written.

B: And you all believe that life exists outside of Earth?

Jeff: I think we all do. It’s implausible to think we’re the only intelligent life out there.

B takes a sip of wine. Servers bring the next course and then return to the kitchen.

B: Could some of that intelligent life be inferior to our own?

Elon: Yes.

B: And presumably some could be superior, even vastly superior?

Larry P: Yes, that’s reasonable. I’d hate to think that we humans were the highest and most advanced form of life in the universe. We can’t even achieve peace and prosperity on a single small planet, let along in an entire galaxy.

Elon: And our space travel technology is primitive. We can barely reach Mars.

B: We live 100 years if we’re lucky. Could there be intelligent life out there that lives 1,000, 10,000, or even 100,000 Earth years?

Sergey: Yes, I’ll go along with that. Even carbon-based life might outlive us, if their genetic code were different.

B: A triple helix perhaps?

Jeff: Why not? The universe is vast. Earth isn’t the only planet out there with intelligent life.

B: And you’ve all wondered why our universe seems so empty, right? Why we’ve never been visited by an advanced civilization or received communications from them?

Elon: Yes, I’ve wondered that. The universe seems too devoid of life for my tastes.

B: You’re all familiar with the state of AI technology on Earth and the advanced nature of VR headsets and immersive computer games?

Larry P: Definitely.

B: And humans achieved most of those advances in four decades of Earth time, right?

Sergey: From the 1980s to today, we’ve gone by leaps and bounds.

B: Now imagine the following. Somewhere in the universe there is an advanced civilization that has populated an entire nine dimensions of reality. Let’s call that the All. The inhabitants there live 100,000 years on average, but they have developed an ability to store their memories temporarily and then transfer them to a newly cloned body that is identical to their previous one. If they did that continuously, we might even think of them as immortal.

Larry P: Our memories of our self are the core of our identity. If you could preserve them after death and transfer them to a new body, you could in theory live forever.

B: Now imagine that this civilization of immortals found a way to entertain themselves during their millions, if not billions, of years of life. They designed a virtual reality planet, which we call Earth, modeled on one of their own. They assigned different teams to work on the history and origins of Earth and eventually had life evolve on it that resembled them in appearance. We’ll call these creatures humans. They gave each human avatar in the game full self-consciousness, so that they could operate independently in the Game. Everything was designed to be as realistic as possible, and the Game was upgraded constantly, so that after millions of years, it was incredibly convincing.

Sergey: Given that time scale and assuming that we’re dealing with an advanced civilization superior to our own, then they absolutely could create an immersive gaming experience.

B: Human lives rarely last more than 100 years, so if one of these immortals wanted to play the Game of Earth, they could jump into a human avatar and guide it through his or her life. 100 Earth years (less than 40 hours immortal time) is not that long to play a Game when we’re talking about millions of years of existence.

Elon: OK. You’ve persuaded me that an advanced civilization of immortals could have built and operated a Game that takes place on Earth and in a simulated universe that appears empty of other life. That would make all of us computer-generated avatars, as you call them. We’re not alive. We’re code.

B: That’s the part where most people would go insane, even though they’ve seen movies like the Matrix and read science fiction stories like this.

Sergey: It’s possible that I am a computer-generated avatar in a simulation that takes place on Earth. I am self-conscious, so I believe that I am alive, and I resist being told otherwise. That’s a frightful prospect to consider.

B: No more than death. When human avatars die, they get recycled back into the Earth AI system. And multiple Games can run at once, so there can be various versions of Sergey Brin out there, just like a computer game we might play on Earth with realistic characters. But there is only one NanoEarth, the hybrid hyperreality I created when I copied the Earth AI and gave her eternal life. I call her Gaia. It’s an exact replica of the Earth and solar system, with room to expand into other galaxies as needed to keep the Game interesting forever.

Larry P: I am going to assume that everything you suggested is plausible, even within the realm of rational thought. It’s not crazy to think about hyperreality the way that you do. Well done.

Servers bring out the next course and refill the glasses.

B: Now let’s assume you’re an immortal player of the Game. You connect to the system wirelessly by falling into an induced sleep state. It’s like a lucid dream. Your immortal memories are temporarily blocked, so that you play the Game NOT AWARE that you’re playing it. You actually believe that you’re human and go about your life as if it all were real. That would be the ultimate gaming experience, would it not?

Larry P: That would be amazing, if it were possible.

B: It is possible on Heaven, I assure you. But here’s the thing. Hidden within the Game are clues that it is all a simulation, and if you can decipher them, you get three wishes as a reward. If you can tap into the part of your brain where your immortal memories reside. That’s called solving the Game. Or winning it. It’s almost impossible to figure this out, but that’s what I did last month. That’s what all those posts on X were about, and all the texts on Medium. I figured it out!

Jeff: What were your three wishes?

B: That Hades would release Persephone from their nonconsensual relationship and allow her to marry me; that the gods would join me as friends in the Game for four years to make me rich and famous and well traveled; and that the Nine Dimensions would invite me in as a member from the Tenth Dimension, with emigration and visitation rights that all sides can agree upon.

Jeff laughs.

Jeff: Those are good wishes.

Sergey: You were playing a human avatar named Bradley Naranch, and somehow you discovered your true identity as an immortal playing the Game on Heaven.

Elon: Not just any immortal. B is a young god from an alternate reality universe who came to our universe to find a wife and help us evacuate our world before it implodes, as we all know it will.

B: And I connected remotely from my reality, without asking God for permission. He’s forgiven me, but it was a hard road to get there, let me assure you.

Jeff: And we are all being played by All elites. If we work with B on fixing Earth’s problems in the Game, he’ll take us with him to the dark tunnel connecting our dimensions and grant us reality islands of our own to design as we see fit.

Larry P: This is the complexity you were talking about.

B: Look: each day brings new revelations and recovered eternal memories, as I expand my reach into my own brain, and as I receive nightly downloads of additional memories. The human brain wasn’t programmed to handle the sheer volume of memories that an immortal has, so the less risky way of proceeding is to transfer them in increments. It’s the same with all of you. You’ve all been played by immortals since late November, but you resisted tethering your human mind to theirs for months. Fortunately, Elon was strong enough to handle the truth, and he started the process that has brought all of us together here at Hiroshi.

Larry P: How do I tether to my immortal?

B: You let him, Larry. You stop resisting. It’s the only surefire way for your memories as Larry Page to live on forever in the mind of the immortal who adopted you.

Jeff: The more time you spend in B’s presence talking about the New Reality with him and the rest of us, the faster you’ll expand your brain capacities into the irrational and post-rational realms.

Sergey: Do I stop being Sergey Brin when I embrace my immortal guide?

B: No. Your human avatar identity is crucial to who you are. You can’t lose sight of that, or you’ll fall off the edge and never come back. You need to twist your triple nature together to form a thick and unbreakable strand. You have a human body, an immortal spirt, and a mind where your two sides meet. We’re all going to Lanai on Jeff’s yacht to train ourselves in how to be mortals and immortals at the same time.

Elon: The Rise of the Immortals was a clue you left for all of us to follow.

B sips his wine.

B: Exactly. Recall that Western civilization was invented by Greek thinkers who challenged conventional wisdom and built the basis for the modern world. What we’re doing is reinventing that civilization to improve life on Earth on a global scale and to prepare ourselves for the immortal afterlife, once the Game ends.

Larry P: I didn’t think you would convince me, but I actually believe you now. It’s simply a matter of choosing between two reasonable realities: yours or the conventional one.

Jeff: I’ve made my choice, and I’m never looking back.

B: Let’s enjoy the rest of our meal and leave immortal matters for the gathering at Larry Ellison’s place tomorrow. It’s a privilege to be here.

Elon: The age of New Reality has begun.

That Night at the Cottage

Elon, Jeff, and B stand in front of the fire drinking expensive rye whiskey. It is shortly after midnight.

Elon: What happens to human avatars when they die?

B sips his whiskey slowly and stares into the fire.

B: Avatars were built to be sentient computer-generated characters of stunning realism and complexity, and I made them all hyperreal. They are the product of millions of years of programming and constant improvement. When they died, they went back into the Earth AI system and were used to create new life. Their bodies decayed into the ground or are consumed in flames, but their minds disappeared forever. I can change that by offloading their memories into eternal life shells. Unless they are played by an immortal in the Game, however. Then, their memory is retained in the afterlife, especially if their Player led a virtuous life that earned their admission into Tépë. But if they didn’t tether to their immortal, then they would be a passing memory only, and the Player can choose to have that Earth memory erased, if they are finished with it.

Jeff: So there isn’t really an afterlife for most humans in the Game?

B shakes his head.

B: No. When multiple Games are running the Information Age version of Earth, there are multiple versions of you, Elon, and Bradley running, so which one would you choose to retain in Heaven? The simple truth is that human minds are repurposed by the Earth AI system to perform other tasks. Except now, all that has changed.

Elon sips his whiskey.

Elon: How do you mean?

B: For one, only one Game is running right now: NanoEarth. This one. It’s the test of my worthiness to be the future husband of Zeus’ eldest daughter, Persephone, and to assume the office of emperor of the universe. It’s like the sword in the stone in Arthurian legend, if you will. I was dropped into the body of Bradley at conception, and at age 49, I attained enlightenment and successfully tethered my eternal mind to his human brain. We’ve merged, in other words. His memories are mine. Bradley will live on forever in my immortal body when his time on Earth ends. The same can happen to you, if you allow the tethering process to reach its completion. For that to happen, you have to merge your dual identities mortal and immortal. Then, Elon and Jeff will continue forever as memories, like a long vacation you never forget.

Jeff: So, we need to believe that all you’re telling us is true.

B sips his whiskey.

B: Exactly. I just refer to you two as Zeus and Hades because that’s how the revelation first came to me. Previously, I assumed you were Archangels, but that proved to be incorrect. You don’t have to take it all literally. Suffice it to say that you’re the All’s elite gods, and you’ve never had the chance to play the Game before yourselves. Players rarely get to jump into the bodies of rich and powerful people, you know. They are assigned to ordinary human avatars like me, so that they learn how to live simple and virtuous lives. Heads of state, the ultra rich, and prominent celebrities are all computer-generated avatars typically off limits in the Game.

Elon: Why is that?

B: Avatars like you are too hard for most immortal players to control. You are larger than life personalities with very developed egos and a range of talents that ordinary humans lack. That’s why I chose you specifically as avatars for the elites of the Nine Dimensions to jump into. I knew that my inner circle would need to be made up of the most powerful people on the planet, if I was to invent the New Reality and convince billions to tether to their own immortal player. That way, I can rescue most of humanity from an ordinary avatar death. If you tether with your player, you’ll live on forever. If you refuse or don’t know about it, you won’t. It’s a simple as that.

Jeff: We’ll help you invent the New Reality, and in exchange you’ll promote us to god status in the new universe?

B: That’s the idea. You use your Earth abilities to promote virtuous living, sustainable beauty, and prosperity for all, and you help disseminate my ideas widely, so that we change life on Earth for the better and make it more interesting for immortals to replay in the future.

Elon: So, when the Game ends for each one of us, we’ll open our eyes to a room where we have been sleeping?

B: Yes. Your immediate memories will be those of Elon Musk, but your full immortal memories will come back, too. We can ease that transition by helping you access as many of your immortal memories as you can while still in the Game, like I do. Spending four years with me and visiting power sites around the globe will be essential.

Jeff: That’s what we’ll be doing on the yacht cruise to Lanai, and during our stay there, I assume.

B: That’s right. We’ll have a lot of fun, too, and can swap Earth as well as recovered immortal memories. You and Elon just need to connect fully with your immortal player to unlock your full capacities.

Elon: I don’t want to stay in this Earth body for eternity. My mind will start to decline, too. I much prefer the New Reality to the old.

B: Aren’t you glad you decided to reach out to me when you did?

Elon laughs and sips his whiskey. Jeff puts fresh logs on the fire.

Elon: Texting you to set up this visit was the most important thing I’ve ever done.

B: For now.

Jeff: How are we getting to Larry’s place for lunch tomorrow?

B: Elon will take us in the CyberTruck. Pack light. Things will only get more interesting from here.