Genesis

Genesis by Chris Green

GENESIS. That’s all it says. Genesis in large clear capitals. Informal font. Plain white envelope. It arrived overnight. Probably promotional literature for stuff I could not possibly want. Some fly-by-night scammer trying to make something worthless seem valuable or something pointless seem essential. The single sheet of A4 is short on detail, but it addresses me by name and tells me to pack a bag and be at Eden Rise at 3 pm today. Someone with the unlikely name of Sebastian Godd will meet me there, it says, to give me the dope on the unique opportunity and guide me through what happens next. But I should have no doubt, the experience will be worth it. I can be certain of that.

My interest is piqued. It is an unusual pitch. Bold and subversive. It takes me a few moments to bring to mind where I recognise the Nueva Vida logo at the top of the sheet from. When Mandy moved out of the houseboat three weeks ago, I flippantly answered a Nueva Vida ad I came across in the murky depths of cyberspace, asking if I was ready to embrace a new way of life, free from the bullshit of the everyday. Two lucky winners would be selected for a never before available adventure for the mind and spirit. It was the opportunity of a lifetime.

It seemed too good to be true, so I had not expected to hear anything from Nueva Vida, if it even existed. Like everything on the outer limits of the internet, it was likely to be a scam or a joke. I had not given it another thought. But this must be the lifetime opportunity Nueva Vida’s curious communication refers to. It might still be a scam, of course. But as my fortunes seem to have been on a Hard Luck Sam trajectory lately, what have I got to lose? Not only has Mandy taken everything worth taking, but my picture restoration gig has gone down the pan. Everyone it seems has either had their pictures restored or has thrown them out. So I need to be getting on with something. Why not take a chance on going along to meet Sebastian Godd? Who knows what might come of it?

Eden Rise is beyond the back of beyond and a steep climb, but I make my way there for three. Sebastian is there waiting, and he looks like a regular kind of guy. Beyond that, reality seems in tatters. The landscape looks like a hologram or some kind of projection, and I have never seen a vehicle like the one Sebastian Godd is driving. Could you describe it as a vehicle at all?

‘It is, if you want it to be,’ Sebastian says, reading my thoughts. ‘It can be whatever you want it to be. Or it can not be there at all. Your choice.’

He can see I am puzzled by his explanation, but I’m guessing he must be used to high levels of puzzlement.

‘Form is arbitrary,’ he says. ‘From now on, Adam, you will find the visible shape of something counts for very little. You will be able to make up your own mind how you want things to appear.’

‘I will?’

‘But you’re not out of the woods, Adam. This does not necessarily mean the episode will be pleasing. The ability to choose can work both ways. You need to be vigilant of dark thoughts that come your way. Your demons will be looking to shape the way things appear to you in the same way that dreams become nightmares. But, look! There’s plenty of time to look into all of that shit. We have to get on. We have another pick-up. I’ve arranged it for 4 pm, and we have a distance to go. But the passing of time is illusory and, like all measures, distance is relative. It may be no distance at all.’

Is he going to keep talking in riddles, I wonder.

Whatever form of transport we are using, it is the business. We zip through space and, in a flash, arrive at what is the mirror image of Eden Rise. The other lucky Nueva Vida winner is standing there with a travelling bag that looks nothing like mine. She has the appearance of someone that has arrived from somewhere a long way off.

‘This is Eve,’ Sebastian says.

We greet each other like long-lost travellers.

‘At times, there will appear to be a host of other things going on around you,’ Sebastian says. ‘But it will save unnecessary confusion if you think of yourselves as the only two sentient beings in existence. The sole inhabitants of the universe. Focus on the focal. Remember, you are originals. Pioneers. The comic book heroes of tomorrow. You are the mythic figures at the centre of the unfolding mystery.’

I can’t explain why, but I’m expecting a talking snake to turn up soon.

………….………..…………………

A green tree python is lurking in a ginkgo tree. It must be forty feet long, which is quite big for a python. This is more the size one associates with anacondas and Amazon jungle snakes.

Meanwhile, Eve has found a large ginkgo nut that has fallen on the ground. It looks like a rosy apple.

‘Go on. Bite it,’ says the cyclopean serpent in python-speak.

Eve apparently understands what the snake is saying and sets about the fruit with some vigour. She has travelled a long way and is very hungry. She offers me a bite. It tastes good.

Godd disappears as dramatically as he appeared. He vaporises like he’s in some low-budget scifi thriller. One moment he is there, the next he is not. There doesn’t seem to be anyone else here at the duplicate Eden Rise. It’s not a people sort of place. Apart from the ginkgo tree, the landscape is decidedly lacking in interest. It looks like it’s just me and Eve and the snake. There seems to be no way back to where I came from.

Eve and I set about exploring our surroundings, but these are apt to change violently without warning. The sky is breaking up. It is light and it is dark and it is near and it is far. As the landscape fractures, it becomes harder to focus. Nothing that is happening here makes any sense. Someone is staging a multi-dimensional universe creation show around us, and we are becoming part of it. We are buffeted this way and that in time and space and probably a number of other things, too. It is altogether too much for mere mortals to take in, and exhaustion eventually gets the better of us.

When we wake, we are naked. The tree python has left, but another snake is eager to get in on the action. The lotus flower opens. We do what seems right in one of those rare fortuitous snake and lotus flower concurrences that happen at epoch-making moments in pre-history. This goes well. We now speak the same language.

………….………..…………………

Sebastian Godd is back. He has brought us a big bag of mushrooms.

‘You’re probably missing the internet and all your devices,’ he says. ‘That nonsense will go down as one of the great errors of history. But other than that, how’s it shaping up?’

‘The turbulence at the beginning was harrowing,’ I say. ‘While we were getting our bearings, we were terror stricken.’

‘Not the snakes?’

‘No. Not the snakes. The first snake was pretty scary, certainly, but the second snake more than made up for it. It was the mind-bending apocalyptic whirlwind we were caught up in that messed with our heads. We were not ready for anything quite like that. But since then, things are beginning to settle.’

‘You have to take the rough with the smooth wherever you are, guys,’ Godd says. ‘It’s a universal understanding. But listen! I’m giving you a free hand here. Occasionally I may require you to do something you might not otherwise get around to doing, but other than that, there are no restrictions. You can behave how you want. It’s your life to do what you will. There are no laws. No clocks. No measurements or money. And once you develop the skill, you will be able to make things you want appear by simply thinking about them. Here you can follow your bliss. What more could you ask for?’

‘But there aren’t any other people,’ Eve says. ‘Where I come from, we had lots of parties and big gatherings. I’ll miss that. And the shops. It was good to go to the shops.’

‘I’ll see what I can do. But you are not going to need shops. It’s not going to be that kind of life.’

………….………..…………………

Whether it is through Nueva Vida recruitment online, we have no way of knowing, but Sebastian Godd gradually populates our community with cool new people. With the wealth of creative energy the freethinkers bring, we have a miscellany of rewarding things to occupy, entertain and amuse us, and being the first to arrive, Eva and I enjoy a certain status in the community. New arrivals look up to us. We are trailblazers. We are the cartoon heroes of tomorrow. We have no regrets about our decision to put our trust in Godd. We do not miss our gadgets and the internet as much as we thought we would, and Eve no longer hankers after trips to the shops. It’s too much of a stretch perhaps to put our concupiscence down to the abundance of friendly snakes and lotus flowers in this hallowed realm. Or to the magic potions that are on offer. It could be that we are just naturally attracted to one another or spiritually consonant. But whatever it is, Eve and I enjoy a wild and fulfilling sex life.

Just when we think how well things are going, two of our more wayward new comrades, Cain and Abel, get themselves caught up in a sinister sacrifice cult. Cain gets in into his head that the wise bearded one with the all-seeing eye has rejected his sacrifice of fine herbs that he has grown in his garden, in favour of Abel’s unethical Nubian goat sacrifice. Does this mean he is not worthy to serve the Omnipotent Master? In the absence of psychological professionals to talk him down from his anger, and with his shaman indisposed, there is no one around to relieve his mania, and he clubs Abel to death with his favourite pet rock, Peter, and goes off on his travels. The brutal killing brings great sadness and casts a dark shadow over our happy tribe, which goes to show, that wherever it is, whatever it involves, and however you come by it, no way of life is perfect. It’s always a good idea to read the small print, and if there is no small print treat it with a degree of suspicion. Eve should have realised that the snake in the ginkgo tree could not be trusted and that the fallen fruit came with T’s and C’s. We both should have realised from the outset that Godd was a charlatan. We should not have signed up for Genesis. Everything on offer needs to be examined with a critical eye. If something seems too good to be true, it usually is.

Copyright © Chris Green, 2023: All rights reserved