The Prophecy Out of Bounds Chapter Five

Back in his room Razjosh suddenly noticed how tired he had become. I’m getting too old for this, he thought. Yes, it was certainly time a younger man took over. But would Kaleem be ready? He was really still only a boy. Razjosh smiled to himself. Of course, Kaleem probably did consider himself to be a man, especially now that he was living at home on his own.

There had been no more news about Maria. Well, there had been reports daily, but there had been nothing new to tell. Was she fulfilling that Babel Prophecy? Had she conceived Kaleem the long-forgotten natural way? Was that what was meant by the Mother? Even with all he knew of Golden Knowledge, Razjosh was not sure whether this was just wishful thinking. Or was it just that old trick of making a prophecy fit a set of events because it was convenient? Odd though, that those three separate threads had come together of their own accord - an implication that Maria might be a natural mother, and that she of all people should possess a book version of the Babel story. Odd too that it was her son who had shown the most aptitude for the Peace Child Programme. And it was looking as if Kaleem was really going to have his work cut out. That would certainly be an opportunity for him to invent himself as something special. Razjosh realised that his time as the current Peace Child had been comparatively quiet  There had been just a few diplomatic exchanges now and then. And he had never had to leave Terrestra before. He and his advisors had just chosen that he should. If only he didn’t feel so tired, he could enjoy it more. Razjosh knew what would help him most.

He took his small portable dataserve out of the cupboard and removed the machine from its case. To anyone else, the case would look empty. Carefully he removed the false bottom. He took out one of the books from the hidden compartment and began to leaf through it. He could read the old printed Wordtext quite easily, and this was written in one of his more fluent languages. Soon, there were just pictures in his head of the inhabitants of another planet, one which did not actually exist, but which someone’s imagination had invented. There were four distinct races. They had found a way of living in harmony, even though they were all so different. There were silly people and sensible people on this planet. There were people who liked to live in luxury and those who lived without shoes and walked on mud.

The pictures in Razjosh’s head became more and more vivid. This is so much richer than movie clips, he thought. And what an interesting place to live. The trouble with universalisation is that now we are nearly all the same. He smiled to himself, though, when he remembered how different the Terrestrans actually were from the inhabitants of other planets.

The communicator in Razjosh’s cabin sounded.