Buttopia
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Chapter 90: Tropical Beaches With Saint Nick
🕑 Added 2025-01-24 22:07:23 +0000 UTCI tossed and turned in some half-awake state when the sound of birds caused my eyes to shoot open as I bolted upright in the cot, fully awake. Those had been tropical bird calls, something I hadn’t heard in years. How could they be here? The darkness of my garage vanished into a cheerfully bright sunlight, illuminating a beautiful beach as the bird songs continued.
Instead of my cot, I was now sitting up on a beach chair, and next to me was apparently Santa Claus. The memories came flooding back that I only seemed to be able to fully grasp while I was asleep. Damn, those creatures were still heading for Earth, and this intelligence was stuck here because I couldn’t find a way to make myself remember any of this happened.
“Hello again, Dave. I’m afraid as usual, I have some bad news. With your new return to Earth it seems to have further drawn in those monsters. And it appears you’ve had no luck in remembering any of our conversations in your waking world,” Santa said. I did my best not to let the scene of Santa Claus on a beach distract me too deeply.
“No, I haven’t, and we already have a ton of problems going on. I wish I could add yours to the list, but I’m not sure how to. The moment I wake up, this is all entirely gone,” I said. This was a serious problem, but I had no way to solve it or even work on solving it.
“What about that strange black box over the ocean, could that help?” Santa asked, pointing one of his jolly fingers toward the water. My eyes followed where he was indicating, only to spot a giant, familiar black message box that was usually only in my mind.
I rolled over in my cot as I started to wake up. The smell of breakfast wafted in from the house. Why was there already a chat message from Corey? I quickly read through its contents.
As I climbed out of bed, the temptation of eggs too great to ignore, I wondered how hard my dream self had been fighting to try and make my awake self remember. How did that even work anyway? Was it just my subconscious, or were there entire memories tucked away inside my head that were refusing to make themselves known? I wasn’t sure I liked the idea of either of those possibilities particularly.
“Morning, Dad, surprised it took you so long to get here, but I saved some eggs just for you,” John said as I entered the kitchen, spotting him doing his best to clean up what he could with the destroyed sink greatly impeding his progress.
“Yeah, I had some weird dreams. I may put up a good front, but the anxiety is still there strong,” I answered, giving him half a smile, hopefully hiding some of my own insecurity about everything.
“So about mom,” John started while I was pilling the remaining eggs onto a plate.
I cut him, wanting to speak there first. “I did a lot of thinking about that while I had some time, and I want to try to find her first. Since we are all heading out to see how bad Earth is, we will do some search and rescue of where she was, and from there, we can tell your sister if we can’t find her. Sound good?” I asked after giving my plan, trying my best to sound hopeful. It wasn’t a feeling I totally shared, but Laura deserved, at the very least, an attempt to find her.
“That’s actually what I was hoping you’d say,” he sighed slightly, seemingly glad for my answer before continuing. “And on that same note, how do you think what’s left of the world governments are going to respond to this? To you, for that matter?” I had been avoiding that line of thought. So I took a few bites of egg before responding.
“I honestly don’t know how they will respond to me. I doubt anyone is going to roll over and accept my rule, and I really don’t want them to anyway. I’ve never been great at the whole politics game, that was always your mother, but if I had to guess, initially, there is going to be so much chaos to handle worldwide they will have their hands full in the immediate future. After that, we will see,” I answered as best I could. I purposely left out the fact that eventually whether they wanted to or not, the whole Earth was becoming part of the Spiral, and we would need to present a united front before it was too late.
“Dad, what happened between you two?” John asked suddenly. I felt the panic grip my stomach, and I almost dropped my plate. For a split second I was there again, the day Laura had told me she wanted the divorce. I shouldn’t have been so blindsided by it. I know that now, but at the time, it was like being hit by a truck.
I forced in a deep breath and started answering. “So, when my parents died, I went deeper and deeper into a shell. I kind of withdrew a lot from the world. You didn’t really experience me before that, so it was probably hard for you to see the change, but it was there. Your mom tried to help me. She did her best. It wasn’t her fault. Eventually, she couldn’t take it anymore, and then I made everything worse by running out here and almost losing you guys,” I answered. It was a very abridged story, but considering it had taken years and mostly moved at a snail’s pace of small events, it was best told this way. The simple reality was that I had gone into a deep depression and was totally unwilling and unable to start my climb out of the hole.
“Oh,” was all John said back, looking at me with both pity and sadness in his eyes.
“It’s alright, let’s change the topic. Too much to do to dwell on things we can’t change,” I said, finishing off my plate. John nodded, though not looking entirely convinced. “Oh, since you’re officially in charge of stocking, I think it might be best you draw up some plans for a kitchen remodel.” I figured that would help take his mind off it.
“Not a bad idea. You’ve got a ton of space outside we could add on with. As long as none of the building disrupts Cecile’s plantings, he might kill us for that,” John said, finally returning to a smiling face. Poor kid, I wish he had inherited less of my anxiety.
“The real question is if Cecile’s plants can kill us. I’ve had some surprisingly painful encounters with several overly mobile plants recently in my life I’d rather not repeat here,” I said as I left the room, leaving John to dwell on just what kind of creatures I had encountered, hoping that added to his distractions.
“Ah, good you’re awake.” Pryte’s voice called from the living room as I left the kitchen. He set down whatever he had been reading and looked up at me. “Mel wanted us to start the meetings as soon as you were ready to go. We are starting with just the three of us.”
I sighed. It was time for a different conversation with Pryte before we found Mel. “So, remember when we first met and how clueless I was?” I asked the small man, trying to make a point very clear to him.
“I do,” he answered.
“Consider that when I asked the next question, as I’m still more or less there. I’ve had months of exposure to only a tiny subset of the Spiral compared to your apparent millions of years. From now on, I want you, alongside your other duties, to be my official explanation guy. Tell me how things are supposed to be and how bad or good it would be if I decided to do them differently. I also want you to answer anything I ask as though I know nothing about the topic. Does that make sense?” I asked, hoping he understood my intent, as I wasn’t sure I had explained it perfectly.
“That somewhat was already my role, but I understand. You need me to be a bit more hands-on with leading you. That alone is a pretty big difference in most of the rulers, especially the older ones. Though some newer factions will appreciate it more. How about we start taking some time out each night as time allows for a few lessons?” Pryte explained before making the offer. It seemed like it was a good idea.
“Yeah, I’d like that. Alright, let’s go figure out these meetings with Mel,” I said, feeling a bit more reassured about the day. I was glad Pryte understood my real plight here, a lack of information.
Who is the oldest being in the Spiral? It’s a question I’ve long wished to know the answer to, but I’ve realized my question was flawed. It only pertained to the Spiral itself, and in that eternal darkness that exists outside of the connected universes live so many beings fully aware of the Spiral and older than time itself. So then my new question is which being can remember the most of existence, and will they talk to me?
Grom’s Musings
