Gaining insight
Frank got up in wobbly legs and sat on the settee and he
took some time to assimilate the entire thing that happened
to him..
He realised that the library was bolted from inside and there
would be a big problem if someone wanted to enter the
library.. he said loudly , ‘ the library is closed from inside’
The raven flew and sat in the opposite settee and the grey
sat on the coffee table between both the settees ..Re the
raven closed its eyes and under one wing a glow appeared ..
Re opened its eyes and said, ‘ not to worry .. it is taken
care ‘
Frank was beyond asking how or what.. he simply looked
at them . Zo the grey told him , ‘ you asked Re, if we had
killed the old man.. do you want to know’
Frank thought that was the last thing he wanted to know.. ,I
like to start from the beginning not from the middle ..so tell
me who are you people ? where did you come ..’
Re said , ‘well , you should believe us.. We don’t know
who we are or where we came from.. Obviously you people
are too primitive and your DNA can hold only the basic
genetic instructions unlike ours..We pass our entire
knowledge that gathered over the time from the parents to
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the offspring. In the sense our entire community is
connected and knowledge transfer occurs internally..’
Frank was puzzled , ‘if so you should know from where
you had come ..’
Now Zo answered , ‘ but that memory had been
systematically deliberately erased from all of us.. so we
have all the other knowledge but not our origin’
Frank again was not satisfied , ‘ if you think the whole
community is connected with the knowledge why you are
not connected with someone other than you… You are
calling us primitive, you could have connected with
interstellar space or beyond’
Re was looking at him with its head to one side , ‘ true
Frank but till now we were not able to connect... we do
come across other intragalactic species but never our own..’
Zo continued , ‘ we have concluded that our home base is
no more and we are the only survivors ... We have been
waiting for some break through for almost our half life time
that is more than 1000years of your time..’
Frank was curious to know how they transfigure
themselves!
Re said , ‘we can transfigure into anything and also we can
be invisible to your eyes ...kindly don’t ask how because
even if I explain you would not understand…’
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‘But if you know transfiguration , it would be easier to
become like human ‘.Frank asked with genuine concern.
Ro said ,’ unfortunately we cannot transfigure into larger
specimen ,only to our size.. Moreover already few
intragalactic specimens in the form of human being are
mingling with you human..we don’t want to lose our
identity like them . But good thinking on your side Frank
and what you had seen in the den is not our original form.
We took your dwarf form but now we are very comfortable
and we may retain the form and pass it on to our next
generation..’
Frank did not want to ask any more as he felt like
kindergarten kid asking questions to the teacher. He
remembered the old man and asked , ‘why and how did the
old man die?
Zo said the old man was killed because of the knowledge.
The old man mentioned the Old Book to you and spoke to
you privately. That triggered the search for him. There is a
group called The Seekers ..have you heard about them.. ?’
Frank remembered something about them .. they were the
treasure hunters and recently they found a treasure of gold
worth several billion dollars in India..and disappeared with
the whole lot …
‘The treasure hunters’ Frank said in awe..
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Zo continued , ‘ yes . The Seekers were searching for this
old man for so many years .the villagers believed that he
was aware of a very vast treasure and had a crude map .
They did not know that the map was a gift from us to him
for services given’
Frank jumped from the settee and towered over the birds
.
.he recalled the pendant that was found with him and the
old book that had information about Re and group ..
Ro said , ‘ it was a gift from us .. he was just a kid when we
needed his help to get water. I remember that year.. the
driest year ever ..no rain and no water anywhere .We need
liquid to survive or we will automatically switch off and the
term you use for that condition is coma and it takes years
and years to revive and part of the knowledge will be lost
after that..’
Ro continued, ‘ He was a loner and was very fond of
roaming the mountains. We watched for few days then Re
approached him like a monkey..like a talking monkey. We
talk about it very often as he was not surprised to see a
monkey asking him to get water .. he acted as though it
was normal to find talking animals . He brought a pot of
water or milk every day for 125 days . Whenever he told
the villagers about all these strange things ,they did not
believe as it was his habit to tell stories.’
‘He was considered not so normal so to make him more
enigmatic, we would predict him about death of people and
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animals … when it came true the villagers started to believe
him and to fear him.’
Frank interrupted Ro , ‘ but how could you predict death ?’
Zo replied , ‘ we killed and the prediction came true’
Frank was taken aback to hear such a terrible thing in that
emotionless voice.. he sat down slowly and asked ,
‘
‘
you killed ‘
We didn’t want our friend to be disturbed or followed.’ Ro
said coolly … ‘ they believed that he had some kind of
power given by monkeys as they had seen him with
monkey.’
Frank thought that these are incapable of human sentiments
or emotions . But they seemed to be very strong on
loyalties ..
‘What was that about a map? He asked without much
interest ..he thought that the old man died because of that
one thing!
Zo replied to him , ‘ we know that you give so much
importance for a particular metal and we knew the place
where a very big cache of them were hidden. So we gave a
map which would be completely useless on its own without
the background knowledge that the old man possessed ‘
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‘But the old man did not have a clue to connect am I right ?
How did the seekers come to know of it?’ Frank was
annoyed.
Zo answered him.. ‘ Oliver.. that was the old man’s name ..
He was featured in a news paper some 50 years back. A
local reporter came to know of Oliver and his power of
predicting death ..during the interview he blurted out about
the treasure . Oliver convinced the reporter that he had
seen it and it made the headlines then’
‘Did he see the treasure?’ Frank asked in reflex
Zo continued , ‘ yes of course but we removed the memory
we thought of guarding the treasure as long as we stay
here ..we needed a bargaining price for the future’
…
‘So, what do you want?’ Frank sounded impatient and he
was told that they did not have permission to reveal ..
He was stunned to hear that he was not given all the
information and only part of the information was given to
him.
‘Tell who ever is giving you permission that I would go
open if I don’t get all the information concerning you
people .. I am not bothered about your so called treasure
.
.you can keep to yourself but other than that I must know
everything and I give you one day time to get back to me ..
Now you may go’
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Frank sounded very decisive and he walked into his bed
room without looking at them .He felt the birds flying out .
*
*******
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