Chapter 3

January, 1948

Here it was, 1948, and I was at loose ends. There wasn't enough crime in our town to keep me busy, so I was looking for something to do. Maybe I could find some other abilities to develop. How about Clairvoyance (Far-Seeing)? I figured it would be useful if I could see a place without actually going there. As it was now, I needed someone in place whose eyes I could use to see, if I weren't there. It would be great if I could see inside the sun, or beneath the clouds of Venus, or in the girls' locker room. I was thrilled by all the things I could learn.

OK, now, how to do it? I figured that the first thing I needed was a clear idea of where I wanted to see. I couldn't visualize a place if I couldn't see it, and I couldn't see a place if I couldn't visualize it! This was going around in circles! Maybe, if I thought of the universe as a series of 3-dimensional map coordinates, I could see that place. If that were the proper technique, I would need a base point, so what to use? I was moving, the earth was moving, the sun was moving, the Milky Way was moving, the whole universe was moving!

Then it occurred to me that my mind was fixed in relation to my body, so I would use my body as the fixed reference point! Suppose I wanted to see what was 40 feet in front of me, 30 feet to my right, and 100 feet up, could I see it? I could! I was looking out over the schoolyard toward the parking lot. I could see the school buses and the teacher's cars. Beyond that, I could see houses and other buildings. It was as if I were standing at that point and looking straight ahead. I turned my head and my view changed. I could look around just as if I stood in that place. How about telescopic vision? Could I magnify the view so that I could read license plate numbers? Yes! Boy, this was neat!

"Bruce McLoud! Pay attention in class!" blared into my ears.

"I'm sorry, Miss Brown. My attention had drifted. I'll pay attention, now."

"Thank you, Bruce. Now, let's return to the major crops of Tibet."

All I needed to visit Mars was to know where it was in relation to me. The moon would be easy since I could see it. After school, I rode my bicycle to the library and asked to see some reference books on astronomy. The librarian had trouble taking me seriously until I complained that I did not want children's books, but real technical reference books. She found the only one they had which dealt in spacial coordinates. It was page after page of tables—just what I needed. I thanked her and went over to one of the study tables to examine my treasure-trove of information.

I flipped and looked at every page. It took about an hour for me to have the whole book memorized. I returned the book to the librarian, with thanks. She smirked at me and I did not have to read her mind to know that she thought that I had been snowed by the book, but too embarrassed to admit it. I just smiled at her and walked out.

I rode my bike home, hardly able to wait before visiting Venus! When I got home, I found my mother listening to her soap operas on the radio in the living room. I went in and kissed her on the cheek. I said I wanted to take a nap, so I would be in my room. "Please call me for supper." She nodded and I went to my room.

I pulled down the shade to darken the room, took off my shoes, and lay down on the bed. If my mother looked in, I wanted her to think that I was asleep. I closed my eyes and called up the tables for Venus' location. I had devoured the stories about Venus by Edgar Rice Borroughs and Isaac Asimov, two of my favorite authors. I was looking forward to seeing the jungles and forests and the strange animals that must live there. I labored over the equations and the data from the book and sent my consciousness to a location a few thousand miles above Venus and looked down.

I saw an atmosphere of roiling clouds completely obscuring the ground below. Ah, exactly what I expected! I pushed my point of view closer to the surface of Venus, but I couldn't see anything! Oh, how stupid! I was on the night side of Venus; no wonder I couldn't see anything. I thought it would be fun to see the sunrise on Venus, so I moved off to the east.

It got gradually lighter as I moved; I assumed that this was caused by the sunlight being scattered by the dust particles in the atmosphere. I was disappointed by the sunrise; the light just got brighter and brighter, without the blast of color I was hoping for. But, where was the jungle? All I could see was an orange-shaded desert!

This was ridiculous. Both my authorities on the surface of Venus failed to mention any deserts. I must be in the uninhabited part, like the Sahara Desert on earth. I just kept going, but the scenery never changed! I sped up, since it was getting close to supper time. Still no change! Finally, it started getting dark, and there was still nothing but desert. How could those giants of literature be so wrong? I was disappointed to my core; I almost started crying!

This required a lot of thought, so I snapped my consciousness back to my room. As I lay in my bed ruminating over what I had seen, I heard my mother call me to supper.

At supper, I asked my father what he knew about Venus' surface.

His answer was, "All I know is what I have read in the science fiction magazines. The problem is that they don't know either. Remember that those stories are written to be entertainment, not to be scientifically accurate."

"But what about the stories by Edgar Rice Borroughs and Isaac Asimov?"

"They are just telling a story and shape the locale to fit the story. Do you think that they have been to Venus to see the planet?"

"Well... OK, I see what you mean. Just because they are famous and write good stories, I shouldn't take literally what they describe."

"Exactly, son. They could be flat wrong, just like anybody else trying to describe a place he has never actually seen."

"Thanks, Dad. That makes me feel a lot better about some things I read."

After supper, I went back to my room. It was Tuesday, so I listened to "Gang Busters." As I listened, I thought about what Dad had said about story writers and I wondered if these crime stories were really true. Getting older was sure giving me a lot to think about!

Before I went to sleep that night, it occurred to me that I should be able to use TK to move things while I was viewing them by clairvoyance. I resolved to find out tomorrow.

The next day after school, I went into our garage to find a place to hide. I figured that my mother would start to worry about my health and schedule a trip to the doctor if I spent too much time in my bedroom. Living in south Alabama means that you really don't need a garage, and most people use them for storage sheds. That was what we did, and I was sure that I could work out a good, safe place. I found the old sofa and cleared it of junk and rat droppings. I also found an old pillow, so I was all set to lie in comfort while I was off visiting other planets and such.

I decided to visit the moon this time. I didn't need any math to find the moon, all I had to do was look. I lay down and moved my Point Of View above the local trees and looked at the moon. It was still daytime in Alabama, but I had no trouble finding the moon among the high clouds. I made a couple of jumps and was in position to see the surface in considerable detail.

I wanted to get familiar with the moon's surface, so I skimmed along, much as I had done on Venus the day before. Since I was still a seventh-grader, I didn't have the backgound to be really interested in the details of what I was seeing, so I became bored pretty fast. It all looked the same to me, so I decided to look on the far side of the moon which had never been seen by anybody from earth.

I scooted my POV around to the moon's back side and was immediately annoyed because there was not enough light here to make out the ground, much less, any detail. For my first experiment, I would try to create some light. I reached out with my TK and picked up a rock. So far so good! I quickly looked around to make sure that I couldn't be seen from the earth. I remembered from my science classes that something was hot because the internal molecules were moving faster than they did when they were cold. I also knew that a solid object would give off light when it was hot enough. Therefore, all I had to do to make light was to make the molecules in the rock move fast enough.