Chapter 14

Although everything the vision of a man said was heard, his lips never moved; they seemed merely to be thoughts in his mind.

Something was happening. My three friends were standing as though in a trance. Now in addition to the voice; images started to appear in front of me, as if on some sort of Vid screen. I never noticed it was there before, just some kind of an upright set of stones. It beckoned me closer then some sort of beam or ray began to emanate from the screen. The images began to speed up. They seemed to be moving faster and faster now, as though a fast forward button had been deployed. There was a whirring sound, and then a soothing voice instructed me to relax and close my eyes.

My eyes slowly closed. I hesitated, fascinated by the scenes unfold right before me. There they were Past, Present and what I could only assume was the future presented. No, this is only a projection of what will happen on Earth if the present actions that have been initiated should continue. This future presented before was not at all pleasant. It morphed from dark and dreary, followed by destruction then chaos; finally ending with an empty view, empty, meaning blank, Nada, nothing there.

No result is perfect. Our own condition needs improvement however, our future projections seem much more positive than yours are. We are much older than your race yet we still survive. Yours has ended and begun again many times. We came to your world in an attempt to improve what we saw. Change for the better was not something your people would accept easily, if at all.

Our gifts to humanity were misunderstood. The technology corrupted, our people enslaved and if any changes did occur, they were not for the improvement of your race but served the greed of a few. We did try and kept trying to help your world grow and prosper. We saw you as our children, learning new things, gaining knowledge and experience we hoped would lead you to a better end than destruction. For countless times Earth was 'cleansed' of evil and allowed to start anew. Nothing seemed successful. Time marches on for all life. Eventually only a few remained, our Queen and the Princess with a few of their servants. Caretaker, who you call Ralph was created to maintain order and control the area you now refer to as "The Preserve' and 'Castle', they are really one in the same. Those 10 families were much like the servants supplied to a time we might try again. They are what you call 'robots', an artificial life form with varying degrees of intelligence. We experimented with many types of creations, Cell division, attribute manipulation, Gene-spicing and matter transfers, what we have now seem to be the most stable.

Your coming here was chance. The instructions we gave the Caretaker would match several types of mates. The fact that there was an attraction to our kind, made it much easier to try once more. Your offspring will allow our efforts to continue.

Your leaving then a return has left the situation unclear for us. You seem to truly care for the trees, yet to us the procreation of a new species gives us some hope that there may be another chance should you decide again to leave. There is little concern on our part for those trees. It is merely an attempt to overcome greed and evil men. If any sum of money would rectify the direction Earth has taken, it would have been provided. We knew of course that such sums would have merely called attention to the efforts and lent credence to those who would want to use the forests for their own purpose. The funding, changes and approach you introduced was something unique and explainable. It has been decided we will continue to wait and seek renewal once more. You have helped immensely and except for your loss of some memories; the Caretaker will see you off and on your way with our thanks. At the proper time, the offspring shall gain what has been lost and the Queen and Princess replaced once again. We have waited a long time; a few more centuries will not seem very long. When you leave, you will remember none of this. Now go with our hope that it has all been worth the effort. Thank You.