The Universe Builders: Bernie and the Putty (28 page)

By lunchtime, Candi was nervous. There wasn’t much she could do except listen to whatever Billy had to say and try to respond as best she could. She had long ago given up trying to find a charm that worked on him. He remained closed and controlled. People like him were always hard to influence.

Candi saw Lenny enter the cafeteria and waved him off. She sat down with Billy, who had chosen an empty table and was waiting for her. She waited for him to speak. Billy looked at her and shook his head as one would with a misbehaving child who needed to be gently scolded.

“Candi, I’m disappointed with you.”

“Why?”

“I’ve told you Bernie is a short-timer here. People like him are social misfits. They have a kind of disease, Candi, and if you aren’t careful, you can catch it from them.”

Candi stiffened. She had talked to Bernie only once. Had someone told Billy? She had to be careful.

Billy continued. “You must know Lenny and Bernie are friends. It doesn’t reflect well on you, to be seen with one of Bernie’s known associates. After all, since Bernie is a misfit, it follows that Lenny and Suzie are also misfits. Hanging out with either of them raises doubts about you. Doesn’t that make sense?” he asked in a mock-fatherly way.

“I don’t know about Bernie and Suzie, but I like Lenny. He’s interesting, and we’ve become friends.”

“Ah, Candi, Candi, Candi… Maybe I need to explain this differently,” Billy continued. “Think of this as a battle between our side and their side. Bernie doesn’t have a lot of people on his side. At most, just Suzie and Lenny. Our side has an army, including you and me and Uncle Shemal. Very soon, our side will deal a deathblow to their side, and Bernie will not survive. Maybe other people on their side will also get hurt. When that happens, you don’t want to be standing close to anyone over there. Does that make it easier to understand, Candi?”

“Yes,” Candi said, feeling trapped.

“Oh, and one more thing…” Billy’s eyes hardened to a piercing stare.

“What?” Candi’s heart pounded in her chest.

“You never want me to ever wonder whose side you’re really on,” Billy said, his voice dripping with menace. “I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t survive that.”

Bloody Moon

Billy saw a continent with thousands of acres of scorched earth. The fire clouds had done a great job. They started fires everywhere. Bernie must have stopped them though, or they would have destroyed everything. The whole planet looked bad.
Too bad they don’t have a Universe Award for Most Incompetent Builder, Bernie. You’d win it hands down.

As Billy looked at the other two planets, he didn’t see much he could do. They were just prefabs. Bernie didn’t seem to be doing anything with them. The pretty yellow moon, on the other hand, begged to be the next target. Bernie must have changed the color for a reason.

In Billy’s visualization, he pictured the surface of the moon, but in his picture, it was not a soft yellow, but a bloody red. And as he concentrated, it became as he wished. Billy smiled at the discolored moon.

Stay tuned, Bernie
, he thought.
You ain’t seen nuthin’ yet.

Wake Up!

“Wake up, Speaker! You must see this!”

Zardok, speaker for the Sun and high priest of the Temple, had been roused from a deep sleep. When he recognized Lord Winson, he grumbled, “Why have you awakened me?”

“Please, Lord, come to the window quickly. You must see it with your own eyes,” Winson urged the groggy Zardok.

As Zardok made his way to the window, he prayed it was not another fire. Even before he got there, he could tell something was wrong. The night looked different. It was not dark, as it had been before the night sun arrived, but also not light, the way it should have been this evening. The night sun should have been at full strength, making it easy to see. Yet the outside was barely visible.

“Oh, my Sun,” said Zardok as he saw the blood-red color of the night sun. “When did this happen?” he demanded of Winson.

“Just moments ago. The night sun was bright and yellow and almost full, just as we predicted. But then it started changing. It got darker and darker until it became this color. What should we do?”

“Call the council together. Do it now! Tell them to meet in my conference room. We must have answers before tomorrow. The Senate has been listening to other voices of late because they offer quicker answers. We must not let this happen again,” Zardok said as he rushed to his wardrobe closet to dress.

* * *

“Wake up, my Lord! Something awful is happening,” his aide said.

Leader Gondal, normally a deep sleeper, had not had a good night’s sleep in a long time. Thousands of people had died, and he slept with the guilt of his failure to prevent the onslaught.

“What is it?” Gondal asked as the knot in his stomach tightened.

“The night sun—it’s covered in blood,” Tuderon exclaimed.

Gondal rushed to the window. Just as Tuderon said, the night sun stared down from the sky, tainting everything a dark, bloody red. This was not good. What did it portend? At a minimum, it would terrify the people. There were many already who distrusted the night sun. He needed to get ahead of this before the rumors started.

“Quickly, Tuderon. Fetch Lord Alcandor to me at once. Tell him I have urgent need of his council. I will await him in my office,” Gondal said as he put his hand on Tuderon’s shoulder, urging him along all the faster.

He’s a Wimp

Suzie sat alone at their usual table in the cafeteria.

“Where’s Bernie?” Lenny asked as he took a seat.

“I don’t know. I didn’t see him yesterday either,” Suzie added with concern.

“He’s probably just working on his universe. Nothing to be worried about. When you’re in there, it’s easy to lose track of time.”

“I haven’t seen much of you lately.”

“Candi and I’ve been spending time together. At least we were. Lately, the whole world is conspiring against us.”

“What’s been happening?”

“At first it was little things, like messages not getting delivered, and then it became things that forced us to cancel our plans. Then my boss changed my schedule, which made it harder to get together after work. Then, to top it off, Billy gave Candi a hard time about hanging out with me. He says she should know better than to be seen with any of Bernie’s ‘known associates’. Candi suggested we cool it for a few days. I can’t believe these things keep happening.”

Suzie wasn’t really listening. She had something on her mind. This was as good a time as any to say it. “Lenny, I have to say something. I’m worried about Candi. I’m afraid you will tell her things that could get back to Billy. Something Billy might use against Bernie.”

“Don’t worry about that. I’m pretty sure my charms are stronger than her charms,” he said as he patted his pocket. “I’m the one in control of the relationship.”

Suzie politely stifled a laugh.
Oh, Lenny
, she thought,
you’re as girl-savvy as Bernie. Both of you spent your lives studying building science. The only thing you know about girls is what you read in a book. You’re as vulnerable as you are clueless.

“And do you agree with that, Sissy?” she asked as she stroked Sissy’s fur.

Sissy’s response was not the purring she expected. Instead, Sissy made a clucking sound. “What does that mean?” Suzie asked, somewhat concerned.

“I don’t know. She does that when she’s upset about something.”

As they ate their lunch, Lenny’s thoughts drifted to important things, like figuring out how to see Candi again. When Lenny got like that, he didn’t notice anyone else.

Sissy waved her antenna in Suzie’s direction.

“I’ll bet Lenny hasn’t been listening to you either, has he? All he wants to think about is Candi,” Suzie cooed as she stroked her little friend.

More clucking sounds came from Sissy.

“Are you worried about Candi and Lenny?” Suzie asked.

More clucking sounds.

“Maybe it would be better if Lenny and Candi didn’t see so much of each other.”

This time a purring sound came from Sissy.

“Lenny, I don’t think Sissy likes your girlfriend.”

Lenny looked up from his plate of macaroni. “She gets like that sometimes. Just ignore her, and she’ll be fine in a few days,” he said, which solicited a new round of clucking.

Suzie looked at her little friend.
Is there something you are trying to tell us, Sissy?

Before she could say anything, Lenny interrupted, “I have a question for you.”

“Are you going to ask me what I think of you today?” Suzie asked politely, although on the inside she was shaking her head.

“No. I want to ask you about Bernie. I really like the guy, but I don’t understand why he’s such a wimp.”

“A wimp?”

“You know. He’s always afraid of hurting things. When he came over to my place, he didn’t even want to see my best universe because it was too violent. How did he ever make it through school like that?”

“I know he had problems in some classes because he didn’t like to blink things out. They were going to kick him out of the program, but his mom got them to change their minds. After that, he studied extra hard so he would pass even if he flunked an occasional lab assignment for not destroying the life forms.”

“How could he get through school if he wouldn’t blink anything? It’s an essential builder skill.”

“He can blink most things. It’s the higher life forms he has trouble with.”

Suzie remembered a conversation with Bernie when they were in junior high. “Is there a rule against talking with higher life forms on your planets?”

“Yes, there’s a school rule about it. It’s a pretty strict rule, actually. They can kick you out of the building program if they catch you doing it.”

“Bernie told me about it once. He couldn’t figure out why they were so adamant about it. I said they probably didn’t want you getting attached to your life forms.”

“That’s exactly the reason,” said Lenny. “Why did he have a problem with it?”

“He said it didn’t make sense. The teachers told the kids not to think of their life forms as real. They said created life doesn’t have feelings or souls, like we do. The rule was there to encourage a certain detachment from them.”

“That’s true.”

“Bernie said a punishment as severe as being expelled from the building school didn’t make sense. He said the rule was there to scare you. He was convinced they were hiding something.”

“What did he think they were hiding?”

“He thought maybe life forms really do have feelings and maybe even souls,” said Suzie.

“No way. You have to think of the stuff we make as toys. We make them one way, and if we don’t like it, we take them apart and make them a different way. And if we don’t like that, we just blink them away and start over.”

“What about feelings and souls? Do they have them?”

“Absolutely not,” Lenny said.

“Not even feelings?”

“Nope.”

“What about Sissy here? She comes from a created world, right? Are you saying she doesn’t have feelings?”

“She doesn’t have feelings. You have to have a soul to have feelings,” Lenny declared. “Everything you see in a creation like Sissy is an instinct or a learned response that mimics emotions. They don’t feel a thing.”

Sissy responded with even louder clucking sounds.

“I don’t know, Lenny. It sounds like Sissy’s upset with what you said.”

“Nope. It’s not possible. She has intelligence, but definitely no feelings. I can show you the books to prove it.”

Suzie reached over to stroke Sissy. “What do you think, Sissy? Do you have feelings?” Sissy’s clucking changed to purring.

“I don’t think we agree with you or your books, Lenny.”

“It’s called anthropomorphism. Untrained people like you make that mistake all the time. You’re projecting your own feelings onto something that doesn’t have any. Builders are highly trained to avoid that mistake,” said Lenny with finality.

Sissy clucked. Suzie shook her head.

“I think Sissy and I agree with Bernie,” she said.

We Must Explain

The inner circle of priests and priestesses had assembled with great haste. No one dared to keep Speaker Zardok waiting. Especially not lately.

“Members of the Inner Council, these are evil times,” Zardok began as he called the meeting to order. “Evil is everywhere. It has killed our people, destroyed our cities, burned our forests, and now it corrupts our night sun. This evil must be fought. Every time it stands unchallenged, our people pay for it with their lives. We cannot allow this foul power to continue its advance against us or against the people we serve in the name of the Sun.

“This evil has spawned another evil, and we must be equally vigilant against it. It is the evil from within. Everyone suffers from confusion and doubt, but some have chosen not to cast these demons out. Instead, they have embraced them. These defectors have claimed our temples and have begun teaching their own distorted versions of the truth.

“We may be powerless to stop them, but we must not allow this to happen again. If the Temple and the people we serve are to survive, we must preserve our resources and strength. We cannot allow these things to be taken by defectors and splinter groups who think they have found answers when we cannot.

“I submit these groups formed because we were slow in giving direction and interpretations to the people, and without answers, they fell victim to false beliefs. Henceforth, we must respond more quickly, so people see us leading in this battle against evil. Can I assume this is clear to everyone?”

No one challenged his statement.

“Then let us discover answers in this matter of the night sun,” said Zardok. “Who wishes to begin?”

Lord Noseter was the first to stand. “I think we can make some suppositions. The bloody color of the night sun tells us it has been grievously hurt. This much is obvious. Also, we can see, in spite of its hurt, it still shines. From this, we have proof it yet lives. The unresolved question is whether it has been struck a mortal blow or whether the night sun can recover. If it’s possible for the night sun to recover, we must consider any actions we can take to aide its recovery.”