Chapter Thirty One. Nice and Cozy in the White Marble

Nice and Cozy in the White Marble

Funny the things that will cross a person's mind when they find themselves in a state of limbo. Not having a body isn't totally without benefits. For one, you don't get hungry. Actually, you have a certain "body memory" so you have this imitation hunger, which is actually a form of addiction and addicitions are much more lingering than true energy (but that is another story--and you poor reader have quite a lot on your plate with keeping track of white marbles and black marbles and mice and spinning wheels and whatnot, so we'll cut you a little slack...this time). Derby found himself with the thought that he hasn't been able to check email or Facebook for about a week.

A week? Is that all it has been? Wow, actually less than a week. All this can happen in less than a week? Well I guess if the Milky Way is 100,000 light years across

just to be clear...100,000 light years across means that if you could travel at the speed of light (which we're gaining traction on discovery but not nearly close to having any technology like that yet), it would take you 100,000 years to get from this little piggy to that little piggy.

But wait, there's more! (If you order now)...That is just one dinky little galaxy. Now there are expected to be about 100,000 million (that's right 100,000,000,000) galaxies. So to hop in your spiffy Jettson's speedster and zip across it all it would take...100,000,000,000,000,000 light years to meet your buddy at Paul's.

So, if all that can fit in a white marble (which it can and does, but again, don't want to overload you cherished lover), I guess lots can happen in a week. You see, as much can happen in the 100,000th of a second as could happen in the 14.7 billion years since the big bang. Hint, hint. There is a correlation between what we think of as time and what we think of as distance (space). In case you hadn't noticed, you just pretty much covered all the ground work of E=MC2 in those last few paragraphs. See, quantum physics can be sexy! Bet you didn't know that...

Thanks for tagging along on that sideline expedition of Derby does Einstein, but the point is that Derby found himself thinking about stuff which he hadn't been able to while villains are blasting his family jewels and a new girlfriend is being swallowed by his gargantuen red peni...scratch that...red dragon. So email and Facebook...yeah, he wondered what has been going on there.

Well, we shouldn't tell him because he would just worry about it, but there was email from Mark Sethlang that he was being called out of town unexpectedly to perform in Hong Kong, and if Derby had a chance, would he mind giving him a ride, once he got back home.

There was other stuff too, but we won't go into it. His buddy Donny Sideburns had a record number of comments on a thread about his confectionary business. There were also the usual thousands of fan mail love letters to him about Children of Zol. But we certainly don't want him to know that because we figure one body part being extraordinarily too large is quite enough for one day without also contributing to the size of his head....

Besides thinking of home, Pam and Barbie, emails, FB, new friends, new fantasies, there was one huge new blast in his mind about the most recent dream he had while in this extraordinary bodiless state of perdition (well, that is too harsh because the truth is we all deal in this state but don't notice it because our bodies are such "high maintenance" and seem to always be getting the extra grease). So the dream...

do you mind? because if you would prefer we get back to the action adventure, we can do that too?

You don't mind? How sweet of you! Kiss.

OK, so in this dream, he had been frustrated because he had been constantly trying to reach his mother on his cell phone but wasn't able to. It was as if there was no signal or it would never ring, or whatever. But he never got close to a connection with her. That was just going on as sort of the pulling thread of the story but he was in a car doing that, looking for something.

He found himself on a one way street going the wrong way and people were signaling to him, "Wrong way, turn around!," but he persevered and finally found a parking place.

Derby left his car there and got out to a beautiful park like place where people had started to gather. There was a band warming up that was going to play to the audience in the park but Derby was preoccupied. One he was still trying to call his Mother every few minutes and two he was facing the wrong direction to watch the band.

Then it happened. The really freaky thing that was so real and so familiar. This guy, like an Indian guy who seemed like an old old friend had come right next to Derby outside and said the strangest thing. It seemed he meant, "Listen" but he said "Don't listen." It was as if he directly was explaining, without using words, that Derby was faced the wrong way to hear the music, so he should pay attention to hear it. But the words he used were DON'T LISTEN!

And the dude himself. He was like a strong Indian man, very wise, and in a way like had known Derby all his life, but for the life of him, as Derby thought about the guide now, he couldn't place him. But it was obvious that the man was a spiritual guide and may have been the main angel in Derby's life.

What brought Derby's attention that the Indian man (let's call him Waahumm--if you're lucky we'll get around to that name later, believe me it has significance!)...Waahumm was there in the first place, Derby felt a little pressure on the back of his head where he felt the back of the cap. He was wearing one of those Irish style touring caps

And the pressure was like some big animal was biting the back of the cap right at the intersection of his head so he could feel the small sensation of the bite. But it was very controlled, like by an animal which was being playful and loving.

So Derby's response to Yaahumm was, "What is biting me back there?"

Without needing an anser he learned it was the big black German Sheppard which was just as familiar and unfamilar as Yaahumm himself. Like the pair came in a package. And the German Sheppard seemed in many ways to be the much better friend to Derby than Yaahumm was. The dog was a mature female and huge. Very strong with a fierce jaw but very gentle, and this part is weird...smiling!

The dog came up along side of Derby, on the other side from Yaahumm and Derby was so happy to see it. He started scratching her chest and talking to her with baby talk. He was practically face to face with her and he realized that this better be the dog he thought she was because this frigging animal could rip his face off effortlessly.

But the dog was obviously so devoted and Derby was obviously its true master and oldest friend. The love ran so deep that it would be nearly an excruciating pain to once again be parted.

Yaahumm and Derby exchanged some small talk and then Derby screamed out, "Look." And on his arms, both arms, tatoo writing had manifested. Like heiroglyphs or Egyptian letters and symbols, like bands around his wrists and arms. Derby couldn't understand them but he knew they were instructions or meant a lot. Yaahumm was amazed but kept his cool. It was as if he wished they had appeard on his arms. He mentioned something about what it meant, but not the actual meaning of the words. He wasn't "evolved" enough to know that, but he seemed to indicate that Derby was.

The amazing thing about the dream is that it was overwhelmingly positive and left such a wonderful feeling. No sadness. Not the hint of anything bad about it. One of those "Today is the first day of the rest of your life" feelings.

The writing was also very colorful and wonderous. It faded back off his skin and Yaahumm said something about that too.

Let's see. Is this chapter already so long that to give you some more story about the development of the marble and getting back to Umpa would be over taxing you kind reader?

The narrator scrolls up, takes a sip of coffee, reflects about particular friends and smiles to himself...

"Oh shit," he thinks to himself. "They can handle it." But we'll keep 'er concise and avoid any more physics or math problems ok?

So it seems Umpa had bumped into Mark in the Ganzhou airport before the Blues man boarded his train to Hong Kong and long before Mark would make his way to the Drummond Hotel, blocks away from the Dungeon of tell-tale-heart.

There were the customary apologies and excusing of each other when the large open shirted Umpa and the hair-in-his-eyes slightly-rushed-anxious traveler bumped into one another. Without the flautist's inkling of "transfer-said-mouse here," a friendly black mouse jumped out of Umpa's pocket and onto Mark's twelve string guitar case (the dobro case was in his other hand). You see, "slipping someone a Mickey" has a whole new meaning in this context doesn't it cherished reader?

So this is surely enough for one day. Geah-ahead, get back to your other distractions. But first a little peck on my cheek. Right cheer.

Mmmmmwaaaa! Thanks!