InterRealm - Chapter 3
#3 of InterRealm
A small bell tingled as Oren and Edgar stepped into a meager truck stop diner along the road they had been taking. The sounds and smells of fried and grilled foods permeated the air, the insulated warmth of the diner almost belying the dreadful chill outside.
"Getting rough out there, Sugar," a slender, plain-looking squirrel in an apron addressed to the entering wolf and horse. "Best getcha somethin' warm in ya," she added in her country accent as she topped off a patron's coffee mug. Night had fallen, along with it a heavy snowfall that was already piling up outside, a small drift lining the outside of the diner's front.
"Not much time for that, really," Oren said loudly, getting the whole diner's attention with his alluring voice. Heads turned in his direction, some showing faces of mild curiosity, others obviously a bit disgruntled at the loud interruption to whatever conversation they had been having amongst themselves.
"Not even for a quick cup of coffee, Oren?" Edgar pleaded. "It's freezing outside."
"Well, perhaps, perhaps," Oren said, staring at his feet a moment. "Actually, if I could have everyone's attention--" All heads turned towards him again, their expressions intensified this time. "My friend and I here are looking for a white dragoness, possibly nude. We were wondering if any of you had seen her."
"Dude!" a young male voice called from the booth in the far corner from the entrance. "Naked dragoness! All right! Can I come with?" Oren narrowed his eyes to slits at the impertinence of the teenage fox that had just called out, getting a few chuckles from his buddies at the same booth.
"Naked?" the squirrel at the counter asked in shock. "Some poor youngin's out in naught but her scales and her skinnies in this weather?"
"We certainly hope she's found some sort of clothing and/or shelter by now," Oren pressed on, turning his focus back to the waitress.
"I should say so!" the waitress replied. "Ain't no one oughtta be freezin' out there in the wild, bless her heart!"
"So no one here has seen her, then?" Oren asked, his mind unwaveringly on his task. A few heads shook, but most kept silent to signify their response in the negative.
"I could help you guys look," the young fox in the back piped up again. Oren approached the teen, snarling slightly.
"You have no idea what this is about, you young fool," he growled as he strode closer to the booth where four young male teens sat. Halfway there, however, Edgar grabbed the back of his collar, trying to prevent any danger.
"Perhaps we could convert him," he said in a low, singsong voice out of the corner of his muzzle. At this, Oren's expression and posture changed abruptly, smiling a bit wryly as he stared at the young fox with new eyes. He pulled up a chair from a nearby table and sat down, the chair facing backwards as he bored his eyes into the eyes of the fox.
"Tell me," Oren began, "have you ever felt that the world in which we live is far too complicated to be explained by current science and philosophy?"
The fox looked taken aback by the sudden questioning tone of the much older wolf. "I-I-I dunno," he stuttered with a shrug. "I've never really thought about it, I guess."
"Ah, yes," Oren smirked sarcastically, "the ever pensive nature of youth."
"Now don't go causin' trouble," came that familiar country voice from right behind Oren. The waitress was looming just behind Edgar--well, as best as a short squirrel could loom over a tall horse--a look of caution drawn across her face. "If you're gonna stay in here, you gotta order something. No vagrants allowed here, lest they be hurtin' somethin' bad, and you're fit as a fiddle, as far as I can see."
"Two coffees, if you please, Miss..." Edgar began.
"Vanessa," the waitress replied, pointing to her nametag.
"Miss Vanessa," Edgar finished, and the waitress went off to fetch the order.
"So no thoughts on our existence at all, then?" Oren continued as if there had been no interruption.
"Well, between you and me, I never really bought into the whole Jesus thing," the fox said in a hushed voice. "Just don't go telling my parents about that. They'd flip."
A knowing smile slowly curled the wolf's lips upward. "Neither did I," he said. "I never really believed much of any of the drivel I was told in this world, until I came across a very intriguing look at life." He placed a deliberate emphasis on the last five words of his sentence, which caused all four teens at the booth to perk up, a hound dog missing the straw for his drink as he fixed his eyes on Oren and tried to take a sip at the same time.
"You boys are familiar with Evolution, I take it?" he asked, and they all nodded.
"Learnt about that in school just last year," a raven sitting next to the fox stated.
"But do you guys really think that, with as complicated as we creatures are, with our souls, our minds, our potential power, that all of this could have simply come from the evolution of one stretch of time?"
"Well, yes," the fox replied, sounding almost sure. "Maybe," he corrected himself, sounding less sure. "Well...I guess...possibly...no?" His response was now full of uncertainty, as if school had taught him nothing.
'Oh, come on, Zach," a young lion sitting across from the fox said, addressing the vulpine. "Of course it could!"
"And what makes you so sure, Ernie?" Zach replied.
"Now, now, boys," Edgar stepped in. "No need to get into any heated debates. Not here, not tonight, at least."
"What makes any of us so sure, indeed?" Oren said lightly.
"So what's your answer, then?" Ernie the lion demanded.
"Long ago," Oren started, "long before any of us were born, a very wise furson named James Albright studied ancient cultures. He delved into their writings, analyzed their belief structures, and stumbled upon a long-forgotten wisdom regarding our entire existence." His speech sounded long-prepared, full of dramatic pauses and weight on specific words and fragments.
"He found that our souls did indeed come from another plane into this world when we are born. And that they entered that previous plane from yet another plane, and so on and so forth, for as many as twenty different cycles, twenty different planes. Twenty different worlds. Twenty different universes."
"What was the point of all this?" a thoroughly-captivated Zach asked, drowning out Ernie's huff of obvious disbelief as Vanessa awkwardly reached around Oren to place his mug of hot coffee on the booth's table, the other mug she simply handed to the standing Edgar.
"I'm glad you asked," Oren smiled. "What Dr. Albright determined was that each world, each universe, was a world upon which all of us have lived and died before. And that in each universe, we are supposed to learn and grow, to evolve ourselves so that we can become higher, more complicated, more powerful, more revered beings. It started, we believe, with the first universe being almost a void where our souls are initially formed. From there, we are subject, in turn, to all the various experiences that we currently know. Hunger. Pain. Love. Joy. Anything and everything, too numerous for me to count and explain here. But you know of what I speak--we all innately know.
"And so in this world, as in all the others, we seek our mission in this life, in this world. We seek what it is that we are supposed to glean from this universe so that we can evolve and pass on to the next plane of existence, the next world in our multiverse." Oren leaned back and sat up, unfolding the arms that had been resting on the back of the chair. He gazed silently into the almost dumbstruck expressions of the four teen boys, vaguely aware of others close by who were also staring, having been listening in.
"So," Zach slowly broke the silence. "Where does this naked chick come into play?"
Oren chuckled gently, sipping his coffee. "She's a member of our congregation. The Church of Multiverse Evolutionism. There was some incident that I will not speak of here, but she is a highly respected member of our group, and we care deeply for her safety."
"Well, good to know you're so caring," Ernie scoffed. "I've heard of your 'church.' More like a cult, from stories I've heard."
"You shouldn't believe everything you hear," Oren said quickly, trying to hold back a snarl that stirred at the word "cult." "Our views are certainly not mainstream--there's no escaping that. But keep in mind that Copernicus was not mainstream with his ideas of a heliocentric solar system. Susan B. Anthony wasn't mainstream with her desire that females be treated as equally as males. Not everything that is mainstream is correct, and not everything that is correct is mainstream."
"The unfortunate truth," Edgar butted in, hearing Oren's temper quickly rising in his speech, "is that many people who do not like these new ideas will do very malicious and underhanded things, such as spreading rumors, to discredit anything contradictory to their own worldview. Especially when a change of worldview would threaten to remove said people from any sort of position of power."
"That may be," Ernie replied, "but I don't think this particular dogma is for me."
"Suit yourself," Oren stated after sipping his coffee again, his jets cooled down a bit. "What about the rest of you guys? What do you think?"