Mr. Quimby stood at the station
entrance to the pneumatic tube that would take him to the teleport. He was
waiting for his son Benjamin Quimby. With his hands resting in the pockets of
his trench coat, Mr. Quimby projected a quiet confidence as he awaited his
son’s arrival. But as the time drew closer for their departure, Mr. Quimby’s
body began to tense and a darkness fell over his face.
Benjamin Quimby arrived on a city
bicycle. He deposited the bike at its station before approaching his father.
There was no awkwardness between the two. The elder man and the adolescent
teenager were comfortable in each other’s presence. Mr. Quimby slid his hands
out of his pockets. He pulled his beloved son into a warm embrace.
“Hey, Dad,” Benjamin said with a
smile.
“Hey, Ben,” said Mr. Quimby. “You
ready?”
“Yeah,” answered Ben.
Mr. Quimby turned and led the way
to the pneumatic tube. Once seated, the train took off at 9AM. 200 miles later,
they arrived at their destination at 10AM. Father and son departed the station
and entered the main foyer for the teleport. The traffic here was more
congested. People were nearly shoulder-to-shoulder. Mr. Quimby instinctively
reached for his son’s hand. He guided the young man toward the far end of the
building. Gradually, the crowds dispersed.
“I thought we were going to the
museum?” Benjamin asked while walking beside his father.
“I’m afraid not,” replied Mr.
Quimby.
“Then where are we going?” asked
Benjamin.
“When we get home, tell your mother
you went to the museum,” Mr. Quimby commanded. “Okay? That’s what you tell her
when we get home; but today was never about going to the museum.”
Benjamin’s brow furrowed with
confusion. But he didn’t say anything. Instead, the two came to a stop near a
large glowing orb in the floor. The clear, shimmering sphere gave off a soft
hum. Both father and son stared at its reflective surface.
“Today’s going to be a hard day for
us,” said Mr. Quimby. “You’re getting old enough now that you’re becoming aware
of the larger processes going on around you. Your mom and I have done a good
job at giving you a happy childhood. We’ve kept you innocent. Innocence is
good. It’s like the years of your life. We only get so many years to live. When
those years are gone, we die. They’re finite. Innocence is the same. We only
get so much innocence. When we expose ourselves to dark things—like lust,
anger, rage, envy—we lose a little bit of our innocence. That’s what it means
to be an adult. Grown-ups have lost their innocence. Now, that’s not to say
being an adult is a bad thing. It just means we’ve achieved a level of
awareness that is greater than ourselves. And if the world was full of
goodness, that would be a good thing. But, it’s not. The world is filled with
good things, and bad things. So, today, I’m going to introduce you to the
larger world around you by showing you a dark thing.”
Benjamin began to chew at his lower
lip while listening to his father. It was a nervous tick. Mr. Quimby noticed
it. So he offered his son a warm smile.
“I love you, Ben,” he said. “I’m
only doing this because I want you to not be taken by surprise. Something bad
will happen to you one day, and I want you to know it’s not the end of the
world. Bad things have happened before. And they will happen again, because our
people haven’t figured out a way to make them stop happening, yet.”
“What bad things?” asked Benjamin.
“You know the shuttles we use to travel
between the planets of our solar system?” Mr. Quimby queried.
Benjamin nodded his head.
“Would you believe me if I told you
11 men forcibly took control of 4 shuttles and flew them into 3 buildings, and
in doing so, killed thousands of our innocent people?”
Benjamin narrowed his eyes. His jaw
tensed.
“What?” he gasped. “No. Why would they
do that?”
“Take my hand, Benjamin,” Mr.
Quimby instructed.
Benjamin slid his hand into his
father’s palm. Mr. Quimby squeezed it gently before tugging his son toward the
orb in the floor. “Come on,” said Mr. Quimby, and together the two jumped into
the teleport.
Time and space whirred and blurred,
and for one infinite moment Mr. Quimby and his son became a part of the eternal
fabric of reality. But then they fell through the orb, and on the other side
they landed in the middle of a large cushion. Father and son crawled across the
mat and out from under the large orb while people at the top of the teleport
jumped inside and disappeared.
“I always love doing that,”
Benjamin said with a grin.
Mr. Quimby looked at his son and he
smiled. But then the seriousness of the situation returned to his mind and the
smile retreated quickly from his face.
“What’s going on, Dad?” Benjamin
asked. “Why are we here today?”
“Because we’re going to see a
memorial, not a museum,” he answered. “Come on, let’s go grab some bikes.”
The two found a bike station. They
retrieved a pair of bikes and mounted their rides. Mr. Quimby pedaled toward
the center of the city they now found themselves in. Compared to the city
Benjamin called home, this city was quite small. The traffic was lighter here,
too. So Benjamin pedaled his bike alongside his father because the roads were
vacant and open.
As they moved further into the
city, Benjamin started to notice signs of decay and wreckage. Eventually,
everything around him appeared broken and smashed save for the street they road
on, which was flawlessly smooth and pristine. Benjamin felt little if any
bumps. But then, Mr. Quimby came to a stop, and so did Benjamin.
Next to Mr. Quimby was a box in the
center of the road. Mr. Quimby reached inside. He withdrew a pair of glasses.
He handed one to Benjamin. “Put it on,” he said. Benjamin did as he was told.
When he did, the ruined wreckage of the city’s epicenter changed. Now, it was
lush and vibrant with people walking and shuttles flying. Up ahead, two large majestic
towers reached high into the sky. Benjamin’s lips parted in awe.
Mr. Quimby, however, did not put on
the glasses. He did not wish to view what his son was about to see. When the
time came, Mr. Quimby watched his son jostle with surprise. He heard his son gasp
audibly. Benjamin’s hand raised to shield his eyes from something. After a few
seconds, the hand lowered and Benjamin stared straight ahead with a pair of wide
disbelieving eyes.
“They really did fly shuttles into
buildings,” Benjamin groaned.
Mr. Quimby reached out with his
hand. He pulled the glasses from Benjamin’s head and he returned the glasses to
the box in the road.
“Who did this?” Benjamin asked
while surveying his surroundings with a mixture of horror and curiosity.
“They’re called terrorists,”
answered Mr. Quimby. “And for whatever reason, they hate us. They want us all
to die. They hate our technology, our tolerance, and our government. They want
it all to go away, and they’ll do whatever it takes to make that happen. This
is the first place they struck. This is where it all started 20 years ago.
There were men, women and babies on board those shuttles and inside this city.
But they don’t care. They love death more than they love life. They can look at
someone as beautiful and as wonderful as you right in the face and kill you
with a smile on their mouth… and that is something I will never understand
about them.”
Benjamin’s eyes moistened with
tears.
“Who are they?” he questioned.
Mr. Quimby shifted uneasily into a
new stance on his bike before allowing a sigh to escape his lips. “They come
from all over,” he replied. “Men and women. Rich and poor. Smart and stupid.
For whatever reason, people are attracted to this cause. We call it ‘being
radicalized.’ This is another thing I’ll never understand about them: how can someone
with a family leave their family and go and kill someone else’s family? Used
to, in the past, the world got together to fight a singular villain. Somewhere
some inevitable dictator would rise up and start abusing people, and the world would
band together to destroy them. But with this, we can’t.”
“Why? Why can’t we fight it?”
Mr. Quimby shrugged his shoulders.
“Because, it’s an idea,” he said.
“You can’t kill an idea. Ideas have come and gone throughout the ages. But, for
whatever reason, this one sticks around. It’s been around for thousands of
years. And it doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon, which is why I wanted
to show you this place. This is ground zero. This is where it all started for
our people. Someday something like this is going to happen to you in your
lifetime. Maybe it won’t be as big as this. Lately, they’ve just been getting
20 people here… 20 people there… but this was thousands. I don’t think you’ll
ever see something like this again, but if you do… just know it’s not the end
of the world. Life will go on.”
Benjamin shook his head. His gaze
lowered to the ground.
“So, did the people that did this
just get away with it?” he asked.
“No,” responded Mr. Quimby. “We got
them back. Took over a country of theirs. Wasted a lot of time and resources
trying to bring them out of the darkness. But, it’s like quicksand over there.
The longer one stays the more it costs. Eventually, we left and a new kind of
terrorism took over. Now, from time-to-time, this new band strikes out into our
lands. Still, even though this was horrific. The saddest part is yet to come.”
Benjamin’s brown furrowed with
concern.
“What could be worse than this?”
Mr. Quimby frowned deeply.
“I’ll show you,” he said.
The two rode back on their bikes to
the local teleport. Once there, they returned to the main teleportation
station. Like earlier, they walked through a thick crowd of people before
venturing to a secluded and less traveled teleport. They jumped in together and
proceeded to another pneumatic tube. The setting here was more rural. Buildings
were intact but outdated. Graffiti covered patches of wall here-and-there, and
vines grew unchecked.
“This place used to be called Utin,”
Mr. Quimby spoke to his son. Both men stared out the tube’s window—each one
taking the view in with noticeable concern. “The place we are going is called
Beslan. From there, we’ll head to a building called School One.”
“We’re going to a school?” Benjamin
asked.
Mr. Quimby gravely nodded his head.
“Did something happen there?”
Benjamin further inquired.
“I’ll tell you when we get there,”
replied Mr. Quimby. “Let’s just say, for now, I wish more than anything to give
someone from Beslan a hug. I know that sounds stupid. But, I don’t know what
else to do. Words can’t express what happened there. But, maybe a hug can.”
The two proceeded toward their
destination without further conversation. The mood in the air was too heavy for
idle chatter anyway. When at last they arrived at their stop, father and son
departed from the tube and proceeded on foot into the little rural city that
awaited them.
Shops were open. People and cars
were going this way and that. The voice of children could be heard playing
somewhere in the distance. Life seemed
normal here. But when they turned a corner and their eyes fell upon School One,
Mr. Quimby and his son stopped in their tracks, and their breath caught in
their throat.
School One was a mixture of several
buildings whose overall design was like that of any other school. But instead
of large halls and chalkboards, the dead carcass of a learning center remained.
Windows were broken. Black streaks of carbon covered large swaths of the
complex. Flowers lay on the ground next to pictures of little children.
Graffiti streaked throughout and around in large angry letters. The mixture of
innocence and savagery turned Mr. Quimby’s stomach, and it brought tears to his
eyes. This wasn’t terrorism. This was a slaughter.
Suddenly unsteady, Mr. Quimby
reached over to touch his hand to his son’s shoulder. He grabbed a hold of his
son, then. “Let’s go,” he said.
Mr. Quimby led the way into the
remains of School One. As he walked through the rubble, he told Benjamin how on
the first day of school 15-to-30 terrorists stormed the area and forced
everyone into the gymnasium. Over the course of three days, the children, their
parents, and their teachers were deprived of water and sanitation. When all
hope seemed lost, something happened and several explosions went off inside the
gymnasium. Locals rushed forward, along with the police, to fight the
terrorists, who continued to slaughter the remaining children. In the end,
hundreds were lost, only one terrorist was captured, and a town was forever
changed.
As father and son neared a
particularly dense collection of flowers and children’s pictures, both men’s
eyes and cheeks were wet with tears.
“This could have been you,” Mr.
Quimby said through a sigh.
Just then, a feminine voice called
out to the pair.
“Excuse me,” she said, “are you
from around here?”
The two turned to see a woman with
a baby in her arms and two small children at her sides. My. Qumby cleared his
throat before responding.
“Um, no,” he said. “We’re from the
Capital. I wanted to show my son what happened here.”
A vexed expression fell across the
woman’s face.
“Did you lose someone here?” she
queried.
“No, ma’am,” replied Mr. Quimby.
“Then why does a man and his son
from the Capital cry for us?”
“Because I feel,” replied Mr.
Quimby. “I have empathy. Did you lose someone here?”
The woman stepped forward with her
children in tow. She approached a set of bright yellow flowers that were
nestled against the picture of a small girl. She knelt next to the memorial and
she smiled softly.
“This was my Amelia,” she said.
“She loved these flowers. I picked them for her from the field near our home.
She was taken from us by the terrorists.”
“I’m so sorry for your loss,” said
Mr. Quimby. “With your permission, I’d like to do something I’ve wanted to do
for years, now.”
The woman stood and met Mr.
Quimby’s gaze. “What?” she asked.
Mr. Quimby opened his arms toward
the woman. At first, the woman was surprised by the gesture. But after a
moment, she nodded approvingly at him. Mr. Quimby stepped forward. He wrapped
his arms around her and her baby. And with a heavy sigh, he said, “again, I’m
so sorry for your loss.”
For several long moments, Mr.
Quimby embraced the woman. He smelled the scent of the field that resided in
her hair. He felt the warmth of her body and the stirring of her newborn. And
then, he withdrew from her with fresh tears in his eyes. “Thank you,” he said.
The woman was not tearful herself.
There was a hardness to her that prevented the release of such emotions. But
Mr. Quimby could tell she was pleased.
“What can I tell my son about what
happened here?” Mr. Quimby eventually asked. “What is the lesson to learn?”
The woman adjusted the newborn in
her arms. Her eyes lowered to the picture of the little girl enshrined by
yellow flowers. After a long pause, words started to form in her mouth, and they
spilled darkly into the air.
“The more you have,” she said, “the
more you have to lose. If I had never had Amelia, I would have never known this
pain. Or, if I had never been born, I would have never known this loss. If I
had had a choice, I wouldn’t have chosen this life. It drove me mad the 3 days
she was here… unable to reach her… to comfort her… to save her. But, life goes
on. You learn to breathe again. You learn to walk again. You learn to have a
family again. I don’t think I’m alive anymore. But I am existing.”
Mr. Quimby somberly nodded his
head.
“Thank you,” he said.
It wasn’t the answer he had
expected. But, it was an answer all the same. “Come on,” said Mr. Quimby to his
son. And with that, he lead Benjamin back to the tube. Then, they returned to
the teleportation station. And finally, back to their home. When both father
and son found themselves sharing their dinner with the rest of their family
later that evening, the inevitable question was asked, “how was the museum?”
Benjamin cast a knowing look to his
father before he answered his mother’s question.
“It was good,” he initially said.
“Did you learn anything?”
“Yes, I learned a lot.”
Mr. Quimby felt his body tense. He
forced his gaze to the vegetables harpooned by his fork.
“I learned that… life is cheap… if
you want it to be. But I value life. I choose life. And, that makes me good. It’s
easier to destroy, than to create. It’s easier to hate, than to love. I don’t
want to do what’s easy. I want to do what’s right. Bad things will happen when
the weak among us lash out. And when they do, people like me will need to be
there to help out; to rebuild; to smile… to love.”
Benjamin’s mother raised her eyebrows
high into the air. “Wow,” she said.
Mr. Quimby smiled.
