Into the 121st Century (collaborative writing project)

low and behold Bob miraculously came back! The world stood beside itself in awe at this wonderous incredible impossible sight! Bob had Returned!

Bob walked out onto the platform to address the planet from afar. The first Rule i must apply he said... No More Men In Tights! and No Speedo's either shall be worn, declaring it an intergalactic No No from that moment on.

History would reveal itself as Bob in fact, they often discussed changing the name of Earth once known as Tiamat to simply 'BoB', alas... that didn't go over too well... So anyways, the planet cheered in delight, burned their spandex and their tights, along with Speedo to their delight! 'cont'd'.

a reply to: craig732

No, no, no worries!

I'll keep going.. it's totally ok!

That was a hilarious alternative ending though in a relatively short post (my response) which tied up so many thorny issues.

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Consider that as something that happened in the multiverse, as but one resolution to the fundamental Bob paradox.

Instead of Schrodinger's Cat, call it Schrodinger's Bob.

But you'll remember that his heart rate calmed and slowed while theirs, spiked, so as much as everyone might have been holding their breath and looking around at each other in funny ways, some wishing just that, a resolution that they could all be happy with, even where it might have made them sad, not for Bob who sailed on (in that timeline), but at their own failure in love, as a simplicity on the far side of complexity that they would never have considered for the life of them.

That was the prevailing fantasy of the "three amigos", who's quantum computer suggested that as one of many possibilities (Bob dying of sudden fright, confusion or excitement), so they were always ready at a moment's notice to whisk Bob away in any form, whether in body, mind or spirit provided that it did not technically violate the Prime Directive.

But alas, that did not happen in the real world. Things are never so easily resolved not when facing such a quandary as this.

No God himself as he looked on from above would not spare them so easily. They had too much to learn and Bob too much to teach.

Bob still bobbed on the ocean of possibility, the ripples in cosmic society not even having yet returned to Bob because the implications of his arrival in the 121st century, have not even been grasped let alone fully processed and integrated.

So they all leaned forward, to see what Bob's next move might be. History itself was being made in real time..

At the tech's console, Bob's heartrate slowed, as did that of the doctor, while everyone else's went up, to the dismay of technicians across the Omegasphere, which only made the problem worse.

For those who were honest with themselves, they would admit that they were afraid. Worse than afraid, they felt lost in their own time beyond the end of history, and they all greedily either wanted to possess, or to kill that nature in Bob that made them so very uncomfortable, particularly in regards to their fellow man who now bore the countenance of a goat, so to speak.

For the rest, what was once the static mask of their face, took on a radiance and a glory that struck further terror into the most terrified, themselves included.

It was the kind of thing that left unchecked, could easily lead to a type of cosmic civil war of the most peculiar variety.

It all hung in the balance.

Thing were getting rather dicey indeed.

Bob gets comfortable.

Bob figured it was time to chill out a bit, so he just climbed back onto his inclined bed, which cooperated with his movements with a shifting contour. Satisfied with this, and with the utmost grace and charm, Bob reclined, placed his hands behind his head, as the good doctor had done, and then just smiled at his two guests, without the need to say anything at all.

But because the room had eyes, it was like Bob was smiling at everyone, the good AND the bad, much to the horror and the chagrin of one or the other, or both.

They were dismayed. Here was a creature from another time that the TOE both predicted, but for whom it did not apply. He was a paradox in his own right. Someone, some geek teen tech, had even playfully spelled his name upside down and backwards and noted that, if held to a mirror it still spelled Bob. When he posted it on Facebook, it went viral.

"Oh what do we do now"? was the unspoken question on everyone's mind, as they looked upon Bob's smiling face, and allowed a blush to set their own alight.

It was like nothing that had ever happened before or would ever happen again.

And for the time being, Bob was more than willing to just take it all in and let the chips fall where they may, while everyone else looked on both in horror and a certain admiration.

"So hey little lady, I don't b'lieve that we've been formally introduced", he said, throwing a mock angry look at the doctor with a wry grin that made the doctor giggle as if like a madman, "what is your name precious little darl'n?"

a reply to: awareness10

We'll integrate that moving forward with Bob setting a fashion trend for absurd reasons, including the desire to be somewhat flawed where because of genetic engineering everyone was perfect, but because of Bob who's like a cause unto himself, they didn't want to be that way any more, so the uniformity had to go.

They didn't have much to go on because Bob came into their world naked to the smiles of the three amigo's who boarded his ship, as we shall see in the ongoing exchange.

Trend setting would have to include fashion and accessories, that's a great addition!

All that spandex just has to go. It'll be like the downfall of Lulu Lemon on a much grander scale.

New Friends cont'd

"And what's with all the spandex?" asked Bob, turning his hand-cupped head on his "pillow" which was more like some sort of gel that had moulded to his head, even as he moved it, so it was light as air, and almost invisible to his senses, to take in the horrified girl who was still reeling from what was taking place and what had happened to her when she looked into his eyes and saw something of herself reflected there, something deep inside that was more beautiful than anything external or available to the five senses. For the moment she didn't even remember her own name.

"Did you help dress me?" asked Bob, with a near wink in the creases of his smiling eyes, then looking down at his own spandex jumpsuit and pulling and plucking at it rather distastefully. "And where are my clothes what I was wearing when I got here?!"

To this inquiry doctor Ibid, Alex, interjected, and said "you weren't wearing any when they brought you in".

"You were very violent at the time, Mr. Smith ("call me Bob"), Bob. You said something about "the drop of a hat", and you were shouting incoherently about someone named 'Musk' and were seen fighting with no one who you called the three amigos, which means friends.

We found you in a back ally area in the untouchable zone, so they beamed you directly to this facility, which is why I asked you about any amnesia or missing time." (did he just say "beamed" as in "beam me up Scotty"? thought Bob).

"In fact, you were so violent at the time, that we had to restrain you and immobilize you and put you to sleep for the good of your health, both your physical and your mental health."

"I'm surprised you don't remember." said the doctor, matter of factly, and still with that slightly bemused Buddha-smile in a flushed and glowing face. Whatever had happened to the doctor via his initial exchange with Bob was irrevocable and permanent.

"But in answer to your question" continued the doctor in his deep, melodious voice, "although I don't presume to speak for our nurse here (still not properly introducing her, noticed Bob), yes, she dressed you, the moment you fell asleep."

Why do you ask, are the clothes not to your liking?"

The doctor had already decided that there was no use maintaining the pretense that Bob's story was not entirely true. He could simply no longer maintain that façade any more, lest he start crying again, his newfound joy, turned to sadness and regret. So he wasn't about to follow protocol and mislead Bob to conclude that he, Bob, was/is insane. He couldn't lie to this Bob Smith and remain.. congruent.

Hmmmm, thought the doctor to himself recalling to his mind his near infinite repertoire of knowledge and information, perhaps that Carl Jung fellow was correct that the only way one can remain helpful is to be prepared to be one's self transformed in the process of psychotherapy. I never understood that, until now and would proceed to write a paper that would transform the human health sciences which would later becomes known as the human health and happiness sciences, thanks to his pioneering efforts to effectively process and integrate the Bob phenomenon.

Throughout the Omegasphere, various officials and techs looked down at their own clothing, and some even picked at it, distastefully, while noticing that everyone was dressed exactly the same and that they were all equally perfectly good looking. Some frowned, and some frowned at those who were frowning, then in astonishment not knowing why except that it made them look ugly, in either case, whether they frowned or not.

Wherever they were gathered together, their faces in some instances started contorting as they looked at one another, while others, not unlike the doctor, just relaxed into their newfound Buddha smile and radiant glow and to heck with anyone who can't take a good joke at their own expense.

Still others looked around without any comprehension as to what was happening, as if they just weren't in on the joke whatever it was. This made them at first even more fearful, and then angry, as the goats grew horns while the sheep basked in the new light radiating upon on their subtle bodies, which they didn't even knew existed prior to that moment and which the goats would never possess.

It was a socio-political rift and quake, the implications of which would reverberate throughout Cosmic time and history like some sort of practical joke told by a great comedian at everyone's expense, Bob included, whether to their immense joy, or to their immense chagrin, but woe to those who chose to hate Bob for all the wrong reasons. Upon their bony fingers, that of the goats', Bob's love formed the unbreakable thread of Chinese handcuffs, where the more they struggle, only the tighter and tighter they'll get, causing their heart to either harden, like the Pharaoh's, or be remade into a heart of flesh, like the doctor's.

No ID

Bob ignored the girl for a moment, who went on staring in a very nervous manner at the scene before her, and turned to the doctor and exclaimed, in a slightly shrill version of his Texas drawl, "Do you mean to say Doctor Ibid, Alex, that I was found out in the boonies somewhere, with no a stitch of clothing on and shouting and punching at nothing like a crazy-person?!"

Silence, a subtle nod, a Buddha smile.

"Could you please tell me where I am, precisely?" asked Bob, with a knowing grimace. "This ain't a mental ward, is it?! Oh my God it IS, isn't it?!" The doctor's look confirmed Bob's suspicions.

"Is that any way to treat a guest of my, my stature?!" asked Bob shrilly, his anger showing, but still under control, barely.

"To tell you the truth, Bob", said the doctor, calmly, serenely, "although I have no reason to doubt your story, at the same time there is no way to corroborate it, nor even your own identity, although your DNA reveals something rather quite extraordinary about your origin. We can really only accept what you're telling us, on faith."

This time is was Bob's turn to be rendered speechless. This was most certainly not what he had in mind. Damn that Elon Musk!

One point five billion, and he ends up in a 121st century mental ward? Then again, this bed thingy is very comfortable and this nurse here kinda grows on a man, at least now that she's not look'n so fake and cold and plastic, and those legs..

As he turned back to the girl, and said,

World Note

Due to genetic engineering, human sexuality, like human love, went dormant while Bob was away, but like the spark of love can light up the human heart, and face, so too was it's rhizome still there, buried deep down under the ground of approx. 200 generations of "petri dish" genetically engineered procreation.

So until Bob came along, they didn't have the first clue as to what they were missing..

..to be cont'd, and don't worry we'll keep it relatively clean, no sci-fi porno or anything like that or very soft perhaps.. we'll see, lol Perhaps the new fashion will also be tearaway clothing!

For the seeded worlds who'd already started to face the prospect of looming genetic homogeneity, this was very good news, unless of course you were an alien halfbreed in search of interplanetary sexual interchange. Everyone thought they were as ugly as sin and didn't care to inquire any further, nor respond to their best overtures.

Unfortunately for Bob, his own DNA made him a prize worth pursuing by such a race at any and all cost, except, of course, at the cost of the TOE-ME, but, luckily for them Bob was also a perfect gentleman and never one to hurt another's feelings, unintentionally.

Poor Bob. Everyone wanted a piece of him.

Thankfully though, Bob was an untouchable.

Love isn't always fair

Via the technology of the Omegasphere, two elite halfbreeds from the (unpronounceable) Galaxy, also looked in on Bob Smith while admiring his endocrine system and his outward phylos or the unique and particular DNA expression of his untainted heritage, with their own equivalent of almond-eyed "lust".

Even his apparent flaws made of him a potential "mate" most coveted, and since Bob was genetically "single" this desire in them did not violate the TOEME's first principal, subset D, that one "shall not covet thy neighbor's genetic diversity". For them, the arrival of Bob appeared like that of a Bridegroom dressed, or undressed as the case may be, prepared for his bride like a gift from God the giver of all good things.

One of them without being even aware of what he was doing lifted up his finger, the tip of which started to glow, throbbingly (they'd long since done away with the crude probes of millennia past), while the other stayed his hand and pushed it back down to the screen, while shaking his head in the negative and telephatically transmitting a truly embarrassing image of being caught red-fingered violating the TOEME (theory of everything, moral equivalency).

Being the least aesthetically pleasing species in the Cosmos was bad enough, but if they were discovered attempting to mate with Bob absent his consent, the quarantine they'd fallen under for their past violations of the Earth's sentient seedbank would not expire, and they would become the pariah of the cosmos, left to genetically rot. The eventual outcome in that case was always suicide (it's not hard to blow up your own star), but that would not happen, and could not be allowed to happen.

Therefore, this had to be done in the most careful and tactful manner.

It could not for a moment push the boundary-line of the very law that allowed life to go on peacefully according to the TOEME, once the planet-destroying power of the TOE was discovered, which also just so happened to allow for instantaneous transit across the oceans of the Cosmos (think of it as God's version of MAD or mutually assured destruction).

As the alien/human hybrid touched the face of Bob on the screen, although he'd tried to get himself under control nevertheless the tip of his finger still glowed and pulsed, involuntarily, to the stern disapproval of his counterpart, who with a single telepathic image was able to persuade it to stop. Although they retained individuality, they were a hive mind but one where sometimes the right hand did not know what the left hand was doing.

The last thing they wanted to do was to telepathically transmit that they wanted to have sex with the rest of the universe, something that would surely lead to their speedy destruction.

So "sex" for them was the riskiest proposition in the cosmic social order now that they were under quarantine for, in violation of the TOEME, stealing human DNA and having sex with the daughters of men, even to the point of necessitating the flood to get them out of the human genome.

What they were now just wasn't part of the plan, as they were left to genetically rot over the eons.

Until, that is, Bob came along, as their very last best hope for a future cosmic social life.

Bob was both an untouchable, and their sole object of desire.

It was therefore with an aching and terrible jealousy and not a little panic that they watched, transfixed, as Bob commenced to interact with a female of his own kind.

originally posted by: craig732
a reply to: AnkhMorpork

I feel terrible now... I was only joking... I didn't really want to kill the main character! I take it back. My wife just told me I was an ass hole for doing it!

Bahahaha, so did I, but you are now forgiven

And as they (the alien halfbreeds) looked on, in their minds eye arose an image of Bob's future daughter, who would serve as their first ambassador tasked with the responsibility to break the quarantine and in the process become the mother of them all, like a new Eve.

a reply to: AnkhMorpork

hah love it! but yes the spandex definately has to go!

a reply to: AnkhMorpork

I hope you don't mind Night Star that I integrated your avatar pic into the story. Just don't worry about the how part and it will all be tasteful don't you worry, and it's not you per se, just an image that was borrowed and integrated into the story, for fun. The pretty face though, with the pointed ears, I just couldn't resist including it. Please forgive me.

On that note, wherever it might be possible, we can add images and illustrative pics here and there to help bring the story to life.

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Poor Bob. He has no idea what he's gotten himself into, eh?

But I feel even sorrier for the Cosmic citizens in what to DO about him, and how to act in relation to him and what he says and does.

It's all up in the air, and that's the way Bob likes it, and after all if everything's out of control, then who's control is it out of?

Bob of course isn't the least bit concerned, as he prepares to embark upon his journey into this strange world where the lines between the Earth and the heavens above has been largely removed, yet constrained by a legal framework that that while it constrains everyone else in one way or another, doesn't apply to Bob because of a legal loophole in the framing of the Prime Directive aka the Moral Equivalency of the TOE, so he's the only one who's truly free, free to fly in the spacious firmament of love and freedom, to the delight, and to the horror and the chagrin of many all of whom who will go to any lengths to make sure that they too have a chip in the game.

to be continued..

Storyline..

Help?

Phew - this writing business is hard. I'm stuck.

I was thinking that it would be best if the tech in the hall joined them, and that all agree to release Bob immediately, to the accompaniment of the girl (of course), maybe chaperoned by the tech too (at Bob's request, for his own good).

The doctor is left behind, doomed, his career in ruins, waiting to be admitted into his own hospital for observation and interrogation. Falls on his own sword with a smile on his face.

So the four of them need to have a real heart to heart conversation, bearing in mind that the other three have undergone in the twinkling of Bob's eye, a radical paradigm shift and transformation about the nature of reality and existence being fundamentally emotional in nature or a sort of feeling what it's like to be an authentic, self-expressed human being.

The irony here is that for Bob it's the adventure that he paid for, and for them, an unknown for which they were not prepared to handle, even though it's the very world they came from!

They can then serve to paint the picture of the world without, 10,000 years from now with little distinction, except a few important ones, between Earth and everywhere else.

It would boggle the mind, but Bob he'll take it all in stride to a degree, looking at the whole thing like a tourist you paid a mighty sum (1.5 billion) to get onboard, so he'll be "all in" (I'm all in with that!) with everything, while everyone around him maneuvers and schemes, and learns from him what it really means to be a free human being with the capacity to love and to make light of everything, so that amid breathtaking technological advance, they'll come to see and recognize the sacred again in the most mundane. Bob will help them to laugh at themselves.

Instead of being forced to conform however, Bob will stick to his guns and in the process transform the Civilized Cosmos, so Bob must also be the epitome of Civility in what will become self evident is a barbaric tyranny of apparent reason and logic that forget the most essential factor in the equation, love, and liberty.

Bob is friendly, Bob is fun. He is a liberator from the bondage of convention. He is a walking paradox, and for some of those who will be meeting him, an absolute terror who'll shake the very foundations of their world and soul with nothing but a little wit and some Texas slang.

It's a great premise. I just don't think I have the wherewithal to follow the project through.. : (

So please, someone - walk Bob out of the hospital with his two newfound friends, and followers, and into this crazy futuristic world after the end of history as we know it, and then some - 10,000 years from now.

run with it - and let's see if we can't get this thing going....?!