Prolouge
Ross Dale Kelly


Little Andy Mercury was sitting in his first grade classroom, working with a piece of paper. It was from the fourth grade math level, utilizing the order of operations within simple arithmetic equations in order to give coordinates on the back of the paper to draw a picture. This was pretty complicated and considering his dedication to blocking out the image that everyone was shouting about in the classroom, as the Thanksgiving holiday came up the next day around, so he remained baffled by the math on the page.

The teacher had assigned simpler problems for the rest of the class to give the answers to the coordinates, but she didn’t discourage anyone from trying to take a crack at solving some of the harder problems on their own.

It would be seemingly impossible for a child without the order of operation background to be able to distinguish the correct answers from about fifty different “complex” equations, especially since the only way to check the work comes from the entirely different part of the brain where the imagery of pictures and imagination was stored. Not only that, but he had blocked out the word “turkey” from his consciousness, and was getting more and more baffled, even though the picture was surprisingly close to the correct one.

He was so deep in thought that the classroom became blurred yells and shrieks, along with a teacher lecturing diligently, trying to keep order as the last student worked toward the same problem which the other students had already solved on their own or by copying off other children next to them.

The paper started looking deep as Andy looked into the paper, seeing shapes and stars and little glints of white among the paper, which started looking much more interesting and deep than a picture of a turkey. The connect the dot lines gave way to the Milky Way, as his mind was calmed by the swirling predictability of math and instantaneous intuition of character and particles. He imagined God, as a perfect man reading a perfect book, which had everything up to the present contained.

Every molecule of the Earth would be predictable by pure physics and intention, and in Andy’s mind, free will was predictable. He then saw the dilemma between reality and fantasy. Caught in this train of thought he thought he felt the presence in the very classroom of a similar thought which long ago had felt the same feeling. He acknowledged the presence of this other thinker who like him had wondered deeply about the nature of free will.

He once again was looking into the stars in the paper. This train of thought through which he was linked had escaped somehow and was out to investigate the heavens for answers. Andy could feel this man’s presence careening through the stars searching for answers.

If all was predictable, to Andy, life would be a prison of repetition and utter loss of control over the situation. He would never know if he was merely a mathematic equation already preordained through the combination of his characteristics with those he was likely to encounter. He did however feel that our own deaths made it impossible for this world to be too much like a prison.

He couldn’t help but feel that free will was a real force and that the interaction of particles were never fully describable by science. It would take much more than just one method of thought to determine how things interacted. Free will seemed like such a perfect design at this moment as he looked into the science of the paper.

But Andy felt a calm feeling knowing that in the science and order of the universe, if one tried something he would be guaranteed the same results as any other under the same pressing situation. The intelligence of this made a safety net for all living people.

His mind moved passed the math and into a philosophical mood, but he continued to work on the math at hand.

God, in Andy’s mind, could always predict the very next move according to the knowledge of all’s mind and intention, along with the predictability of the Earth.

As Andy came back toward the rambunctious classroom, he noticed how the things he would desire would take effort and intelligence to obtain, and he noted how all the others proved to feel the same way with their attitude and smug demeanor. He felt different than the other children in the class, with a need to feel safe with the things he loved, but he was almost finished, so he put his mind to work and the remaining three problems were solved, which did not seem to follow the same pattern as the rest, and he drew the turkey.


Much later down the road, Andy was laying on his back on the hard asphalt. His sweat was leaving an outline around his body pulled itself through the stress of the workout. He tried to grasp the air which was so fleeting around him.

In the real world, birds were chirping in the trees around the light brown dusty oval track. It was surrounding a terribly muddy and weed covered football field.

In Andy’s mind, disillusionment and fatigue filled his brain like a sea much too calm to allow him to remain level above the water. This had been the hardest practice he had attended, and took full advantage of the pressure in the atmosphere to work his body passed its peak performance.

The other players were trotting back to the locker room, through the gate, and across the cement, back toward the gymnasium. Andy took a few calming breaths, and waved off the coaches, who hesitantly left the field.

Andy gave himself a good nine minute rest, and then hopped back to his feet, he ran in place with his track shoes and exercise clothing. He looked out at the field; its white painted lines were fading each day with the feet of the young men running across the surface. The parking lot was on the bottom side of the field diagonally to Andy’s right. It was riddled with a few cars, mostly football players. During the summer season only the dedicated of heart were out on the field, continuing the program with the coaches, being too heartfelt of players to sneak back into the lineup after a few months rest.

As a football player, Andy had been training all summer through sprinting and long distance running, training his body. He worked through the initial pains of low endurance. He also worked through problems with his heels, which seemed to ache constantly, regardless of the shoe or the pressure he put on the back of his feet while running. At this point, there was nothing holding back his training, neither physically nor mentally, but his own limits as a person each day.

This scene was like a pleasant dream now to him. He grabbed his bottle of water, still cold, and drank as much as he could, as he slowly walked on toe to the edge of the field, ready to leave.

When the endurance program is over for the day, Andy knows he could not have pushed himself harder. His strength was becoming tremendous, despite his average stature and seeming size. The sport was always a stress on his body and mind, but for some reason the love and hate pulled him back to the field each day during this period of his life.

When he did lie still wherever he dropped, though, he found himself seeing the Milky Way. He couldn’t help he sensed some train of thought of out there that was like he was, just perhaps a little smarter. It wasn’t God, it was just another person he thought, one who, perhaps had escaped the world to see if the entanglement of free will and divine order would be more clear to study out in the heavens. He felt glad that the thinker had escaped so he could spend his time doing the more mundane things in life.

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Creative Writing by: RDK
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copyrighted October 11, 2008 RDK