Wesley's Story

I stand at the end of the world and wonder why. The obvious answer is war. War had come and the world had ended. This world was one of many with the same story, but that didn't make the reality of it any more comforting. Time is ever flowing and life goes on, but for me time is of no importance. A mere thought can bring to any place at any time. I can even remove myself from there plane and observe without actually being there. These thoughts don't bring any comfort because there are many others who can do the same and before I can be truly a part of them I have to watch countless worlds end for various reasons. While in many ways I am superior to them I do not place myself above them. The society for which I want to join is one of observation and in some cases finding others.

It had not always been this way. I was once human with other aspirations. The life that I thought I wanted to lead was one that had been placed upon me by others. While he didn't resent them for trying to give him a direction, it turned out that it was not the life destined for him to lead. From an early age he had been told about Starfleet and the life he could lead in it. He had always dreamed of the endless possibilities and for a while that was what he wanted. It wasn't until he was actually at the academy that he began to feel out of place. As he learned more and more he felt like there was something else he was supposed to do, but he couldn't say what. He became frustrated with himself and as a result frustrated by the universe. His frustration showed and his closest friends were disturbed by what they saw.

The particular time of which I speak is the mission where the enterprise was assigned to relocate a Native American tribe who had resettled on a planet on the border of Cardassian space. Unfortunately it was in a region of space that had been granted to the Cardassians through a series of negotiations, which had also given the federation some other sectors. The colonists having moved to preserve their culture were unwilling to say the least. They felt that the exact same thing was happening here as it had happened on earth so long ago. His part in it was to help with the relocation, but while there he met someone who had helped him see what was wrong in his life. He rebelled against Starfleet and stirred up the people because he thought it was the right thing to do. When the fighting erupted he didn't want it to so he subconsciously willed it to stop. He found himself looking at the frozen image and when it didn't make sense the Indian who had helped him had shown up, but now of course he knew it was the traveler, and told him he was ready to go to the next plane of existence. Once explained to him what awaited it was the obvious missing element in his life.

The beginning of his learning was the hardest, because the first time he had used his new found power out of instinct. The hard part was to learn to control it.

"You must visualize in your mind that time and thought and space are all related. You must then visualize that your thoughts can control the time. As you begin at first you must try only to slow time." the being know as the traveler said.

"But how do I do that, what you are saying somehow makes sense to me but I don't know how to do it." Wes said in a frustrated voice.

"You will learn. I can only tell you what must be done, in time you will know how to do it. First you must try on your own, once you can slow time, if only for an instant, then I can help you further."

So Wes set out to do what was deemed impossible by his race. He must have sat there for days even weeks. Then the realization came that he must remove his preconceptions of time, space, and thought before he could slow time. So with this new resolve he set out once again to do it. It took him two more days, but finally he slowed time for an instant.

"Now that you have realized that your thoughts can alter time, You must gain control of this process. Slowing time for only an instant was the first step. I will show you the next step." He said as he motioned for Wesley to follow. He took him to a spot nearby that had a lot of animals scampering around. "First I will slow time," as he said this the animals moved slower until they were at a crawl. "Then I will stop time," again as he said it, it happened. Wesley was still astonished by this once impossible feat. "Then once you can slow and stop time at will, you will move it backwards and then forwards and any which direction you like." This he did not demonstrate. "I realize how hard it was for you to slow time on your own without any previous instruction, but it was a necessary step I needed you to realize that you needed to change your preconceptions. From now on I will help you by demonstration and instruction, but only as much help as you need and no more. This will be a largely self learning process with some guidance along the way."

The tasks that the traveler had told him of got progressively harder, but he didn't give up. He felt the guidance of the traveler even if he wasn't physically speaking to him, he felt like his presence was pointing him in the direction he had to go. The traveler explained to him the society from which he came. Society is the best word to describe it they were in essence now the same race, but they had all come from different universes or galaxies with completely different backgrounds. Well race isn't exactly accurate either they all have the same basic abilities but some of them go about it in a different way. I'm sure Q would describe this society inferior to the continuum. This society wasn't omnipresent or omnipotent, but could manipulate both space and time with mere thought.

So as his abilities grew he began to understand things which he had wondered about on a subconscious level. He felt like he had been wearing a blindfold before and now it was slowly being removed. When all that was left of his essential training was over he felt as if he could see everything at once. I say essential because this society viewed the experiences one gained over life were all trainings of a sort. But as I said he still had training yet to go, but this training was observation. His first observation was of a race that had died years ago, in fact it was a race he had studied. This one was to give him a sense of how distorted history really was. The traveler was also there guiding him helping him to get the entire story. Once they had every detail leading up to the fall of this civilization they moved on to the next. After the third observation he was left on his own to explore. This last observation was the last one before he would be allowed to join the society. Until now he had been told or subtlety hinted which places to visit, but once in the society he would be able to observe at his discretion. Also there was an underlying mission in his observations, if he found someone like himself he was to do as his predecessor had done.

There was an unwritten rule though that most did not ignore. The rule was always to observe and interact, but never to interfere with the societies development. After all they weren't all knowing and couldn't know for sure the impact their presence had and how it would impact other societies. It was kind of like an unspoken prime directive. Other than that he was free to do whatever he liked.

"Anyways enough with this reflection its time to get off this planet." he said aloud

It really was kind of sad though, this race seemed like they had so much potential. Then again so did so many other races.

"Well did you learn anything new from that last mission." a familiar voice said.

"I always do." he replied

"The society has accepted you as a new member, so now you are free to explore whenever and wherever you like. There are endless possibilities."

"Yeah I guess there are, but first I think I'll check in on the enterprise." he said excitedly.

"I thought you might, well good luck, and remember you can always find me if you need me." with that said he disappeared.

Wes stood there a moment longer before heading for the ship he had called home for so long. And to think I can now check on them anytime I want.

AN: Well this was certainly an unexpected story that just came to me out of the blue. I hope you liked it. Please leave a review.