Chapter 33: Searching for Meaning in a Meaningless World

The commercial began when a girl and a boy, both about ten years old, rushed into the kitchen of an idyllic suburban home after a long day of having fun, followed by their faithful dog. Waiting for them there was their dutiful mother.

"Mom!" the children cried in unison. "We're thirsty."

The mother turned from the refrigerator, holding a tray with a bottle and two filled glasses. "Well, I've got two glasses of Sun Fizz, coming right up!" The bottle was labeled "Sun Fizz" and depicted the drink's mascot, a cartoon sun with doe eyes, a bow tie, and white hands and shoed feet.

The kids sat down at the kitchen table as the mother placed their drinks before them. "Sun Fizz! That's our favorite!"

The six-inch tall Sun Fizz mascot leaps off of the bottle and onto the table. "That's because there's a delicious ray of sunshine in every drop!" he warbled.

The children screamed in terror!

"Come on!" urged the frightened mother, pulling them away from the table where this monstrosity of nature still stood.

"Mom!" the children cried to their protector.

Mr. Sun Fizz giggled and hopped down to the floor of the kitchen, causing the dog to flee out the back door. "I'm filled with Nature's goodness!" he proclaimed cheerfully, then turned to the hallway to chase after the fleeing family, laughing playfully.

The family had nearly reached the safety of the parent's bedroom.

"Hey, what's with you people?" asked the tiny ball of incandescent gas. "I've got vitamins and minerals!" Yeah, and thermonuclear reactions.

In their panic, the children accidentally knocked over a vacuum cleaner in the hallway, which caused Mom to stumble.

The daughter looked back, and saw that the mascot had nearly reached the fallen adult. "MOM!" she screamed.

"Run!" urged the mother, the last words she would ever utter.

It is at this moment that the narrator of the commercial finally stepped in. "Trust your gut," he intoned, "not some cartoon character." The screen displayed the lesson of this little morality play: "Image is nothing. Taste is everything. Obey your thirst. Sprite." The laugh of Mr. Sun Fizz is the last thing heard.


"Welcome back," said Galt Braunbight, addressing the television audience. "We are ready to move on to the second topic on the debate over Imperial Law 567423: whether fans of the Rescue Rangers television program should be considered enemies of the state. Miss Maughlarde, you may begin with your argument against the statute. You have three minutes."

Carolyn looked pointedly down at her watch, noting the time, then looking up at Braunbight, before she finally addressed the camera. She was still wearing the KEEN helmet. "People of the world," she said, "Mr. Braunbight has urged you to consult the '567423 Review' node of the Wired for more information about this law and how it has been enforced. I had an opportunity to look at this node during the commercial break, and I noticed that the names of all Rescue Ranger fans arrested under this law are listed. Since our anonymity has already been compromised, I urge you to use the search capabilities of the Wired to find out who we are. Some of the fans are children or young adults like myself, 'in some parts of this country not even a legal adult', as I believe someone said. But take a look at the older members of the fandom. Our fandom includes schoolteachers, software programmers, social and health care workers. You probably already know that one of us is a member of the British House of Peers. We are astronauts and journalists, farmers and singers, public defenders and copyright attorneys, and yes, sons and daughters. Before May 16th, we were all law-abiding members of the community. The only reason we are considered criminals now is because what was our hobby has been re-defined as treason. We were not fans of this show because of how Norton Nimnul was depicted. We were fans because we enjoyed the stories, empathized with the characters, and felt like we were part of the world of the show, a world whose attractions are all the stronger now that we know that the world is real.

"Mrs. Nulton over there is biting her tongue right now because I have neglected to mention the one apparent exception to this rule, the one person that appears to justify the entirety of Imperial Law 567423: Harold Largess, the man who tried to use the unconscious body of the Emperor to take over the world. Well, I'm here to tell you that that man is not, and never was, one of us. It's true that after he was arrested, a videotape of Rescue Rangers episodes was found in his bedroom, but the very title of that tape reveals his opinion of the show." Carolyn reached down into the cardboard box the KEEN was in and removed a printed screenshot and a pocket magnifying lens. "This is from the press conference where the existence of the tape was first revealed. As you can see, the tape was clearly labeled 'Loathsome Rescue Ranger episodes, Tape 1'. I ask you, what kind of fan would treat the source of his devotion so poorly?"

"Let me see that!" demanded Francine, snatching the printout and lens and using the latter to examine the former closely. She sighed in defeat upon confirming that her brother-in-law had indeed been the victim of a clumsy plant by the Emperor, using one of the tapes she had herself prepared for him, labeled in her handwriting.

"Do you have anything else to add?" Braunbight asked Carolyn.

"No, I'm done," said Carolyn with a grin.

"Mrs. Nulton, you have two minutes to defend the law."

Francine paused for several seconds as she re-considered her strategy. Her thinking was interrupted by the sound of Dale scrambling up the walls of the cage. Smiling deviously, she began. "I have no defense. As far as I'm concerned, this debate is settled, and the arguments to overturn the statute are completely convincing."

Braunbight blinked, uncomprehending. Carolyn grinned from ear to ear and stretched out her hand. "Thank you for being so magnanimous. It has been a pleasure..."


"However," Francine interrupted, still facing the camera, "there is one matter I would like resolved..." Francine turned to face Carolyn. "...if you would be willing to explain it to me."

"Anytime," Carolyn said wearily, putting her hand down.

"Why are you fans of the Rescue Rangers? Liking the show is one thing, but you have devoted a substantial part of your lives to it, even before you knew it was based on a world that actually existed. For the child fans, I can understand. The show depicts a bright, optimistic worldview that is necessary to grow into a well-adjusted adult. But at some point, children must leave their fantasies behind, and learn to live in the real world. You told us of your occupations, so you appear to be mentally stable enough to hold regular jobs. And yet your free time is dominated by your obsession with a world that, even if it is real, has no bearing on this world at this time. You appear to be optimists, all of you, yet Optimism has not been a viable philosophy for the last sixty years. In that time, Earth has been invaded by aliens three times, has been struck by innumerable natural disasters, plagues, and one 'limited nuclear engagement'. The last iteration of Wired, the Internet, completely collapsed under the weight of endless computer hacking, nearly bringing down the whole of society as we know it. The population of the world in 1925 was two billion people. The population today is barely half of that number, and it is still steadily declining. At this rate there will be nobody left to greet the dawn of the Twenty-Second Century. The time when adults could waste their days in childish pursuits is gone forever."

"Isn't that even more of a reason for us to look at these optimistic points of view?" asked Carolyn. "Hope and dreams, caring and adventure, don't have to be forgotten just because things seem dim. If nothing else, we can at least fight for the right, like I did here, and in that way the Rescue Rangers may be thanked for showing me from an early age that fighting for what you believe in is the right thing. You say it can't change the world but isn't that what I've just done?"

"Yes, but you wouldn't have even needed to fight this fight if you hadn't already decided to write your little stories and paint your little pictures that the majority of humanity would never recognize and which you can't even use to become professional writers and artists! This path you are following is the path of self-deception. You will throw your life into it, until one day you wake up and realize the best years of your life are behind you, and you must forcibly readjust your perceptions to reality. I know this path well, for I have traveled it. The temptation of a fantasy world is so strong, the temptation to reduce the world to black and white. A world of absolute good and absolute evil, where your cause is just and you have the power to make everything better. The world of the Rescue Rangers may be black and white, but not this one. This world is gray; gray through and through. And in this world you cannot hate your enemies, no matter how much you wish to, because they are your father and your sister, and despite their wrongs they have also loved you, in their own way, and you cannot find it in your heart to strike back at them, even if the power to strike back at them was anything more than lies written in old books.

"My years of self-deception were years when I was not myself, but a role from a fairy tale. I only discovered who I truly was when I abandoned the lies, and it was only when I abandoned the lies that life became worth living. You are so young, Carolyn. You have so much of your life ahead of you. Don't make my mistakes. Accept the world for what it is, and live in it."

"I didn't know how personal this was for you," said Carolyn. "I'm sorry, but I still choose to be a fan, despite your bad experience doing something you think was similar. I do accept this world, but the trick is that I accept it, and at the same time live in it in whatever way that makes me happy, and my way of 'living it' is to write the stories that no one notices or cares about, because it makes me happy, and in the end I think that is what's more important than anything, making oneself pleased in the world of black, white, or gray.

"We are fans because we treasure what The Rescue Rangers taught us. The number one thing they taught us was hope. You seem to think that this world has no place for hope, but there is always a place for it, even now. Especially now. Humanity is still far from achieving its true potential. The truest source of hope is by seeing the hope of others. Our hope comes from a more optimistic world.

"And we have not wasted this hope. We have strived to live as our heroes, those heroes" (gesturing at the cage containing the Rescue Rangers) "have lived. And in doing so, we have brought hope to those we have encountered in our non-fannish lives. Even if the people we inspired never knew about the Rescue Rangers, the show has indirectly helped their lives."

Carolyn reached up and switched off the KEEN helmet, then walked over to the Dimensional Viewer prototype and turned it on, causing the back of Tammy's head to appear on the Viewer's screen. "Let me tell you about these heroes," Carolyn said. "Let me tell you about Tammy. She's not a Rescue Ranger, but this makes it even clearer that it is their entire world that influences us. Tammy, let's get a look at you." Tammy reached out a hand and received a pocket mirror from Winifred. She held it up so the Viewer could see her face. "There's no need to be embarrassed, Tammy. Tammy has known about the Rescue Rangers for most of her life, and has always tried to live up to the ideal they represent. She's also a good friend, a fun sister and a dutiful daughter, an optimist despite the loss of her hero father at an early age. In short, she's everything I wish to be, and I'm not sure if I would be here today before you if it wasn't for her example to guide me through some dark times in my life."

"You're modeling your life after a mutant chipmunk," Francine said.

"I am modeling my life after a red squirrel, Tamiasciurus hudsonicus, 'hoarding squirrel of the Hudson Bay', a species sadly missing from our own world."

"Then you're just making my point. The world of the Rescue Rangers is so different from our own that it can have no bearing on how we live our lives here."

"Does it? Francine, you've said before that this world is not a positive place, things are bad, and problems arise. But at the same time there is hope, for so many the Rescue Rangers have provided that hope, and if they were actually in our world would it not be a better place? Not perfect by any means, but improved certainly. Our world could use all the help it can get, and whether it be the fans, or the actual Rangers themselves, they can help provide hope for the future to bring color to this gray world."

Francine pointed at the cage. "There are your Rescue Rangers, Carolyn. Where is their shining example now? Let the Rescue Rangers be heroes on their world, and animals on this one. Animals like all the rest on this planet, mindless creatures of instinct."

"'Mindless creatures'? I think you're fooling yourself. I think we all are fooling ourselves. I mean, look at the animals of our world and ask yourselves the question: Do animals think like human beings? Do they have souls? You might think you know the answers, but I know I don't. I know that mated pairs of animals love each other, and that they sacrifice their happiness to guarantee that of their children, just like us. I know that some of them show altruism towards perfect strangers, just like some of us. Ask any pet owner, and they will tell you tales of animal behavior that go far beyond training or mimicry. Ask any police or fire rescue unit in the world that uses dogs trained to save lives in ways their instincts never provided for. I like to believe that animals are like us, because so often they show us the way. We humans have been feeling like victims for sixty years now, and we tell ourselves our golden age is behind us and will never return. But the mice and chipmunks are also victims, and just look at how much happiness they manage to find in their lives.

"Would it be so very wrong if the animals in that cage could think like us, could wield tools and talk? Can you, for one brief moment, close your eyes and entertain a world of hope, a world of talking animals, a world where the sun can finally shine?"


And at that moment, the clouds overhead broke, and the sun shone down upon northwestern Connecticut for the first time in sixty years. The cameras and the eyes of the people in the conference room were directed up through the skylight in wonder and awe, and the people of the world re-learned for the first time in sixty years that you're not supposed to stare straight at the sun.

It was while everyone was recovering from temporary blindness that the silence was broken by the sound of an old brass smokehouse padlock being picked by the tail of a mouse and falling off of the cage to the surface of the table.

Bud, who had walked into the conference room during this spectacle, finally found his voice. "The Emperor has been spotted on the grounds," he announced. "He's headed for the bunker where the Dimensional Switcher is being kept."

"Rescue Rangers, away!" cried a quintet of voices.

In the entire world, only Bud had sight enough to see the sources of those voices run past his feet and out the door.

"Nobody's going to believe this," he muttered.