First A Note from the Author
Some folks told me they were confused on what I was doing with this post. Since Second Sight is a fictional story based on field research, I wanted the characters to feel real even though they were invented. I thought I would have Jordan and the others speak directly to you. Maybe even answer your questions. It’s a little out of body for me and challenging. I am enjoying the difficulty. Sorry if I confused you. I am going to keep running with the concept and see if I can get it to work. If it doesn’t, I’ll go back and unsnarl it. Thanks for the comments and feel free to post any questions you have about the story, characters, or the science behind the story. If you would rather post privately on my Facebook account, just go to Facebook.com and search for Jack Althouse. I’ll write back privately so you don’t have to worry about your comments hanging out there for the entire world to read. Thank you for visiting!
Jordan Wright
I hope you understand how hard it is for me to talk about myself. It took a lot of people, making a lot of sacrifices to accomplish what we did in Second Sight. I was just part of a team.
I am a husband and father. That’s never going to fade. You never forget the day you marry the love of your life. You never forget the day you hold your baby for the first time. That was especially true for me. Lisa’s contractions came on so hard and fast, we barely made it to the hospital before Sophie was born.
I was an architect. Maybe I still am. It’s hard to say. They don’t have what we call architects here in Javan. Architects in Javan build what they’ve designed. A medium sized structure usually takes a week.
I also served in the Navy as part of a Seal team. Most of what I did remains classified.
I live on Earth during the Second Age. That’s roughly somewhere during 26,000 BC to 11,000 BC. I am fairly certain I am living closer to 11,000 BC based on how much has been rebuilt since the First Age ended. You live in the Fourth Age, circa 7,000 BC to who knows when it partially blows up again. It’s not 2012 by the way. Something scary will probably show up in the sky, but it won’t do anything this time around. Just keep cool and buy a lot of stock after the market tanks. You’ll make a mint.
I wrote my part of Second Sight so you could discover this ancient world the way I did, up close and personal. In many ways it’s like our present world, except much more diverse. There are five races of hominids and, I am told, a hundred times as many species of animal and plant. I can believe it. I eat a different kind of apple each day, all delicious. Dinosaurs coexist with everything else. I saw about thirty different types so far. Did you know some Stegosaurus have red fur? And get this: some trees walk. Not real fast. It takes them a day to move a few inches. They do it to find daylight when a taller tree shades them out.
It’s not copper tools and stone axes back here either. All that stuff about us being the most advanced civilization on Earth is dead wrong. Technology is about a hundred years ahead of present day, maybe two hundred. It is hard to guess how long it will take us to get back to the level of the Second Age. They had a longer stretch of peace time to focus on the sciences and the arts than we have.
As in our Age, advanced technology isn’t everywhere in the Second Age. There are primitive cultures in the remote parts of the world, near the poles and out in the jungles.
The world is divided into regions, west and east. The west is dominated by the Ephraim, a nasty breed of half giants with heads the size of exercise balls and enough body hair to make a rug. They breed like rabbits and seemed to think the only good human is the dead variety. Guess you can tell how fond I am of them.
The east is populated by everybody else: the fully giant race called the Nephillum, other half giant races like the Anakim and Emir, a hundred varieties of Humans, twenty varieties of Trahls, and a few groups of Dwarfs. I haven’t had the privilege of personally meeting anyone from a Dwarf race yet. I saw a few families in Kalase when Aizah, Suri, and I were bugging out of the city. The ones I saw were particularly beautiful and gracious, nothing like the legends portrayed them. I will never forget the three foot tall father struggling to keep his tiny family from getting trampled. I wish I could know if he ever got them to safety.
Sorry, I’m digressing. But that is the way I see this world, in small intense moments. When you explore off the path, nobody displays a “You are here” arrow on a map above your head the whole time. No narrator gives opening speeches about what the Ephraim Navy is up to while you’re sailing out of Baskra.
And communicating with new people is always an adventure. Nobody tells you how the nationals are going to behave. Nobody warns you that waving “Hello” in 11,000 BC means “You are drunk”. That’s what makes exploring fun; not knowing what the heck is going on, seeing one fantastic thing after another, trying to make contact, sometimes succeeding, most times not. But it is worth trying. I found that out with Levi, Aaron, Diago, Aizah, and Suri. Thank God they have a sense of humor.
I should go. They want to post too.
I’ll write more later. In fact if you have any questions for me, let me know and I’ll try and answer them.
Good luck and be careful who you wave at.
Jordan Wright
Levi
I am Guardian to Javan, the brightest, most advanced, most virtuous nation ever to exist on this Earth. Serving her citizens and her benefactor Athena has been my privilege and life purpose. Guardians are members of an elite military society. By society I mean we are a community unto ourselves: children, women, and men. We do not associate with the Citizens of Javan unless necessary. Guardians marry guardians. We raise our own food, build our own cities, and prepare our children for the sacred duty of protecting those who live in the deep verdant valleys of Javan. We live high on the Acropolis, a mountain range that stretched from your present day Athens down to the small statue you call the Sphinx. Jordan told me that much of my homeland would be destroyed and drowned at the end of the Second Age. It is hard to believe. I choose not to.
I have a sister. We lived in a small country to the west of Javan. My village was invaded and over run during a border war. Javan and her sister nation Mestre have been in an undeclared war against the half-giants of the West ever since Athena founded us. They are a league of ten nations that control two thirds of the world and most of the ocean surrounding their immense island. You know them as Atlantis. You know their Island as the Americas.
My sister and I lost our parents, siblings, cousins, everyone we knew during that border war. Athena and her father Odin found us hiding in the bombed out basement of our home. I was five and my sister was two. Athena adopted us, much to the displeasure of Odin. It appears it is difficult for a twenty foot tall Nephillim male to accept a son of a lesser race. Humans are considered lesser than the Nephillim because we are so small and therefore assumed intellectually inferior. I spend my life proving him wrong.
My name may be Levi Ben Odin, but if you want to remain on my good side, you will refer to me as Levi. Otherwise you may address me as simply Guardian. For that is what we are to the good citizens who live safely under our watch: anonymous, unseen, and perhaps appreciated. The latter is not important.
Protect all. Harm none.
Michael Kraxman
Nobody ever called me that except when I was in trouble. Call me Krax. That was my call sign. I grew up in the wet part of Oregon, got tired of being wrinkled all the time, joined the Navy, learned to fly choppers, and ended up in some nasty places that didn’t have humidity. Felt like heaven. Jordan and I went through a lot back then. I had it easy. Fly in, drop them on the DZ, orbit, pray, wait, then haul back in after the hard part was over. I got shot at a couple of times when the bad guys lived long enough to vent their frustration. Fortunately for me, SEALS didn’t let that happen very often.
It’s been what, twenty years since? Jimney Christmas, I’m old. Laura’s shaking her head no. She’s my assistant, I mean my fiance. I mean she’s both. Stop making faces at me, babe. It’s hard enough talking into this thing.
After the Navy, I finished school and became an archeologist. Now I’m in Costa Rica. It rains a lot here. Guess I missed the wet after all. Our team has been working a site on the Pacific coast that wasn’t yielding much until a small hurricane blew through and rearranged the landscape. We found plenty including–
Everybody’s waving their arms at me. Apparently I’m not supposed to tell you about that. Sorry.
I invited Jordan down here to help him get over things. Last Thanksgiving still doesn’t seem real. He finally met the one girl who could get under his thick skin and make him happy. Then that had to happen.
It’s been hard on all of us too. He was instant family to us the short time he hung out here. It wasn’t out of pity. We liked him. And he was smart. Knew how to date a pyramid with a compass. Go figure. He saw things differently than other people. He looked at both sides of a puzzle and all around the edges. Then he stepped back, I mean way back and took in the big picture. Puzzles go together faster when you look at all the pieces at the same time. Jordan could do it faster than the weather changed.
What am I doing talking about him in past tense?
I took the kayak out past the breakers last night. I sat for hours watching the stars sink below the Pacific, wondering when he’d show up. I have to hang onto that. There’s no if he shows up, only when.
I don’t care how long it takes. I’ll go out on the water every night if I have to. I’ll be on station when he makes it back. I never left a SEAL stranded and I won’t start now.
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