The Universe Builders: Bernie and the Putty (26 page)

Tonight felt different. For the first time since Bernie installed his backdoor, he didn’t feel the need to rush home and protect his universe. Billy had been absent for two days.

After work, he meandered around the Central Plaza until, after crossing one of the bridges, he found himself in front of his favorite bookstore. When he worked for Good Shimmer Imports, his job was keeping their bookshelves stocked. Isaiah, the owner, was a gregarious god who always had a kind word for young Bernie. Life was much simpler when all he had to do was keep books on shelves.

Isaiah carried a full range of books. The new titles, prominently displayed at the front of the store, included
Building for Fun and Profit
,
Building in the Zone
, and
The Top 100 Destination Universes
. Bernie, like most builders, was drawn to the award winners section with its parade of new titles. Among the current best sellers, he found:
This Year’s Award Winners: Why They Won,
The Top 50 Awards of All Time
, and
What Does It Take to Win
?

As Bernie read the new titles, he drifted into the biographies section. The shelves were full of stories about current and past award winners and what they had done to make their universes special. It was a popular section, since everyone wanted insight into any tricks or gimmicks the winners had used to put them over the top.

Bang
!
Thump
!

“Stop it. Just stop it,” Bernie muttered under his breath. His cloud ignored him as a third book fell to the floor. Once again, he calmed himself before reaching down to pick up the fallen books. He wasn’t surprised to see the books were about his dad. He was usually more careful in this part of the store. The first book was titled
Simeon Claims Number Three
, a perennial best seller. The second book was an autobiography he had once borrowed from Isaiah called
Simeon Tells All
. At first, Bernie had been excited to read about his dad, but his excitement turned to disappointment when he found no mention of his mom or himself. Simeon talked plenty about his childhood and the rest of his life. But, neither his wife nor his son had merited any comment.

“Hey, Bernie. I guessed it had to be you throwing your dad’s books around again.” Isaiah grinned as he waved to Bernie from his tall stool near the register.

Bernie shook his head. Fortunately, none of the books had been damaged. The last thing he wanted was to have to pay for one.

He wandered instinctively to the Self-Help Section, where he had purchased more than a few books. One title that caught his attention was
How to get Along at Work
. When he saw several chapters about difficult bosses and unsupportive coworkers, he decided it was a good investment.

On his way to the checkout, he passed through the Occult Section. The best sellers included:
Good Luck or Bad Luck: It’s Your Choice
,
Bending Probability to Your Advantage
,
What’s Happening in the Parallel Dimensions?
and
Does Magic Work in Our World?
Bernie thought again of his friend.
Lenny’s a bright guy, and he loves this stuff. I understand OWT, but this is over the top for me.

At the checkout, Isaiah asked, “How have you been, Bernie? We haven’t seen you for a while.”

“I’m fine, thanks, Isaiah. I got a builder job with The Business. They’ve been keeping me really busy.”

“That’s great, Bernie! Congratulations. So when do you think we’ll have some books with your name on them in the awards section?” Isaiah asked with only a hint of teasing.

“Well, it might be a while. I found out it isn’t as easy as it looks.”

“You’ll get there, Bernie. You’ve got Simeon blood in you. It’s just a matter of time.”

A Garden Universe?

Two more days passed and Billy still hadn’t shown up to work.

It was a productive time for Bernie. He worked hard on his animal designs. He’d set a goal to create a companion animal for his pod people, but the complexities of creating companion creatures with the same morphing ability as his pod people was proving exceedingly difficult.

By the end of the day, the best he had come up with was two overlapping companions. The first companion would be a tadpole-like creature living with the fish-kids in the water. Eventually it would grow legs and become like a slow dog and live on land. When it died, halfway through the land period, the pod people would get their second companion. It would be a Rite of Passage for them. The second companion would resemble a flightless chicken. When the pod people were ready to leave the land, the chickens would develop strong eagle-like wings, just in time to follow their companions into the mountains to begin their new lives in the sky.

That kept things tidy. No left over companions.

* * *

“Bernie, I think you’re working way too hard at this,” Lenny said, more than a little exasperated. “Interesting life will develop all by itself if you just give it a chance.”

“But I’m trying to create a very specific type of higher life.”

“I know, but if you can’t figure out what you want or how to do it, in the end, you’re going to end up with nothing. Then you’re really screwed.”

“What would you do?”

“I’d probably just do a Big Bang. That works pretty well.”

“What’s a Big Bang?” Suzie asked.

“Basically, you create a huge mass in the center of your void, apply pressure and heat, and let it explode. Then you advance time about fifteen billion years and see what you’ve got. If you do it with a big enough mass, there’s sure to be interesting stuff that comes out of it,” Lenny said.

“I don’t think that will convince anyone of my builder skills. Even if I get something interesting, everyone will know it was just random chance.”

“Then try a garden universe,” Lenny suggested. “I read a study that one of every four worlds that achieve gaia will develop advanced life forms.”

“I remember gaias,” Suzie said. “You said they happen when the life on your planet reaches a critical mass, and a gaia comes alive and starts looking after the planet, right? But what’s a garden universe?”

Lenny liked it when he got to explain things. “That’s where you plant every kind of seed you can think of in your universe. Then you sit back and see what happens.”

“What kind of seeds?” Suzie asked.

“For example, you pick five types of suns. Then you pick five types of planets. Then you pick five types of orbits. You keep adding more variables, like atmospheric composition, the number of moons, and so on. Once you have your variables, then you create one system for each possible combination.”

“But that could mean thousands of worlds,” Suzie said, as she considered the permutations.

“Yep. You have to plant a lot of seeds in a big field if you want a good crop. The purists would frown on it, Bernie, but you could even seed your worlds with a good dose of primordial soup. That would kick-start the slower ones. Then all you have to do is jump ahead three or four billion years and see what hatched. Make sure you have a good star chart so you can keep track of which systems didn’t take. Then, when you go back, you try something different on your duds,” Lenny said.

“How many of these worlds will generate higher life forms?” Bernie asked.

“It all depends on your variables. Some are more likely than others. If you throw in some soup, my guess is you could get thirty to forty percent. Out of that group, you should get something you like.”

“Hmm… So with 1,000 systems, I might get 300 to 400 worlds with higher life forms. That sounds pretty good. What do you do next?” Bernie asked, warming to the idea. His shimmer confirmed his excitement by adding two new colors to its display.

“I’d pick the 5-10 most interesting, blink out the rest, and then—”

“What?” Bernie interrupted. “Why would you destroy the rest of them?”

“Well, you don’t want one of these other systems contaminating your chosen systems. What if somebody develops space travel and starts messing with your good systems? Or what if some of them start evolving into spiritual beings? A lot of those spiritual types end up as missionaries, trying to turn everyone in their neighborhood into spiritual beings too. It’s hard enough to make life forms take the path you want without a bunch of meddlers trying to send your people someplace else. It’s better to eliminate the competition.”

“I don’t think I can do that,” Bernie said as his shimmer lost the two recently added colors and a third one as well.

Candi Comes Calling

Bernie was the first to see her as she approached their table in the cafeteria. Her long light-brown hair, mixed with her golden shimmer, made her look like a slow motion comet heading straight toward him. Her shapely legs, the slow sway of her hips and arms as she moved were more hypnotic than any cobra that ever existed. Whatever thoughts Bernie might have had turned to perspiration and were lost for all time.

Still, she had not yet revealed her super power. That came when she looked into Bernie’s eyes. Her gaze stabbed deep, and he found himself in a dream sequence, aware of oncoming danger, but powerless to move out of its path. Having pinned her victim, she readied her final strike—the lethal smile. It began with her lips, but soon joined forces with her eyes until the look and the smile fused into a laser beam so powerful it vaporized any male thought within a fifty-foot radius. It also worked on clouds.

And so it was to a blank-eyed, slack-jawed, empty-headed Bernie that she said, “Hi, Bernie. My name is Candi. May I join you?”

It appeared Bernie was at least three to four minutes away from coherent words, let alone complete sentences, so it was probably a good thing Lenny spoke first. “Don’t trust her, Bernie! She’s one of Billy’s henchmen!”

The stunning goddess slowly turned in Lenny’s direction, taking her super-weapon with her. Those same eyes stabbed out, capturing Lenny as easily as she had captured Bernie moments earlier. And, totally unnecessarily, she threw in the smile for good measure. She bent close to him and twirled her finger in what Lenny’s friends generously call his beard. “Now, Lenny,” she said, batting her long eyelashes. “Do I look like a hench-
man
to you?”

Lenny’s eyes darted back and forth, searching desperately for some means of escape, but the only thing that escaped was an unintelligible gurgle. Later, Lenny would refer to this as a lost-time episode.

“Y-y-yes,” Bernie said as he fought to regain control.

Candi turned back to Bernie with some confusion on her face. “You do? That wasn’t the effect I was going for at all.”

Candi noticed Bernie’s hand extended in the direction of an empty seat at the table. “Oh!” Bernie had responded to her request to join them. “Thank you,” she said as she put her tray down.

Suzie, who hadn’t uttered a word, was saying plenty with her shimmer. And it was definitely not in the PG range. With eyes narrowed, jaws tightened and shimmer flickering, she hissed, “Why are you here?”

“That’s pretty direct.” Candi looked hurt.

“You must admit, Bernie hasn’t been welcomed with open arms in your division,” Suzie spat.

“I know, and I feel badly about it. And I’m not the only one who feels that way.”

“Why would you care?” Suzie asked, still suspicious.

“We know what’s been happening to Bernie.” Candi’s voice softened to a near whisper. “Billy told us what he’s been doing. He’s not going to stop until Bernie gets fired. There’s nothing we can do about it, but we had to tell you we don’t like what’s happening,” she said turning her gaze back to Bernie, this time careful to hold down the intensity.

“But why? Why’s he doing this?” Bernie sputtered. At a table somewhere behind Bernie, someone cried out as their glass of orange juice turned itself upside down.

“I don’t think he’ll ever forgive you for the scar you gave him. I’ve never seen him so determined to get someone fired before,” Candi said.

Bernie felt again the guilt that came whenever he was reminded of the fight. Although he rationalized the incident as best he could, there was nothing that could justify the price Billy had paid for his near-death experience and the scar that would always remind him of it. No matter how many years passed, Bernie would regret that day.

Candi broke Bernie’s reverie when she whispered, “Did you have anything to do with Billy being sick?”

“He’s been sick? I thought he was just taking time off.”

Lenny perked up and said, “You don’t suppose he’s sick because… Ow!” Lenny rubbed his leg where Suzie had kicked it. “Why do you keep doing that?” he grumbled at Suzie, who made it obvious she had no intention of answering the question.

“If there’s anything I can do to help, I will,” Candi said to Bernie.

“You and your friends could report what Billy’s doing,” Suzie said.

Candi shook her head. “That would make things worse. Billy would get a reprimand for foolish pranks, but the rest of us would be systematically harassed and fired. Shemal likes Billy, and anyone who makes trouble for his nephew will end up dealing with Shemal. If I learn something that can help, I’ll try to get a message to you. I can’t promise more than that.”

“Thank you,” Bernie said.

Suzie was still withholding judgment. Lenny, on the other hand, was busy formulating a question. Finally, he said, “How did you know our names?”

“We all know Bernie’s name. Suzie’s name wasn’t hard to find because we know she works in Personnel. Your name, Lenny, took some detective work. But one day, I just got determined, and I asked around until I found out.”

“What day was that, exactly?” Lenny inquired.

Candi gave Lenny a quizzical look and said, “It was last Thursday.”

“Do you remember what time, exactly?”

“Lenny,” said Bernie and Suzie at the same time.

“This is important,” Lenny pleaded.