Now, I’ll get into the logistics of how we located one Bryan Florian. But the important thing is that we found him. We snagged him just in the nick of time for next week’s storytelling session where he would attend after many weeks of absence, as the guest of honor.

I’ll never forget him explaining his terrestrial feat to me the day of his Wednesday night performance, when he’d share with the rest of his abandoned tavern gents.

“Bill, you know, I was actually hoping I’d get to meet you one day,” I was astonished at this opening statement from Florian. “Yeah, I had been meditating and studying and researching ways out of this world, but it was only after I stumbled upon a curious manuscript that things really took off. The author of this manual was you.”

“Me, you say?” having visited the Thunderbird Equipment Room at this point had readied my mind to receive even the wildest of notions.

“Yes, you,” Bryan continued. “It was a memoir of one Bill Thunderbird. I checked it out of the local Shermer Library, as the only search result from a keyword query in Lexus Nexus for ‘leaping dimensions,’ ‘navigating the dew’ and ‘forming your own Drop.’ And I’m excited to meet you, sir, not just to thank you for that ticket out of here, but to ask you: did you plant this book here, in this ho-hum town for me?”

“Ummm, well, I’m still getting acquainted with these newfound abilities,” I was basically stalling for time, at this point, to conjure even the slightest of viable responses. I honestly had no clue, at the time, what he was talking about. “I–”

“This thing was like a complete manual for becoming a Thunderbird,” Bryan changed the subject for me, out of an impatience to finally reveal to another soul how he had managed this quite incredible maneuver of realities. “Upon finishing the manuscript, it was like I had become him, having breathed life into the old text. The book was quite old when I checked it out, I might add. How old are you?? You look young. Anyway, I don’t know how you did it, but thank you. Without that book, I’d still be wasting away in sleepy old Shermer.”

“You’re welcome,” I said, still not entirely sure what he was talking about, but intrigued.

I would later realize that the text he was talking about was this journal you’re reading right now. This is, after all, the story of how I became a Thunderbird after rescuing the Cheshire. Should a Thunderbird ever find themselves on some far-flung rock out in the ether of lonely space, bewildered, disoriented and altogether unfounded, may they uncover this manuscript and climb the five stages back into divinity:

1. Learn to surf
2. Find zen in the Drop
3. Leap dimensions
4. Navigate the Dew
5. Teach the crew

May they return to the lofty Thunderbird Order, enlightened as it may appear to mere mortals, an evolved being reunited with their immortal soul. If you’re one such seeker, congratulations on your quest. Now, follow the breadcrumbs that these words reveal.

***

Locating Mr. Florian wasn’t easy. Every night leading into next Wednesday, we performed extensive detective work in the sleepy old town of Shermer. Kitty, Jacob and Gabe would work on the Cheshire during the day, while I putted around on my lowly duties. And then they’d pay a visit down to my Drop each night, where we’d leap, the four of us, to predetermined points in space-time, about Shermer’s version of Earth.

Once we isolated the night Bryan leapt—that happened on our third night of detective work—we next needed to find the breadcrumbs his ascension into the multiverse had left behind. They came in the form of Florian’s scrawlings on a notepad that sat next to his (or my) borrowed Thunderbird journal from the library. They read:

“Learn to surf. Find zen in the Drop. Then, leap out of this dimension…”

Upon reading that handwriting, I flashed back to my first leap, to the Equipment Room. And, in an equally inspirational flash, I knew at once where Florian must have leapt: the Thunderbird Equipment Room.

On the fourth night, I ushered our quartet to those hallowed halls. Hornets abuzz like marauders on the hunt hovered about the Equipment Room’s large, ominous gates. They struck fear and awe in my leap mates, but luckily I was now an old hand at attending the Equipment Room and effortlessly escorted them through the many corridors of the sanctuary.

We whisked to the archives, where records were kept of all comings and goings in the Equipment Room. We located the date, time and dimension, under “Exit Points” to find when Bryan Florian would have checked in. Sure enough, we was logged in the Thunderbird system, which now could keep tabs on the novice leaper.

“There he is,” Kitty said with satisfaction, running her finger down the logged entries, until she found Florian’s whereabouts. “It appears he went to this planet, after checking into the Thunderbird Equipment Room.”

“Then, that’s where we’ll leap,” the Big Cat concurred. His location felt oddly familiar, I can recall.

Our quartet had become quite adept at lucidly leaping, and entered Florian’s local dimension within minutes of his arrival of our landing point. I let Jacob and Gabriel do most of the talking, when we finally met. The planet we found ourselves in represented some utopian version of Earth, where capitalism had been abolished centuries ago. Every sentient entity enjoyed a universal basic income, which freed them to pursue their passions. It was a bit boring, if you ask me—I like a little grit on my reality—but Bryan, the boys and Kitty seemed to like it. Florian elected to venture there for some creative and spiritual nourishment, after suffering soul depletion from his native Shermer.

“Bryan? Is that you?” Jacob initiated conversation with the unsuspecting Florian, in the quaint, creative-friendly coffeeshop we chose as our rendezvous point.

“Ja- Jacob??” Florian was flabbergasted. How could someone from his home Earth find him here, of all places?? I couldn’t read his mind, but that’s what the look on his face said.

“We know how to leap too!” Gabe added.

“Gabriel!” Bryan couldn’t believe this two-for-one special amongst the multiverse. “Is everything okay? Why and how did you two find me?”

“You can thank our friend, Bill, here,” Jacob casually pointed to me, who had been hanging back in the wings.

“Wait,” Bryan was looking directly at me. “Are you a Thunderbird?? Whoa, this is eerie. I think our paths have crossed before. And never in a million years did I think they would again! What a small multiverse?”

“Hardly,” I assured him. “We’re here on a reconnaissance mission. Your presence is much requested at the Storytelling Wednesday Nights back in Shermer.”

“I always planned on returning,” he said. “Just not this soon.”

“You’d really be doing us a solid,” Jacob insisted.

Then, Bryan looked directly into my eyes again. It was almost as if he knew me better than his two hometown chums, in Jacob and Gabriel. Bryan, to Jacob: “Yeah, sure that’s fine, but…” Then, Bryan looked back at me, “First I need to speak with your friend Bill, here.”

***

After Bryan told me what you already know, about how he uncovered my journal in the Shermer Library, which then provided his crucial string of incantations—the sacred spell of dimensional leaping that led him out of his home reality—Mr. Florian became very serious.

“There are forces greater than either of us at work here,” he said solemnly. “Yes, the Equipment Room was my first extra-dimensional destination, but then you’ll never guess where they told me after I arrived.”

I had an idea, but no memory.

“They said that one day I’d have to summon you to the Cheshire,” he said. “That’s Jacob and Gabe’s ship, no? They said the spacecraft would get swallowed by that black hole if you didn’t intervene. Maybe there was entanglement between us, since I already knew Jacob and Gabe who were on the ship. But I still can’t figure out how you got that rather musty old journal in my local library well before this fact.”

I had no clue either.

“You look much younger than I had anticipated, nor did I ever expect to meet you!” he continued.

That’s how Bryan and I came to find we were entangled. And it was weird to think that the journal I had been keeping, ascending the 5 ranks into Thunderbirdhood—a work that at this point was not complete—was the critical component that not only led to Florian’s leap, but my boarding of the Cheshire. Cause and effect. Effect and cause. It’s all the same in the multiverse. Hell, while Bryan was telling me this, he knew he’d one day die and reincarnate as me on the Cheshire. I remember how oddly calm he was about the whole thing.

And our quartet became five, with one Bryan Florian among us en route to the Shermer Earth. What a Wednesday night we had in store for those tavern fellows.

***

NEXT UP: Florian regales his former fellows with tales of the multiverse. They’re now convinced of his leaping, having just returned, himself the embodiment of proof.

Foreshadowing that Bryan and Bill are far more than just entangled occurs to Bill. Upon delivering his story to the boys that Wednesday, he’s then left to continue leaping onto unknown realities. In his absence, Bill’s curiosity gets the best of him, and he decides to read the rest of Bryan’s library book—”Bill Thunderbird’s Journal.” And Bill notices a note in the margin, on one of the latter chapters, well beyond his current progress in the journey:

“Having transcended dimensions myself, by the aid of this journal, I have become a Thunderbird and now know my purpose: to message Bill Thunderbird Himself and summon him to the Cheshire’s distress signal, before they’re swallowed by that supermassive black hole. The Thunderbird Order’s collective purpose exists among many iterations, yet under one singularity.”

Death speed surpasses that of causality. And Bryan is reborn again, as the young boy Bill. These two were not only entangled, they’re part of one eternal soul—two in flesh, one in spirit. It’s tough for the burgeoning Thunderbird, Bill, to comprehend at this time. But certainly provides food for thought, as he’ll continue to leap with his Cheshire crew.

In short, Bill Thunderbird is the evolved version of Bill, who’s the evolved version of Bryan Thunderbird. The cycle continues ad infinitum. But pay no mind to these two ouroboros bros just yet, and stick to the matters at hand: to leap adventures worthy of reporting to the tavern boys every Wednesday night in Shermer; and find a way to once and for all free the Cheshire from Danny V.’s bureaucratic grip. And, oh yes!, for young Bill to become the genuine article: Bill Thunderbird.

***