We all sat in a cirle at the epicenter of the Drop. Each crew member represented one of the twelve clock positions, and me, lucky #13 at its heart.

I looked to each of the five couples, who each represented one of the five spheres I had installed at even positions on the clock face.

“Cap, Guillermo, I want you two to concentrate on your sacred garden, where you first met,” I said to the two lead crew who held court at the 12 position. And then I went clockwise.

“Donna, Edward, focus on your city speakeasy from those many nights in the city where you’d made romantic rendezvous,” the 12 and 2 positions now lit up like ball lightning, as the four I had beckoned began meditating on their respective destinations. “Ron and Rachael, put yourself mentally at the bay club,” and the 4 position lit up. “Kitty, Keith, you’re on the infinite baseball diamond enjoying your favorite game on a sunny day,” the roar of the crowd from their sphere in the 8 position piped up. “Now, Jacob and Gabe, remember your house on the hill of the Shermer town, our entry point to which we descend down to the tavern each Wednesday.”

With that, five of the crew spheres ignited. That was my cue to leap up into the sixth position, the back door, but really that sphere just represented the chaotic present. I stationed Sully and Joey Photo, the two most reliable of the crew, to man this helm, because their sphere was really the ship Herself, the good ship Cheshire. They too represented the present, and allowed me to leap up into the Drop’s true epicenter, the focal point of all this congruent existence myself, Cap and crew had combined to summon.

And then, like leaping through the movierain, and like lightning jumping between rain clouds, I surfed through all six spheres, ever gaining in speed and centrifugal force. From my own purview, the six spheres blended into an impossibly brilliant, bent beam of light that burned brighter with every increase of my circular acceleration. I was threading these five stories and the back door of the present as the sixth connective thread, the black gravity that held all of these worlds together in one present moment. The Cap would later describe to me that, as she looked above her head, she saw a luminous circle hovering above her. Once I reached terminal velocity, suddenly just then, the space-time at this crucial point in the Drop opened up and a shimmery cellar door appeared where thin air once was. Sully would later reveal to me that his energy meter detected 10^113 joules were on the verge of flooding our contained cell membrane, if I had deviated even slightly from the tightly controlled circumference in harmonious balance.

I yelled to Kitty, still piloting a curved vector approaching light speed, “Kitty! Leap up into the shimmer! Our baker’s dozen of a crew here have created passage into the higher conscious plane. I need you to leap to the destination on the other side to sustain its integrity!”

Without hesitation, Kitty formed her own astral drop as I had taught her. Her form was perfect. And she leapt up into the unknown. The portal galvanized upon her entry. And I told the remaining crew that they could relax. The portal no longer required our six stabilizing stories to maintain its shape.

“Where’s Kitty??” the Cap inquired immediately.

“She’s gone to the farthest destination any of us have ever leapt. Her presence on the other side is what’s holding this portal steady. Now, we’re all going to leap up into it. I can carry you in my sphere.”

I was back in the center of the circle again, hovering six feet above everybody else meditating. Like I taught them, they all released their astral selves above to meet me. I shrouded them in the protective electromagnetic shield my orb provided. The Cap and crew were now passengers themselves, as I carried them up into the shimmering unknown behind Kitty.

After a very brief slip through the movierain, we landed at the giant footsteps of the Twelve, surrounded by a beautiful, divine garden. I had only ever leapt there alone. But with the collective power of the crew and our six emboldening stories, I was able to elevate all of them up to meet my god friends.

***

FLASH FORWARD: The crew meet the Twelve. #7 of the Twelve gives the Cap the Book of Earth’s complete history, since the Cheshire and Bill have finally helped all of Earth’s versions reach critical mass, a true droplet in the movierain, which the Twelve acknowledges. They are now masters of this three-body system—the Earth, Moon and Sun—and possess unfettered access to all possible universes adjacent to its iterations.

The Earth has arrived at the hearth of the Twelve, via the Cheshire. They have actualized this planetary system into an archive of a much higher echelon than anything the UU could muster. Kitty’s nowhere to be found. She’s already embarked upon her own Thunderbird journey.

***

Before heading into the megalithic, sacred temple of the Twelve, the crew, Cap and I held a quick quorum.

“Where’s Kitty?” was the first thing out of Cap’s mouth.

“Perhaps she’s made her way inside,” I said, but could not feel her presence anywhere nearby. For the first time since we had started leaping together, it felt as though our tether was broken.

Ron acted like he had been there before, though I knew he hadn’t.

“Well, no sense wasting time out here. Shall we enter?” he said, urging us to push ahead with a stiff upper lip.

The crew and I crossed the threshold into the hallowed, high-ceilinged halls of the Twelve’s temple, and met Them in the center oval where They held their court always.

“Ahhh..” I heard the Twelfth bellow, as we arrived at the foot of Their altar. “You’ve summoned the sophistication to bring your whole crew with you, eh, Bill?” He was almost chuckling. I think He was proud of me.

“Yes, yes, your Holiness,” I said in deference to a superior being. “We held six Earth versions in superposition simultaneously to open a gate long and wide enough for us all to make the leap. We had set one crew member ahead to secure the portal on the other end. Have you seen her? Her name’s Kitty.”

“Yes, she arrived a few moments before you,” He said. “But then she was summoned by the Order to embark upon her own Thunderbird journey. While you seem to have mastered channeling to hone our signal long enough to lift your whole crew here, she has made it to the Thunderbird training program.”

Accomplishment washed over me at this news from the Twelfth. I had successfully set another pupil upon the path toward Thunderbird. I had fulfilled the fifth and final step toward Thunderbirdhood: Teach the crew.

“Will we see her again?” Donna chimed up to the Twelve, intimidated by their impressive stature, but more concerned for her friend.

“If she chooses to pass you on her Thunderbird journey,” the Eighth weighed in, “you’ll see her again.”

“Enough about Kitty!” the Twelfth took back the floor. “Congratulations are in order! By your collective efforts and Bill’s guidance, your crew have earned a unique and prestigious accolade arriving at our premises. In actualizing six distinct Earth versions, held together by Bill’s black thread, you’ve elevated this Sun-Moon-Earth system into Our official archives. Earth, in all Her splendor, have reached critical mass and can now precipitate as a full-fledged droplet in the movierain. To honor this great achievement, We the Twelve grant you this Book of Earth. It contains the complete history of your planet, moon and star system. Let this book be your complete Akashic record of the Earth, in every possible iteration. Open its pages with the intention to know something specific about your history, and you’ll find the answer within what reads on the printed paper.”

“Thank you, your Holiness,” I said with the utmost deference, and then turned to Cap.

“Cap, do you realize what this means?” I said, with no intention of waiting for her to connect the dots, although the optimistic look on her face led me to believe she was almost there anyway. “We’re finally free from the UU’s grip!”

The Cap and I were already there, but the rest of the crew required elaboration, I could tell. I continued…

“This book contains the complete history of all Earth versions. We now hold complete knowledge of our home planet, and all of the universes where an Earth exists. The UU’s assignments, however infinite, always concern an excursion that at some point in time originated from an Earth. We no longer need to painstakingly research tagging missions from barely a clue. It’s like we have all the answers from the back of the math book! This text can answer any possible probing question Danny V. or any other UU official for that matter can muster. We hold, in our hands, an Akashic far more intricate than any UU record can hope to attain.”

I then turned back to the Twelve in gratitude.

“Twelve, the magnificent, omniscient, beautiful, holy Twelve, I can’t thank you enough!” my words did not seem to serve my true gratitude justice.

“T’was nothing,” the Twelfth assured me. “You have earned it in leveraging your Earth planet to Her true potential. You possess an understanding now that is sacred, that deserves praise, acknowledgment. You’ve proven that we can count on you, and your planet of origin, Earth to eventually elevate in consciousness. By arriving here and now, with your crew, Bill, you’ve proven Earth a worthy planet for enlightenment.”

At this, the Cap was the Cap for a reason. She was a little ahead of everybody else. “So, does that mean we can go anywhere now?”

Both myself and the Twelve quietly nodded. I looked in each of the crew’s eyes at Cap’s epiphany and saw all the possibilities fluttering through their minds. We were in a watershed moment for the Cheshire crew. The precipice at which we all stood was a place none of us had ever quite reached, staring out at an unknown, exciting abyss filled with promise.

Oddly, at the notion that I could finally go anywhere without worry about checking into the UU, I felt perfectly calm, content, completely at peace. I was here, in this hallowed place, with my crew and Cap and actually desired to be nowhere else for once.

Jacob and Gabe had other ideas at the acquisition of this knowledge, however.

“Ohh, we could go to an Earth now, where humanity never came down from the trees—where we achieved advanced civilization, yes, but not under the oppressive landscape of ubiquitous concrete!” Jacob declared.

“We could go to a world, an Earth, where all language is sung like angels, a living, breathing musical” Gabe ebulliently opined.

The other couples muttered amongst themselves, brainstorming at all the destinations they’d like to visit. I was relieved, since at that moment I was experiencing writer’s block, so to speak. And then the Cap and I locked eyes, as the only two leaders of the crew. We knew we’d still have to bring organization to this unbridled ability we’d just acquired from the Twelve.

The Cap brought us all back down to the ground, as ever, getting down to business.

“We’ll have to assign a crew member to keep watch, back on the ship’s deck, while we leap to these exotic, extracurricular locales,” she said.

“I’ll take first shift,” said Keith, who was now holding the Book of Earth. “I think I’m getting the hang of asking this book questions. I’m confident I can keep Danny V. and his scrutiny at bay.”

“Then it’s settled,” the Cap said. Then she looked back at me, “Well, Bill, where to?”

“I dunno,” I said. “That forest city Jacob was talking about sounds pretty cool. Let’s try there?”

***

NEXT UP: The crew embark on their first unfettered adventure, as a group. And they live to tell the tale to the tavern, the place they wanted to be all along.

As a 12th-degree blackbelt Thunderbird now, Bill’s helmet helps him and crew navigate their new worlds. It provides them the necessary background for context, and positions them within natives seamlessly. After all, the people are more the attraction than simply the place itself. The people, the prayers give these sought haunts the gravitas.

Keith hangs back to handle Danny V.

***