Read Online Lives of Future-Past (The Chronicles of Max Gunnarsson Book 1) by S.K. Benton - Free Book Online Page A

“How is that?” asked Max, trying to piece together how some old hippy guy on Earth, number one, knew his name, and number two, was alive when there were absolutely no signs of human life - anywhere.
     “You have done amazing things, Max. You were top of your class in the university, you were always honest and driven, and furthermore, you helped – no – you invented the technology around which the SSCC program revolves. Have you ever asked yourself just how you were able to achieve such things? Furthermore, why it is that you can sleep with only one eye shut, or why under stress you show incredible strength? How is it that you had the courage to put your life at risk and test your invention, coming all the way to a nearly-uninhabited planet with no previous knowledge that it would have even been here in the first place?”
     “I ask myself a lot of questions, old man,” responded Max. “Questions like, if I am insane, and simply talking to an apparition of an old warrior that doesn’t actually exist. Or maybe I am simply dead and I’m in Hell. Did I even survive the journey from Azul? Crap, anyway, being as I’m speaking to a ghost – what’s your name?”
     The man smiled softly, and then lifted the pipe to his mouth. Putting his forefinger to the bowl, a flame came out just below the fingernail as he puffed away, procuring light clouds of smoke and creating a pungent aroma at the same time.
     “ Cool trick ,” thought Max.
     “My name is Draagh, although I have been known by many titles. I am the first of my line, one of the Prīmulī, and if you look at time in a linear fashion, I have been in existence for eons more than anyone can even count. I have seen the beginning of the current universe, of this galaxy, and many others. I saw the Exodus to Azul and I saw the fall of Earth. I have travelled to the furthest reaches of space, not limited even to this, what you call the Visible Universe. I have seen the rise and fall of magnificent empires, and some not so magnificent. I am an observer and a corrector, a teacher and a companion - and might I say, I really do think the stars are beautiful at night?”
     Max gave Draagh an incredulous look, and then noticed he was still holding the bottle of Glenfiddich in his left hand. Looking back at Draagh he said, “OK, so you are super old, have seen a lot of stuff and you saw the fall of… whoa, wait… you know what happened here?”
     Draagh gained a whimsical expression, his blue eyes twinkling in the firelight. Taking a small puff off his pipe, he lightly cleared his throat and said, “Yes, the fall of Earth. Quite tragic, really, but it could not have been avoided. No, no, no. That was a certainty. The only reason you stand here today is because one of your ancestors took a job with a certain corporation, and then ended up on an Exodus barge. In fact, if he would have gone out to coffee with a certain girl he fancied he would have left his phone at home, by accident of course. Then he would not have answered when a call came in for him to look into a particular job.”
     “A job? Where?” asked Max.
     “At a bar in the city of Pasadena, California.”
     “Huh?” mumbled Max, unable to make a connection between a bar and being on an Exodus barge.
     “My son, all things are interrelated. If your ancestor had not taken that job as a bartender, that is, one who prepares alcoholic beverages for guests, he would have never worked the happy hour shift and befriended a top executive at a particular company - a company, by the way, that was eventually purchased by a major corporation in the consortium that eventually developed the fleet of barges. Once this man’s company was purchased, there was need for a senior level computer ops manager, and as your ancestor was educated in this discipline, he obtained the job, thereby unknowingly securing his passage on a barge during