“Unencumber my mind with answers. Where are we? How did your predecessors construct all this with their limited resources? How many others are there? Have your people explored space? Colonized other worlds? What has humanity achieved over the last twelve million years?”

McEntyre motioned us down the corridor, his wife linking arms with Dharma. “You have so much to learn; for now we’ll begin with the basics—the equivalent of your first day in kindergarten. Where are we? Technically, we’re in a lunar cave system excavated beneath the Sea of Tranquility. As we discussed earlier, our ancestors were able to process water and air using the vast ice deposits found in the deeper caverns. Our marooned predecessors had seed banks and mining equipment, as well as the materials that were salvageable from the lunar shuttle. The historical records show that fifty-six scientists and crewmen survived the asteroid impact. How our predecessors built all of this involves million of years of history that pitted the challenges of living in near-zero gravity conditions with the greatest evolutionary adaptation since the first lobed-fin fish crawled out of the primordial sea onto land.”

We continued down the corridor, my curiosity burning. At the time I had been frozen, modern man’s intellect traced back a mere ten thousand years. McEntyre’s people represented twelve million years of scientific advancements. Their sonic weapon had made fast work of the crocodilian monster; our transportation from the Earth to Alpha Colony had demonstrated their ability to transport living beings. Even with their limited resources they had to have colonized Mars, Europa … Certainly they had visited other solar systems. And yet an unanswered paradox was in play—Why hadn’t the Alpha Colonists returned to Earth?

Specks of red, green, and white energy glistened like gemstones along the arched ceiling high overhead, glowing brighter as we approached the end of the corridor.

McEntyre continued. “Have we explored space? Colonized other worlds? And why did we allow GOLEM to rule the roost back on Earth? The answers are complex.”

“Simplify it for me. After all, I’m only in kindergarten.”

We had arrived at the end of the corridor and the double doors of a hotel suite. McEntyre nodded to his wife, who waved her hand along the wall to our right, causing a viewport to appear, the Earth still visible in the upper right corner of the glass.

“Robert, everything you see—the moon colony, the Earth, the stars and galaxies—all are part of the physical universe that came into existence with the Big Bang. Back in your time, quantum physicists asserted that the physical universe is merely one of ten dimensions—the lowest of the ten and the only one where time actually exists.”

“I’m familiar with string theory.”