The mind is everything. What we think, we become.

- Buddha, The Dhammapada (625 B.C)

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Hank kept his gaze on Rio, while Milton kept his on him. With Rio glaring murder, the tension was palpable.

"Dots are Geniuses," Milton said again, for emphasis. "We make things happen. Some of us know that's what we do, without getting PEPed. Most unPEPed Dots live peaceful lives, but for some reason, when someone like us takes a PEP test and finds out they're a Dot, the whole world turns against them. Then they get very busy, it seems, making everyone's life unbearable."

Hank glanced from Rio to Milton and back. "Speak for yourself. I don't make anyone unhappy."

"Oh, but you do! You even make your own self unhappy! You've left the only job you've ever known, the one thing you still like doing. You've dismissed the only woman you've ever loved, without so much as saying hello. The girl you've pined over for years."

Anna, Hank thought sadly, looking down at the floor instead of at Rio. I dissed her instead of asking her out.

"You're miserable. She's miserable. The people who know you at Asok's, they're all miserable. You've been busy, Hank, making people unhappy."

Milton got to Hank. He felt like he should cry. He didn't though and, instead, he implored on scary Rio.

"But I didn't! I made them happy! People love coming to Asok's, and coming to see me! I really like it there!"

Rio icy composure broke a tiny bit. She parted her lips and wet them before taking a noticeable breath. Then, after adjusting her glasses, she turned back to stone.

Milton finished Hank's last thought. "And then you found out you're a Dot, and everything has changed. Life was great until the lucky lottery PEP test machine said you were a winner!"

Hank broke his suppliant gaze on Rio, and turned it towards Milton. He waited to be told by the man how to get his life back to good.

"I can help," Milton said. "I'll show you how to fix things, but you have to do it yourself. No one can do it for you. You'll get back all you've lost, everything and more! We're all Dots here, but Rio and I, we don't call ourselves that. Nobody who knows they're a Dot, and knows what Dots do, calls themselves a Dot. It's a buzzword the media invented to describe what happens to one of us if we take a PEP test.

"We're not Dots," Milton said to Hank's attentive face. "We're Others. Sometimes we call ourselves Reality Makers—or more aptly, RMers—or at least the Good Guys do. I'm not exactly sure what Bad Guys call themselves. Probably something cool."

Both Hank and Rio made a face at Milton's attempt at levity, with Rio managing afterwards to look even more hateful towards Hank.

Milton, as usual, carried on. "We make Reality happen, and not just for ourselves, but for everyone. Worldwide. The saying 'Life is what you make it' isn't fortune cookie advice—it's a gospel fact. Some people know how to make themselves rich, while some seem to barely scrape by. But either way, be they rich or poor, great Reality Makers make so much Reality for the whole world that we drown out the pittances of those who are less gifted. Our Realities stretch for miles, and affect millions of people. For hundreds of miles even. For cities. For countries. For continents."

Milton paused, expecting a response, but Hank only stared at the wall.

Rio adjusted her glasses.

"For worlds," Milton said. "We're kingmakers, Hank. The bearers of dreams."

Or Satan, Hank recalled.

"Or Satan's demons from Hell. The crusher of dreams. This is what Reality is like for us Good Guys right now, though. The PEP is pumping out unhappy Dots and, unknowingly to them, they've been spewing bucketloads of very unpleasant Realities that everyone else has to live in. All because some dumb machine—incorrectly, I might add!—told them they were losers.

"You may recall that PEP tests first gained popularity as a Western phenomenon. Asians didn't take them much, at least not right away. Even to this day, there's a stigma attached by many people of Asian descent towards getting themselves PEPed. But that trend is ending. Many Asians have taken the test, and some of them, of course, are found to be normal PEP Geniuses. And some of them are Dots."

Milton leaned back enough in order to rest his arms across the hardness of his belly. He stared at Hank intently before making his next point.

"And some of them, as my friend Rio attests, already know that they're Others. They know how to make things happen, and they're good at doing it. There's always been a smattering of Others throughout all of history, but recently, thanks to the Enlightenment, Others have become aware that Dots are just like them—they're Genius Reality Makers.

"And these Bad RMers? They don't much like us, Hank. They don't like the kinds of Realities we Good Guys want to make. They want the world to exist under the Realities they want to make. Realities like the caste system. Totalitarian regimes, rife with chaos and warfare, to subjugate the masses into servitude, for them to lord over."

"Hell on Earth," Hank concluded.

Rio inhaled noticeably. Milton sat in silence, until things began to get awkward.

"That's right," he said at last. "Hell on Earth, but especially Hell for us Good Guys. Bad Reality Makers want to kill all good Others, and everything we create. They want to destroy peace and civility. It's gone past ideology; way past simple zealotry."

Not a glint of happiness shone in Milton's voice. He no more wanted to say these words than Hank—nor Rio!—wanted to hear them.

"They're going to destroy us. They're going to unleash Hell. They will force the world to live in Hell on Earth."

Rio inhaled audibly, rattling on her breath, and then again turned to stone. After giving her a cursory glance, Hank spoke dismissively to Milton's chin.

"You say that like you know it."

"Oh, it's going to happen! Maybe it already has, and we just haven't noticed, in the happy little pocket of Reality where we live. But that's the way it is. That's what's Real right now."

For some reason, Milton smiled and, after a quick laugh, he boomed. "But we have some Hell of our own to give! Don't we, my Rio?"

He let out another laugh, causing Rio to break her unending glare at Hank. She glanced at Milton for a moment, then turned her attention back to the intruder.

She stands there like a vulture.

Milton boomed again. "Oh, she'll swoop in and carry you off like you're dead meat, my friend! Or maybe she'll bite off your head or pluck out your eyes, and leave you for the jackals! Right, Rio? Am I right?"

Milton grinned at Rio while keeping Hank in his line of sight. She didn't respond to his latest ribbing, although Hank thought she'd look nice if she smiled. Her lips were full, and he was certain that her smile, when she chose to use it, was very full as well.

He came to the conclusion that smiling didn't make Rio happy. And somehow, he assumed, knowing that fact about herself made her even unhappier.

He wondered if she could read his mind, like the way Milton seemed to be doing. Don't think badly of yourself. You're a pretty woman.

"And then there's me!" Milton boomed. "Look around! Have you ever seen anything as grand as all this, ever in your life?" He spread his long arms wide. "I've got everything! Everything!

"And I have Bumbles, too. Don't I, my boy?"

With that, the anime dog trotted back into the room. It jumped on the table where Milton sat, but with its back to the big man, staring happily at Hank.

"And do you know what Bumbles has?" Milton asked with a smile.

Hank felt sure he didn't have to answer in order for Milton to continue talking. But he did think of a few rude things to say, if he chose to say them.

"He has you."

Hank wasn't expecting that. He scoffed. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Milton put his merriment aside to become serious again. "Make no mistake about it, my friend."

You're not my friend.

Milton seemed to miss that thought as he continued undeterred. "Bumbles went out and found you. I Realed him up, you see, and I sent him to look for Others, and he found you. Only you."

He spoke in baby talk to the creature, saying, "We knew Hank was out there, didn't we, my Bumbles? Rio told us he was. Yes she did!"

Milton's childish behavior irritated Hank, especially with the dog-like thing making it another pair of eyes on him. This is too much weird, he thought.

"Okay, let me say something for a while," Hank said, before somebody tried reading his mind again. "You, you're a… a what? A Reality Maker? So is Rio? So am I, or so you say. But now, this dog—it's not real? You Realed it up? You made it?"

"Yes I did! Yes I did!" Milton repeated, answering both of Hank's questions as he cooed at his odd-looking pet. Then he got as serious as he'd ever been before. "And he found you. I made him with the sole intent of finding exactly you. Rio knew you were out there, and we needed to know who you were. We need you to know what we're doing here, and what we're up against."

Milton cast a cursory glance at the vending machine. "And to show you what kind of person you are. We knew you'd have to see for yourself what Genius RMers can do."

Hank eyes widened, while his chocolate colored eyebrows crawled further up his head. I did that, he said to himself while staring at the vending machine. He believed himself completely.

Milton's smile and benevolent eyes confirmed Hank's epiphany. "Apparently, we had to wait until you took your second PEP test before you could find us. Now, I'm going to tell you something, and I don't care what you think about anything else I've said. But you'd better believe this."

His voice regained the gravitas of a man of wealth and power. "There's a silent war going on. It's not coming. It's not out there somewhere else. It's right here, right now, and we are losing it. Maybe we've already lost, and we're too darn stubborn and short-sighted to see how bad things are.

"There are different kinds of Reality Makers, and each one of them is special in his or her own way. Some are really good at it, and some are only so-so. And some…" Milton tapped his index finger on the table next to Bumbles, pressing hard on the surface. "Some of us are great."

Milton looked straight into Hank's toasty warm, almond butter eyes. "What kind of Reality Maker are you?" Hank asked, matching Milton's gravitas as best as he could.

Milton belly-laughed. "Me? Oh, yes! I'm good! I'm a Good Guy, too! I can even Real stuff up, but my friend Rio won't admit to such. Now she—as another example—she sees things, near and far. She can see what RMers are doing, no matter where they are. She can even see what they're thinking about doing, or what they wish they could do."

Kinda like you, Hank purposefully thought towards Milton, who smiled broadly before continuing.

"She can see the Realities other people make, and stop them dead cold. A Reality Preventer, if you will, as opposed to a Reality Maker. That is why she's here. That's why she's staring at you."

"To stop me? To stop me from doing what?" Hank asked as he stared back at her with uncertainty.

"To stop you from doing anything! And, if need be, to crush you with a thought. Well, maybe a really focused, very hard thought thought. But she can do it! To you, to me, to anyone! She truly is a crusher of dreams!"

Milton heaved his great frame around to speak directly at Rio. "I don't think she likes you," he said as a glib matter of fact. "But Asian RMers don't much like any Reality Maker, right? I think we've covered that. So do not be in doubt, my friend. If she thinks you're a threat, if she thinks you're going to exert your Reality on us, on me or just on her, she'll destroy you. That is what she's good at. Crushing Others with their dreams."

Milton leaned towards Hank while still looking at Rio. He whispered loud, for comic effect.

"Don't make her not like you. Crushing Others may be the only thing that makes her happy." He leaned back in his groaning chair and spoke more pleasantly. "Besides, she's actually a sweetheart! I love her! Smart and dangerous! Wow! That's hot!"

Milton laughed at his joke. Hank did not, and neither did Rio. In fact, Hank was pretty sure that Rio's stony look broke for another moment, as she became annoyed at Milton's goofy antics. Only for a moment, though, and Hank felt he might be wrong. He smiled warmly at her, to see what would happen.

She didn't smile back.

Bumbles responded, though. He scooted on his butt a short distance across the table to be nearer Hank, looking happy with his cotton candy tongue hanging out, dripping spit.

Hank was strangely certain that Bumbles' breath smelled like bubble gum.

"People are going to remember us," Milton said in a serious tone.

You're quite some character.

"You have no idea who we are. But you will. There are three special people in this room, working together right now. People will remember us, despite your understandable denial of what's happening. They'll remember me and also Rio, despite her wishing with every fiber and bone in her body that the world would forget she was ever born."

Milton stood up and adjusted his finely tailored, extra-large dress shirt collar and tie. He stretched his neck and shoulders, causing them to pop loud enough to hear.

"Okay," he said. "Now, what if I told you I could help you get rid of those Dots you've got on your face? We'll have another soda pop later, and I'll show you how to do it."

It was weird how Milton liked saying things as if they were a fact. But he was right—Hank would face a room full of blank vending machines and scary Rios if someone helped him get these stupid PEP-dots off his face.

"Come on! Let's get some dinner, and new clean clothes for you, to freshen up a bit. You're a little too old to be sporting a slacker skater boy look, don't you think?"

Whoever this Milton guy thinks he is, Hank thought, as he found himself complying, he's good at what he does.

Rio walked alongside Hank as they followed Milton down the transverse hallway. The recessed light fixtures mounted high on the wall were lined with gold leaf foil, and the resultant glow was breathtaking in both warmth and comfort. Hank turned his head just barely enough, to peek an eye at Rio. She kept her gaze straight ahead, motivated and in control.

She is really something, Hank thought about the cute little assassin.

Aware of the fact that Hank was peeking, Rio pursed her lips and licked them, as they walked towards the estate's guest quarters.

With Bumbles tumbling along merrily at their heels.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It is said that Buddha—along with Aristotle—are the founders of Ontology; the philosophy of Universalism. One of the best things about Universal traits is they hold true at all times, and no matter what.

I wonder what they'd think of Bumbles. Does he possess the trait of Universal Dogginess?

I think he does. How about you? 🐶

The Book of LIBERALITY - Chapter FIVE

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