The Trinity

I looked at Evan. He was still laughing uncontrollably, and all he did was nod. I reluctantly stepped in. I irrationally began to fear for my life. Part of me was still convinced that I was en route to hell. It was a numbing feeling of acceptance. It seemed my life was over, for no real reason.

“Where are we?” I began to whisper. I was unable to speak clearly or loudly, and I began forcing myself to say it louder and louder: “Where are we?”

I was ignored, and Braxton was staring at Evan.

“Nanord, there is something you aren’t telling me, and I do not find that funny.” He said. I assumed he was addressing Evan in code, or something to that effect. Evan was still laughing.

“Thanks for that abdominal workout, Caine.” He said to me.

“You’ve been seeing and you haven’t said anything to me. We have been waiting for this for the past two thousand years and you didn’t bother to say a word.” Quite the exaggeration, I thought to myself.

“I wanted it to be a surprise!” Evan exclaimed, childishly. He was sort of mocking Braxton, and Braxton was fuming.

“Well clearly this is him—this isn’t a prank. The watch successfully communicated with the tip of his finger—this is him. How long have you known?”

“Welcome to the club, Caine,” Evan said, his laughter exploding once again.

“Nanord,” Braxton shouted. The elevator ride stopped—we were thousands of feet up in the air. We stepped out of the elevator onto the top floor. There was a railing and I could see the rest of the place—we were extremely high up. We began walking down the spiral stair case. Braxton tapped one of the steps, and they began moving. We were now on a spiral escalator.

Braxton looked at me.

“What compelled you to try on my watch?” Braxton asked me sternly.

“It was—cool. You guys were busy. It’s a cool watch.” I said. I realized just how stupid I sounded moments after I stopped speaking.

Evan and Braxton looked at each other and simultaneously exploded with laughter. Braxton’s stone face lit up, and then he nodded at me.

“Very well, Arnon.” He said to me.

“Who the hell is Arnon?” I said. I reached a point where all of this was too insane to be real and I figured I may as well enjoy this silly little dream—I didn’t feel any more fear.

The brothers looked at each other and burst into another laughing fit.

“We understand how strange this must be,” Evan said.

“We will explain once we reach the bottom floor.” Braxton said quietly.

“Why’d we go all the way to the top anyway?” Evan asked, irritated.

“I wanted to show him how high up my lab was,” Braxton explained. He was smiling.

Several minutes passed and we reached the bottom floor.

“This is my lab, Arnon,” Braxton said to me.

I glanced around. It was a long and spacious room, mostly made of metal. There were numerous drawers covering every wall—I didn’t know what was inside of them. Other than the drawers, the room seemed fairly empty.

Braxton pushed the button on one of the drawers, and it sprung open. He pulled out his white lab coat, and put it on.

“Here you will find the most advanced technology in all of Oakleaf—it is among the most advanced technology in the world,”

This was too vivid to be a dream. I was growing more and more anxious to wake up.

“It’s time we… properly introduce ourselves. Evan Hart is my civilian name, my true name is Nanord.” He said. That was what Braxton was calling him. It was pronounced Nay-Nord. Nanord.

“My name is Altaron Altmer,” Braxton said to me in his quiet voice, “Altmer is sort of like a modern surname—However, your and Nanord’s surnames have not been discovered yet.”

“But I prefer to be called Braxton, my civilian name. Something about hearing the name aloud makes me nervous,”

“Now it’s time we introduce you, to yourself. Your name is Arnon. Caine is only your civilian name—similar to Evan and Braxton.” I didn’t say anything.

Braxton walked over to a drawer across the room. I noticed all the drawers on the walls were numbered. This particular drawer was number 97. He pulled out a few papers and walked over to Nanord and I.

He motioned for us to follow him, and he seemed to be walking straight into the wall. He began rapidly tapping on his watch, and one of the drawers stretched into a door. He opened it. It was a very small room, with a long rectangular wooden table. An unlit candle was in the middle of the table. There were three seats.

“This will be the first time all three seats have been filled,” Braxton said quietly.

He set the documents down on the table. I waited for Braxton and Nanord to sit, and then had a seat myself in the remaining chair. It looked like an average dining chair, but it was the most comfortable thing I had ever sat in.

“It’s somewhat dark,” Braxton said to Nanord.

Nanord snapped three times over the candle and it was lit. I had seen enough strange things in that day. That particular occurrence seemed minor.

The room was lit up by the candle, and Braxton was studying the documents.

“Arnon, I am six thousand, one hundred, and eighteen years old.” Braxton started, “Nanord is two thousand, three hundred and sixteen years old.”

“I have spent the past three thousand years studying these documents, and have slowly but surely been translating what they have to say. They were documents I inherited six-thousand, one hundred years ago when all of this began. When I was eighteen,” he said slowly.

I glanced at the documents—they looked almost biblical. The writing was bizarre, it was almost reminiscent of old-fashioned Chinese writing, but it was much more bold and explicit. It didn’t look like it was written by human beings.

He pointed at one of the symbols.

“This means three.”

I nodded. He then pointed to the one next to it.

“This means kings. Three kings—it is a literal translation, so it is not completely accurate. These two symbols collectively mean what me and Nano refer to as the Trinity.”

“What’s the Trinity?” I asked.

“The Trinity consists of me, Nanord, and a third who has been unknown to us for all these years.”

“Til now,” Nanord said in a matter-of-fact tone of voice.

“You don’t mean—“ I started.

“Yes,” Nanord interrupted me,

“I am the seer. I have spent many hours here at this table, and I have been seeing you for the past sixteen years.”

I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t say anything.

“The seer,” I said, “What do you mean?”

“It’s a gift given exclusively to Nano,” Braxton said.

“A gift? Given by who?” I asked.

Braxton began chuckling.

“Fate,” he said, laughing.

“Essentially, if I spend enough time in this room, sitting at the table of fate I may be able to catch a glimpse of something—far off in the future. I have to concentrate, I have sat at this table silently for hundreds of hours at a time, doing nothing—just concentrating. Occasionally I will see something.” He explained.

“You were born on the fourth of April, sixteen years ago.” He said to me.

“How the hell’dja know that?” I asked nervously.

“That’s the first time I saw you—you were sitting at the café with us—you looked as you do now, and we were in our current form. I knew it was you. It was far--clearer that particular time than it ever has been. I have seen you occasionally ever since.” Nanord continued,

“It was clear to me that you were the third member of the Trinity. Braxton has been translating the texts he inherited very thoroughly, and you fit right in with the timeline.”

“I don’t—know,” I said, stuttering. Real eloquent, I know.

“I have two-thousand years on you,” Nanord said to me, “I know what I am talking about.”

“You look sixteen,” I said. I realize now that was a very stupid thing to say—I was speaking my mind. I didn’t understand anything.

“We take the form of teenagers for several reasons—for one, no one will expect us to be eternal beings in this form.” Braxton said.

“Plus it is a lot more fun,” Nanord said in his childish voice.

“Hypothetically, in some foreign realm where this bizarre dream is real, am I going to stop aging or something? Is that what happened to you guys?” I asked.

“No,” Braxton snapped,

“You are not immortal.” He said to me.

“This is a real cohesive group we’ve got going,” I said, “I’m gonna die in what? Sixty, seventy years? Meanwhile the two of you celebrate your six billionth birthdays, good god.” I said. I was getting pretty annoyed I suppose.

They burst out into laughter. I was confused. I was slowly coming to terms with the fact that I was not going to wake up, and I could not think of any other explanation other than the two of them were telling me the truth. But that isn’t why I was confused—the laughter was confusing me. I figured if anyone did spend any more time alive then what was orthodox, their sense of humor would be dead within the first five hundred years. Not these guys, though. I was extremely humorous to them.

“Not yet, anyway.” Nanord said, finishing Braxton’s sentence.

“Why not?” I began, “and more importantly, how are you immortal?”

Braxton blinked several times.

“We know you are the third piece. But there is always a chance that the third piece isn’t completely necessary, unfortunately. You will spend a considerable amount of time in our presence, until we come to that conclusion. After all, maybe this pair was meant to stay a pair.”

“A pear?” Nanord asked.

“A pair.” Braxton said.

“So a pear, like Aunt Judy’s pear tree,” Nanord said. They laughed a good twenty seconds over that. Such maturity from these elite, eternal beings.

I keep returning to that day—analyzing every moment of it. The day Evan Hart brought me back to his home. The day that I met Altaron Altmer and Nanord.