They would have been disappointed. The opening ceremony of the FPCJ6 was not auspicious. Only fifty-five people attended, and the central ministerial committee consisted of only three individuals: Robert Burgundy, who thanks to the miracle of ophthalmologic laser surgery, was no longer bespectacled, Riverrain, who was now known as Butterflyhope the First, and the inevitable Jennie Ruptha, who would now and henceforth be known as the High Priestess Guinevere. Those who attended were handed a white slip of paper upon which the following was clumsily Xeroxed:
The event was held in a white tent in a public area, with organic vegetables and steel kegs of well drawn water served for refreshments. High Priestess Guinevere gave a short speech and recommended that the assembled purchase the new self-published book by the central ministerial committee. Entitled “The Traveler: the Revelations of Josef6”, it was a crudely bound softcover with Josef’s military insignia emblazoned in black against white under the title. The cardboard box containing one hundred and seventy five copies was empty by the end of the ceremony.The FPCJ6 is dedicated to fearlessly speaking the truth which has been revealed to us by the Traveler, Josef6, who came to our time in order to rescue us from the dark future in which he lives. We bless and sanctify his sacrifice and his bravery and seek to build our lives through his extraordinary story and teachings. We believe that by changing ourselves we can also change the world. Our beliefs, based upon the messages of the Traveler, are these few, basic, human truths:
1. The Traveler speaks the truth.
2. The Traveler has made his journey for a reason. There is no such thing as a coincidence. The revelations of Josef6 are a gift to this time period and must be honored.
3. In order to honor Josef6 and his courage, we must seek to change both our own lives and the lives of others in our time period by heeding his message and his warnings.
4. The existence of nuclear weapons and the use of war as an instrument of policy must be forever abolished if the future of the Traveler is to be avoided.
5. The political and spiritual leaders of our time have not fulfilled our political and spiritual needs. We look to the Traveler for guidance and not for the outdated and corrupted institutions of our time, which are leading us into the dark future which the Traveler has described to us.
6. We call upon the Traveler to reveal and make his presence known to us, his believers. If he chooses not to do so, we understand that there are reasons we cannot know or comprehend for his refusal and will continue to follow his teachings.
7. We support organic farming, sustainable economics and peace. We reject war, industrialism and social injustice.
8. We believe in the power of organized and dedicated people to make a real change in the world. We seek to make this change through teaching, love and faith in the words of the Traveler.
9. All people, time periods and universes are one and simultaneous. We are responsible not only for ourselves, our time and our universe, but for all the others to whom we are connected. We are them and they are us.
Following her speech, High Priestess Guinevere, newly christened, urged the congregation to join hands and recite her self-composed benediction, which had now been retitled “The Traveler’s Benediction”.
Only a single photograph remains of this founding moment. It was taken by Butterflyhope in the moments before she joined the assembled circle, bowed her head, and intoned the post-modern hymnal.
It shows a blissful group of perfectly ordinary people captured in a moment of transition. They are rising off their chairs, leaning awkwardly towards their neighbors, reaching out towards outstretched hands. They are dressed in the motley, disintegrated collage of styles so typical of the age. Jeans, dresses, scarves, blouses, shoes of all shapes and sizes, it was the amalgamation of the transcendent ordinary that is in frozen movement in this strange, ominous image. The only anomaly is the High Priestess herself, dressed completely in white, her strangles of brunette hair drawn back and tied in a bun above her forehead. The virginal robe touching the toes of her bare feet. She is already looking downwards, her eyes closed, her arms outstretched, palms turned upwards, prepared to receive the tentative fingers of her flock. Behind her is a raised dais assembled of stray, industrial stands liberated, perhaps, from the storeroom of a government welfare office or dissipated public school. Above it hangs a blue placard with yellow lettering. It reads: “WWJ6D?” in enormous red letters.
I obtained this photograph from the TimeLords message board itself, where the High Priestess had happily posted it along with a brief missive describing the elegant and moving proceedings. Many of her fellows posted their approval, along with frequent praise of the spiritual and aesthetic content of the ceremony she had described.
For myself, I relegated the image to the innards of my personal computer. To rest among the static electrons of the billion transistors, alongside my hundreds of files on the Voynich Manuscript. Pulsing in the silicon emptiness that was the perfect shadow of our own memories. Fragile and transient, there was no longer need for them. These blurred and unknown figures, reaching for each other around the impassive High Priestess, were stored forever among the atoms, waiting for the moment when they would be called upon again. To be gazed at in all their candid, deformed, inscrutable virtualness. While the rest of the world was examining, in the minutest detail, down to the anatomy of Armageddon itself, the wasteland of destruction ripped through the urban fabric, I was content with these strange, dancing ghosts.
It was two days after this initial meeting that the High Priestess posted again, informing the virtual assembled that the FPCJ6 were currently in negotiations for non-profit status and were applying for government recognition as a religion, or, as she put it, “legitimate spiritual movement.
Underneath her message was a link to a newly established website. Those who followed through the tear in the electronic architecture found themselves at a single page of text, showing various details and instructions for obtaining the soon to be self-published pamphlet: “Join the Travelers! How to start an FPCJ6 chapter in your community.”
