To whoever’s out there, still looking for me, I’m telling you now that you don’t need to. I know stepping into that wormhole and not coming out the other side gave you guys a scare, but trust me, I’m doing all right.

Where I am now is hard to describe. When my ship got stuck inside the wormhole, something interfered with my controls and sent me spinning, I went unconscious then woke up here. I’m existing between space and time, or maybe outside of it – again, it’s hard to describe. I lost my body somehow during the transition. It’s as though my mind is floating on nothing, not that this is necessarily a bad thing, it’s just … strange. Even with my lack of eyes I can still tell that there’s a lot of light here; and that it’s coming from everywhere. Where I am is just white, pure brightness. No matter how far I travel, all I “see” is white.

But I’m not alone here, there are other beings here. And from the questions I’ve asked them and the questions that they’ve asked me I came to know that they live here, or have anyway for a very long time, or no time at all; as I’ve said, time doesn’t exist here. 

Anyway, these beings aren’t touched by time and space and as such we found it difficult to communicate with each other. Me, a being who was used to living linearly – one moment at a time – talking to these … consciousnesses (that’s the best way to describe them) who live collaterally, every moment all at once. Even talking is the wrong word to use because talking takes time and implies conversation. We shared with each other is more accurate. We shared our experiences, our emotions, our thoughts, ourselves. It was an … out-of-body experience.

When we first shared with each other – and there were a number of them – I could feel their doubts about me, I could feel their fear, not understanding what I was. I was the first creature they ever met that experienced time differently than them.

I could also feel them wanting to kill me.

No, kill isn’t the right word. Destroy. I could feel them wanting to destroy me, destroy me for the crime of trespassing where I don’t belong. 

But I also shared with them. They could feel me wanting to live, they could feel me wanting to get back to my ship, they could feel me fear for my future. That last feeling caused them to pause. They had no concept of the future. What was it? I tried to tell them as best I could. And although I didn’t do a good job of it, I did do good enough to convince them to let me continue my existence. Keep in mind that this happened all at once, in the space between time, between perception. 

Since then, we’ve had a number of interesting conversations. I explained to them that even though, as a human, I live linearly we still have memories of our previous actions. They didn’t seem to understand why so I explained that we use these moments from our past to influence our decisions in the future, and that our past also influences who we are in the present. For example, a son who had a loving father would grow up to be more trusting than one without. 

Mostly though, they were fascinated by the games we play, baseball especially. They just didn’t get them; they didn’t understand the concept of a game. I told them that games are fun for us because we couldn’t know their outcome. They were enthralled, they had never before considered that living linearly could be a good thing. They squeezed me for every last drop of knowledge I had concerning games. 

But I’ve gotten off topic. The purpose of this message is to inform all of you, back at Experience 8, that I won’t be coming back, and please don’t come in looking for me. I’ve discovered things while I was here. Things about my future, your future, the future – it’s all the same – that have changed me. I’ve already experienced and am experiencing all of time, and I can’t come back. 

Every moment I’m here feels as though I’ve been asleep for a very long time and have just now woken up, with everything I’ve seen, everything that I now know, just being something that I had dreamed. Every moment is an exhilarating rush of knowledge; I now understand how conscience works, so that’s nice. I understand how everything works actually. I know how dogs talk to each other, I know how our brains turn electricity into taste, I know that it was the very act of me throwing out this message that caused me to get stuck in the wormhole, and I know that I’m still going to do it again, that I have already done it, that I am doing it, right now. 

Please understand that I can’t come back. Tell my sister that I love her, and that I wish I had asked her more questions; now that I know everything she knew, I realize what an idiot I was. Tell my friends at the station that I miss them and that they’ll never figure out how Dan’s been stealing extra ice cream from the kitchen every Tuesday – don’t worry Dan, your secret is safe with me. And tell yourselves that … tell yourselves that the future is still there. No matter what happens to you, no matter the horrible things you face, the seconds will turn to minutes, the minutes to hours, the hours to days, and eventually the future will be upon you. And whatever was hurting will hurt just a little less, and a little less, and a little less, until it doesn’t even hurt that much anymore. 

Know that the universe is alive, and that it cares about you. Know that happiness, true happiness is attainable. Know that you will explore all of the stars and never run out of things to question. And know that you – you – will do great things. So, just don’t give up yet.

Yours in totality,

Maitreya

P.S. To the all of Experience 8, I love you.