1.

‘’On this day, we have gathered here to mourn Gerald Scant and to honour the memory of the remarkable man he was. He was loved by many, and admired by many more. As we come together in this sad moment, we shall not weep his death but rather celebrate his life. Gerald’s work will forever live on and be taught through science and even history books many years from now. His breakthrough will be the talk of the century. Gerald’s legacy shall pave the way for many aspiring generations to come.’’

‘The soul will forever carry on’ is what Gerald had always said, and he made sure they were his last words too. This had to be the funeral of the ages, for not only all loved ones were present but also all of his colleagues and admirers. The entire funeral parlour was filled with sadness. Everyone shared a deep strong loss and was filled with remorse.

Everyone, except for one attendee: his only son, David Scant. David was filled with anger. He could not believe what he was seeing. An entire funeral dedicated to the oh-so-great Gerald Scant. What a joke, he thought. All these lab coat extras did not care about the man himself at all, but only the work he achieved. Gerald was miserable, and the only people in the world who knew were his wife and his son. David knew because he too, grew miserable over his father’s obsession.

A scientist with wisdom and wit greater than anyone could possibly dream of achieving. A scientist so brilliant, and yet for the past 10 years no one could place a finger on what he was ‘wasting his time on’, as many liked to say. People always had something to say. Rumours had it he burned out after his latest publication on ‘Comatose Communication’ that led to his fame. Other rumours had it he had gone insane, and yet most rumours seemed to believe he was working on his next big breakthrough.

Gerald was a neuroscientist. In all his years of practical work, he focused on discovering a pathway to communicate with the subconscious mind. Or rather, transfer consciousness to a certain device or object. ‘Comatose Communication’ was his major milestone. The publication was on the discovery of being able to communicate with comatose patients. Unfortunately, there was still no accelerated way of full recovery, but being able to communicate with the patient was Gerald’s main concern. This could lead to many more discoveries, and help uncover certain mental illnesses. If a person is able to communicate from within the deep unconsciousness, then a doctor can trace back the root of many severe neuroses.

However, after the publication and his first big breakthrough, Gerald disappeared from the media entirely.

2.

The funeral service had ended traditionally with a distribution of Gerald’s will. This upset David even more, as all he got was a big pile of money for paying off his college and a letter that only he was allowed to read.

David looked up to his dad like no one else did as a kid, he was his biggest fan and always listened to his stories attentively with his ears wide open and his eyes filled with wonder. Only in David’s early teens, did his dad’s obsession start. Because of his upbringing, David started studying neuroscience himself with the main goal of following in his father's footsteps. Now the main goal that kept David going was to be as close to his dad as he was growing up. He worked his ass off with only one objective in mind: working together with his dad and achieving greatness as a team.

Every night in the years before his death, Gerald would not come home before 10 p.m. David saw his father decay years before anyone else did but could do nothing to stop him. All he could do was try to understand him by working hard, and graduating so he could explore his field of work and possibly help him.

Now that his dad had passed away, all those years of hard work seemed to be in vain.

David did not feel like reading the letter just yet, for weeks after the funeral all he could feel was anger. His mother, Anne, was suffering just as much. Both had realised that nothing had changed, his definite absence almost felt like a relief. They did not have to wait anymore for him to come home, and they did not have to be afraid anymore for the exact phone call they received last week. They knew that his work would mean his downfall, the only question was when.

But as they all say, life goes on. Money was not the issue, it never was. The inheritance was sufficient enough to provide for David and his mother until the end of their days if they did not live too luxuriously. But neither of them found any comfort in this.

The Scant family, now consisting only of David and his mother, live in a lavish apartment overlooking the Harbor in Boston. They moved here when Gerald started attending more prestigious fairs, expos and conferences. This was approximately a couple of years before his big publication. David was 12 years old, and his biggest worry then was leaving his friends behind. His mother was a social worker, so moving was never an issue for her considering the immense scarcity of social workers in America.

Weeks after Gerald’s passing, Anne started working again in a nursing home. Money was never an issue but finding purpose, when all the money provided for you, was. Anne found meaning in taking care of others. Unfortunately, taking care of the people closest to you is often more challenging than detached patients. She never blamed herself for what had happened, but always felt like she could have done more. Anne lost the feeling of being needed at home, so she found it somewhere else.

David was not ready to continue his life just yet. He could not handle the pity treatment. His classmates did not necessarily address his sorrow, but they treated him differently. Every act of kindness towards him felt motivated by another cliché headline regarding his father. Most of them did not even know that Gerald was David’s father before his death, as he always tried his best to keep that under the radar. He did not want any special treatment because of his background. No matter how much he looked up to his dad, David was determined to make it on his own, without taking advantage of his father’s image.

3.

Before moving on, there was one thing David had to do: tackle his curiosity. This also meant tackling his fear. There was still an unopened letter left on his desk. A life-changing one at that.

David walked up the stairs as slowly as he could. Every step he took weighed more than the last one.

Thoughts started racing through his head like a bullet storm.

‘What if the letter is just a piece of sentimental crap to excuse his absence?’

‘When did he write this letter in the first place?’

Would it just be a basic template ending in ‘’I love you’’?’

‘If he wrote this letter recently, was he anticipating his death?’

But most importantly:

‘What if the letter does contain the truth on what my father has been doing for the past decade, will I be able to handle what I read?’

When the last question seeped through to his mind, David changed his pace and ran up the stairs, ripped apart the seal of the envelope and folded out one single handwritten piece of notebook paper.

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Dear David,

Let me start this letter off by saying I am sorry. I have been absent for a big part of your life, and for this, I take full responsibility. I have hurt you and your mother for too long, but I will make up for it, starting now.

I regret the pain I caused you and your mother, however, I am not sorry for the way I decided to end my life. Yes, I decided to end it voluntarily. The ambulance workers have found me with a neuron transmitter attached to my head. As the only documentation on the project is stored in a place only you will visit, it will have looked like a failed experiment. No, it was not an accident, it was not an overload in voltage of an experiment and it was most definitely not heart failure or seizure from work-induced stress as many articles shall state and speculate on.

My passing is not without purpose. For the last decade, I have been working on the transcendence of human (sub)consciousness after one’s death. After succeeding in communication with comatose human beings, my next pathway was lit up in front of me. When I started this project, I knew it would result in my demise. It was a sacrifice I was willing to make, for the greater good, but I was only ready to make it after complete certainty of the experiment's outcome.

Of course, this has still been a gamble in the end. But understand this son: in the very high probability that I succeeded I am not entirely gone yet.

This will most likely come as a shock to you, which is why I am asking you to face the truth whenever you are ready. Take all the time you need, but as soon as you have taken that time I want you to come and ‘collect’ me. Considering my closest colleagues will still be using my lab, they will be present during the daytime. So I am asking you to set out after midnight. You will find the keys to my lab in my old ragged leather coat, which I hope your mom has not thrown out yet.

To disable the alarm, enter the code 117532. Below my desk, where I was found, you will find a button disguised as a piece of gum. It will also feel like gum, but fret not; it is not gum. Press this button thoroughly to open a hatch on the floor. In this ‘secret compartment’ you will find a pink and (hopefully) glowing crystal.

If things have worked out the way they were supposed to, I will be able to explain the rest soon enough ‘in person’.

Tread lightly son, but do not go gentle into that good night because I know you will be able to continue and shine light on my life’s work.

Love – Dad.

4.

After every word had been read over 20 times, the note was spotted like a cheetah with tears.

David could not believe what he read. ‘’He was willing to make that sacrifice?’’ David yelled. ‘’A sacrifice mom and I had no choice in at all?!’’

David thought it was the most selfish thing his dad had ever done, even worse than the shallow amount of time he spent with his family. It felt to David like he had been rereading the same fiction like he was part of some practical joke. He was even angrier than before. But he had to find out. He had to believe in the off chance that his father actually had succeeded in his madness.

So the following night, he ventured out. He waited for his mother to fall asleep, not go to bed. After finishing her shifts, she went to bed immediately anyway.

The day seemed to stretch into the night, but luckily for David, nighttime finally fell upon him. David reached for the keys in his dad's horrendous old coat and closed the door softly behind him. He grabbed his bike because the car would make too much noise. It would take him at least 45 minutes to an hour to get there by bike, but he couldn’t be cautious enough.

He finally arrived at his old man’s lab, shaking with impatience. He dropped his bike in the pathway leading up to the door and jammed the key straight in. David rushed to the alarm threatening to go off, and quickly entered the code. Everything seemed to be going well thus far.

David walked straight towards his dad’s desk, which he remembered all too well from when he was still allowed to visit, and reached for the button underneath. The desk was still left untouched, for his closest colleagues were not quite ready yet to start getting to work on what had happened. They were also not quite ready yet to suffer the same fate.

The oh-so-great-but-chaotic Gerald did not tell his son that there would be more than one piece of gum stuck to the bottom of his desk. He also did not tell him that only one of them was a disguise. After fiddling with at least 3 pieces of gum without any hatch opening, he went onto the fourth. This one he also pressed rapidly like the last few pieces, again without any expectations. But just before giving up hope, a dull clunk noise came from below his desk. David saw the hatch on the floor open up ever so slightly and knew that he had to remove the tile himself.

Upon removing the tile David was shocked. There was a bright pink glowing crystal connected to a whole bunch of wires. The wires were concealed so neatly and were connected to the metal armrest of his father’s chair. No one would have suspected a thing.

David was scared of touching the crystal, afraid that it might be the exact thing that led to his father’s death. But if he had to believe his dad, he had no reason to be afraid.

David hesitantly laid a single finger on the crystal and felt familiar energy surge through his body for only a split second. He jumped up in his father’s chair but was surprised to find that nothing had happened. After finally catching his breath, it was taken from him again instantly by what happened next. He reached out for the crystal again and now touched it with the entire palm of his hand.

‘’David! David, is that you?’’

‘This is it, I am officially going insane’ David thought to himself, but decided to play along anyway.

‘’Dad? What kind of sick joke are you playing?!’’ David blurted out while letting go of the crystal, but received no response.

He reached out for the crystal a third time, now picking up the glowing cartoonish perfectly symmetrical glimmering shard. It was just barely the size of a litre water bottle.

‘’David, hold onto the crystal, please’’ said ‘The Crystal’.

‘’This is not happening, this is NOT happening.’’

‘’Son, please calm down. Sit back, relax, take a breather. It is happening. I take it you’ve read my letter? That also means you have read what is supposed to be happening. What I have done, will change the future for good. However for that to happen, I need your help. In other words; you are going to change the future for good.’’

‘’What does this all mean? It does not make any sense at all! You sound like my dad, and for some paranormal reason you feel like my dad, but here I am speaking to a crystal!’’ David said while putting the crystal down again.

“Stop! Do not put the crystal down for now. I am only able to communicate with you upon direct contact. This is the one thing that did not go as planned, but we will find a solution together. However, it is me, your father. I will explain everything steadily along the way, but for now, I need you to listen.’’

David agreed silently, all while questioning his entire life at the same time.

‘’As you have read in the letter, I have been working on directing and preserving human consciousness after one’s death. After 10 long years, I have achieved the unthinkable. I am ‘living’ proof of the outcome, my experiment has succeeded! Now, it is not over yet. In fact, it has only just begun. This is where you come in. I will try my best in my current form to quickly bring you up to speed on my theories, findings and results of the past 10 years that I was not able to share with you before. Afterwards, I will instruct you on how we will continue this ever-lasting revolutionary project. But firstly, and most importantly: how are your studies going? Have you been able to keep up after my death?’’

A bolt of rage now surged through David's body after he heard his father speak so casually of his passing.

‘’How could you possibly ask me that? How could you ask me this casually how I dealt with my father’s sudden death? And even worse, how could you possibly assume without a single conversation or discussion that I would take up the work that led to your sudden death? I’m not having it at all. You hurt me, Dad, and not only me but also Mom. You left an entire world wondering where you were, and here you are telling me as a fucking crystal to pick up where you left off?’’

… The Crystal remained quiet. It almost seemed to darken. David thought for a split second he had been imagining his father’s voice after all, and then after a while, it lit up again.

‘’Son, I truly am sorry. Sorry for the way I treated you and your mother. Sorry for all the secrets I have kept and the lies I have told over the past years. But this project I have been working on, no, this cause I have been working on is greater than you, me and the entire population of mankind combined!’’ Gerald preached.

‘’Give it some time, please just consider it. I want you to see what I have seen! To realize the essence of what I have spent the last 10 years of my life working on! Let me make up for all the time I have spent in this lab and not with you.’’

David contemplated his father’s offer. After a silence that was just long enough to be painful he responded. ‘’There’s not much else you can do now is there? That’s what you gambled your life on is it not?’’

Before Gerald could respond, David put the crystal in his bag and hurried towards the door. He slammed the door shut and left. Not without locking the door first though, he did not want any more rumours spread about his father’s half death.