your studies.»
«Dad, I’ll only take a math textbook with me, that’s all,» Alcmen declared.
His father looked at him intently.
«I will probably agree with you, but you will be doing math from start to finish,» he said.
«Agreed!» exclaimed the son.
«What were we talking about?»
«The temple where the clocks of time were kept,» said the boy.
«Yes. It wasn’t quite a temple as we know it. I don’t know why it’s called that in legend because in reality, this temple was like our university. They studied sciences and kept track of time. I assume that they also had their own library, no worse than the Library of Alexandria. It’s strange that we don’t know what tools the inhabitants of the City of the Gods used to store information. I doubt they used clay tablets or papyrus given their level of development.»
His father thought again, only now noticing this interesting fact. «The absence of written sources… it probably proves that their level of development was not as great as the legend says.»
«Digital technologies,» Alcmen declared.
His father startled, as if he had been woken up.
«Why do you say that?» he asked.
«It’s very simple! Digital technologies leave no traces. Information is stored in the cloud,» explained Alcmen, surprised that his father hadn’t thought of the most obvious thing.
«Either I’m out of touch or you’ve grown up a lot.» The father couldn’t get used to the fact that his son was already grown up, in his mind he was still small. Sadly, this happens in life when parents rarely see their children. «That’s what an unclouded view does,» the father thought.
«Don’t worry, I’ll help you,» the boy encouraged him.
«That’s it, go to bed. We’ve clearly stayed up too long,» said the father as he looked at the ordinary wall clock. The clock’s hands showed one in the morning. They had never stayed up so late.
«What about the temple? I want to know everything about it,» Alcmen pleaded.
«We’ll go and find out,» the father said, ruffling his son’s hair and covering him with a blanket. The boy lay down on the pillow and closed his eyes. In his imagination, a majestic temple appeared, very similar to the university building in their small town. People walked in and exchanged information. They wore togas and sandals, like the ancient Greeks. He knew that the temple held time clocks, but as often happens in dreams, something kept getting in the way of reaching them. Sometimes a wall appeared in front of him, or he suddenly found himself not in the temple, but in the square, or someone started talking to him, explaining the principle of a spear. The boy tossed and turned, and the dream took a different turn. He calmed down and slept until morning.
Chapter 4: The Riddle of Time
The next day, when Alcmen woke up, his father was already gone. He had gone to the university.
Time stretched out very slowly, as it often does when you are eagerly waiting for something. It was his first trip, he had never been anywhere before. So the anticipation was both exciting and agonizing. He tried to imagine the journey the whole time, but he couldn’t, even though he had a very good imagination. «If only I had a time clock, with which I could control time, I would move time forward now and we would already be on our way,» the boy thought.
Alcmen got up and walked around the room, then sat down and sat for a while, then walked up to the window and looked out. Outside the window, everything was the same, he could see the edge of the library and the neighboring house, with bushes growing between them, where he sometimes hid when they played in the yard. «Nothing has changed, is there a place somewhere where everything is completely different?» he thought and looked at the sky. The sky was always different, whimsical clouds changed shapes and made you think. The color of the sky also changed all the time, and it allowed you to look at it longer without getting tired. «You can look at the sky endlessly, it never stays the same,» he thought, took a deep breath, as if something had already happened and it was impossible to change it.
The key creaked in the lock, and that meant only one thing – his father had come. Alcmen went out to meet him, but he had a rather tragic look on his face.
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«Are you so sad?» his father asked.
«That’s how it always is when you’re eagerly waiting for something. Time stretches as if it has stopped, but when you need to catch something, it flies by at the speed of light, and you can’t catch anything,» the boy philosophically remarked.
«Don’t worry. We’re leaving tomorrow,» his father announced.
«Hooray!» shouted Alcmen.
«We’ll have to travel for a long time, so we need to prepare thoroughly. First, we’ll take a plane, then we’ll take a train, and after that, we’ll be picked up by a car. And if we’re lucky, I’ll show you a sunset. They have amazing sunsets there.»
His father looked somewhere through the walls, a sweet smile appearing on his face. Alcmen looked at his father and smiled too. He had no idea what they would need for the journey. When you always live at home, you don’t notice such little things as a lack of certain items. Usually, those things are always in their places and can be easily used.
«What do we need to take?» Alcmen asked.
«Just the essentials, the rest will be provided for us there. The first container with our things has already been sent, and that’s actually very good. So, take some spare clothes and a toothbrush with you.»
«Great!» exclaimed the boy and ran to the bathroom but immediately came back.
«If I take my toothbrush with me, then how will I clean my teeth tomorrow?» he asked with a clever look.
«And that’s true. We’ll take it tomorrow, but for now, take the spare clothes.» «Alright.»
Collecting his things turned out to be not so difficult, just a little boring. And the thought kept swirling in his head that he would forget something. In the end, he took a spare set of underwear, a spare set of clothes, and placed everything on a chair next to the bed. And then he placed his math textbook on top.
Dad looked into the room.
«How are you doing?» he asked.
«Everything is great, but I don’t have a bag.»
«Look in the closet in the hallway, there should be my old bag, it’s just small and should be enough for you. Meanwhile, I’ll gather my things.»
The boy nodded and left the room. The big closet always seemed like a maze to him, it was always difficult to find something in it. It was the size of half the room, and if you wanted, you could get lost in it. Alcmen cautiously opened the door and, to his surprise, his father’s old bag fell at his feet.
«Incredible,» the boy whispered. He immediately closed the door, took the bag, and returned to his room. The items he prepared were still lying on the chair, as if waiting for their moment.
Alcmen opened the bag and carefully placed the items at the bottom. He could feel the importance of the whole process happening at that moment. «Maybe that’s what thoroughness is all about,» he thought, and tucked the bag under the bed. «That’s it, I’m ready. Tomorrow, I just need to take my toothbrush and that’s all.»
«Dad, I’m done!»
«Well done!» praised his father.
«Will you come? I want to hear about the Temple of Time, you haven’t told me about it yet.»
«Yes, I will soon. Do you