Our Present to the Future

After they left T.I.T., they walked a little ways more and discovered that there was also a Rhea School of Public Relations and a Barrett Center for the Arts. Futura told them that the Barrett Center was the locale of many school plays and artwork that heralded their greatest missions.

Traveling further still into the campus revealed the Martin Institute of Therapeutic Science and the Bryant Student Center, which Futura said housed the best cafeteria that side of the Big Dipper. She convinced them to go in for lunch, and they found that she was right. Kel couldn’t hold back her tears at the sight of her own legacy. “You’ve immortalized me, Winston. Not many women can say their husbands did that!” She kissed him, and no less than a hundred students and faculty members took out recording equipment to save the scene for posterity. The other men looked around and smiled. They kissed their wives too, and the recorders flew out again to tape all six couples in a simultaneous lip-lock.

“That rocked!” Peter exclaimed. “I wonder what they’d say if we . . .”

“Don’t even finish the sentence, Venkman!” Dana warned. P lau laughed and kissed her again. The recorders taped this as well. Peter smiled smugly, but he decided to behave.

Futura rolled her eyes and chuckled. “I promise you there’s gonna be a photographic art exhibit in the Barrett Center no later than next week titled something like For the Love of Pete, and none of these 30th century stiffs are gonna get why Morrow and I find that hilarious.”

A few courses and a few laughs later, they left the Bryant cafeteria to complete their tour. At the heart of the campus was the large student common. It was a massive paved circle with a series of walkways leading from the outer circle into the center. There was a well manicured lawn of deep cerulean blue grass growing between the walkways, and each of the mauve sidewalk squares bore the academy crest, a large shield with the two Ghostbuster company logos in each half. Beneath this shield was a carving of a scroll with the school’s motto “Non Timeamus Phasmatis” engraved upon it.

“What does that mean?” Kel asked Futura.

Egon smirked and answered for her. “It roughly translates ‘we ain’t afraid of no ghosts’ if one is rather liberal with the rendition.” They all laughed and smiled at each other.

Within the perimeter of the circular common at equal distance from each other stood twelve large statues . . . of each of them! Even the wives were depicted, aneir eir statues were positioned across from their husbands’ statues. There was a walkway leading from each statue to the center of the common, where there stood a fountain with a large statue in the center. If the fountain weren’t there, each person’s statue would have been connected by a walkway to their spouse’s statue. This fountain was lined with marble, and the statue at the center spilled crystal clear water into the pool at its base.

The central statue was of the six men, and they were all standing in a tight circle, each with one arm raised. They were reaching up towards a depiction of a weapon of some sort that none of them had seen before. When Peter asked Futura what it was, she told him that this was one part of their future that she would not be able to divulge.

Eddie shook his head and raked his hand through his hair. “It’s kinda weird that we’re treated with so much respect. I mean, this is all just too much!”

“Well,” Futura explained. “Although you were all vastly underappreciated in your own time, you wie ree revered after you pass on. Your efforts and the fruits of your labors havpeatpeatedly saved the world, even after your time, and will one day save the solar system, the galaxy, and one time, even the universe. Of course, by saying this will happen, I mean that all this already has happened by this time.”

Janine gave Futura a skeptical look. “The fruits of our labors?”

Futura chuckled. “Yes. You will, in lif lifetimes, lay down the foundation for the establishment of harmony between the living and the dead, and your teachings will one day lead to a better understanding of what lies beyond this realm for all of us.”

They walked on in silence, completely at a loss for words at the weightiness of their fate.