In September 2011, I joined The TomorrowMen. I was extremely excited to join the band, and in a burst of creative excitement, I wrote this official announcement for SurfGuitar101. I'm reposting it because I'm proud of this story, and also my time in this great band. I genuinely enjoyed playing with Danny, Tony and Steve. And, let's face it, Danny is a musical genius, and I went along for a wild ride! We played lots of shows, recorded their second album "Futourism," and toured Europe twice. If you haven't heard The TomorrowMen, please seek out the recordings at Bandcamp.
• Chapter 401, Who is Lazarus Longfellow? •
Lazarus was sad. His friends had left, again. He didn't know if he would see them in two weeks or two hundred years. The scientists, however, would surely be seeing Lazarus again almost immediately. He was always there for them. He'd get their message, show up at the appointed place (and time), and suss out the situation. He'd have a ground plan ready for the T-Men when they showed up, so they could quickly execute their research and move on.
This recurring scenario had become the story of his very long life. How long? He didn't care anymore, the decades and centuries had become a blur of boring politics, wars that solved nothing and lovers who withered while he remained, eternally, the same.
Laz describes his first real meeting with the TomorrowMen crew as accidental. He was hunting wooly mammoth, when four men appeared from behind a bush. They were ridiculously dressed in what he would come to know as pith helmets and canvas clothes that were better suited to a swamp safari in the 19th Century. Clearly they were lost, but he didn't know yet how badly. They asked him if this was Africa, and he mumbled, "I don't know, maybe."
An odd green idol hanging around the neck of one of the men caught his eye, and he recalled that he had seen someone wearing the same thing years earlier, while watching a volcano explode. At that time, the man's clothes had matched his own.
Lazarus told the four men that he recognized them, but they said that was impossible, as they had never been in these parts before. He reminded them of the volcano and the shock registered on their faces..."How would you know about that? It happened almost one hundred years ago in a village far from here." said the leader, a man who introduced himself as Mycroft Eloi.
The last time Lazarus had told anybody his secret, he had been stoned, then drowned, and then burnt at the stake. When none of those tortures took, he escaped his village to explore the world, which was much bigger than anybody had imagined.
He decided to tell his story to the men, how he had outlived all of his family, and never grew grey hair, or felt a hunger in his belly. The madness didn't seem to scare them, and they whispered quietly amongst themselves for a minute.
Dr. Kilometers took something sharp out of his pocket, scraped Lazlo's skin, and disappeared in a green flash, only to return seconds later. "It took a few weeks, but I had his DNA analyzed. Very peculiar, he seems to have perfect telomeres, so when his cells are reproduced they are without error. Imagine that his whole body is made out of stem cells. It's like he is constantly cloning himself".
"He is, dare I say it," Dr. K paused dramatically, "Immortal!"
The man called Grommet X stepped forward, and told Lazarus to have a seat, what he had to say may make him dizzy. What a fantastic tale it was. They were time travelers, able to move about freely across the eons. "Scientists," he said, and another word, "Explorers," neither of which had any meaning to Laz.
Then an offer: "We need someone like you. Someone who can be here when we arrive, and help us with our cover so we can move about freely and unquestioned."
"To make sure we're not dressed like dandies in the Pleistocene," interjected Quark Parsec.
"We need to make our observations without disturbing the people we study. If anybody found out about us or our ability, it would cause great harm to the time continuum" continued Eloi.
Then Mycroft showed Laz a green idol (he called it a medallion) and put it around his neck. "When this lights up, it's us sending you a message. We'll tell you where we want to meet you, and what we need. Usually it's just some clothes or maps."
"Or guitar strings..." said the one called Dr. Kilometers. This phrase made no sense at all.
"And you must never tell anyone about us," intoned Skyles Angstrom with a measure of menace.
...So began the long working relationship between Lazarus (later Lazarus Longfellow) and the time traveling TomorrowMen.
For the Tomorrowmen crew, time was an exciting realm of exploration. Not so for Lazarus. Time equated abject boredom. He saw people make the same mistakes over and over. He had learned and used every sure fire pick-up line. He amused himself with current technologies. He had and kicked every possible bad habit. He saw the world. He invested a few dollars in every possible stock and never sold-- he made billions (and, yes, the T-Men slipped him a winning Lotto number now and then as payment for his services).
Yet Lazarus Longfellow was utterly alone, unwilling to love again, and lay another to rest. His only excitement came when the medallion glowed green and coordinates appeared across the glass. Time, place, project. Laz flew into action, making preparations, travel arrangements, or learning a local language (sometimes the T-Men would give him 10 years notice!) He would show up and wait for them to appear, his old friends, including him once again in their scientific quest. On arrival, they'd be so familiar with him, as though they had just seen him, sometimes asking him about something he was interested in, but then remembering that it hadn't been invented yet.
Lazarus would try to guess how much time had passed in their world. Of course the scientist aged; he had seen them with full heads of hair and bald heads as well. Laz and the T-Men had grown close over the years. After the tests were finished and the notes compiled, there was drinking and mayhem. Bonding like brothers, and then they were gone again, often leaving him only with a bar tab and a hole in his heart.
It was around the year 1960, by man's calendar, that the original TomorrowMen arrived in Southern California to study beach culture, specifically the great advancement in design of women's swim ware, known as the bikini. (This was the all important time trek where Dr. Kilometers and Gromit X first met Mycroft Eloi, who was working in a guitar shop. See Chapter 368 for details.)Lazarus was there, of course to facilitate their needs, and provide sunblock for the ultra pale scientists. But, the T-Men were more interested in the indigenous music of the local teens, known as "surf music". They were infatuated with it, and began to study it almost exclusively. Their meeting with Mycroft had changed everything.
Laz had never seen them so passionate about any other subject. They learned to play the instruments and songs. They bought the records and clothes, they did the "Surfer's Stomp" at the concerts. They seemed to forget about their mission, and wanted to stay in this time. Lazarus mulled a diabolical plan.
The TomorrowMen eventually had to leave and report their findings to whatever agency paid the bills for The Chronolab. As always, they promised to come back soon, and they craved more surf music. Laz would be ready. Unfortunately, they couldn't return until 2007, and by then, much had changed on Earth. Societal devolution and advancements in technology had taken much of the joy and fun out of music, and surf music was all but forgotten, of interest only to a small, underground group of fans.
The T-Men were greatly saddened to see this when they arrived, and crest fallen, they vowed to leave as soon as possible. Laz had other ideas, and, quite literally, threw a monkey wrench into their plans, when he threw a monkey wrench into their time machine. It broke the Momentium tank, releasing all the precious fuel they needed to get back to their own time, the year 3000.
Mycroft and the crew were dumfounded when they saw what had happened, and yet, they never suspected their long time friend and crew member en honoraria was the culprit of the crime. He knew they were stranded, stuck, and not going anywhere until they could find Momentium, and element that wouldn't be discovered for a few centuries.
The T-Men were diligent in their research. They could not, however, work all the time, so they started playing their beloved surf music as a way to relax. Laz loved to listen to the group, and loved having his friends stay with him for an extended period. Eventually, two of the scientists, Quark Parsec and Dr. Kilometers had to leave to follow up Momentium research in other parts of the world, and the Tomorrowmen were in need of another guitar player.
Lazarus Longfellow's crafty plan finally came to fruition when Mycroft, Grommet X and Skyles Angstrom asked him to join their membership. He was incredibly happy, though his sickening greed gnawed at his gut. How long could he keep his black secret, while watching his friends toil away uselessly on their research?...
Stay tuned for the exciting next installment in the story of The TomorrowMen.
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