He looked back at her and grabbed her wrist. “You’ve come a long way in two decades. I’m leaving. You coming with?”
She looked up as if awoken from a spell. He was a fraud. He wasn’t rich at all. He only had a bag of gold. She was angry at the ruse, but then she considered the boredom and let her body relax as she followed his escape from the three. She knew he was trouble. She liked to avoid trouble. She wondered why she was letting herself get roped into trouble with him. Then she realized, part of her heart would always wonder and she wanted to know who he was.
CHAPTER 2
“It seemed ridiculous, at first, that he would lose his own freedom, his own life, just to save my life and ensure my freedom. Over time I came to understand.” -- from the Book of model KRY-1-CT-A1
“So you’re being changed, but you held out longer than the rest. Your family, your clan, they are strong.” Phillip said to her, knowing she couldn’t respond vocally, but he could hear her thoughts and reactions and that was good enough for him. “I’m sorry I am away sometimes. I try to get back as soon as possible. I suppose you know by now I can effect time, but the problem is that I effect it. Maybe it’s the solution. I am not sure, so I try not to mess with it. If I could stop what they are doing to you, all by myself, I would. I don’t know how. Yet.” Phillip stood and kissed her belly. “Blessings on your offspring. May she be as strong as her mother and twice the adventurer!” He knew she couldn’t move. He could hear her crying in his head. Phillip simply did not know what to do. He could tell she knew he did not have the answer. He looked at her and then he clicked.
He saw a man dressed in rags talking to another man on a porch. He concentrated on their thoughts. Then Phillip knew that it wasn’t Solstice, it was Stephen. He tried to think back to them, but they were concentrating too hard on keeping their conversation private. Phillip clicked again. “Illumna, I am sorry for your fate, but I need a favor…”
“I got it Phillip.” Illumna responds in his mind. “I agree. I’m with you on this, but you can’t think about it. Eventually they will realize what you plan to do. If Brian spent all of that time planning his move and yet somehow he’s assured himself that his own idea would fail, you can bet he will stop you if he guesses what you want to do.”
“So Brian is him?” Phillip asked.
“You already knew that Phillip. Just go with your gut. For now, you should click back to who you are thinking about. You can’t be here. Time is confusing, Phillip, but you’ll figure it out. I’m sorry for your fate.” Illumna thinks to him with more emotion than she has shown to others.
“I see. How will I learn all of this?” Phillip asks.
“It takes time. Be wary and don’t abuse your skill. Just because you can do a thing does not mean that you should. For me, I’ll see you soon. For the you that you are now, it will be awhile, but you will do fine, Phillip. You are brave, sometimes foolish, but overall, you learn quickly.”
Phillip clicked. Then he watched as the machines dosed model KRY-1-CT-A1 through one of the many tubes running into her body and out of it. He knew it could be one of several things, amino acids, hormones, etc. Some designed to get a reaction and some designed to repress other reactions. He knew now that Solstice was not the one doing this to her, but it was her mind that made all of this possible. He couldn’t hold back the hatred he felt for her, even if she wasn’t directly responsible. Then he considered how much Illumna had been involved. It was strange he made a secret pact with Illumna. He had heard Illumna’s mind and knew how deeply she loved Solstice. That love that was immortal. He considered moving forward in time to see if his actions had a good or bad effect. He supposed that Solstice had done that often. The problem was, it didn’t mean much. With all of his family line and those of the other family, he realized that what he saw did not mean that was what would happen. They could change it. He also realized that his quest to take out Stephen was a bit hypocritical. Stephen planned on stopping the changes. Phillip couldn’t be against that, he was against the way in which Stephen planned to make that happen. If just one of them went back and farted, there would be a tsunami of change in which way the wind blew for the next few thousand years. Considering his own thought, Phillip made a choice to be far more careful about clicking in time.
CHAPTER 3
“I was bored. I needed him at first. Otherwise, despite my uniqueness, I would have withered. In the end, I loved him more than any other aspect of life. Being with him was even more important than breathing. He is more than he will accept. He knows this, in some ways, but not in others. I exist to help him more than he exists to help me. Yet, he gives every second of his life to help me. That’s him and why I love him so deeply.” -- from the Book of Tomorrow
She followed him as he climbed, but she noted he was very fast and very agile. He didn’t look like he had that in him. She thought about his age. How could he be so old? There were many mysteries about him, but she had to stop thinking about it so she could follow his moves. She was learning new ways to move, quickly, by watching him. She also noted that he would pause when she made a mistake. Why would he care? Wasn’t his goal to get away? If anything, her being caught would buy him time. She knew he knew that. She had certainly learned he was smart. Then she watched as he leaped upwards grabbed a pipe and propelled himself onto a further structure that was higher than the one they had surmounted. She froze in panic. She looked at him trying to pleas with her eyes for an answer as to how he did that. She didn’t expect one, but she turned to look behind her and knew she had to figure it out or face the consequences of following him to begin with. She leaped and grabbed the pipe, but she simply hung there. She knew she had missed something in what he did. She was about to resign herself to her fate when she watched him leap back down to where they were. Then he leaped up and grabbed the pipe and holding on next to her he motioned with his hand. It was kind of a whooshing motion. Then he leaped back down to the original spot again. She started to think he was crazy. Why wouldn’t he just escape? Then she watched as he leaped and grabbed the pipe and propelled himself to his previous destination. She looked at him and shook her head to mean no. Then she let go while aiming herself at their previous location. She looked back to him with a look of dread, but also acceptance of her fate. In her eyes, she wanted to tell him she wished him luck. Instead of continuing on, he dropped back down next to her. Now she was sure he was crazy. Any lead they had gained was lost and any moment they would be onset by the very things they were trying to get away from. Why was he so insistent on dying today? She would survive. She wouldn’t like the terms, but they were sure to kill him.
He spoke, “The way you got back here is the way you get up there.” He pointed to where he had been.
She didn’t understand. He moved his hand in a cradling motion. “Have you ever seen a grandfather clock?”
She looked at him, “I’ve never met my grandfather. What does that have to do with how you did that.”
Without a lot of patience, given the scenario, he explained quickly, “Let your body flow with the motion as you grab the pipe. Then as it begins to echo back, use your legs to create force in the opposite direction and upwards more. I’d say, ‘like a swing’, but you don’t know what that is either. However, you’re pretty fast and rather limber, so I don’t think it will be much of a challenge for you. Just trust in yourself.” Then he grabbed her butt and pushed her upwards.
She grabbed the bar, felt the motion away from her destination and then at the moment when she realized it was as far from where she wanted to be as possible, she pushed out hard with her legs and twisted her body to aim at the destination she had seen him accomplish. She got close, but now the situation was far worse. She was dangling over a long drop. Her eyes were wide as she thought, “Yeah, I learned a few things. Don’t follow strangers, don’t try to rip people off anymore, don’t try to learn how to move from strangers you’ve tried to rip off.”
She stopped looking down because it was making her woozy so she looked up and she saw his hand reaching down as he said, “Pretty good for a first try. Now, we have to move faster.” He pointed at where she had continually retreated to and she saw how many were standing in that very spot and looking angry and frustrated at her. Then she felt herself pulled up. “I’m not kidding, let’s go, NOW!”
She didn’t need to think about that. She was ahead of him now. Her fear turned back to the terms under which she would live if they did catch up to them. He smiled at her while watching her buttocks power into the run. Then he caught up to her, grabbed her by the arm, grinned down at her and clicked.
Her pupils shrunk so small it was hard to tell she even had pupils. He looked at her and put his hands over her brows. “I know you’re not used to the sun. However, thank it for existing. Even down there, we couldn’t exist without it.”
“How?” She looked around but not too hurriedly as she noted that he was shading her eyes and that it made it possible for her to see, but what she saw made no sense. Instead of trying to take it all in she looked at him, “I was running, that was an instant ago, now I’m here. What happened? Did I fall?” She played the last few moments back in her head and her last memory was of him grabbing her by the arm.
“It’s a lot to explain, but they’re probably wondering where we went.” He laughed at himself. “Okay look, out there. Do you see those two on that ridge?”
Her eyes still hadn’t adjusted but she could see the two figures he was point at. Then she watched as his finger moved and pointed to a small dot. She focused on it and realized that was what the people before her mother’s time ate. But it was alive and it was moving. Then he tapped her shoulder and pointed up in the sky and her eyes were pierced by the sun. He tapped her shoulder again, with impatience so she tried to focus. Then she saw a small dot moving slowly through the sky. She turned to him and asked, “Is that a bird?”
He laughed. “Yes, they’re real. Things in the universe tend to find way to use advantages other things haven’t. Birds are real. That bird is a hunter type. Its advantage is seeing really well from up there and having wings strong enough to pull it out of a dive.”
“And the other thing?” She asked.
“Hmm, well it’s called a rabbit. That doesn’t well explain what you are watching.” He pointed back to the two figures looking down at the rabbit. “Consider those two. They just met, but they have the same focuses. Right now they are distracting each other by discussing the rabbit.”
“Why?” She asked.
“Wasn’t it you who just realized that in the old days that was food?” He inquired.
“Yeah, I…wait, how did you know that? I didn’t say that out loud!” She began to feel like she wanted to pull away from this man, but then she realized she didn’t even know where she was and all of her experience was useless up here. In the city, she would have had him dealt with, but here, she knew nothing. Then she recanted that thought, looking down at the rabbit. She wondered how people ate it, then she wondered how it would taste.
“See, now you’re distracted by the rabbit too.” He grinned, then he said, “I can take us back if you want. Or we can sit here and watch how this plays out. If we do that, don’t interfere, please.”
She again found herself more interested in the mystery than the awkwardness of her situation and she watched with him. Then she saw one of the men move in an odd way. She looked up and saw the bird change direction. She noted the rabbit froze in position while so much began to happen quickly.
He reached over and touched her arm and they were on the edge of a cliff. He looked at her, “We’re back to now. I suppose that’s one way to explain it. So what did you see?”
She looked at him dumfounded. “I don’t know. How are we here? Did I fall asleep with all of that going on?”
“No. Look at a rock, pick any rock.” He folded his arms as he made his request.
She had no idea what he was referring to, but he had put the thought in her head and she saw a rock. Instantly she felt his hand on her arm again. Then she looked. Desert. Then she looked down. They were standing on the rock she had seen. She looked up at him, but he shook his head and said, “Pick another rock.” She couldn’t help but note another. Then she again felt him touch her and she looked down. He pointed at the rock they were previously on. “I do hope you don’t miss it.” He grinned. She still didn’t understand. However, now she was determined to.
She looked at another rock and up at him before he touched her arm and said, “One”.
He looked at her marveling in her logic. He knew she said that out-loud to see how fast it happened. He watched as he looked down at her feet, as per usual. Then he clicked to a rock close by and said to her, “Are you seeing how this works?”
“Not really, but I am guessing it has to do with my grandfather.” She stepped off the rock and moved to the one he was standing on. “Can you do that whenever you want?”
Chuckling he replied, “Do you know what a clock is?”
Sheepishly she looked up and answered, “No. I’ve heard the word, but I am not sure what it means.”
He stepped down off the rock and put his hand over her shoulder as he pointed at the sun. She tried to follow where he pointed, but she didn’t know how he could look at it. It was far too intense for her. She tried. She wanted to understand.
He said, “That is the sun. We are on a planet. It rotates, umm spins, and we are all on it, but we don’t feel the spin, although it is rather fast. That doesn’t mean because we don’t notice it, that it doesn’t spin. If you and I were not on this planet, but could see it we would see that it’s true.” He took a deep breath while she thought about his words and then he continued. Now as the planet we stand on spins, it also rotates, umm, circles that.” He pointed back to the sun. “That’s where we get heat so it’s important to us. If you’ve ever stuck your hand in ice, imagine that feeling all around. The longer your hand is in the more painful the lack of heat is. That is what we would not be able to overcome if it were not for that sun.”
She listened intently, but she isn’t sure how much she understands. She does understand the spinning thing he said, but she can tell he doesn’t think she does. “So if we were seeing ourselves from someplace else we’d see us move?”
“Ahh, good.” He looks at her realizing she learns very quickly. “Okay so here’s the funny thing about that sun, it’s called Sol. So we call the entire workings a Solar System. However, it’s in a galaxy so the sun is also being whipped around the center of that. Just as that galaxy is whipped around by the universe.”
“I appreciate you teaching me new words and all, but I get the point. First, you taught me how to propel myself, then you showed me how things interact and compete for resources. That I already knew, but watching that was interesting. Then you pretty much showed me that minds can be heard and somehow you can be wherever the hell you want to be whenever you feel like it.”
“Hmm, that’s not accurate. I taught you cause and effect before I showed you what you can do.” He sat and folded his legs and arms while lowering his head to think.
“What do you mean, what I can do? I can’t appear on rocks like you do!” She was becoming frustrated by this experience and even more so by him sitting down as if it was nothing.
“You did. If I remember correctly, every time we were on a rock, except for my last, you were standing right beside me.” He stood. His hand reached back to his hair and he considered that the sun was too much for her skin. They would have to move to someplace sheltered or she would truly hate him in the morning. He suspected she had never experienced a sunburn before and he knew he would only have himself to blame for it.
“That was you! I can’t do that stuff! I’m a bio, but I’m not a magician like you!” She fluttered her arms in frustration at him.
He decided not to argue.
Then, as she is pondering, it happens. She looks down at her own feet confused as to how she is standing on that rock, and then over at the rock he is standing on. She gets an odd sense.
He yells over at her, “See?” He appears next to her and grins.
“So basically you just focus on where everything is turning throughout, ‘all of it’ and find time it?” She tries hard to wrap her mind around what she just did. She tries to do it again, but to no avail.
“Something like that. Controlling it is different for different people who figure out they can do it.” He puts a hand on her back to comfort her. “I am not as accurate as some, but I have other strengths. They are related, but I don’t know anyone else yet who can do it.” He can hear her thoughts are jumbled and then focus on a single question before she speaks it.
“Like what?” She doesn’t understand and looks at him trying hard to gather understanding.
He looks at her and replies, “You’ll see. I reserve those gifts for necessity. They’re not fun to have to use.” He looked out at the desert and though of her skin again. He knew where there was shade, but he was very bereft to consider going there. Then he looked at her and said, “Okay, do you understand shadows?” While she was wondering what he was referring to, he looked up at the sun again and then grabbed her wrist. As they appeared at the bottom of a cliff, he turned to her and said, “Keep your back to the wall of this.” He expounded on what he was saying by touching her shoulder and then repeatedly pushing his palm into the wall of the cliff.
“I get it, but why?”
“That sun is a good thing, but you’ve been down there too much. Your skin isn’t used to it. I am. Your back is usually the most exposed area to the sun.” He explains to her.