meanwhile,

 

  

Penny, Blade, Corcey, Trevor, and Ian recorprealized in the type of thick, brooding forest that one might expect to find Hansel, Grettel, and Little Red Riding Hood skipping along in.

Penny looked around in awe.  The wonders of another, altogether new planet stretched before her.  The trees forming an emerald canopy overhead looked normal, earthly to her; God had obviously used a similar blueprint here as on her home world.  She was eager to see what other similarities and differences there would be.

Trevor looked around whimsically.  The air had a heavy wood smell to it, bringing back fond memories.  He’d grown up in an a heavily industrialized city called Marathon, and in the middle of the mechanization was a twenty kilometer preserve not unlike this.  The foresty smell surrounding him took him back to younger, simpler days.

Ian looked around, a wry smile on his lips.  He’d lost his virginity in a virtual reality simulation of the forests of Altagon III.  The woody smell also brought back a chorus of fun memories.

Blade had seen her share of forests—in fact she grew up in a coniferous one—so she probably had the best idea of what kind of nasties lived in them.  She pulled out a light-weight throwing knife in case any of them should present themselves.

Corcey, too, was scrutinizing the flora with suspicion, though his was directed to the tree he was standing right next to.

“Wow,” said Penny, impressed with the apparently undefiled splendor stretching around in all directions.

“It is nice,” Ian observed.

“Beautiful, even,” Trevor added.

Even Blade had to admit that it a natural wonder to it.  “It was worth coming all this way just to see this.”

“Hate to burst yer bubbles,” grumbled Corcey, “but can I make an observation?”

Ian was trying to assess the surroundings professionally, but the thick timberland kept asserting its primal awesomeness.  “If you can keep it under a paragraph.”

“Okay,” said Corcey, “ how ’bout: ‘this place sucks’.”

Everybody turned to look at the lanky philistine in shock, but then quickly understood his objection.

Although Corcey had materialized inches away from the thick, mossed-over trunk of a giant tree, his assault rifle wasn’t so lucky.  It had appeared partially inside the living wood.

Corcey sobered them up with a simple thought: “this could have been any of us.”

Trevor, who held the little teleportation template, nodded.  “I see what you mean.”

Ian: “This, at least, serves as a lesson.”

Trevor: “Actually, I think it’s more of a warning...”

Ian, nodded, added “or perhaps it’s an example.”

“A worst-case scenario,” tried Trevor.

Ian, with a smile: “actually, it can be all these things and more.”

“Right,” concluded Trevor happily.  “But the message is clear: don’t use this,” and he held up the template, “unless you not only know exactly where you’re going, but have worked it out to at least seven decimal places.”

Corcey could tell that his weapon was ruined.  In fact, it had bonded at the atomic level with the tree where they made contact.  No point in recovering it, even if it was possible.  He began to take inventory of what he had left.

Since Blade had almost no interest in firearms, her attention was on the template.

“If you don’t mind,” she said, “I think it would be prudent if you gave all of us detailed instructions on how to use that, in case it ever becomes necessary.”

Trevor nodded.  “It’s actually pretty simple to use, if you know where you’re going.”

“...and when you’re going,” added Ian.

Trevor acknowledged that with a nod, then continued, “the toughest part is converting that into the formula input.  As that tree proves,” and he indicated Corcey’s rifle, “it would seem to be best to get as accurate a number as possible.”  He then gave a five minute summation of their findings from the midnight pow-wow with Wicked Lester.

Trevor decided it best not to mention some of the eccentricities Lester had found in the programming, like the four additional dimensional circuits which were built in but currently turned off.

“Okay, so does everybody understand?”  he looked around.  Blade and Corcey nodded.  So did Penny, though a little hesitantly.

“So,” said Ian, “now that we’re all set on that, let’s assess our situation.”  He looked at Corcey for a tactical update.

“Well,” the lanky mercenary started, “we’re on a foreign planet, facing unknown obstacles for an undefined objective.  We have no food, and very limited supplies.”

Trevor shrugged.  “Could be worse.”

On cue, a very faint, but very definite roar sounded somewhere.  A high, shrill screech of an animal that none could identify.  It sounded far away, though that could have been an auditory illusion from the density of the trees.

“I think,” said Corcey nonchalantly, “that this is a good time to discuss our tactical situation.”  He hiked a thumb at his now useless assault rifle.  “I’m basically down to a pistol with two clips, two flash grenades, and five charges of CFM 50.”

“Come Fuck Me Fifty,” remarked Ian, impressed.  “Handy stuff.”

Blade pocketed her flit-knife, whipped out her machete.  “You guys packing?”

Trevor opened up his Armani suit jacket.  This displayed a custom leather holster with a compact laser pistol inside.  Ian merely nodded.

Blade looked at Penny, who shook her head.

“I’m clean,” she said, and when Blade began to pull out a dagger, she added, “and I’d prefer to stay that way.”  Blade looked at her curiously.

“I’ve never used one,” the Earthling said, “and I doubt I could learn.”

Blade handed over the blade.

“Humour me” she said with a slight smile.

Penny decided to.  The sheath had a leather thong around it; she tied it around her calf.

“You do have a lot to learn,” Blade said sadly, and suggested she move it up around her thigh so she could get to it more easily.  Penny obliged with a shrug.  Well, she thought, at least they’re looking out for me...  She decided to return the favour.

“May I make a suggestion?” she asked seriously.

Four faces turned to her with looks of dread.

“Since we don’t know what we’re up against, maybe you should set that thing,” and she pointed at Trevor’s template, “for twenty minutes into the past.  That way, if we get into a situation we can’t handle, we can get out of it and give ourselves another chance.”

The four faces were stunned.

Trevor turned to Ian.  “I told you it was a good idea to bring her along...”

Ian: “I thought I brought her along...”

Blade put her arm around Penny in intense camaraderie.  “Hell,” she said, “I think we should put you in charge.”

“Well, if you do,” said Penny, “then I have another suggestion.”

Trevor finished setting the template as Penny had suggested, then looked up to see if this had been a fluke, or if the Earth-girl was on a roll.

“That noise came from over there,” Penny said, pointing in the direction the howl had come from.  “Since right now any direction is as good as another, I suggest we go this way.”  She was pointing in the opposite direction.

“Good call,” remarked Ian.  “Blade, take point.”

Blade nodded, and set off in the intended direction.  She cast a warm smile at Corcey as she past him.  Penny filed after her, then Trevor and Ian.

Corcey looked around the forest.  Visibility was about thirty feet.  It was old enough that the tops had begun to intertwine, so not that much light filtered through.  He removed his sunglasses, perched them on his hat, and set off to follow.

“What do you think that sound was, anyway?” Penny asked.

Navigating through the thick trees, Blade shrugged.  “Hey, man,” she said, “I only work here.”

“I think what she’s asking,” Trevor clarified, “was if that was the It that the original group was worried about.”  In front of him, blonde locks bobbed up and down.

“Impossible to say,” Ian answered, “since we’re pretty much flying blind.  Probably not, though.”

In the back, Corcey glanced at his watch, and then pressed two buttons.  The chronometer was replaced with a digital compass.

“Good news,” he announced, “this place has a magnetic sphere, so we can find North.”

“Which way are we headed?” Blade asked, curious.

“Sort of north-westish.”

Penny was taking more than a passing interest in the surrounding trees.

“Do you think one of us could climb one of these so we can get the lay of the land?”

All eyes turned upward.  The limbs didn’t begin for about twenty feet off the ground.

“Worth a shot,” Blade said, and looked at Corcey with a slight smile.  He nodded, also with a slight smile, and picked a tree that seemed a little more accessible.  Blade put down her machete, took a running start at him, and jumped into the air.  He caught her foot and propelled her straight up.

The tips of her fingers grazed the branch, came close to catching, but then gave way.  She fell to the ground, landed, righted herself.

“She shoots, and oh!  She misses!” Ian cried like a sports commentator.  Blade chuckled, considered the branch.

“Try it again?” Corcey offered.  

Blade nodded, and walked back a few paces to get a better running start at Corcey.  As she got into a sprint position, her right heel suddenly felt intense pain as if she had twisted it.

The flash in pain coincided with a flash four feet away from her as a second Ian materialized, holding the template.

The original Ian looked at the newcomer.  “Hey, I know you.”

The new Ian smiled in his familiar way, but rather than addressing his counterpart, spoke to Blade.  “Blade, don’t jump,” he said simply.

Blade straightened up and walked hesitantly toward the two Ians.  For a moment, she felt the ghost pain in her heel, but after the second step it was as good as new.

“You miss your third try, ” the new Ian explained, “and land badly on your leg.  We decided to try this thing out and warn you.”  He waved the template for emphasis.

“Well, it seems to work,” Trevor commented, “although we now have two of you, plus what happened to the rest of us that you left behind to tell us not to jump?”

“Yeah, somewhere there’s a me with an injured leg,” Blade said, gliding up to Corcey.  She saw his face study the new Ian with an acrid expression.  He was subconsciously contemplating what it would be like to meet himself as Ian was just doing.  Ian was a social animal and could get along with about anyone, including himself, so the two Ians seemed to view the meeting with minor mirth.

“To be honest, I don’t know,” the new Ian said.  “Like I said, you hurt your foot or something on a jump a few minutes ago, and we all wondered if Penny’s reset idea would work, and how.  So here I am.”

“Okay, so now what?” Ian asked himself.

“Well, you have to use your template to go back about a minute and warn Blade not to jump.  You’ll become me.  It should all balance out.”

“What about the me with the broken leg?” Blade inquired.  The subtle impact of what they were doing on a quantum level was starting to bother her.

“I don’t know,” admitted the new Ian.  

“Actually,” asked Trevor, “wouldn’t it make more sense if you went back instead of him?”  Both Ians looked at him.  “You’re the one who knows of Blade’s mishap, not him.  He can’t go back and warn of an accident he hasn’t seen.”

Ian Two frowned.  “Huh.  Right after it happened, you were the one who recommended we try this, and you also said that he,” and he pointed at his other, “would have to be the one to go back in your loop so that there wouldn’t be two of me like there are now.  To balance the equation, he has to go.”

The original Ian nodded.  “Actually, I think he’s right. Or I’m right.  Or whatever...”  He began adjusting the time controls.  “I think you showed up about a minute ago, so I’ll do that.  

All set, he addressed the group and indicated his newer self.  “Well, I guess I’ll see you all in a minute.”

He pressed the switch and blinked out.

Blade felt the sharp twist in her ankle for half a heartbeat.

Everybody looked at the new, remaining Ian.

“I gather your foot is okay,” he asked Blade awkwardly.

“Yeah, though when you appeared and he disappeared, I did feel a sharp twinge for a moment.”

Trevor was still looking at the doppelganger of his friend.

“This is getting weird,” he said at last.

“Actually, yeah, it is,” Ian agreed.  He held up his template.  “Well, we know this works in case of emergencies, because we saved Blade a broken leg.  But let’s not dick around with this unless we have to.”

The chorus was unanimous: “agreed.”

Somewhere off to the left, a bird squawked, and they could hear it take flight.

“Blade, I believe you had point?” Ian asked, subtly suggesting they move on.

They walked along for about half an hour, talking about art.  The trees were becoming a little less dense, but it was also becoming darker.

Despite the initial awkwardness, Trevor and the new Ian picked up right where they had left off.

“I would suggest that the sun’s going down,” commented Ian.  Impossible to tell, of course: they hadn’t seen the sky since arriving.

“Do you want to make camp?” asked Trevor.

From the back, Corcey said “I think we should keep going for a while; at least until we either get out of here, or find a suitable place for it.”

“If I see anything,” came the Voice at the Front, “I’ll be sure to pass it on.”

As if on cue, they came across a large stream, cutting more or less across their path.

“Cross it or follow?” Blade inquired of the troop.

“Let’s follow,” suggested Ian.  “At least it goes somewhere.”

Trevor walked up to it, squatted down.  Amidst the pebbles, he could see his murky reflection, which suddenly rippled as he cupped his hands and brought some water up to drink.  Ian followed suit: as expected, the two of them had been talking quite a bit and had parched their throats.

“See any fish?” inquired Penny.

The two looked the length of the stream, which disappeared both ways into forest obscurity.

“Nope.” both said at the same time.  Ian quickly turned to Trevor.

“You owe me a beer!” he cried triumphantly.

Trevor smiled.  “I’m with the band.”

Ian snapped his fingers in disappointment.  “Aw, shit.”

Penny looked at Blade, who had a pitying look on her face.

“Don’t ask,” she told the Earthly protégé.  Penny took her advice.

“Why’d you ask about fish?” asked Corcey, coming up to Blade’s side.  She took his hand in hers, fingers interlocked.

“I haven’t eaten since the Party,” Penny replied.  The others nodded; it was a valid concern.

“Well, we have water at least.” Blade replied, deciding to drink some as well.  Disengaging from Corcey, she went to get some.

“It flows that way,” Corcey said, indicating the direction.  Enough of his distaste was present in his voice to show that desert-bred aquaphobia was still ingrained.  “That’d probably be the best way to go.”  It was obvious he was speaking in practical terms, rather than personal taste.

The others nodded, and they set out, following the meandering course.  Trees grew along both shores, their limbs intertwining over it to form a canopy.

They walked in silence.

Blade thought about barbecue potato chips.  She had the munchies.

Penny thought about the New Testament.  Jesus spent forty days and forty nights in the wilderness, being tempted.  So far, she had spent forty minutes and forty seconds in the wilderness, bored silly.

Ian thought about the Key in his pocket, wondering where on this moon was the lock it fit, and what lay beyond.

Trevor thought about the Template, thinking of other uses it had, all the while returning to the episode where an Ian he had never seen before appeared and the Ian he had always known disappeared.  Something was nibbling at the back of his neck on this, but he was uncomfortable bringing it up until he had a better idea of what it was. 

Corcey thought about music.  Five notes echoed eerily through his skull, repeating in psychedelically tedious patterns in 5/8.  It was the fifth stage of Ba’alistti withdrawal.

After a kilometer they reached a small earthen mound which, in their ignorance of the region, they assumed was a hill.

“Guys want to take a break?” Corcey asked.  The question was directed at Penny.  She shrugged for effect, though was actually glad for the rest.  By mutual unspoken agreement, everyone found a spot and sat down.  Blade and Corcey occupied a cozy old log and split a thermos of ice-cold gensing tea.  Ian squatted down to retie his shoes.

Penny walked up to Trevor.

“Trevor?”

“Yes, Penny?”  He was brushing aside the ground, trying to make his chosen spot a little more comfortable.

“I don’t understand you,” she said simply.

Trevor looked up at her.  “Oh?”

“Yeah,” she said, hesitantly, uncertainly.  “I just don’t...” she shrugged.

“What,” Trevor inquired.

Penny had the look of a child who had a great revelation, but not the vocabulary to share it with the adults.

“I just don’t get you,” was all she could explain.

“What,” he tried, “is it because I’m from another planet?”

“Well, there’s that, of course, but...”

“Is it because I see conspiracy in everything and rarely know what I’m talking about?”

She nodded slowly, unsure of herself.  “That’s a start, but...”

“Is it because I panic while making sandwiches?”

“That’s a small piece of the puzzle,” Penny explained, “but...”

“It’s that incident with the badger, isn’t it.”

That only made her even more confused.  “Uh...”

“Penny,” he said flatly, “is it an odour?”

“No...  ...well,...no.”

“Well, what is it, then?”

“Hmmmm.  Maybe it’s Ian I don’t understand.”

Ian appeared by her side, oblivious to the conversation.

“Ian?” she started.

“Yeah,?”

“I don’t get you.”

“Nobody gets me.  I’m the wind, baby.”

And with that he nodded off for a quick power-nap.

Corcey was sitting beside Blade, massaging her spine. 

“You know what would make me feel better?” she asked him.

“Oral sex?” he offered helpfully.

“Besides that,” she replied with a smile.  Seeing he was about to suggest something else along the lines of his original offer, she said “barbecued potato chips.”

“Are you hungry?” Trevor asked, sitting down next to the pair.  She shrugged.

“We’ll have to eat sometime,” Corcey offered, “I’ll go out and get dinner.”

He put Blade’s foot gently on the ground and pulled out the knife he had killed Victor Von Pearlman with the night before.  Blade saw the weapon and laughed.

“Can I see that?” she asked.  He handed it over hilt first.  She studied it with an amused, clearly disapproving grin.  Clumsily, she danced it between her fingers and attempted to balance it; it was obvious the trouble was the knife’s fault, not hers.

“Would you like a real knife?” she offered.

Taking it back, he said “this is real,” and tapped it noisily into his skull to demonstrate the statement.

“Happy hunting,” she said, and kissed him for good luck.

“Don’t get lost,” Penny called out.  He looked over at her sternly.

And, of course, five minutes later he had absolutely no idea where he was.  The forest was that dense and confusing.  He wasn’t especially worried about it, of course: using his compass he could find the river, and an upstream walk would eventually take him back to the group.

In the meantime, he had no problem finding animal tracks, though he could not tell what species that made them other than it was something small and quadruped.  Finding fresh trails, on the other hand, was a different matter entirely.

Corcey had learned to track when he was eight, and had been hunting both animals and people ever since then. Of course, he had learned these skills in a desert.  Forests were new to him, and woodland stealth was a talent he hadn’t mastered for the simple reason that he had never had an opportunity to perfect it.

In this case, that actually had a positive effect: he succeeded in making enough noise that he frightened something reminding him of a large, short-eared rabbit into revealing its position by bolting way.  With quick reflexes, he sidearmed the knife at it, and missed by a large enough margin that would have had Blade laughing for days.  Pulling his knife out of a tree trunk, he gave chase.

To his surprise, he found the ersatz rabbit was twenty feet away, under a large shrub.  It’s neck had been broken by the metal jaws of an intricately designed trap.

The sight made him pause for considerable time.  My, but isn’t this interesting.  He went up and examined the snare.  Rusted metal with a fresh coat of bunny blood and mottled fur.  The trap looked fairly old; somebody had set this sucker a while ago and either forgotten about it or just never got lucky with it until now.

He had to study it a moment to figure out how to open it.  A rather complex working of springs and counterweights.  Nothing electronic, he noticed.  The oversized jaws had bitten deeply into the rabbit’s flesh.  After a moment, he realized that this was designed to snare something larger than the bunny which had fallen prey to it.  He pulled out the rabbit’s body, and noticed with some amusement that the head remained on the ground in a small reservoir of dirty, drying redness: the trap had snapped it clean off.  With his other hand he picked it up by the floppy ears.  Have to show it to Blade, he thought with a smile; she’d probably find it funny.

He was about to work his way back when a thought struck him.  He bent down, gathered up some leaves, and cleaned off as much of the gore as possible, and then reset it.

Just after it snapped back into primed position, he heard the faint snap of someone (or thing) stepping noisily on a twig off to his right.  He assumed a fighting crouch, devoting his attention to his surroundings.

From the sounds, he was able to identify three, possibly four people walking parallel to him.  Very soft fragments of a conversation; either they were rock stupid, or they weren’t trying to conceal their movements.

Corcey, of course, was.  Bunny parts in hand, he slunk off to see who these people were.  Very quickly he had flanked them and was following them from a safe distance.

As he had surmised, there were four men walking in diamond formation.  Each wore a frosty green and brown uniform which struck him as more ornamental than practical.  They were armed, but their weaponry struck him as odd: each had a thin longsword by their side, and aloofly carried a bizarre wooden rifle he had never seen before.  There attitude seemed almost jovial, care-free.  So did their conversation, though he could only pick up snatches of it.  If they were a hunting party, they weren’t taking their task very seriously.

He followed them for several minutes, choosing not to reveal himself.  He was becoming more adept at moving quietly through the woods, though he still made more noise than he cared for.

The two men that snuck up behind him were much more proficient, however: they had made no noise at all until they were right on top of him.

Corcey’s heart skipped a beat as one of them spoke loudly, in a language he did not understand.  The sarcastic tone was obvious, though: it was the native equivalent of “Well, what have we here?”

Corcey slowly turned around, and found two men standing ten feet away from him, also decked out in the pseudo-woodland camouflage and armed with swords and those peculiar rifles.  Both of those rifles, which Penny would have recognized as crossbows, were pointed directly at him.

The other four, hearing the commotion, came over to investigate.  There was a rapid dialogue in the unknown gutteral tongue between the two groups.  The tenor belied irritation, and though Corcey could not tell exactly what they said, he could guess it wasn’t good.

“Looks like we caught ourselves a poacher!”  Next to him, someone mumbled something about “...third damned one this year...”

One of the four who had snuck up on Corcey was addressing him, and then stared at him expectantly.

Corcey dropped both parts of the rabbit and put his hands on his hips.  His fingertips worked their way behind him, and caressed the handle of his pistol.

“I suggest you stop pointing those at me,” he growled at the two, “or I’ll make you look really fuckin’ silly.”

This produced a puzzled response from the group.  The one who addressed him spoke again, a short curt phraze that sounded like a question.  Corcey correctly guessed it meant “what?”

“I don’t speak your language,” Corcey said in Galaqommon.

More chatter, and then one of the others said “Glack-teek Come Teek?” at him, expectantly.

After a moment, Corcey smiled.  He nodded, and repeated “Galactic Com-Teq.”

The group’s demeanor changed instantly: the crossbows all took aim at his head.  The guard who had garbled the Galactic Com-teq name stepped forward.  He spoke a brief soliloquy, though half-apologetically as he correctly suspected Corcey did not understand.

Corcey shrugged and simply said, “I don’t speak your language.”

The man pointed to himself.  “Altgeld.”

Corcey pointed to himself.  “Corcey.”

Altgeld motioned for Corcey to follow, but Corcey shook his head.  He pointed at himself, raised four fingers, and pointed off in the direction he had thought Blade, Trevor, Ian, and Penny were.

Altgeld asked him a question, in which “Glack-teek Come Teek”  was repeated twice.

Corcey nodded, still holding four fingers up and said “Glack Teek Come Teek.”

Altgeld spoke with his group.  He was second in command of the Queen’s honor guard, so the troop would have deferred to him anyway, but he had special influence in this because he was the only one of the group who had been in the Court four years ago when the first group of Glack Teek Come Teek pirates had arrived.

He knew Luthor would want to speak to this Corcey and his four other compatriots.  Indeed, Luthor would have to speak to them, because he was only one of three people still living in the Kingdom who knew any Galaqommon.

Corcey bent down and picked up the pseudo-rabbit, and handed it to Altgeld.  The man accepted it awkwardly, and then handed it to a subordinate, who in turn added it to a small bag of other game.

Corcey kept the head for himself, and toting it by the stubby ears, began to walk back to where the rest of his crew were.

He noticed the odd bowed rifles remained pointed at him throughout.

 

 

 

[continue to next chapter]