ARC OF THE IMMORTALS: Book 1/Pursuit

7/Casanoir: Chapter 7.4/ Tubari Rift Redux

Recap “What you saw was real. It was a quantum duplicate of us. The memory code indicates it collided with the Fish. This happened after I went into the interior world in search of Bhantu. But the collision didn’t match and now were in a time loop.”

“The rift somehow interacted with the incongruity of the collision. The time loop was initiated,“ Jac concluded.

“Oh, my Spirits!” Touzdae was fearful and excited. “What do we do?”

“I have a plan… and I have spoken to Nez about it too.”

“Where’s Jac?” Harry demanded.

“He’s below getting ready to execute the plan,” Touzdae reported.

“So we’re in a time loop,” Harry stated his voice quivering. “Jac’s plan is to leave us? Can you please explain it to me?”

“The first time the quantum ship merged with us was after Jack went into the alternate reality or Nez’s inner world. So I flew the ship, Nez was unconscious, and we waited until the quantum Nez merged with us.”

“Okay. This time loop shit drives me crazy,” Harry said exasperated. In afterthought, he added, “What makes you think it will merge here in the rift?”

“Because it happened twice already, here, in the rift.”

“Really? I didn’t feel it.”

“Crash couch, now,” Touzdae pointed as if scolding and protecting a young child. She pushed the palm remote control to activate Harry’s suit.

Harry’s suit came up. Her own suit came up around her as Fish went unconscious.

Jac moved out of Nez’s control center and swam weightless through the passageway in full suit gear.

Three Days Earlier

“I’m so glad he stopped talking and we can be alone,” Jac said to Touzdae on the bed in his captain’s cabin. The auxiliary helm controls were functioning nearby.

“I don’t think we have time for that right now, sweetie,” Touzdae commented.

Jac laughed a bit. “I wish we had time,” he said and added quickly: “No, I wanted time away from him to see what you think of the new plan.”

“Now that makes good sense,” she said.

He told her his new plan. They discussed it. Nez listened.

Present Time

Pursuer Jac had morphed into a Jac duplicate. He was identical in nearly every way. He pressed a few buttons on his suit. It closed around him. He depressurized the cabin as the oxygen flow ceased. The screen flashed:

— — — — — — ENGINES LOST POWER — — — — — —

~~~~~components ejected outside ship, in tow~~~~~

“It’s a simple job of reassembly, reassembly. Assemble, assemble, assemble.” Pursuer Jac mumbled in a repeating litany.

“Strap in, Harry,” Touzdae commanded.

Jac floated down to the tree by the Pool of Life where there was a modicum of gravity. He crouched and seamlessly slipped into the water. His body paused as his spirit glided into the deep waters connected by a silvery ribbon. He felt a deep connection to his body as his fingers searched for home.

His index, middle, and ring fingers found the groove in the foundation of the inner temple. He surprised himself. He his lungs filled with water separating the molecules of water into light and oxygen. Jac marveled at this. Why had he been holding his breath all these years? Lost in the marvel of the process he forgot his immediate purpose. Touzdae’s thought brought him back.

She’s coming, Jac, she’s coming, her thought arrived.

Pursuer Jac pulled the strands of components towards himself as the Needlecraft drifted. He gazed in wonder at the remnants of the distant kilonovae. He felt an urge of home within himself. He gathered the salvageable instruments and other parts. And hauled them back to the cockpit. He heard an angelic voice in his head:

“She’s coming, Jac, she’s coming, Jac… She’s coming, she’s coming, she’s coming…” He hummed as he brought his haul inside the cockpit. At the controls, he closed the canopy and re-pressurized the cabin with breathable air.

As Jac found the pressure holes. He heard the sound of fire. He was inside and outside the ship as it burst into flames from the collision of the quantum Nez with the Nez. The water boiled away in a flash.

The ship exploded and was gone.

Somehow he was through. He came up out of the water. He looked up. Above was the canopy of the ancient Atlantean Temple. Without looking he ran straight into Pursuer Jac, clad in an exo-suit. Pursuer Jac vanished as quickly as he had appeared. He sat on the steps of the temple and felt the hot sun on his face. His clothing dried. He found himself listening to Touzdae’s thoughts:

Calm, calm, calm, it was the flashback of what happened before. Harry passed out. He’s out now, but alive. I’m alive — you’re alive. I’m doing the 27-breath exercise. Do you feel it in you? I know you do. Calm, calm, calm… Touzdae’s thoughts and actions flooded his being. They were embracing one another — in a fashion.

It’s here, the Quantum Nez.

Time froze.

Jac’s spirit appeared in a thin gray reality slice. He saw Touzdae at the opposite end with a small light highlighting her features. Jac drawn to her but when she turned it was the dark-haired Luna. Touzdae’s twin sister.

You don’t belong here or anywhere, Jac thought. What are you doing here?

Luna smiled in that characteristic way of her’s. The smile sly, seductive, and covert, malevolent. As her smile faded she became softer and morphed into Touzdae.

Jac heard a familiar voice and turned sharp. It was Jac popping in and out of the reality of the space. It was an aggressive voice, that of Pursuer Jac. He was an exact replica of himself. It took his breath away. No time to think, ponder, analyze, Jac thought. Harry appeared. He was 500 years younger and laughing with that cackle of his. Jac remembered that cackle as ridiculous and vaguely sinister. Harry followed the popping pattern of Pursuer Jac; in and out of visible reality.

Pop! He shot back into his physical body in the pool, but not before he passed through Pursuer Jac’s body. The impact of his spirit crashing into his physical body, threw him out of the Pool of Life. He landed on the other side of the tree about a mile or two from the holographic mountains. He emerged from unconsciousness. Shocked. He saw a tall wide-shouldered bald man with his arms crossed over his chest looking down at him with a scowl.

“Bendel?”

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