THE SLIDE — Part 4

Chapter 43: Perilous Flight

Fantasy: Airplanes, Panic, and Purpose

Recap/Summation/ Characters Lost & Found

In the last chapter (42) the narrator’s focal point was Tem. He slept-walked through dreamtime and appeared outside the pocket dimension in the “real” world (also known as Midearthian), testified about the vortex over the south pole and was incarcerated in the dark chamber under the dungeon. He was transported back to the pocket-reality with no explanation.

Kuzma awaits Farha’s return at Ra’s former prison, is distracted by Hrez’s sudden appearance. Kuzma makes a quick move as Farha collides with him and Hrez. Hrez saves them both from being caught up in the prison cell and transports them back to the pocket dimension. Farha remains asleep.

Q and A take the machine apart. It was the device Zed brought back from his trip. They discover nine black creatures inside it.

Characters Lost

Sofie L’Mallard shoots Farha, her lover, in the chest (the bullet/blank is lodged in Farha’s breast plate) but she falls back onto the floor. Sofie is triggered and panicked, she goes out onto the landing in the Paris apartment near the Seine. She is shot and falls to the first floor, but does not die. Later her death is faked by an SS activated agent, General Marie Bissett.

Kuzma is his real name, but he once was Alexis, Farha’s first love — but she does not remember him as such. Ra was once Suni in the employ of the SS who captured and subverted Zed into the SS. Suni met Marie Bissett as a teen on a remote part of the coast of Inja. Through a bizarre series of events, they were captured by a novopus for safety. The novopus was hit by a shard of a descending satellite and had her spirit taken from her body. An Orca dolphin took Suni and Suni was transformed into Ra. Zed was compromised by the divided spirit of the novopus and was owned by X the dark spirit of the novopus.

Marie Bissett (not lost) as a teen falls under the tutelage of Ombolo — the name of the novopus, but is later activated as an agent of the SS. No explanation is given. Ombolo is lost.

Characters Found (known locations)

Zed is outside Paris as a newly formed airfield getting ready for the trip to the south pole. Marie Bisset’s assistant, also of the SS, brings Zed the mysterious organic-hybrid machine detection device for his trip and takes a holographic flash drive program for the supercomputer.

Farha has awakened in the cottage and is being briefed with Tem by Kuzma and Hrez. Ivanovich/Nikos, the Greek, is in the Slide back in time. Nikos’s wife has taken Maria Bissett with the Druids of Ireland in some unknown time and her daughter Sophia has joined her mother, Maria, there. Ra has become a Pharaoh in Egypt and has fallen asleep in his life of comfort.

At the Airfield

Zed helped Bissett’s assistant — a civilian known as Thea, with a locked metal case into the blimp’s small passenger cabin with enough space for four passengers. The cockpit was a two-seater for a pilot and navigator/co-pilot. It would take her to his private train and dedicated track on the opposite side of the Paris Fort area. Once he had word that the program was installed and running, the first wave of planes, glider-planes and drones would be launched.

Fort Normandy

“That wasn’t supposed to happen,” the voice said, and all that had fallen into a deep sleep woke.

“Did you hear that?” Farha asked. Hrez, Kuzma, and Sophia were ‘rousing through grogginess.

“Vaguely,” Sophia said.

“Where’s Tem?” Kuzma said.

They searched the pocket dimension of the cottage. He was gone. Hrez immediately went to dream time and found he had been sleepwalking through dreamtime into the Midearthian realm and was with the Magistrate, R and D of the SS and three guards inconspicuously positioned in the Magistrate’s lounge.

“I found him. But he has some device attached to his ankle and I cannot bring him back. I will show you,” Hrez said, and he projected an image out of his third-eye into the room, holographically.

Sophia saw each one of them as if she was passing through their small group. Kuzma found the ankle bracelet, looked inside it and projected it into another space inside the cottage.

Hrez let his projection go and joined Sophia in examining the ankle bracelet and its probe.

“Damn,” Hrez said. Kuzma’s concentration faltered, and he managed to store the vision before it collapsed.

“It’s a complex probe that’s has a clamp on his mind, heart and chi,” Hrez said.

“And requires great care to remove,” Sophia added.

“We need to begin as soon as possible then, right?”

“No, we must wait until we get to the polar region, because…” Hrez began.

“Because they are leaving in twenty minutes with the air machines,” Sophia added.

Thea arrived had arrived and Q initiated the holographic program into the supercomputer mainframe. Thirty minutes later, a communications link was established with the air group and the first wave was launched.

Paris — Air-Field

Three high-speed glider-planes and twelve drones left first. Zed was among the forward scout group.

Three hours later, one quarter of the heavy equipment on glider-planes along with accompanying remote-line-of-sight drones, piloted drones, gliders and two blimps were launched and partially guided by the program at Fort Normandy and a chain of satellites.

Two hours after that, a smaller group was launched to pick up personnel at Fort Normandy.

Six more groups were launched that day.

Over the Desert

Zed leaned over to one of the three navigators and asked, “How does it look on the satellite feeds?”

The pilot cut engines at 600 feet and extended the wings into a glide configuration. The navigator made a thumbs up, to Zed. Lightning from below sheared off the nose and forward cabin. Another bolt of dry lightning came from above. Two of the six occupants were jettisoned from the disintegrating plane.

Everything happened in a instantaneous flash.

Pieces of the plane fell. There was no fire — only smoldering.

Zed fell, tumbling…

The Previous Chapter:

Here’s Parts 1 & 2 of the Contents with An Introduction:

Here’s Parts 3 & 4:

and the next chapter 44:

I appreciate your continuing readership and applaud you that you take the time to read this longer work in an era of shorter stories. Bravo!

Rebecca Romanelli | Blaine Coleman | Spyder | DL Nemeril | May More | David Price | Dr Mehmet Yildiz | Melanie J. | Joseph Lieungh | Camille Grady | madmess’s thoughts | Orla K. | Ravyne Hawke | Winston | Margie Willis | Noorain Ali | Lee David Tyrrell | Libby Shively McAvoy | Lady Dr. Gabriella Korosi | Ilis Trudie Palmer

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