ARC OF THE IMMORTALS Book 2

Time Rifts: 11 / Final Excursions [part 3]

Recap: Jac relieved to find he had only gone out 1 hour when his Hopper’s chronometer read almost 14 days after the deadline for return. He starts to fix the damaged airlock. Touzdae returns from

her excursion. Worried and angry with Jac for his acting-out behaviors, Touzdae asks him if he has received answers about Fish. Not yet.

Recap Continued: Jac is visited by Tau, the Entu Monk in another dimension, Jac ignores him thinking it a dream.

He goes on a 60-hour excursion. He learns from being on Fish’s escape vehicle and his Hivbrit that Nez Fish is neither alive nor dead.

Upon return to the Obz Station, he receives a message — Touzdae is in trouble. He preps to look for her with the little time left.

And Now Our Current Episode:

Jac finished recording the message for Geordae. He left it with Comsa. As an afterthought, he asked her:

“Comsa, can you make a duplicate of the countdown chronometer as a separate unit that I can take with me?”

“No need. There are duplicate countdown chronometers in Storage Locker A below the Hopper.”

He opened the hatch to Hopper Deck A and scanned the flooring.

“Storage Locker A below this deck? Where is the access?” Jac asked.

“Do you want me to open it for you?” Comsa asked.

“Yes.”

A part of the deck slid open beneath a section of the main Hopper. Jac went below. A few minutes later he returned to the Hopper deck with a small box with a digital face on one side.

“Comsa, would you activate this chronometer. And set the timer to the master countdown clock on the wall outside here?”

“Activation in progress in 33 seconds,” Comsa stated.

“Com Link open. Roger that,” Jac said as his two Hoppers entered the rift.

“Link-open and clear, Comsa standing by.”

Jac sighed relieved.

The rift was bumpy — navigation was unpredictable. It required lightning-fast precise adjustments in course.

Tau made a brief appearance in Storage Locker A. His wake destabilized the individual lockers. They flew open. Tau disappeared as he whirled around the space. His actions turned on the all the Master Countdown Chronometers each set to a different time.

“Caution, caution your approach is too hot, too fast,” Comsa said.

“Input?”

“Slow your approach and arch around the larger Hopper so as not to sever the time streams,”

“Got it.”

Jac applied a full thruster slow-down.

“No….” his anguished voice wrenched from his gut. She is taken, his thought appeared and he knew it to be true.

As he angled his Hopper up over Touzdae’s Hopper and applied a full braking stop, he opened his third eye. The second small hopper swung out into a turbulent area in the rifts and bounced around in it. He absorbed everything from her that he could. Pain of loss suppressed. He used a particle light beam to pull his second smaller hopper back in. He flew into the wake of Touzdae’s second smaller hopper and displaced it. The sudden drop of energy pulled it in close to Touzdae’s main Hopper.

“Deploy collar for dock,” Comsa spoke.

“Affirmative, beginning deployment with glues.”

“Not advised,” Comsa stated.

“Too late. The space is too destabilized not to use the glues.”

Light beams guided the glues into place. Flexible material followed, and formed a hard seal around the hatch.

“Hard seal confirmed,” Jac said.

“Codes transmitted. Hatches opening on your command,” Comsa.

“I’m not going in straightaway. I know that her time bubble is gone. Making observations to start.”

“Affirmative. Support — in the ready. Standing-by.” Comsa went into standby mode. Her com transmission crackled.

He assumed a neutral meditative state.

The residual of Touzdae’s time bubble flowed over him. Images flooded his consciousness and he became overwhelmed. He dissociated. The joined Hoppers began to drift. The two smaller satellite Hoppers collided with each other. They clanged against the joined vehicles moving them further out into the turbulence.

“Jac,” Comsa called. “Attention, Jac!”

Jac regained awareness and noticed he felt overwhelmed. He slowed his breath. His panicked breathing calmed. He cleared the tears away from his eyes.

“Comsa, report, please.”

“Use full-b — “ the transmission broke up.” (crackling) “ — away. Red-line is approaching.”

Jac used pitch and yaw to position his Hopper for a full burn. The joined vehicles were twisting in time’s winds.

He depressed the thruster controls. The two crafts shot forward. Swirls bounced both vehicles backward. They hit the two smaller Hoppers in succession. Jac popped out of his seating restraints and ducked inside Touzdae’s cockpit. He pulled her personal logs and the flight recorder. He was back in his Hopper, jettisoned, thrown back by an unknown force. Before he could secure himself, the two smaller Hoppers hit their joined vehicle. They hit at the same time from opposite directions. A clanged reverberation.

Disoriented and deafened by the clang he went on automatic. He fired his thrusters again for ten seconds. The two linked crafts angled out of the major turbulence. They rocketed toward the opposite side of the time streamers. And they were becalmed. It was the calm space that the Obz manuals had warned about.

Jac smiled to himself. He heard the sound of his breath moving into his body and out again; then nothing. It came as a relief in those few moments as the memories appeared:

As a young boy, he remembered seeing Touzdae in the cargo bay of the Fish for the first time. The heart connection was powerful. Years later they collided with each other at a Bhantu Retreat and laughed. They were of the same age and he remembered her name from before. A few years later they kissed and their spirits blended for a few seconds. Those few seconds were everything.

“Jac, cra “ (static) “docking,” Comsa said and cut out.

He remembered where he was. Out of some need for self-preservation he closed his inner hatch. He depressed the thruster button for a ten-second burn.

His Hopper propelled forward; and lost momentum. It repelled back to his point of origin. He depressed the thrusters on full throttle as he jettisoned Touzdae’s Hopper. The hatch cowling was ripped away along with the siding of her Hopper’s fuselage.

He used most of his fuel escaping the becalmed pocket sailing out of control through the turbulence towards the station. Major thrust ceased as the fuel gauges read — empty. The turbulence threw the craft in a circle spinning and bouncing. He had a choice to transfer attitudinal fuel to the main chamber, but it wouldn’t be enough.

“Maybe I can stabilize this enough to attach a particle beam to the station…” he mumbled.

The field shot the tiny craft up, down, and up, disrupting the artificial gravity. His head knocked into the overhead bulkhead.

“Jac, Jac, this is Geordae Phorae, can you hear me? Over.”

“Hear — ” (static/crackling) “ Out of — , Over.”

“Have you tried your particle beam? Over.”

“ — turbu — ce…” he lost consciousness.

Two beams guided Jac’s Hopper into the docking bay, second smaller hopper followed and slipped into it’s bay.

Jac put her logs/strip and the small clear rectangular flight recorder into his side pocket. He slipped down and out of the inner and outer hatches of his Hopper into the hanger bay. He saw Tau run out of the hangar. Jac took in a breath. He went up the stairs.

Bendel* punched him and Jac stumbled backward.

*Bendel once Jac’s friend was the villain from the previous book Book One: Pursuit. The chapter introducing Bendel (context):

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Thank you for joining me in the adventures that span lifetimes and worlds. Blessings, Passion, and Grace on your journey. May whatever your looking for — find you.

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Julia Medium | Alison Hollingsead | Lee David Tyrrell | Rebecca Romanelli | Joseph Lieungh | May More 💜 Tales | Dr Mehmet Yildiz | Kris Bedenian | Alberto García 🚀🚀🚀 | Blaine Coleman | DL Nemeril | Rip Parker | Annelise Lords | Alison Hollingsead | Barbara Murray | K. Pearson Bradley | René Beauchemin | Dougfrombk | Libby Shively McAvoy |