Experimentally Kimi pressed down on one corner, seeing the rest lift just a fraction of an inch. She nodded her head while slowly turning the cage, looking for what she wanted.
“As I thought. The bars have just a slight give, probably from the holes being drilled a fraction deeper than needed. As one side tilts to receive all the stress, the other sides raise in proportion. The motion causes a loop as the pressure follows a pattern around the circular outside, diffusing the stress with the wave pattern.”
Kimi found the hairline crack along the top of the circular cage she was looking for. She ran her hands over the top, watching the crack until it opened just a fraction. Holding the prison in place she wedged the tip of the dagger inside.
“But a circle made of material is not a pure circle. It always has to have a beginning and end point as you connect the two ends. Even if you interlock the pieces like a jigsaw, one single point cannot be so interlocked or the whole mechanism fails. Nimli, I need you to start rocking the cage. Run around, slam against the bars, push, pull, do whatever you can to put as much force and stress on the cage as possible.”
As the small spirit did as she was told, Kimberly grabbed the handle in both hands, imagining herself as a bodybuilder, with muscles as large as the ones Frank had shown as a troll. The top of the cage began to undulate, spreading out the stress Nimli was putting it under. As it did so, Kimi twisted the knife against the flow, digging the tip deeper and deeper into the ever expanding crack. It wasn’t easy. Even using the weak point, it was a well constructed piece of work. She was sweating and her bulging muscles were aching, but finally the satisfying sound of cracking split the air. The cage fell to pieces, as if that single point really had been the only thing holding it together. Kimi pulled back the moment she felt the dagger lunging through the prison so as not to skewer the tiny woman.
With a shriek of glee, the spirit flew skyward, doing a few loops in her joy. Nimli stopped, diving straight for her jailer, transforming into a tiny bird of prey as she gathered speed. Like a bullet she hit his throat, ripping right through flesh and nearly decapitating him as she exited the other side. Giving out a cry of satisfaction, she shook the blood from her wings, returning to a miniature woman. As the knights dropped the dead body, some of his blood splattered across their uniform, Nimi came to rest on Kimi’s shoulder.
“Thank you for saving me human. You have my gratitude. As much as I would like to return to my people, I cannot right now. They are too far away and I cannot make such a long journey even on my wings. So I shall stay with you for the nonce and give you the blessing of my presence as thanks.”
Taking his dagger back from Kimi’s hand, Daniel spoke while putting it away. “It ain’t smart to get on the bad side of a spirit, as this man found out the hard way. There aren’t many spirits left in this world, but when one speaks or takes action--well, you best not argue with it.”
“I see there are still some sensible humans left in this world. Now then Kimberly, let us explore this place together. And please, get me something to eat that isn’t birdseed!”
Nodding her agreement, Kimi pushed the tables to the side to get back to the street, grabbing up the book and pen set as she passed.
Chapter 9: A New World
“I knew you would go.”
“Oh? How’s that when I didn’t even decide I would go until late last night?”
“Becaushe you’re a hero. You jusht can’t help but help people when they are in trouble, like Nimli, or me. I knew you were worried about Maria all day yeshterday, even when we were having fun around town. I’ve sheen that look in momma and papa’sh eyesh more than once. Usually right before they went running off to help shomeone taken by a hiccup. Or defend the town againsht monstersh.”
Jordon finally got to his feet from where he was sitting under the Quester’s tree, hugging his knees tightly. Two of the branches had already fallen off during the night, signaling two deaths. Thankfully, neither one was Maria. There was already a secondary tree planted nearby loaded down with notes and well wishes for those long gone. It was a tradition that supposedly sent the wishes to those on quest somehow so they could read them.
Nimli sat on Kimberly’s left shoulder, the one she seemed to favor when she wasn’t flying around. Jordon hugged her tightly, not trying to make her change her mind, but one of farewell.
“Promish you’ll come back. That you won’t die.”
“I’ll try not to.”
“That’sh not good enough! Promish me! If you don’t promish then that meansh you won’t try ash hard ash you can to keep it.”
“Then I promise. I will do my utmost to come back.”
“Good.”
Releasing Kimberly, Jordon handed her a small vial of liquid. Taking it carefully, she furrowed her brow at the boy. “What’s this?”
“My magic.”
“More specifically, it is his magical connection to this place. So if you get pulled into a hiccup or a rip without a mage around, you can still use your powers.”
Kimi turned to see Grell heading towards her out of the twilight. The morning sun still trying to decide whether it should crest the horizon or not.
“When he got home last night he pulled me and Joel aside, asking a bunch of questions about the quest and how Other powers worked. Since you’ve already made a temporary contract with him once, you just need a connection again if you get trapped in your own world. He knows he is too young and inexperienced to go out with you, so that’s the only way he could think to help you.”
Grell finally closed the distance, pinning a bronze colored metal flower to her chest above her heart.
“And this is my contribution. That pin was one of the few things that came with me from Atlantis. I was going to give it to my sister as an apology, but, well, I never got the chance. Joel placed a small magic on it, but it is infused with my blood, so it will always work. It might be cold wherever you end up, but that is spelled to always keep you warm. It might not be much, but it is all I can do. I wish I could go with you dear, but I can’t. I’m Joel’s partner. As infuriating as that can be, he still needs my power to help him hold this place together. And don’t think I’ve forgiven him for helping Maria leave by conjuring that steed for her either. When I find him I am going to make him pay dearly for that life choice. So you find my foolhardy grand-daughter and bring her back to me safely okay? If you do so quickly, I might just let my husband off the hook.”
“I’ll do my best. Even if I have to knock her out and drag her back trussed up over my shoulder.”
“I knew I liked you for a reason. You’re a girl after my own heart.”
Grell kissed the top of her head and pushed her towards the tree. Jordon moved to stand beside the woman who gave him a one handed hug. The boy’s eyes turned towards the town, causing Kimi to turn a little farther to see what he was looking at. Daniel was coming down the lane, still clad in his knights outfit. Kimberly wondered if he had even slept at all last night.
“I’m glad I could make it in time. Jordon said you would head out but I half didn’t believe him. He asked me a bunch of questions yesterday about being a Phaser and the timeline I came from. Not to mention things like helpful items that can be used on quests. You really made an impression on him. So I thought it only fitting that I come see you off as well and give you my own parting gift.”
Kimi watched the edges of the shield on his back bob up and down as his hands unbuckled a strap at his belt. soon enough he was holding out the sheathed dagger she had used yesterday to free Nimli.
“There was a custom in Camalot. Men who left the kingdom on quests were given a dagger, so that they would not be defenseless against the wilds. When a person was knighted, they were given a royal dagger. A sign that they served the kingdom as one of the king’s men. This blade was touched by Arthur himself. Handed to me by him personally. Not everyone receives such an honor, and it was one of the most memorable days of my life. It has saved and served me in countless e
ncounters since. Though you are not a man, you are a quester. I could think of no better blade to protect you on your journey. I’m sure Jordon would be sad if you didn’t have the best tools at your disposal.”
Kimberly accepted the weapon from the man with care, belting it around her own waist with his help. Pulling it from the sheath, Kimi noticed the small engraved lion’s head at the base of the blade. Setting it to the palm of her hand, she slit it quickly. From what she understood, as long as she was tied to the tree and considered “on quest” her Map would continue to give her information. She wasn’t sure how useful that information would be, but she would take anything that could potentially help.
The wound closed up on its own as the tree absorbed her blood and a new branch grew.
“Do you have any idea how you are going to find her?”
“Not a clue. But I know I will. This Other power of mine has to be good for something besides killing right? I mean, I’ve read lots of stories about tracking, so I should be able to follow her that way.”
“Well the best I can tell you is she went south. I tracked her as far as I could yesterday after Joel gave me the slip. She headed directly west about one mile then took the turn at Fordrin’s crossing on this side of the river. Looks like she is following two other groups, but I don’t know if she joined any of them. Be safe dear, and keep her safe too. You might have only been here a few days, but I think of you as my own.”
“I will Grell. And don’t be too mad at your husband. He helped her because he has a soft spot. Just like you are too stubborn to admit you have for her as well. Admit it, you’re secretly glad he did what he did, because it made her happy. You realize it is foolish, and you couldn’t bring yourself to do the same, but you would if you could.”
“Your eyes see more than you let on. Now get going, time’s wasting. The longer you dawdle the farther away she gets.”
Kimberly gave Grell a small nod and a quick hug before closing her eyes and entering that special place in her mind. She already knew what she wanted, having worked it out on the predawn walk over here. She was a science experiment. Fusing the genes of a human with that of a lioness and a gazelle. She had speed, and she had the ability to track through eye and scent.
Opening her eyes, her vision was drastically sharpened and her nose picked up the faintest traces on the wind. Her tail whipped back and forth as her clawed feet dug into the dirt, ready for action. Crouching into a sprinters start, Kimi’s legs bunched, Nimli grabbing the fur around her neck in preparation for the move. Like a gunshot she was off, the world going past on either side in a blur. She wished she had read a book where the spliced DNA was of a cheetah, they were much faster than lions. Able to reach speeds of over seventy miles per hour. Still, the fifty miles an hour of a lion was nothing to scoff at. While lions normally could only maintain their great speeds for short bursts, with gazelle DNA added in she got the endurance. Thompson’s gazelle could even outrun cheetahs.
But she worked with what she had. Kimi knew she would only be able to maintain this form for a short time. This was a more exotic character, not as well defined and well known as something like a knight or magician. It took even more energy to keep this shape than it did for one of those role-plays. That was one of the balances to this Other power. She could role-play as anything she read, but the more exotic and the less she knew about the form she took, the more energy it required to use. This information seemed to be a compilation of everything she knew about the character in question, not just a complete rip-off of a single story. Kimberly wished she had read more animal facts, perhaps then she would be able to hold this test subject character longer. Already she was feeling herself tiring, and she had just made the turn right before the river like Grell had mentioned.
Reaching into the pouch at her belt, she pulled out an energy candy. The vendor yesterday had said it was what any good mediator needed out in the field if they couldn’t get proper food. It looked just like a lemon drop. Sunshine yellow and so sweet looking it made her teeth hurt. Time to see if the vendors claims were true, Kimi thought. Popping it into her mouth, her body instantly felt reenergized, even before she bit into it. It was just as sweet as she had feared, the sugar substance, or whatever it was made of, almost like a paste in her mouth. At least it had no real taste, aside from the grainy texture and overpowering sweetness.
Her eyes searched the ground along the path, and even the edges of the forest, for any signs of travel. Sometimes the tracks were easy to read, a hoof print in dried mud here, drag marks of some sort there. But other’s were more instinct, like the slight fragrance of an unidentified perfume that Kimi somehow knew deep down belonged to Maria.
Another mile or two passed and Kimi came to another fork in the road. Here the trail got confused. The signs of a large group split at the junction. The perfume trail sort of just ended here, heading down both directions. This is also where the hoof prints from Maria’s horse stopped, as if the conjuration magic had run out. Dropping her transformation, she stood there panting, wondering what her next step should be.
The Map. Maybe it would give her some clues. Wasn’t that it’s purpose? Taking out the tome she saw that indeed the front was clustered with at least thirty or forty small compasses, each one with an arrow pointing in a slightly different direction. These she knew would be pointing at the different major disturbances that needed to be resolved in order for the quest to be complete. Only within this section of the planet though. All around the world, people were undertaking the Grand Quest, and were receiving information on disturbances in their area alone.
`Not all of them had to be fixed. Once a certain percentage of the ones around the world were resolved, the rest would naturally heal itself. Sometimes questers only encountered one or two anomolies in their area before the quest ended, sometimes they cleared them all and then had to either wait or go out in search of ones in another part of the world.
Opening the book, the first blank page had a timer of thirty-two days, eleven hours, and fifty-three minutes. As she watched, it continued to tick down. This was the Due Date. The window of time allotted to everyone on quest. Once it reached zero, if the required percentage of anomalies had not been resolved, the quest failed and everything resolved itself. The anomalies would close on their own, trapping any quester in the real world if that was where they were. Earth would fix itself in it’s own way, altering the course of the future.
Flipping through the pages, each one showed another compass. Underneath this compass was a short description of the anomaly it was tied to. Kimi thought back to what Grell had told her of the workings of the Map. Feeling a bit foolish doing so, she held the spine carefully while pointing it at the junction.
“Show me the closest rips in reality.”
Pages flipped rapidly, three standing straight up. Inspecting the suspect pages, she saw four total, two in each direction.
“Hmm to the left, Leonardo Da Vinci needs to invent the oil lamp, and Leif Ericson needs to found Vinland in Greenland. To the right is King Edward the third becoming king and the great sphinx of Egypt needs to be built. If I were Maria. No, scratch that, if I were the mediator of the mage Maria must be with, which of those would I try and resolve?”
“Closing the book with a snap, Kimberly grunted in disgust.”
“Who am I kidding? I don’t even know who Maria might have teamed up with. Or even if she teamed up with anyone at all. For all I know she’s running around by herself So how could I even guess at what they might think they could or could not do in any of those situations.”
“So then what are you going to do Kimi?”
Kimberly thought about Nimli’s question for a while. It was a good one. She hadn’t really thought this through all the way. Kimi just knew she had to chase after Maria before the girl got herself killed. She really hadn’t thought much about the roads splitting or even people going off the beaten paths.
“I’ll just go in the direction I think I have the best chanc
e of doing some good if we get pulled into a rift. I know little about ancient Egypt And the only thing I really know about Leif Ericson is he discovered the America’s before Christopher Columbus So it is between Leonardo Da Vinci and King Edward. As much as I’d love to meet Da Vinci, I think I might be able to solve the whole King Edward problem.”
With that decided, Kimi headed to the right, though she didn’t imagine herself as an experiment again.
“You aren’t going to transform?”
“No. I need to save my energy since I’m not contracted to any mage. And I only have a small supply of energy candies that I won yesterday. I’m sure most of the contract pairs are on foot as well, them running off was only a show of strength. They don’t want to drain themselves needlessly either.”
Nimli went silent, whistling a sweet song that echoed in the air after a few feet. After her song ended, she went quiet again, content to sit on Kimberly’s shoulder and watch the world go by. Twenty minutes went by as the two of them traveled the road in companionable silence. Kimberly kept checking the book, altering her course slightly as the compass dictated. Suddenly the trees rustled nearby and a wild deer bounded out of the greenery. It was a majestic animal, with eight points on its antlers. The horns flowing outwards in challenge to gravity.
Kimi stopped dead in her tracks, afraid of startling the animal. Deer were normally not aggressive creatures, but bucks were when it was mating season or defending their territory. The animal looked around, staring directly at Kimberly for a moment before stepping closer and dipping its head.
“Well hurry up and get on. He has consented to let you ride him for a while. It’s not wise to keep him waiting.”
“But how did--?”
“I called him of course. Did you forget? I’m a spirit of the forest. As in, I have a connection to forest dwelling creatures. I can speak to them from great distances, command them at need, and know when the land is in trouble. These are not my woods though, and my power is weak still from being confined and cut off from my connection. So my songs are limited and my awareness fuzzy.”
Out of Time the Grand Quest Page 10