Mac stood up in the stirrups and scanned the horizon, shielding his eyes with one hand. The sky was clear, not a trace of smoke, despite the flames and cascades of sparks from the lightning strikes the night before. Mac considered the lack of smoke, and then figured that the downpour of rain had done a sure job in dousing any lick of flame. It was good news for him. A fire would spread fast on the desert range and he wasn’t looking forward to a day of driving sheep that were already frazzled from the night before, out of the line of fire. Sheep weren’t very bright, and despite the scorching heat from desert brush alight with flames, they tended to flock in panic, too frightened to move out of the fire’s path. The last thing that Mac wanted after a night of lost sleep was long day of rounding up and rescuing sheep.
Mac started off, urging the gelding into a steady walk. He had traveled about twenty yards down the southern fence when a faint voice behind him caught his attention. He pulled up on the reins and turned in his saddle as the horse came to a stop.
“Wait Mac. Wait up.” The blurred image of a small horse and even smaller rider accompanied the voice. “Mac? Mac?” The small boy approached, holding tightly to a horse that moved at a considerable gallop. “I saw it too,” Dee Proctor said, as he reined the little horse in alongside of Mac. “It was amazing wasn’t it Mac? Amazing!” Dee could hardly contain his excitement.
“It certainly was.” Mac squeezed his calf muscles, signaling his horse to move forward.
“What do you think it was, Mac?” Dee urged his horse to keep stride with Mac’s mount. Dee Proctor rode like no other seven year old. He spent every free minute either on, under, or around horses. There was nothing Dee wanted more than to be with a horse and to ride. When Mac brought his own two children to stay at the ranch, from their home in Tularosa, where they stayed most of the time with their mother, Dee would ride with them for hours, covering every inch of the range. With Mac, the rides were more like work, finding and rounding up stray sheep, mending broken fences, clearing debris, and today, searching for lightning strikes. It didn’t matter to Dee, riding was riding.
Dee’s folks, Floyd and Loretta Proctor, had purchased the neighboring ranch several years earlier, and like most in the country had become quick friends to Mac, his children, and his wife. For the majority of the year Mac’s wife and children remained in Tularosa, New Mexico. The schools were better there and the ranch life didn’t suit his wife. So most of the time, Mac was on his own, except of course when Dee Proctor was around.
“I think it was lightning, Dee,” Mac responded to Dee’s question.
“But I bet you never saw lightning like that. Did ya’ Mac?”
“You’re right there, Dee.”
“My ma and pop came and took me to their bed last night. I think they were scared. But not me. As soon as I could, I got out of bed and watched the lightning till morning.”
Mac smiled at the young man’s enthusiasm. In truth, it mirrored a bit of his own. “It was a sight all right.”
“Where do you think it hit, Mac?” Dee didn’t let him answer. “I think it struck up there.” He pointed to a slight rise in the land.
“Could be,” Mac responded. “Could be almost any place ‘round here.”
“We’ll know soon enough, Mac,” Dee said, then added, “What’re the sheep doing up there, Mac? Look.” He pushed his stubby legs up in the stirrups to get a better line of sight.
“I don’t know,” Mac said, as he and Dee set off at a gallop.
As they reached the rise, they pulled their mounts up to a walk, and curiously gazed at the herd of sheep standing uncharacteristically still. Their heads bobbed in an odd unison, all the while keeping the herds’ collective eyes staring across a stretch of torn up land that could only be described as a debris field. The other half of the heard, stood opposite, divided by the scattered debris. And despite their thirst, neither side would cross to gain access to the water guzzler that remained undamaged but littered with debris.
Small shiny bits of metal foil, like autumn leaves, drifted in the hot breeze. They clumped, blown together under brush and rocks, decorating the landscape in glinting confetti.
As Mac and Dee moved in, they noticed a track that looked as though some huge flat rock had skipped off the land, as one would do on the still waters of a pond. At first Mac could make out one area of impact. It had flattened an area of the range. The brittle grasses and scrub brush around the impact area had been singed. Shiny metal pieces of foil littered the area in abundance.
Mac reined his horse to a stop and dismounted with a quick swing of his left leg over the saddle. Dee started to follow. “No Dee, you stay put.” Mac handed him the reins to his horse. “You keep a tight hold there.”
Dee took the reins and wrapped them around the horn of his saddle and watched as Mac moved cautiously toward the impact site.
The sheep on both sides of the debris field followed Mac, slowly matching his stride keeping pace and distance, as if in some hypnotic trance.
Mac stopped.
The sheep stopped, both herds, divided by some invisible field, but tied together in step.
Mac started forward.
The herds moved with him.
The water guzzler in the middle of the debris field had been spared any direct hit by the lightning, or whatever it was that struck there. Although the water guzzler had not been hit directly, dirt and the foil like metal pieces were scattered around it. Mac walked up to the guzzler, the sheep following in parallel rows.
The guzzler was not damaged and it continued to pump up the water from deep underground. Mac leaned in, bringing his face closer to the water. He smelled it, and with no suspicious odor present, he cupped a hand, dipped it into the cool water, and raised it to his lips. Just before taking a sip of the water, he breathed in the scent once again. Convinced that the water had no strange odor, other than the slightly sulfur smell common with well water. He tasted it. Nothing. It was, as far as he could tell, fine, untainted water. He let the water fall from his hand back into the basin of the guzzler. It splashed down onto several bits of the foil like metal that had landed, or had been blown into the water. Mac noticed that some of the pieces floated, while others, that looked to be the same or closely the same size, sank. He pulled out one piece that was floating on top of the water and fished out another from the bottom of the tank. He rubbed the pieces of foil with his fingers and thumb. The foil didn’t tear or scuff. He held first one, then the other piece of debris up to the sun. Like a watermark on a fine piece of linen paper, Mac could clearly make out the design inside each piece of foil. He assumed the design was a series of numbers—not because they looked like numbers, to him they actually looked more like flowers—but because of the way they were arranged, in columns like a mathematician would arrange a complex formula. Mac dropped the foil pieces back into the water, where once again, one floated and the other immediately sank.
“What is it, Mac? Who left it here?
“I don’t know.” Mac took the reins from Dee and mounted his horse. “Come on Dee,” Mac said, and moved on following the path of the debris.
Further ahead, just about twenty five yards from the first impact site, they came upon a second, and shortly after that, a third.
“I don’t think it was lightning,” Dee said.
“Pretty smart for a young’un, aren’t you?” Mac said, then considered what the boy was saying. “Lightning would have caused the dirt and rock to fuse together causing a small crater. But whatever hit here flattened the land.”
“Or bulldozed it.” Dee pointed to the sides of the impact zone. “Did lightning do that?” Dee asked, giving voice to the same question that Mac had.
“Not sure.”
“Did lightning leave all this shiny stuff on the ground?”
“Not sure about that either.”
“Well, Mac, maybe they know?” Dee looked up to a distant hill.
Mac pulled his horse up to a sliding stop. He stood in his stirrups and fol
lowed Dee’s line of sight to the top of the hill. There a figure, distorted by the rising heat waves, stood looking back at Dee and Mac.
Mac glanced around taking in the scope of the surrounding terrain. He allowed his eyes to linger over the rocks and scrub brush that covered the land, checking each for any other figures that may have moved into the area. He returned his gaze to the hilltop and the figure that was there, still looking at him. Mac glanced back to the water guzzler. “What the hell?”
“Mac, you swore,” Dee chastised the man, then looked around to where Mac was looking. “Where’d they go, Mac?”
Mac snapped his head back and forth, from the figure on the mound of rocks back to the water guzzler, squinting his eyes as he scanned the land.
The sheep that had crowded each side of the impact zone, mimicking his every step, were nowhere to be seen. They had silently moved off. Disappearing as though a magician in a sideshow had snapped his fingers and commanded them to vanish.
Mac looked back to the mound and the figure still there. Only now it was moving toward them.
THIRTY ONE
CARDINAL CELENT PUSHED the now cool cup of Earl Grey tea to the side and leaned back into the cushions of the chair. He looked skyward, locking his gaze for a long while before closing his eyes.
Dominic glanced at Tonita and offered a silent gesture of confusion.
“I am not well. As you can see time is catching up with me,” Cardinal Celent said, without opening his eyes. “I have seen much in my time, but my day’s end is near.” He opened his eyes and sat up, leaning forward, hands gripping the armrests of the chair, “That is why you must be told,” he said, looking at Dominic.
Dominic turned in his seat. “Cardinal, you’ll outlive us all.” he said, fidgeting with a corner of a pillow.
Cardinal Celent laughed. “That may be true,” he said wondering if Dominic could understand how true that statement was. “But I’m afraid only God knows that. The majority of my days are behind me. And there is little I can do about that.” Cardinal Celent smiled. “Are you nervous?”
Dominic looked away and then back to the Cardinal. “No.”
“Tense, perhaps?”
“No.” There was a hint of irritation to Dominic’s voice.
“My faith, like your own faith, has not always been unwavering. I doubted. I even spoke out against the Church and its teachings.” Cardinal Celent allowed his eyes to drift off to a darkened arch in the room.
Dominic looked directly at the man sitting across from him. He opened his mouth to speak, then stopped.
“For many years, in my youth, I was without doubt about God.”
“I’m confused. You just said that you were without doubt about God, but you spoke out against the church that you are a part of. Did you not believe in God?” Tonita asked.
“Oh, my dear, I believed. That is, I firmly believed that he never existed.”
“You were an atheist?” Dominic squinted his eyes as he asked the question.
“I was a scientist,” Cardinal Celent responded. “I was a man whose thoughts were based on fact, not belief. I found those who preoccupied themselves with tales of fancy and religion to be beneath me. Nothing more than mere fools who needed some reason, some explanation to their lives and to living.”
Tonita interrupted, “Wait a second. I’m getting the atheist part, but turning from a scientist into a Cardinal? I’m a little stuck there.”
Cardinal Celent smiled. “You do speak your mind.”
“As, apparently, from what you’re telling us, you did too.”
“Touché.”
“I know it is not the background one would normally think of for a priest.”
“It does not seem to fit.” Dominic said.
“You were a scientist of what?” Tonita’s voice carried with it a hint of disbelief.
“Tonita, there’s a flaw in your question.” Cardinal Celent allowed a grin to spread on his face. “Your question assumes a past tense. I not only was a scientist—I prefer to say a student really—but I still am.” Cardinal Celent laughed. “We do not always know why we do the things we do, or what there may be planned for us. And that is true for atheists, and scientists, and the devout.”
“Planned for us?” Dominic raised an eyebrow and ran his hand through his hair. “That doesn’t sound like the words of a scientist.”
“And, of course, you are right. They are not words of a scientist. They are the words of a man.” Cardinal Celent raised an eyebrow, mimicking Dominic’s expressions.
Dominic turned away from the Cardinal, stood, and moved again to the window.
“So,” Tonita spoke up. “A scientist of?” She let her voice trail off.
“Ah, yes. Your question,” Cardinal Celent said, looking down and pulling on his shirt, brushing away an imagined piece of lint. “Rocket science. Propulsion.”
Tonita stood up, a frown crossing her face.
“I guess one could say travel.” Cardinal Celent continued
“Rocket science and travel? What, do you do, book airfare and cruises to ports unknown?”
“Tonita,” Dominic admonished.
“It’s quite all right.” Cardinal Celent pushed himself up and out of the chair, a smile spreading across his face. “Yes. As a matter of fact, I did book travel to ports unknown. Although, my background is in rocket sciences and propulsion. My main field of study was travel.” Cardinal Celent paused briefly. “Time Travel to be more precise.”
Tonita and Dominic turned nearly simultaneously to one another.
“And since I’m being straight with you, Tonita, as I promised to do, I must tell you that I not only studied Time Travel,” he paused again letting the anticipation build. “I was the first person to do so.”
“Do what?” Tonita asked.
“To travel through time.” Cardinal Celent waited, half expecting Tonita and Dominic to bolt for the door. When they did not, he continued, “Actually there were three of us. We all traveled back in time. Unfortunately for the others, only I have survived.”
THE NOVICE STORMED from Dominic’s apartment, knocking down a woman on the street as he exited the building. She screamed at him, but he paid no attention to her and the others who were looking at him. He had no time for her or for anyone. He had a task that needed to be executed and he was not going to disappoint the Jesuit or God.
Dominic could not hide from him for long, he thought, as his rage intensified. The Key’s feeble attempts to circumvent the Lord would not go unpunished, and his escape from death was only for the moment. No matter how far the Key ran or who helped to hide him and his fornicating girlfriend, they could not change destiny or time.
The Novice smiled.
But he could.
THIRTY TWO
JULY 3RD, 1947
Corona, New Mexico
11:13 A. M.
90 minutes from Roswell
“Dee, let’s head back,” Mac Brazel said to the boy, as he turned his horse away from the figure on the hilltop, and back in the direction of the ranch house and main barn.
“Shouldn’t we go and talk to ‘em,” Dee said, pointing to the distant figure.
“No,” Mac said sharply. “We should just head home.”
“But maybe he knows something?”
If there ever was a time for the term, ‘shaking in your boots’, Mac thought, this would be it. He tried to remain calm, and he gallantly fought the urge to charge away at a full gallop, and just get the hell out of there.
Dee Proctor was the calming factor that Mac had working for him. The seven year old boy did not fear the unknown. Instead, he questioned it. Mac wished he could do the same and briefly contemplated going toward the figure. But his instincts took hold and pushed him to turn and run, “I’ll call the sheriff in Roswell when we get back, Dee. He’ll know what’s going on.”
Before Dee could stall him with more questions, Mac dug his heels into the flanks of the horse and leaned forward, urging his mount int
o a lope, with Dee’s little mare just behind, and a trail of dust behind him them.
Twenty-five yards down the fence, Mac peered over his shoulder to the hilltop where the figure stood. He half expected it to be gone...it was not. “Come on, Dee,” Mac said. “We have to hurry up.” He urged his horse into a full gallop and without looking back again, charged toward the ranch house.
THIRTY THREE
“WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU went back in time?” Tonita was up and pacing. “Like, you went from one time zone to another? That kind of back in time?”
Cardinal Celent stood. “No, not like that at all.” He walked to a stack of books and began to rummage through them, pulling books from the top of the stack, then stacking the removed books on top of the table. “We were not the first to try, you understand. Others had attempted many times, but not to any success. There were explosions in Siberia. Villages and forests destroyed. People killed. Planes and ships lost to sea or...” His voice trailed off, “well we don’t know where.” He found the book he was looking for, then neatly restacked the books he had just removed. He made his way back to the chair, sat down, placed the book he had just removed from the stack on his lap, and continued, “But we learned much from those early mistakes. And of course, we tried not to duplicate them. But this is a difficult science, you understand, and despite our best efforts, we occasionally failed.” He paused, looking off into the distance, then continued. “We failed far too many times.” There was a sudden sadness that overtook the Cardinal’s face.
“We?” Dominic’s voice was nearly a whisper. “Did you mean, the church?”
“Oh no. No. Not the church.” Cardinal Celent looked slightly bewildered by the question. “The church had nothing to do with the experiments, at least not in the early days of the project. I was a scientist. We were all scientists. Most of my colleagues, myself, included, were not believers in the tales told by the church. Religious dogma had no effect on our experiments, especially those of the Roman Catholic Church, which I considered to be nothing more than an ancient ruling body. A government, that was, and perhaps still is, fighting to keep its power.” He fiddled with the gold crucifix that hung from a chain around his neck. “No. The church had nothing to do with the projects. Only the governments.”
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