by MK Alexander
Your very dear friend,
—Tractus Fynn (DCI, retired)
PS: Your next best destination would be Sunset Park”
My smile remained and I hastily began to explore the contents of the knapsack. I came across a curiously shaped canteen and drank my fill. The water was not cold by any means, but my thirst was bordering on desperate. Then I found something very much like a chocolate bar and wolfed it down. I checked the expiration date on the unfamiliar package: best used by March 15, 2071. That did not sit well with me. Much renewed though, I dumped the contents of the knapsack onto the patio and immediately noticed how everything had been secured in zipper-locked plastic bags.
One of the first items I came across was a pocket watch. It was a strange mix of old fashioned and modern, with a brass casing and a black face. Only four white lines could be seen, presumably denoting twelve, three, six and nine. With it was another note from Fynn:
To find your way back, you must first determine the relative date. This ingenious device is a gift from Edmund. Set it upon open ground, facing the sky, and within twenty-four hours it will accurately calculate your exact time and position. It’s best if you follow the green line.
Not that this was any help at the moment. There were no hands on the watch, nor a calendar date. I did wonder when the noon siren had finally turned mute, and if the last time it sounded, it gave warning to some rushing tsunami.
The things in the knapsack needed examining; some seemed unfamiliar, others were obvious: an empty thermos, fresh clothes in vacuum-packed bags, even winter gear. I sifted through various foil pouches: freeze-dried lasagna, chili, beef stroganoff— camping food. I found a collection of books about astronomy, along with another yellow note from Fynn: A Step-By-Step Guide to Libra Lapsus. That made me laugh, nervously maybe. I also found a tent, a sleeping bag, a camp stove, a sturdy compass, a flint stick that readily sparked, and a fishing line wrapped along a square piece of cork, tied off with an odd-looking lure. Nothing was high-tech though, no cellphone, no laptop or tablet device; not even a radio. No matches, or a lighter either. I did find a folding knife made of solid brass, quite tarnished, but the blade was quick to leave. It was stainless steel, oiled and very sharp.
I also found several more yellow notes from Fynn. Each short and sweet, mostly instructions on some of the unfamiliar items. Apparently, I had my work cut out for me. I repacked everything and made for the kayak. I stowed the bag and set off on the long paddle towards Sunset Park. “Thank you, Tractus Fynn!” I said aloud. I could feel a grin of relief on my face. Not that my smile lasted long. Looking across the bay and how far I had to go, I was struck by the reality of my situation: I was a traveler, I was far from home and I had a lot to learn in a hurry. And while my gratitude towards Fynn was genuine, it was also tinged with a lingering anger… I was never granted any fair warning.
* * *
chapter two
down fall
I set out across the bay towards what used to be Sunset Park, steering for a small patch of waxy green along the bluffs. It seemed further than I imagined, and as if my sense of reality had not been destroyed enough, another odd occurrence befell me, quite literally. While skimming across the calm waters, a bird appeared from aloft and swooped over me once or twice. Soon enough, it plopped down onto the very front of the kayak. I’m not good with birds, meaning, I had no idea what kind it was. Could be some sort of starling, a blackbird, or even a crow. It was pretty big with shiny feathers of blue, black and purple, certainly iridescent, and it had a gray beak. Its eyes were also black, though ringed in yellow. He or she perched calmly on the prow, then tucked its wings in and gave me an inquisitive stare, tilting its head one way then the other, and arching its neck to examine me with its dark eye. There was some intelligence there, even curiosity. The bird stared at me as if it had never seen a human before. It gave a little squawk then turned to face front. I’ll admit this made me laugh out loud. Eventually, I struck up a somewhat one-sided conversation with my newly arrived passenger as we ferried across Serenity Bay.
Half an hour later we came ashore near the bike path, a portion of it that was not submerged. My feathered friend flew up to the trees and disappeared. I dragged the kayak to higher ground and slid it under some prickly bushes, then clambered up the hill to stand in what was left of Sunset Park. It was depressing, very depressing. The lawn was overgrown, dune grass to my thighs covered the whole place. The benches were not even visible, and the rhododendron forest had been devastated. Clearly these poor trees were dying off slowly and painfully. It was almost like losing an old friend. I slung the backpack over my shoulder and left in a hurry. This was not my best destination.
I hiked east along the bluffs parallel to the bike path that snaked below me, though most of it was half buried by sand, or cracked into big chunks. I hoped to make it to my pine grove, hoping it had fared better than the park. Along the way near a thicket of brambles, I was stopped in my tracks by a rustling noise. Before I could even think what it was, a large deer leapt into the clearing. It landed about three feet away and just stood there beside me. A doe, I thought. She looked in my direction, took a few steps closer and sniffed the air, seemingly unconcerned at my presence. The creature stared at me directly and gave off a bleating sound, a snort; then stepped nearer to lick me across the face with a wet scratchy tongue. She leapt away just as suddenly as she had appeared. Behind her a small herd of three other fawns followed. They jumped next to me as well, gave me long stares with their liquid brown eyes and soon followed their presumptive mom. One fawn stopped and leapt from side to side as if enticing me to spar with him. Then he took off like a shot to join his family. I admit to being dumfounded.
After a mile or so, I came across Cedar Bluffs. Below me, the whole neighborhood was gone, most of the houses had been swept away to their foundations. A dead forest stood in its place. Giant trees had been thrown down and lay rotting. The scene almost triggered a distinct memory, maybe something about Eleanor’s old house, but it was gone before I could bring it to mind. I veered off to the north towards my pine forest and saw what was left of the Sentinel, though from a good distance. The lighthouse looked as if it had been sliced in half at a steep angle. The sharpened stump of its first few floors was just visible on the hilltop. The rest lay on its side like a fallen column. I chose not to linger and hiked across the dunes, closer, I hoped, to my pine grove.
My pace quickened when I saw the first clump of scrubby trees. I could see my sacred ground and it seemed more or less intact. The lay of the land looked different than I remembered, but its promise of solace was unmistakable. I was running now, the knapsack bumped against my shoulders. I was home again and fell to my knees. I scrambled under the branches of a large tree and lay back cradled in its roots. The sweet perfume of pine; green needles against blue sky. This was sanctuary.
I don’t know how long I slept. What woke me was a singular sound, the drone of an engine, I supposed, and felt more than startled. I crept along the high dunes towards the ocean, practically on all fours, and peeked out from a grassy bluff. Coming up the coast from the south I saw a speed boat, though it seemed to be moving at an impossible rate. It passed Garysville and Oldham in a matter of seconds. Its wake, a huge plume of spray, fell back to the waves, and it swept by in moments. I could only make out a cigar-shaped cruiser, jet black and sleek; its hull barely slapped the surface of the water.
Before I knew it, the whine of its engine fell behind North Point. I heard the motor fade to the west and then slow to a throaty idle. I half imagined the craft now drifted through Sand City, Flood City, inspecting some interesting place in the Village. The engine roared back to life a few minutes later and then disappeared as it cruised up Serenity Bay.
Comfortable, with my back against the trunk and shaded by the branches, I started to examine my survival gear. Tractus Fynn had given this his best attention and I lacked for nothing. There was a first aid kit, toiletries, socks, shoes and even a pair
of sandals. I changed into fresh clothes. Three canteens of water hardly seemed enough to sustain me for long but I drank deep, finishing off one of the bottles. I did find some sort of purifying kit that was wholly unfamiliar. As I tried to make sense of it, I tore into the beef jerky and gobbled down some trail mix. Next, I turned my attention to Fynn’s very first yellow note. I recalled there was something odd about it and on closer inspection noticed the dates. The first, 2059 written on a line of its own had been crossed out, and about half a dozen successive dates had been added, all the way up to 2066. I could only surmise that Fynn had revisited this note several times. When I thought about this makeshift calendar, my heart sank. How could I be so far from home?
I estimated that I had enough provisions for a week or so. Long enough to hike to Fairhaven if I had to. And part of me wanted to do just that. I imagined the long slog up Route 16, or perhaps just parallel to it, staying undercover in the woods. Fynn’s warning to stay unnoticed was no idle caution. At the very least I could approach the city on my own terms, and I’ll admit to a burning curiosity. For now though, I was content to read the books Fynn had left, each with a note, and each sealed in a large bag. I passed over the books about dreaming: A Practical Guide, How to Remember Your Dreams, and Lucid Dreaming, a Step by Step Approach. None of these seemed at all relevant.
While motivated to learn about astronomy, I was annoyed by this mumbo-jumbo, aggravated even. None of this was a dream and getting back to the present seemed impossible. Only astronomy would get me there. I read the yellow note from Fynn: Recalling your dreams accurately is an absolute necessity. They often tell us where we have been. Controlling your dreams, having a lucid dream, is also essential. Such skills are paramount for soft jumps.
Cryptic words, yes, but they didn’t make any apparent sense. I turned to astronomy. They were not science books about the cosmos, the solar system, or anything like that. They were books about sky watching, practical techniques for identifying stars. Fynn’s note was clear: Begin with the New Astronomer. Employ the enclosed planisphere and watch the sky this very night. No cool antique astrolabe for me, like Fynn had, no sextant, just some crappy cardboard disk that rotated in a sleeve. I came to understand it was a simple way to spot the constellations at any given time, in any given season. It was the first step in orientating myself to the cosmos.
Back on earth, I set up camp. I pitched the tiny tent under thick branches and fashioned a ritualistic hearth: a dozen flat stones arranged in a circle with the butane cookstove placed at the very center. It was an unnecessary act, but important somehow. By late afternoon, I had learned to boil water and prepared a pouch of macaroni and cheese. Aside from being a bit crunchy at the bottom, it didn’t taste all that bad and certainly filled me up. I also made instant coffee, complete with sugar and powdered creamer. This particular luxury soothed me to my core.
By evening, I could see the eerie glow in the south, suffused and reflected by the dark sky. Fairhaven. It was calling to me, to my aloneness. There were people there and I wondered who they were, or what they might be like. By now some stars also began to appear, and with my new found knowledge, I could make out a few planets: Venus to the west, Mars, and maybe Jupiter. As the night passed I followed their journeys across the sky, reminding myself time and again; it was not the heavens that were moving, it was me. This was especially difficult.
Early next morning the happy chatter of little birds roused me. The tent kept off the dew and the bugs out. The soft sand and pine needles made for a comfortable mattress, so in all, I was rested. I made coffee again, my one luxury, and headed off to Blackwater Quarry. I brought a few books, and two canteens to refill, though I doubted that the brackish water would be drinkable. I tip-toed along the high edge of the cliffs. It was more beautiful than I remembered, and now overflowed along the picnic area in a kind of lazy cascade. Our ad hoc, outdoor courtroom from another time was now wholly submerged. I remembered that night well enough: the trial of Mortimer. What was it he’d said about me? “You, a traveler...”
I chose to linger for a few minutes and watched dragonflies flittering along the water, hovering and darting in some unseen purpose. I also noticed the mechanical chorus of cicadas and crickets, their shrill song nearly continuous, rising and falling against the quarry walls. Below, I could see the water was now pristine. I climbed down the granite ledges cautiously and stopped midway. A small waterfall streamed out from the cliff face. I scrambled over and lay down to reach its source. I plunged one hand in and I tasted: the water was wonderfully sweet and cold. I filled the canteens, then climbed to the bottom and decided to take a quick swim.
Later, while drying out on a slab of granite, I began to notice a few carvings on the rock face. I had never noticed these before, these glyphs: a circle with a line through the center and perhaps some letters or numbers to the right side. But I had seen them before— somewhere else. I also remembered the device Fynn had left me, though he had offered no real explanation about it. As per instruction, I laid it face up to the sky. I could see no date or time on the dial yet. There were two buttons on top, one marked B, the other F… I pushed B. Nothing happened at first until a very faint illuminated line began to appear on the dial. It was a deep blue, maybe like an hour hand. As I rotated the watch, this new line changed in color from yellow to green. It seemed more like a compass needle, but it never pointed north as far as I could tell. I pressed the F button this time. The same line appeared just as faintly, and again changed colors as I rotated the device this way or that.
***
Back at camp, sitting under my tree, I was munching on some crackers. A squirrel boldly sauntered up to me and snatched one from my hand, as if it were his. I was completely shocked by this behavior, though I could only laugh. He was in no apparent rush to finish his treat, but looked up at me in between his tiny bites. He had no fear at all. I shared the rest of my crackers generously.
That afternoon I heard the patrol coming up the coast again. I couldn’t see the speedboat this time, but I could hear that it had stopped nearby, probably just below the high dunes. It’s engine rose and fell a couple of times as if the boat started and stopped, perhaps something had caught its interest. Not long afterwards, it hit full throttle and rounded North Point, then faded to nothing as it headed south through Serenity Bay. From the trees, a cloud of birds rose to fill the sky and then dissipated like dancing smoke. Something spooked them, something much closer. I found myself very anxious. My heart was racing, my palms sweating. I instinctually moved into a shadowed crevice along the granite cliff. In time, I shook it off, the feelings of dread and paranoia; convincing myself I was just being silly. I got up again and found a great ledge to sprawl upon. I lay down to bask in the sun and delved into the astronomy books.
I took my studies seriously. I found familiar words like parallel, equinox and perpendicular. And unfamiliar words like aphelion, obliquity, magnetic declination and angular momentum. Geometry was not my strong suit. I came across a sticky note on one page. It read: perpendicular followed by several exclamation points, though it was not clear what that might mean.
The earth’s orbit lies at a severe angle to the galactic plane, one of Fynn’s notes said, and it was my task to find the constellation of Hydra, specifically the last star of its tail, nearest Centaurus. Neither constellation was visible all the time, and this is where the planisphere came in. Though named a constellation, I came to understand that Hydra was comprised of many stars, galaxies, messier objects and globular clusters.
Still, the hardest concept for me to grasp was my own relative motion. It was not the sky that was moving, no, not at all. It was me, it was this planet that did all the work. I was not the center of it all, the stars were indeed fixed in position. No matter how hard I tried to understand this idea, it didn’t seem to stick inside my brain. I tried to imagine myself perched on a huge ball of rock that was churning ever eastward until it rounded a corner and was bathed in sunlight.
***
If routine is the right word, I slipped into one over the next few days. I fell asleep at sunrise to be woken by the patrol boat around noon. I spent my afternoons at the quarry, reading mostly, and then took a nap to wake again at sundown when I cooked a meal and made instant coffee. On the second or third day, something caught my eye. It was an airplane or an impossibly small helicopter. I saw it flitter around Oldham from a great height, then like some inquisitive insect, it hovered and darted, descending to scrutinize something on the ground. I made for the pine grove hurriedly, gathered up my scattered belongings and hid beneath the branches. The craft swept above the treetops at a tremendous speed with only a whispering sound, a soft whistle almost, as unseen blades chopped the air. A chill went up my spine. I felt like prey and my mind went back to one of Fynn’s yellow notes:
Do not attempt to visit Fairhaven unless you are supremely confident in your ability to jump. Imprisonment in this time frame is rather draconian and arbitrary. It cannot end well for you.
Ironically enough, the bag that contained this dire warning also held several gold sovereigns with a portrait of King George on the front. All the dates read, 1888. They seemed to be a British pounds.
The following night I made a breakthrough. Something in my brain finally clicked. The night sky was becoming familiar. Random stars no longer; they weren’t just anonymous pricks of light— that one is Pegasus, and those, Orion’s belt… That great swath there: the milky way… It spread across the horizon and was easy to recognize now. It also proved to be the perfect signpost. I knew where the constellations were; where they weren’t, and where they would rise and fall during the course of the night. Direction and duration, the keys to libra lapsus. At the very least, I could orientate myself now. The next day I took some time to think about where all those hidden constellations lay on the other side of my spinning Earth.