by Dan Glover
When he fell from the anti-gravity craft he expected to hit the ground hard and no doubt be killed along with Sileas. Instead, they found themselves hand in hand walking through the forest trees they had just flown over minutes ago.
The warp field on the craft had begun to fluctuate as soon as the cloud appeared. Maon thought they were approaching a thunderstorm at first but then the mist had begun to shift into different shapes each more diverse than the last.
"Where are we, sweet Maon? And how did we come to be here?"
He wasn’t sure how to answer his wife. Though he thought he knew where they were, it puzzled him to be there too. From talking with his father, he knew that to come into contact with an energized warp field could have disastrous consequences although that was only theory. No one had ever done so, at least not to his knowledge.
"The warp field produces a singularity around the craft, Maon. As long as we remain inside, we are essentially trapped within it... we are actually inside what some researchers used to term a black hole. Time and gravity has no effect upon us as long as we are inside the field.
"The dangerous part arises if someone was to come into the vicinity of the warp field while it is engaged. It's possible they could be ripped apart by the forces coming to bear upon the event horizon. However, Pete theorizes that any matter coming into direct contact with the warp field would be expelled to another place and possibly another time."
"Are you saying this machine is capable of time travel, father?"
"I wouldn’t go that far, Maon. Rather, the wormhole that it generates might inadvertently form in different times as well as other places. Space and time are intimately connected and we are just now beginning to realize the diversity of uses offered by this machine.
"The singularity protects us from the ill effects of being bodily exposed to the warp field. I'm not sure we could survive without that shield... our molecular structure might well be ripped apart. However, it may be that due to the second law of thermodynamics—though the physics of our universe do not operate inside the wormhole—whatever passes through might be reconstituted just as it was only in a different time and space."
There had been a kind of stutter in his stream of experience when he fell... almost as if he was in several places at once and could pick and choose which place he wanted to be. The calm under the trees had appealed to him, and Sileas was there too. Moments later he saw the anti-gravity craft fly overhead and he had the oddest feeling that he was both looking down and up at himself at the same instant.
They had apparently found Karen and Pete at just the right time. Had they been another hour later, he sensed Karen would have been dead. Pete had been knocked unconscious by the crash and for all intents and purposes he looked dead but when Maon touched him, he opened his eyes. Maon remembered finding the man all those centuries ago in old America in much the same circumstances.
"It's the nanobots that I still carry in my body, Mr. Maon. They're what allowed me to survive."
"But I thought you were purged of those by the presence of the Ladies, Pete."
"I think they only go dormant, Mr. Maon. Otherwise I would be dead. Maybe Karen can offer better insights into the symbiosis between the Lake parasites and Micah's nanobots."
As far as Maon knew, despite her best efforts, Pete's wife had failed to unravel the secrets of how the presence of the Lake people conferred not only perfect health but virtual immortality upon human beings. He had read some of Karen's many papers on the subject though of late she had been more drawn to other ventures.
"Lake Syndromes seems to be a viral response to a blood-borne infection resulting from a proliferation of parasites multiplying out of control inside the human body. I have yet to identify the means by which this response is mitigated by the presence of the Lake people. I'm guessing it might have to do with some type of electrical aura produced around their bodies which encompass and influence the biological components in the humans they are around but I've never been able to measure any sort of field.
"I've located an organ in the people of the Lake that seems oddly similar to the organ that electric fish use to defend themselves against an attack by predators by generating an electric field within their skeletal structure. The people of the Lake seem to have evolved that organ as a means of communicating beneath the water where the density of that medium is too thick for sound waves to propagate as they do in the atmosphere."
Maon sensed that many of the People bore an unspoken enmity toward those of the Lake feeling they were looked down upon as second class citizens. He did not share that opinion but he could understand how it could arise seeing how the Ladies sometimes treated the People as intruders who were more bothersome than they were worth.
"Do you ever wish to mate with the girls of the People, Mr. Maon?"
The question had embarrassed him more because there was truth in it than not. Pete had a way of intuiting the thoughts of those around him in a way that sometimes unsettled Maon. He wondered if it had to do with his being infected with the nanobots for a century before the man was rescued from old America.
"I love my wife, Pete."
Maon knew the words were no more than a pathetic attempt at denying the obvious. Of course he had desires to be with other women and he often found those girls of the People were particularly attractive.
"I love my wife too, Mr. Maon. That doesn’t stop me from wanting other women, though. I always wondered what it would be like to have sex with one of the Ladies. I had a crush on Lauren for years though I never acted upon it. I'm sure if I did she would have shot me down."
"You don’t give yourself enough credit, Pete. The Ladies are not restricted in their love life by the same cultural mores that human beings used to practice."
"If that's so then why don’t you get around more, Mr. Maon? I mean, you're as much of the Lake as you are human... right?"
"Maybe it has to do with how I was raised, Pete. My mother and father always presented themselves as a monogamous couple. By the time I learned better, I was grown and married myself. Plus, being with Sileas has always been as much a fantasy for me as a reality. There are times when I wake during the night and I still cannot believe she is sleeping by my side even though we've been together a thousand years. Don't you have the same feelings for Karen?"
"I'm not sure the one has anything to do with the other, Mr. Maon."
Maon liked Pete and his easy way of speaking his mind. When he saw the anti-gravity craft crumpled and sitting on its side in the field with Pete and Karen inside of it, he thought they had both perished, if not in the crash certainly in its aftermath.
After helping them both from the craft and tending to their injuries, Maon tried the communication device but there was no power. Opening the back of the console he saw that a fire had broken out inside and the circuit boards were a charred mess.
"We need to set up some sort of shelter, sweet Sileas. It will be dark soon and likely as not this area is prime hunting territory for large predators. Remember that old cabin we passed on the way here? Perhaps we can make use of it to at least get out of the open."
Chapter 47—Sins
It had been a dream.
Nate had returned just in the nick of time to save them from certain death... the smile upon his face the same one she remembered from their lovemaking sessions... the light in his eyes alive with love.
He had lifted her from the dirt where she lay and with his strong arms carried her into the villa spreading her out on the bed and whispered words of longing into her ears as he caressed her body to drive away the sickness besetting her bones.
Waking to the black pit of night with the howls of wild animals in her ears and her body numb from the sickness, Amanda realized her vision of Nate had been just that, an illusion cooked up by the dying synapses deep in her brain.
Her strength was spent. It felt as if worms had already begun to eat her body though there was no pain involved, only a morbid sort of discomfort in know
ing the end was near. She had so wanted to see her husband one last time.
Her lungs were filling with fluid yet she hadn’t the power to summon one deep breath to cough it up. She couldn’t help thinking she had brought this on herself with how she had acted, not only toward Nate but Kirk as well.
"Where is everyone, darling Ginger?"
Waking that morning and feeling ill, Amanda had gone out of doors thinking perhaps the fresh air might refresh her. It was an odd feeling, sickness, and one she was not familiar with having rarely been thus afflicted.
The only time she could remember feeling that way was the day Kirk had pushed her friend Ginger down the dungeon stairs deep under Orchardton Hall leaving the girl there to die while he ascended the throne as king.
Joshua was gone. Amanda searched through the vast vineyards and the warehouses where they allowed the wine to age and finally coming back to Toulon castle she woke Ginger to ask if she knew where her son might have gone off to.
"I'm not feeling well, darling Amanda."
It shocked her to see how quickly Ginger was succumbing to Lake Syndrome. There hadn’t been a case in better than eight hundred years but Amanda still remembered the symptoms. She had almost begun to believe the parasites that caused the disease had gone dormant somehow but now she realized her error.
"I think we have the Lake Sickness, sweet Ginger. I woke a little while ago feeling horrible and it has only gotten worse. I cannot find any of the Lake people. Joshua has vanished. Did he say anything to you about leaving?"
"Joshua wouldn’t leave us here alone, my precious Amanda... not unless he was forced into going. He knows the consequences of that action. He must be here somewhere."
"I've looked everywhere, my wondrous Ginger. He isn’t here. The anti-gravity craft is missing too but I don’t understand why he would go... unless someone contacted him while we were sleeping and lured him away."
Joshua had once been with one of the daughters of the People—the girl named Delilah who had been Kirk's love interest and wife—though as was Joshua's wont he didn’t stay with the girl for long before moving on.
Though he had acted nonplus about it, as if it confused him to the point of speechlessness that Delilah would leave him for Joshua, Amanda couldn’t help but notice how Kirk would stare at the man in a brooding kind of silence that often portended a coming storm of emotion.
Kirk had engineered all this. Somehow, he had been in contact with Joshua and told him something so horrendous that the boy left without a word. She couldn’t prove it but the thought stuck in her mind and gave her strength to fight. Amanda didn’t want to die, not like that. It would mean Kirk won.
He had always leered at her, even after she married Nate. It was as if he was undressing her with his eyes. She had considered talking to her husband about it but thought better of it when she realized what good friends Nate was with Kirk. Now, she wondered if she had erred.
Forcing her eyes to open and turning her head to the side consumed what little reserve of energy she had left. Ginger was there beside her, still breathing, but looking every bit in as bad of shape as Amanda felt. When she tried to reach out to touch the girl, to awaken her, she could scarcely move a finger, much less her arm.
"Ginger."
Her voice sounded like a muffled whisper, as if she was buried inside a tin can deep under the ground.
"Ginger... wake up."
Despite the searing pain shooting up from her wrist to her collar bone Amanda reached out to touch her friend. The girl opened her eyes. They were red with burst capillaries. Drops of blood leaked down the side of her head as Ginger turned to look at her.
"We have to get out of here. Can you make it to the car?"
Amanda didn’t know if it would start and if it did, she didn’t know if she could drive it. But she knew if they didn’t try, they would both lay there until death overtook them. She had too much living to do to allow that to happen.
"I can't move."
"If you can talk, you can move, Ginger. Get up."
Amanda didn’t know where the power came from, but she found herself standing over Ginger's prone body pulling at her. Bit by bit, the girl got to her feet as well. She knew the only car that might possibly start was in the warehouse where they kept barrels of wine with corks in the sides which they would sometimes pop out to test for taste.
Staggering outside together into the cacophony of the night she steered Ginger toward the open mouth of the storehouse that held both the car and wine. A familiar odor bolstered her sagging spirits as they entered the cavernous room... a delicate smell of wine aging gracefully in the ancient oaken barrels salvaged from other nearby vineyards.
She had an overwhelming urge to open one, to drink a drought of sweet red wine. She thought how it might energize her and lend her muscles the will they needed to go on for another minute.
The warehouse was warm after the chill of the night. A wooden mallet lay on a bench. Picking it up with fingers that barely gripped, Amanda staggered to the nearest barrel and swinging the mallet knocked the cork out of its side with a single blow.
A siphon lay nearby. With Ginger leaning on one shoulder Amanda used her other arm to stick the hose into the barrel drawing out a mug of wine. It smelled pungent and alive like the countryside in spring.
Raising the mug to her lips Amanda swallowed a small dollop and then another. The warm liquid burst like flowing fire in her stomach causing her to nearly double over in pain but it also gave her the added strength she knew she would need if they were to survive.
"Years ago, Karen and I discovered how the ingredients in our wine are natural inhibitors to the Lake parasites, darling Ginger. It hurts to drink it at first but it will give us a few more hours of life that we wouldn’t normally have."
Though she held the mug up to Ginger's mouth the girl shook her head as she refused to take a drink. She knew it shouldn’t but it angered Amanda that she was trying to help her friend but Ginger was doing nothing to assist her.
"Drink it, goddamn it."
Looking at the bloody teardrops dribbling down the girl's cheeks brought back memories of the day she shot Marilyn. Amanda had no premeditated notion of killing the woman... rather she thought the gun might scare Marilyn into staying put rather than going off to finish whatever unholy business she had begun.
Marilyn and Kirk were obviously unaware that she had overheard their conversation earlier that week though at the time Amanda couldn't make sense of what was said... that and she couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to do harm to the Ladies. If not for them, all the human beings would have died ages ago.
Ever since she was a girl Amanda had a habit of wandering through the many secret passages within the walls of Orchardton Hall. Few of the People knew about them while even the Ladies seemed ignorant of their existence but Amanda made a game out of finding her way to different areas of the castle using only those hidden tunnels.
She knew she was just on the precipice of entering the den through a portal that lay secreted behind a sliding panel of cherry wood. Hearing voices stopped her in her tracks as she bent an ear to the wall to listen.
"I won't be gone for long, darling Kirk... the symptoms of Lake Syndrome will take several hours to manifest."
"I don't like it, Marilyn. Something could go wrong. Your car might break down on the way home. If you are alone, you might not make it."
It puzzled Amanda that Kirk wasn’t stuttering. For a moment, she thought there must be a third person in the den. She had been going to get a book from the library which was more easily assessable from her apartment going through the walls. As she listened, however, she recognized both Kirk and Marilyn.
"We need to stick to the plan, my love... remember, it all depends on us both doing what we set out to do. If either of us fails to hold up our end of the bargain, we'll be banished from Orchardton Hall."
"We've worked it all out, Marilyn. Nothing can go wrong as long as we keep our heads. Remember, just do
what you have to do and I'll do the same."
"I understand, my darling Kirk. Just think... by this time next week..."
"Quiet, Marilyn... I think someone is coming."
Amanda knew she should have gone to the Ladies with what she had heard, but what could she tell them? Neither Kirk nor Marilyn had made any overt threats, at least not that she heard. Besides, she had never even talked with the Ladies. Would they accord her any respect? She doubted it.
Two days later, the Ladies had vanished and Amanda was so sich knew she was going to die soon unless they returned. When a car pulled into the courtyard, she rejoiced thinking it was Lily but instead Marilyn jumped out all alone. She seemed ill too, and excited.
"Where is Kirk, Amanda?"
"He's sick like me, Marilyn. But he told me all about your plot... he said you made him push Ginger down the stairs into the dungeon so the Ladies would go to her rescue and he could lock them down there."
"That isn’t true, Amanda... why on earth would I do anything like that? Kirk is filling your head with nonsense."
"We used to play in the catacombs all the time, Marilyn. There are tunnels leading out to buildings in Kurgan."
"Does Ginger know that too?"
"Of course she does."
"What are you doing with that gun, Amanda?"
Oddly, the wine was energizing her more than she thought it would. Though it riled her stomach at first, as she drank cup after cup she noticed her eyesight beginning to clear up and the malaise affecting her down to the bones lifting and being replaced with a kind of electric excitement, the opposite of drunkenness, if there was such a thing.
The nanobots... what had Micah said? They saved his life by manipulating his genome into opposing the Lake parasites boiling in his blood.
"May I have another cup of wine, darling Amanda?"
"Of course, my precious Ginger... we might just make it now."
Chapter 48—Disaster
"If you go back now, I won't kill you."
Kirk spoke to them with that same metallic voice that set Niall's nerves on edge while he recuperated from his injuries inside that horrid tunnel. The man seemed to think he had them all at a distinct disadvantage despite being both outnumbered as well as facing an enraged tiger capable of biting him in half.