Keeper of the Black Stones

by P. T. McHugh

  Evidently, I’d done a good job. My grandfather had told me that I was the perfect model for the average American boy. “A Rockwell painting,” he’d said. I knew who Rockwell was, and I knew Doc had meant it as a compliment. In a way, that was what I wanted. But lately there had been a voice in the back of my head, whispering in my ear, asking me if I really wanted to be average. Overlooked. Unimportant. Wasn’t that like picking vanilla ice cream as your favorite flavor every time you went into the ice cream parlor? Preferring vanilla over the million and one other exotic flavors available?

  Ironically enough, vanilla was my favorite flavor. But it was starting to lose its charm.

  “Any plans for the weekend?” Paul asked from behind me.

  I jumped, and realized he’d probably been watching me check myself out in the window for a while now. I hunched lower into my worn-out jacket, embarrassed at having been caught. And at the question. Paul knew perfectly well that I didn’t have any plans. I never had plans. Sometimes I thought that his asking was a form of pointing that out. Then again, maybe that was just my bizarre mood.

  “Nope,” I muttered, stepping past him and heading up the driveway to school.

  This was always the most interesting part of the walk, as it took us directly through the entire student body. Everyone who was anyone hung out in front of the school until about fifteen seconds after the last bell rang, displayed in all their group mentality glory. Paul and I made our way past the upper classmen, who stood clustered together in cliques. The jocks stood outside the gymnasium doors to the right of the main entrance, while the ‘untouchable girls’ huddled around a handicapped parking sign just to the left. The emo kids stood next to the bike racks at the end of the parking lot, smoking cigarettes, talking in low voices, and doing their level best to look mysterious. The techies, armed with Apple’s latest and greatest creations, were content to hang out beside the recycling dumpster on the opposite end of the entrance. For a moment I wondered what it would be like to be in one of those groups. To be honest, though, I knew that none of them would accept me, and I didn’t belong with any of those kids. I was the smartest kid in school, brought up on physics and history. I lived with my grandfather, a well-known genius and world-famous college professor. I dressed like a thirty-year-old computer programmer. I was, for all intents and purposes, a self-admitted nerd.

  Paul, who I didn’t think ever worried about these things, shoved past me to throw away his (untouched) cup of coffee. I laughed and looked beyond him, to the entrance of our school. A large, ugly concrete staircase led up to four empty glass doors. The only attempt at decoration was a sign that read “Future Leaders of the World.” Somewhat self important, if you asked me. Having known these kids for most of my life, I also hoped that it was a huge exaggeration. Otherwise our world was in a lot of trouble.

  I kept my head down as I made my way through the crowded hallway, trying to avoid eye contact with both teachers and students. In my experience, making eye contact encouraged people to talk to you, and that was usually the last thing I wanted. The result, of course, was that I generally got knocked around like a ball inside a pinball machine when I was in the hall. I also got stepped on at least three times a day, and always by someone taller than me. Through some bizarre twist of fate, though, I never managed to run into any girls. Only guys. Large guys. Sometimes I had a real problem with Murphy and his laws.

  I got to the refuge of my locker–which I shared with Paul–bruised, battered, and disheveled, and heaved a sigh of relief. I opened the locker, then opened my bag and started shoving books into the compartment. I could never understand why we needed so many books for school. Most of them were worse than useless, and the physics text I had right now was juvenile at best. The thing was, though, you had to have your books in every class or–

  “Damn,” I muttered, pulling my hand out and peering down into my bag. Nothing left there, and I hadn’t found the book I needed yet.

  “What’s up?” Paul asked, looking up from the copy of Johnny Quest in his hand.

  I slammed my hand into the door of my locker in frustration. This turned out to be a mistake, as the locker swung back, hit the locker next to mine, and rebounded right into my forehead, causing Cristina Patterson, who stood across the hall from us, to laugh. This, of course, just made the whole situation even worse.

  “Nothing, other than the fact that I grabbed Doc’s bag again, and I don’t have my Spanish textbook.” Damn it. This was the third time I’d done this. My grandfather’s bag looked exactly like mine, and I had a record of grabbing his bag, stuffing some of my books into it, and ending up at school with only half of the things I needed. This time I had ended up with Doc’s personal journal rather than my Spanish text.

  “Not like it matters,” Paul said with a smile. “You don’t understand the textbook anyhow.”

  “True,” I replied. I pulled the journal out of my locker and blew the dust off the leather-bound cover. At least it was the same color as the Spanish book–a deep blood red. I shrugged. “I’ll just bring it to class. Maybe Senora Caswell won’t notice.”

  “That seems like an awfully big gamble,” Paul replied, grinning. “Good luck.”

  Paul turned away, laughing at his own joke. I cringed, but shook it off. Paul Merrell had been my best friend since I was five, and he’d always been this way. He wore hand-me-down clothes from his brother, and they never fit his lanky frame like they should. His mom cut his jet-black hair for him, so he usually looked like he’d had a run-in with the business end of a weed whacker. He was also the underdog in a screwed-up family. His mother was rarely home, and when she was, she was asleep or ignoring him. Or forcing a haircut on him because she didn’t want to pay for one. Paul’s dad had disappeared several years earlier, leaving him at the mercy of a clueless mother and monster of a brother. He made up for these physical shortcomings with intelligence, a sense of humor, and an independent streak that bordered on suicidal. He also said what he thought–all the time–and cared very little about whether he hurt anyone. And that included me. Paul was even more socially awkward than I was. I had never figured out whether this bothered him or not.

  I snorted. “You’re a funny guy. I find it hard to believe that no one likes you.”

  Paul shook his head and shut his locker, then headed down the hall. I followed him to class, my hand in my bag. I was in for a tough time if the teacher noticed that I didn’t have my book. But this was the third time I’d grabbed Doc’s journal by mistake, and my mind flew back to his recent prolonged–and mysterious–disappearances. As long as I had a book full of his private thoughts, and nothing better to do…

  Hey, I said I was smart. Not perfect.

  2

  My capabilities in Spanish had always been less than stellar. I wasn’t stupid, by any stretch of the imagination, but fifty fruitless minutes of Spanish every day did little for my self confidence. It didn’t help that the teacher didn’t like me much.

  An involuntary shudder ran down my spine as I entered the ugly classroom. It was painted mustard yellow, and the walls were littered with Spanish phrases painted on white cardboard cutouts. Colorful photos of matadors, castles, and Spanish villas decorated the walls haphazardly, many of them peeling at the corners. There was a large whiteboard on the wall at the front of the class, and a television sat atop a moveable metal table lodged in the corner. The desks were neatly arranged in four rows of five, and Senora Caswell’s desk sat in the far corner of the room beside the whiteboard, where she could see everything that went on in the classroom, at all times. The room looked like every other classroom I’d ever been in–pretentious and over decorated.

  I took my usual spot in the back, right behind Rachel Wheeler. My mission for the next forty-eight minutes was simple–I would try my best not to make eye contact with Senora Caswell, while trying to look as though I didn’t care if she called on me. If she noticed me avoiding her eyes, she’d call on me for sure, and then realize that I didn’t have my
book. Then I’d be sunk.

  “Hola class, como estas?” Mrs. Caswell asked. It was her usual greeting. Standard fare. No problem.

  “Hola, muy bien,” we all replied, emotionless. Now everyone in the class held their breath; the game of calling on students for individual answers was about to begin.

  I began praying that she wouldn’t call on me.

  Spanish, and every other foreign language, had always been Greek to me. I was good at math, but I honestly couldn’t take credit for that. I’d grown up with a physics professor as a grandfather, and had heard mathematical and physics equations tossed around ever since I could remember. My talent in that particular realm was purely a product of good genes and exposure. Then again, being good at it never made me love it. My real passion was history.

  Both of my parents had been high school history teachers, and they had read to me endlessly about ancient civilizations, wars caused by power-hungry dictators, and battles that destroyed entire civilizations. My parents and I had done a lot together–fishing, camping, trips to the beach–but the nights when the two of them sat on the edge of my bed, reading tales by Shelby Foot about the Civil War, or Medieval novels by Bernard Cornwell … those were the memories that I treasured. Those were the times I missed the most, and they had colored my development. I was good at math and physics, but I was a history buff at heart, and no mistake. The blood and guts, the mystery, the adventure…

  Unfortunately, I had to focus on my Spanish lessons at the moment. Senora Caswell wheeled the TV into the center of the room and announced in Spanish that we would be watching another episode of Senda Prohibida (Forbidden Path). It was a Mexican soap opera, and was supposed to teach us about their culture. Personally I thought the only reason we watched it was because Senora Caswell actually liked it.

  At least it would keep me out of trouble, for the most part; no textbooks for watching a soap opera, after all. The television came on and half the class promptly dropped their heads onto their desks to go to sleep. Predictable as clockwork. I leaned back in my chair and flipped open my grandfather’s diary. This was exactly the chance I’d been waiting for. I knew I probably shouldn’t read the journal, but that certainly wasn’t going to stop me.

  Not that I was expecting much. Doc was a physics professor, after all. Pretty dry stuff. I figured I’d find some long equations that I couldn’t understand, or a scribbled definition of a theory that would fly right over my head. I was quite surprised when I found a real diary entry on the first page. The writing jumped right in, without any preliminaries, as though I’d come into the middle of a conversation in progress. What I saw shocked me.

  June 3

  My oldest and dearest friend, John Fleming, surprised me greatly earlier this week. He has asked me to view a relic that his son Nicholas discovered in the Middle East. I am by no means an archeologist, nor am I a treasure hunter as the Flemings are, so I’m not sure what to expect. I’ve been told that the object has symbols inscribed on the surface, which may be linked to the language of mathematics rather than linguistics. If this is true, I suppose that I am in fact better equipped than the average historian. That doesn’t mean that I like it.

  I’m looking forward to seeing John again, though. It’s been a long time. I hope I’m able to help in some small way. And I have to admit at least a small amount of curiosity.

  I frowned. This didn’t sound like the Doc I knew at all. This sounded more like the plot of an Indiana Jones film. And a good one. What on earth was Doc into? I flipped the page over and read the next entry.

  June 15

  Met John and his son at Dartmouth College earlier this morning, at Nicholas’ private research facility. It would seem that John’s personal fortune has gone a long way toward funding his son’s research! I doubt that the school knows about half of the equipment in this particular part of the building.

  I snorted at this. My grandfather moved in a very specific crowd. All of his friends were physics geniuses, and like peas in a pod. Except that from what I could tell, some of them had more money than God. Evidently this John was one of those friends. Doc’s finances were generous but were also a bit more … earthbound. I went back to the journal, smiling at the metaphor.

  John and Nicholas signed me into the building and led me past two security checkpoints (I later learned that the security was more of John’s private staff, which made me wonder), and into a basement. There I saw something that affected me in a way I don’t think I can explain. I’m not sure whether words can express my feelings, but I’m absolutely determined to try. For the sake of my own peace of mind, if nothing else, and because I think that it may be important.

  Two large black stones lay on the floor of the office. They were flat slabs of dark, glossy material, almost like obsidian, and possessed an other-worldly beauty. I don’t mind telling you that they gave off a distinctly … unsettling vibe. Each was marked in exactly the same way, and was exactly the same size–twice as large as I am, more or less. Large enough for a grown man to lie upon. It wasn’t the size that drew me, though. It was the humming. The stones sang, as though they were calling out to me. My blood thrummed in my veins until I thought my heart would burst. Before I knew what I was doing, I had crossed the room to lay my hands against the first black stone.

  The stone’s touch electrified me, as I think I knew it would. The texture of the top was smooth to my fingers, polished to a fine finish. The sides and underside were rough, though, almost like sand paper, like the stones had been chiseled from a larger slab. Each stone had carved on its smooth face a set of characters–lines of unfamiliar symbols and signs. John was correct to assume these to be mathematical, although I couldn’t have said what they meant. I thought for a moment that they resembled Mayan formulas I’d studied, and then the whole world blurred. The symbols suddenly began speaking to me, and revealing what they meant … and the power they possessed.

  I paused, took a breath, and went back to the start of the entry. Reread the words. This time I slowed down and concentrated on each word, to be sure that I was seeing what I thought I was seeing. The passage read the same way the second time. And the third. My heart skipped a couple of times, and I turned the page. I was skipping passages now, anxious to find out what had happened.

  July 23

  After all these years of research and speculation, we have proven my Ribbon Theory to be right. And in the most unlikely of ways! Of course I’m overjoyed, can hardly contain my excitement, and yet … Nicholas’ suggestion that we go public with this information … that we consider actually using these Stones … frightens me to my very core.

  We have been over the information–the facts–at least a million times over the past few days. We’ve gone over what we know to be true time and again, and have a very rough idea of how the process works, how the … jumps … take place. But there is still so much that we don’t know. So much that could go wrong. And if it did? I have to assume that it could mean the destruction of something very important, possibly time itself, and therefore our very world.

  Nicholas, I’m afraid, can only see the fame, fortune, and … power that the Stones represent. Of course that’s what he sees. His father made his name and fortune seeing those very things, and now Nicholas wishes to make his own mark on the world. But at what cost? He’s far too reckless for my liking, and I don’t trust him. I’m afraid that he’s spoken to others about his discovery, and I believe there’s even a chance that he’s sought buyers for these Stones. Internationally. John, of course, denies it, but I wouldn’t put it past the man. Despite our long friendship, I’ve never been truly comfortable with his brand of ethics.

  July 24

  Now that we’ve confirmed my Ribbon Theory, I’ve started working on something new. The question is, if time is a ribbon, bending back on itself, and there are windows through which one may pass, what happens when one does? More specifically, is there a time change between the two … planes? I believe that there is, and I believe that I’ve f
ound an answer to that question. The equation I’ve been working with is DT*C*365 (solar cycle) = TE.

  TE= Time Elapsed

  DT= Duration of time (Present Day–Distance in past traveled)

  C= Constant variable is .1440 (.001% of minutes in a day)

  There are problems, of course. This isn’t a true answer. The formula, although sound in its mathematical form, is still missing a variable that I can’t quite understand. The Stones allow me to anticipate the approximate arrival of my comings and goings between present and past, and physics–mathematics–demands that there must be a reason for that. The equation should be the answer, and yet it doesn’t quite work. It seems to collapse in short increments of time. Something is not quite right.

  I shook my head, trying to clear it of that jumble of physics and mathematics, and drew back from the journal. What on earth was this? Was my grandfather actually losing it? This last entry certainly didn’t encourage faith in his … rational mind. Though it fit in with some recent odd behavior. To say that Doc had been acting strange lately would have been an extreme understatement. He’d been constantly preoccupied. Staring off into space, talking to himself … I’d had full conversations with him, only to realize at the end that he hadn’t heard a word I’d said. I thought at the time that he was simply having trouble with his hearing. That had been shocking enough, since I knew quite well that I could mumble a comment under my breath 20 paces away and he’d make a point of telling me what I said. As if he was proving how good his hearing was. I would bet a year’s worth of physics homework that he could still do just that.