Ripped Apart: Quantum Twins – Adventures On Two Worlds
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Ripped Apart
Quantum Twins – Adventures On Two Worlds
Geoffrey Arnold
Copyright © 2015 Geoffrey Arnold
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events
and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination
or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons,
living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
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ISBN 978 1784626 570
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Contents
Cover
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Quantum Twins Series
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
RIPPED APART
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
CHAPTER 41
CHAPTER 42
CHAPTER 43
CHAPTER 44
CHAPTER 45
CHAPTER 46
CHAPTER 47
CHAPTER 48
CHAPTER 49
CHAPTER 50
CHAPTER 51
CHAPTER 52
CHAPTER 53
CHAPTER 54
CHAPTER 55
CHAPTER 56
CHAPTER 57
CHAPTER 58
CHAPTER 59
Could the Twins be telling the truth?
The Twins’ adventures continue in:
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
My thanks go to the team that every author needs.
Naomi Sesay who ran the most powerful workshop I have ever attended: The Human Upgrade. It was there I met the Twins who asked me to tell their story. I never expected that to turn out to be four books!
After the Twins wrote what became the first nine chapters, my (best!) handwriting was so difficult to read that all their other adventures have been put on tape. That those words have made it onto paper is due to the indefatigable efforts of Cecily Wheeler, who also taught me African words like muzungu.
Heather Thomas, editor and playwright, whose comments on reading the first draft of the first part of this book amounted to a marvellous course on the technical aspects of writing.
To the friends who bought my first ebook as a result of whose comments I took it out of publication and engaged a professional editor.
Judith Henstra, my editor, whose advice and comments have been and continue to be invaluable. Caroline Swain who proof reads and copy edits. I have made some changes since she did that, so any errors are mine.
And now, even with self publishing, an author can have a publisher. I have a great team at Matador. Discovering just what is involved to do it properly makes me very happy that I cancelled my first, all-by-myself, eBook.
Trevor Stevens, who built the framework for the Twins’ main website and taught me how to fill it. Anna Langa for the website for Ripped Apart. Francine Beleyi for marketing instruction. All three and Cecily Wheeler for their support and interest throughout the years, and patience as each tries to teach me aspects of the ‘modern communication techniques’ of their own professions.
Through it all there is my wife, who gives me the space and time it takes, on holiday and then at home. And from whom, on our nights out, the twins have learnt the dance steps to most of the popular music of the 60s and 70s.
Quantum Twins Series
Ripped Apart
Hunted
Betrayed
Rebellion
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Born in Cheltenham, Geoffrey Arnold moved around the country during his career as one of HM Inspectors of Taxes - better known then by his full name of Geoffrey Arnold-Pinchin, and for his bright ties; which included The Scream, he likes all sorts of art; Tom & Gerry, he prefers silent cartoons; The Pink Panther playing tennis, his favoured sport; part of the score of Finlandia, he likes a wide range of music; and an ‘in your face’ saxophone.
He lives in Birmingham with his wife and near his children and grandchildren, which means he only has to wait for one person to leave the house before he retreats to his insulated, neighbour-friendly loft with his saxophones and clarinet. The other half of his family lives in Somerset, providing him with a perfect writing retreat amongst more youngsters.
Before young children came along, he spent many years working with youngsters, then in amateur theatre and politics.
Now, he is a Medium, Astrologer, Counsellor, NLP Master Practitioner, Life and Business Coach, and very occasionally a Tax Consultant - gamekeeper turned poacher!
He says that meeting the Twins has made a major impact on his life, not least in trying to keep up with the science behind the stories they tell him. More of that on:
www.quantumtwins.co
&
www.quantumtwins.co/blog
where he would love to hear from you.
Geoffrey’s personal website: www.geoffarnold.co.uk
RIPPED APART
Welcome to The Story the Twins have told me. They do not consider this to be a work of fiction.
CHAPTER 1
A MYSTERY
Out of pale blue ovals, two pairs of large, purple eyes stared at each other. They glowed as the twins recalled the previous evening’s discussion with their parents. They rolled out of their beds, slipped on their dayrobes and made their way to the main window of their attic domain. The view was what they wanted to see. After five continuous days the snow had stopped falling.
ot dare let their parents overhear their plans, or worse, have them discover that their children had worked out how to disable the security around the attic in Lungunu.
Lowering their energies they thoughtsent to their respective halves of the window to open, and leant out searching for a glimpse of Lungunu, the home of their father’s great aunt and great uncle. Living far out in the countryside there were no houses nearby to spoil the view. As far as their eyes could see, everything was covered in a thick white blanket, sparkling under a clear blue sky. With only two days to go to the winter KeyPoint, the longest night of the year, they were expecting to see strange lighting effects in the sky above the house, even though it was several kilometres away. Nothing.
Disappointed, Tullia turned to her twin. ‘Do you think it snowed on Auriga?’ she asked wistfully. She added the thought that she was just wondering, so as to stop him snapping back asking how did she expect him to know.
‘We know almost nothing about our original homeworld and little about the lives of the Auriganii,’ Qwelby replied. ‘I don’t understand why there’s so little information in the Racial Memory Archives.’
‘It’s over a hundred thousand sun cycles since we, well they, left there!’
‘But that’s it. The records refer to sun cycles. That must be their year. We don’t even know how long that was!’ he said, adding feelings of frustration to his thoughts.
As with all young Tazii, their genes tightly controlled the release of hormones at the time of each rebirthday. At fifteen and a quarter years old they were at the beginning of the fourth phase of their second era, when the genes that had been activated required them to explore the meaning of home and roots. Whilst they had some special friends, both boys and girls, it would be nearly two years before they would experience the first stirrings of feelings towards the concept of a deeper relationship with a boy-friend or girl-friend.
Lost in thought, they pulled their heads back in and initiated closure of their halves of the window.
The two soft chimes of the halves closing jerked them out of their reverie. They turned to look at each other. Their purple orbs flared, and they raced across the room, threw themselves onto and down the two twirlypoles, across the hall and into the kitchen, a dead heat, as usual.
Their parents looked up, shaking their heads at the exuberance. Shandur, their father took after the men in the family. He was tall and well built with a full head of prematurely greying, dark brown hair that fell to just above his shoulders, as was the custom for men. He was dressed in his usual style when at home in a lightweight, soft round neck sweater and trousers, today’s choices being plain olive over tan.
Mizena, their mother was shorter than average with a sturdy build that came from all the time she spent working on the gardens and farms of both her own home and that of her husband’s great aunt and uncle. Ready for work, she was wearing a lightweight polo neck in a range of browns and greens, shot through with splashes of orange, and dark green trousers which she would tuck into boots when outside.
‘Mum Dad the forecast was right it’s stopped snowing the sky is clear its not our day this tenday to be in college and you said can we please??’ the twins exclaimed in unison, without a pause.
Tullia was making her eyes go perfectly round, elongating and fluttering her already long lashes and exuding an impression of sweet innocence whilst Qwelby controlled his desire to be sick at her antics.
‘Can you what?’ asked Shandur, their father, with a straight face.
‘Take our sleds to Lungunu!!’ they replied in exasperated tones of two voices.
‘Will you never grow up?’ Mizena, their mother, asked rhetorically.
The twins turned to look at one another, wrinkled their brows and pursed their lips as though giving the question due thought.
‘No,’ they replied. ‘We’re not going to be old!!’
Their parents turned to each other, shook their heads, gave up trying to look serious and smiled. ‘All right,’ they said together, not to be outdone by their children.
‘Yippee!!’
Racing to the bottom of the twirlypoles the twins thoughtpropelled themselves upwards, laughing as each tried to force the other to lose concentration and slide down to the bottom.
‘Breakfast first,’ their mother called after them. ‘Just over fifteen years old and they are so childish at times,’ she muttered.
‘Maybe I’m not being fair,’ she added, turning to her husband. ‘Working with your Aunt Lellia studying the Azurii, I forget how much slower our children grow up emotionally compared to those humans with their short lives.’
With many Tazii living to be two hundred years old, it was customary to omit saying one or even more “Greats”, the speaker’s accompanying thought making the situation clear.
‘We’ve done a lot to encourage that behaviour,’ Shandur said, taking his wife’s hand in his and using the physical contact to infuse her with all his love and support.
His words obliquely referring to their reasoning, the previous existence of another pair of Quantum Twins, stopped any further discussion. In a world where people’s energy fields were clearly visible and easily readable, and where the whole race was loosely mentally interconnected, the transmission of thoughts had to be carefully guarded. Husband and wife locked eyes, each knowing that the other was reflecting on the potential tragedy facing their children.
*
Quantum Twins were unique. Although genetically identical, one was a boy, the other a girl. There was no explanation for that impossibility. According to the Archives only one other pair had ever been born, and that had been several hundred years ago. Surprisingly for such a recent record, it was badly degraded. For the sake of preservation, as with any very old and degraded record, access was restricted to a small group of Custodians known as Preservers. With expressions of sorrow, the oldest and most senior who was known as The Antiquarian, had advised the family of the best interpretation they had been able to make.
Unable to bear being separated in any way, as that pair of Quantum Twins had passed into adulthood their introversion had become pronounced. They had refused to accept help, and their interaction with and contribution to the world outside of themselves had steadily decreased. The world of quantum energy required continuing interaction, symbolised by the Tazii as a constantly moving, three dimensional figure of eight comprised of two dragons swallowing each other’s tail. Failing to interact with the world at large, those twins had broken their essential connection with Life. No longer able to receive the energy needed to sustain their existence, their lifelines had ended at a much earlier age than normal.
Just as with that pair, until the age of six Qwelby and Tullia had found it very difficult to acknowledge that they were different. So much so that they could come running into the house with one saying that they were hurt, when it was the other that had been injured. The family had done everything possible to encourage them to see each other as distinct and separate individuals and form good relationships with other youngsters. The twins’ constant rivalry and bickering was seen as evidence of success, although their parents in particular hoped it would not last for too many more years.
CHAPTER 2
BURGLARS
The twins were pulled in two directions. By their twelfth rebirthday they had developed their own distinct personalities and a keen sense of rivalry, yet underlying their whole existence was a fierce need for unity. Today, that was shown by the identical, heavily padded, blue sledsuits they were wearing. Physically, they obviously were a boy and girl in their second Eras, equally tall at one metre eighty-five. Yet in the underlying quantum world, they were identical. Occasionally they would play with that by dressing the same in the fashionable unisex style. Although that did nothing to hide Tullia’s female features, they were still able to use the power of thoughtsending to pretend to be each other, even fooling their four closest friends.
On their last visit to Lungunu a tenday ago, their father and his g
reat uncle had been deep in conversation, their thoughts safely contained behind a strong Privacy Shield. That was normal. What had not been normal was the almost guilty reaction when the twins came upon them, as though they were hatching a conspiracy. Guessing that the adults were discussing a new invention, the twins had decided to try and listen to their thoughts.
Tazii did not speak words telepathically. Thoughts consisted of images, impressions, feelings and colours. The more that people were in tune with each other, the closer that became to being as clear as actual words.
Unable to break through the Privacy Shield by themselves, the twins had mentally called on their four best friends to help. Invoking their special group, all six had pooled their energies. It was the first time they had tried working as a group when all six were not physically together. There had only been limited success, but the strange and incomplete mixture of impressions had convinced them all that a secret new project was being developed concerning the twins that was connected to their Aurigan heritage. Whatever was being made had to be secreted in the attic as that was the only part of Lungunu the youngsters were forbidden to explore.
What had been overheard was far too tantalising to ignore. If all six tried to break into the attic that amount of energy was bound to set off the alarms. With their unique skills, the twins might be able to succeed by themselves. Ever since that day they had been waiting for an opportunity to return and try to unravel what they were calling The Mystery.
*
As they stepped outside their home they were just in time to see Snubble sliding through a little doorway into Barn. Programmed by their father, it had just finished clearing the snow away from all the paths around the house and garden.
At the twins’ insistence Shandur had made Snubble look like a snowboy and girl, kneeling side by side and sharing one enormous mouth to suck in the snow. To their disappointment that was then blown out through the ears. Glowing garishly with their favourite colours of purple and lilac, red and green, it was easily visible on the darkest night.
‘Open Sesame!’ Qwelby commanded as they reached Barn.