by Unknown
Everyone was shocked into a trance. It took several moments for the info to sink in.
“You’re saying that Tom and Karen have to go back to their timeline and that Caren and I have to stay here. Is that what you’re saying?”
I was having difficulty processing the information as I had so many emotions swirling through me.
Yes, that is the essence of it.
“Well, it’s better than a poke in the eye with a burnt stick but not much,” I said, but then I looked at Caren who had tears in her eyes and wished I hadn’t said it. “How long have you known this?”
To be honest, we knew from the beginning. We thought it prudent to withhold the information when we first approached you to trade places.
Karen gasped. “You mean you knew that this would happen knowing that we would make lives here?”
That is one of the reasons we wanted the children raised in a communal way. There would be no bonds between parents and their children. We did not factor in the emotions associated with family as it has been many generations since we of the future had such experiences. We can only ask for your forgiveness at this time, with the thought that you could understand our decision to withhold this information. After all, the existence of mankind was at stake, Monroe said.
To be honest, after the initial shock, we could see his point. Don’t know what decision we would have made knowing the truth. Guess we’ll never know.
That being said, there is one other difficult choice to comprehend. Monroe cleared his throat.
“Don’t know if we can handle anymore,” Karen said with tears already forming in her eyes.
All the originals’ offspring and their children born here in the future have to remain here as returning them to the past is impossible. You must understand the logic.
Since they never existed in the past, taking them back to the past would cause a time warp that would change the future. If you change the past, all humanity might cease to exist in the future.
That started the tears flowing, but when we stopped to think about it, it was a no-brainer. Disrupting the time line was not a scenario to jack around with.
My brethren and I are aging rapidly. We have but a decade to live. Soon we will cease to exist. We are leaving the future to your offspring and their descendants.
“What about those of you who didn’t agree with the plan from the beginning?” I asked.
They have no choice. I apologize for the resistance you encountered when you were trying to save the originals and their offspring, but the matter is settled now.
It was always the intention when we traveled back in time and abducted people to bring them to the future to leave the survival of mankind to their offspring.
In addition, for the foreseeable future six of the seven Domes will be mothballed as there are insufficient personnel to operate them. At some point in the future, they will be ready to be reactivated when the population is of a size to accommodate them.
“What about you and your brethren, Monroe”? Caren asked.
We will live here in the Kansas Dome with the clones, the offspring, and their children.
“What about running the place?” I asked.
We will transfer government to the originals offspring. They will be able to choose the type of government that will suit them. We hope that they will learn from history and not make the same mistakes.
I figured the first thing they would do would be to revoke the Forbidden Love law. Second thing would be to destroy all the Warrior cyborgs. And then they would resume playing completive sports. Most assuredly, baseball.
*****
P.S. For your information, Tom-Tom has passed the baton to me (Tom) to complete telling you our story. Monroe programmed me with his memories since taking my place back in 1978. So, from here on in, you will be getting the rest of our story from me.
*****
This might be a good time to tell you more about the children that we originals produced here in the future. When they were born, they had a unique appearance and developed special abilities. Their appearance wasn’t exactly the way God had intended and didn’t resemble that of their parents.
Physically they had larger eyes, with smaller ears and mouths than their parents. They were able to walk at six months. They were potty trained a few months later. They could speak and learn to communicate by the age of one. They could communicate both verbally and telepathically.
By the age of five, their cerebral capacity had expanded to 30 per cent. Their intelligence had reached the level of a college graduate of their parents’ time.
Each male grew to be the same height of 68 inches. The females were a couple of inches shorter. All had very fine white-blond hair with a pale skin complexion. They were breed to be of the same race. All were physically superior to their parents.
Monroe attributed their excelled intelligence and physical statue to the Dome’s clean air, water, and modern day nutritional habits. I didn’t quite grasp that theory. I’m thinking that with all their modern technology that maybe they fiddled with some of our DNA and mixed it with some of theirs.
But, I guess it doesn’t really matter how they developed the way they did because they are our children, and they are mankind’s salvation.
As you can see, there really was no other alternative but for the originals to return to their past and to leave their children here in the future.
But we have more pressing matters. We must return the originals to their timeline and to do that we need to repair the Mothership. It was most inconvenient of you to have damaged it.
“We were just trying to survive,” I reminded him.
*****
With a heavy heart, Karen, I, and the rest of the originals prepared for our journey back to our timeline of October 12, 2015.
Saying good-bye to one’s self, your children and grandchildren was not an easy task. As you can imagine, there were lots of hugs, tears, and emotional venting. It was especially difficult knowing that we would never see one another again. There would be no chance of having a family reunion someday.
Karen left our kids with some motherly advice:
“The best gift a parent can give to their children is roots and wings. Your father and I want you to raise loving, productive, and respectful adults. It is now your turn to pass on your roots and wings to your future generation. Soar to the horizons of the new universe you will create. Make us proud.”
Karen and I had some gratification knowing that we would be getting back in touch with the children we had left in the past. And that we had participated and succeeded in preserving the human race here in the future. That in itself eased some of the pain of leaving the children we had birthed here in the future.
I shook hands with Tom-Tom. I couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to know you haven’t much time left.
“You’re so ugly your mamma had to tie a pork chop around your neck to get the dogs to play with you,” was all I could think to say.
“Two peas in a pod,” he replied, giving me a wink.
“Oh! By the way, thanks for subbing for me,” I added.
“My pleasure. I must say, it was an intriguing adventure.”
“Thanks for putting up with Tom-Tom,” Karen said to Caren as they hugged.
“He was a hand full,” Caren acknowledged. “But I enjoyed every minute.”
Then, of course, we would be saying farewell to Monroe. I had taken a special liking to my little grandson, despite the grievances, lies, and language barrier. We had developed a unique bond, despite the many obstacles.
Monroe stated that after we were returned, the time travel program would be abolished. The time crafts and its technology would be destroyed. There would be no further need for the program since it had met its goal of preserving the human race.
After the heart-wrenching farewells with children, grandchildren, and clones, the originals boarded the Mothership for our final journey back to the past. We were each to be returned to
the timelines of our clones. They had previously been picked up and returned to the future to live out their shorter life spans.
Now you might have thought this to be the ending of my story. But, does anyone hear the fat lady singing? I don’t think so. Hold on, sometimes things don’t always go according to plan.
*****
There were about 150 of us plus Monroe and two of his assistants who boarded the Mothership for mankind’s final journey in time travel. An historical event in the history of mankind as was the first journey. Trouble was, it turned out to be as disastrous as the first journey.
Seat belts everyone, Monroe reminded us.
We flew to Lake Waukomis to engage the time mechanism. Karen and I were to be the first to be dropped off. As soon as Monroe ‘engaged’, I felt a slight bump in the ship’s movement. Having time-traveled before, I knew this was not normal. Then the slight bump became a major jolt and the cabin turned upside down and then jerked sideways. It felt like I was back on one of my favorite roller coaster rides. Only the screams coming from everyone were not those of a joyride.
Houston! I suspect we have a problem!
Then the interior of the ship started coming apart. All sorts of objects flew through the cabin like we were in the eye of a tornado. Everyone threw their arms up to protect their faces.
Electrical sparks spat from the dislodged instrument panels that danced around the interior of the ship. A dense vapor made it difficult to see and difficult to breathe. An alarm began to blast a disturbing and annoying sound. I knew immediately that this was not a good situation. To put it mildly, it was total chaos. Then the chaos ended as abruptly as it had started.
Following the turmoil, a fine misty spray started shooting from the ceiling. In a blink of an eye, the electrical sparks ceased, the ship cleared of the smoke, time suddenly stood still, and it got deadly quiet.
Stunned, we all looked at each other. Fortunately we had been wearing our seat belts.
Everyone had the same thought.
What the heck just happened?
Monroe must have read our minds.
In a despaired thought, he announced, We experienced a malfunction.
“No shit, Sherlock,” Someone spat, sarcastically.
“Has this ever happened before?” I asked.
Only once. Roswell. 1947. The initial time flight.
Shit. We all know that story.
“Is anyone hurt?” It was Karen who thought to ask.
It turned out both Monroe’s assistants weren’t so lucky. Both their bodies were crushed under a pile of rubble. Both hadn’t been wearing their seat belts. Everyone else escaped with just a few bumps and bruises.
The first thing on everyone’s mind was; Did we make it to our timeline?
Unfortunately, the time instrument panel was destroyed, and there was no way to know what timeline we were in. Everyone must have had the same thought, as there was a mad dash to the exit door to see what was outside.
Of course, the darn thing wouldn’t open. It was stuck. Someone gave it a kick and low and behold, it popped open. We looked out into a world that knocked our socks off. What we saw was nothing anyone could have imagined. What we saw, no one recognized, not even Monroe. What we saw was unbelievable, uncomprehending, and intriguingly fascinating.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Diversion
I can see it in your eyes that you are thinking that I probably had another head injury and am having another one of those hallucinations. Maybe I shouldn’t bring this up here because it could take away some suspense. But I feel compelled to let you know that what just happened was not a dream, nightmare, or hallucination. The crash didn’t knock me out. The crash and what I experienced was for real. I know because I pinched myself to make sure I was awake.
*****
No way were we in the year 2015. There was absolutely no evidence of a lake or town. No hyperactive squirrels, no irritating geese, and defiantly no cranky old catfish.
We were either far in the past, far in the future, far on the other side of the world, or maybe far from Earth. My logical guess was that we were somewhere far in the past, as that was the direction we were headed in. We had to be on Earth, as time travel was not space travel.
What we saw was a dense jungle, with vegetation growing everywhere. So thick that it was impossible to walk through. So thick that you couldn’t see more than ten yards in any direction. Tarzan, the King of the Jungle, would have a difficult time navigating through that stuff. Jane’s not going to be too happy when her man couldn’t make it on time for dinner.
The malfunction had apparently cleared a 10 yard area around the ship. Looking up, we saw small fluffy snow white clouds dotting a pure virgin blue sky. The air had a clean and fresh scented. The scenery was remarkably beautiful, but at the same time somewhat frightening ugly.
You can imagine what was going on in everyone’s mind. Where in the heck are we and are we going to be stuck here for the rest of our lives? My God, if we are stuck here, just think what that might do to the history of mankind. The timelines would be jacked up for sure. It could threaten our very existence. Were we witnessing what Earth would be like with no timelines? This had to be the dilemma of all dilemmas.
After the initial shock, I felt assured Monroe could make the necessary repairs to get us back on track. After all, our future generation had all this advanced technology and expanded brain capacity. If they could invent time travel, surely they should be able to fix a broken time machine.
His response was not very encouraging. In fact, it was downright devastating.
It is not my field of expertise. I am only an operator. My two assistants were the technicians, he said, pointing back inside to those who hadn’t worn their seat belts.
“That’s great. That’s just great. What are we supposed to do now?” someone said in despair.
There is optimism, Monroe replied. When I fail to return, my colleges will become aware that something unusual occurred. There is another Mothership in storage that can be resurrected. Meanwhile, we have sufficient food and water to last several days. That should be ample time for them to locate and rescue us.
After hearing that, our morale barometer peaked a notch. But not for long as I had to go and open my big mouth by pointing out the obvious.
“But what if they no longer exist?” I said. “If there are no timelines, there is no Earth history. Which means we could be the only human beings in existence. If that’s the case, there will be no one to rescue us. We may be all there is left of the human race.”
As you can imagine, my last statement didn’t sit so well with everyone. We could only hope that my scenario wouldn’t turn out to be our reality.
Then, right off the bat, we discovered another problem. The bathrooms were not functional. The crash must have shut down the systems. Plus, the ship had no means to bathe. No showers were ever installed because no one was ever on the ship long enough to require one. Of course, this distressed the females more than the males. After putting our heads together, we were able to build a make shift port-a-potty, but it was outside the ship. Since we had no idea what might be lurking in the bushes, we went outside in pairs.
Another problem we discovered was that some of the originals communications helmets were damaged. Those whose were damaged could no longer communicate with Monroe and vice versa. So there was a lot of translating that had to be done.
In a few days, the rations dwindled and there was still no sign of help. Monroe halved the quota. What I would do for a cheeseburger, fries, and a milk shake right about now. Amazingly no one complained, not yet anyway.
A few days later, depression started to weave its ugly affects among us. Everyone was having trouble sleeping because the ship had not been equipped with sleeping quarters. We had to sleep in chairs or on the floor. This also created a battle for the few pillows that were available.
Most were getting down right cranky. Women were bitching, and men were belly aching. Temp
ers flared over the littlest things. Our lack of hygiene certainly didn’t help matters.
“Jesus. Do you have to sit so close?” someone would complained.
“Whatever,” would be the usual response.
It began to feel like we were on that TV show called Survivor, wishing we could vote someone out.
It did rain one day, so we were able to fill any containers we could find with water. No one was embarrassed to undress and get a welcomed shower and clean our clothes. Surprising what a shower will do for morale. However, it didn’t last long.
Even the emotionless Monroe was showing signs of fraying around the edges. He finally assigned everyone simple tasks to occupy our minds and time. Some were assigned to clean up the mess the crash made, while others tried repairing broken panels and instruments. Anything to get our minds off our desperate situation.
“Who put Monroe in charge?” someone asked.
“Monroe may be of our descendant, but he is over 100 years old, which makes him senior to all of us,” I reminded him.
Karen and I would sometimes lay on the ground outside the ship and try to make out cloud formations in the sky.
“Look over there,” I would point one out. “Looks like a unicorn. See the horn on top of its head?”
“I see an angel,” Karen replied, pointing to another formation.
“Could be a sign of our salvation,” I hoped.
Into the ninth day, no one had shown up to be our hero. We were down to a day’s rations, which made everyone even more anxious.
It was finally determined that we had no choice but to venture into the jungle to find some type of food. We hadn’t a clue what we would encounter during our search. There were no Warriors to lean on, so we would be on our own, with no weapons to speak of.
We were about to decide who would go into the jungle when Monroe announced a more feasible alternative. He and some others had been checking out some of the smaller craft.
