by Kord Stone
Alise hugged him a while before she finally spoke up. “I am beginning to think she may be the one guiding us on this merry-go-round.”
Jason sighed and nodded. “You may be right. I just wish she would tell us to what end.”
They stayed in bed a while longer trying to think through the information. Jason’s mind was all over the place. His first concern was the protection of the family. They were safe enough at the moment on the ship but their discontent was palpable and he knew the civility was not going to last much longer. He knew he would have to do something about it pretty soon, and an idea came to him. “Alise?”
“Yes?”
“Is everyone awake below?”
“Everyone except the little ones, why?”
He could hear the trepidation in his own voice as he said, “I think I may have a plan to keep the family safe, but I know they won’t agree.”
She sat up in bed. “What is your plan?”
He wavered a second. “I think we need to put them in stasis and wake them when we’ve resolved the issue with TDS 5.”
“It sounds like a good idea but we have nowhere to keep them.”
“Actually we do. The master control room has a stasis chamber off of it. I just accessed the information about it. The room is like the void storage in a way. According to the data the stasis chamber is out of space-time and can only be accessed through the master control room itself. Seeing as how the other ship’s commander doesn’t seem to know about the master control room, the family should be safe in the stasis chamber. For the time I was in the master control room, you couldn’t track my DNA and that room is nearby, so we can keep a close watch on them. I think it would be the best solution, temporarily of course.”
Alise had a concerned look on her face. “There is nothing in the database about a stasis chamber. How do you know those details?”
He steeled himself for another tongue-lashing. “When I was in the master control room I…may have reactivated the neural link. Data…could be streaming between me and the control room as we speak.”
Alise didn’t let him down. She chewed him up one side and down the other. He thought his ears were going to be ringing for a month. It didn’t bother him though. He knew her anger was out of concern and he loved her for it even more.
It took a while before she calmed down. The shoulder rubs and kisses on her neck didn’t hurt. He waited until he felt it was safe to return to the topic and asked, “So, what do you think?”
She let out a sigh. “It sounds like a good idea. How do you plan on getting them in there?”
“When they go to bed tonight we knock them out, and Jerren, Justin and I will carry them in and place them in stasis pods.”
“You are not going to put your brothers in there as well? Or do you think they will go in voluntarily?”
“No, I won’t force them to go but I will give them the option, even though I know they’ll refuse it.”
“Okay, it is a better plan than keeping them all bottled up in this ship the rest of their lives.”
Jason affected a fake hurt look. “Sure let them be at peace, but me, I can be bottled up all you want.”
Alise cracked a wicked smile. “This bottle is made for two babe, and I do not share well.”
That statement got them both cracking up. Jason leaned over and kissed her softly. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“So what is to be done with your brothers?” she asked.
“I don’t want to make decisions for them. I’m just going to offer them a treat and see which one of them bites.” Jason explained about TDS 3 and how he thought he could assign one of them as the new commander. She seemed intrigued by the possibility, and after detailing what he would like her to do, he stood and motioned for Alise to join him.
She did and upon standing she let the blanket covering her drop to the floor. “Oops,” she said and nibbled her lower lip seductively.
He eyed her up and down with amusement before saying, “I hate to do this to you but…” He waved his hand over Alise’s body and clothing appeared on the both of them.
Alise’s lower lip jutted out and she stomped playfully. “I want to stay in bed and have fun.”
“Later,” he told her. “Definitely later.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Jason and Alise materialized in the far corner of the second level. He could hear his uncle and half brother going at it once again. They really didn’t like each other for some reason. Jason and Alise’s appearance ended the unfriendly discussion. His uncle, still needing to vent, turned his anger toward Jason. That is when Jason noticed the bandages and blackened eyes on his uncle and his half brother, and any doubts about his plan were gone.
Jason knew Alise was about to step in, but he put his arm around her and spoke up. “We may have found a solution to the problems we’re facing. We’ll know for sure by tomorrow. It looks promising, so in anticipation I’ve decided to throw a little feast tonight, since we’ll probably not be seeing each other for quite a while after that.”
This statement got them all excited and over the next ten minutes he was bombarded from all directions regarding the plan. All he would say is he didn’t want to get anyone’s hopes up too much but repeated that if it worked this would be the last chance to get the whole family together for a while.
They were not happy about being left out of the details but in the end, they relented. Jerren and Justin on the other hand, seemed to know something was up. Once again he gave them his I’ll explain later look and he and Alise left the room buzzing in anticipation.
Jason’s family seemed happy and were laughing and talking, which was something they had not done since being brought back aboard the ship. A few hours into the feast Jerren and Justin approached Alise and Jason under the guise of asking him how he got the strange music to play. They walked over to a console and Jason was pointing to it randomly as he told them he would explain it to them after the family went to bed. Both Jerren and Justin raised their voices just enough to be heard and said at the same time, “I love this music. Where is it from?” This got both of them yelling, “Jinx! You owe me a Coke,” followed by, “Where do we get a Coke?” in unison followed by another, “Jinx!” then laughter from the three of them and Alise. This drew admonishing glances their way.
Jerren said, “Seriously though, this music is mesmerizing. I really like it.”
Jason looked to Alise for the answer. She said, “It is a Lantin rendition of an ancient Imortum song. The music is the same but the language is different.” She looked between them with a curious expression.
The time seemed to fly past and a few hours later Jason told them all he was going to need to get some rest for the next day. He and Alise said their good nights and he gave his father a hug and he said, “See you in the morning.” Then Jason took Alise by the hand and they vanished without a trace.
Alise and Jason rematerialized on the first level and she turned on him. “I cannot believe you just lied to your father about seeing him tomorrow.”
“I didn’t lie to him. When he wakes up, it will be tomorrow…for him at least. I’ve decided to stop thinking in linear time. It’s easier on my conscience, and my headaches.”
That statement drew her laughter and she said she would have to agree then stretched up to kiss him and sighed. “So, now all we have to do is wait for them to fall asleep.”
“I think it’ll be less time than you might think. I increased the level of tryptophan in their imitation turkey meat dinner.”
Alise got a shocked look on her face. “You drugged your family?”
Jason let out a booming laugh. “No I didn’t… I just made sure they ate a lot of food so their digestion would kick in and they would get tired faster.”
With a chuckle she closed her eyes a moment then reopened them. “Your plan appears to be working. A few of them are already heading to bed. I would say we could get your brothers in about twenty to thirty minutes.”
“Okay, what’s up?” Jerren asked with a raised brow.
Jason pondered where to begin, the Imortum or the family. He decided to enlighten his brothers about their imaginary friend first. “Do either one of you remember where we learned to speak our private language?”
Jerren and Justin seemed to ponder the question a few minutes, then Jerren replied that he only remembered speaking it and nothing about learning it, and Justin agreed.
“Why?” Justin asked.
“Alise heard us speaking it at our birthday party and was surprised because it’s actually the ancient and apparently dead language of the Imortum.” Jason explained about how the Imortum had turned over the running of the time ships to the Lantins, who were known on Earth as Atlanteans and that Alise’s first host Andel was able to speak the Imortum language.
Justin looked at Jason as if he were playing a trick on them as he said, “Good one, you almost had me there.”
Jerren spoke up. “No Justin, I can see he believes it. What makes you sure she’s right?”
“She had me look into her first commander Andel’s memories and she was right. I found the memory where he was speaking with an Imortum. He was not speaking it well but it was definitely the same language, and here is the strange part—”
“Stranger than us speaking a dead language, oh this must be good,” Justin quipped.
Jason said, “Yes, well it does get stranger.”
That statement got Justin and Jerren’s full attention and he continued. “Well Andel was speaking with a woman and I was about to pull out of the memory when I looked at her. She looked familiar but I couldn’t quite place her, so I sifted through more of his memories until I came to the next one. She was Inola.”
Jerren said, “Are you sure? It has been twenty-five years since we saw her last.”
Jason took in a deep breath. He had sworn to himself he would never tell anyone else about the voices in his head for fear they would react the way his shrink did back on Earth, but now he knew the voice was real. He looked at Jerren, “Do you remember when I was captured in Iraq?”
Jerren’s face flushed a moment and he looked to Justin a second then must have figured top-secret information didn’t matter much where they were now and nodded for Jason to continue.
“Well as you know I was tortured extensively. What you don’t know is a few months into the captivity they decided to get creative with their new techniques.” He described, perhaps a little too graphically, if the expressions on his brothers’ faces were any indication, what they had done to him and how he started hearing voices. Then how he heard a different, more soothing voice, and the others faded into the background and how the pain subsided as well. He explained how he was brought back day after day and subjected to more of their methods, but as soon as he heard the voice, none of their torture caused any pain. “I remember having conversations with the voice, but to this day I cannot remember a single word of it. I know now that the voice I heard was the same voice that came from Inola after she changed.”
Both Jerren and Justin looked stunned and Justin asked, “That was you in Iraq?”
Jason just looked from Jerren to Justin in shock. “What do you know about it?”
Justin must have had the same moral dilemma Jerren seemed to but quickly overcame it as well. He paused a second then opened up to them. “There was a coded message transmitted over all of our military bands. I later found out that none of the crypto guys or linguists could figure it out, so they sent it into the Cray supercomputer. It worked for days but couldn’t decipher any of it.
“My commander was in a V-Tell meeting with the joint chiefs when I went in to deliver a critical mission brief to him. They were playing the message and I recognized it as our language. The message was a simple one. The voice said, ‘Sandman is in the nest. Bright boy is sleeping. It gave a latitude and longitude just outside Mosul and a time and date the sandman would go to sleep and bright boy was coming out to play.’ The message just kept repeating. I translated it and all hell broke loose. I was told that information was SCI 4 top secret and not to speak a word of it to anyone, then the military police proceeded to escort me to the barracks where I was placed under house arrest for the next eighteen hours.”
Jason could feel that there was more to the tale and gestured for him to continue.
“The next day I was taken to SOCom headquarters where I spent the next few weeks being interrogated. I was repeatedly ordered to explain how I knew this code and who sent it. I couldn’t explain it. I never said it was the language we three spoke to each other. Somehow I felt like if I did, something very bad would happen to us, so I kept my mouth shut. They knew I had a knack for languages and in the end they must have just figured I was a savant or something. I was tested over and over with codes and languages, and a week later I was transferred to Goodfellow Air Force Base, where I was fast-tracked through crypto training then shipped to the Aluetion chain, and I was under constant watch. I was stuck in a box there, deciphering signals and codes for the rest of my tour.”
Justin gave an exaggerated shudder and continued. “Needless to say, I was more than happy when my hitch was up. They tried their damnedest to keep me in the service though. At one point they tried to say I had to wait until a sensitive piece of information I knew was no longer a threat to national security. I reminded them that I knew if I were to reveal any information deemed top secret or SCI, I would be subject to prosecution for treason, and since it was war-time I could be executed. They made me sign nondisclosure for several things I had witnessed, and in the end they relented and I got the hell out of Dodge. I’ve never said a word about it until just now for fear they would have me whacked.
“I suspected that might be you over there, and wanted to ask you, but with the surveillance I knew our government was performing on our own citizens, not to mention the times I knew I was being surveilled, I didn’t dare ask. When you asked if there was a reason our government would want us dead, that was just one of the memories that came to mind. But this is the first I’ve spoken of it.”
Jason was stunned. What were the odds that all three brothers would have a role to play at the time the Imortum came to help him? “I think Inola has been guiding and helping us along our paths, even though we haven’t seen her since we were nine years old. I heard her voice during the first attack on this ship. She said it was my awakening. I don’t know what I was awakening from or for, but I think we’re all needed for something and Inola has been playing us like a two-bit piccolo to get us here ever since we were little.
“I’m beginning to see possibilities but nothing is certain. And as for our government being the ones after us, we now know it wasn’t them. It’s the guy in the other ship like this one, but we don’t know why yet.”
Jerren let out a groan drawing Jason’s attention. “Do you remember the events of the four weeks after we rescued you?”
Jason cringed at the memory and said. “Yes, isolation and needles pretty much sums it up, why?”
“When my team arrived in the compound to rescue you, everywhere we looked there were corpses with no signs of physical damage. We put on our MOPP gear and set out. My partner and I were tasked with finding and recovering you, and the SEAL team was tasked with securing the warhead. After we located you, we put you into the MOPP for isolation protocol. The SEAL team took blood samples from some of the dead, then we got the hell out of there. The tests all came back negative for any known bio, chemical or radiation and because the cause of their deaths was undetermined, that is why we were all placed in quarantine until the doctors determined we were not a biological threat.”
“And?” Jason prodded.
“And
if as you say Inola was there at least in your head, she may have been the reason for all the dead. As far as I know they never found any reason for all those people’s deaths. And believe me they were definitely interested in finding the cause,” Jerren said.
“So what do we do now?” Justin asked sounding a little nervous.
Jason knew his brothers were alike in more ways than looks but they had their differences as well. He figured it was time to set his plan in motion and see if they were in. “First off we need to get the family to safety—”
Justin interrupted him. “You told us they were tracking us by our DNA and nowhere would be safe to drop us off, or has that changed?”
Jason explained about the master control room, the stasis chamber, and how it was out of phase with real time and could be accessed only through the master control room. “As long as they’re in the stasis room I don’t think the other commander can get to them.”
Jerren looked as if something was troubling him. “I don’t think any of the family are going to willingly get into a stasis chamber. How do you propose we convince them?”
Jason had been afraid of this. He hesitated a moment and then said, “I…didn’t actually give them a choice in the matter.”
Justin and Jerren both said, “What did you do?” at the same time. They both smirked at one another before returning their focus back on Jason.
“The dinner was a bit of a farewell feast, to get them to go to bed early. Once their heads hit their pillows, they were put into an induced stasis sleep. We need to move them into the stasis chamber for their safety and after the threat is over we can take them out and they’ll be none the wiser.”
