I followed Saint Dane out of the flume, onto a desolate, barren plain. The flume was out in the middle of nowhere. In fact, it was between two trees marked with the star symbol that was at every flume. The very air I breathed was filled with evil. All I really remember thinking to myself was, this has to be Saint Dane's home territory. As soon as I got my head together, the first figure I saw was Saint Dane.
"Get away from here. You don't belong here," Saint Dane said in a growling, desperate tone.
To admit it, my little boost of confidence I had was quickly replaced by fear whenever he spoke those words. He was scared, and if he was scared, I was scared too.
"Why?" was the only word I could utter. Pretty stupid too…
"Leave! Second Earth!" He demanded and yelled in the flume as if yelling at the flume would make the musical light carry me away quicker. It must have worked because in a second, Saint Dane and I were both on our way to my home territory, Second Earth.
On the way there, we spoke about nothing. Heck, we didn't even look at each other. His hard breathing and pale white skin were enough to tell me that if I said a word, he'd probably bite my head off, literally.
We arrived at our destination but it something wasn't right. We weren't at the flume in Stony Brook. We stepped out of the little room to find total darkness except for something that looked like a light saber, and rock music blaring. Mark, do you remember when we stayed up all night and watched Star Wars and then went down to your basement to play with out new plastic light sabers for an hour until mine finally broke because I hit it too hard against your mom's washer? All of those memories came flooding back to me. The only difference was that this wasn't us, they were using double light sabers, and they were professionals.
For about one fatal minute, I stood and stared at the "Jedi's" battling it out. I had forgotten that Saint Dane was still there and all of a sudden, I felt a cold, hard grip on my shoulder. The two people were heading this way and Saint Dane was holding me still so they wouldn't see me and kill me! They were getting nearer and I still couldn't move. Saint Dane held me tight until the last minute when he pulled me out of the way.
"Thanks for taking your time," I whispered to him. By that time, the CD that had been playing stopped or was changing songs. Whatever it was, the people had heard my last syllable and turned off their light sabers.
I remember thinking, this is it, this is how my life's going to end. By two wannabe Jedi Knights. I heard two metal things clatter to the floor and footsteps drawing nearer. Either someone was coming closer or the fear of death was making me insane. I'd have voted for B if they didn't walk past us and turn on the lights.
"What are you doing here?" The girl who turned on the lights demanded. She was clad in a white loose shirt that looked like it could've belonged to her brother because of how beat up it was. She had a utility belt with a single weapon hanging from it, the light saber, and tight khaki pants. She wore black, leather, split-soul boots with a Jedi cape to complete the ensemble. She was tall and slender with dark brown hair and even darker brown eyes to match. I would've guessed that she was around our age, maybe a little older. She had tan skin to match her dark complexion and looked really mad. I looked straight ahead and realized they had been wearing some sort of metal helmets that permitted them not to see. That was why they couldn't see the light from the flume.
"I think a better question would be why do you have a flume in your basement?" I half asked, half stated. I guess that would've been a bad move if they didn't know anything about Travelers, but when I looked into her eyes, I just sort of knew that she knew, and somehow I knew that she knew I knew she knew. That is if you followed any of that.
"For Travelers of course," she said in a matter-of-fact tone. Well, duh, like I didn't know that. What I wanted to really know was where the heck I was. As if able to read my mind she said, "You're in Mexico on Second Earth. I'm Graciela Cortez, and this is Luke Skywalker. You can call me Grace for short. We were in the middle of a training session. I couldn't make it to the republic today. If you're the lead traveler from Second Earth, welcome, if you are not, go back to where you came from." Wow, nice girl, right?
"I am the lead traveler from Second Earth," I said stepping forward and giving a little bow. This is Saint Dane, as if you didn't know. I don't know why we are here, but we are"
"You're here because I summoned you here. I've been on this stupid dull territory for 14 years waiting for you to finally find me. It was impossible to find you with Press always taking you away or something like that…" Her words trailed off.
My first thought after this was, 'She knows Uncle Press!' My first words were, "How do you know Uncle Press?"
"Well, he was the lead traveler wasn't he? I am the lead traveler from the other territories and kibbutz. Press told me not to leave in the flume until you arrived. This was two years ago and so here I am. Luke and Obi Wan showed up about a year ago and took me back to the Republic to help stop the rebellion and start my Jedi training. I got back in no time flat and have still been here to wait. Where is Press by the way, I want to give him a piece of my mind for sending the reprobate with you."
I was about to tell her that Uncle Press had been killed on Cloral when I heard another voice. One that was really familiar and undoubtedly someone that could not be. I heard Uncle Press's voice. At first I didn't believe it but looking back now, I truly believe that it was him.
"I am here Grace, calm down. This is my nephew Bobby Pendragon and he is the lead traveler from Second Earth. Just provide some shelter for them. Your parents won't be home for another week and your brother and sister won't be home for at least two more days. Take it easy on him, he still doesn't know about the other territories. Explain it to him, please? Could you do that for me?" Uncle Press said in a kind tone. How did he know her? Heck, how was he speaking?
"You're kidding me! You didn't tell him!" Grace yelled at Uncle Press. She left out an irritated cry and started up the stairs. Luke followed her, then me, and Saint Dane brought up the rear.
"Here," She said in aggravated tone. "Pendragon can stay here, and Saint Dane can stay here." She showed me a really girly looking room that had to be her sister's. It was fairly big and had two beds in it. She explained that Luke was staying in her brother's room, and Saint Dane could take her parents room. Since her sister and her shared the same bedroom, we had to stay together. "The bathroom's through that door and the kitchen is downstairs. Get a shower and come downstairs for supper at precisely 6:30, if you're late, I'm not going to guarantee that there will be any left. Same to you Dane, get a shower, you smell like you were lying in a pile of dead carcasses." With that, she left nothing but towels.
I have to admit, dinner was great. We had some Spanish delicacy, Paella, and followed with Crème Brule. If all that wasn't enough, we also watched a movie on her huge private movie theatre downstairs. All she did was turn the wall that had the booth where she had played music earlier and boom, instant movie screen. We ended up agreeing on watching "The Brother's Grimm" and then went to bed. Before we went to bed though, we had a little training session. Grace decided that she had never ended her training earlier and wanted to do a little of that before bedtime.
"Oh, come on! It'll be so much fun to see how well you fight. We don't even have to use light sabers," she told us. I half believed her, but something about her told me she had been fighting for a long time. I decided that I would sit this one out, but Saint Dane decided that he had to show her how tough he was. It was creepy that night, we actually spoke to each other as normal people, not as mortal enemies.
I had been right, she had been fighting for a while. Since she was four years old to be exact. Let's just say Saint Dane was down in exactly 29.36 seconds. Luke had timed her. The funny thing was that he was a traveler, but he didn't say two words all night. The only one he spoke to was Grace and I couldn't hear him because he was mumbling. As I thought about this, Grace read my mind again.
"He hasn't learned how to hear other languages yet. Back home on Tatooine, he had a C3PO droid that translated things for him. Because I spent a year there, I picked up the tongue quickly and I can talk to him. Being a Traveler is still new to him. He hasn't found out many things yet." She yawned and finally declared she was tired. FINALLY! I was starting to wonder if this girl was a droid herself. It was three am.
She told us to go upstairs, and that she would be up in about an hour, she had some things to do. She held me back from the group and I figured that this was the point where she would start explaining herself. She cleaned up a few things, put the wall back to the way it was earlier, hit a button, and sat down a side table that had popped out of the floor in the corner.
She motioned for me to sit also and after seeing what she just did to Saint Dane, I wasn't about to make her mad. She spoke first, "Bobby, I know this will be hard for you to comprehend, and it was for me when Press first explained this to me, but there are some things you're going to have to learn. I know this won't make much sense, but here it goes."
For the next hour and a half, she attempted to explain who she was and why she had to wait for me. "Bobby, there is another 'system' per say of territories and planets that aren't territories yet called kibbutz. Saint Dane isn't the only one that wants to tip the territories into chaos, there are more. I'm from a kibbutz that mixes every territory in Halla. It's called Zinthos and it's the most powerful kibbutz in Halla. The people there know everything about Travelers, Acolytes, the mysteries of the flumes, everything. I've only been there about three times. I was sent to Second Earth when I was a baby so that the person who killed my mother couldn't find me."
I could hear the gloom in her voice. It was like she was recalling the events that happened to her mother until she was sent to Second Earth. I started to wonder what it would've been like to be deceived all those years into thinking that you were with your real family. It's like what Loor and Aja had to go through. I understood her sorrow, but somehow, I don't think I could. I decided to stop thinking about it because it was making me sad and let her continue.
"My mother was the Traveler from Zinthos before I, and my father was the Traveler from another kibbutz called Orb that had all of the Territories from your 'system' gathered in one place. Together, they knew everything about Halla, and the greed took my father. He used to be friends with your Uncle Press. He invited Press to my birth because he knew that I would be someone to tie all of the Territories together and help stop the person they had been fighting against. On that day, he came to your Uncle Press and asked him to join in taking over all of the Territories in Halla. Press knew better than to take this offer and declined. When my father heard this, he was outraged and swore that he would kill every Traveler that stood in his way. He teamed up with the evil Traveler, Saint Mark, and was convinced that his wife would try to stand against him. Saint Mark convinced his tyro to get rid of his old life and begin a new one.
"My father went after Press through the flume and while that happened, my mother gave me to Press, for he had never left. Press took us to a territory he knew my father wouldn't come to for a while. At the same time as this was happening, Saint Mark killed my mother and went after my father to tell him the news. After he heard the news, he was furious and went against his master. He killed Saint Mark and gained control of the Territories that Saint Mark had. He had all the powers that Saint Mark had and decided to conquer all of the Territories, searching for Press and his children. When my mother died, I became the Traveler from Zinthos."
All I remember thinking at this point was, this story should be turned into a movie. It was all so inconceivable that for a while, I thought she was making everything up. She never once mentioned who her father and mother were and I'm sure Uncle Press would've told me about it if he had encountered something like that. I wanted some questions answered and now was as good of time as any to ask away.
"Who is your mother and father?" I asked. Simple enough question. I figured I'd start out small and work my way up to real brain busters.
She paused for a moment, obviously in deep thought of how to answer and gave a simple answer to a simple question, "I don't know." That helps a lot, doesn't it?
Second Earth Stony Brook
Mark Dimond and Courtney Chetwynde had been sitting in Courtney's dad's workshop he kept downstairs. They called it a tool museum because he almost never used any of his tools. They had been down there for an hour reading the computer print pages that held Bobby's story on them. Mark called Courtney telling her the good news and they agreed to meet.
They were torn from the story by Courtney's mom yelling down the stairs, "Courtney! It's time to get a shower and go to bed. Tell Mark goodbye and I'll give him a ride home."
"Okay mom!" Courtney yelled back up the stairs. Courtney and Mark also agreed that they wouldn't read Bobby's journals without each other. That was the problem.
Mark looked down at his watch. He wished he hadn't. It ended up being 9:30 and he was supposed to be home by 9. He was really in trouble now.
"Let's meet tomorrow after school and we'll finish reading," Mark suggested as he put Bobby's story into his backpack.
"That's fine by me. We'll meet at the Ave," Courtney replied. It killed both of them to stop reading the story that Bobby took time to write for them especially when they were just about to find out about Grace.
The next day seemed to drag by for Mark and Courtney. They both had after school activities to go to which made it longer than usual. For Courtney, she had Volleyball. Mark had a Sci-Clops meeting. They were going over Mark's design for his new battle robot that had won him many awards over the summer. With that said, he could expect to have to take the last bus.
Mark had been invited to join Sci-Clops three years before. He was in eleventh grade at Davis Gregory High and was ready to get out of school. Since his first year there, he had made many friends, including his used-to-be archenemy, Andy Mitchell. Since their middle school days, Andy picked on Mark but never around Bobby. Whenever Bobby left, Mark was left to stick up for on himself. He thought that it would go on that way forever.
On one fateful day, Mark was asked to join Sci-Clops. He walked into the classroom, his pride held high and then was dropped with a bomb. In the back row, he saw Andy. On that very day, Courtney had soccer tryouts. She had already been having a terrible day, but tryouts made it worse. The girls she had beat for so many years were not beating her. She was demoted to junior varsity, and then late quit the team. This was big for her because she never quit anything. She quit soccer, though.
Courtney went into depression. She couldn't get her mind off of how bad she did. It so happened that Bobby was on Eelong at that very moment. Eelong was a place where humans, called gars, were slaves to huge jungle cats called Klee. After the Traveler's failure on Veelox, the flumes changed and Acolytes could now activate the flumes to any Territory they wished. The downside to all this was, they weakened the flume each time they used it.
Saint Dane knew how to manipulate Courtney and Mark. He sent Kasha's, (the Traveler from Eelong), dead father, Seegen, back to Second Earth. Mark noticed that around he seemed to have the same characteristics of the people that died on Cloral. Courtney, along with Mark, took the risk of traveling through the flume and meeting with Vo Spader, the Traveler from Cloral, to discover if this were or were not the same poison.
Wu Yenza discovered that it was the same poison and told of how ten barrels of the toxic fertilizer had been stolen. Spader, Mark, and Courtney went to Eelong to bring the antidote and try to save Black Water. When they got there, Bobby had no knowledge of the poison until Mark and Courtney told them. They eventually saved Black Water, but when they got to the flume, Mark and Courtney went home and weakened the flume even more. Bobby activated the flume to go to Zadaa. The flume started to collapse. Spader forced Bobby to go on, Kasha and Bobby went on to Zadaa, but Spader and Gunny were trapped on Eelong.
When Kasha went to get to the flume, a rock had crashed on her head and knocked her out. They arrived at Zadaa, greeted by Loor. Kasha died on Zadaa and Eelong once again, had no Traveler. Bobby had to save Zadaa without the help of Gunny and Spader. When Courtney and Mark found out that the flume had collapsed, they felt totally responsible, even though they had no way of knowing that it was going to collapse. Courtney went into an even bigger depression so that she had to go to a private school, Stansfield Academy, and try to forget everything about Bobby, Halla, and Mark.
While at her private school, she met a boy named Whitney. The boy wasn't who she thought he was. He was flirting with her, that was a fact, but he was an interstellar dimension-leaping demon who wanted to trash the universe in reality. He was Saint Dane. Courtney rode her bike to meet Whitney in town for a date. Saint Dane took a car and had followed Courtney before, but she was scared this time, because she couldn't see around the turns. Saint Dane hit her head on and put her in the ICU. She was almost about to die, when he came in and healed her. "Like I told you, I give and I take away." he told her.
Since that moment, Courtney had a miraculous recovery. She quit hiding and feeling sorry for herself. She began fresh and ran off of the anger she had for Saint Dane. Mark felt that he could trust her once again. He worked with her and they balanced each other with the problems Bobby had in his adventures. They met upon the bus that took students to the Ave where they grabbed fries at the Garden Poultry and settled into the little pocket park to finish the journal. They spoke little from the time they boarded the bus to the time they got to the pocket park. They found that the park was crowded and decided to go to the Long Island Sound where there was a big wooded park. They could hide between the trees and not be bothered for hours.
Mark opened his backpack, took out the pages that held the unbelievable story, and read the first paragraph of the journal to himself.
Guys, I'm just a little freaked out right now. I'm writing this on an amazing computer on Second Earth. Tomorrow I'm coming to see you guys.
Wait, he was coming to see them tomorrow! Mark received the journal yesterday. That would mean, Bobby was coming today!
"Courtney, read that line," Mark said as he pointed to the third sentence in the first paragraph.
"That one?" Courtney asked, pointing at the same sentence.
"Yeah," Mark said as Courtney read the line to herself.
Tomorrow I'm coming to see you guys.
"I got this journal yesterday," Mark said, leading her onto the conclusion he had made. "If he sent this yesterday, then…"
At that moment, Mark felt his ring twitch. He knew the procedure. He took off his ring and laid it on the grass. Courtney was about to ask what he was doing, when she saw the ring grow bigger, saw the blinding light coming toward her, and heard the music. They shielded their eyes and in an instant, it was over. On the ground was a piece of notebook paper and Mark's ring.
Mark picked up the items and put the ring on his finger. He opened the piece of paper to reveal sloppy pencil writing like someone was using their hand to write on. Mark read the message out loud.
"Where are you guys? Meet me at my house. Come quickly, I gotta leave soon. B"
"It has to be Bobby! What does he mean he's at his house?" Courtney asked.
"Well he must be at his old house, or where his house used to be. Let's try his lot," Mark suggested.
When they got to Two Linden Place, they found Bobby and a girl standing in the middle of the empty lot. Soon after Bobby became a Traveler, his house disappeared along with his family. Mark and Courtney went to the police about it and of course, they came up with nothing.
Mark took some interest in the girl standing beside Bobby. She wore tight Aeropostalé pants with a nice little top that said, "I'm here but my mind is snowboarding." She was tall, tan skinned, athletic, and had deep brown, almost black eyes. She in no way looked like Loor, but had the same characteristics as her. She had dark brown hair to match her eyes, was taller than Bobby by a good two inches, and looked serious. In some ways, she almost looked like an adult. Mark knew better than to think that and his mind kept telling him that she was just their age. She was an adult trapped in a child's body.
Bobby, Courtney, and Mark grabbed each other into a group hug. The stranger stepped back, folded her arms, and smiled. Bobby began to unfold the story of how they got over the border and got there. When all had been caught up on, Bobby finally introduced the stranger.
"Hey guys, I want you to meet Grace. She's the one you read about in the journal," Bobby said, looking over to Grace.
"It's nice to meet you," Grace said politely. "I guess you're Courtney, and you're Mark?"
"Yeah, nice to meet you too," Courtney said, holding out her hand.
"So, why did you want to meet with us?" Mark asked, ignoring the introductions.
"Well," Bobby began. "I wanted to talk with you two. Really, it was Grace that wanted to meet with you. I guess she should explain. Didn't I say something about that in my journal?"
"We didn't get to read all of it. It was 8:30 before we received the journal and 8:45 before Mark got over to my house and we got settled in." Courtney said quickly.
"Okay," Grace said. "Well, I guess we should read the rest of that before I explain everything. Where did you guys leave off?"
"The fifth page," Mark said as he carefully pulled the pages out.
Mark began reading…That helps a lot, doesn't it?
Second Earth
Journal #39 (continued)
How was I supposed to know if she had any answers to my questions. This girl was creepy because it's like she can read my mind. She got to her feet and walked over to the flume. She motioned for me to follow her. I stood up, not entirely sure I wanted to go to where she wanted to take me. After Metreon, I was still a little shaken up. I eventually decided to go ahead and trust her. It was like it was the way it was meant to be.
"It's easier to show you than it is to try to explain about who and where I come from," She turned to the flume and yelled "Metreon!"
Okay, I was confused… I thought she was from Zinthos. Once again, she read my mind. I'll make a mental note to ask if she knows telepathy.
"The only way to change societies is to go through the fusion kibbutz. The fusion kibbutz for your society is Metreon. There is another fusion kibbutz other than Metreon and Zinthos named Azarath. That would make three societies in all with thirty territories and immeasurable amounts of kibbutz."
Okay, 'society,' there's a new term for you. On Second Earth, it usually means like a town or something. In Traveler speak, who knows what it meant. So, I decided to go ahead and ask, "What's a society?"
"A society is the system that ten Territories coincide together. They simultaneously exist without the awareness of each other, but if one falls, they all suffer. Hearing about the news on Veelox, my mission to find you became even more urgent. You have been to Metreon before, and found that it was a place of evil. This is for the fact that Veelox went into chaos. It is not as bad as I would've thought, but it's not great either. Veelox is not yet gone. There is still hope. We will return to Veelox together and turn it right. In any matters, I'm sure that you'll find Zinthos a much nicer place to visit. We have not had a need for Travelers since my birth because all of the activity has been in the Metreon society, but now, I fear that the tide is shifting. Once your Territories are safe, I'm afraid that my home will be in danger…"
I was ecstatic! Veelox wasn't gone after all! There was still a chance to save it. Grace kinda ruined my excitement by telling me about what was going to happen to her Territories. For some reason, I felt that I was obliged to help her rescue them.
As I pondered these thoughts, I heard the musical jumble get louder. We were approaching the exit. I didn't want to get off, it was so nice to take flume rides for no apparent reason. I didn't even have to chase Saint Dane this time. Besides, I hated Metreon. My first trip there was bad. I saw the bright light and prepared for gravity to take hold. We ended up on the same barren plain that I had been in with Saint Dane a few hours before. Grace turned around toward the tree flume and yelled "Metreon!"
What the heck? We were on Metreon! I can't believe this girl! Why doesn't she make up her mind! Anyway, the flume sprung back alive. It picked us up and stopped. I'm serious, the flume stopped. We were floating with the same chord around us and the bright light. I looked forward and saw scenes from every Territory I had ever been to. Alder was jousting at a tournament, Loor was doing combat with another Ghee warrior, on Second Earth, Luke and Saint Dane were shown. I saw Spader and Gunny at Black Water on Eelong and Patrick teaching his class on Third Earth. For First Earth and Cloral, there were blank scenes of the flumes. I saw Aja working on her computer with Evangeline at their house. There were countless other faces I had no idea who they were. There was thirty-three in all. Grace gave me a moment to soak it all in.
"Which one do you want to visit?" She asked in an intriguing tone. Yeah, I wanted to visit all of them.
"I wish we could visit Eelong, it's been so long since I've been able to talk to Gunny and Spader."
"Why do you say you wish? That's within the Metreon Society."
"The flume on Eelong crashed and the Traveler from Eelong is dead. There's no possible way that we can go," I said sadly.
"Eelong!" Grace shouted. Instantly we started to move again. I was both confused and excited. If this really worked, we'd be able to go see Gunny and Spader and possibly bring them back. We traveled through the flume, hearing voices this time.
Remember how I told you about the floating images? They were all of Eelong this time. It follow Spader on my left, and Gunny on my right. I could hear both their voices drowning the musical notes. It seemed they were having a conversation. It was hard to make out what they were saying, but I'll write what I heard.
"How are the farms coming?" Gunny asked.
"They're doin' a fine job. It's great to finally see them functioning properly again," Spader remarked.
"Yeah. Hey, I was wondering, do you ever miss your own Territory?" Gunny asked dreamily.
"Only now and again, but I knew the risks when I came here with Courtney and Mark. I knew that there might be a chance that I would never return to Cloral, I just didn't know that I might still be alive to miss it."
By this time, the musical notes were getting louder. We stopped again. I don't know when I'll get used to that. All the musical notes are on one discordant chord. I saw pictures of places in Eelong. Here, I saw Gunny and Spader. Grace told me that they were in Black Water. How did she know that?
"I'd like to go to Black Water and see Gunny and Spader," I told Grace. I hoped that the flume would come through. Grace stood up, and walked over to the panels. How do you stand up in space? For real, it's creepy.
She touched the panel with her hand and instantly the clear walls turned into a dense jungle without so much of a warning. I recognized the place from so many years back. We were standing at the entrance to Black Water. I saw the seven waterfalls and found the used path to the gar city. There were guards at the door who seemed to recognize Grace. They permitted us to pass and we walked into what was an unbelievable sight.
I had only saw Black Water at its beginning stages. What I saw now was amazing. Black Water had become a thriving city. It was amazing at how much things had changed. Grace led me through the city street and to the tall building in the center of the city. Standing outside of it was the last thing I expected to see ever again in my life.
I saw Gunny and Spader talking to each other outside of the door. They looked like true Black Waterians… or whatever you call them, dressed in their animals skins. If there were any people who looked out of place, it was us in our Gap getup. I had no idea what to say, but I didn't have to because Grace spoke first.
"How have you been?" She asked. It was the opposite of how uncool my first word that I said to Courtney the first night I became a Traveler, 'yo.' Hehe, smooth.
Spader and Gunny both looked over to see me and Grace. I will never forget the hilarious face both of them made when they saw us.
"Hobey," Spader said. "I must be dreaming. If I am, don't wake me up." I had to chuckle at this.
"If you're dreaming, we're dreaming the same thing 'cuz I think I see shorty," Gunny replied in an awestruck voice.
"Hi guys," I said, giving a little wave.
We rushed to each other in a three way hug. Man, it felt good to see them again. Grace stepped back and let us soak up the reunion. For a moment, I forgot all about Travelers, Halla, and Saint Dane and thought only about what was going on. I had found my long lost friends.
It's hard to describe what was going on in my mind but I guess the best way to describe it would be to think about whenever I come home. Sometime it crossed my mind "Can Spader and Gunny come back?" Following this thought, I started to wonder whether traveling though fusion kibbutz was only a lead Traveler thing. I mean, it's logical. That's why Gunny and Spader couldn't come back. Maybe they just didn't know about the fusion kibbutz.
We eventually let go of each other and gave a good look up and down. They looked so different. Spader's skin had lightened up a good bit.
