Voyagers!
Walls
by
Jake Crepeau
Phineas Bogg was a man who lived perpetually behind a wall of stone, letting no one in and rarely reaching out. He couldn't recall ever being any other way. Growing up in an era when "children should be seen and not heard" was strictly—even brutally—enforced had made him that way, and a life among pirates, where he had always had to watch his back, every moment of every day, had finished the job. Not even the women whose company he enjoyed were allowed through that wall, except for a rare one who seemed to have something special; when he had to leave one like that, the pain of it reminded him why it was better to keep those barriers up at all times.
Now the responsibility for an eleven-year-old kid had fallen squarely onto his unprepared shoulders—although it could be argued that he had dived into it when he had dived through that window after him—and, ever since their blowup two days ago at Kitty Hawk, that kid had been determinedly chiseling at the stone.
Only a child could have accepted the reality of time travel as quickly as Jeffrey had; once he had figured it out, he had attacked the job with gusto, probably seeing it as some kind of grand adventure—except for that one moment after they had nearly been caught between two attacking armies. Bogg supposed he had his uses, and perhaps it was some kind of cosmic justice that his new "Guidebook" now walked on two legs and sassed him at every turn. Any kid who would leave his parents in a burning car to try to get help, instead of becoming lost in panic and trying to get them out until the fire claimed him, too, probably had what it took to be a Voyager. He certainly had carried his weight last night in the Wrights' bicycle shop. But now he seemed terrified to let him do what he had to do, which wasn't helping any as he sternly locked away his own fear of heights.
He ran off the edge of the cliff with the kid screaming his name; his cries stopped when the glider's wings caught the updraft and soared.
Bogg had never felt anything like it. His acrophobia was completely forgotten. It was breathtaking; it was exhilarating; it was pure freedom. One wing started to dip in the crosswind; the Wright brothers, far below, were desperately shouting instructions at him to shift his weight. But it was too late, and the glider began to descend, far too fast.
He landed hard and lay there, dazed, for long moments. After a while, small hands grabbed his jacket and tried to pull him up, a young voice desperately crying his name and insisting that he couldn't die. He succeeded in pulling the Voyager's head off the ground, only to lose his grip; Bogg let out a groan as his head struck earth a second time.
"Bogg?" Jeffrey asked, the gathering tears vanishing from his voice, replaced by a sort of tentative surprise.
"Nice to see you, too, kid," Bogg said dryly, the words muffled by the fact that one side of his mouth was pressed into the dirt.
The boy collapsed onto the Voyager's back, his arms, too short to reach all the way around, trying to enfold him anyway. He could feel the body warmth through his leather jacket—and another kind of warmth. Someone cared. Never mind that it was a snotty brat of a kid with a smart mouth; never mind that it was probably because that kid was in a strange place and terrified of being left alone there; on whatever level, he cared. No one had truly cared in far too long; oh, but it felt good...He slammed the lid on that thought. No. He couldn't allow it. Somehow, he had to get that kid back to his own time, and then he'd be on his own again. "Do you mind?" he said brusquely.
"Oh; sorry," the boy said sheepishly as he got up.
But the damage was done. The walls were cracked.
~Finis~