Part III

(Inspired by the Yesterday Picture Challenge)

Lee found himself swirling through a white tunnel heading toward a sharp vortex. The tunnel was uncomfortable with the sounds of murmuring surrounding him, as if history were playing in fast motion, too fast to hear or understand. He reached the vortex and was pulled through like he'd been threaded through the eye of a needle, then suddenly blacked-out as darkness found him.

"Skipper? Is it really you?"

Lee's eyes fluttered opened at the sound of Stu Riley's voice. His lucidness returned about the time he managed to open his eyes and nearly blinked at the sight of the retirement-aged man leaning over him. Lee squinted, as Stu helped him up.

"Riley?" He said, recognizing the man who was now twice as old as himself. "What year is it?"

"1996," Stu replied as his eyes glistened with tears that he managed to sniff back.

"How long have you been here?"

"Forty-five years, Skipper."

"You've only been gone from Seaview for about three hours," Lee explained.

"What took you so long Sir?" Stu said with a chuckle that Lee returned with a weak smile.

"Where are we?" Lee asked looking around at the immaculate grounds with fall colors surrounding them.

"On the Nelson Estate, in Boston."

"Then the Admiral...,"

"Is here," Stu finished. "I'm his gardener," he added as Lee's eyebrows tightened, something wasn't adding up.

"We've got to get you and the Admiral back to Seaview...," Lee started as he stood.

"Wait Sir," Stu interrupted. "We need to talk first... but not here."

"We don't have much time Riley, whatever happened in this Timeline is tearing our world apart."

"I understand, Sir. But you need to know some things before you talk to the Admiral."

Lee studied Stu's eyes, realizing he had far more years of wisdom under his belt than the young twenty-three year old who had left Seaview only three hours ago.

"All right. Where do we talk?"

"This way, Sir."

Stu led him to quarters away from the main house and guided Lee inside.

"Gardener's Quarters," Stu stated with a shrug.

"The Admiral doesn't know who you are?"

"Not a clue."

Lee ran a hand over his dark hair, this really complicates things, he thought silently.

"So why do you remember when the Admiral doesn't?"

Stu motioned for Lee to take a seat as he fired up a small self-contained computer; he noticed Lee's interest and explained as he booted up.

"They're called Lap Tops and just one of these is more powerful than all those boxy computers we loaded into the Missile Room," he explained as Lee nodded in amazement.

Stu sighed and sat back, "You asked why the Admiral doesn't know us?" Lee nodded. "I've been doing a lot research since I got here. I've read everything I can find for the last forty-five years; the scientists, the quacks, science fiction... everything."

"And what did you find out?"

"That simply put, Time is a Jealous Lover."

Lee's eyebrows tightened as Stu continued. "Herman and I got here two years before I was supposed to be born. It got pretty lonely just Herman and me," he said nodding toward the tan and white guinea pig sleeping in his cage. "So I started doing a little digging. You know? To see what my folks were up to. It wasn't hard; I went to Van Nuys and looked up public records and such. Well what I found was disturbing. You see in this Timeline, Dad didn't make it back from Korea." Stu's eyes softened, "I was never born Skipper... so Time just let me be; only she's an Obsessive Jealous Lover. She won't let me get close to anyone; I'm a loner here. I'm like a magnet with opposite polarity for the people around me."

"You haven't been able to build a life here? Have a family?"

Stu nodded, "No. I figure that Time knows I don't belong here and won't allow me to reproduce since I was never really born."

"I'm sorry Stu," Lee offered sincerely, knowing that for the last forty-five years the fun-loving, out-going Stu Riley he knew was merely surviving without a friend in the world.

"Herman here's been my only friend, that's actually Herman the 8th," he said with a tilt of his head.

"As in Henry VIII?"

"No, as in guinea pigs only live four to five years. I keep buying them and naming them Herman," he said, his baby faced smile still evident after so many years.

"Okay, you were never born and so "Time" allowed you keep your memories of who you are?" Lee clarified.

"Right. Now the Admiral... this took a whole lot more research and a lot of deep thinking," Stu qualified as Lee couldn't help admire the man Riley had become in spite of what he had to endure. "The Admiral," he continued, "just meshed with his counter-part. You see Time will not allow two Harriman Nelsons to co-exist. Oh I know science fiction loves to tell stories of people traveling back in time and meeting their former self and all that hoopla, but I'm telling you... Time is a Sadistic Obsessive Jealous Lover and she will not allow two Harriman Nelsons running around.

"So our Harriman Nelson...,"

"...Just blended with the Harriman Nelson here in this Timeline. We arrived in 1951, and our Nelson is living inside this Timeline's Nelson. It's pretty confusing, but it all adds up. You're being here proves it."

"What do you mean?" Lee asked, intrigued and completely trusting Riley's years of study and personal experience.

"Had you arrived before 1978, you would have simply melted into the essence of the Lee Crane already here."

"Why 1978?" Lee asked, knowing that in his own timeline, he would have been serving his second year aboard Seaview.

"That's what I want to show you," Riley said turning toward his lap top and bringing up a page entitled, Riley's World, speaking as he keyed.

"You see Skipper in this Timeline, the Admiral never built Seaview." Lee's forehead furled tightly.

"No Seaview?"

"No Sir. And no Seaview meant a lot of changes in history. I've spent a good amount time tracking down some of those changes and linking them to our appearance here. Some things are quite subtle, others easy to see why."

Stu scrolled down his private locked web page and pressed a link which immediately opened a new tab as Lee looked at a familiar picture.

"How'd you get that?" he asked incredulously.

"This is called the World Wide Web, "www" for short, and it's a library at your fingertips. The whole thing is pretty new, only been out for about six years now, but in another ten years there won't be anything you can't find here. Do you recognize this picture Sir?" Stu continued.

Lee stared at the young man in the picture as he looked over Riley's shoulder. A black and white photo of himself dressed in a black suit, a white shirt and a grey tie.

"Well, it's not like it was yesterday, but that's my graduation picture."

"From high school," Stu clarified. "Just before you left for Annapolis."

"Yes," Lee confirmed.

"I followed both you and the Admiral and lived in Maryland those four years. Of course the Admiral left in your last year to train for the Nautilus."

Lee nodded, that all lined up with his own Timeline.

"Only he never took command of the Nautilus. He's excelled here just like you'd expect. Captain Nelson was offered his first star and promoted to Admiral."

"So he never commanded the Nautilus, and I never served under him?"

"No Sir, and there's more." Stu paused with a sigh. "You asked me about 1978?"

Lee nodded for Stu to continue.

Riley blew a silent breath and returned to his web page, selecting another hyper link, which produced another tab.

"I found this Sir," Stu said as he brought up a local paper from Providence, Rhode Island; the Obituaries. A photo of a young officer in naval uniform with a corresponding article followed:

"Commander Lee Benjamin Crane is missing and reported dead when a wave swept over his vessel and was lost at sea..."

Lee read the headline and shook his head, "Something doesn't sound right... I mean... besides the fact that I died."

"Yeah," Stu agreed. "Sir, since I've come aboard Seaview you've taken quite a few ONI missions."

Lee acknowledged the fact with a nod.

"Well Sir, it appears you took even more missions in this timeline. I found this picture taken in Cairo, Egypt. It's dated just days before your reported death."

Lee looked down at a newspaper clipping of a typical open air market; a red circle brought his attention to the profile of a man in a crowd of people shopping in the market.

"Seaview was never built and you stayed in active duty. That's you Sir," he said pointing to the photo, "And my guess is the mission went bad."

"So I died, and that's why I have my memories?"

Stu nodded as Lee blew an incredulous breath out.

"Alright, anything else I need to know before I talk to the Admiral?"

"That's the important stuff anyway. Skipper what happens next?"

"I have to convince the Admiral to come back to the Time Portal. The changes in this Timeline are tearing our world apart. Dr. Hayes believes that Time will correct the paradoxes that are running with both Timelines intact. If we don't all leave and return to a point before you were originally taken, then our world will disappear."

"And we will too, Sir," Stu added. "I'm probably the world's Foremost Authority on Time Travel Sir, and believe me; once our world is gone Time will not allow us to exist. She's a Black Widow Lover, Sir. She's only keeping us around while she needs us. Once our world disappears, we will too," he finished.

"Then let's hurry. Stay close by; if I can't convince the Admiral I'll have to take him by force," Lee warned. "We have to return to where you found me. Hayes and his team are tracking me, when they see all three of our radiation signatures at the Portal they'll bring us back."

Lee headed for the door and then doubled over with a groan as a deep excruciating pain caught him unexpectedly.

"Skipper!" Stu yelled catching him before he could fall.

Lee breathed deeply, working through the sharp pain until it eased enough to stand upright.

"I'm alright now," he breathed out, but Stu didn't believe him. "But I think we need to hurry," he added as Riley let go of his hold once Lee found his sure footing.

Lee smiled looking back at the guinea pig, "Are you taking Herman?"

Stu reached over and opened the cage door. "No, he belongs here in this world," he answered tickling Herman behind the ears one last time.

"Good-bye buddy," he said and then followed Lee out the door.

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