Mid-Late 2008
When summer of 2008 had rolled around, Tristan had just finished his three-year residency for internal medicine and decided to rejoin his mother and sister living at the new Sanctuary. He wanted to start learning abnormal medicine from Helen so that he could more effectively and efficiently help out once the place was fully up and running in the next several years. It was then that they informed him of their plan to save the elder Magnus and Tristan's involvement in it.
The three of them had come upon Gregory in conversation as Tristan had started to adopt one of his more unorthodox medical techniques and came to find his mother in one of the lounge areas to ask her more particular aspects about it. At the time, both Helen and Ashley had taken a break from their work earlier in the day; Helen was napping lightly on the couch and Ashley was off in a chair quietly reading a book about twenty feet away over by the glass wall that overlooked the waterfall. When he walked in, he accidentally stirred their mother awake in his excitement. As she sat up on the couch, she called him over to sit next to her to discuss what he wanted to know. After providing the details that he asked for, Helen then glanced over to Ashley, to which she nodded back. They had just decided before Helen fell asleep that today would be the day that they told him of their plan to save Gregory Magnus. Tristan wasn't so sure of what that silent communication meant, and just looked back and forth between the two women.
"Tristan, how would you like the chance to meet your grandfather?" Helen asked with a knowing smile.
"Are you serious, I would love to!" he answered back with a wide grin. "When will I get to meet him?" he asked excitedly.
"Hopefully soon, however there are some stipulations attached to you being able to meet him," she cautiously proceeded.
"Stipulations such as?" he questioned.
"You will basically need to be 'James Bond' to reach him," Ashley cut in.
Tristan was confused. "'James Bond'? Why would I have to be like a fictional MI6 agent just to meet my grandfather?"
Helen gave him a short rundown of Gregory's semi-complex history with living in Hollow Earth; how he's chronologically currently on the surface involved in one of the Cabal's plans, his future subsequent return to Praxis, and his interfering with the avatar chamber during the Kali event that results in him going into hiding from the Senate, only coming out into the open several weeks later once Helen herself shows up.
"Okay, I'm still not seeing what the issue is," Tristan stated.
"The issue is that not long before I go back in time, Adam Worth intentionally set off his machine to destroy Praxis, possibly killing your grandfather. I found his walking stick in Ranna's chambers. I'm not sure of the specific date that it happens, just a rough estimate of maybe it occurring within a week or two prior."
"And I'm guessing that you want me save Grandpa?" he deduced.
"Yes," both Ashley and Helen nodded.
"Okay, I can do that. Asides from me possibly dying a second time, how hard can it be to grab him and leave before it hits?" The look of confidence on his face faded with the details his mother told him next.
"Pretty difficult. The first problem is the source blood in you. Due to the Praxians having a warring history with the Sanguine vampiris, their defenses are set to go off at any detection of vampire DNA. Being that you have less traces of the source blood in your system than I do in mine, hopefully the wrist bracelet you are wearing is enough to cloak you more effectively than the shield Tesla made for me. The second problem, is that you need to earn the Praxians trust first, which will mean that this operation is going to take a considerable amount of time for you to complete. You'll have to work your way there slowly step by step to make your way into the city. You can't just show up there and say 'Hi'."
"How long do you think infiltrating the city will take?" he asked.
Helen winced. "I'm hoping you'll leave fairly soon, which means you'll be underground for just over the next two and a half years. Why I've decided now is a good time is because I don't want to make your appearance seem suspiciously connected to when my younger self visits Hollow Earth about a year and a half from now."
Tristan took a breath. "This is definitely sounding like a deep-cover spy op," he agreed. "Why worry about a connection?"
"And this leads me to my third problem. I can't have you connected with Adam Worth, as I need you in the city to save your grandfather. If they have doubts of your intentions, they might decide to 'dead you' and lock you up in their prison. I can't have that. As far as the 'James Bond' parts goes, you'll have to not only gain access with my father without tipping him off that your connected to us here, but you'll also have to spy on Worth to keep track of his progress," she exhaled.
"Meaning you'll essentially have to be a triple agent between Praxis, Adam Worth, and Here," Ashley chimed in.
Helen reached over and took one of her son's hands into her own. "I know this is a tall order to ask of you."
His mind started to swim. "Wow, no pressure," he half-laughed out of stress. "So, if I have this correct, you want me to get into to Praxis without them connecting me to Worth, while simultaneously also getting close to Worth to learn his plans so I can save grandpa before he can set off his machine all the while not telling my grandfather who I am? I get the first two parts, but why not the last one?"
"You can't get too close to your grandfather because it'll show favoritism, possibly tipping Worth off about your connection to me. If Adam knows you aren't a true follower of his, he won't let you get close enough to his plans about his machine," she stated. "You have to try to stay as completely anonymous as you can with everyone you interact with, not only for this to work, but to also not stick out too much," she stressed. "And that leads me to a fourth problem. You'll somehow have to do this all while avoiding me when I go down there. My other self is to not become aware of you in any capacity."
Tristan leaned back into the cushions. "Great, and I'm assuming during all of this that I can't get help from either of you?" he asked almost sarcastically, looking from his mother towards his sister expectantly, hoping that maybe Ashley might be able to visit or go with him.
Ashley shook her head. "I'm not sure if I'll be able to help. Not only will I not be able to get close to the city by any measure due to being a vampire, but Mom said that Adam knows about my other self being dead."
"How does that play a factor?" he questioned. "Your time loop ends in like half a year. What about afterward?"
"The problem is, is that we don't know how he knows about that. It obviously wasn't from Grandpa, as he didn't know about my 'demise' until Mom told him during her visit." Ashley leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms. "I figure Worth met someone on the surface who knew of the Sanctuary during his effort to track her down."
"Which means that Ashley is supposed to be unknown in the Underworld." Helen cut in. "If you sister gets involved there when she historically shouldn't be present, it can potentially cause a cascade effect that alters events; word about her may dangerously spread to both Adam and my father's ears before they're supposed to know about her."
"I'm sorry. I wish I could, but I can't," Ashley apologized. As much as Ashley had wanted to go with him to explore more of Hollow Earth and to see the city with her own eyes, she also knew that her place had to be safety right here in the new Sanctuary.
Helen herself expressed the same line of sentiment. "Until I finish my time loop in the next two and a half years, I'm in the same boat as Ashley," she sighed. "When I was there, I made an agreement between Praxis and the Sanctuary Network that we would mutually keep to our own domains. If Praxis finds out about here, and me, it'll spell disaster, especially if they find out I'm here before my other self even visits Praxis. When I went there, they had no knowledge of me what-so-ever, and I'd like to keep it that way. That means, unfortunately, that I definitely can't help out either," she said somewhat sadly.
Tristan was beside himself, but even after everything he had been told, his mind was made up. "Just so you know, this whole plan sounds stupid dangerous. But I'm in," he said taking a deep breath.
"Are you absolutely certain you really want to do this?" Helen asked, feeling a pit of maternal doubt grow within her stomach as she was unsure if she herself was really going to allow her child to go through with this decision. Almost hoping for some 'miracle' that he would change his mind to make this whole situation 'magically' go away to force them to try something else. She knew deep down that that fantasy expectation was never going to become a reality and that Tristan going to Hollow Earth had to be done. This was the exact moment Helen had feared about for her son for the last sixty-eight years since the day Ashley saved him as an embryo; placing her baby in the path of harm's way with every swing of the pendulum, something that was quite literal this time around.
Tristan nodded. "I'm sure. Plus, it's not like I have a choice. I can't just let Grandpa die down there and on top of that I really want to meet him," he said with a small half-pained, half-excited look to his face.
At his confirmation, Helen leaned over to pull him into a tight hug as her eyes started to water, blinking back tears. Ever since Tristan was a small boy listening to her tell stories about his grandfather, she knew how much he had been looking forward to the day that he could finally get a chance to meet the great Gregory Magnus in person, and that he wouldn't give up any opportunity to do so for the world. "I know you do, sweetheart. Even though we need you to go, at the same time I want you to know that it wasn't easy for me to ask this of you. I really don't enjoy the idea of possibly losing you again through all of this," she said sorrowfully. "I just wish that all of this could be done without putting you in danger somehow, but unfortunately I don't see any other way to save him," she admitted while rubbing his back. Tristan let her have this vulnerable moment of comfort for as long as she wanted. He knew, with how close they were as he grew up and still were right now, how much he truly meant to her and how hard this must be for her being his mother. Even if it were possible for him to not be able to see it for some strange reason, Ashley would have definitely told him just as much.
The next day was spent packing tons of supplies for his expedition through the tunnels. Ashley and Helen made sure to triple check that he had everything that he needed, including enough MRE's, lots of water, a small portable oxygen tank, a well-stocked med-kit, a Swiss Army knife, a Leatherman multi-tool, a headlamp, and even redundant supplies such as extra batteries, an extra flashlight, and a spare change of clothes just in case. With the location of the Underground Sanctuary being just off of an arterial pathway that led into the rest of Hollow Earth, it meant that they weren't too far from an outlying mushroom farm about forty miles away. From there, the plan was for Tristan to work with the nomadic tribes to build credit, before eventually being able to get papers to travel the several thousands of miles to the other side of the globe through a transport module to trade product in Praxis.
When it was time for him to set off the next morning, after an almost ten minute farewell scene standing by the tunnel entrance, Tristan was finally able to give Ashley a hug goodbye and then give one as well to his mother. Helen was understandably having a hard time letting him go; starting to worry like most mothers typically do about being separated from their child, except unlike most mothers Helen had a definite good reason to cause for concern.
"Make sure to stay safe," she cautioned heavily, still holding on to him in a loose embrace.
"I will, I promise," he smiled back at her. "I won't be gone forever, I'll be back before you know it." And with one last extended hug and a kiss to her temple, Tristan bid farewell to his mother and sister before disappearing with his ruck sack into the tunnel to begin his journey towards the farm.
As he left, Ashley had put her arm around her mother to lend support. "He'll be fine. He's been off camping by himself and exploring caves long enough to be able to do this," she tried to comfort as they began to head back towards the facility.
Helen took a breath. "That does make me feel a little bit better, except for the fact that the Canadian Rockies didn't have basilisks slithering about," she finished with a small shake of her head.
Going through the tunnels wasn't as easy as Tristan had initially thought it would be. On his way, he almost got lost six times due to the forks in the path, even with the help of markers placed by Ashley several decades before along the forty-mile stretch of the winding, dark, narrow, jagged, and uneven terrain. After almost five days of travel filled with many rest breaks, he finally made it to the outskirts of the farming land. Luckily for him, the farmers took pity on the lost dirty surface dweller who clearly looked to be in need of some help. They ultimately allowed him to join their group as their harvest was expectantly bigger this season and one of their harvester machines had broken down. For the next year Tristan traveled with the group as they rotated through several fields in alliance with other farmers.
