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In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
Pedro was birding again: “Do you know why I’m so fond of the time-space continuum,?
Besides that I thought it up… Besides you being in it… Besides puppies and kittens…
It’s because it can all seem so logical… so predictable… so real, when you want it to. Or, in the twinkling of an eye, you can choose to remember it’s not.”“What an outstanding ball of blue bull’s dung,” Janet Mendyourhall laughed at the notification from her mobile that had distracted her from ogling the gas station boy.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
While stroking his mustache fondly, Ed Steam had the clearest realization that although he’d done that quite a few times in the past mostly to his advantage, it was a lot of work to rewrite timelines and figure out the hows and whens of everyone in his team.
Maybe it was actually time for him to restore the original timeline while disappearing — by faking his own death to be certain nobody would thwart his carefully thought retirement plan. Then, he could also stop dyeing his mustache he figured… So many things to take care of, retirement would be so sweet.
Although the Egyptian timeturner gave him all the time in the world, he actually felt like he’d lost already a great deal too much of it, and started to enact his plan without further ado.Procuring a body double was actually not so hard. The last surge had brought a few of them in Thrifteen’s Alley in their Moreguest Facility. A switch and a twist of the pocket portal and a zap and a blink of the miniaturizer was enough to get there and come back in seconds with a frozen pocket-size life-suspended body from the testing stock, with convincing enough miniaturized slim lips, safely put in a test tube in his waistcoat pocket.
A six-shot cudgel from his artefact war trove was all he needed to make sure the amateur assassin in red robes they’d hired would be taken care of easily.
Then, an enscombulator bedazzler ray spray would be enough to convince Mari Fe she’d managed to hit him, buying him time enough to then deminiaturize the thawed slim-lipped body double, to slip in his stead.
Last, but not least, he would then have a few seconds to discombobulize Mari Fe while disappearing with a backup transportable portal. The plan was perfect. The original timeline restored in pristine conditions.
Only for a few minor details of course. He’d almost forgotten to reprogram the mini-man in his pocket with enough memories for him to be a convincing Ed-himself sans la moustache of course. At least, for the short time he would survive (surge victims discovered still alive were placed in life suspension by the team, but this was mostly for medical analysis as they usually wouldn’t survive their conditions).
Oh, and the bloody mustache of course… A squeeze of foolicle solventilator would be enough to make it temporarily invisible.Simple enough… Well, sandbagging Mari Fe would have probably conveyed similar results with minimal efforts, although the elegance of his plan, as well as the fact that he was loath to hit ladies did unmistakably weight in favour of it.
And with that, he would be back in time for dinner.
In fact, he already was.In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
There was something familiar with the road. The trees, the warmth. It was a fine weather for the season. Almost 70°F. Janet Mendyourhall had a strong feeling of déjà vu. She was on her way to Sedona to attend the annual Glasnik meeting. The Threshold to 2013. Since she had been posted to the West Coast, she was to attend every psychic or ET manifestation in the area. And believe it or not, there was a lot of them. The Lightbearers, Glasnik, The Crimson Feathers, and all the less famous ones like Birgitt’s Wheel from Germany, the reincarnation of Von Bingen.
Janet was trying to go to those events with an open mind, which usually means that as a premise you didn’t believe what you were going to see. And she had seen a lot of crap and a few gems.
She realized the car needed gas, luckily she was not far from Cottonwood. That name triggered steamy memories and a blush on her face. She had always loved meeting that young boy, he had such a sense of service, and such a wonderful body. She turned left without even thinking of it. The sun was high in the sky and the light was playing through the trees, still green her mind registered.
When she arrived at the station, the boy was discussing with another woman in a red car. Her hands squizzed the wheel and her lips tightened. That feeling of déjà vu again.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
His razor blade in left hand (he was ambidextrous with a slight favour for the left side), Ed suddenly remembered his future struggle with the daft cumbersome vermillion man, so he quickly turned off the portal. Then, against all common sense and years of procedures, decided to put it into his pocket.
Everything following came back at once, interspersed with bits of smashed objects and blurs. But something he distinctly remembered was that Mari Fe was in the apartment, although he didn’t remember bringing her home from last night. It was against company policy to sleep with subordinates, so it had to mean something fishy.
Recalibrating the portal using the failsafe code, he directed it to the secret headquarters where he had started to stockpile dangerous artefacts collected from previous surge control operations, deciding it was the best course of action before assessing who was to be trusted or not in his Chicks team…In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
Waking up (again) without the others noticing, Ed Steam mechanically went for his waxed mustache as he did whenever something like a haywire silly plot perturbed him, before realizing he was sorely missing this part of his definite features that earned him so much success with the ladies (and a few favors from the other gender as well, he wasn’t shy to admit). Anyway, rendered dejected by this, he grabbed his carefully concealed genuinely old pocket sundial dating back from the Egyptians, and turning with precise movements its gnomon to put it back to when it indicated a few hours ago, was brought back at the precise moment before he started to cut his signature waxed mustache.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
Sanso loved old maps, and was eager to help Vincentius spread the map out on the living room floor and have a closer look. It extended to a full 8 meters in length when it was rolled out, and Sanso and Vincentius had to kneel down and crawl over it to examine it. The map was like nothing they’d ever seen before, certainly it didn’t resemble the current state of the globe, although it had confusing similarities in places. Some of the names were familiar, but not in the usual locations, and there were some familiar land masses, but many were quite different.
Meanwhile, back in the kitchen: “Take the lid off and have a look inside” urged Janet.
“YOU take the lid off, what if the mouse runs over my hand?” said Pearl. “I know, let’s get Ed to do it.”Janet and Pearl were cackling and bumping into each other, Pearl holding the teapot outstretched in front of her, and neither of them noticed Vincentius kneeling just inside the living room doorway, hidden behind his invisibility cloak.
Vincentius looked up but was unable to move in time. Pearl tumbled over his back and the teapot flew out of her hand. Vincentius managed to catch the teapot but the lid flew off and hurtled across the room, catching Sanso on the side of the head. Janet fell over Pearl and landed on Sanso, although of course she couldn’t see him, as he was wearing the invisibility cloak. Vincentius looked on in horror, clutching the teapot close to his stomach, upside down. Bee was able to slide down the spout, straight down into Vincentius’ shorts. Bee let out a long whistle. She wasn’t called Belle Endwhistle for nothing, after all.
Pearl sat up and rubbed her knee, wondering why Janet was hovering in mid air, and the tea pot was upside down and apparently defying gravity too. “Perhaps it wasn’t such a good idea to have a tea break after all”. She wasn’t able to see Arona and Mandrake rolling their eyes, hidden as they were beneath invisibility cloaks. Pearl wasn’t able to see Mari Fe either, as she was too small, and appeared as no more than a dog hair covered bit of chewed up toy goat leg on the floor.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
“Honey, we’re shrunk!” explained Bee. “Remember that jelly baby I gave you half an hour ago? It was a miniaturizing potion. We’re inside the Magpie shaped teapot on the shelf in the kitchen.”
“That would explain the strange shape of this room and the curved chimney alright, but what to we do next?”
“Well, there’s a snag.” said Bee. “The re-enlargement jelly babies are still in the bathroom. We’re going to have to find a way back there.”
Just then the sound of muffled voices became louder and closer. “Anyone fancy a cuppa?” they heard Pearl asking.
And then the earth moved. Bee and Mari Fe were hurtling from one side of the teapot to the other, crashing into each other, trying to find something to hold onto on the slippery walls.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
Janet heard a door squeak like an agonizing mouse. Her heart jumped in her chest when she recognized the half bald man who came through… and the implications. The old clock rang. Janet didn’t know Mari Fe had such an antique in her house. Maybe it was on the other side of that door.
“ Riff Raff… “, she said. Her throat was suddenly tight and she could barely swallow. “What are you doing here ?”
“It’s astounding, time is fleeting
Madness takes its toll
But listen closely, not for very much longer
You’ve got to keep control”“Who’s that man,” asked Pearl, “he’s ugly. And why is he singing… and sweeping the old clock ?”
“I think we’re in a time wart, again”, said a crestfallen Janet.In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
Sanso rubbed his sore head.
“Oh well, just one of the hazards of the job, I suppose.” he said philosophically.
“Okay, coast is clear,” he whispered into the portal.
One by one, Arona, Vincentius and Yikesy piled into the small bathroom.
“Don’t forget me!” hissed Mandrake.
“You know,” Mandrake continued, snootily, “there are some who will say we should not be here. There will be some who will be tsk tsking for all they are worth.”
“Positive energy, please Mandrake.” smiled Arona. Mandrake rolled his eyes.
“It will be fine, just remember: nobody must know who we are or why we are here, and positive intentions at all times.” Sanso was tremendously excited. It was a long time since he had had such an exciting mission.
“Why are we here, again?” asked Vincentius, in his deep melodious voice.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
Janet took a heavy stickman and smashed it on the worker’s head.
“Damn it! Janet! What have you done ?” Pearl was beginning to wonder about that hit and smash epidemy. Would she be the next to succumb ? She resisted a strong impulse to smash Janet’s head with what appeared to be a wooden hyppopotamus and took a deep breath.
“I don’t know”, Janet said with a little girl’s voice.
“Oh! Be serious for a moment and stop breathing your helium balloon for Roaster’s sake!”
Janet continued with the same voice, “At least we can throw them all through the portal now, can’t we ? Sorry, I won’t do that again…”“Roaster! That man with the vermillion robes is so heavy”, complained Pearl.
“Maybe we can throw the portal at them and see what happens”, said Janet.Pearl considered the idea for a few seconds, it was very tempting, but also so contrary to what they have been taught about portals, that it gave her chills. It could swallow the entire village, and the two Chicks in the same gulp.
“The story has just begun said Pearl, we can’t do that.”
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
“Bugger!” exclaimed Pearl. “There is a Portal Worker in the bathroom. He says the portal is temporarily closed for repairs. He says there was a surge of unprecedented proportions, and they have to check all the portals before they are used. It is just routine procedure, he says.”
Janet smelt a rat. “Hmmm, how very strange. I have never heard of portals being repaired before and what would cause such a huge surge?”
(aside from the writer: what is a surge?)
“I know! weirdo. So, I asked him if we could stick a few bodies in the portal anyway, but he said he couldn’t guarantee where they would end up, and it was against company policy. What shall we do? Slim Lips is starting to come around”.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
Yann was proud of himself, he had answered his first phone call in Chinese.
When they first arrived at the hotel, it was a wonderful and colorful place, all those reds and warm yellows, with well chosen touches of blue and green. The morning light was illuminating the lobby in a soothing way, it seemed as if it was gently brushing the leather of the armchairs and sofas. He noticed an old cleaning lady carefully sweeping the tiles of the floor one by one.
“I love this place”, he had told Yurick. “It’s so peaceful, I feel energized.”
The big smile on his face stayed there even when he first realized noone in the hotel could speak English or French, or even Javanese. Yurick was speaking Chinese after all.
But Yurick was not always here. He had to go out for a meeting with a certain Lulla for work. And Yann desperately needed to call a taxi. So he plucked up courage and called the hotel management.“Ni hao [incomprensible Chinese words] ?”
Did it really ended with a question mark ? Yann was not sure. “Ni hao”, he said. He was so concerned by the thought of his awful pronunciation that he missed what the person answered.
“I number 447 (translated from Chinese). I wanting taxi.”
“[incomprehensible] 47 ?”
“No. 400, 40, 7.”
“Ah! 447. You are the French guy. (translated from Chinese)”
“Yes, French guy. I wanting taxi.”
“Ok, [incomprehensible]. Ok ?”
“Ok. Thank you.”He hanged up the phone with an artificial sense of trust. That, he had learnt in that country was primordial. You launched your rocket of desire to the universe and trust that it would all end up as you desired. With that philosophy you better be clear with what you wanted.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
The package was labeled in Sinese. Goat was fluent in a few languages after many a travel, and although Sinese wasn’t his mother tongue — he was only half-Sinese from his father’s side, he could read it well enough, and make himself passably understood in most of the Colonies.
It was a code, or more precisely, a reference. It said 时间舱23号, which you could probably translate as “Time capsule #23”. Back in the days, the Surge Team would bag and tag any strange artefact they confiscated during their missions, and usually would archive them in such capsules.Although the concept of Time-capsule in itself for the old teams was soon to become somewhat of a mind puzzle if you thought too much of it, it still held value of… archaeological, rather than historical sorts for their descendants, such as himself. Of course, if you’d like some wild flowers, you’d rather pick them directly in the dewy meadows or mossy forests where they grew instead of taking them from the interstice of an old moldy book between the pages of which it had been laid down to dry, wouldn’t you. Now, anybody could easily become an historian with complete immediate sensory experience of past times at their perception tips —much like how it started, back in the twenty hundreds, with everyone able to become an amateur geographer in minutes with instant access to the satellites maps of Earth.
But being a map reader would never suffice to make you a sailor.So, of course, Time capsules somewhat felt like such old dry plants if you were an historian. But if you were looking for ancient treasures or secret powerful artifacts, you knew you couldn’t just bring them from the past lest you disrupt the chain of events leading you to it. Many had gone madder than Lord Elmed trying to figure out safer ways. Time capsules were such a way.
“Now, I guess that fishy stench was there for a reason after all,” he sighed: to keep intruders and medlers off of its content, surely.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
Lulla Spinosa and Vera Pappaloosa were set to meet in Pohnpei , at a few nautical knots and cable length (as the gulls fly) from the Marshall Islands in the beautiful deeply aquamarine middle of the Pacific Ocean. 🐳
Lulla was the first to arrive, and feeling hungry after the sea trip with the amphibian red corvette, bought a pan seared squid skewer from the street vendor at the jetty. Something Vera would certainly have disapproved of, with her uppity glances, perfect gloss lipstick and mascara. Not the kind to nibble on such barbaric foods. Anyway, too bad the street vendor had run short of garlic, she would have gladly paid extra for it, just for the priceless look on the princess’ face while they would ride for the next hours in the confined car to their assigned destination.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
Terry was a bit confused by all these blinks in and out. He needed some cheese and decided to focus the multronic stream of his TTI (Time Travel Implant) to a fridge in the region called Spain.
Unfortunately, the flux went right through a mousehole and he didn’t quite get to Spain. He was in a dark room. Noises were muffled here and there was no smell he could recognize. Before doing anything foolish, he turned on his night vision and everything appeared with cartoonish colours and enhanced black edges. It was the only one available when he borrowed it from Dr Frankenlaughner’s lab. You got used to it, eventually.
The room was still dark, but a cartoonish dark. That was mysterious. A squirking sound, like an amazonian squirrel, startled him. His curiosity was picked. He took a piece of what was left of his Marie biscuit and began to walk as silently as he could toward the squirrel sound.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
Madam Li was gorgeous in her red silk chinese dress. She might be the eldest of the Team, but she appeared to be one of the youngest. She was proud of her Chinese ancestry. The two golden dragons on her dress emphasized her silhouette and her hair artistically arranged like an empress.
She had just received the invitation to the Tartessos’ 3 King’s parade. Eventhough she didn’t much like travelling, it might be an occasion to go somewhere warmer. It was snowing again in Shanghai and she had been sent there to investigate this strange occurance in that part of the country. Not that it was really strange to her, she had been raised in Harbin, and its ice festival. But having cars half burried in snow in Shanghai was not a normal sight.
At the moment, she was staying at an over-heated serviced apartment near the Pearl Tower of Shanghai. One of the perks of being part of the Team. Ed had always offered them a good salary and an apartment provided with the job, and they could use the red fleet whenever the wanted.
When she had tried to open the window, and didn’t succeeded, the night sight from her window gave her chills. Reminding her that she so loved this city. All the lights, blinking in and out, creating organized or random patterns at every corner. The city had changed so much these last years.
Madam Li put the invitation on the table, she would think of it later and checked with the red fleet to book a flight as soon as she had found out about all that snow in Shanghai.
In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
While her Western colleagues were busy chasing illegal time travellers in Spain, Katarina was busy overseeing the light flux changes at an Ukrainian old pyramid site.
She’d read about the snow on the Gizeh site, and was quick to make the link between this pyramid and hers. In fact, the land had been under a spell of high temperatures and draught, unusual for winter. Intense continuous aurora activity was even spotted further north, sometimes lasting during the pale daylight.
She wondered if this was localized or could have affected other parts of the pyramid network.
She’d tried without success to contact Elza, her Middle East colleague, but she seemed to have disappeared without a trace… Not only was she unreachable on her com devices, but worse, her location chip was deactivated.
Never mind those stupid techs, Katarina had the resources of a long lineage of shamanic priests running in her blood — finding a missing person shouldn’t be more difficult than doing some soul bits retrieval. Unless… Elza was deliberately hiding from the Team…In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
“Glo, ‘tis me or the story site is very very slow to load a new page today?”
“Bugger if I know Sha! I s’pose it ain’t nothing to do with the rodents chewing cables in the cellar, init’?”
In Langley’s most underground basements, the Department of Future Boons Investigations had diverted a significant amount of processing power towards a little known website that they had found held distinctive quantum resonance towards the actualization of future events.
In short, they believed its random nonsense held key to future events. However the level of encryption had baffled even the most expert specialists.
“Major! We had a breakthrough!” Johnny Ingrish passed his head into the smokey office.
The Major didn’t like to be disturbed during his morning nap, but this was important. Indeed, a word too strange to be random had appeared a few times:
Tartessos – Event probability: 103%
103% ! Even the computers couldn’t think straight about it… It had to mean something.In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
Dru Hammond’s flight was being delayed at Charles de Gaulle airport.
Not the most brilliant idea to fly with Air Frange for this mission, he thought…
He held from well informed source that airports days were counted, and that airports would soon become deserted museums – in truth, teleportation tech was being developed and soon would be mainstreamed by Ganga, the mammoth merger of Amazoom and Koogle companies.
That was why he tried to enjoy this vintage means of transportation as much as he could now, and collected plane tickets from all possible flight companies from around the world.
Dru was an auditor from Passadena, working for the Team, or actually for Ed Steam, the boss himself. His mission was usually to discretely assess the Team’s strengths and shortcomings. However, in this case, he was sent to Malaga for the Three Kings’ Parade, and there was a catch to his assignment. But he wasn’t at liberty to think too much about it. Ed had means to read minds, and thinking too much wouldn’t do him any good. So instead he tried to focus on something innocuous, like fluffy white rabbits dancing in a snow field.
The security check was taking forever. After an unending stream of Italian tourists, there was a Frenchman stuck into the security gate with a folded drying rack that he was trying to bargain his right to carry it into the plane with lots of ample movements, while the gatekeeper was stubbornly nodding his head.
Dru after some initial irritation started to find the whole barter amusing. His flight wasn’t boarding before four more hours, so he had time.
He suddenly wasn’t as much amused when, after relenting and letting the security guy take the rack back to be sent in the cargo hold, the French guy accidentally let his suitcase drop and burst open, revealing a clunky mess of things among which: a heavy black hammer, a humongous book as large as the suitcase itself, crockery, tin canned foods and lots of multicoloured clothes pegs.
All his auditor’s instincts were crying at him right now that without the shadow of a doubt this man was a dangerous terrorist, hiding under an innocent awkward guise. Sighing of relief when he overheard he was going to Shanghai instead of his European destination, he wondered what terrorists would do in a world of easy free teleportation…In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
At approximately 11:11 Pearl heard a whoosh and a whoot, and then a loud thump. “Hop in, Pearl! toot! toot! Oh, and sorry about the porch swing, didn’t see it under all that snow” Bee was grinning from ear to ear. “First time I’ve used the snowmobile ski option, it’s a riot, haven’t quite got the hang of it yet though, but boy is it ever fun!”
Pearl laughed and hugged Bee. “It’s great to see you! I love your hat!” It was an elaborate blue turban, over the top with feathers and jewels. “Looks fabulous against all that snow, very delft. You know, you could have just used the portal to avoid all that snow! Janet!” Pearl spotted Janet in the back of the red car, who was picking herself up off the floor, and adjusting her pointy hat.
“But the journey was so much fun!” Janet said. “We bumped into Skolt, the travelling reindeer pee salesman, in Minnesota.”
“I hope you saved some for me!” replied Pearl. “I’ve got the moonshine, let’s party!”
