PLANESHIFTERS, Critical Mass: Book II, Chapter 5: Tachyon Storm

The lights on the entire ship had dimmed to a dark shade of amber and the proximity alert siren was going off in a steady, maddening cadence. After a very short debate, the crew had made the decision to harness themselves in to their seats to brace for impact. Erük was sitting calmly with a particularly large chunk of Crystal in his lap and talons, attempting to use it to augment his control over the properties of the shields to include resistance to the tachyon radiation as well as the interstellar wave it was pushing forward. The flashing lights made the whole situation even more surreal, and things seemed to progress at a slower and slower rate, until, just before impact, time seemed to stand still.

There was no telling if it was the impact of the wave, or the fact that they had gracefully, but quite suddenly, surpassed the speed of light itself, but all at once, things started to change. Time had frozen, but for the moment and its meaning, movement was still possible. Then, as if all the energy from all of the universe had hit them at once, a great shove from behind was felt by everyone, accompanied by a strange noise, knocking McGinn and Thor both, up and over their seats in what seemed like slow motion, revealing that neither of them had buckled their harness. They landed, both of them, on their feet, as if during the flight over their chairs they had some amount of control over their trajectories.

Thor felt a rush of energy, the likes of which he had never felt before, except in his dreams, and instinctively tried to tune into it by raising his pitch accordingly. He felt suddenly as if nothing unusual was taking place, in fact, his focus seemed to have sharpened dramatically, and he drew his katana defensively, as he noticed Kieran reaching for something behind his back. He assumed it must be a gun, though it seemed to be taking forever for him to draw it. Thor looked around quickly and noticed that no one else was moving any faster than McGinn.

Sky murmured something Thor could barely make out, "Thor, watch out… he's got a gun," but it sounded like it was coming through a pitch shifter in slow motion.

He turned back to McGinn, who had the pistol out and almost leveled at him, and spoke directly to him, staring him in the eyes, "You don't need to do this! Everything has changed! WE are in control of our fate… not anyone else! Don't make me do it!" As if he hadn't heard a thing Thor said, or he was speaking some foreign language, McGinn's eyes remained glazed with misunderstanding and the pistol went off twice, sending two bullets spiraling directly at Thor very quickly, but in what was still slow motion to him. He quickly pivoted 45 degrees at the last possible second, then sliced straight down, cutting the first bullet directly in half, right out of mid air as the second one flew past his ear, brushing through his hair and then slammed into the back of his seat, sending some of its filling into the air in a slow motion shower of confetti. The noise from the gun's discharge came seconds later and was greatly distorted, almost as if it was shot underwater. He quickly looked around, amazed that he seemed to be the only one operating in "real time." No one else seemed to be sharing this effect, but as he looked around the room, what he started noticing was much more bizarre than that.

People were phasing in and out of sight, apparently on the threshold of some kind of gateway between planes of existence. The lines between past and present, dream and reality, and space-time itself were crumbling before his eyes. One moment, he saw Sky, sitting with Ar'Jvikkah strapped across his shoulder to her chest, looking slowly around the room, mouthing something unintelligible, then he blinked and it was Kait, sitting there smiling at him! Caught up in the insanity of all of this, he suddenly realized he had been ignoring Kieran…

He spun around and saw him lunging at Sky with his pistol drawn, and without so much as a second thought or hesitation, Thor rolled across the floor toward them in a right chugari, using the momentum of the roll to add considerable force to his strike, as he came up out of it directly beside McGinn with his sword coming down from above, and cut right through the softest part of the midsection, just below his rib cage, completely separating the man in two halves. Thor cringed as he realized the very loud ringing in his left ear had to be the result of the gun going off again, and shocked out of his cohesion with the energy flow, he was now moving in slow motion himself as he turned in horror to see what had happened.

He could hear Sky screaming, but could not see her, only the flashing of the lights and a surrealistic blend of faces, flesh and voices in the darkening room, some familiar to him… some not. Through the corner of his eye he could see a cup of water spilling across one of the consoles. The water was pouring out in slow motion across the countertop, then when it reached the edge, it dripped… upward. His head was spinning and he was having a hard time remaining conscious, though the sound in the room was deafening, and growing louder. It started as voices, then distorted into abstract noises, vehicle sounds, industrial mayhem, and even explosions. It very quickly escalated to the point of complete and utter malevolence, and Thor succumbed to it entirely, collapsing on the floor, still holding a death-grip on his katana.

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Kait hovered above the aftermath of the carnage that had just been unleashed through her; huge dragon-like wings flapping gracefully, instinctively timed, even as the transition back to her conscious self progressed.

She floated softly back down to the floor, quickly regaining her sense of self. She was utterly blown away by what she had just done to them, but they weren't real… were they? She wasn't real. This was a dream. It had to be.

"Does it?" the voice boomed in her head, strong, yet somehow gentle.

"Does it, what?" she asked back without speaking.

"Does it have to be a dream?"

"I was just taken over by someone who destroyed everyone I know who already died… I am not even me… I think that it does!"

"Then, so be it."

"Who are you?"

"A friend."

"Why would a friend put me through this?"

"You can only move forward with your back to the past."

"Am I dead?"

"No, but you have no further use for this plane…"

"Who are you?"

"A planeshifter, as are you."

"Will I see him again?"

"You already have."

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Slowly, as if afflicted with the most severe New Year's Day hangover they'd ever experienced, each of them started to wake up, some laying on the floor and some still strapped to their seats. The body of Kieran McGinn was laying on the floor in front of Sky's seat, cut very cleanly in two, but for as critical of an area as had been severed, they were astonished that there was absolutely no blood. Not a drop. Thor slowly pushed his torso over to reveal something even more bizarre…. His eyes were completely white. No color, no pupils… nothing. Just white.

Sky screamed, and at first, Thor didn't look, he just assumed it was because of McGinn, but then there was a second one… almost a cry of pain. He spun around to see her holding her abdomen with a look of shock on her face. It was then that he noticed something was dreadfully wrong! Looking frantically around the room, he noticed that someone was missing… Erük's howl confirmed it, Ar'Jvikkah was nowhere in sight! He rushed over to where the young dragon had been sitting, strapped to Sky, and nearly ran right into Erük, when they both felt it at the same time… Sky was pregnant!

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Thor and Erük huddled around her as Dr. Astrydd ran through several different diagnostic scans. Though very small, the medical facility onboard the Phoenix was top notch. From the bed that Sky was laying in, they were able to perform any scan, test, or even surgery with all of the necessary tools and equipment within arm's reach of the Doctor at all times.

Thor was amazed at the clarity of the scanning devices, more than anything else. It was apparently no longer necessary to interpret cross sectional data from CT scans or magnetic imaging for soft tissue, let alone x-ray pictures of bone density differences. Medical science had advanced to the point of being able to scan full body telemetry in one shot, then break down the views needed accordingly, whether it be a 3D shot of the entire body of soft tissue missing the skeletal system, or the complete reverse, and everything in between. The image was on the screen at the punch of a few buttons, or floating holographically near the patient for touch-relative identification. It was absolutely astonishing the level of efficiency that mankind was capable of when his survival depended on it.

Astrydd stripped away the internal organs shrouding the view on the hologram, leaving only the obvious for examination… She was carrying the young dragon-child inside her, and she was pretty far along! He looked different than he should have, given his appearance at birth. Erük noticed this first, and spoke out. "He has evolved in reverse."

"Wh…what do you mean?" Sky asked shakily through teary eyes.

"We were not always as we are now," he looked up at Thor with a nod, "we were once very much like you…"

"How much?" Thor asked.

"I do not know for sure… It was-"

"Forbidden. Yeah, I remember. How the hell could this have happened, Erük?" Thor asked impatiently, holding Sky's hand tightly and stroking her hair. Dr. Astrydd looked up from the control module of her scanner with a shocked look on her face after scanning not only Sky, but Erük as well.

"Because they have the same basic DNA. Exactly the same!" Astrydd concluded to the surprise of everyone in the room.

"Who? Sky and Ar'Jvikkah?"

"Us and them!" she clarified, gesturing at Erük. "According to this, we're the same species! And that's not all," she added, looking around the room at each one of them, her face flushed white as snow. "Everyone in this room has the organs, skin, and muscle tissue of a 20 year old!" She continued around the room with the hand scanner repeating the test for accuracy. "I can't explain it, but it appears that we all have undergone some sort of mass regeneration…"

"Well, I'll be a cocksucker's lunch." Thor said with a blank stare on his face.

Copyright © 2011 Gunnar C. Garisson, All Rights Reserved