07-14 thru 07-19-2009

I decided to put all of these in to one post, making it easier to read, especially since there are six entries!

Start Fiction:

(07-14-2009 Entry)
     Working in the machine shed, Darryl heard thunder on a sunny September afternoon. Surprised, he strolled over to the south door to check the sky. As he stepped over the door threshold, the sky split; a crackling boom shook the machine shed causing Darryl to jump forward.
     Looking to the horizon, Darryl dropped the carburetor from his hands and adjusted his hat to get a better view. There in the southern sky a vibrant green light emanated from the center of the anomaly. It looked like an upside down fountain hanging in the sky, shooting illuminated green water.
     Darryl heard Penny and Paige running towards him. His eyes remained fixed on the anomaly.
     "Daddy, what is that?" Paige, the older twin, asked.
     "I don't know," he said, fixated on the sky.
     "Maybe you should head to the lab," Penny said as she wrapped her arms around his waist. "It sure is pretty."
     Indeed, it was quite to spectacle. However, Darryl didn't have that sense of innocence his daughter possessed. There was potentially nothing good to come of this anomaly that had sprung up within the earth's atmosphere and so close to his home.
     "How far is it from us, Daddy?" Paige asked as she stepped forward using her hand as a visor. "How big is it?"
     "That's a good question," Darryl said. It must be close enough and big enough to shake the machine shed, but it's appearance is deceptive. It must not be too big since his pager had not gone off yet. Whatever it was, it made him nervous. "How would you two like to join me in the lab?"
     The two girls turned to each other and smiled. They tried to contain their excitement, but they still bounced towards the out building anyway with each girl holding one of their dad's hands.
     As the three of them reached the door of the out building, the anomaly created another sonic boom. Paige turned around to look as they walked and stopped.
     "Daddy," she said. "Something is coming out of that thing in the sky." Darryl spun around to see a small object emerge from the anomaly.
     "Oh buddy," he said. Even though his first instinct was to grab his girls and head for the lab, none of them flinched. The object was cylindrical; at first impression, it made Darryl think of a escape pod.
     "Either that thing is huge, or we are closer than we think to that anomaly," he said. The girls didn't respond, they just watched the object as it dropped towards the horizon. Darryl tried to estimate the trajectory of the object, but it was almost impossible with out any data as to size or distance of the object.
     As it reached the horizon he expected it to simply disappear. However, it hit about fifteen hundred yards due south with loud explosion; debris and dust shot upward. At the same instance, the anomaly in the sky closed with as earth rattling a bang as when it opened.
     "Let's go!" Darryl shouted as he began to run to the truck. The girls responded and sprinted behind him. He checked his beeper and cell phone as he ran; nothing. Strange, he thought. Surely that had to register somewhere.
     The girls got in the back seat of the truck, strapped themselves in and put on their helmets. "Ready!" the yelled.
Darryl floored it and off they went. Rocks banged against the wheel wells and large amounts of dust rose behind them. Trying to head in a straight direction, Darryl looked to his directional heading on the console, but it was bouncing all around.
     "Are we headed in the right direction, ladies?" he shouted back to the girls.
     "Yes," Paige shouted back as Penny shook her head in agreement. Both girls had their goggles pulled down as the dust rolled in the windows. Leaning forward in their seats, Paige and Penny kept their focus in the direction of the crash site as their heads bounced from the rough terrain.
     Ten years old or not, the girls were all business when it came to adventure; and this was no ordinary adventure.


(07-15-2009 Entry)
     Darryl caught a glimpse of his daughters in the mirror and smiled with pride. Their mother would be so proud, he thought.
They approached what Darryl felt was the final hill before finding the object. He let off the accelerator a little and the truck died.
     "Why are we stopping, Daddy?" Paige said.
     "It wasn't me" he told her.
     He tried to start the truck.
     Nothing.
     Not even a click.
     Completely dead.
     He looked around as the dust settled. Everything seemed so calm, quiet. Darryl expected to smell the prairie burning from the explosion of the impact. Nothing.
     "Time to hoof it?" Penny asked as she and her sister unbuckled their seat belts.
     "Yeah," Darryl said as he opened his door slowly. " Time to hoof it." Looking around, he realized that while the explosion would have scared of most wildlife, there seemed to be a good population calmly milling around the prairie.
     Several birds flew in a cockeyed manner; probably the same electromagnetic interference that messed with his truck's compass.
     "Let's not get in a big hurry, alright girls," he said as he turned to the ridge and noticed they were both standing perfectly still on top of the ridge, helmets and goggles still intact.
     Darryl walked up to the girls with deliberate steps, being mindful of the possible debris fragments hidden in the long prairie grasses. "Girls?" he said. No answer; they remained perfectly still. He took several deep breaths.
     Darryl reached the girls as they began to slowly remove their goggles. He rubbed his eyes; no one spoke, no one was certain of what they were seeing.
     "But, there was an explosion," Paige said as the three of them stood overlooking four hundred yards of pristine prairie.
     No crater, no smoke, no fire, most importantly no debris.
     "There most certainly was," Darryl said stepping forward. The grass was knee deep, swirling in the afternoon breeze.
     "Did we get off course?" Penny asked as she looked back towards the farm. "Seems right," she said as she swung her helmet with one hand and put her other hand on her hip. Paige agreed.
     Darryl continued forward, cautiously "You two coming?" he shouted back over his shoulder. The girls fell in line and followed their dad, keeping a set distance of approximately five feet between each other. All three kept their head and eyes moving, observing everything they possibly could.
     "It couldn't be much farther from here, could it?" Paige said.
     "I didn't think so," Darryl said. "But is is hard to tell considering we have no idea what the anomaly was or the object that came out."
     "We can't be too far," Penny began, "since the truck lost power and the compass went goofy; it's gotta be here somewhere, right?"
     "Right," Darryl said.


(07-16-2009 Entry)
     A hundred yards across the prairie, Darryl stopped and the girls caught up with him.
     "Do you smell that?" Paige said as she turned to her dad.
     "What is the?" Penny asked as she turned around, tugging on Paige's shirt.
     "Stop it."
     Penny kept tugging.
     Paige turned to smack her but froze with her hand in the air. "Dad?" she said as she tugged on his shirt.
     Darryl turned and followed the girls' gaze. Behind them, there was smoke; floating above their heads to the north.
     "I guess we are heading in the right direction after all," he said.
     Paige looked back and forth. "How can we.. why can't we..."
     "I think we need to just take our time," Penny said. Paige continued to spin her head around, trying to understand what she was, and wasn't, seeing.
     "Maybe we should try to go around this," Darryl said.
     "Some sort of stealth," Paige said under her breath.
     "But how?" Penny asked. All three of them looked back and forth once again; were they really prepared for this adventure?
     I wonder how far this illusion plays in front of us, Darryl thought to himself as he drew a screwdriver from his overalls and threw it ahead of them. As it left his hand, it was completely visible for about five feet or so until it seemed to hit something that rippled, like water; then the screw driver was gone. Several seconds passed before they heard a clang. It had hit something metal.
     "Careful where you are throwing things," a female voice called out. The girls jumped behind their dad, clinging to his waist peeping around him towards the voice.
     Darryl spread his arms out, palms up. "I mean you no harm," he called back to the voice.
     "I know," the woman replied. Paige and Penny stepped out from behind their dad and took a couple steps towards the voice.
     "She," Paige began, "she sounds familiar."
     "Yes, indeed," Darryl said as all three of them found themselves drawn forward.


(07-17-2009 Entry)
     The air in front of them began to ripple, just as it did for the screwdriver. A round opening, a doorway formed. Just past the doorway, the prairie began to look as they had originally expected; charred with a massive creator.
     Twenty yards in front of them they saw the front end of the object facing them. It looked intact, considering the impact they witnessed. However, they didn't see the female belonging to the voice.
     "It's okay," the female called out, "it's safe, I promise.". While they had no reason to trust someone who just fell from the sky through an anomaly, all three of them continued to step forward.
     "Dad," Paige said taking hold of his hand, "don't we know her?" Penny took the lead, walking tall and sure. No fear was detectable in the ten year old. She seemed... excited.
     "I hope so, Paige," Darryl said, squeezing her hand. They stepped through he opening and the full scale of the impact stopped the two of them in their tracks. Penny, eyes wide, kept walking towards the object.
     "Whoa," Darryl said. He turned around and watched the air de-ripple; the portal closed. From this vantage point, the prairie was visible with the reality of the impact damage. He figured there was about a one hundred and fifty square yard area scorched. Although to his surprise, the crater was considerably smaller than he had anticipated.; the object had not fallen straight in to the ground, rather there was an attempt to land the craft.
     Darryl stepped forward, tugging a reluctant Paige with him. Inspecting the object as they approached, he noticed a woman making her way around the object.
     The woman was tall, slender and had a beautiful head of dark red hair just like his girls; and his wife. She stopped next to the object, reached her hand up and leaned against the object. She smiled excitedly, as though she was welcoming old friends. Penny ran up to the woman and hugged her tightly.
Darryl and Paige approached their position, both mesmerized by the object.
     "You came!" he heard Penny say.
     "Of course I came," the woman said, "I always keep promises I make to myself." Darryl's stomach sank. There was a good reason he felt like he knew this woman; this was not good.
     "Penny?" he said.
     "Yes?" both Penny and the woman responded.
     "Your name is Penny, too?" Paige asked.
     The woman and Penny walked up to Paige. The woman knelt down in front of Paige, took her hands and stared in to her eyes. Paige returned the stare, studying the woman's face. Her eyes widened.
     "You ARE Penny!" she squealed.
     "Actually, I go by Penelope."
     "Of course," Darryl said as he knelt down next to Paige looking into Penelope's eyes. It sure was Penny, all grown up. "Welcome home," he said. "Or welcome back, I guess."
     "Thanks, dad," she said.
     "I don't understand," Paige said crossing her arms.
     "Maybe Penny can explain," Penelope said.
     "She's me!" Penny told her.


(07-18-2009 Entry)
     Paige looked at Darryl with blank eyes. Perhaps it was too much to take in, even for his little Paige.
     "It's alright," he told her. He looked to Penelope, "I think we need to talk."
     "Agreed," she said as they both stood. Darryl rubbed Paige's shoulders, reassuring her it was going to be alright. Penny danced
and sang around the three of them; her wildest dreams were right in
front of her. She grabbed Paige's hand, coaxing her to join.
     Darryl and Penelope walked towards the object. "It is a ship of sorts," she said.
     "That would make sense," Darryl said. As they walked around the side of the ship, he estimated it was only six feet in breadth and maybe ten feet in length; much bigger than his initial assessment when it shot towards the earth.
     "Do you want to take a look inside?" Penelope asked.
     "No, actually," Darryl said. He looked back to the girls to make sure they were out of ear shot. Penny was turning a dazed Paige in circles.
     He looked at Penelope, "What are you doing here, Penny? Do you not understand the consequences of you being here?"
Penelope crossed her arms, turned her head away from Darryl.
     "Another lecture," she said.
     "Do you understand the consequences?" he said stepping forward.
     "Why don't you enlighten me, dad," she said snapping her head towards him.
     "Whatever you were trying to accomplish failed before it began, defeated once you broke through the anomaly," he told her. "You just
altered your existence, our existence; altered our very reality."
     "Who says this isn't how this reality is suppose to unfold?" Penelope said. "Isn't the reality you believe that needs to be maintained still in fact in existence within it's proper reality?" She knocked on the ship and a door slowly opened. "Besides, it wasn't all my idea," she told him as she stepped back and turned towards the door. There stood another tall, slender woman with a head of dark red hair.
     "Paige?" he gasped. "What... why girls?" Darryl crossed his arms and began to pace in font of them. He took several deep breaths, looked up and down, back and forth between the women.
     "Why not?" the older Paige said as she stepped out of the ship.
     "Who is she?" young Paige asked standing next to Darryl.
     "Maybe she, they, should explain," he said throwing his hands up in the air, turning away.
     Young Paige liked back and forth from Penny to the women, especially her older self. "It's you, Paige," Penny told her. She put her arm around her twin; Penelope followed suit and put her arm around her twin.
     "Sister friends forever!" Penelope exclaimed.


(07-19-2009 Entry)
     "This isn't right," young Paige said. She removed Penny's arm from around her shoulders and walked over to Darryl. "This isn't right, daddy." He knelt down and hugged her.
     "Why here? Why now?" he asked the women.
     They looked at each other, looked in to the ship and then back at Darryl.
     "You want it all now, don't you?" Penelope said.
     "The sooner and more detailed the better," he replied.
"     Very well," the older Paige said. "We are not from this timeline, this reality; this multiverse," she began to explain. "Our universe in our multiverse is dying; on the verge of cataclysmic annihilation."
     "Incredible," Darryl said.
     "You were all going to die?" young Paige asked.
     "Yes, and we felt if we had the ability to escape, then we should take that chance," Penelope said.
     "But why now?" Darryl said. He moved towards the ship, Penny. "You could have picked any time, by why this period of time in our multiverse; why this multiverse?" The women just stared at Darryl.
     "It was the only multiverse they could find that was most like our own," a third woman's voice called out from the ship. Darryl's heart raced. He knew that voice for certain; the voice of the dead.
     "This is wrong, girls," Darryl said as he walked to the door of the ship. "You should not have brought her here, not now." he told, his voice cracking a bit.
     Penny and young Paige ran to their father and held his hands. "That sounds like mom," Penny said. Darryl pulled his girls close; this was going to mess with all of their minds, and hearts.
     Yet another tall, slender woman with a head of dark red hair, albeit with a touch of gray, came to the door. "Darryl," she said.
     "Beth," he whispered.
     "Mom?" Penny and young Paige said. They ran to her and hugged her. Penelope and the older Paige came to Darryl and hugged him as he stood stunned.
     "In our world, you died in the crash, not me," Beth told him as she squeezed the childhood versions of her daughters.
     "We never really knew you," Penelope told him as she kissed him on the cheek.
     "Now we get to spend the rest of our lives making up for our universe's lost time," older Paige said.
     "But, the technology, your ship, you," Darryl began, "how will we fit you in to this world, this multiverse?"
     Beth broke free from the younger sisters and went to Darryl. She cradled his face in her hands, "We'll figure it all out later, sweetheart."
     He stared in to her eyes, smiled as a tear ran down his cheek. "I suppose we will, won't we?"



End Fiction.

I am not sure I like that post for the 19th, but will let it brew a little more in my head. I just didn't want to turn it in to a black op/fight against the military story. Although that would be fun to write...