ARC of the IMMORTALS/Book 1
Recap: “If we want to survive without brain damage we need to get into the Pool of Life, now!” / Pursuer-Jac attacked Jac while the game was in progress.
Recap (continued): Bendel attacked Jac while his helmet and dock detached as a result of Pursuer’s onslaught. / Meanwhile, Yon tried to jump back to his home and failed. He collapsed on the hull. Harry and Touzdae entered the emergency escape airlock.
The win registered in an instant with the Gata-Cortexorgana brain. The giant Cortexorgana expanded. It’s gray-matter exuding a rose-colored light for a minute. Jac felt light building in his third-eye. Like a young child, he opened the door to his privacy booth and looked in the mirror. Light was beginning to exude from above his two eyes in the center of his forehead.
He followed the light of his heart and the urge of his soul. He opened the vent at the top of the privacy booth and hoisted himself up into the cooling shaft. He had no problem seeing in the dark as the light from his 3rd Eye illuminated the way. He was so excited he didn’t bother to shut the main vent as he shimmed through the shaft.
“I’ll go first. Once I get out of the pool it will be safe for you. You can climb down the walls, or float through the holographic field.” Touzdae told Harry as the outer airlock door closed behind them and the inner one slid open. Once open, a flicker stuttered in the holographic field above the pool. It was almost directly below.
Touzdae jumped. The holographic field clicked out for a few seconds. Lasers shot across Touzdae’s trajectory as she fell. Harry jumped, afraid he wouldn’t make it if the holo field failed.
Jac wriggled out of the duct. He dropped onto the transparent tubular walkway that girdled the casino. Covered at waist level the dark currents splashed against the tube like water. Jac caught sight of the great iris in the distance. It was forming. The light from his third eye intensified. A beam shot out of his third eye to the forming iris and opened it. He thought of Nez Fish, Touzdae, and a fleeting thought of Harry. Yon flashed in his consciousness too. They were in the beam. He sighed letting everything go and asked the Iris, what next?
The beam remained fixed to the top of the tubular walkway despite Jac having translated into the beam. He translated into the captain’s chair inside the aft cabin. Jac’s last thought before surrendering into sleep was a vastly slowed timeline. He saw time and space extend from whence he came.
As before — Touzdae jumped. The holographic field clicked out for a few seconds. Lasers shot across Touzdae’s trajectory as she fell the beams grazed her twice. She splashed into the Pool of Life, sank and healed. She found the groove in dark waters. She traced it to its end. She passed through the water barrier and surfaced. The sun was out beneath the Atlantian Temple. She emerged and dried instantly.
She found Nez asleep in her robes. The right side of her face was tight, along with her right shoulder, arm, and leg.
‘How odd,’ Touzdae thought.
“I heard that,” Nez opened her eyes and sat. Her body relaxed upon awakening.
“Your musculature was tight on your right side. Does that mean anything to you?”
“Yes. We’re in the Hinterland and I’m listing to port about thirty degrees, but the equilibrium is level on the ship.”
“Why is that?”
“I don’t know,” Nez answered. “But Jac can fix it. He’s asleep in his captain’s cabin now.”
“And the defensive measures throughout the inside?”
“Down. Everything is as it was, except Harry. And Yon is in the dorsal emergency airlock.”
Harry jumped immediately after Touzdae’s descent into the pool. Lasers drilled into him and he missed the pool. He was unconscious under the holographic tree.
Objects lighter than Fish were sucked out in a static electrical storm near the iris. This included much the debris from the Casino and Hotel as well as a few small ships and Bendel aboard the Needlecraft with Pursurer-Jac.
“The Needlecraft and debris from the crash are being sucked along in a slowed time stream in Jac’s 3rd eye beam. Poor boy he needs his sleep,” Nez said.
In Dreamtime from inside the light, his mind righted the vessel. He gazed aft, his mind trying to fathom what it was seeing through the deep tinted windows.
As a young man, before his fa-ma passed, he crafted the Captain’s Cabin onto the tail end of the Nez Fish. It was a collaboration between Nez Fish and Jac fashioned through visions in Dreamtime. Nez chided him with phrases like:
“This is your escape vehicle if I am to pass,” she told him.
“It could well be your escape ship too if your body dies,” Jac retorted. He avoided the thought that Fish could die.
“Hmm,” Nez soothed. “There’s a thought. I could escape my own death.”
“I can’t tell whether you’re being sarcastic or serious,” Jac ventured.
He awakened from Dreamtime and remained in a trance. Hmm, he thought. He created three Captain Cabin’s Escape Ships ready to go.
An impression of a voice entered his consciousness. It “said”, Lengthen the trailing end up to your ship up to one light year behind you. Jac did it. Some of the debris and ferry crafts drifted backward, as the Needlecraft entered. Jac felt termination of the beam as the outer iris closed.
Jac looked into the small space behind Needlecraft’s co*ckpit where he saw Touzdae and said:
“I’ll be back in a second, sweetie,” he heard a version of himself talk to Touzdae. How curious, Jac thought.
The last chapter:
The Next Chapter:
Thank you for joining me in the adventures that span lifetimes and worlds. (If you do NOT wish to be tagged, let me know, and I’ll tag you not):
Barbara Murray | K. Pearson Bradley | May More 💜 Tales | Dougfrombk | Rebecca Romanelli | Joseph Lieungh | Adam Mackay | Dr. Preeti Singh | Pene Hodge | Ravyne Hawke | Dr Mehmet Yildiz | Kris Bedenian | Alberto García 🚀🚀🚀 | Blaine Coleman | madmess’s thoughts | Lee David Tyrrell | DL Nemeril | David Price | Rip Parker | Annelise Lords | Libby Shively McAvoy
