Authors: Lorijo Metz
“Right,” she said in her typically cheery voice. “I’ll call tech support.”
Nothing seemed to faze the woman. She had the patience of a Circanthian and the face of an—
Provost shook his head. This was no time to be distracted. “No, just buzz her for me. I’ll deal with the phone, later—MYSELF.”
“Did Hayes’ head start bleeding again?”
Principal Provost felt ill.
“Never mind.” Stephanie was frowning now. “I’ll buzz her right away.”
“NO WAIT!” Hayes had indeed been in his office. That could mean only one thing; Hayes was in— “Concentric, help us all!”
“Goodness me! What’s wrong?” Stephanie stood up so quickly that her chair went careening backwards, bounced against the wall, and then rolled back just in time for her to sit down again. She reached for the phone. “How ‘bout I buzz Nurse Prickel?”
“NO! No, no, no, no—please don’t do that.” He was making a complete fool of himself. “I’m sorry,” Principal Provost mumbled. He had to remove himself from Stephanie’s presence—and quickly. “I’ll call her from my office.”
“But your phone?”
Wonderful, my forehead’s sweating.
“What? Oh yes—my phone. I’ll talk to…”
“Tech support? But how?”
“Right. Sorry to have bothered you.” Principal Provost began backing away. “One more thing, Stephanie…” He paused, mouth open, only slightly aware that his face had flushed almost as pink as his secretary’s. “I mean, Miss Chantos.”
Stephanie blinked twice. Principal Provost took this to mean yes.
“I’m in a very important meeting right now with ah…?”
“McKenzie and Hayes?”
“Yes! And I do not wish to be disturbed.”
********
I wonder if it’s a full moon?
Even on a good day, B.R. Provost was a mystery. He was the most intelligent man Stephanie had ever met, and also the most mysterious. He was the first one to arrive at school every morning and the last one to leave. The few times she’d driven past the school late at night, the lights were always on in his office. As far as she knew, he had no close friends and no one had ever been to his house. Today, though, he seemed even odder than usual.
Stephanie Chantos pushed her wispy, gray-speckled bangs from her eyes and leaned back in her chair.
He needs a vacation. Goodness no! What he needs is a wife, someone to keep him from working too hard. I’ll have Nurse Prickel schedule a physical for him—right after I find out what’s going on.
********
His office had a fresh, clean scent, as if all the particles of mildew and dust had followed McKenzie—
McKenzie and Hayes—
through the portal.
Great Concentric! What now?
The answer was obvious. At least part of it was obvious. Upon arriving on Earth, he’d placed two sets of time disrupters around the city of Avondale. One set activated immediately for ten days, when he’d desperately needed time to disguise and integrate himself into the Earth community. The second set standing by in reserve, was ready to activate from his office the moment he prepared to return home with the Corona-Soter. Then he’d waited, choosing to trust the instincts that had brought him to this remote town of Avondale. Instincts…and the fact that on a planet this size, the only logical way to search for a being he knew little about, save for the vague description of Wheeled Warrior, was via a brilliant invention called the Internet. A marvel that almost rivaled travel through time and space.
Provost groaned. The time disrupters were capable of lasting 365 Earth-days, plus or minus a few days. Avondale would be a black hole of time displacement, but it was the only way to provide enough time for the Corona-Soter to fulfill her destiny and return unnoticed.
At least, that had been the plan. Now he would have to use the second set of disrupters for himself.
Principal Provost locked the door, withdrew a set of keys from his inside jacket pocket, and rolled behind his desk. On the right side of his desk was a black, nondescript, two-drawer filing cabinet.
Time to activate the disruptors, he thought. One loonocks, approximately one Earth-year by his calculations, to find a way back…or quietly disappear.
Chapter 9
FBI TRANSCRIPT 21207 - 8
Agent Wink Krumm, Edith Snipe and Helen Nimrev
Thursday, April 16th
KRUMM
: Approximately six and a half years ago, sometime within a…
mysterious
ten-day period, Avondale High School collapsed. And no one—absolutely, no one—witnessed it.
SNIPE
: Dear me! Helen, did you hear, the school building collapsed again.
NIMREV
: No, Edith. Agent Krumm was referring to the original school building.
SNIPE
: Ohhhh, that was a bit of a mystery.
KRUMM
: There was also an incident involving all the clocks in Avondale.
SNIPE
: The entire town was taken. You know, by aliens. I saw it on TV.
NIMREV
: Really, Edith.
KRUMM
: Yes…
well,
shortly after the collapse, the Head Principal—
NIMREV
: Harold Shepherd. A real stickler for punctuation.
KRUMM
: Harold Shepherd retired, and within a matter of days, B.R. Provost arrived.
NIMREV
: It is rather fuzzy. You’re right, though. The school had just collapsed, Harold retired—oh, and that new company—
SNIPE
: Circles, Phasers, or something…
NIMREV
: Sphaera Technologies. Thank you, Edith. Sphaera Technologies moved into town, and somewhere in the midst of it all our wonderful Principal Provost arrived.
SNIPE
: Not to mention all those wheelchair people.
NIMREV
: Edith!
KRUMM
: Ladies! Please, focus. B.R. Provost arrived in Avondale, having somehow heard about the unannounced job opening and was immediately hired.
NIMREV
: He had an excellent record.
SNIPE
: And, he was so handsome, with so many good ideas for building the new school.
NIMREV
: More importantly, he’s never once corrected my grammar.
KRUMM
: Thank you. Thank you, ladies. Your assistance has been…
invaluable
.
***
CONNECTIONS
Monday, March 16th
Earth
P
rovost sighed. It felt like only yesterday he’d stood before the cortext, probably in the very same spot that Revolvos had stood over a hundred loonocks before. He could still recall asking Concentric for strength to particle-weave his way across the universe, for wisdom to help find the Corona-Soter, and chancing one additional prayer, for luck to find his old mentor, Petré T. Revolvos.
Strapped to his back, along with a few personal possessions, had been the pinicolis. More vital to the success of his journey than the cortext, the pinicolis would enable the portal to remain open for the return trip. In his haste, his old mentor had been ignorant of the need for a pinicolis. A cortext was the point of origin, the beginning, but always remained behind.
Fingers in place, supplies secured, he’d opened his mind and envisioned a portal through time and space, a door to another solar system, and within it, one giant sun. Beyond that was a planet much like his own, only larger—described, but unnamed, in the Circolar. Provost had felt sure the planet was Earth, from which H.G. Wells had traveled. A planet, Wells had claimed, inhabited by god-like beings, like himself. Beings capable of producing advanced technology, such as the Tsendi and Circanthians had never seen. Technology, Provost imagined, exactly like the cortext.
More important, if the planet described in the Circolar was indeed Earth, then where better to find the Corona-Sorter—translated into the Earth language, the Wheeled Warrior—the being capable of defeating H.G. Wells.
Now, over six years later, if Provost was sure of one thing it was that humans were not gods, and though clever, did not possess the knowledge to design a cortext. And yet…
His gaze shifted to the bottom of the bookshelf, to an oversized book bound in gold foil attempting to pass itself off as gold leaf. It appeared garish and cheap compared to the surrounding leather bound volumes.
Provost had seen, purely by accident, the book entitled,
Write Like An Egyptian
, lying open on a table in the student resource center. He took, no, borrowed it, so that he could study it further in the privacy of his own office. At first glance, he had been sure his eyes were playing tricks. Exhausted and desperate, having already spent five unsuccessful years searching for the Corona-Soter, he’d come as close in that moment to having what humans referred to as a heart attack, as was Circanthianly possible. There, right in front of him for any being to see, was a book containing pictures of the exact same language used in the Circolar.
Provost had grabbed the book, and for weeks and months afterwards, poured over its contents (as well as any other book on Egyptian hieroglyphics upon which he could lay his hands). He’d searched the Internet, he’d talked to Egyptian experts, but for all the similarity to the writing in the Circolar, he could not find one single clue, with the exception of the style of writing, which linked the Egyptians to the planet Circanthos.
Another dead end.
At least now he knew his old mentor, Revolvos, was alive on Earth but—
Concentric, help me—
he had no idea where
.
That was the problem with dream talking, somehow you always seemed to wake up at the most pivotal point in the conversation.
“I have failed,” Provost lamented, staring at the spot where the pinicolis should have been. “McKenzie will arrive on Circanthos, alone and unguided—right in the center of Tsendi territory.”
Brushing a hand through his thinning locks, he took a deep breath and focused on the small blue box he’d removed from the filing cabinet; a box much like the one that had housed the pinicolis. “I may die a failure,” he murmured, “but I will not give up!” As if by magic, a keyhole appeared. B.R. Provost inserted the larger of the two keys, and what had once appeared to have been a solid piece of wood, split down the middle and swung open.
Inside, was a mushroom-shaped object, as un-alien looking as anything could be. Several smaller versions were already in place at various points around the outskirts of Avondale. They’d been there, unobserved, since shortly after his arrival.
Principal Provost placed the object in front of him. In less than an hour, surely someone would begin to wonder why the students had not come out of his office. Headlines began popping into his mind.
Missing Students Last Seen in Office of Alien Principal!
Alien Principal’s Body Dissected…
Great Concentric!
He had to do something. Not even Stephanie would cover for a locked door all day.
Quickly, he reached out with his mind to touch the object—then paused. The disrupters would only work once.
Slow down! You still have time. First, you need a plan.
If McKenzie could particle-weave, then she must be at least part Circanthian. He shuddered. This meant, once again his old mentor was responsible. Only Revolvos would do something so arrogant—so impulsive—as to mate with a human. It was the only plausible explanation.
An image of Stephanie Chantos popped into his mind. He smiled. Not that humans weren’t worthy. He quickly pushed the thought away.
But why had Revolvos remained on Earth?
Love?
Surely his mate, whoever she had been, could not still be alive. Revolvos was old, even by Circanthian standards. Was McKenzie a great-granddaughter or a great-great granddaughter? How far back did it go? How many other humans existed that were part Circanthian? Who could particle-weave! He had to do something—and quickly.
H.G. Wells must have manipulated time and space to travel to Circanthos. Yet, Provost had never been able to locate even the smallest evidence of such technology—apart from a ridiculous book of fiction written by H.G. Wells.
Provost rolled out from behind his desk and stopped. There remained one other option. Six and a half years ago, he’d built his own cortext. Surely, if he could find Revolvos, they could build another one together. Based upon their ability to communicate via his recent dream, his old mentor was nearby. Was he on his way to Avondale? On his way to see relatives, perhaps? If McKenzie was somehow related to his old mentor, then the best place to begin searching for Revolvos was at the Wu house.
It seemed he had his plan.
Giving his eyebrow one last tweak, Provost gazed at the mushroom-shaped disrupter on his desk—the main disrupter node. Three hundred sixty-five days was a long time, but would it be long enough? Time was the enemy.
Checking that both the blinds and the door were secure, he moved to the center of the room. With mixed feelings, B.R. Provost unsnapped the vinyl costume he’d worn almost every waking moment since his arrival—then jumped out of his wheelchair.
His
roticolar
, a sphere-like appendage made of thousands of smaller bones and joints, began to unfold to its full circumference. The navicals, tiny nerve-like endings that suctioned the roticolar to the body and allowed for a full 360 degrees of rotation, simultaneously transmitted messages, which stimulated the tiny bones and joints to expand and contract as needed. His roticolar began to pulse, unaccustomed to being used, and began to work.
With mixed feelings, Provost gazed at the now empty wheelchair. The human contraption had provided perfect cover, allowing him to blend in and feel almost ‘human’ in the process.
He frowned.
It was a shame so many of the two-legged humans believed he should be pitied; even worse, averted their eyes as if his presence made them uncomfortable. “Fools!” Provost sighed and returned to his desk.