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Episode 1:
"Echoes"
Episode 2:
"Down The Rabbit Hole"
Episode 3:
"Coming Home"
Episode 4:
"Everybody Together?"
Episode 5:
"Tom, the Raptors, and Me"
Episode 6:
"Lost But Now Found"
Round Robin Main
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Chapter One
It was eerie. As much as it had been the first time Challenger had
stepped into the temporal distortion. The wind seemed to pick up
and whip around him. A soft, irritating humming noise he could
barely hear. And the spinning ...he tried to open his eyes, tried
to pick out the tree house, but it made him nauseous. He would
simply have to wait, close his eyes and pray that he was deposited
in the right place.
After what felt like hours, but was in reality only moments, barely
a few seconds, George Challenger stepped through. He had to take a
moment to get his bearings, but it was worth it.
Veronica's worried face peered over the balcony of the tree house at
him. She seemed to visibly relax, "Challenger! Thank God. Where
is Finn?"
How in the world Veronica knew that Challenger had been with Finn
didn't even occur to him. He shook his head a little sadly, "Back
in her own time, Veronica. Where she belongs."
"But ...you said ..."
Challenger shook his head, "I was wrong. She is where she needs to
be. Don't worry, she's in the best possible hands."
Challenger felt silly yelling up at her from the ground and moved
inside the perimeter fence and into the elevator. He was completely
unprepared for what happened when he reached the top.
The exhausted, but smiling face of Ned Malone greeted him. Malone
was seated in a chair with a large, bloody towel draped over half of
his upper torso and left arm.
Veronica threw her arms around Challenger, "I thought I'd done
something wrong."
Challenger smiled and hugged her gently, "You did wonderfully." He
gaze moved to Malone, "What happened to you?"
Malone paused, reviewing the last month or so in his mind and
finally he laughed and shrugged, "Something weird."
Challenger opened his mouth to respond when he realized what was
missing, "Where are Marguerite and Roxton?"
He almost wished he hadn't asked. Veronica's face was immediately
stricken with anxiety again, "I did what I could for them ...but, I
don't ...I don't know if it was enough."
Malone actually started to get up and reach for her, but Challenger
placed a gentle hand on his uninjured shoulder, "I'm certain that
they can handle whatever comes up ...as long as they're together."
Veronica did not look convinced, "I hope you're right."
BC 1482
Roxton had closed his eyes. He had his hands raised in front of him
waiting for the pain. That seering feeling of metal tearing through
his skin. The Conquistadors had fired on him and they had been too
many, and too close to miss. And yet though he waited, the pain
never came.
He had the oddest sensation. It felt almost as if water were
seeping into his boots. He risked opening his eyes and sure enough,
he was standing in the middle of a shallow pool of water. He looked
curiously around the cave. This was not where he had been a few
moments ago, but he knew this place. He smiled. He had been here
before.
He didn't have the chance to ponder how it was he got there. A
sharp scream filled the room. It was full of fear ...terror so
profound that he could almost taste it himself.
"Roxton, where are you? Roxton!"
It was this, more than anything else, that snapped Roxton out of his
memory and back to reality, "Marguerite?"
He screamed her name. It was so loud that the one word echoed off
the walls around him, and still her cry of desperation filled that
cave. His heartbeat pounded in his chest, faster, stronger and in
his mind ...a word. "Hurry ...hurry ...hurry."
A surge of adrenaline pushed him up the stairs to the main chamber.
This was all wrong. What on earth were they doing? He took in the
entire scene with a glance.
About six people in robes surrounded the altar to which Marguerite
had been bound. There was a low chanting, firelight from torches
flickering off the walls, and one of the six was standing over her
with a dagger in his hands.
Roxton's brain froze. He reacted purely on instinct. His weapon
was in his hands before he realized he had grasped it. And then he
began to fire, reload, fire, reload, over and over and over until
the only sound in the cave was his gun. When he did finally lower
his weapon, they were dead. All of them.
Only one other person still lived inside that cave, and she was the
only thing that mattered. He knew the guilt would eventually catch
him. One did not kill without consequence, but as he moved through
the bodies littering the floor, he couldn't seem to find it inside
himself to care.
She was alive, she was breathing, and there was nothing in his world
more important than that.
He unbound her and pulled her up into his arms.
Marguerite came back to consciousness in fragments. She was first
aware of the strong, warm arms that surrounded her body. He was so
very warm and she curled closer to the heat. As her face touched
his chest, she took a breath and recognized the scent. A smell of
trees and musk, soap and something she could never identify,
something that was uniquely him. It was a scent she had grown to
depend on, for with that smell came the man she loved. When all
else failed, he would be there. Somehow, she had always know this.
It was, however, the deep, husky sound of his voice that finally
cemented her back in reality; that finally convinced her this was
not a dream, "Marguerite?"
Her eyes flickered, once, twice and then remained open, focused on
his face. He really was there, "John?"
"Oh, thank God." His voice faltered, thick with relief and
gratitude. No matter what he had done, it was worth it. No matter
the guilt and pain he might have to suffer later, it was worth it to
hold her near him and feel her breath against his neck. It was
worth it. He didn't deserve her. He sighed; he never would.
The love crept up inside him until it slammed into his chest. He
literally gasped with the power of it. So unlike anything he had
known before. He could not begin to imagine his life without her,
for if she was not there ...how would he continue on? He crushed
her up against him, leaning forward and pressing his lips gently to
her forehead, "I'm here."
She reached up and cradled his face in her hands, holding him
gently, and as he stared into her eyes, he could see that she felt
the same thing. Though she might never be able to say it without
holding something back, it was nevertheless true.
She pulled his face toward her and smiled as she pressed her lips to
his. What had once been only lust, passion, need, desire,
translated through them both into pure, unadulterated love. The
kind of love that one can no longer deny exists, for it is as much a
part of you as your heartbeat.
They remained like that for a long time. Holding one another,
tasting, teasing, making one another gasp with pleasure ...simply to
assure themselves that they really were there.
And then it came, as he had known it would.
Guilt ...pain ...regret. The realization that he had taken the
lives of the people lying dead around them.
John Roxton was not, but nature, a cold blooded killer and as he
looked around at the devastation in that room, he was unsure he
could live with what he had done in his desperation to get to
Marguerite.
She was watching him and could see him struggling. She reached out
to him as she had never done before. Reached out before he could
mentally pull away from her, "Don't."
"What have I done?"
Marguerite pushed herself off the altar, still standing in the halo
of his arms, "You did what you had to do."
Her touch was a balm on his soul. He now understood that she had,
over the years, become his touchstone. That one thing in all the
world that could calm him, even in the face of this much pain.
When he looked away from the bodies and into her eyes he did not see
the fear he thought he would find there. He saw only
understanding, "I can't undo this."
She shook her head, "No. No, you can't. But we'll deal with this.
Us. Together."
He almost smiled, "Do you mean that?"
Marguerite took his hand and pulled him toward the cave
opening, "Let this be their tomb. Theirs and not mine."
He couldn't do anything else so he followed her out into the
sunlight. Perhaps there was hope for them after all. |