Save The Crumbling Walls

 

By Graham Winegarden

 

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The smoke and loud music assault their senses as they walk into the pub. It seems over the last little while this place has become a hang out for the people that work at Dynatech Inc. It is a high technologies company, that is involved in a lot of Science Fiction research. Their staff hang out here so much that the company tried to buy the pub a few times, to ensure the security of its employees and it’s research. The owners who would not sell are a group of very unusual people. They seem to know a great deal about radical technologies and all sorts of other thing, this makes them compelling for the researchers to talk to. It is not often that these researchers can find people who understand what they are talking about, let alone get help and ideas to solve any problems they have. That is why then two men have to pass through metal detectors and cameras to get into the pub, but this does not worry them because gadgets are not their strength.

The first of the two men is just below average height at about 5' 9" and have long white hair tied back in a ponytail. This white hair and wrinkled skin give him the appearance of being an old man. That is quickly contradicted by the way he moves. Watching him move, an experienced eye would quickly notice the grace of a highly trained martial artist in those moves. The same experienced eyes would also notice the intensity in those steel grey eyes as they looked around the room, and in particular when they found what they were looking for. The white haired man motioned to the other at their target. The second man was a little rolly polly with a baby face. He had rosy red cheeks like he had been out in the cold, but it was summer time and quite warm. The baby faced man also seemed full of energy as he continuously moved to the beat of the music. The two made an interesting pair and moved into the pub and towards their target.

They were heading towards a middle aged man sitting at a table by himself. He had a pint of beer in front of him, as well as a little pad of paper. The man looked to be of Irish decent and was big. He was about 6' and about 250 lbs., and looked like he liked his beer more then working out. This was Dr. Lyndon O’Hare. They were about half way to the table when a young woman approached the table and sat down with the good doctor. The two men quickly made there way to a couple of bar stools close to the table and tried to hear what was being said. They were interrupted by the bartender saying,

“What can I get for you guys?” The baby faced one turned to the other and said,

“Jackabor, what do you want to drink?” Jackabor said,

“I will have a glass of Chardonnay. What kind do you have?” The bartender said,

“Well we have Black Opal, from Australia, we have a nice Canadian,” Jackabor interrupted him and said,

“I will take the Canadian,” then he turned to his friend and said, “What about you Flash?” The baby faced man looked over the beer taps and said,

“I will have a Keith’s.” The Bartender left and quickly came back with their drinks.

Flash said,

“I can’t hear a thing, how about you?” Jackabor just shook his head. Then he made a few gestures with his hands and mumbled a few words from some language no one alive still knew.  He then put his hand behind his back and pointed then towards the couple at the table. It took a little mental tuning, but soon he had their conversation. The woman said,

“Doctor I know about your research and that you have come across something extraordinary.” She then paused to let her words sink into the mans mind. After a second she continued, “You have found proof that there are other dimensions or as we call them Tangents. The problem is your going about it all wrong. Your work is trying to break down the barriers between the tangents. This will be a disaster, if you succeed.” Dr. Lyndon looked at her and said,

“How do you know all this? My work is highly classified.”

“That may be so Doctor, but I do know about it and I know more then you know about it. I can not explain here but I have been given permission to take you to are facility and there it will all be explained to you.” The Doctor looked at her and said,

“I don’t know, it is against everything the security people tell us.”

“Yes I suppose it is, but if you do not take a chance you could destroy your whole world. Now do you want to come with me or not?” The Doctor thought for a couple of minutes and then picked up his beer and downed it in one drink. He said,

“I will come with you after all how much trouble can I get into.” The woman smiled and said,

“I am not here to cause you trouble but to help you.”

The Doctor rose and said,

“Graham put my drinks on my tab, will you.” Then the two of them made for the door. Jackabor told Flash to pay the tab and meet him outside. Flash tried to flag down his bartender but he was busy talking to another bartender, so he just left the money on the bar. He headed out to the parking lot and found Jackabor in their car already. Jackabor said,

“It is a white GMC Jimmy, it just got on to the highway heading east.” They quickly started after it and got it in sight within a minute. While they were driving Jackabor told Flash all about what the woman had told Doctor O’Hare. Flash said,

“How did she know all this? She did not have a magical aura that I could sense.”

“No you are right but I had a spell going so do you think you would have felt it even if it had been there.”

“Well maybe not, but how could she know about Tangents and the dangers they present.” Jackabor looked at him and said,

“I don’t think she was a native of this Tangent. She might be human but I don’t think that is the case. It took me a little longer to tune in on her then it should have with my eavesdropping spell.”

By this time they had made their way out of Markham and were heading towards Scuogoge Lake. They followed the highway as it headed across the causeway and followed the Jimmy on to the island. It headed away from the most heavily populated area and when it was in a secluded area they stopped. Flash and Jackabor got to a spot where they could see but still remain undetected. They watched as the two got out of the Jimmy and walked around to the front, then there was a shimmering field around the woman. When it was gone so was the woman, and in her place was a 10' tall frail creature with large wings and large red eyes. It had double jointed legs and vicious looking clawed feet. Which it used as it lifted off into the air to grab the Doctor, and then headed out over the lake. Flash looked at Jackabor and said,

“What was that?” A voice came from behind him said,

“That was a Mothman, and it has Doctor O’Hare.” They both turned around to see the Bartender from the pub standing there. He was dressed in black military fatigues and was carrying an assortment of equipment and weapons. Jackabor said,

“We have no time for this. They are getting away.” The Bartender said,

“No problem, the doctor has a homing beacon on him. Now what are you two doing here?" and as he said that he moved his gun so it was pointing at the two men.

Jackabor and Flash looked at each other, and after a couple of seconds of thought he nodded to Flash. Flash turned to the Bartender and said,

“What is your name?” The bartender looked a little shocked but said,

“Graham, you can call me Graham. Now what are you doing here?”

“Well we are to talk to the Professor about his research and what it is doing to the walls between the dimensions. It seems his work is breaking down the walls, if he continues with the way he is doing things we will have no protection from the other dimensions and this could be disastrous to the human race. The barriers are all that protect this dimension from some pretty nasty characters.” The bartender looked at them and said,

“How do you know all this?” Flash then looked at Jackabor again, but this time it was his turn to explain. He said,

“Well it is because we are from another dimension that we know about what is out there.” Graham then noticed a wave of distortion form around Flash. He stepped back and aimed his gun at him. The man who had been standing there was gone and in his place was another creature. It was very delicate looking with long angular features. Then Graham noticed it’s ears they were pointed like Mr. Spock from Star Trek. Graham had read enough fantasy novels to know an elf when he saw one, he had just never seen one before. Graham said,

“You are an Elf?” Flash smiled at him and nodded yes. Jackabor continued,

“You see we know quite a bit about dimensional travel, we did it to get here.” Graham looked at him and said I have a million questions but first we have to make sure the Professor is alright.”

“You don’t seem to concerned?”

“Well the Mothmen from this area have never hurt anyone to my knowledge, and I don’t think they are going to start now.”

“You knew about the Mothmen.” Graham nodded.

He then started to move off in the direction that the Mothman had taken the Professor. Jackabor said,

“Wait we have a better method.” He then did some outlandish moves and Flash took off into the air flying. Jackabor held out his hand and said,

“Let me help you until you get use to how it works. Basically you just think about what you want to do and it will happen but there are some limitations, so go easy at first.” They then lifted off into the night sky. At first Graham held on to Jackabor, but as he got more use to the feel he slowly let go. After a couple of minutes he was flying on his own. Jackabor said,

“So how do you like it?”

“It is wild, I want to learn more of this.” Jackabor thought about that for a second then said,

“Well maybe we can talk about that after we are finished, but now, we must find the Professor.” Graham pulled out his tracker and looked at, then he pointed off to the right. They flew off in that direction.

Graham could not believe the exhilaration he felt from the experience of flight, it was a whole new found freedom. He would have loved to explore the sensation more but the tracer reader told him he was getting very close to where the Professor was. He pointed down and led the others down onto a ledge. Once they had landed and looked around they found a opening into the cliff face. The entrance was very dark and Graham checked his gun. He noticed Flash stringing a unusual looking bow, but Jackabor did not have any weapons. He pulled out his side arm and handed it to Graham, but Jackabor just waved him off, and Flash laughed. Graham looked to Flash for an answer and he said,

“He has more fire power then the both of us put together.” They then moved into the cave mouth.

Flash moved off down the tunnel as Jackabor stopped Graham. He said,

“Flash will scout out a head.”  Graham listened but could not hear a thing. After about 10 seconds Jackabor led him down the tunnel. It was pitch black and Graham had to hold onto Jackabor’s shirt to not walk into walls. It was also so quite that it was eerie, Graham was glad that he was not alone. Jackabor led him down the tunnel as if he could see every little bump and crevasse. Ever once in a while he would stop and listen but Graham never heard anything, then they would continue on. The only thing Graham knew for sure was that they were going deeper and deeper into the ground. After about half an hour they stopped and out of the dark stepped Flash and he said,

“He is just a head, but he is not alone. I can’t be sure but it looks like a shaman is with him.” Jackabor said,

“Ok, we go in strong, but don’t hurt anyone. Can I bounce one off the far wall and not hurt anyone, or bring down the roof.”

“Yah, that should not be a problem. Talk about getting their attention.” Graham looked at them with a good deal of confusion on his face. Jackabor said,

“Just stay behind me, and do what I tell you.”

They then moved and entered a large cavern. Graham could not believe his eyes, as they walked in a huge lighting bolt came from Jackabor’s hand and hit the wall on the far side of the cavern. After being in the dark for so long it almost blinded him. All he could see where vague shapes and he made to move, but an arm caught him. He then heard Jackabor’s voice say, don’t move. He then said in a load and commanding voice,

“I am here to get the human you have taken.” Graham’s eyes started to focus again and he could see there were about twenty Mothmen standing in a large circle. They all had spears in their hands that were now facing towards Jackabor and the rest of the group. In the middle of the circle was the Professor and another Mothman. The Mothman held up his hand and said something in a language that none of them understood, but it must have meant, put down your weapons. For the Mothmen in the circle all lowered their weapons. The Mothman in the middle then motioned for their little group to come and join them.

Jackabor moved up to the circle followed by Flash and Graham. They parted and let them through, Graham at once moved to the Professor and asked if he were all right. The Professor nodded and said,

“Yes I am fine. This noble creature is named Cran No-bla and I think he is the shaman of this tribe of Mothmen. He was just about to tell me why he brought me here.” Jackabor said,

“That is easy he wants to stop you from weakening the Barrier between are world and all the others. The question is how he was going to stop you.” At that Cran No-bla looked up at Jackabor and gave him a once over with his eyes. Jackabor could tell at once he was the leader of his people, and knew what he was going to say. Cran No-bla said,

“I am sorry to say this Professor but if you have fought me on the issue I was to bring before you today, I was going to have to kill you.” The Professor looked at him and said,

“You would kill me if I disagreed with you.”

“When it means this many lives, yes.”

“Lives what, who’s lives are we talking about? My research does not have anything to do with weapons.”  Jackabor looked at him and said,

“You are right Professor, but what you are doing could have bigger ramifications then the nuclear bomb. It could wipe out or enslave hundreds or even thousands of races.” The Professor was taken aback by this statement, and sank down onto his haunches. Cran No-bla then said,

“The white haired one speaks the truth. If you keep up with your research you will break down the walls between the dimensions. If that happens the earth as you know it will be through. All sorts of races and creatures will be coming here to take over, or maybe they are just hungry. If you want to keep looking into other dimensions, let us advise you so as to not cause any damage to the Barrier.” The Professor looked up at Graham and said,

“Could it be so?” Graham looked up at Flash and Jackabor and they both just shook their heads yes. He turned back to the Professor and nodded yes also. The Professor looked over at the Shaman and his head was also nodding yes. The Professor kept looking around but all he could see were heads nodding up and down and eventually his own head was nodding up and down.

Jackabor said,

“Shaman, you will teach him what is right and what is wrong?” The shaman nodded and so Jackabor and Flash turned to leave, but before he could get out Graham grabbed their arms and said,

“I still want to learn some magic.” Jackabor smiled and said,

“I will come and talk to you at the pub, but for now sit and learn from a wise creature.” Then the two of them walked back out of the caves.

 

THE END