The Nexus
By Doug Salway on Monday, October 22, 2012 at 3:26pm
Standing here on the dock, looking over into the water, it’s hard to believe I died here 150 years ago today. My name is Ruari Flynn and I was born Galway Ireland in 1842. My father having moved my family to America to get away from the famine, we found life here to be not so different from home. My family finally found a stroke of luck in a small patch of land in Missouri, the farm was very prosperous. So much so, that my father had arranged a marriage for me to small merchant from home. I was to sail back to Ireland meet my husband to be. My ship was to set sail from New York harbor at early in the morning of September 1st, 1862, of course I never made it to the ship. According to history, I was waylaid by two men. They came up from behind me, one man clasping his hand over my mouth, and dragged me off out of sight. After robbing me of my possessions, I was stabbed and thrown into the water. The men responsible for my death were found a month later trying to pawn what was left of my jewelry. They confessed to the crime, were hanged and my body was never recovered. It was never recovered because I am still very much in use of it. You see, in my time this would have been a very mortal wound. If it had not been for Tarek, it would have been. Tarek found me floating in the water just moments after, my life’s blood spreading across the water like a sheen of oil.
I remember waking in a panic, I had just been stabbed! I felt my stomach, there was no wound, and there wasn’t even scar for that matter. Sitting up and looking around I appeared to be in a small room very much like my own back on the farm. There was an oil lamp burning on the table in the corner. At the table sat a man, Tarek. “Well you seem awake Miss Flynn, after you’ve dressed, kindly meet me outside if you please.” With a slight nod of his head, he left the room. At the foot of my bed were some clothes for me, very odd clothes indeed. They seemed more like men’s clothes what with the breeches and high boots with the laces. Well I couldn’t just sit here in my dressing gown; I managed to figure out how to fasten everything and stepped out of my room into what would be the first day of my new life.
I opened the door and the light flooded in, I had never seen anything so bright and incredible in all of creation. The noise was almost deafening. I felt faint all at once and almost fell. Tarek caught and steadied me. “Welcome to the Nexus Miss Flynn”, “Come, I’m sure you’re famished, let’s get you something to eat while I try to explain the situation you now find yourself in.” He took me to a place they called the lounge. He says this is where most of the agents go to wait for their next assignments. We took a table in the back, the place was practically empty. “Am I dead?” I asked, having a pretty vivid memory of being stabbed and throw off a dock. “Yes and no.” Tarek stated, “You see, this place where we are now is called the nexus. It exists between times. Are you familiar with the concept of time travel, perhaps not? Let me see if I can explain, time as we know it from the beginning, flows forward like a river. What we do here is make sure the river stays flowing smoothly as possible in its intended direction. We make sure the river is never dammed or forked. If the timeline should splinter, we’d be stuck with alternate times, separate rivers flowing in different directions, thus damaging the natural order of things. Are you starting to understand?” I nodded my head, "a bit, but how is it that we’re able to be here? This place I guess, time doesn’t move here does it?” “That’s right” he said, “time is at a standstill here, no forwards, no backward, shoot, we don’t even age while we’re here.” He explained further what it was they do here. The nexus as they call it is like an outpost where they, meaning Tarek and the rest of the people here police the timeline. Correcting its flow and putting back misplaced people and items. From what I gathered, they have a means of opening small ripples to be able to go anywhere or any when they need to. Apparently there are naturally occurring ripples allover the world. People and things accidentally end up wandering through them. Dinosaur and cavemen mistaken for monsters, something call the Bermuda Triangle, apparently things end up there all the time. Oh and a gentleman by the name of Presley, he got a hold of one of their keys and has been nothing but trouble since. They have a tracking system that alerts them to any shifts that need to be corrected. “It also alerts us to new possible agents, such as yourself.” Tarek said. “Well if I’m all healed, why can’t you just put me back where I belong, I’m supposed to be getting married” He looked at me with sadness in his eyes and slid a newspaper along the table top to me. It was opened to the story about two murderous thieves whose victim was never found, me. “Well yes, but I was found, by you, and now I’m healed, you can just put me back in the water and I’ll swim to shore, everything will be fine.” Unfortunately, that’s not how it works. The reason I’m such a viable candidate for being an agent is that my time has ended without any repercussions to the time stream. If I were to go back it would be in the same condition I was found. I would be dead and time would flow on. I think my choice was pretty clear.
That brings me back here to the docks, 3:00am September 1st, 2012. Tarek and I are now partners; this is our first official assignment. A ping in the system brought us here. After some investigating and one sunken cruise ship, it’s not every day that Carnival Cruise Lines gets besieged by cannon fire; we found what we’re dealing with. We’ve set up a parlay and hopefully we can negotiate. Really though, how does one tell Edward Teach that he’s in the wrong place and he needs to turn around?
I remember waking in a panic, I had just been stabbed! I felt my stomach, there was no wound, and there wasn’t even scar for that matter. Sitting up and looking around I appeared to be in a small room very much like my own back on the farm. There was an oil lamp burning on the table in the corner. At the table sat a man, Tarek. “Well you seem awake Miss Flynn, after you’ve dressed, kindly meet me outside if you please.” With a slight nod of his head, he left the room. At the foot of my bed were some clothes for me, very odd clothes indeed. They seemed more like men’s clothes what with the breeches and high boots with the laces. Well I couldn’t just sit here in my dressing gown; I managed to figure out how to fasten everything and stepped out of my room into what would be the first day of my new life.
I opened the door and the light flooded in, I had never seen anything so bright and incredible in all of creation. The noise was almost deafening. I felt faint all at once and almost fell. Tarek caught and steadied me. “Welcome to the Nexus Miss Flynn”, “Come, I’m sure you’re famished, let’s get you something to eat while I try to explain the situation you now find yourself in.” He took me to a place they called the lounge. He says this is where most of the agents go to wait for their next assignments. We took a table in the back, the place was practically empty. “Am I dead?” I asked, having a pretty vivid memory of being stabbed and throw off a dock. “Yes and no.” Tarek stated, “You see, this place where we are now is called the nexus. It exists between times. Are you familiar with the concept of time travel, perhaps not? Let me see if I can explain, time as we know it from the beginning, flows forward like a river. What we do here is make sure the river stays flowing smoothly as possible in its intended direction. We make sure the river is never dammed or forked. If the timeline should splinter, we’d be stuck with alternate times, separate rivers flowing in different directions, thus damaging the natural order of things. Are you starting to understand?” I nodded my head, "a bit, but how is it that we’re able to be here? This place I guess, time doesn’t move here does it?” “That’s right” he said, “time is at a standstill here, no forwards, no backward, shoot, we don’t even age while we’re here.” He explained further what it was they do here. The nexus as they call it is like an outpost where they, meaning Tarek and the rest of the people here police the timeline. Correcting its flow and putting back misplaced people and items. From what I gathered, they have a means of opening small ripples to be able to go anywhere or any when they need to. Apparently there are naturally occurring ripples allover the world. People and things accidentally end up wandering through them. Dinosaur and cavemen mistaken for monsters, something call the Bermuda Triangle, apparently things end up there all the time. Oh and a gentleman by the name of Presley, he got a hold of one of their keys and has been nothing but trouble since. They have a tracking system that alerts them to any shifts that need to be corrected. “It also alerts us to new possible agents, such as yourself.” Tarek said. “Well if I’m all healed, why can’t you just put me back where I belong, I’m supposed to be getting married” He looked at me with sadness in his eyes and slid a newspaper along the table top to me. It was opened to the story about two murderous thieves whose victim was never found, me. “Well yes, but I was found, by you, and now I’m healed, you can just put me back in the water and I’ll swim to shore, everything will be fine.” Unfortunately, that’s not how it works. The reason I’m such a viable candidate for being an agent is that my time has ended without any repercussions to the time stream. If I were to go back it would be in the same condition I was found. I would be dead and time would flow on. I think my choice was pretty clear.
That brings me back here to the docks, 3:00am September 1st, 2012. Tarek and I are now partners; this is our first official assignment. A ping in the system brought us here. After some investigating and one sunken cruise ship, it’s not every day that Carnival Cruise Lines gets besieged by cannon fire; we found what we’re dealing with. We’ve set up a parlay and hopefully we can negotiate. Really though, how does one tell Edward Teach that he’s in the wrong place and he needs to turn around?
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