Turtle Croakies by Sam Cheever

Author:Sam Cheever [Cheever, Sam]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Electric Prose Publications

16

Cha Cha Cha

The return trip to the jungle was much of the same, with my stomach like a fist under my skin and my heart beating the cha cha cha against my ribs.

Narina assured me that she had a handle on our landing and that she’d timed our arrival for ten minutes before the spiny dinosaur emerged from the trees.

Like before, the rich scent of greenery and moist earth assailed my senses as we flew toward the end of the time tunnel. When the heat and light of the open area beside the lake flared suddenly around us, I was more than a little surprised. After the horrible water landing of the last time, I’d been expecting a hard landing at the very least. And a fight to the death in the murky water at worst.

Tildy dropped lightly onto the well-churned ground.

I shook myself out of my stupor, my gaze going to the dust kicking up around the magical tortoise’s big feet. A memory slid through my mind. I turned to the sorceress. “Before you landed here the last time, I thought I saw images of Tildy and then felt her shell ram into me, but she didn’t land. I told myself I was imagining things.”

Narina frowned. “Really? I did do a couple of quick virtual runs, but I hadn’t thought I’d gotten that close.”

I narrowed my gaze on her. “Virtual runs?”

“Yes,” she nodded, flushing with embarrassment. “I hadn’t used a magical tortoise for decades. I didn’t want to end up somewhere unpalatable.”

I had to laugh. “You mean, like the middle of a Jurassic jungle?”

She grinned.

“Naida? Sebille?” Alice’s voice called from somewhere along the shore. I pictured the area where Sebille and I had crouched to examine my backpack. A sudden thought brought my eyes wide. “Narina?”

“Hmm?” she was staring at the arch of an enormous fin rising out of the water a hundred feet from shore. The sight made me shudder violently at the memory of nearly being eaten alive as I drowned. “Um…” I shuddered again. “There won’t be two of me, will there?” I didn’t know why I hadn’t thought of that before.

She shook her head, pulling a cell phone from her bag and snapping some pictures of the sea monster. “There will be a hole in the timeline but no duplications.”

“What does that mean, exactly?”

She sighed. “It means that whoever you were with will suddenly realize you aren’t there. Likely she’ll think you just walked away without her realizing it. But you won’t have an existing physical presence here because Tildy took you away.” She frowned thoughtfully. “It is possible there will be a tiny fold in the timeline, though.”

“Meaning?” I asked.

“The sequence of two or more events might be overlaid upon each other.”

When my face stayed blank with confusion, she clarified. “If something happened directly behind the timeframe when you disappeared, it could be sped up, overlapping your timeframe slightly.”

I thought about that until my head started to hurt.

“Okay, then. Where are the rest of your party?” Narina asked.

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