On the west side of the mountain, almost dead center and overlooking Commons, is a series of honeycomb mini caverns. Queen Mother uses them in the capacity of inventory and storage for just about every department and grotto in the mountain. The mini caverns have been renamed and are in progress of being gutted. They are now called The Warrens. Clever, huh?
Queen Mother has exactly one Passing to achieve that goal and is working feverishly in the attempt to accomplish it. Once we had gotten back to the mountain after Suyet's release, I found out that one Passing is the equivalent of a month. Not much time to get the Warrens ready. We still don't have an exact number of Sabers, and won't until they show up, although Suyet alluded to it being less than a Legion. So, we know that it probably won't be quite a thousand. Just gets better and better.
I wanted to go visit Bubo with Demi, but when I called to her, she told me to meet Queen Mother at the mountain’s Gate. She said it was important and would get there as soon as she could. She said she was working through a situation with my little Aguiva.
A few minutes later when I landed close to the waiting area, I couldn't help but notice the crowd that had formed. Queen Mother was gesturing with her arms, and I could tell she was excited. I took the suit down as I strolled through to the gate itself, and I noticed immediately that it was wound up and open. That seemed to be the main thrust of everyone's excitement, and even from where I was, a forest could be seen.
I nodded to the technicians as I approached Queen Mother.
"New destination for your stable wormhole? Looks like Washington or somewhere close to it."
Queen Mother had motioned to me the moment she saw me walking up.
"Tanis, we need for you to fly through and confirm the location. Carl dialed up the address by accident and we definitely need to know where this is. We're not even sure it's on this planet. If it is, it could still be useful, but if it isn't then we need to know if there are people. This could be huge."
I agreed, sort of anyway. Carl was her Guru with the gate. A stereotype if I ever saw one. He embodied the Poindexter computer nerd, right down to his pocket protector. He had short, brown hair, brown eyes and stood five feet six, if he took the time to pull up onto his toes before you measured. Queen Mother said he'd have to run around in the shower to get wet. You know that guy. In his favor though and I had to admit it . . . he was Einstein smart, so I couldn't imagine him screwing up a dialing address.
I didn't want to be a wet blanket, but if it was Washington, then I didn't see how that was going to be all that useful unless she had holdings there that no one knew about, yet.
"Or it could be Washington. Do we have a need to be able to gate into that part of the U.S.A.?"
She seemed preoccupied with part of the visible panorama.
"Look at the trees, Tanis. See anything wrong with that picture?"
I looked closer and it hit me. The ground foliage was enormous and the trees, which are what kept me from recognizing it at first, were gigantic. Like Redwood big, but they were more similar to Pine, just a lot larger. The undergrowth everywhere was dense, as if it hadn't been disturbed for centuries. Definitely not Washington.
The noise began to subside, and I glanced around at Queen Mother. She was motioning to Carl, and he nodded his head.Queen Mother turned to me, tense and excited.
"How soon can you be ready to go?"
I pressed the switch on my chest.
"Tell Demi I'll be back in an hour, and make sure you get this gate open when I get back. I don't want to get stuck there."
The gate opened onto the first site they showed me. I waited just long enough for Walter to reset the plates and I stepped through.
The onboard sensors registered temperatures that were considerably cooler than the mountain. I wanted to just explore around in the area that could be seen, but sadly that wouldn't have given Queen Mother the larger picture, so I took to the air. At five thousand feet it occurred to me that the vegetation was as far as the eye could see, and at that altitude it was pretty far. It was like the whole world was one massive forest. The air was clean and registered as safe for human inhalation. Definitely a plus in anyone's book.
Several things made themselves known as I reached rarified air. The first, was that according to the preliminary readings taken by Walter, this planet was the same size as Earth. The second was that it had identical land masses. This was Earth, but on a different timeline or a different dimension. The third and final nail in the coffin lid was that there was no evidence of industrialization. We found life signs, but they were all lower orders of animals. We kept scanning and for the next forty-five minutes we never found one sign of human life. Right before it was time to head for the gate, we finally found evidence that there had been humans here before, a very long time ago. I'm also fairly sure that it had been called Seattle. Scary stuff. Walter recorded everything, because without it I don't think anyone would believe me. I'm having a difficult time of it and I was there. Whatever happened to this Earth was global and catastrophic.
I made it back to the exact coordinates where the gate would open. I was five minutes early. Teams would need to be sent to this planet and plans made for the extraction of natural resources, because this world had everything in abundance. I also stopped and picked a flower for Queen Mother. A sunflower that was eighteen inches in diameter. Hey, nothing says love like a foot and a half yellow flower.
I felt a vibration all the way to my feet emanating from the area locally, and knew the gate was imminent to open. Looking closely at the leaves on the closest plants showed the level of power being exuded, as everything was visibly shaking. Then with the sound of air being sucked out of a bottle, the gate appeared in front of me. I could see the technicians and Queen Mother standing just on the other side of the event horizon, and armed with a rather gigantic flower, I stepped through.
"Hey, guys. Good news . . . atmosphere is earth normal, although considerably more dense. No people, not anywhere . . . none. Lower life forms, mammals, reptiles, and insects just to name a few. Plant life galore, huge trees, and the whole planet is like a veritable garden of Eden. Oh, and I found what was left of Seattle. All in all, I think it was a fairly successful trip. This flower is for you, Queen Mother. I tried to find one for you that was bigger, but this was all they had."
The ambient noise began to decrease and then the gate closed down with a slight whistling sound. The silence was astounding.
She took the flower and put her nose down to it and smiled. Then my dissertation finally caught up with her and her head snapped back up.
"You were joking about Seattle, right?"
"Nope, that planet is Earth. Just like ours only depopulated, as in . . . Zero, and if the visible signs are any indication, then whatever happened was cataclysmic. Just bits and pieces are left, and not everywhere either. Part of the Space Needle is still there, which should tell you how well that thing was made; I had no idea. Kinda says Seattle, Washington. Which brings to mind . . . how did you find that planet?"
Carl stepped over to where I was standing and tucked his tablet under his arm.
"The address here at Drago has a rather lengthy numeric system but ends with the last three digits 067, and as a result we refer to it by that number. When I wind up the gate for transference to Bettonwood, it's the addressing for the point of incept, or here, with a slight prefix alteration to connect the two places simultaneously. Today when I typed it in, I mistakenly put a two instead of the usual zero, and voila . . . another Earth dimension. Who knew?"
I understood it in concept and the naming convention seemed okay as well, you know if you like numbers.
"So, we're calling the new planet 267?"
Queen Mother glanced around at the technicians present and they all, to a man, said yes. She turned to me and looked maybe just a tad disappointed.
"Well then, 267 it is, and we now have a resource that no one expected, and maybe a place for the dragons to fly. Accident or not, good job, Carl."
I left the gate area, and the news of 267 had already thundered around the mountain faster than a brush fire. Everybody and his monkey now knew about the other planet and what that might mean to all the dragon riders in two mountains. Talk about a shot in the arm. Demi was waiting for me by the time I had reached the main corridor.
I have always lived by the adage that if something looks too good to be true, it usually is. Admittedly 267 looked too good to be true, but I can't figure out where it suddenly becomes a losing proposition. It's just an empty planet. Even if it was a virus that took everybody out, there would be a time limit of effectiveness for the illness. Whatever it was . . . it was too long ago to know for sure, at least not without a lot of tests and research. The bottom line is that it won't be anytime soon that dragons will dot the skies of 267. Walter performed the suit scans and gave us the all clear before we left, and then again when we got back. I really don't want to be paranoid, and I wasn't until Walter showed me Seattle. Maybe it was the big war, the one everyone talks about here that hasn't happened yet. Too many maybes to calculate, but there used to be over six billion people on 267 if it truly was like our world. I wonder too if there are more earths, and if they panned out the same way. It doesn't take too much of a quantum leap to wonder if we'll end up like the two worlds I had seen today.
Queen Mother walked up behind me and told me there would be a meeting in the Castle in an hour. I hate de-briefings, but at least I don't have to exclude Demi on this. She like every other dragon has already heard about it. The rest of what everyone wants is just details. Lots and lots of details.
Well, I've got one hour to visit with Bubo, throw some food down my throat, check in with Matthew and Greg, and wonder what happened to my life recently. The best laid plans of mice and men often go astray, and today was one of those days. Bubo was asleep and I discovered that my hunger had taken a hike; Matthew and Greg were called back to Detroit, so I spent the entire hour at the river with Demi just relaxing.
The debriefing was primarily what I had expected, with just a hint of a twist. Queen Mother was interested in the other planet's Arizona with a particular aim at a certain part of the desert. In other words, were there dragons, was there a system of caves, and could we get in if there was? She accepted the earth's population being wiped out. She expected a time wait before we could move in so to speak, but I know that if we discovered dragons, all of the above restrictions would be altered as a result.
The recordings were looked at twice all the way through, with a heavy emphasis on the section that showed Seattle. It was pretty obvious, but we still looked at it twice.
It clearly showed a full gambit of lower life forms, and the flora was totally out of control - in a good way. No matter how close we observed the recordings, there was no sign of humans, and no visible bodies or skeletons. No signs of mass graves or bones in and around Seattle. All the people were just gone, and as much as I know that is a tragedy, it will ultimately be best for Queen Mother and the dragons.
Greg and Matthew hadn't made it back from Detroit, but it was just as well because the Green Grotto contacted me and wanted me to come immediately to see Bubo. Not an emergency, but odd none the less.
I could see the Staging areas as I came down the main ramp at the Green Grotto, not to mention the crowd around one of the pens. Several of the staff was laughing when I walked up, and it was Bubo that they were watching. I couldn't figure out what he was trying to accomplish. No, that's not true. I saw what he was doing, I just couldn't figure out why. Inside the pen with my little Warbird was a black bowling ball and he was attempting to perch on top of it. There was no rhyme or reason to it, but he was definitely giving it everything he had in the attempt. One of the ladies there told me that he hadn't been successful with it but had been working on the procedure for over a half an hour. It was comical, but just watching for a minute or two told me there was more going on here than met the eye. It was going to take an enormous amount of strength to get on top of it, but moreover, the amount of balance to stay there would eventually be the most impressive issue. He had become singularly minded to this task and had ignored everything and everyone around him, which showed an amazing level of concentration and presence of mind. I stopped laughing when I realized what else he would achieve after he had accomplished this simple endeavor.
One of the ladies standing over to one side dubbed this as the Brunswick maneuver, and it looks like the title will probably stick.
Needless to say, I went to the procurement area in the mountain and ordered him his own Brunswick bowling ball, and I made sure it was in shades of grey and black. Image is everything.
Demi was also very supportive and praised him repeatedly, clapping her hands when he would get close to success. She also knew how important this simple little exercise was, and whether Bubo did or not wasn't the issue at hand. Aguiva Warbirds were almost totally dependent on their back legs. If they weren't powerful enough to stand up under the strain, the Aguiva would suffer. The average young Warbird was actually afraid to land for the first few months due to the impact they felt when they finally came down. Their balance was only as good as the impact force, or the lack of it, when they landed. Come in too fast, and the inertia would flip them forward on contact with the ground. Come in too slow, and the attempt to flutter would flip them over backward. It was a complicated series of events that spelled a successful landing. Understand too, that the Aguiva cannot see forward. To be able to see in that direction they have to turn their heads one way or the other, but in doing so they inadvertently bank in that direction pulling them off course.
The saving grace for the Aguiva is their rider. It is up to them to dictate not just direction, but also the correct speed to achieve when bringing their flight back to the ground. A successful union between rider and dragon primarily surrounds their ability to urge the dragon to see through their eyes. Once they do, their world changes drastically for the better and a newfound level of courage occurs when they're in the air. All the rest is the strength they develop, with only two legs and virtually no hands.
For whatever reason, Bubo was the first Aguiva Warbird to work with a bowling ball, so I contacted the other riders here at Drago and told them of my findings. Everyone laughed, but everyone adopted the procedure. Then I contacted Mt. Femmes and told them too. Their only question was what's a bowling ball? In their defense, bowling is probably just a human past time, or at the very least the species that started it.
Walking across the whole of Commons takes awhile but I had a lot on my mind. There weren't too many days left before the Sabers showed up, my two apprentices were having trouble with their families, and I was already spending more time in the Green Grotto than I should. Matthew and Greg were being leaned on by their parents to spend more time at home, and I saw the similarities between our situations. Demi was with me, but I spent the bulk of our time together lost in thought about all the things I couldn't control. She was always patient and tolerant of my mood swings, but even Demi has limits. I didn't want to find them the hard way. Bear in mind that I was walking with her and worrying about neglecting her while I was busy neglecting her. Circular thinking and at best, pretzel logic. All of it wrong.
By the time we had gotten to the Warrens, Demi had managed to cheer me up, and although that was quite a walk, you had to give her credit for working wonders.
The Warrens are huge, and from our present vantage point we can only see the foyer and the entrances to the catacombs. The only comparison I can think of to illustrate the size of the caverns versus the number of Sabers would be like putting an ounce of water in a five-gallon bucket. I think they'll fit nicely, and that's if the number quoted is even remotely accurate.
Almost losing to the Dark Lords a short time ago, and then witnessing what was left at planet 267 today was almost too much to process, but in that stupor that comes from overload also came a different thought. The numbering system had been niggling around at the back of my brain and I couldn't get it to go away. I kept picturing a number pad and the placement of the zero, one, two and three. They're all just a key away from each other with the exception of the zero and arranged completely unlike the numbers at the top of a keyboard. No technician would use the top numbers, so I had to assume the numbering pad was the method used for dialing in the addressing at the Gate. It's not a quantum leap to understand how a person could conceivably type in a wrong digit while getting the coils ready to wind up. It is, however, unlikely for a man like Carl to be that sloppy. It isn't like ordering a burger. It is, however, a very long address and if he went too fast, I mean, who knows?
My brain was seething now with the possibilities, and how in space travel certain spatial objects can be triangulated. Is it possible then to use the same calculations for dimensional travel? What if, in their excitement, no one thought to supply the next two obvious numbers on the gate?
I turned to Demi and was about to inquire the whereabouts of The Ariella when she smiled and cut me off.
"I looked for her and she is in progress down the main corridor. She's probably heading for the gate?"
"Yes, I think she is, and she's apparently thought of the same things as me. Smart girl, she probably wants to test the theory. We've got to get there in a hurry, I got to see this."
Without a word, she morphed back into dragon form, and I mounted immediately. She wasted no time springing into the air and I hung on as best I could without a saddle. Let's hear it for the communal mind.
It doesn't take Demi long to get from Commons to the gate area, and this trip was one for the books. The only thing we didn't do was break the sound barrier. She landed and was morphing as I jumped off. We headed quickly to where all the people were congregating. They were already winding the gate up to presumably try what I had been postulating.
Queen Mother motioned for me to stand by her, but before she could speak, I supplied my theory.
"Trying 167, and 367 to see if the three areas triangulate?"
She smiled one of those smiles that just kind of erupt across the face.
"Looks like the Emerald Warrior has been doing some extracurricular thinking in my absence. It seems so logical, and it hit me like a ton of bricks. You ready to fly again?"
"If there's something there, I'm up for it."
The volume of the gate was almost to a point where you'd have to yell, when the addressing synced with the dialed planet, and the event horizon opened.
A similar landscape was now visible through the aperture as on 267 only considerably more dense, like nothing had touched the local scenery for thousands of years. The sky was so blue that it was almost looked purple, and if anything, the trees were even larger than on 267. A flock of what looked like Condors flew between the trees and made weird honking noises as they passed. They too were considerably larger than any I had ever seen.
I made the same sort of excursion as I had on 267, albeit a bit longer, and the only differences were larger flora, an enormous amount of fauna, some of which I couldn't identify, and there was no sign of Seattle. What we did find was a rather expansive community of what appeared to be the Fae. They had all the markings of several different Faery Folk species that had been gone from our Earth for over twenty-five hundred years. I maintained a high altitude after the scanners located them, and I don't think they saw me on the approach. Their civilization had not evolved since we saw them last on 067, and consequently there was little if any industrialization. It's possible that they were indeed indigenous to the area, but it doesn't explain how they survived the holocaust, if there even was one on this planet. There certainly had been on 267. It would also explain, or possibly explain where the Fae had gone when we last saw them, if they weren't indigenous to this world. This planet, 367 actually had a more garden-like appearance than the last, and if nothing else, we found people.
The overall planetary temperatures were somewhat higher but nothing drastic, and the poles had apparently shrunk over time to encompass only a fraction of ours here on 067. The Fae colonization had only spread to the farther most points of what we would call Western Europe, and the other continents were primarily the same as ours. That left the bulk of the world unpopulated and rich in resources.
It was interesting to see Earth as it would be if we hadn't raped its resources, spread out like a virus, and polluted the atmosphere almost beyond recognition. From that point of view, our Earth was really nothing like the other two.
The trip took four hours. Upon return, Queen Mother waited another hour and then had the technicians open the Gate to the world of 167. This one was nothing like the others, I mean absolutely nothing like the others. It was barren and showed almost no growth at all. I found no animals of any kind and only the most meager of flora around the equator. It was a fairly constant forty degrees all over the planet, and clouds covered everything from pole to pole. Everything looked grey in color and the atmosphere was all but stripped away. There were cities everywhere, all burned out and rusted, as if a war had been fought on a global basis and everyone lost. I would put the elapsed time since this disaster at about one hundred years, maybe a little more.
An interesting note: Seattle was located, and the same amount of the Needle was present, and in primarily the same condition as 267. Whatever happened here must have been mirrored on at least one of the other worlds. Parallel worlds with parallel events perhaps?
167 is a disaster, and without terra forming, totally useless to us. The atmosphere would have to be restored before anything. While there's enough to breathe, it's only just barely, and would wind even the hardiest of us after a short distance walking, let alone trying to actually work on something strenuous.
The oceans are approximately half the size of the original, if their oceans were like ours, and are so polluted that they more resemble sludge. We found nothing alive in them, and if by chance there was life, it was at the bottom in caverns we couldn't scan.
The only use I could see for 167 would be a prison for the worst of the worst, where cannibalism would dictate how long the prisoners lasted. Gruesome I know, but this environment changes you somehow, and makes you think in terms of death and destruction. I would be okay with never coming back here again.
If nothing else though, it acts as a constant reminder of what not to do, you know, before it's too late. I also couldn't help but notice that the level of technology or what was left of it on 167, was startlingly similar to what we have here in the twenty-first century, which means that whatever happens will not be very long from now. I'm not saying it's a certainty, but just as a comparison from here to 167, well; the two are way too similar for you not to notice.
During the final de-briefing of the three planets, I got meaningful looks from Queen Mother that told me she had made the same assumptions I had. For the foreseeable future I think we will close the door on 167 and try to not look back. I've said it before, and I'll say it again; all things change endlessly without change. Unless we do something drastic like learn to get along with each other, we'll end up like 167 . . . no change. A chilling thought.
I find it a bit ironic that when the smoke finally clears, it might be humanity that reaps the rewards of the two planets that had humans as the original recipients and cause of the destruction. Maybe that thought alone is enough to have history not repeat itself. As my Mentor taught me, you either learn from history or you become a victim of it. I feel certain that we're coming up on the same set of crossroads as our counterparts at 167. I don't want to see the same results here. Okay, enough soap boxing, I'll shut up now.
In the end it was decided that teams would be sent into 267 and 367 with a heavy emphasis on staying away from the Subcontinent of Europe. Almost everywhere else was free game, and on 267 there were no restrictions at all. As a matter of fact, as soon as the away teams had given the all clear, the first of the dragons would be allowed to fly in open skies.For most it would be a beginning not just a continuance. It changed the sentiment around the mountains and definitely became the shot in the arm that all of us needed.
For the next few days, everyone poised themselves on the edge of something waiting for either good or bad news. If it turned out to be bad news well, look at it from the dragon's point of view. No open-air flying, and that's nothing to blink at if you've lived your whole life in a cave. The good news was plenty obvious, hence the poised stuff.
Work on the Warrens had finally come to an end and its contents dispersed over the mountain. Most of it went into a recently found cavern close to the Grey Grotto. The rest would go wherever it would fit, and hopefully not too far from where it might be needed. Time would tell.
No more modifications to the Warrens could be performed until the Sabers moved in, because in truth, we didn't know very much about their needs. I don't think anyone did.
Queen Mother had made her selections for the away squadrons that would protect the Sabers on their way to the mountain. All of the Section Leaders were picked, and they in turn included their top two subordinates. The total came to eighteen riders and seventeen dragons. Once again, Demi was left out due to her age, but this time she took it in stride and volunteered to watch over Bubo while I was gone. One less worry for me, and I was grateful for that.
The Sabers were watched pretty closely on the Provinces, not in a good way, and there were going to be more of them out in the open than ever before. If the Dark Lords figure out that the Sabers are leaving, then all Hell will break loose. No pun intended. You would assume that three full squadrons of dragons would be enough to protect the Sabers, but I don't think you can be too careful. The upside here is that almost a Legion of Sabers is an unequaled fighting force that even the Dark Lords wouldn't underestimate. This is an assumption on our part; because quite frankly, we have never seen the Sabers fight. They are obviously several hundred pounds of tiger each, so one would expect them to be fierce on the battlefield. Now having said that, we also know they have been hunted to near extinction, so I am guessing that they have not fought in sufficient numbers. The downside is that we don't know how many elderly and children are among the Padnar family groups. When the Hell Hounds traveled to this mountain, they lost more of their people than I care to think about. Where I come from, even the loss of one is too much.
Only a couple days left until the Sabers meet us at the mass grave. The Scouts and Warriors, the two Clans that patrol the Provinces, have not reported any troop movement in the area where we are to meet, so I am beginning to believe this might go down quietly.
The away teams on 267 and 367 finally gave Queen Mother a progress report and the news was exceptional. There were no residual signs of radiation, and the oxygen, nitrogen, and hydrogen levels were within tolerances for human inhalation. That also puts it within a safe range for all of the different species presently living with us. So, hopefully, in a short amount of time we'll actually see dragons in open air and flying free. Demi has never flown in friendly skies so she's understandably excited and talks about it all the time.
I feel certain my name will show up on the roster sheets to help explore 267 after I finish the Saber Mission. Perhaps Queen Mother will even let Demi and I explore as a team since there are no known predators for the dragons. There shouldn't be any for the riders either, as long as they stay close to their dragons during the expeditions.
Demi and I are feeling a bit left out. The other seventeen riders and their dragons are busying themselves with last minute preparations and bonding with each other. It isn't that I'm not bonding with Demi tonight, but it isn't the same, at least not tonight. We're spending time together and playing with Bubo; its fun and beginning to feel like family, but not the same as the adrenalin rush you get before potentially going into combat. Let's face facts; tonight, is about guessing when it's time to go to the cat box and then leaving my dragons behind when it's time to go.