Serial Fiction with Friends
In the last two installments, Ainan was bumped to the wrong time flow and ended up sending someone to the "Isle of the Forgotten in the River of Time," and then we met Tucker in his talking spaceship, just as he accidentally hit "reboot" on his life.
Read up on previous segments (in past issues) here (in case you missed them, or, heaven forbid, it's been so long you've forgotten!).
Split Memories
The ship jolted again. Tucker balled his now-tiny, newly-kidified fists and cursed his newly kidified size and brain. He needed a drink.
Where was his cup? He ran as fast as his short legs could now carry him, through the ship -- which was also, thankfully, quite small. He dashed into his quarters and locked the auto-door behind him. This is it: The End!
There had to be a better way. A better way to bend time, to manipulate its billions of strands.
“You know I don’t approve of that line of thinking,” she said through her far-too-invasive feed in his head.
“Shut up! I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you!” he replied through the same feed.
“'Thank you' is a more polite way of thanking someone,” she replied.
He huffed.
He'd no doubt be found in some Tjalian cell soon...as a tiny boy. He'd never survive in one of their prisons. If they even let him live that long.
Oh, how Tucker wished that a final goodbye could be spoken...but that time had not yet come. First, he had to fix the damages they had caused. He had to reopen the portals. Somehow.
There it was on the shelf above his bed: his cup. But more importantly, next to it, the tiny remote that would allow him to recall his ship. He put it in his mouth, and took a big swig to swallow it down. Hopefully, he’d be free enough to recover it when it reappeared… He scrambled to the end of his bed, crammed himself into one of the storage compartments, and shut the lid.
A Tjalian warrior broke through the door a minute later, and tossed the room looking for him. For a moment, Tucker thought he might be overlooked. The warrior communicated with his superior that he found no one in the room.
A second later, the lid of the compartment was opened.
***
Newly Young Again Tucker woke up in a Tjalian control pod, completely immobilized, as usual. The control pod could analyze his DNA, determining his actual age and identity…
He sighed. He didn’t know if they could return him to it, but if they could, he worried that he was actually so old that he would crumble to dust.
But maybe he wasn’t as old as he suspected he might be. Ugh. His memories were so...UGH!
He suddenly found himself with an intense craving for a banana split.
Or so his young mind told him. He wasn’t even sure what a banana split was. His mouth was cottony. Maybe it was a drink?
He could hear her mocking voice coming from the pit of his rumbly stomach as his breath began to condense on the pod window. “You don’t even remember banana splits? How could you forget our favorite shared dessert?”
“How could I forget my entire past? Let’s figure that out, and I’m sure the banana split question will be answered for you.” This life, or lack thereof, was all her fault; he was sure of it...though he wasn’t sure why he was sure of it.
“You were your own worst enemy. I merely saved you from yourself, gave you more time. If you work on this time problem long enough, I’m sure you’ll eventually figure it out.”
“I’ve worked on it for at least three decades that I vaguely remember. But, as usual, those memories all but faded away when I morphed.” He tried moving his fingertips. Nope. Nothing.
“The ingenious Dr. Tucker was renowned for his ability to figure out the impossible. If I just gave you the answers, you’d very possibly lose your whole identity completely, Banana Split Brain. We can’t have you remade into a lesser version of yourself, now can we.”
His memories felt like he was looking at them from afar. Like a swirling and colorful conglomeration, being sucked in and spit out of a time flow as he watched. “Sometimes I really hate you, you know.”
“Yes, I do. That’s what got you into this mess.”
His stomach gurgling nearly drowned her out. “What?”
He was sweating now. An intolerable itchiness followed where trickles of sweat started down his face. He had to get out of here...fast. His body was morphing again, speeding up his journey to adulthood. Visions of icy drinks started to replace his conscious thoughts.
“Hey, Banana Split Milkshake Boy. You’d probably better return to the problem at hand.”
Tucker couldn’t even move his eyes to roll them at her. But, finally -- his pinkie finger twitched.
