Written for Steemit: A love story occurs during a time anomaly. A woman from today somehow steps into an anomaly and meets a cowboy asleep on his ranch, in his bed, in the 1850's. ©Jeff Kubitz 2016 - All Rights Reserved.

Birth - Chapter 20 - Song of Angels, Book II

Mindy Woczlewski courtesy of Nastya Muratokova

Song of Angels - Book 1 | Book II Chapter 1
Book II Chapter 2 | Book II Chapter 3
Book II Chapter 4 | Book II Chapter 5
Book II Chapter 6 | Book II Chapter 7
Book II Chapter 8 | Book II Chapter 9
Book II Chapter 10 | Book II Chapter 11
Book II Chapter 12 | Book II Chapter 13
Book II Chapter 14 | Book II Chapter 15
Book II Chapter 16 | Book II Chapter 17
Book II Chapter 18 | Book II Chapter 19

Bright and early, just before the sun was up, Rephael decided to leave the 'in-between' and visit Elizabeth. Instead of waiting for her to step outside naked and walk up the hill above the house, it was much more cold this morning, he thought knocking on the door might be best.

He walked across the path to the edge and looked down on the driveway. No one around, he followed the path down. Yesterday, very intent on Elizabeth because she was nude and somehow consented to talk to and kiss him, Rephael had not noticed that the house had a door and a garage door recessed in the dirt. Above that were two huge windows that looked to the west.

As he looked up into the windows, Rephael saw Elizabeth's Dad sitting, watching out the window to the west. Rephael knew the tornado would appear soon. He did not know when precisely. Dad saw him and stood. Rephael knocked on the door and waited. After a few moments, the door opened and Dad starred at him, and then he asked, "Who are you?"

"My name is Rephael," Rephael held out his hand to offer a shake, "What might your name be sir?"

"I am Thomas Bartley." He took Rephael's hand and shook it. "Have I seen you before?"

"Not that I know of but perhaps, I am from around here and travel here every so often on business." Rephael answered truthfully because he had never seen Elizabeth or Thomas and did not think they had seen him in the past.

"What sort of business do you or could you have around here dressed in a robe?" Thomas asked skeptical.

"I have studied an anomaly I saw some time ago and check to see if it has returned every so often." Again Rephael answered truthfully though he was certain that it would be a bit of a stretch for Thomas to understand what he was doing, how, and why. Why invite trouble?

"What anomaly is that?" Thomas asked.

"It is a strange tornado."

"Really, I thought I was the only one who knew about that."

"Oh no, a lot of people know about it now. What to do about it, if anything, that is the question."

"They do?" Thomas was stunned but he quickly recovered. "Would you like to come in and talk about it. I have some very interesting observations on it, have conducted a vast series of experiments."

"You didn't ever go into it did you?" Rephael asked as he entered the house and followed Thomas up a flight of stairs to a sitting room. Thomas motioned his hand to a chair while he took a seat on a sofa across from it. The furniture was arranged so that they could view each other and still watch out the window.

"No, I never have entered it and not even come close to it in all these years."

"Don't." Rephael said, "It will kill you worse than dead if you do."

"What do you know about it?" Thomas asked.

"It is evil." Rephael answered.

"I recently came to that conclusion myself whereas for years, I thought it was God because it said it was." Thomas said.

"Yes. Good. You are obviously a very intelligent man, Mr. Bartley to be able to figure that out. How did you come to that conclusion?"

"Father, is someone here?" Rephael heard Elizabeth's voice ask from down a hallway.

"Yes, a fellow researcher into the anomaly has shown up, make certain you are dressed dear."

"You should have warned me I could have just walked out there." Elizabeth called down the hall and then her door slammed.

"I apologize." Her father yelled. He said to Rephael, "My daughter is kind of a free spirit left over from my wife and I during our hippie days. I am sorry. Where were we?"

"How did you decide it was not God and it was evil?"

"I am glad you reminded me, thank you. It predicted the future incorrectly on many occasions and God knows the future, so it could not be God. Secondly, when it first revealed itself, it made the hebrew letters Koph, Zur, Resh. It held each letter for 15 minutes without error. I made a mistake in translation of the ancient hebrew, reaching 'Prince of the Rock'.

"When it is a name for a Babylonian Prince -" Rephael interjected.

"Exactly! My ancient Hebrew is rather weak, if only you had been here to see that when it happened."

"I truly wish I had seen it."

Elizabeth came into the room from the hall, "Oh!" she exclaimed.

"What's wrong Elizabeth? Do you know this man?" Thomas, Dad asked.

"Uh, no, I just thought that this would be someone from the University, not a handsome fellow. You know Dad, someone your own age."

"Thank you very much, Elizabeth." Rephael accepted her compliment and replied, "It is my pleasure to meet a woman dressed so lovely in so short a time."

"Ha. Ha." Elizabeth said sarcastically. "But has everyone had breakfast?"

"No, we could use some breakfast and some coffee. You Rephael, what is you last name?" Thomas asked.

"Weeks, Mr. Bartley, my full name is Rephael Weeks. And yes, I am famished now that you mention it."

"Oh just call me Tom. Everyone does even Lizzy sometimes though I do not like it."

"I only do that when I can't get your attention any other way." Rephael heard her response from the kitchen.

"Be that as it may, you are just in time to witness one of my communication experiments with the Tornado." Thomas said.

"Oh and what did you do?"

"You see that out there?" Thomas pointed out the window an area a few hundred yards in front of the house.

"Yes."

"How do you like your eggs, Rephael?" Elizabeth interrupted holding a plate in each hand.

"Scrambled?"

"How about over easy instead?" She handed him a plate.

"That will be just fine as well." Rephael took the plate.

"Father, Thomas."

"Don't call me that."

"I am setting your plate here on the table do not forget to eat it." Elizabeth said.

"Where is the coffee?" Dad asked.

"I can only do so much at one time I will be right back with it." Elizabeth turned and left.

"No need to hurry on my account." Rephael said to her retreating behind.

"So then where were we?" Tom asked.

"You performed a communication experiment and we are about to see the result."

"I think we still have another hour left, one hour, fourteen minutes, and 32 seconds by my calculations until critical mass is reached. Plenty of time to talk." Tom said smiling and then shoved some egg into his mouth. He took a bite of toast.

After he chewed a bit of toast, his mouth was dry but here came Elizabeth with the coffee pot and three cups. She set down the three cups and filled each one. "Cream and sugar?"

"Black is fine with me." Rephael said after he took a sip.

"Good man!" Tom said as he raised his cup.

"I need to get my breakfast." Elizabeth said and turned toward the kitchen.

"Tom, if I might ask, you calculated the critical mass of what exactly?" Rephael asked.

"That, or what powers it." Tom said pointing with his left hand out the window across the valley at a very thin tornado perfectly straight that formed. It was more than a mile high. Elizabeth carried her plate into the room and asked if she could sit next to Rephael as they watched her father's experiment.

The tornado grew higher, or rather ionization moved dust up its outer wall, it was perfectly straight at a diameter of maybe 30 feet or ten meters or so.

"Right on time." Thomas Bartley, PhD said then shoveled some egg into his mouth and slugged down some coffee. He had a huge smile on his face of self satisfaction.

Rephael knew it showed right on time and he expected it to show. It was what he watched for.

"Right on time for what?" Rephael asked.

"For it to detonate in a self destruction sequence I set last night." Tom beamed.

"How did you do that?" Rephael had always thought he destroyed the tornado but he was not sure now.

"I determined it was an artificially intelligent machine and I think the Russians made it so I wrote a known, common Russian ICBM self destruct sequence on the ground over there, in Russian." Tom radiated.

From where they sat, the three saw three other tornadoes appear across the viewing area. They were spread out across fifty miles. "Just a second, let's check and see if 5 and 6 have appeared as well." Tom rose. spilling his coffee but not caring and ran outside. Rephael followed him.

Up the path Tom ran with Rephael behind him. At the top Tom point east, "Look there's number five and then he point far to the south. There's six!"

Rephael knew what to look for and he knew where they were at, where they would appear. "What do you think will happen Tom?"

"That one will disintegrate, number one, and all the rest will go with it, its reactor will melt down!" Tom answered excitedly. "Gone forever!"

"Gee. I hope you are right." Rephael said. The wind began to howl. The area instantly clouded over with thick menacing thunder clouds. Thunder sounded. Lightening flashed in increasing frequency.

"Let's run back in the house." Tom said and took off running down the slope. Rephael followed as rain began to fall.

"Are you sure it will melt down?" Rephael asked as they entered the house.

Tom shut the door behind them and bolted it. "I don't really care. I bought this property for my retirement and that thing out there ruined it, ruined my marriage, my finances, everything."

"Well, let's consider what would happen if it blew instead of melt by your calculations. How long do we have?" Rephael knew it would blow unless something had changed in the time continuum. He wasn't certain whether or not Tom and Elizabeth were supposed to be there but if they were and what Tom had done was actually the way to destroy the thing...He had never been responsible for it's destruction for all the times he destroyed it.

"Right." Tom said, "Let's go back to the observation point and I will whip out the calculator." Tom ran upstairs. He grabbed his notes and the calculator and then sat in his chair.

"What's happening Dad?" Elizabeth asked her father but he ignored her and calculated madly.

"Elizabeth," Rephael whispered to her. "Don't disturb him this is really important. Do you think he can hear us?"

Elizabeth looked at her father then shook her head at Rephael.

"Let's go into the kitchen while he works." Rephael whispered.

He and Elizabeth rose and walked into the kitchen. Once they were inside, Elizabeth asked, "What is going on?"

"Nothing I don't know about, I just wanted to know if I might be able to kiss you again?" Rephael smiled at Elizabeth.

"Without even thanking me for breakfast?"

"Thank you for breakfast. It was delicious Elizabeth. I did not mean to be rude it is just that your Dad has introduced something to me I did not know about."

"Oh, he can do that to people very quickly." Elizabeth said, and then she moved closer to Rephael and puckered her lips for a kiss.

Rephael leaned into Elizabeth and their lips joined then their mouths opened. Their arms wrapped tightly around each other.

"You're right Rephael, it is going to blow in two minutes and twenty-eight seconds." Tom said as he burst in through the kitchen door, "Oh!"

Elizabeth broke from Rephael. She smiled at him. She smiled at her father.

"You two know each other?" Tom asked.

"And what will the radiation released be like?" Rephael asked.

"I am glad you asked. It will be a ten megaton implosion. Which will not affect us here at all." Tom said proudly.

"I think you will find out that it releases some very deadly radiation in addition to normal radiactive releases." Rephael said. "Particularly gamma rays."

"Wait. Let me calculate." Tom hit his calculator and looked at the clock. "Quick! Run to the store room at the back of the garage. Follow me!" Tom dropped everything, ran through the kitchen door and headed down the stairs with Elizabeth and Rephael following. He moved really fast for an old, retired academic. Through a door to the side he yelled, "Come on Sparky!"

Tom ran to the back of the garage. He opened a metal door. Elizabeth picked up Sparky.

"Hurry! we only have a few seconds left!" Rephael and Elizabeth with Sparky ran into the room, which was actually down a ten foot hallway behind another door.

Rephael heard Tom shut the door. While he opened the next door. Elizabeth and Sparky went in first, then Tom. Rephael closed the door behind him.

Tom sat at a desk in the big room with a computer on it, "All the recording equipment leads to this computer. "Let's watch."

BOOM!!

"Will you look at that" Tom said. "That must be more than a mile wide."

"Did you think it would be that big?" Rephael asked.

"Not until I just made the calculations a few moments ago. I am sure glad you were here or we would be irradiated."

BOOM!!

"Secondary Explosion!" Tom gasped completely in surprise. "I did not think that would happen."

"Something shot into the air!" Rephael pointed.

BOOM!!

"Wow! Would you look at that!" Tom exclaimed. "Again, completely un-calculated."

"That is fascinating." Rephael agreed. "I need to report in so I will go and use my car radio and be right back."

"There won't be any reception out there for some time to come." Tom said. He returned to studying the computer screen. Elizabeth put her hands on her hips and looked at Rephael. Rephael whispered in her ear, "I need to go pick up what shot up in the air. Do you think he will notice?"

Elizabeth shook her head. "I'll keep him busy if his attention breaks but it won't." Rephael nodded, moved to the back of the room and then popped to the blast site.