The Flint Knappers - Chapter 8

I was so stunned at what Astrid was telling me I sort of just blanked out. Buffer overflow...divide by zero... I just couldn't process what she was saying."Katherine! Stay with me here..."

"We have to begin the evacuation protocol, our entire operation has been compromised." Her distress was apparent. Normally I'm the one with the cool head but her anxiety was contagious and I felt as though my entire existence was draining out of me as the cold realization began to sink in. We were trapped like rats in a maze. The innumerable government agencies that had been hunting us for decades had finally caught up. We still can only guess how they did it. We thought the temporal masking techniques were enough to cover our tracks but apparently not.

Astrid had barely escaped with her life in Germany. It was only blind luck that had allowed her to avoid capture. Now she's here in my office telling me that we have nowhere to hide. She thinks our best chance of escape is to all make the jump. The problem is none of us have trained for it. It took Newman years of preparation and while we have some training that will help there is even more that we don't have. Our chance of survival with a jump would be abysmally small. This is all happening so fast. I want to cry, we were so close to our goals. And now it looks like we will be killed or thrown in some dark oubliette where the things we have learned will never be shared. That's the great tragedy. Humanity deserves better.

According to what Astrid is telling me they know we're meeting in my office at this moment and will be on the way here. I realize it's all unexpected but she's right. I have a suspicion as to how they have found us and if I'm right then there really is nowhere to hide. Except on the other side of the jump. They can't follow us there. Based on the data from Newman's first beacon we think we have located his general vicinity in the cosmos. Using his astronomical data and a new discovery Vijay made Astrid thinks she knows how to land us all on the same planet. This is something that not long ago we thought to be impossible. Our entire understanding of the navigation was dependent on the Watchers. Vijay discovered a connection to an ancient Chinese legend that had born fruit. Newman mentioned a race called the Naga and that their architecture was similar to the Qing dynasty. A mysterious old story about what can only be considered a UFO sighting from antiquity turned out to be an attempt at human controlled navigation for a jump. Vijay had made the connection and in digging deeper discovered a lost city in the Gobi Desert which was built around a quantum anchor point. With what he learned combined with the latest modeling data from Astrid we think we know enough to attempt targeting. And if we're wrong then who knows what will happen. We would probably survive the jump but land in some random spot. We need to stick together if we want to survive this.

I'm going through every possible option we have and keep reaching the same chilling conclusion. Astrid is right, we all have to jump...and like now. I suspect how they found us is that someone in the chain of command finally put the remote viewers together with the chronoscope aka "Project Looking Glass". Our precautions were designed to deal with one or the other but not both working in tandem. I had never told anyone on the team about my work on the chronoscope project. It was one the government's most closely guarded secrets. It allows you to target a particular place and time and get an actual video image albeit a blurry one. Since I left the project they may have improved the resolution but the challenge of what to target would still be a limitation. If the remote viewers were to chime in though it would have a multiplicative effect. Which means that no matter where we go they will eventually hunt us down, one by one. They most likely know the outcome of every move we could reasonably make. My heart starts racing as I realize we have to move immediately.

I call my secretary and tell her to have a car waiting for me downstairs. Myself, Astrid and Vijay need to get over to the warehouse immediately. I can't believe I'm doing this. What's going to happen to the company...all the loyal employees that are like my extended family. Sharon, my secretary has been such an asset to this company. No one knows the ropes like her. On my way downstairs I swing by legal and have Jerry draw up a very broad Power of Attorney. Congratulations Sharon, you're now the boss. Jerry will tell her after I'm gone and he didn't ask questions when I told him I knew what I was doing. The living will I already have on file should take care of the rest of the details.

We don't speak much in the car on our way to the warehouse. What were we supposed to say? "Well, our little hyper-dimensional club didn't really work out the way we planned, eh?" or "Boy this sure will be an adventure, huh?" No...we're beyond words now and in the realm of pure spontaneous action. Like rabbits on the run we are moving instinctively.

Once we arrive at the warehouse Astrid explains how it's going to happen. She will assist each of us with the jump and then send herself through. We're using a new prototype chamber she has built which is the first with any ability to control the destination. My fear has passed and I am now focused on the task at hand. This is one of those moments when you just have to surrender yourself to the fates and move forward with a smile.

Vijay has already gone. We're just waiting a safety period for my jump to prevent some kind of weird two-bodies-in-the-same-place-at-the-same-time-thing. I have always trusted Astrid with my life. That is about to be tested.

She says it's my turn to go and I give her a long hug and walk towards the chamber. We take a moment just to look at each other as if to say "Be brave". Seconds later I'm in position and Astrid gives me the thumbs up through the observation window. I return the gesture while trying to stay calm and begin to wonder what it will be like. I can feel a strange sense of bliss as the cymatic sequence starts and wonder before losing consciousness if my life has been worthwhile. My last thoughts were that yes, even if this is the end it's been one hell of a wild ride.

To be continued...
Read Chapter 1
Read Chapter 2
Read Chapter 3
Read Chapter 4
Read Chapter 5
Read Chapter 6
Read Chapter 7

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Title image provided by pixabay user: darksouls1