Anarchistbanjo's World

He was heading toward the beer barrel when he ran into Wayne and Char. They looked gloomy and were thinking about quitting the program.

“Why don’t you talk to Crow first?” He suggested. “I’ve heard he is taking a group back to the village. Maybe you can check the village out. I was there last month and it was a pretty neat place.”

Char looked doubtful. “I can’t imagine why we would want to live in some primitive village. Still.” She nodded. “We can treat it like a vacation and see what happens.”

Wayne nodded in agreement. “By then the bottleneck about newbies might be over and there might be enough for us to train. He shook his head in frustration. I can’t bring myself to wait in line for an entire month just to get a newbie.” Wayne held Char closer putting an arm around her waist. “We’ve got some catching up to do anyway. Going out to the village might just be a good idea.”

Tobal hoped he hadn’t made a mistake suggesting they go to the village with Crow and the others. Wayne and Char were just simple people that he liked and trusted. Maybe after they found out more about what was going on they might reconsider leaving the program. He moved on looking for Becca.

He saw Melanie and Becca chatting with some others by the drum circle. They were both in high spirits when he joined them. They partied into the night and talked about what they were going to do for the next month while they waited for their solos to become official and they could receive their sixth chevrons. They didn’t have anything to do and Tobal suggested they all go down to the lake and spend a few weeks swimming and having a good time. Tobal was willing to go along and the berries were ripe. He was ready for a vacation from all the fighting any way. The girls agreed and the conversation moved on to other things. Melanie was the first to ask.

“What have we missed about the City Council and the village?” Melanie asked. “We have been so busy the last two months that we missed your meetings.”

“Believe me, there is a lot to catch you up on.” he laughed. “Let’s go find out.”

“Where’s Llana?” Becca asked.

“That’s part of what you missed out on.” He smiled and kissed her. She didn’t ask any more questions.

They caught up with Rafe and Ellen and sat down to talk. It felt good to have Becca beside him again and he squeezed her hand gently. She glanced at him and smiled back. Tobal noticed Crow was talking with his own group and suspected they were talking about the bi-location and time travel thing. He noticed Char and Wayne were in the group listening intently. He thought about going over there and joining that group but decided against it. His own group had too many things they needed to talk about.

Ellen began the meeting with talk about what was happening with the City Council and the Counsel of Elders.

“We finally got together for a meeting.” Ellen told them. “It has been a very rough month for all of us and our lives are all completely changed.”

“That’s an understatement.” Rafe nodded. “Our entire world has been turned upside down.”

Ellen continued her story. “The City Council did some house cleaning and there were several new members in it that had not been at the last meeting. The mayor greeted us and apologized once more for the assassination attempt. He and the other council members were relieved that Howling Wolf was all right. All of the new City Council members had known and thought highly of Howling Wolf. That was why they had been selected for the City Council.

“It seemed that once a clansman, always a clansman. All of the members of the City Council had gone through the Sanctuary program and many had served on the Council of Elders at one time. The mayor assured us that the entire City Council was behind us and supported us.

Ellen continued. “This time General Grant was not there. The mayor said that the City Council had requested a Federation internal affairs investigation into the entire project but had not heard anything back yet. The bottom line was that General Grant denied any truth in what Howling Wolf had told the City Council and the City Council had concluded Howling Wolf was telling the truth and the general was lying. For that reason General Grant had not been invited to the meeting.”

Ellen smiled at Tobal and continued. “Howling Wolf appeared at the meeting and offered to teach the bi-location ability and time travel ability to the city if they separated from the military project. He made it clear there was no need for the dangerous machinery and the inhuman treatment of having human beings wired into it. Howling Wolf also called for the release of Ron and Rachel Kane so their spirits could find rest and peace after these years of inhuman torment and torture.”

“That’s when things got interesting.” Ellen said. “Howling Wolf disappeared and Adam Gardner appeared in the room with a full pack of things. He introduced himself to all of us and passed several items around the room for inspection. He said most of them had come from the past but he showed us a couple interesting items that could have only been from the future. He confirmed that he was working with Howling Wolf in continuing the research and training that Ron and Rachel Kane had developed. He also said that explorations into different time periods was continuing.”

“By this time we were all quite impressed.” Ellen chuckled. The City Council asked for proof that Howling Wolf and Adam Gardner could actually train others and that’s when Llana appeared in the room. She told us plans were currently under way for training the first group of time travelers. They would be trained in secret locations known only to themselves.”

“My COM unit went off. I answered and found out that all the medics had been kicked off the mountain. We no longer had access to the emergency room or to any supplies. General Grant had evicted us from the mountain. We were not even allowed to get our personal belongings. The City Council was just as shocked as we were and with Howling Wolf’s approval decided to use the village as a temporary base until a new permanent base could be built by the lake.

“We decided that a permanent base would be set up at the old gathering spot where the massacre had been and requested the City Council provide supplies and communication equipment. The City Council voted and agreed to help. The City Council promised us immediate supplies and provisions so we could continue our medic work uninterrupted. We were to take any serious injuries straight into the City for emergency treatment. The city was also going to raise some permanent modern facilities there for our own use so we would be able to function during the winter.”

“Most of us spent that first week hauling supplies to the old gathering spot.” Rafe grumbled. “The only good thing is that there were no rogue attacks we know of. We are fairly well settled in now but things are totally different and we are getting our training from the hospital inside Heliopolis.”

“I leave for a couple months and look what happens.” Becca quipped. “Everything falls apart. Do you think there is any danger from General Grant and his rogues?”

“There is really no way of knowing.” Ellen told her. “We are hoping the internal affairs investigation will prevent things from getting any worse.”

The meeting gave them all plenty to think about and Becca kept asking him questions long after they had gone to bed. He found the only way to get her to stop talking was by kissing her. Kissing her led to it’s own problems and it was a long time before they finally fell asleep in each other’s arms.

It felt good to be with Becca and not have anything pressing to do. They had almost two weeks before he needed to be at the Journeyman circle and decided to make the best of it. It was mid June and the weather was perfect. Melanie joined them and they all headed down to the lake for a fun vacation. First though they needed to meet up with Llana at his winter base. It was on the way to the lake and a good place to rest.

It was evening when Llana helloed the camp and approached the campfire. By this time Becca and Melanie were caught up on the situation and determined to be part of Tobal’s group that Llana was training. That made Rafe, Ellen, Tobal, Becca, Melanie and possibly Nikki. No one had asked her yet. Tobal thought Tyrone should be approached about it and Melanie suggested Butch. The obvious problem was that training newbies allowed no time for the extensive training Llana would be giving them. They could be asked but their training needed to wait until they were Journeymen.

“Tobal has already done two months of training with Crow and one month of training with me.” She told Becca and Melanie. “That means he is ahead of everyone else and can help each of you catch up. I think the best thing will be for me to teach Tobal and then he will teach each of you. You can all practice together and help each other on a daily basis.”

Tobal looked at the others and asked. “What about Ellen and Rafe?”

“I will have to find a way to teach each of them individually.” She said.

Tobal nodded, “Rafe wants you to help him check out some forbidden areas. He has them marked on a map and was thinking he could fly you into them on his air sled and drop you off. Then you could bi-locate out of there after you found out why it was forbidden. You don’t have a med-alert bracelet and would not show up on a monitor.”

Llana pursed her lips thoughtfully. “That’s a good idea. Tell him to meet me at my old base camp two days after the new moon at noon. See if both Ellen and Rafe can meet me there at the same time. I can train them together and make further arrangements to meet with them.”

“Have you time traveled yet?” Becca asked curiously.

“Just once.” Llana smiled. “It was really awesome but frightening at the same time. It’s really quite a bit like bi-location once you get the hang of it. Grandfather and Adam want to check out all of the areas first and make sure they are safe before they take us there. They are trying to determine the extent of General Grant’s activities in other time periods.”

She continued. “It’s a problem right now because if anything happens to Grandfather or Adam we loose our ability to train people to time travel. That’s why Crow and I want to go at least once to as many time periods as possible and learn how to get there and back again. We only have twenty-three time periods available to us and don’t want to loose those. No one knows how many general Grant has discovered in the last twenty years.”

“How long will it take us to learn.” Becca persisted.

“We are hoping somewhere between a year and two years. Very much depends upon the intensity of your training and your natural aptitude for it. We are hoping Crow’s group and our group will be ready at the same time so we can work together and help each other out.”

“What will Crow’s group be doing?” Melanie asked in puzzlement.

“They are going to leave the sanctuary program and get rid of their med-alert bracelets so they can’t be tracked or monitored and will be doing the same type of training we will be doing. They will probably be a little faster at the training than we will because we also have to stay within the system and do the work of Journeymen and medics. This group won’t have any contact with Crow’s group at all until training is complete and we can all at least bi-locate.”