Someone bumped into Glen and was rude about it, grabbed his suit jacket and turned him in a half-circle.  The man was obviously in a big hurry and Glen had not been paying attention to where he was going.  Glen could not do much more than brush off his suit and watch as two men in gray suits caught up with the man on the corner.  The man put both hands up in the air like he was being arrested and the gray suits confirmed that impression by patting the man down.  The three then turned the corner and walked out of sight, and Glen imagined those gentlemen had some questions.

            Glen shrugged.  It was 1994 and he was in Atlanta for a two day conference for the church.  The church might have timed it better, though.  The Olympics were going on and Glen could not imagine the exorbitant rates the out-of-towners had to pay for rooms.  He was currently serving a small church in rural Georgia and while it was three hours away, he could at least sleep at home for free.  Then again, he felt lucky to find parking even if it was some blocks from the conference.  That was why he was walking.

            Glen felt the weight in his inside jacket pocket right away.  He looked up to shout to the gray suited men but they were already gone. He pulled the thing out.  It was a slim piece of electronic something.  He was not sure, but it looked familiar.  When he looked up again he saw a face that was even more familiar than the object, and this familiarity came with a name.

            “Lockhart,” he called and ran to the storefront where Lockhart and a younger gentleman were window shopping.  “What are you doing here?”  Glen paused.  He knew the man but he could not place where.  Lockhart returned Glen’s funny look before he responded.

            “Glen, good to see you.”  Lockhart’s expression changed from surprise to curious.

            “Are you in town for the Olympics?” Glen asked while his mind said, where do I know this man from?

            Lockhart nodded.  “A little vacation.”  He introduce his young friend.  “Fyodor Stoloyovich.  He just recently joined the organization.”

            Glen shook the man’s hand.  “Good for you,” he said while his mind frantically raced to remember what organization Lockhart was talking about.

            Fyodor did not know what to say, like he did not know what he was allowed to say.

            “I’m here for a church conference myself.”  Glen shook his head.  He did not know this man in a church context.  That much was certain.

            “We have some time to kill between events.”  Lockhart spoke like it was just an ordinary pleasant morning, which it was—a pleasant early morning.

            “Is he of the—organitsation?”  Fyodor used the word Lockhart had used but mispronounced it with his heavy Russian accent.

            “Yes.  No.”  Lockhart’s pleasant expression turned serious and then worried.  “He is trouble.  What is going on?”

            Glen shook his head, but found his hand go for the gadget in his pocket.  He glanced at the street corner where the gray suits had disappeared and looked back at Lockhart, confused.  “A man just bumped into me and slipped this into my pocket right before he got arrested by a couple of gray suits.  Have you ever seen anything like it?”

            Lockhart shook his head, but Fyodor’s eyes got big.  Glen and Lockhart looked at the man but he appeared to back off from whatever idea he had. 

            “What?”  Lockhart insisted.

            “Well.”  Fyodor hesitated before he blurted it out.  “It looks like a trigger—a timer of some kind.”

            “For?”  Lockhart was not going to let the man get off easily.

            “Well.  For a retro rocket, if it is former Soviet.”

            Lockhart breathed.  “Cosmonaut.”  He told Glen and pointed with his thumb.  Glen smiled but now he was really confused.  What organization employed former Cosmonauts and who on earth was Lockhart?

            “Or a bomb,” Fyodor added.  “Like a bik bomb.”  He made a face and lifted his hands.  “Boom.”

            “Maybe we should take it to the police,” Glen suggested but Lockhart was not finished.

            “How big a bomb?”

            “What is the word?  Yes, Atomic.  An atomic bomb.”

            Lockhart had a mobile phone and he made a quick call.  Glen wanted to drop the gadget from his hand but did not dare.  He was afraid it might explode on contact with the sidewalk.  He tried to hand it to Fyodor but Fyodor would not touch it.  Lockhart made several calls and Glen got more uncomfortable by the second.  At last, Lockhart returned from phone-land.

            “We have an appointment with the FBI,” he said.  “And you need to come with us.”  That was not what Glen wanted to do, but somehow he felt he was not going to get much out of the church conference. 

###

            They were met at the door by the two men in gray suits.  Glen recognized them because one had a full head of red hair and the other had no hair at all.  Lockhart flashed his billfold for the men and Fyodor did the same.  The men looked impressed at whatever was in the billfolds and the redhead immediately asked, “Is this the man who found it?”  He spoke over Glen’s head as if Glen was not even there.

            “Yes he is and lucky for you,” Lockhart said.  “Though he says there is no such thing as chance or accident in this universe.”  He went to escort Glen into the building but the bald one blocked the way.  “Of all the people on this planet and maybe in this galaxy, he is the best chance we have to find out what is going on here and stop it.”

            “May I see the detonator?”  The bald one wanted it.

            “It’s not a detonator,” Glen responded as he pulled it out.  “It is a temporal trigger as Fyodor said.  At least Martok calls it that.”  He looked at Lockhart.  “Who is Martok?”  He did not wait for an answer.  “You still have that man on ice?  The Princess says hold on to him until she can get here to follow him and see where he goes.  Lockhart?”  Glen collapsed.

            “Help me.”  Lockhart kept Glen from hitting the floor and Fyodor stepped up to help.  They pushed their way into the building and the red head found a room with some privacy.  The bald one got the trigger, but then he did not know quite what to do with it.  The FBI expert had not yet arrived.

            They were half-way back to the base before anyone dared say anything.  Glen looked out the window and brooded about the future.  The years he was living through and the next fifty to a hundred years were always fuzzy in his mind.  He figured that was because he was moving in that direction so they had not actually been written yet.  Sometimes, though, he could look back from several hundred years out and get the gist of the days, much like one might get from a history book.  He knew the Earth was in for a rough haul over the next hundred years, and the United States would be far from exempt.  In some ways, the U.S. would stand at the center of the hard times.  It was not a cheery thought.

            Sergeant Thomas sat quietly against the other window.  He did not mind the silence and was no stranger to it.  Lockhart and Boston whispered now and then, but not enough to break the spell.  Alice worked dutifully on the treaty.  She was starting to compose her thoughts and in the Vordan tongue, now that she could.  Pumpkin might have spoken, but Glen told her to keep her eyes on the ball he took from the Humanoid Escape Pod and she was watching it with all her might, but she broke the silence in the end.

            “It’s blinking,” she said, and dared to look up at Glen.  There was a light blinking on the ball.

            “Here we go,” Glen said, and the first thing he did was turn on the volume so they could hear the conversation that was being transmitted from the Vordan in New Mexico to the mysterious strangers in space.  “Pen and pad.”  Glen nudged Alice and she got her steno pad and began to transcribe the conversation that just sounded like guttural gibberish to the others.  Meanwhile, he typed furiously on the computer and gave an update as he got close. 

            “They are within our solar system.  Jupiter is interfering.  No, wait.  They are on this side of Jupiter.  Beyond Mars.  Damn!”  Glen put his hands temporarily to his head.  “They are within the asteroid belt.  That is like a needle in a hay stack.”  He vanished to be replaced by an Asian looking woman who took up the typing but almost exclusively used the number keys.

            “Jennifer.”  The woman gave her name.  “I did my doctoral thesis on navigating the gravity wells in the asteroid belt.  I got to pilot the first ship to go there.”  She paused.  “I mean, I will get to pilot the first ship some day.”  She stopped talking and typed a last flurry of numbers.  “Got ‘em,” she said, and she left so Glen could return.

            “All math.  Not my thing,” Glen explained.  “What?”  Glen looked up and got that glazed, far-away look in his eyes.  He was not talking to anyone in the limo.  “Are you sure?  Damn, I was afraid it might be that.  I can say damn if I want to.  No, no.  Being ordained has nothing to do with it.  Huh?  Yes, I suppose we must.”  He came back to the others, looked once around the car and repeated himself.  “Damn.”  And he did not explain.

###

            They got back to the office before the item on the flatbed decompressed.  That was a good thing because Glen was not entirely sure if the flatbed was big enough or if the trailer would be crushed once decompression occurred.  Glen had read the transcript translation and it sounded to him like the Vordan were planning a strike even though the ones in the asteroid belt advised against it.

            When the odd looking gun decompressed, it turned out to be a box the size of a room.  It took up two thirds of the trailer, but the trailer held it without great difficulty even though it was a wide load.  The stick on the end extended half again the distance beyond the end of the trailer.  It was not heavy enough to shift the box-room off the trailer.  That was another possibility Glen had worried about.  The stick looked like a gun, but Boston thought it might be an antenna.

            “Both, sort of,” Glen said as he climbed up and touched the outside of the box.  The door opened and he was glad to see the room still had power.  Alice, Sergeant Thomas, Colonel Weber, and Bobbi followed him in, and Glen asked Bill and Farquanded to come in as well.  They had been assigned to the truck since the Vordan fighter was gone.  Things were a little tight in that room, but it did make it easy to hear when Glen explained.

            “This is the main weapon station from a Kargill police cruiser that came to earth some years ago.  They were seeking the escaped criminals from a penal ship that crashed.  Anyway, the cruiser got destroyed, a story I won’t go into now, but I managed to salvage this section.  Farquanded and Bill, if you would please come close.  The rest of you please step back and don’t touch anything.”

            Everyone shifted positions, but it was hard not to touch anything.  There were two chairs—human enough looking chairs attached to the floor in front of consoles of some kind.  Glen got in the first and let Martok the Mathematical Engineer take his place.  He could calculate the precise needs in his head and could more easily manipulate what was to him a rather simple system.  He appeared to program the first console and then he vacated the seat and made Bill sit down. 

            “This controls the screens, particle and energy, and this is the on-off switch.  Here is the gauge you have to watch.  If it moves above this symbol and stays there, turn the switch off, count to ten and turn it back on again.”  Martok turned to speak to everyone. 

            “Every warship is screened in space, but for battle, engines, weapons, communications and sometimes escape pod areas have their own screens so they are like double screened.”

            “The Vulnerable areas,” Bobbi understood.

            “I have expanded the screens to cover the building and most of the property.  It has stretched them which means weakened them, but they should be strong enough to ward off Vordan weaponry.”  He turned again, this time to the other chair where he made Farquanded sit.

            “These are your weapon options,” he said, and touched a switch that started a hum and started the whole room vibrating.  It only lasted a second.  “The antenna-gun thing is now sticking straight up.  Leave it there.  You don’t want to accidentally blast a hole in your own building.  This button controls the targeting of secondary weapons.”  That explanation took time.  “And this button sends out a pulse that will interfere with and maybe burn out electrical systems.  I’ve set it so it will go out above the building height so any fighter coming in low will not be affected.  You got it?”

            They appeared to understand, so Martok said there were only two more things they could do.  He ran to the door and jumped out to land on the grass.  Pumpkin screamed.  Lockhart and Fyodor laughed, and Boston did not know what to do.

            “Hello, Boston dear.  I did not want you to miss out.”  Martok grinned for the gentlemen and showed off his teeth before he let Glen come home.

            “Traveler.”  Colonel Weber crawled down from the truck.  “You said there were two more things to do.”

            “Yes.”  Glen sat on the grass.  “You need to gather your marines and Bobbi, you need to get all the muscle you can.  When the Vordan fighters come down, you need to send out groups to pick up as many prisoners as possible.”

            “Why don’t we just shoot the bastards?”  Colonel Weber was serious.

            Glen shook his head.  “We need the prisoners for negotiations, but be on guard.  They will try to kill you and will not be taken easily.”

            “Kill us?  Not if we kill them first.”  He walked off and Bobbi hurried after him to argue the point.

            “What is the other thing we need to do?”  Lockhart asked.

            “Wait,” Glen said.  He sat on the grass and Alice pulled up a spot beside him.

            “What can I do?”  Fyodor asked.

            “Stay alive.  We need to fly to Cape May, after.” 

            “You know, taking prisoners won’t have any bearing on any negotiations with the Vordan.”  Alice said, drawing on the knowledge that had been implanted in her mind.

            “I know.”  Glen understood.  “I just hate the killing part.”

            Alice was the first to pick up the point.  “So what you are saying is Madam Goldman is like the Vordan and what you are really concerned about is finding out who the power is behind the throne, so to speak.

            Glen nodded.  “But the disobedient son of Lyr and Pendaron won’t be around to help with this one.”

            “That is not what I was thinking,” Boston said.  “I was thinking the Vordan  were like the sea worm, able to do some small damage but it is the Mama we really have to watch out for.”

            “I was trying not to think at all,” Pumpkin said.

            “She is afraid of Sea Serpents.  Most fairies are, though a big lumbering beast like that could not hurt a fairy in a billion years.”  Glen Patted Pumpkin’s hand to reassure her.  “So what do you think, Sergeant?”

            The Marine looked around at the faces in the limo before he answered.  “I think you are right.  I’m in over my head.”

            “Aren’t we all?”  Lockhart laughed, but by then they had arrived.

            The two limos were passed right through the White House front gate to drive up to the front door.  The flatbed had to wait on the street.  Once everyone was out of the cars, they had to pause at the front door while the secret service checked them for weapons.  Glen dragged his feet and came last in line, after Alice, but of course he had nothing on him, not even his car keys.  

            As soon as he got the all clear, the party started to follow the guide, flanked by two more Secret Service agents.  Glen only took two steps before he went away and the Princess showed up, dressed in the Traveler’s armor and bristling with all sorts of sharp weapons.

            “Hey!  Wait a minute!”  The man at the front door shouted even though the rest of the agents appeared shocked into silence. 

            The Princess turned, but as she did, all of the hardware went away to be replaced by a mini skirt and a top that was cut low and fit tight around that perfect figure.  Her face wore the saddest, cutest little pout and she put her finger to her lips.  “Did I do something wrong?”  Her hair was a very light golden brown, but a true blond could not have done it better.  The agent at the door visibly melted.

            “No, that’s fine.  Everything’s fine.”

            The Princess slowly let out her smile and the poor man at the door was helpless.  She turned again, the armor and weapons immediately came back, and she walked toward the front stairs.  Alice walked beside her.

            “You are a wicked girl.”

            “Sometimes.”  The Princess grinned.

            “I like you.”

            “I like you too.”  The Princess went away and Glen came back in his own clothes.  ‘But right now we have to be good.”  Alice grinned like the Princess.

            They stopped at the top of the stairs.  There was a man who waited until they all caught up and bunched up like a tourist group at a museum.

            “My name is Mister Johnson, special advisor to the President.  To get to the Lincoln bedroom we will be at the residence, so please be quiet and respectful of the family.”

            “Roberta Brooks, Director.”  Bobbi shook the man’s hand.  Lockhart and Boston followed suit and introduced themselves before Glen stepped forward.

            “Hi, I’m Glen.  This is Alice Summers my lawyer, Sergeant Thomas my bodyguard, Fyodor is my pilot, Darth Vader over there is the one in the Colonel suit and Pumpkin is my personal fairy.  Now, can we get on.  This won’t take long and I have a Google Galaxy report waiting in the limo.”  Glen started to walk.  He remembered the location.

            “Hold on.”  The man caught up and paced him.  “I assume you are the one.”

            “The Kairos.  The Watcher over time.  The experiment in time.  The Traveler in time.  The poor soul who isn’t allowed to die and go to heaven?  Yeah, that would be me.  But I am guessing you have something to tell me.  Spit it out, man.  God, I sound like Althea.”

            The man said nothing.  How could he?  But he indicated he might have something to say in a little bit.  First they reached the Lincoln bedroom and Glen went immediately to a corner. 

            “The room has been renovated since Lincoln’s day,” Mister Johnson said.  “Nothing has been found here.  I cannot imagine what you think you will find.”

            “A temporal and spatial pocket,” Glen responded.  “You wouldn’t find it without equipment that won’t be invented for a long, long time.”  He banged the wall a bit hard.  Mister Johnson jumped, afraid Glen might damage the room, but he did nothing to stop him.

            “Pumpkin.  How many miles to Avalon?”

            “Three score miles and ten.”

            “Can I get there by candle light?”

            “Yes and back again.”  Pumpkin clapped her hands and let out her best smile even as a white light settled temporarily in the corner.  She loved that poem; but Glen was busy, now having turned the lock.  He banged twice more on the wall and kicked it once at the base and a section of the wall disappeared to leave a space that should not have been there.

            “A-ha!”  Glen bent down and everyone else inched forward to look.  When he pulled his head back out of the hole, Glen had something in his hands.  It was metal with a box on one end and a stick on the other.  He handed it to Fyodor.  “This is compressed in time and space.  It should be preserved from the time compression, but the spatial differential will reassert itself after a couple of hours of exposure to normal space-time.  You need to put this on the flatbed, two-thirds toward the cab with the stick pointing out the back.  Got it?”

            “It’s heavy.”  Fyodor took it.

            “It will get much heavier.”

            “Now wait.”  Mister Johnson started to speak but Glen had his head back in the hole. 

            “Oh, look!  Casidy’s badge.  I was wondering what happened to that.”  He came back out with a badge that said Federal Marshall.  He blew off some dust and rubbed it on his jeans to polish it.  “Go on, Fyodor.  Sergeant, do you mind helping?  You really don’t want that thing decompressing indoors.”

            “Now wait.”  Mister Johnson got in the way.  “Whatever is here is the property of the United States.  The President insists that you go to the afternoon meeting of the Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board.  We have several National Guard units ready to roll.  You are to supply the coordinates of the enemy and that is all.”  The secret service blocked the door.

            “Uh-oh.”  Lockhart said the word softly.  “I recommend everyone cover their eyes.”  Everyone did, except the White House staff.  Even Pumpkin played the game.  Glen might have covered his eyes too, only he was no longer there.  There was a woman standing in his place.  Her eyes were like fire, arcane power crackled all around her, and she was ticked.  She spoke in words that penetrated into the soul, far deeper than the ears.

            “This is my property.  The Vordan are my business.  As tempting as it may be, I don’t tell the President how to do his job.  DON’T tell me how to do mine.”  She snapped her fingers in Mister Johnson’s face and the company vanished from that room.  They appeared beside the flatbed and found their limos and drivers there, too.  The box and stick was already in place on the truck bed, but the woman was not finished.

            First, the words “Stand Down” appeared over and over on every fax machine, copy machine, computer and even personal cell phones available to certain National Guard units.  At the same time, a black cloud appeared over the White house.  The earth trembled with a slight earthquake and a stroke of lightening made a big hole in the White House driveway.  Then the woman spoke again in a more normal voice.

            “And I would have spanked him, too,” she said as she went away so Glen could come home and apologize.  “Sorry.”  Glen spoke generally to everyone.  “Sorry!”  Glen shouted back at the White House.  “Maybe we better go,” he suggested, and no one objected.  As they got into the limos there seemed only one more thing to say.  “Okay, Pumpkin.  You can uncover your eyes now.”

            The old woman slid down from the crates.  She spread her legs wide against the sway of the ship and the pain in her whole body.  It was the only way she could stay upright.  “You will suffer,” she said, but while she spoke Althea thought she needed a makeover.  “You have no idea who my benefactor is.”  The woman’s tight hair bun came undone, her hair frizzed out and she lost all coloring so the gray was everywhere.  “He will not be pleased.”  The woman’s fine and rich maroon velvet dress became plain black cotton.  “You will be tormented for a thousand years.”  Althea considered the teeth, but in the end she opted for one hairy wart on the woman’s nose.  “Poseidon!”  the woman bellowed.  “Neptune!”

            Althea felt the pressure inside and she did not resist.  “I’ve had my fun.”  She felt the woman’s appearance now matched the witch that she was, and with that she went away and let the Lady of the Sea return who said something no one heard above the woman’s bellows.  “My husband?”  She clapped her hands together and looked altogether like an excited young girl.

            “Poseidon!”  One more bellow, and he came, but he was not alone.  The one with the crown and plain skirt and trident was in a crumpled ball on the ground.  The one standing over him was too frightening to look at.  He was tall and lean with gray-green skin that was covered only by seaweed.  His eyes were the color of cold iron and his face wore a frown of stone.  He ignored the crumpled man at his feet and walked straight toward the Lady, and without effort despite the terrible swaying of the ship. 

            The old woman gasped in horror at the sight of her benefactor, broken and not daring to lift his head.  Simpson stopped bleeding long enough to hope this demon of a man would whip the sea Lady and drive her to the ground.  Abu became afraid for his Lady of the Sea and would have run to help her but he was paralyzed by his fear.  Madison covered his eyes.

            Everyone was surprised when this man-demon who towered over the little woman came right up to her and fell to one knee.  “Majesty.”  The man lowered his eyes.  Then he said something truly remarkable.  “Mother.”

            “Don’t you mother me!”  The Lady’s words were sharp and she threw her hands to her hips for emphasis.  “If Danna was here she would spank you, you bad boy.  You should have gone over to the other side a long time ago.”

            “Soon.”  The man said one word in his defense

            “Soon?  What is it with boys!  Soon.  I am sick of soon.”  They were interrupted by a tremendous BANG on the outer hull, and the Lady’s response was to bend down and kiss the demon man right on the top of his head.  “Fortunately for you, today is your lucky day.  Keep Mama Serpent busy and away from the ship until I can resolve things here.”

            The man stood up, tall and lean and still as frightening to look at as ever, but now there was something soft in those steel eyes.  “Majesty.”  The man bowed and disappeared while the lady turned her attention to the man on the floor.  He had gotten to his belly to plead.

             “Up.”  The lady commanded, and the man on the floor slowly rose to his feet.  He had a long neck and gills.  He had eyes that were too big and all black like they were nothing but pupil, an image that was reinforced by the man when he blinked and shaded his eyes even from the dim light in the hold.  He left the trident where it lay, but that did not matter.  While the others were taken back by the man’s alien look, the Lady of the Sea began to laugh.  She turned to Madam Goldman.  “You thought Lord Revelian was Poseidon?”  With that said she laughed nice and loud, and it was contagious so soon everyone was laughing, even Lord Revelian.

            “Humans are so easy.”  Lord Revelian used the old expression and pointed at Madam Goldman through his guffaws.  That made the Lady of the Sea stop laughing, suddenly and completely, and everyone stopped with her, no wiping the eyes, no catching the breath.  The room just became utterly quiet.

            Lord Revelian once again fell to his face to plead.  “Great and gracious majesty, I beg your mercy.  It was all just me.  My family is innocent.  Please—“

            The Lady interrupted.  “Your family has been trying to seed Earth’s oceans with every great and glorious monster of old for two thousand years with the hope that you can return and the Mere People can once again rule the Seven Seas.  It is not going to happen.  So what is it, some genetic problem?”  Lord Revelian looked up.  He did not understand what she was suggesting, but then neither did anyone else.  “You know the penalty for breaking the law.”  Lord Revelian lowered his head.  “So be it.”  The Lady waved her hand and Lord Revelian vanished.  No one dared ask where he went. 

            “Now, as for the rest of you.”  She snapped her finger and They all appeared on the Foredeck near the railing at the very front of the ship.  Madam Goldman needed a moment to catch her breath.  “Home.”  The Lady snapped at the knife in Simpson’s shoulder and it vanished.  She said, “heal,” and the shoulder healed itself instantly.  Simpson was still weak from loss of blood, but he would not die from the wound.

            “But.”  Abu nudged Madison and pointed.  The worm was with them, curled up on the deck like a sailor’s rope or maybe the biggest rattlesnake, ever.

            The Lady looked at them and both had to look away from her glorious face.  “You two will get the credit, and Abu, you will get a raise so you can bring your wife and children from Syria to America.”  The Lady turned to Madam Goldman and her accomplice.  “You two will be charged with throwing people overboard in order to rob them of their valuables, including the poor child that saw you in the act.”  The Lady clicked her tongue.  “Madison, you will find those valuables in their rooms.  It should be enough to incriminate.  But don’t worry.  You won’t get the death penalty.  But you, Madam Goldman, you will be penniless the rest of your days, and powerless.  Your magic is taken from you.”  The Lady smiled and turned to the sea.  “Mama!”

            A serpent head the size of a house rose out of the sea and stopped inches from the railing.  The tall and lean demon man was riding just behind the ears and he looked perfectly at home in that place.  The worm on the deck began to squeal — sounds that caused Mama serpent to bob her head up and down.

            “Go on, baby,” the Lady said.  “You are too young to be away from your Mama.”  With that permission, the worm uncurled and stretched out toward that tremendous jaw while the serpent mouth opened wider and wider to receive the baby.  When the worm squirted into that mouth to be lost in the dark cavern, Madam Goldman screamed.  She leapt after the worm even as that giant mouth closed and ripped off a chunk of deck, slicing easily through wood and metal alike.

            “Home!”  The man on the serpent’s back shouted and waved, and as the serpent turned away from the ship it faded.  Even as the rising sun broke above the horizon, the serpent and its passengers vanished from the world altogether.

            “There.”  The Lady turned from the sea and with a simple wave of her hand the ship, deck and all was made whole and perfect once again.  She knew the Captain would come out of his fog and behave normally, now that Madam Goldman’s spell was broken.  Madison would rationalize it all away in time and come to believe his own rationalization.  Abu would remember, but he could never tell anyone.  Simpson was already considering suicide.  With Madam Goldman and Professor Romer gone, Simpson felt it was unfair he take the whole rap for throwing those people overboard, which is what he thought he had done.  Sadly, the lady knew the man would have to make his own decision. 

            Then there was the hurricane coming up rapidly from the south on a collision course with the ship.  She turned it toward Africa instead.  Angola was very dry. “Sorry.”  She said out loud to no one in particular,  She was sorry she let her anger at this whole situation become manifest.  “One century I will learn to control my anger.  Soon,” she thought.  That word made her smile.

            She rose up into the air, and as she did, her legs vanished to be replaced by a true mermaid’s tail.  This was not human legs in a mermaid suit.  It was the real deal as she showed by making the tip of her tail slowly curl and uncurl.  She smiled for the others before she dove backwards off the deck and into the ocean where she could revel, at least for a short time, in the glorious waters of the Atlantic. 

            Poor Glen had to make up a story about Abu being lost and Officer Madison not showing up—or he missed them.  He sulked right through dinner to make it a good show.  There he heard the Chief Steward make an announcement.

            “Ladies and gentlemen.  We apologize for the rough water this morning.  There is a hurricane brewing in the South Atlantic but it has turned toward the African coast so we should be perfectly safe.  Meanwhile, if any of you were up this morning, you may have seen something off the starboard side of the ship.  It may have looked like a very long line of something following us.  Actually, one of the crew let the garbage out from the front gate prematurely.  I’m afraid what you saw was only a stream of garbage.  No Sea Serpent, sorry.”  He laughed, so everyone laughed because there were no such things as sea serpents.  Not really.

            “Darn.”  Glen was disappointed, because by then he had forgotten everything that had happened and he thought it would have been neat to see a real, live sea serpent.

            Captain Hawk came around in the evening to find Mister Madison recovered from his hypnotic-like trance and Abu in the cell with them.

            “Captain Hawk,” Abu looked like he was full of information, but Captain Hawk made him wait while he rubbed his forehead and his stiff neck.  When he was ready, Captain Hawk took the lead.

            “Professor Romer was supper.  Officer Simpson is the inside man working with Madam Goldman and we are designated for tomorrow to be breakfast, lunch and dinner.  Did I forget anything?”

            Madison looked up once at the Captain before he dropped his eyes again to the floor.  He sat in the corner, brooding and depressed.  Abu slowly reached out one finger and poked the Captain before he spoke.

            “You don’t look like a ghost,” he said and then he thought to explain.  “The only reference of a ship called the Golden Hawk from Amsterdam was a Privateer chartered by the Queen of England in 1530.  The Captain’s name was Peter Van Dyke.”

            “Aye.  That would be me.  But we had another name for the ship in the Caribbean when we raised the skull and crossbones.  The Flying Dutchman.”

            “Please!”  Madison shouted.  “Please just stop it.  This is serious.  We have to get out of here and kill that worm thing before it eats us, or anyone else.”

            “Quite right.”  Captain Hawk stood but had to be careful not to hit his head.  “I bet this cage had a monkey in it originally.  Well, no matter.  I will forego tradition this time.  I won’t make you take my hands, but you have to promise not to scream when you see what happens next.  And no, Abu, I am not a ghost and neither is she so please don’t scream.”

            “She?”  Abu asked.

            Captain Hawk nodded and disappeared to be replaced, not by Althea, but a different woman.  Madison screamed.  Abu lowered his eyes and trembled.  This was a woman of the sea—THE woman of the sea.  Abu had been at sea for most of his life and had dreamed about her.  Most sailors had.

            “I must go.”  The woman said in a voice as sweet as the sweetest water.  “I cannot tell you where or why, but I will be back by dawn.  Perhaps we can see the sunrise together.”  With that word she vanished altogether from that place and left a soft spray of sea water where she had stood.  When she appeared in front of Glen’s door, she felt very bad.  Poor Glen was really going to get it.

            “I met a friend,” Glen told his parents.  “His name is Abu and the ship’s officer, Mister Madison promised if we met him at sunrise he would give us a tour of the ship.  Oh, please, please.”  Glen’s half-lie came with the biggest, most pleading eyes he could muster.  That did not soften the yelling, but when Glen’s mom took him for a late night supper and found out the really was an officer Madison, she said no more.

            Glen did not sleep much.  The Hawk spent most of the day in Glen’s place and he might need the sleep.  Being knocked out really didn’t count.  But Glen had rested and in a real sense slept all day.  He was not tired.  All the same, he did fall asleep around four but then he only got about an hour’s nap. 

            He woke up when the ship began to sway, dangerously.  He thought at first that they must have come across a storm or some very rough water, but then he heard a faint “Thump” from below and he sat straight up.

            “No,’ Glen said.  “It can’t be.”  He slipped out of bed, slipped into his shorts and pulled over his shirt as quietly as he could.  He nearly fell twice from the hard sways of the boat, but managed his shoes before his father woke.  He heard his name.  He would pay for his actions, but he raced out the door with the words, “I’m late.”

            One accidental bump into the night steward and he reached the stairs.  Seven steps up and he figured he was safe.  He vanished and that woman—the Lady of the Sea returned, and instantly she was back in the cage.  The list of the ship and the great angled sways were very apparent down in the hold.  Both men in the cage were rousing and Abu looked ready to get sick.

            The Lady sensed no one around but knew Madam Goldman and Officer Simpson were on the way, as fast as they could move in the rough water.  The Lady broke the lock on the cage.  Then she expanded the bars just a little so they would stick and make it look like the cage was still locked tight.  When Captain Hawk returned, he woke the others, fully.

            Abu got wide awake without a word as he swallowed the bile that built up in his mouth.  He stared at the Captain for a long time.  Mister Madison was a bit of a bumbler in the morning.  “What?  What?”  He rubbed his eyes before it looked like the excessive swaying was going to make him sick as well.

            “Breakfast,” Captain Hawk teased.  “Let us hope it isn’t us.”  That woke the man.  By the time Simpson and the Madam came stumbling in, trying to remain upright, all three men were standing, holding the bars of the cage, waiting for them.

            “My, we are early risers.”  The woman grabbed a bar on the water tank to steady herself.  She sounded as smug and self-assured as ever, but when she saw the cutlass was back in Captain Hawk’s hand and the knife was back securely on his hip, she did pause.  Captain Hawk noticed and responded.

            “Like Thor’s hammer,” he said.  “My weapons always seem to find a way back into my hand.”

            “So I see.”  Madam Goldman was clearly impressed.  Simpson fingered his jacket pocket where he likely had the pistol, but he did not pull it out.

            “Madam Goldman.”  Captain Hawk came straight to the point because he knew how little time they actually had.  “For the third and final time I must ask you, how you came by your pet.  I know there is no amount of magical art on your part that could have pulled the worm from its mother’s mouth.  This is a chance I am giving you to reveal the culprit so they may bear the burden for this illegal act.”

            Madam Goldman was still in pause mode, but the smile slowly came to her face.  “You do not wish to know.  Believe me.  You are as nothing to me and to my art.  To him you would be less than nothing.  You would probably find your bowels loosed just to see him.”

            “A most delicate suggestion,” Captain Hawk mocked her.  “But you have had your chance and you have been warned.”  He shoved open the door to the cage and advanced on the woman, the ship having settled down for the moment.  Simpson went for his gun, but Captain Hawk’s long knife came away from his hip and sunk deep into Simpson’s shoulder.  It sent the sailor to his knees.  The gun clattered across the floor when he dropped it and with the next big wave it slid under the nearest car.

            Madam Goldman raised her cane with the diamond top.  “I had hoped to find your secret and turn you to my service, but I see that will not be.”  With that, she let out some of that purple lightning but by then Captain Hawk had gone away and finally let Althea take a turn.  She came dressed in the armor and weapons she lived in when she sailed to the far east end of the Black Sea with Jason and the other Argonauts, and she brushed aside Madam Goldman’s purple lightning like one might brush aside a fly, not even breaking her stride.

            Althea caught the woman with a force of her own and levitated the woman right off the ground.  Althea levitated a little as well to keep herself steady since the ship was starting to sway violently again.  “I kicked fat butt Madea’s fat butt.  In your own words, you are nothing.”  With no sign of effort, she tossed Madam Goldman to slam into a tarp covered pile of crates.  That would have hurt a strong young man.  It had to hurt the old woman.

            “Now, I want to know who helped you bring the worm here.  Now!”  For the moment, the old woman could only groan.  Simpson could only moan and cry, hold his shoulder and try not to bleed to death.  The two men in the cage were talking quietly to each other, but everyone became stone silent when they heard a loud BANG! on the outside hull.  It was followed by a moan that started out low and rose up the scale like whale song but deeper, richer, larger. 

            “What the Hell is that?”  Madison shouted.

            “Mama.”  Althea answered and she saw the worm in the tank was becoming very agitated.

            “Will you gentlemen please step into the cage.”  Madam Goldman was polite about it.  Mister  Madison went right in, but Captain Hawk stalled.  He looked around the hold, a room below the water line that came up against the hull.  It was large enough to hold a number of cars, a couple of trucks and an enormous water tank that held an enormous sleeping worm.

            “I don’t think so.”  Captain Hawk said at last, and as he spoke his cutlass vacated the Traveler’s Avalon home and appeared in his hand.  “I think instead it is time for some answers.”

            “Oh, very good, Captain.”  Madam Goldman was not dismayed to see that Captain Hawk had broken her spell.  She was smug.  “But you have no idea what you are dealing with.”

            “But that is what I am asking.”  Captain Hawk nodded his head toward the tank as he stepped closer to the woman.  “How did you come by your pet?  I happen to know they are extinct on this Earth and only to be found in the eternal sea of the Second Heavens.  They frolic among the innumerable isles, you see, and since there is no way on this blessed earth you could have found your way there, I have to assume you had help to bring the worm here.”

            “Oh, you are so very clever.”  The Madam genuinely smiled for him even as he threatened her.  Some of that purple light escaped her hands and cane and seeped into the water tank.  The worm came awake and immediately pushed up a cut-away section of the tank top.  Captain Hawk took a step back and could hardly be blamed, but the woman had a cloth in her hand and as the worm came to her, she put the cloth on the floor.  The worm curled several times around the cloth like a constrictor might curl around its prey before it opened its maw and licked it up.  Once the cloth was ingested, the worm straightened and took off for a dark corner of the hold at remarkable speed.

            “Professor Romer,” the woman said.  “A pity.  Now I will need to find another.”

            “Another fool to display your beast?”

            Madam Goldman smiled again.  “I shall be the richest woman in history.  Captain Hawk shook his head and lowered his cutlass.  “What?” she asked.

            “This one is what, eight, maybe ten feet?”  He had revised his estimate on closer examination.  “It should still be in its mother’s gullet and only venturing out briefly to test the waters.  They don’t go out on their own until they are eighteen feet or more.  It is too young to be separated.”

            “But you must get them young.”  Madam Goldman countered.  “Think of all the tricks I can teach it, tricks it will perform when it reaches full size.”  Captain Hawk shook his head again so the woman stopped to listen.

            “They don’t have a full size.  They never stop growing.  They do seem clever when they are young and small, but it is a survival mechanism, like the ability to spend time out of the water and escape across dry ground.  But their brains don’t grow, you see.  The bigger they get, the more and more brain space is needed just to maintain movement and to feed.  The bigger they get the stupider they get until at last they get so big their little brains can’t handle it and they quit.  They die of stupidity, you might say.”

            “Mister Simpson.”  Madam Goldman interrupted by looking over Captain Hawk’s shoulder.  The Captain knew there was a man behind him from the footsteps.  He did not know it was one of the ship’s officers.  He felt he should have guessed, though, and he certainly was not surprised to turn and see a gun in the man’s hand.  He turned again toward Madam Goldman in time to see her purple light; only this time it was not just light.  It was purple lightening and it stuck him like 220 volts.  All he could do was shake until his eyes rolled up in his head and he collapsed to the floor.  Even so, he was not quite unconscious.  He heard the madam and the officer step up to meet over his limp body. 

            “Let me come through!”  Althea screamed at the Captain in his head.  He had to quiet her to listen.

            “This one sounds dangerous,” the officer said.

            “He knows things,” the Madam responded.  “Put him in the cage with the other.  I will have to question him again to find out how he knows things.”

            “But that may be dangerous.”

            “Mister Simpson, I think I can handle one skinny man who thinks he is a pirate.”

            Captain Hawk took a deep breath as he was dragged and locked into the cage with Madison.  So he would be questioned.  He would not be immediate worm snack.  That was good because at the moment he thought it best to go unconscious.

            Glen was in trouble for being late to the room.  He did not eat much dinner and he did not sleep well, either.  When he woke up in the morning, he did not remember a thing until he sat down for breakfast.  He lost his appetite thinking about it.

            Once he got free of the family, he went straight to find Second Mate Madison and his helper, Abu Hassan.  They were assigned to find the culprit, though Captain Hawk, as he was called,  thought Madison was a bit of a fool and poor Abu, the one with the brains, was afraid to be anything other than a yes-man.

            “You are Captain Hawk because of your ship the Golden Hawk?”  Abu asked.

            “In part.”  The Captain answered.  “But consider my face.”  He turned to show his profile and pointed out the way his nose stuck out from his eyes before it fell to his lips.  It did appear a bit like a beak.  His skinny features overall also gave his face something of a bird-like appearance, but there was no mistaking that this was a bird of prey.

            “So, I was thinking about what you said, yesterday.  You have seen these worms before?  May I ask where?”  Madison sat behind his desk.  It was clearly the only place he felt comfortable.

            Captain Hawk was not about to be interviewed by a bureaucrat.  He shoved some things to the side and rested his hip up on the desk corner while he left one foot on the ground.  “Best to not go into that.  But for all of our sakes I pray it is only one.  Have you been through the manifest yet?”  He looked over the papers on the desk and craned his neck as if trying to read them.  Officer Madison covered them with his arms and hunched over them like a school boy who was afraid of having his paper copied.  Abu interrupted.  He was good at knowing when to change the subject.

            “What kind of a worm can eat through steel?”

            “A sea worm, technically.”  The Captain answered and got up from the desk to plant himself in a nearby chair.  His point with Madison was made.  “It is a very rare sea creature with a limited ability to come ashore when it is young.  Call it sort of an amphibian in reverse.  Anyway, it should be extinct, at least on this Earth.”  He mumbled the last part, but Abu caught it.

            “And you figure someone brought it on board, but it escaped its cage?”  Abu summarized.  The Captain nodded and Abu handed him a very thick clipboard.  “The passenger list.”

            “Abu?”

            “Mister Madison.  We are getting nowhere.  If this man knows something.”  He apologized and did everything short of bow.

            Madison stared before he shrugged.

            “Who is this Professor Romer?  It says marine biologist.”  Captain Hawk looked at the two men like they should have seen this right away.

            “We did not know it was a sea worm until you told us,” Abu said.  He shrugged and they looked at Madison who shuffled some of the papers on his desk. 

            “There is nothing in the hold with Professor Romer’s name on it,” he declared.

            “Look for a company name, maybe a zoo or aquarium,” Captain Hawk suggested just before they were interrupted.  Two sailors came in and looked twice at Captain Hawk before one spoke.

            “Excuse me Mister Madison, sir.  They found another one.”

            “The worm had breakfast.”  Captain Hawk spoke up.

            “Yes sir.”  The sailor did not know what to say, exactly.  “But this one was a child.”

            “Then we better go see this Romer right away.”  Captain Hawk said, and he started toward the door.  He turned when he got there.  “You coming?”

            Abu looked at Madison.  Madison got up, unhappy about something, but they followed.

###

            “Professor Romer?”  Captain Hawk let Madison take the lead, but mostly so he could look around the room and be nosy, and partly so he could glare at the man over Madison’s shoulder.

            “What is it?  I’m very busy.”  The Professor looked down at his hands rather than up into that frightening Hawk-like face.

            “Just a couple of quick questions, if you don’t mind.”  Madison spoke from the doorway and he would have been most polite about it, but Captain Hawk spied a letter on the desk of that small cabin.  It was from the Philadelphia Aquarium.  He pushed forward into the room.

            “Your sea worm has gotten free.”  Captain Hawk accused the Professor.  He spoke loudly, right over the man’s protests.  He pulled out his long knife which quieted the Professor, but he only used it as a pointer.  “Too bad we can’t try a sea worm for murder.  Philadelphia Aquarium?”  He tapped the letter on the desk.  It said the Aquarium closed last year due to lack of funding, but the board would consider reopening if Professor Romer could deliver the promised specimen. 

            The Professor, an elderly man broke instantly.  “It’s not my fault.  It’s that old woman, Madam Goldman.  She let the beast out.  I never thought…”  The man began to whimper before he stiffened his lip.  “No.  I won’t tell you.  That creature is one of a kind and I will not risk having it damaged by a bunch of frightened sailors.”

            “You and you.”  Captain Hawk pointed at the two sailors who followed them to the cabin.  “Take this man to the brig for further questioning.”

            “Sir.”  The sailors responded to the tone of a ship’s Captain and one gave a slight salute.  They never even glanced at their own officer, Mister Madison.  They hauled the Professor off while Abu asked his next question.

            “We go see this Madam Goldman?”

            “Madison and I,” Captain Hawk answered.  “You need to go back to the office and check the manifests for the hold.  Philadelphia Aquarium and Goldman.”  Abu looked disappointed, but nodded his agreement.  “Don’t worry, Abu.”  Captain Hawk let out his wicked smile.  “I’ll fill you in so you don’t miss anything.”

###

            “Now, you let me take the lead here.”  Madison tried to sound firm.  “ I appreciate your help in this matter, but as an officer of the ship I will be the one to face the heat if we accuse an innocent passenger.”

            Captain Hawk merely tipped his head in response.  He would have tipped his hat, but he left that with his cutlass.  The hat would have made him look too much like the man out of time that he was.

            “Gentlemen.”  The older woman stood with a cane and took an attitude that was completely different from the Professor’s.  “You have come about my pet.  Come in.  I have been expecting you.”

            “Your pet?  I’m afraid I don’t follow.”  Madison let his stupidity show.  The woman ignored him as she looked over the handsome Captain.  “Skinny, but rugged,” she pronounced and she squeezed one of the Captain’s arms to test the muscle.

            “I am glad my lady is pleased.”  Captain Hawk bowed graciously.

            “And you play the part so well,” the woman said.  “Is there a costume party I was not told about?”

            “Alas, no,” Captain Hawk responded.  “I am as you see me.  But let me ask your indulgence.  How did you come by your pet?”

            “A good question,” the woman said.  She backed away to sit and rest on the end of the couch.  This was a first class, luxury cabin with real furniture, far larger than the Professor’s little closet.  “It was by my own art that I coaxed him out of his natural habitat and into my keeping, precious beast that he is.”

            “But you haven’t kept it,” Madison burst out.  “The thing has escaped and it is eating the passengers.”

            “On the contrary, Mister Madison.”  Captain Hawk followed his instincts.  “She has been feeding it.”

            “Very Perceptive.”  The woman was honestly impressed.  She looked again at the skinny man and he bowed once more and introduced himself.

            “Captain Peter VanDyke, Captain of the Golden Hawk out of Amsterdam.  Most people simply call me Captain Hawk.  It is a name I can hardly deny, given my profile.”  He turned his head for the woman.

            “A bird of prey?”

            “One that looks to sink its talons into the great worm.”

            “Ah, but can you match the strength of a serpent?”

            “Your pardon, but it is not yet a serpent, young as it is.”

            “Very perceptive, indeed,” the woman said.  “Too perceptive.”  She touched the diamond knob of her cane and the room filled with a purple light.  It flashed and then wafted through the air like purple smoke before it dissipated.  Captain Hawk found himself still in control of his senses, but his will was sapped.  He had no ability to resist when she said, “Let us go to the hold.”

            “Let me at her.”  Althea shouted in the Captain’s head.  She spoke all the way through time from her life in the deep past.  “I’ll kick her butt!“

            “No,” the Captain interrupted, and in resisting Althea’s suggestion he knew the spell was already beginning to weaken on him even if Madison appeared to be completely under.  “Let us see where she takes us first.”  Althea agreed.