PORTALS IN A NORTHERN SKY
Transport yourself through time and thought ~
Taste the wilds of ALASKA ~
Take a second look at fate.

The Scientist

Wasilla, Alaska: The Near Future

Adam Whitehead looked more like a movie actor than a scientist. His rigid posture and clear blue eyes offset by his bright silver hair gave the presence of a very important person. But Adam was anything but a celebrity type. One hundred years in the future he would be known as the most famous scientist of the twenty-first century for work accomplished and tabled when he was only forty years old. Now, at age sixty-two, he was thinking more about dying than the cutting-edge physics that had so consumed his middle years.

“What did I do with those damned keys?” he muttered, retracing his steps through the house. A simple thought exclaimed each day by untold millions of people who misplace familiar objects, and yet, in Adam’s case, forgetfulness represented fear—a fear of something much worse than death.

Adam was making a list of the items he needed for his last trip into the Alaska bush. He would die on this trip, he figured, but there would be no goddamned nursing home in his future. No rancid smells, no humiliating kindergarten games for the elderly conducted by staff too young to appreciate how demeaning their actions were. No, sir, not for Adam Whitehead. A bullet in the brain was preferable, and he would see to that when the time came.

He had been over the list a dozen times but had mislaid it somewhere. Salt, flour, sugar, and powdered milk in airtight containers, five burlap sacks of beans, three cases of coffee, four cases of pancake mix, and ten large containers of powdered eggs, plus case after case of canned goods and freeze dried food. After all, he might live for another year or two. No sense in going back into town if he could help it. The less contact he had with the public, the better off he would be and the less pain there would be for everyone. He had a chest of medicine, a book about pulling your own teeth, and a book about how to be your own doctor. Hell, he might live three or four years before he succumbed.

For half a decade he had been thinking it would come to this. And now two years had passed since he purchased the cabin on Caribou Creek. He had told no one about the cabin, and that’s the way it was to be.

“What the hell did I do with those keys?”

This was the last trip to town before he started the three days worth of four-wheeler treks to haul in his supplies. That would be it. No more Adam Whitehead. It would be as if he had disappeared from the face of the earth. He was even careful not to buy too much from the same store so that no one would wonder whether he was going to the bush for an extended stay. He was well enough known to his neighbors. The fewer questions asked, the less chance his secret might get out. Somehow he’d find a way to leave one of his vehicles at the airport before he departed to the cabin.

“There they are, right in front of me on the dresser.”

 How the hell could he have forgotten something as simple as his car keys if he was not already in the fiend of humanity’s grip? His parents’ vacant faces loomed in his mind. How often they had stared at him. A glazed look one moment and desperation in the next, trying with all their might to figure out who he was.

Driving down the narrow road to the Parks highway, he began to reflect about his work as he drove. Lately he hadn’t thought about it much. But when he did, it was hard not to feel bitter. Adam had at one time been consumed with Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity, specifically the notion of time, gravity, and curved space. Years ago he had concluded that time travel was impossible. He had begun by wanting it to be true so badly that he very unscientifically set out to prove a theory instead of just letting the pieces fall where they may. But, in time, he felt his discoveries, though they disproved the ability of humans to travel through time, offered something almost as good.

What Adam believed he had proven was that by using a convoluted series of triangulations (a process similar to interferometry) through widely spaced infrared telescopes and satellites, and by looping signals and bouncing them to and from near-earth objects, one could actually look back in time and view the earth in real time for any period in the past. Looking into the future was not possible. But the surface of the earth in the past could be observed with clarity, provided the time and place selected was free of clouds. Even the clouds might be overcome in the future. He had concluded it would be possible to view scenes from the past almost as clearly as a football game on television, covering about the same amount of territory at any given time.

His findings had created quite a stir in the National Academy of Science when he first began discussing his work, but later criticism about the absurdity of his fundamental premise was so unrelenting and had lasted so long that he felt his reputation was tarnished and his career destroyed.

Didn’t they understand what was at stake? he wondered as he drove. Imagine watching a day in the life of dinosaurs. How about a ringside seat for the Peloponnesian War? Not to mention the crucifixion of Christ, or the supposed resurrection. For heaven’s sake it would even be possible to view the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs and the devastating weather that followed. Not to mention the famous grassy knoll in Dallas the day Jack Kennedy was shot. What about really watching the gunfight at the O.K. Corral? Would the idea of entertainment ever be the same after such capability existed?

Better get back to reality, he caught himself, and make sure I don’t forget anything.

Adam winced in the bright daylight. It still seemed a shame that the world had missed an opportunity to awaken civilization in such a profound way. Gaining that perspective would have forever been thought of as the first big break ever afforded human consciousness. Not pursuing it was an embarrassment, a travesty or a crime, he wasn’t sure which.

The Scout

Ohio, spring 1865

     The scent was everywhere. It permeated the woods, clung to the oak leaves and rode the cottonwood spores on their windblown journey to seed yet another tree.  It was the congealed sweat of men and horses fused with the smells of fear, the physical rot of death, and unwashed wool. It filled every forest, every meadow; it dug deep into the earth and renewed its pungency with each morning’s dew.  The merciless odor reminded Captain John Henry Peek of a vengeful act by a wounded beast so incensed by injury that it would tear at its own wound to leave its blood trail behind as an act of rage.

As a boy growing up on a farm in Ohio, Peek had spent many a summer afternoon with the hot air punctuated by the singsong buzz of cicadas. He grew to love the sound. It was mesmerizing, and it had always left him with a sense of calm and security. But now, too many battles had overwritten the effect. Now the insects’ crooning was not comforting at all, but spoke to him as if it were the incessant and insane chattering of the dead shouting about the madness and wastefulness of war.

The changing season was bringing warmer weather, and soon the cicadas would be starting to sing again. He needed to be gone before the serenade began. The prairie would be free of the chatter. No trees, he thought, only blue sky, green grass and buffalo. Now or never, he said. It was time to leave.

The war would be over any day now; General Lee had already surrendered at Appomattox. It was fourteen days since Peek had fired his last shot in anger. The colonel had miraculously approved his discharge. But that didn’t mean a lot to Captain John Peek. He feared the war would never be over in his mind. It had taken away everything he had thought was good in his life. No matter where he went or which direction he took, the terrain spoke to him of battles. One thing sure, he knew deep inside that he had to get out of this territory or the memories would destroy him.

Thanks to the war, his two brothers were dead. Robert had been killed at Gettysburg, James at Cold Harbor. An uncle and three cousins were all the family John had left in the world, and they wore the gray uniforms he had learned to hate.  So, he may as well say he had no family. He would leave this country and erase his tracks as he went. He would disappear from Ohio and he would never return. He would forget the killing, the starving, the hating and the confusion over whether there was really anything worth fighting and dying for. He would go west, as far west as one could go. His mustering-out pay would be enough to buy everything he needed to begin his journey.

Walking alone on a well used trail he stopped and cut a large leafy branch from a small tree. He picked up his pace as he thought about how good leaving sounded in his mind, dragging the limb behind him as a symbolic gesture to kill the sign that John Henry Peek had ever been in this territory. He was going west beginning now.

     At the first town he came to, Peek bought himself two good mares, a used Henry repeating rifle, a new Colt .44 side-arm revolver, and all the gear a man might need for a sojourn into no-man’s land. The storekeeper had been so happy with the sale that he had carved J. H. Peek on a brass plate and attached it to the rifle stock. There would be no additional charge for that, he said.

     Then the storekeeper told him the awful news. President Lincoln had been assassinated. It was as if Peek had been wounded again, except this time it had been his soul that was shot clean through. He would put it out of his mind. He had to. His survival depended on it.

     When he reached Independence, Missouri, Peek met a wagon master named Abraham Enochs, who hired him on the spot as a scout for a wagon train headed for California. Peek knew nothing of the western territory, but Enochs was desperate. He was already late in beginning the five-month journey, and he hadn’t had any takers for a scout. He figured four years of war had sharpened Peek’s senses to such degree that he was a scout if he was anything. Besides, the tracks were already there for any fool to follow, and he had maps and even a book written by a former traveler that explained the trail. The ruts on the California/Oregon Trail were cut so deep in places that you followed the trail best by avoiding it. Hell, you couldn’t miss the way to California, Enochs insisted. All a scout was needed for was to provide fresh meat, look out for Indians, and find the best places to camp. Peek could do that without so much as giving it a second thought.

     The wagon train was small in comparison to many that had gone before. There were eighteen Conestogas and six Prairie Schooners along with three homemade wagons too peculiar to classify. The party consisted of 263 head of cattle, 16 mules, and 73 oxen, not counting the teams pulling the wagons, which consisted mostly of oxen. There were 108 men, 36 women, and 73 children. The largest family had 31 members, counting cousins. Everyone referred to them as the Spencers of Ohio.

     The going was tough, but for John Peek it was nothing compared to the war. That is, until they reached the Great Plains. Early in the journey, Peek had totally lost track of time. He hunted, scouted ahead, and kept to himself, feeling as if the weight of the world had been lifted from his shoulders. Hardship aside from war would always be tolerable, he thought. But when they reached the sweeping prairie with its waist-high grass, the rains came. The clouds opened up as if they would rid themselves eternally of all the earth’s moisture.

     Peek had never imagined it could rain this much anywhere in the world. He had once prayed for rain when the woods had caught fire in a skirmish near Gettysburg. More than forty wounded soldiers had burned to death in that fire, and the rains never came. It was John Henry Peek’s last prayer. But the rain he was experiencing now was something to fear. Had he any faith left, he would have prayed for it to stop. The wagons were stuck as if frozen in time. To move was to mire deeper into the prairie, carving new ruts. They couldn’t even circle the wagons.

     And then, as the final thunderstorm sounded its last farewell, death reminded Captain Peek of its presence. A bolt of lightning lit the sky brighter than high noon and struck down Howard Spencer, the patriarch of the Spencer family. The smell of burnt flesh and a powdery metallic residue lasted for days. Not to be wasteful, they butchered the horse Spencer had been riding, but no one from the Spencer family would partake.

     Peek’s group was trapped in place for ten days. When the sun finally appeared, they still had to wait four days before they were able to get fully underway. To make up for lost time, there would be no nooning, no stopping to eat at midday. They would eat pilot bread and pemmican on the move.

     Many of the pilgrims in the party had been affected by the war, but they had not had their faith in humanity very nearly destroyed as Peek had. They would be tested on this trip. No sooner had they begun making good wagon time than Howard Spencer’s youngest grandson, seven-year-old Jake, was crushed to death when he fell out of the wagon driven by his grandmother. The Spencer family’s grief touched every member of the party. But, in spite of the sorrow, the further west Peek went, the better he felt.

     Now the ground was dry. The sun rose high in the sky like a hot coal threatening to burst the prairie into flame at any moment. The rain-soaked chill had given way to a searing heat, a heat that seemed alien to any weather Peek could reckon he could remember. But the scorching sun did nothing to impede the black flies and mosquitoes that at times seemed to be the only things one could see and hear.

     Only two weeks after the rain had stopped, Peek’s concern was finding fresh water, even though most of the time their trail paralleled a river. They had crossed the Platte River a week before the rains started, and now a lack of water threatened their livestock. Peek found two watermarks on the map, but both turned up bone dry. He wondered how it was possible to be drenched and stuck in mud only to travel 200 miles and find yourself in a drought.

     He was studying the map when a movement out of the corner of his eye revealed an old Indian on a small pony coming his way. The Indian raised his hand and Peek did the same. The old man half smiled, and Peek forced himself to return the gesture. Peek pointed to his mouth with a lifting and pouring gesture and then pointed to his horse as if to show that he was thirsty too. The old man motioned for Peek to follow. Half an hour later they rode to the banks of a small but deep creek with crystal clear water. It was not on the map, but it was here all right. Peek turned to face the old man, but the Indian had already disappeared into the brush.

     Three days later would bring another encounter with Indians. This time it was five young men that might have been a war party, except that they were anything but hostile. Peek guessed they were Shoshone, but he didn’t know for sure and wasn’t anxious to let on that there was anything he didn’t already know about Indians. They seemed more curious than anything else. After looking over the wagons, they offered Peek a hindquarter of a mule deer. Peek grabbed two blankets from the cook’s wagon and consummated the deal. The young men talked and laughed loudly among themselves as they scurried away.

            Peek was always on guard. He didn’t sleep well in the territory marked hostile on his maps. But these Indians seemed a lot less dangerous than any in the stories that rounded the camp each night.

The Searcher

New York City: The Near Future

Robert T. Thornton sat perfectly still as the shouting and cries of jubilance in his Wall Street office reached a crescendo. The noise seemed to threaten the massive glass windowpanes through which he and his associates often stared down at a world they deemed conquered by their proven superiority. He had been certain that the stock profiles he’d singled out would behave precisely as they had and was frankly a little miffed that everyone seemed so surprised. Of course, that was to be expected of someone barely thirty years old and already considered a financial genius. Still, he had to be pleased; the shouting was, after all, a celebration of his accomplishment. Strange that he would react as he did. For, without even giving it reign to conscious thought, he knew what he was about to do as if he had always planned it that way, but he clearly hadn’t. He stood up just as CEO George Salzburg approached him shouting, “Bob you are truly a genius.”

“Thanks, George, but that’s it for me.”

“What’s it? What are you talking about? Do you have any idea how much money we just made on your projections?”

“Yes, I know to the penny, George, but this is it for me. I’ve had enough and made enough and sometimes you just have to say enough is enough.”

The manic but shrill drone in the office began to die like a wave crashing a beach party, as one employee after another was splashed by the oceanic thought that a person as successful as Bob Thornton was quitting. It was unthinkable! The sentiment reverberated like a sour note from a bass guitar. Most couldn’t even think of anything to say as the financial hero of the decade swiftly grabbed a few items from his desk and in one continuous movement headed for the door. George Salzburg stood in silence, pale about the mouth with a gut-shot glaze that washed his broad face in a spectrum of pinks. He looked as if the wounded expression on his face might be permanent. Just like that, the best stock speculator in the history of Wall Street gone without so much as a second thought. Bob could feel a growing sense of exhilaration as he caught the elevator just in time to disappear. Won’t Mary Ellen be surprised? he thought to himself, realizing in the next instant, Why the hell should I spoil it?

With that, he pulled out his cell phone and ordered his accountant to stop the rent on his penthouse. That’ll do it, he thought, and it will avoid a scene. Funny that he should feel so happy about imagining the look on her face when she realized the party was over. The thought of his girlfriend trying to convince the landlord that there must be some kind of mistake thrilled him so much, he suddenly recognized that, without knowing it consciously, he had begun to hate her.

It was the first disagreeable thought he’d had all day. How long had it been, he wondered, since he’d really enjoyed himself, since he and Mary Ellen had enjoyed each other’s company? Their life had become a treadmill existence--he working longer and harder while she partied harder still. When was the last time they had talked when she had appeared completely sober? Try as he might, he couldn’t remember. Thank God they weren’t married.

It had begun innocently enough. They had met in the lobby of a hotel. She had just arrived in town to pursue a career in modeling. He was a rising star on Wall Street. In a little over three years their relationship was a shambles and yet both of them were too busy to notice. Mary Ellen was spending money so fast that it would have frightened anyone with an income anywhere near normal, and it was mostly for cocaine. Well, it would stop now, he thought grimly.

Thornton was a walking fashion statement. Anything he wore looked better on him than on a mannequin. It had become something of an office contest to be the first on any given day to describe what he was wearing. Thornton had always assumed he’d picked up the nickname T&T Thornton because he was the financial equivalent of dynamite. He had no idea it was a term coined by women admirers from the clerical staff because of his resemblance to two movie idols, both named Tom. His face was flawless, save one rugged scar above the right eye. He had incurred the blemish during a bicycle race for a dollar when he was seven. He won the race and tearlessly endured stitches without anesthesia. When bathed in florescent light and observed from particular angles, the old injury gave him a sinister, devilish look. To him it was a lifetime reminder of his competitiveness.  

Again he used his cell phone to call his accountant, only this time he had a half hour’s worth of instructions to give. He closed all of his active accounts except his American Express and Visa cards, gave explicit cash and stock investment instructions and said that until further notice he himself would be mobile. Once a month he was to receive a status of his accounts via e-mail. He didn’t even need to go back to the apartment. There were no material possessions there that meant anything to him. The few keepsakes he really cared about were in a large safe deposit box.

His next stop was a sporting goods store. He bought two pairs of timber green Filson trousers, two matching shirts, a sleeping bag, a few packages of freeze dried rations, a backpack and emergency gear to fill it. He bought underwear and wool socks, hiking boots and two parkas, one light and one heavy. Finally, he selected a hunting-quality slingshot and a sack of steel projectiles. The store clerk looked both puzzled and suspicious when Thornton asked if he could dispose of his $2,000 suit, but he seemed to relax a bit when he realized that he and Bob were about the same size.

One more stop at a bookstore, and he would be on his way. There he bought On the Road, by Jack Kerouac, Walden Pond, by Henry David Thoreau, Moby-Dick, by Herman Melville, Call of the Wild, by Jack London, a collection of essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Confessions of a Philosopher, by Brian Magee. When he hit the street, people stared. Was someone shooting an L.L. Bean commercial? But Bob Thornton couldn’t have cared less. He was off to Alaska.