Chapter 1

Scott Foreman sat lucidly behind the controls of the Cessna Skyhawk as it cruised along. The autopilot was now engaged, keeping the aircraft steady on a heading of 72 degrees and at an altitude at 6300 feet above sea level. He had taken off from a small airport in San Francisco fifteen minutes before and was now passing over the coastal mountains of northern California, mountains that were actually little more than tall hills. His destination was the town of Auburn, in the Sierra Nevada foothills, his course roughly following that of Interstate 80, which could be seen snaking through the passes in the hills like a long black snake. Behind him, the sun was rapidly approaching the horizon, still high enough to provide visual flying conditions, but low enough to impart a mellow light upon the landscape. The hum of the engine was a comforting white noise. Scott stretched a little to relieve the dull thrum in his back and then picked up the can of diet, decaffeinated cola sitting in the drink container. He had a sip and then leaned back in his custom-fit seat.

At forty years of age, Scott was about as comfortable in a cockpit as a man could be. Since that day in 1978 when he was fourteen and his father had let him take the controls of a rented Piper for the first time over San Jose, Scott had accumulated nearly 12,000 hours of flight time in more than fifteen different aircraft. He had gotten his private pilot's license on his eighteenth birthday and had flown crop dusters to help pay his way through college. After receiving his bachelor's degree in Aeronautics from the University of California at Davis he had joined the United States Air Force, where the low level flying skills he'd learned dusting crops helped get him into training in the A-10 Warthog — an anti-armor and close support aircraft. His six-year stint as an A-10 pilot — which included 42 combat missions in the Persian Gulf War of 1991 — was by far the most exciting time of his flying career. His life after the Air Force became a little more sedate — at least in terms of piloting skills. For five years he'd worked for Federal Express flying 737s back and forth across the country. These days he worked for American Airlines as the commander of a 767 on the Atlanta to San Francisco run. And of course, there was his private flying, which, until a year ago, had always been done in rental aircraft. The Skyhawk he was now in was the first plane he had actually owned — or at least that he was making the payments on. In only another fourteen years he would have it paid off.

He let his eyes scan over his instruments and then at the surrounding sky, this visual check automatic and instinctual, his brain noting nothing unusual enough to bring to the forefront where he would actually have to think about it. The forebrain, meanwhile, with no flying related duties to tax it at the moment, continued with the thought it had been mulling over since the autopilot had taken control, namely how nice a double Jack Daniels on the rocks was going to taste when he got home. Though he tried not to drink too much — his father was what society liked to term a "functional alcoholic" and he feared becoming one himself — it was the start of a five day off period for him and he craved the mellowing effect a few double Jacks had on him. He had just completed a thirteen-hour workday, including seven hours in the air and two layovers, and he felt he deserved some relaxation. So what if he would be drinking alone? Just because he did that once in a while didn't mean anything did it? It wasn't his fault that, as a divorced man without much social life, he had no companionship to call on.

The ring tone of "Paint it Black" by the Stones began to emit fro his cellular phone jarring him out of his boozy thoughts. He picked it up from the holder on the instrument panel and looked at the display to see who was calling him, hoping vaguely it was Diane, the accountant he had dated a few times after she'd done his taxes for him the previous February. No such luck. The number identified the caller as Janice, his younger sister and sole sibling. Janice was a lawyer who lived in Granite Bay with her "partner" of six years, Doreen. Scott was not particularly close to Janice, not because of her sexual orientation, which, as a California raised man he didn't really give a damn about, but more because of her abrasive, aggressive personality. They were not enemies by any means but the less time he spent with her the better they seemed to get along. Having her call him on his cell phone was a bit of an unusual occurrence. Curious about why she was doing it now, he flipped it open, answering it.

"Hey, Jan," he said. "What's up?"

"He's gone crazy!" Janice barked at him. "He's gone absolutely fucking crazy!"

Scott blinked, taking a moment to consciously order himself to remain composed. "Who has gone crazy?" he finally asked.

"Dad," she said, her voice flirting with a strange sort of hysteria he had never heard her employ before. "Who the hell do you think I'm talking about?"

"Good point," he allowed. Their father, Jim Foreman, was pretty much the only man she would be calling him up ranting about. And he was what most people — Scott included — would consider a borderline mental case. "I assume he's back in the neighborhood?"

"Oh he's back all right," she said. "After nine fucking months! Just when I thought that old coot had finally disappeared for good, he shows up on my doorstep with that weird-ass bitch he calls his wife."

Scott breathed a small sigh of relief before answering her. Ever since their father had suddenly divorced their mother when Scott and Janice were in their teens he had been in the habit of seemingly disappearing from the face of the earth for days, weeks, even months at a time. Nobody knew where he went when he disappeared and all who knew and loved him had long since tired of even asking where he had been when he returned. He would never tell anyone, would say nothing other than he'd been "traveling". He never brought back souvenirs from his travels, nor sent postcards from places he'd been, nor described the things he'd seen or done. He would just stay home for a few weeks at his house on the shores of Lake Tahoe and then disappear again.

At least that had been the pattern until about two years ago when he'd suddenly shown up with a young Slavic woman he called Beilke and announced she was his wife. Beilke, he said, was someone he had met while traveling in Russia, though he firmly denied any insinuation that she was a mail order bride. Since then his travels had become much more frequent, his stays away much longer until finally it seemed he'd completely fallen of the face of the earth. As Janice had pointed out, it had been a full nine months since anyone had seen or heard from him. And now he was back acting strange enough for Janice to be rattled by it. That was remarkable indeed.

"What did he have to say for himself?" Scott asked.

"He's out of his fuckin' mind, Scotty," she told him. "I think he's going to... you know?"

"No," he said slowly. "I don't know."

He heard her take a few deep breaths, as if bracing herself to say something. "I think he's going to... to... commit suicide or something," she finally spit out.

Scott raised his eyebrows. "Dad? Kill himself?" he asked. "That's absurd. Where in the hell did you come up with that from?"

"You haven't heard what he's done yet," she said. "Scotty, he gave me a million and a half dollars."

"He gave you what?" Scott said in disbelief. "He doesn't have a million and a half dollars. I mean, he's well off, but not that well off. I wouldn't go cashing that check just yet."

"It's not a check. He wired it to my account. I have a confirmation number and I called the bank and they told me it's no joke. That money is there and its already been cleared. He gave me a million and half bucks, Scotty. And he says he going to give you the same. He told me he doesn't need money anymore."

"Wow," Scott said slowly, pondering that with a strong sense of unease mixed with wonder. His father had three million dollars to give away? Where in the hell did he get that kind of money? He hadn't been employed since quitting his last job as bush pilot in Alaska shortly before the divorce. His ability to retire at a young age he had always explained as successful investing during his working years — a story their mother had always proclaimed preposterous — but he had always maintained it was a modest amount he had in reserve. Just enough to get by with. He had certainly never hinted that he was a multi-millionaire. And now he was giving away three million dollars? And telling Janice he didn't need money anymore? That really did sound like the actions of a man contemplating suicide. "Did he seem depressed or anything like that?"

"No," she said. "Not at all. He seemed deliriously happy, in fact. That's what scares me about it. That's the final sign they tell people to look for, the final stage they go through before they actually eat the gun or whatever. Once they've actually decided to do it they're depression goes away because they have a plan, a goal. They see the end of it all. Do you understand?"

"Yeah," Scott said, nodding to himself. Now that she mentioned it, he did remember reading that somewhere before, probably in that psychology class he'd taken as an elective back in college. "Did he say anything else?"

"Just that he wouldn't be seeing me much anymore, that he was going to be taking a much longer trip this time." She paused, as if maintain control of her voice. "Scott, he was basically telling me goodbye. He hugged me. Doreen too, and you know he can't stand her. He wished us a long and happy life together and said he hoped it would be happier than his first marriage."

"Jesus," Scott whispered, mostly to himself but loud enough for the cell phone to transmit the word to Janice. "Where is he now?"

"I don't know," she said. "He said his goodbyes and then he and Beilke just left. And they left on foot!"

"On foot?" he asked. "Are you sure?" Janice lived atop a hillside in an isolated, gated subdivision. It was not the sort of place that one arrived at on foot.

"They just went walking off down the street," she said. "And they never checked in or out with the gate guards either. They just showed up. I'm telling you, Dad has completely lost it! He's gonna off himself, Scotty. We need to get hold of him and... do something."

"How are we going to get hold of him?" he asked. "You know he doesn't have a cell phone. And even if we do get hold of him, what are we supposed to do?"

"Have him committed, get him put on some sort of psychiatric hold... something," she said.

"You're the lawyer, Jan," he said. "He didn't actually tell you that he was going to kill himself, did he?"

"Well... no," she admitted. "But..."

"Look," he said soothingly, "if he stopped to say goodbye to you, he'll say goodbye to me as well. He'll show up at my house at some point, don't you think?"

"I suppose that makes sense."

"When he does, I'll talk to him, try to figure out what he's planning, okay?"

"But what if you can't?" she asked.

"I'll do everything I can, Jan," he said. "Don't worry too much. You know he finds it... well... you know... a little easier to talk to me than to you. He'll tell me what he's planning."

"Maybe," she said thoughtfully, although she didn't sound like she'd stopped worrying. "Jesus, listen to me. If you'd have told me two days ago that I would be frantic because that crazy fucker was thinking about suicide I'd of told you you were insane." She sighed. "I guess I have feelings for him after all."

"I guess it takes something like this to show us that," he said. "I'll keep my eye out for him and I'll let you know as soon as I know anything, okay?"

"The minute you know anything," she said. "The second."

"Right."

They said their goodbyes and disconnected the call. Scott made another check of his instruments, another scan of the airspace around him, and then closed his eyes for a second. He gave a silent sarcastic thank you to his sister and father for giving him something new to worry about.

It was well after dark when he pulled his BMW into the driveway of his two story home. With a push of the remote control button the garage door slid obediently upward on its track, revealing a semi-cluttered three-car garage full of power tools he never used, Christmas decorations he never put up, and a Harley-Davidson Fatboy he rarely rode. He shut off his engine and got out, absently pushing the inside garage door button with one hand while digging out his house key with the other. As the door rattled shut behind him he put the key in the lock and opened the door. On the other side of it was the darkened back hallway that led past a guest bedroom and into the kitchen.

As expected, he was greeted by the steady beeping of the burglar alarm box just inside the door. He had thirty seconds to punch in his code before the actual alarm began to sound. The sound he didn't expect to hear, however, was the sound of classical music issuing from his surround sound system deeper in the house. He never left the stereo system on when he left the house and, even if he had, it most certainly wouldn't have been classical music. He looked at the alarm box and then down the hallway. How had the music come on?

He pondered this question for quite some time, his eyes peering through the darkened kitchen towards the direction of the family room beyond it. There was a light on beneath the doorway in there. He could see its glow on the tile floor. He never left the lights on when he left either. The only conclusion he could draw was that someone either had been in the house... or still was. But how could this person have gotten by the alarm? And why would he or she have turned on classical music?

The alarm panel began to beep more rapidly, indicating he had less than ten seconds to go. He stepped forward and pushed in his four-digit code, silencing it. In doing so, the music became more distinct, enough so he could identify it as Bach, although he could not quite remember the piece. It was the sort of music his father enjoyed listening to, that he had forced upon he and Janice while they were growing up. Was his father the one who had been in there?

He walked slowly down the hall, taking pains to keep his footsteps as quiet as possible. He entered the kitchen and looked around, his sharp eyes searching for anything missing or out of place. Nothing seemed to be amiss but this did little to ease his mind. If he had been burglarized — or was currently being burglarized — was there really anything in this room of the house worth taking? Burglars didn't cart out major appliances, did they?

He stepped forward again, easing across the room towards the beam of light beneath the decorative, swinging door that guarded the entrance to the family room. He put his hand to it and slowly pushed it open, wincing a little as a squeak emitted from the hinges. He looked through the gap created and beheld his family room — the room of the house he spent the most time in when he was home. It was a large room, tastefully decorated with leather couches and mahogany tables. A sixty-inch HDTV was mounted on one wall above a home theater entertainment sound system. The table lamps were all burning brightly and the ceiling fan was turning at high speed. Sitting on the couch, dressed in a tattered pair of denim shorts and a plain white T-shirt, was his father. He was sipping from a water tumbler that contained what appeared to be plain cola but that undoubtedly had a healthy shot of some sort of alcoholic beverage in it. Jim looked up as he saw his son enter the room and a warm smile touched his face.

"Scotty, my boy," he greeted, hefting his drink in a universal salute. "I've been waiting for you."

Scott let out a breath of air and stepped fully through the doorway into the room. "Jesus Christ, Dad," he said. "You scared the crap out of me. How in the hell did you get in here? And for that matter, how in the hell did you get to the house? I didn't see a car out front."

"I'm glad to see you too," Jim replied with an amused chuckle. "And as for the how's and why's of my presence, that will all be explained to you shortly." He stood up, leaving his drink on the end table and walking over to Scott. "In the meantime, son, it's good to see you." He put his arms around him, giving him a fatherly hug.

Scott returned the embrace automatically, though he was as confused and nervous as ever. How had his father gotten in the house without turning off the alarm box? And what was he going to tell him now that would explain all the 'how's and why's', as he put it. "It's good to see you too, Dad. A little disconcerting, but good to see you."

"Disconcerting is my middle name," Jim said, releasing him. "Let's get you a drink."

"Uh... sure," Scott said, forgetting that is was he that should be playing host and not the other way around.

As Jim walked across the room to the oak wet bar installed in the corner, Scott looked him over, marveling with wonder, as he always did, how young and fit he appeared. The man was seventy-three years old but looked fifty at best, maybe even mid-forties. He had a full head of thick, brown hair although Scott — who presumably carried the same genes — had started to lose his in his mid-twenties. Jim's stomach was fit and trim despite the lack of anything resembling exercise and despite a diet that consisted of booze, marijuana, and anything he could shovel into his mouth. This while Scott constantly had to count calories and work out at the gym to keep his beer guy from expanding into something that looked like a second trimester pregnancy.

"Jack on the rocks?" Jim asked as he pulled a glass down from the rack above the bar.

"Yeah," Scott told him. "Make it a double."

"How about a triple? You might need it for our little talk."

Scott considered the matter for perhaps a tenth of a second. "Sure," he replied. "Nothing like a good triple."

Jim opened the refrigerator and shoveled some ice into the glass and then poured a healthy amount of Jack Daniels over the top of it. He then carried it across the room and handed it to Scott. "Don't know how you can drink that shit without a little coke in it," he commented.

"An acquired taste, I guess. Where's Bielke? I talked to Janice earlier and she said she was with you."

"I dropped her off at our new home on the way here," he said. "She had a few things to take care of."

"Your new home?" Scott asked. "You have a home down here now?"

"No," Jim said simply, sitting down on the couch and picking up his own drink.

Scott looked at him for a moment. "Then what new home are you talking about?"

"I'll show it to you in a bit," Jim said. "I think you'll like it. In the meantime, why don't you sit down? Have a couple sips of your drink. We need to talk."

Slowly, Scott sat down. He did as suggested and took a large slug from his glass, relishing the burn of the whiskey as it went down his throat, luxuriating in the warmth it spread throughout his body. He set the glass down and looked at his father. "What's going on, Dad?" he asked. "You had Janice very upset. She said you deposited a million and half dollars into her bank account."

"I did," he confirmed. "And I've done the same to yours as well. I'm liquidating all of my assets in this world and giving them to my two children."

Scott thought about asking his dad where he had gotten three million dollars but decided that wasn't the important question at the moment. "Why," he asked, "are you liquidating all of your assets?"

"I won't need them anymore," he replied.

"I see," Scott said slowly. He licked his lips. "Uh... you're not thinking of doing anything... you know... rash or anything, are you?"

Jim smiled. "You think I'm considering ending it all?" he asked. "Did Janice give you that idea?"

"Well... you know... you're giving all your stuff away and you were just talking about not needing it in this world. What are we supposed to think, Dad?"

"A fair point," he allowed. "I assure you, however, I am not going to be ending it all. On the contrary, I've finally found what I've been looking for all these years and it is time to begin it all. My life, my real life, is just starting."

Scott took another large slug of his drink. "I have no idea what the hell you're talking about," he told his father. "What do you mean you found what you've been looking for? I didn't know you were looking for anything."

"You didn't know I was looking for anything? What do you think I was doing during my travels all these years, my boy? Did you think I was just traveling for the sake of traveling? I was searching for what every man desires, what every man searches for, whether he realizes it or not. I was searching for the perfect companion to spend my life with — a companion I found in Bielke while traveling in Russia. That was the first part of my quest. The second was the perfect home, which I found last year and have been setting up these past months."

"The perfect home?" Scott asked. "And where might that be?"

"Let's just say it's in Maui," Jim replied.

"Maui? You bought a house in Maui?"

Jim laughed loudly, shaking his head in obvious amusement. "Bought a house? How linear your thinking is, my son. No, buying a house does not entail a perfect home as I choose to define it, as any real man should chose to define it. It is not the dwelling or the land that makes a perfect home, but the existence that you carve out. I have carved out my perfect existence on Maui, Scotty, and now that it is complete, I will spend the rest of my life there with Bielke at my side."

"I see," Jim said slowly. "You know, of course, that I have no idea what the hell you're talking about. Anyway, I'm glad you finally found you're... uh... perfect existence. But why all the drama? It's not like we're not going to be seeing you anymore. Hell, Janice takes vacations in Hawaii all the time. And I get free air travel. I'll probably visit you a couple times a year. Hell, maybe more since I'll have a place to stay there."

"Yes," Jim said. "Indeed you will. I will need you to keep me supplied with certain items. Janice, however, will find it a little more difficult to visit me. I don't believe she is ready to see my new home. You, on the other hand, are. You are your father's boy in many ways."

Scott sighed. Just when he thought he was starting to get a handle on what his father was spouting off about, he threw another curveball at him. "Keep you supplied?" he asked. "What are you talking about? And why can't Jan visit you? What kind of weird-ass house do you got there? Are you living in some sort of commune or something?"

"In a manner of speaking, yes," Jim replied. "But that's not important now. As I said, I'll show you my new home soon."

"You have pictures?"

"No pictures," he said. "You will have to see it in person."

"You want me to fly out to Maui with you?" Scott asked. "I only have three days off. I don't think I can make it out this week, but maybe at the beginning of next month? I can do a couple of flight trades and get six days off. That way... what?" He saw that Jim was shaking his head.

"We won't be flying there," Jim told him.

"You want me to take a boat to Hawaii?" he asked. "Why? What's wrong with flying? I do it all the time."

"I have a much more efficient means of travel," Jim told him.

Scott raised his eyebrows up, thoughts of his father's mental instability coming to his forebrain again. "More efficient than flying?" he asked. "And uh... what exactly might that be, Dad?"

"It's what I've come to talk to you about, Scotty," he said. "It's what I've come to give to you tonight, to teach you how to use so you can begin your own quest for that perfect existence."

Scott licked his lips slowly. He was now wondering if his father was an undiagnosed schizophrenic babbling on about delusional ideas he thought were real. This conversation certainly had the air of something out "A Beautiful Mind", didn't it? "Dad... I uh..."

"Hold up on your judgments for the time being, Scott," Jim told him. "I know how all this must sound to you and I know you're probably thinking I'm insane. I assure you that I am not and I never have been. I will explain what I'm talking about and then give a demonstration. All I need from you is an open mind for the next few minutes."

"Open mind, sure," Scott said. "I can do that."

"Okay," Jim said. "Do you remember when you were a child and I lived in Alaska? When I worked as a seaplane pilot for Far North Adventures?"

"Yes," Scott said. And it was true. He remembered that well. It had been when he and Janice were in their early teens, about two years after Jim and their mother had divorced. Jim, seemingly going through a vicious mid-life crisis, had quit his job as an airline pilot and had moved to Alaska to shuttle tourists into the farthest reaches of the vast state in seaplanes. It was the last job he would ever work. After doing it for two seasons he had abruptly quit and his "retirement" had begun, and with it, the mysterious disappearances he called "traveling".

"While I was flying for Far North I developed somewhat of a relationship with a band of Eskimos in the village of Atqasuk, which was an overnight stop for us while we were waiting to pick up our tourists from whatever lake or river we dropped them at. We pilots were virtually the only white people who visited this village. Not even the flying doctors went there. It was an isolated place, accessible only by sled or by aircraft. There were people there who had never even seen a white man prior to Far North's use of it as a waypoint. I found these Eskimos fascinating. They were truly wild people, living the life their ancestors had lived instead of the corrupt and despairing life their kindred were living in Nome and Fairbanks and all the other places where white influence and domination had choked them. I took the time to learn their language and to socialize with them. Eventually they accepted me as a white man they could trust. It was then that they brought something to me one night, something they had found in a cave near the village, something that had been buried beneath some rock and had been there for a long time."

"What was it?" Scott asked, his curiosity piqued a bit.

Jim lifted up his shirt and unclipped something from his belt. "This is what they gave me," he said, holding it up so Scott could see. It was a small black box, about the size of a cellular phone, but thinner and less complex looking. It seemed to be made of steel instead of plastic. There were some ventilation holes in the side of it and a few things that might or might not have been buttons on the front. Other than that, it looked completely uninteresting, more like a child's toy than anything else.

"Okay," Scott said. "What is it?"

"It's a teleportation device," Jim told him.

Scott blinked and took a few deep breaths. "A... teleportation device?" he asked slowly.

"That's right," Jim told him. "I'm not sure exactly how it came to be in that cave where they found it. My best guess is a time traveler from the future put it there."

"A... time traveler from the future?" Scott said, backing away from his dad the slightest bit.

"Yes," Jim agreed. "Although why he or she put it there is somewhat up in the air. You see, it was a brand new device, still in its original box. The Eskimos told me it had been wrapped in some sort of plastic type wrap that kept out the moisture."

"It was in the original box, huh?" Scott asked, his tone mild and careful. "That's uh... uh... amazing, Dad." He was now convinced that his impression of a few moments ago had been correct. His father was an undiagnosed schizophrenic and was deep into a complex delusion. The question was, what should he do about it? Was his father dangerous? Should he contradict this fantasy or go along with it until he could call the authorities?

"I'm not schizophrenic, Scotty," Jim said, his eyes showing mild amusement. "That is what you were thinking, right?"

"Uh... no, Dad, of course not," he said, maintaining the careful, placating tone. "If you say it came from a cave in Alaska and it's a teleportation device, then that's what it is."

Jim chuckled. "You should be commended for your tact, son," he said. "I know how this sounds and what you're thinking. When I read the directions for the device the first time I was thinking the same thing. But I'm not going to sit here and try to convince you I'm sane and that I speak the truth when there's a much easier way to convince you. I will give you a demonstration."

"A demonstration?"

"Watch me carefully, son," he said, holding the device up before him. "The way you view the universe is about to change."

"Dad, look..." he started, and then stopped suddenly as his father disappeared before his eyes. There had been no flash of light, no smoke, no sparkling in the body, only a slight popping sound, like someone clapping their hands together. His father was just gone, the only trace of him the indentation in the couch cushion where his butt had been a moment before. And even that was slowly resuming its natural shape.