Chapter 1

Well, what came next? Where, as they often ask, do I go from here? Hell, I could go anywhere I wanted to, couldn't I. That was the rub though. I had it to do. It wasn't as if I could hop in a car and go somewhere though. There were no cars here, or at least I hadn't seen one yet. It didn't matter so much though because there were no roads here either.

Another big mystery was where was I starting from? I didn't have the first fucking clue there either. The last place I remember being was near my hometown, in Texas. In North East Texas as a matter of fact, and it was possible I was still there, or somewhere close.

When was I here though? I know, I remember, Stephen Hawking said time travel was possible, but not in the rearward direction. Say what? You can't go back in time because of the possibility of causing a paradox?

What I want to know is where are the time cops located? Who checks on things like that to keep it from happening? I can tell you who. No one. There is no great cosmic intelligence directing things. We are just where we are unless we get moved somewhere else and the universe has to deal with us on an as is basis, with individual trials. We are where we are and it is when we are. If we get moved somewhere else we are just somewhere else and if we get moved some when else we are just some when else.

The only thing, which really matters, is now. What is happening now and what will we do next. Time keeps moving on, unless something abnormal happens. It's like position. Your position in space stays the same unless something happens to move you. So why should travel in time be limited to only one direction? Everyone can travel in time and we do so from the start, but are we really traveling in time or are we just letting it go by?

Damned if I know is what I can tell you, but if we travel in time who is to say we can only travel in the direction we are already going? Stephen Hawking is saying it, but so what? In my mind he isn't talking about traveling in time at all, he is only talking about accelerating the passage of time. Hell, we do that every night when we sleep.

And after all that discussion where am I left. I'm left right where I was, but I don't know where it is and really, I don't know when it is.

I know I'm in a pine forest.

"Why," you might ask, "do you think you have traveled in time?"

Because of the fucking trees, that's why.

"Well what about the trees? There are trees everywhere and every when by the way."

Maybe, but not like these.

"What's so special about your particular trees?"

I'll tell you. They are giants. Giant yellow pines. Three and more feet in diameter.

"So what?"

So, they would have been cut by 2010. Oh, maybe a few made it past 2010, but not this many. Damned nearly all the trees I can see are these old giants. Yellow pines only grow, mostly, in one particular area on earth. It's a large area, as in, the southeast United States, but by 2010 it was heavily populated. And there was no area left where trees this size could have hidden from the maw of the timber and paper industries. At least there wasn't a place they could hide in 2010.

But I was here now. I was some time or some place I couldn't know about. How did I get here? Somehow I was removed from where I was and deposited here. It was the only thing, which made sense. The last thing I remember was being in my home, asleep.

Something took hold of me and moved me. Whether it moved me in space or time I didn't know for sure, but I was removed from where I was and moved. To get so far from where I had been something unusual had to have happened.

I could easily imagine a scenario where people could have entered my house, used gas or drugs to render me even more unconscious than I was already, kept me unconscious, and physically moved me. What I couldn't imagine was how they found this place with these giant trees. I also couldn't imagine why any group of people would go to so much trouble to move me.

I was nobody to anybody but myself. I wasn't a mover and shaker among the elite. I was a poor boy from North East Texas. Hell, I was a redneck, for God's sake.

The only thing that really made any sense was that something accidental moved me. Something that occurred naturally had happened to happen right where I was and sent me here. What could have happened?

Lightning. It must have been lightning. Lightning was the most powerful natural event happening the night I last remember. Thunder was rumbling in the distance when I went to sleep. The weather channel had told me, and others no doubt; a storm was coming our way. It was one of the reasons I went to bed early. I was anticipating a power outage from a close by lightning strike to one of the power lines.

"Aw hell, you say, lightning strikes all the time and doesn't send people back in time." I say, how do you know? How do you know people aren't sent back in time occasionally? People are struck and killed by lightning. How do you know their essence isn't moved back in time leaving their current body dead? Face it. You don't know. Lightning is the most powerful unintentional release of energy on earth. It is the most powerful natural release of energy. Who is to say what it can do or what it does.

So there you have it. I was struck by lightning and put back in time. Simple when you get down to it. It would explain my current situation perfectly. It covered all the facts I had available anyway.

It also left me in one hell of a mess. I was in a piney woods. Place unknown, time unknown, and naked. This was down to the basics. The first thing I needed was a weapon. I looked on the ground around me and found a nice baseball sized rock. It would do for now.

Next thing I needed was some clothes and no matter how hard I looked I didn't see any jeans lying around. Oh well, maybe I could do better after the sun came up.

When the sun did rise I started looking around me more carefully. I found a wagon trace, though it was barely used, and started walking down it. From the sun's position I thought I was moving west, but I wasn't moving very fast.

I was keeping my eyes open though and shortly I noticed a man sitting on a horse standing beside the road. He was back in the woods a little from the road and he seemed to be watching it.

I kept trees and brush between us and moved closer to examine him. He was dressed and he was riding a saddled horse. He also had firearms on his person. He had some sort of revolver in a holster at his right hip and there was a saddle scabbard on the left side of his horse with a rifle in it. I couldn't see what type of rifle it was from my vantage, but I could tell it was a lever action.

Wait. He moved and is looking down the trace. It was as if he'd heard something and was peering down the road to see what it was.

Then I heard it too. It sounded like some sort of harness rattling. I turned to look also and I saw a wagon topping a gentle rise about half a mile away. There were mules pulling it. A team of eight mules and the noise had come from their harness as they moved.

The waiter was now focused on the coming wagon and he pulled his revolver. To me it seemed obvious. He had somehow known the wagon was coming and was waiting to stop it or rob it.

I used the fact his attention was on the wagon to slip up closer to him. I could see him getting more tense as he waited and I could tell he intended to spur his horse into the road when they came close enough. I moved too and put myself into a good rock throwing range from where I expected him to go.

It seemed to take hours but finally the moment was on us. He spurred his horse into the road and stopped exactly where I'd expected him to. The wagon stopped also and then the rider turned toward it and fired one shot. I fired my shot then, or at least I reared back and threw the rock.

My move wasn't unprecedented. In my previous life, the only way I could think of my past now, I had been a baseball pitcher. I'd been a wonder in little league, earned a college scholarship, and even gone on to pitch in the minors. I didn't have a good curve ball or even much of a changeup, but I'd always had a powerful fastball. I guess now it was a fast rock. It hit him just behind the ear and he fell as if he'd been pole axed.

Naked or not I rushed to him and grabbed up his revolver. All I could hear now was a woman screaming "Papa, Papa", from the wagon. I took the time to remove the attackers pants and put them on myself before rushing to the wagon to see if I could help.

I couldn't and in fact no one could. I shuddered thinking of the shape I'd be in now if the rider had seen me first. He'd drilled the wagon's driver right in the heart and the man was dead already.

It took me half an hour to settle Amy down. Amy was the woman's name, or the girl's. I'd have to see later which she considered herself.

After a lot of explaining I told her my take on things and it was more information than she'd had even though she'd been present for most of it. After she was somewhat coherent and with me again I got back down out of the wagon and examined the attacker again. He was still out, but he was still breathing. I didn't want him to come back to himself so I looked around and spotted a large sheath knife in its sheath on his belt.

I didn't even know the proper way to cut a man's throat, but I took his knife and gave it my best shot. I could tell when I'd opened both his carotid arteries and after I had I considered myself done. I removed his shirt first of course since I didn't want blood all over it. In fact I removed everything from him, took his ankle, and dragged him off into the woods. When I had him out of sight I even cut off his dick and ball sack. It was death by bleeding after all and more openings in his vascular system would mean a faster death.

I caught up his horse and tied it to the back of the wagon and then went back to check on Amy. She asked if I could bury her father and when I agreed she showed me where to find the shovel. Let me tell you, it is hell digging a grave with a round point shovel while barefoot. I did it though, and then I pulled the wagon off the road and into the woods beside the grave I'd just finished.

With Amy's help I took her father out of the wagon and lowered him into the grave. She said a few words over him and then a prayer and then she turned away and I took my cue to cover him up. After the job was done she prayed over him again and then turned to me.

I told her my story then, or an abbreviated version of it. I think I left her thinking I'd been waylaid and left naked in the woods by person or persons unknown.

Thankfully she asked if I was hungry and I admitted I'd at least gone without breakfast this morning. She asked me to build a fire and after I had she started cooking a meal, or part of one anyway.

As we were talking it came up that I didn't know where the attacking rider had come from and Amy asked if I didn't want to look around to see if he had camped nearby.

It made sense to me and I started off walking until she asked me why I didn't use my horse. After a little confusion she pointed out that his former horse was mine now since he wouldn't need it any longer. I took it on faith and extrapolated it to taking his boots too. They were approximately the correct size and they went on fairly easily after Amy provided a pair of her father's socks.

It was a smart move for her to suggest since when I mounted and heeled the horse without giving it much direction it walked about two hundred yards farther into the woods and came upon a camp. There were two wagons there and one mule hobbled and grazing.

After looking through the wagons I could see they had been ransacked. Looking more closely I found a stash up near the front of the best looking wagon and it was a stash of valuables. Apparently the robber I'd rocked to death had been using this as his outpost.

He had made a good haul or hauls. I found nearly three hundred dollars worth of coined money in gold. Four revolvers in various states of condition. Two Henry rifles, one Sharps rifle in 50-90 and three more Army Colt conversions fixed to fire the .44 rim fire cartridges used also by the Henrys.