Tim Poral walked the floor, his paws sliding on the rough carpet. He was unhappy to say the least, that his best Time Agent was late, and since because she was the best he couldn't yell at her for her tardiness.
Tim puffed on his cigar, his tail thrashing, and he continued to pace the floor. Looking at his watch in spite of the huge exact time indicator on the wall (accurate to the last microsecond), he still depended on his Timex, with the hand of that curious cartoon human indicating that his agent was 10 minutes late. What a day to be late. Indications in the Chronosphere showed that a change in temporial stabilizers was being caused by... well, that was the problem... they didn't know WHAT was causing it.
Tim again checked his watch, and opened his mouth to curse, when his office door flew open. Crashing against the wall, and almost overturning his lunch cooler of fresh fish. A sultry voice said smartly, "Hiya Boss! Sorry I'm late!"
Tim Poral looked into the face of his best agent. "Glory Jones! Don't you own a watch?"
Glory looked at her boss in surprise. "A watch? Well, of course I wear one. Unfortunately the battery died during the night. I've been to three jewelry shops trying to get a new battery. They can't seem to get the back of it open." The Time Agent sighed and opened a desk drawer. Throwing her purse into it, she shoved it shut with her foot and sat down in a chair. "There... Now what is it that you are so uptight about? It's not like I'm an hour later than usual... only a few minutes..."
Tim shook his head and grumbled under his breath. He started pacing the room again, wringing his hands over and over. "I need your expertise, Glory. Something is terribly wrong and I don't know what. The temporial stabilizers are changing... I have no idea why. This could mess up everything...
Glory cocked her head a little to the side, a quirky grin on her face. "How exactly could this mess everything up? And what *IS* everything?"
Tim furrowed his eyebrows and suddenly went still. He looked around and motioned for Glory to close the door behind her, and sit down. After she did, he cleared his throat and spoke. "Well, there isn't much that I can tell you, really. A lot of what is going on has still been classified by the government, ...damn beaurocratic red tape..." He started to grumble and curse under his breath.
Glory smiled and gently cleared her throat to bring him back to the room. He harrrumphed and thought for a moment, following his train of thought. When he got it back on track, he continued.
Tim Poral stopped and looked at Glory, "When was the Declaration of Furripendence signed?"
Glory looked at her boss and laughed, "What? Why, July 4th,1776 of course."
Tim shook his head, "Not according to this." Tim handed Glory a 5th grade civics book, opened to a picture of a group of furs in early furrimerican dress, all watching one of them sign a document. The caption under the picture read, 'The Declaration of Furrypendence being signed December 7th, 1941.'
Glory looked at the photograph... (photograph?) and chuckled, "Ok..so someone made a pointless joke... so what?"
Tim took the book and opened it to another page, showing a fur in a spacesuit setting foot on the moon.
Glory looked at the painting, and the caption which read, "Someday soon a fur will walk on Earth's nearest neighbor."
Glory blinked, "But... furs have already been to the moon, more than 30 years ago..."
Tim nodded, "Maybe... but every book in the world has dates that are all wrong... and furs are starting to 'remember' these dates and facts as reality. Something has changed history. Who or what has affected the Temporial stabilizers, we don't know... but it's your job to find out, and set it right!"
Glory shook her head and leafed through the book some more. "Everything is like almost 200 years behind... this is so weird." She snapped the book shut and stood up abruptly, turned on her heels and went over to the chronosphere.
Glory tapped at the sphere's surface and then spread her paws over the smooth surface. Her fingers tingled as if the chronosphere was emanating an electrical charge. Quickly she snatched her fingers away and began to rub her paws together. "Boss?" She turned and looked at Tim. "Boss, have you touched the chronosphere? It made my fingers tingle... just like they say happens moments before lightning strikes."
Tim looked at Glory in surprise and shook his head in disbelief. "Oh no... they warned me about this. I should have known it would happen someday."
"What, Tim? What has happened? Will you please just tell me what we need to do?"
Tim nodded and moving over to a chair, sank down into it. "Something has happened to bring time and space into a misalignment. It happens every 200 to 500 years or so. We need to go back into the book to see when the last accurate dates are shown. Then we have to travel back into time to find the problem and fix it."
Glory snorted "Geez... wouldn't you know it? And just before a holiday... I was planning on going to my Mom's place in Furndiana, too."
"Well, let's get started on that book. We need to get this settled." Glory picked the book up off the desk and went over next to Tim. She dragged up another chair and spread the book open between them, paging through it slowly, moving backwards in history.
Slowly, Tim started to leaf through the book, going thru the first paw prints on the moon, past the blemish of human slavery, backwards to the Civ-fur War, and finally found the date that he was looking for, the first Thanksgiving.
Tim put his clawed finger down on the page and looked to Glory. "Ok, This is the First Thanksgiving. We need to go back to... (he looked at the page to read the date) November 26, 1634..? That is quite an odd year, I would say." He looked to Glory and closed the book marked to the page they needed. He stood and took Glory's smaller paw in his, saying "Come on, we need to brave that time machine once more."
Glory sighed. "You know how sick that makes me! I guess I know the world rests on our shoulders though, and so we must tally ho... right?"
Tim beamed "You read my mind!" He clapped her on the back and opened the door for the fine fur, noticing her nice slim body for what seemed like the umpteenth time. He sighed, remembering his wife and kids at home.
Tim held the door open for Glory and started in after her into the plain hall sloping down into the ground. "Glory, do you think we should go to 1634 and find out why the Pilgrims got here then, or head on over to Plymouth England in 1620 and find out why they didn't leave?"
Glory looked thoughtful for some time. "Well, I don't know Tim. I think we will head to 1634 first, to find out how the old ancestors are doing."
Tim nodded and put his paw on the security plate at the end of the hall. The massive door opened and two large human guards aimed plasma pistols at them as they entered the room.
"State your business here or face immolation!" blurted one of the guards.
Tim looked at him. "Gee, Valdezz. Do you always have to be so dramatic?"
The little human puffed up his chest. "I take my job very seriously!"
Tim laughed.. "Sure, sure... reg us through to portal one."
The guard nodded and did so. Tim and Glory headed to the main time portal through another heavy door. When they got there, three techs met them with equipment and cloths.
"We are issuing you synthetic wool. It is just as warm as the real thing but not at all as itchy... Here are your coms... Slip them in your ear and they will wiggle into place. You two should know the rules of conduct for travel so I will not tell you again. What date you want to dial for?"
Glory looked at the tech. "1634, east coast of what is now the US."
The tech nodded. "You got it."
Two hours later, Glory and Tim were laying on their tummies looking at the camp of the 'just arrived' Pilgrims. Glory listened for some time, then looked at Tim. "I can tell you want is wrong if you would like."
Tim grunted. "Easy to tell Glory. They are not English. What are they speaking?"
"Spanish." Glory sighed. This was going to be harder then she had hoped.
Glory and Tim got to their paws and started towards the group of 'Pilgrims' near the beach. They walked closer, and did their best to casually mix into the group.
Tim looked confused, and he leaned to Glory, saying, "This isn't good, the last time I spoke spanish was in 7th grade, and I was more interested in the fish in the stream by the schoolhouse window than I was in the lesson."
Glory smiled, "Don't worry, "She whispered, "I wasn't asleep." [For convenience sake (and due to my lack of bilingual skills) the dialogue will be mostly in English.]
"Ola! Como esta?" Glory said.
A large Spaniard in brightly colored clothing and a gold chest plate moved forward, "Ola, "He said, "You are Spanish? You have a strange accent."
Glory smiled, "No we are... from far away... we heard your group and thought we would say hello."
The big Spanish bear looked at Glory and Tim, "At least you aren't those savage furs that seem to be all over the place here.
"They are a strange race.. living by streams and eating fish... watching the skies and beating drums. They are not like us.. but they are friendly enough."
Glory of course knew of the Native Furrimericans of which the bear spoke. "Yes, we know of those... uh savages... but tell us.. what brings you to this wild country?"
El oso diga le, "We had happy lives and homes in Spain. We worked hard and raised our children as best we could. Then Signore Allcedo De La Blanka came into power and began an Inquisition. All furs who even hinted of living up to his view of 'Christian' were put in prison, tortured, or even killed. We decided to come here to the new world, and escape his insane vision of being a Christian. He is insane you know... he destroyed an English colony in Virginia about 18 years ago. It was terrible... the Furrimerican's told us of it."
Glory looked at Tim, "You say that this La Blanka destroyed the English colony in Virginia?" Glory whispered to Tim, "I think we know where to go next."
"Now we are free of La Blanka, and can live and worship as we choose."
Glory nodded and listened politely to the bear, at which he smiled and continued on telling her and Tim about the trials and tribulations of his people. She felt bad for Tim, knowing that not a word of this diatribe made any sense to him at all.
She admired him for seeming to pay such close attention. He had a knack for nodding his head at all the right moments. As the bear seemed to wind down, she smiled at him and reached her paw out to pat his shoulder. "It is good that you and your people are safe now. We wish you luck, but we must continue on our way. It was nice talking to you." She waved at his men and grabbed Tim's paw as she started to move away from the bear. Tim nodded to the bear and the two of them turned to walk back over the hill where they first had spied the Spaniards.
Once they were out of earshot, Glory leaned closer to Tim and quietly said, "Boss, we need to get to Spain right away and find out what should be done. The Spaniards suffered through the Inquisition but never fled their country because of it." Tim nodded and they started walking a bit faster as they neared the top of the hill to the coordinates where they first appeared...
When they get to the top of the the hill, Tim and Glory saw a portal, just tall enough for two furs to walk through. With a deep breath, Tim took Glory's paw, knowing how she hated the ride, and strode with her into the unknown.
For a few seconds, they saw nothing, felt nothing under their feet, feeling like they were spinning yet still at the same time. Then, with a flash, it was all over. They were in Spain, 18 years before they would have met the bear. It was night time, and they saw a large city on the top of the hill . "Guess that is where we need to be," Glory said, her stomach still reeling.
"Yeah." Tim responded. When he saw his time travel mate turning an odd shade of green, he helped her sit down for a moment. When she started to feel better, Tim helped her up and looked her over.
"You ready?" he asked.
Glory nodded her head and held her paw in his, just for a moment, before blushing and letting go. "Lets go!" she exclaimed, and they started to walk towards the Spanish city.
The city was dark and only lit within a few buildings with burning candles to ward off the dark. Tim and Glory worked from one shadow to the next, as they looked over the city like thieves at night. Their clothes no longer fit for the time and place. They slowly came up on a small inn and looked at each other. Every time agent always had one gold coin on them when they went into flux. They entered the building together and blinked in the light of an electric bulb.
Glory sent a glance at Tim. "Oh, Glory be! Evil magic!" Glory criss- crossed her face and started to back out of the room. A fur on the other side of the room looked up. He had on far more modern clothing. "Oh put a sock in it Glory. Your accent really sucks."
Tim looked at the man with narrowed eyes. "Count Tarcam. I thought you were dead."
The other man snorted and waved his paw. Guards came out from the woodwork behind Tim and Glory. "Sorry to disappoint you. Least I will know that you are dead when I am finished, this time..."
"Why are you doing this, Tarcam?" Tim asked, trying to buy some time. "This interference of yours will set technology back 200 years... we might *never* discover the Chronosphere. And you know what that means."
Tarcam threw his head back and laughed. "Good try, Tim, but do you really expect me to believe that == ERK!"
Glory pressed her claws tighter against Count Tarcam's throat! "Back off!" she yelled to the guards in spanish. They didn't, but they stopped advancing. Tim took the chance to join her, safely out of harm's reach.
"What now," he asked.
"We need to find out how much damage is done before we kill him," Glory snarled. "Let's take him to the cellar. I bet he has a whole stash of torture equipment."
Count Tarcam gulped.
"Glory," Tim scolded, "I know you're not feeling very well tonight but that's no reason to turn psycho on me. We should at *least* give him a chance to tell us what he did without removing any..." Tim looked down, "....appendages."
"Yes! Yes! I'll talk!" Tarcam babbled.
"What do we need to do --" "What did you do to --" Tim and Glory looked at each other, then Glory tightened her claws. "You know what we want to hear."
"You need to -- you have to --" Tarcam gasped for breath. "I can't -- let me --"
With that he slumped against Glory, unconscious.
Tim looked at Glory, "Uhmm... maybe a bit less pressure on him would have been better."
Glory smiled, "Don't worry, he'll be coming around pretty quick... I've been watching Xena: Furry Princess. In fact he should be rousing just about..."
Tarcam began to stir. He lifted his head and opened his eyes. Glory waved her claws in front of his face, "All right Tarcam... talk."
Tarcam mumbled... a flash of Glory's claws made his voice improve markedly.
"It was like this," He quivered, "I made a deal with La Blanka to.. uh.. assist him in his Inquisition, for all the land in the New World.
"He is a religious zealot, he cares nothing for material gain, only religious purity. I told him that I could bring 'the light...' (Tarcam pointed to the electric lamp) to his followers, in exchange for ownership of the New World. Of course, I convinced him that in order to bring his version of 'Christianity' to the savages there, he would have to remove the unclean English folks who were settling in Furginia."
Tim looked at Glory, and then at Tarcam, "And the modern technology?"
Tarcam grinned, "I only had to show him that lamp and the generator to convince him I was an agent of the Lord. Everything else is in the basement. The English are 2 weeks ahead of La Blanka's ships. By the time they get settled, La Blanka's forces will destroy them, and Furrimerica will be mine!""
Glory looked at Tim, "Well... I guess we first have to take that machinery, and," she looked at Tarcam, "...this.. back to our time. Then.. off to Furginia."
Tim nodded and started for the basement.
Glory dropped Tarcam into the paws of the waiting techs and grinned. "Here you go... one problem solved. Do you have one of the wavestorm ships left from the last war?"
The tech blinked and looked at Glory. "Miss. Those things are not a toy to be played with. You know as well as I do that the UN banned all wave- storm ships after the end of the war. Only the US still has them around anymore, and if they dare use one the rest of the world..."
Tim reached out and put his fingers over the muzzle of the tech. "Just answer the question. Do you have a wavestormer available?"
The tech sputtered. "Well... yes. I do. There will be some papers that you will have to fill out for it and you will have to sign your life away about ten times to hell..."
Tim reached out again and held the techs mouth shut... then took out some paper and signed his name onto it. "Copy it and put it onto all of the right papers. We want the windstormer tonight."
Glory giggled and headed out of the room and Tim turned to follow. As they walked down the hallway Tim looked at Glory. "Why do you want a windstormer anyways?"
Glory glanced at Tim. "You can't kill the ships following the pilgrims. You know that. So what do you do?"
Tim laughed... "Make them seasick!"
Dusk. November. 1620. Ten majestic warships sail slowly towards a rocky shore. Suddenly a glowing portal opens in front of them, and out drops what looks like a tiny toy plastic boat.
Inside the portal, Tim looks at his partner. "Go ahead, Glory. Push the button."
"But... but it's so *cruel*..."
"Here, I'll do it." [CLICK]
On one of the warships, its scout at the top of the mainmast sees the shore and yells, "Land --" [BRRRAAAPPP!]
"What is it, sailor?" asks the captain, when a strange look comes over his face. "Excu -- " [pfft] [braaap]
Sounds of coughing and choking and... other sounds come from the holds below, where the waiting soldiers are packed in tight quarters.
Back inside the portal, Tim nods. "It looks like the windstormer did its job. They'll be no match for the English." ;-)
"Say..." Glory said, looking through the portal...
"What?"
"Do you think we should have closed the portal before setting that thing off?"
Tim and Glory looked at each other in horror, and ran back to the land of modern toilets!
The End