Chapter Six: Harsh Reality

Author's Note: This post didn't get posted the first time... so It's out of order. It shout be read before "Chapter Six: - continued -" and after "Chapter five: unexpected visitors"

The shuttle took off smoothly.
"Who are you?" the man demanded, sitting in a chair, facing Jonathan. Jonathan was secured in the chair by some sort of restraints
"My name is Jonathan Brooke," he replied.
"I'm Captain Ignus Fortworth," the man returned. "Listen Jonathan, I have to admit I was pretty worked up down on the surface. I'm going to need you to explain to me what you were doing on the surface."
"I was following out my orders, I was establishing a colony."
"What do you mean your orders? Who would order a colony on a pre-industrial race's home world?"
"What are you talking about?" Jonathan asked. "If you're here, then you know the mission profile. How did you get here so fast, anyway? I only sent my distress signal two weeks ago. That only accounts for transit time, one way."
"We never received a distress signal from you." Captain Fortworth replied, looking confused. "We picked up a disturbance on our planetary monitors, and I was dispatched to investigate."
"What, are you telling me that somebody was here before me? That's not possible!"
"Why not? This planet and the race on it were discovered over fifty years ago. In keeping with the hopes that their development could tell us more about the Mind, we decided not to interfere with the race. That planet could be pivotal to the next Transfer, and you were there tampering with the locals."
"What are you talking about? None of this makes sense. Was I held outside of time for longer than I should have been?" Jonathan could not understand what the man was talking about. None of it made sense. The only logical explanation was that Jonathan had been held outside of time; perhaps missing years or even centuries of his timeline.
"What do you mean, held outside of time?"
"It's one of the few principals of faster than light travel I do--" Jonathan was cut off when the man stood up and clasped a hand to his head, brushing hair aside.
"Faster than light Travel? Faster than light travel! What family are you with- and don't you dare lie to me."
"My name is Brooke, if that's what you mean."
"What the hell planet are you from, man!" Ignus could hardy believe the seemingly endless ignorance of his captive. Why could he not answer the simplest of questions with a straight answer?
"What kind of a question is that? It's not like there's much of a choice." Jonathan retorted
"With seventeen fully settled plants and multiple colonies, I'd say there is."
"This isn't happening to me." Jonathan said. "What year is it?"
"Thirty-Four Ninety Five. What year did you expect?"
"Oh no. On no." Jonathan looked stunned in his seat.
"What year did you think it was?" Ignus asked the man sitting in the binding chair. The conversation was becoming progressively more and more odd.
"Eleven-Fifty-Two. I thought it was Eleven-fifty-two," Jonathan admitted.
Ignus looked at the man. "You're solidly insane. That's why you don't make any sense."
"I'm not insane! I would never have been selected for the mission if I was mentally unstable. I was the first man to travel faster than light away from Earth in Eleven-Fifty-Two P.D."
"Earth? Did you just say Earth?"
"What else would I have said, Port Orphos, or whatever?"
"It's Orpheus..." Ignus said in a sort of daze. He walked towards the exit.
In the main cabin, two other Spacing Commission officers sat at the controls of the vessel. One seemed to be in some sort of meditation.
"Hey, Cap," the one who appeared to be awake said. "Who's the nut-bar in the back? Why was he on that planet?"
"I'm not sure, Andy. He's made some pretty heavy claims, though."
"Like what?" The eager young officer asked.
"He said he's from Earth, Andy. And that it's the Year Eleven-fifty-Two P.D. Furthermore, he said that he got to the planet by faster than light travel."
"What? Really, Cap? He's got to be crazy."
"I thought so too, Andy. But he seems so sincere. I can't read any lies coming off of him. There seems to be no reason for him to tell such lies, either. For all intents and purposes, I think he’s telling the truth."
"Yeah, but I thought nobody survived the Destruction of Earth. I mean, it was the Destruction By definition, nobody should have survived."
"That's the history I learned, too, Andy. But, we all know the Mind is fallible. And the universe is an unpredictable place. Its useless to try and extract any more information from him out here. I think we need to see the Elders in Port Orpheus. They'll be able to read this situation, discover how we can best proceed. Join Helen in the Mind, Andy, I'll be there shortly after I lock down the vessel. We need to make all haste back to Port Orpheus."
"Yes sir."

Jonathan sat in absolute wonderment. Norman was exploring the room they were in. The man -- Captain Forthworth, had shown them both to another section of the shuttle, what was essentially a state-room. He had said that there had been a grave misunderstanding and that Jonathan would be able to speak to some people who could make more sense out of what was going on soon. In fact, the man had told him that the less Jonathan moved, the faster they would arrive at their destination, the mysterious Port Orpheus. Jonathan did not rightly understand what was happening, but he knew it would be useless to argue. And, he had to admit, it did feel good to be in contact with human beings again, no matter how convoluted their system seemed to be.
Jonathan could find no way to explain his situation other than to assume that his trip outside of time to Sigma had somehow managed to throw him off course not only in space, but also return him at the wrong time. Humans must have spread out considerably in the two-thousand years or so he had been gone. His name, perhaps, would not be on many people's minds, if he had supposedly never survived his first Faster than light trip. And how would they know if he survived, if he ended up so many hundreds of year after when he was supposed to be. He compared his knowledge of two thousand years ago --his years-- with that of what should have been his current time. It made sense; he did not know the names of anybody from the middle ages. He knew people did important things, but not who they were. Perhaps by this time, he had been lost in history.
It was useless to dwell on such things at the time, however. Jonathan soon realised that he really had no conception of what was going on and consigned himself to sleep.
Norman had settled onto a chair in the room. Jonathan mumbled a goodnight to his strange companion, and drifted off to sleep.

Word Count: 9,900/50,000
Days Left: 24
Sanity: Still here
Cafinated Beverages: 1