*
Thunder raged around us, ripping open the rain clouds and forcing us to seek shelter. We had arrived at a strongly flowing river in a valley filled with lime trees, birch and hazel. The river seemed to double back on itself around a marshy mere at the foot of a wooded rise. If we were still in the Stonehenge area, I guessed we might be at what came to be called, the river Avon at Amesbury - but then for all I knew I could have been blasted thousands of miles. Luckily, Vart knew exactly where we were, and jogged along the bank to where an ancient fallen tree bridged the river. Sure footed as a squirrel, he danced over its thick boughs to the far side. I followed, less elegantly, manfully bearing his laughter and obvious insults.
As I skidded on the slippery bark and teetered above the quick waters, I realised that my usefulness to Vart was purely as entertainment. I was a constant source of amusement to him; the Matt Lucas of the Stone Age. Despite his insults, I made it across with dry feet. Once on firm ground, I raised my arms wide and sang out a triumphant “TARRAAHH”.
With a look that would freeze curry to your fries, he stared at me as though I was a total nutter, and stomped off.
When the great tree had fallen its roots had erected a deep cowl of shelter. It was obviously a place well known to Vart. Wood-ash and the bones of various fish and fowl littered a well-used hearth, dry as toast, even in the downpour. From the deepest recesses of the tree root canopy, he pulled out a large bundle, wrapped in leather, and unrolled from it a couple of bed furs. Selecting the best for himself, he tossed the other to me. I was glad to have it too, though it felt damp and smelled like a vet’s doormat.
As I looked around I saw what an ideal spot it was for a camp site, securely surrounded by river on three sides and by marsh on the fourth. From one of his bags Vart produced a flint and a small cob of iron pyrites. He struck them together over dried moss kindling which he produced from a pouch inside his jerkin. Soon he had a flame. It burned up brightly, filling our shelter with warmth and light, and I realised what luxury this was. He grinned at me, seeking approval. I gladly supplied it.
Hungry and worn out, I sagged back into my damp bed of leaves and bracken, wondering again what had happened to me. How had I come to this terrible place? I tried ineffectively to gather my damp bedding about me as I looked across the fire at my companion. This was his world not mine. I did not belong. I should not be here. How had this happened to me?
I was shivering and weary. I couldn’t think clearly. I watched Vart leaning over the fire, performing what I would learn was his nightly ritual. First, he straightened his arrows in the heat of the flames, and then inspected their flint tips and feather flights in the firelight, before blowing on them one by one and replacing them in his beaver skin quiver. Next, he took a flint knife from a pouch at his belt and inspected its edge, napping it here and there with a special antler tool, shaped like a fat cigar. His work bench was a stiff leather pad, about the size of a saucer, balanced on his knee. He inspected his spear too, checking its ash-wood shaft and flint tip. As I watched, I wondered miserably if this was to be my future too, fretting about the edge on my flint axe, or the straightness of my arrows. Of course, I could see how these things could be matters of life or death in this world; the difference between eating and starving, defending yourself or being killed. I just didn’t want to be here.
I did not find out then what other chores Vart might have included in his nightly ritual. Instead I closed my eyes and tried to sleep. But as weary as I was, I did not sleep well, in fact, hardly at all. I was cold and my damp, bear skin cover was not much help. Nightmares stampeded across my mind. I dreamed such terrible things. I saw the fight over my torch, only it was between me and the professor. I killed him and buried him in my trench on the dig site. I was the only person left there. I could hear him calling out to me from beneath the ground, crying that he was still alive and wanted the world to know it. I could not shut him up. Then I saw bears writhing in a slip of chalk mud and felt the slash of a spear across my throat.
Vart was missing when I awoke. My wristwatch told me it was just after eleven, but the bright dawn sky indicated a much earlier hour, five or six perhaps. Looking around I guessed it was still June. There were fresh green leaves on the trees and the brambles had blossoms but no fruits yet. I was relieved to think that the previous day’s wintry sky had evidently just been a one off. I was not ready for winter. I could never survive. Summer would be hard enough, even with Vart’s help. Thankfully, this day was clear, sunny and warm. Birdsong echoed gloriously in the cathedral-like acoustics of the valley roofed by majestic limes. Perhaps I could learn to survive before winter came. I would have no choice if I could not get back to my own time.
It was a relief to see Vart’s bags lying on his bed of bracken and grass. He must still be close by. I went looking for him, stalking carefully, so as not to make too much noise. Vart could move through the woods like a ghost. To survive here I would need to learn the same skills.
I caught a glimpse of him downstream, his feet firmly planted on a leafy bough bent out over the water. Screened by leaves I could not see all of him clearly, but could tell he was poised to spear a fish. I crept closer. I wanted to see how he did it. If I were to be stuck here forever, fish would be an essential part of my diet, especially in winter. Suddenly he struck, making a clattering splash over the water. Twisting round he flicked a large trout from his spear on to the muddy bank between us.
I ran out of hiding eager to congratulate him, but the startled face I saw was not his. It was a terrified stranger, who immediately sprang at me like a gazelle. A stone axe appeared in one hand as he flung his spear at me with the other. I ducked and knocked the shaft aside as it sliced the air above my head. I took a vicious kick on my thigh that sent me sprawling. My reflexes rolled me out of reach of the expected follow up. Thank goodness for judo lessons. I was quickly up on my feet and ready for the onslaught. The stranger danced around me to get to where his spear lay amongst a tangle of flotsam. Gathering it up, he lowered it and charged at me. Luckily for me, it was a classic judo practice move. I knew exactly what to do. I side stepped, grabbed the shaft of the spear and rolled backwards using his momentum to take him down. He hit the ground face first, busting teeth and biting into his tongue.
Rolling around clutching his mouth, he screamed in agony, spraying blood through his fingers. I had his spear now, but I was terrified and confused. I swung it round and brought its point to bear on him. His stone axe caught my thigh as he slashed blindly. The wound sprayed blood, but oddly it didn’t hurt. I saw that his bloody fingers could not grip his axe firmly, and sure enough, as he took another swing at me, it flew from his hand and skittered across the ground to plop into the river shallows. Fighting like a wild cat, he produced a stone knife and lurched up towards me. I fell backwards in my panic to get away, but he ran full tilt onto the spear's wildly flailing point. It pierced his fur tunic. I couldn't stop it. I felt sick to see it bury itself in his stomach. I had not intended to spear him. I just wanted to get away.
He let out a soft, gurgling cry and rolled into a foetal ball clutching the spear point. I pulled it out of him carefully, as though doing so would somehow make it all better again. I prayed that it would. Blood squirted over the grass. I was trembling and weak with nausea I dropped to my knees beside him, begging him not to die. Groaning and coughing he was clutching his stomach as if trying to push the pain away.
Vart was suddenly beside me. He rolled the man onto his back and slashed him across the throat with his flint blade. Turning to me, he shrugged. ‘Maruth,’ he said.
‘He’s dead! I killed him,’ I wailed.
Vart eyed me thoughtfully. ‘Maruth doth,’ he said softly, and holding out his arms, he shrugged with an air of inevitability. Gesturing to a dead tree nearby, he repeated, ‘Maruth,’. And, pointing to the now dead fish on the bank, he said it again. I realised with a shudder how little life meant in Vart’s world. Maruth was everywhere, inevitable of course, b
ut brutally so. In modern times too, death is everywhere, but so often we do not see it. Until that moment I had barely thought about death. In my world death is cleaned up and dressed in flowers. Television news coverage of the even bloodiest wars and disasters is carefully edited. Nothing must upset the sensitive viewer. I had just fought a man, wounding him fatally. The sleeves of my jacket were soaked in his blood. The gash on my thigh bled through a tear in my jeans and soaked into my sock. Maruth, was everywhere and I was its bringer. Two men were now dead because of me.
Vart was searching the corpse. I fished the flint axe from the river and washed its bloody handle. He signed that I should keep it. Rejecting the man’s spear shaft for some reason, he hacked off its flint tip and stowed it inside his jerkin. Around the corpse’s neck, a bear tooth was strung on a leather thong. Vart removed it carefully and looped it over his own head. It was stained with recently dried blood and I realised it was probably from the bear that had chased me. Perversely, I found myself wishing I'd taken it as my trophy. Vart saw my coveting glance and grinned, but kept it for himself.
As I watched him, my nightmare came back to me. I had dreamed that I could hear the professor calling out from under the ground, telling people he was not dead. Could I do that? Could I put a message where they would find it? Would something like that work? I'd been wondering about this time travel thing, even though I tried putting it from my mind, it seemed too weird.
Einstein’s general theory of relativity doesn't disallow the possibility, but quantum physicists are not queuing up to prove him right. There are many who simply say, it’s pure Hollywood. But, I vividly recalled that I had been touching the silver thing in my bag when I’d been zapped into this hostile, stone-age world. What was that if not time travel? Was the silver thing some sort of key to time travel? Was it a time wand? I had certainly wanted it to be when the bear was chasing me. Had I been right? Set it, wave it, and wizzo you’re off to another time. But it hadn't worked. Could I fix it? Could I learn how to use it?
Who did I think I was fooling? It was as dead as a pan. Even the little green LED was dead. And so was I, at least as far as my world was concerned.
I thought about my mom and Ryan. I missed them. I knew my mom would be in a state. She cried a lot since my dad died. I wished he was alive. He would have made one of his crazy inventions to get me home. He was brilliant at science and always showed me stuff.
I thought of Tori too.
……….