The Time Pacer: An Alien Teen Fantasy Adventure (The Time Bender Book 2) Read online

  THE TIME PACER

  by Debra Chapoton

  copyright 2017 by Debra Chapoton

  cover art by Boone Patchard

  Praise for THE TIME BENDER series:

  “I thoroughly enjoyed The Time Bender. Debra Chapoton has once again entertained and delighted me with her world building and lovable characters.” Norma Tolman Rudolph, author, Norma's Novels

  "Action, romance, mystery, suspense, and surprising twists--The Time Bender has it all. You'll care about the fate of the characters from page one until the exciting end." Tifani Clark, author

  “A quirky young adult sci-fi story with a cast of loveably flawed dorks that capture your heart from start to finish!” C.E. Clayton, author of The Monster of Selkirk

  The Time Pacer

  Book 2 in the Time Bender series

  CHAPTER 1

  ♫ … hold your ground … ♫

  “SO … HOW ABOUT this extragalactic nebula?” I took my eyes off the screen to wiggle my brows at Selina. She gave me “the look,” one she’d been giving me since we were twelve. I’d say something goofy and she, in her infinitely cute way, would shoot Cupid’s darts into my heart with a quick smile.

  “Alex,” she said, casting a stern look at me, “don’t make me laugh.” There it was: her quick involuntary lip curl. If I said chocolate fondue now with a Swedish accent she’d lose it. She glanced away from me and over at Coreg who had his eyes tightly squeezed shut, hands above his head holding the spaceship’s control levers, feet tucked into the pilot divots, and concentration at maybe Mach 5. I’d been pacing along with him as well as I could for most of this journey, helping us get to his planet, Klaqin, in a fraction of the time. But, dude, I needed a break. My claustrophobia was threatening to resurrect itself in this cockpit.

  I discovered I was half-alien, or rather half-Klaqin, a mere day ago and then it was fight the star cannibals, blow up Gleezhian space ships, punch an alien in the face for kissing Selina, say good-bye to my dad, and begin this epic journey with these two: Selina, one-quarter alien girlfriend; and Coreg, full-blooded alien rival. Now we had a mission: use our time manipulation skills to help the Klaqins repel the invading enemy Gleezhians and keep them on their side of the universe, away from Earth.

  I’d been suspicious of Coreg as soon as he, with his white hair and body-builder’s physique, had shown up as a foreign exchange student at our high school. He and his buddy Marcum, equally intimidating, had taken too intense of an interest in Selina. But it didn’t take long to figure out they intended to kidnap her for her quote super power. I’d always known there was something special about her. I had no claim on her then, other than best friend status, but after we ended up in outer space things changed in my favor.

  Who knew we both had parents who kept our unique ancestry from us? And then there were our time manipulating powers: she could time-bend and I could time-pace.

  Selina’s waving hand drew me out of my thoughts. She indicated the lower screen where stars and glowing clouds of interstellar dust made hypnotizing patterns.

  “Think we’ll see any black holes?” she asked. Her hair floated sideways across cheeks that were pleasantly pinked up at present.

  I shrugged. “Keep your eye out for angels though.” I knew she thought of me as her guardian angel; she called me that whenever I helped her through a seizure. The look she shot at me now made me gulp and my pacing wavered.

  Coreg was an experienced pacer; he could speed up the passage of time to make a light year pass in a minute. I didn’t know how long it would take me to match him. This inherited power drained me mentally. Selina, on the other hand, could slow time almost effortlessly. I’d been aware of how she could make a minute drag into eternities since we hit our teens, making a host of awkward encounters beyond uncomfortable and, of course, allowing me to fall in love with her … slowly.

  I beefed up my pacing as soon as she turned her attention back to the screens, but my concentration withered. I hadn’t taken a nap since kindergarten, but a good long siesta sounded extremely tempting now. Maybe Selina could use her time-bending gift to slow things down long enough for a satisfying snooze. At least the smell of oily bio-metals had subsided, becoming a minor note in the symphony of stinks aboard this ship.

  Suddenly ripples of excruciating pain filled my head. Selina groaned and Coreg popped his eyes open and hissed at me. “Alex, pace! We’re in the space alley.” He pointed at the helmet clamped to the spaceship’s interior bio-metallic wall next to me. “Use that if you have to.”

  He’d warned us about this anomaly when we started out from Azoss, leaving Marcum, super powers unknown, to return to Earth with my dad and Selina’s. The helmet blocked most of the condensed radio waves that played havoc with our brains. He only had one helmet so we’d left it on the wall, but Selina’s pathetic whimper changed that. I handed it to her and concentrated on speeding up time.

  The pain wasn’t quite as uncomfortable for me once I resumed pacing. Selina gave me a thumbs-up signal, then rubbed her nose—our secret message. That was more than enough encouragement for me. I tripled my effort and a buzzing, felt rather than heard, flickered from ear to ear, and seemed to rumble and shake me from my feet to my head though I didn’t move a muscle. In no time we burst out of the space alley and the larger screen showed a clear picture of the fantastic galaxy we entered.

  Safe and sound. Song lyrics echoed in my head. That was so much better than the jolting static of moments ago. But I realized right away why I was repeating some of the song’s lines over and over. It wasn’t just to relieve the buzzing. It definitely looked like the skies were falling down. Stars rained from the top of the screen, but we weren’t getting any closer … to anything. I kept singing in my head that we were safe and sound.

  Coreg signaled to stop the pacing. I thought I did that pretty smoothly.

  “Are we there?” Selina directed her question at Coreg. Her hair shimmied out from under the edge of the helmet. Thick brown locks did a slow motion whip to the side as she turned her head in our weightless cabin and then, as Coreg touched the display, her hair fell straight to her shoulders.

  “No,” Coreg answered. “I’m resuming the artificial gravity so I can check the bio-metals and feed them some galactic lard. We have a few light years to go yet, but we’ll be passing Gleezhian outposts so …” He wouldn’t look me in the eye, but I knew he meant we might have to put our recently learned skills to deadly use. As for his not looking at me, that was fine; he wouldn’t understand my middle finger anyway—I hadn’t liked him since the first second I’d laid eyes on his pale face and white hair. He’d infiltrated our high school with Marcum—went so far as to join the basketball team—and then kidnapped Selina. I couldn’t believe that I’d rescued her then only to now agree with her that we had to accompany Coreg to Klaqin.

  ♫ ♫ ♫

  COREG TOOK HIS time feeding the bio-metals. The looks that Alex and Selina tossed back and forth were readable even from his culturally distinct perspective. What he had called galactic lard, a necessary supplement for the living frame of his ship, the Intimidator, was a product of humanoid origin. He’d impulsively revealed that fact to his two passengers before they took off from the last planet, Azoss. Their disgust was evident then and now as they rubbed at their sensitive noses. But they needed to know what happened to the dead. There was little waste on his planet and dead humans made more compatible lard than dead animals. Something in the genetics made controlling the systems infinitely easier because of it.

  He finished and gave
the pair a smug look. “Get used to the smell. Most of the dwellings on Klaqin are also larded.” He resumed his position and clucked his tongue at Alex. When Alex did not respond with an answering cluck Coreg spoke again. “You’ll also have to get used to a few more sounds than your language employs. Two days in a language cab and you’ll be fluent. Are you ready?” He aimed a grin at Selina, but the smile that had softened her attitude toward him on Earth now hit a wall; she wasn’t open to his flirting any longer. Too bad. It would make things difficult when the First Commanders, the leaders of Klaqin, decreed their union. Cousins or not, it wouldn’t matter. He could be ordered to marry his sister, if he had one, especially if it furthered the genetic superiority that his planet was anxious to achieve. She had no idea what would be expected of her.

  Coreg dismissed the gravity function and set a course around the Gleezhian outpost. He clucked at Alex and ordered, “Begin pacing.”

  The time saved was exponentially greater than when he and Marcum had latched ships and sped to Earth. He chuckled to himself. He had won his bet with Marcum after all. The time-bender had come willingly. And better yet, Marcum was not returning with them. Marcum was his main competition in the military corps and though their superiors had never witnessed Marcum’s unique gift, it would only have been a matter of time—something Coreg could manipulate—that Marcum’s greater ability would have manifested itself. Good thing he was headed to Earth with the fathers of these two. There couldn’t have been a better outcome. If the father had had any idea at all of the risk to Selina he would have taken her back instead of allowing her to cross the galaxy.

  Coreg opened his eyes to admire the time-bender. Her looks were growing on him. He’d seen prettier girls on Earth, but Selina, he was finally thinking of her by name, had a special aura to her. Of course she would, she was a descendant of a lost Klaqin space explorer. He was also beginning to think of her as a potential mate and not just the time-bender who could increase their battle capabilities. He’d been motivated by the incentive of a promotion and fame and the satisfaction of proving himself to his father when he dared Marcum to go with him to Earth and search for a time-bender, but now he lusted after something else.

  He sniffed the air. She smelled strongly of fresh sweat laced with some pungent Earth perfume.

  ♫ ♫ ♫

  MY GUT CLENCHED when Coreg dropped the gravity on us and again when we went weightless. My poor stomach was reminding me how empty it was. I time-paced as commanded, but my mind was on food. If I didn’t get something soon I was going to faint like a girl. I didn’t know how Selina was holding up; she had to be as hungry as I was. I began to fantasize about salty junk food. Since my dad was raised on Klaqin—a fact I learned last night—I hoped I’d be able to eat whatever they offered. Obviously Coreg wasn’t going to offer anything on the flight. I tried not to think about it, but songs about food formed a menu behind my eyelids. Food, glorious food, hot sausage and mustard …

  “Alex, look.” Selina’s sharp order brought me out of my thoughts and I focused on the screen. Wherever the cameras on the Intimidator were mounted they were all receiving incredible shots of a bright planet, growing larger. I got an unbelievable rush of adrenaline and lost my hold on pushing time forward.

  “Stop pacing,” Coreg said.

  “Already did, dude.” I felt a pressure grow, like an invisible full body water balloon was being pressed against me. I’d felt something similar when I landed Marcum’s spacecraft. The screen showed a shot of the planet that resembled every outer space picture of Earth I’d ever seen, except that this planet’s outer edges were a consistent white. The continents and bodies of water were all interconnected, as if there was either one major continent with many seas or one ocean with multiple land masses.

  Selina let out a breathy gasp of wonder. “It’s beautiful.” She lifted her head my way. “Alex, we have relatives down there.”

  That was both comforting and scary. I nodded absently and noted that there were no swirls of clouds. My father had told me bedtime stories about this place and I believed this world was as fictitious as Oz or Narnia. Klaqin always kept one side toward the sun. I knew a lot about it: how the two moons that crossed mid-day caused water to rise from the lakes and settle on the land like rain; how the weather was constant with mild breezes and sunny days; how this world was filled with colorful plants and flowers; and how the insects didn’t sting and the wild animals were non-threatening. As peaceful as all that sounded I knew this planet’s awful curse: the war with the Gleezhians meant brutal aggression and horrible violence. And a work load on the people that rivaled slavery. That is, if those bedtime stories were entirely true.

  The cameras switched to a landing view and Coreg turned on the communication system. He spoke in quick spurts, his face scrunched in anxious concentration. The voice that responded was measured, masculine, and angry—and totally unintelligible to my ears. A moment later we landed.

  Selina’s seat shrank back and she stood up, a little wobbly. I undid my buckle and grabbed at her. “Steady. There’s less oxygen here and not as much gravity. But it shouldn’t be too big a problem for us.” I almost sang a bit of lyrics—I’m walkin’ on sunshine, wo-oh—but I held back. The musical habit I’d developed as a coping mechanism when Selina sat next to me four years ago in middle school, seemed stupid in the face of this life-changing—existence-shifting—event.

  “How would you know?” she whispered. Her eyes held disbelief, or maybe it was a new respect for me, ever since that first kiss. Our easy relationship was shifting into something more complicated.

  I shrugged. “My dad told me some stuff.”

  ♫ ♫ ♫

  SELINA REACHED FOR Alex’s hand. He didn’t fool her; he was trembling as much as she was. A little time-bending, her new specialty, seemed in order now. Just for a bit, to make the arrival, the grand entrance, slightly more relaxed. And to slow her heart down. She wanted to cue a drum roll.

  Coreg made the ship’s wall open. Selina expected to see grass, trees, and sky, but instead they were parked inside and it looked no different from an airplane hangar. Dark, gray, and hard, the docking bay boasted massive proportions. She held tight to Alex and followed Coreg out of the ship. A delegation of yellow-clad men surrounded them, all holding arc-guns, something she was familiar with now. She and Alex stopped short, said nothing, and waited for Coreg to diffuse the situation. But all Coreg did was stomp the dust off his shoes, garble some Klaqin words at the column of men, and throw a simple English good-bye at her and Alex.

  Two guards—their faces a lighter shade of the same yellow as their uniforms—seized them, patted their coats, sprayed something on their shoes, and pushed them forward. No one stopped her from holding Alex’s hand.

  ♫ ♫ ♫

  “TRY SMILING,” I urged Selina.

  “I am, I am. Do any of you speak English? ¿Habla español?”

  Cute. That was a tremendous social effort on her part. She reaped a few laughs from our guards. One of them rattled off something strange then tried to mimic her. More laughs. I guess Marcum and Coreg were in the minority on their interstellar language aptitude. I didn’t feel threatened by the guards, more like they were protecting us. Four sets of hands with butter-colored fingers rested on my shoulders, Selina’s too, as the men—well they seemed more like kids our age—kept us moving deeper into the hangar, past space craft built sleek like the Intimidator and some older, fatter versions that were identical to Marcum’s ship, the one I had flown from Earth to that first planet. Glad to see I had some options if weneeded to make an escape. I hoped they could fly; their sides were scaly and shed dusty flakes of something that looked diseased.

  We came to a hallway that was lit by round holes in the ceiling that let Klaqin’s continuous sunshine in. It smelled different here. Like baby powder. Quite an improvement over the oily spacecraft. It was too narrow to allow Selina and me to walk side by side and still be guarded the way we’d been in the open bay. They s
ignaled us to drop hands. I turned and sidled sideways down the hall following the lead guard at a respectful distance, but keeping my eye on Selina. We came to a window where one of the guards—the one whose skin looked more olive than lemony—took my left hand and shoved it through. The window didn’t break like glass; my hand just slipped through to the other side like passing through a waterfall. I could see the person on the other side, a man in a blue robe, who gently held my wrist, then pricked my finger. I drew my hand back so fast that I must have broken the window. A glob of its clear substance fell to the ground and rolled to the wall. Strangest thing I’d ever seen. Hot prickles of sweat broke out on my neck.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Huh, I’m not bleeding. I guess that just startled me. Go ahead; it was nothing.”

  Selina’s guard pressed her to submit her hand through the same window. She did. No quick movement from her, though, not so much as an ouch.

  Then it was obvious they wanted us to move on. Two guards went first, then Selina and four guards, then me with my four guys. They still had hands on us, but their weapons were lowered. Good sign.

  The end of the hall opened onto a courtyard. I felt instantly better in this open area.

  I did not expect this. There must have been around thirty Klaqin men, a few women, and several small children quietly waiting for our entrance. Really good sign. Mostly because they were all smiling—even those with tears streaming down their faces—and there weren’t any weapons pointed at us. A few of the kids were manually wagging their ears to match the grownups’ fluttering lobes, a skill my dad does to perfection.

  “Alex …”

  “I know. I see them.” Two pictures, ten times life size, hung from the roof of the building behind the courtyard. One was my dad. Young, not much older than me now. The other was of a man, white haired but not old, who had a faint resemblance to Coreg.