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 Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2010 5:25 pm
Landyron sighed. "Fine, fine, whatever, I don't care." He waved them away. "Just get out of my sight," he gruffed and sat back down in his seat.
Jykan made a low bow, and nudged Alax to do the same. "Yes, sir. Thank you."
"Yeah, yeah." He said, but then glanced back up at them. "Don't forget, Jykan." His tone was meaningful and he gave his subordinate a pointed look.
"I'm heading to the Keepingmagus right away, sir," Jykan responded.
"No, I meant the other thing."
The younger Time Traveler rolled his eyes as he moved to the door. "I know, sir, I was being discrete of the matter."
"Get outta here."
"Yes, sir~" Jykan said all too happily and pulled Alax along.
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Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2010 6:04 pm
 Alax was addmitadly curious to know why Jykan was so excited. And what matter he was being descrete about. "Hey, Jykan. Not meaning to ruin any moment you are having right now, but why are we running?" He asked once they finally stopped outside, a couple blocks away from KIFT. And more importantly; "And what's all this mate buisiness?"
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Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2010 10:52 pm
Jykan finally slowed to a stop, breathing in slight pants. There was a grin on his face. "No reason," he said, "Just wanted to get out of there before Landyron got too upset by me being in his space. I torment him for fun each time he tries to knock me off the crew, but he knows he can't, really." Bullshit and lies, bullshit and lies.
Landyron's threat was real this time. He might not turn in his Time Keeper to the executioner, but he would demote him for still messing with other people's Times. It was a crime, no matter who they were in history.
Jykan looked around his surroundings more carefully, ignoring the prickle at the back of his neck everytime someone turned to stare at them. In a moment he was going to stare right back at them with a mean look, but he was too busy.
Three days. Three days. Three days. Forty-eight hours and sixty-three seconds, fifty-four miliseconds, divided by 15,547 square plus another sixty deciseconds cubed to the forty-seventh power.
That small amount of time made it seem as though getting in touch with his Keepingmagus (which was dead impossible to do sometimes, because they switched locations every other day and were uncontactable by Time Keepers, "which the concentrated power might ruin the project at hand if answered"-quote unquote Sympson) was unimportant and finding a purebred Rysonan willing to commit to the Inner-Connection Ceremony top priority.
Who, who, who, who, who....
Jykan was drawn from his thoughts (which was terribly easy to do) when he was being directly spoken to. He looked at Alax dumbly for a moment, not sure he heard correctly, but then began to explain.
"First of all, it's usually more likely that whoever syncs someone with the Time Stream will become the other's mate, the person they will swear to protect for the rest of their lives. It's usually done by two people who love each other to have that greater aspect, and by Rysonan to Human, for the Rysonan to guide the Human to the Time Stream, the core of all life."
He glanced around for a moment to find something to give example to, but found nothing so he turned back to Alax and found him the perfect example.
"Take yourself for example. From just looking at you, I can see that you have been alive for twenty years, four months, seventeen days, eleven hours, thirty-three minutes, sixteen seconds, forty-two miliseconds, eighty-two deciseconds, divided by four squared plus the time that you've spent in your mother's womb (eight months, thirty days, ten hours, fifty-six minutes, fifty-four seconds, forty-eight miliseconds, eleven deciseconds cubed to the eighty-sixth power) cubed to the twenty-first power."
Jykan took a breath, his voice having been an almost mechanical-sounding tone. Then he focused back on Alax as if seeing him again. "Everything is made of time. Time is the center of Y, which is the center V, which is the center of gravity. There is nothing more powerful than Time itself.
"And the Rysonans knew that. They've gone this far to teach humans that numbers aren't just numbers, but that numbers are ever moving and changing. Here, two plus two can equal five, or zero multiplied by zero can be infinite. Everyone who is linked with the Time Stream understands this fact, and know who is linked with it as well. Looking at you, Alax, sometimes is just a...wrong feeling; there's something in the back at my head that just screams 'stop talking to this person and run away, there is nothing I can do to fix him'.
"That is the importance of the Time Stream, and being connected with it connects everyone to each other and to a..." Jykan held out his Time Keeper "...not-so-simple pocket watch. Our existence is held in Time, and what more fitting than to keep it in a watch?"
He went back on to the main topic. "But it would have to be a pure Rysonan to connect you with the Time Stream because it is Law. I can't change that part of this world, even if I think that anyone connected to the Time Stream would be able to do; nowadays Humans (mothers and fathers) can connect the loose Humans (their children who weren't born with their Time synced with the Stream) to the Main Line just because a couple generations ago several Rysonans connected some Humans and didn't want to end up as mates. If Humans can do it, why can't Rysonan-hybrid, who would all naturally have the Time Stream connected with them?
"But Law states that only Rysonan and Timed-Humans can bring Human into the Time Stream," Jykan went on, not really caring if Alax understood. So far the twenty-first century human was being quiet, and Jykan was thankful for such. Questions could come later because if Alax wanted to live in this century, he would need to know this.
Jykan went, again, back on topic. "For all the mating, though, like I said earlier it is more likely that the pair initiating the Human to the Time Stream is planning to create a partnership because the Inner-Connection Ceremony can be highly...intimate. Through inheritance, I've obtained my grandparents' Inner-Connection Ritual Documentation, and while nothing in it suggests they actually mated and linked together to the Stream through sex, it is still highly...suggestively...intimate."
Yeah, so maybe he did blush a bit.
"But anyway, wasn't that boy...Nathan, in the pictures, your mate? Or as the Humans usually put it, 'husband'?" Rysonans were a race that believed to be with one person and one person only for the rest of their lives. Whatever the Humans had of divorcing or cheating wasn't familiar with the Rysonans and many of them kept to the one-with-one life style.
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Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2010 11:22 pm
Alax's brow furrowed with each paragraph the Time Traveler said, only catching about 1/4 of the whole thing. Okay, he was now officially creeped out and sorry he asked. Swallowing and shaking his head slightly, he snapped out of his trance-like state and looked up at the older male. "No, I don't know. We never really. . ." He stopped himself before he said anything too personal. "I don't know if he felt the same way as I did or not. He was what us humans would call 'normal.' So I don't think so." He finished, looking down slightly with a thoughtful look. He may have just confused himself more than Jykan. . . And that was saying something. He had thought that they were, but there was no telling what Nathan thought. Yeah, sure, they shared a house, and a room on occasion. But nothing ever really happened between them. So why did Nathan mean so much to Alax? Why was he still beating himself up about the other male's death? With a sigh, he looked up again, his look softening a little. "No, I guess not. . ."
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Posted: Tue Sep 21, 2010 4:52 pm
Jykan raised an eyebrow. "What's normal to the twenty-first century and how would you be considered abnormal?" He hadn't taken the full coarse of History in that era, him being surprised with Alax's kitchen obvious enough.
Then Jykan heard the end result of what he and Nathan were. So he and the other kid weren't an item together. That meant that they could probably find a potential partner for Alax for the Ritual. It made Jykan able to breathe a tad easier. A part of him wasn't sure it was for the right reason.
"Right," the Time Traveler said definitely. First thing's first. Jykan was going to find Sympson. The Keepingmagus had usually the best words of advice for things like this, too, because the man was almost literally in the phonelines and was able to pick up on the newest bits of information. Sympson was usually the one who gave KIFT inside trails of potential crimes and criminals by hacking in on their Time Keepers.
He closed his eyes and turned his head skyward. Where would Sympson be right now?
Jykan gave a jolt when his Time Keeper rang. It was more of a clock alarm sound than actual beeping.
Incoming call: Sympson - 77
Accept? Yes -- No
His fingers automatically pressed over Yes, and Jykan spoke loudly to be heard over a whirring that was coming from the speaker. "How the hell did you know to call?"
"Well," came Sympson's voice, slow and rather wise sounding. "I could feel a twitching in my Stream. Then I asked myself: who have I not talked to lately? I was not going to call back anyone I owe money to, so that left you."
Jykan rolled his eyes to a man would wouldn't be able to see the action. "How very insightive. Where are you? I need my Time Keeper checked on."
"So I heard. Landyron is loud as ever."
"Did you feel that in the Stream as well?"
"No," Sympson matter-of-factly. "I could hear it in through the pipes; I am underneath the Dock's storage warehouse next door to Time Keeper's Investegation Force."
Jykan sighed exasperatedly, beckoning Alax to follow him as he went back from where he came from. "Call it KIFT, like everyone else, Doc."
"I certainly will not, it is not even in the right order!"
"Right," Jykan said dismissively. "I'm on my way, and I'm bringing a guest. We need help, if you're able to be of service...?"
"I will do my best, Jykan, as always."
The line was cut and Jykan picked up the pace, making sure Alax was always in toe with him. He tried to offer an explanation to the, most likely, confused man. Jykan couldn't deny, however, that the look of puzzlement was quite endearing on the Human.
"We're going to see my Time Keeper's mechanic," Jykan offered. "He might be able to help us find someone able to sync you with the Time Stream."
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Posted: Wed Sep 22, 2010 8:14 pm
Alax looked up at the older male, thinking about how to answer. "Well, you know the pictures of me and Nathan?" He asked, finally figuring out something to say. "That, is what 'normal' people look like." "And obviously," He started, motioning down to his appearal, "this isn't anything like that." Waiting until Jykan was done talking to hs pocket watch and started walking back to where they had come from. "Who is Sympson?"
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Posted: Fri Oct 01, 2010 9:35 pm
Jykan nodded slowly. Alax's appearance did catch an unwanted eye and odd-raised eyebrow for the majority of his outfit. What was the reason for so many chains? They didn't even have time pieces attached at the ends. He suspected he would need to take Alax shopping for a new wardrobe.
"Sympson is my Keepingmagus, someone who fixes Time Keepers when they're acting funny," he explained as he turned a corner and down the alley next to KIFT. "It's extremely important that you trust your Keepingmagus and know them for a long while so you known you won't end up dead.
"Most Time Travlers don't have a Keepingmagus and learn how to fix their own Time Keeper when it goes wrong. But they have the most count of 'suicidal' deaths in the world because they tinker too much with their pocket watches." Jykan paused, looking around the alley. There weren't any cellars attached to the buildings, so how was Sympson underground...?
Scuffled dirt caught his attention, which led underneath a tin trash can. He went over and moved the garbage, finding a darkened cellar window behind it. It was just big enough to squeeze the average sized-man through.
"But Keeping School is five years minimum," Jykan went on, kneeling on one knee and sliding the window open. He couldn't see anyone or anything inside. "I'm not going to waste five more years in school, after thirteen of it for necessary history lessons."
He looked at Alax suddenly. That's right. Alax would need to go to school, all the history he would need to learn...
Three days. . . He thought while shrugging off his jacket so it wouldn't get even more dirty. This is going to be impossible!!
"Here, hold my co---s**t!"
Sympson's ghostly white face seemed to have appeared from nowhere, dark glasses hiding his wide eyes just as the high collar of his white science lab coat hid his crazy smile.
"Language, Jykan." His head turned towards Alax. "This must your guest and what you want help with. Century.... Twenty-first, if I am not wrong. My, my... You are a long way from home." His head disappeared from the window momentarily before a odd whirring sound started, then some thumping.
Sympson reappeared, grabbing Jykan's forgotten coat from the ground. "You may come in if you like. Just watch your step, please; it is quite dark."
Jykan crawled in backwards, help given from his Keepingmagus. Once he dropped and settled on his feet he turned towards the window that barely reached his head to help Alax in as well.
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Posted: Fri Oct 01, 2010 9:55 pm
Alax nodded as Jykan spoke on, tired of looking like an idiot for knowing more than nothing of what he was saying. As the older male took off hs coat, he reached out to take hold of it when Jykan freaked out about something and dropped it. Looking down, he saw what had freaked the Time Traveler out and blnked at the man underground. This was Sympson? He was expecting something less like a science-nerd L. But who was he to judge? Figuring that he was to follow the two into the cellar, Alax waited for Jykan to crawl in before he too did. He sat with his legs hanging over the edge of the window sill and slid through. With the help of Jykan, he managed not to fall and hurt himself like he normally would have.
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Posted: Sat Oct 02, 2010 7:06 pm
Jykan caught the other male by his dangling legs first before slowly helping him down to the wooden box that served as a step. His arms ended around the Human's torso in an almost mock embrace. The dim light made it difficult to see in any case, but he caught Alax's brown eyes instantly.
"Hi," he said quietly, switching from eye to eye, but feeling completely random after saying it. He let go and turned around too quick, or wasn't prepared for the lack of room to do so with. Jykan fell off the box from a greater height he was expecting right on his backside. Winded, he heaved for air.
"Watch your step, I say, but does he listen? No~oooo." Sympson came from the dark surroundings, and a mechanical arm that was strapped to his back whirred into action, assisting Jykan to his feet. The box he fell from came up to his waist.
His head turned to look at Alax. "Surely you have more sense. There is a decline of boxes to use there, or be careful if you wish to hop down."
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Posted: Sat Oct 02, 2010 7:14 pm
"Yo," Alax returned, having his hands on the older male's shoulders for support as he got his feet on the ground, looking back at the other. He raised an amused eyebrow at the sight of Jykan falling. He didn't laugh, for he got upset when ever he fell (whichwas alot). He watched and listened quietly as Sympson helped Jykan, nodding as he carefully hopped off the box, not wanting to fall as well.
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Posted: Sun Oct 03, 2010 12:35 am
"Can't you turn a light on in here, Doc?" Jykan asked, brushing his backside from the bit of dirt that covered the concrete floor.
Sympson immediately snapped. "Certainly not, little fool! If I were in hiding, why would I have the lights on to give a spotlight to my location?" He moved on top of the box, reaching out to place the trash bin where it was previously and sliding the window shut. It killed the little light that was left out instantly, and why Sympson wore dark goggles at night, Jykan had no idea. He grabbed a hold of Alax's arm to guide him around, since he had better sight than Humans, but still not nearly enough to see where he was going.
The Keepingmagus moved the box after he was done. The window was about eleven feet from the ground. If anyone were to notice the scuffled dirt near the trash can and attempt to fit through the window, they could very well suffer from an unslightly injury.
Jykan raised an unseen eyebrow. "Why are you in hiding? And from who, exactly?"
"If you have not be getting the news," Sympson began almost testily, "there have been quite a number of Time Travelers dying in the past week. Over a dozen. And all deaths have one thing in common: each of them has a Keepingmagus." He started to move away from their entrance, and determinded to find out more, Jykan followed, pulling Alax with him. It wasn't hard to follow the whirring sound of the machine arms.
"You should be certain that no Keepingmagus is sleeping peacefully until this killer is caught. We are all in hiding, all grieving from lost friends, and all looking for word for whoever is tracking down these specific Time Travelers.
"As for who it is... we have no idea or thought as who would do such a thing. It is as though they are purposely sheading a bad reputation to the Keepingmagus."
Jykan's eyes widened in horrified surprise. "Why haven't we heard anything in KIFT!?"
Sympson shrugged, his white coat being the most visible object in the room. "You might have. There are many different crews in the Force. Some random criminal suspect or death crime could have been a clue as much as any.
"Now," he said, switching topics. "About your friend. I am nearly certain you are here to find someone to synchronize him. I am here to tell you that I know no Rysonan that can."
"What?" Jykan asked pitifully. "But you were my last---"
"You can do it," Sympson cut in matter-of-factly. "You'll be breaking nearly every Law the world believes in, but you can still do it if you are willing and brave enough to go against the Trials."
The Time Traveler froze in his steps. He tried to find a voice, but it was lost.
The Trials were many tests to prove what a person thought was justice for going against Law and Tradition. Many of times, over ninty pecent of the time, the Law outweighed the protest; Jykan thought it biased. And if one were outweighed, then they would have their Time Keeper taken and be executed the nice way.
Jykan shivered. He wouldn't dare...
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Posted: Sun Oct 03, 2010 11:57 am
Even though Jykan whd hold of his arm and was leading him through the dark, Alax pressed his body into the older male's, more for comfort than anything else. He hated the dark (bad experiences in it), which sounded weird due to his choice of clothing color, and it was way too dark for him. As they walked, following the noise from Sympson's mechanical arm, he tried to see what lay around them. Listening to the two, Alax wasn't expecting Jykan to suddenly stop and almost fell over, ready to drap Jykan with him if he did. He gripped onto the other male, almost tightly, not knowing what Jykan was doing. "What's wrong?" He asked, feeling Jykan shiver under his grasp. At the silence that followed, he took it upon himself to ask the question that had been burning in the back of his mind since Jykan first explained to him about getting synced; "Why do I have to get synced? What is so important about it that makes every one talk like it's life or death? Why can't I stay me?" He paused, lifting his head to look at what he could see of Jykan's face, poking him to let him know that he addressing him as he said, "And why do you care so much if I get synced or not?"
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Posted: Mon Oct 11, 2010 10:39 pm
Jykan swallowed pass the sudden lump in his throat to answer the first question. "N-nothing," he said and simply left it at that.
From up ahead, Sympson muttered, "A half-truth is still a whole lie." The Time Traveler resisted the urge to kick at him, but couldn't tell how far away the other man was. There was a rumaging noise, however, from the Keepingmagus, and suddenly there was something thrust into his hand.
A pair of goggles, by the feel of them.
"Put them on, that way you can see."
Oh, well, duh. Night vision goggles would have been helpful from the start, but Jykan had forgotten all about them. Jykan gave a pair to Alax and begun to strap them on, his vision tinging green. He came in sight of Sympson holding out his hand.
The Time Traveler, used to these silent suggestions, unclipped his Albert from his waist-coat and handed the whole Time Keeper to the Keepingmagus. Sympson almost dropped it on first touch. His expression was aghast.
"What did they do to my beautiful creation!?" he cried.
Jykan lifted an eyebrow. "What?"
"So many bugs," Sympson sneered. "I must rid of them before they attack the inner drive... I will be back; have a seat." It was here that Jykan noticed that they had been led to a make-shift living room. Really make-shift, Jykan couldn't help but think.
He sat on a box while Sympson left, and hearing Alax's voice pop up again, he turned to look at him. The goggles gave the human bug eyes, and Jykan had to cough down his laugh.
The question asked, however, was completely serious. "It is a matter of life or death. Probably," he hummed in thought, "if you had to compare it with something, take the Christian story of their God going through Egypt and smiting those without the blood on their door. Not saying that Xylor will kill you for not being apart of the Stream or anything, but until then you're basically the man with leporsy. You're a freak of nature, something ill-deformed, incomplete."
Jykan turned his head so his smile wasn't seen when the human poked him in a slight ticklish spot. "As to what it means to me, well... I don't know. It'd be about the same as to why I don't want to see puppies being kicked or of the like."
Half truth, whole lie.
Jykan's goggles look like the ones in his normal picture. We're going to spend a lot of the time in the dark. . .
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Posted: Tue Oct 12, 2010 4:44 pm
Alax Listened quietly as Sympson walked away with Jykan's watch, then to the time traveler's explination. A freak of nature? At the comment, Alax felt as if something had been jabbed into his heart and was trying to rip it out of his chest. It hurt to think that Jykan might actually think that of him. He tried not to let it show on his face as he looked towards the older male when he started talking again. . . . Those goggles made Jykan look. . . very attractive. . . Shaking his head, Alax closed his eyes and turned his head away from the older male. Walking to the wall, he took the goggles off and sat down, pressing his knees against his chest and resting his chin on them.
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Posted: Tue Oct 12, 2010 11:10 pm
Jykan gave an odd look to his companion for his out-of-the-norm behavior, but shrugged and tried to find Sympson without moving. The Keepingmagus must have been too far away.
Sympson's POV
The man went to an even lower level, a cellar of sorts, some extra space he dug out himself when he moved in yesterday. Sympson reached for his tool kit immediately, staring at the Time Keeper in his hand with narrowed eyes and a frown.
From the inside, the bug was shaking, knowing it had been caught. He couldn't say he recognized the signature of the creator, but it was a new virus, unique. Just like all the others that had effected the now-dead Time Travelers' Keepers. Having blindly found a tiny pick, Sympson wrenched open the back of the watch, finding the spyder-like creature latching on the hard drive of the Time Keeper.
Sympson glared. "Get the hell out." When the mechanical bug gripped tighter to its place, although shivering, the machine arm came forward and clacked its three fingers together in warning before delicatly gripping on the tiny bug. He tugged, and it came loose at once.
A smile appeared on his face below the collar. It was nearly sadistic, off its hinges, crazy...like the smile of a mad scientist.
"Let us disect you..." And then he cackled.
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------
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