Portal Island -- Open to All

An experiment in teleportation has gone horribly awry. Every 84 hours, somewhere around the globe, the "portal" appears, then disappears in an instant, "sucking up" anything -- people included -- unfortunate to have been within its sphere at the time...

Imagine getting ripped away from your life, your world, in an instant, with no forewarning ...

And if that's not bad enough ... you get dumped out on an unknown island in the tropics ...

And if that's not bad enough, you're now hundreds of years in the past ...

Oh ... and Welcome to the island!



Look about yourself right now. Or, think back to where you were at 11:50am or 11:50pm last night. Can you picture every object that was within 5 yards of you? Can you imagine suddenly finding yourself on a tropical island with only those possessions? Can you imagine yourself on that tropical island ... only to realize someone stole those meager possessions?

How would you live? What would be your next move? You could find yourself alone for days, weeks, months; or you might find yourself staring down the barrel of a shotgun, being held by John Taylor, who was once the Head of Security for the Research Lab that inadvertently created the "portal" ... and who was the phenomenon's first victim.



Read more here in the storyline thread; then PM your Host (PNW_Male) to get more information from our OOC Thread.

Players can write their own independent stories or collaborate with other Players and/or the Host.

Most PCs will begin their adventure with virtually no resources and no idea of what they've been pulled into; while others will be loaded for bear as well as being perfectly suited for survival in just such an environment. Some will think they are in a tropical paradise, while others won't be able to get their minds off the mosquitoes and the lack of sustainable food.

And then, there will be the periodic twists that yours truly will throw in, just to shake things up. Oh, and did I already say, Welcome to the island?





Expectations can be such a demanding word, but the demands here on "Portal Island" are fairly tame:

--- Post when you want. (That's was demanding, wasn't it?)

--- And, I beg of you, DO NOT POST ANYTHING IN THIS THREAD except for STORY LINE REPLIES.

--- ALL PMs should be addressed to the Host or other intended Player.

--- All OOCs (unless little snippets IN your replies explaining something ABOUT the reply) should be PMd to the Host or other Player you are inquiring from.

(I am sorry to sound so anal and asinine about this, but have you ever tried to read a story line thread riddled with PMs and incessant non-story ramblings?


Thanks,
Bing

John Taylor: "Where the hell am I?"

Dec 9, 2010 -- Thursday

John Taylor "came to", disoriented and trembling all over, as if he had been taking a walk across a high voltage power line, carrying his golf clubs, in a thunder storm! He righted himself to his haunches, steadied his still wobbling body, then tried his best to focus his eyes.

He looked about himself; nothing looked familiar. And yet ... it all did. The landscape in general -- the big picture -- was there, but all of the little things that were supposed to be in it -- all the human things -- were missing.

He'd almost been done with his 2300 rounds of the grounds, heading back to the Tucker Wool Building -- which these days had nothing to do with the fiber for which it had been named -- when he had apparently passed out.

Now, standing there confused, he was looking at dense, tropical forest that for more than 300 years hadn't been within an equal number of yards from here.

He looked to the left, where the Lawrence Family Administration Building should have been. He took a few unsteady steps, stumbled, stood again, and pushed through the undergrowth until he was looking out over a small clearing at Velvet Angel Falls, a sight no one had been able to see from here on the plateau for over 200 years.

Where are all the buildings? Where's all the concrete ... and steel ... and gravel driveways ... and cars and scooters and ...

He looked around, ran back to where he'd been and looked out across the Hamiltonia Gorge, where a decade before pressure from developers had turned the last fully natural view of the island's interior into just another tract of expensive estates, vineyards, and horse ranches.

Where are all the houses ... and where ... oh my god ... where are all the people?

He walked out to the edge of the cliff, turned himself totally around for one more dismayed look, and asked, Where the hell am I?

John Taylor: "Footsteps in the Sand"

December 21, 2010 -- Tuesday

The sea looked lonely.

The Isle of Dayton had received cruise ships, yachts, sailboats, and supply ships on a nearly daily basis. Because the Hatfield Project -- nestled at the end of a long, private road high in the Isle's interior -- was a classified government facility, the Port Authority was required to keep John, head of the facility's security, apprised of all incoming and outgoing vessels and aircraft.

This morning, he was sitting on what had been called Rooster Rock. In the past, he'd sat right here with dates, overlooking the sea to the south from the 4 Star restaurant, or next door at the oyster bar, listening to local bands or, unfortunately, the sounds of the float planes landing in the bay below. Today, he was now listening to the incessant cawing and screaming and cackling of the hundreds of birds that filled the trees, undergrowth, and cliff's edge.

In the past, he mused. In the future?

It was like a Michael J Fox movie, only Marty McFly -- who'd been considerably confused in the first movie -- now seemed like a Master of Time Travel compared to John Taylor. He simply ... had no idea ... what the next step was. Is this real? he was constantly asking himself. Is it for ever? was another question coming up again and again.

He had no doubt what-so-ever that he was still on the Isle of Dayton; all of the natural sights he had spent so much time at -- the cliffs, the waterfalls, the valleys, the bogs -- he had visited many of them over the past two weeks of wandering the Isle.

And while he still couldn't fully explain why this had happened to him, he had a fairly good idea of what had happened in general: someone fucked up!

John Taylor had been with the Hatfield Project for almost two years before he ever became aware of what they were working on: teleportation.

Right up until the moment that he'd realized he'd been teleported -- not just to a different place but to a different time apparently -- he'd laughed at the idea of somehow sending an object through space by breaking it down to its molecular, sub-atomic, or pure energy state, all three of which he'd looked into on his free time in an attempt to learn more on the topic.

It just seemed too Star Trek to be real. And yet here he was, on the Isle of Dayton before the arrival of humans.

He tried to recall some of the history of the Isle, hoping the knowledge would somehow aid him. One of the women he'd been seeing was a volunteer -- or will someday be a volunteer -- with the Isle's Board of Tourism. Once, she'd taken him to a private beach protected on each side by cliffs, where they spent the day snorkeling, spit-roasting fish she'd speared, and making love in the sand ... and the forest ... and the hot spring ... and where ever the mood struck them over their 12 hours together that day.

What she had told him then made his current situation seem a bit gloomy. No ... very gloomy.

On the diet side of things, pre-human, the island had had very little edible animal life except for birds and fish. There were no mammals at all, and the largest reptile -- one of which he was yet to even see, let alone get to eat -- was some sort of chameleon.

John had speared some fish, trapped some nearly worthless crabs around the tide pools, and killed a pair of birds after throwing about a thousand rocks into the trees. His only significant source of protein had thus far been bird eggs, and getting those away from the dive bombing parents had been scary even for a grown man of his former and dropping rapidly 200 pound bulk.

He was, of course, armed; he'd been snatched while on an exterior patrol, which required him to be in his vest, carrying both his shotgun -- capable of discharging both lethal and non-lethal rounds -- and his side arm, as well as his full utility belt.

So, he very well could put a 9mm slug through a huge sea turtle that he'd been unable to wrestle to shore; or use the shotgun to take down the albatross looking birds that looked as tasty as turkey to a man on the edge of starvation. But he didn't, for several reasons. First, he had a pretty good idea what double-ought buck shot would do to a bird; second, he had no idea of how long he would be here, in this time, nor of what dangers might confront him in the near future, dangers that might require that one last round that had only fed him for a day. Hell, for all he knew, there might be dinosaurs walking about looking to make a meal of him. (He knew this wasn't the case, of course; he had never paid much attention to Earth History, but he was fairly sure sea gulls came after dinosaurs by a couple of years.)

And third, and this came back to him often, he had no idea who, rather than what, might be with him here, now. He had more fear of another individual with a fire arm than of any other creature likely to come after him here.

No, for now, he was going to have to make his way without using his limited source of ammunition.

So, for the most part, he'd been living on the fruits and nuts that, fortunately, his former (or future?) lover had introduced him to; and, with the exception of the fat and protein provided by some of the raw nuts, this diet was not going to sustain him long term.

Things were even worse on the "mobility" end of things. Moving about was even harder than eating. The man-made trails and roads that had once criss-crossed the island were, of course, absent; as were the ferries and water taxis that the locals and tourists alike had used to pop about from one cliff isolated town or inlet or beach to another.

John figured he'd been averaging six hours a day trekking about, searching for answers; and had seen -- seen, with his eyes, not tromped through with his feet -- less than a tenth of the island. Travel through the rugged volcanic mountains and deep, untamed tropical forests was going to be a challenge.



He made his way down to the ocean's edge. Much of the shoreline of the Isle looked just like this, rocky volcanic jumbles of rock that were less for commuting and more for breaking ankles. Back in the 21st century, the Hamiltonia Crater had been periodically leaking lava off to the south, right up into the sea, for the past six decades; and, while John hadn't yet gotten close enough to see down inside the crater since his arrival, the steam rising up for the south told him that the volcano was active in this period as well.

Dayton had some wonderful, sandy beaches as well. John made his way to the only one that seemed accessible from this trail, used a flat almost-shovel like piece of volcanic rock to dig up a pair of clams, then made his way down the beach to find a place to try to build a fire. Roasted clams and a view of the sunset over the ocean; it was almost ... normal.

His eyes were on the lapping waves as he let him mind wander. And he almost missed them.

In an instant, everything changed: no longer, it seemed, was John Taylor the only man in the world.

John Taylor meets Finn and Teagan

Deleted. Placed incorrectly

John Taylor: "Merry Christmas, Hanna"

PLEASE BE FOREWARNED: The link in red near the end of this post depicts nudity, not so much so that it is not suitable for Literotica, but just enough so that if you weren't expecting it, it might startle you. (It won't, but I felt it necessary to at least say something. It is not necessary to open the link to appreciate the text.) BTW: My regular links are always in purple; my nudity-sex-related links are always in red.


December 25, 2010 -- Saturday -- Christmas

John had spent the past four days attempting to locate the person responsible for the first evidence that he was not alone on the Isle of Dayton. Tracking hadn't been part of his military training -- they didn't teach tracking on a US Navy Cruiser -- but he'd learned a little bit later in life when he went into Security.

More recently, one of his Dayton girlfriends -- a biologist concerned with the preservation of native species -- had taken him out to hunt cats and dogs. He'd initially had a problem with blowing away what to him were pets, but after he'd learned about feral mammal predators -- the island had been mammal free until the arrival of humans in the 17th century -- and the damage they could do to the unprotected native species, as far as he was concerned it was open season.

He'd found some evidence of the other human, scattered along over more than two miles of the trail the man -- John assumed it was such, due to the size of the print on the beach -- was blazing through the lower wetlands and up into and over a ridge to yet another low lying wetlands.

There were more foot prints, a frond shelter, feces --which the insects were quickly devouring -- and yet another shelter. The oddest evidence, however, was an attempt to make a fire, an attempt that had likely failed as a heavy rain had begun and soaked the paper the person had been using to fuel the flame; it appeared to be a French traffic citation.

Three days had passed with no luck on finding his neighbor, and then John was given a gift on, coincidentally, Christmas day.

He been skirting along a wetlands near the southwest coastline -- a place that today, at least 2010 today was farm land and suburbs -- when he found deep foot shaped holes in the soft mud -- that hadn't yet filled to the surface level with the swamp's muddy water.

He quickly gave chase -- as quickly as one can through a wild bog -- and burst out to find his island mate sitting on the edge of the estuary, cleaning the mud off her bare feet.

John, in shock -- and, not immediately aware, in stimulation mode down below -- simply stared at the woman, whose body, except for a lengthy doubled-up strand of pearls, was as bare as her feet.

Merry Christmas, John.

John Taylor and Hanna

John stared -- ogled, in fact -- the naked woman sitting in the sand for a long moment before she finally looked up and saw him.

Immediately she stood and started backing away, talking quickly. She sounded frightened, which didn't surprise John; what did surprise him was she wasn't speaking English.

Until this moment, John hadn't really considered what he was going to say to the only other human he knew to be on the island when he finally found him -- or, as it turned out, her. He'd thought he would get some answers; he'd never considered that the other person might not understand any potential questions.

John realized that the woman's eyes were traveling up and down his body -- his Security Force dressed body, complete with shotgun, side arm, bullet-resistant vest, utility belt and more.

He slung his shotgun and held his hands out to his side in a peaceful gesture. "It's okay. I won't hurt you."

The woman rattled off some more quick, surprised words as she began gathering the long strands of pearls up into her hands; then -- like a jack rabbit -- she turned and was sprinting away along the sandy shore of the estuary.

"Wait! It's alright!" John began to walk her direction, then broke into a sprint himself, hollering to her, "Stop! Stop! No one's going to hurt you."

John was running as fast as he could, but the gap between the two of them was only increasing. Between his weapons, his pack, and the gear on his belt, John was carrying 59 pounds in addition to his almost 200 pounds; his pack weight was light compared to a war zone soldier but heavy for a typical security officer; and every step that he took in the muddy, estuary sand sunk three or four inches deep. He tried moving inland, onto the more solid ground, but dodging the roots and low hanging limbs was slowing him more than sinking was.

And he was exhausted. In over two weeks on the island -- in this time frame -- he'd eaten less protein and carbs than he typically consumed in two days. After about two hundred yards, he simply tuckered out and slowed to a stop.

Ahead of him, glancing back and seeing him cease his pursuit, the woman slowed but continued on until she'd stomped her way across a little stream dumping into the estuary, then disappeared up it.

John moved to the shoreline and dropped down onto a stump to catch his breath. Okay, that was interesting. Who the hell was this woman? The Isle of Dayton was a French possession, and the traffic ticket had definitely been French as well; but the woman wasn't speaking French when she began rambling at John. She could have been a tourist. The local cops loved to ticket the tourists because if they threatened to take the offenders in, they were usually offered bribes to prevent an expensive vacation from being ruined.

But, the most interesting question was, why the hell was she naked? There's no one else on the island -- at least until John showed up -- so he guessed she could feel free about walking about in anything she wanted to, even if anything meant nothing.

He looked back up the direction the woman had disappeared. There was no sign of her; she was gone, likely back into her running shoes and shorts and half way up the mountain. The terrain she'd disappeared into was steep and, he believed, only led back to the trail he'd blazed getting here. So he opted to go back the way he came. If the woman was in fact heading up and over, he may even get another shot at talking to her on the other side.

He headed off.

He had just left the shore of the estuary, beginning back up the stream, when he caught sight of something that didn't belong. He moved off the trail and found a layer of natural debris -- fronds, leaves, and more -- which likely had been where the woman had been sleeping. And right there, in the middle of her bed was a small black bag. John's black bag, in which he'd stored some items he hadn't wanted to pack around with him. John had left the bag behind -- at the portal site.

Which meant ... the woman had been through the portal as well.

What the hell is going on?

Finn and Teagan: Arrival, Wednesday January 19, 11:50am

Dr. Finn McCool was checking Raven. One of the horses in the barn at Barley Sheaf farm. The Farm was actually a B&B with horses. They rented them out and boarded a few others as well. Barley Sheaf was part of his regular rounds. The McCormack women were warm and welcoming, Maeve was an excellent cook and he always went home with a few meals' worth of food. Cooking was not one of his favortie things, unless it was outdoors over an open campfire. Maureen, Maeve's sister, was an herbalist and made him all sorts of remedies that as much as his scientific mind balked--he had to admit, they worked. Maureen had a daughter Morag, who was interesting to say the least. And Maeve had Teagan. Get a grip, Finn ol' boy. She's not jailbait any more, but...her mother would cut your balls off and hang 'em out to dry.

Teagan McCormack came into the barn with a tray with lunch for four people. That was her mother's doing. Why feed someone when you could overfeed them. "Mom made me bring you some lunch and she says come into the house when you're done so she can give you some roast beef to take home." Teagan checked out his ass while he leaned over and ran his hands on the horse's legs. She caught herself. She supposed she had some daddy issues. But really, Dr McCool--his name made her want to giggle every time she said it, was really hot. The fact that he had known her since she was a dorky 12 yr old and had a horrible crush on him didn't help.

((More to come, it's too late and my Muse has gone to bed.))

John Taylor witnesses the Portal

December 28th -- Tuesday

John concluded that the woman at the estuary had either come through the portal -- what John was calling it, for lack of a better word -- or had simply been in the vicinity after John had teleported. He raced back there are quickly as he could to check it out. It took him three days to get back to the spot he'd left nearly six and half weeks earlier.

About every hour or so while on the trail, he would conceal himself for a few minutes. He was eager to see if the woman from the estuary would attempt to follow him, either out of a need to join him in a more appropriate fashion -- dressed -- or simply to keep an eye on the enemy. Nothing; no sign of her what-so-ever.

Just in case she did decide to follow, John left a trail a blind man could follow, snapping limbs, using his big knife to cut away the undergrowth, and walking heavier than necessary to ensure he left an obvious trail through the wetlands and up the steep cliffs.

When he reached the rocky switch-back trail that climbed to where the Hatfield Project had once existed, he passed it by, continuing on for another half mile or so, blazing an even more obvious trail, then back tracked to the switch back. John wanted the woman to get close to the portal's location, but not that close.

He had another reason for doing this, and this one was concerned him more than a naked female tourist following him through the forest. If the two of them had made it to the Isle of Dayton through the portal, who else had?

Who turned out not to be the question; what did.

John arrived back at the portal zone to discover a six foot high pile of ... stuff! Right where he'd come to weeks earlier, was a stack of just about anything and everything you could imagine.

On top of the pile was a book case full of books. Not enough books to fill a bookcase, but a book case -- sitting on its back at a slant -- that was full of books! It was as if two big guys had walked into grampa's second floor den, grabbed each end of the totally loaded case, and heaved it right out of the second floor window onto the pile.

There were other den-type things as well: a pipe and all the supplies, including cleaners and a pouch of tobacco; an old recliner, a lamp table, a yard long Persian carpet, and a huge framed wall photo of an older couple with a pack of children and grandchildren. All of it was near the top of the pile and seemed to belong together.

John walked around the pile for several minutes, just taking a gander, contemplating. He came to a conclusion, the logical one: the portal was, of course, still active!

He wondered whether it was safe to get near the pile. What would happen to him if it activated, or what ever the word was, while he was near the pile? He still remembered the pain of coming through it -- vividly! He wasn't about to go through that again.

Perhaps getting near the portal is what caused it to trigger. When he'd been teleported, he'd been approaching the Tucker Woolen Mill, inside of which the research lab was -- had been --located. Perhaps John had stepped into something that wasn't supposed to be there.

The naked chick on the beach; she could have done the same thing, perhaps been coming from the Administration Building, on her way to the lab with reports or supplies or tea and crumpets.

But ... that didn't explain the crap sitting in a pile before him. The book case didn't walk into a teleportation device, nor did the recliner nor the picture of grampa and the clan. No, the portal was moving about. There was little doubt about that; the portal was mobile and was sucking stuff up from all over the place.

It was still early in the day. John decided to give it a while and see what happened. He wandered around the pile for hours, gawking at it, even using his field glasses to identify smaller objects or read writing on others. He began taking notes in his pocket journal, notes about how he could use some of the treasures.

It didn't take long to conclude that the portal was snatching up things from all over the world, not just from near the lab, or just from the Isle of Dayton. There was a road sign from the UK; kimonos from (or at least inspired by) Japan, San Miguel beer from the Philippines, a case of paper hot dog sleeves from, he guessed, a German soccer stadium, and much more.

As he bored of the distance inventorying, he laid back into the curved trunk of a big tree and began, again, to consider the woman at the estuary. There was clothing, as well as other fabrics, in the pile, fairly obviously exposed just below the den level. If she'd passed naked through the portal after these things, awoken to find herself either atop or lying at the bottom of it, wouldn't she have snatched something to wear? Did that mean she'd passed through the portal before the clothes did? Did she pass through before any of this mess did, perhaps even before John had? Or had she simply stripped a bit before John discovered her, then run off to the bungalow that she, her husband, and their three dogs and cat lived in? (John regretted not having investigated the estuary more thoroughly. He planned to do so soon, however.)

Eventually, the sun began dropping and John decided to give up all the speculating and inventorying for the night. Thirty yards away, he put together a shelter and laid back; he recalled that he had been snatched about 2350 and wanted to stay up until then, but the three day forced march had beat him. He was passed out in less than a minute.

He awoke the next morning to find nothing had seemed to change.

He was tired of waiting and launched into pillaging the pile. He stripped out of his gear, keeping only the 9mm on his hip, then made quick dashes to the pile grabbing handfuls of stuff, rushing away to deposit them across the landscape, then rushing back in again.

Sometime around 1100, he hit pay dirt -- a full case of Zagnut Candy Bars, and another of crunchy peanut Mountain Bars. He decided it was a good time for a break and wolfed down a pair of each, causing him to get a dizzying brain from the oh-so-welcomed sugar rush.

He stood again, stretched -- chomped yet another candy bar -- and was returning to the still ample pile when, just a few yards short of it, his skin began to tingle, and a moment later a split second of light flash before him.

And what he saw amazed him -- then made him laugh with childish joy. A huge ... sphere, it seemed to be, of thick, fluffy snow flakes suddenly surrounded the entire pile, then very quickly -- as if still being propelled by the storm from which it had come -- blew all around John's body and, as quickly as it had appeared, melted into tiny droplets of water, that simply wafted away in the mountain breeze. It was unbelievable; he had seen the portal for himself, had seen it activate and deliver -- in this case -- a miniature blizzard.

John backed away, his skin still tingling, a chill climbing his spine a moment after that. It was ... simply unbelievable. He had seen what had brought him from his place and time, dropped him into this place and time. And it was ... simply ... unbelievable.

The portal hadn't harmed him -- or course, he hadn't been inside it, only near it -- and it hadn't seemed to remove any of what remained on the treasure.

John spent a few minutes simply contemplating what had occurred ... then went back to work scrounging and organizing, this time at a more leisurely, comfortable pace.



January 2nd, 2011 -- Sunday -- Dawn

As dawn broke, John awoke to discover a wild assortment of old, rusty automotive parts scattered about the now browning grass of the portal zone. Upon closer inspection, he found them each bearing identification tags, each written in Spanish, which John unfortunately did not read beyond simply comparing to English and guessing. He concluded that the portal had likely activated in the parts storage room of an automotive salvage yard in Latin America, or possibly Spain itself.

He was beginning to see a pattern. This latest activation had occurred between when he had sacked out Saturday evening and dawn Sunday morning; and John had himself has been teleported on a Saturday night, just before midnight. He'd also found other evidence that seemed to indicate a regular Saturday event, including a scribbled note from one lover to another about meeting later that night -- a note written on a receipt dated December 18, a Saturday; as well as a clipping from of a Japanese Newspaper -- again, unreadable by John -- that clearly had a different Saturday date on it.

And there was a similar pattern for a midday Wednesday event, with yet another newspaper -- this one a full copy of a Wall Street Journal -- and a kitchen garbage can that included in it's contents crumpled notes about Tuesday dentist appointments and more.

So, John had a plan. As he continued sorting through, cataloging, and planning to use his new resources, he waited: for Wednesday afternoons and Saturday nights.

John Taylor meets Finn and Teagan

January 19th, 2011 -- Wednesday -- 1pm

Fucking clumsy ass numb skull son of stupid ass bitch!

John fought his way up yet another steep, gravelly incline, alternating between cursing himself and wiping away the blood flowing from his forehead down into his right eye, his good eye.

Knowing your luck, it's a whole flock of chickens!

He'd been gathering bird eggs on a cliff edge and, when the need called, swatting at the diving, angry avian parents -- with a recently acquired tennis racket -- in the hope of killing a few of them for dinner as well. He'd lost his foot hold and fell several yards into a chasm and gotten stuck. By the time he'd gotten himself out, then circled around the three mile detour that his drop had forced upon him, it was nearly noon.

It activates at ten 'til! he reminded himself, hurrying up the route he'd slowly been developing into a navigable trail. He'd managed so far to connect together a clamming beach, crabbing tide pool, fresh water spring, egg-rich rookery -- where he'd just fallen -- and three overlooks; and with the new trail, all were within an hour of the Portal without giving any potential neighbors -- Estuary Girl was still out there somewhere, along with possible others -- the ability to locate the source of all his wealth.

The reason for his hurry was his last great treasure: guinea pigs!

A week before, John had been disappointed, to say the least, when the portal activated and pummeled him with a sphere of air filled with dead animal stench, as if it had activated in the middle of a cattle stock yard or a meat packing house. No objects of concrete value had appeared, just like the night of the blizzard, which had been far more magical than the cow shit smell.

But the following Saturday night had been very fruitful, if not labor intensive to eventually make good out of. John had lit the torches now surrounding the Portal, then stood back to see what -- if anything -- would come through this time. The expected skin tingle began, and John shielded his eyes against the also expected flash of the Portal. Then he turned to find ... guinea pigs.

There were two cages, with other miscellaneous paraphernalia, sitting atop a cabinet that immediately reminded John of the middle school classroom he'd been in a few years back for "Occupation Day" at his niece's request. Despite John leveling the surface of the Portal Zone, the cabinet -- obviously designed to be supported by the wall behind it -- slowly but surely fell backwards dumping every thing atop it into the torch-lit darkness.

John hurried around to the cages, but too late: one of the little creatures hauled ass from an opened cage for the tree line, evading the less-nimble John Taylor.

John secured the rest of offering, then sacked out. The next day, he checked the cages and found the still occupied one labeled "Sophia" and the empty one labeled "Diego". And John smiled. He smiled because if there was anything John knew about guinea pigs, it was that like rabbits -- and himself -- they liked to fuck. But -- unlike himself -- they didn't use condoms to prevent babies!

An hour later, using some bungee cords and a bed sheet, courtesy of the Portal, John had created a nice little live trap on the ground near where Diego had disappeared. The bait, of course, was sexy Sophia, munching away and going about life probably not unlike the day before in what ever classroom she'd been snatched out of.

Then, John just sat back and waited. He opened the trashy romance novel he'd dog eared the day before and started reading about Paris in springtime. He'd decided to read the less desirable books first, so that if he needed them for other purposes later -- such as fire starting -- he wouldn't feel like he'd let a good read go to waste.

Two hours later, movement caught his eye. Diego was coming out to call on his girlfriend, and with the jerk of a phone cord, John Taylor was a guinea pig rancher.

Now, hurrying up the trail, still wiping the blood away from his eye, he was dreaming of cages full of turkeys or chickens when wham!

He never saw it coming, the Mack Truck that bowled him over and into the forest. He fought to regain his breath, then righted himself and looked about for what ever or whomever had wiped him out; nothing. He check his body and his gear. Fuck! His Beretta was missing, ripped from its holster. He managed to get to his feet, again looked about himself, then searched the underbrush until he found the 9mm and holstered it again.

He moved up to the trail, looked uphill, then downhill. Nothing. He pondered which was to go, then looked down to the trail itself. Are you kidding me? He knelt and traced his fingers in the deep tracks pressed into the dark, volcanic soil. You didn't need to be a tracker to recognize the hoof prints of a horse -- a shod horse.



(OOC --- At this point, the story moves to a Side Thread. You, the reader, are free to follow and read.