THE DAISY SAGA EPISODE 36

THE DAISY SAGA EPISODE 36
Daisy Versus the Tempus Venatores, Part IV

"Hi Daisy," Garth greeted, a crooked smile touching his mouth. "I took care of that, by the way," he said, pointing at her toned abdomen. The front of her dress had a slit in it, but her skin showed no sign of injury.
"Garth," she said, still disoriented. "How did you...?"
"Nanomachines. The same way I fixed your hand."
Her eyes grew wide with realization. But she still had questions.
"What's with this net?"
"It's charged with a chronoparticle field. We're currently moving thousands of times faster than the rest of the universe."
She turned again and looked at everyone outside the net. "So," she remarked, "they all appear to be standing still."
"But, if you watched them long enough you might see movement. Although, the chronoparticles would likely run out before that."
Deja vu, she thought, and hoped briefly that this was a dream. Then she asked, "So what now?"
"Now," he said, pressing buttons on his silver box, "we escape."
"Escape? Where?"
"Not where. When."
Daisy did not have a chance to roll her eyes at the overused time travel cliché before she felt herself being pulled sideways in a blinding rush.
She was nauseous and disoriented for a moment and nearly fell, but Garth caught her. She was about to snap at him and assert her independence, but his touch was comforting. She hated to admit it, but it was a little thrilling as well. She could not explain why she felt lukewarm about Brandon, yet went nuts over this creep she practically hated.
I'm a teenage girl, she thought sarcastically. My emotions are supposed to be inscrutable.
Still, she wasn't about to make it that easy for him. Gently pushing him away, she stood on her own. "I'm okay, really. Thanks."
He gingerly pulled his hands away and began removing the net from their bodies. Once it was off, Daisy saw they were still standing in Kanahwa Plaza.
"So," she began haughtily, her hands on her hips, "What year did we land in?"
"Well, 'land' isn't the most accurate term, but we should be in the early part of twenty-eleven."
"Two thousand, eleven," she replied, a bit annoyed with him already.
"That's what I said, isn't it?" he challenged, raising his right eyebrow.
She watched the traffic rolling by. It really didn't look all that different from 2004. A quick glance around revealed that a few changes to nearby buildings and newer cars on the road were the only real differences. That, and the statuebots had been removed.
"Whatever. So we're in 2011. What's the game plan? Acquire some future tech, go after Scarecrow-Zombie and Friends when they're kids?"
"Um... no."
"So, we came to this time period for what exactly?"
"I told you: to escape."
"Right. And, by 'escape', I took it to also mean 'regroup, return to my own time, and fight back'."
A pitiful look began to wash over Garth's face. This was clearly not going the way he had planned.
"What!" Daisy was beginning to have a very bad feeling about this.
"We can't go back," he said, shaking his head sorrowfully.
"At least, not yet," Daisy ventured. "Riiiight?"
Garth pursed his lips and shook his head again. His eyes actually began to water.
"Garth," Daisy said slowly, "Why can't we go back to the year 2004?"
"Because my time machine only goes one way: forward." He fought back his tears. "I had to get you away from the TVs, and even if we could go back-"
"The TVs?"
"The Tempus Venatores! You're no match for them! You're the toughest person I know, but you can't take them on. And if we went back in time, they could follow us way too easily!
"They do it the same way the Enforcers do. When you move backwards through time, it's easy to trace from any point in the future. They would be there waiting for us if we went to any point in the past.
"But moving forward through time is untraceable. Even the robots in the next millennium can't track it. And since the TVs seemed to think you disappeared, and assumed you would go with them-"
"Stop."
"What?"
"Stop! I said, 'Stop!' I can't think with you babbling like that."
Daisy briefly ran through what she knew.
"Okay," she said, regarding the nervous boy before her. "What are our options for returning to 2004?"
"I just told you..."
"Not good enough! Tell me. What would happen if we could go back?"
"They would be waiting for us. They would kill me and take you away."
Before Daisy could think or say anything else, a woman's voice interrupted.
"Daisy?! Is that you?"
She turned and saw a gorgeous blonde in tight black leather. Unlike her future self, this woman's features were immediately recognizable to her.
"Penny!"
"Oh my god! Daisy! It really is you!"
This twenty-something Penny grabbed Daisy in a warm, hard embrace. She then let go and unloaded on her.
"Where the fuck have you been for the last seven years?! We thought you had been captured by those freaks!"
Then she stopped and said, "Holy shit! You haven't aged. Oh my god! You just got here didn't you?"
Penny turned to Garth and grabbed him in a bear hug. "Oh, thank you so much for keeping her safe!"
"Um, excuse me," Daisy interjected, "but I didn't need to be saved. All I needed was a chance to-"
"Listen to me, girl," Penny interrupted. "Me and Brandon were damn lucky the Tempus Venatores didn't decide to kill us right then! We were no match for them. We barely beat Dron when he came back last year, and that's only because someone had already wiped out the rest of those jerks."
A new voice interjected. "Son? Is that you?"
They all turned to see an older man already climbing the steps to the center of the plaza.
"Dad!" Garth replied.
"Mister Dark Evil-" Daisy began. He winced at the old name. "Mister Shadow Man," she retried, abashedly. The years were visible on him as well.
"You should all come with me," he said. "We have a lot of catching up to do."
"Lemme call B.B.," Penny remarked as she whipped out her phone and started dialing. "He's gonna wanna know."

A NEW STORY BEGINS.