The Plunge (Parallel Past) Book 1

By Edward J Schneider

It’s the year 2150 and the exotically beautiful Chandra Jarvis is jogging in Golden Gate Park, when suddenly she is catapulted into a parallel universe to a bygone era: the Old West. Fortunately, her futuristic suit of special fibers and a personal computer chip implant come with her, as she will need every available advantage to survive on the Oregon Trail of 1850.

Leaving behind her somewhat labile, sheltered, electronic dream life, she is thrust into rash encounters with all the people, grit, and danger of that time. She experiences the gamut of emotions, from love to heartache, to comfort and fear, establishing true and lasting friendships along the way.
Will she ever be able to return home? Can she ultimately accustom herself to the ways of the west and find a new direction for her life?

Join Chandra in her quest for that answer and more in this first novel of the Parallel Past time travel series, a refreshing dip into other worlds and possibilities still to be explored.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Edward J Schneider
• Release date: May 24, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311606525

Edward J Schneider

Biography of Edward J. SchneiderI was born in 1941 in a little town in Southeastern Wyoming called Wheatland and am the middle of six children. I graduated from Torrington High School in 1941 and moved to the Los Angeles area when I was twenty-one years old and spent the next fifteen years going to night school, working as a chemistry lab assistant, a data control clerk, and a computer operator.Missing the sunsets, beautiful clouds, and the breathtaking views of far horizons—and the good people—I eventually moved back to Cheyenne, Wyoming. I worked for the state as a programmer analyst for the next eleven years. Making a move to Idaho Falls, Idaho I went to work for INEL. I also meet and married my wonderful wife Judy while there. In 1990 we moved to the Salt Lake Valley where I finished my career for the State of Utah and retired in 2006. After retirement we homestead in Bridger Valley, Wyoming for a number of years. Due to health issues and the need for nearby doctors, regretfully, we moved back to Utah to a city called Tooele where I presently live with the love of my life, my wife and partner, Judy.I’ve wanted to write novels for years but life kept getting in the way. I wish I’d started sooner but feel fortunate I still have time to do so. I might add, my children, grandchildren and even my dear mother-in-law, Luella love reading my books and that is one of the great joys of my life.

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The Plunge

A Parallel Past Novel

by

EDWARD J. SCHNEIDER

The Plunge, A Parallel Past Novel

Copyright © 2012 Edward J. Schneider

All Rights Reserved

www.edwardjschneider.com

First edition eBook 2012

Smashwords Edition

This book is licensed for the purchaser's own personal enjoyment only and may not be re-sold or given away to other people. Unauthorized redistribution or reprinting of this book is prohibited and doing so constitutes copyright infringement. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission from the copyright holder. Thank you for respecting this author's work.

This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Cover Design by James, Go-On-Write.com

Editing by Janet Green

www.thewordverve.com

Formatting by Bob Houston eBook Formatting

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Dedication

I want to dedicate this book to the love of my life, Judy M. Schneider, my wife. Without her loving encouragement and help, this novel could not have been written.

Foreword

I have admired strong women and loved science fiction for years. I am fascinated by love stories that involve themes such as crossing dimensions or time travel. It occurred to me that I could combine these themes into a novel.

I made a living for years as a programmer analyst and am thoroughly familiar with the history of computers and what motivated their invention. It is ever more fascinating to speculate what the future holds with them.

My main character in this series, Chandra, is thrown via a wormhole three hundred years into the past into the northwestern territories of the United States. A computer chip that was implanted at the base of her brain as a child helps her to cope. She has named it Sugar and it communicates with Chandra by vibrating tiny speakers imbedded in bone near each of her eardrums. As a guide, these vibrating words (i.e., a humming or buzzing sound) are depicted in this story as italicized words surrounded by tilde symbols: ~~ When Chandra answers with a whisper or subvocalizes, her words are italicized and surrounded by quotation marks.

May you find much pleasure in these stories, a combination of our past and future humanness, which inevitably involves the heart.

Chapter 1

An implanted computer chip just behind Chandra’s right ear stirred in an attempt to communicate with her. It was self-aware to the extent that the law allowed, and Chandra thought of it as she because it seemed so feminine. Maybe the designers did that on purpose. She had even named her chip Sugar and communicated with it subvocally.

"Sugar, I told you to be quiet unless there is an emergency. I want to enjoy my jog, so stop with the yammering."

This morning Chandra jogged through a lovely, shaded lane in Golden State Park, her long, ebony hair streaming behind in the breeze. The sun had just burned off the morning fog, revealing a view of the Golden Gate Bridge in the distance silhouetted by a yellow-tinged, blue sky and a slate-grey sea.

Chandra knew that Sugar had a hard time grasping her need for natural sounds and experiences; in fact, she was completely baffled by Chandra’s archaic hobby of reading paper books and sketching on paper with charcoal pencils. To Sugar, the electronic way was the only logical, efficient way, and that was all that mattered. But not to Chandra. Sugar constantly warned her about approaching the boundaries of abnormality. Chandra found her peers predictable and boring, but society considered it unhealthy to be too different.

Chandra loved to sweat and make her muscles burn with fatigue. Sugar would periodically lecture her—after all, such exertion was unnecessary. Chandra understood that her health, muscle tone, and youth could be maintained by the nanobots circulating by the millions through her blood stream while maintaining tissues, DNA, and disease protection.

In midstride, the air swirled around her, exuding a smell like a short in electrical wiring, followed by a silent, blinding flash and a falling sensation. A second or so later, she could see again. But what she saw was not comforting. She plunged through the air toward a cone-shaped, beige-colored structure about ten feet below her. Chandra’s startled yelp alerted Sugar, who immediately commanded her special fiber smartsuit to become rigid. As she fell, Chandra had time to catch a glimpse of an ochre and yellow horizon stretching far and away.

She brought her feet down before striking the side of the structure. Thanks to her suddenly rigid jogging smartsuit, Chandra barely felt the impact.

Everyone wore a one-piece smart suit controlled by their implanted chip. Comprised of special fibers, the smartsuit could change color, be stiffened, tightened, or softened, or could vary in size at the wearer’s command.

The structure billowed and wrapped around her as it collapsed. Screeches and startled yelps and puffs of smoke came from beneath.

The smartsuit fabric relaxed but squirming lumps under her made it difficult for Chandra to get to her feet. She crawled to the edge of the structure and was startled by a small, brown boy erupting from under it, screaming and running toward other brown men and women.

With eerie howls, some of the men brandished knives and charged her. Others ran into other tapered structures and came out with hatchets, knives, and to Chandra’s amazement, bows and arrows.

Who are you, and where is this?! Chandra bellowed. The men ignored her cries, throwing rocks and knocking arrows.

She screamed aloud, Sugar, I think they’re going to try to kill me! Let’s get the hell out of here!

~~ I’m already ahead of you, boss. Start running while I assist your speed. I suggest you go left. There are fewer men in that direction. ~~

Chandra sprinted northwest away from the howling men. Arrows began to fly by, and she shouted again, Do something, or I’m gonna become a pin cushion! The fabric stiffened around her torso just as an arrow struck between her shoulder blades, bouncing off without damage. With the smartsuit helping, she could do thirty-five miles an hour, and it wasn’t long before she left them out of sight over the horizon. She slowed to a brisk trot, but kept going in the same direction.

Sugar buzzed ~~Quick, gather your hair and stuff it into your smartsuit so I can form a helmet over your head and face. I need to analyze this air until I determine that it is safe for you to keep breathing it. ~~

Horrified that she might suffocate although she didn’t detect any difficulty in breathing, Chandra complied and then Sugar quickly grew a helmet with a transparent front over Chandra’s head.

Taking deep breaths to calm herself, she asked, Sugar, am I crazy or what? Weren’t those Indians or at least men dressed like them? If they are fakes, then why in all that’s holy were they trying to kill me?

~~ I believe the politically correct term is ‘Native Americans’ or possibly aborigines. My files that deal with that subject are still scrambled, but you can believe that my priorities are going to be to restore those of the Old West circa the nineteenth century. ~~

"Look, Sugar, I don’t give a damn about political correctness! This is my life that’s being threatened!"

Chandra was astounded to see that the sun was about two-thirds of the way across the sky making the time somewhere around late afternoon.

"Sugar, what happened to the intervening eight or nine hours?"

~~ Maybe I somehow blacked out, but it certainly didn’t seem like it. I don’t recognize the mixture of yellowish grass and sagebrush. ~~

Chandra scanned the horizon. Sugar, my sense of direction is completely skewed. Please orient me.

~~ The flat horizon stretches away to the north and east and ends in mountains to the south and southwest. ~~

"Sugar, what the hell happened? More importantly, where are we?"

Sugar didn’t respond right away, which was very unusual, as she could process information at a rate of several trillion operations a second.

After a few seconds, she asked Chandra to wait while she ran a diagnostic on herself. ~~ About ten percent of my files have been scrambled, and it will take some time to restore them. I’ve tried communicating with orbiting satellites but there doesn’t seem to be any. If there aren’t any, then I can’t tell you where or when we are for certain until it gets dark. Then I should be able to read the position of the stars to determine our latitude and longitude. Meanwhile, I can tell you that the sun has advanced five hours and nine minutes into late afternoon, and its latitude shows we are farther north, and it is about midsummer instead of late spring. But I can’t explain how as of yet. Also, your smartsuit’s power pack has been drained of about eighty percent of its stored energy. It’ll take about an hour of smartsuit inactivity and strong sunlight for the solar batteries to be fully restored. ~~

Chandra massaged her covered head. My mind seems to be intact; that is, I don’t seem to have a memory loss or to be confused. Why is that?

~~ Until I have more data, I can only guess. There are things that affect me that don’t you, such as magnetic fields or electrical pulses. I’m pursuing that angle even as we speak. Please be patient. I’m currently reviewing everything in extremely slow motion, and I hope to be able to answer your questions soon. ~~

"Sorry, old gal, I didn’t mean to put pressure on you, but you have to admit, this sort of thing doesn’t happen every day."

~~ My astronomical files are now in order, and I’ll be able to give you an exact fix on where and when we are tonight. A search of my files says there have been a few mysterious explosions at random in the atmosphere and low orbital space recently, sometimes right before witnesses’ eyes. In all cases, nobody has ever been able to explain them. Maybe our ‘event’ is related. ~~

"Why haven’t you brought this to my attention? I mean, isn’t this somewhat sensational news?"

~~ This isn’t an area in which you normally have interest, and most incidents have been brushed off as a variety of natural causes or drug-related hallucinations. ~~

"Yeah, most people are spending hours every day drugged or immersed in interactive, computer-generated fantasies, so I can understand that."

Chandra started to press a seam that would retract her facial cover, and Sugar warned, ~~ Please leave that in place until I do a complete analysis of the air. I don’t believe it is harmful, but I must tell you that it is different from the air you are used to breathing because it’s missing several ingredients. Hm . . . the hydrogen sulfide, nitrous oxide, ozone, and other components of air pollution are either completely gone or in such small quantities as not to matter. There, I am finished. I am going to retract your helmet. The nanobots are removing your respiratory and physical dependencies on these various pollutants. Enjoy breathing natural, pure, uncontaminated air! ~~

The helmet peeled back, and Chandra took a deep breath. Her nostrils were bombarded by the smell of grass, swampy water, traces of animal dung, and crisp air. There were no signs of anybody—a new experience because people, buildings, and traffic were everywhere in her world, a result of the world population that had ballooned to twenty-four billion.

"Sugar, where are the people? Even in Antarctica you can see jet contrails, vacation resorts, and traffic. I’m looking from horizon to horizon, and I see nothing except a few lone trees and—what are those? Are those buffalo off in the distance? I can’t believe this!"

Sugar suggested moving toward a small clump of cottonwood trees growing near the bank of a pond.

Puzzled, Chandra asked, Why is there a pond out here in the prairie? I don’t see a source for the water, where does it come from?

~~ The pond probably comes from a high water table and may dry up by early fall. Such ponds are common on the prairie. By the way, I’ve been scanning the radio spectrum from end to end and have detected no broadcasts. Meanwhile, I suggest you create one braid from your hair and tuck it into the smartsuit so I can quickly form a helmet if it is needed on short notice ~~

Chandra paused a few moments to do so and then walked to one of the trees. She was about to sit down to lean against it when an arrow thunked into the tree trunk just a few inches from her head. She whirled and saw several men with long, streaming, black hair in leather breechclouts and moccasins running toward her while firing more arrows.

Sugar quickly reformed the helmet and needlessly warned ~~ They aren’t giving up! Run, before they kill you! ~~

Chandra’s smartsuit kicked in, speeding her away, and she soon lost sight of the shouting men.

After about thirty minutes, Sugar slowed the smartsuit. ~~ The sun will set in about two hours. We need to find shelter and stop before the smartsuit’s power is all used up. There’s enough left to keep you warm for the night. Tomorrow’s sun can recharge the power pack. ~~

Chandra stepped near a clump of sagebrush. A loud buzzing shattered the silence, sending a primitive spike of fear through her. Then she felt a thump against her ankle. Looking down, she saw a huge rattlesnake rearing back for another strike and back pedaled, furiously screaming, What the hell kind of place is this!? Everything here is out to kill me!

~~ Calm down ~~ Sugar soothed ~~ Your smartsuit is more than adequate to protect you from any animal. Are you sure you don’t want a mild tranquilizer? ~~

"No! I need to be sharp! Give me some time to get adjusted. I’ve never been in a situation like this before. How are your long-range sensors? Are those Indians, or whatever they are, still after us?"

~~ I’ve been monitoring them, and it appears that they’ve given up. Uh-oh, I hear gunfire in the distance. I believe that may be why the Native Americans are running in the opposite direction. The smartsuit still has some power left before I have to switch to the emergency reserves. Do you want to move toward the noise, stop, or go in some other direction? ~~

"Let’s go see what is happening, but do it cautiously. Maybe there’s a chance we’ll meet ‘civilized’ people who can tell us where we are."

Chandra trotted over a rise in the prairie and came to a dead stop. She couldn’t believe her eyes! In a valley below, four or five covered wagons were burning. A band of men on horses were whooping and shooting men, women, and children dead in their tracks as they tried to run. One man dismounted and tackled a young woman to the ground with the obvious intent of raping her.

From the east, a lone man on a horse galloped to the struggling couple and bashed the head of the would-be rapist with the barrel of his rifle. He leapt from his horse to help the woman. While he ran toward her, another bandit literally galloped over him, stomping him into the ground. Then the murderer leaned over, ran a saber into the rescuer’s stomach, and swung it at the young woman, who had just risen to her knees. Her head leapt from her body, blood jetting in a crimson arc as the body collapsed.

Sugar urged ~~ Lie down in the grass and hide, or they will see and kill you! Your smartsuit can stop arrows, but right now, it can’t stop bullets ~~

Chandra dropped to the ground and listened, agonizing for what seemed an eternity before hearing the gang gallop off, whooping and shooting their guns in the air.

Chapter 2

Chandra lay on the ground for another few minutes, making sure that the murderous gang was long gone. Then, getting up slowly and shakily, she walked toward the carnage.

It was horrible beyond belief! She had never experienced anything like this in real life, although she’d seen plenty of virtual violence in holographic crime and war dramas. But virtual violence didn’t compare at all with the real thing.

"Sugar, do you have access to emergency medical treatments in your unscrambled files? And while you are looking, adjust my stomach because I’m feeling queasy, and it won’t be any easier as I get closer."

~~ Of course, I’ve already started on that. Don’t you think I’m aware of how you feel at all times? It isn’t necessary to micromanage me. ~~

"Don’t start that again. Just humor me. I’m damned upset!"

There was thick smoke and dust hanging in the still air as Chandra approached, and she couldn’t see who was alive or dead. The only sound was the labored breathing of the man who had tried to save the woman.

Gently, Sugar advised her ~~ He’ll survive for the next few minutes. I haven’t detected any other signs of life, but even so, you should check the others first to be sure. ~~

As the murky air began to clear, revealing the carnage, the horror of it all struck home, and Chandra felt her gorge beginning to rise.

~~ Whoa! Easy now. Here, I’ll stop that right now. I didn’t settle your stomach enough the first time. ~~

Chandra continued to walk in silence, dismayed and disgusted. Bodies were splayed here and there. Walking over to each, she checked for a pulse and found none. She counted four other men, four women, and fifteen children all sprawled in positions suggesting they were fleeing when killed. Some had been chopped or skewered by sabers, while the rest had been shot. No mercy had been granted; they never had a chance. At least none of the victims had suffered for long. The one attempted rape had been interrupted by the tall man, who continued his belabored breathing.

All of these people were small-statured by Chandra’s standards. How tall would you say these people are, Sugar?

~~ The men appear to be around five feet five inches tall and the women anywhere from four feet ten to five feet two. This contributes to my growing suspicion that we’re at some point in the past because people of centuries ago were shorter in height. In our time, the mid-twenty-second century, people average around a foot taller. ~~

She went back to the tall man and peered down at him. He differed from the rest of the group with a height of around six feet four and weighed possibly around one hundred ninety pounds. If her guestimates were correct, he was taller than she by two or three inches, which surprised her. If they were in the mid-nineteenth century, then this man would be regarded as a giant. Comparably in her time, he would stand out like someone who is over seven feet tall. Abe Lincoln, who was six feet four, was regarded as a giant. A photo of him came to her mind, in which he was sitting in a small chair with his crossed ankles tucked beneath and his bent knees almost touching the floor. That chair obviously was made for the normal-sized man of that time. Briefly, a thought popped into her head: Poor Abe Lincoln! It must have been hell for him to find a bed where his feet didn’t hang over the end.

Studying the wounded man’s face, she was struck by his rugged features, so different from those of the men in her world. The skin on his face was deeply tanned, prematurely lined, and weathered from the sun and wind. She might have considered him handsome, except for the area around his eyebrows and cheekbones, which were layered with scar tissue. This gave his face a brutish, dangerous cast. Something else about his face struck her as odd. His ears! They were swollen and puffy.

She whispered to Sugar, What strange scars. The ones around his eyes don’t look like burn scars, but what? And I wonder, why do his ears look like that?

~~ I’ve just consulted my files I’m fairly sure those scars come from repeated beatings to his face. His ears are what used to be called ‘cauliflower ears’. If they are repeatedly struck, they accumulate fluid under the skin and swell, and if untreated, stay that way. Wrestling can cause cauliflower ears, but scarring around the eyes doesn’t usually happen. I’d say he’s boxed or fought a lot in his past. ~~

In Chandra’s world, everyone had a sort of look that reflected the latest fashion or the latest celebrity. Face and body shape, as well as skin, hair, and eye coloring, were easy to alter using internal nanobots. The skin was always kept smooth, supple, and healed. Chandra had been, for the most part, disinterested in altering herself. Once in a while, Sugar scolded her for refusing to go along with those trends, suggesting it would be easier to socialize with peers and get along in life. And as usual, Chandra passionately disagreed, stating that if people couldn’t accept her looks and lifestyle, then they could go stick it! However, she had yielded to one bit of vanity by allowing Sugar to alter the color of her eyes to a glowing cobalt blue.

Sugar snapped Chandra’s attention back to the task at hand, teasing ~~ You really need to stop gawking. Your libido seems to be kicking in. Do you want me to dampen it down? ~~

Frowning with her wide, generous mouth, Chandra growled, You leave my libido alone! Sometimes you go too far! She mentally prepared herself to administer first aid to the man at her feet.

~~ Well, if you are in control of your lusts, then we need to get— ~~

Irritated at letting Sugar get to her, Chandra interrupted, Damn it, don’t nag me! Now tell me what needs to be done!

~~ Make a small cut on your fingertip and bleed into the wound. ~~

"That sounds fine, but what do I use to cut my skin?"

Sighing, Sugar hummed ~~ You must start using your mind and not depend on me to do all of your thinking for you. Search this man’s pockets. I’ll bet he has a clasp knife in one of them. ~~

Even being somewhat tranquilized, her temper was starting to flare. Counting to ten, Chandra rummaged through his pockets and found a folding knife.

She cut her finger just enough for blood to drip from it into his