Excerpt from Quintessence (Novella)

I Had a hard time finding an excerpt from this book because most everything would give away too many details. I want these to be saved for the full experience of the reader....so hope this excerpt will give you at least a slight idea of what the book is like.

Excerpt from
Quintessence
 (Speculative Fiction)
by
Kelli Jae Baeli

I moved a little stiffly to the doorway and recognized the living room on the other side of the kitchen. It was the house by the barn. The one I had pilfered food from. It appeared lived-in, unlike the last time I was there. There was no blanket of dust on everything. Someone had cleaned. Moved a few things around, added other things. "I get it. . ." Wow. Just for a minute I thought I was in the Twilight Zone.

Pritchard moved up behind me. "You get what?"

"The tube. . .it went underground and came up here, and it had some gas hose in it somewhere that knocked me out, and you switched my clothes . . ."

The doctor laughed merrily.

"That's it, right?"

He stopped laughing. "Sorry, son. It's significantly more complicated than that."

"Just give me the Reader's Digest Condensed Version."

"I. . .it can't be condensed—"

"Try."

"Very well," he sighed, searching for a simple statement. "I brought you into one of your alternate realities with a device I invented. The tube, the ARM."

I waited. Letting the statement sink in. It never sunk. It just hovered there on the surface, aggravating me, a little frightening.

"If you want to join me for coffee at the table, I'll make sense of this for you."

Ignoring his invitation, I headed straight out the front door, pausing in the driveway, looking for my van. There were three cars in the driveway. One was a silver sedan that had rounded fenders much like the old cars in the 50's. The other two were SUV styles, but altogether odd, compared to the ones I had seen in my lifetime. One brown, and one the color of coffee with cream. I was a bit surprised that they had round wheels, as if this reality had somehow managed to make a vehicle roll on squares.

My attention on the barn, I started for it. Sprinting over to the large door, I grabbed the handle and pulled. It squeaked open to reveal a room just like the room I stayed in before all this got so crazy. There was a large rug in the center, but it was mostly green instead of the blue I remembered. I knew the room was different, too. The hand written journals were replaced by a computer on the desk. But I was only interested in The ARM. I stepped over and kicked the rug away to reveal the circle of light.

The coffee can was not in sight, and instead, I found a small cylinder of comparable size, that had a handle on the top. I assumed this would serve the same purpose. Grabbing it off the desk, I leaned down to press it into the circular indention.

The wood panel whirred upward, the Bank Tube or ARM or whatever, rose to full height and stopped with the airbrake sound. It was not silver anymore, but white.

I pressed a button on the outside and the door slid open. I stepped in. I wanted to go back to my life. The one I understood, the one that made sense. I wanted out of this nightmare reality.

As I closed the panel, I heard Pritchard yelling, "Jason! No!"

That susurrous second of air and then. . .

The panel slid open, and I saw her spin around to face me, lift a handgun and cock it. I flattened myself against the round wall, and hit the panel button again, and the door closed as a shot ricocheted off the housing. The door opened again, and I fell out into the arms of Ethan Pritchard.

"Oh my god. . ." I mumbled.

"Jason!" He helped me stand upright. "Are you okay?"

"What the hell was that?"

His arm came around me as he led me out of the barn.

* * *

(Quintessence is due for release in 2010)

Excerpt from Quintessence (Novella)