“An anchor?” Journey asked. “What does that mean.”
Kota looked between Reno and Journey, his gaze at last settling on the young woman. “You were the anchor. You are his lodestone. Like a homing beacon, the power of your love forged a byway, a shining light that drew him through the darkness of the vortex to emerge safely on the other side. In this time. In this place. To you.”
All were stunned. Speechless. Journey and Reno’s eyes were drawn to one another, both realizing their connection was more powerful than they’d even realized.
Finally, Lou found her voice. “Do you know what was in the bag Ela gave to Reno?”
“I’m pretty sure.” The old man shrugged his narrow shoulders. “A piece of Galena, a fossil, perhaps a geode. Probably a sprig of rosemary. Most certainly a stone carved with words of power.”
“You mean you don’t know, for sure?” Journey asked, the thoughts in her mind swirling like one of the vortexes Kota mentioned.
“The recipe, as such, did not make it down to me. The wisdom and knowledge to recreate such a talisman did.”
At this point, he stood and gave them each a glance of apology. “Excuse me a moment, I can’t hold my water the way I used to be able to.”
When he left the room, they all exchanged a dazed look. “This is incredible,” Lou muttered. “I want to ask him a million questions.”
“You can ask him all you want at another time,” Reno cautioned. “Let’s concentrate on finding out if he can help me get back to where I came from.”
“Help us go back,” Journey corrected.
Reno didn’t acknowledge her comment. Instead, he turned to Lou. “Does this sound logical to you? I know you said there should be a scientific explanation for all of this. Are we dealing with science or are we dealing with magic?”
“Magic is science. Science is magic.” Kota announced his return by proclaiming this circular reasoning. “Both exist and share a far greater relation to one another than we can imagine. If man dreams of something unbelievable, then creates it with the power of his mind, we call it an invention. But an invention starts with an intention. Our minds act as conduits to receive the rich blessings of the universe. What we can conceive, we can believe in. Our belief translates into reality by our actions. Helped along by powers greater than we, of course. This is called the law of attraction or the theory of electromagnetism.”
“That’s a familiar sounding word,” Reno looked to Lou, who appeared to be in a near ecstatic state, like she might swoon and faint at any moment. “I’m not sure this discussion is going to help me go back in time.”
“Since you’ve come this far from the past, you might as well learn something.” Kota shook his finger at Reno. “This is important and brief. It explains how your human body traveled through a powerful electromagnetic field without flying apart in a bazillion pieces. It’s also an example of how science is nothing more than the structured study of miracles.”
Everyone grew suitably subdued.
“We all consider ourselves to be solid, made up of flesh and bone. What would you say if I told you that your body, your car, the trees outside, even the mountain itself are composed, almost completely, of empty space?”
“Well, I’d say you were…”
“Hush.” Journey tugged Reno’s hair that he had tied at the base of his neck with a leather cord. “This is our best chance.”
Reno nodded, returning his attention to Kota Blue.
“Everything in the universe is 99.9999999 percent empty space. That miniscule part that’s left of anything is made up of atoms. If you look deeper, an atom is made up of a nucleus filled with even smaller particles called electrons, neutrons, and protons. The size of something is determined by how much space there is between the nucleus and the atom’s outer shell. Picture this, the nucleus is a hundred thousand times smaller than the atom it is housed in. If the nucleus were the size of an almond, the atom would be the size of a football stadium. If somehow all of the dead space in our atoms was lost, each one of our bodies in its entirety would fit into the tiniest particle of dust, and the volume of the entire human race living now would fit into one die, not a pair of dice, but one die.”
“I feel pretty small about now,” Reno muttered. “But, I still don’t…”
Kota held up that finger again. “But that empty space isn’t really empty, it’s filled with energy contained inside a massless strong force called gluon. You can think of gluon as the glue that holds everything together. Literally. If it were not for this glue, your body – hell, everything in the universe would scatter wildly out into a formless sandstorm of nothing.”
Stretching out his arm, Kota poked the muscle of his forearm. “I may be old as the hills, but I still feel pretty solid.” He winked at Journey. “Feelings can be misleading. What if I told you that your butt isn’t really touching the chair you’re sitting on?” At their skeptical looks, he laughed aloud. “Since the dense part of your atoms is contained within this gluon, you physically aren’t feeling the atoms of the chair. Basically, you’re not sitting in the chair – you’re hovering above it. The same goes when you touch one another, what you’re feeling is the electromagnetic force of your electrons pushing away their electrons.” Kota seemed to be amusing himself. “Talk about killing a romantic moment, huh?”
Reno raised his hand, feeling like he was back in the one-room schoolhouse he’d attended as a boy. “Again,
