Free The Time Stone by Jeffrey Estrella Page A

grateful that it was a reality as a gift as she told him.
At night fall they made their way to the door but there was a
problem being that they would be out of the blind spot and exposed
to capture by the tower security guards light that was turned on
after dark, a beam so bright to make the most hardened criminal
freeze dead in her tracks.
    As they approached the trap door, Tina
quickly used an old trick from her life on the streets by ripping
off part of her shirt and entering it carefully into the lock of
the keyhole and then sliding it back and forth very fast carefully
not to break it but fast and steady enough to use the friction to
trigger the unlocking mechanism, as she explained to James. After
several seconds, nothing happened and James looked at Tina with an
amused grin.
    “ I thought it would work.”
She responded to his grin.
    “ Let me try.” James flung
his wrist in the air and struck his hand down as he closed his eyes
and pressed hard with his mind’s eye. In a matter of seconds, the
lock clicked open. He opened his eyes and smiled as he removed the
lock and opened the door.
    “ You got some real magic
power, James” Tina added dropping herself into the hole.
    James frantically looked up at the
spotlight and saw it approaching and knew that they had to move.
The duo quickly escaped through the trap door and down a tunnel and
collapsed the door just as the light of the tower passed right over
the sealed hatch.
    James and Tina escaped
from the tunnel leading from the place of their captivity. The road
out of the tunnel and into the open field was lonesome and arduous
for James and Tina. After getting passed the stench of the tunnels
and the muddy liquid on their shoes and clothes, it was a long run
from the tunnel exits across the muddy and filthy field. They
walked down the muck-ridden dirt road looking up at the stars and
quietly holding one another close trying to avoid being spotted by
the guards who might spy over to watch the other side of the fence
beyond the tunnels. Fortune smiled on them as the nearest pickup
truck made its way puttering along the dirt road for
“ hidden treasures ” as the sole occupant referred to, a poor dirt farmer named
Melville who was more than happy to have their company as he gave
them a ride back towards civilization. He was the only one with a
vehicle who stopped by so they were grateful for the
ride.
    “ You kids are heading to
Chronix Bay, are ya?” said Melville. “I find it you gonna need some
supplies and things.” Melville was a simple man but had a coy
attention to detail.
    “ Yeah, we would be very
appreciative of any help you could give us in finding some cheap
supplies. We are kind of low on funds right now” said
Tina.
    “ Lots of varmints in town
got what you need. Free Castle is a mighty good watering hole to
wet your whistle and ponder your next move.” Melville replied. “I
don’t wanna mind what you two were doing nearby the old loading
front for the prison.”
    “ Good. ‘Cause we ain’t
reckoning to be telling” laughed Tina mimicking Melville’s old
southern vernacular.
    “ Well, we aren’t in
Chronix Bay anymore. The first thing that we need to agree to do is
get as far as they could away from here.” James whispered to
Tina.
    “ This here be Radcliffe.
Chronix Bay, varmints, that is quite a ways east,” said Melville
with his broken dialect and peculiar vernacular depicting his lack
of a proper education.
    James and Tina looked at one another
with dismay. They knew they had been transported far but not
knowing how far would make it difficult to plan an escape somewhere
else. They rode with Melville in his green faded pickup truck and
spent the two and a half hour ride talking to them about his job
lifting hay and feeding his pet rooster named Roger. The duo smiled
with complete joy as they endured this proverbial debauchery and
were still ever grateful when he let them in and even more grateful
when he let them off in a small