*Author's Note*

And yet again another H&M story. Yikes, I would get an idea while watching the show in order to get my story plots and ideas in line. Well, this one has a bit of time travel in it and new OCs. Yeehaw! I'm also working of the first chapter of an Assassin's Creed story too. Oh boy.

Alma 'Allie' Freeland's face claim is Alicia Agneson and Jessamine 'Jessa' George's face claim is Jennie Jacques.

Mr. Sullivan aka Hector 'Sully' Sullivan's face claim is Liam Neeson

Gotta Go Back In Time

Alma POV:

The wall clock in the front of the room ticked by ever so slowly as my history teacher, Mr. Sullivan, went back to his desk, perching on the edge of it, after handing out the class the graded quizzes for last Friday's test on the Civil War units we had read over the last couple of weeks. My paper rested on top of my desk with a pristane red A+ marked in the upper left corner. I looked over to my right, silently gesturing at my best friend with my eyes to find out what grade she had received. Jessamine grabbed her paper and tilted it up slightly, revealing a bold red B in the corner. Aha, I had finally received a better grade then my brunette bookworm bestie. Woot-woot, sweet. I smirked, causing her to roll her indigo eyes at me.

"Class open up your book to page 52. The chapter's titled America's Bitter Blood Feud: Hatfields & McCoys." I grabbed my American History book and flipped it open to the page Mr. Sullivan instructed us to find, only to see two large black and white pictures of two hillbilly families toting guns with the title that my teacher had said printed above the pictures. So, guess one family's the Hatfields and the other's the McCoys. Right below the picture was a subtitle that read, Start Of The Feud: A Deserter & A Murder. "Class, today we're going to study the most famous feud in American History. Once we're down with this unit we'll be taking a cross country road trip to the Tug River Valley area of Appalachian Kentucky and West Virginia in order to visit all of the historic feud sites." Rising from his desk, Mr. Sullivan grabbed a stack of papers off his desk, and told us, "I'll be passing out these field trip forms. They include pricing details along with an area for parental signatures. Since this is a mixed grade class and there are some Seniors here, if you're 18 you can sign for yourself, but I must see your id for proof of age."

Great, this history lesson comes with a friend trip to the land of hillbillies. Just what I need, to be on a bus for days going from Oklahoma to the Appalachia's. I wasn't 18 yet, hell I was still a month shy of 16, but I knew either my dad or step-mom would sign the form. Anything to get me out of their hair for a while. I looked over at Jessa and she looked so stoked, like this trip was the highlight of her year. Wait, it probably was considering how strict and helicoptering her parents were. I knew they'd let her go cause it's an academic trip, not a fun one.

I just shook my head and began to read the page in the book while the footsteps of my teacher walking around the room echoed into the air. While reading about the start of the feud, and nearly dozing off since this was the first class of the day and I was still a bit tired from working overtime at the bar-b-que joint last night, Mr. Sullivan placed a form on my desk and then on Jessa's since her desk was next to mine. After he walked up a few desk lengths away, Jessa grabbed her form and turned to me only to say, "I can't believe we get to go on a historical field trip that's out of state. This is going to be so much fun."

"Sure, it'll be fun, I mean it gets me out of the house for at least a week."

Jessa POV:

I shook my head at my blonde cynic of a friend. Her home life was horrible. Her father was flakey and unreliable while her step-mother didn't really like her. Her step-sister was the favorite child and her older brother had taken off as soon as he hit 18 a few years back. He joined the military, and nobody's heard from him since. "Things still bad at home?" I asked Allie before turning my attention to the page we had to read.

"They're not bad. Not everybody can be the only spoiled child with the perfect doting parents." Allie scoffed, flipping the page of her book. "This is stupid. They started a feud over a Confederate home guard killing a Yankee and a supposedly stolen pig. Really? That's nuts."

"I think it's not as cut and dry as that. Who were the Confederate and the Yankee? Why was the pig stolen?"

"If you'd read instead of staring at the fieldtrip form, you'd see that Devil Anse and Randall were like bffs fighting for the Confederacy, but Devil Anse's uncle killed Randall's brother and then poof no more friendship. The pig was Randall's, he thought Devil Anse's cousin Floyd Hatfield jacked it. Took the case to court."

Looking at her with semi-wide eyes I asked, "You already read all of that?"

"I skimmed thru it while struggling not to zone out, but yea." She shrugged, turning the page in her book.

"Then off to the next page." I announced, flipping to the page that she was now on. The page was full of pictures and little notations by the pictures. The pictures and notations took up the page next to it too. The pages were labeled in a long bold bannered print Meet the Hatfields. The pages were a sort of family tree, but instead of being in the shape of a tree it was set up as a bullet point list with a picture of each family member by a bullet point.

"Shit, Devil Anse Hatfield sorta looks like Kevin Costner." Allie giggled, pointing to the picture of the Hatfield leader in her book.

"He does, doesn't he?" I rhetorically asked in a slight giggle of my own.

"His son Cap sounds like a badass." Allie remarked, causing me to zoom my attention on the picture of a cold and hard looking man wearing a black hat with only one eye. Well, he had both of them, but one eye was milky white while the other had an iris. Underneath the picture I read the caption of, Born William Anderson Hatfield Junior, Cap received his nickname after the loss of an eye in a logging accident in his mid-teens. Despite only having the use of one eye, he went on to be the best shot on both sides of the Tug River along with being his father's most feared lieutenant. After the feud he was a successful logger, farmer, lawyer, and deputy sheriff.

"You would think he's a badass." I rolled my eyes at her. My best friend's taste for bad boys wasn't healthy. Her ex, Kevin, was a Harley riding dropout that sold weed and hot goods. The guy she was with in middle school, Andy, got into so many fights he was expelled and sent to a special school for unruly kids. She needed to get away from her rush of bad boys. "The caption says he was feared and his daddy's right-hand man, that means he was shedding a lot of blood in the feud." I told Allie as a way to let her know that in his time Cap Hatfield was a dangerous man.

"Like I said, badass." Allie told me, not even letting what I just told her sink in.

I just shook my head and continued to read the captions and look at the pictures. Once I reached the bottom half of the right page, I noticed that it was just a bunch of pictures of the Hatfields taken during the feud along with tiny descriptions. One picture that made my eyes widened was the one of Cap Hatfield and his family since the woman next to him, who I assumed was his wife, looked like the spitting image of my best friend that was sitting right next to me. I blinked, trying to soothe my shock, and then read the caption. The caption wasn't a big help since it only said, Cap Hatfield with his wife and children posing with guns for the Logan Banner.

Alma POV:

Jessa looked like she'd seen a ghost as she stared at the bottom of the right page of her textbook. I guess all the rough and gory details on these hillbillies was too much for her. I just shook my head and shrugged off her look before turning the page only to reveal the large double paged heading of Meet the McCoys. Okay, time to look at McCoy pictures and read up on them before delving into the real details of this feud. I mean there has to be more to it then what was in the introduction.

My eyes caught sight of a fine-looking man with a sour look on his face. His picture was underneath a man's in a faded hat. Quickly I realized he was one of Randall's sons whenever I read that his name was Tolbert McCoy. Tolbert, what kind of name is that? I decided to read the caption underneath his picture which revealed the details of, Tolbert McCoy was the second eldest son of Randall. He was described as being very handsome, but very cruel. He had an uncontrollable temper, which led to him getting into a fight with Ellison Hatfield in which he and two of his younger brothers killed the man. He was killed along with Pharmer and Bud by a Hatfield posse in retaliation to the death of Ellison. Damn, hottie was crazy.

I continued to read on until I got the bottom half of the next page. There I saw a picture of Tolbert with a woman, a toddler, and a baby. What made my blood freeze in my veins was that the crazy guy's wife looked just like Jessa. I mean if she wasn't sitting in the desk next to me, I'd say that it was her. A shiver went up my spine before I read the picture's caption. It said, Tolbert McCoy with his wife and children three months before his death.

Ding-ding!

The bell, finally time to close this book and leave this class.

I didn't see Jessa again until lunch. We were sitting outside at one of the picnic tables in the large patio area near the cafeteria. She was picking at her salad, which her mother had packed for her, while I dug into the cafeteria food I got at a reduced fee since my family was signed up for reduction due to being, for a lack of a better word, a little poor.

"Did you see the family pictures in our history book?" Jessa asked while I was squirting a ketchup packet on my foam tray next to my tots.

With a nod I answered her with, "Yea. Tolbert's wife looked just like you. Shit, she could be you."

"Really? I didn't notice that, but I noticed that Cap's wife was your spitting image."

"Ah, I must've missed that." I shrugged, earning me a huff paired with an eye roll from my raven-haired friend sitting across from me. I took a big bite out of my cheeseburger, well since it was cafeteria food it was more like a hockey puck with a plastic-like yellow square melted on it smooshed together in a bun, before saying, "Tolbert's wife could've been you." Jessa's eye went wide as I pointed my burger loosely at her and seriously remarked, "Looked like your twin, Jessa."

"Well, that's strange." No shit, girl. Shrugging, she suggested, "Perhaps we had relatives back in that era."

"Um, I don't know 'bout you, but all my relatives lived in Wilmington, North Carolina up until the Great Depression. That's when they up and moved, traveling and looking for work; ended up settling here in Tulsa."

"My family's roots are from Coastal Carolina. Charleston and Myrtle Beach in South Carolina to be exact. My parents moved out here when I was a baby since my father got a job at the University of Tulsa as a professor."

"Then we didn't have any relatives in Kentucky or West Virginia during the time of the feud. Maybe we just have dead doppelgangers out there."

"Maybe." Jessa sighed, sounding a bit reluctant, as she stabbed her perfect mixed green salad with her plastic fork.

"I think it's bullshit tho how the only women there's information and names for are the ones born into the Hatfields and McCoys pre-feud. Like wives that married in and resulting children don't matter to the historians."

"Maybe that information got lost?" Jess suggested, grabbing her water bottler and taking a sip of it.

"Maybe, but it's still bullshit." I scoffed, grabbing some of the hard as rocks tater tots off my tray.

*Nearly 3 Weeks Later*

Today we were heading back home to Tulsa. Yay! The past week's been okay, but I'm ready to leave the Tug Fork Valley. Apparently, even tho the feud has been over for over a century now, the Hatfields and McCoys still hated each other. Damn, I don't think anything's ever going to make those people tolerate each other alone like each other.

Hell, one of the things we did on our trip was visit an old general store in what's considered Historical Pikeville and the guy that owned it wouldn't shut up bout how his Great-Great-Whatever-Uncle Parris McCoy was murdered by Hatfields. Cap to be specific. The man did tell us, much to my teacher Mr. Sullivan's urging, that his Great-Great-Whatever-Grandpappy Squirrel McCoy had worked for Mr. Adam and then saved up his earning to buy the store from the man. Well, that explains what happened to Sammy 'Squirrel Hunting' McCoy since my history book kinda stopped talking about him once he ran off after witnessing his brother get shot while trespassing on the Hatfield logging site.

Another thing we did, after crossing the Tug into West Virginia, was visit the grave of Devil Anse Hatfield which was marked by a life-sized Italian marble sculpted statue of the guy. Also, we went to a museum in Mate Creek that was all about the Hatfields and the feud. Hell, they had pictures and items pertaining to the Hatfields on display. As an example, Cap Hatfield's prized Winchester rifle and his black Stetson hat.

We also did some other site seeing things in Pike County, Kentucky and Logan County, West Virginia such as visit the courthouses and jails, visit the houses of both Wall Hatfield and Perry Cline (which are still standing and historically preserved), and land marks of things such as the woods were the paw-paw tree incident occurred at (which has a sign explaining what happened there at the entrance clearing), the locations of all the election day festivals, and some other things. We also stayed at a Hatfield and McCoy themed hotel in West Virginia too.

But, like I said before, today we're going home. I had just boarded the charter bus that was labeled William Rodgers High, Tulsa, OK and was sitting in the window seat near the back. I was resting my head on my pillow, which was leaning against the window, and had my throw draped around me. Since it was so early, nearly 5 am, my eyes were heavy and drooping as I tried to go back to sleep. Jessa was next to me; her dark curly hair was covering the little lilac pillow underneath her head while her matching throw was covering her as she rested. I'm not sure if she was asleep, but I nearly was. Right before I fully dozed off, I felt the bus moving and my teacher announcing, "Class, we're heading out right now. In about 45 minutes, maybe less, we'll be crossing the Tug Bridge into Kentucky."

*45-Minutes Later*

I jolted forward, waking and tumbling out of my seat, as I felt like the ground had just dropped out from underneath me. Screams and cries were heard all around me. "Allie, we crashed, the bus skidded on ice right off the Tug Bridge!" Jessa screamed in a shrill cry with all the power her lungs could muster as she grabbed onto my arm with a panicked death grip.

Oh God… suddenly water began pooling into the door cracks of the bus as we slowly tanked into the river. "We're sinking, taking on water!" I screamed, feeling my chest pounding erratically as I realized that we're gonna die.

"Miss Freeland, Miss George, don't panic. I'm going to get us out of here safely." My history teacher, Mr. Sullivan, said in an assuring shout as he rushed down the flooding aisle towards us near the back. Clearly the tall blazer wearing teacher was ignoring the other panicked students' screams and cries, only focusing on me and my best friend. Why, only god knows. I guess he was trying to calm us? Me and Jessa looked at each other, terrified, before looking back to the aisle only to watch (as we sunk deeper into the river) our teacher reach us. "Girls, this might sound crazy, but trust me when I say this, with my snakehead ruby-eyed ring I'm going to transport us to a different time."

"What?" Jessa shrieked, her face pale with an unbelievable look on it.

"Has our impending death made you go crazy?" I asked my teacher, not really thinking about how disrespectful I might sound, as I shot him a weirded out look.

He just rolled his eyes and grabbed our hands, making sure that his right hand wearing the snakehead ring was touching both of our hands, and shut his eyes. Under his breath Mr. Sullivan muttered, "Tug River wagon train crash, June 1878."

Suddenly a white light flashed and I felt like I was falling thru a worm hole of some kind. Oh, this was it, I was following the light and dying with my best friend and my crazy history teacher.

Jessa POV:

Oh my god, I can't believe it, but my crazy history teacher was telling the truth. He had transported us in time somehow with his ring. Me, Allie, and Mr. Sullivan were bobbing up and down in the river, pieces of broken wagons (covered wagons from the 1880s wagon trains) were floating around us. I heard cries and wails as people dressed in time period clothing sunk all around us like rocks. Allie looked startled as she looked around us. Mr. Sullivan must've noticed her curious and panicked look because he told us, "I told you, my ring has the power of time travel. Now come on, girls, we need to swim to the east side of the river bank."

I just nodded my head even tho I was terrified since I wasn't a strong swimmer, unlike my best friend who was on the swim team at William Rodgers High. Mr. Sullivan let us go and then started to swim over to where he wanted us to meet at, the east side of the river. I noticed that he did pause to grab some dresses that were floating in the water amongst the wagon wreckage. He tossed us the dresses while explaining, "Once we get to the bank ya'll have to change to blend in. Can't be wearing jeans and t-shirts in 1878."

Allie caught the dresses with one hand while never letting my hand go with her other one. She handed me my dress while telling me, "Hold onto this tight and paddle."

"Okay." I nodded, following my best friend's advice.

Mr. Sullivan had just reached the river bank and we were almost there whenever my hold on Allie's hand slipped caused of the current in the river. One second our hands were linked and the next they weren't and I was being carried downstream, struggling to stay afloat.

Allie POV:

"Jessa!" I screamed, looking over my shoulder only to see my best friend get dragged off by the river as soon as her hand slipped from mine. I wanted to go after her, save her, but didn't cause of Mr. Sullivan screaming at me, "Keep swimming or you'll drown!"

So, I did just that, kept swimming until I got to the bank. I felt exhausted as I pulled myself up onto the river bank, collapsing on the ground and panting to catch my breath as my arms and legs burned.

"Get up and into that dress. We got a lot to talk about." Mr. Sullivan instructed me from his spot sitting nearby.

I just sighed, pushed myself off the ground, and went to go change behind a tree.

"So, let me get this straight, you like your father before you have the ability to time travel cause of a ring with gypsy magic enchanted on it? Oh and you grew up bouncing between the future and here cause your mother just happened to be Jim Vance's sister and Devil Anse Hatfield's aunt?" I asked, making sure that I heard what he'd just lengthily explained to me, after dressing in a loose cotton dress that skirted a bit on the ground due to me barely being 5'2", correctly.

"Yes, that's right." Mr. Sullivan told me as we sat against some trees. "Nobody knows about the ring's magic tho, if they did I'd be admitted to the looney-bin quicker then Grant went thru Richmond."

"Yea…so how did you and your dad get away with the time travel thing?" I asked, curious to know how they were never caught. I read a book once were a woman touched Stone Heng or something like it and got sent back to 1700's Scotland so, I guess I believed my teacher. I mean, I am on a river bank that only has a wooden plank for a bridge and badly written wooden arrow signs pointing the ways to Kentucky and West Virginia so being in the 1800's isn't a big stretch since I know what the 2018 river area's supposed to look like.

"My dad claimed to be a railroad scout mapping routes for Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. Said he was passing thru West Virginia on his way to Ohio for work, or at least that's what he told the Vance family. I also claim to be a traveler, but a teacher in the Midwest going from town to town." Mr. Sullivan explained, chuckling a bit inbetween his sentences. "Only one that knew the truth was my mother. She knew 'bout the feud, from reading it and watching a documentary bout it in the modern-day era, and always begged my dad to help save her brother and stop it."

"He didn't tho. Jim Vance still gets ambushed hiding out in Western PA." I told him, letting him know that I read the material, even tho we weren't tested on it yet.

"Yep." He popped out in a long sigh. He let out a low breath before telling me, "He locked up the ring and never took us back here after she learned the truth" A sad look came over his stark featured face as he sighed, "She died first, of cancer, and we had to bring her back here to bury her. Then dad died from a heart attack when I was in college and I had to bury him next to mother."

"But you've come back to visit tho since you got willed the ring?" I asked, assuming that this wasn't his first time back here. I mean the man was a history teacher for Christ's sake.

"No, I've been back multiple times, but never during the feud. I wanted to, but didn't know how to help stop it or calm it down. Well, til now that is."

"What do you mean by that?"

"I've been teaching the Hatfield and McCoy feud unit in my history class for a good 15-years, but this year when I saw you and your friend I knew that ya'll had to get back here to this time cause you two were the women in the pictures with Cap and Tolbert."

"What?!" I shrieked, jumping up a bit and hitting my back on the tree I was leaning against.

"Hey, don't shoot the messanger." Mr. Sullivan chuckled, his hands up in a mock surrender. "I was hoping that by bringing us back to the date of the wagon train river accident that I could use that as you girls' cover story. Say I found ya'll on the bank half-drowned on my way to visit my kin in Mate Creek."

"But it didn't go as planned cause Jessa got swept down the river. Prolly dead now." I remarked in a mournful tone as I subtly eyed the river.

"I doubt she's dead, I mean she ends up with Tolbert…."

"Why him?" I asked before quickly adding in, "I read he's a crazy soulless ginger, even if he's cute."

"I don't know the answer to that. Once we find her, we need to convince her to stay away from him; from all the McCoys for that matter."

"Yea…" I nodded, my voice trailing off into the air that was full of the sounds of the lightning bugs whizzing around.

Jessa POV:

I don't know how long I was half-drowning while going down-river for whenever I smacked into a log drifting in the middle of the water. Weakly, I climbed up it. I knew in my gut that I was in the historic Tug River of the 1800s. I knew cause no signs of civilization could be seen. Hell, I felt like I was in that movie Kate & Leopold, or something like that since I was thrown back in time. Knowing that I needed to change I quickly pulled my dress on, shimming out of my modern clothes as carefully as I could so I wouldn't fall off the large log. I tossed the clothes out into the water since I didn't know what else to do with them. I also took off my shoes, figuring that it would be believable to anyone I came across that I lost them while fighting for my life in a river after a wagon accident.

I don't know how long I was on the log for until it lodged into the river bank. Grateful to be alive, I quickly scrambled off the log and onto the ground. The sun had risen, casting a bright yellow and orange glow into the crystal blue sky. Knowing I needed to find somebody that could help me I just started to walk ahead.

I don't know how long I was walking for, hours maybe, but my feet were cut and had some splinters in them. My entire body ached and before I could stop myself I collapsed in the woods with a big thump. My vision was spotty, a sign I was ready to faint. I heard the sound of heavy footsteps paired with a smooth Appalachian accent cursing out, "Goddamn…" Suddenly I felt myself being lifted into a sitting position. "What happened t'ya? Where ya come from?" Asked the man that had a hold on me.

I looked up only to see that none other than Tolbert McCoy was the one helping me sit up. He had a rifle on the ground by his feet and a coil of rope slung around his upper arm and shoulder. On my god, I really am in 1878. "I walked here from the river. Wagon train accident up stream, got dragged down with a current." I shakily and weakly told him before my vision got spotty and fuzzy again as my fainting spell threatened to take over me.

"Well, that's a far walk ya did. Yer in the clearin' on McCoy land, I'll take ya home an' have ma patch ya up." I heard him tell me, scooping me up like I was a sack of potatoes, right before everything went black and I fainted.

AN:

Hope you guys liked the first chapter of Transcending Time. Yea, it's got an Outlander twist to it (but unlike Outlander the girls will never make it back to their time). The only thing I could think of to make a time traveling portal with was a ring and gypsies are known as fortune tellers, etc so… Anyways from here on out everything is set in the 1800s. This plot will differ from other H&M series (obviously).