Apollo Project

by Brittany E Brinegar

  “I could use your help burying Mr. and Mrs. Delossantos.”

  “You know their names?”

  “It was on the mailbox.” She tossed Jasper a shovel. “Are you going to help me.”

  “I’m tired and sore. This is a waste of time.”

  “We’re staying in their home and eating their food. The least we can do is bury them.”

  “Fine.” Jasper thumped the shovel. “Why’d you volunteer me and not your man Scotty?”

  “Because I needed to talk to you. Tomorrow I’m planning to send a search party for Nate Campbell.”

  “Excellent.”

  Reagan knelt for the shotgun in Mr. Delossantos’s hands. “You can’t join the search party.”

  “Why not?” Jasper pounded the shovel on crisp grass. “If anyone deserves to go after Nate Campbell it’s me. He killed my son. Or did you forget?”

  Reagan checked the chamber of the shotgun – empty. “Which is exactly why I can’t let you come. We need Nate Campbell alive. He’s the key to understanding wormholes. He isn’t working with the Merry Men, but he’s traveling between here and the mountains. If you come with me, I worry you might do something reckless.”

  Jasper loaded the bodies into the wheelbarrow. “Maybe. But Nate Campbell doesn’t deserve to live after what he did to Junior.”

  “Do we agree you’ll stay behind and protect the rest of the group?”

  “Fine.”

  By sunset, the chores were complete. Barb and Dawn cobbled together a nice meal of rice, spam, and canned green beans with the use of the gas stove.

  Scotty flopped at the table, next to Granddad. “There was a horse in the barn. The water bucket was nearly empty but she was well fed. But there are no signs of cattle, pigs, goats, chicken, or sheep. Not much of a farm if you ask me.”

  “We didn’t find any more guns,” Barb said. “There was a box of shotgun shells on the counter with two left.”

  “Anything else useful?” Reagan asked.

  “No smokes.” Meredith pounded a fist, rattling the table. “Did cigarettes disappear along with all the people?”

  “We found enough canned food to last a few weeks,” Olivia said. “There’s a water well on the lawn and to be safe, we can boil the water on the gas stove.”

  “I doubt the gas company is up and running,” Granddad said. “Anything left is probably residual and won’t last.”

  Reagan pivoted to Kelly, who lit another candle at the table. “Now’s a good time to tell us about your day.”

  “I agree.” Kelly bobbed of her head. “But please don’t interrupt with questions or comments. It’s a lot to take in.”

  Chapter 21 – Whatever Happened to Kelly

  Reagan

  Settling at the antique dining room table, Reagan noted the sturdy pecan wood and intricate carvings. Her eyes landed on Kelly’s face, glowing in the candlelight. Despite her roaring stomach, Reagan couldn’t touch her plate until she heard Kelly’s tale.

  Kelly’s Story:

  I galloped the tracks in pursuit of the train for a good two hours before I realized it was either a figment of my imagination or long gone. When I stopped, I noticed smoke rising above the treeline. I watched for a few minutes, wondering if I was witnessing one of the fires Barb described. But the flames didn’t spread. I tied Silver to a tree and circled the area. My mind raced with a list of potential suspects. Everyone from Nate Campbell to Jon Little came to mind.

  As I approached, I saw two women situated in the middle of a clearing. The redhead hunkered on the edge of a log, writing in a leather-bound notebook. An Asian woman paced the grounds. A popup tent was pitched behind them and a fire blazed. Based on Gilbert’s descriptions, I knew I stumbled upon Scarlett Williams and Sunny Miller. With silent steps, I inched closer to their camp, the Glock 40 drawn. “Freeze,” I said impersonating Dan Stark from the short-lived but excellent show, The Good Guys.

  Scarlett jerked her gaze from her notebook and studied me. “There’s no need for the gun Mrs. Pak.”

  My grip tightened at her words. “How do you know my name?”

  “We have a list,” Scarlett said. She spoke with a faint Italian accent. “A rather lengthy list. All the clients, variables, and applicants are on it along with a brief narrative and a wallet-sized photograph.”

  “Your ‘drop your gun’ speech needs some work.” I glanced from Scarlett to Sunny. I remembered Gilbert referred to Scarlett as a scientist, but I couldn’t remember Sunny’s role. “Where’d the list come from? Nottingham?”

  “Not directly.” Scarlett consulted Sunny. “We got it from a friend. Well not really a friend. I guess an acquaintance more accurately.”

  “Teammate?” Sunny offered.

  “Not really. He had a different agenda.”

  “Nemesis is probably a good comparison.”

  “I suppose,” Scarlett said. “We found the files in the possession of our nemesis, Gilbert Whitehead. He had his own agenda which included terrorizing the rest of us.”

  “What can you tell me about this?” I asked with a wave around the forest.

  “It’s not we don’t want to confide in you, Mrs. Pak, but we have some trust issues,” Scarlett said.

  “You think you people have trust issues? Try walking around with my group for a day. We’ve been spied on, infiltrated, and blindsided. And since I’m the one with a gun, you don’t have room to pick and choose what you share.”

  In an instant, Sunny snatched the gun from my grasp. I didn’t notice she crept closer during the conversation. “You can have this back when you leave.”

  Scarlett rose from the log and smoothed her olive, khaki shorts. She wore a matching button-up shirt with cuffed sleeves, open to a pink tank top. Tawny colored hiking boots and a pink bandana around her neck completed the ensemble. “Among Gilbert’s possessions we were looking for an item. Only certain members know about the device. They call it a beacon. Have you heard anything about this?”

  “What is your plan?” I asked. “Nottingham is running experiments on us. Where are we? What happened to all the other people? What’s with the wormholes?”

  “You ask many questions at once.” Scarlett chuckled. “I can at least trust we have the same foe, so I’ll answer what I can. I suppose we should begin as I despise chitter-chatter talk.” Scarlett placed a hand on her waist. “Sunny and I are currently working on our own. We’re not affiliated with Nottingham or the Merry Men. Do you understand the importance of what I’m telling you?”

  “Yes. But it doesn’t mean I buy it.”

  Scarlett removed wire-rimmed glasses and placed them on top of her journal. “Your assessment of wormholes is correct. There are pockets hidden about the area capable of transporting us between samples. The two of us are working on a way to find them and use them to our advantage. The problem we discovered is once used, they disappear. The same wormhole cannot be used twice. Gilbert was in possession of one of the only known ways of tracking wormholes. Maybe others had these beacons too. But Nottingham didn’t entrust details with me.”

  “Wormholes emit electric surges,” I said. “Why not track the surge?”

  “We don’t have access to working equipment necessary to construct such a device.”

  I stared at Scarlett in an attempt to gauge her reaction. “I’ve seen Merry Men on snowmobiles and ATVs.”

  “They don’t last,” Sunny said. “Only a few hours at a time.”

  “Why do they work at all?”

  “Before the experiment began, we brought lead-lined cases with supplies. The experiment was meant to last several weeks, but something went wrong. The iterations happened too soon and people were ripped from existence,” Scarlett said.

  “What do you mean brought?” I asked. “Where are we?”

  Scarlett held a hand to her mouth as if debating how much to divulge. “It’s called the Apollo Zone. Nottingham treats his experiments like the space race. It’s a cloned dimension. I wasn’t privy to the details, but
when he started, he cloned one room at a time. At some point, it escalated to this. We’re working on mapping the area, but it appears a stretch of land from the Canadian border to the Gulf was replicated.”

  “What happens when you reach the edges? Texas for example?”

  “Stretches of Texas were replicated. But I’m not sure to what extent. In theory, when you reach an edge, say the eastern border, you would then arrive on the western perimeter. Our cloned universe should be round.”

  “Should be?” I asked.

  “We haven’t tested the hypothesis. I’m only comfortable saying ‘should’. Given more time, I could learn about this world.”

  “Is this even real? I’ve read about computer simulations. Futuristic but plausible.”

  “It’s very real,” Scarlett said. “A near-perfect match, down to the details found in a store or the furniture in someone’s home. But there were consequences to playing with the fabric of reality.”

  “The sky turning green?” I asked

  “Yes, among other things.”

  “Why are you interested in figuring things out?” I asked. “Are you planning to steal the technology for yourself?”

  “While the discovery is fascinating, it isn’t why I signed on. I’m eager to get what I came for and leave.”

  “What did you come for?”

  “What’s Pak doing here?” I whirled to find Jon Little approaching the camp. “How’d you capture her?”

  “She stumbled into our camp,” Sunny said. She tucked her sigma into the waistband of her straight leg football brown jeans.

  “Tie her up,” Jon said. “We can use her as bait to catch her friends.”

  Sunny wrapped a strong hand around my wrist.

  “Wait a minute.” My voice screeched.

  “Don’t make me shoot you, Kelly,” Jon said. “I can send you back to your people unharmed or in pieces.”

  “You’re a psycho. We saved you. How could you betray us?” I spat at his feet.

  “I’ve got a million and one reasons, sweetheart. And you’re on the losing side of a battle.” He pointed to Scarlett. “Cassidy shot me, through and through but I gotta get stitches.”

  “I’m not a doctor, Jon,” Scarlett said with wide pupils.

  “I’d rather have you stitching me up than your butcher partner,” he said with a finger at Sunny. “Anyways, we better chat. I heard Gil’s dead. Making you head honcho by default. I received orders from Nottingham…” Jon’s voice faded as they paced from camp.

  Sunny slid aviator sunglasses through her raven-colored hair. It was tough to gauge her age, but I placed her around forty. “Don’t worry, Red’s putting on a show. We’re not working with Jon.”

  “Why should I believe you?”

  “I made a mistake signing on for this. I wanted an adventure and boy did I get it. But Scarlett’s had another agenda all along. She recruited me in boot camp and we’ve been trying to figure things out from the inside. By the looks of it, you and your people could use allies.” Foreshadow Sunny?

  “Last time we trusted one of you, Jon tried to kill us. He blew up a bridge with us on it.”

  “Jon’s a thug. Now make it look good.” Sunny handed me my Glock.

  “What?”

  “The escape. Jon said you were a fireball. He might believe you got the drop on me if I spin it right.”

  The woman stood about a foot taller than me, making the punching angle awkward. I pictured Jasper’s face and a ridiculous ponytail and uncorked.

  She dabbed blood from her lip. “Good. Now go.”

  Reagan’s mind spun with the latest information Kelly shared. “Cloned world. Nottingham chose certain people for his experiment. Scotty, his brother, Mr. and Mrs. Delossantos and maybe others were mistakenly brought into the universe.”

  “What makes you believe you can trust nonsensical mumbo-jumbo from Scarlett?” Jasper asked. “Isn’t her spilling all those secrets a little convenient?”

  Kelly folded her arms. “They didn’t have a reason to tell me anything. When Jon showed, they had me good as dead.”

  “Jon was following Nottingham’s orders?” Scotty asked. “Guess Artie and Jacki didn’t clue him in.”

  “We can’t trust any of these Merry Men,” Jasper said. “The risk is too great.”

  “Jon has been confused since the sky turned green. Duke’s wormhole arrival was the perfect opportunity for Jon to pull the ripcord and bail. What they said to Kelly about the beacon, tracks.” Reagan unzipped her pack and gathered a pair of jeans. Wrapped inside was the canister/beacon. “No idea how this thing works, but my dad described it when we talked. He said this was the key to using the wormholes and Nate Campbell is the key to understanding them.”

  “Finding Nate Campbell is priority number one,” Kelly said throwing her arms into the air. “Any ideas?”

  “Where would I hide if I was a maniac park ranger?” Scotty asked as he rubbed the five o’clock shadow on his chin.

  “What about the wormholes?” Annabeth asked.

  “What do you mean, honey?” Barb patted Annabeth’s arm.

  Twirling a lock of strawberry blond hair, Annabeth stared into the distance. “Think about it. Nate Campbell is using wormholes to travel between here and the mountains, terrorizing us. Maybe he’s staking out active wormholes. And maybe we should search for him there.”

  “Look, kid, if we could find wormholes, we wouldn’t need Campbell alive,” Jasper said.

  “It’s an interesting theory and luckily, we have a way to find wormholes.” Reagan tapped the beacon. “If we figure out how to activate this thing, we can set a trap for Nate Campbell.”

  “Why would we bother with the theatrics?” Olivia asked. “If we find a wormhole, I vote for going through.”

  Reagan’s mind clipped through the information. “I understand your point, but we don’t know enough about the wormholes. We could teleport to Montana or somewhere entirely different. Not to mention the last time we traveled, Travis Wayne and Barb were left behind. We don’t know why or if it might happen again.”

  Jasper polished off an extra helping of rice, not abiding by the rule to not talk with food in your mouth. “Even if a wormhole lures Campbell out of hiding, how will we catch him with two pistols and a shotgun with two shells?”

  “One problem at a time,” Reagan said. “Let’s get some sleep and return to this question in the morning.”

  Chapter 22 – Whatever Happened to Travis Wayne

  Tom

  Tom woke to the new normal, a disoriented state, as the sunlight blasted through the dining room windows. “It looks like I slept through the night.”

  “And you snoozed through most of the morning, too.” Dixie perched in a bar chair watching the window with a rifle in her lap. Tall snowbanks piled against the window, reflecting sunlight into the room. She didn’t wear the red jacket but sported the three-quarter zip red shirt, the white ski pants, and the tall boots. “You better get a move on. Emerson is cackling from the watchtower. I guess Travis Wayne and Robin are back from vacation.”

  In stocking feet, t-shirt, and sweatpants, Tom bolted from the bed. The entire group waited for the entrance to open. Blockbuster information arrived with every waking moment in this world. Tom braced.

  Exhaustion plagued the duo. Robin hobbled inside with the aid of a walking stick. “I’m okay, but we had a Campbell sighting. I twisted my knee running after him.”

  Travis Wayne kicked the snow from his boots. “He’s an enemy.”

  “Tell me what happened.”

  Travis Wayne’s Story:

  In pursuit of a beacon, a wormhole or Nate Campbell, we checked the obvious places. We scouted a junior high school tucked off of the main road, a post office next door, a police station, and a bus station.

  At the police station, I snagged a police riot shotgun and shells. Prepared for battle, I carried a pistol, a rifle, and a shotgun. Robin fancied her sniper rifle, but I talked her into a sweet Colt Delta Elite
handgun. The police station reminded me of my hometown. A sunken office off the main door contained two desks full of messy paperwork. The second room housed a padlocked gun case, which I smashed. A kitchenette with a stove, fridge, and sink provided snacks. I found a block of ham and after the smell test, we ate it.

  At dark we made our way to the main road through town and circled the Bass Pro, weary of birds. Robin theorized Campbell controlled them in some manner, though I had doubts.

  In my mind, I strummed a guitar to pass the time as we trekked to the Ranger station where Robin said they left one of the merry men she trusted. Went by T.C. I regretted leaving my guitar behind in the chaos. I liked the instrument but wanted to get better and the exercise helped me relax. I played off and on for my whole life but recently got more into picking instead of strumming. I didn’t play half bad and the latest thing I tried was to get the bending sound of the guitar on Haggard records. I visualized my hands and the dozens of YouTube instructional videos. All the while, my eyes searched in every direction and my ears evaluated every noise.

  “Dogs,” I said as I kicked through a snowbank at the edge of a sidewalk leading to a radio station.

  “What are you murmuring about?” Robin, in good shape, didn’t breathe as hard.

  “Should be dogs running loose since all the people are gone. Only one I’ve seen is Scotty’s.”

  Shoving forward with a smirk, Robin gripped her rifle and eyed the front door, which creaked open. “I’m not sure any living things are here. Real things anyway. It seems the only living things are us.”

  Peering inside the front windows of the main entry, I trudged through the melting snow. A blast of heat met me. A furnace? “The living things we encountered were bees. Could’ve been artificial. Like the birds.”

  “Is the heat on? How’s that possible?” Robin pulled the hood from her jacket and the wool cap from her ears. She bit one glove and removed it, hesitating with the one on her left hand. I followed her eyes as she pivoted for a glowing room. The radiance came from an office – the name on the door, Ms. Howard.

  Guns ready for action, we sprang inside the office. Cheap plastic chairs lined one wall with mismatched leather chairs in front of a desk. Behind the desk, a captain’s chair with large armrests, loomed like a football linemen’s neck stuck in a buttoned-up shirt with a tie. The chair dominated the tight space. The glowing emanated from a battery-operated lantern teetering on the edge of the desk, swaying from the breeze of an open window.