by Justin Sloan
Every grunt from the man was heartbreaking, but Giovanni just had to remind himself that this was not his Luke—this was a madman, someone who didn’t have the moral sense of Luke, the strong will to do what was right, or the common decency to be a good human being.
Still, when Luke looked up with blood dripping down his face and a mixture of fear and heartache in his eyes, it tore at Giovanni’s soul.
How can one see that look on the face of one they love, and not be affected?
“Fuck…you.” Luke managed, and there was a click.
Giovanni took a step back, confused, then saw the grenade in Luke’s open palm.
He kicked again, but this time it was to break the man’s will and then, with a stomp, he slammed Luke down upon the grenade.
KA-BOOM!
It went off, sending Luke to fly up and hit the top of the glider with a thump. Giovanni had been knocked sideways, but he was mostly unharmed thanks to Luke’s armor absorbing the explosion.
Giovanni pushed himself up, crawling on forearms to the exit of the glider, and then rolled out. He lay there, wincing at the pain and breathing heavily of the fresh air that tasted great, even if it was too warm and humid.
Holy shit. What had he just done? Even though he knew it was the right choice, no, the only choice, it stung. As far as he knew, he could be stuck in this time, forced to live with what he had just done to the love of his life.
How does one move on from something like that? Luke hadn’t only been with the Syndicate, though, he had been a full-fledged Syndicate dick-head. This wasn’t his Luke, and he knew it.
Somehow, he told himself, he was going to get the hell out of here and back to his time…back to his Luke. Then, and only then, would he be able to block out that image of the pain in Luke’s eyes as they’d fought…the betrayal…the death.
When he managed to turn his head, he saw the hillside was infested with mechs and drones, lighting up the place. There was no way there’d be any survivors after this, not unless he did something.
But what could he do in this state?
He groaned, pushing himself up, and looked over to see the body of Luke, head mostly gone. It was sickening. And yet, it gave him an idea.
If he wanted to join in this fight and try to make amends for what he had done here, he had one chance. Take out the head.
There was little to no chance of getting to the command ship and fighting the Potentate, but General Aames was here and could be dealt with. The base still stood in the form of the mountain, and something could be done about that.
He managed to limp his way back into the glider and find the first aid kit. He applied a salve to his burns, then wrapped them as he had seen others do. The glider might not be a space fighter, but it had grenades and would have to do.
Powering it up, he strapped fake-Luke’s body with all the grenades he could find, then returned to the controls and took her airborne. It only took him a minute to figure out how to fly the machine. A swish came as drones flew past, but as far as they knew this glider was one of their own. He first had to orient himself, finding his directions relative to the mountain and where he had seen Aames go, and then he was off.
Soaring over the line of jeeps, Giovanni scanned the area and found his target—the general had met up with his backup, and now had a line of men behind him as he marched to the front jeep, likely preparing to move out and bring more destruction to the resistance.
No way was that happening.
Throwing the glider into auto, Giovanni ran to the back and checked to make sure he’d made his estimate appropriately, and yelled, “NOT ANY MORE!”
He pulled the pins on all the grenades and kicked the corpse out of the glider. A twinge of guilt hit him with the thought that this corpse had some semblance to Luke, but he was moving on, processing the realization that this was not his man. No more of those thoughts, he smiled as the body hit the main jeep’s hood. Everyone paused and then—
KABOOM!
They went up in a ball of explosive flame, while Giovanni scrambled back to take the controls of the glider.
Good timing too, because a tree was right in front of him.
“SHIT!” he screamed, pulling up and sideways, though it nicked one of the wings and sent him teetering slightly off course. That was fine—all he needed to do was reach the mountain.
Now he was back on track, with the drones, mech, and the lights of the mountain in his sights. He took a rocket launcher in one hand, shot out the window with a pistol, and then readied himself. As he careened down into the command center of the mountain, he pulled the trigger.
Flames.
An explosion.
SCREAMS!
He had no idea why, but with a massive shaking of the ground and a flash of colors, the world seemed to expand and then retract and then… darkness. Nothing but black.
He wasn’t there on that mountain. He wasn’t anywhere.
A light flickered on in the distance.
Where the inside of the mountain had been a second ago, now there was a hallway. Large windows showed space, stars and planets unlike anything he had ever seen before. Then a glimpse of someone, a man who looked deformed but now was glowing slightly, stepping toward the window as he took on the form of a woman. In the next moment, he was growing armor around him and he went right through the window as if it wasn’t there at all.
This man, or woman, whatever it was…didn’t make sense.
He was there one moment, then darting through space, flying as if propelled by rockets, going right at an attack vessel that began opening fire on them. Before engaging, Hadrian glanced back, waved a hand, and it all faded away into darkness again.
This time Giovanni fell through the darkness, landing on a bed. He stared around, confused, until a bathroom door opened and out walked Luke, in perfect health, a towel wrapped around his midsection. It was dark except for the light silhouetting the man.
“You’ve really never done this?” Luke asked, stepping forward. His smile faded as he saw Giovanni and he cupped his mouth. “Oh my God, what…how? I went in there for a shower, that’s all. These burns…?”
Giovanni looked down to see he was nude but for a pair of boxer briefs, but unlike any sort of underwear he had ever worn—he’d been a tighty-whiteys kind of guy since joining the Marines.
A glimpse at his hands showed they were still bandaged, but he imagined his face looked like a burned sausage patty, at least the side that had taken the majority of the hit from the rifle’s explosion.
The towel started to slide away as Luke climbed over Giovanni, straddling him to get a better look.
All Giovanni could think was, damn, whatever timeline this was, he’d take it.
“Quinn!” Luke shouted, then he ran to the door, not even worrying about the towel except to hold it in front of himself. A moment later, Giovanni saw why—when he flung the door open, Quinn and Samantha were running in, worry on their faces. They both looked older, and neither seemed to notice the nearly nude man standing there, instead asking what was wrong until they saw Giovanni there with his burns.
He covered himself, not wanting them to see the bulge that had been forming. Part of him was still confused, disoriented, and high as hell from the adrenaline of everything he had just been through. The rest of him said screw that, this was a place he could get used to. Ignore the burns, have fun.
“Who did this to you?” Quinn demanded, then pointed to the doorway and said, “Samantha, get your gun and search the area. Luke, first aid. Get me the flesh gun.”
“Like the Syndicate had?” Giovanni asked, remembering the story Quinn had told him about the way she had been revived on the Syndicate ship.
“Yes,” Quinn said, frowning. “Like we, the Syndicate, had and have.”
Giovanni groaned, knowing it was too good to be true. “What…what’s happened? How many years since the Syndicate invaded?”
Quinn shook her head, checking out the wounds. “We need you to s
tay with us, okay? Just…you sound delusional. Stay with us.”
“How many?” he demanded.
“Seven or eight years,” she said, and when Samantha popped her head back in, she was wearing some intense, black armor with areas of blue light on it, a hood, and had a stern look in her eyes. Yes, he could see how she might be nineteen or twenty, but damn, how could that be?
Better than in his timeline, he supposed, for her and Quinn. They were with the enemy, but they were both alive, together. His whole concept of enemies was starting to get very confused, but he brushed it off as a likely side-effect of the pain he was feeling.
Quinn pulled a needle out and only then did he realize she had pumped something into him, Luke at her side.
“Just be still, this won’t hurt a bit,” Quinn said, holding a gun-shaped object up to the burns on his face. “Not with all the morphine I just pumped into you, anyway.”
“Mom,” Samantha shouted, turning back away from the room, “I’ll get those sons of bitches, I swear.”
Quinn closed her eyes, nodded, and smiled. “If anyone can, it’s her, Gio. Don’t worry.”
“I still don’t understand how the hell this happened. If you two hadn’t been staying here, I don’t know what the hell I would’ve done, I mean…”
Luke’s voice started to fade as Giovanni’s surroundings blurred…then the darkness returned.
He was getting real tired of this.
His eyes opened partly and he was back on the time ship, but he couldn’t keep his eyes open, and when they closed again, the darkness shook worse than before.
Now the time loops, as he had decided they were, flashed by. He was living them, part of them happening, but in his mind it was like they had never happened. One minute he was charging across the frozen lake with his companions, Milo at his side with a gun almost as big as he was, blasting drones out of the sky.
Next he was at a lake-side cottage, smiling as he looked out at the water and took a sip of a warm mug of coffee. Someone came up behind him, wrapping delicate arms around his mid-section, and when he turned, expecting to find Luke, it was Quinn. She smiled and had a round, very pregnant belly, and leaned in to kiss him. His eyes went wide, then closed, and more darkness.
That darkness permeated everything. It was inside him, and then…a flash of a star. Another. And then lasers. Explosions.
Flying through space, Giovanni sat in the copilot seat as Luke plowed through enemy fighter planes, swooping down and then pulling up to join a line of other fighters.
“Where are we?” Giovanni asked.
Luke turned to him with an excited smile, his hand reaching out and taking his. “At the moment of victory. At the moment of—”
And then there was a bright flash of light, and Giovanni couldn’t believe his eyes. A massive gate had emerged before them and, the best way he could see it, the head of a massive snake was coming at them. It seemed almost translucent, like it wasn’t fully there yet, but as they approached, it continued to materialize.
Luke said it perfectly when he uttered, “Oh, shit.”
The grip on his hand was crushing, leaving no room for Giovanni to pull back, not that he would—he was frozen in terror.
Whatever this was, he hoped to God the time ship hadn’t come to its end.
His answer came in the form of the ship shaking as its force fields were hit then, as the mouth of the snake opened and came it at them…
…a flash of white.
Snow now.
He was on a mountain, hiking as a frigid wind cut through his thick jacket, Luke at his side, their boots crunching across snow. Although the man’s mouth was moving, Giovanni didn’t hear any sound…only a distant ringing. They stopped and looked out at the other side of the mountain, where before them were miles upon miles of crashed Syndicate drones, mechs, and even a massive space ship. He could see exotic looking temples in the distance, prayer wheels clacking and the sound of strange horns blaring, which made him think this must be Nepal, or maybe Tibet.
Not that it mattered, because a moment later he was slumped over, falling down in the snow, and was gone.
Vomit worked its way up and out, and he looked at the puke-soaked ground in front of him, realizing he was on his hands and knees. His hands…they weren’t healed completely, but they were better wrapped, better treated.
“Gio!” a voice shouted, distant, almost like the final echo. “GIO!” Louder now, and then, right in his ear, “GIO, GET UP!”
He startled, turned, and saw Luke and Quinn in front of him, all geared up in their resistance clothes. Was he home?
“Shit, man, I thought we’d lost you,” Quinn said, clapping him on the shoulder. “You keep your head in the ga—”
BAM!
A gunshot went off and Quinn’s head exploded.
Luke cursed, but there were others running past them now, returning fire. Giovanni stared in horror at the corpse of his friend, then up to Luke.
“What world am I in?”
“The hell are you talking about?” Luke pointed at the rifle next to Giovanni. “I don’t know what’s going on with you, where the hell those wounds came from, but pick up your rifle and come on! We almost have him?”
“Have who?”
“The Potentate!” Luke grabbed Giovanni under the arm and helped him stand, then shoved the rifle into his bandaged hands. He pointed at a massively defended military compound, complete with mechs, drones, and more, and Giovanni felt his heart sink.
But then the ground shook and he turned to see mechs coming from behind, and they were shooting at the other mechs. Planes came out from the clouds and released missiles, and more came to engage the drones in combat. This was insane and, if not for Quinn lying dead before him, it would’ve almost felt right.
“Samantha?” he asked, hopeful. “Is she…?”
Luke frowned, then bit his lip to stop it from quivering. “Fucking still dead, Gio. Can you pull your head out of your ass and focus?”
Breathing in the gunpowder ridden air and coming to the realization that this was as likely as not his time and place, just not sure how he had blocked out so much of it, he did his best to grip the rifle and said, “Let’s go.”
“Wait, wait!” he grabbed Luke’s arm, pulling him back to stare into his eyes. “Is this us? I mean the real us?”
Luke allowed a distant, hesitant smile. “If we kill this bastard, then yes. If not, well, see you on the other side or in another time loop. Who the hell knows.” He leaned in, kissed Giovanni briefly on the cheek, and then stood with a shout and charged.
Giovanni was up and with him, running to join the others in the assault.
Explosions took apart drones and large chunks of cement, bullets and lasers tore through troops, and yet they charged. There was no stopping them this time. If there was a chance he was home, Giovanni was going to damn sure be positive that Quinn hadn’t given her life without a true reward at the other end.
If the Potentate was in there, he meant to pull the trigger that killed the bastard.
He skidded across an old, partially burnt car, then ran for cover behind a wall that looked to have once been part of someone’s house, but was now mostly rubble. Giving it his all, he stood and opened fire on a squad of Syndicate Marines in their red armor, knowing his piece of shit rifle didn’t have much hope of doing much damage, but just might distract them long enough.
BRRRRTTTT!
A mech’s massive gun lit them up, then it turned and let loose with its cannon—KABOOM! The squad of Syndicate Marines was gone.
“We have a MECH?!” Giovanni shouted, elated. “Holy shit!”
“A small army of them,” Luke shouted, running past him. Giovanni jumped up and ran, both of them diving for cover as another mech appeared, facing down theirs. A field of energy rose up in front of this one, absorbing the shots from theirs, and then charged forward on thrusters as it returned fire. These mechs were massive, and Giovanni knew he had to get out of there or risk
getting stomped on and squished.
“Over there,” he shouted, and the two ran to join another squad of resistance fighters about to breach what looked like the main building, judging by the defensive guns they had just taken out.
With a nod back at the mechs, Luke said, “We wouldn’t have a shot here if it weren’t for Dannyboy, may he rest in peace.”
Giovanni frowned, trying to remember a Danny, or Dan. No matter, probably one of the other many fighters either with the resistance or Marines—remembering all of their names was impossible, and it wasn’t like he had ever met all of them anyway.
A loud thud sounded behind them and the door fell in. He jumped up to charge, when a new barrage of shots tore through the rest of their group.
“Mother-fuc—” Luke started, but an explosion cut him off and a second later drones fell from the sky, barraging the ground around them. Two more exploded upon impact and a piece of shrapnel hit Luke in the shoulder.
“I got you,” Giovanni shouted, running over to him.
“No!” Luke grabbed him, then turned him back to the building. “Get into the command center. I’m on your tail. GO!”
So they charged, lighting up the Syndicate Marines at the entryway. They tore through halls, tossing flash-bangs and frag grenades, falling back only once as a spider mech breached the building. It caused the ceiling to fall in, turned back, and fired at something outside.
Luke and Giovanni ran forward, leaping over the pile of rubble, and continued in, turning left through a door where they found a line of blackened out windows.
The command center.
They ran in, slamming through the door, and froze. With his back to them, there stood a figure they knew had to be the Potentate. He faced a wall full of screens, each showing not only their immediate surroundings, but images from all over the place, some in major bases where the resistance had been, others in the remains of large cities, showing rubble, a toppled Tokyo Tower, and more.
The potentate turned to them, slowly, and waited. He wore a blue robe over red armor, a metallic mask over his face that only revealed his eyes, and yet, somehow those eyes looked familiar.