The President was unharmed, still standing at his podium.
“What do you want?”
He looked around at each of the men, but received no response. The men continued to circle, checking for potential threats from the gathered dignitaries and press members.
Penny felt movement at her right and noticed her own protection that day—the man who would have been her husband in another reality—was beginning to move.
“Don’t!” she whispered. “They’ll kill you!”
He just smiled and stood. No bullets were fired. Nicholas Davidson, known as Agent Green, walked to the President and stood face to face with him.
“Mr. President. You’re in over your head, sir. Project Blink was kept from you on purpose. Because it was known that if you knew, you would do exactly this. You would tell the world of perhaps the greatest strategic advantage the United States has had since nuclear weapons were developed in the 1940’s,” Nicholas said. His tone was brisk. Impassive.
He brought his gun up and pointed it dead center at President Hanson’s forehead.
“You are exactly what is wrong with this world, son,” President Hanson said to Nicholas. “I don’t know you, but I know your type. You think you can rule the world through fear and intimidation. You think that this world owes you something. You think you are the exception, not the rule. You, my boy, are the rule. It’s easy to let fear win, to give in and just allow those feelings to come back again and again. If you’d just....”
“Shut up,” Nicholas said. “You don’t get to dictate the future anymore. We control the portals, so we control what happens from here on out.”
“Oh really?”
“Really.”
A shot echoed off the decking and Penny flinched. She expected to see Hanson fall backwards, his body limp in death, blood and his life draining from his form.
But Hanson continued to stand, resolute and bold. It was Nicholas who had moved, the blood spurting from his hand. The gun he’d held had skittered across the deck and was resting near Penny’s feet. The men who had been calm and stoic as they took over the press conference with their weapons were now scrambling, attempting to stabilize the situation now spiraling out of their control.
_____
It was killing Nik to wait. For the past half hour he’d sat and waited, watching through a mirror as if it was a television program that had nothing to do with him. Except one of the main characters was his wife. Away from most of the action, but close enough that Nik’s heart started and stopped more times than he could count.
After he followed the two Agent Streets through the portal to the sub-basement, they unfolded their plan. Apparently they’d had more than just a day to put it together, and did so with the cooperation of President Hanson.
Hanson had known some things, but was still in the dark about others. The aircraft carrier press conference was all his idea, A. Street told Nik. He was that kind of president—if he needed to root out a problem, he’d do it in the biggest way possible.
So Nik had watched A. Street head through the barrier earlier and then Nik and E. Street waited with a couple portals in front of them. E. Street had a hand held control panel with numerous buttons on it. He handed it to Nik.
“Here. You’re going to need this. When I make my move, start flipping those switches. Frankly, I don’t even really care where. I mean, I’d like you to follow me, but as for anyone else—I don’t care what happens to them, or where they go.”
“Got it.”
Nik’s palms were so slick, he was afraid he was going to drop the controls, but he kept it together. Through the mirror, he could see his mirror double—a man he’d once trusted because they shared a face. Nicholas pointed a gun at the President and was clearly agitated and angry. A clear sense of confidence. Misplaced confidence it would seem as Nicholas was shot by A. Street, hidden onboard the ship.
Nik felt his heart skip a few beats. Even if he hated Nicholas, it was still troubling to see a man who shared your face get shot.
Nik looked over at E. Street.
“Not yet. Hold on. You’ll know when to push those buttons,” E. Street said.
_____
“What’s wrong, Agent Green? Did something bite you?” President Hanson asked. He was apparently unfazed at what was happening.
Nicholas scowled at the President, whipping his tie off with his left hand and tying it around his right hand, stemming the flow of blood. He grimaced as he gripped the end of the tie to keep the makeshift bandage from shifting.
“That’s okay,” Nicholas said. He looked around at the other men who had come through the portals, and found one. “You. Agent Walters. Come here.”
The young agent rushed over to Nicholas and the injured man grabbed Walters by the shoulder with his good hand. “I want you to shoot the President. Can you do that?”
“Y...yessir,” Walters said. He raised his own gun, like Nicholas had done just moments earlier, and was ready to fire. Just like before, the President began to address his would-be shooter.
“Agent Walters, is it? I’m sorry you have to do this. You can walk away now. Full pardon—I can do that, you know. I’m the President. Walk away and I’ll make sure no one ever presses charges over any of this. Penny, you’re my witness, right?”
Penny felt disconnected. Almost as if she was somewhere else entirely, watching the events on a television. When the President called out her name, though, it made it abundantly clear that she was indeed present, and smack dab in the middle of the action. His words, though, also told her something else. The President knew. She didn’t know how, but he knew she wasn’t Penelope. He’d called her Penny. In a strange way, she felt a huge burden lifted from her shoulders as she sat forward, willing to play along in the President’s game.
“Absolutely, boss,” Penny called out. She noticed one of the mirrors seemed to ripple next to her, but she did her best to keep her face impassive.
“You see, Agent Walters, the life of a presidential assassin is not the one for you. You can stop right here, and you’ll be safe,” Hanson reiterated.
Walters’ gun was pointed at Hanson’s head, but it shook just a bit, wavering under the stress of the situation.
“Shut up. All of you,” Nicholas said. He turned to the President. “You don’t get a say in what happens. Not anymore. And as for you,” he turned to Penny, “I think you might want to keep your head down, if you know what’s best for those children.”
Nicholas took a step towards Walters. “Now you, take the shot.”
“You don’t have to, Agent Walters,” Hanson said quietly.
Walters turned his head slightly towards Nicholas. A moment of hesitation.
Nicholas’ entire body tensed and he lurched forward. He stood millimeters from Walters’ shoulder. “Take the shot!”
Walters’ face snapped forward and his finger tightened on the trigger. Just as with the previous attempt on the President’s life, the shot came, but not from the intended shooter. Walters crumpled onto the deck. The gathered press was frozen, each of the reporters and cameramen hiding behind their chairs, but all were focused on the action from the President’s podium.
President Hanson stood unfazed. He turned to his left and gave a short nod to the mirror nearest to the stage on that side.
Nicholas immediately leapt up and ran towards the mirror, speeding up as he went, burst through the event horizon and vanished from the aircraft carrier. His disappearance left six of the mirror agents left behind, minus Agent Walters, who still lay motionless on the deck in front of the President. To those remaining agents, President Hanson must’ve appeared invincible. Two attempts. Two failures. Each had their weapons aimed at the Chief Executive, but each waited.
_____
Nik’s entire body was ready to combust. The adrenaline was more than this simple schoolteacher could take...almost. Somewhere, in the back of his mind, he knew that his doppelganger from this world coul
d handle the action and stress, so he should be able to do the same.
He watched Nicholas turn to another of his agents and have them do exactly what he was going to do, but President Hanson and Penny did their best to keep this new agent from carrying out his shot.
Regardless, Nik knew they had both Agents Street ready to fire from the deck of the carrier or through the portal here. He looked over at A. Street, who was entirely focused on the dialogue being exchanged on the other side of their mirror. Without taking his eyes off the president and his would-be assassin, A. Street asked, “Ready?”
Nik nodded, and then realized A. Street couldn’t see it. “Ready.”
A deep breath. Before Nik could release all the air, the report of gunfire echoed in their sub-basement.
“He’s safe,” A. Street said. Nik assumed he meant President Hanson. “Here we go.”
For a brief moment, A. Street inserted himself through the mirror, but only partly. Nik checked a feed from the other side of the ship and he could see A. Street pointing at Nicholas and making a gesture—daring the inured agent to come after him. Nik could see now that the Streets were purposefully using Nicholas’ anger to make him commit to a foolish course of action. And that’s precisely what happened. A. Street retreated from the mirror and took a few steps back to another mirror.
In a flash, Nicholas emerged with a shout. Four steps later, his momentum carried him through another portal awaiting his presence. Nik slammed the button on his console as soon as Nicholas left the room. He watched on a closed circuit feed as Nicholas cascaded through portal after portal in a maze they’d set up for him. Not difficult, but time consuming nonetheless. Enough to frustrate the already angered agent.
_____
The wait was short. Momentary. Less than a few seconds because after Nicholas had left them, she heard a buzz go through the crowd of reporters on hand. Within just seconds, that buzz was silenced when Nicholas reappeared running through a different mirror and landed with a huff on the deck.
He looked wildly to each of his allied agents’ faces. “Did he come through here?”
Each looked confused and turned to look at one another. The one closest to Penny spoke up. A stocky man with no apparent neck.
“No sir. Just you. Ten seconds ago you went through the portal and now you’re back.”
Nicholas fumed. “Great. You—come with me.”
Nicholas turned and leapt back into the portal he’d just come through and the other agent followed. His reappearance was much quicker this time, emerging through a mirror on the edge of the stage. He was alone. The other agent was nowhere to be seen, but Nicholas didn’t seem to notice. On the opposite side of the deck—exactly on the other side of President Hanson, a figure half-appeared. He appeared to be smiling.
“Aren’t you going to come get me, Agent Green? You’re much younger than me—this shouldn’t be much of a contest,” the older man said. His grey hair shone in the sunlight, but disappeared right along with him when he ducked back through the portal.
“Go!” Nicholas swung his left hand—his only good one—motioning for the three other agents on that side of the ship to follow through that portal. “Get him. Get Agent Street. I want him eliminated!”
Nicholas ran across the deck and followed the other agents through the portal, leaving just two to possibly threaten the President or Penny.
_____
Nik had to be quicker on the buttons this time. More targets meant more portals. Instead of keeping the agents together with Nicholas, the goal was to split them up and trap them. For a little while, A. Street acted as the human bait, running and taunting the alternate dimension version of Nik Davidson and his followers. But when all the agents were contained, he returned and Nik calmly shut all the available exits.
The men were stuck.
Now was his turn.
_____
The wait this time was longer. The two agents stood on the balls of their feet, ready to move—ready to act if and when Nicholas came back through. But he didn’t. Not for a few minutes. During that time, it was almost as if someone had taken all the breathable air off the deck of the aircraft carrier. Penny’s attention was faltering. She wasn’t used to this tension—to the action that had befallen her very first press conference as a Vice President.
President Hanson stood his ground at his podium. He didn’t say anything else, but didn’t back down, either. The two remaining agents had their service weapons drawn and aimed at the president, so caution was the word of the day.
Penny heard a commotion behind her. She looked back and saw the portal over her right shoulder shimmer and Nicholas walked through. Except...not him. Something was different. The clothes were the same, but something was different. In hindsight, she realized it was the bandage on his hand—the fact there wasn’t one. No bullet wound. But in the moment, if she’d been asked what was different, she would have said his eyes.
The eyes of the man who emerged from that portal were not the eyes of a man who cared nothing about her. The eyes she looked into were full of love and compassion—a full heart that was seeking completion. This wasn’t Nicholas.
It was Nik.
But he was still playing the part of his doppelganger, running onto the aircraft carrier with a gun in hand and wearing a suit identical to the agent’s. He ran up behind Penny and grabbed her roughly—but somewhat tenderly as well—by the bicep and pulled her up.
“You two,” Nik shouted at the two remaining agents on the deck. “The operation has gone south. I’m taking the Vice President as insurance. Keep the President locked down while I get reinforcements.”
Penny knew she still had a part to play for a few more moments and struggled against Nik’s grasp on her arm.
“Let me go!” Penny shouted. She dug in her heels for an instant.
“Not too much,” Nik whispered in her ear. “Time to go.”
She made a show of resisting once more, and then gave in. Nik dragged her back towards the portal he had emerged from, backing through the mirror to the dark room on the other side.
_____
Nik and Penny made it back through the portal to the sub-basement below The Utility Company with some scrapes and scratches, but altogether mostly unharmed. As soon as they made it through together, Nik let go of Penny’s arm and waited. She turned around and if she cared at all about their surroundings she didn’t show it, immediately diving into his arms.
“Oh, Nik.”
“I’m here. I crossed dimensions to get you back, babe.”
“Just shut up and hold me, you idiot.”
He could hardly breathe, he was holding her so tightly, but Nik didn’t care. Throughout their lives together, Nik had never realized how much Penny meant to him before that moment. The mother of his children, the love of his life. Even in an alternate world, even dressed up like somebody else, he would always love her. He would always find her.
As if a sudden thought struck her, Penny pulled away. “The kids? Kira, Sisco? What…”
“They’re safe.”
That was all she needed to hear and she was back holding onto her husband as if nothing else in the world—or worlds for that matter—mattered. “What is going on Nik? How did this happen to us?”
Nik filled in some of the details from the early days with his dry forehead and suspicions of what was happening (she slugged his shoulder for not telling her then), the arrival of Agent Smith and his team only after he’d realized what had happened to her, and a brief recap of his journey to get her.
Nik decided maybe this wasn’t the best time to mention that their house was no longer standing. But he did drop some other information on her.
“Oh. And I met your father,” Nik said. He rubbed his chin as he said it, remembering the punch he took from his father-in-law.
“You did?” Penny asked. Realizing he must’ve if he’d gotten to their children, she smil
ed. “What’s it like meeting your wife’s dad for the first time?”
“Hard. Really hard.” Nik stroked his chin, remembering how Bridges clocked him.
Alarms klaxoned around them. A. Street walked through the mirror behind Nik and immediately picked up the console Nik had discarded after he’d trapped Nicholas and the evil agents he’d brought through the portal with him.
Nik had cornered all of them. Or so he’d thought.
“Look at this,” A. Street said, flipping the console around. He’s rewound some footage recorded from Nicholas’ makeshift prison. Nicholas had a portal generator of his own. Must’ve been a low-power unit—good for only one person. He attached it to a nearby portal, and changed the end-point location. He walked through and the portal shattered after his foot finished crossing the event horizon.
_____
Back on the deck of the ship, the press, the few remaining agents, and the President stood for a few moments, until it was clear that was the last time Nik or Nicholas would be making an appearance.
Hanson broke the tension left behind in the wake of Nicholas’ disappearance.
“Agent Street, if you could take over here, that would be great.”
A grizzled face broke away from a camera in the midst of the press section and smiled. The same face that had peered through the portal earlier, beckoning Nicholas and his agents through. Agent Street—one of them at least—looked at each of the two remaining agents.
“Me and just two of you. Oh man, you guys are so screwed.”
Engine Control
The drill was self-guiding, and it went nearly all the way to the Engine Room before drilling a chamber wide and tall enough for Smith to stand then shutting itself down. Smith crawled into the chamber twenty minutes later, a bit relieved to have some room to stretch. He rubbed his muscles and shook out, preparing.
Utility Company (Book 1): Blink Page 29