by JT Dylan
FOUR
The President watched the pods all light up, one by one, even the empty ones. A low, unpleasant noise filled the chamber. Like scratching steel rods across ceramic. Tubes that snaked into the pods stiffened as they filled with black liquid. The General busied himself with two main data monitors. He signalled a tech over. Pointed at some figures. The tech shrugged. The President couldn't hear anything over the howl of machinery now, but lip-read well enough to get the idea. Something wasn't right. Nothing major judging by their reactions. No one shouted, no one ran, no machines were powered down. The extraction was still going ahead. Maybe just some calibration issues. The Ox opened his eyes and smiled at him. The President smiled back politely. Wolf was still motionless.
As he glanced over the machines again, President Freeman felt uneasy. He swiped a thumb across his brow, and it came away wet. Just the anticipation and the electrical humidity perhaps? He didn't think so.
He had survived years of intense warfare by following one simple rule. Always follow your gut instinct. During training for the Elite they'd been trained ruthlessly. He remembered the burning cabin test. Only one entry point. Possible hostage situation. His superior barking at him to get in there. Screaming in his face. The hostages would all be dead if he didn't go immediately. They were going to fail him if he refused. He had followed his gut. He had ignored the Major, commandeered his truck, and rammed it through the hut's wall.
Inside were six drone synthetics, heavily armed. No hostages. The surprise attack allowed him to take four out before he even got out of the truck. The other two he killed with his hands.
Out of a hundred and thirty eight soldiers, he was the first of only three men that made it through to Elite squadron that year. General Jim Daniels had been the second. Their missing Alpha Soldier Jack had been the last. The three of them had become brothers over the years. Had survived together. Never lost a fight. Never left a man behind. Until now.
This last thought triggered more alarm bells in his head. He tried to immediately calm himself. Used the same trick they had been taught before time-jumps. Increase distance from yourself. Look at yourself within the room as others see you. Imagine yourself in the pod. He had always found that part hard because they had never actually seen the inside of the pods. They were always... Christ! His thoughts crashed down on him at once. They were always asleep in the pod. To eliminate any chance of sabotage. The Ox was awake!
'Jim!' The President launched off the gantry and sprinted toward General Daniels. The noise was too loud. The General remained hunched over a keyboard with a superior officer. They scratched their heads and pointed at data streams. An Asian technician looked up idly from her paperwork and stared curiously at the vip running towards the General. At the same time, a door opened behind her and Cal walked in, her long legs swishing through the gap in the lab coat. The President had just enough time to wonder why Cal was wearing a lab coat when the technician's face disintegrated. Her lifeless body slumped forward and Cal stepped over her, her handgun still smoking a thin blue wisp.
'No!' The President suddenly understood. In that split second his mind pieced together multiple key events. He was trained to react to unplanned scenarios proactively. Never question why. Just win. Survive first, ask why tomorrow. He flipped a steel coffee table up in front of him and ran with it, toward the Synth. Not Cal anymore. Just another Synthetic. She was the first priority. Eliminate the primary threat, then abort the mission and eliminate the other sleeper cell; The Ox.
The machines howled ever louder but finally the General had heard the commotion. He turned around and saw all hell breaking loose behind him; The President being shot at. The President swinging the solid steel table at Cal's head as she reloaded. A puff of blood on impact. Her head knocked to an unnatural angle. The General vaulted over the desk and put three bullets from his own sidearm in the cyborg's skull.
The President didn't even pause. He sprinted toward the pods.
The General saw the Ox pound the toughened glass between himself and Wolf, who was still in a deep sleep. The glass splintered under the force. Ben was still half a room away.
The General aimed directly at The President's back. 'Ben! Lunar Base!'
The President didn't respond. Damn! Had he even heard?
The General pulled back on the firing mechanism, breathed out and fired. Just as his finger tightened on the trigger and before his hand jerked back with recoil he saw the President tuck into a forward roll. Perfect. Years previously they had used the exact same manoeuvre to eliminate a bomber during a moon shuttle hijack.
The bullet whistled over the President's head and ruptured its target, the capsule's main supply pipe. Oxygen squealed out of the flayed rubber hose. Nothing happened to the power levels. The machines still rolled. Damn it. The auto-shut down hadn't kicked in. The President was already back on his feet and powering toward the Ox. There was no time left for finesse. Brute force was all they had now. Still running at full pace, Ben swung his left arm as hard as he could toward the glass. The heavy table leg he held in it becoming a fierce club.
The thick glass only chipped, didn't even crack. The Ox's arm was through the inner partition, reaching deep into the twinned chamber. The President's mind raced through possible scenarios. It didn't make sense. The emergency manual controls were directly beneath the Ox, not behind him. The Ox's fist was bloodied, his knuckles shreds of skin from the huge blunt force trauma. The President took a heavy breath. Best bet was to pull him out, worry about details later. He switched to his right arm. Aimed for the glass's weak spot. Near the hinge. A huge blow. The table leg dented on impact but the pod remained intact. An inhuman moan made the President jerk back a step. Black-red fluid sprayed across the inside of the pod.
'Shit!'
Wolf thrashed around in his harness like a wet fish. He was cut deep across his right thigh. Arterial spray quickly filled the pod. The Ox had a makeshift blade in his hand fashioned from a shard of glass and was panting heavily. The inner wall lay in fragments. Blue sensor LED's lit up one after the other along the glass bottom where the blood pooled. A klaxon rang out. It sounded like it was coming from everywhere at once.
'Chance of a little help here?' Ben shouted. He put his whole weight against the pod. Used his good arm to lift the bottom. It weighed much more than he remembered. 'Fuck!'
'I'll shut the power cores down!' the General opened a floor panel. Started ripping out electrical couplers. Lights went out along the walls. But the pods remained active. Their self-contained lighting throwing a red glow across the room.
The President managed to tip the pod maybe another inch before his fingers slipped and it crashed back down. Its solid mass shaking the walls. Too heavy. The Ox alone probably weighed more than he could lift since the last surgery.
'It's too late Ben, the pods go into lock-down within seconds of detecting DNA contamination. They're powering themselves now.' The General held up the last of the detached power couplings.
'Damn it! How long have we got Jim?' President Freeman tried to focus on a clear strategy.
The General just stood gaping.
'General! I need our position right NOW! How long before this whole place is swarming with that Swat Team?'
'I don't... they're 3 minutes away from the furthest corners of the station. Optimum time for response. From here, a little less.' The General blinked at the bloody carnage unfolding only feet away from him, 'But they'll never stop him in time Ben, the pod bays will release automatically in half that time.'
'They aren't coming to stop him, General. They're coming to clean up after him.'
'What?'
'It's the Company Jim! We're both nothing but damned puppets. And they're on their way right now to cut our strings.'
Behind them, the Pod's hydraulics hissed. A motor noise almost like a shuttle's undercarriage whirred and clanked below deck, locking unseen struts into place. The pod jolted, then sank down quickly into its launch tunnel. As he was taken
away the Ox looked the President right in the eye and saluted. He was backdropped by smeared red glass and the slumped Beta soldier Wolf, still in stasis, his life draining quickly.
The steel top of the pod became flush with the floor. The glass unit detached and a loud blast of air-loss as it was sucked out into open space. The General and the President watched through the hull's glass wall as the time pod's thrusters flared back up into their field of view in the distance. It made minute micro-adjustments to its trajectory, and powered onward on its pre-programmed course; Toward Earth.
FIVE
Jack looked down the steady barrel pointed right at him and raised his arms. Not out of fear. He had held none of that for a long time. But out of respect. The old man had just stumbled across a naked stranger on his land. The least Jack could do was let the man be angry.
'I'm only looking for water old man. Sorry about the intrusion.'
The old man's face cracked into a grin. He lowered his gun. 'Sir, you have no idea how long I've waited for those words. Oh my. Come here Jack and let these old eyes see you again.'
Jack dropped his arms and took a cautious step forward. 'I can't recall...'
The old man shifted his hat and blinked at Jack in the sunlight. Jack realised the man had tears in his eyes. He grabbed Jack by the shoulders and shook his head. 'My, my, my. A wonder. Yes sir, an absolute marvel.' The man beckoned the boy over. 'Take a good look at this man's face son. This is the face of a hero. A god-damned hero no less.'
The boy giggled and hid behind the old man's britches.
The old man wiped his eye then clapped his hands together. 'Well gentlemen. Now that we're all here, I guess we have some eating and drinking to do!' he gave his gun to Jack to carry and slapped him on the back. He hoisted the boy high in his arms and set off toward the house.
Jack was confused but glad of the warm welcome. His memory might come back to him later. In the meantime he could drink, rest and eat. Now that food had been mentioned he suddenly thought of nothing else. Jack set off after them. The boy was peeking over the old guy's shoulder, studying the new strange arrival.
The old man shouted without turning around, 'Oh and remember to watch your step!'
Jack's foot slid in something dark and he almost went tumbling. Horse manure. The boy giggled and clasped his hands over his mouth in delight.
The old man laughed, a big hearty laugh. 'Maybe you'll miss it next time.'
Jack thought maybe the old guy was crazy after all. In the distance the dog started barking again. Jack felt an odd comfort in that. Now that he was no longer an intruder, the dog's yelps made him feel at home.
SIX
The Ox exhaled. Finally clear of the station, he strapped himself in and de-activated the autopilot. The Ox saw the gargantuan vessel's plethora of blinking lights shrink to a singular point in the distance. The pod rocked him sideways as it corrected its course. Wolf moaned softly behind him. There wasn't much time. The Ox twisted around and tearing off his own emergency supply pipe, strapped a makeshift tourniquet around Wolf's upper leg. The cut was deeper than he had intended, but worse than it looked. It had been a fine balance between releasing enough blood to activate the lockdown, and not cutting so much that his comrade would bleed out. He examined the wound. It would heal itself. At worst, Wolf would find himself in an unknown timeframe because of the nano-fluid loss. Ox hadn't used his own blood because he couldn't risk changing his own dose. He checked his levels. They were a little high, but well within the safety parameters. He would very likely shoot back only a day or two past his target date. He flicked the thruster switch. The pod rocked and shuddered under the increased G-Force. They shot head first toward the remains of the late, great planet earth.
Small fragments of debris rattled against the glass. Then larger chunks, more often. The Ox craned his head round and saw nothing but planet. They were on the outskirts of the dwindling atmosphere. Now for the fun part.
The pod guided itself toward a vast piece of blue surface miles below, avoiding large pieces of asteroid as it went. It hurtled toward the ocean, at times flaring its rockets. But only left or right. Never to slow itself. The Ox watched the altimeter count down through the volatile clouds until they were a good mile above the surface, then the front thrusters blasted on and they slowed fractionally. The rocket flames dazzled the Ox's forward view and he turned his attention back into the pod. He kept his eye on the altitude and waited until it approached 500 meters. The lower he could get it, the better their chance of survival. Outside, a raging wind bucked and threw the falling capsule like a raft at sea. The Ox rapped his head on the glass. Wolf groaned with each jolt. The altimeter said 20 meters and hovered there.
Showtime.
Unstrapping himself and turning around to face Wolf, the Ox cut off the thrusters and counted the fall in his head. When he reached six he pulled Wolf's magnetic coil. Half of the pod sheared away and Wolf was sucked out into the howling winds.
'Safe jump kid.' He watched for a fraction of a second and saw Wolf 's dead weight evaporate into fine particles a couple of meters before hitting the fiery sea. Ox removed his own magnetic coil and felt the nano-cells in his bloodstream activate all at once. He was sucked out of the pod and had a sense of falling. The pod crashed heavily into the sea to his far right.
Then there was no sea.
There was nothing.
SEVEN
'Feeling more like yourself?' The old timer grinned at Jack over the broad wooden table.
Jack had eaten more than his fill and had washed it down with about a gallon of water. He felt like he could nap for a week. The old man had given him dry clothes that almost fit, and they had spent the rest of the daylight hours preparing then eating what little the bare cupboards had yielded. Jack saw that the boy had finally fallen asleep, his head heavy on Jack's shoulder. A single candle flickered on the table, making the urge to sleep that much stronger.
'Kid likes you. Seems you pass the test.' The old man winked. The dog, an ugly brute, nuzzled Jack's hand and wouldn't stop until Jack succumbed and scratched his head. The old man's smile faded. 'Go on now Barkuss. Off with you!' The dog hung its head low and lay down quietly under Jack's legs.
'He's a good dog, but we don't get too close to him. He's for working.' The dog blinked up at them, his head on his front paws. Outside, the crickets played their moonlight song.
'I can't stay old man. There are some bad people looking for me. You and the boy aren't safe while I'm here.'
'That much is true. But we'll be safe for long enough to say what needs to be said. You'll stay here tonight. Those damned injuns won't travel this far in by night. Then tomorrow there's someplace you have to see. The big fella ain't too far away neither and so we'll keep our wits about us nonetheless.'
'Care to tell me how you know so much about another man's business?' Jack found himself too tired to be anything but curious. For this man was indeed a curiosity.
'You're not the only man who knows a little about father time.' And with that he was on his feet. 'You can rest your eyes where you sit or take the dog's sack if he'll let you.'
He scooped the boy up and put him on a wooden crate in the corner of the room. He put his own overcoat over the boy then went to the door, his rifle in one hand, his smoke in the other.
Jack's eyes felt like lead weights. Maybe he could make some sense of this old man's ramblings in the morning. 'Where will you sleep?'
The old man turned as he opened the door, 'I won't need sleep tonight son. I'm dreaming with my eyes wide open!' and gave a high chuckle as he went out into the night.
Jack slept fitfully that night. His dreaming mind went back to a man in a white suit. The man grinned yellow snake teeth. He wasn't a man at all. The Devil himself pointed across the street at a face in an upstairs window. Jack saw his own lifeless face staring back down at him. Then the shutters slammed shut with a bang!
Jack opened his eyes and sat up straight. His shirt was soaked through. The candle
had burned to nothing. He saw the boy fast asleep in the corner. The dog's ears were pricked up and he was looking at the door. Its eyes were alert and its fur stood on edge. The dog had heard it too. Jack shushed the dog's whining and slid behind the door. Another crack! A gunshot.
Jack crashed out through the door, the dog bounding after him. He almost fell over the old man who lay sprawled on the grass.
'What in the name of heck are you playing at?' The old timer was up like a rattlesnake. Jack saw he had a rabbit by his feet. Another lay twitching maybe twenty yards from them. His rifle smoked from the barrel. Jack exhaled. Seemed the old man had been catching their breakfast.
'Seeing as you're here now, I'm going to get me some shuteye. Remember how these work don't ya'?' he handed Jack a handful of rounds with the gun. 'If it moves, shoot it. And I ain't talking about rabbits here. We've got plenty of them, yes sir.' The old fellow smiled and squeezed Jack's shoulder as he went inside. Judging by the colour of the sky, Jack thought the old man could get a couple of hours sleep before sun-up.
Looked like it was his turn to keep watch. He crouched down low, his back to the house. The dog whimpered and sat next to him. His ears twitched as he sniffed the wind, keeping his own watch. Jack smiled to himself. He knew the dog could smell a man at over two miles. He hoped the old man was right and that he wouldn't have to. He was kind of curious about what the man needed to show him. He'd hate to have to leave before that happened.
EIGHT
The Ox rode west. He'd been moving west for a few days. Since he'd fired his gun point blank at a man and shot nothing but a ghost and the clothes on his back. But he knew where the man had gone. He knew exactly where to pick up the trail. He scratched his beard and wiped sweat from his brow. He'd already been stuck in this primitive hell hole for longer than planned. He'd landed a little earlier than the technicians had accounted for. A few months earlier than even he had expected. He'd had time to get his bearings. Made some new friends. Planned the ambush. It hadn't gone well but he never dwelled on failure. He lived by a simple rule. Always adapt immediately, find another way forward.