by Alex Myers
They’re going to give me a lobotomy? Oh, hell no. The scream was soundless at first, his facial and neck muscles refusing to move, air simply rushed over his vocal cords, thus making a growling, moaning sound. It started slow and low, then turned loud and thunderous. “Noooo!” he screamed.
Dr. Klarner nearly fell over and Dr. Liz spun around. “Jack, you’re awake. Dr. Klarner, thank you, but there’s no need to proceed.”
Klarner regained his composure and said, “I’m afraid you’re wrong. We have come too far to stop now.”
“But there is absolutely no medical reason to go ahead with the surgery. The patient is conscious, there were never visible signs of hematoma.”
Klarner advanced with a Liston knife with its long razor-sharp, polished-steel blade. In his other hand was a weighted wooden mallet. “There is no medical reason to continue; this is personal.”
He was focused on Jack, and Jack was still unable to move with the exception of his eye, that swung wildly around the room. Dr. Liz, a full head taller, put her fists on her hips and stood like a golem between Dr. Klarner and Jack.
Klarner was so focused on the procedure he was about to perform that he, as if for the first time, saw the formidable determination in front of him. His cheeks turned the color of fire and his eyes bulged and twitched. “You, Madame, need to remove yourself from my surgery theater.”
“He’s my patient.” Her black-leather, Victorian ankle boots stood like pointed tree trunks beneath her white coat.
“No, he’s my patient now.” Klarner said and stepped forward swinging the heavy mallet at Dr. Liz’s head. She flinched with the top half of her body and the swinging hammer missed her by less than an inch. He reached under the swinging arch of his arm and thrust the orbitoclast, which was like a pointy tip screwdriver, into Dr. Liz’s face. Blood blossomed on her right cheek. The wound didn’t look deep, but the fish hook shaped end of the instrument ripped open her flesh.
Jack watched in horror, unable to move or make a sound.
Klarner pulled the pointed instrument back and did a reverse arc with the bone splitting mallet. This time the mallet connected with Dr. Liz’s forehead, and she dropped to the floor like a puppet suddenly freed from its strings.
Jack heard an evil laugh as Klarner stepped over Dr. Liz, purposely kicking her in the head as he did. He was heading straight for Jack, holding the pointed object out in front of him. Jack couldn’t see Dr. Liz, but he could hear her moaning.
“You foiled our plans at the church, didn’t you Mr. Jack Riggs. Oh, wait a minute, you can speak, that’s one of the side benefits of our toxin. You get to be conscious in your own little hell as I slice up your cerebellum. You killed our man Cooper, but killing you would be too kind for you. I want you to see the South rise up and reclaim what is rightfully hers.”
Jack tried to move, but he had no control over his body. Klarner was upon him now and had the pointed-hooked instrument inches away from his eye. There was a loud crash and Klarner was suddenly falling toward him. Jack tried to move but was pinned down. Then Klarner’s forehead made contact with Jack’s, and things went black.
Jack awoke but was afraid to open his eyes. It didn’t sound like a hospital… he tentatively opened one eye. He knew from the murky light this was no longer the future. Jack inhaled the sour odor of an 1857 hospital room. He opened the other eye and knew he was back in time. He looked at the grimy wall in front of him and thought, I’m back!
He tried to raise his head to look around the room and pain shot from his temple down his neck to his back. He felts cuts and bruises on his head where the harness had dug into his skull. He turned his head from one side to the other and was surprised to see Frances asleep in a chair.
Her face looked so innocent and fresh. He watched her sleeping and really took time to look at her like never before. He noticed the slight freckles on her nose and cheeks, the way her bangs were tapered and the shape of her eyebrows. Listening even harder, he could hear the sound of her breathing, the way she puffed in air and the little baby snores when she exhaled. She was wearing a white shirt and a black skirt; from the wrinkles he assumed she had been in them a while.
He looked at her forehead and wondered if she was dreaming. He wondered what was in that head, what it was that made her who she was—so strong, so honest, so scared of loving him.
She opened her eyes and stared directly into his. “Jack, you’re awake!”
He just smiled at her.
“How long have you been awake?”
“Not—too…” He started coughing and motioned to a glass of water sitting on the bedside table. Frances understood and helped him with the glass. He drank greedily.
After clearing his throat several times, he said; “Not too long. Not long enough, really.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I was enjoying watching you sleep. You looked so peaceful—so beautiful.”
“Oh please,” she said, blushing as she slowly came awake. “How do you feel?”
“Not really sure. Bad, I think. I tried to move a little while ago and it hurt like hell. Where am I?”
“The NYU School of Medicine, this is a quarantine room.”
“I’m infectious? What do I have?”
“No, nothing like that, but Dr. Blackwell wanted to get you off the ward floor. She said plenty of people there were infectious. There is also a Pinkerton guard posted outside your room after the incident with Klarner.”
“Klarner? What happened to me? Was someone going to do brain surgery or was that a dream?”
“No, that really happened. This Dr. Klarner attacked Dr. Liz. He works for the SAC. He’s in a coma himself right now—I think his skull is cracked.”
“I remember him saying that it was his brother that worked for the SAC.”
“No, it was this guy. Pinkerton can even place him in Washington Square outside the church.”
“Why would you let this crackpot anywhere near me?”
“Because he isn’t a crackpot. Or, let me put it this way, he has amazing qualifications. No one realized he was connected to the SAC. After the accident we were short on doctors, you were hurt and he said he could help.”
“I’m too tired to get into it now.” Jack’s exuberance upon waking was fading fast.
“So you remember him trying to kill you?” Frances asked.
“I don’t think he was trying to kill me; he said he wanted to turn me into a vegetable.” Jack looked around the room. “Why am I here and not at my complex?”
“You became unstable every time someone tried to move you.”
“How long have I been out?”
“One week. We were all worried about you. Everyone’s here or has been here—Samuel, Murphy. We’ve all been taking turns sitting with you.”
“What are you doing here?”
“You needed someone to babysit you.”
“Where’s Kaz? I didn’t hear you mention him.”
Frances looked away. Then finally, looking deadly serious, she said, “That is something that can wait.”
“Kazmer? Something’s happened to Kaz?” Jack tried to sit up but was too weak to move. “He wasn’t at the church, was he?”
“No.” She wouldn’t look Jack in the eyes.
“Is he dead? Hurt?”
“We don’t know.”
“Don’t know. How can you not know?”
“Because no one can find him.” She looked him straight in the eye.
“Well—“ Jack still struggled to sit and failed. Finally Frances propped his pillow and helped him sit up. Jack searched for words; Frances gave him another drink of water. “He must have been kidnapped, he just wouldn’t leave.”
“I don’t think so, Jack. His bags were packed. He sent Robbie over to Mrs. Goodyear and Robbie’s been there ever since.”
“Kaz would not leave Robbie, he wouldn’t leave him.”
“I thought he was in love with that—“
“Mattie
? Mattie was here in New York, at the church. This is bizarre though. What we thought was Mattie’s dying breath, she said: ‘Help Kazmer’, like she was calling out for him, or she thought I was him. She might have known exactly who I was and was saying that I should ‘help Kazmer’. Like Kazmer needed my help.”
“Allan Pinkerton told us all about it. I know I shouldn’t say this, but I so despised that woman if she’d have died, I’d have been relieved. I’m not surprised she was a part of this.”
Jack was getting weaker by the second, the room started to spin. It was hard for Jack to talk. He had to build strength just to begin again. “What’s wrong with me?”
“You hit your head pretty hard on the ground. Plus the concussion, the impact from the explosion broke several ribs. They brought you here in a coma. The doctors were going to do exploratory surgery. That’s when Klarner showed up.”
“How many people were hurt?” he asked in one long, weakened breath.
“Eight people died at the accident, two more died from their injuries here at the hospital.”
Died? People died? Oh God!” He closed his eyes and shuddered.
“Six others were hurt bad enough to need hospitalization. A lot of people are hurting from this tragedy.”
A cold finger ran down Jack’s spine, remembering how he thought the hospital smelled like a butcher shop and not the clean antiseptic smell associated with hospitals in his time.
“Why haven’t they moved me to my place in Norfolk? It’s the best medical facility in the world.”
“I told you, Jack, you’ve been in a coma. Relax. There’s nothing going on here—no conspiracy.”
“After what happened at the church and with Dr. Freako?”
“Jack, you need to rest.”
“Please make sure I don’t receive any kind of treatment unless it’s discussed with me first. Get me Dr. Blackwell, tell her I want to go home to the complex.”
“I will. Now rest, no more talking.”
A wave of exhaustion hit Jack and he was gone.
When Jack woke again, he was in the medical building on his complex in Norfolk. Frances was there by his side, as if she had never left. He asked her, “How long?”
“You’ve been out for three days, we moved you yesterday. And when I say we, I mean a bunch of us.”
“Dr. Blackwell?”
“Let me just say that Dr. Blackwell is a bulldog, remind me to never get on her bad side. But it finally took Allan Pinkerton and Scott O’Leary to get involved. Do you know what a police escort is?”
“Yes…”
“Before yesterday, I didn’t. Dr. Liz, that’s what Dr. Blackwell said to call her, she said that there were things wrong, really wrong with your treatment. She acted like they were trying to poison you—mercury, I think she said.”
“Thank you.”
“Sure. Dr. Liz said you re-injured an old wound.”
He felt the bandage on his head, feeling for the wound underneath. “This is the same spot I hit when I had the accident that brought me here. I wonder if that had anything to do with the time travel thing?”
“What are you talking about? Are you saying you traveled through time again?”
“I’m not sure, but I think…” He cleared his throat again. “I think I woke up in another time.”
“You couldn’t have, someone was with you all the time. If you did, why didn’t you say something?”
“Because I didn’t wake up here.”
“I’m not following you?”
“I think I woke up in a twenty-first century hospital.”
“Why do you say you ‘think’?”
“Because it wasn’t like any hospital I had ever seen before. It was different… more advanced, I guess. There were electronics there that looked way beyond anything we ever had.”
She put a finger to her lip, deep in thought. Finally she said, “You have brought a lot of new ideas to our time, and by how much would you say technology and science has leaped ahead in just the last year?”
Now he thought for a moment. “Since I’ve been here? Maybe twenty-five, thirty years. It’s hard to say, maybe more.”
“And you said that technology leaps ahead exponentially, right?”
“Yeah…”
“Say things have moved ahead at least twenty-five to fifty years, maybe more. Wouldn’t the world, the future you saw, reflect those same changes?”
“That would be one explanation.” He thought for a moment, then continued, “That would mean the things I’m doing here really are making an impact.” He smiled, but then a darker continence took over. “Frances, this hold I have on the past seems to be tentative at best. I’m not saying I have this whole thing figured out—not even close—but what if somehow I die in this world? Will I wake up back in my own time?”
Frances didn’t know what to say; she seemed sickened by this possible scenario. They both sat thinking of the ramifications. He reached and intertwined one her fingers in his. He felt a cold front roll over her.
“Hey, I’m back, everything’s okay.”
“I know, and I’m thankful. I really am. I don’t know, it’s just everything else people have to worry about in this world, and now this. One day you could just disappear?”
“I’ve got to remember all I can about medical history, in case I am ever injured again… or you, or someone we know. My biggest fear is that team of medical witch doctors will get a hold of one of us.”
“This has really got you spooked, hasn’t it?”
“I just need to devise a plan in case I get sucked back unexpectedly into the future.” Jack said then, “Oh, Kaz, is there any word on Kaz?”
“Nothing.”
“I’m sure something bad has happened. I will get him back,” Jack said.
CHAPTER 2
Thursday, June 25, 1857
Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell
“Dr. Blackwell, you are the best doctor I’ve ever had, and the best looking.”
“Oh fiddle dee dee.”
“Fiddle dee dee? People actually say stuff like that? The first female physician in the United States and you’re all mine. Do you know that you’ll be on a postage stamp one day, you’ll have all sorts of strange men licking you.”
“Shut up, Jack, like you can foresee the future. You are not going to sweet talk me. I’m not releasing you from the infirmary.”
Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell was fussy and normally all business, despite only being thirty-six years old. She was coordinating all the research at the facility and met with Jack often. She spoke fluent German and French and was an excellent administrator and go-between with the researchers like Louis Pasteur, Ignaz Semmelweis, and John Lister. Even with everything she had going for her, she spent so much of her time proving she was just as competent as a man, Jack thought she forgot she was a woman. They had a great relationship. They almost flirted.
“I know you are keeping me here for my own good. I just have some things I need to do in the city,” Jack said.
“It’s too jarring. All that bouncing around in a coach won’t be good for you.”
“I’ll take my boat. I’ve been cooped up for two weeks.”
“Ten days. A week of that, though, you were unconscious, so you can’t count that.”
“The weather is good. I’ll get Sam Clemens to take me…”
“I’ll say yes, you dickens, but I am warning you for your own good.”
Jack offered the SAC $20,000 for Kaz’s return, no questions asked. He made the offer in a personal letter sent to Abner Adkin’s office in Williamsburg. In a return message, Adkins claimed to not know a thing and suggested perhaps Kazmer went back to Poland. Jack was still weak, otherwise he would have already have been to the SAC plant himself.
They docked Jack’s boat at the same pier where they met Frances from a two-day trip to Baltimore.
Sam snatched the bag she was carrying. Jack took her into his arms, tried to lift her from the gangway, and almost fell with her whil
e trying to set her down on the dock.
“You are still sick,” Frances said. It sounded like a statement, not a question.
“I wouldn’t call it sick, I’m just not one hundred percent myself.”
“How did you know I was going to be here?” Frances asked while smoothing out her dress.
“I’m from the future, I just know things.”
“The telegraph. I swear you use a telegraph more than anyone I know.”
“Remember, I come from an era of instant messages to anywhere in the world. I like to keep in touch.”
“Good evening, Miss Frances.” Sam stepped up and kissed her cheek.
“Sam.” Frances looked at both of them until finally she asked, ”What do you two have planned?”
“Something that remains a mystery still to me is on our friend Jack’s mind. It must be high-falutin’ cause he’s made reservations for us at the Atlantic Hotel.”
Looking concerned, Frances said, “Please God, tell me you’re not going to ask me to marry you?” There was a knifing edge to her voice.
Jack’s throat tightened, immediately angry. “That’s not cool, you didn’t need to react like that. To answer your question, no, I wasn’t going to propose to you.”
“Then what is it about? Did you hear something on Kazmer?”
“I was supposed to hear something this morning, but there’s no word,” Jack said.
“What are you going to do? I mean, what are we going to do?”