Ray's eyes drifted back to the screen. "The paradox of time travel? The grandfather thing?" Ray asked.
John nodded. "That's the whole point; we don't know yet. We can travel back, but as for changing anything in the past, hell no! Not after what happened the third time out testing Placement."
Ray adjusted himself in his seat so he could face John. "How do we get back?"
"It lasts anywhere from four to fourteen days. Taking you back to roughly the same place that you left from. It does not return you to an exact time and date. Rydel can't figure it out yet."
John stood up, staring down at Ray.
"But once we find Rydel and get him back working again at Genesis, just imagine what Placement can do."
"A weapon."
"The best defense in the world, brother. Think about it—no more 9/11s, bombings, the threat of an EMP—which is bound to happen."
Ray glanced back at the huge screen once more and then looked back at John, speechless.
"But it is beyond dangerous to change the past now, Ray. And we cannot go on any further without Rydel. We need to get him back."
John could see Ray struggling with everything he had just seen and everything he had just been told. "I know. A lot to take in. Let's get a beer and check in on your team."
Sending Them Out in Style
Inside the lab's hangar they had all sat in hours before, Ray's Unit now gathered around a long table set up for a large sit-down meal with their beverages of choice in hand. The hangar doors opened, and military personnel walked in, making their way over to the table. The six men carried pizza boxes, Chinese cartons, McDonald's bags, Taco Bell bags—and one man held a tray with a roasted duck.
Jack looked over the members of the Unit at the table.
"Who ordered the duck?"
Sal raised his hand. "I did. They said anything we wanted; never had duck before. And with what they plan to do with us, I may never get a chance again."
Across from Sal, Janice shook her head. "Had to know it was Sal—who the hell else would order a fucking duck."
The military personnel placed the meals in front of each Unit member at the table, getting each dinner order right without having to ask. Then as a group, the military food-delivery service made their way out of the hangar. As the hangar doors closed, Todd stood and held up his Budweiser bottle, and the rest of the Unit did the same. No words—they just raised their drinks in a toast.
"Let's eat," Todd simply said and sat back down.
Sitting with their backs against the hangar, which was partially underground, John and Ray peeked through a window at the Unit seated around the table, a bucket of ice with a six-pack of beer placed between the two men. The two reached for a beer, taking in what was going on inside the hangar. John and Ray leaned away from the window and twisted the bottle caps off their beers, grinning.
"To be their age again…right, Ray?"
"Nope. Only wanna take this journey once and then take the next."
"I wish I had your faith, brother. I really do."
"There is something waiting for us after we die, John. There has to be."
After slugging down his beer in three sips, John reached for another in the ice bucket, twisted the cap off, and flipped it away with his thumb, the cap landing on a rock path leading away from the hangar. John lifted the beer to take a sip and stopped, the bottle inches from his lips. His eyes fixed on the bottle cap reflecting the light of the sun lowering over the hills around Genesis—just the slightest trace of sunlight on the bottle cap recalling a long-buried memory.
The light under the door…the only light.
Ray reached over for another beer and noticed the look on his brother-in-law's face.
"John, you okay? You—"
"I just don't believe like you and Kate do. I never will, Ray. Would a caring God leave two children in a basement to starve to death? Put there by their own father."
Ray's head dropped. He knew not to try to come up with a comforting response. He just sat and waited for John to speak about what he had been subjected to, something John never spoke of but something Ray knew a lot about, being married to his sister. There were many late nights holding Kate in his arms, her screaming as if he wasn't there…unable to shake the nightmares.
"He laughed at us," John said in a voice cracked with emotion.
Squinting from the lowering sun, Ray looked over at John. "What was that, John?"
"As he closed the basement door on us after smashing all the light bulbs, my dad was laughing as he walked away. A malicious sort of laugh I’d never heard come out of the man."
As John stared out at the woods surrounding the lab, Ray noticed that John's eyes seemed to be searching for something. Reaching back to the past, reliving the horror he went through with Kate.
John's face suddenly changed. Coming back from where his mind had traveled to, he looked at Ray. "I'm glad Kate was able to find religion after what we went through. But I'll never take comfort in any kind of God. Never."
"You two got out."
"Clawing away at the bottom of the door like two wild animals, which I guess we were by then, starving down there. No God helped us, Ray. Only a survival instinct saved us, with our fingernails ripped off, fingers sliced down the middle. A will to survive."
"Doesn't that will you're talking about have to come from somewhere?" Ray asked.
"Not from your God. It's just something every living thing has."
John took a long swallow from his beer.
"But if you are right and I'm wrong, and there is a God like you and Kate believe in—I want nothing to do with it. Nothing at all, brother."
Rydel in the City of Jerusalem
Rydel walked among the people of Jerusalem and blended in perfectly with his pilfered clothing. He kept his head low and slowly walked through the crowd inside the stone city, eyeing a possible candidate ahead to help him. At a corner fish market, a man was looking at the selection on the table. Rydel approached the man and tapped him on the shoulder. The man turned around, facing Rydel with an angry, weathered face cracked deeply by the sun.
Rydel lowered his head and made a peaceful gesture with his arms raised, and the man calmed down. With his head down and his translator covered by both the hood of his garment and his keffiyeh, Rydel spoke to the man in Aramaic.
"The Nazareth man Jesus, the preaching man. Can you tell me where I can find him?" Rydel asked.
The man shook his head and nudged Rydel out of the way so he could choose and purchase the fish for his family's supper.
Rydel blended back into the crowd, hustling his way through the streets of the city. He continued his search for just one person with information on Jesus—one he could control to help him on his mission to rescue Christ.
Through the congested city, walking almost elbow to elbow with the people of the time, Rydel reached out for a lean-looking man walking toward him and tapped him on the shoulder. Before Rydel could get the words out through his translator, the man brushed him aside and looked back with a warning glare.
Rydel stepped aside from the busy horde of people and leaned against a tan wicker basket outside a tent selling meats. The proprietor stood at the other end of a long table under the tent, busy with a line of waiting customers. Rydel took it all in. The place was a metropolis much like Manhattan; the way they were all hustling and bustling—truly amazing. Not much has changed, Rydel thought to himself, and then he saw the man in the black cloak. A large black hood concealed the man's face; however, Rydel could feel the man staring at him through the black fabric.
The man folded his arms over his chest and continued to focus on Rydel without revealing his face from under the hood of his jet-black cloak. He stood out from the rest because of his garment's inky color, unlike anything worn by the people in the city. The man also had an allotted space to himself—not crammed in with the others fighting for room in the marketplace. He stood alone, his back against a stone wall. Rydel watched as people
walked toward the space the man had to himself but then would inexplicably turn away and bump into one another—almost fleeing.
Rydel realized the people did not see the man—the people just knew instinctively to stay away.
Fear stiffened Rydel's body. He was able to take a few lumbering steps, his whole body shaking as he did. With the temperature in the city reaching at least ninety degrees, Rydel felt cold. His body felt as though he had been sprayed down with water and thrown out into a winter storm. Something inside of him also felt off—a wave of nausea. He felt the urge to throw up, but couldn't. It felt as if whatever started to come up out of his stomach was being thrust back down again to make him feel even worse.
Rydel's mind and body pleaded with him to do one thing—run. He quickly turned so he could escape from the black-cloaked man and ran into a tall man standing right behind him. The man looked down at Rydel, his face shadowed by the lowering sun.
"I overheard you speaking with the rude man and followed you." The man's soft-spoken Aramaic was translated back to Rydel. "I know the man Jesus. I'm a follower."
From under his cloak, Rydel slipped out S-7 and stuck it into the man's arm.
Countdown
Ray's Unit sat at a table inside another white room at the lab. Above them, skylight windows dripped beads of rain from a heavy storm outside. Colonel Adams stood at the head of the table, flanked by Ray and Will. The colonel looked over the men and women of the Unit, all appearing to be unfazed about traveling back in time.
"You need to put aside the way you feel about Rydel. He's become completely unhinged. He is not the man you met before. I want you all to remember that," the colonel reminded them.
Will moved closer to the table.
"Understand, only two Placement chips will be left after we send all of you out to find Rydel. I hope you realize the importance of getting Rydel back," Will stated.
Sal raised his hand like a fourth-grader, his enthusiastic arm waving left and right to get Will's attention.
"Yes, you have a question?" Will asked Sal.
"Do we go nude?" Sal bluntly asked. "I'm thinking like in The Terminator movie, you know, where the Terminator ends up in some back alley on one knee with his ass crack taking in a stiff breeze. I mean, hey, I'm comfortable with it. I'm just asking for the others who are maybe too shy to ask."
Sal pointed his thumb behind him at Janice and whispered, "Rumor has it that Janice behind me doesn't shave her legs or anything else while she's out on a mission. It could be embarrassing for her. She's Greek."
"Fuck you and the small sack of old-man balls you got cursed with, Sal," Janice said, her face flushed.
Sal looked over his shoulder. "What? Easy, Janice. We're all family here. I was giving you a heads-up, that's all. My balls are small, but they're not old. Don't be mean."
Sal returned his attention back to Will.
"So…how about it, do we go nude?
"Anything touching you will go," Will curtly said. "Even the part of the floor you stand on will be sent back in time with you. Strap down tight everything you take. If something separates from you while traveling, it will follow you to the time you travel to—but you will have to search for it when you get there."
A slim lab tech in her thirties entered the room and walked over to John Adams.
"The chips are ready, Colonel.
__
Ray and the members of his Unit filed into an octagonal white room at the lab. They were all dressed up in cloaks of light and dark brown with large hoods draped over their shoulders and tan shemaghs around their necks to hide their translators. The weapons they carried were hidden under the cloaks they wore—all except for Sal, who had his gun and a tan bag slung over his back. Each member of Ray's Unit carried a sizable tan duffel bag with the exception of Steve and Ben. The two men each held a duffel bag in one hand and had two larger ones strapped to their backs. John and Will sat at the one table inside the room, John wearing a cloak like the others, waiting for Ray and his Unit. In front of John and Will was a line of small black boxes.
Ray and his team lined up at the table. The colonel grabbed a tan duffel bag by his feet, stood up, and joined them at the other side. They all waited silently for the colonel to speak.
"We find Rydel and avoid the people in the past at all costs. Let's hope we're not too late."
John took a black pill out of one of the boxes on the table. He walked away from the table to the opposite side of the room, turned around, and met the eyes of the others. He swallowed the pill, remained where he was for a moment, and then disappeared—along with some of the floor tiles he had been standing on. A small white hole floated and lingered in midair until it evaporated like curling smoke, twisting itself into nothingness.
Ray took his black pill out of one of the boxes. "Anyone wants out, I'll understand. And so will the colonel. He told me he would—"
"Adams said nothing about this to me, Catlin. All must go," Will said in a raised voice.
All in the room turned toward Will.
"What you need to do now is leave the room. I am in charge at the moment," Ray said, glaring at Will, the look in his eyes telling Will he really should leave—now.
"But—"
One word was all Will was able to get out. He noticed the members of Ray's Unit, as one, walking his way to remove him from the room. Before they could, Will shot up out of his seat and was gone. With Will out of the room, the members of the Unit turned back to face Ray. Janice was the first to speak.
"You're lying about the colonel, Ray. Why?"
"When I reach him, I'll explain I gave all of you a second chance to think about it, and that it was my call. I need to make sure all of you want to do this. In no way will your military careers suffer if any of you say no. I'll make Colonel Adams understand because…well, shit, as only you guys and General Dowling know, he's my brother-in-law. It's all good. So for anyone having second thoughts, stay behind. I'm ordering you."
"You're trying to protect us, Ray," Steve said.
"It's what he always does," Adriana said, agreeing with Steve.
"I have to go. I believe John and I can find Rydel alone. It is an overabundance of resources sending all of you out."
"Shit, he's lying to us all right!" Sal said, looking over the others in the Unit. He then looked back at Ray. "You never lie, Ray. And, man, let me tell you something, you suck at it."
Yeah, he was lying, and they all knew it—he was bad at it. Ray glared at Sal for a split second, then looked over the faces of the others in the Unit.
"Okay, maybe I'm not being completely forthcoming about my—"
"Uh-oh. Forthcoming. Ray said forthcoming on top of the phrase overabundance of resources," Sal blurted out and then continued: "Yep, I feel another lie coming."
Arm straight out, Ray pointed at Sal. "Sal, shut up."
Glancing at the members of his Unit one more time, Ray took a few steps away from the table and swallowed the pill he held in his hand.
"Stay. You all don't have to do this—"
Ray disappeared just like John before him, the tiles where he stood going with him.
The members of Ray's Unit stood where they were for a few seconds. They reached out and took their assigned pills out of the black boxes.
They all swallowed the pills at the same time.
The Messiah
The faithful entered the arched gateway into the Holy City of Jerusalem all crammed together, barely having room to lift their arms from their sides. Behind the flow of humanity entering the city, a man on a donkey approached and waited to enter, His followers flanking Him. Men and women of all ages seemed to notice the man on the small animal at the same time without anyone saying a word to one another. The people inside the bustling stone city made a path as best as they could so that the man could enter. Then, as one, the crowd screamed in heightened joy at the sight of the man—the Holy Man unlike any other before—slowly entering the city of Jerusalem.
Toward
the back of the crowd, Rydel watched the man make His way through the city. No matter how hard he tried to get closer, he could not take more than three to four steps at a time. He was the last man in the back of the crowd—too far away. He watched the man he had come back in time to save slipping out of sight through the crowd.
Rydel tried once more to pass the people in front of him and accidentally pushed over a small child standing next to her mother. He gasped at what he’d done and lifted the girl off the ground, brushing the dirt off the back and front of her knee-length tunic. The stunned child moved closer to her mother, looking up at her. The child’s mother, caught up in watching the miracle man enter the city, did not realize that her little girl had fallen to the ground. But she did suddenly notice Rydel standing close and smiled at him.
"They say he's cured a man from death. Do you believe?" the woman asked Rydel in Aramaic.
Rydel took in the language through the translator hidden under his keffiyeh and nodded at the woman. The child pulled on Rydel's cloak. He tilted his head down at the girl, who was now by his side.
"I believe," the little girl said, her words translating to Rydel in English.
Rydel smiled down at the young girl, the sweet child not caring that he had just accidentally pushed her down moments before. Rydel looked back up and took in the last glimpse of the celebrated man moving deeper inside the city against the late afternoon sun.
Rydel felt a pull on his cloak again and looked down at the little girl beside him. The sweet girl now tugged on his cloak with a serpent's tongue—the girl's face reddened in rage—the pupils of her eyes slits of black. The snake-like tongue recoiled and slid back into the little girl's mouth. The face of the child, beautiful and innocent seconds ago in front of Rydel, started to crack by her eyes and cheeks, blood running freely. The little girl grinned at Rydel with her reptilian face.
Save Him Page 10