“What is that?” Ashlyn asked.
Mark stopped the cart and stared at the strange sight. “That must be the dome. I guess it’s just transparent.”
“Will we be able to get through it?—” Kathleen questioned “—After all, it was strong enough to hold back six-thousand feet of ocean.”
“I guess we will find out.” Mark answered as he jumped off the cart and headed for the boundary. He reached out to touch it.
“Wait!—” Ashlyn sounded panicked “—What if it’s dangerous, like a high voltage fence? You can’t just touch it.”
He stopped and looked around until he found a small tree branch, apparently, the tree had been demolecularized, but the branch left intact on the ground. He slowly pushed it through the barrier. Though it formed a ring around the stick as if he was poking it into a barrel of water, there didn’t seem to be any resistance. He pulled it back in and examined it for any damage. There was none, so he very tentatively reached out and pushed his fingers through.
It felt a bit strange, kind of like thick wet cornstarch, when he pulled his hand back there was no damage to it either. He climbed back on the cart, and they slowly moved through the boundary. Shocked by the sudden, unexpected temperature change they realized they had severely misjudged the situation. They had assumed no protective dome. That was clearly false. Hastily, they assessed their situation and turned around.
Only minutes after they had reinterred the dome, they heard the sound of a helicopter. They all looked up instinctively and saw not one, but ten Apache helicopters flying in formation—each following closely behind the other.
“Man, that can’t be good, no matter what year this is—” Mark said what they certainly were all thinking “—we have got to follow them.”
“How are we going to that?” Stewart asked, astounded by the suggestion.
It was true that all they had was a little food, water, and a golf-cart. Not to mention, not one of them had a coat—not normally, the type of thing one takes scuba diving.
“Just get back to the base as quickly as possible”—Ashlyn spoke urgently—“we’ll figure something out.”
The carts weren’t exactly made for speed, so by the time they finally arrived, the choppers were well on their way to where ever their intended target was.
Ashlyn nearly leapt off the cart and said, “Take this stuff back to our rooms, and I will meet you there.”
They all looked at her incredulously. “What are you going to do?” Mark demanded.
She just looked at him for a moment then kissed him and said, “I’ll be back soon.”
Ashlyn didn’t wait for agreement, she literally ran until she was out of sight. They couldn’t exactly call out, or run after her without arousing suspicion, so they did as told, but Mark was not happy about it.
“I hate it when she does that,” he grumbled under his breath.
However, Stewart heard him and said, “Yeah, me too.”
“When has she done that to you?” Mark asked.
“A story for another time my friend—” Stewart said “—let’s just say, I wouldn’t want to be on the wrong side of her friendship.”
Mark didn’t have to think too hard to understand that statement. If Dierdra was Ashlyn’s clone, then he already knew all too well. However, for the first time he seriously wondered about what had happened during their time apart. She had been alone with Stewart, rescued him, and then had come to rescue him. After thinking about it for a while, he wasn’t so sure he liked the fact that he always had to be rescued by a woman. Stewart was right about one thing; Mark wouldn’t like to be on her bad side either.
About an hour passed before Ashlyn’s return. They were all waiting in Mark’s room. She had her arms full of clothing and supplies. They all stared, confused.
“How did you get that stuff?” Mark asked, scowling.
He was thinking about how dangerous the situation must have been for her to refuse to tell him what she was going to do. The clothing was mixed, some American military outfits and some was civilian clothing. The civilian clothes looked as if it was from the mid-nineteen hundreds. There was a set for each of them, along with military backpacks complete with water and food packs.
“I’ll be back,” she said and left before anyone could question her.
Mark wanted to scream at her for her recklessness and for keeping him out of the loop. He had already been worried sick, and now she was gone again. She returned in moments, this time she had weapons, handguns, and rifles. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know how she had pulled all of this off, but he couldn’t help himself.
“How did you get all this,” he demanded.
“I pretended to be Dierdra”—Ashlyn stated flatly—“she can go anywhere or do anything. All she has to do is tell people the admiral sent her.”
“I thought we agreed that you weren’t going to do that.” His nerves were getting the better of him.
“We agreed to no such thing—” she said impatiently “—and we don’t have time to argue. Follow me.”
They followed her quietly around several buildings until they arrived at a convoy of military trucks. They looked a little unusual, but they didn’t take time to discuss it. Most of the trucks held marines, but Ashlyn directed them to one on the very end, which only held supplies. The quietly climbed onboard and ensconced themselves behind boxes. They travelled for what seemed an eternity, and near dusk, they arrived at their destination. They had already changed into civilian clothes and quickly disembarked before anyone saw them. They hid the weapons behind what looked to be an abandoned building.
The stores of the main street were closed, but there were masses of people heading toward an enormous building of some sort. They lost themselves in the crowd and followed them in. The name on the building was Sportpalast, clearly, some kind of sports arena by the look and size. There was little doubt that it could hold at least ten-thousand people, probably more.
There were two enormous balconies, which circled the room. At the very far end of the arena, there was a large stand, which reached across the entire end of the building. It held rows of seating that appeared to be filled with dignitaries and military officers.
One each side of the stand hung an enormous flag, at least twenty-feet long and half as wide. On both, a bright red swastika, in between the two, directly above and behind the podium there was a giant bird emblem with yet another swastika below it. It was clear also from the swastikas on the armband of each military officer that they were, in fact, in Nazi Germany.
This was about the last place any sane person would pick for a time-travel destination. Of course, the admiral was most certainly insane. It didn’t take a great deal of thought to guess who the main speaker would be. Mark was surprised at the mood of the room. Somehow, he expected that the people would be filled with fear as he certainly was. However, the attitude was more like an Obama rally. The crowds were cheering; even he could feel the positive energy they were expressing, in spite of the fact that he couldn’t understand a word they were saying.
He wanted to ask Ashlyn to translate, but didn’t want to call attention to his group. It didn’t take long for the keynote speaker to take the stand. At first, Hitler was somewhat sedate in his speech with his arms crossed in front of him. However, as the speech progressed, he got more and more animated in his behavior, his voice boomed louder and louder. The powerful cheering in the arena became more intense, almost deafening. The people loved him; there was no way to discount that. Mark was no history buff, but from what he remembered from school, Hitler was a very scary man. Nazi Germany was supposed to be a bad place.
Ashlyn interrupted his thoughts by whispering in his ear, “It’s February 10, 1933.”
Mark eyed her strangely and whispered back, “How do you know?”
“I recognize the speech.”
He didn’t want to draw attention, and so he just sat there, trying to remember the significance of the date, but all that he could think of
was that it was during the great depression and World War II didn’t start until 1939. That had to mean that the holocaust would begin very soon if it hadn’t already.
Mark couldn’t understand what could possibly make this evil man so popular. Did the Germans know, or did was he simply fantastic at pulling the wool over their eyes? Mark had a hard time believing that the German people could be so inhumane so he assumed it was the latter, but he could hardly wait to get out of there so that he could start asking Ashlyn and Kathleen questions.
When the rally was finally over, and they had escaped the masses, they went back to where they had hidden their weapons. Mark wanted to press for answers to his questions, but beyond letting the other’s in on the date, they had no time to talk.
They hid silently behind the building until the last of the people had cleared the streets. Looking at the trucks now, it was easy to see why they had seemed different; they were made to look the same as the Nazi trucks. They had seen no sign of the Apache helicopters. They found the truck that they had hidden in on the way there and stealthily climbed into the back.
This time there were no boxes to hide behind, so they quickly changed into their military attire. If they were caught, hopefully, they could fake their way through it. If not, well, they did have guns.
They were in luck. The convoy of trucks headed back to Atlantis. They waited until the truck was moving to discuss the situation.
“What do you think the admiral is planning to do in Nazi Germany?” Kathleen asked.
“Take over the world”—Stewart shrugged—“what else?”
“But why here? Why now?—” Mark asked “—Hitler has the people in the palm of his hands. Maybe the admiral wants to join forces with him. He has all that modern technology with him. The allied forces would most certainly lose the war, and then the world would be under the rule of the Third Reich.”
“Now that’s a scary thought”—Stewart swallowed hard—“we can’t let that happen.”
“Do you really think the admiral could persuade Hitler to work with him?—” Kathleen was skeptical “—I don’t think he could even with the helicopters, and who knows what else he brought. Like Mark said, Hitler has control of the people.”
Ashlyn had been quiet, but suddenly her face drained of color. “I know what he’s going to do.”
They all stared at her in disbelief.
“You got that from just what we’ve seen and the date?” Stewart asked.
“He told us”—she shook her head—“remember Mark? He told us his plan to take over the world. We only traveled back in time because the modern world was so …Well gone, for lack of a better term.”
For a moment, Mark was silent, thinking. Suddenly, he looked up. “Ashlyn’s right.”
“Okay—” Stewart said slowly “—would you mind letting us in on the plan?”
Mark took a deep breath. “He isn’t going to work with Hitler; he’s going to clone him—like Dierdra.”
Kathleen stared at him, and then Ashlyn, and then she turned to Stewart. “Do you believe that?”
“Well”—Stewart tilted his head—“I …Yes, that has to be it. That was his plan in the future. Clone government officials so that he could take over the world.”
“Don’t forget—” Mark said sarcastically “—he was going to do it to spread democracy.”
Kathleen looked away and pursed her lips. When she didn’t say anything, Stewart prompted her. “Are you going to weigh in on this?”
“You know”—she shook her head—“I wasn’t there. To be honest it sounds crazy, but I’m sure whatever he is planning to do will have equally bad consequences. We have to find a way to get back to our own time.”
They all looked at Mark.
“Hey”—he threw up his hands—“don’t look at me. I don’t have any idea how to get back, or if it’s even possible. Quite frankly, regardless of what we do now, we have probably already changed the timeline.”
“Can’t we go back at exactly the time we left so that it’s like we’ve never been here?—” Stewart asked “—that’s what they always do on TV.”
“Again with the sci-fi”—Mark responded—“reality isn’t that neat and simple. Even if we can get back, there is no way to plan it. The only thing I can think of would be controlled chaos at best.”
“So you do have an idea?” Ashlyn asked.
He was silent, but finally said, “You aren’t going to like it.”
“Tell us anyway”—Kathleen suggested—“maybe if we put our heads together we can come up with something better.”
“Are you suggesting that it’s my fault the plan to stop it didn’t work?” he asked.
“Well”—she looked around—“we have no way of knowing since you never told us what you were going to do before.”
Mark clinched his jaw and looked away. He felt guilty enough for helping the admiral without added accusations.
“Kathleen”—Ashlyn jumped in—“Mark didn’t tell us because he didn’t want me to try and stop him. He knew that he would die if his plan succeeded.”
He hadn’t actually told her that, but she had known, probably all along. It was true, but he didn’t feel like defending his choice to someone he barely knew.
Kathleen clearly regretted her statement. “I’m sorry Mark. I didn’t know that. I just thought you were afraid the admiral would kill you when he found out, and that’s why Ashlyn looked so sad.”
“It doesn’t matter anyway—” Mark shook his head “—Dierdra somehow talked him into taking me out of my position at the last minute. There was no way for me to complete my plan. The point is moot now anyway. I can’t get near the machine.”
“You said you had a plan though”—Ashlyn said—“assuming you could get to the machine what could you do?”
He shook his head and let out a long breath. “First of all, I don’t think there’s any way of repairing what’s been done”—he rubbed his eyes—“the people that we demolecularized are gone. I have no access to any more information about the machine than what is already in my head.”
He gave Ashlyn a meaningful look. She had suggested earlier that he would be willing to trade those people’s lives in order to get back home. I can’t believe that she could ever think so little of me.
She seemed to know what he was thinking. She put her hand on his. “I didn’t mean what I said earlier. I was just upset.”
“You have no reason to apologize”—he said flatly—“this is a deplorable situation, which I helped cause.”
She shook her head. “Why do you even think that? You did everything you could to stop him. You were willing to die.”
“Without my help—” Mark shrugged “—his plan wouldn’t have succeeded. He simply didn’t have the knowledge base to implement it.”
“You helped him to save your friends”—Stewart interjected—“and you wife. Besides, you thought you would be able to stop it. Quit beating yourself up over this, it wasn’t your fault, and it wasn’t your plan. You aren’t responsible.”
“He’s right”—Kathleen said—“and I’m sorry that I made assumptions. We’re all just distraught, and we aren’t thinking clearly.”
Ashlyn nodded. “Please Mark”—she touched his shoulder—“tell us what you’re thinking. We don’t expect you to fix this. Those people who were …you know—”
“Demolecularized.”
“—yeah. That wasn’t your fault. None of this is.”
Mark was quiet for a while and then finally said, “The only thing, and I do mean the only thing that I can possibly think of is to turn off the machine”—he shook his head—“thinking about it longer won’t give me another idea. Actually, we don’t even have to turn it all the way off; just disrupt one of the relay switches. The overload should force the admiral to turn it off himself.”
“I believe you”—Ashlyn smiled sadly—“you are the idea man, after all. If you say that’s the only way then we believe you, right?” She turned to the o
thers, and they nodded their agreement.
“So it’s that simple—” Stewart asked “—just …turn off the machine.”
“It took a tremendous amount of power to turn it on”—Mark let out an exhausted breath—“I’m sure you’re all aware of that. That’s why we had to time it with the Hadron Collider experiment, solar maximum, and drill deep into the earth. However, once started, the machine is self-powering. If we turn it off, it can’t possibly be restarted.”
“So if we turn it off”—Ashlyn asked—“it will take us back to our time?”
“Possibly”—he said—“or we could simply be stuck here and the admiral would summarily execute all of us.”
“That seems worth the risk to me,” she said.
He shook his head again. “Those aren’t the only possible outcomes”—a serious expression clouded his face—“by destabilizing it, we could create a black hole, and that would probably destroy the planet.”
“How likely is that?” Kathleen asked.
“I don’t have any statistics for you”—he answered—“but I think that it’s highly unlikely. I think we would have to put more power into the system to do that, which we don’t have. It’s much more likely that it would destabilize the void of the worm hole and vaporize us.”
They all sat there in silence for about an hour, contemplating the options.
Finally, Stewart said, “I think we should do it and the sooner the better. Can you do it by tomorrow?”
“I agree”—Ashlyn weighed in—“the longer we wait, the more damage the admiral can do.”
They turned to Kathleen. “Sure, do you need me to do anything?”
“No”—Mark looked at Ashlyn—“but I would need your help.”
“Okay”—she said—“what do you need me to do?”
He clinched his jaw and met her eyes. “Pretend to be Dierdra.”
Chapter 20
Know that love is truly timeless. — Mary M. Ricksen
~
Mark’s sabotage idea worked, and the machine began to lose its carefully controlled balance.
“We have to shut it off!” he yelled to the other scientists.
Time Storm Shockwave Page 23