Maybe the secret was in keeping things small. A small group of people who were family and had the interests of the world at heart could be what it takes to put society back on the right track. With such a large population of people, all with their own — usually selfish — agendas, how could it ever be possible to agree on the right course of action for the world as a whole? One thing she could say about Victor and his friends was that their intentions were noble and selfless, they really did want to make the world a better place. They proved their morals with their refusal to agree to her kidnapper’s plans, their future selves made the ultimate sacrifice for those same morals. They’d persevered with their long lives in a terrible future which they had focused on correcting, right up to the end.
The end of the world was already in motion, and no one cared, they continued to live their lives as they always had, making no significant changes to the respect they show for their planet. They chose to ignore that their very way of life was destroying the metaphorical vital organs of the living organism that carried them on its back through the unwelcoming void. Beth realised that she was as much to blame as anyone else on the planet and could see the direction the world was headed before she even met Victor, but she felt so powerless against it that she had become resigned to it. Maybe society as a whole was too far past the point of no return to be trusted with this new technology, but she believed Victor and his team could. They weren’t satisfied with accepting the apathy that engulfed the rest of the human race, and now, neither was she.
Beth realised that her mind was evidently already made up and she had an answer for Victor and his friends when she returned to their place of work in the morning.
∆ ∆ ∆
Simon had risen even earlier than usual to check on Victor’s son, making sure the incubation was going as planned and that he hadn’t passed the point where they were planning to stop his growth. Their calculations told them that he should be at the desired age later in the evening, but Simon thought it was better to be safe than sorry. The clone was in his teens by the look of him, the reading displayed on the on the pod’s touchscreen panel confirmed as much. He was feeling some anxiety about how the Beth situation might play out; they’d come too far to have it all stripped away from them. He pushed some of his unease to the back of his mind with a deep breath. No one was going to take this away from them if things went against them with Beth, they’d just delete her findings from yesterday’s visit, make sure they had everything that might cause concern hidden before she arrived. He hoped, for Victor’s sake, that she decided to leave them to their work and that Victor wouldn’t allow any emerging feelings he had for her to cloud his judgement in the situation.
Once Spencer and Victor arrived, the clone’s development had made progress equivalent to another year and a half. Spencer and Victor immediately busied themselves with android assembly. They were in the process of finalising their deal with a manufacturer they had chosen to mass produce their pet collar. They had briefly discussed the possibility of constructing their own factory to build their gadgets, but they preferred to remain behind the scenes and to be responsible for a whole facility would make that difficult. They could create another business for the factory and keep their part in it minimal, but they had their hands full right now. They’d kept the manufacturing contracts short term, so if and when they decided to go it alone, they could make the change with minimal fuss.
Not long after Spencer and Victor arrived, Beth entered HQ. They’d purposefully left the door unlocked this time, as they were expecting her. She didn’t waste much time on pleasantries before she launched into announcing her decision.
“I want in.”
“Erm, hello," Victor replied.
She pulled up a spare chair and addressed the group.
“Hi. I’ve been thinking all night about it, and I’ve decided that you’re probably the planet’s best hope right now and would like to help.”
“Wow, you really have played too many video games. These three humans are the world’s best hope; it is your destiny to ensure their success. Go now, but take this, it’s dangerous to go alone.” Victor said.
“I’m not joking, this is serious business, and I wanted you to know that I’m serious too. You’re right, I’ve played the hero in plenty of games, it’s time to stop hiding my head in the sand with fictional peril and face up to the one that’s factual.”
“Great epiphany speech. Plus one rapport XP.”
“Okay, if you don’t want my help, I’ll go.”
“No, we need all the help we can get, but how much do you know about our technology. Do you even science, bro?”
“You’re mocking me with memes now?”
“Sorry, I’m just surprised with your answer, I didn’t expect it. Seriously, though, how do you expect to help if you don’t understand what we’re doing here?”
“Can’t you teach me with that mind writer helmet thingy.”
“You know, that’s actually not a bad idea. We could teach you, then send your mind back to this point to be merged. You’ll learn instantly, skipping the time it took to study.”
“Sound like my kind of learning.”
“Oh, yeah, I plan on learning a lot of cool stuff. Kung-fu, a full orchestra of musical instruments, snowboarding, several languages. Then more work-oriented things like rocket science.” he turned to Simon. “Now I’ve thought of it; we need to make a friend over at NASA, we could bring him or her in on our plan, then we could make the interplanetary travel thing happen faster.”
“Of course," Simon said. “We have plenty of lifetimes to find the right person.”
“Lifetimes?” Beth asked.
“Yes, if you’re in on this, you’ll technically become immortal.”
“You could have led with that. Is this something that you all have already?”
“Yes, we’ve been around the block a few times," Victor said.
“How old are you mentally?”
“Well, we’ve only done one long-term loop so far, along with a few short-term resets of a day or so. All in all, about a century and a half.”
“You’ve lived for about a hundred and fifty years?”
“Yeah, but it’s only a recent development. When I first met you at the PC centre, my mind and body were the same age, we only merged with our future selves a few days ago. It’s not as great as it sounds, though, I always thought that the best part of being immortal would be seeing what humanity achieves after my natural lifetime. I was always so in awe of what we’ve done up until now, what we had to come would be mind-blowing. Turns out we lose it all because of our own arrogance and stupidity. A bit of an anti-climax.”
“Well, I want to help you do something about it. How long until we can start on my lessons?”
“We’re a little tied up with the work we have right now, but we’ll gain two more particle physicists within a few days.”
“But if you teach me now, then send me back to this time when it’s done, no time is wasted, right?”
“That’s true, you catch on quick, but we’ve found that it’s too easy to get distracted and start something new, then you’re endlessly looping and not finishing anything. Give yourself some time to acclimatise to all this; there are other things you could help with in the meantime, right Simon?”
“I’d say that we could sign her up for some classes, we have plenty of cash to pay for it, but I think it’s the wrong time of year for that," Simon said. “What is it that you’re currently qualified in?” he asked Beth.
“Well, I have a business degree. I didn’t really use it, but the marketing knowledge I have helped with promoting my vlog.”
“That actually might be of some use to us right now, we’ve been thinking about starting a new company to deal with production, but we want to have as little involvement with it as possible, we don’t want it interfering with our work here. We need to buy a used factory or build a new one, doesn’t matter which.”
“I could
definitely help with that. What kind of budget are you looking at?”
“We have about a billion pounds to work with," Spencer said. “More coming in all the time.”
“O… K…” Beth said. “Money’s no object, got it. I can get on that right away.”
“I can make you a helmet if you like," Spencer offered. “We could call it an initiation present. Won’t take long.”
“That would be awesome!” Beth said. “Fucking time travel helmet. This is all too much. Easiest job interview I’ve ever had.”
“Yeah," Victor said. “That happened fast. Looks like we have another employee to add to the list, guys. Standard salary and benefits?.” He laughed.
“Sure," Simon said.
“I suppose we could say she’s getting in on the ground floor, so why not," Spencer said, then addressed Beth. “Welcome to the company.” She stood and held her hand out to Beth.
Beth smiled and shook enthusiastically.
“It’s something we should probably have tried before now," Simon said. “We do have the best ever method of trialling new employees. They can help us with the work, and if they turn out to be unsuitable, we can just delete their time with us. Might not want to give Beth her own access to the drive yet.”
Victor sighed. “I’m sorry, Beth, Simon doesn’t have the best social skills.”
“It’s okay; I think he’s right, that should be something that new employees earn after a time, it’s a lot of responsibility to be given right away.”
“Exactly.” Simon said “Right, back to work. I think I’ll get onto that NASA thing right away. I’ll try out a few of their employees, let them in on what we’re doing, delete them if they’re cut from the wrong cloth then repeat until we have the perfect person. Beth, since you’re our new business liaison, you can get me face to face with someone from NASA.”
“Talk about throwing me in at the deep end. Okay, I guess I have the backing of a billion pound company, should be helpful to get my foot in the door. They’ll receive partnership offers all the time, I’m sure.”
“Alright then, chop chop, new partner, time’s a-wastin’" Simon grinned.
Chapter 34
By the time they were ready to release James from his pod, Beth had overseen the purchase of a new building in Knaresborough, the next town over from Harrogate. They had lucked out as an electronics company had recently filed for bankruptcy and they had the opportunity to buy their production plant with a good deal of equipment included in the price. The factory had been abandoned for almost a week, the timing had been perfect. Beth had also made arrangements for getting the facility back up and running as soon as possible. It was quite the first day of work, and the others were pleased to have her on board.
They had stayed late at HQ to wait for James to emerge from his pod. His rate of development had been reduced gradually over the last couple of hours until it reached a natural pace. Resetting the rate instantly would have had adverse effects on the body, akin to coming to a dead stop when travelling at a thousand miles per hour. Inside the pod, mechanical tentacles with electrode tips were attached in numerous locations around James’ upper cranium, allowing his rescued backup file to be imprinted onto the clone’s vacant grey matter. The write was underway, and he would remain unconscious until he was ejected from the pod and the liquid in his lungs was flushed. Once he was successfully breathing, it would then be safe to wake him.
James was due to emerge at 7:36 that evening. It was a predetermined time chosen for his body to have reached the exact same age as when the backup was taken. This wasn’t essential, but Simon had enjoyed the calculations. The time of his emergence was now just a few minutes away.
Victor was ready with a gurney next to the pod, there was also a folding room divider so James could be removed without causing any embarrassment to him or the group. Once the clone had left infancy, the sliding shutter on the front of the pod was usually drawn shut, so the office didn’t contain a giant naked paperweight.
The familiar microwave ‘ting’ sound rang out from the pod.
“We really need to find a sound with more grandeur for these things," Victor told Simon, who was ready to help with moving James onto the gurney.
The pod began to pump out the fluid, slowly draining away until James was lowered to its base in the foetal position. Victor pulled the screen around the area in front of the pod and picked up several towels. Once the last of the fluid had drained out, there was a beep, and the door to the pod released its lock. Victor opened the door, placed the towels over James’ naked form and wrapped them around him as best he could. James coughed up the fluid on his lungs and, after a few minutes, began to breathe without rasping. Victor and Simon lifted James and placed him on the gurney, the tentacles still attached to his head. Victor removed the towels and covered James with a sheet, then hit a button on pod’s touch screen to wake him, the tentacles made their retreat back into the pod. James slowly opened his eyes and cognition of his environment began to register within them. He frowned and slowly raised himself to a half seated position, taking in the pod, then looking to Victor.
“What happened?” He asked, followed by a wet sounding cough. The cloning procedure had primed the vocal cords for use; otherwise, they would not have had the strength for speech.
“Take your time, get your bearings, dry off and put some clothes on, we’ll discuss it then," Victor said. “There’s a fresh set of clothes over the screen.” he pointed to where the clothes were hanging. “I’ll be just outside.”
Victor stepped to the opposite side of the screen and sat with the others as they waited for James to follow. A few minutes later, James appeared from behind the partition with a towel, which he was using to dry his hair. Once he noticed Simon, the towel fell.
Recognising the fear and anger in James’ eyes, Victor stepped to him.
“It’s OK, it’s 2018, this Simon is not going to hurt anyone, trust us.”
“He killed you!”
“Yet, here I am, so it’s fine. We have the crazy version of him locked up nice and tight, and this one is psychosis free, even in the future, nothing to worry about.”
“Nothing to worry about?”
“Well, maybe a little to worry about, but it’s a long story, so you’d better take a seat. Firstly, why don’t you tell us what you remember?”
“Shouldn’t we get below ground first?” James asked.
“It’s 2018," Victor repeated. “There’s nothing to worry about, remember?”
“2018?”
“Yes, we’ll get to that," Victor said soothingly. “Let us know what you remember, and we’ll fill you in on the rest.”
“Well, I was performing a backup when I heard the gunshots. I turned and saw you and Mum fall to the ground, Spencer was slumped in her chair, and Simon was holding a gun, he pointed it at me and threatened to pull the trigger if I moved. Then Jules came in, he asked her to stand by me and stay there while he sent a message to the past, there was no way I could get to the gun, so we did as he asked. We stood there for a minute, then I woke up on that gurney.”
“Okay, that fills in a bit of information, but not a lot," Spencer said.
“You all look so different. What happened to this timeline? I don’t recognise this woman,” he pointed to Beth “and where’s Mum?”
“Well, this might be hard to hear, James, but when Simon sent his message to the past, it interfered with my first meeting with your Mum. We never met, so you were never born. He then came here and deleted your timeline. The specifics are complicated, but we tapped into the alternate reality, found your backup and wrote it to the clone your mind is in right now.”
James had a quick look down at his arms and legs.
“So you did actually die, and this is your twenty eighteen self?”
“That’s right.”
“You never met Mum, so she’s not here, and you don’t remember a thing about me?”
“I’m afraid you’re right there too.”
>
James sighed. “What about Jules?”
“She’s next in line for the pod.”
“She’s not going to take the loss of her mother very well, they were like best friends. I don’t think I’m quite registering it yet either. How did you manage to find my backup from a different timeline?”
Drive Time Page 19