Victor removed the drone from its case, held it at arm’s length and touched a button on its side. The drone’s rotors began to spin, and when he released it, the tiny aircraft remained where he had held it, hovering in place. He tapped a button on his smartwatch, and the floating device began its survey.
“Should I program the portal to make a boat so I can go out and check the waters?” Zack asked.
“What if there are mosasaurs in there? You don’t know,” Jules said.
“Relax, Jules," James said. “You didn’t wear your red shirt today.”
“This is serious, James. We don’t know what’s out here.”
“We have backups, Jules.”
“I’ll remember to shout that when you’re getting eaten alive and I’m running through the portal. I’m sure you’ll feel a lot better.”
The group were all wearing smartwatches that would relay their life signs to Simon. They also had a panic button written into the software, which they would use if it was thought that the portal should be shut down and they weren’t within reach of the hoop.
“You don’t need a boat. I have plans for a miniature submarine with a camera on the drive, just launch it from the shore.” Victor said.
“Ah. Much better.” Zack agreed as Victor tapped his tablet.
“There’s already a control app installed on your tablet.”
“Excellent," Zack said as the mini-sub appeared through the portal. He reached out his hands, and the sub dropped right into them.
“I want!” Beth said as Zack went to the lake with his new submarine.
“Okay, okay.”
Another submarine dropped out of the portal into Beth’s hands, and she went to join Zack.
“That’s the last of them, though," Victor said. “We’re low on osmium. I’ll create a pipe for syphoning the lake.”
As they continued to excavate the foundations for their first architectural structure on the planet, the earth would be recycled into building materials. As much as the group hated to destroy this beautiful natural environment to make the place habitable, they knew it was necessary, and the building due to replace it would be as environmentally friendly as possible. They’d try to make the architecture blend in with the surrounding environment, with grass roofs and new homes for the wildlife that they may have deposed. Start as you mean to go on was their current mantra, taking the ecosystem into account and finding ways to circumvent the adverse effect they might have on it. There would be no more lost bees on their watch, if mobile communication were the cause of the decline in bee population on earth, they would soon know, as wireless transmissions here would utilise entanglement in place of radio waves. As of yet, they were unsure what this new ecosystem’s equivalent pollen carrier might be, but what they knew so far led them to believe that there must be a creature very similar to bees. When trees and earth were recycled, the SARA made a note of the organisms that were contained there, ready for reintegration when they could be re-homed. Microorganisms like bacteria were easy enough to replace, so they weren’t counted.
Zack and Beth explored the lake using their mini-subs, James and Jules were observing. Victor, Sarah and Spencer were leading a few new worker androids into the woods to indicate the boundaries of the expanded foundation area. Two more androids were assembling a cage around the portal, the bars of which had slots so metal panels could be placed between them. It was an easy, secure way to protect the teleporter until they had a real, new world headquarters and more information about the inhabitants of the area.
Both groups returned to the portal after their hour was up since they had yet to decide whose turn it was to man HQ.
“Let’s all just go through together and have Isaac make tea while we decide," Spencer said.
“Sounds good to me," Sarah agreed.
The group stepped through the portal to Earth HQ, Victor was first through and didn’t see any sign of Simon. He watched as the others made their way back, waiting for Simon to make an appearance, which he didn’t.
“Seven teas please, Isaac," Spencer called.
There was no immediate answer.
“Isaac?” Victor called.
The group looked around for signs of either Simon or Isaac.
“Where are they?” Beth asked.
“Wait a second, I think I hear Isaac coming," James informed them.
The sound of Isaacs footfalls could be heard ascending the steps from the lower level, his walk was unmistakable, the rhythm of the steps being inhumanly paced. The group watched with curiosity as the android approached.
“I am sorry, Miss Spencer, but I cannot currently make tea. There is a risk to human life in this area. I would request that you go back through the portal until it is safe.”
“A risk to our lives?” Spencer asked. “What do you mean, Isaac? We can’t leave until we know.”
“It’s imperative that you leave immediately, Miss Spencer.” Isaac intoned. “I have been unable to locate the creature that came through the portal, and it is a risk to the rest of you.”
“The rest of us?” Victor asked. “Isaac... where is Simon?”
“He is here, Mr Victor.” Isaac’s programmed jovial use of their first name in place a surname sounded eerie in the current circumstances. He was motioning to his right.
“There’s no one there, Isaac.”
“He is here, Sir.” his open-handed gesture turned to a point with his index finger. He was pointing to the floor.
Victor followed Isaac’s finger and moved to the area indicated. As he walked around to the opposite side of their workstations, he noticed the edge of a dark liquid pool and his heart sank. When he saw the mess of gore at the centre of the puddle, his knees weakened, and Isaac rushed to his side to ensure his well-being. Victor turned away and held out his hand to the approaching group.
“No, don’t come any further," Victor said to them. “Issac, get the portable SARA recycler and remove that immediately.”
“Right away, Sir.”
Victor went to his console and began to tap at the keys. A minute later, Simon appeared through the teleport hoop.
“Hey everyone.” He looked around. “This isn’t where or when I was supposed to be, is it?”
“No, it’s not, buddy," Victor said. “There’s been an accident, and you didn’t come out of it too well.”
“Okay...” Simon said. “What’s going on?”
“Well, apparently we have a vicious, man-eating alien creature somewhere in the building and we don’t know where so it’s best if we leave right now.” he turned to Zack. “Do you have a tablet at your apartment that’s connected to the time drive?”
“Yes.”
“Well, let’s get there right now," Victor said and initiated the portal to Houston.
The group ran through the portal, shutting it down once they were on the other side.
“Okay," Victor said. “First thing we need is our helmets, I’ll send copies out of the portal now.”
“Why don’t we just change the past, so it never gets through?” Jules asked.
“It’s better if we clean this up ourselves, rather than make another timeline. Sending a message back in time won’t help us right now anyway, it will only affect the new version of us.”
“Damn, the multiverse is really ruining time travel for me," Beth said.
Each of them took their helmet from the hoop and found a place to get comfortable while controlling their androids. The scanners would connect with the teleporter, which would relay the data stream to the quantum computer back in Harrogate. Thankfully, the teleporter could manage multiple device connections and pass them to the quantum computer from here, similar to how a router accepts numerous devices and shares the bandwidth among them. Everyone took their place on Zack’s furniture, Simon and Zack on the floor — resting their head on pillows — Jules lay on the couch, Victor and Sarah took a reclining chair each, and Beth and James went upstairs to settle on Zack’s bed.
Simon
used Zack’s tablet to connect each of them to an android, leaving himself until last so he could set a timer and make himself comfortable before he departed his body.
Once the timer was initiated, Simon placed the tablet on the floor next to him and snuggled into the cushions while he waited to join his colleagues.
Chapter 58
Simon allowed himself a moment to adjust to the android body and quickly take the obligatory glance at his hands. Absorbing his surroundings, he found the other seven androids surrounding him, ready for action.
“Okay.” He said. “Let’s split up and find this thing.”
“Or you could dress your android, and we can all go outside and try to pick up a trail on where the thing went after it broke through that window," Victor’s android avatar said, pointing at the smashed glass at the west end of the lower floor.
“Oh. That’s not good.”
“No, it’s not, so you’d better hurry with the clothing. Get your hoodie on.”
“Or maybe now’s the moment that we should be resorting to my time manipulation suggestion," Jules said.
“It wouldn’t change this timeline, and someone could get hurt here," Simon said.
“Yep, right, sorry. Must be the android sickness.”
Each pilot dressed their androids to be as inconspicuous as possible when leaving the building, nanobots supplied their faces, as in Spencer’s impromptu trial run. The semblances weren’t their own, so if they were seen, they could not be identified. Each of them wore a pair of leather gloves to hide their inhuman hands, which might have looked odd during the relatively warm day, but would withstand closer scrutiny than seven sets of silicone sheaths in caucasian flesh colouring and one pair of milk chocolate for Zack. The robotic search team left HQ and headed for the outside of the west wall, so they could inspect the broken window from the opposite side and maybe get an impression of which way the alien creature had headed.
“I can’t tell a thing by this," James said. “We’re not CSI: Harrogate, how the hell are we going to find this thing? Why do we keep fucking up?”
“I’ll send a few automated drones out to look for anything unusual," Victor said. “A nanobot swarm too.” He sent signals to both from his android’s virtual, mind-controlled interface. A requested apparatus floated from an upper floor window and began forming their own search perimeter.
“I’ll wait in the van," James said. “Send me a signal when one of you finds something, and I’ll bring the van to you.”
“Good plan," Victor said. “We’ll need to get it off the streets as soon as possible once we tranquilise it, no one can see it.”
“Are these footprints?” Sarah said, pointing to the ground and an impression in the sandy surface of the car park. The car park had never been renovated, much like the outside of the building, to avoid attracting too much attention to the building.
“Yes, I think they are," Victor replied. “See where they go.”
“I think this is blood," Jules said, pointing out some dark red droplets on the gravel.
“Yeah, it must be soaked with the stuff, judging by the state of Simon’s old body.” Sarah agreed.
“So glad I don’t remember that," Simon said. “Poor past me.” Simon had removed his helmet shortly after the team left for their off-world expedition.
“Absolutely, I wouldn’t want to remember that either," Victor said.
They followed the path that the prints and droplets seemed to exhibit, no other clues were discernable. At the edge of the car park, they visually scanned the opposite side of the road, where a grassy area lay beneath the cover of trees.
“I think it would probably have gone in that direction.” Jules offered. “Let’s try and get into the head of the thing. This is an alien world, everything here would frighten the life out of it, it may have tried to find a safe place, probably somewhere dark and contained.”
“Why don’t we try the back gardens of those houses over there," Simon said, pointing to the fences at the other side of the grassy area.
“I’ll direct a drone in there," Victor said. “I’ll grab another from HQ, so the search area isn’t broken.” He sent another signal, and a few moments later a single drone joined them.
Victor gave an order for the drone to enter the garden beyond the fence and check every nook and cranny, but the footage offered no sign of an alien creature, as far as he could see.
“Nothing there," he reported.
“How do you know?” Jules said. “What if it can camouflage itself? Do we even know what we’re looking for?”
“Jeez, Sis. You have a serious case of xenophobia, probably the most literal case the world has seen up to now. Calm down a bit, it’s not the apocalypse.”
“How do you know?” Jules repeated her new catch-phrase. “What if it’s releasing reproductive spores into the atmosphere or something?”
“You’re letting your imagination run away with you. Let’s see it before we panic, yeah.”
“She has a point though," Simon said. “We don’t know what we’re looking for. I’ll check the security cameras inside.”
“You sure you want to do that?” Victor said. “I don’t think I’d want to witness my own gruesome death.”
“I’ll be fine," Simon said. “It’s all just science.”
Victor had to acknowledge that Simon had a point, everything was science, except for human emotion. Emotions were still undiscovered country as far as science was concerned. Seeing himself ripped apart on camera would undoubtedly provoke an emotional response in him, he thought. Simon, on the other hand, had more in common with the android that he currently resided in when it came to emotional control.
“Is there a security camera outside?” Spencer asked.
“Yes, but it’s not pointed at the window that the thing broke out of," Simon replied.
“Will it not have caught the thing at all? Maybe we can tell what direction it fled in.”
“I already checked, there’s nothing," Simon said. “It must have run through its blind spot. I have a visual of the animal, I’ll pass it to your HUD.”
A video window appeared in their visual range, the scene unfolding before them; Simon at his workstation, looking to his left in alarm as something bear-like in size and shape appeared from the right of the frame. Unlike earth bears, the creature wasn’t completely covered in fur but had bald spots with a slightly reptilian look.
“That’s great," Beth said when the image disappeared. “But can you warn us before you put something like that up again, it’s not like I can close these visual receptors.”
“Oh, sorry," Simon said.
“It’s OK, I just hope that my body isn’t choking on its own vomit right now.”
“It won’t, there are security measures to wake you up if anything like that happens.”
“I know, Simon, it was a joke.”
“Oh.”
“Well, now we know what it looks like, even in this avatar I feel anxious running towards it instead of away. How did that even slip past us?” Sarah said.
No one had to answer, as they knew precisely how it slipped past them, there were moments before the androids set up the cage when no one had a visual on the portal. Some were in the woods, the rest were looking at the submarine footage on their screens. They assumed that the bear-thing was more curious about the portal than he was eager to maul them and slipped through while eyes were averted.
Victor went to a nearby fence for a peek at the opposite side, the bank there dropped away to a rail track. He followed the rail with his droids visual receptors.
“Do you think that it might have run for the tunnel?” Victor asked.
“I don’t see any breaks in the fence where it might have gotten through," Sarah noted.
“I see one there," Victor said, pointing to the bank on the opposite side of the track.
“Let’s go have a look," Jules suggested.
They took the bridge to the opposite side and found their way to
the break in the fence.
“More blood," Spencer said, pointing to the splatters on the splintered edges of the hole in the wooden boards.
“Looks like it, and the hole is big enough to let it through. Seems like we’re going down there.”
Victor bent his android into a low crouch to fit through the hole, the others followed. The bank descended steeply, and the team weren’t quite adept enough at controlling their new android form to be fully steady on their feet, a few of them lost traction, slid down the bank and ended in a heap on the tracks. After finding their feet and brushing themselves off, they jogged towards the tunnel. Their androids were equipped with ultra bright LEDs in the head casing, alongside the cameras in the eye sockets. The group lowered their hoods as they approached the tunnel to allow the lights to shine unencumbered.
“Okay, now how are we going to get the thing back? We can’t exactly pull it back up that embankment, we couldn’t even walk down it alone.” Sarah said.
“James?” Victor said. Their voices were not being routed to their android’s built-in speakers; instead, the audio was shared among the group digitally, it saved the possibility of being overheard and meant they could hear each other over a distance.
“Yeah?” James replied.
“We don’t need the van now, come join us and bring a porta-portal.”
The porta-portal was a more compact SARA unit — about the size of a car battery — attached to a container that held an osmium block large enough to create a full-sized portal hoop. The whole unit was similar in size to the maximum allowed aircraft carry-on luggage.
“Sure. What are you planning? Chase him through a fake opening like Wile E Coyote?”
“Something like that, I guess. I’m still working on it.”
“You know, I could create a SARA grenade for situations like this. A tiny SARA that we could throw at something like this alien creature and it’s sucked in and recycled into an osmium block.”
“Like a Ghostbusters trap?” Victor asked.
“If that’s the only way you can visualise it, yes.”
Drive Time Page 32