"Nooooooo...." The boy scrambled for the nearest rifle as the killer's hand stopped and his head turned. The boy snatched the rifle up. The killer didn't do anything. Just watched him curiously. Behind the door the boy could hear panicked cries and a bumping of some kind, but he didn't take the time to wonder what it was. He lifted the gun and swung it in the general direction of the killer. The thing shot thirty times. The boy remembered that. Just squeeze the trigger and he couldn't miss in the narrow hall. He closed his eyes and yanked at the trigger.
Nothing. It raced through the boy's mind that the brother, one of them, hadn't followed instructions and turned off the safety. Hadn't ever intended to go through with it. Somewhere through the tears he saw the open barrel of the killer's rifle trained on him, like looking down a well into eternity. He threw back his head and howled with laughter.
The boy knelt there forever, although it could only've been seconds since he'd lurched from the elevator. Laughing and sobbing hysterically. He dropped the rifle and pressed his hands tight over his ears as if he didn't mind seeing himself blown to pieces but couldn't bear hearing it. The killer stared down the barrel curiously at him. The boy started shaking uncontrollably. He lowered his arms and clutched at himself.
"Oh my God." The boy's head lurched toward the voice behind him, fighting against the sensory overload. The killer lowered the barrel of his rifle in surprise. A young woman stood at the top of the steps. He has a gun for God's sake. But the words of warning only echoed in the boy's head.
"Oh my God," she repeated, this time in a gentle voice, as if afraid she might wake the brothers lying inert on the floor with gaping holes that still seemed to smolder. Couldn't she tell they were dead? Her eyes raised to the killer. "The police are coming," she said in a voice that was a lot firmer than anything the boy would've been able to come up with in similar circumstances. The killer's lips slowly lifted. He took a step toward her and began to raise his weapon but the woman was already moving. She leapt over the boy, hands out, and shoved the killer with a small grunt. Like a child trying to push a tree. The killer stepped back to catch himself, caught one leg on the other, reeled back and slammed into the door behind him. The door moved an inch with the impact but didn't open. That thumping he'd heard, they, those innocent people inside, must've piled furniture in front of it. The boy'd given them time to do that. The woman had sprawled onto the floor from the momentum but was on her feet almost before she landed, ready to spring again.
The boy could never remember hearing the small ding of the elevator behind him. An interesting thing. The sound was there but the boy's brain couldn't process it. If a gun shoots in a hotel and no one hears it is it really there? Well the elevator was really there, whether anyone heard it or not. The killer whipped toward the opening elevator doors, the rifle at his hip. The boy turned. It was like a movie, the film slowing so the audience didn't miss any of the carnage. The elevator doors slid open on two smiling faces. One of them vaguely familiar. They were happy. So happy. What was it like to be that happy? Then the widening eyes as they surveyed the bodies and the man pointing the gun at them. It hit them in the eyes first. They widened in horror even though the smiles were frozen on their faces. The boy noticed that. Played it over and over in his mind. Then the man pushed the woman to the floor just as the killer pulled the trigger.
And the strange thing, the thing he never understood, the boy didn't hear the shots. He actually heard and felt the whizzing of the bullets flying past his ears. How could you hear that and not the shots? It didn't make any sense.
The woman in the hall flung herself at the killer but she was too late. The man's body slammed against the back of the elevator, punched back by a red fist. Dead. Very dead. Almost cut in half as if he'd swallowed a bomb. No neat little bullet holes. Like the brothers the wound seemed to explode out of him in a spray of red. The woman in the elevator sprawled on the floor halfway out of the door. At first the boy didn't realize that unearthly scream was coming from her. The other woman slammed into the killer but he swung around and threw her off in a fluid motion. She rolled over and turned back, ready to lunge. The killer glared at her. She was too far away. The killer swung his rifle around and pointed it at her with an evil smile.
*
"Stairs," Mike barked as the guy threw open the door and jumped outside to get out of his way. A wavering hand pointed vaguely down the hall. Mike pounded down the hall and found the stairwell. Took them two at a time and pushed through the door labeled LOBBY. Found himself in an empty hallway. He slowed to a fast walk, taking a couple of deep breaths to control the pumping of his heart and to calm his voice. Pushed the button of his radio. Well he'd wanted something to take his mind off his problems. A shooting should do that. Be careful what you wish for.
"Bravo two-four-two is on the scene of the ten-ten. Any other information on the twenty?" But as he cleared the corner of the lobby he knew he wouldn't have to ask where it was. People were screaming and pointing up two broad stairways leading to the mezzanine level. Some of them saw him and started talking all at once.
"I'm going to need back up," he barked into the radio just as an old guy in a uniform jogged up to him, wincing with the effort.
"Shooting," he croaked, wide-eyed. "Something happened up there. Someone shooting." His lined face white as a sheet. He clutched Mike's arm with one gnarled hand and pointed a finger up the stairs. This was security?
A short burst of automatic weapon fire from the floor above punctuated the old man's sentence, followed by the piercing scream from a bad horror movie.
"You stay here." Mike unholstered his weapon and sprinted for the stairs. The old man didn't look as if he wanted to argue.
"POLICE," Mike shouted as he pounded up the stairs three at a time, hoping to cause some hesitation. A howl rose from above him. It was the howl of a wounded animal. Sent tiny frozen insects crawling over his skin. The opening to the floor above seemed to hover in the far distance as his pounding heart fought to propel his bulk up the stairs.
*
"POLICE," someone shouted from the floor below.
The killer raised his face to the ceiling and let out a howl that made the boy's blood curl. With a last, angry glance at the woman crouched on the carpet he charged at the boy, vaulting him at the last second. The toe of one foot caught the boy on the shoulder and sent him reeling back into the carpet. The killer grabbed the woman sprawled in the elevator, who the boy only realized later had been screaming the entire time, and threw her out onto the carpet, where she reeled but somehow managed to keep her feet, staggering and screaming, her hands pressed to the side of her head. The last thing the boy saw of the killer was his smoldering eyes disappearing behind the closing doors as the policeman leapt to the top of the stairs, breathing heavily, eyes trying to look everywhere at once. His eyes stopped on the two woman. The one who'd tried to stop the killer clasped the screaming one in an embrace.
"Are you...YOU? Stay there," he ordered before training his pistol on the boy. "FREEZE YOU."
Freeze? It was too much. The boy was groggy. Punch drunk. Was it the foot that'd slammed him to the floor or just too much for his limited brain to absorb? The boy's head turned. It felt as if someone'd put a hand on top of it and moved it, and he was looking down the barrel of another gun, this one held in the extended arms of a policeman, still fighting to catch his breath. The policeman reached out with his heavy shoe and shoved the boy to the floor. He dropped to the carpet with relief.
Freeze? That's all the boy wanted to do.
*
Mike swung around at the landing and leapt up the second section of stairs. The scene seemed to drop to meet his eyes over the barrel of his weapon.
Jesus. At least two bodies at the far corner, blood all over the walls. A man on his back, clutching a weapon, laughing hysterically. A woman staggering, covered in blood, screamed hysterically, held by another woman who calmly watched Mike.
"Are you...YOU?" What
the hell was this? No time to worry about it now. "Stay there," he barked, waving his hand for her to get down. He trained his weapon to the live one, all in black, cringing on the floor with an assault rifle next to him, swinging his head from side to side, looking for any other threats. Nothing else but the closed elevator doors. And blood. Lots and lots of blood.
"FREEZE YOU," he shouted. The suspect stared at him. From the look on his face didn't understand. Mike took a step and gave his shoulder a shove with his foot. He went limp. Rolled over. Mike planted a foot on his back, holstered his weapon and cuffed him. He slowly raised himself, tried to catch his breath, as if he'd just run a marathon.
"And you," he said, turning to the woman, the one he'd pulled over yesterday, but she was gone, leaving the other woman sitting on the carpet, face in her hands, sobbing uncontrollably.
*
Who, what, was that woman at the window? She was crazed. Crazy. If she lived to be a hundred Agnes'd never forget that face. And what'd she meant? That they'd tricked her?
Guilt pushed her from the door but fear pulled her down the hall. Fear that she'd end up in prison the rest of her life. It was her fault but she couldn't do anything about it now. She'd make amends. Make it up somehow. But she couldn't do that from inside a prison cell, could she? She recognized the rationalization for what it was but let it take deeper hold and steadily push the guilt out of the way, speeding her feet under her as if someone at the controls in her brain slowly pushed a throttle forward.
She ran back to a closed door and stood, looking through the small window. Leaned over and dry-heaved into a corner. Deep breaths. Deep breaths. She shuddered to think what she must look like. People wouldn't need the tape. They'd be able to read it on her face. She forced air into her lungs and felt her heartbeat slow a little.
The tape. Agnes knew she had to get the security tape. She and Pruitt had walked carefully through that part. How he'd learned so much about the security procedures she had no idea, but he'd told her exactly where the tape would be and that part of the study... the study, she pressed her eyes closed at the thought. How could she've been so stupid? Part of the study was to get the tape. But they'd had masks. Why hadn't she? And then there was the answer, so obvious she almost laughed. What better incentive to be sure Agnes got the tape than for her face to be all over it? How could she've been so stupid?
She stared through the window. What if he didn't leave? What if the security guard stayed in his room? Pruitt was sure he'd either see them come in and leave to investigate or the attack would pull him from in front of his monitors. But what if it didn't? What would she do then? Pruitt'd seemed so sure but what if he was wrong? The thought jolted her like an electric shock. What if that was the plan? To leave her exposed? Holding the bag? It couldn't be, she told herself. She could identify him. He wouldn't want her being questioned by the police.
The silence on this floor told the story. Somewhere the blood and mayhem'd sucked all the building's activity to it like a vacuum. She stared down the empty corridor. The security guard was a retiree filling in hours napping in front of a bank of monitors. But where was he? Had he already gone? What should she do?
She stared down the empty hallway for several seconds then pushed through the door and ran down the hall. The guardroom was empty. He must've already run upstairs, the door left open behind him. It hadn't occurred to her to be afraid it might be locked until she saw it standing open. What would she've done then? Stop it. It wasn't locked. She glanced through the open door. No one. She stepped in and across the room. Had to steady a trembling hand to be able to push the button. A whir. She waited. Nothing. She pushed again, then again and again. She stuck a finger in through the little door and stared at the slot, horrified. Nothing.
My God. Where's the tape? She reeled back a step. What have they done? What have I done? She turned and threw herself through the door and down the hall.
The end?
Time Travel Protocol 6-7-2012* (Organization):
The Chief Scientist controls the scientific and technological aspects of time travel. The Chief Logician has final say in cause and effect, such as potential deviations. Due to the joint scientific and logical nature of time travel the Chief Scientist and Chief Logician share responsibility for the project equally. (Cross reference Protocol 4-7-2015-a)
*(Highly Confidential: Paper Copies Only)
"Ted," Tomas said slowly. "When they ask whether it's possible. Just say yes. Please"
Dr. Ted's face lifted. The beady eyes stared guilelessly across the desk. "But I don't know whether it's possible. Only that it's not theoretically impossible." He shook his head. "I was kind of hoping we'd get some indication yesterday."
"Equipment failure," Tomas said with disgust. Bad news. Or good news? If the Europeans had managed to make a neutrino move at the speed of light it was the indication they were looking for. Time travel is possible. On the other hand it would've also meant that the race was on and they were already looking at the other guy's back. And as Ted said over and over, second place isn't a logical possibility. Not with the human race what it is.
"Well that's that for the Europeans," Tomas said to no one in particular. "No faster than light neutrinos here. Everyone move along."
Dr. Ted's forehead knotted. "Move along? Where are we going? The meeting isn't for an hour."
"A joke Ted," Tomas sighed. "It's a joke. What cops say at an accident."
Dr. Ted stared intently at Tomas for a few seconds before his mouth split into a wide grin and his head bobbed up and down, pointing a skinny finger across the desk at Tomas's chest.
"So," Tomas sighed. "What do you think? Have they or haven't they? Did they really screw up the equipment set up or do they have a faster than light neutrino and don't want anyone to know? Or," the thought suddenly occurred to him. "Did someone else get to them?"
Dr. Ted's smile drifted away as he turned and stared at the wall. He leaned forward on the desk, skinny chin rested on the bony knuckles of his clasped hands. His fingers fluttered as if his head were being carried on top of a pale spider. "I don't see how they could've made a mistake that basic," he said slowly. "On the other hand who else would've gotten to them? That fast I mean," he added before Tomas could answer.
"It'd have to be somebody convincing. Very convincing. Which means money. Big money."
"It would have to be someone who grasped the implications. Someone who's already made the kind of progress with the math behind closed timeline curves that we have." And they had made progress. But math wasn't enough. They needed experimental success, which so far had eluded them. He turned and faced Tomas. "Who could that be?"
Tomas shrugged. "European government? More likely Asian government. Can't be the US government because it'd be all over the news." They sat there, no closer to any answers than they'd been before the press conference'd started.
Ted nodded his head slowly. "There is another possibility."
Tomas raised his eyebrows.
"If someone else got there first," he said slowly, "...they might come back..."
"And sabotage them?" Tomas said eagerly. How had that not occurred to him? It's exactly what he'd do.
"I know it sounds awful."
"It sounds fantastic. Do you think that could be it? Do you think it could be us?"
Dr. Ted nodded, but his head slowed, stopped, then began shaking back and forth. "I'm not sure. If it's us," he turned to Tomas. "...would we know about it?" He looked at Tomas, who stared blankly back. "We need the logician."
"Ah. The new egghead." Tomas shrugged, his optimism deflating. Just what we need. Another boy wonder. Tomas could be a kindergarten teacher with a class of gifted students staring at him through thick glasses, wondering how someone as stupid as him managed to find his way to school in the morning. "What's his name?"
"Pruitt. Pruitt Root."
"I still don't understand why we need..."
"Logic is everything," Dr. Ted
cut him off. "And time is logic." He jumped up and Tomas cringed as he ran to a xylophone, or was it a glockenspiel, what the hell was the difference anyway? He picked up the sticks.
"Ted please."
"What?" Ted looked down at the sticks in his hand. "Sorry." He set them down like a first grader who'd had his toy taken away and started pacing around the room. "Meddling with cause and effect is like shaking a tree with mankind hanging from every branch. It's more profound than splitting the atom. Inventing a time machine is the equivalent of harnessing nuclear power. No. It's even more fundamental. It has the ability to light up the world or melt it down."
"But you're..."
"I'm a scientist," Dr. Ted said, swinging on Tomas. "And science tells us nothing, nothing, about what will happen once we can move back and forth in time. Pruitt's the one who came up with the idea of investigations, at the interview."
"I still don't get that."
"It's brilliant," Ted gushed. "The missions need to go back slowly at first. We find crimes without witnesses and send chrononauts..."
"Chrononauts," Tomas muttered with a shake of his head.
"...back as bystanders. They come back and provide evidence. There's no impact on the past that can affect the future and it provides a social good. It's brilliant. I'd been trying to figure out a framework for the missions and he just came up with it."
"OK. Ted. OK," Tomas waved a hand in the air. "So he's brilliant. So we need a logician. So where is he?"
"He's doing field work for his post-doctoral thesis."
"What sort of field work does a logician do?" What the hell is a logician anyway?
"Stoicism as a philosophy in the twenty-first century. It's on guilt."
"I should introduce him to my mother. She wrote the book."
"On logic? I didn't know..."
"A joke Ted." Tomas raised a hand to his forehead. Ted actually threw his head back as he grinned this time. Tomas felt a migraine coming on. Must be the finger jabbed at him every time he made a bad joke.
Soul Source: Back and There Again Page 4