Soul Source: Back and There Again

by Charles Vella

  Dutch lowered his finger as the door swished closed. "Agnes," he sighed. "I was right. This is becoming very complicated."

  7

  "She's gone."

  "I can see that." Monica turned and looked at him. "Who're you?"

  "Justin. Justin Case."

  "You're kidding," she said as she looked at his extended hand.

  "No. I'm kind of an assistant to Agnes."

  "Well I'm Monica." She shook the hand then turned to look back up the empty road.

  "I know. Someone pointed you out to me." Great. That's her. Used to be the head of Team One but now she supervises the trash emptying bots. "What do we do now?" Justin said after they'd realized that staring down the empty street wasn't going to bring the car back.

  "We? What were you doing eavesdropping on us?"

  "I wasn't eavesdropping," he said, reddening. "I didn't realize you were there and by the time I did..."

  "The conversation was too interesting to interrupt?"

  He reddened even more but didn't say anything, just stared off into the distance. "Where do you suppose she went?"

  "Sarah? God only knows." She looked around. Nothing. "Well," she finally said. "Call your car and let's get back. There's no point standing here."

  "I don't have a car. I walked."

  "Walked?"

  "I wanted to think."

  "Well I'm not walking back in these high heels." She looked angrily down at her shoes, as if it were their fault.

  Justin projected a screen on his forearm, frowned. "At least a half hour for a car."

  "A half hour?"

  "At least. It always takes a long time to get a car out here," he said glumly. They stood there, watching the empty road as if that'd make a car show up faster. "Want to go back inside?"

  She shook her head, stared down the road. "Not really. How long did it take you to walk?"

  "It didn't seem so far on the way here," he said a few minutes later.

  "Didn't seem so far," Monica mumbled as she picked her way carefully on the uneven road in her heels. Fifteen minutes and they'd barely gotten out of sight of Hazel's. "There must be someone we can..." Her words trailed off as a car came careening around the corner. They both jumped back as it headed right at them.

  "Only one person can make a car travel like that," Monica said as the car flew toward them. "Yes," she said, taking a deep, angry breath. "That's Sarah's car."

  They jumped back as the car screeched around a tight circle and stopped in front of them. The door slid open.

  "Where's my car?" Monica snapped. "Tell me you didn't wreck it." If you total a car that sounds like your mother is that matricide?

  "Just get in," Sarah snapped back. "There's no time to explain."

  Justin shrugged, glanced at Monica, and climbed into the car. Monica took a step forward then reeled back as the door slammed shut. She felt the heel of one of her shoes give out from under her and she went down.

  "SARAH," Monica shouted, sitting in the grass as the car grew rapidly smaller and disappeared around the corner. "I'M GOING TO KILL YOU." But the car was already gone.

  6

  "He's...he's..." Mike lowered himself into a chair and rubbed his face in his hands.

  "What're you on about?" Rick asked, staring across the desk at him. He'd killed as much time as he could before coming back. Agnes wasn't in her office. Hopefully she was out gettin this show off the road. He'd been flipping through the news screens when Mike'd staggered into the office looking like he'd seen a ghost.

  "Get security," Mike said through his hands.

  "They're gone," Louise said from the door where she'd stopped when she'd gotten up from her desk to follow him into the office.

  "I know I know." Rick waved a hand at her. "Sensitivity trainin."

  "He's dead."

  "Dead?"

  "Go get'im some water," Rick snapped, glaring her out the door. It closed behind her and he turned back to Mike. "Who's dead?"

  "The prisoner."

  "Dead? How..."

  "He looked like, like he'd been boiled alive," Mike said with a shudder. "I've never seen anything like it."

  "Boiled alive?"

  Must be the shock. Hartron's voice sounded far away. As if he were talking in an echo chamber. Mike lowered his hands. Hartron was standing over him, the desk between them. He seemed to be wavering, fuzzy at the edges. Mike stood, or tried to, but his legs wouldn't lift him. All he could do was watch Hartron getting fuzzier and fuzzier as he dropped back into this chair. He was saying something but Mike couldn't make it out. Hartron's voice was distorted, like he was in an echo chamber. Mike tried to answer but could feel the room slipping away.

  "Don't worry Louise," Dutch said as the door swished open. "I'll give it to him." He came into the room holding a carton of water. The door closed behind him. He looked at the two bodies slumped in the chairs. "Oh dear," he sighed, setting the carton on the corner of the desk.

  His nose twitched at the air in the room. He shook his head. "If you hadn't been in Agnes's office this would never've happened," he admonished them, but they didn't respond. He shook his head. "Well," he finally sighed. "I'm going to have to clean this up." The gentle hum of a fan started up. He grasped Mike under the arms and dragged him toward the black water of the aquarium. He waited as water seemed to drain out of a section of the wall, leaving an open space. The section of wall slid open. Dutch dragged Mike into the space created inside the aquarium and leaned him against the back wall. A fish swam up and peered through the glass with blank eyes.

  Dutch grinned and pointed a finger at the inert form at his feet. "Now don't move."

  5

  Time Travel Protocol 6-7-2012* (Time-Appropriate Equipment):

  Chrononauts will be outfitted only with items of standard manufacture during the destination period.

  *(Highly Confidential: Paper Copies Only)

  "It's crazy. No," Eileen went on before Agnes could get the words out of her open mouth. Eileen stood up and looked down at Agnes and Griff. "It's worse than crazy. It's obscene. Immoral. Evil. I don't know who thinks this mission is so important or what you hope to get out of it but I won't have any part of it. I'm surprised you will," she added to Griff as she turned and walked to the door.

  "I haven't said I would," Griff called after her, but she was already gone.

  "We only have one other time-appropriate vehicle," Lemberger said, wringing his hands. "And it isn't appropriate at all. We've just kept it to play around with. They'll never learn to drive it in time."

  "I suppose we can use the same landing coordinates," Kristen said. "We've got to get him clothes. Tailor them. Sarah still has hers. At least I hope she does. She left wearing them." She looked around. "Has anyone seen Sarah? If Pruitt finds out she's left the compound in those clothes..."

  "We still haven't figured out what the technical problem was on the last mission," Sturgell Bob protested.

  "We don't have much time," Agnes cut them off, preferring not to dwell on what Pruitt was doing instead of attending her emergency meeting. "So I suggest you get onto solving all those problems instead of sitting here talking about them."

  She almost laughed. Lemberger and Kristen stared at her wide-eyed across the table, then planted their hands on it in unison and pushed themselves up. Sturgell Bob gave her a morose look and followed them out.

  "I haven't said I'd do it," Griff repeated when they'd left, but he didn't get up. "And Eileen's right. This is crazy. You can't send someone back there. Not after what happened."

  "Oh," Agnes said. "You don't think we should let the chrononauts make the decision?"

  "No."

  "Would you want someone else making that decision for you?" Direct hit. This wasn't a guy who accepted anyone making decisions for him and his face showed it. She pushed on. "But it's OK for you to make those decisions for someone else? I see. Does that have anything to do with the fact that the chrono
nauts are women?"

  "Who?" he finally asked, his forehead resting on his clasped hands, elbows resting on the conference table.

  She took a deep breath. "Well, one of them has to be Justin..."

  "Justin? That kid who's been hanging around you? He's not qualified..."

  "And he's not your responsibility," she said reasonably. She took a deep breath. "Look Griff. Accept for a second that there are reasons for this that you don't know."

  "I bet," he snorted.

  "Just accept it for a second," she said, raising a hand. "We'll send Justin with someone experienced."

  "The only one experienced enough is Monica," he said grudgingly.

  "And you don't want her to go," Agnes said, taking a shot in the dark, remembering that little exchange, or lack of exchange, in the launch room. A good shot, judging from the combination of guilt and misery on his face. "But," she added as he lifted his head and raised his eyes to meet hers. "Do you really think you have the right to make that decision for her? How would you feel if she made that decision for you without asking what you think about it?" The pain and indecision on his face were hard to take. Manipulating hurt people was something she preferred to leave to Rick and his kind, but when you decide to roll around in the slime you shouldn't complain about the smell. Stop the attack. Focus on that. You can't stop the mission so use it for good. Repeat that enough times and you may begin to believe it.

  "At least let me talk to her," she added. "In the meantime let's just start doing the prep work. We can always stop it if we change our minds."

  She read in his icy stare that he saw that for the cheap way out it was, but she also saw that she'd won. He slowly stood and she knew it wasn't just the accumulated aches and pains of time travel that suddenly made him look old. He left without a word and she stared over the table, trying to arrange the next couple of hours into a coherent plan, trying not to wonder what it would mean to stop the attack. Was Pruitt right? Would the world somehow come to an end? Or would she suddenly be sitting somewhere else? Happily married with children and a life time of bliss behind her?

  "You're looking for Monica?"

  Agnes started out of her reverie. Dutch. The tape. She opened her mouth to ask him where it was, what he was going to do with it, how he'd known she wanted Monica, but slowly closed it and nodded her head. Yes. She's looking for Monica.

  "This isn't a joke is it?"

  "A joke? If it is it's a bad one."

  "Of course it is," he said, turning. "You had to explain it."

  4

  "Voila. That's a French word meaning 'there it is,' but we use it to denote..."

  "Make him stop," Agnes said dully as Monica limped past Dutch into her office. Agnes'd come back from the planning committee, spent, and dropped into her chair. A strange smell in the room. Very faint. But she'd been so relieved not to find Rick in her office she forgot about it. Louise said he'd been there but he must've gone off somewhere. Hopefully he stayed there.

  "That wasn't a joke," Dutch explained.

  "Close the door Dutch," Monica said.

  "From the other side," Agnes ordered, rallying. The guilt'd been like a weight, pushing her slowly under most of her adult life. But today'd worn her out as badly as the twenty-four years before it combined. The combination of re-facing the attack every day, the suddenly very real threat of exposure and the possibility of going back and freeing herself if she could only outsmart Pruitt and whoever else was out to get her was grinding her under the heel of some giant shoe like a smoldering cigarette butt. The seconds when she allowed herself to believe she might really be able to stop the attack were clouded with the fear that she wouldn't make it to find out. That the giant grinding her under his heel would finish the job before she could stop the attack. Could she really go from an old woman holding up the weight of the world to someone free from the baggage she'd carried around all these years? Watching Monica fall into the chair across her desk, she couldn't imagine the weight falling away. She took a deep breath.

  "You look awful."

  "Thanks. It's been a long day."

  "Why are you limping?"

  "It's a long story." Monica fidgeted in the chair. Her eyes darted around the room. She stood, limped to the window and parted the curtains.

  "What are you looking for?"

  "Nothing." She came back to the chair and sat, staring across the desk, and Agnes knew that whatever the weight, she had to keep going. She'd become a shark. If she stopped swimming she'd die. So she had to convince this young woman staring across the desk at her to throw aside everything her file suggested she stood for and going back to do it for her. Where do you start a conversation like that?

  "You're sending another mission. And you want me to go on it this time."

  "I am?" Well, at least she didn't have to figure out how to start the conversation. "I am. That's why..."

  "I can't."

  "Can't or won't?" Agnes asked, her stomach sinking. She'd hoped to at least get Monica to listen, but could tell from the look on her fact that the conversation was over before it'd begun.

  "Can't, won't." Monica shrugged. "What difference does it make? Send Sarah." She took a deep breath. "She'll go."

  "Sarah? But..."

  "I know," Monica waved a hand in front of her face.

  "You know? What do you know? How can you..." but Monica had stood and limped to the window again. She parted the curtains and looked out, then let them drop again and let out a sigh.

  "What are you looking for?"

  "I've got to go."

  "Got to go? Where do you have to go? Wait." Agnes stood but Monica had limped past.

  "If you don't want me to replace Sarah maybe you can go with her." That'd mean sending Sarah but maybe Monica could neutralize her somehow. Rick wouldn't care about dropping his stooge, would he? "I can probably convince..."

  "No," Monica sighed. "I told you. I'm not going." She stopped in front of the door and stared hard at Agnes. "You'll have to send someone else with Sarah."

  The door swished open and Monica disappeared through it without a look back.

  What the hell was that all about? Send Sarah. Was it possible? Did it have to end the same way as the last time? And it suddenly hit her. Pruitt. He'd seen Sarah in the alley too. But then why did he suddenly not care whether Agnes sent her? Because he knows she didn't stop it. But couldn't it be different if Agnes gave her the information to stop it before it started? Why not? Pruitt seemed to be betting that it wouldn't. But Pruitt could be wrong. Couldn't he?

  Agnes sank back into her chair and stared at the door that'd swished closed behind Monica. It had to be different this time. Because Agnes didn't have any choice. It had to be different.

  "Is she gone?"

  Agnes looked up, following Dutch with her eyes as he walked to the chair Monica had been in and sat down. "I can still feel her body heat. I'm very sensitive that way."

  Agnes sighed. There is a God. And he's making her pay for her mistake by inflicting this on her. When she died and stood in front of Saint Peter she was going to punch him in the nose.

  "That didn't go very well did it?"

  She stared balefully at him. What, exactly, was the penalty for murdering a cyborg? Two-fifths of the electric chair voltage? Three-fifths? Did it depend on his exact ratio of biological to mechanical parts? Somewhere no doubt lawyers debated things like that.

  "If you know it didn't go well you know she's gone...don't..." but it was too late. He was already grinning and pointing his finger.

  "What do you want Dutch?"

  He dropped his finger and his grin faded to a solemn expression. He nodded. "I assume you want Sarah now."

  He assumed she wanted Sarah now. He assumed she wanted Sarah now. Did she want Sarah now? The idea rolled around in Agnes's brain accompanied by visions of Sarah running wildly down the alley, too late to stop them, looking as if she'd kill them all with her bare hands if she cou
ld, which she very well might've. That'd be crazy. But what was the other option? Griff? Somehow she knew that wouldn't work. He might not make the decision for someone else but he wouldn't go any more than Monica would. You need a stake in changing the past to be willing to take the risks. Only Agnes and Sarah have that.

  But Sarah. The young woman Agnes'd seen through the small square of glass in the door. The one she still occasionally saw in her sleep. Ruth's daughter. Could Agnes actually send her? What if she didn't send her? Then Sarah wouldn't see Agnes. But the attack would still happen. The guilt would still happen. The years of living a shell of a life would still happen.

  But did it have to happen that way? If Sarah went? Why couldn't she give Sarah enough information to stop it instead of ending up in the alley? Why not? Besides, what choice did she have? Give up? Look forward to spending the rest of her life living a string of days just like the ones littering her past? Agnes felt resolve course through her veins. No. She wasn't giving up yet. She took a deep breath and leaned across the desk.

  "No. I mean yes. Get Sarah in here."

  Dutch nodded. "I have to warn you. Sarah has sort of figured it out."

  "Figured it out? Figured what out?"

  "Sarah's very smart," he said as if that explained anything.

  "Fine. Go ahead and get her."

  Dutch smiled, nodded, stared at her across the desk.

  "Well?"

  "Well," Dutch lowered his voice and looked around. "There was one other thing."

  "Well. What is it?"

  Dutch frowned. His forehead creased. He leaned across the desk and looked at Agnes with an expression that almost seemed like fear.

  "What is it Dutch?" What other mayhem could there be to deal with? Judging from the look on his face it must be at least ten more dead chrononauts.

  He licked his lips. Did cyborgs need to lick their lips? She'd have to ask Abraham. "Is it true Dr. Agnes," he finally began solemnly, "...that if you have to explain a joke then it isn't funny?"