TimeRipper

by D E McCluskey

  Youssef was nodding his head as he followed Jacqueline’s explanations. ‘So, how do we follow them physically?’ he asked.

  ‘The magnetic and quantum tags bash against each other as they pulse. They piggyback onto each other’s signals, so we receive a quantum signal with a magnetic signal embedded into it.’

  ‘Accident or design?’ he asked shaking his head slowly in awe of the science. ‘Come on, doctor, you can tell me,’ he chided.

  She looked at him with pretend puppy dog eyes.

  ‘Come on, it’ll be our little secret.’

  Her eyes shifted from one side to the other, ‘Accident.’ she confided. ‘But it happens every time, almost as if they’re attracted to each other. Quantum does time, magnetic does space, it’s a perfect cocktail.’

  ‘This is outstanding. It truly is. So, now all we have to do is work on how we bring them back.’

  ‘Well, we’ve already started on that. It may be a little trickier than we thought,’ she winced as she confessed this. ‘We’ve only gone through it theoretically, but it seems that the hardest part of getting them back is the fact that we have to boost our quantum signal, on this end, to allow their transponder to see our code. We’re also dealing with signal degradation. There’s an added complication that when the quantum slug enters the body, it disguises itself, so the cells don’t reject it. That part is actually very clever. Because of this, to pick up the return signal, the return code has to be localised to the slug. We need to saturate the entire body with the code serum in order to catch it. We’ve left instructions with our counterparts on the other Platforms on how to inject the code serum. If and when we do use an agent, that agent will have to take the serum with him. We think this is how The Quest have done it.’

  Youssef was still shaking his head as he digested the information. ‘I tell you what, it’s a good job Farley isn’t here as he would have started a fight by now,’ he laughed.

  ‘We don’t know what, if any, reaction all this quantum signal will cause on return…’ she paused and smiled, ‘but we’re dying to try.’

  He stopped shaking his head and began nodding instead. ‘Let’s do it then.’

  27.

  London. 1888

  OVER THE NEXT few days, Aaron Kosminski watched the comings and goings of his girls, as he had come to think of them, closely. What little relationship he still had with his wife had deteriorated, broken down completely, but he was beginning to see that as a blessing.

  He had a new vocation; one he couldn’t afford any distractions from.

  In a private room above his barber’s shop, he kept an in-depth dossier regarding the girls. He had worked out most of their names from conversations overheard while walking behind them in the streets, at the marketplace, or in the various bars of Whitechapel. He had also produced a diary of his dreams and how they featured in his plans. He’d realised that if he could embrace these dreams, their actions and locations, then they may be able to help him fulfil, what he thought of now, as his destiny.

  He paid special attention to his favourite. The large woman they called Martha. He felt like she had a power over the other girls. He knew she wasn’t their leader, that seemed to be a woman named Carrie. She was a handsome woman if ever he had seen one, but Martha, she was feminine, yet could fight like a man. He’d watched her on many occasions. She would seduce a mark, get him to show her his money, take him down an alleyway, attack him, and take his money. She would take the men in a strange hold, trapping them until they stopped fighting, before dropping them to the floor and leaving them to die.

  Each time he had gone back to investigate the body, it was gone.

  More proof that she and her friends were witches.

  ~~~~

  ‘I have a moral obligation to rid this place of their vile filth,’ he mumbled to himself while following Martha down towards the bottom of Shoreditch High Street. The sun was dipping behind the large buildings on either side of the road, casting long shadows in the twilight of the day. He watched as she met with a small, blonde woman, who he recognised as Rose. He had seen Rose fight too. The way she looked after herself brought to mind images of men fighting in wars. The two women exchanged pleasantries, no more than a few words, before parting and continuing their separate ways.

  A strange feeling on the back of his neck, like the hairs rising, alerted him to the presence of someone else watching his girls.

  He looked around, not knowing what he was searching for, but confident he would know it when he saw it.

  There was a man over the other side of the market square. The way he was idling in the street, it looked to Aaron like he was trying his best not to be noticed. He didn’t look like a trader, and he didn’t seem the type who would be looking for business with the ladies of the evening who frequented the market after the stalls were gone. No, this man seemed to be rather too interested in his ladies. Aaron could see something in his hands, from this distance, and in the failing light, he couldn’t make out what it was. He was covertly pointing it at the women and then looking at it afterwards, as if reading something on it.

  This odd activity unnerved Kosminski, but he pushed it to one side, a musing for another time, he thought, as he noted Martha’s movements in his notepad before going home.

  ~~~~

  That night, alone in his bed, as his wife had taken to sleeping in the other room with the children, the murder dream came again; but this time it was different. This time he welcomed the chaos, he embraced the mutilation and the gore.

  The next morning, he woke extra early. He felt refreshed from the relaxing night of sleep. His thoughts wandered to the man on the street, the one who had been watching his girls. There was something about him that he didn’t like.

  He arrived at the women’s address in Whites Row and took up residence in his usual spot. He was just in time to witness an exodus from the lodgings. Eight of the women left the house carrying bags that looked like they were packed to leave. Are they all fleeing the nest? he thought, as the dilemma of which ones he should follow sunk in. He hadn’t thought this far in advance. Deep down though, he knew that Martha deserved to be his first victim.

  Luckily for him, his two favourites were heading off in the same direction. Martha Tabram and Annie Chapman paired off and made their way towards the High Street.

  He decided to follow them.

  The sun was not long up, and it was already warm. It looked like London was going to get a little bit of summer after all. It didn’t matter much to him. In East London, no matter where you were, rain or shine, day or night, there were always shadows to hide in.

  As he stalked the two women, the strange feeling that he’d had the day before was back; a feeling that he was not alone. He scanned the already bustling street but, to his relief, he couldn’t see anyone following him.

  There was no sign of the man from last night.

  He continued walking, but the feeling persisted. He kept stopping and searching, but still, there was no one there. That was until a small flash of red caught his eye. The colour screamed out to him in the drabness of the dirty, grey street. It looked like the lining of an expensive cape.

  His heart began to pound as he recognised the wearer of the cape as the man from last night and realised that he was stalking his girls.

  This infuriated, and scared him, in equal measure. Irrationally, he wanted to cross the street to confront him. He wanted to find out what he was playing at. The irony of the situation almost forced his dour face to break into a smile.

  The man was holding something in his hands again.

  This time Aaron could see it, due to the light of the day. It was a small device of some kind; he had never seen the likes of it before. From time to time, he would point it towards the two women strolling before him. Every now and then he would touch it and read from it.

  It confused him. He hated the feeling of not being in control and thought that he should try and find out more about this stranger and his odd
device. A thought occurred that he might be an agent of the police. Maybe they were investigating the murder outside the pub on the night Martha, the witch, arrived?

  Probably best if I keep my distance for now, he thought.

  He didn’t like the police, they unnerved him. He tried his best to push all thoughts of them aside as he fed his obsession with the women. ‘Police don’t investigate witches,’ he mumbled. ‘That’s down to the likes of me!’

  Police, or no police, he thought. Tonight, I will rid this world of their evil.

  He entered the shadows of a nearby building and watched as the women entered one of the lodging houses in George Yard Buildings on George Street. He smiled as he recognised the address from his dreams. Martha stood in conversation with a small man who had opened the door, then handed him something—he assumed it was money. All three of them then entered the building.

  ‘Time to get organised,’ he told himself. ‘There’s no doubt she’ll be out looking for more victims tonight. That’s when she’ll find her last one.’ He smiled as he gripped the razorblade in the pocket of his overcoat. ‘Me!’ he snarled.

  With that, he left the scene and walked back across the East End, towards his home.

  There was no sign of the other stalker anywhere.

  29.

  Orbital Platform One. 2288

  THERE WERE SIXTEEN scientists on hand to witness the return of the apple. Youssef and Jacqueline were included. He was excited for the return, but he was also reticent. He knew how much was at stake if this was a failure.

  ‘OK, reverse the collider and prepare the Higgs-Boson hydrogen mix. Let’s bring Granny Smith back from the past,’ Jacqueline shouted.

  Everyone put on their goggles to protect their eyes from the reported bright flashes that would come with the reversal. The lights dimmed as the whooshing of the Hadron Collider filled the air and the racetrack began to glow.

  It was the only sound in the lab.

  Jacqueline was monitoring the hydrogen acceleration from her console. She gave the order to inject the mix when she saw the optimum conditions flash. The recall signal to the quantum slug, buried deep inside the subject, was sent.

  As the mix entered the stream, another lab scientist entered the instructions on a portal next to the device. After a few moments, there was a bright flash of purple and alarms began to blare as the magnetic containment fields deployed around the Collider’s racetrack to contain the Higgs Storm that would be produced by the recall.

  The flash was sustained, and Youssef turned to face Jacqueline. Her eyes were hidden by the darkened goggles she was wearing, but she couldn’t hide the grin on her face. The light began to oscillate. It flashed faster and faster as the alarms continued to blare louder and louder.

  Suddenly, the flashing and the alarms stopped. The silence in the room was pronounced as every noise ceased at once.

  No one breathed. No one even moved as the smoke inside the glass room began to dissipate.

  It took a while to see, but there, dead centre of the racetrack, was an apple. It looked as fresh as it did when it had been sent. There was no visible damage to its dermal layer.

  In the jubilation, and the celebration of the returned apple, no one noticed one faint alarm still ringing in the background. In the midst of the shouting, cheering, and hand slapping, it went unnoticed.

  ‘We did it!’ Youssef shouted, shaking his head, holding his hands in the air. Several of the other scientists had been hugging him, and he even acknowledged a few kisses. ‘I don’t quite believe we did this.’

  ‘Well, believe it, sir.’ Another scientist who was stood at a monitor next to him was beaming as she ran scans on the returned apple. ‘That’s the exact same apple we sent back.’

  He grasped at the handle of the glass door; eager to see if there was any damage to the fruit that they couldn’t see. The door was still magnetically sealed. ‘Why is the door still locked?’ he asked the scientist at the console.

  She shook her head in response. ‘It shouldn’t…’ her fingers began to tap at her console faster. ‘Sir…’ her voice had lost all its former joviality; she was now all business. ‘Sir, it seems that there’s an anomaly. An inordinate amount of Higgs Strom is swelling within the containment field.’

  ‘Is it holding?’

  ‘Erm, negative, sir. It’s more than we were expecting, and its expanding.’

  The containment field had been programmed with the correct power to contain more than double the amount of Higgs Storm produced as the apple left. They had not considered that the recall would produce so much more. The field was straining like an over blown balloon.

  ‘Everybody, out of the lab, NOW!’ Youssef shouted as he grabbed the scientists, pushing them towards the door. The celebrating had stopped as everyone watched what was occurring.

  ‘GET OUT NOW, ALL OF YOU.’

  Youssef was manually throwing people towards the exits. None of them had ever even heard him so much as raise his voice before, so the physical acts of violence that he was bestowing upon them now were a cause for alarm.

  Jacqueline was about to protest the manhandling of her staff when she saw what was happening. The containment field was too swollen. It was straining; like it was about to pop at any given moment.

  The Storm’s growth was relentless.

  ‘DO AS HE SAYS! DO AS HE SAYS!’ she shouted, as the containment field continued to swell, out of all control.

  ‘ITS GOING TO BLOW! GET OUT, ALL OF YOU… NOW!’ Youssef yelled, grabbing the nearest scientist and jumping towards the exit, pulling the scared, and confused man, though the door with him by the collars of his white coat. Most of the others were already behind the door as the two of them fell through. ‘LOCK IT DOWN!’ he screamed, as the door hissed closed behind them.

  There were four scientists still trapped in the room.

  He got up from the floor and looked through the window. He watched and whispered a small prayer. ‘Allah, have mercy on their souls.’ He closed his eyes in a futile attempt to block out what he knew was coming. Gloria Hartigan’s face—or what was left of it—came forth like a ghost in the darkness. He could feel a scream rising in his chest. It took most of his will to beat it down.

  Eerily similar to the events of twenty years prior, no one could look away from what was happening in the lab.

  Jacqueline took it the worst. ‘We have to get in there and help them. They need our help!’ There was no conviction in her voice; Youssef knew, deep down, that she knew the four poor souls inside were lost. She looked to her boss and mentor. She needed guidance; guidance he knew he couldn’t offer. Everyone else was motionless, all of them silent, dumbfounded, helpless.

  Finally, the Higgs Storm breached the containment field, and the lethal purple gas spewed forth towards the petrified scientists inside.

  One, obviously resigned to what was about to happen, ran towards the cloud and allowed herself to be immersed within its destructive embrace. Her scream was mercifully muffled as a wave of blood spilled out before being greedily sucked back in again by the purple mass. The other three scientists were screaming, banging on the glass doors, trying to get out, to get away from the path of the rolling, purple death.

  Youssef opened his eyes. A reality had just occurred to him, it was a terrifying reality. He sat up and cast his panicked gaze back into the room.

  The single glance confirmed his fears.

  As the remaining three colleagues within the room succumbed to the creeping cloud, his fears were founded.

  The Higgs Storm was still expanding.

  ‘Fuck!’ he uttered. Jacqueline looked at him. She had never heard him swear before now. ‘We’re going to have to evacuate the OP! We have to go, NOW!’ He pushed away from the door and ran from the lab in the direction of the bridge. ‘Everyone, follow me,’ he screamed.

  None of them needed to be told twice.

  As he ran, he tapped a small device on his wrist. ‘Amanda, order a widespread evacuation of
OP One, immediately. No time to explain. Do it right now!’ The thing he liked most about Amanda was that she never second guessed his orders, any of them. Five seconds after their conversation, the OP’s lights dimmed, and the emergency evacuation klaxon sounded.

  Amanda’s tinny voice spoke through his wrist device. ‘Sir, emergency evacuation of OP One, to the nearest functioning base, that’s… erm, Liverpool, England, happening in five… four… three… two…’

  The world began to dissolve around him, and he felt the familiar, but never comfortable, sensation of falling. The next instant, he was on the ground in one of the functioning EA’s headquarters. He had materialised into a huge warehouse. ‘Amanda, get me the readout and make sure everyone is out. Also, find out who’s in charge of this station.’

  As he looked up, he saw Amanda in the crowd of people materialising around him, she was using a tablet portal that was interfacing with her headset. ‘Sir, everyone accounted for, with the exception of…’

  ‘I know who the exceptions are, Amanda,’ he snapped. He knew there would be a time to grieve their lost colleagues, but that time was not now.

  ‘The officer in charge of this station is…’ he watched as she tapped furiously on the tablet, ‘Commander Lisa McFadden! I’m patching you through to her now.’

  ‘Amanda, you’re a star!’

  ‘I know, sir,’ she replied.

  ‘Dr Haseem, this is Commander McFadden. Welcome to Liverpool, England,’ the comforting voice spoke through his device.

  ‘Thank you, Commander. Sorry to have to jump right into business, but has OP One exploded?’

  ‘No, sir. We’re monitoring the situation right now. It seems that most of the systems are functioning correctly. If it wasn’t for the fact that you have a hole stretching from decks four through to twelve, I’d think that you were here for a holiday. What could have caused that kind of damage? Are we under attack again?’