by James McEwan
“I get it, so when you want the item back you pull energy from the subspace void and convert it back into matter using the pattern stored in the device.”
Doctor Hammer was beaming ear-to-ear, “You got it my boy, which is why you are such a great assistant and why when I go I hope you will carry on my work.”
Thad was honored that Doctor Hammer would want him to continue the work, but he was not sure how to tell Doctor Hammer he only understood about a third of the things he was working with. He smiled and placed his hand on Doctor Hammer’s shoulder, “Congrats Doc, you really have something here.”
“I know, but I am going to have to think of a way to keep people from figuring out the tech because if they do it could be really bad.”
Thad thought for a second, “dead man’s switch.”
“What’s a dead man’s switch?” Doctor Hammer’s face contorted.
“It is a switch that is wired to a person or held in the hand so if the person is killed the switch is triggered, and if it is attached to a bomb then it goes off.” Thad drew a quick diagram on the screen with his finger.
At first, Doctor Hammer didn’t understand what Thad was getting at, but then it dawned on him. “I get it, if a switch in the casing is opened or tampered with then it sets off something in the device which renders the whole device useless. Kind of like a criminal burning the evidence when the cops are closing in on him. Yes, it could work. I could make it so it converts itself into energy, then no one would have anything to reverse engineer. Genesis, pure genesis, my boy! I will have to do that.” Doctor Hammer went over to a bin on a shelf and came back with another device.
“What does this one do Doc?” Thad asked.
“Right now, not what it is supposed to. I call it a singularity scalpel. The idea would be for a non-invasive surgical tool. The way I want it to work is, let’s say you have a tumor on the inside of your colon. The way we would deal with it now is to use a robot with a laser to cut it out of you. The problem is, it causes scar tissue, and there is always the risk of infection. The way this would work is you would use the screen to scan the area, find the tumor, select it, and move it out of phase.”
Thad interrupted Doctor Hammer with a question, “Out of phase?”
“Yes, I have found a way to take items in this dimension and put them temporally into another dimension with only what I call a ghost in this dimension. Just enough of the item is left here so I can see it, move it, and then bring it back into phase with this dimension. You could complete a surgery with no complications, or scar tissue to worry about. At least that is the theory.”
“So what is wrong with the device?” Thad asked.
“I can’t seem to get the damn thing to phase out just what I want and nothing else. Here I will show you.” Doctor Hammer took a pen from the table, sat it in a cup, and poured some water. “Okay the cup is the body, the pen the tumor, and the water is the flesh and fluid in the body. As you can see here on the screen I can select the pen,” the pen glowed on the screen. “Now when I put it out of phase watch and see what happens.”
Thad watched as the pen, cup, and water all but disappeared leaving only a faint image. “I see the problem everything goes out of phase, not just the pen. Why is that?”
Doctor Hammer gave him what Thad liked to call the, are you really that stupid look, “If I knew why it did that then it wouldn’t be a problem would it?”
Thad felt he deserved the stupid look from Doctor Hammer this time, “Sorry, that was a dumb question.”
“I thought maybe you could play with it and see what you could do, who knows maybe you will have more luck than I did.” Doctor Hammer handed over the device.
“I don’t know what I can do, but I will be glad to play with it, however, I do have a question,” Thad took the device.
“Yes?”
“How come the whole thing didn’t just fall through the table?”
“Oh good question, well it is because there is just enough of the item left in this dimension to keep it from falling through the table,” Doctor Hammer replied.
“Oh!”
The following day Doctor Hammer, Thad, and Archie took the sand crawler into town. Doctor Hammer figured he would load up on some supplies. Archie pulled up in front of the freshly painted general store. Doctor Hammer jumped down, “You two get the supplies loaded. Carl just got in a new case of Jack Daniels, and I’m off to go get it.”
Thad watched as the little Doctor trotted off dressed in his trademark khaki shorts, Hawaiian shirt, sandals, and his tan pith helmet, which covered his little-wrinkled head. Thad turned back to the robot that was standing there, “Come on Archie, the supplies won’t load themselves.”
The problem with the increased business in town was that it also brought increased crime. The Sheriff had to hire a few deputies to help keep the peace. They were nice boys and a couple of them saw Thad loading supplies. “Can we give you a hand Mr. Hammer?”
Thad looked at the two young men, both of them couldn’t be a day over twenty, “Sure, we can always use a couple of extra hands.”
A few days earlier on his ship, the Night Terror, Big Red entered the mess area where the crew was arguing where to go next. “Listen up ya bunch of space dogs! I think it is time for us to visit Nome again.” His voice boomed.
Max spoke up, “but Capitan the place is a hole. There is nothing there, but some used up whores and old men. Why would you want to go back to Nome?”
Red threw down his tablet. It bounced, sliding towards the crew, “If any of ye morons read something once in while you’d know that Nome was just featured in the new issue of Up and Comer Magazine.”
Confused Stan said, “So?”
Red folded his massive arms and sighed heavily, “So ye idiot, the article says, and I quote, ‘The small moon Nome, once the home to the lost and forgotten has become the home to one of the universe's most interesting up and coming businesses, Miss Jenna’s Homemade Lemonade Company. The article goes on to say a lot of new money is flowing into that their little moon of Nome, and I think we should go exact our cut.”
That got a cheer from the crew, “Pipe down ye dogs,” Red barked. “Now, before ya go getting all crazy and tear up the place, I think ye should take a little R&R time, get the lay of the land, while I figure out how best to squeeze every last credit out of that their little moon.”
That garnered another cheer.
The Night Terror landed on the same day that Thad, Archie, and Doctor Hammer were in town to pick up supplies. After landing, Mighty Max and too tall Stan could barely wait for the airlock to open before they ran straight for Bob’s and the bottle. Two more of the crew made a b-line for the Nymphia, while the ship’s engineer thought the downtime was a good time to do some work on the ship’s engines. Big Red himself liked to stay on board most of the time. He was wanted on too many planets. He didn’t like to take the chance a bounty hunter might be out there looking for him.
Inside Bob’s, Mighty Max and his drinking buddy, too tall Stan had been drinking since they got there, and with every drink, Max and Stan were getting closer and closer to being falling down drunk. Carl was trying to hide in the back as much as he could. He hated to deal with these guys when they were sober but drunk they scared him to death. Luckily, for him, the two space pirates were the only two in the place at the time. Bored with just drinking, Max pulled out his laser pistol, “Stan throw that bottle and let’s see if I can hit it.”
“Okay sounds good to me,” Stan said, as he tossed a nearly empty bottle into the air.
Max missed it, “Toss another one,” he said.
This time, Max hit the bottle, spraying glass and liquor all over them. The two drunks looked at each other and laughed. Stan tossed another bottle, this time, it flew over his Max’s head. Max spun around to hit a bottle and missed it. The bottle hit the wall and shattered right above the doorway.
Doctor Hammer was unfortunate to walk through the door at that very moment and was
showered by the glass, “Hey what the Hell?” he yelled out.
Way too drunk to know better, Max turned his gun on Doctor Hammer, “Hey old man get, out of my way, I’m trying to hit that bottle.”
Doctor Hammer understood he was in trouble. He knew these men and knew that they were bad enough sober, but drunk there was no telling what they would do. He held up his hands, “Whoa there cowboy, why don’t you put the gun down son, and let me buy you a drink.”
Max stood there swaying, “What are you saying old man? I can’t buy my own drinks. Hell, I don’t have to buy them. I just take what I want.”
Hammer tried to back out the way he came, but it was too late.
“Hey, I wonder if he can dance, what you think Stan?” Max tried to aim at the floor, but he was so drunk he could not tell the floor from the roof. He was swaying badly when he pulled the trigger.
The blast from the laser pistol hit Doctor Hammer just left of the sternum, burning a hole straight through his heart, killing him almost instantly. Doctor Hammer, the man who never hurt anyone and spent his whole life working to help people, now lay dead in the doorway. Max didn’t even flinch. He turned back towards the bar, “Barkeep, get your fat ass out here and get me more drink!”
“What have you done?” Carl asked as bravely as he could. He had been watching from the back. He ran to the body of Doctor Hammer. Carl picked up his limp body “You are dead men walking now,” he said and gently carried Doctor Hammer out.
Max stumbled to the bar and sat down, “What do you think he was talking about?”
Stan stumbled to the stool next to Max, he tried to sit down but fell off twice before being able to stay on. “I don’t know, don’t care, pour me another one.”
Thad, the two young deputies, and Archie were still loading supplies into the sand crawler when he noticed Carl carrying a body into Doctor Burton’s place. Doctor Burton was the local doctor who took care of the small stuff. For anything major, he would always send them to Doctor Hammer. Thad wondered what was going on, and then his heart seemed to fall right out of his chest as he caught a glimpse of the brightly colored shirt. Thad burst through the door of Doctor Burton’s office, heartbroken, tears flooding his vision. He rushed to the side of Doctor Hammer. “What happened?”
Doctor Burton sighed, “I’m so sorry Thaddeus. He was gone when Carl brought him in. There was nothing I could do.”
Thad held the hand of the man who had saved his life, the man who gave him a second chance, the man who called him a son, the man he called father. Tears ran down his face and it struck him this was the first time he could remember really crying. Doctor Burton placed his hand on Thad’s shoulder, “A drunk at Bob’s shot him through the heart. It was quick. I don’t believe he suffered.”
Those words meant little to Thad. Right now, the only thing he could think of was some drunk, with a gun, ended the life of one of the greatest men the universe had ever known. The tears died, and sorrow was replaced with anger. His face flushed with the hot red burning deSire for revenge.
The door opened again and the Sheriff stepped into the room. “Thad I just heard, I’m so sorry. Carl says the ones who did this are still there. I have one my deputies putting together an armed posse to go pick them up.”
Thad looked the Sheriff straight in the eye and with a voice that was as cold as ice said, “No, they’re mine.” His hands balled into fists so tight he started shaking.
For a second, the Sheriff thought about giving Thad the, I am law speech, but thought better of it. He could see Thad was not a man to be trifled with. Thad gently placed Doctor Hammer’s hand on his chest, and then gently he kissed his forehead. He closed Doctor Hammer’s eyes and whispered into his ear, “Forgive me father, for what I am about to do.”
Thad turned to leave to find his way blocked by the Sheriff, “Don’t even think about trying to stop me, Sheriff.”
He held up a set of keys, “I wouldn’t dare. I just wanted to give you these, the keys to my gun cabinet in my office.”
“Keep them. I’m not going to need a gun!” Thad said, in a tone that could turn your blood to ice. He stepped past the Sheriff, opened the door, and walked out.
Stan fell off the stool again, “I got to take a piss.” He stumbled towards the restrooms but was too drunk to find the door so he just staggered to the back of the hallway, unzipped and urinated on the wall and floor.
Thad jerked the door open and walked in. He saw a man sitting at the bar alone. The man never even looked up, just tried to pour another drink, but he poured more onto the bar than into the glass.
It took only one look at his face and giant forearms for Thad to remember who this was, Mighty Max! I should have killed this piece of scum years ago, he thought. Thad walked up to the bar and stood next to him. He picked up the bottle, “Here friend, let me help with that.”
“Thanks, I seem to be having trouble. The damn glass keeps moving.” Max slurred his speech.
Thad poured the drink and set the bottle down. Once again, he placed his foot on Max’s stool and this time he had his hand positioned near Max’s pistol. “So Max where is your buddy Stan?”
“Oh he is in the back, probably passed out drunk or pissing all over himself.” He paused to look up at the man who he was talking to, “Do I know you, friend?”
Thad looked right into his eyes, dropped the smile, and in that tone that would turn your soul to ice said, “You should, after all, we are so close.”
“What do you mean?” Max asked.
Thad, he leaned close to Max’s ear, “so close that you are wearing my teeth.”
Max’s foggy drunken mind took a minute to think. Then his eyes got as big as dinner plates, “You, but it can’t be, you’re dead.” Before he could do anything else Thad pulled the same move as when they first met, the bar stool went sailing across the room. Gravity took over, Max shot straight down chin meeting the bar top once again, and once again, teeth shattered, but this time Max was trying to say something. His tongue was part way out of his mouth when it was slammed shut by the bar. The very tip of his tongue landed on the bar in a small pool of blood and whiskey.
As Max fell to the ground, in a bloody screaming heap, Thad had his gun. The motion of Max falling made it very easy to unholster the weapon. Stan came stumbling back expecting to see Max pouring more drink. His eyes gave away his surprise at being greeted by the barrel of a gun.
“Hello Stan, long time, no see,” Thad said pointing the gun right between Stan enlarging eyes.
“Who in the Hell are you?” Stan demanded.
“Which one of you shot the old man?” Thad asked and not politely.
“What old man?” Stan asked.
There was a flash of light followed by the distinct crack of the super-heated air as the laser gun fired, “Wrong answer. Now which one of you shot the old man!”
Stan sagged to the ground holding his left knee, which had just become a smoking hole. He screamed, “You shot off my knee cap, you mother...” He did not finish that thought for another bolt of light streaked from the tip of the gun and into his other knee. “It was Max, it was him! He did it! Please stop!”
“One more question, where is the rest of your crew?” Thad asked.
Stan held up his hands, “Two guys went to see the whores. I don’t know about the rest.”
Thad said nothing just pulled the trigger again. The bolt of light burned a neat hole through Stan’s head. The heat from the laser boiled his brains and his head burst from the steam pressure. Stan’s headless body lay unmoving. With Stan dead, Thad turned to Max who was still rolling on the floor holding his bleeding mouth. “Get up!” Thad took him by one arm lifting him to his feet. Pressing the gun into his back he said, “Move!”
The Sheriff had returned to his office to call off the posse. He wanted to see what would happen next. He did not have to wait long. The door to his office burst open and Max flew through the door. He hit the ground hard enough to knock the wind out of him. Righ
t behind him was Thad, “Hold him for me. I have information that more of his crew are at the hotel. I am going to make sure this filth will never hurt anyone ever again.”
Thad wheeled around and was out the door. The Sheriff turned to his deputy who was standing there, hands in pockets, looking the fool with his mouth hanging open, “Well just don’t stand there you idjit, put him in one of the cells.”
Chapter 9
Thad entered the hotel lobby. Xandra saw him right away. She called out to him, “Oh Thaddeus, I’m so sorry I just heard.”
He approached the front desk, “Thank you Xandra, I need a favor.”
She took his hand in a tender way, “Anything for you, Love.”
“Two men came in today, two rough types,” he said as he pulled his hand back.
“You mean the guys from Big Red’s crew?” Xandra asked, surprised at his reaction to her touch.
“Those are the ones. I need to know what rooms they are in,” Thad said, with a tone that frightened her.
She looked into the eyes of a man who’s soul was on fire, “Please Thad, not here, not under my roof, please.”
“I promise I won’t do anything under your roof, now Xandra the rooms, please,” he pleaded with her.
“One is with Kendra on the second floor. The other is with Carrie on the third floor,” she said reluctantly.
Thad leaned over the desk and kissed her on the cheek, “Thank you.”
He made his way up to the third floor, finding Carrie’s room. He tried the doorknob, it was unlocked. This was good because he really did not want to have to replace a door. Slipping into the room as quiet as possible, he found a man on the bed naked with his ass in the air. Carrie standing over him with a riding crop, “Who has been a bad, bad boy?”
“I have a mistress, please may I have another?” He replied.
Thad walked lightly until he was standing next to Carrie who was startled to see Thad standing there. This made her squeak, a little. Thad put his finger to his lip.