Lost Friday

by Michael Bronte

  Chill out, girl. I’ll take care of this. I took a couple of deep breaths and tried to calm my nerves. I flexed my fingers and hardened the muscles in my legs. One-Mississippi, two-Mississippi…. At three-Mississippi, I screamed, “NOW!”

  We blasted forward off that couch in unison—well, Johnny and I were in unison; Remington simply managed to stay on her feet. Rather than rushing the Synthetic, however, we headed for the kitchen. What happened next was like we’d rehearsed it a thousand times. The Synthetic probably had no idea that the kitchen to every twentieth-century beach bungalow would have a drain board next to the sink, but Johnny did. In the time it took for the Synthetic to get from the front door to the kitchen—three seconds, maybe—Johnny grabbed a steak knife and slit the duct tape binding his left wrist to my right wrist. He handed me the knife, and I immediately slit the tape on my other arm. The Synthetic was there by that time, DNA-controlled Glock at the ready. It only took a second after that.

  In a move reminiscent of a Ron Guidry fastball, Johnny hurled a second knife at the Synthetic with everything he had. He missed him completely, but it was enough to force the Synthetic to raise his arms instinctively to protect himself, and that was enough for me. I hurled myself toward the Synthetic, praying to God that I hadn’t been dreaming back in the living room and Johnny had my back. The Glock, I was thinking, get the Glock! I hit the Synthetic’s midsection with my head and he went down like marshmallow. I got up with my bell ringing, thinking: what a fucking pussy, when I discovered that the ringing wasn’t my head, but a cast iron frying pan that Remington was holding. She’d clocked the Synthetic but good. Oh, that’s why we went down so easily. I took the Glock, which no one except the Synthetic could fire anyway, and put it in the refrigerator where no one would think to look for it. Evidently Roarke and the other three Synthetics hadn’t heard the scuffle, but it was only a matter of time before they showed up again.

  “It won’t work,” Johnny said to me.

  “How do you know it won’t?”

  “Because, it won’t, that’s why. It’s probably not even loaded.” He was referring to the goose gun, which is what I was thinking about.

  Good point, I thought, and we certainly didn’t have time to look for the ammunition.

  Remington said, “What the hell are you two talking about?”

  “You got a another idea?” I said to Johnny, ignoring her.

  “I’m thinking.”

  “We don’t have time for that,” Remington said as she picked up the phone.

  “No you don’t,” came a voice from behind us. It was Roarke. Two of the other three Synthetics walked up and tied our hands behind us again, not using duct tape this time, but some kind of magnetic tape that bound itself around our wrists. I figured we’d need bolt cutters to get it off. The third Synthetic appeared in the archway to the living room and did the same thing to Remington, but not before she put the phone down on the counter. She didn’t hang it up, I noticed as they shoved me back into the living room.

  Chapter 45… Battle In The Bungalow

  Forty minutes later we were still sitting on the floor in the living room with our hands bound behind us. Again, Roarke was somewhere else doing whatever he was doing, but this time he left two Synthetics behind to guard us, one of them at the front door like before, and one at the back door that led from the kitchen to the elevated deck.

  “I wonder where they got these handy little handcuffs,” Johnny said as he squirmed about uselessly.

  “Quiet!” the Synthetic at the front door called out.

  Not surprisingly, I was thinking the same thing. My wrists were bound so tightly that I could barely feel my fingers. “Something’s wrong,” I whispered so the Synthetic wouldn’t hear me. “I think they missed a teleportation time.”

  “Is that good or bad?” Johnny whispered back.

  “I’m not sure. I think their friends at the other end must have sent more Ken Dolls back to see what was happening. That’s probably where they got these damned cuffs.”

  The Ken Doll from the front came over and aimed a zapper at me, the same type Roarke had once used on Remington, Roy, and Robert Behari. That seemed like another lifetime now. I took the hint and shut my trap. Remington didn’t, however.

  “Hey, hot stuff,” she called out at her bitchiest, most arrogant best. “I have to pee.”

  The Synthetic shifted the zapper to her. “You just went to the bathroom.”

  “I drink nine bottles of water a day, and I’ve only gone to the bathroom one time. If I sit here much longer I’m gonna have one big puddle underneath me. You want to clean that up?”

  Johnny caught on to it too. As the Synthetic reluctantly pulled Remington to her feet and led her to the bathroom, Johnny nudged me and mouthed the words: nine, one, one. I just nodded as the Ken Doll at the back door was keeping an evil eye on us.

  “I can’t go with my hands tied behind my back,” Remington said loudly enough for her voice to carry into the living room, which meant it was also loud enough to carry to the phone. It was one of those old fashioned phones, from before the time when cordless phones became the norm. Almost every house had one in the kitchen back then—which was now—its long stretchy cord always twisting and tangling as if it was alive. Remington had put the handset down, but we’d never heard that loud beeping sound that indicated a phone was off the hook. The line was still open, which meant someone could be listening, someone like Roy. But which Roy would it be? I had my answer a minute later when his voice pealed through the walls of the bungalow.

  “This is the police. We have you surrounded. Come out with your hands up.”

  How eighties, I thought. That had to be the original Roy. I mean, after everything he’d been through, I figured the replica would have come in shooting first and would have asked questions later—if he bothered to ask questions at all. So, where was replica Roy? As I recalled, his plan had been to use the Synthetics to lead us to Chuck and Jenna Robelle so that David’s conception could be prevented. As part of that plan, he’d gone off to find original Roy to keep him and his men away from this very bungalow so that said prevention of conception could be accomplished. Well, that didn’t happen, but if original Roy was out there blowing into that bullhorn, replica Roy had to be close by. The question was: had replica Roy been through this event before?

  The question swam inside my head, along with several other related thoughts. As a reporter, I tried to tie them together in a neat little mental bundle: the many occurrences of Lost Friday itself, I don’t know how many trips to 2194, replicas all over the place, Synthetics coming back to alter events; I was lost in a swirl of time that was as if a drain had been unplugged at the bottom of the ocean itself. Sitting there with my hands tied behind my back, I felt like I was being sucked into it. I knew then, as always, that I had to rely on my instincts and no one else’s to make something happen and get myself out of this mess. Remington was setting something up. Roy was lurking and waiting. Johnny was waiting to make a move. I looked into his eyes.

  “You ready?”

  “As ready as I’ll ever be,” he replied nervously.

  I’m sure he didn’t know what he was ready for, but he was putting his trust in me. Okay, replica Roy, don’t fail me now.

  “On three,” I called out so that my voice would carry to the phone.

  The Ken Doll at the back door focused on us immediately. The one who’d escorted Remington to the bathroom bounded in right away as well, his eyes and his DNA-controlled Glock pointed in my direction. I made no move of any kind.

  “One….”

  The Synthetic from the back retreated to his position and looked out the window.

  Again, Roy’s voice came over via bullhorn. “Come out with your hands up. We don’t want anyone to get hurt.”

  The Synthetic pulled his Glock. I could see the confusion plastered all over his face. “Two….” I called out loudly.

/>   “Shut-up,” the Synthetic hollered.

  “Three!” Nothing happened.

  “I’m done,” Remington said as she came back in from the bathroom. “What’s with all the yelling?”

  The Synthetic who’d been guarding her immediately bound her wrists behind her again. “Quiet!” he ordered, forcing her to the floor to her original position, which was back-to-back with me. “There will be no more movement.” To his partner at the back door, he asked, “Where is Commander Roarke?”

  “Completing this part of the mission,” the partner replied, indicating somewhere outside.

  “He’ll never get close to Chief Mulroney,” Johnny spat out.

  The Synthetic zapped him and Johnny almost came off the floor. “I said quiet!” the Synthetic ordered again.

  Remington elbowed me as I realized that Johnny had just hit it on the head. There was more to this event, and Roarke was here reshaping it. That’s when I also figured out why replica Roy had really separated from us. He said he was going to keep original Roy away from the scene, but why? The only reason I could think of was that perhaps something awful had happened, or was about to happen, to original Roy, or his men. Replica Roy was trying to reshape this event as well, and while his motivation was clear, I wondered what Roarke was trying to prevent. His own death, perhaps? Was that the other part of the mission the Synthetic had just mentioned?

  Remington was still nudging me as Roy’s voice pealed through the night. “You are completely surrounded. Put down your weapons and—”

  I never heard the rest as an immense blast from a DNA Glock drowned out his words. I’d become familiar with that sound, and I knew it had to come from Roarke, or one of who-knew-how-many other Synthetics that were sent back to reshape this night. But why this night? I didn’t have time to think about it as the air ignited in a deafening symphony of gunfire. This situation was happening all too often—what was it, three, four times now?—and I knew that sooner or later, any of us could become a victim of the crossfire. This time, we were totally defenseless, and it seemed like we were on the receiving end of the instant onslaught. Remington and I pressed ourselves into a single, shivering mass, while Johnny was laid out next to me, still moaning from having been zapped. I remember being scared during the previous episodes of being shot at, thinking that I could never be more frightened. Not.

  The first thing that happened was that the Synthetic at the back door went down when a bullet tore right through the wall and his upper thigh like it was pudding. Remington and I tried to burrow into the floor as he lay there screaming.

  “Must have cut an artery,” she said as blood gushed from the wound. I mean, it was spurting out of the poor slob, and as much as I hate to admit it, listening to his screams I realized that Synthetics were human.

  “Stay down!” I hollered as bullets ripped through the house and zinged through the air above us.

  The Synthetic who’d zapped Johnny dove to the floor and, keeping his eye on us the whole time, slithered over to try and pull his partner out of harm’s way. Big mistake. Bullets were pinging and whistling all over the damned place, and Remington and I cringed with every report.

  “My pants,” Remington screamed as several booming DNA-Glock blasts obliterated any other sound. Roarke and the Synthetics were returning fire.

  “What about your pants?” I yelled above the pandemonium.

  “Put your hand down my pants!” she shouted.

  A slug thudded nearby. “What? Now?”

  “I have a pair of scissors stuffed down my pants… from the bathroom. C’mon Pappas. Do it now!”

  “Where down your pants?” The Synthetic made it to the back door and started firing through the shattered window. The blasts were huge, awful-sounding, and deafening.

  “Jesus, Pappas, right here down my pants, okay? Put your hand down there before I end up cutting myself open.”

  I looked at her pants: they were jeans, which were what she usually wore, and tight. Somehow, I had to get into position to get my hands, which were cinched behind me, down there. Did I say her jeans were tight? Anyway, she wiggled around and managed to prop her elbows behind her, her flat stomach and belt line an offering to me. The Synthetic clipped off two more rounds that sounded like cannon fire. Temporarily, we were the least of his worries. I found myself looking into Remington’s crotch only a foot away.

  “C’mon, Pappas. Get in there!”

  Of all the times to have her beg for me to get into her pants…. I scooted around so that my hands were in position just as a bullet whistled past my nose and exploded into the TV across the room. I expected to feel denim when I felt fingers instead, Johnny’s fingers, who was already in position and had her pants undone.

  I turned as another bullet splintered a doorjamb only a few feet away. “What the hell are you doing, kid?”

  “She said, ‘C’mon Pappas.’ I thought she was talking to me.”

  “Hey, snot-nose, this isn’t buried treasure!” Remington shouted, and suddenly they were there, in Johnny’s hand, a small pair of cuticle scissors, but scissors nonetheless.

  “Can you get your fingers in the handles?” I said to Johnny as footfalls pounded up the outside stairs.

  What sounded like a shotgun blast ripped through the back door, and the other Synthetic went down, blood oozing from buckshot spray in his neck. I could hear voices from outside now, Roarke’s unmistakable voice among them, screaming orders in between bursts of gunfire.

  “I think I have it,” Johnny called amid the clamor.

  I looked. He did have it, his long, thin fingers gripping the cuticle scissors. My first thought was that the scissors wouldn’t be strong enough to cut through the metallic tape around our wrists, but it was our only hope of freeing ourselves before Roarke and his men crashed through the front door. In my mind, there were only two possibilities if that happened: the first was teleportation back to Red Diamond territory, which meant we’d be fish food; the second was that he’d kill us now in order to abort our mission.

  I turned and shoved my wrists at those cuticle scissors until I felt them gouge my arm. “Cut!” I called out, and I felt the small blades clamp onto the magnetic tape. “Cut, cut, cut!” I yelled again, and Johnny kept pushing on those handles.

  “Nothing is happening,” he called out, and Remington scooted around to take a look.

  “No, you have it,” she yelled. “Do it harder.”

  Johnny renewed his effort and kept squeezing the handles. I could feel the blades working on the magnetic tape, when suddenly I felt a surge of power bolt through my body. I was being zapped, electrically, as if I’d shoved my finger into a light socket. Johnny recoiled and dropped the scissors as a similar bolt of energy knifed through his body. The smell of burnt skin instantly filled my nostrils, and pain suddenly flooded through me. Johnny lay there moaning as if he’d just been punched in the head.

  Remington went for the scissors, and said, “Let me try.”

  “No!” I called out. “If the same thing happens to you, none of us will get free.” Roarke’s voice was more prominent, just outside the door. “Johnny,” I said. “Get up.” Nothing doing. He could barely move. More shots rang out, rapid pops, off in the distance, and I felt the floor vibrate as more bullets crashed into the house somewhere.

  “We’ve got to do something,” Remington cried out.

  Normally I would have said something like, “Gee, thanks for the update,” but I didn’t have time to be a smart-ass. I knew wholeheartedly that if Roarke made it back inside, it could be curtains for us. I looked around. Maybe we could crawl out the back door, and indeed Remington and I probably could, but I wasn’t about to leave Johnny behind. Neither of the Synthetics was moving now, their blood mingling together in a huge puddle on the kitchen floor. Remington kicked me in the back.

  “Magnets,” she shouted. “On the refrigerator.”

  I turned. I saw them. “So?�
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  “Have you ever heard the word electromagnetic?”

  I had, of course, but I didn’t know a damned thing about it. I also didn’t have a better idea, and I didn’t have time to object. I crawled to the fridge and looked at the assortment of magnets stuck there pinning messages, shopping lists, coupons, all kinds of crap, to the refrigerator. Standing, I picked one shaped like an apple that I could remove with my teeth, noticing as I did that the piece of paper beneath it had today’s date on it, Saturday, March 25th, with the words anniversary suite, Bally’s, $250. I thought: the Robelles weren’t even here. They were celebrating their anniversary in Atlantic City. Fuckin’ A. All of this was for nothing. But wait. Roarke was here reshaping this event, so certainly he knew the Robelles were off doing what he needed them to do, which was conceiving David. So what event was he reshaping?

  I heard a cough and turned to see Johnny crawling toward me. His eyes latched onto mine, and even from a distance I knew he could sense my uncertainty. As if he was inside my head, he called, “If Roarke is here to reshape an event, he wouldn’t be here reshaping one that worked to his advantage. He’s here to stop you, which means that he must know how this event has turned out before.”

  I stayed focused on Johnny as he kept coming. He was me, and I was him, and I knew that what he’d just said was true. I’d been here before, and, somehow, I must have been successful. It made sense. That’s why Roarke was so focused on me throughout this whole ordeal. But why didn’t I remember any of this? The answer to that came instantly. The only way I wouldn’t remember this would be if it had been wiped from my memory, which meant I’d gone through a memory cleanse. Vishal, that bastard; he was using me.

  As Johnny crawled up to me, I said, “If he wants to stop me, that means he wants to stop you as well. You know that, don’t you?”