There
was a loud whirring sound and my surroundings began to fade and fizzle away –
the stark contrast of bright colors on the stage against the dark, drab colors
of Victorian attire and top hats of the audience below; the look of
astonishment on the would-be assassin’s face as he crumpled to the floor, only
feet away from his target: it all melted into nothingness. The tall, bearded
man seated in the state box would never know; the world would never know. But
we knew. This is why I was here.
Old
Ford’s theater melted away into nothingness. A moment later, the hatch of the
pod hissed and then opened. I lifted my headgear and emerged from the pod to
the thunderous applause of the entire bunker: dispatch, coordinators, officers,
fellow pilots, cadets, janitors, everybody. I could feel a smile creeping
across my face. The ovation grew louder as I began to bow and wave in all
directions. As I finally began to make my way down the platform, the crowd
began to chant my name – “Jen-kins! Jen-kins! Jen-kins!” I hurried through the throng of bodies,
tucked the warm, glowing crystal away in my pocket and ducked into the
debriefing office at the far end of the flight deck.
Major
Reynolds didn’t even look up as I burst through the door. I dropped my gear on
the floor and flung myself into the chair across from the Major’s desk.
“Told
you I could do it.” No response from Reynolds. His eyes remained fixed on his
paperwork. I grinned. Game on.
“’That’s
technologically impossible!’” I began, in a mocking tone. “‘Altering history?
Would the time-space continuum withstand such a drastic change? Will we still
be here when he gets back? If he succeeds at all?’” I paused for dramatic
effect.
“All
that discussion, all those secret meetings, back and forth, wasted time and
effort; and all you had to do was say the word, throw the bone and watch me
fetch it.” Reynolds was silent. I pressed on.
“You
see, Major, I’m just a really big dog. Like you, Napoleon.” The Major’s fluffy
white pooch growled at me from within its cage. “I am perfectly content to just
lie around, take up space and beg for treats,” I winked at the dog. “But you can choose to feed me, train me,
nurture me, and even take me out for the occasional walk. A dog’s gotta get out
and stretch his legs or he’ll start to make trouble and poop on the floor, putting
dirty stains all over your years of hard work.”
For
the first time, Reynolds looked up. It was more of sharp glance, but that was
all I needed. I leaned forward.
“Just
throw me a bone, Major. And I’ll go get it, no questions asked.”
I
sat back in my chair and clasped my hands behind my head. I was about to put my
feet up on the desk as well but thought better of it.
“Are
you finished?”
“I
can keep going if you like.”
“I’d
rather you not, Captain.” As rebuking as Reynolds sounded, there was a hint of
mischief in his eyes as he said it. “How long did it take you to memorize that
one?”
“Believe
it or not, I actually came up with that myself.”
“Oh,
I don’t doubt it.” Reynolds paused a moment, then returned to business. “Have
you run your after-action TDP yet?”
“Um,
no I haven’t had my trans-chronicle particle decontamination shower yet… sir."
“Then
what in the hell are you doing here?”
“I
wanted to see you, of course.”
“Jenkins—!”
“Relax
Pops, I’ll get to it. You know it’s me; c’mon, why would anybody as brilliant
as myself wanna alter their genetic make-up? Does that even make any sense?
It’s not like I’m gonna die if I don’t take a shower right away. You just gotta
learn to trust me; let me do my thing. I’m a big kid now remember? I can handle
big boy underwear. You’ll see, at the end of the day, the brass will be happy, you’ll
look good, I’ll look even better and everybody goes home a winner. You, my
friend, just need to have a little faith.”
I
waited for Reynolds to respond or react, to lash out at me or strike back.
Shoot, I was due a promotion after my performance today; it wouldn’t surprise
me at all if he busted out the lieutenants stripes right now. But he was
silent. The smile slowly melted off my face as he stared into me; the anger and
displeasure I expected to see was strangely absent. There was something else in
his eyes that I had not seen before; it stopped me in my tracks and made my
blood run cold.
“I
have another assignment for you, Captain.”
“Uhh,
Major?” I was confused. “No debrief?”
“This
is… straight from the top.”
I
frowned. “Aren’t they all?”
He
slid a manila folder across the desk. ‘Top Secret’ of course. The cover didn’t
scare me. But the contents of the folder did. A line at the bottom of the first
page jumped out at me. ‘This operation will implement a new and untested form
of time navigation – a reversal of particle distribution that will allow the
pilot to navigate his/her flight through events that have yet to be established
in the time-space continuum…’
My
eyes grew wide. “That’s impossible,” I breathed. “You said it was
scientifically impossible!”
“It
is.”
My
mouth hung open. I was at a loss; I didn’t know what to say.
“Ever
since the discovery of this method of travel and the creation of this unit, our
primary objective has been repairing the past to create a better future.”
Reynolds spoke in reverent tones. “Little by little, we worked to tweak minor
details of the past, small things, cleaning up this mess that the world calls
‘history.’ Today we took the first major step in rebuilding history in a way
that has never been done before; in a way that betters all of mankind. But now
we have found a way to skip the first step entirely. We will decide the future; we
will create our own destiny—one mission at a time.”
The
future. The words were stuck in my throat.
“This
is strictly off the books,” Reynolds said. “This meeting and this assignment
never happened. Are we clear?”
“Yes
sir.”
I
had several hours to sleep and prepare myself for this undertaking. Sleep was
scarce that night; my nightly routine of nausea and vomiting from skipping my
TDP was the main culprit. It didn’t bother me as much as it used to; it was a
sacrifice I was willing to make.
I
read the through the information Reynolds had given me for the fifth time; it
still didn’t make any sense. As I knelt next to the toilet for what seemed like
hours, I tried to wrap my mind around the task before me; so many unanswered
questions to tackle. Fixing “minor things” in the past was trippy enough but
altering the future? That was like cheating. There was no need to travel to the
future if a person could alter the past, right? Neither my conscience nor my
stomach felt right that night. I filed this away in a special place, with all
the other discrepancies that I had noted and returned the service log back in
its place, next to the collection of stolen power crystals.
I
cleaned myself up the best I could before I made my way back to the flight deck
at 0200 hours. The large room that had been full of people cheering me on the
day before was now fairly empty, except for flight personnel and Major Reynolds
waiting for me at my pod. I went through the pre-flight procedures and the
added precautions that the complications this new flight would present. As I
was about to secure my helmet, I suddenly remember something important.
“Major,
wait… What am I supposed to be doing? The mission report didn’t specify a
target or a real objective. Who am I supposed to kill?”
“You’ll
know,” was his reply. I felt a pang of fear in my stomach and cold shiver shoot
down my spine as everything faded away.
If
going to the past was like flying an airplane high in the sky and using streets
on the ground to reach the destination, going forward to the future was like
trying to find a road that doesn’t exist from 40,000 feet and predicting where
that nonexistent road will end. More like trying to jam a human being through
one specific opening in a cheese grater. Picking one possibility in the millions
that exist in the future and then trying to reach a specific one is not only
physically impossible, it’s extremely painful. Being stretched and warped,
dematerialized and then put back together again was too much to handle. I puked
in my helmet and then blacked out.
I woke
up a pool of blood. Pain racked my side and my head throbbed. Everything seemed
very far away and unreal, like a bad dream. I rolled over to see a man standing
over me. I could have sworn I had seen him before but I didn’t know where.
“I
knew you would come,” he said. “I knew they would send you. You knew that as
well, that’s why you played the part flawlessly; you knew it would come to this.
You also know that both of us cannot exist, therefore I cannot allow you to
return. I’m sorry, Jenkins.”
For
the first time, I noticed the weapon he clutched in his hand and the glowing
crystal he held in the other.
Then
I knew who he was. He was right.