Breaking Time
Page 3
“Mom? Dad?”
His dad went over to his mom. And suddenly, everything – his parents, the furniture, the walls, the bike – all faded to white.
Back in the mirrored room inside the pyramid, the sphere reappeared over the pedestal.
Dawn was in human form again, putting back on the last of her clothes. She looked and saw the manifesting sphere. “Ray?”
The sphere grew larger and larger, and suddenly, Ray got spit out – launching several feet away through the air. “Whoaaaaa!!!” he yelled, unintentionally flying.
“Ray!”
But right before landing hard on the floor, he held his hands out – and magically delayed his fall, allowed him to descend gently, and he landed softly on his feet.
“Wow! You got powers too!” Dawn exclaimed.
“What?”
“Look what I can do!” Dawn shouted excitedly. She closed her eyes, concentrated, and focused her emotions. Suddenly she began shape-shifting her face and appearance. She stayed human, but changed her hair color, made her breasts bigger, and shifted the overall shape and appearance of her body. Within seconds, she looked like a completely different woman. Different face. Different hair. Different everything.
“What?” Ray stared in disbelief and confusion.
“That’s not all I can do,” she said. “I can do animals too!”
“What?”
“You’re getting repetitive, Ray. Try to keep up.”
“I don’t… you’re saying you’re a… a changeling?”
“That’s right,” she nodded excitedly. She shifted back into her normal form, height, weight, and appearance.
Ray smiled. “You’re prettier this way.”
She blushed.
“But why… how did… how come you can suddenly do this? How long was I gone?”
She shrugged. “I guess it’s a side-effect of that chemical they injected me with. But forget about that – how’d you get your power!”
“What? Oh… I’m not sure, to be honest.” He seemed a little disoriented. “To be honest, I’m not even sure I’m really here. Are you real?”
She laughed. “Yes, silly, of course I’m real!” She walked up to him and hugged him. And then kissed him.
“Definitely real,” he said.
“Where’d you go? What happened to you?” she begged to know.
“I’m not sure. I saw… my parents. When I was a kid. The day they broke up and my dad left… It was… difficult.”
She hugged him again.
He seemed lost in thought, still recovering, still processing his experience.
“You okay?”
“I think so. I will be. That place – wherever I went – it really messes with you.”
“But it gave you a real-life super power, too! Just like in the comic books!”
He laughed. “My roommate would be so jealous if he was here right now.”
“So what can you do, exactly?”
“Well, I didn’t get an instruction manual or anything, but I seem to be able to move objects with my mind.”
“You did more than that,” said Dawn. “You levitated. You slowed down your fall.”
“Yeah,” he said, looking at the distance he traveled from the pedestal, and the floor where he now stood. “I guess I did.”
She hugged him again. “This is so cool. We got powers!”
He laughed. “Keep saying it. It doesn’t make it any easier to believe.”
“Seriously. I was a turtle, then a bird, and a cat, and then I was a—”
“How long was I gone?”
“Oh, I dunno. Fifteen minutes? Maybe less.”
“Fifteen minutes!” he exclaimed. It seemed a lot longer than that.
“Or less,” she said.
“Whatever. It’s not important. We still need to find Luke.”
“This place is enormous,” said Dawn.
“I know. And we’re not even sure he came in here.”
But Luke was a lot closer than they realized.
Helping his uncle limp along, they climbed up the narrow and twisting tunnel, around the bend, and suddenly stepped into an open room.
Unlike the cave before, this place had been carved out. The walls were perfectly flat. The room was evenly square. The humming noise was quite loud – and they now knew what was causing it.
A large metal cylinder extended from ceiling to floor, with bright glowing red lights on the outside. It gave off a lot of heat, too. It was artificial and mechanical, whatever it was. It seemed to extend higher up through the ceiling, and deeper down through the floor.
And a lone control panel with several buttons and a video screen hung on the cylinder’s side.
“This is it,” said his uncle, struggling to hide the pain.
“The healing chamber?”
“No. Take me to the console.”
Luke helped his uncle limp up to the control panel. It had several buttons, much like a keyboard, but all marked with strange alien writing and symbols. “What is this thing?”
His uncle looked at the large cylinder. “No idea.”
Suddenly its humming went quiet, like it was powering down. The red glow dimmed almost completely off. It was too dark for Luke to see anymore. But his uncle, barely, still could.
“If I remember correctly, one of these is the recall button.”
“Recall button? Uncle, when you’re all better, you’re going to tell me everything, right?”
“I think it’s…” Charlie pressed a button.
A circle of white light instantly appeared around their feet, lifted up into the air above them, and both they and the circle of light disappeared.
Elsewhere, the same circle of white light appeared on the floor, lifting up, causing them to appear.
There were in another room entirely. A large hexagonal room, with three circle platforms side by side along the floor. They stood in the center one.
They were inside the pyramid now, although they didn’t know it right away. The same small lights lined the walls. The ceiling was high. The walls were made of the strange metal alloy. The air was cool and conditioned.
Luke took a relaxing breath.
“This way,” urged his uncle.
The left that room, entering the long narrow corridors. His uncle looked left and then right. Either direction appeared pretty much the same. He leaned up against the wall. Placed his palm flat to the surface.
Suddenly a section of that wall came to life, illuminating with text, symbols, icons, menus, and more.
Luke’s jaw dropped. He was in nerd heaven. A touch-based interactive computer monitor built into and hidden within the walls? Awesome!
“Healing chamber,” his uncle spoke to wall.
A map of their current location suddenly displayed. Then a red dotted line appeared from their current location, showing them which way to go, turn by turn, to get to the desired room.
Charlie memorized the directions. Then he placed his hand flat on the wall a second time, and the screen menus disappeared. It looked like a completely ordinary empty metal wall again.
Luke shook his head. “You’ve got a lot of secrets, Uncle.”
Charlie smiled. “This way.”
With Luke helping him along, together they limped down the hallways, made the correct turns, and soon enough arrived at the doorway.
His uncle pressed the blue button. The door rolled open to the side. They walked in.
This room looked like a full-scale medical lab loaded with only the coolest high-tech stuff that most movies never even dreamed of. There were beds, imaging chambers, glass cylinder stasis pods, all kinds of electronics and various machines that even Luke could scarcely imagine what they were used for. A variety of alien tools, high-tech scanners, medical supplies, computer screens, and all sorts of stuff. And all very clean, white, and sterile.
“Help me onto the bed,” his uncle said.
Luke helped him onto the nearest bed. His uncle laid down.
On one hand, this was so cool for Luke. Never in his wildest dreams did he ever imagine coming to a place like this. On the other hand, his uncle was in pretty bad shape. In this better lighting, he saw just how bad the wounds were. It was amazing the man survived this long.
“I’ll be fine,” said Charlie, reading Luke’s concerned face. “Just give it a sec.”
A hologram suddenly appeared beside Charlie’s bed. It was a 3-D, realistic, lifelike, fully-animated representation of an actual human doctor – lab coat and all. The doctor had a friendly, kind face. It was clearly a hologram. But it almost looked like it had substance.
And then it spoke.
“I’ve completed my diagnostic,” he said. “Are you ready to be repaired?”
“Yes, heal me,” said Charlie.
Luke just watched in awe.
The holographic doctor grabbed one of the nearby devices. It looked like some kind of spray gun, like something you might use to paint small surfaces with. He held it over Charlie’s wounds and began spraying a fine mist. His uncle’s skin immediately began repairing itself, and within seconds, looked good as new.
“Your external wounds have been repaired,” said the holographic doctor. “Please wait for immunization. You have been infected by an unknown virus.”
“Unknown?” Luke repeated. “Are they sure they can cure it?”
“Relax Luke,” said Charlie, laughing for the first time in far too long. “Their medicine’s a little more advanced than ours.”
“No kidding!”
“Please lay still for this procedure,” said the doctor.
A beam of blue-green light shined from overhead, slowly passing over every inch of Charlie’s body.
“The virus has been removed,” said the doctor. “You have lost some blood and need to be refilled. Please wait.”
“Told you,” said Charlie.
Luke shook his head in disbelief, but smiled.
“Your blood type has been replicated. Your lost blood will now be replaced.”
The doctor held a small, flat, round device over Charlie’s heart. He held it there for several seconds. Charlie immediately started feeling much better. A few seconds more, and then doctor removed the device.
“All repairs have been completed. Please wait for final diagnostic.”
Different lights from overhead scanned Charlie again, just like before when he first laid down on the bed. A few seconds later, they stopped.
“Confirmed. No additional repairs needed. You are cleared to go.” And suddenly, the holographic doctor disappeared.
“Uncle?”
Charlie sat up and looked himself over. Even the blood had been cleaned out of his clothes. He lifted his shirt and checked his wounds. All gone. No trace. Not even a scar. It was as if he had never been injured.
“That’s incredible.”
“You’re telling me!” he laughed. “And just a tad bit better than a hospital back on Earth.”
“Uh, yeah. Just a tad.”
Charlie hopped down off the bed and onto his feet. He felt like a new man.
“So now what? We’re gonna—?”
“Shh,” said his uncle. “You hear that? Voices.”
Luke listened. He did hear voices, coming from just down the hall. Shit. He suddenly realized he and his uncle were inside some kind of alien facility and just used their technology without authorization. Had these aliens even ever seen a human before? They must have – the holographic doctor looked human. Were the aliens human too? Maybe they weren’t aliens at all – maybe this entire facility was from the future! Or… maybe…
No, wait, one of those voices sounded really familiar.
“Ray?” he remarked.
Luke ran out into the hall.
He saw Ray and some cute blonde girl, carrying backpacks, wandering down the hallway. “Ray!”
“Luke!”
They ran toward each other. Gave each other a big hug. And then realized how gay that probably looked, even though they were best friends. They were in the presence of a hot girl, of course, so they stopped hugging and shook hands firmly. “Good to see you.”
“What the heck are you doing here?” Luke exclaimed.
“Well, I… we…”
“The portal! Doh!” Luke slapped his forehead. “I left that open at the apartment. You came home and saw it, didn’t you?”
“You could say that. Anyway,” said Ray, “this is Dawn, the date I told you about.”
“Oh,” said Luke. He shook her hand. “Nice to meet you.”
“I’ve heard so much about you,” she said.
“Ray and I go way back,” Luke said.
“Yeah. All the way back to college,” Ray added.
Dawn smiled. “I’m glad you’re safe.”
Charlie leaned against the doorway. “So, you going to introduce me anytime soon?”
“Of course!” said Luke. “Ray, you already know my uncle. Dawn, this is my uncle, Charlie.”
“Nice to meet you,” she said, shaking his hand.
“Oh my gosh, you’ll never guess what just happened!” exclaimed Luke. “This hologram just healed Uncle Charlie with some kind of spray gun after we used this teleporter to get inside and when he pressed his hand to the wall a computer screen appeared and there was this giant snake with eight eyes and it almost ate us but trapped us in this web instead, and I have this crystal that opens portals and stuff, and we fell down a giant pit in the desert and almost drowned!”
Ray and Dawn just stared at him like deer in headlights, trying to keep up. “What?” they both said.
Charlie placed his hand on Luke’s shoulder. “That’s my favorite nephew. Always up for an adventure.”
Ray said, “I’m glad we found you. We were getting pretty worried. We weren’t even sure if we should be looking for you here.”
“Good thing we did, huh?” said Dawn, proudly. It was, after all, her idea.
“How did,” said Ray, “I mean, why is there a portal back in our living room? Do you know how it got there?”
“Well…” said Luke. “That’s a long story.”
“One for another time,” said Charlie.
“So do you also have powers?” asked Dawn.
“What? No. It’s this crystal. It creates the portals,” said Luke. “Wait. What do you mean, ‘also’?”
Ray chuckled. He wasn’t sure how to tell his friend this. “Well buddy, there was this… well, yeah, you could call him a super villain, and he injected Dawn with some chemical… and now she can shape-shift.”
“WHAT?!”
“And,” enthusiastically added Dawn, “Ray disappeared into this alternate dimension or something, and when he came back, he can move objects with his mind!”
“Wait, wait, wait,” said Luke, looking at his uncle and the two of them. “Do you mean to tell me that I’m the only one here without any powers?”
“What? Charlie’s got powers too?” asked Ray.
“How is that fair?” said Luke.
Chapter Two
Monsters
A zillion light-years away back on Earth, in the city that doesn’t sleep… No wait, that’s New York City. Los Angeles is the City of Angels. Land of the fruits and nuts. Home of the LA Lakers, the famous Hollywood sign, and the Walt Disney Concert Hall. A city with countless millions of people, most of them good and decent hard-working Americans… or unemployed aspiring actors and writers, but we love them too.
But tonight, right now, none of those other people mattered. They could’ve all been robbing banks, stealing cars, and speeding through every red light in town. Right now, every police officer was on alert and in hot pursuit of just one man.
Mastermind.
Of course, they didn’t know him by that
name. Not yet. He was just a “John Doe” they picked up – who then made an embarrassment and mockery out of some of their finest uniformed men and women. Too many good cops lost their lives that night. The claim that he had some kind of “mind control” power no longer seemed so silly. A grave mistake they would never repeat again.
This asshole was going down.
After he mind-controlled several officers at the station and turned them against each other in an open fire fight, he freed his accomplices plus five other arrested perps – and they all escaped in an armored police van.
But that was his mistake. Because every one of their vehicles had GPS tracking. They knew exactly where he was and where he was going.
Interstate 5. Northbound. Cruising along at a nice and steady 72 miles per hour.
It was the middle of the night, so there wasn’t much traffic. The highway onramps and exits had all been blocked off. Six police cars chased up from the rear. Another four joined in farther up ahead. And six more came from ahead, traveling south on the northbound side, preparing to trap and block him in.
They had him. They controlled all the exits. They raced ahead in every direction, ready to box him in and take him down.
Two police helicopters flew overhead, beaming a pair of spotlights down on the fleeing police van.
And it wasn’t long before the news media was swarming the area with their own helicopters. Reporters pointed their cameras down at the freeway, filming it all as it happened. Of course, most people wouldn’t see any of this until the morning news as they sipped their cups of coffee. But the few people who were awake right now and watching TV – they’d get to watch it all gone down, live, and on camera.
“I’m Alex Alvarado reporting for NBS News. You are looking at live footage of the Golden State Freeway. The black police van moving right on your screen was stolen less than fifteen minutes ago from an unidentified criminal who was arrested earlier this evening. He escaped from police custody and is considered armed and extremely dangerous. The LAPD has blocked off all exits and onramps to the I-5 Northbound freeway in an attempt to box in this fugitive and prevent further casualties. He’s wanted for the murder of over twelve LAPD officers and attempted murder of several more. We believe the fugitive is driving with seven other recently arrested persons – all arrested for various crimes from drug dealing to illegal human experimentation. The fugitive’s connection to these individuals is unknown at this time, but they appear to be headed into Santa Clarita or beyond.”