“Nearly two hours,” Craig replied.
Paine nodded. “And this ship takes about two hours to sink, am I right?”
“In our universe, yes, but—”
“And how long ago was the collision with the iceberg?”
“About twenty minutes ago,” Craig replied, “but the ship’s not sinking.”
Paine’s eyebrows knitted above his computerized eyes. “What?”
“The Titanic isn’t sinking. It rammed the iceberg head on. The collision damaged the hull but didn’t breach it. We’re safe. Everyone is safe.”
Paine stood to his feet, suddenly alarmed. “Are you telling me that even after all that damage, this ship isn’t going down?”
“Affirmative, sir,” Craig replied, smiling. “I pushed the ship straight on into the iceberg. The A.I. said that was the best way to keep the ship from foundering.”
“The A.I.,” Paine replied with a sneer. “Of course. Of course it would say that.” The colonel paced away from the trio of men and left them sitting in their chairs for a few moments as he mulled over his next move. His cybernetic hand stroked his chin as he worked his way through the scenario, moving toward the correct strategic decision. Finally, he turned to the men and announced, “Men, we have to sink this ship.”
“What?” Craig reacted, astounded. “Why?”
“Doc,” Paine began with a sigh, “I respect you. I respect the hell outta you. You always put the lives of others before your own. I wish more soldiers had your qualities.”
“90 percent chance that he’s being honest,” the A.I. noted.
“However, this is one of those extremely rare instances when saving the lives of thousands of innocent people comes at the cost of putting the lives of innumerable other people at risk.”
“Sir, with all due respect—”
“Think about the consequences of your actions,” Paine said, cutting Craig off. “You’ve altered the natural history of this timeline.”
“Natural?”
“Not only are you keeping the 1,500 people who are supposed to die tonight alive, causing a cascading effect that can’t be measured, but you’ve also managed to make your presence known to everyone on this damn ship. I even saw a kid on the deck with a damn camera. Do you realize that if this ship makes it into port, our picture is going to be on the cover of every major newspaper in the world?”
“And that’s a bad thing?”
“Doc!” Paine suddenly shouted. “We’ve exposed these people to technology a century and a half ahead of where they currently are. You even left your jacket in this room while you were off playing superhero. What if someone had taken it while you were gone and examined the tech? What if they succeed in reengineering it? I mean, for Christ’s sake, son, for a soldier who’s supposed to be trained in covert insertions, you’ve been clumsy as all hell. And don’t think I didn’t notice that handcuff you’ve got around your wrist. You’ve been into all kinds of trouble already.”
“None of this means that people should die,” Craig continued to protest. “Just so we can protect the ‘natural history’ of this timeline, whatever that means!”
“Jesus,” Paine grunted in frustration as he pulled out his neutralizer and fired at Craig’s midsection. Craig groaned and doubled over once again. “Doc, they’ve got pictures of the Planck platform. They saw us appear out of nowhere. What if they use those pictures to develop Planck technology? What if they use it to interfere in other universes, just as you have? How would you feel knowing that you’d spread that can of worms throughout the multiverse? Knowing that, because of you, people from another universe could enter ours and manipulate it for their own ends?”
“It’s all what-ifs!” Craig suddenly yelled, exasperated as he struggled to stand. “All of it! You’re willing to kill over 2,000 people because you’re afraid bad things might happen if you don’t?”
Paine stood straight, his mouth slightly open as his golden eyes burned into Craig. “I’m not going to hold this against you, Doc,” he said in a low voice, trying to remain calm and affect an understanding tone. “You’re understandably confused right now. For all I know, the A.I. might be manipulating your thinking.”
“The A.I. has nothing to do with it. This is all me, Colonel. You can’t kill these people. It would be...monstrous!”
“Monstrous?” Paine suddenly lost his cool and strode toward Craig, clutching the front of his shirt with his powerful prosthetic arm and lifting him, jamming Craig’s back against the hot mahogany above the mantel of the fireplace. “No, Doc, let me tell you about monstrous. Monstrous is creating a species that could wipe out humanity! Monstrous is interfering with the timeline of another universe! Monstrous is unilaterally deciding that you have the right to play God! Well, Doc, there’s only one true God, and He planned for this ship to go down. Who the hell are you or I to decide different?” Paine released Craig and let him slide down to the ground, where he stumbled to his knees in front of the fire. “So what’s it going to be, Doc? Are you with us or against us? Am I going to have a problem with you?”
Craig clutched his chest where the sharp claws of Paine’s fingers had scratched his skin raw. He clenched his teeth and seethed in reply, “If your plan is to sink this ship and let these people die, drowning, being trampled, or freezing to death in the middle of the ocean—men, women, children, babies—then yeah, you’re going to have a problem with me.”
Paine’s face remained frozen for a moment before he finally turned to Drummey. “From this moment on, treat the doc here like a hostile prisoner. If he resists or tries to escape, you have permission to shoot him with your rifle, but no kill shots, understand? We need him alive so we can extract the A.I.”
“Yes, sir,” Drummey replied. He bent down and used the cuffs that were already around Craig’s left wrist, closing the second bracelet over his right wrist to secure his prisoner.
“Degrechie,” Paine said to the other soldier, “it’s up to us to sink this tin can. We’ve gotta get below decks and blow a big enough hole in the bottom of the Titanic to make sure nobody onboard lives to tell this tale.”
28
“Craig, your life is in serious danger,” the A.I. warned as Craig was dragged by the scruff of his neck toward the Purists’ Planck platform.
Even at six-five, without his MTF generator functioning, Craig was helpless against the strength of the super soldier prosthetics. Drummey manhandled Craig as though the post-human were nothing but a small child, pulling him with ease down the steps toward the front deck of the Titanic.
Ismay spotted the bizarre spectacle and shouted down to Drummey from the bridge, “You there! Who are you, and where are you taking that criminal? What right do you have to be here?”
Drummey didn’t even have to turn his head. Instead, using the intelligent system in his rifle and his aug glasses, he uttered, “Kill shot,” thereby setting the rifle to use the most devastatingly frangible bullet it had. His left arm moved automatically, guided by the computer system, and it immediately locked the rifle on Ismay’s face. A fraction of a second later, the gun blasted forth a hollow-point projectile that hit its target squarely in the nose, sinking into Ismay’s face and fragmenting, nearly liquefying the inside of the man’s skull without even causing an exit wound.
Ismay collapsed to the ground, never having known what hit him.
Craig’s teeth clenched furiously as he struggled against the right prosthetic arm of the super soldier before it tossed him to the ground, just two meters in front of the Planck platform.
“On your knees!” Drummey shouted.
Craig struggled to move his legs, which were numb thanks to the effects of the neutralizer blasts. “You—you can’t let them do this,” Craig said. “You’re supposed to protect the innocent.”
“Shut up,” Drummey replied before shooting Craig with his neutralizer once again.
Craig groaned as the MTF shimmied next to his spine, the vibrations causing severe spasms in his back and
legs.
The A.I.’s image suddenly appeared in Craig’s mind’s eye. “Listen to me, Craig. There will be no reasoning with these people. The passengers on the Titanic are lost.”
“I can’t let them die,” Craig replied weakly.
“Shut up,” Drummey repeated. “The colonel won’t let me kill you, but I swear to God that I’ll shoot you in the most painful place I can think of if you speak again.”
“He will shoot you, Craig,” the A.I. Confirmed, “and they will remove your MTF implant in a most gruesome manner. The only reason they haven’t already removed it is because Colonel Paine truly hoped to be able to reason with you and spare you the excruciating pain, but his patience has reached its end. Craig, you have to escape. I’m wirelessly reprogramming the Purists’ Planck platform as we speak. Although I cannot change the course we are on, I can activate the device early and take us into the next universe.”
Craig couldn’t respond verbally, so he shook his head instead.
“What was that?” Drummey asked. “You communicating to your rider?”
“Can I speak now?”
“Of course you can, Goddamnit! If I speak to you, you answer!”
“Yes, it’s speaking to me.”
“Stop doing that. If you speak to it again, I’ll shoot you.”
“What happened to the post-humans at their facility?” Craig demanded, risking his mortal safety to do so. “Are they prisoners?”
Drummey smiled. “We didn’t take prisoners. We’ve got one VIP alive, and the rest are dead.”
Craig’s mouth fell open as his lips pulled back into a horrified expression.
“Craig,” the A.I. informed, “there’s a 97 percent chance he’s telling the truth.”
“Is the VIP you have...is it Samantha Gibson?”
Drummey shook his head and chuckled. “Your ex-wife? Nah. She’s dead. The colonel cut that pretty little head clean off.”
Craig began shaking as his chest heaved. He was having difficulty breathing as the shock of hearing of his wife’s demise quickly overwhelmed him.
“There is a 99 percent chance of truthfulness, Craig. I am sorry,” the A.I. said.
“You’re all upset right now,” Drummey said, still grinning, “but think about it, bro. Really, the colonel did you a favor. You were married to the most dangerous woman alive. Disloyal to her country, to her species, and to you.”
“You need to keep calm, Craig,” the A.I. urgently warned. “Your heart rate is accelerating, but if you act rashly now, you’ll not only hurt yourself, but you will endanger the future as well.”
Drummey watched Craig’s fury boiling and suddenly lifted his rifle, resting it casually on his shoulder, amused. “You seriously think you’d have a chance, big fella? If I let you out of those cuffs and gave you the first punch, you think you’d be able to knock me out? Huh? You want to try that?”
“Craig!” the A.I. shouted. “He’ll beat you until you’re close to dead—and post-humans do not die easily. You must remain calm. If you don’t, Samantha will have died for nothing.”
Samantha...dead. The words brought Craig back from the brink of insanity. If it were true—if she were dead—then she gave her life for a reason. Craig bowed his head obediently, abandoning his challenge.
“That’s what I thought,” Drummey scoffed, feeling victorious.
Craig stepped to the Planck platform and knelt, keeping his head bowed. Drummey grinned. “Good boy. Now you just stay hushed there, ya hear? Let the grownups do their work, and then we’ll be right with you.” He chuckled.
“Excellent work, Craig,” the A.I. said, a tone of relief in his voice. “I’m initiating the Planck effect. Brace yourself. We’ll be in Universe 332 momentarily.”
Craig looked up at the ship he’d helped save and was now abandoning. He’d never felt like such a coward in his life. He closed his eyes and waited for the next horror to appear.
A second later, Drummey was left looking at the empty space where his prisoner and his ride home once were. “Uh oh,” he whispered. He wasn’t looking forward to informing the colonel.
PART 3
1
Aldous watched as the powder in the 3D printer slowly dropped in the tray, the binding material being added by the carriage one layer at a time.
“Even if these forgeries pass a cursory visual examination,” Lindholm began to point out as he reentered the room and handed Aldous a paper cup filled with cold water, “and even if we leave them in the resin for hours, they won’t have anywhere near the strength of the real ones.”
“I’m aware,” Aldous replied as he sipped the water. “I’ll do my best to ensure they aren’t put up against the genuine article.”
“You know,” Lindholm noted as he leaned against the wall adjacent to the bulky industrial printer, “for a man who’s spent his life questing for immortality, you seem rather determined to commit suicide.”
Aldous lightly shook his head, continuing to stare at the carriage’s rhythmic movements. “I’ll have the advantage,” he said. “They won’t be expecting this.”
“No,” Lindholm observed, “because, as I said, it’s certainly unexpected from a man who values life the way you do.”
“The way I did,” Aldous corrected. “There are some people who don’t deserve to live, my friend. I learned that lesson too late. It cost me my wife. I won’t make that mistake again.”
2
“Goddamnit!” Craig shouted as he sprang to his feet and stepped off the Planck platform and onto the gravel rooftop, storming furiously, but aimlessly away. “Goddamn it to Hell!”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” the A.I. began, “but we have—”
“You have no idea what you’re saying you’re sorry for!” Craig shouted. “You have no goddamn idea what I’ve lost! You’re a machine! Goddamnit! I’m in Hell! Get me out of this Hell!”
“Craig,” the A.I. replied calmly, “your MTF generator is back online, and we need to find a more secure location immediately. Brace yourself.”
Instantly, Craig was encapsulated in his green cocoon once again, as the A.I. took over the flight systems and quickly scooped him into the air, then flew him down into an alley shaded from the brilliant morning sunshine and toward a giant, abandoned warehouse. Pillars of light shone down through the broken slats of tile in the roof like the fingers of God, illuminating the hellish, dark interior. The A.I. set Craig down on the top floor of the sprawling building, and his boots sank into the two inches of dust that covered the ground.
“Be careful,” the A.I. warned. “The floor is not entirely structurally sound. There are holes.”
“Where are we?”
“This is an abandoned textile—”
“No!” Craig shouted with frustration as he used a powerful blast of energy to rip apart his cuffs, tearing through them like butter. “Where are we? What universe is this?”
“332.”
“You know that’s not what I’m asking,” Craig spat back as he clasped his hands over his head. He resisted the urge to start pounding on his own skull. He wanted to dig his fingers inside and pull the A.I. out.
“I’m afraid that physically damaging your own brain will do little to alleviate your anger, Craig. However,” the A.I. continued as his form suddenly appeared only two meters away, “if you wish, you’re more than welcome to pummel me in this form.”
“What is this?” Craig asked with a snarl.
“A hallucination.”
“What do you mean?” Craig demanded. “You mean...I’m imagining you?”
“No, I am quite real, but I’m accessing the region of your brain that is responsible for hallucinations. It is a major component of the mind’s eye technology. The hallucination is visual, auditory, and also tangible, so if you punch me, your brain will make you feel as though your fist has made contact with my jaw.”
“That sounds tempting,” Craig replied, nodding enthusiastically at the thought.
“I’m ready when
you are,” the A.I. said in his typical matter-of-fact tone. He closed his eyes and tilted his jaw so Craig could hit him at an angle that would level the most force and, in theory, produce the most satisfaction.
Craig wound up, but after a couple hesitations, he abandoned the effort.
“Are you sure, Craig? Your system is rife with enormous amounts of cortisol and adrenaline. This would likely help you alleviate some of it and I would not feel any discomfort.”
“That’s the problem,” Craig replied. “I want somebody to feel some discomfort.”
“Your anger is understandable.”
“Where are we?” Craig repeated his question.
“I’m sorry, Craig, but I do not feel comfortable relaying that information to you.”
“Why?”
“Because you will undoubtedly choose to interfere with this timeline, just as you did in the last.”
“And that’s bad, why? Don’t tell me you’re siding with the Purists.”
“Regardless of the possible implications for the history of this universe and the multiverse at large, the greater concern is that the Purists will expect you to interfere—and they’ll be waiting.”
“Hold on,” Craig responded, as something in the A.I.’s explanation did not resonate with him. “How can the Purists be here? I thought we just abandoned them in the last universe.”
“We did. However, we have to assume they will locate your Planck platform and follow us here.”
Craig began shaking his head as he paced away.
“Be careful,” the A.I. warned once again.
“I want an explanation. What the hell is going on? How are we hopping from one universe to another?”
“Certainly. As I said earlier, explanations are my forte. We are using the Planck platform to concentrate enormous amounts of energy at one point, thereby manipulating Planck energy and causing space and time to become unstable. In the midst of that forced instability, a bubble forms. The bubble acts as a gateway to a parallel universe.”
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