by Charles Mead
“I need some water,” said Chris as he turned into one of the shops. James followed without looking.
“Gentlemen, what would you like to purchase?” said the man behind the counter, whom James and Chris instantly recognised from the flight and video footage. He was flanked on either side by four other men. All of them had their guns drawn.
The agents approached James but Chris stepped in their way and pushed them back hard enough for them to stumble. James ran out of the shop as quickly as he could.
James sprinted down the concourse looking for anywhere to hide, his heart pumping far faster than he was used to as he frantically looked for an exit. He tried to remember the terminal map they had looked at earlier to recall the closest exit. Which direction was the plane in? He knew he could get outside if he could remember what gate it was at. He glanced behind him as he continued to run down the concourse and saw the men surround Chris and restrain him.
James had to get out of their line of sight. Now.
He saw the ladies’ toilets come up on his left and sprinted inside.
James slammed the phone camera down next to the sink and quickly turned on the cold water tap to full and slurped up some water as fast as he could. He could feel his heart pounding in his chest like never before and tried to take some deep breaths as he looked at his reflection in the bathroom mirror.
“Come on, James. Breathe,” he said to himself as he looked at his red and sweaty face in the mirror.
He drank some more water and slapped some on his face to try to cool down. For a moment he thought of how the footage he had on his phone was easily going to get him the Bentley he’d always wanted. James was then reminded of the gravity of the situation and that he was stuck. In the ladies’ toilets.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“Think, James! Think!” he whispered at himself in the mirror and clasped his hands behind his head. He needed to find a way out of this airport without those people seeing him. He took several deep breaths.
James started to look around the ladies’ toilets, which were much bigger at first than he’d realised. There was little point hiding in the toilets where he would easily be found, and he thought the surveillance footage—if they had access to it, it would show them in minutes where he had gone.
James then remembered his camera was still running and picked it up as he walked around the cavernous toilet room. “There’s got to be another way out of here,” said James to himself as he walked towards the back of the room.
The rows of toilets continued as far as he could see and then around a corner, to more toilets and sinks.
“I have got to find a way out of here without being seen,” he mumbled as he walked around the corner, and then he saw it. Another exit. He walked quickly towards it before stopping to think of his next move.
The other exit led back to the terminal concourse. There had to be cameras outside, which would show him leaving. James pressed his back against the dividing wall between the toilets and the terminal concourse and extended his hand with his phone in outside.
He looked on the screen and could see Chris, in the distance, being handcuffed and lifted back up to his feet by the group of men. The lead agent—what else did one call men dressed in crisp black suits like that?—the one that had spoken to them in the shop said something to the two men holding Chris and they led him away towards the security room. He then spoke with the remaining two agents and pointed in James’s direction before walking away. The two agents then casually started walking towards where James was hiding. He quickly pulled his hand back in and retreated into the ladies’ toilets.
“Now what do I do?” said James to himself. He felt his heart start to pound in his chest again, even though he was not running. It was the adrenaline surge, he told himself. He estimated he had about two minutes before the agents would be inside the ladies’ toilets. James thought an agent would enter via each entrance and trap him.
He quickly began to search for any other means of escape. He pushed the doors of every cubicle open to see if there was anything in any of them other than a toilet.
James looked up at the roof tiles and spotted an air vent. He thought perhaps he could get inside the air ducts as he had seen in so many movies. He then reminded himself that he probably would not fit, and the roof tiles were so high, even if he found something to stand on he would not be able to reach an air vent. Even then, what if they were locked? He didn’t have time to unlock them, and even if he could, that would give his escape route away to the agents.
He started to jog around looking for any options, and then noticed a door in the corner between two toilet cubicles that he had clearly missed. He pressed down on the door handle and it opened. Without looking he quickly went inside and closed the door.
The lights in the room were already on so it was easy for James to see where he was. It was clearly a supply room which was full of cleaning products arranged on a few rows of shelves. James looked back at the door and saw that the key was in the lock. He turned it to lock the door. That might slow them down a few minutes, he thought.
He looked around the room and saw at the end a door labelled “Emergency Exit”.
“I knew this was the way to go,” said James confidently to his camera phone. He stepped back to the front of the room and turned the light off.
James returned to the emergency exit door and took a deep breath before he pushed against it, hoping the door itself was not alarmed.
The door silently opened to a lit passageway. He stepped in and quietly closed the door. Those agents must be in the toilets by now, he thought.
“At least there are no cameras in here,” James said as he examined the passageway. “Which way to go? Left or right?”
There were large arrows pointing to the left labelled “EXIT” with “Salida” written beneath it.
“Left it is,” said James. He heard movement from behind him back in the toilets. He started to run again.
As he sprinted down the corridor, the thought occurred to James that he should have spent far more time in the gym in their apartment building. His heart started to pound again and he felt his face start to go red as he exerted himself. He turned his phone to face forwards so his face was not shown on screen.
He had passed a few exit doors but wanted to keep going along the corridor as far as he could; perhaps the last one would lead outside.
James was rapidly approaching a door directly in front of him when he heard a door far behind him open. He was not going to make the door so turned left into the nearest door and tumbled through it, and he emerged into daylight outside the terminal.
Freedom! He was certain to lose them in the city streets.
He was about to continue running away when he thought of Chris and stopped. Damn it, he couldn’t just leave him, could he? Chris had saved him, had stepped in front of those guys to keep them back just long enough for James to escape. Idiotic, sure, but kind of brave as well.
James scowled, eyeing the quiet streets under that strange unmoving sky. Damn it.
He turned around and opened the door again and stepped inside. He looked down the corridor and could see the agent in the distance approaching, so he tried the nearest available door, and was back on the terminal concourse.
The door closed and he looked for something to jam it with. Nothing was immediately available, so he did a quick scan for cameras, found none, and ran down the terminal concourse. He stuck to the sides of the concourse, as he thought the cameras would have a harder time picking him up.
James thought the best option would be to try to find a weapon of some description from somewhere and then try to find Chris, starting with checking the security room.
He spotted a restaurant coming up on his right and went inside and headed straight for the kitchen. James quickly opened the drawers and could find nothing sharp at all. Even the butter knives had rounded edges.
“Of course,” James mumbled to himself. “It’s an airport, so noth
ing sharp is allowed air-side. DAMN IT!”
He slammed his fist into the metal preparation table and felt the shock travel up his forearm.
James checked the countdown time on his phone—less than ten minutes remaining, to whatever happened at zero. He ran back out to the restaurant and grabbed a bottle of vodka from the bar. He wrapped the handle with one of the bar towels and hit the bottle hard against the work surface. Glass shattered and vodka spilled out.
“This will have to do,” said James as he ran out of the restaurant and back onto the terminal concourse with his new makeshift weapon.
He picked up the pace as much as his body would allow, his heart pounding away constantly and sweat pouring down his face and back.
He came across a terminal map and had a quick glance to work out which way led back to the security room. James oriented himself, took a deep breath, and took off towards it. He slowed to a gentle jog as he approached the security room and scanned for the cameras in the area. James quickly noted them, and positioned himself behind one of the large potted plants nearby. He flattened himself on the floor and slowly crawled towards the security room door. James promised himself he would at least try to save Chris from whoever these people are, and then they would work out what was going on. He just hoped that Chris did not leave the external view of the security room on the large screen.
James propped himself up against the wall of the security room close to the door. He pressed his ear to the wall where he could hear one man talking calmly with an American accent. There was a pause and then what sounded like Chris talking. He could not make out the words but at least Chris was alive.
He crawled closer to the door and pressed his ear against it. James heard voices again and worked out that the American was to his left and Chris was to his right. He had no choice. He had to burst through the door and try to rescue his friend. James put his phone in his pocket, still recording, and stood up, with the broken bottle in his right hand. He carefully reached for the door handle and pushed down on it. At the same time he felt something really hard grip his right hand.
“No need to be a hero!” said a voice from behind as someone grabbed the broken bottle out of James’s hand.
It was one of the agents who had been looking for him. The other agent grabbed James’s left hand and then his right hand and placed them behind his back and cuffed them.
The agents opened the door and led him inside, forcing him to take a seat next to Chris.
CHAPTER TWELVE
“Chris! What’s going on?” asked James.
“Firstly, great failed rescue attempt!”
“At least I tried!”
“Fair enough. I’m still none the wiser. Agent Smith here was just asking if I knew where Neo was,” said Chris.
“You mean me?” asked James.
“Wow, nothing gets past you, does it?” answered the American man who had been on the flight with them.
“Well, I like to think I am on the ball,” said James as he remembered his phone was still recording the audio.
“Well, let me assure you that you are not, and also I was not referring to you as Neo,” said the American man.
“What were you referring to me as?” asked James.
“A damn nuisance.”
James smiled.
“Okay. I will introduce myself. My name is Agent Jensen and I am with a… shall we say, special part of the United States government...”
“You mean like the X-Files?” asked Chris.
“No I don’t, and if either of you interrupt me again when I am speaking, I might have to do one or both of you some serious bodily harm, understood?” said Jensen.
James and Chris both nodded.
“You two idiots have been quite the unexpected and unwanted surprise in the experiment we are currently running. For various reasons, which I will go into, you both shouldn’t actually be here right now. Want to know why?”
They both nodded slightly.
“Whilst you are wrong about the X-Files, you are right about how people disappeared.”
Jensen looked at both of them, waiting for a response.
“Christ! You millennials have appalling social skills! Too much screen time. Now I have finished talking, you can answer me without me wanting to put a bullet in you,” said Jensen.
“You mean the theory about time being stopped?” said James.
“Yes, we can stop time.”
“Why would you want to stop time on a plane full of tourists to Las Vegas?” asked Chris.
“Finally, a sensible question. Well done! In the unlikely event that you are aware of what is going on in the real world beyond your phone and make-up challenges, the world is moving to a very different beat these days.”
“What does that mean?” asked James.
“Christ…”
“I didn’t interrupt you,” James objected.
“I know you didn’t. I shouldn’t be amazed at how ignorant you are of the world around you. It shows that part of our mission to produce obedient worker drones via the public education system is working,” said Jensen.
James and Chris still look confused.
“Right, let’s just focus on one thing at a time here. The world is changing fast, and we have to be prepared. To that end we need to sample the public’s DNA en masse as quickly as we can to assist us with another project. Of course, the public in many countries, including your own, have objected to volunteering DNA samples. No matter what we tried through our puppet politicians, under the guise of public safety, we just couldn’t get it through.”
Agent Jensen took a sip of water and started to pace up and down in the small room.
“We had a serious problem. We needed the DNA and we couldn’t wait for your largely asleep generation to become mature adults who would more than likely passively accept it. So we needed a solution.”
“The solution was to stop time and forcibly take the DNA of tourists?” asked Chris.
“Perhaps half-right. We are not taking the DNA by force as technically the people we are taking it from don’t know about it. However, we needed as wide a capture of the DNA pool as possible so the British government, along with others, allowed us to do it this way.”
“I still don’t get it. As you can clearly stop time, why use it for this and not other purposes?” said James.
“I never said we only use it for this. It was actually invented for something else, to help us maintain order. Anyway, this was the easiest way to do it. One of our agents would be on whatever flight to ensure each DNA take went successfully. We ensure the device is activated just as the plane comes into the gate.”
“So if you can stop time, where have all the people gone?” asked Chris.
“We have to move the people to another location to take the DNA—part of the stipulation of using the device. It seems jet fuel can become a bit unstable for some reason when time is frozen.”
“That makes no sense,” said James.
“Right, that makes no sense, but stopping time is perfectly plausible to you? Give me a break! It is what it is. We freeze time and then move everybody off the plane. Take the DNA, then put everyone back on the flight, unfreeze time and the sheeple have their nice holiday or business trip.”
“So what went wrong then, as it obviously hasn’t worked on us?” asked Chris.
“The pair of you are quite stupid, aren’t you? We had to test our procedures for what to do in the event that some passengers do not pass out correctly in the moment before we freeze time. What better source of idiots than two self-absorbed vloggers.”
“We’re talented—well, I am the more talented one, obviously. We earn loads of money,” said James.
“Deluded is more accurate,” replied Jensen. “Money is not the only measure of success in the world. Breaking news to you, James, I’m sure!”
“You just don’t get what we do. It’s hard work doing what we do.”
“No, no it isn’t. Your videos of your day o
r playing with your hair in front of the mirror take a maximum of two hours to film and edit. TWO HOURS! Most people in your country have to work far more than that to make ends meet. You’re so ungrateful, James, it amazes me. Part of me just wants to kill you now…”
The colour left James’s face and Chris opened his mouth to speak.
“Relax,” continued Jensen. “Regrettably, on this mission I am not allowed to kill anyone. I just wanted to see your reaction.”
“Not funny,” replied James. “Anyway, if we are so stupid and you are on top of your game, why did you let us loose in the airport? We could have done a lot of different things. Could have just walked out onto the strip. Could have just gone into the cockpit and taken the plane off again.”
