Empty Planet

by Lynette Sloane

  I was amazed. Could life get any stranger?

  “So not everyone could travel through time?” I asked.

  “No Steve, just as an unprotected space shuttle will burn up as it re-enters the earth’s atmosphere, anyone who has not had the appropriate genetic modifications will rapidly age when they travel back through time.” He paused before continuing, “Now would appear to be an apt moment to fill you in on a few facts. I joined Section straight from University, working in genetic engineering, although, at first I wasn’t party to the information I now have, and it was only through meeting Carla and visiting her website that I became aware of the devastation left by the super-virus.”

  I was speechless, trying to take in Dad’s revelation, but there was more to come. “Small meteorite fragments, all weighing under ten grams, and some no bigger than dust particles, have fallen to earth for thousands of years. Most are harmless, but some have brought deadly viruses with them.

  “For generations scientists and sci-fi fans have speculated as to whether Alien life exists. On this level it does, although the invaders have been microscopic. Eons ago, somewhere out in deep space, small meteorite fragments broke away from their trajectory and started their long journey towards our planet bringing with them the deadly Frumscyld-Ábitan super-virus. Once established, this flesh-eating virus attacks the nervous system, giving flu like symptoms and incapacitating its victim. Death quickly follows and the virus is left to eat away the whole body, usually only taking a few days. After its hearty meal billions of spores are released into the air, each seeking out a new victim.” Dad’s eyes bored into mine as he said; “Unless we stop it, this super-virus will annihilate the whole human race.”

  He turned to include Gemma in the conversation. “To quote one of our medical investigators, ‘Frumscyld-Ábitan is a terrible virus, but at least it cleans up after itself ’ … some consolation I suppose.

  “Our most talented and experienced medical researchers have worked tirelessly to find an antidote, but have concluded that there is none to be found in this timeframe. We therefore hoped to use the jumps to find someone who’d survived the super-virus so we could acquire the appropriate antibodies from their blood. We’d almost given up hope of finding anyone until Carla contacted me through her website with your news. Steve, with your discovery of a survivor, we now have renewed hope of finding the answer. That is why you are so important in all this. Only you know the location of the one who can save us all.

  “In natural time, that is to say, at this point in time, even the survivor doesn’t know who he or she is, or how important they will be to the future of humanity. In a few years this person will survive the super-virus. We want to harvest the antibodies from their blood and use them to develop a vaccination that can be replicated and administered to the whole human race. This is why I had to risk the temporal vortex—that doorway I pulled you through—to save you.”

  I quickly added, “And because I’m your son and you love me.”

  “That goes without saying.”

  Gemma spoke again, “So if I wasn’t with Steve when the dam collapsed no one would have saved me?”

  “Sorry, love, but no,” Dad replied.

  Gemma shook her head, “Typical,” she fumed, “I’m just not important enough.”

  Dad disagreed, “Gemma, all Jumpers are important. I’ve managed to build up some immunity to quantum time travel. Unfortunately there are no longer enough years left for anyone else to do the same, so I am the only one who can use the temporal vortex, that is, except for Jumpers. If anyone else had tried to save you today, reaching through the vortex might have killed them.

  “Carla was very wise in withholding the information about the virus and the survivor. The information posted on her website has already proved invaluable in helping humanity. This is how we became aware of how little time we have left. Time is running out and we need to develop and manufacture as much of the anti-virus as we can. There are over eight and a half billion people on earth and we would like to vaccinate as many as possible.”

  Dad’s pager buzzed and he said, “Ok it’s time. I have instructions to take you to the centre of the complex.”

  Gemma and I followed Dad through a doorway and down a long passage. He continued talking to us as we walked.

  “I must impress on you both that you can never speak of anything you learn here today, not even to Carla.” We both agreed.

  “Section knew the Jumpers would use the Internet and build a network of Jumpers who keep in touch and exchange information with each other. The Jumpers, however, are oblivious to Section’s existence and are unaware they are being monitored. This has been, and continues to be, a very handy tool for finding out information about the future of the planet, without letting the Jumpers know of our existence.”

  We followed Dad into a large communications room where rows and rows of men and women sat working on hi-tech computer interfaces, seemingly conversing to each other through headsets.

  Dad said, “We call this room the Hub.”

  At the front of the room was a huge viewing screen showing various parts of the world on what appeared to be some sort of highly developed PowerPoint presentation.

  Dad showed us to some seats on the far right side of the room, and spoke quietly, “Sit here and don’t make a sound. The people you see on the computers are known as controllers and are managing the temporal jumps.”

  He pointed out a man standing at the front of the room near the large screen.

  “See that guy standing at the front—the bald man in the grey suit—he’s Commander of Operations. We call him C. I answer directly to him; he’s in charge of all this. There are more senior people at Section but none of us ever gets to meet them.”

  C was a tall, well-toned man a few years younger than my father. His presence seemed to fill the room. Everyone was hanging on his every word and obeying his every command; I thought him quite intimidating.

  What’s happening now?” Gemma asked.

  “They’re about to bring everyone out of the same temporal jump you were on today.”

  The controllers stopped entering data into their computers and looked to the front, poised for their next instruction.

  C announced, “Synchronise quantum signature. Are we all together?” He checked the front screen for acknowledgement from each country represented, then gave the command, “Proceed.”

  The controllers immediately started entering the appropriate data into their workstations, the only sound being the tapping of fingers on several hundred keyboards.

  Unexpectedly the orderliness was broken. One of the controllers exclaimed, “We’ve had our first fatality Commander.”

  “What? How did that happen?” asked a supervisor in a raised voice.

  “I don’t understand, I checked everything. I always check everything.”

  “Well not this time obviously.”

  Dad rushed to the front of the room and took up position at the primary console, hurriedly searching for any information regarding the death of the Jumper.

  “I’m overseeing the Jumpers’ website now” he interjected.

  The controller was panicking, “It was just one person. We’ve being doing this for years and it’s never happened before.”

  The supervisor was incensed. He brought his fist down a table very hard startling us all.

  “Maybe it was only one person, but everyone of them is important. The future of humanity is at stake!”

  “I have information Commander,” said Dad. C nodded to him, intimating that he should disclose what he’d found out. Dad continued, “I’ve tapped into the police radio frequencies in the Bodmin Moor area and the cell phones belonging to the victim’s friends. The Jumper, Edward Thompson, was killed here in the United Kingdom seemingly by a wild animal. He and a group of his friends had been camping out on the Moor. His temporal jump took him into the path of a large cat: a puma or lion or something. Poor kid didn’t stand a chance.”


  “What was his vocation?” asked C.

  “He was studying to be an architect.” There was a long pause while none of us dared to speak.

  The supervisor’s anger subsided; like the rest of us, he felt helpless.

  C spoke quietly yet with complete authority, “We have to make sure this never happens again.” Addressing the controller he continued, “It wasn’t your fault, you couldn’t have known a wild animal would be prowling the moor forty years from now.” Turning to include the other technicians C continued, “It’s your responsibility to ensure your allocated Jumpers are in safe locations at the commencement of the temporal jumps. For instance, we don’t want anyone jumping under a collapsed building or when they’re rock climbing with friends.” He turned to face the rest of us. “We can’t possibly know what will happen during the jumps, but we can ensure our people have a fighting chance. From now on you are to stagger the jumps, holding back anyone who is in a potentially dangerous situation. There are to be no more fatalities.”

  When Edward’s jump had ended, and normality returned, his mauled remains had reappeared on Bodmin Moor next to his traumatised friends. The jump had taken over an hour, although from the friends’ perspective, less than a second had elapsed.

  The Hub quieted, and Dad played part of the telephone call Edward’s friend had made to the emergency services when he reported the incident. The voice was unsteady and that of a young man obviously in shock.

  “Our friend’s dead. It looks like a wild animal attack … but we didn’t see any animal.”

  The operator asked, “Where are you?”

  “Bodmin Moor somewhere. Ed was standing outside our tent talking and drinking a can of lager. He suddenly disappeared and a second later his body landed on the floor next to us. It’s covered in blood. Something’s bitten chunks out of him—his head and legs and body … like a large animal mauled him. He fell out of the air … you know, like out of a tree … but there is no tree, and nowhere he could have fallen from.”

  Dad said, “That’s the relevant part of the conversation.”

  C concluded, “It seems a large cat killed him, then dragged him up a tree. After the jump his body was drawn back to natural time, and as the tree hasn’t grown yet he simply fell out of the air.”

  When the story became public knowledge, panic spread throughout the area and several men set out to shoot the large cat responsible for killing the young man. Of course, no such cat was ever shot or captured, despite a large reward being offered by a national newspaper. Curiously, over the next several weeks, the village drunks and local eccentrics reported a few dubious big-cat sightings.

  __________

  C spoke to my father with an air of authority, “Bring our visitors to my office,” then turned and walked away briskly, disappearing through a doorway on the right of the viewing screen.

  Dad said, “Come on you two,” and walked towards C’s room. Gemma and I followed, pausing outside the open door for a moment.

  “Enter,” said C.

  We all entered the bright, comfortably furnished office. Three large frosted-glass windows allowed plenty of light into the room but didn’t give any clues as to our location.

  C was standing behind an antique rosewood writing desk.

  “Have a seat everyone,” he said.

  We sat down on the leather chairs as he continued, “Although I’d never met Edward, I’m saddened by his death. Like all our Jumpers he was unique, the product of years of genetic research. None of them know it yet, but the survival of the human race rests heavily on their shoulders.” C sat down behind the desk and took a deep breath. He looked troubled.

  “So this is Steve and Gemma. Have you briefed them John?”

  “Yes Commander.”

  “Great, so I can get straight to the point.”

  C addressed Gemma and I, “Section needs you both to go on a temporal jump and bring the survivor back to this time frame. Steve we know you are the only one who has knowledge of his or her identity. Do you realise how important this mission is?”

  “Yes Sir, I think so. When do you want us to go?”

  “Not for several weeks,” replied C. “Engaging in a temporal jump too soon after the last one could prove fatal for you both. It was ok when you were only jumping back and forth a few years, but the temporal stress produced jumping back from locations forty or more years into the future is much greater. Your bodies couldn’t withstand the temporal displacement.”

  Dad explained, “Further meteorite fragments are projected to shower the earth over the next few thousand years. These too are thought to carry the Frumscyld-Ábitan super-virus and although Jumpers are immune to all harmful earth-born viruses and germs, they are not necessarily immune to any virus coming from deep space. We can therefore only send you to periods in time when the virus is absent—which we refer to as windows—and time will only permit us to use each window once, so we can’t send you on a jump nearer to this time frame. We’ve already used them all. The next window is at the fifty-five year stage.”

  “How long will these showers keep occurring?” I asked.

  “At least five thousand years,” C answered. “Maybe much longer. The recurring showers will have kept high levels of antibodies in the survivor’s blood, so we just have to hope that they will still be alive and you will be able to find them.

  “You won’t have to travel to their last known location in natural time and wait for the jump; you will be able to use the temporal vortex as you did when you were rescued off the dam. It will take you wherever you need to go. One of the controllers will programme it for you.” C smiled, “Don’t worry, we’ll contact you first so you’ll know exactly when all this will take place.”

  Gemma asked C, “Please may I ask a question?”

  “Yes, ask.”

  “How do the Jumpers fit into this? There must be a reason we’ve been genetically altered and sent to the future so many times.”

  C leaned forward and spoke again, “The Jumpers have always been plan B. If we cannot develop and manufacture the vaccination in time, and the human race succumbs to the super-virus, it will be up to the Jumpers to preserve humanity and its various cultures by repopulating the earth.”

  C told Dad and Gemma to leave his office, and when the door was closed behind them he looked directly into my eyes and asked, “Who is the survivor?”

  In that moment I realised I held the key that could save humanity. I had to give the information to someone I believed would use it wisely, so because my father trusted C, and I knew of no other person whom I should tell, I answered, “David Franklin, my girlfriend’s older brother.”

  __________

  To protect the location of the Hub, Section sent Gemma and I back to Elan Valley via a parallel vortex. Dad explained that this was similar to a temporal vortex except that instead of taking us to another time, the parallel vortex would take us to another location within the same time frame.

  We were excited and could talk of nothing else all the way home.

  “Remember not to tell anyone about this,” I reminded Gemma as she stepped out of my car onto the road outside her parents’ bungalow.

  __________

  Now aware of my father’s part in the temporal excursions, I had plenty to ask him. Mum got fed up of our ‘secret talks’, so when Charlie invited her to stay with him and his new live-in girlfriend in London for a few days Mum jumped at the chance. Dad was due a weeks leave from work, but after a couple of days at home he said he was going stir crazy, so I joined him on a visit to a steam train exhibition in Hereford. We had a great time, and Dad, a Great Western Railway fanatic for as long as I could remember, took a ride on King George IV, his favourite locomotive.

  After a hearty meal I drove the three-hour journey home while Dad chatted excitedly about the engines he had seen, and the fact that they should never have gotten rid of steam engines in favour of ‘electric monstrosities’. Gradually he tired and dozed in the passenger seat giving m
e a chance me to play my favourite music on my vintage ‘CD’ player.

  A little after midnight, I pulled up the driveway, exhausted and relieved to be home. As I stepped outside the car I became briefly aware of someone standing close behind me. I half turned, expecting to see one of the neighbours on their way home from the public house further up the road, but before I could get a good look at him or her they grabbed me from behind. An arm tightly gripped my throat, while a cloth was pressed over my mouth and nose. I struggled, momentarily becoming aware of a sweet sickly smell before falling into unconsciousness.

  __________

  I didn’t know how much time had passed, but gradually I became aware that I was lying on my side on a hard, dirt floor, my legs tied together at the ankles and my wrists tied securely behind my back. I struggled for a moment trying to free myself, but the ropes were too tight so I only succeeded in hurting my wrists. I looked around; nothing was in clear focus. Obviously my sight was still affected by whatever had been used to incapacitate me.

  Feeling rather light headed, I slipped back into unconsciousness waking with a jump some time later as I remembered what had happened. My eyesight was a little clearer this time. I was in an old barn. I tried focusing on the high, tiled roof. Several large beams ran across its width and sunlight crept though small, occasional gaps in the stonewalls. To my left, well out of reach, was a rough wooden door. I called out but a gag muffled my voice. No one outside the barn would be able to hear me; I would have to wait for my attacker to return.

  After what seemed like hours I heard approaching footsteps and the sound of a padlock being unlocked. The door opened and five people entered, all dressed in dark clothing. Hessian hoods with roughly cut eyeholes covered their faces. The last one in slammed the door. One of them pulled my gag down from around my mouth so it hung around my neck. He grabbed me by the front of my jacket, and dragged me across the room, roughly placing me in a sitting position against a stone chimneybreast. I was still feeling a little light headed and was unable to free myself from his grasp, so I sat there wondering what it was all about and hoping I was going to get out of this alive. Surely no one could know of my involvement with Section.