Out of Time (The Adventures of Eric and Ursula Book 4)

by A. D. Winch

  "Maybe it was her pencil," Alexander replied, still unable to see anything curious in a broken black pencil.

  "I'll go and sleep on it. I am going for a siesta."

  Johan walked back towards his room, and Alexander turned to Andrea.

  "If I can find a way to stop these research facilities in what they are doing, would you support this?"

  "Your question contains too many variables to give you an accurate response," Andrea said, standing up. "I will leave you to your research."

  Alexander pushed the laptop to one side and took the tablet that was hidden behind. It was the only device they had that was connected to the internet, and used a VPN to hide their whereabouts.

  As Alexander discovered information that could help him to find a solution, he jotted it down. After two hours in front of the tablet, he had had enough but felt that his notes could now help him.

  Unsurprisingly, the facilities he was researching did not advertise what they did. Instead, most of the information he found had come from conspiracy theorists' websites. Before meeting his father, reading his mother's diary and talking to Eric, he would have dismissed them as nut cases. However, his views had changed, and even though he was wary of the content he read, he was surprised at how near to the truth much of it seemed to be.

  Alexander picked up his papers and began to read what he had written.

  Djupidalur, Iceland

  Underground facility. 24 km long by 1 km wide. Authorized by U.S. National Security Council in 1993 for research into biological, chemical and nuclear weapons. BUT, integral part of Cabal Plan (WHAT IS CABAL?) to create a super army of genetic alien/human clones with enhanced mental, psychic and physical abilities.

  What is CABAL?

  Cabal - Small group of people, possibly controlling the governments worldwide. Cabal Plan – plot to control Earth and beyond? Cabbala (Hebrew) meaning 'secret behaviour.' IS OSS CABAL? OR IS THIS CONSPIRACY NONSENSE?

  Pine Gap, Australia

  Outside Alice Springs. Joint base – Australia/USA but run by National Security Agency (NSA). Building began 1966. Opened 1970 as Defence Space Research Facility. Main purpose – monitor missile activity. Schulz (WHO IS SCHULZ?) says 'Even though they're in terrible environments, some portion of that land is strategically important.' HAARP also has the same features. Pine Gap is used for getting information from Intelligence satellites. Monitors UFO communication? Many UFO sightings around base? Underground alien base? Ships particle beam weapons to a moon base?

  Haarp Research Station, Alaska

  High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program. Uses high-frequency transmitters, 180 Antennas array to disrupt Ionosphere. Official purpose – improve communications and surveillance and research potential defence. Unoffical purpose – change weather. Link to global warming? Make planet more habitable for aliens?

  Diego Garcia, Chagos Archipelago

  Joint UK/USA facility. Tracks satellites, monitors GPS, logistic support. 1600 km from India on small atoll – very thin, 43 km long but less than 500m wide. Has 'deep space' surveillance systems. Tracks objects in space. Ships supplies to Archimedes Moon Base?

  In the past, Alexander would have laughed at his notes but now he looked at them with a seriousness that worried him. An expression in English came to him, 'No smoke without fire.' There was some truth in what he had read, but he was uncertain as to what it was. The existence of a moon base he found too absurd to believe, but the rest had a degree of truth that worried him.

  The locations of the bases were problematic. Even if they could fund groups to attack these bases, the chance of success would be minimal. The bases were in such far flung places that it would be easy to intercept any intruders before they got anywhere near them. Alexander bit his nails and stared at the vines above his head.

  "Is stopping IHBs a priority?" he asked himself. Was it really necessary to stop experiments that, in his opinion, held little chance of success? Even if they could stop the research would they ever know if they had been successful in stopping the IHBs? He didn't have any answers. There were too many unknowns.

  Suddenly, an idea came to him. All they had to do was disrupt work on these facilities and keep the scientists from conducting research on the samples. It would delay the research, and they could do this without attacking the base physically If they could find the names of a person or people working at the base they could send them a letter. They could coat the letter with an aggressive but common virus such as Influenza. The disease would spread. As it did so, it would confine staff to bed and possibly have a negative effect on the research being undertaken.

  By using a biological weapon, the children would not be put in harm's way and, until everyone at the facility had a clean bill of health, work would be disrupted.

  Alexander stood and paced up and down. He could not think of a better solution but still felt that it was not enough. He became distracted by a spider that was spinning a web on the vine between two branches. It worked quickly until the web formed a trap for passing insects. Alexander watched the spider finish the last few strands and then return to the centre of the web. He raised a finger and tapped on one of the outer threads until it broke. The spider scuttled towards the strand to investigate, spun a new strand and then returned to the centre again.

  This was why his solution was not enough, Alexander thought. The OSS is like the spider. If you damage its web, it will be repaired. If you want to destroy the web, you have to destroy the spider.

  Alexander had had enough. He felt he had wasted two hours of his life achieving nothing of any real help. He wanted to switch off and do something brainless for a few minutes. He sat back down, took the tablet and visited a website that showed millions of videos that people had uploaded. As soon as the website loaded, he saw something that he was not expecting. At the top of the screen were five thumbnails of videos under the heading 'Most Popular.' The third one on the list had already been viewed by twenty-one million people and was called 'Battle in Morocco.' He clicked on the familiar image and began to watch. There was no sound at all but the images were clear.

  The video was taken from inside a car, looking out of the front windscreen. A rocky desert spread out on both sides of the road. Next to the tarmac, there was a crumbling wall.

  A Yukon was directly in front of the camera. It had stopped, prevented from going any further by a taxi blocking the road. Eric and Ursula suddenly appeared from behind a wall, running forward with catapults in their hands. A man got out of the Yukon and pointed a revolver at them. He fired, but Eric jumped over the bullet. Ursula floored the man with a stone from her catapult.

  Meanwhile, three well-built people were approaching the children from behind. They could just be seen around the Yukon, and their weapons were raised. Suddenly, the camera moved backwards, and there was a wider view of the battle scene. Eric sprang into the air and executed a bicycle kick on the man holding the revolver. He followed it with a punch and a kick. The man collapsed. Eric opened the Yukon's rear door and then sprinted in the direction of the camera as it moved towards him and crashed into the back of the Yukon.

  A woman, Sasha, ran to the taxi. She fell to the ground but was obviously screaming. The tarmac around her exploded twice and then she recoiled backwards as a bullet hit her thigh. She stopped and then moved forwards again. Blood was visible. Eric rolled next to her, and then both of them disappeared from the camera's view.

  The camera jolted forwards and then moved slowly away from the scene. In the background, Ursula could be seen standing calmly, looking around. The three agents were creeping up behind and had nearly reached her. Their weapons were raised but had she not noticed.

  She ran towards the Yukon and leapt up onto its bonnet. She sprinted up the window, onto the roof and launched herself towards the camera as it moved away. For a split second, she disappeared from view and then her feet could be seen in the top of the frame as she dropped down.

  The camera moved away from the Yukon
and increased in speed. It spun around and then headed away down the road. At this point, the film jumped forward in time as the camera headed straight for a lorry that it narrowly missed. The film jumped forward again to a warehouse and finished when the car stopped.

  Alexander didn't know what to say or think. He could not remember seeing a camera on the dashboard of the taxi he had stolen, but it must have been there. Was this video good or bad? He scrolled down through the comments underneath the video and read some of them.

  'Awesome.'

  'Wow, those kids rock.'

  'How cool is this!'

  'It looks real.'

  'Who are the guys shooting at them?'

  'Why would they shoot kids?'

  'It's a sneaky trailer for a new film, you idiots. It has to be.'

  'If it is, I WANT to see it, NOW! Does anyone know what it is called?'

  'No, but it could be an extra-ordinary beginning to a film.'

  'After watching this, I want a catapult.'

  'Who are the kids? Are they actors. It looks like they do all their own stunts.'

  The comments went on, but Alexander was relieved to see that neither Eric nor Ursula's name had been given, yet. It was only a matter of time before someone who knew them saw the video and posted their names and then what? As he was debating whether the video was positive or negative for them, Eric and Ursula walked up to him with towels draped around themselves.

  "What are you doing?" Ursula asked.

  Alexander handed her the tablet.

  "Please sit down, both of you. There is something that you have to see."

  Back to Contents

  ***

  Chapter 7 – Transfusion

  There was only one more week before they were to leave Parga. The days were still warm, but the nights were much cooler and it felt as if the holiday was coming to an end.

  Nobody had welcomed Alexander's idea of sending the IHB research facilities a virus, but they had all accepted that the only way forward was to go to Roswell. Over the previous two weeks, a plan of attack had been drawn up. It was in no way concrete and, as Andrea kept pointing out, there were too many unknown variables. However, with Johan's insider knowledge and the data he had copied they were as prepared as they could be. He was also determined to go with them and had actively volunteered.

  The 'Battle of Morocco' had remained in the 'Most Popular' category on various internet sites. Eric and Ursula checked it regularly and were enjoying seeing the number of views grow daily. As Alexander had predicted, it was not long before the children were named.

  A user called 'natacha' had posted, 'That's Eric Meyer. He used to be at my school but vanished.'

  Underneath a user called 'vaness' had added 'And that's Ursula Benjamin. She vanished too. Neither of them are actors!'

  These two comments had started a whole stream of posts about the video. It was not long before Eric was also recognized as a gymnastic champion.

  Over forty million people had now watched the video, and more versions had been uploaded. One person had added techno music. Another had added sound effects so viewers could hear gunshots and car brakes; he had even dubbed Sasha's screams. Another had added visual effects – changing the colour of the picture, pausing on certain moments and using slow motion. The slowed-down frames looked particularly good when Ursula jumped off the Yukon. For some reason, other users had simply uploaded duplicate copies of the original film.

  The adults had decided that the internet publicity was positive. Anyhow, there was nothing they could do about it. Andrea decided that when the time was right a post should be written explaining the events of that day, the events leading up to it and exposing the OSS. She had already started and was going to link it to Johan's flash drive data, using Jason back in Paris.

  Agent Hoover was sat in front of his computer. He was watching 'The Battle of Morocco,' for the umpteenth time. Until a week ago he had never seen it or heard about it. This had all changed when the internet monitoring software had alerted him to the names 'Eric Meyer' and 'Ursula Benjamin.' By this stage, thirty-three million people had already seen it. He debated whether to have the video removed but knew that it had already reached tipping point. If it were taken down, it would be replaced, and he would create an even greater interest in it. As far as he knew, the number of websites that it had been copied onto had exceeded thousands before he had come across it.

  There was an OSS team working on containing the footage and the internet furore around it. They posted comments about it being leaked footage from a film, and a trailer had been uploaded to accompany it. The posts diverted people for a while, but the 'vanishing of Eric Meyer and Ursula Benjamin' had grabbed their attention. Agent Hoover's one major hope was that it would be short-lived, as with the majority of internet sensations. A few years ago the 'Star Wars Kid' film had been massively popular, but it was a thing of the past, and nobody watched it or spoke of it anymore. He felt sure that the same thing would happen to the 'Battle of Morocco.'

  Agent Hoover was assigned a team consisting of eight people, but they were up against millions. He hated to admit it, but in this instance they were small fish in a large pond. It was another example of the OSS losing out. The escape of White King and Schwarzkopf, the events in Morocco and now this, were all a concern for him. There was, however, a bright side.

  Up until now, the OSS had not been mentioned. The public were mainly interested in White King and Black Queen; not who was attacking them. Any posts that did contain words such as 'OSS' or similar could not be submitted. Agent Hoover had ordered his team to hack into the site and add a filter. As soon as a user tried to post anything that may implicate the OSS, an error message would appear on his or her computer, and the connection would be temporarily terminated.

  Unsurprisingly, Agent Angel had been furious when he was first notified, and then again when he viewed the footage. He had huffed and puffed and sworn. When he had calmed down slightly, he ordered that it be removed from anywhere that it appeared on the internet. Hoover had not wanted to contradict Agent Angel and suffered when he told him that it would not be a good idea. However, in the end, he had understood Hoover's reasoning and accepted that the video should not be touched.

  An added advantage for the OSS was that the children were becoming more and more famous with every video viewed. Many people would now recognise them, and someone was bound to post something on the internet again if they were seen in real life. Once that happened, the OSS would pounce.

  The two children were out there somewhere. At the moment, they were not a target. The OSS was on a war footing, and Agent Hoover's job was to monitor any leaks of data from Schwarzkopf's flash drive. However, if they did appear, he had his instructions. Teams were on standby, and the targets would be taken by force. Once White King and Black Queen were in OSS custody, they would never escape again.

  Eric was going nowhere. He was not even going to try and escape. Up until the moment when he had laid down on the bed, he had considered running away. However, as soon as he lay on the cool sheets, he knew he could not move. Andrea and Alexander were coming towards him and placing bags of his blood in a line from the door to the bed.

  A coat stand was placed on the floor near to his head, and a bag of blood hung from it. Despite himself, Eric had to look up at it. He began to feel weak.

  Alexander placed an empty bag on the floor and ran a tube from it to Eric's left arm. He took out a bottle of disinfectant and wiped Eric's skin with it. By the time he had finished, Eric's arms were stained brown and no longer looked clean. Alexander patted the skin opposite Eric's elbow until his veins came to the surface.

  "Ready?" he asked kindly.

  Eric nodded and looked away as the needle punctured his skin. The pain was sharp and sudden, but this was not the real issue. Eric could handle the pain. The real problem was simply the needle.

  The needle attached to a thin tube and Eric, unwisely, watched the blood drain out of his body, snake down th
e tube and into the empty bag.

  "Okay?" Alexander asked.

  Eric nodded again, not daring to speak.

  Another tube dangled in front of his face and dropped onto his right hand. Andrea leant over him and without any bedside manner, stabbed the needle into Eric's other arm. Eric bit his lip so hard he could taste iron. The needle was attached to another tube and blood slid down in front of Eric's face and into his arm.

  "Do we have to do this?" Eric squeaked, but he knew his question had come far too late.

  "This blood was taken from you two months ago. It is younger than the blood in your body and, therefore, may give you some more time," Alexander replied.

  Eric already knew this but just wanted someone to talk to him. He was feeling faint and nauseous.

  Reluctantly, he said, "I feel sick."

  Andrea looked at him. "It is highly improbable to be physically sick from a blood transfusion. Your issue is mental, not physical. Close your eyes and think of something different."

  Eric did as he was told. Giant bags of blood, hundreds of tubes and huge needles appeared in his mind. He tried to think of something else but failed. Suddenly, he heard Ursula's voice in his head.

  "Do you want to play chess?" she asked.

  "Can I play chess?" he asked Andrea meekly.

  "If you allow me to move the pieces for you," Andrea replied. "Alexander, please fetch a set."

  "And one for Ursula too," Eric croaked.

  Alexander returned with two chess sets. He gave one to Andrea and then went to the room next door to give Ursula the other one.

  Ursula was sat on her bed in the same situation as Eric but apparently oblivious to the blood, tubes and needles that surrounded her. She was happily talking to her grandparents as if nothing out of the ordinary was happening.

  "Everything okay?" Alexander asked. "I've brought you a chess set. Let your grandparents move the pieces for you. I'll be in and out with Andrea, checking on you both and changing the bags. This may take several hours. We shouldn't be disturbed, but Johan is manning the stairs in case anyone decides to come up, and he'll warn us."