Eunoia

by R J Johnson

  One aspect of the Patrons that Alex had noticed over the years, was the absolute certainty they held about the universe. Nothing could surprise them. Technology and a regular sense of purpose held their species in a kind of emotional adolescence. Alex wasn’t sure if they even knew what a lie was. Proving a negative seemed beyond their capability.

  And that was a perfect Achilles heel.

  The plan didn’t take him long. He had always been good at thinking things through on the fly. It was just the execution that he was having trouble with.

  The Channel the Patrons provided him allowed him to program whatever simulation he wanted – they didn’t even have any idea of what security was like. He was surprised to find how easily he was able to access plans of the citadel where the Council of Twelve held their meetings (and presumably the twelve stones).

  It was difficult, arduous work. It was no easy task to plan a heist – let alone one on an advanced alien species. But he had to try.

  And more importantly, he had to succeed.

  Besides, it didn’t’ matter how long it took. Every time he failed and was caught (resetting the simulation), all Alex saw was Emily’s face and the two tiny unborn children the Channel had showed him.

  It was more than just a simulation to him now. They represented every child on earth he had met. They represented the hope that humanity still had something to offer the cosmos – a universe that deserved a species dedicated to understanding and love.

  Not the one of perfect order the Patrons wanted. With everyone and everything kept in isolation from one another.

  Besides, Emily was waiting for him and he had no intention of disappointing her. He had promised he would return, and now, after nearly a year of simulated planning within the Channel, he was ready.

  Alex slide a piece of gum the Channel had synthesized for him and began chewing. The distraction helped him forget the nerves. This time, there wouldn’t be a reset, there would be no second chances. If he was caught, the Patrons would likely vaporize him over keeping him alive – even if he had become the savoir of their species.

  He walked through the corridors, nodding to the many Patrons who had protected him through the years. They watched him impassively. They had strict orders to not interfere with the human that walked their walls. They were there to keep the adoring masses outside from charging in allowing Alex the freedom to roam within the citadel.

  After a few hundred feet, he reached his destination. He put his hand out, ready to open the door to the main throughway that would let him out into the Patron’s world for the first time in thousands of years. There was his moment. Once he stepped outside, there would be no turning back. He would be committed to the heist.

  He swallowed and suddenly his mind flashed back to the first night he had met Emily and they had watched Oceans 11 – the heist movie to end all heist movies. He chuckled, and smiled, thinking of their first encounter together.

  That memory gave him all the courage he needed.

  He stepped forward and pressed the button, opening the door between him and the citadel.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Scott and Christina were barely able to keep up with Emily as she retreated back to their cabin hidden away in the Onyx forest.

  They arrived a few minutes after Emily had gotten back. They ran up the stairs to Emily’s room where they could hear her softly crying from behind the door.

  Scott looked over at Christina, “I think you’re up best friend.”

  She nodded and tapped lightly at the door. “Em, hun? It’s Chrissy, let me in huh?”

  The crying stopped and Emily pulled the door open, revealing her tear stained face. Christina stepped forward and grabbed her best friend in a hug. “Now, now, it’s okay.”

  Emily leaned into her friend as tears began flowing freely down her cheek.

  “I’m sorry,” Emily said quietly through the tears. “I’m better than this, I know I am.”

  “Pregnancy hormones can screw a gal up,” Christina said, stroking her friend’s hair.

  “I’ll get some tea going,” Scott said softly. Christina nodded.

  “That sounds good,” Emily said, sniffing. Scott turned toward the kitchen moving to get the kettle on. The pair listened to Scott fumble his way through the kitchen, pots and pans clanging off each other loudly.

  “Got it!” Scott shouted down the hallway. “Don’t worry about me. I found it. One tea coming right up.”

  Emily looked up at Christina smiling, “I can see why you like him.”

  Christina glanced down the hall, a smile tugging at the edge of her lips. “He’s pretty fun all right.” She sighed and looked back at her friend. “But we’re not talking about me right now.”

  “I’m sorry,” Emily said, standing up under her own power and moving to the chair in her room. She sat down, her hands moving all over her lap as if she had no idea what to do with them. Christina moved and sat down on the edge of Emily’s bed, listening to her friend.

  “Stop apologizing for being human,” Christina replied. “Besides, you’re apparently going through some shit that I’ve been ignoring making me a piss-poor best friend.”

  “You deserve to be happy, I can’t always expect you to be there for me to bitch and moan to,” Emily said.

  “Yeah, but…” Christina’s eyes went wide. “You’re pregnant?”

  “And it’s even Alex’s kid.” Emily replied, trying to keep her sense of humor going. “Plus, it’s not as if I’ve had a lot of opportunities to hook up what with us fleeing for our lives and all.”

  “And seeing him this morning…”

  “Was a lot to take in,” Emily confirmed. “I was stupid to think seeing Alex, even as a kid, wouldn’t affect me.”

  She looked up at her friend, the tears beginning to return, “it’s not the hormones. That’s silly. I miss him, and I’m worried that I’ll never see him again. I’m worried that we’ll be stuck in the past forever and we’ll never get a chance to stop Kline from whatever the hell he’s doing to our present.”

  Christina nodded, “It’s not fair,” she said. “We got dragged into this without knowing what the hell we were in for.”

  She leaned forward and grabbed her friend’s hand. “But that doesn’t mean we can give up. Personally, I believe that wherever Alex is, he’s working just as hard as he can to get back to you. I’ve seen how he looks at you. That’s true love right there, and there ain’t no force in the universe that can defeat that.”

  Emily looked up, the tears on her cheek beginning to dry. “You really think so?”

  Christina exhaled, nodding. “I know so.”

  Emily reached forward and grabbed her friend in a tight hug.

  “Good,” Christina said. “Now, let’s reset.” She pushed Emily back. “We need to get you to the doctor. Just ‘cause we’re traveling through time doesn’t excuse forgetting about pre-natal care.”

  Emily snorted through a laugh and nodded. “We gotta be careful.”

  “We’ll keep your kid safe,” Christina said sounding confident. “It’s important I get to spoil this future niece or nephew of mine.”

  Scott entered the room with a pair of steaming mugs. “How’s everything?” He handed one mug to Emily who accepted it gratefully and the other to Christina.

  “We’re good,” Emily said glancing over at Christina. “But we decided it’s time we start planning on how to keep Kline from taking all the stones.”

  “Good.” Scott said, the smile returning to his face. He moved over to Christina and began rubbing her back. “But without Alex, or getting this letter into Kline’s hands, I’m not sure how we’re going to accomplish that without blowing up the world in some stupid paradox.”

  “Actually, I’ve been thinking about that.” Emily said, her voice sounding stronger and more confident than ever. “And I’m pretty sure, he’ll never see it coming.”

  Christina and Scott smiled as she began laying out her plan. It was then after she la
id out her plan to them that Emily was struck by how lucky she was to have friends like these two.

  “What do you think?” Scott asked Christina after Emily finished laying out her plan.

  She pursed her lips together thinking through Emily’s plan. “It’s doable. But from what it sounds like, we need to get started yesterday.”

  That’s when they heard the knock on the door. The trio looked around in panic. Scott shook his head. “Relax. It can’t be Kline. There’s no way he could even know we’re here.”

  But even as he stood to walk to answer the front door, he found himself wondering if this really was it. If Kline had managed to track them all down, then it was all over. He touched the shapeshifting stone in his pocket and got ready to do battle.

  He looked through the window, and frowned. “It’s Alex’s father.”

  Scott opened the door with Ted standing in front of him.

  “Mr. McCray, what can we do for you?”

  “Hello Scott…” Ted said, watching him expectantly.

  Scott felt the blood drain out of his face.

  “There’s no mistaking your.” Ted replied softly. “I don’t know what’s happening, what’s going on, or who you really are. But, I know you’re the spitting image of my son’s best friend and after what she said back at the house,” he pointed up at Emily who was standing at the top of the stairs watching their exchange, “You said if I wanted the real story of what’s going on, to come over. So here I am.”

  His voice softened, “And if has anything to do with my son getting hurt, then I want to know.” Tears welled up in his eyes and his voice cracked. “Alex is all I have left.”

  Emily stepped cautiously down the stairs as Ted watched her. She rushed forward and grabbed him in a tight hug.

  “It’s good to see you again Ted,” she whispered into his flannel.

  Ted looked taken aback, but pulled her in for the hug anyway.

  “We have a lot to tell you,” Scott said finally. “It’s probably best if you stepped inside.”

  Ted immediately crossed the threshold of their cabin and Scott closed the door hoping he wasn’t resigning the planet to an unstoppable paradox.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Ash was in between a foggy haze of unconsciousness and reality. He could hear shouting, screams of pain and he knew that people around him were dying. But his brain kept that all far away from him.

  He couldn’t tell how much time had passed. All he knew when he woke was he was in a truck moving down a highway at a fairly high rate of speed.

  Bleary he tried moving when he heard a voice that sounded like it was coming from a hundred miles away.

  “Easy there,” the voice cautioned. “You took quite a hit back there.”

  Ash struggled. His brain was trying to make the connection with why that voice sounded so familiar.

  “Here, drink this.” Ash felt the plastic top of an open water bottle pushed in between his lips. He sat up, his head spinning wildly, but that didn’t stop him from drinking down the water greedily.

  “Easy there, not so quick,” the voice cautioned. “Just a sip or two until you regain your bearings.”

  That’s when the voice clicked. Ash opened his eyes wide and saw Geoffrey Tate sitting next to him driving them down the interstate in a huge Ford F-350 truck. “We almost didn’t make it outta there.”

  “You fool,” Ash gasped. “He’ll know exactly where you’re taking me…”

  “Relax,” Tate said, waving him off. “If Kline wanted us dead, he would’ve killed us already. In fact,” Tate said, changing lanes to take the next exit, “I’m sorta counting on him following us.”

  “Where are you taking me?” Ash demanded. “Let me out now. Maybe I can convince Kline to…”

  “Have you had any of headaches?” Tate asked him mildly.

  Ash stopped for a moment and realized that Tate was right. His head was pounding thanks to the escape from Area 51, but it wasn’t the same kind of nerve wracking pain he had experienced thanks to Kline telepathically punishing him.

  “No…” Ash said slowly, rubbing his temples. “Not exactly that no.”

  Tate nodded. “I figured as much.” He rolled down the window and waved at a guard who was standing at the border of the exit. “The Governors in California and Nevada decided to cut themselves off from Washington after Kline took down the White House. They’re forming up a pocket of resistance against him out west here.”

  “They’re suicidal,” Ash whispered looking over the rows of tanks and artillery that had gathered around the California/Nevada border. “Even if Kline doesn’t just wipe them out with a wave of his hand, you know as well as I do he’d sooner nuke this whole place than allow any sort of resistance carry on.”

  Tate nodded. “That’s why I need you here, to helps us take Kline down.”

  Ash stared at Tate, his eyes narrowing. “And how the hell can I trust anything you say? You worked for the man for -”

  “Twenty years,” Tate said, cutting him off. “I was making good money. And I made some evil decisions over the years, but none of them involved nuking a country just so I could prove my power over the world.”

  Tate spun the wheel and turned into a parking lot filled with Humvees and other huge vehicles. “You know just as well as I do that nothing short of total world domination will do for the man. I don’t see any profit in helping him turn my world into something that only serves him.”

  He turned the truck off and looked over at Ash. “So what do you say? You want to go back and continue helping Kline kill millions of people? Because it won’t stop with one country. It’ll be anyone that looks at Kline sideways. I guarantee that by the time Kline’s through with the world, billions of ‘undesirables’ in his eyes will be exterminated. That’s a piece too far for me, and I’m betting it’s too much for you too.

  “So what do you say soldier?” Tate asked, challenging him with a glint in his eye. “You want to help save the world? Or condemn it to a lifetime of slavery?”

  “When the hell did you get so righteous?” Ash growled.

  “When it started being the better option over getting paid,” Tate quipped. He opened the door to his truck. “Let’s go.”

  Ash sat there for a moment after Tate got out of the truck debating his options. He knew Tate was right, but the odds of them succeeding was too small.

  But then again, that’s what he had always excelled at.

  He smiled, and opened the door following Tate out of the truck and into the small corrugated building.

  Tate glanced back, seeing Ash follow him into the building with a smile.

  Once inside, the heat of the midday sun disappeared, the blast of an air conditioner set on ‘Artic’ keeping the building filled with equipment and people cool from the desert heat.

  Dozens of men and women were on the phones coordinating response and troop movements from states all over the US. Some states had so far refused to answer the call of the California and Nevada resistance, but many more had.

  Tate led Ash over to a big board lit up with an image of the United States. Several states in the upper north east were outlined in red while California, Nevada, Washington and Oregon were all lit up in green. A man Ash recognized from the San Ellijo Hills Nuclear plant when Professor Collier had taken it over was standing in front of it scowling.

  “Lieutenant Washington?” Tate called out. “I have Kline’s former assistant here.”

  Washington glanced over at Ash and nodded. “I remember you.”

  “I remember you too,” Ash replied quickly. “Not many people out there who can get away with throwing me in the brig.”

  “As it turned out, I was right to do so,” Washington snapped back.

  Tate’s sudden coughing fit sounded like a cover for laughter.

  Ash growled, but Tate held him back. “Lieutenant, between the two of us, you’ve got the most information you’ll ever get about Kline and his operation. So maybe some respect is du
e?”

  Washington cocked his head, “Gents, I have no time to deal with egos right now. If you think you can help, then help. If not, get the hell outta the way…”

  “So I can go about doing the business of the US Government,” Ash finished for him. Washington looked over at Ash with a nod.

  “Indeed.” Washington turned and looked at the pair of men in front of him. “So, what do you say? Can you help?”

  Ash glanced at the big board and shook his head. “First off, you don’t have enough of Kline’s actual strength represented up there. There were at least three or four million people left in Manhattan when he walled it off from the rest of the world. Even if you figure only ten percent of them are in any kind of fighting shape, that’s around three or four hundred thousand men and women dedicated to following Kline’s every order.”

  He shuddered thinking about the cluster headache that had come every time he thought about defying Kline’s order. “Because believe me, they’ll do anything to keep from being punished by Kline.”

  Washington absorbed the new information impassively. “That it?”

  “There’s more,” Tate said. “He has his hands on just about every stone out there. There’s only one left in the world.”

  Washington looked at the two of them. “Do we know where the last one resides?”

  Tate’s face fell. “Unfortunately not. But the good news is, I don’t believe he knows where it is either.”

  Washington turned to the big board with the updated figures provided by Ash. “Then our new mission is to find that last stone gents. Think you’re up to the assignment?”

  Ash wasn’t sure he was, but it was too late. Tate had already piped up.

  “We’re likely the only ones who can at this point.”

  “Good.” Washington grunted. “In the meantime, we’re moving out to head for New York City to hook up with various other armored divisions from all over the United States. We’ll make our last stand here…” he pointed to a spot on the map near DC.

  “Figures…” Tate whispered. “Another Battle for Bull Run.”