“I just want to go home,” Brigham said.
“We’re on our way,” Martin replied, nudging Gerald in the shoulder.
Gerald’s eyes shot open and looked around the vehicle to gather his surroundings. “We all okay?”
“Yes. Let’s get back to headquarters.”
Gerald turned the van on without hesitation and reversed out of the field toward the frontage road. “Let me do all the talking when we get back. When I dropped off Web, I sort of left in a hurry; they’re going to have hundreds of questions.”
“Good with me, I’m gonna take a shot and go to sleep,” Brigham said, no sign of joking in his voice.
That’s all Martin wanted too. He hadn’t had a solid night’s sleep in a few days and it was starting to take a toll on his ability to think straight. One more skipped snooze session and he might grow crazy enough to run for Commander. He laughed, a bit slaphappy.
“What’s so funny?” Gerald asked.
“Oh, nothing. Just can’t believe how easily we got the medicine. It was supposed to be this big secret operation, and then someone just hands it over.”
“I’m glad you think this is funny,” Gerald snapped, clearly tired and cranky as well. They drove silently, thankful for the break in stress, enjoying a quiet morning into the city.
Within thirty minutes they pulled into downtown, working their way through the bustling traffic that was always present in 2019, regardless of the time of day. They pulled up to the marketing office, and Gerald let out a long sigh as he turned the engine off.
“We might have some visitors,” he said, scanning the area.
“What do you mean?” Martin asked, reaching for a gun that wasn’t on his waist, but packed somewhere in his suitcase.
“I think there are some high-ranking Road Runners in town, likely to see you, Martin.”
Do these people not believe in resting? Martin wondered. I just survived the future and want to go to bed. But all they want to talk about is what to do next.
The fatigue created a short fuse for his irritability, but he understood the widespread panic across the organization with Strike being held hostage. He’d try to answer their questions, but if they wanted him to ever run for Commander they needed to respect his basic wishes of a private bed to sleep in.
Gerald kicked his door open and stepped outside, his back cracking as he stretched his beefy arms above his head. Martin joined him while Brigham pulled himself out of the back seat.
“It does feel good to be back in my city without worrying about stepping on a Revolter on the sidewalk,” Martin said as he rounded the van to meet Gerald in front of the building.
“I’ve nearly forgotten the sensation,” Gerald replied with a forced chuckle. “Shall we?”
Martin nodded and the three of them trudged up the steps and entered. The marketing office hummed with energy he hadn’t seen before, and he wondered if everyone was actually working on their marketing projects, or looking for Strike. Eyes followed them as they passed through the hallway toward the back office.
No one said a word as they entered the manager’s office where the secret staircase waited. A brief, sick thought popped into Martin’s mind where he questioned the use of a basement as their hideout. Chris also used a basement for a hideout of Road Runners, and the connection made his mind spin.
As they descended the stairs, the sound of voices grew even louder than they had been in the marketing office. The Road Runners seemed to have doubled in population as dozens of people ran frantically through the office, papers in hand, phones to their ears, and not a soul paying attention to the three men who just returned from the future.
“Let’s see if Tarik’s in his office,” Gerald said, and led the way toward his office where the door stood open. Tarik sat behind his desk, two other men standing along the walls in the middle of an intense conversation.
“Gentlemen!” Tarik said, standing up to meet them at the door. “So glad you made it out of there alive. They bombed your hotel this morning, and we temporarily lost the signal on your tracking devices. Let’s just say there was a good five minutes of complete panic until the signal came back and we saw you were safe.”
Martin looked behind to see Brigham turn white as paper. Gerald stepped into the room, with Martin following. Brigham remained in the hallway, frozen as if he had just seen a ghost.
“I figured as much after they killed Web,” Gerald said, unfazed by the news. “Have we learned anything more about his death?”
“I’m afraid not,” Tarik said. “They didn’t leave a trace beyond the bullet wound. It appears they never even touched him. We did learn his laptop was designed to self-destruct if any false attempts were made to access it, so they wouldn’t have gained any information from that.”
An older Asian man cleared his throat from the corner of the room.
“Gentlemen, this is Commander Quang, the leader of our Asia chapter,” Tarik said. “And this is Commander Blair from Europe.”
Commander Blair stepped forward and stuck out a hand to both Gerald and Martin. He appeared to be in his early 40’s, with a head of light brown hair, and glowing white skin to complement a charming smile. “Always nice to meet a fellow Warm Soul,” he said to Martin in a British accent.
Commander Quang followed suit, his bony hands fragile with age, but stern. He was bald and clean shaven, making him appear younger than he really was. “It’s nice to meet you both,” he said in a low raspy voice. “We have a lot to discuss, so if you wouldn’t mind us beginning.”
He directed this last statement to Tarik, who hurriedly escorted Gerald into the hallway and closed the office door. Tarik returned to his seat behind the desk and gestured for Martin to sit down.
This must be it, Martin thought, knowing what these Commanders wanted to discuss.
“Commander Iglesia was going to join us, but something came up in Argentina that he needed to tend to,” Tarik explained.
Just cut to the chase already, Martin thought. I need to get this medicine to my mom. He had finally released his death grip on the pill bottle when they entered the office, trusting his back pocket to keep it safe while these men tried to convince him to run for the Commandership.
“Mr. Briar,” Quang said. “Commander Strike thought very highly of you. Her reports call you a perfect fit for a future Commander position within our organization. We’re close to calling her rescue mission a failure, and need to have certain plans in place before that decision is announced.”
Martin decided to play dumb.
“I’m sorry, did you say you want me to be a Commander?” he asked, placing an open hand across his chest.
“Yes, sir,” Commander Blair added. “You’ve progressed quickly through our training program, and now have a futuristic mission under your belt. We assume you have the medicine you sought to get, yes?”
“I have it, sure, but that doesn’t mean I’m a Commander.”
“Not yet,” Quang continued. “It’s an election, and sure to be a crowded one. But an endorsement from each of us can basically guarantee your election. Is this something you’re interested in?”
“Honestly, no,” Martin said sternly. “I don’t want to be responsible for people’s lives. I don’t even want to deal with time travel anymore.”
“With all due respect, Mr. Briar,” Blair said. “We are beyond that point. You’re in this life until you die, especially now that Chris has a target on your back, but I’m sure you already know that by now.”
Martin’s face flushed, the inevitable gnawing at his soul no matter how badly he wanted to refuse. He now realized that stepping out of Chris’s mansion both simultaneously liberated and trapped him.
“I haven’t even been a Road Runner for a year – why would anyone take me seriously?”
Blair nodded. “Same scenario as me. I was a Road Runner for six weeks when the election came up. They asked me, endorsed me, and I won. Now I’ve been the Commander for a little under a year. It�
�s very much a job you learn on the fly, not much any one can do to prepare you for it.”
“I just don’t understand why I’m the one you want out of all the people who are surely more qualified.”
Tarik pulled open a drawer and dropped a file on the desk. “This is Commander Strike’s report on you. We’ve had eyes on you since the very first time you took the pill from Chris and traveled two hours back in time at his store.”
Martin peered at the file, bloated with an inch thick of papers.
Commander Quang stepped forward. “Chris doesn’t know that we follow everyone he brings into this world of time travel—at least in recent years since we’ve started doing so. You were followed during your attempt at Columbine, saving your daughter, and all the way up to your trip to 1919. We look for people who have a natural feel for adapting to different eras, finding ways to survive, and you passed every test. You’re a natural time traveler.”
“But I’m not a leader.”
“Wrong. You don’t have leadership experience. There is a big difference. Your raw ability to adapt and strategize will translate into strong leadership qualities. You’ll never grow into a leader without trying.”
“And putting me in charge of the entire organization is the best option to do that?”
Quang smiled, the wisdom of thousands of years swimming behind his eyes. “We like to move quickly and boldly.”
The room fell silent, waiting for Martin to make the next move, but all he did was look from Tarik to Quang to Blair, then back to his twiddling thumbs. After two minutes, he realized they had dug their feet in and wouldn’t say a word until he did, the medicine burning a hole in his back pocket.
“I don’t have much of a say in this, do I?” he finally asked.
“Anyone in the organization can nominate anyone for the position,” Blair said. “I guess you could say we’re seeking your blessing before doing so. But we have every intent of nominating you unless you give us a compelling reason as to why we shouldn’t.”
Blair crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. Martin felt Quang’s eyes burning into his soul. His Warm Soul. The damned reason he was in this mess to begin with.
“I suppose the fact that I don’t want to do it isn’t compelling enough?”
Blair shook his head, grinning as if he knew he had won this debate. Which he had. They had him backed into a corner with no way out. Martin Briar was going to be a nominee to lead the North American Road Runners, and had endorsements in place from the commanders around the globe.
He wanted to start laughing at the thought, growing more punchy by the second, but the tension in the room was ready to burst at the seams. He was pretty sure Quang was trying to hypnotize him, as the old Asian man had still refused to break his glare toward him.
Martin’s mind raced for something—anything—to say that would make them leave him alone, but there was nothing.
“Okay. So what happens next?”
126
Chapter 33
Martin wasted no time bolting out of the office. He promised the Commanders to return as soon as he delivered the medicine to his mother. And yes, he would bring a pill back for them to reverse engineer.
His car waited outside, and he jumped in, speeding off like he had just robbed a bank. His mind kept trying to tug him to sleep, but it had no chance against the anticipation of saving his mother’s ailing brain. Martin drove like a maniac, weaving through traffic, honking at anyone who dared touch their brakes. By habit, he reached into his pocket for his cell phone, but it wasn’t there. He didn’t remember where he left the damn thing, or if it was even in the correct year. He wanted to call his mom and let her know that he was on the way with the medicine in hand.
“I’m coming!” he barked into the empty car.
He briefly wondered how painful it was for Sonya to cut the tracking device out of her arm. Any amount of pain would be worth the freedom of getting his mother and disappearing to an island in the Caribbean with his millions, never to be seen again. Sooner or later, the Revolters and Road Runners would give up searching and move on to the next schmuck they learned had a special ability.
He rolled down the windows on the freeway, the day’s warmth magnified in the enclosed car. The wind ripped through the car, splaying his hair in a wild mess, and drowning out the silence with the whipping white noise that accompanied driving 75 miles per hour with the windows down.
As much as he hated traffic, Martin was relieved to see other cars on the road, driving slowly without a care in the world. The way it should be. Even the bustle of life could be taken for granted when you saw the darkness of the future where zero traffic existed because everyone was dead.
Martin brought his mind back from that dismal setting, taking his exit that faced the stunning Rockies in the near distance. As he weaved down the side streets and toward his neighborhood, butterflies started to flutter in his stomach. He had subconsciously accepted his death on the journey to the future, and never expected to be driving home right now with the medicine.
He turned into his driveway, heart thumping as he parked and jumped out, hands flailing for the medicine bottle in his pocket as he rushed to the front door and burst inside.
“Mom!” he shouted. “I did it. I have your medicine!” The house was silent. Too silent, he thought. “Mom?”
She could just be napping.
He dashed down the hallway to her bedroom and flung open the door. Martin gasped and sprung back, tumbling across the hall and banging into the wall as all feeling drained out of his legs, causing him to collapse to the ground. The door banged against the inside of her bedroom and swung back toward its closed position, stopping ajar with a three-inch gap of visibility. Martin saw his mother lying in bed, her throat slashed in the shape of a red smiley face, her intestines oozing out of her stomach like a gutted deer.
The room spun around Martin as his mind worked in overdrive to make sense of what his eyes were seeing. His entire body trembled as his throat swelled like it had an inflated balloon inside.
You’re dreaming, he told himself. You’ve done too much time traveling and your brain doesn’t know what’s what any more. You’re asleep and will wake up soon, back in bed with Sonya, because none of this has actually happened.
The lie to himself gave him enough strength to rise to his feet and step toward his mom’s room. No, he didn’t actually believe he was dreaming, but wasn’t that how dreams normally worked? His body shuddered when he entered the room, the stillness of death thick in the air. He glanced around, looking for anything to keep his eyes from returning to his torn open mother. She kept a table by the window, stacks of her puzzle books and novels standing neatly on the edge. A single sheet of paper in the center caught his attention.
Martin forced his legs to cross the room, Marilyn to his left where the darkness of blood soaking into the sheets was impossible to ignore. He cleared his throat and gulped as he leaned over the table to read the paper:
Hello old friend,
I thought we had an agreement after I saved you from the Road Runners. I brought you into my home, my private domain, and you betrayed my trust by running away a few hours later. I’ll admit, it’s my own fault for not being more cautious, and thanks to you, future residents will have zero privileges as far as roaming the house and the grounds.
We could’ve made a great team. I had a grand vision for how to use your special ability to make the world a better place, but it appears you’ve fallen into the familiar trap laid out by the Road Runners. It’s a shame, because now our relationship can only end with your death.
I was ready to let it all go since I had only myself to blame. But then I heard you used Sonya to get the medicine to cure your mother. How dare you try to find a workaround to our deal. I exchanged a lifetime supply of the Juice (which you still have) for your pain. By avoiding the pain of watching your mother fade into a shell of her former self, you violated our agreement.
I’m sure you un
derstand why I had to carry out this drastic action. If it puts your mind at ease, she was sleeping when we did this, so she shouldn’t have felt a thing.
I’m not a monster, just a man of my word. Until next time.
Your friend,
Chris
Martin’s lips quivered as he read the note, clenching the paper tighter in his grip with each passing line. Tears spilled down his face onto the paper, blotting parts of the hand-written ink. Reality sunk in that this was no dream.
I can go back in time and stop this from happening.
The thought jumped into Martin’s head with such fierceness that he sprinted out of the bedroom in search of his bottle of Juice. He couldn’t remember if he had left it hidden in the basement bar or somewhere in his bedroom, sprinting to the basement first since it was the closest door.
But like most ideas that come to fruition in the middle of panic, the possibility quickly faded, taking along every ounce of hope with it. There was nothing he could do about his mother’s death—Chris would never allow it. If he had gone through this much trouble to prove a point, anything further would only result in Martin’s own demise.
That doesn’t sound so awful right now, Martin thought, memories of his mother flooding his mind. It had been a while since he contemplated taking his own life, and much had happened since that last time at his old apartment in Larkwood. But the temptation always stood silently in the corner of his thoughts, in case he needed an easy way out.
He had left his suitcase in the car, containing his flask and pistol. He debated running to the car and flipping open the suitcase in dramatic fashion, to face the ultimate crossroads of his life within the same bag. Drink the Juice to go back and save his mother, or slide the pistol between his teeth and squeeze the trigger, once and for all.
The days of flirting with suicide were behind him, though. If there was anything Chris had done, it was reform Martin into a person who longer toyed with the idea of ending his own life. He now tried to contribute to the world after coming out of Izzy’s death a changed man. Even if Sonya and the Road Runners were the ones who actually reformed him, it was Chris who had given him the opportunity to ever meet them.
Wealth of Time Series Boxset Page 75
