“Exactly,” Celeste agreed. “Not to mention that James the first probably didn't understand how dangerous it was.”
“Getting donuts isn't as dangerous as it sounds,” Robert asserted. “But, either way, I don't want to argue about it right now. We've got a lot to do and the sooner we get on it, the sooner we'll get it done.”
“And, the sooner we'll be able to get to date night,” Morgan added.
“Precisely,” the traveler agreed.
This observation brought the meeting to an end. Minutes later, Robert had landed in the VIP section of the island and ordered a sleek, one-seater ship to be delivered to Cleo – the spaceship-time-machine, not the girl – as soon as possible. Morgan also took the opportunity to order something. He wanted – a Rubik's cube. It was his hope that it would help him learn to solve the first formula. If he managed to do that, Sister might be able to program him with something more difficult. Like, something they programmed toddlers with, maybe. These orders placed, Robert contacted Sister to get all the information she had managed to collect on the fan club.
“You know it's weird,” Morgan mused the moment the comm was closed.
“What is?” the traveler asked.
“Sister being named Sister.”
“Her name's not Sister,” Robert pointed out. “It's Melisa.”
“Then why does everyone call her Sister?”
“She's in charge of induction,” the traveler replied, “and always has been. She's the first person in Never Never Land that most people ever meet. She tends to stay in touch with people. So, she's like everybody's sister.”
“And Brother?”
“It's basically the same thing. He's in charge of job assignments, so everyone knows him.”
“What's his real name?”
“Baklarrmanfusllas.”
“I'll just keep calling him Brother.”
“Good idea,” Robert said, rising from his seat. “Anyway, go tell Doc that I want him to meet me in the conference room in about half-an-hour. I want you there, as well. But, make sure you don't let the girls find out.”
“Yes, sir,” Morgan replied with the laziest salute he could manage.
Just over half-an-hour later, Robert, Morgan, Doc, and Vox were all gathered around the table in the conference room with the door locked.
“Doc,” Robert said, before taking a deep breath and letting it out in a sigh. “I've committed a crime.”
“Only one?” Doc asked with a smile.
“No...” the traveler replied slowly. “But, at least one that really matters. I've broken one of the laws. Do you want to know more or do you want out?”
“Whither thou goest, I will go,” Doc assured him.
“Thanks, Doc,” Robert replied. “I knew I could count on you.”
“What exactly have you done?”
“I've... well, that is to say, we've traveled back in Never Never Land's time.”
“We've?” Doc asked.
“You were asleep,” the traveler explained.
“I see. And, why did we do that?”
“I was looking for clues,” Robert explained. “Well, that, and trying to prove to the girls that Morgan and I weren't pigs.”
“Did you find any?”
“We did,” the traveler nodded. “And, Sister has managed to find us even more, although she doesn't know it. While we were back in time, we found out that the woman who sabotaged the ship was a clone. Going through the information Sister collected for us, I discovered that she was the clone of a woman named Martha Summers who works in the history department. Susan Montgomery is the fan club president and she works for the department of resource management. She's only been on the island for about a decade and started the fan club out of her garage just over two years ago. All the rest of the women seem just as ordinary. So, our only lead it that Miss Summers was cloned and that her clone was the instrument used against us.”
“How do we go about following that lead?” Doc asked.
“Call Sturm and ask him why he did it,” Morgan suggested.
“It's not Sturm,” Robert insisted. “Doc, I want you to go over the clone's DNA profile. Look for any anomaly that will tell us where she was grown. Vox, I want you to track down every cloning facility on the island, as well as any unexplained power draws on the grid that might have been used by a hidden cloning facility.”
“Going through the facilities themselves will be a piece of cake,” Vox replied. “But, tracking the power is going to be next to impossible. For one thing, we don't know when the clone was grown. For another, if I was making a clone for something like this, I wouldn't be plugged into the grid.”
“That's an excellent point,” Robert ceded. “Still, we've got to work with what we've got until we get more. So, do your best to find out what you can.”
“What can I do?” Morgan asked.
“Find out everything you can about Martha Summers,” the traveler replied. “If she's done anything that's even slightly out of the ordinary, I want to know about it.”
“Sounds good,” Morgan nodded. “Oh, and why don't you want the girls to know what we're doing?”
“We're all accessories after the fact,” Doc explained. “The girls aren't yet. At least, I assume they aren't.”
“Cleo and Azure know that we went back but, that's all they know.”
“In that case, we should be able to get them off the hook even if we get caught,” Doc nodded. “You ordering them not to tell anyone will be enough to keep them out of prison.”
“I believe so, as well,” the traveler nodded. “Now, we've all got more than enough work to do, so let's get on it.”
Get on it, they did. Morgan had enough sense to the see the possible dangers of being caught reading about a woman who wasn't Azure when he couldn't even explain why he was doing it if he did happen to be discovered. As a result, he had Robert send the information to the computer in his room and locked himself in for a few hours of study.
During this time, the soon-to-be-clone's-ship arrived, along with Morgan's Rubik's cube. These essential items were brought on board and the traveler launched the ship into non-space, heading straight for the target world at the target time.
As soon as he felt he had learned what he could, Morgan completely deleted his browsing history, making a mental note to have Robert double-check it for him when he had a few minutes. The last thing in the universe he wanted to happen was for Azure to discover some almost-deleted information about some other woman on the computer in his bedroom.
“He's maladjusted,” Morgan heard Celeste say as he stepped onto the bridge.
“I don't think I'd say maladjusted,” Doc replied, rubbing his chin. “Although, I readily admit, he's not your average man.”
“Who are we talking about?” the young man asked, slipping down into his normal seat.
“Rob,” Cleo replied. “Who else around here could possibly be described as maladjusted?”
“I probably could be,” Morgan mused, “depending on how you look at it.”
“No, you're not,” Azure assured him with a smile. “You are very much the average man.”
“Since I'm not sure exactly what you mean by that,” he replied, “I'm going to take it as a compliment.”
“Suit yourself,” she said.
“Either way,” Celeste continued, “he seems to have absolutely no interest in family.”
“Yes, he does,” Doc disagreed. “It's just that we are his family.”
“I suppose we are in some ways,” she ceded. “You know that's not what I mean, though. I hadn't thought about it until we started working on this job but, Rob has never mentioned his parents in front of me and I've known him for... longer than I care to admit.”
“Go on and admit it,” Morgan chuckled. “You're a smoking hot twenty-year-old woman now, no matter how many years you've lived.”
“I suppose that is a point,” she said, shaking her head, “Although, I'm not sure about the smoking hot pa
rt.”
“Please,” Morgan replied, rolling his eyes.
“You may as well get used to that, Celeste,” Cleo said, shaking her head. “It's the only way Morgan knows how to compliment a woman.”
“Not true!” the young man replied. “I also think you're all brilliant and virtuous as well as being beautiful. And, Azure can kiss a man until his knees just about buckle up under him.”
“Thank you, Morgan,” Azure said with a slight blush. “But, I think we're getting rather far afield.”
“Yes, we are,” Celeste agreed. “My point is that, I've known Rob for roughly a hundred years now and he has never mentioned his parents to me. Cleo, you've known him your whole life, and you're engaged to him. What do you know about his family?”
“I think he's got some cousins on the island,” she replied with a shrug. “But, I've never met them and he might call anybody Cuz whether or not they were actually kin to him.”
“That proves my point, right there,” Celeste asserted. “Robert doesn't do family.”
“You know,” Cleo said, “it's crazy but, I never even considered the fact that Rob had parents before this very moment.”
“Maybe he didn't,” Morgan suggested with a smile.
“Everyone has parents, Morgan,” Doc pointed out.
“I mean,” Cleo continued, “I've never known anything about my own parents, so I never thought anything at all about his.”
“He never told you about your parents?” Celeste asked, shaking her head.
“He didn't,” the green maiden replied, “But, I can understand why he wouldn't have. I went missing as an infant so, more than likely, my parents lost me somehow or they were killed. I never asked because I was sure he wouldn't tell me and, even if he did, he would have just told me what I most wanted to hear. So, what I think probably happened was that my parents misplaced me somehow and then found a girl almost exactly my age, whose parents had also mysteriously gone missing for some reason, right around where they lost me. So, they raised her thinking she was me and she always believed they were her parents.”
“Yeah...” Morgan said slowly. “That's probably exactly what happened.”
“Well, it's what I like to think happened,” Cleo replied. “Since I'm sure that Rob would tell me something like that if I asked him, I decided it would be easier just to believe it without putting him to the trouble of lying to me about it.”
“I can actually understand that,” the young man replied. “And, that fact scares me a little... Anyway, since you didn't have parents, who raised you?”
“I was basically shared around from family to family,” she explained.
“That's kind of sad,” Morgan replied.
“No, it's not!” she laughed. “It was awesome. You know how few babies there are on the island? I was almost like a celebrity. I got to stay with countless couples growing up. I have I don't know how many basically foster-mothers and father-figures. Plus, Rob would drop in every week or so to tell me stories. So did Doc and Vox, actually. I've known all of them all of my life. I actually remember having a crush on Rob as far back as five years old. I spent my early teens dreaming about what it would be like to work with him and have him ask me to marry him.
“I can't contrast my upbringing with what it would have been like to have had my own parents, of course. But, it never bothered me growing up. Every day was just about like Christmas. I was constantly showered with presents and attention.”
“It's a wonder you didn't end up spoiled,” Morgan observed.
“Rob says I did,” she replied with a hint of smile.
“Have you stayed in touch with all of your foster-parents?” Celeste asked.
“Kind of,” Cleo said, tilting her head back and forth. “I'm usually really busy and, compared to them, I'm still an infant. I imagine most of them wouldn't think anything of it if I didn't call for a decade or so. Although, I did make it a point to go see all of them when Rob abandoned me on the island for a year.”
“I can't imagine not talking to my parents or my children for a decade,” Celeste replied.
“Being essentially immortal gives you a slightly different perspective, my dear,” Doc asserted. “I've known Rob for – I suppose it's been centuries now. And, it seems to me that, for him, the past, the present, and the future are all merged into a single moment. He also has a truly phenomenal memory, in spite of certain claims he occasionally makes. I've seen him pulled into the past while telling a story, his mind locked in a time and place long since gone.”
“I know exactly what you mean,” Morgan nodded in agreement. “That's happened to him right in front of me, as well.”
“What was he talking about?” Cleo asked. “I don't think I've ever seen him like that, and he's told me countless stories. Of course, a lot of them were probably lies.”
“It's almost as if he's reliving those moments as they pass through his mind,” Doc continued, ignoring the green maiden's question. “He's never told me anything about his family and I've never asked. I don't know why he might not want to talk about it but, I know why I don't.”
“Know why you don't what, Doc?” Robert asked, marching onto the bridge.
“Nothing we need to discuss at the moment, Rob,” Doc replied.
“Excellent,” he nodded. “Because we don't really have time. We'll reach the target in a few hours and we need to make sure everything's ready before we get there. Morgan, I need you to help me record a video.”
“Not a problem,” the young man said, lifting himself from his seat.
The pair headed to the ship's recording studio, where Morgan flipped the leave-us-alone-light switch and took control of the camera as Robert dropped down into his normal seat in front of the future green-screen.
“Do you leave the background green?” Morgan asked as he made sure Robert was in the center of the shot.
“Nope,” Robert replied, shaking his head. “By the time old James the first sees it, the background will be a slowly spinning galaxy.”
“That's pretty cool, I guess.”
“I think so,” the traveler agreed. “It makes me look more like I'm from the future.”
“If you say so,” the young man chuckled.
“You ready yet?”
Morgan did the rolling gesture.
“Hello, James,” Robert said, gazing into the camera, “my name is Robert Hood and I'm a time traveler. In point of fact, I'm the last time traveler. I've come back in time to undo all the damage the previous time travelers, including yourself, have done. I know that you've just completed your time-machine and intend to go visit your great-grandson in the morning. It's imperative that you don't do that.
I can, however, tell you a bit about the future. In the years to come, James Morgan the fourth becomes one of the most successful inventors your world has ever seen. His genius in business allows him to use his talents to become extraordinarily wealthy, making your family more successful during his lifetime than it ever was before, or ever will be again. He is the pinnacle of your line, representing everything that is good and noble. So, as you can see, he does very well for himself without any help from the past charging unnaturally into the future.
“Time travel can have truly devastating results, James. I would appreciate it if you would destroy your machine, along with any notes you have, and never tell anyone about your experiments. I'm sure you'll see the sense of my request, and am completely confident of your compliance. For that, you have my thanks.”
“You lied to him,” Morgan pointed out as soon as Robert gave him the cut signal.
“About what?”
“James the fourth was a jerk.”
“What was I supposed to say?” the traveler asked with a shrug. “Hey James, don't go see your grandboy in the future; he's a total loser. Do you think that would have kept him from changing the time-lines?”
“Probably not,” Morgan nodded. “He seems like the kind of guy that would try to fix it and mess things up even
worse.”
“You have good instincts sometimes. Let's go.”
With the message recorded, Vox and Robert got to work rigging up the video system that would deliver it, while Cleo and Azure were busy prepping the remote control system they intended to install on James Morgan's time-machine. They all completed their tasks with just enough time to bowl one game before they needed to suit up. This time Robert managed to beat Azure but, honestly, she just had a really bad game.
Just minutes after they dropped into real-space, the entire crew was in the car headed for the manor house. Once again, they crossed the lawn in complete silence as Morgan's mind chattered almost non-stop directly into the brains of the rest of the crew. They reached the servant's entrance and opened it with a newly printed rubber-ish thumbprint without incident.
This done, they made their way cautiously back to the security office, where they found the guard just beginning to wake up. Robert administered a little more night-night-gas before Doc picked him up and laid him on the floor again. Vox took control of the system as Robert and Morgan set out to find James the fourth, and Cleo and Azure headed back to the vault-lab.
“Alright, ladies,” Vox's mind said, “Go.”
“We're in the elevator,” Cleo thought just seconds later.
“Perfect,” Robert replied with a smile. “Vox, are there any guards between us and his door?”
“It doesn't look like it,” Vox said, glancing over the monitors. “Although, we may have a small problem.”
“What's that?” the traveler asked.
“It looks like his door has a lock on it,” Vox replied. “And, it's not tied into the main system. So, I can't open it from here.”
“Will you need my help?” Cleo asked.
“I'm not sure,” Robert replied. “Let me take a look at it and I'll let you know. Once you've got the door to the vault open, you can come up here if I need you.”
“I thought you always needed me.”
“I do. But, right now, I need you to get Azure into that lab.”
Bad Behavior (The Last Time Traveler Book 3) Page 5
