Eliminator Time Force

by Derek Slaton

  “Neither,” Rudo snapped. “Artemis and I have been through more together than you can comprehend, and I’m not going to be the reason she dies if I can help it.”

  His pawn pouted. “So what should we do with them?”

  “See if our friend Agent Hodge has some handcuffs on him and secure them,” Rudo instructed. “Please make sure they are comfortable, as they will be here for a while.”

  Duke nodded in acknowledgment before moving towards the duo. “Okay you two, move over to the steel beams near the wall and get comfy. My two friends Pete and Rocco will handcuff you.”

  “Once you have them secure, start loading up the truck,” Rudo said. He walked over to Artemis, now secured to the beam, and knelt beside her. “I hate that it’s come to this, Artemis. We have been through so much together. We rampaged through Europe together while taking down one of the most fearsome empires the world has ever seen.

  “You and I, we prevented billions from perishing. We created a world far superior than even our wildest dreams could come up with.” He brushed a lock of her hair back from her face. “You know, it could even be argued that you and I are two of the most important people ever to exist in the history of the world. We have done more to shape the path of humanity than anybody who isn’t currently worshiped by billions.”

  “Then why are you doing this?” she asked. “Why are you being a mentor to a psychopath and murdering the future leaders of our country?”

  “I lost the ones I loved because I had to protect our secret from governments that would misuse it,” he replied. “However, if I were in charge and the entire world knew I was an immortal who could see into the future, there wouldn’t be a secret to protect now would there?”

  Her jaw fell open. “So you are going on a killing spree just so you can be President?”

  “President, omnipotent god king, I’m open to whatever title they bestow upon me.” He grinned.

  She scowled. “You’re crazy if you think the general public is going to elect an egotistical narcissist like you.”

  “They will when I’m the only viable option. Now that I have updated equipment I can see the future in real time again. It’s just a matter of taking out my opponents until I get one I can win against, either by their incompetence or by being able to dig up dirt on them for that October surprise that hits every election. And the beauty of having an apprentice like Duke is I don’t even have to do the heavy lifting.”

  “You do know I’m going to do everything in my power to stop you, right?” She jutted out her chin.

  “Frankly, I would be disappointed if you didn’t,” Rudo replied. “In reality I should just kill you and your partner now, but I have faith in you Artemis. I know that more than anything you want America to be the greatest it can possibly be. With me in charge, knowing all the things I will know, it will be the greatest.”

  “We set out on a mission to save the country from destruction, not rule over it,” she hissed.

  “But if I rule it, we save it not only for today but for all eternity. I think once you see that you’ll understand that I’m right. And when that day comes I hope that you’ll join me.” He pointed to the case still in the center of the room. “You see that? I’m leaving you a case of gear so you can see just how successful I am in this venture. I assume you are still sending movies out to Brent?”

  She nodded, jaw clenched tight.

  “Now, one of my associates will be dropping by here in 24 hours to give you a key for these handcuffs. Don’t bother interrogating him because he won’t know where I’ll be. When you get back home with the equipment, look up the bright future I will provide for our country. Then continue what you have been doing all these years. Saving the little guy.”

  “I swear to god Rudo, I’m going to stop you!” she snarled.

  “I admire your optimism. However by the time you are released from these cuffs I’ll be far away from here. And we both know that thanks to our unique relationship with time I will be completely insulated from your reach until I’m in a position of power.” He stood up and began to walk away before turning around. “I sincerely hope that once you’ve had a chance to look at the future you’ll decide to join me. Although if this is indeed the final time we are face to face, I just want you to know how appreciative I am of all the sacrifices you’ve made over the years in making our nation stronger. And for the record, by leaving you and your friend alive I’m considering my debt to you paid in full. Good luck Artemis.”

  Rudo and his gang left the warehouse, slamming the door behind them and leaving the prisoners in relative darkness. The two of them sat in silence for a few moments before Hodge broke it.

  “Any idea what time it is?” he asked.

  Artemis chuckled. “Why, you have somewhere to be?”

  “Well he said in 24 hours he is going to be gone, so I just wanted to know what our deadline is,” he said.

  “Well my arms are behind my back, so I can’t see my watch, but if I had to guess I’d say about one in the morning. Not that it matters much, seeing as how we are stuck here.”

  “What, you don’t have a fancy gadget that can get us out of these cuffs? What about your laser pointer of death?”

  “Yeah, that would work perfectly, if it wasn’t in my front pocket.”

  “Well damn.” He sighed, and fidgeted in the darkness. “So what did he mean by his debt being paid in full?”

  “It’s kind of a long story,” she muttered.

  He chuckled. “Well, as fate would have it, I have some time to kill.”

  “This is true,” she replied. “During the war, a mission Rudo was heading up went south and he ended up getting captured, giving himself up so that the other members of the team, including myself, could escape. Our commander made the decision to cut our losses and focus on the main task. I disagreed with his order and went on a solo rescue mission.”

  “Goddamn you are one hardcore woman,” he blurted.

  “Oh you have no idea.” She laughed. “He was being held at this small POW work camp close to the border with Poland with about a hundred other men. The Germans had them working in a factory producing something or other. I’m not sure what they were making there, but whatever it was it warranted a heavy guard presence which made my job all the more difficult. I spent a day doing recon and had planned on doing a few more, but my timeline was moved up when I witnessed them execute a prisoner in the courtyard. I went in that night.”

  “How did you take out an entire work camp on your own?” He asked while continuing to move about.

  “Luckily it was a moonless night, so I was able to slip in undetected and into one of the bunkhouses,” she explained. “Rudo wasn’t in the first one, but a dozen angry Polish men were. We didn’t speak the same language, however when I pulled out a fist full of knives and tossed it onto the bed I’d like to believe we connected. They armed themselves and after some crude hand gesturing and pointing at blonde hair they understood who I was looking for. One of them had me follow him to the appropriate building while the others began taking out the guards one by one.

  “About thirty seconds after I reached Rudo, gunshots began to ring out. We didn’t know if it was the guards retaking control or if our Polish friends had upgraded their weapons. We didn’t stick around long enough to find out. We spent the next five weeks on the run, evading capture and raising as much hell as we could. Unfortunately in the process we endangered the main mission, but that’s another story for another time.”

  “Well that explains why you two didn’t want to kill each other. Kind of hard to go through something like that together and not be close,” he said as he continued to fidget.

  “Yeah, we’ve been through some shit together. And...” Artemis paused and watched Hodge begin to really squirm about. “What in the hell are you doing?”

  “In all your research on me, did you ever look really closely at my college years?” he asked.

  She raised an eyebrow. “Well I know you went
into Tech, got a degree in criminal psychology with a minor in classic lit. Not sure how that explains whatever you are doing at the moment.”

  “It can be difficult to make ends meet as a college student. Some of my classmates waited tables, a few of them stripped. And me?” He pulled his arms free and held up the pair of opened handcuffs. “I was a street magician.”

  Her jaw dropped. “You have got to be kidding me.”

  “Yeah, I’m just fucking with you.” He chuckled as he made his way over to her. “I had a crazy as hell girlfriend in college who was into some really kinky stuff. One night she left me handcuffed to her roommate’s bed and left to go to the bar. It was really awkward a couple of hours later when her roommate came home with his date only to find a naked man chained to his bed.”

  She barked a laugh. “That must have been a mood killer for him.”

  “Unfortunately, his boyfriend was a lot more open to the situation than I would have hoped,” he said with a sigh as he unlatched her cuffs. “Ever since that incident I’ve had a handcuff key sewn into the sleeves of all my shirts.”

  “Just for the record, if we survive this and save the country from being taken over by a madman, we’ll leave out the part where we were saved thanks to your paranoia brought on by kinky sexcapades gone wrong,” she declared.

  He nodded. “That’s probably a good call.”

  “Come on, let’s grab the gear and get back to the office.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  Artemis burst through the office door and made a beeline for her computer, leaving Hodge to drag in the crate of gear. Once he finally got into the room and kicked the door shut, he ripped open the lid and began digging through the box.

  “What am I looking for?” he asked.

  She glanced over her shoulder. “It’s going to look like a bright silver USB key. Should be near the top.”

  He rummaged some more and then found it, tossing it over to her. She plugged it into the side of her laptop and began typing away.

  He leaned over her shoulder. “What are you searching for?”

  “Anything about Rudo,” she said. “If he is serious about running the country he’s going to show up on this drive. Then all we have to do is work backwards to see when he first shows up and hope there is a way to get to him.”

  His brow furrowed. “I don’t understand. He’s had this plan for a while now, why couldn’t you have found him before now? Don’t you have a direct link to future news?”

  “Well, for starters, I wasn’t looking for him because I thought he was either retired or dead,” she explained. “Secondly, even if I was looking for him it’s highly unlikely I would have found anything since before today he didn’t have the technology at his disposal to win. I mean I have a deep seeded plan to become the first female host of Family Feud, but I don’t have the means to actually accomplish it, so I wouldn’t show up if I searched for myself in the future, does that make sense?”

  He nodded, and she took a deep breath as she continued to type.

  “The moment he entered the warehouse and got in position to get the jump on us he solidified his future, and now that he has a constant link to the future news he has the means to achieve his goal. This will hopefully be a big enough splash to force him into the timeline.” She leaned forward, lips pursed.

  Hodge scratched the back of his head. “So how do you track him? Just type his name into future google?”

  “Hardly,” Artemis replied with a shake of her head. “He’s going to have to come up with a fake identity in order to run for office. Partly because he isn’t technically born for another decade or so, and partly because if he ran under his real name he’d have to explain why his family and a couple of government agents were found dead in his house. I’m gong to start looking ten years in the future. If he does become President I can get a name and work backwards from there, hopefully finding him at a low enough level where he isn’t surrounded by a massive protection detail.”

  “Then what?”

  “No clue. But first things first. We have to find him.” She grunted as the search turned up No Results Found. “What the fuck?”

  He bit his lip. “That can’t be good.”

  “No, no it’s not,” she muttered. “I’m searching news sources ten years from now and can’t find anything.”

  “Wait, why isn’t that good news? If you can’t find him then maybe he wasn’t successful.”

  “You don’t understand, I can’t find anything about anybody. Every news source I use is simply gone ten years from now,” she said.

  Hodge’s knees buckled a bit, sending him against the edge of the desk. Artemis continued to type, getting more frustrated as she went along.

  “Jesus, nothing at nine years… eight… seven… okay here we go, finally,” she said, and leaned forward to squint at the fine print. “Well, he’s President six years from now.”

  He swallowed and cocked his head, still not trusting his legs. “Wow, from nobody to President in six years. Guess knowing everything has its advantages.”

  “No kidding.”

  “So what did he do? Why did everything vanish?” he asked, mouth dry.

  She clicked the mouse a few times to move forward in the timeline. “My guess is that it has something to do with the fact that World War Three broke out.”

  “How the hell did that happen?” His eyes widened.

  “A few months after being sworn into office, he went and addressed the United Nations. During the speech Rudo decided he wanted to let the world know he had the ability to see into the future,” she said as she skimmed the articles.

  He rolled his eyes. “I’m sure that went over well.”

  “Everybody thought it was a joke and that he had some sort of mental break. Nobody took him seriously and other world leaders, not to mention every light night comedy show host, mocked him mercilessly. They stopped laughing a week later when he exposed some third world dictatorship’s program to develop WMDs.”

  “How did he manage that? He send in spies or something?” he asked.

  “He was able to provide a photo of the country’s leader standing in the WMD facility,” she replied, pointing to the photo on the screen. “Took it from the country’s grade school history book that was written fifty years from now. With that photographic evidence he was able to justify a preemptive invasion, and it was brutal. He micromanaged the entire war from the Situation Room, doling out orders on a near hourly basis to minimize casualties. Knowing every single battle and how it went down was an amazing tactical advantage for our troops. Took all of four days for the country to be pacified, with our death toll under a hundred. And in typical Rudo fashion, he put the rest of the world on notice that if they tried anything against the USA they would meet the same fate.”

  “And let me guess, the other nations didn’t like the idea of a rogue US President having the ability to see into the future?” Hodge retorted.

  “Yeah, not so much,” Artemis agreed. “Within weeks of the demonstration, China, Russia, and Europe came together and demanded that Rudo share the technology with them so that they could prevent attacks on their soil, as well as keeping the USA in check. When he refused, the rest of the nations came together and deemed America the enemy of the world. The war was short and brutal, with America dominating all comers. Unfortunately for Rudo, and really everyone, Russia had a secret stockpile of nukes that was just far enough away from the US reach. They were able to get off a barrage of nuclear missiles before their country was overrun.”

  “I’m sure Rudo took that well.”

  “See for yourself,” she said, and hit play on a video of President Rudo.

  “My fellow Americans,” he said, spreading his arms. “A few short months ago, you placed your trust in me to make America the greatest nation that has ever existed in the history of the world. We became so great that our supposed allies got jealous and wanted to take us down a notch or two so we would be at their level. At first they just wanted wha
t we had, but when I, your President, refused to hand it over they made the decision to destroy it and us. As I deliver this message to you a barrage of nuclear weapons are bearing down on our great nation. Within the hour everything that we have build over the centuries, every bit of greatness will be vaporized. But fear not my people, for we will not go quietly into that good night. I have ordered the launching of every missile within our arsenal. With our dying breath as a nation we will strike back at our assaulters with such fury and force that it will crack the Earth itself. Even though we will no longer be here, you can rest in peace knowing that our actions and our greatness will remain forever. Godspeed, and God bless America!”

  “There are also an alarming number of livestream videos of the world ending, which I’ll spare us,” Artemis muttered, and closed the program window.

  The hair on the back of Hodge’s neck stood straight up. “Holy hell, that was all kinds of terrifying. Didn’t take long for all that power to go straight to his head.”

  “You have to understand, Rudo was always the most dedicated, most patriotic among our group,” she said. “When we discovered we could go back and alter history, he was the first one to volunteer. During the years before we left he did tireless research on the war, learned multiple regional languages, and familiarized himself with every resistance group that we might come across. By the time we hit Europe he knew exactly what needed to be done in order to accomplish the mission. He was, and is, willing to do whatever it takes to make our country the greatest.”

  “So even if we show him this video and the aftermath of nothingness he won’t abandon his plans?”

  “Unfortunately no. This will only get him to work harder and try to find a way to achieve his goals of American supremacy.”

  He sighed. “So how do we stop him?”

  “I don’t know yet. I need time to trace his steps,” she said, leaning back in her seat. “Hodge, it’s five in the morning. There is a comfy spot in the corner there if you want to get some rest. It’s going to take me a while to figure out our next move.”