The last time she had seen Harrison was in Southeast Asia. He had been a major then and had served as an advisor to her father. He had a good reputation as a dedicated career man, and her father liked his “astute observations.” She guessed he was in his early forties due to the light brown hair mixed with gray and a build only an active soldier could have.
The rest of the men were younger, all probably in their mid-twenties, and each one looked more nervous than the next. Samantha asked, “What exactly have they volunteered for, Colonel?”
He glared as he turned on his tablet. With the device held out for her, he said, “Yesterday, we lost two ground divisions at these coordinates. Power it up and send these men to this location exactly two hours prior to the attack, Major.”
She held the tablet and read the report. After reading the details of the failed mission and the horrid loss of life, she asked, “How are eight men going to prevent the air strike that kills our troops?”
The colonel answered coldly, “They can’t. I need to know that your research works.”
Her eyes closed at the death sentence. No rescue mission and no plan to make a difference. Her hand involuntarily reached up to the small chip that had been placed under the skin at the base of her neck. The colonel would know her research worked when their chips stopped signaling. The revulsion crept down her spine at the blatant disregard for human life.
“Major, set the coordinates,” the colonel commanded.
“You still don’t understand. The minute these men enter the other time stream via the quantum door, this time line changes. They no longer exist here, and they exist there in the other time. Their potential impact on the past could alter what is our reality today.”
Samantha tried to explain the risk to their current future and decided to try a fear tactic. “You may no longer be here to read that report.”
“I’ve read enough of your reports to know that they may enter a different time line, an alternate version of this time. I’m willing to take my chances.” A sneer covered his face. “Maybe another me in another timeline will have the satisfaction of your work being tested.”
“There may not be a you in the other reality,” she countered. He may have read my reports, but he obviously didn’t understand them. While she had falsified her methodology for time travel, there had been only fact when it came to the dangers.
“It’s a chance I’m willing to take. Enough stalling. Fire up the main system and the laptop and make it happen,” the colonel commanded as he gestured to the armed guards.
Samantha’s blood ran cold as the rifles pointed directly at Boomer, her only weakness. With no immediate options, she sat again at the desk and removed the laptop from the bag and went to work. Baby brother UNK005 stayed tucked in its hiding spot. She looked up long enough to say, “This will take a bit.”
The colonel offered a cold smile. “I have the time.”
As she entered the coordinates, two clicks outside of an enemy base in the former country of Brazil, she asked each man for his weight. Mass could never be assumed, according to UNK005. The Brazilian jungle became landing point alpha. She dropped another planned landing point to accommodate the order. Her plan would still take place, nine time slips before Kansas City. Without enough time to formulate a plan to remove Boomer from danger, she was ready to initialize the reaction.
She looked up at the very silent Captain Chandler. “You know I’m right. This future could cease as soon as the quantum door closes.” While the information she shared with him wasn’t all of it, there had been enough truth to scare any physicist.
Chandler replied, “I read your reports, and you may be correct. However, there is enough room to argue that you can slide from one reality to another without harming the initial point in time and space.”
Samantha countered, “Did you get far enough to look at the calculations on the impossibility of return? Time slipping only goes backward as the future continues to be unwritten. Not to mention that we have no idea if tampering with the past will even impact this timeline. Have you considered the possibility that sending these men to Brazil yesterday could simply change the past in another reality which would have zero impact here.”
For a moment, Chandler thought over the implications and then looked at the armed guards. “I am here to serve. If the colonel believes this can be of use to our troops, then so be it.”
He gave her the ultimate non-answer mixed with personal detachment. She had hoped for more from the man whose papers on gravitational distortions had inspired her once-curious mind. She was finally able to see him for what he was, an older, beaten-down man with the sole intention of saving his own meaningless life.
Chandler moved to stand behind Samantha at the desk. “It looks to be ready when you are, Colonel.”
The colonel turned to one of the guards. “Get their packs from the sleeping quarters.” Turning to Samantha, he added, “You missed the camera in the lamp on your nightstand. By the way, your skivvies are not military issue.”
She cringed at the leer, even as panic rose in her mind. How did we miss a camera? Since I’m still alive, it must not have had a microphone. Logic took over, and despite the fact that everything had gone so wrong so fast, she assumed her secret plan to change time was still unknown or she would have been ordered to change the settings.
“Given the travel bags, you have obviously made plans that contradict my orders. The United Forces is here to arrest you and Sergeant Michaels.” As the packs were laid at his feet, he said, “Congratulations, Major, you get to be among the first to travel through time and locations. The good news is I’m allowing you to take your precious laptop. You will have two hours to hack into the enemy’s computer system and prevent the attack on our men. Prove your worth, and maybe you get to live. If you can hack into our classified system, the enemy’s should be a piece of cake.”
With no other option, Samantha slipped the pack over her back and held the laptop in one hand. She uttered no comment on the paradox of there being two of her in one time stream. No mention was made of changing the fabric of time. Valid theoretical argument had no place there. She asked, “And Sergeant Michaels?”
“He reports for transport at 0800 as per orders,” the colonel answered.
She caught the quick wink Boomer offered and wondered what he had in mind. Samantha said, “I would like to let the men know what to expect.”
With a grand sweeping gesture, the colonel said, “By all means.”
She made her way to the group of military prisoners. “When I open the quantum door, there may be a lot of noise and perhaps even a sonic boom. Don’t let it startle you. I need you to clear the entry quickly because I can only keep it open for approximately ninety seconds. Turn immediately to the left and keep walking. Do you understand?”
Captain Harrison, as the highest-ranking officer among the prisoners, clarified, “Soldiers, do you understand what the major said?”
They answered with a uniform, “Yes, sir.”
Samantha stepped closer and whispered to the captain. “There will be another door. You can trust me and keep going into the series of doors or stay in Brazil. Decide now. I can’t hold it open for long.” She was taking a huge risk in trusting the man who had entered her lab as a prisoner. But her dad had once had full faith in Harrison, and that must count for something. He was also the enemy of her enemy, and in their world that had meaning.
Harrison drew in a quick breath and said loudly, “I have point. Follow me until I give the command to stop.”
She stepped back and asked, “Why bother giving them supplies, Colonel?”
“Any soldier sent into the field must carry a one-week supply of MREs and basic equipment,” the colonel answered.
She knew regulation 654-32.45; she was surprised he bothered to follow regulations.
Harrison chimed in. “Subset B-47 of that regulation also states any soldier goes into active combat armed.”
Samantha waited as the colonel scowled. The armed guards at his side exchanged quick glances at the conversation, which was good. It meant they weren’t simply his drones; they were soldiers. She added, “I need their cuffs removed. I can’t have them tripping and falling down in transit.”
The colonel gave the command, and the prisoners had free hands. “I know my responsibilities, Major. The men have knives in their packs.”
Samantha groaned at the thought. Taking knives into a battle with missiles was absurd at best. Almost as absurd as the colonel wanting her to hack into an enemy computer system in two hours; she was gifted but far from magical.
Out of the corner of her eye, she caught the gesture Boomer made with his hand—two fingers pointed down. He planned on rushing the guards and joining her. They had used the same communication during war games in boot camp. She walked back to the laptop and made a final adjustment to the program; he was a large man, and his mass mattered.
With a deep breath, she pushed the enter key and watched as the wall between the metal poles wavered. Wind rushed into the packed lab, and as the door-sized opening appeared, the air screamed with a noise beyond description. In a flash of momentarily blinding light, the jungle appeared. Harrison kept his calm and lined up at the quantum door, with the men falling into place behind him.
As he left the lab and entered the new reality, the world shook in complaint. Samantha steadied her feet while she shoved the laptop into the carrying case. With uncertain steps, she walked to the doorway she had created. All eight of the prisoners were in the jungle and turning left just as she had asked. As her foot entered the muggy heat, she felt more than saw the flash behind her and was forced forward by a conflicting wind. Her body was pushed as someone slammed into her from behind. She heard yelling, almost an inhuman wail, and a gunshot from a great distance as both of her feet hit the ground in the jungle.
Boomer shouted for them all to run as he picked Samantha up and ran for the next door that showed a snow-filled field with another door ten feet ahead. Samantha only saw the blur as alternative worlds flashed before her eyes.
Chapter 3
Samantha had only counted seven doors when she landed face down in the forest clearing. Before she could catch her breath, the air left her lungs when Boomer fell on top of her. She could feel something pushing him down for a moment. With a hoarse cry, she called out, “Get off of me, Boomer.”
As he rolled to the side, she felt hot air forced from the quantum door. It’s so hot it almost feels like blast residue. The doorway fizzled shut, offering the view of two people running away into the forest. Her mind cringed at the implications of startling the locals before reality took hold.
Boomer lay at her side, gasping for breath, and the eight former prisoners were either lying flat on their packs or on their knees, doubled over, which all but confirmed they had been thrown by a blast, but none of her calculations explained that concept.
Panic surged through her veins as she struggled to her knees and released her backpack. Her eyes scanned in every direction and only found the clearing and surrounding forest, no more doors. This is wrong, so very wrong. They were only on time shift number seven, and there were supposed to be two more slips, or more specifically, two more quantum doors.
The voice called to her again, and she had to force her brain away from the physics to the words. “Major Sykes, what in the hell just happened?”
She looked up to see an extremely pale Captain Harrison waiting for an answer. The nausea and disorientation she felt was reflected on his features. Before she could reply, Boomer jumped to his feet to snarl, “Back off now, Captain.”
Samantha’s grin came unbidden at the protection. She said, “Not what I had planned. Somehow my calculations were wrong, but that can’t be. I’m never wrong.”
“We are no longer on the base and definitely not in Brazil. It’s way too cold and damp for the jungle. What went wrong?” Harrison asked.
Struggling to her feet, she said, “There were supposed to be two more doors. I had planned to stop it, to prevent them from ever finding it, and I failed.”
One of the men rose from the ground and threw his pack to land by his feet. “While you two figure this shit out, I’m taking this off. It weighs a ton.”
Could the error have been so simple? She had factored in the mass of each man’s pack based on the weight of her own and Boomer’s. She looked up at Boomer and blinked rapidly while her mind spun. “Their packs can’t be that different from ours, can they? Even the potential for a slight difference in the mass should have been acceptable. I can’t understand why this went so wrong.”
Harrison crouched before her and asked, “So what does that mean?”
Her eyes closed. “It means that I violated seven points on the time space continuum for nothing.” She knew he waited for more as her mind ran through the points they had briefly touched. “We should be in Kansas City in 1984, with a final destination of Phoenix to prevent the world from finding UNK005. Instead, we are in the highlands of Scotland on May 4th in the year 1128.”
She looked up to see him contemplate what she had revealed. In an instant she knew why her father had liked him: he thought before reacting.
Harrison finally said, “We have traveled almost one thousand years into the past and halfway around the world.”
“Yes.”
Captain Harrison blew out a large breath of air. “What’s an UNK005?”
The question hung in the air unanswered as one of the men called out, “We have incoming.”
Samantha and Harrison followed the man’s gaze to the tree line to the west. Five men emerged from the newly budding trees and stood out in the open. All wore coarse shirts and worn leather pants. One man stood in front, clearly the leader. Training instincts took over as she assessed him: over six feet tall, medium yet muscular build, light brown hair that fell to his shoulders, and brown eyes that locked on hers. The man offered a small nod as he covered half the distance between them. Another man with similar coloring and build followed. The other three stayed behind.
Her heart beat rapidly as the man continued to hold her gaze and called out in clear voice hinted with a Scottish brogue, “I would speak with you.”
Harrison helped Samantha to her feet. “Do you mind if I take point on first contact?”
“It may be for the best. This is a pre-medieval culture, and a woman in command may be more than they can handle,” Samantha said. “We need to keep this simple and end it quickly. The lower the amount of contact with the indigenous people, the less impact on the timeline. As far as the men go, assume command. While I’ve read the manuals, I have no interest in military hierarchy.”
Harrison acknowledged the statement with a quick nod. He said to the men who listened to the conversation, “You heard the major. The situation is unusual to say the least. As I get answers, so will you. For now, I have point, and you will follow orders. It’s our best hope for survival.”
He glanced at a man sitting on the ground and said, “Private Weiler, I want a full inventory of supplies, from gear to what’s edible. Do you understand?”
The man snapped out of his daze. “Why should I follow orders? I’m a dead man walking.”
The captain replied, “You will follow orders because you are a soldier, and it’s what you do. I have command, and we all seem to have a reprieve from that death sentence. Choose now. Remember what it’s like to serve with honor, or leave.”
Weiler asked, “Can the major get us back?”
Eighteen eyeballs fixated on her. “I’m not sure. It will take some time to determine what the options are.”
Weiler said, “I’m not going back, Captain, but if you want to lead, t
hen I’ll follow.”
Harrison pulled Samantha a few feet away from the men in their company. “As soon as we get rid of the welcome wagon, I want a full briefing, including information on whatever UNK005 is and why it spurred your need to disobey command.”
“Consider it done. But while we’re at it, I want to know why you are now a captain sentenced for death,” Samantha countered. “It was an incredibly large leap of faith to take you with me, and that was only because my father trusted you.” With a nod to the rest of the soldiers, she continued, “I want their stories as well.”
Harrison smiled. “Your father was a good man and a better general. I’ve met most of these boys on our daily thirty minutes of required exercise topside while in the brig, and most are good soldiers who refused to follow bad orders.” He glanced over at Boomer. “He’s with you?”
Boomer answered, “Always.”
Samantha ordered, “Break it down for me, Captain.” While she could assess the situation, she wanted to know what Harrison was capable of doing.
Captain Harrison faced the two men who waited on the other side of the clearing. “Their posture is relaxed and seems to pose no immediate threat. While they appear to have some type of swords strapped to their backs, we would certainly see the attack coming. My guess is the noise from our entry drew their attention. My goal is to be polite, gather some basic information on geography and settlements, and then withdraw.” With a shrug to Boomer, he finished, “Maybe he should stay here. The sergeant doesn’t exactly scream harmless traveler.”
Boomer immediately said, “I have the major’s back. Besides, there is no way I’m going to miss this.”
Time of the Draig Page 3
