He blinked.
Pain radiated out from the light recepters, a pain so constant, so low, that it no longer registered consciously, the blink a habit as minute fluctuations from a crewmember’s screen registered out of the corner of his left eye.
He breathed in, and out, the rhythym the constant focus of years of training, of controlling his body, forcing it to adapt to the new, and the old, the evolving nature of existence. Never ending pain, as the……
“Colonel,” the aide repeated.
The man blinked again, focusing on the woman standing to the right of his command chair, auburn hair glinting just slightly from the reflected blue lights of the deck. Her black working uniform so different from his green, the only reminder of their shared duty status the unit patch on the left shoulder.
“Captain,” he acknowledged quietly. Barely speaking above a raspy whisper, the gravel in his voice a result of repeated trauma that his body had not quite healed yet. Eventually, not yet.
“Sir, you requested notification at twelve hours prior to targeted convergence.”
“Very well. Inform security on deck two that I will be down in fifteen minutes.”
“Aye, Aye, sir,” she replied as he stood calmly, smoothing out the uniform, before walking off the bridge of the ship.
Speaking into her communications device, she tapped a code on the tablet. “Ready the Portal. He’s on his way down.”
As she returned to her duty station, she frowned. Like everyone on this ship, she knew she had been selected by the commander personally. Just like he’d overseen the design of the base, and every upgrade in the last seventy years relative time. And he still looked to be an age of her brother, her much younger brother. Until you looked him in the eye. No one looked him in the eye if they could avoid it.
“Sir, the Portal is ready for transport as soon as you link and provide coordinates.”
“Very well, Sergeant, you are dimissed. Return in thirty minutes.”
The sergeant looked at the three technicans in the room, even though he was as briefly befuddled as they, then barked, “You heard the Colonel.” As they moved quickly to exit, “Thirty minutes, sir.”
He walked over to the other door in the room, entering a complex alphanumberic combination, followed by a scan of his eye, a blood test, and verbal confirmation of his voice print.
Then he entered.
She stood as he entered. Thirty years ago, when he had “rescued” her from the transdimensional time tunnel in which she’d been cast, she had been battle hardened. Young, far younger than him, even then. Scarred, but hopeful. Thankful to see him. Now . . . . now, she was still beautiful to him, but she had aged, as all people did. As all people did except him.
Her eyes glowed with a lot of emotions when see saw him, but hope wasn’t one of them. Hadn’t been in fifteen years, not since he’d killed it with one sentence. Two words, really.
He let the door hiss shut behind him. Then placed a device on the inside, clicking a subdued button and the lights began to flicker.
‘”Hello, Shawna.”
“Fuck you, Colonel.” The sarcasm of the rank was only outweighed by the true rage that encompassed the first phrase.
“Get the fuck out of my cell. Open whatever portal. To wherever. I don’t fucking want to look at you.”
“There’s no mission Shawna. Just the destruction of this facility.”
“Like I fucking believe anything you or your people say anymore.”
“I know…….and I’m sorry for that. I truly am, even a monster can know regret. I wish I could have told you then, but it wasn’t safe for them.”
The rage emanating from her seemed to pause for a moment, “Safe for who?” A tiny spark of hope flared in her eyes.
“Henri Grace Porter-Anderson, Brett Oliver Porter-Anderson, Shawn Jacob Porter-Anderson.”
She staggered at the names, grunting as if punched, and then punched again, before whispering, “You said…..”
“I know what I said. Everybody had ta believe the mission failed again. Or else the evil of this world, this crew, this team I built, would have tried again, an’ again, an’ eventually they would succeed in actually breaching into other worlds.”
Tears are already running down her cheeks, “How?”
He walked slowly to her, taking her hand lightly, “We have twenty-four minutes left. Want to here the story?”
He knew it was coming but he didn’t react as she slapped him, again and again, before collapsing into his arms. “Yes. Tell me, you fucking bastard.”
It was cold for Southern California, this December, this world, in the year 2019. He’d been there a week. With three infants who did not obey orders in any way. He didn’t even have to sleep, but he kept getting strange looks, a one-eyed man with three babies.
The readings all said he was in the right world, the closest version to her world they’d been able to map. The one he’d been from, the version of him she’d thought he was so long ago. The one she’d jumped after.
He’d seen him, with Amelia of all things. And someone who had to be their daughter. That had shocked him. And, strangely gave him hope. In every dimension he’d visited, she’d been dead, their children, if they’d ever made it that far, dead. Murdered. Always. How it was different this time, he didn’t know.
So, he’d found the residence. The other one that she’d said could be trusted, although there was no real way to be sure. That version had died, but…..they had been allies, lovers in another world.
He was home. He could see movement in the house. He was alone, his senses were never wrong. So, he bundled the children into the weird conveyance, a stroller built for triplets. So strange, this world. Then he walked up to the door and rang the doorbell.
It took awhile, he could feel the eyes even through the security cameras. Finally the door opened, “What do you want Oliver?”
“I’m not Oliver, Jacob, an’ I need yer help. Or shou’ I call ya Colonel?”
He explained it all. Well, not all. But enough, implying that their world was about to fall to Experion. Lies came easily to him after all.
“I can’t take them ta their base Jacob. I can’t be near them. There are too many, protocols, for lack of a better term. I can’t get near somebody that……enhanced. Run what tests ya need ta confirm on the children, but she said ya could be trusted ta get the babies ta them. Ta protect them for a few days until you did. She has faith in you, an’, well, I’m desperate.”
He stood there, looking down at the infants in their carriage. A blind man could see that they were…..more than human. He named them, pointing at each one an’ their distinctive features. Jacob flinched a little on the last name.
“I have ta go. Please. For her. For them.”
“Is she dead?”
“Not yet. But she can’t leave. The transdimensional phasin’……I’m the only one we have ever found that can survive it. Apparently these three too. I honestly don’t know what will happen long term. I……well, long ago, another one of my children died. Horribly. But that was an hour after phasin’ before we really knew what ta expect.” He didn’t bother to say the child’s age, the fact that she had been a cadet, as brutal as one could be raised by him, on that base. Or who the mother had been.
“Jacob…..one last thing. She’s a good woman. I don’t know if they can be told eventually. But, well, maybe it won’t matter if they are with them. But I am in no way a good man. Just a desperate one. She made me a better man, but still not a good one. It’s your choice of course, but anywhere here is better than the world I live in.”
“Thank you.” And I engaged the transphasic device.
“I hate you for doing that to me.” But she sat on the bed, leaning just slightly toward me.
“No more than I hate myself. No one will ever be able to recreate this base, not on this world anyway. Anybody that knew enough about it, I killed. Planted viruses within the research. We have five minutes left.”
“Brett….”
“Shawna….I hate myself, but I love ya.” She didn’t need to know about all the other things he’d done. After almost one hundred and twenty-five years, one good act in no way cleansed the sins. Yet it would have to do.
I kissed her lightly on the forehead, “I’m sorry.”
Then I held her until the explosions began.
Last Dreams 