Post-Human Trilogy Part 8

"No, of course not," he replied. "I was studying them. I knew some universes move more slowly, so I focused my research on ones that are nearly identical to our own. The best way to determine this was by looking for recognizable events from history."

"Red letter dates," the A.I. added. "I can set the Planck to take us through a series of these universes, but I don't have enough time to change course."

"I understand." Aldous nodded before turning back to Samantha. "Don't change anything. These are all major events in history. We don't have the right to interfere with the timelines in those universes. Just lie low and wait for the Planck to engage again and take you to the next universe."

"How many universes are you talking about?" Samantha asked, still aghast.

Aldous turned to the A.I. for the precise answer.

"We've examined sixteen," the A.I. answered. "They are loaded and ready. There will be a ten-hour layover in each universe, though the time frame will be relative to that universe."

"Relative?" Craig asked. "What does that mean?"

"We don't have time to explain," Aldous interjected. "Explain it to him when you arrive in Universe 66," Aldous ordered the A.I.

The door to the Planck room suddenly opened, and a large syringe on a small, levitating tray entered.

"The nan.o.bots are ready. I will upload my consciousness now, with your permission, Professor," the A.I. announced.

Aldous nodded. "Do it."

The A.I. returned the nod before turning to Samantha to give one last instruction. "You will need to have Dr. Emilson implant the nan.o.bots high in the back of your neck, just below the occipital bone. It will take the nan.o.bots anywhere from several minutes to an hour to pa.s.s the blood-brain barrier and make neural connections so I can communicate with you." And with those final words, his image vanished from the room.

Aldous grabbed the syringe and handed it to Craig. Their eyes met, ever so briefly. The look on Aldous's face was intense, and his eyes communicated a message that had to remain silent but needed to be communicated nonetheless: Take care of her.

He turned back to Samantha. "I have to go now. We're down to five minutes. I have to meet the others." He grabbed her hands, and their fingers interlaced as he looked upon her wet, desperate eyes. "Live for me, Sam."

"No, no, no! We need a better plan!" Samantha shouted, her eyes squeezing shut as she tried to block the nightmare out. If only she could wake up.

"There's no better plan. Craig can't take care of himself yet. You have to protect him and the A.I. When you return, the two of you have to hide and rebuild. You've got to wait for your opportunity."

"For what?" she asked.

"The A.I. will know," Aldous replied. He leaned in and kissed her quickly but pa.s.sionately-a last kiss.

Craig, with great effort, resisted the urge to stab Aldous with the syringe.

Aldous pulled back and stepped away, but Samantha wouldn't release her grip.

"Don't do this, Aldous!" she shouted with all of her desperation.

"This is the right thing," he said to her, pleading for her understanding as he tried to disentangle himself. "This will make things right."

Aldous turned to Craig for help in separating himself. Craig didn't have to be asked twice and pulled her roughly away from her new husband. Samantha fought back, but Craig easily manhandled her.

"No!"

"Live for me, Sam," Aldous said again before turning regretfully and flying out of the room.

"No!" she shouted one last time before the tears turned into sobs and overwhelmed her.

Craig stood over her and watched as she cried. He shook his head slowly as he watched. He couldn't have written a version of h.e.l.l that would have been more painful. "I hope you're not expecting me to console you right now," he said as Samantha continued to sob.

She pulled at her hair and rocked herself slightly, her face bowed to the ground and hidden from view. "I don't expect you to understand," she replied, her tone harsh but filled with regret. She almost wished she hadn't reanimated him.

Craig watched her, crumpled and in pain, and suddenly sighed. An hour earlier, the woman had been his life. "Samantha, how about some understanding for me, huh? From my perspective, I was doing a suborbital jump over China ninety minutes ago. Now I'm watching my wife make out with a dirty old man and being told to stab her in the neck with a syringe and then to go hangout with her in another universe? This is like a bad acid trip! What do you expect from me?"

"Nothing," she said as she stood slowly, her legs unstable. "I expect nothing."

"Sam, this whole thing is crazy. Just give up the A.I."

"No!" she suddenly shouted, her neck snapping around, her eyes wild. "No! Craig, they aren't here to negotiate. They show no mercy!"

"How do you know that?" he responded.

"We tried to make contact once," she replied. "We tried to show them what we'd done-our powers. At first they welcomed us. But it was a trap. We were invited back once they'd a.n.a.lyzed our powers. As soon as they'd figured out how to neutralize them, they led us to a slaughter. They killed hundreds. Aldous barely escaped with his life."

"How can they kill you people if you're superhuman?"

"They have super soldiers of their own, Craig. No doubt, they'll be the ones leading the charge." Her eyes were wide and stricken with horror. "Aldous won't survive this."

There was something in her expression that sent a stab of cold through Craig's body. He could see she wasn't exaggerating, and he knew he had to heed her warning. "All right," he said, making up his mind. "All right, then we'd better go. How much time do we have?"

"Haven't you set your mind's eye yet?" she asked, concerned.

"The A.I. helped me with it, but I'm still a little foggy on how to control the d.a.m.n thing. It gives me a headache just looking at it."

"We've less than three minutes now," Samantha announced.

"Okay. Well, we better get started. How does this work?"

"First, we step up on that platform," she began, pointing to the small, silver platform. "The machine will harness the fusion energy from the generator and, for a microsecond, boil s.p.a.ce, for lack of a better description."

"Boil s.p.a.ce?"

She nodded. "You'll be protected by a magnetic field, but you'll slip through the hole into the next universe."

"You haven't been through before?"

"No one has."

"That's not very rea.s.suring."

"We've sent probes, and so far they've all come back fine."

"And what about the nan.o.bots?" he asked, holding up the syringe. "Aren't I suppose to inject you with these?"

"We can do that on the other side," she said. She was no longer looking at him, but speaking as though she were in a trance.

"I think we better go then," Craig stated. "Time's short."

"Yes. Time's short."

"Sam. Are you okay?"

"Craig," she said, the look in her eyes warning Craig too late that something was very wrong, "I'm afraid I won't be coming with you."

Before Craig could verbally respond, she held up her hand and sent green sparks of energy flas.h.i.+ng toward him, stunning him unconscious and collapsing him to the ground.

There were only ninety seconds left now before the Purist attack force arrived. She rushed to Craig and quickly turned him over so the back of his head faced her. She grabbed the syringe and quickly stuck it into the soft flesh just below the occipital bone and pumped the nan.o.bots, complete with the A.I.'s mother program, into his body. Then she clutched his s.h.i.+rt and, with a grunt, began to drag his six-five frame up onto the Planck platform. Craig groaned, but his eyes remained shut.

"I don't know if you can hear me," she began as she folded his arms and placed his body into the fetal position so there was no danger of any of his limbs dangling over the ledge and being left behind in Universe 1, "but no matter what you think, I do love you." She opened the controls for the Planck platform in her mind's eye and readied herself to activate the machine. "I always dreamt that I could bring you back, Craig, but you were gone a long time. Maybe someday, you'll understand. I hope you will anyway." She leaned over him and kissed his lips. He moved slightly, but she couldn't be sure if he felt the kiss or had heard what she said. It didn't matter anymore anyway. They had run out of time.

She stepped away from the platform and activated the machine. Craig instantly vanished, the ripple in s.p.a.ce and time moving through her, causing the walls to bend and twist. In a few moments, everything was stable once again.

"Goodbye, Craig."

In Universe 66, Craig and the silver Planck platform suddenly appeared on a small outcrop on an icy ledge. The freezing air cut through him, and he quickly began to stir, reaching up with his hand to touch his aching forehead. He opened his eyes slightly but found only a pitch-black night. He leaned forward, trying to pull himself up to a sitting position, but he was still too weak to accomplish the maneuver. He reached backward in an attempt to get the leverage to rock himself up, but his hand slipped over the edge of the platform, and he was sent backward, tumbling over the ledge into the darkness, splas.h.i.+ng into the freezing water of the vast, black ocean.

9.

"No!" Aldous shouted when he saw Samantha flying toward him as he stood with over 200 other post-humans at the main entrance of the complex. The entrance was a large, square concrete loading bay built into the side of a rocky outcrop on the eastern side of Mount Andromeda. It was hidden by a convincing holographic image of a snow-covered slope, but the image was only visible one way, and the post-humans had a clear view of the Purist invasion force gathering outside.

"I won't leave you, Aldous!" Samantha shouted back as her body thudded against her husband's; their embrace was tighter than any they'd ever shared.

"What about the A.I.?" Aldous shouted. "What about Craig?"

"I sent them through!" she replied.

He took her face in his hands and held it just inches from his own. "You uploaded the A.I. into Craig? Do you know how reckless that was?"

"I don't care, Aldous! I love you! I won't live if it's not with you!"

A precious second pa.s.sed as he considered the ramifications of her actions. She loved him as much as he loved her. Their bond was beyond reason. He knew the right thing-the logical thing-was for her to protect the A.I. He knew the logical thing was for him to sacrifice himself to save her. But he'd been wrong. He should have known she wouldn't leave him. A huge part of him had wanted her to do just what she'd done-to choose between him and her former husband. He'd tested her without even consciously realizing it, and he'd won. To h.e.l.l with Craig Emilson. The right thing to do would have been for them to go through to Universe 66 together. Now, everything they'd worked for was in jeopardy. Craig, who could barely protect himself, was now charged with protecting the most important ent.i.ty in the history of humanity.

He turned and faced the spectacle that loomed in the air, mere meters from the facility entrance. An ever-darkening wall was forming of dozens upon dozens of stealth harrier transports, the preferred delivery system for super soldiers. Every second, more planes joined the wall and hovered, forming a nearly impenetrable impediment.

"I'm sorry I led you to this, my love," Aldous said, his voice nearly failing him as he struggled to keep his gaze fixed on the death-bringers.

"It's not over yet," Samantha replied. "We'll take more than a few of them with us."

"No!" Aldous quickly shouted, turning to Samantha and the other post-humans a.s.sembled. "We're not killers. They're the ones that are here for war, not us. We won't lose sight of who we are!"

"It's a little beyond that now, don't you think?" Samantha replied. "They're here to kill us."

"It's not that simple," Aldous answered, turning back to the rapidly a.s.sembling force opposing them. "If they suspected we were here, they could have deployed a tactical nuke. There's no need for all of this...this show."

"Then what do they want?" Sanha shouted from amongst the increasingly large group of a.s.sembled post-humans.

"I don't know. To negotiate our surrender?" Aldous conjectured.

"Or to look us in the eye," Samantha suggested, "and make sure they get every last one of us."

Aldous didn't counter Samantha's suggestion; it was plausible. Her words had sent a palpable spike in tension in what was already a barely controlled terror amongst those a.s.sembled. He turned to them and called out, "A show of hands! Who wishes to make a run for it? We will do our best to cover your escape!"

At first, no hands went up.

"This will be your one and only chance!" Aldous shouted.

A long handful of seconds pa.s.sed before the first hand went up. Once one went into the air, several others followed. A few seconds later, nearly half of those a.s.sembled had raised their hands.

Aldous nodded. "Okay. When I give the word, you must flee as fast as you can and scatter in all directions! We'll do our best to disrupt any pursuit!"

Sanha was not amongst those who chose to flee. He sidled up beside Aldous and Samantha and shared a determined expression with them. "Any predictions to ease my mind, my old friend?"

"Not this time, I'm afraid," Aldous replied.

"Then," Sanha began with a sigh, "at least it should be interesting."

"Indeed." Aldous turned to Samantha. "Are you ready, Sam?"

She nodded. "I'm ready. I've dreamt of this."

His eyes narrowed. "I mean it, Sam. We're not life-takers. We're life-savers."

She remained silent.

Aldous didn't have time to press the point. Every second that pa.s.sed was another moment in which the Purists might launch their attack. He held his arm up to signal the post-humans, and the entranceway grew suddenly silent as every man, woman, and child collectively held their breath.

"Now!"

10.

"For Christ's sake!" Craig screamed out as the freezing water bit into his skin, shooting stabs of pain throughout his body. For a moment, he became unhinged, panicking as he clawed desperately in the darkness toward the only thing he could see: the white wall of ice in front of him. His soaked and numb fingers slipped off the icy side as the monolith seemed to toss him aside, back into the black abyss from which he'd come. He thrashed desperately to keep his head above water, the pain of a cranial submersion too painful for him to endure a second time. When it became clear that he couldn't get a grip on the ice, his mind suddenly cleared.

His mind's eye was still flas.h.i.+ng in his peripheral vision. He'd not yet gone through all of the set-up screens, and the flight systems were up next. As impossible as it sounded, he would have to fly to save himself; failure would make death a certainty.