The Time War Ch. 03&04

The Time War

By Gary LM Martin

Chapter 3: The Continuity Service

Those glowing orange eyes....

Consciousness slowly returned to John Calle.

He was sitting in an elaborately furnished office. A man was staring at him intently. A man with bright blonde hair, combed in a wild way over his forehead. The man had very strong blue eyes. He was wearing a severe looking white suit with high collars. The man looked somehow... familiar.

"He's coming out of it now," said a familiar voice.

Calle turned and saw Doctor Vladek.

"What... what did you do to me?" Calle's voice was raspy for a moment.

"Forgive me," said Vladek. "But it was necessary. I have brought you to a sensitive location."

"Where am I?" Calle asked, rubbing his neck.

"Not far from where you were, in Straykerland," said the blonde man.

"And who are you?" Calle asked.

"My name is Ted Strayker."

********

Calle blinked twice. "Ted Strayker? The founder of Straykerland?"

"The one and only," Strayker smiled.

"What does the founder of Straykerland want with me?" Calle asked.

"You did something quite remarkable today," said Strayker. "You went on a highly programmed innocuous ride, to have an innocent round of sex with Eva Braun, and somehow you ended up changing the entire course of history, in that brief pocket of time. How did you do that? How did you know exactly what to say to Eva Braun to get Hitler to change his war plans?"

"I... I don't know. It... it just felt right," said Calle slowly.

"It just felt right," Strayker smiled, as he repeated those words. "We could use a man with your talents here, Mr. Calle. Or may I call you John?"

"You want me to work for Straykerland?" Calle squinted his eyes.

"Not exactly," said Strayker. "Straykerland is the least of what we really do here. It's a training ground, meant to uncover diamonds in the rough, like yourself."

"Then what is it you really do here?"

Strayker paused. "If I tell you, you have to understand this must be kept in the strictest of confidence."

Calle looked at Vladek and back to Strayker. "Of course."

"I'm in charge of a top secret global security organization called the Continuity Service. We're an organization which protects against tampering with the timeline."

"Tampering with the timeline?" said Calle. "How can there be tampering with the timeline? Only the World Government has the ability to travel through time."

"An ability which we gave them," said Strayker. "Hence their... generosity in licensing the technology back to us so we could operate Straykerland. Among other things."

"You gave them time travel...." Suddenly, it became clear to Calle. He had always wondered how Straykerland had persuaded the World Government to let them open a time travelling amusement park. Now it all made sense. "But in Straykerland, everything that is changeD occurs in discrete pockets of time, which are quickly overridden by the next customer."

"Correct," said Strayker.

"But you are saying that there is someone else out there, someone with real time travel ability, who is trying to make changes to our timeline?"

"Many someones, actually."

"How can that be?" Calle said.

"And therein lies a story," said Strayker.

********

His name was Carl Voidovich, and he had invented the first device to travel through time. Originally, the United States military had given him funding for a more modest goal, to create a portal which could enable people to travel through one point in space to another in an instant. Galactic Physicists had theorized that the connections between two points in space could be bridged by a gateway, if space could be properly bent and twisted and turned, like a party balloon.

But Carl Voidovich did much more than anyone expected. He succeeded in creating a gateway that allowed people to travel from one place to another in an instant. But he also created something else, a gateway through time.

When he realized what he had created, he swore his assistants to secrecy; he didn't know how the military, which funded the project, would use a device which allowed time travel. Instead, he decided to write false progress reports, and surreptitiously explored the nature of time himself, with his key senior technicians.

Voidovich discovered that he not only he had the ability to travel through time, he found he had the ability to change it. He went back in time to the night before, when he knew no one was in the lab, and purposefully left a marker on top of a scanning unit. When he returned to the present, he found the marker still there.

And it hadn't been there before he left.

The implications were enormous. Anyone with access to the device could change the course of time.

********

"And what happened then?" Calle asked. "The World Government took over, right?"

"Wrong," said Strayker. "One day, Professor Voidovich simply disappeared."

"Disappeared?"

"His senior assistant, William Bright, entered the lab one morning to find the Professor gone. But the Time Corridor was still active."

"So Voidovich simply went somewhere in time...."

"And never returned."

"That's so frightening," said Calle. "Who knows what he might have changed in the timeline?"

"Apparently, he didn't change a thing," said Strayker. "But, on the other hand, we wouldn't know if he had. We would have changed along with it. Professor Voidovich's senior assistant, William Bright, took over. One of his first acts was to build a Time Suppressor into the Time Shaft."

"Time Suppressor?"

"It's a kind of.. shield of anti-time particles which protects the building around us," said Strayker. "If time is changed, this building, and everyone inside of it, will be protected from changes to the timeline."

"But what happens if you go outside?"

"We have developed a treatment which coats the body with anti-time particles which protects individuals for several days. That's the only way can safely go home at night, confident that we'll wake up in the morning."

"You said 'we'. I thought this William Bright was running things."

"He was. Until a few years ago. Then Doctor Bright handed the reigns over to me. He put me in charge of the Continuity Service."

"Tell me more about this... Continuity Service," Calle said.

"At the CS, our motto is to 'Leave things as we found them'," said Strayker. "Our prime directive is to prevent any changes to the timeline."

"Why would there be any changes to the timeline, if you have the only time machine in existence?" Calle asked.

Strayker grimaced. "When Doctor Bright took over, his first step was to move the lab to a new location. He didn't want the military discovering what had been done. Bright found a sympathetic industrialist who helped him set up shop in a new location. But all was not harmonious from the start. Many of Professor Voidovich's senior assistants had different ideas on how the Time Shaft should be used. Some of them wanted to go back in time and right historical wrongs, to end slavery, genocide, world wars. And then others had... different ideas."

Strayker stared at Calle meaningfully before continuing. "Doctor Bright was opposed to all changes in the timeline. And so, one by one, the senior assistants all left. There were four in all, Ken Larson, Marsha Kalinsky, Mercury Jones, and Richard Smith. Each set up their own lab in other locations, and each successfully created their own Time Shafts. Thus were the temporal factions created."

"And so these guys are all trying to change the timeline?" Calle said.

"Yes," said Strayker. "And our mission is to stop them."

Calle laughed.

"What's so amusing?"

"Well, I would think your solution is simple. Go back in time before all those people defected, and stop them."

Strayker shook his head. "It isn't that simple. Looping ourselves is very dangerous. It can create rips in the fabric of time. And if we handle it improperly, the entire Continuity Service could cease to exist. Remember, the Service was created after the factions broke off. If we tamper with this event, we may wipe ourselves out of existence."

"But... you won't need a Continuity Service if you stop these other assistants, would you?"

"The risk is too great," said Strayker, in a tone that tolerated no argument. "We are in a deadly fight against these factions. Whenever they make a change to the timeline, we can determine what changes they make. But how they make the changes can be very hard to determine and how to fix them without causing even more harm can be even more challenging. We think someone with your talent, with your... intuition, for want of a better word, would be of tremendous help to us. Will you join us?"

Calle paused. After what had happened at Mohonk, he had retaken his old job at Astrodyne in San Diego. But with Marion gone, all his love for his work had dissipated as well. What Strayker was proposing was exponentially more important than the work he was doing designing rocket engines. He was tempted.

But....

"And what happens if I say no?" Calle asked.

"If you say no?" Strayker looked at Doctor Vladek and smiled before turning back to Calle. "Why nothing, of course."

"I'll be free to go?" Calle asked skeptically.

Strayker spread his hands. "You'll be free to go."

"Aren't you worried that I'll reveal what I know?"

"And what is it that you think you know?" Strayker asked. "You don't know where this facility is, which is really the only secret information we have. If you went public and claimed that Ted Strayker, the founder of the time travel amusement park Straykerland, also operated a secret temporal security service, you'd be treated as a lunatic or conspiracy theorist. No, we're not afraid of anything you might say."

Calle stared hard at Strayker, trying to figure out if he was being candid. He thought for a long moment. Then he said, "All right. I'll help you. But I want something in return."

Strayker leaned forward expectantly.

Calle told him what he wanted.

Strayker shook his head no.

Calle asked him again.

Strayker said no again.

Calle tried one more time, in a demanding tone.

Strayker refused him again. "I'm sorry. I can give you nearly anything else you ask for."

"I don't want anything else," said Calle. "I want-"

They knew what he wanted.

Calle put his head in his hands. Strayker waited patiently, looking up at Doctor Vladek, who nodded subtly.

After a long moment, Calle lifted his head. Strayker was still looking expectantly at him, with those hard blue eyes. "Well?"

"All right. I'll do it."

********

Calle's training was remarkably quick, a matter of weeks. He would have expected a training period of months, if not years. But it seems a lot of the skills were learned on the job.

Shepherding him through the training process was one Lieutenant Erica Green. Erica Green had been a staffer on the World Government's Global Security Council for a number of years before joining the Continuity Service. Her specialty was temporal threat assessment, measuring the advantages and disadvantages of a potential intervention in the timeline. Her focus was not on measuring the impact of interventions from one of the factions, but rather interventions on the part of the CS designed to fix incursions made by the factions. The CS frequently had to stage interventions in order to counter a temporal incursion committed by one of the factions. The question was whether the CS intervention, meant to "cure" the factional intervention, would make things worse than the original problem created by the faction. It was Erica's job, among others, to make that assessment.

Erica Green was a blonde with curly hair who bore a slightly uncomfortable resemblance to Eva Braun. "So nice to meet you, Captain," she said, extending a slender hand.

"Captain?" said Calle, taking her hand and shaking it.

"That's you, John Calle," she said, in a way that made him shiver. Only Marion used to call him... call him....

"Why am I a Captain?" said Calle. "I think I've been a member of your organization for about five minutes."

"It's Colonel Strayker's orders," said Erica crisply. "Rank is allocated based on ability. You're a Special Talent, the new John Collier."

"John Collier?"

"Your predecessor," said Erica. "Like you, he was a Special Talent."

Those glowing orange eyes.

"I'd like to meet this... Special Talent," said Calle. John Collier. John Calle. Even their names were similar.

"Not possible," said Erica. "John's... retired. Sorry. This way, please."

She led him to a room filled with weapons and targets, where a very muscular dark skinned man with straight black hair combed to the side awaited him. "Captain, this is Major Alex Reynolds, your new team leader."

"Welcome aboard," said Reynolds, a very friendly black man with a bone crushing handshake. "So you're the new John Collier! So nice to have you."

Erica said, "The Colonel said that he wanted Captain Calle to get at least proficiency 1.0 on Compression Pistols by 19:30."

"I think we can manage that," said Reynolds, giving Calle an appraising stare. "Have you ever fired a weapon, son?"

"No."

"Good. Then we'll be starting with a clean slate."

Before long Calle was shooting targets with a compression rifle. Reynolds was right. It really wasn't so difficult. Of course, Calle didn't instantly acquire the skills of a true marksman, who could aim and shoot in a fraction of a second. But after a few hours of practice, if Calle aimed carefully and slowly, he could hit a target at 200 feet with a compression rifle; or 50 feet with a compression pistol. Most of the time.

After that came hand to hand combat training in the gym. There Calle's development was much more modest, and he spent most of the time on his back on the training mat, listening to what he did wrong. He had several sessions with Major Reynolds, and didn't learn much about hand to hand combat, but he did learn a little more about the Major.

Reynolds had been a Captain in the World Government Army when he had been recruited by the CS. When asked why he had been picked, he shrugged and said, "They told me I had potential."

He had been on 43 missions to prevent or reverse changes in the timeline in the two years he had been with the Continuity service.

"43 changes to the timeline? Have there really been so many?" Calle asked.

"Yep," said Reynolds, throwing Calle over his shoulder again.

"How come I never noticed?" Calle asked, after he recovered his breath.

Reynolds looked down on him as he slowly got up. "Because after the changes were made, you had no memory of the original timeline. In fact, in some of the timelines, you probably didn't even exist anymore, until we reversed the incursions and restored the original flow of time."

"But... I have no memory of not existing."

"You wouldn't," said Reynolds easily.

"But you do?"

"Of course. We're protected here by the Temporal Suppressor," said Reynolds.

"And outside?"

"Before we leave we always take an anti-time particle treatment, in one of the treatment booths, in the control room." Alex Reynolds shuddered. "I remember one time I went home, and my home was gone. Just... gone. So was my wife and dog, by the way."

"That sounded terrible."

"It was--until we fixed the timeline. But once we did, my wife and home and dog reappeared, and had no memory of ever being away," said Reynolds. He saw the look on Calle's face. "You'll get used to it."

The next member of his team who Calle met was Doctor Daniel Action. Doctor Acton was a historian. His purpose was to help a team understand past times they would travel to.

"How far back in time do you go?" Calle asked.

"The Temporal Shaft is only powerful enough to project us back in time about 800 years maximum, to the 18th century," said Acton. "The farther back we go, the more energy is required, on an exponential level.

"We can only go 800 years into the past?" Calle asked

"That's actually a good thing," said Acton. "If it could project us to the beginning of mankind, one of the factions might be tempted to end mankind."

Calle raised his eyebrows.

"Don't laugh, they've already tried it."

********

Erica Green gave Calle his orientation on time travel. "When you travel back in time, you have to be very careful of everything you say and do. If you say the wrong thing, if you reveal the future to someone, you may change the course of history."

"I suppose if I do that, you'll have to go back in time to prevent me from doing that."

"No," said Erica. "We don't loop ourselves."

"Why not?"

"It can create temporal paradoxes and physical anomalies," said Erica. "If you make a mistake, if you get injured or even die on a mission, don't expect it to get fixed. We don't loop ourselves except under the most extraordinary circumstances. So when you go back in time, be very, very careful of what you say and do."

"I will," said Calle.

Erica took him to the center of operations, the control room. It was filled with a wide array of control consoles. But the most impressive part of the room was a vertical glass shaft that hummed with power.

"Welcome to the control room," said Erica. "What you are looking at is the Time Shaft."

"The Time Shaft," Calle murmured, staring at the shaft. It was long, it was thick, and it was powerful. Calle watched the blue rings of energy surging up the shaft. Each time one went up, the shaft moaned with temporal power. He suddenly realized he was looking at the most important invention ever created by man. It could save mankind, or change it, or destroy it. Possessing such a device and using it wisely was a tremendous responsibility.

Erica said, "The Time Shaft is used to create the Binochi Corridor." She pointed to a wide doorway, which lead into blackness.

"Binochi Corridor?" Calle stared into the darkness.

"Named after Doctor Frank Binochi, who hypothesized that, given the right circumstances, one could walk through corridors of time," said Erica. "Every time we activate the Binochi Corridor, you have to walk down it to get to your destination, in another time, and another place."

"Wait a minute. When I went back to Nazi Germany in the 20th century, I didn't go through any Binochi Corridor. I just went from room to room," said Calle.

"That's because you were entering a small, artificial pocket of time. That was much easier. Here you're navigating the real timeline," said Erica. "You need to be extremely careful when walking down the Binochi Corridor. If you stray from the path, you can get lost forever. Sarah, activate a random configuration."

Suddenly, the dark doorway came alive. The Binochi Corridor lit up. It was now a bright, swirling mist that was not easily opaque. It looked like one could get lost quite easily.

Calle walked to the doorway.

"Careful! Make sure you don't fall through," said Erica. "Once you go inside, always follow the light. If you walk outside the lighted corridor, you'll never find your way back. Ever. That's what we think happened to Doctor Voidovich."

Calle stared at the swirling mists. "And how do we get back?"

"Through these," said Erica, holding up a device like a hand grenade with a big button on it. "The recall device will activate the Binochi Corridor wherever you are, and you can walk through it to get back here. Simple."

"Yeah, simple," said Calle, staring at the brightly lit mist. The way the mist was moving, it almost seemed to be... alive. And then he thought he heard... whispers... soft sounds of voices. Coming from the Corridor. "Does anything live in there?"

Erica laughed. "That's everyone's favorite rumors. Time Monsters! But no, nothing lives in the Binochi Corridor, Captain." She paused. "Come. Let's meet Sarah and Naomi." She led him over to two women who were watching a large series of holographic screens.