Time ticked by slowly for Justice. Irony. Time, or, rather, timespace, had become the bane of his life. It wasn’t even a recent development but the realization had taken quite a long time to sink in. If he weren’t alone in a cell with no entertainment maybe he wouldn’t have struck upon the idea even now. Now that it had been … probably a day? Somewhere in there. He wasn’t sure. He’d have to ask for a clock next time someone came, assuming the concept of timelessness wasn’t some kind of ironic punishment to suffer while he waited.
He thought back on his simple life. True, he wasn’t a bulletproof powerhouse capable of smashing anything he set his mind to, but it was good. He had a purpose as a soldier and a whole life, one that continued to take form as false memories, that would have seen him leave his mark upon history.
So introspective was Justice that he completely missed the tiny lizard alien science person who had entered the room outside his cell. “Ah, interesting. The brig. I’ve never examined this location. I see that there are exactly one dozen cells, very human, but you are the only one occupying a cell. Curious.” Justice parted his fingers and looked down at the little guy. “You did not hear me approach. Interesting.”
“Derglabin, right?” It was barely a question.
“Your voice sounds different. Lower, quieter, trailing off in volume actually. Feeling despondent? I believe this is the correct emotion but I am unsure. I have been told that my people have ‘lizard brain’. Unsurprising given our similarity to Terran ‘reptiles’.”
Justice blinked in the general direction of the lizard midget, not his favorite person in the galaxy. “I trust that you, ah, got a good reason0
for bein’ down here then, little guy?”
“Perhaps I should come back later. When your mood has improved.” Derglabin turned away and started to walk.
“My mood ain’t never gettin’ better while I’m in here, man! Now why’d you come down here?” Justice rose, moving up just behind the bars.
Derglabin turned back. “Yes, I have information here–” Derglabin held up his tablet. “-given me by one Spaceman McKinley. I was told to impart it to you.”
Justice had a flash of hope. “Well impart away! Or … let me see.”
Derglabin recoiled as Justice reached through the bars, current arcing into him. “Mrhm, no, you are to have no access to data. The Captain says you’re a hacking risk!”
“How the hell could I be? They been callin’ me a caveman since I got in this crazy universe.” Justice felt like this was a home run as far as points in an argument go but he was dealing with a strange little alien.
“What is a caveman?” asked Derglabin, earnestly.
“Uh…” Justice was at a loss. “You know. Like … a person who lives in a cave?”
“I see. Yes, my people have never lived in caves. This explains why the concept is alien to me.”
“I meant humans. Humans that lived in caves.”
“Oh. Why, then, did you say ‘person’ before?” Derglabin was catching the subtext.
“Uh…” Justice knew he was digging a hole here.
“Do you even know what my people are called?”
“No, I do not.” Justice admitted.
“Do you know that we are people?”
And just like that the conversation got uncomfortable. He had to pull it back and fast or he’d never get the information. “Look, kid, are you gonna give me the info or not?“
“Excuse me, yes, of course.” Derglabin read the tablet aloud. “‘No historical precedent for an Outsider. Potential explanation for deities throughout the known history of the universe.’ Many examples of religious figures with mysterious backgrounds. My judgment; no point to reading these. Hold please… Ah. ‘Thoroughly digested Doctor Phineas Black’s copious notes. I believe I could operate the chrono car at this point.’ Hm. Chrono Car?” Derglabin stopped reading and started tapping around on the tablet screen.
“Hey! Read on your own time, Spaceman! This is end of the world shit!” shouted Justice.
“Ssst! Please, quiet. I have not obtained permission to visit you like this!” whisper-screamed the lizard midget.
“Uh-huh. Well, then, finish tellin’ me what McKinley found then.
“Yes, of course. Ah … ‘Black had been keeping a journal that reads like a fantasy novel wherein he tracked unusual activities that may pertain to science and the supernatural. Much of this was notes about his own innovations. Note: historical records show no inventor named Doctor Phineas Black in this time period. This Earth, therefore, must be assumed to be in a different universe.’ This … this is remarkable.”
“Uh … buddy? It sounds like you’re goin’ off-script again.” Justice was increasingly tense, watching the hallway behind Derglabin.
“But … the science. It’s … he was centuries ahead of his time.” The little reptilian was hard to read but his tone made it clear that he was enthralled with the concept of Doc Black.
“Focus, dammit.”
“Right. Right. ‘But in November of nineteen-eighty-six a California politician, Governor Avery Rockefeller, began advocating for a specific corporation, AngelPharma, pushing legislature to fund them in the form of several billion dollars in grants. Note to self: research age of scarcity subject; currency. AngelPharma then had several scandals including misappropriation of funds, high worker mortality in accidents and whistleblowers publicly accusing them of creating mind control drugs.”
“Finally, an escaped test subject caused a minor outbreak in Los Angeles, California. The test subject was witnessed by police attacking and biting a woman. When an officer intervened he was forced to shoot the test subject and, then, while taking the woman’s statement, she also attacked the officer. In all four people died, including two officers, but lucky shots to the head stopped the spread.”
“How the hell does this relate to the Outsiders?” grumbled Justice.
“With respect, sir, I have not pre-read these materials. Patience, please. ‘In mid-nineteen-eighty-seven Rockefeller was revealed to be majority owner of AngelPharma through his own hedge fund business. An investigation was cut short as he held a press conference, covered by all major news outlets, and declared a new age. He was no mere man, he promised an end to suffering and that he would bring Heaven to Earth by … removing free will.”
“Son of a bitch. Lot of overlap there with Brigham Young.” Justice muttered.
“I’m not familiar with your background, sir. What’s that?”
“There were these spirits, you know spirits?”
“Yes, sir, my people have legends of incorporeal beings like most cultures.”
“Well, one possessed me, made me strong, and I kept the strength by killing the spirit. Young had sort of a king spirit in him. Lookin’ back I think that was an Outsider. Sounds like this Rockefeller feller might be in the same situation.”
“Oh my. Well, there’s no denying your strength. That, and as I understand, you withstood blows and weapon discharges that would kill most life forms and kept going.” Derglabin was nodding as he spoke.
“Yeah man. Though, truth be told, the real change was when I got dumped in space. They’re still figurin’ it out. Speakin’ of how about you finish before they come to get me for today’s probin’?
“Right! Ah… ‘All Hell broke loose. Pockets of what were called zombies by the media, based on their similarity to victims of a voodoo curse (likely drugs and not an actual curse), burst out of hidden spaces in major cities all over the United States of America. It’s presumed that it was the same elsewhere in the world but communications were quickly cut off.” Derglabin paused. “Sir, I … maybe you should just read this. It’s a transcription of the journal pages rather than McKinley’s take.” Derglabin held the tablet up for Justice to see.
“Uh, yeah, okay.” Justice looked at the screen, wondering what it could say to make Derglabin, a rules-obsessed scientist, change his mind about access to the tablet. Skimming, waving a finger outside the bars to keep his place, he found what had to be the passage in question. “Justice Haymaker, having joined us in our efforts to save the timeline, came along and we attempted to drop him back in his timeline right at the spot where we originally fled the eighteen-sixties. However, a chrono-magnetic effect occurred again, just like what brought us to Justice in the first place, and we were back mere seconds after we left in February of nineteen-eighty-eight.”
“Are you done reading, sir?”
“I … hold on.”
“I only ask because you move your lips as you read and you’ve stopped moving your lips.”
Man this lizard was annoying. “Look, I … it says he came and got me, past-tense. Shit … lookie here.” Justice pointed. “A whole account of how I smashed all these zombies but got a tiny cut and … neck-roe-tized?”
“That means that your flesh began to die.” Derglabin volunteered.
“Right, and surgery. Shit.” Justice started swiping through the entries. “It goes on for … forty years!? What the hell! So Doc was Eighty? Matty was at least late fifties. Son of a bitch, finally he dies and … what the fuck?” Justice peered closely then remembered he could magnify what he was looking at. It was a picture taken of the final journal page. “Doc is dead. They’re all dead. Have to go back and warn myself about these Outsiders. Only way to stop Rockefeller is before the outbreak. Then may be safe in this timeline.” Justice read aloud. Then “son of a bitch … that’s my writing…”
“Yessir, that was her hypothesis. I scrolled past it to test and, if you recognize it as looking like your own, it must be true.”
“But I didn’t go with him. I had to kill him. He basically used me to commit suicide.” Justice felt his blood pressure rise, grabbing his own temples and squeezing as his head began to throb.
“There was a theory, hypothesis really, by a human male in the twenty-second century standard time that might explain this. Chronal bleeding.”
“Man … don’t be introducing new terms right now. Just say what you mean.”
“Ah, well, in layman’s terms. Let me think… Basically, even though you broke the cycle with your duplicate he had already travelled with Black in that timeline. You didn’t go with him, he didn’t even return, but the journal was written at one point in the past. Chances are the ink was already on the page as you had your showdown with him in the back of the cave.”
Justice nodded solemnly then realized. “Wait a second, how you know so much about all this?”
“Ah, yes, I was not privy to your … meeting. Our own debriefing, Praggin’s, Mckinley’s and my own, I mean, seemed odd. Not that you weren’t there, as we had all seen your physical state before parting company, but the Captain was clearly angry when addressing Michaels’s death and assured us that such a thing would not happen again. That statement indicated action, ergo I … began taking measures to observe and gather information to ascertain the truth. In the event that you were charged and appeared innocent I would provide this information to Spacefleet.”
“Son of a bitch, you did it didn’t you? You recorded that polecat all but admittin’ he was railroadin’ me.”
“It was near to an admission, sir. Between that and your doppelganger’s mangled corpse, I believe you’ll be exonerated.” Derglabin flinched as a distant scuff was heard.
“Shit,” whispered Justice. “You gotta hide.”
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
But the reptilian alien was already in motion, rapidly shifting color. Justice had to stifle his shock as Derglabin scrambled to several positions, failing to blend in due to too-flat surfaces, before finally settling between the panel and the control panel for the cells. It now appeared to slope into the wall instead of standing separately from it.
In walked Jeffries. “Hello there, Commander.”
“Jeffries?” Justice was surprised. “You’re alone? Where’s the daily scientist for my probin’?”
“No, uhm, ‘probing’, today sir. We are two hours out from Earth. I came to notify you of this personally so that you wouldn’t be surprised.” Jeffries’ tone was flat. Emotionaless.
“Aw, hell man, you’re not sore over me shovin’ ya I hope?”
“Shoving!? No, sir, it was not the physical act of shoving that caused me difficulty. It was my impact with the wall. Luckily I was only bruised. One of those bruises was a hand print on my chest, however.”
“Yeah, I, I am sorry for that. Look, if there’s anything I can do…”
“It was an honor to serve under you, sir. Or, maybe honor is the wrong word. You’re … unique. I feel like I had an excuse not shared by many people. I think I could write a book about my experiences with you and millions of people would read that book and be entertained.”
“You’re welcome? I guess…”
Jeffries continued. “In fact, my enlistment period is over in two months. My duties do not permit me enough spare time to draft a manuscript now but, because of you, I will not re-enlist. You’ve inspired me to live my dreams, sir.”
“Wow! That’s–”
“Because I could die at any time to forces greater than myself. Thank you for that.” Jeffries smiled, mirthlessly.
“Oh… So sarcasm? Okay.” Justice jumped as a klaxon went off. “Oh shit, red alert!” Jeffries ran out of the brig, top speed. “Jeffries! Let me out of here! I can help!” Justice hammered his door with both fists, blinding white energy arcing into him as he did so.
Derglabin came out of his hiding spot. “Here! I can hack it.”
As the little scientist worked his magic on the tablet he still held Justice hammered away, heedless of the burns forming on his hands. The door began to slide just as Justice slammed into it one more time, sending it bouncing, almost rolling, out into the hallway. “Oh … uh, I think we can agree that’s shoddy craftsmanship, right? It shouldn’t come off track when it’s open like that.”
“You were going to help, sir?”
“Oh yeah, help! Let’s go!” Justice burst out of his cell, hands and forearms smoking. They made their way towards the bridge as people started filling the halls, unsure of what to do. “What the hell? There ain’t no commands issued!?”
Derglabin climbed up on Justice’s back to avoid getting stepped on. “This would suggest that something has happened on the bridge. We should hurry.”
Justice started running, not concerning himself with the people who were in his way. He’d evade them if possible but, for many, it just wasn’t. “Why is there someone watchin’ out every porthole!?” The Undertaking had small holes through which people could look every so often in the hallways that lined the inner hull. Pushing someone aside Justice looked out one. “What the hell is that?” It looked like a humanoid arm, gigantic, waving in front of the ship.
Derglabin got a good look. “Is that why we’ve … stopped … mov…” and he fell silent.
“The hell?” Justice looked down at the crewmember he shoved aside and that man struggled to his feet and started to run. On his back, Derglabin had gone into a trance. “Derglabin?” Grabbing him off his back and shaking him Justice managed to snap the little guy out of it.
“No! I … terror. Don’t look at it!” Derglabin clung to him with what, Justice now realized, were painful little retractable claws.
“Ow! C’mon, man. I already saw.”
“You … you weren’t affected?” Derglabin stared, bewildered.
“No, I…” said Justice.
Then both spoke together “Outsiders…”
The race was on. Every lift was crammed with people and, increasingly, with no word from superiors, the crew was starting to panic. “Left! Then right immediately. There’s an emergency shaft at that corner.” Derglabin shouted, directing Justice along a course that didn’t rely on technology.
Finding the corner, Derglabin was able to disengage the lock and Justice lifted a panel out, allowing him into the emergency shaft. It was just him, a ladder, and his lizard backpack. “Okay, hold on.” Justice hauled them both up the ladder at incredible speed before kicking the panel on the bridge level out to save time. “Okay, here we are.” They stood in the hall between the lift and the bridge. Turning to the bridge Justice saw a helmsman, face up, automatic door trying repeatedly to close on him. “The hell?”
Derglabin dropped to the floor. “Looks like the bridge crew is catatonic!”
Justice burst into the room, quickly took stock and saw that a hand and arm was on the viewscreen. It pulled at nothing, or perhaps the fabric of space, and was slowly pulling itself into existence. “Captain!?” Justice ran to the man he’d been serving loyally, who’d turned on him, and shook him. “Renaud!? Paul? C’mon, man.”
In response Renaud offered only gibberish followed by an odd chirping sound. “Ia! Ia. Ia…”
“Sir! What do you see!?” shouted Derglabin.
Justice instinctively knew he meant on the screen. Everything else was visible from the hall. “Well, it looks like … is that? It’s one of those squid guys! Like the one that pulled me out of space only … huge!”
“Sir? You mean like the C’thulates?”
“That’s right! But he’s big and … ripping everything up to come into our reality!” Justice hip-checked a helmsman out of position.
“Sir, I think you’re looking at C’thulohn, god of the C’thulates!”
“A god!? What?” Justice took a good look and it was true; that face, basically a squid on a neck, looked like Rant back on the old space station. “That thing’s comin’ after us and we’re dead in the water!”
Derglabin, looking down just to be safe cleared his throat. “Well, then… Maybe we should call for everyone to abandon ship!?”
“Son of a bitch!” Justice cried out as he struggled with the controls for this ship. “I don’t really remember much how to use these but I know they should be doing somethin’!”
Derglabin again. “They’re reading your fingerprints, sir. The only thing that will listen right now would be comms. Everything else would need proper biometric authentification.
Justice had begun fumbling, trying to use the hand of the still living helmsman to operate the helm but his clumsy efforts did nothing but cause error messages. “Shit, fine!” he made his way to comms. “Attention! Attention all decks! Evacuate ship! There’s somethin’ out there erasin’ brains; don’t look at it!”
Derglabin shouted into the room. “Sir, we should do the same!”
“Damned right!” Jumping up, Justice slammed both hands into the center of the display screen, doing next to nothing. “Dammit, we gotta get this screen off first though! Bridge crew can’t stay in here!”
“Sir, it’s augmented reality! You’re looking through a large porthole with a display in it.”
“Fine. We … we gotta get to shuttle bay six!” said Justice but he stopped over the helmsman, pulling him the rest of the way into the hall. “Okay buddy, you gotta … buddy?” he showed no sign of awakening.
“Sir, when I looked at C’thulon it was like I was falling away from myself. I was exposed for only a second. The bridge crew was exposed for several minutes.”
“Right. So … gone.” It was a mad dash again. “Shit, kid, grab my boy! I gotta get my things.”
“Ensign Gentle!?”
“That’s right. He’ll be in the Security Office. Then the two of you get McKinley. I got space for four, six really, but Glen’s like three by his lonesome. Go on! Git!!”
Justice made for his quarters, untouched since his incarceration. “Shit, forgot my future bullshit tech was on me in the sickbay. It’s still there!” He had no communicator so Justice just started shoving all his possessions in his old bags from the eighteen-sixties and started running again.
The halls had thinned out quite a bit and Justice was having no trouble moving or even getting a lift. Worst case scenario if the lift stopped for some reason there were ladders and paths that led through the ship. The main problem had been people.
With a beep the lift opened and, inside, were Glen, Derglabin and McKinley. “Goin’ our way?” asked Glen.”
“Hell yes, and keep movin’! We gotta get to shuttle bay six! Anybody gets in the way just squash ‘em!
“But, but they’re our crewmateth!” exclaimed the horrified Glen as the door slid shut, rushing them towards their goal.
“They had plenty of time to get out, Glen. I did everything I could, more than most and I was a prisoner! Did you see what was out there?”
Derglabin interjected. “When I arrived he was watching C’thulon and repeatedly messaging the bridge.”
“I didn’t know what to do!”
“Thankfully, when I looked at the screen, he had enough sense to check on me, breaking my line of sight. I’d never seen the security office and so didn’t know where the screens were.”
“What is happening, Justice?” asked McKinley, brow knit, more than a little scared.
‘We were lookin’ into the Outsiders when one was catchin’ up to us. This one’s, apparently, a god. May have created one of the races in Spacefleet.”
“Oh my stars. That’s … crazy.” said McKinley.
“Not as crazy as you’ll be if you look at ‘im. Now c’mon!” the lift door opened and Justice started plowing ahead, full-speed.
“Wait! Don’t leave Derglabin!” shouted Derglabin and Justice snatched him up just as some sort of shockwave struck the ship.
“Just get on the bear and don’t let go!” and he shoved both McKinley and Derglabin onto Glen before piling on himself. “Glen! Four-foot it! Now!”
Just like that Glen went from an unwieldy humanoid figure in a world too small for him to an unstoppable juggernaut moving more than twice as fast as a human. People got plowed over in his mad sprint to the shuttle bay. Just as they walked in the final shuttle breached the atmospheric shield, exiting into deep space..
“The shuttles are all gone? We’re doomed!” cried out Derglabin, sounding almost like a howling wolf.
“Not here for a shuttle. See right there? That’s the Chrono Car.”
“What are we doing Justice?” McKinley asked. “Are we really abandoning the ship? What happened to the Captain and the rest of the bridge crew? Why were you the one calling to evacuate?”
“Yeah, when the bridge crew saw that wannabe god on the big screen in the bridge they started losin’ it. Went catatonic. Everybody who looked at it did.” Justice was going through the Car, adjusting things, flattening down the back two rows of seats. “My brain’s done been damaged, I survived the void of space and worse, so I must be immune. Glen didn’t get affected neither.”
“We’re really leaving leadership here to die?” she asked.
Justice straightened up to look her in the eye. “Honey, I pulled a helmsman out into the hall and couldn’t wake him up. They’re already dead.” Hitting like a nearby stroke of thunder another shockwave hit the ship. “Now c’mon. The two of you don’t look when we get outside.”
Justice moved to the driver’s seat, opening the door. “Get in.” he barked. “The hell?” he asked, picking up a giant pile of papers.
“Just throw them in the back! It’s the notes; I put them back so nobody would know I’d read them.
“Hell yeah! You didn’t, by chance, get my shit from sickbay?” he asked with a smile, turning over the Flex Dynamo like an engine. Mckinley got in the front seat while Glen squeezed into the back, nearly in a fetal position and Derglabin nestled in the middle of the bear.
She held up a cloth bag. “Derglabin said you were free so, yes, I was bringing you your things. I wish I’d known the context…”
“McKinley, I’m … it’ll be okay.” he said unconvincingly. Then, working the controls. “Man, that’s tight. Shit. I don’t really know how to work this. Just … hold on. Previous trip…” he tapped the words on the screen. “Return trip. Okay…”
“Wait, Justice.” she said, working the touchscreen like a pro from the passenger seat.” There, that should take us back to where your Doctor Black came from. I assume that’s what you were trying?”
“Ayup. Wish I knew a better way to do it but here we go!” and he worked the pedals as best he could, turning the vehicle until it faced the opening out into space. “Close your eyes…”
Tires screeching, the Chrono Car broke through the atmospheric shield and continued accelerating, wheels turning out ninety degrees to enter into flight mode, same as when he’d jumped from the planet’s surface.
There it was, viewed through only the thin transparency that somehow protected the Chrono Car from the vacuum of space; C’thulon. The creature focused on the Undertaking, a clawed hand reaching out as its wings continued to widen the hole. It was truly titanic, perhaps as big as a small planet. Its eyes flicked towards him in a relatively slow motion (it was huge, after all) and he heard a voice in his head. “None will escape!”
“Yeah, whatever man.” he thought in his loudest mental voice. “See you in five-hundred years!” Twisting he flung a hand back, flipping the terrifying titan an interstellar bird.
Glaring at them as the Flex Dynamo charged up, C’thulon grasped the Undertaking in both hands, strained, and snapped it in two with a great explosion. McKinley screamed out a hysterical “No”, drawing the word out over several seconds as the Chrono Car slipped through the dimensions and back to its former home.
And they were gone, somewhere else entirely. It was far more disorienting than Justice thought it would be (though not as bad as just floating there with no vehicle). Head swimming he turned to McKinley who buried her head in her hands, crying. “You looked. I told you don’t look.”
“It … that monster, it didn’t affect me. I think, maybe, being in this time-space vehicle maybe we’re shielded. But … my home, my friends. Did any of them really escape? I know some got out on shuttles but … that thing was so big and strong. It broke the ship like a toy!”
“We’ll stop ‘em honey. The whole lot of ‘em.” He was starting to understand; no matter where he was one of those Outsiders was going to be there. The first time he was at ground zero, this time it took a couple years before they caught up, next time; who knew? With a “thud” a piece of debris hit the Chrono-Car. Then another. The Flex Dynamo produced a field that repelled solid matter when engaged but these were hitting with a lot of force. “What is all this now?” That’s when Justice noticed all the satellites.
McKinley sniffled, coming back to the reality of the situation. “Uh, Justice,” she asked. “Black was from the past, right? This is … this is a time machine and he was from the twentieth century?”
“Ah, yes, yes ma’am. That is correct.”
“So … those must be satellites. Orbital junk cleared out on my Earth over a century before I was born. They’re for communication, mostly. This is before we had any colonies off-world. Before any established communications with other civilizations.”
“Oh. Right. So we’re just gettin’ out in space. Good to know, McKinley.”
“I think you can call me Renna now, Justice. There is no Spacefleet...” said McKinley, obviously depressed by what’s happening.
“Yeah, I knew that. Sure. Uh, Renna…” Justice pondered what to do next.
“Well ain’t that some shit?” said Glen.
“Hey, my boy said my favorite phrase! Ain’t that … what he said. And that lisp is gone. Wh-ahhh!” Justice screamed as he caught a glimpse of Glen in the back seat. He turned around. “Ahhh!”
McKinley covered her ears from the noise. “Why are you–ahhh!” she screamed after turning around.
Glen screamed too, not sure what was going on. Nobody could find the words and it was something that he couldn’t see for himself.
Luckily they’d brought a weird, little, unflappable alien along with them. “Observation; the bear that talked like a man is now a bear-sized man! Is this evolution? Timespace is an unpredictable, untapped scientific frontier.” Looking around the little lizard man was confused. “I’m sorry, am I the only one excited by this new discovery?”
Glen Gentle was now a seven-and-a-half-foot tall, pale-skinned, brown-haired man. He looked at his newly human hands and promptly hyperventilated, falling unconscious where he lay.
“Actually, he may be a little too excited.” muttered Derglabin.