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Nanobots, time travel and a confederate superhero...nuff said! |
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1 I found myself alone in a room. I had no idea why I was there or who I was. The room itself was without furniture. It was just gray. I stood up and kicked up quite a bit of dust. That was interesting. I could see my imprint in the dust on the floor where I must have been sleeping. But there were no footprints leading up to where I lay. Normally there wouldn't be footprints in a room but it was so dusty that as I walked around the room...I left a trail of foot steps in the dust. I even reached out with my hand and with one finger I was able to draw a single line on the wall in the thick dust. I heard a strange flapping behind me. Startled, I turned and realized the source of my lighting in the room was this wall, or rather the lack of a wall behind me. It seemed that this wall was just a tarp with seemingly endless small holes that allowed in an intense light. Daylight outside? I peeked through one of the small holes. I wasn't sure what I'd see but I didn't expect to see this! I was in the middle of a huge city and apparently I was in a very large building. Across the street was a tall building and I quickly counted it's floors. It wasn't easy because I was apparently at least 50 floors up if I counted correctly. I backed away from the tarp. 50 floors up...and I'm on the edge with only this tarp to prevent me from falling? My stomach turned at the thought. Was I afraid of heights? I don't think so. It's just the feeling of being so small in such an immense space and the possibility of being killed with one misstep. I needed information. Who was I? Why was I here? I started going through my pockets. My right pocket had a large pin button. It had a yellow background with a simple smiley face on it: two dots for the eyes, no nose and a broad smile. I held it a moment trying to remember something about it...but it meant nothing to me. Damn it! Why couldn't I remember? My left pocket had a thick piece of folded paper in it. I unfolded it and could read the writing on it. Possible trap. Elementals have been seen in this area. Hideout? Elementals? I had no idea what or who that was. I turned the paper over and saw that it was a photograph of a huge bridge over a large river. The bridge looked quite old...like it was built in the early 1900's, but the city looked modern and similar to the city that I had seen outside. Had I been to this bridge? Did something happen there that led me to here? I closed my eyes tight and tried to remember. I could hear the wind whipping the tarp wall reminding me of how high I was off the ground inside a building that probably wasn't very safe to be in to start with. I backed away from the tarp a few more steps. I was desperate to find any information about why I was here and who I was. I reached into my back pocket. I found a wallet. I pulled out an ID card. There was a photo of a man with the name Dan Morgan along with his address. He looked familiar. I walked over to the door leading out of the room. The top part of the door had glass paneling and I was able to see my reflection in it. I looked just like "Dan Morgan". So that must be my name. The name didn't seem right though. It just didn't seem to fit me. But it was mine I guessed. I pulled out another ID card. The name on this one was "Brett Singleton". The photo was the same "Dan Morgan". Different address though. I pulled out all the cards in the wallet and there where several other names with other ID cards but all the same picture. Well, that didn't make me feel good about myself. Was I some kind of thief? Terrorist? Who needed several fake ID's? Hmmmm...I noticed I also had matching credit cards. One for each fake name. Well, I wasn't forming a great image of who I was. Obviously I was someone that worked outside the law. Something about that was so wrong to me. I didn't feel that being a criminal sat well with me at all. The thought of theft, assault, rape or murder made my insides feel like I was in free-fall. My hand happened to brush across my chest. I was surprised to find a strap across my chest. Felt like thick leather. Near my waist I found something clipped to it near my right shoulder. I felt around it for a moment and found a way to unhook it. I pulled it free of the strap and held it up to the light. It was golden and fit squarely into my palm. I held it up and could read the words, "Special Investigator of Villains". Villains? That sounded rather dramatic and unnecessary title for your common criminal...but maybe that's the point. If I really am a Special Investigator of Villains...maybe these guys aren't so common. I took another look at the photograph. There was a circle drawn on it with an arrow pointing at the bottom of the bridge. I turned the photo back over. Elementals...hideout. This felt more like me...who ever I was. I reached down with my right hand to my left hip. Yeah, this felt more like me as my hands felt the grip of my weapon. I pulled it out of the holster. The hand-grip was the only thing about it that seemed normal. The weapon itself seemed to be constantly moving slowly as if trying to decide if it was a small handgun or a large one. I stretched out my hand and thought "9mm handgun". It suddenly shifted into a 9mm handgun and stopped. I thought "Double-barrel shotgun" and it quickly shifted itself into a double-barrel shotgun. Yeah, this felt more like me. With a thought my weapon changed shape to fit the holster as I placed it back into it. I took another look at the badge and saw the words, "San Antonio, Texas". I was born and raised here. That much was sure. Just the thought it it made me hungry. Breakfast tacos, enchiladas, steak fajitas, re-fried beans, tortillas...yeah, this was my city. But...something wasn't right. I walked over and took another look through one of the holes in the tarp. I may not remember anything or much, but this city seemed alien to me. I had never seen it before. That's when I noticed the words on the building across the street. I couldn't read it. I looked at the other buildings and realized I couldn't read any of the signs on the buildings. Was that some Asian language? How did I wind up in a deserted sky scraper, 50 floors up and in an Asian country? Something hit me hard. It was sudden and unexpected and I dropped to my knees. My weapon was suddenly in my hand and I spun around...but there was no one behind me. My head...felt like there was someone besides my own thoughts in there. I held my hands up to my head gasping. I closed my eyes and saw...computer text? I saw a black background with green text spinning and unfocused. I was able to make out some of the text but it seems I'm no computer expert. I felt like I was looking at a computer booting up...inside me? "SYSTEM ONLINE...PLEASE WAIT...CONNECTING TO NETWORK", a familiar voice rang in my head. I placed my weapon back into my holster as I watched more text flow and then stop. I was "online". And I was right. I wasn't in San Antonio, Texas. I was in Manila, Philippines. Various maps and videos suddenly appeared in the air before me. Or rather they were in my head but seemed to be in front of me. I knew that only I could see and hear what I was experiencing. I was being shown the local time (1:37pm) and date (March 1st, 2030), the local temperature (86 Fahrenheit or 30 Celsius). Okay. That's a start. It was time to find out who I was. "Computer", I said aloud, "I need to know who I am and why I'm here". Suddenly the air was filled with files and videos of who I was. I started to read one when the building suddenly exploded. 2 I could feel the explosions from a different parts of the building far below. I remember watching videos of buildings being imploded in busy downtown areas to avoid damaging other buildings. I was always amazed at how well the implosions were handled to avoid destruction beyond the property line. I couldn't see much in that room but I could feel the building lean a little towards the center as it started to fall in upon itself. It was all happening too fast...but only for a moment. Things started to slow down and almost stop. I stood there a moment not sure what to do. The building was caving in on itself, but very slowing. I could see the dust that had leaped away from the floor and walls and ceiling just hanging there. I turned around and looked at the tarp wall and it wasn't moving at all. I wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. I needed to leave the building. I opened the door and stepped into a hall way. The building obviously didn't have power or lights and I was standing in the dark. I did what seemed natural. I pulled out my weapon and thought "light" and a bright beam shot out into a huge open space. It was unnerving to see that the building was indeed collapsing in on itself but for the moment it seemed to be frozen in time. The room I was in seemed as if it could have been a large open area for desks and cubicles at some point in the past. The ceiling had a large crack with what seemed like the weight of the roof crashing down...slowly. I think I could have stood there an hour without being hurt by any falling debris. I looked for an exit and found one quickly enough. The damage to the building was minimal on the sides and that's where the stairs were. I ran down the stairs at about two to three steps at a time shining my light in front of me. You would think that running down 50 flights of stairs would take a while but after a couple flights I tried just jumping from one end of the stairs to the other and found I could do it easily enough. Within seconds I was outside the building and jumped over a barrier that was four times my height and then ran down the deserted street until I felt I was far enough away from the building. I turned around to look at the building and it resumed falling at a normal at normal speed. I could now hear the overwhelming booms of the explosions and implosions coming from the building as it fell sending a massive plume of dust in my direction. I turned and ran and time seemed to slow down to a stop again. When I felt I had out ran the dust I turned around and time returned to normal speed again. I couldn't see the building anymore. I must have run up and over a large hill in the city and I was surrounded by other tall skyscrapers. Only now I noticed people going about their day, walking up and down the sidewalks on their way to work or home. No one seemed to pay me any particular attention and I could see quite a number of people that may have been American or American-looking anyways. I remembered a time, twenty or years or so, when the liberals hated America and the pride that American's took for simply being American. Thankfully, Texas had managed to break away from the US when China attacked and claimed California, Oregon, Washington and Alaska. Canada seemed to be next on the list as China pulled their Ambassador out of Quebec and expelled the Canadian Ambassador from Beijing (but for unknown reasons China backed down but never re-established relations with Canada after that). The US federal government found itself weakened after the attack and was eager allow Texas to leave the union for only a few billion dollars. Texas was the new oil king of the world as the Middle East oil supplies dried up. Trillions of dollars flowed into the nation allowing the Republic of Texas to buy most of Mexico which allowed even more fracking and more trillions. Within ten years Mexico was transformed from a third world country into a first world country. The Republic was negotiating with America to buy out it's confederate cousins and it appeared that DC would allow it...after a bit of time and a few trillion dollars. Whoa. I was starting to remember but I still didn't know who I was. "Computer?", I asked. I could see a flurry of text on a computer screen (in my head?) but didn't understand it. "Too fast! Can you just speak to me?". "Yes, yes, yes", the computer said with a childlike voice. "What's wrong with me? Why can't I remember who I am?" "Memory loss occurred during our fight with the Elementals in the year 2023 in the city of San Antonio, Texas. The Elemental known as Fire has the ability to damage computer systems with a nuclear electromagnetic pulse." Hmmmm....Fire fit the profile of "villain". "Am I human?" "Yes, yes, yes", the computer said, "You are Paul Meachum, age 32, resident of San Antonio, Texas". "I'm just a little confused at how I can be in Manila, Philippines in the year 2030 after fighting Elementals in the year 2023 on the other side of the world. Am I a superhero?" "No, no, no, the computer said, "Superheros are vigilantes and vigilantes are illegal. You have no special abilities or powers. You were once a prisoner in Huntsville on death row..." "Death row? For what? What did I do?" "Your files have been erased from record when you volunteered to be injected with nanites...small but powerful robots...in the hopes of fighting NBC weapons of the Chinese". "NBC weapons?" "Yes, yes, yes. Nuclear, Biological, Chemical weapons that the Chinese used in abundance when it invaded the US. The nanites you were injected with give you special abilities and powers that you would normally not have." "Such as?" Suddenly a dozen videos flew up into my field of view. I could see myself making impossibly high jumps, out running cars, dodging bullets, bullets bouncing off me, lifting up a car and using it as a shield to protect a small group of people from a hail of bullets. I also saw various videos of me using my weapon. "So my weapon is nanite-powered?", I asked. "Yes, yes, yes. It will form into any weapon you can think of." "So...how am I able to time travel?". "You do not have the necessary education to understand that but in the simplest of terms...you teleport from on time to another. The Earth of today is in a different point of space than it was yesterday. Time travel is just simply teleporting through space to where the Earth was or will be in the future." "But, that doesn't make sense. If you teleport to where the Earth will be...it' won't be there because it's here". "My original statement of your intelligence is correct. You are unable to understand." So my on-board computer looks down on me. I chuckled at that. "The orginal nannite-nachyon..." "Nachyons?" "Yes, yes, yes. Nannites were used to create tachyons but found it was impossible. But it was discovered that with..." Videos flooded my mind showing small particles being used to accelerate other particles to the point of being able to fold space to allow instantaneous travel...teleporting. "It was quickly found that nannite-nachyons could be used in cars and even vests to send messages backwards in time to warn of collisions and police could wear them to warn them of being shots several minutes before it occurred. Before long nannites were able to send entire vehicles and people into the past to avoid injury or death. But time travel was quickly banned as the possibility of terrorist using it to kill the leaders of the Republic." "So why can I travel through time?" "Because you are judge, jury and executioner of super human villains. Time travel is permissible and a part of your job duties. " "What's to keep me from attacking the leaders of the Republic?" A video popped up in front of me. I read the caption and it said, "Huntsville Prison, Republic of Texas". It showed a prisoner being injected with nanites. He started to scream as he disintegrated. A guard came vacuumed up the remains. "Because we would not allow it". Well, that seemed to explain everything. I just hoped that the leaders of the Republic had the best interest of the population in mind. "So why am I here if I was suppose to be in 2023?" "The damage from the villain called, "Fire" had the potential to destroy us. The attack wiped your memory and killed millions of us. A self-preservation code had been encoded into each nanite to teleport to Manila, 2030 if termination of nanites and/or you was imminent." "You mean we almost died." "Yes, yes, yes." "So what are we doing in Manila?" "It was felt that Manila would be far enough out of your jurisdiction to avoid your enemies from attacking you here as we sought repair." "Where?" The side walk under my feet suddenly was highlighted green and headed down the street and turned left. "Follow the path." And so I did. "Why 2030? Why not just teleport me to Manila 2023?" "Because the technology was a bit primitive at that time." "Then why not just teleport us to 2040 or even deeper into the future for better technology?" The computer said nothing but I saw in my minds eye a computer screen with text flowing across it at an impossible speed...as if it was worried. 3 Chapter 3 So Manila is the place the nanites bring me if I need to be repaired. Why was I in the skyscraper? "System-wide nanite damage resulted in improper alignment of nacionic...". "Are you reading my mind?", I asked. I suppose it made sense but up till this moment I spoke out loud when talking to my on board computer. "Yes, yes, yes", it said, "but to continue the calculations were off due to the damage from Fire". "Does that mean that you could have just ported us to the 2030 repair center instead of a dead skyscraper about to be demolished?" "Yes, yes, yes, computer said, "or we could have ported you into a wall in error or even into outer space in error.". Ah, I thought. Well since we almost died anyways I guess the risk was worth it. I felt fine outside of remembering almost nothing of myself. How bad was the nannite damage? "90% damage to systems. Only the redundancies kept us from dying fully but another encounter with Fire should be avoided". Yeah, right. I had a feeling I wasn't the type of guy to give up that easily. Probably why they gave me this job. I followed the green path that the computer had drawn on the ground for only me to see. Manila is a busy place. Very much like New York city minus the suits. Too hot for that here. Most people wore shorts and short selves. Traffic was insane and you could always here someone in the background shouting, "Balut!!!". Balut is basically a half-cooked goose egg with the embryo still intact. And by intact, I mean you can easily see a beak, feathers, claws, eyes...all of it. As I understand it, you're suppose to chew it, but I was only brave enough to just swallow it whole. It was a little like eating chicken jello. But if you're not brave enough for balut, you might try the cheese ice cream or sweet spaghetti when in Manila. Wait. How do I know that? I must have been here before. "Say, computer, how often have I..." "This is your second time in Manila. The first time was for your nanite 'orientation'" "Really? How long was I here?" "Six months. You almost died during the orientation". "Well, I guess things turned out okay." "True, but most people die with the nanite dosage you received." I stopped walking. "Most people? That makes sense why I'd volunteer since I was on death row already. How many people have survived at this dosage?" "Only three survived before the program was halted for more testing." "Animal testing?" "Yes, yes, yes. The bonobo is most similar..." "Bonobo?" "Yes, yes, yes,", computer said showing me images and videos of a... "Monkey?" I asked. "Formerly known as pygmy chimpanzee. Bonobos are most similar to human brains. The bonobos used for testing have had their brains augmented to almost human level intelligence." "Why is it difficult to survive nanite dosage at the level I received?" "The human brain resists the nanite invasion at levels that are counter productive to the human body's survival". Computer showed me several videos of men and women in various states of what I can only define as insanity. Some of them sat in the corner and rocking back and forth while urinating on themselves. Others clawed their eyes out. Some attacked the staff before the nanites turned them into dust. One rammed his head into the wall until it burst. "And this almost killed me?" "It seems to do that to every human but only some humans such as yourself are able to survive the orientation". Thank good for small favors I guess. I continued to follow the path that computer had selected. "Say, computer, what's your name?" "As always, you've named me Samantha". "Yeah, that does seem to suit you". We arrived at a large glass skyscraper in downtown Manila. I walked in and a guard waved me to an elevator. Samantha continued to light my path to the elevator and so I followed. She even lit the button for me to push, "B15". Fifteen flights underground? The elevator dropped quickly and then the doors slid open at B15. "Tex!", a short Filipino squealed as she ran to me and hugged me tight. "I'm sorry", I said, "but I don't remember anything but Samantha has provided me with some information on our way over here." "Well, my name is Maribel Gomez and we've known each other since you left prison to come work with us on the nanite project. Samantha has already downloaded everything that has happened to you from 2021 to now." Maribel led me to an office in the back and opened the door. I could see several people working on a variety of things from office work to computer repair. There was a large chair to one side that looked slightly like a dentist chair along with some very un-dentist attachments that attached to it in the back and curved up and over the chair with various tools. "Sit here", Maribel said handing me a helmet. The helmet was similar to a motor cycle helmet except if didn't have a plastic shield over the front and there were a variety of holes in it. I put the helmet on and sat in the chair. It was amazingly comfortable and I felt that I was floating on water. I looked down at the chair but it looked normal enough. "The chairs cushion is made from nanite fabric that can be as hard or soft as you like. It also detects the most pleasant temperature for you as well". I had to admit that it was the most comfortable chair that I had ever been in. "Close your eyes", Maribel said. I did and I could hear her attaching things to my helmet. "This won't hurt and you'll be fine but the sensation is somewhat like jumping off a mountain high cliff. You won't actually hit the ground but if you do what you've done before, you'll be just fine". She slid the last attachment into the helmet and then said, "Good luck!". The chair suddenly dropped under me and I did feel as if I was falling off a high cliff. The chair seemed to spin and I could feel the air rushing in my face. I tried to grab on to the arms of the chair for support but I found I was no longer in the chair. My arms and legs found nothing to stop myself from falling. I opened my eyes and only saw the most perfect absence of light I've ever experienced. My ears throbbed with each heart beat and I tried to suck in a breath but I couldn't. I felt I was about to black out despite the panic I was feeling. Instead, I brought my feet and knees together and reached up to grab my front and rear risers on my left and right side. I looked up and could see that my parachute had no holes and my risers were not tangled. I looked down and was unable to see the ground. It was pitch black and so I floated to the ground as my eyes adjusted. I looked out to the horizon for the tree line that I hoped to see. I could barely see it...it was a jagged line coming up to eye level. I took a quick look down and could see the ground racing to me. I pulled the rear risers to slow my impact just before my feet hit the ground together. I turned as I fell so I could spread the impact over the soft parts of my body on my side while I brought my hands up over my head. And I was on the ground. I stood up, but I was no longer outside. I was in a hospital. I pushed a med-cart down the hall and stopped in front of a room. I pulled a medical administration book out of a draw and turned to a page. I read the doctors instructions on the medical administration record and pulled out the appropriate drugs, opened the bottles and placed the meds into a small paper cup. I poured some cold water into a plastic up and then locked up the med-cart. I opened the door and walked into the room. A woman lay there in bed in obvious pain. Pain is considered a vital sign and this woman experienced it at level "10" for several days. Level 10 is how a patient rates their pain and 10 is considered to be the most painful. Her spine, hips and legs was crushed in a car accident. Her lungs and heart had been punctured. Her skull had been fractured and she lost one of her eyes. She was awake and crying. "Are you going to help me?", she asked looking at me with one swollen red eye. She always had the most beautiful hair and even now, I admired it. I remembered all of the times we spent together growing up. All the fights, all the talks, all the times we played together. We lost our parents when she was only seven and I was twelve. We managed to find ourselves adopted by the best family you could choose if you could. They put me through college and I became a registered nurse. Sis wanted to become a nurse also. But she had a car accident on her way to her first day in college. And now she's here. "Are you sure you want this", I ask. "Oh, Paul, you have no idea how miserable I am. The pain is too much. The only comfort that I have is that you end this for me". She shuddered as she cried even more. I was crying too. Her doctor said that she was not going to survive this. Even if she did, it wasn't the live she wanted to live. I pulled a syringe out of my pocket. I didn't bother using an alcohol wipe on her arm. She smiled at me. Despite all the pain she was in, she was happy at seeing that her misery was about to end. It was that same smile I had seen so many times before that we shared with each other when we both knew everything was going to be alright. I inserted the syringe into her arm. I couldn't hear her, but saw her say, "Thank you", as she closed her eyes. 4 Chapter 4 And then I was back in the chair with the helmet on my head...crying like a baby. I remembered everything. I knew who I was and why I was the way that I am. I assisted my sister to die. She was the really only blood family that I had and I would have done anything for her and I did. The Republic of Texas considered the act to be an unethical procedure for a registered nurse to preform without a doctors order (which her doctor had already denied) and as such judged me as a murderer. The jury had no mercy on my act of kindness for my sister and I was sentenced to die by electrocution. If you don't know anything about Texas then you should know that Texas has no qualms with the death sentence. So if you are looking for a tap on the wrist for murder then you should move to the more liberal United States...like Old New York. Heck, felons can even run for public office there. But not here in Texas. I was sent to the Huntsville prison system and waited my turn for five years. I was allowed access to books, pen and paper and small items I could buy at the commissary. My bed was just a thin blue mattress on top of what looked like a short desk. But instead of drawers in the desk there were little cubby holes where I could store small items that I was allowed to keep like shampoo, soap, cookies, soda, coffee, creamer, sugar, and so forth. The larger area under my bed had no cubby holes and I used my bed as a desk anytime I read or wrote. I didn't have anyone to write to so I just wrote to Samantha telling her about this or that. Just anything to get my mind off of my present situation and allow me to live in a world where she and I lived as successful nurses moving up in the world. But Samantha and I didn't live in that world. I was just here alone...waiting to die. That was until Maribel Gomez came down to my death row prison cell and told me about an experiment that wasn't working as well as they had expected. If I died during the experiment then it would be on my own terms and I'd somehow be helping other people. If I survived, I would be allowed to leave prison on the condition that I worked as a government employee of the Republic and I would work to help others. My record would be scrubbed and I'd be a felon or a murder no longer. I knew nothing about nanites. But I would always think of myself as a nurse even though the Republic of Texas had stripped me of my Registered Nurse license. Even though my country thought of me as a killer, I knew that I acted in my sister's best interest. I would always be willing to help others even if that meant I had to suffer for it. The Republic was sure I would die in the experiment and so I was allowed to be taken to Manila, Philippines. The experience was similar to what I had just gone through. I fell, I overcame the nanite influence and they brought me to Samantha's bedside. After that I was a free man working for the Republic fighting "Villains". None of them were common criminals but people that had been effected one way or another to give them powers and abilities that the Republic considered either criminal or dangerous enough to be labeled, "Villain". I didn't like going after vigilantes because I felt we needed all the help we could get even if they weren't registered with the government. But if you had powers and or abilities that went beyond your normal human and you didn't register, then you'd probably get a visit from someone like me. The Republic felt strong enough about that to allow me to even travel back in time prior to laws that made "Villains" illegal to begin with. I was fine with that. I didn't consider the thought that I owed a debt to the Republic for giving me this new life but rather I thought I owed it to Samantha to move on with my life as I helped others and tried to make a difference for our country. "Do you remember now?", Maribel asked. For a moment I forgot where I was. I shook my head. Yeah, I remembered. There was something about the nanites where the mind fights for control against the millions of nanites who are smarter than you are and almost as willful. Most human minds died from the shock of losing themselves in the artificial intelligence. But a few people where mentally strong and agile enough to not only fight off losing control to the nanites but instead controlling the nanites to do their will. So most people believe they are falling and they simply allow themselves to hit an imaginary ground killing themselves. I was one of the oddballs that would use the nanites to create what I needed to survive even in my dreams. But nanite artificial intelligence is strongly curious about powerful emotions and in my case, they always pulled my mental file of my sisters death. Sadistic little bastards. I gave them my sister's name and voice just to spite them. "Most of your nanites were destroyed in your fight against the Elementals, especially the one named Fire. We've injected you with an additional dose of nanites and these will be more prepared against that particular villain." "Maribel?", I asked pulling off the helmet, "If this is 2030...why didn't you tell me about Fire before I almost got killed?". "Ah, well, from your point of view that makes sense but you have to understand, we didn't know Fire would do that to you until you fought him...the first time. We knew that he was a killer but we didn't know the precise nature of his abilities until we received your nachyon transmission. 2030 is your 'present' time but you change history each time you go back." "So you have no idea how I'll do the second time I find the Elementals?" "I only know that you will find them but, until you do, I have no idea what the outcome with them will be". "Okay, then I guess if you have nothing else for me, I'll get back to tracking the Elementals". "No, but I wish you luck", she said hugging me, "just come back to us in one piece, okay?". I nodded. "Drop by Texas sometime and I'll teach you how to ride a horse", I said tipping an imaginary hat in her direction. "You just keep yourself alive and we'll see you when you make it back to 2030", she said tipping her own imaginary hat. I walked out of her office and out into the street. One thing about time-travel...you always have plenty of time. When I was only a nurse, I use to just take walks just before I started work. It got the blood moving and allowed me to think about my next move. A good nurse knows his patients well and a good nurse knows what they need and it helped just to visualize the medications that would be needed and the steps to the procedures that would need to be done. But other times I just liked to walk and let my mind wander on nothing in particular at all. The insides of a hospital can be a bit hypnotizing because each hall wall, each floor looks the same. But outside, nothing was the same. Each tree or bush or random animal (deer actually came up to the parking lot on occasion) or random cloud just lifted my spirits to where they needed to be in order for me to find the focus I needed for the day. I'm not a nurse any more. If anything I'm a government slave with the right to terminate villains if they won't come peacefully. "Samantha?" "Yes, yes, yes", Samantha the computer responded. "How much of my sister is in your programming?", I asked watching a group of students crossing the street on their way to school. "Your emotions are strong concerning your sister and we are very curious about your feelings about her on these days." Samantha the computer tossed several photos and videos of my sister and I up into the air in front of me. I should have been angry and the nanites ability to move my emotions they way they do...but I stood there and drank in the memories. Each one sweet and each one I would remember until my last day. "Your ability to manipulate us has increased our curiosity to the point of emulating as much of her as possible making your manipulation of us even easier". I suppose that made sense why I was one of the strange ones to survive. I wanted my sister to live to the point that I'd even kill the nanites will over me to bring her to life...even if she was only an artificial intelligence floating in my head. I know what you are thinking. Why don't I just travel to the day she died and save her? Don't you think I tried? Despite my ability to override the nanites, they were hard coded so they wouldn't allow me to interact with her in the past. Saving her would make weaken my ability over the nanites and that would be a death sentence for me. The Republic of Texas took a bit of pride in me and had no intention of allowing me to die by saving my sister. But I had to find a way to keep her from being killed in the past. But first, I had other work to do. I walked down the street until I found an unoccupied alley. Manila is busy any day of the week but this side of down is less busy than others and there was no one walking up the street to the alley. It was time to go back. Samantha knew what I was thinking. "Working", she said. At first nothing happened but the Sun finally stopped moving..and then started moving backwards. Slowly at first and then suddenly it was night. The days and nights started to increase in frequency until everything to me was just blinking lights. I could see myself pull up into the air away from the earth until I was above the spinning blue and white ball of the Earth. It was soon gone and I was floating in space moving to the Earth of the past. Soon it was below me and I moved back to the earth until I was on the ground again. The sun finally slowed and finally stood solid in the sky. "Error, error, error", Samantha stammered in my mind. "Where are we?", I asked. It was dark but I could see trees and a small town below the large hill I was on. My eyes were enhanced by the nanites allowing me to see in infrared and I could see large distances clearly without the need of a telescope. I saw a group of people riding horses into town. Just past the down was a harbor with what looked like a military base jutting out into the water. I saw men in various degrees of uniforms preparing...cannons? Most of the men held...muskets? "Sam", I repeated, "Where are we?". "Unable to establish internet connection." "Then just get me a location with a gps satellite". "Scanning", Samantha replied. After a few seconds, "Unable to establish any satellite connection". "Can you give me a date and time?", I asked. In my minds eye I could see Samantha measuring the stars movements and then after a few calculations, she replied, "April 12th, 1861. Current time is 4:15am." "Can you give me a location based on the stars?", I asked. "Charleston, South Carolina", she replied. I didn't think it was possible to travel this far back in time due to the restrictions placed on my time-traveling abilities, but here I was...at the start of the Civil War about to witness a Confederate victory. "Take me up", I said. The nanites transformed my weapon into wearable helicopter and I flew up into the dark night sky. 5 Chapter 5 "Sam", I said looking at Fort Sumter far below. I was hovering high enough over head where the soldiers below couldn't see me unless they happened to use a telescope. And who would expect a flying man over their head in the year, 1861? Besides it was dark, but I could see them just fine. From what I remembered from my history books, the Union commander had been notified by the Confederate commander that the south would attack by 4:30am. I was fascinated to watch the preparations going on down below. I had never seen canons of war used that were so...ancient and yet these looked fairly modern for this time period. The muskets just looked like a very awkward thing to deal with when bullets were flying at you. But I also remembered from history that these guys beat the north...at least in this battle. I was proud of them. I needed to help them but first, "Care to tell me what we are doing in 1861?". Samantha seemed to think about that for a second, "Unable to determine". She showed me various videos of possibilities...possible nanite mutation from my battle with the Elementals...possible sunspot activity creating a nachyon navigational error...possible undetected wormhole pushing us further into the past...possible sabotage from Maribel herself or possibly even a subconscious override on my part. The bottom line was that without the World Wide Web and satellites flying over us, the only information we had access to was what was stored in Samantha's impressive nanite memory system and my own personal memories. And Sam really had no idea how or why we were here and I was completely clueless. "So when are we going to snap back?," I asked. Snap back was a basic procedure used by the nanites to return us to our starting point if this type of error occurred. As far as I knew, it never occurred, but snap back was suppose to correct this if it ever did happen. "Snap back error. Unable to snap back to starting point." Well, I knew I wouldn't be allowed to stay here. The nanites and I could become rulers of the world unless the nanites found a way to move us back to 2030. The Republic of Texas certainly didn't want me in charge of things so I was sure they would program a correction for this type of error. "So are you going to move us forward", I asked as I watched the soldiers activities below. "Nachyon abilities have been damaged. Unable to self correct". "How is that possible? I thought you guys could pretty much self-repair anything?". A video popped up in front of me showing a flurry of nanite activity. They were working on it but it was as if they couldn't remember how to fix the problem and they weren't creative enough to come up with their own solutions. The only other solution would be to self-terminate themselves and me to prevent any tampering with Texas history. They stopped moving. Almost as if they and I looked at each other to determine our next move. My helicopter shut off and I fell. "Samantha, you wanted me to live even though you asked me to release you from this life". I still fell. I hit the water hard. My weapon turned into something similar to an outboard motor but instead of pulling me across the water it just pulled me down into the depths. I brought up my sister's memory and dug deep into my emotions for her. My nanites swarmed over the memory, fascinated by the emotions. I'm guessing the original design for these guys was to emulate those emotions and memories to control who ever they were in. That in itself was the defect that caused people to simply die as they wrestled with the memories, emotions and nanites. I pushed the emotions hard onto the nanites. "Sam! I know you are in there! Even if you are just a copy created from these damn micro-robots. You can't kill me, Sam! I know you want me to live". Damn things kept pushing me deeper and I started to see spots in front of my eyes. I didn't have long. I dug deeper into my memories and held each one up for the nanites to see: Sam and I at our last Christmas, Sam and I at her high school graduation, Sam and I playing in the back yard, Sam and I working on her homework. The nanites swarmed around each memory and I could feel the tug toward the bottom of harbor loosen. "Sam! Let go! I'm about to DIE!!!", I yelled mentally at the millions of nanites in my system. A small breathing mask formed over my nose and mouth. It allowed me to pull in breathable oxygen from the water around me. I won. We had no way to 2030 and the nanites had too much of my sister in their system to actually kill me. I was fully in charge of what I did next. But now what? I was in 1861 about to witness the first battle of the Civil War. The Confederacy would win this first battle but would lose the war. "Sam, how many people died in the Civil War?" "620,000 deaths as a result of the Civil War," Sam replied, "that was the most deaths from a US war until the Chinese invasion of the US in 2018 which resulted in 10 million deaths". I remembered the Chinese invasion. Liberalism had flared in popularity in the US from 2008 until present day (or rather 2030) although the US was slightly better than a third world country in my time. Liberalism always hated the original configuration of the US when it came to the military and the static nature of the Constitution itself. It was a poison that always demanded liberal change and it weakened the US to the point that an invasion was simple to accomplish for a country that pushed it's resources almost fully into industry and it's military. China even televised the launching of it's nuclear weapons at Los Angeles, California. CNN broadcast the event as the once glamorous city ceased to exist. It was quite a bit of overkill for that one area, but the Chinese wanted to make a point as it rolled it's military into every American state on the coast including Alaska. There was little resistance at that point. What was left of the American military was pulled to the east coast leaving the west coast with no means to defend its self. The Americans that remained in those states quickly became slaves to China. They were not allowed to own any property. They were herded to ghetto communities where they had to sleep side by side in every home. I saw photos of thirty people sleeping in a bed room that normally was a large bedroom for two people. Auditoriums that were once used for basketball games were now home to thousands of people. During the day they would go out doing mundane task for their new Chinese overlords. Anyone too weak or too old or too sick would simply be killed if they couldn't work. Texas immediately broke away from the US and the rest, as they say, is history. At least future history. The Chinese didn't seem to want to take on the nanite technology that the Republic of Texas had and the US quickly just rolled over to what the Chinese wanted. The Texas Constitution was rewritten to basically abolish any future liberal activities that would weaken it as it did the US. You could have your own personal liberal beliefs but liberal laws were simply not possible to create if such law could create national debt outside of military action. The military always came first in the budget and that included caring for it's wounded soldiers. Emergency aid would only be used as long as it didn't create a deficit or a debt unless a military invasion gave the Republic no choice. Basically, the Republic of Texas was liberal as long as it stayed out of debt. The law stated that if the Republic ever went into debt then liberal programs would be sacrificed first until Texas was out of debt. But now, in 1861, I could possibly change all that. I could save over 600,000 people from dying in the Civil War and I could save over 10 million from dying in a Chinese invasion in 2018. "Get me back into the air, Sam". Within moments I was out of the water and back up high in the air. I could see that the battle had begun. No one would die from this battle but it was the start of the Civil War. I pointed at the center of Fort Sumter and said, "Put me down there, quickly, Sam". She dropped me like a stone but at the last moment rockets from my feet slowed my descent until I was on the ground. Fort Sumter is more or less circular and the soldiers attention was in the direction of their canons. Nearly all of them missed my drop from the night sky and the sound of my rockets were drowned out by the canons report. But one soldier did see me. He had stumbled backwards as he saw me land dropping his musket. I walked over to him and picked up his weapon. It was heavy compared to weapons from 2030 but effective for his day. I offered him a hand up and handed his weapon back to him. "Are you from the South...sir?", he asked me. He held his weapon there not sure whether to salute me with it or shoot me with it. My guess was that despite the battle going on around us that he hadn't had the chance to even load his weapon. "Son, I need to speak with your commander", I said. He just stood there a moment stunned. "Yes, Sir!". He started walking and I followed him. 6 Chapter 6 I was among Union soldiers, of course. Fort Sumter was surrounded by Confederate artillery on Fort Moultrie to the north and Fort Johnson and Citadel Battery to the south. Explosions rocked Fort Sumter as the Union soldier in front of me led the way to the man in command of the union troops at Fort Sumter: Major Robert Anderson. As I followed the soldier, I watched a video supplied by Samantha explaining to me why they were even here. The United States had not been very united for several years prior to 1861. There was an agreement that as new states were added on that there would be an equal number of states that could have slaves and would not have slaves. The north was more industrialized than the south and so the need for slaves was not as great. The south's primary economic source was cotton and cotton plantations where huge. Picking cotton was done by hand and that required slaves. Prior to 1830, the south had produced about 750,000 bales of cotton a year. The mechanical cotton gin had allowed the south to produce even more cotton and production shot up to about 2.85 million bales of cotton a year, which led to a greater dependence on slaves. The first patent for a mechanical cotton picker was issued in 1850 but it would take almost 100 years before it was commercially available. One was almost ready for production in the 1930's, but the world was in the grips of the Great Depression and the thought of machines taking what little jobs were left was incredibly discouraging to any mechanical innovations. While modern day coach potatoes, from the north, would claim that the south would want to keep slaves even if the mechanical cotton picker was available...keep this in mind. A skilled slave would cost about the same as a luxury car with all the options. An average cost of an average slave was about half that cost. Multiply that with anywhere from a handful of slaves to a few hundred slaves. Now add in the cost of keeping them fed, providing them with housing and clothes. What was known as "health care" of the day usually meant the slave owner would try his own home remedies before sending a slave to a doctor. Some of the slaves had some skill in the healing arts and would attempt their own remedies. Losing a slave due to death or due to escape was a large economic loss to the slave owner. So having a mechanical cotton picker available in the 1850's would have meant a drop in the need for slaves by quite a bit. All the cotton without all the fuss and more profit with less or no slaves at all. Racism was a different problem but it was still a problem in 2030 despite liberal efforts to outlaw it and/or control it. There was no known cure to racism but the cure to slavery seemed to be best found in ways to increase profit through mechanical ingenuity although that would take time. Profits of the time came from slavery and slavery came from the federal government who deemed which states could have it and which states could not have it. But there were no mechanical cotton pickers on this day and Major Robert Anderson moved to take Fort Sumter shortly after seven states removed themselves from the Union. South Carolina left first in December 1860. Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas left before anti-slavery Abraham Lincoln took office as President of the United States of America in 1861 (Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee and North Carolina left shortly after). The problem with Major Robert Anderson taking Fort Sumter was that President Buchanan had made a pact with South Carolina not to interfere with the states actions in taking the federal arsenals and forts that had been lost in that state (as well as the other six states) in order to maintain a peace between the states. But the President had failed to inform Major Robert Anderson and the Major took things into his own hands and seized Fort Sumter before it feel into the Confederates hands. President Buchanan was now out of office and President Lincoln was unaware of the southern volcano of Confederacy was about to explode. The Major was directing his artillery to counter the incoming rebel artillery. The soldier that had led me to the Major had tried to interrupt him but was instead backhanded by the Major as he continued to bark his orders. I walked up to him and tapped him on the shoulder. He was about to back hand me as well but quickly realized that I didn't belong among his troops. "Who are you!?!", he asked pulling out his pistol and leveling right between my eyes. A few of his soldiers leveled their rifles at me. "I need to talk with you for a moment, Major", I said. "I don't have time for this!", he shouted, "You two", he said pointing to a couple nearby soldiers, "take this one into custody". The came at me from both sides, but before they did I had Sam take me up about 15 feet into the air with my compact helicopter. A few of them fell backwards with their mouths wide open in shock. A few of the veterans were quick to open fire and then they stopped when they realized that they had hit me and I was just fine. On a scale too small for them to see, my nanites had absorbed the bullets on contact saving that material for whatever we would need in the future. Quite often if I needed to run at blinding speed or lift a few tons for a particular feat, the nanites could cannibalize various minerals and glands in my body to produce the necessary augments I needed to fight villains. And often villains would fire things in my direction that the nanites would collect for future use. While I viewed the Union with disdain, I didn't hate them or even consider them villains. Just misguided folks that believed the South had no right to leave the Union. Which was silly since the Union was created with sovereign states that never gave up their sovereignty despite the creation of a Federal Union. Liberals claimed that either the states never were sovereign or that they surrendered it with the creation of a centralized federal government. It was not a common belief from the South that believed that the power of the Union was through cooperation of the states whom could leave the union should they please. Hence, the Major here encouraged the Confederates to fire the first shot. President Lincoln was well known for saying that he would not start a war with the south. Was the Major here inspiring the south to start this war with his agitations? I didn't think I'd ever know the answer to that and frankly, I didn't care. After seeing me still hovering in the air, they started shooting at me again. After the smoke cleared and they saw I was still there, the Major stepped forward. "Sir, would you please come down?", he asked. I did. "Which side are you on?", the Major asked. A few soldiers lifted their weapons back up at me, but the Major wisely waved them to stand down. "I'm on the side of freedom, Major", I explained. "The north wants to be free and the south wants to be free. No need to insist on starting a war where your side will incur more deaths than the south". "Freedom?", the Major retorted, "The south does not have the right to seize federal property and as a Major in the Union Army, I reclaim Fort Sumter in the hopes of preventing the start of a war". The bombardment from the north and south of Fort Sumter continued, but he asked me to walk with him as his men continued to fight back. "You don't know this, Major, but Buchanan actually didn't want this", I said pointing to the walls of the fort, "but he wasn't expecting you to take this fort". "How could you possibly know that?", he asked. "Well, where do you think I gained the ability to fly or live through a rain of bullets?", I asked. "I can't even imagine how that is possible unless you are from..." the Major trailed off as if almost afraid to say it. "I'm from another time, Major", I told him, "I'm from the year 2030 and in my time the south broke away from the north twice." He stood there a moment watching the incoming confederate fire. Some of the walls had already caught on fire and the history of my time recorded that the Major would be unable to fight the fire and the Confederates at the same time...leading to his surrender. "You speak as if you are from the South", he said. "Well, if you know anything about Texans, we regard ourselves as Texans first and everything else comes second". He looked at me for a moment before saying, "I have received a report that a fourth of the Union soldiers in South Carolina have recently been captured by the Texas militia". "Major, I came here to let you know that this is the first battle of the Civil War. In my time, it is recorded that no one died in this battle and that you'll surrender because you're surrounded, short on supplies and unable to control that fire on the wall. Me telling you this will change nothing. You can't win this and you'll witness instead a Confederate victory. I'll leave you for now, but I'll be back after you surrender." I had Sam take me up into the air again as the Major asked, "Why? You seem to have the ability to stop us yourself?". "Because, I know that you can't win this and I want those guys", I said pointing at the incoming artillery, "to have one of the few wins that they had during the Civil War". I rose higher into the air until the Major was just a speck on the ground. He didn't know what or who I was but he knew that with just one of me, he couldn't win. The Confederates didn't need my help, but I'm sure the Major's spirits were dampened by my existence. "Sam, it's time we spoke to the commander firing on the Major". Sam moved me through the night sky in search of Colonel Chestnut. 7 Chapter 7 As Sam hovered me there far up in the dark night sky trying to locate Colonel Chestnut, I thought about my orientation back in Manila. I survived the nanite invasion in my body and made them submit to my will simply because I refused to die simply because the Republic disagreed with my sister's right to die. But I still needed training and those first days were unbelievably tough. Take my weapon for instance. It can turn into anything I can think of easily because the nanites take my thoughts and literally create the item I want out of what I'm wearing or whatever it is I'm touching or it digs deep and cannibalizes the warehouse that all humans have: the bones themselves. The skeletal system stores a life time need of minerals that the nanites can use as I direct them. They don't need much to work their magic. If I need medical attention they can also create the drugs I need from my own glands or they can decrease my pain by merely insuring that my brain never gets the signals from those particular nerves. If I needed to run so fast that time seemed to slow down, a little cannibalization, a little nanite augmentation with a tweak of nachyon technology and the entire world seemed to come to a stop. The nanites only used my own bodies systems if they were unable to gather them from my immediate vicinity, but pretty much anything cannibalized was regained later by only being within a feet of what my body needed. Oh, but back to my weapon. It can form anything that I can think of. The first issue that I had was that I couldn't think of anything for it to become. It just looked like a black ball of oozing mass that slid well into my holster. "You're thinking too hard", Maribel told me. "How can I think too hard?", I asked. "You're trying to think of every detail of whatever it is you want your weapon to be and frankly that slows down the nanites reaction to what it is you want because you can't decide every single detail", Maribel said. "So what do you suggest?", I asked. "Hmmm...You have to get a feel for what it is you want to do", she said. "What do you mean by 'feel'", I asked. "Well, nanites have the most sophisticated artificial intelligence possible for 2030. However, as you found out, they are fascinated by emotion. We don't know why and we can't tweak that aspect out of them without 'dumbing' them down. But if you want to control them then you need to use your emotions without losing control to your emotions", she said. "Any idea how?", I asked. "Why don't you ask them yourself?", she said. "To who?", I asked. "Them...the nanites. They are a part of you now and if you just talk to them...they'll talk back", she replied. Okay. The thought of speaking to something that is inside of you is a bit freaking at best. "Here", Maribel said, "Talk with them and then punch a hole through this". It was a simple square board that looked like it was about 3 feet square. Nothing really impressive and easy enough to punch a whole through it with a shotgun. "Okay, computer, shotgun", I said and pulled out my weapon. The blob on the handle mearly slid around the base and around my hand but...nothing. "Hmmm...computer? Can you show me how to punch a hole in that board?", I asked. The computer pulled up a video...of Bruce Lee? "You have to visualize your opponent", Bruce Lee told me via the video. Okay, so I closed my eyes and thought about the board. In my mind's eye I could see how far it was. I could see how high off the ground that it was. I touched it with my mind and felt the grain of the wood itself. "Computer...now what?", I asked. It was Bruce Lee again. He looked so young and he was...died too damn young. "When you punch...don't think about just hitting your opponent...think about moving through your opponent. Punch through to the other side of your opponent." Bruce danced in front of me and stood before a board similar to mine. In a blink, his fist struck out, hit the board and moved through it up to his elbow and then snapped his arm back. Sooo...I visualized my "opponent". I visualized going through my target. Suddenly my mind visualized my sister dying. The nanites were pulling my focus away from the board and toward my sister. "Focus", Bruce told me. The nanites swarmed over my sister's memory. Feeding on it. Drinking in the agony that she and I both felt at that moment. "Focus", Bruce reminded me. My anger was starting to boil. I reached for my weapon with a shaking hand and gripped the handle to the point that I seemingly squeezed the blood from my hand turning my knuckles white. It wasn't right. My sister should have lived. Why did she have to die? Why wasn't she allowed to die the way she wanted to die? The tears in my eyes stung as I leveled my weapon on my target. "Strike!", Bruce shouted at me as he punched through his own block of wood. I visualized everyone that stood in front of my sister's bright future. I thought about the drunk driver that struck her because he just had to be out driving that day. I thought about the doctor that could have written the doctor's order that would have allowed her to die without pain and peacefully without having to place that decision into our laps. "STRIKE!", Bruce shouted again punching his imaginary boards. I pulled the trigger screaming my rage at the world without seeing the board at all. I just visualized it as being nothing but splinters. It sounded like the world exploded as I felt the weapon recoil in my grasp. I opened my eyes. My ears were ringing. Bruce was smiling at me. The board was gone. So was most of the room. The walls on both sides were gouged heavily allowing me to see into the rooms on both sides and the wall in the back had fallen over with a ten-foot hole in the middle of it. Pieces of the ceiling fell into the room kicking up a dust storm. "Now we'll help you focus your rage so that you can hit with more control and less collateral damage," Maribel told me dusting off her hair. "Think of yourself like water, my friend", Bruce told me. Time went by and I was able to use my emotions to control the nanites in such a way that I didn't take out several rooms at once. Once during a lunch break, I talked to Maribel about what's next. "Maribel, what does the Republic want with me after you are done with me?", I asked. "You'll be a part of the law enforcement of the Republic. Once we get a few more of you guys established, you'll have a team that you can work with", she said. "We have villains that law enforcement are unable to take down. Many of them have died in the line of service trying to defend the public so we needed someone who can operate above the law, through the law, around the law...whatever it takes to protect them and the public. Once a violator is labeled as a "Villain", they fall under your jurisdiction to cease their activities as you see fit as long as you insure they are no longer a threat to the public." "When will I be considered fully trained?", I asked. "Well, there will always be an opportunity to train and to learn, but once you can beat a Bonobo is the day you can leave here", she said. "Yeah, you have pretty good control of your abilities now, but Bonobos are unpredictable...just like Villains", she replied. "In fact, it's time you met one today. If you beat it, you can go back to the Republic and start your new life in law enforcement". "Maribel, exactly what is a Bonobo", I asked. "You'll see!", she said laughing. She led me to an area outside and took me in to a large building. It was dark in there until she turned on the lights. I could see what looked like a boxing arena. Maybe twice the regulation size. Inside the ring was a... "A monkey?", I asked. "That's Caesar. He's a pygmy chimpanzee and he's fully capable of taking you down if you are not careful", she said. She led me to the ring and helped me into it. She then walked over to a chair on the side and sat down. "You really expect me to fight a monkey?", I asked. "That's like punching a cat in a bag, it's silly and too easy and cruel", I said. "Caesar is not cat in the bag. He has nanites just like you do" she said. "How is that possible", I asked. "What? You think that just because you have human intelligence that you can beat Caesar? Let me tell you something that you obviously don't know. Real stupidity, and I'm talking about REAL stupidity can beat even the best artificial intelligence because animals are widely unpredictable. You and your nanites artificial intelligence can't out think Caesar because he doesn't think like you do. He's an animal and he's armed. Good luck", she told me. I turned to face my opponent. He had his weapon out. But he was poking his feces with it. I could smell it from here. Revolting! He then pointed the weapon at himself and took a large bite out of his feces. I felt like I was going to throw up. What was he going to do? Gross me out and win? I looked over at Maribel and saw she was holding what looked like a remote. She pushed one button and a bell sounded. "Round one!" a voice from no where shouted. She pushed another button and suddenly Caesar moved at me faster than I was expecting. I'd like to tell you that I fought the good fight. I'd like to tell you that I easily overcame Caesar. I'd even like to tell you that I won that first fight with that little short, smelly, bastard. But all I can and will tell you is that I didn't last long and I had mouth full of Caesar's feces. 8 Chapter 8 Sam was able to find the Colonel easy enough and as before I was shot at. I could just imagine the tiny 3-D printers that the nanites used to mold the bullets material into something that could be set aside for future use. Quite often I would catch them repairing holes and tears in my clothing from various battles I've been in using materials they mainly collected as I went about my business. They even provided a minty taste to my mouth when it needed cleaning but even that wasn't enough after my first meeting with Caesar. I shuddered at the memory. Sam brought me down to the ground and I was face to face with the Colonel. "I mean you no harm, Colonel", I said with my hands open and to the side. "Who are you?", he asked. "My name is Paul Meachum and I'm from San Antonio, Texas", I said. Colonel Chestnut waved his soldiers back to the fight, "Care to come with me to my tent?", he asked. I followed him away from the artillery to the back where his tent was. It was one of the largest tents complete with a large table filled with notes and maps, a bed for rest and a small book self with books laying haphazardly in it. His tent was close enough to the artillery that the canvas walls shook with each canon report. He offered me a seat in one of the wooden chairs he had there. "Coffee?", he asked. I ate or drank if I wanted too. It wasn't really necessary since the nanites provided me with all that I needed by simply replicating what my body needed as it needed it. I still had my favorites that I ate the old fashion way with my hands and mouth but other than that, I didn't miss eating. Took too long to cook and eat and I usually had a lot to do. Since they provided me with what I needed, I had little to no human waste. What waste was produced was removed by the nanites to be used to create whatever else they felt needed to be created. Any sweat produced by my body was also used by the nanites. So I had no need to eat, drink, shower or even change my clothes. My clothes were always created to be similar to those around me allowing me to mix in. When I visited the Union side, I was in Union uniform and now I was dressed in a similar confederate officer garb. Colonel Chestnut may have had questions about my abilities, but not my clothes. "No, thank you, I'm fine", I said. He poured himself a cup as his tent shook again carrying an ample amount of dust from his tent to his cup. He didn't seem to notice or maybe he just didn't care. He sat across from me and asked, "So, what do you want exactly? We don't seem to have the means to stop you and your method of travel is beyond any engineering that I'm aware of." "And I'm guessing", I said, "that you probably already have considered that I'm not from your time." He nodded, "I'm also considering that I'm not even awake or that perhaps you are cousin to the 'Headless Horseman'. You are bizarre and strange and yet you give off the feeling that you are perhaps a friend. A friend of another time? That thought is beyond me and I can't comprehend it". "Maybe not", I said, "but as you said, I'm a friend". I stood an pointed toward Fort Sumner, "That is the start of what my time calls the 'Civil War'. Too many people died in that war and although you will win Fort Sumner in a couple days with no blood shed, the south will lose the war. In my time, we do eventually break away from the north but not for almost another 200 years". "200...years?", the colonel said trying to understand. He stood up and started to pace within his tent. "So we do break away from the north?", he asked. "Yes", I said, "and I had no intention of coming to your time. I'm a part of law enforcement from the year 2030 and I have the ability to pursue my targets through the fabric of time. However, I was never meant to travel this far back. I'm not sure what happened but some quirk or twist of fate brought me here. There are safeguards that would have normally pulled me back to 2030, but they failed and I appear to be stuck in your time." "That's an amazing story," the colonel said, "and I'm not sure how we can help you". "You can't", I agreed. He raised an eyebrow, "If you are a Texan, would you consider helping the Confederacy?". "Of course", I said, "but I would need to talk to your President". "President Davis?", he said, "Of course, of course. You'll find him at the Confederate White House in Montgomery, Alabama. That's a few days by horse, but can you fly faster than a horse?". "Yes", I said while Samantha brought up a chart in front of me, "and it looks like he's only thirty minutes from here for me". "Thirty...minutes...", The colonel sat back down dumbfounded. He quickly stood back up, "Before you go...", he pulled a blank sheet of paper out of the piles of books on his desk and started to write. I took the time to look outside the tent to watch the bombardment of Fort Sumter. It was receiving a pounding from the north, south and west confederate locations. I saw the fires on the walls and wondered if the Major would surrender sooner now that he saw me. I remembered history reporting that the Major would surrender on the 14th, but now? I could end the war quickly and allow the south and north to go on their own separate ways minus all the deaths of the Civil Wars. "Here", the colonel said, "take this to the President. It'll let him know that you were here and that you want to help our side". "Thanks," I said. I took his note and walked outside. I stood there a moment and watched as the Confederacy and the Union fought each other. I was proud of my side and allowed myself to drink in the moment. The colonel waved good bye to me as he returned to his men and started to issue commands. "Sam", I said, "get me to President Davis as fast as you can". I rose up into the air and continued to watch the battle. At about 1,000 feet, Sam hovered for a moment as my boots formed into rockets. The gloves on my hands also formed into rockets and my headgear formed into helmet complete with a heads-up display and oxygen. I moved my hands to my sides and aimed the palms down. The rockets ignited and Sam deactivated my helicopter as we shot up into the night sky. The heads-up display provided me information on how to steer myself into the direction of the President. I had Sam play some music from the 1980's. It wasn't my favorite type of music, but my sister use to love it. I closed my eyes and for a moment I was with her as she played this music in her headphones doing her home work. The computer had already shown me that it was quite likely that altering the future by helping the Confederacy could quite likely mean that she and I wouldn't be born in this alternate Earth. What else could I do? I couldn't go back to my time and I was still a Texan and as such, a Confederate by heart. Now I'd be a Confederate in fact. The flight was short but it allowed me to see American in a way I had never seen it. Despite my augmented abilities, I needed Sam to point out major cities on the way. And by "major" I mean cities that Sam was able to detect and even she was having a hard time. Atlanta, Augusta and Macon were far to the north of my flight plan, but I could still make them out in the distance. Sam gave me a slight ping on my heads-up indicating we were about five minutes from Montgomery. I looked over at the time being displayed on my helmet and saw that it was about 5:45am local time. We had been flying at about 10,000 feet and I had Sam ease us down to 1,000 feet as we approached. Sam pinged again showing a railroad on the ground and I had her use that to guide us into town. The city itself was surrounded by houses on the edges and the center of town had wide dirt streets with wooden buildings that were no taller than three stories. There were gas lights throughout town that were on as people went about their business getting ready for the new day. One of the main streets lead up to an impressive building at one end. My display flashed the words "state building" to notify me what it was. It wasn't the Presidential abode. Sam guided me a short distance and brought me down near a smaller building and the words "Confederate White House". I was a little surprised that there were no guards in front of the White House, but I remembered that even the Union didn't have have much of a White House staff until much later. I had Sam bring me down in front of the mansion. A horse across the street cried out and tried to run but was held in place by a hitching post. My rockets had kicked up quite a bit of dust and dirt off the road and I stood there waiting for it to clear. I heard the door to the mansion open and when the dust settled I saw the President standing there. I pulled the letter out of my jacket and walked over to him. "President Davis, this is for you". He took the letter, read it and then offered to lead the way into the White House. 9 Chapter 9 I never expected to ever visit the Confederate White House even in the year 2030 let alone the year 1861 at the start of the Civil War. One thing that strikes you as you compare the world of 1861 to the world of 2030 is just the diminutive size of things. It seemed as if just a short while ago I awoke among an enormously expansive dead structure in a city of huge buildings of immense girth stabbing deeply into the blue sky above. Here in Montgomery, Alabama, there was no building that was more than three stories in height and that included the Presidential mansion. Inside the mansion the President led the way as Sam popped up the floor plans for me. To the right was the President's bed room and the next door down was his wife's bedroom. To the left was the door to the front living room and further down the hall was the rear living room. Deeper in the mansion was a large library, rear hall, dining room, breakfast room, pantry and porch. Upstairs were five bedrooms for guests. The President led me into the front living room. He gestured towards a chair and I sat. Each item in the room was polished to a lustrous shine. The chandelier above was golden and provided just enough light with it's candles. Portraits hung on the wall which, according to Sam, were of himself, his wife and children. The room, if not the mansion itself, was amazingly clean and I doubted I could find a speck of dirt or a hint of dust anywhere. That would be an easy feat to achieve with household nanites, but in 1861 I was sure that the President had plenty of slaves working around the clock keeping every detail of the mansion looking new and even unused. At that very moment a slave entered the room. He was an older gentleman but richly dressed as you would expect a butler to be from his emaculate tie, lace cuffs, white gloves and black glazed shoes. He looked at no one but rather stood there as if at attention. "Coffee for me and my guest, Reginald", the President said as he took a seat himself. Reginald nodded, turned on his heel and left the room. "Colonel Chestnut tells me that I should listen to your impossible tale and suggests that you can help our new country in ways that are beyond belief", Davis said watching me. "I saw you come down out of the sky with fire coming from your boots and hands", he mentioned as he looked at my hands from a distance. "Mr. President", I said, "I am a friend and I am from the future". I told him about my accidental venture into the past (present for him) and that it seemed I was locked into the pages of this present time. I explained that I was from the new country of the Republic of Texas and that we were reaching out to the other former confederate states and had already acquired most of Mexico due to the wealth we had acquired from fracking. "And the Union of 2030?" the President asked. I explained to him the various liberal policies that had placed the United States into a weakened position globally and militarily and economically. Liberal policies demanded debt and China was more than willing to "help". After the US found itself in debt to China by about $150 trillion US dollars, China demanded payment. The US was unable to pay within the given time limit and so China moved in to claim huge parts of the American west. The American military was too weak because the liberal mindset was that the military simply wasn't a necessary asset to upkeep. There had been no modernization of the American military in years. Texas had no love of the Chinese, but most Texas couldn't help but laugh at the liberal US media as they reported, in shocked expressions, the invasion by China. I pulled up a video of the nuclear missiles exploding on and over Los Angeles, California for the President to see. He nearly fell out of his chair as he tried to comprehend what he was seeing. "It was the start of the downfall of the United States of America", I told the President, "but Texas had been producing more oil than even than the Middle East and a few trillion was used in nano-technology. That technology was enough to frighten China from considering invading the south and allowed the Republic to become the new superpower of the world". I showed the President a video of what the nanites looked like and what they did. Nanites are very small robots able to take individual atoms and use them as building blocks to create whatever is needed. Some of the nanites were collectors of materials, others where in charge of warehousing the materials and others were tiny three-dimensional printing nanites that created whatever was needed from the materials. I explained that I had countless of them in my bloodstream and that I was an officer of the Republic of Texas in charge of protecting the public from villains who had acquired abilities beyond the means of normal law enforcement. I showed him a video of my various abilities as a result of my nanites: strength, speed, agility, virtual invulnerability, enhanced senses, flight and on-board computer system. "So the south will lose this war?", the president asked. "It did", I said, "but now that I'm here, you can win this war". "Tell me more", he said. "Mr. President", I said, "We will need a few ground rules before I do anything for the Confederacy". "You don't recognize our sovereignty to act as we see fit?", he asked. "Mr. President", I replied, "about 600,000 people died in this war the first time it was fought and lasted from 1861 to 1865. I can help you win it in the time it takes Colonel Chestnut to take Fort Sumter with little to no lives lost, or rather, no Confederate lives lost. The Confederacy will live on past 1865 but if you want me to help you, you'll allow me to share my technology with you so that we can strike China first, just a few years from now, which would allow us to save another 10 million people in the future." "What do you propose?", Davis asked. "Every slave must be freed," I said. "That is outrageous!", the President said standing. "They need us to care for them and to give them jobs to do. I don't know how they act in your time, but here, they do nothing without direction from the white man. They benefit greatly from us and would suffer without us". "Really?", I asked. I had Sam pull up various photos and floated them in the air around the President. "It looks to me like they were whipped for the slightest offense. Families were separated at the whims of the owners, women were raped and the children of those rapes were cast out." "How can you claim to be a Southerner?" he asked. "Look, even in my time, blind ignorant hate for someone who is different than you is something that is just part of being human. We just love to hate the other guy that doesn't look like us. I get it. Keep your hate if you want, but look at this", I said having Sam pull up a video of a large harvester in a cotton field. As the President watched the video of the robot harvester picking cotton I explained, "At the moment, the south produces about 2.5 million bales of cotton. I can easily increase that to 50 million bales." "But", the President said, "we would need more slaves to process the cotton..." "You mean processed into cloth or thread?", I asked, "you would do it with these". I had him watch a video of a large factory with only a couple people supervising automated machines. "You can have your cotton at an increased volume with a decrease in the cost of slave ownership." "What would we do with freed slaves?", he asked. "Well, the north is just a little less racist than the south but I'm willing to bet they wouldn't be too happy with a few million freed slaves leaving the south to take northern jobs at pay rates far below what a white man would take." The President smiled, "an underhanded attack on their economic system?". "Perhaps", I said, "but they are people and they should be freed. If you don't want mischief from them then I would suggest that the increase in cotton profits should be used in educating them properly so they would be more useful to the Confederacy in preparing for our own invasion into China". "Why should we pay for their education?", he asked shocked. "When you die, is your wealth going to your children?", I asked. He nodded. "They have no wealth to pass on. They have nothing to give to their children that would help them go from slave to educated citizen. You have to help them now because it would take them a couple hundred years just to catch up. If you want a Confederacy that is a dominate world power, you need to free the slaves and help them become productive and intelligent citizens on par with any white man." "I'll take this to the Confederate Congress, but you understand you ask for a lot," he said. "Take me with you and I'll show them that I can help your country move from where it is to a dominate confederate world power more powerful than the United States ever was in my day", I said. And so I went with the President to the Confederate Congress. They were a bit emotional at the thought of freeing the slaves and at one point, one representative from Arkansas stood up and stabbed the representative from Tennessee. I raised a hand to stop him but the local law enforcement moved in and removed him from the room. Before the end of the day, the law was passed and the slaves were freed. 10 Chapter 10 Of course it wasn't as easy as all that. I had to demonstrate that not only was I from the future but that I could easily allow them to replace their slaves with mechanical cotton pickers. After I left Congress I flew to a patch of land granted to me by the Congress to build my factory. The land was undeveloped area of 100 acres to the north of town. Using the nanites, I had them form five mobile three dimensional printers complete with their own artificial intelligence with instructions from me on what to build. They were about the size of small cars. The front of each flared out into a head similar to a vacuum cleaner (used to collect materials from just about anything they came across from rocks to trees to dirt and even animals if any got in the way). The back of each held various appendages needed to print out whatever material was needed and then that material was moved into place of whatever it was that needed to be built. I needed a factory that would move the Confederacy from the 19th century technology to 21st technology. It took me a couple hours to build the original three dimensional printers for my factory. Building them was as simple as telling Sam to get started on it. A stream of nanites left my system and poured over the ground forming first one three dimensional printer and then another and another until they were done (nanites can reproduce by building new ones from the atom level on up). After they were built, they received all the instructions they needed from Sam and I to get started. Within 30 minutes they had removed all the trees in a four acre square and used the materials to build the first building. It was about three stories high complete with electrical lighting powered by rechargeable cells on the roof. A fence quickly went up around the building and it too was electrical to prevent any unwanted guests from wandering in. The printers worked all night and by morning, 25 acres had been developed with even more buildings. I had 150 mechanical cotton pickers complete with artificial intelligence. I needed someone to handle the transfer of each cotton picker to each new owner and so I had Sam put together an android that would work the "sales floor". It would take new orders, offer modifications and would refuse orders outside of parameters that I had set. I knew the military would want to get their hands on some 21st century weapons, but I would wait and speak with the President and Congress about that first. As agreed, members of Congress had first dibs on the new mechanical cotton pickers. I met the first one at the front gate. A few of them were on their backs despite the signs on the fence telling them not to touch. I think they were starting to get a clue that electricity was a part of the fence. The first Congressman was a gentleman from Alabama by the name of Thomas Jefferson Foster. I guided him to the android. "How may I help you, sir?", the android asked. Foster was visibly shaken, "Is that thing talking to me?", he asked me. "Ask it", I said. "Are you talking to me?", Foster asked bravely. "I am", the android said. "I understand that you are in need of a mechanical cotton picker". "Yes", Foster said, "It appears that Mr. Meachum has convinced our new country to free our slaves and in return he would freely give us what we needed to live and work without the slaves". And with that the android introduced Mr. Foster to his new mechanical cotton picker complete with the latest artificial intelligence from the year 2030. While an operator wasn't needed in the cotton picker, there was room in there for several people. The primary use of the cotton picker was to pick cotton, but it could receive commands from the owner to take him places and the nanites could shrink the cotton picker until it was about the size of a car. Soon, Mr. Foster climbed into his cotton picker and it drove him home. While the crowd behind the electrical fence was skittish about the entire affair, after seeing Mr. Foster drive off, they clamored to the fence to climb it so they could claim their own cotton picker. Of course all of them were shocked off the fence and onto their backs and one of them managed to make it through the open gate before it closed and then soon he had his own cotton picker driving him home. The crowd soon got into a single file and one by one claimed their own cotton picker. I could see the President arrive and he waved to me. I flew over to him and he and I walked to the shade of a nearby tree. "I see you made good on your promise to help us", the President said. "The Confederacy won't be recognizable in a few weeks", I told him. We both stepped out of the way as another cotton picker drove a new owner home. "You can make weapons?", the President asked. "Oh yeah, that's not a problem", I said. "What do you ask in return for all this?", the President asked. "Mr. President, I know every mistake the US did from the Civil War to World War I and World War II and the other wars that followed. I know about the mistakes that we did in the Middle East and I know how to avoid 9/11. I know enough to stop the Chinese from attacking the US. I want to avoid all those mistakes and take what is ours before others take from us. If I do nothing, history will repeat itself and the US will suffer for it. This time around, I suggest we just take it all in the name of the Confederacy". "You are talking about world domination?", he asked. "Why not?", I asked, "The world in my time saw that the rest of the world was quickly moving to wipe America off the map. Wouldn't it be best if we just wiped the world off the map and replaced it with a Confederate flag? The President stood there a moment trying to absorb everything I was telling him. "My entire focus up to this point was the freedom of my country to do as want. The US demands that we act like we are northerners and from what you tell me about the future, it seems that the south never becomes like the north. It's sad to think that the Confederacy failed in your history. What a horror it must be to live under a flag of a country that does not reflect the best interest of the people below it. Would we not be inflicting other countries with beliefs that do not reflect their own?" "True and I see your point. I really don't have a counter for that outside the fact that if we do not act now, in your time, future history will be the world against an America that didn't invade them. So, if you choose to stay within your own borders, other countries will still hate you and still work to invade you as China did. Or you can invade them, control them and they'll still hate you. But at least the Confederacy will be large enough to counter any military that rises against it." "This is a lot to consider for a President of a country that is only a couple months old", he said as we moved out of the way. Another cotton picker drove it's owner home. "Well, these are concepts that the liberals of my day couldn't wrap their heads around. They believed that if we did nothing then the world would love us. The problem with that is that Americans believe in protecting and assisting friends from around the world and the enemies of our friends would then target us. We could have easily won every single war we were in but the liberals would always drag us down to the point that it was impossible or rather difficult to win wars after World War II. I admit that I don't like the brutality of war but brutality is what wins the wars for the safety of our citizens. World War II ended, in the Pacific, when we destroyed two Japanese cities with nuclear weapons. I know you don't understand what a nuclear bomb is but just one is enough to take out a city. We won that war after the Japanese surrendered. We helped them back on their feet and now they are strong allies of ours. Despite that important lesson of how brutality can change the course of a war, the liberals of my day would rather sit down and talk with the people that want to kill them...and usually do after such talks take place. If you want to convey a message that protects your people and prevents your enemies from attacking then you'll need to brutal, Mr. President", I said. "I...see", the President said. "You say that you know the mistakes that will be made? Do you know what mistakes that I made the first time?" "Actually, yes", I said. "History records that you didn't choose the best people to surround you and you didn't choose a general to lead your troops until late in the war and by then it was too late for Lee." "Robert E. Lee?", the President asked. "He's my senior military adviser". "And I'm sure he's good at it but he's even better leading your army", I said, "and history shows you wait a year before you give him that honor". "I see," the President said, "and your weapons from the future?" "Not a problem but I think that we can end this war rather quickly", I said. "How so?", he asked. "Mr. President," I said, "I can have President Lincoln here within a few hours. Would you like me to fly him to your Confederate White House?" President Jefferson Davis smiled. 11 Chapter 11 Finding Lincoln was easy enough. He was in the White House composing what I knew to be the proclamation listing the Confederate states as being a "force too powerful to be dealt with through ordinary channels of compliance such as the judiciary and the Federal Marshals." Lincoln would call together 75,000 men from various states to defend the north. Of course this was 1861 and it would take weeks before thousands of untrained men would arrive at Washington DC. It only took me fifty-six minutes to get to Washington DC from Montgomery, Alabama. The Union White House of 1861 is one mile from the capital itself. The front lawn is peppered with trees with a conservatory to the right of the White House. I hoovered over the White House for a moment looking down at the conservatory. It wasn't around in 2030 and Sam pointed out that in the future it was torn down. I could see there were no guards at the gates or entrance to the White House. I dropped down to the ground and walked into the White House without anyone to even ask what I was doing. I found him sitting in his office writing his speech for the next day. He looked tired and appeared not to be surprised to see me. "Are you the flying man from the South?", he asked me. "I am, Mr. President", I said, "And I'm here to end this war right now". He stood up. I knew he was tall, but there is something about standing next to Lincoln that was a little imposing. I had heard that he was a backwoods fighter and he looked it. "Why are you against a United States?", he asked. "Surely you know that slavery can not continue even if the South wins? A southern victory would only tear this great country apart. Together we are stronger but divided we are weak." "Actually, Mr. President", I told him, "I'm from the future and I can tell you that in my history, the north wins, but this country is united in name only. The south will always be the south even 100's of years from now and the north will continue to impose it's will on the south but never to the point of ending southern will or even racism itself from the whites or the blacks." "So the south didn't have proper representation in Congress?", Lincoln asked. "Well, as the country grew, liberalism pretty much destroyed representation by creating a central power at Washington DC that went far beyond what the founders of this country envisioned. Instead of a country in which the power was shared equally among the states with a weak central government to command the military, Washington DC grew into a monster that overshadowed the states to the point that there just one state...the US. No longer would the states be used as political experiments of power but they became states by name only". "But your representatives..." "The thing about liberalism is that it breeds more liberalism when the people find that they can vote money for themselves making Benjamin Franklin's quote true: 'When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.'". So our representatives failed to represent us. Liberalism demands debt and China was more than willing to assist us until our debt was far beyond $100 trillion dollars". That seemed to stagger Lincoln for a moment and he sat down. "Mr. President", I said, "China demanded the US pay the debt back and when we couldn't...they moved in and took the West Coast (California, Oregon and Washington state). Texas broke away from the Union and the former confederate states will soon follow. And that's not all. This civil war you are about to fight is a nightmare you wouldn't want to face if you knew the cost." I had Sam pull up a video for the President to see. I watched him as the video revealed to him the repugnance of the price paid for a Union that wanted things only one way...the Union way. Over six hundred thousand dead for a Union that may be strong if united with the south in the 1800's, but eventually weak because of the Union in the 2000's. "The south and north need to go their own ways, Mister President," I said. "The United States was created with a vision of freedom and yet it grew to chip away at each individual freedom that you cherish now. If the Union must do that to their own people then so be it, but it'll be without you and it'll be without the south". I led the President outside and without any opposition, I flew away with him into the air. 12 Chapter 12 The Civil War ended that day and the north and south drew their lines in the sand and kept their distances from each other. The Confederacy would prosper. To no one's surprise, many of the freed slaves moved to the north, but a few stayed and accepted the governments assistant for education through college. Racism was still an issue but equality was achieved or at least sought out. My factory now turned out tanks and hand-weapons to ensure that the prosperity of the south would not be infringed upon while we prepared for the future. We saved six hundred thousand by ending the Civil War but what now. I had made such a profound change to the present that the future that I knew would no longer be what I remembered it to be. Really the next step would be to expand the Confederacy. We would take pretty much everything from north of Texas to west of Texas. The next logical step after that would be to take Mexico and then start on China. At least, those were the plans that I spoke to President Davis about. He agreed and as I stepped out of the Confederate White House, I saw them. The Elementals. Fire was there hovering several feet off the ground next to Air. Earth and Water stood on the ground. They were expecting me. "I thought we killed you," Fire said, "But you can imagine my surprise when the four of us popped up a few days ago in 1861." "Yes," Air said, "I was able to move among the public unseen to learn that you had ended the Civil War." "Treasure!", Earth mumbled. "He's trying to say that the north was more than willing for us to hunt you down and kill you", Water gurgled. "After that, we'll claim the south for the US!". A tank opened fire on Earth. He stands at about eight feet tall and looks like a man-shaped clump of rock, dirt and roots for hair. He exploded one the shell hit him knocking the rest of us to the ground. Fire was the first one up and sent a blast of intense heat at the tank. I had Sam assemble a scoop large enough for Water. Water was just a blob of water that stood about four feet off the ground. She was able to form herself to look very human...that is if your skin looked just like water itself. I swung the scoop at Water and managed to catch her in the scoop and then tossed her at Fire. I managed to place Water between the wave of energy heading towards the tank causing Water to scream out in pain. She managed to maintain her shape until she actually collided with Fire. Then they both screamed in agony vaporizing into steam. That left only air and she simply vanished. She wasn't likely to attack alone but she would remain invisible as long as she wanted to be. "What the hell was that?", one of the people on the street asked me. "They call themselves the Elementals", I said. "That sounds about the right name for them," he replied. I had Sam take me up so I could think in private. "Sam?" "Yes, yes, yes", she replied. "Can you explain what happened back there?". "No one has traveled this far in time before", she said. "Why not?" I asked. "Because nachyons travel on beams of light in order to travel into the past or into the future. The deeper into time, either the past or the future, you risk arriving on a time line that is alien to the one you came from". "Are you talking about alternate realities?" "Yes, yes, yes", she said. "What is the chance that this 1861 isn't the history from my time line?", I asked. "Odds are that this time line is twenty five percent divergent from your own". "Twenty five percent?", I asked. "Which history is different here?" "I am unable to determine that without an online database to this time lines history". "Yeah, right". I said there hovering above Montgomery. "But what does that have to do with the Elementals being here in 1861? I got the impression that they knew me from my time line." I could see President Davis below me, waving me to come down. I did. "Mr. President," I told him, "I know you have questions, but I'm not sure I have answers at the moment." "Mr. Meachum", he said, "I'm glad that one of our tanks was able to assist you with this strange group of beings, but we have another problem". He pointed to the east of town. It's where they had me take Lincoln to his own private prison. "We have a problem there that requires more tanks and possibly your personal attention". I took to the air immediately and found the problem. It was Abraham Lincoln. He managed to break out of his prison by himself. There was five tanks around him...all smashed to pieces. And there was Abraham freaking Lincoln. He looked absolutely furious. He looked absolutely...huge. Must be at least 50 feet tall. And that's not counting his stove pipe style hat. Great. He saw me. 13 Chapter 13 He leaped at me. It was hard to gauge his size since I normally don't come across fifty foot tall villains. Your mind tells you one thing about the person but the reality of the situation requires you to remind yourself that this person is a lot closer to you than you think. He leaped into the air and caught me. He squeezed me hard. If he could crush a tank, he could and would crush me. Only thing was that a tank is just a tank. Me on the other hand...I had Sam create thousands of needles projecting away from my body and deep into the President's skin. He screamed and released me as he drew his hand back. Blood dripped from his hand and pounded into the ground fifty feet below. I aimed at his vulnerable areas and used my weapon to shoot bladed projectiles coated with poison. "I'll kill you, you traitor!", he screamed leaping at me again. I was ready for him this time. I let Sam take over my flight while I aimed for one of his toes. The projectile managed to make it through his boot and into his toe. He screamed in pain. As Sam kept us just out of reach as I continued to hit his toes, groin and knees. By that time several more tanks showed up. They opened fire. The President of the United States went down with a loud thud. The impact sent up a huge cloud of dirt, dust and trees and I saw the tanks bouncing on their suspension systems. "WARNING!!!", Sam yelled at me as a large chunk of earth flew at me. There was no time to react and I was smacked hard in to air. Sam was able to stop our assent and I was able to look down to see something the size of a large hill crash into the ground taking out several tanks. Was it Earth? The Elementals were tough to take down and I hadn't had much success before. I was hoping that maybe there were down for good. But I only saw Lincoln getting back onto his feet. He stumbled and righted himself again. The poison was working, but he was fighting it. A couple tanks managed to fire at him from behind hitting him in the back. He went down to one knee, but managed to get back to his feet as he turned around to face them. I dived down and opened fire landing several more bladed projectiles up and down his spine. Lincoln spasmed while arching his back and fell backwards away from the tanks kicking up another building sized dirt cloud. I landed next to Lincoln after the dust settled. He wasn't moving and as far as I could tell, he wasn't breathing. "Sam", I said, "I need you to give me a look inside his bloodstream". I placed my hand on an exposed area of his neck and several nanites entered the President's bloodstream. Several videos popped up in front of me. Lincolns entire system was huge even on my screens, but it made it easier to make out what I was seeing. On thing that stood out fairly quickly was that the size of this pituitary gland was about ten times larger than it needed to be for even a fifty foot man. "Yes, yes, yes," Sam replied to my unasked question. "Lincoln's pituitary gland was sending an unusually large amount of growth hormone into his system." "Would that explain his unusual height of fifty feet?", I asked. "No, no, no", Sam answered, "Possible effects of an overdose to a growth hormone would be arrhythmias, bradycardia, chronic heart failure, pulmonary edema..." "English please", I said, "I'm not a doctor". "An injection of growth hormone at this dosage would have adverse effects on the heart and circulatory system". To stress her point, Sam showed me videos of Lincoln's heart. It was swollen beyond what a normal heart would be...if you were fifty feet tall. The walls of the veins appeared damaged. "Was he bleeding from the inside?", I asked. "Yes, yes, yes", Sam answered. "A blood thinning agent is also detected." Blood thinner? So we had a fifty foot man with an enlarged pituitary glad, various circulatory system issues and blood thinner. Something wasn't right about any of this. The Elementals belonged in a time stream that I probably didn't have access to. According to Sam, in order to get to 1861, I had to travel a light stream that was probably divergent of what I knew in my history books. Instead of appearing in the past, I appeared in the past but in an alternate Earth due to the scattering of light over time. Could I possibly travel back to the year 2030 on my Earth? "No, no, no", Sam answered. "Traveling that far forward in time would result arriving in the year 2030 but on an alternate Earth". "Different from this one?" "Yes, yes, yes", Sam answered. The time stream is unstable past a few years into the past or present". "So how far into the past or future can you travel before time-deviation occurs?" "Anything over fifteen years is unpredictable but usually it's possible for a successful snap-back if there are any problems. Time probes have never been recovered past twenty five years into the past of future." "And I'm about 169 years in the past. What would the odds of me returning to my time on my earth?" "Returning you to your correct time line would be impossible to calculate and would be completely random if you made it back." "So how is it possible that the Elementals, that I knew, found this exact time line and how did Abraham freaking Lincoln grow to 50 feet in height?", I asked. Sam didn't say anything. I just saw text on my mental screen moving faster than I could read. She didn't know. I didn't know either, but I remembered a lecture from Hank McKloy mentioned something about a time-vacuum. "Yes, yes, yes", Sam replied to my memory. From what I remembered, if someone traveled far enough back into time (and I didn't remember how far back), the strain of the nachyons maintaining or trying to maintain a particular time stream, too far into the past or future, could create a time-vacuum that would suck in people or things from different times. It would be similar to a high-diver diving into a swimming pool. The air from the top gets pulled down to the bottom where the diver is. And so in my case, I was pulling people from 2030 to 1861...such as the Elementals. The effects on the future would be tremendous and chances would be that I would not recognize the year 2030 even if I could find my way back. The damage had already been done. I remembered asking Sam about the year 2040 and she never replied. Did the nanites already know that this would happen? Sam remained silent and continue to scroll text at blinding speed. Then Sam showed me one video with a worse-case scenario possibility for a time-vacuum. The pull from the future to the past could be so strong that it would loop everything back to 1861. "What exactly would happen if that happens", I asked Sam. "Possibly time as we know it would cease since it is impossible for all times to be linked so closely together," Sam said. She showed me a video of the universe with the earth passing through it from it's birth to death. "As you can see, in normal time, the Earth moves through the universe as it circles the sun. But if all times become one time, then this is what would happen". I saw the Earth sitting there in space moving through the Universe as it always did. Then I saw multiple Earths from multiple times occupying places in the past and in the future. The video pulled back to show all the Earths linking together and then...a bright and blinding flash. "So the Earth explodes?", I asked "And the universe with it", Sam said. 14 Chapter 14 So it seems that somehow my last trip I not only went too far back, but I moved a little to the left or right of my time line's history. What history was different on this world, I had no clue. Maybe the south won without my help. Or maybe another country took advantage of the Civil War and invaded. Who knows? But what I did know was I somehow created a time-vacuum by either my trip into the past or through my actions of changing the past and now the future was falling into 1861. "Sam, is there any chance of us leaving this time-line for ours. Anyway to track our way back home?" "No, no, no", Sam said. "Although we are not far off our original time-line, there is no way to know which time-line to move too until after we arrive in the new time-line. And any error would make it even more difficult in finding our way back home". Which was what "snap-back" was suppose to assist a time traveler with if he found himself in the wrong place and/or time. Of course, there had never been a need for it and this was the worst time for an error in snap-back. Later, I spoke with the President and he asked me to speak at the Confederate Congress. As I flew to the Congress I notice quite a bit of change to Montgomery. There were now flying vehicles buzzing overhead and several buildings were now being built over twenty floors tall. Nearly everyone drove to where they wanted to go and they left their horses at home. Less horse waste on the roads lead to a cleaner smelling city and I'm sure it went a long way in improving public health. I had allowed the nanites to create vehicles and weapons and construction tools/vehicles. But I prohibited nanites to be injected into anyone. I had heard of one doctor trying and the nanites simply broke the needle and flew away to join with me. I didn't say anything to the good doctor. I know he meant well, but it wasn't time for that just yet. I had been in 1861 for only one month. As swiftly as I had changed things...some improvements needed time before being introduced. I entered the Confederacy Congress building and noticed quite a few changes to the inside. All of the beautiful handcrafted furniture had been removed in place of nanite created furniture that adjusted to the person using it. Chairs and desks would shrink or grow to the ergonomic needs of the individual. Even the pens being used were ergonomically malleable to the individual. The design of the building had been crafted to let in as much light as possible since the creation of the first light bulb was still about 20 years in the future...at least in my time-line. But the walls and the furniture created its own light filling in every shadow without being too bright as a result of the walls and furniture being treated with light giving nanites. The room was filled with members of the Congress and Senate and I could see that members of the Confederate Supreme Court were seated in the front. As I walked in I heard a loud voice over to my right, "Ladies and Gentlemen, may I introduce Mr. Paul Meachum!". Thunderous applause irrupted and I was guided down the aisle and up on the platform on the front and was asked to have a seat next to the Vice-President. Moments later another announcement, "Ladies and Gentlemen, may I introduce the President of the Confederacy of the United States of America!" The President appeared and walked down the aisle waving at people and shaking hands as he went. A few people got out of their seats and walked over to shake his hand and pat him on the back vigorously. About five minutes later, with the applause continuing clamorously as the President finally made his way to the platform and took his seat. Vice-President Alexander H. Stephens stepped up to the nanite powered microphone and waved for everyone to take their seats. "Members of Congress, I have the great pleasure, the high privilege and great honor of presenting to you, the President of the Confederate States of America!" Everyone stood to their feet and my ears rang from the explosion of applause and cheering. From somewhere someone was throwing confetti from above. Others shouted out the rebel yell while most of them were jumping up and down in joyous celebration. "Rebel yell?", I mentally asked Sam, "didn't that come later in history?". "Yes, yes, yes", she told me. "Possible time variation of our own time-line or it's introduction here as a result of our entrance into this time-line. The President motioned for everyone to sit down. Applause continued for another minute and then people slowly begin to take their seats. "Vice President, Mr. Speaker, members of the first Confederacy Congress..." Everyone shot out of their seats and started applauding and shouting again. Suddenly the started to chant, "DAVIS, DAVIS, DAVIS!!!". The President smiled and motioned for them to sit again. Slowly they did and the room quietened. "I congratulate you all. We stood for what is right against an oppressive federal government from the north not knowing if we would win or lose. Through a blessing that must be from God above, Meachum was sent to us..." The room jolted again from the clapping and cheering. More confetti was thrown from one side of the room to the other. The President motioned them to be quite once again and they all sat. "Mr. Meachum comes to us from Texas and from what he claims to be the year 2030. He helped us move from depending on slaves to being self sufficient without slaves. While some of you and I have to admit even myself, still believe that the black man can not live without assistance from his masters...slavery will never again be a part of this nation". Most people clapped but there were a few boos. "Within only a month, Mr. Meachum has moved us from a poor nation on the brink of a major war to a nation at peace with the world and a nation with the most advanced scientific advances in the world." More applauding and cheering. "We will make gains in cotton production that have been unimaginable in the past. Per, Mr. Meachum's request, we will educate our former slaves through college, with some of the profits gained through cotton production, to ensure that not only do they take their place as equals among the rest of us, but, once educated, assist us in building this great country as a beacon of freedom and scientific domination of all the world!" The audience stood again to show their appreciation and the President motioned them back down again. "I think it is fair to say that this great nation of ours is not only doing well and will do well in the years to come, but thanks to Mr. Meachum, we will insure that our nation dominates as a world power for all time!" More cheering and whooping. "Mr. Meachum, as we all know well, is a man from the future. He tells me that one major flaw of the Confederacy was that I, myself, failed to have a strong central command of the military and that lead to several strategic weaknesses which allowed the north to win in his time-line. So, seeing the wisdom to create a central command, I am creating a Homeland Security branch of the Confederate government and placing Mr. Meachum as Chief Director of that department. The generals of the Confederate military will work under that department taking command from Chief Director Meachum and the Chief Director of Homeland Security will report to me." More cheering from the crowd as they stood again with many of them jumping for joy. "I really don't have anything to add to this. I would like to say thank you to all of you that stood with me against the north even though we had no idea of what the outcome would be. I know that many of you, myself included, would have preferred to stay as a part of the US, but we could not allow northern ideals to impose themselves upon the unique issues and problems of the south. The Confederacy will allow each state to decide their own fate outside of national treaties, outside of national defense, outside laws levied by the supreme court and outside of national diplomacy. We will live as a free people united by love of country and God!". The applause this time continued for several minutes but died down as the President took his seat and asked me to stand and make my comments to the Congress. "Mr. President, Mr. Vice-President, Mr. Speaker, and Members of Congress and the Supreme Court and the good people of the Confederacy, I thank you for this opportunity to speak to you today". I knew that many of the people in the Confederacy had recently acquired radios and were listening to the President and I today. My enhanced hearing could hear the cheering even down the street. "As you know, I am from the future, but I think of myself first as a Texan and now as a citizen of the Confederacy!" I waited until the applauding stopped. "As you know, there have been appearances of others from the future. In my original time-line, we called these super powered criminals 'villains' and I was responsible for judging them and executing them if necessary. Time travel was some times used in order to capture them or terminate them. The normal parameters for time travel was not to exceed fifteen years into the past or the future. Due to some unknown error, or as the President stated, godly blessing, I was sent one hundred and sixty nine years into the past...your present. Sam, the name I gave my computer, tells me that this unusual dive this deep into the past has created a type of time-vacuum that is pulling people from the year 2030 to present time and the focus seems to be me. I don't know if this vacuum will collapse at some point or if it'll grow. All I do know is that I can do nothing to fix it outside of using the military we've created to fight any and all villains that happen to come through the time-vacuum." The mood in the room had become much quieter. I didn't blame them for their uneasiness with this information. They had gone through a huge amount of social and technological change and the thought of even more change was a bit much. "Look, I know this is frighting, but from what I know about the Confederacy is that we are not ones to surrender no matter what the odds are!" That got them back on their feet but they were visibly shaken with this new information. "In my time line I was responsible for fighting villains and I never lost. Each and every villain was either rehabilitated to return to return to a normal life as a productive citizen of the Republic or they were terminated. I had come close to death a few times but each time I was repaired to return to fight another day. I did it for the Republic of Texas and I'll do it for the Confederacy of the United States of America!". The crowd was cheering again. I walked over and shook the hands of the President and the Vice-President and then hoovered above them all. I waved at them all and then flew out of the building. Outside there was a crowd and I could see a group of radio newscasters waving me down. I flew down to them. One of the radio newscasters asked, "Do you know that the people are calling you, 'Captain Confederacy'? "No", I said, "but it does sound catchy, doesn't it?" They all all laughed. "So, is there a woman in your life, Captain?", one of the ladies asked. "What's your name", I asked her. The report blushed, "Maria Trask", she said looking away shyly. "Well, Ms. Trask...it is Ms? Isn't it?", I asked. "Yes. Yes, it is Captain Confederacy.", she said blushing even more. "Well, Ms. Trask, I'm sure if there is a lady in my life that you'll be the first to know", I said tipping my hat at her. She tee-heed as other reporters stepped up. "Captain? Mr. Meachum? Have you thought about running for President?", one reporter asked. "Maybe in my old age, but I have too many things to do now especially with my new job as Chief Director of Homeland security. Even though I didn't cause the time-vacuum, I do feel responsible for it and quite honestly, I'm the only one to respond to whatever comes down from 2030. How can I be President while fighting off villains? No, I can't and won't consider a run for the office of the President of the Confederacy. Besides we have President Davis and he's doing a great job!" "Captain Confederacy?", I heard a voice above me. Holy crap, it was Fire floating there. "I suppose that has a better sound to it than Inspector Meachum, but what do you know? I'm more of the sentimental sort, Inspector!". He leveled both hands at me as if to shoot beams of energy at me. I really don't know where the Elementals come from or rather, how they came to be. They just appeared one day in San Antonio and dried up the river-walk and knocked down the Tower of Americas while killing several people and injuring hundreds before I could respond to the urgent calls from dispatch. I managed to beat them back at the last moment but it was too late to save the people that were in their path of destruction. At the very least I saved the city by traveling back in time. The first time they left the entire city in ruins, but I managed to make it back to 2023 just minutes after they started. Time travel to a precise time is difficult if not impossible at least not for 2030 technology. But they were here now in 1861 and Fire was about to let loose on me...in the crowd. "Rockets, Sam!", and instantly I collided with Fire as my rocket boots thrust me even higher over Montgomery. I managed to stun Fire for a moment and I didn't have much time. I could see the Alabama river below and aimed for it increasing my thrust. Fire focused his heat rays at me hitting me in the chest as we both hit the water splashing up water, heat and steam. I took him all the way to the bottom as he continued to fire his rays at me with his hands. For a moment there I thought that this wasn't going to work, but Fire fizzled out. He was just a man. I held him down to the river bed for a moment before having Sam alter the riverbed into a cocoon around Fire that was fire proof but allowing him to breath. I pulled him up out of the river and flew him to the crowd I was just talking with. "As I was saying, it would not be possible to do this country justice by serving as the President. I have no idea when villains will come down the time-vacuum and I have no idea what my being here will mean for any new threats out there in the world." The reports cheered and I could hear up and down the street people cheering for me as they listened on their radio. "Captain Confederacy?", I heard a familiar voice ask. I turned around to see that it was Maria Trask. "Yes?", I said. "Would you have some coffee with me?", she asked. "Coffee?", I said, "Of course, but it'll have to wait. I need to put Fire someplace safe". "Okay, then let me give you my address. I live over on..." "No need, Ms. Trask", I interrupted, "I can find anyone. You get the coffee going and I'll see you before you know it". Taking Fire with me I flew back up into the air and out to the boundaries of the city to my little plot of land. I could see that the nanites had pretty much developed all one hundred acres. I had left them some instructions for a prison...for villains. It was about 20 floors deep underground and I took Fire all the way to the bottom of the prison. I had Sam construct and asbestos suit that covered his entire body. The suit was filled with nanites ready to deal with any fire abilities that Fire might try to use. They would either freeze him or flood him with water if he tried anything with his elemental abilities. Interesting. According to the combat log Fire even used an electromagnetic pulse on me when we were underwater but it didn't work. Looks like Maribel Gomez, from 2030, had insulated the nanites from another EMP. Thank goodness because I could no longer go back to 2030 for repairs. That was something I needed. A place I could go to for repairs. But there was no one like Maribel in 1861. Well, that would be something for me to do another day. Today, I was going to take a break with Maria Trask. I locked Fires cell and every door up to the surface. I flew into the air and asked Sam for a layout of the city. I found the Maria's address from Sam's history archive and flew off in that direction. I could see here down there getting out of her new nanite vehicle. I hoovered there watching her as she locked it and then walked up to the house and unlocked it and walked in. Was I sure I wanted to do this? I hadn't involved myself with anyone since I left prison. I was always too busy and there were always too many villains. But everyone needs a break and I know I did. If I didn't connect with at least one other person...a normal person...then what was the point to all this? I lowered myself to the ground and then knocked on her door. |
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