Encompassing (7 page)

CHAPTER 20

“In chaos, someone should take command, even if they are guessing.  It increases the odds of success.”  -- from the book of Vladimir

“We all agreed to give you a break and we know that puts us behind schedule, but we weren’t about to interrupt.  Given the noises proving you’re healthy again.  Instead we spent the time on two other plans.  One was very bad and we lost a good officer.  So no more digging.  The other is we go around, not over.  There is a problem with that plan” Brady looked harried as he said the last.

“I can make it!” exclaimed Renfield.  “Let me add to that. I know how to make it work!  Our pilot is about to become a skydiver!”

Christina looked down at him inquisitively.  The ‘heli’ guy or me?  Didn’t you just give me a speech against jumping?  After last night, I at least proved I’m worth keeping around.  Didn’t I?”

“No you.  Of course you!  They would be thinking we would never try that maneuver again, so while you fall we run.”  Renfield grins at her as if he has seen a light he didn’t expect to be in the darkness.

“What kind of protector are you?  Talk about one-night stands!  This ended worse than any date I’ve ever been on!”  Christina looked at Renfield in awe of the audacity, but he just smiled.

“We have plenty of tents!  In communications you get different results on a wire depending on the number of twists per inch. If math serves correctly I know how many twists per inch will cause enough feedback on the line.  It’s complicated, but we need to get everyone twisting tents as fast as possible.”  Both Brady and Christina look at him confused.  Renfield continues anyway, “Brady…thanks to you and the others.  We needed our time.”

“Time for you to plan my death?” Christina was truly angry now.  At first, it might have been a joke, but Renfield was clearly not joking any more.

“I love you and I know you’ll have faith in me.  You might want a change of underwear for later.”  Renfield quipped.

Christina looked at Brady who just shrugged.

Renfield went on.  “If we get the twists right, it will seem to them that Christina, whom they are aware is the mother has taken an old strategy as she plummets to the ground.  They will think they’ve won and not note the rest of us going around instead of over.  She will hit a tensile resistance point that’s going to really hurt those hips, but she’ll be projected upwards.  If we get it right, she’ll go over the top and land close enough to run the rest of the way, hence the rest of the skydiver part, because some of the tents will be used as a parachute.  You do trust me, right?”

Christina came at Renfield furious!  “If I didn’t know you were brilliant I’d hate you for putting my life at risk after, well, all I’ve done.”  She looked downward, then up as she started to move, “Well Brady, get your people working on twisting some tents, but please put the best of them on making the chute!”  Christina looks back at Renfield with a look of anger he didn’t think she could muster as she left the tent in a quick march to her own.

Brady looked at Renfield, “Soooo?”

Renfield looked up and said, “What?  She’s probably going to pack her other set of underwear.  If she actually needs them, make sure no one comments on it, okay?”

Brady looks at Adam.  He holds a finger to his chin and then points with his elbow resting in his other hand.  “So this is how you impress the ladies?  Seems like a bad strategy to me.”

Renfield looks back at Brady and comments, “A good strategy is determined by the winner.  I plan to win.”  Then he also leaves the tent and begins to survey the route.

CHAPTER 21

“Laughter cures some things.  Good love cures more.”  -- from the book of Brian

Christina came bolting up the hill and ran straight into Renfield’s arms screaming, “Don’t you ever do that to me again, but it was amazing!  I love y…”  She stopped short.  “I’m sorry.  Way too soon, huh?”  After a bit of a pause as they both stared away she asked, “Do you miss them?  The other ‘me’s’.”

“Of course, very much, but this you I want to get to know and what you were saying was not out of line.”  You have residuals of the other ‘you’s’.  They were special to me.  You are too.  You’re you.  Does that sound, too soon?”

“No, Ren, I get it.  I feel odd that you know more about me than I know about you, but I get it.”  Christina begins to pull away.

Renfield holds her arm as she turns and when she looks down at his hand he says to her, “In one night, I barely know this you.  But I can tell you have an appetite for adventure!  That works!”

“Two nights!”  She corrects him.  “We have tonight.” She turned to show she didn’t need the change after all.  Renfield grins as he looks at her derriere, inspecting more than her lack of requiring a change.

Renfield laughs.  He regains his composure and replies, “Best we take advantage of our lead, but hard to turn down a proposal like that!”

“One problem, your ‘no tent’ or mine?”  She was pointing out the obvious.

“Oh, umm, we do seem to have a problem there.  It’s OK, eat. ‘Problems are solutions that haven’t happened yet’.”

“You have a lot of sayings.  Are they other people’s?”

“No usually they are things I tell myself when I am bored.  If you hadn’t noticed things for me tend to be active.  When they are not, I get, well bored.  I repeat them to myself when I have to, ummm, rebuild me.”

“About that and the other thing…”

“Christina are you getting all specific with me?”  Renfield grins at her.

“No creep!  Yes, I get that was vague, but so are you!  Just tell me something.  How is it you, I don’t know, move through time back to where you began all of this before?”

“Hmm, that would be the hardest to explain.  It’s not like bending space or a wormhole.  I see where I need to be and my mind calculates the gates and when I know the math is correct…it’s complicated.”

“With you what isn’t?”  Christina rolls her eyes at him.

“Now you are reminding me of someone else from my past.  She was wonderfully funny.”

“Did she look like me, do you have a type?”  Christina prods.

“Nu shi was frucking British, culdn’t understand the wench ‘alf the time. When I did I was usually laughing but so was she.  Good times.”

Christina giggles at his poor attempt to imitate an English accent.  “How did that go?”

“Well.  For many years.  Then she died.  Life’s a long song, her chorus was interrupted.  I wasn’t in love with her, although I completely reveled in her company.  As she would say, ‘ave a propor tempor, aye do!’”  Renfield smiled at the memory.  Adam turns to Christina, “Great gal, wish you had met her.”

“Have…?”

“No, none of the other ‘you’s’ met her, and that’s a shame.  When she wasn’t yelling at me or asking other people to ask me to ask her back she was quite funny.  I miss her.”

Christina noting the far away gaze in his eyes asks, “And me?”

“This you?  I won’t be missing you, dear.  We’ll win this time.  Then we’ll retire and buy a home in the country and forget all about this.”

“You implied before I don’t die, this time.  As if you know the outcome.  I know you don’t know or you wouldn’t be trying so hard.  But can you die?”

“I also implied you should go eat while I solve the no tent problem I desperately want to solve!”  With that he grinned down at her and walked towards Brady.

She stood still for a few moments, pondering then she went to eat.

Renfield approached Brady and said, “I umm, have a favor to ask.”

CHAPTER 22

“I remember the weather that day.  It was hot and dry.  The same as it was every day.”  -- from the book of Persistence

Christina woke up and realized Renfield was still awake.  “It’s time to go, isn’t it?”

Renfield stopped staring at the stars and turned his gaze towards her. “Yes, but soon this will be behind us.”

“In weeks, months or years, how long have you been trying to win this?”  Christina asked.

“Hmm, if laid out in a timeline, I suppose it would add up to well before you were born.  I’m probably older than my grandparents now.  Weird when I think of it that way.”

“You already know the future, don’t you?  You know, you’re not guessing, are you?”

“I umm…”

“Ren, that’s what you were doing last night.  Checking in on this future.  You don’t think I understand you.”

Renfield sat quietly and looked at his beloved Christina. “Focus.” He said quietly, to no one in particular.  Then he stood and moved toward her and requested, “One more time?”

Christina wasn’t sure if she should laugh or cry, but she hugged him and whispered in his ear. “For all time, Ren.  All of mine at least.  No one should endure all of yours, but I…”

“Christina, it’s OK to say it.  You feel and that is what makes you different from those things.  They don’t.”  Adam pulls her close to his own body.

“But do you feel, Ren?  I’ve seen them rip pieces of flesh from you and you continue to…be.”  Christina trails off and then continues on a different track, “You know, that was a foolish moment, if you didn’t feel you wouldn’t endure this”, she paused searching for a word, “Hell” she finally concluded.  “What do you love more than your own life?”

“That’s easy to answer.  She’s laying in my arms right now carrying our future.”

“What? Ren, am I…?”, she nearly laughed in glee, but this was something she never really had considered.  She joined the force without thought of childbirth.  She was top in her class and upgraded to pilot.  Why would she throw all of that away to…for the greatest moment of her life.  She smiled, understanding and asked, “So what is she like?”

“None of that, girl!  Let’s get ready to move.”  Renfield clearly choosing not to visit that topic.

“What are we supposed to do?  I haven’t heard you tell anyone that yet.  They’re blindly following you, and I guess I am too, but I have more motivation to.  What is waiting for us and what are you going to do about it?”  Christina watches as Renfield prepares himself mentally.  He seems to have a moment where he is simply still and considering.  As if the weight of the world is on his shoulders alone.  Then she thinks, “Perhaps it is.”

“Solstice.  Name her Solstice to mean a great change in the weather.  Of course, if it’s a boy name him after me, but then I will have to live long enough to tell you my real name.”  Renfield grins back at Christina.

“What is your real name?  They call you Renfield and ‘other things’ behind your back.  Sorry, but it’s true, you are a bit pompous, but I understand why.  But they do hate and love you simultaneously.  Brady calls you Adam.  I don’t mind Ren but when I see your face after I say it, I can tell it isn’t your real name.”  Christina makes clear.

“One more move then one more night.  We’ll sleep more, later, if you prefer that to….”  Renfield grins.    “I am sorry about the arrangements.  Filthy sweat stained uniforms does not a proper bedroom make.”

“Stop!  It was kind of them.  That you even requested something for us, of such magnitude as this, means a lot to me.”  Christina looks away and then back at Renfield.  “One more night and then that house in the country.  Do tell.  What country?”

“Well aren’t you the clever girl?  When they are gone, I’ll change.  I won’t be able to…Will you still be infatuated with a mortal?”  Renfield’s eyes lower as he asks.

“It’s not what you can do, Ren.  It’s that you do it.  That won’t change and that’s why I don’t believe we are going to move into a quiet nook in the country.  You’re not going to settle after all of this.  One thing I wonder.  When my jet was still flight ready, you could have asked Brady to request a lift here.  Why didn’t you?”

“Seasons don’t change in the time of a flight.  This is our Solstice.  Do you understand?”

“Yes, but what changes.  No one even knew this existed until you pointed it out.”

“That, my dear, was the problem.  It’s everywhere and people don’t know.  They use it every day and they don’t know it is learning from them.  It’s quite literally the most evil creation of all time and it leads to…”

“You’re about to go quiet again, aren’t you?” Christina forms a look of frustration on her face.

“Kiss me.  Just kiss me and then we HAVE to move, woman!”  Renfield picks up her entire body as he pushes his face as deeply into hers as he can.  Just in case.

“So sudden!  You know I’m kissing for two now?”

“Well then it better be twice as passionate!”  Renfield grins, grabs her more tightly and pulls her into him more intensely.

CHAPTER 23

“Knowing you can do a thing does not always mean you should.”  -- from the book of Brady

“Ok, start talking, buddy.  What the hell is this Queen thing you’re going in to take out?” Brady was dead serious.

Renfield looked up at him from his crouching position.  Brady notes he looks as if the weight of the world was on his shoulders.  “It’s me.  I have to take myself out.  The problem is, I know how, I think.  It’s why, with such a small force on our side and such a big one on theirs, we lose.”

“Wait when you said Queen, I guess my head went to feminine and you’re not very attractive.”  Brady jokingly frames Renfield’s face with his hands and then says, “Well, with a bit if lipstick you’d be an ugly one.”

“What’s in there was female in the future.  Now it’s hell bent on destroying everything and starting everything from total extinction up.  It learns fast so I have to think faster.”

“Wait, hold up, that doesn’t make any sense!  How is it you then?  I’m wondering if you are insane and everything I’ve seen in the past few days is my own hallucinations.”  For point, Brady pinched his own arm.  “Cacti?”  Brady looks at Renfield, half joking, half wondering if that could explain everything they had been through the past few days.

“I created it.  I have to take out.  Me.”  Renfield looks very sober as he speaks.

Brady, now sure, from the look on Adam’s face that he can’t explain it away with Cactus Juice, says, “Ok, is it physical or a database or…?”

“It’s her.  I have to be faster this time.  I need Jacobs to go in with me.”

“I told you about his problem.  He is the last person you want in a crisis situation, Adam.”

“Just tell him to take all of his meds before we go, then I’ll know he’ll remain calm no matter what happens.”

Brady begins to laugh and then looks at Renfield and realizes he is serious and says as even toned as he can muster, “Why?”

“Brady, by now you trust me.  Trust I need him to take all of the meds he brought with him.  He’s skittish so he brought extra.  I need him to take it, now.”

“Ok, first, what makes you think he planned to be out here this long and second, I cannot order someone to take medicine in a non-prescribed manner.  That’s against the…No, I’m not going to say a word to him and you stay the hell away from him!”

“Okay, Brady, so this is OUR shot and you won’t let me take it?  I will probably be back again, but I’ll be having this argument with a different Brady about a kid who didn’t make it once.  He will never be who he is right now, again.  You know that, right?”

Brady looked at Renfield starkly and observantly replies, “You actually need him, don’t you?  You’ve planned all of this madness!  You really are the creator of the shit we’re in right now!  You’re an ass!”

“Yes, I know.  I have to fix it.  You do get that, right?  I know the other path.  If I don’t…”

“Sir!” Jacobs interrupts and walks over.  “I heard.  I already took them.  I have no idea what Renfield is up to, but I trust you and I can tell you trust him.  We don’t know why, but we do too.  He’s kept us alive.”

Brady throws his hands in the air and exclaims, “This is madness!  Did anyone stop to think he’s the reason we’re here?”  Brady stabs a finger in the air towards Renfield, repeatedly and clearly angry.

Renfield turning from him towards Jacobs replies, “True.  Thank you, Jacobs.  Just one question, do you faint at the sight of blood?”

Jacobs replies, “No, well…”  Jacobs thinks about the nature of the question then adds, “Well, I don’t know.”

Renfield reaches for a steak knife and Brady, now uneasy reaches towards his sidearm.  Renfield ignores him and slashes his forearm.  Jacobs goes limp.  Renfield says to Brady, “Not optimal, but it will have to do.  Now is he going with me or not?”