The Temporal (13 page)

Suteko grabbed Sam’s shoulders and met his eyes. Her face stole his attention away from all distractions, from all the death around them. In a moment, if one can call it that, they were the only sentient beings. Sam heard a slight ringing in his ears—the tinnitus he’d had since childhood. He was otherwise surrounded by complete silence. The oddity of the silence struck him to his core. No street noises, no wind, no screams—just complete silence.

Turning his head toward the source of the explosion, Sam saw in the distance one man in the process of falling over. The man appeared to be stuck, unable to move. He was, however, stuck in thin air; it was as if somewhere between beginning to fall and completing the fall, time had stopped.

Agent Cobbs was a statue, his frozen lips in the process of hurling silent curses toward Sam and Suteko.

Suteko moved to Cobbs and searched his pockets. Finding his keys, she removed the handcuffs from off of Sam. She walked in front of him and gently massaged his irritated wrists.

“Sam,” she said in a soft voice that seemed extraordinarily loud within the context of the complete silence. “We need to leave.”

“
Leave? What’s going on? Why isn’t everyone moving?”

“
If you concentrate hard enough, you can sometimes experience a stronger encounter with eternity.”

“
You mean you can stop time?” Sam asked in childish wonderment. The world seemed so strange with no breeze, no human chatter, no birds singing—only that constant ringing in his ear told him that he was still alive.

“
No. Time continues within its proper context. We are merely visitors outside of time.”

It made no sense to Sam, but at this point, Suteko could say,
“up is down” and he would at least consider it possible.

“
Sam, we need to move. We were granted a stay, but time will pull us back like gravity. Help me carry Agent Cobbs. We must take him to safety.”

Sam followed Suteko
’s finger and positioned himself in front of the agent. Suteko gently nudged the agent forward. Cobb’s stiff body fell into Sam’s arms. Suteko, in a surprisingly quick motion, lifted Cobb’s legs. Sam caught the man’s weight, gripping his hands around the armpits. He was amazed how light the muscular and fully-grown man seemed. It was like carrying a plastic mannequin filled with air.

“
Quick. Away from the explosion area.”

“
Why not take a car?”

“
Things still caught up in time can’t move.”

“
We are moving Agent Cobbs, aren’t we?”

“
We are
carrying
Agent Cobbs. Now go, quickly!”

Sam shifted his arms so he could face the direction he was moving. Agent Cobbs seemed to float in the air for half a second as Sam repositioned his grip. Once again, he marveled how light the man seemed. Had he become as strong as Suteko? Or was weight and gravity also subject to time?

“Why are we helping the guy who is hunting us down?”

“
Did you not hear the Echoes just then? Agent Cobbs will help us stop the bombs.”

“
The bombs? You mean, ‘the bomb’ and it has already gone off.”

“
There are more.”

“
More? When were you going to tell me about this?”

“
If you had your ears open, you would have just heard the future Agent Cobbs tell us that.” Suteko composed herself, removing some of the edge from her voice. “This is the beginning, not the end.” She seemed to hurry her words as she hurried her feet. “There are more, Sam. There are more.”

New Orleans

Through the smoke—patches of which still hung thick in the air—a woman with long, curly blood-red hair strolled down the sidewalk as if she owned the city. On her feet were the finest pair of Prada high heels, blue suede and purchased at Saks Fifth Avenue with a credit card owned by a man who was now, sadly, deceased. Her oversized sunglasses and wrinkle-less face gave the false impression of a woman in her twenties; she had, however, the mien of a mature lady who knew what she wanted and was on the march to get it.

The clack-clack of her heels reverberated off the glass storefronts. There were also sounds of coughing in the distance. She stepped over and around two bodies
lying on the sidewalk.
Only two?
She had expected more. There were no cars around; the area had been more or less vacated. She heard sirens in the distance, but that would not be a threat; they would be long gone before the police arrived.

She entered the building. Through the thick smoke
—it was most potent there—she saw the outlines of McGregor, face down on the floor lying in a pool of his own blood.

“
Pitiful,” she said as she entered. Stepping across the room, she was careful to avoid planting her six-inch stiletto heels into the uneven valley of grout between the tiles. Reaching McGregor, she knelt down and turned him over. His cheeks were dirty and smudged by the blood; his eyes were shut, but she could hear the shallow breaths of a dying man.

There were two blotches of red seeping through torn cloth indicating he had suffered two bullet wounds, one in his arm and one in his left shoulder. She unbuttoned his shirt, exposing the wounds.

With her right hand, she reached for the knife strapped to her leg. A quick, shallow slice of the ulnar artery just below her left wrist began a blood flow that was quickly dammed by her supernatural healing abilities.

With her right index finger as the brush, she used the palette of her left wrist to apply
the red pigment to the bullet holes. Rubbing one of the entry points with the tip of her forefinger, her blood reacted with his to induce a sizzling sound and a mild smoky smell. After a few circular motions, she lifted her finger and moved to the next wound.

The two bullet holes vanished, leaving only a trace of drying blood and grime from the floor. She finished by buttoning his shirt and adjusting his collar.

With a swift motion, she scooped him up. His body seemed weightless as she flew across the room and out the door, twisting her torso to maneuver the body out head first.

Once away from the smoke and death, she stopped at a bench and leaned over. She gently set him down so, other than a slumped head, he appeared to be sitting upright and waiting for a bus. A shallow breath was accompanied by a
weak guttural groan.

Hands flew to his cheeks and her mouth was an instant later attached to his. She began to breathe into the near corpse causing the chest to rise like an inflated balloon. He responded with a meager cough followed by a deep draw of breath. McGregor had a look of utter confusion, but he was alive.

“Who...” A raspy cough prevented him from finishing the question.

“
Quiet. You have much work yet to do. But we are pleased with your service so far.” Her voice was raspy, like an over-smoked torch singer just past her prime.

McGregor remembered the events leading to what should have been his death.

“But—there were guns—I was shot!” He felt his arm and his shoulder but he experienced no pain, not even the slightest discomfort. He felt better than he did during his college days, the last time he exercised regularly.

“
My colleague told you we would help you. You fulfilled your part and so have we.”

The men
—back at the apartment.

“
Show me your eyes!” McGregor’s voice was pure thirst, like that of a man suffering from sunstroke and stumbling toward an oasis in the distance.

She smiled as her right hand grasped the frame of her sunglasses, peeling them off.

McGregor was at a loss. Her eyes were beautiful, like the glittering sands of a pristine beach at twilight. Then came the stars. He gazed deeper, farther. The man at his apartment had also had stars, but these were more primal, more satisfying. McGregor couldn’t pull away even if he had wanted to—he was witnessing the birth of an angel.

In the middle of a constellation, there was a woman. She was floating in space without any visible footing. McGregor couldn
’t understand what was holding her up. He couldn’t see her feet and there was nothing but black beneath her. Her long, flowing white dress resembled a nineteenth century tea dress with its transparent yoke of chiffon over beautiful layers of silks and satins underneath. The rippling dress covered the area that should have been her feet.

The angel leaned forward, arcing her head to reveal her
eyes which were passionately locked on his. She appeared to be in motion, moving toward him. His heart fluttered in embarrassment and anticipation.

Then she changed.

Her face turned red. White light shot out of her eyes and into his, blinding all that he could see except what was in his extreme periphery.

With his vision impaired, he couldn
’t be sure, but he felt that she was raising her arms and that her hands each held something. The arms were moving in small circular motions that increased in swiftness as the vision progressed. He could only hear a constant whoosh and see a blur of motion in the corners of his vision.

He had now lost the gnawing anticipation
and desire, but he still could not break his gaze or move his feet. The angel stopped broadcasting the light and McGregor could now clearly see that she was holding two very sharp long-bladed daggers. She had also moved much closer to McGregor; her face was bloodied. Upon closer inspection, that single face somehow was an amalgamation of the faces of the girls—the girls he had murdered.

“
No! Help me.”

“
You didn’t help us,” said the woman in a voice resembling a duet.

“
I... I wanted to help you, Becky, Michelle!”

“
Now it is our turn to help you.”

The angel crossed her arms in a pose resembling that of a mummified pharaoh before lashing out, blades forward,
in the direction of McGregor’s neck.

McGregor found himself flat on the ground, looking up at the red headed woman who had returned her glasses to her face. His hands were on his neck, but it was not moist with blood or cut by the blades he had seen.

“
Would you like to see more?”

“
No—No, ma’am.”

“
Get up. We have work to do.”

After carrying Agent Cobbs through several blocks of the streets of New Orleans, Suteko said that they had gone far enough. They carefully set him down against a wall, his body conforming to the angle of the brickwork.

Sam was amazed that his muscles were not sore nor were his legs tired from carrying a full grown man for so long.

“
Stay here. I won’t be long.”

With that, she ran away faster than he had ever seen her move, faster than he had ever seen anyone move. She turned the corner with a blur in the direction of the old theater. She returned after what seemed to be ten minutes
—although Sam knew there was no proper way to measure time, with its flow having been stopped.

“
Sorry, I had to move as many of the others away from whatever was released by the explosion.”

Suteko grabbed Sam
’s hands as she had done before. In an instant, Cobbs animated with a startle, birds chirped, and a breeze already mid-blow splashed against their faces.

“
What the...?! What did you do to me?”

Cobbs was surprised, confused, terrified even. One moment he was looking down at Sam with the coffee shop behind him. The next moment, he was looking up at Sam with trees and a swing-set behind him. He had been standing; now, he was sitting against a wall. He searched Sam
’s eyes for answers, but Sam had only a slightly less puzzled look on his face.

Suteko quickly leaned over, touching Cobb
’s shoulders. “Please do not be afraid. You are safe.”

“
Where am I?” Cobbs brushed away Suteko’s soothing touch and began groping up the brick wall behind him, trying to stand.

“
The bomb went off. We took you to safety.”

“
Did I pass out?”

“
No.”

Sam looked at Cobbs
’ utterly confused face and wondered how Suteko would explain the unexplainable.

“
No, I realize this will be hard to grasp, but…”

“
You stopped time, didn’t you?” Cobbs said, surprising the two fugitives.

“
Yes, sort of.”

Cobbs was standing now. A confused look still remained, but the fear had vanished.

Cobbs stepped back. Letting his hand fall to his belt, he pulled his pistol from its holster.

“
I don’t know what your intentions are, but you are both under arrest.”

“
Yes, I understand. I broke your laws, but our purpose for coming was to stop this bomb, to save lives.”

Cobbs held the gun between Sam and Suteko. Sam backed
up a step, but Suteko stood motionless.

“
Looks like you failed spectacularly,” Cobbs said, keeping the gun up.

“
There are other bombs.”

“
Other? Why didn’t you report this to the authorities?”

“
I only just learned about the multiple bombs,” Suteko said in a calm voice—too calm for Sam’s raging nerves; being held at gunpoint didn’t seem to faze Suteko. “We had hoped we could stop this one before anyone needed to know. Besides, what would we tell them? We had a dream about a bomb?”

“
Is that how you knew about this bomb and that there are others?”

“
Sam and I both had the same dream. A little research led us here. But the fact that there are other bombs, I learned from you—a you from some time in the future.”

The reference to a future Agent Cobbs didn
’t throw off the present Agent Cobbs.

“
That man back there. Who was he?”

“
We don’t know. We had no idea what to expect.”

“
There could be more bombs,” Cobbs said lowering his pistol somewhat, but not completely. “I noticed the countdown was originally set for thirty-six hours before he must have pressed a panic button.”

“
A coordinated and simultaneous attack would certainly cause wide-spread panic.”

“
Look,” Cobbs said while re-holstering his weapon. “I don’t know what is going on, but you had opportunity to escape or to do me harm and you didn’t. You could have removed my weapon and you didn’t. As crazy as it sounds, I believe what you say is true and that you wanted to prevent the bomb from going off. I don’t understand it, but the video feed from the airport shattered my understanding of reality. Help me stop the other bombs, and I will do my best to make the customs incident go away. But you,” he said, pointing a finger at Sam. “Assaulting an officer is a different matter.”

“
I understand. I’ll...”

A cell phone that Sam didn
’t know existed began to buzz from within Suteko’s pocket.

“
Yes.”

She nodded and then pressed
“end” not five seconds after answering.

“
I have an email waiting for me. The old man has found something out.”

“
The old man?”

“
A friend of ours.”

Suteko pulled up the email app on her phone and then moved to create a huddle where the three could read it together.

His name is Todd McGregor. A professor at Coastway Community College (SF, CA).

Some other cities are: Boston, NYC, New Orleans, and DC.  Prob only one per. There may be other cities...

This information came costly. Make good use of it.

“
This must be a list of targeted cities. Can you have the security heightened in those cities?” Sam asked.

“
Based on what? An email? What are the targets? Should people walking into a supermarket be frisked? We need more specific information before we start a panic.”

“
Then, we work with the name,” Suteko said. “We need to find out about this McGregor. We have less than thirty-six hours. I suggest we visit California.”

“
Shouldn’t we examine the bomb site before leaving?” Sam asked.

“
Leave that to the Hazmat crew,” Cobbs said. “There is no guarantee it will be safe for hours—maybe days. That’s time we simply don’t have. I can pull the strings necessary to be kept in the loop.”

Suteko nodded.
“Let’s go.”

An hour later, the three were waiting in a line with tickets in their hands. A few hours after that, they landed at the San Francisco International Airport.

Cobbs thought it best to simply tell his superiors that a recent transaction on Sam
’s card meant they were heading to California and that he would follow them. Until he understood enough to be able to say something without sounding crazy, he decided this was the best course of action. It wasn’t his main concern, but he wanted hard facts before risking his spotless record. Besides, getting permission often got in the way of doing what had to be done.

“
The site in New Orleans is clean now,” Cobbs said after ending a phone call. “Whatever the bomb sent out—they are still working on what it was—it dissipated quickly. The death toll is exactly two. I would have expected much more—at least a dozen people were fairly close to the explosion.” He looked at Suteko. “Let me guess... You had something to do with that? My contact reported a few people who claimed to have been near the building and yet were a block away an instant after the explosion. And that sounds mighty familiar to me.”

She
smiled and Cobbs continued thumbing his phone, checking email. His screen lit up with detailed data from the scene.

“
And now let me guess, one of the two deaths was Todd McGregor,” Sam said, wishing McGregor’s end had occurred a few hours earlier than it had.

“
That’s what is puzzling. I shot him twice at least, and he was inches away from the bomb. If he survived the bullets and the explosion, the chemical it released would have been most potent at his location. And yet his name isn’t on the list of recovered dead. And even if your old man got his name wrong, the two victims don’t match the bomber’s age or sex. Most peculiar, there weren’t any bodies in the building where the bomb went off,” Agent Cobbs said with severely crumpled eyebrows.

“
He wasn’t wearing a gas mask. Could… his body have been scorched into nothing?” Sam asked, hoping for some logical explanation.

“
There was an explosion—we all saw the flash, but the report states there was only limited damage to the building. The explosion couldn’t have been very big. I would expect a singed or even crisp body, but according to my contacts, there wasn’t even a body. Still, the list may not be complete.” He turned toward Suteko. “Was he… one of yours?”

“
One of mine?”

“
Yeah, you know. Super powers, stop time, that sort of thing.”

“
No. He couldn’t have been. But I think you overestimate what we can do. I have only been able to step outside time so completely as I did twice in my life. It is a rare gift that cannot and should not be taken lightly.”

“
We have just over thirty hours. Let’s get to Professor McGregor’s college and talk to his buddies. My contact will call back in a few with the perp’s home address.”

★

“Are you with law enforcement too?” The man’s high, girlish voice seemed oddly mismatched with his large body. Dr. Philip O’Conner was the Coastway Community College president.

Cobbs looked at Sam and Suteko before answering,
“No, I’m with Immigration Services, but was Professor McGregor wanted by local law enforcement?”

“
Not local. The feds. They wouldn’t tell me what exactly it was about, but they looked serious. Professor McGregor has been gone for two days. No word from him, no canceling his classes. He just vanished.”

“
What did he teach?”

“
Well, we had him across the board—remedial English, English Lit, Social Studies, things like that, but his main interest was Arabic studies. He was well sought out, I hear, for his expertise on Islam and the Arabic language.”

“
And yet he taught remedial English at a small community college—no offense,” said Cobbs.

Cobbs
’ phone vibrated in his pocket indicating a new message. Glancing at the screen, he suddenly put the phone away and said, “Thank you for your time.” Holding up the card Dr. O’Conner had given him, he added, “If we have further questions, can I reach you at this number?”

The principal nodded as
Cobbs motioned for Suteko and Sam to follow. They did so with some reluctance.

“
Why didn’t we ask more questions about McGregor?” Sam asked once out of earshot of the school president. “Shouldn’t we at least get his home address from Dr. O’Conner?”

“
No need. I have that now,” he said holding up his smart phone. “But we wouldn’t have been able to find anything without a warrant—unless you use your super powers to enter without me watching or knowing—but now we may be able to legally search.”

Before Sam could ask another question, Cobbs had his phone to his ear. They only heard his side of the conversation, but it was clear he was trying to get a contact of his to get them access to McGregor
’s investigation files and a warrant to enter his home.

“
There’s no sense in reinventing the wheel. I suspect we will learn a lot more and learn it faster by reviewing his investigation files. Then we can bother Dr. O’Conner with any follow-up questions. Besides, my contact is usually fast and well connected. We need to start heading over to McGregor’s apartment.” Cobbs was now picking up his pace as he led them to the school parking lot and to their rental, a beat-up Honda Civic.

Sam opened his mouth to ask something when he was interrupted by Cobbs
’ phone.

“
Yes. Uh-huh. Good.” The call lasted only a few seconds but Cobbs was smiling. “Let’s go.”