The Traveler (15 page)

The questions started flying and it took Niles standing to silence them. He was used to his people being excited about things, but to actually have the ability to travel through time was not something they had ever remotely considered with the technology this planet currently had.

“And we never had a hint of this experiment throughout our world search for quantum technology when the British found Captain Everett's wristwatch in the ice in Antarctica?” asked Sarah again.

“No,” Niles said. “It seems Himmler covered his tracks rather well from the Nazi regime. And the Mossad's reluctance after the war to pursue this to the full extent, well, let's just say was disappointing. Now, through the discovered construction records and the description of the site from the concentration camp survivor, we found the location of the bunker system. The boy claimed the last experiment failed because of some mishap in the power supply. We now know that interruption was the RAF doing a number on the Möhne Dam. The boy claims the bunker system was flooded and destroyed and his sister, known to the Germans as the Traveler, never came back.”

“She was lost?” Alice asked, always placing a human face on such things from the past that made them seem more real for everyone around the table.

“Yes,” Anya said as she watched a weakened Niles Compton walk slowly to his desk near the far wall and lower himself painfully down into the far more comfortable desk chair.

“Since we know the location, why don't we investigate firsthand?” Jason asked as he kept a hand over his partially disfigured face.

“If you had noticed, Colonel Collins was missing for some time a few weeks ago. He and Anya took a little foray into the woods outside of Dortmund. Jack, if you would?” Virginia volunteered.

“We spent three days wandering the woods and then we finally found a conduit access port used for electrical line maintenance. We found the bunker complex and that was why Anya was sent back to Israel to look for the final piece of the puzzle. And why Alice had to use an intermediary to get her out.”

Alice was the only one to nod her head in Farbeaux's direction.

“The last puzzle piece? I thought you found the bunker?” Jenks asked as he pulled the cold stub of cigar from his mouth.

“We did indeed. Flooded and collapsed, most of it. A few old skeletons in SS uniforms and evidence that something very powerful happened there.”

“And you recovered the equipment used by this Thomsen and Himmler?”

Jack pursed his lips and shook his head.

“None of the displacement equipment was there. It had been removed,” Anya finished for him.

“Himmler went back and got it, huh?” Jenks interjected while shaking his head.

“No. The equipment was moved in 1969, several years after all concerned in this particular event was dead, even Himmler.”

“How in the hell do you know that?” Jenks persisted, looking for any holes in Jack's or Anya's stories.

“Because the same construction company, which is family owned and operated, removed the equipment that very same year. Contracted by a company not from Germany.”

“Where is the equipment?”

Anya looked at Jenks and then lowered her head. “We don't know.”

“And that was why Anya went home. We had to know more, personnel records and things like that. We had to know who was still alive in 1969 who would know what it was they were looking for down there. Anya found the only other person who is known to have survived that night.” Jack sat down and looked at Anya.

“And that is why we need each and every one of you in the next few weeks. We have the name thanks to Mossad files, we just have to locate that person because they have the time displacement equipment for some reason.”

“Well, you goin' to let us in on the big secret?” Jenks said, huffing at the dramatics of the group.

Anya went to her chair and pulled out the same file that General Shamni produced for her. She tossed it into the middle of the table.

“I give you the thief of the technology taken from the bunker in 1969. Moira Mendelsohn.”

“Who?” Sarah asked, looking from Anya to Jack. It was Jack who answered.

“Moira Mendelsohn—
the
Traveler.”

The room went silent.

“Humph, rumph,” the master chief rudely said as he stood up from the table. “So, you're telling us that the only person to actually … time travel”—he sourly hissed the words—“stole the equipment we need to retrieve our boy?”

“Yes, that's what we're saying, Master Chief,” Jack said.

“So the one question we have to ask is,” Niles said from his desk, “where did she go with it and what reasoning did this concentration camp survivor have for wanting it in the first place. Even if we weren't attempting to do the impossible”—he shot a quick glance at the master chief—“we could never allow this technology to be utilized for any one individual's personal gain. The tech itself will eventually have to be outlawed.”

“You mean after we possibly use it for our little illegal gain?” Jenks quipped.

“Something like that,” Collins said, quickly losing his patience with the master chief.

“I have a better question,” Charlie Ellenshaw said. “It seems you have overlooked one little item. If she hid the equipment, where she hid it is not the right question at all. When did she hide it—in the past, or right here in the present?”

Niles lowered his head and rubbed his temples. “That is why I have called upon the most brilliant people I know to find out. Xavier, that is the task I am assigning you and Europa. Find me that woman. Your first order of business.”

Young Morales was not afraid of the challenge. He could find anyone, which he had already proven. He just nodded and then frowned when he saw Charlie Ellenshaw staring at him. The man was angry and Morales would need to know more about the strange professor they called Crazy Charlie. For now, as the others filed out of the conference room, he looked up at the still photo of Professor Thomsen and the young girl sadly standing bedside him and he silently repeated the name.

“The Traveler.”

*   *   *

Alice Hamilton lagged behind as the others left the conference room and then took her time turning to face Niles, who sat at his desk and pretended he didn't see her. This was a confrontation he had not been looking forward to—a battle with his own conscience as voiced by the marvelous young actress Alice Hamilton.

“Quite a collection of new faces you have; interesting, to say the least,” she said as she easily placed her ever-present files on the edge of the large desk.

Compton looked up and smiled. He decided to let Alice throw the first punch and remained silent as she politely folded her hands in her lap and then adjusted a strand of gray hair that slipped from her bun. He kept the smile and waited.

“The young man”—she picked up a thick file from the top of her stack and opened it—“Xavier Morales, brilliant, so many letters after his name it looks like a screwed-up alphabet. Thus far since his professional career has started he has broken into no less than three commercial companies with names like Microsoft, IBM, and Raytheon. He claims boredom. Main achievement in life, hacked close to a billion dollars from a drug cartel.” Alice smiled and closed the folder. “Still, him I can understand. You need an abstract mind to keep up with Europa, I get it.”

Niles leaned back as he watched the waters of the floodgates overflow. He pushed two aspirins into his mouth and dry-swallowed them. They caught, he grimaced, but then managed to get them down just as Alice reached for the second file. She eyed Niles as she opened it, waiting to see if his one good eye would flinch.

“Master Chief Harold Jenks, United States Navy, retired. Owner Blacksmith Engineering. Everyone in his own company hates his guts even though he has made all fifty-one employees very wealthy. Ruthless, barbaric, and quite the engineering genius. Here only because he has a fatal attraction with the only woman he has ever been terrified of, our own assistant director. Bottom line: unstable, uncontrollable, and any other ‘un' you can think of. Not Department 5656 material, and that is according to your own job description and criteria.”

“Okay I—”

Alice politely smiled and held up her hand. “Oh, but there is more Mr. Director. How about a foreign intelligence agent who now has access to the greatest finds in the history of the world? Granted, she's a woman we all like and admire, especially myself.”

“Alice, I—”

“And let us not forget our good friend Colonel Henri Farbeaux. Do I need to go into his record?”

“Now that was Jack's idea and you have to admit Henri's already paid dividends for this Group.”

“Yes, by getting our other high-risk asset out of Jerusalem, I know. It was me who sent him in as I figured if the Mossad arrested him we weren't at a loss of one of our own.” Alice started gathering her files. “You are rushing into this, Niles.” She stopped and looked at the director. “All I'm saying is be careful. These new people are brilliant and are capable of good things, but make sure they belong here in the long term and not just for getting Carl back. They need to belong.”

Niles decided to let it drop now that he knew that Alice was only voicing his own inner thoughts and venting her fears, which were in line with his own. He watched her as she gave him one last look before patting his arm.

“You look pretty good, by the way. How's your buddy?”

“The president is doing better, and yes, I do feel somewhat … well, besides being blinded in my right eye, having a scar on my face the length of Long Island, and knowing that this is the best I'll ever walk again, hell, not bad at all.” He gave Alice a sour look as she smiled and turned for the conference room door.

“Could have been worse, Mr. Director. After all you still have your balls, and with these new personnel changes here at Group, you're going to need them.”

Niles watched the door close and then he faced the large monitor and the image that was still up. He gave a crazed chuckle and wondered if he was doing the right thing in risking more lives to get one back from the dead.

*   *   *

Alice caught up to Xavier Morales as he just finished his rounds in the computer center. Though quiet and shy he asked very legitimate questions of the one hundred men and women who would be working for him in computer sciences. Most of the apprehension at having someone so young being a department head was tempered by the fact that they had all heard of Xavier Morales, the wunderkind of MIT. Alice watched the young man through the glass and immediately saw that he wasn't dressed as a man of his education would have normally dictated: black tennis shoes and an old checkered button-down shirt. His black hair was neatly combed and in his shy way looked as if he were nothing more than a teenage boy.

Jason Ryan turned and saw Alice standing outside of the large theater-style comp center and then nodded as Morales turned to leave. Jason quickly opened the door for him. Alice greeted the young man and introduced herself again. She looked at Jason and stifled a laugh at his tattooed predicament.

“And I suspect Jason was taking you over to meet Europa face-to-face?” Alice asked. With boredom etching his features, Jason nodded. “Well, you probably have far better things to be doing. I'll take him, I need a word with our new comp genius.”

Without a word Ryan hurriedly left toward the bank of elevators so he could get down to logistics where a whole lot of people responsible for this tattoo had better be ready for war.

Alice gestured for Xavier to continue down the same hallway. She noticed the old chair and the strong arms that propelled the young man at a pretty good clip.

“Our engineers can find you something far more advanced than that old chair if you wish,” she said, suspecting she already knew the young man's answer.

“And Master Chief Jenks is one of those engineers?”

Alice only raised her lovely brows and smiled.

“No, thank you, Mrs. Hamilton, I was raised in this chair and if I get anything else now I would get lazy and also get no exercise at all.” He slowed his pace and then looked at Alice. “Tell me about Professor Ellenshaw.”

“Charlie?” A sad and knowing look crossed her features as she adjusted her load of files. “I won't go into detail, but Charlie's had a rough go of it the past three months.”

“I understand he was close to Dr. Golding?” Morales asked as he stopped by the double clean room doors and the blue-clad Marine guard standing outside. Xavier removed the new temporary ID card from around his neck and gave it to the guard, who checked it. He nodded at Alice as he gave it back.

“Quite close, rather unexplainable as they were such opposites, a man of science and one who chases dreams and sometimes nightmares … yes, they became close because they started out so distantly separate. He's hurting and if he's taken it out on you, I assure I'll speak to him.”

“No, no, please, don't do that, Mrs. Hamilton. I have an idea: Would you please give me five minutes with Europa to introduce myself properly, and then would you ask Professor Ellenshaw to join me in the clean room?”

With a curious look Alice just nodded. “Yes, I can do that.”

The clean room doors hissed open and Morales smiled as the guard handed him a sealed plastic bag with electrostatic clothing. Morales just shook his head with a polite smile.

“Nah, we don't want to start off like that.”

The guard looked at Alice and then saw that the Group matriarch was smiling.

“You heard him, that's no way to meet someone for the first time.” Alice nodded at Morales and then left.

The doors hissed closed behind Xavier as he entered the dressing area and then easily went to the last door and opened it. He wheeled himself inside and then turned. The console for Europa was there with six stations. Microphones were at each. The large bulletproof glass stretched fifteen feet across the front. The metal screen protecting the inner sanctum was in the down position so Morales could not see inside. But he knew, or could guess, what was there. Gone were the robotic program placement arms, and in their place would be a series of long glass tubes that contained Europa's bubble memory system of Pete Golding's own design. Morales closed his eyes as he faced the large glass remembering the paper he read from Golding describing the theory of bubble memory cylindrical super-microchip technology. He cleared his throat and a seventy-five-inch monitor lowered automatically from the ceiling. It came to life with a simple screen saver that said
DEPARTMENT 5656
.