The Whitehall Syndicate: A time travel conspiracy thriller (30 page)

The lecherous fingers of guilt picked and clawed at him from the inside and he felt nauseous. None of his friends looked at him in quite the same way anymore, especially Frank, who had dedicated his life to catching murderers and was now staring at one.

Ortega stood in front of Jack, a morose look on his face.

“You've killed Green. Now once you destroy the components of the device, this will all be over.”

“What happens then?” he asked defiantly. “How do I know you'll let my friends go?” Kim began to sweat, scared at the thought of being trapped in this mansion forever…or worse.

“I won't have to,” continued Ortega. “I won't exist anymore. It's the Heinzberg-Grüber theory.

Once you destroy the machine's parts, it won't exist in the future.
That means Michael won't start altering the world and that means I won't be forced to come back here, so you won't be held hostage. This whole situation won't exist anymore.”

Jack nodded along, thinking carefully about the message. This whole experience had made him think more about the consequences of time travel, and the extremely complex problems that resulted from it. As he reached into his pocket, Anisha stopped him and turned to face the aged man.

“What about Jack?” His eyes focused, and he realised he had forgotten to ask the most important question of all. Or maybe he hadn’t asked on purpose.

“What
about
Jack?”

“You showed us those photos of Jack dying. After this, does he live happily ever after?” Ortega frowned and paused for thought before answering.

“Without Michael's machine, the laws of time apply. You were killed a week ago, well the day after you go back to work technically,” he said before pausing, “and that can't be changed.”

“What about the Heinzberg theory? If you don't come from the future back in time anymore then doesn't it mean that you never shoot Jack?”

Jack's eyes glazed over into a pensive stare. Slowly he turned to her, all the pieces falling into place.

“It's the rules of time. Everything works out. Ortega didn't kill me. He must have hired the man who ended up causing my death in his version of the future.” He turned to the man and asked, “Is that right?” He simply nodded. “I'm going to die anyway. There's nothing anyone can do about it.”

Anisha began sobbing, water filling her deep brown eyes.

“You could use the device; stop it from happening.”

“I have to destroy it. We both know what happens if I don’t.”

“It'll mean killing yourself,” she cried, tears stream down her face. Kim's eyes were also watering and even Frank held a shocked look over his groggy face.

“I don't have a choice,” he finally whispered, before kissing Anisha lightly on her lips. Still sobbing she turned away, unable to watch.

Jack took the crystal out of his pocket and dropped it to the floor, then stamped on it until it smashed into a thousand pieces.