Wake Me In The Future (35 page)

‘But there’s nothing to connect them to his plans then?’ asked Rachel hopefully. ‘I am relieved to hear that. What do the records say about me?’

‘There’s a lot of gaps here Rachel. Selected files seem to have been transferred to a secure area on the main information hub, which I suspect not even you will have access to. I believe those files will implicate them in his plans for the Cryogens. I am sorry,’ he said apologetically ‘but I can’t see any other reason why they’d move information from their personal files onto the main system.’

Rachel’s head was down, almost embarrassed. ‘That’s ok Jon, I suspected as much anyway. I can’t say it’s not a disappointment though.’ and I saw Jane squeezing her hand supportively.

‘As far as you’re concerned’ Jon paused, ‘there’s nothing other than the normal references to them having a daughter named Rachel. There's not a lot of detail.’

‘That’s great,’ she said rather plaintively, ‘not only were they in cahoots with Ramoon, they were so ashamed of my existence that they couldn't even be bothered to give me any space in their reference files.’

‘I don’t think that’s the case,’ Jon said, trying to give her some hope; ‘if our plan is successful I am sure you’ll find other files relating to you when we get full access to the system. There must have been other information attached to the files they transferred over.

She just offered him an unconvinced smile.

‘I think you’re wrong Jon, I think they were trying to erase anything that would link them to being Manooran. Remember how deluded and obsessed they were with wanting to see themselves as human. These types of Manoorans want to forget where they came from so they gradually wipe out all records relating to the past before they submit themselves to have their memories altered, to enable them to join the Community of Humanity; if my parents wanted that, then what must they have thought of me marrying Richard?’

I looked at Rachel forlornly, ‘don’t beat yourself up about it Rachel, if anything, what’s happened to you is my fault for coming into your life.’

She hugged me then, nothing else to say.

But I looked at Jon and said ‘You’ve both made reference to this Community of Humanity. What actually is it?’

‘It’s the fiftieth planet Richard.’ Rachel said, ‘An alternative society where all Manoorans have had their memories altered and they actually think they’re all humans living alongside us Manoorans. I mentioned it before at my parent’s house.’ I nodded as I remembered, ‘Their history has been changed to show it happening exactly as they’d hoped it would when they first travelled to earth; only with them as the humans.’

Jon looked up at us, ‘Its no use us pondering over this any more today. We’ll find out more when we get full access to the system, and unless Ramoon alters his travel plans that’ll be tomorrow. Then looking at me, probably realising he could be parting me from Rachel for good so soon after we’d been re-united, he said, ‘are you ready Richard?’

‘It can’t come soon enough for me,’ I said with bitterness in my tone that must have told them I was thinking of Ramoon.

But it was more than just Ramoon that was playing on my mind. As I shuddered, the thought of the next day flashed through my mind, because even if my entire world didn’t come crashing down, I was certain my whole life was about to change once again.

Chapter 38
– Jump

I was more aware of what I was risking, than any of the people I was surrounded by, realised. Jon seemed to understand my torment over my love for both Helen and Rachel, but only my friends on the outside knew what I knew about Jane, and they were out of contact for now. No one really knew the true extent of what was going on in my mind.

It was a catch twenty two situation, there was just no way out of this dilemma, my feelings of shame were draining me more each time I thought about what I was going to have to deal with. Circumstances were going to force me to be a horrible person. The decision I'd have to make would reflect me badly in everyone’s eyes, and to some I'd be that person I knew I wasn't. To be thought of like that weighed heavily on my conscience and outraged my sense of justice. How could I make it all right, I'd never wanted to hurt anyone.

I couldn’t think of one reasonable action I could take to spare the feelings of the women I loved.

It was only the incredible construct that was my new body that was keeping me going; otherwise my increasing mental exhaustion would have already bought my whole system to the brink of failure.

Well, if things did go wrong tomorrow, at least I’d have had one final night with my new family, knowing they were out of harms way, and safe.

As I drifted into sleep with my arms around Rachel I heard Jon’s word’s ringing in my ears. ‘Let them be the judge of your love for them and of the situation you find yourself in.’

I fell into a fitful sleep, haunted by dreams of frozen bodies, a faceless Data with his head full of cogs and wheels manoeuvring lid-less eyes, my parents and best friend Pete emerging from pods, and the agonising screams of the burning librarian.

From the moment I opened my eyes the following morning I began going over and over the plan in my head. There was no margin for error, everything had to go smoothly.

When I finally lay down on the couch, and the interface attached itself to my forehead, I was as ready as I could be to face the truth. Was I going to find the truth about Helen, even though I had another woman that I loved by my side? I had no control over the outcome of the journey I was about to make, but right now, as I waited for the transfer, the only thing I was concerned about was;
would I ever return?

Ramoon was furious; it had not been enough, having the guard that had bought him the bad news, destroyed. He still hadn’t calmed down.

‘I WANT THEM DEAD!!,’ he shouted at the two men standing in front of his desk. ‘I don’t care how you find them or what you have to do, but everything has to be destroyed, including them. We need to find these people and get rid of them for good – there’s too much at stake.’ and taking a deep breath he composed himself and said, ‘I’ll be back tomorrow and I expect results.’

The two guards he'd been ranting at stiffened to attention and the taller of the two said, ‘leave it to us sir, the prisoners have begun to talk and we have some fresh leads that we’re fairly confident about. We’ve initiated a search around the power core that feeds the main water processing plant on the Moon.’

‘Good.’ he said sharply, and staring them down, he barked, ’because I don’t think you have any idea of how displeased I’ll be if you fail.’

He dismissed them with a nod of his head and when they’d gone he looked at the hovering planet in his vid-screen and said to it, ‘the outcome of all this will dictate the future of one of our races, and I am not prepared to let ours be overrun. We are the only humans now. All the originals have to be destroyed.’

He touched the consol on his desk and the image on the screen faded and went out.

Then thinking of Richard, he cast his mind back and felt a small sense of pleasure at recalling that he’d had that meddlesome first wife of his completely destroyed. She’d been getting too close to the truth, he couldn’t afford to let her live. Smiling at the thought, he walked into the adjoining room to get ready to
Jump
to India Central.

He was unaware that the protesters were monitoring his movements and as soon as he made the jump they re-checked the systems attached to me and initiated the process.

From the very beginning I’d been told Jumping wouldn’t be an unpleasant experience, but they’d lied. I didn’t know why I should react so differently to this process than others did, but every time it happened I felt sick. This time I felt that all my body had been pulled into a central point somewhere near my heart. As if a tiny black hole had appeared there and sucked me in. My head exploded and my stomach turned, then.... nothing.

When I opened my eyes I looked down to my hands and said to myself, ‘it worked, I can’t believe it.’

I got up and looked around for the vid-screen. I knew Ramoon was supposed to be away for the day but I couldn’t rely on anything, I had to move quickly. Besides I wanted this to be over and to get back to my own body – this was just too strange.

I walked into the main room that contained the main terminal. My hand reached into the wall and the vid-screen lit up. It recognised the contact immediately. ‘Welcome Councillor Walker,’ it greeted me. What can I do for you today?’

A lot,
I thought.

It took the best part of an hour to track down the files I needed and transfer them to the location I’d been given, and I was so engrossed in my task that the time went by before I could worry. I just prayed that these files did actually contain the damning information we were looking for.

When I’d finally finished I began to relax as I made my way back to the room I’d come from. I smiled at the things that 'Little God' had suggested I do to the body I was now in control of, and I looked down at myself in temptation. But somehow I just couldn’t bring myself to act on it. Because, after all was said and done, it was just a shell that Ramoon was using. No, I just wanted out. I was glad this part was all over, and smiling at the thought I closed my eyes and braced myself for the terrible feelings of jumping to return.

Nothing happened!

I waited with my eyes closed. But still nothing happened. I shouted the thoughts in my head again, just as I’d been instructed. ‘READY TO TRANSFER’ and added ‘please…’

But, nothing happened.

After a few minutes and several more attempts, I opened my eyes. I was still in Ramoon’s room, and looking at my hands confirmed the worst. ‘Oh no', I breathed, ‘what’s gone wrong.’ I got up and walked back to the terminal I’d been using in the main room; perhaps I could get a message through to Jon.

As I approached it I became aware of a curious sensation; a feeling of foreboding, and psychological discomfort and as I lifted my hand to present it to the screen a terrible sound came from behind me. It wasn’t terrible in the normal sense, and probably wouldn’t have been terrible to anyone else. It’s just that I never expected to hear a voice that by all rights should only be able to come from the mouth I was now in possession of.

‘I’ve got you this time Richard,’ said the chilling voice of Ramoon from behind me.

I caught my breath and for a second was frozen to the spot. I stayed absolutely still, afraid to break the spell and initiate a hasty reaction, I didn’t want to die just yet, and especially not as a result of an error on my part. No, I stood absolutely still, whilst desperately thinking of a way out, what could I do to get out of this?

I gradually found the courage and slowly began to turn around repeating the same prayer to myself, ‘don’t let this be happening, don’t let this be happening.’

But when I’d turned completely, my nightmares had become reality. I was staring directly at another Ramoon!

‘Et Voila,’ said Ramoon, with a satisfied smile on his face and arms thrown wide to acknowledge the duplicate body. ‘I always keep a spare template here at the office. And the system, although rather slow today, has done its job of alerting me to the access of my files and your possession of my primary body. But best of all it’s successfully trapped you inside.’ He pointed the gun he was brandishing directly at me, as my gaze was now fixed firmly on it.

Following my stare he said, ‘Normally weapons aren’t allowed, but if you wield enough power, it’s amazing what you can do; this one creates a sticky plasma called Plasmex that will entirely cover a body and eat it away, including the Brainpod and whoever’s mind happens to be stuck in it. And I am really going to enjoy using it to get rid of you.’

‘Well, its too late Ramoon,’ I somehow found the courage to say, ‘I’ve transmitted the information so you’re little plan to destroy all the Cryogens will be all over the Information System within hours,’ and with as much confidence as I could make myself display, I said, ‘I suspect you’ll be reborn, it’s a shame, if it were up to me I’d take that gun you’re holding and destroy everything you are.’

The reaction that I'd expected in response to that particular piece of information didn’t materialise. He was still smiling as if he’d not heard anything I'd just said.
He should be quaking in his boots!

‘I am afraid you never got the information out Richard, my system is set up to intercept anything transmitted from here and hold it in a buffer until I send a secondary command for it to be released. And before you can stick your hand in there again and utter the words, ‘secondary transmit,’ I am going to melt you down to nothing more than a teaspoon of slag.’

I felt like I’d been punched in the stomach. A tremendous feeling of loss overcame me at having everything I thought I’d achieved snatched back, and a sudden realisation of my predicament brought me very near to panic.

But somehow I managed to maintain the façade of confidence, ‘I don’t care about that Ramoon. You can’t keep this silent forever, the rest of the protesters know what they’re fighting for now and it won’t be long before they show you and your nasty group of supporters up for what you are.’

I wouldn’t have thought it possible but the smile on his face seemed to be getting bigger, ‘you mean the ones based near the power core for the Moon’s water processing plant?’ he asked, like a nasty little fox that had outwitted a farmer. ‘Right at this very moment its under attack from my guards and within the next few hours your comrades and their despicable notion of reviving your obnoxious race will be nothing more than an irritating memory, and a pile of ash, just like Maya and her annoying husband.’

I was feeling totally defeated. All the fight had been knocked out of me. After coming so far was this really the end of everything?

But hearing Ramoon mention Rachel's parent's names fired me up again.

‘So it was you then,’ I spat, ‘I thought you were involved in their deaths somehow.’

‘Oh yes, it was me. Their loyalty to the cause was getting just a little bit too shaky for my liking. They were both very loyal at one time; in fact Maya was responsible for destroying your first wife for me.’