Day 275 - Repeat Offenders - Chapter 16.1 (1985 Words)

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REPEAT OFFENDERS

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 16.1

Kyle and George moved as quickly as they could to the warehouse but they were too late in one respect, the warehouse had been found by someone and broken into. They could see from the alleyway that the door had been forced and the video camera that usually perched high above the doorway was now only a bunch of loose hanging threads.

Someone had found the connection to Brian and the warehouse from the evidence at the bank. The door hanging on it’s hinges the place was now deserted, the machine smashed to pieces on the floor of the warehouse.

“Shit. Now what?” George asked as he looked around the room, not expecting anything in particular but wondering all the same if he would see reality crumbling away.

“I don’t know.” Kyle Stone was not one to swear, even now the best or worst he could manage was a mild ‘dammit.’  He kicked through the ruins of the machine in parts on the ground, it certainly looked beyond repair and without it there was no travelling to the next dimension or the previous, they were now stuck here and would be awaiting the end of all things.

“Not quite how I pictured the end of the universe.” George finally said and scratched his head with the barrel of the gun, suicide far from his mind.

“Armageddon in an industrial park?” Kyle managed a rare smile.

“Hardly the stuff of fervent religious visions is it? No devils, demons or magic numbers.”

“Magic numbers?”

“You know, like six-six-six, the four horsemen, the one hundred forty four…”

“No, I mean the numbers, the code.” Kyle was remembering the other part of their mission. The doorway to the Freeze Room was intact. It had been graffiti’ed within an inch of its total surface area but it was intact. A crowbar had been taken to it in an attempt to get it open but obviously the door had not given and having it left open meant that a number of vagrants and bored vandals had got inside. “How long ago do you think this was done?”

George was examining the doorway and the remnants of the machine, parts of it had been smashed and other parts had been removed. Most of the consoles and PC monitors were gone, with cables and connections taken as well. The remaining architecture and cabinetry had been smashed, kicked in and desecrated. It would be a nightmare to recreate from scratch, but if the Freeze Room was untouched then there was a good chance that one of the Brian’s was in there and they had a shot at remaking the machine.

“Hard to say, not long maybe a day or more? Why?” George asked, but he had the same suspicion as his new partner.

“They’ll be back for whatever is in the room they can’t get to, I suppose they went off to get some equipment to open the door and in that time… this happened?”

“That’s a lot of damage for a few hours at best yet…” George took a couple of deep breaths and then screwed up his nose. “You may not want to go into that room.” He pointed at the storeroom, one off to the side where once in a preceding dimension a tear gas canister had been isolated. Now it had been the receptacle of all human waste from a drunken revelry in an opened warehouse at night.

“Is that… oh God.” Kyle came close to examine but the smell of fresh vomit, urine and alcohol wafted towards him as he opened the door.

“I warned you.” George had a huge grin on his face despite himself.

The sound of a car in the alleyway got their attention and together they ran for the doorway. George was punching in the numbers via the keypad and pulling the door open when they were discovered.

“Hey!” came a voice and neither man turned to look at it as they frantically tried to fling the door open to get inside, but it wasn’t moving fast enough under the weighted steel security of it’s construction.

A hard shove in the gap between his shoulders forced George through the doorway, scraping a shoulder on the jamb, pulling at the skin through his clothing and careening him forward on his knees just as the shooting started.

Kyle Was shot in the back and the left leg as he pulled the door too, bullets still firing through the air, two more hitting him in the shoulder and the back, near the first bullet hole. He held fast and the door clicked shut and a buzzing sound signaled the lock down of the security bolts. Then he let go of the handle and fell backwards, falling into the shadows cast on the floor by his own blood.

“Stop shooting you idiots!” Came a shout and then Kyle blacked out, the room was swimming, spinning like a merry go round as his eyes closed and through the blurry view of his closing lids he saw a man standing over him and looking down.

When George picked himself up he knew it was already too late to stop the door from closing, he had seen that Kyle had been pulling back on the door even as he was being shoved through the gap. The bullets had a distinctive sound as they ricocheted off of the door, but he counted a few where he heard the shot but no corresponding noise.

Which meant his partner was dead. If not in the moment, certainly once whoever wanted to get into this rom had their way with him. There was no way to end this well for Kyle Stone, George was not even sure that there was a way out for him, but at least he could freeze time and …

That was it! Freeze Time! He would freeze time and open the door, according to the interviews with the various members of the preceding time travel teams that’s what the secondary machine was capable of; there must be a way to use that to his advantage. He had the instructions on his tablet, he just needed to quickly figure that out and see what could be done.

The monitors where the video feed came to were only lit in one corner. The camera outside, then two more inside the warehouse had been totally destroyed so they were static feeds of grey snow. The remaining one was of the doorway and the kitchen area to the left of the Freeze Room, it’s camera was well hidden in the wall and had not been found yet.

He kept an eye on it and he could see that Kyle was lying still on the floor and a man in a long coat was going through his pockets. George turned up the volume to listen in as he looked for the instructions on the time freeze.

“Kyle Stone. Special Access Program. NSA?” The man said to himself. “What the fuck?”

“What is it boss?” One of the other voices asked, George looked up but the speaker was off camera view at this angle, he could only see Kyle’s body and the man in the suit, the one referred to as ‘boss’.

“What the fuck is the NSA got to do with these … thieves?” the man stood up and nudged Kyle with his foot, and then to George’s surprise he heard a low moan coming from the man he though was dead.

“Jesus, he’s still alive.” Came the voice off screen.

“He’s not Rasputin for fuck’s sake, you just didn’t hit anything major. We need some questions answered. Get over here and clean him up, stop the bleeding and put him in that chair.” The man pointed to a kitchen area off screen and then obligingly two men also in long coats pulled over the chair and started work on Kyle.

Within a few minutes he had belted tourniquets and makeshift bandages applied. Kyle looked pale and very close to death as he was propped up in the chair and then slapped a few times in the face to get his attention. Water was thrown on him and then the boss man pulled a small flask from his pocket and offered Kyle a drink.

Kyle took a long drink from the flask and choked back the burning bourbon, as he wanted to get as much numbing booze into himself as he could.

“Not too much Mr. Stone, we don’t want you bleeding to death.” The man sounded quite reasonable but the vicious chuckle from his henchmen left no suggestion of sympathy or realistic concern.

“More, please.” Croaked Kyle and he blinked his eyes rapidly as if he were about to pass out.

“A little if you tell me what I need to know. A lot if you tell me more than that…” the smile that came with the offer was not reassuring.

Kyle took another swing and then looked high up on the wall and straight into the camera. “Brian. Get out of the box.”

The man spun around and looked up at the wall where Kyle had been looking. He handed the flask to one of his men and indicated they should give Kyle a drink with a small gesture they would obey.

“Dr Brian Crouse? Are you in there Doctor?” the man smiled, they knew who the warehouse belonged to and they wanted to talk to him about his involvement in taking their unregistered diamonds. “We have something of yours, you have something of ours. A trade perhaps?”

“Hah.” Kyle managed a croaking laughing and spat a little whisky in the air, landing on one of his bandages and a few seconds later burning his flesh, but he ignored it and kept his laughter going.

“Come now Doctor Krause, you must know that there is no other way out of this but through that door, we’ve checked the plans, we know all about your little … what… Panic Room? There is no other exit.”

“Not in this universe.” Kyle shouted, his voice cracking under the strain.

“Come on now, you were being so helpful before.” The man took the flask from the man who had been holding it for Kyle and waved it in front of the bound man’s face. “More?”

“Don’t mind if I …” Kyle screamed the end the sentence as the Boss drained the contents on the wounds and bandages on Kyle’s legs, soaking them all in about a half cup of whisky.

The man looked back up at the camera, which was obvious once you knew it was there. “Your last chance Doctor. I’m going to count to three.”

“One.” The man pulled a lighter from his pocket and held it up for the camera.

“Two.” Then he held up the flask and lit the open end of the container with the lighter, the fumes and residual alcohol burning off in a flash and small puff of air.

“One.” He dropped the flask and held the lighter, still lit nearer to the man bound on the chair covered in blood and just enough flammable alcohol to burn painfully and slowly.

“Fuck you.” Kyle spat at the Boss and stuck out his chin, it was on the third time in his entire life he could remember using the F-word outside the bedroom and only the second time he had directed it at a human being. He still regretted the first time he swore at someone in anger and frustration, he had vowed to never do that again.

Now it seemed more than appropriate, this time was the best and only good reason to allow him the luxury of base profanity.

The Boss smiled like a shark and raised his arm and let go of the lighter, still lit above Kyle Stone’s alcohol soaked legs.

Then George finally froze time.