Fallen Empire

chapter 20

V.

In a flash of brilliant light Alice and Seren emerge out of the Infinity-Tunnels. Alice appears, riding a hover-cycle on the Pacific Ocean off the North beach of Oahu. It is morning for the beautiful beach of Hawaii and the sunlight glistens over the still waters. Alice isn’t concerned about anybody seeing them hovering over the water because of the impending dooms lurking on the horizon of this particular day. Looking out over the crystal clear waters she spies the first wave of Japanese bombers flying towards them. Amidst the buzz of the planes Alice notices an out of place sound that is more of a cackle.

She searches the airborne squadron to find the origin of the misplaced sound, “There they are.” Alice says pointing at the Crusader’s ships intermingling with the Japanese fighters.

“Is it the Crusaders?” Seren asks with a limited view.

“I believe those are the ships the Guardian spoke of.” Alice says as she watches the Japanese ships break off into a new formation. They split into two groups surrounding the island and another two groups split going directly over the island. The Crusader’s ships are in all three divisions.

Alice cracks open Seren’s’ throttle to follow the groups flying over the west coast. She gains speed quickly causing a ripple in the water that splashes Seren.

  “I am not a jet ski!” Seren protests as Alice pushes the throttle even faster. She struggles to keep up with the air-ships.

The groups of planes fly over the west coast; they fly over the western tip of the island.

Alice drives Seren over a small peninsula engaging the bottom thruster to leap over a small stretch of grass. She flies through a pair of palm trees only to land splashing down momentarily before hovering over it. Irritated Seren says, “Do you know what salt will do to my paintjob?”

Alice does not respond to this, instead the Crusader’s ships intrigue her. These had to be the Valkyries the Guardian spoke of. It is only big enough for one person and it has a large engine sitting directly in front of the cockpit. Two metal arms reach out from behind the cockpit, stretching out parallel from each other rotating around the vehicle. “Those are nuclear warheads on those ships, not to mention the very sophisticated laser cannon on each arm.” Alice says in slight admiration.

Alice and Seren skip across the crystal clear waters of Oahu hearing the sounds of battle beginning in the distance. Alice pilots Seren around the coast and turns into Pearl Harbor. The devastation is extensive and the attack has only just begun. Alice releases her grip on the throttle and comes to a stop hovering in the harbor watching the attack. Her eyes are immediately drawn to the smoke bellowing from the barracks. She looks past that to see the rest of the c*****e. The American military is ambushed by the Japanese while the better-equipped Crusaders do very little to add to the attack. They fire on the Americans with their laser cannon’s but obviously they are saving their missiles for the mainland. The Crusaders attack for now seems to be concentrated on making the Japanese attack more devastating.

Alice moves in closer to the war zone, not wishing to participate but needing a closer view. The U.S.S. California is printed on the bow of the ship sinking directly in front of her.  She looks over at a second ship to find a similar nomenclature but laser cannons from a Crusader’s ship blasts the bow off the ship.

“I thought the Guardian said the Crusaders just supplied history with the means of change. They are changing history themselves.” Alice says as she tries to remember details of the battle.

 A gunman, Alice remembers from history, fires at the Japanese from the U.S.S. Arizona. She maneuvers closer to the battle to get within sight of The Arizona. She finds it just in time to see one of the Crusader’s ships gunning down a hero that should have been. The deck of the U.S.S Arizona is engulfed in flames…

“They are protecting the Japanese, making sure they survive.” Alice observes, “Nothing the Americans have can harm those ships, The Crusaders must have found a supply of Cove somewhere. Their actions are not random; this is a premeditated composition.”

The Japanese continue their attack and it takes them to the Ford Island command center. The Crusaders blend in skillfully to finish the job.

 A ship in the harbor begins to turn over because of a Japanese torpedo. It poses no threat to the planes from Japan so the Crusaders leave it alone and concentrate their attack on the U.S.S. Nevada and U.S.S. Utah. Amidst the c*****e Alice spots the remains of Japanese k******e planes.

“They are showing respect to the Japanese culture by not interfering with suicide missions.” Alice postulates, “This encourages the Japanese bombers to hold off dying until they reach the mainland, which is how the Japanese take the western hemisphere!”

“But why do the Crusaders need the Japanese at all? I am picking up thirteen Valkyries on radar and they have enough nuclear weapons to level America.” Seren disputes.

Alice thinks for a moment and says, “They don’t want it leveled, they wish to conquer it. The Crusaders can conquer America but there is too few of them to occupy the land and control the populace. This is want Hitler wants, with America out of the way there wouldn’t be anyone left to stop him.”

Seren encompasses this thought and answers, “Remember this is not the first thing in history that was altered. What about that Republic of Texas the museum spoke of?”

Alice thinks and says, “The Crusaders changed something in the 19th century but we still don’t know what or even when. I’m not about to go teleporting randomly into the past. I need to conserve my jumps.”

Alice thinks for a moment remembering her old guideline for teleportation, no more than three times within twenty-four hours, “I have only one more teleportation left for today and I’m not ready to go home just yet.”

-“What are you planning?”-

“I want to go back to our entry point in 2050, exactly where we entered fifteen minutes before the ShadowGate is opened. Do you remember the coordinates of our arrival?” Alice asks.

“Yes” Seren says, “Transferring them to you now.”

Alice programs her Temporal Gauntlet with the vital information of destination then says aloud “I’m starting to see why the Guardian sounded scarred of these guys.” As she finishes this statement she retracts her armor and reactivates Seren’s cloaking hologram. Both Alice and Seren are surrounded by an electrical storm that takes them to the Infinity-Tunnels.

                                                •

A small lightning storm appears inside a tunnel in Berlin in the year 2050. Instantly Alice rides Seren out of the storm and it vanishes as quickly as it appeared. They arrive exactly where they Pre-arrived the last time they were here. Alice does a U-turn to go in the opposite direction from last time and tells Seren, “Tap into their G.P.S. satellite again, see if you can find where Hitler calls home.”

“That may take longer than fifteen minutes to find.” Seren says trying to think ahead.

“We will just make a brief stop, get what we need and return to Vaulkner when the Guardian opens the ShadowGate fourteen and a half minutes from now. If it becomes necessary we can teleport home, I would prefer not to but we have it as an option.” Alice says.

“Okay I have the address but what are you going to do: walk up and ask for national secrets?” Seren asks dubiously.

“Remember what the Guardian said, ’He who wins the wars writes the history books’.  Hitler is a Cyborg; he could have what we need stored in a memory file.”

“How do we even know if he is home?” Seren asks.

-“He has no more countries to conquer; his war is finally over. He might not require sleep anymore but I bet he has to recharge after returning home.” Alice answers.

Seren ponders a moment then asks, “How are we going to get in? Security could be tight?”

“Can your hologram be reformatted to blend in with an environment?” Alice asks.

Seren checks his programming then says, “It might work at a quick glance, however it will not be able to cover both of us. If they take a second look they will know someone is there.”

“You will have to move fast then!”

“Me?” Seren shouts

Alice reiterates, “You’re better suited to download Hitler’s memories. It would take me much longer.”

“Yes, but you can protect yourself if you are caught. I am programmed for research not combat!”

“Fine, I’ll do it.” Alice concedes, “Now which way?”

“Superior officer’s quarters are on this street to the left.”

Alice turns the corner and slowly proceeds down the street. “Which one is it?” Just then she realizes the entire block of houses is in actuality one heavily armored house. It takes up three stories all the way across a full city street. Alice notices the Sentinels standing guard every five feet on each level. She continues down the street as inconspicuously as she can and turns a corner to go down an unattended street out of the sightlines of the Sentinels.

She pulls over to the curb and asks Seren to change into Robot-mode.

 Seren complies then she asks him to reformat his holographic cloaking device. Seren does as he is asked then removes the small piece of hardware and hands it to Alice. Her armor stretches into position and she takes the cloaking device hooking it to her belt. She presses a button on the front of the cloaking device and the image of the building next to her overtakes her form blending in ‘almost’ seamlessly with the environment. “How does it look?” She asks Seren.

“Meh… It looks okay. Just be quick in there, if they start looking for you they will see you.”

“Understood” Alice says with a nod, she walks down the street within sight of the Sentinels and the cloaking device keeps changing her form to what-ever is beside her. The Sentinels do not see her and Alice breathes a sigh of relief.

She walks down the street to an entrance hoping the hologram keeps her concealed. As she gets within sixty feet of the main entrance she is aware of two things:

One: the disguise is working perfectly, and two: she cannot get through the door without drawing attention to herself. She looks up to the balcony and sees a door without a guard. With a quick burst from her rocket pack she is propelled through the air landing gracefully on the balcony of the second level.

The brief flare up of the rocket pack catches the Sentinels attention but they can’t figure out what it was and it disappears too quickly for them to spend too much time thinking about it.

Alice stands in front of a door on the terrace pondering how to get in when suddenly the door slides open.

 A Sentinel walks outside to investigate an odd sound. Alice’s muscles stiffen as this Sentinel almost walks over her. She maneuvers out of the way realizing how well the holographic cloak is working.

She walks through the doorway and the doors slide shut behind her. She sees a computer monitor and keypad on the wall. She turns back to the doorway she entered and presses a button on the wall to lock the door and quickly goes to the computer. The room only has one chair connected to the wall with several electrical cables; this chair is facing a wall with a giant swastika banner. The computer is in the far wall along with a second entrance. She touches the space bar to activate the computer. Skillfully she navigates her way to a search engine and looks up technological achievements of the Cyborg legion. Too much information comes up that Alice remembers from actual history, nothing seams added or out of place. She refines her search to the origins of cybernetic implants and it says, ‘Classified information – see mainframe’

Alice types in a question concerning the location of this mainframe.

 The computer responds by showing her a map. Her suit takes a picture of the map for quick reference. Alice hears a noise and quickly turns the monitor off.

The front door of this room slides open and a Sentinel walks in. Alice sneaks past this Sentinel and exits to the hallway. The door slides shut behind her sealing her out in the hall.

A large opening is in the center of a round hallway with a landing surrounding all three levels. There is a crystal chandelier suspended over a black-and-white tiled floor with several-statues.

 Alice walks out on the landing of the second level.

She reaches up and stabs her dagger into the molding of the third level’s landing. She pulls herself up to the third level; quietly she crawls over the banister and proceeds to the room the map indicated has the mainframe. “How odd.” She thought of there not being any Sentinels on this level.

Alice approaches the door she needs to pass-through but sees that a retinal-scanner is the lock-and-key.

 She unsheathes her sword and sticks it in the break in the center of the metal doorway. With a twist of her wrist the door slides open.

 Sliding left to right the door pries apart like the fangs of some foul beast. Once the doors clear all she can see in this room is darkness except for three small lights on the far wall. She enters the room and her eyes adjust to the lack of light, it is then that she notices one of the lights is emanating from an unconscious Adolf Hitler.

As quietly as she can she approaches the other two lights emanating from his computer. She activates it and plugs in a flash drive. She downloads Hitler’s memories from his first implants to ‘today’.  Nervously she waits for the download to complete when she takes a closer look at Hitler recharging in his throne.

She scans the technical components of his face and realizes he has a micro disc behind his metal eye. The download is complete and Alice removes the flash-drive and places it in a pouch on her belt. She then comes closer to Hitler; she touches his metal eye and half of his face opens. She reaches in and ejects a micro disk.

As Alice puts her fingers on the disk, Hitler’s human eye opens. Alice takes the disk and Hitler yells for his guards. She unsheathes her sword and swings it at his neck. Hitler’s head falls to the ground and lets out a loud, high pitch, electronic screech after it lands alerting the entire satellite link up. Alice runs out the door into the hallway.

Sentinels come charging towards Alice from both directions. She ignites her rocket pack and flies to the top of the chandelier as the Sentinels open fire at her. She raises her arm and fires a laser blast at the closest Sentinel.

Several Sentinels converge on the ground floor beneath, firing up at her. Alice takes her sword and cuts the attachment holding the chandelier up. She rides it down firing at Sentinels on all three levels on the way.

As the ground rapidly approaches her, she ignites her rocket pack and flies towards the front door as the chandelier crashes to the ground. She takes a Temporal Disk out of its pouch and flings it at the front door. The door vanishes just in time for her to fly through it.

Two Sentinels by the entrance move in to stop her escape. She shoots one and slices the other without hesitation. She lands on the ground outside Hitler’s home and begins to run. “Seren! Let’s get out of here!” She yells in frenzy!

Seren, who has patiently waited by the same house she left him, converts to hover-cycle-mode. Alice jumps on board and speeds off down the street at maximum velocity. Every Sentinel in the vicinity come after them, heavily armed helicopters take off in search of them. The Sentinels fire shots and a few of them hit Alice and Seren.

 Alice is protected by her armor but loses her holographic image; Seren is hurt but loses no speed. Alice drives as fast as she can towards the tunnel that she had originally entered.

 As she enters the tunnel she sees ‘herself’, and Ryland riding a motorcycle exiting the other side of the tunnel.  She doesn’t see the ShadowGate.  (Because you can’t see the backside of it) however she knows exactly where it is. She speeds towards the invisible ShadowGate and vanishes. The Guardian closes the ShadowGate with Alice and Seren safely back at Vaulkner.