The Great Altruist (43 page)

       
    
Roger stepped forward and patted Val's hand. “I'm not worried. You've
not let
me
down.”

       
    
Val smiled and walked off to her quarters with a skip in her step. Roger watched her leave, removed a locket from inside his coat, and examined the picture of his wife inside.
Just a little while longer, my dear
.

Chapter 5

       
    
Archer sat quietly in his office reading over schematics for the expedition vessel under construction. Roger knocked on the door’s frame and entered, as there were no doors in the office deck. “Everything on schedule?”

       
    
Arched looked up suddenly and jumped a little. “Yes, very much so. Sorry, you scared me a bit.”

       
    
“Well, you've been working for weeks on this with little to no sleep; I figured you'd like a ten minute chat just to change up your day.”

       
    
“Oh, sure,” Archer said as he set his papers on the desk. “Anything in particular on your mind?”

       
    
“No, just usual status report stuff.”

       
    
“The retrofit is going just fine. I expect it will only be another day before we're ready for launch.”

       
    
“Really? That soon?”

       
    
“Yes, I don't know where you've found these men and women, but they are the hardest working group I've ever seen.”

       
    
Roger smiled and nodded, accepting the complement. “People tend to adjust the effort they expend based on the compensation. The people on your team are paid well enough to move faster than light if it were possible.”

       
    
“Actually, that's something I've discovered you might find interesting. As you're probably aware, time and space are interrelated. Well, a lot of what has gone into that time machine can be adjusted to make the vessel travel through space much faster than it does now – breaking the speed of light shouldn't be impossible.”

       
    
“I imagine that would take some time to do.”

       
    
“Yes, it would,” Archer said. “But seeing as you're using my current work for peaceful purposes, I see no problem in giving you my other work if you feel it may be of use.”

       
    
“I'm sure it would, and thank you.”

       
    
Archer pushed his chair back from the table and stood up. He came around to the front of the desk and pulled up a chair beside Roger. “My friend, we've gotten to know each other pretty well these last few months, right?”

       
    
“I trust you implicitly, Doctor,” he responded.

       
    
Archer smiled. “It's that trust that compels me to share a secret I have been keeping from you and I want you to know sooner than later.”

       
    
“You can tell me anything, friend.”

       
    
“The time machine contains a log that tracks how and when it is used. It tracks markers in the stream of time that make it possible to find someone who is lost or unable to return on their own. I wanted you to know this because there was a trip taken that the log never tracked.”

       
    
Roger sat expressionless as he feared he might have to explain why the time machine was used without Archer's knowledge.

       
    
“You see, Roger,
I
used the time machine a few weeks ago. I'll be honest and tell you what happened but you need to know that it was only out of
curiosity. I never would have betrayed your trust if it wasn't for all the negative talk from the crew.
”

       
    
“What talk?” Roger asked.

       
    
“My team, when they stop talking shop, tends to complain and paint a negative view of the future they all hold – almost like they're hiding something from me. I grew scared and wanted to know what the future holds for us. What I saw frightened me. A thousand years from now, the earth is just a desolate rock; I saw no people, no animals, and no life at all save a measly cockroach! All my life I've known of man's tendency to corrupt, but there has to be a better way.”

       
    
“That's why this mission is so important, Doctor. When we bring back what the future knows and apply it here, the world will be forced to see that all of our worst nightmares don't
have
to come true.”

       
    
“And it was that notion that's kept me on course these past couple weeks.”

       
    
Roger sensed the amount of guilt his friend carried over his secret, so he reached out and placed his hand on Archer's shoulder. “Rest assured I'm not mad at you. As for the crew, I know they can be a little negative about humanity's current direction – it's one of the motivators for bringing about change. Some of them, scared of what you saw becoming a reality, have suggested replacing the whole system.” Roger watched Archer's reaction carefully, as this was not the first time the organization's true mission was hypothetically suggested.

       
    
Archer shook his head in disagreement. “I think the expedition to find advanced knowledge is the best course. The apathy in the world doesn't require starting over; it needs a jump start.”

       
    
“I admire your optimism, Doctor. I'm hopeful for that result or else I wouldn't have funded this operation. My only real reason for secrecy goes back to what I told you the day we met: the governments of the world would never permit us to travel through time if they knew it was possible. Most likely, the very presence of such an invention would trigger a world war. Given the war going on now, the last thing the world needs is more fuel on the proverbial fire.

       
    
“And I appreciate you telling me of your little side adventure. If nothing else, I hope it has helped spur you on to the goal.”

       
    
Archer finally smiled. “It has actually. I feel ready to begin, as long as you're happy with the experts we've got now.”

       
    
“Our success depends very much on the expedition team, and I think the fifty teams of two, each from their respective fields of expertise, are well equipped to find what the rest of us need.”

       
    
“Good. Then I'll start making preparations.”       
       

       
    
Only a few months after John Archer was fired by his homeland's government, he stood a hundred meters beneath the surface of the ocean on a deck of a rig he now called home. In front of him stood the craft that could send him to prison for the rest of his life if his connection to it was ever revealed. The ship contained, at its heart (and its very reason for existence), the device that would soon change the course of humanity.

       
    
Roger and the ship's crew had come for the grand tour. The ship took up most of the hanger that was built for its construction. It resembled in shape a stealth fighter jet, but it was many times its size. Roger, although present for nearly
every day of its assembly, still stood in awe of its completion.

       
    
As Archer presented the craft to everyone in attendance – the crew of the decks, Roger, and (unknown to Archer) all of the celibates except Val – it was evident he took great pride in the work he had done. The vessel was cramped, as everyone had come to expect since the very platform they lived on was exceedingly cozy, but there still seemed to be plenty of room for the crew to mingle about.

       
    
The craft was two stories tall, with each floor of the vessel serving a very specific purpose. The top floor existed for the crew of the ship only, while the bottom floor was mainly for the use of the civilians. The one peculiarity of the bottom floor that surprised only Archer when the request was made was that there were no separate rooms or showers for men and women. There were exactly twenty-one rooms on the top floor for the celibates; each room had a door with a lock and its own bathroom. Not so the bottom floor, which Roger insisted be kept open. The only doors were to be on the bathroom stalls. This was clearly for the purpose of encouraging procreation, a process more likely if the men and women were given little to no personal privacy.

       
    
The command center of the ship was one of the only rooms with a view. From the bridge of the vessel, all corners of the craft could be monitored – with the exception of one room, which Roger demanded contain no surveillance equipment. He never gave Archer a reason, and Archer never asked.

       
    
Archer watched nervously as Roger sat in the captain's chair on the bridge and surveyed the vessel.

       
    
“You've truly outdone yourself, Doctor,” he finally said, to which Archer finally relaxed.

       
    
“I do have one other matter we'll need to discuss, but it's one we should probably have alone.”

       
    
“Understood,” Roger replied. To the crew: “You're all free to leave. Thank you all for your time.”

       
    
Once the ship was empty besides Archer and Roger, Archer sat down at one of the communication stations on the bridge. “We need a place to hide this thing.”

       
    
Roger nodded as though he was prepared for Archer's complaint. “Are you concerned for the ship's safety?”

       
    
“Well, an object this big can cause a pretty catastrophic temporal wake as it enters the stream of time. It would probably be better to leave this time from an isolated location.”

       
    
“What did you have in mind?”

       
    
“Well, the best place would be on the ocean floor.”

       
    
Roger shook his head. “Unless you've built a submersible as well, I don't see how that could work.”

       
    
Archer reached into his pocket and removed a small device that looked like a wristwatch. He tossed it to Roger, which made him flinch. “This is better than a sub.”

       
    
“What does it do?” Roger asked.

       
    
“In a nutshell, it's a transport device. Remember how I mentioned travel through space at great speed as well as time?”

       
    
Roger nodded as he fastened it on his wrist.

       
    
“This device, once placed on your wrist, marries itself to your DNA and allows you to transport to any location on earth – well, it might work elsewhere, we've only tried it on Earth.”

       
    
“Hm,” Roger muttered as he played with the device without pushing any buttons. “Then the bottom of the ocean it is.”