August 10, 2020
"Agent Christophe, what is going on?" Agent Thomas Brady barked.
Inside the laboratory a small red light was blinking on one of the consoles. Accompanying it was a shrill, beeping alarm.
"Give me a moment," Agent Tyler Christophe responded as his eyes darted from his tablet to the large screen on the wall. "I'm trying to figure that out."
Agents Samuel Thomas and Lisa Monroe were also scouring the machinery, running internal diagnostics and checking reports.
"I'm waiting!" barked Agent Brady.
Tyler pushed an override button silencing the alarm, though the red light continued its flashing. "I'm not finding any anomalies in the timeline." He motioned to Monroe and Thomas. "From what I can see it doesn't look like there is any issue with the machinery."
Agent Lisa Monroe agreed with a nod. "Everything's coming back perfect. No issues on our part," she said.
Agent Brady walked across the crowded room to Tyler who was still tinkering with things. "Well what was that, then?" he asked.
"Could have been a number of things, sir." Tyler explained. "Easiest explanation would be a simple equipment error. A false reading of sorts. With all the diagnostics coming back A-OK, that would make sense." He paused, consulting his tablet. "My next guess would be that this is all due to a small fluctuation in the timeline."
"Due to what?" Brady asked.
"Well, looking at the status of her time jumps it looks like Agent DuPont's most recent one brought her to December of 1980," Tyler began. "This would be the first jump where she, herself, would have already been born and would be existing in her correct time. My guess," he continued, "would be that the machinery could have picked up that there are currently two Holly DuPont's existing within the same timeframe."
Agent Brady let out a small sigh. "And this isn't something that we took into account already?"
Agent Samuel Thomas jumped in, "It's not that we haven't taken it into account," he explained. "It's just that with this being the first mission to include multiple jumps, this is something we haven't had to encounter before."
Tyler nodded in agreement, "Exactly. The diagnostics coming back show no issues. Like I said it's either a machinery fluke, or it's the fact that Holly is now in a time where she already exists." Tapping the screen of his tablet and comparing it to the screen on the equipment next to him, he added, "If it happens again we'll know it's something more, but as for right now I wouldn't be concerned."
Agent Brady nodded and walked back across the lab. Tyler turned to face the equipment, his back now facing the rest of the crew. He briefly closed his eyes, letting out a small sigh of relief.
••••
December 8, 1980
Holly sat on the bed inside her room at the Olcott Hotel. Both the television and the radio were on, and she flipped between news channels searching for information. The sound of sirens were constant outside. From her window Holly could just barely make out the scene down the street. What had started as one police car soon turned into multiple, then came the ambulances, and even a fire truck. No one seemed to be leaving the scene. That had to be a good sign.
It had been twenty minutes since the first gunshot rang out. The 11:00 news was halfway done before any mention of the shooting.
We come to you now with breaking news out of the Upper West Side.
YOU ARE READING
Borrowed Time: Saving John Lennon - A Beatles Fanfic
FanficHolly DuPont spent the majority of her life wondering what things would be like if John Lennon had not died on that fateful night in December of 1980. As an adult working for the CIA, she suddenly finds herself involved in a secret project in which...
