CONTINUUM Serrano Point: 2028

CHAPTER XI

-Tuesday, August 15 2028 (10:17)

Serrano Point

“So far Hess thinks he’s found about fifteen people who were somehow knowingly involved,” Derek said as he and Savannah made their way to her office. “He thinks there might be a few more, but unless the ones we have start talking we probably won’t find everyone.”

“I think it will probably take more than one or two people to kill me,” Savannah said. “We don’t need to find them all. How’s our cover story going?”

“People in Hydro Lab IV seem to have questions, but every where else people seem to be buying it.”

“How are our people doing?”

“Ah, Sergeant Choi will be sent back to Serrano Point in a few days. It will take a few weeks, but he should make a full recovery. Private Grutina was hit in the right hand with a plasma rifle, which I suppose still makes her fairly lucky. She’s pretty much lost her small, ring, and middle fingers, and while her doctor thinks she can keep what’s left of her hand, it’s questionable how much her other two fingers will recover. Now, she’s left handed, so again it could have been worse, but…”

“Nine dead and two wounded, and that’s only if you don’t count the ones who were trying to kill us. It’s hard to imagine how this could have been worse,” Savannah shook her head. “Well, yes it is, but still, I didn’t see this coming.”

“No,” Derek agreed. “So what do we do now?”

“I’m promoting you to full Colonel; you’ll take over for Ellis. Have Pinington promoted to Lieutenant Colonel and Hess take over as acting commander when he gets back. We continue to build the TDT and wait,” They reached an elevator. After a few moments the doors opened and they stepped into the elevator, along with Savannah’s guards.

“And what do we do with the people who tried to kill you?”

“I don’t know.”

“We have to do something.”

“I know. But… what? The problem is, I understand what they did. Why they did it. I’m not even entirely sure it was wrong…”

“Ma’am, they tried to kill you.” Derek said incredulously.

“Yeah, I know, I was there. But, what I’m doing…”

“Are you having second thoughts about trusting the machine?” The elevator came to a stop, its doors opening upon their floor.

“No,” Savannah said as her guards moved out into the corridor. “Well yes, I mean…” she and Derek left the elevator, “I’m not going to stand here and say I can’t possibly imagine what could go wrong, but that’s not what I’m talking about. If we do this, our lives will have never happened. At least not the way we remember them,” Savannah stopped walking. “We will, on some level, cease to exist.”

“What, you don’t wish things had been different, that your life had been different?”

“Of course I do, but fore better or worse, it’s not like I’ll be around to appreciate it when it is, if that makes any since.”

Derek started to nod, then shook his head. “No, it doesn’t.”

Savannah turned with a snort and continued walking. “Lock them up. There’s really not much else we can do with them, is there?”

Derek hesitated for a moment. “Ma’am,” he said slowly, “under the circumstances, we should be willing to consider other courses of action-“

“No Colonel Reese. I’m not going to have them… we’ll talk about this latter,” Derek nodded and they turned the last corner to Savannah’s office where they saw both Catherine and Hellic waiting for them, along with Catherine’s ‘escort’.

“If you’ll excuse me Ma’am,” Derek said, then turned and left.

Savannah walked up to Hellic. “You have news?”

“Yes Commander,” the engineer responded. Savannah nodded, opening her door and motioning the two of them in. Following them she turned on the lights and went over to sit behind her desk. “We think we’ve finalized the plans for the TDT.”

“You think?”

“Well, I mean we can’t be sure that nothing will come up but,” he glanced at Catherine, “as best as we can tell, it should work.”

“How long?”

“It should be operational in about two weeks. Maybe less.”

Savannah nodded, then looked at Catherine. “How long until John Henry contacts us?”

“I can’t be sure,” Catherine responded.

“Take a guess.”

Catherine shrugged. “It could be any day now. Do you mind me asking about what happened at the Hydroponics Lab?”

Savannah stared at her. “Yes.”

“I heard that a terminator was able to infiltrate the base,” Catherine said undeterred.

“Basically, yeah. We try to prefect our security systems, but this wouldn’t be the first time one managed to sneak through. The results usually aren’t quite so spectacular, but…” Savannah shrugged.

Catherine starred at her. She thought that her ‘daughter’ was being strangely flippant, especially considering that several people had died. She snuck a glance at Hellic, and while her ability to read human facial expressions could be less then perfect, she thought that maybe he agreed.

“If there’s nothing else you can go,” Savannah said. “Hellic, if you could stay for a moment there’s something I’d like to talk to you about.”

Catherine narrowed her eyes at her, but after a moment nodded. “Of course. Mr. Hellic, I’ll wait for you at the end of the corridor,” Catherine glanced at Savannah as if to see if there would be a problem with this, but she gave no reaction, so after a moment the shapeshifter turned and left.

“Ma’am,” Hellic said after a moment, “If you don’t mind my asking, do we know how the terminator was able to-“

“There wasn’t a terminator,” Savannah said. “That was just a cover story.”

“Then… what happened?”

“Ellis. He and Smith apparently had a problem with some resent developments, so they recruited other people to help them and set a trap to lure me to Hydro Lab IV. Obviously we can’t have it going around that my second in command tried to have me killed, so we made up a story about a terminator.”

“I…” Hellic paused for a moment. “Why didn’t you want Weaver to know about this?”

“I have my reasons. They may not be good ones, but, I don’t know how she would react, and I don’t want to find out. It’s not that I’m afraid she might become violent or anything, I just don’t want to have that particular conversation.”

Hellic nodded. “Yes Ma’am. Is there anything else?”

“No, just, anything you want to talk to me about?”

“Not that I can think of,” Hellic responded. “Well, actually, some of my people are getting curious about what it is we’re building. I know it’s classified and all, but is there anything you want me to tell them?”

Savannah thought for a moment, then shook her head. “Tell them that ignorance is bliss.”