by Danny, The Eurostar, TheTimeTrust and I'm Not Mister Mxypltk
La Perdita International Airport:
Danny Hearn was waiting at the airport an hour later. Next to him stood Mick Harrison and Marv Velo. Mick was staring intently at a German tourist brochure. Danny reached into his pocket and pulled out his mobile phone.
He remembered when he had got this a few months ago now, not long after they'd relocated to the island. Pete Glover had paid for them, and Kit Piper arranged them, and now just about everyone on the team had one. Nobody paid them much attention except Danny. They all viewed the phones as a perfectly normal way to keep in touch. To be placed in pockets and forgotten until you need to make an urgent call, or order a pizza. But Danny... when they first got them, Danny had found them strange, bulky. Yet another space-consuming thing to carry around, along with his passport, and wallet, and other stuff he had never been used to.
He remembered a time when he could place a tiny earplug into his ear and operate it with voice commands. And he could talk to anyone in the world with it.
This was one of thousands of tiny irritations that had bugged Danny ever since he arrived in this time. The mundane details of everyday life that had made life unbearable, that had just about driven him insane. He turned the phone over and over in his hand. This thing had driven him nuts for months. But now he barely noticed it.
Looking up Grimm's number in the phone's memory, he hit the button to dial. After waiting a moment, he was diverted to Grimm's voicemail.
"Grimm. Message. Beep," came the recorded greeting. Danny waited for the beep, then began to speak.
"Grimm? It's Danny. I'm leaving this message with the field leaders of both missions, so I'll be talking to Chance in a second as well. I just wanted to ask you to check in with me on arrival. Then let me know the second you find anything... or, you know, anything important happens that I should know about. Not to sound like a control freak or anything, but... well, I'd just like us all to keep in touch. And I'd like an idea of exactly how we're all doing. You know? Right. Okay. Talk to you later."
Danny hung up, then dialed Kristofer Schanz's number. After a few rings, there was an answer.
"Hello?"
"Kris? It's Danny."
"Hi. What can I do for you?"
"I just wanted to ask you to check in with me as soon as anything happens. I'm trying to keep us all in touch. And I want to gather an idea of how the mission's going. I've asked Grimm, now I just wanted to ask you, since you're leading your mission and all."
"I am?"
"You are."
"Okay then."
"Okay. So you'll give me a call when anything happens?"
"Sure. Not a problem."
"Thanks. Oh, and Kris...?"
"Yes?"
"I'd like you to keep an eye on Ed. He's seemed... I don't know... stressed out or something lately. Just... keep an eye on him."
"Sure thing."
"Thanks. Okay, I'll talk to you later."
"Bye. Good luck."
"You too."
Edulcore Cicciotto:
"Piloting the UFO was smoother and easier, Chance," I say. Go go go go go go, straight to south.
"The probability engine we salvaged works the same, Ed, but the structure of the hovercraft is way less advanced. It can't reach light speed, it can't turn at right angles, it can't do any of the marvels the UFO did. But at least it works off of the Earth's magnetic field, and that means it doesn't need any fuel. That's good for missions like this one."
Go go go go go. "And it also means that everybody can pilot it without any special preparation." Go go go go go.
"Well, everybody with enough self-control to concentrate exclusively on the mental commands. I wouldn't let Mick pilot this ship, I think..."
Go go go go go go. "Or Daniela. She seems to look miles away... hundreds of miles away each day that passes." Go go go go go go.
"Right. I nearly forgot about her. No, to tell you the truth, I totally forgot her until you mentioned her. She wasn't around lately. Do you know where she was?"
Go go go go go. Turn three degree west. "She was right in the factory all the time. Funny you didn't see her."
"Yes. Funny. And strange."
Go upward. Ten thousands meters. Radar shield on. "Tell me about your MBL." Now go go go go go.
"Why?"
Go go go go go go go. "Because from the little you said before, it resembles my Revolutionaries much more than this MBL." Go go go go go go.
"I... at the moment I wouldn't like to talk about that."
Go go go go go. Go downward, in the cloud formation. "You seemed always happy to talk about your universe." Slow down. Go go go go go go.
"I know... but Velo said something that made me wonder if... if I really came from another universe... or if I am instead from this universe, a clone of this Schanz, with false memories..."
Go go go go go go. "Don't doubt about your memories. I remember perfectly my life in your universe." Go go go go go.
Chance is staring at me. Oh, God, what have I just said?
La Perdita International Airport, early afternoon:
Kit Piper paced back and forth as he watched the plane leave that was carrying Danny, Velo, Mick and Tobias to Berlin. He couldn't believe how slow they had been just when he needed them to get out of his hair long enough for him to raid the Hero Revolution Fund for the cash he needed today. And Danny's group had the longest trip ahead of them out of all three groups, having to cross the Atlantic Ocean and all. He wondered briefly why they didn't have M'xy just beam them over to Berlin immediately, but put that thought out of his mind. He had a man to meet here.
Kit continued to sweat profusely as he waited in the airport for Gambini's man to show up with his daughters. His palms were sweaty, and the briefcase he held in his right hand felt heavier by the second. His knees were shaking, and he was racked with guilt over having stolen from the guys and abusing their trust so badly.
Oh well, he thought to himself, maybe I can make it up to them later somehow. But the only thing that's important right now is getting my daughters back. Nothing else can matter as long as those bastards have them.
On the plane heading for Berlin:
"So," Velo said to Danny, who was sitting next to him on the plane, "what do we do once we get to Berlin?"
Mick, in the seat next to Velo and Danny, looked back to his teammates. "We get off the plane and kick some Nazi butt," Mick said.
"We're a bit late for that, Mick," Danny said. "We're going as soon as possible to the Berlin University library to meet this..." Danny took a piece of paper from his pocket with some addresses, a phone number, and a name written on it. "...Dr. Seltsamliebe... so he can tell us how to find Netzel's tomb."
"Ah," Velo replied.
"And when do we get to kick some Nazi butt?" Mick asked.
"We don't," Danny answered.
Mick mumbled something and directed his view to the front.
The home of Dr. Henry Quantos, North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada:
Henry Quantos took another sip of his English Breakfast tea and smiled as he thought about Barbara Townsend yet again. For far too long now he'd believed himself to be too old to get involved with another woman, and yet once this beautiful redhead (it always seemed to be a redhead with him for some reason) came into his life, he'd found a new passion. He was in his early sixties, but he felt like a young man again when he was around her.
"Time to get back to work," he finally said, tapping a few keys on his computer to log into the MBL Consulting database once again. Dr. Quantos was always ready to keep the team informed of any information they needed, and each field team could contact him at any time they needed by using the specially built communicators each was given for the missions, which tracked their location with a built-in GPS system.
Mandelovia whined at him.
"Mandy, what are you whining about, girl?" he said, bending down and petting her head. "I just took you for a walk half an hour ago." At the word walk, the dog began wagging her tail heavily and fidgeting in excitement. Finally she couldn't take it any more and barked at him. Henry laughed and started wrestling her for the next few minutes. Finally, he got up and said, "Okay, Mandy, I'll take you for a walk."
He clicked the leash onto her collar and went back to the front door of his townhouse. Mandelovia always seemed to get what she wanted.
As he shut his door and took Mandy around the block, he failed to notice that part of his screen was blinking red.