Timelost

Ice hung from his fingertips. The only movement came from his eye as it swiveled in place, scanning his surroundings for any sign of the radiation signatures InterFor left behind as they traveled. His second eye, this one a fleshy remnant of his long lost humanity, had long since been blinded, however he lacked the will and parts to fix it. Standing on the endless ice, the wanderer waited in hopeless abandon.

The cold was unbearable. The exposed sinew that wrapped around his metallic bones was exposed to the unending winds, but the wanderer remained silent through the pain. The wind whipped around his jaw, biting into what little red flesh was left on his face. The layer of blood frozen into a thin sheet across the stretched muscles did little to help against the gale. Shifting upwards, the wind snatched his Stetson Gus into the sky. His fingers cracked as icicles fell from them. He caught the fleeing hat, then fit it snugly around his scalp. Pulling his duster around him, he continued to scan for any signs of life.

A flash of x-rays to the north made the wanderer cock his head. Tiny gears furiously spun within his eye to focus on the disturbance. The wanderer coughed up a viscous spatter of oil and bile as he began to lurch towards the signal. The mixture froze in his teeth, but he ignored it. He hoped the noise of the storm would hide the sounds of scraping metal as his body fought through the wind and ice, unused to the motion after his long bout of stillness. He couldn't be certain if he had stood in this spot for six months or two years, but whichever was the case, he had almost grown numb to the cold, yet there were parts of him that still felt its chilling touch. His fingers curled around his revolver. If InterFor really had arrived he would need all of his remaining bullets.

The wanderer crept over the frozen wasteland, fighting his way uphill through the wind. The ground sloped upwards like the swell of a wave. He figured it had once actually been a wave, now frozen in place on a plane filled with identical icy structures. He never knew where he would go next; his only destination was perpetually ‘away.’ If they did catch him it would be over, his running hiding, his stasis, all of it would have been in vain. But although hopelessness had long since been set into the metallic bones of the wanderer, some spark inside him still believed InterFor could still be stopped.

As he neared the apex of the wave crest, he crouched down. His eye scanned the surroundings for traces of radiation. As he neared, he spied the source of the x-rays. Its shape was strange, too short to be the imprint signature left behind by an InterFor agent. It could be a remote drone he mused, but no… InterFor never sent single drones before. He lightly touched the scarred tissue where his nose had been. Besides, they like to take a more hands on approach.

Still hidden, the wanderer turned his vision from x-ray to infrared. His mouth twitched upwards in satisfaction: the infrared spectrum proved to be fruitful. Instead of the smear of x-rays that travel signatures left, the wander now had a full view of… whatever it was. Seen through the infrared spectrum he couldn’t be sure it wasn’t a person, but it didn’t look like any person he had seen before. Removing his revolver completely from its holster, the wanderer switched to a more comfortable visible light and peeked out from behind the crest of the wave.

What he saw was unusual but did not take him by surprise. He had experienced enough weirdness in his timestream alone to desensitize him to the otherworldly. It was a small creature, maybe two and a half to three feet tall. The wanderer did a quick calculation before settling on exactly 2.74 feet. In the sparse patches where there was no fur, the creature’s skin was gray, but not in a pallid dead way. Thick ears sprouted from above the creature’s disproportionately large head, these too covered in fur. Its mouth could only be described as something resembling a small beak. Two large round eyes were looking curiously around the frozen sea. And it had wings. They were relatively small, covered in fur like the rest of the creature, though the wanderer suspected they could unfurl to a greater length if they were not busy sheltering the little critter from the cold. He stood upright on two stubby legs crowned in blue hoofs and in his hands he clutched a cylindrical device that crackled with residual energy. Flitting between x-ray and visible spectrum, the wanderer instantly recognized it as a travel spire. He slowly raised his pistol to face this intruder.

The creature looked up at him. It dropped the spire, made an expression as close to a grin as a beak could make, and cheerily waved at the wanderer. “Hello!” it shouted. The creature’s voice could barely be heard above the wind.

The wanderer paused. With a deft agility and a screech of scraping metal the wanderer hurdled the crest of the wave before sliding down to meet the creature, revolver pointed at its skull. The creature took a step back in shock, then looked up in awe at the wanderer who towered over him. A twinkle of joy sparked through the creature’s eye.

“You’re the Timelost Wanderer, aren’t you?” it asked shyly. The wanderer looked down menacingly at the impish creature. He was more than double its size. This and the amalgamation of frost coated sinew and steel that interlocked across his open chest should have made the creature at least a little fearful. But it did not. He smiled up at the wanderer, calmly waiting for a reply. The wanderer exhaled a raspy snarl of air that billowed and hung in the frigid air. Then he nodded once.

“Oh good. I was worried that I’d gotten to the wrong place!” The creature’s voice was slightly squeaky, but had a quality of joy to it. The little imp picked the spire off the ground and taking the wanderer by surprise, offered him the device.

“I made this for you!” The wanderer stared in disbelief at the offering. How did he find me? And he’s offering me his spire? What is with this creature? Without taking his eyes off the strange monster, the wanderer produced a similar spire from the inside of his duster. He shook his head. The creature looked at the wanderer quizzically.

“Are you able to speak?” asked the creature. The wanderer paused, then shook his head. “Oh my, I’m so sorry. I can fix that if you’d like, but for now are you versed in any sign languages?” replied the creature cheerily. The wanderer raised the bony plate where an eyebrow once sat, then he looked down at his hands. In his left was the spire, in his right was the revolver. He figured it was unlikely that whatever this was, it was from InterFor. The wanderer placed the spire back inside his coat and re-holstered his weapon cautiously. His joints creaking he signed out his first question; “Who are you?”

The creature grinned again. “I’m Skeef! I’m a gremlin!” he voiced proudly.

“Not possible. Gremlins were erased. How are you here?” signed the wanderer, before shaking his hands and refocusing himself.

“No. How did you find me?” he asked. As he continued to sign he noticed that Skeef was becoming fidgety. The gremlin picked up the spire and began to adjust the bits and parts that protruded from the delicate object. Skeef did not look up from his work as he answered.

“Well, I built this spire specifically to pinpoint your spatial and temporal position, then using the triangulation of…” The wanderer grabbed Skeef’s shoulder roughly, staring at him with an intensely furrowed brow. He built one? Maybe this thing really was a Gremlin… the wanderer mused. Spires were highly controlled by InterFor. You couldn’t just build one on a whim, much less program it to find a specific person. The idea was lunacy. The wanderer had barely gotten away with stealing his spire, but to imagine building one from scratch…

“What do you mean you built it?” the wanderer signed with intensity.

“I… I just built it, I guess,” said the gremlin. “I built it for you! That’s why I’m here.”

The wanderer looked at Skeef with confusion and wonder. Then suddenly he spun his head around to hear the crackling sound of a spire materialization. The wanderer picked Skeef up with one arm and began to sprint. Making sure he wouldn’t trip, the wanderer rolled his eye backwards in his skull, refocusing on the x-ray spectrum to confirm his suspicions. Four InterFor agents were materializing on the ice plane behind him. Slinging the gremlin over his back, the wanderer slid down the canyon of a large wave. Skidding to a halt at the trough of the frozen wave, the wanderer turned to look at Skeef, who was trembling.

“Did you tell anyone where you were jumping?” he signed quickly.

The gremlin shook his head. He looked around nervously. The wanderer squatted to look Skeef directly in the face. The gremlin’s large black eyes stared hopefully at the wanderer’s glowing red iris and milky blind corpse of his human eye. Of course he wouldn’t tell anyone, especially not InterFor the wanderer thought, irritated at his automatic distrust in the creature.

“They’re here for you,” signed the wanderer.

“How do you know they aren’t here for you? I’m here for you,” replied the little creature nervously. The wanderer gave the briefest suggestion of a smirk.

“Because if they were after me, they’d have brought a few hundred more agents.” Skeef’s eyes widened in awe, an action which the wanderer found unsettling considering their large size to begin with. The wind began to settle down, forcing the wanderer to slow the movements of his signing. Too much noise and InterFor could locate them and catch them off guard. The wanderer placed a finger to his teeth and gums. He had no lips, but he hoped the gremlin would understand the need for their silence. Skeef complied with his request, closing his beak and readying his hands for signing.

“Is that why you wanted my help?” the wanderer asked the gremlin. Skeef nodded.

“Yes… if I could come with you… there are no gremlins I can turn to” he signed meekly. He looked at the ground in shame and discomfort. The wanderer began signing again before realizing that Skeef was still looking away. Annoyed, he flicked the gremlin on the head before signing his reply.

“I understand,” the wanderer signed. The wanderer paused for a second, collecting his thoughts. He’s like me. Is there a single being InterFor won’t harm? The wanderer readied his hands in apprehension. “Interpol is here. We might be able to give them the slip now, but they control the dominant timestream, so if we jump too often they’ll eventually find us.”

A tear formed in Skeef’s eye. “So you’ll help me?” The gremlins fingers twitched anxiously as he signed. In all the awe he had for the wanderer, it was clear that his fear of InterFor hit harder.

“What would it make me if I didn’t?” he signed. He rolled his eye back to check behind him. They had not become aware of him and Skeef yet. That was good.

“How fast until you can get your spire ready for another jump?” the wanderer asked Skeef. The gremlin looked up at him confused.

“Ready? Why wouldn’t it be ready?” he signed slowly, confused.

“Have you never traveled by spire before this? You need to recharge between every jump,” the wanderer replied. He was stressed. As confident as he was in his abilities to defeat the team of agents, he had been inactive for months before. He was rusty, both physically and mentally, and the gremlin’s complete misunderstanding of spire technology was not helping ease his anxiety. Four InterFor agents could quickly turn into twelve hundred if they called in for backup.

Still the presence of the gremlin was giving him hope. InterFor had blocked the timestream to before their erasure, so the wanderer had never seen one before, but if a gremlin had made it beyond the barrier, what else was possible?

“Not this spire!” The gremlin grinned at the wanderer. His teeth poked out slightly from beneath his beak.

“See I built this one with a self contained temporal jump loop! It circumvents the need for navigational recovery while allowing…” The wanderer waved his hands in front of Skeef to recapture his attention.

“You can explain it later,” signed the wanderer. “We just need to get out of here before InterFor finds out that you’re not alone…” This time it was the wanderer who was cut off. His hand wavered in the air as a wave of expanding blue mirage washed over the pair before continuing on towards the horizon. Skeef placed his hand on the wanderer’s leg and clicked a button on the spire. Nothing happened. The pair looked around at their blue tinted surroundings. The wanderer reached for his gun.

“What is this?” Asked the gremlin. His ears folded slightly inwards. The wanderer turned away from Skeef, his attention fully on the fading x-ray signatures over the wave crest. With one hand he signed, “Temporal cube matrix. Can’t jump.”

Big mistake, he thought. The wanderer had only seen temporal cube matrices a few times before. It was a technology only used by InterFor. This confirmed his suspicions that they were not aware of him. As long as the wanderer and Skeef couldn’t jump, InterFor couldn’t either. Nor could they call for help.

“On my back,” the wanderer commanded. Skeef complied, scrambling up the wanderer’s duster and perching behind his shoulder blades. Moving with caution, the pair began the ascent of the wave crest. As they reached the apex of the wave, the wanderer and Skeef cautiously peeked their heads up to spy on the enemy’s party. Switching to infrared, the wanderer observed that the four agents were suited up and clustered around a large black cube: the cube matrix generator.

The cube itself was vibrating and occasionally sending a jet of blue light off in a semi-random direction. A jet of light passed by Skeef. He stared in wonder as it became clear to him that it was not just a stream, but a small sliver of a picture. Through the jet Skeef could barely make out the image of a roiling sea. Timidly reaching his hand out to the blue jet, Skeef touched the edge of the image. It tickled slightly, then began to waver, the stream growing more unstable, looping back and forth on itself and wrapping around the gremlin’s finger. The wanderer instinctively pulled Skeef’s hand away, but it was too late. The stream snapped back sending a wave of blue light along the jet’s path back to the cube. The cube shook violently. The agents looked up to see the form of the little gremlin disappearing beneath the crest of the ice.

“Fool!” the wanderer signed angrily at Skeef, dragging him below the agent’s line of sight. I forgot how curious these moronic gremlins were supposed to be, the wanderer thought, annoyed. Boots pummeled the ice as the agents raced up the wave. They were approaching fast and wildly lacking caution. I guess they still don’t know I’m here, thought the wanderer as he shoved Skeef aside and clicked back the hammer of his revolver.

The first agent leaped over the crest of the wave. The wanderer hadn’t seen one in a while. The uniform was essentially the same, though it had changed slightly every time the wanderer had a run-in with InterFor. The wanderer wasn’t sure if their technology ever improved with the new suits, but at least it kept things interesting. In exchange for the typical dark gray armor, this agent was clad in white. It was decent camouflage amidst the ice, plus what the wanderer suspected was permafrost plating stopped perception on the infrared spectrum. But as the agent hovered above the wanderer, his white armor clashed against the sky. The agent was in full view of the wanderer.

Assuming his target was the gremlin, the agent had equipped himself with a sizable stun canon. Floating mid-jump above the wanderer he made the split second realization that the gremlin was not the person his weapon was trained on. The panicked blast of the stun cannon hit the wanderer dead on to absolutely no effect. Arcs of residual lighting danced around the wanderer as he pulled the trigger of his revolver. A resounding bang echoed around the frozen sea. If they keep changing the armor, the wanderer mused, why do they never decide to make it bulletproof? The bullet sank past the energy reflectors lining the armor plating, burying itself within the body of the agent. He crumpled on the ice, unmoving.

The footfalls of the agents stopped abruptly. Skeef’s ears perked up hearing three slow whines from the rest of the unseen enemies. He gripped the wanderer’s leg, but was ignored as the wanderer marched to the peak of the wave. Standing tall against the wind he stared down at the three remaining agents, all equipped with pristine gamma rifles. The agents looked past Skeef, their attention only on the wanderer. As icy wind whipped his duster around his skeletal form, his eye glowed red in the dusk lighting. A rifle clattered to the ground, dropped by the nearest agent. He scrambled away, slipping on the ice and sliding on the ground.

The other two agents wasted no time firing two beams of gamma rays from their rifles at the wanderer. As resistant to physical damage as he was, the wanderer was not impervious to the cancer that a blast of gamma radiation would eventually cause his remaining living organs. He scooped Skeef into his arms, pivoting to dodge the beam as it turned the air he had just occupied into a blazing plasma.

Any residual stiffness from the wanderer’s stasis was gone. Leaping towards the nearest agent, the wanderer dodged yet another gamma blast. He felt the heat of the plasma warm the skin of his face that had grown used to the cold. It was an odd sensation, not entirely unpleasant. Dashing his way through the remaining few paces he reached the agent. One punch to her abdomen sent the agent flying across the icy ground. Her armor cracked under the force of the wanderer’s fist. Skeef clung to the wanderer’s back for dear life as the twists and turns of the cyborg threatened to fling him to the icy ground.

A second agent approached the wanderer at a sprint. Narrowly dodging the bullet he shot towards her, she returned fire with a blaze of gamma heated plasma. The wanderer dove to the icy floor as the blast flew over his body. Skeef yelped as he leapt off of the back of the wanderer to avoid what would most likely be his disintegration. Disoriented, the wanderer’s eye spun wildly in its socket attempting to find his target. As his pistol was brutally kicked from his hand he became very aware of where his attacker was: directly on top of him.

He caught the head of the gamma rifle just in time to avert its course as a beam of energy bore a hole through the ice not even two inches from his head. Boiling steam billowed out of the cavity. Increasing his grip on the rifle, the wanderer kicked out at the agent. His foot connected with her shin sending her to her knee. She released the weapon. The wanderer spun the gun around and without a second shot fired a beam of gamma rays into the agent’s torso. She staggered backwards as yellow light danced across her armor. Then she regained her footing and looked down as the light dissipated across her armor.

“Not gonna work, Timelost.” she quipped at him, though he could hear the fear in her voice. As his opponent was attempting to engage him in a verbal banter to which he could not reciprocate, the wanderer took the opportunity to check his blind spots, spinning his eye over in its socket. The first agent was readying her gamma rifle to fire directly at his back.

As the beam exploded out of the weapon, the wanderer slid to the side. The shot hit the other agent square in the jaw, knocking her off her feet. The wanderer swiveled, then fired his borrowed rifle into the other agent’s damaged armor. She fell to the ice, as her ruined plating failed to disperse the blast of radiation.

The wanderer calmly walked across the icy sea. Trickles of water now flowed down the ice in small rivers melted by the heat of the rifles. Slowly being swept away was his revolver. The wanderer calmly picked up the gun, spun it once and holstered it. He looked up and rage flared in his heart.

“By the order of the Interplanar Policing Force I command you to surrender yourself and drop your weapons,” the agent said cruelly as she held Skeef by his ears in one hand. In the other, the agent produced a knife, holding it to Skeef’s throat. The wanderer stared fiercely at the gremlin. Skeef was shivering from fear and cold. His ears were twitching, attempting to tuck in to the sides of his head, but unable to in the iron grip of the InterFor agent. His beak chattered slightly as his whole body trembled.

The agent became more angry. “Surrender or this thing will die.”

Skeef looked up into the inhuman eye of the wanderer. The wanderer gave the best lipless smile he could muster. With one hand still gripping the dead agent’s rifle, the wanderer signed a single word at Skeef.

“Spire?”

Skeef nodded slightly. He pulled the cylinder from the recesses of his fur.

“Put your weapon down or it dies, Timelost!” the agent yelled, tightening her grip on Skeef. He winced with pain, tears forming in his eyes to be frozen by the brutal cold of the icy sea.

The wanderer rolled his eye backwards in its socket. Zeroing in on the temporal matrix cube, he slowly took aim, pivoted his weapon towards the cube and fired. As the beam of gamma radiation connected with the box, turning it into a plasma, the cube convulsed. Then in a spectacular warping of space the cube imploded, releasing a radial blast of blue streams in every direction.

An arc of light careened towards the agent. Releasing Skeef onto the ice, she threw herself backwards to avoid the arc. Over her head it sailed, a blue tinted view of a luscious forest visible through the beam.

The wanderer leaped towards Skeef, the blue mirage disappearing from the atmosphere in an instant. As the Timelost Wanderer held Skeef tightly, the little creature pressed the largest button on the spire and the pair vanished into thin air leaving behind only a crackling shower of x-rays.

The wanderer and Skeef landed on sand. Above them the moon of a desert night illuminated an endless landscape of dunes. The gremlin stared up at a starry sky in wonder.

“Are those stars?” he asked quietly. The wanderer nodded.

“Do you think they’ll find us?” he asked even quieter. The wanderer stood still for a moment before replying. He sifted through the sand with his boots as he talked.

“They will find me. They always do. I guess it’s unavoidable. But if you would like…” He paused as he stared up at the stars, then returned his gaze towards the gremlin.

“I will try to keep you safe.”

Skeef beamed. The frozen tears began to melt on his face, melding with the new ones that flowed as joy and relief cascaded through his mind. The wanderer picked Skeef up and placed him on his shoulders. Finding a comfortable pace in the desert sands, the pair began to walk.