The Impossible Future: Complete set by Frank Kennedy (mini ebook reader .txt) 📕

role in this new universe. It scared the hell out of him.

19

Great Plains Metroplex, NAC

J AMES NEVER ATE SO WELL. The beef – tall and juicy, blood drizzling with each slice of the knife – fell apart in his mouth. He chewed with ravenous imprecision, one large bite after the next. Sides of vegetables so fresh they might have been grown next door; bowls of steaming cheese, pasta, fish, and clams – plus long, stringy yellow strips of something he did not recognize – entranced his nose then lined up en route to his stomach.

They brought him enough food for two families, yet he barreled through it all. A far cry from the daily routine of cans, microwaveable pouches, and pre-fab cafeteria fare.

“It’s all so good,” he told Ignatius. “I mean, beyond good. Is this what food is really supposed to taste like?”

“Techniques vary from world to world.” Ignatius rocked back and forth in a skiff, looking toward the Florida shore hundreds of yards away. “Sometimes, it’s all in the water.”

“Whatever. I love it. I want more. My body wants more.”

“You will need at least five times the caloric intake to maintain this new physique. In time, even more. How do you feel?”

“Hard. Like steel.”

“And growing. I can’t see the end of it.”

“It’s like I was shoved inside someone else’s body.”

“That will go away in time. Once you have seen action, taken care of the next phase of your business, you will embrace this body.”

 James looked toward the shore. The cottages morphed in and out of vision, as if fighting to escape a growing fog.

“What’s happening, Ignatius?”

“You’re leaving this place, James. Leaving the memories of your childhood. That Earth was never your home, just a holding tank. In time, you’ll discard all of this. Does that make you sad?”

He mulled the idea for an instant. “No. Everything there was a lie. I’m where I was always meant to be.”

“Even if you have to die for your cause?”

James looked up from his dinner of bottomless servings. The door to the command dining room, for which he was given exclusive access, slid open. Augustus Perrone entered with a peacekeeper. The soldier held sentry at the door while Perrone, drinking a glass of wine, took a chair across the table from James.

“Yes,” James told Ignatius. “Even if I have to die.”

Ignatius smiled as fog crawled over the skiff.

“You have come so far so fast, James Bouchet.”

James turned his attention to the admiral. He ran a napkin over his lips. “Thank you for all this.”

“You earned it, James. Give the word, and I’ll summon another round of … well, everything.”

“I might take you up on it.”

James heard his voice mutating into a deep, crisp tone, crackling with age and authority. Like Valentin.

“I appreciate your cooperation,” the admiral said. “The genetic screening, the shower, the change of clothes. You appear to understand I am not your enemy.”

“But no sense taking chances, right?” James pointed to the sentry. “I could turn you to ash before he could shoot.”

“True. However, I think you misunderstand. My aide is not here for my protection. He knows I am in no danger.”

“Are you sure?”

“I am.”

Perrone tapped his stream amp and threw a cube to a resting position just about James’s eye line. A video appeared of Michael sitting on grass. It was dark. Sammie spoke.

    “Tell me,” she said.

“When we were there with Christian Bidwell,” Michael began. “When I had that bastard in my sights … point-blank … I could’ve made him do anything. Told him to run. But I didn’t because I knew what he was, and every-damn-thing he’d ever done to us. I never hated anybody like that before. I pulled that trigger the first time because I couldn’t tell myself to do anything else. But the second time, Sammie? I shot him the second time because I wanted to kill him, and I did not care. I saw him lying there and … I was glad. Good goddamn riddance to a sorry sack of shit.”

Perrone snapped his fingers, and the holocube dissolved.

“I am in no danger, James, because I am not your enemy. But in case you should ever consider aggressive action, beware. I have an agent embedded close to Mr. Cooper. If I ever experience the slightest degree of … let’s call it death … my agent will receive instant notification that this,” he touched his chest, “beats no longer. He will kill Mr. Cooper without hesitation.” James rose from his chair, but Perrone remained relaxed, sipped more wine.

“Please understand, James. Christian was two when I last saw him. I would have been a stranger to him had he returned. What I lost was the chance to rebuild a relationship with my son. Michael deprived me of that opportunity. To his credit, the entire transmission suggests he feels remorse. A weakness, but an admirable one.”

The hunger thickened, the dark swarmed, but he sat.

“So, you’ll hold this over me until I do everything you want.”

The admiral laughed. “No, no, James. You have me all wrong. You and I will be partners. I can provide you with the resources you will need to take whatever path you choose, and you will help me save the Chancellory. Our interests align.”

“Save the Chancellors? Why?”

Perrone chased a holocube and flicked a finger toward a wall beyond the head of the table. It dissolved into a room-width map of the Collectorate’s forty worlds.

“If I am correct, your Mentor program revealed why people such as you were created. Yes?”

“I was trying not to listen when Lydia … the Mentor … was filling me full of Collectorate history. Didn’t enjoy being gagged and tied to a chair.” He studied the star map. “Something happened a long time