Apocalypse Wow! 2! Part 1, Chapter 7

Disclaimer

The following is a work of fiction. Any real names, real events, non-original content, or likeness of celebrities are used in a fictitious and parodic manner. All other character names and events are fictional and any resemblance of real names or events are purely coincidental.

CHAPTER SEVEN: TEMPORAL COLD WAR PROTOCOL FOR DUMMIES. OR, IN WHICH THE VEGREVILLE SIX ARE INTRODUCED TO THE WATCHERS AND CLEANERS AND LEARN ABOUT THE HORRORS THEY MISSED OUT ON. AS WELL, MORE OF JASON SAXON’S MASTER PLAN PLAYS OUT…

The Vegreville Six and their respective offspring found themselves inside a room that they were teleported by Megan mere seconds before the chain of events that had begun in the middle of Stephen Harper’s speech. The nine of them remained totally oblivious to the carnage that soon followed after their arrival in a giant circular room filled with monitors and groups of men and women wearing blue trench coats. A few of them also adorned grey coats. In the middle of the room was a giant sphere which shone a bright light, something similar to what some observers witnessed before the series of explosion went off.
“Someone care to explain where we are and how we ended up here?” Donnie asked as the remaining five looked around in awe and confusion. Donnie then looked briefly at Kevin, only to mockingly ask him “How about you? You always seem to know have the answers about weird shit like this!”
Kevin, still doing his best to maintain eye contact with Donnie, answered back “You know, for the first time probably ever, I am speechless. I… don’t know what this is or where we are.”
Karen spoke next “You don’t suppose we’re, you know?” and them mouthed the word “Dead” to Dean so as if not to frighten the young girls.
Dean looked around and did notice a small amount of chairs. Maybe Ryan was right about Heaven, or as right as a drug-and-alcohol induced hallucination could be on the afterlife. “I am clueless as everyone else is too, Kare Bear.” Dean said with his hands shaking nervously, but thankfully not picked up by anyone else.
“Well someone better get to explaining what is going on here right away!” Ariel stated rather loudly, hoping to gain the attention of the men and women walking around and not paying attention to them at all – except for Megan, who very much heard the demand from the fiery red head. “Oh right, forgot you prefer introductions,” Megan said to the nine of them. “Special Operative Megan Malone, Fifth Cleaner Brigade.”
“Um, hi.” Sarah was the first to extend a greeting back to Megan, even though she was hesitant in doing so. “I’m Doctor Sarah Bellum…”
Megan politely cut off Sarah and said “Yes, we are all aware of you each and everyone here.”
Ariel rolled her eyes and bluntly stated. “Well, that’s reassuring. Now do you care to explain who exactly you are and where we are?”
“In a moment,” Megan said, looking at a spot close to where they themselves materialized. Megan waited patiently for her partner Molly to hopefully appear if she leapt at the appropriate time as per her orders. A bright light and low electrical discharge appeared as Molly, Amy, Rachel, Benny and Lucas materialized before everyone’s eyes.
“Whoa!” exclaimed Benny. “Of all the time to quit smoking pot.”
“Great, more white people.” Amy lamented.
“This seems highly improbable.” Rachel said as she looked around in awe.
“This is not happening! This is not happening!” Lucas kept saying over and over until Benny smacked him in the back of the head. “Ow!” Lucas cried out. “Why’d you do that for?”
“Because you’re being a sissy in front of the angels, dumbass.” Benny said.
“What makes you think this is Heaven?” asked Rachel.
“Sure seems like Hell for me.” Amy scoffed.
“She may be right.” Benny said as he noticed Donnie standing about a few feet away and then said “They let him in here after all.”
“Appreciate the thought, dickhead!” Donnie shouted back, who then got slapped in the side by Sarah. “Language, please” she chided her husband.
“Okay, all the gangs here, now can we finally get some answers?” Ariel demanded. Just then, a man in a grey coat walked over towards them. He had neatly trimmed brown hair and looked very young.
“Answers you shall all have very soon. Hello all, my name is Jericho,” the grey-coated man known as Jericho said to everyone.
“Look, can we just get to it already?!” Ariel said impatiently.
“In due time,” Jericho said to Ariel. “In fact, that is what we will talk about. Time.”

Sloane marched down the long hallway of another apparently vacant warehouse in an undisclosed location in the middle of Saskatchewan. Flanked by two men in white lab coats, their footwear clanging against the metal grating of the catwalk. The three of them stopped in the middle of the structure and looked down at fifty men and women, all in black combat gear. Sloane looked to her left and to her right – inspecting the troops from afar.
“This is my army?” Sloane asked with some disdain in her voice.
“There are units like this in every major city, border crossings, and shipping ports. All waiting for the signal from Mister Saxon.” One of the men in the lab coats answered back. “These are the best of the best. Selected through the Daring Strategic Homeland Security Initiative and Mister Saxon himself.”
“Hmm.” Sloane said as she made her way down from the catwalk and onto the main floor, promptly followed by the two men. Sloane slowly walked past the men and women in the front row, inspecting them one by one. Sloane came across a woman, stopped in front of her and proceeded to lay a nasty back-handed slap across the woman’s face. The woman did her best to suppress any tears or emotion from the slap that echoed throughout the warehouse. Sloane gave a quick smile as she made her way down the front rank and stopped in front of a very tall man. The short Sloane looked up at the man, then down, and then proceeded with a thrust kick to the man’s left knee. The man doubled down in pain as Sloane continued down and stopped next in front of another man that was two slots down. This one was more to her eye level as Sloane coldly stared into his eyes. “What is your name, soldier?” Sloane asked the man.
“Sam Zuckerman, sir!” the man answered. Sloane smiled as she walked behind the man and proceeded to snap his neck. The man slumped down to the ground while everyone around never flinched or move.
“Impressive.” Sloane said. “Mental toughness is very high. Physical endurance is suspect though. If he expects me to lead these… people… your boss better have another ace in his hole,” she said to one of the lab coat men.
“Actually, there is another project that Mister Saxon has kept under wraps, but they are not completely ready yet.” The same men in the lab coat stated.
“Any reason why I haven’t been shown this ‘project’?” Sloane asked with urgency.
The other man answered “Because Mister Saxon thought you were not read – AHH!” His scream interrupted his sentence as Sloane had grabbed him by the wrist and proceeded to twist it and his arm behind his back. “ – Which I’m sure was an oversight on his part since he wanted to make sure you were committed to his cause!” he said as the pain from his arm caused him to scream.
“Well then,” Sloane said as she released the man from her hold and shoved him away. “Show this little project.”
The two men acknowledged Sloane’s request as they motioned for her to follow them further down the room. They stopped in front of a large hanger door as the two men proceeded to open it. In the room were an undeterminable amount of giant glass structures similar to test tubes. In each of the tubes were an indistinguishable life form.
“What exactly are those… creatures?” Sloane asked in awe.
One of the scientists handed Sloane a disk and told her “I think this will have all the answers you need right here.”

Jericho walked down the hallway of his people’s headquarters flanked by Megan and Molly. They were followed by the thirteen people they went to great lengths to save from the event that had occurred – an event most of them were unaware of for the moment. Jericho looked around and began to spoke as he led everyone into a giant room that looked like a lecture theater from a university: “I do apologize if our actions may have rather impulsive but saving you all was crucial to everything in the grand scheme of things.” Jericho then motioned towards the seating area of the theatre and everyone took a seat.
“Great, so Hell is a long lecture series.” Benny bemoaned as he took his seat.
“Again, what makes you think we are in some divine or torturous afterlife?” Rachel asked.
“Well, the first clue was the series of explosions that went off before we ended up here.” Benny replied.
“That and the fact I didn’t remember seeing Kevin or the rest any time around the first explosion?” Lucas inferred.
“Okay, seriously, what are you three going on about?” Donnie asked.
“Again, I apologize that the nine of you seem to be more disoriented about the situation that the others are.” Jericho said as he took to a podium. A giant screen that stood behind him began to play a video reenactment of the Edmonton Incident from three years ago.
Jericho began to talk more and looked at Ariel, Kevin, Dean, Karen, Donnie, and Sarah: “Three years ago, the six of you were witnesses to a very unique experience that at the time were not prepared to handle. A piece of advanced technology fell into hands of some of your fellow primitives acquired when the original owners of said technology left it behind on your world, along with two other items. That device was to restore things in the present by moving around moments in its recent past. Which was why you experienced flashbacks to key moments in your lives.”
Kevin raised his hand to ask Jericho: “What about the other incidents?”
Dean nudged Kevin and quietly told him. “We’re not suppose to talk about that.”
Kevin looked at Dean and said “Oh come on, you had it in your little movie, I’m sure it’s okay to bring it out now.”
“Well, it was easier to have it done with the respective players making cameos.” Dean said defensively.
“Wait, what are we talking about again?” Kevin asked.
“The whole ‘Doctor Who’ thing?” Dean asked.
“No, the conversations we had with… whoever they were.” Kevin answered back.
“The conversations you and Mister Williams went through were with a higher evolved form of what we are.” Jericho said, jumping into Dean and Kevin’s semi-private conversation. “It was a byproduct also of the device, that thankfully was destroyed…”
“…Thank you very much.” Kevin interrupted, hoping for some faint praise from the grey coated Jericho, who returned the favor and said “… Which unfortunately created a tiny rift in the space-time continuum.”
“Some hero now, huh?” Donnie scoffed.
“Get stuffed, Donnie!” Kevin retorted.
“Anyways,” Jericho pressed on despite the petty bickering, “This tiny rift could have easily been fixed, but some aggressive elements within our own ranks saw this as an opportunity to create chaos in shear defiance of our Temporal Cold War Accords…”
“Excuse me, what?” Rachel asked.
Jericho sighed and went on: “During the first millennia of your timeline, there was a war amongst our people. There were those who wished to travel to other time periods, other worlds, and other places to cause trouble. However, direct interference was strictly prohibited and thus we had to create a special force to go back and correct any of these indiscretions caused by the people we eventually got to call ‘Corruptors’. We gave special orders to groups of people like Megan and Molly here called ‘Cleaners’ to restore damaged timelines and to ensure everything in the timeline plays out as it intended.”
“Wait a minute? Are you trying to tell us everything that has ever happened or will happen is predetermined by you, whatever you are?” Rachel asked.
“That is not quite true.” Jericho answered. “You all still have free will and whatever choices you make - be it the right one or the wrong one - are yours and yours alone to deal with any consequences. We are talking major events being altered…”
“… Like someone stopping the assassination of JFK?” Karen asked.
“Or going back in time and falling in love with your grandmother and becoming your own grandpa?” Dean also asked.
“’Futurama’ did that already!” Lucas protested.
“Quiet you, or I’ll have those two blue birds there throw you back to the Jurassic age.” Benny retorted as he slapped the back of Lucas’ head while looking at Megan and Molly.
“Well, the first one definitely. The second one gets a little tricky if you factor in predestined paradoxes.” Jericho answered. “Which is why myself and others like me observe and calculate various factors in the multiple time streams we watch…”
“So you are basically ‘Watchers’ then?” Kevin asked. “And these so-called multiple time streams you watch are…”
“… Parallel time from different actions caused by every single decision made by those living in the here and now. One world, many outcomes.” Jericho answered as Kevin nodded his head in a confused yet slowly grasping what is going on manner.
“’Sliders’ did it!” Lucas scoffed.
“I’ll give you ‘Sliders’, by which I mean my foot in your ass!” Donnie snapped as Lucas just simply slunk down in his seat.
“That was rather harsh, Donald.” Benny said, surprisingly taking the side of his favorite target to mock and ridicule.
“Well, I’m sorry. Here we are listening to ‘Time Travelling For Dummies’ here and no one has clearly explained why we are truly here!” Donnie said as he stood in frustration. “Now are we going to find out why exactly you ‘Watchers’ and ‘Cleaners’ brought us here or not?”
“Very well,” Jericho said as the video screen behind him switched to showing three different news reports showing the carnage that occurred in Vegreville. It was the first glimpse the six of them saw of could have very been them. It could have been any one of them who were among the rubble and unaccounted body count. They all watched in horror as medics and police officers combed the area, possibly looking for survivors and possible clues. Thankfully, the sound was muted on the video, except on the third screen that showed Jason Saxon, covered in bruises and minor scars, talking to a group of reporters. Dean noticed this and said “Hey, can we get some sound on the third screen there?” Jericho obliged as the sound came on in the middle of Jason Saxon’s speech:
“… This was obviously a cowardly attack by someone whom we have yet to determine. All reports from my office indicated nothing was in the works and this caught me by surprise. Rest assured, under my watch, something like this will never happen again and I will see to it that those responsible for this heinous and cowardly attack are brought forth to face justice…”
Jericho then turned the sound off as everyone sat back in a hushed awe of what was being played. “We have reasons to believe the six of you are important in a coming series of events that start off with this incident.” Jericho said looking at the six in the front row with their children.
“And what about us?” Amy asked. “What are we here for?” she asked again, pointing to the Squints.
“Comic relief?” Benny said.
“There is something about you four as well.” Jericho inserted himself into the conversation. “But a lot cannot be revealed. Knowing too much about ones future could ultimately impact it.”
“’Back to the Future’ did that!” Lucas said.
“That was Part Two, gah!, for someone with a genius IQ you’re pretty dense!” Benny said again after delivering another slap to Lucas’ head.
“In due time, we will all know.” Megan said.
“All we know the chain in the future cannot be broken in the past, only the present.” Molly added.
Amy looked at them, sensing some déjà vu, and asked “What did you say?
Rachel answered “They said the chain in the future…”
Amy interrupted her “I know what they said, but this crazy old man in L.A. said something similar to me. Same thing happened in Calgary.”
“Yeah I kind of remember that old woman in Calgary.” Dean joined in.
“So, what does that even mean?” Amy asked looking at Jericho
“It means,” Jericho paused and thought for a moment. He then continued with his thought. “It means we may have our work completely cut out for us this time around.”

It felt odd for Jason Saxon being thirty-thousand feet in the air. All other commercial flights had been cancelled since the events earlier in the day occurred in Vegreville. But he was heading back to Ottawa on a private government plane to co-ordinate the nation-wide search for the perpetrators of this act of terror on his home soil. He was going back to Ottawa to see that the person or persons responsible for the deaths of hundreds of men, women, and even children would suffer as well. Normally happy, Jason Saxon bore a face of concern and dread. Not even watching a now eighteen-year old Miley Cyrus shaking her hips and covering The Beatles’ “Helter Skelter”. That was his outward look anyways – on the inside he was positively giddy with delight. However his quiet reflection on what had gone down was interrupted by another passenger – a tall, arrogant looking blonde woman. Her name was Patricia Harris, and was also the woman who was ahead of Jason Saxon in the leadership race.
“Well Mister Saxon, you look rather grim.” Patricia said with an arrogant sneer on her face.
“Well, we all couldn’t be campaigning in Darington instead of finding a way to cheat death and watch a man whom we both admired get blown to bits.” Saxon said, keeping up his mournful charade.
“Touching. Anyways, thought you might find this interesting. Apparently the leadership committee is looking at suspending the race and holding an emergency vote between you and me.” Harris mentioned smugly.
“Really?” Saxon said as he stood up, and suddenly began to let the happiness inside of him slowly show. “And between a man whose current portfolio is suited for this current crisis and a woman who – wait, what are you minster of again?”
“Fisheries, Mister Saxon. You should know that. You plucked one of my staffers away from me for whatever purpose!” Harris sneered at him.
Saxon just shook his head and looked at Patricia. “Well, then who do you think they’re going to choose, hmm?”
“Well, I’ve been in this longer than you have.” Harris said with an air of arrogance about her.
“True, true. But I think now is the time to shake up the establishment. Time to go into a bold new direction. A time for a youth movement.”
Harris rolled her eyes and scoffed at Saxon’s bravado. “What movement? You, my former staffer and that little inflatable-chest baring Ukrainian whore of yours?” Unbeknownst to Patricia Harris, Claudia Daring was standing behind her and didn’t even realize it. Nor did Patricia Harris realize that Claudia Daring then quickly jabbed what looked like a medical syringe into the side of her neck. Harris collapsed onto the floor of the plane, and thankfully it was only her, Saxon, and Daring who were in that area. Saxon looked at the now limp body of his worthy adversary and suddenly he felt comfortable allowing his true emotions once again come out.
“That’s ‘Ukrainian-Canadian whore’ to you, you vapid cunt.” Claudia said with mild disgust. Saxon just smiled and asked his new partner in crime “My dear Missus Daring, what exactly did you give her?”
“A new experimental sedative courtesy of the guys and gals of Daring Pharmaceuticals.” Claudia said with a great smile on her face. “Can I now zap her silly please?” she begged Saxon.
“Hmm, using the Lazarus Glove on a doped-up airhead? It’d be like beating down a midget with Down’s Syndrome. Sure, you get the pleasure of raw primal rage out, but where’s the sport in it?” Saxon said as he kneeled beside Harris’ head and lightly tapped it and imitated the sound of knocking a hollow object. “Besides I don’t think one can fry a brain that really isn’t there, know what I mean?” he asked as he laughed uncontrollably. He regained his composure and said “Well, I think I have the perfect end for the soon-to-be late Honorable Patricia Harris.” Saxon then activated his Bluetooth earpiece and spoke into it “Agents Black and White come to front please.” Within moments, Agents Black and White came into the compartment, flanked by two other men in black coats. Agent White just shook his head as Agent Black asked “What happened here?”
“Well, here’s what’s going to happen.” Saxon said as he delivered his plan “Missus Harris had a little too much to drink and accidently ingested a very potent anti-anxiety drug to calm some pre-flight jitters. Mixed with the amount of booze, she felt disoriented and made her way to the back of the plane, mistaking the emergency airlock for the bathroom and fell to the ground and died on impact.”
“You always seems to have the right idea, Mister Saxon.” Claudia said, beaming with pride.
“Indeed I do.” Saxon smirked as he watched Agents Black and White drag Patricia Harris towards the back. “And the best is yet to come.”