I’m Nine Again - Chapter 12 The End Of The End Of The Beginning

We all ran inside the house. Alice ran over to the counter where Matthews keys were. She picked them up and clenched them tightly in her hand.

“We need to get out of here now!” she said, “Sean, get that map out. See if there is a quicker way off this mountain!”

I placed the rifle down on the bench and started rummaging through my bag for the map of the area.

“What were you saying, Laura!?” Matthew asked, barely managing to catch the keys, “Why are you both acting so strange and. That man. Oh god, you killed that man.”

“He was shooting at us,” Alice said.

“Why were you shooting back!?” Matthew asked, “Why do you have guns!?”

“My name isn’t Laura,” she said resting her weapon on the bench and resting on a stool, “And Travis isn’t really Travis. His name is Sean.”

“Laura what’s going on!?” Rachel asked.

“Look, you guys probably won’t believe this even if I tell you but 12 months ago, I was a 29-year-old woman who was out drinking with her friends. The year was 2019, and then when I woke up in the morning, I was an eight-year-old girl in the year 2002.” Alice took a moment to catch her breath and continued, “It’s the same thing with Sean, he is from the future as well, although he didn’t come here until 6 months ago. He is also from the year 2019. We didn’t know each other in the future, and we don’t know why we were teleported to the past.”

The room was silent apart from the sound of me rustling through the bag, looking for the map. I had pulled out the satellite phone and some magazines of ammunition and sprawled them out across the desk before I found the map and opened it out on the table.

“That’s how we both knew what horses were going to win in that horse race six months ago. It was a race that we remembered from our past in the future. It’s how we knew which companies were going to see an increase in stock price. We looked at companies that were just beginning today but that was still going to be around in 17 years. That’s how we’ve been managing to make nearly half a million dollars in 6 months. It’s all from memory,” Alice said, watching Matthew and Rachel’s expressions slowly turn to a horrifying realization.

“It was by pure coincidence that we’ve met each other in the past,” she continued, “But we vowed to try and change all of the bad things that are going to happen in the future, that’s why we are here today. Four fires are going to be created by lightning strikes and it’s going to turn into a large forest fire that nearly burns through the suburbs of Canberra. We came here to try and stop that fire but we aren’t the only ones from the future. Those guys shooting at us, they were trying to make the fire larger, to potentially wipe out the capital of Australia. That’s why they were shooting at us because we tried to stop them.”

“Where is Laura?” Rachel asked.

“Rachel,” Matthew said to try and comfort her.

“If you two are from the future and you’ve come into these bodies then where is Laura? What happened to her?” Rachel asked again.

“I don’t know,” Alice said.

“WHERE IS MY FUCKING DAUGHTER!?” Rachel screamed, “WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH HER!?”

Rachel dropped to the ground, crying uncontrollably. Matthew knelt with her.

“If what you are saying is true,” Matthew said, “Then you aren’t Laura, and that boy isn’t Travis.”

“That’s true,” Alice said.

“And you have known that, and lived in our house, under our roof, eating our food,” he said, “And the things that we have done for you, helping who is supposed to be Travis though the death of the woman that is supposed to be his mother.”

“Dad,” Alice said.

“Don’t!” he snapped, “Don’t you call me Dad if I am not your father!”

“I’m sorry, Matthew,” Alice said, probably using Matthews name for the first time since she had known him.

“We let the both of you live with us and the entire time you were lying to us,” Matthew continued, “The entire time you took us for fools.”

“We didn’t take you for fools,” Alice said, defeated.

“YOU USED US! THIS ENTIRE TIME YOU WERE LYING TO US AND YOU WERE USING US!” he yelled, “YOU WERE TAKING ADVANTAGE OF US AND YOU WERE USING US!”

“We weren’t using you!” Alice said desperately.

“Yes, you were,” Matthew said, “You weren’t there because you loved us, or because we were your parents. You were there because it was convenient, and you were taking advantage of our kindness.”

“Would you have believed me if I told you back then!?” Alice snapped, “Hi Dad, My names, not Laura, it’s Alice and I’m from the future. You wouldn’t have had a bar of it. You wouldn’t have believed a single word I said so what do you think I should have done differently!?” She asked “Tell you I’m from the future and have you thought I have an overactive imagination? Runaway from your house without you knowing why one day your daughter just disappeared from home and never having closure on why!? I DID WHAT I THOUGHT THE RIGHT THING TO DO WAS!”

“Is that why you killed that man!” Matthew snapped, “Was that the right thing to do?”

“HE WAS SHOOTING AT US!” Alice yelled, “We had an opportunity to stop him from attacking us and we took it!”

Alice was breathing heavily again, this time in anger. It was probably hard for her to confront the people she had called her parents for the last year.

“Is that what you think we are?” Alice asked, “Just a bunch of killers? We don’t want to kill. We’ve never even killed anyone before today!” She dropped to her knees in tears, “We didn’t want to kill them,” she sobbed, “They left us no choice. It was either us or them.”

“I know that you are lying, manipulative people who are from the future. Who takes advantage of innocent families to remain fed and housed. I don’t know what you people are capable of,” Matthew said, still holding Rachel who was continuing to cry uncontrollably.

“You people?” Alice asked sobbing.

“Alice!” I said, “I’ve got it. A path we can take.”

Alice sombrely stepped over to me, whipping the tears away from her eyes as she looked over the map with me.

“If we go south from here, there is a small off-road, it takes us right into the ACT into some backroad farmlands,” I said, “Then it’s a matter of going through Canberra and hopefully getting a plane out of here.”

“That might be private property,” Alice said running her finger over the backroads on the map.

“I don’t think that really matters anymore,” I said, “We’ve got an out of control fire coming and those New World Order guys scouring the mountains.”

“Okay,” Alice said, “It’s not really like we have any other option. We’ll do it.”

“Pack up the bags Alice,” I said, “I’ll deal with them.”

Alice nodded and started getting all our gear packed away in the bags. I walked over to Matthew and Rachel, standing only a few feet away from them.

“I know you hate us, and I don’t blame you,” I said, “But right now we have bigger issues to deal with so you can focus on hating us once we get out of this mess.”

“What do you mean, we!?” Matthew snapped, “There is nothing stopping my wife and I taking the car and leaving you two here!”

“There is,” I said, “We have guns. I don’t want it to resort to that but if you’re intending to get in our way and stop us from leaving, then we will steal the car and leave you here if that’s what it takes to get Alice and myself out safely.”
for visiting.

Through the tears, Matthew glared at me with his bloodshot eyes, his eyebrows angled as far down as he could get them.

“I don’t want to do that. You hate us but I don’t hate you, I care for you. Even though it was all a lie, you still helped me when I needed it the most. You opened your home to an orphan and focused on not only Alice but my education. You are good people, and I’m sorry we’ve had to take advantage of you. I don’t want to abandon you here. There is a forest fire that is about to burn most of this state for over two weeks and enemy soldiers roaming all through the mountains. If we stay, we get burned, that’s not an if, but a when.” I took a moment to catch my breath and continued.

“Remember that we are from the future. We know for a fact that within a day this entire area will be ablaze. We need to leave now, so let’s work together and then when we are in the clear, we will leave. You will never have to hear from us again.”

Matthew stood up, helping Rachel with him as she stabled her self on his shoulder.

“This is all going a little fucking quickly don’t you think?” Matthew asked, “We haven’t had any time to process the fact that our daughter is gone and that we have had strangers living in our house for the past six months. Using us.”

“You don’t have time,” I said, “I’m sorry that you had to find out like this, but we don’t have any time for you to cry. We need to leave, and we need to leave now. If we don’t, we all die.”

A distinct clicking behind me was Alice reloading the weapons. She walked over to me with a backpack and one of the assault rifles. I took them and strapped the rifle around my back.

“Matthew,” I said, “Get the keys and get ready to drive the car.”

Without hearing his response, I ran over to the door and looked out along the hillside. Alice threw the keys to her father, who dropped them, and then she made her way next to me.

“What’s your plan?” she asked.

“We make a run for the car,” I said, “I don’t know how many people are out there but remember what Scarlet said?” I asked.

“She said that of the time travelers they knew about there were 80-120,” Alice answered. Matthew and Rachel joined us by the door and listened to us speak.

“We’ve killed what?” I asked, “Two on the hill and then three others including that guy out there.” Matthew was visibly uncomfortable with the conversation about killing.

“So, that’s five. Then it could be a huge blow to the New World Order,” Alice said, “But then again, we don’t know how many of those 80-120 is split between the factions.”

“I don’t think we can accurately guess their numbers,” I said, “For now we need to get off the mountains and the only way is by running.”

“Ru oren ry,” Alice said.

“Ru oren ry,” I affirmed.

I turned to Matthew, “We’re moving,” I said.

Alice swung open the door and I stepped out into the hot summer air. Smoke rose from across the mountain range and the smell of the burning forest hung thick in the air. My heart pounded fast as I took my first few steps outside. Raising my rifle to search around the tree line. I ran over by the brick barbeque by the pool and took cover behind it. Raising my head and rifle over the top I continued to scan the tree line looking for any movement.

I had no idea what I was doing. The decisions I was making, the steps I was taking and the actions that I was performing, were not controlled by my conscious mind. There was no active thought to what I did. It felt like all my movements and been taken over by my subconscious. My survival instinct was taking over my body and performing all the necessary actions to ensure my own survival. There were no background thoughts, no emotions, no fears. Just doing. Everything I was doing was just that. I was just doing.

Once I made sure the tree line was clear I ran forward to the corner of the building and peeked around. It was clear. I beckoned the others to come forward. Matthew and Rachel ran low to the ground with Alice covering behind them. Once everyone was at the corner of the building, I took another look around the corner. It was clear. I took another look at the tree line behind us which was also clear. The only thing in sight was the dead body of the man Alice and I had killed earlier.

“Okay, let’s go,” I said.

We ran over to the car, Matthew unlocking it as quickly as he could, and we all jumped in. Matthew jumped into the drivers’ seat and I jumped into the passenger seat. Alice and Rachel threw themselves into the back seat and as quickly as all of the doors closed the engine had started a Matthew was reversing out of the parking spot. He slammed the gear of the car into drive and then started to take off at speed down the hill.

“Keep following this main road,” I said, “As we are about to come to the base of the mountain, the main road will continue down and around to the west, but we want to go onto a back road which will go straight and to the east.”

“Whatever,” Matthew said in begrudging acceptance.

Alice, in the back with Rachel, was trying to put her seatbelt on.

“Don’t you fucking touch me!” Rachel snapped, “I can do it myself.”

“Rachel please,” Alice said, “Let me help you.”

“I don’t want your help!”

“Guys!” I said, “Now is not the time, Alice keep a lookout. Rachel put your seat belt on please.”

She also begrudgingly obliged to my request. Alice wound down her window and put the barrel of her gun out, ready to take shots if she needed too. The trip down the mountain was bumpy and fast. Matthew was taking it as fast as he could. We were driving for about 10 minutes, going over bumps and rounding the corners while losing traction in our tires multiple times through the journey.

“STOP!” Alice yelled.

The car ground to a halt as Matthew slammed on the breaks.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Listen!” she said.

We all went silent. Matthew switched the engine of the car off as we all kept an ear out. From just over the hill we were about to drive, we heard gunshots.

“A firefight!” I said, “Do you think it’s NWO?” I asked.

“It’s gotta be,” she said. She opened the door and hopped out of the car. I did the same. Turning to Matthew I said, “Stay here. If you drive forward, we’ll take out the tires if that’s what it takes!”

“Fine,” he said, “We won’t move until you get back.”

Alice and I ran to the top of the hill and edged ourselves over the ridgeline to see what was happening. At the bottom of the hill was a jeep, like the one used by the men at the top of the mountain. There were a bunch of men taking cover behind the jeep and shooting further down the road where another car had parked with people firing back. I raised my gun and aimed down the hill.

“Wait,” Alice said, “What if they are fighting the preservationists?” she asked.

“I think this is a case of, the enemy of my enemy is my friend,” I said, “We tried to do something here and we failed. The NWO wants to make this fire spread faster and kill more people. The preservationists are probably fighting against that. They still want the four people who were originally going to die to still die. But it’s a lot better than whatever the NWO have planned.”

“So we are choosing a side here?” she asked, “We are helping the preservationists?”

“For now,” I said, “It’s mutually beneficial.”

“Okay,” Alice said, “Then before you shoot.”

She reached around to her bag and pulled out some grenades out and placing them on the ridge in front of us. There were five grenades in total.

“You got these off the bodies?” I asked.

“Yeah,” Alice said, “They are pretty well equipped.”

“So, what, we throw all of these down the hill?” I asked.

“That’s my plan,” Alice said, “It will also make a big bang. Send a message to the Preservationists that we aren’t weak!”

“That’s actually a decent play,” I said.

We unstrapped the rifles from our bodies and got ready to start throwing the grenades. The soldiers were pretty far away but the advantage of being at the top of a hill meant that the grenades would roll down to them.

“Okay on three!” I said.

“Wun!” I said.

“Yowu!” Alice said.

Together we both yelled, “Feruye!”

One after the other we started pulling the pins from the grenades and throwing them as far down the hill as we could. By the time I picked up the fifth and final grenade to throw. The first one exploded.

CRACK!

I threw the last grenade down the hill and picked up my rifle to watch over the hill. I watched them all roll down the jeep as the soldiers were still trying to recover from the first explosion.

BANG! BANG BANG! BANG!

There was dust and blood everywhere. The khaki-colored jeep was painted red with blood and limbs had become detached from people’s bodies. There was screaming and then it was silent for a moment. Then there was a single solitary scream. Down the hill, a man was trying to crawl away from the jeep. He was missing a leg.

BANG!

I looked to my side and Alice had fired a single shot, putting the man down.

“Alice!” I said.

“He was going to die anyway,” She responded, “I was just making sure that he was no longer a threat. Not after what happened with the guy back at the lodge.”

She had a point. It was the safe thing to do. We thought the soldier in the woods was dead and then he came back to shoot at us. It was better to be safe than sorry.

The men that were in the firefight with the NWO started to slowly step forward and inspect the wreckage of the people that they were fighting with. I slowly edged out over the ridgeline.

“HEY!” I called, “YOU GUYS ARE PRESERVATIONISTS YEAH!?” I asked. The three men all stopped dead in their tracks and aimed their rifles up to the top of the hill.

“WHAT’S IT TO YOU!?” one man called back.

“WE JUST HELPED YOU OUT WITH YOUR NWO PROBLEM!” I called, “LET’S TALK!”

“HOW DO WE KNOW IT’S NOT A TRAP!?” he called out.

“BECAUSE WE HAVE THE HIGHGROUND!” I yelled back, “IF IT WERE A TRAP, WE WOULD HAVE KILLED YOU BY NOW!”

“YOU WANT TO TALK!?” He yelled.

“IS THAT AN OPTION!?” I yelled back at him.

“COME DOWN AND TALK THEN!”

Alice grabbed my arm and pulled me down, “Are you trying to reason with them?” she asked, “Let’s just kill them here and now!”

“No,” I said, “They are going to keep moving up the mountains and fight the NWO. Let them fight, maybe they can stop the fires.”

“And you’re going to talk to them?” she asked.

“Stay here and keep aimed at them,” I said, “If they kill me, then kill them.”

“Don’t talk like that!” she scolded.

“Just trust me, Alice,” I said, “We can get out of here without more bloodshed.”

I put my hand on her head and bought her in close to kiss her hair at the top of her head before letting her go.

“I’ll be fine,” I said.

I stood up and pulled my rifle around to my back and started to slowly make my way down the hill. The three men raised their assault rifles and had them pointed at me as I walked slowly down the hill with my arms raised to chest height.

“How do you know about the preservationists?” one man asked. He was middle-aged with dirty blond, spiked back hair.

“Hold on,” one of the other men said, “Those are the kid we went to visit with Scarlet.” He was much shorter. He had short black hair, glasses and a mole under his left eye.

“That’s right,” I said, “My friend and I were targeted by you guys a few months ago. Warned us not to do anything to change the future.”

I got closer to them and lowered my hands. “I’d appreciate it if you lowered your guns,” I said, “My friend is still on the hill aiming at you.”

They looked around at each other and then slowly lowered their rifles. The blond-haired man stepped forward.

“I suppose we have you and your friend to thank for taking out the NWO roadblock?” he asked. I nodded and he continued to speak. “But it still stands that you guys were already told not to try and influence the past, but here you are at the sight of the Canberra fires. You directly violated our requests. Why shouldn’t we kill you here?” he asked.

“If you kill me now, then there are more grenades that will be rolling down the hill to take you out,” I lied, “Besides, we can make a trade.”

“A trade?” the third man asked. He had dark brown hair, slicked back and to the sides.

“I’ll just hop right to it,” I said, “My friend and I are looking to get off the mountain. We have two people from the past with us. We tried to stop the NWO but we failed, now we just want to get off the mountain safely. We also have intel that you might be interested in.”

“Intel,” the blond-haired man said, “Spit it out then.”

“Not until we work out a way for us to get off this mountain and you guys can continue up the mountain. We want to work out something that works for both of us.”

“Okay,” he said, “How about this. You stay here and get your friends to come down the hill and you can pass us,” he said, “Once they are past us, you can give us the intel and then we can go out separate ways. What do you think?”

“That can work, but how about this?” I asked, “I stay here, and you stay here. Our car comes down and your car goes up the hill. When our cars pass each other, we both hand over our weapons into the cars and they continue. Then you and I stay here unarmed, I give you the intel, and then we both walk our separate way.”

“How can we trust that you actually have useful intel?” he asked.

“This is a precarious situation for all of us,” I said, “This is the best plan moving forward yes?”

“I guess so,” he said, “Make it happen.”

I called out to Alice and told her the plan. The blond-haired man stood back giving a few orders to the other two that were with him. The other two men ran back over to their car and started it, bringing it within a hundred meters of just the blond-haired man and me. A few minutes later, the top of the SUV that Matthew was driving appeared over the hill. Slowly, he drove down the hill towards us as the car the preservationists were driving slowly came close as well. Soon, it was the blond-haired man and me standing in between the two cars. We started to take our weapons off and handing them into our respective cars.

“What is going on?” Matthew asked.

“I’m negotiating our safe passage,” I said, “Just keep driving to the corner of this road and stop.”

Both cars continued to drive once the man and I were unarmed. He watched his soldiers drive up to the top of the hill and then when they were out of sight turned to face me.

“Alright, what do you have?” He asked.

“Let me get the map,” I said. I reached into my bag and pulled out the map, laying it out on the ground.

“Right here is a lodge, it’s not on the map,” I said running my fingers along with the map. “There is a dead NWO guy on the road outside. Take this hiking track and there should be two more NWO bodies. Keep on this trail for about 5 Kilometres and take a right when you reach the top of the mountain. There is a small walking track here, but your car should easily fit through. At the edge of a cliff here is two more dead NWO soldiers.”

“You two sure managed to do a fair amount of damage to them while you were here. I’m impressed,” he said.

Without paying the compliment I continued, “You’re going to want to be careful. We hid from a few more soldiers running up the hill. There might be four or five more up the same hiking track. We didn’t fight them and they are probably going to finish the job of the two soldiers on the cliff.”

“What were they doing on the cliff?” he asked.

“They were making a bomb,” I said, “Some sort of pressure cooker that was supposed to spread thermite throughout the forest. I think they were going to drop it off the cliff.”

“They had thermite!?” he asked.

“Yeah, apparently it’s military-grade so they have some pretty powerful friends,” I said.

“Why didn’t you get rid of the bomb-making materials?” he asked.

“Hindsight is 20/20 vision,” I said, “We could have, we should have, we didn’t.” I took a breath before folding up the map and handing it to him. “That’s what I have.”

“It’s good work,” he said, “You two wouldn’t happen to want to join us, would you?” he asked, “Join the preservationists in our effort to save the future?”

“We both have different ideas on what saving the future actually means,” I said, “I’m leaving you guys to handle this fight with the NWO because it’s the best option for us. But we aren’t friends.”

“I suppose we aren’t,” he said, “But what do you think is worse?” he asked, “The enemy we know or the enemy we don’t know.”

I took a moment to ponder his question.

“I don’t understand what you are trying to say,” I said.

“Look, I’m with you,” he said, “The future sucks, but it’s a future we know. It’s a landscape that we are familiar with, meaning that we know how to deal with the problems that will arise,” he took a heavy breath in before continuing his lecture, “When we change the past, we are creating a future that we can’t predict. We create problems with no foresight. We are going into the future in the dark.”

“Respectfully, I disagree,” I said, “The future has always been dark. It has always been unwritten. No matter what happens whether we have time travelers, multiple dimensions or whatever else out there that could affect us. The future is always going to be dark. When are you from?” I asked.

“I’m from 2023,” he said.

“You know what I don’t know,” I said, “I’m from 2019. To me, the future you are from is dark and unwritten. That shouldn’t stop me from trying to forge it though.”

“You’re right,” he said, “We do disagree. If there isn’t anything else here.”

“We should leave now,” I said.

“It sucks that we are supposed to be enemies,” the man said, “You’re actually pretty smart and likable. Makes it hard to tell whether you’re a good guy or a bad guy.”

“There is no such thing as good guys or bad guys. All there is, are people who have different ideas for what this world should be. We all want peace, stability, security and economic prosperity. We just have different ideas about how to get there,” I said, “That’s the shitty nature of this world. We aren’t fighting against good people or bad people. Just people who want to make the world a better place.”

“Hmm, I’m going to have to leave now,” he said, “Otherwise it’s going to be hard for me to see you as an enemy in the future.”

“Unfortunately, that’s exactly what we are,” I said, “Enemies.”

We both slowly started walking away from each other. Not once turning to look at each other. I took the minute of the walk to reflect. It really did suck. We all wanted to make the world a better place. Because we are all so hard-line in our beliefs, the only way to decide who’s plan becomes reality, is to debate the reality of our future with weapons. The world really is an unfair place.

I got back into the car and Matthew continued driving down the hill. We approached the backroad.

“Don’t turn this corner,” I said, “That gate there, I’ll unlock it. We drive through there.”

I unlocked the gate and got back into the car, Matthew continuing to drive on the bumpier and narrower back road. After about an hour of driving, we came out of the mountains into a vast valley, we were able to see the city of Canberra in the distance. Halfway through the valley, Matthew slowly bought the car to a stop.

“Get out,” he said.

“No!” Alice bit back, “Take us to Canberra!”

“You’re off the mountains now. I’m not driving you into the city with guns!” he said.

“Matt,” I said, “Don’t do this.”

“I’m not leaving you to die,” he said, “You were saying that this fire is going to take at least a week to get this far into the state. Just get out.”

“Are you kidding me!” Alice yelled.

“JUST GET OUT NOW!” he yelled, “We are out of the mountains so leave. Let me and my wife leave. Let us go home and mourn the loss of our daughter. Just stop getting us involved in whatever the hell you guys are doing.”

I opened the passenger door and hopped out.

“What are you doing Sean!?” Alice snapped.

“Canberra isn’t far away,” I said, “Let’s just let them go. There’s no danger for us anymore.”

“But Sean!?”

“Alice enough is enough,” I said, “We’ve been really horrible to these people. I think now is the time when we can cut them some slack.”

Alice sat in silence for a moment before nodding her head. She turned to Rachel who was still in the back seat with her.

“Rachel,” she said, “Matthew, I know it will mean nothing to you, but I really am sorry about Laura. I didn’t choose this. But just know, that you are good people, and I think that for what it’s worth. Those years that Laura was still here. I think that she might believe you guys are amazing parents.”

“Just get out,” Rachel sobbed, “Just leave.”

“Yeah,” Alice said, “Sorry.”

Before I closed the passenger door I said to Matthew, “Just so you know, in 2008 there will be a global recession. It’s because of the American banks and horrible loaning practices. But it affects the whole world. Just watch your investments around 2008.”

“Whatever,” Matthew said, “Thanks I guess.”

As quickly as I shut the door, Matthew planted his foot down and the car took off at top speed on the dirt road towards Canberra, leaving a cloud of dust behind its trail. Alice and I both turned back towards the mountains and watched as the smoke rose high into the clouds, the dusk sky turning into a blood red.

“What do we do from here?” Alice asked.

I looked back to the road and watched the dust cloud disappear into the distance as Matthew and Rachel took off further down the dirt road.

“I don’t know,” I said, “We just have to do what we can to survive now. Just keep moving forward.”

I swung my rifle around to my back and started to walk towards Canberra. Alice turned to look back at the mountains, overcast with a blood-red sky and smoke.

“Next time,” she said to herself, “Next time we will really make a difference.”

She slung her rifle over her shoulders and made a short jog to catch up to me and then started walking by my side. We both walked off towards the darkening sky eastward. Walking towards Canberra.

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End Act I