Lost To Time

## Atari Twilight: Lost To Time

###### Part 1: Garret Maryland October 1988 - Disappearance of Veronica Kirkshaw

A Huge Motorcycle, a Cherry Red Indian Chief roared down main street Garrett Maryland with a 1949 Lincoln Coupe hot on its rear fender with red and blue flashing lights behind it’s huge metal grill, illuminating the still of the Maryland autumn air. A seasonal downpour had just finished and the tarmac was still wet. The rider out in front made it seem very official like an outrider for a presidential motorcade, ridin hell for leather like they owned the street. The only other person who rode with such reckless abandon in this sleepy town was one Shannon Locke, but she hadn’t been seen tearing up the asphalt for some time.

A tall man in perhaps his middle 50s with salt and pepper hair, a high hairline to match and full beard bounds out of the Lincoln as soon as the bike, coupe and several dark sedans with government plates had stoped in front of the Garret Police Headquarters, outside to meet them, is Chief Theodore Simmons, barely a year in the top job and he’d already had to summon the feds. He hoped it appeared to the townspeople that he was far more proactive than his shamed predecessor.

“Thanks for getting up here so quickly Gene”

Simmons shakes the hand of the familiar man, a frequent visitor to his town, though it had been considered an unwelcome one to Ex Chief Rugen. All thoughts of addressing each other by rank are instantly forgotten, between the two old peace officers. Gene Tyler had offered Ted enough manpower to search half of Maryland as soon as he’d reached out for help, when Miss Kirksaws Aunt had called Ted in a state of distress on Saturday Morning.

“Ted, I’d like to introduce you to my number two, this is Supervisory Special Agent Dale Bozzio, one of the big brains behind ViCAP, if anyone is going to find Miss Kirkshaw It’ll be Dale.”

The figure removed the full face helmet and a swathe of untamable curly blond hair was released

“Agent Madeline Bozzio”

Chief Simmons shook the young woman's gloved hand, seemingly un-phased.

“We’re here to help Chief, I’d like to start up at Stonehenge, see the crash site, then take a further look at our missing woman's burnt out car”

Her senior agent spoke up

“I’d like to get a look at that Volkswagen Rabbit myself, see what caused the damage with my own eyes. I’ve got my overalls so I’ll get my hands dirty.”

Ted knew more than a little about now The Deputy Director of the FBI’s skills with a wrench he’d rebuilt the 49 Lincoln coupe he often drove with his Father, an auto worker for Lincoln in his native Dearborn, and was often the first port of call for any agent with a vehicle involved in a case.

Over an hour later outside the local outdoor music venue and Bar Stonehenge. Tyler and Bozzio waited for the Chief and his people to finish up follow enquiries.

“I’d wager my pension that they’re not telling us something Mads”

Tyler says to Bozzio as he leans against the warm hood of his car. He called her Mads, a nickname few people used for her, another short form of Madeline, a name she didn’t feel fit her anymore. As most people called her Dale, many people expected a straight laced male FBI agent. That’s certainly not what they got.

“I know what you mean boss. There’s something hinky with those security guys, I talked with. I know it’s a small town and they’re turning a blind eye to high school kids going in.”

Dale holds up her hands. The local police had no issue with the FBI rolling up but it seemed like certain quarters of the town where closing ranks. Not just the loop where even his old friend George Butts wasn’t taking Gene’s calls.

“Wasn’t like this years ago. Back then almost everyone wanted to talk to us. Something has changed around here and not for the better, let’s examine where the Volkswagen was dumped, then take a look at the car. Then I’m going to talk to Miss Maggy about the multi talented young Mister Gary Riley, as he has just left her employ.”

Gene was so glad that Mads believed even a single word of his diatribe about the goings on in this sleepy Maryland town. It helped that he’d served as a mentor and something of a surrogate father figure since she joined the Bureau some years back. He and Rose could be pretty convincing when they were trying to turn a logical mind to *The Dark Side*. Mads had at least let them finish, and at least reluctantly accepted the Onyx crystal and kept it as a key fob on her Indian keys.

The Two federal agents looked down on the town of Garrett in all it’s Maryland autumnal colour. The techs at *Stonehenge* went about fitting a brand new sound system, something had gone down here a couple of nights ago expensive sound systems didn’t just burn out. They’d been very reluctant to even have the old system examined

The sounds of the new song by *The Pixies Where is my mind* began to play from the hastily fitted new sound system. Those Lyrics are pretty much how Gene had felt since the 60’s. None of this made conventional sense. He was hoping a visit with the eerily unflappable Maggie Arkaville world centre and focus him.

Tape recording of examination of Veronica Kirksaws white 1982 Golf Rabbit at the police impound

“It’s fourteen thirty-six hours on October (Date) 1988 This is deputy director Gene Tyler of the FBI Behavioural Sciences unit. With me is Supervisory Special agent Madeline Bozzio. We’re at the Garret PD impound. With the permission of Police Chief Ted Simmons were examining the vehicle of the missing Veronica Kirkshaw. It is a 1981 Mk1 Volkswagen Rabbit Cabriolet. Or a Golf in Europe. I know you like your European cars Rose.”

Gene paused

“This is SSA Bozzio, It looks like it’s been driven to destruction Chief”

Everyone at the BSU still called Gene *Chief*, he’s been their bureau chief before accepting the deputy directorship, more out of necessity so that they could continue their work unhindered by politics and bureaucracy than a desire for advancement.

“Joyrider? We need to see if Miss Kirkshawe had any enemies at school.”

Gene pointed to the driver’s seat

“I’m examining the driver's seat and it’s been moved, someone much shorter than Miss Kirkshaw was driving. How tall is she Mads?”

There was a rustling of paper as Agent Bozzio rifles through the case file to the Garart PD missing person report.

“Quite a Bit shorter than me Chief, five feet seven, I'd say.”

Dale was 5’11” in her socks and well over six foot in her usual boots

“Our Miss Kirkshaw was last seen wearing flats at *Stonehenge”*

Gene continued

“So her car being hotwired and stolen could just be a high school grudge”

Gene looked to Bozzio for her opinion

“Seems like it’s a least worth our time to look into. Nothing much else in the contents of the car, a melted copy of *U2 with or without you* on Cassette. A vanity plate reading *IM LATE.* A few take out containers from *Pings Fine Chinese Dining,* Mostly coffee cups”

“That fits with what the local witnesses say, and what my old army buddy Sergeant Herbert Seville told Police Chief Simmons that Miss Kirkshaw had been driving around the town, pretty consistently, hard to miss this white VW. Also, her Aunt says she’s hasn’t slept in her bed for some time.”

The two agents made short work of examining the mechanics. No signs of tampering breaks, accelerator, transmission all good, just damage consistent with going off-road on the hill up by *Stonehenge*. Smashed up suspension, ripped off underside covers damage to the tyres.

Gene snaps off his latex glove filthy with soot from examining the burned out cars mechanicals and stroked his grey beard, deep in thought.

“So our suspect for the wreck is a kid, but naturally not the kidnapping?”

Bozzio continued

“Yes Mads, so I’m hoping she’d dumped her very conspicuous ride up at *Stonehenge* Maybe thumbed a lift out of town.”

It was logical, but Akham’s Razor could be proved to be utter hogwash where this town was concerned. The true solution often included time travel and other dimensions.

“Scared kid Chief. If she’s not been going home something has her spooked, does her Aunt have a new boyfriend? If it’s that, why didn’t she go and stay with one of her parents?”

Mads knew this kind of job inside and out. She had started ViCAP and the database for missing people.

“Ted didn’t know of one, and he’s always number one with the local knowledge, has been ever since I’ve known him.”

Ted had never let him down unlike his odious predecessor, who was also curiously missing and when Gene get hold of Rugen he was going straight to an all-expenses paid trip to club fed. Gene couldn’t stand police corruption but add to that more than a few counts of conspiracy and then attempted murder? He’d be lucky if he didn’t get the gas chamber.

“Another weird disappearance in Garret Marland? Great!”

As much as Bozzio didn’t mind helping out on the Chief and Dr. Tyler’s little crusade here. It so rarely showed results. This Chat and Chew Killer he’d been after since 1969. Almost 20 years, The guy *Randall Flagg* was a ghost. A guy Stephen King would later write about, not a coincidence. Weird thing was the stuff that the Katrops, those out there Aussie academics said that also made sense, a killer not of our dimension. Dale had seen the Skull reconstruction of Jeana Butts, on the first day she’d walked through the doors into the basement office a Quantico that housed the Behavioural Sciences Unit, Gene kept the photos in his office, along with those he’d saved, and the victims he was still hunting the killer or killers of.  Then a few years later she’d seen her with her own eyes in this little town, Jeana Butts, a very live healthy middle-aged woman. She never had an identical twin on record. They’d tracked down her mother's obstetrician and midwife, so how was a woman with her face and blood type dragged out of the Hudson river? She only hoped that Gene had a way to write this case up so that it didn’t look like they’d wasted a whole bunch of taxpayers money on a total boondoggle.

###### ***Part 2: Greyskull Redux***

A short while later Gene and Dale pulled their personal vehicles into the strip mall on main street Garrett. Across from *The Night Owl Consignment Store*.

Gene hops out of his Lincoln and examines the hastily boarded up window of *The Paperback Exchange*, and the note hurriedly written in what seemed to be Maggie Arkaville’s hand in the door with the *closed* sign. No time to get this to a  handwriting expert now to see if it was written in duress. Gene was kicking himself for not checking in with Maggie as soon as he’d arrived in town.

“Curiouser and Curiouser said, Alice”

Gene quotes *Alice in Wonderland* glibly*.* Boy could he relate to the kid in that book. Nothing was what it first appeared to be around here.

“We waiting for a warrant on this one Chief?”

Mads indicated a pouch on her belt that Gene would deny to anyone contained a set of highly illegal lock picks that should not be possessed by anyone, even a member of law enforcement. Those were *feeler gauges* for setting spark plug gaps on her motorcycle, any fool could tell that! Mads' father had been one of those old school cops and the apple hadn’t fallen far from the tree. Gene turned his back, obscuring the road from what his subordinate was doing.

Click went the tumbler on the lock of the glass door to *The Paperback Exchange*. Bozzio drew her new Sig Saur and opened the door with the toe of her motorcycle boot. Behind here Gene had done a one-eighty and drawn his Colt 1911 from his shoulder holster

“Miss Arkaville are you in there? It’s Gene Tyler from the FBI, we’re concerned about your welfare.”

A few seconds later after hey they’d cleared the building in a well-practised manner. Tyler and Bozzio discovered what had up until recently been a neat little small town bookshop. One where Gene had acquired more than a few books on psychology before now. To many it was the heart of Garret. This sanctum sanatorium of the written word was trashed, books everywhere, not catalogued and categorized for sale with care and precision as per the hundreds of other times Gene had been here. Immediately there were obvious signs of several physical alterations throughout the store. Miss Maggie's fringed brown leather jacket was still in her backroom office. Not a thing you’d want to be without in October.

“A Kids shoe, Chief. Size 7 red Chuck Taylors, looks to be the left, seemingly lost in an altercation”

Mads examined the shoe without moving it. A silver pen had appeared from one of the many pockets of her leather biker jacket, as she examined the laces for trace evidence.

“This is it Mads, Jimmy Hendrix told me he left this store in 1988, pulled though some portal in the form of a mirror.”

Gene rose his hands in exasperation. Poor old Jimmy had been a bit foggy on dates. Hiding out in the woods for day on end could do that to you. Did this mean Chris' friends needed they’re help? A girl who answered to the name Van Hallen who was once a captive with Chris at Castle Grey Skull, she could be in danger. Had the time loop been completed, could Gene finally act? Was his friend of almost twenty years Maggie Arkaville, in a similar predicament. Held captive in her own father’s old lab?

“No trace of a mirror sir”

Mads checked the turned over store for telltale shards of glass

“The old Lab, the one the kids call *Castle Greyskull*, we need to get over there, call the hostage recovery team, I want wheels up in twenty.”

Mads lost a little of her usual composure.

“Sure Chief, I’ll make the call and be right behind you.”

Gene roared up the hill towards the old loop lab of Doctor Arkaville as fast as the old Lincol lead sled with its far never V8 engine would go.

For some reason local DJ Jackie Emrock was playing *Geno by Dexy’s Midnight Runners*.

Gene slowed his massive Lincoln down to a slow rumble as he pulled up to the poorly maintained loose gravel car park at Castle Greyskull. Somehow rattling around the old concrete edifice of the castle Gene could hear a familiar voice singing a *Fleetwood Mac* Song *Dreams*. It was almost as if the place was acting like a concert hall amplifying the voice.

*Oh, thunder only happens when it's raining*

*Players only love you when they're playing*

*Say, women, they will come and they will go*

*When the rain washes you clean, you'll know*

*You'll know*

Well if it was one of these Decepticons wearing Maggie’s face that Jimmy had warned him about Gene wasn’t about to let it go all *Terminator* on him. He took out the ignition keys on it’s fob that read *Lincoln Dearborn Assembly Plant* and went around to the trunk of the car. Uncovering and unlocking a secret compartment within it. Withdrawing several clips of armour piercing rounds.

Gene waited apprehensively for some time. This was one of few times he wished he smoked. It’s what the guys had done back in Korea trying to kill some tension waiting for another big push up a godforsaken hill. Gene couldn’t take his eyes of the huge metal doors to this concrete fortress. He was so close, hopefully close to answers.

Some 25 minutes later Bozzio arrived with Ted Simmonds and maybe half of the Garrett PD, decked out with shotguns and bulletproof vests. She and her boss where ready a full forty minutes before the rest of the hostage recovery team made it from the Raven's football pitch at Edgar Allan Poe Elementary, where a bigger bird had landed a *Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk.* The team rode from the chopper up the hill in a couple of squad cars that had been laid on. Gene let Bozzio brief her team on an old plan of the facility that Ted Simons had hurriedly acquired from the Garret city hall planners office. Fortunately since the loop had abandoned this laboratory and it had fallen into local hands.

“Only one way in, we’re going to have to use a breach charge on those reinforced steel doors”

Bozzio was a different breed of FBI agent there she was with her leather motorcycle jacket on over her FBI stamped bulletproof vest throwing on a PASGT helmet and military goggles slung around a bandanna on her neck.

“I’m with the Chief. The rest of you pair up and sweep the building floor by floor inch by inch, we go slow, we do it right. Local Police are on the perimeter. We’ve at least one confirmed hostage in the place, let me and the Deputy Director deal with her, we need to make sure that she’s not developed a bond with her captor, as we’ve reason to believe she’s been in there for some time.”

The door was blown in, mangled and only fit for scrap now. Covering those close to it in a hail of pierces of tiny concrete. Bozzio let her team move in first and clear the stairwell down before escorting Gene into the inky all-consuming blackness below, This is what she saw her job as making sure *the old man* as she often called him made it in and out of these situations intact. Gene didn’t act like a man ready for retirement, Remington shotgun in hand ready for anything. With one of The Sage’s Korea era weapons drills ringing in his ears.

Crises for help could be heard as the team fanned out on the main laboratory floor. From cages sunk into the very fabric of the building. What had old man Arkaville been doing locked up in here with his own ensuite cages? Gene wondered. Because someone had to know.

“Maggie is that you?”

Gene pointed a flashlight towards one of the holes in the ground.

“Agent Tyler?”

The gaunt face of Maggie Arkaville looked up at him

“Maggs, tell me something that only you would know. What did you give me the first time we met?”

Gene asked hurriedly

Maggie smiled

“Obsidian in hope that it helps enhance the truth”

Gene nodded to Dale at his elbow

“Bolt Cutters here”

She instructed one of her people

“This is my friend Sean, I’m not sure if you’ve met him, Gene, he was in ALTA and was at Woodstock with me. If you can trust that I’m me, Agent Tyler, you can trust that Sean is himself.”

Bozzio went to work with Bolt cutters. Gene hauled up the svelte figure of Maggie Arkaville, her hair mattered, clothes torn and grubby. She felt light like no one had been feeding her for the entire time of her confinement. It took Gene back many years to his brief time in south-east Asia. Wondering how many of our boys were still caged up like this.

Dale hauled up the figure of a man in a stained white t-shirt and combat trousers. He looked unshaven and unkempt, he’s clearly been held here as long as Maggie if not longer. They began to escort the hostages clear of the crumbling old facility.

“Captain Sean Locke I presume. Right, let's get the pair of you somewhere safe. I think Garrette is a bit too hot for you right now.”

The deputy director announced

“My daughter Shannon, and her friends they’ve gone … somewhere else it’s hard to explain... I need to get Erin somewhere safe.”

Sean Locke tried to explain it was clear that he was a soldier, not a scientist, that he was concerned more for the welfare of his family than his own.

“Well, I’ll know as soon as she comes back. I’ll have your wife picked up and brought to you. From what I’ve heard your kid is tough, smart and she won’t give up fighting until she gets back to you, That’s if some Twilight Zone shenanigans don’t happen and the timeline is repaired and we’ve never met. Well, that’s what some of my physicist friends believe.”

Gene shrugged, not sure he understood half of the science, it’s why his degrees were in social sciences.

“Meanwhile in this space and time you need rest, a shower clean clothes, and food. Then we’ll talk. We’ll all sit down with my wife and figure things out. I have some idea what’s going on but I want you both to tell me in your own words what’s happened since I last visited with you, Maggie.”

Gene smiled his best smile hoping that it exuded confidence.

“If you insist a friend of mine owns the Trade Winds Trailer park, if we can find a way to smuggle you back into town, you can lay low there with some of my agents keeping an eye on you. But first things first”

The FBI Hostage recovery team packed up and left Garret as quickly as they had arrived. Maggie and Sean were showered, fed and clothed, and not let out of the sight of they’re new FBI minders, then ferried out of Garrett towards the state line with the destination of Prince William County Virginia in the mind. Being moved in a manner more befitting protected federal witnesses. Tyler and Bozzio could only hope that their department was free from the interface of unknown subjects from another reality.

Life continued in Garrette Maryland with no one taking any notice of the massive FBI operation. The groundskeeper of Edgar Alan Poe Middle school was quite baffled to find odd tyre marks and military boot prints all over the field. It was put down to a prank from a rival school that hadn’t quite panned out for the pranksters.

A small old transistor radio hung on the groundskeeper’s Tractor radio-emitting from it the lyrics of Pete Townsend of The Who erupted into the autumn air, with their song Eminence Front.

*The sun shines*

*And people forget*

*The spray flies as the speedboat glides*

*And people forget*

*Forget they're hiding*

*The girls smile*

*And people forget*

*The snow packs as the skier tracks*

*People forget*

*Forget they're hiding*

###### Part 3: Back to Base

It was early morning in Prince William County Virginia about three hours from The Loop in Garrett Maryland. Far from Garette yet the problems of Garette and Its inhabitants were in the forefront of the minds of its owners, and their guests. In a small clearing of trees stood a rustic home, hewn out of the local trees. Far more than a simple log cabin. The House was unobserved by any neighbours in about thirty acres of woodland. The foundation stood on a slightly raised bed with Garages and a full basement below. Large windows let in the sun as it rose above rural Virginia. The suns rays caught upon a crystal hanging from a dream catcher in a window, and equally decorative crystal wind chimes. Down a very long and winding driveway that was paved and graded much like the county road it connected to, there was a metal mailbox shaped like a lead slead wagon. the paintwork glinted in the morning sun it had clearly been made by someone with great skill. The little vanity plate bore the name *Tyler.*

As the day began a woman with a very new age vibe of a curiosity indeterminate age laid out a yoga mat up on the deck and began a well practised yoga routine with unrivalled poise and grace.

A little while later an Asian woman shorter than Maggie Arkaville, for it was she. Perhaps a little older exited the house to the deck with a large tray on legs full of tea things.The tray had an indent for everything. It held a Chinese tea set, the aroma of a pungent blend of green tea filled the air, as Miss Maggie finished her yoga routine.

“You didn’t have to go to all this effort just for me”

Maggie exuded that unique Joie de vivre of hers, that steadfast spirit of 1969.

“I don’t get to make it that often, we rarely have the time, such busy lives”

Rose explained to her house guest.

“You and your husband do such important work. I know what it’s like living with someone totally dedicated to their work.”

Maggie referencing her own father. His research had brought her to Garret in the first place. She had tried to take care of him. Though she had her own life now, and many friends. Even if that put her at odds with her own father. Rose and Gene Tyler were different though. Their son’s influence was all over this house, from the mailbox he had made for them, to pictures of Ray, his wife ‘Olina and their children on the walls and most surfaces. One of the doorways even had his heights notched into it with a recently carved one that read *thirty-six*.

“We try to make the world a little bit safer, for everyone's kids.”

Rose struck a chord with Maggie. She just wanted to hold Robb in her arms again. Maggie felt she had more of a hand in raising that boy into the fine young man he was today than his parents. It was much the same as Rose and Ray. She wasn’t Rays biological mother; she was still in South Korea, though as present in her son's life as geography would allow.

“I just wish I could be more helpful. My father and I are estranged, as you know. I’ve barely seen him in the last twenty years. As soon as the abominable first lab, the one you’re husband and Angen Bozzio found me in, was completed, well that’s the day I lost my father. Now I’m stuck here in limbo because I’ve lost Rob and his friends to the same experiments my father has been running all these years.”

Rose laid a reassuring hand on Maggie’s, for a few seconds.

“They’ll be doing everything they can to come back, we have every resource available to the FBI working on it. We’ve got the best physicists trying to work out exactly what’s happening. I know you’re more than entitled to worry, but we’re doing everything we can.”

Maggie forced a smile

“There are worse places to be confined, I would know, thank you again for opening your home to us.”

In the Garage below the house an older man and a younger man examined a Harley knucklehead engine on a trolley.

“It turns freely.”

Captain Sean Lock confirmed that the pistons moved when they were manually cranked, with a socket and breaker bar.

“Needs a new set of gaskets, and I’d like a look into the cylinders, before we run it”

He continued

“My son got me an endoscope, like it’s a hospital in here not a garage, so that’ll save some time if I can work out how the kajigger works”

Gene Tyler admitted. Hopefully Sean wouldn’t be stuck here long enough for a full restoration. Erin, his wife, was still asleep upstairs, she had been exhausted with worry. Stuck at they’re home in Garrett unable to identify what was wrong. Maggie had at least been able to keep Sean in the loop about what was really going on, as they were confined together. It was normal for Erin that her husband and daughter didn’t check in with her. Sean’s work kept him either on base or at the Loop for weeks on end unable to call or come home. They were both very independent, Shannon fiercely so.

Gene went over to a drawer to find a very lightly used endoscope. No point damaging the engine of the old Harley that was fresh out of the crate, then they had to.

On a hydraulic motorcycle lift was an olive drab army surplus Harley Davidson WLA, it looked to be a 44. It’d seen use at the back end of World War Two and had gone on to be used in Korea. Gene had it drained of fluids and it had sat about his shop for a while with the intent of getting it running again. A project he didn’t necessarily need  Ray’s help with. Something to do at home on weekends. His son had spent enough of his own weekends and holidays here helping to rebuild the Saville house after the fire. It was a long drive from Detroit to Garette. Yet if the Loop went up like *Chernobyl* Gene’s Son, daughter in law, and grandchildren would be in the direct line of fire.

Sean wasn’t the kind of guy to have a conversation with unless he was doing something with his hands. With his mind on the task in front of him, his thoughts and feelings could escape the closely guarded military-style checkpoint of his mind, via his lips. He was one of those soldiers who seemed to be content with their own thoughts. That was fine up on the line or on a mission in the jungle, where if you make any sort of noise you’re finished. But not exactly the best way to live. You keep everything inside and it’s likely to eat away at you, physically mentally or both.

You couldn’t see a lot of the war other vets were still fighting. Gene knew that well enough after all the times he’d been with Jimmy at the VA. There was only so much they could do for him. So many times you could drag him to the VA, or have his prescriptions refilled. He’d never really adjusted well to civilian life, particularly as civilian life became one he recognised from his own childhood. The army had given him structure even if in Korea and Nam even he knew exactly who was going to win this one, and neither of them would be the US of A.

Gene had hoped that Jimmy starting a business on a plot of land he'd bought as a youth before the Korean War. would give him the routine he needed back in the ’70s. It lasted a good time. Until things become too familiar for him until he saw his own mother and father as courting teenagers, and then with him as a babe in arms. It was more than any man could take. Unable to say anything. So he’d left his home and become the Main Street Jimmy the whole town knew.

They continued to work, as Sean Locke spoke infrequently. About his work, being seconded to the Loop from the army. About wanting some stability for his family. A permanent home. Then losing that hard fought for sense of stability the first time he dove, the uncertainty after losing Patrick Mithcell, seeing a world where Pat’s wife was the Loop’s sock puppet Mayor. Then losing Eugine Butts, Eugine was at least here but he was not himself, lost to some extra-dimensional entity that named itself after a Decepticon from Transformers. It was never a good sign when some extra-dimensional force named itself after the bad guys.

“Sean, don't worry about it. Really I’ve known about much of this for nineteen almost twenty years, you’ve known about it eighteen months. Believe me, you’re doing really well. You just have to admit that it makes very little sense.”

Gene tried to reassure him

“I feel like I’ve sent my daughter on a mission I volunteered for. Pat and I got into this travelling to other dimensions, to worlds like ours but not ours. We wanted to somehow fix our planet's issues to do good. We should have known it was wrong when we got to what we called Earth Betra. Now our kids have to clear up our mess, somehow, before everything is destroyed.”

Sean wiped his hands on an oily rag.

“Tell me about it. Main Street Jimmy, the homeless guy Sarge and I served with, he’s stuck in this time loop, he was your daughter's friend Chris, then we had to see him running around as a Kid completely unaware of his fate, unable to help until pretty much the last second. A lot of good men would be dead if he hadn't gone back in time. The Sarge and myself among them. All I could do was kick my heels and chase my tail until now when I know for certain that he’s gone back in time and that our timeline is preserved.”

Gene took out a folding knife from his pocket and carefully peeled apart the greased paper packet containing a new old stock set of piston rings and gaskets for the knucklehead. Inspecting them for any signs of wear or markings from storage. They looked as perfect as the day they were made.

“All we can do now is wait, I hate not being able to do anything.”

Sean exclaimed

“I know the feeling, at least we get to do something now. If the Loop is capable of moving people through time and relative dimension in space like Doctor Who, it needs to be mothballed. I know we can’t ever put the genie in the bottle again on this one. I’ve talked to the relevant Senators on the subcommittee, they've no idea what’s going on. The whole operation has gone rogue. At least Senator MacLoud is in our corner,”

This wasn’t really news to Sean. he’d been too focused on getting Pat back to ask too many questions about where his reports went. There was always an appropriations subcommittee in Washinton or some General in the Pentagon. He was glad that Tyler had a grasp of politics.

“I’ll happily testify to the subcommittee when this is all over, once we work out what we can tell them.”

Captain Sean Locke was nothing if he wasn't an honest guy. A lot of the work he’d done over the years since he’d been drafted for Vietnam sat ill at ease with his own principles. Gene could read him like a book, he’d felt a lot of the work he’d done for the CIA over twenty years ago conflicted with his principles as well, it’s why he’d seen the opportunity to jump ship and taken it.

“The Senate are about the only people in with a chance of getting any answer out of the elusive Doctor Arkeville, I’ll just be glad to be in the same room while they ask the questions.”

Arkavile had been Gene's perennial white whale for a lot of years. He specialised in being immune to warrants, and ignoring interview requests  DARPA *The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency*, had a lot of political sway, and vast budgets. Even they couldn’t keep the FBI off Arkavilles' back for much longer, as it was clear what he’d been meddling with presented a very real threat to the fabric of the universe itself. That Ajrkaville had been blowing smoke up the posterior of his paymasters for years in order for them to bankroll his work. That was perhaps the biggest crime of all the misuse of federal funds. For Gene and Rose Tyler, It would be nice to see an end to all this and to go back to profiling and catching less well-connected people, full time.

From what Gene could unravel *DART: The Department for Advanced Research into Teleoperation* had gone entirely rogue. They had not produced any concrete data into teleportation of troops or resources, Arkaville was on borrowed time and the treasury subcommittee would want to know what every cheque stub equated to.

“I don’t know how we’re going to do it, but we’ll get Pat Mitchell back, and we’ll get our mutual friend Eugine Butts back to his normal self.”

Gene solemnly vowed

“Eugene seemed strange the last few times we talked.”

Sean inspected the gearbox of the old Harley

“Odd things have been happening to him since the mid-’70s and probably before, but at least that he could tell me about. My wife and I are certain that Gena and his boy George come from one of those parallel earths, like the ones you dove to.”

Gene tried to explain, and Sean looked visibly taken aback.

“Makes sense, now how he knew there was something on the other side of the vortex.”

Sean eventually said

“He stopped talking about his family for long periods, suddenly stopped being a goofball. All business, Then he’d come back. Something or someone on the other side had sent his wife Gena and his son to him, then he seemed to forget every conversation we’d ever had I never wanted him to go work for the loop, but he insisted. Wanted to help. Help anyone displaced or lost to time, restore order.”

Gene wished he could have talked George Butts out of it. His deal with the devil. He couldn’t be everywhere.

“It was my honour to know him and have his scientific insights into our missions. I’ve served with a lot of men and there are few men finer than Eugene”

It was Captain Sean Locke’s turn to comfort his genial host.

“He didn’t deserve to play a terrible price. These temporal shenanigans cost him enough, even if by the grace of God he can’t remember what happened to him. Rose and I, we remember, Mads knows, and now I have to tell you and Maggie.”

Gene laid down the socket he was using, Sean stood there listening, waiting patiently.

“Gena Butts was murdered in Winter 1969. Rose and I were there when they pulled her mangled, partially decapitated corpse from the Hudson River.”

Gene found himself censoring the visceral details of the degradation of the corpse, he knew Sean Locke could deal with anything, he’d seen worse in his military career, it was different when it was someone you knew. The Mom of one of your kid’s friends.

“A creature not of our earth killed her, my hunch is it was the creature, man, necromancer, whatever, that calls itself *Randall Flagg*. I’ve been hunting him for almost twenty years now, most FBI agents only serve twenty, and I’m going to see Flagg brought down by any means necessary before I collect my gold watch from the Attorney General.”

Gene looked visibly deflated and took a seat on a 1950s metal framed office chair in the garage, one that looked like it had been saved from a Skip at Quantico.

“If you need another Gun, I’ll do whatever I can to help. Eugene if he remembered who he was, and what we had done together, would do anything for me.”

Sean Locke laid a hand on Gene’s shoulder

“You know I have some experience with worlds that aren’t ours, where things from people's imaginations are as real as you and I. As long as it doesn't involve another dive.”

Sean Lock was uncharacteristically verbose. Gene felt a kinship between himself and Maggie’s friend. More than just being too old soldiers.

“We’d better get back to it then”

Tyler announced, indicating the engine and motorcycle before them. All the five souls gathered in this Virginian log home could do was wait, try and gather what resources, what few tangible answers they could. In trepid preparation for a final political and possibly physical assault on the Garette Loop.

*The Lyrics of Reach Out I’ll Be There* by *The Four Tops* echoed around the treetops of this tranquil idyll, the little clearing in the dense forests of Prince William County Virginia. As the camera pulls away from the piedmont forest, Northwest towards Maryland, across highways and bi-ways. The shadows of Mag Trucks on the ground. Eventually focus on the great man-made circle of the particle accelerator known as the Garette Loop, a ticking timebomb right in the central Appalachians.