The Wounded World
A Story of Mantra
By Aladdin
Originally written 2006
Posted July 21, 2021
Revised July 22, 2021
Revised July 28, 2021
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DATING THE N-ME

Edited by Christopher Leeson
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Chapter 13

Lo! now the direful monster, whose skin clings
To his strong bones, strides o'er the groaning rocks:
He withers all in silence, and his hand
Unclothes the earth, and freezes up frail life.

William Blake

Our party made landing at a restricted field next to L.A. and were taken elsewhere by van. It conveyed us to a corporate site, basically a Deep State safe house. There we conspirators would organize and ready ourselves for the day ahead.

With Wrath directing the A-Team in every detail, there wasn’t much for me to do. I was among the first who were authorized to go get some sleep. My assigned quarters were Spartan, offering fewer amenities than a cheap motel. Again, I couldn’t make use of my cell phone since the premises were protected by energy-field dampeners, making calling out impossible. To use a land line required permission from above, but I didn’t want to ask. The house phones would absolutely be monitored.

Lying back on my bunk, I tried to establish mental contact with Lauren. My concentrated effort seemed to get me close to Lauren's mind, but that consciousness of hers was like a ringing phone that just wouldn’t pick up.

So, I turned my attention to my friend Strike instead. Tomorrow was Sunday. The future history I knew told me that some catastrophe would turn New York City into the new Hiroshima and Strike would be blamed. But my contact attempt never got close. It was as if he were nowhere to be found on the entire planet. Why? Was he dead? Maybe.

Blocked in every direction, I did my best to relax. I’d been dealing with fatigue all day and by now it was shutting down my higher brain functions. I closed my eyes, intending to try to reach Lauren again, but the next thing I knew it was morning.

Wrath wakened me with a tap on the door, calling that I should come down for breakfast. I yelled back, “Okay” and took my Aladdin action suit out of its plastic bag. It was very like what the A-team wore and I didn’t doubt that this was the same outfit that Lauren had seen me sporting at the Mall. Or, maybe I should say, would see me sporting at the Mall.

The morning meal would have been bested by hospital food in any foot race. It’s like government can’t do anything right, nothing at all, except when it comes to causing trouble. The whole A-Team was chowing down and Wrath briefed me on my specific orders. He emphasized that I would not be coming with him and the others to the Mall, but would deploy in a safe area and keep in contact via a com link.

That didn’t sit well. I wanted to get into the action right out of the gate and urged Wrath to upgrade my role, specifically asking permission to go with the team to the Mall. He shook his shaven head. "Can't do that, Ma'am. Protocol says that we've all got to follow the plan. Bad things happen when a plan is laid aside."

So, I was transported to an empty lot near the Mall along with a few others who composed my monitoring team. Then Wrath and the A-Team moved out, with N-ME in the back of a truck box. The thing really filled up the available space. I supervised the work of my helpers readying the equipment. When everything was shipshape, all I had to do was sit quietly in a folding chair, waiting for something to happen.

In fact, I was a pathetically minor piece on the a game board, like the pawn or rook that doesn’t move at all before the checkmate. From what I could tell, the more I tried to change the future, the less traction I was gaining. I wasn’t even sure that history could be altered, but until I knew for sure I wasn’t going to give up. To try to reach Lauren again I needed privacy, something I didn’t have where I was. So I went to the portable toilet that had been dropped off for us and, once alone inside, made another effort at nailing down a psychic link.

"Wha---?!" I heard the teen’s thoughts exclaiming. "Eden, is that you?"

"Yes," I said, projecting as forcefully as I could. "Didn't you hear me trying to reach you last night?"

"Oh, I was having trouble sleeping, after what I’d gone through with Gus, Coven, and Necromantra. So, I took a full dose of Unisom and it clicked me off like a light, until Dad got me up for breakfast."

"Well, I’m calling to warn you. Aladdin is back. They’ve set up a sting operation trying to capture any ultra who takes the bait. They’ll be at the Sherman Way Mall this morning. That guy Wrath is already there with a hit team. Don’t go anywhere near the Mall today."

"You’re talking about the big bald dude in the funky red spandex?"

"Yes. Take it from me, these guys are deadly. Remember how easily they took out Gus? And this group is even better trained than that one was. If you hear news about a giant robot endangering people, don’t try to help. It’s only a government false flag. I mean, it's just a buff to draw in unsuspecting ultras and capture them. The robot is programmed not to hurt anyone."

"You mean Aladdin and a robot are at the Mall now?"

"Yes. Stay home!"

"But I'm almost there -- at the Mall, I mean. Mom and I are meeting at the bookstore. If she sees a giant robot clanking around the place she might have a heart attack! I have to get her out, and quick! Maybe I can breeze in and breeze out with her before the dirty dozen barges in."

"No! Lauren, you can't risk it. You'll be in the middle of a hurricane. Your mom will be all right. If anyone attacks NM-E -- the robot, I mean – it will shift into combat mode. The Aladdin people think they can control the thing, but I know they can't."

"I can’t take chances with Mom. She has a really low melting point. Look, if the robot shows up, all we have to do is play it cool and head out the back door. Right?"

"Wrong. Getting close to that monster is like juggling lightning bolts!"

"Bye, Eden. Gotta go! Every second counts!"

"Lauren, no!"

She was gone.

Teenagers! They're all idiots!

#

Again I wondered if it was possible to change history. Maybe I was worrying about nothing. Possibly, the fight between Lauren and NM-E, along with its successful conclusion, was foreordained. But I wasn’t sure.

It’s not in my nature to sit around hoping that things would turn out for the best. I’d already meddled with Lauren’s encounter with N-ME by contacting her ahead of time. There's a theory that should a person move even one pebble on a beach, all of future history is going to be changed, not just here on Earth, but all over the universe. It was just possible that merely by being on a planet where I didn't belong had randomized all of its future events. That would include any fight that would be waged between Lauren and N-ME.

The trouble was, I lacked freedom of action while inside this nest of Aladdin agents. It also bothered me that I didn't have a plan. I wasn't sure what I could do at the Mall even if I went there. If Wrath was no match for N-ME, I was only a straw in the wind. Feeling rotten, I went back to my team and asked for an update report on Greg Tunney’s operation.

Tunney had, in fact, been sending in play-by-play reports via his remote. He had just released NM-E and the robot was advancing across the mall tarmac. Already hundreds of panicked shoppers were fleeing by car or on foot.

I wondered if the killing machine had been programmed to say, “I’m from the government. I’m here to help you.”

According to plan, the robot would roam about looking scary and Tunney was under orders to recall it as soon as local authorities started to arrive. If Necromantra or some other ultra got into the mix before that, the A-Team would rush in with nets, gas grenades, and stun guns. If captured, the hero would be spirited away for interrogation and brainwashing, à la Blythe Ashwin.

Whomever they caught, I knew it wouldn’t be Necromantra. A bitch like that couldn’t care less if innocent people were being terrorized just a mile away from her!

If forced to leave the Mall without a capture, the team would move the operation to an alternate site – a multiplex movie theater in an adjacent suburb. I kept my fingers crossed, hoping that Lauren had already gotten in and gotten out.

But I was almost equally worried about Warstrike – or Strike, as he was called in this twisted world. I’d already verified that his phone numbers were not duplicated on this planet. It was like I was walking around in a dream; I knew something awful was coming, but couldn't do a damned thing about it.

And then there was the problem of New York. It was useless to give anyone in authority advanced warning about the coming disaster. Government functionaries don't pay attention to concerned citizens claiming to see the future. Worse, after 911 the USA had become a surveillance state. If I sent in a call and something happened, law-enforcement bureaucrats would hunt me down, thinking I had to be part of the plot. If the FBI found out who I was, they would tip off their buddies at Aladdin, too. Both agencies would slam me with questions that I wouldn’t be able to answer. As much as I hated it to admit it, Fun City was on its own, and so was Brandon. I only hoped that he could survive being smeared as a mass-murdering international terrorist fugitive.

An electronic voice interrupted my dismal thinking. It was Tunney, saying that NM-E had made contact with an ultra opponent! I closed my eyes and clenched my fists, hoping that – this time – that the robot had run into someone other than Lauren Sherwood.

"What does the opponent look like, Wrath?" I asked, my throat tight.

"It's not the red-headed chick from the picture," he replied. “I'm seeing that same bouncy cheerleader-type I ran into Saturday night -- the one that your little girl called 'Mantra.' She's coming on strong! That kid's got real power!"

Worst-case scenario! Why was Lauren doing this? But that was a dumb question. Why did kids her age do anything?

“Ah! The little blonde just got a good haymaker on NM-E..." Tunney was saying. "He's staggering. I'm checking his damage readouts...No, it's good! Old Nuts and Bolts must have the constitution of an Abrams tank.” Then I heard Wrath give the order: “NM-E -- intercept and detain....”

Then he yelled "No!" and went silent.

I sucked in a breath. That outcry could very mean that Lauren had trashed the equipment van – the very van that Aladdin depended on to keep control of the situation. NM-E's hard drive would now be rebooting to its original program -- a psychotic algorithm that had somehow been written ages ago, long before the human race had conceived of software. It was a program that had been telling the robot to hunt down and kill ultras for thousands of years.

Wrath would intervene to help Lauren, I knew, which would result in getting himself seriously injured to no good purpose.

I turned to my subordinate officer. "Try to pick up Tunney's lieutenant on the A-Team,"

A moment later, he'd raised a woman's voice.

"Smoke is coming from Wrath's van," she reported. "Tunney doesn't respond. There's an ultra-battle going on in front of us; we can’t head in directly. I'm sending a squad to circle around and get a visual!"

The situation had already spun out of control. Plainly, I had to let Aladdin know that we had a disaster on our hands. I sent in my message and the far-end monitor answered, “We hear you, Agent Blake.”

"We think that Mantra has attacked the mobile mission van," I said. "There's a good possibility that Wrath has lost control of NM-E. This could turn into a civilian massacre. The A-Team has to be ordered to put the robot down. And I recommend that additional heavy support be dropped in ASAP."

“Measures will be taken, Agent Blake,” a different voice answered back. “Maintain your position.”

I sat for a few minutes with no further contact.

Even though I didn't know how I could make a difference by intervening, I couldn’t stand the idea of Lauren fighting alone against a monster that had already made mincemeat out of squads of ultras. I was on the edge of going AWOL and heading for the Mall when a headquarters colonel came on the air. I knew him only slightly, a hard case called Colonel Smekes. "Agent Blake. Move your monitoring operation closer in. We need better information.”

I didn’t give a damn about the monitoring, but I could use Smeke’s words as an excuse to go to the Mall personally. I took about five seconds to tell my communications team to move our station to within sight of the A-Team's activity focus and I’d join them there. Then I took off for the shopping center at a sprint.

#

I actually made better time on foot than I could have in a vehicle. Every car at the Mall was trying to get out at the same time. But swarms of other motorists were going toward the lot -- thrill-seekers alerted by broadcast news that they could go witness a first-class ultra brawl. Horns blared as the opposing streams of traffic ran afoul of each other, bringing everybody to a halt.

I had to weave between a hundred mostly-stationary autos. Upon reaching the parking lot, I saw something jetting into the sky like a giant bottle rocket. It was NM-E, making his escape by air -- just as future history had foretold.

I’d already known that Lauren's fight with NM-E was fated to climax inside the Toy World store, a location I knew well. I set out and, when it was just ahead, Wrath came staggering from of the wreckage, holding his shoulder and limping. I got goose-flesh. He should have been in a much worse condition than this. History had been changed! But if Tunney had lucked out by being hurt less than he should have been, could Lauren have been even more hurt?

"Wrath," I yelled. "Where's L -- Mantra?"

"B-Back in there," he gasped.

I scrambled through a gaping hole in the Toy World wall. Inside, it looked like a herd of buffaloes had rumbled through its aisles using flamethrowers. Broken and scorched toys were strewn everywhere. A headless action figure of Mantra lay at my feet. The poor thing looked about as ruined as I felt.

With my eyes burning and tearing from the stinging smoke, I scanned what was a chaos of ruination. Tunney touched my shoulder.

"She's -- she's over there, M-Mrs. Blake. B-Behind those boxes," he stammered.

I went where he pointed and, amid a pile of crumpled cartons, I saw Lauren. Blood covered much of her slim body and her peaches-and-cream flesh was torn in many places. The gray magic armor she had on had been heavily scarred. Even if the girl could have survived such a battering, her open throat wound made all the rest of her injuries look irrelevant.

I dashed to the teenager and gripped her bloody arm, feeling for a pulse. I detected not hint of life. She was still warm, but....

But she was dead.

Lauren was dead.

The fatal injury of a young person would have been hard to deal with under any circumstances, but in a fiasco like this I had very good reason to suppose that I was responsible.

CONTINUED IN 14