FAILURE LOG
LA/LOSTON TRANSPORT
SUBJECT A
Adam stepped into the plane, replaying what had happened and trying to see if it could have been done any differently. The mask he wore over his face chafed at his mouth and nose, tiny fibers inside it weeding out the particles of gas that still remained in the plane.
He looked at the wounded, the dying.
The dead.
He whipped around, fury rippling across his normally placid features.
"Get Dirk down here," he said to the woman who had followed him into the plane. Like him, she was dressed in a drab outfit, a gray that was so neutral it was almost colorless. It was the color of their home, and suited them. But it did nothing to hide the display of anger that seared forth from Adam’s eyes. His fury was a terrible thing to behold, the more so because he was so rarely angry.
"Yes, sir."
The woman nodded to him and left. She did not salute, for that was a thing of the Past. Besides, this wasn’t exactly a military unit.
Not exactly.
Adam turned his eyes back to the compartment, searching. Those eyes missed nothing. He noted every passenger’s placement, divining from what he knew of the trajectory of their impact with his knowledge of their assigned seats to figure out where she would be.
Jason, Adam’s second in command, stood beside him in the plane, his own gaze following Adam’s. Jason was shorter than Adam, and was a quiet man, seeming to keep his own counsel more than most. That was all right with Adam. When he did speak, Jason always communicated something worthy of attention. That was why he was Adam’s right hand, and why when Adam was finally killed or went mad he would take charge.
There was always the possibility Jason would die first. It was a dangerous business they were involved in. But if not, he probably would not go crazy before Adam did, so it was right for him to be next in command. Jason had the best chance of carrying on Adam’s mission when the inevitable finally occurred.
"She should be in 7-C, sir," said Jason.
Adam nodded and picked his way through the debris that littered the plane’s interior. He tripped over a woman’s handbag, the straps catching at his heel and sending him stumbling. He heard a dry crack as his foot landed hard on something.
He looked down and saw a young woman. She lay in the aisle, one hand thrown up over her face, no doubt to protect her beautiful features as she flew out of her chair. Her hair curled in a matted carpet over her face, knotted and gnarled from the cruel buffeting she had endured.
But her indignities did not end with the mere fact of her state of dishabille. Adam had stepped on her elbow, and he could see that it was broken.
This did nothing to improve his already bad mood. He muttered a curse, then stepped off the woman’s arm. He gently brushed her hair away from her face, combing his fingers loosely through her hair. It was probably somewhat silly of him – uncharacteristically frivolous, even – to do so. But her broken elbow would not bother her, not in her present state, and her extreme dishevelment seemed to rebuke him. You did this to me, it seemed to say, and so Adam gently combed her hair away, softly put it as right as he could, then even more gently put her back in the nearest empty seat. It probably wasn’t hers, but it didn’t matter. Adam did it more out of respect than out of a desire to put things back the way they had been.
He respected all the people on board the plane. Some of his coworkers did not, seeing the plane’s occupants as mere window dressing, but Adam certainly held them fond in his heart. They were, after all, the future. Or rather, they guarded its safekeeping.
He put the girl’s broken arm on the armrest. She did not moan at all, though Adam could not tell whether that was because the synaptic inhibitors had done their jobs or because she was simply dead. Either way, she would not remember that any of this had ever happened.
Adam stood again.
7-C.
He found it easily. The woman had managed to stay in her seat.
"Thank God," he whispered.
He reached out to touch her forehead. It was smooth; cool. Unlined in spite of the horrible toll the past years must have taken on her. He traced the delicate curve of her chin, following her jaw to the point where it joined her throat. Skin so white, so pure. So real.
He took a deep breath, preparing himself for the worst, then touched her throat with two fingers. A pulse beat at his fingertips, strong and healthy. He let his breath out, his knees growing suddenly wobbly with relief.
She was alive. So for today, at least, the world would not end.
I could love you, Fran, he said to himself. But that was a half-truth, at best. Because he already did. Not in the way some might think, but in the way of a father for his only child. In the way that only a man who has spent his whole life protecting a woman can feel towards her. "I do love you," he whispered.
She simply slept, like the beauty from the Old fairy tales. No kiss would wake her, though. Indeed, very few things could.
Someone coughed lightly.
Adam stood upright, spinning around so hard that he almost tripped again. Dirk, the man who had been in charge of the boarding process, stood behind him. He wore an ill-fitting mask that covered a mouth no doubt puckered downward in a pious frown.
"Idiot!" shouted Adam. The sleepers around them did not wake. "You could have killed her!"
"I’m sorry, there was a problem syncing our ship with the plane and –"
"I don’t care what the problem was, Dirk. You could have killed her. Do you understand what that would mean?"
Dirk nodded. His eyes suddenly welled up and a tear streaked its way down his cheek, touching the edge of his mask and steering along the seal to his chin. Adam let up a bit. He didn’t want to be too hard, but still....
"You are relieved of your duties as pilot. Have Abra take over," said Adam in a quiet voice. It was not meant to carry to the other men and women in the room. His decree was not meant to humiliate, but to teach. And above all, to ensure that the jobs that needed doing were done well. Dirk nodded and turned on his heel.
Adam followed him to the front of the plane, where the Cleanup Crew waited. They were Controllers, of course, as Adam was, but their function was more specific than most. They had to turn back the clocks perfectly; make sure that what they did left no trace, either in evidence or memory.
Adam looked at his feet. A little boy lay nearby, body smashed into a mangled ball by forces beyond his control. From the way his neck crooked, it was evident he was dead, and Adam resisted the urge to grow angry again. Anger would solve nothing and would not serve to teach any lessons, so he quelled it. He did this reflexively, subordinating the emotion almost as a matter of course. Emotions were a dangerous luxury, and one that Adam rarely indulged in.
"You’ll have to fix that," he said to the Cleanup Crew, pointing to the child. They all nodded as one. Each had the exact layout of the plane in his or her head, where each item of luggage had to go, where each passenger sat.
They would make it right.
Adam sighed. I’m getting too old, he thought. But it was a lie. He was only fifty-two, and more than equal to the physical aspects of the challenges that lay before him. He would never see sixty, of course, as his death was sure to come before then, but until it did he would work and protect. He was a Controller, and that was what a Controller did: service and toil until death provided a release from both.
He looked at 7-C again, at the blonde-framed face that slept so peacefully in the midst of so many convergences of history.
"Fran," he whispered. He touched her lightly, a quick caress that was almost too fast to be seen. Then Adam stepped out of the plane. He would leave while the Cleanup Crew made all right again, and then would watch Fran as she reached her destination, the place she must go, if humanity was to have any chance at all.
Loston.