The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 11, 2398

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It wasn’t easy, but they were able to get The Olimpia moving. They weren’t traveling at normal cruising speed, but they were making decent time. Three days later, they can finally see land again. It’s exactly where Ramses said it would be. They have to get pretty close to see any sign of civilization, but it is there, just without any skyscrapers or roads. The people who live in Vertegen reportedly like the quiet life, far from the hustle and bustle of everywhere else, but they’re not completely cut off. There’s a radio tower. The team hasn’t been able to learn too much about them, only as much as the blurb on the map can tell them. Ramses is missing some key parts that were lost to the deep in the crash, and the communications system was damaged the most. It’s unclear who they would call, though, considering that their friends are all locked away in a penal colony, and Amir Hussain is hiding from the U.S. government. They would rather meet someone who can help get the Olimpia back in the air, but it’s not going to happen. That’s okay. They weren’t holding out hope for a mechanic who can work on a vehicle that quadruples as a car, boat, submarine, and airplane. They just need to contact someone who may be able to help, and as remote as this settlement is, they have that. But who can they trust?

The people of Vertegen are trying to speak to them in a language that they don’t recognize, let alone understand. They seem to be able to tell that the four of them are speaking English, but none of them understands that. Ever the counselor, Angela takes over the responsibility of fostering communication. She points to themselves—particularly their lips—and says, “English.” Then points to the local, and raises her eyebrows to suggest a question.

The local points to himself, and the crowd behind him, and says, “Rakripa.”

She nods. “Rakripa.” Now they’re getting somewhere.

They learn a few more things as their ambassador is showing them around. He picks up a cup, and says “pani.”

At first they think he’s just trying to teach them a few words, but then he keeps trying to give it to her, so she accepts, and drinks.

“What is it?” Mateo asks.

“It’s just water,” she answers. “It’s nice and cold, though.”

The man smiles, and hands her another cup. “Panijiben.”

“Panijiben,” Angela echoes. She accepts the drink as well.

He gives her one more cup or just plain water, which they all think is a little strange, but who are they to judge these people’s rituals?

He says, “momma” and hands Ramses a small lantern. It’s then that they realize these aren’t lessons, but gifts. This becomes clearer when he presents Mateo with a beautiful knife, and calls it a “kjuro” but much less clear when he smiles at Amir, opens his arms wide, and says, “keri.”

“Keri?” Angela tries to decipher the code.

“Keri, keri,” the man repeats enthusiastically, gesturing to Amir. He points at one of the tents, and says it again. He indicates the whole settlement one more time. “Keri.”

“Home,” Amir realizes. “He wants me to stay.” He turns to face the group. “I think I’m meant to be here.”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 10, 2398

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They’re not sure why there was a time limit to literally get through the door to get processed out of Birket, but it turned out fine. They all made it through, and walked across the desert to the Israeli border. It was there that they waited for almost the entire day before transport to Cairo came for them. People obviously weren’t in any hurry to help them. They weren’t on the road for long before darkness fell, and their driver had to stop and check into a motel for the night. He didn’t secure any rooms for them, of course, and clearly didn’t care, so they were forced to sleep under the stars on the beach in a coastal town called Taba, Egypt. Fortunately, it was pretty nice weather, and they were all glad to be free at least. So far, there was no indication of how exactly they were going to get back to the states. Their devices were confiscated from them, and never returned—wiped clean upon any attempt at unauthorized access—and no one in Taba was willing to let them use a phone.

They woke up this morning, all reporting having slept well enough, and made their way back to the motel. Neither the driver nor his bus could be found. Amir asked the front desk about it in Arabic, and learned that he checked out early, and took off. That’s very weird. It’s his job to get them to a special final processing center in Cairo, not just to help them make it all the way home. They’re expected to exit the region according to policy, which entails either meeting their sponsor, or an approved representative, in country. Now it’s going to be much more difficult to do that, and might even get them sent back to Birket. Maybe that’s what someone has wanted all along, and is driving these obstacles. Still, no one lends them a phone.

“How long will it take us to walk?” Kivi asks.

Amir laughs. “At least a week. That’s if we walk for several hours each day, which we won’t be able to do, especially not without any water.”

“Why won’t anyone help us? Do they not have any taksis, or anything around here?” Leona asks.

“I tried asking,” Amir begins, “but just because we speak the same language, doesn’t mean they like me. They know what we are, and while Egyptians don’t have any particular distaste for colonists—or freed colonists, like ourselves—there is some local annoyance that they’re being used as a waypoint for us. Their government struck a deal to make it happen after Israel and Jordan both refused, but regular citizens don’t like it. It’s not the only deal that Egypt has regarding refugees. It’s a huge political issue.”

“Is that why the driver abandoned us?” Marie asks him.

“Probably, yes, but it doesn’t make much sense. He could still get in trouble for it, because now it’s worse. The only thing Egyptians hate more than processing refugees is wayward refugees who are stuck here, and can’t be processed out.”

“What about Saudi Arabia?” Kivi presses. “How do they feel about us?”

Amir looks to the south. “You’re not getting across the Red Sea, and you’re not getting through the two borders between you and Saudi Arabia on land.”

“It was just a thought,” Kivi says, shrugging.

“Keeves, maybe you could find someone to help us?” Leona asks her.

“I’ve already asked,” Amir protests.

“Keeve?” Leona urges, not wanting to explain what makes her method different.

“I can try,” Kivi replies, uncertain of her own skills. She steps away from the group, as before, trying to seek an ally. Her stride is wider than normal, reminiscent of a wedding party gracefully drifting down the aisle. She periodically alters direction, hoping to catch a scent, for lack of a better term.

“What is she doing?” Amir asks Heath in a whisper.

“Honestly, I don’t really know,” Heath answers him, probably not lying.

It feels like she walks all over town, encountering each one of the 10,000 people who live here. She doesn’t get the sense that any of them would tell them the time, let alone help get them out of the country. Amir talks to a few more people himself, and receives the same cold welcome. They’re starting to think that they really should get themselves out of the area as fast as possible. If they tried to walk to the next town over, it might only take them two days. Of course, water and food is still a problem. If only Birket gave them small samples of Energy water as parting gifts, they would be able to survive just a little bit longer. As it stands, they may die here like a flower in drought.

They don’t end up walking anywhere. They just go back to the beach, and sit to watch the waves come in. Marie suggests that they fish for food, which she surely learned how to do at the master level in the afterlife simulation. Amir informs them that he saw a sign back there, forbidding all shore fishing. Hours later, a fleet of helicopters roar towards them from the horizon. “Those are American,” Amir exclaims.

“We better go,” Leona determines.

Once more, they head for downtown, where they find a bunch of soldiers spread out, trying to take control of the populace. People are scared, but cooperating, and it doesn’t look like things are going to escalate to true violence. A woman who looks in charge spots them coming towards the crowd. She orders a group of her soldiers to escort us over. “Agent Matic?” she asks when they meet her halfway.

“That’s me,” Leona responds reluctantly. She doesn’t want anyone to know that she’s a secret agent, and only partially because she isn’t really.

“Miller Dennard. Why didn’t you call?” she demands to know.

 “We don’t have phones,” Leona explains. “No one would let us borrow theirs.”

She’s fuming, but not at them. She’s staring daggers at all the locals. “Follow me. We’re taking you straight to Frankfurt, where you’ll board your connection, like you were always supposed to.”

Leona nods to the others that they should accept the ride. “What prompted you to come for us?” she asks the Miller.

The Miller puts on her sunglasses. “Orders from high.”

“How high?”

Miller Dennard turns away to head for the helicopters herself. “All the way up!”

Leona sighs, recognizing that while this looks life a gift, it only makes things more comfortable. Every person who knows that they’re special makes their lives that much more complicated. Still, they have to get back home if they have any chance of getting back to their real home, so she runs over, and gets in the aircraft too.

Miller Dennard places her headset on as their launching, and turns towards one of the other helicopters. “Put an A-bomb in that water!” she orders.

Horrified, they watch as an object slides out of the other helicopter, and drops into the Gulf of Aqaba. Stillness until the water shudders and ripples all at once, as if a powerful electrical charge had been sent through it. They fly away.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 9, 2398

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Okay, new plan. As it turns out, it’s a good thing that Amir Hussain is such a common name, because there are a few others in the penal colony. It takes them a little bit of time, and a little bit of them breaking into a records room, but they think they have found the right impostor for the job. He actually wants to leave the colony, and start a new life in Usonia. The real Amir Hussain—or rather, the one they’re assuming the two senators are trying to transport as a refugee—is already gone, having been teleported to The Olimpia just as it was coming in to free all of them. He and the rest of their friends should be safe and sound by now. He would have explained to them who he was, and they would have dropped him off somewhere else around the world, given him a little starter money, and returned home.

They weren’t trying to trick Birket, per se, but since no one on the team appears to have actually escaped, their enemies shouldn’t suspect a thing, and they will hopefully accept the other Amir as a decoy. He looks enough like him, given the poor quality of the photo, but maybe there are better ones out there. The Honeycutts may have deliberately made this difficult on them, for whatever ridiculous reason. If so, then they’ll see right through the ruse. The didn’t explain any of this to the new Amir. They’re pretending to legitimately presume that he’s the one they have been looking for this entire time. They’ve almost convinced themselves of as much. Right now, they’re waiting outside of the rundown transition building, which is where release requests are processed.

A man gets on the speaker. “Leona Matic, Marie and Heath Walton, Kivi Bristol, and Amir Hussain, please come inside.”

They walk in to find the building cut in half. Their side is bare, with only chairs up at the barrier, allowing them to communicate through bulletproof glass. The other side is part of a sliver of land where the true citizens of Birket live. A woman is rifling through some papers, and doesn’t bother looking up when they walk in. “Please sit in the order that you were called, starting from this chair here, to that one down there.”

They do as they’re asked.

She keeps consulting the documents, but finally does look up at them. “One million U.S. dollars.” She smiles in a strange way before adding, “each.” Not even Leona knows what she means by that. “That is how much it has cost to get you out of the Birket Penal Colony. I have never seen a bid that high, not even close. But apparently it comes with a...” She looks back at one of the pieces of paper. “...relatively large jug of Dead Sea Water?”

Leona clears her throat to show that she’s not deaf, but doesn’t say a word.

“We don’t like stealing here, but one jug of saltwater is still just one jug. It’s not worth five million dollars.” She continues to wait for them to respond, but gets nothing. “Though, I suppose the payment is more to get us to keep quiet about the whole thing...which I’ll honor. We need to repair and remodel half the blocks in the colony, and that money will contribute nicely to the fund.” She waits once more, but is neither surprised nor perturbed by the silence. “We don’t care if you have any belongings. You won’t be returning. A guard will open that door way down there in ten seconds. You’ll then have ten seconds to get through it before it closes again. Good luck.”

They jump out of their seats.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 8, 2398

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The stranger was just as nervous as Team Matic was, because they were strangers to him too. They didn’t have much time to get to know each other before The Olimpia started suffering from some major problems. They started falling out of the sky, causing them to become weightless, making it harder for Ramses to reach the controls that he needed. He was able to slow them down long enough to keep from crashing so hard it killed them, but they still hit the ground hard. They might have indeed died if they hadn’t landed on snow. As it turned out, they were very close to the North Pole, which wasn’t exactly the plan. Ramses was just trying to get out of Birket airspace. Navigation using the temporal engine is still a little difficult.

They’ve been here since yesterday, doing everything they can to stay warm despite failing systems all over the vehicle. The doors are still closed, and since it’s summer, the solar panels are at maximum efficiency, but they won’t survive here forever. “What do you know about this area?” Ramses asks their new friend, Amir.

“I don’t know much,” he replies.

“Well, are there any research stations nearby, or what? I don’t see anything on the map, but there’s gotta be something.”

“Why would they build anything all the way up here?” Amir asks. He’s trying to wrap his mind around this whole thing. One second they were in the Middle East, and now they’re on the top of the world. He explained how he met Leona and the rest of the team, but they never clued him into all the time travel stuff. Well, they mentioned a few things, but he just figured they were talking in metaphor, or something. He didn’t take anything they said seriously. Now he does. Now he has proof. Now he can’t deny it. And he’s implied that it’s opened his eyes to a few things he experienced in his youth. “It’s too cold.”

“Well, that’s—” Angela begins, confused. “That is why they would be studying it. They would want to understand the cold.”

Amir is even more confused than she is. “Cold is cold. This place has snow and ice. I mean, what more do you wanna know?”

They don’t know how to respond. Mateo definitely can’t explain the purpose himself. When he’s heard about Arctic and Antarctic bases in the main sequence, he has always just accepted that the scientists in question have good reasons to do what they do. The fact that the people in this reality don’t seem to value such study isn’t inherently problematic, though I’m sure Leona would have some choice words to say about it. The real issue is that Ramses didn’t sleep last night as he was trying to figure out how to get out of here, and if they’re all alone, their situation may ultimately prove helpless. Shaking his head, Ramses gets back to work, but has to take a break after only another hour.

“I think we need to talk about the elephant in the room.” They’re sitting in the main cabin together.

“Who, me?” Amir asks, thinking it’s obvious.

“What? No, you’re cool. Leona trusted you, we trust you. I’m talking about that stuff out there.” He looks at the viewscreen, which is showing them the horrid winterscape outside. All the real windows are closed to insulate them better. They won’t freeze to death anytime soon, but every little bit they can do to save energy is best.

“Well, we have plenty of water. As long as we can melt it, we’re fine,” Angela says.

“Not that either,” Mateo replies. “I’m talking about the special water, which is about eight kilometers that way?”

“Oh, Invincibility Water,” Ramses says.

“Does invincibility mean we can’t get cold, or does it just mean we can’t get hurt.”

Ramses narrows his eyes. “Neither. Invincibility means that you can’t get injured. Body water, I realized, means that you wouldn’t feel pain. As for the cold, I’m not sure if any of the waters do that. The pain and temperature receptors in the body are different things. Perhaps that would go away if you combine them properly?”

“Oh,” Mateo utters.

“It doesn’t matter, Matty,” Ramses goes on. “Invincibility water only works on the winter solstice. We’re nowhere near that date.”

“But you’re out of the Energy water that Leona threw us, aren’t you? Every jump seems to use up all you have, but you could synthesize Invincibility water to replace it.”

“I have a few samples left, though you’re right, not enough to help us. I don’t think the Invincibility water would help either, as I’m not sure the Olimpia can make it all the way to civilization in one piece, via teleportation or air travel.”

“We don’t have to get the Olimpia to civilization,” Angela offers. “We just have to get ourselves there. You don’t have to inject the Invincibility water into the engine if you can inject it into us.”

“Yeah, that was a plan I had a long time ago,” Ramses begins, “when I first began my research. The problem is that I’m not a doctor, I’m an engineer. Building the engine from scratch was easy, but figuring out how to bind the temporal energy to our cells is entirely different, especially since something stripped us of our powers.”

“You did it before,” she points out, speaking of their clone bodies.

“I had a lot of resources in the Fifth Division,” Ramses counters. “Time travel is all but impossible here. I’m not working from scratch. I’m working with one hand tied behind my back, and the other only has one finger left, and I’m blind and deaf, and—”

“We get it,” Angela stops him, “it’s hard.”

They sit in silence for another few moments. “What is the nearest spot of civilization?” Mateo finally asks.

Ramses sighs, having trouble keeping his eyes open. “That would be Vertegen, Norway. It’s about eleven hundred kilometers from here.”

“You say we can’t fly, but can you make this thing float?” Mateo questions. “Even if it’s slow, can you get us down there eventually?”

“Yeah, maybe with some help with the manual labor.”

“I can do that,” Mateo promises.

“I as well,” Amir volunteers.

“We’ll follow your lead,” Angela adds. “We’ll start after you get some sleep.”

Ramses struggles to stand up, but he can’t even get out of his seat. “No, I can do it. Just give me a second.”

“Okay,” Angela says understandingly, because she knows it won’t be an issue. Once Ramses falls asleep, Mateo takes a sip of the Energy water, and uses his slightly heightened strength to carry his friend up the steps, and into the real bed. He then goes back to his cubby to get some sleep himself, as do the other two. Come the next day, they start to work on effecting repairs. They’re in this for the long haul.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 7, 2398

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Mateo, Angela, and Ramses can’t wait any longer. Angela had the bright idea to crack open the LIR Map, and see if it could give them any answers. They were all shocked that they hadn’t thought of it before, and not just for this situation. It could have been really helpful before they got into this mess, and might even help them find Danica Matic, or other answers. As Leona described it, the map worked like a comic book strip. Future or present events could be seen illustrated on the page, allowing the viewer to make certain decisions with an advantage. That’s not what is happening here. Each of them sees something different when they look at it.

Angela is seeing moving compasses with numbers on them. Some of these numbers are going down, and some are going up. As she turns her body around, the compasses rotate, and are not always pointing North. Interim deadlines, she presupposes. These are the places that she’ll be going, and when she’s going to get to each one, or maybe how long she has before time runs out. It’s annoyingly cryptic with the details.

When Ramses is in charge of the map, he sees an actual map. There is no legend, so it takes him a minute to decipher, but he realizes that some of the points of interest are places that he’s been, and some of them are probably places that he has yet to go. A couple of them have both kinds of markings, suggesting that he’ll return to those places. A few really important places that they frequent, such as the loft, the lab, and the tasty taco restaurant down the street have their own special markers.

Mateo doesn’t see anything at all when he tries to look at it, which he’s choosing to believe is because he just so happened to try it last, and the other two have the plan covered, so he would have only seen what’s already been seen anyway. Yeah, that’s probably it. “Why do you think it stops here, though?” he asks. Somehow, Ramses and Angela managed to take possession of the LIR Map at the same time, which combined what they were seeing into one image, which Mateo actually can see, and so could likely anyone else in the room.

“What do you mean? That’s our goal,” Ramses decides.

“No, our goal is to get our friends back, and come home safely. This stops at the Dead Sea. What do we do after that?”

“Maybe the map doesn’t know what happens after that,” Angela suggests.

“The map knows literally everything,” Mateo argues. “I once saw Lincoln flip out when he went to another universe, because he was suddenly seeing an entirely different timestream than the one he normally does.”

“What are you saying?” Ramses questions.

“The map doesn’t show us what it knows. It shows us what we’re allowed to know. It’s psychic.”

Angela stands up straighter, and looks away from the console of The Olimpia. “Or it shows us decisions.” She pauses, but the other two don’t bother asking for more information, because they know she’ll go on. “We know to go to the Dead Sea, instead of the colony blocks, because our friends have already chosen to go there. Yeah, they’ll arrive in the future, but it’ll be part of the plan. They’ve not come up with a plan beyond that, and neither have we, so we can’t see it. It’s like The Oracle in The Matrix films.”

“That’s not how Lincoln’s power worked,” Mateo contends. “He could see everything, including alternate paths. He saw all timelines, even ones that hadn’t been created yet.”

“Well, it’s like you said,” Angela continues, “we’re not allowed to see all that. It’s restricted. I don’t know why, but I can make an educated guess.” It seems unlikely that the limitation would be built into the document when it was created. It probably has more to do with it presently being in this reality, which they know handles time and time travel in weird ways. Still, this should help enough. They know where they need to go at this very moment, and that’s more than most people get.

“So it can never tell us the future unless someone has already decided upon it,” Ramses laments. “Who has to decide? Obviously not just the map user, because we didn’t know we needed to go to Birket until today.”

“Didn’t we?” Mateo poses. “We all wanted to go to Birket. The map didn’t tell us that, it just proved that we got some follow-through. This reality; it’s different. Nothing and no one is all-knowing...or someone is, and they always squash their competitors.”

“It doesn’t matter what we don’t know,” Angela determines. “We have to go to Birket, we’re going to Birket. We spend most of our time understanding the future, but not knowing too many details. I’m sure we’ll get through this too, even with the limitations.”

Angela was right, but barely. They make it all the way to the Dead Sea, just in time to find Leona, Marie, Kivi, and Heath by water’s edge, along with another guy. As soon as they land, sirens go off, and a squadron of fighter jets starts heading their way. Leona throws a jug of Energy Water through the hatchway, but she doesn’t step in herself. She orders them to take off vertically, and teleport under the cover of clouds. Mateo frowns at her, but she doesn’t explain any further. Ramses reluctantly agrees, and takes off again, leaving the team on the ground. Angela monitors the computers so Ramses can inject the temporal hydroxide into the engine. After they successfully escape without the air force firing a single shot, they find a stranger in their midst.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 6, 2398

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The team tried to play it cool with Amir. They let him get a few meal vouchers for them, so they don’t starve. Heath is the one who needed these the most. Leona and Marie have realized that they can last a little bit longer without food, even though their upgraded bodies aren’t operating at full capacity. Kivi is apparently in the same boat, even though she supposedly originates from this reality, and never received any upgrade. Perhaps all Kivis are like that. She certainly does have a special ability, which they’re thinking now may not be just this thing that she happens to be good at, but which is actually somehow supernatural. She found Amir pretty quickly, as if he was giving off a smell. If it’s real, and not a coincidence, that is certainly a talent that they could use in the future.

Amir has been very helpful and kind, but they’ve gotten to the point today that squeezing information out of him covertly is no longer working. It’s time to take a more direct approach, and just tell him why they’re here. “Listen,” Leona begins, “thanks for all your help, but I think we need to be honest with you.”

Amir drops his whole face towards the floor. “You didn’t just think I looked like a nice guy,” he figures. “You were sent in here to retrieve me.”

“So you know?” Leona asks.

“I’m only in here to get away from people like you. Who do you work for?”

“We weren’t sent here to extract you,” she begins. “We ended up across the border for unrelated reasons, and I think the Senator just thought it would be a great opportunity to exploit our skills again. We had no idea you existed until a couple of days ago, I swear.”

“Senator Morton has something on you?”

“No, Honeycutt,” Marie clarifies.

Amir shrugs. “Never heard of him. Who knows how many links in the espionage chain are between you and me?”

“Do you want to live here?” Kivi asks him.

“Not particularly,” Amir answers. “It’s just the safest place to be. I didn’t think anyone would be able to find me, and even if they did, the government wouldn’t want to help. I’m not sure how your boss convinced them, but maybe he’s more powerful than Morton.”

“He’s not our boss, he just has a grip on us,” Heath contends.

“I’m sorry to hear that, but I’m afraid I’m not going anywhere. Either you get out without me, or you stay here for the rest of your lives. I don’t care what it takes, I’m staying away from Arctos.”

“Arctos? What is that?” Leona asks, thinking about it, but still needing answers.

“That’s what they call themselves,” Amir says. “Their symbol is a bear.”

Marie looks at Leona. “Leelee, is that...?”

“Bears eat salmon,” Leona says. “That must be what it means.”

“Yeah,” Amir remembers, “they used to talk about salmon all the time, like it was some kind of rival organization.”

“We’re not rivals,” Leona tells him. “We’re targets. Did you hurt any of them? Did you work for these Arctos people, or something? Did you escape?”

“I didn’t work for anybody,” Amir claims. “I was their prisoner. Or their test subject, it was always unclear to me. They thought I was salmon at first until tests somehow proved that I had nothing to do with them.”

“What kind of tests?” Kivi asks.

Amir shakes his head. “Mostly involving water? I don’t know, it wasn’t torture, but it was weird. I couldn’t say what they were looking for. Yes, I did escape, because some of them thought that I should be let go since I wasn’t really salmon, but others seemed to think that I was associated with them in some way. I really don’t know, can we stop talking about this, please?”

So the Honeycutts know more than they have let on so far. Or maybe they’ve been letting it on just fine, but the team has been blind to the truth. There are people here who are aware of time travel, and now they know that there are other time travelers. Amir must be connected to them, perhaps by relation, or he saw something as a child he didn’t understand. Regardless, they all have to get out of here. They don’t know how long Amir has been on Melville’s radar, so maybe he’s not any less safe than before, but it doesn’t matter, because he’s definitely not safe now. “We can’t,” Leona says apologetically. “In fact, we’ll need your help more than ever. Can you get us back to the shore? Can you get us to the Dead Sea?”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 5, 2398

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Heath and Marie moved off to one side of the line of megablocks while Leona and Kivi went to the other, planning to meet in the middle. They started asking everyone they could find whether they knew anything about the person they were searching for. The inside man who gave them their mission info was right when he said they didn’t know much. They have a first and last name, but Amir Hussain is so common in this area that it’s hard to pinpoint just one individual. They have a photo, but it’s grainy and shadowy, so the people they try to show it to can’t always quite tell. Plus, residents don’t really want to talk, which is understandable. There’s no way for them to know whether the team has good intentions, or bad, or if their target is a good person, or not.

They wake up the next day having accomplished just about nothing. It’s just so overwhelming. This isn’t working, so they’re going to have to change tactics. It will take far too long to canvas the entire country. The government representative who handed them this mission said that this place doesn’t take census, but they have to keep records of some kind. Otherwise, how did he ever find the four of them?

“Can I suggest something?” Kivi asks, surprisingly nervously.

“Yes, of course,” Leona says.

“Sorry, I just don’t know my place within the group.”

“You just said it yourself,” Marie explains. “Your place is within the group.”

Kivi smiles. “Every Kivi has a superpower. I mean...not literally. We just have our own skill set, unique to us. I’m shockingly good at finding allies. They have a certain look about them, like an aura, except auras aren’t real, because like I was saying, it’s not magic. It’s just something that I can do. I can’t tell you how, because most of my memories are false, but I know this to be true about myself.”

“We believe you,” Marie tells her. “Go ahead and try to find us an ally.”

Kivi starts to walk around their megablock. She’s eyeing the people around them as if shopping for a nice new pair of shoes. The other three follow her as she’s browsing, but try not to get too close. They’re already friends with her, so they don’t want to throw off her spidey sense, or whatever it is. She keeps going for several minutes, ultimately making it halfway to the other side of the block when she suddenly stops. She’s not looking at anybody at first, but then she turns her chin quickly, like a dog who has suddenly noticed a squirrel. She walks briskly across the lawn, and approaches a stranger. He’s staring at her now, but she doesn’t say anything; she can’t.

Leona decides to trust Kivi’s intuition, and take control of the situation. “Hello. Sorry, we’re new, and she’s nervous. We were hoping to meet someone who could sort of show us around, and make sure that we’re not causing any trouble. You just seem like the kind of guy who would be open to that.”

He smiles quite kindly at them. “Why, yes, actually, I am. I have helped a number of people get themselves oriented. Do you already have a unit assigned to you?”

“Yes,” Leona answers.

“But no food.”

“Not yet.”

“I’m sure I can help you with that.” He extends his hand, and nods as each of them recites their respective name. “It’s nice to meet you all. I’m Amir Hussain.”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 4, 2398

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They’re called megablocks. By nesting courtyards inside of other courtyards, many times over, and building vertically, tens of thousands of people can live on a plot of land not much greater than 60 acres. Most of these do not contain prison cells, though they could be modified, if need be. When the government of Birket built the first one, their idea was to give criminals a place to live, but nothing else. They would have to farm for themselves, and take whatever water rations they were allotted. Over time, other nations, and private organizations, took pity on the residents of the penal colony, and began to send them supplies. Now these gifts are airdropped on a weekly basis. Furniture, entertainment, and of course food is shipped in from all over the work. The leaders of Birket do not try to stop this. Their only concern is keeping the guilty away from the Dead Sea and Jordan River, or transporting them to Egypt when the appropriate asylum paperwork goes through. For the four time travelers in this reality, this paperwork has not yet gone through, and they’re not sure it ever will.

In other penal colonies throughout history, left to their own devices, the people living there usually govern themselves, and this is true of the Birket colony, though to no astounding degree. The internal leadership only worries about whether someone has a place to live, and whether they intend to cause trouble. Don’t cause trouble. It’s the only written rule, and it’s posted all over the place. Stealing, murder, rape; these all fall into this category of crime, along with a lot of other things, and they all come with the same punishment. The original megablock is a prison within the prison, does indeed contain cells that lock from the outside, and is reserved to house all the ne’er do wells that disrupt the unexciting harmony of life in the other megablocks. It’s rundown, dirty, and rationed. There aren’t too many people in there since most of the colony residents are here because they want to be, not because they have behavioral issues.

Leona, Marie, Kivi, and Heath don’t want to be here, but they are trying to make the best of it. They arrived with two phones, which means that Ramses will be able to trace their location. These devices were taken away from them, and communication with the outside world is extremely restricted—which helps to curb the population—but they’re confident that they will be released soon. For now, all they can do is wait in the bare housing unit that was assigned to them. There is hardly anything in here, because they have yet to earn that right, but it shouldn’t matter much. Overall, it’s not a bad place to live, which is why some people try to cross the border intentionally. In some cases, it’s the best path to asylum, even if that ends up being somewhere else. There’s only so much room, though, so they don't encourage it. Newbies just have to sleep on the floor, and pretty much beg for rations, and this is a fact that the rest of the world knows all too well, which is again why not all refugees just flock here.

For the most part, representatives of the Birket government do not step foot in the megablocks. When they do, it’s kind of a big deal. People know that special circumstances have forced this to happen. That apparently isn’t going to be okay in this situation, which is why one of them has had to make contact with the group in secret. “Which one of you is Agent Leona Delaney?” the young boy asks.

“Who is asking?” Leona questions.

“Senator Melville Honeycutt has a mission for you while you’re stuck here. I would do it myself, but—” He presents himself regrettably. “...I don’t fit the prerequisites.”

“You live here permanently?” Marie asks him.

“I have a certain medical condition that stunted my aging,” he explains. “It would have made my life annoying, but I work here, because I can fly under the radar. No one suspects the kid to be the inside man.”

“I assume that Honeycutt wants us to find someone?” Leona asks.

“You make it sound so simple. I don’t think it is. They don’t exactly take census in the colony. If you’re here, people assume you belong, and no one cares who you are, or who you were before your verdict. Yes, he wants you to find someone. But you won’t have much to go on.”

“That’s okay,” Kivi says. “I’m sure we have done a lot more with a lot less.”

The young-looking man takes an envelope out of his breast pocket, and hands it to Leona. “Good luck. He’ll theoretically release all five of you once you find your target.”