The Time Portal 6: The Philadelphia Experiment: Time Travel Paranormal Romance Read online

  Jack’s eyes tightened and he leaned forward a little. “Well, your instincts are right. Something is wrong and we were hoping you would show up. Did you ever hear of the Philadelphia Experiment?”

  “Yeah. I heard of it.”

  The mention of the Philadelphia Experiment piqued Lucky’s interest. Now it was his turn to lean closer. “I guess most everyone has. They even made a few movies about it a few years ago. Why do you ask?”

  “Manheimer called me yesterday morning.”

  Lucky interrupted him. “Yesterday morning? That’s exactly when this feeling came over me. Sorry to interrupt you. Go ahead. Please continue.”

  “Manheimer asked me if I had heard from you recently, and I told him I hadn’t. He went on to tell me that the Navy has resurrected the old Philadelphia Experiment from 1943 and they started where they left off. They’re experimenting on humans again.”

  Kinsey shuffled some folders on his desk, looking for a particular file.

  “Ah, here it is. The Navy scientists based the original experiment on Einstein’s Unified Field Theory. This file describes both mathematically and physically the interrelated nature of the forces that comprise electromagnetic radiation and gravity. What the scientists tried to do in 1943 was to combine the fields of electromagnetism and gravity into one unifying field. They figured that if they could bend light, then they could bend space time also, which would result in a time machine that would be invisible to observers.”

  Lucky put up his hands.

  “Hold on a minute, Jack. Enough of this scientific jargon. Just tell me what the problem is, and what you want me to do about it.”

  “You need to know everything that has happened this time before you can help. Be patient for a few more minutes and let me finish. The original experiment took place at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard in Pennsylvania on or about October 28, 1943. The scientists in charge of the experiment bombarded the USS Eldridge with magnetic radiation. And from eyewitness reports, they were successful in rendering the Eldridge invisible. In fact, the report states that it disappeared in a flash of blue light. And then it reappeared for a short while in Norfolk, Virginia some 200 miles away in full view of the sailors watching from the SS Andrew Furuseth. Then the Eldridge vanished from their sight and then reappeared back in Philadelphia at the exact site where it was originally berthed.”

  “Why was the Philadelphia Experiment cancelled?” Lucky asked.

  Jack laid the file on his desk and looked straight at Lucky.

  “Because when the Eldridge reappeared in Philadelphia, something went horribly wrong. Men were found embedded in the steel structure of the ship. One sailor was found with his arm embedded up to his elbow in the metal wall. Many of the survivors of the experiment were never the same mentally and some of the men disappeared and were never seen again. The Navy did damage control. They spread the word to the public that the stories reported in the papers were all rumors spread by uninformed personnel. But that brings us to the part that concerns you.”

  “Wait a minute, Jack. This all happened in 1943. What does any of this have to do with me?”

  Jack nodded and explained. “The Philadelphia Experiment was recently restarted and it’s happened all over again, Lucky. Men have disappeared and no one knows where they’ve gone. We’d like you to try to get them back for us. You’re the only one with the unique ability to travel in time, and time is what we’re dealing with here.”

  “Hey, wait a minute, Jack. I’ve lost the ability to create a portal on the fly. Now I have to search for portals just like I did at the beginning, and when I discover a portal, I can only travel to where it takes me. And if I’m reading you right, the powers in Washington think that the tremendous amount of magnetic radiation applied to the missing men could have somehow pushed them into a portal. And if that’s the case, then how the heck am I to know where to begin looking for those men. It’s a billion to one shot that they would have stumbled into the few portals that I've managed to discover. Forget about me helping you, Jack. Believe me, if there was even the remotest chance I could be of some help, you know that I'd jump in with both feet to help you…but I can’t, so count me out. I plan to visit my friends while I’m here and then I’m heading back to my wife and son. Besides, how the hell did they find out about my time travel ability?”

  By the look on Jack’s face, Lucky could tell that Kinsey was uncomfortable with the question.

  “When Stanton questioned Manheimer about the rumors, he heard of an operative in his organization that could travel in time, Manheimer was on the spot. He couldn’t lie. He didn’t know that you lost your ability to create a portal whenever you needed to, so he told Stanton what he believed was the truth.”

  Lucky was seething.

  “That does it. Forget about me helping you. Did you forget how Neil Stewart, the Director of the FBI, tried to use me as a guinea pig when he found out that I could travel in time? The guy wanted to dissect my brain so he could create others like me. I’m afraid this new crew will do the same thing.”

  “Wait a minute, Lucky. This order comes from the Secretary of War, Oliver Stanton. If you walk away without meeting him, you’ll become a fugitive like you were when Dirk Sommerville tried to assassinate you. Meet with the guy and tell him to his face that you can’t help him. Explain it to him. He’ll understand.”

  Lucky met too many self-serving bureaucrats interested in one thing and one thing only, and that was their own self-interests. Lucky wasn’t a fool. He knew he had to talk to Stanton. He also knew from past experience that he needed to protect himself as best he could, and that meant meeting with his old friends, the guys he grew up with. Together, they could set up some sort of counter plan in case he was taken into custody. Jack went to the coffee machine and poured himself a cup of coffee. “Want a cup, Lucky?”

  “Yeah, maybe coffee will settle my stomach. Look, Jack. I’ll meet with Stanton, but from what happened to me in past meetings, I’m not ashamed to say that I’m a little concerned.”

  Jack looked at him.

  “Look, Lucky, it’s not Stanton you have to worry about. If there’s anyone you should be concerned about, it’s General Slater. He’s the general in charge of the military and he’s the one guy you never want to let your guard down with. Stanton’s kept him out of the loop because of the way he’s been behaving lately and Slater is really pissed off about not being a part of this new Philadelphia Experiment. Remember, he’s the guy you have to watch out for, not Stanton.”

  “That’s good to know, Jack, I’m glad you told me about him. But if the authorities take me, I want you to find out where they’ve brought me and then let Mickey know. Do you understand? I’m putting my neck out and I don’t want it chopped off, so I’m depending on you to watch my back. Can I count on you, Jack?”

  “Are you kidding? I owe you everything. Hell, I would have been in prison myself if not for you. I owe you big time — and besides, you still have my confession hidden somewhere,” Jack said, laughing. “Okay, so where do we start?”

  Lucky didn’t hesitate in answering him. “Call Stanton and set up a meeting for the day after tomorrow.”

  “Why the day after tomorrow? Why not agree to meet with him this afternoon and get the meeting over with?”

  Lucky shook his head.

  “No can do, Jack. I have to meet with Mickey and the boys first. I have to set up a contingency plan and, besides, I’d like to see how they’re doing.” Even though Lucky trusted Jack with his life, it was better if Jack didn’t know everything he was planning. Jack couldn’t talk about things he didn’t know anything about. Lucky was secretive about any matter concerning his safety. He let everyone but his closest friends know only what they needed to know. It was true that Jack had become one of his closest friends, but there was a difference between Jack and the men he grew up with. He knew from experience that the men he grew up with would die beside him in combat if it came to that.

  “It’s gonna take me two or three days to take care of any loose ends that may have cropped up while I was gone, and that includes the business I set up for the guys. Take care, Jack, and I’ll see you in a couple of days.”

  Lucky turned to leave, but Jack stopped him. “Here, take this throw-away phone with you. If I need to speak with you, I’ll call you on this phone and not your iPhone. The CIA ordered the iPhones for their top operatives from Apple. Who knows what extras Apple might have put in them, so it's better if we err on the side of caution.”

  Lucky took the disposable phone and left. As Lucky walked down the hall to the elevator he looked at his Apple modified iWatch and laughed. Looks like Jack forgot about the iWatch he gave me.

  Lucky left Jack’s office, stepped out of the Administration building, and walked the short distance to the gatehouse. He sat on the bench facing the street a few feet from the guard shack, took out his cell phone, and called Mickey. When Mickey answered, he told him that he needed to be picked up. He said he’d be sitting on the bench in front of the guard shack by the entrance gate to the Compound. With that out of the way, Lucky sat back on the bench and relaxed, knowing it’d take Mickey a good forty-five minutes to an hour to get there. He started to go over what he read in the report Jack had handed him in his office. After reading the file, he thought that there was a good possibility that he could run into some problems with the people who were in charge of this new Philadelphia Experiment once he explained to them that, because of his reaction to the titanium handcuffs placed on his wrists, he couldn’t create a portal any longer. Yeah, he thought to himself, they’re gonna think I’m full of crap. He knew that if he gave them any kind of excuse, they would think he was lying and, like the others, they would try to force him to do it. He knew the people he would be deali
ng with weren’t beyond kidnapping friends of his to get him to do their bidding; he had a history of this happening. First Vlad Kouros and then Heinrich Mueller, and he knew it wouldn’t end with those two. To hedge his bets Lucky reached into his shirt pocket and removed the time portal map he made in Jack’s office. He checked the layout of the time portals, figuring that he’d like to be near one in case he had to make a hasty departure, but he put the map away, knowing that the likelihood of him being near a portal he could take advantage of was nil. He knew that he’d have to have an exit plan when he met with the government officials. He couldn’t chance not having one if he hoped to escape from their clutches. Before he could sit down to plan anything, he had to set up a meeting with his friends so he could tell them about the danger they faced if they agreed to help him, but he’d leave that part to Mickey. As for the meeting with Stanton, his best-case scenario would be to go to the meeting knowing he had a portal close enough to escape through if he had to. But this wasn’t a best-case scenario, and he didn’t have time to find a portal he could use if he had to leave in a hurry.

  Fifty-five minutes after Lucky made the call to Mickey, a black Lincoln Navigator screeched to a halt by the security shack in front of the Compound. Mickey jumped out of the car and bounded over to Lucky, grabbed him in a bear hug, lifted him off the ground, and spun him around in a circle.

  “Man, but it’s good to see you.”

  Lucky chuckled. “See me?”

  “Yeah you—you big lug. I missed you; hell, we all missed you. How come you came back? Don’t tell me you’re getting tired of living in the twelfth century.”

  Lucky waved his hand, dismissing such a notion. “No, nothing like that. I love it there — it’s just that something’s come up. I think that we may have trouble with some government goons.”

  Mickey smiled. “They tried that before Lucky, and it didn’t work out too good for them.”

  “It’s different this time, Mickey. They want something from me. Something I can’t give them and when they find out I can’t create a portal, they’ll revert to form and try to use you guys to get me to do what they want.”

  Mickey motioned towards the car. “Come on; get in and we’ll talk about it on the way back.”

  “You got here real fast. I thought I’d have to wait another half hour.”

  Mickey eased onto US RT 9 and brought the Navigator up to the speed limit.

  “There was hardly any traffic on the road this early in day — it would have driven me crazy if there was.”

  Then Mickey looked at Lucky with a sheepish smile. “Well — I was in a hurry. I was anxious to see you.”

  Lucky returned the smile and leaned back in his seat. “Yeah, I guess I missed you guys too.”

  “You guessed? So that’s the kind of friend I have. He guessed he missed his friends.”

  Lucky’s faced turned a little crimson. “Come on, Mick; you know what I mean.”

  Mickey slapped his thigh and laughed. “Of course I know what you mean. But I got you, didn’t I? Now come on and tell ole Mick about this trouble you think is gonna happen.”

  Lucky explained the feeling of urgency he felt to return home while he was relaxing in the palace gardens with his wife. He told Mickey about the phone call Jack Kinsey received from his boss Murray Manheimer and the conversation he and Jack had in Jack’s office. Lucky could trust Manheimer because Lucky was the one who secured the position that Manheimer now held. Mickey’s demeanor became serious after hearing what Lucky just said.

  “So you think that when you tell them that you can’t help them, they’ll try to use us to get you to do it?”

  “Look, Mickey, I can’t be sure of anything except that there’s no way I could help them find those sailors. If this happened a year ago when I could conjure up a portal to take me anywhere I needed to go, maybe then — and I say maybe, because I have no way of knowing where those men disappeared to. Sure, there’s always the possibility that they could have slipped into a portal. I’m living proof that that could happen. But if the effects of the magnetic radiation vaporized the sailors. Or if they became part of the superstructure of the ship, then there would be no hope for them. I need an exit strategy.”

  “Yeah, and how are you gonna do that?” Mickey asked while taking a quick glance over at Lucky.

  “I need to be proactive. I have to assume the worst and hope for the best. So I think the best thing I can do is contact the professor and have him prepare the saucer, and then he can pick up you and the boys. Then, with the ship cloaked and invisible, you can follow me to where the meeting is being held. You and the boys will need the invisibility suits just in case they imprison me.”

  “Lucky, you’re confusing me. Why would they imprison you?”

  “I can think of many reasons why they’d do that. Remember, they’re gonna ask me to do the impossible and when I refuse them, they’ll hold me while they try to get leverage to force me to help them, and the leverage will be you and the boys. This is just a guess, but based on our friendship, I have a strong feeling that they’ll try to use you as leverage to get me to do what they want.”

  Mickey kept his eye on the road but nodded in agreement. “So how do you want me to play this?”

  “Call the boys and tell them to drop everything and meet us at ten tomorrow morning at the Astoria safe house. We still have that house, right?”

  Mickey stole another glance at Lucky. “Of course we still have the Astoria safe house. Why would we get rid of it?”

  Lucky raised his hands in supplication. “Just asking, Mickey, just asking. Listen, while you’re at the safe house I’ll need Dr. Witherspoon’s translating device. It’s in the desk drawer in the hidden room, I have a feeling I’m gonna need it.”

  The ride from Ossining took a little longer to get to the Astoria safe house on Twenty-third Drive. Mickey was in no hurry to get back and the drive back to Astoria was pleasant, so he stayed in the right lane and took his time driving. Their conversation was enjoyable but disconcerting because they both knew what could happen at the upcoming meeting with the government.

  CHAPTER TWO

  12th CENTURY ENGLAND

  Lucky had only been gone a few days and already the princess missed him. She never thought that she would be so fortunate as to meet and then be allowed to marry someone she fell in love with. Instead of being forced into an arranged marriage to some old nobleman she never met like so many other noblewomen were forced to do. Arranged marriages were commonplace among royalty; they cemented treaties and assured peace by preventing wars between neighboring countries. It pleased Krystina that her father, King William, king of the northern provinces, finally approved of her marriage to Lucky. At first, her father was against her marrying a commoner, a man with the reputation of being a wizard. In his opinion, a wizard was nothing more than a cheap street magician. But when the Inquisition kidnapped his daughter, no one in either his or King Robert’s kingdoms could help her except the wizard. After Lucky rescued his daughter, King William realized two things. His daughter was not married to a cheap street magician, and he saw how much his daughter loved him. After many a sleepless night, he finally acquiesced, and much to Krystina’s relief, he gave his approval to their marriage, which meant everything to her. She was thinking of her father as she walked in her garden until she stopped before a white bench in the castle gardens in front of a beautifully manicured row of red roses and sat down. She thought for a moment about the possibility of taking a trip to see her father, but she dismissed it from her mind; the trip would take too long. Her husband might return quicker than she expected and she wanted to be here when he arrived. Then she thought about the trip she and her sister Queen Alexandra made when they journeyed to see Richard of Wallingford. She tossed the idea of another trip to the abbey and thought it would be interesting if she went to see him again, and she could ask Richard to do another chart, this time for the three of them—she, her husband, and their young son. She smiled at that thought. That was what she would do, she decided. She’d visit Richard of Wallingford and ask him to do a chart for her and her family.

  Krystina rose from the bench and was about to rush to see her sister, when she heard a weak voice say “Good morning, princess.” She turned to see whom it was that spoke and she noticed Tor laying on a lounge given to him for his comfort in place of the hard white metal bench. She had been so preoccupied in her plans that she hadn't seen her protector sitting on a lounge a little further along the garden path. Maybe it was because a manicured hedge hid part of him, but deep down, she knew that wasn’t the reason she hadn’t noticed him. She had been too preoccupied with her thoughts to notice anyone. She walked toward him and, when she got closer, she noticed that he had color in his cheeks, which he hadn’t had since he was wounded by the Inquisition, and that made her feel better. She felt sorry for this big, strong, gentle man who had almost given his life to save her.