Multiversal Yarns

Through the Eyes of a Drone

A Multiversal Yarn by Drew Torchia

Bartholomew Alvarez was walking to work on a perfectly typical day. He worked for a problem solving think-tank organization knows as Unfuckers Inc. Because it was their business model to be “outside the box” thinkers, their rather non-PC name had granted them more business than it lost them. Bartholomew’s title on his business cards even listed him as a “Professional Unfucker”.

They had worked for major employers looking to downsize and be more efficient, small companies looking to keep up with modern technology but more than anything they worked with police and government authorities to evolve search and capture techniques, getting criminals off the streets faster than ever before. If everything worked smoothly the company would be bankrupts in days but in our busy modern reality, Unfuckers Inc. was an overnight success.

Then something atypical happened, something that Bartholomew struggled to explain. All in an instant, he felt as though someone had pushed him and he heard two women scream, one just behind him and one well in front of him. He stumbled forward and took stock of himself. There was no one in range of him to make that kind of contact and a quick pat down revealed that his wallet wasn’t with him. He had stopped to buy a green tea so he knew he had his wallet this morning. He was not the type of person to forget something or leave it behind. Turning back, there was a lovely young woman sitting on the sidewalk struggling to cover herself up. He offered his coat and enquired what had happened.

Stifling a sob she said, “I have no idea. I was just walking along and in an instant; all of my clothes were pulled away or moved. You were the closest person to me and you couldn’t possibly have done it, how is that possible?”

The police seemed unimpressed by their story. “So, what your saying is someone, who no one saw or heard, removed the clothing of two women and stole your wallet, despite your geographic separation, at exactly the same instant?” “Precisely” “Are you sure it wasn’t one after another?” “Yes, it was as if all three happened at once.” After taking some notes the officer said, “We’ll be in touch” failing to hide the fact that he had rolled his eyes.

Finally walking into the front door of Unfuckers Inc., Bartholomew stood aghast at the fervour of activity in every corner of the company’s sprawling offices. His boss Larry Trent, spotted him from across the room and without breaking eye contact, quickly strode over to him. “Where the hell have you been? We are having a crisis.” “I had a crisis of my own, I had to fill out a police report, the strangest thing happ…” “I bet I can beat it, two pallets of newly printed bills just disappeared from a federal bank vault while the cameras were recording the whole thing.” “Define “disappeared”” Bartholomew said while making sarcastic air quotes. “I mean vanished, like a god damn magic act, you can watch the tape, one second they are there and the next, gone. The tape hasn’t been tampered with and there is no glitch or power failure.” “So the police are lost and they have brought us in on the investigation? Get me a copy of that tape and every other camera the bank has.”

2 A.M. finds Bartholomew with heavy bags under his eyes from hours spent unblinking at monitors showing security footage of two pallets of money, disappearing. Larry pops into the room looking for an update but can see on Bartholomew’s face that he has nothing positive to report. Feeling sympathy for his best problem solver he instead asks if he can get him anything. “NO, wait yes, I need a wider view, get me every CCTV and security camera in a 5 KM radium, every coffee shop and dentists office too, I want every piece of information I can get my hands on concerning what happened at exactly 09:34:28:34AM this morning.” “If you think it may be important I will scramble a team to get it to you.”

Bartholomew booked time in a multitasking lab at Unfuckers Inc., which was comprised of a bank of computers that powered a display that covered a whole wall. The display could be separated into hundreds of smaller screens. With the help of one of the company’s IT Techs he was set up to view 150 different security monitors at once. 10 rows of 15 video feeds rolled forward synchronously in frame-by-frame starting at 09:30:00:00AM hoping to see the build up to the crime. Bartholomew strained his eyes to try to see the big picture rather than individual monitors and watched as time rolled across the mark of 09:34:28:34AM but all he could see, at that moment, was the money going missing on the vault camera. The longer he looked, the less sense it made.

Larry Trent snuck in the room, not wanting to break Bartholomew’s focus and was astounded by the sheer volume of data being analyzed. He watched certain quadrants of screens for several passes across the marked time, after the fourth pass something in his peripheral vision threw him off. “What was that?” Bartholomew, who thought he was alone with the tech jumped, “Sweet merciful poop man, you have to let me know you’re in here, I haven’t slept in a very long time. What did you see and where?” “I am not sure, run it again. There, 4th down, 5th from the left. The rooftop, who is that?” Bartholomew watched entranced as the Tech spooled the video one more time and he saw a man standing on a rooftop, with a bag slung on his shoulder. His face could not be made out as the sun was behind him and he had a hood up. As time approached the mark, he found himself holding his breath for fear of missing it, but right on cue at 09:34:28:34 AM the man on the roof, just like the money, disappeared, vanished.

“Bring that feed up full screen and roll time back. I want to see his face. I want to know where he came from. How did he get on that roof? What is in that bag?” Trent ducked out of the room, not wanting to mess with the process once it was rolling. He knew his job very well, this wasn’t the only crisis that Unfuckers Inc. was dealing with and this wasn’t the only team he was supervising. He has an innate ability to know when to step in and offer an outside eye and when to step out and let his people do their job.

“This guy just stands there, unmoving for almost 20 minutes, then disappears at precisely the same time the money does. Where does he come from? This has to be related. What can you see from that rooftop?” The IT Tech suddenly realized that Bartholomew was actually talking to him rather than just ranting, and perked up. “I could launch a drone and give you a view from where he is standing.” “Make it so.” The Tech’s brow furrowed, but he shrugged it off and left the room to launch a drone and program it to be controlled from the multitasking lab.

Looking through the eyes of a drone, it was as if Bartholomew Alvarez was standing on that rooftop. The VR gear in the lab tracked his movement and controlled the drone to mimic it and report the sensory information back to his headset and goggles. The sun was now coming out and with it the bustle of people moving throughout the city. Across the street he could see the bank in question and was starting to piece some things together.

Suddenly he saw it, what the mystery man must have been looking at. From that vantage point, you can see through the mostly glass front wall of the bank. You can watch the workers go through their routine and more importantly, you can see the vault door. Not just the big scary re-enforced one but also the smaller cage-like door for ready access.

Stripping off the VR hardware he turned to the Tech, “Were there any cameras pointed at the outside of the bank that can see the vault door?” This was likely since the city had been wired with cheap CCTV camera pointing at just about anything, especially a federal bank. “Yes, I’ve got one, here we go on the big display” Bartholomew watched as the small cage door opened while the bank manager walked out and let the door close behind him. “Pause the feed when he lets go of the door, when there is a wide opening with no one in the way.” Rolling time forward to the moment the manager clears the opening of the door, where there is the largest opening in the door, sure enough the timestamp reads 09:34:28:34 AM. Bartholomew Alvarez said nothing and calmly walked out of the room with a smug grin on his face.

Larry Trent was more than a little confused “So you’re saying, he stopped time…” “That’s exactly what I am saying” “Please tell me you have some sort of logical basis for this hypothesis.” “My proof is Sherlock Holmes.” “If possible I am even more confused now, dare I ask you to explain?” ““Once you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbably, must be the truth.” he stopped time” “When I asked you to explain I should have been more clear, I meant for you to make sense.”

“At 09:18:43:33AM yesterday morning the man in question appeared on the rooftop across from the bank, he didn’t walk there or stand up quickly, he appeared. At precisely 09:34:28:34AM, in the perfect window of time while the vault door was closing, which he could clearly see from his perch on the roof, he and the money vanished. It is not possible for him to get off that roof and steal the money before that door closes, never mind without being seen. Therefore while I agree that the ability to stop time is improbable, it is the only explanation that fits.”

There was a long silence, followed by Larry Trent slowly getting up from his desk and pouring himself a large glass of scotch. “I am not saying that you sold me on this whole stopping time theory, but I am also not saying it is the strangest thing I have heard all week. If it were possible for a person to do that, what do we do from here?” “Widen our search and build software to scan all CCTV feeds in the city for the sudden appearance and disappearance of things.” “Those are marked bills, why not just wait until some of the money turns up and track where it’s being spent?” “I thought I was the tired one. You believe my theory about a man who can stop time who used his ability to rob a bank and yet you think he is going to pay money for a chocolate bar? He doesn’t need money, he could stop time and walk around the counter and grab whatever he wants, these crimes must just be for the thrill of it.” “You assume too much, what if his ability is finite? He can only stop time every so often, or for a certain amount of time. Maybe there is some sort of recharge time he is dealing with.” “I will get a team started on that software and start thinking about the really complicated problem. Can I have an R&D team?” “Sure, wait, before you leave, what is the complicated problem?” “Even if you know where he is, how do you catch a man who can stop time? There is no surprising him, grabbing him or caging him, the slightest opening and he is gone.”

The software engineers at Unfuckers Inc. had a program up and running in no time at all and it was quickly collecting data from all over the city. Drawing up a map of carnage along a line of reported and ignored police calls. A picture was starting to form in the mind of Bartholomew Alvarez. At 5PM he had been awake for over 35 hours but his focus hadn’t waned. He had trained in sleep deprivation and knew that rest would come when this man was in custody. With his abilities he could wreak untold damage in the 5-6 hours it would take Bartholomew to complete a circadian sleep cycle.

Anytime the mystery man was spotted he, remained visible and moved like every other person until he blinked out of existence again and appeared somewhere else. He was never congruent for less than 5 minutes so Bartholomew took that to be some kind of recharge timer on his ability as Larry Trent had suggested. After the bank job he wasn’t visible anywhere for hours, which suggests that he had somewhere indoors and away from the CCTV cameras to hide out or plan his next move.

Bartholomew also tried to build a profile based on the types of crimes being committed. Every young attractive woman in a line between the sightings had reported their clothes to be in disarray. Some even reported some… soreness. Most people’s wallets or at least money also seemed to be missing. “What could a person with such abilities possibly need with all that money? That’s what doesn’t add up to me. Based on the violations of young women I can usually assume that the person is fairly young themselves, but with that much power and no perceived consequences, an older man could be tempted just as easily.”

Bartholomew wasn’t talking to anyone in particular but a whole research team was in fact listening intently as they worked to complete a rather quizzical device that Alvarez had asked them to make. Knowing how an item will be deployed is often not needed in order to complete the job, but who wouldn’t be curious?

By 10PM that evening, the R&D team was ready and Alvarez had a plan. Larry Trent had given up on staying awake and gone home to get some well-deserved rest. In the absence of his boss Bartholomew contacted local authorities and laid out his plan, which received mixed reviews. The police were not at all sold on his time-stop theory but they knew better than to doubt Unfuckers Inc. The company had never led them astray, but Bartholomew was asking them to take quite a leap. He wanted bait for the man he had started to call the time-stop bandit. The police had influence over other banks and repositories that would be holding enough value to attract the time-stop bandit’s attention.

As the morning of day two dawned on them, their plan was in place. A local museum had agreed to display a special showing of gold and precious stones. Despite the high value there would be nothing overly rare so that it could be easily sold. Museum security was not beefed up in any way but they were made aware of the situation. Advertisements about the display were broadcast all night and morning and people seemed to take an interest and flock to see the new collection. Bartholomew Alvarez, donning a long coat and brimmed hat, sat on a nearby bench pretending to read a newspaper. His eyes darted to each and every person as he tried to recognize shapes in the crowd, he looked out the windows and scanned the rooftops but so far he saw nothing.

In the eyes of the time-stop bandit, this looked too good to be true, so much value, so easy to sell and being displayed in open-air. Protected by the velvet rope of the museum barricade. Modern security forces were laughable to someone who could stop time. All he had to do was go to the bathroom, where there would be no cameras, freeze time and walk up to the display, then load up everything he could carry. He knew that once he froze time he had 20 minutes to take care of what he needs to do. He had a safe house about a block away so he knew he could make three or four trips before the timer ran out. He had trained his body for this very situation. He would burn every bit of energy he had in 20 minutes and come away with a huge profit.

Stepping into the bathroom he quickly did a set of stretches, not wanting to pull a muscle. Staring at himself in the mirror, he readied his mind for the task that lay before him. Pulling up his right sleeve he admired the intricate looking bracelet that clung to his wrist. The slight green glow indicated that it was ready for use. Steadying his mind he pressed the face of the bracelet and felt the slight pang of nausea that let him know something had happened.

He left the bathroom ensuring he closed the door behind him as it wouldn’t close on its own until time resumed, that would look odd on security footage. Walking through the halls of the museum, he never ceased to be fascinated by people frozen in time. He saw an old man who had probably come here every week for 30 years and knew the displays and collections better than some of the guides. He saw a family with young children who frankly, looked bored. Around the corner there was a crowd forming around the open-air display of gold and precious stones. He laughed at the imposing looking security guards standing in a row to prevent people from crossing the velvet rope. He imagined their surprise when the items they were tasked to protect simply vanished. As he was about to cross the rope for his first load he noticed an absolutely stunning woman, front and center. His mind raced through all the things he wanted to do to this beautiful creature. Shaking his head, he told himself that he didn’t have time to deal with her and all of the loot.

Since the world was frozen there was no need to tip toe or sneak, so the time-stop bandit simply strolled towards the gold and stones. Pulling out his first duffle bag he loading it with everything it could hold. Placing the strap carefully on his shoulder he hoisted the weight and readied himself for his first of what looked like three trips to carry everything.

The weight of the stolen goods affected his pace and he walked with a visible limp, not that anyone was capable of witnessing it. Five steps away from the gold he stubbed his toe on something, hard. Dropping the bag he punched at the air in frustration. To his surprise his hand connected with something, something un-movable. Hand and foot now throbbing he moved more slowly, like a mime in an invisible box he patted around the smooth hard surface. It didn’t take long to realize that he was, in fact, in an invisible box. Roughly ten steps across and square.

Looking at his watch, the bandit saw that he only had four minutes of frozen time left. Panic started to set in and his mind was spinning with wild escape plans. He grabbed the duffle bag and spun around several times to build momentum, throwing the bag at the wall of his invisible cage, it passed right through and crashed down in the room. Elated that the wall was defeated, he tried to leave but found, once again, that he was still trapped in the box. Panic had fully set in now as he frantically searched every surface of the box, hoping for a tiny opening of some kind. He watched, in a cold sweat, as the final seconds ticked away on his watch.

Suddenly an alarm sounded and what seemed like an open-air display was now incased in a nearly transparent box that glowed slightly red. Outside the box there was a torn duffle bag on the floor, spilling gold and precious stones in a pattern away from the box. Inside the box there was a distraught looking man, curled in a ball on the floor. He had his hood pulled up and was facing away from the crowd, hiding his face. Calmly Bartholomew Alvarez discarded his paper and casually removed his hat and long coat. As if he had all the time in the world he walked up to the box and cleared his throat.

“My name in Bartholomew Alvarez and I am a Professional Unfucker, I am working as a consultant to the police and you have fallen into my trap. I derived your time stopping abilities and devised this clever box to prevent you from escaping. Do you want to know how it works?” All that could be heard was security ushering the museum patrons out of the room. In a few minutes it was just Bartholomew and the time-stop bandit. Still there wasn’t a word from the man in the box. Looking at his watch Bartholomew spoke again “You should be able to stop time again in a moment or two, feel free to really explore your situation and feel out every corner of your new home.”

In a flash the man who was seated in the middle of the box, on the floor was now at the far corner, leaning on the now reddish wall. His head still hooded and his face buried in his elbow. More and more objects were strewn about outside of the box. Bartholomew could not have been more relaxed when he said “Aren’t you even curious how it works? I will tell you if you ask.” After a long pause, a clearly disguised and overly gruff voice said, “Fine, tell me.” “The box keys on organic material, once you walk through it, or even put your arm in it, the box learns your body’s unique signature like a retinal scan. The same biological material can only cross the walls of the box once. In other words, it is a one-way trip. Once you are in you can’t leave. You are too fast for any electronics, since you seem to actually stop time, so our R&D department actually made this box biologically. You won’t run out of air and you can throw any non-organic material out of the box that you want, tire yourself out, but you won’t leave that box until I let you.”

Silence fell on the room once more. This time as the timer came near the 5 minute mark, Bartholomew thought it would be prudent to stand behind some cover incase the bandit got the idea to throw something at him while time was stopped. He stayed behind a pillar until he heard the bandit’s breathing shift, he was now breathing much deeper and faster. Bartholomew came out from his hiding place and could not help but be impressed with the carnage that had happened in such a short time. Everything that had been in the box with the bandit was thrown out and now lay sprawled across the floor. Now there was only a man standing in the middle of the room, head down, hands on his knees, panting.

“Do you believe me now? You had your fun but now the fun is over, now it’s time to pay for your crimes.” No longer bothering to disguise his voice the bandit spoke “What is it you want? Let me out of this infernal box before I go crazy.” The voice was all too familiar to Bartholomew. “Stand up straight! Show me your face!” Larry Trent straightened his back and pulled back his hood. He looked pale and his face was wet with exertion. Bartholomew could read the guilt on his boss’ face. “How is that for a twist?” “I have known for a decent while that the time-stop bandit was you, Larry.” “How could you possibly have known that?!” “Who else would have access to the people needed to come up with that kind of technology? There is two things that I want from you… the first is easy, the second will be more difficult.”

Smiling now Larry said, “Ask away.” “The only thing I can’t figure out in this whole mess is the “why”. A few liberties with the odd young woman I can understand but why steal money? What could you possibly need it for?” “Do you have any idea what the overhead for Unfuckers Inc. is? We employ the top minds in problem solving, IT, Security and countless fields of R&D. The salaries alone are crippling. In the end what are we? A consulting firm?! That doesn’t pay enough to justify the head-count we have. I dreamt of this company my whole life and I wanted to make a company that knew the answer to every question, could solve any problem. That meant a lot of people and a lot of money. I have been stealing to finance the company. I had an offshore team come up with this bracelet and told them it was for a military contract.”

There was a long pause again while Bartholomew soaked in all the information his boss had just told him. This delay proved too long for Larry Trent’s curiosity and patience. In another time jump he was suddenly just inches from the wall of the box and yelled “WHAT’S THE SECOND THING?!” Startled by the sudden movement and noise, Bartholomew took a moment to gather his composure and walked right up to the wall as well. He spoke in quiet, calm tones. “You know what the second thing is, I am not letting you out of that box until you throw your time-stop bracelet across the barrier.”

With that said he walked back to his bench and reclaimed his paper and began reading again, this time in earnest. He looked up every five minutes to find his old friend suddenly in a new place in the box, looking more and more distraught. For every 5 minutes he spent with the flow of time he spent 20 in frozen time. Bartholomew looked at his watch after half and hour and realized that his friend was in there for two and a half hours. Looking up he saw that Larry looked worse than he had ever seen him. He put down the paper and walked back to the box. “Are you ready to hand over the bracelet now?” “What will happen to me if I do?” “I will take down the box, but you will still have to answer for your crimes. I can’t help you there.”

“Fine! Fine, I’ll do it. Here is the damn bracelet.” He slid it across the floor and it passed readily through the reddish wall. Bartholomew picked up the bracelet and placed it in his pocket. Larry’s trained eyes saw the tiniest shift in Bartholomew’s body mechanics and his eyes narrowed but he said nothing. “Please stand in the middle of the box, you will notice a small piece of tape on the floor. I want to make sure that you are as far away as possible from the edges of the box when I take it down. This is, after all, experimental stuff.”

Wanting the ordeal to be over, Larry Trent stood in the middle of the box, on the piece of tape he was surprised that he only just noticed now. With a click of a button the floor beneath him rose. He was now standing on a 4 foot by 4 foot platform that rose 8 inches off the ground. Noiselessly the red box shifted and shrunk. Larry found himself in a 4 foot by 4 foot raised red box, just tall enough for him to stand up. Bartholomew walked to the big doors of the room and as he left he called out “Take him away boys”.

A man with a pallet jack walked into the room along with 5 men from the police force and the members of museum security who had been in the room before. Larry Trent ranted and raved like a wild man and pounded on the red walls of his tiny box, his claims fell on deaf ears.

Outside, Bartholomew spoke to the police captain. “I was able to contain him but I can’t determine how he was able to stop time. I would recommend keeping him in the containment box until you know how he did it. Here is the controller for it.” “How did you figure all of this out? What should we do from here?” “His ability may not be an isolated incident; he may not be acting alone. I can only point to the success of this containment box and recommend that it become the new standard in security for high value items.” With that Bartholomew Alvarez walked away from a very confused police captain with thoughts of finally getting to sleep on his mind.

Six months down the road finds Bartholomew Alvarez running Unfuckers Inc., which is now a very profitable venture. The money they made selling invisible containment boxes now called One-Way-Tickets pulled the company out of near bankruptcy and into the fortune 500. The demand for One-Way-Tickets was fueled by a sudden rise in time-stop related crime. The interrogation of Larry Trent had only yielded the ravings of a truly tortured mind, still in his little red box. All footage of the exchange between Larry and Bartholomew at the museum had somehow been erased. There was just the exhibit intact and then a man in a small, raised, red box.

The police had no real leads to explain the new wave of time-stop crimes, but they knew who to turn to. The company that had never failed them and the one man who could stop time-stop bandits… Bartholomew Alvarez.