Acme Time Travel Incorporated - Volume 2

The Alameda de Hercules - Seville

Gabriel and Ginny had teleported into Seville several hours before Sara and Zackery were due to be shot. They walked around the area, then chose a small café adjacent to the one that Sara and Zackery would be sitting at. They were both using Vicky’s holoface technology to make them look like an old couple. They had noticed that a lot of younger people were wearing steam-punk couture. If they had not been disguised as old people, they would probably have felt it necessary to get Vicky to attire themselves accordingly, but the Seville old people just looked like... old people anywhere.

They sat and drank coffee.

They waited for Sara and Zackery to arrive.

To their left, up the Alameda de Hercules, past the boulevard of trees, the water fountains began their periodic spouting of cold clear water high into the air. The fountain was just simple faucets set flat into the stone terrace. Every ten minutes the faucets would activate, sending twenty-foot jets of water cascading into the air. On a sunny day like today the fountains were creating a rainbow of colours. Each time they triggered, groups of children would rush over to run in and out of the spray.

“Here they come,” Ginny said.

Sara and Zackery were walking down the roadway. They were both smiling, enjoying the day. They sat at a table maybe forty feet from Gabriel and Ginny. Sara ordered drinks from a passing waiter. They were chuckling to each other about something.

“They look very happy,” Ginny said.

A woman with a baby in a buggy stopped at the café. She sat down at a table close to the road. She pulled the buggy around and locked its brakes. Then she lifted the baby out and cuddled it against her chest. The baby nuzzled against her.

Sara and Zackery watched her. Sara looked over to Zackery, smiling. Zackery partially stood up. He leaned over to Sara and gave her a kiss on her forehead.

A small ramstat flyer came up the roadway and slowed as it passed. Smythe leaned out from the passenger seat, raising his weapon. He fired a two-second burst. The lady with the baby fell to the floor, her baby falling from her arms. Its head smashed against the ground. Zackery had turned towards the flyer. He instantly fell to the ground; his chest ripped apart. Sara screamed. Then her head jolted savagely backwards; she fell to the ground.

The flyer pulled slowly away. The pilot seemed to be in no particular haste.

Gabriel and Ginny leaped up from their seats. They could see that the woman with the baby was dead. It was obvious. Likewise with Zackery.

The baby was lying on the ground, its head at an awkward angle.

Sara was still moving. A section of her skull had been blown away.

“Her STU is offering medical support,” Vicky said. “She is unconscious, but her STU will be providing her with pain relief. And it will be covering the exposed section of her brain with a protective shell ... thin layer upon thin layer.”

“But,” Ginny said, “we know that the damage is irreparable.”

“Quite so,” said Vicky.

As they watched, a young woman plucked the young baby up from the ground where it had fallen. Its head hung loosely as she picked it up. She began cuddling it; rocking it slowly backwards and forwards in her arms. The young woman’s tears rolled down onto the baby’s face.

Gabriel stood up and grasped Ginny’s arm, leading her away. He led her down a small side-street, away from the muddle of people standing there, some shocked, some shaking.

“We have to stop Smythe,” Gabriel said.

“How do you ...?” Ginny said.

“We have to stop him before he gets here.”

“But what about the rule on not changing historic events?” Ginny said.

“ACME was very clear about not changing historic events,” said Vicky.

“Fuck that,” Gabriel said.

Ginny smiled at him in agreement.