MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 58)

“Move back! I’m here to rescue you!” Kevin shouted against the door. The beating against the door didn’t stop at first, and he waited a moment to be sure whoever was inside would be out of the way. Then he pulled the door down with the force of his entire body, opening the dark, musky closet to the world of heat and smoke that surrounded Kevin. He spotted three children inside, two probably about the age of eight, and one much younger.

He immediately charged inside to embrace them, all three of which were crying and gladly flew into his arms. There was no time to spare, however, and he opted to secure them against his body before they knew what was happening or thought to run from him. After turning around to make sure there weren’t more kids, he raced out of the classroom, but only into a wall of smoke and fire. He’d only been inside the room for about a minute, yet the fire had grown exponentially. The flames that were beginning to surround him before were now barring his every path, and the heat no longer just pressed into his clothes, but his skin and muscles as well. The children began to fall limp in his arms, the lack of oxygen stealing all their strength.

There would be no safe way through the fire, and because of how fast it had grown, there was no time for him to check for any more survivors. No matter how badly he wanted to rescue everyone, the lives of the three children in his arms depended on him. If he were to save them, at the very least, he needed to get out, and get out now. It was a tough decision, but it was one that had to be made.

Kevin covered the children with his arms, trying to guard them from the fire. He braced himself, and then dashed through the fire; the flames licking at his skin and clothes. It burned his clothes and ate through his skin, but he didn’t let it get to the children. He kept them in his arms even if it slowed him down, even if he had to take the fire’s wrath for them.

There was too much running, and finally he collapsed. The heat was still around him, the children still in his arms. His eyes closed.

(To Be Continued Tomorrow...)

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MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 57)

He stood staring into the hallway before him in a daze. It seemed to wind through the school, no longer heading in a single direction. For every second that passed, his senses were distorted twofold. In that moment, it was the first time since entering the building that he felt his strength begin to falter. His limbs seemed to grow light, and Kevin had to fight it in order to keep moving. Too much smoke had gotten in his lungs, and even the abnormal strength of his body wasn’t going to be enough to hold out for much longer.

The screams were louder now, and as he got closer he was able to perceive the direction of the cries. Closed doors were everywhere, but so were the flames, closing in from what seemed like every side. From some angles the flames seared his skin and blinded him, but the pain didn’t stop him. He had a goal, and it wasn’t one he was about to give up on. Kevin ran onward, kicking open each closed door open as he passed; yet there was no sign of the missing children, even though he could still hear them. Each door he opened to nothing began to deepen Kevin’s growing panic. His own mind was beginning to fail, he had to find them soon.

Kevin ran further, deeper into the flames and the thickening smoke. His body was weakening against the heat, and he could feel ash and chunks of other debris stick to his slick, sweaty flesh. He heard the screams again, but this time more clearly. He instantly turned to the nearest door, knowing that finally, he may have found them. Without hesitation his foot slammed into the wood of the door, breaking it from the hinges and sending it flying into the room, where it split in half against a nearby desk.

There was something different about this room, Kevin realized, once he took a step inside. He’d inhaled a breath of fresh air; somehow the fire’s smoke hadn’t managed to find a way inside the room. The relief of the gratifying, small gulp of fresh air was erased from his mind when he heard the panicked slamming of limbs against another door inside the classroom. His ran in that direction. The sounds seemed to come from the classroom’s closet. 

Kevin’s hand grasped the strangely cool handle and turned it, his blood ran cold. It was locked, or jammed. He couldn’t help but think of the worst; what if someone tried to keep them in there on purpose? Trying to push the horrible thought from his mind, he fought against it to find a way to get the children out.

(To Be Continued Tomorrow...)

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MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 56)

"Someone went in to find the rest of the kids just a few minutes ago," a man said in response to one of her questions. Martin was baffled by the possibility of that. Weren't the fire fighters supposed to go in before the fire got too bad to search for anyone still trapped inside? And yet there was a civilian brave enough to run inside the burning building to do something they weren't properly equipped for.

Martin inched toward the fence and leaned over it, trying to get a good look at the front doors, which were becoming engulfed by newer flames. The flames were growing faster now; whatever it was the fire fighters were doing clearly wasn’t enough.

The smoke inside the building was thick, and the flames grew swiftly when more oxygen was found for it to consume. All Kevin could see through the haze of smoke were the slightest of shadowy movements his hands made when waved in front of him. That was how he spent the first five minutes inside the building, with his minimal supply of usable air depleting much quicker than anticipated. Finally he began to see more than shadows when he grew nearer to the flames, the red hot glow piercing the many layers of smoke that stung at his eyes.

Kevin had entered the school sometime after the fire began, when he heard there were still children missing. Several  people told him that it was too dangerous to try and help, and that there were fire fighters with proper equipment searching inside, but he needed to try and help. He couldn’t watch from the sidelines when he knew there were children who were in need of help. He used the brunt of his strength to force his way past the authorities and the crowd of people that was accumulating at the scene, and rushed inside without a semblance of a plan.

He heard faint screaming down the hallway. He was sure they were the screams of children. He needed to find the source of the noise. He bolted in the general direction of the shouts, finding a veneer of comfort in the fact that the screams were of terror, not of pain. If the fire had yet to reach the children, he may still be able to save them.

Of course it was when he finally had a lead on the children when everything around him began to confuse him. It was the carbon monoxide in the smoke, he knew, messing with his mind. He may be able to find the children before he passed out. By then he would be useless to them. Like that, they would all die; he for nothing. There had to be another way.

(To Be Continued Tomorrow...)

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MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 55)

The building wasn’t any building… it was an elementary school. He gripped the steering wheel with the force of his anger, and for a moment, he swore he saw red. What if it really had been Kevin who did this? Martin would never forgive the man for putting innocent people- innocent children - and if he caught the man again, he would be delivering a corpse instead of a man to the FBI.

Martin managed to sneak through the mess of traffic and pulled to a stop just outside the school's grounds, far away from the fire trucks and the commotion. Anita was already out of the car. They both stood on the sidewalk with their hands gripping the chain link fence. The school was going up in flames, but that wasn’t the worst part of the entire ordeal. It was midday on a Wednesday. School would have been in session. They both hoped that everyone was able to make it safely outside; it appeared too late to save anyone who might be left inside.

"Do you think, Kevin...?" Anita asked, and tugging at his arm. He didn’t first understand what she was trying to do, but he allowed her to pull him along anyway.

"It's possible," he gulped. If it was Kevin, it was his fault. All of this was his fault.

The flames were prominent on the other side of the school. He realized then that Anita wanted to see what was going on. They tried to break through the crowd that piled at the front of the school. Martin stopped dead when he saw the flames. They shot up through the ceiling on the one side of the building, hot orange tendrils licking at the building’s walls. Black smoke poured through the remnant of the building’s west wing, suffocating everything that was in its path.

Martin scanned the area, looking through the crowd to try and find Kevin, but had no luck. He roamed further into the crowd with Anita behind, moving closer to the school and the teacher’s parking lot. But then on the far end of the nearby lot, he noticed a poorly parked red truck; he was positive that it was the vehicle Kevin stole from their attackers and drove off with earlier that day.

He clenched his fists when he again thought it may have been Kevin responsible for the fire. Anita, however, wasn't content to just stand around. She went to the front of the crowd of the chatty onlookers, questioning them on what happened. Martin was close enough to catch some of their conversation and the responses that Anita received, but it was more than enough.

 (To Be Continued Tomorrow...)

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MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 54)

She looked away from him and back to the world around her. Martin seemed a good man, but his deception hurt her. She would leave if she could, but she relied on him for survival. She couldn’t entrust her survival to herself, especially not against psycho killers searching for something she didn't understand or wanted nothing to do with.

Her thoughts were all over the place when they entered the next town. She sat on the edge of her seat looking out the window, wondering where in the world Kevin would have gone. Would he have even stayed, or would he continue on in search of a somewhere much further away? She hoped he stopped here; the thought of chasing the man across the country was rather unappealing to her.

Buildings flew by on the edge of their vision, but that wasn’t quite what either of them paid attention to. The skies were dark with large clouds, but Martin knew they weren’t just clouds. The air seemed thicker as they drove deeper into the town, and once they were at its heart, he could see the source of what was undeniably smoke. Black smoke billowed from what he assumed to be a building. There was no doubt that, like him, Anita’s gaze was being held by the scene. It seemed to be an unspoken agreement that it would be where they were heading.

"Looks like there's a fire," he said. Martin had tried speaking with her earlier on in their drive, but she’d been intent on ignoring him. This time, however, she caught every word. Though she was now willing to listen, she was still adamant about speaking.

Anita only grunted in response.

Martin began to wonder about the circumstances of the fire. It had to have started recently, but they wouldn’t know how recent until they reached the site. Martin couldn’t help but think about the worst. Wasn’t Kevin supposed to be a terrorist? How was he supposed to rule out the possibility that Kevin started it? It was possible that Kevin started it purely as an act of terror. If it was Kevin’s doing, in a way, it was Martin’s fault, too.

He drove onward apprehensively, driving in the direction of the thickening smoke until they finally reached the building on fire. They’d spotted the smoke ten minutes back, and it appeared it had got significantly worse. Martin stopped in the center of the blocked street; there were too many vehicles and other onlookers in the way to keep moving. Martin saw what was going on. And he was froze in horror.

(To Be Continued Tomorrow...)

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MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 53)

"Kevin, wait!" It was Anita that called for him, but he didn't want to risk his momentum by stopping for her. He saw that she'd gotten out of the car and was running toward the truck, but he was already passing her by.

He sped off, leaving Anita, Martin, and the three dead men on the road.

***

Martin scrambled out of the car after Anita. When she ran onto the road toward Kevin, it was too late to stop him. The truck was speeding past, and was but a dot on the road ahead of them.. Unless they moved fast, they wouldn’t be able to catch up with him.

Anita turned her gaze from the road to the three corpses lying on the ground. Such superfast reflexes! Kevin killed them all with such little effort, but he restrained himself from using such force against them. Why? He could have taken Martin’s gun and shot them. He didn’t . Instead he put himself in danger, and killed the men who were after them.

Martin kept his gaze on the bodies, all of which lay in a crumpled, bloodied mess. Already the thick pools of blood were covered with a thin layer of dust and sand. The pool of blood was fast drying in the hot, desert sun.

He was being forced to make another difficult decision. In the two seconds he used to make up his mind, he turned back toward the car and pulled the door open.

“Get in the car. We’re going after him,” he said, throwing himself into the driver’s seat.

“O-okay,” Anita said. She was still dazed, but pulled herself together ran around the car and hopped back inside.

As soon as she was seated, Martin sped off in pursuit of Kevin.

The pair remained silent for the entire ride; Martin, because he was sulking on the fact that he had Joseph- or Kevin-or whoever he was and yet, failed to capture him. He doubted he would get another opportunity, and because of that, his entire operation was thrown into chaos. He needed to find Kevin again, and this time he had to be prepared to hand him over to the FBI. 

What he didn’t know or what he thought about the case was irrelevant- he had a job to do. 

It was Mid-Afternoon. The sun was high in the sky. Anita and Martin hadn't eaten for many hours. His gaze shifted from the side of the road- which was populated for the first time since last evening- and onto Anita. Since he’d taken her from his place, she hadn’t been following him of her own free will. She was pulled along with him as her life was also being threatened. Maybe at the beginning she helped him because of her genuine interest in Kevin, but he lied to her and hid the fact about him being a terrorist.

Anita’s eyes met his when he looked to her. She was fighting her confusion, but most of all, her anger. First, martin had lied to her that Kevin’s name was George Wilson, which he was not. Yesterday night, since she was under great duress she hadn’t followed up on Martin’s lie. Kevin said he was Kevin. But Martin’s file said he was Joseph, a terrorist. Who was he? Kevin? George Wilson? Joseph? It was difficult to blame Martin for what he did. Maybe he had to lie because of his work in the FBI. But she had difficulties not blaming him; she decided to anyway. He could have told her, she could have helped him, and then they wouldn’t be chasing the man they had found already.

(To Be Continued Tomorrow...)

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MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 52)

"But I- I didn't-" Kevin’s words abandoned him. He held his hands out in a defensive stance. Martin wasn't happy to resort to such methods to capture the man, but Anita had blown his cover.It annoyed him greatly. Before she interfered, he had planned on learning about Kevin and the people pursuing them. Now that plan was ground to dust.

"Martin! What are you doing?" Anita shouted. Normally he would ignore her, but he realized that her opinion mattered to him now. He hadn't known her long, but... he looked over to her, his resolve faltering at the sight of her terrified face.

Kevin took this small opportunity and lunged forward, grabbing hold of the barrel and pushing it up toward the roof in one swift motion. Martin's grip was weakened. Martin was annoyed that the man touched his gun.He fired it- though the bullet only shot straight through the roof and went up into the sky. The sound was deafening. Anita screamed.

Just as the shot went off, the car was jolted forward. This knocked the wind out of them. Kevin was the first to look behind and see that they'd been rear ended by a pickup truck. There were three men stuffed into the front seats, none of whom looked familiar to Kevin, but all of them held guns; aimed and poised to fire. This was no accident

He saw this as an opportunity to escape the mess he’d been dragged into.

Martin and Anita were still dazed from the impact of the truck, but Kevin hopped out of the car and moved toward the driver door of the pickup. One of the three men hopped out of the truck.He intended take a shot at Kevin. The second his feet touched the ground, Kevin lunged forward to grab the man’s gun and punched him in the face; hard enough to splinter his nose and send fragments of cartilage and bone into his brain. The force of the punch alone was enough to send him flying backwards.If puncturing his brain hadn’t been enough to kill him, smashing his skull to the ground would be.

It all happened so fast that the other two men hardly had time to react. Because the truck’s door had been left open, the man sitting in the center seat took a shot at Kevin. Kevin quickly dodged the bullet. He moved like a monkey on steroids. The man seemed taken aback by Kevin’s superfast movements, and was unable to fire another shot, before Kevin raised his stolen gun and used it to rain bullets on the remaining two sitting in the truck. 

He then hopped up inside, gripped the dead man by the shoulders, and threw him out of the truck to join his other companion on the floor. Once the truck was finally under his control, he slammed the door shut.Kevin threw it into reverse, and before speeding off, opened the passenger door to throw the remaining corpse from the vehicle. 

(To Be Continued Tomorrow...)

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MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 51)

Martin spotted the beat up, silver truck, and was even more confused as to how it got there without him noticing. When had it got there? If it had been the hit man who arrived late in the night, then they would have been dead before being able to even think of a defence.

Martin could make out that the truck driver had parked the vehicle and fallen asleep. A good night’s rest was most important for any driver. He must have parked in the middle of the night, long after Martin and Anita had fallen asleep.

He watched Kevin approach the truck, with the tool he intended to use to siphon gas from the truck. Hopefully it would have enough fuel to get them to the next town without stranding the driver with his goods. He watched the man work from a distance,. From what he already knew about Kevin- or Joseph- he was a mechanic, and if he could help them get moving again, there was no point in hassling the man. Several minutes later Kevin came back to the car and began pouring the gas he had stolen into the tank.

"Give her a try," Kevin said once he closed the latch on the side of the car. Martin opened the door and reached inside to turn the key. The engine turned on.He read that the gas dial which showed some fuel. Hopefully it was enough to get them to the next town at the least.

Martin got into the driver's seat and buckled up. Kevin hadn’t got into the car yet. Anita was sitting beside him, silent and looking worried.

He cocked his head in her direction. "Something wrong?" he asked, and she nodded her head. He saw that Anita had opened his briefcase and had Kevin’s file in her hand.

"Why didn’t you tell me?"
"Tell you what?"
"About Kevin- your Joseph?" her words came out at the wrong time, just as Kevin opened the back door and hopped into the back seat. Martin and Anita remained silent, but the woman couldn't help but look back at him.
"What about me?" he asked, bewildered.
"You! you're a terrorist!" she shrieked, shrinking back against the passenger car door.

"What in the world are you talking about?" Kevin’s eyes widened in fear and confusion when he saw Martin raise a gun directed at his face. "There has to be a misunderstanding! I'm not a terrorist!"
Martin kept the gun raised. "I've been deputed by the FBI to capture you dead or alive. If you don't cooperate I won't hesitate to shoot you and take you back to them as a corpse."


(To Be Continued Tomorrow...)

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MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 50)

Martin said nothing at first. He was baffled, especially because the man didn’t seem to acknowledge how unusual a trait that was. Was it magic, or something more than that? Martin figured that, with more time, he would find out. Martin latched on to the thought that this might be the reason so many people were behind Kevin. He made a mental note of the fact for later contemplation. Martin even surprised himself by believing that Kevin was being genuine- it just didn’t seem like a lie.

"You're telling the truth, aren't you?" he mused. For a moment he felt bad for the man, for having to doubt him over something like that, but then Martin remembered who he was. Kevin was supposed to be a terrorist named Joseph Cooper, someone he was charged with capturing and handing over to the FBI, dead or alive. But after talking to the man, saving his life, and learning more about the strange quirks that revolved around him, he again began to feel that something was wrong. Was Kevin really a terrorist? Had someone, somewhere made a mistake? Martin thought that it was unlikely, even though he didn't look or feel the part; there were too many people after this single man. 

"I have no reason to lie,” Kevin said, walking around the car toward Martin, where he lifted his shorts just past the scab for Martin to see.

“No one who hasn't seen me heal that fast first hand has believed me.”

Martin had no choice but to believe. He had worked on the wound the previous night, had left it a bloodied, torn mess, and here it was in front of him- already scabbing as though two weeks of healing had passed.

"That’s… fascinating.” Martin paused. “You're still sure you feel good though?"

Kevin hesitated. "Well... From last night I’m fine, but in general, I guess not. For the last few weeks my chest has felt awful; stuffy and a stiff feeling and it’s been getting worse by the day," he shrugged. "Regardless, it's manageable, but in the meantime, we should get out of here. You know who shot me? They'll be back."

"Anita and I haven’t been dealing with them for long, but yes, we have reason to believe they’ll be back, but we're out of gas." Martin muttered."

"Oh. That's not a problem," Kevin smiled and returned to the trunk of the car, which he opened with force. He spent several moments shuffling through the contents in the back before he pulled something out and closed the trunk.

Martin didn't recognize the item at first, but when Kevin lifted it for him to see with a bright smile on his face, he figured what the man was about to do. Martin whirled around, checking out the road. 

(To Be Continued Tomorrow…..)

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MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 49)

Martin woke up. It was a dream. Martin was sweating. Anita was asleep beside him head lying on the head rest. Martin checked Kevin in the back. He watched Kevin's chest for some time to make sure that he was breathing. He was. But so feebly that Martin doubted whether Kevin would survive the night. Martin wiped the sweat off his fore head and tried to go to sleep. Martin was shaken by the ominous nightmare. He closed his eyes and tried to go back to sleep. Only this time he hoped that it would be dreamless.

The car shifted, and Martin’s eyes opened when he heard one of the vehicle’s doors slam shut. He squinted in the sunlight, but lifted his head to search for the disturbance that woke him. For a moment his eyes rested on Anita, who still slept soundly in the passenger seat. He turned to look into the back. Kevin was no longer there. Sitting up and craning his neck, he looked for the large man, but he wasn’t in view. Martin felt the car shake again, this time because the trunk was being closed.

He lifted himself and got out, immediately seeing Kevin standing behind the car. He had put on a fresh pair of shorts. Martin thought it was odd to have a change of clothes in the back of some random, beat-down car. But before that moment, he hadn’t considered the car being anything else. It might have been one of Kevin’s spare cars, ready for running away. Kevin looked up scraping some dried blood from his arm, spotted Martin standing outside of the car.

"You sure you're in good enough shape to be moving around so much?" Martin asked.

"I feel perfectly fine,” he shrugged; the fact that he was shot yesterday evening meant nothing to him. 

“What did you do?”

"I removed the bullet. The wound was still pretty bad when I was done, though. Have you taken a look at it yet?" Martin asked.

"It's started scabbing. Doesn't even look like I was shot- just a scratch," he said. Martin lifted an eyebrow. He didn’t believe that Kevin was really that far along with healing in less than ten hours.

"Really, now?" Martin asked, baffled. 

Kevin seemed to pick up on the disbelief in his voice, and responded accordingly.

"I've healed fast ever since I remember. Get a broken arm, good as new in a few days, crash and burn on my bike, a bloodied mess for a day and not even a scar three days later. This type of wound doesn't seem to be any different," he paused. He turned away from Martin and leaned against the door of the car. "Thanks for removing the bullet. I’m not sure how my body would have handled healing with the bullet still in there."

(To Be Continued Tomorrow…..)

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MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 48)

His hands were shaking when he finally tore the bullet free from Kevin’s flesh. Even more blood- if that were possible- squirted everywhere, and Martin, morbidly, thought that the gloves seemed to have served little to no purpose. His arms were soaked in blood regardless. Anita managed to be spared from the crimson liquid, but not from the trauma of the whole incident. When Martin finished up by wrapping Kevin’s leg in his jeans and tucking him back into the car, he saw Anita pale. It appeared she was the one getting a bullet removed from her leg.

He smiled in an attempt to comfort her, but knew it was futile. After carefully placing the bullet into a small baggie from his briefcase, he removed his coat and used it to wipe away what blood he could from his skin and the outside of the vehicle. He ended up with red smears on his arms, but looked better than before.

Martin closed the door, quietly, so as not to disturb Kevin and then looked to Anita. She looked at him with tired eyes. 

He noticed how everything around him had a thick metallic scent. Deeply unpleasant in high concentration. He leaned against the car, breathing in the fresh air, staring off into the distance. He hadn’t noticed it before, but far off in the distance the city glowed like a million fireflies; a rather pleasant sight so much blood. Anita joined him leaning against the car, looking at and appreciating the same view.

"Do you have a plan?"

Martin shrugged. He didn't have anything, yet.

"We rest for now. Switch off your phone. We may be tracked. We'll have to think of something when we wake up,” he said.

Anita didn't bother responding. she remained silent alongside Martin for some time. Neither of them knew or cared how much time had passed before she finally retired into the car. This time she got in the front passenger seat and not the back. Martin followed shortly after.

He was so tired that his eyelids felt like lead. He gazed at the sky. He saw stars. Thousands, nay millions of them out there. They all formed a pattern. Swirling, moving, and undulating. He could see a giant disc in the sky seen along its edge. It was huge. It stretched from one end of the horizon to the other a full One Hundred and Eighty Degrees apart. 

The Milky-way! Our Galaxy! Could Man, in his present, delicate form ever fathom the Milky Way? Could there be beings out there superior and more intelligent than our own? Did they know that Mankind existed? Or were they already among us? As Martin watched the sky, a point of light came down from where he was gazing. It hovered over him and landed some distance away. Out came some creatures from what had landed. As they came closer to Martin he could see that they had glistening mirror like eyes. They opened their mouth and there were hideous, sharp teeth. one of the creatures gripped Martin's Neck. He couldn't do anything. The grip grew tighter and Martin found it hard to breathe. Those eyes! Those Teeth! Martin Gasped. 

(To Be Continued Tomorrow…..)

[The complete Book ‘MAN FROM TOMORROW’ can be downloaded at amzn.to/2MSf1ng]

MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 47)

“Need to get the bullet out of him,” he said. Anita remained behind him and watched; Martin moved to unzip the man’s pants. Kevin didn’t quite writhe in pain, rather, he vibrated, his muscles tightening and loosening with each of his strained breaths. Kevin seemed to somewhat relax when his jeans were finally eased off of his feet, leaving him half naked and bleeding on the backseat of the car. Removing his pants had reopened the wound that was partially clogged. Blood was oozing free at a quick rate.

“Bring my briefcase from the front,” Martin said, his voice firm and calm. Without questioning, Anita rushed to the front and grabbed the briefcase which Martin had thrown beside him while fleeing. Martin worked to temporarily secure the wound with the legging of Kevin's jeans as a temporary bandage. Anita dropped the briefcase next to him. Martin took his attention off Kevin for a moment, opened the case, searching for the box of latex gloves he had kept somewhere inside. It took him a moment, once he had them, he slipped on the pair of gloves and turned back to Kevin.

“Now for the difficult part.” Martin heaved

Martin carefully unwrapped the jeans from the wound and spread the bullet hole apart with one hand, peeking inside the wound. It wasn’t too deep, but the blood was obstructing his view of the bullet. It wasn’t much help that the little light that was left was quickly draining from the sky.

“I need some more light,” he said. Anita burst into action, this time reaching into her coat pocket to claim her phone. She moved alongside Martin and directed the phone inside once she opened a flashlight app, holding the light so Martin could see what he was doing.

With some decent light, Martin took a deep breath and slid his fingers within the wound in search of the bullet. With his fingers inside, even with the light, it was hard to see anything. More blood gushed from the wound each time he moved, and the man’s muscles were so dense he practically had to dig at them to get any deeper. Kevin groaned in pain and occasionally jerked his body in pain, Anita held him down, with one free hand. Kevin clenched his teeth inspite of his morose state. The tip of Martin’s finger touched something that wasn’t pure muscle. It was the bullet.

Martin wriggled his fingers deeper, completely conscious of the blood that now soaked the seat and the sleeves of his coat. He managed to wedge the bullet between two of his fingers and wriggle it free; tugging it from Kevin’s muscles. Martin noticed Kevin’s ridiculous muscles. They were enormous; maybe even two or three times the size of his. No wonder the bullet had only gone far enough to scrape the femoral artery. It hadn’t caused much damage despite the fact that Kevin was bleeding like a horse.

(To Be Continued Tomorrow…..)

[The complete Book ‘MAN FROM TOMORROW’ can be downloaded at amzn.to/2MSf1ng]

MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 46)

"You remind me a lot about my soon to be ex-wife." Martin said. Anita’s gaze returned to watch over Kevin when Martin hesitated, but when he spoke up, she looked up at him, this time not through the mirror. 

"I- I hope that isn't a bad thing," she looked down, Martin turned to look over his shoulder, her face slightly flushed.

"Not at all."

The silence resumed, but the inside of the car vibrated with Kevin’s snoring. He hadn’t meant to tell Anita that she reminded him of the only woman he’d ever truly loved. Sure he’d been thinking it the entire time, but there wasn’t any reason for her to know about it. Kevin’s snores worsened to the point where Martin was about to tell Anita to wake the man up. He found that she too had fallen asleep. The car began to make a puttering sound. He steered the car to the side of the road, where it rolled to an abrupt halt. He turned off the engine and sighed, not bothering to try and start the vehicle again. He knew it was out of gas.

Anita perked up once the car stopped. “Great. No gas?”

He didn’t need to explain the problem to her. He sighed and popped open his door, hopping out into the warmth of the late evening. The sun was on the horizon, but it was quickly disappearing. He didn’t have a clue how far they were from the nearest city, there weren’t any signs to give him an idea.

Martin walked around the vehicle and opened the door on Kevin’s side. The man lay there, obviously asleep, but with his eyes half open and his pale face glistening with sweat. He watched the man’s laboured breaths, knowing that despite the fact that he wasn't a doctor by any means, he needed to get the bullet out of the wound. Even if they could keep moving, they wouldn’t be able to take him to a hospital to have a professional deal with it. 

In order to ensure Kevin’s survival, he would have to do something about it now. Kevin snored laboriously, a death snore, oblivious to what was about to happen, and Martin decided he would get started. He grabbed Kevin’s torso and turned him so his legs were hanging out of the door, both of his pant legs soaked with blood. A plan was forming in his mind when Anita appeared behind him.

“What’re you doing?” she asked. Martin didn’t turn to her when he began pulling off Kevin’s shoes.

(To Be Continued Tomorrow…..)
[The complete Book ‘MAN FROM TOMORROW’ can be downloaded at amzn.to/2MSf1ng]

MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 45)

Martin was focused on driving for some time before he looked in the rear-view mirror to check on the status of Anita and Kevin. He gazed into the filthy, dinky mirror for several moments before deciding it was of little use. He instead everted his eyes from the road and looked over his shoulder. Anita was sitting on the seat, looming over the pale, bleeding man.

“How are you holding up?” he asked, looking back and then to the road. About twenty minutes prior, he’d gotten off the dirt track road and onto paved road. The car had stopped jittering a hundred times a second. He drove onward, the car quite smooth for the wreck that it was.

“I’m fine. Kevin is…” she paused and looked to the man, leaning in to brush his hair away from his face, affectionately. “He’s asleep now.”

Martin said nothing else, pretending to be focused on the road. There wasn’t much for him to be focused on but the wide expanse of Continental America ahead of them.

He found himself worrying about Kevin- who he still thought of as Joseph. While he was concerned about the mystery regarding the man’s name, he was debating what to do with him. After all, the man had been shot. Martin’s moral standards told him that he should take him to a hospital, but he was conflicted. He needed to turn the man over to the FBI, and he wasn’t sure if that would still be possible if he brought him to receive medical attention. He knew he wasn’t the only one in search of Kevin. Taking this wounded man to a public place was likely far from safe.

Why were so many people after Kevin? Apart from the FBI, there seemed to be at least two other organizations. One of them consisting of the Korean men… but he wasn’t so sure what to think of their other encounter. He had the feeling that the remaining group wasn’t with the others. The man in black was unusual… he appeared to be a hitman. Then there was him and the FBI.

Martin was distracted from the case, and pretty much everything relevant to his situation. His thoughts drifted to his soon to be ex-wife, and his entire being seemed to clench with grief. It was a gradual process, but he’d noticed since he first met Anita- she and his wife were shockingly similar. Sometimes it hurt to look at her, other times… Martin’s eyes shifted to the mirror, watching Anita on its spotted surface. She sensed his gaze, looked up and met the reflection of his eyes.

"What's wrong?" she asked. Martin thought for a moment, he had no intention of telling Anita what was on his mind. Even so, after many moments of silence, the words blurted out.


(To Be Continued Tomorrow…..)

[The complete Book ‘MAN FROM TOMORROW’ can be downloaded at amzn.to/2MSf1ng]

MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 44)

Martin redirected their course according to where Kevin said the car would be. He was beginning to tire from half-carrying such a massive man, and had to begin heaving Kevin with his own body in the general direction of the car in order to continue at all. There weren’t any vehicles that Martin spotted that looked even remotely blue, but he kept looking. Once Anita moved to help Martin support Kevin and help pick up the group’s speed, he devoted a bit more of his strength to searching for the car.

Finally, down in the middle of the row of cars, Martin spotted the only vehicle that could be considered blue. It was a hideous thing, but a vehicle was a vehicle, and they needed one to save their lives. They helped Kevin limp toward the car as fast as he could, but it was still a long and slow process. The man in black and his gang of deadly assassins were surely in the lot searching for them by now.

They reached the car, Martin first helped Kevin into the back seat. He left Anita to get herself in, as he was eager to get moving. Who knew how much time they had left? Sitting down in the driver’s seat, he leaned over the passenger side to search the glove box for the keys. There wasn’t much else in there. He grabbed it and started the car without much trouble.

Martin then realized that the car was standard, with manual gears. A bead of sweat dripped from his brow at the thought of driving something that wasn’t automatic, as he hadn’t used anything else in quite some time. Standard definitely wasn’t what he preferred, but at least he knew it well enough to get them out of there.

As soon as the car was on, he shifted into gear, hit the gas, and drove around the other cars within the yard. Martin turned into the main road in the yard, and was focusing on not stalling before getting the chance to leave. Anita stared eagerly back at the building they left, seeing the man in black standing there. He had stopped, was watching them, no longer pursuing. He held his hand backwards. Someone from his group passed him a long tube with a tapering end. Anita remembered seeing such a thing in movies. The man in black placed the long tube on his shoulder with the tapering end pointing towards the speeding car.

The gate was at the end of the road, when Anita cried- "Shit! Martin! He is firing a rocket at us!" Martin stepped on the gas pedal instinctively and charged toward the gate at full speed. The black man pressed the trigger. The tube spit out a lengthy tongue of smoke. The rocket roared towards the car. Anita looked in horror at the blunt tip of the rocket, fast approaching them. Suddenly the car swerved violently to the left. The car hit the metal wires, which for a moment, resisted the car’s strength. 

An ear piercing sound rent the air for a moment when the side of the rocket scraped the back of the car, over shot it, hit the fence and exploded. The shock wave from the blast shook their car. Anita felt a jolt in the small of her back as the whole car got thrown forward. The car knocked free the lower half of the other side of the fence and pushed through, flipping the gate when it moved inside the lower section like a trap door. They bounced inside the car when they landed on the dirt road on the other side, but Martin didn’t slow to see where they were going.

"Bazooka!" Martin said.

"eh? What did you say?" Anita asked. "Bazooka, the rocket fired at us was a Bazooka" Martin said looking at the road in front of him.

He drove off into the darkness, his destination now being the nearest paved road.

(To Be Continued Tomorrow…..)

[The complete Book ‘MAN FROM TOMORROW’ can be downloaded at amzn.to/2MSf1ng]

MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 43)

The first thing Anita spotted after catching sight of Martin and Kevin was the door that they already had cracked open, looking out into the shop’s yard out back.  Martin knelt beside Kevin. It took her a moment to figure out what was going on. Kevin sat on a crate while Martin was beside him, his hands busy wrapping a make-do bandage of a towel around Kevin’s leg, where he’d been shot. At first it was a bit of a relief to know that the man hadn’t been shot in the chest, but there was a big puddle of red, pooling around the crate. So much that she began to wonder how in the world he was still alive. The blood broke Anita from her daze.

“We have to go,” she said, her voice urgent. “I think he’s cutting open the door-“she stopped herself when Martin stood up, his hands red from wrapping Kevin’s leg.

“He was shot near the femoral artery in the thigh. If I hadn’t stopped it, he would have bled to death before we left this place,” Martin explained, moving to lift Kevin to a stand. The man was ghostly pale and blood darkened both legs of his jeans. He was able to support himself enough to move a bit quicker. “Even with this, we’ve only bought ourselves only a little time.”

The silence in the shop was broken. On the other side of the building, there was the sound of the front door being busted open. The three of them looked to each other and without a word, began to funnel out back. All of their thoughts were the same: they needed to escape. There were no other options.

The yard was filled with a mixture of broken down cars and some that looked like they were in the process of being repaired. Martin figured that their position could have been much worse. At least at Kevin’s garage, assuming any of them were working, they’d have a solid getaway vehicle and could ditch their pursuer without much of a problem, perhaps.

“Do any of them work?” Martin asked. He was already forcing Kevin to walk with him, as they had no time to waste conversing over the status of the vehicles. Whether or not they were going to be of use, Martin intended to escape. And unless they kept moving, the men behind them would catch up. Martin wasn’t sure he could protect them both with one already injured.

On second thought, there was something about the one pursuing them that had Martin on edge. The way he seemed so relaxed coming from his vehicle after shooting Kevin, and how he moved through the building, he wasn’t in a hurry.  Seemed strange to Martin. He had the feeling that the only reason they hadn’t been caught already was that their pursuer was playing with them; he didn’t intend to apprehend them, but kill them.

“The blue car two rows down is one which works. It's not in t-the best shape, but it'll get us out of here," Kevin stuttered, his pain evident in his voice. "The keys will be in the glove box." Martin didn't have time to offer Kevin any sympathy, but he was still awed with the strength that remained in him. If Martin were in his position, he’d likely be unconscious or dead.

(To Be Continued Tomorrow…..)
[The complete Book ‘MAN FROM TOMORROW’ can be downloaded at amzn.to/2MSf1ng ]

MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 42)

Martin turned away from Kevin and Anita. His gaze was cast out on the deserted street and the property beyond. Something black speeding down the road toward them caught his eye. It came closer without losing speed. Martin realized it was a black BMW, and the driver’s window was quickly rolling down from view. There was something about that vehicle that sent Martin’s body into a panic. The car's Headlights were not on. It was like the black BMW were an extension of the night itself. Unseen, stealthy. It was being driven without headlights. And that only meant that the driver didn't want to his victims to see the car coming.

“Get down!” Martin shouted, jumping at Anita, throwing them both to the Kerb just as a bullet shot out in their direction. seconds after the shot sounded, Kevin screamed in pain. Martin rolled off of Anita, only to see Kevin crumple to the floor. Before moving to check the state of the man, he saw that the BMW stopped in the middle of the street, and the car doors were opening its occupants hopping out.

While Anita was picking herself up, distressed and confused, Martin moved to grab Kevin by the arms so he could begin to drag him toward the shop. Once Anita realized what he was doing, and that Kevin had been shot, she scrambled to help. Hooded strangers were walking towards them dressed in black.

She whipped the garage door open before rushing back to help Martin pull Kevin into the shop. His weight was more than either of them could handle alone, and together, they barely made it inside before a masked man approached; his strides slow and measured as the door slammed shut in front of him. He seemed sure he would get his mark without even needing to try. Anita used every locking mechanism available, but what she heard next sent shivers up her spine.

Something pressed against the door. “You can’t keep me out with simple locks,” a cold voice sounded from the other side. Anita stepped away when there was a clank against the metal frame. Then the horrendous sound of metal gnawing at metal vibrated from the door, and she ran. They weren’t going to be safe for long.

She moved through the shop, following the trail of blood that Kevin left in his wake as he half-walked and half-dragged by Martin, also holding his briefcase in one hand. She closed all of the doors behind her, and locked those that she could as she went. While she was unsure how long it would take the man in black to break through the door, she wasn’t about to make it easy for him.

“Martin!” she shouted, having lost them in her attempt to slow down the man pursuing them. The building was a lot larger than she expected. Moments after she called to him, she heard his response and rushed in that direction.

(To Be Continued Tomorrow…..)

[The complete Book ‘MAN FROM TOMORROW’ can be downloaded at amzn.to/2MSf1ng]

MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 41)

“Joseph!” Anita called to him once she was a lot closer. The man hadn’t seemed to be paying much attention to them, but when Anita spoke, he turned to look at her. His expression showed a mixture of confusion, yet also recognition. While he stopped to acknowledge her, he said nothing until she stopped in front of them. Behind her, Martin was taking his time to cross the street.

“It’s you.” It was a simple statement, but it held a lot of weight for the both of them. For Joseph because in a way, he knew he was seeing the mysterious woman he saved on the street once again; for Anita because she never expected to have the opportunity to thank her saviour. “How did you find me…?” he asked, his words trailing off when he spotted Martin coming up from behind, unsure what to think of the man who was with her.

“I’ve been trying to find you since-"Anita was interrupted by Martin.
“It’s not hard to find someone when you have the appropriate resources,” Martin said.
“And you are…?” Joseph asked.
“An acquaintance of the lovely Anita here; Martin Phillips at your service,” he said and reached out a hand to shake his, and Joseph only reluctantly reached out with his to meet Martin’s. “You must be Joseph Cooper.”

Joseph’s face told Martin, however, that that wasn’t quite the case. “Sorry, I’m not sure where you got that name from, but my name is Kevin Campbell, not Joseph Cooper.”

Martin and Anita looked to each other, both of them confused. The folder he’d received from his Director stated that this man’s name was Joseph Cooper. Even if the man had perhaps changed his name, Martin would have at least seen some kind of recognition from the man. But there was nothing. Anita was confused because Martin had said that the man’s name was George Wilson. She stared at Martin in anger. Then turned to Kevin.

“Well, Kevin then… Sorry for the confusion,” Anita broke the silence. “I’ve been looking for you since that day… I just wanted to thank you for saving my life.” Kevin didn’t seem to know how to take it.

Anita gazed up at the large man, who had a good foot on Martin in height. 
“Well… uh… no problem. I didn’t expect you to go out of your way to thank me, though,” he said.

At that point, Martin retracted himself from the conversation. It didn’t involve him, and something else seemed amiss. Was Joseph… or, Kevin, going to do something? He had a pair of handcuffs in his briefcase, which he had brought with him from the car.


(To Be Continued Tomorrow…..)
[The complete Book ‘MAN FROM TOMORROW’ can be downloaded at amzn.to/2MSf1ng]

MAN FROM TOMORROW (EPISODE 40)

His eyes lingered on the vehicle sitting in the lot. Was it even safe to be here? After all, if the men at Anita’s house were hired by Joseph, they might only be a block behind them. On the other hand, Martin also thought that if they were underlings, they might not be so eager to let the big boss know they’d failed to kill the people investigating him. For all he knew, Joseph might suspect that they were dead. He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel in frustration. There was too much that he had to figure out, and it was beginning to get in the way of what currently, was most important: protecting Anita.

 “Since we last met, I’ve been doing a lot of investigating in order to locate Joseph Cooper, the man you claimed to have saved you. I narrowed it down to this address, but-“ before Martin could even finish, she was already out of the car with the passenger door slammed shut behind her.

Martin sighed, stretched his neck, and moved to join her on the street. When he finally got out of the car, she was moving around it to cross the road. Before she could do so, Martin caught her arm and pulled her back toward the car; pushing her against the steel frame, despite her resistance. Finally her angered expression fell to that of defeat and she quit struggling, allowing Martin to speak.

“Anita, it’s too dangerous for you to just run off like that. I understand that you’re capable of taking care of yourself, but until we know what’s going on and how to combat the problems that have arisen, you’re my responsibility,” he said. Anita frowned, but shook Martin off of her. He backed away willingly, and she crossed her arms. Understandably, she was upset. “So please, don’t make my job harder.”

Anita sighed, and Martin knew he’d won. “I’m not staying in the car.”

“Of course not, but… it’d be best not to stay out here too long, either,” he said.

“Is that…?” she asked. Martin’s expression twisted in confusion, but he turned from her to see what it was that she spotted. On the other side of the street, at the entrance to the auto shop, a muscular man wearing a simple t-shirt and jeans appeared to be leaving the establishment. There was no doubt in Martin's mind as to who the man was.

Before Martin could manage a word, Anita already bolted past him and toward the man on the other side. Whether Martin liked it or not, she was headed straight for her second encounter with Joseph Cooper. All he could do at this point was make sure that Anita didn’t get hurt, and that he got his man. Then it would all be over.

(To Be Continued Tomorrow…..)
[The complete Book ‘MAN FROM TOMORROW’ can be downloaded at amzn.to/2MSf1ng ]