Chapter 108 When scientists draw inspiration from myths
Luke couldn't remember what had happened next. The machine had probably overheated and shorted out when he took a closer look at it. He only knew that he was standing in a forest clearing. He remembered that they had built the laboratory in an area where there had been a forest fire during the second wave. Luke looked at his watch.
It showed the time, that was all. No network. He sighed and walked in the direction of where the city should be. After two hours he arrived where the outskirts of the city should be, but there was nothing. Only nature.
Luke changed his shape and began to float. He saw a breathtaking panorama, just no settlements. He took a few photos, then grumbled, activated more modules and shot like a rocket through the air towards the megacity. Only to find nature there too.
"What the..."
He decided to fly to the Middle East, because there should be a company tower there. So he flew there, and to his amazement, instead of the tower, he found a moloch of a city. He flew closer.
"...
He had already taken some photos during the flight. He changed his view and flew closer. His implant switched on and translated for him. He thanked Ned inside for giving him something good instead of something cheap. That the thing at least helped him speak.
So he realized that he was in Babylon.
It was not what Luke had imagined. Everything was dirty and primitive. He only found out that it was 3002 BC after he flew into a temple.
After some thought, he decided to travel the world. So he flew over the planet, looked at every spot on it, cataloged everything.
He slept when he wanted to sleep, used the time to study and refine his genetic code. He took breaks, sometimes realizing that he had done something wrong.
So that his body even absorbed information from plants and animals. He had to start creating a mental palace to better sort his memories, and it took a while to sort the genetic information as well.
Nevertheless, he still had time to look at everything in peace. Every now and then he mingled with the humans. Apart from the technology, they were just as knitted as his versions.
At some point, he no longer felt like knowing that he had to wait so long, without technology and without cigarettes. He used the teleporter on his wrist and landed on the casino planet, which was not as ostentatious as in his presence, but still impressive.
He got a small basic income and a legal ID. What if he admitted that he was lighter than a time and a spaceship and flew through the galaxy, the looks. But most of the time he spent in casinos, where he gambled and pulled alien money out of his pocket. He invested a lot, often traveled to Earth to see how far it was there, he set spy satellites that periodically sent drones.
From time to time he interfered in wars, collected literature, art and data. At some point he no longer knew how long it had been since he had arrived. When he was picked up by imperial soldiers in a casino and brought to the empress, he realized that she was the mother of the current empress. Luke wore the typical clothes of a money shark and looked human. The empress looked at him contemptuously.
"Well?" he asked, lighting a cigarette.
"How much does my great-grandmother owe you?"
Luke thought about it, right, one of them had been with him to play. She had lost everything, he had made her sign a promissory note, before that she had paid several times with her body and left.
"The whole empire?"
She snarled. The guards opened fire on him, but the shots went right through him. Luke came closer.
"Well, well, such cheap tricks? Hm?"
As he came closer, he saw that she was pregnant. He calculated that the regent in his timeline was about 300 years old. He knew his time, he reckoned. She looked at him in panic, changing several colors. Luke gently placed a hand on her stomach, his hand slid through and he stroked Teheen's head, to his surprise she reached for his hand. He smiled.
"Thank you."
"Huh?"
She looked at him, confused.
He smiled.
"You will have a strong daughter who will take over from you and advance the empire and once more instill fear in the other species."
She looked at him silently.
"Up close, you're not one of the human species that crawl around."
He grinned.
"Regent, I'll tell you something and that's why I'm not collecting what I owe you. Originally, I come from another time. I just have to wait until I get back there. "
She looked at him.
"There have been reports of this before, failed teleportation attempts, but your species can't live that long..."
He grinned.
"Regent, I'm not human anymore, I've known that for a very long time."
"What are you then?"
He took his hand from her stomach. She looked at him skeptically.
"I was born a mutant, my species not yet. But in my time, nothing is genetically identical to the other humans anymore."
"I see..."
Luke grinned.
"I have a question: What criteria do you use to choose your spouses?"
She raised an eyebrow.
"Just a few memories when I saw you. Just like your daughter used to say. She had a husband before you, but she never said who."
She sighed.
"We're always looking for power and status and influence, or what a damn family, and this one is supposed to be my successor?"
She stroked her belly.
Luke nodded.
"Your daughter will want me for herself someday, in her harem. Annoy me with text messages. So my young self."
He grinned.
She looked at him again.
"What's the goal then?"
"I'll see that when my timeline arrives."
"What do the purchase transactions in the Useless Sectors and the Outcast Zone mean?"
"Ah, yes. I'm just preparing myself. Out of interest, is it really true that your sister was with a space vampire?"
"How would you know..?" she looked at him. 'Yes and no... she was infected by them and mutated into one of them.'
"Well then..."
He teleported away. Now that he knew what date it was, he spent the time preparing things.
He tried to come to Earth during the outbreaks, but he failed because of Uther's wall. No matter what he tried, it didn't work. He even ended up serving him because he had lost at cards. He had to push and take care of him when his younger self left.
He returned to Earth when the time finally came, scanned the situation, and went to get his things when he saw the current situation. His watch indicated the time for the golf game against Ted. He teleported there.
Ted was standing there, annoyed as always, and Leo was trying to explain something to him.
"Ted, I swear to you, Luke had an accident..."
"Yes, of course!"
Leo grumbled and looked at Luke, who was approaching him.
"Eh, who the hell is that?"
Luke was wearing tourist clothes.
Ted grunted.
Luke looked at his watch. He had made it in time.
Kia, who was standing next to Alex, stared at him and the watch.
"Wow, he's still on time," he murmured and sauntered over to the second golf bag that was waiting.
"Ehhh..." Leo said.
Luke looked at the clubs, took one out, then the ball and the tee.
"Eh, what's that doing here?" Alex then asked.
Luke looked at him.
"Golf, what else?" Ted grumbled.
"Alex, we have to expand the search," Kia said.
Luke shuffled to the starting point, rammed the pin into the ground and put the ball on it.
He cracked his back to relax.
"Kia..."
Luke lit a cigarette.
"You won't find him," he said, trying.
He sensed their eyes on him.
"What do you think?" Kia asked.
Luke looked at the pin.
"The teleporter fool got inspired by the Philadelphia program and read incomplete data from there and data fragments from the moon. He thought he could imitate the method Uther used."
Luke swung and knocked the ball off the pin, it flew elegantly through the air and landed just next to the hole.
Alex groaned.
"Nobody knows how Uther did it, not even the aliens..."
"There's a reason why the biodata is stored, Ted, it's your turn."
Luke took a drag on his cigarette and made room. Ted looked at him.
"I'm playing against..."
Luke pulled on the butt.
"So your question is not where, but when."
He smoked away. Ted didn't move.
"Okay, so when?"
He looked at Alex, looked at Ted.
"If you don't hit, I win. Far, far away."
Ted reached for Luke.
"No, I'll hit!"
"Well then…"
Ted snarled and let him go.
Luke reached into his pocket, took out a casino chip and flicked it to him.
"A bet's a bet."
Before the chip landed on Ted, there was a loud bang from the transporters. Ai and several droids pointed their rifles at Luke and pushed the others back. Ai's eyes shimmered blue.
"Ai, what's the point?" Alex protested.
"As ordered, I scanned the entire planet, and a weak signal came from here. Then the scanners said that there was an unknown life form here."
She pointed at Luke, who was calmly pulling on his cigarette.
She looked at him, his watch twitched briefly and he looked up.
"Ah, the scanners, so they have been activated after all."
Laser points appeared on his chest.
"So what? So he's an alien, have you found Luke?" Kia asked. Ai looked at her. Luke looked as if he was looking for an answer.
Alex looked at Luke.
"And now an explanation!"
Luke backed away from him.
"You really don't have any brainteasers. "
The rifles were still pointed at him.
Luke walked over to his golf bag, everyone watching him. He took out a few golf balls, walked unhurriedly to the tee and started again.
His back cracked.
"This impatience."
Kia reached for her sidearm, stormed up to him and held the gun to his head.
"Tell me where the hell Luke is, or I'll shoot you!"
"Oh..."
She didn't say a word as she pulled the trigger.
Luke was thrown back and remained lying on the floor.
He heard them discussing something and touched the spot where he had been hit. The bullet had remained in his skull. He pulled it out. Leo looked at him in horror.
He lit a new cigarette and grinned at Leo. The glances turned to him.
Luke pulled on the butt, letting the miracles heal.
His watch beeped again, and he looked at it and grinned.
"What are you grinning at?" Kia shouted.
He didn't say that he had already loaded the data from his tablet and cell phone into a crystal and emptied it.
"I'll do my rounds."
They aimed at him again.
"Oh, how unfriendly, and I've already given so many clues."
Kia was getting angry.
"You're not going anywhere!"
"Let me think, ah, I know. I'll go play cards until then."
He took a drag on his cigarette, reached into his pocket and took out a cell phone and a tablet.
"What until then?"
"You should know the answer by now. At the beginning I said not where, but when."
They stared at him in silence.
He put the bundle down in front of him.
"The beauty of technology is what you can do with it."
He looked at Alex.
"In all the years you've been making plans, think about what you really want. Until then."
Ai winced.
"No..." She looked at Alex desperately. "The scanners... they recognized the death... and the system says that he exceeded the official duty time by two minutes..."
"What did you do?" Alex asked.
Luke put his arm behind him.
"Well," he tilted his head. "According to the facts, you found and shot your target. Congratulations, you're the ruler of the world. Yes, I know about the clause you built into the contract. I've been waiting for this for a very long time."
He looked at Kia, who stared at him, and she fired again. The bullet stopped in front of Luke's nose, then fell to the ground.
Luke's bones cracked ominously, and he transformed back into his original form, only he had more wrinkles and hadn't used the form in ages.
They stared at him in disbelief.
"Tsk tsk tsk Kia, don't make a show of it now, you weren't even interested. Until two days ago and then suddenly Ohh ppff, please."
She fell silent.
"If you've been here that long, why only now?" she then said.
"Well, actually I wanted to come right after the accident. Nice with tam tam etc. But then I heard your talk and that of the others. You know, when you hear that you're just a figurehead and a double until further notice. Well, "
Kia wanted to pull the trigger, but her weapon jammed, she swore and lashed out at him, passing right through him.
He looked at Alex.
"Like I said, think about it."
He teleported to his ship, took off and landed in the sector of the outlaws.
This area was avoided by all empires and great factions, there was nothing to be gained here. Some time ago he had had a habitat here. The planet was a death world, but that didn't matter to him. He traveled to the habitat, entered it, turned on the generator and looked around. Standard equipment of the habitat. He undressed and took a shower, then put on new clothes, burned the old ones and lay down to sleep. He admitted to himself that he hadn't slept enough in all these years.
He had realized early on that something was wrong. Alex had arranged for Kia to be there suddenly for her birthday. He put her there as a guard dog, which was 100% confirmed when he wanted to show himself. It was just a job for her, and that was why she had snapped at the bowling alley, because he didn't sit there obediently like a dog like she wanted. At some point, when they had started to work with their genes, they had turned them around to control their genetic modification. A tool, nothing more.
Later, he got a sample from Alex, which wasn't difficult, and compared them. Earl had really done a lot to him, but it was still within limits, and he hadn't ended up in galactic jail. When he compared Spector's genes when he took office as world president, his genes were much stronger than Alex'. Now the comparison was from adult to born child.
Luke slept in, then went exploring on the planet, exploring ruins.
On one of these tours, he was attacked by natives, rather a horde. He killed them, got meat, but it cost him a lot of money. He flew to a black market doctor who had fled here because he had affairs with the wives of Planetary Senators.
He explained to Luke that the implants, the good ones, had no problems with his organism and that he had only been told nonsense.
The arms were replaced, one arm was missing completely, the other was crippled. The legs too, the spine was reinforced. He even relieved Luke of his crystal eye problem and his crystal problem in general. Okay, now he had stolen military-grade implants from a cyber race.
On the return flight, he looked at his hands, the doctor had assured him that they were shape-shifting. He tried it out and was surprised that it worked.
He spent the next few days fine-tuning and testing.
The doctor had set it up so that the implants were only connected to his nervous system and could not be hacked, which was necessary for cyber beings.
After that, he chilled in the living area on a lounger. Less than a month had passed since Lynx and Nad, dressed in protective suits, had stood in front of his habitat; his scanners showed him several cruisers in orbit. They seemed surprised that the door was not locked and that he was sitting on the lounger drinking a soda.
He didn't even bother to transform. He sat there in his original form with the visible implants, looking at them with his pitch-black eyes and neon pupils.
"You're living pretty openly for someone who's been declared an enemy of the planet," came the dull announcement from the loudspeakers.
Luke grinned and took a sip of his soda.
"Well, now I know how he decided."
He took a cigarette out of a pack and lit it.
Both were still standing there, as if hesitating.
"We... want to know..."
Luke took a drag on the cigarette.
"To make a long story short, the teleporter that exploded sent me into the past. When I finally arrived at the time when the North Block was..." he blew out a cloud.
"I started to wonder. I suddenly saw people differently and now I don't want to be a puppet."
He looked at them both.
"So if you want to kill me, I hope you have a planet cracker in one of the cruisers up there, otherwise it won't work."
Nad was the first to open his helmet.
"We found out when we approached the planet. My mother wants to know what this means."
Lynx opened his helmet.
"My parents want to know too, especially since your parents are with my parents right now."
"I'm out of work, well I disconnected my bank account a long time ago and only kept the necessities on the earth account. Well, otherwise the investments of wait and the few industries and promissory notes and a few companies."
"I remember that's where you made all the casino winnings and the money from the jobs..."
"Yep. Well, I can only give you two the bare necessities here. I had hoped that he would respond on a partnership basis."
He took a drag on his cigarette.
"You don't seem angry..."
"I had expected that, yes, I had hoped that the power wouldn't go to his head." He shrugged.
"Then never mind."
"But why, traitor..."
Luke shrugged.
The teleporter sounded and Nad pressed her face against Luke's. Then she felt his face, and Lynx and Ned had come closer too.
"What are your plans?" Lynx asked.
"At the moment, I don't have any."
They took him with them to the home planet of Ned and Nad. He had to go to the throne room of Nad, who looked at him from her throne.
"I want an explanation immediately!" it resounded from her.
Luke grinned.
"I made my own putsch to be free, Nid. My grandfather wants to have and keep control."
Nid winced when she looked into his eyes.
"I'll leave it to him."
She growled.
"Nid, please, look at it from a business point of view. The contracts still have half a year to run and then have to be renegotiated."
"And then?"
"That depends on you."
She looked at him stubbornly.
"I...," she began.
The door to the hall was pushed open and soldiers of the imperial army marched in, followed by the turquoise-skinned teenagers.
"Nid? Tell me, what the hell is going on? First you tell me that there is finally something good and then... someone from the whispering department tells me that the person was labeled a traitor."
"You gossip a lot..." came from Luke.
Teheen looked at Luke, she looked at him questioningly at first, then her skin turned yellow.
"Luke."
Luke grinned.
"Yes, I actually wanted to greet you with Tam Tam and parade. Well..."
He lit a new fag.
"There's manipulation in every family."
She looked at Nid, who sighed and nodded.
"Screw them. Screw them. Let's send a fleet."
"They have a moon defense," came from Lynx.
The Empress looked at her unimpressed.
"So what? Then we lay siege." She grinned.
"Teheen..." came from Nid.
She looked at Nid.
"What? That reminds me. '
She patted Luke's chest.
'What about the rumor that Specter is getting a harem?"
Luke took a drag on his cigarette. He wanted to say something.
Nad croaked.
"I'll keep the brand on Luke, even if he's not a Regent."
Teheen looked at her.
"Good. And the vampire too."
Lynx grinned.
"Nid marked him too," she said.
Luke sighed, took a step back and was held by her.
"Not so fast, Luke. I don't care who you fuck, but you still belong to me, and I calculate that you have belonged to me longer than you were with them here and the one on your planet."
"Oh..."
She nodded.
Nid rubbed his nose.
"Teheen, you and your ceremonies."
She laughed.
"I just have an eye for it and I got him before all of you."
Later, when she had him alone, she showed her true colors, almost crying, and feeling him up for the implants. He had just held her close.