Unknown Soldier

When I was a kid, I was fascinated by the grave of an Unknown Soldier in the Olympia Military Cemetery. It had only one date: December 23rd, 2012. Under the date was an inscription that read: The men and women of the Pandora Expedition owe their lives to the sacrifice of this nameless man. I was amazed that someone would do that without expecting so much as a thanks.

As I got older, I became more obsessed with the mystery. In high school, I even wrote a research paper on the subject. Before long, I knew everything there was to know about the expedition and the Unknown Soldier, except for who he was and where he came from. I learned that there was really no body in the grave. None had ever been recovered, and the headstone was just a memorial marker.

The Pandora Expedition was an American team that had been sent to explore a subterranean tunnel under the Caucasus Mountains in Russia that was believed to lead to the mythical land of Hyperborea. After a mile of tunnels, giant ancient carvings had been found, interspersed along the tunnel walls. There had been stone animals, men, and gods, leaning out from the walls. As reported by expedition leader Major Harry Crone, USMC, in a cavern two miles underground, on the edge of an abysmal chasm, the expedition had stopped for a meal. They had made camp under a ten-foot high relief carving of a vulture with a hooked, protruding beak. They had been halfway through some military issue potatoes au gratin when a mysterious man in black military fatigues had appeared out of nowhere.

He had been tall, with dark hair and eyes that had seen too much. At least, that was how he was described later on. There were no photographs, no real proof that the man had been there at all, other than the solemn oaths of five men and three women. He had dropped from somewhere, landing on the narrow precipice twenty feet from them. He had told them just one word, "Run," pointing back the way they had come. Crone had tried to talk sense into the stranger, but the man had been adamant that they leave. The ground had shaken from a small seismic tremor deep in the mountain. The expedition had encountered several such tremors already, and were unconcerned. But Major Crone had decided it was best to humor the strange man and deal with him at a later time.

The expedition members had gathered their belongings and moved in the direction that the strange soldier indicated. He had followed them until he stood under the carved vulture. Another, larger, tremor hit. The soldier had lost his footing, landing on his back. He had looked at the expedition, standing in the mouth of the tunnel leading out of the cavern, with a tired resignation. The tremor's aftershock broke loose the vulture's stone beak, which had fallen, impaling the soldier for a moment before the whole precipice, where they had been eating dinner moments before, broke free of the cavern wall and disappeared into the chasm.

The expedition had later returned, bridging the fissure, and followed the tunnel far north. They did find the ruins of a Hyperborean city, in a cavern of once phosphorescent crystals. Many said that it was the archaeological and cultural discovery of the century. If it was not for the Unknown Soldier, the expedition would have failed, and the mission would have been declared unsafe, and abandoned. Hyperborea would have never been found.

That was why I joined the military in the first place. I wanted to be the kind of man who would sacrifice himself to help a group of strangers. There was no one to convince me otherwise, since my parents had died when I was 12, and I had been bouncing from one apathetic foster family to the next. I enlisted in the US Army on the 15th of March, 2067. I had just turned 19.

After basic training, I was shipped off to Israel, where we may or may not have started a revolution. We were just following orders. After that I was sent to Pakistan, then Serbia, then Bangladesh. But, I never felt like the hero I had always wanted to be. I never made enough of a difference, it was always just trading one evil for another. Somehow I thought that the Army would be better than that. None of it felt worth dying for. So, after settling a coup in Poland, I applied to train in Special Forces. A month and a half before my 26th birthday, I was accepted.

I was told to report to a General Deius at Fort Aetna to receive my assignment, and there I was met by a grey-haired man with the star of a Brigadier General carrying an attaché case. I saluted and he led me down four levels and into a small room equipped with only a table and two chairs. He took a thick file out of his case and laid it on the table.

"Have you ever heard of Project Prometheus, Captain?" he asked in a rough voice.

I shook my head. "No, sir."

"That's because it's classified. Completely Top Secret."

I waited. After what he deemed a justifiable pause, Deius continued. "It's a little program we've been working on, and the time has come to give it a test drive. That's where you come in. You've been specially selected for a combination of your training and your lack of family ties."

"Sir?"

"I've been through your files. You effectively executed night-ops in Pakistan. You efficiently put a stop to that sect of so-called 'New-Prussians' from Königsberg that were causing all the trouble in Poland. And, it appears that you have no parents, no siblings, no spouse, not even any close friends."

"Well, sir, I have been in the army for seven years, I haven't had much free time."

"Exactly, Captain, and that is why you're perfect for this assignment."

He opened the file on the table and flipped through the pages inside. "What do you know about time travel?"

"Only that it's impossible, sir."

He responded with a slight shake of his head. "Not long ago, I would have agreed with you. But now, well that's what we intend to find out."

Deius slid the file across the table, rotating it so that it was right side up to me. Inside were pages of schematics and equations, several reports on the medical effects of various forms of radiation, and a short list of names, with mine at the top.

I flipped through the pages, skimming over the science part, since I didn't understand it enough to gain anything from reading it. I gathered that they had built a device, and a lot of numbers, some crystals, and a bit of radiation made it work. But what they were suggesting was impossible.

"Sir, what does all this mean?"

"You're a bright young man, what do you think it means?"

"You've built a time machine?" I hadn't meant for it to sound like a question, but every part of my brain told me that it couldn't be the right answer. Still…

"That's what we're hoping, Captain. We've tried to send probes, but the machine seems to emit an electromagnetic pulse, which turns our probes into useless chunks of metal and wire. So, we have had no choice but to take Project Prometheus to the next level: sending a human volunteer."

"Volunteer, sir? I can say no?"

"Of course. This is America. We can't very well send you into the unknown against your will."

"But you've told me about your top secret time machine. Won't you have to wipe my memory?"

The general laughed. It was unexpected and I recoiled into the back of my chair.

"No, no. The closest thing we have to memory-erasing technology right now is a hammer borrowed from the engineers downstairs. It tends to be difficult to calibrate the exact amount of memory loss, and it causes unnecessary skull fractures and brain damage."

I wanted to laugh, but decided against it. "Can I have some time to think about it, sir?"

"Of course. Quarters have been prepared for you here on-base." Deius closed the file and stood up. He opened the door and stepped into the hall. I followed. A young soldier with a violent spray of freckles awaited us. "Corporal Socordeski will show you to your quarters," Deius said, and I followed the corporal down another hall.

I sat in a sparse little room for a while before looking around. It had a bed, a chest of drawers, and a small attached bathroom. The bed was made, the drawers were empty, and the bathroom was dark. I wandered into the bathroom, brushing my hand up the wall to hit the light switch. I grazed the switch, but not hard enough to turn on the light. I left it off. I leaned over the sink and looked in the mirror. In the dim light coming in through the doorway, my reflection looked ghoulish. My dark hair looked black, and my eyes looked sunken.

This could be my chance, I thought. I can finally do something that matters. It was what I had been trying to do for the past seven years. If this time machine worked, it would be a major advancement, and I could help make it happen.

But, I would be trapped there, right? Stuck in some time where I didn't belong? But maybe I didn't belong where I was, either. Deius had said it: no family, no spouse, no friends. Would I really be giving up that much? It's not like I was marching towards certain death. Right? Besides, if I was sent to the future, they should still have their own machine that could send me back.

I wrestled with my thoughts for hours. In the end it came down to one thing: I had always wanted to be a hero, and here was the perfect opportunity.

I stepped out into the hall. I spotted the freckled Corporal Socordeski twenty feet down the corridor.

"Corporal!" He stopped and turned. "Where can I find General Deius?"

"He's in a briefing, sir. If it's urgent, I can—"

"No, that's all right. Just give him a message: I'm in."

Deius found me half an hour later in the commissary, where I was finishing off a turkey sandwich.

"Are you sure you're ready for this, Captain?"

"Yes, sir." I paused. "What exactly is my mission?"

"Let's move to a less… public location." Deius led me back to the meeting room we had started in, or one that looked very much like it. "Well, we need you to send us a message, so that we'll know the machine worked."

"What if I get sent forward in time?"

"You won't." Deius continued on without further explanation. "Obviously, you'll have to arrange to have it delivered at some point after you've left here."

"And then what, sir?"

"Then?"

"After I've sent a message, what do I do?"

Deius took a deep breath. "That's why we selected you as a viable volunteer. This is a one-way trip, Captain. Once you're there, there's no way back. You'll have to lay low and try to avoid changing history."

That makes sense, I wouldn't want to overthrow the government or prevent myself from being born… Wait. I was considering time travel like it was an everyday occurrence. I still wasn't sure if it was even possible.

"Sir, if you don't mind my asking, how do you know it's a time machine if you haven't been able to successfully send anything through?"

"Our scientists tell me that, in theory, the device forms a temporal distortion that connects to another place and time. The science and math seem legitimate, so it could conceivably work."

"In theory."

"Yes. And, as I've said, for some scientific reason, it can only form a distortion to the past. The boys downstairs can explain it better than I can."

We left the room and Deius led me to an elevator, down six floors, and into a large room. The room was full of computers and other equipment. A path was cleared through the Gordian knot of wires, leading toward the center of the room. Half a dozen people sat or stood around the room, checking monitors, pressing buttons, and adjusting dials.

Deius approached a man in a lab coat with dark red hair that looked like it was trying to be in dreadlocks. "Captain, this is Dr. Ephestes. He's in charge of the technical side of Project Prometheus."

Ephestes stepped forward with a limp and shook my hand. "Yes, I've heard a lot about you, Captain. Here to check out our little science project?" He gestured at what appeared to be a metal frame, like a doorway, in the center of the room, about seven feet high, with dozens of wires attached to it.

That's a time machine? It looked so unobtrusive, like a piece of bizarre modern art. Perplexing, yet useless.

"Don't you want to know how it works?" Ephestes prodded.

I gave him a slight nod. I had a feeling he was going to tell me either way.

"It's quite simple really," he began. "It uses these rare crystals from some subterranean ruins in the Caucasus Mountains—which were found by my grandfather, you know—to create a temporal distortion out of the chronological stream, the other end of which conjuncts with an indeterminable point in the temporal wake."

I blinked. Twice. Then three, four times in quick succession. Ephestes sighed.

"In layman's terms, time and matter as we know it is rushing forward, constantly. The past is dragged along behind us. If you step out of the flow of time, and then back in, you'll be somewhere behind where you started, in the past. It's like a leaf in a river, if you imagine that the river is static and it's the land that's moving. The leaf goes in at one point, and when it washes back onto land, it's far from where it started and, being a leaf, it can't very well walk back up to where it started."

"So, I'm a leaf?"

Ephestes nodded with a bit too much excitement.

"But you don't know where I'm going to 'wash up'?"

"Right. We're pretty sure it will be in fairly recent history, so you won't wind up in the stone age."

A thought occurred to me. "What would happen if I changed history?"

Ephestes considered the question, almost savoring it, as though it were delicious. "Well, there's all kinds of conjecture on the subject. Anything could happen. The timeline could just correct itself around the anomaly, or the universe could implode. It's a pretty broad spectrum. Why, are you planning on changing something?"

"No, I just wondered, in case I did something accidentally."

"Oh. Well, if you want my advice, just… don't."

"I'll keep that in mind."

Deius appeared behind my right shoulder. "Also, if you somehow manage to prevent this installation from being created, you won't get your paycheck."

Ephestes rolled his eyes and shook his head. "Come on, then. We've got to get you ready to go."

There wasn't much to prepare me for a trip through time. I could take no weapons, no technology that would affect the past if it was found. I was given my paycheck in advance, and I received it in cash in sixty year old bills. Ephestes had estimated my destination to be within that time, so with any luck, I wouldn't have money that hadn't been printed yet. I had basic black fatigues, no insignia, no mark of nationality. I needed to blend in and disappear.

I was told to memorize contact information, so that I wouldn't need to carry it with me. I had the address for the base, and was to address the envelope to Brigadier General Deius, and no one else. I was supposed to have the message delivered the day after I left, so I had to remember February 18th, 2074.

On the seventeenth, I returned to the room with the wires and the empty metal frame. Technicians started up computer programs, flipped switches, and adjusted dials. A low whir filled the air.

"You ready?" Ephestes asked.

I nodded and he flipped another, larger switch. With a sound like lightning hitting a tree, an energy field jumped across from one side of the frame to the other. It looked like I'd be electrocuted if I touched it. Maybe that would be all. I'd get zapped and not go anywhere. I wasn't sure if I'd be all that disappointed.

"Whenever you're ready," Ephestes called over the electrical buzz.

I took a step forward.

"Good luck, Captain," Deius shouted.

"Thank you, sir." I took a deep breath and stepped through.

I landed on my back. Hard. My back ached from the impact. I rolled to the left and started to get up on my knees. I stopped. I was in a dimly lit cavern, on the edge of a chasm. The light was coming from a few lanterns in a campsite twenty feet from me. Eight people sat in a circle, eating MREs with brown plastic spoons. And they were all staring at me.

Oh God. I knew exactly where I was. I knew what was about to happen.

"Run!" I yelled, my voice echoing in the empty darkness. I pointed behind them, back the way they had come. They continued staring. One man stood up, placing a hand on the sidearm strapped to his hip. I recognized him from all the encyclopedia articles I'd read in my childhood research. He was Major Harry Crone, leader of the Pandora expedition, and I had a hunch that he aimed to shoot me. Dark reddish sideburns protruded from under his hat. Could this be Ephestes' grandfather…?

"Who the hell are you? Are how did you get here?"

"Listen to me, you need to get out of here!"

"And why should I listen to you? You show up two miles underground and start yelling and expect us to believe you? Have you been following us?"

"What? No!"

"Are you with the Philiki Etaria? They always were trying to stop this expedition." Crone unholstered his sidearm and leveled it at my head.

"No, I'm just trying to help—"

"This is a government sanctioned expedition. Do you know what the penalty is for sabotage?"

"Less than the penalty for murder." The 9mm Beretta aimed at my skull wavered.

"As if anyone's going to care if I blow you to hell and throw you in this abyss."

"Fine, kill me, but you're all going down with me."

"Are you threatening me, punk?"

"No, I'm trying to warn you. If you don't want to listen, it'll be your own fault when you all die horribly."

"You little piece of—"

I spun to the side and grabbed for the gun as Crone pulled the trigger. The shot echoed off of the stone walls. A shock of white lightning sliced across my forehead. I staggered as blood oozed into my left eye from the graze above my eyebrow. The ground shook, and I nearly lost my footing.

"Argue later, go now!" I insisted as I held a hand to my head. I could see the major watching me out of the corner of my right eye. I guess I looked sincere enough, or he was tired of trying to shoot me for the moment.

"All right, move out. We'll deal with this crazy bastard later," Crone called to the others, and at last the group started to pick up their gear and get moving. I shooed them with my free hand until they reached the tunnel out of the cavern.

The ground shook again, and knocked me off my feet. Ah shit. I knew what would happen. It had to happen, because it already had. I turned my head and looked at the group, the Pandora Expedition, with a heavy sigh. An aftershock rolled through the ground. I heard a crack above me, and saw a blur of movement in the dim light from an abandoned lantern, as the hooked beak of a stone vulture surrendered to gravity.

Pain ripped through my stomach. It was hard to breathe, but I told myself it would be over soon. I'd become the hero I'd always wanted, so at least my death would have a purpose. I had failed my mission, but I had accomplished something better. I felt the ground below me give way, and I fell down into darkness.

I landed on my back. Hard. What the hell? The stabbing pain in my stomach and my head was replaced by a dull ache in my back. I started to get up on my knees, then stopped. There they were, eight people, in the middle of dinner, staring at me.

No, no! This can't be happening. I just did this! Then I remembered what Ephestes had said. Anything can happen. The universe didn't implode, but from my point of view, this was much worse.

But I had a job to do.

"Run!"

After the fifth cycle, I ordered myself to stop counting. It would only hurry my descent into madness. I tried to figure out what would happen if I didn't save them. They would die, and Hyperborea would never be found. The crystals for the time machine had come from Hyperborea, and without them, I would never have gone back in time. Yet here I would be, a universal impossibility, a paradox. I decided not to try that.

For someone who will live forever, it turns out that I have very little time. The only time I have to sit back and think is while I'm bleeding to death, and even after all this time, it's still hard to concentrate with a boulder in my guts.

I spent my whole life trying to live up to a dead man. A brave and selfless dead man, but still, dead. I guess I got my wish.

I'll be here, fighting forever…