"Connected" Part 1, draft 1.

The day started like any other. Alex woke up at 6 am almost on the dot. He always woke up a couple seconds before the alarm went off. He looked over at it, shut it off and pulled the covers off him. The small metal sink next to his bed was dripping again. He hated seeing all that water being wasted, "I have to get maintenance in here, this whole place is a scrap yard". He pressed the button for the closet door and nothing. "oh come on!" He exclaimed as he just pried the door open.

He always set his uniform out on the bed and inspected it before he put it on. Today he was in a hurry so he just laid it out and finished brushing his teeth and combing his hair. Alex was never late for chow, and especially when the cafeteria was serving hash browns. They reminded him of the corner deli from his moms house where the deli guy, "Italian Sam" would do wonders with the most mundane ingredients. "I wonder why everything taste like cardboard here?, its not like they dont have enough to work with". Alex took his usual route after breakfast to his duty station trying to sneak a peek at the deployment bay as the door would open for people entering or leaving.

His shift was about to start and he liked to check in with the guys before he took his post. new developments were a rarity but he still did it every day. Alex also liked to say hello to Major Sedwhich. She was very attractive and Alex couldn't help but smile a little too much around her, which made her uneasy.

"Amanda Sedwich, if only we met in training...." Alex thought to himself as he saluted her and walked over to station 12.

"Good morning mike", Alex said as he pulled the chair out of the console. "mike! take off the helmet, MIKE! Good morning!". Mike was a slug for everything, but this is ridiculous. "Good morning Al, you know your shift doesn't start for 10 minutes right?".

"I know, but same as yesterday, Fill me in on what you got.". "Well sir, just like yesterday, NOTHING!, now let me finish my log file so you can cycle in and I can get some sleep".

Alex finally took his post and prepped the system to cycle him into active status. This was the best part, the wait for an available host. The lights on the panel started to turn from red to green one by one. "God, mike always stinks up the head gear, I wish he would get rotated back into the day shift so I didn't have to deal with this stink."

Alex was about to initiate the launch sequence for the system when under the edge of his helmet he noticed a yellow light on the panel that was blinking. " The hell is that?, I never noticed that".

"Cycling down", Alex pressed the alert call button and started running the routine diagnostics.

"what is it captain Cordodova?" major Sedwhich asked in a stern voice. "Major!, I noticed a yellow light on the panel and I figured I would run a systems check since that has never happened before."

"Captain, you do realize that we have a dead line to keep to right?" " your starting to slack and I cant say I appreciate the lack of effort on your part!, Your weekly review is tomorrow and I dont think you will be scoring the minimum qualification points to remain in this program. Is that what you are aiming for?"

Alex looked on at her in horror. "no Sir!". "I am following procedure...."

Major Sedwich abruptly interrupted him, "captain Cordova, are you not up to speed on the new upgrades to the interface module?"

"sir, yes sir" "I spent all week going over the T-R-42 upgrade specifications for the control interface and I did not see anything on a new alert protocol."

"The whole thing, you read the whole 540 page report on the interface upgrades?", "In a week". "and You think you understand it?" Sneered the Major with an angry look on her face. "you are not even supposed to have access to that section of the report!". " you were assigned the 200 page field version of that material. You were supposed to read R-40 packet material."

"I am going to have to report this Captain, you are going to have to explain to the Kernel how you gained access to that report."

Alex was worried. He had taken it by accident. He still wasn't sure why it was even in his information packet the operators get distributed every week, but he couldn't really explain why he hadn't reported it as soon as he realized it was in there. "Stupid stupid stupid, WHY did I even mention that to Major Sedwhich?" It just popped out. Alex was good at keeping secrets but Amanda made him nervous. He couldn't stop himself. In any event, the Kernel was going to be really pissed. This wasn't the first time Alex´s over anxious attitude brought him to his office.

"Get back to your station and cycle in", "as soon as your shift is over, you are to remain in your quarters until further notice."

"Sir, yes sir". Alex nervously responded.

He sat back in the terminal and snapped his helmet on. "Jesus, this might be my last time in this thing", Alex thought to himself as he cycled the system into active status. "I might as well make it count. I hope I get unit 7 this time. It should be up and running today. God, I hope I get to at least try it out before they can my ass".....

"green lights across the board..... and that F-ing blinking yellow light". "launching."

*Interface sequencing 100% of synaptic activity. Loading into next available host.......Unit 7 is now prepped and ready. Please wait for mission status update.

"YES!"...."Finally". Alex almost jumped up.

Alex pressed the "commit" button on his arm rest and blacked out.

Alex awoke a little more groggy than usual. He thought nothing of it really. It was familiar to him at this point. He checked to see if all the equipment was there in its cases. He grabbed his gear and looked up like he always did before heading out. Earth, looks so small. The view on the ground was not that thrilling. Just grey rocks and dust. You tend to get used to it after a year of looking at it. He boarded the transport and waited for the other units in his cycle to come online and join him.

He rotated his units head to the right. He noticed that the holding configuration for the transport had been modified. He quickly noticed why. There were a series of crates in along the wall that weren't normally there.

"this isn't an cargo transport. What equipment do we need today that we cant mount to our units?". Alex was starting to get over anxious again. His curiosity was driving him mad. Why all these changes without telling the operators, or at least giving them a heads up about the change to protocol. He thought about the blinking yellow light on the control interface back at La Grange 1.

The other units loaded onto the transport and it lifted off the ground. Alex was still thinking about the blinking yellow light and the crates when his unit was deployed to his test zone. He rotated units 7´s arm and stationed himself along the crater wall like the mission specified.

Units 1-5 were going to have a mock fire fight with units 7,9 and 10 simulating an ambush on their patrol route.

The lunar surface was easy to get used to visually, and difficult to get used to physically. Especially with the command of a 2 story tall robot via remote link. Today exercise was critical for allocating more funds to the program.

"Unit 7 in place, weapons hot.". Alex was about to try out the most advanced Mobile armor the north Atlantic Federation could afford. He couldn't wait for the combat exercise to start. He tried to calm down and ready himself.

"all units, enemy convoy en route." "prepare for assault sequence baker 1".

Alex was a little farther away from the rest of his assault group. He was to provide sniper fire and break apart the convoy and then switch to artillery confinement of the area until all hostiles were neutralized.

The convoy entered into the kill zone and Alex´s assault group commenced the attack after Alex fired the first shots at the lead enemy unit.

"I wonder who is unit 5 today. I hope its Bill, Jerk" Alex thought to himself as he aimed for the units head and fired.

A bright violet beam of light exited Alex´s rifle and impacted Unit 5´s head. It slowed and shut down. The rest of the convoy spit up and took cover in the surrounding rock formations.

"YES!". "Now its just clean up"

Alex was about to switch to artillery fire mode when he noticed something up in the horizon. He watched and almost didn't have the words to even speak.

"Enemy armor inbound!" "Enemy hostiles in test zone!, all units switch to live fire mode"

"unit 7, what are you talking about, you are going to ruin this exercise"

"Commander Myers, this is captain Alex Cordodova operating unit 7. I have a visual on enemy armor heading to our location"

Alex got up and headed towards the group of other mobile armor units. "what are your orders commander?" Alex asked over the com on an open channel.

"come on Bill you sack of crap, get it together" Alex thought to himself as he watched unit 5 activate and begin to send telemetry data to him. "Confirmed, enemy hostiles in test zone." The commander´s armor unit started up and took a knee as the commander tried to get communications back up with HQ. "Unit 7 fire concussive rounds at this intercepting vector of enemy approach. Units 1-4 make a defensive line under that ridge north, north west. Units 9 and 10, establish a channel to command via SAT LINK. Our communications are being jammed. I cant get through to la grange 1. "

Alex began firing off rounds at the incoming enemy armor. "damn these things are quick" .
Alex could begin to make out their configuration...."WHAT!? those are Eastern alliance mobile armor".

"Why is this happening? Why now? we have a peace treaty" Alex´s head filled with thoughts of the last days of the war. He thought to his family, his wife he would never see again. He began firing more erratically.

*warning, synaptic degradation in process. Synaptic activity sequencing at 90% and dropping.....

"damn it not now", Alex tried to stay in control of his emotions and line up his shots.....

The enemy armor dropped down across from units 1-4 They fired off what seemed like an endless barrage of rockets. Units 1,3, and 4 were gone just like that, completely obliterated. Unit two looked like it was badly damaged. Alex moved up and managed to flank the EA armor. He was almost right on top of them and fired. "Nothing........"

"damn it". What are these things made out of?". He tried to get completely around them to head over to the remaining units from his group, but he was mowed down rather quickly. He then felt himself slipping out of consciousness. He looked up at earth until everything was black. ....

He woke up and looked around. He wasn't at la Grange1. He tried to make his eyes focus on the writing on the walls. This place looked like a hospital. Beds machines with tubes and wires, white robes.

Then the letters became clear to him....."Holy crap", "its Eastern alliance!. Where was the major? Where was everyone from command?!"

Then he saw a familiar face. "kernel!"

"Kernel!" Exclaimed Alex. "what are you doing here, where are we?, What the hell is going on!"

The Kernel smiled and placed his hand on Alex´s shoulder.

"Calm down son, everything is OK. I know you have some questions that you would like answered. We will get to those in just a moment. What I want for you to do now is let these doctors asses your physical condition. As soon as they are done we will move you to a debriefing room where someone will meet us and explain everything to you. I will be here the whole time."

Alex was angry, scared, confused and generally apprehensive about the whole situation. " I am not letting these eastern alliance scum touch me. Get me the hell out of here!". Alex tried to get up from his bed, but soon realized he was strapped down tight. He fought with the straps until a little nurse came over and sedated him like a seasoned cowboy would hog tie a lame bull.

When Alex woke up he was sitting up in a comfortable office chair in what looked like a brightly lit conference room. His uniform was gone and he was wearing a soft white cotton jump suit. He looked straight ahead at the door with an eastern alliance guard in full tactical gear. His eyes moved to the large windows to the right of him.

he was thinking up how he would get at the guards side arm when suddenly from behind him he heard the sound of womens high heel shoes walking towards him. The woman placed a steaming cup of coffee on the table next to Alex as she passed and sat down directly across from him at the table.

Alex followed her around the table with his eyes and stayed perfectly still. She was the defense minister for the eastern alliance. He had seen her on the news during the war and right after during the peace talks, he couldn't remember her name. He started to think of the Kernel. "was he in on this? Did he sell us out, are we under attack again?"

Then the woman spoke. "Captain Alex Cordova, My name is defense minister Arundhati Nimesh of the Eastern Alliance. I am here to welcome you to this facility and our temporary service. Your kernel Anderson Cooper will be here in just a moment with your technical aid. Please sit patiently and wait for him before doing anything rash. The guard is authorized to tazer you if you should get up from your chair."

She got up and walked over to the door. She looked back at Alex and smiled, then casually pushed the rhino at the door aside with a sway of her hand.

Alex could still smell her perfume. It reminded him of something his wife used to wear. He was feeling low now. "captured without so much of fight". "and you, dumb ass!, you speak English?"
Alex saw the guard grin and put his hand on his tazer.....

"well I guess he does"...

Then in walked the kernel with an older gentlemen. The Kernel had a relaxed face on him. He wasn't even concerned about being in an enemy installation. He seemed to be in on it Alex thought.

"Captain, I would like to introduce you to Dr. Strongman. He will be answering your questions.

"Hello Alex, I am pleased to finally be here with you face to face. As you may know I am the founder of the project you are currently enrolled in with the North Atlantic Federation defense force." Alex suddenly remembered the name at the top of each information packet he had received every week. This was Dr. Strongman?

"Dr. You mind telling me what the hell is going on here?" Alex was getting nervous. "Am I some sort of guinea pig for the enemy now?"

The doctor suddenly got very stern and loss the smile on his face. Even the Kernel lost his casual demeanor.

"Captain, the "enemy", as it were, is not our enemy anymore. Since the war ended we have not had any formal enemies."

"Dr. I dont need a history lesson. I remember the war very well thank you. We are technically not at war with the Eastern alliance BUT we won and signed the peace treaty some time ago and..."

The doctor got up and began to walk to wards the widow while he interrupted Alex.

"Captain, we did not sign a peace treaty. We signed a declaration of unconditional surrender."

Alex turned pale. He could feel his heart beating. He was about to get up and make a try for the guards gun, when the doctor made his way to the table again, sat down next to the kernel and turned on a holographic projector on the table.

Alex looked on at it with pins in his stomach. It was a bright blue representation of earth with little red and green dots everywhere. Some sort of tactical display...

"captain what you see here is the state of our forces deployment across the globe 1 day prior to the last day of the war." He then switched to another view. "here is their state the day of our surrender".

"gone, they are all gone". What are you trying to tell me?"

"Son" The kernel interrupted, we lost almost all our forces in less then 30 seconds. Disappeared. Gone."

"you mean the biological weapons strike that ended the war on both sides when we retaliated with nukes?"

the kernel continued...

" We never got hit by eastern alliance biological weapons and we never retaliated with a nuclear response. There was an incident. Something happened that affected both sides, and we were forced to surrender to the EA because they still had forces around our capital as well a necessary advantage for our mutual survival. The president negotiated our surrender and both sides decided to declare it a stalemate publicly."

Alex started to regain his composure, and sat up, looked the kernel in the eye and said "are they all dead?", "Is that why there is hardly anyone in the defense force above the age of 25?" "You people told us that the Biological weapons targeted certain age groups. That most of the defense forces were undergoing treatment and we would see them soon". Its been 7 years since the end of the war." "where the hell are they? Dead?"

Dr. strongman put his hand over the projector and switched the view once again.

"Captain, let me explain. They are not dead, exactly. We dont know where they are."
You see the incident that we mentioned before was, not an exactly an attack on our forces, the truth is the eastern alliance also lost a large number of its forces"

"We lost ours by what can only be classified as,in lay mans terms, "slipping into another time"
"the EA lost their forces to a series of strategic strikes.", Take a look at this video feed from one of the EA´s norther outposts on the Iberian peninsula the day of the incident."

Alex was looking at a standard front line deployment for the Eastern Alliance. He noticed something forming above it just to the right of the cameras view. The camera spanned right and focused on the sky above the position.

"what is that, it looks like a red storm cloud forming!". "just watch captain" replied the Doctor.

He saw as the cloud got bigger until it was over the entire compound. Then a bright flash of light, then more, then a long drown out flash, like a huge explosion....the camera went dark and then sputtered up in between static feeds what looked like little black dots raining down from the cloud. The "dots, corrected their descent and then began swarming in all directions...

"an invasion!, aliens!" "you are trying to tell me aliens invaded!?!", "captain please, just watch." the doctor insisted.

The crafts began to come into view. They looked like fighter jets. They began pummeling the EA forces with what looked like an advanced form of beam weapons. The doctor then paused as one of them flew past the camera. He adjusted the speed of the play back until the tail section of one of the crafts came into view.

"Alex couldn't believe it."

"That´s a north Atlantic Federation logo!" "wait, WE have THOSE and you mean to tell me we lost the war and killed our own people"

"the doctor shut off the projector and walked over to the seat next to Alex".

Before he sat down he handed a small metal fragment of some kind.

"Captain what you are holding in your hand is the only piece of the enemy force we were able to find. Its composition is not within our capabilities to reproduce". Those air crafts were not "ours, technically".

"I mentioned before that we lost our forces to a form of time distortion, they all "slipped into a different time".
what I mean is that they were PUSHED into an alternate time, we think... We believe that we were targeted for collection and the Eastern Alliance was targeted for destruction."

The kernel interrupted. "Son, we were losing the war from the get go. The truth is we were at a numerical and technological disadvantage. The Terminal Reality project at La grange 1 was coming along too slowly for us to even the odds in time. We were losing too many of our people in useless confrontations. We were about to collapse. We think that for this reason, the EA was targeted for destruction so that after the "extra-time" forces withdrew with our people, that we would not be totally defenseless. It was a gesture of some sort in deluded sense of balance by them. The thing is it didn't go down exactly as they had planned. The EA was able to prevent their total destruction by the use of mobile armor they had been developing."

"the truth is, that we got our designs for our mobile armor from them. They in turn got them from another source."

Alex started to see where the kernel was going with this.

"ok, wait. Let me get this straight. Correct me if I am wrong." " our forces were taken prisoner by "extra-time" forces, nice name by the way...., that apparently ARE us from the future" the doctor chimed in "well they could be from an infinite number of points in time in a linear conceptualization of it, linear compared to our relative position along the...", Alex continued, "ok doc, hold on. So these "extra-time"
people came here to collect us and kill off our enemy. Alex looked over at the grunt at the door...." and we then surrendered and started collaborating with the enemy and for What?"

The Kernel answered. "the advantage that we both needed for our mutual survival I mentioned before is also the source of the designs for the mobile armor they have been using." they have a ship, and it is not from this time, or this version of events."

The doctored then chimed in "I know this is allot to take in, but you see, the EA has had this craft in its possession since before the war started. In fact it was the reason FOR the war". At first there was an international effort to decipher its technology, but that soon ended. They decided not to allow access one day. To be precise, the day we deciphered the on-board library computer access. It showed a series of events that were supposed to happen in which the EA was betrayed by the rest of the world, and spear headed by the North Atlantic federation, was invaded and replaced by a puppet government. "

"They got scared and expelled the international teams working on the project. I was part of one of those teams. I was in charge of analyzing the neural interface on board the ship. It is the source of our Terminal Reality project for remote operation of mobile armor at La grange 1."

"That is the reason you are here captain. You are the best operator we have in the program. To be honest you would have been rejected time and time again had the Kernel and I not intervened for you. You have the right bio-electric field and brain waves for the interface to work at, what to us are theoretical levels operation for the time ship. I have been giving you advanced weekly packet data for the last two months to get you up to speed. Your purpose here is to operate the time ship and assess what exactly happened and if we can expect another attack."

"The blinking light you saw on the interface was an addition to simulate cardiac arrest when the link was severed.
Officially you died as a result of cardiac arrest following an act of aggression from the EA over a disputed lunar training zone. The enemy units rode in on your transport to the testing zone so our radar alert systems would not detect their approach. We do have an illusion of hostilities to keep up you know."

"Your team woke up to you being rushed out of the command center by emergency medical personnel. "