San Francisco: The roof began to cave in and things were flying off the shelves as the quake began ravaging the entire area. Kara and Tom had already decided to act and tipped the table to get it between them. Kara grabbed Sera and they bolted to the car as Jake cocked his gun.
"What're you doing?" Sarah demanded.
"My job, apprehension or elimination," he said aiming at the fleeing couple. His hand pulled the trigger, but Sarah slammed his arm upward and the bullet hit the ceiling.
"What're you doing?" Jake demanded.
"You never mentioned eliminating them! I won't have blood on my conscience while I'm aware of it," Sarah said.
"That's part of the Temporal Charter you should know that!" he said. The trailblazer wheels rotated downward and it faced the far wall.
"Well at least they're trapped," said Jake. Then the far wall dissolved and was revealed to be nothing more than a hologram. The car roared out into the open air as Jake ran to the ledge and began firing at it. He then pulled out a much larger gun and fired one projectile at the vehicle, which hit it before the vehicle vanished into time.
"Gotcha," he said with a smile. "Let's go!"
"Did you kill them!" Sarah shouted. Jake shook his head.
"Nope, but now I'll be able to get them later," he said. "C'mon we gotta get out of here before the whole town collapses."
"There's no time!" shouted Marty as the building began to collapse towards the ground. Jake produced a device and pressed the single button on it. An instant later a roar was heard as a modified V8 supercharged 1974 XB Ford Falcon rose up outside the wall.
"Quick jump!" shouted Jake. The three leapt onto the roof of the car as the whole building collapsed. Jake crawled over to the right side of the vehicle and got in since it being an Australian car the wheel was on the right. Marty and Sarah managed to get in on the other side as Jake gunned the engine.
"I'm afraid we'll have to pick up your machine later," said Jake gunning the engine as the car tore off through the sky.
"What?" Marty and Sarah demanded. Jake pressed a couple buttons on his time machine and the date sprung up: November 2nd, 2800.
"We really need our machine," said Marty protesting.
"Yeah our parents will kill us if we don't bring it back," said Sarah nodding.
"Relax, I'm just going to report to my superiors that I've finally planted a bug on Kara and Tom's time machine and now we can finally send in an assault team to capture them once and for all," said Jake.
"So that's what the second gun was for," Marty realized.
"So why do you need us?" asked Sarah.
"I need IDs from both of you to put on my report for references," said Jake. "It'll only take a minute."
"I don't believe this," said Sarah.
"Umm, Jake I don't know how to put this, but we aren't exactly from the 29th Century," said Marty.
"Doesn't matter so long as it wasn't before the 27th Century," said Jake as the machine roared into the future.
"The 20th and 21st Century!" shouted Jake's boss. It had been three hours since their arrival into the future and after Marty and Sarah revealed what time frame they were from. Jake didn't believe it, but then proof was found and then Jake's boss had found out and went ballistic when they were called to his office.
"How was I supposed to know?" he shouted back. "I don't know of any recorded time travel prior to the 27th Century!"
"Haven't you heard of Doctor Emmett L. Brown, the creator of time travel whose research was uncovered in the 27th Century and led to the mass birth of time travel?" said the boss.
"Yeah but the odds of me running into any of his assistants in any specific time period were astronomical!" shouted Jake.
"Yeah well you did," said the boss. "And you lost your quarry."
"I didn't," Jake began.
"It'll take three weeks to fully track them down assuming they don't perform multiple jumps. Their deposition is in five days. If they aren't found before then, there goes the case," said the boss.
"I'll find them," said Jake angrily.
"No you won't," said the boss calmly.
"What do you mean by that?" asked Jake.
"You're off the case Whitacre," the boss sneered. "You've been relegated to maintenance duties on the time machines."
"You can't do this to me!" said Jake leaping out of his chair.
"I just did," said the boss. "Now get out of here Whitacre before I ask for your badge."
"Take it," said Whitacre tossing it to the ground along with his guns. "I quit."
"That means temporal erasure," the boss reminded him as Jake left for the door.
"It's better than living like this," said Jake through tears and rage. "I'd rather die on my feet than live on my knees."
"Alright Jake get back in here," said the boss waving him back in as Sarah and Marty sat there at a loss for words.
"What?" demanded Jake.
"I'll…suspend you and you can come back in six months," said the boss.
"There isn't going to be a world left in six months, I need to capture them now before it's too late," said Jake.
"I'm sorry Jake. As much as I would like to budge on this issue, I do have my orders from above to deal with. They'll probably already be mad that I'm rescinding this part of the order, but to have you back on the force without any punishment would be unthinkable. I'll have to assign Chalmers to do it," said the boss.
"He won't be able to find them in five days," said Jake preparing to leave.
"Yeah well I don't have a choice," said the boss as Jake left the room. "Wait Jake come back!"
"Yeah?" he asked coming back.
"Since you were the one responsible, for bringing them here they are now in your custody until we can prepare a trip to take them back to San Francisco," said the boss. Jake looked at him stunned.
"I can't take care of two teenagers!" he protested.
"Deal with it Whitacre because I can't have them hang out here amidst all of this classified stuff," said the boss. "Take them for a tour around town or something!"
"Not at DEFCON Four I sure as hell will not!" said Jake incredulously. The boss's eyes suddenly went open.
"Good point, have them hang out at your place," said the boss going back to his notes.
"Maybe we will go on that tour after all," Jake mused.
"Jake!" said the boss annoyed. Jake laughed before hanging his head in defeat.
"Let's go," he said to Marty and Sarah who filed out with him.
"I don't believe this," he said grumbling as they walked through the immaculately white offices.
"You're the ones who brought us here," Marty teased while Sarah laughed. Jake shook his head.
"God I'd forgotten how obnoxious teenagers could be," said Jake shaking his head as they boarded a moving escalator. It moved out of the building and into a tube with large windows set around it, and finally Sarah and Marty saw the hell that was the 29th Century. The sky was permanently dark and was covered with smoke and smog. Down below was a small roadway that was surprisingly deserted.
"What town is this?" asked Marty.
"Frisco," said Jake leaning against the railing.
"Where is everybody?" asked Sarah looking down at the desolation.
"What do you mean?" asked Jake confused.
"Well in Blade Runner and Total Recall the future was nothing but streets crammed full of people in darkened environments. This looks the same but there are no people," said Sarah pointing to the emptiness outside. Jake looked at her confused for a few moments.
"Oh yeah I keep forgetting you're not from around now," he said. "There's only 1.5 million people living in what in your day was called the United States of America," said Jake.
"1.5 million!" Jake and Sarah shouted.
"Yeah, luckily the population is on the rise, ten years ago it was half that," said Jake. Sarah and Marty looked at him shocked.
"Is there a large enough population to teach these new children?" Marty asked.
"Oh the increase in population is from immigration from other USA members. There hasn't been a live birth in more than 200 years," said Jake with a smile. "Well, at least a legal birth at any rate."
"But you can't be older than twenty two," said Sarah. Jake shook his head.
"People live longer in my time," Jake explained. "I'm 210. Divide that number by ten and you'll have my age for your time frame, twenty-one."
Marty and Jake had just stopped talking by this time as they tried to digest all of this information.
"That's…" said Sarah before she was at a loss for words. Jake just shrugged.
"You get used to it when it's pretty much all you know," Jake responded.
"It's so barbaric here," said Sarah. Jake nodded solemnly.
"Unfortunately you have to get used to it. Remember from my point of view your time is barbaric," the investigator responded.
"How?" asked Marty and Sarah laughing nervously. Jake shrugged nonchalantly and drank some coffee from a thermos he'd appropriated earlier.
"You haven't experienced World War Three yet," he said drinking it. Sarah and Marty's eyes went wide-open. Jake laughed.
"Don't worry, that won't happen until 2240 but when it does the world will be changed forever," said Jake. "A 300 year war, the deaths of five billion individuals, the complete and total destruction of the moon, plunging the Earth into near total darkness, it's all good."
Marty fainted while Sarah just stood motionless after his statements.
"At least the ice caps are in one piece," said Jake trying to put a positive spin on things. Now Sarah fainted while Jake just laughed. He looked out at the destroyed ruins of the Golden Gate Bridge and the vaporized bay before turning back and drinking his coffee as the escalator continued moving.
Later: Sarah blinked and opened her eyes to see a white yet dingy ceiling.
"Morning," said Jake as he appeared over her, still holding his cup. "At least I think that's what you people say when someone wakes up. Course morning is kind of relative when the sun doesn't rise anymore."
"And here I was hoping it was a dream," said Sarah.
"Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a dream, right? Isn't that how it goes?" asked Jake. "I think I heard Kara say that to Sera when I was tracking them in the 1950s. No clue what it means or what context it was said in, but I never forgot it."
"It's about rowing a boat," said Sarah sitting up.
"Oh," said Jake now knowing what to think.
"Where's Marty?" asked Sarah.
"Still out cold in the next apartment," said Jake shrugging.
"You own two apartments? Boy you must be rich," said Sarah.
"When there are only 100,000 people living in your city, you could potentially 'own' a lot. But material possessions went the way of Australia, they just don't exist anymore," said Jake.
"You really need to meet my Jake Whitacre," said Sarah shaking her head. "I think you two would have one hell of a conversation."
"You've said that before, and while it would be promising to meet whom I take to be a fellow time traveler, ultimately it'll never happen," said Jake. He walked into his dingy kitchen and looked at the junk that was in it, an archaic refrigerator, and a hanging bowl full of vegetables, and basic cabinets and a sink crammed into a very small area.
"Hungry?" he asked. Sarah shrugged.
"What've you got?" she asked. Jake opened the refrigerator and looked at the various pieces of indescribable food.
"I don't know," he said. Sarah walked over to the refrigerator.
"No food processor like those thieves had?" she asked. Jake laughed.
"That was another one of their 'stolen' items. It was being built inside a building that got destroyed during World War III so they jumped in, grabbed it, and jumped out before it was destroyed," said Jake. "That was three months ago MFT."
"MFT?" asked Sarah confused.
"My Frame of Time," Jake explained. "I've been trailing them for six months and three months ago they obtained it."
Sarah looked at the apartment, which was clearly falling apart and in need of repairs.
"And how long since you've been in here?" she asked. "This place looks like a dump."
"Every place looks like a dump. I picked this apartment at random from thousands of others in the city," said Jake walking over to some blinds. "It's got a nice view of the bay."
Jake threw back the blinds to reveal the heavily damaged Golden Gate Bridge visible earlier and the vaporized bay in the middle of the darkness.
"Unbelievable," said Sarah shaking her head at the destruction.
"Looked really different 894 years ago didn't it?" Jake said laughing. Sarah shrugged.
"I was planning on going to San Francisco to meet up with my friends, I hope they don't mind that I showed up 785 years late," said Sarah.
"Don't worry you'll still make that rendezvous," said Jake leaning back against the island in his kitchen. Sarah stood up.
"Well let's go," she said. Jake looked at her confused.
"Go where, on a tour?" he asked. "I'm afraid there's not much to see."
"No," said Sarah shaking her head. "Let's go get break into Temporal Investigations, retrieve your time machine and go arrest those crooks," said Sarah leaving for the door. Jake didn't move.
"Maybe you didn't understand the boss, we're not leaving this timeframe anytime soon," said Jake.
"So? Rules and regulations didn't stop the Jake Whitacre I know from doing what needed to be done," said Sarah. Jake looked at her annoyed.
"I'm not that Jake Whitacre. The fact that our names are the same and the fact that we both time travel does not mean we are any more similar that that!" he exclaimed. "Go talk to some other Jake Whitacre, maybe he'd be more willing to help. I don't disobey the rules on a whim to do what needs to be done."
"Somehow I'd think that this time period would warrant that course of action more than any other," Sarah observed.
"No if anything it would make things worse," said Jake. "Since there are so few of us left it takes all of us following the rules to ensure a working society."
"This isn't a society," said Sarah shaking her head. "You and I both know that."
"For you it isn't, for me it is," said Jake angrily.
"Sometimes the only way to uphold justice is to break the law," said Sarah. "Who really rules in this glorious United State of the Americas?"
Jake remained silent.
"Out with it!" Sarah shouted.
"Five people," said Jake silently.
"What do you mean five people?" Sarah demanded.
"Five people decide everything," said Jake solemnly. "The rules, going to war, punishment, everything."
"You've got be joking," said Sarah shaking her head.
"No I'm not. And don't say things like that, it encourages dissent," Jake said sitting down on his ripped up couch.
"Were they elected?" asked Sarah.
"I don't know," said Jake matter of factly. "They've been around since the end of the war. That's how it's always been and that's how it's always going to be. Well, at least until the war does us in."
"And why are you going to war? Surely the USA and the EAAA must realize this," said Sarah.
"It's more a lack of options really," said Jake shrugging. "Either we go to war and kill ourselves or we all starve to death."
"Share your resources!" shouted Sarah.
"Why? There's not enough to support everyone," said Jake shrugging. "Better to die on your feet than live on your knees."
"So go get those two!" said Sarah. "Do you want to die when the war starts knowing that you'd failed in a six month quest to bring them in or do you want to die knowing that you'd outsmarted them once and for all leaving no unfinished business in your life?"
Jake sighed, knowing that she was right.
"Goddamnit," he said angrily, holding his head while groaning. Sarah gave him a look of triumph.
"Alright! Let's go wake up Marty and go back to TI," she said moving to the door.
"We won't do either," said Jake still not moving.
"But," Sarah protested. Jake laughed.
"We're still going," he said. "But your friend Marty looks like he could use some sleep. I scanned him earlier, if he has too much more excitement he'll be on the verge of a nervous breakdown."
"But how do we get to the past?" Sarah asked confused. Jake nodded his head towards the single door behind him with a lock on it.
"You're right I'm not all goody goody. Behind those doors is a pet project of mine I've been working on for the past twenty years and it'll get us into the past," said Jake. Sarah shrugged and walked to the door as Jake produced a keycard for the specialized lock on it.
"Are pet projects illegal?" asked Sarah confused.
"If they're not registered and approved by the Big Five, then yes. And this most certainly was not," said Jake. He flicked the card through the slot and the door unlocked. It retracted and revealed a darkened room with a single blob visible.
"Prepare yourself," Jake said. Jake reached inside and flicked the light which revealed a single object in the room.
"Oh my God," said Sarah. A slick black Lamborghini rested in the room with time circuits attached to the back and a license plate reading: FUTURE2.