Mid-West Campaign
Session Sixty-Five

Thursday, 24 May 2001

[Editorial note: Much of 24 May is replete with events subsequently cancelled out by Drake's trip through Hamblin's time door in the late afternoon. Again these events are displayed in blue type, whereas everything else really happened and is remembered by the agents. Please see the section on Time Travel for a further explanation of this.]

The message from the north-east team is that they just reported Raphael missing and didn't give an explanation. It is up to Jane and Drake to come to up with something fool-proof and watertight. Fortunately, Benedict arrives in Fredericksburg about 10:00am after having been tipped off to these events by Artemis. He is sorry to leave his cushy accounting assignment in Canada, but Benedict has incredible experience in fabricating evidence, so the agents are pleased that he is here.

After appraising Ben of the situation and the time-travel, the agents sit down and try to come up with a convincing story that makes them sound good. At present the facts (as far as internal affairs judge them) are thus: Agent Turn signed for Raphael on the morning of 14 May. Turn and agents Jones, Munroe and Drake left the thirteenth precinct in two FBI modified sedans with the prisoner. Both cars were later found abandoned in a multi-storey car-park with no sign of the agents or the prisoner.

Jane telephones Artemis Black to see if he can simply get them off. The smarmy Black says that he cannot do that. The agents have to prove 'reasonable doubt' first and then he can mop things up. Reasonable Doubt will be easy to prove for Jane, Turn and Jones. But they have to do more than that for Drake. Things are no looking good for him.

Drake suggests going to Los Angeles and using Hamblin's time door to go back in time to 26 July 2000 and stop Jane from meeting Drake. That way none of this will have happened. Benedict cannot sanction time travel - not after what happened last time. They know that God doesn't like it (although he is having a small crisis of faith after Jane told him Raphael didn't believe in Catholicism).

They talk themselves around in circles trying to come up with a story that will make Drake look good. Eventually, it seems as though Benedict is leading toward making him look like an idiot which will destroy any chance Drake has of promotion. Drake decides to act. He TASERs Benedict in unconsciousness and then takes off for Los Angeles to use the time door. Jane can't stop him because he has seriously injured Benedict, and she is labouring to save his life. Alex tells her not to worry. Once he goes back and changes time, none of this will have happened.

Benedict is rushed to hospital with a serious heart murmur, while Alex gets on a plane for Los Angeles. After Ben has been taken off her hands, Jane telephones the airport to find the plane that Drake is travelling on. It will touch down at 1:00pm (or 11:00am Pacific Time). She telephones Todd O'Connell of the west coast team to warn him. Todd is rather curt with Jane, but she tells him what Drake is planning and that he cannot be allowed to use the time door.

Jane revives Benedict, but Ben refuses to use his powers to heal himself. He doesn't want to get any older. Jane is concerned. At first she agreed with Alex's idea to use time travel - but the ruthless way he has gone about it has made her think again. Is this really Alex Drake? They don't know how he came back from the dead, after all. Maybe he made a deal like Nathan did. This is all seems like Nathan Harlow all over again! Also they realise Drake is stupid enough to try and work the door without Todd's help. She texts him: "Don't do it, Drake!"

Benedict contacts Dominic Rocaan. Dominic is not at the west coast HQ, he is on a fishing boat five miles off the coast (on holiday). Dominic listens to Benedict and says he will deal with it. He contacts SCHULT and says Alex Drake is not to be admitted under any circumstances. He tells Campbell-Robson to find Drake and tranquilise him and he tells Todd (who is en route to the airport) to arrest Drake. He then turns his phone off and goes back to his holiday.

Todd arrives and tells Alex is there to arrest him. On the way back to the west coast HQ, Alex spots Campbell-Robson trailing them in another can with a sniper rifle. Drake summons the tranquiliser rifle into his hand! Todd is amazed and nearly loses control of the car. A very sedate chase is now on as Bruce follows Todd back to HQ. Meanwhile, Jane is on a plane and rushing toward Los Angeles.

Todd convinces SCHULT to let him and Drake in because Benedict cannot be raised and now he is in charge of the team. He tells SCHULT to keep Campbell-Robson out as he frightens Todd. Bruce tries to blow up the gates with C-4 but the force field keeps him out successfully. Inside Todd is taking Alex to the cells, but Alex refuses to go. He says that he is trying to correct his life that Jane ruined.

Todd telephones Jane and the two have an argument on the telephone. Jane explains what happened and says that Drake was always screwed, only now he is screwed in a different way. Todd says that despite his falling out with Jane (and the fact she is a tramp!) he does respect her. He will do what she says, and what Dominic has said. He has to lock Drake up. Drake considers this for a moment and TASERs the unfortunate O'Connell into unconsciousness. Jane (who is still on the phone) hears all this.

By a quite ridiculous hierarchical quirk, Drake is now in charge of the west coast HQ (he is the only agent still in there). He orders SCHULT to open the vault and he takes out the door. He is distracted for two hours by the incredibly interesting house brick. He then hands the non-descript door in a doorframe and wonders what on Earth he is going to do with it.

Meanwhile Jane has landed at the airport and rushing to the scene. She phones SCHULT who tells her that Todd is unconscious but stable, however, he won't let her into the HQ. From the street she can see Drake repeatedly walking through the door. She tries phoning but his phone is switched off. She sees him summon his energies, walk through the door and vanish.

Drake emerges in the Wichita HQ. All the computers are covered in plastic. He sits and he waits, and eventually Jane emerges through the door to the dormitory. At first Jane thinks that Drake followed Hamblin through as she did, but he soon puts her right. He tells her he is from the double-double future and that he has come to stop her meeting the Drake of this time. However, when he said he came through Hamblin's door (and Jane can see the glowing portal in the corner of the room) Jane is horrified. Drake shouldn't be dabbling with that. She doesn't trust that it is safe, and she doesn't want to go back through it.

After listening to Drake's story she suggests that he go back through his time door, and she will return to the present by seeking out Raphael. She promises not to interfere in Drake's life (she has no desire to do so after all). Drake is not sure about this, but soon the decision is taken away from them as the time door disappears and a furious Archangel Gabe.

Gabe says that this is the seventh hole in time their unit has caused and he is sick of clearing up their mess. How can they be so stupid? He really rounds on Drake for opening an unstable time door. He doesn't like what Hamblin is doing, but at least he has the sense to close his doors behind him. He sends Jane and Drake back to the west coast HQ closing this episode of time travelling, and saving the timeline again.

[Editorial note: and thus we return to reality once again. We are now back in the original time-line. Drake's past and reasons for being in evidence response are the same as they were before Jane's time-travel trip on 23 May.]

In Fredericksburg Benedict Oaxaca is in a meeting with Artemis Black. Benedict arrived in Fredericksburg to join his companions in the afternoon and hasn't had the chance to see them yet. Artemis Black is present to tell Benedict the truth behind Alex Drake. He says that now Ben looks to be in charge on a permanent basis he needs to know this.

Drake was moved to evidence response because a large quantity of narcotics was found in his car. However, these drugs were placed there by the FBI. Drake was a super-agent who was placed under cover with the Chicago Mafia. After the mission it was feared that his life would be in danger so an excuse was concocted to move him into evidence response. Drake hasn't actually done anything in his past to merit the assignment. He will stay in the unit for a few years, get his promotion and then (when the heat has died down) return to his old job. Drake knows all about this. Black implies that "Alex Drake" may not be his real name.

In the west coast HQ Jane and Alex still have memories of all their various time-travelling exploits but the memories are painful and already beginning to fade. Jane does remember that Gave said about evidence response having caused seven holes in time. She can only county six. Todd is quite coy on the subject.

Jane is pleased that Todd isn't injured (although she is not sure now why she thought he was). She tries to talk to Todd and understand why he has been so stand-offish with her recently, although she knows why. She asks if he wants to talk about it, but he says that he doesn't: "A man cannot control where his heart wanders," he says rather pompously. Jane feels extremely sorry and guilty for the hurt she has inadvertently caused Todd. He says that he is fine, but it is blatantly not the case.

Jane telephones Benedict to tell him all she can of what has been going on. He doesn't understand why she and Drake are in Los Angeles - and Jane really can't explain it either. However, at least one thing is certain: Alex was successful in that the investigation by Inspection Division never happened. She and Alex write down everything they can remember of the various timelines before getting on a plane for Richmond late in the day.

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