Aberrant: The Infinity Hour - [ItB:The Infinity Hour] - Jillian Johnson

[Titan]

Jillian's muscles throbbed as she let the freeweights rest on the floor of the gym. She lay for a moment, just breathing and feeling the burn in her chest. Her arms and legs ached, and her abdomen was on fire. A good workout.

She rocked up slowly, dragging a towel over her head, and sat with her arms dangling at her side. She rested, feeling her muscular ache sitting now. She listened to the grunts and clinks around her, as other people trained. No talking or chatting, it wasn't that kind of a gym. Jillian raked the towel off of her head and dragged herself to her feet. She began to mop the bench with the towel, her biceps and forearms twitching with fatigue. As she finished cleaning her sweat off of the bench, she caught sight of herself in the mirror.

She stood and stared for a few seconds. Her muscles trembled visibly, but she slowly assumes her face-front position. The mirror Jillian grimaced as she turned a quarter turn to the right. She continued to turn, a quarter at a time, until she again faced the mirror. She took a deep breath, and slowly did a front lat spread. The burn almost brought tears, but she attempted to hold it.

"Jill!"

She exhaled noisily, losing the pose and staggering a bit with exhaustion. She turned, and saw Bobby Klein watching her with concern. His broad shoulders and tree trunk arms belied the mostly white hair on his head, but his expression was right at home with his grandfatherly features. His little tupperwares were all over his counter, he'd been eating. A little chicken, a little salad, a little fruit- Bobby chowed eight times a day, but with the consciousness of a serious dieter. Her stomach growled, and she blinked back sudden tears that threatened.

"What are you doing? Never pose just after a heavy workout like that! You'll hurt yourself."

Jillian quelled her stomach with a drink from a water bottle.

"Sorry, Bobby. Thanks."

He gestured to the clock on the wall.

"Don't you have somewhere to be? I thought this was your dad's big day?"

Jill looked at the clock, but for a moment, her vision blurred a bit and she couldn't make sense of the numbers. Then the clock came into focus, and the numbers still didn't make sense.

"Three Forty?!" She almost shrieked, and lurched towards the locker room.

Bobby shook his head, and returned to his food.

[Jillian Johnson]

Three forty... three forty. I'll never make it in time... Her thoughts were spinning making her more dizzy than she already was. Somehow she got entirely lost in this session although she knew it was an important day for her.

Dad's big day... Which date was it? Suddenly she wasn't sure if it was his birthday or something over at the fare. Probably both.

The heavily muscled blonde with the stunning blue eyes quickly got under the showers still feeling sore all over. Usually she would take more time to come down from the workout and let her muscles ease the tension under the constant flow of warm water but time was not on her side. She knew she had pushed too far this time and slowly her fogged mind was refocusing on what had brought her here in the first place. She was having an argument with her old man... a slight disagreement about her priorities and to spite him she simply went to the gym instead of prepping the smithy at the fare, where she was supposed to be over 3 hours ago...

Dad's gonna be pissed off... The thought both made her smile and frown. She actually didn't want him to be angry at her but each time she tried to... explain... didn't matter what he took it all wrong and brought the subject up to their family legacy and how his father used to run the fares and, and, and... and if she were his son she'd understand...

That usually ended their "conversation" which then proceeded to the next stage - screaming and yelling at each other until Jill lost her cool and walked away. She'd never hit her old man, she never would but the built up frustration needed to be vented somewhere and each time she felt like this she went to her gym.

Normally her anger would've been evaporated within an hour and then she'd be back and there'd be enough time to get the tents up and fire the ovens... but three forty... damnit. By the time she got to her car it was already four...

What a shitty day...

[Titan]

The shower she had taken after her workout, first as hot as she could stand then as cold as she could stand, was quick but occasionally worked miracles. Today was one of those days, and thankfully, Jillian felt merely tired and sore when she went to her car. Her only real complaints were a headache coming on, and faint hunger pangs. Her anger at her father, usually banished by her workouts had today simply dulled. She was late for something important to her dad, something big enough that she had told Bobby, and now she couldn't even remember what it was. And instead of feeling bad about it, she was mad at him. Even realizing how shitty that was made her madder at him. She rooted in her bag for her keys.

A full minute of prospecting turned up nothing. She went through the pockets on the side of the bag, through the pockets of the shorts in the bag, down under everything in the bag to the left and right and left again. She growled under her breath, and started to turn back to go inside to look in her locker, when she saw them. Dangling next to the steering column.

"FUCK!"

[Jillian Johnson]

“Fuck!”, she yelled at the car rattling it briefly back and forth as she pushed angrily against the side of the vehicle.

Maybe I could break into the car by smashing a window? No, bad idea, that only works in the movies… sigh.

Jill breathed agitated caught between anger and frustration. This day was getting worse with every passing minute. She picked up her bag and got her cellular.

The phone rang a few times before the answering machine picked up the call. Of course… he’s at the fare and probably left his cell at home. Strict no tech policy made sure that not even a landline was really within reach. Only the guys from security had their phones but they usually didn’t know who was who at the fare.

Jill sighed again and dialed home… no success.

“Shiii…”, she searched through her contacts until she found JoAnna’s number, her best friend and as close as a sister could be. Unfortunately she’d be at the fare, too and again only the answering machine picked up her call.

The tall blonde was on the verge of losing her temper. Checking her options she decided to dial Dad’s number again and leave a message on his mailbox.

“Yeah dad… it’s me Jill. I… listen… I’m sorry. I quit the SCA. I should’ve told you before and I know it’s crappy to do this over the phone but I’ve been really having a bad day and I don’t really feel like talking much. I’m proud of you and your… promotion.”, she hoped she was right as she was still having trouble remembering what today’s event was about. It wasn’t her Dad’s birthday, she knew that by now so it must’ve been an SCA event. Probably him becoming Duke., “I’ll never be able to achieve much in the chapter anyway. Being a woman limits ones options, you know that. I’m sick of it... and tired of lying. I’m sorry Dad. I love you.”

She hung up and stared at the display for a moment and then angrily threw away her phone across the street where it quickly got smashed by the ongoing traffic. That felt actually good. The buff Barbie smiled briefly and picked up her bag, then she decided to walk home, she needed the time to clear her mind and refocus on her future. She’d definitely sign up for the next local competition and then go for her pro-card as female bodybuilder. Yeah – that sounded really good to her.

The hunger pangs subsided a bit but her headache remained but she ignored it for the moment. This was the best decision she has made for a long time and she felt liberated to have made the step. She was already training with the pros why shouldn’t she dedicate 100% of her time to it if it made her feel better?

[Titan]

When Jillian finally made it to her door, she was literally on the verge of collapse. She had hoped that some fresh air would clear her damned headache, but during the twenty minute walk, it had blossomed into a full-on migraine. She could not remember ever having a headache like this. It had even soured her hunger, her stomach now clenched with nausea. She stood at her door for a moment, holding her side against a cramp. Then she went for her keys. Abruptly, she remembered where her keys were, and shook her head in disgust. She lifted the potted plant off of a small glass table, and found the spare key underneath. She let herself in, the air conditioning blasting her face and body with relief.

Jill threw her bag into a corner, and went into the bathroom. She grabbed the Excedrin off of the shelf above the toilet and took two. After a moment, she took a third. She peed, and splashed some water off of her face before going into her bedroom. She found the handset, turned off the ringer, and collapsed into bed. An hour or two of sleep might knock the pain in her head out.

She tossed and turned for a while, trying to sleep, until finally giving up and sitting up in her bed. She looked at the clock- 9:42. Once again, the numbers on the clock made no sense to her. She had been in bed for twenty minutes, maybe. She thought. But, according to the clock she had slept over four hours. Her headache still split her skull, her muscles still ached, she was still exhausted. Jillian tried to wrap her brain around the idea that she had been asleep, and for so long. One thing was different, her hunger was back.

She grabbed the handset, which was showing a battery alert on the little LCD screen, and went in search of some food. On her way to the kitchen, she put the wireless phone in the cradle, then paused. The number 14 flashed up at her. What the hell? Who could have possibly called her fourteen times, and how did she sleep through it? She took back the handset and saw that the ringer was off, remembered that she had turned it off. Jillian flipped it on, and the phone rang instantly, startling her into almost dropping the phone.

She pushed the button. "Hello?"

'THANK GOD! Jill! Jill!"

Alarmed, Jillian thought she recognized JoAnna's voice, though it was hard to tell- she sounded frantic.

"JoAnna? What is it? What's going on?"

"It's your dad." Instantly, Jill knew. She just... knew exactly what JoAnna was going to say. She felt like she were floating, all of a sudden. She only heard snatches of JoAnna's reply, coming from far away.

"After the ceremony, we were all getting ready for the feast... He said he was going out to the car to check his messages.... Eric went looking for him after he was gone so long... found him on the ground next to his car... Doctors say massive heart attack... life support right now... asking for you... You have to hurry, Jill."

"I'm on my way," Jill said, and hung up the phone. She noted that she sounded completely calm. She felt around in her heart for the guilt. Searched for it, and found it. Her dad had spent years trying to make her feel guilty for not being a boy, but she never had. She had always recognized that it wasn't her fault, that his problem was his alone. But right now, she found the guilt that she had successfully avoided all these years. It was a hard thing, and cold, but she made the guilt a part of her heart. She drew it in, and became it, and knew that she would be marked by this guilt forever.

She grabbed her bag and took two steps towards the door before remembering where her car was, and why.

[Jillian Johnson]

Jill stared at the door for a while feeling nothing but the cold in her heart. Time seemed to slow down, the migraine she had was dulled by this numbness that spread over her body. Would she be responsible if he died?

She didn’t know how to answer that question. I need to get to the hospital...

The thought was less driven by emotion and more by fact, by the need to do the right thing and it was the right thing to be with her father now, no matter if she was the cause for his condition or not. Jill forced herself to go each step making her feel less and less attached to the situation and at the same moment her epiphany was cemented the further she walked.

She hailed for a taxi and calmly requested to be taken to the hospital and stared outside the window. The world passed by and she felt... cold and detached. This is not happening...

[Titan]

Jill got out of the taxi in front of the overlarge revolving door at the entrance to Memorial Hospital. She continued to feel detached, not only from events surrounding her, but from her own body. Her muscles felt like jelly, loose and wobbly. A ball of hot lead seemed lodged in her belly. The tips of her fingers and toes were numb, so was the lower half of her face. And her head. Dear god, her head was splitting.

The entire ride to the hospital, the driver talked. Jill never heard a word. She instead wondered if it would be a relief for someone to stab her in the eye with an icepick, or be worse. She didn't know how it could be worse, but an icepick to the eye sounded pretty bad. But she only felt it in a floating, separate sense. Almost as if it were happening to someone else, but she could feel it as well.

So, her head no longer pounding, but throbbing; on rubbery legs, she staggered into the revolving door. It spun constantly, and she simply followed the pane of glass in. She caught her reflection, and almost lost her detachment in shock. She looked the same as always. A bit serious, but just the same as always. It surprised her that what she felt, physically and emotionally, had not left its mark on her face in any way. But she shrugged minutely, went in.

The elevator was mercifully empty, and she rode up in silence, again seeing herself. She closed her eyes. She opened them at the ding, avoided her own eyes as she left the elevator. Jill walked around the maze of the fifth floor for a few minutes, then saw the room. She walked to the door in dread, but still half expecting it to be all a trick, or a misunderstanding. The ball of lead in her belly uncoiled as she put her hand on the door latch. For a moment, she thought she may throw up right here outside her dad's hospital room. Her stomach steadied, and she turned the latch, entered.

JoAnna sat next to his bed, her peasant dress incongruous with the almost-twenty first century technology hooked into her dad. She noticed Eric Gunderson in her peripheral vision, lifted a disinterested hand in his direction. He nodded. She stared at her dad. He was tied into four different kinds of machines, machines that she knew the name of, but couldn't bring her mind to go fetch the names. One of them was the kind that went beep...beep...beep on TV. This one didn't, but made its little mountains in silence. Her eyes crawled over her dad's face.

He looked gaunt. Loose jowls hung from his prominent jawbone, and his skin looked brittle, pale, and thin. His eyelids twitched, opened. He turned his head a bit, and opened his mouth. His lips twisted horribly, and a rope of drool spilled over onto the bed. He wheezed in a gasp of air.

Jill took a step forward, something in her breaking at seeing him so helpless, so vulnerable. For a second, a brief moment, she lost her detachment, and her heart cracked. Just that second.

"so... damned...weak," he rasped, tears of fury streaming from his eyes. The thing in her stomach uncurled again, and Jill faltered in her step forward. She gasped at the sudden pain, at the horrible unfairness of it all. The pain in her head seemed to leap down her back and her chest all at once, and the gasp became a ragged inhaling scream. A thin and reedy yell it was, JoAnna nevertheless looked at her, concerned. But her father had whooped in another shallow breath, and had more to say.

"just...like..." She knew what he was going to say, and it still roused anger. Even now, in pain as she was, dying though her father was, she wanted suddenly to hit him.

"a...goddamned...girl." He slumped on the last word, pushing the last of his breath into spitting the last word at her. She felt something tear in her head, and the thing inside her, the pain, pushing its way out of her chest and face. She felt she was dying, as surely as her father was.

His back arched, his pitifully wasted frame jittering with some seizure. The jagged line on the screen of the beep...beep...beep machine went flat all at once. EKG, Jill thought suddenly. Then pain and blue light filled her world.

[Jillian Johnson]

Dr. Shrivers was on the verge of breaking down. He was on his 3^rd back to back 24 hour shift meaning basically he hasn’t sleept for the last 3 days. The situation was getting worse and worse, staff was desperately needed and qualified personell was a rare commodity these days.

The normally handsome tall man with dark hair and a 5 o’clock shade that was blossoming into a full beard was starting to see things and it was getting hard to focus on such simple tasks as reading what time it was.

His last case was a middleaged man, somewhere in his late 50s maybe wearing some unusual medieval dress – one Gerald Johnson – who was brought in with a serious case of heart attack. He was on life-support now while Dr. Shrivers waited for clearance and he dialed the number of his colleague Max Sheldon hoping he would answer the call. Dr. Shrivers wasn’t sure if he could pull off a bypass surgery given his current condition. He could barely look straight, let alone make a precise cut with a scalpel – it would be murder...

“Damn it, Max...”, for the 20^th time he got his answering machine and time was running out. Dr. Shrivers was leaning against the wall rubbing his temples trying to get rid of the growing migraine.

“Mr. Jonson? Down the aisle and to the left.”, he heard a voice and turned around to see who was coming. He’d half suspected someone on horseback and in full plate armor after dealing with Mr. Johnson and his relatives who were all dressed up like medieval royalty but what he saw instead surprised him.

A tall blonde woman with stunning blue eyes walked down the aisle towards him, she was wearing a sleeveless shirt that hung losely over her bulky frame and was just long enough to end right at her navel showing off some impressive abs. Her arms were thick and defined and there was no doubt she was not only lifting weights, she must’ve been an active athlete, probably a bodybuilder.

She gave him a tired smile which made his heart skip a beat for a tiny fraction making him more alert and awake than he thought possible and before he could gather up the courage to greet her she was already around the corner and inside his patients room. Following her would be impolite but he had to know who she was.

“Hey...”, he ran back to the nurse who just gave directions to the blonde woman he was suddenly infatuated with.

“Ahm, that... blonde woman you just talked to. Did she say who she was?”

The nurse blinked a moment before she recognised the Doctor, “Of course, she said she was Mr. Johnson’s daughter. Jane... or Jillian.”

“Ah, thanks... go on.”, he added trying to make this sound as if it had some kind of importance.

She’ll probably want to know how his condition is... but her relatives will surely tell her. I should give her some time to talk with her dad... damn, what’s wrong with me. That man is about to die and the only thing I can think of is asking his daughter’s phone number.

Dr. Shrivers forced him to refocus on his job. He had too much responsibility and there was still Max he had to call but if he made the surgery himself he’d be the one she would thank... his thoughts started to spin in what-ifs and fantasies when a sudden noise pulled him out of his reverie.

“What was that?”

BUMP

“Nurse?”, he looked around confused – it felt like an earthquake but... that was...impossible?

BUMP

The walls started to crack, then he heard an earsmashing sound and the door to Mr. Johnsons room shattered against the wall. He briefly saw a huge hulking shape before he was blinded by a bright blue light, then he lost consciousness.

The alarm was on, he saw dust on his coat and he found himself lying on the floor. To his surprise he felt a few rays of sun on his face which was unexpected. He was in the second floor of the building and there were no windows nearby but yet he felt the warm touch fo the sun. He looked up and was completely shocked by the sight. Half the building, or so it seemed was missing.

“What the...”, he was trying to comprehend the situation. From his position he could see the parking lot and his car. Everything seemed fine outside but the hospital itself was a complete wreck, almost as if a meteor had crashed into it. He slowly approached the edge of the gangway he was which abruptly ended suspended by the few steel girdles that supported the building and looked down into the “crash site”. He’d expected an airliner or something of similar size to explain the vast devestation but instead he found a ... naked... body?

It was the blonde woman he just met... but she seemed much larger... somehow. But why was she laying there?

Jill opened her eyes and blinked several times... “What...”, she felt exhausted and weak and what she saw didn’t make any sense... “What?...”, she blinked again and blacked out.

What happened?

[Titan]

Lincoln and Susilo popped into what looked like a war zone. The hospital that they had been briefed to expect had a chunk out of one side, like a giant ice cream scoop had dipped into it about halfway up and scooped downward. The floors above were sagging significantly, and Lincoln shook his head in disbelief. It was still hard for him to wrap his mind around. The people August sent him to find, the things they could do, were beyond anything his twelve years at the dairy farm had prepared him for. Still, he was August's first find, and the old man in the young body was counting on him. Susilo, an Indonesian national, had been Lincoln's first find, and the two had done the recruiting ever since. Lincoln's physique simply screamed Novus, and Susilo's teleportation abilities made him an ideal candidate for such work. This woman would make Lincoln's ninth find for August, but he doubted that it would ever feel routine.

August had told them that she would be big, so Lincoln looked around for a big woman. In the distance, he heard sirens, but nearby things were relatively quiet. Along the broken edge of the building, sparks flew, and suddenly the power in the hospital went out. It made little difference in these early morning hours, at least in terms of being able to see. The morning sunlight was quite sufficient for that. Lincoln worried, though, about the other patients in the hospital. The ones on life support. He motioned to Susilo, and the smaller man nodded.

Susilo did not speak very much English. Apparently, he had studied it in high school, but not further, and his knowledge was about as limited as one would expect. Despite this handicap, he and Lincoln seemed to get along quite well. They carefully picked their way through the wreckage towards a crater near the hospital. The crater wasn't particularly large, about the size of a Volkswagon minibus, but as they moved carefully towards it, suddenly a giant naked woman rose up from the center of the crater on wobbly legs.

She had obviously been lying in the center of the crater, and was just as obviously its cause. She was massive, almost fifteen feet tall, though she seemed to be decreasing in size as they approached, and breathtaking in her muscular nudity. Her body was perfectly formed, though large, and gave her angular and attractive face an exotic air. She was looking up at the wreckage of the hospital, one hand on the rim of the crater, when Lincoln stepped forward. Naked and beautiful or no, he had a job to do.

"Hello! Hello, miss!" She looked down at him, and shrank another foot. He waved, and was gratified to see that her hand jerked up unconsciously, as though she would wave back reflexively. He took another few steps forward.

"Hello! Are you alright?" The woman nodded, slowly, and Lincoln was glad to see some of the confusion leave her eyes. Not much, but some.

"I have some clothes for you!" August had had them put together yesterday, he said, and Lincoln had no reason not to believe him. A simple pair of shorts and a tank top, but they billowed like a small tent as he held them out to her. They were extremely elastic, and Lincoln felt sure they would fit her, if a trifle snugly. "Can you get out of there?"

In answer, the woman levered herself over the edge of the crater, like a swimmer exiting a pool. As she stood, Lincoln saw that she had shrunk even more. Now only nine or ten feet tall, she began to look an almost normal height.

"Put these on," Lincoln said urgently, pushing the clothes into the woman's hands, "We have to get you out of here."

"What- Who?" The woman seemed confused again, and her eyes tried to focus on Lincoln. He smiled grimly.

"WHO, exactly," he glanced at Susilo, who grinned back. He had been able to make this joke every time, and it amused him no end. She fumbled with the clothes, but got them on. The approaching sirens were louder now. It was time to be gone.

"What- what happened?" the woman asked, looking around her at the destruction, "Who are you?"

"I'm Lincoln Goode, and this is my friend Susilo. We are Novus, like you. But, we don't have much time. They will be here soon, and it's best for everyone if they don't find us here. Including you. We offer a place to be calm and think. No media, no doctors, no tests. Just privacy, and a chance to figure out what is next for you. I hope you will take us up on it, but unfortunately, there is no time. We need to leave now." He gestured to his right, to the increasingly close sirens. The woman looked fearful for a moment. She was down to maybe eight feet, and Lincoln thought that was where she would stay, at least for the time being. She nodded suddenly.

"Yeah. Yeah, I need to get out of here."

Lincoln nodded, smiling. They always decided so quickly. Hell, he had too. It was a lot to take in, and a quiet place to think held a lot of appeal.

"Are you thirsty, or hungry, or anything?" The woman shook her head, then winced.

"No, but I have a bitch of a headache." Lincoln looked sympathetic, but shrugged.

"I can't do anything about that, but it fades fairly quickly. Ok, Susilo, do your thing. I'll meet you there."

The Indonesian man, silently watching until now, stepped forward. He held both hands up, as though indicating his general harmlessness.

"I. Am. Susilo. No problem." He touched her arm, there was a faint pop, and they disappeared. Lincoln nodded at the empty space where they had been. Another one gathered. August would be pleased. Lincoln looked around, shook his head, then picked a direction and started walking.