Free Stasis: A Will Vullerman Anthology by J. Tobias Buller Page B

he could be as innocent as she was. People like her gave him hope. They were what the world hadn't screwed up yet.
    He picked up the phone again and poked through the wires with his tweezers.
    "Well," May said, breaking her thoughtful silence, " We can be your family, then."
    "Thank you, May." Will swallowed back the lump in his throat. He didn't have time to dwell on May's statement, however, as he found the wire he needed. "All right, there we go!"
    "What?" She glanced down at the dissected phone.
    Will gently pulled out the wire and cut it. "Here's the wire I needed to connect the phone to my comm." He took a wire from his comm and touched it to the one in the phone. A jolt went through his fingers, and the wire sparked. Will dropped the electronics with a grimace. "Ouch! Must have been the wrong one." He shook his hand, his fingers tingling and going numb.
    "Are you sure you know what you're doing, Mister Vullerman?"
    Will rubbed his fingers. "I guess not.”
    Mrs. Torrey swept into the room and pulled May to her feet. "Time for bed, May. Don't bother Mr. Vullerman, okay? He has to work."
    "He shocked himself, Mommy."
    Mrs. Torrey raised an eyebrow at Will. "Is that so, May?"
    "Uh huh."
    "Is that true, Mr. Vullerman?"
    Will grinned ruefully. "I'm afraid so. I think I'm done for the night, anyway. I'll continue working on it in the morning." He stood, thanked Mr. and Mrs. Torrey, and went to bed.
    But Will didn't sleep very well. Not that the bed was the problem. Much of the night, he laid awake and stared at the ceiling, the raspy voice echoing through his thoughts.
    I'll finish what I started. You can't hide. Because I'm coming.
    Sleepless nights had a way of dredging up the worst in him. His soul wrestled with the problem facing him and came up with nothing. And late that night, his conscience dug up something he had tried to forget. A family with an innocent little girl, and his mission to protect them.
    The one mission he had failed.

    ************

    Will punched a few buttons on his comm's keypad. "Error" flashed on the screen, and he sighed. Another failure.
    Will was familiar with modern-day technology, but wedding his comm with this dinosaur of a phone was proving to be a headache. Will had managed to connect the comm to the phone, but programming the comm to reverse the phone's incoming signal was the problem. He had been working on it for two days now, and all he had to show for it was a long list of what not to do.
    To make matters worse, Brownbarr had instructed him to keep things unofficial, so Will couldn't consult any of the ASP's resident tech geniuses.
    And in the meantime, the calls continued. Will glanced at the clock—it read ten minutes till six. In about an hour, then, the phone would ring. No way he would have this hack figured out before then.
    Will set down the comm for a moment and gazed out the window. A taxi sputtered past, leaving a trail of exhaust fumes behind.
    He heard footsteps behind him. Will turned and found Mrs. Torrey standing in the doorway to the living room. She gestured over her shoulder. "I've got everything but the potatoes on the table, if you'd like to join us for supper.”
    Will shrugged. "Sure, I'd—"
    Will's words were cut off by the loud ring of the phone.
    Beeeeeeeeeep.
    He picked it up, and the familiar "unknown caller" scrolled across the screen. What in the world—?
    The phone abruptly stopped ringing, and "new voice message" blinked on and off on the screen. An hour early—but why? He pushed the call button, and the message played, the same one that always played. With a beep, it ended.
    “What—what does it mean?” Mrs. Torrey's face was pale. “It always calls at seven. Always. It's never called earlier before.” She covered her mouth with her hand and tore her gaze from the phone, looking up at Will.
    Will set the phone on the table and frowned. “I don't know. I don't know what it means, but now we can't count on predictability. Once I get this comm