Juncture 2.8

The next few days were a blur of action. I was carted to and fro by Major General Siegfried and Hans. They were giving me what they called “A thorough tour of the facilities.” By the first day, I thought I had seen the entirety of the OST facility. From what I had seen, it was just absurdly enormous. Each day was comprised of trips to the important different wings of the facility, and we didn’t visit the same location twice. Even so, we walked miles.

Miles. And that was only the first day. The other few days we walked just as far, if not further. My legs were aching by the end of the week.

If what I could tell was correct, the place was at least ten miles if I took the various twists and turns into account. Of course, that was only the places that I was brought to, and I didn’t know if I saw the entire thing. There was no apparent entrance or exit.

Aside from the sheer enormousness of the facility, the rooms were impressive in and of themselves. The one that stuck with me the most was the Archive. It was a huge, cavernous warehouse, with endless rows of shelves from wall to wall and floor to ceiling.

Each row was segmented into shelves, and each shelf had a plexi-glass box. On each box was a small brass plaque explaining what was inside it, and when it was from.

The actual contents of the boxes varied wildly, and there wasn’t anything that wasn’t interesting. One of the boxes was filled entirely with unidentified bones. The plaque read “Remnants. Unidentified Tribe, East Americas. -1012.2.4.26”. That was it. No explanations, of why they were there, how they died. Just a big ol’ box of bones.

There was another one right next to that that had an old Gameboy color in it, complete with games and several extra batteries. Again, no explanation.

Another room that struck me was the lab. It was surprisingly small, considering the rest of the facility. Sheets of metal and small bits and pieces of scrap were littered on every available surface. The walls were lined with vials filled with strange liquids I couldn’t identify.

There was only one girl in there, at least when I was in the room, and I didn’t get the chance to talk to her. She was busy wrangling several dozen wires together, a couple of which appeared to be attached to a live power source.

Needless to say, I was forced out of there fast, before I could see anything too bad happened.

I also saw more cafeterias, more offices, a hospital wing, and a war room. The war room was less cool than I would have imagined a high-tech war room to be. It was a large concrete box down several dozen flights of stairs, or by an elevator that I wasn’t allowed to access. In the box was a single round table with about twenty chairs around it, and several monitors on the wall.

By the end of the week, my head was crammed with all of the places it could hold. After that, I was allowed out of the facility for the first time since I had gotten there. Hans took me on a trip in Major General Siegfried’s office to a tailor in 1920’s France, who measured me for a uniform, like the one Major General Siegfried so often wore, only minus all of the medals he had.

I was patiently uncomfortable as the elderly man did his work, and when he finished, we walked out, Hans thanked him profusely, and we went around two weeks into the future to pick it up.

We went back to the facility maybe ten minutes after we had originally left, and I was forced to put on the suit. It was extremely uncomfortable, but as I checked myself out in a restroom mirror I appreciated how it looked on me. Much better than most of the second-hand clothes I wore at home.

The thought of home was sobering for a second, and I wondered how I would explain such a long absence to my parents, if they noticed that I was gone. Then I remembered, of course, time travel. I would be back the same day.

As soon as the suit was on, I was swept to where my “commitment ceremony” would happen. Hans left, and I was alone in the room. It was smaller than I expected it to be. The lights were dim. I sat in one of the two folding chairs in the center of the room

Call me self-centered, but I thought it was going to be a big event, as it didn’t seem like the OST recruited new members so often.

The door to the room opened, and Major General Siegfried walked in. He was alone, wearing his full uniform. He sat in the other chair.

In his hand was a thick manila envelope. He handed it to me, and made the universal gesture to open it and look inside. I did. There was a small badge and some papers inside. I pulled them out.

The badge was two infinity symbols next to each other, or two eights, I couldn’t really tell the difference. It was carved into brass. I turned the papers over. The top one was fancy-looking, with the declaration that I was now a member of the Organization of Temporal Stability, all in fancy script.

Major General Siegfried pulled the pin out of my hand and gently affixed it to my lapel. Then he stood up and put his hand out, waiting for me to do the same. I did, and he firmly grasped my hand in his. He shook it swiftly, almost painfully; up, down, then up, and back to the starting position. He released it, and beckoned me to follow him.

We walked out the door of the room, into a crowd of people, some of whom I recognized. They cheered, deafeningly loud, and I turned to look up at Major General Siegfried. He looked down at me with a grin.

“Welcome to the OST,” he proclaimed.