It was blue, oh so blue and it hurt. With a whimpering I tried to pull away but I couldn�t, no matter how I tried. Oh how I wished I could just leave but I was stuck fast. If only I had listened, if only I had heeded the advice of my friends but I hadn�t and here I was � stuck.

I had thought I was being clever, stealing cars and baiting the police to chase us. They got scared and demanded we stopped. They told me to get out the car like they did but I sped of leaving a trail of rubber. Now the car was on its roof having rolled down the embankment. The car lay mangled on the beach and all I could see was the approaching tide.

The tide was cold and bitter and it stung my hands, which were trapped. The blood had rushed to my head and I was feeling dizzy and confused. All I could think about was how disappointed my mother would be. The fact I would soon be dead wouldn�t give her cause for concern just the knowledge I had been committing a crime, which would disgrace her family.

If only the police car that had been chasing me had seen my accident. The sirens that gave me the buzz to go faster had now disappeared and all I could hear was the waves gently lapping the shore. I tried again to pull my legs free from the wreckage. The pain was intense, I screamed, but something gave. My head hit the roof. I pulled myself some more along the roof. Now I felt dizzy and sick and in even more pain. I had little feeling left in my body but I could feel water on my back. It could only mean the tide had finally reached the wreck.

Although the pain was intense I managed to pull myself from the wreck of the car. There was sand beneath my fingers, and I felt myself sinking a little. I half dragged, half crawled away from the wreck of the car as the rising tide began to submerge it. It was then that I noticed something, some one, approaching me. A woman wearing a loose fitting white dress was walking towards me. The setting sun was right behind her and as a result it seemed as though a halo glowed behind her. The woman was right beside me and looked at me with a smile on her face. �Hi, I�m Khaira.� The tone was far too cheerful.

�Khaira, please tell me you have a mobile, call for help.�

She looked at me and nodded, she reached into her bag and pulled out a phone. She gave a little smile and whispered, �You do know your dreaming don�t you?�

I instinctively opened my eyes. Doctors surrounded me. Bleeping machines, people rushing around me. My head felt blurry and I saw two police officers talking to a doctor. I must have been rescued but now I was in a whole new heap of trouble.

There was only one problem, when I closed my eyes Khaira was still there as was the beach and the wreck. �What is going on?�

�I said you�re dreaming.�

I felt my eyes open and I saw the doctors but this time the woman called Khaira was still here and still in her white dress.

�Are you a nurse?� I croaked.

She nodded, and lent in to take my temperature. She wrote some notes, and then leaned down to check my dressings, which covered my chest and stomach.

�You had a lucky escape, but I am afraid there are two police officers who want to talk to you.� She took a side step to let them walk up to me. I took a huge gulp of air and wracked my brain as to a great excuse or sob story I could use.

�Wait,� a though suddenly occurred to me, �if you�re a nurse then why are you wearing that dress. It�s not a nurse�s uniform. What�s going on?�

�I�m sorry but this IS MY UNIFORM,� she stressed, �Don�t tell me your one of those people who thinks we should dress like the traditional nurses did in 2004�.

She looked at me laughing. My head was thumping and everything looked unfamiliar to me. Like it was new. Different. I had a strange thought I might be in a new time, but that sounded crazy. I mean, that kind of thing only happened movies. Didn�t it?

I looked around again and realised that the equipment being used on me was rather odd, in fact everything was rather odd and askew. What had happened to me? One minute I had crashed my car and the next I was laying on a hospital table.

�Where am I?�

�Don�t you mean when?� Khaira�s voice never once faltered from her exceedingly happy tone.

I closed my eyes trying to remember everything leading up to the accident. What had caused me to crash? Then I remembered a flash of light and a cold blistering feeling. Images of a ball of light in the sky flooded my head.

�Your trying to remember aren�t you? Do you remember feeling frozen, deep in sleep?� Khaira asked.

I shook my head, she looked at me and said, �There was a new type of attack on earth. One never seen before. A bomb no body ever knew existed. They froze earth.�

�Who?� I was confused this was not happening to me. My brain was struggling and failing to understand everything that was going on around me.

�That doesn�t matter yet. Suffice to say we managed to save everyone who survived the initial attack. You�ll be getting sent back soon but you were having some resistance to the holographic images we were feeding you so we had to awaken you prematurely.�

�Hence the reason you appeared.�

�Exactly. Until we can send you back I�m to be your future liaison.� Khaira beamed again, showing how proud of her position she was.

I suddenly had images of my family and friends. And the two police officers. Were they here to reprimand me for stealing the car? Imagine after all this time being arrested.

�Is my family hurt, alive, how many died,� I asked.

�Mr Harkins, I am PC Oliver Kendrick. I am afraid to say that many, many people died, including your family. You�ve been frozen for so many years, your car acted like a cocoon holding your body safe. But for those out in the open, I am afraid they had little or no chance.�

�So why send me back?� I wept.

The police officers colleague stepped forward. �Mr. Harkins, I am PC Janice Mulholland. The reason we have to send you back is to continue the human race. We will be sending you back along with the rest of the survivors after the main attack.�

�But, there will be nobody I remember there?�

�But what if you don�t go back, we might never be here.� Khaira was trying to impress on Evan Harkins how important it would be for him to return. �We lost a lot of records during that time and we don�t know how important each of the individual survivors are to the overall survival of the human race. You said you wouldn�t know anyone if you went back but if you stayed you still wouldn�t know anyone.�

�I don�t want to go back, I want to kill these people. I want to know what happened.�

Khaira looked at the two police officers unsure of what she should do.

�Listen Evan, there was only around 10,000 survivors in the whole world. The people responsible can�t be brought to justice. They died. Martyr�s they called themselves.� PC Kendrick stopped to grunt, �Well our population now is diminishing. We have found 5000 survivors who are being rehabilitated, any gene faults are being removed and in 5 days time they along with yourself, will be sent back. You need to help the survivors there to grow in numbers so by the time you die and your children�s children, and their children and so forth they will have helped increase our population so by now we will have millions of people inhabiting earth. Not the small amount we have now.�

My head was taking so much in, �So why send back survivors? Why don�t send back your own�

Khaira spoke up, �That wouldn�t work. It needs to be people from your time. And to answer your next question, we have cleaned the gene to stop illness in our time. Now rest, you have 5 days to get back to full health.�

�No, this is insanity.� I looked around at these people as I lay on the table. �I refuse to do your bidding. Don�t you guys realise that you can�t change the past. I watch television; I�ve seen those time travel shows. If you send me back to do what you want then the future changes. Will this new future want to rescue or will they do something different?�

Khaira looked at me with a sympathetic look on her face. �We have been segregated from time. If our plan succeeds we can never go back. The changes that we affect will not have any effect on us. We will be alone.�

�And why did those people attack us then? Why not go back and stop them?� I was furious at these people, my mind was beginning to catch up and process all the information that had been fed to me in the last ten minutes.

Everyone looked at each other nervously; eventually it was PC Kendrick who spoke, �that was the next stop for the army forces on board.�

I was still confused. None of this made any sense to me. If only I hadn�t stolen that car I might of wound up dead like everybody else. And with all these survivors couldn�t they just keep us here to increase population now? Why was it so important we return, and surely if they can change time they could stop these �martyrs� killing us.

�You still don�t get it do you?� PC Kendrick said. �You�re still asking questions in your head, and I guess if I have to speak to you like your stupid then so be it.� There was an angry tone in his voice.

�You are the contingency plan,� explained Khaira. �We have a force of troops on board who are out to stop our attackers. We have yet to fully identify who they are but we know where the attack came from. If we can not stop them then the group of survivors that we send back will be our last chance.�

�If we fail then you are our only hope.� PC Mulholland was obviously quite desperate.

I didn�t ever imagine myself as a fighter. But if we attacked, perhaps there would be a chance my family would survive. Maybe even I could change my ways. Being the bad boy wasn�t all it cracked up to be. All it did was break my mum�s heart, especially since she was all I had. Bringing me up from birth, being there for every scabby knee. I had really messed up my teenage years. My mum had stood by me no matter what, but if I kept this up I�d be just like my father.

�I�ll do it.�

�Good, we�re glad you�ll go back and help the other survivors.� Khaira�s grin had returned.

�No not that?�

�What do you mean?� asked Kendrick.

�I�ll help you with the attack.�

They all looked at me sympathetically, �Do you think at 16 you are able, fit enough to be a fighter?� Khaira asked.

�I have 5 days don�t I? I could go back and help stop the attack. Then things would go back to normal. I could return home. I could stop all these innocent people dying.�

I was determined. I was stupid for allowing my so-called friends leading me astray. I couldn�t even remember when I last did something for someone else and not myself. I was lying in a hospital bed, injured but alive. I had a new strength inside me now.

�I will fight. Whoever these people are, I will stop them committing this crime.� I was determined and I could see that these people knew it.

Then I saw Khaira leaving the room.

I couldn�t bear it any longer, the thought of that young boy wanting to go to war, wanting to die. What he didn�t know was that if he went to the attack he would never return. The ship only had enough power to make the time jump to the attack and then it would be trapped there. They would not have enough power to make it to Earth after they had found the attackers location.

I needed to rest somewhere; this had been a stressful day. Too much emotion ran through her, too much pain at seeing the destruction first hand rather than just in history texts. I remembered sitting in history at school, the pictures of those that had died. All the horrible deaths and images could be erased if the army forces were successful.

I had hated growing up in what was left of earth and wondered what would happen if Evan and the team were unsuccessful. They would have to grow up seeing the horrible images that she had only seen in text. It sent a shiver down my spine. I placed my hand on my stomach and felt a small bump.

�I hope Evan succeeds little one. You don�t want to live in this world.�

Success was all that mattered, one less in the contingency plan would not affect it so much. It was still horrible to think about a sixteen year old who was willing to risk his life for a future he did not even know.

There was still the problem of what would happen to her child. If they could never get home then her child would grow up on this ship plagued by the knowledge of what had really happened. Perhaps, as the doctor had suggested, termination would be the better option.

Captain Phillip Reynolds stood on the bridge of the Agamemnon. �Five days to go,� he mused to his first officer.

�Yes, and we have trained our men well. They have all been rested and undergone the programme. They are all fit and we are about to commence briefing. And I have to break the news they can never go back. For people like that young Evan, that�s going to be hard to take.� He sighed.

Suddenly a loud speaker sounded out through the halls, �WOULD ALL ARMY PERSONEL PLEASE MAKE YOUR WAY TO HULL �E� FOR OPERATION THAW�.

�Sorry Captain Reynolds, but that�s my cue to leave,� the first officer left quickly, a large binder and two young officers in tow carrying boxes of plans and satellite photos.

Captain Reynolds stood proud. His family had all been wiped out in the ice bomb except for himself, as a small baby. Frozen in time. His father had been a Captain and now it was his turn. He�d get revenge for his ruined childhood, for being orphaned. He had spent the last 35 years growing up helping plan for this attack. Now was the time he�d stop the pain even though he knew he could never go back to being baby Phillip.

It had been a miracle that some people managed to survive frozen in the ice for thousands of years. It was a miracle of the ice bomb that there had been life that survived. The small pockets of �ice people� had been thawed out thirty years ago and it had been as a young teenager that Reynolds had made the decision to commit himself to restoring Earth. It was this act, which allowed him to sympathise with Evan and realise what the boy was going through.

Reynolds looked out of the main window and saw the void outside of the normal space/time continuum, a sort of pinkish swirling mist. There was nothing more beautiful or more terrifying that Reynolds had seen in his life.

Reynolds decided there and then that he would have to meet Evan and find out what his time had really been like. Being so young Reynolds had never known what his life would have been like if he had been allowed to live properly. This young man would be committing suicide with his life, he was not a trained fighter, he was not anything � he was just a young boy.

They had 5 days till the genetic modifications of the survivors were completed and they were returned to Earth after the attack. Once that was completed the mission to trace the attackers would begin. The clues were in Earth 2004 so a second time jump would have to be made once they had dropped off the survivors, it was that time jump which would deplete the chronometric energy from the engines.

They had the length of their mission to train Evan to fight along with the best of their soldiers. Captain Philip Reynolds hoped it would be later rather than sooner that they found their enemies.

The heat was hot on my face. I had been dreaming again. My past often came back to me but instead of happy memories I was plagued by the thought of what happened to my mum and family. Since I had awoken from my ice cocoon I dreamt of the last thing my mum said to me.

�Evan, get to school and be good. Love you.�

Be good. I was far from it. The dreams were of my mum screaming as the building crashed around her, suffocating in the cold. Her heart was frozen solid and her body breaking apart. Is this how she planned to die? Her heart believing I was the son she wanted. I felt tears in my eyes now. I had to stop. I was now a man, a soldier.

Evan snapped awake. �What�s going on?� he asked as he looked around. He was lying in a bed in a small cabin and Khaira was sitting in a chair looking at a pad.

When Khaira realised that Evan was awake she looked across at him. �How are you doing?�

�It�s all still a little weird. I mean I�m getting used to the idea but it still seems ridiculous.�

�Believe me,� said Khaira as the smile faded from her face. �When you�ve lived with the consequences of the ice bomb as long as we have then it doesn�t seem so ridiculous.�

�Sorry,� said Evan. �I wasn�t thinking.�

�You�ve been brought back to the medical centre. You had some sort of fit. You must have banged your head or suffered some damage to your brain when you were frozen. Don�t panic about it. It�s common.�

Evan pushed his fingers through his hair. He was scared. Having something wrong with your head is never good.

�Evan, you have to know something. I have been questioning judgement on whether to tell you or not, but,� she hesitated.

�What is it? Tell me,� Evan yelled.

�There is no going back Evan. Your mission is to destroy then die,� she whispered.

�What do you mean I can�t go back?� Evan was stunned into a near whisper.

�The engines that we have could only make three full time jumps. We�ve made half of our allotted jumps already. Each time we jump in and out of the space/time continuum it uses up half a jumps worth of energy. It will take another three half jumps to get us back to your time where we can trace the attack. The chronometric energy used to power the time jumps will be depleted and we have no way of making any more. We will all be stuck.�

�You mean this is a suicide mission?� The reality of the situation suddenly hit home.

�You can still change your mind and leave after our next jump. You can go with the rest of the survivors.�

Evan was silent.

�Well?� prompted Khaira again.