The Stainless Steel Rat Saves the World

It was while I was engrossed in this navel-examining introspection that the sound began. A distant whine just on the edge of audibility, so weak that I would never have heard it had it not been for the absolute silence of nonexistence wrapped about my cathedral-sized tomb. The sound grew and grew, as annoying as an insect, making me aware of it although I did not wish to be made aware of anything except my sensation of overwhelming defeat. In the end it was quite loud, coming from empty space somewhere high above beneath the dome. I looked up despite my lack of interest just as there was the loud bang of displaced air.

A figure appeared in the darkness above, someone in a space suit. Wearing a grav-chute because he drifted down slowly before me. I was stunned and ready for almost anything when he opened the dark faceplate of his space suit.

Ready for almost anything other than the fact that he was not a he.

"Get rid of that silly chain," Angelina said. "You always manage to get into trouble as soon as I leave you alone. You're coming away with me right now, and that is all there is to it."

There was very little to say even had I been unstunned enough to say it. So I did a fine moronic gaping act and rattled my chains a bit as, light as a falling leaf, she drifted down to the floor. In the end her undoubtedly physical presence jounced my open synapses closed, and I did my best to rise to the occasion.

"Angelina, truly named. You descend from above to save me."

She opened the faceplate of her space suit wider so she could kiss me through the opening, then took an atomic lance from her belt and began to cut away my chains. "Now tell me what all this mysterious time-travel nonsense is about. And talk fast, we have only seven minutes; at least that is what Coypu said."

"What else did he tell you?" I asked, wondering just how much she knew.

"Now don't you start being mysterious with me. Slippery Jim diGriz! I've had enough of that with Coypu."

I jumped back hastily as she waved the atomic lance under my chin, then beat out the fire that was smoldering on the front of my garments. An angry Angelina can be quite dangerous.

"My love," I said emotionally, attempting to embrace her while keeping an eye on the lance at the same time. "I conceal nothing from you, nothing! I know better. It is just that my brain is tied in knots from all this time traveling, and I want to know where your knowledge leaves off before I continue with the complete story."

"You know perfectly well that I talked to you last on the phone. Big rush, you said, top priority, get over fast you shouted—then rang off. So I did, to Coypu's lab, where everyone was running about and playing with the machinery and too busy to tell me anything. Back in time, they shouted, nothing else. And that horrid Inskipp no better. He said you vanished, just vanished out of his office while he was reading the riot act to you. Apparently he found out about that little bit of money you are putting aside for a rainy decade or two. There was a lot of babble about you saving the world or the galaxy or something, but I couldn't understand a word of it. And all of this went on for a very long time, until they could send me back here."

"Well, I did," I said modestly. "Saved you, saved the Corps, saved the whole thing."

"I was right, you have been drinking."

"Not in entirely too long a time," I muttered petulantly. "If you want to know the truth, you all vanished, poof, just like that. Coypu was the last one to go, so he can tell you about it. The Corps, everyone, they were never born, never existed, except in my memory…."

"My memory is slightly different."

"It would be. Since through my efforts He's evil plan was foiled…."

"His not he's. All that drinking has affected your speech." "He is his name—and I haven't had a drop in hours. Can you possibly listen without interrupting? This story is complicated enough in any case…."

"Complicated and possibly alcoholically inspired."

I groaned. Then kissed her, longer and warmer this time, a distraction we both enjoyed. This softened her a bit, so I rushed on before she remembered that she was supposed to be angry at me.

"A time attack was launched against the Special Corps, so Professor Coypu whisked me back in time to foil the nefarious scheme. I did all right in 1975, but He got away, went back to whenever he came from, then set up an elaborate trap here in 1807 to trap me. Which he did. But his plans didn't work completely because I managed to change the setting on the time-helix so he was sent to a different time from that he had planned. This must have defeated his time-war plans because you appeared to rescue me."

"Oh, darling, how wonderful of you. I knew you could save the world if you really tried."