In Times Like These Boxed Set

by Nathan Van Coops

  The curator appears undaunted by the crowd’s criticism because his next item to be revealed is in a crate big enough to hold a horse. As he pulls the curtain back to display it, the crate begins to shake and thump.

  “Ladies and Gentlemen, it is my privilege to exhibit the star of McSweeney’s Traveling Circus. A beast so vicious, so foul, that no other captive specimen exists. I present to you, the mighty, the ferocious, GARGANTURON!”

  The sides of the crate fall away to reveal a steel cage. The creature inside is a tangle of striped legs and arms, and four heads. It’s ricocheting from one side of the cage to another, its arms gyrating and horned heads snarling.

  The reaction of the crowd is total awe. One lady up front promptly faints into the lap of the man seated behind her, and her friends attempt to buoy her back up. There is a fair amount of shrieking and wonderment from the kids in the audience. I smile as the creature climbs the bars of its cage and dangles from the top. I work to puzzle out how it’s being done. Two of the heads are static dummies, open mouths fixed in anger, but the other two lively shrieking faces do a good job of drawing attention. The arms and legs are likewise a mix. I notice that a few of the furry striped legs are linked together by what are supposed to be manacles, but upon closer inspection are in fact a clever way for the moving legs to actuate the dummy ones. But even understanding the dummy system, I can still make out at least four real arms and legs. Two men in a suit working together?

  The creature rattles the bars of its cage and the curator steps forward to calm it. One of the beast’s arms lashes out and clamps onto the curator’s throat. The creature lifts the man off his feet and hurls him backward. The curator’s limp form tumbles off the side of the stage and disappears. More screams erupt from the audience and they only increase as the beast grasps the gate to its cage and wrenches it from its hinges. It hurls the door aside and steps onto the stage. The audience panics and flees. Ladies lift their skirts away from their ankles and men abandon hats and carnival prizes in their haste to escape the tent. Viznir and I rise to let people get around us. A few onlookers are still frozen to their seats, not sure if this is part of the act or a real danger. As the crowd thins, I notice Ariella and her guide among the spectators. Unlike the surprised citizens around her, Ariella’s gaze is almost amused. Beside her, her usually stone-faced guide, Dagmar Sensaborria, looks less than sure of herself.

  To my surprise, the monster points an arm directly at Ariella and shouts. “I know who you are, mercenary whore! I won’t be going back. Not today, not ever!”

  I look down to find Hanna clinging to my leg in fear.

  “Viznir, I think you should take the kids outside. I’ll handle getting the objective.”

  Viznir is staring transfixed at the interaction between Ariella and the monster, but snaps out of it when I put Hanna’s hand in his. He nods and grabs Noah’s hand, guiding them hastily toward the exit.

  Ariella rises from her seat and steps over the bench in front of her. “I’m not here on assignment, Ajax. But Geo will be fascinated to know I’ve run across you. You’ve got yourself quite the home here.”

  “You tell your Journeymen cohort not to bother coming for me. I’ll be long gone.”

  “And leave all this?” Ariella gestures to encompass the tent. “Such a shame. It suits you so well.”

  Ajax twists one of the dummy heads off his costume and hurls it at Ariella’s feet. He next rips the rest of the costume’s appendages off in a single motion using all four arms. As the contraption crumples to a heap beside him, I can finally make out his real shape. The monster costume was merely an exaggeration of his actual body—or bodies—as there are two men joined together at the shoulder blades of their respective sides. At first I think they are conjoined identical twins, but the similarities between them go beyond even nature’s gift for duplication. They are the same man.

  I marvel at the way he’s been fused together. He has somehow survived experiencing the fate every time traveler fears the most—accidentally occupying the same space with someone at the same time. His muscular frame has been stooped from the angle he joins with himself, but he moves forward with a surprisingly fluid gait considering his impediment. The two versions of him have developed a system of walking where one walks forward and the other steps sideways in a sort of skipping motion. He flips a bench out of his way, his four arms heaving it aside with ease. Ariella stands her ground.

  “I’m not here for the bounty on you, but if you really want to suffer the embarrassment—” Her voice is cut off as Ajax vanishes then reappears directly in front of her. One of his arms shoots out and seizes Ariella’s neck. He hoists her into the air, his other arms simultaneously pinning her wrists. She kicks at him but connects only with one of his knees. He slams her to the ground. I’m stunned by the sudden violence.

  Dagmar reaches for her weapon, but she’s too slow. One half of Ajax swings a bench and smashes her backward into the bandstand. Her body dislodges half a dozen wooden chairs as she crumples to the platform, limp and silent. The other half of Ajax contends with Ariella’s flailing fists. She only manages to graze one of his chins with a punch before his other half seizes her arm and flattens it to the ground. She cries out as he pins her hips to the floor with a knee.

  Don’t just stand here. Do something.

  I’ve dashed closer to the fight, but lacking any weapons, I hurl the only thing available to me—my half eaten bag of popcorn. The crumpled bag strikes the nearest of Ajax’s faces and explodes with a shower of buttery, puffed kernels. Ajax pauses with his fist raised to strike Ariella.

  “Get off her, asshole.”

  Both of his heads stare at me. The expression on one face is cautious, sizing me up. The other is merely angry. Unfortunately, the angry one is in control of the fist. It swings and connects with Ariella’s face with a meaty thump.

  Anger drives me forward. I launch myself into the midsection of the body closest to me. Either half of Ajax would be heavier than me on its own; his frame is dense muscle. But while I lack his bulk, my height translates to weight, and the momentum of my almost two hundred pounds is enough to unbalance him and topple him sideways. I land on top of him in a mess of arms and legs. He immediately uses them against me. Fists strike my ribs and face while another arm tries to wrap around my neck.

  I lash out with my elbows and knees, squirming about and punching everything within reach. My right elbow connects solidly with one of Ajax’s noses, eliciting a howl, but the other half of him shoves me away and I sprawl in the dirt. I spit out a few grains of sand and turn around. Ariella is getting to her feet, one hand reaching behind her back. Ajax springs up and clamps her in a bear hug with one half of him while the other half wrenches a gun out of her hands and tosses it away.

  “No, no, little wench. It won’t be that easy.”

  Ariella twists in his arms and lands a punch on the side of his right head. “You’re dead, bastard!”

  Ajax merely laughs at the attack and viciously head butts her, causing her to cry out in pain. I get my feet under me and spring onto his back, wrapping my arms around his right neck and squeezing. His other half attempts to pull me off, but latched onto his broad, fused-together back, I’m in the spot he’s least able to access. Let’s see you fight without a windpipe. With two of his arms wrapped around Ariella, and the other two angled away from me, Ajax is unable to land any effective blows. He careens around the tent, knocking over benches, and I let myself hope that I might choke him into releasing her, but then he stops at one of the cabinets. He reaches inside for something and the tent around us vanishes.

  We’ve relocated to a rocky hillside. The anchor Ajax used is the head of a pickaxe that’s sticking out of a stony embankment. Ariella narrowly misses having her head fused into the handle on our arrival, and the way Ajax is cursing, I suspect he may have been hoping it was going to skewer her. I’m still squeezing hard on one of his necks, and finally the half of him I’m choking starts to panic. He releases
Ariella and throws his hands up to grab at me. Latching onto my arms just above my biceps, he heaves me over his head and I crash onto my back in the dirt. Ariella scrambles to her feet and starts tapping her Temprovibe. As Ajax lumbers toward her, she takes only a microsecond to look at me, then vanishes.

  I have no idea if Ariella has jumped forward or backward to that spot elsewhere in time, I only know I’m suddenly very alone. Ajax pivots and scowls at me with both heads. Getting to my feet, I glance at my chronometer. The bezel is still glowing a solid red. No skipping out of this for me.

  I clench my fists and check my surroundings. The dirt road we’re on winds its way up the hillside to a cluster of dilapidated buildings. Below us, a couple hundred yards beyond Ajax, train tracks terminate abruptly into the hill. The deep ruts in the road tell of many trips by wheels carting something heavy. Broken shovels and rusted rail parts also give away that we’re near the mine. The air is brisk and the shrouded sun is low, making me wonder if it’s even the same day. If he jumped us too far back I could be disqualified. I check my bracelet. Nothing seems amiss. The counter is still ticking off seconds I’ve been in the level.

  Ajax extracts the pickaxe from the side of the hill and moves toward me. “You gonna keep up this fight or have you had enough?”

  I nod toward the pickaxe. “You make a very compelling argument for quitting. And since my reason for getting into this fight seems to have disappeared, I’m rapidly losing motivation.”

  “If you’re caught up with that witch, you’re in for a world of hurt worse than I’d give you. You should let me put you out of your misery before she stabs you in the back.”

  I back away slowly. “It’s not like that. We’re not exactly friends. I have a few scores to settle with her myself.”

  “That so? Then you should have let me get rid of her for you.”

  “Didn’t look like a fair fight. And I’m not much for letting guys beat up on women.”

  “Ha! Hero type, huh?” His laugh is harsh and guttural. “You’ll learn. Some women need a beating worse than men.”

  “That one needs a dozen,” his other head chimes in. He lowers the pickaxe. “So why don’t you vanish along now, too?”

  “I’m not sure when we are. How far did you jump us?”

  “Just popped back to this morning. Passed this pickaxe here on the way out of the mine.” He considers the point of the tool in his hands. “Liked the way it looked and thought it might save me a walk back later. In fact, I’ll be out of the mine in a few minutes to pick it up.” He swings the pickaxe and buries one end into the embankment where he found it. Next he pulls a couple of items from his pocket. I recognize them as a degravitizer and some sort of round anchor. When he gets done working with them, he pockets the degravitizer and holds his palm out. The anchor is a tiny shrunken head. “You want to head back to the circus?” He laughs at his own joke.

  “You’re offering to help me?” I ask.

  “Sure. You fought well, and the enemy of my enemy is . . . something or other. No hard feelings.”

  I think about how difficult it will be to get back to my own flow of time with no working chronometer and no way to charge it. Even if I were to walk back myself, I would be hours behind. I take a step forward. Ajax smiles with both of his faces and elevates his palm. His lips are smiling, but his eyes are still cold. My hand wavers, and I take a step back.

  “Not today.”

  The smiles on Ajax’s faces fade in unison, but one of his mouths turns up again at the corner. “Good decision.”

  “You wouldn’t have helped me?”

  “I would have buried you in the ground quick as breathing.” He casually rotates the anchor in his hand. “And I wouldn’t have wasted a single synapse on your memory.”

  I put my hands in my pockets. “Thanks for the belated honesty.”

  “Ha.” Both heads grin. “Good luck finding any more around here. Time travelers are a bunch of cutthroat assassins. They’re not getting me, not this time. I have connections now. Tell that bitch not to come near me again. Next time she won’t walk away.” He puts a hand to his belt buckle and vanishes. The shrunken head falls to the dirt with a plop. I stare at the little pinched face; its squinty eyes and tight-mouthed grimace mocking me from the ground. Almost without thinking, my foot lashes out to kick it. The tiny head flies over the embankment at the edge of the road and sails into the bushes below.

  I breathe the tension out of my body and pull the map from my pocket. I stare at it blankly for a few seconds, then trace the line of the train tracks from Pucketsville to the mine. I get my bearings and start walking uphill to the dilapidated buildings. Somebody has to know when the train comes.

  Birds are chirping in the underbrush despite the overcast sky, and the morning air is pleasant. It could be that the rest of the world is going to have a beautiful day. I’m reminded that my chronological future is less bright when Ajax comes striding down the hill ahead. His unusual gait seems even more out of place here against the backdrop of peaceful nature. He isn’t wearing his striped costume pants yet. Instead he’s dressed in custom-made denim overalls that strap over opposite halves of his broad four-legged body. He looks clean and downright cheerful.

  “Morning.”

  I’m startled by the pleasant ease in his voice. The expressions on his faces are something akin to satisfaction and make me wonder what he’s been up to in the mine.

  “Good morning.” I try not to stare.

  Ajax merely looks amused at my discomfort and continues on. I hear one of his heads whistling softly as he walks away. I plod up the hill, only glancing back once to see Ajax pull the pickaxe from the hillside and lean it over his shoulder. He saunters down the hill as if he hasn’t a care in the world.

  “See you in your future, Ajax,” I mutter. I turn and head for the mine.

  18

  “It’s surprisingly easy to get lost in time. Makes you realize whom you really value in your life. Would you navigate across a millennium to be with someone? That’s the sign of a keeper.”–Journal of Dr. Harold Quickly, 1996

  The mining camp is mostly quiet with the exception of two Chinese men who mutter indecipherable greetings as they pass with a wheelbarrow. After a little diligent searching, I find a white-bearded man in an apron scrubbing pots behind what appears to be the camp’s mess hall. There’s a fire burning in a pit dug behind the building with a massive pot perched above it. I smell what I guess to be chili simmering and wander closer to investigate.

  “Excuse me, sir. Do you happen to know when the train comes through?”

  The man doesn’t look up, but keeps wiping out a pot with determined strokes. “Cars are loaded overnight. The train’ll be by to pick ’em up round noon. I reckon you’ll hear the whistle.”

  “Do you happen to know the time now?”

  “Time when men ought to be workin’ and not yappin’.” The man stands and takes his pot indoors without looking at me.

  “Thanks,” I say to the back door as it slams shut.

  I ignore the alluring scent of the chili and wander back through the camp. A sign labels the outpost as ‘Ever Winding Silver Mine,’ belonging to the D. Ambrose Mining Corporation.

  “Ben?”

  Milo and Kara are tromping up the hill, a sheen of sweat on both of their faces. “Hey, guys.”

  “What are you doing here?” Milo’s expression is a mix of curiosity and annoyance. “Did you get lost? The first teams aren’t supposed to be through the gate for at least a couple hours.”

  “Yeah, it’s a long story. Got in a fight with a time traveling circus star.”

  “There are penalties for crossing the restricted time line,” Kara says. “You’re not supposed to be back before your arrival time.”

  “Yeah, I figured I’m probably in trouble for that.” I fidget with the bracelet. “What’s the penalty?”

  “If you get caught, they tack thirty minutes onto your time or drop you a place ranking for every hour you str
ay outside the limits,” Milo says.

  “Dang. Okay. Do you know how many hours early we are right now?”

  “Three hours twenty minutes.” Milo doesn’t even check his bracelet.

  “So wait, why are you guys here so early then? I haven’t seen much of you all race.”

  Milo shifts his pack and looks to Kara. She shakes her head at him.

  “We’re doing a bit of a side project,” Milo says. “We had to investigate something on this side of the restricted line.”

  “Oh. What?”

  Kara is tight-lipped and glaring at me, but Milo is thoughtful. “Look, Ben. We need you to not tell anybody you saw us here. Can you do that?”

  “Yeah, I suppose so. Why? What are you guys investigating?”

  Kara turns toward Milo and angles her back to me. “You can’t tell him. He’s bound to rat us out. This is already going to be a problem.”

  “I’m not going to rat out anybody, it’d just be nice to be in the loop for once if I’m keeping secrets.” I rub at my jaw where I suspect I’m developing a bruise from my fight.

  “He’s already seen us.” Milo gestures toward my Gizmo shirt. “And he’s not one of them. Look at him. There’s no way.”

  I don’t know who “them” is, so I’m not sure if I should be offended.

  “He could be,” Kara counters. “Why is he even here if he’s not involved? You don’t think that him being here is suspicious, considering the circumstances?”

  Milo seems to ponder what she’s saying as he looks from her to me. His eyes range past me and linger on the mouth of the mine before coming back to my face. “Look, Ben. It’s probably best if you got back. You’re already facing a penalty. You don’t want the committee to come down on you any harder and risk losing more positions.”