“We’ve got enough lift workers,” Guy replies. He glances at Mr. Longcase, then returns his gaze to me. “How much did you hear?”
“Too much,” Longcase hisses. “He’s a liability.”
Another yellow light with a little satellite symbol is blinking in the corner of my viewfinder. I want to select it, but my eyes are intent on the gun in Guy’s hand.
“We could just lump him in with the others.” Lawrence appears from behind the security synths and has apparently been listening. “Take him with her. We just need to get them off the property.”
Guy lets the gun droop, considering this new option.
“Deal with this,” Longcase says. He stabs a long index finger at me. “Our operation requires secrecy. Either you clean it up or we have no further business.”
The yellow light in my goggles blinks faster. I finally tear my eyes away from the men in front of me long enough to open the com link.
Guy raises the gun at the same time Rixon’s voice shouts in my head. “GET DOWN!”
I dive for the cover of the planter just as something crashes through the greenhouse wall and impacts the ground between me and Guy. The object detonates in a spray of earth and acrid smoke. A figure leaps through the hole in the wall immediately after and, a moment later, Rixon is pulling me to my feet, his other hand aiming a weapon toward Guy and the cluster of security synths. The wall at the other side of the greenhouse erupts in a shower of Plexiglas, and the void is promptly filled by the massive form of Eon carrying some kind of assault weapon.
Guy balks at the sight of the two men and squeezes past his synth security on the heels of Lawrence, who is likewise fleeing the scene.
Longcase scowls at us between coughs from the smoke and draws a gun from his own belt, but he doesn’t aim it at Rixon or Eon. He snatches Sonia from the security synths and attempts to use her as a human shield.
Something in Sonia’s eyes changes when he wraps his arm around her neck and presses the gun to her head. Whatever rational mind was in control before no longer reigns inside her now. She raises one arm and slams her elbow into Longcase’s gut. He lets out a gasp and then a snarl before hurling her aside. He fires one round in Sonia’s direction, then flees for the safety of the house. Sonia ricochets off the wall, grabs at her side for a moment, then reels and pursues Longcase inside, shrieking the whole way.
The security synths, to my surprise, do nothing. The presence of Eon and Rixon and their weapons seems to have shut the red-shirted guards down. Their loyalty to their masters clearly does not supersede their logic or self-preservation in this situation.
“What now?” I ask as the smoke clears. “You got a ride out there?”
“They might have other guards,” Rixon explains. “Ones with weapons. We need to get in and nab these bastards quick.”
“You want to capture them?” I ask. “I thought you were just getting me out.”
“Well, yeah,” Rixon replies. “But the guys who own this place have been on our contract list for months now. Robbed a bunch of casinos. I about choked when I saw them on your view screen. We’ve been looking all over for these two. Never thought they’d hide right in plain sight. We owe you one for flushing them out.”
“Kind of a two birds, one stone scenario,” Eon says, joining Rixon beside me. “Not that keeping you safe wasn’t the priority.”
“If you’ve got a way out, go ahead and take it,” Rixon says. “If not, just wait here and we’ll be right back.”
“Okay. Hey, are these clothes you gave me gravitized?”
“Of course,” Rixon replies. “What kind of dumbass time traveler would wear regular clothes?”
“Right. That would be stupid.”
Rixon narrows his eyes at me, then pulls a second pistol from a shoulder holster and moves toward the house.
Eon addresses the synths as he passes them. “Now I trust you gents are going to recall that we let you off easy and act accordingly in the next few minutes. We’ve got a warrant with all the appropriate details. I posted it on your public wall on the way in. No reason anyone needs to get hurt.”
The small synth I first encountered in the hallway replies. “Our contract specifies that we must keep our employers safe, but in the event of illegal activity on their part, we cannot impede a criminal investigation.”
“Handy contract,” Eon says. “Thought you boys looked smart.” He grins and follows Rixon inside. The synths look at me, then turn and file out the side door of the greenhouse.
Once my companions have all disappeared, I pull the ragged oxygen mask from my face and exhale the stress of the past few minutes.
I find the anchor stone in my pocket—considering a quick exit—but then decide to wait for Eon and Rixon. I’d like to see Guy and Lawrence in custody. Can’t think of a better scene to watch.
There is a smear of blood on the doorframe.
I think of Sonia and her hand clutched to her side. What’s happening with her in there? Will Eon call in a medic for her?
I attempt to pull up the toolbar for my meta goggles to see if there is an emergency services button, but the meta functions are still offline. Whatever satellite technology Rixon used to call me is not accessible from my interface. That or I’m just too inept to make it work. I stare at the smear on the door and try to tell myself that she’s fine. Nobody appointed me the crazy lady patrol. Not my responsibility.
I sigh and head inside.
The blood trail is not difficult to follow. Sonia has left periodic hand smears on the walls and stair rails. They lead back toward the garage. When I step into the garage I see no immediate sign of Sonia, but through the front windows I spot a figure in the driveway. Mr. Longcase is striding toward a driverless vehicle that’s making its way around the circular driveway. He’s made the mistake of using public transportation to get here and has had to wait to make his escape. I still don’t see Sonia, but push my way out the side door of the garage, keeping low along one of the hedges.
Did he shoot her again? Where is she?
The driverless car pulls to a stop near the fountain of blind angels. Longcase, still holding his pistol in one hand, opens the rear door just as an engine roars to life inside the garage beside me. Longcase looks up, perhaps sensing the danger. The garage door splinters into fragments as the black Toyota 4x4 erupts from inside. Sonia is wide-eyed and screaming in the cab.
“YOU BASTARD!”
The big truck rolls over the scraps of garage door and adjusts course for Longcase’s car. He dives out of the way just in time to avoid the impact as the vehicles collide. A few thousand pounds of 1980s Japanese steel blows through the composite frame of the driverless car in a fury of noise and exploding airbags, shoving it backward into the fountain.
Sonia must have her foot jammed down on the accelerator because after some slipping on the bricks now soaked with fountain water, the Toyota finds purchase atop the crumpled electric car and begins to climb over it. The truck rolls over the other vehicle and knocks down one of the angel statues in the process. Sonia continues to yell over the roar of the engine and the splashing of the water and bounces the truck straight through the back side of the fountain, shearing its low wall away, spraying concrete and bits of broken angel all over the driveway.
Longcase is on his feet now and scouring the ground. He’s lost his gun in his diving bid for escape. From my position near the garage I spot it under the front tire of his ruined car, but he doesn’t see it. Flight is his next best option.
He sprints for the main gate but doesn’t make it. Sonia guns the truck ahead of him, fishtailing past and making him skid to a stop. He slips on the wet bricks, rights himself, and changes course for the house. The frantic young man makes it halfway to the front door before Sonia comes roaring back, the black truck coughing smoke and reeking of gasoline. Sometime during her fountain-climbing excursion, a fuel line or the fuel tank must have been punctured because her watery trail now shimmers with petroleum rainbows. She spins
the wheel hard, clearly hoping to flatten the panting and wild-eyed Longcase, but she misses him by mere inches and careens up the front steps of the mansion, smashing the truck directly into the front doors.
Ouch.
The Toyota is done. Longcase pauses for only a moment to assure himself that Sonia’s assault by truck is over, then sets off at a brisk jog down the driveway, headed for the main gate. He spots me standing open-mouthed near the garage hedges but doesn’t slow. He looks back only once as he rounds the corner, then disappears.
Sonia is still in the truck. The driver’s-side door is jammed against the doorpost of the house and she slams into it futilely a few times before crawling to the other side. I make my way across the driveway, carefully circumnavigating the puddle of fountain water and the sparking wreck of the electric car which has begun to smoke ominously. I hop over the now steady stream of gasoline pouring out the back of the Toyota and meet Sonia at the passenger side of the vehicle. I kick a few pieces of shattered doorframe aside so she can get the door open.
“What do you want?” Sonia demands when she sees me.
Despite her bravado, her face is pale and bloodless. The stain at her side has grown significantly and her movements are sluggish.
“Come on. Gotta get you out of here. It’s not safe.”
Sonia doesn’t object when I help her from the truck and throw one of her arms over my shoulder. I help her down the couple of steps and into the driveway just as Eon and Rixon climb out the hole in the ruined garage door. There’s no sign of Guy or Lawrence.
“What happened?” I call across the driveway.
“I guess we missed your invite to the demolition derby,” Rixon replies. He pulls a thin cigar from his pocket and bites off the end. “Your boys had themselves a goddamned time gate.” He flicks open a lighter with his other hand.
“I wouldn’t light that. Gas all over,” I say.
Rixon surveys the shimmering puddles with curiosity. “Yeah, it’d be a shame if these poor criminals didn’t have their fancy mansion to come home to.”
I recall the wads of cash Lawrence and Guy stole from us and the still-missing chronometer they took from Francesca. “Actually, you have another one of those?”
Rixon grins and hands me a cigar and the lighter. I stick the cigar in my mouth with my free hand and light it while still holding Sonia upright with the other. When the end of the cigar is good and bright, I toss it toward the nearest puddle of gasoline.
“Oops.”
The cigar lands with a thump on the concrete, but unlike every Hollywood film I’ve ever seen, the gas doesn’t ignite. Instead, the cigar merely sizzles a moment before going out in an anticlimactic puff of smoke.
I frown at it.
Eon pulls something from his jacket and overhand tosses it in a lobbing arc toward the house. The object clatters into the bed of the Toyota, then a moment later explodes with a deafening boom, momentarily lifting the entire chassis of the truck off the ground. It rains parts around the driveway and lands again in a blaze of brilliant flame.
“Oops,” Eon says.
“Too bad they didn’t keep this place on the metaspace,” Rixon comments. “Fire brigade would already be on their way. But now . . .” He chews his cigar and studies the hungry blaze blooming inside the mansion.
“A real pity,” I reply.
“Though we probably should have staked the place out to see if they return for their stuff,” Eon says. “Gonna be a bitch to track ’em down now.”
I toss Rixon’s lighter back to him. “If you want to know where they’re headed to hide for the next few years, I think I can help you out.”
“Really now,” Rixon says, lighting his cigar and flipping the lighter closed. “You know what, Travers? I think I like you after all.”
Sonia watches the dancing flames engulf the mansion. I’m not sure which of her personalities is in control at the moment, but it seems all of them are smiling.
17
“It doesn’t matter how many times you press the pin on your chronometer to skip ahead. The laundry isn’t going to wash itself. Real life still takes living, and sooner or later you’re the only one who can decide what’s worthwhile. For me, not smelling like a sweaty gym sock falls under ‘items of vital importance.’”- Journal of Dr. Harold Quickly, 1986
Port Nyongo, 2165
Fawcett Memorial Hospital in Port Nyongo is used to vagrants. They are used to patients spitting and talking to themselves. They are used to gunshot wounds. That still doesn’t make them ready for Sonia. In the end, it takes three trans-human nurses and a lot of promises of food and coffee to calm her down, but she makes it inside. The doctor who scans her in says the wound isn’t serious and she’s very lucky.
We’re lucky to have her out of the car.
Once the doctors have examined Sonia and given her some preliminary treatment to stabilize her, I’m allowed in for a few minutes to talk to her. Eon and Rixon opt to wait outside.
Sonia fixes me with a much calmer stare when I walk in, following my movements around the room. When I take a seat next to her bed, she finally speaks. “I was supposed to be someone great, you know. They told us the great ones would change the world.”
“Change it how?”
“Make things different. Give us another future.” Her eyes get a little glassy. “They split us into two groups. One group they said could live forever and send their messages to the brethren of the past. The other would send their messages to the god of time himself so that he would know who were his chosen ones. He has to be told who to save when he comes for us. He promised to save us from the future.” All of her anger seems to have faded. In its place is only disappointment. “Should have known it was all too good to be true.”
“How do you know about the future?”
“They read it to us from the book. The Chronicles of Gnomon. It’s all been passed down, person to person. Survivors from the future sent it back to save us. We’re supposed to write down all their memories in the Chronicle and pass it back farther.”
“How far back in time is the message supposed to be delivered?”
“Six thousand years. The very start of civilization.”
“Wow.”
Sonia’s voice shifts to a lower tone and her eyes dart around the room. “We know the end is coming. The world is going to Hell. These machines are to blame. The Chronicle tells it.” She stabs a finger toward the door. “These synths might patch us up and keep us alive for now, but they’ll leave us to die when the end comes. The brethren say we can’t put our hope in the machines. We can only hope in Zurvan.”
Sonia grimaces and shifts in her bed, and her voice changes back to passive resignation. “But now there’s no hope. Now I’m nothing. They wouldn’t let me be one of the chosen ones. They wouldn’t let me talk to Zurvan. They wouldn’t even let me go back to work.”
“Where do they do this? The talking to Zurvan. The selecting people to send messages.”
“There were rooms for us in the basement where they kept us—taught us how. They make you stare into a fire till you can’t even remember your own name. We slept at the house with the blind angels. But they take us to the fire temple in St. Petersburg for the ceremonies. They preach to us and listen to our visions and decide who gets to be chosen to talk to him.”
“The fire temple? You’ve been there?”
“I’ve seen it. I got my messages, but they weren’t right. They said I wasn’t supposed to keep hearing the voices. They said I was supposed to just be myself again, only with more memories. My memories got all confused.” She puts her hands to her head. “Bad dreams. Bad visions.”
“So some people get it to work? Some people get their own minds back to normal after? What about the mess-ups? Can they try again to fix it or does everyone end up—” I almost say crazy but stop myself. “Do they just end up with other people living in their heads?”
Sonia frowns. “They said there was no time left for me to fix it. The
y said I missed my chance. The training is over. The Lost Star is coming. I heard they might dispose of the ones that didn’t make it. That’s why I knew I had to get out.”
A nurse sticks her head in the door and informs me that they need to get Sonia prepped for her procedure. I stand and move around the bed. Sonia’s eyes follow me. “What do your voices tell you? Is your future any good?”
“I’m not sure yet.”
“Then, tell ’em to go to Hell.”
I move toward the door but pause and turn back for a final question. “If I wanted to go to this fire temple, see how they’re doing this, how do I find it?”
“Finding the temple is easy. B train stops there. They call it the Temple of the Eternal Flame.”
“Thanks for helping me, Sonia. I’m sorry we didn’t get what you wanted today.”
“Got to see their house burn.” She cracks a smile. “That was all right. Let ’em look into that fire and predict their damn future.” She settles back against her pillow and closes her eyes.
The ride back to Rixon’s bar is quiet—a comedown from the adrenaline rush of our afternoon. I let out a yawn and Eon passes me a carton of water.
“How long since you slept, Travers?”
“I don’t know. A while.”
“If you want to get some rest once we’re back, we have a place for you to sleep.”
“I’m fine.” I stifle a second yawn. “Just need to keep moving.”
“We aren’t going to save her today, you know. Still two days till that sub pulls into the harbor. You’ll need to sleep at some point.”
“Let’s just get back. Where’s Carson?”
“Still up on the high lifts. Got put on some manufacturing jobs up there. Seems to be doing fine. I checked on his meta feed a few minutes ago. He’s fitting right in.”
“Of course he is.”
When we pull up to the bar, we find it significantly more active than when we left. The dingy room is bustling with patrons seemingly averse to the far more pleasant day outside. Once indoors, I take a moment to let my eyes adjust, and the first thing I make out moving toward me is Tucket, dressed in an apron and carrying two pints of beer.
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