Dissonance (The Machina of Time Book 2)

by Daniel R. Burkhard

  "I used to work here," Wyatt said, hoping his lie would help calm Gene. The man appeared older than the last time he had seen him, but that could have just been the way things had changed recently.

  "Be careful," Gene said, nodding his head slowly. "Everything seems to be changing around me lately, and I think I should be worried about it." His hands when to the front pocket of his overalls and Wyatt saw it was a notebook he held there.

  "We should all be worried about it," Brooke said, casting a glance toward Wyatt. She meant more than what she had said, but Wyatt wasn't quite sure which direction her thoughts were taking her.

  As they stood facing Gene, he felt the resonance building inside him, and knew things were still changing.

  "Have you ever felt anything like this before?" Brooke asked.

  Gene looked at Wyatt for a few seconds too long before he breathed in deeply. Something had changed in the way the old man stood. It was like a switch had been thrown inside him.

  "Who was that woman you asked me about a moment ago?" Gene asked. "Did you say Hannah?"

  Wyatt nodded and pulled his hands out of his pockets. Brooke backed away on his right side and Gene rubbed his head again. When he looked back at Wyatt, he stood taller, and his eyes had a little more of the fire Wyatt had seen at other times.

  "Someone is changing things on us," Gene said. "Hannah used to work with me. I remember her being here earlier today, but at the same time I remember never meeting a girl with that name." He shook his head and his white eyebrows angled down over his eyes. "This isn't right."

  "Weren't you just talking to her back there?" Wyatt asked.

  Gene turned his confused expression on Wyatt. "That wasn't Hannah. I don't know who that was. She was thin and blonde." He rubbed his temples. "What is that?"

  "It's the resonance," Brooke said. "It is hitting each of us right now, and we're trying to fix it." She stepped around Wyatt and stood looking up into Gene's eyes. "We're trying to fix it." She looked ready to reach out and touch Gene's arm, but Gene backed away. She lowered her arm with his action.

  "What has changed it?" Gene asked.

  "That's what we are trying to figure out," Wyatt said. "Those double memories you have are part of the resonance. That is the way we know"—he motioned to take in himself and Brooke—"someone has been changing the timestream."

  Gene nodded and backed away more. "Do you guys feel it stronger than I do?"

  "Sometimes," Wyatt answered as Brooke nodded.

  "Can you fix it?" Gene asked. "As we stand here I can both remember seeing you with Hannah and remember never seeing you or Hannah. Can you fix that?"

  Wyatt glanced toward Brooke who was holding her wrist terminal and backing away. The watch-sized device with its white band was hidden under her right palm as she watched him back. A fear grew that she might leave without him, but he forced that down. She was on his side.

  He gave her a nod, hoping she would activate her portal.

  Wyatt turned toward Gene as the portal opened behind him. "We're going to fix it," he said, moving closer to Brooke.

  Gene grabbed his arm for a moment, his grip tight. "Listen to me," he said, reaching a hand toward the front pocket. It appeared he wanted to pull what looked like a notebook from that front pocket but stopped as he continued. "There are others involved." He glanced toward Brooke, seemingly realizing she was still close. It seemed whatever warning he was prepared to give suddenly vanished. "I've lost Hannah, and odd things are happening. Be careful who you trust.

  He wanted to ask Gene for more details, but Brooke grabbed his left arm and pulled him through the portal.

  CHAPTER nine

  DORMITORY ENTRANCE, R333PS,

  TUESDAY, APRIL 4, 2090, 12:30 PM

  Falling to his knees, Wyatt heard others around him, and his heart raced. His uneasy stomach and the dizziness forced him to close his eyes. Brooke coughed several times to his right, close to him. Wyatt managed to hold his stomach down, but he remained on his hands and knees with his eyes closed for too long.

  "Where have you guys been?" Aldan asked, jolting Wyatt's eyes open.

  Wyatt looked up as Brooke stopped coughing and rubbed her chin. It seemed she had coughed up a bit of bile onto the floor in front of where she sat.

  "What did you guys find?" Aldan asked, stepping through the doorway, and crouching down in front of Wyatt. "Hurry. The others will be here soon."

  Wyatt watched Aldan's face, and thought he saw something different about it. His chin was nicked as if he had recently shaved and cut himself. "Where were you?" he asked.

  Aldan smiled broadly for a second, shook his head, and glanced over his shoulder toward the dormitory door.

  The mildew and dampness of that portion of the warehouse seemed to return to Wyatt as his breathing calmed. He stared at the dormitory door, wondering if the others would open it soon.

  "Things have changed," Brooke said, pushing herself from her butt to her knees. She watched Aldan, without looking at Wyatt.

  "You and Wyatt just came back from when?" Aldan asked as the dormitory door opened behind him.

  Avery stood there, her face drawn with worry or something else. Jeremy was not with her. She looked first to Aldan then scanned Brooke and Wyatt. Shaking her head, she looked over her shoulder into the dormitory. After a second, she reached in and pulled the door closed behind her, quietly latching it.

  "Are you okay?" Aldan asked.

  "Everyone left me," Avery answered, shaking her head. "Where did you go?"

  "You went to your haven, right?" Wyatt asked, finally feeling well enough to stand. As he rose to his feet, he squared off against Aldan, staring at him. He hoped Aldan would answer honestly.

  "Where were you two?" Avery asked when Aldan didn't answer.

  "With the lingering resonance we felt," Brooke started, "we thought we would go back and see if we could stop Hannah from getting his wrist terminal."

  "But you failed," Aldan said.

  "How do you know?" Wyatt asked, moving his left hand behind his back.

  "Too much has changed." Aldan stepped toward the shelving near Brooke and rested his left arm on it. He looked worn out and tired.

  "Are you okay?" Avery asked Aldan, stepping between Aldan and Wyatt.

  Aldan looked at her then at Wyatt. "You couldn't stop Hannah from taking your wrist terminal, could you?"

  Wyatt shook his head. He wanted to know what had bothered Aldan so much, but he wasn't sure Aldan would talk about it. They stared at each other for several seconds.

  "This resonance is all your fault," Aldan said. He spoke to Wyatt, but his eyes shifted toward Brooke.

  Wyatt watched the way Avery stepped a little further into the space between Aldan and Wyatt. Aldan's eyebrows lowered and he let out a sigh.

  "Please calm down," Brooke said, drawing their eyes toward her because of the soft voice she had used. She appeared to notice she had their attention and straightened up. "If we start to fight now, we might as well give up."

  "He is the one that lost his wrist terminal to my cousin," Aldan said, his eyes boring a hole straight through Wyatt's.

  Wyatt found himself looking away first. He didn't do well in confrontations. Fights were a different thing, but he didn't think a fight was coming. Aldan didn't seem to be the type that would carry out a fight, but that was probably due to his being older than the rest of them.

  "He already said he didn't do it on purpose," Avery said.

  "I didn't let her have it," Wyatt said.

  "But you went back there to visit her," Aldan said. "What did you expect her to do?"

  Wyatt shook his head, watching the anger flare in Aldan's face. He was thankful for Avery's positioning of herself between him and Aldan. Her stance between them gave him a little more confidence. "I didn't expect her to take it," he said. "I went back to see how she was doing because she was a friend."

  Aldan watched him for several seconds. As the pause drew on, Brooke stepped closer to the dormi
tory door. She seemed ready to enter.

  "That last time, she seemed a little more worried about someone watching her," Wyatt said, deciding he wanted to try and deescalate the tension a little if he could. "I think a smaller woman in white watched her."

  "How many women in white are there?" Aldan asked, shaking his head. "I can't believe it. You think she was being followed by another woman in white?"

  "Yes," Wyatt said. "A smaller blonde woman in a white jacket. Hannah was really worried about it. More so than any other time I have gone back to visit her." He left out telling him about Gene talking to a smaller woman in the white jacket. Nothing made sense any longer.

  Aldan folded his arms, still shaking his head as Brooke opened the dormitory door.

  "What are you meeting about out here?" Jeremy asked, stepping past her to stand with Avery.

  "We really should go inside the dormitory to talk about it," Brooke said, stepping through the doorway without looking back at them. "I hate to air dirty laundry in an open space."

  Avery nodded her head as Jeremy stepped closer. He wrapped his right arm around her shoulders and turned her toward the dormitory.

  "Brooke's right," Jeremy said. "Something terrible has happened. Lenny is gone."

  "How do you know that?" Wyatt asked, shock filling him.

  "When everyone disappeared, I went looking for him," Jeremy answered.

  "You noticed we all left?" Aldan said.

  "The resonance grew stronger when you left." Jeremy led Avery through the dormitory doorway.

  Wyatt looked at Aldan, shrugged, and followed Avery and Jeremy. He scanned the interior of their dormitory for a moment. Again, something wasn't right.

  "Did you make that bed?" Wyatt asked pointing toward the bed to the right of the doorway. "Wasn't that a bit of a mess this morning."

  "The resonance has been rough," Aldan said. "Don't trust your memories. You may not be remembering what actually happened."

  "But that bed was unmade a bit this morning," Brooke said, twisting around on the sofa to the right. Her eyes traced the bed that now appeared to never have been used.

  "The changes aren't that bad, yet," Aldan said. "But I think they're about to get worse."

  "Your cousin is making them," Wyatt said. "I'm not sure why, but she has my wrist terminal and has to be making these shifts in the timestream."

  "What do you mean worse?" Brooke asked, glaring at Aldan. "What have you seen?"

  "I don't think she is doing it," Aldan answered Wyatt's question. "She knows how dangerous it is to make changes." He turned toward Brooke. "You remember how we saw you come back before the big fight with Jarod? What I've seen may be kind of like that. I'm hoping that keeping it to myself will prevent it from happening."

  "What happened?" Avery and Jeremy asked.

  "You can't keep it to yourself," Brooke added.

  "You may be right about it not being Hannah," Wyatt said, changing the subject. The confrontation made his pulse race. As he moved closer to the sofa where Brooke sat, he focused on her. "But who else would be doing it?" For now, he didn't want to remind himself of Gene's last words. He glanced toward Avery, and she watched him for a moment before turning her attention back toward Jeremy.

  She sat beside Jeremy on the sofa to the left of the doorway.

  "How do we know what really happened any longer?" Jeremy asked.

  "I still feel the dizziness of the resonance," Brooke said. "I don't know how we trust anything. I think we need to stay together, no matter what."

  "Do you think that will help us work this out?" Aldan asked with a laugh. It was like he knew something about Brooke.

  Wyatt wanted to know what that might have been, but instead, he watched Aldan as he sat beside Brooke.

  Brooke shrugged, her face turning toward Wyatt for a moment. "If we stay together, I think we will be able to remember each other."

  "She's right," Avery said.

  "What makes you so sure," Aldan said. "It hasn't kept us together much lately. Where were you?"

  "Look at that bed over there," Jeremy said. "Each of us remember that bed being unmade, but none of us made it."

  "We also remember that bed never being used," Aldan said. "That proves nothing. We're already in trouble."

  "Are we just going to sit here and argue about it?" Wyatt asked. The contentious tone of the conversation bothered him. He tried to diffuse it with a little humor. "I'm all for a good argument I can win, but I don't think any of us will win this one."

  Avery shook her head, looked down, and pushed herself to her feet. "I've got to take a quick break." She moved toward the bathroom.

  Wyatt watched Jeremy and Aldan exchange a look at each other. Avery walked around the kitchen area. Wyatt thought she would head toward her bed, but she didn't. Instead, she moved toward the bathroom.

  Too many things had changed, and Wyatt's mind couldn't stop replaying the experience with Gene. That thinner woman he had seen wasn't any of them. Gene didn't seem to know who she was either.

  "What do you think we should do?" Brooke asked, her voice quiet.

  It took Wyatt a moment to realize she was talking to him. He straightened up on the sofa. So much had happened in the last trip, he wasn't sure he could answer Brooke's question.

  "What do you suggest," Aldan asked.

  With all three of them looking at him, Wyatt felt his heart quicken, and took a deep breath. He glanced toward the bathroom door and spoke quietly. "I think there are more people involved than just your cousin."

  Brooke's eyebrows knit with worry as she cast a quick glance toward Jeremy and Aldan before looking down. "Do you think it would have something to do with what we did with Jarod?"

  "That's not quite what I was thinking," Wyatt said, thinking about the way Brooke had defended Jarod.

  "Then what is it?" Aldan asked. "I think you are right. We need a plan. We cannot simply remain here and talk things through, so tell us what you are thinking."

  "I've seen an older version of Avery," Wyatt said. He decided to keep focused on the piece of Gene's warning he could verify. An older version of Avery was out there. He watched their reactions to his words for a moment, before continuing. Jeremy glanced back toward the bathroom, whose door was still closed, and Aldan shook his head. Brooke was the only one who seemed to still watch him. "When we went back to stop Aldan's first group, one of them, Brittany, said she had been collected by Avery. That was why she had been ready to hand over her wrist terminal to her."

  "Weren't you also found by Avery?" Brooke asked. "I don't think she would cause this."

  "Yes," Wyatt answered then decided to clarify his thoughts a little more. "But when she came after me, I refused. She had a copy of my contract that was unsigned and folded." He waited for them to figure out the significance of that comment. When they had first encountered Lenny, they had been handed their contracts on flat pieces of paper. But after seeing their signed contracts, they were told to sign them, and they were folded to fit their envelopes.

  "Your contract was folded before it had your signature?" Brooke asked.

  "Really?" Aldan asked.

  Wyatt nodded in answer to both questions. "I tell you there is an older Avery messing with things." He glanced toward the bathroom at the sound of the toilet flushing.

  "At least we know she wasn't traveling back somewhere," Jeremy said. "I'm not ready to suspect she is behind all these changes, yet."

  "Neither am I," Aldan said. "I think we need to find my cousin and get to the bottom of this."

  "What if they are all interconnected in some way?" Brooke said. "What if the changes are because we stopped Jarod?"

  "Don't start that again," Wyatt said. "We did what we had to do to save the Machina. If we hadn't done that, we wouldn't be here." Brooke tensed beside him at those words.

  "I'm serious," Brooke said, turning to face Wyatt. "What if your actions with his versions in 2099, ruined him somehow? What if we placed him in a paradox he can't get out of?"
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  "Now you are talking paradoxes?" Aldan asked. He shook his head, glanced over his left shoulder toward the bathroom door, and sighed. "I'm not sure."

  "What are you guys talking about?" Avery asked as she rounded the kitchen area.

  Aldan held his hands up for the others to keep quiet and looked at her. "I'm glad you came back," he said. "Things have gotten really strange out here. Brooke is saying we might have messed up Jarod."

  "What do you mean?" Avery asked Brooke, rubbing her hands on her pants. "We did what we had to do."

  Wyatt wanted to ask the same question but kept it to himself. He placed his hands on his legs and waited. Brooke turned on the sofa, moving closer to him as she did. Wyatt felt his face grow hot as she looked back at him and smiled.

  Aldan rose to his feet as Avery sat on the other side of Jeremy. "I've been trying to go back to my special time," he said.

  "Your haven?" Avery asked.

  Brooke smiled.

  "I knew it," Wyatt said.

  "At least I haven't caused the problems," Aldan said, looking directly at Wyatt. He raised his hands before Wyatt protested. "Beyond what I just went through, everything has changed. I think whoever used that bed figured out where I go. I think I saw a drone the last time."

  "And that's what you dealt with?" Brooke asked.

  Aldan shook his head. He didn't answer for a moment.

  "Why would that be a problem?" Wyatt asked and wished he had stopped himself. As Aldan glared at him, the answer became obvious to Wyatt. "Sorry. The cameras weren't there before and now your haven is useless to you."

  "What else did you suffer?" Brooke asked, changing the subject fast enough Wyatt looked at her.

  Aldan's glare softened. "Because there are cameras there, I couldn't stay," he said. "I don't want to believe my cousin could do that."

  "What else did you do?" Brooke asked, pressing a little harder with her question that Wyatt thought was necessary.

  "It's better I don't speak about that," Aldan answered.