by E W Barnes
“The photo was of a march, with signs. He was standing near a tree.” Sharon closed her eyes to visualize the photo. “The march probably happens after this rally.”
She opened her eyes and gestured to the crowd still focused on the speakers.
“The photo could have been taken after he does what he came here to do. Waiting for that moment may be too late.” Part of her strongly wanted to return to the house and clean up her scrapes. The stinging was a distraction, and the fight had frightened her. The urge to retreat was strong.
“It looks like the crowd is getting ready to march, now. I don’t think Kevin will have had time to do… whatever he came here to do.” Caelen said pointing to people were moving through the crowd, now, handing out protest signs. “Do you remember what was in the photo's background?” he asked.
“We should have brought it with us,” Sharon muttered, trying to remember the details.
“No, it is better we didn’t. What if we lost it or someone stole it? There would be too many questions and potential for errors in the timeline.”
Sharon closed her eyes. “There was something in the background. Something unique looking… like metal petals rising from the ground, maybe some kind of art installation, like a sculpture.”
“Hey man,” a languid voice said. Sharon opened her eyes.
A friendly faced youth with a tie-dyed bandanna covering his long hair stood at the foot of the steps, holding out a plastic cup.
“You got caught in that fight,” he said. “It was far out. I thought you could use something to drink.”
Caelen took the cup and smelled the contents. “I could use water, thanks,” he said as he took a long swallow.
He offered the cup to Sharon. She shook her head. “No thanks, I’m fine.”
“No problem,” the young man said with a smile as he took the cup back.
“Do you know where there is a sculpture on campus that looks like metal petals growing up from the ground,” she asked with sudden inspiration.
He smiled and nodded with satisfaction. “It is ‘Now’,” he said. Caelen looked confused. “What?”
“It's ‘Now’ man," he said again.
“You mean like it’s modern?” Sharon asked.
“The sculpture, man. It's called ‘Now,’” He pointed across the grassy area. “It’s over there. It reflects the sun, the source of all life.” The young man raised his arms and looked up at the sky, eyes closed, as if he would enter a spiritual trance if they let him.
“That’s great, thank you,” Sharon said, standing up. She could feel the ache of bruises blooming on her shins.
He raised his hand, two fingers up. “Peace, man.” He meandered away and soon disappeared in the crowd.
From their vantage on the steps, they could see how to get behind the platform to go in the direction the young man had pointed. As they came around the platform, they spied the sculpture in the distance. Sharon scanned for Kevin.
“There he is,” Sharon murmured.
Kevin was standing to one side of the petals next to a device that appeared to be part of the sculpture. The young man had said something about the sculpture reflecting the sun. At first, she thought he meant that the metal was shiny and easy to see in the daylight. As they neared it, she saw light emanating from inside the space where the petals curved together. Because the petals curved inward, there had to be a way of getting light to the underside of the petals - presumably the device Kevin was now surreptitiously opening.
“Come on we need to hurry,” she said. At that moment Kevin stood up and looked directly at them. Caelen leaned against her and, assuming they were doing the “couple in love” act they had done in New York City, she put her arm around him. He kept leaning on her, and soon she was holding him up as he slowly slid to the ground.
“What are you doing?” she whispered urgently.
“I think I am falling… whee! The path is moving up and down, like hills flowing toward me. Beautiful path hills….” He laughed.
She glanced at Kevin, but he was no longer looking at them and was instead slowly circling the sculpture with his hands behind his back.
“What?” Sharon was confused and worried. Maybe Caelen had hit his head when the fighting crowd had caught them in its wake, and he was having a delayed reaction. She squatted down next to him and he leaned against her leg.
“Do you see that tree?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“The trunk is rippling. It looks like the temporal amplifier’s shift phenomena!”
“Shh!”
“And the clouds. They are full of sparkles. How do they do that?”
Her panicked response was drowned out as the crowd behind them chanted in unison. The rally had ended, and the march was about to begin.
She tried to get Caelen on his feet to get out of the way of the marchers she knew would head their way, but he was too immersed in the shadows of blades of grass to cooperate.
A pair of hands came from behind her and lifted him up. A man and a woman, both wearing flowers and fringed clothes, were smiling.
“Looks like our brother is on a good trip, little sister. Let’s get him out of the way.”
They carried Caelen to the shade of a young tree near the sculpture where he fell back against the trunk and flicked his fingers in front of his eyes with a look of wonder on his face. She turned to thank the couple, but they had vanished.
She couldn't see Kevin anywhere. She knew he must still be there somewhere because the march hadn’t reached the sculpture. The photographer had not yet taken the photo.
“I will be right back. You stay right here,” she said to Caelen.
He nodded, peering closely at the strand of hair he had pulled from his head.
She walked around the sculpture, looking carefully at it from all sides. When she knew which side had been in the photo's background, she worked her way away from it, until she was as far from it as the photographer had been when the picture was taken.
There was a building close to where she needed to be, and she climbed the steps and stood next to the doors. From here she could see Caelen, the sculpture, and the approaching crowd.
The chanting grew louder. Members of the press scurried around the marchers, like remora fish looking to hitch a ride on a shark. With satisfaction she watched the photographer drop to a knee and take the shot that would one day end up in her computer bag.
And there was Kevin, looking right at the camera. Then he stepped aside out of the crowd, letting it pass him and moving away until he was under a large tree. He slid around the back of the trunk; and then Sharon saw the telltale ripple of a temporal shift. He was gone.
Moments later the crowd was too, having moved on to whatever destination their march would take them. She walked back over to Caelen.
“Did you see the colors?” he asked her as she approached. “Such beautiful colors, like the colors I can see when the sun is in your hair. So shiny and beautiful.”
Sharon cocked her head at him. “You're going to be embarrassed when you come out of this.”
She sat next to him, staring at the sculpture despondently. They would fail again. She did not understand what Kevin had been doing here, or what they had to do to fix the “error.” She did not want to come back - one unruly crowd experience was enough for a lifetime.
Glancing around, she confirmed that they were now alone - the crowd was long gone, leaving only its chanting in the far distance. She pulled her phone out of her pocket and surreptitiously took photos of the sculpture and of the device next to it. She got as many shots from every angle as she could.
“You told me to look for anachronisms, Grandmother,” she murmured to herself with a sigh. “The only one I’ve seen here is the one I am creating.”
Putting the phone back in her pocket, she heaved Caelen to his feet. “Ready?” she asked him.
“I am always ready,” he answered, sounding more like himself until he added “I can see your heart be
ating in your eyes.”
“Right,” she said, not knowing whether she should laugh or cry.
Making certain they were still alone, she pulled the remote out of her other pocket. The air rippled with a blue glow, flashing like they were on a speeding train as she shifted them back to the library.
◆◆◆
There was a slight, nauseating smell of a cigar in the library as she eased Caelen to the floor. Kevin, the bank representative, and the other man had already been there - she had programmed the amplifier perfectly. She quietly explored the house to make sure she and Caelen were alone and then checked outside through a crack in the curtains over the front windows. Two police cars moved slowly through the neighborhood as if they were looking for someone, and there was no sign of Kevin. She locked all the doors and windows.
Caelen was asleep when she got back to the library and she spent the rest of the afternoon charging her phone and loading the photos she took onto her laptop to inspect them more closely. Then she made the short walk to pick up a pizza and was back as Caelen was waking up.
“What happened?” he moaned.
“What do you remember?”
He grasped his head in his hands. “Colors. Flowers. Sparkles in the clouds…?” He looked at her questioning, and she nodded, trying not to laugh.
“The guy with the water….”
“Yeah, I think so. I am guessing LSD.”
“What was I thinking? It was ...”
“A rookie mistake?” she said teasingly.
He grinned. “Thank goodness you didn’t drink the water.”
“Yeah, we could still be there watching the shadows of the blades of grass,” she said laughing.
“Well, they were cool. What happened with Kevin?”
Sharon’s face fell.
“The trip was a failure,” she said. “I didn’t see any anachronisms, nothing to tell me when Kevin caused the error, and I don’t know what he did before he shifted away.”
“Ok,” Caelen said as he helped himself to a slice of pizza. “Tell me exactly what happened after I, uh….”
“After you saw sparkles in the clouds?” she said, glad for a reason to smile again. She showed him the pictures she’d taken while she described what she saw.
“It looks like he was interested in a rudimentary solar-powered device,” Caelen said thoughtfully.
“Maybe it was,” Sharon said, gently pulling the laptop away. “The guy with the… uh… ‘happy water’ said the sculpture reflected the sun, and even though the petals curved inward, I could see they were reflecting light from a small dome-shaped piece of metal in the ground. What if the device Kevin was interested in was part of that?”
She typed on her computer. “The guy said it was called ‘Now’….”
“Yes, here it is. A sculpture entitled ‘Now’ which used panels to reflect sunlight onto that dome-shaped metal in the ground which then reflected it onto the underside of the petals. The reflectors originally tracked the sun powered by solar panels; and the design didn’t work as intended, and after a few years, they shut down the solar-powered device and left the panels in a stationary position.”
“Let me see the photos again,” Caelen said looking at them closely.
“I think he took some solar panels and part of the mechanism,” Caelen said as he pointed to areas on the device where there appeared to be pieces missing.
“It was subtle,” Caelen added. “You would have to know what to look for to notice they were missing.”
“Did you see him give them to anyone?” Caelen asked.
“No. I guess he could have, but I didn’t see it happen. I saw him join the crowd, get his photo taken, and then shift out.”
“Why would he take late 60s solar technology?” Sharon was perplexed. “Would it have any value in the future, maybe historical value?”
“I don’t think so,” Caelen answered. He sounded as confused as she was.
“Let’s go over what we know so far,” she said, trying to get a handle on all the details.
“Kevin took specs for a technology that could have advanced the Soviet Union’s global standing in the future; and he also took solar power technology which would not be of any value in the future.”
Sharon took another slice of pizza to calm her roiling stomach. “What’s the connection?”
“The solar technology would not be of any value in the future,” Caelen said. “But what about the past? In 1962 it might be very valuable.”
“What about 1940? Wouldn’t it be more valuable in 1940?”
“Yes, and the errors in the timeline are not huge technological leaps, such as solar technology being introduced in 1940. A small change, such as a six-year advance in technology could go undetected. I think 1962 is mostly likely where he’s taking it.” He paused.
“You did great, by the way,” he sounded embarrassed, just as she had expected. “I am sorry I was not available to help.”
“You did a great job preparing me,” she answered. “Sounds like we did what a good team does,” she added with a grin. “Whaddya say we plan for 1962?”
“Sounds good,” he said as he got another slice of pizza.
◆◆◆
Planning for the shift to 1962 was more intimidating than she had expected. The farther back in time, the less confident she was of knowing how to blend in. While Caelen assured her they could get away with jeans and t-shirts, she worried about not having appropriate money if they needed funds. Plus, there was the gala.
“The article was about a charity gala event,” she said pulling out the plastic-covered page. “We can’t just wander into a formal gala, uninvited and in jeans and t-shirts.”
“Maybe we could get in as part of the wait staff,” Kevin mused. “They might have uniforms for us to wear, and then we would have access to both the gala and behind the scenes.”
“Plus, people tend to not see wait staff,” she nodded. “We might almost be invisible.”
It was becoming a routine, she thought as they again hid their stuff in the crawlspace. Sharon carefully programed the temporal amplifier for 1962 in Washington, D.C., taking a moment to confirm she had her phone and the remote control before she shifted them away.
I am getting the hang of this time travel stuff, she thought as the room appeared to slow down before it disappeared.
She heard traffic noise with an occasional car honk as they shimmered into a small parking lot. Large neo-classical buildings surrounded the parking lot on three sides, with a small driveway leading to a main thoroughfare. It was mid-morning by the angle and quality of the sunlight, she decided. The August air was thick with humidity making the temperature scorching and promising an even more unpleasant afternoon.
The parking lot was empty except for them. Caelen started casually moving down a row of cars, finding an unlocked door about 20 cars away from where they arrived. “We can hide in here and watch for Kevin,” he explained.
They easily slid across the plastic covering the wide bench seat and slouched down far enough to hide themselves as much as possible while keeping an eye out. It seemed like only a moment before the air rippled and Kevin appeared. He looked around briefly and then walked out of the parking lot without a backward glance.
“Let’s go,” Caelen carefully opened the door and slid out, Sharon on his heels.
Even though they were only in the car a few minutes, the legs of her jeans were already moist with sweat where they pressed against the hot plastic of the seat.
Sharon tried to pull the damp cotton away from her skin while hurrying to follow Kevin out of the parking lot and stopped as the air in front of them rippled and warped. Sharon looked for a place to hide, but it was too late. A figure appeared in front of them.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“I see that I’m in time,” a woman said, as if she expected to find them standing in front of her.
Caelen stiffened. “Commander Sprucewood,” he said respectfully.
“At e
ase, Agent Winters,” the woman said. She was about the same age as Sharon, younger maybe, but with an air of self-confidence and authority Sharon had ever only dreamed of.
The woman looked at Sharon with frank curiosity, and Sharon almost thought she also saw relief and pride in her expression. There was a ringing in Sharon’s ears as her eyes and heart told her what her mind was slow to grasp, still trying to convince her she was hallucinating.
“Commander Sprucewood…?” she managed.
“It's good to meet you, Sharon,” the woman said. “I’m Rose Sprucewood. I will be your grandmother.”
Before Sharon responded, the woman turned to Caelen, all business as if the personal revelation that left Sharon reeling hadn’t happened.
“Agent Winters I hereby supersede your authority on this mission. I am now in command,” she said, the words sounding almost ceremonial.
He nodded respectfully. “We need to get out of the open,” she then said to both. “There is a TPC safe house nearby.”
Not giving them a chance to respond, Commander Sprucewood strode out of the parking lot and flagged down a taxi. Caelen tried to ask questions, but she stopped him with a quick shake of her head. The cab drove for about six blocks until they pulled up in front of a narrow brick townhouse with black wrought iron trim. The street overhung by ancient oak boughs heavy with summer green.
Commander Sprucewood paid the taxi driver and led them up a walk made of brown concrete squares with no gaps for grass or moss to grow. The shade of the trees was a relief as was the cool of the entry hall as they walked in.
“Welcome home, Miss Rose,” a voice said. “I see you have brought guests.” A man in a crisp suit was walking toward them.
“Yes, Richard. This is Caelen Winters and Sharon Gorse. They are here on my recognizance.”
“I understand, Miss Rose. Will you take some iced tea in the parlor?” Richard asked.
“Yes, that would be lovely,” Rose answered. Caelen and Sharon followed her into a front room, and she invited them to sit. Caelen and Sharon sat on a small sofa, Rose in a wingback chair facing them.