Crucified: The Rise of an Urban Legend (Swann Series Book 9)

by Ryan Schow

  “This is an emergency,” his multiverse self said.

  “Do tell,” he said.

  Right then, stopped in the middle of a Newcastle backroad, his multiverse doppelgänger told him where Savannah was headed, which took him by surprise.

  “What am I supposed to do with this information then?” he said, exhausted.

  His almost twin then handed him a rather large time travel device and said, “I can’t go back that far. But if she can, you can. You need to put a stop to this once and for all.”

  “She’s not like you described,” Aloysius said.

  “I told you she was not only strong but cunning. Did I not tell you that?”

  “You said the version of her in your universe was, but you said this version of her would be easier to kill. For the record, I think you’re wrong about that.”

  “I don’t want her meeting her other self,” he said. “It’s how they hook up in the future. It’s how they ruin everything.”

  “Amanda,” he said.

  “Yes.”

  “Twice,” Aloysius said, his deadpan stare locked in on his slightly stronger looking self. “That’s two times that she’s killed me.”

  “I’m painfully aware of that.”

  Ticking off his fingers, Aloysius said, “First she collapsed the building on me in Argentina, then she pushed me in front of a car on the highway. I died in the morgue when I was turned into a popsicle and now you want me to do this? Because this dying shit is getting old.”

  “You sound like a whiny bitch,” he said, breaking the gaze with his disgust.

  “Twice,” he said, holding up the two fingers.

  “Don’t let there be a third time,” his doppelgänger said, ignoring his fingers.

  “Or else what?” he asked, weary, exhausted, starting to get pissed off.

  “Or she might just end you permanently.”

  “I can’t be ended permanently.”

  A pair of lights shined in the distance, rounded the turn and swerved to avoid them. Neither man paid the nearly out of control car any mind.

  Aloysius’s counterpart looked at him though and in a most serious voice, he said, “If you think we can’t be killed permanently, then you are an arrogant fool.”

  “I hope you’re not confusing confidence for arrogance.”

  “I told you how to end her.”

  “Yes, you did. Eat her, digest her, evacuate her.”

  “In that order,” he said, his dry stab at humor unappreciated.

  “You need to take her head though,” his better self said. “Eat as much of her body as you can, but leave her head back in that timeline.”

  “Give me the coordinates and the time,” he said. His multiverse self obliged him. Aloysius managed to choke down the gigantic time travel device, then he said, “You might want to stand back for this one.”

  “Kill her and I’m done in this universe,” his doppelgänger said, moving away from the side of the car. “I’ll have no reason to come back here ever again.”

  When Aloysius was swallowed into the giant wormhole, the second it closed, instead of the car exploding out, it imploded inward, sucking all the glass and metal towards the driver’s seat in fractions of a second.

  The Aloysius from another universe simply closed his eyes, concentrated for one second, then popped out of this timeline, off to another world with struggles of his own, struggles that would be made easier with a dead Savannah Swann. He was entirely too busy with Amanda and her little mob to deal with Savannah, too.

  Chapter Nineteen

  I hang around for a few days, but then three days later, at lunch, the girls break their silence about all things Savannah and ask me about time travel. They want to know if I can go anywhere I want.

  “As far as I know, yes.”

  “So, like, you can take a vacation to anywhere you want in any time you want?” Tempest asks.

  “I guess,” I reply, “but my life isn’t exactly a vacation.”

  “Sure, yeah…we get it, but if you could go, where would you go?” Georgia asks. “Who would you meet?”

  My mind draws a blank. I’ve never thought of it like this before. This makes me think that I’ve got nothing to do, no one to fight, no one after me as far as I can tell. Maybe it’s time to do something good with this gift of mine!

  “I don’t know,” I say, but inside my head, I’m thinking I’ve survived something that never had an end. I stopped Hitler. I stopped a damn nuclear war.

  I saved the world.

  “For me these days, a good eight hours sleep feels like a vacation,” I say.

  Over the last few days, I finally yielded to my body and slept. I also spent the better part of my days in meditation, trying to see if there was a way to open up other parallel universes. I wanted to do it on my own rather than use Draco, but so far I was only having luck in feeling better. And I did feel better. I do. It’s been a few hours since I reached out to find Aloysius. For two days I’ve come up with nothing.

  I’m sure he’s gone. But what about Hitler? I killed the 2021 Argentina version of him, so does that mean he’s still alive in this time? I guess I don’t bother too much worrying about Hitler because…who cares? He didn’t do squat until after 2021, so as far as I’m concerned he’s a non-issue that’s been dealt with already. So back to the two part question: where would I go and who would I love to meet?

  “Hello, Savannah,” Cicely says, snapping her fingers in front of my face.

  My eyes clear and I smile.

  “I’m still thinking.”

  “Of?”

  “Who I’d like to meet. I was thinking I’d like to see someone who would make me a better person. I’ve had time to reflect on my past—on who I am and what I’ve done—and the truth is, I’m not a good person. My heart is in the right place, but I might need some help steering myself in a better direction.”

  “You do what you have to do,” Tempest says.

  “I’m no Mother Theresa as much as I’m a vigilante,” I say, eating a scoop of mashed potatoes with turkey gravy. “But I don’t always have to be that person. I have to believe I can be better than this. That I can be good.”

  Right then it occurs to me: I know what I have to do. I know this like I know I’m going to take my next breath. But can I?

  Oh my God, I have to!

  What I’m thinking…I can’t tell anyone. No way. Not with where I’m going. Not with what I’m thinking about doing. I don’t know how people would take it in today’s screwy climate. I barely even want you to know this. What will you think of me?

  Well, in all honesty, I have to say: this isn’t your life, so whatever judgements you might have of me when I do what I do, honestly, please don’t be too harsh!

  Shit.

  Reality comes rushing in.

  There’s no way I can keep this to myself. I have to tell August, at least. I need to see him, actually. Before I travel, I have to talk to him.

  And I have to have him.

  Chapter Twenty

  After dinner, as I’m meditating, I give up on trying to travel to other universes and just focus on August. I want to see him, but I really don’t want to take a flight back out there. When you’ve traveled through time the way I have, the thought of public transportation seems so, I don’t know, unappealing. Sitting next to strangers, smelling them, trying not to talk to them, eating toffee peanuts and drinking Sprite…no thanks.

  So as I shut down my senses, close out the sounds and smells of everything around me, and I focus in on the street leading to August’s place in Texas. I focus on it so intently that I start to feel the asphalt beneath my feet, the cool air on my cheek and the smell of the earth and grasses around me. Then I imagine ripping a hole open in California as well as one in Texas. I connect the two locations, and then I imagine shoving myself into a portal and launching myself from here to there.

  It doesn’t work.

  Discouraged, I get up, go pee, then come back and close my e
yes, going deeper than ever. Instead of making a connection with Texas, I make a connection with the universe, begin to feel my body as part of it the same way an oxygen molecule is a perfect part of air. I am of no body. I am of no mind. I am not my clothes, my shoes, my hair, my skin or my organs.

  I’m nothing; I’m part of everything.

  A lightness pervades my body and I feel lighter, almost dizzy drunk, but in a good way. I go deeper still, release my body to this universe, which makes me feel even lighter, so light I almost feel myself disappearing. Within a few minutes, I open the holes in California and Texas, see myself slipping into a portal between them.

  And then I feel myself sliding apart, becoming nothing. It’s not the same as time travel where you’re pulled apart and put back together over and over again. It’s like moving through cool water and in seconds I am standing on a Texas road, the asphalt beneath my feet, the evening air upon my cheeks and arms, the wet smell of earth and grasses suffusing the night.

  Holy crap! Did I just do this?!?!

  I start laughing slowly at first, then I’m jumping up and down in the dark, and then I’m dancing around like I just won the lottery! And then I calm back down, try to lock into memory what I did and how I did it so I have a way back.

  The night is dark, the air cool, the landscape not at all my dorm room at Astor Academy. I am fully here, I reassure myself. I’m here!

  But I’m not alone…

  I smell an amatory smell, chocolate infused with cinnamon and a clear, more crystalline earth smell. I turn and find myself looking at Draco. I stagger backwards a couple of steps, taken off guard. Okay…unexpected.

  He is looking at me in human form, smiling. “When I heard you did this,” he says, “I just had to see it for myself.”

  I can’t stop the smile that’s right back on my face. Not only am I thrilled with what I’ve done, I’m even more excited that it impressed my reptilian friend.

  “You are finally ready for what I have to give you,” he says.

  “Which is?”

  “The next level of your evolution.”

  “How long will it take?” I ask. “Because I came here to see August and I’m pretty much dying to get with him, if you catch my drift.”

  “It won’t take long.”

  “Will it hurt?”

  “No more than you’re used to,” he says. “You just have to ask me for it.”

  “Wait, you’re going to do it right here? On the side of the street, just like that?”

  “Do you want your next gift?”

  “I do.”

  “Then ask.”

  “Can I have my next gift, pretty please?”

  A small bubble wraps us and we’re sucked slightly off center to the world, casting a distant white haze over everything.

  “Whoa, what is this?” I ask.

  “We are just outside the world, not far enough to disconnect from everything around me, but far enough that we are here, but not here. It’s like a foggy, whitewashed version of the world.”

  “Okay…”

  “Are you ready?” he asks.

  This is all so overwhelming, but I’m a trooper, so what the hell.

  “Yes.”

  He moves forward, uncurls those fingers and starts for my head.

  “Relax,” he says.

  “Okay,” I say, reeling slightly. Then: “When you reach for me and say relax, it just makes me more on edge. Say relax first, then reach for me…”

  “Close your eyes,” he tells me.

  I do. That’s when I feel it. His finger against my forehead, then in it. The pain is instantaneous, like having an exposed wire touched to your fillings. Then it’s gone. All I feel is a feather light touch moving over sections of my brain. Then there is a sucking-out feeling and the release of everything.

  “All done,” he says.

  I get my bearings, feel stability reenter my body, then glance up at him. He is looking down at me, proud, but having a hard time holding his form.

  “Take me back,” I say knowing it will ease his struggle. We reenter the world, that slight haze gone. His human form solidifies. “I feel different.”

  “How so?” he asks.

  “I feel connected, but not just to here. Everywhere. It’s more intense than I’m used to. It’s like…I feel light and airy, like if I just thought my location, I’d be there.”

  “Play with that feeling,” he says. “It will get easier. And then it will be like nothing at all for you to travel.”

  “Travel in time?”

  “Teleport, time travel, hop universes.”

  A chill starts in me, then wraps me like a warm tingling sensation that won’t quit and I say, “Are you for real?”

  He smiles, then says, “You did good, Savannah. But you need to be careful for what’s next.”

  “You know where I’m going?”

  “After August, yes.”

  I slowly nod my head as I think about what I’m going to do, but then he knows what’s next so maybe he knows something I don’t know.

  Before I can ask, he’s gone.

  Starting up the street, I’m feeling my body, feeling how everything has changed. I stop walking. The James’ house is a hundred yards up the street. I look at the door step, see the porch light, imagine myself there. A second later, I blink and I’m there, and this starts a giggling in me that becomes a soft cry that I don’t understand.

  What the f*ck am I becoming? Because even though what I just did was about the coolest thing ever (second only to traveling through time, or meeting my eight hundred year old self), it makes me wonder if I’ve totally lost myself to this.

  I want to turn and walk away from August’s home. I can’t do this. There’s no way I can be me, but then I reign it all in and say, “Get your shit together.”

  The damaged front door opens and it’s August’s dad, Lloyd.

  “Savannah?” he asks, startling me.

  “Yes, it’s me.”

  “What was that sound?”

  “What sound?” I ask. Did I make a sound teleporting?

  “Like a popping sound,” he said, his eyes looking around the street behind me, “like maybe a tire blowing or something.”

  “That was me knocking on the door,” I say. “Sorry about that.”

  He shakes his head, not buying it.

  “How’d you get here?”

  “Um…is August here?”

  “Is he expecting you?” he asks. “Because he didn’t say anything about you coming. Not that it’s a problem. It’s not.”

  August is suddenly at the front door, seeing me, and then pushing past his father with a disapproving frown. He pulls me into a hug, asks me if I’m okay. It’s in this very moment that my emotions surge and I completely lose it.

  He ushers me in past his father, scowling at him for making me stand outside while he subjects me to a small interrogation. He walks me past Lenore to the bedroom and then he closes the door. His room is gorgeous, but all I want to do is lay on the bed and let these ill-timed and unwelcome emotions run their course.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?” he finally asks, brushing my hair out of my eyes. He leans down, kisses me just above my eye.

  “I just left,” I tell him, looking up, desperate for those gorgeous eyes of his.

  “Just now? What do you mean?”

  I nod my head, the last of my tears coming. A cold wash of dread pours over me as I think about what the hell I let Draco do to me. It felt sharp at first, beyond painful, but then what he did was like magical—God, I hate that damn word right now, but that’s the best descriptor—and it felt safe, invigorating.

  I can travel through time and space, but now I can teleport, and supposedly slip in and out of universes, too? How the hell am I supposed to process any of this?

  “I…uh…I can teleport now.”

  He sits up, takes a deep breath. There’s an expression I don’t like. No. Am I losing him? If I say the consternation in h
is face is at first concerning, that’s me being optimistic. He looks down at me, his eyes locked on my eyes, almost like he’s looking so deep inside me he wants to see past my body and into my soul.

  Is he trying to decide if I’m a good person? I want to know, but I won’t invade his thoughts, not when he’s struggling with me as much as I’m struggling with me.

  “How am I supposed to be with you when I can’t tell anyone what you do, what you can do, or how you do it? I mean, trying to explain to my dad about how you slammed that door hands free without telling him what you are”—he says, shaking his head in dismay—“is like being a total moron trying to explain physics to anyone.”

  Right then I feel like a total crap. He’s still got that bomb in his brain and I’ve forgotten! How could I forget something like that?

  “If you want me to come clean to your parents, I can.”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because they can’t handle it. Lenore is already convinced the wind pulled the door shut. Not because she really believes that, but because she can’t believe in the alternative.”

  My hands come to his face, not because it is the best looking face I’ve ever seen, but because his pain is apparent, and moving, and I haven’t even dipped inside him for a second. It is just that clear.

  “Kiss me, August,” I say.

  His eyes clear and he sits up with a huff.

  “Kiss me, and let’s pretend I’m Abby and you’re Brayden before all this.”

  He leans forward, his lips finding mine. The door is slightly open, so I use my mind to quietly close it, not missing a beat. He pulls away, turns and sees the lock on his door slowly turning.

  “Really?” he asks.

  My eyes are dry now, my emotions settled, and for now all I want is August’s love because it’s what I’m going to hang on to when I go…where I have to go, where I’ve chosen to go. It won’t be easy. It’ll probably break me. But given the chance to go anywhere in the world at any time and see whomever I want, my choice is clear.

  It’s not long before we tear each other’s clothes off and we’re crawling all over each other, our lust unrestrained, our need to be as close as possible to each other a mutual desire. I swear, this is the best place ever. Me in his arms. There is no safer, warmer place. Even though my time with Chloe was sensual and erotic and like nothing I’ve ever experienced before, being with August is right.