Skyline

by Zach Milan

  The man settled at a desk and began typing. With every glance to Monroe, Felix, and Charlie, his frown deepened.

  Felix squeezed Monroe’s shoulder, then asked the guard, “Why are we here? We weren’t involved in the fight. We don’t know where they went.”

  “That wasn’t you who knocked that blonde woman out?” The guard tutted. “Anyway, I told you to be quiet. Unless you want to explain what’s really going on, I’d suggest you keep your traps shut.”

  While the guard typed, Monroe pressed his hand inside Ana’s bag, ran his fingers along the mesh that wrapped around the core of her device. With the guard watching, he didn’t want to travel through time. But it was their only way out. He’d have to use it sooner or later.

  The guard’s radio crackled to life. A voice shouted, “Ralph?” In the background were more shouts, some other fight. Maybe Charlotte and Bill had come back. “Oy, Ralph. Get out here. We have some questions about those people you found.”

  Ralph pressed the walkie-talkie against his mustache. “Got ’em right here.”

  “Here?” the voice asked. “Fuck, Ralph, get outta earshot. Now.”

  Ralph cast them another dark look, but stood. “Stay here,” he said. “I’m locking you in, so you don’t got much of a choice, but …” He pressed an open hand downward like they were dogs. “Stay.”

  The door clicked after he left, and jiggled a bit as Ralph made sure it was re-locked. His voice dwindled as he walked down the hall.

  “What was that?” Felix asked. “You think the Blast still went off?”

  “If it were the Blast, we’d be traveling through time,” Monroe said. “Or dead. It’s gotta be a coincidence. Or it’s Charlotte and Bill. Either way, it’s a lucky break.”

  A security camera perched in a corner watched their seats closely. Monroe stood and scurried to the computer. There he deleted the guard’s typed words with an elbow and drew himself as close to the walls as possible—just out of the camera’s sight. “Come on,” he hissed, beckoning to Felix and Charlie. Monroe had twice seen Ana use the astrolabe, so he tried to copy her insignia. Only a couple tries later, lights glittered out through the mesh.

  “You know how to use it?” Felix asked, surprised, as he and Charlie clutched Monroe’s arms.

  “Not really,” he replied, but as long as there was a date below, he’d be fine. But when Monroe looked, all he saw were unfamiliar shapes, a string of symbols he couldn’t read. As he twisted the lights, they changed, but that didn’t mean he knew what year it was.

  The most important thing was that they’d be free.

  • • • • • • • • • • • •

  In the dull, uninspired security office under the Statue of Liberty, it was hard to tell how much time passed. For split seconds, ghosts of security guards would come in with juvenile delinquents. But aside from a new computer and replaced chairs, nothing changed.

  Until the room was demolished and a grandiose ballroom filled in the basement of Fort Wood. Sparkling chandeliers hung everywhere, the walls awash in ornate mirrors. It felt like they’d stepped into the past, not the future. But as a tide of ever-shifting tables and tuxedoed people swirled around, the mirrors flashed with light; the chandeliers changed color. In one moment, the high ceiling was replaced with glass and Lady Liberty was visible above, her torch a burning luminescence, something to hold on to as time sped forward.

  As cracks split mirrors, wallpaper dulled, and chairs grew hefty cobwebs, time slowed. Regardless of the age of this room, Lady Liberty still stood far above.

  “Jesus Christ,” Felix said, massaging his temples and putting his head between his knees. “What was that?”

  “I …” Monroe had overshot. Without the date below, he hadn’t been able to tell how far he’d taken them. He hadn’t tracked his test swipes and twists to see how fast the digits changed. They had to be hundreds of years in the future, maybe more. “I fucked up,” he said.

  Felix’s eyes wide, his shoulders hunched, he didn’t look like the strong man who’d fought Ana. Now he looked more like the little boy he’d raised. Though now that Monroe looked, even Charlie was better composed. Holding himself straight, gazing around with only interest—not worry. “But you can fix it,” Felix said. “You can get us back, right?”

  “I don’t have a choice,” Monroe said. Though how he’d get them precisely home, he wasn’t sure. Monroe dropped a hand to take Charlie’s. “Let’s get outta here first. No point jumping back into that cell.”

  They exited the ballroom and entered a hallway with flickering screens spanning the entire length of both walls. Above the screens, small versions of Lady Liberty were placed on shelves leading all the way back. The floor was covered in dust.

  Monroe pushed through a set of double doors, and they entered a giant lobby, widened from the one they’d fought in however many years ago. Now three torches filled the interior: the old one Charlotte and Ana had rolled into, the one installed before the Blast occurred, and a new one that Monroe recognized as a facsimile of the currently installed torch. Around the room was a melting pot of people. Some of their hair was colored vibrantly. Some of their clothes looked like they belonged to farmers of the 1930s. Monroe pushed through the crowd, clinging to Charlie, and led them outside onto a plaza.

  “We gotta get onto Manhattan,” Monroe said. “Find a newspaper seller, or whatever passes for that in this time.”

  Felix pointed to a giant placard featuring an image of a boat and an enormous arrow. They followed the symbols across Liberty Island until they found the dock, enlarged from what it had been in the 2000s, and boarded a boat—it was thankfully free, like the ferry of their time. Once onboard they found seats on top, away from the noisy interior where most of the tourists stayed to drink.

  After a few more minutes, the boat pushed away and drifted across the Upper Bay. But the soothing motion of the water didn’t relax Monroe. Across from them, hundreds of unrecognizable buildings towered. Walkways connected dozens of the tallest skyscrapers; the city had become a spiderweb. It was possible that the New York Monroe knew was still there, buried. One World Trade, the Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building could all still stand, but they weren’t visible.

  For the first time, Monroe didn’t belong in his city.

  “I’m sorry,” he told the wind. “I’m so sorry.”

  So much had happened so fast.

  Ana had crashed into Charlotte as she spun through time—and then the three of them vanished. What then? Charlotte would’ve fought Ana. Bill would’ve focused on the bomb, maybe enlisted Charlotte if she had a chance. And Ana … There was no way she would risk getting sucked through time. So with Charlotte and Bill focused on defusing or discarding the bomb, she would’ve stolen Charlotte’s astrolabe.

  She could’ve gotten away easily while they struggled to defuse her most complicated bomb. Whatever emergency the guard had run for, it wouldn’t be Monroe’s sister or boyfriend. It would’ve been Ana, returning too late to get her astrolabe.

  That meant that either Charlotte and Bill were trapped on Liberty Island in the past or—if the bomb had gone off—they’d been swept through time. And without Charlotte’s astrolabe, wherever they were, they were stuck.

  Monroe had two choices: he could either let their sacrifice be worth it, let them die in some other time. Or he could keep using Ana’s device. Get the hang of it. Help them. First he had to get Felix and Charlie safe, get them back home. Then he’d deal with Ana.

  “Uncle ’Roe.” Charlie tugged on Monroe’s sleeve. “We’re here.”

  The boat had come to a stop at Battery Park. What had been a grassy area once was now filled with dozens of bright buildings, ready to entice tourists. They exited the boat and walked along the shoreline, passing a dazzling aquarium whose building extended below the Upper Bay’s waves. Past the aquarium, along the southern tip of Manhattan, the crowd dwindled. Only a few businessmen strolled by, wholly focused on conversations to no one. A scree
n on a nearby shop had the time and date scrolling along with some news.

  Five hundred years in the future.

  Wasn’t this what he wanted? Didn’t this prove that he’d been right? Charlotte could’ve sent him to the future. He could’ve researched from here. Maybe he could’ve found out exactly how to stop the Blast without putting anyone in danger.

  None of that mattered.

  All he felt was dread.

  “You can do this,” Felix said. His voice grew as he encouraged, “You’re smart, just like her.”

  Monroe felt a twinge of guilt for all the times he’d asked Charlotte whether she and Felix were compatible. “Well,” he said, “just so long as you don’t mind a tour through New York’s future.” He needed to stay focused. Otherwise he’d get daunted by everything he had to do.

  After a slight spin, several buildings around them deconstructed. Battery Park glowed in the distance. The buildings that remained still had interconnecting walkways. They reached up taller than anything from Monroe’s time. The store nearby was gone, but they were clearly still in the future.

  He spun more, and every building deconstructed, leaving behind the older buildings of Monroe’s time. The boardwalk running around Manhattan stripped away. Battery Park didn’t have a single building inside.

  “Shit,” Monroe said. In their time, Battery Park would have a few statues, at least. “I told you this wouldn’t be easy.” But then, instead of spinning, Monroe kept his hand on the mesh, watching the stars move slowly, the symbol readout changing a few digits at a time. Getting the hang of how to use this stranger’s astrolabe.

  He released after watching, then would check the date at a nearby news seller. Eventually, he got them home. He even felt like he could understand the numbers—if not the digits themselves, at least which section was years, which the months, which the days. That was something.

  Just across the bay, he, Charlotte, Bill, Felix, and Charlie were arriving at Liberty Island. He could call, right now, and fix this. But that’d probably mean a headache. That’d probably just make everything worse.

  “Now you’re gonna save Mom, right?” Charlie asked, his eyes bright with hope. “Right, Uncle ’Roe?”

  “Right, Charlie,” Monroe said. It never ended, not ever. He’d rescued Charlie and Felix, but there was more to do. There was always more to do.

  • • • • • • • • • • • •

  Bankrupt of ideas on where Charlotte and Bill could be, exhausted from the work of getting home, Monroe collapsed on Felix’s couch. He had no trouble falling asleep, and there were no dreams he could remember. But when he awoke in midafternoon, something about the apartment felt strange. Wrong.

  He couldn’t put a finger on it, so he got up, grabbed a glass of water, and sat at Felix’s table. It was important, but why? How could this apartment impact his need to save Charlotte and Bill? His need to stop Ana?

  Although he couldn’t name it, it was there. Just like the image of Bill that his subconscious had seen in the rebuilt New York Public Library. He had to trust himself.

  Monroe had never been in this Felix’s apartment, but it didn’t look too different from when Charlotte lived there. The couch was shabbier. The table was cluttered with mail instead of technology. Charlie’s whitewashed door still had a few of his earlier drawings affixed to it.

  Was it Charlie? No, they’d saved Charlie. So how could his door be important? Why couldn’t Monroe stop staring at it?

  And then it came rushing to him. “Charlie’s door.” He leaped from his water and traced the lines on a drawing Charlie had made of him, Charlotte, and Felix. But in a world where the original Charlie had never been born—as they assumed would happen once they stopped the Blast—he wouldn’t be around to draw anything.

  Still crouching on the floor, Monroe pulled out his phone, breathing hard, and looked up the day that was forever in his mind: April 8, 2016, the day of the Blast. As he read through the news of that day, everything clicked into place.

  The guard had been called away. Ana had gotten free. Charlie still had a place in this world.

  Although its size had been diminished, the Blast had still happened.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  THE NEW BLAST

  JUNE 26, 2023

  Unwilling to wake and worry Felix and Charlie, Monroe grabbed Ana’s astrolabe and pushed out into the sticky late-afternoon air. He had to see the devastation caused by the bomb—a fifth that Ana must have created since Charlotte and Bill stopped the fourth.

  No longer was the Blast a cross or a single line cutting through Manhattan. Now it was localized. Only a small circle of Manhattan had been taken through time. The circle of erased land barely passed the streets surrounding the New York Public Library. Although she’d never admit it, Ana had started to regret her actions. The minimized destruction of the Blast proved that.

  That idea vanished when Monroe stepped into the redbrick circle that marked the new Blast. Almost every building around the library had large chunks cut out. A series of metal struts kept some aloft, but most were swathed in scaffolding. The Blast may’ve been smaller, but it still destroyed too many adjacent buildings.

  In the center of the circle, the new New York Public Library had been rebuilt in almost the same way as when the full Blast happened. The waterways surrounding it were gone, of course, along with the four trams that had connected the island to Manhattan. But new lions were installed. Every stone brick recut to precision. Even a new metal eagle perched above the entry. And where there had been only water in the timeline with the full Blast, there was Bryant Park. It was green and beautiful, as it had been before the Blast.

  The beauty didn’t matter. “Dammit, Ana. Dammit, Leanor.” Why had her older self thought they could stop her? Didn’t she realize that her past self would never stop? She was still too afraid of the Council. She would never regret the Blast if it had never occurred.

  Charlotte had been right; Ana’s regret was integral.

  There were so many questions they should’ve asked Leanor. In the distant future she’d been too certain that they’d save her. She hadn’t given them the specifics they needed to actually stop the Blast. So convinced of her stupid plan, she hadn’t given any thought to their questions.

  Why had she constructed the Blast like she did—in four separate places—if only the middle mattered? What about the Council necessitated such destruction? If only three people appeared, why not focus it on their exact entry, three people wide? And the library, centered at both Blasts. “Why the goddamned library?”

  For Ana to target it specifically must mean that it was where the Council arrived. Was she unable to see exactly where the Council would appear without becoming a target once more? Had they hidden that well? Or was the library too big—too full of nooks, crannies, and bookshelves—to search it completely?

  The truth was, it didn’t matter. Ana had bombed the library, which meant the Council arrived there. That was enough. But Monroe wasn’t going to stop the Blast on his own. He needed to retrieve Bill and Charlotte first.

  Unfortunately, he had no clue where they’d be. He guessed that Charlotte had spun them to New York’s prehistory. But then Ana must have stolen Charlotte’s astrolabe, leaving them stranded. Did that mean they were stuck on Bedloe’s Island, the bomb defused? Or had they been unable to defuse it?

  He had to find out which. He pounded up the stairs to the library’s reading room. Just as Charlotte had told him, researching was his forte. He slid to one of the computer bays and tapped away, pulling up the history of Liberty Island.

  It still began as a shallow oyster bed, but now it was more of a doughnut of land. When the island was expanded for Fort Wood, the landfill began in the center, filling the hole that no one investigated. The hole that was too perfectly shaped to be anything but man-made. Or, rather, bomb-made.

  Ana’s fourth bomb had still gone off. Without an astrolabe, Charlotte and Bill couldn’t have gotten away. They woul
d’ve been taken to wherever New York and the Council had gone. God, Leanor hadn’t even told them that. Without that information, there was no way Monroe could use Ana’s astrolabe to find his boyfriend and sister.

  He pushed himself back from the screen, staring at the glass.

  There was one way to find them.

  A stupid, foolish way—especially if he was wrong, and Charlotte and Bill were simply waiting for him on the shore of Bedloe’s Island. But he had Ana’s astrolabe. He had a way out of whenever the Blast would take him.

  Because that was his stupid idea.

  Get transported in the Blast.

  All he needed was one final piece of information. A current screenshot from a satellite far above. In their rush to memorialize, to make sense of this Blast, New York had given him the tools to find the exact center.

  Outside, he walked, then ran, then walked, then ran his way across the red brick and grass rings that made up Bryant Park. They alternated in ever-smaller circles, a target that New York would never forget. And at the center, a single circular piece of stone, with a crosshair cut into it.

  There were dozens of tourists around, somberly walking the circles one by one. A group of three stood around the center circle, their hands clasped together, their heads bowed in prayer. A little boy lay in a grassy circle nearby, staring up at the sun.

  Kneeling opposite the boy, Monroe pulled Ana’s astrolabe from the bowling-ball bag that Bill had brought back with him. It would take him a little time, jumping back, then forward, slowly centering on the morning of the Blast. But he had all the time he needed. He’d get there. He’d get caught in the bomb. And then he’d bring back Charlotte and Bill just as he had Felix and Charlie.

  He froze, hands still on the mesh astrolabe. The little boy across the way kept staring at the sunlight, then squeezing his eyes shut, then opening them again.