The Last Beginning

by Lauren James

  “You remember him?” Clove and Ella both asked together.

  Kate nodded. “I remember all of my lives. I remembered months ago.”

  Ella’s eyebrows raised. “I didn’t know that,” she said, confused.

  “What’s happening?” Matthew asked.

  Clove didn’t answer. She realized that she should have asked Ella sooner what she knew about Kate and Matt. Ella could probably have explained everything, but Clove had been too overwhelmed to consider it before now.

  “I don’t understand,” Matthew said, still holding Kate tightly.

  “You’re reincarnated,” Clove said quickly. “For some reason that I never worked out, you and Katherine keep being brought back to life, throughout history. Kate is one of the newest versions.”

  “I know why,” Kate said. “It’s because we needed to have a child. My daughter, Clove. That’s why we keep coming back.”

  Clove broke into a nervous smile. Kate thought the reincarnation was because of her? “Er, that would be me. Hi.” Clove waved at Kate.

  “My daughter is a baby,” Kate said. “She’s only three days old.”

  Clove shrugged. “Time machine.”

  Kate’s expression turned serious. “Clove?”

  “Hi, Mum.”

  Kate stared hard at Clove. There was a long silence, and then she abruptly burst into tears. “I left you,” she said. “I had to leave you, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s OK,” Clove said, touching her arm and trying to sound reassuring, even in such a strange situation. “Tom was a great dad.”

  “Tom raised you? Matt and I never come back?” Kate gasped.

  Clove nodded, unwillingly. She didn’t want to upset Kate, but she couldn’t lie to her. For Kate, this was all new and raw – especially as she’d given birth only days before. Clove had had a lifetime to get used to the idea of Tom being her father. She couldn’t imagine it any other way.

  “That’s why we’re here,” Ella interrupted. “To make sure you get Matt home.”

  “You’re going to help me rescue Matt?” Kate said, sniffing, just as Clove said, “We are?”

  “We’re going to get him out of prison,” Ella confirmed. “And take you both home to your family.”

  Clove was gobsmacked. They were going to take Kate and Matt home? After all these years? How could Ella bring her here and suggest something so life-changing as if it was no big deal, without even asking Clove if she wanted her parents to come home? What would it mean if Kate and Matt came home? Would Clove have to leave Tom and Jen and move out?

  She couldn’t believe Ella was doing this to her.

  Kate’s emotions clearly weren’t so mixed. She’d grabbed Clove’s hand like she never wanted to let go, tears of joy running down her cheeks.

  “I have absolutely no idea what is happening,” Matthew said. “What do you mean when you say I’m … reincarnated?”

  Clove took a deep breath and pushed her feelings aside. She had brought Matthew to the future, and she had a duty to make sure he didn’t go crazy because of it − which, judging by his frenzied eyes, and the way he was holding tightly to Kate’s arm, was very close to happening.

  “OK. Matthew, you and Kate are born over and over again, throughout history. Every time you are born, you get together and do something important, like what you did at Carlisle to help stop the Jacobite Uprising. In the early twenty-first century you were born again, and when you were trying to do your big thing − which in this case was stopping a biological weapon being used in warfare − the version of you here was arrested and taken to prison. Kate escaped to Scotland, where she gave birth to me. So I guess I’m technically not actually your daughter? I’m the daughter of another version of you. Are you with me so far?”

  Matthew shook his head. Clove persevered. Even if he didn’t understand, at least he looked a little calmer.

  “After Kate gave birth to me, a few days ago, she decided to try and break Matt out of prison, so they could finish their task of stopping this biological weapon from killing millions of people. She left Me-as-a-Baby with your – Matt’s – brother. He raised me, because Kate and Matt disappeared for ever after that. We had no idea where they went, for sixteen years. So Ella here decided that Kate probably needed our help, and brought us here − to a time before they disappeared.”

  “That sounds about right,” Kate said, in a tiny, overwhelmed voice.

  “Forgetting all of that,” Ella said to Kate, “you just said you thought you were reincarnated because of Clove? How did you know?”

  “Sorry, who are you again?” Kate asked.

  “This is my friend Ella,” Clove said quickly, before Ella could make another unsubstantiated claim about their relationship status. “She’s the one with the time machine. She’s from the future.”

  “Oh!” Kate said, and let go of Clove’s hand to take Ella’s. “It’s great to meet you.”

  “It’s lovely to meet you too,” Ella said. “So, you were saying about Clove…?”

  “Right,” Kate said. “Clove is the reason we were reincarnated, I think. I worked out that in every other life we never had any children, so I figured we kept being reborn until we did. Clove must grow up to do something really important.” Kate took Clove’s hand again, smiling at her proudly and affectionately.

  Ella snorted. “That’s a good theory. You’ve got it a bit backwards, though.”

  “What do you mean?” Clove asked. “I thought you said I do end up being important! You said I saved millions of lives.”

  “You do. But your parents aren’t somehow magically reborn to make sure that you are alive to do that. They are reborn because of you doing that.”

  “What?” Kate and Clove asked together.

  “You change history using your parents,” Ella explained. “That’s how it works, your History Control. You make sure that there is a version of your parents alive in every time period where they could be useful. You put them there and make sure they meet. Together they act like white blood cells for the universe. They isolate issues and fix them, and make sure things happen the way they should. In the last beginning, back in 2040, Kate gave birth to you.”

  Clove’s brain switched itself off, then turned on again. She couldn’t process what Ella was saying.

  “Dropping people into pivotal moments of history is a crude prototype for the current system of History Control in my time,” Ella continued. “But it worked for you. You thought it would be less intrusive to history to use existing people, rather than to send in loads of agents from the future, who might mess things up beyond repair. I think you’d been burned by your first mission and by all of the changes you made in your visit to 1745.”

  “You put us here?” Kate asked Clove, trying to catch up. “But why? How?”

  “I have no idea,” Clove said. The idea was unbelievable… But Ella wouldn’t have any reason to lie, surely. That meant Clove was going to use her parents to change history. She had been the one planting them in the past. This whole thing was Clove’s fault. “Why would I do that, Ella? It doesn’t make any sense.”

  Ella pulled a face, clearly trying to work out how to explain it. “You thought that Kate and Matt had the … instinct, you called it, in your book. They could sense what needed doing better than any computer.”

  Clove shook her head. “That’s ridiculous. There’s no way I’m going to do that.”

  Ella shrugged. “You will.”

  Clove glared at her and folded her arms. “I think I know my own mind.” She was annoyed at how cockily certain Ella was of everything. It made her feel like she had no control over her own future.

  “I know the future, Clove. I literally know exactly what is going to happen. I promise that you will do this.”

  “Oh, you can’t just use the fact that you ‘know the future’ to win every argument, Ella!” Clove retorted. “How is that fair?”

  “If you’d just listen to me—”

  “Stop tellin
g me what to do!” Clove burst out.

  Before Ella could reply, Kate cleared her throat. She looked between the two of them. “Uh, how did you two meet?”

  “Ella stalked me,” Clove replied at the same time as Ella said, “I saved her life.”

  Kate sighed. “I think we’ve all got a lot of catching up to do.”

  “Yes, please,” Matthew said. He pressed his forehead to Kate’s, sighing loudly.

  CHAPTER 34

  History Control Assignment

  Name Elenore Walker

  Form 71

  Fill in the gaps in the time loop diagram below. Identify the main paradox intrinsic to Clove Sutcliffe’s life.

  This is a paradox because Clove would never have timetravelled if her parents hadn’t been placed throughout history, but they are placed throughout history because she travelled.

  File note: Homework assignment submitted by ELENORE WALKER for her history class

  LEEDS, ENGLAND, 2040

  After the bus had deposited them in Leeds, Matthew, Kate, Ella and Clove checked into a hotel. It had been nerve-racking, seeing as the group was comprised of a terrorist and three time travellers, none of whom had legitimate identification, which was an issue during the political tensions in 2040. They ended up in a disreputable motel on the outskirts of the city, because nowhere else would take them.

  To Clove, this time looked old-fashioned and sparse. The streets stank of exhaust fumes, and everyone seemed wary and suspicious. To Matthew, it was all a miracle. It was almost impossible to get him up to the motel room, because he wanted to inspect everything, from bus stops to carpets to light fittings.

  “Excuse me for a minute, will you?” Kate said, throwing her rucksack onto one of the twin beds and pulling out a breast pump. “My body still thinks I’ve got a baby to look after.” Her gaze drifted to Clove. She shook her head. “I still can’t believe you’re her. You’re so grown up. You look just like Matt.”

  “She has your eyes,” Matthew said.

  Kate’s own eyes brimmed with tears. She brushed them away. “I miss you so much,” she said to him. “I know you’re here, but it’s not … you’re not…” She sighed. “I miss my You.”

  “I miss my You too,” Matthew echoed.

  They stared at each other with an intensity that made Clove look away. “Shall we go and get some food?” she asked Ella.

  Ella nodded and pulled out a few banknotes, before passing them to Clove.

  Clove was suspicious at how prepared Ella seemed to be for this trip. Had she been carrying money from 2040 around the whole time because she had been planning to bring Clove here? She must have done so much research about this time to know exactly where Kate would be and when. Why had Ella never mentioned her plans to Clove?

  When they were on the street, Ella stopped and turned to Clove. “Go on then.”

  “What?” Clove said, surprised.

  “Didn’t you bring me out here to fight?”

  Clove squirmed under her steady gaze. “No.”

  “Yes, you did.” Ella crossed her arms defensively, and then uncrossed them and tucked her hair behind her ears.

  Clove blew out an exhale. “Fine. I don’t know what you’re doing, Ella. I asked you to help me take Matthew to 1745, and instead you brought us to 2040, completely out of the blue. You obviously had it all planned out in advance because you brought money with you, and you knew exactly where Kate would be.”

  Ella tried to speak, but Clove pushed on. She needed to get it all out.

  “And anything could happen while we’re here! I’ve destroyed the future once. I don’t want to do it again! We’ve already made things worse by showing Matthew even more of the future. It’s getting so complicated! You should have told me what you were planning. I really, really don’t want to be here, Ella.”

  “I’m sorry,” Ella said, blinking quickly, tears filling her eyes. “I wanted to help, but I didn’t think things through. I can be really bossy sometimes, I know. I’m really, really sorry. I messed up.”

  “Just ask me, will you, next time? I feel like you’re … I don’t know…” Clove pushed her hair back from her face. She still felt annoyed. “You’re enjoying that you’ve got this leverage over me, because you know everything that happens. You’re marching ahead with all this confidence, doing everything according to your textbooks. But you can’t tell me what to do and then expect me to do it. Surely that’s not the way it works! If you make all the decisions for me, then I will never do any of the things you think I’m going to do. You will have done them all.”

  “You want me to pretend I don’t know what happens?”

  “No! I want you to work with me, so we can decide together what the best thing to do is, regardless of what your textbook happens to say. Ella, you study History Control! Your entire life is about finding the best path of history, the most optimal version of events! Why is this any different?”

  Ella’s frown disappeared. “Oh. I can do that.” Ella held Clove’s hand, swiping her thumb along the sensitive skin of Clove’s wrist. “I really am sorry.”

  Clove could feel Ella’s heartbeat thumping against the skin. It sent shivers through her. Her breath came out too sharp. She wanted to cradle Ella’s cheek, to push her fingers into her hair. “I didn’t want to have to regret becoming emotionally invested in you,” she said in a whisper.

  Ella laughed quietly.

  There was an unfamiliar low-level thrumming under Clove’s skin. Clove took a step closer to Ella, forcing the space between them into nothing. Ella’s hand was on the small of her back, her gaze on Clove’s lips.

  Clove drew a breath in, and then all of a sudden they were kissing, softening together like wax. Ella’s hair felt like silk when Clove pushed her hand through it. When she touched Ella’s scalp, Ella made a small hitching sound that went straight to the base of Clove’s spine. Clove had never felt anything as good as the brush of her tongue against Ella’s, the slow exploration of each other’s mouths, the soft warmth and catch of her teeth on Ella’s lips.

  Clove remembered Ella’s declaration, “I’m the love of your life,” and the thought shot heat right through her. Her mind went deliciously blank of anything that wasn’t Ella − the viciously bossy girl wrapped up in her arms.

  This was the polar opposite of her kiss with Meg, and of the fear and panic that had followed it. Clove felt safe. She could fall without worry, knowing that Ella would catch her.

  When they finally pulled apart, Ella blinked dazedly. “That was my first kiss,” she said, touching a finger to the swollen pink of her mouth, which was the same colour as her bright cheeks.

  Clove took her hand. “I wish it had been mine.”

  “It wasn’t?” Ella asked, her look sharpening.

  Clove grinned. “That’s not in the textbook, then?”

  She pulled Ella down the street, telling her about Meg while they searched for a chippy, and restraining herself from dropping kisses on Ella’s lips more than once a metre.

  When they finally got back to the motel room with bags full of food and grease, Kate was curled up beside Matthew on one of the beds, her head on his shoulder.

  They all sat on the bed, pulling flaming hot chips out of the paper and comparing details of each of their timelines.

  Clove couldn’t remember ever feeling so happy.

  CHAPTER 35

  File note: Blueprint of Wakefield Prison

  LEEDS, ENGLAND, 2040

  “So what are you doing here?” Kate asked when they’d finished eating and explaining the joint phenomena of hot showers and Harry Potter to Matthew. “Are you going to help me break Matt out of prison?”

  Ella looked at Clove, who was leaning against the headboard, chewing on a toothpaste tablet. Clove was pleased that she was actually waiting for her to make the decision, and she smiled at her. Clove wanted to think about it carefully before deciding. She was reluctant to mess with the past again. What if breaking Matt out of prison here in 2040 chang
ed something in 2056? It might be too much of a risk, however immoral it was to leave him there.

  Although he really did break out of prison in 2040. It was a fact: something that had always happened. Surely she wouldn’t be changing history so much as helping it on a bit? Besides, what if they had always come here to break Matt out of prison?

  “I think we should, yes,” Clove said, slowly. “I think we’re supposed to. Nobody could ever work out how Matt had escaped. It must have been the Skim that got him out, all along.”

  “Thank you,” Kate said, looking hugely relieved. “I had no idea where to start, honestly. But if you can use your Skim thing, that’ll be loads easier. I had a vague plan to, like, dig a tunnel or seductively bribe a guard or something. I have an old Victorian floor plan of the prison that we could use to find him, once we know what cell he’s in. It might be out of date by now, though. We might end up in an ancient slurry pit.” Kate began flicking through files on a tablet that looked slow and clunky to Clove. Between Kate’s tablet, Clove’s watch and Ella’s Skim, they had almost the entire history of computers in one room.

  Ella’s hand was resting on the bed next to Clove’s. Clove moved her little finger so that they were just touching. “Spart, any chance you could find a newer map?” Clove asked, enjoying the tingle of Ella’s skin against hers.

  > I can certainly do that. The prison won’t have any security protection against AIs in this time period. We won’t be widely used for another decade.

  > I should also be able to stop the security cameras from recording during your visit.

  “I can open a wormhole in his cell, but at least one of us will have to go through to bring him back,” Ella said. “It should all be super easy if I have the coordinates. We’ll need to find out exactly which cell is his, of course.”

  Matthew cleared his throat. “Er,” he said. “If you don’t mind, I would really like to go home before you do any of this. I don’t think I would be of much use to you, and, as pleasant as it has been to meet you all” − he cast a goofy look at Kate, which made Clove wonder what the two of them had been up to while Clove and Ella had been outside snogging − “I am ready to return to my own time.”