Rift (Rift Walkers #1)

by Elana Johnson

  “This neighborhood is one of the best in Castle Pines,” Dad says. “Oh, look there. See those lights? Those are the crime lords.”

  A huge, black vehicle—similar to the Humvee I rode in—slithers toward the camera. Orange and yellow lights flicker over the chaos in the streets. As the vehicle passes, doors open and people shuffle onto porches.

  Dad ducks to the side of the window, but keeps the camera focused in the street. I want to yell at him to get out of there, that something bad is going to happen.

  “Stop,” I say, but the vid keeps playing. The vehicle rolls to a stop right in front of my house, and a tall, slick man exits. He wears a long, black coat and sunglasses, even though it’s the middle of the night. He points a gun toward someone standing on my porch.

  The deafening sound of a gunshot is followed only by his loud voice saying, “This neighborhood now belongs to the Neapolitan Crew.”

  The flick fades to black, and I understand several things at once.

  People who exist in a different dimension could come through the rift—straight to my bedroom, which is geographically anchored to the rift in both time and space.

  They could assume my identity, my dad’s identity, anyone’s identity. The time rift that runs through my bedroom is hella dangerous. Not just for me, but for everyone in this dimension.

  I shut everything down as quickly as I can, taking care to make sure I can’t be traced. Even when I’m settled back into my locked cell, I don’t feel safe. I don’t want to be released tomorrow, and I certainly can’t go home—where the rift could open at any moment and my alter ego could step through and slit my throat.

  Saige

  HEATH AND I RETURN TO CASCADE’S house without incident. We find Shep sleeping in the armchair, so I tell Heath I need a minute, and I go upstairs to Cascade’s room. It’s a disaster, with clothes piled everywhere and gadgets all over. I almost start crying remembering how messy she was. I stuff down the emotion and trail my fingers over her dresser, imagining her standing there, looking into the mirror and admiring the lights implanted into her face.

  She seems so different than the sister I knew. I haven’t seen her yet, haven’t been able to look into her face and know. I never really looked at her when I drove her and Price into the city. She scared me more than anything, and I’d done everything I could to ignore the spikes and leather and flashing lights.

  I head back downstairs, where Heath has gathered some food for us. “You gotta eat,” he says, pushing a plate toward me. It has two slices of leftover pizza on it. The thought of eating it makes me sick.

  “I’m not hungry.” I glance at the counter and the walls. “Does Cascade have those fancy screens like you do?”

  Heath takes a bite of his pizza as he moves to the wall behind the table. “I’m sure Cas has a rod that can see through walls and a pellet that can reduce the air temperature. She’s good with gadgets.” He taps the wall and it brightens. “We might be able to find something on this. Cas liked to keep a journal.”

  “You know Cascade well, then?” I ask. Jealousy squirms inside, making my empty stomach feel even more hollow. I hate that this boy knows more about my sister than I do.

  “She’s in my social group,” he says, looking uncomfortable. “The government assigns us friends, you know? So I see her every few days. We hang out and stuff.”

  Hang out and stuff. I start nodding and I can’t stop. I glance down, where the same journal he pulled up on the wall is on the screen on the counter. “Do you mind if I…?”

  “Go wild,” Heath says. “I need to take care of some things for tomorrow’s…events.”

  “What was all that with your brother?”

  “I’m getting him out of there,” Heath says. He gestures to the countertop screen. “Let me know if you find anything.” He settles on the couch in the living room. The silence between us feels strained for the first few minutes, then I realize that he’s busy doing something I simply can’t hear. I have no doubt Heath is making all kinds of arrangements, but it’s all happening inside his mind.

  I focus on Chloe’s computer. She did love keeping journals, especially about her scientific studies. I have trouble finding the right thing though. She has a file for everything.

  After a while, I hear Heath’s steady breathing and realize he’s fallen asleep. It’s starting to get dark outside, and I decide to check one more journal.

  The first page brings up a maze of purple dots connected by buzzing blue lights. Measurements are detailed between gaps, and in the margin, Chloe’s written Photons in rift getting closer. Caused by increased laser power?

  I think of the note she gave me when I drove her into the city. She’d disguised her handwriting—something you only do to trick someone. I grind my teeth together at the thought of her concealing her identity from me on freaking purpose.

  “Heath,” I say. He doesn’t move, and I wonder if he’s a bad waker-upper like Shep is. I glance at the old man still snoozing in the armchair. My heart clenches at the thought of my teenage brother left alone in the past.

  I step to the couch and jostle Heath. “Heath.”

  “Hmm, what?” He sits up straight.

  “Come look at this.”

  Heath takes a minute to gain his bearings before he joins me at the counter.

  “What does this mean?” I tap the screen again and again, and each time, the calculations show the photons in the rift getting closer and closer together. At the bottom of the fourth panel, Chloe’s written, “Explosion?”

  Heath frowns at the screen. “Look, she’s programmed in a simulation.” He points to an arrow in the bottom corner. “This is about the time rift at Price’s house?”

  “I don’t know,” I say.

  Heath exits out of the file, studies the name of it, and re-enters the document. “I can’t tell,” he mutters. “You wanna watch the sim?”

  “I guess,” I tell him.

  He touches the screen. The lights vibrate and switch and pinkify, and then they explode. I watch as the sparks dim, leaving the counter black and stagnant. I don’t dare breathe in the silence that follows.

  “Whoa,” Heath says.

  I open my mouth, and a squeak comes out.

  “Exactly,” Heath says. “And I need to use that rift before that happens.”

  I breathe, and the world seems to spin at the right rate again. “Those exploding lights didn’t look good.” I tap the counter and another page in the journal comes up.

  Chloe’s written: The more the rift gets used, the more it fuses together. The yearly destinations we can visit will shrink as the rift becomes flatter. Traveling months, weeks, or days will be impossible.

  Heath and I read the entry, and then we look at each other. “Is she saying she won’t be able to come home?”

  “I think she’s saying the rift is going to collapse,” Heath says.

  I glance out the sliding glass door as a shadow darkens it. Looks like rain, feels like it in my chest too. If the rift collapses, Chloe can’t come home. I can’t get home.

  Heath flips through pages of notes in Chloe’s glowing handwriting, most of them marred with equations and arrows and boxes with exclamations like Have Newt tell Guy! and Run another test! or Take additional measurements with a low-level laser.

  I scan as he goes. Chloe doodles in the corner of her screens, and I imagine the way she bites her lip while she thinks, letting her stylus go wherever it will. She’s a good artist too, and I see technical drawings of gadgets, I see a bank of lasers shooting bright light toward a wall, I see Price’s face. I see his name, with a box around it. His name with an exclamation point. His name with a heart for the dot on the i.

  Maybe she hasn’t come home because she’s fallen in love, I think. I focus on Chloe’s handwriting in an effort to calm the rising emotion. In the corner of the screen she’s written Price’s full name. Below it is Cascade Kaufman, like she was lining them up to see how they look next to each other.

 
In a box near the bottom, she’s written:

  Tomorrow?

  Next week??

  Soon!

  It could be a reminder to herself to ask Price out. More likely, it’s a warning about the rift.

  Soon, I think, and wonder if I have enough time to find my sister and get through the rift before everything blows up.

  Price

  WITHOUT CIRCUIT ACCESS I CAN’T communicate with anyone. Cooper and I exchange a few hurried words about the forthcoming breakout during shower privileges. After I’m released, my only job is to find Heath and coordinate with him.

  When I get back to my cell after showering, Dad’s waiting in the hall. “Are you ready?” He scans me from head to toe. Cooper throws me one last glance before entering his cell and pretending like he doesn’t care what’s going on with me.

  Dad dismisses the Hood and steps slowly toward the exit. “You’ve been cleared for release,” he says. “I had to pull a lot of strings for this. I expect you to keep your promises.”

  I know which promise he’s referring to: Stay out of the rift.

  “No problem,” I say. I don’t want to see that rift again. I don’t know how I’m going to sleep in that room. “Dad—” I start, but I don’t know how to continue. I saw this freaky flick in Sector O, and now I’m afraid to go home sounds weird inside my own head.

  “The rift is safe, right?” I ask in the lowest voice I can. Everyone is watching us, and one man purposely moves closer to his electronic door so he can overhear us.

  “Safe enough,” he answers in an equally quiet voice. “I have guards stationed at the house around the clock.”

  The intense security at our house suddenly makes sense. It’s not for Dad, and it’s not because of his business—well, maybe it is—but not only for his business.

  “I’m sending you with one of my guards today,” Dad says. “We’re not going home for a few days, okay? Everything is fine.” He opens the door to the hall, where Monroe is waiting, decked out in his full security garb. I can see myself in his mirrored sunglasses, and I look like a scared little boy.

  “This the boy?” he asks as if he doesn’t know me.

  If I didn’t know Monroe, he’d strike fear directly between my ribs. I glare at him, completing the game he started.

  “I need you to take him to my apartment.” Dad puts his hand on my arm and looks at me. “Price, I have everything under control.”

  “Okay,” I say, wanting to shrug his hand away. All I see when I look at him is how he’s using the rift for illegal walks. Every time he does, he’s putting me and Mom in danger—he’s putting everyone in this dimension in danger.

  Monroe jerks his head toward the exit. “Let’s go.”

  Outside, Monroe opens the back door of a sleek auto, and I wait until he’s behind the wheel and the locks have deployed before I say, “Are you my babysitter now?”

  “Yep,” he says. “Your dad wants to make sure you stay out of trouble.” He meets my gaze in the rear-view mirror and smirks. “At least for one day.”

  I lean against the headrest and close my eyes. The flick I watched last night parades through my mind. I sit up and open my eyes. I don’t want to see that again. The problem is, I can’t stop seeing it. I can’t erase that gunshot from my ears.

  “I have a job this afternoon,” Monroe says. “Heath says we need to pick him up at 3:30.”

  “Great,” I say. “Can you take me there now?”

  “Can’t. Your dad wants you at the apartment, so that’s where you’ll be.”

  “I have to be at the Bureau to help Heath,” I argue.

  “I know,” Monroe growls. “And you will be. But we’re hanging at the apartment until then.”

  He parks on the street, but I can’t open the auto from the inside, so I wait for him. “Listen, Price,” he says after he opens the door, leaning into the vehicle so I can’t get out. “I overheard a couple of Hoods talking about the Black Hat while I was waiting in the Bureau.”

  I stare at him, my heartbeat rippling as I struggle to make sense of what he’s said. “So what?”

  “I know who he is.” He steps away so I can get out of the auto.

  I follow him into the apartment and the lift. “Does my dad know?” I ask, continuing the conversation about the Black Hat.

  “Not yet. Listen, Price,” he says, his voice nearly too low to hear. “The Hoods just want someone to take the fall as the Black Hat. It doesn’t have to be you.” He moves out of the lift and down the hall to our apartment.

  “Thanks, Monroe,” I say. I riddle through what he means while I eat breakfast and run a jam in Ohio to hopefully lure the Hoods away from Castle Pines. If I have to spend the day in the apartment, I might as well be productive. I wish Cascade were sitting next to me, biting her thumbnail and reminding me to stitch my code tight though I don’t need her assistance.

  With the rift miles away and my dad’s promise that he has everything under control, every thought focuses on how I can keep the Black Hat one step ahead of the Hoods. I do not want to go back to that prison.

  Price

  HEATH HAS SAIGE WITH HIM as they wait on his front porch. She looks older somehow, less like a frightened animal. Monroe unlocks the auto doors and they slide in the back next to me and Soda, who Monroe picked up on the way over.

  Heath takes one look at Soda, and everything is written on his face. He practically sits on top of her, kissing her before they begin a whispered conversation. I glance awkwardly at Saige, wondering if she knows that Soda came from the past the way Cascade did.

  “Do you know her?” I ask Saige.

  “No,” Saige says, still watching Heath and Soda as they practically make out a few feet from us.

  “Come on.” I nudge Heath with my foot, and he has the decency to put a few inches between him and Soda.

  “Blood,” Heath says. “You look…good.”

  “What happened to your face?” Saige asks.

  “Good to see you too,” I tell Heath. I eye Saige warily. “I’ve been in prison. Use your imagination.”

  Heath smirks, but Saige just stares at me. “Have you seen Cascade?”

  I shake my head. Cooper wasn’t able to find her before I left, and even Monroe doesn’t know.

  “We’ll get her out,” Heath says to her. He looks at me. “Here’s what I have planned.” He explains what he needs me to do, and what Soda’s role will be. Saige doesn’t have anything to do beyond getting in the way, but she insists on being present.

  I tell him that I have clearances to be in the system so no one should question it. I tell him I can get codes to any cell, and that I can create a diversion to draw Hoods away from the Subterranean level.

  Soda has authorization to be on the security feed, and I study her. “How do you have that authorization?”

  “My mother works for the Enforcement Squad,” she says, glancing at Saige. “It’s a real perk to know what’s going on in that department.”

  I have no idea if Heath knows she’s not from our time. She has the Receiver; she uses our technology with ease. I would’ve never known she came from sixty years in the past.

  Heath is grinning by the time we reach downtown. “I’m glad you’re out of there,” he says. “And not just because I need your help to get my brother out.”

  “Me too,” I say, though I wonder if being in prison is safer than returning to my house.

  “I need a favor after too,” Heath says, deadly serious as Monroe snakes through the high rises toward the Bureau. “I want Coop to be able to escape through the rift at your house.”

  Monroe clears his throat, and I catch his eye in the rear-view. He doesn’t have to say anything; I can tell we’re thinking the same thing.

  “Can Cooper jam?” I ask. Heath opens a chatline with me. I’m not sure if he just doesn’t want Saige to know, or Monroe to overhear, or if he just can’t vocalize what he’s thinking. Soda’s watching him encouragingly, and I suddenly realize it was her idea to u
se the rift for Cooper’s escape—the way she did once.

  Cooper could play the Black Hat, I chat him. The Hoods are hella close to finding me. I could really use some help.

  He can do it, Heath chats. Consider it payment for using the rift.

  You don’t have to pay me to use the rift.

  “What are you guys talking about?” Saige asks.

  “Nothing,” Heath says. He gives me that slight nod, the one that calms me during a jam. This time he’s saying Done. He slings his arm over Soda’s shoulder, his mouth already at her ear. I’m sure he’s filling her in on our deal.

  Inside the Bureau, Heath, Soda, and Saige check in at the electronic receptionist. I linger on the couch as if I’m waiting for someone to come down from one of the Sectors. Dinner service in the Subterranean level begins in twenty minutes. Heath planned it this way so the majority of the Hoods will be busy.

  I fiddle with the flatpanel Heath gave me, worming my way into the security system. If my presence is a problem, I’ll know before Heath gets his clearance to go downstairs and we can abort the mission. Nothing happens, so I buzz him that we’re a go.

  A few minutes later, Soda takes my place on the couch as Heath and Saige leave the reception screen. I follow them to the stairs and slip in front of Heath as the faux wall lifts to reveal the stairs. The three of us start down together, leaving Soda in the lobby. She and I will have a secure chatline open, and she can distract or delay anyone from coming down the steps if necessary.

  I stop on the first landing, the last access point to the Circuit. “Diversion first,” I say. “Send me a cell location when you find Cascade.”

  “How are we going to do that?” Saige asks. “You said there’s no Internet down here.”

  “You’ll have to run,” I say, reminding myself that her Internet is the same as my Circuit.

  “We need all outside doors open too,” Heath says. “We can’t bring people out this way.”