A Matter of Time

by Brian Harmon

  “She wasn’t bluffing, though,” said Steampunk Monk as he secured the sack and returned it to his pocket.

  Eric looked back at him. “What?”

  “If all else failed, she would’ve taken that power from your corpse.”

  He tried to wrap his head around that. “But I thought she took people’s power through sex.”

  “She does. Or did, I should say.”

  “Then how does…” He squeezed his eyes shut. “You know what? I don’t think I want to know.”

  “No. You don’t. But she wasn’t going to give up on it. Death was the only thing that was going to keep her from seeking whatever power is inside you. That means it must be significant.”

  Eric stared at him, wary. “So what do you plan to do about it?”

  “Me? Nothing. I have no interest in taking your power from you. It probably wouldn’t do me any good if I could. I have nothing to gain from it. I just find you intriguing. That’s all.”

  He wasn’t convinced, but he definitely liked where this was going. “So now what do we do?”

  “Well, now that we’ve interrupted the energy supply to this room, we won’t be having any uninvited visitors from the oblivion. And thanks to the curious nature of this school, we don’t even have to clean up after ourselves.”

  Eric glanced over at the body. “You’re just going to leave her here?”

  “Why not? She wouldn’t be the first.”

  He didn’t respond to that. He glanced over at the charred skeleton marinating in gory sludge. Creek Bend’s unseen seemed to have a disturbing habit of collecting bodies.

  Steampunk Monk looked down at his former associate. “I’m sure you’ve deduced by now that I was really sent here by my employer to see what she was up to.”

  “And to kill her?”

  “If necessary.” He met Eric’s gaze and said, “Obviously, it became necessary.”

  Eric wasn’t remotely surprised. Receiving an order to kill one of your own seemed to be just another day in the life of an agent. So you’re done here, then?

  “I am. But I do have one question before I leave. I overheard you talking about the jinn. What do you know about them?”

  “The jinn?” He hesitated, unsure how much he should say. This man had been listening to everything he and Mistress Janet said. It was obvious that he knew enough about it to warn her against summoning one. “I know they’re dangerous.”

  “They’re powerful beyond words. What do you know about the one that was trapped here under this building?”

  He decided it was better to be blunt. “I know it was your people who did it. In 1881. It burned this school and started the fire that destroyed half the city.”

  He nodded. “I see. All true except the date.”

  Eric was confused. “Not 1881?” But everyone knew that was the year of the fire. It was called the Fire of 1881.

  “Look around you. Does this look like a schoolhouse from 1881?”

  Eric instantly felt like a fool. It was true. He’d never thought about it before, but he was right. It was a little small for a modern school, but it was completely wrong for the eighteen hundreds. Did they even have high schools then? He wasn’t sure, now that he was thinking about it.

  It was another agent who put the idea in his head, he realized. Pink Shirt. Again, he glanced at the skeleton.

  He was the one who said the building was from the late eighteen hundreds. He was the one who concluded that the jinn’s hellfire was what started the Fire of 1881. Was he lying? Did he intentionally mislead him? Or was he really unaware of the events that took place here in 1962?

  How did he not realize this before now? He felt so stupid.

  “This building wasn’t even built until the late fifties.”

  “Wait… But the fire of 1881…”

  Steampunk Monk raised his eyebrows at him. “Do you think time and space matter to gods?”

  Eric stood there staring at the man, a bewildered expression on his face. What the hell did that mean? Was that some kind of movie quote?

  “My people, as you called them, plotted to summon the jinni in 1962, not 1881.”

  1962?

  Hector…

  He felt stupid. No wonder Hector’s letter was here in this building. It wasn’t unseen. It wasn’t even burned. It was still in use. This was the high school Zachery and his friends were attending. It was here, inside this building that Hector stole the book. And it was here that they all returned that night…

  “But something went wrong. Nobody knows what. The records state that just before the summoning, one of the men involved was killed. Possibly murdered by the other, who disappeared the same day.”

  All Hector’s doing, but it didn’t sound like they knew about him. Eric had no intention of telling them.

  “It happened in 1962 and in 1881. It was the same event. When those kids threw open that door, the power of the jinn catapulted the entire building back in time eighty-one years. I suspect it was only there for a moment. Then it snapped back into its rightful place. But it was enough. In 1962, the building was burned, but the surrounding city was spared, because the hellfire that exploded from the doors and windows belched forth in 1881. That’s why no one ever knew what started the fire.”

  Eric turned away and ran a hand through his hair. This was crazy. The Fire of 1881 was started in 1962? The whole school was teleported backward through time and then back again?

  Then an awful thought occurred to him. “Wait… If it’s already happened…that means he’s doomed to fail. It means nothing he can do will stop it…”

  Steampunk Monk stared back at him, baffled. “Say what now?”

  He’d been following the assumption that because there was no tragedy on record in 1962, that Hector must’ve found a way to stop the gray agents from recreating the tragedy caused by the agents of 1881. But there were no agents in 1881. It was the gray agents all along. They summoned the jinn. The only thing that happened in 1962 was the fire at the high school, which wouldn’t be on record because the building was now unseen, including all records of it.

  And if all records of the place were unseen…not only would there be no record of the fire, but anything relating to that fire would be gone, too. Including the deaths or disappearances of those kids!

  The teenagers he saw in his flashback the previous year, the ones that were incinerated when the jinn was released…they weren’t from 1881. They were from 1962. They were Zachery and his friends. It was all one event… And that meant that Hector was charging into a situation that was already destined to happen. If he was inside the school when the jinn was summoned…

  “There was never any hope…” he muttered.

  “What are you going on about?” asked Steampunk Monk.

  Eric faced him again. “Nothing,” he said. “Just…tired and confused.”

  He didn’t look convinced. “Right…”

  “So why were your people trying to summon a jinn in the first place?” he asked.

  “They weren’t. They were trying to open a portal to the jinn dimension.”

  “Oh.”

  “I don’t know what they planned on doing with that ability, but I do know the intention was to simply open a window, not to actually bring one back. No further attempts have been made. It’s pretty well agreed upon that it’d be a bad idea. It’s like you said. They’re too powerful to control.”

  “That’s good to hear at least.”

  “The real question is this: Why 1881? I don’t believe that date was random. I think there was something there, something it was drawn to, like a lightning rod of sorts.”

  “Why are you telling me all this?” asked Eric.

  The steampunk monk feigned surprise. “Just chatting. That’s all.”

  “Right.” He dabbed at one of the scratches on his face with his fingers. He was still bleeding. He probably looked like hell.

  “You should get that cleaned up.”

  “Yeah.” He turned and
looked at Jay. He was still standing over the dead woman. His fists were clenched. His jaw was set. A tear had streaked down his face. “Hey… You all right.”

  He shook his head. He said something, but it was little more than a mumble.

  “What?”

  “It’s not her,” he said. He turned and looked at Eric, his eyes glistening.

  “What do you mean, ‘not her’?”

  “It’s not her,” he said again. “That’s not the woman who did this to me.”

  Eric wasn’t sure what was more horrifying, the thought of what must be going through his head right now, three wasted years hunting the wrong woman, his vengeance torn from his grasp at the last moment, or the simple fact that there was someone else out there who was anything like her. “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “It’s time for me to leave this town,” said Steampunk Monk. He fixed Eric in his gaze. “You’re not going to try and kill me, are you?”

  He shook his head. He had no reason, he supposed. Except for the fact that this man was a member of the nameless organization that he’d grown to despise, he hadn’t really done anything evil. The worst he’d done, as far as he knew, was dump a body, and that kind of didn’t count since the body wasn’t actually dead… Also it seemed he owed the man one for saving him from Mistress Janet. (Although he was pretty sure he could’ve taken her.) He hadn’t really even hurt anyone, if he was telling the truth about all his traps being temporary.

  “Good. I appreciate it. I’ll even give you a little advice. If your friends are still feeling wonky, tell them to take a shower. Get the particles off their hair and skin and they’ll feel better a lot quicker. Won’t help the blindness—that’s going to have to run its course—but it’ll help with any of the dusts.”

  Eric nodded. “Thank you.”

  Steampunk Monk turned to Jay then. “So about what we were discussing a little while ago… Are you in?”

  Jay was staring at Mistress Janet’s body again. Now he turned and looked at him. He seemed unsure.

  “What?” asked Eric.

  “I’ve invited him to come work for me for a while,” he explained.

  “What?” he asked, shocked. “No… You can’t. That place is evil.”

  Steampunk Monk shrugged. “I can’t really argue with that. But there’s a place there for someone with his kind of talent.”

  “I don’t know much about that place,” argued Eric, “but I know once you’re in they don’t let you out. It’s a one-way ticket.”

  “Also true, but we all know there’s only one thing that matters to him. And the best way to find the woman who did him wrong is to do it from the inside.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” said Eric.

  “I’ll do it,” said Jay.

  He turned to face him again, surprised. “What?”

  “I have to find her. Nothing else matters.”

  “That’s insane. Think about what you’re saying.”

  “I’ve been thinking about it for three years,” he said. “And I thought for a second it was finally over. But it’s not. How many more years will I have to spend looking for her?”

  “You can just let it go,” said Eric. “I know what she did to your friend was awful, but he’s gone now. He’s not in pain anymore.”

  “I’m still in pain,” said Jay.

  “You don’t know she did this to you. I mean it’s not like you’d ever died before that. How do you know she did it?”

  Steampunk Monk surprised him by saying, “That’s true. Chances are you were born this way.”

  Jay looked down at Mistress Janet again.

  “It’s your choice,” said Steampunk Monk.

  He was right. Eric said no more.

  “I have to find her,” said Jay. “Whether she made it so I couldn’t die or not, she made me what I am now. I can’t let that go. Robbie deserved better.”

  Steampunk Monk nodded and looked at Eric. “Okay.”

  “Okay,” said Eric. He didn’t like it. But he wasn’t going to change his mind.

  “Let’s get going then.”

  Eric stood there in the burned auditorium, watching them walk away until they were gone. Then he stood there a while longer, his thoughts swirling in his head.

  The steampunk monk got away. Jay was gone, turned to the dark side, so it were. Mistress Janet was dead. Even the gray agents were no more.

  Holly’s visions and Hectors dreams had all come to pass after all. They failed. The town burned.

  Just not tonight. Just not in 1962. The city and her people burned in 1881. He failed to help Hector and Hector failed to stop the gray agents from completing their plan. Even though he destroyed them both, they still won in the end.

  Was it always meant to happen that way? Was there ever any chance he could’ve changed any of that?

  And what became of Hector?

  His eyes drifted to the far corner, beside the stage. He couldn’t see it without a looking glass shard, but there was a door over there. It led down into the tunnel beneath the school. That was where it happened. Zachery and his friends had died down there. He knew that for sure. He’d seen it through the jinn’s eyes.

  Had Hector died with them?

  Did he charge headlong into his own doom?

  What chance did he have? He couldn’t help him from here. From now.

  He looked around the room. One possibility occurred to him. One tiny chance. “Hector?” he said aloud. “Can you hear me? You can’t stop it. It’s already happened. They’re all going to die. If you go in there, you’ll die too. You have to stay out of the high school. You were never meant to stop what happened there that night.”

  But as he stood there, listening to the silence around him, he realized it was too late. Hector was going straight into the school at the end of the last letter. He wouldn’t have slept. He wouldn’t have dreamed. If he hadn’t already received the message, he wasn’t going to get it at all.

  It was over.

  There were no more letters.

  There was nowhere left to go but home.

  He left the room as it was and made his way back outside. As he crossed the parking lot, he pulled out his phone. Before he could ask her, Isabelle replied, ALREADY CALLED HER. SHE’S IN THE SHOWER WITH KAREN AND HOLLY RIGHT NOW

  Eric nodded. “Good. Let me know when they start acting like themselves again.” He started to lower the phone, then stopped, distracted. “Wait… Did you say they’re in the shower together?”

  REALLY?

  “Right. Sorry. Just… Right.”

  He couldn’t help it. It was a little hard to process things right now. It’d been an emotional day all around. And that mental image was… Well it was a mental image.

  He rubbed wearily at his forehead and started walking again.

  DIANE SAID SHE’LL DROP KAREN OFF AT HOME IN A LITTLE WHILE

  “Thanks.”

  SHE ALSO SAID GOOD JOB SAVING THE CITY

  “Yeah. I did great.”

  YOU DON’T KNOW THAT HECTOR DIDN’T MAKE IT

  “I know.”

  YUNA SAYS THANK YOU, BY THE WAY

  He frowned. “For what?”

  SHE SAYS YOU’RE VERY BRAVE. AND IF YOU CAN BE SO BRAVE WHILE FACING REAL MONSTERS, THEN SHE CAN BE BRAVE WHILE FACING WHAT SHE HAS TO FACE

  He stopped walking again as that sank in.

  SHE SAYS SHE’S NOT AS AFRAID ANYMORE

  WHATEVER HAPPENS NEXT…SHE SAYS SHE CAN DO IT

  BECAUSE OF YOU

  He had no reply for that. There was a sudden aching deep inside him.

  Isabelle felt it too. I KNOW, she said. JUST HEAD ON HOME. YOU’VE HAD A LONG DAY

  It had been a long day.

  He put the phone in his pocket and drove home, his heart heavy. He needed a shower and a good night’s sleep.

  If sleep would even come to him. He wouldn’t be surprised to find it impossible after all he’d been through.

  He parked in his driveway and wearily made his way to the h
ouse.

  It was waiting for him at the front door, taped to the glass where he couldn’t miss it.

  One last letter.

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Hello, Eric. It’s been a long time.

  I apologize for not coming to see you in person. I was worried that I might mess things up if I did. And I’ve made far too many mistakes already.

  By now you know I blew it pretty bad that night in October of 1962. Zachery and his friends are dead. They summoned a monster far worse than the men in the gray suits and they paid for that mistake with their lives.

  What you don’t know is how I survived the hell those poor kids unleashed that night.

  It doesn’t matter much. Not really. The story of the men in the gray suits ended in fiery tragedy. The boy hero faltered and failed. The villains got what was coming to them. But when the smoke cleared, innocent people had died.

  But that wasn’t the only story you cared about, was it? You wanted to hear my story. I owe you that much. After all, if it wasn’t for you, I’m sure I wouldn’t have survived that night either.

  So here you are, for better or worse:

  After I stole the Impala and drove it to the high school, I sat in the parking lot and wrote that next letter while I waited for Midnight to approach. Then I made sure no one was around and I headed for the nearest door.

  Almost immediately, I heard noises coming from a nearby storm drain and stopped. I had a flashlight with me. It was one of the soggy supplies I was carrying around in my bag. I shined it down through the grate and saw a monstrous face staring back at me with shining eyes.

  I jumped back, startled. Then I heard the sound of cast iron grinding together from the street behind me. I turned to see a manhole cover being lifted from underneath. When I shined my light at it, I saw the eye shine of another one.

  It was just like my dreams. Monsters with shining eyes were rising from the sewers.

  Somehow, I knew that those monsters weren’t just monsters. They were a sign. They meant that I was running out of time. They meant that Zachery and the others had already started the ritual.

  I didn’t understand how I knew these things then, but I do now. It was the book. Even then, it spoke to me, telling me things from deep inside my subconscious mind. It knew, as I do now, that those creatures were wendigoes. And they only appear in certain areas of the world, and only when something is disturbing the borders between this world and another.