Timescape

by Robert Liparulo

  “Didn’t think so,” Keal said. “Look, from what you’ve told me, these items will lead us right to the portal. I say, let’s make a run for it.”

  “What?” Xander said. “Through those . . . things, those creatures that just came after us?”

  Keal shrugged. “They’re scrawny.”

  David wished he felt Keal’s confidence.

  “Come on,” Keal prompted. He took a step up the hill, stopped to wait for them.

  Dad’s brows came together. He looked into each of his sons’ eyes. He said, “Stay close.”

  “But, Dad . . .” Xander started. His lips closed on his words. He shook his head and started to climb.

  CHAPTER

  four

  WEDNESDAY, 6:36 P.M.

  The flickering lights cranked up the dial on Toria’s panic. They fluttered on and off quickly, almost in time with her heartbeat. She lifted her head off Nana’s back to look along the crooked hallway. Way down, toward the farthest wall, a steady bright glow splashed against the floor, wall, and ceiling. It must have been coming from an open portal door. That meant the door to the antechamber leading to the portal was also open. The force tugging on Nana must be coming from there.

  A wind blew past, brushing the hair off her face. She couldn’t feel the pull, but she felt the wind. Chilly, like the air when the family went to Mammoth Mountain for skiing lessons.

  “Hold on, Nana,” she said again, and slid onto the floor. She rose and ran for the light.

  “Toria!” Nana called. “What’re you doing? Don’t go near it!”

  “The door, Nana!” she yelled. “I’m going to shut it!”

  I am. I am. I’m going to shut it.

  The flickering light came from lamps mounted to the walls between the doors—creepy things carved to look like fighting warriors or faces or animals. Their strobing—darkness, light, darkness, light—made Toria feel like she was moving through the hallway in jittery jumps, leaping forward, then stopping, leaping again. She concentrated on the steady glow at the end of the hall and kept running.

  As she approached, the air grew colder. Her tears felt icy. A light spray of water stung her cheeks.

  Then she was there, squinting into the light that poured from the open portal door and filled the antechamber. Water droplets blew in with the light, swirled around the room. The wooden floor glistened with wetness. It smelled salty, like the ocean. She started to take a step into the small room, but immediately she felt her feet sucked out from under her. She fell, twisted, grabbed the edge of the door frame, just as Nana was doing at the other end of the hall.

  Now Toria did feel the pull. It gripped her like hands, tugging her toward the portal. It was as if the portal didn’t care who was in the antechamber—it wanted someone. An image flashed through her mind: the antechamber was a mouth, the portal was the throat. She remembered what Jesse had said about the house: it’s hungry.

  The wind wailed in her ears. Her hair whipped around, slapping her face.

  She pulled and kicked, her sock feet slipping against the slick floor. She hooked her elbow against the hallway side of the wall and rolled until she was completely free from the pull. Then she sat, leaning her back against the wall. She breathed—panted.

  “Toria!” Nana yelled.

  “I’m okay.” Toria stood and tried to grab the handle of the antechamber door. Invisible hands pulled at her hand, her arm. She couldn’t reach the handle, and she couldn’t risk leaning in any farther. Probably the door would not remain shut anyway. It would open again, lips parting for a bite.

  As she ran toward her grandmother, the flickering engulfed her again. “Keep holding on, Nana.”

  “Can’t . . .” Nana said. Her legs fluttered, as though she were clinging to the wing of an airplane instead of a door frame.

  Toria grabbed one end of the ladder her brother Xander had used to mount the camera above the doorway to the landing. It was heavy and awkward, but she managed to drag it back to the antechamber. She laid it lengthwise on the floor across the opening. It was something, anyway.

  She returned to Nana. She knelt at her feet, pushed the bottoms of them. They wobbled under her palms, as though she were trying to connect two magnets.

  Crack!

  Nana’s feet shoved Toria back six inches. A piece of the door frame had snapped away. Nana was holding it, uselessly. Her other hand gripped the opposite side of the opening. Nana released the length of wood, stretched, and reclaimed a grip on the edge.

  Toria shifted over her grandmother to the landing. She clutched both hands on Nana’s wrist, put her feet against the wall, and pulled.

  “I got you,” Toria said. “But don’t let go.” Movement at the bottom of the stairs caught her eye. “Jesse! Je—”

  Not Jesse.

  Taksidian stood staring up at her. The man who wanted them out of the house, who had chased David, who had gotten the town to try to evict them. Cloaked in shadows, his face caught the flickering light, flashing like a skull in a haunted house. Toria screamed.

  Taksidian shook his head, the strobing light making it look like he was snapping his face back and forth. “I got you,” he said, mocking Toria’s words to her grandmother.

  His shoe clicked down the first step, and he rose toward her.

  CHAPTER

  five

  “Doesn’t look so bad,” David whispered.

  “If you think sticking your head in a garbage disposal isn’t bad,” Xander said.

  Crawling on their bellies, they had just reached the top of the hill. Below them, the creatures were mingling around the boulder-sized clumps of concrete, wrecked cars, and other refuse. Many were squatting down in small groups, as though discussing something. Earlier, when the creatures had come after them, David had not recognized any words, but he guessed they must have some way to communicate, some sort of language.

  “Looks like a lot of them are leaving,” he pointed out. Scores of them were picking their way through the rough terrain of trash toward the ruins of the city.

  “Probably heading out to forage for food,” Dad said.

  Keal slid backward, away from the crest. David, Dad, and Xander followed. When they were far enough down the hill to kneel without being seen, they huddled together.

  “Why would Jesse send us here?” Xander asked Dad through clenched teethed. “To such a dangerous place?”

  “He didn’t send ‘us,’ ” Dad reminded him. “You and David followed Keal and me on your own.”

  David could tell his brother was trying not to look guilty.

  Dad continued: “Besides, he was trying to explain what we’d find here when Keal fell through the portal.”

  Xander waved his hand over his head. “But this has nothing to do with finding Mom.”

  Their mother had been kidnapped into one of the worlds, and ever since then their lives had been consumed by trying to rescue her.

  “Jesse wanted us to see the destroyed city, the future,” David said glumly. “To know how bad it gets . . . if we don’t stop it.”

  “Stop it?” Xander said. “How?”

  “Worry about that later,” Keal said, glancing up toward the ridge. “We gotta get out of here.” He looked at each of them. “Ready?”

  “No,” Xander snapped.

  Dad gripped Xander’s shoulder and spoke to Keal. “You go first. Keep your cap and blanket in front of you. Follow their pull. David, you grab Keal’s belt. Don’t let go. Xander, hold on to your brother’s belt. I’ll bring up the rear.”

  Keal reached behind him and produced the pistol.

  “Don’t—” David said.

  “Just to scare them,” Keal said. He read the concern on David’s face. “I promise.”

  “Unless you have to,” Xander said. “Right? You’ll use it on them if you have to?”

  Keal said nothing, and David didn’t know what to say: have to was have to.

  Dad said, “If you can’t feel the pull, or my things tug me in a different dire
ction, I’ll take the lead. Deal?”

  “Let’s do it,” Keal said. He stood.

  David slipped his fingers around Keal’s belt and felt Xander grab his. He leaned closer to his brother and whispered, “Strong and courageous.”

  Xander smiled—the first smile David had seen in a while.

  Keal bolted forward, nearly yanking David off his feet. He fell in step, and they went over the hill. They were twenty paces down when the first of the creatures spotted them. It stood, pointed, started howling.

  A bloodcurdling scream—close—seemed to knock David’s heart out of his chest. Then he realized it was Keal. The man was howling back at the creatures, making the scariest lion roars David had ever heard come out of a human. Maybe it was to psych himself up for the plunge into enemy territory or to scare the tar out of the creatures, but whatever the reason, David liked it. He began screaming himself, an airy, high-pitched squeak at first, then deep, loud, get-out-of-my-way yells. Behind him, Xander’s and Dad’s voices kicked in. They were a freight train of hurt steaming down the hill.

  The creatures scattered, disappearing into the rubble or hurling their bodies over it, tumbling to get away. But not all of them: a dozen or more actually stepped forward. Watching the four of them coming, these drew together. They began picking up rocks.

  Keal stopped screaming long enough to say, “Watch your step!”

  They hit the first of the rubble, chunks of concrete the size of watermelons. David jumped over them, on them, swerved around them. It became harder to keep hold of Keal’s belt. Just as he moved right to avoid a jutting piece of rebar, Keal went left. David came off his feet, and he sailed into the rebar. It scraped his arm, but he had no time to think of the pain. He scrambled, his feet out of control, then pedaled again beside Keal. Xander was having just as much trouble. He jerked at David’s pants, causing David’s hips to shift this way and that, totally out of sync with his upper torso.

  David was about to release his grip on Keal when Dad yelled, “Stay together! Don’t let go!”

  They continued that way, a train now off the tracks but still locomoting forward—emphasis on loco: didn’t that mean crazy in Spanish? Yeah, crazy. Down, down, closer and closer to the creatures waiting for them.

  Keal angled a different direction, toward the outer edge of the creatures’ camp. Most likely, David knew, Keal wasn’t trying to prevent a collision with the creatures but was following the tug of the items.

  Fine with me.

  The creatures noticed the shift and started jogging to intercept them.

  Thirty seconds, David guessed. Half a minute until they met: rocks, teeth, claws, and all.

  A gunshot startled him. He tumbled, catching sight of the pistol raised in Keal’s hand, aimed at the sky. His feet were gone, left behind. He fell. Xander came down on David, crushing him against a jagged rock. His cast hit the ground. Agony, like an electrical current, radiated into his shoulder.

  Keal jerked to a stop. He reached back, grabbed David’s shirt, and hoisted him up.

  David felt Xander rising behind him.

  “Let’s move!” Keal said. He fired another shot into the air.

  The creatures responded. Several were already running away. The others were disappearing behind slabs of broken buildings, into cubbyholes.

  “The pull’s strong now,” Dad said. “The portal must be just ahead.”

  Keal slid up onto the hood of a rusted, crumpled car, pulling David with him. He dropped down on the other side. The train followed.

  Only one creature remained. Another gunshot sent it scrambling between two huge sections of what looked to David like a street, only standing on end.

  Yeah, he thought. We’re doing it.

  The four of them scrambled over larger and larger clumps of debris. Finally, they jumped down onto a flat area, cleared of trash. A big circle of rocks in the middle marked a fire pit. Only gray and black ashes filled the space inside.

  “Over here,” Keal said, tugging David—and, in turn, Xander and Dad—across the open area.

  A movement caught David’s eye. He turned in time to see the bold creature lurch into the clearing from the other side. The thing held a spear over his head, aiming it—and wild, fiery eyes—directly at David.

  CHAPTER

  six

  The creature hoisted the long weapon back over his shoulder.

  “Keal!” Xander yelled. “Shoot him!”

  Keal swung the pistol around and pulled the trigger. Click. Click. Click.

  “Aahh!” he said. “I took out a bullet for safety!” He jabbed his fingers into his shirt pocket. “It’s not here. I lost it.”

  David watched the creature shuffle forward. He kept shifting his aim to each of them in turn, as if deciding which to kill.

  Who? David thought. Who’s going to get it?

  “Move!” Keal yelled. He leaped.

  Xander went the other direction. Connected to both of them, David jerked sideways, right, then left. And the four of them didn’t go either way; their evasive maneuvers canceled each other out.

  David let go of Keal’s belt and dropped straight down.

  A flash of white shot out from the rubble at the perimeter and crashed into the man with the spear. A second creature was on top of the spearman, bringing him down. Their rescuer ended up on top. He slashed his hands at Spear-man and looked up. Scar tissue ran from his hairline, skipped over his eye, and continued down his cheek. It was the creature David had saved from Keal’s first shot. Its eyes locked on David’s.

  David nodded. He scrambled up, grabbing Keal’s pants. “Go! Go!”

  They ran across the clearing.

  Tugging along behind Keal, David looked back at the creatures. The bold one slammed the side of the spear into the other’s head. The one who’d saved them went down, appearing to be out cold. Spear-man turned toward them again.

  “Faster,” David said. “Keal, run!”

  Spear-man stepped forward and almost fell. The other creature had a grip on his ankle. Spear-man spun and thrust the weapon down, nicking the downed man’s calf. He howled, baring a mouth of bent and missing teeth. He grabbed the javelin. Spear-man tugged but couldn’t free it. He let it go and ran for them.

  “Let go of me, David,” Keal said, handing him the blanket.

  “But, why—?”

  Keal charged toward their attacker.

  David let his fingers slip off the belt. He said, “Dad?”

  His father held up his hand, telling him to hold on.

  Before Keal and the creature met, Keal ducked low. He seized the man by the knees, rose, and flipped him over his head. The creature landed on his back, hitting so hard David winced. Keal leaped backward, planting one foot on either side of his opponent. He dropped, aiming his knee at the man’s chest. The creature rolled against Keal’s leg, surprisingly fast. As Keal’s knee struck the ground, the creature slid out from under him and sprang from the ground, wrapping his arms and legs around Keal’s head and chest.

  Dad hurried past Xander and David. “Let’s go. This way.” He pointed. The edges of the blanket in David’s hands stretched and flapped in the same direction.

  David grabbed his arm. “We can’t leave him!”

  Dad appeared unsure. Keal yelled, and all eyes returned to the fight.

  The creature was biting the top of Keal’s head. Dad started for them. Keal planted a fist in the creature’s ear. It was the fist that held the tam-o’-shanter; David wondered if the cap would pad the blow, but the creature’s head snapped away. He fell off Keal and thudded onto the ground. The creature gripped its head and rolled back and forth.

  Keal ran to the group, collected the blanket, and said, “Okay, then. Belts?”

  They held on to each other again, and Keal led them across the clearing. He climbed on top of a chest-high lump of asphalt, reached back, and yanked David up. They dropped to the other side. Xander lost his grip on David’s pants and spilled over the rock. He rose and moved just
as Dad’s feet came down.

  The butterfly net flew out of Dad’s hand and sailed through the air. As Dad reached for it, it hit Xander’s back, flipped over his shoulder, struck David in the head, and kept going—until it disappeared a few seconds later.

  The portal! David saw it now. It presented itself as a shimmering oval that seemed to project in midair a translucent image of a room: wood floor, finished walls, a bench.

  Keal plunged into it. His body wavered, as though seen through the heated exhaust of a jet engine. Then David went through. Blinding light. A gust of wind. He landed on his knees, cracking them hard. He fell and shot forward. He was still gripping Keal, who was scrambling up onto the bench, apparently to get out of the way.

  David didn’t feel Xander on his back. Hanging from Keal, his legs dangling on the floor, he craned his head around.

  His brother leaped through the portal. He kept coming, tripped over David, and ran headfirst into the closed door that led to the hallway.

  “Oww!” Xander yelped. He bounded back, holding his head.

  Dad burst into the room and slammed into Xander, shoving him once again into the door.

  Groaning, Xander turned and slid down the door until he sat on the floor.

  “Sorry,” Dad said, stepping over David’s legs. He leaned to examine Xander’s forehead. “You okay?”

  “I was,” Xander said, burying his face in his hands. “Until we got home.”

  David pulled himself up by Keal’s belt and plopped down on the bench. “I thought we were dead meat,” he said. He rubbed his face where the butterfly net had smacked it, then caressed his cast, though a lot of good that did. He closed his eyes and let out a heavy breath.

  Keal lowered himself beside David. He set the pistol on the bench and patted his chest. Then he reached into a pocket and fished out a bullet, holding it up for David to see. “Wrong pocket,” he said shyly.

  “Some safety trick,” David said. He grinned at Keal. “I’m kind of glad it worked out the way it did.”

  Keal set the bullet down. He rubbed the top of his head and brought back a bloody palm. Long gouges—claw marks—ran the length of his forearm.