Twisted Fates

by Danielle Rollins

  “You have to get out,” Dorothy was saying. “Mac won’t be long, and if you’re still here when he returns, he’ll kill you.”

  “I don’t die today,” Ash muttered. His thoughts were still soupy. “I know when I die.”

  “Lucky you. Now go.”

  Either a moment or an hour later, Ash opened his eyes and found that he was alone in the small hotel room. Dorothy wasn’t there. She’d never been there.

  He was about to let his eyes drop closed, to let himself fall unconscious again, when he noticed that the Cirkus Freaks weren’t there, either.

  And the door to his room was open, the darkened hallway twisting before him.

  And . . . his gun was lying on the floor in front of him. He blinked to make sure he wasn’t seeing things.

  The gun stayed where it was.

  Now go.

  Was that possible? Could he even stand?

  I have a plan to take care of them, he thought, and the words worked like a salve, easing the pain in his body somewhat. He slid his hands under his shoulders and, cringing, began to peel his body off the floor.

  He rose to his forearms first. Then, arms trembling, pushed himself to hands and knees.

  It was a mistake. Pain crashed over him, leaving him dizzy. He tilted to the side, and he thought he was going to fall back to the ground again but he steadied himself against the side of the bed.

  He breathed. Sitting upright became a little easier. He grabbed his gun, hands thick and clumsy. It took a few more tries but, eventually, he made his way to his feet and stumbled for the door, his heartbeat hammering in a small, panicky way.

  I have a plan to take care of them, he remembered again.

  Whatever Mac’s plan was, he had to stop it.

  Ash followed the twisting docks through New Seattle without stopping to think about where he was going. His feet seemed to lead the way, carrying him through the dusty, damp buildings and out into open water. Downtown, the docks all converged and overlapped in a strange labyrinth. But once he got to the edge of the city, the docks stopped, leaving only empty, black water dotted with white trees.

  Ash stood at the edge of the final dock, breathing hard. There was a little over a mile of water from where he stood to the anil. He was reasonably sure he could make it.

  And then . . .

  What?

  What was his plan, here? He had no idea how long it had been since he heard Dorothy, Roman, and Mac planning to go back in time, but he was sure he was too late to catch up to the Black Crow. Which meant that he was going to have to try to go through the anil on his own, again, and hope that he’d be pulled through time by the Black Crow’s wake.

  Would it work?

  Shouting cut through the streets behind him. Ash looked over his shoulder and saw lights flicker in and out between the buildings, figures moving. He swallowed, tasting blood. The Black Cirkus wasn’t far behind. It’s not like he had another choice.

  He shrugged off his jacket, an ache moving through him as it dropped to the dock. It was a good jacket, and he was sad to see it go, but the leather would just get waterlogged and drag him down.

  Gunshots blasted through the air behind him.

  Ash jumped.

  He sank into the black water, cold pressing against his skin and seeping into his ears, blocking out all other sound and leaving him with a deep ache in his skull. He surfaced, gasping, and started to swim, hoping the exercise would pump some warmth back into his blood.

  His arms and legs began to stiffen after a few minutes, and his skin burned with cold. His trousers quickly filled with water, slowing him down. Another ten minutes of this and everything below his neck had gone numb. He was vaguely aware that he’d slowed down, that it was harder to move his limbs through the water.

  It can’t be much farther, he told himself. His chest ached and he could barely catch his breath. He heard the sound of a motor growling in the distance. The cackle of laughter. It wouldn’t be long before the Cirkus found him.

  Pain prickled just below his ribs, where the piece of the Second Star had lodged itself into his gut. Cringing, Ash pressed a hand to his belly. He could feel the hard edge of his ship just below his navel, shifting inside of him, and he realized that the wound must’ve opened up, again.

  He lifted his hand. It was damp . . . but not with blood. The substance that clung to his fingers was thicker than water, and silvery.

  Ash blinked, and the substance changed, hardening into a solid, black mass that coated his hand like a glove.

  And then it changed again, this time becoming gaseous and green. Ash watched, amazed, as it drifted into the inky-blue sky around him and was gone.

  Exotic matter acted like that, he knew. It shifted and changed in that canister the Professor had built for it, so that he never really got a handle on what he was looking at. But Ash didn’t have any exotic matter in his body.

  Did he?

  It was true that, when they crashed the Second Star, he got a piece of something lodged inside his belly, just below his ribs. He’d thought it was part of his ship, but what if he’d guessed wrong? What if there was exotic matter inside of him, lodged deep into his belly along with the old piece of the Second Star? Would that explain why he’d been able to travel through the anil without a time machine?

  Was it possible that he was the time machine?

  Ash closed his eyes now, swimming hard toward the anil. The sound of shouting bounced over the waves, so near. He felt the spray of a boat on his cheeks.

  The anil was just a few yards ahead. As Ash swam closer, he felt something, some faint pressure slip beneath his ribs, tugging him forward. It was so slight that he could’ve been imagining it. Just a needle’s prick of pain. A sharp tug. It took his breath away.

  Ash had thought he’d understood time travel, but in all the years he’d flown through the anil, first in the Dark Star, and then in the Second Star, he had never felt anything like that sensation.

  It was like fate, like magic.

  He dove down into the water, and through time itself.

  43

  Dorothy

  Dorothy lifted a hand, fingers trembling as she pressed them to the bulge of fabric at her neck. She’d tucked her old locket beneath her shirt and now she relished the chill of cool silver on her skin. It was familiar. The closest feeling to home she could conjure.

  The locket had come with her on her first trip into the future. It felt fitting that it come with her for this trip, too.

  They were in the Black Crow, flying low over the water on their way to the anil. Dorothy and Roman sat up front while Mac lounged in the passenger cabin, his bad leg propped up on the seat opposite him, as he carefully polished one of his guns. The rhythm was almost hypnotic. He’d hold the gun up so that the barrel caught the green light coming off the control panel and then shake his head and lower it again, spit, and rub the metal with the edge of his bloodstained shirt.

  Roman, sitting in the captain’s seat, glanced at Dorothy and away. His hands were tight on the yoke, his shoulders stiff.

  There hadn’t been another chance to kill Mac. The Freaks he’d wooed over to his side had surrounded him as they’d made their way through the twisting hotel hallways, and down the stairs to the parking garage where the Black Crow waited. The Freaks had stood outside the time machine’s doors while the three of them crawled inside and, once he was seated, Mac had pulled out his gun and busied himself polishing the barrel.

  It had all felt carefully, perfectly planned, and now Dorothy stared straight ahead, worrying that she would only ever have that one chance, back at the hotel. She’d let it pass, and now there wouldn’t be another.

  No, she told herself, focusing on the daggers beneath her sleeves. Once the three of them landed in the past, she would find another moment, or she would make one.

  The Puget Sound anil yawned ahead of them. It was light dancing on the waves. A great, reflective bubble. A swirl of smoke and shifting color.

  R
oman aimed the nose of the ship toward the tunnel. Dorothy swallowed.

  “The Black Crow is moving into position for departure,” he said, plunging them through the crack in time. The ship shuddered, and they were through.

  Lightning flickered from the curved edges of the tunnel, and vicious winds howled outside the ship’s thin walls, but their full supply of EM kept the ship itself steady.

  Mac picked at his teeth with his thumb. “I want to see the golden age of piracy first. That was, what? The 1700s? 1600s? I always thought I’d make a great privateer.”

  “Very well,” Roman said, unreadable. He pulled back on the ship’s yoke, shooting them forward. Dorothy noticed, with some interest, that he didn’t turn left to take them back in time. He turned right, toward the future.

  Mac, still picking at his teeth, noticed nothing.

  44

  Ash

  MAY 2, 2082, NEW SEATTLE

  When Ash came to, he was crouching in the dirt. He had one leg curled beneath him, the other propped in a low lunge, hands braced against the earth to either side of his foot.

  Earth, he thought, distantly. Actual, solid, earth. He curled his hands into the ground below, his fingers digging past the dirt to brush against something hard and flat.

  Not earth. Wood.

  Where was he?

  He noticed the cold, next. It seeped into his skin, curling around his bones until his teeth were chattering and he was breathing, hard. He didn’t even realize he’d opened his eyes until he felt the cold press against them, drying them instantly so that he had to blink, rapidly, to keep them from freezing.

  He saw nothing. The dark around him was perfect.

  Nerves trembled over his skin. He stood, fingers numb with cold as he fumbled in his pocket for the pack of waterproof matches he’d taken from the Dead Rabbit. He pulled a single match loose and struck it against the box—once, twice, three times—clenching and unclenching his hands to keep his blood flowing. Light leaped between his fingers.

  It didn’t illuminate much. He appeared to be standing on a small dirt pathway. A single, craggy mountain rose before him, black and decaying and covered in rubble.

  Ash made his way to the edge of the pathway, shivering. He was only wearing a wet T-shirt and jeans, and he wouldn’t last long out here if he didn’t find some sort of shelter. The wind was fierce, and it blew him back a step, threatening to knock him over. It carried the smell of fire and dirt and rot. He tried to keep a hand cupped around the match to stop it from blowing out, but the flame flickered, and then died completely. Darkness swallowed him once more.

  “Hell,” Ash said out loud. His voice sounded strange. Closer. Like he was speaking directly into his own ear.

  He lit another match and, when that one died, he lit another. Slowly, the scene around him began to come into clearer focus. The mountain wasn’t a mountain at all but a building. Weeds had grown up over the walls and threaded through the openings. From the glow of his match, Ash could see that it had been reduced to rock and rubble. He squinted through the flickering light . . .

  Oh God. That building was the Fairmont hotel. He recognized the old columns out front, and the architectural details above the windows. Which meant that this was New Seattle and this . . . this rot was all that was left of his home.

  A nasty shiver went down his spine.

  How?

  Ash remembered, vividly, the first time he’d stepped out of the Dark Star and into the New Seattle of 2075. It was one of his favorite memories, how the blazing light had nearly burned his eyes, how he’d strained his neck trying to lean back far enough to see the tops of the skyscrapers. Everywhere he’d turned, he’d seen some new, fantastical thing: cars that looked sleek and fast as airplanes; people dressed in the strangest, most extraordinary clothing; buildings clustered so closely together they were practically on top of one another. The Fairmont hotel had been at the center of all that, the old building an elegant contrast to all that was sleek and new.

  He’d had to throw his hands over his ears because everything was so loud and still he’d been grinning. Because the future was overwhelming and messy and wonderful. It had been scary, yes, but also exhilarating. Life had seemed to get bigger than he’d ever thought possible.

  He had the opposite feeling now, staring out over this dark, dead city. Life hadn’t gotten bigger.

  Life had rotted and died.

  Eventually, Ash found a door. It rose up from the darkness so suddenly that he actually slammed into it and then stumbled backward a few steps, forehead smarting from the impact. He fumbled for it again and, this time, his fingers wrapped around the cool metal of a doorknob.

  He pulled, and the entire door snapped off at the hinges, creaking forward and slamming into the ground before him with a thud that vibrated through the dirt.

  Ash hesitated, staring into the black. He tried to calculate where he was standing based on where he was relative to the old Fairmont hotel and realized, with a start, that he must be standing on the docks outside of the Dead Rabbit.

  It felt like he’d only just been sitting at the bar inside, watching the bartender build a tower out of matchboxes. The thought sent a chill through him. Should he even go inside? Would it be safe?

  He looked over his shoulder, into the eerie darkness of this dead, futuristic world. At least, inside, he might find something to burn.

  Swallowing hard, Ash ducked through the door. The smell of something old and musty rose up around him. He tried his best to breathe through his mouth but, still, the smell persisted.

  And something was dripping. The sound came at even intervals, like it had been timed. It bounced off the walls and echoed over itself until Ash didn’t know if it was coming from right beside him or deeper inside.

  And then, from outside, a light.

  Ash stood, frozen, as the light came closer.

  45

  Dorothy

  MAY 2, 2082, NEW SEATTLE

  Roman landed the Black Crow on the docks outside of the skeletal remains of the Fairmont. Dorothy found herself morbidly curious, her gaze drawn to the old hotel’s rotting walls and broken windows. And so it was a relief when the ship kicked up a plume of black ash that blackened their headlight, sending them plunging into darkness again. Anything to block her view of the Fairmont.

  Her eyes flicked, instead, to the rearview mirror. Mac’s face was bathed in shadow, but the silver gun on his lap reflected the green light of the control panel. It glowed, menacingly, in the dark.

  Dorothy was staring at the gun when his voice reached out for her from the darkness. “Well. This doesn’t look like the 1700s.”

  There was a beat of silence, and then Roman said easily, “There must be a problem with the ship’s navigational controls. Let me go take a look.”

  And then, with a heavy sigh, he pushed the door open and stepped outside.

  Dorothy threw her door open, too, and followed him. She didn’t want to spend a single moment alone with Mac.

  Roman was waiting for her in the circle of the time machine’s headlights. Cold wind bit into her cheeks and blew through her coat as she came to stand beside him. She gritted her teeth, pulling her collar tighter around her neck.

  Roman looked terrified. He dragged a hand over his sweaty forehead and whispered, “I don’t know what I was thinking. I guess I thought it would be easier to take him out here, where no one could interrupt us.”

  “Stay calm,” Dorothy hissed back. Her daggers rustled inside her sleeves, restless.

  Mac’s shadow reached the circle of the headlights a second before the man himself, and this was how Dorothy knew he had his gun out and aimed at them. The shape of it stretched across the ground, larger than it was in real life.

  In an instant, Dorothy’s hands were on the daggers hidden up her sleeves. She spun around, her heart crashing wildly inside her chest.

  “Hands where I can see them, Miss Fox,” Mac said, and she froze, fingers twitching. He had his gun aimed at her
face. She was fast with her daggers, but she doubted she was faster than a bullet.

  “I don’t think you’ve thought this through,” Roman said. “It’s two on one, old man.”

  “I’ve done the math, thanks,” Mac said. “According to my calculations I’m the only one holding a gun.”

  There seemed to be a smile playing at Roman’s lips, as though the thought that they could be so easily disposed amused him. “You have to know we won’t go down without a fight.”

  “Fight?” Mac laughed, swinging the gun around so that it pointed at Roman now. “Who said anything about a fight? I could just leave the two of you here to rot. I was planning on doing that once we all got to the past, but this works, too.”

  And, with that, he took a step toward the time machine’s cockpit. He was closer than they were, Dorothy saw. He’d get there first.

  “You don’t know how to fly it,” Roman pointed out, but he didn’t sound nearly as confident as he had a moment ago. His eyes darted, nervously, to the gun pointed at his chest.

  Mac looked between the two of them, his smile hardening into a sneer. “Yeah, well I only need one of you for that, don’t I?”

  And Dorothy heard the click of his thumb against his gun’s hammer. The air around her seemed to shiver.

  This is it, her blades whispered.

  It would be the only moment she ever got.

  She flicked her wrists and her daggers leaped into her hands, blades glinting in the steady beam of the time machine’s headlights.

  Mac kept his gun aimed at Roman. He clearly didn’t consider her a threat. “You really think you’re going to kill me, sweetheart?”

  Sweetheart. Dorothy smiled at him, grateful that he was making this easy.

  “Yes,” she said.

  And she would’ve, too. She would’ve pierced Mac’s neck with her dagger and laughed as she watched the life drain from his eyes.

  But, at that moment, a bullet whizzed past her cheek, close enough that she felt the burn of gunpowder flare across her skin. She stumbled backward, gasping, and she had just enough time to lift one hand to her face, her dagger falling to the ground in a cloud of ash.