Decoherence

by Liana Brooks

  Donovan shook his head. “There aren’t any.”

  “If Sam was right about the serial killer, there are at least four more victims you don’t have files on. I thought your ­people had everything.”

  “We do, from the point of time where the two iterations converged.” Donovan held up a hand. “The iterations are acting abnormally because of the upcoming decoherence event. Instead of running parallel and bumping, we’re spiraling around each other. Twisting and tangling like a storm system. It’s making everything difficult. Usually, we operate with some form of linear time on the other side of the portal. Right now, going through could land you anywhere at any time.”

  Mac rubbed his forehead as he sorted it out. “So even though it’s early January there, it’s not in this iteration?”

  “Unless my team collapses your iteration at an earlier date, there exists an early January in your iteration. We just can’t find it.”

  “My wife’s going to kill me,” Mac muttered. This wasn’t taking three hours to get groceries because he’d stopped to fix someone’s flat tire. Sam had to be beside herself with worry right now. “I could wind up back home before I’m kidnapped.” That wouldn’t go over well. At all.

  He’d probably shoot himself if he ran into himself . . . that sentence shouldn’t have made sense, but it did.

  “I wouldn’t worry about it.” Donovan smirked. “You’re never leaving.”

  “Commander Rose has promised she’ll let me leave when this investigation is finished.” Even as he said it, though, Mac studied the other man. He was very similar to the man who’d traveled with Nialls Gant to kill Sam before they moved to Australia. Tall, muscular, hardened by a lifetime of brutality that had scraped the light from his eyes and left him as flat and cold as any killer Mac had ever seen.

  A physical fight between them would result in at least one bruised rib even if Mac fought dirty. Donovan held himself like a person who knew how to fight, and the cruel smile twisting on his lips was no comfort.

  And a seed of doubt crept in.

  “Do you doubt your commander’s integrity?” Mac asked.

  “Rose would never allow anything to jeopardize our truth, the real timeline of humanity. The best you’ll get from her is an offer to bring your girlfriend over.”

  “Wife,” Mac corrected. “She’s my wife.” Even if traveling back in time meant the wedding was still several months away. “And she wouldn’t like it here. Your food is terrible.”

  Donovan shrugged in acknowledgment. He looked at the stack of files. “Can I help?”

  Mac sighed. “Have you ever investigated a murder before?”

  “No.”

  Figured. “I’m going to read through all of these and looks for details I missed. Foreign objects listed in the autopsy, traces of chemicals that are unusual, fingerprints on the belongings of the victims that don’t belong to the victim. I also need to look for similarities. The killer chose these women for a reason.”

  Donovan grabbed one of the files and turned it so he could read. “Don’t they all look the same? Maybe that’s the link.”

  “It’s a link,” Mac agreed. “But most killers have a pattern for choosing their victims. Serial killers can’t go on a dating site and filter out victims that don’t look right.” He stopped. “Well, that’s a lie. They can do that. I worked a case in Chicago where one did. But the method for picking each of the victims was the same. Dating site, bars, grocery stores, biking trails, car sales lots; the killer is a predator. Predators go back to where they know they can find prey.”

  “So the more times the killer has a successful kill from a method, the more he repeats it?”

  Mac nodded. “Usually, yes. If the killer were being completely random in his victim selection, we’d see a wider range of victims. They’d probably be isolated to a single area. Instead, we have a roving killer who targets these women for their looks.”

  “Maybe they’re useless?” Donovan suggested, tossing the file back on the table with a shrug. “Unwanted women. Working women? What do you call them in your iteration?”

  Mac frowned in confusion. “Are you suggesting they’re sex workers? Homeless? I’m not sure what you mean, actually.”

  “Some ­people aren’t as valuable to society,” Donovan said with an arching hand gesture. ­“People who no one cares about?”

  “I’m a bureau agent, and my field is forensic medicine. There’s no insignificant death or person.” He glared down at the files, fighting the desire to get up and run away.

  Deep down, he knew the type of ­people Donovan meant—­he’d been one. Isolated and overlooked. He’d cut off contact from his family, avoided making any friendships, drowned out his common sense and worries with ever increasing doses of sleeping pills. Until Sam pulled him out of the abyss of depression, he’d been taunting death. Welcoming it, even.

  Mac shook his head again. “If you aren’t going to help, please leave. I’d like to get this done sooner rather than later.”

  Donovan shrugged and left Mac to himself. Once the door closed, Mac looked around, then sighed. There was nothing else he could do but sit in the room with the files, so he did. Reading through the details over and over, scant though they were.

  The only thing that stuck out was the fingerprint on Jane Doe’s body. His fingerprint.

  Drugs had created a hazy bubble around him the morning Jane came to the morgue. He remembered a few colors, the red of Sam’s lips, and the green of the grass, and the cloying smell of antiseptics masking the sickly-­sweet scent of death. He’d probably forgotten to put his gloves on before wheeling her into the lab.

  Probably.

  Donovan was smiling, which was enough to make Rose nervous. Senturi was avoiding her eyes. The whole team was working hard to pretend they didn’t know each other.

  The air on her arms prickled, a primitive alert system that backed up what she was already sensing. Something was going to go horribly wrong today. She’d felt the same way the morning before they’d lost Wagner. The same gut-­churning sensation had nauseated her the day Senturi was shot.

  Now the awareness was an itch impossible to scratch. It grated against her nerves, heightened all her senses until the faint scent of deodorant and clean sweat became overwhelming.

  Senturi finally made eye contact. “You doing okay, Commander?”

  She gave him a tight nod. “How’s your shoulder?”

  “The doctor gave me the all clear two days ago. It’s a little sore, and I’d like to avoid getting shot again, but I’m fine.”

  She looked at the members of her team, trying to find some clue to what was about to happen.

  Senturi frowned at her. “Problems?”

  “No. Just . . . too large a team, maybe. We can do this detonation with half the ­people. There’s no security to worry about.” She finished tightening her gear and headed for the jump room. The lights were too bright. The air too cold.

  “Commander Rose!” Emir’s voice cut through the noise.

  Her emotions froze into a cold steel shield. Turning, placid smile in place, she nodded to him. “Sir.” With alarm, she noted the bulge of a bulletproof vest under his suit.

  “I’m coming with you,” Emir announced. “On a slight delay, of course.”

  “I have to protest,” she said as politely as she could. What she wanted to do was shout “Are you crazy?” A civil war would erupt if Emir went missing. They were already on the edge of one. The world government was splintering already. Only fear of Emir’s pruning them from the future kept the peace right now.

  “Sir, we do not have enough control in this iteration to ensure your safety.”

  “I’ll keep Captain Donovan with me,” Emir said in a placating voice. He wasn’t going to change his mind—­not that she expected him to.

  And Donovan would see this as a sign of favo
r. The poor fool. He didn’t realize how close he was to being collateral damage.

  “How far from our arrival point will that place you?” she asked

  “The iterations are frayed at this convergence point. It almost looks like a node is trying to form.”

  Rose shook her head. “There’s no nodal event on this date. Not in the history of any of the iterations we’ve been to.”

  He smiled, eyebrows raising. “I know. Isn’t it exciting? I wonder what we’re creating.”

  Dread of uncertainty filled her. She didn’t dare voice her question: What if we aren’t the ones creating the node? What if someone else, on the dark side of history, was changing everything?

  She shivered. Life would be so much better once they’d collapsed the rogue iteration. They’d go, destroy the nodes, destroy the MIA, and move on. She’d spend some of her very limited company credits to buy a hot meal.

  By tomorrow, it would all be over.

  Donovan stood at Emir’s right hand, surveying the busy kingdom of the control room. Techs in scrubs, agents in jump gear, and Emir in his power suit . . . there was a fluid nature to it. What was the natural spiral found in nautilus shells called? A golden ratio or Fibonacci or pi? The math of time was the same. At the center, there was always a central point on which everything else turned. Emir fancied himself to be that axis. Donovan knew better.

  He caressed the tiny bumps on the butt of his gun as Commander Rose prepared her team. Black hair framed the stretched copper skin on her bony face. Oh, how he dreamt of this day. Of finally taking her down, beating her into the dirt, where she belonged. Her black eyes caught his look, and he smiled. There was fear in her eyes. She knew she was hunted. Knew with some animal instinct that he was coming for her.

  It didn’t change anything—­in old nature videos he’d seen that the gazelles saw the lions before they attacked, too, but they went down nonetheless.

  The jump sequence began, and Rose’s team moved in to secure the building. Senturi looked up, and Donovan nodded. The traitor would do his job.

  Emir clapped his hands as the portal closed. “Thirteen minutes until our entry. Are you ready, Captain?”

  “Always, sir.”

  A tech scurried across the room and handed Emir a datpad. “Excellent. Absolutely excellent. Come along, Donovan.” Emir handed the pad back to the tech and walked down to the portal. “Begin the jump sequence.”

  “Sir?”

  “We’ve made contact of sorts with the other iteration.”

  Donovan could have wrung that man’s scrawny neck. “Sir?” He kept the reproach and disapproval out of his voice, but only barely. “This is not part of the agenda.” Emir was going to ruin everything. The man simply delighted in making his life difficult. He was going to frag up everything to what, feed his manic ego some more?

  Emir waved his hand with a tut-­tutting noise that drove Donovan to the edge of rage. “One of our ­people intercepted a communique from a man named Marrins. He’s trying to blackmail my other-­self.” He chuckled with self-­indulgent cruelness.

  “I can’t imagine that matters, sir. The iteration will cease to exist in a matter of hours.” And Rose would be obliterated with it. A tragic accident. He’d wear the black armband, give an appropriately joyless speech at her memorial, and move on without a trace of guilt.

  It was her fault, after all. She’d brought them an extra node to ensure this iteration’s stability. And MacKenzie was easy enough to get along with. A big, stupid fellow who would follow Donovan anywhere he led.

  Emir patted his arm. “Indulge me, Captain. It has been a long time since I was able to safely explore all the worlds the Prime touched. I’m curious.”

  “Yes, sir.” Donovan hid his anger well. He was nothing if not adaptable. He’d let Emir wander, it would give another layer of verisimilitude to Rose’s coming “accident.”

  CHAPTER 23

  “Why are stars seen as romantic? They’re forever alone, doomed to destroy anything that comes too close.”

  ~ excerpt from Serenade of the Quiet Heart by Jaylee Dini I2—­2027

  Wednesday January 1, 2070

  California District 21

  Los Angeles

  Commonwealth of North America

  Iteration 2

  Hunger woke Sam. Not the mild pangs she associated with sleeping in but a gnawing, bone-­biting hunger like she’d never had before. Sixteen hours without food. She’d never gone that long without something. She rubbed her fingers on Bosco’s ear. “I am not going to survive on the street.”

  Which meant doing something drastic. The buses wouldn’t let her bring Bosco, there was no one in the Commonwealth to call, and her cash was at the bottom of the harbor. Eyeing the aquarium duffel bag, she mentally calculated how much selling the T-­shirts would get her. Enough for breakfast and something for Bosco. But not enough to get her a car.

  Bosco whined, stretching at the end of the lanyards that had finally quit flashing a little before dawn.

  She stood up and stretched. Sleeping behind the bushes next to the DMV had seemed like the safest choice last night, but now it seemed like a bad idea. There were lines of ­people, a crowded parking lot, and across the street a police substation with its own impound lot. She’d thought everyone would have closed for the holiday, but apparently not. A beat-­up brown car pulled up in front of the impound delivery gate, and the driver hopped out.

  “Oh . . .” She looked at Bosco. A story from her past bubbled up from under the demands of hunger and the fog of frustration. Ruthie Reid, the Polynesian rugby goddess from the Academy, kept a mailing loop of craziest stories. Sam had never contributed, but before Troom’s death, Mac’s meteoric reentry into her life, and the decision to jump back in time, Ruthie had told her about the wonders of the new volunteer program. The police and the CBI were understaffed on the West Coast, so some brilliant mind in HR had decided to farm menial work out to volunteers. Sometimes clones, but usually college students who could use the hours for credits at the government-­funded colleges.

  The volunteer program ended when a carjacking ring started posing as drivers. They showed up, volunteered to park the car, and drove it to a chop shop across district lines before anyone was the wiser. It had taken months to sort things out, and the CBI had never recovered all the cars.

  Bosco whined.

  “Yeah, this is fine.” She watched the volunteer take the paperwork from the impound’s front desk and drive into the parking lot. “Let’s go find breakfast. I probably have something we can sell.” Searching through the duffel, she didn’t see anything the pawnshop down the street might want until she checked the pockets of the jeans she’d jumped off The Piper in. There was an Aussie ten-­dollar bill, and a bill worth 1000 rupiah. Both worthless in the Commonwealth, but they might have value to a collector.

  Whistling, she led Bosco down the street. He lapped up a bit of a puddle left by the sprinklers, peed on the gates of the DMV, and let his tongue hang out as she pushed open the door of the pawnshop.

  “Hey!” the man behind the counter shouted. “No pets allowed.”

  “He’s my comfort animal,” Sam said without missing a beat. “I was assaulted.” She looked him in the eye to see if he’d squirm. He did. “Bosco makes it so I don’t have panic attacks.”

  The man grimaced. “Fine, but if he ruins anything, you bought it. Hurry up.”

  “I’m here to sell, not buy,” Sam said, holding up the bills. “We’re moving grandpa to a nursing home, and I’m in charge of cleaning out his old things. Grandpa said I should shred these, but I figured I’d check and see if they were collectible.”

  With a disappointed look, the man slid the bills across the glass counter. “Australian? And, what’s this?”

  “Indonesian,” Sam said, pointing to the rupiah.

  “Where’s Indonesia?”

&
nbsp; “Ah, it used to be a group of islands north of Australia. I think it’s part of the South Asian Union now. Like I said, older than fossils.” She smiled.

  He shook his head and pushed the bills back. “I don’t sell currency, lady. I don’t even take cash. But there’s a coin shop two blocks away. Go north, second left. It’s Art’s Coins and Collectables. I can’t promise he’ll pay anything, but he’s the only one around here who might unless you want to go to the valley.”

  “Nah, Art’s will be fine.” Her stomach growled.

  The guy looked at her. “There’s a deli down the street that does a good breakfast.”

  “I’m not really hungry,” Sam lied.

  “There’s nothing healthy about skipping meals,” he said. “My granny died of doing that. Kept starving herself to lose weight, and her bone density was awful. Here”—­he rummaged behind the counter and handed her a card with a flower and a handful of almonds on it—­“that’s the number of my dietician. She’s very patient. Very affordable. Give her a call, tell her Paul sent you, and she’ll give you a free consult. With a little mindful eating, you can make a whole lifestyle change.”

  “A lifestyle change?” Sam nodded in confusion. “Of course. What a wonderful idea. I’ll call her. Paul, you said. Good. Thank you, Paul.” When she was back on the street, she looked down at Bosco. “Do I look like I need to diet?”

  He grumbled. “No. I didn’t think so either. I can run a six-­minute mile. I paddleboard. I parkour. I eat healthy!” she shouted loud enough to draw worried glances from customers leaving the DMV. She waved and walked down to Art’s. He bought both bills for four hundred—­enough to buy used sneakers at the thrift shop next door and breakfast for both her and Bosco, with enough left over for meals throughout the week.

  After finding a pet store and a good leash, she and Bosco circled back to the DMV. It was three in the afternoon, ­people were shouting, ­people were sweating, the lot was filled to capacity. In other words, it was perfect chaos.