A Girl in Time

by John Birmingham

  Her whole body crawled with gooseflesh.

  She shivered and turned away as the spectral figures faded out of existence.

  “That was us,” Smith whispered, the timbre of his voice that of a man who has not just seen a ghost, but has seen his own ghost.

  “Quantum shadows,” Cady said. “Come on.”

  She double-timed it all the way to the gas station, occasionally checking behind them to see if they were being followed. By themselves.

  But they were alone.

  She tried not to think about what it meant. She knew little enough of the technology or magic that had done all of this and she was learning not to make assumptions. Not to be so fucking arrogant.

  But it was hard not to let some hope grow. It was a dark flower inside, budding and growing and blooming at 10x speed as they hurried towards the lights.

  Cady hurried across the wet concrete tarmac of the Texaco. She could already see the clerk behind the counter, the same Indian guy who'd been working the till when they last arrived. A bell over the door rang as she hurried in. He looked up, but he did not recognize her or Smith. And Smith was not a character you forgot.

  His eyes did go wide momentarily, but then he dropped his gaze and Cady realized just how much dried blood covered her tee shirt and jeans. Smith looked like he'd been in a car accident.

  The cash machine sat exactly where it had before. The same junk food and porno mags lined the aisle leading to the rear of the shop. Smith did not recoil in fright from the skin mags this time. He stuck to her heels, following her through the little convenience store.

  Cady's hand was shaking as she grabbed her wallet and took out the plastic. The machine gobbled it up. She was so jittery she messed up the PIN code twice.

  “I don't exactly know what you're trying to do,” Smith said, “but I can see you need to take a breath and come at it a little slower.”

  She resisted the urge to say something harsh and stupid. He was right. Smith was always right. It could be annoying, but she would have to get used to it. They were going to be spending some time together.

  Three deep breaths, and a few seconds with her eyes closed to clear her mind.

  She entered the PIN for her business account and requested a balance.

  Nine and a half million dollars.

  The tremor in her hands spread to her whole body.

  “It's there, Smith,” she said. “It's all there. It's like we haven't been here yet.”

  “That's good, Cady. So, what next?”

  “This,” she said.

  She withdrew $200, the maximum she could take in one hit from this machine. Then she hit it again, twice. She didn't buy a burner phone this time. Instead she picked up a $50 micro SIM for the iPhone. Her fingers were numb, and her hands were shaking so much that she had to ask the clerk to switch out the simcards for her.

  “Man,” he said, “you're lucky. This is our last one of the old SIMs. Gotta sell the new ones now. With the backdoor.”

  She giggled nervously at that. Laughing inappropriately, she paid him for the card and tipped him another fifty bucks. He was stunned and then a little suspicious. She noticed for the first time that his ID tag was not issued by Texaco. It had come from Homeland Security.

  “Don't worry,” she said, “we just had a big win. Thanks.”

  She virtually dragged Smith out of the store so she could make the call.

  “You getting one of them Ubers?” he asked.

  “In a minute,” she said. “But first I have to call …”

  She trailed off unable to finish.

  “Miss Georgia?” Smith asked gently.

  She couldn't speak around the lump in her throat so she just nodded.

  “I just need a minute,” she said, and walked away from him. Smith did not follow.

  Cady walked into the dark. She wanted fresh air, but all she could smell were petrochemicals. She didn't know what would happen when she rang her friend. Would Georgia be here? Would she be lying dead back in the villa? If she did answer the phone, did that mean that their whole sword-and-sandal adventure had never happened? That could be, but they were still covered in blood and bruises.

  And what of those quantum shadows? An echo of things which had not happened yet?

  There was no way to know what would happen until it happened, even when you could travel in time.

  Cady calmed herself as best she could. She walked back to Smith who waited patiently for her by the pumps.

  “We can't make a call here,” she said. “Mythbusters proved it was bullshit, but people still think cell phones will blow up a gas station.”

  He didn't ask what she meant by that. He was learning to roll with it. They both were. They walked a few yards away to the spot where she'd previously called up a taxi to take her back to her apartment.

  She entered Georgia's number from memory, her landline this time. One of only handful she knew by heart. Her own and her parents were the others. They’d shut down Georgia’s cell phone, but she had to have some way of contacting work, didn’t she? And her prison guards, of course.

  It was after ten o'clock now and she wondered if Georgia would be awake. If she would be alive. The phone rang and rang. No voicemail cut in. When nobody picked up, Cady's heart sank. She could feel the heavy darkness of spirit creeping back upon her.

  She'd been wrong.

  She'd fucked up again.

  And she'd left her best friend behind, shot dead in some villa two thousand years ago.

  “Hello. Georgia Eliadis.”

  Cady gasped.

  And hung up.

  They did not return to her apartment. Not this time. Instead they caught a cab to the Alexis Hotel after she'd grabbed a couple of adjoining rooms on Expedia.

  “It was her?” Smith said in the back of the cab.

  “It was,” Cady said, still giddy with relief half an hour after she'd heard Georgia's voice.

  “But you didn't talk to her?”

  Cady shook her head slowly.

  “I didn't want to get her in trouble. Not after what happened last time.”

  “But you intend on talking to her?”

  “Not about what happened, no. But yes, tomorrow. I'll talk to Georgia. Call my parents, maybe. But first I need to get a lawyer.”

  “Well, you are in luck, ma'am. It just so happens I met a good one last time I was here in Seattle,” Smith joked. “I could give you his name if you so wished.”

  She squeezed his arm. The sleeve of his rawhide jacket was stiff with dried blood, but she did not pull her hand away.

  “That's very kind of you. First thing in the morning, then. But right now, I want a deep bath and a soft bed.”

  They had both at the hotel.

  Cady rang the concierge to warn them they'd be checking in late, and that they had suffered a minor car accident. Their luggage had been trashed. They looked a little rough around the edges. The staff shouldn't worry, but they might need to buy some clothes in the morning. Was that something the concierge could arrange?

  It was. Indeed, if they had no objection, he could provide them with clothes from the lost property room as soon as they arrived. The hotel held on to such items for a month, before sending them to charity.

  Smith worried about Chumley.

  “If Georgia is alive, shouldn't he be, too?” He asked over a late snack and a drink in the bar of the hotel. Cady had a crab sandwich. Smith ate two bowls of fries and a cheeseburger, washed down with a couple of bottles of beer. They were clean and reasonably presentable, having taken the concierge up on his offer of dipping into the lost property bin. They wore tourist outfits while their own clothes were being laundered. Cady had told the concierge she'd pay whatever it took to get them back by morning. In the meantime, she found a reasonable pair of jeans and a black T-shirt, which was one size too large. Smith wore a loud red and white tracksuit left behind by a visiting Welsh rugby player. It was the only thing that fit him.

  “He could be
here,” she conceded, “but I'm hoping not. I'm really hoping that, because he was independent of this reality, because he wasn't native to this timeline, like we're not, that he can't be rebooted or overwritten or whatever. He was playing hard-core, like us. Dead is dead.”

  “But you don't know for sure,” said Smith around a mouthful of cheeseburger.

  “No, I don't,” she admitted. “I don't know a lot about how this is going to work out, Smith. But I do know that we're a lot closer to getting home, both of us, then we were when you rescued me from those guys.”

  He looked troubled at that.

  “Yeah,” he said. “I still don't rightly cotton to what happened there. That pair were apprentices, no question of it. They'd been tracking me for hours. But when you came walking down the street, it was like they were a couple of wolves got the scent of new blood. They went after you, not me, Cady.”

  She smiled and leaned forward as if to impart a secret.

  “Maybe they saw the future,” she said. “Maybe they saw just how badly I'm gonna kick their asses.”

  Smith raised his drink to that.

  They retired to their rooms, but she was pretty sure he did not sleep. Not for long. She found him in the morning, sitting in an armchair in her room, his pistol on the coffee table in front of him. He had been watching over her. Guarding her.

  Three days ago she'd have freaked.

  Now, she found a warm unfamiliar feeling curling deep inside her chest when she woke and saw him there. It was possible, she thought, that she might be falling in love with this huge, hairy brute of a man.

  Possible, but impossible, too.

  They came from different times, and neither would ever wish to live in the other's world. Not forever. Nor, it seemed, would they be allowed to.

  She got out of bed, careful not to wake him, showered, dressed and ordered breakfast. Their laundered clothes arrived with the coffee and eggs. Smith's jacket was permanently stained and Cady's jeans had lost color to multiple bleaching rounds. Neither cared.

  “How long do you think we should stay here?” Smith asked when the meal was finished. “Even if Chumley stays dead, he said more would come, and I believe him.”

  Cady sipped the last of her coffee.

  “We won't stay long,” she said. “We should get back to London. Make sure Gracie and Bertie are cool.”

  “All right, and then?”

  He did not ask the question that obviously weighed so heavily on him.

  “Then we drop into my home year. I'll let people know I'm going to take a little time off because I need it after releasing the game, and we find a way back to your daughter, Smith.”

  He said nothing, but his eyes held hers for what could have been an uncomfortably long time.

  It wasn't uncomfortable, though, and Cady could happily have let the moment go on much longer.

  “Thank you,” he said quietly, “but what about you?”

  “Smith, if I can get you home to Elspeth, I can retrace my steps to Seattle. To Georgia and Matt and my parents and my home.”

  “On your own?” he asked.

  She smiled. “Only if you weren't minded to ride that trail back with me, pardner.”

  The apprentices did not find them, not this time. Doubtless they were looking, using all of the arcane technologies and methods at their disposal, on behalf of whatever master they served.

  For time itself?

  For the great watchmaker?

  Who knew?

  Cady's only immediate concern was to protect those closest to her, and to get gone, as Smith would say. She paid cash at the hotel. If they had to stay another night or two or even three, they would not return there. They were fugitives now. But Smith was a man who had hunted fugitives, and he knew how to remain inconspicuous, how to move without drawing the unwanted eye. Cady would learn from him. After all, he had been willing to learn from her.

  They visited the law firm of Dexter and Calvino, where one of the senior partners, Mr. Thomas Calvino, assured them that the firm would gladly take on the cases of Mr. Matthew Aleveda and Ms. Georgia Eliadis. Mr. Calvino did not question Cady's instructions that Georgia be given power of attorney and control of Cady's assets, which principally consisted of nine and a half million dollars in a checking account.

  Mr. Calvino also promised to personally deliver a handwritten note from Cady to her parents, explaining that she could not come home, but that they were not to worry about her. She thanked them for never losing faith in her and told them that she would always love them, now and for all time.

  But she had to go.

  She did not call Georgia again.

  Mr. Calvino strongly recommended that all contact with Ms. Eliadis be channeled through his office.

  “They'll probably put down your call last night to a wrong number or a cold caller, but she is being monitored and it could adversely affect her sentencing agreement if she's found to have made unauthorized contact with anyone.”

  They thanked Calvino, organized his payment, and were done with this world before lunch time.

  Cady did not feel the need to explore it, like she had with London. The longer she was here, the more it disturbed her. She could understand why Smith did not see things the same way. To him, this looked a perfectly reasonable time and place. Pleasant and prosperous, even.

  But he didn't see what she did.

  People were missing.

  Lots of them.

  Had they gone to the Wall, or somewhere else?

  She didn't know, and she found that she did not want to know. She just wanted to get gone.

  “You don't want to see your ma and pa?” Smith asked as they sat in a coffee shop, passing the hours.

  It was a painful question for him, and she could see it hurt to ask. He must have been contemplating his own daughter, from whom he had been gone a month, and many, many years. Would she refuse contact with him when they were reunited?

  “I do want to see them,” she said, “but they're not my parents. Or, they are, but, you know, they're … not. Chumley was right, Smith. We don't belong here. We have one place, one time we belong. And we should be getting back.”

  They spent the afternoon shopping discretely, picking up some camping supplies, survival equipment, weapons. Just in case. But most of the day they stayed low and kept away from other people.

  After all, they did not belong here.

  At 9:47 that night, they were back standing by the side of the road where they had stepped into the future. Or this version of it, anyway.

  They held hands.

  “Are you ready?” Smith asked.

  “Always,” said Cady.

  Together, they jumped.

  Afterword

  A Girl in Time is finished, but Smith and Cady will be back. If you’d like a heads up, and a big discount on their next adventure, you can get both by joining my bookclub. Just hit up the link below.

  JB Is My Master Now.

  There’s plenty of free stuff waiting there for you, too.

  And if you were inclined to give me a review at your ebook store of choice, you would be my new favourite. Seriously. It makes a huge difference. So if you have the time, please consider writing one.

  Acknowledgments

  As always, first thanks go to you, the readers. I’m not being precious. My first editors are my readers, specifically those long time friends who serve as my alpha crew, and beyond them, my blog regulars, who are always willing to tell me exactly what they think.

  The production team for A Girl in Time went above and beyond, as they always do.

  Jen Wadsworth, for editing.

  William Heavey, artwork.

  Alicia Wanstall-Burke, proofreading.

 

 

 
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