Twin Speex: Time Traitors Book II

by Padgett Lively

  “I’m fine,” she assured him, “I may be coming down with something, though.”

  He nodded and laid a gentle hand on her forehead. “You do feel a bit warm. Go home and rest,” he declared. “I can take care of this performance.”

  When it came time for the company to depart for the colonies, Lillian had joined them. She left the letter behind as ashes in the grate of the fireplace at their lodgings.

  Her grasp on sanity, however, was a tenuous thing, always dependent on circumstances outside her control. And circumstances took a disastrous turn. The company’s tour of America was ruinously unsuccessful. Laurent abandoned them in Philadelphia, taking what money was left and sailing back to England.

  In the beginning, she and the costumer were modestly successful. They set up a tailoring business, exhibiting some cachet as the purveyors of authentic English style. But he died less than a year later, and Lillian struggled to meet customer demand and deadlines. Then Sewal sickened, and her existence reduced to the pinpoints of light shining from his eyes. She did anything and everything to keep him alive. She spent, and scrimped, and begged for the medicine and expertise that would cure him, but to no avail. Sewal died in her arms, gentle and placid to the end.

  That is how he had found her, starving and catatonic, with a dead child in her arms. The Temporatus had burst like an exploding comet into her bedroom, and yet she had moved not a muscle.

  Knightly Davis had finally achieved his goal. From the schematics and materials left by Sir Archibald, he had built a Temporatus; rudimentary to be sure, but a time machine nonetheless. Davis used it now as the promise of a new life to revive Lillian.

  At first, she could only beg him to go back in time to save Sewal, but he lacked the expertise to do so. The machine could only move forward in time and then back to the very moment it had begun working. Sewal had died only days before. The bitterness of this took root in Lillian’s soul.

  Knightly Davis fed this with stories of her father’s brilliance. He filled her mind with dreams of power. He told her of her father’s plans and how they had been dashed by a woman from the future. He knew who was responsible for her father’s death, and through his, Sewal’s. Thorough investigation had revealed the conspirators: Odette, Odell, Franklin, and the rest… all of them, guilty. With patience and careful planning, they could realize her father’s dream and destroy his enemies.

  The old virus awoke and spread with malevolent force through her body. When she was stronger, they moved out to the countryside, a strange and solitary pair that were rarely seen and actively avoided. It took many more years for Knightly Davis to improve the technology. Years that Lillian planned and schemed, for while Knightly Davis sought power, Lillian sought revenge.

  During that time, what gentleness, what compassion, what kindness, Sewal and the old costumer had taught her gave way to the early lessons of her childhood. Knightly Davis had brought her back to health with food and purpose, but what had brought her back to life was the most potent and bitter medicine of all: hate.

  Thirty

  “IT’S PERFECT,” ETTIE declared, surveying the other building from the roof directly across from it.

  She stood with Charlie, Clem, and Kevin Smyth. Beatrix sat patiently at her feet unable to see over the waist-high wall that encircled the roof. The dog was snuggly encased in a wool-knit sweater depicting a number of cute woodland creatures that she would happily have chased in a real forest setting.

  Ettie brought the spyglass down from her eye and said, “The particle stream appears strongest right below the dome.”

  “May I?” Kevin asked, holding out his hand.

  Ettie handed it to him, and he put it up to study the building opposite.

  “Yeah, if the Feralon was correct, that is where the prisoners are being used. One would assume the machine is there as well.” He lowered the spyglass and pointed to the three arched windows that spanned the topmost story from floor to ceiling.

  Ettie nodded slowly and laid her hands flat upon the top of the cold bricks. She stepped closer to the wall until the tips of her boots touched; as if those few inches would somehow bring into focus what was behind the windows. But not even Faith Temple could tell them that.

  “I don’t know,” Faith had insisted. “I am never allowed in that room.”

  Ettie believed her.

  Adelaide’s confidence that Faith’s love for her would override her anger at being used proved overly optimistic. When she had revealed to Faith her initial intentions in befriending her, the woman had thrown Adelaide out and refused to see her. They all assumed that Faith would betray them to her employer, and the rooftop university prepared for an attack. But none came. They waited several anxious days until the two women walked into the large meeting room where they were gathered. The tension between them was evident in Faith’s stiff, uncompromising posture and Adelaide’s pale face and tremulous mouth. Faith had come to see Kevin and had only contacted Adelaide as an intermediary.

  “I’ve decided that my only way out of this is to throw my lot in with you,” she had announced to the room at large, avoiding Adelaide’s anguished glances.

  She seemed only vaguely surprised to see Charlie. “Sir Knightly is an evil and dangerous man, but he isn’t entirely in charge of this operation.” She nodded over to Lord Westchester. “I’m sure his lordship has told you what he knows, but it isn’t nearly enough. I’m not sure even I can help you much.”

  Contrary to this pessimistic pronouncement, the resulting conference yielded important new information. Faith told them in a stiff monotone that the blond woman, the no-named villainess as she was known among the group, was a close associate of Sir Knightly’s, but she had little interaction with Faith or any of the other servants. It was this woman who had added Lord Westchester to their little group of henchmen. For that is what they had become in Faith’s mind, sent out on nebulous and secret errands, collecting all sorts of strange articles and materials, never allowed to speak of their work, even to each other, threatened with terrible punishment should it become known.

  It was this that had terrified her. Faith was kept mostly in the dark, petrified of making a wrong move. Sir Knightly with his lightless eyes and soft voice, saying, “Let no one know of this, Faith. It could go very badly for you if anyone finds out.” Elliot Wakefield’s mysterious disappearance only lent more weight to his threats.

  Charlie had nodded with unconscious solidarity during her recital. Yes, it was when She had first appeared, recalling him to a new mission, that it had all begun to spiral out of control. He looked at Ettie with vague unease, hoping that this little reminder of his treachery would not reignite her distrust.

  Ettie had noticed both Faith’s terror and Charlie’s discomfort, but her mind was occupied with other matters. Was it with the woman’s appearance that the world began to shift and her brother to reveal an impossible story? He had left her with a mission as well, one he couldn’t even explain, just some objects… a letter… cryptic instructions.

  Around that table they had looked to her, the one who could feel the shifts, who could communicate with the Feralon, and she felt her path narrow to a speck of light down a long tunnel. They were hurdling toward the end, and she had no idea what that end might be.

  Gazing across the dark expanse at Knightly Davis’s penthouse of horrors, she felt the cold move in around her. Space tightened and compressed as snow fell, melting against the brick. An inversion of air at her side, and a Feralon appeared; its head barely cleared the height of the wall.

  Clem sucked in her breath. This was her first sight of what she had always believed to be a mythical creature. Although it was much smaller than her childhood imaginings, she shivered, conditioned from a very young age to view the dark, hooded silhouette as sinister. It bent its head and turned only a fraction in her direction, yet Clem felt its gaze slide over her and had the distinct impression of amusement. She held her breath as it pulled a rough cube from its robe and handed it to
Ettie.

  “That block Odell gave me is how they communicate, at least with me,” Ettie had earlier explained as they lay side-by-side on the thick rug in Ettie’s bedroom watching Uncle Matthew’s gossamer-winged creations float just below the ceiling.

  It was only recently that Clem had learned that these beautiful and delicate flying machines were more than just ornamental. Her Uncle Matthew, dear old Uncle Matthew, had invented them to interrupt the listening devices that the Ministry of Technology, under the leadership of Sir Knightly Davis, had planted in almost every noble house. Most of them had been introduced by way of the myriad bots that the Ministry gave as “gifts” to every peer of the realm; a gift one could never refuse. Even though the gliders could mask some conversations, Clem was learning to hold her tongue in front of the innocuous little tablebot and be on the lookout when other various household bots slipped quietly into a room.

  She had told Ettie of how Uncle Matthew, comfortable old Uncle Matthew, had turned the tables on Sir Knightly by giving him some of his own gliders. The thin, delicate wings were covered with tiny receivers. An elaborate tangle of antennae was set up on the roof of their house to capture any stray word.

  Uncle Matthew had heard snippets of conversations, small pieces of a conspiracy he had no real way of piecing together. “Time constriction,” “altered reality,” “total control,” and “revenge,” all figured largely in the faint dialogues that drifted up to his gliders.

  Once, one of his contraptions must have come to rest close to the plotters, because the conversation had come through more clearly than usual.

  “No, I will not quit while we are ahead!” a woman’s voice shrilly insisted. “It isn’t enough. I want to see them suffer, as I have!”

  “Power is your greatest revenge. This scheme of retribution has become a wasteful diversion of time and resources,” Sir Knightly’s dead monotone had responded.

  “How dare you! How dare you!” she screeched, “You, who would be nothing without him!”

  “I know what I owe him,” he returned unemotionally, “but he would not want to see you so consumed.”

  She must have stood to pace the room, for her reply came back muffled. “I know, I know,” she said in a mollified tone. And then with childlike pleading, “Can’t you make it go back? If you could make it go back, I could keep him safe!”

  “I have tried, but it is beyond my capabilities, as you well know.”

  “Yes, yes,” she replied, her voice breathless and agitated.

  “I have supported your efforts, because I believed they would bring you peace and aid us in the creation of your father’s dream,” his voice was flat, yet somehow still conveyed impatience. “But your need has made you reckless…”

  At that point, the garbled words of a servant were heard and then silence. Uncle Matthew had not known what to make of such a conversation until Clem’s unexpected interest in the Lacy Group Building. The building was one of the most iconic landmarks in the city, and it was upon this roof that Clem now stood with her companions and the Feralon.

  Ettie turned the block over in her hands. “Tomorrow,” she read aloud the faint word that seemed to float up from the dark depths of the ocean to waver on the surface of the cube.

  She took a deep breath and nodded to the little Feralon. “Okay. We’ll be ready.”

  *

  Matthew sat in a small hut built rather inexpertly within the large complex of chimneys on the roof of his house. He and his butler’s grandson, Rolf, had constructed it to camouflage the antennae and receiver he put there to pick up any communication from one of his eavesdropping machines or any palmavox operating on the same frequency.

  He was a self-taught engineer, science coming in second only to politics as his greatest passion. He had employed as much technology as was permissible in the days when he was trying to pull Arbor Brook back from the brink of ruin, before he had become fabulously wealthy.

  As it happened, one of his neighbors at the time was a young man by the name of Edwin Armstrong. The boy had been exiled to the country estate of his parents, sent down from Columbia for the terrible crime of being too bright and inquisitive. Edwin was shy and a bit socially awkward, but he and Matthew hit it off and spent many long days discussing the various enhancements Matthew could make to his estate. Edwin’s help was invaluable. He designed a low-cost irrigation system and drew up plans for land use. Once or twice, in a pinch, he even calculated a long-shot winner at the horse races. Beyond his general genius though, Edwin’s particular gift was in transmission and radio communications.

  Matthew had kept in contact with him as best he could, but his sudden wealth and notoriety as a prominent politician kept him away from Arbor Brook for long stretches of time. Years went by, and only after his retirement did Matthew discover that Edwin had committed suicide.

  Matthew berated himself for his neglect and eventually contacted Edwin’s only surviving relative, an older sister. She had let him have free rein of Edwin’s dusty old workshop where he had found a treasure trove of documents and mechanical prototypes. It was Edwin’s genius that had allowed Matthew to develop the flying listening devises that he had planted in Knightly Davis’s house. Matthew just hoped one day to openly acknowledge his old friend’s contributions.

  The crackle and pop of the receiver brought his attention back to the present.

  “Can you hear me, Uncle Matthew?”

  Clem’s voice came through with a screech, so he adjusted some dials and replied, “Loud and clear.”

  “It’s on for tomorrow…” a slight hesitation, “…so Aunt Abigail’s going to have to keep Reginald occupied.”

  After learning of Matthew’s devices, Ettie had reluctantly agreed that he and Abigail be brought in on their plans, but had steadfastly opposed Reginald knowing anything about them.

  Matthew nodded as if she could see him before adding, “Right you are, dear. Leave it to Abigail.”

  “Of course.” She laughed. “She always knows what to do.” He could almost feel her knowing smile through the airwaves.

  “We have some more preparation, but I shouldn’t be late…” another hesitation, “… Uncle Matthew?”

  “Yes, my dear?”

  “I saw one… one of the Feralon. I don’t think I truly believed it all until now. It… it just appeared…like magic.”

  He could hear her struggling with something incomprehensible and remembered what Edwin had once told him about his work. “People believe that what they see is all that there is, that anything outside their realm of understanding is magic. But magic is just re-imagining the world differently. It is really only a matter of perspective.”

  “My dear,” Matthew replied, “you are seeing… experiencing things that exist on a different plane.”

  He wasn’t quite sure what he meant, and the silence that followed this statement was equally confused.

  “Just because we can’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not there or rather, that it’s not a natural part of our world,” he struggled to explain. “The Feralon just occupy another space in it. They use the resources around us in different ways.”

  “I… I think I know what you mean.” He heard her laugh. “Could you have ever imagined this, Uncle Matthew?”

  It wasn’t a question really in need of an answer, so he just shook his head and replied, “Check in with us when you get home, my dear. You know your aunt won’t be easy unless she sees you.”

  Another laugh and, “Rightio,” before she rang off.

  The radio popped and screeched again as she disconnected. Matthew adjusted the dials to a much more manageable fuzzy white noise.

  He stood up from the iron stool he used to operate the receiver and walked over to the comfortable old armchair situated in the corner. He sighed as he sat back into the cushions and, crossing his arms over his ample stomach, rested his chin on his chest. It was his typical thoughtful pose, and it is in this attitude that Abigail found him.

  “Good gr
ief, Matthew, It’s frigid up here!” she exclaimed in her cheerful way, coming into the hut with a heavily laden tea tray. “At least open the vent.”

  She set the tray down and flipped the lever to a vent built into the red brick of the chimney. It was an invention of her own design. Matthew had one too many times passed along a nasty cold to her before she determined to find a way to prevent it. The system used the constant heat from the kitchen chimneys and the winds that blew across the rooftops to draw hot air into the small space. It certainly warmed the room, but also prompted Matthew’s protests.

  “Abigail, the machinery works best when cold,” he complained, getting up to close the vent.

  “Sit back down,” she ordered. “A few degrees of warmth won’t hurt it, and I’ve got something to talk to you about.”

  He agreed reluctantly and with poor grace, but his mood improved when she poured him a hot cup of tea and put before him a thick slice of gooey butter cake.

  A slim, birdlike woman, Abigail perched on the iron stool and sipped at her tea. She looked around the rickety hut with its cracks and chinks through which icy drafts found their way and suppressed an urge to suggest for the hundredth time that they plaster the walls. She knew the dilapidated state of the hut was a deliberate ruse, just as their house had been all those years ago. It had to look innocuous and benign, something that would contain nothing more dangerous than rabbit hutches or pigeons cages. The surveillance state had only grown in intensity over the last few years and, while they were generally considered a harmless old couple, it didn’t make sense to let down their guard even a little.

  She put her cup down on its saucer and said, “I don’t think it’s entirely fair to keep Reginald in the dark like this.”

  Matthew looked up at her over the rim of his teacup. He sat back and rested his hand with the cup on the arm of the chair. “Yes, I agree. Reginald deserves to know what is going on, but my dear, I’m not sure he would believe us. And I certainly don’t want him speaking to his father about it.”