At the very back of the parking lot, in the shadows, is a car. Even at this distance, I’m sure from its shape that it’s Kane’s Lexus.
I try the doors to the building one by one, but it’s only the entrance closest to the car that’s unlocked. The hinges creak as I push the door open. The area inside is dim but not dark, the dirty windows letting in more than enough light to make out details. The entire space—side to side, front to back, floor to rafters—is open. A warehouse, though one that clearly hasn’t been used in a while. At precise points, metal columns rise from the ground to support the roof, but otherwise the floor is empty.
Well, not completely empty.
Forty feet in front of me, Iffy sits in a chair, Kane standing behind her. Wide silver bans encircle her ankles and her chest. Duct tape—a name I know thanks to Iffy—holding her in place. There is a small table, too. On it are two bags—a dark-colored backpack and my satchel.
“Please close the door,” Kane says. He’s trying to sound calm, but the shake in his voice is even worse than it was when we talked on the phone.
Perhaps that should give me some hope, but what it does is make me worry he might do something stupid and unexpected. The smartest thing I can do at the moment is play along. I close the door and turn back to him.
“Now come over,” he orders me. “Slowly. And keep your hands where I can see them.”
My steps echo off the cracked cement floor. As I draw nearer, I lock eyes with Iffy, trying to silently ask if she’s okay. If she’s responding, though, I can’t tell. She just looks scared to me, further fueling my anger toward Kane.
“Stop,” he says when I’m about fifteen feet away.
As soon as I halt, he steps out from behind Iffy’s chair. In his hand I see that he is once more holding the gun he threatened me with in the apartment.
I raise my hands out at my sides, fingers spread, to drive home the point that I’m unarmed. “I came just like you told me to. Now let my friend go.”
With a speed that surprises me, he whips his gun up and points it at me. “Shut up. You only speak when I tell you to speak.” He takes a step in my direction. “Here’s your first question. Where were you born, Denny Younger?”
“Here,” I say. “In California.”
He glares at me and shakes his head. “No. The truth.”
“It is the truth.”
“It’s not!” His voice has started to shake again, only this time it also has an edge of desperation. “Where were you born?”
I try to swallow, but my mouth has gone dry. “The Shallows,” I finally say. “New Cardiff.”
For a few seconds, he starts and stops a smile several times, as if he’s forgotten how to actually do it. “Say it again.”
“The Shallows in New Cardiff.”
“And where is New Cardiff now?”
I see no reason to lie. “It never existed.”
“Like the Upjohn Institute?”
The cotton that has soaked away all the moisture from my mouth has moved into my throat. “Yes.”
“Like the magnificent world where the British still ruled here?”
My voice fails completely, so I only nod.
He stares at me for what seems like hours before he says, “I didn’t believe it, didn’t believe the stories about you.” His voice has taken on an almost dreamy quality, and I sense that he’s talking as much to himself as to me. “How could anyone? And yet you’re actually real. I’ve been waiting to find out the truth for a long time. A long, long time.”
Waiting for a long time? What’s he talking about? I’ve been here only since early spring. It makes no sense.
The only thing that is clear is that though he knows about my world, he’s not of it. I thought it impossible to be more confused about what’s going on, but I was wrong.
He walks over to the table, removes my chaser from my satchel, and sets it down. “You’re going to help me with a mission.”
“What kind of mission?”
That half smile again, there and gone. “A mission of mercy.” He places the muzzle of his gun against the back of Iffy’s skull. “Approach the table. But be warned, any trick you try won’t be fast enough to stop me from pulling this trigger.”
I wish he was wrong, but he’s not. Even if I were to activate the emergency escape combination, he’d likely know something was up and would shoot Iffy before I could disappear.
Yes, I know. Ultimately it wouldn’t matter. I’d be able to go back and stop Kane long before we ever got to this point and avoid Iffy’s death. But I would always remember that I let him kill a version of her. Despite all the lives I have already erased—once even Iffy’s—I’m not strong enough to be even tangentially responsible for her outright murder. What I must hope is that he will drop his guard at some point for long enough that I can make my move without risking her life.
When I reach the table, Kane says, “Open it. Nice and slow. No sudden movements. Tell me you understand.”
“I understand.”
I reach out and touch the plate that unlocks the lid and then move the top out of the way.
“Step back,” he barks. “Ten steps. Big ones.”
The buttons are right there, so close. Three seconds, four tops is all I need. But Kane needs only one to pull the trigger, so I move away.
Once I stop, he lowers the gun and drags the chaser closer to him. From inside the backpack, he removes an old, leather-bound book. I’m close enough that I can see there’s no title on the front or spine. A bookmark sticks out of the top, and he opens the book to that page. When he sets it on the table next to the chaser, I can see just enough to know that the text is not commercially printed, but rather handwritten. A journal?
After studying the page, he shoots me a look to make sure I haven’t moved and then does something I’m not expecting. Looking back and forth between the book and the chaser, he enters information into the device.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“I told you to be quiet,” he says.
I don’t care what he told me. He could damage the machine, and this period of time that I’ve been thinking is only temporary might become permanent. “You shouldn’t be playing around with that.”
“I know exactly what I’m doing.”
He takes another look at the book, and enters something else into the chaser.
“So to use this, I just press GO, right?”
“It won’t work.”
“Let’s see.”
He picks up the chaser and taps the go button. But as I’ve already warned him, nothing happens.
Looking disappointed, he says, “Because it’s keyed to you?”
“Yes.”
Kane considers the box for a moment before setting it back down. “But you can take someone with you, correct?” He taps the journal. “Says here you can take someone. Which I’m guessing is how you got your sister here, right?”
I nod, momentarily unable to speak.
Kane glances at Iffy and back at me. “What about three?”
I don’t like where this is going at all so remain silent.
Kane picks up the journal. “You don’t need to answer,” he says, flashing the book in my direction before putting it in his backpack. “That’s in here, too, so I already know you can.”
If the journal was a curiosity before, I absolutely must get my hands on it now.
Kane pulls my satchel over his head so that the strap drapes across his chest, removes a hefty collapsible knife from inside the backpack, and dons the bag, effectively securing the satchel in place. He then uses the knife to cut away the tape holding Iffy’s ankles to the chair.
Before he does the same with the loop around her chest, he says, “This is very sharp. I wouldn’t try anything if I were you.”
Once the tape is off, he closes the knife and slips it into the small pocket on the side of my satchel just below where the strap connects. He then pulls out the chaser.
“It’s my unde
rstanding that we need to be in close contact,” Kane says. “Is that correct?” Even if I wanted to answer, he doesn’t give me enough time before he starts talking again. “I’m sure you’re thinking this is your chance to overpower me, but don’t forget I’m the one holding the gun. Now, we will do this in exactly the way I describe.”
I’m instructed to stand a few feet in front of Iffy and then turn my back to her. As I do this, I catch a glimpse of the chaser’s control panel. Kane has input a number into the destination box at the top that appears to conform, at least in length, to a standard location number. The glance I get is too quick to memorize each digit, but the last four stick with me—3928—because they’re familiar, but at the moment I’m too occupied to figure out why. I also note he’s input a date, but the only number I catch is a 2 at the end.
Once I’m situated, he has Iffy stand up and press against my back.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers as she puts her arms around my chest. “He surprised me.”
“It’s okay. Don’t wor—”
“No talking!”
From the sound of Kane’s voice, he’s right behind Iffy now. I feel a bump as he moves against her back.
“Just so you know,” Kane says, “I’ve got my gun to your girlfriend’s head again.”
He has obviously given this considerable thought. To further prove this, he grabs my hand and pulls it back toward him, out of my sight.
“Extend your finger and keep your hand right where it is,” he says.
I do it, though it’s hard to remain completely still in such an awkward position.
He grabs my wrist and says, “Here we go.”
The words are barely out of his mouth when I feel the chaser’s go button press against my outstretched finger.
CHAPTER NINE
The gray mist of the journey swirls around me like a cloud. I think I still feel Iffy behind me, but it’s hard to tell. The sensations of touch and pressure within a jump can be misleading.
No more than half a minute passes before the shroud begins to fade and the world takes shape around us. It’s nighttime, so at least Kane’s done that part right. Without seeing the chaser, though, I have no idea of the exact hour. It’s also significantly colder than it was in the warehouse. I feel Kane’s hand slip from my side, and hear him grunting in pain as the price of the time trip is extracted in the form of a headache.
I, too, am feeling it. Even though it’s far from the worst I’ve ever had, it still takes me a moment to realize this is my chance to grab the chaser.
I try to twist around, but Iffy is still clinging to me, her face contorted as she works through her own internal torture.
“Stay here,” I whisper as I pry myself loose. “I’ll be right back.”
By the time I’m free, Kane is weaving and stumbling away from us, and is already a good thirty feet away. I head toward him, intending to run but barely able to manage an ugly jog. We are on an open surface that crunches strangely under my feet. I can’t get a sense of what exactly it is or tell how far it goes on because my eyes are still accustomed to the relative brightness of the building in LA.
I’m only a few feet away when Kane lurches around, his gun slicing through the air like a club. The only way I can keep from being hit is to arch backward as I skid to a stop, the ground crumpling loudly under my feet.
Kane seems to find his balance, and aims the weapon at me.
There’s nowhere for me to hide, so I yell, “You’ll never get back if you kill me!”
I can see him thinking about this for a moment, and then he shakes the end of the gun at me. “Stay there.” He watches me, daring me to defy him.
I hold my ground.
After a few moments, Kane’s gaze moves beyond me, and then he starts scanning the area. “Where are we? Where’s the city? Where’s the damn city?”
Keeping my voice calm and low, I ask, “Which city?”
“Which city? Los Angeles! What do you think?”
He spins around, taking in our surroundings, but as I can see from my position, there are no city lights in that direction, either. In fact, except for the stars above us, there are no lights anywhere.
He focuses on me again. “Where are we? What did you do? Are we even in the right time?”
I have no idea where we are, but I know what’s causing his confusion. Not only have we been traveling disconnected from a companion—a human grounding point that rewinders at the institute used to keep their chasers on course—we have also been affected by the three of us jumping together. Either factor alone would be enough to throw us miles off course. Together, who knows how far we are from his target? As for the date, though, whatever he input is the date we arrived. That is always accurate.
None of this I tell him, however. I simply say, “If you let me see the chaser, I can figure it out.”
He clutches the device against his chest, panicked. “I’m not that stupid.”
Taking a step toward him, I say, “Then just show me the display and I can—”
He points his gun at my chest. “Get back!”
“You won’t hurt me,” I say. “The chaser is useless without me.”
I take another step.
“I said get back!”
A gust of wind suddenly blows past us, making the already chilly air feel like ice. We are all dressed for a warm summer day in Southern California, not for the freezing night we’ve ended up in.
“You tricked me, didn’t you?” he says, his gun hand shaking, from fear or the cold or likely both.
Fighting hard to keep my teeth from chattering, I take another step. “I didn’t trick you. I don’t know where we are. You said Los Angeles. Is that where we were supposed to arrive?
“When is this?” he asks as if he hasn’t heard me. “When?”
Another step takes me to just a couple feet from the outstretched weapon. “When is it supposed to be?”
I’m close enough now that I can see his eyes narrow. “She warned me you couldn’t be trusted.”
I have a terrible feeling that despite the fact that he can’t use the chaser without me, he’s about to shoot me anyway. Knowing I need to act first, I dip down and lunge forward, then slam upward into his wrist. As my shoulder connects, the gun fires into the night sky, the boom of the weapon temporarily destroying the hearing in my right ear. My left isn’t doing much better, and picks up only a muffled yell as Kane screams in anger.
I barrel forward, intending to knock him to the ground, but he twists to the side, and instead of connecting with his chest, I glance off his ribs and stumble past him.
“Denny! Watch out!”
Iffy’s voice is barely discernible above the ringing in my head, but I heed the warning and whirl around. Kane has heard her, too, and has abandoned whatever he was about to do and has started running toward her.
She’s my weakness. I can’t let him get control of Iffy again, so I push off the crumbling earth and thrust myself after him.
Glancing at me over his shoulder, he shouts, “Stop or I’ll kill her!”
His words might be tough, but the fear in his eyes tells me his threats are just bluster.
I cover the last few feet in an angled leap that crashes me into his side. Down we go, hard to the ground, but in a direction that keeps him from landing on the chaser. Any hope that the fall stunned him quickly dissolves as he scrambles out from under me and tries to get back up.
I reach out to grab him, but only manage to snag the strap of my satchel. I expect to see the muzzle of his gun at any second, but while Kane stills hold the chaser to his chest with one hand, the other is now empty. At least the fall has done some good and jarred the weapon loose.
He grabs the strap a few inches above my hand and pulls at the bag, trying to break loose my grip. I see something peeking out around the edge of the small flap that covers the side pocket and then remember the knife.
I rip it out and flick the blade open. As soon as Kane sees it, he jerks back as
if expecting me to stab him. I lunge a few inches forward like that’s exactly what I’m going to do, but instead yank the knife back and slice through the satchel’s strap.
Kane tries to pull the bag with him as he scrambles to his feet, but I’ve got too good a hold on it. He kicks out, hitting my knife hand, but ultimately the satchel slips from his grasp. Apparently unwilling to fight for it any longer, he starts to run.
I push myself to my feet to chase after him but immediately fall back down from unexpected pain radiating up from my right thigh. I think at first I pulled a muscle when we fell, but when I touch the spot, it’s sticky and wet.
The cut is not much more than a quarter inch deep, but it is long and painful. I was so focused on Kane that I didn’t feel the knife slice through my skin after he’d kicked it.
I look in the direction he’s gone and can barely make him out in the distance. In my current condition, there’s no way I can catch him.
Iffy stumbles over, still wincing. “Did you get the chaser?”
I shake my head and try to keep the pain from my face, but fail.
“What’s wrong?” she asks, suddenly concerned. When she spots the gash in my jeans, she kneels and leans in for a closer look. “We need to get you to a hospital. You need stitches.”
“No hospitals,” I say. I don’t know where we are in time—in fact, there may not be any hospitals here—but whether there are or not, minimizing the chances of being remembered by the locals is basic training, so automatic for me. “You’ll have to do it.”
She looks at me as if I’ve gone insane. “You mean the stitches?”
“Yes.”
“I, I can’t do that.”
“Sure you can.”
It would be easier to just cut through my pants, but it’s the only pair I have with me, so with Iffy’s help, I pull them down to my knees, gritting away as much of the hurt as I can. I then remove the med-kit from my satchel. Once I clean out the wound with a packet of disinfectant, I give Iffy the suture kit.
Looking dubious, she says, “I’m not even good at putting a button on a shirt.
“You have to do it and fast. If you don’t, Kane gets away, and we’re stuck here forever.”
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