Destroyer (Rewinder #2)

by Brett Battles

  The home button was created to give rewinders a quick way of returning to the institute—the preprogrammed location—at the point that corresponded with one’s date of birth and how long he or she has actually lived since then.

  Where we are, though, is not the location that equates to where the institute would be had the institute existed in this world. Once I committed to living in Iffy’s time line, I reprogrammed the home location coordinates to the living room of Ellie’s and my apartment. Even so, given the distance Lidia and I have just traveled, all without a companion to keep our path true, a displacement of several hundred miles is not out of the question.

  I check the chaser and see that we are a little bit north of where San Diego should be. What surprises me, though, is that we’re not in 2015. The date on the device reads: October 12, 2018.

  That’s impossible. I can’t go to 2018. I haven’t lived long enough. That’s three years past my home time. It must be some kind of mistake. It has to be an—

  Wait. Lidia has lived an extra three years. Instead of being nineteen like I am, she’s twenty-two now. And the chaser has been keyed to her. Could it be possible that the time barrier is in effect only in relationship to the person who is connected to the chaser?

  Another wave of pain rushes over me. This is too much for me to figure out right now. I need rest. I can figure out what’s going on when my head clears.

  I weave up the slope, my hand touching the ground with every step to steady myself. In the distance, I hear a hum that sounds a lot like the drone of traffic, but there are no other noises.

  Good. The farther away civilization is, the better.

  As I climb out of the dip in the land, I see a glow rising above a jagged horizon in the general direction of where San Diego should be.

  Good. Maybe the change hasn’t affected things as much as I feared.

  Off to my right is a line of vehicle lights on a road—the source of the hum. Scattered here and there are other lights, too, homes I’m guessing, but none are closer than a few miles.

  My luck seems to be holding.

  I randomly choose a direction and start walking. I can’t describe how utterly exhausted I feel. I don’t think there’s a single atom in my body not pleading for me to lie down and close my eyes.

  In this condition, it’s no wonder I don’t hear the footsteps behind me until a moment before I’m hit in the back. I trip over my own feet and take a slow tumble to the grass. I have enough energy to roll onto my back, but not enough to stand.

  Lidia sways a few feet away, her face twisted in fury and pain.

  “Where do you . . . think . . . you’re going?”

  “Go away, Lidia. Leave me alone.” To be honest I can’t help but wonder if this spot might be where I lie forever.

  A growl starts low in her chest and becomes a scream the moment she throws herself at me. I curl to the side to protect the satchel and chaser a second before she smashes into me.

  She claws at my shirt, at my neck, at my hair. A fingernail rips a gouge across the skin just above my collarbone.

  “Get off!” I yell as I throw back an elbow.

  It connects with her jaw, knocking it into her skull while at the same time causing my arm to feel like it’s been rung like a bell. The sting is so acute, I look at my arm, thinking it must be broken, but instead of seeing bone sticking through my skin, I see Kane’s knife still in my hand.

  I pull away from Lidia and am somehow able to get my knees under me. From there I lurch to my feet. “Go, Lidia. You’re done. Go and enjoy what you’ve created while you can.”

  She pushes herself up and rubs her jaw. Her gaze flicks to my hand, and she huffs, “What? Are you going to cut me?”

  “I said go.”

  She starts walking toward me. “Or what?”

  “Just go!”

  I take a backward step, but she keeps coming until she’s only a few feet away. Holding her arms out wide to her side, she says, “Go on, Denny. The first slice is free.”

  I don’t want to do this. Why can’t she accept the fate that she’s created for herself?

  After a few seconds, she drops her arms and laughs. “I knew you didn’t have it in you. You caste dregs are all the same.”

  She sneers as if she thinks she can simply take the knife out of my hand.

  Ellie.

  Iffy.

  The billions and billions who now have never been.

  Yes, I’ve done my share of erasing, but my crimes pale compared to Lidia’s. I did what I did for love—for my sister and for Iffy. Lidia? Her motivation has been spite and anger and jealousy. The only one she’s contorted history for is herself.

  In a burst of speed that surprises even me, I rush at her. Her eyes widening, she reaches for the knife, but I jerk my hand so that it flows under her outstretched arm and drive the blade into her chest.

  Confusion is the first emotion that rolls over her face. Her hands go to the wound, and when she sees blood on her fingers, fear rushes in. She takes a staggering step before falling backward.

  “Wha . . . what . . .” She loses her train of thought as she looks at her hands again.

  Slowly, as if she is just going to bed, she lowers her back all the way to the ground. Her eyes, however, remain open as she stares between blinks at the night sky.

  I didn’t want it to go this way, but she’s left me no choice.

  She is Kali, the goddess of time and destruction, to the end. Because though my hand is holding the knife, she has destroyed herself.

  When I kneel beside her, her lips begin to move, but she emits not even a whisper.

  I stay there, my bloody hand holding hers until the life finally fades from her eyes.

  Gently, I shake her just to be sure. “Lidia?”

  No reaction.

  “Lidia?”

  It is truly and finally over. I have stopped her in the most permanent way.

  I lay her arms beside her and close her eyelids. The last is for me, a final gesture that proves to me she’s gone, and perhaps, to a lesser extent, that in killing her I haven’t lost all of my humanity.

  What I really should do is dig a grave. There’s no way to know who might live around here, and I certainly wouldn’t want some kids stumbling upon her body. The problem is, I don’t have enough strength to even start.

  Doesn’t matter anyway, I remind myself. Once I jump out of here, I’ll change the past, and Lidia’s body, along with whatever reality this 2015 (or 2018 or whenever this is) has become will disappear.

  Right.

  Good.

  Not an issue then.

  The next thing I know, I’m stretched out on the grass beside her. I don’t remember lying down, but, well, it does feel good.

  Maybe I’ll rest for a few minutes, just get a little strength. Five minutes, tops, and then I’ll find someplace else to hole up, where I’ll be out of the sun when it rises.

  Good thinking.

  A few minutes. That’s all.

  Just . . .

  . . . a . . .

  . . . few—

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Voices.

  Sunlight.

  No, close your eyes. Don’t let it in.

  A dream. The same one that has been wrapped around me for what feels like forever. Iffy and I on a pier overlooking the ocean. Ellie is there, too. We’re having hot dogs. Or maybe ice cream.

  Voices.

  My body shakes.

  I say something, though I’m not sure if it’s in my mind or aloud.

  Pressure on my thigh. And then a sting at the cut on my back.

  Voices.

  A prick on my arm, near my elbow. It hurts only for a moment so there’s no need to open my eyes and check . . . not that I could if I wanted to.

  The dream. Iffy and I in her car. Well, it’s not her car. It’s Marilyn’s. Only it’s not Marilyn’s, either. Music on the radio that Iffy sings to as we drive and drive and drive.

  A song I’ve never hear
d.

  With lyrics I don’t actually understand.

  Waking seems to take forever. It must be evening, though, because I no longer feel the heat of the sun on my skin.

  Sun? Why would I be sleeping outside?

  For a while the question ebbs and flows in importance. But as the tendrils of unconsciousness continue falling away, I begin to remember everything.

  Lidia.

  The Mongols.

  My satchel.

  Oh, God. The knife.

  She’s dead.

  I’ve stopped her. That has been my primary goal up until now, and with the knowledge that it has been achieved comes a huge sense of relief, despite what it ultimately took for me to accomplish it.

  I then try to recall where I moved to after I left Lidia’s body, but I don’t actually remember getting back up. Am I still beside her?

  The thought causes me to wrench open my eyes. I look left and right, confused.

  I must still be asleep. I must still be in the dream.

  I’m not outside at all. I’m on a bed in a room with soft green walls. There’s a black, very solid-looking door on the wall past my feet. In the upper half is a small window, but I can see nothing through it.

  I try to sit up, but I can’t seem to move. Have I hurt myself worse than I thought?

  No, wait. I can move. I moved my head to look around, remember? I lift my head again, but this time examine my body. The good news is that I don’t think I’m paralyzed. The bad is almost as disconcerting, though. I’m being held in place by straps across my chest, arms, and legs.

  Panicking, I push at them, hoping they’re loose enough for me to slip out of them, but it quickly becomes clear they’re not.

  My chaser! Oh, God, my chaser!

  I scan around. My bag is definitely not on the bed with me, nor is it anywhere in the room, as there’s not a cabinet or table where it could be stashed. In fact, the only other item in the room is a chair sitting against the wall.

  “Hello?” I yell toward the door. “Is there anyone out there? Hello?”

  I’m either being ignored or no one can hear me.

  Think! I tell myself as I close my eyes. What happened?

  My last memory is lying next to Lidia on the grass. Whatever happened after that is nothing more than jumbled images that very well could only be part of my dreams.

  I didn’t jump, did I? I mean, I’m still where Lidia brought me, right?

  I can’t tell from anything in the room. The chair and the bed look as if they could be from 1915 as easily as 2015.

  I lie in my ignorance for what seems like hours before I finally hear a clank from somewhere outside the room. A moment later, the door swings open, and three people enter—two women and one man.

  The man and one of the women, the taller of the two, are wearing some sort of uniform I have never seen before. The other woman is dressed in a light gray pantsuit, I guess you’d call it. Their skin tones, though not identical shades, are all browner than mine, and there’s a slight Asiatic look to the women’s eyes.

  The woman in the uniform starts talking. If she’s talking to me, as her gaze would indicate, I don’t know what she wants as I can’t understand what she’s saying. There’s the occasional word that sounds familiar, but I can’t be sure of their meaning because everything else is completely foreign to me. When she finishes, she stares at me, obviously waiting.

  I hesitate for a moment to see if anyone else is going to speak up before saying, “I’m sorry. I don’t understand.”

  Stone faces all around.

  The uniformed woman says something else to me, and again waits.

  I shake my head and then ask, “Do any of you speak English?”

  This causes the three to huddle together, each rapidly talking over the top of the others. The man gives me a suspicious sideways glance and then says something to the woman in gray.

  With a nod, she approaches the bed and starts checking me over. From the attention she gives my wounds, it’s pretty clear she’s a doctor. As she moves the sheet away from my leg, I can see that the wound has been resealed, though not with sutures as far as I can tell. There’s also less redness around it, which I take as a good sign.

  She has to loosen the strap across my chest to look at my shoulder, but immediately tightens it again when she’s finished. The last thing she does is place a square on my neck that looks kind of like a piece of thick paper, but is cold like metal. She looks at it for a moment and then says something to her colleagues.

  More conversation, and then the three leave without engaging me further.

  I try not to theorize about what kind of society I’ve found myself in. The only thing I need to concentrate on is finding my chaser and getting out of here.

  Barely a minute passes before the door opens again. This time I have five visitors, all in uniform. One is the woman from before, but the others are all new. She directs them as they unshackle me from the bed and roughly pull me to my feet.

  As I’m guided down a series of white hallways, I try to keep track of each turn and draw a rudimentary map in my head.

  At the end of a particularly long corridor, they take me through a doorway into a small room we all barely have enough space to stand in. The moment the door is closed, I feel the room move downward and realize that we’re in a lift. There were none of the usual indicators when we entered—no gap between the doorway and the car, nor any selector buttons on the wall.

  When it stops moving, the man closest to the door opens it, and I’m ushered out again. No white hallways here. Dirt, with wood and rock supports. Almost like a mine shaft. We are definitely belowground. How far, I’m not sure, but I don’t like it. They take me along a windy route before turning down a new tunnel. Unlike those we’d just come through, the walls of this tunnel are made of what appears to be concrete. The passageway dead-ends about thirty feet down. Spaced evenly along each side are black doors—three to the right, three to the left.

  I’m taken to the farthest door on the left. When one of my escorts opens it, I try to peek inside, but there are no lights so all looks black.

  The woman says something to me and waits. I don’t even try to respond. After several moments, she says something else, and one of her colleagues pushes me in the back.

  As soon as I stumble into the room, the door shuts behind me, plunging the space into complete darkness.

  I stand still, temporarily unable to move.

  Whatever relief I’d been feeling at the knowledge that Lidia was no longer a problem is gone. Unless I can get out of this cell, the havoc she has sown will stand.

  And at the moment, I’m not feeling particularly optimistic about my chances.

  Something scrapes against the floor to my right. I whirl around to face it, but in the pitch black, I can see absolutely nothing.

  “Is someone there?” I ask.

  The movement stops for a second before starting again.

  “Hello?”

  The punch that hits my face comes without warning. I fall onto the floor, my mind barely clinging to consciousness.

  “Confuto,” a deep male voice says.

  The scraping returns to the place from where I first heard it, then all goes quiet again.

  The word the man has spoken feels familiar, like I should know what it means. But my mind has shattered into a million shards, and all it wants is to turn off.

  A final stray memory guides me into unconsciousness.

  RJ standing in my living room with a big grin on his face as he says, “May you live in interesting times.”

  He said a friend told him it was a curse, but RJ wasn’t so sure.

  I could tell him now, without hesitation, that his friend was right.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Brett Battles is a Barry Award–winning author of more than twenty novels, including the Jonathan Quinn series, the Project Eden series, and the Alexandra Poe series—the latter of which he wrote with Robert Gregory Browne. Battles draws
on his extensive world travels to infuse his thrillers and science fiction stories with rare cultural and historical authenticity, bringing people and places to vibrant life. He lives in Los Angeles. You can find him at www.BrettBattles.com.