Cursed Apprentice (Earth Survives Book 2)

by R. R. Roberts

  Payton gasped despite himself. Geez! That stung!

  Patty’s smile, meant to encourage, was weak. “That’s it, protection from our best-guess at the viruses from three hundred years ago. That should keep you healthy.”

  Coru said, “Thanks, Patty,” and nothing more. It couldn’t have been too serious between them, then. It was time to go.

  Payton adjusted his sleeve, then produced one of the two blue M-pods he’d hastily prepared and handed it to Coru. “Some things you need to know; things I’ve learned in the archives. In case we get separated.”

  Coru shoved the M-pod into his back pocket. “Tell me yourself. We stay together, no matter what.”

  “The least you need to know is Wren Wood will be able to read our thoughts.” He smirked at Coru’s surprised expression, happy to see he had the power to shock his brother. There would be a few more shocks over the next several days, shocks Payton would take a measure of satisfaction from when he delivered them. Who knows? Maybe his brother might agree to escape into the past with him. Wait ‘til he read what was on the M-pod...

  Payton hitched his pack higher onto his shoulders and strapped it across his chest as Coru had done, covering his jacket with the cheeky “Professor Rez” emblazoned across it, then slapped a second blue M-pod into Cyprian’s hand with that same satisfaction. “Give this to Coru should he return without me.”

  The M-pod disappeared inside Cyprian’s fist. “You return together,” he insisted, his voice thick with emotion. “I want you to know how proud I am of you both.”

  A thunderous crack sounded overhead and they all staggered, reaching out for something, anything, to steady them. The aftershocks were hard and strong, and slower to dissipate. Daggers of blinding sunlight flooded into the lab through the gaping ceiling, cracked open like an egg from side to side. Glacial air exploded into the lab, erasing the Bore’s heat. Warning sirens erupted all around them.

  Moira rose like a drunkard and staggered toward the exit. “We’ve got to get to level three,” she screamed even as the air vents flooded breathable air into the compromised lab and hundreds of repair-bots scrambled across the roof dragging secondary skins behind them to seal the space. It was all over in seconds: Pressure equalized, sirens silenced, shadows reappeared. And Moira was gone.

  Where were her cries, “My boy, my beautiful boy” now? It was all for show, and this confirmed it. If he’d had any doubts about his plan to ditch returning as soon as the mission was done, his mother’s true feelings cemented them now. There was nothing for him to return to here in WEN 2341.

  “This is as good as I can get it, Cy. It’s now or never,” Keyes called out, his uncertainty carried in the swirling dance of icy atmospheric and mechanically warmed air. Without taking his gaze away from the cracked screen before him, he began counting down. “Ten.”

  Coru’s hand enveloped his, and Payton was grateful for the contact. This here was the part he was most afraid of—going through the Bore itself. “It’s a good plan,” Coru murmured.

  “Nine.”

  Payton swallowed the lump in his throat, locking his gaze with Coru’s. “You and I will make a new history, I promise. This will be the adventure of our lives.”

  Coru frowned. “This isn’t a game, Payton.”

  Payton realized he’d said the wrong thing. Coru didn’t see all the possibilities yet, but he would, and very soon. “I know it’s no game. We go together, brother.”

  “Eight.”

  They turned to face the yawning entrance of the Time Bore, ignoring the growing signs of widening destruction, the ever-increasing vibrations that had to be snaking through the entirety of Cloud Rez in wave after wave. Payton shivered, biting back the fear that wanted to surge forward. He wouldn’t let it.

  “Seven.”

  “Six.”

  This was why they would go together. Coru was strong and dependable. Payton knew this era like the back of his hand. A tough guy and a smart guy. What could go wrong?

  “Five.”

  “Four,” Keyes shouted, his tone more frantic this time, his fingers flying across the control board. “May the gods protect you both!”

  Coru glanced back at his father, their gazes locking for a long, telling moment, leaving Payton out once again. Did they not see what they were doing? Did they not know how it felt to be left behind in this special father/son bonding? What Payton would give to have his father look at him the way he was looking at Coru right now. Payton blinked sudden moisture from his eyes and turned away, pissed at himself for letting the Coru thing get to him once again.

  “Three.”

  He heard his father choke out, “Coru. Son. Remember your promise,” and ignored the stab of abandonment that pierced his chest.

  “Two!” Keyes’s voice cracked.

  It was time. It was time to run from this toxic place and build a new life for himself, in another place. Anywhere was better than this. He’d lose his freaking ‘hero’ brother at the first opportunity. He wanted this so bad, he could taste it.

  “Now!” Keyes yelled out.

  Coru and Payton ran toward the hungry black mouth together; toward the life Payton would grab with both hands.

  Or he was about to die.

  They leapt together—disappeared inside the Time Bore—together.

  2

  ARRIVAL

  Payton: Vancouver WEN 2036

  PROPELLED from darkness into blinding light and a fleeting vision of a shadowed alleyway, Payton tumbled hard onto the ground, shredding his outstretched palms as he skidded across its crumbling surface, his brain still shuddering from the beating he’d taken inside the Time Bore. He felt as if he were a kid’s toy, flung back into the toy box, hard. The pain—he’d never experienced so much pain—reverberated throughout his entire body. He was going to vomit.

  Panting hard, he lay where he landed for a long moment, his teeth clenched, waiting for the pain to subside, for his head to stop spinning, for the urge to upchuck the contents of his stomach to pass. Wave after wave of nausea swept through him, forcing him to dry-heave, his stomach muscles bunching to rigid, again and again, rocking his whole body until he spattered the black surface with chunks. Pressing his forehead against the ground, he groaned in his effort to stem the carnage.

  After a few moments, the nausea subsided, leaving him limp and spent. He’d never eat Texas Rolls again.

  As his sickness passed, a dim understanding of his new surroundings trickled into the edges of his consciousness. For one, it was suffocatingly hot here. He wanted to unzip his jacket, pull it away from his body, let cool air brush his sweaty skin, but he couldn’t move. Not yet.

  The ground he lay on was both hard and crumbly. They made their roadways from oil during this time, called it… blacktop? Pavement? It didn’t matter. It was coming apart, in any case.

  Beyond the unforgiving ground on which he lay, he registered the gawd-awful smell of rotting meat… and gasoline and exhaust, and a snatch of briny ocean? The sound of traffic passing by this hollow place filtered in, in brief spurts, further grounding his location.

  What did all this add up to?

  His brain was slow to assemble the clues. A city, a big one, near an ocean—Seattle, Vancouver, maybe? This was good. It seemed they’d at least made their target.

  He hoped Zhang’s reentry had been at least this bad. Worse, even. The idiot.

  The idiot who’d handed him the keys to freedom, he reminded himself, his joy at his escape currently tempered by his less-than-stellar arrival. He’d get over it. He prayed, Don’t let this be a mistake.

  The good news—they were alive.

  Keeping his eyes squeezed shut, he rolled onto his side with a moan, then jerked upright in revulsion at recognizing the overwhelming stink of urine, now soaked into the shoulder and side of his jacket. He’d landed in freaking urine? He staggered to his feet, swaying, squinting around himself, taking in a shaft of weak light that cut down into the narrow alley he was standing in, bookende
d by tall, smoke-blackened brick buildings. A series of overflowing metal Dumpsters lined the walls and cast long shadows, creating dark places in which danger could lurk.

  Where was Coru?

  The path to escaping this hot, stinking monochromatic world presented itself in the form of a brightly lit narrow opening at the end of the alley and out onto a city street. Here the pressing, cloying atmosphere of the alleyway was broken with brief glimpses of passing combustion automobiles, a garish parade of colors, bringing with them snatches of blaring music, or an impatient horn. This had been known as the Saturation Period in the art world, with nothing untouched by wildly innovative interpretations of colors expressed on the canvas, in the architecture, transportation, fashion.

  His heartbeat sped up with excitement; his pain already subsiding. So completely different from the subdued colors of Cloud Rez. Cloud Rez was lifeless; this was exuberant. He fully intended to embrace this exuberance. If he was smart, Coru would follow his lead.

  Coru.

  He searched out the Time Bore’s entrance, the evidence of its presence so slight, the casual eye would miss it. A shimmering vibration in the air, a slight trick of the eye were the only indications it was even there, and that evidence would most probably be dismissed as a mistake.

  He turned this way and that, searching. Where was Coru?

  Nowhere. Coru was nowhere.

  Payton was alone. His heartbeat remained high, fueled by apprehension now. He caught sight of movement by one of the dumpsters, heard a faint shuffle.

  Not alone.

  He crouched, drilling his gaze into the shadows, willing himself to see what he was facing. “Who’s there?” he demanded, his voice gravelly with the need for water on his raw throat.

  A stooped man drifted forward, his gray, layered clothing more rags than garments. His brown hair was long and stringy, his lined face held an expression of terror.

  This guy looked more scared than Payton. Payton took some comfort in this fact. Some; not much. He straightened, shrugging his damp shoulder, shivering in revulsion at the pungent smell of urine he now emitted. Gawd. Five minutes. He’d been here only five minutes…

  The man moved closer, his expression becoming more wondering than afraid now. “W-where’d you come from, Mister? I was watchin’ the whole time. This place was empty—I was by myself.”

  He stopped and nodded at something over Payton’s shoulder.

  Payton wasn’t falling for it.

  “Except for that guy. He ain’t going nowhere. You fell out of the sky right in front of me.” Dumpster Guy fell silent and waited for Payton to respond. When Payton didn’t, he shrugged and let it pass. “Nice backpack you got there, buddy. Got anything you’re willing to share with a man in need?”

  Payton opened his mouth, about to tell Dumpster Guy to take a hike, then thought better of it. This guy would have information he could use. Payton shifted, glanced back to make sure there was in fact no one behind him. His gaze arrested at the sight of a body stretched out where the broken blacktop met brick wall. The guy wasn’t moving, his eyes were open, staring, his jaw wide as if gasping at something.

  The guy was dead.

  Payton jerked back, choked down a cry of horror, reined in his compulsion to bolt down that alley, away from death toward light.

  Creaking laughter brought him around to face Dumpster Guy, who was grinning wide, displaying his two remaining brown teeth.

  “You’re fresh off the turnip truck, aren’t you, boy?”

  Payton straightened his shoulders, ignored the smell the action produced and strolled confidently along the alleyway toward the daylight out on the street. “I’m new, but I’m no fool. You see another guy? Big guy, all muscle, tattooed head like mine, only with a ton more ink, with a walking hero complex?”

  Dumpster Guy gazed back at him quizzically. Okay, so this guy wasn’t the brightest star in the galaxy. Not a bad thing, since he’d just witnessed Payton’s appearance from thin air. If he were to tell anyone, they’d likely not believe him, keeping Payton’s entrance into WEN 2036 on the down low. Plus, Coru would doubtlessly make a dramatic entrance somewhere in the vicinity. No one who saw his brother would have the balls to challenge him. In the meantime, Payton would do some recon, and set them up for their Charles and Wren Wood search.

  First order of business—get away from the dead guy in the alley. He didn’t need to draw attention to himself like that.

  He jerked his chin back to the dead guy. “What’s his story?”

  “Fentanyl.”

  “Yeah? You’ve still got that here?”

  Dumpster Guy’s expression was baffled. “What else’s cheap down here? Don’t touch the stuff myself. They’ll scoop him.”

  “Scoop—?” Payton stopped. He didn’t want to know. He had more important things to do. One: Find Coru. He let his pack slide from his back, pulled out a spray pen, and keeping a tight grip on his backpack, strode to the wall. Here he sprayed the message in red quick-drying ink both he and Coru had agreed upon. C. I’ll return at 1 every day. P.

  Satisfied, he tucked the pen into his bag and slung it back onto his back.

  “What’s that all about, Mister?”

  Leading the way toward the street and infusing a friendly tone into his voice, Payton addressed Dumpster Guy. “I’ll make it worth your while to give me the grand tour, old man.”

  Dumpster Guy hurried his step into a shuffling trot alongside Payton, his eyes flickering often to the backpack in question. “What d’ ya got in there for a fella?”

  They reached the opening and stepped out into the full light. Holy Trident! The fossil fuel smell hit him square in the chest, making him first gasp, then choke on the filthy air that invaded his lungs. He could literally taste the emissions!

  A huge bus pulled up, blocking his view. A large photo on its side showed a pristine city, sparkling ocean, happy families, and smiling business men and women smartly dressed, hurrying to important business meetings. There were tarnished silver solar panels on the top of the bus. The telling part was the dangling wires that led nowhere.

  The bus pulled forward, revealing emission-blackened buildings, and harried foot traffic, obviously down on their luck—their shoes, their eyes, their expressions—flattened. Their faces were vacant or harassed, or just beat up, accepting of their fate. Brutal.

  Beyond the foot traffic was the road traffic.

  The noisy, colorful vehicles, traveling four lanes deep before him, formed a river of motion that threatened to sweep him away, end-to-end, blaring horns, thudding music pulsing from their interiors, the passengers inside showing no interest in him or Dumpster Guy, their eyes trained forward, their lips moving as they spoke either into a device somewhere nearby or to others in the vehicle.

  He pushed back against the wall of the building behind him and raised his eyes up. He was surrounded by a mosaic of towering colored buildings that made up this pulsing city, each building flashing huge 300, maybe 400 foot frantically animated ads across their glass sides, selling more vehicles, gold jewelry draped on naked women’s bodies, sleek bottles of hard alcohols poured over ice, trips to exotic places, a full set of glistening veneers in a single afternoon at Doctor Denali’s Clinic, stacked plates of foods he could not name surrounded by smiling, hungry people, a cherry-red clad skier skiing down a pristine-white snowy slope, leaving a lazy, curling trail behind her.

  Narrow rapid-transit railings wove an impossible to comprehend overhead grid, with sleek white, bullet shaped passenger compartments defying gravity as they slipped along each railing without a sound, or so it seemed from down here on the street.

  He glanced at Dumpster Guy and did a double take. The man was gawking at him as if he were an alien just arrived from another planet. And why not? He’d appeared out of thin air and was now clinging to the side of a filthy building like a toddler to his mother’s leg. He’d have to lose the newbie attitude, grow himself a pair.

  Deliberately he straightened up, st
ood away from the building and shrugged his shoulders free of tension, looking around with a bored expression, searching for some sort of marker of where he was in order to find the Bore entrance again and where to return at one o’clock to hook up with Coru.

  Oh yeah—he didn’t need to know the Bore entrance to get home because he wasn’t going home, was he? He made note of the street anyway, for Coru’s sake. Cordova Street. Cordova and... he strained to read the cross street sign down the block.

  “Move along, Punk,” a flat voice commanded from behind, breaking his concentration. A painful rap across his shoulders took his breath away.

  He staggered, barely keeping on his feet. “Hey! What the hell?” He twisted around and found himself face to face, no wait, face to a broad dark blue chest of a guardian. What did they call guardians here? Beef cops? Beat cops? This guardian’s name was printed across his chest. Waights. A monster of a guy, bigger even than Coru. Payton looked up. This guy’s face was not happy.

  Raising thick, bushy eyebrows, the guardian blinked slowly, as if he couldn’t believe what he’d just heard. He asked softly, “‘What the hell’? Is that what you just said to me, Punk? ‘What the hell’?”

  Dumpster Guy rushed forward, waving his hands in protest. “No, no, Officer Waights! He didn’t mean anything by it. He’s new around here and doesn’t know the rules yet. I was about to tell him we gotta get going.” He gave Payton a shove down the street. “See? We’re going right now.”

  Officer Waights slapped a thick, dark billy club inside his palm, the sound traveling up Payton’s spine. The officer considered them as they hurried away, Payton’s gaze still glued to Waights’. That club could break a collarbone, an arm, easy. The billy club, the perennial bully’s favorite, never goes out of style, does it, Officer Waights?

  Waights lurched forward, his eyes bugged, and when Payton jumped and squeaked in fear—which he hated himself for—the officer laughed.