by Rysa Walker
I give him a weak smile. “Any advice on these jumps? Is there one that’s really easy?”
“Port Darwin, if you want to get an easy one out of the way. I’d definitely suggest waiting on the 1938 jump. The one to Georgia. It was the last one we tried, and . . . it didn’t go well. If you want to tackle them in the same order that she did, you should start brushing up your Russian.”
“But . . . I don’t speak Russian.”
He nods. “I know. But you’re going to need to learn at least a few phrases to find the historian who’s there to gauge Soviet reactions to . . . I can’t remember the name. Some satellite thing. Mid-1950s?”
“Sputnik?” I throw my hands up. “Are you serious? What kind of crazy people decide to observe events in a dictatorship? One wrong move and I could end up in a freaking prison somewhere in Siberia.”
“I’m sure there’s a long rant on that very subject in the diary you’re holding,” he teases. “If that’s any help. We never found that key, actually, so hopefully you’ll see something new in the evidence.”
My expression must show my doubt on that front, because he laughs.
“I don’t suppose you speak Russian?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “If the jump was to Ireland and you needed some Gaelic, I might be able to dredge up a few handy phrases. But my Russian doesn’t extend beyond borscht, da, and nyet. And dosvedanya.”
“Well, you’re still four words ahead of me. I suppose I should get back and order a copy of Rosetta Stone. It sounds like there’s a lot of work ahead.”
“Yes. I know you’re up to the challenge.” He gives me a smile that I’m sure is meant to be encouraging. Unfortunately, it has the opposite effect. Maybe Other-Kate was up to the challenge, but she wasn’t thrust onto the fast track.
“I’m not so sure.” I protest. “It’s hard to get enthused about the jumps that are ahead. What if something I do just screws everything up again?”
His smile fades. “How could you possibly make it worse than what Saul is planning?”
“If they’re really putting this Culling thing into action, then no, but . . .” I pause for a moment and then continue, measuring my words carefully. “Don’t get me wrong, okay? I don’t think you’re lying about any of this. But how certain are you? I mean, a lot of religions talk about end times and how only the faithful will be saved. Maybe Saul was just looking for a way to get a lot of money and a lot of power, and he and Prudence will just . . .” I shrug, looking down. My mental image is the two of them rolling around in piles of cash, laughing maniacally, but that’s too silly to say out loud.
“I’m certain, Kate,” he says quietly. “And so were you.”
“No!” I snap my head up and stare directly into his eyes. “Maybe she was certain. Not me. I’m not certain about anything except the fact that I don’t know what I’m doing. And even if you are certain, this Culling might be scheduled for a hundred years in my future, two hundred years for you. Maybe the wisest course of action would be to wait until—”
“Until what?” he asks, his voice rising. “Until the Cyrists are even more powerful than they are today?”
“Until I know what the hell I’m doing! Like you said a few minutes ago, this jump was easy. I had a video of their son. Dad and I both have Timothy’s green eyes. I knew pretty much where to find them. They were speaking English, for God’s sake! The others won’t be as simple, and the next time someone tries to kill me, I might not get off with just a scar.”
He doesn’t respond, and I wish I could take back those last words. I didn’t mean them as a rebuke—I really do think I was lucky to escape with only this small reminder, but I can tell from Kiernan’s expression that he took it personally.
I soften my voice. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to argue with you, Kiernan, and I’m definitely not saying I’m backing off. But I also don’t want to get in over my head. I want to plan these next steps carefully.”
He stares down at his hands for a moment. “As well you should. Speaking from past experience, I don’t think Katherine will like me being in on the planning stages, but I want to help. Just tell me what you need.”
I nod and give him a tentative, peacemaking smile, then lean forward to unbuckle my shoes. I take my sweater and the other pair of shoes from the drawstring bag, and my fingers brush against the edges of something rectangular at the bottom. It’s another diary. Giving Kiernan a quizzical look, I hand him both the diary and the bag.
“That was my grandfather’s,” he says. “It’s mostly in Gaelic, and as I said, my Gaelic is pretty rusty. I just use it for the CHRONOS field. Even with those booster cells sewn into the hem, that dress would have vanished at Jess’s store if it wasn’t within range of a diary or a key.”
Once my shoes are swapped out, I stand to unfasten the Velcro at the back of the dress, but Kiernan is already there. The fabric slides to the floor, leaving me in the sleeveless shell and skirt I wore to Dallas. He rests his hands on my bare shoulders for just a moment and then helps me into my sweater.
“You’ll get the dress and shoes back to the storeroom?” I ask.
“I could,” he says. “But it might make more sense to leave them here and set this room as a stable point. That way you can just pull up the location and check to see if I’m home. And you won’t have to sneak in and leave notes for Jess.”
It does make more sense, but I’m hesitant. “I don’t want to intrude on your privacy.”
That brings his grin back, although it’s a bit subdued. “What if I promise to dress and undress behind the curtain?”
I hadn’t even thought about that particular aspect of privacy, but suddenly it’s difficult to think of much else. “Wouldn’t having the dress here just be a reminder of when . . . she was always around?”
“It doesn’t matter, Kate. I’m never really alone in this room.” He follows my glance upward and smiles. “And it’s not just the glow stars you . . . she pasted on my ceiling. Little things hit me at the oddest moments. Your dress and shoes under my bed won’t make the slightest difference.”
I glance up at the stars again. For some reason, their presence nags at my brain, like a mystery that needs to be solved, but I can’t find the clues. Maybe it’s just the intrinsic weirdness of seeing something you’d buy at Spencer’s in this tiny apartment that lacks a toilet, electricity, or running water.
I take the CHRONOS key out of my sweater and run my hand across the center to activate it, punching in the few keystrokes needed to set this room as a jump location. Then I start to pull up Katherine’s house so that I can leave, but Kiernan places a hand on my arm.
“Will you come on Saturday? I really want you to see Norumbega Park. If you’re here by ten, we’ll have time to see the sights before I start.”
“Before you start what?”
He shakes his head. “Not telling. You have to come and see.”
There’s a mischievous light in his eyes, and in that moment he looks so very much like his eight-year-old self, waiting for my decision to hire him as a guide at the Expo. Who could say no to those big, dark puppy-dog eyes?
I laugh. “Okay, okay. You win.”
And even though I don’t want to give him false hope, I can tell from his smile that I have.
∞3∞
There’s a definite drawback to scheduling a time jump in the morning, especially when it takes four tries to get it right and you decide to add in a two-hour side trip. I walked the better part of a mile on each of the four jumps to Dallas and nearly that far in the heat of Boston in July. While you’re there, the adrenaline surge that comes from being out of your time and place keeps you going, but the aftereffect is a bit like jet lag. And it doesn’t help that I’m already wiped out from lousy sleep. I don’t think I’ve had more than two or three nightmare-free nights since I returned from the Expo.
So while my internal clock would swear it’s nearly midnight when I arrive back at Katherine’s, the microwave clock begs to differ.
It’s 10:32 a.m., exactly one minute after I left for that last jump to Dallas. Katherine, Connor, and Dad are still at the kitchen table, drinking coffee. Daphne is still chasing a squirrel in the backyard, happy to have a door and a few hundred feet between her and an activated CHRONOS key.
“So?” Katherine is the first to speak, but all three of them are leaning forward.
I pull the two medallions out of my pocket and toss them on the table along with the diary. “Two down. That makes fourteen if we count the two that Kiernan has, so ten to go, right?”
She nods and then pulls the diary toward her. “I haven’t been collecting the diaries, but that’s a good idea.” She flips it open and then looks back at me, an eyebrow raised. “This isn’t from Evelyn and Timothy. It’s one of mine.”
I hadn’t thought about that when I tossed the diary on the table. “Um . . . yeah. I stopped in Boston to get the information Kiernan said that they had gathered. In the other timeline.” I point toward the diary. “Her notes are in there.”
“So you stopped in Boston and kept us waiting?” Connor says.
“You were waiting a sum total of sixty seconds, regardless of whether I stopped in Boston. And now we can start planning our next moves. I’m still worried that we’re going to trigger some change to the timeline that will alert Saul and Prudence to what we’re doing before we finish. And I’m even more worried now, because Kiernan says the next jump is to Russia—or at least that was the next one we attempted last time.”
Katherine is about to say something else, but Dad cuts in. “They were okay with all of this? What did they say?” He takes a sip of his coffee and tries to look nonchalant, but I know what he’s thinking. I just saw his parents, the ones he can’t even remember. He’ll want to know every word they said, every expression, every gesture.
“Oh, Dad. I’m sorry. I wasn’t even thinking.” I sit down with him at the breakfast nook, giving him a big hug. “I don’t know if this is CHRONOS protocol,” I say, glancing over at Katherine and Connor, “but I brought back a few minutes of video. Before you watch it, though, I need to make sure I didn’t mess anything up. You were still adopted by John and Theresa Keller, right?”
He nods, and I continue. “You still teach math?”
Another nod.
“And your name is still Alphonse?”
Picking on my dad at such a vulnerable moment is probably kind of evil, and if there’s really a karma police, I’m sure it will earn me a demerit or two. But the look on his face is truly priceless.
“I’m joking, Dad. But it was a pretty close call, apparently. You were very nearly named after your grandfather. I’m not sure why they decided to switch.”
“Please tell me it’s because you stood up for your helpless, unborn father and insisted that they reconsider,” Dad says.
“Nope. I don’t owe you anything on that front, since you stood by and let Mom name me after Prudence.”
Dad grins. “Touché. Although I really think Alphonse is worse.”
“I don’t know.” I hand him the phone with the video and head for the coffeepot. “I could see you as an Alphie. Or you could have been the prototype for the Fonz.”
“I wasn’t alive in the fifties,” he says. “And if I’d walked around in a leather jacket saying ‘Aaay’ in the eighties, I’d have gotten my band-geek ass kicked on a daily basis.”
When I turn back to the table, Katherine is holding the diary and has clicked to activate one of the video links. A holographic image that looks a lot like me appears above the diary and starts talking.
“Katherine! What are you doing?” I cross the kitchen in two steps, sloshing a bit of coffee on my saddle shoes. I snatch the diary from her hands and turn off the video. “That’s private!”
“I don’t see why,” Katherine counters. “It’s my diary, after all, and there may be some things in those entries that I need to know.” She glances around the table. “Although, maybe we should watch it upstairs. It’s a bit rude to do it down here, since Connor and Harry won’t be able to see and hear what—”
I press the diary closer to my chest. “No. I haven’t even seen the videos yet. I will watch them upstairs, and if there’s anything you need to know, I’ll tell you. It will also take twice as long if you’re doing it.”
Katherine can see and hear the videos in the diaries and even preview some of the jump sites in the Log of Stable Points, but the CHRONOS gene seems to mutate and degrade over time, or maybe it’s due to the tumor and the medicines. Holding the signal for very long is difficult for her. In the past, she’s joked about it being like going through a tunnel while talking on a cell phone, but her eyes narrow a bit when I mention it, so she’s apparently not in the mood to joke about it today.
“What if you don’t realize that something is important?” Katherine asks. “I’m far more familiar with what we’re doing here than you are. Something could easily slip through the cracks. And may I remind you that you viewed mine—at least the ones that were relevant to your jump to 1893.”
Okay, that part is true. I watched Katherine’s private entries in preparation for the trip to the World’s Fair. But she knew what was in those diaries when she handed them to me. Furthermore, the Katherine I viewed in those entries was part of her distant past.
I, on the other hand, have absolutely no clue what I’ll find in these videos, aside from Kiernan’s caution that there might be some things I don’t want to share. Even though the Kate in this video isn’t exactly me, the idea of sharing her diary bothers me. This Kate isn’t part of my past but part of some alternate present and future. I’m not even sure I want to watch these clips, and I’m completely and totally positive I’m not watching them in the same room as my grandmother, especially when Kiernan said it’s full of rants about her.
I match Katherine’s stubborn expression with one of my own. “This is not negotiable, Katherine. When I’ve determined which of these entries are relevant to our work, you’ll be welcome to view them. While you’re waiting, maybe you should order me a Russian language course. Kiernan said Moscow is next if we follow the same order as last time, although I’m inclined to skip ahead to Australia. He said that one was pretty easy.”
Katherine grimaces. “Adrienne . . . I can’t imagine she’ll be cooperative, although easy sounds about right.”
I have no idea what she means by that, but she doesn’t respond to my questioning look.
“And I already have a language course,” she continues. “I’m well aware that Wallace’s Moscow trip is on the agenda.”
The criticism in her voice sets me on edge. “There’s an agenda? Maybe you could print me out a copy of that? It might come in handy since I’m the designated traveler.”
Katherine glares at me and pushes away from the table, then storms out of the kitchen. Connor shoots me a reproachful look and follows her.
Dad’s expression is pretty much the same as Connor’s. “You should go a bit easier on Katherine, you know.”
“I’m sorry, Dad. But . . . it’s like she wants to control each little thing. She doesn’t give me the information I need, and then ten minutes later, she expects me to know every detail. I’m not a mind reader. And this diary is private.” I grab a blueberry muffin and napkin from the table and then lean over and give him a quick kiss on the cheek.
“What was that for?” he asks.
“Apology for the Alphonse joke. And just because. Aren’t you heading out soon to pick up Sara?”
“Yeah, I need to get a move on. Sure you don’t want to come with?”
I shake my head. “You know I like Sara, and you know I like art museums. But I do not like Sara and art museums together.” His girlfriend teaches art history, and while she’s a lot of fun anywhere else, she goes into docent mode when there are paintings or statues around.
“We could make up fake histories like we did last time,” he offers.
“Sara didn’t find that nearly as funny as we did. And anyway,” I say, h
olding up the diary, “I have a date with my other self. You’ll be back early, right? Trey’s supposed to be here—”
“Yes, I know. At seven thirty.” He laughs. “Don’t worry. The lasagna just needs to go in the oven. The salad is made. I’m bringing back dessert and fresh bread. Everything will be perfect.”
I give him a goodbye hug and head upstairs. Even if everything is perfect, I’ll probably be too nervous to eat. Part of me thinks that having dinner here was a bad idea, because it’s too much pressure on Trey. But this is also where we spent most of our time together in the other timeline, so maybe there’s a vibe here that we’re missing.
Once I’m upstairs, I change out of the less than comfy 1960s clothing and curl up on the sofa. I pick up the diary and stare at it for a moment, still not entirely sure I’m ready for this. For all of Kiernan’s insistence that this Kate is really me, just with a different set of experiences, I can’t help but view her as an imposter—a fake Kate who was off using my identity and my body and apparently having a pretty good time with them before she vanished. It’s not logical, but I resent this Other-Kate thoroughly, and there’s this huge part of me that really doesn’t want to know anything more about her.
But if I don’t watch the videos, Katherine most certainly will. One of us has to—it would be beyond stupid not to learn from the mistakes we made in this alternate past. So I open the diary, flip to the pages at the back where Other-Kate saved her videos, and click on the first link.
My face pops up in the holographic display, so close at first that I can see every eyelash. After a moment Other-Kate moves a little farther away. She seems nervous, and I can’t help but remember the time Charlayne and I made this silly video to post on her Facebook page. But there’s no Charlayne in this video, just someone who looks exactly like me, minus the faint scar on my neck and jawline.
The first entry, entitled simply 1, is really short. Other-Kate says:
Okay, I’m not sure this is working. I’m going to turn it off and check, then I’ll be right back.