by Rysa Walker
I slide over a little closer to Grant so that there’s less likelihood of anyone overhearing us. “If you’d hit Willis, you’d be the one in jail.”
“Yes, and that would be a billion times better. Like I said, I study legal systems. White man hits white man in 1938 Georgia, and even if he’s a stranger, there’s a decent chance that they’ll listen to the outsider, especially if there are witnesses who back him. So I think your friend will be okay. Black man hits a white man, however—hits three, maybe four of them in this case—and reason flies out the window. And that Willis guy was getting his ass kicked before the others jumped in, so he’s going to be in a vindictive mood.”
One of the two kids, a girl of about nine, is watching us, possibly because we’re spattered with blood. I tug at Grant’s sleeve, nodding toward the door. The heat isn’t much worse outside, and there’s less chance of being overheard.
I tell the receptionist we’ll be outside, and we walk out onto the porch of the hospital. The place looks more like someone’s house than a medical center. There’s a large shade tree on the lawn, and we sit down beneath it.
“We’ll get Abel out,” I say.
“I hope you’re right. But even if we do, being stuck in 1938 isn’t exactly good news for an interracial couple. And here’s the irony—Abel’s five or six shades darker than his parents. Delia’s several shades lighter than hers. Why? CHRONOS doesn’t need multiracial historians—they’d have a tough time blending in any time before the twenty-first century. So they tweak appearance as well when your parents sign you up. I don’t look much like my family, either.”
“So—they do that to all the historians?”
“Yeah,” he says. “Hair color, eye color, skin tone—mostly stuff like that.”
I’m silent for a moment, preoccupied with wondering what I’d look like if all four of my grandparents hadn’t been genetically altered.
“Not that being stranded here is good news for me, either,” Grant says. “On top of everything else, there’s a draft coming up in a few years. I can’t believe I could end up as a soldier, for God’s sake. In an actual war—how ironic is that? This is just wrong on so many levels.”
“I’m not sure my era is a lot safer right now—it’s just that no one realizes they’re in danger.”
“And this danger in your time is from Saul?” Grant asks, with an incredulous look. “From these Cyrists he’s created? I know he’s a jerk, but . . .”
He’s not convinced, and I don’t blame him. And just as he did a few minutes ago with me, I stare into his eyes, trying to determine whether I can trust him. It’s probably not a great method even when both eyes are readable, and one of his is now swollen almost completely shut.
He could be lying. He could be in on it with Saul.
I don’t get that sense, however. I’ve seen a homicidal maniac quite recently—two, if you count Holmes along with Saul. Three, if you count Prudence, although Kiernan seems convinced that she views the Culling more as collateral damage. Grant could be that type, I guess—a true believer so intent on some cause that he sees human casualties as a necessary evil—but that seems hard to believe. He looks like an average guy who just got some really bad news—and who got the crap beaten out of him as well.
“What can you tell me about your time, Grant?” I can see that he’s taken aback by what seems like an abrupt change of topic, so I add, “I’m not asking for spoilers, although I’m not sure they can really be considered spoilers when I’ll be dead long before then. I’m just trying to get a sense of what Saul’s people want to change. Are there trees in your time? Animals? Do you have to live under a bubble in order to breathe?”
He looks at me like I’m crazy. “No, to the last one. Yes, to the first two, although . . . it’s nothing like what you have around here. We have parks in our urban areas, trees on most of the large housing centers. Wildlife refuges scattered around the world, and controlled numbers of most of the species that were endangered—they’ve even restored many that went extinct. At least, the ones that weren’t dangerous.”
“Do people still have political rights—like free speech, free religion, democratic government?”
“Yes, yes, and yes—although there are limits.”
“What sort of limits?”
“Well, pretty much the same as here. No yelling fire in a crowded movie house. And even after we get past this racial nonsense, the U.S. isn’t really a true democracy—you have representatives, right? So do most countries in my time.”
“But are most people happy with the system? I’m trying to get a handle on why Saul and this club of his would be so dissatisfied with their situation that they’d be willing to wipe out half of humanity to change it.”
“What club?”
“They called themselves the Objectivists. Apparently spinning off from some group from my era.”
He laughs. “Those guys? They’re . . . they’re like a debate group or something.”
“Katherine seemed to think the leader, somebody named Campbell, influenced Saul. That maybe he was in on the plan.”
“Maybe, but I can’t see it. All I ever heard Saul and Campbell do was argue. I went a few times—CHRONOS historians have an open invitation, because we can fill in some of the blanks about history. When I was there, they spent most of their time talking about alternate history.” His voice takes on a pompous tone. “But what if the Revolutionary War had ended differently? If slavery hadn’t been abolished or if the Progressive Era never happened? If this president or that one had lived or had died? If 2092 turned out differently?”
There’s that date again. “So . . . what happens in 2092?”
Grant thinks for a moment and then shakes his head. “You’d be pretty old, but you could live that long, so I’m thinking that’s a spoiler.”
I narrow my eyes, but he’s probably right. “Fine. Have it your way. So you’re saying you’d go back there if you could? To your time?”
He looks at me like it’s a really stupid question. “Yes.”
“What if you’d been stranded in some time and place other than 1938 Georgia?”
“I’d still pick 2305. I have a life there. Someone who’s expecting me to return.” He glances over at the hospital. “Staying here isn’t what I signed up for. It’s an interesting time to study, but . . . I can’t live here.”
Grant could still be lying, but if so, he’s really good at it. I think back to my conversation with Trey in the cafeteria. Maybe it’s my golden-retriever personality coming to the forefront again, but Trey was right—I don’t want to be the kind of person who believes the worst of everyone. It’s bad enough to know that there’s one individual out there who thought nothing of killing an entire village of innocent people to test out a theory, who even reveled in their deaths. The evidence, at least what I have at hand, doesn’t point toward Grant being another one.
“If you have doubts about the Cyrists,” I say, “whether they exist, their numbers, or whatever—the university is less than a mile away. Find the library, check a few history texts. Or go back inside and ask the receptionist for a phone book. There’s a tiny Cyrist temple in Darwin, Australia, in 1942, so I’m guessing there’s one or two around here as well.
“But,” I continue, “if you’re wondering about Saul, you’ve been around him more than I have. And even if you can’t remember it, you were with him when he did a . . . test run. At the village—Six Bridges, God’s Hollow—not sure what Saul would have called it. All but one of those people are dead, Grant. If the university has local newspaper archives, you can find proof of that. The date they died will synch up with when you were there with Saul.”
He looks stunned. “How?”
“Something in the well. We’re pretty sure he tested the antidote on the girl who survived. He would have killed her, too, but . . .” I hesitate. “Let’s just say she got lucky.”
“Martha, right? The blond girl?”
“Yes.”
“She
burned him, didn’t she?”
The question catches me off guard at first, until I remember that Grant would have seen the wound on Saul’s arm on their trip back.
“Something like that.”
“He killed them all?” Grant asks. “Even the kids?”
“Yeah. Some of the articles had pictures.” And, yes, I could show him with the CHRONOS key, but he’d also get a glimpse of me and Kiernan in biohazard gear, in addition to Saul, Martha, and the bodies in the chapel. If he finds out the role we played, it’s going to lead to a lot of questions I don’t have time to answer.
I stand and brush off my skirt. “I have to make a quick jump, okay? We need bail money, and I need clothes that aren’t blood splattered. I’ll wait here for Delia when I get back, if you want to go change or grab some lunch.”
“No lunch,” he says. “I’ve lost my appetite.”
BOGART, GEORGIA
August 11, 1938, 1:20 p.m.
I feel like I’m being watched.
I know it’s my imagination. The odds of anyone viewing this stable point at this exact moment are slim to none. But I keep picturing Prudence and her followers—or keepers or whatever they are—here in Kiernan’s kitchen earlier in the day. Well, earlier in the day for me. As far as I know, she hasn’t actually been here since 1905, but it’s still unnerving.
Someone else has been in the cabin since we left, however. A basket of peaches, cucumbers, tomatoes, and other vegetables is in the middle of the table, along with a half dozen Mason jars and a note from Mrs. Owens telling Kiernan to please let her know if he runs out of anything, because she has more than she knows what to do with. At least there are no religious tracts, so perhaps Owens decided to keep our presumed romantic adventures to himself.
I climb up the ladder and sit on the floor next to Kiernan’s bed, which probably hasn’t been slept in since 1905. It’s not that the room is dusty—Mrs. Owens must come in to clean when he’s away—but more that it just doesn’t feel lived in.
I dig around under the mattress for several minutes before I locate the large manila envelope wedged between the mattress and the bedsprings in the upper rear corner. It’s constructed of heavier paper and has one of those odd figure-eight string ties on the back, but it still reminds me of the envelope I left with Trey that held our collected memories from the other timeline.
It’s mostly money inside, about $300 in ones, tens, and fives. There are also three pencil drawings that tumble out with the bills. The artist is no Da Vinci—I’m sure if we saw these hanging in a gallery, Sara would note that the perspective and proportions are off. Still, the work is very good for an amateur, and there’s no mistaking the girl in each of these drawings, even in black and white. One of them was folded at some point, and there’s a pattern of weathered creases on the page. That one is clearly of me, this me, sitting on a grassy bank, my feet in the water, with the towering buildings of the Expo in the background.
The other two drawings are my face, my body, but unless he’s imagined the settings, they’re all of Other-Kate. They could also be of Prudence, but I don’t think so. The first drawing shows her in a boat that’s slightly larger than the canoes we saw at Norumbega. There’s a palm tree in the background, and I’m pretty sure the dress she’s wearing is the one that I saw hanging from the bedpost when I watched the video she made at Estero.
The scene in the final drawing is more familiar. It’s Kiernan’s room back in Boston. The girl in the picture is curled on her side, asleep, her hair fanned out against the sheets. One arm is under the pillow, and the other rests on top, in an arc above her head, her hand near her face.
If you watch me sleeping on any given night, this is probably what you’d see. What you wouldn’t see is the ring she’s wearing.
Just a simple band. Ring finger, left hand.
∞20∞
ATHENS, GEORGIA
August 11, 1938, 2:47 p.m.
Delia waits in a chair in the hallway, a large white bandage over the center of her face. Her blouse is still spattered, but the blood has dried, and they’ve washed her up a bit, so she looks less like a victim from a slasher film than when we brought her in.
Grant and I follow the nurse over to the reception desk. She leans toward us, her eyes troubled.
“Miss Morrell insists on being released, but the doctor thinks we should keep her overnight. We’re concerned she may have a concussion. Did she fall as well?”
“No. Just the one blow to the face,” Grant says, and then looks like he’s remembered something. “But she may have bumped her head getting into the car. She was . . . upset.”
The nurse jots something down on the clipboard. “We only found a small bump, but some of the things she’s been saying are . . . odd. Does she have a history of psychiatric problems?”
Grant and I exchange a look.
“Not that I know of,” I say. “I think all of this has just been a bit of a shock for her.”
The nurse’s expression is far from convinced, making me wonder exactly what Delia said back there. “I see. Does she have family in the area?”
She has a husband in a nearby jail. It won’t help to note that, however, so I just shake my head.
She responds with a tsking sound and then shoots an uneasy look at Grant before glancing back at me. “And you say they caught the person who did this?”
We both catch her implication, and Grant’s mouth tightens. I’m pretty sure he’s about to explain, in no uncertain terms, that he’s not the one who messed up Delia’s face, so I jump in before he can begin.
“Yes, Sister. They have him in custody over in Oconee County.”
Another shake of her head and another tsk. “Well then, I guess there’s nothing to be done but to release her into your care.”
To be honest, I kind of like the idea of Delia staying here overnight, sedated. I’m not sure how emotionally stable she is—not that I blame her, given everything that’s happened. But my long-term goal is getting her to give up her CHRONOS key, which means getting her trust, and that’s far less likely to happen if she thinks I had anything to do with keeping her here.
The nurse hands me a sheet of paper and says, “She needs to keep still and avoid activity. Even talking is ill-advised, otherwise those stitches may not hold. We gave her laudanum for the pain, and I’ll send a few doses home with her. Just keep a careful eye on her. The doctor wants to see her again in a few days, after the swelling goes down, because we’re pretty sure that nose needs to be reset.”
Grant pays the bill, which I’m stunned to see is less than I’ve paid for a T-shirt—a cheap T-shirt—and then we walk Delia out to the car. I’m not sure what laudanum is, but it seems to have taken the edge off Delia’s panic. Grant helps her into the backseat, and I sit up front with him, something I suspect she’d have balked at before her brief stay at St. Mary’s. She leans her cheek against the seat, the purplish-black circles under her eyes vivid next to the white bandage.
As he pulls away from the curb, Grant whispers, “Do you think she’s going to be able to talk to a judge or whatever in this condition?”
“She is awake,” Delia says, “and would appreciate being included in the conversation.”
“Sorry, Delia.” Grant shoots me a look, because even though her brain seems engaged, the words are slurred.
I shrug, and he continues. “While you were seeing the doctor, I drove to the university library and did a little research on these Cyrists. Kate’s story checks out, at least concerning their existence and early history. There were some images of paintings that show this Cyrus, and he looks a lot like Saul to me.”
Before Delia was released, Grant told me that he also pulled up information on Six Bridges, but he doesn’t mention that. And that’s fine with me, since it would raise issues I don’t think we need to get into right now.
“I also bought this.” Grant reaches into his pocket, pulls out a small copy of the Book of Cyrus, and tosses it onto the backseat.
“The entire thing? No. I thumbed through it. It’s boring. Repetitive. Some parts are a bit creepy, if you ask me.”
Their boardinghouse is about ten blocks from the hospital. I help Delia inside and up the stairs so that she can change, while Grant stays downstairs to fend off questions from the landlady.
Several minutes pass, and I’m still waiting, so I tap on her door. No response. I knock again and then check the handle. It’s not locked, so I ease it open.
“Delia? Are you okay?”
She’s sitting sideways across the narrow bed, eyes closed, her back propped against the wall. “I’d have to say no. Why are you here?”
“Grant and I were worried that—”
“No,” she says, opening her eyes to look directly at me. “Why are you here?”
“Like Katherine said in the video, I need to collect your CHRONOS keys so that Saul’s people—”
“So why don’t you pull out that gun and take it?”
I take a deep breath, annoyed both that she spotted the gun and that she keeps interrupting me. And then she interrupts me again, before I can even start to answer.
“We were unarmed,” she says, once again closing her eyes. “You could have snatched the keys the minute we arrived. We might have fought you, but you’d have won, given the gun and the element of surprise. So why’d you wait?”
I sit down in the wicker chair across from the bed and consider my answer. At this point, I don’t see what harm can come from leveling with her. “We tried that once, in a different timeline. Snatching your keys. There were . . . repercussions.”
“For you or for us?”
“Both. Shortly after, someone snatched my key. Apparently Katherine’s as well. Then Saul’s people made some rather major shifts to the timeline.”
“But you’re still here.”
“It was a different version of me, if that makes any sense. Different Katherine as well. But I have the diary the other Kate kept. I know some of what happened to you and Abel in that timeline. And what happens in this one, if we don’t find a way to prevent it.”