Time Series: Complete Bundle

by Claire Davon

  “Holy shit,” she said breathlessly, the words whisked away in the wind. Her breath felt similarly snatched away by the hot, unremitting gale.

  The sand and dirt were driving into their eyes, and she felt her feet going out from under her. In a matter of seconds, they were going to get pulled away, sucked into the vortex and no doubt into this hellish landscape, to be dead within minutes. She tried to concentrate, tried to figure out a picture, something to hold in her mind, but the brutal landscape was making it impossible to focus. Rogald, hampered by holding onto her, was trying to activate his wrist device. She saw the screen flicker, but it didn’t come to life.

  They were going to die. There was no way around it.

  Rogald seemed to know it, too. “I’m sorry, Fiona.”

  NO. NOT YET.

  She felt something, a presence, lifting them and touching their minds, pulling them from the aftermath of the Event, back, back into the black and the unremitting darkness.

  She felt, rather than heard, Rogald trying to shout, felt him as if he was touching her mind.

  It wasn’t Rogald touching her mind. But something was.

  Then Rogald’s presence was gone, pulled away from her. She still felt something in her mind. Something completely unlike her.

  Something infinitely more powerful than she was. Something so old and so unlike her that she had no point of reference to relate it to. That was the only thing she was sure of.

  She was still in the black. Something was happening, something she didn’t understand. Sounds were being spoken, but she had no frame of reference. She felt her consciousness fading away, and memories spun out, stretching thin and vanishing.

  And then…blackness. Even blacker than before, if that were possible. Then, nothing.

  Chapter 14

  The bizarre, weird, impossible dream finally shook her awake.

  Fiona blinked, and looked at the clock.

  Eight.

  Shit.

  She needed to hit the road. She was late. She never overslept, but today, she had not heard the alarm. That was so unlike her; she couldn’t figure out what had happened.

  A quick shower, lightning fast, one gulp of instant coffee, and Fiona hastily jumped into her work clothes. She looked at her sweater, trying to decide whether to bring it, and finally decided not to.

  It would be warm enough in the trolley with the body heat and the car itself. The wait may be a bit cold, but if the schedule was right, she would only have a few minutes to wait once she got there.

  She locked the front door and dashed down the stairs from her second floor apartment to the small porch and then down to ground level.

  It was a beautiful spring day, but there was definitely a nip in the air, and she briefly debated about going back for her sweater, but decided against it.

  A strange flash of déjà vu hit her, an image of someone familiar, someone she saw only in her dreams, and then it was gone.

  She felt weird, wrong, like she hadn’t gotten any rest, but she knew she had gotten six or seven hours of sleep. That shouldn’t have been a problem.

  She was going to need to shake it off. She had a busy day ahead of her. Hopefully, the trolley would come on time. By taking the world’s fastest shower and taking her makeup to do on the subway, she was now back on schedule, back in her familiar time.

  Familiar time. Why did that sound so strange? She kept to a regular timetable, and wasn’t called On Time Fiona for nothing.

  The rush of Beacon Street traffic was evident, both in noise and in the cars already piling past her street, which began at Washington Street and ended at Beacon, just a small slice of road going nowhere. She suddenly found herself wishing for the quiet of Pepperell, a town she had never seen, only heard about from her mother.

  How odd. She hadn’t thought about that place in years. She wished she had visited. Maybe she would arrange a drive out there. It was only forty miles away.

  She waved to a neighbor as she continued her walk down to the subway stop. Most of the shops weren’t open yet, but she waved to the shopkeeper inside the one on the corner that was. It all felt disorienting, odd, as if she’d.…

  Done it before. She felt as if this was all familiar, as if she’d already been to the subway stop, already had…had what?

  The déjà vu was gone, and Fiona shook her head.

  Just going to be one of those days.

  Far off in the distance, muffled and distorted, she thought she heard shouting. It sounded like her name. Fiona looked around, but all she saw were her familiar neighborhood surroundings and nobody waving her down. The brownstone buildings, the bark of the old drunk’s dog, the familiar Brookline air--all were familiar, and none had called her.

  It all seemed familiar, but unfamiliar, as well. It seemed like a dream, like the déjà vu she had experienced earlier. She felt as if she didn’t belong there. She felt disoriented, out of place.

  Ridiculous. Fiona tried to reach into her mind and remember the dreams she had had last night. They must have been a doozy to cause her to be so out of kilter this morning.

  Nothing. No dreams surfaced, but something lingered there, something she couldn’t quite reach. She rarely remembered her dreams, anyway. Today, she wished she had. Maybe it would help.

  She walked down the street to the end of the block and turned onto Beacon Street, walking past the set of buildings there before the traffic light at the busy corner of Beacon and Washington. She could jaywalk, many did, but an extra minute to cross with the light didn’t hurt, and might help. It might save her from getting killed.

  Images, hard and fast, came at her, and she staggered by the brick wall between one storefront and another. A screeching trolley, unfamiliar people, mist, dirt, broken buildings. Blackness. A shimmer.…

  Then it was gone, and the street was back. The lingering images faded, leaving a metallic unpleasant aftertaste.

  What the hell? She hadn’t had anything to drink last night and had never done hard drugs, so she was totally stumped as to why this was happening to her.

  Or did she know? A thought swam through her mind, too quick to catch.

  Just get through the day, Fiona. Just get through the day, and everything will look better the next morning.

  A quick look at her Smartphone indicated the trolley was due in a minute or so. Fiona hurried across the street and walked along the outside of the small concrete pedestrian area, taking up her usual position at the far end, nodding to the one or two people she recognized as fellow travelers to downtown Boston.

  In the distance, she thought she heard the squeal of brakes a T-stop or two away, and coming fast.

  Again, way off and distorted, she thought she heard her name being shouted. Fiona looked around, but saw nothing, and nobody, that appeared distressed or interested in her in any way.

  A sudden compulsion to turn around, go home, jaywalk right now across the street and back to her roomy, sunny apartment, was almost too much to resist. She could dash back right now–the cars were stopped at the light–and be inside her place and safe in under five minutes. She could call in sick and pull the covers over her head and forget this day.

  Fiona shook her head. The squeal of the trolley car’s brakes could now be clearly heard, sounding even more frayed and broken than usual.

  The brakes jolted her back to reality. People began crowding the platform, jostling each other for a better position, speculating based on prior travels where the two-car above ground trolley would end up and open their doors. Fiona preferred to stand away from the crush, right where the asphalt met the sparse grass, and preserve her personal space as long as she could.

  The squeal of brakes was loud, and hurt her ears. This was wrong, this was all wrong. This shouldn’t be happening. Fiona found that she was rocking slightly, watching the trolley emerge over the hill, its familiar green flaking and rusted in places, the brakes making a hideous noise.

  This was wrong. The image blurred, everything blurred, another ima
ge superimposing over this one, an image of death and destruction. The still moving trolley barreled through the other image, brakes still squealing, and its speed was too fast for the trolley stop it was rushing into.

  It was going to hit them, she realized in horror. It was going to hit all of them and nobody seemed to notice.

  Awareness was lurking just outside her mind, awareness of something big, something huge, something…

  NOW. REMEMBER, FIONA.

  Power surged through her, images and memories flooding into her, too fast to make sense of, but more than she’d ever known. An ancient awareness moved through her, touching her with a sort of reassurance, and was gone.

  She waved her arms, and everything stopped. The trolley, sparks flying from the undercarriage, halted right as it appeared to be about to jump the tracks. The people, still jostling each other on the platform, stopped all motion. Cars were frozen in place, the light of Beacon Street stuck on yellow.

  There was a shimmer and a glow, and then three figures stood on the tracks, in front of the stationary train. It was odd, this sudden freezing; she had never realized how much ambient noise there was before. Ambient smells, too; the air was sterile tasting, like all nutrients had been leached out of it.

  The shimmery figure were two men and a woman, unfamiliar except.…

  Except.

  “Sonder,” she breathed. “Illiria. Commander.”

  Memories came rushing back, hard and fast, nearly knocking her over. Like a movie in fast forward, the events of the past days flooded back into her mind. Her hands shook as she remembered it all. The portals, the time jumps, Sonder’s betrayal and, of course, the Event. She knew her face was pale as she absorbed all the memories as if they were happening for the first time.

  The people crowding the platform looked like dolls, not even swaying. There was no wind, nothing. It was as if they were frozen.

  She took a deep breath as the memories surged, sorted and settled back into her. She shook her head at the tang of that awful place, that nothingness where the Earth used to exist.

  Sonder took a step towards her, and Fiona stepped back, towards Beacon Street, her hand outstretched as if to ward him and his two companions off. If the traffic were moving, she would have been so close to the moving cars that she would have been buffeted off her feet by the rush of them going past.

  “You three, don’t come any closer. Just…don’t.”

  Another shimmer, and Rogald was there, looking as grim as the other three.

  Illiria shot the other leader a glance.

  “Why are you here?”

  He ignored the woman, focusing on Sonder. “It’s too soon to tell, but something seems to have changed. We haven’t sorted it all out yet; it’s like it is still moving, but something is different.” He pointed to Fiona. “She’s having an effect.”

  Illiria nodded.

  Rogald looked at Fiona and then at the tableau around them, and smiled.

  “Nice job, Fiona.” His tone held pride and gladness.

  She flushed.

  Sonder hadn’t taken his eyes off her since they jumped. His stance was tense, aware, and ready for anything. “Fiona.…”

  She studied him, her head cocked to the side. It was hard to read what the soldier was feeling, but his eyes were blazing with fire. He looked at Illiria and then at Rogald, and moved towards Fiona, ignored her hand.

  The Commander, in a sudden movement, took out a gun.

  “Stop, Sonder.”

  Sonder froze, and swung his head back to look at the Commander, his gaze one of menace.

  The Commander addressed Fiona. “I thought they could handle this, but clearly they cannot. I am sorry, my dear, but you are too unpredictable. This cannot be allowed.”

  Fiona swallowed, looked at the gun, willed herself to make a witty Han Solo remark about blasters, and came up empty.

  Maybe she could do something, maybe she could send him somewhere…but all her resources were being consumed by the time freeze, she had nothing left for murderous Commanders.

  “So you’re just going to kill her?” Rogald’s voice. “We spend all this time looking for a freelance Jumper, for the Traveler, and you’re just going to kill her?”

  The Commander nodded. “It’s safer. We are Guardians. We protect the time stream.”

  Fiona saw Rogald and Illiria exchange a glance.

  “It’s chickenshit.” Rogald waved at the Commander and Illiria. “You’d rather just let the Event happen than think someone like her might be able to stop it.”

  “She is too dangerous. How do you know she can stop the Event? Perhaps she causes it and our efforts here will undo it. How can you be sure of anything?”

  As he talked, he shifted slightly, his attention distracted by Rogald and Fiona saw Sonder move.

  The soldier was on the huskier man in a microsecond, surprise on his side. He karate chopped the weapon out of the Commander’s hand and it went skittering away, skipping down the platform and onto the trolley tracks.

  Illiria didn’t move.

  “Rogald?” Sonder nodded to the other leader, and pointed to the Commander, still several steps away, his mouth open in surprise.

  Rogald took aim at the Commander and pressed a button. The Commander vanished in a shimmer.

  Sonder looked at the glowing spot and back to Rogald.

  “Thanks, man. That will hold him for a few minutes.”

  “You owe me.”

  “I do.” He turned back to the others.

  “You will not take her,” he said, clearly to Illiria and Rogald, but still looking at Fiona. “You will have to go through me.”

  Fiona cocked her head, heard the faint crack of her neck bones as she did so. That small sound reassured her that she was still alive.

  “I had an effect on what?” she asked Rogald, but also just looking at the man in her dreams, the man she had so lately been naked with, the man who may or may not have betrayed her.

  Illiria opened her mouth to speak, but Sonder waved her silent and nodded at Rogald.

  Still nothing moved around them, and there was an eerie quiet that seemed unnatural, wrong.

  Fiona wasn’t sure how long the suspended animation would last, still had no idea how much power she had. On impulse, she looked up and saw, to her surprise, that the clouds were still moving and, way up, she saw the vapor trail of a high altitude plane. Apparently, there was a range to the suspense. Hopefully, she would find out, in time.

  In time. Time.

  She had no idea what time was, or what dimensions were–anymore, but she hoped she would be able to find out.

  “We don’t know, Fiona,” Rogald answered after a nod at Sonder. It seemed like a nod of one leader to another. Or perhaps one alpha to another. “Something is still rippling through the time stream, but we don’t have all the answers yet. You changed something. You’re still changing something. It’s too soon to know the effect now, or what you mean for the future.”

  Illiria swore, loudly. She seemed unarmed, however, and was making no aggressive moves. “This is what we have been trying to prevent. That is why the Commander was going to do what was necessary.”

  “Too late, Guardian,” Sonder said, his voice sharp. He turned again to Fiona. “This may save us. Save everything.”

  “You don’t know that.” Illiria sneered at Fiona. “She could be the one that destroys everything.”

  Sonder swore, louder than Illiria, and turned to face her. “Look around you, Guardian. Really look. Look at what she can do. This power, this is a power none of us have. We can’t ignore this. I won’t ignore this. Fiona,” he moved to stand near her, as close as she would allow, the length of her outstretched arm. “Fiona is under my personal protection.”

  “And mine.” Rogald nodded at Sonder again.

  The swear was louder this time. “Captain.…”

  “No, Illiria, no. Rogald can send you to where the Commander is. Rogald?”

  Fiona was watching the
byplay with interest. She felt that the time stream was starting to slip, and her freeze wasn’t going to hold much longer.

  “Guys, I don’t think we have much more time.” She finally looked at Sonder and saw darkness under his eyes, darkness that worry and concern might have placed there.

  Concern for her?

  Illiria punched a few buttons on her wrist device and then nodded. “She’s right.” She raised her hands and looked at Fiona. “I am not the Commander. I won’t use force. But she is too dangerous. She should not be allowed to continue without guidance.”

  Sonder moved in front of Illiria. “You’ll have to go through me.”

  Rogald moved next to Sonder. “And me.”

  The woman only nodded, as if she already knew. The look she gave Rogald was pensive, as if she had expected something different. She gestured to the frozen tableau.

  “You can’t save them,” she said, pointing to Fiona’s neighbors, some her friends, all doomed. “The ones who are supposed to die, they still die, no matter what you do. You will be reported as missing, and never found.”

  Her eyes were still on Fiona.

  Fiona nodded, although her heart was heavy. “I know.”

  Illiria’s nod was grim. “Next move is yours, then, Traveler Fiona.” She looked at Sonder. “You are in serious trouble.”

  Fiona looked first at Illiria and then at Rogald and, finally, at Sonder.

  “I.…” She realized they were all looking at her with expectation. “I have no idea what you expect of me. I have no idea what to do.”

  “You can jump to anywhere,” Rogald said with a rising lilt of excitement in his voice. “You can change things.”

  There was a creak and a groan as if the time freeze was starting to crack.

  “Whoa there, soldier.” She raised her hands similar to how Illiria had a moment ago. “Just whoa. I don’t know what ‘this’ is or what all has happened in the past few days. I know my life will never be the same.”