by S. E. Babin
If I hadn’t been listening I would have never caught his last statement. “We both took the serum, believing we’d only have a few extra years. It…changed our DNA, mutated it into something far beyond what we expected.”
He slowly turned to me, his face reflecting regret.
“What we didn’t plan on was the serum’s long lasting effects. It never wears off.”
I nodded with a sick understanding. “Are you telling me you and Mom are immortal?”
He shook his head and offered a smile full of pain. “No, Penelope. I’m telling you that you, me, your mother and every single person in our genetic line is immortal. My children, your mother’s children, your children, your children’s children…”
I held up a hand, tears pricking the back of my eyes as understanding dropped on me like an anvil. “Like immortal, immortal?” I asked, horror evident in my voice.
“There is no other kind of immortal,” he said sadly.
“When I’m twenty-five, there will be no more?”
He shook his head. “You will not age after 25.”
Confusion wrinkled my brow. “But what about Mother? She’s way past twenty five now and she’s aged.”
“No she hasn’t. She’s living a lie. Her hair remains as black as ebony, and her skin as unlined as it was the day we met. When I knew she was leaving, I gave her potions to age her skin gradually so she could try to have a normal life. They are temporary, and she’s running out.”
I’d heard enough. I needed time to process this. Alone. “Take me home,” I demanded.
“Penelope,” My father reached his hand out to me, but I rebuffed his advances. I tried to remove the device still attached to my arm, but I couldn’t unfasten it.
My father sighed. “Keep the device. It seems to like you, after all.”
“What does it do?” I asked him against my better judgment.
He snorted. “Don’t you remember what it did a few hours ago?”
I closed my eyes. I guess I’d have a lot of extra time to travel around the world now, wouldn’t I?
“Concentrate on where you want to go, punch in the date, and hold on tight. It will take you there. Consider it my gift.”
I stiffened. “It appears you’re just full of gifts today, aren’t you, Father?” I stared at the offending thing resting innocently on my wrist. “What about this thing not being fully tested for human use?” His warning right before he transported us reverberated against my skull and anger over his actions burned through me.
A wide grin split his face. “Oy, thought you knew I was kidding there. Of course I tested the bloody thing extensively. Just a joke, child.”
I glared at him. “Yeah. Super funny.” I wanted to rip it off my arm and stomp it into a thousand pieces, but I also couldn’t stop myself from being lured in with its siren song. Anywhere I wanted to go, anywhere I wanted to see. People dreamed about that.
“Before I forget, make sure you concentrate on Earth only. I haven’t got all the kinks worked out for inter-dimensional travel.”
“What’s it who?” I asked dumbly. Dimensional travel?
“It’s best not to dwell on it.”
I sighed, ready for about a week’s worth of sleep and a rewind. I gave him a short nod and concentrated my attention on the device. Cold sweat formed on the back of my neck as I stared at it. One wrong number and I could find myself getting manhandled by a highland laird in sixteenth century Scotland. I paused, my sex-starved brain thinking about it for way too long and finally shook myself from thoughts of Jamie Fraser and him murmuring mo duinne in my ear while I begged him repeatedly to take me.
The soft sound of my father clearing his throat jerked me out of my fantasy. I scowled at him and punched in today’s date – the date my father took me from home and ruined my life. Scotland could wait for now. I needed a beer, my couch and a paperback book to erase these last few hours out of my head. I had no doubt I’d be thinking about this entire ordeal in great detail, but now my focus was to just get away from him and get back to my normal life.
“Penelope,” my father’s crisp accent broke through before I pushed the final button. It didn’t seem quite that simple when he’d used it on me, but now in spite of my newness to the device, I thought I had an innate sense of its inner workings. I found that operating it came second nature to me. Something else strange to mull over later.
I looked up at him, my hand poised over it. “Yes?”
“We are not through here. I will return soon enough to give out your first assignment.”
“Excuse me?” My hand dropped down from the device and I stood staring and waiting for him to elaborate.
He strode over to me, a wide grin spreading across his face. “Assignment. Webster defines it as a “specified task or amount of work –“
“I know what it means!” I gave him a dumbfounded look. “You just drop several huge life bombs and then ask me to work for you?” My rage was like a teakettle, loud and shrieky.
He smiled, reached his hand out and touched the device. My bones began to tear apart, and my mouth opened in a soundless scream. His last words floated through my ears as I hurtled through time and space.
“You’re quite mistaken, dear. I didn’t ask.”
Chapter 4
I landed in a pissed off heap on my kitchen floor, my face at eye level with my mother’s jeweled sandals. I closed my eyes and lay there for a moment, my face resting on the cool, probably dirty tiles. My mother said nothing, but tapped my shoulder and held her hand out to help me up.
I accepted it, even though I didn’t want to. When I met her eyes, she smiled softly, sympathy shining in her eyes.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
She sighed and her shoulders sank, making her appear even smaller than she actually was. Her ebony hair, streaked liberally with grey, swung across her shoulders as she turned away from me.
It was a lie. Everything was a lie. I still couldn’t wrap my head around the events of the past few hours.
“I deluded myself into thinking I’d never see him again.” She shook her head. “I’m not sure why I thought that. If he wants something, your father will go to extreme lengths to get it.”
I snorted. “I kinda got that.”
“Well,” she said and fell silent, busying herself with washing my dishes, even though I only had a few mugs in the sink.
“I tried over the years to tell you.” At my look of disbelief, she sighed. “I did. But looking at your face, so sweet and hopeful, I decided I’d rather be hated for the lie than the actual truth. It was too much. He’s a supernova, Penelope. You’re either with him or against him. There is no room for grey in his world.”
She took her hands out of the soapy water and dried them on my teal dishtowel. “There’s nothing to be done now. I’m sorry, honey.” Her gaze fell upon me, sorrow and regret swimming in the depths of her brown eyes. We stood there for a moment studying each other. I was paralyzed by the depth of my anger and sorrow. It wasn’t because I suddenly decided after five minutes of knowing my father that he was a good role model or anything of the sort. It was mostly because I trusted my mother to always be honest with me. She’d instilled those values upon me at a young age, but it didn’t seem like she shared them.
At the look on my face, she paled and muttered something under her breath. She grabbed her purse. “I need to get home.”
“Mom!”
She shook her head, but stopped. When she looked at me, her eyes were beseeching. I paused. I’d never seen that look in my mother’s eyes. I bit off my next statement. She was probably just as shocked as I was, maybe more so. I had no lies to keep up with. My mother had twenty-five years of them.
“I love you,” I said instead.
My mother turned away from me and slipped outside. It didn’t escape my notice that she didn’t return my sentiment.
Once the door clicked shut and I heard my mother’s car pull out of my driveway, I slowly turned back to my k
itchen. How could everything look the same when life was so fundamentally different than it was a few hours ago? The same teal and white curtains blew softly in the light breeze floating through the window over the sink. The tile was still a light brown and just as dirty as it was before my father came tromping in all over it. The walls were a pale cream color littered with paintings of outdoor French dining scenes that all had a pop of teal somewhere in them.
I admit it; I was a wee bit obsessed with teal. I didn’t go crazy, but everything in my kitchen had some touch of it. From the curtains, to the paintings, to the retro style refrigerator I gleefully bought with my first real paycheck. The color was prominent, but not overwhelming. I loved it. But now the color stood out with the starkness of a yellow umbrella in a sea of black suits. Sort of like my life now.
My doubts about my father’s identity had evaporated over the last few minutes. I was the offspring of the most famous detective in history…a supposedly fictional detective, at that. I held my arm up in front of me. Olive skin, lightly dusted with dark hair, and long, elegant hands with unpolished fingernails met my notice. Not like my father. But my face…I knew I had his face. Now that I’d seen him in the flesh, the only part of my mother I’d gotten was the barely noticeable tilt to my eyes and my long black eyelashes. My aquiline nose, which I’d always cursed as being too long, was his, and my lips, full and described by my teasing friends as a “rosebud”, were definitely his. Although it was sort of weird for a man to have lips like mine, he made it work. Of course he did—he was Sherlock freaking Holmes!
My long hair was a combination of both of them. Mine fell in loose waves across my shoulders and down my back, something, it seems, my father gave me since my mother had the straight, ebony sheet of hair typical to Asian women. Not that my mother embraced her heritage or anything, she preferred hamburgers to rice or noodles any day. She was the most contradictory hippie I’d ever known. My mother thought green tea was the cure all for anything that ailed you, but she’d sip whiskey at night when she thought I wasn’t looking.
Now that I knew some of her history, I guessed she could eat or drink anything without any ill effects. And I guess…in a little while, I could too. That thought, while exhilarating, sobered me. How many times had my mother reinvented herself? How many times had she moved to avoid her friends and peers from noticing she never aged? How many times had she had her heart broken by someone other than my father?
“Deep thoughts,” I muttered.
I trudged to my bedroom, kicked off my shoes, and slipped my tunic over my head. I was about to take off my jeggings when a cool, dry voice said, “Wow, you aren’t very observant, are you?”
I shrieked and spun around. A man was leaning against the wall next to my closet, but I wasn’t afraid. I was angry. “What is this? Break into Penelope’s house and scare the shit out of her day?”
He raised one eyebrow, but made no move to come any closer. I reached down to the floor, picked up my tunic, and shoved my arms through. My cheeks, and probably every other part of my body, were bright red with embarrassment. Once I was decent again, I closed my eyes, praying to God I’d have five minutes of peace soon.
“I don’t think there’s any sort of national holiday dedicated to scaring the shit out of you, no,” he said dryly.
I rolled my eyes. “What do you want? I’m assuming this has something to do with my father.”
A small smile quirked his lips. “Maybe I’m a murderer.”
A small quake of fear snaked down my spine, but I kept my face blank and studied him. He wasn’t exactly a handsome man, more…arresting. If I had to guess, I’d say he was confident in his skin and used to getting his way. He was tall and lean; a runner or swimmer, I’d wager. Tousled blond hair waved around his head, framing a lean, haunted face. A small scar right below his full lips caught my attention. Beautiful lips, that was for sure. He reminded me of a starving lion, fierce and proud. I raised my eyes up to meet his and noticed the amusement in the glinting brown depths right away.
“Do I pass?”
“It’s not a test,” I snapped.
“If you’re truly Sherlock’s daughter, then everything is a test.” He straightened. “I’m here to give you some tips on using that handy device you have on your arm.”
“Why didn’t Father come?”
He blinked in surprise. “So familiar already? My, it must have been some meeting then.” His accent was beautiful, more cultured than my father’s, but dry as dust. It appeared this mysterious bedroom marauder wasn’t a fan of mine.
Two could play that game. I wasn’t sure I liked him either. “I guess that would be none of your business, would it?”
He chuckled, and there was a dark edge to it, setting my heart to racing. Whoever this was…he was dangerous. I could feel it down to my cells.
“Watson,” he said, and held his hand out to me.
Well, shit. Could this day get any better? “Ah,” I said lightly. “My father’s partner-in-crime.” I didn’t hold out my hand.
His face shuttered, anger flashing for a second before he covered it with a cool, appraising look. “When you know your father better, you can judge me. Until then, I’ll consider you an infant I’m forced to babysit.” He dropped his hand.
My lips pressed together. Sherlock Holmes and Watson…romanticized by so many, reviled by me. At least for today anyway. “What do you want, Watson?” I bit out.
“I already told you. I’m here to babysit and make sure you stay out of trouble.”
“You can’t stay here. This is my house. Plus, I don’t need your help. You rudely interrupted me, pajamas, a cold beer, and a Mr. Darcy reading marathon.”
Heat flashed over his face, gone as quickly as I thought I saw it. Or it could have been distaste—that seemed to be more his speed. He was probably the sort of guy who got his jollies off by reading technical manuals.
He sighed, as if I was the biggest pain in the ass to ever walk on the earth. “I never said I meant to stay.” He motioned for me to come closer, but my feet were rooted to the floor. His lips thinned. “Well, aren’t you a right pain in the arse, then? Your father is going to have to pay me more.”
“Hey!”
I thought I saw a flash of amusement in his eyes, but Watson was proving a difficult person to read. I trudged over to him and he clamped a warm hand over my arm. I got the tingles and willed my flesh not to break out into goosies. Watson might not be traditionally handsome, but something about him caused my lady parts to want to stand up and salute.
He turned my wrist to the left, then right, studying the buttons and dials on the device. He clucked his tongue and met my eyes. “Good girl,” he said. “You really did go straight home, didn’t you?”
I bristled at his arrogant tone. “One trip into the past and one family falling apart was quite enough for one day, thank you very much.”
To his credit, he didn’t respond. Watson dipped his head, pressed a final button, and released my wrist. “You need to be very careful with the DAR.”
“DAR?” I questioned.
“Your fancy new wrist bracelet,” he said with barely concealed irritation. “The official title is Dimensional Atom Relocator.”
“DAR it is.” I gave the bracelet a look of distaste.
He shook his head in disgust. “Look, there’s a ton of time travel rules, but we don’t have the time and I don’t have the energy to go through them all with you right now. Over the next several months, you should learn everything you need to know. My suggestion is just not to use the device, but since I know whose daughter you are and telling you not to do something is like telling a teenage girl she can’t date the bad boy, I will say this: Avoid yourself at all costs. Meaning, make sure the present you avoids the past or future you at all costs. Never travel to another dimension until your daddy dearest gives you the okay, and never, ever try to take someone with you. The DAR is only programmed to take one person at a time.”
I frowned. That real
ly wasn’t any fun. Not that I had a BFF who’d gladly risk her life to go gallivanting through time with me, but still, it would be cool to think I could bring someone. My mind settled on something bothering me. “Wait. He pressed a button on my wrist, held on to me and went with me. If it was so dangerous to take more than one person, why would he do it?”
Watson’s face shuttered. “In due time you will find out all you need to know.”
Super. A cryptic Sensei. Exactly the kind of person I needed to help me transform from ordinary admin person to time traveling immortal.
I settled on another question. “Why would he even give me something like this when I have no idea what I’m doing?”
Watson looked a little bewildered. “Exactly,” he finally said. “I instructed your father not to give you anything with that much power, but sometimes he’s like a kid in a toy store. And you,” he tilted his head to study me, “are a brand new shiny thing he wants to discover.”
That wasn’t creepy…at all. “Fine. It’s obvious you don’t like me, and it seems like you might not even like my father all that much, so I think we’re done here.”
Instead of leaving, Watson merely crossed his arms and stared at me. “Unless you can add psychic to your list of qualifications, I really don’t think you know who or what I like. And since I don’t plan on sharing that list with you for the foreseeable future, I think I’d prefer to stay here for a little while and make sure you don’t do anything stupid.”
I opened my mouth, then closed it. I glared at Watson and wished for super powers so I could throw him out of my house without expending any physical energy on the task. “Fine,” I said again. “You’re going to be awfully bored, though.”
He made a flippant go ahead gesture with one hand. “I’m immortal. Boredom is pretty much my constant state of life now.”
Immortal? John Watson was immortal, too? An annoying wrinkle formed on my brow. “Daddy Dearest gave you some of his serum, too?”
His lips thinned before he gave a bitter chuckle. “Gave is not quite the right word to fit the situation.” His eyes shuttered and I knew I’d get no more out of him tonight.