Millennium Crash

by James Litherland

  Anya didn’t need to be told that last part. She’d worked with doctors long enough. “What now?”

  “I’ve had a little chat with the hospital administrator. Officially nothing’s changed—but, without saying your friend is getting any kind of preferential treatment, the second doctor will happen to review her case soon. No one is going to insist on a particular verdict, but that psychiatrist will understand the administration’s feelings.”

  Anya grinned. “But how did you convince them to arrange things like that?”

  Mr. Hollingsworth combed his mustache with his finger. “No one wants to be dragged into court if they can help it. And I have a certain reputation. I expect your friend will be released and returned to you shortly. Unless this Nye does something stupid, which you tell me is unlikely.”

  “Thank you. This is the best I could’ve hoped for.” They certainly had gotten their money’s worth—depending on what his bill was.

  “I’ve done all I can do, and it should be fine now. But you’re paying me by the hour—if you want me to sit around with you and wait...”

  “No, indeed. Thank you again for what you’ve done. And we’ll contact you if it turns out we need more help.”

  The lawyer grinned. “I sincerely hope you don’t, Miss Anya. I have enough money as it is.” With that he tipped an imaginary hat at her and walked out of the hospital.

  Turner looked from the lawyer leaving to her. “I’m still curious why we lost Nye’s signal.”

  Anya smiled to herself. “At some point she had to realize they might take her possessions, and she wouldn’t want to lose her watch, even temporarily, or let the wrong people get too close a look at it. I suspect she swallowed it.”

  Turner’s eyes widened. “That would be enough to keep the locator from tracking her?”

  “Probably not normally, though it would cause interference. Since the device charges off the body’s electrical field. But remember that Nye’s body has absorbed abnormally high levels of radiation.”

  “So how did the signal return?”

  Before Anya could decide how she’d answer his question, the sally port that led back to the wards opened and Nye came trotting out toward them.

  Mr. Hollingsworth must have scared the hospital administrator good, and Anya really didn’t care how he’d done that. It was just good to see Nye.

  The girl came up to them beaming, and thankfully wearing her watch. “That was interesting.”

  Anya shook her head in wonder. “You enjoyed your experience, did you?”

  “I wouldn’t say enjoyed. It was educational.”

  “I hope your Travel device still works properly. At least it did enough for us to track you here.”

  Nye shrugged. “It looked alright when I washed it off. A little worn, but it seemed to function fine.”

  Anya smiled at the girl. “That would’ve been the acids in your stomach.”

  Turner interjected. “Now what? Back to the hotel, or all the way back to Chickadee County?”

  Anya considered. “We’ll return home, for long enough to rest a bit and get things squared away. I want to put some distance between us and this incident. Cut the summer short and go to next year.”

  Turner definitely did not look happy. “I still haven’t finished getting the web site set up. At least let me leave Ms. Dervan a message.”

  Nye piped up. “We’re leaving?”

  Anya kept her voice low. No one was around to hear, but they were still standing in a mental hospital. “I hope you got enough of a baseline to start, because I want to skip ahead to two thousand one. We’ll make next summer extra long to make up for cutting this one short.”

  She glanced at Turner. “Leave your message, but finishing the website can wait until next year.”

  Chapter 14

  Abandoned

  July 30th, 2000 Midtown Manhattan

  MATT pushed through the side exit, pulling Page along behind and trying not to rush out of the building. It was night, with bright lights all around, and warm. When are we? She had said she was aiming for the summer of two thousand.

  Page stopped and stood her ground as soon as they were out on the sidewalk. She looked down at her watch. “It’s two and a half years in the future—I doubt they’re still looking for us.” She fiddled with her device a little more. Finding her friends.

  Matt dropped her hand with some reluctance. They’d been so close when they’d Traveled, he had failed to notice any separation when they’d arrived. “I’d rather not be found inside while you’re carrying that bag, and stuffed with cash.”

  Page rolled her eyes. “Both receipts are dated from the past, now—they won’t be taken for forgeries.” Apparently forgetting they’d left the receipt for the bag two and a half years in the past. “Anyway, I’m tired of shopping.”

  “I’m not surprised. I suppose we should get you a hotel room for the night. You can find the others and go shopping tomorrow, if you still want to.”

  “I am tired.”

  Matt looked down at the watch he was wearing and frowned. “Two and a half years in the future, you said. It’s the thirtieth of July—I’ve been gone for a whole month. People will be wondering.”

  “Close enough. I’ve returned you to your own time, your own life. Now I need to get back to mine. But before I do—” Page reached into her pocket and pulled out Matt’s billfold and handed it to him. “I imagine you’ll need that.”

  He found he couldn’t feel irritated with her casual dismissal of his lost month. “I thought we were supposed to come through at the same time of day, but it’s several hours later.”

  “Because at the same hour in summer, it would still have been light out. The bias is to help prevent a feeling of disorientation from a change in sensory input.”

  “Like jet lag.”

  Page gave him a blank look.

  Matt sighed. “When you board a plane in the morning and then travel half the day, only you land and it’s still morning, or the middle of the night.”

  “Oh, airplanes.”

  The way she said it made him wonder again—what that future world she came from was like. He’d have to continue with her if he hoped to find out the answers. Of course, he had other reasons to stick by her.

  He’d known this moment was coming, and now it was here. But he wasn’t ready to let go. “Are you going to search for your friends right now?”

  She stared at him for a long moment, but it was too dark to see the wheels turning behind her eyes. “I think I want to find that room and rest for a while, before I do anything.”

  “Then why don’t I help you search for a hotel. I should probably continue to escort you anyway, as long as you’re carrying around all that cash. Until you’ve got your real helpers back at least.”

  “You don’t have to do that. Contrary to the impression I’ve given you, I can take care of myself.”

  Matt pressed his lips together to hold back the comment that immediately sprang to mind. “You need a nice hotel, one where you won’t have to worry about carrying that cash. You’ll need me to use my ID and credit card for that kind of place.” If my card hasn’t been cancelled by now.

  Page nodded. “I’d appreciate your help. But in the morning, I’ll go to the bank first thing. I’ll deposit most of this money into my account and see about getting one of those debit card things. Then you won’t feel you have to protect me, and you can get back to your own life.”

  Matt grinned. “It’s difficult getting away from you. I wonder if that will do it.” He also wondered when she was going to demand her watch back. It had been a while since she’d pressed him on it, and now if she would be leaving him behind, she’d need it back. And he was out of excuses for holding on to it. “For now, you’re still my responsibility.”

  “Well then, take me to a good hotel. And I told you I’m tired, so make it one close by.”

  “We’re between Broadway and Park Avenue—why not just close your eyes and point? Or try t
he nearest first, until we find you something?”

  “Alright, Matt. It’s your city.”

  Page walked wearily beside him into the plush lobby of the closest hotel he could see. He gestured at a comfortable couch. “Why don’t you relax while I find out if I can get you a room?”

  She nodded without a word and plopped down on one of the big red leather sofas with her bag sitting next to her. He hurried over to approach the desk clerk and discover if they had any vacancies. They did.

  Matt took out his credit card and slid it across the counter, praying it wouldn’t be declined. “Two single rooms, if they’re available, and next to each other if you can.”

  The man clicked away on his computer. “I can give you two single rooms on the same floor. That’s the best I can do, sir.”

  “That’ll be fine.”

  The clerk programmed the card keys for both rooms and handed them over with the receipt to be signed and a folder with the record of the reservation. Matt slid his own key into his wallet together with his credit card. He walked back over to Page and handed her the other.

  “Room 404. And if you want to put your bag in the hotel safe, I’m sure that clerk would help you—but you might want to take out some cash first.”

  Page nodded. “I already took a wad of bills and stuffed them in my pocket. You see? I can take care of myself and don’t need you to do my thinking.”

  “You want your watch back now?”

  “That’s not necessary. I switched them when I was swapping the batteries. You never noticed how I was operating the watch on my own wrist?”

  He’d been too distracted. It was her watch, but her trick still irked him. So much for trust.

  Matt didn’t know what to say. “I guess I’ll stop by in the morning. In case you’ve not reunited with your friends yet and need an escort to the bank.”

  “If you feel you have to.”

  “I do. I don’t want you trying to carry that cash alone through the city.” She swapped the watches.

  Page smiled. “Then goodbye for now, Matt.”

  “Alright, then. Good luck with your research.”

  He turned and walked out of the lobby without looking back, leaving before she thought to ask for the other device. He stopped to think once he was out in the bright, busy night. There were things he should do before he returned to his room down the hall from Page. He wouldn’t let her slip away from him, not yet.

  And with the room nearby and the locator app on this watch he was wearing, he should be able to stick close to her.

  Like Page, he wanted to lie down and rest. But first he needed to go back to the clinic he’d left only this morning, a month ago, and find out what had happened to him. Since that was a long, long walk, he decided to splurge on a taxi.

  Before he tried hailing a cab, though, he had to check to make sure he understood how to work the tracking function on the helper device he now possessed. She had shown him, but that could’ve been another of her tricks.

  Standing on the sidewalk, Matt switched to the locator screen. He saw the white blip that ought to correspond to where Page must have been making her way up to her room. Recalling the layout of the hotel, he estimated the size of the area that screen represented. Now he knew the range.

  He was glad he’d taken that second room. He didn’t have a plan yet, but he meant to Travel with Page whenever she left the present. So he had to try and stay close enough to be inside the field when it happened. But she wouldn’t be leaving until mid-day tomorrow at the earliest, and he had things he needed to wrap up if he intended to abandon this life for one with Page. If she let him.

  Matt hailed a taxi then, and after it was taking him away he checked the locator screen again and saw Page’s blip had disappeared and a glowing red bar had lit up at the bottom. South.

  Now he was comfortable with using this device to keep track of Page if he had to. He hoped it didn’t come to that. In the morning, maybe she wouldn’t have found her friends yet, or they’d not have found her, and he could escort her to the bank. And find some way to convince her to let him come along. If that meant shopping, even—eventually he’d figure out a way to extend their partnership.

  Matt sat tense in the back of the cab all the way to the Empire City Clinic. He worried about Page, and he wondered what might’ve happened over the last month to his supposedly ‘normal’ life. After the driver had dropped him off, he stood outside soaking up the atmosphere.

  It felt as if he’d been gone for years. In a sense he had. And a lot can happen in a month. He hoped Marcia hadn’t changed shifts, though—a month ago she wouldn’t have been working this late, and he’d rather not face her questions about what had happened that morning in the clinic.

  Finally he took the plunge and entered. Walked right up to the receptionist he didn’t know. “Please page Dr. Wallace.”

  The woman frowned up at him. “Dr. Wallace is busy. If you need help—”

  “Just tell Harding his old friend Matt is here to see him.”

  She shook her head but grabbed the phone and called someone, repeating his message. She hung up and looked at him. “Dr. Wallace will see you in his office. It’s down—”

  “I know where it is. Thanks.” Matt headed back through the small clinic’s sterile white halls, trying not to think about the last time he was here.

  He found Harding leaning against the jamb in his office doorway, waiting. They both grinned, but Matt saw the new wrinkles on his friend’s forehead. Stress. The man had chosen to become a doctor.

  “You’re looking good for a ghost.” With which remark, Harding ushered Matt into his stark, utilitarian office.

  Matt perched on the metal stool that likely belonged in an examination room. “Is that your way of telling me I’ve been declared dead?”

  “No such luck, I’m afraid.” His friend plopped down hard in his cheap office chair and began swiveling back and forth. “It means Marcia’s been going on about how you vanished into thin air right before her eyes. She’s now convinced you were a specter all along. It is hard to believe you’re real.”

  “And I suppose the patient I brought in never existed at all.”

  “Marcia’s the only one who remembers seeing you with an attractive redhead.” Harding chuckled. “She made a few notes but only wrote down a first name, so no one really believes her.”

  Matt frowned. “Sorry about that, Wall. I didn’t exactly choose to leave the way I did.”

  “You know I hate that nickname.”

  “Why do you think I use it?”

  His friend grabbed a pen off his desk and began twirling it in his fingers. “Your parents are worried—the poor people called me to try and get in touch with you, but what could I tell them?”

  “Can I use your computer for a minute? I’d better e-mail them.”

  Harding nodded and rolled his chair across the floor to the other side of the room. “Nobody at the school is concerned about you, though.” The man grinned. “You did lose your apartment. The landlord was quick to box up your belongings and rent the place to someone else. Who knows where your stuff is now?”

  Matt shrugged. It was never a real home, and he’d nothing there of value—sentimental or otherwise. He stood and walked to the desk, hunching over the keyboard long enough to log in to his webmail account and send a short note to his parents. Then that much at least was finished.

  He moved away and looked back at his friend. “I told them to call you if they have any questions. You can tell them I was no phantom.”

  “Thanks.” Harding’s smile was grim. “I take it you mean to disappear again?”

  Matt nodded. He thought about Page at the hotel and how he should be headed back there. It had been easier to wrap things up here than he’d anticipated. “Only this time it’s intentional.”

  His friend stood and flipped his pen over onto his desk and offered his hand. “I sure will miss you. Do you think you might drop back in again someday?”

 
Matt shook his friend’s hand. “I’ve no idea what the future holds, Wall, or the past.”

  Matt walked out of that office, and hopefully out of his old life. Needing the exercise and in no rush to get back to the hotel in Midtown, he didn’t bother trying to find a taxi—he just started walking.

  If he managed to stay with Page, he had no idea where or when that would take him, so he might as well enjoy the sights and sounds of the city as if for the last time. Not that he’d miss it.

  He stayed alert as he strode through the jungle, because it was just as wild as he’d tried to convince Page. It was a fascinating wilderness however, and thankfully tonight a calm one. On the surface.

  When he passed through into a nicer neighborhood, he used his bank card to get out as much cash as it would let him. It’s a good thing I’m not dead, or the ATM wouldn’t give me any money.

  He kept checking the locator as he walked along even though he didn’t expect Page would be on the move. He imagined she’d be fast asleep. She could have started looking for her friends though, or gone shopping. She’s unpredictable.

  By the time he got back to the hotel he was not only tired, but thoroughly exhausted. He even took the elevator up to save his feet.

  He paused in front of room 404 and checked to make sure she was safely inside. Dead to the world, no doubt. Then he trudged down the hall to his own room and collapsed on the bed.

  A few minutes later he was startled awake by a ringing noise near his head. The hotel phone. Light was streaming in through the window because he’d not bothered to close the curtains.

  Matt wondered if Page had checked her device and discovered where he was. She could be calling for her escort to the bank.

  He grabbed the receiver while he tried to blink the sleep out of his eyes. “Hello?”

  “Mr. Walker? Room 412?” Not Page’s voice—someone official.

  “That’s me.”

  “Did you wish a longer stay? To keep one room or both? You understand we require guests to check out before eleven. But if you intend to stay...”