Selfless Series Box Set

by S Breaker

  It was another one of those moments that she never thought in her wildest imagination was possible. Any uninformed passer-by would rightly assume that she was waiting to go on a date with Jake Donovan. Those passer-by’s heads would probably explode if they knew what was actually going on.

  Still, she had to check the little streak of thrill that coursed through her when Noah emerged from the doorway along with a puff of steam.

  He had his usual flight jacket and jeans back on but he had left his hair slicked back probably so as not to arouse any suspicion from his “friends”.

  He met her gaze as she looked him up and down in appraisal but she didn’t say anything.

  Noah rolled his eyes and dangled a set of keys. “You have to drive,” he said. “I had enough trouble getting that infernal thing here by myself this afternoon.”

  Laney’s eyes lit up. “You drove Jake’s car to school?” And her expression which started as impressed turned incredulous. “What, you don’t know how to drive a stick shift?”

  He shot her a pointed look. “I grew up in Wellington. At most, everyone cycles.”

  She shook her head as she snatched the keys from his hand. In another time and place, Laney would have been thrilled to be able to drive Jake Donovan’s classic Ford Mustang. However, the actual current circumstances were a bit of a damper. “Are we actually going to The Shack?”

  “I’ve already done a preliminary sweep.” He gestured to the HUD on his arm, not activating it. “The traffic cone is not on campus, which means—”

  She was already nodding as they walked toward the parking lot. “We have to go out and find it.”

  “Do you know where this ‘shack’ is?”

  “Of course. It’s like the most popular dating spot near campus.” She stopped short. “I mean, I know this isn’t a date,” she hurried to amend. “Of course. I’m just saying that’s where normal students go when they go out on dates.”

  She bit her lip to shut up. Alright, Laney. That’s quite enough.

  Noah gave her an eyebrow-raised look but didn’t comment.

  Laney gripped the steering wheel as she drove down the tree-lined streets headed away from campus, her chest heavy with the feeling of impending doom as so far, things hadn’t gone to plan at all.

  For starters, they had already almost got separated. And with the portal marker not being where they were expecting it to be, it potentially meant even more delays in their already nerve-wracking tight schedule. She wondered when she would ever stop feeling on edge.

  And being in Jake Donovan’s Mustang with a Jake Donovan was just a smidge too eerie, it wasn’t helping the situation.

  Not to mention Berry’s words that kept bouncing around in her brain.

  Primaries… Fireworks…

  She almost wished she hadn’t asked Berry about it at all and stayed oblivious about what could have possibly been going on between her and Noah. She felt as though that “theory” was breathing down her neck like it was expecting her to do something, to feel something.

  She shook her head to dismiss the thought. That doesn’t make it real.

  Besides, it was irrelevant. She already had a boyfriend. Or…she thought she did. She frowned at a sudden sting in her insides from what she had seen back on her world, but she shook it off again.

  Regardless. Even if she didn’t, even if Kevin was with Darla now, it was completely ill-advised for her to be starting any of this with Noah. She was going to go home soon. She was never going to see him again.

  At least, not this one.

  She sensed something was weighing on him too, even though his face was as sullen as it normally was. “What?”

  Noah looked far away. “Jake’s parents. They were similar enough to mine,” he relayed softly. “I missed them.”

  Laney’s eyes lit up in understanding. Oh, of course. She pursed her lips, not really knowing what to say. “That must have been rough.”

  He shrugged. “I know it wasn’t them.” He glanced over at her. “But it does get confusing. Doesn’t it?” he prompted, a catch in his tone.

  A corner of her mouth turned up as she gave him a quick sideways look as she was definitely one of the few people in the entire multiverse who would understand exactly what he meant, but she didn’t say anything. She knew she didn’t have to.

  Noah gave her an appreciative look. Then he took a deep calming breath as though coming to peace with it as he settled to look out the window to watch the world zip by. “Dad offered to make me some crepes, which was weird because my mom was the molecular gastronomer—”

  The car swerved across the centerline.

  “Whoa!” Noah’s gaze snapped to the wheel on which Laney’s hands were not.

  Laney, whose hands had flown up to press against both sides of her head, had her eyes squeezed tightly closed.

  Noah’s eyes lit up in recognition as his HUD beeped.

  Laney was having another ‘bleed through’, similar to the one she’d had on the submarine yesterday, which was manifesting as her head feeling like it was going to implode. She screamed again.

  Noah grabbed the wheel. “Laney! Stop the car!” he yelled, his face showing effort as he concentrated hard on not running the car off the road. “Laney, listen to me! Get your foot off the gas now!”

  But she couldn’t move. She couldn’t think. There was nothing but intense pain.

  “Laney!” Noah’s eyes widened in dread as he saw that they were about to run head-on into something up ahead.

  Laney was convulsing in her seat, her eyes beginning to roll back in her head.

  “I’m sorry, Laney!” Noah called out before he flicked up his HUD and pressed a button.

  Laney momentarily jerked in her seat before she fell slack against it.

  Noah drew Laney up enough so that she couldn’t reach the pedals before he pulled hard on the handbrake, making the car nearly spin out and kicking up a substantial dust cloud on the unsealed road as it screeched to a stop.

  He collapsed back in his seat, still slightly heaving before he turned to check on Laney.

  She was unconscious but breathing.

  He swallowed hard, relieved, but unsettled. There was no way it was good for Laney to be receiving zaps from her CCL every time this happened. As it was, they would also be needing to find access to some type of laboratory with proper instruments to be able to remove the strip safely.

  But first, they had to get moving again.

  ASAP.

  He patted Laney’s cheek lightly, then started to shake her shoulder in an attempt to wake her, but as he did so, his gaze was distracted when the dust settled back around the car, and he looked around, entranced.

  The car had swerved to a stop just before a fenced-off area with big red ‘No trespassing. Quarantine zone.’ signs all plastered on it, the area behind the fence so vast he couldn’t sight where it ended.

  He opened the door to get out, his gaze still pinned to the desolate expanse before him.

  It looked like a bomb site or what would have been left of a populated suburb after a massive bomb.

  The ground was dry, there was a smattering of dead trees along the road, the cracked bed of what looked like used to be a river, and ruins of structures crumbling in the dust as far as the eye could see.

  Noah frowned, an image of his own troubled world flashing briefly in his mind.

  “What happened here?”

  He whirled around upon hearing Laney’s weakened voice and jumped to support her arm as she straightened up from inside the car. “Are you okay?” he asked, his forehead creased with concern.

  But Laney’s mouth had dropped open. “What did this?” She squinted at the yellow police tape running across the street where it looked like the paving of the street itself cut off unnaturally at a certain point, just before the dark, barren land that lay beyond it.

  He shook his head. “Looks like a bomb of some type,” he guessed.

  “A bomb,” she echoed as they both walk
ed up as close to the fence as Noah figured was safe to inspect it.

  And as if on cue, the Zeta device beeped and Laney checked her wrist. “Oh boy.”

  Noah had already closed his eyes, wrinkling his nose in dismay. “Don’t tell me,” he started. “The orange cone is in there, isn’t it?”

  Laney nodded, looking dazed. “Uh-huh.”

  “Perfect.”

  ***

  Laney craned her neck briefly to read a road sign. “We just passed another county.”

  Noah who had insisted on driving was continuously scanning the road up ahead as they had been driving along the quarantine zone fence for about twenty minutes, trying to find a gate, a gap, or an entrance into the area with no luck.

  Laney shifted in her seat with a slight moan.

  He gave her a sideways glance. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  Laney’s head was still stinging from the aftereffects of the ‘bleed through’ and her CCL felt itchy but she tried to ignore it. “Fine.”

  Noah’s forehead creased in concern again but he knew there was little he could do about it. He signaled to diverge at an interchange. “We should go back,” he said. “Maybe we’ll have better luck the other way.”

  She didn’t reply. She was feeling exhausted, unenthused about either option. She gestured out the window after a few minutes. “I remember this used to be a wildlife reserve. And there should have been a country club over there, right before the interstate. It’s so weird that it’s all just gone.”

  “We need to find out more about this world so we know exactly what we’re dealing with,” Noah suggested. “Do you think the library at the school would still be open?”

  Laney craned her neck back again as she spotted something across the road. “Look.” She pointed out the window.

  A big neon sign was blinking ‘Open til Midnight.’

  The quarantine zone fence also ran right along a street that was across from The Shack. And when Noah slowed the car down, a voice calling his name made him turn to look.

  “Hey, Jake!”

  One of the guys from the basketball game earlier at the school was at the parking lot right outside the diner and spotted Jake’s Mustang. He made a big wave to beckon them inside. “You finally made it! Hurry up and get in here, you sneaky lovebirds!”

  Laney rolled her eyes. She would have found his comment annoyingly immature, except she was finding it refreshing to be around actual teenagers, with actual teenaged brains, with regular teenage concerns for a change.

  Noah glanced back at Laney. “Feel like doing some recon?”

  She shrugged. “I guess you’d better park the car.”

  The Shack was a fifties-inspired diner, with candy-striped window frames, shiny silver bar stools, lacquer tabletops, and pink leather booth bench seats, complete with a jukebox playing retro music. The place served thick milkshakes and some of the waitresses zipped around on rollerskates.

  It was Friday night and the place was well close to crowded. Laney noted that a lot of the people looked familiar since they were also students from her school.

  As they walked in, Noah gave a casual wave and a nod across the floor to the table full of jocks by the window where the guys he’d been playing basketball with were sitting with some cheerleaders, but he headed for two bar stool seats at the counter instead and Laney guessed that he wasn’t so keen on continuing his masquerade as Jake Donovan.

  Noah leaned against the counter. “Want something to drink?”

  Her eyebrows rose. “You don’t have any money,” she reminded him.

  He scoffed, looking miffed.

  She handed him a laminated drinks menu. “I got it,” she said, relieved she had grabbed some cash from her room. “Pick what you want.”

  “We’re not here to drink.”

  “Then why did you ask?”

  “I’m just trying to blend in,” he rationalized, shaking his head. “I really don’t understand this kind of world.”

  “I’m sure this kind of world doesn’t understand you either,” she quipped.

  “We need to get more information about that quarantine zone. I thought I saw a newspaper box right outside. I’ll go see if I can get one,” he said, pushing off the bar stool.

  Laney nodded, watching him go.

  Noah passed a few girls on his way to the door and they turned their heads to watch him walk past.

  One of them giggled. Another whispered to the others before very obviously gesturing at Laney, sitting at the counter. And then the three of them gave her curious, not exactly friendly looks as they walked past her on their way to a booth across the diner.

  Laney had seen those looks before. Other girls at school used to give her the same looks when she had started going out with Kevin. It usually made her feel incredibly insecure, made her think she didn’t deserve to be with him, made her afraid those girls knew there was someone else better for him.

  She looked down at the empty stool that Noah had vacated. Somehow, she didn’t feel any of those things right then. She shook her head to dismiss the thought. She wasn’t really with Noah.

  When she looked up again, she groaned as she could already see from the mirror behind the bar that two other guys were walking up to her from across the diner.

  Both boys looked a few years older than her, and one of them, the one who looked like he was auditioning for a role in Grease later on, slid over to lean against the counter beside Laney with a wide grin on his face. “Hi there,” he said. “I’m taking a poll for a local charity. We’re concerned with the level of satisfaction of today’s consumers. Tell me, are you satisfied with the service you’ve received tonight?”

  The other guy who was hanging back was stifling his chuckle back as he watched his friend.

  Laney didn’t move, didn’t look up. “Not interested. Thanks,” she replied with a tight smile. She was hoping they would just go away and leave her alone.

  But “Danny” straightened up, his grin widening as he prepared to pose his next offer, putting his hand on her shoulder. “Oh, come on, don’t you want to help out a—” And he broke off with a sudden yelp.

  Laney looked up, startled.

  Noah had grabbed his arm from behind, and was not-so-subtly, painfully, extricating it off of her. “Hey guys,” he started, his face blank. “Why don’t you go find someone else to annoy?”

  The two immediately scrambled away. “Danny” was bent over, nursing his hand. It appeared Noah may have broken it.

  Laney met Noah’s gaze as he swung his leg over the barstool to sit beside her again. “Thanks?” she said, almost uncertainly. “We’re supposed to be incognito, remember? I don’t think you breaking that guy’s arm is going to help that.”

  Noah grunted, looking away. “They were bothering you.”

  “It was fine—,” she began to dismiss.

  “Well, they were bothering me,” Noah amended firmly.

  She watched his expression, slightly amused.

  Jake Donovan was not normally this intimidating. But Noah’s spin on his personality was making him absolutely formidable. It was no wonder all the other guys in his world wouldn’t even talk to her.

  Different

  Noah crossed his arms, leaning his elbows against the counter, looking dissatisfied. “They were out of newspapers.”

  Laney narrowed her eyes in thought. “Or we can just…” She raised her hand to call the bartender. “Hey,” she started with a sheepish smile, her gaze dropping to his nametag. “Paul. Could I possibly borrow the TV remote for one teensy minute? I really want to check on this reality show I’m watching.”

  The bartender looked to be in his early twenties, probably a college student on his part-time job. He simply grinned and handed Laney the remote control for the TV mounted up in the corner of the diner.

  “Thanks,” Laney said, already clicking on the channel button on the remote, settling on the next news broadcast channel she found.

  Noah looked up to watch. />
  “Nearing the anniversary of the devastating global catastrophe. Commemoration event planned.” was rolling along the bottom on the ticker tape as footage of quarantine zones, sinkholes, and more areas that looked as though a massive bomb had cleared it, like the one they had passed along the road, flashed on the screen.

  She mumbled in surprise. “Well, that’s different.”

  “It looks like this world has already suffered some side effects from a quantum spacetime disruption,” Noah said, looking around as though re-surveying their surroundings in light of the new information.

  “I thought you said this world was safe?” Laney asked through clenched teeth.

  “It was safe.”

  Her eyes were still locked on the TV. “Oh shit, look at the date.” She tugged on his sleeve. “Whatever it was that caused all this happened on the twentieth of March earlier this year. That was the day we first met, the first time I went through the quantum shear with you.”

  He shook his head ruefully. “Man, that event must have had some rippling effects throughout the spacetime continuum. That must be what Berry didn’t want to tell us.”

  Laney’s stomach was in knots. “I feel terrible. Like this is all my fault.”

  Noah didn’t meet her gaze. “We both know whose fault all this really is.”

  She made a face as she also knew all too well whose fault it all was, but the fact that she was a ‘Laney’ too didn’t appease her at all, especially since she had been an instrument in enabling it.

  Who knew how many other worlds had been damaged because of her? How many more worlds were going to be damaged because of her?

  “This doesn’t change anything. We still need to find a way to sneak into that quarantine zone,” Noah said.

  Laney was trying to clear her head, but it wasn’t every day that one found out they’re responsible for severely damaging the spacetime continuum and it was difficult to refocus. She clenched her fists in remorse.