by PK Hrezo
From the rearview mirror, I catch Tristan nod. He has so much trust in me right now—it’s comforting and freakish at the same time. How can I give into doubt when he’s so sure of my abilities?
“Departure in ten, nine, eight …”
I count off robotically, my heart thumping double time. Glancing down once, the slight bulge in my pocket beneath my buffersuit catches my eye. Quincy’s pocket watch. It’s a huge violation to travel with a relic, but after reading the inscription, there’s not a chance in hell I’d let go of it.
My voice falters on number three. I swallow hard, steeling myself for departure, something like numbness consuming my chest, sucking it inward. My entire body trembles with such a mélange of emotion, I can’t distinguish one from the next. Peculiar and indescribable.
“Two, one …”
Gripping the armrests, my knuckles crackle into a painfully white shade. I find my focal point.
Pressure. So much pressure.
I can’t watch. My lids squeeze shut.
There’s a tight pulling in my chest, like a vacuum from within. I know that sensation—it means we’ve left the ground.
Holy hell, here we go …
Spinning. Quaking.
The vessel jolts with cavernous thunderbolts, rigid and sharp, as if we’re bouncing off angles, not shooting through tunnels. I’ve just ejected us halfway into a time tunnel, but what if we didn’t make it all the way past the radiation feedback? We could burn even through Essence’s cloak.
Or we could fall, be lost in space and time with no way home. What was I thinking?
Sperrrrluuuunk ….. crunch …. errrraaaaattttt ….donk, donk, donk …..
Voices screaming. Is it in my head?
Or from me?
Where is Tristan?
Why am I all alone?
Why is it so dark?
No, please … I’m falling …
Chapter Twenty-Two
“Bianca!”
My eyes pop open and I’m shrouded in soft white haze. My shoulders quiver, out of my control. Hands are at my neck. Angels? Is this the end?
I tilt my head back, squinting my eyes.
An echo-y voice fades in until, finally, it’s clear enough to make sense. “Honey, are you okay?”
Dad’s voice.
Focus.
Slowly, his blurred image becomes clear, his green eyes wide with concern.
“Dad? I’m … home?”
He unfastens my seatbelt and guides me to my feet, an ironic laugh bursting from his lips. “Yes, you’re home. Thank God.” He wraps his arms around me.
We made it. Tristan?
Pulling back from Dad, I turn to the passenger seats where Tristan is slumped forward.
“Bianca!” Mom climbs into the vessel, hugs me.
There were a few minutes there across the universe, when I feared I’d never feel her warm embrace again. “That was the worse cosmic climbing of my life. I thought …” My voice cracks.
Mom strokes my hair. “You’re fine. You’re home.”
The realization hits me so bluntly that tears burst out of nowhere and stream down my face, followed by an unattractive snort that quickly turns into sobs. I’m blubbering. But it’s such a release. I bury my head in Mom’s neck to hide my whimpers.
“Oh dear. I know. You’re all right now. What you managed was … remarkable.” Mom squeezes me, talking over my head. “No matter what happens, you remember that, okay? It was an achievement beyond anything I’ve ever seen.”
Her unexpected words quell my weepy state and I pull back to look at her. “What do you mean?”
As if surprised by the question, she studies me, her blue eyes softening with a light all her own. Protective and warm.
Dad slips his arm around my shoulders so they’re both embracing me.
“What you did out there was second to none.” He lets out another strange little chuckle. “There we were, waiting and watching the screen ‘round the clock—bloodshot eyes desperate for a blip that’d show you entering the vortex from a damaged time tunnel. It was so hopeless and preposterous to believe it could happen.”
“We never stopped believing though, sweetie,” Mom says, tears welling in her eyes now. “Agent Garth told us to close up shop, get some rest—”
“Your mother and I wouldn’t hear of it.” Dad grins, smile lines spreading across his scruffy face.
“Anyone in the mood for sourdough pancakes?” Tristan appears at our sides, groggy-eyed and off-balance. “Hello Buttermans.”
“Tristan, are you okay?” I hold his arm, searching his goofy expression.
He burps as if he’s been drinking. “Sure. Better than okay. I’m in one piece. Just please tell me it’s 2069.”
Mom gives him a little hug. “Yes, and I’m afraid—”
A commotion outside the vessel draws our attention. Clamoring. Voices shouting, flouncing off the exterior.
“People are out there?” I ask.
Dad groans and heads for the time-craft door. “Just the surveillance screen picking up activity outside the Launchpad.”
“The media is still here then,” I say.
Mom flashes me a proud smile. “They’re here because they want to celebrate, announce your success to the world.” She clutches my arm for emphasis. “You’ve made quite a stir—more than any of us ever would’ve expected. Everyone in town has been rooting for you, talking you up on interviews.” She shakes her head. “I can’t say the same for Agent Garth. She’s been an unconscionable killjoy. Once we detected the chute destruction, she suggested to the press that chances were slim and they should conclude their stories. It was all Dad and I could do not to barrel her over with the snow plow.”
Sounds like Garth overstayed her welcome. Good.
“No one would leave or give up though,” Mom adds.
The look on Mom’s face suggests I should feel touched, or proud. Instead, dread burrows down into my stomach to form a pit, heavy and hard. I don’t want to make a thing out of this. Not after glimpsing disaster and death and gut-wrenching fear. The memory of Titanic is too fresh.
“What do they want?” I ask.
Mom flashes me a funny look, as if she doesn’t get my question. “To support you. And celebrate your success. Both of you. People around the world have been watching every minute. Fans have been lighting candles and posting messages of hope—even though the DOT led them to believe it was hopeless.” Mom beams. “They gave Dad and me strength in a way I can’t explain.”
Fans? I have fans now?
“Mom, I don’t feel like celebrating. There was no success. People were dying.”
Her head tilts with what must be clarity washing over her. “You saw more than you should have. Honey, I’m sorry. But you made it back in one piece, with your passenger, and with Essence. That’s a success, even if it doesn’t feel like it right now.”
For a few seconds, I want to curl up and cry in her arms, tell her all the horror I witnessed, the hopelessness I felt at leaving all those people to die. But I brace myself, jutting my chin forward. “Garth can’t be trusted. She set me up. All of it.”
Mom puts a finger to her lips. “She’s still here. You should’ve seen the look on her face when we told her the radar picked up Essence nearing Port Butterman. Wiped that smirk right off of her smarmy little lips.”
My mouth drops open. “Mom. What’s gotten into you?”
She half shrugs. “No one tells me what my daughter can or can’t do.”
A fuss sounds off from the surveillance screen, then grows louder with what must be the bay door opening and closing. I’m not ready to step out of the vessel.
“Is it, uh, safe to go out there?” Tristan asks, his lids still heavy over his glassy eyes.
“I think you should speak to the press and get it over with,” Mom says. “They’re hungry for details. Let them share this accomplishment with you and they’ll be on our side if the DOT decides to crack down.”
Dad pok
es his head in the vessel. “About those details your mother mentioned. How about sharing them with dear old dad first?” He shrugs, smiling faintly. “I’m eager to know how you pulled it off. Time tunnel damage that severe would take months, maybe years to correct itself. If ever.”
“Man, you shoulda seen it,” Tristan raises his hands. “Like something out of a sci-fi film, only, so real it gave me goose bumps.”
Inside now, Dad joins us, eyes wide with interest. “And the 1912 time string?”
“Unaltered, most likely,” I say. “Titanic still went down. We saw all of it.”
I don’t mention the fact Titanic hit the berg sooner than recorded, speeding up the event. That will have to be dealt with and researched later. Quincy’s pocket watch is still in my pocket. Maybe he made it out alive. Maybe the timeline was meant to be altered, so he could survive.
“Once you missed the time window, I had a horrible feeling you didn’t make it off the ship,” Mom says.
Tristan scoffs, but it has a chilling ring. “We almost didn’t.”
Mom and Dad stare at me, eyes full of question.
“It was down to the wire,” I say. “We launched before the window closed, but hit some kind of magnetic storm over the Atlantic, never made it out of the time tunnel. We were here in Alaska all along. Right here.”
“But in 1912,” Tristan says.
“Astonishing.” Dad rubs his chin.
“We almost froze to death,” Tristan adds. “And Bianca was sick … and—”
“Just a bad case of time lag, that’s all,” I’m quick to add. No reason to alarm them with TDS right now.
“Then how did you launch? Travel through the tunnel?” Dad asks. “We saw the damage to the vortex, and it was impaired beyond use.”
I hesitate, wondering if Dad will even believe me. “A Cosmic Shortcut.”
Mom looks to Dad for clarification. Dad just stares at me.
“Bumpiest effin’ ride of my life, but holy shit did she deliver.” Tristan’s voice jumps an octave.
I arch a brow at him.
“An unapproved, never-been-done-before maneuver using teleportation science?” Dad’s still staring at me. “That’s how you accessed the time tunnel?”
All I can do is nod. He knows about T-cube science, but only from what I’ve shared from Evangeline and Evan Butterman.
He lets out a flabbergasted gust of air, begins pacing, though there’s barely room for it.
“What does that mean, Gavin?” Mom asks, following him. “Unapproved?”
He stops, turns to Mom. “She used the T-cube equation to launch the vessel midway into the time tunnel, bypassing the radiation damage. It’s a technique only in theoretical stages—no proof of any success. But then, teleportation hasn’t been invented yet either.” He turns to me. “Bee, you know what this means. And you know how I feel about using borrowed science … It’s dangerous, and unethical, and—”
“The only way she could’ve saved our lives,” Tristan says. “We were doomed to die out there … out here.”
“And what I was going to say,” Dad’s gaze lingers on Tristan’s a few seconds before finding mine, “is that although it’s entirely presumptuous, it’s also in this case, a brilliant solution to saving the time-craft, as well as your own lives.” Dad lays his hands over my shoulders, holding me at arm’s length. “You’ve proven you’re a true time traveler, Bianca, even if we can’t put this one in the books. I’m proud of you.”
A little lump forms in my throat. “Dad, my Induction Day failed. Titanic … it ...”
My voice hitches. It’s still so fresh in my memory—the fear, the loss, the bellows of the ship ripping apart beneath our feet ...
Dad smiles, scuffs the top of my head. “Consider yourself fortunate. You got to see the real event, and since this was just a trial run, you’ll get to see it again. Next time, you’ll know what to do.”
Right. It’s a thought that should fill me with hope. Dad can’t understand that what I experienced isn’t so easily cast aside.
“As far as I’m concerned,” Dad continues, “you’re more than capable. After the time tunnel has had a chance to repair, you can—”
The intercom buzzes from the bay to signify someone wants in. Mom and Dad exchange glances, then step out of the vessel. Tristan and I follow, where we find Garth’s polished image appear on-screen.
“If you’ll allow me in, we can commence with procedures,” she says, although her former phony smile has been replaced with an impatient frown.
For some reason, at the same moment, my body twitches—knees wobbling, head spinning, as if my strength was zapped by Garth’s words.
Tristan grabs my arm. “You okay?”
I massage my temple. “Yeah, just … wow. Guess it’s catching up with me.”
This is the second time I’ve T-cubed. Evangeline warned of the mental issues it can initiate without proper post conditioning, but she had to know there were no means for it in this decade. Still, she didn’t know I’d use it more than once. Or did she? It doesn’t help that I caught a severe case of TDS on top of it all.
“You need to lie down,” Mom says, moving in to prop me up.
I wobble again, this time my eyes falling closed for a moment. My head suddenly weighs a hundred pounds.
Tristan bolsters me upright.
The docking bay’s door slides open and voices grow louder. Two hover-cams zip into the time-craft doorway, but stop there, motionless, their lenses gaping wide-eyed and blank. Mom and Tristan help me out of the vessel, shooing the hover-cams away with their hands.
My stomach stirs, now that I’m outside Essence. Slowly, my gaze lifts from the metal grated floor of the docking bay to the hooded parka dusted in snowflakes standing before me. Gloved hands pull back the fur-lined hood and Garth’s pale face hones in on me.
“Well, then,” she says with a flippant little smirk. “I suppose we should get right down to it.” She pulls out her device and projects the holo-screen. “An investigation is underway. My superiors have agreed to take your statement now and give you a chance to come clean on any violations before the press has an opportunity to obtain details.” She eyes me. “It would be in your best interest. The DOT will consider your cooperation when issuing any citations.”
Mom points a finger at Garth, moves in toward her slowly. “Bianca is safe and sound, thank you so much for your extraordinary concern, Agent Garth.”
Garth freezes a few seconds, maintaining eye contact with Mom, then resumes her on-screen activity. “The DOT is relieved to hear that, Mrs. Butterman, I assure you.”
“Are they?” Mom asks, a slight hiss to her tone. “Because it sounds like you’re more interested in charging her with a violation.”
Garth doesn’t look up. “We have a professional obligation to uphold, Mrs. Butterman. You were aware of that when you agreed to go public with your daughter’s Induction Day. The world is watching, and the DOT has a job to do.”
Dad steps in. “Agent Garth, you’ll have to excuse my wife, she’s been out of sorts for the past twenty-four hours. Surely you can understand that, given the fact we didn’t know whether or not we’d ever see our daughter again.” He forces a little smile, seemingly having switched roles with Mom and assumed her diplomacy. “We’d never ask you to ignore your obligation, we’re asking you to consider the very simple fact that our daughter saved her own life, as well as the life of her passenger. That should count for something.”
“Point taken, Mr. Butterman.” Garth moves around him toward Essence, begins inspecting.
Mom and Dad exchange glances with me. Tristan’s struggling with the zipper of his buffersuit. I give it a tug, tremors pulsing through my brain for a few seconds that I try my best to ignore. I grab onto Tristan’s torso for support til his zipper is all the way down.
“Your time-craft is no longer up to code,” Garth says, squatting next to the rip in the siding. “Quite the damage here.”
“It can be fixed
,” Dad says.
“That’s debatable,” she answers without meeting his gaze. “This material is outdated. You’ll have to upgrade. And at the cost of exterior replacement, you may as well rebuild the entire vessel, which you’ll need a permit for. But we can start the process before I leave. Takes a few weeks time.”
“You’re kidding, right?” Dad looks like someone just told him an offensively dirty joke.
Garth flashes him the most insulting no-chance-in-hell-am-I-kidding expression, her thin brows arched in faux innocence over her dark blue eyes.
“This is an outrage.” Dad’s voice hikes up a pitch, his hand raising. “You know what this is? This is entrapment. Bianca’s right, you set us up, you lowlife, scum-sucking—”
“Ah, what my husband is trying to say …” Mom steps in front of him. “Is that you may have fooled us by getting under our good graces, but we will counter file a claim against you and the entire DOT for unfair treatment.”
“Go ahead.” Garth hardly sounds concerned, now snapping shots of Essence’s damage. “See how far it gets you. The fact remains, if your daughter’s found guilty of a violation, her license will be suspended and a hearing will commence.”
“And the entire world will know how the DOT entrapped my daughter and waited for her to die out in the middle of nowhere,” Dad says. “We’ll make sure every reporter that steps foot on our property knows the whole story.”
Garth stands, closes down her holo-screen. “Have a nice time trying to prove anything. The DOT gave you exactly what you asked for. Bianca failed to make an on-time departure through the time-window. She made an example of herself. I’m sure a new regulation will be set in place. Now, thanks to her, time travel agencies around the world will know what not to do.”
“Oh?” Dad asks. “And what’s that?”
“Make a spectacle of themselves.” Garth twitches her lips to the side.
“No one could’ve prepared any better than Bianca did,” Mom says.
“Mom, it’s okay, don’t waste your time.” I lay a hand on her arm, thankful for the hidden support it gives me. “Garth won’t listen to reason, that much is obvious. This was her goal from the very start. Make friends with us, get me to agree to go public with my Induction Day so they can cite me for something on World News Network and exploit me. She never expected me to succeed. That’s what this was always about.”