“I hope so, too,” she whispered into his hair.
Chapter nine
Varya’s car lurched forward as it prepared to swing into the kerb in front of Daniel’s school finally, after waiting nearly fifteen minutes in a queue that backed up all the way to the end of the narrow street. Traffic was stopped up at the main road thanks to worried parents all insisting on dropping their kids right at the school gate.
The music on the car radio faded as they pulled to a stop. The announcer calmly informed them that, “Police still have no leads in the case of the disappearance of nine-year-old Ben Williams. Relatives and friends have all been questioned but evidence is pointing towards an abduction. A spokesperson for Rest Time Corps has dismissed rumours that the time thieves may be active again and has asked for patience from the public in what they’re calling an ‘isolated incident.’ A search of the bushland surrounding his house commenced at sunrise today, with dozens of volunteers...”
Varya pushed a button to silence the woman’s voice. She scanned the road before unlocking the car doors and nodding to Daniel. Daniel didn’t move. He sat, gazing out the window, both hands on the schoolbag at his feet. A car horn sounded behind them.
“Hey, Dan. Come on, kid. Time to go,” she said gently.
Daniel took an enormously long breath in and blew it slowly and noisily out of his flared nostrils. He nodded. Without looking at Varya he pushed the car door so hard it swung out and bounced back slightly.
“Sorry,” he mumbled, eyes still cast to the floor.
“It’s okay.”
But it wasn’t okay, thought Varya, as she watched him walk through the school gate to safety, before driving away. Ben Williams was out there somewhere. With someone. They were all just stumbling about in the fog, trying to make sense of this new world until everything returned to normal.
If, she chastised herself. If everything returned to normal.
“Send message to Zoe. Daniel safe at school. End message.” She spoke clearly and confidently to her car.
“Message sent,” it replied serenely.
Varya had a sudden urge to swing the car around, call to Daniel and tell him to get back in, and to drive as fast and as far away as possible. But when she looked in the rear-view mirror another car had already taken her place.
Varya swallowed her foreboding and joined the stream of vehicles heading away from the school and towards workplaces. She needed to focus on finding cures, to keep other children safe. Potential kidnappers were not the only threat to a child’s safety. And besides, she admitted to herself, she found it was far easier to think of many, faceless, needy children than one familiar, vulnerable child.
Chapter ten
Zoe
Ben Williams walked into Gillard Memorial Hospital at 9.43 a.m. that same day. News items would later describe how his mother walked by his side, her hand at his back, her face pale. His father walked behind him, bringing up the rear, as though he could shut the gate after the horse had bolted. Ben walked like a robot, almost gliding along the floor.
Dr Zoe Parker would tell reporters that she didn’t see them come in, but she heard the commotion outside. She’d been doing her rounds, checking up on Annie, a six-year-old girl suffering from a rare form of brain cancer. She always left Annie until last. A year ago, the diagnosis would have been terminal. Zoe would have been prescribing anti-seizure drugs and pain relief. Palliative care only. Rare forms of cancer didn’t warrant research investment from the government.
Annie was lucky, Zoe would tell the journalist who later wrote a twelve-hundred-word feature article on the incident. The Minor Miracles Foundation facility had been working on a cure for years. And they’d found one, just in time for Annie to receive it.
Zoe had smiled at the young girl just before Ben walked down that corridor, the article would begin: “Another week and we’ll have to send you home, Annie.”
Annie’s mother had beamed. “Really?”
Dr Parker heard a muffled roar of noise from the corridor. She left Annie’s room in time to see the ward doors burst open and Ben Williams appear, flanked by his parents and a team of medical staff.
“I recognised him from the news articles. He goes to my son’s school, but I’d never met him,” said Dr Parker.
Mrs Williams howled in grief as the doors swung closed behind them, muffling the noise of the media, shutting out the bright lights of their cameras.
A colleague of Dr Parker’s pushed them forward gently.
“We need to get him to the scanner, to check his date,” Dr Martin told her.
A hush fell over the group then, Dr Parker remembers. That was the point at which she believed the authorities shed the pretence that they thought the abduction had no connection to the horrific time thefts the country endured a decade ago.
Dr Martin opened the door to the treatment room and ushered Ben and his parents in, closing the door to allow them some privacy. Dr Parker described the procedure:
“Dr Martin would have taken the scanner out from its cupboard and plugged it in to charge it a little. It’s so rarely used these days, since... He would have asked Ben to sit sideways on the chair, to present the back of his neck to him. There would have been a soft beep as he held the scanner above Ben’s Rest Time Chip.”
Dr Parker confirmed she had not heard the beep from outside the room, but everyone standing in the corridor that day heard Ms William’s cry of anguish as Dr Martin explained to her that her son would be dead before nightfall.
With tears streaming down her face, Dr Parker described how her own legs buckled temporarily. She then ran down three flights of stairs to the car park, found her car, and drove to her son’s school. She needed to feel her arms around him, to keep him safe.
Chapter eleven
Varya
Varya went back to her own apartment after leaving Daniel at school that morning. She’d rescheduled her meeting with Marisa but there were time tab orders that needed to be filled.
When Zoe’s call came through, she was sitting on the sofa in her living room, staring at a picture of her own son and mother, while Marisa counted the packages in the kitchen. In the photograph, her mother was smiling; Kir was pouting. He was so adorable when he sulked. It never lasted long. How could she help keep someone else’s child safe when she’d failed her own child so badly?
Zoe’s name flashed on the screen. She picked it up immediately. “Zoe? Is Daniel okay?”
“Yes, he’s fine,” came Zoe’s voice. “I mean, I think he’s fine. I haven’t heard anything. Why, have you heard something?”
“No, I haven’t. Where are you? Has something happened?” Varya recognised the note of anxiety in her friend’s voice.
“I… I’m outside Daniel’s school. I just… I had to be near him.”
Varya pictured Zoe sitting at the school’s front gate in her car, just as she had earlier that morning. Beyond the wire fence was a strip of green, a concrete path and a flat-roofed building, its walls still stained orange. A fashionable colour for 1976.
Varya heard Zoe tap her fingers frenetically on the steering wheel. She felt the strong urge along with her, while she also tried to resist it: the desperate need to leap out of the car and bang on the classroom windows, shouting for her son. She picked up the photograph of Kir and her mother and placed it on her lap.
“Zo’?” Varya prompted.
“It’s Ben Williams. They found him.” Zoe sniffed and her breath came in irregular gasps. “I saw him at the hospital, he came in this morning. He looked fine, not hurt, but… Varya, they scanned his date.”
Varya swallowed and pinched the edge of the photo frame, feeling the sting from the rough metal against her skin, trying to anchor herself to the present. She felt like she might just float away, her head was spinning.
“It didn’t sound good,” Zoe blurted out, before she started sobbing.
“I’m so sorry. Oh, Zoe, I’m so sorry.” It wasn’t her fault, she knew it wasn’t her fau
lt, not really. But she felt so responsible. Her hand shook as she replaced Kir’s photo on the side table, not trusting her trembling hands to hold it. She stood and began to walk, as though forward motion could somehow help.
“It’s happening again, Varya, it’s time thieves, it must be. I don’t know what to do. How can I keep Daniel safe?”
Varya wanted to tell her to run into the school and hold onto Daniel and never let him out of her sight. But it made no sense to pull him out of school now. Enmeshed in the day-to-day routines, he probably wasn’t even thinking of his absent friend. They should leave him there to enjoy the bliss of ignorance for a few more hours.
“Just keep doing what you’re doing,” she told Zoe instead. “Make sure you’re there to pick him up. Let me know if you need me to step in.”
“Can’t you do something, though? For Ben, even? You know about these things. You know, from before, from last time. You can help.” It was an accusation disguised as a plea.
Varya stopped walking and sat down heavily on a kitchen chair, opposite Marisa. She dug her fingers into the thin seat cushion and felt her jaw clench.
“Zoe, I…”
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything. It’s just… I’m sorry. I have to go.”
The call ended abruptly. Varya put the phone on the table and laid both her hands over it. She stared across her kitchen into nothingness. Eventually her eyes focused on the small black box perched on a high shelf. Her body shook involuntarily for a moment.
Chapter twelve
Marisa
Marisa looked at her expectantly, having heard the one-sided conversation and drawn her own conclusions. Varya met her gaze and shook her head.
“I need to get back to work,” was all she said.
Marisa knew Varya would be thinking that maybe if she immersed herself in the research this would all blow over soon. It was how her employer and friend operated. Work herself into the ground until the problem had magically been resolved. Marisa had to grant that it had worked well so far for most of Varya’s problems—as long as those problems were related to finding treatments for illnesses for which research had previously been underfunded.
Marisa forced herself to breathe evenly. She would need to tread lightly if she were to persuade Varya to get involved in something her instincts were telling her to run from.
“They found the kid? Ben Williams?” she started.
“Yes.”
“Bad news, huh?”
“Looks that way, yes.” Varya looked down at the packages scattered on the table in front of Marisa. “That’s all of them for tonight’s drop, yes?”
Marisa shuffled a couple around and nodded.
“Okay. Then we’re done here.” Varya stood up. Marisa didn’t.
It infuriated Marisa that she even had to bring this up. She was quite sure that Varya would have thought of it herself already but dismissed it as too risky. Varya was very good at doing what was necessary for herself and her family. But when it came to helping others, she could be extremely reticent. Marisa shrugged off her indignation. She couldn’t fault her for looking out for her family first. It was just human instinct. And the Minor Miracles Foundation had helped dozens of people and their families, which seemed to suit Varya just fine, as long as she didn’t have to actually meet any of them.
“The kid, the one that was taken,” said Marisa. “He’s a friend of your friend’s kid, right?”
“Sort of. They’re in the same class. I don’t think they’re close though.”
“You could help him, then. If you think they’d stay quiet.”
“Help him?” Varya bristled. “I can’t tamper with Rest Time Chips. Nobody can.”
Marisa snorted. “Well, clearly somebody’s figured out how to. Least you could do is give the kid a few time tabs on the house. Just ‘til one of the good guys figures out how to tamper his Chip back for him.”
Varya leaned over and began putting the packages back into the waiting box.
“Not much point in delaying the inevitable if he’s only got a short time left,” she said, her tone dull.
Marisa bit her tongue. If this were a time thief copycat, a few days would be the most that Ben Williams could hope to have with his family. She may not have a PhD but the mere fact that the kid’s family had time to bring him to the hospital and scan his Chip suggested these new thieves were either more compassionate or less accurate in judgement.
“Not sure his family would agree with you there.” Marisa took the box that Varya held out. “I’m just saying, it seems like the kind of thing we could help with.”
“We sell a product to fundraise for a medical research facility. We don’t get involved in police matters,” said Varya flatly.
Marisa held up her free hand. “Alright, alright. I’m just saying.”
“Save your talking for our clients.”
“Yes, boss.” Her tone held a little more sarcasm than she’d intended.
Varya stood, bent forward, hands pressed into the edge of the table, eyes gazing into the mid-distance. She frowned.
“I guess I’ll see myself out then,” muttered Marisa. She should have known better than to get involved. Maybe it was just a one-off abduction. Just one kid. But she knew from hard experience that if that ‘just one kid’ happened to be your one kid, the relative global scale of the catastrophe bore little weight on the cataclysmic effect it had on your life. She blinked rapidly and stood.
“What? Yes. Thanks.” Varya picked up the empty coffee mugs from the table and turned toward the sink, her mind elsewhere.
Marisa took her cue and left.
Chapter thirteen
“Fifteen. I ordered fifteen four-hour strips. There are only ten in here.”
Marisa frowned as she peered into the matchbox and shuffled the time tabs around.
“Ah, sorry.” She delved back into her bag and pulled out another small box. She opened it and tipped the contents onto her palm. One tab escaped and fluttered onto the side table, coming to rest next to her coffee cup.
“Careful with that.” The large woman in the bed harrumphed and pushed ruby-rimmed glasses up her nose with a swollen-knuckled finger. “Don’t want it contaminated with your hideous poison.”
Marisa glanced down at her cooling coffee and raised a questioning eyebrow. “Whole lot more natural than dosing yourself with time-altering chemicals,” she muttered.
“What? Speak up, girl, I can’t hear you.”
Marisa slid the matchbox closed. “Fifteen now, all there.” She held out the correct tally and presented an empty palm for payment. The woman obediently placed her defective box into Marisa’s palm and snatched the new one, holding it to her chest and closing her eyes. She began to hum. Marisa cleared her throat. The woman hummed more loudly.
“Mrs Denisovitch?”
The woman cracked her eyelids open wide enough to be able to narrow them at Marisa.
“Really know how to spoil a moment, don’t you, girl?”
Marisa shrugged and waggled her screen at Mrs Denisovitch, head cocked slightly. It had been several decades since she could reasonably be described as a ‘girl’ and she was taking none of this woman’s sass now. Truth be told, Mrs Denisovitch was barely more than fifteen years her senior.
The woman sighed and sat up a little straighter, reaching around the pillows for her own screen. Never letting go of the matchbox, she placed her palm on the screen and then tapped it a few times before dumping it back on the side table.
“There. Done. Now leave me in peace to be able to enjoy my few extra hours of glorious music before they take me out of this hell-hole and put me to rest permanently.”
Marisa refreshed her screen to confirm the payment had been received. ‘Donation to med resrch’, it read. She put her screen in her coat pocket and picked up her coffee cup. Mrs Denisovitch might want her gone quickly, but she wasn’t about to pass up the opportunity to finish her free liquid gold. Besides, this was the one place she
could safely conduct business all day without having to worry about being questioned. Palliative care for the wealthy. Ironic, really, that euthanasia was still illegal in most countries, but once you hit the magic sixty-five-year mark you’d be put out of your misery, whether you liked it or not. Marisa’s clients in palliative care used the tabs as soon as their next round of pain relief kicked in, to extend the agony-free hours they had remaining. Marisa drained her cup and placed it back on the saucer. She straightened her badge—‘Volunteer’—and stood up.
Mrs Denisovitch opened both eyes and pushed herself up off the pillows.
“That kiddie that got snatched. Your lot have anything to do with that?”
“What kid?” Marisa feigned ignorance, picking at her nail, and wondering whether her own knuckles would start to swell with arthritis soon. A warm climate to retire to, that’s what she needed. Sometimes when she looked at the pamphlets, she could just about the feel the warm rays beating out of them.
“Good grief girl, don’t you pay attention to the world around you?”
She shrugged. “Not if I can help it.”
“Got snatched outside school a couple days ago. Dropped back today. Expired just a few minutes ago. Just like all those other kids, all those years ago.” Mrs Denisovitch looked Marisa up and down and sneered. “Not that you’d remember. You can’t be more than, what, twelve?”
“Forty-seven, actually, but thanks.” Marisa shuddered, remembering. Varya had been right, then. That poor kid hadn’t stood a chance.
“So, it wasn’t your lot, then.”
Marisa gave a small smile. She wondered if Mrs Denisovitch lay awake imagining a whole network of time-giving angels wandering around the country selling time tabs to the dying wealthy. She didn’t realise just how lucky she was to live within a five-mile radius of one of the few remaining time engineers.
Stealing Time Page 5