by Wyatt Kane
I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. The demon had dealt me a terrible blow. Thankfully, my jacket and the cushions tied to me had softened my landing, but pain still coursed through my ribs.
Get up, you idiot, I said to myself.
At the same time, I tried to focus, tried to slow time again, but the monster was right on top of me. Even blinded, it knew where I was, and for the second time since the time rift had let it through into our world, the horrible scorpion-thing bore down on me.
I gritted my teeth and strove with everything I had to keep its pincers away from my face. Once more, I thought I was done for. I couldn’t see how I could survive, how I could keep the vile creature away. Its strength was monstrous!
For how long I would have continued to struggle, I didn’t know. All I knew was that I was a heartbeat from despair, a heartbeat from giving up hope, when the van door opened up next to my head and April emerged.
Still wrapped in cushions, she wielded the tire iron at the demon and spat curses at the demon. The sight of her screaming like a warrior stepping out of a history book jolted me back to life, and her first attack with that heavy piece of metal did the trick. The demon staggered off me with a screech that hurt my ears.
I sat up, then stood.
The demon lunged. It couldn’t see, but its aim was true. I shoved April roughly out of the way and drove my scissors deep into the monster’s obscene-looking face. It reeled back, screaming and writhing in agony. Maybe my scissors were a better weapon than I’d given them credit for.
Then April was there, bashing it with her tire iron. I had abandoned the scissors in the creature’s flesh, but I slowed time again, focusing my talent on the demon itself, affecting it and nothing more.
If I’d done that to a person, they would have practically stopped. But the bug-demon’s resistance remained true. It slowed, but only a little.
Hopefully, it was enough.
“Cut its head off!” Shell called from inside the van.
“With what?” I yelled. We didn’t have anything with that kind of cutting power.
Before the AI could answer, I spotted one of the dead demon’s claws. It had been wrenched off in the fight. I grabbed it and turned back to the scorpion before it could turn its attention to April.
The claw sliced through the monster’s flesh like a cleaver through jelly. More of the insect’s gross innards splashed over my arms and face. This time, the burning didn’t bother me as I hacked at the demon’s neck.
April saw what I was doing. With a look of fury Bruce Banner might have been proud of, she jumped on top of the demon, straddling it, and drove the tire iron into the other side of its neck, punctuating her strikes with grunts of sheer effort.
The sight of her atop that monster with her hair flying around her face and her hands covered in bug goo was something that would stick with me until the end of time.
I knew right then that I was in love.
Working together, we finally brought the demon down. It fought until the last tendrils of flesh were severed. When the head rolled onto the concrete, I helped April away from it and we sank, exhausted, into the van.
“You okay?” I asked.
“Yes,” she answered, grinning broadly. “You?”
“Never better.”
“Wow,” June said softly. I didn’t know if she was legitimately impressed, or if she was making a sarcastic noise in response to the tenderness she might have seen between April and me. Nor, at that moment, did I care.
“Well, that wasn’t so hard, was it?” the wizard asked.
I sat up. He had reappeared, arms and all, sitting in the cockpit at the front of the van.
IX
My response at seeing the old man was complex. Relief featured heavily because his presence meant we could go home. But there was also a healthy dose of resentment, and if I’d been less shattered by yet another near-death experience, I would have been angry as well.
“I have a few questions,” I said, then decided I was too tired to sit, so I flopped back down on the floor of the Bedford. April was lying down beside me, looking equally spent. We were both covered in bug guts that soaked our cushions, clothes, and hair. Despite the gore—and the stink—I still thought she was the hottest woman I’d ever met.
“I have more than a few fucking questions,” June spat. She was sitting against the van wall with her foot propped up on a cushion. “What the hell is going on, old man? Start explaining. Wait, you know what? I don’t care. Just take us home, now.”
The wizard favored her with his casual grin. “Before we talk about that,” the wizard said, “let’s assess where we started and where we have gone.”
“I don’t see—” June began.
The wizard held up a hand to stop her and nodded to the floating AI. “Shell?”
Shell glowed purple instead of white for a moment, and then holographic screens appeared in the air and filled up with glowing text. April and I hauled ourselves back up once again. As the AI started to speak, I pulled the cushions off my body, and April did the same. Gross, yellow ooze stuck to each of us in strings.
“You have both learned that you are stronger working together than you are apart.”
“What, so all this was just a team-building exercise?” I asked, pausing briefly.
At this, the old wizard uttered a snort of a laugh. “In a way, lad. In a way.”
“The point is that neither of you would be alive if you hadn’t helped each other,” Shell continued.
“It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out,” April said, sounding tired.
“But it does take a genius to assess whether or not the timelines have been straightened out, and I am happy to report that by destroying the minor demons in this area, you have quelled the tide of incursions. For now.”
“For now?” I asked.
“Shell is correct,” the wizard said. “As usual. There are more minor demons out there, and of course, there is the major demon as well.” I hadn’t seen where he’d pulled it from, but somehow he had another bottle of bourbon in his hand. Perhaps it had materialized with him. As he finished speaking, he took a swig any seasoned, practicing alcoholic would have been proud of.
I tossed the last of the ruined cushions outside the van. They made a disgusting pile next to the dead insects. “I could use a drink,” I said.
He held the bottle away from my outstretched hand. “Go find your own damn liquor. Shell, that assessment, if you will.”
“Your ratings,” Shell announced. A holographic screen appeared in front of April, June, and myself.
Despite myself, I was curious, and I could see that April was as well. June, not so much.
It was like a character sheet from a video game. Most of the information displayed was stuff I already knew. Name, Age, Description, etc. It was only near the bottom that things got interesting.
There were categories for Strength (12), Speed (6), Wisdom (8), and Luck (8). I wondered if the speed figure was low due to my leg. In addition, it had a health bar. Happily, mine was still green, and about 90%. I figured all I needed to do was eat a few blocks of cheese or swallow a health potion and I’d be back to 100% in no time.
There was also an item I didn’t understand:
Augmentors: 2 (x1.0 augmentation)
I didn’t know what an Augmentor was, but if I was reading it right, apparently I had two of them. And the figure in brackets—was that some sort of multiplier?
I could have asked, but there was something even more interesting. At the bottom of the holograph, under a heading called Atypical Skill, was this:
Time Bending: 1
“Time Bending?” I murmured out loud.
“Would you prefer to call it something else?” Shell asked.
“No, no,” I said. Time bending was as good a description for my talent as any, I thought. It was just that until then, it had been my secret. “What does the ‘1’ signify?” I asked.
“It is your rating. Powe
r level, if you will, on a scale of one to ten.”
I didn’t find the idea flattering. “And I rate only one? How do I rate only one out of ten?” I asked.
“You fought only one tiny insectoid,” Shell responded. “And you would not have survived if April hadn’t assisted. Given your potential, how could you rate more?”
I didn’t know what she meant by my potential, and didn’t ask. “Two bug demons,” I corrected. “And both at once. That should count for something.”
She didn’t budge. “The ratings are only to help you see what your power is. They are estimates of how much damage you can inflict and endure during battle.”
I looked at my bum leg. “Trust me, I can endure plenty during battle.”
“Ha,” the wizard said. “That’s what you think. But we aren’t talking about guns and bullets here. You should have been able to freeze the demons in their timelines completely, long enough to kill them without worrying about being eaten. But don’t worry, my friend, that skill will come.” His eyes twinkled as he looked from me to the girls.
June rolled her eyes. “Look, this is all wildly entertaining and all, but can we just leave now?”
The wizard shook his head. “Not yet. Not with those other insects out there. We have to stop them. If we don’t, it could trigger the end times,” he said.
It was a sobering thought. I couldn’t help glance at the dead demons outside. Could their actions really lead to the end of the whole universe?
“We didn’t sign up for this,” June said.
The wizard ignored her. “Are you excited, young Caleb?” he asked. “You feel it, don’t you? The ebb and flow of time, the way it moves around everything. This is what you’re meant to do, isn’t it? This whole gig, tracking down time demons and giving them hell. You were born for this.”
“I feel like shit, actually,” I said. I didn’t want the wizard to know how right he was. As he spoke, it was like he was awakening something long hidden within me. I could feel something deep in my psyche resonate with him, something deeper than the universe itself.
It was inexplicable. Was it a sense of destiny, maybe?
What was destiny if not time?
And yet, that wasn’t the only thing going through my mind right at that moment. Remembering what happened during the fight, I turned to April. “How were you able to talk to me out there after I lost my transmitter?”
April blushed. “I … I don’t know for sure.”
The old man snorted. “Liar.”
April shot him a dirty look.
“You do know, don’t you?” I asked.
Instead of answering, she deflected the question. “How were you able to slow down those demons?”
I shrugged, then grinned. “I don’t know for sure.”
“You have something in your teeth,” the wizard pointed out. “Just there. Looks like bug guts.”
I quickly shut my mouth and then spit out the door.
June had been quietly seething throughout the entire conversation, but now she spoke up again. “Why won’t you take us home? In case you hadn’t noticed, I need medical attention!”
The wizard moved out of his cockpit and shuffled over to June’s side, and with one hand still clutching his bottle of bourbon, gently lifted June’s leg. The dark-haired twin looked about ready to deck him. To my surprise, she gasped instead.
“What are you doing?” April asked, moving closer, hovering over her sister protectively. Nor was she the only one. In my mind, the wizard was an untrustworthy old man whose motives were suspect, and I felt surprisingly possessive toward both sisters.
Touching June’s swollen ankle, the wizard began chanting. A faint blue glow emanated from her skin, and the air began to tingle as it did before a storm.
“That tickles,” June said, sounding uncertain.
The wizard stopped chanting and removed his hand. The swelling and bruising had disappeared.
June moved her foot around, testing it. “It doesn’t hurt anymore. What did you do?” The way she said it was almost an accusation.
The old man gave a grunt and took another swig from his bottle. “Localized timeline shift,” he said. “Took your ankle back to a time before it was sprained. It never happened, my dear.”
“Wow,” I said. I was impressed despite myself. At the same time, I was trying very hard not to look at June’s beautiful legs, which had become exposed when her dress slid upward. “How…?” I began.
“It’s just something I picked up over the years. Well, millennia, actually.” The wizard made his way back to the driver’s seat, and June gingerly stood in the back of the van, testing her ankle.
“Millenia? How old are you, then?” I asked.
“Old enough to know that some things don’t need to be told until their time,” the old man said as he settled himself into his cockpit.
I snorted. “Ridiculous.”
“Is it?” His bushy eyebrow shot into the hair flying over his forehead. “You’ve never withheld information because it wasn’t the right timing?”
I scratched my face. Stubble had grown on my chin, and drying bug goo peeled off. “Of course I have. But we just defeated the demons, don’t we deserve to know something?”
“How about a hot shower instead?” the wizard asked.
“As long as it’s in our apartment,” June said.
“Nope, not yet,” the wizard said.
I was getting annoyed. “Look, you can’t just keep us here against our will. That’s called kidnapping where I come from,” I said. “We have lives to get back to.”
The old man looked at me with a remarkably sober expression given the rate he was drinking his bourbon. “Do you really want to go back there? To the Good Times Club, in 2019 or whenever it was? There’s an open rift there, in case you had forgotten, not to mention an enormous time demon. Oh, and let’s not forget Eddie, shall we? The police will be wanting to investigate. That’s if the Feds haven’t already showed up to quarantine the area.”
He made a good point. “I have classes,” I muttered weakly.
“Ah, yes, the pursuit of higher knowledge. A noble calling. Tell me, Caleb, have those classes shed any light on your abilities?”
“You seem to know an awful lot about me,” I noted.
His eyes twinkled mischievously. “You have no idea.” He looked around at the three of us, then nodded. “A hot shower it is. Shall we get to it, then?”
X
As if it was a signal, the various displays Shell was showing faded away. At the same time, the door closed all by itself, and the old man yanked the lever down on the van.
We went hurtling through time once again. It was just as before, with the three of us in the back bouncing around and the old man laughing maniacally in the front. But this time, when we stopped, the world outside looked grey and nebulous.
“Where are we?” April asked.
“We’re going to get some rest, and then I will give you your next mission,” the wizard said, proving once again that he really was very bad at answering questions.
“Are you deaf as well as crazy?” June demanded. “We are not going with you. We’re going home!”
April reached an arm around June’s waist. The move was sisterly, protective, but I couldn’t help remember the way the twins had danced on stage earlier that night. Now that we were out of danger, my mind was drifting to places it shouldn’t go, filled with entertaining possibilities. Yet I wasn’t exactly well-placed to do anything about it. Covering myself in bug juice didn’t strike me as a sure-fire way to win a woman’s heart, after all.
The wizard turned back around. “Look, I need your help. There are things going on that you simply don’t yet understand. Going back to the Good Times Club isn’t really an option, and I’m tired. For much of today, I didn’t exist. So tonight, I’m going to rest. Which means so are you. Okay?”
We didn’t argue, but I would have liked to rest in my own bed, in the privacy of my apartment, where I
could stop my head from spinning. Yet it didn’t seem to be an option.
I sighed out loud. “These cushions aren’t exactly the recipe for a good night’s sleep,” I said.
“And I’m not sleeping anywhere near you,” June shot at the old man.
“Well then,” the wizard said, as casually as ever. “We’ll have to fix that, won’t we?” He looked at the floating AI, which had been largely silent since the old man had returned. “I’m thinking a Greek palace, yes? Complete with columns, soft linens, giant baths, and salty sea air. What do you say?”
“Why not just wish for your own private island?” I joked.
“We can do that,” Shell said. And, incredibly, as soon as she finished speaking, the Bedford began to change.
One minute, we were crammed into the back, sliding around on cushions, the next, the walls pushed outward and the ceiling grew taller. With a thump, the wheels fell off and the van landed on something solid beneath us. The driver’s cockpit became hidden by sheer, luxurious curtains, and everywhere I looked, the van was morphing.
Elegant, Ionian columns sprang from the van’s metal frame, the floors turned to marble, and calming yellow light filled the space.
“I’ll be damned,” I said. It was incredible. Unbelievable. Tardis-level amazing, and then some. Instead of the van, we were now inside what looked like a Greek villa. Or at least, pictures of some I had seen. I had never been in one.
There was only one real room, but what a room. A large bed sat in one corner, draped by more sheer material that hung from the ceiling in cascades. A pool-sized bath steamed in the opposite corner, fed by a fountain at one end. The smell of sand and salt filled the air, and I rushed to the high windows on one side to look out.
Sure enough, a blue sea had replaced the forest. “Is this the Mediterranean?” I asked.
“But we haven’t moved, right?” April asked. She came up beside me, her expression echoing my own astonishment as she closed her eyes and breathed in the sea air.
“Isn’t it romantic?” the wizard asked.