Quantum Entanglement

by Liesel K. Hill

  “Okay, what the hell just happened?”

  Doc dropped his face into his hands.

  Chapter 20: Arachnoid

  WHEN THEY LANDED, MAGGIE staggered but Jonah caught her. The sky was not dark, but there were enough clouds to hide the sun. They were the light, feathery kind, though, and the day remained bright. Yet something felt different about the world. It felt wrong.

  Kristee swayed on her feet and Jonah put a shoulder under arm, allowing her to lean on him. He probably would have carried her to the thicket, except it didn’t exist in this time. Most of the shrubs and other foliage that littered the mountain, ones Maggie had gotten used to seeing in various stages as they leap-frogged through time, were gone. Of the trees, there remained only stumps. Parts of the meadow had been burned and the air smelled acrid. A mixture of urine and sweat and blood; of burnt hair and flesh and a hint of decomposition.

  A tiny black pile to Maggie’s right looked like the corpse of some animal, so bloated she couldn’t identify the species.

  “Where are we?” Lila asked with disgust.

  “Nowhere good,” Jonah answered, voice grim.

  “We should hike farther up the mountain,” Lila said. “We need to find a place to conceal ourselves and try to sleep.”

  They all nodded and started up. Maggie took a few steps before realizing David wasn’t with them. She turned to find him staring out at the valley.

  Walking back to him, she put a hand on his arm. “David? Are you all right?”

  He turned troubled eyes on her. “Yes. Fine. Let’s go.”

  They hiked three hundred yards up the mountain, but still didn’t find any place to hide. Maggie struggled for breath by then. She kept in decent shape but right now felt like she could drop. The others looked the same. The drama of the past few days, combined with a lack of nourishment, had exhausted them.

  Finally Jonah stopped them. “Hey, look at this. Will this work?”

  A row of gigantic boulders jutted out from the slope. Along the back side of them was a deep groove, the size of a World War I trench. It wouldn’t conceal them from anyone coming down the mountain toward them, but Maggie thought they were too high for there to be much danger of that.

  They all sunk gratefully into the trench and Jonah pulled out the bread. They decided he, David, Maggie and Lila would split one loaf. The second would be reserved solely for Kristee. She would eat half now and half when they woke. She needed the most if they wanted her next jump to take them the rest of the way.

  The quarter loaf wasn’t nearly enough to satisfy. Along with the others, Maggie licked the crumbs from her fingers and wished she had some water to wash it down. Or a cheeseburger, if she was wishing for things.

  As the food disappeared, Maggie’s eyes grew heavy. Lila volunteered to keep the first watch. “I don’t feel tired at all. Honestly,” Lila said. “Besides, I’d like to keep an eye on Kristee for a few hours.”

  “As soon as you start to feel tired, wake one of us up,” Jonah said. “Don’t stay awake too long.”

  “I won’t.” Lila gave him a nod and a quick smile.

  One side of the trench sloped naturally. If they sat with their butts at the bottom, the natural reclining position was surprisingly comfortable. Maggie settled down beside Jonah, glad David kept his distance for once, even if only because he was obviously preoccupied.

  Head resting on Jonah’s shoulder, Maggie fell asleep.

  She slept deeply. Images of filthy encampments, screaming women, and strangers in glass rooms ran through her head. They were fleeting, and not nearly as vivid as the dream she’d had before. Then her dreams became more solid.

  She lay in the trench behind the boulders, only she was alone. Jonah no longer lay beside her. She heard something. Something strange. Something far away. Tiny voices. Lots of them. Like choir music coming out of ear buds that were not in your ears: tinny, faint, fleeting, but still audible. Yet, it didn’t sound harmonic. Every member of the choir sang something different, all at the same time. The cacophony was distracting. Her head throbbed and lightning flashed overhead, followed by the deep, sonorous peals of thunder.

  Maggie kicked awake as the thunder rolled. The sky had darkened considerably, and the wind had picked up, though the trench blocked most of it. The thunder grumbled again, a one-thousand-times-magnification of the sound her stomach made. She’d already burned through the bread calories and now her stomach complained more loudly than before.

  Great, she thought. Getting rained on was exactly what they needed. Maggie wondered how long it would be before Kristee grew well enough to get them back. Interchron would have hot food, hot water, and soft beds. From what David and Lila told her, it probably wouldn’t have Marcus. She longed to see him, and wished he would be there when she finally arrived. He and Karl ran off to kill Colin. Her stomach twisted with worry at the thought.

  Jonah stirred when the thunder sounded, but didn’t wake. On her other side, Lila slept deeply. Kristee lay unconscious beside her, so David must be on watch, now. Maggie wondered how long she’d been sleeping.

  She couldn’t see David, so she cast her mind out and located him easily. He sat not twenty feet from her, atop the bolder that loomed over the trench. He’d positioned himself on the other side of it, though, where she couldn’t see him.

  Deciding the thunder wasn’t going to let her sleep again anytime soon, Maggie crawled out of the trench. Maybe from where David was, she could determine whether or not this storm would actually hit them.

  David sat in a groove of the rock, feet flat against its face, knees pointed toward the sky and forearms slung lazily around them. He turned his head as she scrambled up to him, but gave her no other acknowledgement. She scooted up beside him, adopting the same pose and looking out over the valley. The view would have been stunning if the world in this time hadn’t looked like such a wasteland.

  “You should be sleeping,” he said.

  “I was. The thunder woke me.”

  He didn’t answer. She wanted to ask him what was wrong, but figured if he wanted her to know, he’d tell her, so they sat in silence for a time.

  “I can feel them, you know.”

  Maggie glanced sideways at him. “What?”

  “The collectives. They’re just beginning to coalesce in this time. I can feel people joining them, making the links.”

  “That may actually be good news for us,” Maggie said. “We’re close to our destination—probably within fifty years.”

  David stared across the valley. Maggie studied him. For once, he was too preoccupied to return her gaze.

  “Do they call to you, David? The collectives, I mean.”

  He turned his gaze on her, amber, color-flecked eyes searching her face. “Yes.”

  Maggie looked away. It wasn’t exactly the answer she’d wanted. “You can’t...go to them, or anything.”

  “I won’t. But they do call.” He turned his eyes back to the valley.

  “David, how did you know about forcing memories? I didn’t know such a thing was possible until Kristee brought it up.”

  David’s eyes dropped to study his knees. “The collectives...use that technique sometimes.”

  Maggie raised an eyebrow. “Use how?”

  “They can force a memory, but color it so the owner remembers it differently. It makes them more docile toward collective living.”

  Maggie frowned. “How long has that been going on?”

  “Years. Since before I went in.”

  “You said only recently they started doing immoral things, which is why you left. How were you okay with that all those years?”

  He turned his head to look at her, mild surprise written across his features. “It wasn’t always a bad thing. I’ve seen people ask the collective to color a memory for them.”

  Maggie recoiled. “Why?”

  “Many of them have bad memories from before they came to live in the collective. Some of them were sad about things they’d left behind. They
asked the collectives to color the memories for them, so it would be easier.”

  Maggie turned to stare out at the valley. “They ran from their pain.”

  “They tried to Heal themselves,” he said quietly.

  Maggie turned to him again. “You can’t Heal away the memories that make you you, David. That’s giving up your identity. You have to absorb them. Learn from them.”

  “You lost your memories. Your identity didn’t go with them.”

  “My memories were torn away from me,” she objected. “I didn’t decide they weren’t worth keeping.”

  “I thought you purposely dumped your memories.”

  “No.” Maggie was being defensive, but she didn’t care. “The Remembrancer said they were dangerous. I had to dump them. I must have done it to protect people.”

  “Just as these people protected themselves and other members of the collective from harmful memories. How is that so different from what you did?”

  Maggie sighed. She steepled her fingers and rested her forehead against them. She supposed she couldn’t argue with his logic. “I don’t know,” she finally sighed. “We don’t have all the pieces of this puzzle, David. I don’t know why I would have done that. The possible motivations behind it...haunt my dreams.”

  She sensed David staring at her, but couldn’t meet his gaze. He placed a warm hand on her shoulder, and she shut her eyes, a tear leaking from the corner of one.

  She shrugged his hand off her shoulder and wiped the tear from her eye, deciding to change the subject. “What did you and Jonah see in the valley? You both came back looking...disturbed.”

  He gazed at her for a time before turning his eyes back toward the valley. “What we saw was disturbing. More than disturbing. I don’t think you want to hear about it, Maggie.”

  “I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t.”

  He glanced sideways at her and she thought he’d refuse to tell her. “The encampment we went into was filthy. The people lived in make-shift shacks. Sometimes they weren’t much more than mud huts. Everything was desperate and destitute. They disposed of their elderly in violent ways. We watched a man—one of the leaders, we think—cut an old woman’s throat. Her daughter had been hiding her.”

  Maggie’s mouth dropped open. She couldn’t make it close, or make her eyes less wide, but David wasn’t looking at her.

  “And there were two teenagers. At first I thought they were talking about sex, but they were talking about linking their minds, like the collectives do. It must have been a new thing, at that time. Like a fad. Now, in this time, it’s rising and—Maggie what’s wrong?”

  He’d glanced over at her mid-sentence, his expression changing from grimness to alarm.

  Maggie swallowed, but couldn’t find the words to explain. She’d seen and heard everything he’d described. It had only been a dream, hadn’t it? She’d dreamed she’d hiked into the valley with Jonah, which meant, if it were real, she’d seen it from David’s perspective. How was that possible?

  David turned more fully to face her and took her hands. “Maggie, what is it? Tell me what’s wrong.” When she still couldn’t find the words, he dropped his gaze to the rock beneath them. “I’m sorry. I told you what we saw was disturbing. I shouldn’t have—”

  “It’s not that, David,” Maggie cut him off, surprised how confidently her voice sounded. She’d been sure it would come out in a squeak.

  He arched an eyebrow. “Then what?”

  Maggie wanted to explain, but how could she explain something she didn’t understand herself? “The man you spoke of,” she said softly. “The one who cut the woman’s throat?”

  David nodded, worried eyes searching her face.

  “Did they call him Chain Eyes?”

  David froze, though his eyes widened ever so slightly. It was answer enough.

  Maggie turned away from him, facing forward again. She rubbed her forehead, wondering what it all meant.

  “Maggie,” David said quietly. “How did you know that?”

  Maggie swallowed the lump in her throat, but it wouldn’t budge. It occurred to her for the first time that she would have to explain. She made herself look at David.

  “I saw it. I dreamed it when you and Jonah went into the valley. I dreamed I went with Jonah. Only, I was...too tall—”

  She sensed it right before it hit: a hot, static feeling crackling in the air around her. She’d only felt the sensation twice before: once in the alley when Justine attacked them, and again when she’d shown up at Kadin’s cabin. Her mind making connections faster than she could have put them into words, Maggie sucked Constructive energy toward her and threw up a shield.

  It worked, but only to deflect the Offensive energy. It hit the rock two feet below where they sat, and the force of the explosion threw them both backward. David skidded upward but, digging his fingers into the hard surface of the boulder. He caught himself at the apex, teetering at the precipice of the drop-off.

  The explosion drove Maggie up the surface of the rock as well, but she weighed less than David did. She grabbed at his arm as the boulder fell away beneath her. He caught her hand, but Maggie flipped backward and the downward momentum of her fall nearly pulled them both over the side. From there they would have dropped fourteen feet into the trench and landed on top of Kristee.

  David lay on his stomach, holding onto Maggie with one hand.

  Where had the energy come from? She hadn’t felt anyone converging on them. One moment the five of them were the only ones on the mountain, and the next...It could only mean one thing: someone Traveled here, lashing out with Offensive energy the instant their feet hit the ground.

  David strained, brow furrowed in concentration and sweat beading his forehead. Another blast of energy came toward them. Maggie deflected again, but they came so fast, she couldn’t deflect them fast enough to keep them from doing damage. The boulder exploded two feet to David’s right, spraying them with stinging, rocky pellets. Slowly, he got his knees under him and pulled himself into a kneeling position, dragging Maggie with him. When she came high enough, he wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her the rest of the way up. She wrapped her free arm around his neck and clung to him, allowing him to pull her into his lap. He pointed her feet to the side and pushed her down the sloping face of the boulder.

  “That way! Go!”

  She obeyed and he slid down behind her as more explosions rocked the boulder. Between the explosions of energy and their little death-defying adventure, Jonah, Lila, and Kristee were awake by the time Maggie tried to jump back into the trench. Kristee stopped her. “No, stay there. We’re coming out.”

  “Why?”

  “If I’m going to Travel, I need level ground. It’s too sloped down here.”

  “Karl never needs that,” Lila said frowning.

  Kristee glared at her. “Well, excuse me. I guess every Traveler is different.”

  More energy torpedoed toward them, but Maggie was ready this time. She threw a shield up around them and the energy bounced off, warping the look of the landscape as it hit.

  “Who’s doing that?” Jonah shouted.

  “It’s Justine,” Maggie answered. “She’s found us.”

  As if speaking her name was a summons, Justine appeared fifty yards higher up the mountain. The whites of her eyes shone brightly out of her black face, making her look demonic. She flicked her tongue out and hurled energy toward them. But it wasn’t only Justine. Smaller balls of energy came from every direction, from sources Maggie couldn’t identify. All of them bounced off the shield. The sooner they Traveled, the better.

  Lila climbed out of the trench last. Jonah pulled her up.

  “Come on,” David said. “Let’s go.”

  A ball of energy came through the shield and slammed into the boulder behind them. Exploding bits of rock burst outward, hitting them all on the back of their arms, legs, and torsos. Maggie cried out as her knees hit the ground. The others reacted much the same way. Tiny streams of bl
ood crawled lazily from where jagged shrapnel stuck out at odd angles from their bodies.

  Maggie turned to stare at what was now a black chasm in the boulder with disbelief.

  She glanced over to find David staring at her in alarm. “What happened to your shield?” he asked.

  Another ball of energy came through the shield, hitting higher up and spraying them with boulder-gravel. This time they all ducked, covering their heads. “It must be like before,” she shouted at him. “Justine is close and my abilities are failing.”

  “Kristee? Kristee, are you okay?” Lila shouted.

  “Oh no,” Maggie murmured. If Kristee couldn’t Travel they were doomed. “What’s wrong, Lila?”

  “She got hit in the head with a chunk of rock.”

  David cursed loudly. “Can she still Travel?”

  Another ball of energy struck the boulder directly in front of Maggie. Jonah grabbed a handful of her shirt and yanked her back, saving her face and neck from the worst of it. Still, dozens of tiny sharp rocks stuck to her chest, stomach and arms, each stinging like tiny whips.

  “Kristee, we have to go.” David hauled Kristee to her feet, but she didn’t look like she could hear him. “Kristee? We have to go now!”

  Lila slapped Kristee across the face. “Kristee look at me. Listen to my voice. We need you to get us out of here. Can you Travel?”

  Maggie’s eyes were on Justine, so she couldn’t see Kristee’s reaction.

  “Good,” Lila said grimly. “Let’s go.”

  They clustered around Kristee, and Maggie prayed the girl would be able to Travel. Twenty feet away, Justine gathered a massive amount of energy, shoveling it together like a giant snowball to be lobbed at them. Maggie turned her head as they all got into position around Kristee.

  The ball of energy grew more gargantuan every second. Maggie had never felt anything like it, even in the memories she’d recovered. Like a gyre, it sucked vast quantities of energy and matter into it. They swirled like debris in a cyclone. And there was something...crawly about it Maggie couldn’t put her finger on. She didn’t know how Justine had constructed the gyre, but one thing was certain: they couldn’t be hit by it.