Time's Mirror: A CHRONOS Files Novella (The CHRONOS Files)

  And then I’m back in the present again, in this version of the present, where Saul has taken my hands in his. “And it’s all because of you. Because you were smart enough to see the wisdom of my plan.”

  Being touched by people I don’t know always bothers me, and I don’t really know Saul yet. But I don’t want to offend him, so I give him a shaky smile.

  “I just…I don’t understand. If this plan was going so well, why did you send Simon to intercept me today? Do you think we can just skip all of the stuff I did…since I already did it?”

  He laughs. “Well, the bad parts, yes. But not the things that were useful, because then you won’t have done them and a lot of stuff will change. The point is, we’ve kept records of each jump you took. We know what worked and what was a waste of time…and sweetie, there was a lot of wasted time. Mistakes that you’d have to go back and undo. Over and over. The last time I saw you, you were older than I am. Older than June, even. It made me sad to think how much of your life you wasted. And then I thought…we have the key. We can expedite everything. Make sure your valuable time is preserved for things that matter. Things that help people.”

  Back in alter-reality, we’ve left the donut place. We’re on a sidewalk now, in the middle of town, flagging down a cab to take us to a train station so we can get to Miami. Something about documents in a safe deposit box. Saul is more relaxed now, friendly almost. Asking questions about Tate and Campbell. He has a nice laugh—

  The Saul back in the real world is looking at me like he’s waiting for something. “That’s what you want, right? To help people?”

  I think about my response for a moment. It’s not that I mind helping people. I generally like it, but something about Saul makes me suspect he puts big-picture problems first. And I have small-picture issues I need to resolve before we start ending wars and saving the environment.

  “Could you help me see Deb? My sister? I need to do that first—”

  I stop, because he almost looks like he’s going to cry.

  Why is he giving me that look? What happened?

  “I just want to get word back to her that I’m alive and…oh my God, she’s okay, isn’t she? I mean, I know she’d be old by now but I’m talking about back then. My time. I just want to know she’s okay, and tell her I’m safe and I’m coming back—”

  “Pru, she’s fine. It’s just, you were so hurt when you saw Deborah. I don’t know if it was Kathy manipulating her or if she was just that angry about…his name was Jim, right? Your stepfather?”

  The word makes me angry. He’s my dad, not my step-anything. But even though I know I’m angry, I can’t quite touch that anger. Like it belongs to someone else. My headache is beginning to calm down, too.

  The medicine, maybe?

  “Deborah blamed you,” Saul says. “And then you tried to go back and stop the accident, but you can’t, because it sets up a conundrum, baby. You went a little crazy for a bit. You wasted five years trying to fix something that just wasn’t fixable, and you spun off dozens of timelines in the process. In one, your interference pushed Kathy over the edge, and she killed herself and your sister. In another, she even went so far as to hire a company that took her order and waited until 2028…then sent a hired killer after the two of us.”

  He rolls up one sleeve and shows me a long scar that runs down his lower arm. “I managed to protect you, and our security guards actually took the guy out, but not before they got one shot in. We were lucky, Pru.”

  Nothing he’s saying makes any sense, and I don’t have the energy to process it. My head is starting to spin. I just want to lie down somewhere and sleep, but he keeps talking.

  “…have gotten things mostly patched up, with Simon’s help, but you can’t open that wound, sweetheart. I really don’t want to hurt you, but you have to hear this. I don’t think you’ll believe me, otherwise. You’ll have to go and see for yourself and this whole cycle will start all over.”

  Saul pulls something out of his pocket. “Simon followed you—for security reasons—the last time you went back to try and talk to your sister. He recorded this.”

  He clicks a button. I hear traffic noise and voices. Then he hands me the device.

  The video is small and it’s a lot blurrier than the images I’ve gotten used to at the OC—not all that different from the grainy home movies Dad used to record on vacations. I guess video technology doesn’t really improve much until after—when are we now? 2030?

  The picture is clear enough, however, that I recognize the corner where we’re standing. It’s a few blocks from the house. My back is to the camera, but the girl I’m talking to is very clearly Deb. She’s wearing the same blouse she was wearing in one of the pictures that I finally got back from the CHRONOS snoops.

  She’s not just angry, she’s angry at me. “…know what that medallion does. Mom says you’re lying, that you could have fixed all of this if you wanted to. You’re just doing what he…”

  A truck passes by at this point and I can’t follow what she’s saying for a few seconds. “…want nothing to do with you! Not unless you find a way to fix what you’ve done. To bring Dad back.”

  I’m talking more softly in the video, trying to calm her down. I can’t make out most of the words. It doesn’t matter, though. Whatever I’m saying just seems to make it worse. At the end she shoves me backward, and hurls a few choice words at me before yelling, “I hate you!” and hurrying away.

  When the video ends, I feel someone’s thumb on my cheek, brushing away a tear. It’s Saul. I didn’t even know I was crying.

  He pulls me into a hug that I’m too numb to resist, and then holds me out at arm’s length so that he can look into my eyes. “This is why I had Simon go back and intercept you, Pru. If we can do all of the things we need to do, just faster, then you’ll have time. Time to patch things up with Deb, and maybe have a life…”

  His mouth is still moving, but the words aren’t registering anymore. I have to sleep.

  Tate was right. I shouldn’t have come.

  THE FARM

  ESTERO, FLORIDA

  April 11, 2030, 12:43 p.m.

  More of the crazy false memories start flooding in when I wake up.

  A hotel suite. In Miami. Pancakes from room service and then Saul goes out to get the documents and money from a safe deposit box at a downtown bank.

  I push those thoughts away. I need to focus on what’s happening here without being dragged there, wherever there is. And that seems a little easier to do than it was yesterday, maybe because I’ve gotten some rest.

  My gut twists when I think about the video Saul showed me. Deb yelling that she hated me.

  I’m not even sure how I got to this bedroom. The last thing I remember thinking is that Tate was right. I shouldn’t have come.

  Oh, crap! What if they took—

  The panic fades away when I reach into my pocket and pull out the CHRONOS key. I haven’t decided yet whether I’m coming back, but I know for certain that I need to discuss all of this with Tate. Maybe even Campbell. Things are just way too weird for me to keep going without someone else’s take on things, someone who has more experience with timelines and time travel than I do.

  The panic comes surging back as soon as I activate the key. This isn’t mine. It’s the medallion Simon gave me yesterday, with the stable point that brought me here to the Farm.

  Except it looks like someone added a few other locations. I pull up one at random and my pulse begins racing even faster. It’s a war zone of some sort. Bodies everywhere. The other locations look eerily similar, except for the last one, which appears to be the front entrance to a hotel.

  A quick pat of my right pocket reveals that the other key, the one Campbell gave me, is definitely missing. So is the masher-basher thing I got from Tate. And I’m pretty certain who took it.

  Suspect number one is sitting at the kitchen table when I storm in. “Ah, Sleeping Beauty awakens at last. Thought I was going to have to come in a
nd kiss you.”

  “Where the hell is my key, Simon?”

  He snorts and pushes his plate away—empty, except for the crusts of the sandwich he was eating. “Well, you seem to be feeling livelier. You want some lunch?”

  “I want my key! Where is Saul?”

  “He’s busy.” Simon taps a button on the wall. “Barb, be a love and bring in another sandwich, some water, and the medicines June prescribed for Sister Prudence.”

  “I’m not taking any more of those pills. I need to talk to Saul.”

  Simon shrugs. “Your choice on the pills, but I told you, Saul’s not here. You’ll be with me today. We have to go on a little field trip and then I’ll get you to the hotel.”

  “What hotel? Is that where Saul is?”

  He rolls his eyes like I’ve asked a dumb question. “Yes. But it’s earlier Saul. The hotel where you would be staying with him now. If I hadn’t diverted you.” I give him a pained look and he adds in a more condescending, singsong voice, “I have to get you back to when Saul first arrived. So the two of you can get started…just more quickly now, since you’ll know what the hell you’re doing. Because you’ll have the List.”

  I can actually hear the caps when he speaks. He apparently thinks I should know what he’s talking about, but I don’t. “What list?”

  “God, Pru. Why did you even bother having that little family chat with Saul if you weren’t going to pay attention? I’m talking about the detailed agenda Saul and I put together with all the things you need to accomplish. Some of them have specific dates, and you’ll need to pay attention to those, especially the ones that are starred. But otherwise, we’ll just get them done in order as quickly as possible.”

  I park myself in one of the dining room chairs. “I’m not going anywhere with you until you give me back my key. Until I see Tate. Let me talk to Saul.”

  Simon sits in the chair opposite me and closes his eyes. His face wears a look that suggests he’s praying for patience. I’m doing the exact same thing, because I really just want to slug his stupid face.

  He leans forward and gives me another of his smiles. “Tell you what. You do everything you’re told to do over the next few days. We’ll get a few things marked off the List, then we’ll talk to Saul about key privileges and jumps to the future. Once you’ve shown—”

  And my patience is all used up.

  I punch him in the mouth, as hard as I can, and take off. I have no idea where I’m going other than out the door I saw at the other end of the hallway.

  My only hope is that swiping Campbell’s key was Simon’s idea, and Saul isn’t in on it. Last night is fuzzy, but Saul seemed nice. I think I can reason with him. Simon? Not so much.

  But the door is locked when I reach the end of the corridor. Through the glass, I can see that the place is a farm of some sort, like Simon told me. There’s another, smaller building just across the courtyard, and what I think are orange trees beyond that.

  I scan the door to see if there’s a deadbolt. No luck. For the first time ever, I really wish we’d taken the jiu jitsu class Deb suggested, instead of pottery. I back up a few feet and run toward the door, turning my shoulder toward it like I’ve seen in the movies, half hoping that the glass shatters and half dreading the possibility that it will.

  It doesn’t yield. And Simon is right behind me now. He’s wiping the blood from his lip with one hand, and pointing Tate’s masher-basher at me with the other.

  “You son of a bitch!”

  “Not the slightest doubt about that,” he says as he pushes the button.

  6

  For the second time in a row, I open my eyes without the slightest idea where I am, when I am, or how I got here. I have a vague memory of being at the Farm after Simon zapped me. He was arguing with an older woman. I didn’t hear the first part, but it had something to do with me, and I think Simon won, because the woman huffed off. A moment later, something pricked my arm and everything went blank.

  I sit up and swing my feet over the side of the bed. Then I hold that position for several minutes, waiting for the dizziness to pass. This wasn’t just the masher-basher. The Rat Bastard drugged me. A quick pat of my pockets reveals that he’s also taken both medallions.

  My stomach rumbles. I have memories of eating donuts and pancakes in that other timeline, but I haven’t eaten anything in this one. And I have absolutely no idea how long it’s been since I left 2306.

  Wherever I am, I seem to be alone. There’s a luggage rack against the wall and a plastic ice bucket on the dresser, so my best guess is a hotel room. It’s dark, with the exception of a thin streak of sunlight that glares in through a gap in the curtains and a very familiar lime-green glow near the dresser. It’s not a CHRONOS key, or I guess I should say it’s not just a CHRONOS key. The device looks a bit like a hand mirror, but there’s an additional handle. The key itself sits in the center, pulsing slightly. Four small green dots are also visible around the room, one attached near the center of each wall.

  I grab for the key, and that’s when I notice the tattoo on the back of my hand. The color isn’t clear in the green light, so I go over to the window and pull back the curtains a bit. Pink. A pink orchid, I think. Or maybe a lotus. The edges look a little puffy. I lick my finger and rub it over the top, but it doesn’t smudge at all. No scent, either, so I don’t think it’s one of those temporary tattoos.

  Even though a pink flower is far from the worst thing you could wake up and find permanently affixed to your body, I feel violated. I didn’t agree to this.

  My efforts to yank the medallion out of the weird holder prove spectacularly unsuccessful, partly because I’m trying to be quiet. The damn thing is locked down…both the device, which is bolted to the dresser, and the medallion itself, which appears to be locked into place. When I slide my finger across the surface, the holographic display pops up as usual. It seems like it’s in a different position, slightly off to the side, rather than directly above the key.

  Even though I can’t see the display well from this angle, it’s obviously not the original medallion that Campbell gave me. This is Simon’s key, and he’s stripped away all but that one stable point—the location with the dead bodies stacked up like kindling.

  I move around so that I can get a better look as I debate my options. I need to find someplace to hide while I figure out how to get back to Tate. The only question is whether I’ll have a better chance of doing that in this hotel room or in that field among the stacks of bodies.

  The door opens. I freeze, expecting Simon, but it’s Saul who pokes his head through.

  “Um…hi. I’m Saul, but I guess you know that. Apparently we’re related?”

  This Saul is younger and his hair is shorter. I’m again reminded of that Rob guy, the actor, and I kind of get why my mother might have been a possessive girlfriend. Which is a truly gross thought to have about someone who is apparently my biological father, but then, in a normal world, he’d be in his forties, like Dad, and way past the hot zone.

  “Do you mind if I come in?” He takes my silence for permission and steps inside, closing the door behind him. “I’m very relieved to see you. I thought I was going crazy.”

  Saul leans back against the dresser. He’s wearing the white button-up shirt with his jeans, instead of that tunic. It’s the same thing he was wearing underneath the burqa in the double memories I kept having.

  “I was halfway down the block from the Edison stable point when I started getting the feeling that everything was…off, you know? Double memories. Were you getting them, too?”

  “Yeah.”

  He tilts his head to the side and looks at me for a moment. “You don’t look much like Kathy. More like my sister. She had the curls, too.”

  I notice the past tense, and the faint note of sadness in his voice, but I don’t ask for more information. Maybe he expects me to ask, maybe he’s even planned some sad story he can tell me about how he lost a sister, too.

  I trust him m
ore than Simon, but that’s not saying much.

  “Where’s Simon?” I ask.

  “Don’t know. He showed up at the door of my hotel room—not this one. A smaller room, downstairs. Told me he had this suite reserved, that he could explain the double memories I was having. So I followed him. Thought he was with CHRONOS, actually, until we got up here and he gave me the diary, with the messages from Tate and Morgen, and also a message from…me. From the future. As for Simon, after he gave me the stuff, he blinked out. Said the less he talked to this version of me, the easier it would be on everyone. Oh, but he said he’d be back later to take you on the…tour?”

  His eyebrows go up like he’s waiting for me to explain.

  “No clue.” Actually, I’m pretty sure it has something to do with the corpse-filled stable point, but I don’t see any need to give him extra information.

  Saul is silent for a moment, just staring at one of the little green dots on the wall. When he finally speaks, he still doesn’t look at me. “I thought I’d be in time to stop her. Stop them, I guess, since it’s pretty clear that Richard Viers is the one who talked her into it. He was always putting ideas in her head. We had a fight just the night before.”