Time's Divide (The Chronos Files Book 3)

  Trey slides his hand forward, and Charlayne stamps it quickly. He pulls it back and says, “Would you mind making Kate’s blue as well?”

  His eyes are troubled, and I know what he’s thinking. A pink lotus tattoo on my hand takes me one step closer to being the girl in the Rio video. But if what they’re claiming is true, this temporary ink will be gone long before I could be either as emaciated as that girl or as pregnant. If she’s me, and I can’t see how she isn’t, this doesn’t change anything. And as much as I don’t want the nasty thing on my hand, Pru has one. If I’m impersonating her, we need to match.

  I give Trey’s knee a reassuring squeeze under the table and wink at Charlayne, like it’s a joke. “No way. I want to be a girly-girl. Gimme the pink.”

  The device barely touches my skin. “That’s it?”

  “Yep. Easy-peasy.”

  I’m not sure that’s the phrase I’d have used, because seeing the pink flower on my hand makes my stomach very uneasy. But it’s a done deal.

  Then Charlayne slides a small white box toward me. “You’ll need these at some point. The color isn’t exactly the same as Prudence’s in the picture I have, but it should be close enough.”

  “Um . . . I’ve never worn contacts. Will they fit?”

  “One size fits all. I had a pair that looked like cat’s eyes for Halloween. They were cool. And they’re not hard to put in, but your eyes feel a little funny at first. You might want to start getting used to them.”

  I’m not looking forward to that at all. I even hate wearing mascara. But I shove them into my pocket.

  The waiter stops by to see if we need refills. He glances at the barely touched cheese fries and asks if they were okay, and we assure him that they’re fine.

  When he moves on to the next table, I move on to the next thing we need to discuss.

  “Has the rest of the Fifth Column been told about Julia?”

  “I haven’t told anyone except Max.” Tilson’s mouth twists downward. “A single word of code to convey that his only surviving family member is dead.”

  Charlayne rests her hand consolingly on Tilson’s shoulder. “You didn’t have a choice. We couldn’t risk him going to Langley. He could be targeted, too.”

  “That brings up another thing we need to talk about. We have to assume that any of you could be targeted. Families, too.”

  “Not an issue for me,” Tilson says. “No kids. No wife. I gave away my cats last month.”

  That seems like overkill at first thought, but then I remember poor Daphne’s limp. Maybe not.

  Bensen squeezes Charlayne’s hand. “We know there’s risk. No one likes it, but . . . my mom knew what I was getting into. So did Charlayne’s. They both cleared out of DC yesterday, along with two of Charlayne’s brothers. They were careful. I think—I hope—this Simon guy will have a tough time finding them.”

  But not Charlayne’s dad or her third brother. I guess that explains her earlier comment. This Singleton family isn’t quite as happy and united as the one I remember.

  Charlayne catches my gaze and holds it for a moment. She seems to mistake my concern for pity, or maybe a lack of faith in their commitment, because her mouth tightens and her dark eyes are defiant. “We all knew this could happen, Kate. Ben and I have kept a packed bag in his van for months, along with . . . supplies. Like I said earlier, we’ve been planning for this a very long time.”

  “Miss Singleton is correct,” Tilson says. “The three of us will find a place to stay. Trey is welcome to join us, and I think we can secure it well enough for you to use it as a jump location. Focus on what you need to accomplish and we’ll—” He stops and nods toward the door. “Max.”

  I look over my shoulder, relieved to see that he’s alone. When he spots us, he crosses over and drops into the empty chair. An annoyed huff when he sees Trey suggests Max considers him an add-on rather than true Fifth Column. But he probably thinks the same about me. Too bad we can’t just step aside and let Max save the day.

  “We were getting concerned,” Tilson says.

  “It took time to deal with Eve. I think . . .” Max’s mouth tightens. “No. I don’t just think. She knew about Julia.”

  “And where is she now?” Tilson asks.

  “I took care of it,” he says. “She won’t be sneaking off to report on us.”

  Charlayne’s eyes widen. “You didn’t . . .”

  “No.” When he realizes we’re not going to settle for a vague answer, he says, “Trunk of my car. That’s what took so long. I had to unload some stuff to fit her in there. I want to find out what she told them, whether she was involved in . . .” For a moment, it looks like he’s going to cry, then he gives his head a shake. “What did I miss?”

  I give him the condensed version, ending with the fire and my conversation with Simon. “He’ll kill them unless I get the keys from CHRONOS before Pru and turn them over to him.”

  Max is quiet for a moment, giving me a long, level stare that’s clearly intended to make me uncomfortable. Then he leans back a bit in his chair and says, “Okay, first. I think you’re lying. What you’ve said doesn’t make sense. Why would Simon need you to get the keys? He could just stop Prudence from making that jump, right? Or go himself. And second, there’s no way I’d let you hand over those keys.”

  I bristle, both at what he says and how he says it. He’s baiting me. While I’d rather take the high ground, Trey tensed up when Max said I was lying, and even more when he got to the last bit. If I don’t defend myself, Trey will feel like he should. So I guess I’ll go on the offensive.

  “Okay, first,” I say, mimicking Max’s snide tone, “I have no intention of giving Simon a damn thing. But I will most definitely play along and make him think I’m willing to trade. That’s not even up for debate.”

  Max’s nostrils flare, but he doesn’t respond, so I go on.

  “And second . . .” I point to my face, drawing an air circle around it. “Unlike Simon, I stand a decent chance of passing for Prudence. She’s the one with the connection who gets her those keys. I don’t even know if Simon has coordinates for that time, unless he wanted to jump into that . . . gaping pit . . . as you were expecting me to do. I now have the Houdini key, which used to be Pru’s key, which means I can avoid that fiasco.”

  He lifts his chin combatively. “Let me guess. You got it all by yourself, without any help at all from Simon’s best buddy.”

  “Yes. I got the key myself, Max.” I put as much conviction as I can muster behind the half truth. Houdini and Bess didn’t turn over the key in Eastbourne, and aside from telling me where I might find Prudence, Kiernan really wasn’t all that much help.

  “So, you’re telling me you’re not in contact with Dunne?”

  Okay . . . that would require an all-out lie. Tilson, Charlayne, and Ben are all watching to see how I’ll answer, and at some point, they’ll know Kiernan is involved.

  “I didn’t say that.”

  Max pounds the heel of his hand against the edge of the table. A fork clatters to the floor and the pepper shaker topples. “I knew it. That kind of stupidity is why Julia’s dead!”

  “Maximilian Waters, lower your voice.” Tilson has silenced several generations of Briar Hill students. He uses that experience to good effect now, casting a meaningful glance first at Max and then around the restaurant.

  He turns to me, continuing in the same tone, “But to be blunt, Miss Keller, Max is right. You weren’t authorized to contact anyone outside of this group. Dunne is a known associate of Saul and his allies—”

  “Everyone at this table is a known associate of the Cyrists! That’s pretty much a prerequisite for working from the inside.” I jerk my head in Max’s direction. “I’m not the one who brought Eve Conwell, someone I know beyond any doubt to be—”

  I bite back what I really want to say, which is that it’s far more likely Max’s association with Eve is what got Julia killed. Playing the blame game won’t bring her back and will make it
even harder to work with Max. And I think everyone gets my point without me saying it.

  “Listen, Max,” I continue in a softer tone. “I’m sorry about what happened to Julia. I wanted to go back and stop it from happening, but Dr. Tilson said—”

  “And he’s right,” Max says. “The rules are clear. But since when have you paid attention to rules?”

  “I didn’t play a part in making those rules, Max. And I know . . . I’m absolutely certain . . . that Kiernan had no role in Julia’s death. Or your father’s. Have you forgotten that he saved your great-grandparents’ lives? He’s as passionate about stopping the Cyrists as anyone here. If we’re going to work together, you’ll have to take my word on that, because I will be working with Kiernan.”

  No one openly objects, so I go on. “Kiernan will be going on the jump with me to CHRONOS. I need backup and—”

  “I’m going, too,” Max says.

  “No. That’s not what Julia wanted.”

  He gives me a scathing look. “You met her twice, Kate. Don’t presume to tell me what Julia wanted.”

  BOGART, GEORGIA

  March 1, 1913, 7:12 p.m.

  Connor and Dad are doing exactly the same thing they were doing last time I checked. If I lived in a logical universe, I guess that would be obvious because I’m looking at the same time and the same location I watched earlier today at the diner—the time when I agreed to jump back in. But since my own personal universe is a far-from-logical place where Simon or Pru or some second-cousin-twice-removed could jump in and change this reality at any moment, the fact that they are still where I left them comes as a huge relief.

  Kiernan’s cabin is a bit on the chilly side tonight, so I tug up the quilt before using the key to check on Trey and Charlayne. They are also when and where I left them—a quarter after five in the evening in one of the hotel rooms Tilson rented just north of Silver Spring. They’ll serve as a temporary base for the Fifth Column, or at least this particular cell, since we can’t assume any of our houses are safe. Trey’s on his phone, probably trying to convince his dad to leave town again.

  Charlayne sits on the bed, cleaning a rifle. That ranks high on the list of things I never, ever expected to see Charlayne doing. Of course, I also never expected to see this lotus tattoo on the back of my right hand, but it’s there. The center is puffy, and it’s starting to itch a little. I don’t know if that’s just the normal reaction to ink and teeny tiny needles or something to do with the vaccination, but I resist the urge to scratch.

  Since I don’t see Max, Ben, and Tilson, I’m guessing they’re hanging out in the other room a few doors down. I didn’t set a stable point there, mostly because I didn’t want to watch Max glowering. He’s angry that I wouldn’t give him the stable point for CHRONOS headquarters before I left, even though I was being totally honest when I told him that I don’t yet know which one it is. Pru has dozens of local points on this key that are active in 2308, and this afternoon, here at Kiernan’s cabin, is the first chance I’ve had to go through them.

  I told Max I’d jump back and give him the coordinates once I pinpoint them. But I’m not sure I will, and I think he knows it. Unless I have a major change of heart, I don’t trust Max enough to want him following me to 2308.

  Each time I think about his arm around Eve, my resolve to exclude Max from this jump strengthens.

  Kiernan is currently combing through the Future-Wiki that the Fifth Column put together. Every few minutes he gives a huff and jots something in his notebook. He’s sitting in the same spot where I saw him with Prudence. It’s not the first time that memory has sneaked into my brain in the past hour.

  And each time I think about Pru on his lap, my resolve to include Kiernan on this jump weakens.

  That’s probably not fair—to either Max or Kiernan—but I have little reason to trust Max. And Kiernan has stretched my trust almost to the breaking point over and over in the past few days.

  I tuck my own CHRONOS key back inside my T-shirt and pick up the other key I’m wearing—Prudence’s key, which hangs from a long silver chain. My eyes are tired and itchy, partly thanks to these stupid contacts, but I need to keep working. I’ve spent the past hour looking through a lot of Pru’s local points, most of which make absolutely no sense. On the whole, my first glimpses of the future have been very anticlimactic. Quite a few of the locations seem to be black holes, and not just at night. They’re perpetual black spaces, like the one at the remains of CHRONOS headquarters, minus the staticky feedback.

  Pru wasn’t exactly diligent about labeling the points she set—not that I can fault her for that, since I’ve never labeled any of the points I’ve set on my own key. Still, I can’t tell why she set any of these locations, and that worries me.

  Because the thing about local points is that they haven’t been tested for stability. I mean, I can set a point at any time and place, but there’s nothing to indicate that it’s going to be a good jump site two years later—or two years before, for that matter. Someone could build a highway through that point tomorrow.

  The locations in the CHRONOS Log of Stable Points all include a range of dates when a specific point is viable. The same is true for the commonly used jump locations that are hardwired into each medallion. But with points that individuals set on their own personal key, it’s basically a crapshoot.

  For every one of Prudence’s local points that’s black, there’s another that’s worthless in terms of stealth. And many more just don’t make sense. A dozen or so are inside the bedroom of an elderly couple, most of them centered on their bed. At least, I’m pretty sure it’s a bed—it’s more like a small, partially enclosed platform that they climb into at night.

  “Kiernan?”

  “Mmm-hmm?” He doesn’t look up from his writing.

  “I need a second opinion. Bring your key.”

  I transfer four of Pru’s stable points to his medallion. And yes, it would be quicker to just hand it to him—I’m still covered by my own key, so there’s no risk. But he might jump away with it. He clearly knows why I won’t let him handle it, just as Max did. Unlike Max, however, Kiernan doesn’t complain.

  “Why would Pru watch that couple?” I ask. “They’re ordinary, other than being really old. The woman has mobility issues when she first gets up, at least until she’s dressed. Otherwise they seem unremarkable. The cat, on the other hand, is bizarre. It does normal cat stuff when they’re awake, but when they crawl into bed, it goes straight to its own bed and . . . I think it shuts down. Sometimes it stays there all day, unless they come back and point at it. Then it gets up and starts being a cat again.”

  “The cat isn’t too surprising,” he says. “They had similar pets when I was stuck in 2152. Although this guy looks a lot more like a cat than the so-called dogs I saw on the street. Never understood people walking the bloody things. The whole purpose was to own a pet they didn’t have to walk, but they’d still take them out and show ’em off, let them sniff each other at the park. But yeah, the old couple—no clue. The number of stable points at their place seems almost . . . voyeuristic?”

  My brain wanders off in search of a logical explanation. I’m about to ask whether they might be Katherine’s parents, or maybe Saul’s, when Kiernan says, “But maybe she wasn’t watching them. Maybe she was watching someone else? Did you scan through the whole period when she was using these locations?”

  “I skimmed the full two-year span, picking random dates. They occupy this apartment the entire time.”

  “Then this could be another change. Come over to the table. Might as well show you now.”

  Something about his tone makes me reluctant to follow, but I do. He slides the notebook across the table, and I see a long list, divided into the same categories as the Future-Wiki. “Someone in the Fifth Column spent a lot of time compiling this information, but a lot of it doesn’t synch up with what I’ve heard or seen.”

  “But you haven’t been to 2308.”

  “No. I have
n’t been to any point past 2152. But you can extrapolate some things about the future from the past. The people in 2308—and I mean the people currently in 2308—had a very different past than what they’ve got recorded here. Different from the one Abel and Delia remember. Or Katherine and Saul, for that matter.”

  Kiernan picks up the tablet and scrolls down to the section for 2100–2220 and the subsection Government. “Like I said, I’ve only seen to the halfway point of that century, but the government they describe here is nothing like the one I experienced. And keep in mind that was before the latest shift and the Culling, so I’d imagine the changes are even more extreme. One government controls the entire continent—North and South America as a whole—by 2308, based on what Pru told me. The mergers start happening around 2050, and there were only a few pockets of resistance by 2152, when I visited. The government gives a few nods to religious freedom, but everyone in power is Cyrist.”

  He paces back over to the table. “And that’s the point whoever put this together is missing. Scroll through and you won’t see a single mention of Cyrists. The war in Africa I told you about—the one where I suspect Saul got the toxin he used at Six Bridges? Still happens, but not the same way. There’s a centralized government for the African continent as well, although it’s showing some signs of strain in the 2150s. Europe and Asia are a bit more fractured. And the environmental issues. Those affect society as well. To name just one, what impact would killing off most of the population have on the sea level? Pru said half the landmarks in DC were partly underwater when she first arrived . . . but who knows if that’s true now, with fewer people and lower emission levels or whatever.”

  The panic engine was already cranking up inside me when he started speaking, and by the time he gets to the end of his future history lesson, it’s roaring full speed. “So the file is garbage?”

  “Pretty much. I’m guessing the stuff about the Objectivist Club is worth a look because of Saul’s bet with Campbell. If that’s really why he’s doing all of this, and Simon seemed certain it is, then Saul would make damned sure Campbell knows he won. But other than that . . .” He sighs, rubbing his temples. “Think about it this way, Kate. Each time there’s been a shift, you’ve noticed small changes, and you don’t even remember the timeline before the Cyrists. Those little changes spread out, and before long, you’ve got a very different history. Very different government. Different cities, different culture, different pretty much everything.”