by Hunter Blain
“It’s…it’s antimatter,” I babbled.
Jose processed what I had said, shifting his gaze between me and the ball which might as well have been pure, exposed plutonium.
Still in disbelief, I mumbled, “That…that’s why he told us to use it inside the In-Between.”
“I thought antimatter was sci-fi bullshit,” Jose said, taking another step back. “Isn’t that stuff dangerous?”
“What choice do we have,” I replied in a low voice as a statement of both defeat and acceptance.
Taking a deep breath, I steeled my nerves and exhaled while saying, “I don’t know how Elon gets his rockets to fly…but I know they work.” Holding up the sphere that Gabriel had helped me build using Baleius’s memories, I finished with, “I trust this thing to work.”
“Then why did the angel make us use it in here?” Jose questioned, gesturing all around the frozen world, his voice echoing as his volume increased with uncertainty.
“Same reason you wear your seat belt,” I answered, my tone resembling harsh ice in the dead of winter; cold and uncaring.
Jose looked at me for a moment as he processed what I had said, then let his gaze slide back to the sphere in my hands that might as well have been a bomb.
“We’ve already come this far,” I said with a shrug that was born from a lack of options rather than an indifference to the severity of the situation.
Pulling the Time Sphere close to my chest once again, I did a downward nod to Jose, indicating for him to take his position. Hesitantly, he moved about a foot away from me. I could hear his heart pounding in his chest. It was odd that I couldn’t hear the usual heavy breathing that went along with a speeding heart, until I realized the man standing before me was controlling it. It was impressive.
“How far do you think we should go?” I asked, my hands almost going numb from the signal pulsing from my brain demanding that not even the tip of a finger had better move until we were ready.
“Maybe a year at a time?” Jose suggested.
“That’s kinda what I was thinking,” I consented. “If we jumped, like, ten years ahead when he was only one day away…”
“That would be a long, long time for him to wait,” Jose finished my thought before his eyes went unfocused.
“What?”
“What if he’s in the future?”
“I doubt it.”
“Why?”
Taking in a deep breath, I considered telling Jose about the upcoming apocalypse, but decided against it.
“Just a hunch.”
Jose seemed to study my face and dissect my answer. After a few seconds, I could see his expressions relax as he made the decision to let it go. For how long, would be the question.
Intensely focusing on my movements, I ever so slightly moved my left hand to engage the sphere, making sure to be as careful as a surgeon removing a brain tumor.
The gold etchings began to glow as the world around us flew forward like a sped-up movie.
The sun and moon chased one another as waves of shadows engulfed us before a tsunami of light replaced them, only to repeat again and again and again.
The sphere in my hands pulsed, feeling like destructive waves under the ocean where you couldn’t see the swell or caps…only feel the passing mountain that was heading toward shore.
Within moments, the world had become a massive strobe light that stole my breath and captivated my eyes.
I was completely taken aback by the scene around me changing when I’d thought the In-Between was all but exempt from time according to the earthen plane.
Gabriel sprang up in the forefront of my mind, reminding me that this was an intentional method for angels to traverse forward through time. But how had he managed to put me in the broken-off stream that Lolth had potentially created and Depweg had gotten lost in?
“STOP!” Jose cried out, breaking me from the questions that were building dangerously tall in my mind, nearing the tumbling point like a giant game of Jenga.
With my wrist already primed to snap back to neutral, I twisted the sphere to the starting point, effectively stopping the flow of time.
Panting, I let my hands yank apart as the Time Sphere vanished at my mental command, leaving Jose and I to stare at the empty space where the glowing, pulsating ball had just been.
Glancing around my environment with nervous eyes, I sought familiar landmarks…or unfamiliar ones.
“I…I don’t think we went too far,” I said aloud for both Jose and myself.
“How can you be sure, man?!” Jose demanded, clearly upset at me.
Snapping my eyes to lock onto Jose’s, I straightened my stance ever so slightly, and with agitation leaking through, I said, “Because I know my neighborhood, man.”
Jose tilted his head as we exchanged challenging glances.
“You sure you’re one of Depweg’s?” I asked with narrowing eyes.
Jose seemed to consider the real question behind my words, and after a few more tense moments, he turned his back to feign looking at the world outside.
Grabbing the scene around me, I pulled us both from the In-Between and into the world of the now.
“Sense anything?” I asked a tad more harshly than I had intended, knowing full well I hadn’t given him enough time to even blink.
Ignoring my aggressive question, Jose let his head swivel around as if he were looking for something just on the horizon. Closed eyes seemed peaceful as he searched.
“Nada,” he said, turning back to face me.
“We need to figure out how far we jumped,” I said, glancing toward the boarded front doors of the church. Shit…when had Father Thomes said he’d moved in? Had he even mentioned it? I couldn’t recall. All I knew for certain was meeting him in 1990.
Knowing it wouldn’t do anything but helpless to the urge, I pulled up my phone and checked the date. No Service confirmed my suspicions, and I pulled my lips into thin lines as I nodded my head in disappointment.
“Did you really just check your phone?”
“dId yOu rEaLlY jUsT blah blah blah,” I mocked him in a high-pitched voice before realizing how pathetic it was to do just that. “Sorry, force of habit.”
“Which part? Being a child or checking your phone after traveling to 1960? Which, by the way, is before even the first satellite went into space.”
“You trying to get on my good side, cutie-pie?” I challenged, telegraphing my distaste as I gave him an obnoxious once over while grabbing my hips.
His heart rate did not increase as he accurately perceived the threat I was not so subtly waving in his face. That worried me because he was rightfully unnerved by the antimatter sphere that would propel us through time. I understood why the ball made him nervous, considering it held enough destructive potential to mimic the asteroid that had destroyed the dinosaurs, but the fact that his heart rate did not increase with me signaled that he didn’t view me as a threat to his existence, unlike the angelic sphere.
Sensing his resolve, I squared my shoulders and let my purple eyes glow a fierce crimson before uttering with a voice that sounded like a movie villain’s, “How about I just leave you here to rot? Maybe I’ll pick you up in fifty years or so, when I’ve had time to forgive your insolence, dog.”
The words that left my mouth surprised me, as I would never say that to any of my were friends; unless I was joking around, of course.
“Then you’ll never find him,” Jose responded calmly, not giving an inch nor taking one. He understood the stakes and acted accordingly, unlike me.
It was my turn to about-face and stare off into the distance while attempting to co…cool…holy shit.
“Holy shit,” I breathed in complete disbelief.
Sensing the dramatic shift in my voice, Jose asked, “What?”
Lifting a hand that was all of a sudden really heavy, I half raised my index finger in an attempt to point at a nearby rusted-out car with all four tires missing.
Stepping up beside me, Jos
e barked, “What, man? I don’t see…”
A featureless black cat with purple eyes was watching us from the shadows of the car. It was nearly impossible to make out except for those piercing, haunting eyes.
I breathed out an entire lungful of air to say the only word my mind could formulate, “Lolth.”
The cat smiled, revealing a Cheshire grin that gleamed in the darkness.
22
Depweg - Grand Island, Nebraska, 1985
The white Lincoln coupe pulled onto the driveway and into Depweg’s usual spot of the three-car garage. Clicking a button on the remote attached to his visor, the garage door began groaning as it shut before Depweg had even gotten out of his car.
Stepping to the brand-new washer and dryer that sat close to the entrance to the house, Depweg kicked off his scuffed steel-toed boots and slid out of his favorite pair of long-sleeved Dickies coveralls. The faded blue workwear was thrown into the washer along with a heaping scoop of detergent.
The machine was perpetually set to the toughest setting, and Depweg only had to hit start. The basin began filling with water as he opened the door into his kitchen.
With a pair of plain blue jeans and a white tee, Depweg padded through the large kitchen with his white socks, stopping to kiss his one-year-old son, Joey Dawson Depweg.
The child—who was making raspberry noises while slamming his hands on his plate of ground beef—didn’t seem to notice the loving kiss atop his head.
“Hey, handsome,” Meli cooed as she turned from the steaks she was preparing on their five-burner stove.
“Hey, beautiful,” Depweg returned as he crossed the distance to embrace his mate and kissed her deeply.
“You smell,” she teased as she pulled back and rubbed the tip of her nose against his a few times while scrunching her face.
“I thought you liked the smell of cow,” Depweg replied, pulling the top of his shirt up to his nose, making a show of sniffing.
“I didn’t say you smelled bad,” she said with a smile before turning back to the steaks, ensuring the rib eyes in the pan were only seared on the outside and raw in the middle. “Take a quick shower, and the food will be ready when you get out.”
Smiling, Depweg took a step in the direction of their luxurious master bedroom before stopping and excitedly saying, “Forgot to tell ya. Got a promotion at work!”
“Another one?” Meli answered, turning with a proud smile on her face. “You’ll be running that place in no time.”
“Yup. I’m the head of the kill floor now.”
“They must have really liked all the improvements you suggested.”
“It helps to come from the future and know what the USDA and PETA want even before they do.”
“It also helps that you care about the cattle,” Meli stated, taking a step forward to rest her hand on Depweg’s face in admiration.
Depweg smiled in return, bringing up his fingers to rest on the back of her hand as she cupped his face.
“Bwaaah bwah bwah,” Joey Dawson, or JD, offered his own opinion while smacking his plate off the high chair.
“Go,” Meli said, dropping her hand to give Depweg a smack on the bottom. “Shower and come eat with your family.”
Stealing one more kiss from his mate, Depweg strode to their master bedroom, stripping off his shirt as he went.
After his clothes were in the laundry basket, Depweg turned on the shower and began the process of waiting for the water to warm.
Glancing at himself in the mirror, Depweg couldn’t help but notice he looked younger somehow, almost as if he were emitting an aura of happiness he had never experienced before.
“No apocalypse. No demons. No Satan. No Ulric,” he whispered as he leaned forward toward the mirror, looking at himself in the eyes. “No John…”
He knew he had time. Precious, invaluable time with which to relax and enjoy life…before his obligations caught up with him in 2019.
There had been a war inside Depweg’s head since arriving two years ago in 1983.
On one side, peace bloomed like an unmolested rainforest with plenty of sunlight and ample rainfall.
On the other, the knowledge that he was living on the literal definition of borrowed time crept in like an army of greedy men, ready to tear the forest down faster than it could regrow.
Depweg had to continually focus on sending in the indigenous tribes that would fight to the death in order to keep the rainforest alive, but he knew one day his army would be depleted, and the trees would fall. Time…would catch up to him.
Shaking his head, hard, Depweg banished the thought of his borrowed time, and instead, imagined the faces of his mate and son.
His heart bloomed, and the anxiety-inducing thoughts that were trying to devour his rainforest of peace evaporated like a drop of water in a searing pan.
Steam drifted across the top of the mirror, pulling Depweg the rest of the way out of his internal war, and he allowed himself a sigh of relief as he stepped into the warm waters that cascaded down his skin.
Looking down at the shower floor as the day of hard labor was whisked off his skin, Depweg willed his negative thoughts to circle the drain and disappear into the darkness.
A tear of happiness might have stealthily escaped his eye, escorted by the ample running water, but no one would have been able to tell.
He had time now. He had time.
23
John - Houston, 1960’s
“What do you want, Lolth?” I demanded with a stern voice, setting my jaw for the inevitable combat.
A black mist swirled through the air like a cyclone turned on its side, but with the two purple eyes staying at the center of the mouth.
Jose attempted to take a step forward with fists clenched before I lifted an arm to my side, blocking his advance.
“Wait,” I whispered as quietly as I could.
The tornado of black smoke coalesced into the featureless black cat once again. What she had done could be described as peacocking, merely aiming to demonstrate the power she had at her command.
To show she only wanted to talk, or so I assumed, Lolth sat down more than a few feet in front of us while looking up with knowing eyes. The finger of death slid down my spine, making me fight a shudder that I didn’t want to telegraph.
“Greetings, vampire,” Lolth purred in her deep, sinister voice.
“What do you want?” I repeated, lowering my arm when I felt Jose relax as he let me take control of the situation.
“Who’s your friend?” she asked, turning glinting amethysts in Jose’s direction and producing the gleaming smile that reflected light that wasn’t there.
A cold wind tugged at my trench coat and the hair spilling from underneath my beanie.
“Do you know what you’ve done?” I asked, remembering my conversation with Gabriel about the stream that had broken off from the river of time.
“Do you know what you’ve done?” she asked slowly, turning her eyes back to me and letting her smile grow a tiny bit bigger.
“You could destroy the universe with this stream of time you’ve created.”
“Oh? Could I, now?” Lolth purred with delight in a way that only someone tasting the first course from a full-blown revenge meal could experience.
It was at that moment that I remembered this was exactly what Lolth had wanted all along; the destruction of everything.
I wanted to let out a defeated, “Shit,” but instead, I acted purely on instinct and summoned my gladius as I swung my hand through the air.
There was a thump as my blade smacked into Lolth’s skull, followed closely by a low chortle that grew into a full-bellied cackle.
Pulling the blade back, I couldn’t fight an expression that telegraphed my wonder that my angelic sword had been replaced with a wooden variant sold at Renaissance fairs.
“Foolish vampire,” Lolth purred with an evil chuckle. “You are in my time line now. I created it. I…am god here.”
As she spoke, sha
dows from every dark corner began lengthening and expanding. I did note that—just as before—Lolth stayed away from the artificial light provided by a streetlamp.
“Auh!” I yelped in an inward gasp, sensing the growing wave of darkness silently moving to encircle us, effectively cutting off our escape.
What made things worse was that Lolth didn’t grow to her gargantuan form that resembled a cross between a rock golem and Juggernaut from the X-Men comics, all bulging muscles and unstoppable strength.
The fact Lolth purposefully remained a cat made me unconsciously take a step backward as I held my gladius up in a defensive stance.
“Let’s play a little game, vampire,” Lolth purred with delight. I narrowed my eyes as I mentally prepared for whatever cruel game she was going to give me no choice but to play. “The first of us to find the lost werewolf, wins.”
Immediately upon hearing her proposal, my surprised expression clenched into one of angry annoyance, but not because she was threatening to find Depweg first.
“You reveal too much, kitty kitty,” I coldly stated before letting my sword vanish and turning to latch onto Jose in the blink of an eye.
Before Lolth could react, I yanked us into the In-Between and willed my Time Sphere into existence.
“What was that thing?” Jose asked in barely controlled bewilderment.
“Later,” I barked, focusing on moving my right hand and moving us forward only a month or so.
The scene around us moved as before, but at a much slower pace. The sun and moon remained orbs that seemed to circle the sky.
“Twenty-six. Twenty-seven. Twenty-eight,” I counted just under my breath, keeping a stern gaze on the sky. “That’s it!”
Slamming my hand back to a neutral position with the noon sun directly above, I let the sphere vanish before looking at Jose and saying, “Be ready. And don’t let anything scratch you.”
“Anything?”
Letting my armor cover my body from head to toe, Oberon flashed through my mind as an arrow pierced the back of his knee where his angelic armor had failed to protect him. Even with my protection, there were more than a few vulnerable spots in which Lolth could infect me with the darkness.
