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“There are few teachers as instructive as your past or as inspirational as your future.” -Journal of Dr. Harold Quickly, 2275
The real problem with time travel is keeping yourself ignorant of the future. When you know what’s coming, you have time to think about it. And when the future isn’t good, that’s an even worse problem. As Dr. Quickly always says, you can’t change the past. What happened, happened. I would add an addendum. What you know is going to happen, is going to happen, because you’re an idiot and did things wrong the first time.
I’ve seen the past. It’s now my future. And I’m not going to like it.
Piper doesn’t know. She can’t know.
Standing near the wreckage of the collapsed roller coaster in her now disheveled clothing, she’s starting to look like a street urchin. Our frequent gate jumping has at least removed some of the dirt from our day, but we’re both tired and we’re still just as lost as we’ve ever been. The warp clock is here somewhere—the way home. I thought I would be the one to find it, but I was wrong about that. It seems I have another destiny.
I lead Piper out of Frontier Town and back into the heart of the park.
“Where are we going?” she asks.
“We need to find a gate that’ll get me back to 1777 again. Back to your dad.”
“I want to come this time.”
I shake my head. “I know you want to help, but that’s not going to work.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I was there. I’ve seen what happens. If we change it, then we split the timeline. We could end up with two of us. Or more copies of your dad. Who knows what kind of paradox that might create. We can’t risk it.”
Piper frowns. “I could help. Maybe this time I could be there and not change anything. I could hide . . .”
“Hiding is good but you’re going to do it here. I’m going to get your dad and I want you to wait.”
“I don’t want to stay here. It’s scary,” Piper argues.
“I know, but if you want your dad back, it has to be this way. And I know you want him back.”
Piper looks like she wants to argue more, but she stays quiet.
It takes a few minutes to reach a time gate. I locate the gate in the Green Dragon Tavern as it’s the one I went through the last time. I study the controls when we reach it. The gates we’ve been using are apparently on a shared network of some kind. The problem with Franco’s system of stolen time gates is that they are low on options for exit times. Many of the time slots I would like to use have been used up by other travels. The exit unit paired to this gate has been a lot of places in its day. Unfortunately I have only one destination left in me.
I turn to Piper and take a knee.
“We’re going to try this again. I need you to do me a favor though. When your dad comes back through this gate, don’t wait for me. Show him where we last saw Vanessa, and see if he can find where she took the warp clock. I know he’ll get you home, but he’ll need your help.”
“What about you?” Piper’s brow furrows.
“Don’t worry about me. I’m gonna be okay.” I gently brush a strand of hair away from her face. “If you guys get the warp clock back on, your mom will bring the cavalry so fast it’ll make your head spin. You’re going to be fine.”
The little girl in front of me is putting on a brave face, but she’s still just a kid. She’s been through so much today already. It pains me to be leaving her again, but I’m not the version of me she needs. If I don’t go, I doom her to a lifetime without him.
I extend a hand to Piper. She cautiously raises hers to mine.
“It’s been a pretty exciting day. I’m glad you were the one I got to spend it with.” I shake her hand. When I let go, Piper opens her mouth to speak but then closes it again. I get back to my feet and activate the time gate controls. The temporal emitters flicker to life, casting their eerie colors across the gate.
I take a breath and try to steady my nerves for the crossing.
“Wait.” Piper takes my hand and turns me around. Then she wraps her arms around my waist, hugging me hard.
“What’s that for?” I ask, laying my arm across her back.
“Because even if you’re not my real dad, you’re still a good one.”
I pat her gently. It takes all of my resolve, but I slowly unwrap her from me. I hold her shoulders as I look her in the eyes. “If it was up to me, and I did get to have a daughter, I’d want her to be just like you.”
A tear runs down Piper’s cheek, and her lower lip has developed a quiver, but at least this time it’s for the right reasons. She looks like she wants to say something else, but I have to go. I’m not going to let her down again.
“I have to go now, okay? Be patient. Your dad is going to be right back.”
Piper wipes her eyes and nods.
Brave girl.
I wish I could see the woman she grows up to be.
I turn and face the gate. If I don’t go now, I’ll never hold together. I take a step and plunge into the ether.
Limited options. That’s what I’ve had to work with. And a long history of bad luck. I half expect to meet another group of men with guns when I step through the gate, but for once I’m given a break. The barn is empty.
It’s mid-afternoon. According to the time gate settings, I’ve arrived prior to my earlier trip. I’m once again unarmed. I have no advantages in my favor except one—a little bit of time.
I exit the barn and look around. The scene is quiet except for a continual splashing sound to my right. Cautious of being seen, I creep around the side of the barn to ascertain its source. The sight of the water wheel and the generator answers one of my previous questions. I wondered why these temporal fugitives positioned their time gate so far from Arnold’s property, but having a steady source of power makes sense. This water wheel will attract far less attention with the locals than running noisy gas generators or displaying mysterious solar arrays.
It takes a moment to get my bearings, but I don’t have a lot of time to waste. I break into a run along the riverbank, headed for the road to Benedict Arnold’s property. My captors are going to be arriving before long, so I’m forced to use the woods again. I really can’t risk running into Wiggy and Smiley on their way to send Arnold through the time gate. But if I can get to the house while they are gone, I’ll have fewer eyes on me and might be able to work out a plan.
A plan.
There is something fundamentally wrong with plotting my own demise. My brain doesn’t want to admit that’s what I’m doing, but I am. There are ways out. I could run. I could abandon all the rules of time travel and commit to my own survival. But at what cost? I’ve seen this future. They shoot me. They send the video to Jermaine Clevis. He sends it to us. That starts us down this entire journey to rescue my other self. We lose the warp clock. I end up here.
If I choose something else now—create a paradox—it’ll fracture into a new branch of this timestream. Then what? They don’t send the video? They do but it’s different? Some other version of Mym and I go off on this adventure? Another version of the warp clock goes missing. We are still stuck. No one saves us. I’ll have duplicated all of our problems. Another me gets to make this choice. Will he succeed in saving Piper’s dad or would he chicken out too? Another Piper loses her dad. The girl I know gets left to die in an abandoned theme park in the future.
I’d escape but end up living or dying somewhere in the 1700s in this timeline, far from everyone I know and love. They’d never even know what happened or what choice I’d made to cause it. But I’d know.
No.
That can’t be my legacy.
We all have to go sometime. There’s a good chance that when I die here, no one else would know either. Except me. Literally. If I save my alternate self, he has a chance. He can get back to Piper. He can find the warp clock. He can live the life I never will. And I won’t have failed everyone. I won’t have inflicted the res
ults of my own cowardice on the rest of the universe and the people I love. Piper will have a chance to grow up.
I think that’s a legacy I could die for.
If I can get there on time.
My run through the woods is noisy and exhausting. I force my way though brambles and leap over fallen logs. I let the exertion wipe the doubts from my mind. It feels good to be breathing. My beating heart feels good in my chest. I pass into a glade filled with sunshine and have to pause. Maybe it’s just my emotional state, but the world looks like a beautiful place. The trees are putting on a brilliant display of autumn leaves, and the breeze is just the right temperature. The earth is vibrant and sensual and alive. I walk gratefully to the widened riverbank, my heels sinking into the sandy pebbles. At the water’s edge, I kneel and scoop a handful of the refreshing current to my face. I splash myself twice, then cup my hands and scoop some for a drink.
In my time I’d think twice about drinking river water. Here, under the current circumstances, I have little to lose.
I’m still drinking when I notice I’m being watched. With the sound of the river and my own noisy breathing, I never would have heard them if it wasn’t for the little child’s burbling cry. Two adults are frozen like statues near the riverbank opposite me. A family. The native man is bare-chested and knee deep in the water holding a forked spear. His partner is on her knees on the riverbank, a string of fish in her lap. The little wild-haired boy is perhaps two. His tiny fingers are clutching a stick. He’s been scribbling in the sand or perhaps just digging. He has his mother’s jet black hair and his father’s strong nose.
The man with the spear considers me. He doesn’t seem tense or overly concerned, but he keeps his eyes on me nonetheless. The woman gets up from the sand, abandoning the string of fish in order to scoop up her son. She balances him on her hip and holds him with both arms.
I rise slowly, my chest still heaving, but my body is calming down. The little family is expectant, waiting for some indication of my intentions. I raise my hand, palm open to them. It’s not really a wave, but it seems to convey the message. The man lifts his head just slightly. The woman turns and says something to her partner. She’s hugging her child close. He responds in their language, then steps out of the water and scoops up the string of fish. The trio moves away from the river, climbing a grassy embankment and stepping into the cover of the woods. The woman and child disappear beyond the trees. The man reaches the tree line and pauses. He turns back to consider me one more time. He transfers the string of fish to the hand holding the spear, then lifts his free hand palm out toward me. He smiles.
The next moment he walks into the woods and vanishes.
I don’t know why the scene I’ve witnessed matters to me, but it does. There have been times I’ve wondered what it would be like to witness life before modern explorers changed the continent. Even before I was a time traveler, the idea fascinated me. But this little happy family is more than that. They are living in their own sort of twilight—the remnants of a changing world. Whether they know it or not, time is moving on.
The beginning of the end.
I could be wrong. With Smiley and Epaulettes here to change the Constitution, maybe that will change the future of the American Indians. Perhaps their destiny is more hopeful than mine. Maybe I’m just jealous that they are experiencing a family life that I never will. Either way, it’s making me sad. I squat and splash myself one more time with a handful of water.
It’s time to go.
I reach the farmhouse without encountering Smiley or Wiggy. They most likely passed on the road without me hearing them. They aren’t home yet in any case. When I sneak up to the barn where they are keeping the horses, the one I rode in on isn’t present. I don’t recall the exact coloring of the other horses I came in with, but I’m fairly certain they aren’t here either.
That just leaves Epaulettes and the other me.
And this is where things get tricky. I have no idea what to do next.
I exit the barn and keep my eyes on the farmhouse. I have to assume Epaulettes is in there guarding my older self. It’s now a waiting game. Somehow, some way, I’ve got to replace my other self, but only after he’s had a conversation with me later in the evening.
I creep slowly from the barn toward the farmhouse, my eyes flitting between the pair of windows on this side of the house. Is anyone watching?
I’m about halfway there when my luck runs out. The back door swings open.
Shit.
I drop to my belly in the tall grass. Have they seen me?
Lying prone on my stomach, I fight the urge to flee, at least till I know whether they’ve seen me.
I recognize the pair that exits easily enough. Epaulettes is prodding my other self along in front of him using a musket. My other self is bound at the wrists, but his hands are in front of him. A useful fact, as the two are making for an outhouse situated at the back of the clearing.
As soon as they are far enough away that I think they won’t hear me, I jump up and sprint for the door they just exited. I make it to the steps and take one last glance in their direction before slipping inside the house.
Okay. I’m inside. Now what?
Looking around the room, I search for places to hide where I won’t be discovered. There isn’t a lot to work with. I have no idea where my captors will be throughout the night. The spartan furniture doesn’t leave a lot of options. I need to be close enough to the pantry to sneak in and get to my other self. It’s hard to know where to hide out here when all I saw the whole night was the inside of the pantry.
The door to the pantry is hanging open. My other self hasn’t constructed his bed of grain sacks yet. The sacks are still piled up at the back wall past the wooden barrels. I take a closer look at the barrels, noting that while two of them have sealed barrelheads held tight with metal bands, the third barrel near the back is a different style. It has a lid with a handle. I didn’t pay much attention to it when I was in there before . . .
I cast a quick glance out the window. Epaulettes is still waiting outside the outhouse. Apparently my other self is taking his time in there.
I slip into the pantry and lean over the front barrels to lift the lid on the one in the back.
Potatoes.
The barrel isn’t full. Potatoes fill about a foot of the space at the bottom, but if I were to move some around . . .
I find a grain sack that’s mostly empty and start tossing potatoes into it. I work frantically to buy myself some space. I’ve removed most of them when I hear the voices. They’re close. I drop the sack of potatoes. One escapes the confines of the bag and bounces across the floor, wobbling to a stop near the doorway.
Hinges creak at the rear of the house as the back door opens.
Out of time.
I throw my legs over the edge of the barrel and slip inside. I wrestle with the lid for just a moment before deciding to just flip it over and face the handle down inside with me. If anyone tries to lift it, I’ll be able to keep it secure.
I gently close the lid to the barrel just as my other self and Epaulettes come into view. I cling tightly to the lid handle and do my best not to make a sound.
“Get back in there. I don’t want to hear any more complaining out of you.”
“It wasn’t really a complaint,” the other Ben says. “If you’re going to kidnap people after they’ve had that much coffee, I feel like you should have bathroom breaks in your game plan.”
“Okay, wise guy. Just shut up.”
Epaulettes slams the door and slides the latch closed. My other self goes quiet for a few seconds, then I hear some scraping as he rummages around the shelves. His footsteps stop near the barrel I’m in and I hold my breath, but then he begins dragging sacks away to the other side of the pantry. He’s making his spot to lie down.
The position I’m in is growing uncomfortable, but I don’t dare move.
I keep pressure on the handle of my barrel lid until I hear him settle
down on the sacks. Even then I’m cautious, doing my best to not breathe, partly to stay quiet, also because my hiding place isn’t a well-ventilated choice. Smells like dirty potatoes and sweat in here.
As the minutes go by, I finally get the courage to move. Slowly. I get my legs under me in a more comfortable position and, just before I settle back onto my haunches, I lift the lid of the barrel a fraction of an inch, peeking out to determine the situation.
My other self is lying on his back, hands resting across his chest. He appears to be asleep, or at least drowsing.
He’s Piper’s dad, and he’s still alive.
The reality of what I’m trying to do is creeping back in on me. While I’ve had something to do, I’ve been able to keep my mind off it. Off dying.
I’ve been shot before. If you want to get technical about it, you could argue I’ve died before. I’ve been through some weird experiences as a time traveler, but this one is different. I’m not dealing with a flesh wound. Not a timeless Neverwhere of memories either. We’re talking death. The real deal.
Looking at the man reclined on the grain sacks, I’m almost resentful. He’s me, so I shouldn’t be upset. I’m going to live. A version of me anyway. He’ll carry on with my future life. I won’t be completely gone from existence, just this particular version of me. In a multiverse full of possibilities, I’ve always known there had to be an ending. We all have to die. I just didn’t think I’d be going so soon.
I settle the lid back on the top of the barrel and slump into a sitting position. The darkness in here just makes it worse. No distractions.
My mind goes to Mym.
Of all the people in the multiverse, she’ll be the one most affected. She chose me to go through this life with. It was our combined story. No matter what happens to Piper’s dad, he still won’t be her Ben.
I know she’s strong. I know she’ll survive without me. Doesn’t make me any less sad about it though. We thought we’d have the next fifty years or more together.
I lean my head back against the side of the barrel.
In Times Like These Boxed Set Page 182
