by Damien Boyes
The earth is churned up and smoking around me. I can’t take another hit.
I’ve overestimated myself. As powerful as I feel, I can’t even take on a bunch of soldiers—how am I supposed to kill Thrane?
Now I do have to run.
I struggle to get moving, take two steps, then leap aside as another blast impacts where I was just standing. I hit the ground and roll, but slip on the stupid mud and land hard on my side. This is it.
I brace for the shot, hoping it doesn’t hurt too long before I wake up back in the Aperion, but it doesn’t come. The tank explodes instead, bursting in another gout of blue fire with a sound so loud the world closes to a whine. The ground heaves as it crashes silently a few feet away from me.
Though I can barely hear anything, I can make out muffled yelling, as though from a great distance, and more gunshots, high-pitched and droning through my overwhelmed ears. The soldiers are fighting someone else.
I force myself up to my feet, barely able to see, just as a man rushes up to me and takes me by the arms, gets right up in my face. His eyes go wide and he starts yelling something but I can’t make out the words. He rips his helmet off and he’s talking to me like I should know who he is, but how could I?
But then I get it. Her again.
He’s Asian, his hooded eyes are dark and narrowly set and his face is weathered, with fuzzy black stubble over his lip and under his chin. I’m dizzy, but for some reason I want to touch his face. I reach my hand out to feel his whiskers and he twists his head away, jams his helmet back on his head, and pulls me away from the fighting.
I can hear the gunshots better now. Whether my ears are starting to clear or because I’m getting closer to them I don’t know, but there’s lots of them. A major battle’s going on somewhere nearby, but I can’t for the life of me figure out where.
The man hands me something, a thick ring made of either heavy plastic or light metal, and says something to me that doesn’t filter through the mess in my ears.
“What?” I say, and lean in close to his blue uniform. He doesn’t smell particularly good, but not terrible.
“Don’t let go,” he says, and my ear is still warm from his breath as the city vanishes and we appear somewhere else.
25
Resistance
We land in a wide-open warehouse that smells of salt and rust. Wherever we are, we’re still close to the ocean, but it’s so hot and bright I don’t think we’re in New York anymore. I don’t even think we’re in America.
We’re standing on a concrete floor in the center of a painted yellow circle, surrounded by equipment kind of like what the Omegas were trying to set up back in Buffalo. The roof is three or four stories above us and sunlight’s streaming through the broken glass skylights. It looks like a beautiful day outside.
I figure I can let go of the ring I’m clutching, and the man who brought me here gives me a look out of the corner of his eye then motions for me to follow him. The second we step out of the circle another pair of soldiers fills it, materialized in from the fighting back in New York I’d guess. One of them is hurt. Blood pools on the concrete as it drips from the arm dangling at her side, and medics rush immediately to help.
This looks like a staging area. Soldiers are returning from the battle, clearing the circles and stowing their weapons in racks. Back in New York I thought there must have been hundreds of soldiers in the fight, but there doesn’t seem to be more than a few dozen here now.
Many of them give me looks as they return, especially those clutching the bodies of their fallen friends. They must have been ordered to come get me. But why? And by who?
My rescuer leads me out of the warehouse to a dock right outside, and I squint at the sudden sunlight and have to shield my eyes with my hand. We’re surrounded by water that looks like a river but smells like the sea. There are tall buildings all around, abandoned, their foundations submerged, colonized now by nature. A few have even toppled over, creating shoals overgrown with creeping vegetation. A few of the buildings still have their logos, colorful Chinese writing advertising companies I’m sure no longer exist.
Dad used to teach me the hanzi characters when I was young and I still know a few of them, but don’t recognize any of the logos. I figure I’m in China somewhere, but other than that I have no idea where or when.
“Where are we?” I ask the soldier as he leads me onto a waiting boat.
“Shanghai,” he says simply, but there’s an edge to his voice.
“What year?”
His brow furrows. “2234. Have you forgotten already?”
I furrow my brow right back at him. “I’ve never been here in my life.”
“Don’t mess around, Jas—” he says, but then stops and gives me a good hard stare. “Wait, how’s that ...?”
I already know what he’s thinking, he has the same look on his face Delta did when he first found me. “No, I’m not her. I mean, I am, but not the one you know.”
He shifts his feet in a practiced shuffle to steady himself as the boat pulls away from the dock, and I grab onto him to keep from losing my balance. He doesn’t pull away but I feel him tense at my touch.
“Another Jasmin?” he mumbles. He runs his hand through his sweat-damp hair, drying it in the sun, and I notice a red tinge to it. “I don’t know what’s going on anymore,” he says as we pull away from the cavernous buildings and out into the open water.
“That makes two of us,” I say, and he opens his mouth as if he wants to respond but changes his mind. “Where are we going?” I ask after a moment.
“To see Captain Fan. He jumped the Sea Dragon here to meet you.”
“Who’s that?”
“The leader of the Resistance.”
“Resistance?” I ask. “Against Thrane?”
He gives me a skeptical look. “I thought you’d never been here before?”
“I haven’t,” I answer.
“Then why are you here?”
“Not on purpose,” I say. “But when I realized where I was, that Thrane was here—”
“But you know Thrane?”
“He took my world from me,” I say, the knot of anger burning in my gut. His lips twitch but he doesn’t say anything. “What’s your name?” I ask.
“Chen.”
I take a breath, in and out, tasting the sea on my tongue. “I never thanked you for saving me,” I say. “So thank you.”
He grunts and looks away, clutching the railing as the boat bounces over a swell.
“You knew her—the other Jasmin?”
He nods as if unwilling to say more.
“Did she piss you off too?” I ask, trying to catch his eye but he refuses to look at me.
“Something like that,” he says, and grows quiet, staring off at the passing whitecaps. Fine with me. I could use a little peace myself. Every time I think my life couldn’t get any stranger I manage to plunge head first into a fresh bucket of crazy.
About ten minutes later I notice a black speck on the horizon. The ocean swells grow heavier as we approach a big swoop of a boat bobbing in the waves. It’s matte black and angular, with an orange dragon painted along the side. The bow rides high in the water with a massive landing pad hanging over it, but slopes down almost to sea level at the rear.
Our boat pulls alongside the back and two crew members grab the tossed ropes and tie it off. Chen jumps out ahead of me and strides across the rear deck and I jog to catch up with him. He leads me inside and we twist through narrow passageways and up a set of metal stairs to what I think is the bridge.
The heavy door is already open, and Chen stands aside and waves me in.
There are seven people inside, each of them except one manning a station of some kind. I don’t know what they’re doing—boat stuff, I guess. They’re all looking at screens, and a glowing image of the boat hovers over a glass table in the center of the room.
Only one man is standing, and he’s got his back to the door, gazing out the window to
the sea beyond. He’s wearing a gray, military-style jacket, with his hands clasped behind him, and his hair is black and pulled into a loose short ponytail. He doesn’t turn as I enter but I see his shoulders straighten as my boots clomp on the metal floor.
“Before you say anything,” I start, getting this over with before he can turn around and get weirded out because I’m not who he thinks I am, “I’m not the Jasmin Parker you know. So whatever issues you have, they’re with her, not me. Deal?”
He snorts, turns with an amused grin, and looks me up and down from across the glass table.
“And so you’re not,” he says. His accent reminds me of Dad, and I clamp down on the sentimental gush. This isn’t the time. With his hair pulled back, Captain Fan’s face is angular and sleek, like his ship, sweeping down from a wide forehead past piercing dark eyes to a narrow, precise mouth. “I assume Gibzon didn’t send you?”
I take a beat, wondering what Gibzon has to do with anything—it seems like everyone knows each other in the future—but shake my head. “I’ve never even met him.”
He waves the image of the boat away from the display table, leans forward, and rests his hands on the glass between us.
“What brings you to this timeline then?” he asks, all casual, like he’s part of the tourism board.
“It was an accident,” I say. “But now that I’m here I’m going to kill Thrane.”
He barks out a laugh that draws the attention of the others in the room. I glance over my shoulder and see Chen is behind me. I didn’t hear him follow me in.
“A serious endeavor,” Captain Fan says, deadpan. “How do you intend to accomplish it?”
“I haven’t quite figured that out yet,” I admit.
Fan’s smile fades. “Not the Jasmin Parker we knew,” he says with a sigh. “But not so different either.” I feel annoyance flicker through my face but Fan waves his comment away before I work up a snarky comeback. “You want to kill Thrane,” he says, “but what do you know of him?”
Heat rises up my neck. I don’t like feeling unprepared, and I’m way less than a B student in all this. I only know Thrane and his soldiers erased my life, then I took off to go sightseeing. I’ve been gigging my way through history instead of taking this seriously.
“Not much,” I mumble.
“And of this world?”
“Nothing,” I say. Now he’s making me feel stupid. “Just that he took everything from me. I know it won’t be easy, but I’m going to make him pay.”
Captain Fan shakes his head. “You are not prepared for this.”
The hell I’m not. My skin tingles, flickering with purple light. “I have powers,” I say. “I took out one of those cannons—”
“And then required rescue,” Fan chides.
I cross my arms over my chest as my face burns. I want to protest but I know he’s right.
“Fine then,” I say. “Tell me. What do I have to do to get to Thrane?”
“You can’t—”
“Not good enough,” I snap.
Fan narrows his eyes at me. “You didn’t let me finish. You can’t—not without help.”
“And you can help?”
“We can,” he says, his eyes flashing.
“Tell me.”
“There is power in this world,” Fan says. “I know you can feel it. I can see it rippling over you. I’m not connected to eternity and even I can sense the energy surrounding us. We all can.”
“I feel like I could lift a mountain,” I say.
Fan twitches an eyebrow then waves his hands over the display glass and calls up an image of Earth. Red dots pop up across the globe, equidistant—in northwest Mexico, Egypt, China, Australia, and a bunch in the oceans. “Thrane has erected harvesters all over the planet. They collect the energy teeming in this world and feed it to New York.”
“To keep the shield up around Midtown?” I ask.
Fan nods. “Yes, but there’s far more to it than that. The world’s elite live inside the bubble, what few remain, but occasionally someone is convicted of crimes against the state and is exiled. We’ve heard the stories, incredible though they are. It’s said time itself moves slower inside. It’s why their resources have yet to run out. Why their skies are not dead. Indeed, President Price was elected more than two hundred years ago.”
He looks old, but not that old. “How is that possible?” I ask. My initial reaction is to believe it isn’t, but I’m learning nothing is impossible.
“A singularity,” Chen says as he comes to stand beside me. “The harvesters suck the energy from around the world and transmit it to the obelisk in the center of Midtown.”
“A singularity? You mean like a black hole?” I ask, thinking back to physics class.
“Possibly,” Captain Fan says. “Who can say? Whatever it is, we believe it possesses gravitational force strong enough to bend time.”
“Okay, but why?” I ask. “What does Thrane want to slow time down for?”
Fan shakes his head. “We don’t know. Gibzon may have a theory, but if he does he hasn’t deigned to reveal it to us.”
“You never asked him?”
“I’ve never spoken to him.”
“I’m confused,” I say, but I’m getting used to the feeling. “I thought you knew him.”
“Only through you—the other you,” Fan says. “Gibzon formulated a plan to combat Thrane, and your previous incarnation brought us a communication device that would help us coordinate the assault.”
“Wait,” I say, trying to wrap my head around all this. “She hooked a system up to let you chat with Gibzon?”
“Yes,” Fan answers.
“So why don’t you call him?”
“The singularity interferes with communication across timelines,” Fan answers. “And it also prevents Gibzon’s team from traveling here.”
“You mean the Omega Guard can’t jump here?”
Fan shakes his head. “For some reason you are able, but none of the others.”
I take a moment, trying to figure through what he’s told me. “So let me get this straight—you have a plan to take on Thrane, but to get this plan to work we need to get the singularity down, but I can’t do it myself, and no one else can get here to help me while it’s still up?”
“An impasse,” Fan says. “And so we wait. Though you’ve returned at a crucial moment.”
“Why’s that?” I ask, suspicious. What else could go wrong?
“Little time remains. Thrane is gearing up for another invasion, the biggest we’ve ever seen, and that can only mean one thing.”
“Gibzon’s timeline is next,” Chen says. “Could be weeks, could be days, but his world will be the next to fall. Who will stop him then?”
My brain goes into overdrive, and it almost feels a bit like the start of a seizure. The entire universe is in danger and it’s up to me to send out the warning cry, except I have no idea how to get to Gibzon.
I got here by accident, and Delta said Eternity Station isn’t even anywhere, that it sits somewhere outside time. How am I supposed to find something that exists outside of time?
“Can you help me get to him?” I ask, and Fan’s chest sags.
“You don’t know?”
“I was in high school until recently—I don’t know anything about the real world.”
“Then all hope is lost,” Captain Fan says. “Without the Omega Guard to aid us, the Resistance has no chance of overcoming Thrane and his forces.” He drops his hands on the display and stares at the spinning globe.
“You’re not giving up, are you?” I ask.
He shakes his head, but there’s a weariness to it. “Never,” he says. “But planning for a suicide mission is much harder than planning for one you have a chance of walking away from.”
I step toward him, right up to the table. “There has to be something we can do,” I say.
“Plenty we can do,” he responds. “Though very little of consequence.”
“I’m he
re,” I offer. “I can help.” He raises his head slowly, and there’s something in his eyes I can’t read.
“We need more than what you alone are able to provide,” he states.
Who does he think he is to tell me what I can and can’t do? “How do you know I can’t?” I ask.
He locks eyes with me. “Because you left us to confront Thrane once, the other you, and she never returned.”
26
Disorder
My head buzzes and the room falls to a hush. That’s what happened to her, the other me. Thrane killed her.
“What do you mean she never returned?” I ask. I’m almost afraid of the answer, but I want to hear it just the same.
“We told her not to go …” Fan starts, but his words trail off.
“And?” I prod. I want to know and don’t want to know at the same time. I keep meeting all these people who’ve already met me, who hate me or are disappointed by me for things I didn’t do. To be honest, I’ve tried to put the thought of her out of my mind.
It was easy when jumping from concert to concert and living it up to let myself forget a version of me, another Jasmin Parker, existed somewhere. What was she doing? What was she like? Did she hate pickles like I do? Prefer showers over baths? Did she have a crush on Martin Locke in high school too?
Grackle said he knew where to find me, said I’d told him about how I first manifested my powers and that’s why he was waiting for me on that corner, so I guess she probably was a lot like me. If she ended up throwing herself in front of the same truck to save the same boy, we must be nearly identical. Or at least we started that way.
I wonder where she is, where she disappeared to. I thought we boundless were immortal. If Thrane killed her, why didn’t she come back from the Aperion? Could she have chosen to stay? That seems unlikely. I didn’t—why would she?
So where is she?
Fan looks like he doesn’t want to answer, but Chen pipes up, and his voice has an edge to it. “She was angry. Gibzon wouldn’t act, so she took it upon herself to face Thrane,” he says.
