by Damien Boyes
“She went after Thrane alone?” What must she have been thinking? She had to be desperate to try something like that. Or crazy.
Chen shrugs. “That was two years ago.”
“Thrane came for us,” Fan adds. His eyes are unfocused, staring right through me. “The Resistance nearly died that day. If not for our safeguards, for the Resistance’s insulated cells, we all would have been lost.”
“But you survived,” I say, my voice quiet.
He blinks, comes back to me. “Some of us,” he says, his voice soft as mine, but then he perks up. “Only a few cells remain now, scattered around the world. Even I don’t know where they are. But now you’ve come. It is time for us to act. We can wait no longer.”
“What do you mean?”
Fan clears his throat and pauses a moment, as though he isn’t sure he should be telling me this, but then seems to convince himself because he says, “We worked together, the Resistance and the Omega Guard, and devised a plan to overthrow Thrane, but Gibzon deemed the idea too risky, claimed that none of us would survive failure. The other you disobeyed him and jumped here. Somehow you’re the only one who’s able to get here without the aid of Gibzon’s devices.”
“You mean those loop things?” I ask. “How can I get here and not anyone else? Not even Alpha?”
Fan lifts his hands like he’s holding them out to see if he can feel rain. “You’d like me to explain how you can invalidate the laws of nature more efficiently than the other supernatural beings?”
“I actually would, yes.”
He smiles. “Might as well ask me to explain the instant love I felt at the birth of my daughter. Some things are unexplainable, they just are.”
“What was I—she—planning to do?” Now even I’m doing it. “Why did she go after Thrane?”
“He protects the singularity preventing your team from reaching this world, and she went to disable it.”
“The singularity on the inside of that force field around Midtown? How did she plan on getting through?”
“She said she’d ‘figure it out,’” Chen says, frustration at the edge of his voice.
“And you don’t know what happened?”
“No,” Fan says simply. “We waited for her to return, and when she didn’t we assumed her dead. Or worse. Then we waited for some contact from Gibzon. Nothing came. Until you.”
“So what can I do?”
Fan glances at Chen. “If we had more time …” Chen says.
“I’ll help however I can,” I offer, but before Fan can answer an explosion rocks the boat. The deck heaves under my feet, but I just hover, stationary, while everyone else is thrown to the ground.
Red lights snap on across the bridge and an alarm kicks into a howl.
“Report!” Fan barks as he pulls himself back up to the display table. It’s still working and he waves the globe back to the three-dimensional picture of the boat and surrounding water. The skies are empty though—it doesn’t look like the blast came from one of those flying tanks. But then what—
“Captain Fan!” someone yells from the hallway outside the bridge, and when he drags himself through the doorway he’s pale, covered in blood, and missing a leg.
Chen catches him as he falls, and I zip over to help get him on the ground as Chen whips off his belt and wraps it tight around the bleeding stump.
“Thrane ...” the man says before his eyes flutter and he slumps down in my hands, not breathing. I’ve seen a lot of death over the past few weeks, but watching the life drain out of his face still sets me trembling. Once again, people are dying because of me.
I rest his head on the deck and Captain Fan and I share a look. “He’s after me,” I say.
“He’ll be happy with either of us,” Fan says, then turns to a soldier manning a display showing images from around the ship. “Zheng, give me a sit-rep.”
“I’m tracking twenty-three enemy soldiers,” Zheng says. “Twenty-two,” he updates as an explosion reverberates through the metal under our feet.
“Prepare to jump the ship,” Fan says. “Get us out of here.”
“Negative,” Zheng says, and while his voice is steady, I can hear the fear in every syllable. “Translocation capabilities are offline.”
“We can’t fight Thrane,” I say. “Is there a way off this boat?”
“The escape subs,” Chen says, rising from the dead soldier’s side. “Jasmin’s right. We can’t fight Thrane, not like this.”
“Sound the retreat,” Captain Fan orders. “Everyone to the subs. I’ll find a way to distract Thrane so the crew can escape.”
“NO—” Chen and I say at the same time.
We give each other an exasperated look but I don’t even let him start. “Of all the people in this room right now, who has the best chance of slowing Thrane down, show of hands?”
I raise my hand and look to each of them, daring one to argue. Captain Fan glares at me, frustrated that I’m right, and Chen pinches a smile off before it gets started.
“She has a point, Captain,” Chen says.
Captain Fan growls in his throat. “Don’t engage him directly. Draw him away from the ship if you can and then do your best to evade him. Once you’re free you can rendezvous with us at the—”
I slap my hands over my ears. “La la la, I can’t hear you.” Fan’s eyes bug out but I keep my hands tight and say, “Insulated cells, remember. If I don’t know where you’ll be, he can’t make me tell him.”
Fan’s eyes narrow but he nods in agreement and I lower my hands.
“I’ll wait at the warehouse where we first arrived here,” I tell Chen. “You’ll be able to find me there.”
“Done,” Chen says, then straightens. “Captain, we need to go.”
Fan takes one last look at the crew. “Not until everyone in this room is clear.”
“You heard the captain,” Chen says. “This is not a drill. Go. Go. GO.”
The bridge crew sets the ship to auto and evacuates with precision. Captain Fan waits until they’re all clear and moves to follow but lays a hand on my shoulder. “Remember, do not let him get close to you.” He gives me a reassuring squeeze. “Once again, I am in your debt,” he says and then leaves the bridge. Chen flashes me another look and follows his captain without a word.
Now comes the hard part.
I imagine standing at the back of the boat, hovering twenty feet above the deck, and when I jump I don’t close my eyes.
The damage is already extensive. Smoke pours from holes in the boat’s dull black hull, and black-armored soldiers are moving around the ship, engaged in running gunfights with the Resistance.
I don’t see Thrane anywhere. Chen said they were going for the escape submarines—what if Thrane’s down there waiting for them?
“Thrane!” I yell in my best bad-ass voice, and I wait for him to come get me, but he doesn’t. A bunch of soldiers notice me, though, and I muscle out a shield to deflect the stream of metal that comes flying at me.
I soar up and out of the line of fire and then swoop back down and catch three soldiers in a row, moving so fast they’re all propelled off their feet and over the side of the ship.
“THRANE!” I yell again, but still nothing. He must be inside, after Captain Fan. I know he said to keep my distance but I need to get in there, and if that means getting close, then so be it.
There’s no way I can jump straight to him—I don’t even know where he is—so I fly instead, circle down into the ship, shields up. I’m not sure where I’m going but I’d guess the subs would be at the very bottom of the boat, so I find the nearest stairwell and head down.
I notice a sign for the Moon Pool and figure that must be where I’m headed. I swing around into the next level and nearly run into one of Thrane’s soldiers holding rear guard. He opens up on me and I let my shields take the bullets, walk right into him, rip the weapon out his hands, and hit him so hard his helmet dents the metal wall.
Five more soldiers fall be
fore I reach the bottom of the stairs, where I plow through another group lined up in the hall outside the entrance to the Moon Pool, knocking them aside as I fly past, and don’t stop until I carry the last soldier with me and toss him into the pool as I emerge into the open room.
Captain Fan, Chen, and a bunch of Resistance soldiers are huddled on the other side of the pool, most of them frozen in terror, eyes locked on something to my right. I flick my eyes to the side and see Thrane. He’s a ghostly vision on the deck, waiting with a look that’s half bewilderment and half pure glee.
“Jasmin—” Fan shouts, and Thrane waves him quiet.
“You must truly be a wonder,” Thrane says, and his voice is thundering in the tight room, “for the Universe to insist on repeatedly conjuring you up.”
“Can’t keep a girl down,” I say, feigning way more confidence than I feel. Good thing I’m flying, otherwise for sure he’d notice my knees quivering.
He laughs. It’s deep and old, like it just bubbled up from the bowels of the Earth. “We’ve done this before, you and I,” he says. “Here I am. No one’s seen you since.”
“I’m not her,” I spit back.
“No,” he sneers, and energy flares iridescent in his eyes, “more’s the pity.”
Suddenly his body solidifies and a irridescent-black bolt of electricity streaks from his fingers, but Thrane isn’t targeting me, he’s shooting across the room, trying to kill Fan and the other rebels.
I act without thinking and teleport myself into the path of the blast, trying to get my shield up at the same time. Energy slams into me and I crash backward into something hard.
The Resistance soldiers have scattered in the commotion, taking meager cover behind the line of submersibles and racks of diving gear. Thrane lashes out with another jolt of energy that blows a submersible from its restraints, and it crashes to the deck with a hollow clanging thud.
Captain Fan, Chen, and the others won’t last long in here. I need to lure Thrane away from them. I get up off the deck and launch myself straight at him, flying as hard as I can. When the electricity lashes out from his hand I teleport past it, emerging on the other side with my fists in Thrane’s chest. It feels like slamming into a rock face, and my hands shatter and compress down into my forearms. I ignore the pain and keep flying until my ruined arms are around him and then I jump again, hoping I’ll take him with me.
It works, and we emerge over the ocean and I twist my body around him and try to get free, but he grabs me by the back of my head and squeezes my neck so hard my vision goes gray.
He holds me out at arm’s length and studies my face. I reach up to try to pry his fingers loose but my bones are powder and my arms flop at my sides, useless.
“You think you’ve won?” he says in a weary tone. “You think this accomplished anything?”
I don’t know exactly where we are, I just imagined the open water somewhere and then, poof, Fan and the others are in the clear. By the time Thrane gets back to the boat they’ll be long gone. I hope, anyway.
“Captain Fan isn’t dead,” I manage to croak out. “So I guess I did all right.”
“Yes.” Thrane grins and brings my face close to his. His breath washes over me in a chill. “Once again, you’ve earned this.”
I smell my flesh burning before I feel the pain lancing through my chest. Thrane releases my neck and lifts me higher on the shimmering black energy blade jutting from his fist. I shudder in pain and feel it saw deeper into me.
Agony tears through me like nothing I’ve ever felt, burning and ripping and shocking all at once, and I know this is the end. The throbbing in my head returns and I want to let go, abandon my body and wake once again in the peaceful embrace of the Aperion, but part of me refuses to give Thrane the satisfaction. No way I’m going to let him watch me die.
With everything I have left I imagine the one place in the world I want to be, picture Dad’s office back in the hospital in NY, and then I’m there.
27
Dead Again
I collapse on Dad’s office carpet, blood literally pouring out of me.
My head hits the floor and then he’s above me, peering down in a mixture of shock and confusion, but the doctor in him takes over and forces him into action.
“Shelley!” he yells. “Call a Response Team.”
He’s pressing something against my chest, trying to stop the bleeding, but that’s not going to help. I’m already so cold. The hospital PA buzzes with Shelley’s code but I don’t think I’ll be here when the team arrives. The room’s getting dim, but it’s nice to be here, with Dad.
He’s feeling around my back, and the pain sends a shooting white light into my brain.
“What happened?” Shelley asks from somewhere.
“I don’t know,” Dad answers. “She was impaled on something. There’s cauterization, electrical burns.”
“But who is she?” Shelley asks, her voice rising, edging on hysterical. “How did she get in here?”
“I don’t know—” Dad starts, and snaps his eyes to me as I grab his arm. He still doesn’t know me. No matter where I go, nothing sticks. I wonder if I accomplished anything with Thrane. Is Captain Fan still alive or did it all disappear the second I left?
I can do anything, but what’s the point if nothing I do matters?
And then I think of Dad, what he’d do—he’d never give up. If he could do something, he would. If that didn’t work, he’d try something else. Something is always better than nothing.
“Dad,” I croak. I want to tell him how much I miss him. That as much as dying sucks, being with him makes it a little easier, and that I’m sorry about what a mess I’m making on his carpet. They’ll probably need to replace it.
“Miss ...” Dad leans over me, his eyes fixed in concern. He doesn’t know me, but he’ll still do whatever he can to help. He won’t give up, even after I’m long gone.
Then my body stops breathing.
I tremble through a moment of panic, but it’ll be over soon. I’m going to wake up in the Aperion. I can’t die.
I still have a hard time believing it, but impossible isn’t impossible anymore.
My chest is thumping up and down. Something bubbles up my throat and spills down my cheeks.
Doesn’t matter now. The pain is dissolving, seeping away. The Aperion calls and I answer, grab hold to the knot in my head, and pull myself out of my dying body.
Then I’m soaring through nothing. Pulled inwards through a blaze of color and twisting sensation and find I’m back in the Aperion.
Phew.
I run my hands over my chest and it’s all in one piece. Everything the way it was.
Except I’m not standing in the pond like last time. I’m floating, hovering in an endless tunnel, one that twists out ahead of me through the black-and-purple light of the cosmos. I turn in the air and every direction I face becomes the way forward. No matter which direction I’m facing, that’s the only way I can go.
I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. No one comes to greet me or offer directions. After a few minutes—or a day, I don’t know—I figure I should probably get on with it, so I pick a direction and start floating. I don’t particularly feel like I’m getting anywhere but then I catch a glimpse of movement out of the corner of my eye. I spin and there’s nothing there but now I’m facing in a new direction. I float ahead and again, something moves in my peripheral vision and I spin, but see only the glowing stars and dust through the translucent tunnel walls.
Then I think about moving forward but don’t, and instead of a brief glimpse, I can see directly into another world: a primitive tribe living in the jungle. I don’t know if they’re even human yet, but they look like a family. A man is chipping a stone against another stone while two children chase a small yellow birdlike creature.
I tilt my head for a better look and the view changes to a glittering undersea city populated by fluttering creatures that don’t even remotely resemble humans, more like fluo
rescent octopi but with only four legs. Again, I move without moving and see a world ruined by war. Another twist shows me a herd of shaggy animals grazing over an orange grassland.
Are these other worlds? Or Earth done differently? I spin and spin and spin, see worlds fantastic and devastated. I could do this forever, until finally I come across a world that forces me to stop.
I see me, inside my old apartment. It’s the world Thrane took from me. I’m sitting at the kitchen table with Mom and Dad and we’re talking about something, we’re laughing, and then Mom turns and a tea towel is burning. She’d left it on the stove close to the burner and it caught fire and she had to dash over and toss it into the sink. This was just a few days before I discovered my powers, before I touched the chronoverse and doomed my world to destruction.
It’s there, waiting for me. I could have it all back. I only need to walk through and I’ll be there, I know it.
Is this why some boundless never return? Did the other me choose to stay?
But the thing is, even though I don’t know what the Aperion is, or what I am when I’m here, I’m certain the world I’m seeing isn’t real. I could go there, be her, live the way we were. But I’d also still be here, in the Aperion, coasting through eternity while Alpha and Delta and all the people in Gibzon’s timeline are absorbed into Thrane’s madness. While Chen and Captain Fan die fighting.
All that, out there—that’s real. This is a dream.
The thought of Thrane’s malevolent eyes scrubs the haze from my brain and I know I can’t stay.
“Antheia!” I call out, and then she’s beside me.
“Daughter,” she says, unsurprised by my call, like she was standing on the other side of nothing just waiting to make an appearance.
“Do you know Gibzon?” I ask. “Or the Omega Guard?”
She considers this a moment, then twitches her lower lip. “By reputation only,” she says.
