“So, boss, what’s the plan?” Seth asked with a flirty smile. He was getting his way; of course he was happy
I looked from Ty to Seth. They were ready to go to war with me. I wanted it to be easy. I wanted to be able to just flash in and take Logan’s mother to another time. But I had a very good feeling it wasn’t going to be as easy as that.
I filled them in on my plan in as simple terms as I could. In reality, it was just an outline. Get to Logan’s mom. Move her to her real time. Keep her there until Logan was born. After that, everything would have to change back. At least that was the hope.
I offered each guy a hand.
“Now is as good of time as any,” I told them. Waiting even a day or two wasn’t going to make a difference.
“Let’s do this,” Seth said with encouragement.
If I wasn’t so nervous, I would have laughed.
I closed my eyes and looked for the strings that connected me to everyone. Suddenly, I remembered that Logan still had my grandfather.
“My grandpa,” I said as we faded into nothingness.
I didn’t mean to direct us to him, but I did. Luckily I had enough control to stop us from appearing near him and had the time to look over the scene. My grandfather was in a room by himself with Logan and Kye in the outer room. They were waiting for me. If they didn’t want me to find him, they could have kept him hidden, but instead he was out in the open.
“It’s a trap,” Seth said as he looked over the scene.
“Yeah. Figured that much, but what am I supposed to do? Logan won’t hesitate to hurt him,” I replied.
“We go back and change everything, and you don’t have to worry,” Seth replied.
“And what happens if Logan figures out what I’m doing? My grandfather is there unprotected.” I looked longingly at the old man that had been the only father figure I had ever known.
“Let me protect him,” Ty said from beside me. “Send me down there and let me take him back to Egypt to stay safe. We can always return him once you’re done.”
I smiled. That was simple enough, and I was pretty sure my grandfather would love a trip into the past. Somehow Ty and I were always on the same page, just like friends were meant to be. I reached forward to set Ty down.
I felt the pull before I realized what was happening. Somehow, I was being stopped in place. I didn’t let Seth and Ty come back with me, pushing them the way we came. I saw Seth’s face contort in anger as I pushed him away.
“Sorry,” I mouthed as he disappeared. I couldn’t let him be trapped. Someone needed to continue on with our plan, and together he and Ty could do just that.
I felt a jolt as I was pulled back into the time travel and Ty took my place. He appeared next to my grandfather as Kye and Logan rushed into the room. Ty fell to his knees. I could see the pain that was shown in his eyes, but there was nothing we could do. Slowly his skin began to glow and the stones that I had embedded were being pulled out, piece by piece.
“We need to go now,” Seth said to me, tugging on my hand. “We need to go finish this.”
“Mari,” Logan called, though he couldn’t see me. “I told you I’d find a way to take back my stones. You’re next.”
My heart was still beating hard as I tried to process what I’d just seen. We were now sitting in an open meadow somewhere in some time period, but I had no clue where or when. Luckily the grass was tall enough to keep us covered. Logan was able to pull the stone out of Ty, and worse yet he found a way to immobilize us to do so. I now needed to stay away from him as much as I could. This wasn’t going to end well if we let him get too close.
“Mari, are you okay?” Seth asked from beside me.
I wasn’t, but I couldn’t tell him that. I not only left my grandfather behind, but now Ty.
“We need to keep going,” I replied.
I kneeled high enough to see over the grass. The field, while it seemed endless from the ground, was actually not that big. Maybe only about a hundred meters away was a farm house. A much younger Mr. Sangre appeared just outside the doorway. I wasn’t sure where we were going when we got here, but I knew now. I had followed Logan’s line into the past as I planned.
“I think we don’t need to go too far away,” I said to Seth as I scooted back down. “We might have just found Logan’s mother. Let’s hope we’re right on time.”
“Let’s observe first,” Seth suggested and began to creep through the grass in the direction I had indicated the house was located.
“Um. Seth,” I said to him and he stopped. “I’ve got an easier way.”
I held out my hand to him and flashed us across the meadow into the house. We were upstairs in a lofted sleeping area with Mr. Sangre and Logan’s mother right below us.
“Martha, you need to come with me now,” Mr. Sangre told the obviously pregnant woman.
“No. I have a bad feeling about leaving,” she complained before gasping for air. She grabbed her middle and rocked on her toes before opening her eyes and looking back at Mr. Sangre. “I need to stay here.”
“That’s just the hormones. I promise you, the future has a much better place to have children. They can even numb you so that you don’t feel the pain.” He was outright begging.
“James, please believe me. We need to stay,” she told him.
Mr. Sangre reached for her arm, and I knew exactly what was going to happen. He was going to take her away, and we would lose our chance to keep Logan from messing everything up.
“She’s right,” I said, traveling instantly from my place in the loft to where they were standing.
Mr. Sangre stared at me in shock. He stepped in front of her.
“No, you can’t take her from me,” he told me.
I looked at him, perplexed with his odd possessive behavior.
“I wasn’t planning on it. It is just that she needs to stay here to have the baby. You can’t take her away to the future, or it will mess everything up. The whole future from before this time until long after will be altered, and not in a good way,” I told him.
Mr. Sangre continued to stand protectively in front of Logan’s mother. She grunted as another contraction took her, and he was torn between her and me. All I saw when he looked at her was concern, and when he looked at me, it was fear.
“I know I went against what you told me. I know I wasn’t supposed to have a child with Milly; I couldn’t help it,” Mr. Sangre sounded so young and unsure. He wasn’t even close to the old, wise man I knew.
“Who do you think I am?” I asked. I had never talked to him before when he was this young, but he was certain he had met me.
“It doesn’t matter the shape you take, Goddess, a true keeper always knows it’s you.” He bowed his head to me as Milly’s contraction faded.
I wanted to look at Seth to gauge what he thought I should do. Mr. Sangre thought I was the goddess. Then again, he thought I was against the child being born. That wasn’t the issue. I didn’t care if Logan was born; I just needed him not to be able to time travel.
“Why did you go against my word?” I asked. If he thought I was the goddess, maybe it would help me get everything under control.
“Because I love her,” he told me.
“Is love worth ruining the world?” I asked.
“How could a child born of love ruin the world?” he asked back.
That wasn’t going to work, so I had to try another way.
“Is this the time Milly was born in?” I asked.
She looked up at me with questioning eyes.
“I have lived here my whole life. Yes, this is my time,” she replied, before another contraction took over.
“And you don’t want her to have the baby here because?” I asked Mr. Sangre.
“I might not have followed your orders to stay away from Milly, but I have always followed your rules.”
That was why no one seemed to know how to make a gatekeeper without powers and made even more sense why Logan made Miller that way. He
hated the goddess. Of course he wasn’t about to follow her rules.
“And if I gave you permission to have this baby, on one condition, would you follow that rule?” I asked.
Mr. Sangre’s eyes turned from anger and protectiveness to hope.
“Yes. I would do anything,” he replied.
“Stay here in this time. Have the baby here and stay here with them,” I ordered him.
“But what about the gates, and the people traveling between times?”
“That will be no more. I have taken back my stones. Stay here. Live your life here and never talk about time travel to anyone ever again. Would you do that to keep your son?”
Mr. Sangre looked at me, his eyes going wide.
“It’s a boy?” he asked.
“Yes,” Milly replied through gritted teeth. “He will do just what you ask.”
I smiled and nodded to her before disappearing back up to the loft. I took Seth’s hand in mine. Now all we had to do was wait. Seth nodded to me as I laid my head on his shoulder.
Down below us, Mr. Sangre took his wife to her bed. She was groaning and screaming, but we couldn’t step away. We needed to be sure that Logan was in the right time period. By the time baby Logan was born, I was ready to leave. I needed to be sure everyone in the future was safe.
I held my hand out for Seth. I hoped that Melissa was right.
Seth grinned at me and nodded. He had faith that it was fine, but my gut told me it wasn’t quite done yet.
I dropped us down in the outer room this time. I wasn’t sure what Logan had used to freeze me before, but I didn’t want to be surprised. Logan was in the other room with Kye, Ty, and my grandfather. My heart sank. Logan was still in the future, which meant something didn’t work right. I took Seth’s hand and crept closer to the door.
“What’s wrong?” Kye asked Logan. Logan was rubbing his head.
“Nothing,” Logan growled.
I stood in the shadow of the doorway as Logan paced around the room, stopping to glare at Ty, who they had gagged and bound on the floor. Logan walked over and kicked Ty.
“What are you guys planning?” he grumbled, but there was no way he was actually looking for a response. Ty was gagged after all.
I took Seth’s hand silently and whisked us away to my grandfather’s place to talk.
“We need to get Ty and my grandfather out of there,” I told Seth once we could speak freely.
“But how do we get rid of Logan? He’s still there,” Seth verbalized what I was thinking about.
I looked down at the floor, and my eye caught on the pendant around my neck from Sim’s father. I knew what to do.
“I give you this, and you can then go in and rescue my grandfather and Ty. You can travel with one person, and Ty has a stone, so you guys can head back to our time in the past. My grandfather would love that.”
“And what will you be doing?” Seth asked.
“Leading Logan on a wild goose chase after I give you this.” I tapped the pendant. Without it, Logan would sense me and come after me. All I had to do was stay one step ahead of him until Seth got everyone home. After they were home, we could figure out what went wrong and try to get rid of Logan’s powers again.
“I can’t let you do that. It’s too dangerous,” Seth replied.
“It has to be me. Logan won’t be able to sense you and come after you, but he will me. I have always been on his radar.” I took Seth’s hand in my own. “I can do this. Believe me. I can do this.”
For once I didn’t need the pep talk for myself. This was to reassure Seth. I was certain that I could do it. Seth stared at me and then smiled. He could see it in my eyes. I was ready for this. This time, Logan wasn’t going to win.
“Fine. But you come right home to me. You don’t try to play the hero and go back to Logan’s parent’s time to figure out what we did wrong,” Seth held out his hand for me to shake.
“Promise. Just a game of chase and then home.” I shook his hand.
Seth sighed, but at least he agreed with me.
“Once I take this off, I’m going to send you back to his place. That way you don’t have to use your stones,” I told him. Seth nodded. “Just get everyone home for me, please.”
Seth stood before me and placed each of his hands on my cheeks. He stared into my eyes, and for the first time ever, I saw how much he believed in me. I was ready to face Logan, and he was ready to let me. We would always be a team, and he was showing me just how much he believed in me by not arguing.
“Marcella, I love you and always will. Come back to me in one piece, please.” He pulled me to him, pressing our bodies as close as he could with us both being fully clothed. His lips met mine, and I savored the moment, even though it was going to be short.
“Always,” I replied with a sigh as soon as I could catch my breath.
I lifted the pendant cord from my neck while still holding it in my other hand. I placed it around Seth’s neck, and he nodded. Without waiting to regret my choice, I pushed Seth back to the Sangre mansion. Seth stared at me as he disappeared. He had complete faith in me, and he was the one person I would never disappoint. Now it was time to play chase.
I felt the air in front of me shimmer, and I disappeared as fast as I could.
I didn’t think about where I was headed next until I was already standing there. Before me was the expansive wall that I recognized to belong to the Taj Mahal in India. I had never been there before, but since Sim was on my brain when I began to travel it seemed like a good place to set down. The expansive, white, mushroom-topped building stood across a long lake from me. I looked at it in the setting sunlight, and it seemed just like a travel magazine image I had once seen. But I had to keep moving. When the air next to me shimmered, I let myself fade from India.
Notre Dame towered above me as I appeared in France. Now this was familiar; I had been there before. I looked around, and it was still open to visitors, so I made a run for the entrance. Blinking here and there was going to be tiring, but it didn’t take too long. I needed Logan to follow me on foot a bit to waste more time. As expected, Logan appeared just where I had been. He looked around the open square and quickly zeroed in on me going into the building. I wanted to run further, but worried he would appear next to me.
I faded out of France and ended up in front of another familiar building. This time, I was on Main Street in Disney World. People bustled around me as the theme park was in full session. No one seemed to notice me appear. Logan appeared not too far away, but with the crowd he couldn’t get near me. I began to walk through people and made sure he was close behind. When he got closer, I flashed away again.
This time I ended up in Washington DC, in front of the twenty-foot-tall statue of Mr. Abe Lincoln. I saw Logan coming in, and I hurried across the room, stepping behind one of the columns. Surprisingly the place was very slow and wasn’t at all crowded.
“Mari,” Logan called to me. He began walking to the other side of the memorial. “What game are you playing?”
I didn’t dare answer. It seemed he could sense me, but not as well as I expected.
“You know you can’t fight fate, right?” he called out as he shoes clicked on the marble floors. He was walking even further away from me.
Fate? Was he serious? Logan was doing everything he could to fight against fate.
“Or me,” Logan said from right next to me.
I faded out as quickly as I could. I didn’t have a clue how he got that close. As I began to fade back, I realized I was in the room that Logan was holding my grandfather in before. Kye was lying on the floor and immediately I felt the pain of being immobilized. I looked down. Logan had a grasp on my arm. He had forced me to come to that room.
“Kye, get up,” Logan growled at Kye.
It seemed I wasn’t the only one that was affected by the room. Logan was also frozen in place.
Kye pushed himself up on his knees for a moment and then after shaking his head, he stood up. He walke
d over to us, looking at us both.
“Take me out of here so I can move,” he told Kye. Kye didn’t move. “Did you hear me? Take me out of here.”
“Yeah, about that,” Kye replied. “I kind of like it better when you can’t move. I like it even better when you can’t time travel.” Kye bumped Logan’s hand, and a large brown stone fell to the ground.
Logan was pissed, but began to smile as he slowly started to move again.
“I’ll deal with you later,” he scolded Kye. Kye just stared back at him.
“Before I lose my chance, I wanted you to know you were a crappy father in this lifetime and all the others,” Kye said to Logan. Logan stared at him like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You never deserved Mom, and I’m glad that this is finally over.”
“This is only over when I say it’s over,” Logan growled. He moved to strike Kye, but his hand went right through him.
I looked at Kye. Was he disappearing? Logan reached to take my arm, and he went through me as well.
“What’s going on?” he said, concern now laced his voice as his anger was completely drained from him.
“Mari fixed everything, just like I knew she would.” Kye grinned at me. “You no longer can ruin this world or anyone’s world for that matter. You are now just a normal person. Goodbye, Dad.”
Logan faded with a shocked expression on his face. It would be the last time I ever saw him, and I wasn’t sad to see him leave. In only seconds, everything changed. Making his parents stay in the past had done it. Logan could no longer bug a single person or me in particular again. He was gone. It turned to Kye to smile and celebrate when it hit me. With Logan gone, Kye would be gone soon too.
“What about you?” I asked him. Without Logan, there would never be a Kye.
Kye took my hand and transported us back to Egypt. I knew the moment we crossed the border we were home. He let go of my hand, but not because he chose to. He was now fading also.
I looked up at Kye. He was no longer the twenty-year-old man that had become my best friend. He was younger now. Much younger. A thirteen-year-old boy looked back at me. He flashed a lopsided grin that reminded me so much of my father.
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