by Jill Cooper
When I get to the lobby, I peer around the corner. There are three cops pacing in the lobby. I’m going to have to make it across the room and out the emergency exit that faces away from the busy street. Out the front exit, I can see police squad car lights spinning, flashing red, and blue.
No matter where I go, this isn’t going to be easy. I need to find a fast way out and it has to happen now.
With my back to the wall, I wait for one of the guards to get close. My hands are twitching, ready to make a move. I’m anxious and my legs jitter as if they’re Mexican jumping beans. I grab my black electrical stick and pull it free. I spin it as if it’s a baton, just as I used to when I was a cheerleader.
The guard approaches. I sink back into the stairwell so he can’t see me. When he’s close enough, I strike like a cobra. My arm up offensively, I jolt the side of his neck with electricity. His body goes rigid as I hold the baton there long enough to render him unconscious, leaving a giant red welt on his neck.
The other guards’ eyes are on me before his body hits the floor. I reach down and free the other electrical stick from his holster. The guards and I approach each other.
Zot-zot-zot goes the batons as I bang them together.
The blue light sears up the black devices and as I pull them apart, the electrical field grows, breaching the space between them. The further I pull them apart, the wider the net between them. The guards stop as they see me coming. Frozen with fear because of what I’m about to unleash on their sorry little butts.
They should be scared. They’re nothing but rental cops and sure, they do a good job most days, but they didn’t train at the academy as I did. They didn’t zot electrical prods together for the fun of it just to see how many volts you could take before going unconscious.
I’m a damn good cop and I’m a girl, which means I had a lot to prove then.
The fact that I’m only another guilty suspect fuels my anger as I stretch my prods apart creating an electric sail. The field of blue grows between the open spaces like a net, desperate to cling to each other. “Flick of my wrist and this electrical field will run off and just keep running until it hits the wall. The floor. Or you.” My eyes widen for impact and from the way the guards shake; it works.
“Get out of my way. Now. Or you’re going to feel what it’s like to fry from the inside out.” It wouldn’t kill them. It’d hurt for a while, but they’d be okay.
But they don’t need to know that.
The guards back away, keeping their distance. I trot pass them and then spin around. I walk backward to keep my eye on them. I use the monitors on the ceiling to keep an eye on the door.
When a green light sweeps over me, an alarm sounds.
My heart pounds as I rotate and I slam through the glass door, my arms up to protect my face. I’m back on the street and everywhere the cameras are red and alarms are screaming in all directions. They’re pulling out all the stops to catch me.
I take off running. I bank right around a corner and if I don’t stop, I’m going to slam into two Rewind Officer’s standing by a patrol car. I cross the black rods in my hands to form an X. My right leg shoots out high to kick one in the chest while the other one gets the full brunt of my elbow.
At least, that’s what is supposed to happen.
Instead, he catches my elbow as the other officer, Mahoney, deflects my foot. I spin toward the ground and land on one knee. I jump up right and we duel, our black batons meeting mid-air. The charge between us intensifies and spark flies off at random. I spin; they pivot as they try to get their prod against some of my exposed skin. High jabs and low kicks, and one of the guards crashes to the pavement and I rear back, my leg coming high, kicking Mahoney right in the face.
“Uhhh,” Mahoney grunts. Older, his face is flushed pink and there’s sweat on his brow. He holds up his hands, attempting to fend me off but my foot cracks through his feeble defenses and with a defining crunch, catches him right under the jaw.
He starts to fall to his knees and I help him along with a jolt of electricity to the back of the neck. “Sorry, old pal.” I struggle for breath as I step off the sidewalk. Behind me, I leave the wreckage of the two officers, downed like bowling pins. Mahoney is clutching his neck, lying on the concrete with murder in his eyes.
“You leave us here like this and you’re done, Winters. You’re done!”
“We’re all done.” I consider throwing the batons down for impact, but decide to keep one for myself.
I trudge off the curb and run to meet Jeff. I need to keep going. Can’t slow down the pace. If I do, my heart might catch up with me.
And that’s something that can’t happen.
****
When I get to Boston Garden, everything is locked down. I jump the fence and walk across the luscious green grass despite the signs everywhere that say not to. Under the pedestrian bridge, the Swan Boats are locked down for the night.
Jeff sits in one of them.
I hurry over and when he sees me, his eyes light up with relief. He stands and we hug. The embrace is short, far too short. For a brief moment, I hold his face in my hands and gaze into his eyes. Seeing his love gives me everything I need to push on. Devotion.
I just hope we can make it through. I hope if we help Lara undo all of this, that somehow, we’ll still find each other. Somehow, we’ll still have a future.
“What’s going on, Cass?” He’s scared. I can hear it and I’m scared too. I’m terrified.
“Do you love me?”
Jeff’s eyes widen, exasperated with me. “Don’t ask me to prove it again. You know I do.” He holds my chin delicately. “But whatever is going on, it goes far above anything you’ve ever done before.”
“We don’t have time to answer every question you have, but I need you to get me into Rewind. The old Pru towers and we need to do it now.” I pause to let it sink in and I can practically see an exclamation mark appear over his head. “Lara’s there with Daniels and she needs our help. All of our help.”
“To do what?”
“Change the past. Stop all of this from happening.”
Jeff isn’t a convert yet. He shakes his head and wipes his mouth. “This is…crazy. You’ve asked me some crazy stuff before, but never like this.”
“I know and if we had more time I’d tell you all of it. But she’s in there now. Already I’ve wasted enough time. So I need you to take me in there. Tell everyone you’ve convinced me to turn myself in. I don’t care what we say as long as it gets me through the door.”
Unsure, Jeff’s face flickers.
I grip his jacket in my hand and yank him close. “You have to get me to Lara and it has to be now.”
“She’s so important to you? Suddenly, she’s more important than your career? Me? Your life? What you’re asking…”
“Daniels is manipulating everything. Everyone. He’s killing people and using information only he has to cover it up. He killed Katie. Reynold’s wife.” My mouth tastes bitter.
Like bile.
“The news is saying you did that.” Jeff stares deep into my eyes with a question.
A question I can’t believe he needs to ask.
I’m appalled and my mouth gapes open. “You really think I’d do that? After everything…we share a bed, and you believe I’m capable of killing a defenseless woman? Someone I was trying to help?”
Jeff sighs. “No, of course not. I’m sorry. Just…to lose you, Cass? Do you have any idea what they’re going to do to you if you fail at all this?”
“Well, thanks for the vote of confidence.” My eyebrows arch with anger.
Jeff sighs. “I didn’t mean it like that. You know I didn’t, but you’re scaring me. All of this is scaring me.”
“I know,” I say softly. “It’s all I know and I don’t want to die, Jeff.” I slide my hand behind his head and force him closer. My lips play against his. “I want us to be the future and doing this, it’s all we have. It’s our only chance. Please.”
Jeff’s eyes dance with mine as we kiss. I know he’ll help me. I always knew he would, but this final tender moment among the swan boats is ours. It’s something we both need. I wish it’d last a few moments longer. I wish it could.
But it can’t. Because nothing is forever.
We’re racing toward the end game.
He takes my hand in his and squeezes his fingers around mine. Jeff steps off the boat and even though I don’t need his help, he grips my arm as I step down. I let him do it because I always have. I might be strong, but I love Jeff. I like that he takes care of me, even though I can take care of myself. Isn’t that what love is all about? Taking care of each other.
In the car, I lay down in the backseat and he speeds towards Rewind’s headquarters. “Inside, when we get there, things are going to get tense. Bad.” I lick my lips. “Find somewhere to hide and don’t come out until it’s safe.”
“No,” Jeff says with deep resolve. “I’m not going to hide while you’re risking everything.”
“Jeff…”
“I said no, Cassidy.”
Silently I curse, but I nod. “Okay. We do it together then.” I lean my head against the seat cushion. The drive to the Pru seems to take forever, but part of me wishes it’d never end. Once we get there, I can’t guess how it’ll go.
I don’t know what will happen when it’s through.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I say a silent prayer. I’m not the type, usually, but on a day like this, we can use all the help we can get.
Please let Lara be okay. Please…
16: Lara
I wish I had never come here.
I wish I never thought I was smart enough or brave enough to beat Daniels at his own game. Before this big reveal, I didn’t even realize what the game was. I thought we were playing Monopoly, but it turns out we’re playing Chess.
Daniels has been twenty steps ahead of me because he knows what I’ll do, twenty different ways from Sunday, because he controls everything.
The wave of the future; multiple futures that spread infinitely across the universe. Sure, I’ve heard the theories before from every Whovian I’ve ever met, but now, I’m staring truth in the face.
Literally.
Daniels escorts me to what used to be the other side of the observation deck. It’s been reconstructed into a narrow hallway and behind the curved panes of glass is a room that spreads as far as the eye can see. It contains a series of white and silver tubes, coax cables, and monitors. Inside, people sit at computer terminals and the air is electrified, as if we’re in the middle of a lightning storm.
I push my hand to the glass.
Daniels studies my expression. “They’re studying the future near and far. It spreads like a spider web across infinity, Lara.” He talks quick, as if he’s excited. Daniels wipes his mouth as saliva gathers in the corners of his mouth.
There’s no witty comeback from me this time.
I’m not even sure any of this has sunk in yet. All I can do is stare. The place is massive and the amount of power needed to generate something like this I can’t even comprehend. How was Daniels able to do this so easily and transform the country—the world—in such a short time?
“You want to know, don’t you?” Daniel leans in and whispers against my ear. “You want to see how it all works? Think I should let you in on my secrets.”
I stare into his dead, hollow eyes. that are so near to mine. I could reach out, snap his neck, but that wouldn’t change the future. It wouldn’t change the dozens upon dozens of alternate universes that he’s manipulated.
I nod, staring into the face of whom might as well be the devil himself.
Daniels takes me to a small glass door. He knocks on it and then swipes his ID card. As the door opens, those at the computer terminals stand to salute Daniels. He ushers me in, his hand firm on my arm.
Stepping inside, I glance over my shoulder. I hope Cassidy is on the way as I step into the belly of the beast.
Daniels, for his part, is relaxed as he takes me through the facility. He lifts his cane and swipes it in the air to gesture at the expansive nature of it all. “Here we exist almost outside of time itself. Able to move back, move forward. Catalog hundreds of different choices and different outcomes with a flick of a switch.”
My jaw clenches. “That’s how you were able to frame Reynold.”
“He was guilty in one world.” Daniels’ eyes flash and his lips turn down in a defensive expression. “All the other worlds, he was guilty of helping our detractors. Some they won, some they lost, but in all of them he was guilty.”
Of trying to take down Daniels? Reynold deserved a prize.
“This is the world where it matters most. The building block of all others. Here, Reynold had to fall. If he took me down, if they took down this place, all of it would fall apart. No other second chances.”
“So this place is connected to all the others? It draws its power from the other timelines.” Gears begin to tick inside my brain.
Daniels nods. “You could say that.”
“How did you learn how to do that?” I ask, my brows pinching together. How could one man be this smart? Daniels had never been on my radar, but I’m now beginning to think he’s more dangerous than Patricia James was. Rex. Everyone I’ve gone up against in my past.
“I’ll show you. I call them my collection.”
The eerie way he says it, with a click of his tongue, makes my skin crawl. I’m about to get the final piece and I just pray I get enough information to stop the creation of this place.
He leads me further in. I see stations on the side with beds. This must be where the time travelers hook up. We turn the corner and then I see them.
Rows of small glass boxes, almost as if they were designed to hold life-sized Barbie’s. However, inside, there weren’t dolls at all.
My throat is tight and I can’t breathe. Beside me, Daniels’ eyes glint with happiness. Pride. “Aren’t they beautiful?”
Inside the glass boxes. No, I almost can’t believe it. I touch one box with my hand and my lip quivers.
Inside the glass box… Inside all these glass boxes…
It’s me.
****
I’m in a cage.
Dozens, possibly a hundred versions of me. Some young, some old, but they are all without a doubt me.
Lara Crane Montgomery.
I can’t fathom it. I can’t deal.
The ground shifts below me and I sink to my knees. My breath is rapid and my pulse is off the charts. If it’s possible to feel your blood pressure rocket toward the roof then I’m there. My vision starts to sway almost as if I’m about to jump back in time, but my vision is going dark.
I’m going to pass out.
The only thing keeping me grounded in this grotesque version of the future is my hand pressed against the glass. I stare up at her. Lara. Me. Some version of me that I don’t know and don’t want to know, but there she is.
She’s the only thing keeping me from blacking out.
Her head is tilted back and over her face, she wears what looks like a gas mask, but it’s fitted with a hose. It runs up out of the box and into the ceiling where all the tubes and pipes pulse with life. Lara’s arms are spread-eagled and are held up by a series of wires running through them and into multiple points throughout her body. The wires glow and pulse blue, flowing with life.
Lara’s face is wrinkled and her long curls are silver. She’s been here a long time and I stare at her. I rise to my feet and whisper her name with uncertainty, almost as if I’m whispering to the dead. “Lara?”
I’m not sure if she can hear me, then her head jerks and her eyes open. Lifeless. Dull. They take in the sight of me, of whom she was one, and they light up with a spark. A tear forms in the corner of her eye.
Seeing me upsets her. She’s trying to move. Trying to say something. Alarms sound around us and Daniels pushes a button on the box. With a hiss, a nozzle lowers into the prison, fillin
g it with a haze of white smoke.
Drugs.
Lara falls back into her stupor and I feel as if she’s been ripped away from me. I grit my teeth and angry, hot tears fill my eyes, but I dare not let them spill.
“She was first. The first one of our assassins, as you’ve called them in the past, to jump back in time. Made that jump across the slipstream into the world where you were still in the cage. We grabbed her and brought her here.”
This version of me…this version of me had never gotten out of the cage? The grief I feel for her, for me, threatens to cripple me. The prize of toppling Rewind, of bringing Daniels down seems so far off now. There isn’t even a hint of light at the end of the tunnel.
Not even a beacon of hope, because no matter what I do, there is always a version of me, of a world, that’s lost everything.
“You’re the last,” Daniels says in my ear. “The last to add to my collection. I’ve saved a box just for you.”
My chin quivers and the emotion welling inside me is so intense, I can’t stand to feel it.
“And the most important. You’re the one who was that Lara in the box. And that one. And that one over there. A hundred different choices and you’ve made nearly all of them. You mind is the most powerful of them all. Once I hook you up, Rewind will have no limits. No one will ever get close to stopping us again.”
The truth of his words is daunting and they anger me. I squeeze my jaw together so tightly, it aches. “You’re using me, my brain to power this thing?”
So twisted, so wrong.
I see the answer in his eye and it sickens me. I clench my stomach and think I might be sick.
“Monroe went back a hundred times and brought you to me. But for some reason this time,” Daniels shrugs, “he was stranded and you ended up somewhere you shouldn’t have. The middle of the street, rather than in my containment hold.”
Daniels puffs up his chest and takes a step back to gaze at me with a strange lust in his eyes, as if he must have me. Must understand me.
I want to punch him in the face.
