A Matter of Time

by Brian Harmon

  “It’s the old municipal tunnel system,” explained Paul. “Back in the early nineteen hundreds, they built these to connect the police station, courthouse, mayor’s office, jail and city hall. I guess it was supposed to let all the important city employees avoid the cold while running back and forth between buildings. Also I guess they probably thought it was a more secure way to move prisoners around.” He pointed to the door. “If you managed to break through that door, you’d end up in the basement of the police station.”

  Eric frowned. “But we’re not anywhere near the court house…”

  “Well, yeah. Not anymore. Only the police station and city hall are still in their original places. The others all moved. So they pretty much just use these for tornado shelters now.”

  “How do you know these things?” wondered Eric.

  “I’ve done a lot of contract work for the city.”

  “Oh yeah.” Paul was friends with one of the city’s contractors. His carpentry business wasn’t very big, but he had a great reputation for quality work and staying on schedule.

  Kevin had wandered into the tunnel. Now he yelled back at them, “Gate’s locked down here. We’ll have to backtrack to get out.”

  Eric had expected as much. He looked back at the locked gate again. “What’s down there? Is there another way out?”

  Paul glanced at the tunnel. “That’s where the jail used to be, but that’s a parking lot now, so there’s not even a door down there anymore. It’s a dead end.”

  So there was no way there was anyone down there. It was impossible.

  “We should get going,” suggested Paul.

  Eric nodded. He was more than ready. And yet, he found himself hesitating for a moment as he stood there, gazing down that dead-end tunnel, wondering.

  Did I imagine it? he thought.

  LIKE I’VE TOLD YOU BEFORE, texted Isabelle, MY ENTIRE PERSPECTIVE OF YOUR SURROUNDINGS COMES FROM YOU. ANYTHING YOU SEE OR HEAR IS EXACTLY AS REAL TO ME AS IT IS TO YOU

  That was pretty much the answer he expected from her.

  But if it wasn’t my imagination…?

  I JUST REALLY HOPE IT WAS YOUR IMAGINATION, BECAUSE THAT WAS REALLY TERRIFYING

  It certainly was.

  AND…

  And?

  Isabelle hesitated. Then she said, IT’S PROBABLY NOTHING

  Eric waited.

  IT’S PROBABLY BECAUSE THE WHOLE THING WAS A PRODUCT OF YOUR IMAGINATION. BECAUSE I’M IN YOUR HEAD ALL THE TIME. I KNOW A FEW THINGS ABOUT HOW YOU THINK

  She did, indeed. Sometimes she knew him better than he did.

  IT FELT FAMILIAR SOMEHOW

  What does that mean?

  LIKE I SAID. PROBABLY NOTHING. JUST GET MOVING. I DON’T LIKE IT THERE

  Eric followed Paul and Kevin back through the tunnels and caught them up on the day’s events. He told them about the letters from 1962. The monsters roaming the hallways of the Goss Building. Karen’s odd behavior. The steampunk monk and his psycho water pistol. The hot-tempered young stranger.

  He left off the part about the demonic figure in the locked tunnel, though. That seemed a little too crazy even for him.

  “It’s the same sort of thing again,” marveled Paul. “Why is it always you?”

  “I have no freaking idea.”

  “And why the fuck don’t you carry a gun?” he added. “It’s not like this is your first rodeo.”

  “What does it matter?” countered Eric. “He got the drop on me. He would’ve just taken it like he did my wallet and phone.”

  “Maybe this time. But what about next time you run into one of those monsters? Or another psychotic cowboy? Remember him?”

  “Of course I remember him,” replied Eric. You didn’t forget something like that.

  “Then why would you go into this stuff unarmed?”

  “I don’t know. Guns complicate things.”

  “Sometimes,” Paul admitted. “And sometimes they simplify things. A lot.”

  He wasn’t convinced. He couldn’t have simply carried one into the art gallery with him, even if he’d had one. There were gun laws. And if he ever got caught sneaking onto private property, it wasn’t going to look any better for him if he was armed.

  It just didn’t seem like a good idea. It was asking for more trouble than it would solve, in his opinion.

  “The real question,” said Kevin, “is what do we do now?”

  Eric considered it. Hector’s first letter sent them straight to the cemetery, where the second letter was buried. That letter sent them to the Goss Building, where they eventually found the third letter. The only hint that letter gave them, however, was the vague mention of an “old folk’s home” which they somehow managed to trace to the Aberration Station, where there was no fourth letter. Instead, he ran into the steampunk monk, who drugged him and sent him stumbling to the entrance of these old tunnels, where he in turn was confronted by the young stranger. Just as Isabelle theorized at the beginning of this odd journey, nothing happened by chance. So why did that mysterious voice in his head send him here? What was he supposed to find in this place?

  He could think of only a single clue that the stranger might’ve given him. “Have you guys ever heard the name ‘Rossetter’?”

  Kevin shook his head.

  Paul considered it for a moment. “Sounds familiar…but I can’t place it. Why?”

  “Wire Ties asked me what I knew about Rossetter.”

  “I’m not sure. Sorry.”

  They reached the end of the final tunnel and stepped out into the bright sunlight. It was practically blinding after being trapped in the dark for so long.

  No one was around. The only people they could see were two fishermen in a boat far downstream. The young stranger hadn’t lingered. He probably assumed he wouldn’t be able to call for help with his cell phone so far away.

  Eric couldn’t help but wonder where he’d gone and what he was up to.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Paul and Kevin led Eric along the river path to a nearby parking lot where Paul’s pickup truck waited. From there, they wasted no time returning to the Aberration Station, where Karen and Diane were waiting for them beside the PT Cruiser.

  Diane was tall and slender, with long, auburn hair. She was the kind of person who was almost always cheerful, but today she was chewing on her nails and looking worried.

  Karen was watching a squirrel as if frolicked in the grass.

  As soon as Eric stepped out of the truck, Diane said, “Isabelle called and told us everything.”

  Keven took out his phone with the pictures he’d taken and handed it to Karen. “Isabelle’s great, but I don’t think words can possibly do it justice.”

  “That’s awesome,” giggled Karen. “Hector’s hero from the future. Totally dignified.”

  “It’s hilarious,” said Diane, taking the phone from her hand. “His expression is priceless in this one. It’s just too bad that guy didn’t strip him down to his undies, too. That could’ve been your Christmas card this year.”

  “Oh that would have been better,” she laughed.

  “Yes, it’s hilarious,” growled Eric. “Can we stay on task, please?”

  Diane handed the phone back to Kevin. “Touchy…”

  “What did you do to your hand?” asked Karen.

  Eric lifted his hand and looked at it. He’d forgotten about that. “Just a scratch,” he assured her.

  “Looks like more than a scratch,” observed Diane.

  It had bled more than he expected it to, but it still wasn’t that bad.

  Karen opened her purse and began digging for a cleaning pad and a bandage. She was always prepared. You’d think he was the clumsiest person alive, judging by the amount of first aid supplies she always kept on hand. And it wasn’t because of these weird adventures. She’d always been extra-prepared for emergencies, for as long as he’d known her.

  He thought maybe it had something to do with her habit of hiding her emotions. It was
hard for her to say she was scared that something would happen to him, but easy to buy stockpiles of Band-Aids.

  “Anything from Holly?” asked Eric.

  “Hm?” said Karen, as she stared into her purse.

  “Holly?” he said again.

  “Oh. She called a little bit ago.” She frowned at her purse. “What was I doing again?”

  Diane shot Eric a worried glance and took the purse from her. “Let me help you.”

  She let go of the purse without protest. “’Kay.”

  “Holly said she tried to call you,” said Diane. “But she didn’t get an answer. We told her you were underground.”

  It made sense. He probably didn’t have reception when he was in those tunnels. Isabelle had been able to contact him, but that was different. She could almost always connect with him, regardless of whether he had a signal. No one could quite explain how or why.

  “Did she say if she saw anything when she cast her spell?”

  “Just that it was complicated. She wanted to talk to you directly.”

  It was always complicated. Part of it was that Holly was so young. She was a talented witch, but in many ways she was still a novice. And she was doing it all by herself. She didn’t have her sisters to help channel energy. But looking into the future was always tricky, even for the most advanced of witches. It was constantly in motion and so easy to veer off course.

  And it was the nature of the thing to be vague and ambiguous. The future, itself, was but a riddle.

  Except this time was even more complicated. The future and the past were connected somehow.

  Diane found the first aid supplies in Karen’s purse and began cleaning Eric’s hand. It was weird having someone other than Karen patch him up. But Karen seemed to be distracted by the leaves fluttering in the trees overhead. She was squinting up at them, looking oblivious to everyone around her.

  “Is…she all right?” asked Kevin.

  “She’s been like that since we got here,” recalled Eric. “I’m not sure what it is. It’s like a medicine fog, except she’s not taking any medicine.”

  “Isabelle said she was acting a little off,” said Diane. “But this is kind of weird.”

  They all watched her for a moment, but she didn’t notice any of them.

  Diane finished applying the bandage and then put the remaining first aid supplies back in Karen’s purse. Then she took Karen by the hand and said, “I think I’ll take her back to my place and keep an eye on her.”

  Karen turned and faced her now. Suddenly, she seemed alert again. “No. We should go to the library and see if we can find any news articles from 1962.”

  “That’s not a bad idea,” said Eric. “It’d be helpful to find out if anything bad happened that year.” And it should keep the two of them safe from whatever was going on with Steampunk Monk and the stranger from the tunnels.

  She nodded. “And I want to see if we can find any trace of Hector Conant. Maybe take a look into Gardenhour’s history, too.”

  Diane looked her over. “Sweetie, I’m not sure there’s enough Ritalin in the world to keep you focused enough to do research today.”

  “We’ve got to find Hector,” she insisted.

  Diane sighed. “I guess I’ll be doing some research, then.”

  Eric’s cell phone rang. It was Holly. He needed to take this call. If anyone might have an answer for him, it was her. But his battery was nearly depleted. Quickly, before the stupid voicemail could answer, he opened the PT Cruiser’s door, plugged the phone into the travel charger and accepted the call. “Hey Holly!”

  “Finally!” she sighed.

  “Sorry. No reception in the catacombs. What’s going on?”

  “I need you to meet me in the parking lot of the Top-Down Bar as soon as you can.”

  Eric had to take a second to register that. “Wait… Top-Down?”

  “You know the place, right? West side of town?”

  “Yeah. I know it.” But he’d never been there before. It wasn’t the classiest place around.

  “Hurry. We don’t have a lot of time.”

  “Okay. I’m on my way.” But she was already gone.

  “What’s going on?” asked Diane.

  Eric dropped the phone into the cup holder and sat down behind the wheel. “I’ve got to go. Holly needs me to meet her. Sounds important.”

  She stared back at him, concerned. “Is it extra bad when a witch says it’s important?”

  “Probably,” he replied. He took all of Hector’s letters out of the glove compartment and handed them to Diane. “Take these. This is everything we know so far about what was going on in 1962.”

  “You be careful,” said Karen. “Tell Isabelle to stay in touch.”

  “She will. And she’ll contact you if we find any more letters.”

  “We’ll come with you,” said Paul as he opened the passenger-side door and climbed in. Kevin followed his lead and slid into the back seat.

  “We’ll call you if we find anything,” said Diane as she led Karen to her car.

  A moment later, they were going their separate ways. Eric didn’t want to leave Karen. He was still worried about her. He’d never seen her like this before. What happened to her? How did it happen? He hoped they’d be safe at the library.

  But if Holly said it was important, she meant it. He had no idea what could be so urgent that she couldn’t simply tell him what was going on over the phone. What had she seen in the water this time?

  How bad were things about to get?

  “My phone’s about dead,” he said as he turned west onto Main Street. “Any chance I could borrow one of yours until mine’s charged?”

  “You don’t have an external battery charger?” asked Kevin.

  “A what?”

  He leaned forward between the seats and gestured at the cup holder. “Let me see it.”

  Eric handed it back to him. Kevin was great on the football field, but he was no dumb jock. He was surprisingly handy with technology. This same thing happened last summer, too. He’d borrowed Karen’s phone because he lost his. When its battery went dead, Kevin saved him from having to borrow Paul’s by opening it up and swapping the dead battery for his nearly full one. He didn’t think much about it at the time, but he’d since learned that iPhone batteries weren’t made to be easily replaced. You could do it. You could find instructions online if you did a simple search. But it was far more complicated than simply removing the battery cover and swapping it out.

  Karen wasn’t happy when she found out, either. Apparently, tampering with the battery voided the warranty. But Kevin had only ever shrugged and insisted that it would be fine.

  Now Kevin pulled a small, black cylinder from the pocket of his jeans and plugged Eric’s phone into it. He stared at the screen for a moment to make sure it was working and then handed both devices to him. “There you go.”

  “That’s it?” He took them both and looked at the screen of his phone. It said it was charging.

  “That’s it. Just leave it plugged into that until it’s charged. And you can use it while it’s charging, too. You should get you one of those next time you’re at the store. They’re cheap.”

  “No kidding?”

  A new text message from Isabelle popped up: HOW DO YOU NOT KNOW ABOUT THOSE? EVEN I KNOW ABOUT THOSE. KAREN WAS TRYING TO GET YOU TO BUY ONE LAST MONTH

  “I don’t remember her ever mentioning anything like this,” replied Eric.

  THAT’S BECAUSE YOU IGNORE HER EVERY TIME SHE TALKS ABOUT ANYTHING TO DO WITH YOUR PHONE. YOU’RE SO STUBBORN

  He scowled at the phone.

  I DO NOT SOUND JUST LIKE HER!

  “I didn’t say anything!”

  I’M IN YOUR HEAD! YOU DON’T HAVE TO SAY IT OUT LOUD!

  He dropped both the phone and the charger into the cup holder, making sure to turn the phone’s screen away from him.

  It actually sounded angry when it vibrated at him, alerting him to a new message.


  “Are you sure you should be making her mad?” asked Kevin. “How do you know she can’t, like, fry some of your brain synapses or something?”

  “She can’t do that.”

  The phone rattled in the cup holder again.

  Paul grinned. “Maybe not, but she can call every phone in your house every time Karen starts getting romantic with you.”

  “Ouch,” said Kevin. “Fear the Izzy.”

  It actually sounded a little smug when it vibrated this time.

  Eric glanced down at it. She could never be that evil.

  Could she?

  Kevin started to say something more, but at that moment Eric looked up and saw a man walking down the sidewalk in a familiar, ugly coat. “Whoa! Hey! That’s the guy! That’s Steampunk Monk! Right there!”

  “That’s the guy with the psycho drugs?” asked Kevin.

  “Trust me, you don’t want any.” Eric slowed down and watched the peculiar little man as he passed. He didn’t seem to notice them. He was wearing his looking-glass-shard spectacles and examining that odd little device again. He was only a few blocks from where he and Karen first saw him that morning, but on the opposite side of the street, heading the other way. It seemed that, after that first sighting, he made his way across the river and over to the Aberration Station. Maybe that strange device led him there. Or maybe that was simply where he’d always intended to go. And here he was again, going back the way he came.

  “What are you looking for?” he wondered.

  Then the steampunk monk was behind them and Eric turned on his blinker to circle the block.

  He cursed. He didn’t know what to do. Holly said to meet her as soon as possible, and yet he didn’t want to let this guy out of his sight again.

  “Drop us off,” said Paul. “We’ll tail the guy, see where he’s going.”

  He glanced over at him, uncertain. “This guy’s dangerous. He knows stuff.”

  “He’s seen you. He may have seen Karen, too. But he wouldn’t recognize us. We’ll just look like all the other pedestrians.”

  That was a valid point, he supposed. But he still didn’t like it.

  “Hell,” said Kevin. “Even if he sees us looking at him, we can’t possibly be the only ones. I mean, did you see what he was wearing? It’s June! How is he not dead?”