Edge of Time

by Susan M. MacDonald

  “He took quite a punch to his stomach,” Darius advised. “Rhozan had already taken over several people and was just waiting.”

  “How?”

  “I have no idea. Unless it was Alec.” Darius looked at the farthest bunk where Alec still lay. “They probably heard him in Africa.”

  “You felt it?” Anna asked, slipping the orb back into her pocket.

  “Are you kidding?” Darius rubbed his jaw ruefully. “The kid’s lightning. Are you okay?” He reached out and touched Anna’s shoulder for a second, before she pulled away.

  She didn’t look at him as she headed back to Alec’s side. “I managed to get my shields up in time.” She sat back down on the edge of Alec’s bunk and brushed a lock of hair off his forehead. “I wasn’t expecting it. What did you tell him to do?”

  “Just the usual.” Darius sighed. “I’m not sure how we’ll get out. There were four of them inside the warehouse.”

  “Impossible. The shields haven’t lessened. I’ve monitored it.” As if to reassure herself, she created another screen in mid-air. “See, there, in place.”

  “Go and look for yourself, if you don’t believe me.” Darius dropped into a chair and closed his eyes.

  “Are you all right?” Anna asked, the barest hint of warmth in her voice.

  Darius smiled but didn’t open his eyes. “Anytime you want to come over here and check me out is fine with me.”

  “What’s going to happen? I mean, with the Emissaries upstairs? How will we get out?” Gino asked.

  “Get Darius some juice, Mary Beth,” Anna said briskly. “He needs to regen. Don’t worry, Gino. They can’t get in here.”

  “You said they can’t get in the warehouse, but Darius said they had.” Gino’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down.

  Riley watched with satisfaction. Anna’s hold over this little party was weakening. She could feel the building anxiety. Any minute someone was going to try and leave. The only snag was the Emissaries waiting upstairs. If they were the same as the woman in the subway station or the others back home, she was in trouble. One had been bad enough, but four?

  Peter sat up on the bunk beside Riley and looked around. “Where am I?” He caught sight of Alec. “Hey,” he shouted, “what have you done to my brother?”

  The lights went off.

  “Nobody move!” Anna shouted. “Darius?”

  The lights flickered for a moment before coming back on. Anna and Darius faced one another, their orbs held outwards, flashing a faint bluish lightning from one orb to the other.

  Peter grasped the brace of the bunk bed and leaned forward. “What’s going on?” he whispered.

  “I dunno,” Riley replied.

  “Check the perimeters,” Anna instructed.

  Darius nodded briskly and traced a screen into the air with his orb. Immediately it filled with moving symbols.

  Alec gave a pathetic moan. Riley crossed to his side. She dropped to the edge of his bed and grabbed his wrist. His pulse was strong and steady. Other than some slight static electricity, he seemed to be fine.

  “What’s the matter with him?” Peter leaned over her shoulder.

  “He took some kind of seizure,” Riley replied. “Does he have any medical problems that you know of?”

  “Are you a nurse?” Peter asked.

  “First year pre-med. This coming September,” she added. “Answer my question.”

  “No. He never even gets a cold. It’s ridiculous.”

  “I’m not sure what happened to him. Anna,” Riley pointed out who was Anna, “found him unconscious. I think he was fooling around with one of these.” She held up her orb.

  “Did he swallow it?”

  “Don’t be an idiot,” Riley scoffed. “He’d have choked.”

  The overhead light got redder.

  “Look, what is this place? Why did that guy bring me here? Who were those nuts who tried to kill me? What’s going on?”

  “These people are aliens from another planet.” Riley couldn’t help but grimace as she heard herself speak. It sounded so crazy. “Anna and Darius have kidnapped all of us and brought us to train to fight the bad guys who are about to invade our planet.” She waited for Peter’s scathing response.

  Peter leaned forward and lowered his voice. “I saw him lots of times. He was following me around for the last couple of weeks. I thought he …” Peter blushed. “I warned Alec to stay away from him, but Alec never does what he’s told.”

  “Yeah, well, too late now.” Riley dropped Alec’s wrist back on the bed, suddenly aware that she’d been holding it far too long. She focused on a chip in her black nail polish.

  “How do we get out of here?” Peter asked.

  “The only door opens with this.” Again she held up the orb. “I’m not sure exactly how it works. I’ve been waiting for a diversion so that I can slip out. Could be soon, too. Something’s happening.”

  The lighting got redder.

  “What’s with the stupid lights?” Peter asked. He gave his brother a shake and jerked his hand back as if he’d been burned. “What’s with him?”

  “Alec seems to be filled with static electricity. Don’t ask me how it happened. It won’t hurt you.” Riley neglected to mention anything about contacting Alec’s mind because it hadn’t happened. It had all been a figment of her imagination. “The lights are some kind of warning sign. Darius thinks those people who hurt you followed you here and that they’re waiting outside.”

  Peter blanched. “There were four of them. I’ve never been so creeped out in my life.”

  “Like zombies?” Riley asked. “Just focused on you and nothing else. And no one else seems to notice, right?”

  “How did you know?”

  “It happened to me. Several times. I thought, at first, that it was, I dunno, weird. Like something out of a bad horror movie. But I shook them off. No problem.”

  Alec moaned and raised a shaky hand to his forehead. “What are you doing here?”

  Peter shrugged. “What’s it to you?”

  Alec struggled to a sitting position.

  “How do you feel?” Riley asked in her most professional manner.

  “All right, I guess. Bit of a headache. What happened to me?”

  “What do you remember?” asked Riley.

  Alec’s forehead wrinkled in concentration. “I guess I was holding the orb Darius gave me, and I …” He trailed off, a strange distant look sliding over his features. All of a sudden his eyes widened. He pointed at Riley. “You were there. In my head.”

  “No way.” Riley started to get up.

  “You were, I know it.” Alec grabbed onto her arm and a trickle of electricity shot up into her shoulder and neck. “You’re going to your sister’s cuz you hate it at home. You think your new stepmom is a witch. You don’t think you’re pretty.” Alec could barely get the words out fast enough.

  “That’s enough.” Riley shoved at him. “Get away from me.”

  “What’s going on?” Peter tried to wrest Riley’s arm free.

  Alec ignored him. “But you are pretty,” he babbled. “Really hot, actually.”

  Suddenly he stopped and let go. Riley clasped her arms around herself and backed away. Alec panted slightly, watching her intently as a dull flush rose up his neck.

  “Both of you are total idiots,” Peter said.

  Riley didn’t answer. Alec didn’t have a chance to speak. At that moment, the bunker was attacked.

  9

  The walls echoed with the sound of a thunderclap that shook the very air as huge cracks appeared on each of the four walls. Alec fell off the bunk and onto the floor and bashed his elbow on the bed frame. The floor tilted. Riley tumbled out of sight. Peter grabbed onto the brace of the upper bunk to prevent himself from falling.

  The glow from Anna’s orb mixed with Darius’ and grew to dazzling brightness. Alec grabbed his own without thinking.

  “Rips, underneath?” Anna shouted.

  “Impossible. He ca
n’t make them appear,” Darius gasped as he waved his hand furiously at the transparent screen.

  “Doesn’t matter now. We have to get everyone out.”

  “We can’t transport them all,” Darius shouted back above another hideous cracking.

  The air in front of Alec began to shimmer. He squinted. The hazy air began to sparkle, expanding slowly and growing between himself and Peter. Mesmerized, Alec couldn’t move.

  Peter leaned over, holding onto the edge of the upper bunk to steady himself and swaying slightly. With his free hand, he pointed at the shimmer and mouthed something, but Alec couldn’t hear it over the roaring that seemed to come from everywhere at once.

  An odd feeling crept over his skin the more he looked. Something really bad would happen if the sparkles touched him. Alec slid onto his back, easing away without taking his eyes off the shimmering. He bumped into the bed. He glanced under the bunk as briefly as possible. Riley was on the floor on the other side. She was yelling something he couldn’t hear and waggling her fingers, encouraging him to slide under the bunk towards her.

  He didn’t hesitate. He thrust out his arm to her.

  The shimmering lights moved closer.

  Alec’s fingers touched Riley’s and he clasped tightly.

  He turned back just in time to see Peter’s arm reach through the shimmering air.

  “No!” Darius yelled as he ran towards them. He grabbed for Peter, but in the instant he did so, Peter disappeared into the sparkles like he was sucked down a drain.

  Alec opened his mouth to scream but before he could draw breath, Darius threw himself down on top of him. There was a yank, a pull and then … nothing.

  The bunker around them vanished.

  10

  Alec landed with a brain-jarring thud. Darius nearly flattened him as he winked into existence immediately after, and Riley, who was still holding his hand so tightly he’d lost all feeling in his fingers, landed farther away, nearly pulling his arm from its socket.

  “Ow!” he screeched as he yanked his hand from Riley’s.

  Darius heaved himself off Alec and looked around with a darkening frown. He glanced up at the sky then back at Alec. “Did you mean to bring us here?”

  “Err?” Alec tried to sit up but was immediately overcome by a very unpleasant wooziness. This was far worse than the teleporting from the subway station. The world tilted alarmingly to one side, then spun for a moment before righting itself. His stomach decided to move to a new location. Off to his left, Riley groaned.

  Darius held his orb out in the palm of his hand like a water diviner. He bit his lip for a moment and then shoved the orb back into his pocket. Thunderclouds amassed across his face. At Riley’s second groan he stepped over a pile of refuse and yanked her to her feet.

  “Nice spot you’ve brought us to,” he said sharply to Alec as he held onto Riley’s shoulder with one hand and knocked a flattened cigarette box from her knee, along with other, unidentifiable rubbish. “Ten out of ten for getting us out of a tricky situation, but minus several million for moving us in time.”

  Alec blinked several times, trying to clear the fuzziness from his vision, while the world heaved itself to the left again. “What?”

  “Time,” Darius snapped. “The past, the present, the future. It’s changed.” He angrily pulled out his orb again.

  “Alec can move time?” Riley wiped a shaky hand over her pale face and gave Alec a dark look. “That’s stupid. No one can–”

  “No.” Darius grimaced. “Time doesn’t move around. We did. He transported us back by several hours, if I calculated it correctly. And it’s a serious problem.”

  Alec gave his head a shake to clear it but it didn’t help. Darius wasn’t making much sense and the sick feeling churning inside wasn’t making paying attention any easier.

  “Serious? Why?” Riley pulled her hand from Darius’ grip. She warily took a step away from him and nearly toppled over.

  “Reliving time you’ve already spent goes against all the laws of nature. You start all sorts of paths that go nowhere. It’s a fundamental rule that cannot be broken. Ever.” Darius turned to face Alec. The knuckles that gripped his orb were white. “I don’t care how you did it, or why, Alec. But you can never do it again. There are rules that cannot be broken. The consequences are unimaginable. Promise me, never again.”

  Alec shrugged. He felt so awful that it didn’t much matter what Darius was yakking on about. He’d just panicked in the bunker and for an instant desperately prayed to go anywhere, before this had all started. He hadn’t actually done anything.

  “Alec,” Darius cut into his thoughts, “promise me.”

  “Yeah, whatever.” Alec swallowed the bile at the back of his throat. He tried to take a deep breath but the alley’s foul odour made him gag.

  “We’re in trouble, in case you need a reminder,” Darius continued. “The bunker was infiltrated, several of your fellow Potentials are probably dead, Anna is out of reach and Peter has been taken.”

  “Huh?” Alec raised his head. “Whaddya mean? Who’s dead?”

  “Jake and Mohammed.”

  “What about Mary Beth and the other girl?” Riley rubbed her hands over her arms and shivered as she took stock of their surroundings.

  “Gone with Anna. I hope. Gino too.” Darius walked down the alleyway, looking closely at the walls, the doors and the fire escape.

  Alec thought back over the last harrowing moments in the bunker. Darius and Anna’s increasing desperation. His feeling of uninformed helplessness. The glittering air that winked into existence right in front of him and his growing dread as it reached closer and closer. Peter had put his arm right through it.

  “Where’d Peter go?” Alec gasped.

  “Rhozan has him,” Darius called from the farthest end of the alley.

  The air whooshed out of Alec’s lungs. “How?”

  Darius strode back. “Rips are openings in the time/space continuum. A portal of some kind between our dimension and theirs. The Others can sense them. They wait for one to open and either empty their life force through into your world, manipulating the people they contact for their own pleasure, or they pull someone through. One opened up inside the bunker and Peter fell into it. Or was pulled.”

  Where on earth was a different dimension? How was he going to tell his mom? “How’ll we get him back?”

  “Good question.” Darius ran his fingers through his hair. “No one’s ever come back. I mean, we can sense them in there, we’ve just got no idea how to reach them.”

  Alec slowly pulled himself to his feet, careful not to meet anyone’s eyes. He leaned over, bracing his hands on his knees, and waited for the vertigo to pass, while Darius headed towards the street.

  There was nothing else to do. Whatever idiocy Darius was saying would probably sort itself later. Right now he had to figure out where they were and get back home. Alec followed Darius’ footsteps to the alley entrance. The road in front of him was completely unfamiliar. They were downtown somewhere, but the buildings were lower than those of inner-city Toronto and Alec had the impression that the ground was sloping away from him. A bike messenger whizzed by and two women, both pulling heavy carryalls, slowly meandered past. There was an unfamiliar tang in the air.

  “No matter how far you run, you can never quite leave home,” Riley said to no one in particular.

  Darius sighed. “We’re going to have to get something to eat and think about transportation.”

  “A bus is cheapest,” Alec said before thinking. He blushed. Only losers took the bus.

  “Do either of you have any money?” Darius asked.

  Alec didn’t have to check his pockets. “Five bucks. That’s it.”

  Riley didn’t answer.

  “Riley?” Darius asked.

  “You’re the one who’s organizing this picnic. You pay.”

  Darius gave a one-shoulder shrug. “Fine. Come on.” He turned left and led them down to the end of the block. A bl
inking traffic light warned non-existent traffic. Darius stopped, looked both ways and stepped off the curb. Riley was already halfway across. Alec, still feeling muddled, trudged behind them. The road they crossed headed downward at a steep angle. There were several more streets parallel to the one he was walking along, a traffic light at each, and at the bottom, several blocks away, the tantalizing glimpse of water.

  This was not Toronto.

  Riley was speaking. Alec hurried to catch up with her but it was difficult on such wobbling legs.

  “The airport is really far out of town. About forty kilometres from here. A taxi will cost a bomb.”

  “And the bus station?” asked Darius.

  “Have no idea. I never take the bus. You can get the train, but it’s pricey and will take awhile,” Riley said.

  “Airfare is out of the question,” Darius sighed. “Guardians don’t have unlimited monetary funds. And even if I did, I doubt Alec has identification on him sufficient for air travel. Wasn’t there a tightening of restrictions several years ago? I had a memo on it.”

  “A memo.” Riley smirked. “Alien invaders hand out memos. Puh-lease.”

  “Blending seamlessly into the surrounding environment is essential, hence the use of simulations and extensive investigation. Field agents are constantly updating cultural information.”

  “You have field agents here. In Halifax,” Riley snorted, without breaking her stride.

  “Well, not here exactly. But several in Canada. Wherever there’s a Tyon training centre, there are field agents, gathering information, keeping our records up to date.”

  Alec startled. Halifax? That meant the water was the ocean. Cool. He loved the Pacific.

  “Atlantic Ocean, Alec,” Darius said, before turning his attention back to Riley. “Once a planet is deemed possible, the Collective establishes bases and operatives to collect information, introduce the resistor and monitor the situation.”

  “What’s a resistor? What are you guys monitoring here, anyway?” Riley stopped walking and stood, feet wide apart. Her hands went to her hips. “Just what are you introducing to my planet?”