by K. J. McPike
“Shh!” Mom’s crystal-gray eyes darted to her friends.
Ori frowned at her in response. “Is that true? Is that why you went into genetics?”
Mom bit her lip. “It is not that simple.” Her gaze moved back to our group, and though there was clearly annoyance there, I thought I saw a hint of consideration for what we were claiming. “Even if you are from the future, why would you ask us for help? What is it you think we can do?”
“We are hoping you can help us get back to the correct timeline,” Kala said.
“How?” Ursula asked. “We are full-blooded Astralii. We do not have abilities like yours.”
Kai ran through an explanation of what we’d been through, covering everything from the attack on my family’s house up until coming here. As he spoke, unwelcome memories of the day flooded my mind and settled on my chest like a ten-ton weight. One glance at Oxanna and our brothers told me that hearing it had stricken them, too.
“So we’re hoping you can help us find Sariah,” Kai finished, tapping the toe of his sandal against the leg of one of the sofas. “And that she can help us get back to the timeline we came from originally.”
A long moment of silence passed as the three girls absorbed the story. I couldn’t blame them for being incredulous. If the roles were reversed, I was sure I would have a hard time believing it, too. I studied the streaks of gray that branched in all different directions within the polished white of the marble floor. If Mom and her friends didn’t agree to help us, maybe we could project just a few moments into the past and try again. But what if Dixon couldn’t handle holding onto all of us for a third time?
“We do not know anyone named Sariah,” Ursula finally said. “Or Trace.”
“But you do know Delta.” Oxanna made it sound more like a statement than a question, but she quickly added, “Right?”
Mom shrugged. “Not exactly. She is a test subject, and she is not conscious yet. They injected her two days ago, and her body needs time to adjust before they can let her wake up.”
Crap. How far back had we come? If Delta wasn’t even conscious, how long would it be before they had her working to awaken semmies’ abilities? It could be weeks—maybe months—until she awakened Trace’s ability, and longer than that before Sariah came into the picture.
“Even if we did know them,” Ori said cooly, “why should we help you get out of a mess you created by playing with time?”
Oxanna threw a hand in Mom’s direction. “Because we’re her kids.”
“Oxie!” I cried, turning to gape at her.
“What? We’re not going to get anywhere by dancing around the subject. We need their help, and they should know the truth.”
“The truth?” Mom tried to look skeptical, but the way she shifted her weight told another story. “Do you not think I would know if I had children?”
“We’re your future children,” I clarified. “Well, the four of us, anyway.” I gestured to my three siblings beside me. “Kai and Kala are friends.”
“You are lying.” Ori glared at us one by one, as if she could scare us into admitting we were making it all up.
“Why would we lie about this?” Dixon challenged. “I mean, look at us. We all have her eyes, and Lali looks just like her.”
Mom gasped. “Lali?”
I nodded slowly, meeting her gaze. “My name is Xitlali.”
“That was my grandmother’s name,” she whispered. I stayed quiet, not sure whether it was better to let that sink in or keep talking before she convinced herself it couldn’t be true. She studied all of us as if seeing us for the first time.
Someone’s stomach growled, and I realized we hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast. I hadn’t even considered food since then.
Mom’s face fell. “You are hungry.”
“Maybe a little.” Dixon rubbed a palm over his belly. “It’s been a long day.”
“Do you have somewhere to go?” Mom asked. “Access to food? Beds?”
“We don’t have anything,” Ulyxses mumbled, a crushing reminder of our desperate situation. If they didn’t agree to help us, we had nowhere to go and no money to pay for food or any other necessities. I didn’t know what we would do.
Ori scoffed. “Mara, you are not thinking of housing them?”
“Who else is going to help them?” Mom didn’t take her eyes off of us, and I said a silent prayer that some maternal instinct would kick in despite her friend’s skepticism.
“It would only be for tonight,” Kai said, and I resisted the urge to shoot a questioning look his way. We could discuss the logistics after we figured out what we were going to do tonight. “I’ll figure out somewhere for us to stay first thing tomorrow. We just need a chance to regroup.”
Ursula’s dark curls swayed as she shook her head. “Mara, no. What if your mother or father finds them?”
Oh. I hadn’t even considered that we might run into Mom’s parents—our grandparents who we’d never met. Would they change their minds about semmies if the semmies in question were their grandchildren? Would they even believe us?
“That will not be a problem.” Mom glanced through the wall-length windows that revealed the night sky. “Mother and Father are asleep, and they will wake up and go to work like always. They have no reason to go into my bedroom.” She looked back at our group and smiled. “You can stay with me for tonight. We have plenty of food, and there is space in my bedroom. Then we will find a long-term solution until this Sariah comes into the picture.”
“Thank you,” I gushed, relief flooding my body. The others voiced their own appreciation, and Mom nodded once.
“It will take some time to carry all of you back,” she said. “But we can find a place to hide you while you wait.”
“You won’t have to carry us,” Kai told her. “I can project after you.”
Mom’s head moved back in surprise. “What do you mean?”
“I can project my body,” he explained. “And anyone else I touch.”
Mom and her friends blinked at him as that sunk in.
“If you go home, I can project everyone to where your physical body is,” he added softly.
“All of our homes have blocks around them,” Ori said. “No one can project inside.”
I heaved a sigh. Of course it couldn’t be that easy.
“My balcony is not blocked,” Mom countered. “I can let them in through there.” She glanced at the rest of us before her eyes settled on Kai. “I need time to get my friends home, and then to get to my own house. Once I am ready, I will come back here in astral form to let you know it is safe to come after me.”
Kai nodded. “Deal.”
My stomach had nearly twisted itself into a pretzel by the time Mom’s astral form showed up for the third and final time. Kai, Kala, my siblings, and I had all been hiding in a patch of trees near the transposer house while Mom and her friends took turns carrying each other’s physical bodies back to Alea—something about wanting to avoid the main transposer. Mom and Ursula had switched into their astral forms and taken Ori’s body back first, and watching them lift their friend high into the hazy night sky made me more thankful than ever that Kai could project us to Mom’s house without leaving the ground.
Not to mention, if any other Astralii showed up, he could take us out of here in an instant.
“You will have to bring them one at a time,” Mom instructed Kai, the trees behind her visible through her silvery astral body. “The balcony cannot hold more than two at once.”
Kai looked at me, and I nodded to the rest of our group. “Take them first,” I said. There was no way I was going to leave them behind if there was any chance an Astralis might come by. I could at least project to the transposer and switch into my physical body to get away if it came down to it.
“I’ll be quick.” Kai took Kala’s hand, and the two of them disappeared. Mom’s astral form vanished shortly after, and I did my best to stay calm while I waited with Oxanna and my brothers. Kai made qu
ick work of coming back and getting everyone to Mom’s, but even the short time our group was separated had my pulse throbbing.
When he finally came back for me, I was all but hyperventilating as I reached to take his hand. He gave my fingers a squeeze, and for some reason tears threatened. I closed my eyes before they could spill.
We showed up on a balcony that was barely wide enough to hold us both. Despite the darkness, I could make out the shapes of tree branches breaking up the stretch of murky amber sky. Even at night, the air in Alea was thick and hot, and sweat was already beading above my upper lip.
Kai tugged my hand, leading me through a small entrance. A wall of cool air hit me the minute we were inside. Reaching over my head, Kai closed the door to the balcony as I took in Mom’s bedroom. The area was spacious but sparse, with bare metallic walls that curved to the right as if following the lines of a racetrack. The wall opposite the balcony appeared to be made of wood, with another door in its center that I assumed led to the rest of the home.
Mom stood next to a drawer that came out of the wall at the same level as her waist and passed out blankets to my siblings and Kala. I stepped down from the small ladder leading to the balcony, gasping when the floor sank like foam under my shoes. I looked down, studying the springy gray material beneath me. It almost looked like a stucco ceiling.
“Here,” Mom whispered, carrying a blanket over to me. “Make yourself comfortable, but be as quiet as possible.” She pointed up at the metal ceiling. “My parents are sleeping.”
Though I’d gotten glimpses of the houses in Alea during my time here before, it never occurred to me that they would have multiple stories. From what I’d seen, they looked like bracelets wrapped around the massive trees.
“I will be right back.” She pulled open the door along the wooden wall and stepped out of the room without making a sound.
The rest of us laid out the blankets without speaking. Thankfully, whatever the floor was made out of meant our steps were silent, too.
Mom came back in with what looked like a cereal box tucked under one arm. In her hands, she carried a pitcher of water and a stack of clay bowls. She turned to close the door with her hip, and I realized she had spoons in her back pocket.
Placing the pitcher on the floor, she set out six bowls next to it one by one. Then she went to work pouring the contents of the box into each. From what I could tell, it was some kind of grain that had been ground into meal.
“My parents and I will leave for work early tomorrow morning,” she said in a hushed voice as she poured water over the powder in the bowls. “I will find an excuse to come home and help you figure out what to do. For now, eat.”
After she mixed the food into the consistency of grits, she passed us each a bowl and spoon. The smell was like bran cereal, but none of us was going to turn down anything edible. I took a bite, thankful for something to coat my stomach. The taste was surprisingly flavorful, and if it weren’t for the mushy texture, I might have thought I was eating a spicy version of chicken noodle soup.
We were all done in a matter of minutes, and Mom stacked the bowls in the corner near the door. “Now get some rest,” she instructed, standing to hold a palm up to the wall. A moment later, the metal split open and a bed lowered into the room. Again, the process happened soundlessly.
Ulyxses gasped. “Your bed hides in your wall?”
“Yes.” Mom laughed softly. “So does my desk. I can show you tomorrow.” She climbed into her bed, and I joined Oxanna and my brothers as they got comfortable in the mess of blankets on the springy floor. Kai lay along the balcony wall, and Kala settled in a couple feet from him.
Once we had all stopped shuffling, Mom turned out the light. The minute the darkness hit, the events of the day forced their way to the forefront of my mind. Everything that had happened played in choppy bits like a broken movie that froze on the image of Salaxia’s body.
Fighting the mental picture, I called on my memory of seeing her in the hallway this morning. Just this morning, she was apologizing for calling me a butthead. Just this morning, she’d bragged about how wise she was now that she was almost double digits.
But she was never going to make it to ten years old. The realization stole the air from my lungs. I was never going to see her through another birthday again. I choked on a sob, doing all I could to keep quiet. My siblings didn’t need to know that I didn’t believe we had a chance of finding a timeline where Salaxia would be better off leaving with us. I didn’t have the heart to shoot down their hopes. They needed something to hold onto.
You should have brought Sal with you. The thought played in my mind again and again, and it was getting harder to convince myself we’d done the right thing. How could it be right when we would never get to see our sister again? How could it be right when it hurt just to breathe? The doubts built up in my mind, the weight of them threatening to crush me as I cried myself to sleep.
Chapter 13
Interruption
Salaxia raced toward me with her arms outstretched. I fell to my knees in the grass, and she slammed into me so hard I toppled backward. But I didn’t care. We found a way to get her back, and that was all that mattered.
“I thought you guys left me,” she moaned.
I squeezed her to my chest, burying my face in her hair. “We would never leave you.”
“Stop hogging our little sis!” Oxanna cried. She and our brothers tried to wrestle Salaxia away from me, and I couldn’t help but laugh through my tears. Letting go, I used my sleeve to wipe my eyes. I watched my brothers and sisters reunite and thanked every divinity I could think of for giving us a second chance. No matter what, I swore to myself that I would never let anything happen to Salaxia ever again.
A loud thump jerked me out of sleep. I sat up with a jolt, disoriented as my eyes searched for the source of the sound.
“Sorry,” Kai whispered, pushing away from the wall. He kicked off the blanket wrapped around his ankle and sighed. “Didn’t mean to startle you.”
The sterile metal of Mom’s room and the curled-up forms of Oxanna and my brothers sent reality crashing down on me like a tidal wave. It was a dream. We hadn’t found a way to get our sister back.
Salaxia was gone. She would always be gone.
A cry tore out of me, and Kai was by my side in an instant. “Hey, you’re okay.” He ran a hand along my arm. “It was just a dream.”
Fighting back a sob, I dropped my face into my hands. “I don’t want it to be a dream.”
Without a word, Kai pulled me into a hug. The stubborn part of me that still blamed him for everything lost to the part that needed comfort, and I didn’t fight his embrace.
Instead, I melted into it.
Every emotion from the last twenty-four hours raged through me like a tempest, and my shoulders shook so hard it hurt. Letting my hands slide from my face, I pressed my cheek against Kai’s chest. The soft material of his t-shirt still clung to a hint of his citrus and spice smell, somehow familiar despite the weeks since I’d been close enough to him to notice it.
“I’m so sorry, Lali.” He tightened his hold around me. “I’m so, so sorry.” He stroked my hair and rocked me back and forth as everything poured out of me. I wanted to scream and pound my fists into the wall and tear apart this whole room. But more than that, I wanted to curl up into a ball and never move again.
“Do you think we made a mistake?” I asked, my face still pressing into him. “By not taking Sal out of that timeline when we had the chance?” I felt his deep inhale against my cheek and my body sagged even more. “We should have brought her with us, shouldn’t we?”
“I understand why you didn’t,” he said, keeping his voice low. “I admire that you always try to do the right thing, but no matter what you choose, I couldn’t call it a mistake. Either way I get it, and once time catches up, if you decide you wanna go to the future and get your sister after all, I wouldn’t hold it against you.”
I sniffled. He had a poin
t; we could always go back if we changed our minds. I tried to take comfort in that thought. The option would always be there.
So will the knowledge that it’s wrong.
Someone shifted beside us, and I quickly pulled away from Kai. Wiping my face with the back of my hand, I forced my expression back to neutral. My siblings needed support right now, not a blubbering mess of a big sister.
Dixon rolled onto his side, mumbling in his sleep before his breathing settled back into a steady rhythm. I glanced at Oxanna and Ulyxses, both wrapped in the bedding on the floor. As usual, they managed to sleep through anything. Kala hadn’t budged, either, so maybe she slept like a rock, too.
Staring at my siblings, I didn’t know whether I should wish them pleasant dreams or nightmares. The former only made waking that much harder. At least bad dreams meant finding relief in consciousness. If I had to wake up from happy reunions with my sister only to remember all over again that she was gone, I would take nightmares any day.
I pushed my bangs off my forehead. I needed to focus on getting us through the day and figuring out where we were going to go from here.
“Um, you wanna talk in the other room?” Kai whispered.
“Is everyone gone?” I realized that I had no idea what time it was. There were no windows in this room to indicate the hour.
“Yeah, I heard them leave a while ago.” Kai got to his feet and held out a hand to help me up. “It’s been quiet since.”
I slid my palm into his, careful to avoid bumping anyone as I stood and followed him out of the bedroom. We ducked under a staircase just outside the door that I assumed led to my grandparents’ room.
Just ahead of us was a living area that looked almost normal—other than the obvious curve of the floor plan, the metal walls, and the seating that appeared to pull out from the wall the way Mom’s bed did. Across from the seats, the opposite wall was smooth and didn’t appear to have any breaks or lines where hidden furniture could fit.
“I feel like I’m in the twilight zone.” Kai nodded toward a small window just above the seating. The soft orange sky shone through the glass, and I moved toward it in a daze. Staring out at the expanse of massive white trees, I couldn’t help but think of the first time I’d come here—when the Astralii guards had carried me to the lab. Once they’d gotten me inside, I was certain I would never get out of there. Maybe if I hadn’t, Salaxia would still be alive.
