Crucible Zero

by Devon Monk

  “I’m in,” Dotty said.

  “Y’all know how I feel about that man,” Wila said. “He should have been put out of our misery years ago. Count me in.”

  “Fine,” January said. “I’m not going to be the only one who misses out on seeing Slater die.”

  “What do you need?” Buck asked.

  “You to follow my orders.” Abraham stepped away from the bar and paced, every inch a commander addressing his team.

  “Of course we will, Bram,” Dotty said. “Unless you’re being a complete idiot. Otherwise, we’ll stand aside and let you walk into whatever fire you set off, if that’s what you want.”

  “Dotty,” he sighed. “Following orders means doing so even if I’m being an idiot.”

  “I know,” she said. “But I, for one, reserve the right to follow my own judgment if things go completely to hell. It’s more of a promise to cover your ass than a prelude to mutiny, darlin’.”

  He tucked his thumbs into his belt. “Fine. We also need information. Do any of you remember what happened to the Wings of Mercury machine?”

  Vance whistled. “That’s digging back a ways.”

  “Wasn’t it taken apart and destroyed?” Wila asked, frowning. “The scientist, he decided it shouldn’t be replicated because it was too dangerous, or some such. He tore it down, broke it up. Or did the government confiscate it?”

  “I thought there was a fire,” January said. “Hot enough, metal and all the components melted.”

  “I remember hearing that too,” Wila said. “Why the interest in that old thing, Bram?”

  “There is a piece of it, or a piece of something from that experiment, that is causing ripples in time.”

  No one said anything. Finally Buck spoke up. “Bullshit.”

  “Don’t care if you believe me,” Abraham said. “But if any of you kept a token, an heirloom, or a piece of the Wings of Mercury machine, or know of anyone who might—a historian, a museum—I need to know now.”

  “Why?” Clara asked.

  “Without it, we can’t kill Slater.”

  “Are you confusing murder with daydreams again, Abraham?” Wila asked. “Slater ain’t any more immortal than the rest of us. He can be killed with enough bullets to the head.”

  “Not without destroying the piece of the time machine,” Abraham said. “He’s hooked to it.”

  Vance shook his head. “You’re not making sense. No judgment—we’ve all stepped off the deep end now and then, some of us more often than others.” He nodded at January, and she flipped him off. “But there is no time machine, Abraham. Never was. Whatever the Wings of Mercury experiment did to us had nothing to do with time.”

  Abraham glanced over at me. He hadn’t asked me to state my case, and from the mood in the room, I didn’t think they’d believe me anyway. Still, I figured I should offer my position on this mess.

  “Alveré Case, the scientist who built the machine, was my ancestor,” I said. “It was built to manipulate time. It didn’t produce the results he expected. But it did create a weird situation where Slater might not be able to be killed unless we make sure he’s not tied into a relic from the past. A relic that was a part of the Wings of Mercury machine. If Slater can be killed”—here I held Abraham’s gaze—“we’re going to take that shot, even without destroying the relic. No matter the consequences.”

  His nostrils flared and his eyes narrowed before he went back to that stony expression.

  “Oh, now, this is just too much,” Dotty said. “Honey, you might think your great-granddad was a time traveler, but we’ve been alive for hundreds of years. Time travel isn’t anything more than fairy tales. Do you understand?” Dotty looked over at Abraham. “She does understand that, doesn’t she? Or is she the flighty type?”

  “She’s sane,” Abraham said. “And she’s proven to my satisfaction that what she says is true.”

  “You’d believe anything she says,” January said. “She’s your will-o’-the-wisp. Now that you’ve caught her, you can’t believe she isn’t magic. She’s playing you.”

  “I’m not playing anyone,” I said.

  “Is there proof?” Clara asked.

  “Yes.” Foster stood. “This.” He was holding the pocket watch in his hand again.

  A chill washed over me as I realized it wasn’t a pocket watch; it was the pocket watch that had been handed down from Case father to Case son.

  “Is that Quinten’s watch?” I asked.

  “You gave it to Alveré,” Foster said. “Alveré gave it to me. A gift. For the corrected formula.”

  “What formula?” Vance asked.

  “Time,” Foster breathed. “Mend time. Save billions.”

  I walked over to him and looked at the watch in his palm. It was worn, the shine by the watch stem rubbed off, the face scratched a bit at the edges, and the chain replaced. But that was the watch I’d carried with me back in time.

  I didn’t feel any different standing this close to it. I didn’t feel the world shift or time slide. I didn’t smell roses or hear bells. If it was causing the time slips, it was not doing so now.

  “Matilda?” Abraham asked.

  “That’s the watch,” I said. “It was Alveré’s, and passed down from father to son in the Case family. I took it back with me. It was the only thing of modern time that traveled back in time with me. Maybe this is the relic.” I looked over at Abraham.

  He bit at the stitches on the corner of his mouth. “I don’t know. Was it a part of the machine?”

  “No, but I took it back with me,” I said again. “It was a physical item that shifted through time. And if what Welt—” I paused. I didn’t want to drag Welton into this. They didn’t believe me about time travel, I didn’t think they’d believe that the current custodian of House Earth was the head of House Yellow in my time. Nor that he had found a way to tell me that we needed to locate the time artifact if we were going to kill Slater.

  “Well,” I said instead. “Well, if what we think is true, then I don’t know if anything else exists that could be the relic. Plus, if this is it, there’s an easy way to test it: destroy it and kill Slater.”

  He didn’t look convinced. “You don’t know for certain that this watch is the item.”

  “I don’t know for certain that it isn’t,” I said.

  The others swore softly or shook their heads.

  “But I will go to great lengths to see Slater dead. That”—I pointed at the watch I still hadn’t been brave enough to touch—“is as good a start as any.”

  “It’s still a gamble,” he said.

  “I’m not afraid of a little gamble. Are you?”

  Before he could answer, there was a soft knock on the door. Oscar strolled into the room. “I thought I might find you here, Abraham, Matilda.” He paused and scanned the rest of the people in the room. “Hello, everyone. I hope the day is treating you well.”

  “Binek,” Buck, and several others, said by way of greeting.

  “Abraham, I have your information,” he said.

  “Might as well say it here.”

  Oscar raised his eyebrows. “Are all of you in on Abraham and Matilda’s plans?”

  “They are,” Abraham said.

  “I see,” Oscar said. “This has been some years coming, hasn’t it? Far be it from me to stand in the way of revenge rightfully earned. For the things he has put you all through, I hope this retaliation is sweet and swift.”

  “Thank you,” Abraham said.

  “You will need to be at the east entrance of House Fire before sunset. There will be a contact who will meet you there and guide you in behind the wall. Once past the wall, she will take you to a building adjacent to Slater’s private office and residence. That’s where you’ll run into problems I can’t solve for you.”

  “Problems?” I asked.


  “I can’t be sure exactly where Slater will be in the building. It’s fifteen floors. The entrances are under surveillance, with cameras and guards, and everything is run off an encrypted computer system of his own design. To get past the cameras and through the doors, you’ll need passwords I can’t obtain in a day. Maybe not in a week.”

  “House Earth doesn’t have a week,” I said. “There will be another bombing today, if there hasn’t been already. I won’t wait a week while innocent people die.”

  January scoffed. “Seriously, Abraham. Where did you dig up that sweet little hero?”

  I turned to her. “We get it. You’re angry. Fine. If you want to bitch, take it somewhere else. If you want to fight me, you’ll have to wait until I kill this bastard. In the meantime, keep your opinions of me to yourself.” I turned to Oscar. “I can hack the computer.”

  “What?” he asked. I wasn’t sure if he was startled by my snapping at January or that I had computer skills.

  “I know computers. I can hack into any system. Get me close enough—the building next to where Slater stays—and I’ll black out the surveillance system, spring the locks, and pinpoint Slater.”

  “Where did you learn computer skills, Matilda? Your farm isn’t wired.”

  “I learned it a long time ago. I can get us past his security.” I glanced up at Abraham to see if he believed me.

  He chewed on his bottom lip, his gaze steady on me. “Hollis was no help?” he asked Oscar.

  “Slater changes the passwords every three minutes,” Oscar said. “Seems our friend has taken his paranoia to dizzying heights.”

  Abraham inhaled, exhaled, and released his lip. “Matilda will handle the security.”

  “That’s what I call a vote of confidence,” Vance said. “A foolish, foolish vote of confidence.”

  Wila chuckled, but no one else had any comments. “I’ll leave it to your decision,” Oscar said. “Is there anything else you need?”

  “Do you have a way to fill bullets with powder?” I asked.

  “Of course,” he said, almost offended.

  “Give me a couple minutes, Abraham,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”

  * * *

  While Oscar watched me closely, I filled six bullets with Shelley dust, and still had a small amount left over.

  “Waste not, want not.” Oscar handed me a medical syringe and needle. I filled the syringe with the remaining powder.

  “I am more than a little curious as to what that powder might be,” he said as I loaded the six bullets into the handgun, then tucked the syringe into the breast pocket of the leather coat I was wearing. “Can I assume it will kill Slater?”

  “Sure,” I said. “That’s what I’m going to assume. If I can get close enough, anyway.” I stood away from the worktable he’d taken me to in a room that looked more like a bomb shelter than the basement of a church. “Thank you for all of your help, Oscar. I mean, Mr. Binek. I hope to see you again someday.”

  “You will,” he said. “I’ll need to come out to your farm to inspect that medical balm you’ll be giving me seventy percent control over.”

  “Fifty. Nonexclusive distribution.” I smiled.

  “Is that what it was?” He grinned, his eyes twinkling. “You do know this is all going to work out, don’t you, Matilda?”

  “Nice of you to say so.”

  “I am a man of some reputation. A man who never makes reckless bets. And I would stake my reputation that you and Abraham will see this through to the end. That you and he will be done with Slater once and for all.”

  “I hope you’re right,” I said, climbing the stairs. “If I don’t see you again . . .”

  “Which you will,” he said, climbing the stairs behind me.

  “But if I don’t, I want you to know I appreciate how much you’ve always gone out of your way to help others. To help me. Even when there never was much of a reason to.”

  I knew he’d think I was talking about the information he’d given us in this time. While I was grateful for that, it was the other, generous-hearted Oscar from the other timeway that I wished I had one more chance to thank.

  But this timeway and this Oscar were the best I could do.

  “I haven’t done much at all, really,” he said. “We’ll have time to get to know one another better. I’m sure of it.”

  We crossed the landing and paused there in the small private room at the top of the stairs. Just beyond this single door was the lounge where I’d last seen the galvanized.

  “I will give you one piece of advice,” he said. “For free.”

  I smiled. “I was under the impression you didn’t do free.”

  “This isn’t business,” he said. “This is advice, and you may set your own value for it. Abraham and I go back a long way. Almost all my life. He has been looking for you for many years, Matilda. He has never forgotten that you saved his life. I know your hatred for Slater runs deep, and so does his. But understand, all that aside, Abraham intends to pay back your act of kindness. No matter the cost.

  “He may be galvanized, but he is also a man who follows a certain set of morals. Old-fashioned in his loyalties. He is capable of great kindness and immense sacrifice. I would be very upset if he comes to harm. Any harm.”

  “We’re walking into an enemy camp,” I said. “I can’t guarantee any of us are going to walk out of that in one piece.”

  “I wasn’t talking about bullets,” he said. “I was talking about you.”

  Those words stopped me for a moment.

  “You think I want to hurt him?”

  “I don’t know. But my advice”—he pressed his hands together like we’d just come to an agreement—“is that you should not use the advantage he’s placed in your hands for wrong. Or you and I will be on much less friendly terms.”

  “What advantage?” I was the one new to this world. I was the one who was having to sort through however many different timeways and versions of people and rules and threats. As far as I could tell, I was more at a disadvantage than anyone else. Plus, there was a madman who had made killing me his priority number one.

  Then there was that whole thing Abraham had pointed out: if Slater died, would I die too?

  “He cares for you. More than he shows.”

  “Did he tell you that?” I asked.

  “In many ways. He went with Sallyo to find you, stayed with you, brought you here, bartered my favor for you, took you to his home. You’re wearing that jacket.”

  I tugged at the edge of the jacket. “So this is more than him showing me common courtesy and also wanting me as his kill buddy?”

  “It is much more.”

  “Who did it belong to?”

  “That’s his story to tell,” he said. “Ask him someday.”

  “If I get a someday, I will.”

  The door to the room opened, and Abraham stood there. “Are you ready? We don’t have much time if we’re going to get there before sundown.”

  “Good,” Oscar said. “Then I will see you on your farm, Matilda Case, if not sooner. Good luck to you.” He nodded to Abraham. “Stop by for a drink when you’re done, Bram.”

  “I’ll do that,” Abraham said.

  I nodded to Oscar, then stepped out of the small space toward Abraham.

  “Did you take care of what you needed?” Abraham asked.

  “I’m ready,” I said, “no matter how much time we have left.”

  19

  Does he think I’ll lay down and die? That I won’t find a way to tell you everything? To save you, to save Foster?

  —W.Y.

  We traveled in two cars across the open terrain. After driving for over an hour on rugged roads, our tires hit smooth highway and made twice the speed. Other vehicles whizzed past us, while heavy motorized equipment trundled more slowly on the r
ight side of the road.

  It was amazing how quickly the scenery went from dirt, scrub, and wilds to tended fields with rows of produce, and rows of workers harvesting and hauling.

  The longer we drove, the more populated the area became. I thought that if the borders were still to be drawn in the old-fashioned manner of my timeway, we were a good deal more east and had crossed into the boundaries of the big city and metropolitan sprawls that had existed there.

  After a steady blur of fields large enough to feed countless cities, we came down over a rise, and I got my first glimpse at House Fire’s impressive skyline.

  Abraham hadn’t been kidding when he said House Fire was far more advanced than House Earth. This city looked so much like the cities from my timeway, I couldn’t help but smile at the skyscrapers that spiraled up hundreds of stories, and the bridges and roadways that looped and stitched through the neon buildings, trees, and other structures.

  There were no speed tubes, but there was no lack of trains, trams, cars, and motorcycles in this bustling landscape. It was big. It was busy. It was familiar.

  The two things noticeably different from my time were the lack of airplane traffic—or really any traffic in the sky at all—and the massive metal wall that stretched out for miles and miles, surrounding the city.

  Cameras reflected sunlight at regular intervals along the walls, and watchtowers built with heavy glass windows that allowed clear vantages of the city and its surroundings were set at equal distance along the top of the thick wall.

  “That’s not a city; it’s a fortress,” I said from where I sat in the passenger’s seat next to Abraham, who was driving.

  “Both,” Abraham agreed.

  Foster sat in the very back of the car, which was big enough to comfortably seat six. Dotty, Vance, and January filled the other seats. I was pretty sure January had only come along to watch me fail.

  The galvanized carried weapons and watched the scenery go by with the casual confidence of someone who could kill their way out of any situation and had done so often enough that it had become routine.

  In a way, I couldn’t be among stronger allies. I couldn’t be in a safer place than surrounded by these people.