Erasing Time

by C. J. Hill

Taylor traced the street going left. Sheridan traced it going right.

  “I don’t see anything,” Taylor said.

  Sheridan’s finger reached the end of the short street. “This end runs into a shopping plaza. I don’t see anything either.”

  “We’re probably just not catching it.” Taylor kept checking the map. “Who knows how many religious terms they came up with since we’ve been gone. Look on the surrounding streets and see if we can pick up the trail again.”

  Sheridan searched the names of the nearby streets. Nothing rang a bell. Minutes went by. She examined larger and larger areas.

  “We’re almost to Maria Avenue,” Echo said. “Which way should I turn?”

  Sheridan peered from one window to the next. “We’ll have to go both ways and see if we can recognize anything. For all we know, this may be the end of the trail.”

  Taylor turned her attention back to the map. “Try right first. It’s shorter.”

  As Echo gave the car the direction, she added, “We’re searching for a religious symbol on something—an angel, a cross, scriptures. Maybe light.”

  “Light?” Echo said. “Light is everywhere. How am I supposed to look for light?”

  The car turned. Sheridan eyed the passing buildings, trying to find a clue among their shrubless walkways and rows of windows. She read the shopping plaza sign, turned her attention to the buildings on the other side of the street, then stopped. Her gaze snapped back to the sign.

  Taylor leaned toward the window to get a better view of the top of a building. “I don’t see anything. Maybe it’s on the other end of the street.”

  “No,” Sheridan said. “It’s up ahead.”

  chapter

  37

  Taylor stared down the street. “What do you see?”

  Sheridan gestured to a curved bridge that acted as a walkway over the shopping plaza. A large sign hung there:

  * * *

  Recreacion Senter

  traverton plaza

  2nd entrans

  * * *

  Taylor’s face remained blank. She simply said, “Wow.”

  “I know,” Sheridan agreed. “It’s clever, isn’t it?”

  Taylor blinked her eyes in frustration. “No, I was saying ‘Wow’ as in: Wow, I must have really missed a lot of Dad’s sermons, because I don’t remember any stories from the Bible with a bear in them.”

  “It’s a code, Taylor. Read the first letter of every line.”

  Taylor silently did and gasped.

  Echo did the same but only looked perplexed. “RT Two. What does that mean?”

  Sheridan read it for him. “The R—‘our.’ And do you see how the t looks like a cross? The number two, and then the bear. ‘Our cross to bear.’ It’s a religious phrase. Our contact will be somewhere inside there.”

  They had almost reached the parking structure.

  Taylor scanned the area and bit her lip. “What if it’s just a fluke? We might be grasping at straws.”

  Echo let out a sigh of exasperation. “We’re supposed to look for straws now?”

  “No,” Sheridan said, “we’re looking for … Well, I’m not sure what, but hopefully we’ll know it when we see it.”

  The car stopped. “Here goes nothing,” Taylor said.

  Echo was the first to climb out. “Would you two stop talking in slang? I have no idea what you mean.”

  Taylor climbed out of the car and smirked at Sheridan. “Yeah, cut it out.”

  Echo shook his head as Sheridan emerged from the car. “Light, straws, and now scissors?”

  Sheridan took his hand and gave it a squeeze. “Don’t worry. Taylor and I will find the symbol. All those years of being preacher’s kids are about to pay off.”

  The three walked slowly from the parking structure into the plaza. A sunken fountain splashed upward in the middle of the open area, surrounded by bleacher-type benches that led up to the ground level. Several statues were clustered in the area; past them, walkways led to dozens of stores and restaurants around the perimeter of the plaza.

  Sheridan strolled up to the nearest statue. Could one of these hold some clue? One looked like a jumble of Y’s, another resembled a rabbit with two tails and three ears, but that could have just been Sheridan’s viewpoint. Why would anyone make a huge statue of a mutant rabbit? Another looked like a stack of ten-foot milk jugs, and the last, well, Sheridan wasn’t sure, but she got the feeling it was something obscene.

  “What are the statues supposed to be?” Sheridan whispered to Echo.

  “They’re art. You’re supposed to decide for yourself what they are.”

  “A waste of space,” Taylor said.

  Sheridan tilted her head to get a different angle. “An indication that sculpting skills have decreased over the last four centuries.”

  Echo rolled his eyes. “Are you two even trying to find a symbol?”

  They left the statues and wandered around the plaza, weaving in and out of the crowd of peacock-colored shoppers. Time after time, people they passed would gaze at them, smile, then glance at their shirts to check their rank. As soon as the strangers saw they weren’t wearing badges, they looked away and moved on, no longer interested.

  Well, this was one time Sheridan didn’t mind being snubbed. The fewer people who paid attention to them, the better.

  As they walked, Echo told them what each building was. “Clothes store, hair-decorating salon, jewelry shop, furniture store, Mexican foodmart, Italian foodmart, VR center …” He spoke in his regular accent so as not to draw notice to himself. When Sheridan and Taylor spoke, they kept their voices low. They could understand the accent but not duplicate it.

  They strolled past a variety of restaurants: pasta, Thai food, seafood. The smells wafted out into the plaza. It had been hours since they’d eaten, and all the walking had made Sheridan hungry.

  When they’d made it around the plaza, Echo stopped. “Did you see anything familiar?”

  Sheridan shook her head. Taylor did as well.

  Echo rubbed his brow, disappointed. “Let’s go around again. Maybe you missed something.”

  Sheridan’s feet ached, but what else could they do? They walked more slowly this time, looking closely at shop displays for something that might be a clue. Sheridan saw lion figurines in one store. C. S. Lewis had used a lion as a Christian symbol, but then again, half a dozen sports teams had used lions too. The railing on one building had ends that looked like shepherds’ crooks. A clothing store had a selection of white dresses, which could symbolize purity, or marriage, or that it was spring.

  How would they ever find a contact? It was worse than looking for a needle in a haystack. At least you could tell the difference between hay and needles.

  After they’d completed their second trip around, Echo led them over to a bench. “Did you see anything from any religion?”

  “The farthest VR center has five pillars,” Taylor said. “There were five pillars in the Muslim religion. One of the paintings in the art store showed a woman with three eyes. That could symbolize the Hindu inner eye. Or it could be a Picasso reproduction. Or just more of your funky twenty-fifth-century art. I couldn’t really tell.”

  Sheridan rubbed her calves. “A vague knowledge of other religions isn’t going to help us. Even if the other religions’ trails did lead here, we’ve got to sound like we know what we’re talking about. We can’t fake being Hindu.”

  Irritation made Taylor’s voice crisp. “Well, we’ve got to do something. Everybody is looking for us.”

  Echo held out a hand to keep them from fighting. “We’re tired and hungry. We should get something to eat and then keep looking.” He turned and surveyed the nearest restaurants. “I can only use one food credit at a time. I’ll have to go in alone and bring something out for us to share.”

  “All right,” Taylor said, slouching against the back of the gel bench. “Get the biggest meal you can. I’m starving.”

  “What do you want to eat?” Echo aske
d. “There’s a Japanese foodmart, a pasta place, Mexican food, another Mexican foodmart, a seafood restaurant, or a pizza bar.”

  “Mexican,” Taylor said. “It’s the most filling.”

  Sheridan didn’t answer. Her gaze was riveted to the restaurant directly across the plaza. She grabbed Taylor’s arm, almost jumping off the bench with excitement. “Fish!”

  “All right,” Taylor said, “if your heart is set on seafood, Echo can go there instead.”

  Sheridan pulled Taylor to her feet. “No, the Christian fish symbol. I bet there’s one in the restaurant. It’s our contact point. I know it is.”

  “Fish?” Echo repeated as though he hadn’t heard right.

  “Christ told his apostles he would make them fishers of men,” Sheridan said, and set off toward the restaurant.

  The other two followed after her. Echo caught up to her side. “Didn’t fishermen eat what they caught? How is being a fisher of men a good thing?”

  “It’s symbolic,” Sheridan said. “Christ is called the alpha and omega, the beginning and the end. So the picture of the fish looks like the ancient Greek letter alpha—open tailed.”

  “What’s an open tail?” Echo asked.

  Taylor drew the picture in the air with her finger. “It sort of looks like a pregnant X.”

  “Back in the early years of the church,” Sheridan said, more to herself than the others, “when Christians were persecuted, they had a secret way of identifying themselves to strangers who they suspected might be fellow believers. They would draw a line on the ground—the upper curve of the fish. If the stranger was a Christian, he would draw the lower curve, finishing the picture. Just two curved strokes. Quick to draw, quick to erase.”

  Echo gaped in disbelief. “Wait—are you saying we have to go around the restaurant drawing half a fish?”

  “It will be a complete fish,” Taylor said. “Not enough people would know about the secret curved sign. I didn’t.”

  “You didn’t?” Sheridan asked, and felt an odd sense of satisfaction at knowing something her sister didn’t.

  They were close enough to the seafood restaurant to see a plaque over the door. It read FISHERMAN’S FEAST. A simple fish shape with an open tail sat at the end of the words.

  “That’s it,” Sheridan said, stepping toward the building.

  Taylor took hold of her arm and pulled her back. “What if you’re not right? We can’t go in there, order something, and then say, ‘Oh, I’m sorry, I don’t have any food credits because I have no crystal. But do you happen to know a way out of this city?’ They’ll report us to the government. We’ll be arrested.”

  “I’ll go in alone,” Echo said.

  Sheridan shook her head. “You won’t know what to say. It has to be all of us.”

  No one answered. Sheridan said, “They won’t report us once they know what we want.”

  Echo ran his hand through his hair, blending gray dust into the blue. “You’ll have to pretend you’re feeling sick—that’s why you don’t want anything to eat. You’re there keeping me company, but don’t speak while the waiter is around. I’ll order, and I’ll have to eat the meal myself. It would look strange if you didn’t order anything, then shared my food.”

  “Great,” Taylor said. “Not only will we probably be arrested, I’ll get to see and smell food and won’t be able to eat any of it. Order something really unappetizing so I won’t feel as bad. Does any of that bioamino protein come in squid flavor?”

  Sheridan tugged on Echo’s hand. “No, listen to me. Tell the waitress you want the bread of life so you’ll never hunger again. When she asks you what you want to drink, tell her you want living water. Remember to use the words bread of life and living water.”

  “Manna,” Taylor added. “Ask if they serve it.”

  “You think those are the contact phrases?” Echo asked.

  “No,” Sheridan said, “but they’ll recognize those phrases. Language may change, but scripture doesn’t. And if we’re wrong about the restaurant, the waitress will just think you’re one of those odd, difficult customers.”

  Echo let out a slow breath. “I want the bread of life and living water?”

  “Yes,” Sheridan said.

  Echo recited the phrases under his breath while they walked to the restaurant. He paused when they got to the front door. “What if the waitress asks me questions I don’t know?”

  “We’ll whisper the answers to you,” Sheridan said.

  Echo sighed, resigned. “That won’t seem suspicious.”

  “We don’t have anywhere else to try for contacts,” Sheridan said.

  Echo opened the door, and the three walked in.

  They sat in a booth in the corner. Sheridan had forgotten that you ordered your meal through the computer, and the waiter came to the table only to bring you your food. For a moment she panicked. Their requests for bread and water were going to go unsaid—but Echo pushed a button on the bottom of the computer she hadn’t noticed before. It read Recommendations.

  A waiter immediately appeared on the computer screen. He was young, perhaps a teenager, with white clouds on his face. He peered over them as though looking over a storm. “What can I recommend for you?” he asked.

  Echo ran his fingers across the table, fiddling with his silverware. “I’d like the bread of life.”

  The waiter leaned closer to the screen. “The what?”

  Echo’s words came out stiffly. “The bread of life.”

  The waiter pursed his lips and considered Echo. “The only bread we serve is for the fish sandwiches, and we cook it so the yeast is dead. Would you like to order a fish sandwich?”

  Echo shifted in his chair. “Do you have any manna?”

  The waiter smiled, but it was more a smile of agitation than pleasure. “We’re a seafood restaurant. The items we serve are listed on the menu.”

  Echo glanced at Sheridan, and she fluttered a hand of encouragement at him. He turned to the computer again. “I’ll have a fish sandwich, and to drink, I want living water.”

  The waiter raised an eyebrow, his smile still intact. “Our water is filtered. If there were any bacteria living in it, you’d have to go to the Medcenter after your meal. You wouldn’t want that, would you?”

  Echo tapped one hand against the table and glanced at Sheridan again. Well, his expression seemed to say, what do I do now?

  She shrugged dejectedly back at him. It wasn’t going the way she’d expected. All her hopes of freedom—now they seemed for nothing. The waiter had no idea what Echo was talking about.

  The waiter’s gaze moved to Taylor and Sheridan. “What about the ladies with you; do they need any recommendations?”

  “No, they won’t be eating right now. They feel sick.”

  It was true.

  The waiter gave the group one last insincere smile and turned away. Before the computer screen changed back into a menu, he mumbled to someone offscreen, “How come I always get the memory-washed customers?”

  Echo nodded and let out a long sigh. “He thought I was crazy.”

  Sheridan slouched in her seat. “Maybe we should have used different phrases.”

  Taylor propped her elbow on the table and put her chin into her hand. “Yeah, let’s make Echo call the waiter back and ask him if he’d put a candle under a bushel.”

  “I’m not calling the waiter back,” Echo said. “They would think I’d had a neural failure and call the meds.”

  The noises of the restaurant seemed artificial, too loud, too happy, too confining. “I was so sure it would work,” Sheridan said.

  “Maybe we got the contact place wrong,” Taylor said. “Maybe we can think of something else.” She turned to Echo. “When the food gets here, let’s take it outside to eat. They may think it’s strange, but we’ve set a precedent for strange behavior, so it won’t matter.”

  Echo didn’t answer. Instead his gaze shot to the aisle by their table. Sheridan turned to see what he was looking at. A waiter was
approaching them, and not the teenager from the computer screen. This waiter was tall, at least six feet seven, with hulking broad shoulders and arms that looked like they could snap chairs in two. Braids of black hair hung down past his shoulders. He wore no colors on his face, and somehow it seemed even more menacing to be able to see his features clearly.

  It’s the bouncer, Sheridan thought. We’ve acted too strangely and now we’ll be thrown out of the restaurant.

  When the man reached their table, he smiled at them calmly. “I heard you had some special menu requests. I thought you’d like to see the chef. Perhaps he can help you.”

  Echo’s gaze ricocheted between Taylor and Sheridan, but neither of them answered. They just rose from their chairs. He joined them. “Yes, we’d like that.”

  “Come with me.” The waiter turned and walked back the way he’d come. They followed him down the aisle, through a door, and along a hallway with more doors. He opened a side door and a light automatically came on, showing a staircase. With each step down the stairs, Sheridan’s optimism grew. They weren’t going to a kitchen. He was taking them somewhere else, somewhere secret. He stopped at the bottom of the stairs, then pulled a calculator-looking box from his shirt pocket. He held the device up first to Taylor, then to Sheridan.

  “Scanners are illegal,” Echo told him.

  The man held the device up to Echo. “So are weapons, but my scanner tells me you have one.” He held out a hand to Echo. “Before I take you any farther, you’ll need to give me your laser box.”

  Echo’s jaw clenched. He pulled the black box from his belt and slapped it into the waiter’s hand.

  The waiter checked his scanner and held out his hand again. “And whatever other electronics you have.”

  Echo took his sensor box and his lock disabler from his belt and gave those to the waiter too.

  The waiter slipped them into his pocket, then checked his scanner again. “Pues, you’ve got as many gadgets as an Enforcer.” He motioned with his fingers to Echo. “Give me the last one.”

  Echo grimaced. It was clear he didn’t want to turn over this last device. Slowly, he unclipped a silver box from inside his belt and handed it to the waiter.