by Lola Dodge
Countless factors could be involved, but given the timing of my arrival… Was I the thing pushing the clone toward the edge?
Had I done the same to Quanta?
It couldn’t be that simple. The pairing was complex, but its purpose was stabilizing Red Helixes—not throwing them out of balance. Even if I was the trigger, some other force had to be at work, but I had no luck figuring out the specifics as the minutes ticked away.
We were only disturbed once, when an attendant came to clean away the breakfast trays and remind her of her holo room session. She waved the man off. “I’m busy now.”
That easily, we were left alone. We were certainly being watched through the room’s cams and sensors, but even if Doctor Nagi himself checked the feeds, sitting on the couch together wasn’t earthshattering.
My nerves tensed as we neared the hour that Quanta and Devan had originally appeared. The clone searched the harbor’s security cams.
Finally, she went rigid. “There.”
She centered the image on a nondescript boat. The same one that had exploded when Cipher lost control.
Quanta emerged.
Alone.
She hopped across to the dock, and I could read her posture clear as day. She bobbled a little as she hit the crowds—and I assumed, their timeghosts—but for the most part, her shoulders were straight and she moved as if she knew where she was going.
A thread of hope tugged at me. If Quanta had missed the time reversal, I would’ve expected her and Devan to head out together. She’d obviously changed her plan.
I touched the clone’s shoulder. Can you see where she’s headed?
She winced at my voice. “It’s so blurry.”
“Take your time.” I tried to sound encouraging instead of projecting the urgency that shot through me. This was the only window I’d get.
The only chance that Quanta and I could both survive.
“She’s on the way to…” The clone’s brow furrowed. “To here?”
I gripped her wrist. We have to go out and meet her.
Why? The clone’s tone sharpened. Security can take care of her.
Look at her. I tilted the tablet. She’s destabilizing. If they shoot, she’ll implode again. I tried to keep emotion out of my voice. The clone had to believe I was on her side. How much of the Citadel is in her blast radius?
The clone stared at something beyond me as she thought. I hoped she wasn’t seeing another escape attempt. But now that Quanta was involved—her third eye shouldn’t be at its clearest.
You and I are the only ones who can stop her.
Her eyes snapped back and she glared. “Not you. Me. Alone.”
It would’ve been too easy. Let me walk out with you. Then you can leave me with a guard detail, but I don’t want you out there alone.
“Okay.” She rubbed at her temple, missing the lies in my voice and eyes.
I stood and offered her a hand up. “Should we go out?”
The clone took my hand. She wobbled as she stood. Then she gripped her head. “We’d better. I could use some air.”
Whatever was affecting her, it worked in my favor as we strode to the door. The clone couldn’t be paying much attention to the future.
She approached the guard who was posted next to the lift. “I need a security detail with me outside.”
“Reason?” the man asked.
“There’s an enemy coming.” She gripped her temple. “You can tell Ming I said not to engage. I’ll take care of this one myself.”
The man relayed her message through his com. I hummed with anticipation I hoped the clone couldn’t feel.
Finally, the guard nodded. “You’re cleared to go.”
“Good.” She slipped a bloodthirsty smile as we stepped into the lift.
I kept hold of her arm, steering her toward her showdown.
Chapter Forty-One
QUANTA
My head ached like a mother as I worked my way through the harbor. The timeghosts were pressing in, but I managed to find my way back to the smuggler hut. The guy the captain had paid off the last time stepped forward to stop me, but then cowered back before I had to defend myself.
Oh.
I was glowing again.
Concentrating made the light go away, but I couldn’t hold it—or the inevitable explosion—forever. I had to get to Tair and the clone before that.
And then…
I still wasn’t really sure.
Which was kind of crappy plan-wise, but I knew if I could just get to them, I could figure out a way. There was always a chance when Tair and I were together.
The tunnel wasn’t as easy to crawl through without Devan. I should’ve brought a flashlight. Then again…
I stopped tamping down my glow. Ghostly blue light lit my way.
Handy.
I gritted the blue lights back down when I popped out on the other side. Then I made my way up to street level and headed for the pod station.
My steps were a little too slow, but I couldn’t help it with the timeghosts bearing down like a solid wall. They strobed and howled, and my fingernails sliced into my palms as I tried to keep focused on the present.
Almost there.
A single pod coasted to meet me when I finally made it to the station. I fell into the seat and punched my destination into the touchscreen. My head pounded like a drum.
Almost. There.
Building number three. As crazy as this was, I could still see the future I’d glimpsed, and it was as solid as ever. The clone was coming out to meet me.
I zoned out until the pod voice announced my arrival. Then I hopped out. Timeghosts hit me in waves as people bustled around the station. My ears rang.
I had to keep it together a little bit longer.
People gasped.
Aaaand I was glowing again. I didn’t have the heart or the energy to make it stop.
Besides. I wanted the clone to know I was coming.
The station had a clear view of the building I wanted. I walked straight for it as guards started falling into formation around me. I let out the tiniest breath when none of them shot me right away. The clone must’ve okayed my life for a few more minutes, at least.
That was all I needed.
The little plaza in front of the building felt strangely familiar. Or maybe that was just me. Blue light spilled out of me as I moved forward, and it felt like an important walk.
Like this wasn’t my first time heading to a duel with my doppelgänger. Maybe it wasn’t the last time, either.
It tasted like destiny, which I hated. I’ll make my own future, thank you very much.
A solid wall of guards formed around the plaza, but they held their positions instead of coming at me. The security was thickest near the building’s entrance.
Rippling like a solid wall of body armor, they made a space in their ranks. A figure walked out to meet me.
She wore a coral sundress. Her dark hair was a little shorter and better combed than mine, but everything else…
It was like a mirror. A warped, awful mirror.
Something behind her drew my eye. Tair stood in the thick of the guard squad.
My breath caught in my throat. If I could just get to him—
“You won’t make it.” She stepped in front of me, blocking off my view.
Pain stabbed my temples. I staggered and gripped my head. “You—”
The clone stood in the same posture as me. Hunched over and glaring. “What is this?”
My voice sounded so weird from her lips. And she wore stilettos. Who wore stilettos to a showdown?
I forced myself upright. “We’re both destabilizing.”
“No.” She teetered. “I can’t be.”
“You can. You are.” And now both of us were glowing.
“This is your fault.” Her face twisted into a snarl.
As much as she looked like me… That expression wasn’t me at all. “It’s our fault. And I know how to solve the problem.�
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“How?” She bit out the word.
I reached out to her, just the way I’d done in my glimpse of the future. “Fight you?”
She recoiled. “Wha—Why would I?”
“You want both of us to die?” As it was, my head was splitting, and I could barely see the clone through the growing fuzz of timeghosts. I didn’t know what would happen when she took my hand, but energy hung heavy around us.
Something was cooking.
A fight for dominance? A mental battle for survival? It didn’t matter what exactly. This was the only chance I’d get to burn her out, and I didn’t dare lunge for her or all the Black Helixes with happy trigger fingers would ignore the orders that had them on temporary stand down.
“I’ll win,” she said. “My control is better than yours.”
“Maybe.” But between the two of us? I had way more to fight for and I was no slouch at brain games. I waggled my fingers. “I’m kind of in a time crunch here.”
Slowly, she reached for my hand. “He’ll be mine when this is over.”
I shook my head. “This has nothing to do with him.” This was about her and me. Nothing and no one else.
The clone grabbed my wrist.
Blue lights burst from us. Pain sizzled through my brain.
And timeghosts exploded.
I couldn’t tell if they were spilling out of us or just trading back and forth between our brains. All I could see were writhing shapes and scenes. Chaos.
As I strained to throw up my walls, I felt the clone do the same. But the best defense was a good offense. Right?
Holding my own barriers strong, I pushed the flow of ghosts at her. Her mental presence shrank back.
Was that it? All I had to do was overwhelm her? Then I could burn her out. Would that be enough to save me, or was I screwed either way?
However this ended, I didn’t want her walking away. I bit down and pushed harder. The ghosts flowed from me to her, and her presence wavered in my head.
I was getting to her. I pushed and pushed and pushed and—
Then she pushed back. Her ghosts crushed into mine.
One of us—and I can’t tell who—skips happily along with Tair; fluorescent lights flicker overhead as we’re wheeled down a long hallway on a table; we kick our feet, reading a book on a white sofa; bubbles pop around our face, fizzing through green liquid, and we claw against the tubes and cold glass, trying to get free; we stare over Tair’s body, numb and dazed—
Gasping for air, I tried to hold my own. To fight her ghosts with mine.
But the truth echoed in my bones.
She was right. She did have more control than me.
We walk down an endless corridor; a tech draws blood from our arm; Tair and us stand shoulder to shoulder on the floor of the Senate as Doctor Nagi grins down from his seat on high; we sit in a white living room on a sofa next to Tair—
Panting, I managed to rebuild my walls. She was still forcing images my way, trying to overload me.
But that last image…
Tair and the clone sat next to each other on an eerie-familiar sofa. They weren’t blue or hazy or sketchy like all the other timeghosts. The image looked photorealistic from the fabric of the clone’s coral dress to the golden brown of Tair’s eyes.
Now that I had the image in my head, it shone above everything else. Crisp and clear.
Too clear.
Because it was a reset point. Their reset point.
Hope tingled all the way to my toenails. If I could see the reset point and it felt exactly like any other reset point… Then I could use it just like it was mine.
It wasn’t mine, but the clone and I shared everything else, so why not this? I’d expected a mental battle would end with one of us brain fried, but even if I won, the guards weren’t letting me walk away.
A reset was exactly the out I needed. I still couldn’t rewind back there myself, so I needed to get to Tair somehow, but I didn’t see any other rays of hope bursting down from the sky.
This was my best chance of getting out of the nightmare.
I focused everything I had on that one image, just sketching myself over the image of the clone. Tair and Quanta sitting on a white sofa in a white room that looked exactly like my old prison. Her legs—my legs—tucked underneath me. His hand touching mine.
It felt like I’d already been there. And I could really get there. I knew it.
No. Pain flashed as the clone’s voice stabbed into my head. The image of the reset point started to blur as she yanked at it.
No yourself. Flexing my mental muscles, I pulled at the moment of time. It blurred—clearer then washed out, crisp then dull—as we wrestled back and forth.
Every tug lanced me with pain until it felt like the world itself was fracturing. The clone and I toppled as we fought back and forth any way we could.
Focus.
The couch and the dress. Tair and me. Not her. Sitting in a white room. The sterile, dry air. Even the warmth of Tair’s touch. I was slowly taking over the reset point. Just a little bit more…
“Quanta!” Tair’s voice jolted me back to reality.
The clone and I sprawled on the ground, flaming with ghostly blue light. Every guard in the plaza knelt, gripping their temples.
Only Tair was still on his feet. He sprinted, heading for me—
But the clone was closer. She grabbed his ankle first.
For a breathless second, time froze. Then it started moving again, but in the wrong direction.
The clone was trying to rewind time.
That would bring Tair and her back to the sofa room, but me? I already had a grip on the reset point, and if I was rewinding with them, I had a feeling I wouldn’t end up back on the boat. Time already howled in my ears, tearing at my brain like it wanted me to let go.
I couldn’t. I’d either get spat out into the raw flow of time or vaporized. Probably both.
The clone kept rewinding. My world vibrated as reality paged backward frame by frame, like reality was a flipbook.
My grip on the reset point started to give.
I was a bug on the windshield. The clone had the wheel. And I had to get it back, or…
Time howled louder. Deafening. A limitless universe of other possibilities churned out there, and if I got too close, I’d get charred by the flames of time.
NO. I screamed into her head.
She flinched as I fought for control.
Only one of us could survive this…
But I wasn’t winning.
Chapter Forty-Two
ALTAIR
Unseen forces pulled me in every direction. As the present began to rewind, I fought to understand the howling energies at work.
The clone had touched me first. Separating the roar of time from all else, I zeroed in on the main sources of the chaos.
Two sources. Two energies. Similar, but not nearly the same.
Quanta. The clone.
They were fighting for control as they pulled us back through time.
The immeasurable pressure whirling around us left no doubt what would happen to the loser. And if neither of them won the battle—
They could send us all spiraling outside of time. Not knowing the limits of their power, they could tear the fabric of reality in half.
As I delved into the mental battle, I could feel the tide turning. The clone had momentum, and that gave her every advantage where the forces of nature were at work.
Quanta’s energy wavered. She was flagging.
But the three of us were connected. I pushed my mental strength toward my Quanta.
I pitied the clone, but I’d made my choice before we ever met. The genetic pairing meant nothing without a real connection to back it up.
Quanta was the only one I cared about.
Chapter Forty-Three
QUANTA
I was losing.
Fighting. Clawing.
Still losing.
I tore at the image of the reset
point, trying to wrench it back from the clone, but as we rewound, my grip faltered. The living room scene faded.
The clone took control. Her smug sense of victory laughed through our psychic link.
And something else…
Tair.
His solid, steady presence reached out to me through the insanity.
Not to her. Through her. To me.
I’m here, he said. Warmth and love and trust filled me, and I knew she felt them on the way through her—and she knew exactly who he was reaching out to.
She flinched. Then faltered.
I doubled down my focus, fixing every detail in my mind as I tried to mentally shove her away.
Tair and I sitting on the white couch. The bright fabric of that awful sundress. Tair in his bland scrubs. The smells of breakfast leftovers wafting from the kitchen.
The present shifted as time crawled backward.
The flames of time gave one last screech, and the clone disappeared in a blink.
Without her pulling, the reset point snapped back at me with a flash of pain. I almost lost it, too.
But I gritted my teeth and held on. Now that I was the only one driving, time flowed in the direction I wanted it to. Reality rewound itself, letting me backtrack the clone’s timeline.
The pain didn’t let up as I pulled back toward the reset point. It bit down harder like fangs to the brain.
Maybe stealing her past hadn’t been such a good idea…
I gritted it out through pulsing waves of nausea and dizziness and searing pain. Reversing into her shoes took me back with Tair and the guards. I tugged us back and back and back, holding onto the reset point with my life and my willpower and everything else I could bring to the table.
Back through the secure door, back into a lift, and up and through the familiar corridors of a fluorescent white prison.
All the while time roared, and blue flames burned off the layers and layers of timeghosts like they were tissue paper. It flailed at me, egging me to lose focus, but I wasn’t budging.
Finally, everything stilled. The quiet rang in my ears.
I took in a ragged breath. Tair and I sat in the living room, alone and surprisingly alive.
