Lost Time (The Bridge Sequence Book Two)

by Nathan Hystad

  “But you’re still here. It was a hoax,” he said, coughing lightly.

  I hadn’t explained my father, not since the beginning of the conversation. “Not quite. Turns out Veronica was Clayton Belvedere’s daughter, and he returned with my father, Dirk Walker.”

  He flicked the cigarette butt into a pool of water, and I watched it snuff with a hissing sound. “What do you mean, returned?”

  “They’re back. From another planet.”

  “No. Damn it. I thought we were getting somewhere, Rex, but you’re here telling me outrageous stories.”

  “I don’t care if you believe me or not. They’re both staying with us at this very moment, and yes, they’d been gone for thirty-six years.”

  “So they’re seniors?”

  “Not quite.”

  “How does any of this help me bust into the Believers?” Young asked.

  “We find this seventh Token, we stop the Objects full of Unknowns. It’s our only hope,” I told him.

  Special Agent Young lit another smoke, exhaling a lungful before speaking again. “If you’re telling the truth, how can I help?”

  “I have a feeling we’re going to be diving headfirst into the snake pit pretty soon. It would be good to have someone who can pull us out. What do you say? Give me your contact information, and I’ll be in touch.” I offered my palm.

  “No way. I want to come with you,” he said.

  “I don’t think that’s a great idea. If the others know about our little arrangement, they’ll be extremely upset with me. Tripp Davis isn’t the trusting kind. Lucky for you, I see the world through rose-colored glasses, and you seem like a good man.”

  He dropped a business card in my hand. The FBI emblem stood out on the left side, with his name and address underneath. “Kentucky?” I asked. That was listed as his office.

  “I needed a change after my wife… It’s quiet there.” Evan stared at the parking lot.

  “Be careful, Young. They’re everywhere. If they know you’ve been snooping around their business, be assured someone’s been watching you,” I said.

  “Rex.” He stepped closer. “There’s no chance you’re deceiving me, is there?”

  “Not even a little.”

  “That’s what I was afraid of. Keep me posted. I’ll be there when necessary.” He smirked, squinting as cigarette smoke floated toward his eyes.

  I took my groceries from his car after rejecting his offer to take me home, and I watched him drive off before I started the hike.

  7

  My phone finally rang after dinner. The letter S appeared on the screen, and I answered it as quickly as I could. “Saul. Is everything okay?”

  “Fine. We were out in the yard for a bit. Reception sucks down there.” He sounded fine.

  I set it to speaker so we could all hear. The others gathered in the dining room, and I slid the phone into the middle of the table. “Saul, you’re on with everyone.”

  “You too,” Saul said.

  “Hi, Rex.” It was Beverly’s voice.

  “How are you guys holding up?” Dirk asked her before I could.

  “Fine, Dad. We’re ready to go home, but we know that’s not a possibility,” she said with a level of resignation to her tone.

  “Saul, we need your help. We were able to break into Madison’s home, and we found Hardy mentioning that the Token is in the Believers’ possession,” I said.

  “Is that so? That isn’t the news I was wishing for.”

  “No,” Marcus said, “but he also said it was in the possession of a French collector. Hunter believed it was the Sovereign.”

  “The French leader? That was a while ago. This may actually be a good thing. If that’s the case, all the items from that collection were transported to the US a decade or so ago when the new Sovereign took over.”

  “Did he die?” Tripp asked. He was the only one of us standing around the table. I noticed how he conveniently lingered by Clay and Dirk.

  “I think so. If you ask me, he was killed. Probably by his successor,” Saul answered.

  “And you haven’t met him?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Where would the collection have been shipped?” Veronica asked.

  “Way I see it, there are two realistic options for that.” Saul cleared his throat. “Seattle or Palm Springs.”

  “Why those two locations?” I couldn’t recall hearing any mention of those sites from Hunter or my father’s journals.

  “Those are his primary spots. Most action I’ve seen comes from those places. I’ll send you the addresses. Bear in mind they may have moved since I’ve been absent,” he said. The phone call cut out for a few seconds.

  “You still there?” I asked.

  “Yep. Connection isn’t great.”

  Marcus had his laptop open, and he turned it so I could see what Saul had pinged over. Two maps appeared.

  “We’ll need to split up to check these locations.” Tripp said this, and it instantly had me on edge.

  “I’d rather we didn’t,” I told him.

  “No other option. We’re losing days here, and neither of them is close to Scranton.” Tripp’s crossed arms meant he was done arguing.

  “I’ll leave that to you guys to decide. We’re doing fine here. Going to stay put until this is dealt with. Hopefully, you find the Token and return to Porto in a week or so.” Saul’s advice sounded so simple, like we could just waltz in and snatch the thing from their unsuspecting grips.

  We conversed for a few minutes before I threw it off speaker and stepped from the table, asking to talk to Beverly. “You really okay?”

  She sniffled. “Rex, this is terrible. I can’t stop picturing Fred. That sneer. My finger on the trigger. Is this a bad dream?”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “How’s Dad?” That was my sister, worrying over everyone but herself.

  “He’s… strange. But he’s our dad, I suppose.” I didn’t offer the gibberish he’d said in his sleep the other night. She had plenty to worry about.

  “Give him a hug for me. He may be different, but he’s our blood, and we need all the family we can get.” I pictured her standing straight, her mouth in a firm line.

  “I will. Say hi to the kids for me. And be careful.”

  “You too,” she said, and our call ended.

  “Not on your life. I’m not splitting up with Clayton!” Dirk shouted.

  “What’s the problem?” I intervened.

  Tripp pointed at Dirk. “I suggested Dirk go with you and Veronica to Seattle. He has other ideas.”

  Clayton sat at the table, his posture so poor, it looked like he might roll into a ball.

  “Dad, what’s the issue?” I asked.

  “Clayton and I cannot be separated. We are a team. A duo. Batman and Robin. You understand.” He nodded toward Marcus.

  “Tripp, does it really matter? You go with them to Palm Springs,” I said.

  Tripp frowned, unhappy with the decision. “Fine. I’ll babysit the out-of-this-world club. You better hope to hell they don’t screw this up.”

  Suddenly, sending them with Tripp sounded like a death sentence for the pair. “Maybe I was wrong. I could—”

  “No. You go with Veronica and Marcus. Makes more sense.”

  And like that, our plan to infiltrate the Believers’ hideouts was made. We stayed up late talking it over, booking flights and renting cars. Tomorrow morning, we were leaving on our first real lead, and I hoped it would be as simple as Saul had made it sound.

  Marcus and I were sharing a room, and we started to pack our few possessions in anticipation of an early rise. He passed me my jacket from the dresser near the door of the bedroom, and something drifted from the pocket to the hardwood floors.

  He showed me the front of the business card. “What in the hell is this?”

  “Marcus, I swear I was going to tell you,” I said, trying to keep my voice low.

  “When?”

  “T
onight. When we’re alone.” I hadn’t decided what to share with him, but if he doubted my lie, he didn’t show it on his face.

  “The FBI? What happened?”

  I explained Evan Young and his objective of stopping the Believers. When it was over, Marcus flipped the card around, staring at the typeface. “I suppose it can’t hurt to have someone on our team. Maybe it won’t be such a bad thing.”

  “Let’s hope.”

  “Are you telling him about Seattle?”

  “Not a chance. I still don’t trust him completely. Let’s investigate the site with our own two eyes first, and see what happens,” I said. He passed me the card, and I folded it, hiding it inside my wallet.

  “Are we telling Ronnie?” he asked. Marcus had already opened his computer and knew what he was doing.

  “We will. Yes.” When was the operative question.

  “Looks like Special Agent Evan Young is the real deal. Joined when he was twenty-six. Dealt with some serious crimes, and has a good, but not spectacular, track record.” Marcus showed me a series of articles.

  “The kind of lackluster approach a distracted agent might have?” I asked.

  “Probably. At least we know he’s legit. You didn’t even check before you gave him everything. Try not to be so careless, Rex.” Being chewed out by Marcus was a new thing, and I appreciated his candor.

  “I’m sorry. It was nice to have someone on our side that could help. When you’re swimming upriver for so long, it’s hard not to grab a life jacket when it’s tossed at you,” I said.

  The pair of us finished packing, and Marcus sat on his bed. “You really think of us like Batman and Robin?”

  “Sure.”

  “That’s cool. Except, wouldn’t Hunter be Batman? He’s the rich one. Was the rich one,” he corrected himself.

  “Speaking of which, have you listened to the device again? We need to understand what it says,” I reminded him.

  “Sounded an awful lot like the notes from the journal. Must be from the Unknowns,” Marcus said.

  “I’d love to know how Hunter came into possession of that thing. I wonder what these Unknowns look like.”

  “The Believers think they were the first beings on Earth, and that we evolved from them. So it kind of makes sense if they were similar to us,” he said. “You taught us a comparable theory in an anthropology class.”

  “You’re right. But that was ages ago, and we haven’t changed all that much.”

  “Not on the physical side. We can’t tell what additional attributes they might have. For all we know, their brains are fully operational, not like us using ten percent,” Marcus said.

  “It’s possible, but the whole ten percent theory is a myth. That’s neither here nor there. We’ll keep working on it.”

  Marcus lay on his comforter, staring at the ceiling. “It might have been something he took from the cult. The device.”

  “That’s true.” My gut told me that wasn’t it. But at the moment, I didn’t have better explanation. “Goodnight, Marcus.”

  He turned his light off, and I climbed into bed. I found sleep shortly after and woke hours later to creaking floorboards. Marcus was still dozing, and the cool moonlight pierced through the open blinds, guiding my steps to the bedroom door.

  Clayton and my father were in the kitchen, talking with their backs turned to me. I crept up, trying to hear their words. When I did, I froze. They weren’t speaking in English. They sounded like the voice we’d heard in Hunter’s basement.

  8

  Rimia: Day 47

  The sun beat down on Dirk’s uncovered shoulders, and he hiked his shirt up, trying to hide from the ceaseless rays. He toiled in the field alongside Clayton, digging several rows for the new season of seedlings to be planted. It wasn’t bad work. He was eager to contribute for their village, knowing he owed them much more than he’d given.

  “Does it ever get cooler here?” Clay asked. Sweat poured off the shorter man like water, and he kept wiping the moisture from his damaged glasses.

  “I hope so. They told us it does, but their definition of winter seems far different than ours.” Dirk waved as Opor approached. Her tanned skin was impervious to the heat, and she didn’t even blink in the middle of the hot day. Their speech was surprisingly easy to articulate once they had the hang of it, and he tested it out again, trying to recall the words before speaking.

  “Hello, Opor. Are the others ready with the seeds?” Dirk spoke slowly and thoughtfully. Clayton was better at this than he was, and he corrected Dirk’s pronunciation of “seeds.”

  Opor smiled, her teeth baring in a rare expression. “Dirkwalker”—she said it as one word—“you honor us with your hard work.”

  “Happy to help,” he said in English, making her frown.

  They’d struggled to learn about the people here, only finding that they’d been there for as many as an estimated twenty generations. They weren’t sure who’d founded the cities, or what had happened to destroy the region. None had ventured more than a week’s travel from their home before turning around, so it wasn’t known what existed beyond this place. Dirk wasn’t in a hurry to find out. He’d returned to the dome every couple of days for the first month or so, but the treacherous trek was growing more exhausting with each attempt.

  Clayton had stopped going, choosing to work at the village instead. Dirk couldn’t fault him, but he still clung to the hope that someone would activate the Bridge to rescue them.

  The locals called it Rimia. He didn’t know if that was the title of the planet, country, or city, and when he asked, the elders would shrug, repeating the name.

  Dirk spotted four of the villagers walking in the distance, rolling barrels to gather water in. It had turned out that the body of water was fresh, but they used a semi-permeable sheet to filter it for drinking.

  He gazed to the right, where the mountain range jabbed upward miles away. “Has anyone gone that direction?” he asked Opor.

  “It is not allowed,” she told him.

  “Why?” Clay finally stopped plowing and rested his elbow on the shovel’s handle.

  Opor was six inches taller than Dirk, and he peered up at her dark eyes. They hinted at an emotion, fear perhaps, as she looked at the mountains. “It is said evil lies that way.”

  “But no one’s seen it?” Clay asked.

  “No.”

  “If you haven’t investigated it, why be scared?” Dirk tried to understand what mystery the range held. Perhaps there was an answer to an unasked question waiting within the peaks and valleys.

  “My parents warned me, as did theirs, and so on,” she said. “There is no more to it. Evil is evil.”

  “Fine. We’ll accept this.” Dirk saw the other villagers arriving, carrying heavy brown sacks of seeds. They began to plant the rows of loosened soil across the field.

  “Will you dine with my family tonight?” She stared at Dirk while she asked this, but it was Clayton who answered.

  “We’d love to.” He returned to work, and Dirk watched as Opor walked away. Her clothing was green, a variation on coveralls. He’d seen the older members of their village making the clothing: using a local plant, processing it, and hand-sewing the material. It was an arduous procedure, one he was surprised to see on an alien planet. As far as physiology went, there seemed to be minor differences between these people and humans. It was a curious discovery.

  “What if they came through the Bridge?” Clay asked, bringing up an old argument.

  “We’ve been through this.”

  “It’s possible,” he assured Dirk.

  “Then why were the Tokens spread out again? No. I don’t think they’re human. Perhaps some distant connection, or we were derived from them.” Dirk watched the workers coming closer with their seeds. “Did you see the way they begrudge the mountains?”

  “They definitely don’t worship them. They’re scared to check it out,” Clay said, dragging his spade through the packed soil. More sweat dripped off his
nose, and Dirk watched it plunge to the ground.

  “Then we need to do it for them. See what they’re so afraid of.”

  “Are you nuts? There has to be a reason they’ve been warned off.”

  Dirk dabbed his forehead with his sleeve. “Maybe. Or maybe they were placed here to prevent anyone arriving through the Bridge from seeking salvation.”

  Clay stopped what he was doing and peered up at Dirk. “Then why not just kill us?”

  “Time will tell.”

  Clay lifted Dirk’s shovel and pushed it toward him. He accepted it, working in the adjacent row, but couldn’t stop gazing at the forbidden range.

  ____________

  The airport was quiet in the early hour, and I was exhausted after a sleepless night. Hearing my dad and Clay conversing in an alien language was unsettling, and instead of confronting them about it, I tried to tell myself I’d heard things. That they’d been whispering, distorting the words. But when I looked at my dad as he waited near the check-in desk, I knew what I’d witnessed was real.

  I don’t know if that’s my father. Veronica’s words from that first night of their return echoed in my mind. Then I considered what Dirk had told us in his speech about the Bridge and Hardy’s theories. By learning their language, the cult thinks they can attune and merge with the aliens’ minds upon arrival.

  Was that why the Believers spoke the language of the Unknowns? And was the speech from the woman in Hunter’s basement congruent with what my dad had been speaking with Clay? Were they planning on attuning with the being in the Objects?

  “Rex, you okay?” Marcus plopped into the seat beside me.

  “Sure. I’m fine.” But I wasn’t. Not until this was all over and solved. I glanced at Veronica, dreading telling her about Evan Young on the plane. Marcus had already agreed to let the two of us sit together on the five-hour flight.

  Tripp walked over, handing us each a boarding pass. “You can fly business class, thanks to Madison Investments.”

  “Tripp, can I talk to you for a second?” I asked.

  “What is it? Having second thoughts?”

  “Keep an eye on them, would you?”