Time Twisters

by RABE, JEAN

And he was raising that gun.

  Putting the trembling barrel in his mouth.

  Crossing himself with his free hand.

  And pulling the trigger.

  As Cell 91 reappeared around him, he felt the nausea boiling up in his stomach. Lurching from the bed, he managed to reach the primitive chamber pot that came with each of the cells.

  Shivering, he wiped his mouth and dropped back on the bed, too weak to stand or even sit up.

  He was also too weak to thrust away the memories of this last host, no matter how much he longed to do so.

  The man had been a priest.

  And he had committed what he had always thought was the ultimate sin: the taking of his own life.

  But in his case suicide had not been the worst sin he had ever committed. This man had committed worse sins—dozens, hundreds of times.

  Until he had been found out.

  Until some of the children had finally ignored his warnings and pleadings and told the truth to their parents.

  Until his sins, no longer a secret of the confessional, had been broadcast to the world.

  Until he could stand the guilt and the vilification and the shame no longer.

  And now he was dead, by his own hand. But his sickening memories lived on in the occupant of Cell 91, to whom the worst knowledge was not that his host had killed himself. Nor was it what he had done to dozens of children. The worst, the knowledge that threatened to rip his heart from his chest, was the knowledge that such behavior was widespread and ongoing. This host, the memories insisted, had been but one of many who had inflicted their moral carnage on the most innocent of their flocks, year after year, decade after decade.

  A mixture of relief and terror gripped him as he realized the room was once again vanishing from around him. Relief that he might be able to escape those memories he already possessed, terror that he might be on his way to even worse memories, if such a thing were possible.

  His stay in the new host was shorter than in any of the previous ones. He was at the wheel of a car, racing down an empty highway at breakneck speed. A hundred yards ahead loomed a concrete bridge abutment.

  A quick glance in the rearview mirror told his latest host there were no vehicles behind him, no one who would be injured by his own selfish act, by his escape.

  This time, in the two or three seconds he had, he instinctively tried to control the host’s hands, to force them to twist at the wheel and bring the speeding car back into the traffic lane.

  But he was, as before, only a passenger.

  As the car crumpled around his host, first crushing him, then literally tearing his body to pieces, the host’s memories flooded his mind, and he found himself screaming at the walls of Cell 91, his whole body shaking.

  This latest host, the new memories told him, had been one of the victims of the previous host. Unable to bring himself to tell anyone, even his parents, he had kept it all inside until, decades later, it had overwhelmed him.

  Satan! he thought, shuddering. These mad visions can come from no one but Satan!

  But why? What sins have I committed that make me subject to such punishments?

  There was no answer, except for a renewed feeling of vertigo as Cell 91 once again wavered out of existence and he found himself in yet another body, another host.

  But this one, he realized instantly, was different. This host was peacefully asleep and showed no signs of waking.

  And the flood of memories he had come to expect and to dread did not come.

  Instead, the only sensation he experienced was a muffled beeping that, he realized after a few seconds, or perhaps a few hours, matched his own pulse. His host’s pulse.

  Is this one in a coma? he wondered. Is that why his memories have not been thrust upon me?

  He had no way of knowing how long he lay there, thankful for the respite, however long it lasted, be it seconds or hours.

  Or forever.

  As the ill-defined minutes drifted by, an unexpected and sourceless feeling of familiarity crept over him. The same kind of gentle nostalgic feeling that washed over him whenever he returned to his boyhood home.

  The feeling grew, slowly forcing out the apprehension and dread that he had felt as he waited for the merging with this new host.

  Finally, the host’s eyes opened.

  The host looked around the hospital room, slowly. The beeping accelerated, and he wondered: Is this it? Is it this host’s time, as it had been the others’?

  But it wasn’t, not yet.

  The host, not strong enough to sit up unassisted, crossed himself as best he could with his palsied hand.

  “Who is here?” The words themselves were slurred, but they were crystal clear in his mind.

  Abruptly, he realized with absolute certainty who this host was, why the sense of familiarity had been so great.

  It was himself, decades in his own future.

  How long did I serve, he found himself wondering? Twenty years? Thirty?

  And the answer came, appearing in his mind as the countless other memories had: twenty-six. Followed by the words themselves, slurred as the host’s lips tried to form them.

  As his own dying body tried to speak them.

  Does this future self know the truth, he wondered? Does he remember this night more than twenty-six years in his past? Is that why I am here, merging with that future self? To learn what the nightmares meant? Who had sent them? And why?

  Even as he silently asked the questions, the same voice that had spoken to him wordlessly moments before the first of the nightmares spoke again: you are here to learn your destiny.

  And the memories flowed.

  But not randomly, as they had flowed into his own mind during each incarnation. This time, as they flowed from his younger to his older self, they were organized, and both selves instantly recognized the starting point: Humanae Vitae, the document that his older self had upheld and defended zealously all these years. Its convoluted but meticulous logic, its carefully chosen words, its elaborately constructed arguments, its sometimes arcane references had not changed. Its conclusion was still, to them both, as obvious and irrefutable as ever.

  Without warning, it was juxtaposed with the countless memories of war and famine and starvation, and the links between those catastrophes and the enforcement of the document’s conclusions suddenly were made inescapably obvious by one memory after another.

  Too many people, too few resources. A deadly combination.

  Still, both selves resisted, convinced that it was nothing more than a Satanic trick, that Satan was indeed the source of these hideous visions. Surely the thoroughly reasoned and eloquent defense of God’s law put forth in that sacred document could not have been the cause of such tribulations! Surely—

  Abruptly, the memories of the last two hosts, the suicides, overwhelmed all the others.

  The older self crumpled inwardly, shocked to his core not by the suicides alone but by what had driven them to it. By the hundreds of evils the one had inflicted on the other. By the knowledge that this one offender was not alone in his actions, but only one of many within the Church.

  For an interminable moment it was as if his older self had ceased to exist, and he wondered if the end had come, if that terrible memory had utterly destroyed him.

  But then his answer came.

  I knew, but I did not believe, the older self’s mind confessed, the unspoken words a cry of agony that assaulted the younger self’s mind. I was told, time and again, but I would not believe. I could not believe!.

  But now, suddenly and belatedly, he believed. They both believed as the memories settled firmly into their minds, establishing their reality. And it was not just the abuse that they believed. They now knew that those terrible visions of starvation and war and cruelty and, most importantly, the relationship that had been revealed by the countless memories, were not the work of Satan. While they might not be directly from God Himself, they were most certainly a miracle—and a warning! They coul
d both now see that they and countless others in the upper reaches of the Church hierarchy had been cruelly deceiving themselves. They had in their pride convinced themselves that their esoteric logic and eloquent words about respect and love and responsibility could truly bring about the Utopian marital relationships they desired and God demanded. They both knew that, despite their own memories of the death camps and a thousand other historical atrocities, they had not taken human nature with all its flaws sufficiently into account. And those flaws, like those of the abusive priests, had inevitably led to disaster.

  And they both realized what must be done.

  With that realization, the hospital room and his older self simply vanished, and he found himself back where his terrifying journey had begun: Cell 91, the room in the papal residence to which he and one other had been assigned while the elections were held and to which he had returned, alone, to spend the last night before his installation in solitary contemplation.

  Resisting the totally impractical urge to rush from the room with the news of how his attempt at contemplation had been rewarded, he lay quietly, formulating his plans.

  He might well fail, but at least he would have tried.

  In his first act as pope, John Paul II startled the world by using the traditional speech following his installation to call for preparations for Vatican III, including a new and thorough examination of his predecessor’s encyclical on the regulation of birth, the controversial Humanae Vitae. In the following months, he also earned—and gladly accepted—the nickname The Great Reformer, by exposing and waging relentless war against the child abuse that had been going on within the Church for decades. Already one of the most powerful popes in centuries as a result of his boundless energy and charisma, his series of major victories in that war gave him even more influence, so that when, at the conclusion of Vatican III, he issued a new encyclical in which birth control was not only accepted but encouraged. Objections were heard only from a minuscule and hidebound minority. From then on, birth control was no longer anathema but was promoted in all its forms around the world by this wildly popular and utterly fearless pope, who traveled and proseletyzed more widely than any previous pontiff.

  And he succeeded.

  By the end of the millennium, world population had leveled off and become stable, and abortions were at an all-time low. The specter of famine, while not entirely vanquished, was no longer the leading cause of death. He knew there were of course other problems, other disasters that would afflict humanity as long as it existed in all its imperfections, but at least irresponsible procreation, the worst of the self-inflicted disasters, was, for the time being, off the board. It would not be looming over everything, ready to multiply the effects of the natural disasters, the wars and all the rest.

  Humanity still might some day succumb to the darker side of its nature, but now at least it had a chance.

  OYER AND TERMINER

  Joe Masdon

  April 19, 1692

  “Abigail Hobbs confessed to being a witch today before the court.”

  The sound of three slowly rocking chairs was the only noise on the porch for the next few minutes. Hands worked busily at patching small tears in shirts, knitting a small blanket, and shelling early season peas. A low whistle finally came from the youngest woman, and a hunting dog stood up from the steps and padded his way around the house. Pausing to sniff the air a few times, the dog raised his leg at a fence post, marked his territory, and finished his walk around the yard.

  The old bloodhound had baggy eyes, and his tongue lolled from his mouth as he panted lightly. He stretched out near the corner of the house. It was early spring, and the New England air still held a chill in it. The bloodhound’s spot was in the sun, and he closed his eyes as if to take a nap.

  “No surprise about Abigail. The poor young girl would confess to being a butter churn if she thought it might shock those men.” This came from the tall, rail-thin older woman who was shelling peas.

  “She did certainly spend enough of her life being used as a butter churn—more like a butter churn than a witch by any account,” came a muttered invective from a woman whose small gnarled hands were creating a baby blanket.

  “Now, now, don’t go being spiteful, Agnes. The poor dear has never been in her right mind, least not since . . . that business when she was younger.” All three heads nodded briefly, sadly, at the truth behind the words of the youngest on the porch.

  “Well, not the first to suffer such business, our young Abigail, nor will she suffer the last, I fear.” Fingers flexed slowly, taking a break from the labor with the peas.

  Repositioning the shirt, the youngest continued, “Even so, Constance, while it is the girl’s nature to be inappropriate, I wonder at the things she claimed. Poor thing said she pinched those three young girls at the devil’s bidding and flew on a witch’s pole to dark meetings with others of the village.”

  Disapproving frowns and clucks came from the two older women. “Why didst she make such an outrageous claim, Ruth? I hope all in attendance did see her stories for the twisted yarns they were.”

  “I fear not, Constance. Judge Hathorne and Captain Sewall were most interested in her tale. It came as quite a shock to the gallery, let me tell you, when she talked of her parents being witches, too.”

  “That ungrateful child! Deliverance Hobbs, a witch? Foolishness!” Agnes scowled as she shook her head.

  “They took much truth from her tales, as though she spoke gospel. Names were put to paper, and Sheriff Walcott didst hold the paper most solemnly when he was given it.” Agnes snorted quietly as she heard this.

  Agnes held up the blanket, examining it for some nonexistent flaw, “First Tituba, and now Abigail. How many others must falsely claim to be Satan’s brides to appease these men?”

  For a few minutes, there was no conversation on the porch, just rocking. Peas were shelled with a bit more agitation, and stitches were made a little tighter. The sound of gentle rocking continued unabated.

  “Stupid color-skinned Indian sow,” Agnes spat.

  “Her and her backwards voodoo talk. Got all those little girls all turned around with her words of fortune telling and bespelling men’s hearts,” Ruth agreed.

  “Do not show pity too quickly on all those girls. I believe they have some knowledge of what they are doing. The contortions of young Parris and her cousin we all three knew as grain-fed when first we were told, despite Dr. Griggs being befuddled as a man on his wedding night.”

  Constance and Ruth nodded their agreement.

  “But I do not see as anyone would have given them any of the purple rye since Tituba got jailed.”

  “I am most put out by Mercy Lewis, for I had hopes for her.” Constance irritably threw an empty pod to the porch.

  “It’s the men I most hold in harm for this day. To follow the Book, and to try to do the Lord’s work is one thing, but to let girls lead you astray when you ought know better is unconscionable.” The baby blanket felt warm to Agnes’ frail old hands.

  “Aye, a problem not uncommon in Salem, is it; men acting unconscionably in the presence of girls, young and old.” Constance was becoming agitated, and her voice started to rise. “Parris and his . . .”

  A snuffling bark came from the corner of the yard. The gentle sounds of rocking returned, along with a subdued humming, halfway through a hymn.

  “Good afternoon, ladies.” A strong voice came from the front of the yard. “Might I come visit and share a bit?” The man held his hat, and absently patted the large bloodhound who had padded casually over to him.

  “Well, of course, Mr. Samuel Wardwell.” Constance’s lined and weathered face smiled with genuine motherly warmth.

  “You’re very kind, ladies.” The large hound followed him lazily and laid down at the steps when Wardwell joined the women on the porch.

  “I hate to bear unpleasant news, but have you heard that Judge Hathorne pulled a confession of witchcraf-tery from Abigail Hobbs today?” If he
found the news unpleasant, it was clear that he was nevertheless eager to be the one to make the delivery.

  “My word, no!” Constance dropped her hands slowly, looking genuinely surprised.

  “Goodness, Mr. Wardwell, what on earth did she say?” Agnes demurred.

  “Well, ladies, I do hate to shock, but she claimed that she had pinched at poor Elizabeth Parris and her cousin Abigail Williams at the heed of the Devil. She confessed that she did fly by witch pole to a gathering right here in Salem Village, and that other witches are among us! I am just come from the court where she made her confession not thirty minutes ago!”

  “My sakes, Mr. Wardwell, suren the child was being fanciful! I do hope the judges set a switch to her to see if the truth could be had.” Constance and Ruth nodded agreement.

  Samuel Wardwell pulled back at the notion. “I fear she spoke truth. She proclaimed with such recollection and detail that it chilled me as I sat. I daresay the room itself grew colder as she spoke. Further, all the while, poor Elizabeth and her cousin, the younger Abigail, were twisting and groaning in the court, in ways most unnatural. Such afflictions seemed only to stir the awful confession from the witch Abigail, as if she took devilish strength from their torment.”

  The three women sat stunned on the porch, shaking their heads. “Well, Mr. Wardwell, I am glad you have shared the truth of it with us. Without your direct account, we might not know the truth of it all.” Constance said.

  “Ladies, I fear our own neighbors might become revealed as doing the devil’s work in this fine village. I must return to Andover on the morrow, so my prayers are with you.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Wardwell, and ours with you,” Ruth nodded as he left.

  After Samuel Wardwell departed, pea pods and clothing remained untouched. The chill New England breeze carried Samuel Wardwell along to another porch where he hurried to deliver the ill tidings.

  “What do we do?” Ruth asked.

  One of the chairs began rocking slowly, and a baby blanket was picked back up, “We do nothing. You heard him. At the very suggestion that the girls might be dissembling, his own tendency was to make his memory more than it was. We do not speak against this. We are especially careful not to . . .”