In Times Like These: eBook Boxed Set: Books 1-3

by Nathan Van Coops

The diamond patterned snake retreats from us with impressive haste. I just spot the end of the rattle disappearing between some rocks when Viznir finally gets his pistol aimed.

  “Whoa, Viznir, it’s fine. Don’t waste your bullets. It’s not the snake’s fault we barged in on its nap.”

  “But it’s a rattlesnake! Did it get you?”

  I step onto a reddish boulder and turn the seconds dial on my chronometer. “Yeah, he got me. I’ll be right back.” I blink past the next three seconds just to be sure, then step off the rock and admire the tiny splatter of poison I’ve left behind. Amazing that such a tiny wet spot could kill a man.

  Viznir is still staring nervously at the shrubs around us. I pull up the leg of my jeans and note the pair of holes in my calf muscle. They’ve just started to bleed. I take off my pack and find my first-aid kit. I look at Viznir’s pale face and pause. “It’s okay, Viznir. I’ll be fine.”

  He finally holsters his pistol. He watches me clean the wound with an antiseptic wipe and his shoulders droop a little. “I would have died. I wouldn’t even have thought of that. I swear they never taught me the useful stuff. This makes sense.” He gestures vaguely to my leg.

  I Band-Aid my bite wounds and stand. “Viznir, I hope you don’t mind me saying this, but it doesn’t seem like time travel is really your thing. How did you even end up doing this?”

  Viznir shuffles his feet. “I needed the money.” He kicks a rock out of his way and starts walking again. I readjust my pant leg, and as I do, I notice a faint red glow around the bezel of my chronometer. The low power annunciator. Jumping seven people onto that ship must have really drained the power supply. I stand and fiddle with the dials. I’m stuck till I can charge it again. I trot to catch up with Viznir.

  “Hey, man. Did you happen to bring any external power?”

  Viznir stops and looks in his pack. “Yeah. I have a backup battery for the Temprovibe.” He holds up a black box.

  “Does it have an outlet to plug into?” I grab my charger out of a side pocket and hold out the two-pronged end. “Like a wall outlet?”

  “Oh. No. This charges wirelessly.” He touches the Temprovibe with his fingers. “Thanks for reminding me, though. I should probably check it.” He taps a few things and a green light on the box lights up.

  “Damn it. Well it looks like you’ll have to do the next few jumps for us. My chronometer’s drained till I can find some power.” I frown and wad my charger into my front pants pocket.

  Viznir puts his power supply back into his pack and keeps walking. I pick up on his new habit and we kick whatever loose stones we find ahead of us in an attempt to warn any more fanged reptiles of our approach.

  Despite the barren landscape and the horrid end to our Caribbean adventure, I feel a little more optimistic about this level of the race. I don’t know exactly what state or year I’m in, but it’s clearly the United States. The red rock buttes in the distance could easily be in Utah or Arizona. Almost home. Florida and the twenty-first century are both a long way away, but I’m a little closer. Maybe even close enough to get a message to Mym. She told me once that Dr. Quickly had taken her to witness the Gettysburg Address as a child, so the 1800s are definitely in range of her abilities.

  “Hey, Viznir, what timestream are we in?”

  Viznir consults his Temprovibe. “Kilo Oscar Seven.”

  “Does the Kilo ever connect with the Lima stream?”

  Viznir switches to his tablet and consults a timestream chart. “Yeah, it does, but not until 1903 at the earliest. Why?”

  “I need to get a message to somebody.”

  “Communications with non-competitor time travelers while on the racecourse is grounds for disqualification. Didn’t you read the rulebook?”

  “I skimmed it.” I frown at this news. “What if I’m not contacting a time traveler?”

  “Why would you need to do that?”

  “What if I just need to say something to somebody. Is it against the rules?”

  Viznir works his tablet again and his eyes scan through the text of his digital rulebook. “It doesn’t specify anything about contacting non-time-travelers.” He flips through a few more pages. “I’d be careful though. The committee might read what you write and find it suspicious.”

  I try to puzzle my way around this new obstacle as we walk.

  The “fairground” is little more than a dried lakebed, but the circus that has taken up residence there is lively and colorful. It has absorbed the population of the town and then some. The pathways between circus tents are jammed with curious patrons, farmers and townsfolk alike, listening to the various circus barkers shouting enticements from their platforms. The first crowd we reach is huddled around a man advertising the seven wonders of the sea brought to land. The painting on a banner behind him depicts a voluptuous mermaid, her breasts scantily covered by the tentacles of an octopus in her arms. There are eels and even a shark depicted, but it’s clear what the main attraction will be.

  Someone taps me on the shoulder and I turn to find a mustached man in a black hat giving me a stern glare. He has a silver star pinned to his vest and a hand resting on a gun at his hip. He points toward Viznir’s holster. “You gentlemen will have to check your guns at the entrance.” He doesn’t wait for a response but merely leads us toward a small tent near the start of the midway. I trail slightly behind and scoop up an eligible pocket-sized stone. The tent we’re brought to is guarded by another armed man perhaps a decade younger than the sheriff. He is sporting a badge as well. The sheriff throws the flap open and gestures me inside.

  “Put your guns with the others. You can claim them when you leave.”

  I unpack my gunbelt and hang it on the corner of a wooden gun rack. Two rifles are in attendance. I drop my pack next to the rack and casually toss my stone to the open space next to them. When we exit the tent I make a show of chatting up the sheriff and the deputy about their favorite attractions. The deputy has clearly been bored and jumps at the opportunity to have a conversation. A couple minutes into his description of the werewolf, I excuse myself, leaving Viznir to listen to their banter. “Just forgot one thing in my pack. Be right back.” I check my timer and duck into the tent to snag my stone. I smile at the absence of our packs and guns. I wipe the grin off my face before rejoining the conversation outside. We make our goodbyes and I idly take the stone from my pocket and show it to Viznir as we walk away.

  “Did it work?” Viznir asks when we get out of earshot of the lawmen.

  “Yep. Our stuff is safely in the future.” I consult my map again. Our objective is shown as a jar of liquid. I hold the drawing closer to my face and recognize the shapes in the jar as eyeballs. That’s disgusting. Those better not be human. I pocket the map again and look around for a tent that might be a likely candidate.

  We pass a popcorn vendor and I’m immediately distracted. I pause and stare at the cart where the man is handing out paper bags of the heavenly-smelling snack, then turn to Viznir. “You think they’d take American money from the future? I’m in the right country at least.”

  “Good luck. I doubt money here even vaguely resembles what you’ve got.”

  “I really need something to eat. Racing on an empty stomach is making me grouchy.”

  “Then you should have planned better.”

  I look around and consider my options. A kid of perhaps ten is standing outside a magician’s tent listening to the barker describe the magical feats the audience will witness inside. A girl a couple years younger is at the boy’s elbow. The paintings on the banner shows the standard woman sawn in half and a manacled man in a box filling with water. The kid watching the barker is holding a pickle in one hand and nibbling from an ear of corn in the other. Periodically he lets his sister have a bite of one or the other. I watch him chew off another section of corn, then take a position next to him, pretending to be interested in the show.

  “I bet this guy doesn’t know a thing about real magic.”

  The
boy chews a chunk of the pickle and glances sideways at me. The little girl pokes her head around her brother and stares at me unabashedly. One of the blue ribbons in her hair has come untied, but she hasn’t noticed.

  “How much are they charging for this nonsense?” I ask.

  “You gotta have twenty cents to get in.” The boy looks disappointed.

  “You can probably buy a lot of food for twenty cents. How much did that pickle cost?”

  “A penny.”

  “Yeah, see? This guy is a rip-off. I’ve seen magic ten times better than what he does.”

  “What’s a rip-off?” the little girl asks.

  “Something you shouldn’t have to pay for,” I say. “What if I told you kids that I could show you some real magic, honest to goodness magic, and it wouldn’t cost you a thing?”

  The boy looks at me suspiciously. “There’s no free magic. All the shows cost money.”

  “Well, they cost money for some people. But it wouldn’t have to cost money for you. In fact, I bet you could make money. You interested?”

  “What would we have to do?”

  Viznir is eying me suspiciously, too. “Yeah, Ben. What do they have to do?”

  I wave him off. “Calm down. Just a little advertising. Come on kids. I’m gonna show you something amazing.” I walk between the two tents to an empty area out back. The kids and Viznir follow cautiously. Viznir looks as uncomfortable as I’ve ever seen him.

  When we get clear of people’s view I stoop to the kids’ level. “You see this guy right here? I’m gonna make him disappear.”

  Viznir stares at me. “You’re what?”

  “You’re going to disappear, Viznir. A couple seconds ought to do it.” I jerk my head toward his Temprovibe, then point to the nearest tent stake. “I am going to use this magical tent stake right here and make you vanish. You kids ready?”

  Viznir frowns but sets his Temprovibe and squats to place his fingertips on the metal tent stake.

  I wave my hands in the air and then wiggle my fingers at Viznir. “Abracadabra, zippity pow!” I thrust my hands toward Viznir and he vanishes. The little girl gasps. The boy immediately tosses his corncob at the spot where Viznir was just squatting.

  “Whoa! Don’t do that!” I step between the boy and the tent stake. “You’ll hurt somebody.”

  Viznir reappears and the little girl gasps again. The boy’s mouth drops open too.

  “Do it again!” the little girl shrieks.

  I shake my head. “Nope. That was the free one. If you want to see it again we need to get a bigger audience. You two go round up a few of your friends and tell them what you saw, but let them know it will be ten cents to see the show. If you get us a good audience we’ll give you half the profits.”

  “Half?” the boy says. “Honest?”

  “Honest. See what you can do. Just don’t take too long.” I point to a solitary pine. “Bring whoever you can find over to that tree in ten minutes.”

  The boy grins and rushes off, towing his sister along behind.

  Viznir shakes his head.

  “What?”

  “You’d make a good drug dealer.”

  “Whatever.” I frown. “I can’t help it if drug dealers use a practical system of doing business that also happens to work for scoring lunch money.”

  I walk to the tree and wait. A few minutes later our audience starts to arrive. Most are young kids or teenagers, but more than a few adults wander over too. I’m given a good deal of suspicious looks and a lot of attention is given to my Gizmo T-shirt, but I simply smile and try to look welcoming. When our recruiters return, I gesture for the boy to join me. “What’s your name, kid?”

  “Noah.”

  “I’m Hanna,” the little girl chimes in.

  “Those are good names. Okay, Noah, you and your sister are going to collect our fees.” I straighten up. “Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, you are about to witness the most astounding magic that has ever been performed. Real magic needs no fancy tents or mirrors. It requires only that you believe. For a mere ten cents, you are about to witness the complete and utter disappearance of a human being. If you would like to gather in a circle around this tree, you will be able to see this amazing feat from any angle you choose.”

  The audience complies, but based on the expressions of some of the adults, it may be so I don’t have a route to run off with their dimes before they get their money’s worth.

  Viznir rolls his eyes but takes a position near the tree. I add a lot more theatrics and hand gestures to this performance while Noah and Hanna gather the money. When Noah finally brings the hatful of change to me, I make Viznir disappear again. Kids and adults react with equal surprise. When Viznir reappears he’s met with enthusiastic applause. The cheering immediately improves his disposition. He even takes a bow and shakes people’s hands before the crowd disperses.

  I start to divide the spoils into two parts until the little girl pipes up. “Which one is mine?”

  “I was assuming your brother was going to share . . .” I take one look at the girl’s dubious expression and count out a new pile. I’ve just gotten them even when Viznir clears his throat from behind me. I look up at his expectant face. “Oh come on. You too?” I rearrange the change into a fourth pile.

  The kids are elated with our success and tag along with us as we reenter the midway. The duo takes turns tugging at our hands and pointing out the best items to eat. Before long I’ve got an armful of carnival food and a pair of inseparable shadows. I remove my map from my pocket and show the drawing of the jar of eyeballs to Noah. “Have you or any of your friends seen this anywhere?”

  Noah stops gnawing on his candied apple and puts his hand to the map. It leaves a caramel thumbprint when he pulls it away. “That’s the House of Horrors. That’s where the monster is.”

  I wad the map up again. “Okay. Let’s go see this thing.”

  The barker has finished his most recent spiel and is guiding his latest acquisitions through the entrance of the House of Horrors. This attraction is not merely a tent. It has an actual wood façade that’s been painted to look like a creepy Victorian house. Depictions of ghoulish creatures leer from shadows and from behind window curtains. The upper story shows the multi-headed monster silhouetted against the drapes.

  The fifty-cent fee stumps me momentarily, as my munching spree has left me slightly short, but Hanna and Noah generously spot me the difference since they get in half price. Viznir and I file inside after paying our half dollars, mostly in nickels. The ticket vendor doesn’t look nearly as annoyed at this as I suspect someone from my century would. We take seats on wooden benches before a stage. The show begins with a curator who tells us of his daring exploits into the far reaches of dark and mysterious places. He promises amazing sights and wonders and then begins presenting us with specimens. Most of the supposed wonders, like dragons teeth and unicorn horns are obvious fakes, but a few of the items are authentically interesting. One of the supposed dragon skulls appears to be a fossilized carnivorous dinosaur of some kind. I pause my popcorn consumption and lean forward on the bench to see a little closer. He next presents a stack of cabinets on wheels and opens each cupboard in turn to display its exciting contents. The third one reveals my jar of eyeballs. He claims they are leftovers from human sacrifices in the amazon jungle, but I suspect their true origins might be a butcher shop closer to home.

  The curator next brings out a live boa constrictor that evokes some screams from the ladies in the audience, and he makes a show of letting it coil around him. He also presents a “Giant Crocodile of the Nile.” Having seen one recently, I know it isn’t, but I keep my mouth shut. His “Giant Croc” is actually an average-sized alligator that could easily have called Florida home. There must be at least a few other southerners in the audience because the curator’s boasting garnishes a few boos and some heckling from the back.

  The curator appears undaunted by the crowd’s criticism because his next item to be
revealed is in a crate big enough to hold a horse. As he pulls the curtain back to display it, the crate begins to shake and thump.

  “Ladies and Gentlemen, it is my privilege to exhibit the star of McSweeney’s Traveling Circus. A beast so vicious, so foul, that no other captive specimen exists. I present to you, the mighty, the ferocious, GARGANTURON!”

  The sides of the crate fall away to reveal a steel cage. The creature inside is a tangle of striped legs and arms, and four heads. It’s ricocheting from one side of the cage to another, its arms gyrating and horned heads snarling.

  The reaction of the crowd is total awe. One lady up front promptly faints into the lap of the man seated behind her, and her friends attempt to buoy her back up. There is a fair amount of shrieking and wonderment from the kids in the audience. I smile as the creature climbs the bars of its cage and dangles from the top. I work to puzzle out how it’s being done. Two of the heads are static dummies, open mouths fixed in anger, but the other two lively shrieking faces do a good job of drawing attention. The arms and legs are likewise a mix. I notice that a few of the furry striped legs are linked together by what are supposed to be manacles, but upon closer inspection are in fact a clever way for the moving legs to actuate the dummy ones. But even understanding the dummy system, I can still make out at least four real arms and legs. Two men in a suit working together?

  The creature rattles the bars of its cage and the curator steps forward to calm it. One of the beast’s arms lashes out and clamps onto the curator’s throat. The creature lifts the man off his feet and hurls him backward. The curator’s limp form tumbles off the side of the stage and disappears. More screams erupt from the audience and they only increase as the beast grasps the gate to its cage and wrenches it from its hinges. It hurls the door aside and steps onto the stage. The audience panics and flees. Ladies lift their skirts away from their ankles and men abandon hats and carnival prizes in their haste to escape the tent. Viznir and I rise to let people get around us. A few onlookers are still frozen to their seats, not sure if this is part of the act or a real danger. As the crowd thins, I notice Ariella and her guide among the spectators. Unlike the surprised citizens around her, Ariella’s gaze is almost amused. Beside her, her usually stone-faced guide, Dagmar Sensaborria, looks less than sure of herself.