Greg explains about me showing up, spotting the time lord, and asking Iris to come over. Victor asks me to tell him about the alternate universes, and all three of them look like I’ve rayed them between the eyes.
“It’s true,” I insist. “I’m from what Orville calls the Primary Verse. This one is called Global. Two different worlds, connected by the rift, like a bridge.”
“I knew it,” Iris finally whispers. “That’s why Payton took me off the project and sentenced me to a life in the research department.”
Greg squeezes her hand. “It’s kept you alive.” He glances at me. “And here.”
“So, uh…” I clear my throat, not quite sure how to ask for what I need. “In my time, you know how to open and control a rift.” I chin-nod to Greg.
I glance at Iris. “You’re here with me, as an eighteen-year-old.” Her jaw falls to the floor, her eyes wild.
Victor remains standing, his eyes serious. “And me?”
“You’ve been taking care of her for years, giving her supplements and running tests and…stuff.”
“I’m here?” Iris screeches. “And I’m only eighteen?”
“It’s not really you,” I say. “It’s your…It’s you from another Verse. The Primary Verse.”
She places her free hand to her forehead. “I need to talk to my father.”
“Uh, yeah, about him.” I stare at the floor like it’s the most fascinating thing I’ve ever seen. “He knows everything about the rift, the alternate universes. He’s not from here.”
“Not from here?”
I didn’t think Iris’s voice could get any higher. I was wrong.
I frown. “I guess maybe you have your own father? The girl I know—the girl who’s you in another dimension—her father came here by accident over twenty years ago. He hasn’t been able to go back and now he works for Orville.”
“My father works for Orville. He’s the lead physicist.”
I shift uncomfortably. “Well, I guess they are the same person then.” I wonder how that can be true, and a horrible idea enters my mind. Cascade’s father probably had to kill his doppelganger in order to stay in this Verse. Maybe he just took over the man’s life, including raising Iris.
“So you’re telling me my father is—”
“I don’t know who your father is,” I interrupt, my patience at its breaking point. “All I know is me and Cas don’t belong here, and we need your help to get back to our own Verse.”
Tears slip down Iris’s face. Victor studies his hands. Greg shakes his head. “I can’t help you.”
The man’s a bad liar, but I don’t call him on the fib. He just needs the proper motivation to help, and watching him clutch Iris’s hand, I know exactly what that is. Or rather, who that is.
I lay awake on Victor’s couch, staring through the darkness to the ceiling. I didn’t push Greg. He needs time to come to terms with helping me, and I need time to plan how he’s going to help me.
When dawn breaks, I head out into the frosted air. We’d flown for thirty minutes, but Victor’s cabin isn’t that far from the edge of the city. It’s on the complete opposite side from Greg’s apartment though, and that’s why it took us so long to get here.
I arrive at a bus stop within twenty minutes of walking, and ten later, I step onto the sidewalk across the street from the Global Initiative building. It’s too early for employees to be streaming in for work, and I expect to get stopped by the guards in the lobby.
They only nod at me as I pass through and enter the lift. I navigate the hallway maze to my room, my mind weary and my muscles tight. I stall at the sight of Cascade’s open door. I peer into the room, but it’s empty.
No Cascade, no hint of Cascade. I reason that she could just be in the bathroom, or down at breakfast, or in the medical wing for treatment.
But I know, on a deep, gut level, that she’s not in the building.
She’s not in the city.
Cascade’s gone.
Price
COOPER-AS-NEWT GRINS AT ME WHEN he Links in the next night. We hadn’t had much time to talk after I’d discovered who he really was, because my dad insisted I come back to dinner. It was weird, and I got the feeling that we ate dinner together every night. Something I definitely wasn’t used to.
There are so many things in this version of my life I’m not used to.
“You really don’t remember,” he says as I regard him warily.
“It’s not a matter of remembering,” I tell him. “I didn’t live it. I went through the rift with Heath to save Cascade and woke up a few days later with a brand new life.” I suck in a breath and hold it. “Whoever you’ve been talking with over the past month is a different version of me. So no, I don’t remember.”
Heath stares at me, the wheels in his head turning. I see the calculating look in his eye, and I release my breath. “What do we usually talk about?”
He shrugs. “Jams and hacks and the Hoods. Staying ahead of them. That kind of thing.”
Sounds like something I’d normally like to hash over. Probably made me feel like I was doing something since these past six months have been barren in the excitement department.
“You in touch with Soda?” I ask.
“Yes.” He leans back in his chair, his arms folded. “What are we going to do to get Heath back?”
His guess is as good as mine, and I tell him as much. “I don’t even know what kind of tech and gadgetry I have access to,” I add. “And where are the rifts? Do we still have access to those?” I don’t mention the parallel dimensions, because my plans of stepping through a rift to save Heath aren’t concrete. I don’t even know if it’s possible, or where to even start looking. Me going into a health-hazardous rift on a wild goose chase sounds like suicide.
“There are still rifts, yes,” Heath says. “Obviously, or I wouldn’t have been able to use one to escape last summer.”
“Oh, right,” I say. But if my father doesn’t control the rifts, how did Cooper escape? The fluidity of time warps my mind. Of course, when Cooper used the rift, the reality was that my dad did control the rifts. We did live in the house in the suburbs. Nothing changed until a few days ago when I saw that obituary and Heath and I stepped through time.
I’m kidding myself. We didn’t move from the house to this swanky apartment while I was sleeping. I know my reality, my childhood, my everything is different. But I didn’t experience any of it, so for me, the change only happened a few days ago.
I bang my head softly on my desk. “I hate time travel,” I moan. “I can’t make sense of it.”
“Better to leave it alone,” Cooper agrees. “After we get Heath back.”
I cradle my head in my hands. “So you know where the rifts are? How to open one?”
“Yes, and no.”
“Let’s start with the yes.”
“The time rifts are anchored geographically. That hasn’t changed.”
“So there’s one downtown and one at the house in the suburbs.”
Heath nods. “So go see what you can find out. Maybe you can step through and, I don’t know, talk to someone for a few minutes. See what you can learn about where Heath went.”
And Cascade , I think, but don’t vocalize. “I’ll check it out tomorrow.”
Heath signs off the Link, leaving me alone to think through how I’m going to explore downtown without arousing any suspicion. I pull up a map of Castle Pines to see what sits on the blocks that used to house the Time Bureau.
“I don’t believe it,” I murmur to myself.
Hyperion Labs sits right on top of the former Bureau.
“My dad is such a liar.” I explode to a stand and jerk open my door. “Dad!”
Last night after dinner, he retired to his den, and I stalk in that direction now. Sure enough, he’s sitting on the couch with Mom curled into his side, a flick playing on the wallscreen in front of them. The sight of it freezes me momentarily. I’m not used to seeing Dad relax in any capacity, and
my parents never showed any affection previously.
“Price,” he says.
“Can I talk to you for a second?”
He eases away from Mom, who I realize is asleep, and joins me in the hallway.
“We’re still mixed up in the whole time—rift—” I wave my hands. “Thing.” My blood feels very close to boiling. “Our building sits on the blasted rift site!”
Dad glances over his shoulder. “Keep your voice down.” He puts his hand on my elbow and guides me further away from the den.
I yank my arm out of his grasp. “Tell me the truth.”
“Yes, our building is at the rift site. That’s for mere convenience for Orville. He insisted he be able to communicate with my grandfather at any time, day or night.” He pinches the bridge of his nose. “And he did. Does. He calls whenever he wants, sending his henchmen through the rift to summon us to the first floor conference room where he can boss us around.”
Dad’s jaw tightens and releases. Tightens and releases.
“What does he ask for?” I ask.
“Well, Orville’s gone now,” he says. “But his posterity keeps his enterprise running.”
“What enterprise is that, exactly?”
Dad’s eyes glint with anger. “The Openshaws send people to our Verse. People who show potential in the arts, science, mathematics, engineering, business. These people establish profitable ventures and send a percentage back to the Openshaws.”
“And how does our family fit into this?”
If Dad’s jaw clenches any more, it might break. “We provide credentials for those who cross over.”
My insides go cold. “We create fake identities.”
“Yes, Price, we create fake identities. Fake identification cards. Fake pasts. Fake everything.”
I fall back a step as if his words have struck me in the chest. “But, why?”
“We’re well compensated, of course,” Dad says. “And that’s just how it’s always been. We set people up in new cities, with roommates or affordable living. We give them their backstory, their credentials, everything. We monitor them for six months after they cross over to make sure they have everything they need to be successful.”
“And this is legal?”
Dad closes his eyes in a long blink before focusing on me again. “No one in this Verse knows about the rifts, or time travel, or parallel dimensions.”
“Where do we get the identification information these, these cross-overs need?”
“We have our ways.”
“So it’s illegal.”
“Price, please.” Dad sounds exhausted. “I don’t expect you to understand, what with your reality being completely different than you know, or remember. But this is how things are now.” He puts his hand on my shoulder. “We’re safe. The rift isn’t unstable like it used to be. And we’re profiting. We have everything we want.”
“Sure,” I deadpan. “Everything we want.” I refrain from rolling my eyes, but barely. “Why did Orville start this? Why does his family continue it?”
“Why does a man do what he does? Money, power, fame. Orville had all three, and it’s very hard to slide backward from that.” He removes his hand from me and steps toward the den. “I’m sure you understand that.” He leaves me standing in the hall, remembering when I woke up on the couch in that dingy apartment, how I couldn’t even access parts of the Circuit, how I got chewed out for missing a digi-class.
Money, power, fame.
I’m sick of all three.
I just want to find Heath and get him back here. Then I want to go to wherever Cascade is so I don’t have to worry about money, power, or fame ever again.
The next morning, I leave the apartment and ride the elevator to the first floor. I ask the guard at the information desk where the conference room is and get a surprised look in return.
“Around the corner,” he says. “Same as always, Price.”
“Right.” I chuckle. “Same as always.” I hurry away from his questioning gaze and slip around the corner. Greenery lines the windowed wall as I make my way toward a set of double doors that stretch twenty feet tall.
They aren’t locked, and I enter the conference room without incident. There’s nothing here but wall-to-wall flatpanels. At the far end of the room hangs a tall picture frame with nothing inside. I step closer to the carved gold frame, and a chill blossoms on my skin.
I stumble backward as I realize what it is—a rift. Contained in a frame.
I leave the conference room as fast as I entered. I don’t want to be there when that rift roars to life, because I know what it’s connected to—another Verse.
I ride the train out to the suburbs and walk the few blocks to the house I used to live in. The familiar sight of the rain gutter I’ve used so many times brings a smile to my lips. It’s quickly squashed as the front door opens and a young couple exits. They link arms and head off down the street, probably going to the el-rail stop I used, probably heading into the city for work.
I don’t want to trespass, but I have no other choice. I use the rain gutter and duck through the unlocked window, stepping into what used to be my room. It’s now a digital studio of some kind, with a long table against the wall where my bed used to stand. Seven chairs are pushed in neatly at the table, with each place having it’s own pad of devices, gadgets, and panels.
The room feels so sterile, and I hurry through it and go downstairs. Through the kitchen, the foyer, and my dad’s old compound, and into the basement. This was where Shawna Phillips kept the chemicals she needed to produce the energy required to open and operate a rift.
I don’t know what I’m expecting to find there—maybe a dozen canisters with the necessary gas—but it isn’t the rift.
The blue light dances merrily, inviting me to touch it. I hesitate before I square my shoulders and duck through.
I’m inside the eerie whiteness for less than a breath before I emerge on the other side of time. The air is colder, the carpet different. The cabinets are dark, and—
“Price?” A girl’s voice cuts off my train of thought.
“Price! It is you!” Saige launches herself off the couch and into my arms. “I knew Cascade and Heath would find a way to rescue you. I just knew it.” She steps back, her happiness fading a little. “Do you know where they are? Cascade and Heath?”
“Haven’t seen them,” I say quickly. “I can’t stay long. They never came back to the future. What do you know?”
Worry fills her green eyes. “All I know is they left through the rift to try to figure out a way to save you. Cedar—remember Cedar?—he opened the rift for them, and we haven’t seen them since.”
I curse and pace a few steps away. Turn. Come back. “They disappear out of the records,” I tell her. “No college for Cas. No marriage certificate. It’s like she died, but there wasn’t an obituary or funeral either.”
Saige blinks as that familiar fierceness enters her expression. “She’s not dead.”
“She’s not here.” I don’t know how much Saige knows about the dimensions tethered to the rift, but the way her lower lip trembles, I’m guessing she knows something.
“Did you open this rift?” I ask.
“Yes,” she says. “Cedar told me not to, but I couldn’t just do nothing.”
“Cedar’s right,” I say. “It’s not safe to just let the rift sit open. Anyone could come through, from…anywhere.”
“You think Cascade’s in another Verse.”
“Yes,” I say slowly. “Don’t you?”
She glances toward the stairs. “Yeah, I think so too. I was hoping she’d come back through the rift if I left it open.”
The longing in Saige’s voice mirrors the emotion pulling through me.
“I’ll see what I can find out from my dad,” she says.
“Okay,” I say. “And if you find anything, just open the rift and drop a note through. I’ll get it.” I move back to the glimmering rift light and say good-bye. A moment la
ter, I’m back in the future, the white cabinets welcoming me home.
I’m only halfway up the stairs when a chat lands in my feed. An alarm rings in my ear, and I open the message hella-quick to get it to silence.
I read the message, my heart dropping to my feet with every syllable.
“I’m under arrest?” I ask the emptiness around me. I haven’t even thought about fleeing when three resounding booms land on the front door above me. I make it to the foyer before the Hoods smash down the young couple’s door and swarm me, electrorays at the ready.
Cascade
I’M VAGUELY AWARE OF MOVEMENT BENEATH ME. I try to open my eyes, but they won’t obey my brain. My mind feels foggy, and voices seem to come from far away.
But I’m moving. Held against someone soft, and then transferred to something hard. More voices, and the movement now is vehicular. I drift from unconsciousness to consciousness when someone laughs, and again when someone coughs.
My own throat feels dry, cracked, caked with something. I remember screaming when someone came into my room. A face blurs behind my closed eyelids. A man. But not my father.
Payton Openshaw —the name slams into my mind as the vehicle I’m riding in makes a sharp turn. By degrees, my body and mind wake up. I keep my eyes closed, my breathing even, my ears open.
I remember Payton coming in and saying I needed to come with him. My gut had writhed, and I’d told him no. My father had been summoned, but the sight of him in his lab coat didn’t soothe my nerves.
I wouldn’t leave with them, and Payton pulled out a syringe. That’s when I screamed for Heath, for anyone, to come help me.
No one came.
I wonder where Heath is now, if maybe he got his own vein-full of sedative and that’s why he couldn’t help me. I wonder if he’s in the car with me, still drugged out.
“Should be right up here,” a man mutters, pulling me back to the present.
The vehicle bumps over the road, foot by foot, until it comes to a stop. I remain as still as possible, though I’m dying to sit up and figure out where I am.