Lost sentinel box set, p.24
Lost Sentinel Box Set, page 24
part #1 of Earth Survives Series
She waved a shaking hand at her assistant, her voice rising again with pent-up emotion, the words now coming in a rush. “We tried working the control panel, but it was truly and freaking fried! We barely got the Bore shut down before the whole thing blew.”
“Father!” This time it was Cyprian’s younger son Payton on the screen, his image beamed erratically down from research where he worked in historical documentation. “Mother just called, but then her transmission—.”
“She’ll be fine,” Cyprian cut him off. “Stay online and listen and you’ll understand.”
Cyprian nodded to Patty to continue.
“Then we searched Zhang’s chamber. I was praying to The Mother I was wrong, but it was obvious the moment we entered that he’d packed up with no intention of returning. We checked terra transport, in the wildly unlikely chance he’s gone to Surface without authority. Nothing.”
She hesitated a moment, then reluctantly added, “The main frame was destroyed as well.” She pulled a jagged piece of motherboard from her tunic and held it out, blackened and distorted.
“Then how did he get...?” Cyprian frowned. “He destroyed it before he went in?”
“He had to have set it to self-destruct after he was through, is all I can surmise. Zhang’s too self-serving to put himself in harm’s way. He likely calculated what time he needed, then set it in motion just before he went through. It’s obvious he has no intention of returning. He doesn’t give a damn how his actions in the past will affect us here in the future. Not his problem. Sean managed to stop the destruction, but we were way beyond too late to stop Zhang.”
Cyprian was sweating profusely now. He said, “One wrong move… and everything changes.”
For a long moment, Patty’s eyes locked with his. “You know it.”
Coru’s gaze returned to his father’s personal screens, Moira’s still accusingly blank, Payton’s winking in and out of focus. Payton was soft like his mother, whereas Coru was hard like Cyprian. The brothers were polar opposites in every way. What did his father see when he looked at his sons? Coru knew Cyprian would lay his life down for Payton.
Coru looked away from Payton’s face. A lifetime of inequality could not be lain at his younger brother’s step. Payton was an innocent in this.
Cyprian was glaring at Patty once again. “Can you fix the control panel? Do we have back-ups of the development boards? Can we go after him? Do we know where and when he went?” Cyprian kept his voice modulated as he churned out the questions, but it all came down to one. He stood suddenly and gripped Patty’s shoulders, locking eyes with her. “Can we get him back before the damage is done?”
Patty’s shoulders slumped. “Only older versions. Everything current he took with him.”
For the first time, Coru saw the woman behind the bluster, the thorn in his father’s side, the constant stream of profanities. She’d devoted her life to scientific advancement here on Cloud Rez and had been forced to ride the wild bull that was Moses Zhang and his crazy notions. All the while Cyprian had barely tolerated her and what he’d termed “Patterawadee’s prattle”. He wondered what Cyprian thought of her “prattle” now. It was clear she’d raised the alarm yesterday and he’d over-ridden her.
“As far as we can guess, he was aiming for WEN 2036 in the Pacific North West. Maybe Tacoma or Seattle? Vancouver? Could be anywhere,” Patty said. “But even if we’re right about the WEN and win the cosmic lottery by getting the where right, with all the damage he’s done, we can’t follow him through the Bore. There’s no way to get to him now.”
“Then we’ll rebuild the Time Bore and we go to WEN 2036. We have no choice.”
“Easier said than done. The best we could do would be to cobble together old pieces, cross our fingers, hold our noses and have someone jump after him today. They’d have a snowball’s chance in hell, honestly. To rebuild our best version, and guarantee stability would take weeks. The damage Zhang could do during that time is incalculable. And would we be in time?” Patty’s question came out as a wail of desperation that exactly mirrored the fear that now gripped Coru’s chest.
The sound of an explosion in one of the lower sectors rocked the chamber violently. Cyprian threw himself across his desk and hung on. Coru swung from the support beam, Keyes careened against the data wall and a terrified Patty was off her feet and sliding on her side across the undulating floor. Lights sparked and crackled, a protesting whine rose from Cyprian’s personal control panels; a lick of blue flame appeared then disappeared, leaving a thread of acrid smoke. All screens went dark.
Was that Sector Five? His mother was in Sector Five! He’d dismissed her pleading to his father, having seen her act so many times before. He’d had the power to go in his father’s place, to help her.
The mother screen flicked on, exploding with frantic demands from the councillors. Cyprian yanked his com-band from his sweat-slicked head and threw it across the room, yelling, “Frack it!”
The north wall hemorrhaged out into the atmosphere, disintegrating before their eyes, leaving only benign blue sky.
With a small cry, Wren pulled out of Coru’s mind and jumped to her feet. It was too much, too bizarre, too dangerous, too… too…
What should she do? What did this mean? Frozen in place, she rolled over the images she’d just witnessed, the haunting sound of her father’s name—Charles Wood—echoing inside her brain. What did her father have to do with this… this place, Cloud Rez, and this thing they called the Time Bore? Abandoning her blanket on the ground, she fled through the darkness, around the garden and across the meadow toward the main cabin.
She almost made it.
She was tackled from the side, the hit so hard it knocked the wind from her lungs. Before she could scream for help, her mouth was covered, she was lifted off her feet and pulled into the trees.
21
Missing: The Truth
Nicola rolled over in her bed, awakened with a start by something just beyond her conscience. Wide awake, she sat up, knife in hand, pulled smoothly from under her pillow. Moonlight flooded her room through the locked window. Rhea lay undisturbed beside her.
Everything was as she’d left it when she’d laid down. Shotgun on her side of the bed by the night stand, boots standing at the ready should she need them, her and Rhea’s bug-out bags beside them, chair jammed under the door handle. All was quiet.
What had pulled her from her slumber?
Something. She knew she would not sleep until she was satisfied everything was as it should be, so pulled aside the blankets, making sure not to disturb little Rhea. She slipped into the boots and stood up, fully dressed. She never wore night clothes—precious seconds lost dressing could mean her life; Rhea’s life.
She slid the knife blade under her belt at the small of her back, picked up the shotgun, then quietly removed the chair and opened the door. She peered out into the main living area, what Catherine had laughingly named “the great room”. It was as it should be, kitchen clean and tidy, and pans and pots hanging, row upon row of glass jars shiny with reflected firelight lining the shelves above the butcher-block counters. The chairs were all pushed up to the dining table, now claiming much of the room’s real estate with being permanently elongated by three extra leaves to accommodate everyone.
The wraparound sectional was empty, save for Ninja, who snuck up onto it nightly after the humans went to bed. Now Ninja raised her head, saw Nicola and slunk off to lay beside Hero and Xena in front of the woodstove with an annoyed huff.
The surrounding walls now all sported much-needed shelves, thanks to Dan and Bill, and were filled with books for the adults and thanks to Sean and Mattea, games and toys for the children. The room was still comfortably warm, with a banked fire flickering behind the glass front of the woodstove.
The doors to the other bedrooms were both closed. Nicola crossed the floor and climbed up to the loft. All three boys were asleep. Deklin was tucked in as neat as a pin in his own bed. Malcolm was spread eagle on top of his blankets on the lower bunk with Wyatt on his stomach, one arm and one leg dangling from the upper. Good thing there was a bar to keep him from rolling out completely. How she wished she could sleep with such abandon.
She eased back down the stairs and checked Sandy and Annie’s room. Both were fast asleep.
The utility room was good. Laundry on racks to dry, pantry shelves carefully labeled and beginning to look healthy with supplies for the winter, the inverter signaling an assuring red number that all was good with the solar panels, wind turbines and bank of batteries that powered their world. She closed the door, scanned the empty bathroom, then eased Wren and Catherine’s door open, peeked inside and stopped. Catherine was asleep, her latest knitting project—a thick wool hat for Deklin, had rolled off her bed onto the floor beside her. The woman was always working, even in bed before she slept.
Wren’s side was empty.
Dropping caution, Nicola strode into the room, checked the far side of the bed and the closet—why, she asked herself. Silly. People don’t hide in their own closets. She strode back to Catherine, shaking her awake. Catherine’s eyes popped open, instantly alert.
Nicola murmured, “Wren’s not here. I’m going to search for her. You watch things here?” Catherine swung her feet to the floor, stepping into her boots as Nicola had done, reached for a weapon as Nicola had done and followed her out into the great room. By now the three dogs knew something was up and were on their feet, roaming restlessly around the room.
Catherine said, “Take Hero with you.”
Nicola nodded once and headed out. Should she alert the men? This was a problem, right here—no way to let them know something was amiss across the meadow. They needed a way to communicate between the two cabins. She’d bring that up at tomorrow’s breakfast meeting.
She’d wake Mattea and ask for his help.
As if she’d conjured him up with her thoughts, Hero gave a soft woof of recognition and Mattea appeared before her, stepping from the cover of trees behind his cabin, his hands raised.
“Don’t be scared. It’s just me.” His voice, as always, sounded melodious to her, and he spoke as if he were calming a skittish animal. Seeing his shadowed face, so strong and patient, his eyes understanding and accepting, she wondered, am I the skittish animal he’s calming?
She thrust out her chin. “You don’t scare me, Mattea. Never did.”
A slow smile formed on his face, strong white teeth against russet skin, crinkled creases around warm dark eyes. “Yeah. So, what’s up? Why are you wandering around in the night?”
“I can’t find Wren. She’s missing.”
Mattea’s smile vanished. “How long?”
“We went to bed around eleven, it’s one now, so somewhere between then and now.”
“No signs of a struggle?”
“If there were, I’d have everyone up. It looks as if she just got up from her bed and went outside. But, I can’t be sure. She might be in trouble. S-she’s been so…” Nicola trailed off, wondering if she should even tell Mattea what she suspected.
“So what?”
“It’s kind of like she’s living in this fantasy world half the time. She gets this strange expression on her face, and sometimes she doesn’t answer when you speak to her, like she’s in la la land. I’m worried about her. I’ve been thinking she might be about to break with reality, like this has all been too much for her. And… and she’s running on empty. I see it every day and it’s getting worse. She works hard, like we all do, but it seems to take something out of her. She’s exhausted all the time—I can see that she’s forcing herself to keep up.” Nicola smiled apologetically. “Sorry to sound all dramatic, but this, wandering from her bed at night. This is not good.”
“Let’s go let Coru know.” Mattea led her away from the men’s cabin.
Nicola grabbed his sleeve. “Wait. Isn’t he in the cabin with you?”
“No. He sleeps out in the woods, watches Dew Drop Hill.”
“What? You’re kidding!”
“Nope. And I have a feeling we’re going to find Miss Wren Wood there with him.”
“Oh.” Nicola blinked. “Oooh. Okay. It’s like that.”
Mattea tilted his head and shook it. “You’d think, right? But, nope. That’s not what’s going on here.” He set out to skirt the fenced in garden.
She followed. “So, what is going on here?”
“I always like to wait and see. Life’s way more interesting that way.” His strides were long, and his long black hair flowed out behind him as he loped rather than walked around the garden. She sped to keep up. “We’ll find out when we get there.”
They rounded the garden, and started up Dew Drop Hill, veering onto an animal trail Nicola hadn’t seen. After a moment, they arrived at a sleeping bag. No Coru.
Mattea looked at her and raised his eyebrows cheerfully. “Curiouser and curiouser.”
“Oh, stop it. So, you think they’re hooking up. That’s why she’s so tired. Booty calls.” And she’d felt so bad for Wren. Stupid.
Mattea shook his head again. “Nope. There’s something much bigger than a booty call happening here, and it’s time we learned what it is.”
An alarming idea flooded Nicola’s thoughts. She blurted, “Are they leaving together?”
“No! Nothing like that.” He led her back out to Dewdrop Hill. “If I were a visitor from another planet, meeting a strange girl in the middle of the night, where would I go?”
“Okay, now you’re making fun of me.” Nicola turned and struck out toward the boat launch.
Mattea ran to catch up to her. “Nope. He’s from some other world, for sure. Not another planet obviously, but from someplace completely different than here. I’ve even considered a monastery.”
“A monastery!” She crinkled her face. “Go back to bed, Mattea. That’s where I’m going.”
“Or even an experimental lab.”
“Mattea!” Now she was laughing, as he’d obviously intended. “I’m telling on you tomorrow, you wait and see if I don’t!”
He caught up with her and wrapped his arm around her shoulder. “Nice to hear you laugh, Nicola Zamora. Very nice.”
Before she could act on her reflexive need to jerk away from his touch, his arm was gone, and he was walking amiably next to her as if this was all normal, wandering around with a man in the middle of the night, searching for a pair of clandestine lovers in a post-apocalyptic world. How had life exploded into this abhorrent existence?
“You can’t make this stuff up,” she murmured under her breath.
He answered, “Totally.”
A whistle rent the air. Hero took off toward the little stand of trees that stood between the two cabins and the alfalfa fields. Mattea grinned. “That’ll be them.”
He took off after the dog.
Nicola stood for a moment, undecided, then raced after him. What the hell; she hadn’t seen any clandestine lovers for at least six months.
Coru and Wren emerged from the trees just as Mattea and Nicola got there. First Mattea, then Nicola pulled up, their expressions wary at what they saw in Coru and Wren’s faces.
Nicola gasped, “You’re not dead. Good to know.” Nicola looked worried and offended at once.
Wren pressed her lips together, keeping quiet. This was Coru’s show—let him work it out.
Coru said, “No. We’re fine. But it’s good you’re here. We need to talk.”
“Okay.” Mattea replied, his expression eager.
Wren knew he’d been holding back, waiting for Coru to step up. Here, at last, would be the truth telling. The story was so fantastical, she didn’t even know if she bought it all herself. But, there was the dream… and she couldn’t dispute Coru’s dream. She’d heard it herself, hadn’t she?
Nicola said, “We should tell Catherine you’re all right. She’s standing guard at the cabin, waiting to hear.”
“That’s good—she needs to know this as well.”
Nicola blinked, seeming to dial into the seriousness in Coru’s tone. “O-Okay. I’ll go get her?”
Coru nodded. “Yes. Bring her out to the barn. We’ll talk there.”
Nicola took off at a sprint toward the cabin.
By the time Mattea and Coru had pulled down a few bales of straw and arranged them in a circle as seating for this secret meeting, and lit a single lantern, Nicola and Catherine appeared at the door with mugs of hot sweet tea. Mattea met them, swinging the big barn door closed behind them with a small, but decided thunk of finality.
The barn felt warm, close and quiet, the sounds absorbed and muffled by the wall of sweet smelling straw and hay. Missy and Junior shifted in their large, shared stall, looked over at the group of visitors then went back to their rest. The horses blinked, stared then closed their eyes once again.
Catherine and Nicola handed off the mugs, Catherine assuring them with a nervous laugh, “Nothing strange in there, folks, only Rhea’s mint and Deklin’s honey and some boiled well water.”
This typical Catherine reaction—make tea—proved to be the perfect secret meeting accessory. Wren wrapped her hands around the blissfully warm mug. She took a tentative sip, then smiled at Catherine. “Best idea ever.”
Catherine returned her smile, though Catherine’s was tinged with dread.
Coru took a swallow from his mug, then set it down. “I want to get right into this, as it’s important you know everything, and that we come up with a plan we all agree on.”
“Okay,” Catherine answered, her tone apprehensive, but resolute. As always, top of mind for Catherine was Malcolm. Protect Malcolm resounded in her brain, again and again.
Coru stood suddenly. “I think better on my feet.” He gazed around at the faces that encircled him. “My name is Coru Wisla, and I was born in the year WEN 2317. I’m now twenty-six-years old, and I’ve come here from the future, the year WEN 2341, to be exact. Oh—and a bit of housekeeping. He gave a small smile. “‘WEN’ is the term we came up with for a specific time as it relates to time travel.”
