The Continuum, page 8
part #1 of Place in Time Series
“No,” I say, interrupting my own thoughts. I have a whole week to convince Chandler to Extract, and if we’re working together, maybe I can gain his trust. Then maybe I’ll be able to find out what the message is that convinced him to stay and maybe find some way to convince him otherwise. It’s a lot of maybes, but often in my job, a little patience pays off.
“I think there’s more at stake here than just my mission.” I choose my words very carefully as I explain my trip to 1912 and how Allen witnessed his fiancée’s Extraction.
“If my actions in the past have resulted in his presence here, I’m the one responsible to make it right. I need to figure out why he’s here. I think he might be following me.”
“Possible,” Chandler says, “but it still doesn’t all fit. I’ve been trailing this guy for a week already, and you just got here.”
“You’ve been trailing him? How did you find him?”
“Same way I found you.”
“What do you mean?” I knew the meeting at the library couldn’t have been a coincidence.
Chandler motions to one of the recliners. I perch on the edge of the cushion and eye the floral upholstery while he settles into the other chair. He looks as if he’s trying to determine how to best answer me, but I interrupt.
“Why are you living here?”
“Huh?”
“Whose home is this?” I gesture to the floral wallpaper, the doilies, the cookbooks.
“What, you don’t like my throw pillows?”
I scowl. Chandler grins.
“The apartment belonged to a lovely old lady by the name of Hannah Greenley, who passed away from natural causes shortly after I arrived. I’ve been telling the other residents that I’m her estranged son, though in reality, I just altered the record in the housing database—”
“The housing database?”
“Ah, one of the many fabulous features of the Governing Committee’s Grid. The housing database keeps track of who’s assigned to which building.”
“And you have access to that?”
“Not technically. Let’s just say I have a way with computers, hmm?” The twinkle in his eye tells me that his ‘way with computers’ might not be entirely legal. “It was the reason TUB hired me.”
“So you’re a hacker?”
“You could call it that.”
“And how illegal is that, exactly?” I narrow my eyes.
“How legal is any of this? How legal is your little travel agency? How legal is my reconnaissance here?”
I open my mouth to protest when his words sink in. “What? Then TUB isn’t a government agency?”
Chandler’s eyebrows jerk up so high they’re nearly buried underneath his hair. “Government? Really? That’s what they told you? Wow. I knew they were brassy, but they’ve really stepped it up.”
My mouth opens and shuts, but no words come out.
“No,” he says. “TUB has nothing to do with the government, except that they have deep pockets as well as other, less polite ways of getting the government—and others—to do what they want. How did you think a project like the Continuum got pushed through?”
“What’s their interest in the Continuum?” It may be a stupid question, but I need to hear the answer.
“You really don’t know? TUB is the Continuum, in its infancy. They’re the ones planning it, planting the seeds in the minds of politicians and CEOs and investors, getting everyone on board, and getting all the major players in their back pockets so they can be the ones to benefit when the money starts rolling in.
“I was interested in the project because I wanted to explore the possibility of space habitation. Maybe I’m a romantic, but it sounded like a way to make a difference in the world. Or off it, I suppose. The others, well… I found out they were just in it for the money. A project that takes over ninety years to complete is a great way to guarantee job security, especially if you have the technology to verify it’s not going to go bottoms-up halfway through.”
“Which is where you came in.”
“Risk management. Believe me, if my first Jump showed the project was a flop, there’s no way they’d have stuck with it; they’d have turned their scheming to other pursuits. But, as it turned out, the Continuum actually did succeed, so they got the distinction of being the spearheads.”
“And you? I suppose they’ll set you up nicely as well when you get back.”
“Fat chance. Besides, does it look like I care about money? I mean, look at our apartment. Does it seem like money’s a major priority?” He gestures around to the quaint, doily-adorned dwelling.
“You said ‘our.’”
“Huh?”
“‘Look at our apartment.’ Who else lives here, Chandler?” My voice sounds shrill and accusing.
Our stare-off is intense, but I must be the winner, because he finally sighs and gives in. “Dodge.”
“Dodge? Is that a dog?” I wonder if he knows that I already know, that I’m only asking to test his integrity.
He scrunches up his face. “Have you seen pets of any variety—any animals at all, for that matter—aboard the Continuum? Of course he’s not a dog. He’s a kid. He’s a bit of a menace, but overall a good kid.”
“Does he not have any parents? What is he doing here? Why are you involving yourself in the life of a little boy? You know, it’s one thing for a client to get caught up in things and form relationships with people from other eras, but you’re a professional. What were you thinking? That is in direct violation of Rule #8.” The sharp tone rises again, and I force myself to take a few deep breaths to calm down.
“Look,” he says, “I’d just Jumped here and went out to get some groceries. The little punk tried to swipe some food from my bag, and I caught him at it. I offered to take him home to his parents, but he claimed he didn’t have any. Instead of turning him over to the Governing Committee and having to explain who I am and why my name isn’t on the Continuum’s manifest, I sat him down to see if we could come to some sort of arrangement.”
“I thought the Continuum’s residents were all single adults or family units; how did a kid end up here without anyone to go home to?”
“That’s what I wondered, too. Turned out, he lived with his grandmother.”
“The owner of this apartment.”
“Exactly. She was one of the older residents of the Continuum, and though the doctors predicted that she’d live for at least another sixty years, she had some sort of freak heart attack and died. Dodge hadn’t told anyone yet, for fear that they’d send him back to Earth the next time one of the bigwig diplomat shuttles came around. Apparently, he doesn’t have any other living relatives, so he’d be sent off to a Home for Superfluous Children. Doesn’t that sound like a welcoming place?”
I ignore the challenge in his set jaw, the unspoken question of what I would have done in the same situation, and stick with the facts.
“So he needed a legal guardian, and you needed a place to stay?”
“That pretty much sums it up. I hacked into the system and designated myself his uncle. Then, when he reported his grandmother’s death, custody passed to me. He teaches me all about the twenty-second century, and I bring home the bacon. Not literally, though. Bacon’s become a precious commodity since the mad pig disease of 2092, or at least that’s what Dodge—”
“Spare me the history lesson. How old is he?”
“Seven.”
“Seriously?” I rise to my feet. My muscles are too tense; they need to move. “You brought a seven-year-old kid into this?”
“Elise.” He leans forward, his face now serious. “He needed someone and I happened to be there. Seven-year-olds can’t make it on their own. He may be smart, but he’s just a kid.”
The thought makes me uneasy; I can’t deny his heart was in the right place, even if what he did was stupid. Some unfamiliar maternal part of my heart tugs within me for the poor boy. What’s going to happen to him when Chandler returns to the present?
Chandler sits back and crosses his arms.
I throw my hands up in defeat. “I don’t have time to deal with this; we’ll discuss it later. For now, just tell me how you found Allen and why you have a journal that looks like his.”
“Believe it or not, I have a brilliant plan.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN:
April 13, 2112
“You plan to swap it out?” I ask. A blank journal that looks like Allen’s makes Chandler’s “brilliant” plan somewhat obvious.
“Exactly. See, I discovered he was on the Continuum about a week ago.” He jumps to his feet and says, “Screen on.”
The blank wall on the other side of the room lights up, revealing a screen like the ones at the library, only much larger. With a few finger flicks, Chandler manipulates the displayed images, too quickly for me to comprehend. I stop watching the screen and look at him instead. His wrists snap and his fingers fly. He pushes his lip out to one side in concentration. Then he stops.
“What did you do?”
He grins. “I just hacked into the Governing Committee’s Grid and pulled up the day’s retina scan records.”
Sure enough, floating off the wall in three dizzying dimensions, are lists and files and folders. I approach the wall cautiously and reach out a single finger. When it connects with one of the files, I can almost feel it on my skin, resisting slightly as I tug it open, a gift-wrapped box of digital information hovering in the air above me.
“This is incredible.”
“The output may look complex, but once you figure out the system, it’s not that much different than the quantum computers being developed back in the twenty-first century. The Grid was designed for maximum efficiency, so once you have a feel for it, you can find nearly anything. I wanted to keep an eye out for anyone who might be coming to Retrieve me. With the information on the Grid, I can determine what anyone on the Continuum is doing at any given time by tracking their retina scans.”
“So how’d you find Allen?”
“When I first arrived, I discovered a glitch in the system. See, the Continuum’s network only has its residents’ retina scans on file. They don’t pull from the worldwide database because, well, they don’t have to. The only people who travel back and forth are political diplomats, so anytime a new scan shows up, it automatically gets logged into the system as a ‘Diplomat Guest’. The Governing Committee’s system doesn’t even ping it out unless the same scan continues getting hits after a week—the maximum length of time diplomats are allowed on the colony—so I’ve got a notification set up to tell me immediately if a new ‘Diplomat Guest’ scan goes through. Then I manually check it out myself.”
“What about yours? You’re not registered here.”
“Added myself to the system. So when this guy’s scans showed up and I knew no diplomats had arrived recently, I started following him because, like you, I thought he might be a threat to my mission. Or, a threat to me avoiding my mission, I guess.”
“What made you think he was with PITTA?”
“I wasn’t sure initially, but then I saw he had one of these babies.” He reaches onto the top bookshelf and pulls out a shiny black sphere.
My breath catches. “A Wormhole.”
Seeing the device in Chandler’s hand tempts me. I could stop him right there and force his thumb onto the button, propelling him abruptly back to 2012 where he belongs. Well, where he’s from, anyway, I think and then mentally scold myself for that concession. Of course he belongs in 2012. That’s where he originated, and that’s where his life is. Everyone must return to his own time. There’s a reason it’s Rule #1.
Chandler sees me staring and stuffs his Wormhole into his pocket. I’m about to wonder aloud where Allen might have gotten one, when it hits me: Marie’s original device, the one she left back in 1912. In the chaos following her Retrieval, I’d never gotten a chance to report it missing. Another error on my part, though, in my defense, I hadn’t exactly expected to be kidnapped that afternoon.
“What’s he been doing?” I ask.
“Raiding supply closets, breaking into surveillance rooms, studying blueprints—”
“Blueprints. That’s what he was looking at when I saw him at the library.”
“Oh, and he spends a lot of time watching old vids of some pop star. You know, the one who did that song that goes ‘Nah nah nah nah na—’”
“I know the one.” Marie.
“Here’s what I don’t get.” I pace the room. “Our DeLorean Box isn’t even capable of sending someone forward in time, so how did he get here?”
“Not TUB’s Box; you’ve seen how secure theirs is. Besides, his Wormhole isn’t the same.”
“What?”
“It’s got multiple buttons and dials.” He reaches toward his pocket, as if to pull out his as a visual aide, but then thinks better of it and turns to the screen instead, zooming in on an image of Allen sitting on a park bench. “See?”
The device in Allen’s hands is definitely a Wormhole, but at the same time, it’s not. I step closer until I’m enveloped in the holographic image, the 3D projection of the Wormhole-Device-that’s-not-a-Wormhole-Device hovering in the air within my grasp.
“It’s similar…” I squint to get a better look. “But it’s like he gave it upgrades. I wonder what it does.”
“Seems pretty obvious to me.” Chandler shrugs. “It does the same things as ours, but better.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN:
April 14, 2112
ALLEN
Allen stepped off the early morning solar train and patted his pocket, ensuring that his precious ‘time sphere’ was there. It was a nervous tic, an action he caught himself doing more and more frequently nowadays. He removed his journal from his opposite pocket and scribbled furiously with the tiny stub of pencil he always carried with him, recalculating to be certain his numbers were correct, that today was truly the day he’d come here to observe. His one chance to ensure everything was in place.
The “sky” here was useless here for determining his location, so he was forced to don a set of those infernal spectacles. His finger hovered over the button that would show him her image and fill his head with her voice. No, there wasn’t time for nostalgia today. After double-checking his bearings, he set off at a jaunty pace. As he walked, he reviewed his mental checklist.
Acquire provisions and shelter. Test retina scan. Check documented time table. Plan emergency escape. Acquire emergency supplies: oxygen tanks, suits, food, water. Determine ideal location for viewing area. He stopped mid-stride.
A surveillance room, perhaps, he thought, and pulled out his notebook again to make a note. Watching from afar would be ideal, though he wondered if potential clients might think that too far removed.
He sighed, returning his journal to its proper place, then pulling it out again to check his figures. It seemed to be all he did nowadays—check and recheck, for it was only in those numbers and figures and calculations, in this planning and organizing, that he could lose himself, could forget all he’d lost.
After Marie, he hadn’t known what to do with himself. And perhaps this most recent venture of his was just a distraction to keep his mind from returning to her. To keep himself from clicking the dials and pushing the button that would bring him back to her time. Perhaps part of him hoped that it would lead her to him. He suspected all these things may be true, at least in part, but never allowed himself to dwell on it.
The outer, domed surface of the space colony curved gently upward, meeting with brilliantly lit panels that made spots appear in his vision. He closed his eyes and soaked in the heat. Adrenaline pumped through his body at the knowledge of what would occur here in a mere matter of hours. He pulled out the pencil and began his calculations again.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN:
April 14, 2112
I don’t know what time it is when I finally wake. With the unnerving lack of shadows outside, the day is perpetually stuck on noontime from very first moment the panels brighten in the morning. Nor do I remember where I am, until I see that I’m still in that awful, shapeless suit. Right. Chandler’s apartment. I have five days left to complete this Extraction, and now another man from another time to deal with, too.
Chandler and I spent hours the night before formulating plans and hypotheses, but we didn’t get any closer to discovering why Allen is here, how he altered the Wormhole, or what we should do about it. Nor did I get any closer to convincing Chandler to Extract back to our present. When I started to doze standing up, Chandler offered me the privacy of the master bedroom while he crashed in the living room recliner.
Awake now, I stumble into the kitchen, and Chandler greets me with a smile and a cup of coffee.
“Here’s another thing I love about this place.” Chandler hands me the steaming drink. “They’ve figured out how to insulate cups so that coffee doesn’t lose its heat or flavor. That cup’s been sitting out for hours already and I can guarantee it’ll be as fresh and toasty as if it’d just been brewed.”
I take a sip and have to agree that there’s something miraculous about it. I turn to sit in the armchair I occupied last night, but it’s already taken. The same scrawny, dark-haired kid I saw at the school stares at me with wide eyes.
“Who are you?” he asks.
“I—I’m Elise.” I put out a hand in greeting, but he just frowns at it. Chandler steps in.
“Ah, no one’s really used handshakes since the so-called ‘Dragon Flu’ of the 2030s,” he explains. “Dodge, this is Elise. We work together.”
Dodge watches me with an open curiosity that makes me want to sink into the floor.
“I’m going to grab a fresh suit and hit the shower before we head out,” Chandler says, oblivious to my discomfort. “Make yourself at home.”
“Are you a spy, too?” Dodge asks as soon as Chandler’s gone. His huge eyes have grown even wider. I feel like a bug under a microscope.
