Chronica (32 page)

"Please, enter now," the voice said again. "The window for a conclusion that could be successful with this is now 25 seconds for you to enter the elevator."

"We've had more experience with good than with evil models," Sierra said, "and Mr. Charles told us about an android working on our behalf right here." She took Max's hand. "The odds are in our favor, that's the best we can hope for."
 

Max nodded.

The two entered the elevator, and its doors closed.

***

The key, she knew, was distracting Heron's party, but distractions were a hazardous business. "I will tell you where to find me," she spoke to Heron and his men. "But you need to leave Mr. Appleton behind. He's too feeble for all of this exertion."

"We'll take him," Heron replied, "and if he drops dead, that's going to happen in a few months anyway." Heron smiled at Appleton, the kind of smile that would make a baby cry and drive a dog to fury.

"I'm not going to haggle with you," she replied. "Leave Mr. Appleton where he is, unharmed, or you'll hear nothing further from me."

"I'll blow up this whole damned facility – tell me where you are!" Heron demanded.

"If you do that, you'll never get what you want," she replied, "you'll never know with 100% certainty that all copies of the
Chronica
have been destroyed."

The mention of the
Chronica
was too much for Heron to resist. "Stay with him," he barked at one of his men, about Appleton. Then, to the voice, "ok, I've done as you requested, now tell me where you are."

She began to say that Appleton had to be left alone by the elevator, when Heron wheeled around. "I've changed my mind, come with me," he said to the man he had just assigned to Appleton. "We can deal with him later." He glared at Appleton. "He doesn't look likely to go anywhere."

***

Heron grasped the small but powerful explosive device that he had in his pocket. He indeed was going to blow up this whole little building, and a good piece of Foster Square, too, as soon as he had what he came for.

"Where are you?" he repeated, to the voice.

"Follow the lights," she replied.

A panel of footlights appeared on the floor. Heron and his two men, weapons drawn, followed them.

***

Sierra and Max emerged from the elevator, three floors below ground level, in the Foster Square Facility.

"My dear!" Appleton was overjoyed to see them, and flung his arms around Sierra. "I was afraid I would not have the pleasure of seeing you again, before I died."

"You're not going to die," Sierra insisted, and didn't add, "not yet".

Appleton extended his hand to Max. "Good to see you, too."

Max took and shook it, gently.

"You better go," Appleton said and pointed to the floor lights. "Follow the lights. Please be very careful."

Sierra hesitated. She didn't want to leave Appleton alone.

"I'll be fine," he said, but his voice was weak. "I'll be right here – after I pay a little visit to the lavatory," he kissed Sierra on the cheek, waved to Max, and slowly walked off to the other end of the hall.

Sierra and Max looked at him for a moment, then followed the floor lights, which led in the opposite direction.

***

Heron realized that he recognized the voice. It had been in the mouths of all of the abominable androids that Sierra Waters had created somewhere up the line in the future – maybe even right around now, when she was older and more accomplished. Heron had managed to crack the code once, and create an android or two who looked and sounded like these models, but followed orders from him not Sierra Waters. But Sierra Waters had regained control of the code, changed it in a way even Heron could not fully fathom, and had produced a cadre of these creatures that were invulnerable to Heron's ministrations.

One had died in Sierra's stead as Hypatia in ancient Alexandria, and had fooled Heron for quite some time, because of the locket – Sierra Waters' locket – that the android had cleverly worn around her neck the day that she was ripped apart by the Nitrian mob.

Another now stood in his way right now, trying to stymie his reclamation of his
Chronica
. She would end up, if Heron had anything to do about it, the same way as her sister in Alexandria.

The three men reached the end of the footlights. "I'm right inside the door to your right," the voice informed them.

***

Sierra and Max approached the same room a few minutes later, weapons drawn. They could hear lasers crackling on the inside, likely from weapons.

They looked at each other in a now or never way, and burst through the door. The room inside was a mess of damaged digital equipment, hissing and smoking from a savage fight that was still going on. Heron and his two men were firing at a place in the far corner of the room, where someone – no doubt the android – was firing back.

Sierra and Max began firing at Heron's men, but were at a distinct disadvantage. These legionaries or whatever they were called in this era were well trained in use of laser weapons. Sierra and Max were passable at best. They turned over tables and did their utmost to keep these men at bay, but knew that sooner or later Heron's men would get the decisive upper hand.

The android, however, used the distraction of Max and Sierra to run across the room for a better position.

Heron was still firing at her, but he was an even worse shot than Sierra and Max. Puffs of smoke and sizzles accompanied the android as she moved quickly across the room, but none came close to her.

But Heron thought he noticed something out of the corner of his eye. It was a gleam from something, he couldn't be sure. He pulled out his magnifier and looked across the room. Nothing he could see . . . then, ah, what was that? It looked a digital stick, the size of a needle. A needle in the haystack containing the
Chronica
? Impossible to say.

The android saw where Heron was looking and started firing feverishly at him. He quickly moved back to a safer place, but kept the needle stick in view. "Forget about those two for now," he ordered his two men, dismissing Max and Sierra with a wave of his hand. "Keep your fire on her." He pointed at the android.

The men did as requested.

The android fell back under withering laser fire.

Sierra and Max saw what has happening, but didn't see the needle, and didn't understand what was going on.

Heron's men laid unrelenting laser fire on the android, who was losing the battle as everything around her barked and cracked with flame.

Heron used this opportunity to take careful aim at the needle stick, which he still had in his sight. He fired at it three times, and hit on the third. The needle flared then crumbled into soot. Every light in the building and all electrical connections went dead.

***

Sierra and Max were only momentarily stunned by the sudden darkness. With flashlights in one hand and knives in the other, they leapt across the room, each jumping on one of Heron's legionaries, who had been much closer to the flare, and had been briefly blinded by it.

The flare and the sudden darkness equalized the battle, but didn't outrightly win it for Sierra and Max. Each struggled with their legionary, and by no means had the advantage. The legionaries were indeed starting to get the better of Max and Sierra, when–

The android blew each of their brains out with her laser weapon.

The room was still dark, except for the flashlights, but it was soon clear to Sierra, Max, and the android that Heron was gone.

***

Heron had left the room as soon as the lights went out. He ran back to the elevator, looking to personally put Appleton out of his misery then set off his explosive device and get out of this cursed building, but the feeble publisher was nowhere in sight.

The elevator wasn't working. Heron opened a few doors and was pleased to see that one contained a staircase. He fished around in his pocket for the small, potent bomb but couldn't find it – he must have lost it in the frenzied battle with the android.

He walked quickly up three flights of stairs, using his own flashlight, and left the building.

It was light outside – early afternoon. There were a group of kids in the square, likely from some sort of summer camp. Heron walked by them, hoping he didn't look too disheveled, and smiled.

He had a lot to truly smile about. He might have just destroyed the last copy of the
Chronica
. He walked to the Brewster train station, savoring the moment, hoping to rent a car there. But a fast-track train to New York City was just pulling in, and he jumped on it.
 

He looked out the window at the quickening blur of trees that splashed against his face like a watercolor and thought about what awaited him. If the destruction of all
Chronica
copies disrupted the operation of the Chairs, that would be something he could fix. After all, it was he not Sierra Waters who built the vehicles of time travel in the first place. It was his invention, always his, and now was finally likely, once again, to remain that way.

Chapter 22

[New York City, June, 1899 AD]
 

Charles was stretched out, ill and exhausted in the Millennium Club's infirmary. His last act, before he surrendered to the bed and instructions that he should rest, had been to get Bertram out of a back door, and home to his brownstone on West 73
^rd
Street, where he could recover from his gun wound in private, away from police scrutiny.

It fell to Astor and Tesla, aided by Hastings the young doorman with the British accent, to tell and sell the police that no one in the club was responsible for Woodruff's death, or knew anything about it.

Astor and Hastings walked quickly from the infirmary to the front door of the club, where Tesla was explaining to the two policemen what had happened, in a thicker accent than usual, talking loudly and gesticulating.

"He was a strange looking man," Tesla was saying. "Hard to figure his age – definitely middle-age or older, clean-shaven, with slightly foreign eyes, if you know what I mean. I would say about 5'9" inches, 180 or so pounds. I have a good head for details – I'm a scientist!"

Astor instantly recognized the description, and now thought Tesla was a genius not only in invention but in brilliant prevarication.

The police recognized Astor. "You're John Jacob Astor the IV," one of them said, pleased to be in his presence. "My sister got married at your hotel last year – to a rich dentist from Baltimore!"

"Congratulations," Astor said. "It sounds like she did very well."

"We were talking about what happened here," the other officer said, not quite as enamored with Astor. He pointed to Woodruff's body, now covered with a sheet, with a half a dozen blood stains. "What can you tell us about this?"

"Well, I was unfortunate enough – or fortunate, in terms of giving you information – to walk up to the club just as the maniac was leaving," Astor said. "He looked just as Mr. Tesla described," he added, thinking the most fortunate thing about all of this now was his approaching this conversation just as Tesla was giving his description, so Astor could hear it. "Medium build, medium height, salt-gray hair—"

"Yes!" Tesla agreed.

"And he was talking to himself as he walked right past me, out into the street," Astor said. "He was saying something like, 'both Flannery and his partner got what they deserved, for what they did to my sister'."

"What did you say?" both officers asked Astor.

"The second part wasn't as clear as the first," Astor said, "I can't be sure about the sister. But I heard 'Flannery' as clear as a bell."

The cops looked at each other. They clearly knew that Flannery had been missing, and that nothing had been announced to the public. This made Astor's account extremely convincing, just as he intended.

"That's
very
helpful, Mr. Astor," the cop with the sister who got married said. "Thank you!"

"It was frightening!" Hastings spoke up. "Thank goodness he didn't stay here and take any other lives!"

The cop nodded. Two other policemen, non-uniformed, entered. "Please don't leave this facility," the cop with the sister told Astor, Tesla, and Hastings. "The detectives will likely have more questions after we give them our assessment."

"Of course," all three said.

The cops went off to brief the new arrivals, clearly superior, definitely detectives, Astor thought.

"I'll go check on Mr. Charles," Hastings said.

"Good idea," Astor replied. "Mr. Tesla and I will repair to the bar upstairs for a drink. My mouth is a little dry after all of that talking."

"Mine as well," Tesla said.

The two walked slowly up the stairs. "Impressive, bringing in Flannery," Tesla complimented Astor, who had told him about the Flannery ferry incident when they had first met in the Millennium, earlier in this remarkable day. "That should send the police off in the wrong direction for quite some time."

"Thank you," Astor replied. "But you win the prize for telling the police that the homicidal maniac looked just like Heron."

Tesla chuckled slightly. "I got a good enough view of him when he was standing transfixed at the bottom of that staircase with Porter and Woodruff. And he is in a sense responsible for Woodruff's death – who likely wouldn't have been here with his guns in the first place, had it not been for Heron."

[New York City, 2096 AD]
 

Heron took an automated car from Moynihan Station up to the Millennium. He sat back in the seat and enjoyed the ride. The more he thought about what had happened in Massachusetts, the more he felt confident that the last copy of the
Chronica
had indeed been on that hairpin stick – why else would the android have fought so hard to keep it out of his hands?

Fortunately there was no one at the front door that he knew. And three Chairs were upstairs in the room, just as he had expected. One had been his, the other two had been taken here by Sierra Waters and Maxwell Marcus. With any luck, the two were dead on the floor now, three stories below in the Foster Square Facility. But he'd had his fair share of luck today, and it didn't really matter anymore whether those two were dead or alive. With all copies of the
Chronica
gone, and with it her ability to build time machines and interfere with his own, there would be little Sierra Waters could do other than observe him keep the world the way it was supposed to be.