Disrupted (5 page)

Chris’s jaw hardened with frustration and anger.

I didn’t blame him. This was his life. Or rather, his death, if one wanted to be morbidly accurate. And so far all we’d heard from Drustan was nothing.

“Ah, come on,” I moaned over the rim of my mug. “You can’t tell Chris he’s dead, but not to worry, you’ve got everything sorted, and then come back here with ‘still working on it’ and ‘unexpected barriers’. You must have something you can tell us.”

“Ooh,” exclaimed Wanda.

We all looked at her expectantly.

She gave me a small grimace. “Sorry, I’ve just received confirmation that our parcel’s been dispatched. I’ll just go down to the lobby and wait for it, shall I?”

“Take Gale with you,” said Drustan.

Gale put up an instant protest, but Drustan was firm. He clearly wanted Gale and her histrionics out of the way. I could really get to like this guy.

Once they’d gone, Drustan scraped his chair around so that he was facing Chris. After a long, thoughtful silence, he sighed. “Jack Townsend has just been charged with your murder, Christian. Events are escalating and time is running out.”

My gazed flicked to Chris, half expecting to see him fade before my eyes. Chris had gone very pale, but he was still decidedly solid.

“How do you stop him?” I looked to Drustan again. “What are you going to do about Jack?”

“Jack has nothing to do with this,” said Chris. “I know Jack. He didn’t kill me. He wouldn’t! You’ve got everything wrong. Police make mistakes. They catch the wrong guy. It happens all the time.”

Chris sounded so certain, I almost believed him. Almost forgot the cold hatred I’d seen on Jack’s face. I wanted to forget.

Drustan rubbed at tired eyes, contemplating Chris a long time before speaking. “I assume you’ve heard of genetic engineering.”

He addressed Chris, but I was eager to follow through with this change in subject, to leave Jack and his knife slashing antics behind in 2013. “You mean like choosing the colour of your baby’s eyes and hair and stuff?”

A designer baby clinic had opened in Switzerland recently, and I’d thought it rather cool. I mean, why should you have to live with your dad’s thin lips or your mum’s freakishly large hands?

“And more importantly,” added Chris with a cool look my way, “eradicating hereditary illnesses and correcting defects before birth.”

“Of course,” I said airily. There was that.

“Yes, well,” said Drustan, “a few decades back, the field advanced into genetic stamping.”

Chris and Drustan shared a dark look.

I slammed my hand on the table. “Non-genius here, guys. And genetic stamping is...?”

Drustan pulled his gaze from Chris to me. “We’ve always known a child inherits the emotions and memories of their parents. By nature, or God’s design if you like, that wealth of knowledge and store of raw emotions are inherently dormant within the child’s genes.”

“I’ve read something about that,” said Chris. “There’s a theory linked with evolution, isn’t there?”

Drustan nodded. “Psychological evolution. Without us being consciously aware of it, genetic memory has accelerated our development, advanced our minds and refined our emotions over generations. Genetic stamping unleashes that dormant power. Imagine a child being born with the full contents of an adult’s brain and a lifetime of experiences.”

I couldn’t. “A baby would be able to do trig and physics and recite Shakespeare?”

“Not quite, Miss Ervant. The body and mind follows natural growth and development arcs. But a child of, say twelve, would indeed be able to do calculus, for example, without ever being taught what it is. The sleeping knowledge is slowly awakened as the child matures.”

“Wow.” Scrap genetic engineering. This genetic stamping was seriously way out. Think about it. No school. No homework. No tests. An instant download on each birthday.

“To put it mildly,” agreed Drustan wryly. “Instead of re-learning everything over and over, we could move the starting point with each generation.”

He stood and collected our mugs, busying himself with making another round of coffee while he spoke. “In essence, a foetus could be stamped with someone else’s genetic memory.”

“Gross.” From Chris.

“Brilliant.” From me. Why keep dumbness in the family when you could borrow a bit of genius here, a bit of athletic flair there?

Drustan set a mug before me, then went to stand near Chris. “Mrs. Townsend was admitted to hospital in her second trimester for correction to a hereditary heart condition.”

“Mrs. Townsend had a bad heart?” I gasped.

Drustan frowned at me, then blinked and said, “Maybe. But the genetic engineering was performed on the baby she was carrying. Jack Townsend.”

“This discrepancy was picked up by TIC?” asked Chris.

“No...there’s no discrepancy, Christian. That part of the past has not been changed.”

“I don’t understand.” Chris shook his head. “Then what does this have to do with what’s happened?”

“We believe Callum Jade went back in time to genetically stamp Jack when he was still in his mother’s womb. The foetus had already undergone the necessary treatments required for genetic surgery. Both convenient and an excellent camouflage. No changes in Mrs. Townsend’s medical records to alert TIC. I believe—we believe that’s why Jack was chosen in the first place.”

“What’s the point?” said Chris, taking his mug from Drustan and cradling it tightly. “Suddenly Jack’s a databank for someone else’s memories and he decides to kill me for it?”

“Not only memories, Christian. Emotions. Rage. Hate. Revenge. As Jack matured, that intent would fester, grow, and not even Jack would know why he felt the way he did. Why it was so important to kill you.”

I’ll kill you.
Jack’s threat throbbed through my entire body. I could hear his insane rage, see the hate on his face. Oh. My. God.

“You can’t prove any of this,” protested Chris. “If TIC couldn’t pick up any changes, how do you know- this theory has no foundation!” He pushed away from the counter, sloshing half his coffee over the floor. “If Callum Jade went back, why didn’t he just pull a gun on me or something? Why all the cloak and dagger theatrics?”

Drustan stepped back from the mess, but no one attempted to clean up it up. “It isn’t possible to take a life out of natural time. The universal chaos is too great when you disturb the balance of souls. We’re not even sure what would happen to Callum if he’d tried to influence another to do his bidding. But Jack was born into your time naturally, and he would not be acting on Callum’s command. With genetic stamping, Jack would inherit Callum’s objectives as his own in every way.”

Chris opened his mouth, but he must have run out of arguments. His jaw went slack as he closed his eyes for a moment. “Okay, so you go back to the same time frame that Callum Jade leaped to and protect Mrs Townsend from him.”

“A leap blurs the time coordinates for a few months either side,” said Drustan. “My team is working out the nearest coordinates possible for us to leap back to.” His voice lowered considerably as he added, “We’ll need to hide Jack’s mother until after he is born.”

My heart cheered at Drustan’s solution. I mean, it was totally non-violent, no blood, no one gets dead. What was not to like?

So why did Chris look like he was choking on an entire shark carcass?

“Chris,” I said brightly, “this sounds like a good plan.”

Chris’s blazing eyes turned on me. Burned right through me, actually. “No, Willow, it’s not a good plan. What about Jack’s heart?”

I hadn’t forgotten about Jack’s heart. “I assume,” I said, turning to Drustan, “that Mrs. Townsend will be admitted to another hospital for the genetic engineering?”

Drustan stared intensely into his mug. “That might prove difficult, initially.”

“Because,” snorted Chris, “they plan to kidnap her. It’s slightly illegal, Willow.”

“There’ll be opportunities later in Jack’s life for the corrective surgery,” said Drustan.

Chris grunted his disbelief.

“Christian,” started Drustan. “I honestly wish—”

“No! You don’t even know for certain. You’re gambling with Jack’s life on some far-stretched hunch.”

“You couldn’t be more wrong. Callum Jade has always been devoted to his work at the Institute... by which I mean the Institute of Advanced Genetic Exploration. An unnatural business. I never did approve.” Drustan gave a long, exhausted sigh. “Callum Jade leaps back to the period nearing Jack’s birth and suddenly your best friend turns enemy and kills you? Christian, the only thing we’re not certain about right now is TIC. For some reason, we’re unable to find a reasonable time coordinate in the required time frame.”

“There’s a problem with TIC?” Chris sounded almost happy.

I was still on, “Huh? Jack and Chris? As in best friends?”

“Ex friends,” said Chris. He gave Drustan a dark look and said quickly, “That’s not proof.”

“Then you can explain your sudden falling out?” Drustan demanded. “Did something happen? Or did Jack just turn on you one day? Maybe somewhere around his twelfth or thirteenth birthday?”

I watched Chris carefully.

He clamped his lips tight and shook his head.

Chris knew something. Or should I say, Chris knew nothing had happened. Jack had turned with the onset of puberty. Call me genius, but that smacked of genetically matured stamping.

And Chris knew, but he was refusing to admit it.

“We grew up,” said Chris at last. “Things change. That doesn’t make Jack a killing machine. You’ve got this all wrong.”

Drustan rubbed at his temples wearily. “We’re not wrong. You need to understand—”

“No, you need to understand,” Chris said rudely. “I will never agree to risking Jack’s life. If I’m so damn important, then I’m important enough to listen to.” With that, Chris dumped his mug on the table and stormed out the kitchen.

Drustan turned to me.

I shrugged. “I’ve only been in Biggs Hill for three months. I barely know Chris.”

But I recognised a threat and we both knew Chris had just issued one.

When Drustan started for the door, I called out in panic, “Everything’s going to be alright. Isn’t it?”

“Of course.” Drustan threw me a glance with those stony greys. It wasn’t cold though. There was warmth and empathy reaching out to me, willing me to take it and be comforted. “Everything is going to be just fine. I promise you.”

And why not?

If Drustan said he was going to fix this, I was just scared enough to believe in him.

It’s not terribly grown up, I know, but it’s what I do when things go too horribly wrong. I become the ostrich, head in the sand, and let the adults deal. I’m very smart that way.

Ten minutes later, Drustan popped back into the kitchen to say goodbye. He was leaving, to do his thing. I don’t know whether he’d decided to risk Chris’s wrath (or whatever), but I had to believe Jack would be fine. Drustan had said everything would be fine.

Chris was fuming somewhere else in the apartment. Or so I assumed, until Gale barged into the kitchen.

“What did you do to Christian Wood?” she demanded, all but throwing two brown parcels in my face.

I started counting to ten. I got halfway and decided Gale wasn’t worth the other five. “I didn’t do anything to your Christian Wood. What am I? This season’s target bunny? If you’re so concerned, why don’t you go comfort him and leave me alone?”

She took my advice with a huff and a strut.

As soon as she was out the door, I stripped the parcels and took me and my new clothes off to my (or Drustan’s, I suppose) room. I couldn’t even begin to wrap my mind around the speedy delivery service, but hey, if I had to live with the headaches of the 22
nd
century (i.e. Gale), then I fully intended to enjoy the perks.

I stopped in at the bathroom on the way to brush my teeth and splash cool water on my face. The corner shower was two parts glass and two parts wall, the whole of which was splattered with flat nozzles that would pummel water at me from all sides. I was tempted, but couldn’t see a towel-rack and didn’t rate my chances at getting anything out of Gale. So I picked up my parcels and promised myself a spa sensation as soon as I’d conned Gale into pointing out the linen closet.

The clean pants were heavenly; the bra was a revelation. I already knew what mini-me looked like with pop-out breasts, but now I knew what it felt like too. Kind of sexy as well, I thought, turning this way and that before the mirror.

The door burst open.

Chris!

Heat shot to my face as I crossed my arms over my chest and wished myself invisible.

But it wasn’t Chris.

“See what you’ve done now!” shrieked Gale, flying at me with enough force to topple me over. “Christian Wood is gone!”
 

Chapter 6

T
he lobby of Drustan’s building was spacious and elegant and quiet, with a thick oyster carpet that absorbed my footfalls. The walls were murals in varying shades of brown and cream with soft flowing lines. We’d arrived here the old fashioned way, via one of three circular elevators housed in enormous marble pillars that spiked through all the floors. Me in fab new jeans and a tight white T-shirt that contained my breasts better than the bra, and Gale in a sickly yellow that had struck her tubing upstairs and showed no signs of dimming.

“What if we don’t find him?” asked Gale. She twined and twisted her arms together until they resembled a gnarled grapevine. “What if he’s lost? What if something happens to him out there?”

“What if you just shut up?” I snapped.

Gale froze, her arms mid-tangle, to stare at me in triple-focus.

“I’m sorry,” I said, “but you have to calm down. Take a deep breath.”

“I don’t breathe.”

“Then count to a hundred.”

She bobbed her head. “Done.”

I sighed. “Okay, how about trying on another colour before I puke?”

“I can’t help it. My emotive programs are colour tuned and worry happens to be yellow.”

“Whose yokel idea was that?”

“Yours!”

“Not,” I yelped. I didn’t even know what an emotive program was and, trust me, even if I one day grew a second brain, I still wouldn’t know. Besides, “I’d never choose such a horrid colour.”

“No, of course you wouldn’t,” agreed Gale, a little too quickly. “You didn’t. The colour tuning wasn’t your idea. I don’t know why I said that. Pretend I didn’t.”

“Gale, do you and I—”

“No.”

“—know each other in the future?”

“No.”

I briefly contemplated the many delightful ways I could torture the truth out of her, but just then I pushed through the opaque revolving door and out into another world.

The daylight was strange, second-hand beams trapped between the sheer walls of reflecting buildings that soared on each side of the road to totally block the sun. On the ground, pedestrian traffic was thick and noisy. Above, land hoppers crowded the sky, zipping and dipping their way through the many near-collisions I witnessed in the few seconds I looked up.

Something hard and solid smacked into me.

“Ouch!” I cried. “Watch out, why don’t—”

The rest of my indignation stuck in my throat as the tall man-robot swung about. His face was square and silver, his body fashioned to look as if he were wearing a black and white tux. Tucked in each arm were large brown paper shopping bags filled to overflowing.

“Forgive me, ma’am.” He looked me in the eye, gave a small bow of his head, then turned and went on his way.

“The Butler Series,” muttered Gale. “Mass produced and dumb as anything.”

“Actually, he seemed quite polite.”

Gale snorted. “We’re wasting time.”

She grabbed my arm, trying to pull me with her. I resisted stubbornly, just to show her I could, but then the moving street caught my attention and I forgot to resist.

The street was split into three horizontal conveyor belts, all sliding in the same direction. The outer belts closest to the sidewalk inched along slowly, allowing people to step on and off at their leisure. The centre belt moved considerably faster. I watched a group of teenagers hop from the slow belt to the middle without so much as a stagger.

At regular intervals, footbridges arched over the belts for access to the other side. When we reached the corner, I saw the intersecting street was exactly the same, only curving up and over at the crossing like a bridge.

Suddenly I understood what Drustan had meant about the inner city streets being reclaimed. These streets weren’t built for cars. What I didn’t understand was how it could be remotely practical.

“I mean,” as I told Gale, but only because there was no one else to tell and talking to oneself is just, well, weird, “it would take forever to walk across town, even with the extra oomph of a moving conveyor.”

“It works,” she said, taking a left at the corner. And then she stopped abruptly and turned to me. “Ni London was rebuilt upward to condense the city area when vehicles were banned and the ICT replaced roads.”

My mouth hung open in shock.

“The ICT being our Inner City Transport system,” she added.

My jaw dropped a little more.

“It’s not rocket science, Willow.”

“But you actually telling me anything about 2106 is just as mind-boggling. Isn’t it against the Drustan code or something?”

Gale thought about that, then shrugged. Well, by shrugging I mean the point of her inverted triangular head dipped behind her body, then up again.

“You should know how to get around in case we’re separated. So, the ICT runs down and across on a North-East grid.” She pointed to a marked number on the corner. 56.12. “Take the East Line to block 56, then the North Line to block 12. Even you should be able to find your way back here.”

I was still thinking up a catty retort when Gale glided on ahead. I rushed after, of course. Not. Unfortunately, she was waiting for me at the next corner.

This street opened up into a flood of flashing neon advertisements.

2065 Memorabilia.

Instant chip insertions.

50% Discount on all Off-Planet Cruises.

“Please God,” I murmured in a daze, “tell me we haven’t colonized the universe.”

“We haven’t,” said Gale, her eyes zooming out on their springy extensions to scan in three different directions.

“I wasn’t asking you,” I said, finally getting my snub in, and almost got head butted by a lone eyeball for my effort. What I’d do for a ping pong bat right now.

But as I was jerking my head out of the way of a nasty bruising, I spied a potential Chris-like person disappearing into an entrance beneath the Off-Planet Cruises sign. “We’ll never find Chris in this crowd. We should split up.”

“Do you think so?” asked Gale doubtfully.

“Oh, yes, I really, really do,” I said eagerly. Too eagerly?

I was treated to a triple helping of suspicious stares coming at me from impossible angles.

But hey, I’m not the by product of a child psychiatrist and a High Court barrister for nothing. I’d sharpened my milk teeth on reverse psychology and subtle manipulation.

I put on a watery smile and shrugged. “Sorry, that was stupid of me. I thought you were used to going out and about on your own. You know, you come across as so independent, I just assumed... But you’re right, you shouldn’t be left to wander alone.”

“I- I can take of myself,” blubbered Gale, retracting her eyes with a snap.

“Of course you can,” I agreed kindly. “You certainly don’t need me to protect you. But just in case, you should stick close, even if it does take us longer to track Chris down. Don’t worry, I’ll look after—”

“We meet back here in a half hour,” croaked Gale. I think she meant to growl, or maybe hiss, but manufactured vocal chords have their limitations.

Hiding my smirk, I glanced over my shoulder to watch her fly off in a tizz of luminous puce. Ugh.

The Off-Planet Cruise place was called Tripod Travel. Personally, I thought their orange and green plastic décor a genius stroke of marketing. I’d only just stepped inside, and my feet were already itching to get away as far and fast as possible. Seriously, if I had £9,999 on hand, I’d have jumped the very next cruise out of here.

Which departed in just two hours and ten minutes, I saw from one of the endless advertising screens that teased and tantalized. Okay, so I’d probably be on that cruise with or without the itchy feet, but that didn’t change the fact that I had a fiver tucked into my pocket and not a penny more.

Which also meant I wouldn’t be boarding the Cupid Star Cruiser for a seven-day excursion to circle Venus, detouring past Mars on the way there and surfing the rings of Saturn on the way home.

A chill of envy started to tug at my mouth, then I remembered my sad, lonely non-expectations.

God, I could actually see myself, a forty-year old spinster huddled in a loveseat meant for two and set inside a viewing dome as we took a turn around Venus. Teary eyes glued to the glass ceiling as the beauteous planet of lurve mocked from above.

Or maybe that’s the aquarium I’m thinking of, and hungry looking sharks nose-butting the glass that suddenly looks a little fragile- but you get the picture.

I backed up against a pillar, below a screening of Lunar Leaping expeditions on the moon, and tried to think positive thoughts.

Hadn’t Chris said that seeing the future changes it? I mean, I wasn’t alone yet.

There was still Jack.

Except, I was pretty sure Jack murdered Chris. And even if he had been stamped and couldn’t help himself, I’d still be left with a boyfriend designer engineered to commit heinous deeds.

But maybe that’s something I could live with. I mean, it wasn’t really Jack’s fault, was it?

My mum need never know.

Oh crap, the priest marrying us had certainly better never know. Our darling brats would need all the help God could give them with a could-be-would-be-murderer for a father.

Except, I’d dumped Jack, hadn’t I?

Or had he dumped me?

An ultimatum had been issued, that much I was certain of- and thoroughly trampled in his haste to clobber Chris. Not that he had. Yet. There was still a small possibility that whatever Drustan was fixing and undoing might erase everything. Including the whole woods incident. And I’d never even issue that silly ultimatum.

But I would always know. Given the choice, Jack had not chosen me. On a scale of one to ten, how bad was that exactly?

Grrr. How desperate was I?

This was all my parents fault. I’d been perfectly happy in Mayfair, before... before...

I was suddenly spitting mad, hissing steam through my nostrils kind of mad. I don’t know where it came up from. Usually I’m quite even tempered. Really. It was as if I’d been brimming to the top, and sad desperation was the drop that burst the seams.

I felt lost, alone, empty, scared.

But mostly there was this venomous rage thickening in my tummy, noxious red fumes gagging at the base of my throat. I couldn’t breathe. I had to swallow back hot vomit. My head was throbbing.

“Willow?”

I blinked, totally confused when I saw Chris striding up to me. It shouldn’t have been a surprise, of course. I had followed him in here.

“Everything alright? You look pasty.”

I had to work the bile loose in my throat before attempting to talk.

By which time Chris was standing in front of me, frowning. “Did something happen? You’re not going to pass out, are you?”

I stared at him blankly for a few seconds.

And then I said it.

Just like that.

After so many months of refusing to think the thought spawned straight from the hole called hell, I said, “I think my parents are getting divorced.”

Chris didn’t say anything for the longest time. He just looked at me. And I looked at him.

Then, “That stinks.”

Yes, I thought miserably, it really does stink.

Tears swelled in my eyes. Strangely enough, the nausea in my tummy let up a bit. The red haze choking my brain eased. I slid down the pillar until I was balancing on my haunches.

Chris came down with me, even though he looked as if he’d rather be anywhere else than here. Even back in our time, being sliced and diced by Jack’s blade.

Urgh! Did I always have to come back to that? And while I was there, how, in the name of all that is Holy, had I attached myself (quite literally by the lips, numerous times) to the one boy in town who had cold-blooded killer stamped in his veins?

“And my parents haven’t even bothered to discuss any of it with me,” I said hoarsely. “I mean, honestly, does my mum really think I’ll simply wake up one day and forget I ever had a father? Which shouldn’t be all that hard, considering I never see him anymore.”

Chris made a sympathetic noise. Actually, it might have been the start of a word, but I was too far gone in my bitter rambling for interruptions.

“Why did they even get married in the first place if they weren’t going to stick to it?” I plunged on. “They’ve made me stick to my piano lessons just because I took it up on a whim a few years ago. Where is the fairness in this world? It’s not as if I took an oath before God to play and play until rigor mortis us doth part.”

I dashed away a tear and took a deep breath. “I wish- I just wish I could do something to make it all go away. I wish I had someone like Drustan to swoop into my life and make the bad things right again.”

“I—um, well, I don’t think he’s into that kind of fixing,” mumbled Chris.

“Trust me, if anything threatened Christian Wood’s perfect world, he’d be there like flash.” I heard the bratty envy in my voice. I didn’t like myself for it, but there it was.