Dissonance (43 page)

“I can do it,” Addie said.

“I can do it faster.”

She looked like she was going to argue, but I closed my eyes and shut out everything except the frequency before me, isolating the bad string and following it back to its source, moving parallel to the wall. I was dimly aware of people fumbling behind me, but I kept pushing until I was through, gasping like I was coming up for air.

And nearly stepped into empty space. The bleachers were pushed in, and I bobbled on the ledge, fighting to keep my balance—only for Addie to knock me into the metal railing as she crossed. I tipped over empty space, my center of gravity too far off to compensate. My arms windmilled, trying to break my fall.

Addie caught my hand and hauled me upright. “Great start.”

“Your timing's good, at least.” I clutched the railing so tightly my knuckles turned white.

An instant later Eliot appeared, and we steadied Simon and Monty as they came through, the five of us balancing on the top row.

Simon shuddered. “Am I ever going to get used to that?”

“Let's hope you don't have to,” Addie said. The pitch clashed with the buzzing of the giant fluorescent lights in their wire cage. I rubbed at my ears, feeling as if something were crawling inside them. On the floor below, the girls' basketball team was practicing, oblivious to all of us.

“We're invisible,” Simon said wonderingly.

“Welcome to my worlds,” I muttered. “Eliot, how long will the Baroque event take?”

He held his phone up to Simon, checking the readings. “Less time than I thought. It's like we're picking up momentum. I'm
guessing three or four minutes, tops. Go ahead and isolate the inverted threads, Addie, but don't tune them till you hear my signal. Be ready to move.”

“As long as there's no pressure,” Addie said. I wondered if she was having second thoughts about helping me. But she simply closed her eyes and reached back into the inversion.

“How does it feel?” asked Eliot after a minute. Addie's face was pale and strained, but there was a hint of triumph at the corner of her mouth.

“I've got the threads. Can I start?”

“Not yet. The Baroque event hasn't progressed enough.”

Monty nudged Simon. “Move closer. It'll speed things up.”

“Get over here,” Addie said, not bothering to sound polite. Simon brushed past me, and I went a little weak-kneed at the sensation, despite the seed of doubt unfurling within me. Something was off.

Simon stretched out a hand, inches above Addie's, and the frequency ratcheted up. Monty and I both winced, clapping our hands over our ears.

“Go,” Eliot said, his voice wavering. “It's moving fast. Ninety seconds, Addie.”

She bit down on her lower lip, brow creasing as her fingers made minute adjustments.

“Sixty seconds,” Eliot warned. Around us, the entire gym started to flicker, the Key World version alternating with this one, creating a strobe effect with the lights. Beads of sweat popped on Addie's forehead.

“Thirty seconds.”

“Almost there . . . ,” Addie breathed. “Got it!”

The room trembled as if the molecules were rearranging themselves. The frequency crescendoed, rippling through us like a sonic boom, and Monty staggered into Simon. An instant later the pitch dropped back to almost normal, and our ears filled with the sounds of basketball practice—squeaking sneakers, basketballs on hardwood, the shouts of the coach. The banner was nowhere in sight, safely locked in the Key World.

“Knew you had it in you, Addie-girl,” Monty said.

“Time to go,” Eliot said. “Even if it's tuned, we don't want Simon boosting an Echo any more than necessary. The longer we stay, the stronger this place gets.”

One by one we edged through the pivot, easier the second time. I clung to Simon's hand, pulling him through. Eliot dropped onto the bleachers, which were fully extended once again.

“We have to do that how many times?” he asked, looking haggard.

“As many as it takes,” I said, hauling him to his feet.

Simon touched my cheek. “Are you sure you can keep this up?”

“No problem,” I said.

•  •  •

An hour and a half later it was clear we had a very big problem indeed. We'd tuned the Baroque events according to our plan, but we'd also run across several inversions, each one bigger than the previous one.

“I don't understand,” I said. We sat on the floor of the
commons, Simon's arm draped around my shoulder. I huddled against him, shaking. “Why isn't it stabilizing?”

“We're losing ground,” Addie said, massaging her temples. “The Baroque events are holding steady, but the inversions are increasing.”

“We've got to get ahead of it,” I said.

“We can't,” Eliot said wearily. He took a bite of his chocolate bar. “The inversions are coming through faster than we tune the Baroque events. Look.”

He tossed me his phone and I scrolled through the map—the inversions showed up as pixilated blurs where there should be steady lights. Another burst of static took out the lower right corner of the screen as I watched. “How do we stop them?” I asked. “What's causing it?”

“I don't know,” he snapped. “I can't think like this, with all these frequencies . . .”

“We need to tell the Consort,” Addie said. “They're going to pick up on it anyway.”

“Not yet,” I pleaded.

“We need to start cleaving,” Eliot said. “It's the only way.”

“Absolutely not,” said Monty, as a high-pitched whine filled the air. The room flickered around us.

“Time to go,” said Simon, hauling me up by the arm. “We can argue when we're clear.”

We ran for the main office, and Monty dropped onto one of the wooden benches. When his breath evened out, he said, “We could cover more ground if we split up.”

“That is a terrible idea,” Eliot said. “In the entire history of movies, there's never been a case where splitting up turned out well.”

“It's a better idea than cleaving,” I said. “This isn't a movie; it's Simon's life. We're running out of time.”

“Del, we need to discuss this,” Addie said. “Review our options.”

“Discuss all you want. In the meantime, I'm going to stop the inversion.” I sprinted back down the hallway.

The noise streaming out of the commons hit me like a tidal wave. It was cycling rapidly, electric-blue carpet and white chairs changing to the familiar beige and maroon.

I plunged into the inversion before Simon or anyone else could stop me.

•  •  •

The dissonance was doubly strong on this side, furniture blurring, ground swaying. The damage was so widespread, I didn't need to find a specific object—I closed my eyes and reached into the air, the frequency abrading my skin. Fighting the instinct to pull away, I dug in, and the fabric of the world peeled back. I began sifting through a million different strings, trying to find the ones out of tune.

The threads were as weightlessly strong as spider silk. Resilient, too. When I pushed, they pushed back, weaving together more densely as the world grew stronger. I imagined Simon on the other side of the pivot, trying to find a way through. He'd be furious when I got home.

If I got home.

Reckless,
I thought, as the signal increased and threw me off-kilter, interrupting my search. That's what they were always saying: Addie and Simon and Eliot, my parents, my teachers, the Consort. My recklessness had brought me this far, but now I needed to be more. I needed to be as good as I'd claimed, and that meant gathering up all my skills and all my wild jaunts through the multiverse to find the one strand that would calm this world down.

I breathed out, pictured Simon, breathed in, and reached through the threads one more time.

And found a piece of silk that twisted and kinked and sang in a key far different from the rest of them.

I grabbed it, traced the damage back to the snarl I'd been hunting, a cluster so large I needed both hands to span it. Bit by bit, I smoothed the strings, rocking them back and forth, coaxing and nudging until they chimed in harmony with the rest of the threads.

Done.

The instant I let go, the frequency roared around me, and I dropped to my knees, fumbling for the tuning fork at my neck. I tapped it once, twice, and followed the signal home.

•  •  •

Four pairs of hands grabbed at me. The room spun like a top winding down. “I did it?”

“Yeah, you did it. And you nearly gave me a heart attack.” Simon gathered me up in his arms. “Are you okay?”

“Never better,” I said, teeth clenched.

Wordlessly Eliot passed me a chocolate bar.

Addie's face was bloodless, save for two splotches of red high on her cheeks. “What were you trying to prove?”

“We can split up, like Monty said. Cover more ground.”

“It's too dangerous. Besides, without Simon, Eliot and I can't trigger Baroque events.”

“We'll still fix double the number of inversions. Hold off the Consort.” I stood, Simon's arm tight around my waist. “Please, Addie. We can't quit yet.”

Monty piped up. “If she's willing to try, I'm willing to keep an eye on her.”

“It's getting late,” said Addie, consulting her watch. “One hour, Del. If we haven't turned this around by then, there's no point in trying more.”

“Got it,” I said, and next to me, Simon and Monty made noises of agreement.

“Good luck,” Addie said, but Eliot scowled at Simon, and then he and Addie took off.

“What next?” Simon asked, looking from me to Monty.

“Next we start looking for another inversion. That way,” I said, and gestured toward the music wing.

Simon took my hand and we started moving, only to realize that Monty wasn't following. He'd sat down on one of the couches in the now-stable commons, face slack and hands trembling.

“Grandpa? Are you sick?”

His eyes were a pale, watery blue. “We're never going to get ahead of the inversions.”

“But you said . . .”

He tugged me down next to him. “Like calls to like. Every Echo he's ever created carries the flaw. They're being drawn here at the same time his flaw is weakening the Key World. It doesn't matter how many we tune, they won't stop coming. They'll only get faster.”

“Then why did you want us to split up?”

“We need to take Simon away. Find another branch. Hide him from the Consort.” His voice dropped. “The minute they realize what he is, they'll kill him.”

“You want me to run?” Simon sounded insulted. “Won't I bring the inversions with me?”

“If we could find a world where we knew he never existed. A major branch, one without an Echo of him in it, would be more resistant to the inversions. It would buy us time.” Monty clutched at my arm. “Time's the only thing we can't choose. It runs like a river no matter how the world branches. But we can slow the damage if we draw him away. Let the Key World restore itself, repair the Echoes.”

It sounded crazy, but I couldn't see another option. We needed time to fix the Key World, time to fix the flaw in Simon's frequency. Time we didn't have here, where reality was degrading.

“I don't know any Echoes where he doesn't exist, Grandpa.” I'd watched Simon for so long, I couldn't even imagine a world without him.

“A place he'd never even been born,” Monty mused. “Your
parents met at the train crash, didn't they? Near the Depot.”

“If the crash never happened . . . ,” Simon said, understanding. He fished in his pocket for his keys. “I'll drive.”

“Best we hurry,” Monty said, struggling to his feet. “The others will notice soon enough.”

I stopped cold. Addie would track us. “Someone has to stay behind and throw them off the trail.”

“Nonsense,” Monty replied. “We should all go. She won't guess where we've gone.”

“If we vanish, she'll turn us over to the Consort. We need you to stay here and talk her down. Stall her.”

“And we'll go back for him later?” Monty frowned. “You know the risk, Del. It's better if we stick together.”

“You said it yourself. There's no time. Please, Grandpa.”

“Do you think you can handle Addie?” Simon asked.

Monty drew himself up, offended. “She's just a girl. I've handled worse.”

“Then let's go,” Simon said.

T
HE DEPOT WAS
busy with the Saturday lunch crowd. Through the window I saw black-clad waitresses toting trays of lattes, oblivious to the disaster bearing down on us.

“Good date,” Simon said.

I smiled despite my nerves. “We'll do it again soon.”

“I'm holding you to that.”

We climbed out of the Jeep. “Is the pivot at the memorial?”

“The Originals' memorial marks where the train hit. The Walkers' is where the engineer chose to maintain his speed instead of slowing down. If he'd applied the brakes a few minutes sooner, there would never have been a crash.”

We circled the building, crossed the grassy median between it and the tracks, and followed them a hundred yards, holding hands. I spotted the small cairn of white pebbles at the same time the pivot tugged at me.

“This is the spot,” I said, nudging a stray pebble with my toe.

“Your memorial is a pile of rocks?”

“It's symbolic. We build it up each time we cross; the vibrations from the train knock it down. Entropy.”

I slid my arms around him, trying to fight off the panic crawling over me. “Ready?”

He nodded, jaw tight, eyes looking past me at a rent in the air he couldn't see and was about to give himself over to.

“You shouldn't get frequency poisoning. You'll be safe.”