John Gone (23 page)

Amandine leaned down and kissed him again,
this time harder than before. Their lips remained pressed as a
cloud drifted between their bodies and the moon, shrouding both of
them in darkness. That night in the vineyard, John experienced one
more first, and from that point forward never thought about Molly
again.

Ronika tackled John off the toilet the moment
he reappeared in the America Offline bathroom at 3:14 A.M.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” she cried from the
top of him.

John tried to speak, but his body was still
in recovery from the jump.

“I was so worried,” she said. “I tried to
stay optimistic, of course, but it was almost impossible knowing
that those men are out there. John?”

John moaned and fluttered open his eyes.
“Huh?”

“Look, John!” Ronika said, picking up Mouse
from the ground beside them. “It’s fixed! Everything is working!
The parts came in like thirty minutes after you left. I was so
angry; I missed going with you by less than an hour! Thank goodness
you’re okay!”

She leaned her head down and tickled his nose
with her fox ears. He sneezed. She laughed and dismounted him.

John slowly sat up and looked around the
small room.

“So, what happened?” Ronika asked excitedly.
“Did they show up? How did you get away? Where were you? A concert?
A spaceship? That would be so cool.”

“France,” John replied. “At a family
reunion.”

“
Bor-ing
,” Ronika said. “Too bad I
wasn’t there. I speak French.”

“I know,” he said, slowly standing back onto
his feet. He crossed his arms, placing his hands inside of his
armpits for warmth.

“Oh, I almost forgot. Look what I brought,”
she said. Ronika held out her couch’s blanket to John.

“You’re a life saver,” he said. She
smiled.

“So, did the men come?” she asked, quieting.
“The Advocates?”

“Yes.”

Ronika’s eyes widened as her mouth puckered
into a frown. “What happened?”

“They killed most everyone there,” he
explained. “I was able to escape with someone from the party. We
hid in a field somewhere. The Advocates never showed up. I guess
it’s harder to track someone through the grass. I don’t know.”

“So, pretty boring, then? Minus the reunion
holocaust, I mean. How was ... ” She nodded toward the watch.

“The watch?” John asked, still slightly dazed
from his reentry.

“No,” Ronika said coyly. “I mean ... ” She
did a silent, spirited impression of a tall man lecturing. John
laughed.

“Oh, fine,” John answered. “Right, Doc? We
came to somewhat of an understanding, I think.” There was no
response.

“How was France, Kala? Bet you don’t even
speak French,” Ronika jeered smugly. Still, he said nothing.

“Kala?” John asked. Ronika leaned in and
examined the watch. She noticed the depressed knob.

“Crud,” she said. “I think you turned him
off. When did that happen?”

“I don’t know,” John said. “We can turn him
off?”

“Certainly makes sense,” she answered.
“Pulling the knob out made him appear, so it’s definitely possible
that doing the opposite would turn him off again.”

“I’m going to turn him back on,” John
said.

“Why?” Ronika asked. “Just leave it.”

“He can help us more than he can hurt us,” he
said. Ronika raised an eyebrow.

John carefully pulled the knob out one click.
The doctor’s hologram appeared immediately.

“What in the hell do you think you’re doing?”
it yelled. “I’ve been stuck down here for over thirty years and
you’re just going to turn me off, just like that? You can’t do that
to people. I’m in the dark down here!”

“I thought you said you had florescent
bulbs,” John said.

“I meant figuratively, smartass! How was I to
know if you were coming back?” Kala yelled. “How can I monitor
what’s going on if you just arbitrarily turn me off?”

“Wait a second,” John protested. “I didn’t
mean to turn you off.”

“You didn’t turn me off at all; it was the
girl. I saw her hand go over my lens and then,
wham
,
nothing!” he said. “How did she know about the knob? She’s working
with the Advocates!”

“What girl?” Ronika asked.

“Amandine,” Kala said.

“Who’s Amandine?” she asked.

“She’s the one I told you about, the person I
hid with.”

“Seems like you two were about to do a little
more than hide,” Kala said angrily.

“What?” Ronika said.

John pushed the knob back into the watch
quickly, vanquishing Kala’s hologram instantly.

“John, what happened out there?” Ronika
asked.

As John began to answer, a sudden wave of
fatigue overcame him. His eyes closed, and he slowly crumbled to
the floor asleep. Ronika leaned down over him and shook his body.
He didn’t wake.

Forty-five minutes later John opened his eyes
to the sight of Ronika sitting against the wall of the bathroom,
knees pointed upward to support her resting head. She was sleeping.
John tried to piece together what had just happened.

Unable to reach an answer, he crawled across
the floor and tugged on her pajama pant leg.

“Hey,” he said lightly.

Ronika slowly opened her eyes and lifted her
head.

“You’re awake,” she said.

“Did we pass out?” he asked. “I’m not sure
what just happened.”

She yawned. “You passed out. I couldn’t wake
you up, but you were breathing, so I figured you were alright. I
just meant to sit down for a moment, but I must have dozed off. You
were really tired, huh? I thought you were faking or something at
first, but you really wouldn’t wake up.”

“Yeah,” John said, sitting up from the
ground. “I don’t know. Did you turn Kala back on?”

“No,” Ronika said bluntly.

“I’m going to turn him back on now, okay?” he
said. “I feel bad. Like he loves to remind us, the guy’s had no
human contact in over thirty years. I don’t want to leave him in
the dark.”

Ronika nodded in agreement, but the
disapproving scowl hadn’t left her face. John pulled the knob out
from the watch’s side. Kala appeared in a seated position.

“I’m sorry I got heated,” the doctor said
immediately. “Obviously, when the girl turned me off, it was an
accident.”

“It was,” John said.

“It was
not
an accident, however, when
you did so again, almost an hour ago,” Kala said calmly.

“True,” John replied, “but I only meant to
for a moment. I actually, well, seem to have fallen asleep, or
passed out, or something. I don’t know what happened.”

Kala nodded grimly. “Yes, it’s the same thing
that happened at Molly’s,” he said.

“I was just tired.”

“Yes, but you have less control over that
than you think.”

“What are you talking about, Claw?” Ronika
asked.

“It’s ‘Ka-La’, thank you,” he said. “Now, Mr.
Popielarski, think about your body like a rechargeable battery. You
have a portable phone, yes?”

“Not with me,” John answered.

“Right, but you understand the way its
battery works, I imagine,” he replied. “When you first got that
phone, I’m sure its life was long and impressive. Those are the
numbers they probably used in the advertisements. But manufacturers
aren’t exactly forthcoming about what happens to a battery after
even the first time you recharge it. Slowly, over time, its maximum
life will get shorter and shorter until the time eventually comes
that it doesn’t work at all. It’s that same process that’s
happening to you now. I can remotely adjust the power the watch
pulls while in standby, but doing that won’t affect how much energy
the watch uses during quantum events.”

“I need to ... wait, what?” John asked.

“The farther you jump, the more of your
body’s energy it uses,” Kala explained. “And to keep you ticking,
your body has to recuperate that energy quickly. Like the phone,
however, the more times you do that, the worse your ‘battery’
becomes. That’s why you’re passing out. When you’re low on energy
you can sleep and recharge, or you can ignore it and you’ll pass
out. The number of jumps you’ve been experiencing recently is
difficult on that process, and it will only get worse.”

“What can I do about it?” John asked.

“I would answer ‘come to my lab and let me
take it off to save your life,’ but you don’t want to hear that,
right?” Kala said.

John stood silent.

“It’s also how you die, by the way,” he
added.

“What do you mean?” John asked quietly.

“You drain, like you just did. But when it
happens that time, you won’t be asleep. Your body will just be
lifeless, so taxed that regeneration will be impossible for at
least an hour. Within that hour, everything in your body shuts
down. Your brain goes first, then the other organs. I suppose the
good news is that it will feel like going to sleep. Much like what
you felt about an hour ago, I’d imagine. Yes, much like that.”

The grim nature of Kala’s explanation hung in
the air for a few moments before someone decided to speak
again.

“I, of course, don’t want you to die, Mr.
Popielarski,” Kala said.

“I know.”

Ronika put her arm around John and walked
with him out of the warehouse toward the scooter parked in the lot.
John stopped before mounting it and looked above him. The sky
outside was black and lightless. Thin clouds blanketed the stars
and moon, obscuring any light they’d hoped to produce.

The sun will be out in about an hour
,
John thought.
That will be nice
. He didn’t know why the
thought passed through his mind.

“Don’t be upset,” Ronika said to him. “He’s
just trying to push your buttons.”

“I can hear you,” Kala noted.

“I’m not upset,” John said. “We knew that
anyway. Maybe not the specifics, but we knew. We’re getting closer,
you know.”

“Closer?” Ronika asked.

“To whatever comes from all this.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” she said. She
wrapped both of her arms around one of his and hugged it tightly.
“What really happened out there?” she asked. “Who’s Amandine?”

“Just a girl,” John said. “In a way, she made
me feel better about certain things. Her whole family died in front
of her, and she seemed completely okay afterward. At first I
thought it was weird--well, I still think it’s weird--but at the
same time, it made me realize that no matter how many awful things
come from all this, life will keep moving. Just as stupid and as
funny as it ever did.”

Ronika released his arm and turned from him,
taking a few steps away. “I’m sorry I didn’t make Mouse strong
enough to stay together. If I’d done a better job, I would have
been there with you.”

John brought his eyes from the stars to
Ronika, whose head was turned away from him and angled at the
pavement.

“So, hey,” John said, touching her shoulder.
“Do you remember how I told you I want to spend more time with the
people I care about?”

“Yes,” she said quietly.

“I still need to do that. I have to go see my
mom,” he said.

“I understand,” Ronika replied.

“But,” John said, “I was wondering if you’d
maybe come with me.”

“Are you sure?” she asked, turning to face
him.

“Yeah,” John said. “I am.”

Ronika beamed. “Well, of course, then, yes.
Okay. Let’s go. Right?” She smiled her head-cocked smile and took
the keys from her pocket to offer John.

“You should drive from now on,” he said, “I
don’t want to risk falling asleep at the wheel.”

“Good point.”

Ronika lifted a leg over the scooter’s seat
and leaned her slender body forward as John mounted the vehicle
behind her. He put his arms around her torso and leaned his head
against her back between her shoulders.

“Still tired?” she asked.

“I’m alright,” John answered.

Ronika placed her left hand on John’s arm
across her belly. With her other hand she put the small key into
the ignition and started the scooter. Her touch reminded him of
Amandine’s, and he thought back to their night in the vineyard.

“Do you know what
terroir
is?” John
asked.

“No idea,” Ronika answered, removing her hand
from his arm to place it on the handle of the scooter.

They drove down the road and arrived at
John’s mother’s short blue house just six minutes later. Her car
was parked in the driveway. Ronika slowed and stopped the scooter
next to the sedan. She and John dismounted and walked to the front
door.

John tried the handle, but found it locked.
He didn’t know if this was normal or not; he’d never tried entering
his own house at this hour. He tried the doorbell next.

“She’s going to freak,” John said.

“Probably,” Ronika replied.

“I’m inclined to agree,” Kala added.

“She’s not going to answer,” John said only a
moment later.

There was a back-to-back marathon of Starship
Love Affair playing, and though it was her favorite show on
television, its frequent plot twists and intrigues could do little
to excite John’s mother. Even while watching her characters fall in
love or murder each other, she was stuck in delirium, caught within
that limbo between dreams and reality. She hadn’t slept more than a
few short hours since last she’d heard from her son, and the
caffeinated tea she brewed hourly was becoming less effective with
each cup.

A doorbell rang. She examined the set of the
spaceship on her television.
There are no doorbells in
space
, she thought. The doorbell rang again. The second noise
forced her slightly more awake. She sat up and swiveled her legs in
front of her.
Oh, that must be my door
, she concluded.
It’s probably the police again. Maybe they re-opened the
case.