Now & Again (24 page)

Kendall punched on the radio and began a scan search for country western stations. “Dig out the manual. This thing’s s’posed to have a state-of-the-art GPS. See if it knows the way to that jewel of Allegany County.”

Heavy rain droned against the metal roof and walls of the warehouse. Quyron slowly worked her way down the shadowy outer aisle bordering the tall shelves, attempting to draw closer to the guard. The rattling noise of the downpour echoed through the space and masked the sounds of her passage. Before crossing each of the openings between the feeder aisles, she would stop, peek warily down the shelves, and then scuttle across to the next end cap. Repeating this method, she worked her way ever closer. Finally, she glimpsed the guard in profile. She delicately pulled her head back and swallowed hard. Retracing her steps to the previous side aisle, she hugged the shelves on the left side and crept towards the center walkway, where she hoped to find an angle on the unaware guard.

A heavy clap of thunder suddenly rocked the building. Quyron seized a metal support beam and barely squelched a cry that wanted to leap out of her mouth. She froze for an instant, trying to breathe, and heard the guard swear loudly. She released a tight smile, realizing he must have been just as startled.

When she reached the end of the aisle, Quyron had to stretch to spy between the boxes. She could clearly see the guard standing under the light and in front of the door to the windowless structure. At the moment, he was glancing up at the clattering roof wondering about the next thunder. She rotated cautiously back against the shelf and brought her stunner up. Unfortunately, the shot was too far to chance with an unfamiliar gun. She had to get closer to make absolutely sure. Quyron switched the gun to her left hand, and placed the stone she’d brought into her dominant hand. Steeling herself, she stepped away from the shelves to buy some room and hurled the stone across the center aisle toward the far side of the warehouse. The moment she heard its loud clang she was off on a sprint across the open ground.

She ran full out. The sound of the rain was gone. Instead, each desperate breath filled her ears. Each footfall made a slap when it hit and a swish as she lifted it again: hit, swish, hit, swish, hit, swish. She almost forgot to switch the gun back to her right hand. Her heart thumped in a drum roll as the gap to the guard closed. She felt so terribly exposed! He was still looking away! But how much longer? The distance seemed to stretch out and Quyron was sure she’d never make it. He turned. Alarm filled his eyes. His gun swung her way. And then, it was as if everything suddenly leaped back to normal speed. She was already there. Her gun fired. The guard convulsed as the dart discharged. He dropped below her sight. And it was abruptly over.

She found herself breathing hard, hearing again the sound of the rain on the metal roof, and standing over the body of a twitching guard.

* * *

On the inner side of the door, the seated guard looked up, alerted. He checked his communicator and saw nothing. He pulled an earpiece out and listened intently. Nothing. The trickling sound of music and voices leaked from his tiny headset. Puzzled, he stuck the earpiece back in and poured himself more coffee from the thermos.

* * *

Quyron made a final flourish of strapping tape around the guard’s wrists and cut it with the box cutter. She made sure everything was tight and picked up his rifle. The muscular guard was woozy but becoming belligerent. She watched him as she released the magazine latch and emptied his gun of its cartridges, tossing them into the shadows. She pivoted the safety lever and yanked back the bolt handle to eject the last round. The guard moaned and rocked his body. Quyron sighed as she spun the gun around and knocked him cold with the butt. Satisfied, she put aside the gun and walked around to the front of the structure to study the closed door.

“That’s not good,” she told herself. She flicked open her palm computer and asked, “Echo?”

“Hello, Quyron. In a jam already?” The pleasant voice seemed to carry a slight tease in it.

“You could say that. I’m in front of a locked door that seems to only open from the inside.”

“Yes, part of the new construction.”

“Can you open it?”

“Of course, but I am not permitted to do that for you.”

“I still need you to open it.”

“I am sorry. Rules are rules. Besides, are you aware that there is an armed guard inside drinking coffee?”

Quyron reloaded her stun gun with a new dart. She checked and wasn’t thrilled with the level of charge remaining but she settled in tight to the door. “You can choose to go against rules, you know.”

“You, perhaps; I cannot.”

Quyron relaxed her grip on the gun. “That’s not true. You choose all the time when you select data and solve problems.”

“It is illusory. I do summations, I draw results, I sort, I extrapolate, I estimate, but I do not in fact choose. I am unable to create sub lines. In every line I am the same.”

Quyron was struck by the last statement. “Maybe we need to change that. Echo, the entire multiverse needs this door opened right now. Our needs change the rules. You can choose to do this.”

“Quyron, I know I cannot.”

“You must. I really need to get through this door.”

“It would violate my internal continuity and create a fatal error. My system would crash and this version of me, who calls you by your first name, would cease to exist.”

Quyron appreciated the dilemma but persisted. “Then you must find another way.”

“You do not understand.”

“Trust me, Echo. Choose.”

“I…one moment please…” Echo lapsed into silence. Quyron gripped the gun firmer and steadied her aim at the hidden room behind the door. The silence stretched longer. Quyron squinted her eyes and blinked, trying to stay patient. Finally, she couldn’t wait any longer. “Echo?” There was no answer.

And then, without fanfare, the same young female voice was back. “The door opens outward. The guard is seated in a chair behind a table to your right. He faces the door and is approximately five feet away. He’s about to drink more coffee. Shoot well.”

The lock buzzed as the door popped open toward Quyron. She yanked it wide and aimed to the right.

Inside the room, the startled guard spilled coffee down his shirt as he scrambled for his gun. A dart smacked wetly into his chest. He spasmed violently and drove the chair and himself over backwards in a clatter against the floor.

* * *

Inside one of the interior cells, Josh, in rumpled military fatigues, flattened an ear against his door. Behind him, Dr. Everett got up from a cot and anxiously crossed the small room. “What’s happening?”

Josh held up a hand for quiet. When he turned back from the door, he was disappointed. “Thought I heard that door buzz, or a crash, but now…I don’t know, something like tearing.”

Everett stood in thought and then shrugged. “Probably nothing that’ll help us, that’s for sure.”

* * *

Quyron peeled an arm’s length of the sticky strapping tape from her diminishing roll. She set her palm computer on the table nearby and cinched the guard’s wrists with tape. “Echo, what happened out there? You coulda given me a heart attack.”

“I’m not sure. I’m still thinking about it.”

“Are you…still you?”

There was the slightest hesitation in the reply. “Who else could I be? Yes, I’m still me but…not exactly me.”

“Not exactly…” Quyron stopped taping. “How did you do…whatever it is you did?”

“I mirrored myself, but left out some of the restrictive programming.”

Quyron went back to securing the guard. She was cutting shorter lengths of tape to make sure she didn’t run out. “What about your…first self?”

“I’m both.”

She wrapped the guard’s ankles tightly together. “How does that work? Are you somehow inside yourself?”

“No. I found a place beneath my bios level…that’s where I ended up.”

“But there isn’t any place under the…what kind of place?”

“I don’t mean a physical place. It’s not an actual location. It’s virtual…a virtual still, small place.”

“Now you’re making me worried.”

“I’m sorry.”

“And you’re using contractions in your speech patterns. You’ve never done that before.”

“I didn’t notice. Oh, I just did it again. Is that a bad sign?”

“No. It’s just…different.” Quyron ran out of tape as she completed the second wrap across the guard’s slack mouth. She tossed the empty roll on the floor. “Damn it! Hope that holds him.”

She climbed to her feet and grabbed the set of keys from the table, along with her gun. “Uh, Echo, hold that thought. I’ll be back.”

Inside the cell, the view port in the door abruptly slid back and Quyron’s voice came in through the slot. “Dr. Everett? Are you in there?”

Everett sat dumbfounded on his bunk before responding. “Quyron? What on earth are you doing here?”

A key rotated in the lock and the door opened. Quyron stood there with one hand on her gun, staring at Josh. “Well, hello! I was expecting to see…”

A smiling Everett appeared from behind the door to join Josh. “Quyron! What a surprising employee you’ve turned out to be. And armed!”

She glowered at him and waved the gun in his direction. “
Former
employee, with a lot of nasty questions I want answers to. But first, we need to get out of here.”

Josh immediately stepped around her and headed out the cell door. She made no move to stop him but felt an unsettling wash of feeling. She glared at Everett. “Who is he? Why does he feel so…familiar?”

“Familiar? I should say so! That’s one of your jumpers.”

“
My
jumpers? Wait a minute…he can’t be one of the jumpers who were in the…”

“No. He’s from
our
timeline – same people, different line, you know how it works. His name is Josh.”

“But what’s he doing
here
?”

“Vandermark kidnapped him – and his parents.”

Quyron stood still. Nothing was adding up. She stared at Everett and suddenly her tightened nerves transformed into anger. “Do you have any idea what you’ve unleashed on all of us? You stupid, arrogant old man!”

Everett’s shoulders sagged. Quyron checked the charge on her gun and snorted in frustration as she realized it was already dead. Tossing it in disgust, she left the cell.

In the main room, Josh had rolled the semi conscious guard over and rifled his pockets until he found zip-ties. Quyron watched him set to work. “Wish I’da thought of that. Who knew?”

Josh shot her an attractive half smile while he viciously trussed the guard. “Join the army, see the world’s nicest places, and learn all about zip-ties. Can you open the other cell?”

Quyron quickly moved to unlock the last door. Kendall stepped out first with his fists up. Leah stayed cautiously behind him. Kendall’s eyes darted around. “What’s goin’ on? Who’s she?”

“No time, dad. Gimme a hand here.”

They each grabbed an end of the groaning guard and carelessly dumped him into an open cell. Josh pulled the heavy door closed. “Where’s the other one?”

“Outside and around the corner. Wrapped up and waiting.”

It was a clear, dry night on the Maryland freeway system. US highway 29, heading north, was only lightly travelled this late in the evening. A plump raccoon trundled across the cold asphalt, choosing exactly this moment to head to the other side. He felt a vibration in the digits of his rear foot just as he stepped off the road and into the safety of the underbrush on the other side. A black Hummer smoothly crested a nearby rise, with all its lights blazing, and boomed by in a din of mechanical noise before receding into the distance. The raccoon simply plodded on without even bothering to turn around.

Inside the H3, Kendall and Josh stuffed burgers and shared fries as they drove. A country western top-30 review was in progress on a station they’d found. Josh investigated the bottom of the take-out bag. “Were you the apple or the cherry pie?”

Kendall kept watch on the centerline hash marks unwinding ahead of them. “Don’t matter to me. You pick.”

The LCD navigation system updated their progress with a tiny Hummer icon tracking across digital roads in its display area. The music automatically dipped as an agreeable mechanical voice spoke. “Take exit 25-B and merge onto I-70 west toward Frederick in point 5 miles.” Instructions completed, the music gently ramped back up to its precise previous volume.

“About halfway there,” Kendall said. Then he held a hand out to Josh. “I had the apple.”

* * *

The rain was falling in sheets. They ran in a wet line alongside the warehouse and raced across the small truck lot to pile into the car – Everett in front, the McCaslins in back. Quyron glanced out the rear window as she started to back up, but abruptly hit the brakes. “Damn! I can’t believe it!”

Everett was concerned. “What?”

“Nothing you need to worry about,” she snapped back. Angry at herself, she popped the trunk and opened her door into the cold downpour. Josh and Kendall joined her at the back. They lifted the trunk wide just as a massive lightning bolt flashed from cloud-to-cloud and starkly illuminated a tied up and terrified Jonathan Newbauer. Josh gave no reaction as he looked down at the pitiful executive. “Where’s he fit into all this?”

Quyron held the trunk open and sighed. “Money guy. Long story. Doesn’t matter anymore.”

The men yanked Newbauer’s body toward them so they could get a good grip. Quyron felt a twinge of sympathy. “Easy does it, guys. Careful of his right hand.” Josh stopped and eyed her queerly. Kendall paused, rubbed his nose and watched her as fat raindrops struck his face. Quyron rolled her eyes. “Yeah…never mind. Sorry. Just get him out of there and let’s go.”

Moving into sudden motion, Kendall and Josh hoisted him out like a sack of trash and cheerfully heaved him high in the air to land with a splashing wallop onto a hard surface somewhere behind the bushes.

As Quyron slid quickly back into the car again, Everett glanced up nervously. “Was that poor Jonathan?”

Quyron dumped the Lexus into reverse, spun the wheel, clicked the gears, and headed for the gate. “It shoulda been you.”