“A few weeks ago. My secretary walked into my office five minutes before she actually walked into my office.”
“Okay, well, maybe we can go in real quick, just so you can see the body…”
“I don’t think so.”
“Why not?”
He sighs, rubs his face with his hands. “I’m close to retirement. I can’t risk this getting any worse.”
I want to call him a coward. Tell him that the Allyn I knew would say, damn the consequences and let’s get the job done. But I also see the example I have set. How I’ve made this look. And how it can’t be pleasant to know what’s down the road.
And in that I understand. Why he pushed me so hard, why he wanted me out of here. Why he wanted me safe. My anger dissipates a little. No matter how many times he said it, I didn’t want to believe it, but he was trying to protect me.
“Where did you learn German?” I ask.
He shrugs, exhausted. “I just liked the language. There was an app for it.”
“Simple as that?”
“Simple as that.”
“I’m sorry for what a complete pain in the ass I’ve been,” I tell him.
He smiles. “You think a simple apology is just going to wipe all that away, you got another thing coming. I’m going to need dinner and a round of drinks. At least.”
“Deal,” I tell him. “After we get out of this. I know Popa said the radiation is leaking into the hotel, and presumably it’s from the gateway. We know Davis is the guy. Drucker is working with him. We have to figure out who else is compromised. Because someone staged an attack on Davis to throw suspicion off him, so clearly he’s not working alone.”
“We need to solve this soon. Popa just let me know, the time distortions are starting to ripple out…”
“The Battle of Brooklyn,” I say.
“There was just a woolly mammoth in Ohio. Killed three people before it disappeared. This is not good. And we have no idea how to stop it.”
“Well let’s make sure no one is standing in our way first. Who else is compromised? I mean, for a hot second I was worried about you. Who else is there?”
Timing. Think of the timing. Think about who’s been close to this.
And who doesn’t seem to be around when the fan gets struck by a handful of shit.
The lightbulb in my head blinks on.
“Where did Nik come from?” I ask. “Are you really grooming him?”
Allyn frowns. “I wouldn’t call it that. It was more, I guess he knows people because Drucker’s office put in a good word for him, and then this assignment came up, and I pulled his file…”
He stops. We don’t even have to say it. We look at each other and we know.
Then Allyn’s body goes rigid and he cries out.
Nik is standing on the other side of the room with a stunner in his hand, pumping volts into Allyn’s back. He’s got a second one, and he’s bringing it up to point at me, so I grab a mug off the desk and wing it at his face. He ducks and it misses, but it gives me time to cross the room before he fires, and I get my foot into his midsection. He goes sprawling, letting his finger off the trigger, and Allyn falls into a heap.
I pull the barbs out of Allyn’s skin and check his pulse. He’ll be okay. I turn my attention back to Nik but instead of him I see a desk chair swinging toward my head. I manage to get my arms up and twist a little into the blow so it doesn’t land too hard. But it still hurts.
Nik tries to get around me but I kick his legs out and he launches facefirst into the door, and as I’m getting to my feet I find the chair he discarded, which I pick up and throw at him, just to slow him down. It misses and he makes it out of the room. I follow him into a lobby that no longer resembles the lobby I know. It’s decrepit now. The blue carpet is faded and ripped and in desperate need of cleaning. The astronomical clock in the center of the room isn’t working, and seems covered in a layer of dust. So do the desks, which are now chipped and dinged. The place smells moldy.
I chase Nik into the hallway of Atwood, where he’s headed for the elevators, and by the time we reach them, everything is back to normal. He passes them and heads for the staircase, and I know exactly where he’s headed, so I follow along, a few landings below, until I hear him curse loudly, and then a door bangs.
At the next level I find a handful of people maneuvering their luggage down the stairs, and there’s no easy way around them, so Nik must have opted for the third-floor hallway, which he’ll take to the far end, and the other stairwell, doubling back around to the supply closet.
As I push into the third floor I catch the slightest glimpse of him disappearing around the curve of the hallway, so I pour it on a little, trying to catch up.
And then the hotel is gone.
I’m in freefall. Tumbling through the air. Nik is too, about a hundred yards ahead of me. We’re in the middle of a field, the land virgin and untouched, and my stomach lurches as the grassy ground rushes up.
But then it’s back.
I land hard on the second-floor hallway, my face full of carpet. I roll over and catch my breath, the wind knocked out of me.
The actual building is slipping in time now. Great.
I get back to my feet just as Nik is making it to the stairwell, and I get to the fifth floor without any further disruptions. As we’re headed to the gateway I reach in my pocket for the Retronim and find it’s gone. Must have dropped it. Hopefully the last dose is enough to keep me straight in there.
Just as I’m getting to the closet, Nik disappears inside. The door slams shut and I get to it, punch in the code, and step through.
And as soon as I step inside I feel a searing pain behind my eyes.
I stumble out of the storage closet and the hallway is clear. Who knows how long he’s been in here? He disappeared from my view seconds ago and he could have been wandering around in here for hours.
I head for the lobby but my knees buckle. I take a deep breath, try to center myself, but crumple into a heap.
Droplets of blood pat the blue carpet, turning from red to black as they soak into the fibers. The drops come slow at first, before turning to a trickle as the bones of my skull squeeze like a hand around my brain. My body yearns to release the tension in my shoulders, to let the pressure off my knees, to lay down and go to sleep.
Except it won’t be sleep.
It won’t really be death either. Something more in-between.
A permanent vacancy.
This moment has been chasing me for years. The third stage, when the strands of my perception unravel and my ability to grasp the concept of linear time is lost.
More pats on the carpet. But the blood from my nose has stopped flowing.
Heavier, from the other end of the hallway, getting closer.
Footsteps.
Maybe I can fight this. A handful of Retronim. A cherry lollipop. What if I scream? I open my mouth but no sound comes out. Just more blood.