Sherry Ficklin - Extracted

I stare at the box full of rainbow glass. “She always had a soft spot for pretty things, even things other people thought of as trash.”

I got that from her. My need to collect things. My hand goes to my empty pocket involuntarily.

“Here,” Ethan says, putting the box back and pointing across the room. On a pegboard near her bed, a dozen keys hang randomly from hooks.

I sigh. “Can’t make it easy, can she?”

Ethan shakes his head. “Give me a second. She described it to me. A shiny brass key with an oval at the end, with little spirals inside the oval. I think…” He runs his hands over the keys until it closes on one. “Ah. It’s this one.”

I make a face, which is stupid since he can’t see it under the mask. “Are you sure? Maybe we should take them all, just in case?”

“No, it’s this one. I’m sure.”

I eye the rest of the keys. “Look, it’s not that I don’t trust you, but—”

“You don’t trust me,” he finishes.

“Pretty much, yeah.”

He shrugs. “Whatever.”

I pocket the remaining keys. No way am I going to risk another botched mission.

Ethan moves toward the door, only to hold up a hand. There are voices on the other side.

“It’s fine,” I say. “We’ll just rift out from here.”

Then someone—a girl—screams. I rip off the gas mask. Ethan hits the pad beside the door with his fist and rushes into the hall. I’m close behind. My initial fear is that it’s Ember. But it isn’t. It’s a blond-haired girl and she’s running toward us. A massive cyclone has appeared in the middle of the hallway, and it’s moving in our direction. The girl nearly makes it to Ethan’s outstretched hand when she’s lifted off the ground and sucked into the heart of the storm. My feet skid forward. Paintings are being ripped off the walls; vases of flowers are hurtling toward the abyss. We stumble backward just as a flock of ravens flies out and over our heads. A split second later, a shaft of lightning strikes and a lone motorcycle driver in a white rhinestone jumpsuit speeds out, maneuvering between us and down the hallway. I look over at Ethan, who is also struggling to stay on his feet. The things being spit out don’t seem to be affected by the storm, only the things being sucked in. Things like us.

“Take the Contra,” I yell over the sound of the raging storm. He shakes his head.

“I want to grab some Tethers. This way.” He motions for me to follow and we tear off down the hall. He hits another keypad. We step into a large dome room with metal-covered walls. Above us is a row of windows like an observation area. Next to a platform in the middle of the room is a tray full of tech.

“Here, take this,” he says, handing me a contraption that looks like it’s going to eat my arm. I take it with two fingers, hoping it doesn’t. “Tethers. A much easier way to travel.”

Then he moves to the wall and punches a code into the brass keypad. The wall slides up, exposing a cache of the devices. He grabs one, attaches it to his arm, then takes two more, stuffing them under his arm.

He turns to me. “Okay, let’s go.”

Just then a hologram appears on the pad beside us. It’s an image of a man—tall, greasy hair, and a weird mustache. I know right away who he is even though I’ve never seen him before.

“Tesla.” The name hisses like steam through my teeth. The man who stole my family from me, who has been mercilessly hunting down the Hollows for years. The man who started the time war.

“Identify yourselves,” the image demands, making Ethan turn.

“Crap. Go,” he commands, plugging the keys on his Tether.

I shake my head, knowing Ember will kill me if I come back without him. Slipping the Contra in my mouth, I grab him by the arm and we vanish in the time stream. The last thing I see is holographic Tesla, his face contorting with rage as he reaches for us.

EMBER

I don’t throw up this time, which I consider an improvement, though I’m on my knees and too wobbly to stand just now. My belly is on fire and I’m weak and sweaty. It’s not pain, per se, but a relentless ache that makes you pray for the forgiving arms of death. Stein is unaffected, which doesn’t seem fair. She begins to stomp off in the direction of the lab.

“Wait. We can’t just go bursting in there,” I say, grabbing her by the back of her shirt.

She doesn’t shrug me off, but instead offers a hand to help me find my feet. Her tone isn’t angry or challenging, just impatient. “Why not?”

“Because if Tesla knows we’re here, then Tesla will know that we were here. In the future. He’ll know he can catch us here. If we alter the timeline here in any way, Tesla from my time will be able to detect it.”

Stein nods, so I continue.

“The computer that is Tesla can detect the slightest changes in history. It’s part of his elaborate matrix. Our best bet is stealth. We get in and out unseen. We blend in.”

“So what’s our next move?” she asks, not entirely without sarcasm.

“Recon. We’ll go pinch some period clothes and scout the building.”

I point above us where strings are tied between the walls of the alley. Freshly laundered clothes hang from wooden clips.

Stein nods and whips a knife from the cuff of her boot. She slices the string where it’s tied to a pulley and lets the end fall. The clothes slide free and we’re left standing in an alley littered with fallen laundry.

Picking out just a few pieces, we fashion a makeshift bag out of a pillowcase and haul our load out into the street. I’m feeling pretty pleased with myself. My plan is already moving like clockwork. At this rate, we’ll have the Dox by nightfall. We step out into the dim New York morning and I freeze.

We aren’t going to need the clothes after all.

“Um, what year is it supposed to be?” Stein asks, putting her top hat back on.

“It should be 1898,” I answer slowly.

I step forward onto the corner of Broadway and Houston Street, into the very heart of New York City. A large hovering police car zips past, nearly taking me out.

“I think somebody got their wires crossed,” Stein offers smugly.

For a second I think she’s right. Those stupid pills must have dumped us in the wrong place.

The sound of hooves clopping on cobblestone makes us both turn. A large coach pulled by four brown horses trots by. The driver is dressed in leather skins and a cowboy hat. I’m staring after them when Stein elbows me.

She points down the road. Crossing Houston Street is a young woman from what looks like the 1950s, judging by the poodle skirt and saddle shoes, chatting with an older gentleman whose long, button-down coat and top hat put him in the early 1800s.

“What is going on?” I ask.

“I think it’s our fault,” Stein whispers. “It’s the paradox. It’s leaking time.”

She’s right. It’s as if every moment of time that ever happened in this place is overlapping, the stream touching in places it shouldn’t.

“On the upside, at least we don’t have to change clothes,” Stein says with a smile. She tosses the garments back into the alley.

“The plan is still the same. We recon the building, then go after the Dox.”

“Agreed.”

“The building should be just up there a block or so,” I say, gesturing with my hand.

We move out as casually as possible, passing two robotic street sweepers that remind me of metal trash cans with legs, one lost-looking guy in an old sailor’s uniform, and two men having an Old West shootout in the middle of the street. Finally, we stop across the road from the building.

It’s tall, at least five stories, with a single entrance at the front. Parked outside the large arched stairway is a small motorcar. Two men are loading trunks onto the back while another stands guard from the doorway. Even from a distance, I can tell it’s a young Flynn. He pulls a pocket watch from his vest and checks the time, saying something to the men before turning to go inside.