Anna Jarzab - Tandem

“Good girl,” the man said in a patronizing tone that made my fingers clench into fists. “Now, why don’t you have a seat?”

“I’ll stand, thanks.” I wasn’t really in a position to be mouthing off, but I couldn’t resist.

“You’ll sit,” the man said coldly, gripping the back of the chair. When I hesitated, he continued, “You’ll sit or I’ll have Agent Mayhew strap you down.”

Reluctantly, I sank into the chair, seeing that it was fruitless to argue. For the first time, I noticed just how cold the room was, like a walk-in refrigerator. Was it always this cold, or was it for my benefit, to shake me up even more than I already was? I was shaken, deeply. My insolence was more a reflex than a show of bravery, and even then I wasn’t sure I had either Thomas or his nameless superior convinced. But it made me feel better, to give him a little lip.

“Who are you?” I demanded.

“My name is unimportant. Around here, they call me the General.”

“Where’s ‘here’?”

“Where to begin?” The General stroked his chin thoughtfully. “Thomas has already apprised you of the fact that you’re no longer in your home universe, I’m assuming.” I shrugged, which he took as confirmation. “In that case, welcome to Aurora. You’re in Columbia City, the capital of the United Commonwealth of Columbia.” My eyes grew wider as I attempted to process the things that he was saying, but he wasn’t giving me any time to wrap my head around them. “This the Citadel, the flagship royal military compound of the city. To be precise, you’re in the Tower, which is my domain. I am the Head of Defense in this country, and you, Miss Lawson, are my prisoner.”

“Your what?” Hearing myself referred to as a prisoner upset me terribly as I realized that, of course, it was the truth. I was entirely at the General’s mercy. Any notion that I’d simply been mistaken for someone else—the person they really wanted—evaporated.

“I don’t understand,” I protested. “Why would you want to kidnap me? I haven’t done anything!”

The General’s eyebrows lifted. “I find it interesting that you believe this may have something to do with what you’ve done, but I assure you that is not the case. In fact it has nothing to do with what you’ve done. It has everything to do with what you are .”

“Don’t you mean who I am?”

He shook his head. “No. I don’t.”

“What am I, then?” I said, in a voice so low it was practically a whisper. I wasn’t anything but a teenage girl! Surely that was obvious .

“Does it strike you as curious that I keep answering your impertinent questions?”

“Not really. If I didn’t think you’d answer them, I wouldn’t ask them.” I risked a glance at Thomas, who was standing near the door, his back straight as a pillar, hands clasped together near the base of his stomach. He stared at them as if they had something fascinating written on them, but I could tell from the tension in his shoulders and the slight incline of his head in my direction that he was paying very close attention to what we were saying. What a coward. He couldn’t even meet my eyes.

“It isn’t because you’re particularly adept at interrogation,” the General continued. “I’m telling you these things because I need you to know them. But the time for questions is over. Now it’s your job to listen.”

I was struck dumb. Growing up with an old-fashioned guy like Granddad had given me a healthy respect for authority, but nobody had ever spoken to me like this before. The General terrified me. My limbs felt loose and heavy, and I could barely lift my head. I hadn’t realized before how much strength I’d drawn from the knowledge that I was not friendless in the world, that I had people who loved me and looked after me. In Aurora, that wasn’t true, and I was starting to see just what a liability it was to be alone.

The General paused. “All right, then, I’ll answer one last question. You asked what you are. You’re an analog, and a valuable one at that.”

“What—?” I began, but he cut me off.

“What’s an analog?” The General leaned forward, as if he was about to tell me a very juicy secret. “Agent Mayhew, what is one of the most fundamental axioms of the multiverse?” He didn’t look at Thomas even as he spoke to him. The General only had eyes for me, it seemed.

“Everything repeats,” Thomas said, a mechanical recitation. He’d been asked this before.

“Exactly. Everything repeats. Over and over, again and again, throughout the multiverse, atoms assemble according to predetermined patterns.” He said this in philosophical way, like he really was contemplating the beauty and grandeur of the cosmos. By the time he said his next words, I had a pretty good idea what he was getting at, and I didn’t like the sound of it at all . “An analog is a double. We all have them; if not in one universe, then in another, and in an infinite number of others besides. And as it happens, you have an analog in this universe who is very, very important. So important, in fact, that I have spent a considerable amount of money and resources to bring you here so that you might replace her.”

“ Replace her? Replace her how? Who is she?”

“Her name is Juliana,” the General told me. “And she’s the princess of this realm.”

I drew in a sharp breath. No, I thought wildly. It can’t be. The girl I’d dreamt of all these years—Juliana, the princess, the girl with my face—she was real . I was here because of her . The dreams, then—were they even dreams at all? Or were they something else altogether? Visions? Omens? Predictions? I didn’t believe in things like that. Raised by a scientist, in a house without religion, I wasn’t a superstitious person. Yet somehow I’d known all along. How could that be?

“Is she … ?” I couldn’t bring myself to finish the question.

“Dead? No, she’s not,” the General said. “Or, rather, we have no evidence to suggest that she is.”

“What happened to her, then?” I didn’t know this girl, this Juliana; she wasn’t me, and I wasn’t her, just as Thomas wasn’t Grant and vice versa. But the thought of her dead was devastating. I became light-headed with something that felt like grief. But how could I grieve for someone I hadn’t even known was real until two seconds ago? How could I grieve for someone I’d never met? It was a relief to hear she wasn’t dead, but that was clearly not the whole story.

“Juliana’s been kidnapped,” the General explained. There was no emotion in his voice, nothing to suggest he cared in the least about Juliana. But Thomas had shifted, almost imperceptibly, at his post, and I saw that he was fidgeting with the ring on his finger, looking truly anxious for the first time since he’d told me who he really was. “A revolutionary group called Libertas that operates within our borders abducted her.”

“Why would they do that?”

“Libertas’s goal is to destabilize the monarchy that has ruled this country for over two hundred years. Removing Juliana from these premises and holding her for ransom is their latest bid to do just that.”

At the mention of Libertas, Thomas looked directly at me for the first time. His eyes widened, and he shook his head. He was telling me not to mention our run-in with Libertas to the General. Clearly he hadn’t told his superiors about what had happened back in the alley. Who was he trying to protect—me, or himself?

“Just pay the ransom, then,” I said. “You don’t need me.”

“Unfortunately, their demands are too high, and anyway, even if we acquiesced, they wouldn’t return her to us. Libertas never plays fair.” The General sat back in his chair. “So you see, I had no choice but to bring you here, so that you can act as princess in her stead while we search for her.”