Allergic To Time (26 page)

Before I could ponder that thought any longer, a mobile phone on John Raymond’s desk starting to ring. It played what was seemingly a standard tone, but he glanced over it in surprise, and then threw a knowing look at Naomi before answering it.

He simply said, “Hello”, and then listened to the person on the other end in silence for several minutes. Naomi seemed to be holding her breath for the entire length of the phone call, as she sat teetering on the edge of the man in black’s desk. For a split second I wondered about the turn of events that had even led to John Raymond taking over Martin’s desk. After all, this very desk had belonged to Martin for more than six years...

He ended the phone call with a very abrupt, “I understand” and pressed a button to hang it up. He placed it down carefully on the desk and turned to Naomi, with a smile as large as any I had seen him give so far. There was a gleam of excitement in his eye, which Naomi’s eyes began to echo. She almost did a giddy little clap and jumped up off the desk. She ran for the door and fetched her coat. The man in black stood straight up and went after her. He turned back for a brief and still moment to ask if I was coming with them.

“Well where are you going?” I asked.

He smiled. “RPA Hospital.”

***

The three of us travelled to RPA in the man in black’s Rolls Royce, Naomi in the front, and me in the back. It was only a five minute drive, but the tension in my stomach made it feel like a lifetime.
 

I assumed that asking them for any details would be in vain, but I tried anyway. Just as we were pulling into the hospital car park, I leant over to Naomi and whispered “Can you at least give me a clue as to what to expect?”

She smiled slightly, looking nervous. “Just wait. We don’t know any details for sure.”

I sat back and sighed. “Fine.” I un-did my seat belt and climbed out, dutifully following the other two as they made a beeline for the entry, and then took the two secret flights of stairs down into the dungeon ward.

The sight of the blue glowing lights made my stomach turn. Sweat prickled at my neck and my palms were suddenly clammy. I really worried I might be sick and I looked around for a bucket or a bathroom as we hurried down the long corridor. The lighting and the stale air, along with my memories of the place made me feel sea sick.

Naomi was positively skipping along. “Baby’s first time travel mystery,” I thought to myself, watching her youthful enthusiasm, remembering how I had acted exactly the same way only weeks before. I had skipped down that same corridor, hot on the heels of Martin, confident that I knew better than anyone what was going on in that bed. Should I hurry to catch up to Naomi, warn her? I sighed: what would be the use?

We finally reached the end of the corridor, the very same room that Robert had been kept in all those weeks — or months — earlier. All of a sudden, I had a thought, and I turned to John Raymond with my eyes wide open. “Is Robert in there?” I asked hopefully. I wasn’t sure what I was hoping for, exactly. I guess some part of me was hoping that he had been picked up the day before and been sent through time, so that even if he had been lying to me along, this would finally make an honest man out of him, or something. I still didn’t want to believe that he had lied to me. I really wanted to open the door and find him lying there...

But the man in black shook his head. He glanced at Naomi, who nodded, and then put his hand on the door and pushed it open.

Just like before, my eyes had trouble adjusting to the dim blue light, and I had to take several steps while blinking and squinting before I could make out the body lying in the far left corner, hooked up to an oxygen machine.

I gasped, half in shock, half in joy, and my hands shot up to cover my mouth so that I didn’t yell out loud.

Naomi turned around to grin at me. I could have hugged her.

Lying in the bed was Connie Hung.

Chapter Thirty-Two.

“Oh my god, Connie!” I screamed out, running over towards the bed. As I got closer to her I saw how bruised and unwell she looked. Her eyes were shut tight, and she was hooked up to an oxygen machine.
 

I spun around to face the other two. “Is she going to be alright?”

The man in black edged closer to the bed, and looked down at the unconscious Connie. “Well we can’t know for certain...”

I backed away from the bed, away from John Raymond. My heart was beating faster. “That’s why you’re here. My god.” I shifted my glance from him to Naomi and back again. “You’re here to make sure she doesn’t wake up!” My voice rose to a yell. “Well, I am not going to let that happen! You’re not going to kill Connie, not after she has survived this!”

“Shh!” Naomi hissed, looking around to make sure no one was coming into the room to see what the racket was. “We are not here to kill here.”

“Oh yeah? Then what are you here for?”

“We SENT her here, duh,” Naomi said, looking at me incredulously. She walked over the hospital bed and looked down at Connie. “And she made it!”
 

“I don’t understand...” I began, but stopped at the sound of the door opening behind me. I was expecting it to be evil Nurse Bianca and her machine gun, or some other insane member of the medial staff, but standing in the door way were Martin and a terrified looking Fanny.

“What the hell are you doing here?” I asked.

“Anna? What the hell are do you doing here?” Martin raced into the room, almost tripping over his own feet as his eyes adjusted to the light. When he reached the bed he exclaimed out loud in almost the exact same tone I had used. “Connie!” He looked like he wanted to hug her. She would have loved that, I briefly thought.

I turned to John Raymond. “What is Martin doing here?” I hissed.
 

“We always call him in when this happens,” he replied, like it was a matter of fact, and I had asked a really stupid question.

“Even though he is planning on killing you?” I mouthed to him behind Martin’s back. Martin swung his head around and I composed myself and acted innocent.

He moved away from the hospital bed and toward me. “Anna,” he began quietly. “I saw the contents of the bag on my floor when we got home. I know that you found it...”

I backed away from him. “I seriously do not want to hear anything you have to say.”

“I can explain.”

I let out a laugh of disbelief. “Explain how you knew all along that Robert was lying, that...”

He glared at me before his eyes widened, signally for me to shut up. He nodded his head slightly in the direction of John Raymond. Well, I didn’t know which side to take anymore. I sighed and shut up anyway. Martin turned back towards the bed and Fanny walked gingerly over to me, and touched my arm slightly.

“That’s your friend?” she asked, nodding at the bed.

“Yeah, we thought she was dead.” As I said it, a few tear drops sprung to my eyes. Despite everything that was going on, I had to at least stop for a moment and be thankful that Connie Hung was not dead after all. It was basically a freaking miracle. Then I glanced at Naomi and John Raymond huddled over her bed, their eyes gleeful like they had just won the lotto. What the hell did those two think they were doing, playing with people’s lives like that? Maybe Connie hadn’t died, but she very well could have. They knew the risk! And yet they still did it anyway.

I looked away to find Martin staring at me. “Anna...” he began again, but I looked away from him, back towards the scene at the hospital bed. He walked over to me and grabbed my arm gently.
 

“No,” I said, shaking him off.
 

“Please, come outside. I have to talk to you.”

I sighed. “Fine.” I followed him out into the hallway, which now seemed inhumanly bright compared to the inside of the room, but which was still dimly lit by any normal standards.
 

“Do you think Connie will be okay?” I asked him, thinking he might know better than I did. After all, he had more experience in the matter.
 

“She’s in the hospital, that’s the main thing, I suppose,” he replied, shrugging. “People usually die at the scene, when they first arrive through time, when they struggle to get a breath in. If someone finds them and they make it this far, then they’re usually alright.”

“Unless these guys show up to kill them!” I reminded him, pointing back into the room.
 

“They only show up when it’s one of their experiments gone wrong. Or gone right, rather.” But he did turn to face towards the room for a second, his face concerned.
 

“This
is
one of their experiments gone right!” I exclaimed. “Don’t you know that?” For a second I was pleased, giddy with the information that maybe I knew something more about time travel than Martin Anderson did, for once.
 

He turned back to me and shook his head slowly. “No... What do you mean, one of
their
experiments?”

“Naomi and Raymond. They’ve built a time machine or something. They’ve gone rouge, broken away from my father, I think.” I realised as I said it that I didn’t really know what was going on for certain, but that was my best working theory right then.
 

“Martin,” I added, firmly. “I don’t think you can send him through time tomorrow, like you had planned. It’s not right.”

He turned around to look at me in shock. “Who’s side are you on now?”

I looked up at him defiantly. “No-one’s. Not yours, I can tell you that much.”

“Anna. What?” He looked seriously distraught. “Is this about the bag you found?”

“Of course it is about the bloody bag. Why do you even have that?”

He sighed in frustration and ran his hands through his hair. “Look, I can explain, but you are not going to like it.”

I scoffed. “Of course I am not going to like it. But if you don’t tell me, then I am going to...” I trailed off, unable to think of a suitable threat. “Well, I will never talk to you again.”

He looked at me, sad. “Well, I wouldn’t want that.” But he still didn’t speak, didn’t start explaining anything.
 

“Well?” I demanded. “If you even care about me in the slightest, you better start telling me the truth, right now.”

“Fine,” he said, resigned. “But not here.”

Chapter Thirty-Three.
 

We took a seat down opposite each other in the cafeteria.

Martin reached into his pocket and pulled out Robert Smith’s drivers licence ID, the same one I had discovered only hours earlier. He flung it on the table, and it skidded towards me, landing right under my nose. “I guess you saw this then,” he stated plainly.
 

I could still hardly bear to look at him. I glanced away and shook my head bitterly. “Congratulations,” I muttered. “You were right all along. Robert was lying.” I stopped for a second, staring at a row of vending machines on the right side of the room, before pulling my gaze back to Martin. “But then again, you knew all along, so it’s hardly a victory. Well, it is a victory for you — in lying. You are really amazing at that at least.”

He didn’t say anything.
 

Him not responding to me made me even angrier “What was the point in keeping this from me?” I spat out, leaning forward. “All along you wanted to convince me that Robert was lying, and you had the proof the entire time!” I gestured angrily towards the driver’s licence on the table. “Why didn’t you just show me this?”

He stared down at the driver’s licence for a long time. “It’s not real,” he said at last.
 

“What?” His answer had caught me off guard. I absent-mindedly picked up the ID in my hands, fingering it lightly. What did he mean it wasn’t real? It looked pretty real. I glanced down at it to make sure, turning it over. I looked back up at Martin for an explanation.
 

“It’s not like a time traveller can just use their original ID,” he started to explain. “They can’t just explain what has happened
 
to the wider population. Not everyone is as understanding as we are.”

I scoffed.

“Anyway,” he continued. “Time travellers are like...refugees I suppose. They have to be set up with new lives, new identities. Robert needed one with a more believable birth date, so I had one made up for him.”

“Hang on,” I said, shaking my head. “What?” I tried to understand what he was saying. “So, let me get this straight — now you
do
believe Robert is a time traveller?” I threw my hands up. “Because I am really not following this anymore.”

Martin pursed his lips. He seemed like he was about to continue on, when I thought of something else and interrupted him.

“And when did you make this ID for him anyway? When did you even get a chance to? While I was stuck in hospital in Newcastle?”

“This is the part you’re not going to like.” Martin looked down at the table, unable to meet my eye.
 

“I don’t like
any
of this,” I shot back. “So just tell me.”

He nodded, and sighed, and began. “I made it for him about...three years ago.”

“WHAT?”

I sat up straight in my chair, pushing it back from the table slightly. The metal legs screeched against the hard tiles on the floor.
 

Martin had leant forward and was now cradling his head in his hands. “I’m really sorry Anna...” he began.

“Sorry for what, exactly?” I asked, fighting the urge to just storm out of there and never speak to him again. “Because I still do not understand. Did Robert travel through time or not?”

I stared straight at Martin, demanding an honest, real answer for once. But he was staring over my shoulder. “What are you looking at?” I spun around to see what had gotten a hold of his attention.
 

There he was: purple sequinned jumpsuit, black shaggy Joan-Jett hair, black massacred eyes. My 70s man. “Rob!” I shouted, reflexively, jumping up to greet him. I almost forgot the conversation we were having as I was temporarily taken over with joy and relief that he was okay. Without thinking I walked over to him and hugged him.