The Eighth Guardian (23 page)

I nod my head even though I don’t understand a word she’s saying. “Of course.” Dammit. I’m blowing this.
Keep it simple.
“What did you say your name was?”

“I didn’t.” The girl stops and holds out her hand. “I’m Mona. Mona Hirsch. I’m Dr. Stender’s research assistant.” She reaches into her purse, pulls out a pack of cigarettes, sticks one in her mouth, and lights it. “This way.”

I can’t walk. My feet won’t move. Because she’s Mona.
The
Mona. Ariel’s future wife. Abe’s future grandmother. And she’s going to be a karate sensei someday.

Without thinking, I leap over to Mona and tear the cigarette from her lips. I throw it to the ground and stomp on it.

Mona looks at me with horrified eyes. “What’d you do that for?”

How am I supposed to answer her? I can’t very well tell Mona that she’s going to die of lung cancer in a few decades, caused solely by her pack-a-day habit. And I certainly can’t tell her that the love of her life, who I guess is currently her professor, is going to be completely heartbroken over her death.

“Cigarettes cause cancer,” I mutter.

Mona shrugs. “I’m nineteen. I don’t need to worry about that.”

“Yes, you do.” I’ve never met this woman, but I know the void her death will cause many years from now. “Besides, I don’t think Dr. Stender likes girls who smoke.” This part is true at least. Ariel used to rage whenever someone would light up in front of him. I don’t know whether he’s always been that way, but it’s worth a shot.

“He doesn’t?” Mona asks, and I hear it in her voice. She already has a thing for Ariel. I knew the two of them had met at MIT, but the way I’d always heard it, Mona was a grad student, not a nineteen-year-old undergrad. Maybe that’s why I’d never heard about it. Or maybe they don’t get together for another few years. “How do you know that?”

“It came up in conversation,” I say.

Mona raises an eyebrow at me, just enough for me to wish I hadn’t opened my big mouth, but then she points to a huge, ugly building that stretches forever. It’s white concrete with plain, square windows. “There’s Building Twenty.”

We enter a dingy, dark corridor, and Mona leads me to the B wing. The floors creak, and most of the windows have mold growing in the corners. I rub my hands over my arms. This place is creepy.

We stay on the ground floor and head down another dirty corridor until we’re at the last door. Mona holds it open, and as she does, a short, thin man looks up from behind a very odd-looking machine. Ariel. I stop in my tracks. It’s like looking at a slightly older version of my boyfriend.

“Dr. Stender,” Mona calls over the whir of a machine, “this is Miss Hart. She’s here from the Kershul Group.”

“Is she now?” Ariel switches off the machine he’s working on. It’s small, with two discs on either side connected by a thin copper wire. There’s a thin silver switch on the base of the machine. “I was expecting Jack Briggs from Kershul. He’s who I’ve been communicating with. But he’s not due to arrive until next week.”

Ariel is young.
So young.
I’m used to the man with silver hair and age spots dotting his hands, not this trim, fit, slightly older version of Abe that stands before me. My heart is hammering away inside my chest. I miss Abe. I’ve been trying my best to leave him behind and go about my business, but now he’s standing here before me and I want to run to him and throw myself into his arms.

It’s not Abe,
I tell myself. Not Abe. Ariel. And I have to focus.

“He couldn’t make it. I came in his place. From San Francisco.” My voice is wavering.

“Hart, you said?” Ariel’s voice is skeptical. I’m being naive if I thought such a weak, poorly thought-out cover story was going to fly. “Ah yes, we’ve spoken before, have we not?”

I choke back my shock. What’s Ariel playing at? Either there really is a Miss Hart he’s actually spoken to somewhere at the Kershul Group—whatever that is—or he knows something’s up. It has to be the latter. After all, how many teenage representatives are hired by huge funding groups? I’m dead in the water.

“We have.” I extend my hand. “But I’m short on time today. Can you show me what you’re working on?”

“Oh, did Jack not give you the designs I sent?” Ariel starts rifling through a stack of papers on a nearby table.

“No,” I say.

“Where did I put those?” Ariel wonders out loud. Mona comes to his side and helps him look, then pulls out a plain brown expansion folder.

“Is this it?” she asks in a tone that says she already knows it is.

Ariel takes it from her. “Thank you, Mona,” he says without looking at her. Her face falls just the slightest bit, and I know they’re not a couple yet. He barely even sees her. “You can leave us.” Her expression goes still.

Ariel’s already flipping through the papers in the file as Mona walks out. He doesn’t say good-bye or even turn to watch her go. I hurt for her. I feel like I’m being shunned by Abe. And I know I’m not supposed to interfere with the past or alter things, especially for my own personal gain, but what does it matter? If I fail, no one is ever going to see me again.

“She’s very pretty,” I tell Ariel.

“Huh?” Ariel grabs several pieces of paper and pulls them out of the folder, then looks at the door. “Who, Mona? Yes, I suppose. Here”—he shoves the papers at me—“these are the final designs for this beauty.” He taps the machine he was tinkering with when I first got here, the machine with the two discs and the copper wiring.

I look down at the designs. There’s a picture of the machine, then arrows labeling all the parts on the first page. I flip to the second page and am hit with page after page of complicated mathematical calculations. I have no idea what any of it means, and I don’t see anything that talks about a genetic link. Does this machine even have anything to do with the Annum watches? I glance at the clock on the wall. An hour has passed since I arrived in 1962. That means almost three hours have elapsed in the present. This is not good.

I flip the papers closed. “Walk me through it.”

Ariel nods and heads over to the machine. He spins the discs on either side of it. “This is just the prototype, of course. The actual device is larger.
Much
larger.” He chuckles like he just made a joke, and I give a weak smile. “When it’s turned on, these discs start spinning faster than the speed of light.” He points to the copper wire in between the discs. “And this tunnels exotic matter, which creates a wormhole between the two points. I’ve figured out a way to load the wormhole into a small, everyday object that would allow time travel.”

Ariel switches off the machine and turns to me.

“We’re limiting it,” he tells me. “We’re loading the genetic makeup of seven men, hand-picked because of their strength, acumen, physical prowess, and intellectual capacity. The time travel devices will only work for those seven men.”

“Why?” I ask.

“This is an experiment. The fewer people who can travel through time, the better.” He drops his voice. “It’s never a good thing to go messing with time unnecessarily. Time is a powerful and dangerous tool.”

A chill races up my back.

“I have folks at the Department of Defense interested in this project,” Ariel continues. “They’re the ones who’ve asked us to limit it.”

“Have they given you money?”

“No,” Ariel says. “Not yet. They promise they will if the prototype is to their liking, but until that day, I need the help of the Kershul Group.”

Yeah, Kershul Group, whatever. “And what if someday you want to expand it past those seven individuals? How do you do that?”

“Well, their children would be able to time travel, obviously—”

“I’m talking broader than that,” I interrupt.

Ariel takes the papers from me and flips open to the fifth page. He points to a calculation. “That’s this. A later addition to the machine down the line. It’s only in the design phase. The machine was specifically designed to reflect only the genetic makeup of the chosen seven. Adding another person would require complicated and
expensive
changes to the design. We’re not there yet. We don’t have the funding.”

I ignore the push about funding because, oh my God, this is my solution. I don’t have to ask Ariel to scrap the genetic thing and let anyone time travel. I just have to make sure he doesn’t ever change the machine to add other travelers. This is even better. This way I’ll never be recruited into Annum Guard in the first place. I’ll leave 1962 and go back to Peel. Go back to Abe.

Or will I be stuck in 1962 forever? If I’m suddenly incapable of projecting, how am I going to get back?

I look at Ariel. I know this man. I love this man. He doesn’t know me yet, but he’s going to come to love me just like a granddaughter. Maybe I should trust him with my secret. Tell him that I’ve come from the future and beg him to help me.

Or do I trust Alpha? He says he really wants to help me, and part of me wants to believe him. Ariel or Alpha? Ariel or Alpha? Who’s to say I can really trust this Ariel from the past? I don’t know him. People change so much over the years. Maybe young Ariel is greedy and ambitious and out to prove his name no matter what. That’s so different from the generous, caring, genuine Ariel I know; but it’s definitely possible.

I don’t want to spend the rest of my life locked in an eight-by-ten cell with a small, slatted window. Or maybe no window at all.

I decide to trust Alpha. To complete the mission he gave me.

“I’ll give you the funding on one condition,” I say.

Ariel’s eyebrows pop up. “What’s that?”

“Change the design. Get rid of the genetic link. Make it so that anyone with one of your watches can time travel.”

Ariel blinks. Then he scowls. “I never said anything about a watch.”

My heart skips a beat. “I—uh—” I flip through the papers Ariel gave me while my heart beats wildly. “Um—” I flip past a page of calculations, another page of calculations. Oh, please please please let there be a visual in here somewhere. “I mean—” And then I gasp. “Here!”

I shove the page in Ariel’s face. It’s a drawing of the machine, and in the bottom left corner there’s a rendering of a watch. I’m not religious, but thank-you to anyone or anything that might be looking out for me right now.

“Ah,” Ariel says. “Of course. You’ve seen this before.” But there’s something funny in his tone. I’m blowing this big-time.

“So you’ll get rid of the genetic link then?”

“What?” Ariel shakes his head. “No.”

I blow out a breath from my lips. “No?”

“No,” he repeats. “The DOD wants the genetic limitations. It’s always been my intention to partner with them on this, to let them use the power of Chronometric Augmentation—that’s what I’ve been calling it—to improve our lives. I’m unwilling to risk this machine falling into the wrong hands.”

“Then I’m not funding you.” My voice cracks and wavers. I can’t lose it. Although, what’s the point? The real Kershul Group representative is going to show up next week and probably provide the funding anyway.

Ariel sticks out his hand. “Sorry to hear it. It would have been a good fit for your interests. I’ll start looking elsewhere.”

I hesitate before taking Ariel’s hand in my own. My heart puddles onto the floor. Is this the last time I’m going to have physical contact with another human being? I blink back tears. I have to get out of here. I have to go
now
.

I turn on my heel and race toward the door, then down the stairs and onto campus, and I don’t stop until I’ve reached Massachusetts Avenue. I drop onto a bench. This can’t be happening. I can’t believe this is happening. I’ve failed.

Good-bye, Abe. I hope you know how much I love you. Be happy. Good-bye, Mom. I’m so sorry your life turned out the way it did and that I wasn’t there for you. I hope you find the help you need someday. I’m never going to see either of you again. I’m done.

Except that I’m not. The thought flies into my brain and yanks my breath away.

Ariel hasn’t finished the prototype. The machine doesn’t have the genetic link yet. And I have a gun strapped to my ankle. I could take care of this now and go back a free woman.

But I can’t do that. I
won’t
do that.

Or will I?

I don’t leave the bench. An hour ticks by, which means I’ve lost three more hours in the present. Maybe I’ll just stay here forever. Except that they’ll track me. They’ll win.

My watch clicks to noon, and campus bustles with lunchtime activity. Students and professors dart this way and that, but I see Ariel straight ahead. He waits for traffic to die down, then jogs across Mass Ave.

I spring up off the bench and follow him. His house is only a few blocks from campus. I know it well. I hang back half a block and follow him to the wooden-shingled Cape-style home stuck plumb in the middle of the block. There’s a long, flat, baby-blue Chrysler out front; but apart from that, the house looks exactly the same. Same white eyelet curtains in the windows. Same wrought iron bench on the stoop. I can’t see that well from where I am, but I bet you anything there’s a twisted metal
S
nailed above the doorbell and a mezuzah on the frame. I stop walking and watch Ariel enter the house.

The gun on my ankle feels so heavy.

I park myself on the stoop across the street and sit, staring at the house. The light in the living room is off. I wonder if Ariel is in the kitchen, which is next to the living room. Maybe he’s pulling leftovers out of the fridge and sitting at the kitchen table eating his lunch. The house doesn’t have a formal dining room, just a little space right off the kitchen. It’s tiny, but somehow we always managed to squeeze eight or even ten people around the table at holidays. I was there a couple months ago when Abe invited me to celebrate Rosh Hashanah with his family.

Ariel wanders into the living room and opens the window. I don’t try to duck, don’t try to hide. My hand travels down to my ankle, and I unhook the gun from its holster. I raise it, just to see if he’s in my line of fire. He is.

I wonder if past-Ariel knows how lucky he’s about to become. He’s going to get married and have a son, then his son is going to get married and have a boy of his own, a boy who’s going to have his grandfather’s physics genius and his father’s athleticism. I wonder if past-Ariel has any idea he’s going to fall in love with his research assistant and marry her. I wonder if past-Ariel can possibly know the pain and sadness her death is going to cause him. I wonder if he’ll know that his grandson’s girlfriend will stare longingly at the picture of Mona hanging at the top of the stairs and hope and pray that her boyfriend loves her even a tenth as much as Ariel loved Mona.