Paradox (17 page)

Zac caught on; he reached out as if he was
going to tickle her again. She dodged and moved out of the way, then ran for
the door.

“No!” she said playfully. “Stop it!”

“Fine,” Zac said, running after her like
he was going to tickle her again. Emilee let out a squeal and passed through
the doors as they opened for her.

The security guard looked up from the
computer monitors, chuckled, and mumbled something about “lovebirds.”

Once outside, Zac stopped and stared while
Emilee laughed. Her smile was enormous, bigger than he’d ever seen before.

“How… how’d you do that?” he asked.

“What?” she asked, becoming serious
again.
She started walking.

“That little scene back there? I’ve never
seen you act like that.”

Emilee shrugged. “I took drama back in
high school.
Junior year.
By the
way, nice job pretending to be in love with me.”

“Uh, yeah…”

She stopped, staring straight ahead. “Wow…”

Zac stared, too. The city in front of them
was alive with activity. While it was nothing like in the cartoons that took
place in the future, it was still bright and vibrant. It was nothing like the
dark, dystopian futures he had read about in novels at school.

In front of him, he watched as the cars
hovered just slightly off the roads. But the roads weren’t paved; instead, they
were made of a smooth, whitish material that hummed as vehicles passed over it.
The curbs had raised edges with bright orange paint on them, presumably to show
where the road stopped and started.

Zac approached it and tried to step off,
but there was some kind of invisible barrier preventing him from simply walking
onto the street, whatever it was.

The buildings stretched high into the sky,
more massive than any he had seen back in his own time. A huge metropolis
spread before them; it looked pristine and immaculate. Nothing was dirty. It
was as if the sidewalk had never been touched by anything.

Several cars sped by, and Zac marveled at
how similar they were to vehicles in his own time, but they were only slightly
modified on the exterior. He could only guess at what kinds of technology was
on the inside.

Even the sky was a brilliant blue; any
pollution had long since been cleaned up. Maybe that was because these vehicles
didn’t seem to run on gasoline, he reasoned. It had something to do with the
street itself.

“Amazing,” Emilee said.
“Brilliant,
really.”

“What?” Zac asked.

She pointed to the cars. “I think they’re
maglev.
Magnetic levitation.
Back in our time, they
use it for some high-speed trains, but to use it for the road system…” Her
mouth dropped open in awe. “That makes so much sense.”

Zac thought of the hospital bed that
seemed to hover in mid-air. Maybe it, too, used magnetic fields to move. He
took out the Wand and looked at it. The device still only had one light on it
that was lit. “Do you think all this magnetism could be affecting the Wand?” he
asked.

“Maybe,” Emilee shrugged. I don’t know how
strong the magnetic field is here. Their technology here might be adapted to
it, but maybe it’s causing the Wand to malfunction.”

Zac grabbed Emilee’s hand and pressed down
on the top of the Wand. “Nope,” he said.
“Nothing yet.”
He put the Wand back in his pocket. “We should get out of
here,
try to find someplace further away from the city if we can.
At
least someplace where the magnetism isn’t as strong.
We don’t even know
how much power the device has left.”

“But we don’t even know where we are,”
Emilee said.

“I think it’s our own city,” Zac said.
“Just a hundred and fifty years in the future. These streets look familiar,
even with all the huge skyscrapers.”

“I hope you’re right,” Emilee said. “We
need to move fast.”

Zac stared at the wall on the outside of
the hospital, which was now flashing another image. The same picture of Emilee
was projected, but under it, the words had changed. Instead of saying
“Considered Dangerous,” it flashed the words “Unauthorized Exit—Retrieval Units
Tracking
.”

“Retrieval Units?”
Emilee asked. “What could those be?”

Zac stared through the door of the
hospital, watching as the security guard at the desk looked up from his monitor
and pointed at them.

“I think we’re about to find out,” he
said. “Run!”

Zac grabbed Emilee by the hand and took
off down the street, moving as fast as he could. He didn’t want to stop and
look back to see who was following him. It didn’t matter; all he had to do was
get them far enough away so that he could activate the Wand.

He checked its light status; still only
one light. They tried the Wand again, but nothing happened. They had to find a
way to get farther from the road, from these buildings that used a stronger
magnetic field.

Then a thought filled him with dread. He
didn’t even know if there
would
be a place in the future that didn’t
have the same kind of magnetic field.

They kept running, coming upon a small
arch-like structure. People stood on top of it, looking down. “There,” Zac
said, grabbing Emilee by the arm. “I think we can hide under there. It looks
like a bridge or something.”

They ran under it, following the pathway.
The sidewalks were so different that it was hard to get used to walking on
something other than concrete. This was more like a thick plastic, sort of like
Plexiglas. Once under the bridge, he leaned against the wall.

“Let me see your Wand,” he said. Emilee
held it out for him to see. “What happened to it?” he asked. “Did you break it?”

“No; do you think I would be that stupid?”

“No, but I’m just completely confused
about how you got here. Bryce said you two talked last night about what I did,
and then you got to talking about your past, and –”
“Wait,” Emilee interrupted, “what do you know about
my
past?”

Zac froze. He wasn’t supposed to let her
know that he knew. “I just know you had a rough start,” he said. “Bryce told me
that things were pretty bad for you growing up, and that of all people, you’d
be the one who would want to change it.”

She rolled her eyes and paced back and
forth. “I told him that in confidence.” She fumed. “That’s nobody’s business.”

“I won’t tell anyone,” Zac said, almost as
an apology. “I know you don’t want anyone to know.”

“That’s not the point,” Emilee said. “I
don’t really care if you know; you’re not the type of person to take pity on
me. I know my stepfather was a horrible person. I just don’t want people seeing
me
through a different lens.” She stopped. “So that’s why you’ve been
asking me all these questions, haven’t you?”

“I’m sorry?” Zac said.

“You think I used TEMPUS to get rid of my
stepfather, don’t you?” Zac didn’t answer. “I can’t believe you’d think such a
thing about me. I know we’re just starting to get to know each other, but I’d
like to think that you’d give me more credit than
that
.” She sighed. “I
know the rules. I would never try and change anything.”

“Sorry,” Zac said, hanging his head.
“Bryce told me it was bad, so I figured...”

“Oh, it was bad, all right. You have no
idea how many black eyes and bruises I got trying to keep the bastard from
hitting my little brother. I’ve thrown myself in front of his belt more times
than I could count when he came in drunk and looking for a fight. But no matter
what he did to me, no matter how much I had to lie to the teachers at school,
saying that I sprained my hand on something, I never let him win. He never had
the satisfaction of defeating me deep down.”

Zac started to say something, but stopped
himself.

“So, yes, Zac, I was abused. I wish it
didn’t happen, but it did. And I would never go back in time and try to stop it
from happening to me, and you know why?” Zac shook his head. “Because I stood
up to him and never let him win. I kept him from hitting my little brother and
that means
I won
. I was stronger than him; I
am
stronger than
him. It’s what made me who I am today. Now,
no one
will ever be able to
destroy my willpower.”

Zac simply stared at the ground, unsure of
what to say. How could he argue with her? She had endured more than he would
ever want to. Not just physically, but emotionally and psychologically. Yet the
past made her into the person she was today. How would he be different if his
mom hadn’t died? Would he be better?
Worse?

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t realize.”

“Shh!” she said. She held up her hand,
listening. “Do you hear something?”

Zac froze. “Maybe someone’s coming down
the sidewalk.”

She shook her head, concentrating. “It was
more of a metallic sound. Like a scraping, but light.”

Zac shrugged. “I say we keep going. I
think we lost anyone that was following us.”

With a flash of movement, something silver
moved across the ground toward Emilee. Zac couldn’t make out what it was before
it had wrapped around her legs, bringing her to the ground.

It was thin and made of several metal
plates, each one interlocking like scales. The machine resembled a large snake
about six feet long and about two inches in diameter, just slightly thicker
than a jump rope. At its “head” Zac could see a small, blinking green light.

“Get it off me!” Emilee screamed. “What is
this thing?”

Zac could hear voices in the distance
getting closer. “It stopped moving,” the voice said. “I think it’s tracked the
target.”

Emilee tried prying the coils away from
her legs, but each time she moved, it tightened, constricting until she cried
out in pain.

Zac struggled with it, pulling its head
away while trying to find a way to push it to the ground. Whatever this thing
was, it was tough. “Roll over,” he said.

“What?!”

“Roll over so I can move the head next to
the ground. I can try to smash it or something.”

Emilee squirmed as she moved to her side,
the head of the serpent-like object against the ground. Zac raised his foot and
began stomping it, but it was resilient. The voices got closer.

“The boa’s got something,” a voice said.
“It’s not going anywhere.”

“I have an idea,” Zac said. “Give me your
Wand.”

“What?” Emilee said. “It’s broken. The
middle’s crushed.”

“Yeah, that’s what I’m counting on,” he
said. “It’s just crushed; it doesn’t look like
it’s
completely broken open like when the dinosaurs bit into mine. Maybe there’s
still some energy left in it.”

“Just hurry,” Emilee said, clenching her
teeth from the pain.

Zac took the Wand, lifted it high, and
slammed it against the machine, right next to the flashing green light. Nothing
happened.

The end of the snake opened like a mouth,
stiff and rigid, and two sharp daggers protruded like fangs.

Zac shoved the Wand into the opening and
stomped hard onto it, collapsing it. A bright flash filled the air accompanied
by a small
pop
!

The snake-like machine went limp. Emilee
wiggled her legs free and pulled them out from the coils. “Good thinking,” she
said.

“It was worth a try,” he said. “If it
didn’t work, I was out of ideas.” He pulled her to her feet, and she rubbed
them.

“Ow,” she said, rubbing a sore spot on her
right leg.

“What?”

She pulled her pants leg back. There was a
small incision made above her ankle. “That’s strange. It looks like a surgical
cut.” She pushed down on it and looked at it curiously. “There’s something
under my skin,” she said. She met eyes with Zac. “I think they did something to
me.”

They heard a voice. “The boa went off
line. Let’s get down there and check it.”

“They’re right above us,” Zac said. “We’re
going to have to make another run for it. Can you do that?” Emilee nodded.

Zac grabbed the broken Wand, and they
dashed out the other side where the sidewalk exited, looking behind them to see
several shadows descending into the space under the bridge. Zac could see a man
pick up the body of the mechanical snake, holding it limply and dropping it.

Ahead, the space opened up, and there were
fewer buildings. It was a park or something. They rushed to it, and Emilee
called to Zac. “Wait,” she said. “My leg is really starting to kill me now.”
She was hopping on one foot, scratching at the spot she had discovered. She
looked behind her and walked over to a bench, sitting down. “I don’t know what
this is,” she said.

Zac sat down next to her and examined her
ankle. “It’s small,” he said. “I can see it beneath your skin right now.
Sort of a grayish mark.”
He pressed his finger to it, and he
could move it back and forth. “Does that hurt?”

Emilee shook her head. “No.”

Zac glanced around to see if they were
being followed. Something in the distance glinted in the sunlight, somewhere
near the area around the walking bridge they had come from. He took a deep
breath and checked the indicator on the Wand. It had two lights now. His theory
seemed to be correct; something with the maglev streets might be interfering
with it. They had to keep moving.

“What’s that?” Emilee asked. She pointed
to a red, round structure in the middle of the park. It was the size of a
one-story house. They walked toward it. As they approached, they noticed an
engraving toward the center of the object. It was almost like a dome, but had a
more rounded bottom. “There’s writing here,” Emilee said. “It says this
building was erected to display the artifacts of the early twenty-first
century.”

Zac moved in and began reading the ornate
text. “Inside, visitors can view the contents of a time capsule that was
buried, as well as learn more about the early twenty-first century.” He turned
to Emilee.

“Let’s go inside and see,” she replied and
stood next to the building. Two large doors parted and slid into the walls, and
the two of them stepped inside. The structure was one massive room, the round
walls covered with artifacts from Zac and Emilee’s time. No one else was inside
the mini-museum.

Zac smiled as he looked at each item. Some
of them were references to movies and music; some were newspaper clippings that
were displayed and framed. Each object on the brilliant white walls had a small
white space next to it, illuminating a spot on the wall.

Zac touched one, and a video of a person
popped up and began narrating, describing popular movies and showing clips of
them. “These films were produced using archaic techniques,” it said, “and were
made before sensory films became the standard format.”

Emilee moved along the walls, pressing
them and listening to the description of each item as if she had never seen
them before. “It’s funny,” she said. “I never would have thought something like
a cell phone would one day seem like an ancient relic.”

Zac moved to a spot on the wall opposite
her. It was a single white screen surrounded by a black space on the wall. It
stood in total contrast to the rest of the walls. Zac and Emilee stared at it,
and Zac reached out to touch the wall. The video began.

“In the early twenty-second century, an
earthquake caused untold damage to the city, unearthing a forgotten time
capsule right under this very location. The capsule’s marker had been missing,
but the capsule itself contained items from the early twenty-first century.
Each item has been researched and is displayed here. Touch the wall next to an
item to hear more about it.”

Zac continued looking throughout the room.
“For a city demolished by an earthquake, they cleaned it up pretty well.”

Emilee stopped. “Zac, come here. Look at
this. Isn’t this… you?”

Zac hurried over to where Emilee was
standing. Behind a glass panel, mounted on the wall, was the picture he had put
in the time capsule.

“That means… this is right where our old
high school used to be…”

“That’s you, isn’t it?
With
your mom and dad when you were little?”

Zac nodded, a tear filling his eye. He
blinked it away. He didn’t want Emilee to see him so emotional. Time had flown
past, he thought. He was no longer the scraggly-haired kid in the picture, arms
wrapped around his dad’s neck. He was so happy back then. Both of them were.
Zac pressed the illuminated spot on the wall next to the picture to hear what
it said.

“This photograph was included by a student
named Isaac R. It is assumed that this is simply a family picture and nothing
of significance.”

“Nothing of
significance?”
Zac said. “That’s the last picture I have of my mom.”

Emilee put her hand on his shoulder.
“Let’s get going,” she said. “We shouldn’t stay here too long.” She grabbed him
by the elbow and moved him along.

“Wait,” he said, stopping. On the wall was
a piece of writing; the penmanship looked familiar. “I think that’s what my dad
had me put in the time capsule for him.” He approached it with caution, not
sure if he should be reading it. His dad told him it was something for people
in the future who would be ready for what he had to say. But he’d probably
never have this chance again. He had to know what his dad had asked him to put
in the capsule. He stepped forward and began to read out loud.