Roeland’s little outburst alerted the authorities to his presence at the
quarantine hotel. They ran over right quick to place him in his own
quarantine, which will only partially overlap Leona and Tarboda’s. It isn’t
until late the next night that they’re able to reconnect in the
post-transition lobby. “Mr. Roeland. Do you have time to talk?”
“I do if you have time to tell me what this is.” He pulls his shirt away to
show the timonite stain again.
“We’re not sure how it works, or really why. My husband was infected with
that—that’s not really the right word, he wasn’t infected. It started out as
a rock, and he somehow...absorbed its power. It’s what fueled his ability to
teleport to orbit, and install something I now call a leechcraft on a
preexisting satellite. The leechcraft was designed to scan the entire
surface of the Earth, looking for time travelers. Well, it was only meant to
find a specific person, but we think it found everyone, including you
and...”
“Go on. Including me, and who?”
“And whoever you’re living with on Vulcan Point.”
“I told you, I’m not living with anyone. I’m alone. Your scanner is wrong.
And you’ve still not explained why this thing is on my shoulder.”
“It must have gotten on the scanner, and then got transferred to you during
the scanning process. It was entirely unintentional, but as long as you
don’t step within proximity of my husband, you’ll be fine.”
“What happens if I do get too close to him?”
“It would transport you to another universe. There you would find all sorts
of objects that were randomly dropped there from the multiverse.”
“How do I prevent this from happening accidentally? What if we end up
sitting next to each other in a couple of bathroom stalls without realizing
it?”
“You don’t have to worry about that.”
“Why not?”
“He’s dead.” She doesn’t believe that, but all evidence points to it, and
admitting her true feelings undermines her argument that Roeland is safe, so
she’s not going to mention it.
He nods. He’s old, and has seen death, so likely he no longer feels the need
to pretend to be butthurt over the death of a complete stranger, like most
people do. He’s more honestly indifferent. “So you have one too?
“A timonite stain? I don’t.”
“Why not. Were you not on Earth when it was scanned?”
“No, I was, but...” That’s a good question.
He turtles his head out when she doesn’t finish her sentence.
“You’re right. Why weren’t we also marked? We found eleven errors, but that
number was in addition to the people we already knew about, so we
disregarded them.” That’s a good goddamn question.
“This kind of implies that it actually was intentional,” Roeland points out.
“Who’s the we in this scenario? Who helped you build the thing?”
“No. Ramses would never do something like that.”
“Ramses Abdulrashid? He’s one of us?”
“He’s a time traveler, but he doesn’t have a power or pattern. Or rather, he
does have a pattern now, but he wasn’t born that way. He turned himself into
it. How do you know him?”
“I don’t know him personally, only by reputation. In my timeline, he was a
famous engineer for the Freemarketers in the early 23rd century. Legend has
it, he defied them, and defected to the mainstream. They consider him the
first domino to fall. The movement did not last long after that.”
“That’s a wholly inaccurate story. The truth is he didn’t defect to the
mainstream, he defected to us. How you would have heard about it at all, but
not known that part, is bizarre, especially since a great deal of
Freemarketers were reportedly killed in an interstellar ship cataclysm, but
were rescued by Dardius.”
“Then you and I are from different timelines, because the Ramses Abdulrashid
that I learned about in school went on to become an activist for the
post-scarcity lifestyle, focusing on educating and rehabilitating the most
violent of antiestablishment insurrectionists. He refused most life
extension advancements, considering him unworthy of immortality since he
rejected handouts prior to his epiphany, so he eventually died. I don’t
recall the details of his life; I was born in the 24th.”
“Yeah, that’s definitely different.”
“Is he here? I would not mind meeting him, even if it is an alternate
version.”
Leona is staring into space. “No, he’s lost, I can’t find him.”
“Can’t your satellite scanner do it?”
“He designed the thing. I’m sure he has a way to shield himself from it.”
This piques Roeland’s interest even more than the news about Ramses.
“Really? How would one go about doing that?”
“Are you hoping to keep us from finding the other ping that we’ve detected
on Vulcan Point?” Leona guesses.
“I’m telling you, there is something wrong with it. I live alone. I chose
that spot because it’s beautiful and remote.”
She takes out her handheld device, and shows him the data. “My satellite
scans every ninety minutes. Whoever was there with you during the first pass
is still on the island. See? This is you, this is me, and that is the other
person.”
“I don’t know what to tell ya. If there’s another time traveler in the area,
maybe it’s, like, a rabbit who unwittingly ate some—what did you call
it?—timonite, and ended up there. It’s not a human. I would know. It’s a
very tiny island.”
Leona shakes her head. He is showing all signs of lying, through macro and
microexpressions alike. If she knew him prior to this, she might be able to
give him the benefit of the doubt, but he could be keeping Alyssa prisoner.
She could be trying to get away as they speak. It would be irresponsible of
Leona to just walk away without investigating. If the other error is fine,
she’ll leave without further questions, and try to forget it ever happened,
but until then, she is getting on that damn island. It’s up to her to find
Alyssa. She’s the only one who can. No one else is capable, and no one else
cares. Ramses made that quite clear when he abandoned them. Roeland is
looking at her with puppy dog eyes, so she can’t just keep arguing with him
about it. “Okay, I believe you.”
“Good. Are ya hungry? I found the quarantine food to be no bueno. Perhaps
you and your bodyguard would like to join me for a late night snack. I know
a great place.”
She laughs. “He’s not my bodyguard. If anything, I’m his.”
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