“Well,” she said, “talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“Lady,” Xander said, “you don’t know the half of it.”
She held out her hand. “I’m Lizzie.”
Xander shook her hand. “Xander. This is my brother, David.”
She shook David’s hand. “How’d you get here?” she said. “Who brought you?”
“No one,” David said.
“I understand,” she said. “Come, let’s get you off the set.” She began walking toward the cameras. The boys followed. People everywhere scowled at them.
“Great,” Xander said. “I finally get on a movie—a big-budget action set—and everyone hates me.”
“Would you rather we were really in Viet Nam?” David said. “Getting shot at?”
“Maybe.” He tapped David’s arm and pointed at a man with headphones perched on his head and a camera lens hanging from a cord around his neck. He was talking to Arnold Schwarzenegger. “That’s John McTiernan,” Xander said. “Great director. He did
Die Hard
! And
Last Action Hero
! And
The Hunt for Red October
.”
Lizzie smiled at him. “You must be thinking of someone else. John didn’t do any of those.”
“Not yet,” Xander said.
“I haven’t even
heard
of those movies,” she said.
“Not yet.”
They walked past the cameras, to the back of the clearing. Lizzie pointed to two director’s chairs. “David, Xander, why don’t you sit here while we figure out what to do with you?”
David started to sit, then saw the name stenciled on the canvas chair-back. He said, “Uh . . . this is Mr. Schwarzenegger’s.”
Lizzie leaned close and whispered, “Don’t worry. He
never
sits.”
As soon as she left, Xander hopped up. “Let’s go.”
“Where?”
“Anywhere but here. I don’t want people around us, maybe
guarding
us, when the pull starts. You want them to chase us into the portal?”
“But,” David said, looking past his brother at the film crew, the cameras, lights, the actors. “This is your thing. Don’t you want to look around?”
“Like they’ll let me,” Xander said. “They won’t even—“
A hand clamped over his shoulder, and Schwarzenegger stepped up next to him. He was grinning.
“You guys causing trouble, ya?” he said.
David gaped up at him. Phemus was muscular, but this guy was totally
ripped
. It was the difference between a boulder and a granite statue. His arms were bigger than David’s legs, and they seemed to ripple and flex on their own. Black and green camouflage grease was smudged over his cheeks and forehead, and his hair was cropped short, making the top of his head look as square as a castle. David remembered where he was sitting and started to hop off. Schwarzenegger stopped him with a finger to David’s chest—firm as a railroad spike.
“Stay,” Schwarzenegger said. “I insist.” He hitched his head toward the glade. “I guess that was really, really scary.”
“I almost had a heart attack,” David said.
Schwarzenegger laughed. “You should have seen your faces.”
David said, “Sorry about ruining your . . . thing.”
The man leaned a scowling face toward David. “Don’t do it again,” he said and grinned.
“Yes, sir.”
The whole time, Xander had been looking up at Schwarzenegger as though at a shiny new Ferrari. The actor turned a worried eye on him. “You okay, boy?”
Xander nodded. He snapped out of his daze and said, “Great director, Mr. McTiernan.”
Schwarzenegger glanced back at the director. He was showing one of the other actors how to hold the Gatlin gun. Schwarzenegger said, “Want to meet him?”
“Uh . . .” Xander said. “As long as he doesn’t shoot me.”
“He’s a pussycat. Come on.”
Xander looked at David, a questioning look on his face.
“Go on,” David said. He watched
Da Terminator
himself take his brother through the set. They stopped at the cameras, and Schwarzenegger pointed to things while Xander nodded. Xander shook hands with the cast and crew. Schwarzenegger wrapped an arm around Xander’s shoulders like they were old buddies, and David was happy for his brother.
Xander suddenly ducked out from under the massive arm, turned, and fast-walked toward David.
Schwarzenegger called to him: “Is it my deodorant?” The other actors laughed.
“Gotta go,” Xander told David. “The hammer’s pulling. Hard.” He grabbed David’s hand, and together they darted into the forest. “That was so cool,” he said.
With the hammer held out in front of him, his other hand clasped around David’s, Xander led them directly to a portal. It shimmered in front of a fat green-barked tree.
David stopped, pulling Xander’s arm to keep him from going through. “Is it the right one?” he said. “To the antechamber?”
“I’m just following the hammer, Dae. What choice do we have?”
All the places they’ve been, all the places they
could
go flashed through David’s head. He braced himself for whatever they’d find on the other side and said, “Let’s do it.”
S
ATURDAY
, 12:10
P. M
.
Toria stood in front of the portal. She was dressed in a dirty monk’s robe ten sizes too big for her. The sleeves bunched like accordions around her elbows; the heavy canvas material completely covered her legs and feet and pooled against the floor. A necklace of wood beads looped over her neck, and an ornate gold ring adorned her finger.
Standing just behind Toria, Ed clutched the back of her collar and looked through the portal over her head. The image before them was of an ancient town: stone-blocked buildings and streets, people herding donkeys and oxen past vendors selling bread and fish, a group of boys kicking around a ball. The por-tal seemed to be hovering on a raised terrace. A railing crossed in front of them, with the street scene playing out below.
“Always three things?” Toria said.
“Three antechamber items unlocks the portal door,” Ed confirmed.
“Any three?”
“Yes, but you should choose ones you don’t have to hold,” he said. “That’ll keep your hands free to hold onto the door and the wall next to the opening.”
She nodded.
“Where do you think this is?” she said.
“Could be anywhere,” he said. “A long time ago, probably. I don’t see anything modern.”
“Looks like it’s going to rain.” In the distance, beyond the town and flat, brown hills, dark clouds rolled toward them.
A loud bang came at them from behind, through the open hallway door.
“That must be the boys,” Ed said, relieved to hear it. They’d been gone way too long. He pulled her back from the portal. “Shut the door and put the stuff back,” he said.
“Aww,” she whined.
He turned away and darted into the hall. “Toria, please!” He ran to the antechamber that led to Young Jesse’s world.
S
ATURDAY
, 12:11
P. M
.
David tumbled into Xander, catching glimpses of hooks, a bench, Dad standing in the hall doorway: they were home!
Yes!
The portal door slammed. He climbed off Xander and sat on the bench. He leaned his head against the wall and groaned.
Xander crawled up his legs, flipped around, and sat beside him.
“You okay?” Dad said. “What happened?” He checked his watch. “You’ve been gone almost an hour.”
David looked at Xander. “Seemed longer,” he said.
“You can’t stay in each world that long,” Dad said. “Don’t—“ He stopped himself, turned his head, and yelled, “Toria?”
“Yeah?” Her voice seemed far away.
“Did you shut the door?” Dad called. “Like I told you to?”
“Just a sec!”
“Now! Come here where I can see you!” He turned back to the boys. “Don’t tell me you went through the wrong portal again. Did you hit another world?”
David nodded. “We met Arnold Schwarzenegger.”
“On a movie set,” Xander said, with a toothy grin.
“What about Jesse? Did you see him?”
Xander’s smile ran away from his face. He began breathing fast.
David’s eyes watered up. He had been trying to avoid thinking of Jesse’s prediction—or was it Xander’s prediction? That part was confusing. But they had to tell Dad, and that meant bringing it all up.
Dad stepped in, closed the hall door, and leaned against it. “What is it?”
Xander reached into his pocket and pulled out the scrib-bled note. He frowned at it as though it were a disgusting bug, then handed it to Dad.
Dad studied it, checked the backside, and returned to the drawing.
“That’s supposed to be a drawing of David,” Xander said. “Dead.”
Dad shook the paper. “What is this? Who drew it?”
“I did,” Xander said. “We saw Jesse’s dad, and he said I’d just been there an hour earlier. He said it must be that I go over to see them soon in the future, but when I do, I’ll arrive an hour before
this
time.”
Dad nodded. David knew he understood the way the por-tals worked. He said, “And you told them what? That David was dead?”
“I said Taksidian killed him,” Xander said. He was talking quietly, as though David’s death was his fault.
Dad squinted at the paper. He pointed at it. “What’s the heart?”
Xander offered David a weak smile. “I love my brother.” He stood. “Dad, it’s not going to happen. It won’t, I won’t let it.”
Dad looked down at David, whose tears hadn’t spilled out yet; they just sat there on his lids as though waiting for a start-ing gun. He said, “When is this supposed to happen?”
Xander shook his head. “Jesse’s dad said soon, but he didn’t know.”
Dad knelt in front of David. He grabbed David’s thighs, crushing the paper under one palm, and stared sadly into his face.
David blinked, and the tears rolled.
“Do you believe it?” Dad said.
David nodded. “How can it
not
happen?” he said. “Xander went back—or will go back. He has to. Otherwise there wouldn’t be any note, right?”
Dad leaned up and pulled David’s head into his chest. “We’ll change it,” he whispered. “Nothing’s going to happen to you, Dae. I promise.”
David pushed away. “Have you ever changed the future? Have you seen it happen?”
Dad’s silence was worse than anything he could have said. David hung his head and sniffed. He watched tears fall on the bench between his legs.
“That doesn’t mean we
can’t
,” Dad said. “Look at everything that’s already happened that I would have said was impossible. Going back in time in the first place. Your changing history— saving that little girl, who went on to eradicate smallpox, and getting that doctor in the Civil War and ending the war earlier. If we can do that, then we can do this. Right?” He clamped his hands on David’s shoulders and gently shook him. “Right?”
“I guess,” David said.
“That’s right,” Dad said, standing up. He turned toward the door, then to Xander, then David. It was clear to David he was thinking, not sure what to do.
David said, “Dad—?”
Dad held up his hand. “Just a sec.” He turned his back on the boys and ran his fingers through his hair.
The wind, as it always did, rushed into the antechamber. It blew through David and Xander’s hair, fluttered through their clothes. Tiny particles of dirt, some pine needles and leaves came off them and swirled through the room. It snatched the paper out of Dad’s hand. He tried to grab it, but it moved too fast, whipping around like a panicked bird. A pink haze drifted from it, as though it were glowing. The paper, needles, leaves, and dirt vanished in a flash under the door.
David, Xander, and Dad stared at the small pink cloud left behind. A second later, it shrank in on itself and fell to the floor. It splattered—dark red blood.
David’s
blood from the note. It belonged here, in this world. They gaped down at it, and David wondered if Xander and Dad felt as he did: that it was a bad sign. Looking at it, David had the sense that his death had already happened: there was his blood to prove it.
I’m dead
, he thought. I’m not even here.
Just my spirit, watching
it happen all over again
.
He ran a hand over his chest, squeezed his leg. He was real, he was here—for now.
Dad spun, pointing at David. “Go grab some stuff. We’re leaving.”
“But, Dad,” Xander said. “It can’t be that simple. Something’s going to happen. Taksidian will—“
“Taksidian can’t do anything,” Dad said. “Not if he can’t find Dae, not if Dae’s not here. There was blood on this note.” He waved his hand at the portal door. “That means it’s fresh when you go over to Jesse’s world and write it. You’re here, in the house, when it happens—but it’s not going to happen, because David’s not going to be here. Go get your stuff, David! Now!”