Prologue (62 page)

“
Rostov
didn’t know who she was,” Ginter said. “And she needed us to work the Accelechron. She didn’t know how to do it and the wormhole was closing. Petrovchenko obviously didn’t trust Natasha, and so
Rhodes
had to follow her. And she couldn’t kill us back here because she needed us as bait to find Natasha.”

“She must have killed that campus police officer who went missing,” Natasha added. She pointed with her toe at the serrated knife lying next to
Rhodes
’ body. “Probably trying to get in to see your little machine and the officer came upon her. The patrol car was found near the lab.”

“What do we do now?” Paul asked. He gestured to the ground. “With the body, I mean.”

Ginter considered.
“The quarry.
It’s deep enough. Weigh the body down with rocks.”

Amanda looked at her watch. “The wormhole, it’s opening now.”

Ginter reached over and picked up Pamela’s shoulder bag. He pried it open, snickered, and reached in. He pulled out the loaded cartridge.

“Why’d she keep it?” Amanda asked.

“In case she needed a quick explosive,” Natasha answered.

“The wormhole will be open for about two hours and thirteen minutes,” Paul said. “Anyone who passed through can pass back. Anyone who didn’t pass through won’t even notice any physical disturbance. Is everyone ready?”

Ginter turned to Natasha. “The police who were here in the park when we arrived,” he asked simply. “You called them?”

The Russian nodded.

“The wormhole departure ratio was 55 to one,” Ginter continued. “If you jumped in even two minutes before we did you would have gotten here almost two hours before us.
Plenty of time to find that store with the pay phone.
But why?”

“To make you think a neo-Soviet might be back here,” Natasha answered.
“To get you thinking about your Ms. Rhodes, just in case.”

“Why not just tell me?” Amanda asked. “I could have warned them.”

“How?”
Natasha demanded. “What could you have told them without letting the cat out of your pocketbook about you and me? No, I had to make them suspicious on their own.”

“And at the hotel?”
Ginter asked. “You sent them again?”

Natasha laughed. “Dr. Hutch told me the story. No, I did not send them again. I do not know why the police were at your hotel but apparently you made a right turn on red, which is not legal in 1963. Like you said, Comrade,” she added with a smirk, “you were never in Intelligence.”

“The wormhole’s open now,
“ Paul
said, rising to his feet.

Ginter stepped back. “You three go. I’m staying.”

Hutch physically reacted. “There’s plenty of
time to, to, take
care of this,” she said pointing at Pamela’s body. “We can all carry it to the quarry. We’ll have to dump in her body, weigh it down. The gun too,” she said pointing at Natasha’s red backpack with the hole in it. “And, and that bullet.”

“No, I mean I’m staying here and not going,” Ginter said.

“What? Lewis, you can’t,” Amanda said vigorously. “We’ve discussed all this. You know too much. It would be too dangerous for history.”

Ginter tilted his head back and chuckled. “Know too much? Know what?” he demanded. “Everything is changed now.”

He pointed to Natasha. “Thanks to our Russian friend here. Or, hopefully will be changed. There’s no history now except what we make and I want to be here to help make it. If she didn’t change it in
Dallas
, maybe I can still do something here.”

DeVere and Hutch looked unconvinced.

“Look,” Lewis Ginter said slowly. “There’s nothing back there for me. What use is a former Special Ops guy who was injured in a war that now might never get fought?”

He looked at Hutch directly. “I’ve been here three months. I’ve seen prejudice. You think there is racism in 2026? Try segregation.
America
’s going to change. In eleven years Martin Luther King will give his ‘Freedom Reigns’ speech. Everything will be different now. I want to be here. This is my new battleground.”

It was Natasha who broke the silence. “I’m staying too.”

“There is no other wormhole for the two of you. And you’ll never build another Accelechron with the technology that exists today,” deVere said quietly.

“I never got to know my parents,” Natasha said. “And I have no country. At least, I hope that I won’t have the Soviet one,” she added, smiling at Amanda.

“Who knows,” she smirked at deVere. “Perhaps Lewis and I will revisit your Harrison Salisbury at the Times and tell him all about it. He may not have believed you two, but maybe, just maybe”-she looked at Ginter-“he will believe us and another tragedy can be averted.”

Ginter shrugged. “I can always use another sniper.”

“Not with this rifle, though,” Natasha said. “Dr. Hutch is right. It’s going in the quarry with that,” she said, pointing at Pamela’s body.

“It’s safe to go back,” Ginter said. “Assuming that our Russian friend here is right and Igor will be out cold for over an hour you should have plenty of time to revive and get rid of his body. That’s if he is even there, in your new future.”

“And,” Natasha added with a smile, “the bullets in his gun are all blanks anyhow. I made sure of that.”

“It’s time,” Hutch said, glancing up from her watch and standing up.

Amanda and Paul stared at the innocuous pile of leaves in the middle of the clearing that now stood within the open circle of time.

“Heck, it worked one way,” deVere said. He forced a smile. “Don’t bet too much on those ‘69 Mets of yours. People will get suspicious.”

“I just want tickets to Super Bowl III.”

Natasha moved to Dr. Hutch and the two women embraced tightly. Paul deVere shifted uncomfortably.

“I hope things work out back there,” Natasha said when they separated.
“For all of us.”

Amanda nodded wordlessly.

Natasha moved over to Paul. “I always tried to get you to call me Natasha.”

Paul smiled.
“Of course, Miss Nikitin.
Perhaps I should have.”

She laughed and stood back from him, but held his eyes. “Godspeed,” she said softly.

Paul swallowed and nodded awkwardly. “My grandfather knew there was a God,” he said.

DeVere broke his gaze away from his intern’s and turned to Lewis. He considered extending his hand to his friend but decided that doing so would be maudlin. Instead, he extended his hand to the side and without a word Amanda took it. They looked at each other and together walked across the clearing and out onto the pile of soggy leaves.

Chapter 30

Amanda Hutch sat up first. As the cobwebs began to clear from her brain she raised her head off the floor and looked around. Paul deVere lay next to her. She thought she hadn’t lost consciousness. But as with their departure three months earlier, travel through the onrushing wormhole had left her exhausted and weak and she found herself unable to move.

DeVere opened his eyes and rolled onto his side before sitting up. He rubbed his temples and pulled at his shirt.

“We have to deal with Igor,” he said groggily.

“What?” Amanda was still foggy.

“Igor should still be lying where Pamela dropped him. If we’ve done it right it should be
August 8, 2026
, just a few minutes after we left. We didn’t have time to tie him up, remember?”

Amanda stood and stumbled around the counter to where they had left a bloodied Igor. The tile floor gleamed in all directions. It was, in fact, shinier and cleaner than she remembered it.

“Where is he?” deVere asked, standing behind her now. “Don’t tell me we screwed up and came back on another day.”

Amanda turned toward the back of the lab.

“Ah shit,” she said.

“You find him?” deVere asked from the sink area.

“Where the hell is the Accelechron?” Amanda asked.

DeVere spun around. Together they stared at the back of the lab. The far wall was bare except for a poster commemorating the tall ships visit in the summer of ‘25. Filing cabinets stood against the walls. The back wall was intact, and the room was deeper than when they had left. There was no walled off area.

“Where the hell is the Accelechron?” deVere demanded.

“This is different,” Hutch stammered. “I’ve got to . . . got to go to my office. Get on the computer. Maybe get a newspaper.”

Hutch took a step toward the door but reached out with her hand and grabbed the counter.

“Easy does it,” deVere said. “Remember how we were in the park. It will take time.”

“The fire alarm,” she said, cocking her head to the side. “It’s not ringing.”

Paul hesitated. She was right, the building was silent.

“Someone must have turned it off,” he said.

Amanda stumbled back to the counter and slumped on a stool opposite Paul. She reached for the computer mouse in front of her and started when she touched it.

“It’s already on,” she said.

“What is?”

“The computer,” she answered. “I have to get on the Gor....whoops! Here it is.” She squinted at the screen that faced away from Paul and moved her right hand quickly back and forth.

“According to the Icon it’s called the...the Internet.”

Paul turned back to the front of the lab and studied the walls. They were painted white as before but to him the tint seemed brighter and, as with the floor, shinier.