The Time Travel Directorate (8 page)

“Tonight, some wine,” the monk said, motioning for one of the rice gourds located on a high shelf.

Kanon
stifled a giggle before removing the gourd. Pulling it down off the shelf, she spied a flash of fabric. Taking a closer look, she realized it was her gown. Placing the gourd on the floor, she brought the garment to her, studying it like a foreign object.

In a flood of
déjà vu, Kanon realized it was the dress of her dreams—soiled, filled with holes, a sad memory of her time at Versailles. Gripping it anxiously, she felt an object bunched up within the petticoats. Startled, she realized it was her web, still hidden within the folds of fabric. Releasing the web and tapping at the reading pane, Kanon felt a surge of electricity run through her.

Turning towards where the monk sat at
their dinner table, she placed the web down in front of him. He did not respond immediately, arranging the dishes to his satisfaction before looking at the web.

“Soon,” he said,
picking up the wine gourd.

“I can’t go back
,” Kanon supplied, taking a heap of rice. “Not until Chief Smiley programs an endpoint.”

Kanon
gazed at the web, wondering where it would take her. The monk didn’t respond immediately. He took a sip of wine, before pointing to his bald head.

“This is what controls
it,” he responded succinctly. “Your will.”

Kanon
bit off a sarcastic comment, looking for a more secure hiding place for the web. She decided on her cot, tucking it firmly under her mattress. After dinner, she would dispose of the dress in the kitchen midden.

That night she dreamt of Versailles. As she wandered around her boudoir, everything she touched began to disintegrate. Her terror grew as the entire room began to disappear. Panicking, Kanon remembered the web, whipping it out from beneath her petticoats and pushing the button.

Kanon’s
eyes flew open as she jolted upright—fully awake.

The dream felt
more real than any of the others. She listened to the monk’s rhythmic breathing and calmed her own. Slowly, she reached down to feel the web beneath her cot. Thinking of her dream, an unorthodox theory formed in her mind.

Can the
web be used without an endpoint?

Chuckling to herself,
Kanon felt the dream slowly fade away.

“There’s only
one way to find out,” she spoke aloud—half joking to herself.

Before putting the web away
, she stopped.

What if it were true?

Her heart thumping, she looked again at the monk, still dead asleep.

What’s the worst that could happen? She would end up right back where she started—training camp.
They had done it plenty of times as rookie inspectors. So what if she willed herself miles away and never got further than the courtyard? Kanon had nothing to lose.

Standing, she
wrapped the web around her. Tapping the reading pane to life, Kanon hit the red button. Leaning back off the cot, she closed her eyes.

When she opened them
, she was in a dorm room. Her first thought was she traveled back in time to her graduate school days. After surveying her surroundings, Kanon realized this was not the case. It didn’t look like a girls’ dorm. For one, there was a decided lack of any decoration. It looked more like a bachelor pad than anything else. Feeling her fingers tingling, Kanon quickly realized she had overlooked the most important aspect of her new location—there was someone else in the room.

A
man was lying on a bed, snoring slightly. As Kanon inched forward, she realized in dawning horror who it was.

“Holy shit,” she whispered, watching in horror as Vin Damato’s eyes flipped open.

A
s he pulled himself upright in confusion, she leapt onto his wooden bed frame. Whipping the web around her, she eased backwards off the ledge, hitting the button frantically.

Blinking,
Kanon stood on her cot—back in training camp. Sitting down heavily, she sat breathless for a few moments. How is it possible that webs could be controlled without end points? The monk had been right all along—it was all in the mind. Heart thumping with the revelation, Kanon forced her eyes closed—formulating theories of what she discovered.

Vin could swear he was dreaming. He saw Kanon, outfitted in her training outfit, staring over him. In the next instant, she jumped up on the bed post and flew backward, disappearing through time.

He
sat up, now fully awake, disturbed enough to pinch himself. Easing out of bed, he turned on his reading lamp, feeling coolness replace the earlier rush of body heat. Sighing, he realized he could not go back to sleep—he was far too keyed up.

It must be
that damned test stressing him out. How else could he account for that bizarre scene? He wouldn’t be in training much longer. So long as he passed the test, the next day was his last. Fishing for the textbook he placed under his bed, Vin flipped it open.

“It was just a dream
, Vin,” he said to himself, heart still pounding. “Just a dream.”

But he could not shake off the startling image of
Kanon’s untimely appearance, and he was still feeling the effects of his disturbed night when Quill joined him the next morning.

“All that talking about
Kanon Hay got me dreaming of her,” Vin began, watching closely for Quill’s reaction.

“Was it one of those
kinds of dreams?” Quill responded, raising his eyebrows suggestively.

“No, not one of th
ose,” Vin laughed.

“Well
, then don’t tell me,” Quill said. “After this test, you get to go on your next assignment and I get furloughed.”

“I guess you can stay here and hang out
,” Vin offered pathetically, feeling a wave of anxiety about the exam.

If he didn’t pass
, he wasn’t going anywhere. He had to make his inspector chops legit.

“
Let me know if I have this right, Class B felony for inferring a future event into in the past,” Vin asked.

“
Class A Felony.”

“What if you brought back a lighter, is that the same penalty?”
Vin asked nervously.

“I
t wouldn’t work. It’s not a living thing,” Quill responded succinctly.

“Neither are my clothes or my shoes
,” Vin said, thinking again about this explanation as he hastily made some notes.

“It’s different
—objects you wear pick up on your electrical current. Inanimate objects don’t have the same sort of ability. Think about what happens to your clothes when you create static electricity,” Quill responded.

“They stick to you,”
Vin noted. “I wonder how they figured all this out?”

“
If you have to regulate time travel, you may as well know everything about it,” Quill said.

“Point taken,”
Vin responded, shaking his pen to get the ink flowing. “Can you bring someone else then?”

“What do you mean?” Quill asked.

“I mean if living things can be transported, can one web take two people.”

“I don’t think so
,” Quill said. “It is pretty old technology. I doubt it supports more than one person.”

“Didn’t they test that?”
Vin asked.

“With two real people?
God, can you imagine that liability form?”

“So they haven’t
,” Vin concluded.

Quill shrugged,
losing interest in the exchange. Feeling a shift in the conversation, Vin busied himself with studying his notes.

“So the
application of the code can, no wait,” Vin scratched out several sentences, writing in the margins.

“Don’t play
dumb, you’ll pass,” Quill said sharply, taking a sip of his coffee and rolling his eyes.

“You just want me to talk about
Kanon again,” Vin shot back, smiling.

“Um, yes.
It’s the most interesting topic we’ve discussed so far.”

Vin
chuckled, putting his notes away.

“I told you, I was only around her for an hour at most. Brought her to
training camp and then left. And besides,” Vin continued, crossing his arms, “I think it’s high time you told me more about Julius. I need to know everything.”

“You know if the man wasn’t such a sadist, one could admire him. He came from nothing. Revolutionized how to sell private
user data from reading panes—made a fortune. Then he got interested in travel,” Quill said, sounding envious.

“Didn’t he buy a
time travel company to make it easier?” Vin asked.

“Bought the entire
staff, right down to the office plants,” Quill replied.

“Is that how he skips through time so easily?”

“No one knows how he does it,” Quill responded matter-of-factly. “That’s why he’s a risk to the Directorate.”

“Can’t he use
his company’s portals?”

“No, he can’t. Man you
are
new,” Quill responded. “Remember your unique passcode?”

Vin
nodded in recognition.

“Portals
have them as well, unique identifiers for each traveler—think of it like a passport control number. Central Computer tracks each one. If say, you go rouge tomorrow, we would shut down your code, meaning you can’t travel anywhere.”

“So you are stuck, essentially?”

“Remember, the government controls the destination of every traveler, and there are different codes for each person traveling. It should be impossible for someone to jump in and out of time without either of those things.”

“Then how the hell
. . . ”

“Exactly,” Quill fi
nished for him, looking at the crowd of students waiting for the lecture hall to open. “You got anything to eat?” Quill asked, looking bored.

“Here,”
Vin offered, throwing a bag of peanuts at him.

“Perfect,” Quill responded,
opening the bag before taking up their previous conversation.

“No one can figure out how Julius Arnold
travels. In addition, he doesn’t exhibit any signs of PTS.”

“
You must be kidding, surely beheading an inspector is a sign of insanity?” Vin noted.

“When you put it like that,
” Quill admitted.

“I wonder if he found
new technology,” Vin said, searching for another solution than the one that was staring them both in the face.

“I never
did figure that out. I just . . . ” Quill stopped himself.

“
You just what?” Vin asked, looking at him queerly.

“Nothing,” Quill responded
, moving toward the door. “We better head in.”

Vin
followed, with no intention of dropping the conversation.

“Y
ou were about to say something,” he said, moving behind Quill as they made their way into the lecture hall.

“I have no idea why
Chief Smiley didn’t brief you on this,” Quill said. “This need-to-know shit is getting out of hand.”

As they took their seats,
Vin gestured for the peanuts. He had skipped his breakfast due to nerves and was now hungry.

“
Julius Arnold must be getting help from within the Directorate,” Vin said, unnerved with this revelation.

Quill
slowly took his pen out from his bag and tapped it thoughtfully on his desk.

“I had my suspicions
,” he said, staring at the chalkboard as their instructor began writing out instructions for the test. “And I shared it with Chief Smiley and Director Hay—both said it was impossible.”

“Why?”
Vin asked, looking up at what the instructor was writing.

“
Central Computer has his code on lockdown. Let’s say, for the sake of argument, he was still able to use his web. We would be able to see in the Central Computer. And we don’t.”

“I have to ask you something then,” Vin responded quietly.

“
What?” asked Quill, taking a blue book and passing it to the row behind him.

“
If Julius Arnold figured out how to manipulate travel, has anyone else?”

Quill shook his head dismissively.

“He is probably using an untraceable code. There is no way to control your destination without it being programmed in—the technology doesn’t work that way.”

Vin
nodded, turning to the blue exam book. He thought again of Kanon’s appearance in his room last night. He must have been dreaming. Inspector Quill confirmed it. It would make no sense to tell him about the “visitation.” It was just too embarrassing.

The test was straightforward,
and Vin felt confident he passed. He expected for Quill to wait for him, but as Vin exited the classroom he found himself alone. He watched as other inspectors whipped out their webs and departed. Shrugging, he followed suit, using a park bench as a makeshift landing pad.

Opening his eyes,
Vin was pleased to see the once vacant locker room at headquarters was now filled with people. Inspectors were securing their webs in lockers, chatting about—what else—their furlough plans.

Wondering what he should do next,
Vin found his way to Chief Smiley’s office. The door was closed, so he stood to one side, nodding at inspectors as they headed toward the exit.

After a few minutes
, the door opened, with no one but Inspector Quill exiting.

“Hey, there you are
,” Vin replied, shaking his extended hand firmly. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah, just letting him
know I aced it,” Quill responded succinctly, turning to leave without a backward glance.

“Ok
ay, see you around,” Vin replied, slightly annoyed at his abrupt dismissal.

After a cursory knock, Chief Smiley
called out for Vin to enter. Vin cooled his heels for several minutes as Chief Smiley fussed with his reading pane.

Finally
, Chief Smiley broke his silence.

“
You will deploy immediately to capture Julius Arnold,” he said, tapping furiously.

“I’ve been in training without my reading pane, so
I’m a bit behind,” Vin responded, looking around the office for where he might have left it.

Chief Smiley sighed, pulling
Vin’s reading pane from his desk drawer and shoving it across the table.

“Thanks
,” Vin added, a slight edge of sarcasm dripping in. “Where to?”

“
England,” Chief Smiley noted, before continuing. “Another report came in, I have it on good authority Julius has resumed an old identity in the Middle Ages. You won’t like the time period—most people don’t. We consider it a hardship post.”

“Why is that?”

“Crowding, disease, especially in the town centers. What else—a weakly organized central government after the fall of the Roman empire created a culture of every lord, peasant and serf for himself—that sort of thing,” Chief Smiley said quickly, seemingly pleased at how new all the information was to Vin.

Vin
activated his reading pane, skimming Quill’s case files.

“He is posing as a Feudal Lord with aristocratic leanings,” Chief Smiley continued, “Took over a castle, rounded up some knights—what he’s planning is anyone’s guess. The region itself is unstable due to its proximity to France—these are warring years you may recall. Alliances are only as good as the money and personalities fostered behind them, every day there is a change in fortune.”

He
formed his hands into a pyramid.

“T
his chaotic environment is just the sort of thing Julius Arnold adores, the manipulation of money, people and property. We don’t know how long he’s been embedded there, so we are going to place you a few days ahead of the sighting.”

“A few days
? Shouldn’t I build up an alias?”

“
You can take over the one Inspector Quill vacated.”

“
How do we manage that when he can’t travel with me?” Vin asked, his concern growing.

“It’s very straightforward
, Vin—inspectors do it all the time. Just check out Quill’s old disguise in the wardrobe department. The rest is in the case files.”

“
Who reported the sighting?”

“That information is
. . . ”

“Don’t tell me it’s
classified,” Vin snapped, placing his reading pane down. “I’m going in there risking life and limb to find this guy. Who reported the sighting?”

“I told you it’s classified. You think I would ruin an ongoing investigation by revealing that
information to you?” Seeing the unconvinced expression on Vin’s face, Chief Smiley relented a smidge. “We are relying on your efforts, Vin. Don’t worry, you are in good hands.”

Vin
pulled up Quill’s alias on his reading pane.