Twin Speex: Time Traitors Book II (30 page)

Their journey onto the labyrinth rooftops of New York City had begun inauspiciously. There was a delay of several days before Ettie was able to even make contact with the man Odell insisted she seek out. After finally receiving his communiqué, a map detailing their path across the rooftops was further delayed by tactical re-routing through several rebel and criminal networks before finally appearing on her palmavox. With it had arrived instructions on how to navigate the different checkpoints and rival gangs that ruled the rooftops.

Community was too gentle and cohesive a word for the society that had sprung up far above the city streets. Initially the refuge of thieves and outlaws, it soon became home to political dissidents and society outcasts of all stripes. There was enmity and suspicion among the different groups and an anarchic environment prevailed. Anyone venturing through their domain without leave might find themselves held for ransom or worse, thrown from the ledges onto the streets below.

It never failed that some spoiled and drunken offspring of the nobility succumbed to a dare from his friends to infiltrate the rooftops. Whether he would escape with his life or be found splattered on the concrete below seemed an outcome determined entirely by chance. Each death was succeeded by calls to wipe out the vipers’ nest, demanding police patrols and military action. But they were rarely heeded. Most people remembered all too well the one attack on the rooftops nearly twenty-five years earlier that had diminished their numbers by very few at the cost of destroying vast swathes of the New York City skyline. It seemed that attacking your own infrastructure was a bad idea, particularly since those who inhabited it could use it to their advantage.

So most of respectable society chose to ignore the rooftops, and the wealthy paid an exorbitant price to protect their persons and property. They never explored the possibility of opening political discourse to dissenting opinions or of any democratization that might entice the denizens of the rooftops to reengage with lawful society.

Some of this went through Charlie’s mind as he stood beside Ettie and looked down from the ledge-side “office” of an individual by the name of Hound Dog. Obviously an alias, the man nonetheless had a rather hang-dog expression with large droopy eyes and a prominent nose.

The ledge was really a platform between two closely situated buildings. It lay barely six feet below the eves of the overlapping roofs. Charlie stooped slightly to stand beneath it. Hound Dog had stretched a large piece of canvass over the top, creating a space that was only a little sheltered from the wind.

There was some electrical rigging that tapped into uncomfortably exposed wires where Hound Dog had plugged in a small space heater. He sat behind an old metal library desk, and a hurricane lamp burned dimly as he squinted at the screen of Ettie’s palmavox.

“Dust and coal fire, I can’t see a damn thing!” he exclaimed in that laconic manner often attributed to cowboys. He pulled out a drawer and dug around in it, retrieving a pair of wire-rimmed reading glasses. He adjusted them on his face before turning his attention back to the palmavox.

“It looks legit, but the professor’s not really one for company. You’ll have to wait here while I check.”

He stood up and had to stoop nearly double being startlingly tall and extremely thin. Two long strides brought him to the brick wall behind the tarp where he climbed up a steel ladder attached to the wall and was gone.

“Wait here?” Charlie grumbled irritably as a strong gust of wind buffeted the canvass shelter. “What do we have to wait for? You have the pass right there on the palmavox.”

Ettie looked at him sympathetically. Her nerves were also ragged and raw. The journey over the rooftops had taken longer and was more perilous than she had imagined. Unlike Charlie, she had always been aware of her fear of heights. She was strong and flexible and knew that the physical exertion was well within her capabilities, but the knowledge of great height ate away at the edge of her consciousness and robbed her of balance. She had spent the last two hours not only physically challenged but focused mentally on the task of ignoring the danger.

The figures lurking in the shadows and skulking just outside her peripheral vision didn’t help matters. Masked guards at each checkpoint just served to reinforce the sinister and unknown nature of the territory they were traversing. Hound Dog’s was the first face she and Charlie had seen since embarking.

Hundreds of feet in the air on top of some of the city’s tallest buildings, perhaps now they felt secure enough to reveal themselves. Ettie knew though that their security was really never the issue. She was well aware that neither she nor Charlie would leave the rooftops alive unless they were deemed either useful or harmless. Since harmless was likely out of the question, she had better find a way to make them useful.

Hound Dog descended back down the ladder and stopped just under the canvass to pull a handkerchief from his pocket and blow his nose. “Wind howls like the devil up here,” he said, and then gestured to them to follow.

Ettie and Charlie exchanged a quick look and followed Hound Dog toward the ladder, but instead of leading them up it, he veered off to the side into a very narrow passage that they had not noticed.

“Why aren’t we going up the ladder?” Ettie asked.

The passageway was barely wide enough for them to walk without turning sideways, and Hound Dog was unable to make any gestures with his hands. He shrugged his shoulders instead and said, “Just some misdirection. We have our little procedures here, always on the lookout for spies and such.”

“Are you referring to us?” Ettie questioned incredulously. “Because there is no way anyone could have followed our trail without being spotted.”

“Maybe not.” Again the shoulder shrug. “We have lookouts posted all over the rooftops, though many are from different factions. So we have to be careful.” He nodded decisively to himself and added, “You could have a tracker or homing device on you.”

“Then why not just search us?” Charlie asked, perplexed.

“Didn’t have to,” he replied, “We scanned you while you were waiting.”

The tunnel-like passageway came to an abrupt end. Before they could pursue any questions regarding the scan, the steel door in front of them opened upon a particular sight. It was a large circular room with a peaked roof that reminded Ettie of a yurt. The ceiling was beamed, and along the entire length of the curved walls were book shelves. Long, narrow windows interrupted the continuity of shelves at regular intervals. Round and rectangular tables of differing sizes were situated throughout the room, and both men and women sat reading, writing, or talking quietly in groups.

“What is this place?” Ettie asked.

“A library.” Hound Dog raised his eyebrows in an exaggerated fashion as if stating the obvious was a major hardship. “It’s our entry point into the university.”

“A library? The university?”

He sighed loudly. “Yes, yes. Not what you were expecting. I understand, but don’t go repeating everything I say.”

“Where exactly are we?” Charlie asked, having been completely turned around during their ascent.

“In the King’s Turret.”

Both Ettie and Charlie stopped in their tracks. The King’s Turret was a citywide landmark. It was called a turret, but it was really a scaled-down re-creation of the Keep at Winsor Castle. It was erected after a season of protests had been brutally repressed. The King was said to order its construction as a constant reminder of his presence even while far away in England. The turret had been built upon one of the tallest buildings in the city so that it could be seen from almost anywhere.

Hound Dog shooed them along. “Don’t dawdle.”

“But… but how?” Ettie asked amazed, as she followed him through the room.

“Oh, it weren’t much more than stagecraft. They built some stonework in the foundation, but much of it is backed by your standard masonry and even, in some places, plywood. We fortified it and laid in the heavy beams you see there and there.” He pointed out certain features of the ceiling. “It was meant to be symbolic of monarchal power. I mean, really, a keep on the top of a skyscraper ain’t much real use now, is it?” He waved his hand as if dismissing their unvoiced objections. “A real keep, maybe,” he admitted, “but this sham, no.”

After exiting the library they walked down a spiral ramp of sorts that stopped at the intersection of two hallways.

“Do they know you’re here?” Ettie asked as they turned down the rightmost corridor.

“They, being the nobles? Yes and no. They know
someone’s
here, but they don’t have much idea of the size of our operation. We’ve tapped into their grid, although the improvements Dr. Smyth has made far surpass what they have.” He laughed a little to himself. “Driving underground any scientist who doesn’t toe the line ain’t the smartest move. They’ve lost a lot of brainpower. Something we like to harness here at the university.”

While he spoke, they walked through a sky bridge connecting two buildings. On one side, large windows opened up to the view which was both spectacular and terrifying. Ettie and Charlie could see across the tops of skyscrapers. Ettie felt a tingle of panic shoot up through her feet at the void that stretched beneath the steel beams and reinforced concrete.

“How come I’ve never noticed this bridge,” Charlie asked.

“The bridge is built into the side of the building, and the brickwork is patterned so as to look two-dimensional. The windows are tinted and look like just any other part of the wall,” Hound Dog explained. “Also, the height is such that you would have to be almost eye level with the bridge to actually see it.”

“So you have persecuted architects and engineers here as well?” Ettie half-joked.

“That’s right,” he responded seriously and kept walking past two guards and into another winding hallway and finally up a short staircase. At the top was a thick wood-planked door that opened into a large room.

Walking into the room was like walking back into the sixteenth century. A very large fireplace was home to a roaring fire across which a few chickens roasted on a spit. The walls were covered in elaborately carved paneling, and a long oak table was spread with papers and books.

Leaning on that table, with both hands planted on its surface and looking intently at a map, was a slight man with wild gray hair. He straightened up and looked at Ettie.

“Miss Speex.” He had the clipped speech of an army drill sergeant, but the lopsided smile and messy hair belied any such discipline.

“Yes. You must be Dr. Kevin Smyth, a.k.a, the globular sea slug”

He laughed. “A nickname your brother gave me. The slugs, I believe, are a valuable commodity.” He shook his head. “I think he meant it as a compliment.” Changing the subject abruptly, he told her, “I saw you dance once.”

She wrinkled her brow.

He noticed her hesitation and was quick to discern the reason. “It must be confusing to switch dimensions, but rest assured that you and Lord Westchester, with his chromaticon, are unique in that ability. The rest of us are not cognizant of timeline phases.” He gestured them over to the fireplace where a smaller round table was set with fine china and a bounty of food. “Please sit down and help yourselves. You must be tired. I know the path can be harrowing.” He sat down with them and asked Hound Dog, “Please find Adelaide and ask her to join us.”

Charlie was looking at Kevin Smyth intently and said rather grimly, “Mine is not the only chromaticon.”

Dr. Smyth took note of his tense demeanor and poured him a glass of wine. “You are referring to the people for whom you work.”

Charlie nodded curtly and reached for the glass, sipping gratefully at the red liquid.

“Dr…”

“Please, call me Kevin.”

Ettie nodded. “Kevin, Odell sent me to help you. Do you know for what purpose?”

Kevin looked up from the plate on which he had served himself a helping of chicken and fried onions and chewed thoughtfully. Finally, he swallowed and said, “When I first met your brother he was in the company of a rather mysterious group we refer to as the Feralon.”

“The Feralon?” Charlie looked at him sharply. “Aren’t they just like the boogie man… a group of wild youth who creep into nursery windows… something made up to scare misbehaving children?”

“If only…” Kevin laughed, but then sobered. “I haven’t known them to steal babies, but they are secretive and agile; you will never see them coming. I have not seen one face-to-face. I don’t know anyone who has. Some here attribute the occasional murder from these rooftops to them. But, in truth, it could be any one of the criminal factions that reside here. The rooftops are the last refuge of many of the most notorious outlaws in the city.

“When I fled here over twenty years ago, it was a struggle to build something that was free of societal strictures, yet lacking in dishonest intent. We have tried to give refuge to those who seek intellectual and political liberty, to build a free community, but the criminal element is ever present.” He shrugged his shoulders. “There is something of a symbiotic relationship, certainly fear of their actions keep most of our enemies at bay. But it is definitely a double-edged sword.”

“Odell…” Ettie prompted.

“Um, yes, well, they had captured him… the Feralon. It was one of his first timeline shifts. He had been fleeing the police and made his escape over the rooftops.” Kevin shook his head in disbelief. “I do believe your brother can get out of almost anything. I don’t know how he accomplished it. The way he was dressed and his rather aristocratic bearing should have resulted in an ignominious death on the streets below. Instead, they brought him to me, or, rather, left him at my doorstep so to speak. I never saw them. I don’t think Odell really did either.”

He reached out and took a sip of wine before continuing, “His insistence that he knew me from another timeline was… um… hard to believe. We, at first, suspected him of being a spy.”

“His story would certainly have been unbelievable,” Charlie agreed.

“It would have been if I had not already been monitoring micro-distortions in the timeline for some months.”