Coma (Paranormal Romance) (32 page)

“No,” I giggled, feeling my cheeks getting
warmer. I leaned forward to take another shot of my plate. At that
second, Zack snapped a picture of me taking a picture of my
plate.

“If that doesn’t prove that you’re not forced
to live here,” he chuckled, “I don’t know what will.”

~*~

Zack explained that he would deliver the
letter to my parents, because my emotions would cause too much
disturbance in the field, possibly revealing what we were doing to
both sides in the war. I knew he was right, but I wanted to see my
parents one more time, so he promised to share his memories upon
return.

“It will be a good practice at omitting
memories, as well,” he said, tucking my letter in his back pocket.
“Here we go. The army of two,” he smiled, cupping my cheeks. I
stared at his gleaming eyes, adoring the way he looked at me as if
I were his most precious belonging. His lashes swept down as he
kissed me, and then disappeared from my view.

Feeling kind of empty, I spun on my heels,
and started toward the window. Taking a deep breath, I crossed my
fingers, praying my parents would believe us.

“Ly,” Zack said behind my back, startling the
ghost out of me.

“Geez! You spooked my knickers off,” I
sputtered, panting. “I'll never get used to this time travel
instant returns.”

“Sorry,” he chuckled. “Wanna see?” Grinning,
he took a step toward me.

“They believed us?” I gaped, and then jumped
into his embrace, locking my legs around him.

“You bet,” he spun me in his arms. “You must
have never lied to them before. They had no doubt that it was
true.”

“I can't say never, but mostly I told them
the truth,” wide grin was plastered to my face.

“Without further delay,” Zack said, and then
sent his memories through his bracelet.

My face turned into gooey as soon as my
parents' faces hit my view. Seeing Mom and Dad crying while reading
my letter, I felt as if an iron fist had grabbed my chest, but then
I realized those were tears of joy. They were actually happy for
me! Smiling through tears, they flipped through our photos,
commenting on each one. Dad wrapped his arm around Mom, kissing the
top of her head. When it was over, I glanced at Zack. He was gazing
at me with so much love.

“Thank you,” I entered his embrace, sealing
our lips together. There wasn't a more perfect moment than that. I
felt fulfilled. Everything fell into its place.

“Come,” Zack threaded his fingers through
mine. “We've got to practice. Zoe might call us for a mission any
moment now. I'd hate to explain why I took her code out of our
security system.”

Reality slapped my face. Mere mention of
Zoe's name sent unease straight to my stomach. “What code and what
system?”

“Our home, my beautiful wife,” he locked his
arms around me while my heart did a couple of three-sixties, “Is
surrounded by an invisible force field to keep snooping time
travelers out. Only those whose code is in our database may come
through.”

“Oh,” I giggled, “I was wondering why Ethan
hasn't dropped by.”

Zack laughed wholeheartedly, “I took them all
off,” he flashed a mischievous grin. “I have to put them back,
though. A day of privacy is understandable, but anything more than
that might raise suspicion.”

It took me a couple of hours of non-stop
practice before I managed to omit a single piece of my memory.
Unlike me, Zack was pretty patient about it. His cool and steady
voice guided me through a complicated neuro-labyrinth of my brain.
At moments, I wondered whether he knew my brain better than I did.
Later, though, I was certain he did. Before Zack, I never knew my
neurons could be programmed to do anything, let alone put a
permanent omission to a memory for others without losing access to
it myself. It put a whole other perspective on amnesia.

Getting that small piece of memory omitted
was the hardest part, but once I got the hang of it, the rest ran
smoothly. It was as if my brain just needed to be shown how, and
then it knew what to do. By the end of the day, I sent my memories
to Zack like a pro.

“One last thing,” Zack looked at me, biting
his lip. “You can't omit any private moments we share.”

“Whoa,” I sputtered. “That's not fair!”

“It’s not,” he chuckled, “But to keep it
credible, you have to let it all in.”

“I get that, but I don't have to like it,” I
pursed my lips into a pout.

Zack leaned in and gently bit my pursed lip,
“I don't like it either,” he murmured against my lips.
Suggestively, I pushed closer into him, but he stopped me by
saying, “We've got some other things to do first.”

“Like what?” My pout was back in place.

“Did you see those lockers in Zoe's
office?”

“Those things that look like safety deposit
boxes?”

He nodded.

“Mhm,” I confirmed.

“That's where all our memories are kept. From
all time travelers ever,” Zack's eyes twinkled.

“I thought everything was in Zoe's head,” I
chuckled.

“It's a big head, but not that big,” we both
burst out laughing. “Anyway––” He paused, nibbling his lower
lip.

“Yeah?”

“We have to hack them.”

“We what?!” I gazed at him, incredulously.
Was he out of his mind?
“Do I look like a hacker to you?
A-a,” I shook my head.

“We have to, Ly. It's the only way to get to
the truth,” he stopped my shaking head by cupping my face.

“It's a way to Zoe's shit list! That's what
it is,” I sent him a glare. “We'll get caught.”

“No we won't,” he faked a self-assured smile,
but that didn't reassure me at all.

“Do you have a trick for that, as well?”

“Nope. But we'll make a plan that will ensure
we don't get caught,” his smile turned into a crooked one.

“Before I lose my mind, as well,” I strode
off, gazing out the window toward nighttime city skyline. “What do
you know about time ending? What's the official story?”

“Right! We never did cover that, did we?”

“Not that I know of,” I said without turning
around.

“We usually get to that part later, after new
recruits understand more about the nature of time and space.”

“I think I know enough by now to get to that
step,” I replied, turning slowly to face him.

“You sure do,” he smiled. “After the
originals invented time travel, they were keen on fixing things to
make a better world. At first, it was the little things. Some
historical mistakes that resulted in a loss of life were the first
to get fixed. When they saw it had worked, the originals took on
bigger tasks to fix, each time going further back into history.
What they didn't understand is that history has a way of
readjusting itself.”

“Readjusting?” I repeated, scratching my
chin.

“Mhm. Those lives they saved by fixing
history ended up dead in some other events later on, and with some
new casualties. When they discovered some of them, they tried to
correct them, as well. They didn't understand that those weren't
new events, but rather history keeping a score, and adding a
penalty to it. That resulted in a complex domino effect with more
and more casualties.”

“How come they didn't notice?”

“Those things are subtle and not easily
noticeable. The adjustment doesn't happen immediately. They were so
wrapped up in doing good, and then the end came as the sum of all
changes, wiping them out of existence.”

“Dammit,” I breathed.

“After they perished, the ones that were
still alive studied all data in depth, and noticed that history had
that effect. All of this was a process of trial and error until we
learned the laws, or the rules of engagement if you will. Luckily,
the originals were smart, and knew that recorded history would only
have the latest version, so they founded a memory bank before they
changed anything.”

“Can anyone access that memory bank?”

“No. Only Zoe from TGA and Harold from Elders
can.”

“Why? If it's all true, why wouldn't everyone
be allowed to see it?”

“That's what I thought, and why I want to
hack it. After we broke into two factions, and Zoe and Harold put a
lock on it, the rest of us that were recruited later were told that
they couldn't risk losing the only copy of real history to some
unforeseen error. Knowing how fragile those chips are, no-one
doubted that explanation.”

“Do you think they are hiding something?” I
held my breath.

“Not sure. I have this nagging feeling. We've
been fighting this war for so long, and nothing ever changes. It's
a never-ending ping-pong. There must be something,” his face was
worried.

“And if there isn't?”

“No harm done,” he flashed a brief smile,
then glanced down, and started jerking a zipper on his cargos.

“Are we getting Ethan and Sophie into
this?”

Zack's eyes shot up. He pondered that idea
for a moment and then replied, “I'd rather not.”

“Let's say I'm crazy enough to go along with
this,” I said. Zack's lip curved to the side. “We know nothing
about hacking. How do we do it?”

“I didn't mean it literally,” he chuckled.
“We should get access to those memories, is all.”

“And how do we do that? Chop Zoe's head
off?”

“No,” he laughed, “But I like the way your
mind works,” he winked. I frowned, so he ditched the grin, and
said, “I'll do some snooping around, and see how we can get her
access code.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“For now, omit this conversation,” he kissed
my forehead, and I did as he asked.

~*~

“
All war is deception.”

–– Sun Tzu, The Art of War

Zack did some digging and snooping around,
while I did my best to keep cool, and act normal. We met with
Sophie and Ethan almost every day, and it was nearly impossible to
keep it from them. Luckily, we were the unbreakables, so they
thought our weird looks and occasional double-meaning conversations
were a part of that.

While waiting to be called on a mission, our
everyday routine was checking the frequency field for any
disturbances. Feeling like Yoda, I kept cracking jokes about the
force, but they all fell short. Only Zack knew that it was my
sloppy way of coping with what a disturbance would mean—a
fifty-fifty chance that he would be erased from existence—so he did
his best to show support.

Zack returned all access codes to our home's
security grid, but he put an additional reinforcement around the
bathroom attached to our room so no-one besides us could enter.
Naturally, Zoe asked him about that, so he told her it was
temporary until I got used to showering without protection.
Strangely, she bought it. Or at least she acted as if she did. We
didn't care as long as we had a
safe room
where we could
have all our confidential conversations. However, she did ask for
my memories more frequently under the guise of monitoring my
adjustment to the new environment since I was so
shy and
fragile,
as she put it.

The first memory transfer to her was a
mortifying event. My palms were clammy, beads of sweat rolled down
my forehead, and my heart threatened to give me a coronary, but
after she seemed satisfied, I relaxed and trusted the process
completely. She was no fool, though. There was no room for
error.

~*~

Zack had said that history has a way of
readjusting itself, but it also has a way of surprising everyone.
One of Zack's snooping endeavors resulted in a tidbit of strange
info. We were all left under the impression that Michael had been
taken out by the Death Squad, but it wasn't so. That added to our
suspicions that things were not what they seemed. As a matter of
fact, a morally corrupted person shouldn't be able to time-travel,
and Zack's informant told him that Michael was now on a Death Squad
team. That didn't sit right.

“My informant, Jessica, is an Elder,” Zack
said one day in our bathroom aka safe room. “She's Michael's best
friend. That's how she knows Michael isn't dead.”

“Can she be trusted?”

“No-one can,” Zack smiled, faintly, “But we
have to take some risks.” He took my hand in his, staring into my
eyes.

I knew he was worried, especially since we've
been through that Michael situation. He took a risk with him, and
it backfired, but we had to move past it, so I asked, “What else
does she know?”

“When Michael's wife died, they started
digging deeper, and found some gruesome things,” Zack shifted in
his seat.

“Like what?”

“She said Michael had no real intentions of
killing you. Their goal was to get Michael on the Death Squad, and
the only way he could, was to try to kill someone,” he swallowed
hard.

“So DS isn't what we were lead to believe,” I
said more to myself, than him.

“Not at all. They found out that DS is some
sort of an army serving Zoe and Harold. There are thousands of
them,” his eyes rounded.

“Jesus,” I breathed, “Zoe and Harold are
working together?” He nodded. “What do they need an army for?”

“We don't know,” he clasped his neck.
“Apparently, there's a third memory bank, a secret one that is not
under any access codes. It's guarded by Death Squad. That's why
they needed Michael to get on that team.”

“It makes sense. What do they plan to do now
that he's there?”

“He's gonna steal the chip and give it to
Jessica. Allegedly, this chip is filtered from all the redundant
personal crap, and contains the entire chain of events.”

“And she's gonna let us see?”

“Uh-huh. It's going down tomorrow,” he stood
up and sat next to me on the tub. “There's one more thing.”

“Which thing?” My head snapped toward
him.

“Jessica told me,” he paused, “That whenever
a TGA member or an Elder became a liability, Zoe and Harold would
find his or her soul mate, and arrange for them to meet.”