Shadow Boxer: NA Fantasy/Time Travel (Tesla Time Travelers Book 2) (32 page)

I shake my head. “He’ll know.”

“No. He has been far too busy. You obeyed him well enough during this alteration that he believes you work with him.”

Tiana peeks from behind my arm, but Penya’s still scanning the room. When she turns, she gasps. “Who is this?”

“She followed my residue here. This is my little sister—”

“Tiana,” Ti says, interrupting and stepping out from behind me, hands clutched to her chest.

“Another female.” Penya grins. “That is fantastic.”

“Now you have to leave Ilif’s lab. It’s time for you to teach her and Papi.”

“You are right. First things first, get me these papers.”

“No, Penya, I’m serious. We haven’t talked, but Nikola told me that Ilif was—is—I don’t know—into shady stuff with international weapon trafficking.”

She laughs. “I have known that for ages. His final weapons negotiation was long ago. His focus is riders, for centuries.”

I should let it go, but I can’t. “How is that possible? How old are you guys?”

Overhead, the fans kick up a notch. Apparently we’re too humid for the room.

“Age is complicated. Think of your own situation. How much time have you spent in an arc compared to the time that has elapsed at home in your birthtime? Ilif and I have been traveling for over forty years of our birthtime.”

From beside me, Tiana says, “But if you spend a week elsewhere and it’s only been a day at home… and you do that every day… you’ve just added another three-hundred sixty-five weeks to your year.”

“Not always a week, but basically correct. Now we worry about the information here, okay?”

I twist my head and look at the rows of boxes and laugh. “You’re not thinking about all of it, right?”

She shakes her head. “We need only the papers for the wireless energy. This is where Aurelia’s great-grandaughter, Camaria, comes in—her great to the eighth.”

I choke. Nikola knew all along. I shouldn’t be surprised.

Penya looks at me, but I wave her on.

“Camaria’s findings and inventions are on the cusp of creating Tesla’s wireless energy. And she has the international backing to make it available to the world for free—the piece Tesla was always missing.”

“But his papers have all been published—why can’t she use what’s publicly available?”

“Not all of them. That what Ilif’s been looking for. During Tesla’s final push—when J.P. stopped funding him—several days were not included in the final published findings. Those days are the critical ones.”

“Find the papers for his death ray; she needs those, too.”

I hide my shock and stiffen. “No.”

“It sounds more dangerous than it is. She is not weaponizing it.”

I shake my head. Just the name makes my skin crawl. Bad enough the wireless energy could crack the earth. “I’ll be the judge of that.”

“Fine. Find the wireless energy documents and we will work on how to get them to her.”

“Why can’t Evy just take them?” Tiana asks.

Penya shakes her head. “No rider moves past their own birthtime into the future.”

“Yeah, but this is Evy.”

Penya purses her lips. “True. First, determine a way I can find them in the future. If that doesn’t work, Evy can try.”

“Why can’t she come here tomorrow in her future?” Tiana whispers.

I shush her. Penya needs to know what happened since I last saw her, but I can’t go into details with Tiana here. She’s already sufficiently freaked out without knowing the FBI may or may not have it out for me. “How long do we have—when can you come back?”

“How long will it take you?”

I pretend to survey the stacks of boxes, even though I think I know exactly where the papers are. I’d bet my life they’re the last ones I took from his hotel room, the ones he’d hidden in a way only I could find. “Give us until tomorrow.”

She nods. “Good. While you do, I will work on a solution to get them to Camaria.”

“Meet us at my—” I shake my head. “No. Meet us at Papi’s.”

“Wait!” Tiana grips my arm. “What about my alteration?”

Penya purses her lips and addresses me. “She followed your residue?”

I scowl at Tiana. “Yes.”

Tiana splays her hands and mouths, “What?” while Penya stares over our shoulders.

Finally, she says, “Because she followed your residue, and you were already in an alteration, one negates the other. Your residue would not trigger her own alteration. She can arc home no problem, either with your lightning, or her own.”
 

“I can just take her home,” I say.

“No. She will be fine. I will meet her to make sure she is safe. If anything goes wrong, I will come get you. Get those papers. Ilif will not wait much longer. Do you want him to find you here?”

I shudder. Definitely not. “You’re sure she’ll be fine?”

“Would I lie to you about your sister? Have I ever lied to you?”

This isn’t the time to have that conversation, but it needs to happen. Soon. “You’re a big fan of omission. Kind of the same thing.”

She crosses her arms and scolds me with a look.

“Don’t I get a say in the matter?” Tiana asks meekly.

“Welcome to riding,” I snort.

“Alright then,” Penya says, clapping her hands together. “We have work to do.”

Tiana moves closer, and Penya’s light fades away into the spotlight until it’s just a regular band of light.

After she leaves, I take one last glance at the sheer awesomeness of the warehouse and wrap an arm around Tiana. “Time for you to learn how to arc.”

She rubs her hands together. “I’m ready.”

“What happened when you touched the residue?“

“All the lights went out and I felt like someone launched me from a catapult. Then I landed here.” She shakes her head. “It was terrifying.”

I think of the rush of my first time and laugh. “Sissy, we couldn’t be any more different.”

She shudders. “I’m okay with that.”

“This time is going to be the same. Huge expanse of darkness, and you’ll show up at Papi’s house—”

“Wait, don’t I need to help you find the document?”

I shake my head. “No. They’re not here.”

“Oh. Okay then.”

I take her through a quick lesson on arcing. So similar, and yet so different, from teaching Constantine how to time travel. “Try to make your own gloves this time.”

Her face squishes up like it always does when she concentrates. I’ll give her one chance to do her own, and then I’ll give her mine so we can both get to business. But I really want her to be able to do this. The need surges in me and I clench my fists and lean toward her.
Come on, come on.

Lightning crackles from her fists then snaps outward and back to encompass her hands with her boxing gloves. Both her face and knees soften, like she’s a total natural.

I take a step back. “You look amazing,” I say, and mean it.

When she turns to me, her grin is nearly as bright as her gloves, and she puffs up beneath my praise.

“Now you think of home, and repeat after me. I am whole.”

“
Yo soy todo.”
The words spill from her in Spanish, and I wonder if that’s a first-timer thing, since Papi and I said them together.

“I am filled with light.”

“Estoy lleno de luz.”

“Nothing exists beyond this moment in time.”

“Nada existe más allá de este momento en el tiempo.”

“Paths are mine to make and unmake.”

“Las rutas son míos para hacer y deshacer.”

“Time is flexible.”

“El tiempo es flexible.”

Her lightning flashes to the ceiling, and then she’s gone, a tiny filament of residue hanging suspended three feet off the ground. I whoop and turn in a circle. My baby sister is a rider. Now if I can get Papi riding again…
 

While I wait for the residue to dissipate, I fight the urge to follow her. Penya will handle anything on the other end. Not that there will be issues…
 

Maybe she’ll have a chance to give Papi and Ti a lesson while they’re all there together.

Before I leave—and to satisfy my own curiosity—I move to the perimeter of the building and search for a window or door so I can figure out where the warehouse is and how he’s concealed it from satellites. And when he built it… and how no one knew…
 

The single door is steel and looks heavy. A giant wheel sticks out from the center, looking oddly like the ones they use on submarine hatches. I twist and scan the ceiling again. It looks like an ordinary warehouse ceiling, except now I notice it’s arched, and there’s no hard corner where it meets the sides, but it curves downward and becomes the walls.

No… way.

No way is this thing underwater.

I could try and arc to the other side of the wall, but I’m not sure if I’ll be able to stay here, or if it will just send me home.

Curiosity pulses in my belly.

I drum my fingers against the steel door. I don’t dare open it now. It’d be my luck that the access point was destroyed and there’s only open water on the other side. I want to laugh at the ludicrousness of the idea of an underwater warehouse. Safe from fire, I suppose, if he was worried about that again.

One way to find out.

A quick band of fear squeezes my spine, but I trust my lightning. This isn’t swimming, this is holding my breath. I can do this. I arc, closing my eyes just in case.

The sensation of darkness is ripped away by the pressure of cold water. I force myself not to gasp, and pry my eyes open.
 

Stunned, I recount what I’m witness to. Possibly the only one alive, definitely the only person who’s ever seen it from this vantage point. I’m on a seabed just outside Long Island, staring at a secret warehouse of Nikola Tesla’s. One that’s never been discovered, one that contains every single document and machine he ever built. The truth of this is staggering. I cannot reveal this to anyone, ever.

I kick my feet and grip the end of the building, peering around the corner to see if I was right about the tunnel, and I was. There’s a long metal tube stretching toward the sloping incline of land. I’d follow it, but the pressure on my lungs to take a breath is intense and my time here is over. I flare my lightning and arc home.

The bolt fractures and yanks me free of the water. I land hard on my back and suck in lungfuls of nothing. I struggle to sit, and rough ground abrades my hands. I wheeze and my lungs start to work. Barely. I wipe my eyes and check my surroundings. Back in the Salt Flats. I completely forgot about the water factor.

C
HAPTER
33

W
HY
DOES
IT
bring me here, of all places? And why not the one time I arced home to get Papi during the flood. My lungs fill with sweet air and I stand. There’s nothing here, so I flare another ball and finish the arc.

Dripping wet, I land in the spare bedroom, remembering only at the last possible second to diffuse the trap. My sweater clings to me, and my hair is a dripping mess. I push it out of my face. Figures, the
one
time I don’t braid it.
 

Tiana’s chicken scratch from the calculations lay scattered on the floor, and I sidestep them on the way to the door. I pause and listen, but it sounds like Mr. Steinaman managed to dissuade whoever he saw from coming in. I drip to my bathroom and peel off my soaking clothes, and pad back to the spare room.

I gather Tiana’s papers and pull the stack from Nikola’s room out of the trunks and reset the trap then shut the door. Back in my bathroom, I tuck Nikola’s papers in a bottom drawer beneath my makeup bag and keep Tiana’s to give back. Even though I’m right here, I don’t feel good about leaving it out. I probably should have left it locked up in the bedroom, but if I have to give it to someone, I don’t want them knowing what else I have.

Quick mop-up of my running makeup, faster change of clothes, and this time I braid my hair, my short mourning period over.

I gather Tiana’s papers and head downstairs to make another protein shake and figure out a plan. When I’m in the middle of slicing my banana, Ilif arrives.

To keep my hands busy—and from shaking—I keep making my shake. Adding ice to the blender, I hastily decide to put him on the defense. “Where have you been?”

“Busy. What have you found?”

“Well, I did what you asked. Nikola gave me his patents.”

He inhales swiftly.

“But,” I say, before he can control the conversation, “the day I went back to get them—a whole
day
before he was supposed to die—guys in suits showed up and took everything.”

His head hangs, and it’s the most human I’ve seen him look. “So you failed to complete the alteration?”

I add a scoop of protein powder to the blender. “No. You failed to tell me there were guys on the other end who distorted history. I can’t work with a corrupted timeline.”

He shakes his head. “Their involvement shouldn’t have made a difference.”

“Well, it did,” I say, punching the blender button on.

“No,” he says. “That’s not possible. There’s no way to distort a timeline or change an arc. That’s the entire point of them.”

“Whatever. I’m done believing anything you say. Guys are casing my house.”

He stills. “What kind of guys?”

“How do I know? My neighbor says they’re FBI, but apparently—” I stop. No good can come from revealing more than I have to. Not to him. “Nikola’s dead, Ilif.”

“Well of course he’s dead. You knew that.”

“No! Murdered. He was murdered because you shot off your mouth to J.P. Morgan about what I was doing there. You killed him!”

“What are you talking about? Under what circumstances would I jeopardize anything of Tesla’s, let alone involve his most difficult critic and curator.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“When have I lied to you?”

“Every time you’ve tried to kill me!” My temper flares and I’m shouting.

“That was once, and you were working with Penya. I had a right.”

“I thought you were partners.”

“Back to the topic, please. I have never lied to you about riding. I did not agree with your involvement from the beginning, but I have never distorted the truth about the power.”