Timescape (18 page)

“What do you mean, what do I think?” David said. “Go over? Now? We just came back. I'm beat—again.”

“You didn't get hurt,” Xander said. “That was a horrible one, but we got out better than we usually do. You said yourself you think this is the one. The one Jesse—”

“Whoa,” Keal said. “I promised your dad I'd bring you to school.”

“Keal,” Xander said, a little whiny, “Jesse wanted us to find this place. If we leave now, it may not come back for a long time, if ever. We can't just
ignore
it. Jesse thinks—”

“Hold on,” Keal said. He scratched his chin. “I'm sure it is important, but—”

“You want to sit in here and hold it till we come home?” Xander said. “Don't you have other things you wanted to do? You won't be able to go the bathroom or—”

“I'll manage,” Keal said.

Xander started to say something else, but Keal stopped him. “Give me a minute. I'm thinking.” His eyes roamed over the items, then settled on David. “Okay, okay. Let's call your dad.”

“What?” Xander complained. “He'll just say—”

“That's the way it is, Xander,” Keal said. “Take it or leave it.”

Xander frowned. He waved his hand toward the hallway door. “Fine, go call him.”

Keal smiled and shook his head. He made a come-here gesture with his finger. “You're coming with me. David, you stay. If you hear anything that's not us, run. Forget about the room and get your butt downstairs, understand?”

David nodded. “But who's going over . . . if we do?”

“I am,” Xander said.

“That means both of us,” David said with a sigh. “I'm sticking with you. Jesse said—”

“I know, I know, stay together.”

“What about Keal?” David said. “He could go.”

“I think
you
should go,” Keal said. “I'm pretty sure the message was for you guys. With Jesse, it's always been about you. Where's Xander's phone?”

“On the floor in the hall downstairs,” David said.

“Come on, then,” Xander said. He brushed past Keal and left the antechamber.

“You going to be all right?” Keal asked David.

“If I hear so much as a rat's fart, I'm outta here.”

Keal grinned. “What about going over? You cool with that?”

He nodded. “I'm tired, but it's important to Jesse.”

After Keal left, David began psyching himself up. He stood, stretched, made sure the Ace bandages over his cast were tight. He put on his sneakers and tied them tightly. He looked at the items. Not a weapon among them. He liked that. Then again, there wasn't a weapon in the future world antechamber, either. And except for the machete, none for the jungle world; even so, he had been almost eaten by tigers and skewered by warriors. He rubbed his shoulder where the arrow had nicked him.

I can do this
, he thought.

Mom had a saying for every situation. Most of them didn't make a lot of sense to David: dollars to doughnuts (
what?
), a lost ball in high weeds (
had something to do with not knowing what you were doing—come on!
), don't add insult to injury (
okay, I sort of get that one
). The one that came to mind now was, “In for a penny, in for a pound.” Obviously, from England; a pound was like the American dollar. It meant if something was worth doing at all, it was worth doing right—committing yourself to doing it all the way. When it came to rescuing Mom, he was in for a penny, in for a pound. Going over was part of that.

Xander was right. He had no new injuries. So why not go into another world now?

He heard something and jumped. Someone was pounding up the stairs, fast.

Xander better not be running to go over, despite being told no, David thought.
I can hold him back at least until Keal comes.

He went to the hallway entrance. He held on to the frame so the door couldn't slam and knock him into the hall—you never knew about this place. And that might cause them to lose their chance to discover what it was Jesse wanted them to find.

Xander hit the landing and darted into the hallway. He was smiling. “Dad said yes. You should have heard Keal. He was great. He said to find Mom, we're going to have to do things, like just us going over sometimes.” He pushed past David into the room.

“That doesn't mean whenever you want,” David said.

“I know. Don't be such a baby.”

“I'm not a—” He stopped. There was no arguing with Xander sometimes. David could fight a thousand wars, rescue children from burning buildings, stay in this house alone, and Xander would still find a reason to call him a baby.

Keal stepped into the doorway. “Xander, only take enough items to open the door,” he said. “Both of you go together. When you get there, give an item to David, so he can get back if you get separated. That way, I'll be able to come get you, if you're not back in—” He looked at his watch. “Say, a half hour. Deal?”

“What if it takes longer?” Xander said. “What if—”

“Half an hour,” Keal repeated. “That's it. Don't make me come drag you home. What?” He was looking at David's grin.

“Mom would like you,” David said.

He patted David on the arm. “I'm sure I'd like her too.” He pointed. “Take the hammer, tool belt, and blueprint. Those are the things Jesse specified. Better stick to the plan.”

Xander strapped on the tool belt and picked up the hammer and scrap of paper. He opened the portal door. Bright sunlight streamed in. A fresh smell, like trees and grass, blew in on a gentle breeze.

“What do you see?” David said.

“Trees.” Xander smiled over his shoulder. “Nothing but trees. Ready?”

David returned the smile. “Let's do it.”

CHAPTER
thirty - eight

Xander had been right: nothing but trees in every direction. David couldn't name them to save his life, but he appreciated their beauty. Sunbeams speared down from the sky, breaking through the foliage in a hundred places. So while much of the woods was in shadow, it wasn't spooky. A warm breeze touched his arms and face. It was the kind of place the King family used to go for picnics. They'd always favored the woods over parks and open areas. Maybe that's one reason they'd liked the house when they'd first found it.

Should've kept looking
, he thought. But even if they'd hated it, Dad would have insisted. That'd been his plan.

David sat on the ground where he had wound up after spilling out from the portal. He had tucked his cast close to his body and avoided getting it banged again. Maybe he was starting to figure out this portal-jumping business.

Xander hadn't been as lucky. He had cracked his head on a tree, and now he was sitting up against it, rubbing his skull.

David stood. “You okay?”

“My head's getting more knots than these trees,” Xander said. “Here.” He held the scrap of blueprint.

David took it and flapped it around. “This little thing has a pull I'd be able to feel?”

“Drop it and follow it, like we did the yarn. Just don't lose sight of it.”

David pushed it into his back pocket. He looked around. “Any idea where we should go?”

Xander pushed himself up. “Just start walking, I guess.”

They'd gone forty or fifty paces when a sound reached them. It was the distinctive
pound-pound-pound
of a hammer. Someone pounded, paused, pounded. David could almost see him hammering in a nail, lining up another one, and pounding on it.

Xander raised his eyebrows, and the brothers headed for the sound.

The pounding continued, grew louder, then stopped.

They trudged on, going around bushes, ducking under branches.

Xander braked. His arm shot up to stop David. “No way!”

David followed his gaze, and his heart skipped a beat. Carved into a tree was the face of their family mascot, Bob. David ran to it. He put his fingertip into the groove that made Bob's bulbous chin. “Looks fresh,” he said.

Xander stepped beside him. He brushed his fingers over the whole face.

“You think it's Mom?” David said. Hoping against hope.

“Who else?” Xander said, smiling.

David had seen it on the
Titanic
too. “She could be leaving messages for us,” he said, “like we are for her. Telling us where she's been.”

“Maybe it's like a marker,” Xander said. “You know, not just where she's been, but a place to go. If she finds herself in a world she's already been to, she comes to where she left Bob and waits. If we do the same, we'll have a better chance of finding each other.”

“Maybe she's here,” David said. “Now.”

“Could Jesse have known that?” Xander puzzled.

The pounding started again.

“Come on,” David said, heading toward the sound. As he walked, he scanned everywhere, looking for more signs, a person, Mom.

They went up a small incline, then down the other side till they came to a wall of bushes that stretched a good distance on either side. Xander pushed through, and David followed. When he emerged, he bumped into Xander's outstretched arm.

Xander was staring at someone sitting on a log fifty feet away. The person's back was to them. He—David thought it was a he—was wearing a white T-shirt and blue jeans. Nothing weird, like the other worlds they'd visited. He had blond hair, and his head was bent forward. The way his shoulders and arms moved, he was fiddling with something, David thought. Not just sitting there or reading a book.

Xander started for him, tiptoeing.

David caught up and tapped him. He whispered, “Shouldn't we call to him? We don't want to scare him.”

“I want to make sure that's not a gun he's got, first,” Xander said. He took a step. A twig snapped under his foot.

The person snapped his head around. He set something on the ground, hopped up, and turned. He was a boy, about David's age. He stared at them, his mouth hanging open. David saw that he was gripping a knife.

David waved. “Hi! We didn't mean to scare you.”

“Does he even speak English?” Xander whispered.

“What are you doing here?” the boy said.

David backhanded Xander's leg. “We're looking for someone.”

“Who?” The boy looked in the direction of the hammering.

“Our mother,” David said.

“You lost her? Around here?”

David walked toward him. “It's sort of hard to explain.”

The boy took a step back. His foot came down on something, and he almost fell. “Stay there!” he said. He lifted the knife, but he didn't look like someone who'd use it on them.

David stopped. “We're not here to hurt you. We want to just look around.”

“Well, you can't. Not here. This is private property. You're trespassing.”

“Come on, man!” Xander said. He strode past David.

“Dad!” the boy yelled toward the pounding. “Dad!” The hammering continued.

David fell in beside Xander. When they were twenty feet from the kid, they stopped. Xander lifted his arm over David's head, pointing. “There's a face on a tree over there, a cartoon face. Do you know anything about it?”

“What's it to you?”

“Like my brother said, we're just looking for someone. You don't have to cop an attitude, all right?”

The boy looked puzzled.

“The face?” David said.

“I carved it,” the boy said.

“
You
did?” Xander said. “Where did you—”

“What year is it?” the boy demanded.

Xander squinted at him. “What?”

“What year is it!” He screamed it.

The pounding stopped, then resumed.

David and Xander looked at each other. David shrugged.

“Uh . . .” Xander said.

“I knew it!” the boy said, stepping back. “I knew it!
Dad!

Dad!
You have to go back! You don't belong here!”

“Wait a minute,” Xander said, walking forward. “You know about the . . . the . . .”

The boy backpedaled and went down on his butt.

Xander stepped over the log.

The boy pointed the knife at him. “Stay back!”

“Xander,” David said, stepping over the log. “You're scaring him.”

“He knows, Dae. He knows about the portals.”

“Portals?” the boy said. “What are portals?”

David shifted his feet. His heel tapped something that rustled. A brown paper sack, its top rolled tight. His eyes shifted to the thing the kid had been fiddling with before they startled him. He stopped breathing.

It was a box, shaped like a half cylinder. Carved into its curving surface was a warrior thrusting a spear. The warrior's target was smooth wood, but David knew what would go there: another fighter. He'd seen it before, finished. And it wasn't a box. It was one of the wall lights in the curvy third-floor hallway of their house.

“You . . .” David said. He looked at the boy, who was looking up at him with big blue eyes. “Who are you? I'm David. This is my brother, Xander. What's your name?”

Before the boy answered, David knew. Those blue-blue eyes.

The boy's brows came together. He said, “I'm Jesse. Jesse King.”

CHAPTER
thirty - nine

David sat down hard on the log.

“What?” Xander said.

David grinned. He waved his hand at the boy. “Xander, he's Jesse!
Jesse
! ”

Xander's face swung around to the boy, then back to David. “That's not Jesse's last name. It's . . . it's . . .”

“
Wagner
,” David said. “He
changed
it! He told me! He said a lot of people in our family go by different last names. Because of . . . I don't know, the house or what they do or something, they change their names.”

Xander appeared completely baffled. He leaned closer to the boy, squinted at him. “Jesse?”