Erasing Time (20 page)

Elise attached the suction cups to the wall and lowered the ladder out the window. Without another word, she took hold of the ladder and heaved herself through the opening.

Sheridan watched the suction cups, ready to grab them if they slipped. They didn’t, and when she looked out the window, Elise was several rungs down. She motioned for Sheridan to follow.

Sheridan gingerly straddled the windowsill and took hold of the rope.
Don’t look down
, she told herself. She’d heard that advice somewhere.
Don’t look down and don’t think about how high up you are
. She swung her second leg out, feeling for the flimsy rope beneath her. Hard to do without looking down. She finally felt the rope underneath her foot and took a wobbly step onto the next rung.

As far as that
Don’t think about how high up you are
piece of advice—yeah, that was pretty much impossible. What else could a person think about while clinging to a rope seven stories up? Dinner? Basketball? She was going to die, and not for some meaningful reason—it was going to be death by suction cup malfunction.

Her thoughts were interrupted by voices. Men’s voices coming from the outer room of the Wordlab.

Sheridan took two hurried steps down the ladder, and then it slipped.

At first she thought the whole thing had fallen out of the window. She gripped the rope anyway, and stifled the scream erupting from her mouth. Even now, when there wasn’t a point to her silence, she didn’t want the Enforcers to know where she was. She couldn’t stand the thought of them peering out the window and watching her fall to her death. In another minute, she was going to look really gruesome.

It was a prideful thought, and her father had always said that pride went before a fall. Apparently it came afterward too.

A moment later, Sheridan realized she wasn’t falling. The rungs were sliding downward, fast-paced, but the top of the ladder was still attached up at the window. This wasn’t a ladder at all; it was some sort of makeshift elevator.

Sheridan leaned her forehead against a rung, let out several trembling breaths, and took back everything she’d thought about ladders of the future. They were wonderful. She and Elise never would have been able to climb down in time to get away from the Enforcers. Now they had a chance.

The rungs jerked to a stop. They had reached the ground. Well, almost the ground. The ladder didn’t actually reach all of the way, and she was dangling six feet in the air.

Elise dropped to the sidewalk, then waved to Sheridan. “Hurry!”

She jumped. Her feet hit the concrete, and she pitched forward. She steadied herself, then dashed after Elise into the parking garage.

Elise ran to the closest car, opened a door, and gestured for Sheridan to get in. Once she had, Elise said, “I’m sending you to Salima Street. You actually want to go to Los Angeles Avenue, but since the government will trace the car, I don’t dare send you there. Once the car stops at Salima, walk two miles north until you reach Los Angeles Park.”

Sheridan sat on the edge of the seat. “We need to go to the Scicenter. Taylor and Echo don’t know Helix is looking for them.”

“If I have time before the Enforcers find me, I’ll beep one of my contacts to meet you at the park. Someone will approach you and ask if your name is Hermana. That’s your contact.”

“But Taylor—”

“If Taylor told Echo who she was—and she must have to get his help—she’s already with the Dakine. Just be glad you weren’t with her.”

Elise reached into the car and pressed her hand to the control panel. “Salima Street.” She stepped back as the door slid shut and the car hummed to life.

“Wait!” Sheridan pressed her hands against the window to catch Elise’s attention. “I can’t leave Taylor. I’ve got to help her.”

Elise never turned back to look at the car. She jogged out of the parking garage, her lavender-and-pink hair swishing around her shoulders until she went out of sight.

Sheridan hadn’t said good-bye to Taylor, and as she watched the fading parking garage, she realized she hadn’t said good-bye to Elise either. And now she was alone.

Echo watched the dots travel across his sensor. It was horrible luck to be trapped in the Scicenter now. The scientists would be the first people notified of Taylor’s absence. They were probably organizing search schematics right now. That made it harder to sneak out unnoticed.

He glanced at Taylor, at her long white hair and the blue makeup swirls on her face. The scientists might not recognize her. She looked so much like an average citizen now, and not like the colorless time rider the scientists had seen before.

And it was possible that not all the scientists knew of Taylor’s disappearance. Perhaps the people they passed in the hallway wouldn’t be suspicious.

Echo checked the dots on the sensor one last time before he clipped it back onto his belt. “How well do you run?” he asked Taylor.

“What?”

“I know most people from the old twenties were weak and unexercised, but can you run long enough to make it out of the building?”

“Yes,” she said tightly, “I can make it out of the building and a good mile down the street before I have to rest. Honestly, where do you get your information?”

Echo ignored her question. “Don’t run down the street. When we get out of the building, we’ll head to the first car we see. They won’t be able to track me, and with any luck we’ll lose them in traffic.”

Echo walked to the door, then paused before opening it. “You remember which way the front entrance is?”

“Yes, and my weak and unexercised body will beat yours out of the building.”

“We’ll try to make it the elevator without anyone noticing us. If someone looks like they’re about to stop us, then we’ll have to sprint down the stairs. They’re through the door to the right of the elevator. We’ll go down four flights. Any farther than that and you’ll end up in one of the underground levels. Understand?”

She nodded, and before he could think about it any longer, before he could think about all the reasons this wasn’t likely to work, he opened the door, and they slunk out of the room.

They made it to the first turn of the hallway without being seen. This was vital. It was one thing to be caught in the Scicenter without proper clearance. It would be unthinkable to be caught coming out of a restricted area. He let out a breath of relief as they turned into the main corridor.

Several people were walking in different directions. None seemed to pay any attention to them—yet. Echo could see the outline of the elevator down the hallway, a tiny metal rectangle set against white walls. He forced himself to keep his pace casual, to not draw attention to himself by a hurried gait.

A few heads turned as he walked by. That didn’t mean they suspected anything. It was normal for people to glance at each other as they passed.

Taylor picked up her pace a bit, pulling slightly in front of him.
Not yet
, he wanted to tell her,
don’t give them reason to notice you
, but he didn’t dare speak.

More heads turned. A couple of men who had been talking in the hallway stopped and began walking after Echo. That might be coincidence.

Echo lengthened his stride. They were almost to the elevator. Another few seconds and they’d be there.

“You there,” the man behind Echo said.

Echo pretended he hadn’t heard.

“You,” the man said in a louder tone. “Aren’t you a wordsmith?”

Echo paused. Could he talk his way out of this situation, or was it better to take his chances running?

Taylor didn’t give him the choice.

She took off in a sprint, reaching the door to the stairs and pushing the open button almost before Echo realized she’d gone. He turned and followed after her without another look at the men.

The stairwell was dimly lit. Echo’s feet clanged heavily against the steps as he ran. Taylor took them three at a time, and Echo matched her pace, hoping he wouldn’t fall. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d used stairs, let alone run down them.

Other footsteps sounded behind them, so many that the pounding noise vibrated through the stairwell. Echo didn’t look behind him. He didn’t dare take his eyes off the steps. It was all he could do to unclip the laser disrupter from his belt. He’d have only one chance to use it.

They passed the door for the third floor, then the second. One more flight to go.

Echo couldn’t tell if any of the men chasing them were Enforcers or just scientists. No one had fired at them, but that might be because they couldn’t get a clear shot among the twists of the staircase. Once he and Taylor ran out into the hallway, there wouldn’t be anything to prevent laser boxes from cutting them down. And if any of the men had called ahead to the security station—and why wouldn’t they have?—the exits would be well guarded.

Echo ran his thumb along the side of his laser disrupter, feeling for the switch. He would have to time things exactly right so that all the Enforcers were within the disrupter’s range. If even one of them was out of range, he and Taylor would be shot and captured.

Taylor reached the first-level door, hit the control button, and was through it before it slid halfway open. He followed after her, searching the hallway as he emerged into it. The elevator door began to slide open as he ran past, and he saw men poised to pour out of it. He sped forward, faster now that he was on level ground.

His thumb hesitated on the disrupter switch. The building entrance was still a couple minutes away, and several Enforcers were heading toward it in front of him.

Even if he disabled every single laser box, he wouldn’t be able to get through so many men. Could he at least hold them off so Taylor could escape? He had youth on his side, and the strength of having had a twin brother who enjoyed wrestling for entertainment. But he couldn’t win against so many. Besides, Taylor couldn’t survive in the city by herself. She couldn’t even access a car for an escape route. If they fought, they’d both be dragged to detention rooms. And his sentence would be even worse for inventing and using the disrupter.

Echo slipped the device back into his belt, picked up his speed, and with one last burst of energy lunged into Taylor, bringing her to the ground.

She twisted, trying to free herself, then saw it was Echo who’d tackled her.

She hit him on the shoulder hard.
“What are you doing?”

He shifted his weight, pinning her arms down. “You’ve got to go back to the office!” he shouted, using his modern speech. “Stop fighting!”

She didn’t stop fighting. She flailed and kicked, repeating every old-twenties swearword he’d heard of and some he hadn’t. Still, he kept her pressed to the ground while Enforcers surrounded them. Echo glared up at the men and the weapons pointed in his direction.

“Put your boxes away!” he yelled. “If you damage her, Helix will see you in the shredder.”

“Maybe,” one of the men said, “but he won’t mind if we use them on you.”

“Me? I had her under control—I was bringing her to Helix like he ordered—until some of the scientists decided to scare her. Now look at her. Helix wants to talk to her, and she’s writhing around on the floor. Put away your weapons before you give her seizures.”

Slowly, the Enforcers put their weapons back on their belts, but none of the men moved away.

Echo took hold of Taylor’s hands and tried to keep her from biting him. “Calm down,” he said, using the old-twenties accent so she’d understand. “I’ll do what I can to help you. Do you understand?”

“I understand perfectly,” she spat out between breaths. “You’re a slimy, two-faced rat!”

Two-faced rat? He’d never heard of those. Must have been an animal mutation from all the pesticides in her time period.

“It won’t do any good to keep fighting,” he said.

Taylor’s eyes burned like recharge coils, but she stopped struggling. She lay on the floor limply, breathing hard.

One of the Enforcers had been talking on a comlink. He turned it off and glared down at Echo. “That was Helix. He’s on his way from the cemetery and said to put the girl in a detention room until he can get here. He also said your signal is still at the cemetery, and he wants to know what you’re doing at the Scicenter.”

Echo shrugged as though it were a simple matter. “His tracker must be frozen on my last location. When my father told me that Helix wanted Taylor, naturally I left the cemetery and came here to find her. Everything would have been
bien
if your men hadn’t decided to play Dakine assassin and scare her brainless.”

The man’s eyes narrowed. He didn’t quite believe the story, but he didn’t contradict it. He just waved his hand at a couple of the men in the circle. “Take her to room twelve.”

Echo moved aside and let them grab Taylor. One man took her arms, the other her feet, and they carried her down the hall like a trash receptacle. She tried to kick her captors, and Echo hoped she succeeded, but he didn’t look into her face. He didn’t want to see the accusation in her eyes.

Instead he stood up, brushing at the wrinkles in his clothes. “If you don’t need me for any immediate translations, I’ll go back to the Histocenter to help bring Sheridan over. I assume Helix wants her too?”