Fusion (28 page)

D
oppelganger—a temporal duplicate of myself. Is that what she was? I watched the girl as she slid on the ice like she’d known no other way of getting around, focused on one thing only—slamming the puck into the goal.

I
knew
that. Not by the way she skated, nor by her facial expression, which was hidden behind the caged helmet. I knew it because I felt it. I might be her doppelganger, but she was so much more to me. Her whole being had been fused with mine.

David and I stood hidden in the shadows of the otherwise-empty viewing area at the ice rink so we wouldn’t get spotted. I didn’t have to look at him to know that he was smiling from ear to ear as he watched
A
skate.

The whistle blew, and she skated to the side, removing her helmet to unleash a cascade of platinum blond tresses. She grinned at one of her teammates and tossed her hair.

I was confused. “I thought she had brown hair…”

“Yeah, she dyed it again last night.” He laughed. “She can’t make up her mind.”

I stared at her. It was like I was looking in the mirror. There was just one little difference—my reflection was not separated from me by silver-coated glass. She could have been my twin, except I didn’t have one. No, she was
me
.

“You okay, Poppet?”

David’s soothing voice snapped me out of my transfixed state. “I guess. This is just so weird. Is she like a whole different person? Does she know about me?”

“Weird is right. Like I told you before, I haven’t told her about you. She doesn’t even know that I’m a Wanderer. She thinks I’m just a regular guy—”

I burst out laughing. “A regular guy? Really, David? You were never a regular guy, even before all the Wanderer stuff!”

He smiled. “What do you mean?”

I shrugged. He had always been extraordinary at everything he did.

“Ready to go back?”

I looked over at the rink again, my eyes drawn back to Arizona Stevens. Was she real? I felt a strong urge to touch her, just to make sure.

“Nope.” I slithered out of his grip and made a run for her. As I crossed the bleachers making my way toward the ice, somebody got me from behind, body tackling me, causing me to lose my balance, and I fell. I caught a glimpse of
A
again, and hundreds of memories bombarded me all at once—lying by the lake with Kellan, dancing with him at the Ball, walking around Paris with Luna… Inches before my nose hit the hard cement, I was jerked in the opposite direction and the ground faded away.

And reappeared as I landed moments later on the same hard cement, with David on top of me. “Ouch!” I screamed, wriggling to push him off me. “You big klutz. You’re going to break my back!”

“Miss? Are you okay?”

I looked up to see a big policeman roughly pulling David up from the floor.

“No, no,” I protested. “I’m fine. We were just joking around.” I got up to show him I was fine, even though my back was killing me.

David looked confused, and his eyes were out of focus.

“David?” I nudged him.

“Miss, is he high? Did he take something?” the policeman asked as David’s legs buckled.

“No! I think he might have hit his head. Can we get him to the hospital?”

The cop sat David down on the bench, still holding onto his elbow. “There are plenty of doctors here.” He looked around the rink. I followed his eyes, gasping at what I saw. And then the smell hit, knocking all air out of me. I sat down, gasping for breath. I barely heard the policeman bark into his cell for a paramedic.

“What happened here?” I asked the policeman, who probably thought I was high as well. Much as I fought the urge to look at the carnage around me, my eyes were drawn to the shredded, bloody bodies strewn all over the bleachers and ice. Was one of them
A
? Did I cause this by trying to meet her? My stomach ached at the thought.

“You tell me,” the cop said. “How long have you two been here?”

“I don’t know… ten minutes or so?”

He squinted at me. “That’s not possible. The whole place has been cordoned off for well over two hours. Only police, emergency, FBI, and military personnel have been allowed in here. How did the two of you get in? And what are your names?”

“Is this the boy?” A paramedic rushed up to us.

The policeman nodded as he let go of David. “Well?” he continued while the paramedic checked David out.

“I’m Arizona, and that’s David.”

“Last names, please. And your addresses.”

I gave them to him and he wrote it down.

“California? What are you doing in New Jersey? Are your parents with you?”

“Hockey,” I said. That one word had served as an unchallenged excuse for my brother a bazillion times. “What happened here?” I pointed to the bodies around us.

“Back up,” he said sternly. “How did you get in here?”

I wanted to say through the front door, but something stopped me. I was clearly not at the rink where
A
was just playing—at least I hoped not. David must have wandered me off in the clumsiest ride ever. I looked over at him. He stared at me, looking like he was with us again.

“I’d like to get him to the hospital. He’s got a bad gash on the side of his head.” The paramedic stood up and looked at the cop.

“I’m fine,” David protested.

“Fine enough for some questions?” the policeman asked.

“I don’t think so,” the paramedic answered for him. “David, do you feel able to walk on your own, or do you want me to get you a stretcher?”

“I can walk.”

“Are we free to go?” I asked.

“Not until you both tell me exactly what you’re doing here. I’m going to need to talk to both of you back at the station after you’re released from the hospital.” He looked over his shoulder. “Jim! Could you accompany these two to Princeton Hospital and keep an eye on them? Escort them to the station once they’ve been checked out. Call me if there’s going to be a delay.”

A burley six-foot-seven cop nodded and followed us as we skirted dozens of torn-up bodies on our way to the exit. It looked like the place had been attacked by a pride of ravenous lions. Bits of flesh and tissue were all over the place. Some of it stuck to the soles of our shoes as we walked. I covered my nose with one hand to stop myself from breathing in the rancid fumes, but they seeped through my fingers, choking me.

Halfway out of the building, I lost the battle to hold down my bile, bending over and emptying the contents of my stomach.

The paramedic passed me some wipes as David and the policeman watched. “I don’t blame you,” he comforted. “I did the same when I first got here. We’ll be out in the fresh air soon.”

I was blinded as we opened the door to walk outside—first by the bright sunlight and then by the hundreds of cameras flashing into our faces.

“Keep your head down, and walk toward the ambulance,” the paramedic instructed, steering us each by our elbow.

The parking lot was buzzing with people. It seemed like mostly cops and other official-looking men and women. And the press was out in full swing with camera crews from all the major stations peering at David and me. Crap. We were going to be in so much trouble when Mom and Dad found out.

As soon as we were locked in the back of the ambulance, I whispered to David, “Quick, wander us off!”

He looked at me, totally tapped out, and shook his head. “I can’t. Not yet.”

“Okay, we’re off,” the paramedic shouted from the front.

David and I held on as the ambulance turned a sharp corner.

“How bad is your head? Can I touch?”

David took my hand and moved it against the side of his head. I felt a sticky mound scrape against my palm.

“Are you going to be okay?” I asked. A concussion could be really serious. I needed to contact his mom.

“I’m fine, just
really
pissed off at you. And what the heck is going on here—those bodies…” his voice flaked out.

“David,
A
’s not in there, is—”

He looked confused again for a moment, but then he shook his head. “No, I wandered you. We’re back in our home dimension.”

“We’re in New Jersey in our home dimension? What do you think happened at the rink? Is this why Dad wanted us out of here?”

“I don’t know. I’m hoping we find out more at the hospital. Once I get rehydrated, I’ll hopefully be able to take you back.” His face turned angry again. “What were you doing?”

“Looking at
A
made me feel things, remember stuff. I wanted to get closer to her. To touch her. I felt like I might become whole, that everything that I seem to have forgotten over the last year would come back to me.”

“You promised me you wouldn’t.”

The paramedic drove up the ambulance ramp and let us out. He insisted that David get into a wheelchair before he escorted us in. Jim followed close behind. The hospital seemed deathly quiet with just a few nurses and doctors scurrying around. Where were all the patients? We walked through the ER waiting area. Again, not a patient in sight.

“Where is everyone?” I asked the paramedic.

“Don’t you teens ever pay attention to the news?”

“Not really,” I said.

“The Governor has declared a state of emergency, like most of the other states have. Everyone is obviously scared shitless at the moment and hiding out in their homes. Some families have even moved in together. Safety in numbers and all that. All the hospital patients have been moved to the higher floors, with mostly just armed guards in the lower ones.”

“Because of what happened at the rink?”

“No, but that’s what’s going on all over the place. Hence the panic.” He looked at me like I was an idiot. “Where are you folks from anyway?”

“California.”

“Well, I guess California hasn’t been hit yet, but still… It’s been all over the news. How can you not know?”

He took us up to the makeshift ER on the fourth floor where a grumpy-looking nurse pursed her lips at David and sighed at the paramedic.

“What do we have here?” she grumbled.

“Head wound. Do a drug panel on both of them.”

“Gotcha. They in custody?”

“Just for questioning, at least for now,” Jim said. “I’ll need to take them to the station as soon as they’re released.” He bent down so that his face was close to David’s. “The place is swarming with armed cops, so try anything and boom!”

“All righty, let’s have a look at you,” the nurse said and wheeled David to a bed.

An hour later, after a scan of his head, David was propped up in bed with an IV stuck in his arm for hydration. I sat in an armchair next to him.

“Ready to go, Poppet?”

“I have been ready for hours. How are you feeling?”

“Pretty much back to normal. We should go. It would be better to do it from outside the hospital, but I don’t think Jim will let us past. I guess we’re most likely going to land in a hospital bed. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that it’s empty.” He flinched as he clumsily unhooked himself from the IV drip.

I found a bandage on his bedside table and covered his wound.

“Climb in with me, and put your arms around my waist.”

I did what he said, and we wandered back.

N
ever the twain shall meet
. Olivia had, of course, considered the possibility of doppelgangers during the course of her research into the possible offshoots of traveling through the Portal. She’d even known of their existence. The Dillards had been clear proof of their reality. However, looking at the picture Ella just handed to her sent a fresh chill through Olivia. Not because of the pictures—Celia had shown her those already—but because Ella had seen them. The two Ellas were in the same dimension. That was unsettling, unnatural, and instinct told her that it would be calamitous if they ever met. She had no scientific data upon which to base her instinctive feelings. None. But this time she would trust her gut. She couldn’t allow the two to meet. The sooner they got back home to their own dimension, the better. Whatever had occurred here after they journeyed through the Portal was best left alone.

“Where did you find this, Ella?”

Ella fidgeted nervously, twirling a strand of hair through her fingers. “In Mrs. Pope’s closet,” she whispered so softly that Olivia had to lean forward to hear her.

Olivia checked herself, breathing slowly to maintain her calm. Now was not the time to admonish Ella’s nosiness. That would have to be dealt with later. “Were there more of these?”

“Yes, a whole bunch. I just grabbed those when I heard her walk up the hallway.”

“Have you shown them to anyone else?”

“I showed them to Arizona. She told me to show them to you.”

“That’s good. Did she say anything else?”

“She said that they might have been photoshopped, that maybe Celia is doing a fun scrapbooking project for you.”

“And what do you think?” Olivia noticed Ella’s obvious contempt at that suggestion.

“Mom, it’s not me in that picture, but someone who looks a lot like me. Why don’t we just ask Mrs. Pope who it is?”

“Don’t you think that would be a bit difficult without mentioning how you got hold of them? But you’re maybe right. It’s probably someone who looks a lot like you.”