Odette Speex: Time Traitors Book 1 (5 page)

He had a feeling she was clinging to a habit or convention that in some way was more fitting with her nature. It was as if she had been pulled out of her proper place and plopped down here, in a twenty-first century that just did not compute. This wasn’t the first time he had felt a shift or blur in the timeline.

He pursed his lips to hide his disorientation. “An agreeable luxury,” he said. “We would be most obliged if you would drop us at the Empire Union Building.”

Chapter 5

Wisps of cloud
slid by the window and curled away like friendly ghosts. It was a moonless night, and Odette could just see a sprinkling of stars through the thick haze. New York City lay at her feet, but her eyes rarely strayed from the dirigible platform several floors above the observation deck where she sat with Odell.

“Have you ever flown in one?” she asked her brother.

“Not that I recall,” he replied absently.

She looked at him skeptically. “How could you not recall riding in a dirigible?”

Odell looked down at his plate and pushed the half-eaten piece of chocolate cheese cake to the side. Linking his fingers together, he sighed heavily and leaned forward. He looked at her for an indecisive moment, then leaned back in his chair and ran his fingers through his hair.

Their surroundings were elegant. The observation deck was a graceful mix of restaurant and passenger lounge. Only the affluent could afford air travel and the eighty-sixth floor of the Empire Union Building reflected this. Richly clad couples gathered at the bar or danced to the music of a big band. Some, like Odette and Odell, came only to dine and watch the enormous airships dock and depart. Others were clearly waiting to board or disembarking from newly arrived flights. At this time of night, few flights were scheduled and the atmosphere was festive with wealthy young partygoers.

This was Odette’s first visit to the upper reaches of the Empire Union Building. She had spent most of the evening soaking up the ambiance and mesmerized by the graceful ships. She also noted Odell’s sidelong glances and uncharacteristic fidgeting. He wanted to speak with her but didn’t know how to begin.

“What is it Odell?” she said in her firm, sisterly voice. “I’ve been commendably silent about how you can even afford to bring me here. So spit it out. What’s going on? What have you gotten yourself into?”

He slouched a little and stuck his hands in his pockets. Odette smiled. Odell would sulk like this when they were kids. Now, however, this boyish posture mixed with the rumpled hair, handsome face, and athletic physique garnered him admiring looks instead of the admonishing glares once received from their mother. Clearly his sister, Odette was the beneficiary of friendly smiles from women hoping for an introduction.

“I’m not stupid, Odell,” she said reprovingly.

He sat up and blinked at her in surprise. “I’ve never thought that. I have never said you were stupid.” He looked at her uncertainly. “Have I?”

“Of course you’ve never said it,” she snapped. “But something has happened. Something has changed.” Her voice caught and she sat back to compose herself.

Odell leaned across the table and grasped her hand. “I’ve wanted to tell you. It’s just complicated. Very, very complicated.”

“Listen, Odell, I know you are involved with Drake somehow. And The White Swan. Your recent elevation at the Academy, the money, your illness last year—you’ve never fully explained any of this to me.” She looked at him intently. “I want to help. If it’s Drake, if you’re in trouble…”

“It’s not trouble like you think, Odette. It’s much bigger. And I’m just afraid you’re going to think I’m crazy when I tell you.”

“You are crazy!” She laughed. “Not crazy-crazy, just visionary crazy.”

Odell smiled in return and looked around them. He had requested this table in particular. Large potted plants encircled it and left only a narrow gap for the waiter and a view of the dance floor. The music was just loud enough to cover their conversation without forcing them to raise their voices. The enormous picture window had a magnificent view of the dirigible platform jutting out from the one hundred and second floor—certainly a good enough reason for anyone to be sitting in this spot.

He drew back and put his head in his hands. Odell had thought of this moment a thousand times. He had watched her for months. He had seen her kindness and courage. He knew she trusted him like she trusted no one else. Her belief in him was central to everything. She was the key to all his plans.

“Odette, it was never supposed to be like this!” he blurted out. “This place… those things floating out there… the bloody aristocrats! None of it!”

Her confused and concerned look forced him to regain his self-control. “Ever since I was a kid, I’ve been interested in physics and time. How the universe functions.”

“I know.”

“What you don’t know is that I figured it out.”

“Figured what out?”

“Time. How it works… how to move through it.”

She shook her head disbelievingly. “Move through time? Like to the past or future?”

“Yes,” he replied bluntly.

Just then a waiter wandered by, and she waved him down. “A shot of tequila, please.” He hurried off, and she turned back to her brother. “Time travel,” she said, shaking her head again. “I’m sorry, Odell, but that is crazy-crazy. You’re having me on, right?”

“Listen, Odette, I can’t explain it to you. You wouldn’t understand.” She gave him a hard look, and he held up his hand. “Not because you’re stupid. None of the fellows at the Academy would understand either. It requires knowledge that doesn’t exist in this timeline. Relativity, the fundamental basis for my work, has never been discovered. In this reality, Einstein was a simple mail clerk.”

Odette looked at her brother intently. She had never known him to lie or exaggerate, certainly not when it came to his work.

The waiter appeared with the tequila. Odette tipped it up and downed it in one. She brought the glass down hard on the table, scrunched up her face, exhaled through gritted teeth, and said, “Try me.”

He looked at her set expression. “Fine,” he replied in his clipped professorial tone. “Basically, time is not some unchanging constant. It can be influenced by outside factors, such as motion and speed. Essentially, the faster one goes the slower time moves.”

Odette rolled her eyes. “That makes no sense.”

Odell leaned forward impatiently. “And it’s not going to. For this to make sense would take years of study and research. I’m trying to explain as best I can so you don’t think I’m a nutcase,” he finished a little angrily.

“Okay. I’m sorry. Go on.”

“It’s clear from the Theory of Relativity that we can move forward in time. But moving backward, into the past, was typically considered impossible.”

He picked up the salt shaker and methodically made three slim lines with the salt on the tablecloth. He used the butter knife to push the lines together in a few places so the whole thing looked something like beads on a necklace. At the intersections he swirled the salt into tiny whirlpools.

“Each line represents a place, or more correctly, a direction in time—past, present, and future. Let’s eliminate the future line.” He pushed it aside with the butter knife. “It’s not necessary for your understanding.”

He pointed at the remaining two. “That leaves us the past and the present. These two lines are typically independent from each other. But in some locations they come together, or more correctly, turn in on each other.” He indicated the intersecting spots. “These are places where time curves into itself.”

He looked up at her, and she raised her eyebrows. “Well,” he told her matter-of-factly, “I figured out how to find these intersections and access a temporal slipstream.”

“Temporal slipstream?” She hiccupped and grimaced.

He blew out his breath exasperated. “Odette, this is the best I can do. Without an understanding of Quantum Mechanics, String Theory, and two hundred years of knowledge before that, I can’t explain it to you completely. But it’s real. These crossings are something outside of time. Like another dimension. I call them Temporal Inter-dimensional Fluxes, TIFs for short. Because they aren’t stable, they’re always changing. With the proper calculations I can find a crossing or, more accurately, a spiral and use it to travel to the past and back to the present.”

“How do you make the calculations?”

“I built a machine, a computerized space-time machine. I call it a Temporatus. With it I can find a TIF and cross into another temporal slipstream to arrive at a specific time and place.”

“So you’ve traveled to the past?”

He nodded his head. “Twice.

“The first time…” he faltered and then drew in a deep breath. “The first time, Odette, was from a different present… a… a present where the American Agitators, or rather the Founding Fathers, succeeded in starting a revolution and winning. We should be sitting in the Empire
State
Building. In Manhattan. In New York State. In the United States of America.”

“Odell,” she barely whispered and looked around furtively. “The Americans were put down. Almost all of the Agitators were captured and hung.”

“No they weren’t. In the prime timeline, the real present, the American Revolution gave birth to a democratic movement that swept through Europe. France soon followed suit. You can’t imagine the profound effect it had on the world.”

Odette stared off into the distance and murmured, “ ‘We have it in our power to begin the world over again.’ ”

“What!”

“A quote by Thomas—”

“Paine! I know!” he whispered intensely. “But how do you know?”

She looked at him dazed. “I found some of his work in an old portable writing desk I bought at a street market a few years ago.” Her eyes came back into focus. “While refurbishing it, I sprung a lever and found a false bottom. There were several pamphlets and papers within. All of them written by Thomas Paine.”

“Good God! Where are they now?”

“I put them back in the desk. I figured they’d be safe there.” She grasped his hand fervently. “I’d never even heard of Thomas Paine. Every school kid learns about the American Agitators—traitors like Washington and Jefferson. But Paine… his writings… I could tell they were important. They left me breathless. But it’s like he never existed.”

“He existed alright. His words, like Jefferson’s, Adam’s, and Franklin’s gave voice to the revolution and much more.”

“Franklin?”

“Benjamin Franklin.”

She made a sound like a cross between a snort and a laugh. “Benjamin Franklin? The funny little inventor fellow? But he died long before the American Agitators.”

“He wasn’t supposed to. His death in London is what started this timeline. It’s part of what changed everything.”

A boisterous cheer from the partygoers interrupted them. Odette peered out from between the leaves of the potted plants and saw a group of elaborately dressed men and women sweep majestically into the room.

“It looks like the
haut ton
has decided to grace us with their presence,” she informed Odell sarcastically. “I can just make out the French Ambassador’s son, but I really can’t see anyone else.” She let the leaves fall back into place. “What kind of world did these revolutions create?”

“I won’t lie to you. It wasn’t a perfect world by far.” He hesitated, searching for the right words. “But it was a world of possibilities… a world of potential. Not this stagnant, wasted society we live in now.” He sneered in the direction of the frivolous aristocrats gathered around the bar.

“It gave men
and
women rights unheard of before. Monarchies and aristocracies were things of the past. The remnants of these structures hung on. But they were decorations… meaningless. They lacked any true power.”

“Democracy,” Odette quietly mouthed the outlawed word.

He nodded solemnly. “Yes, democracy. In all its messy glory.”

Odette swiveled her head around. “Where’s that blasted waiter? I want another drink.”

Odell pushed a glass of water toward her. “I need you with a clear head.”

“Oh my head’s clear, but it seems my wits are missing.”

He ducked his head to hide a smile. “Does that mean you believe me?”

She was distracted momentarily by the waiter. “Another shot of tequila, please.” Odette ignored his question and asked, “So how did you change all this?”

“Me?”

“I found you, Odell,” she replied firmly. “Do you remember what you kept asking me?” He shook his head. “ ‘What have I done?’ ” “ ‘What have I done?’ ” she repeated breathlessly.

He clenched his jaw and looked away. The waiter returned with Odette’s drink, which she quickly emptied. She then sat back and crossed her arms. “What did you do?”

“I’d published some of my findings in an obscure journal. I was an outsider. No one really took me seriously. I’d lost my place at the university and was trying to do independent research. But it was hard. I had no money and couldn’t get any grants.” He looked down at his hands and continued. “A man approached me. He said he could fund my research with money left over from a family trust. His only stipulation was to be the first to use my technology.” Odell took a sip of water and cleared his throat. “This man wanted to go back to a time when his family first lost their money and prestige. He wanted to change that so as to retain his social standing in the present.”

Odette’s mouth dropped open, and she released a little huff of air. “Drake.”

“I said you weren’t stupid.” Odell swallowed and shook his head ruefully. “I thought it was harmless enough. In my arrogance I believed I was in complete control. I had nothing holding me back… nothing grounding me.”

“Me.” Tears started in her eyes. “You had me.”

He looked away. “Nothing mattered but my work. I could only think of the recognition I would receive when we returned. I wanted to throw it all in the faces of those pompous professors who doubted me.” He laughed with bitter self-awareness. “I wanted mother to be proud of me.”

She looked intently into his eye. “Are you even my Odell?”

“I am.” He squeezed her hand so tightly she felt her bones crack.

“Why are you telling me this now?”

“I need your help. I need you to help make this right.”