The Paradox Initiative (15 page)

Kestrel, dressed and ready, stood in front of the coffee maker in the kitchenette, gazing back over her shoulder at Wolfe.

He lay on his back in his bed, the covers thrown half over him, one hand resting on his chest—asleep. She watched the steady rise and fall as he breathed.

She t
urned back to the coffee maker and poked the picture of plain black coffee. The machine buzzed to life, and within moments, hot liquid poured into a short ceramic cup.

Wolfe stirred, groaned. She faced him. He rubbed his face, t
hen lowered his hand.

“What’s that smell?”

“Coffee?” Kestrel supplied. He blinked, sucked in a breath, and halfway sat up. His night shirt hung unbuttoned—he closed one eye, swung his feet around and set them on the floor.

“Smells good,” he commented roughly, buttoning his shirt. Then he stood up,
tugged out his suitcase from beneath the bed and opened it. “Sorry, let me go make myself decent.” He pulled out a set of clothes and strode past her into the bathroom. The door shut. Kestrel moved the cup of coffee off to the side, then selected a fruity hot tea for herself. It instantly started to brew.

She stood there, leaning back against the counter, sipping her tea until she finished it. She faced the maker again,
bit her lip, and was trying to decide what she wanted next when the door opened.

“What’s this contraption?” Wolfe asked, coming to stand
close next to her. He was dressed in a black shirt, jeans and boots; clean-shaven, his hair mostly combed. And he didn’t smell like smoke anymore. He smelled earthy—with the barest hint of a sharp, masculine cologne. Kestrel’s breathing unsteadied for a moment, but she made herself stand still.

“
Oh,
now
you’re putting me on,” Kestrel chuckled in disbelief, picking up his coffee and handing it to him. “You know what it is.”

“Thanks,” he said.

“Do you think I should have a hot chocolate or a mocha?” she asked.

“H
ot chocolate,” he said, sipping his coffee. “At least it’s being honest with itself.”

Kestrel snickered, then pushed the button.
The chocolate poured into the small cup and foamed, leaving whipped cream on the top, and she picked it up and took a careful sip.

“Ooh, that’s
hot,” she murmured, touching her lip.

“Got to watch out for that,” Wolfe grinned, taking another sip and then crossing to the sitting room chairs. He eased down into one, set
tling back. Kestrel watched him.

“How do you feel?” she called.

“Fine,” he answered. “Why?”

Cradling her drink in both hands, Kestrel ventured toward him and sat in a chair to his right.
She hesitated.

“
I heard you coughing last night.”

He
gave her a sideways glance, then shrugged.

“
My cold is hanging on longer than I thought. Probably because of those cigarettes,” Wolfe assumed, taking a long drink and then setting the coffee down on the entertainment console. “Picked smoking up a while ago—just a bad luxury I allowed myself once in a while. I think I’ll get better now that I’ve stopped.”

Kestrel nodded, unsure.

“So,” he sat forward and put his elbows on his knees. “What’s there to do today?”

Kestrel looked at him. His
gray eyes were brighter, probably from the sleep he’d gotten, but his shoulders still seemed heavy, his smile tired.

“What if we went to see a 4-D?” she suggested.

“A what?” he asked, taking another swig of coffee. She stared at him.

“You
cannot
tell me that you’ve never been to a movie.”

He chuckled
darkly.

“My life til
l now hasn’t exactly allowed me a whole lot of leisure time.”

“Well, we have to fix this,” Kestrel determined. “I saw an ad for a theatre on level six—we can go get something for brunch and see what’s playing.”

“Sounds good,” he nodded. “Lead the way.”

“
The Almost King,”
Kestrel said, watching the names flicker by above the box office. “That looks good.”

“What is it?” Wolfe wondered, looking at the same thing.

“I heard about it—it’s about some ancient hero a really,
really
long time ago. He does some great things but when his people offer to make him king, he turns it down.”

“Hm,” Wolfe grunted. Kestrel wrinkled her nose
as she scanned the other titles.

“
The others aren’t any good,” she shook her head. “Nothing interesting.”

“You know more about this than I do,” Wolfe confessed.

“All right, let’s give it a try,” Kestrel said, striding toward the doors. They opened into an extremely long hallway riddled and strung with colorful flashing lights. Movie music themes from various famous stories greeted them as they walked in. Dozens of doors waited on either side of the hall, each one with a movie name blinking above it.

THE ALMOST KING

Kestrel stopped in front of that door and faced the computer console.

“
How many are in your party?”

“Two,”
she answered.

“Please insert your card.”

Kestrel did, then put it back in her pocket.

“Enjoy the show.”

The door opened, and they stepped into a large, tall, square room. The walls, floors and ceiling glowed soft blue. As they approached the center, two slots opened in the floor, and two chairs on short poles rose up.

“Please be seated,” a pleasant computer instructed. “Fasten your lap restraints
, and keep your feet on the foot rests at all times.”

Kestrel turned around and sat down on the chair on the right. Wolfe sat next to her, on
her
right. They both fastened their lap belts, and then Kestrel lifted her heels and hooked them easily on the bar that stuck out of the sides of the pole that elevated her chair. She looked over at Wolfe, who sat uneasily in the short-backed chair.

“Ready?” she asked.

“I’m not sure what to be ready for,” he admitted.

“It’s just a movie,” Kestrel shrugged, smiling.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” the computer said. “The lights will be dimming during your show. However, the exit sign will be lit all during the performance. Please locate it now.”

Kestrel glanced over to the left and found it, then nodded.

“Thank you, and enjoy the show.”

The ceiling, walls and floor faded to dark. For a moment, all was silent. Then, a low, stealthy musical score rose up as light arose.

They sat in a gray field beside a dirt road, which was bordered by a tangled black forest. The sky hung dark and overcast, only moonlight peering through the cuts in the clouds.

Wolfe sucked in his breath, startled. Kestrel smiled to herself, looking all around as well. Mist rose up and wove along the ground just below their feet, and the scent of damp forest, and frost, filled her lungs.

The soundtrack grew restless. Far ahead of them, in the depths of the shadows, something pattered.

A patter—that became a rumble.

And suddenly, out of the darkness and into the white moonlight, burst a single horse and rider.

Wolfe jerked.

The horse’s hooves flashed and thundered across the earth. The rider hunched over its neck, holding on for dear life, his coat bannering out behind him, his tricorn hat pushed down low on his brow. Gold writing faded to life beneath him, then disappeared:

April 19
th
, 1775

Then, all at once, Kestrel and Wolfe seemed to be flying alongside the rider. They swooped closer to his flank, the forest behind him blurring with the speed. His breath and the jet-engine breaths of the horse pounded in Kestrel’s ears as the wind rushed against her face and through her hair. They turned slightly, and Kestrel glimpsed buildings up ahead. Crude, wooden ones. The rider pulled off the main road and darted into the yard. Kestrel and Wolfe seemed to follow right with him, pausing beside a barn.

Lamps lit inside
the little house. The door opened—a man in a long nightgown stepped out on the porch, holding a lantern.

“Mr. Revere!” he called. “What news?”

“The British are coming!” the rider gasped. “Ready the militia! I go to spread word further!”

“Godspeed!” the man at the house urged him, and Revere wheeled his horse around, gave it a lash, and away he
shot. But Kestrel and Wolfe did not follow him.

Instead, their surroundings melted away, the
n clarified to become the cramped interior of the glowing house, now boiling with activity. It smelled like coal fire, dust and straw. The scruffy man set the lantern down, hurried around a wooden table and shook his tall sons, who slept in cots along the walls. They got up, asking him dozens of questions and throwing off their patchwork quilts. Then, they all pulled on their trousers and coats and shoes and hats, dug out their long, gleaming musket guns from beneath their beds, loaded up their ammunition and charged out into the night.

Kestrel and Wolfe
’s surroundings then transformed into a frenzied tapestry of a dozen different homes, all of which were awakening, donning their clothes and gathering their weapons. Mothers wept, wives gripped their husbands tight, and men dashed out the doors and toward the moonlit roads. Then, all of the tapestry coalesced into one scene—a scene into which Kestrel and Wolfe immediately plunged. They moved amongst the walking ranks of men as they hurried through the woods, and the sky lightened with the dawn. Ahead of them, an open space waited. A meadow. Kestrel could see the tall grass. The men, all around them, muttered encouragement to each other. Their weapons clinked against their belt buckles, their clothes rustled, their boots snapped on twigs and underbrush. Branches passed overhead, whispering with their passage.

They drew to a halt on the edge of the meadow. Kestrel looked around her—they stood in the second line of troops. One tall, youn
g, gangly soldier poised on Wolfe’s right. An old, grizzled warrior hunched to Kestrel’s left. In front of them, the men held their muskets across their chests, quieting. Listening.

But o
ne of them was breathing hard, right near Kestrel. She glanced around. All the rustic soldiers stood still. She blinked, and looked at Wolfe.

He swallowed, staring past the shoulders of the front line, his jaw clenched. Kestrel opened her mouth…

“Ssst,” the captain lifted his hand, then pointed. Kestrel’s head whipped around.

Across the field, a bridle rattled.

Their line of men stiffened.

And out of the
murky fog of the dawn melted nine-hundred red-coated, black-hatted British soldiers. And a good many of them rode on horseback.

“Hold your ground, men,” the captain muttered.

Wolfe’s breathing labored, tightened—sped up. Kestrel sat up and glanced at him again, wondering what was wrong…

Both lines began to shift, restless, nervous. Challenging.

“Steady,” the captain held up a warning hand. “Hold your fire until—”

BOOM
!

Smoke exploded through the air—a flash, an impact, a thundering snap.

Wolfe lashed out and snatched Kestrel’s arm. She jerked.

“What—”
she yelped.

The shot echoed through the forest. The lines rattled.

“Ready!” the British captain shouted, raising an arm. The British lifted their rifles and aimed straight at them. The Minutemen aimed back.

“Oh, God—” Wolfe
moaned—

“Fire!”

Shots burst out from both sides. Explosions peppered Kestrel’s hearing. The air swam with gunsmoke. A soldier next to Kestrel screamed, threw up his arms and fell to the ground—

Wolfe
moved.

He threw himself out of his chair—his feet hit the floor—

The scene disappeared instantly.

The floor, walls and ceiling blinked to bright blue.

Kestrel stared up at Wolfe, who stood right in front of her,
over
her, his hands reaching past her shoulders to brace on the back of her chair, his eyes screwed shut. Bent over her, leaning in very close.

“Hey,” she whispered, shaken.
He opened his eyes. For a moment, they didn’t focus. Didn’t see anything. Then he blinked again, three more times…

He met her gaze.

He drew in a deep breath, withdrew and stood up, passing a hand across his face.

“People do this for entertainment?” he grated
, facing the far wall. “Stand right in the middle of a battle without any weapons?”

“It isn’t real,”
Kestrel murmured.

He looked at her.

And what she saw reflected in those bright, weary gray eyes silenced her. He let out a sigh that shuddered.

Her heart twisted and clenched.

“I’m…I’m sorry,” she breathed, her throat catching—though she was at a loss as to why she was apologizing.

He softened.

“Not your fault,” he said, sniffing and shaking his head. “Not your fault at all.”

“You want to go?” she asked. He hung his head, then nodded twice.

“Yeah, I think we’d better.”

Kestrel ate dinner alone. Wolfe had discovered that meals could be brought to the room, so he ate there. Kestrel, however, couldn’t sit still any longer. She had to move, had to walk
—had to clear her head. So she made three laps of the entire level before she settled down and found a small sandwich shop.

She sat in a booth and finished off her food slowly, then sat back and sipped her drink, watching the foot traffic out the window, fighting to keep the tension in her chest at bay.

“Pardon me.”

Her head came up.

Standing beside her booth was a young man.

The same tall,
good-looking, gold-haired, blue-eyed man she had seen at the beginning of the voyage. He still had his long camel coat, now draped over his left arm. Now he wore brown and cream-colored classy travel clothes. He smiled down at her, friendly and easy.

“Yes?” she asked, startled. He canted his head, his brow furrowing at her without his expression losing its amiability in the least.

“I’m sorry, but I couldn’t help but notice how rapidly you walked through the level just a while ago. Several times, I believe.”

He had an English accent—an educated, pre
cise and delicate version, accompanied by a musical tenor voice.

“Ha, yes,” Kestrel nodded, managing to answer his smile.
“I um…I was tired of sitting in my cabin. Had to get some exercise.”

“That’s exactly what I was afraid of,” he said, with interested seriousness. “I’m William Anthony, the ship’s chief surgeon.” He held out his hand to her. She took it. His
hand was soft, but strong.

“
I’m—uh,” Kestrel started, mentally staggering before she realized what to say. “I’m April Johnson.”