JACKIE:

Back in time, Baxter and I hit the PX checkpoint, where a thick mob of people waited to get into the subway station. I craned my neck to see what was going on up ahead. Police cars, Life Rite vans, and uniformed men and women clogged the entrance to the underground metro.

“The checkpoint,” I said with a sigh. “Here we go again. Time to change the course of history.”

Baxter’s eyes darted around. Now it was clear why he didn’t want me to go through the checkpoint. How much did Pops know about my true identity?

I tried to steel myself for what came next. The police officer who shot us waved the line forward.

“Maybe we should go another way,” Baxter suggested.

“I agree. Let’s get the hell out of here.”

We turned around and walked into the fray.

I heard the woman asked, “What does that mean? Do I have the PX virus?”

Commotion trickled through the mob of people waiting to pass. That poor woman was dragged to a Life Rite van against her will. Another reminder of how disposable we all are. I pulled Baxter’s arm and wrapped him in a bear hug.

“Pops, I know the truth about my mother.”

Baxter looked at me, surprised. “So you finally know how special you are?”

His confidence in me brought tears to my eyes.

“How much do you know, Pops?”

That incessant clicking sound interrupted our conversation. Alpha scanned the crowd with its facial recognition laser.

“Come on,” Baxter said as he pulled me onward. “We’ll talk more later.”

I hid my face with my hands to evade Alpha’s evil eye.

We made our way through the sea of people, which was no easy feat. Shoulder after shoulder knocked me around as we went against the desperate horde.

Baxter whispered, “Whatever you do, don’t go through one of those checkpoints. Promise me.”

“I promise,” I lied.

“Trust is the glue that holds families together,” Baxter reminded me. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the truth sooner, pumpkin.”

I hugged Baxter again and said, “It’s okay, Pops. Thanks for taking such good care of me.”

We held each other tight. I didn’t want to let him go.

“Hey, you two! Get back in line. Time to comply,” the police officer shouted at us. He had already drawn his gun and aimed it at us.

“Crap! I fell into the exact same probability.”

Baxter grabbed my arm, and we broke into a sprint. My back tingled with fear as we ran away from the armed officer.

“Freeze!”

I looked back as he trained his gun on us. This time, I bumped Baxter out of the way.

The pistol fired with a deafening bang. I fell to my knees and grabbed my stomach. Blood poured out of my fresh wound.

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Screams came from all sides. Mine were the loudest. Tears spilled from my eyes as I looked at Baxter when he came to my side. The crowd dispersed in all directions around us.

“Run!” I yelled to Pops.

Instead, he grabbed my hand and put my arm around his neck. He struggled to pick me up. We hobbled forward, surrounded by a growing chaos.

The police officer walked toward us, weaving his way through the restless mob stirring around him.

“I love you, Pops,” I said through my tears, a blood bath all over my jumpsuit.

“I said comply!” the officer yelled. He shot Baxter at close range. Baxter’s body slipped out from under me, and we fell into a bloody pile in the street.

I stared into Baxter’s glazed eyes. He was gone instantly. I whispered goodbye, but he didn’t hear me.

Someone from the crowd threw a homemade grenade into a storefront next to us. The bomb exploded, sending flames and debris into the street.

I sat up and looked into the fire. The flickering of the flames took me into myself, and I indulged in the reservoir of my own mind. I sadly slipped out of the stream, leaving no better off than I came.

I stepped out into the slipstream’s vast void, dejected. No matter what I did, Baxter would get shot. The probability was already written. Baxter’s fate was sealed. Beatrice was probably right. You can’t change the past.

New fire sparks rained down on me, but the rush was gone. Lost and alone, I didn’t know where to go next. I couldn’t find Firestorm and couldn’t save Baxter. I had no interest in running future scenarios about dumb business deals. Yet I wasn’t ready to leave.

The high of this place made the real world dull and grey. What to do? My familiar sense of dread crept back in.

Another spark glittered and captured my attention, so I moved toward it. It was a simple moment from my childhood.

“Yes, this will be the perfect experience to ground me.”

I focused and went into the past stream.

Back to the home I was born into. I forgot about this place. It was spacious and clean, a palace compared to communal living with Baxter and our endless string of roommates.

I looked down at my stubby little toddler body standing in a crib. Must have been two-years-old.

My mother, Grace, sat on the floor folding laundry. The sun shone in from the window, illuminating her glossy blonde hair with a tinge of red from the Grid. She looked like an angel.

I laughed, and she moved toward the crib.

She spoke to me in baby talk. “Hi. Hi. How’s my little love? Huh? How you doing? Hi.”

I tried to talk, but it came out as gobbledygook.

Grace kissed me and smiled. With her face up close, I saw dark circles under her eyes. The rest of her skin was pale. She coughed, a little at first, then a whole hack job. Gross.

“You okay?” Zayne raced into the room.

“I’m fine,” Grace lied. “Just a little cough.”

“Please go to a doctor. There’s an elder in my village who —

“No! We’re never going back to that damn island, okay?”

“Okay…” Zayne raised his hands in surrender.

Trying to soften the blow, Grace stood up and hugged him. She ran her hands over the back of his arms. He recoiled under her touch.

“Stop,” he said.

“What’s the matter?” Grace asked.

“Nothing. I don’t talk, okay?”

“Try again,” Grace chided.

Zayne sighed. He said with extra enunciation, “I don’t want to talk about it, okay?”

“That’s better. How do you expect to get a job if you don’t speak proper English? Now come back here. I want to see that patch of skin on your neck. I think it’s getting worse. Maybe it’s eczema.”

“No!” Zayne screamed, startling me and my mother.

“Geez, you don’t have to get defensive. I’m trying to help. I have so many nice creams.”

“Creams won’t help, Grace,” Zayne said. “Leave it.”

I called out from my crib. “Don’t leave it! Dad, make sure she goes to the doctor! And mom, look at his skin. He’s mutating! You’ve got to help each other!”

Of course, the wisdom I was dropping fell on death ears because I was a toddler in this stream. What was the use, anyway? You can’t change the past.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a drone pop into the stream. It explored the room like a fly, zipping around at dizzying speed. I yelled for my parents to see it. They looked, but didn’t notice it.

As they argued, the drone pricked Grace in the back of the neck, stealing a blood sample. She stopped arguing and got a far-away look in her eyes.

The drone’s insides glowed as the blood flooded into its belly. It clicked its eye several times quickly; click, click, click. A screw fell from its eyelid and landed on the carpet.

The screw lit on fire, and the hot metal expanded quickly. I watched in horror as the screw mutated into a replica of the original drone. It cloned itself!

The entire transformation only took a few seconds. I cried and pointed at the clone, but my parents ignored me.

“Grace? Grace?” Zayne said as the replica drone pricked the back of his neck.

As the new drone synthesized his blood sample, Zayne zoned out as well. My parents from the past stood still, as if they were turning into ghosts.

Maybe that’s all they ever were…

A screw fell off the replica and landed in my crib. I cried and clutched my blanket at the other edge of the cot. The screw burst into flames, and the hot malleable metal grew into a third drone.

I looked around my nursery to see three replica drones circling me with needles drawn, ready to steal more of my blood and turn me into a ghost next. I gripped my crib bars, trapped and helpless.