s3.e1

Time Bomb

           On the first day of 1990, Wes and Jace had lunch in the mall food court around noon. The holiday rush done and gone, the place was sparsely populated outside of a few wandering teens twiddling away their winter break, or some older folks making gift returns. Wes seemed to be in a sour mood. Jace, waiting impatiently at the other side of the table with his slice of pizza already munched, tapped his fingers and sighed.

            “You gonna tell me the plan or what?” he asked.

            “Plan…” Wes mumbled and finally took another bite of his pie.

            “Yeah, I mean, we can’t afford another night at the hotel, and we can’t go anywhere in time right now because the quartzes aren’t working.”

            “Uh-huh… That’s a… A real pickle, isn’t it?”

            Jace glared at him, then eased up and replied, “I say we talk to André. He was your time-science business partner guy in another future life. I bet he’ll set us up with a place to stay while we figure out the problem.”

            “I don’t want to hang out with him right now, Jace. I mean, I’m still just trying to wrap my head around… everything. If I’m in his presence too long, he’ll end up telling me more creepy things about my older self, intentionally or otherwise.”

            “Is that really a big deal?”

            “I don’t want to hear more of that crap! How’d you like it if I sat here and told you that you become a horrible, selfish, obsessed weirdo in a couple decades?”

            Jace shrugged. “I’d try to change for the better.”

            “Augh… It was my fault all of this happened in the first place. André wouldn’t have made the door that led this version of me to the past, if not for old me.”

            “C’mon, stop trying to see the bad in everything. Maybe this whole adventure we’ve been having will keep you from being an old obsessed dude to begin with. Plus, it gave us a chance to help your friends. And save Ash. Look at the good parts.”

            “I know, I know…” Wes’ face disappeared into his hands. “I just… don’t know what I’m supposed to do now, even if we do get back to ’96. We have to prevent the earthquake, sure, but then what? Everything feels so messed up.”

            “What do you want to do? Maybe you should just ease up on all the plans and schemes. Have some more fun in the past, like we did when we first went back.”

            “I guess… I could just wait a few years, let time go by. There’s a lot to like about the early 90s. Maybe we’ll figure out the quartz by the time we catch up to ourselves.”

            “I hope you aren’t serious. I’ll be, like, seventeen by then.”

            “That’s okay. I’ll just go back in time, to right now, let this version of myself have his turn, and then as my older self, I’ll take you back home. Older, and wiser.”

            “Sounds… like a big waste of time.”

            “Oh, hey, there you are!” Wes exclaimed, waved, and looked past Jace’s shoulder.

            Jace flipped around in his seat, but only saw the Sam Goody that would become the arcade; no sign of a forty-something version of his uncle.

            “Wes, quit playing around…” Jace mumbled and faced forward to stare at him. “Now isn’t a good time for another ‘nostalgia attack’ or endless jokes.”

            “I’m just asking for a few more hours to wrap my mind around everything, bud,” he exhaled sharply. “I stayed up late with a racing mind and woke up all out of sorts.”

            “André really messed you up that much, huh…”

            “It isn’t just him. I was messing with the quartz last night, and…”

            “Did you figure out how to fix it?”

            “No, but… Never mind. I’ll tell you later. I just feel a little off, is all.”

            Jace followed Wes’ eyes as he watched another teenager pass by, this one with acid-washed jeans, a denim vest, and dyed green hair. By this point, his uncle had studied about a half dozen of them over the course of their lunch. It wasn’t in any sort of creepy way; more like he was some sort of documentarian, quietly observing the wild teenager in its natural habitat. Then Jace remembered a recent talk.

            “You really think 80s kids are something special, don’t you?”

            “I mean, I did tell you that I kind of wish I got to be one.”

            “Yeah, yeah… You wanted to grow up with the best Saturday morning cartoons, golden age Nintendo, Michael Jackson, MTV, John Hughes, The Goonies… Blah, blah.”

            Wes smirked, adding, “And all without late-stage capitalism and the internet ruining things just yet. Okay. One more good look at the mall circa 1990, then we go.”

            Jace tagged along with Wes as he toured the place, now able to get a better look at all the stores—especially those that wouldn’t be around in a few years.

            “Isn’t it great, getting a chance to live in even more years?” Wes prattled. “I mean, think about it, kid. According to history, you exist in four—five?—additional years than you would’ve without this whole experience. I don’t think we’ve shown time travel the proper respect so far. Problems and bumps in the road aside, it’s an amazing thing.”

            “Yeah, I guess…”

            “You know what I want to do, Jace? Or be, rather? A fifth-dimensional being, able to walk through time like we’re walking through the mall. Pick a store, or a year,” he gestured towards Sheepers, “and visit for a bit. Hang out with the locals. End of the day, you go back to your time-space station or whatever. Changes aren’t permanent; no risk of screwing up the continuum.” Wes turned around, walked backwards, and started using his arms in an expressive manner. “Revisit the best years of the past, like they’re a fine wine. See an awesome moment otherwise lost to time. Get answers to nagging questions. If André just kept developing his science project instead of filling the role of a retiring Biff Tannen, he could’ve ended up with something capable of doing that.”

            Jace, hands in his jacket pockets, shrugged and replied, “I dunno, Wes. You still have to live in the present, no matter what year you’re in. We’re both still aging. I should be about at the end of sixth grade by now. What’s there to really do with your own past, other than think about it, maybe watch some old movies, play a few old games?”

            “You could take a day off and literally relive a better day, that’s what I’m saying! Time’s a bitch, Jace. Just keeps moving ahead, and details and stories fade away and get lost. It takes a lot of work to get through a single day, and then what? You just have to eventually forget everything that happened during that day? It could’ve been terrible, or amazing, but after a year, it barely matters anymore. If I were a super hero, my power would be time travel. That’s all I’m saying. I never want to forget.”

            Jace sighed again, replying, “You come up with a lot of funny ideas, Unk.”

            “But don’t we already have the power to do it all, almost?” Wes took the quartz out of his pocket and locked his eyes into its translucent angles and pink sheen. “We could go anywhere with this thing, right? The distant past, the far future, Taco Tuesday at the Corny Cantina, a rainy Friday afternoon in 1985…”

            “Something special about that day?”

            “I was born. Other than that, nothing much.”

            Wes’ eyes turned to two teenage guys walking past, both of them looking tough with ripped clothing and t-shirts from heavy metal concerts. They looked like a couple of punks, but Wes didn’t care. It only mattered that they were somehow interesting.

            “You lookin’ at something, dude?” one of the two said after he and his buddy stopped and turned around as they walked past. “Got a problem?”

            “None at all,” Wes assured them. “Just thinkin’ about how great the 80s were. I hope you cool kids enjoyed it. Never going to be another decade like it.”

            The two’s broship had mannerisms similar to Bill & Ted. They looked at each other, laughing like Wes was the lamest adult in the world.

            “Whatever you say, ass munch.”

            They snickered and got back to walking through the mall to find someone else to mock. Jace gave Wes another curious glance, surprised he didn’t seem insulted.

            “You really are in some sort of mood…” Jace mumbled.

            “I’m telling you, kid, I suddenly feel… free… Weird, confused, but free.”

            “And how’d that happen?”

            “Still trying to understand it myself. One more place I wanna check out.”

            As they headed towards the exit by the JCPenney, Wes stopped for a moment to observe a group of tweens about Jace’s age at a table. Three boys were going through each other’s trading cards, while listening to some Billy Joel on a portable radio. Once they noticed Wes, they stopped their chat and looked over at him, a little weirded out.

            He grinned, gave a thumbs up, and said, “You guys are gonna love the 90s.”

            “Okay, Wes, that’s enough,” Jace grumbled and pulled at his arm to hasten their exit. “Probably not a good idea to keep doing that.”

            “Yeah. They’ll find out on their own, anyway. I shouldn’t spoil the surprise.”

            Jace followed Wes out of the mall, and the two kept going without boarding a bus, walking right down the sidewalk that bordered a busy highway. The weather was warming, and the last remnants of snow were melting away down the storm drains.

            “I know we’re out of money, but are we actually going anywhere?” Jace asked over the noise of the traffic. “Or is this another one of your tours?”

            “Like I said, I just got one more destination in mind,” Wes shouted back.

            After traversing a few more crosswalks over wide swaths of asphalt, the sight of the sprawling mall’s exterior disappeared and Wes turned left, taking them down a quieter side street full of strip malls and auto part shops. Another couple of blocks later, he stopped in front of a large, run-down building with a currently empty parking lot. A one-eyed pirate mascot overlooked the venue from a marquee above the entrance, from a faded painting that looked like it was right out of a 1950s magazine ad.

            “What’s this?” Jace wondered as they stopped and looked. “I haven’t exactly been on the street behind the mall that much. Another place that closes?”

            “Well, yeah, but it’s still around another couple years. It’s only empty right now because it’s New Year’s Day. As you can see from the sign, this is Jolly Roger’s Treasure Trove. Eh… My history’s a little fuzzy here, but I think it was the original kids’ place to be in town. Kind of a junior remnant of Royal Valley’s brief casino days. It closes before King Arcade opens. They knew they’d lose the last of their business.”

            “So… another arcade?”

            “It’s pre-video arcade. I believe it opened in the late 50s as a roadside attraction after the interstate was built nearby. Carnival and boardwalk games, mostly. And it has a mini-golf course out in the back. Hazy mems of this place; didn’t go that often. But I bet my dad did when he was younger. I just wanted to stop by while I had the chance.”

            “Is it important to you, somehow?”

            “I… Yeah, maybe.” Wes sighed and slid his hands into his pockets. “I had my seventh birthday party here, shortly before it shut down. It was fine and everything, but something happened that has always nagged at me, and my mom was never really forthcoming on the details when I asked about it once I was older…”

            “Something to do with your dad again?” Jace asked earnestly.

            “Guess you know me by now. Yeah… That guy.”

            “We already walked this far. Let’s try and find out what happened.”

            “I’m sure it’s just typical adult drama, Jace.”

            “Don’t care. You got me curious. So let’s figure out the quartz thing and go.”

            Wes thought it over for a minute or so, then took out his time crystal and gave its error messages their hundredth look. He spotted the dumpsters on the side of the next building over, and Jace went with him to their next time-travel safe point.

            “Alright, punching it in…” Wes clenched his teeth and specified the temporal destination at 07-05-1992, and guessed the time at around noon. “Here goes nothing.”

            Squeezing his synchronized quartz tightly, Jace waited for something to happen. Unsurprisingly, nothing indeed did. Wes exhaled and looked at the quartz, frustrated.

            “Any new ideas?” Jace asked him.

            “I… I don’t know. These things are borderline alien technology.”

            “C’mon, you’re an IT guy, even if you might be a little rusty by now. I get that you’re in some sort of funk, but there has to be a way to figure it out.”

            “I know! Augh…” Wes rubbed his forehead and grumbled. “I’ve looked through every menu, error log, quantum tuning configs that I barely comprehend…”

            “Maybe you’ve been overthinking it. I think you told me once what usually ends up solving the problem when someone calls you up asking for help. What was…”

            Wes’ eyes grew a little wider and he stared at his nephew. “… Restarting?”

            “Yeah. Works for my iPhone when it’s acting stupid. How’s this so different?”

            No way it’s that simple… Wes thought, and looked down at his quartz.

            He replied, “That isn’t as obvious as you’d think, Jace. I never saw a restart or shut down option anywhere when I looked. Still, I wonder if…”

            He pressed his thumb down on the glowing circle that acted as a general confirmation button, and kept it down. After five seconds, the pink glow of the quartz faded, and the glassy structure became clear. He let out a faint gasp, and then he and Jace watched as it began to pulsate steadily another few seconds later. Some verbose boot-up messages scrolled by, most of them disappearing too quickly to catch.

            Those that stuck around long enough to read included, “Initializing… System check in progress. Memory check complete, all blocks OK. Charge level 28%. ERROR: Temporal link mismatch. Re-establishing… Success. Current time: 13:10:02—1-1-1990.”

            The activation button then filled out like a loading pie and spun about for a moment happily, finishing the reboot sequence. Wes’ mouth dropped open a little.

            “Did that really just work?” Jace wondered.

            Wes did the same thing to his nephew’s quartz, and got a repeat result. He breathed a sigh of relief, handed it back, and put in the desired date again.

            “This time, I’m a little hopeful,” he said, and squeezed the little rock.

            The duo disappeared through time, and reappeared on a hot summer’s day next to the dumpsters, now full of festering garbage. Their previously chilled clothing warmed up quickly after they stepped out into the sunlight, and got a look at the half-full parking lot of the Treasure Trove.

            “All right, well, that’s one problem down,” Wes said. “I really thought André would’ve been the one to fix them, but it was all you, kid.”

            “Nah. You helped, too. We going in?”

            “Y-yeah…” Wes took out his sunglasses and slid them over his eyes. “Hoodie up, Jace. It’d be a bad idea to let my younger self see you in there.”

            Jace brought his hood down to his eyes, and the two headed inside. The venue was one big hall, with faded and stained red carpet, dozens of token games that spit out prize tickets, a food area with tables, and about a hundred kids and parents. A man in a shoddy pirate costume patrolled the floor to keep kids from cheating at the games. The yo-yo at the prize claim counter needed those 500 tickets to be legit, after all.

            “That mildew-pizza smell brings me back…” Wes said, sniffing the air.

            “I can’t believe the place lasted this long,” Jace replied as he took in the sights. “Not an actual video arcade game anywhere. No wonder it didn’t stick around.”

            “Guess the owner didn’t believe in them. Not that these sorts of games aren’t still popular even in the, uh, present—at certain tourist spots, at least.”

            “I see party balloons,” Jace said and pointed them out.

            They were a short distance away, not far from the cheap pizza that baked under lamps all day at the buffet. The two approached cautiously, using the game cabinets as cover, until they could both get a good, safe view of the small birthday table.

            All of them in party hats except for Charlie, Wessy sat between Jared, Arthur, and Colin, chatting with his friends happily… as his parents talked nearby.

            “Um, Wes? Are both your mom and dad supposed to be here?” Jace asked. “Was there, like, a scheduling mix-up or something? They don’t look happy.”

            Adult Wes didn’t say a word as he tried to make out his parents’ conversation. For now, the long-divorced couple were just bickering, trying to keep things at a simmer as their oblivious, energetic seven-year-old son celebrated a birthday with his little pals.

            “Far as I remember, this was the last time they spoke in person,” Wes murmured after the adults took the conversation elsewhere to spare his younger self from seeing it.

            Colin’s mom was the other adult on birthday duty, and she stepped in to watch the kids and give Wessy’s parents some time to resolve their issues. Unknown to them, their fully-grown time-traveling son followed in the shadows close behind, determined to spy on a discussion that he was never meant to hear.

            His mom, with her arms crossed, stopped by a shut-down crane game machine and turned to her former husband, with a scowl on her face.

            “How did I know that you’d screw up something so simple?” she groaned. “Our kid’s birthday party, and you both pick him up late—he was the last one to arrive—and you leave Lucy behind. I took him to her last party, and she’s not even here.”

            Wes’ dad grumbled a few words before replying audibly, “She was out of place at his sixth. Come on, you saw that. I still brought the present she picked out, and they can hang out together at my place this weekend. Look at the kid—he’s having enough fun with all his friends already. What would there be for Lucy to do?”

            “Gee, I don’t know, maybe be here to be part of a family moment?”

            “I just don’t see what the big issue is. They’re only half-siblings. They don’t have to do everything together. I thought we agreed on all this last time.”

            “Wessy still has a sister who needs to be in his life, Barry. He’s good at making friends—though I’m not sure about that Charlie boy—but those will come and go. Everything I’ve read about siblings says that they need to establish a bond when they’re young. Those two are going to be a part of each other’s lives for longer than anyone.”

            “You and your new-age parenting guides again…”

            Wes’ mom pinched her nose and sighed, “Do you think you’re sparing him embarrassment or something here? Did you even ask Lucy if she wanted to go?”

            “Yes. She shrugged.”

            “That’s what she always does when you ask her something. She doesn’t like to make the decisions, because she thinks she’ll make the wrong choice. You know she doesn’t like to take the initiative. You have to actually talk to her about things.”

            He glared at her and shot back, “You think you know my kid better than I do?”

            “I see it when she visits. It’s like she’s afraid to ever speak up. And meanwhile, her brother does all the talking at the dinner table. Why… is she like that?”

            “So she’s quiet. Is that a crime? Running your mouth isn’t always admirable.”

            “Is that what you think Wes—”

            “I wasn’t talking about him. I’m just trying to make a point.”

            “… Did you at least get him a present he’ll actually enjoy?”

            “Sure. It’s not something he asked me for, but he’ll like it.”

            “Really. I got him a Super Soaker and a few… video games.”

            “Actually, this is when I get my Super Nintendo…” Wes whispered to Jace.

            “And what’d your dad get you?” Jace asked as Wes’ dad hesitated to elaborate.

            “It doesn’t really matter. I don’t even remember, so it must’ve not been great, anyway. Ugh… This is such an insight into what he’s like.”

            “Look, I just don’t think he needs quite so many toys and games in his life,” Wes’ dad eventually replied. “The kid’s hyperactive enough, and now those friends of his are going on about ‘being cool’ or having ‘awesome stuff’ when they visit. What good will all that do when he’s looking for a job? He needs at least one useful gift.”

            “Barry, he’s seven! He wants to have fun, and should be making good memories with his friends. Kids his age need to be learning social skills more than anything else.”

            He exhaled sharply. “We always did have very different ideas on parenting…”

            “And I think that’s why he told me last week that he finds weekends spent at your house so boring,” she replied, getting glowered at in the process.

            “I just bet you think I have him cleaning the gutters and learning about wood carving. We get pizza, and we go to movies or watch HBO at home. Is it ‘wrong’ if I teach him how to do a few chores on the side? Help with his manners?”

            “No, it isn’t, but I don’t think you’re trying to bond with Wes, either. Do you ever ask about his day, or what he likes? Or are his visits one big schedule you made?”

            “I don’t know what you want me to do,” he muttered angrily. “I really don’t.”

            “Just forget it. I don’t want to fight with you anymore. Let’s just go see him open his presents before we really get pissed off at each other.”

            “Yeah. Good idea. Better than reliving the past again.”

            Without either of them “winning” the argument, they turned and headed back to the birthday party. Wes groaned, took off his shades, and dangled them at his side.

            “That was bad, but not ‘never speak to me again’ worthy. So, I bet they had a few talks on the phone before things really blew up. We probably saw a good preview, though. They tried, but they were never meant to be together.”

            “Do you feel any better after watching that?” Jace asked. “I mean, I don’t really get most ‘adult issues,’ but, yeah… Kind of a jerk move not to bring my mom.”

            “It didn’t tell me anything I didn’t already know. But, um… Growing up, I sometimes had this thought in the back of my mind, having separated parents and everything, that I was kind of, you know… A mistake?”

            “C’mon, man. Don’t say that. Every time I sleep over at Wessy’s, it’s really obvious how much your mom adores you. The guys joke about it, but it’s true.”

            “Let’s just get out of here.”

            Wes turned and began power-walking out of the place, with Jace struggling to keep up unless he wanted to start running. But his uncle came to a quick stop once he could see the party table again. He apparently still wanted to see a present get opened.

            Wessy’s parents trying their hardest to smile, his mom gave him a gift on the larger side, and the boys all came in close to watch—except for Charlie, of course. Even at his age, emoting seemed to be outside his definition of “cool.”

            Wessy unwrapped his SNES console in its iconic black and red box, complete with a copy of Super Mario World. He beamed as he showed it to the others. Colin, who apparently had the system first, began prattling on about the best games to rent or buy.

            “Wasn’t all bad…” Adult Wes murmured, and headed out.

            Jace was about to leave as well, but instead chose to stick around a bit longer, curious what Wes’ dad was about to give him. Wessy’s smile all but disappeared when he opened a box of toy power tools, though Charlie did let out a snicker.

            “It’s the biggest set the toy store had,” Wessy’s dad said. “You like it, buddy?”

            Put on the spot, Little Wes answered, “Um, y-yeah… Sure, Dad… Thanks.”

            The bus stopped near Captain Salty, closed for the day, and Wes and Jace stepped out, now nearly penniless. Wes was in one of his less talkative moods again following what he had seen in the Treasure Trove, but Jace could respect that, now having seen another reason for his ongoing contention with his dad. At least his uncle had that determined glint back in his eye, and he seemed focused on the task at hand.

            Wes glanced at one of the security cameras covering the vacant lot that would one day be King Arcade, figuring that if André was watching, he wouldn’t call the cops on them. He found the segment of the fence they had come in through about a week ago their time, took a few steps in, and examined his quartz.

            The park had developed a bit in the last year and a half, now having a foundation and several major walkways in place, and loading zones for material so the construction crews could start putting together the rides and buildings.

            “Right… A quick hop back to July ’95, and then from there… April 1^st, 1996. This should be the main entrance to the park, so I don’t think we’ll space-time-fuse with anything on the ‘other side.’ Then again…” Wes stared back into the crystal, “these things probably have some failsafe to prevent that, anyway.”

            “Not ready to experiment today, Unk,” Jace said.

            “Yeah, same. Well. Think I’ve had my fill of 1992. You ready?”

            “Sure.” Jace grabbed his own quartz. “I mean, unless there’s something you wanted to, like, talk about first… Because that was kind of rough back there.”

            “Nope,” Wes replied affirmatively and squeezed his dialed-in crystal.

            The position of the sun and the temperature barely changed as they were transported almost exactly three years into the future, shortly after they accidentally left that day for a cold one in late 1989. The park, however, had seemingly built itself up around them, and was suddenly nearly complete again. Without any workers present and already past the security fencing, they were free to walk back to Galaxy Hub.

            “We shouldn’t run into our older selves,” Wes said confidently. “I advanced it a few minutes past our previous departure time. We’re right back where we left of.”

            “And maybe we should actually clean up the place this time.”

            “I’ll do what I can,” Wes replied as they started walking, and looked down at the attaché case that was almost glued to his hand. “But that isn’t what I’m worried about.”

            Wes pushed away the entrance tarp, and they happened upon a scene that might as well have been frozen in time. The carpet was still covered in dry wall crumbs, the offending sledgehammer and other tools waited to be reunited with their owner, and the footsteps from a week-younger Wes and Jace were still fresh on the floor.

            “This is… kind of a head trip…” Jace mumbled.

            “Closest we’ve ever come to ‘doubling back,’” Wes replied. “I’m not looking forward to ever having to move around another version of ourselves.”

            “What if we don’t ‘fix’ the earthquake problem on our first attempt, then?”

            “Jace, if it really is a bomb, then we might not be around long enough to worry about that. You don’t have to come with me, you know. This really could be dangerous.”

            “No way, dude. The earthquake totally screws up my future, too. I need to see the reason I don’t currently exist. I’m with you all the way on this one.”

            “Heh. Brave kid.” Wes looked around the site. “We can’t entomb ourselves, but we can at least hide the murder weapons. Let’s toss the stuff in the elevator.”

            “Won’t we be trapped if we time-travel back to 1996 down there anyway?”

            “I don’t think it’s against the ‘rules’ to come back to our starting point and take the lift back up. As long as we do it, the bomb should stay diffused regardless.”

            “Wait, hold on… We haven’t even talked about how we’re going to deal with it in the first place. Did you work a summer job with the bomb squad or something?”

            “I wish. Look, we’ll figure something out when we see the thing. Worst case, I stick my quartz to the thing and send it to the far-off future. I figured out how.”

            “Hm. I guess that could work,” Jace said as Wes began prying off panels again.

            Once the way was open and the crowbar, sledge, and both flashlights were inside the elevator, the two stepped inside and Wes let the face-scanner from the future grant him access to the labs far below, which he now knew he would one day help create.

            They descended into the depths, and turned on their flashlights before the doors opened. After they stepped into the dusty crypt of a waiting area, Wes took out his metal keycard, took a deep breath, and approached the big blast door. Jace anxiously watched as his uncle dropped the card into the small slot on the side of the grand entrance.

            The security device let out a faint beep, and some subtle shudders in the walls and changes in air pressure signaled that the place was slowly coming back to life.

            After several minutes, dim emergency lights came on in the lobby, the air began to circulate, some machinery could be heard spinning up, and gears turned.

            “Sounds like generators are coming back online,” Wes surmised.

            “But there’s no way the lab could get back to 100%, right?” Jace wondered. “It’s been sitting here for, like, twenty years.”

            “As long as the door opens, we might be okay. I didn’t want to try getting the door open next April, when we have a time limit. We’ll time-skip once we’re inside.”

            Another minute went by, and the once impassable main entrance began to groan and slide open. The facility on the other side drew in the old air of the lobby, creating a noticeable breeze that beckoned in the duo. There was light on the other side, but not enough of it to make them feel safe navigating the strange place that itself had traveled through time. Keeping their torches going, they stepped through the door the moment it had opened wide enough to do so. It really was like walking into a sci-fi movie.

            The floors were a sterile, dark gray, matte metal, while the walls were similarly colored, made of large brushed metal panels. Between the segments were vertical strips of LED lights, although they seemed to be only just barely glowing. The central area of the lab was where three hallways converged, and it had nothing but a few chairs.

            “We should probably get a layout of the place first… Right?” Jace asked.

            “Before stumbling around in the dark in an unfamiliar underground lab from the future, while looking for a bomb? Yeah, probably a good idea.”

            “There aren’t, like, any signs pointing to where anything is…”

            “He probably never got around to putting them up. Um, let’s try left first.”

            Going down that hallway, a short one, led them to some frosted glass doors that had to be manually pried open with the crowbar, given that they couldn’t slide on their own with the lower power levels. The room beyond was the laboratory itself, filled with workstations, some of them missing components or nothing but empty desks. The screens were about as thin as the one in the lobby, and the four PC towers inside were solid black obelisks that Wes couldn’t even figure out how to open.

            “Ugh, they’re heavy…” he huffed as he picked one up for a moment.

            “Bet they’re expensive. But I don’t think this room’s important for us.”

            “I’m still a nerd at heart. I just wanted to see what’s next in computing.”

            “How much hard drive space do you think they got?”

            “No idea. I don’t even see a way to turn them on.” He plopped the heavy tower back onto the desk and thought aloud, “There’s a chance these are quantum machines.”

            “What’s that mean, exactly?”

            “Basically, super-advanced. If you’re calculating the physics of time travel, you might need something that can process multiple possibilities at the same time.”

            “I don’t get it, but I don’t think we should mess with too much down here.”

            “Just wish I could get some data out of these things, but… maybe they’re not even supposed to open. Huh…” He looked around one more time as they headed out. “My older, even more obsessed self must’ve pulled all-nighters in here, trying to crack some code. Probably trying to find out just what he was trying to crack in the first place.”

            “Sounds like this place turned you into a mad scientist.”

            “It’s not like I have some formal education in physics, but then again, a lot of the big discoverers in history didn’t. Spend enough time on something, and you’re going to stumble onto something. I had, will have, André around to guide me, too.”

            The right hallway of the junction was long and led to an uninteresting metal door, so Wes chose to go down the central corridor next. The lights toward the end of it were particularly dull, leaving the two to rely on their portable bulbs. They stopped at another security door, and hoping it had enough power to work, Wes slid his keycard into another slot. It let out a beep and the door unlocked, but didn’t open. The crowbar came through again, granting them access to the place’s inner sanctum.

            The control room looked just as it did on André’s video recording, although the large main console with a black glass surface was inactive, so Wes had no way to check out any of the possible settings that would show how such a massive device worked.

            Above the console was a thick viewing window, but past it was only darkness, as the glass was too reflective to allow the light beams through. After nervously eyeing the bulkhead-style door nearby for a moment, Wes began turning its locking mechanism.

            “Hold on, is that a good idea?” Jace asked. “We don’t know what’s in there.”

            “I’ll… close it right away if something begins to leak out.”

            “You’re not really making me feel confident here.”

            Wes took a deep breath, unlocked the door, and opened it just an inch.

            The air pressure inside the cave must’ve been close to nothing, as it rushed in from the control room and hallway via high-pitched wind. Once the chamber had equalized, Wes opened the door fully and swept his light across the space.

            “Holy crap…” he muttered. “Jace, look at this.”

            Cautiously, he joined his uncle at the door and added in his light. The house-sized cavern was a rocky dodecahedron, its twelve carved-out facets perfectly smooth.

            “This is where that ‘time-sphere’ thing was?” Jace asked. “There really is nothing left of it. It didn’t just explode or something, so… where did it go?”

            “André wasn’t even completely sure himself. It could’ve gone further back in the past than he did… Or into the future… Or maybe it just blinked out of existence.”

            “Wes. You have a blank stare again. You hanging in there?”

            “I mean… I could be looking at my crypt right now.”

            “It doesn’t have to be. You can decide not to go in there a second time.”

            “Yeah, but if I already did, why am I looking right at it? I mean, is this from an alternate timeline now? Or am I just destined to continue a cycle no matter what?”

            “I… really don’t think you should keep gazing into the abyss, Unk.”

            “Mm-hm… Okay. Let’s move on. Place makes me feel… I don’t like it.”

            He closed and locked the door tightly, and they quietly returned to the junction and went down the final unexplored hallway. Past the door, there was nothing special. The first room was a small cafeteria, with a single table and two unpowered vending machines likely filled with decades-old food and drink. A smaller hallway off to the side led nowhere, ending in construction tape. All that was left to explore were the rooms behind three different doors, one of which was just a bathroom with a shower.

            The door in the middle seemed to be André’s office. It featured a small, basic bed for longer nights, a desk with its computer and monitor removed, a locker, and not much more of note—other than a few dorky science posters from the 90s. Wes checked the desk and cabinet drawers, but they were bare. With nothing of much interest to see, they exited and went into the final room, which Wes assumed was his.

            Somehow, it was even more spartan than André’s—and smaller. Its concrete walls were bare, and the bed still had messy blankets from whenever Wes’ older self last slept under them. André couldn’t even bear to make them, it seemed.

            “I can somehow picture that obsessed version of myself, getting five hours of sleep in here a night just so I can get up early to start another long day of research,” Wes said with a sigh. “Sad, isn’t it, Jace? Not even a piece of 90s memorabilia to be found. I must’ve stopped caring about the past, outside of just wanting to revisit it.”

            “What’s that low rumble?” Jace asked, eyeing one more door on the back wall.

            Wes pressed down its lever and pushed it open to reveal another rocky chamber, almost as large as the one that held the actual time machine. Shelves of batteries and big capacitors covered the walls, while a tank of dully-glowing chilled liquid bubbled in the middle of it all. Some sort of electrical converter was the mechanism causing the faint vibration in the air. The fuel was running low, with only about a fourth remaining.

            “What is that thing?” Jace wondered.

            Noticing the liquid nitrogen tanks off in a corner, Wes replied, “I think this is a hydrogen power plant, keeping the place going. Future tech, but within reach.”

            “Think it’s enough to power the time machine?”

            “Probably not.” Wes closed the door and got back to looking around his on-site home. “I’m guessing André had to borrow power from the whole city to run it. And, also, this wasn’t meant to be a bedroom. Looks more like a utility closet.”

            “So… you move into this cramped, dark place just to avoid a commute.”

            “Yeah. Looks like it. I can’t wait to be this guy,” he said sarcastically, and looked at the wall safe in the room. “I think I’m done learning about myself today.”

            Eyeing the safe as well, Jace asked, “You wanna try opening that?”

            Tempted, Wes stretched out his arm—but his hand stopped a foot away from the safe’s keypad and he backed off, shaking his head. “Nah. We have a bomb to find.”

            Wes took out his quartz again, and Jace followed along.

            “How close should we… get?” Jace asked tepidly. “We haven’t seen anything that looks like a bomb, yet, so… how does someone get one down here?”

            “I’m thinking an hour before detonation, so a little after six, before our dinner that evening? Now we really will be going back to a time we’ve gone through before, so I hope that’s agreeable with spacetime and everything.”

            “Okay, but… That might be cutting it close.”

            Wes dialed in April 1^st, 1996, 6:00 PM, and then eyed the power plant door.

            “Hm…” he murmured in deep thought.

            “What?”

            “Got a debate going on in my head. I was going to turn the backup power off to make sure the place doesn’t run out of fuel sometime in the next nine months, but… maybe I should just let it run out. The hydrogen fuel would detonate and make an even bigger boom, maybe trigger the earthquake. It even could be the bomb.”

            “Probably safer to let it run out, then. We still got flashlights.”

            “Y-yeah. That’s where I’m leaning. Just don’t know if it’d be possible to get this place running again if we ever needed to without any fuel. All right. You ready?”

            Jace nodded nervously and squeezed his crystal. Wes gulped in air, held it, and sent them through time to his past’s last normal hour of the last normal day. The facility remained so undisturbed over the course of nearly a year, that the only change upon their arrival was that the lights were all off; even the temperature was the exact same.

            Flashlights came on, and the first thing Wes did was check the power plant. Peeking through the door and moving his beam across the chamber, he saw that the fuel was depleted—and that there was no bomb suddenly inside the place.

            “We have to sweep the lab thoroughly,” Wes instructed after closing the door. “Look for anything out of place, that wasn’t here nine months ago. A bomb should be pretty big if it takes out this whole facility and causes a sinkhole.  Unless, you know, the sucker’s nuclear.” He saw Jace’s eyes widen frightfully in his light’s glow, and tried to calm him down, “But I’m sure it’s not! Just focus. We’ll find it. No problem.”

            Jace took a moment to do his anti-stress breathing exercise, gave Wes an assuring nod, and then split off after they left the room so that they could cover more ground.

            Together, they skimmed the lab, then did a slower second tour. And then they went through the place a third time. They checked everywhere, and in everything that could possibly be opened. Even the bare lobby was covered. But across all the rooms, cabinets, trash cans, computer desks, and the vending machines, nothing explosive could be found within the darkness of the subterranean science lab.

            “We still have a half hour,” Wes said after they met back in the hallway intersection again. “If we get much closer, we’ll just go back in time and start over.”

            “What difference would that make? Maybe… we need to get even closer.”

            “I didn’t want to tempt fate on your behalf, bud. What good would that do, anyway? You think we’ll start hearing a ticking clock?”

            Jace shrugged. “I dunno, man. Maybe someone shows up to hand-deliver it. Are we sure we’ve checked everywhere? Maybe it’s in an air vent?”

            “Hold on… There is something else I want to check.”

            Jace followed him back out into the lobby, and then watched as he tried the elevator. It didn’t have power, either, although Wes did manage to pry open the doors with the crowbar and get a quick look inside. He backed out with a puzzled look.

            “The elevator has to be powered from the park side, but it must be cut off right now. Guess that means we can’t take it up and bash through the panels and dry wall as frightened arcade-kids scream and scatter.”

            “I think we should be more concerned that we’re now trapped down here.”

            “Yeah, that too, but we’ll figure that out when we get to it. My bigger point is, someone can’t hand-deliver the bomb, so how does it get in here?”

            “You still haven’t told me if we’ve actually checked everywhere.”

            “Well…” Wes hesitated. “I mean, I looked into it, but I didn’t step inside.”

            “Where? What are you talking about?”

            “The time machine chamber. I didn’t exactly give it a very close look. But, really, that wouldn’t be a good place to put one anyway, right? A big cave of solid rock? It would just dissipate and contain the blast. Unless the sucker’s… Uh, you know.”

            Jace looked unconvinced and sighed, “We have to look closer, dude.”

            “Ah, man, I really didn’t want to go in there. I’m telling you, it gives me serious eldritch horror vibes. Like, non-Euclidian geometry, space-out-of-place type crap.”

            “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Can we just check it? We’re talking about the future of Royal Valley here. And mine.”

            “All right, all right… I was just really hoping I wouldn’t have to.”

            Wes followed Jace this time, reluctantly. With time ticking away, he stopped at the chamber’s edge after opening the door once again. Jace had no problem jumping down into it and swinging his light around, but Wes still had some post-traumatic stress to overcome. The tentacles, pulling him into an abyss, even now felt fresh.

            “Wes, seriously, it’s okay. It’s cold and dark in here, but it’s fine.”

            “W-why don’t you do the looking around, since you’re in there already.”

            “It’s bigger than it looks from the outside. Just help me check the edges.”

            Wes closed his eyes, nodded nervously, and leapt down. He didn’t feel safe in the cavern, but he worked up the courage to at least look around with his light. The twelve-sided chamber was nearly featureless, other than the door and observation window on one face, and an enormous power conduit that suddenly ended in a clean, angled cut.

            “That must’ve connected to the time-sphere thing…” Wes said, giving it a quick study. “When it disappeared, it took the rest of the conduit with it.”

            “Cool. But I don’t see a bomb in here, either.”

            “I don’t know… Maybe the place just spontaneously explodes.”

            “We can’t give up, Wes!”

            “Then any other ideas? I’m willing to wait until we have five minutes left to see if it magically shows up, but then we’re getting out of here.”

            “But how would…” Jace trailed off as they both sensed something change.

            A faint breeze or noise, a subtle shift in air pressure, or a feeling that they were all of a sudden not alone—whatever it was, it made them start sweeping the cave with their lights again. Both beams came to a stop the moment they illuminated a frightening sight that caused Wes to stumble backwards, trip, and fall to the ground.

            A horizontal time portal had appeared, floating over the center of the bottom face. They watched as a few eyeless tentacles sprang out, “sniffed” the air, and then promptly retreated back into the void beyond time. Trembling, Wes got to his feet.

            “S-shit…” he stuttered. “What’s that… thing doing here?”

            A heavy, metallic object with a small glowing panel dropped out of the portal, landing on the ground with a heavy thud. Then the gateway promptly closed.

            “Is that…” Jace whispered, and looked at Wes. “Warren called it the Time Daemon, right? Did that thing just, like… crap out the bomb?”

            “I was about to say that…” Wes replied and cautiously approached it.

            The device was a solid box with no visible seams, or rivets or bolts, about the size of a footlocker. Aside from its small display with a timer ticking down—apparently starting at 20:00, it also had a red light that blinked every five seconds, accompanying a beeping sound. Wes leaned in for a closer look, then took out his quartz.

            “I tried this before, when I was cooped up in the hotel,” he explained to Jace. “You can send objects through time by using a countdown function.”

            “Yeah, okay, neat—j-just get rid of that thing now, whatever it takes.”

            “I’m putting in a date…” Wes murmured as he concentrated on scrolling through the years. “We don’t want this bomb to change history at any point…”

            “So where’s it going, then?”

            Wes didn’t know how to answer. He couldn’t just say “the true present,” as it would confuse or upset his nephew. Jace saw the future as something one could just go into, if they wanted to see flying cars and mega-tall sci-fi towers. But the concept that it actually had an upper boundary and a real, ticking “now” had ominous implications, which the kid shouldn’t need to be worrying about just yet along with everything else.

            “Some place… far, far into the future,” Wes replied.

            He activated the object-transfer five second countdown, and placed it on top of the bomb. The moment he did, a robotic female voice made a worrying announcement.

            “Intrusion detected. Proximity fuse activated. One minute remaining.”

            “Ah, shit!” Wes burst out. “C’mon, c’mon! Get it out of here!”

            “It’s not working!” Jace shouted. “Is the quartz broken again?”

            Wes got in close and examined the crystal’s interface, to see a flashing error message reading, “Unsuccessful transfer: Object mass over limit.”

            “Too much weight!” he explained. “Damn thing’s too heavy!”

            “Oh, crap. Oh, crap… U-uh…” Jace thought hard for a moment, and then held out his quartz for Wes to take. “Try both of them! Sync them up and try again!”

            “But—”

            “No time to argue, man! Just do it!”

            Wes exhaled and nodded, grabbed the crystal, set it to its slave setting, and placed it next to its mate. When he activated his quartz this time, the countdown appeared on both, with the bomb’s own numbers indicating that there were forty seconds left.

            “If it doesn’t work, we run to the elevator and…” Wes went quiet the instant the bomb disappeared in a flash, and air rushed in to fill the vacuum it left behind.

            “Did… Did it work?” Jace huffed. “Is it gone?”

            “Y-yeah… I think so. Let’s not stay here. We’ll seal the place, to be safe.”

            Jace was the first to get back into the control room. Once Wes joined him, they shut and locked the door together, and then promptly sped-walked back to the junction.

            “You didn’t send it into the past, right?” Jace fretted.

            “No, the far future. Trust me. We’re not about to be inside a pile of old rubble.”

            “But we did it, didn’t we? Royal Valley is safe? You still look freaked.”

            His heart rate settling down as he looked around like he was waiting for something to happen, Wes answered, “I just kind of expect to hear this reverberating echo, like that huge bomb messed up the local spacetime…”

            “Like what happened above King Arcade? When the quartz cracked?”

            “We should be more worried about ourselves. We can’t time travel our way out of here now. Elevator’s got no power. We could be trapped.”

            “Maybe… Maybe Warren will find us?”

            “The kid disappeared on us when he was investigating all this. I wouldn’t count on it. We just gotta hope there’s a way to get some power going again. Right now, I need a minute to calm down… That was… heavy, what we just went through.”

            They returned to lobby, where Wes plopped down on the waiting couch and used the glow of his phone’s screen to provide some illumination.

            After several minutes of rest, but in need of idle conversation to keep his mind off the situation, Jace asked, “So… are you going to live in the 80s for a few years?”

            “Wha-huh? Why do you think that?”

            “You’ve been obsessing over the decade. I won’t be surprised if, after the school year is done, you go back without me and hang out in 1984 for a while or something.”

            “An awesome year I never got to see, but, I don’t know what I’ll do. I know we gotta get you back home so you can survive your middle school years, but… I still feel like there isn’t enough for me in the… present to make me want to stay for too long.”

            “But you told me you would stay!”

            “Heh, well, yeah. For a while. But if I get another quartz, you know I’ll be checking out some other time periods. Couldn’t give up the chance.”

            “Just stop saying there’s nothing for you back in 2020. I told you, we could totally hang out more. And let Mom help find you a girlfriend,” he added, jokingly.

            “Don’t even kid around about that. Ugh.” He moaned. “Hey… Be right back.”

            “Where are you going now?” Jace asked as Wes rushed out of the lobby.

            “Got something else nagging at me. Wait right there.”

            Flashlight in hand, Wes returned to his on-site bedroom, where he glared at the wall safe again like it was his newest enemy. He bit his lip and tried one last time to resist, but his hand, already hovering near the keypad, seemed to move on its own. In a way hoping that it wasn’t powered so he wouldn’t have to see what his old-self had stashed away, he nevertheless tapped in “0304” and hit the enter key. Incorrect. Then he saw the notice in small text on the keypad, that it required six digits.

            He hesitated even longer before his second attempt, but once his fingers started punching digits, they did so quickly. He put in “030485”, and was disappointed that it worked and he heard the safe’s latch unlock. He let out an exasperated groan.

            “I really have to stop hanging onto things for so long…”

            He opened the little metal door and lit up the contents. There were only two objects inside. One was the photo of himself with his friends, in a familiar frame; it was the very same photograph that he kept on his desk at work. The second object was an instant new big mystery: a floppy disk in a plastic case, labeled “Toys Backup”.

            Before he could ponder it for long, he heard Jace shouting, “Wes! Come back!”

            Thinking he might somehow be in danger, Wes pocketed the floppy, slammed the safe door shut, and ran back into the darkness to the lobby.

            Warren was there, having appeared from nowhere. Jace, his flashlight down at his side, wordlessly stared at the ninja kid, who held his headgear under an arm.

            “H-he just… flashed in, r-right in front of me…” Jace stammered.

            “Warren?” Wes said and walked over. “You… look a little rough around the edges. Where have you been?”

            “Looking for you,” he huffed. “For months of my time. What the hell are you doing down here? I didn’t really want you to see this place.”

            “There was a bomb, and—”

            “A bomb?”

            “I guess ‘this’ you never… We’ll talk in a bit. We’re trapped down here. Quartzes are gone. So… Don’t suppose you have another pair we can borrow?”

            Warren let out a long groan, replying, “Okay, what did I miss?”