“[Our] experiment provides strong evidence that a quantum event at one location can affect an event at another location without any obvious mechanism for communication between the two locations.” ~ Alain Aspect, 1982

I WAITED UNTIL they passed the Staying Well, and then jogged to catch up with them. I called out, and Kate turned around. Her face lit up.

“Corey!” She threw her arms around me and planted a kiss on my lips. Where there had been a gaping wound, now thumped a whole heart. Her simple kiss and honest pleasure at seeing me soothed my soul.

“You should have seen my whip-cracking!” She unfurled her whip. “I spent the whole afternoon getting schooled by Trip. He is an amazing teacher, well duh, you know!” Trip and Tara had coached the Keepers in weapons and warfare during our three weeks underground. Their three year Scriptorium experience made them experts in the art of battle.

“She really did get the hang of it. She popped six kernels of corn off of the fence in as many snaps!” Trip raised his eyebrows. “Impressive.”

“Well, let’s see it, then.” I stepped back to give her room. She took three steps forward, shook her hair back and planted her feet, one ahead of the other.

With Kate’s back to us, I ventured a gander at Trip. His smile fell and his face grew somber. He shifted his weight and crossed his arms, locking his gaze on mine. His expression remained neutral, but his eyes held deep pain and regret.

An impossible situation, in that moment when our intents connected, Trip’s pain became my own. I wasn’t the only person suffering. At least Kate chose me. He didn’t even have that satisfaction, only passing touches and lingering glances.

We had talked about this. I wouldn’t force her into a suffocating relationship. She had freedom to come and go between us without fear of retaliation. Her best intuition centered in the unconditional love she had for her friends. Absolutely crucial to the mission, she needed access to everyone. I had made this arrangement fully knowing she loved me, confident enough to share her affections with the whole Keepers team. Even Trip.

I had been arrogant, thinking their connection fragile. It wasn’t, I saw the strength of it in the set of his determined stance. He didn’t want to hurt me, but he resisted the idea of giving her up.

Don’t push me into doing something we will regret, Trip. I clenched my jaw and gave a barely perceptible nod. Then we both turned to watch Kate snapping her whip.

She turned around and held her hands out to her side to take a bow. I cheered, “Bravo, bravo!” I swept her into my arms and spun her in a circle. She staggered when I set her down. I grabbed her hand and we continued down the hill to the feast we could smell already wafting its charbroiled scents in beckoning invitation.

Navarro made it his mission to match us bite for bite. My mouth watered at the familiar spiced seasoning of Jose’s burgers. Joey tried something different with the steak marinade. We laughed until our cheeks were sore, and then lapsed into an easy harmony as night fell and the logs simmered to glowing coals.

Kate’s head rested in my lap. Engrossed in her sleepy eyes and glow of firelight across her flawless face, I had to tear myself away from her beauty when Ash stepped in front of us.

“Will you please honor us once more with a song?” He handed me an exact replica of my guitar from Jewel City.

“How did you get this?”

“I made it.” He beamed, proudly.

I turned it over in my hands and examined the fine workmanship. “This is exactly like mine, Ash!” I strummed a few chords. It thrummed, perfectly tuned. In Jewel City, I had made one just like this to get us through the rough times. We would gather often and sing songs, at first in English, then as their language shifted, I would sing to them in the new tongue.

“I didn’t know you could play.” Kate sat up, interested.

I shrugged. “What do you want to hear?” I asked the family of my heart, looking into all of their eager faces.

They began to call out their favorites. I picked a lively tune and began strumming. Navarro grabbed some spoons and a metal pan and set the pace. We sang a song about Tara and her mighty band of warriors. Then I transitioned into a crisp tavern song. Caitlyn and Eunavae jumped up to dance. When that song ended, they called for another and another. We laughed and sang until our eyes streamed happy tears and our throats ached.

Caught up in the joy of my Jewel City clan, I turned to Kate to find her missing. I scanned the campsite and located her on the porch lying in the hammock with Trip. They swayed back and forth, pinkies linked, talking to Kim Stevens, Mama Ty’s assistant and acting RA of the Chartreuse cabin. She stood in the doorway thrown into silhouette by the cabin light.

It was then that I realized we hadn’t been singing in English.

I looked away and straight into Tara’s knowing eyes. We shared a moment of unspeakable dread. We both quickly turned away from the confirmation of the other’s expression.

Donnie and Mel strode up behind me. “We need to go,” he whispered.

“We have an appointment to keep.” Mel tilted her head toward the lake.

“I think it would be better if we wandered off two at a time,” Donnie murmured. “Less conspicuous.”

On the porch Trip lifted Kate out of the hammock and held onto her just a fraction longer than he needed to before he set her down and took her hand. They hopped down the porch steps and sauntered by the tennis courts toward the lake.

I continued strumming the guitar. Donnie and Mel waited a few moments longer, then nonchalantly walked behind the cabin in the opposite direction of the Scriptorium. Their shadows strobed through the distant pines as they circled around toward the lake a few moments later.

“My fingers are going to bleed! Ash, you’d better spot me.” I handed the instrument over to him and the next song started up. Tara strode into the cabin carrying dirty dishes. I gathered the rest and followed her.

We stood at the kitchen sink side by side and rinsed the dishes. “How do you stand it?” she whispered. “How do you continue on as though nothing is horribly wrong?”

I tapped a cup on the edge of the sink before setting it in the drying rack.

“I need them to be close,” I confessed, realizing that my plan hurt Tara, too. She loved Trip and they had been together, sort of, since they rescued me from the jump of the Darchori Tree Dwellers. “I need to know that he will guard her with his life.”

“You don’t know him very well if you think he would do any less for the rest of us.” She plucked up a dishtowel and dried her hands. “It’s who he is, Corey. He protects.”

She stepped out of the back door and turned to wait for me. I dried my hands, took hers, and we stole off to the lake.

We stood at the bottom of the lake in the Scriptorium entry chamber. Torchlight flickered across our faces as we prepared ourselves for the spiritual journey that would give us vital information for the jumps to come.

“So, how does this work?” I asked Mel. “Are we all considered jumpers or commanders now? Are you three going in too?” I waved my fingers at her, Donnie, and Dirk.

“We are all going to draw a stone. The Scriptorium will decide who goes in and who stays. The ones who go in will be the jumpers, the one who stays will be the Jump Commander.”

It sounded right. Let the One decide.

“Since we are a new team, we may have new team leaders, too,” Dirk explained as he passed the bowl of black water around and we each took a stone. “We pretty much start from scratch here, tonight.”

Team leaders were chosen by the Scriptorium as intuitive members to help guide the team into making decisions based on moral and cognitive matters, rather than survival instincts only. They usually had the ability to see through threats to the heart of the issue that needed to be resolved in the quantum therapy sessions. The Scriptorium chose the first boy and girl of each team to enter the chamber ahead of the others and solidified them as team leaders for the remainder of the stay at Heartwork Village. The last time we descended to this antechamber the Scriptorium chose Kate and me as team leaders of the Chartreuse gang, but this was a different team. With Donnie’s and Mel’s experience, I assumed if they weren’t chosen as jump commander, they would be chosen as team leaders.

I didn’t have time to consider it very long. The stone already glowed warm in my hand. I held it out at the same time Kate held hers out. They both burned with an inner fire. Her mouth hung open, as shocked as I. She gave Mel and Donnie an incredulous look as she passed them to step to me.

“I’m not surprised at all, Kate. We knew you would still be team leader,” Donnie said, and Mel squeezed her arm.

We approached the rock wall as we had before, but this time I looped my belt through hers. She huffed in amusement, and raised her arms to give me room to work, cocking an eyebrow. My heart raced at the thought of another thousand years with her. I tested the buckles, gathered her into my arms, looping my fingers into her belt at her back. She wrapped her slender arms around my waist and pressed her cheek against my chest. We lifted our stones to the cave wall.

Click. We were slurped into the Scriptorium.