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Mom appeared before me with her father. They were no longer birds.
“Change back, Corinne,” my mother requested.
It took me a bit of time to go from amorphous liquid to flesh and blood. But Mom and Grandpa Brian waited patiently.
“Good work,” Grandpa Brian congratulated me, nodding with approval.
“But why did you wait so long to do anything?” I yelled. I was actually having trouble drawing breath.
“We were waiting to catch him unawares. Aldous was so busy with you three that your father was able to jump in and get him,” said Mom. “That's exactly what we were hoping for.”
“And we're not done with him yet,” Grandpa Brian muttered. “Now Julian's in danger.”
“Corinne, find your brother. Change Jonas and him back,” instructed my mother, biting her lip nervously. “We have to help your father. Can you locate us if we travel back in time?”
“Um, I don't know.” I was afraid to ask how.
“If you can't, Uncle Jonas can. Be careful, and try to get pretty close to the time when we arrive so you can help us!” They disappeared before I could formulate any type of response.
I looked down at the toy bird sitting there with glass eyes and a stuffed, plush body. I still couldn't feel anything from him. My thoughts went back to questioning Uncle Jonas at my graduation party just days ago. At that point, I would never have believed anything he might have told me. Still, knowing the truth now didn't make his current condition seem any less terrible.
“Oh, Uncle Jonas, it's so awful to see you like that. I'm getting you back.” I concentrated on the animal, curling my fingers into fists. “Make him into light...” I repeated to myself, forcing the toy into a glowing mass, “and make him human again... Please come back right... Don't let me mess this up...”
Returning him to human form seemed like reviving Uncle Jonas from the dead, and I shivered at the irony, given that his death certificate was what had started me on my quest for knowledge. Back among the living once more, he stood in place, squinting and rubbing his head.
“What was I?” he asked in a low voice.
“A stuffed animal,” I replied guiltily.
He was decidedly not upset, and I couldn't fathom why. Instead he commented, “I bet that might have been interesting had I been awake for it.”
“Uh...okay...” I wasn't sure how to answer him, so I simply changed subjects. “Uncle Jonas, he turned Daniel into a bug!”
Uncle Jonas almost chuckled. “Well, I guess that's original.”
“How can you laugh?” I cried. “How are we supposed to find one bug when there's millions of them?”
He sighed. “I'm not laughing. I'm just marveling over Aldous' creativity. Listen, there's an easy solution to this, as much as Brian would disagree with it.”
“What?”
“Time travel.”
“Uh...how?”
“We go back and watch it happen, we follow Daniel to see where he goes, and then, when it's safe, we turn him back.”
“And how do we follow him?”
“We become bugs too, of course!”
***
A FEW MINUTES LATER (well, really earlier, since we’d traveled into the very recent past), Uncle Jonas and I sat on a branch, scanning the woods. I worried that Allen would detect us, even though I had transformed us into small flies. But my uncle said he might be too diverted by the events at hand to be feeling the effect of two insects popping in from the future. I hoped he was right.
Feeling helpless, I witnessed the struggle between Allen, my family, and my past self. I desperately wished to intervene, but Uncle Jonas's stern admonition not to interfere kept me at bay.
When the past version of Uncle Jonas was reduced to a stuffed-animal, present fly-Jonas bragged, Yup, I definitely was a cuddly one.
Uncle Jonas, that's just so disturbing! You're so blasé about it. You could have been left that way forever, and...
Another laugh. You're so new to this, Corinne. It's so endearing. Oh! Look! He made Daniel a house fly! Follow him!
Both of us buzzed after my brother. He ducked under branches and flew through the leaves, stopping on one to groom himself.
Huh. Daniel never cared what he looked like. It was all Mom could do to get him to comb his hair. Look at him now, I commented.
That's not Daniel. That's a fly that once was Daniel.
When should I change him?
Not yet. First of all, he'll fall out of the tree if you change him. Second, we're not far enough away.
Daniel took wing, and we followed him deeper into the woods. By now I'd gotten so impatient with his antics that I wanted to change him into a pebble and toss him into my pocket for safekeeping.
That's a good idea, said Uncle Jonas, overhearing my thoughts.
What? A pebble?
Yes. Who knows when he'll stop flying around. Just make him a pebble, then follow him to see where he lands. It's not like it'll hurt him.
I felt bad for the little fly as I changed it to a speck of light. As I shifted its form into a pale pink pebble, I became convinced that I was committing an act of animal cruelty.
Corinne, you just turned a house fly to stone. No animals were hurt in the making of this rock, Uncle Jonas kidded me.
I laughed in my mind, impressed at my uncle's ability to lighten the difficult moment. I knew he was trying to soothe me, but he couldn't completely assuage my guilt.
We dived down beside the pebble, and I stared at it through my crazy compound eyes.
Uncle Jonas, I hate that that's him.
You know, if you were ten years younger, you would be on top of the world right now – you turned your annoying older brother into a rock.
I just sighed, and pushed all my strength into bringing Daniel back. I tried to ignore my sheer exhaustion so I wouldn't bungle the transformation.
Slowly, the rock melted into a pool of energy. I paused, yawning deeply.
Keep going, Corinne, Jonas encouraged. Finish him up, kid.
I pulled the brightness into my brother's form, and he came to with the same baffled manner that Owen had displayed.
“What?” he asked, blinking around perplexedly.
I took human form, allowing Jonas to as well.
“Welcome back to humankind,” the physicist said heartily, approaching Daniel and patting him on the back.
“He changed me all the way?”
“Yes.”
My brother shook his head in wonder. In spite of everything, he still seemed to admire Allen's ability. “What did he turn me into?”
“A fly.”
“Amazing. He always kept me conscious when he transformed me before. This time, I don't remember a thing. Is everyone okay?”
I found it hard to bring myself to speak. “Dad brought Allen back in time, and then Mom and Grandpa Brian went after them. We need to get back there.”
“But we need to do it carefully so he doesn't see or detect us,” added Uncle Jonas. “If any of them need help, we're their only hope. Corinne, save your strength. Let's let your brother take us back. I'll help you if you need it, Daniel.”
Shaking his head, Daniel requested, “You do it, Jonas. You've been doing it a lot longer than I have.”
“Oh, you'll be fine. When you took me back to see Julius Caesar's murder, you were so accurate that I couldn't have done it better myself.”
Julius Caesar? I filed away that comment for the future.
“But how do I find them?”
Observing the two of them heartened me. Daniel was iffy with his ability just as I was, Caesar notwithstanding.
“Feel back into the past. Find the place and time where you sense their presence and aim for it, or perhaps a few minutes after. Just try to place us a decent distance away from them so we're not detected.”
Uncle Jonas turned toward me. “And Corinne, be prepared to change us. We might very well need that.”