My Uber driver needed to invest in better air freshener. The label on the container said ‘dark cherry’ but smelled like someone burning Fruit Loops in a Yankee Candle store. I cracked the window and checked the side-view mirror again. The Dodge truck was two cars back on the interstate, keeping a wary distance.
I had the driver drop me off near my office downtown instead of my apartment. Central Avenue was busy. Couples held hands strolling beneath the streetlights and groups of twenty-somethings laughed their way between bars. My Uber driver had a new fare by the time I got out of the car.
I pretended to ignore the Dodge as I walked up the block. Whoever was tailing me would have a hard time finding parking downtown on a Friday night. Despite the glacial 15 mph speed limit, they were forced to pass my position on the sidewalk. I made sure there was a palm tree between us as they went by in case they were looking to shoot me, but the driver was doing a good job of pretending to be uninterested.
I stole a glance. Guy. Mid-thirties. Scruffy beard and a trucker hat. Never seen him before.
The truck was a beater. Faded blue paint and rust holes on the bed. I pulled my phone from my pocket and made a note of the license plate number. I’d see what Waldo could do with it.
The burrito place next door to my office was still open so I stood in line at the take-out window and waited for Trucker Hat to reappear. Took about five minutes but I spotted him across the street just about the time my tempeh burrito was up. What to do.
This guy clearly had an interest but wasn’t especially subtle about it. Still, he was one of the only leads I had going at the moment. It wouldn’t pay to lose him.
I opened the door to my office and locked it again from the inside, then jogged up the stairs two at a time. When I reached my office I stole a quick peek out the window to see if my stalker was still on the corner. He was. I noted the time and sat myself at the desk to see what I could do with my chronometer.
First things first. I ate the burrito. No good working on an empty stomach.
The tool kit was in the credenza. Once the burrito was gone, I made short work of opening the back of my chronometer and inspecting the damage. Easy to find. The capacitor for storing excess static had overloaded and separated at its seams. Whatever I’d been hit with at Isla’s was meant to do more harm than I’d received. The capacitor had taken the brunt of it. Might have saved my life.
I retrieved a spare capacitor from my parts kit and used the magnifying lamp to do the requisite surgery. I had the chronometer back together in fifteen minutes.
Test trip.
I stood and put my fingertips on the rings that selected the time. Then I double-checked my pockets for anything that wouldn’t make the jump. Found Foster’s phone in my jacket. I stuffed it into a drawer of my desk.
“Hey Waldo, you awake?”
“You know how I love it when you ask questions you already know the answers to.” His voice droned from the speaker in the desk lamp.
“What time did I leave the office this morning?”
“Eleven forty-one AM. Eastern Standard Time.”
I set my chronometer for 11:42.
“See you this morning.” I touched my chronometer hand to the desk, noted the time on the wall clock, and pressed the jump pin.
The onslaught of daylight made me squint.
The office still smelled like Isla Phillips. Lovely.
My Stinger 1911 was on the desk—the exit anchor my earlier self had used to jump home. Time to clean up after myself.
I snatched up the gun and moved to the credenza. The right-hand cabinet concealed the gravitizer. Ten seconds inside was enough to imbue the gun with enough of the temporally unstable particles to make a trip in time. I took off my jacket and put on my shoulder rig while I waited. The gravitizer made a satisfying chime when the treatment was complete. I slid the pistol into the shoulder holster and donned my jacket again.
“Hey Waldo, can you research a Kentucky license plate number for me?” I read him the plate number.
“Honoring your request will again require me to circumvent local legal parameters.”
“But for a good cause.”
“Are you appealing to the conscience of a synthetic mind?”
“I know you have a heart of gold, Waldo. Lack of a body is a technicality.”
“I’ll see what I can manage.”
I smiled.
Time to go meet my new friend.
I set my chronometer for shortly before my Uber driver would show up and jumped back to the nighttime. I locked up the office and trotted down the stairs.
I was across the street near the roundabout when my earlier self arrived by Uber. He lingered in the line for a burrito while the Dodge drove by.
Tick tock tick tock. Fun with time travel.
My mystery driver made a left out of the roundabout and headed for First Avenue South. I jogged across the street to conceal myself behind the closed Thai restaurant on the southwest corner. Trucker Hat came slinking back on foot and posted up at the southeast corner, spying on the version of me in line for the burrito. I waited till my earlier self was unlocking the office door before skirting across the lot of the Thai restaurant to get a better angle on my stalker. I was peering around the rear corner of a parked car when my earlier self peeked out the blinds of the office. Once the blinds stopped moving, I was in the clear.
I had one hand on the grip of my Stinger as I jogged across the street. Trucker Hat still had his back to me, watching the office. Sweat stained the back of his Guy Harvey T-shirt. He had a buck knife in a sheath clamped to the belt holding up his Levis.
The movies always show guys jamming guns into people’s backs. I wasn’t that dumb. I kept my distance and raised my voice.
“See anything interesting?”
When Trucker Hat spun around, I had the Stinger leveled, waist high and aimed at his chest. He did a double take.
“I know. I was there but now I’m here. How’d I do that?” I puffed my cheeks out and mimed an explosion from my skull with my free hand.
He looked tired and rumpled. Long night of watching Isla’s place?
“What do you want?” I said.
“You got the wrong idea.”
“Enlighten me.”
His eyes were frantic.
“Don’t run,” I added.
He ran.
Shit.
I wasn’t above shooting people, but unarmed strangers sprinting down Central Avenue didn’t make the cut. I holstered my pistol. People gave Trucker Hat odd looks as he dashed to the end of the block and raced around the corner. Headed to his truck no doubt.
I checked my phone. A notification showed Waldo’s info on the license plate was there in the data cloud. Truck was registered to a Dirk P. Walls. Dirk. That’s a name you don’t hear often. A quick check of the time showed I still had a few minutes till my earlier self would be done fixing the chronometer in the office. I walked across the street and ordered a beer from the burrito place. When my watch hit the appropriate time, I ascended the stairs again and walked back into the office. My earlier self was gone.
“Failing at your job again?” Waldo asked.
“This one’s a sprinter.” I set my beer on the credenza and reset my chronometer. Before my jump, I fished around in the toolkit and came up with a slim jim that ought to work on an ’80s model Ford.
Let’s try this again.
I reappeared in the office prior to either of my previous visits and trudged back down the stairs. It would be a full ten minutes till I’d show up in the Uber now. Enough time to avoid my other selves. I crossed the street, followed the trail of my future quarry, and located the only open parking space on First Avenue South. Then I waited, lurking in the alley, concealed by a malodorous dumpster. Oh the glamorous life of a P.I.
Dirk Walls arrived in his battered pickup truck and parked. He walked off to stalk me.
I used the slim jim on his passenger side door and had it unlocked in seconds. I climbed into the truck and left the door ajar as I rifled through the glove box. There was a Smith and Wesson .38 with a half box of ammo in there. It wasn’t a Glock like Foster’s killer had used, but maybe he had multiple guns. There were a few receipts for truck parts and several loose ketchup packets.
Man of simple tastes.
The truck was a manual. I respected that.
I closed the truck door the rest of the way and slouched in the darkened interior, taking care to flip the switch on the dome light all the way to the off position.
The minutes ticked by and I turned to keep an eye out for Dirk. First Avenue South was a one-way street four lanes wide here. The truck was parked on the left side of the road meaning Dirk would approach it from the left rear. We were a good distance from the nearest streetlight and he’d have a minimal view of the passenger seat until he was climbing in. That was my hope anyway.
He showed up at a dead sprint minutes later, huffing and puffing down the sidewalk. I slid lower in the passenger seat with my hands resting across my abdomen. Dirk had to fight with the keys to get the driver’s side door unlocked. He yanked the door open and didn’t seem to notice that the light failed to come on. He was all the way behind the wheel by the time he saw me sit up.
“Oh shit!” He went for his knife.
I grabbed the hair at the back of his head with my left hand and slammed his nose into the top of the steering wheel. His hat fell off.
“Jeezus!”
“Time to talk, Dirk.” I plucked the buck knife from his belt and tossed it to the footwell on my side.
He put a hand to his face and felt his nose. I hadn’t slammed him hard enough to break anything but his eyes were watering.
“You ought to realize you can’t run from me. Let’s not do this dance anymore.”
“What do you want?” he mumbled through his hand.
“Shut the door. Let’s go for a drive. You get to tell me all about yourself.”