In and Out of Time 5/10

Title: In and Out of Time (5/?)
Author: wonderbread9
Rating: PG-13 - R
Characters: The Cast of Kyle XY, OCs here and there
Pairings: Kyle/Amanda, Kyle/Jessi
Disclaimer: I don’t KXY because if I did it’d have a season 4.

Author's Note: Sorry, everyone! So, sorry! I hope you guys didn’t think I abandoned this baby, did you? I was just out cold with the flu and then my boyfriend caught the flu then my mom and my little AND older brothers caught the flu and then my dad and my boss and…yeah, that baby was going around like WILDFIRE. I blame my bf’s dog. Anyway, here be chapter five! Woo-ha!

Summary: “If you want to save the world,” Jessi replied, her voice softer, “then let me go.”

Joshua breathed. “I can’t do that. I can’t—”

“Then for all you know,” she cut in, “the future’s going to be the same.”

8o8o8

It was a quiet drive to the place that Jessi had been…kidnapped, and Josh didn’t even want to think of the ‘k’-word or what it could possibly mean for him, his family and Kyle. After all, Jessi was just as much of a superior being as Kyle, so…if she could get caught, what did that mean for Kyle? Could that mean that one day Kyle would be out walking and then, all of a sudden, just up and disappear? He’d already come to accept the strange dark-haired, blue-eyed science experiment into his life and called him his brother, he didn’t want to have to go through losing Kyle again. He didn’t think he or his family could handle that.

But then, what of Jessi? Yeah, she was weird, but not unalike Kyle had been upon his first few days out of the pod. He had been awkward and strange and socially inept and even though it was annoying to have to deal with someone that just didn’t understand the social etiquette that existed in the Trager household again, it would be weird to not have someone there to descramble the porn channel signal for him; after all, Kyle already knew it was wrong, but Jessi…he figured he still had a few bribes left in her to get him what he wanted. And, as much as he hated to admit it, Jessi was starting to grow on him too.

Don’t forget about you dream, came a snide voice in the back of Josh’s head. He gave a mental shake and tried to push away the sudden memories that washed over him: Jessi’s pale skin washed in moonlight, her dark eyes staring at up at him and her lips twisted in a lustful smile. He cleared his throat uncomfortably and sat up straighter in his seat. He glanced at his father, but Stephen’s mind and gaze were directed straight ahead, around the winding, twisting road that Kyle had told their father and Josh that he had taken the night before to get to Jessi.

Josh turned, and stared straight ahead too, all thoughts of Jessi or his dreams or Jessi in his dreams (weird) banished with the returning weight of why they were traveling this road in the first place. He didn’t know how they were going to help the other dark-haired teen, especially since Kyle had told them, in broken sentences, how Jessi had been kidnapped.

Vanished, he’d said. Like a puff of smoke. Or well, not with the same wonder and mystique of a magician’s trick. More like the absolute terror of something stranger than Kyle, or Kyle’s birth, disrupting the already crazy existence that Kyle, Jessi and the Tragers were thrust into. The man had grabbed her by the wrist and then, all of a sudden, they were gone and there was nothing to indicate that two very real, very alive people had been in that spot only moments before. It was…disconcerting to say the least, and it left Josh wondering exactly what he and Stephen were supposed to accomplish by going to the spot.

They weren’t going to find some clue to help them so…what was the point? If the guy had taken her the way Kyle had described then wouldn’t it have been better for Kyle to come along? Josh glanced over at his father and noticed, for the first time, the hard set to his father’s jaw and the way the man’s eyes were intensely fixed on the road as if that were the only thing that he could do with himself. Josh swallowed. Okay, so, maybe his family wasn’t taking this the best that they could. He did remember seeing Lori glance worriedly at the grandfather clock in the den, as if staring at it could somehow hasten the time that it would take for Jessi to return home.

Even his mom, the usual rock of the Trager family had been pushed to her boiling point much quicker than any bickering or antics that the Trager children got into. Josh didn’t want to admit it, not even to himself, that Jessi’s disappearance was scaring him. At least, when Kyle was gone, he could talk to him and would get an inkling that his adopted brother was okay, even if he didn’t know all the details. With Jessi though…there was no telling what was happening to her or what the mad-kidnapper was doing.

Josh pushed those thoughts aside and stared out the window, focusing on the greenery as it rushed passed his window in a dizzying blur. It was such a nice day out, a stark contrast to the doom and gloom that seemed to always linger around the Tragers. He wanted to angle his head upward to take a look at the sky, see the clouds and maybe convince himself that nothing was wrong. Foolish thought he knew because reality had a tendency of crashing down around his ears when he least wanted it too, but even so…

His father finally pulled up to the spot, putting the car in park and shutting it off. It took a moment for he and Josh to get out of the car, and before Josh could, his father grabbed him, twisting in his seat to face his son with a worried, but concerned look. Josh swallowed, meeting his father’s gaze in trepidation.

“Be careful,” his father said shortly, looking away and out to the open spot that revealed a breathtaking view of the Seattle skyline. “Just…look out for…anything, and…if you see…something…let me know. Don’t touch anything, just…let me know.”

Josh gave a single shake of his head and swallowed again, unnerved. His father nodded himself before giving Josh’s arm a squeeze and then getting out of the car. Josh followed swiftly, keeping his eyes peeled on the seemingly innocent surroundings that he and his father found themselves in. There was nothing there, just trees and shrubbery and a light dusting of grass over the surface of the earth. There was an outcropping of abandoned concrete that jutted over a slight hundred-foot drop, but that was all that completed the lonely place and Josh had to give Jessi credit on disappearing off to the one place that nobody smarter than Kyle would be able to find.

He walked the circumference of the spot while Stephen stepped over rock and grass carefully. Josh kicked a pebble and came to stand beside the concrete outcropping. The sun shone on the artificial rock and he laid his hand across it, imaging Jessi sitting there, basking in the glow of barely-there-starlight contemplating whatever super-geniuses contemplated in their loneliness. He wondered what drove her to this quiet place. What had possibly upset her existence again that had driven her to seek the comfort of such a lonely spot?

He walked the circumference of the clearing again, trying to think like a Latnok evil-doer, but all his mind could keep thinking of was Jessi and his dreams and…

Then it happened. He stepped on a single blade of grass, the wind blew and his heart stopped. The entire world exploded into a Technicolor nightmare. Neon greens and blues and pinks were streaming passed his vision at light speed and all he could see were these strange images, strange moving pictures on the back of his eyelids that made no sense and had him screaming, even though he could hear himself, and falling to the ground in agony, even though he couldn’t feel anything at all. Just the colors, just the pictures that he could not understand and that were moving too fast for his mind to catch up to.

8o8o8

Stephen had turned at Josh’s abrupt shout and watched—as if the world had suddenly been slowed down by a cosmic hand—his son’s eyes roll back into his skull and Josh fall to the ground. His heart stopped before slamming back into action full force and he rushed over to his son, pure adrenaline and panic sweeping aside any anxieties he’d had moments before.

“Josh!” he shouted, gathering his son in his arms. Josh’s body began to convulse, deep shakes that ripped through his muscles and made his jaw crash together in jarring sound. Stephen was cursing to himself as he hoisted Josh up, gathered him in his arms again—and with a strength he didn’t know he had—dashed off to the car and loaded his son in. He got into the driver’s side and immediately cranked the car up and into gear, not bothering with his seat belt. There was no time. No time at all.

Whatever it was that was affecting Josh had to have something to do with Latnok, had to have something to do with Jessi’s disappearance and had to have something to do with Kyle. What it was, he wasn’t sure, but he was going to get to the bottom of it.

“Josh, just hold on…

“Hold on.”

8o8o8

He snapped awake immediately as if someone had rudely shaken him from a dream. He had been in a clearing and the whole world was new: green grass and trees, the first tale-tell signs that the earth was awakening itself from its winter sleep and ushering in the rebirth of spring. His father had been there and they had been…trying to find…something, but… The contents of it slipped away and Joshua looked up and gave a start. Two very awake, very lucid brown eyes were staring at him intently from across the room. He licked his lips nervously and stood.

“You’re awake again.” It was a statement , not a question, but even so Joshua felt dumb for saying it. She always had that affect on him before; he just didn’t figure her teenage self would have that affect on him too. Jessi smirked and Joshua swallowed a suddenly dry throat.

“You said when I got better you’d tell me everything,” she replied, not missing a beat. “Well, I slept. I’m feeling better. Spill.”

He chuckled in spite of himself. “I always forget how blunt you can be.”

Jessi’s gaze took on a razor edge. Her lips curled back into a snarl. “Who. ?”

Joshua turned and grabbed the water canteen that he kept on his person and approached her cautiously. She eyed him and the canteen warily, and drew back when he opened it to give her water. She shook her head fiercely and struggled to sit upright. He tried to reach out to help her, but the look she shot him stopped him cold. Instead he threw up his hands in a sign of defeat and watched as she managed to sit herself upright.

Alright, there were a lot of things that he had forgotten about her, this time period and just how stubborn and capable Jessi XX could be. After all, she was superhuman and made of the same stuffs that the Destroyer was. How could he have ever forgotten how powerful she could be when she really set her mind to a task? He capped the canteen and set it back where he had found it before taking his seat once again across from her. He watched her and she watched him, not breaking eye contact, until Joshua, unnerved, looked away.

He swallowed, shifted in his chair and breathed.

Here goes.

“You already know me, Jessi,” he began, meeting her gaze again. “Even if I don’t look the same.”

Her face creased into a puzzled frown. “I don’t know you. Is this some kind of a game? Are you Latnok?”

He chuckled again.

“No,” he replied softly. “Although, life might’ve been much easier if I’d’ve just bitten the bullet and become one of them. One of Latnok.” He bit off the last part with some bitterness. “But no, I’m not one of them. I’m someone else. Someone pretty close to you—”

“Quit the guessing games,” she growled, “and just tell me who you are!”

He breathed, heart speeding up to beat furiously in his chest. Butterflies fluttered like mad circus tricks gone wrong in his gut and his palms suddenly became very sweaty. He wiped them off on the fabric of his pants and all she did was watch him, watch him with those piercing brown eyes that cut him deep into his soul, dragged out all of his secrets and laid them bare for the entire world to see. He suddenly missed that older, wiser, snarkier Jessi that developed fourteen years into the future. At least he didn’t have to tell that Jessi anything of what had transpired in the past. She was there for part of it, and what she had been absent for…well, Joshua had filled her in on.

But this Jessi…this one, he had forgotten about in the long years of war, buried deep under memories of better times, memories that he had thrust so far down in his subconscious that it would take every effort he had to drag them out kicking and screaming. They were sketchy: he remembered that bad things had happened to Jessi, but not quite what. He remembered that people had not always been kind to her, but not whom and that when things seemed like they were looking up, life always smacked her with something else to tear all of her efforts down.

The older Jessi—his Jessi—had accepted that her life was a piece of crap, but even then…she made the most of it. She still joked and laughed and played poker with the guys after long missions and the nights when soldiers just wanted to unwind. But this Jessi, this Jessi’s heart was still an open wound that the world still had much more to bruise. This Jessi had not yet seen the heartaches that would be reaped on her nor the injustices that she would have to suck up and deal with.

But, if Joshua could help it, she would never, ever have to see those dramas unfold nor see the fruition of her life’s tragedies. If he could help it, he would change things for her, for everyone.

“Jessi,” he began, quietly. “It’s me…Josh.”

8o8o8

It was Lori, not Nicole, who had received Stephen’s frantic phone call. She had been standing on the front porch, cradling the small device in her hand and waiting for it to ring—like she had been waiting for it for nearly three hours—and let her know if the Seattle police had found anything. For three hours it had remained silent in her arms and she had remained still as a statue, watching the world pass by, hoping against hope that nothing had happened to Jessi, hoping that they’d find her and that she’d be alright.

It was as she was glancing right that two things had happened at once: Amanda came out of her home, going straight to the mailbox and glanced up at and Lori, who’d lifted a hand to wave, and the phone rang scaring her witless. She picked it up immediately, not seeing the frown that had creased Amanda’s face nor the way the blonde-haired teen made a move to approach the Trager house.

“Nicole?! Nicole?!” came Stephen’s panicked shout from the phone’s receiver. The phone immediately flew to Lori’s ear and she called out, “Dad, what’s wrong? Did you find her?”

She didn’t notice that Amanda had come up the walkway of the Trager’s home, her frown creased even further. She stepped lightly up the stairs as Stephen shouted through the phone, “Lori?! Go-go get your mother! Now!”

“What? Why?” Lori asked, panic lacing her voice. It was then that she glanced up and saw Amanda standing at her side, mouthing, ‘What’s wrong?’ Lori shook her head, feeling helpless tears want to spring to her eyes. She heard her father curse, heard a pained groan in the background and all color drained from her face.

“Dad, is that Josh?”

“Go get your mother.” She jumped at the vehemence in her father’s voice and rushed towards the front door before remembering Amanda had been standing beside her. She turned back to the very confused, very puzzled Bloom girl and said, “Amanda, now is…it’s just not the time.”

“What’s going on?” Amanda demanded, walking forward and grabbing Lori’s arm. “Does it…Does it have to do with…Kyle?”

“Look,” Lori swallowed, feeling helpless. “Can you come back later?”

“I want to help,” Amanda replied, her eyes pleading. Lori gripped the phone tightly and nodded before rushing off to find her mother, and Amanda breathed, taking a step into the Trager household, feeling like a prisoner on death row. It had been so long since she had been in this house she half-expected it to suddenly sprout tentacles and chase her away. She stepped inside cautiously and closed door, still gripping her mother’s mail, but not quite sure what to do with herself.

She knew she shouldn’t be there. After all, it was her that had pushed Kyle away after he had run off to go and help Jessi…once again. But…she couldn’t help herself. Something about Kyle kept dragging her into his life, and like a moth to a flame, she couldn’t help but follow her desires no matter how much the other parts of her kept shouting ‘No!’ She walked deeper into the Trager house, gently touching the wall and setting her mother’s mail down on the table that decorated the foyer. She looked up, saw herself in the mirror and gave a grim sort of smile. She did say she was going to help. She could just sense that something was wrong here, and even if she weren’t needed, she’d let someone else tell her that. Until then, she’d lend a hand.

“Amanda,” came the soft whisper, and Amanda gave a start before turning swiftly to face the speaker of her softly spoken name, and when she saw him, her eyes widened to bright, blue saucers. It was Kyle, looking to all the world like a lost puppy. Bags were under his eyes and his skin was paler than usual. He looked like a man who had stared into the face of death.

“Kyle,” she whispered back, reaching out a hand to him, wanting to take him into her arms. Had she done this when she had turned him away? Was he torn up and broken about his decision to once again abandon her for Jessi? Was he what all the fuss was about in the Trager house?

For a second, Kyle looked grateful, as if this was what he had been wanting for, but when he looked up into her gently smiling face, whatever grateful emotion he’d had evaporated immediately and he looked just as sorrowful as ever.

“You shouldn’t be here,” he informed her and looked away. “You should—”

“But I’m here now,” she replied softly, stepping closer. “And…And, if you need me…I’m not going anywhere.”

He looked up at that, surprise registering in his deep blue eyes. She smiled wider and he allowed himself a gentle smile in turn. He grabbed her hand instead of falling into her arms like she was sure he wanted to and took her into the living room and seated them both on the couch. She turned to him, her gaze expectant and he met her gaze dead on.

“Amanda, I—”

“No,” she said gently, cupping his face in her hands. “Let’s not talk about it. Let’s just—“

But they were interrupted by a panic-stricken Lori, who—with tears pouring down her face—entered the living room and said in a shaking voice,” It’s Josh…Something’s wrong.”

8o8o8

“You probably won’t believe this,” he began. “Sometimes when, I think about it…and I mean, really think about it…Sometimes, I don’t want to believe it either. You must realize, Jessi, that…so much has changed. And not for the better. The whole world…it became really screwed. FUBAR. And so irrevocably so that…no one was sure that this little gamble would work. I mean, c’mon…seriously…time travel? Who’d have thunk it? Who’d have dreamed it possible? Well, I’ll tell you who. You did Jessi. You did, and for one second, in this messed up existence and life, I had hope. Real hope…”

His heart was beating faster and faster in a chest that he wasn’t even aware of. His body was shaking in a body that he couldn’t remember was his own. All he could see were the dizzying, sickening colors that rushed passed his mental vision and the horrible nausea that he felt when he saw what was there. War. War, and the ruined remnants of Seattle. Burning cities. Slave encampments and the face of someone he had trusted so implicitly displayed across billboards and television screens and broadcasted on radios: ‘You will submit. You will submit. The Creator knows what’s good for you. The Creator is your guiding light. Trust the Creator. Love the Creator.’

But somewhere deep down, his mind was screaming, ‘Wrong. Wrong. All wrong. He is the Destroyer. The Destroyer will level you, will waste you and will kill your soul.’

But even deeper than that, even deeper, in a world that he was no longer aware of, someone was shouting at him, “Come back, Josh! Goddamn, don’t you leave me! Come back!”

“It wasn’t supposed to be this way, you know?” he continued. “Life wasn’t supposed to turn out this way. Everything was supposed to go on its merry little course. Me and Andy, we were supposed to get married, you know? Have the house, the white picket fence, the dog and the cat and the two point five, cancer-free kids, but…Andy had always been so outspoken. I don’t remember much about her, but I do remember that. She’d never been able to keep mouth shut about anything, always expressing her opinion, always telling others what she thought. Maybe that was the reason why he killed her first. Kill off the strongest opposition you have—those that know you best—and the world won’t see what kind of monster you’ve become.”

More colors. More visions, more images floating passed. He knew these things, something in him knew these things, but…he didn’t know them either. A very strange and confusing paradox. But then, one image streamed passed his vision and it almost stopped his heart…a second time. Andy, red hair and green eyes, twinkling at him, was bloody and bruised and he could see, looking at this horrible image through his own eyes, a shadow of a boy with dark, black hair and blue eyes glaring at her with such anger and such hatred in his eyes that it made Josh sick to his stomach to see. How could—

Where could—

What was going on here?!

But Andy was smiling at him through her and mouthing like a new age mantra, ‘Be strong, Josh. I love you, I love you. Be strong.’

She wasn’t pleading for her life. She was screaming or asking for mercy. She was staring at him, her eyes were twinkling and she was smiling and she was telling him to be the strong one. This was worse than her cancer threatening to come back. This was worse than anything he could ever experience in his life.

Please, please, dear God, let this be a dream…

But dreams didn’t feel this real, didn’t have this flavor of reality around, didn’t have this finality to them, like he was staring at an aspect of his life that had already happened. But it was crazy because this had never happened. This had never—

His hand came up, blues eyes shadowed with a dark intent and Josh cried out, sobbing, pleading and screaming profanities, ‘No, don’t! Please, dear God, don’t! Please, Kyl—”

He could feel the sweep of power like the gentlest caress across his face before Andy’s body locked up, tense for the briefest second, and then slumped forward. Dead. Her green eyes were lifeless as they stared at him. Her face slack, never to smile at him, never to laugh. Nothing. Nothing.

Josh let out a howl of grief.

“He killed so many, but nobody thinks him capable of it now. Right now, he’s probably the innocent boy that everyone knows and loves, but to me…I know him as a monster. Sure, I was gullible like everyone else, but I’ve seen the things he’s capable of. I know the things he can do to people. He gets inside of you and messes with your head. He can do that Jessi. He can…” Pause. Cleared throat. “But I’m digressing, aren’t I? You want to know what happened, right? Not the ramblings of some thirty-year-old war vet, eh? Alright. I’ll tell you. But this isn’t going to be easy to hear.”

It was all in rewind, a crazy story from the beginning, and his father was somewhere outside of his confused consciousness, shaking and sobbing with a nurse trying to comfort him and his mother and sister, his brother and his neighbor on their way to the hospital and its staff that was trying to keep him alive. He was lost in this world of memories, but eventually they dragged him back, all the way back, to the beginning when everything began to fall apart.

He saw it in crystal clarity. He saw it as clearly as day, as clearly as stars on a cloudless night, and what he saw chilled him to the core.

No, no. That was impossible.

It couldn’t happen.

It wouldn’t happen.

Not…him.

Not…

No.

“In one week, Latnok is going to kill Amanda Bloom, and Kyle is going to destroy the world.”

8o8o8

Josh woke with a scream in his throat just as Joshua sat up straight in his chair with a jerk and breathed as if his throat were raw. Jessi was staring at him intently and he licked his lips, dragged his canteen to his suddenly dry lips, popping the top and taking a long gulp of the refreshing liquid.

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Jessi replied heatedly. Joshua glanced at her, but she wasn’t looking at him. She shook her head, fixed him with a momentary glare. “Kyle would never…Kyle wouldn’t…I mean, Kyle would never destroy the world. Me…maybe, but Kyle…Kyle loves everyone.”

Joshua dropped his empty canteen in his lap and let a grim smile split his face in two. “Oh you think so, eh? Kyle has the same abilities as you, the same will power and the same passions grip him.”

“But, but,” she looked away again. “He wouldn’t…not for anything. Amanda gets killed by Latnok? Why?”

“Why’d she get kidnapped?” Josh countered. Jessi glared at him.

“Kidnapped,” she snapped. “Not killed.”

The grim smile snaked its way across Joshua’s face again. “Let me break it down to you then:

“Kyle goes crazy with grief because of what happened, and he kills Cassidy. Then he takes over Latnok and after that…well, Seattle was the first city he destroyed.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Jessi continued, stubbornly. “What happened? Why didn’t I stop him?”

“You left,” Joshua replied with a shrug. Jessi look immediately became a perplexed one.

“I left?” she repeated in disbelief. Joshua nodded solemnly.

“I suppose it was…after he’d told Amanda the truth about himself.” He shrugged. “Must’ve brought them closer together? But, it drove you away…made you think that you’d lost the only real person in this world that, uh, meant something to you…and…when Latnok killed her and Kyle went psycho, there was no one to stop him. No one to put an end to the reign of terror before it became so.”

“So…when did I join the…uh, war effort?” she asked, her voice still tinged with disbelief.

“When it looked like it was hopeless.” Joshua smirked again. “At least, for us normal humans anyway. You came in like an angel of death, killing off an entire platoon of his soldiers all by yourself. Then…well, you settled more for the science track than you did the…uh…war front. You made advancements in technology that turned the war around for us. Turned it around enough that we thought we could win it…”

“But?” Jessi’s eyes were wide now, and her body leaning slightly forward, all ears, intently listening. Joshua kept his grin of satisfaction to himself. It wasn’t always that Jessi got play hero, he remembered that too. It must’ve been a treat to hear that she’d saved his ass more times than he could count.

“Kyl—I mean, the Destroyer—brought out the big guns…Something we couldn’t handle and…it decimated everything,” he replied, his voice somber. “Everything…all of our troops, our supply lines…everything. And when we all thought it was lost, you told the big bosses that you had a secret weapon that could possibly change everything so that nothing would be the same ever again. A secret weapon that would help us win.”

“Time travel,” Jessi finished and sat back on her cot. “Unbelievable.” She was quiet for a moment, contemplating what he had told her and Joshua watched her, watched as the gears worked in her head. He wanted to believe that she believed him. He wanted to believe that his gamble would work. That Jessi was the key to stopping everything, to preventing the war and to changing the course of history, even if that meant depriving himself of the history that they developed between each other. He wanted her to believe him, needed her to.

She looked up with a start, surprising him from his inner thoughts, and asked, “But then…why take me? Why did you…”

“Hopefully,” Joshua admitted quietly, “to take his focus from…her.”

“I don’t…I don’t understand,” she replied, puzzled. “He…he probably already told her and they’re probably…”

“He didn’t get the chance to,” Joshua said firmly. “And…with you taken, he’ll focus more on…getting you back.”

Jessi’s look of disbelief returned. “So, what…you’re playing a time traveling matchmaker? C’mon.” She shook her head, her face cracking a little and showing the sorrow that existed underneath it all. “Kyle cares about her…about…Amanda. He’s not going to…he won’t…he won’t come looking for me with his precious Amanda around.”

Joshua was silent for a moment. “Maybe he won’t…And maybe he will.”

Her look was a hopeful one before she masked it behind a look of stone. “He won’t.”

She looked away, fiddled with her shirt hem and Joshua continued to watch her, wishing so desperately that this entire ordeal could be over with. He wanted to know if he somehow went back now, would he be returning to a much happier future where he, in his current incarnation did not exist, or would it be the same dismal future? Was anything he was saying or doing making even the slightest difference?

“Can you just…” Jessi started, then stopped and swallowed. “Can you just…turn this…dampening what’s it off, please?”

“I don’t know if I should do that,” Joshua replied, steel lacing his tone. Jessi glared at him.

“Look,” she growled. “You already kidnapped me, battered me and are stopping me from using my powers. I heard what you had to say. Now, let me go.”

Joshua raised an eyebrow. “And what will you do? I know, you’ll go back to him and tell him exactly what I’ve said and then everything…EVERYTHING…that I’ve done will be for nothing. No, you’ll stay put.”

“No, I won’t,” Jessi hissed. Joshua raised his other eyebrow.

“Oh, you won’t will you,” he hissed back. “Trust me, you built this field. You can’t break out of it, you can’t manipulate it, you can’t do anything unless I turn it off and since I’m not in the mood to—”

“What did he ever do to you that makes you hate him so much?” Jessi asked, her brown eyes laser points again and Joshua paused in mid-rant, feeling like someone had dumped him with a bucket of cold water. He swallowed and looked away, a frown creasing his features.

Did he dare tell her? Did he dare let her know what kind of a monster Kyle was? Or the monster that Kyle could be? He breathed and listened to her and she shifted on the cot.

“He killed her,” Joshua replied, quietly.

“What?” Jessi asked, puzzled.

“He killed her,” Joshua repeated louder. “He killed Andy. He killed everyone. Except Declan, but even he wished he were dead sometimes.”

“K-Kyle?” Jessi asked, her voice horrified. Joshua nodded.

“He killed Andy first. She was one of the few to oppose him, you know? I kept quiet little the good, little coward that I was. Then he killed…Lori and-and Mark…and Dad and Mom…He killed them all because…I mean, how could he look at them and not remember what he had been? How could he not peer into their faces and see the kind boy that had loved everyone and everything. He’d called himself the Creator to the rest of the world, but to those of us that had survived his nasty assault on Seattle, we knew. We knew.

“He wanted to no part of that boy that he had been. And when Latnok killed Amanda, he figured that us lower humans didn’t know how to think for ourselves and make decisions for ourselves and that we’d always entertain hurting others before helping them. He’s always been that you, you know? He never let others make their own decisions. He just always figure: ‘Kyle knew best. Kyle was so smart. Kyle was always on top of things. Kyle was always helping and always take control.’ No one ever thought that those same ‘good’ traits could go horribly wrong if unchecked. And nobody ever checked them because he was Kyle and he was good.”

Joshua shook himself as if he were trying to shake the old cobwebs of horrible memories from his mind. He looked up and met Jessi gaze.

“I have to stop him,” he continued firmly, “anyway I know how.”

“And you’re going to use me to do it?” she snapped, her words laced with anger.

Joshua’s jaw hardened. “If I have to.”

“Then you’re no better than Latnok,” she replied in a hiss.

“Maybe not,” Joshua hissed back, “but at least it changes the future. At least, it saves the world.”

“If you want to save the world,” Jessi replied, her voice softer, “then let me go.”

Joshua breathed. “I can’t do that. I can’t—”

“Then for all you know,” she cut in, “the future’s going to be the same.”