I lean against the side of the lifeguard tower, scanning the beach around me. It’s pitch-black except for the faint sliver of the moon and the dim light on the sand. Everything here is in black and white—the sand, the water, the sky, the few stars visible over the light of the city. The only thing with any color is the Ferris wheel in the distance.
After some time, a slim figure approaches from the parking lot, moving quickly over the sand. As it gets closer I make out the shape of a woman in a suit. Lynne.
I wait for her to come to me, knowing this has to end here, tonight. I wish I had a weapon or something, but without a gun of my own I’d always be at a disadvantage. She’s probably never been in a real fight before though. My best chance is to get her to confess, distract her, and then attack.
When she’s only a few feet away, she raises the gun with a gloved hand. “Hello, Elena.”
I don’t see any regret or hesitation in her eyes. Her hand is steady as she aims at me. And that certainty, that confidence scares me more than anything else. I trusted her. We all did, and now she’s aiming a gun at me like it’s no big deal. How could she lie to our faces, both now and in the future? How could she swear she would help us and then kill us all?
“You don’t seem surprised to see the gun,” she says. “But I had a feeling you knew when you suggested the beach. Did you see that in the future?”
I step back quickly, my feet slow and catching in the sand. Suddenly I doubt my plan. Why did I think I could fight against a woman with a gun? The recording, I remind myself. I have to get her to talk.
“You lied to us all along, both you and your future self,” I say. “Our entire trip to the future was set up just so you could get the cure, wasn’t it?”
“That’s true. Dr. Kapur did want to use teenagers, but I had to convince Aether to go along with it so I could recruit Adam. I figured he had the best chance of getting the cure, and I didn’t have time to send multiple teams. And I chose the rest of you to assist him, even if you didn’t know that’s what you were doing. You, in particular, were chosen to protect Adam. From your files I knew you liked to fight for the underdog. That’s why I gave you a gun.”
All this time I thought I was chosen for my memory, but that was another lie. I flash back to the first time I met Lynne. She asked me if I liked to fight and I said, “No, but I will if I have to.’’ I remember her smile at hearing those words.
And on that first day at the Aether facility, they’d left the five of us alone, probably to see what we did and how we interacted. Only after I defended Adam from Chris did Lynne walk in and start talking about the project. Even my feelings for Adam were manipulated from the very beginning.
I glance around, looking for help or a way out. I have to keep her talking. “And you sent us thirty years into the future instead of ten, didn’t you?”
“I had to. Adam discovered the cure ten years from now, but it was still brand-new and untested and not available to the public yet. I wasn’t sure how many years it would take for it to be safe to use and widely available, so I secretly set the accelerator back to its previous setting. I figured in thirty years it should be easy for Adam—or his future self—to get the cure.”
“But why kill us?” I ask, inching closer to her. “You got your cure!”
She sighs, and I hear the first hint of emotion in her voice. “I never planned for any of this to happen, truly. Trent stole my doses of the cure, and when I went to talk to him, he said he didn’t have them. But then he attacked me and I shot him. It was an accident, I swear. After that…well, I had to deal with the others too.”
“You killed them,” I spit out. “They trusted you, and you killed them!”
“I just wanted the cure back! My daughter…she only has weeks left to live. Maybe days. Do you know what it’s like, watching your four-year-old child wither away in a hospital bed, and there’s nothing you can do? The cure was the only way to save her life!”
“But you have the cure now. I won’t tell anyone about this,” I lie as the wind twists my hair behind me. “You don’t need to do this!”