Return Once More

Could it?

Perhaps that was today’s lesson. The overseers might have a specific aspect of today in mind, one we should have noticed. I should have been paying more attention. As usual.

We left before Jay’s friends sent out the search party that would recover his body. It wouldn’t look right for the five of us to be in the same spot, morning to night. People would remember that, once this day became memorable to them, and despite the ancient Egyptian tale about dark ones showing up in the pages of history, we’d been trained to take every effort to ensure no Historians accidentally appeared in Earth Before’s history books.

Silence accompanied our group on the way back up the beach. We’d witnessed the death of a boy of only twenty-two, and even though it wasn’t violent or horrifying like so many of our observations, this unsettled me, too. Perhaps it was the idea that we could be so fully alive and present one moment and gone the next. That the smallest choices could change everything.

A small group of people—two girls, four boys, all young—sat around a crackling fire at the edge of the beach, books embossed with the title Holy Bible opened in their laps. They looked as though they might be seminary students of some kind, based on their serious expressions and the fact that they sat on a gorgeous beach to read religious texts instead of enjoying the sun or water. One of the boys read aloud in a pleasing tone that helped ease my mounting tension.

“So, God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them, male and female he created them. God blessed them and said to them, ‘Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.’”

He continued, his voice fading as we passed by, making our way back to the secluded coconut trees. The words sounded right, and yet they didn’t. My mind played with the verses, trying to figure out why they felt wrong. My brain stem tattoo was no help—every version of the Bible it searched came back with the passage read exactly like the boy had intoned it moments ago, yet my memory, which had always been excellent, insisted it was off.

As we gathered together inside the blue bubble, waiting for our return trip, it hit me. The passage had been missing something—the words “be fruitful and increase in number, fill the earth and subdue it.”

My mouth went dry and my knees buckled, causing Analeigh to reach out a hand to steady me and Oz to raise a sharp look my direction.

All I could think was that since my brain stem tat hadn’t been able to find any texts with the correct wording, they were missing from the historical record.

Which meant someone, sometime, had purposely taken them out.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Oz’s prickling gaze remained on me until we left the air lock, but I refused to meet his eyes. He’d been watching me too closely these past days, and though we knew each other’s secrets—some of them, anyway--he wasn’t my friend. I wasn’t sure he was a friend to any of us anymore. He’d been working behind our backs, trusting the Elders, and it was too soon to tell whether he actually believed the bullhonky they were feeding him.

No matter how understanding he’d been about Caesarion, or that he’d shown me the Projector instead of telling the Elders where I’d been and what I’d caused … he hadn’t been totally honest with me about anything. There had to be more to the project the Elders had him working on.

Analeigh sensed my unrest, her body rigid and her breathing quick at my side. It was hard to believe Booth and everyone else couldn’t hear my heart pounding and the bile sloshing in my stomach. If spending a few days with Caesarion had such massive consequences, who knew what kind of shit storm altering a text like the Bible—a book that literally influenced the daily life of billions of people—would stir up.

Oz, and maybe the Elders, were using the Projector to change life on Earth Before. To alter the time lines that led to the major issues that destroyed society—first, Oz and gun development. Now, religious texts, particularly those of the Judeo-Christian variety were being changed to no longer encourage procreation—which would go a long way toward curbing devastating overpopulation.

I dragged Analeigh into our room, even though the di

“What happened?”

I sank into the chair behind one of the desks. My stomach had never been twisted into more knots and my head pounded, this time not because of fighting the bio-tat’s instructions. “Did you hear that kid reading from the Bible on the beach?”

“Um, I guess?”

“You didn’t notice anything weird about the passage?” My voice sounded strangled even to my own ears, the words spilling out in such a jumble they almost felt out of order.

Analeigh’s face paled. “Kaia, you’re freaking me out. Tell me what’s going on.”

The air in our room hummed with unspent energy. Analeigh and I had been friends for long enough that our moods played off each other’s, and I sensed her discomfort and the fear mounting in the face of my own. I couldn’t do this alone anymore. Oz didn’t count, and Caesarion wasn’t an option any longer. I needed my best friend.

I sucked in a deep breath. “I think I know what Jonah was talking about, the secret the Elders are keeping. And it’s dangerous, like he said.”

Analeigh sank down on her bed, her green eyes never leaving me. “I’m ready.”

“They’re trying to find ways to fix Earth Before, based on the largest issues that led to our evacuation.”

Her eyes went wide, her knuckles white as she gripped her bedspread. “How? But. Why? How?”

The sputtered questions died out as I shook my head. “I don’t know, Analeigh, but that Bible passage was missing the command about populating the earth—the part the Church used for hundreds of years to assert God’s resistance to birth control. What’s one of the primary contributors to the loss of Earth Before’s viability?”

“Overpopulation,” she whispered.

“Right. And that’s not all. Oz’s trips all focus on the development of automatic weaponry—unmitigated violence. That’s another major contributor.” I paused, my brain trying to click pieces into place. “They’re trying to fix it.”

“How can they? After all these years, drilling into our heads that even the slightest alteration made—allowing ourselves to be seen or heard, acting inappropriately in the past—how can they be sure their actions won’t inadvertently wipe us all from existence?” Her voice rose, red circles on her fair cheeks betraying her panic. “That Bible verse, Kaia. How many people won’t be born because contraception isn’t frowned upon? It could be our grandparents.”

She crossed her arms, grabbing her biceps and squeezing as though she might disappear any moment. Her words echoed my own fears, barely mollified by the knowledge of the Projector or any of Oz’s nonsense about fate. If the Elders were altering the past, they had a reason. Intentions.

“There’s more. You’re going to be pissed at me for not telling you sooner, but you were already so angry, and … I knew you would tell me to stop and I didn’t want to.”

“Kaia, I think what’s happening with the Elders pretty much overshadows any additional rules you’ve managed to break. Not that there were many left,” she added dryly.

I told her everything. About all my transgressions with Caesarion, about what Oz had shown me regarding the consequences of my unintended effect on my True’s demise. About the Projector, and that Oz refused to admit the danger it could pose.

Her face grew so pale I worried she’d pass out, but as always, Analeigh proved to be stronger than she looked. “How are you not being tracked?”