Finally, Sekun-ak said, “It is time, then?”
“It is time.”
They stood and faced each other, one hand on the other’s shoulder.
Quietly, Alex said, “If you ever need me. Follow me through the door. I will be there, and you know I can help.”
“Gunta, brother,” Sekun-ak said, then sat down and stared toward the forest.
God, I hate goodbyes.
Alex climbed back down to where Reggie still sat. “Sanda-eh, do you have your toy?”
Sanda-eh reached in her pocket and pulled out the small blob of high-tech material that Emily had given her. “Time to go, then.”
“Can we play a little longer?” Sanda-eh pleaded. It was as though she was begging to swim another lap in a lake, instead of preparing for the biggest journey of her life.
“It’s time,” Alex said simply.
Sanda-eh waved to Tinka-eh and ran to Alex’s side. They walked to the waterfall. Alex had hoped to make a quiet escape, but when he turned for one last look at the landscape he knew so well, he saw that almost all of the tribe had gathered on the field. They didn’t speak, but simply held a hand up in goodbye.
Alex took a long piece of rope around his waist, then did the same with Sanda-eh and Monda-ak. He only had the experience of going through a door a single time and he had been alone. He wouldn’t risk losing either of them this trip through.
“Remember. Close your eyes, and just keep your feet moving. I’ll tell you when to open them.”
The three of them stood and faced the waterfall.
Alex led them through the door into time.
Chapter Forty-ThreeOregon
The feeling inside the door was instantly familiar to Alex, though he had only experienced it once before. The darkness was total and the silence nearly so.
Monda-ak had not closed his eyes as Alex had instructed. His keen eyes were able to see something even in the darkest of nights or caves, but not in this darkness. He let out one of his mightiest woofs in protest, but the sound barely reached Alex’s ears.
Alex gripped Sanda-eh’s hand tightly and forced himself to take a few steps forward. He stumbled, pulling Sanda-eh with him. He remembered collapsing face first on the beach and fought to maintain his balance.
Then there was light and more-breathable air. Alex blinked and looked around, trying to prepare himself for anything. Even so, he was not prepared for what he saw.
It was his basement, but not as he expected it. The wall had not been rebuilt as he feared. In fact, the bricks of the two walls were still stacked on the floor a few feet in front of him. The bricks that he had laid out like they were a puzzle were still in the same spot, the claw marks of the karak-ta still visible.
To Alex’s eye, it appeared that nothing had changed in the eleven years since he had stepped through the door.
That’s impossible.
That thought had no more flitted through Alex’s brain than the definition of impossible was ratcheted up several notches.
He still held Sanda-eh’s hand in his right, but the oddest thing of all was that his left hand brushed up against the frame of the wall. His left hand. A complete hand.
He held it up in front of his face and gawked.
“Dadda!” Sanda-eh said. “Your hand is back.”
ALEX REACHED OUT AND stroked her hair, trying to keep her calm. What he really needed was someone to stroke his hair and keep him calm.
Monda-ak moved quickly around the room, sniffing at everything, cataloguing an entire new spectrum of smells.
Alex turned his miraculous left hand this way and that, admiring it. His focus traveled up his left arm and he noticed that the long, slicing scar—the one from where Draka-ak had sliced him open—was gone. He lifted his kilt and saw that the dozens of wasta-ta and zisla-ta scars were gone as well.
He lifted his new left hand—or maybe his old left hand—to touch his forehead and noticed another thing. His hair was gone. At least, his long hair that extended down his back was gone. He touched the top of his head and found his old familiar buzz cut.
“What is going on?”
That is what he asked, but in his heart, he knew.
Bista, or perhaps whatever iteration of Janus II was currently functioning, had set the door to return him to approximately the time when he had first stepped through the door. He dashed to the basement window and peered outside.
Blue skies and sunshine. Just like it had been on the day he had left. He picked up his cell phone from the workbench. It felt like a foreign object in his hand. Clumsily, he swiped it to life. It said it was 2:47 P.M. on February 27, 2019.
Alex’s heart leapt. His first thought was Amy.
She’s still four years old. I didn’t even miss her party. She didn’t grow up, thinking I abandoned her.
Monda-ak saw the stairs and went up to explore.
Alex scooped up Sanda-eh and followed him, double-timing it up the stairs.
The giant plush teddy bear sat on the chair, waiting to be delivered.
The dishes from making breakfast still sat in the drying rack. Everything in the house was just as he had left it.
He sat down on his couch, put Sanda-eh on his lap and explained where they were.
“This is where we live.”
Sanda-eh looked around uncertainly at the living room furniture, the television. “I don’t like it. Where is our home?”
“This is our home now. It will take time, but we will get used to it. We have Monda-ak with us, right?”
Monda-ak woofed his agreement. He was indeed with them.
“Do you remember your sister Amy I’ve told you all the stories about?”
“I remember her,” she answered.
“Today is her birthday, and we are going to go see her now.” Alex considered telling her about riding in his pickup truck, but decided it might be best to let her absorb things on her own.
