Future Shock

18

“The same thing happened to us,” I say.

That means four of us aren’t in the system. Everyone is missing except Adam. The empty research facility was just the beginning of our problems. It must all be connected.

“Seriously?” Chris runs a hand over his shaved head. “How can we all not be in the system?”

“It might be related to whatever happened to Aether Corporation,” Adam says, echoing my own thoughts.

“Maybe,” Chris says. “All I know is, we couldn’t buy anything. But Trent picked something up anyway.”

“Check this out.” Trent pulls something that looks like a pen from his coat. “It’s like a laser that heals you. Awesome, right?”

“Wait, did you steal that?” Adam asks.

Trent shrugs and lights up a cigarette. “They can have it back in twenty-four hours.”

Chris narrows his eyes at Adam’s bag. “How’d you get your stuff?”

I hesitate, but they’ll find out the truth soon enough. “Adam was in the system.”

“What?” Chris takes a step toward Adam. “Is there something you’re not telling us, smart guy?”

“No! I have no idea why I’m in the system and you’re not.”

“I think you’re lying. I think you know exactly what’s going on.” He shoves Adam in the chest, knocking him back into the side of the truck.

Trent throws his cigarette on the ground and moves forward to join in. “Did you know we’d be going thirty years in the future instead of ten?”

I’m getting really tired of these assholes. I step in front of Chris and Trent. “Leave him alone. He doesn’t know anything.”

“How do you know that?” Chris asks. “You don’t know anything about him!”

“I know he’s not a thief like you two.” I clench my fists, ready to fight them both. All the pent-up frustration from the last few hours bubbles to the surface, and my muscles ache to unleash it on these two. It’s not their fault everything is going wrong, but they’re not helping things either.

“Oh my God, stop fighting!” Zoe huddles against the truck, tugging her jacket around herself. Her eyes are wide and fearful. A memory rises up from when I was a kid, cowering under a table and scared out of my mind while my parents fought. I’m disgusted with myself as I see Zoe looking at me now with the same fear. I drop my hands and take a step back.

“She’s right,” Adam says at my side. “We need to work together.”

“Work together?” Trent snickers. “That’s hilarious.”

Chris points a finger at Adam. “You’re lucky your girlfriend is here to protect you. This time.”

My temper flares up again. “He’s not my—”

“Yeah, whatever.” Chris crosses his arms and glares at us. “So what’s your plan?”

No one answers. The question is too big. Nothing’s gone right since we arrived in the future. Hell, we’re not even in the right time period.

Maybe something bad happened to us in the thirty years between our time and now. Aether told us not to look into our futures because it could send us into shock and cause brain damage—but what if they’re wrong?

Or what if that’s all a lie, and they don’t want us to do it because we’ll discover what’s actually going on?

I have to know why I’m not in the system. Even if it damages my brain, I need to know my fate.

“We need to find out what happened to us,” I say.

“What?” Zoe asks. “But we’re not supposed to look into our futures.”

“Do we have any other choice?”

“Yeah,” Chris says. “We figure out how this stuff works and go home. That’s what we came to do.”

I shake my head. “I don’t know about you guys, but I signed up for this ‘research project’ to make sure I have a future. Something obviously went wrong in the last thirty years. I’m going to find out what happened and fix it.”

“How do we do that?” Trent asks.

I’m not sure. But Adam answers for me. “We can use the stuff we bought to search for ourselves. We’ll try to link up with our profiles. Our future selves must have f*******: or whatever the equivalent is now, right? Or a website, something we can use.”

“What if we can’t find anything?” asks Zoe.

“We look for other people we know. Friends, family. Or for Aether Corporation. Try to find out what happened to them.”

While Chris stares off into space with a grim look on his face, Trent flicks his lighter on and off. “What about paradoxes and all that crap?” Trent asks.

“We won’t actually interact with our future selves,” Adam says. “We’ll just look them up. That’s it. We should be okay.”

Zoe chews on the edge of her black nails. “I don’t know…”

“Screw it. I’m in,” Trent says. “We can look ourselves up and figure out how the technology works at the same time.”

“But won’t we go into shock or whatever?” Zoe asks.

“Maybe,” I say. “But that’s a risk I’m willing to take. I have a gut feeling something is very wrong in this future.”

“This is a bad idea,” Chris says, shaking his head. “If we do this, we can’t let Aether know that we looked ourselves up.”

“None of us will tell them.” I glance at the others, and they all nod.

Adam opens the bag and passes out the flexis we bought, while briefly explaining to Trent and Chris how they work. We spread out between the two trucks. I sit against a huge tire and hold the flexi in my fingers, feeling the thin plastic membrane. The others all start to apply them, but I still hesitate. I don’t want this thing poking around in my brain, but if it’s the only way…