The Lost Train of Thought Read online

  The old man thoughtfully rubbed his chin.

  “And is that not a Stopwatch you wear on your wrist?”

  Permin’s right hand reflexively slid to his left forearm, where a leather band held the one personal item he’d been allowed to keep in Seemsberia as something to hold on to in his moments of dark despair.

  “It is. But this one’s set to work at the normal flow of Time in The World. According to those drawings, the moat has almost ten times that much Essence!”

  “Can it be done? Even by an old Ticky such as yourself?”

  At the mention of the entry-level position from where Permin had begun his meteoric rise through the Department of Time, the ex-Administrator’s hunched old back seemed to straighten.

  “I’ll need twenty minutes to rewind the gears, and another ten to calibrate the hands.”

  “Voilà.” Thib rolled up the blueprints and tucked them away. “That will give Simly and I time to take care of one final errand.”

  But as Simly followed the Frenchman through a maze of steam tunnels, question after question began to seep into the Briefer’s skull. Like how was it that Thibadeau just happened to have been assigned to the exact same cell as the infamous Time Bandits? And how did he just happen to get his hands on an original copy of the Seemsberia blueprints? Worst of all, how could he, Simly Frye, just happen to be placing his trust in two convicted Tide felons?

  “Hold on a sec, Freck.” Simly stopped in his tracks and pointed an accusatory finger at his fellow escapee. “I thought we were trying to escape!”

  “We are. But even if we succeed, we are just three men in pajamas in the frozen tundra—hundreds of miles away from where the machinery that makes The World is under assault. If we are to save The Seems, we must find help.”

  It was only then that Simly noticed he and Thibadeau were standing above what looked like a submarine hatch. Judging by the rust on the surface of the turning wheel, it hadn’t been opened in years—probably because the hatch was also covered by at least fifty stickers that delivered the exact same message: “Whatever you do, please, under any circumstances, do not open! (And we mean any!)”

  “Where does it lead, Thib?”

  “The Heckhole.”

  “But Permin said there’s Glitches down there!”

  “Permin did not lie. And yet, we must let them out . . .”

  Thibadeau spat into his hands and rubbed them together, then began to turn the ancient wheel. The hinge squealed and the iron oxide crumbled away from the hatch— but not before Simly finally reached his breaking point. In a gangly tumble of elbows and knees, the Briefer leapt upon his former friend and threw him roughly to the floor.

  “I’m not gonna let you try to destroy The World again, Thib!”

  Beneath his thick brown beard, Thibadeau smiled sadly.

  “Trust me, Simly. I’m not trying to destroy The World, I’m trying to save it.”

  “And if I don’t trust you?”

  “Then the minute I step inside this door, lock it behind me and do not open it again until you have contacted the proper authorities. Of course, by that time The Tide’s sleeper cells will have seized control of each and every department in The Seems, and The World will be under the control of Triton himself.”

  Thib tentatively rose back to his feet, and with one more twist the hatch opened with a hiss of stale air.

  “What will it be, mon ami?”

  The Weather Center, Department of Weather, The Seems

  “This is SNN Special Correspondent Waldy Joels reporting live from Seemsberia, where a violent uprising has left this normally loving facility teetering on the edge of chaos. Nearly two hours ago, reputed Tide boss Robert Marcus began an armed uprising against Warden Inkar Cyration and his staff. Special Forces have been dispatched from the Big Building and Second in Command High-tower insists the riot will be brought under control before our next scheduled update. Stay tuned to this special continuing coverage of: CRISIS IN SEEMSBERIA. Jim, back to you.”

  “First the Unthinkable, now this!” Weatherman #1 turned down the volume on the fuzzy black-and-white TV and flopped into his chair. “So much for working together to build a better World.”

  His tired eyes scanned the control panel and the dials that orchestrated every aspect of The World’s Weather, from the humidity in the Amazon rain forest to the smallest flurry of Tasmanian snow.

  “This never would’ve happened when Samuel was in charge.”

  “Don’t worry, #1.” Weatherman #2 placed a reassuring hand on his boss’s shoulder. “They’ll Fix it.”

  “They always do,” concurred Weatherman #3.

  In the time since #2 and #3 had joined the team, they’d cut their trademark ponytails and got rid of the piercings that once kept them from moving up the ranks in the conservative Department of Weather. Their recent promotions to the Control Room couldn’t have come at a better time, for after twenty-three years on the job, the #1 meteorologist in The Seems was finally starting to burn out.

  “Listen, Harry,” Weatherman #2 suggested. “Why don’t you take the rest of the day off. Me and Freddy can man the Board.”

  “You guys wouldn’t mind?” #1 perked up for the first time since his fourth Pickmeup of the morning. “I could surprise my wife with lunch over in Love.”

  “Beat it.” Freddy pushed his boss jokingly out of the middle chair. “And don’t worry, we promise not to sink another continent until you get back!”

  “Thanks, fellas.”

  Weatherman #1 shook his co-workers’ hands, pulled on his tattered trenchcoat, and made for the elevators with an extra spring in his step. But as soon as he was gone, #3 got up from the board and locked the door that separated the Control Room from the rest of the Weather Center. Then he removed a small magnet from his pocket and placed it against the security camera that monitored the Board 25/7, effectively neutralizing the recording.

  “Ready to change The World?” asked #3, loosening his tie and revealing a small black tattoo on his neck.

  “I can’t do it, Freddie!” #2 sat before the Board, running his shaky fingers through his freshly cut hair. “I just can’t do it.”

  “Yes you can, bro.”

  #3 walked over to the wide pane of glass that gave view to the sprawling Weather Center. Dozens of Weathermen in white shirts and black ties sat in front of Doppler radar screens keeping tabs on every sector of The World, little knowing that their department was about to change forever. “Remember what the big man promised? No more hurricanes or tidal waves wiping out entire countries. No more freezing to death, no more droughts or mudslides, no more anything! Just perfect weather every day.”

  Down on the Weather Center floor, a Storm Placer was waving in his direction. She had clearly noticed that the security feed to the Control Room had gone to static, and gestured as if to say, “Is everything okay?” #3 simply smiled and gave her a thumbs-up.

  “This is why we got into Weather in the first place, Charlie . . . to help people, not make their lives miserable.”

  “But what if Triton’s wrong?” Weatherman #2 had never liked tattoos and wore a Tide pin on the underside of his tie that, right now, felt like it was burning a hole in his chest. “What if the Plan really is for the best?”

  “It’s too late for cold feet, dude. The word’s been given.”

  “Yeah, you’re right.” #2 mustered whatever courage he could. “The World’s gonna thank us someday.”

  “Totally.”

  The two Tide moles bumped fists, then each removed the metallic keys that dangled around their necks. If inserted into their respective keyholes and turned counterclockwise, they could single-handedly stop the flow of the Jet Stream. It wouldn’t destroy The World, but it would certainly wreak havoc with the Weather systems in multiple Sectors, not to mention draw the attention of the Fixers. Which is exactly what it was intended to do.

  “On my mark . . .”

  24. Justin and Nick F. Time pulled off twenty-three separate
heists until they were finally caught on “The Night They Robbed the Memory Bank.”

  11

  The Most Amazing Thing of All

  The Middle of Nowhere

  Twenty minutes after the light had faded, Becker’s head popped up from the sand to find the rest of his team had vanished, along with all their equipment and gear. Seeing that no black robes were visible on the plateau either, he quietly lifted his body from the hole he’d dug in the ground. Part of him longed to scramble over to the ridge and take another gander, but since the Nowherians had somehow been alerted to their presence the last time, it was a bad idea. So was breaking radio silence.

  “Drane to Fixer Blaque, come in, over.”

  All that came back was the white noise of static. Becker switched channels, then whispered into his Bleceiver again.

  “Drane to Hassan, can you hear me? Hassan?”

  Still nothing.

  When the white light had come, Becker’s first thought was to follow his fellow Fixers on a mad dash for the safety of higher ground. But then he remembered Casey Lake’s broadcast at the pre-Mission briefing, and how she had frantically dug her way underground to escape the attack. Any strategy that was good enough for the best of the best was good enough for him.

  With the help of his Bear Claws™, Becker was already thirty feet down when the first inkling of something warm started licking at his heels. The only thing he could compare it to was what he imagined the mosquitoes in his backyard went through right before they made a kamikaze run into his dad’s beloved bug-zapper: they knew the light would destroy them, but they wanted to touch it anyway. Even with his eyes clamped shut, Becker didn’t like the feeling at all.

  “Drane to Octo. Sylvia, are you there?”

  He tried one last time to reach a member of his crew, but again to no avail. Even if they were still alive, chances were good that they’d been captured, and right now he didn’t have the luxury of trying to find and free them. Becker’s first and only priority was locating that train and somehow riding it all the way back to The Seems.

  And he was going to have to do it alone.

  A soft breeze blew through the oasis, causing palm leaves to whisper and black canvas tents to rustle in response. Their conversation could be heard just above the stream that spilled an endless supply of cold, fresh water into the pool at the center of the compound. In every sense, it was the perfect picture of a community that had claimed paradise for its own— all except for one minor detail.

  “Where the heck is everybody?”

  Becker almost bit his tongue just to punish it for speaking aloud, but he couldn’t really blame it. Outside of two goats nibbling on a section of grass and a one-eyed dog lazily rolling in the dappled sunlight, there didn’t appear to be anyone around. Looms were still threaded with multicolored yarn, a water wheel spun, but the Nowherians who had once manned them had either vanished in the light or gone inside their tents.

  From his hiding spot beneath a small cart, Becker did one last visual sweep of the stronghold. Every bone in the Fixer’s body screamed that some kind of gathering was taking place in the huge octagonal tent, but he resisted the desire to satisfy his curiosity because the heavily guarded grove of palm trees he’d spotted from above had been evacuated as well. That meant the Train of Thought he hoped was hidden there was unprotected and just a hundred-yard dash away.

  The air inside the grove was cool and dark, with only little flecks of sunlight managing to penetrate the leafy blanket of palm leaves above. Becker followed the thin dirt trail straight to the center of the grove, but when he emerged into a clearing, what he found was not a linked collection of boxcars or some light-shooting doomsday device . . .

  It appeared to be a manhole cover.

  To Becker, it didn’t look much different than the one in the middle of Grant Avenue, which he and Chud and the Crozier boys used as home plate for wiffleball. The only difference was that instead of asphalt, this one was built directly on a pile of sand, with a large keyhole in the center. Judging by the scrapings around it and the numerous footprints at the base, the Fixer surmised that the manhole had been opened several times recently.

  He had no idea what was down there—maybe a Nowherian sewer or the source of the strange light, or better yet, a storage facility where the train had somehow been stashed for safekeeping. But as he dangled his Key Chain™ over the hole and prepared to break inside, the one thing that concerned him was: why had the Nowherians left this mysterious place unguarded?

  Inside the octagonal tent there was indeed a meeting taking place. The two hundred and fifty villagers who had been conspicuously absent from the town center lined the back walls, arrayed in black robes of all shapes and sizes. They were currently being whipped into a frenzy by a wizened old crone, who shook her gnarled staff and screeched for every interloper who’d been captured this day to have their tongues removed and their eyes put out, so they could never speak of what they saw.

  Sitting on a faded rug with his injured leg extended, Jelani Blaque knew the angry crowd was calling for blood. But he also knew if he could keep this conversation going long enough, there was a chance their mighty Chieftain could be persuaded.

  “We simply want the train back, Kalil.” Blaque’s mastery of their harsh and guttural language had slipped from lack of use, so he spoke slowly and clearly. “Trust me when I say that we have no designs on staying, and no wish to—”

  “Trust you?” The nearly six-and-a-half-foot-tall man with thickly braided hair reclined upon his wicker throne and laughed. “Jelani Blaque asks me to trust him!”

  A derisive roar shot through the assembly, which Kalil silenced with but a raised finger.

  “You must think me a fool.”

  “Hardly.” Blaque chose his next words slowly, for if said incorrectly, they could very well be his last. “I know you to be a reasonable man, which is why I ask you again to return the Thought before millions of innocent people are hurt.”

  Silence fell upon the Chieftain’s tent, which was hung with purple draperies, hand-woven tapestries, and the shrunken heads of those who dared defy him. The oil from the lamps was kept so low you could barely see anyone’s face, and the sweet smell of incense wafted through the heavy air.

  “You are right, Blaque. I am a reasonable man.”

  The Chieftain rose to his feet and approached the Fixer he’d faced in battle many years ago.

  “I was reasonable when I allowed The Seems to build a train station and a mining operation on our very border.”

  Fixer Blaque held his ground, firm in the knowledge that neither the End of the Line nor Contemplation had violated the terms of the treaty.

  “I was reasonable when I decided not to raze that ramshackle town built by your exiles . . . but only because my scouts enjoy their mush.”

  Indeed, Who Knows What from Who Knows Where was a highly coveted delicacy among Nowherians.

  “I was even reasonable when you and your so-called Fixers snuck into the Eternal Springs and stole our precious Hope like thieves in the night. Which to many of my people is still considered an act of war!”

  Another ripple shot through the assembly, and the Fixer felt a dangerous vibe creep into the space.

  “But when Seemsians trespass upon our sacred grove and defile our holiest shrine, I do not feel reasonable . . .”

  Kalil moved to within an inch of Fixer Blaque’s face.

  “And this act of war I do not forgive.”

  Jelani Blaque had not been appointed head instructor at the Institute for Fixing & Repair because he was easily shaken. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  Kalil snapped his fingers and two of his guards threw a teenage boy with shaggy hair and a freshly blackened eye onto the floor of the tent.

  “Maybe we should ask him.”

  Becker Drane’s hands were tied behind his back, and the legs of his Extremely Cool Outfit were torn away. By the vicious burns on his ankles, Blaque figured he’d stumbl
ed into a classic Nowherian rope trap, but the bright red flush on the Fixer’s face was far more indicative of defiance than embarrassment. It was a dangerous emotion to express in this setting, and Blaque subtly motioned for his young friend to keep his head, lest he lose it.

  “This boy is not a thief. He is a Fixer on a Mission to save The World . . . which you cannot in good conscience hold responsible for the actions of a few Idea Smugglers or Back Scr—”

  “These were not Idea Smugglers!” The Chieftain gritted his teeth to control his rising ire. “This was the witch who plays with Time!”

  Blaque figured he must referring to Sophie Temporale, but what had she been doing all the way out here? “The Time Being has not been officially associated with The Seems in generations, Kalil.”

  “If that is so, then why is she currently advising your Powers That Be?” Kalil relished the surprise on his adversary’s face. “You sent your spies into the Middle of Nowhere— did you not think we would respond in kind?”

  The Chieftain strode over to an arcane machine that was manned by a small boy in orange robes. It looked almost like a telegraph or an old-school Chatterbox™, but the ornate quality of its architecture was distinctly Nowherian. And unlike the Fixers’ Bleceivers, it seemed to function quite well in the Middle of Nowhere.

  “In fact, I just received an interesting report.” He casually lifted the spool of yellowed parchment attached to the device. “Apparently, The Seems is under attack by something called The Tide— and on the verge of losing its precious World.”

  Kalil turned to the crowd, addressing his people more than his prisoners.

  “So you see, even if we were to return your Train of Thought, it would do you no good.”

  As the crowd roared its approval, the blood drained away from Becker’s face. “What do you have against The World, anyway?”

  A cold silence fell upon the tent.

  “What did you say?” asked the Chieftain, a mix of fury and wonder in his tone. Becker ignored it, and wriggled to his feet.