The medical suite still reeked of antiseptic and ozone, a combination that made Neve’s stomach queasy. She sat propped against starched white pillows, her fingers wrapped around the geode half her father had pressed into her palm moments ago, right before he’d vanished into thin air. The crystallized surface pulsed with a faint warmth, as if it were alive.
“Neve?” Diana’s voice wavered from somewhere to Neve’s left. “Are you alright?”
Neve couldn’t answer. Her throat had closed around the words she wanted to say. Instead, she clutched the geode to her chest and stared at the small circle of scorched carpet where her father had stood just seconds ago. Her nose wrinkled against the acrid smell of burned synthetic fibers mingled with the metallic tang of an electrical fire. Paired with an underlying hum, it was enough to over-burden her senses.
“Well, I think we can agree, that was a skosh overdramatic,” Perry announced with a decisive chirp from his perch near the window as the African grey parrot ruffled his scarlet tail feathers. “One thing is certain, your father sure knows how to make a grand exit.”
“Perry, not now.” Diana moved closer to the bed, her hand hovering over Neve’s shoulder as if uncertain whether her touch would be welcome.
Neve finally tore her gaze from the floor and looked down at the geode in her palm. The surface was smoother, more polished, as if countless hands had worn away its rough edges over years of handling. Delicate inscriptions spiraled across the crystalline exterior, symbols that reminded her of mathematical equations rendered in an alphabet she couldn’t quite decipher. But most important of all, it wasn’t missing any of the shards from her previous travels.
“This isn’t mine,” she said, her voice raspy from disuse.
Diana leaned closer.
“What do you mean?”
“This isn’t my half of the geode.” Neve’s fingers trembled as she held it up, watching ambient light dance in its amethyst depths. “He took mine and left me his.”
Perry alighted in the air and landed on the rail of Neve’s bed, cocking his head to study the geode from a different angle. “So, Ellis pulled the old switcheroo? Classic misdirection. He must have learned that trick from me.”
“Highly doubtful,” Neve croaked absently, her throat hoarse, still examining the crystal. “You’ve hardly spent any time with him.”
“Details, schme-tails.” Perry flapped a dismissive wing. “The point still stands. Who knew your nerdy father could turn into a veritable Houdini under the right conditions?”
The door to the medical suite opened, admitting a nurse who handed Diana a report. As she read it, Neve noticed her biological mother intentionally kept her expression neutral, but Neve cataloged the tightness around her lips, the way her mouth pressed into a thin line. It was obvious it contained bad news.
Diana approached the bed, papers in hand, a grim expression settling into her face. “Your latest test results are here.”
“I already know what they’ll say.” Neve set the geode on the bedside table carefully, her eyes rolling to a fixed point while she recited the facts. “My cellular degradation has accelerated. The time jumps have aged me approximately thirty-five years beyond my chronological age. My telomeres are further shortened, my mitochondrial function is even more compromised, and my bone density is now consistent with someone approaching eighty.”
Diana swallowed hard. “That’s remarkably accurate.”
“It follows the pattern of my previous jumps, and…” Neve gestured at the stack of medical journals on the rolling tray table. “…Dad’s notes were specific about the cumulative physiological effects of temporal displacement.”
“Then you understand the severity of your condition.” Diana pulled up a chair, sitting so she could meet Neve’s gaze directly. “Your body has sustained significant trauma. Your next jump could be fatal.”
“Could be,” Neve repeated. “Not will be.”
“Neve…”
Dismissing her concerns, Neve said, “I understand what is at stake and will plan accordingly.”
Perry made a small chirp of distress.
Diana studied Neve for a long moment. When she spoke, her tone was defeated. “You’re still planning to follow him.”
“Yes.”
“Even knowing it might kill you?”
“Yes.” Neve reached for the geode again, unable to resist its pull. The crystal warmed in her palm, and for a fraction of a second, she could have sworn she felt her father’s presence nearby. “He said to meet him in 1992. That means he believes I can make it there. If I stay here, then I am trapped in the physical body of an eighty-year-old woman that is deteriorating every day. As far as I can tell, there isn’t much more left to lose.” Her eyes locked on the shimmering center. “But we haven’t answered the million-dollar question.”
“Which is?” Perry asked.
“Why is he able to jump whenever he wants?”
“The process seems to affect you both differently,” Diana reasoned as she stood, her practiced medical detachment troubled by worry. “You’re not strong enough to travel right now, anyway. Your muscle mass has deteriorated significantly. If you insist on pursuing this course of action, you’ll need to build up your strength before the leap. You’ll need physical therapy, proper nutrition, rest—”
“How long until the next Mercury Retrograde?” Neve interrupted.
Diana’s pause stretched, searching for an appropriate argument that could sway Neve. Finding none, she answered, “Nine weeks, give or take a day, depending on the lunar alignment.”
“Then I have time to prepare.” Neve pushed herself more upright in the bed, ignoring the protest of joints that felt decades older than they should. “I’ll need a physical therapist familiar with geriatric rehabilitation protocols.”
“Neve—” Diana began.
“Mom.” The word still felt strange on Neve’s tongue, even after everything they’d been through. She’d said it deliberately, hoping it would lend credence to her next words. “I know you’re scared. I’m scared, too, but Dad needs me. He asked for my help, and I will not let him down.”
Diana’s eyes filled with tears. “What if I lose you both?”
The question hung heavy in the air. Neve could find no answer that wouldn’t be a lie, so she remained quiet.
“Why don’t we take a beat, honey bee? You’ve been through so much,” her aunt, the famous spiritual medium, Talulah LaRue, said from her chair beside Neve’s hospital bed. Her dog, Chakra, was curled at her feet, fast asleep.
“Taking a beat will not make me change my mind.”
“We know,” Talulah said, taking Neve’s reluctance in stride, as she turned her attention to the nightstand where Ellis’s journals sat. A new one had been added to the stack, and Talulah handed it to her. “Ellis gave this to me three days ago, while you were lost in your last jump. Made me promise to give it to you…” She swallowed hard. “…if anythin’ happened to him.”
The leather was worn soft, and Neve recognized her father’s neat handwriting on the cover: Temporal Mechanics & Biological Adaptation - Field Notes for N.
“He knew you’d need answers,” Talulah continued. “Spent every moment you were gone writin’ in that thing, mutterin’ about pathways and resonance frequencies.”
Neve opened the journal with trembling fingers. Her father’s familiar script filled the first page, but unlike his usual clinical notes, these words were personal, urgent.
Nomo—If you’re reading this, you’re holding my half of the geode now, and you’re probably confused and possibly angry at me again for leaving. There are some important things you need to know.
Diana leaned closer, reading over Neve’s shoulder. “His handwriting looks different. Shaky.”
“Keep readin’,” Talulah urged.
The truth is, the geodes affect me differently. Decades of jumping has changed me at a cellular level. My body has become what I call a temporal conduit, permanently infused with chronometric energy that regenerates on its own. I believe this energy keeps me tethered to my own body every jump, while the absence of it means unpredictability for you. Your DNA changes with each jump. It’s why you shift into other consciousnesses and experience advanced aging each time.
Neve looked down at her own hands, aged and spotted from her jumps, cursing them, when she felt the geode pulse with a soft inner light, filling her with a sense of comfort.
She turned the page, finding detailed diagrams of the two geode halves. Her father had labeled one “virgin crystal—unlimited potential” and the other “pathway-locked—single destination.”
Your geode is like a blank canvas, capable of moving freely within the universe. But the half I left you is different. It’s made the journey to March 15, 1992, 47 times. Each trip has carved deeper channels through space. It is less like a key and more like a railway track, taking the holder to the same destination.
“Forty-seven times,” Neve repeated, astounded. “He’s been going back to the same day for over two decades?”
Perry hopped closer on his perch. “That’s either dedication or insanity,” he crowed, his chirp adding considerably more snark when he added, “Knowing your family, it’s probably a little of both.”
The next section made Neve’s heart race:
Your untrained geode is like driving without GPS through unmarked roads in the dark. You’ve been brave but reckless, and it’s killing you. My geode eliminates that risk. It knows EXACTLY where to go and when to drop you off. When Mercury Retrograde comes, you won’t have to navigate, just hold on and let it carry you to me.
The pathways are worn deep. I’ve traveled them many times, trying to fix what I broke, but each time has been futile. I now know I can’t do this alone. I need you.
I’ll be waiting for you in 1992.
Come find me.
Neve read the notes three times before the words fully locked in.
“Look at this.” Neve held up the geode, angling it so the light caught in its depths. Now that she knew what to look for, she could see the difference clearly. Her father’s half glowed with an internal luminescence, a soft purple-blue radiance that pulsed in a steady rhythm. “This isn’t just a geode. It’s a map. A pathway worn deep by repeated use.”
She thought back to her own jumps, the chaotic, unpredictable nature of them. Landing in 1984 instead of 1992. The disorientation, the sense of being thrown through time rather than guided through it. Her geode had been like a student driver, veering and swerving all over the place without clear direction.
But her father’s half… Ellis’s half was different. It had traveled the same route so many times that it had carved a channel through time. Like a river deepening its bed after every rainfall, each journey had strengthened the connection, making the pathway more stable, more accessible.
“That’s how he jumps whenever he wants,” Neve said, awe flooding through her. “He stores so much temporal energy from repeated jumps that he’s not dependent on celestial alignment anymore.”
Perry whistled. “Frequent flyer miles for time travel? Now I’ve seen everything.”
Neve turned back to the geode, examining the inscriptions more closely. They weren’t random decorative elements, she realized now. They were calculations. Equations that described the curvature of spacetime, the relationship between velocity and temporal displacement, and the mathematical formulas needed to navigate a different dimension.
Her father had turned his half of the geode into a working temporal compass, calibrated to one specific point in history.
“Nine weeks,” she said softly. “I have nine weeks to make myself strong enough for one more jump.”
“And then what?” Diana asked.
“Then we figure out how to fix the past so we have a chance at a future.”
The geode pulsed again, stronger this time, and Neve felt an answering resonance in her chest. Despite her aged body, despite the pain that had become her constant companion, despite every rational reason to abandon this impossible quest, she felt something she hadn’t experienced in years.
Hope.
She closed her eyes and whispered the words her father had left her: “March 15th, 1992. 3:47 PM.”
The geode warmed in response, as if sealing a promise.
Perry muttered something about dramatic women and their daddy issues, but Neve barely heard him. She was already planning, already calculating the steps between here and there, between now and then.
Nine weeks until Mercury Retrograde.
Nine weeks to prepare for the most important jump of her life.
Nine weeks until she finally learned what her father had been trying to tell her all along.
The answer was waiting in 1992.
And this time, she had a map to find it.
Sold out
