I slotted the ceramic cube in place, and the temporal displacement system Mark II whirred to life. The honeycomb matrix contained precious metals that filtered radiation from the cletonium crystal inside the cube. A tiny amount of palladium and platinum served the same function for the chronometer on my wrist. Finally, my time machine was repaired and ready.

Brian stomped down the basement stairs in khakis and a nice, blue shirt. I glanced at him and turned away without speaking. He positioned himself between me and the TDS. “Are you coming?” he asked.

“Where?”

Brian shook his head. “You know where.”

“Yeah, sure. Let’s go.”

“You can’t go dressed like that.”

I looked down at my rust and grease covered shirt and cargo shorts. “I guess I’ll shower,” I said with a deep sigh.

“We’re already late. Just change.”

“We won’t be late. We’ll never be late to anything again.”

An hour later, Brian and I arrived early in a blaze of electric blue light. Brian doubled over and wretched in the grass along the sidewalk.

“You get used to that,” I said quietly.

Brian and I walked into the funeral home. I stayed in the lobby during the visitation while people filtered in. The experience reminded me of waiting with Ashley in the same room during her mother’s funeral. I couldn’t go in and look at her. From the doorway, her body looked pale and bloated. The thing in the casket wasn’t my friend. Everyone whispered about how sweet she was and how unfortunate her suicide must be for her father. Only Brian and I knew the truth about the vampire killing Ashley.

Brian and I stayed at grave until after the casket had been lowered into the earth. Everyone else had left, even Ashley’s father. I placed her blasting rod and daggers atop the glazed wooden box along with the silver broadheads Ashley had forged to fight a werewolf that had never existed. With the groundskeeper’s blessing, Brian and I shoveled red clay dirt over the coffin without a word.

When I missed school for a couple of weeks, rumors spread of my death. I wasted none of my time correcting anyone. I saw no point in going to school. Class focused on information I already knew and posed no challenge to me. I spent most of my time wandering in the past, smoking myself into a stupor. Brian stopped spending as much time at my house. Honestly, his absence made it easier for me to disappear unnoticed.

I had just returned from Woodstock and fallen asleep in my own bed for the first time in days when David burst into my bedroom. “You ain’t a little kid no more,” David said. “So, I can’t believe I gotta say this, but you smell like shit. Shower. Right now.”

“Got it.”

“And tomorrow you’re either gonna take your ass to school, or you’re gonna go get a goddamn job. Don’t care which, but you ain’t gonna sit around on your ass doing nothing. You will contribute in some way.”

I rolled out of bed and shuffled downstairs. Less than a minute later, I returned with a large box. I pushed the box into David’s hands and sat down at my computer.

“The hell is all this?” David asked.

“Mostly war bonds,” I said. “Some old silver certificates. Old money you might be able to sell. Legal documentation showing you as the inheritor of a sixty-year-old account and all its accumulated interest. I think that’ll cover my half of everything for the next decade. That enough contribution?”

“Where the fuck did you get all this? You stealing shit? Selling drugs? You know I’ll find out.”

No reason to lie. What did I have to hide? “That big ass thing I built in the basement from scrap is a time machine,” I said. “I just went back in time, gathered all of that, and came back exactly one second after I left.”

“You expect me to believe that? I ain’t fucking stupid.”

“You can believe whatever you want. The truth doesn’t rely on your belief in it.”

“If you got a time machine, why wouldn’t you go back and fix the shit that’s bothering you? Keep that girlfriend of yours from killing herself.”

“She’s not my girlfriend,” I said, “but I don’t know why I couldn’t fix things. Leroy David Clemens, you’re a goddamn genius.”

“Don’t use my first name,” David said. “The hell are you doing?”

I grabbed a handful of random clothes and the hoodie Ashley gave me. “I’m going to shower,” I said. “And then, I’m going to make all of this right.”

I crept through thick trees under the full moonlight. I could see the white wolf walking through the field just beyond the treeline. As I approached the edge of the clearing, dizziness and nausea racked my body. Before I broke through the trees, I collapsed to my knees, and the world spun around me. “Hurts, doesn’t it?” a voice said behind me.

I rolled onto my back and looked up at the man standing over me. Short white hair and a matching beard lined his face. Baby blue eyes stared at me. A thick blue trench coat, tied at the waist, covered his body. Clenching my guts I asked, “Aren’t you the guy that played the Devil in that shitty Dorian Gray movie?”

The old man spun cocked an eyebrow. The pain in my stomach and head doubled.

“Who are you? Why are you doing this?”

“I came to protect the timeline from a child with more power than he deserves,” the old man said. “You clearly don’t realize what would happen if you altered your own past.”

“Chronos would probably kill me,” I said. “Worth the risk.”

My pain and dizziness disappeared.

“Fool. You’d be risking our entire existence. This is a point in Time that cannot be changed. If you tried, catastrophe would befall you sent by the time god himself. If you altered these moments, the deviations in Time would be so drastic that the time stream would fracture. The branching timelines from that rupture would rip away into closed time-like curves and slowly disappear.”

“This is kind of moment when I’d expect Chronos to stop me.”

“Such arrogance from a pissant. Why would an elder god dirty his hands over the likes of you? He could dip his finger into the time stream and prune this branch without any of us knowing. I would much rather that not happen.”

“You’re not Chronos. Who are you?” I asked.

“The only time mage to ever exist,” the old man said. “From my perspective, we’ve had this conversation countless times now. You did not read the letter that Ashley gave you upon her deathbed.”

I had not read the letter. I had avoided the unmarked envelope. Reading her final words to me would mean admitting Ashley was gone. The old man snapped his fingers, and the envelope appeared in my hands. I stared at the envelope for so long I heard the fight between Ashley and the vetoli begin beyond the trees. “Open it,” the old man ordered.

Inside the envelope, I didn’t find a letter. The package contained a single note card covered with a string of numbers, two dates, and a single message:  Take me there.

I exited the time stream the night of December 20, 2003, the first date from Ashley’s card. I rapped Grasscutter’s pommel on the outside of Ashley’s bedroom window. She answered the knock in a nightgown. “Cletus?” Ashley asked as she forced her window open. “What’re you doing here?”

“Can I come in?”

Ashley stepped back, and I struggled to drag myself through the window onto her bedroom floor. I adjusted my belt and hoodie as I stood up off the carpet.

“Are you wearing a sword on your hip?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Long story.”

“Sounds like you should start telling it now then.”

“Better idea,” I said. “Do you trust me?”

“I guess. What kind of question even is that?”

“I need you to trust me right now,” I said. “I’m from the future. I’m here to help  you because you and a time wizard both told me to.”

“Are you high?”

“Not at the moment, but maybe you should be. It’d make things easier.” I pulled my sleeve up to show Ashley the chronometer. “You have to accept that I’m from the future without any questions.”

“Okay. You’re from the future.”

“Really? You’re actually just going with it.”

“You’re taller. You have more facial hair than you did at school today. You’ve got that weird giant watch thing going on there. Makes more sense than a twelve-hour growth spurt.”

“That’s actually pretty smart. I should’ve led with those things. Alright, cool. You need to get dressed, pack a bag, and grab whatever magic shit you think you need.”

“Why?”

“I’m taking you to the past.”

To her credit, Ashley turned unusually pale but did not vomit after her first jump through time. The second date and set of coordinates dropped us in a clearing surrounded by lush forests with light rain drizzling from the grey sky.

“Now, I need your help,” I said. “This is the spot future-you told me to take past-you, but we need to go further. Cast a spell to find other sources of magic.”

“I might be able to do that,” Ashley said.

“Might?”

“I can, but it’ll take awhile.”

I paced for over an hour while Ashley prepared and performed her ritual. She drew glyphs and runes on a sheet of paper before wandering in a circle with incense. Ashley knelt within her invisible circle and etched a pentagram into the soil. While she worked, Ashley explained the importance of symbolism in magic to connect small rituals to a greater source of power. Each point of the star represented the four classical elements along with spirit, the primordial life energy that bound magic to the mortal world. Ashley used interesting choices to portray the elements. She chose a full plastic bottle for water, a rock for earth, a paper airplane as wind, and a lit candle represented fire. At the top point, Ashley placed a necklace with a heart-shaped pendant as her symbol of spirit. She set a large, black candle at the center of the pentagram. Ashley lit the candle and grasped a crystal in her hand while she chanted.

Ashley pressed the crystal to the outer rim of the pentagram. The lines ignited with white light. Each elemental symbol glowed a different color. The energy collapsed to the center of the pentagram and changed the candle flames to a deep indigo. Ashley burned the rune-covered paper in the candle while continuing to chant. As the last of the ashes crumbled, the flame lazily tilted to the side.

Returning things to her bag, Ashley plucked her magic compass from the ground and scuffed away her magic circle with her heel. “Let’s follow the flame,” she said.

Ashley led the way. Her purple flame grew in size and changed direction as we walked. The flame compass directed us through the forest. Ashley asked questions about the future. I refused to tell her about her own fate, but I openly discussed building the time machine and the misadventures of my maiden voyage. I stressed that she could not tell the me of her time about the TDS in any way before I told her.

After what seemed like forever, the magic compass brought Ashley and I to the base of an ancient oak. A man who looked older than the tree sat on a gnarled root. His braided white beard hung lower than the end of his goldenrod tunic. The man’s brilliant eyes matched his bright blue trousers. When the man noticed Ashley and me, the geezer clapped and shouted, “You’re late! I think I’ve been waiting for days.”

I wasn’t sure I could be late for an appointment I’d never made. As the old man moved about, Ashley’s purple candle compass followed his motions. The man waved use forward. “Come on. We’re wasting valuable learning opportunities.”

“What are you?” I asked, placing myself between the man and Ashley.

The man paused and started at me. “Oh,” he said, “that’s right. You haven’t officially met me yet.”

I rested my hand on Grasscutter as the lanky man jogged toward us. He extended a hand that was more wrinkles and liver spots than skin and said, “Forgive me, young friend. I did not introduce myself that night in the forest. I am Merlyn. It’s good to see you again.”

Merlyn ushered Ashley and me around the grand oak. A thin hole cut into the side of the tree. Merlyn disappeared into the hollow. Unsure what else to do, I followed the old man. I stepped into the gash in the oak’s bark and out onto a grassy lawn. The courtyard surrounded a stone tower that stretched into the sky. Ashley gasped as she appeared beside me. “Where the hell are we?” she asked.

“Spirit world,” I said.

“Specifically, my demesne,” Merlyn said from my other side.

Ashley and I followed the wizard across the grass to the tower. Through the tiny wooden door, we entered a massive entrance hall. “How does this room fit inside the tower?” Ashley asked.

“Nothing makes sense in the Nether,” I said.

“Almost nothing,” Merlyn said. “There are rules, you know.”

At the end of the entrance hall, a massive staircase ascended into the tower. Smaller hallways branched off to either side of the stairs. “Ashley, head right,” Merlyn said. “Cletus, go left.”

“Why?” I asked.

“To begin your training.”

“I didn’t come for training. That’s why I brought her here.”

“You’ll see. Just go.”

I looked at Ashley before we split up. “Stab the creepy old bastard if he tries anything weird,” I said.

Merlyn waved as I departed. The left hall ended at a single wooden door. I pushed on the thick mahogany and stepped into a small, dark room. Candles in each corner cast dim light across the stone walls. Multiple, interconnected magic circles covered the metallic floor. A man in jeans and a black t-shirt fumbled with papers at a desk across from the door. The man’s thick leather boots clacked on the floor as he turned to face me. “Well,” he said, “close the door.”

“Who the hell are you?” I asked.

“Merlyn.”

I cocked my eyebrow at the man. Shoulder-length black hair framed his sharp face. “Don’t say you’re Merlyn in a tone like I should just assume you’re the same person as the old guy in the hallway.”

“Right. You don’t get this yet. I’m the hybrid son of a witch and a demon. I exist outside of the time stream. I’m the only time wizard to exist. I’m the Merlyn at sixty-four. The one in the hallway is almost seven hundred. The one that stopped you from sticking your dick in the timeline was three hundred something. There’s a Merlyn in the garden and one in the kitchen. I’m also cleaning the aviary. It’s confusing, but I am Merlyn. So are all of them.”

“Do you guys just hang out and play cards with yourself?”

“No,” Young Merlyn said. “I avoid interacting with myself. You ever see Timecop?”

I imagined two wizards melting into a single mutated blob upon touching each other. “Probably a good idea,” I said.

“Well, step into the magic circle, and we’ll get started.”

“Started with what?”

“All of this will go faster if you stop talking and just do what I say.”

“That’s not why I’m here. I just gave Ashley a ride.”

“No, see, I also wanted you to be here. It’s probably more important than her being here. Just step into the magic circle.”

I moved to the center of the massive circle in the floor. “If this is a trap, I’ll kill you.”

“You could try,” Young Merlyn said as the circle ignited with blinding pink light.

The flash faded to a subtle rose tint along the edge of my vision. I floated in the air. Beautiful, grassy hills rolled beneath me. My view drifted over the valleys below. I looked over a group of men with spears and clubs hiking the hills. The leader of the hunters bore a striking resemblance to me, aside from his darker skin and slabs of sinewy muscle.

My field of vision rolled upward. Another group of men stood higher up the mountain side. The second group rolled a massive long down the hill. I screamed, trying to warn Apeman Cletus, but nothing escaped my lips. The attackers threw boulders down the slope before drawing weapons and sprinting at the first group. Apeman Cletus noticed the assault. He shoved his hunting party out of the way of the log. Apeman Cletus rushed uphill and drove his club into the earth. The log crashed against Apeman’s club. With inhuman strength, Cletus stopped the log. Leaving his club, Apeman Cletus hurdled over the log and sprinted at his attackers.

The ambushers converged on the single caveman. Cletus stomped on the side of the first attacker’s knee. The caveman’s leg folded at the wrong angle. The next attacker swung his club. Apeman Cletus caught the weapon and wrenched it from his opponent’s hands. Cletus shoved the other caveman to the ground and brought the weapon down like a golf club. The arcing blow separated the other man’s jaw from his head. One of the remaining attackers launched a spear. Apeman Cletus snatched the spear from the air. Cletus snapped the haft in two and buried the tip in the nearest caveman’s chest. The spear thrower leaped atop Cletus. The cavemen sprawled across the ground and grappled. Cletus gained the top and pinned his struggling opponent to the ground. Cletus ripped a stone from the soil and bashed it against the other man’s skull. The caveman fell still except for a few subtle jerks.

“He’s quite fascinating, isn’t he?”

A muscular, vaguely Asian man floated in the air beside me. The shirtless man’s skin pulsed with golden light. “I think I’ll name him Cletus,” the gold man said. “He just sort of looks like a Cletus, doesn’t he?”

“I’d say so.”

“I’d like to keep him.”

The golden man drifted down. Cletus stared up at the vibrant glow. The man extended his hand, and light enveloped the caveman. Apeman Cletus transformed into a stone sphere the size of a softball. The golden man pocketed the sphere in his billowing pants and disappeared.

The world rushed around me. I landed back in Young Merlyn’s tiny room. Sitting up, the walls spun around me. I lay back down. My brain throbbed inside my head.

“What was that?” I asked.

“A vision,” Young Merlyn said. “Specifically of the past.”

“Why’d the caveman look like me?”

“That was your grandfather, in a way. That was the original Cletus, a Neanderthal granted immortality by the Buddha. Cletus was a good friend of mine, or he will be.”

“But why show me that?”

“I want to help you understand where you come from, and hopefully influence where you’re heading.”

“I didn’t come here for history lessons,” I said. “I already know where I came from.”

“Do you?”

“Parents are from Chicago. Mom was a nurse. Dad was in the Army. He died in the Gulf War when I was a baby. Mom moved to Mississippi to live with her parents. Grandma died. Mom ends up going crazy and being institutionalized. I live with my grandfather until he died when I was eleven. Uncle becomes my guardian at that point.”

“Only partly right. That’s why you’re here.”

“No, I’m here because I brought Ashley here so you could teach her to be a wizard and die fighting a vampire.”

“Did you?” Young Merlyn asked. “Or did she send you here because I asked her to?”

Young Merlyn sent me away for the night. An orb of light guided me through the twisting halls. I climbed a winding staircase to the top of a tower. Two doors stood on either side of the small landing. My guidance orb bobbed in front of the right hand door.

Entering the room, simple decorations greeted me in my temporary bedroom. The wooden floor and walls smelled like pine. Doors to a closet and bathroom stood directly across from the entrance, and to the right a window overlooking the Chicago skyline somehow. Away from the entrance hall, the room opened into a small living space with wooden furniture.

Walking through the far door, I entered a forest clearing. A waterfall spilled into a small pool. Numerous bronze pipes covered the mossy stones behind the waterfall and around the pool. Towels hung from a rack just inside the clearing.

I threw my dirty clothes on the bed in my room. Under the cool waterfall, I found a seashell on the rock wall that controlled the water temperature. The bronze pipes dispensed a wide variety of soaps and shampoos. I showered under the steamy falls until my skin pruned.

After my shower, I slid into the pool at the base of the falls. The bronze pipes filled the water with bubbles and lotions and salts. I rested against the rocks in the warm pond and closed my eyes.

A small shriek woke me from my nap. “What’re you doing here?” Ashley’s voice came from behind a group of trees.

“Bathing,” I said.

“Well, leave. I need to shower.”

I climbed out of the pool and returned to my room. Someone had replaced my dirty clothes with simple pants and a tunic. I found my cleaned clothes in the closet and pulled my hoodie over the tunic.

Half an hour later, Ashley entered my room in a dress that matched my tunic. “Where have you been?” she asked. “I’ve been freaking out.”

“I went with Merlyn,” I said. “Just like you.”

“I’ve been here for weeks and haven’t seen you once. I didn’t even know this room was here.”

“It’s only been a few hours,” I said.

“It’s been like a month and a half, Cletus,” Ashley said as she sat next to me. “I thought you left me.”

“I wouldn’t do that. I think the vision Merlyn sent me into may have lasted way longer than it seemed.”

“Merlyn showed you a vision? Of what?”

I told Ashley about the immortal caveman. After my story, Ashley recounted the weeks she’d spent in the tower. Merlyn had taught her to control and manipulate her emotions, dampening and exciting feelings to match desired characteristics to enhance spells. Merlyn structured Ashley’s days like a strange military academy. Ashley spent the mornings exercising and learning to fight from an animated scarecrow named Frank. After breakfast, Merlyn tutored and instructed her on the details and history of magic. In the afternoon, Merlyn guided Ashley through learning a single spell or magical skill. Ashley researched assigned topics at night.

I listened as Ashley explained that all magic in our world counted as thaumaturgy. She detailed that magic could be classified as sympathy, contagion, ceremonia, invocation, evocation, or chaotic based on either the source of power or method of casting the magic. The most power magic relied on chaos, simply willing magic to alter the world around the caster.

“I’m glad you’re learning so much,” I said.

“I’m just grateful you brought me here,” Ashley said. “But, I have to research the poison made from gnem lizard kidneys and how to best counteract it without harming the afflicted person.”

After breakfast the next morning, I met Young Merlyn in the metallic chamber. I found him playing with a yo-yo and smoking a rolled cigarette. “You’re late,” he said as he waved his cigarette in my face.

“No, you never gave me a time to come back. I can’t be late.”

“I certainly expected you to be here earlier.” Merlyn ground his cigarette out against the side of a candle on his desk. “Are you ready to get started?”

“Another vision or something else?”

“A couple of visions if you’ll shut up so we can start.”

I stepped into the circle, and magenta light bathed over me. My vision floated above a version of myself. This new Cletus was taller than me, lanky, and had straight hair instead of my curly mop. He sat in a dirt-floored hut. Across from Cletus rested a white-haired old man and a teenage girl.

“He said to leave,” the girl said sternly.

“Explain to him,” Cletus said in a thick, Brooklyn accent, “that I can pay him handsomely.”

“You do not understand. Your money will not help you. Go now.”

Lanky Cletus left the hut. He sat in the grass outside. The girl followed after. “He will not change his mind,” she said.

“I’ve studied with mystics and trained with shamans,” Lanky Cletus said. “I’ve learned to move objects with my mind and to eliminate pain from my body with a thought. I control my mind, body, and soul, but I need his secrets.”

“He will not teach you because of your greed. You seek only power.”

“I seek to save the world from pain and hardship.”

“You wish only for yourself.”

Lanky Cletus didn’t leave. He sat in the grass until night fell, and then, continued to sit. Night passed, and day broke. Cletus remained in the same place. Lanky Cletus remained for three days without moving. He did not eat, did not sleep. He did not stir to relieve himself. Lanky Cletus only waited.

The fourth day, the girl brought food to Lanky Cletus. He did not move. The girl rolled her eyes. “Eat,” she said. “He says you may stay, but you must work.”

“He will teach me?”

“No. You will work. Maybe in time you will earn his trust.”

“Then I will work,” Cletus said, taking food from the bowl.

“I am Aapti,” the girl said. “Do you have a name?”

“My name is Benjamin Bartholomew Brown, the third,” Lanky Cletus said.

Benjamin Brown worked in the mountain village. He tended to beans and wheat. He gathered water and fished. Benjamin helped Aapti care for the old man. Benjamin woke in the early morning to watch and mimic the old man’s elaborate breathing and exercise routine. Benjamin ran and meditated during his free time. Two years passed. “Cletus” Benjamin Bartholomew Brown had fully integrated within the mountain community and abandoned his quest to learn the old man’s secrets.

While cooking with Aapti one morning, four white men attacked the village. Much like Benjamin, the attackers sought the old man. With a whisper, Benjamin sent Aapti inside the hut and placed himself in front of the men. “Gentlemen,” Benjamin said, “I must ask you to leave.”

“We heard an old man here has a treasure,” one of the men said.

“Thought he’s clever hiding here in the mountains,” another added.

“There’s nothing for you here,” Benjamin said. “The old man’s treasure is not one that will gain you riches. Please, leave.”

The men attacked Benjamin. One stabbed Benjamin in the shoulder. Ben did not react to the knife wound. He struck the man in the chest. Ben’s attacker flew several yards after the blow. The next attacker swung a club. Benjamin caught the weapon and threw the man into the air. Benjamin extended his arm. The other to men froze mid-step. Strain spread across Benjamin’s face. The men slid backwards through the dirt until stumbling over their comrades.

Benjamin panted. “Please, leave.”

The men gathered each other from the dirt and ran. Benjamin stumbled to the hut and sat down. Aapti knelt beside him. “You’re hurt,” she said.

“I feel nothing. Get me sewing supplies and water.”

Aapti gathered a bowl and rags. With instructions from Benjamin, the girl dressed his wounds. The old man emerged from his darkened room and sat in front of Benjamin. The old man spoke, and Aapti translated. “He says you are ready.”

“For what?”

The old man held out his hand, and a ball of red light formed in his palm.

“To learn.”

Hunger burned in Benjamin’s eyes as he smiled.

The breath ripped from my chest as I slammed back down in Young Merlyn’s tiny chamber. I pressed my fingers against my closed eyes to relieve the pain behind them. “Another distant relative?” I asked.

“Less distant,” Young Merlyn said. “The first reincarnation of the Neanderthal.”

“Benjamin Brown. Shitty comic book name.”

“Says Cletus Clemens.”

“I’m not taking shit from a guy named Merlyn.”

“Not my real name,” Young Merlyn said. “How do you feel?”

“Like little jack hammers are pounding away at the back of my eye sockets.”

“Drink more water. Proper hydration will help with the side effects. Though I thought you’d be stronger.”

“Bite me, old man.”

“You wish.”

I stumbled toward the door. As I reached for the handle, Merlyn shouted, “Catch!”

I flailed but managed to snatch the small ball from the air. As my fingers locked around it, flaming jets of blue light erupted from the ball. Torrents of energy burst from my loose fist. I yelled and threw the ball away from me. When it broke contact with my skin, the ball ceased spouting power.

“What the hell was that?”

Merlyn doubled over with laughter. He placed the ball in a leather pouch and offered it to me. I grasped the pouch. The ball inside remained dormant.

“That is a focus orb. Touch it and boom. If you concentrate, you can control the energy and pull it back into the ball. You’ll get better, hopefully.”

“Thanks, I guess.”

“Eat. Sleep. Lots of water. I’ve more to show you.”

Back in my room, I toyed with the focus orb. The ball flared to life as I touched it. If I tried to draw the energy back toward the ball, i could reduce the intensity of the orb’s blaze. It felt like forming an energy ball only much harder. As I concentrated on pulling the power back into the orb, I felt a barrier inhibiting my control.

A knock resounded from my wooden door. I hid the orb under my pillow and called Ashley into the room. She collapsed next to me on my bed.

“How long was I gone this time?” I asked as I curled up beside her.

“Couple weeks again,” she said. “See another vision?”

“The caveman got reincarnated as a guy that looked enough like me that he could be my father. He learned to make energy balls from an old guy living in the mountains.”

“Is that where your powers came from?”

“Hell if I know. What’d you learn?”

“Mostly water magic, which also means ice magic and potions and healing and blood. I know more about anatomy than I ever thought I’d need to. Like, did you know erections are actually decreased blood flow out of the penis instead of increased blood to the penis?”

“I did not.”

“Me neither. I also got turned into a fish.”

“What?”

“Yeah, it was nuts,” Ashley said. “Merlyn took me somewhere else in the Nether. I had to walk up a river. I almost drowned, but beautiful spirits helped me swim. At the end of the stream there was an amazing waterfall surrounded by ice and snow. I meditated under the crushing flow. Thought I was going to freeze to death. Actually passed out.

“I awoke transformed. I had become a fish. A catfish ruled the lake I lived in. Things were peaceful, but the catfish had strict rules, Anyone old, sick, or injured was killed. Weakness wasn’t tolerated. Everyone helped maintained the community. Anyone that couldn’t pull their weight was not part of the community, and outsiders were eliminated.”

“That sounds kind of awful,” I said.

“Not at first, but I eventually had to stand up to the catfish. I died protecting an old lady fish.”

“That’s fucking morbid. What’s the point? What’d you learn from that?”

“I mean, I learned to work as a team, but also when to go against the group. I learned to protect other people. And my magic got way stronger.”

The next morning, after six eggs, two bowls of cereal, and half a gallon of milk, I returned to the tiny metal room. Young Merlyn wasted no time throwing me into the next vision.

I floated in a black room with several couches. A screen covered one of the four walls. Three boys identical to Benjamin Brown stood in front of the screen. Each boy glowed with faint, colorful mist. One pressed his hands against the screen.

“Who’re you?”

I froze and slowly turned to face the person questioning me. Another copy of Benjamin sat on a couch. This fourth copy didn’t glow like the rest. “You can see me?” I asked.

“Yeah,” the young Benjamin said. “Why wouldn’t I be able to? You’re in my head.”

“Wait, what?”

“I’m Tom,” the kid said. “I’m a mostly normal eleven-year-old. Those three,” Tom waved at the other boys, “have super powers and live in my head.”

“Like split personalities?”

“What’s that?”

“One person has like multiple personalities. I don’t actually know how to describe it beyond that.”

“No, they used to have their own bodies. Someone put their memories in my brain.”

I sat on the couch next to Tom. The screen showed a first-person-view of a fight against a man in military fatigues. Every so often, the three boys would switch positions at the screen. “What kind of powers do they have?” I asked while watching the spectacle.

“The red one, Scarlet, has super strength,” Tom said. “Amber is really fast with super senses. Sapphire is geeky smart and can heal really fast.” Tom looked over his shoulder. “Then, there’s Zero.”

I sat up and followed Tom’s gaze over the back of the couch. A man sat in the corner of the small room. He looked like a bearded Benjamin Brown only emaciated to the point bones pushed against his pale skin.

“Zero doesn’t do anything,” Tom said. “Just sits in the corner. Never talks. Never moves. Never takes control of the body. That’s why we call him Zero.”

“Yeah, I got that.”

We turned back to the screen. Sapphire and Amber lay on the floor. Blood oozed from a gash on Scarlet’s chest. A first slammed into the screen. With a flash of white, Scarlet collapsed. Tom swore and looked at me. My skin burned under his pleading gaze. I stood to move toward the screen, but a hand pulled me back. “My name isn’t Zero,” the starving Benjamin copy said. “I am Chaos.”

The skeletal young man placed his hand against the screen. Light exploded across the room as thousands of smaller displays appeared in the air. Combined, the countless screens provided a three-hundred-sixty-degree view of the fight between Tom’s body and the military man. Tom’s eyes glowed white as Chaos took control.

The boy floated in the air. Streams of sand churned against gravity all around him. Tom’s hair stood on end. Chaos-Tom lifted his hand. The man launched into the sky. From his open palm, Chaos-Tom fired a beam of light the size of a small car. The blast engulfed the man, leaving nothing behind. With the man dead, Chaos rocketed across the sky.

“Holy shit!” I said. “He can fly.”

Chaos crashed down on a small island. He looked around at the inhabitants of the village and began firing beams of light.

Back in their head, Tom and I leaped from the couch. I grabbed Chaos by the shoulder and slammed back into Young Merlyn’s room.

“Send me back!”

“It already happened,” young Merlyn said. “That was only a vision. Nothing you did would change anything.”

“Send me there for real.”

“You can’t change your own past. There would be dire consequences.”

“Yeah, shattering the time stream. Time will fix itself, or Chronos will do it.”

“And he would erase you from all of Time. Do you want to know what happened?”

“Yes.”

“Then go on your own,” Young Merlyn said as he activated the magic circle.

I dropped into a white room. Three chairs stood around a glass sphere. Inside the sphere, a slightly older Tom fought a mountainous, bear-like man. Three glowing teenagers sat in the chairs over the sphere. One boy pressed his hands against the globe. I assumed he was controlling the body through the orb like they had through the screen before.

“You’re that guy,” the yellow teen sad. “Does that mean something awful will happen again?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked.

“Well,” the blue one said, “last time you showed up, Zero and Tom disappeared. So, Amber thinks that’s why you’re here now, to take more of us.”

“That’s not why I’m here. What’re you guys doing?”

“Fighting Scarlet’s dad.”

“Why?”

“Strongest guy on the planet,” Amber said. “When we fought that last guy that nearly killed us, Tom and Zero vanished when the three of us almost died.”

“We’ve been doing tons of deadly stuff since,” Sapphire said. “Jumping off cliffs, out of planes. Hopping trains. Rodeo. Lots of fighting.”

“Ya know, risking life and limb. We’re trying to get our brothers back.”

On the screen, the ogre punched Tom so hard that back in the room Scarlet released the orb and collapsed into his chair. Not missing a beat, Amber took control. I watched in silence as the three boys fought the small giant. They switched control of Tom’s body among them as they fatigued or suffered injuries. Soon, all three controlled the sphere at once. The colored mists wafting off their bodies swirled together. The Benjamin clones melted into a multicolored cloud over the control orb.

With a blinding flash, I reappeared inside the magic circle.

“What the hell did I just watch?” I asked.

“That was the first Cleti,” Young Merlyn said. “A single body with the knowledge, abilities, and experiences of multiple lives.”

“How?”

“A perversion. A mixture of advanced science that should not have existed at that point in time and black magic. That boy — your precursor — was the result of an abominable experiment.”

“You think I’m an abomination?” I asked.

“That is not what I said.”

“No, you just strongly implied it.”

“I brought you here to teach you of the evil wrought to create you in hopes to turn you away from such darkness.”

“Which means you think that without your intervention I would evil.”

“Because you would. I’ve seen into the branches of your timeline where I did not seek you out. In almost all of them, you become a monster. But in this timeline, I guide your course.”

“That seems to be working real well,” I said.

 

***

 

I didn’t talk much that night as Ashley rattled on about her own adventures. With the two Young Merlyn visions back-to-back, Ashley had been training for almost four months since the last time we’d seen each other. Ashley’s training had shifted to wind-based magicka naturalis. Her scholarship had focused more on blood as well as the effects of night on magic and how to control the flow of magical energy.

Ashley had experienced another animal vision quest. She had been a sparrow in a kingdom ruled by a court of raptors. Ashley had led a revolt against the hawk king and died in battle.

Ashley slept in my bed, taking up an awkward amount of space. At first I tried to sleep on the floor, but then I got up in the middle of the night. I used the flare from the focus orb to light my way through the darkened castle. In the dining hall, food covered the table as it always did any time I entered the room. While I munched on a turkey leg, Young Merlyn entered the room.

The wizard piled potatoes and gravy almost a foot high on his plate. He topped the starchy mountain with a fist-sized chunk of butter. Merlyn sat across from me and shoveled food into his mouth. He ignored me as much as I ignored him as we both ate. Sometime in the middle of his third plate of potatoes, Younger Merlyn cleared his throat. “Think you’re up for more?” he asked.

“I really don’t know,” I said. “This all feels kind of shitty. You’re basically just telling me that I shouldn’t exist, but you need to tell me I’m a piece of shit to keep me from becoming a bigger piece of shit.”

“Fair assessment. I think the vision I plan to show you next should help though.”

“Not like I was sleeping,” I said as I threw my fork down.

The next vision departed from Tom’s head and returned to a disembodied perspective from above. My view floated above a teenger that was a muscular copy of Benjamin Bartholomew Brown. He leaned against a wall across from a bloody man tied to a chair. “Where’s Brown?” the muscular copy asked.

“I’m not giving anything up to you, White,” the beaten man said.

“Cut the shit, Zickefoose,” White said. “I want answers. Tell me, and I’ll let you go.”

“Brown knows you’re looking for him. He probably knows that you’re here. If you don’t kill me, he will.”

“I can stop him. I’ll protect you.”

Zickefoose tugged at his restraints and shouted, “Want to shake on it?”

“I could at least kill you quickly,” White said. “Benjamin Brown would never give you that comfort. Where is he?”

“A compound in Georgia,” Zickefoose said. “Some medical research company called RightCore.”

“Thanks, Zickefoose,” White said as he walked out of the room.

My vision faded to black. Light crept back in and revealed White in an elevator. The doors slid open. White stepped into the hallway and immediately starting flinging beams of light at guards. He sprinted through doors and burst into an open room.

A tank of sorts stood at the center of the room. Several men in lab coats and polos stood around the vehicle. At their center, an aged Benjamin Brown oversaw the work of the technicians around him. The group turned as White ran towards them. Brown waved his guards off. “Please excuse me, gentlemen,” Brown said. “Project Osiris, I’m so glad that you could join me.”

“Benjamin Brown,” White said, “I’ve come to kill you.”

White pointed at Brown. Bullets of light spat from White’s fingertips. Brown waved his hand. A wall of shimmering red energy stopped White’s attack. White sprinted across the room and threw a punch at Brown’s gut. Brown lashed out with his cane and broke White’s hand. Brown kicked White across the room. The old man tossed his cane aside and rose into the air. Balls of energy appeared in his hands. “Let’s settle this like only two gods can,” Brown said.

Brown threw the balls at his younger clone. White crossed his arms in front of his face. A dome of light sprang up around White to block Brown’s attack. White launched a beam at his flying opponent. Brown caught the beam and redirected it as a bolt of lightning. The red streak slammed into White’s chest. The younger clone spasmed and dropped to the ground.

Benjamin Brown landed beside White’s corpse. The old man clicked his tongue against the back of his teeth and sneered at the teenager. Brown spat on the body. “Pathetic,” Brown said. He waved at a group of scientists. “Take this failure to the labs in Oklahoma. Use him as the framework for Project Einherjar.”

I crashed back into my body, which no longer left me disoriented. I sat up to find Young Merlyn strumming a guitar in the corner. “The fuck is an  in-here-yar?” I asked. “I know Osiris, but not einherjar.”

Merlyn continued to play as he answered. “The einherjar are the ‘once fighters,’ the honored slain. Those who die in combat go on to Valhalla where they will die in battle every day and be reborn each night.”

“White was actually Tom after all five personalities merged into one.”

“Smarter than you look, Clemens.”

“No shit. What’s Project Einherjar?”

“Tell you tomorrow,” Merlyn said. “I’ve got a gig in 2011.”

“You’re literally the only time mage in all of existence. You can do both at the same time.”

“Trust me, get some sleep. However, in a couple of years, feel free to stop by the show.”

Back in my room, Ashley sat on my bed and read a book that floated above her head. “How long this time?” I asked.

“A few weeks,” Ashley said. “Haven’t really been counting.”

“What’d you learn?”

“Earth magic, mostly. Got turned into an ant. It was the most confusing experience I’ve ever had.”

“Full-on hivemind?”

“Yeah. How’d you know?”

“Happened to Wart in one of the King Arthur books. Sounds awful.”

“More chaotic, just acting without thinking.”

“Still sounds frightening,” I said.

“What did you learn about?” Ashley asked as her page turned on its own.

“Somehow the caveman’s reincarnation engineered five boys with super powers similar to his own,” I said. “He then combined them into one body called White. Brown killed the White to use for something he called Project Einherjar.”

“What happened next?” Ashley asked.

“I don’t know,” I said as I lay beside her, “but I assume I’m going to find out.”

The next morning, I wasted zero time. I skipped breakfast and went straight to Young Merlyn’s tiny room. Saying nothing, I sat at the center of the magic circle. Merlyn shrugged and pressed the toe of his combat boot against the edge of the circle. The magic came to life and blinded me with pink light.

A muscular copy of Benjamin Brown lay naked on a metal examining table. Another copy paced around the chrome room with a clipboard. The clone on the table opened his eyes and began pulling needles and electrodes from his body. “Oh good,” the pacing copy said, “you’re awake.”

“Where am I?”

“An underground facility in Indiana. We’ve finally activated you, Subject Black.”

“I have so many memories,” Black said. “Who am I?”

“You are the product of what we’ve been calling Project Zeus, originally Einherjar. You are a clone, a culmination of over one hundred twenty individuals. The simulated experiences of the last generation were designed with your enhanced physiology in mind. Some of your predecessors were scientists, doctors, engineers, martial artists, soldiers, philosophers, and a deep variety of other things. All of this, we did to create you for a single purpose. You will kill Benjamin Bartholomew Brown.”

“I can sense him,” Black said.

“It is one of your abilities,” Lab Coat said. “There’s a chip implanted in your skull that will transmit your memories back here in the event that you die. Failure will initiate another generation of clones being incubated to replace you. From them, another Subject Black will be created. Good luck.”

Lab Coat press a pistol to the side of his head and pulled the trigger. Black stole the other clone’s clothes. He exited the compound to find a barren field that went on for miles. Black looked around for a moment, and then, he launched into the air and flew away.

My vision faded as Black disappeared over the horizon.

The world snapped back into view in the middle of a chrome room. Benjamin Brown — almost hairless and more wrinkles than man — flew circles around the room with Black. The men exchanged volleys of energy blasts while scientists watched in horror. Brown fired a blast into the ceiling. Rubble showered the bystanders. Survivors ran for the exits. With a twist of Brown’s wrists, the doors slammed. Brown smiled as he fired on a crowd of his employees.

A flickering blade of light formed around Black’s arm. The young clone snarled as he rocketed across the room. Black sliced Brown in two. With the old man dead, Black dug through the wreckage to save anyone he could. Black uncovered a single living woman. Rust red hair spread messily from her bun, and her glasses had lost one lens. Blood soaked her clothes from mid-stomach to below her knees. A slab of concrete rested across her lower legs and a metal pipe jutted from her left side. Black tended to her injuries.

An armored fist punched through Black’s stomach. The robotic arm lifted Black into the air. “You,” wheezed Brown from inside his power armor, “are perfect. Finally, my Übermensch has been created. I will copy your body and implant my mind. I will live forever, shedding bodies as they grow too fragile. Thank you for your sacrifice, Project Einherjar.”

“Go fuck yourself,” Black said as he unleashed a beam of light that engulfed Brown’s robotic suit.

Black dragged the auburn-haired woman to the tanks lining the walls. He removed the metal pipe with care not to further harm her before he placed her inside one of the tubes. Black punched commands into the console computer before climbing into a pod himself. “Good luck, kid,” Black said with a smile.

I slammed back into Young Merlyn’s room and wretched.

“I told you to eat,” Young Merlyn said.

“That was my mom,” I said. “I’d recognize my mom anywhere. Why was my mom there?”

“You’re smart, Clemens. I’m sure you’ve figured it out.”

“I’m so sick of your cryptic shit. Just tell me.”

“You just witnessed your conception.”

“So I’m just another clone?”

“To a degree. Technically your mother was already pregnant. Granted, her child died from her injuries. Black used the tanks to heal her and clone himself as a replacement for her lost child. Through cannibalizing the other fetus and some epigenetic weirdness, you’re more like a child of your mother and Black than a clone.”

“I’m just a clone of a clone of a clone.”

“You’re more of a chimera. You have your mother’s hair and eyes. You have some genes from your father. But yes, most of you is a copy of Black. Despite all of that, you’re actually more similar to the immortal caveman than his first reincarnation since you are clearly his second.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?” I asked.

“It should. Cletus was my only friend. He was King Arthur. Cletus was Gilgamesh. He was Hercules.”

“I’m not him.”

“You can be better than him. That’s why I brought you here.”

“I wish you hadn’t,” I said as I left.

Ashley walked into my room a few hours later. She turned on the light and found me crying in bed. Ashley paused before she crawled under the comforter with me. She wrapped her arms around me. “I’ve never seen you cry,” she said. “I honestly thought asshole was your only emotional setting.”

“I’ve had a pretty fucked up couple of months,” I said. “All the visions Merlyn’s been showing me boiled down to the fact that I’m barely even human. I’m a clone. Everything about me was engineered. Yet him revealing that somehow keeps me from becoming evil in the future.”

“Is being made really a bad thing?”

“How wouldn’t it be?”

“Instead of being random, you were created purposefully to be you.”

“Which makes me a freak.”

“Why would you even want to be normal? You shoot laser beams out of your hands. You built a time machine out of scrap metal. Anyone would give their life to be you.”

I wiped mess from my eyes and nose, but stayed silent.

Eventually, Ashley said, “If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t even be a wizard.”

“Yes, you would.”

“No, I really wouldn’t. My mom taught me magic. After she died, I thought my life was over. I thought about killing myself. The only people there for me were you and Brian. You kept me alive. Then, you showed up from the future and brought me here. You gave me all of this. I wouldn’t trade you for anything.”

Again, I didn’t answer. I buried my face into a pillow. Ashley pulled me tighter, and we drifted to sleep.

The next morning, I changed back into my own clothes instead of the dusty tunic. I strapped my sword and the focus orb to my belt. After stealing food from the dining hall, I wandered into the courtyard. Old Merlyn sat on a stone outside the tower. The ancient wizard was speaking to an unusually large frog.

“Hey,” I said through a mouthful of biscuit, “can you let me out of here? My time machine doesn’t work in the Nether.”

“Just going to run off?” Merlyn asked. “What about your friend?”

“You’re a time mage. Can’t you bring her home?”

“Probably. Not sure. Best to not risk it.”

“When will her training be done?”

“Oh, it’s over,” Merlyn said. “She’s taking her final exam right now.”

“How’s that working out?”

“No idea. She might be dead already.”

“Come again.”

“She’s backstage right now. She has to cut through the aether to form her own demesne.”

“Is she going to be okay out there in the Nether on her own?” I asked. “She’s a really powerful wizard, right?”

“She has the potential, but you and I know she won’t reach it.”

“I know she doesn’t die here,” I said.

“But maybe she only survives because you help her,” Merlyn said. “Wouldn’t want to negatively impact causality would you? Time can mend from minor changes, but significant differences would collapse the timestream. I’m sure it’ll be fine. Chronos will just reset Time. Unless you want to help?”

The wizard tossed a rock in front of him. The stone spun in the air and multiplied into a ring of dozens of rocks. Yellow flames ignited within the ring of stones. The smell of sulfur poured from the portal on a wave of heat.

“What do you say?” Merlyn asked with a grin. “Up for a little adventure beyond the Veil?”