Rewinder

CHAPTER TEN

A chill passes through me. “What’s this about?”

The guard turns and walks down the hallway without answering. Seeing no other choice, I follow. He leads me into the administration section, and then to a room about three times the size of mine. Behind a desk sits a woman with graying brown hair.

“Mr. Younger,” the security man announces.

After a nod of acknowledgment, the woman points to a chair along the wall and says to me, “Wait there.”

When I sit, she picks up her com-phone, says, “He’s here,” then listens for a moment before cradling it again.

I glance nervously at her while she busies herself with some papers as if I’m not even here. After a few minutes, a door behind her swings open a few inches. “You can go in now,” she tells me.

The new room is twice as large as the woman’s, with walls covered in dark wood paneling and bookcases stuffed end to end with leather-bound volumes. A beautiful carpet covers the floor, but the desk is the focal point of the room. Massive and old, it looks as if it was carved from a single piece of wood. What’s missing is the room’s occupant.

Hesitantly, I walk over to the guest chair in front of the desk, but I know sitting first would be disrespectful so I remain on my feet. About thirty seconds later, I hear the faint squeak of a hinge. I look over just in time to see a small section of a bookcase open outward, revealing Sir Gregory.

“Mr. Younger.” With a smile, he walks over and shakes my hand, then gestures to the chair. “Please. Sit down, sit down.”

I wait until he’s lowered himself into his before I do as he asked.

“Something to drink?” he offers. “Tea? Coffee? Water?”

“I’m fine, thank you,” I say, though I’m far from it.

“Very well, then.” He picks up several sheets of paper off his desk and looks them over. “Let’s see…ah, yes.” He glances up and smiles again. “We first met in New Cardiff last spring.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And now you’re a full-fledged personal historian.”

“Junior, sir. But yes, since September.”

“I never doubted you’d pass the program.” He gestures to the file. “When I first learned of your Occupational Placement Exam scores, I knew you would be perfect for the program.”

“Um, thank you,” I say, not knowing how else to respond.

“And how do you like it?”

“Sir?”

“Being a Rewinder.”

“Oh, it’s, uh, it’s more than I could’ve ever imagined. I still have a hard time believing it.”

“Of course you do. That sense of wonder will likely stay with you throughout your career. It does with most Rewinders. God knows, I still can’t believe it sometimes.”

He’s quiet for a moment as he reads through another one of the sheets. When he looks back at me, he says, “I see here that you wanted to go for a walk today.”

“I’m sorry, Sir Gregory. I forgot I needed authorization. I haven’t been out since I arrived here and I ended up with some extra time this afternoon so I thought…”

“But you get out all the time on your assignments.”

“You’re right, sir. I do. It’s just…” I pause, thinking quickly. “I’m always working then.”

“Of course. I understand. Truth is, there are times when I wish I could take a walk outside.”

“You don’t go out, either?” I ask.

He studies me for several seconds and then sets the papers down. “This was going to happen eventually. It always does. You should feel honored. You’re the first from your class I’ve had to talk to about it.”

“About what exactly, sir?”

He leans back in his chair. “There was a time when members of the institute freely moved in and out of our gates. In fact, when I started as a personal historian, it was a necessity. Our work at the time meant tedious hours spent combing historical archives and records that were often not accessible via data monitors, so we traveled throughout the empire to consult and decipher the original texts. For over a hundred and sixty years, this is how the institute did its work. But then everything changed.” He pauses as if he’s given me the answer I’m looking for but he hasn’t, and my expression tells him as much. “Mr. Younger, what is the most powerful thing on Earth?”

I say without hesitation, “The king.”

“Yes, yes, naturally,” he says. “But I’m not talking about a person. I’m talking about a thing.”

I shrug and say the next thing that comes to mind. “The nuclear bomb.” I’m not sure how it works — something about atoms smashing together — but everyone’s seen the destructive results in photos of the cities in China and Africa where the bombs have been dropped. One bomb can destroy miles of land, its radiation continuing to kill weeks and months and often years later.

“An understandable choice,” he says. “But not even close.”

I consider the question again. “Volcanoes?”

“That’s a much better guess, but still not correct.” He opens one of the desk’s drawers and pulls out a Chaser device.

It’s different from the one I’ve been using. It’s dinged and scuffed and has several more buttons and switches than mine.

He admires it for a moment before setting it on the desk between us. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”

That’s not exactly the word I’d use but I nod.

“This is one of the early devices. Second generation. Mine, actually.”

He flips one of the switches and I pull back, half expecting him to disappear.

With a chuckle, he says, “The battery cell was removed long ago. I like to keep it here, though. A reminder of the whens I’ve visited and the things I’ve seen.”

He picks it up, and without warning tosses it to me. It bounces off my hands as I’m reaching out, but I manage to snag it before it falls to the ground.

“That, Mr. Younger, is the most powerful thing on Earth,” he says. “In the wrong hands, can you imagine the devastation one of these could cause? Someone could go back and ensure someone else is never born. Or worse.”

Having traveled as much as I have, it’s easy to imagine the things someone could do — assassinating world leaders before they gain power, introducing technologies decades or centuries prior to their development, using knowledge of the past to increase one’s wealth in the present. I could spend hours writing a list and still not cover everything.

“That’s why the only person living outside our walls who knows of the Chasers and what they do is the king, and even his knowledge is limited to believing that we can only witness the past, not interact with it. If he knew the full extent of its abilities, well…”

With the experience and education I’ve gained at the institute, I can see the necessity of limiting the Crown’s knowledge, but I can’t stop the feeling of dread that grips my chest for holding knowledge back from the king. It’s a reaction rooted in how I was brought up, how all in the empire are brought up.

“You can see now that it’s imperative we guard against those who might attempt to obtain our secret,” Sir Gregory continues. “Abducting one of our members while he’s out for a walk would be a simple thing. We can’t expose institute personnel to that kind of danger. The Chaser and what it allows us to do must be protected at all costs.”

“So we’re imprisoned here.”

“The institute would never phrase it that way. The grounds are expansive, and you are one of the lucky ones. As a Rewinder, you get out all the time. Think of the others here — the companions, the administrative staff, the security officers. If anyone is imprisoned here, they are.”

Up until this afternoon, despite some of the lingering questions, I’ve never felt any doubts about joining the program. Now, I can feel them starting to creep in.

“You do understand, don’t you?” Sir Gregory asks.

“Yes, sir. I do.”

“And you’ll be able to live with these conditions?”

Do I have a choice? “Absolutely.”

I focus all my energy on work so that I won’t think too much about what Sir Gregory has told me.

I’m aided in this by the project Johnston and I are assigned. It’s a comprehensive rewind of an old and influential Midlands family. Their ancestral lore speaks of deep roots in England, and while those are indeed there, lines also lead to German, Dutch, and — the family will not be pleased about this — French relatives.

It’s usually at night, as I’m waiting for sleep to take me, that my mind drifts in directions I don’t want it to go. Some nights I see myself running along the institute’s outer walls, screaming, “Let me out! Let me out!” Other nights, I see a dead Harlan Walker IV in his open casket, surrounded by bags of cash labeled Upjohn Institute, or Johnston balling up dozens of newspapers that he buries me in, or Palmer arching in pain over and over and over as he screams, “Denny!”

It’s a beautiful spring evening and I’m taking advantage of it by reading a book in the back gardens. The topic is the Protestant reformation, a period I’ll be visiting on an upcoming assignment. It’s a dry subject not holding my interest, so the moment I hear loud footsteps, I look up and see Lidia racing out of the main building. I’ve seen her in foul moods before, but I’m not sure I’ve ever seen her this angry.

When she nears the reflecting pool, she begins turning around as if she’s decided to go back inside, but then she spots me and makes a beeline in my direction.

“Did you know about this?” she asks as she nears me.

“About what?”

“You know very well what I’m talking about.”

“Go bother someone else, Lidia.” I look back at my book.

She points past me. “I’m talking about that!”

When I twist around, all I can see is the wide grass field and the distant institute wall.

As I turn back, she says, “How long have you known that we’re locked in here?”

So that’s it. She’s just had the talk with Sir Gregory. Despite the tension between us, I can’t help but feel some sympathy. “I was told only a few weeks ago. Before that I didn’t know, either.”

She gapes at me. “A few weeks ago? It didn’t cross your mind to share that information?”

“Before I left, Sir Gregory made me promise not—”

“I don’t care what he told you to do. You had an obligation to your fellow trainees. You should have told us as soon as you left his office!”

I consider letting her know she’s the first from the group I’ve seen since then, but it’d probably fall on deaf ears so I only say, “Sorry.”

“Sorry?” Her face twists so tight that I’m sure she’s about to unleash a torrent of rage on me, but then she takes a breath and looks toward the wall again. “My father won’t stand for this.”

Without another word, she whirls around and races back toward the main building.

I see her the next evening in the dining hall, sitting alone. The anger from the night before has been replaced by a distant stare. I know I should let her be, but her words about my obligation to my group have stuck with me. It’s the Eight in me, always feeling the need to do more for others than they do for me. So I stop at her table before collecting my meal.

“How are you doing?”

I’m not sure she’s heard me until she slowly tilts her head up. Her gaze is on me but I feel like she’s looking through me. “He already knew,” she whispers. “He arranged for me to be here, and he already knew.”

Her eyes remain on me for a few more seconds before she looks away and stares off at nothing again.

I ask if she’s all right but she doesn’t respond this time. I decide to let it be and retrieve my meal.

Lidia must have been talking about her father. But how would he have gotten her into the institute? I’ve been under the impression we’re all here because of our test scores. It’s clear, though, that she thinks he had a hand in it, and that he already knew she’d never leave once she’s inside. If that’s even partially true, I actually feel sorry for her.

As I eat my meal, I think things have gotten as strange as they could get.

But I’m wrong.

Two days later, in the prep room as I dress for a trip back to 1924, I find a note.