Induction Day: Book Two in the Butterman Travel Series Read online

  In front of me, a small boy is pushed from his mother’s grasp by a frantic man in a lifebelt. The child is forced to his knees, bawling, calling out for his mom, while trampling boots trudge past from spineless cowards competing for their chance at a lifeboat. I launch myself toward the boy, reaching out to lift him, when my body is slammed from the side and pinned against the wall.

  “Tristan!”

  He hovers beside me, his dark blond hair in disarray, no longer confined to his tweed cap. His face is pale, cheeks flushed. Urgently, I kiss his lips, flinging my arms around him just to make sure he’s really here. “I thought I’d never see you again.”

  “How long do we have?” he asks.

  “We have to get back to the time-craft now. The window is closing soon, and Titanic is going down fast. We need to leave within the next ten minutes or we might not make it off.” I pause searching his face. “If Titanic goes down before we exit the port, we could go down with her.”

  He stares at me a few seconds, his blue eyes wide. “This is what you wanted to witness?”

  Shaking my head no, I can barely find my voice. “I was wrong.”

  He grabs my hand, gives it a tug. “Or you have some serious thrill issues.”

  From behind, I’m shoved forward, which plows me right into Tristan, and Tristan stumbles farther down the deck, toward the bow, which is leaning perilously forward.

  The scene before us defies all purpose, and my childhood dreams suddenly seem like nightmares. People cram to the railing where a lifeboat overflowing with passengers wobbles on its ropes, one end lower than the other. A child no more than three is torn from her father’s arms and thrust aboard the lifeboat, into someone else’s arms, her body flailing, face distorted with screams leaving her lips.

  An older woman on the lifeboat calls out, rising from her seat with a wobble. “Give the man my seat. Let the child stay with her father.”

  People cramming to get on protest, but the steward fires off a gun into the sky. They back away, parting the cluster for only a moment while the woman debarks and trades places with the tearful father.

  A thunderous creak erupts from under our feet—the very sound of terror. Shrieks fill the air. I wish I could wither into oblivion and never see this moment. It’s painfully apparent to me now—how vulnerable I am. I come from an age of such drastic advancements, yet I’m no different than any one of them. How we fool ourselves into thinking our technology gives us any kind of edge over the inevitable.

  “Come on.” Tristan yanks my arm in the opposite direction, toward the steam funnel where Essence is parked.

  Dazed, I tag behind him, and I can’t peel my eyes from the disaster closing in. At the next lifeboat we stall, unable to move in any direction for all the arms and shoulders tightening around us. One lady cries out in such hair-raising sobs, others around her snap at her, pushing and shoving, accusing her of delaying their departure.

  My throat constricts. So much anger and confusion in the air, spinning webs and casting them over the deck—over human lives doomed to ever see another dawn. Tristan grips my hand, his eyes searching mine, and for the first time I see how full of fear they are. A dull, but stormy blue, with pupils dilated like black full moons.

  I should never have brought him here.

  “Bianca!”

  I turn toward the distant voice, and spot Quincy’s head bobbing over the many lifebelt-clad passengers encroaching on the next closest lifeboat nearer the stern. He’s waving me over, but I can’t get past the mass of passengers waiting for their turn at the lifeboat.

  Clinging to Tristan, I plow forward, throwing elbows to force my way.

  “What are you doing?” Tristan calls from behind me. “The time-craft is behind us.”

  I don’t respond to him, but continue til I reach Quincy’s tall uniformed frame at the corner of the lifeboat that’s now accepting passengers one by one.

  Another earth-shattering creak from below arrests the night. The deck trembles. In a jostle, the floor beneath us quakes and slopes downward even more toward the bow. My insides twist and drop like I’m on some kind of simulator ride.

  I meet Quincy’s lonesome stare and mouth the words, “I’m so sorry.”

  “I can’t do this,” Tristan yells at me from behind. “I don’t wanna die here, not like this.”

  I turn, cup his cheek briefly. “Look at me. We’re not gonna die.”

  He nods, gaze searching the pandemonium on every side of us.

  Quincy’s voice carries toward me from my right. “Ye were right all along.”

  I turn, still gripping Tristan’s hand, bringing him in closer to my side. We move in toward Quincy, crowded by shoulders and elbows.

  “Did you get word to the other ships?” I ask him.

  “Aye,” he says. “But we’re sinking fast. They should’ve slowed like ye said. I tried talkin’ to the captain, but his mind’s left him like a ghost. He just mumbles, repeats words that don’t make any sense.”

  My eyes plead with his. “Remember what I told you. Get on a lifeboat.”

  “Come on.” Tristan tugs my arm, eyeing Quincy for only a moment. “Let’s get outta here.”

  “Hold on,” I tell him, then turn back to Quincy. “I wish I could do more to save—”

  “Ye best be saving yer own self,” Quincy says, brows furrowing. “Now if ye’ll excuse me, I’ve got a job to do.”

  His gaze lingers on mine for a split second longer than I expect it to, before he takes the arm of a young woman in a lifebelt and helps her into the lifeboat.

  Tristan’s already pulling me backward toward the steam funnels.

  I breakaway, push my way in to Quincy’s side, blood coursing through my veins with more adrenaline, more power than I’ve ever felt. “Promise me you’ll get on a lifeboat.”

  Almost amused, Quincy shakes his head just slightly. “Yer crazy, ye know that?”

  “Promise me.”

  His gaze falls from mine. “Not with all these women and children here. Go on then, time traveler.” He’s about to step farther away, when he turns back to me. “Wait.”

  Reaching inside his pocket he pulls out his gold pocket watch, disconnects it, and hands it to me. “It’d do me a great honor if ye’d hold onto this.” He stares at it, clasping it in his open palm, as if measuring its weight. “Was me grandfather’s. Can’t stand the thought of it ending up on the bottom of the ocean.” He shrugs, hands it to me. “Take care of it for me.”

  The smooth metal is cold in my hand, the gold chain snaking down my wrist. My chest aches with a dull pang. “I can’t take this.”

  “Not even as a dying man’s last request?” His lips pull up in the faintest of smiles.

  Oh. My nostrils burn, tears pressing the backs of my eyes and I have to look away, down at the relic in my clutches. Within another second, I meet his steady gaze again. His amber-brown eyes are welled with tears.

  And there’s not another word left to say. I squeeze the pocket watch in my palm, nod, and attempt to swallow the lump in my throat.

  Quincy turns back to assist more pushing people at the lifeboat. Slowly, I back away, watching the way he gently takes a woman’s hand and leads her onto the boat. What must it feel like helping others to live, when your own life hangs in the balance?

  I don’t have time to think on it. Rejoining Tristan in the fray, I slip the pocket watch into my pocket and we weave our way across the deck to the center platform where the second steam funnel stands erect. There is no steam filling the starry sky now. No string instruments serenading the night, brainwashing passengers into an easy calm. There is nothing but straight panic.

  We pass so many painful images on our way. Bravery mixed with enigmatic fear. Cravenly horror, devout hope. I whisper a prayer that the Carpathia and Californian heeded the distress signal early this time. At this point, I don’t even care about the DOT or time travel violations anymore. Who cares if any of this breaks regulation? All of that seems so trivial and pe
tty at a time like this, when Death is lurking in the shadows of the night.

  “Everyone onboard must be on deck right now,” Tristan yells over the commotion.

  “I know,” I say. “It means they didn’t lock the third class passengers below.”

  “Maybe they should’ve. I mean, look at this mess. They can’t control it. It’s complete havoc. ”

  His thoughtless comment makes my jaw go stiff. “Who has the right to even try to control something like this?”

  We pummel forward through a group of men and women waving their hands in the air.

  “I don’t know,” Tristan says. “But more people only add to the chaos.”

  I pinch his forearm between my fingers and thumb. “Who’s to say third class human beings don’t have as much right to fight for their lives as the rest?”

  He doesn’t answer me, yanking his arm from my grip.

  Rockets sing out overhead. More distress signals lighting up the night in fluorescent orange. My ears tune out the hysterical voices, concentrating on the whistle and crackle of the rockets. There’s almost beauty in its imploring song—so crisp, so intent.

  Must stay focused.

  Just as we reach the platform, Captain Smith’s white-bearded image appears amidst the gridlocked disorder, his expression confused. Fully dressed in his navy uniform and hat, he seems hauntingly dutiful, like a spirit drifting through disastrous death. Like Quincy, he seems to know his fate. I want to run to the man and tell him everything he should do to save these people, but … what good would that do? Destiny has already proven I have no say here.

  More groaning from inside Titanic’s metal guts, and then … splashes over the side, into the night. It’s happening. As the ship inclines even more, people fall to the icy depths. Screams shatter through the air from every direction. At my right, two men slug at each other, before another gunshot commands their attention.

  “Bianca.” Tristan’s in my face. “Let’s get the hell outta here.”

  I feel as mixed up as the captain looked. Everything is so real and surreal at the same time.

  “Look. At. Me.” Tristan’s eyes bore into mine. “There’s nothing you can do. It’s time to go.”

  I nod, still no words emerging from my lips as I move forward, ignoring everything but my foraged path. At the ladder to the other side of the platform, I climb up behind Tristan. It’s a relief to be out of the horde, but from this height, the spectacle of it all is too much to bear.

  I force my eyes away, a strange mix of regret and relief flooding me. Finding the ripple of light that suggests Essence’s presence, I scan for the control panel at her door and uncloak her. My identity is verified from my right index finger at the sensor and the door slides open. Swiftly, and without conversation, we climb in and grab our buffersuits.

  I’m jostled forward, slamming into the dashboard, banging my hip bone. A resonant thunder from below stretches out like the caterwauling of an enormous sick cow, and all I can do is hang on to the dashboard. The weight of Titanic shifts so far forward, we slide a few inches, and for a moment I expect to tumble into the ocean.

  Strapping myself into the pilot seat, I maximize the holo-screen. “No time for the buffersuit, just get in your seat. The ship’s breaking in half. We have to depart now or we’ll go down with her.”

  On-screen, the countdown clock has already initiated. Twenty-one minutes til the window closes.

  We slide forward again, this time with a wobble. The top deck is now visible from the cockpit window.

  “Holy shit, we’re gonna tip.” Tristan’s voice is dense with alarm.

  “I’m trying,” I yell. “Doorcheck verified, all systems go. Standby to engage.”

  “It’s all happening so fast.”

  My brain in autopilot mode now, I verify the coordinates for home. “Just be happy we didn’t land on the bow or we’d be done for.”

  Another bottomless rumble vibrates the entire vessel. Right now the railing around the funnel’s platform is the only thing supporting us from tumbling forward with the rise of the stern.

  Tristan’s image is clear from the rearview mirror, his knuckles white, his hands gripping the armrests of his seat. His gaze is fixed on the scene from the cockpit window. “All those people.” His voice cracks.

  My fingers tremble as I ready us for departure. My stomach is sour and swishing, bile rising in my throat. In a brief upward glance, I find people moving toward us, their faces masks of desperation and horror. I reactivate the cloaking device.

  More awful wails and bellows confirm Titanic’s ripping into pieces beneath us.

  “What’re you doing?” Tristan yells over the rumbling. “Go!”

  I’m frozen, gaze plastered on the ashen faces out the window. “We have room for at least three people—we should help some of them …”

  “There’s not time for that. You tried, okay? This is how it’s supposed to happen.”

  My voice hitches before coming out. “But even if it’s just one person, we should try—”

  “Bianca, you can’t save them. This isn’t your fault. Save us.”

  I flick my gaze upward onto the rearview mirror where Tristan’s pleading with me. An engulfing silence swaddles me with knowledge. My responsibility is to my passenger, not Titanic. A smart player always knows when to accept defeat.

  “Countdown to departure in ten,” I say, finding my focal point. “Nine, eight …”

  The vessel is thrust forward again, this time slipping faster, farther. In front of us, a spine-tingling crunch rips down the center of the ship. Kerrrrraaaaachhh.

  I can’t peel my eyes from the window.

  The bow wavers, pulling the entire vessel down. And us with it. Holy hell, Titanic is splitting in two only yards from my face. My heart is in my throat. We’re sliding, tilting. Vertigo invades my brain, my body. Like an elevator dropped down the shaft.

  The stern is rising … we’re falling …

  “ENGAGE.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  I’m going to puke.

  Leaning forward, I fall over my knees and hurl my guts onto the time-craft floor. My head spins and I cough, dousing my chin with spittle. My body is so heavy I can’t lift myself up. I’m crumpled over. Maybe I’m dead. Do you puke when you’re dead?

  “No way.” Tristan’s voice. “Bianca Butterman spewing chunks on a time trip?” He chuckles. “I am never gonna let this slide, you realize that.”

  Now I know I’m not dead. I can’t look at him yet, though. So embarrassing.

  Slowly, I lift myself up and lean back in my seat, peeking from beneath my lids at Tristan’s image in the rearview mirror. He’s got the goofiest grin on his face.

  “You’re not sick?” I ask him. In lieu of making eye contact, I glance at the details on-screen, confirming our location in Northern Alaska.

  “No, not really, but that ride was insane.” He laughs. “I thought we were exploding.”

  My brain reels for the memory of our journey, but all I can remember is the launch … and Titanic … going down. A seething pain shoots through my chest. All those people. Poor Adelaide … and Quincy.

  Unstrapping myself, I stumble to my feet, teetering from left to right and back again til I have to grab onto the back of my seat for support. Something happened to me. All at once, my body shivers, easy at first, then so violently I can’t control it. My teeth chatter in rapid clacks like ceramic tiles knocking into each other, and the odor of vomit wafts through my nostrils, sour and putrid. I have to get out of here.

  Dizzy now, I hold onto my head, squeezing my eyes shut. Dad’s voice should sound over the com any second. He’ll be mad we’re not wearing the buffersuits, I know he will. He’ll insist that’s what is wrong with me.

  Tristan’s at my side, his hands on my shoulders. “Whoa, you okay? Why don’t you sit down.”

  I let him move me into the pilot chair, but my eyes remain closed. “I’m thirsty. Below the dashboard … a supply pack …”
<
br />   When I open my eyes, Tristan’s ripping off the tab of an airtight water pouch. He hands it to me and I gulp it down.

  “Uh, where the hell are we?” Tristan asks.

  I glance at him where he stands at the cockpit window, my vision blurred.

  “Port Butterman,” I say through panted breaths. “My dad should be opening the door—”

  “No.” Tristan’s voice holds a strange tone of amusement. “We’re not at Port Butterman.”

  My stomach’s cramping now and I clutch it, cradling my torso. He’s not making sense. “Check the dashboard screen. It says arrival: Port Butterman.”

  “Well, you need to take a look at this, then.”

  With some difficulty, I get to my feet. I’m totally off-kilter. Staggering to the window, I spread my palms against the glass and lean in for support, blinking my eyes for focus, my head still spinning.

  A snowy landscape expands before us, the frigid air outside seeping in through the window to my skin. Flurries drift down from a sapphire night sky, and high above, chartreuse lights dance like neon scarves blowing in the wind … only the stars and snow present to watch their performance. The Northern Lights. We have to be in Alaska. But there’s not a manmade structure for as far as my eyes can see.

  My discomfort momentarily forgotten, I stumble to the dashboard, scanning the screen for details:

  Arrival: Port Butterman, Alaska

  December 5, 1912

  23:49:22 hours AST

  1912? What the …?

  I refresh the data with a gesture of my hand, expanding the screen. The same information appears. My body feels heavier on one side, like I might topple over, or split in half like Titanic. Propping myself from the edge of the dashboard, I examine the launch and landing details, review the time-port coordinates.

  How could I have made such a huge mistake?