The Quantum Cartographer Read online

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  CARTOGRAPHER

  BOOK OF CRUXES

  KRISTEN KEENON FISHER

  THE QUANTUM CARTOGRAPHER

  BOOK OF CRUXES

  Copyright © 2017 Kristen Fisher.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  iUniverse

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  Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

  Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

  Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

  ISBN: 978-1-5320-1538-0 (sc)

  ISBN: 978-1-5320-1539-7 (e)

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2017903715

  iUniverse rev. date: 3/20/2017

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1 And Then There Was War

  Chapter 2 The Lost Aeon

  Chapter 3 Foreign Policy

  Chapter 4 Lost in Transposition

  Chapter 5 Till Death Do Us In

  Chapter 6 By Hook or by Crook

  Chapter 7 Moons over Kressya

  Chapter 8 Out of Sight, Out of Time

  Chapter 9 The Purification

  Chapter 10 Give Up the Ghost

  Chapter 11 Takes One to Know One

  Chapter 12 The Inventor

  Chapter 13 A Bird in the Hand

  Chapter 14 The Night-Dressed Visitors

  Chapter 15 Finders Keepers

  Chapter 16 And Here, Carve Your Will for the Stars to See …

  Chapter 17 The Hierophant in the Room

  Chapter 18 Rubik’s Cube

  Chapter 19 Tremors of Jubilation

  Chapter 20 Godspeed

  Chapter 21 Night of the Messenger

  Chapter 22 The Revival’s Advocate

  Chapter 23 White Elephant

  Chapter 24 Wait for Me!

  Chapter 25 March of Wolves

  Chapter 26 All the King’s Horses

  Chapter 27 The Mad Dealer

  Chapter 28 The Gatekeeper

  Chapter 29 Tempter of the Forbidden House

  Chapter 30 Vengeance

  Chapter 31 Déjà Vu

  Chapter 32 Albatross

  Chapter 33 First, There Was Transposition …

  About the author

  To Annie Collins, Sheri Fisher, Tange Francis and Shana Francis

  Watch your thoughts turn to embers

  As you collapse into a dream

  Where no clock here is as it seems

  Deep beneath the constant stream—

  No neutral gears for this machine

  Winding levers and clever strings

  Attached to talking, wooden things

  With green means and red ends.

  —SORCERERS OF THE HOURS,

  BOOK OF CRUXES (THE CRUX)

  CHAPTER 1

  AND THEN THERE WAS WAR

  TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY, FOURTH DECADE, YEAR 2033

  MIDDLE OF NOWHERE, NEVADA

  “Do you know who we are?” asks a man, half-obscured in darkness, in a graveled tone. The only visible marker of his identity is the emblem of a pendulum on the left shoulder of his black coat. This seems intentional. He is addressing a young woman of small stature, with short, dark hair and startled green eyes. Eliza. She doesn’t respond. She only keeps her eyes on the shrouded man who sits cross-legged in the center of her living room, surrounded by eight men who are equally as mysterious and uninvited. A television broadcast murmurs in the background.

  The shrouded man continues, “I’ve been many things in my time—despised and revered alike. I am called the Proctor. Do you wish to know why?”

  Eliza positions her son behind her. “You drew the short straw?”

  The man laughs gingerly while pressing down his bowler hat. Using a cane leaning against his chair, he pushes himself up. The wood floor of the living room creaks beneath the slow clacks of his heels as he walks patiently, examining the empty walls with his back to Eliza. His henchmen, still as statues, stand in a semicircle behind him. Black hats, black trenches, black gloves. The kind of visitors who walk without shadows. Men whose handiwork fills the pages of innumerable unsolved mysteries and cold-case files.

  “We know who you are. Eliza Carrefour, former scientist at the Holifax facility in New Mexico. Last known project was the Abeona experiments. You have a two-year-old son, whom you love dearly, and before you enter your home, you circle the perimeter exactly five times.”

  Eliza remains composed. “That project was a long time ago.”

  The Proctor faces Eliza and steps into the light, standing tall. His face is bruised with scars that look recent. A solid black glass eye is stuffed in his left socket. “That is correct. It went dark two years ago, to be precise. Funding was cut, and all data, video, and intelligence were deep-sixed. The project’s future—uncertain. Recently, we did some digging. One last sweep to tie any and all loose ends. During this process, many inaccuracies were discovered. Unauthorized access to files, missing surveillance feeds, unaccounted for assets, forged documentation—and that was just the first day.

  “You worked closely with Dr. Layla Velasquez, world-renowned scientist turned defector, whose whereabouts following the project were unknown—up until recently. We … spoke to several of your former colleagues on the matter, and after a very lengthy conversation, all of them managed to reveal one name. Any guesses?”

  Eliza’s eye slips toward a butcher’s knife lying flat on the kitchen table, no more than ten feet away.

  “Tell me, Eliza—are you familiar with the sacred writings of the Crux? ‘War is the inevitable fate of an idea forged in the fire of revolt. Born of havoc, it is doomed to return—doomed to repeat the conditions in which it was conceived, knowing no other path toward progress or resolution, ignorant of the will to evolve.’

  “I’ve always hated that passage, for its poor appreciation of art. Out of conflict rises supremacy. War—its masterpiece! Its ultimate legacy. Building to destroy.”

  “What do you want?” Eliza shoots the question, tense and unamused.

  The Proctor slowly clacks toward her. “What do you know about a man who went by the name August?”

  Eliza scratches her palms while glancing at the wide blade.

  “Our best trackers sought him to the ends of the earth. He was the most meddlesome and elusive man we have ever known.” The Proctor squats down in front of Eliza’s son, who remains firmly attached to her leg, and stares at him with fascination. “Such power in such an unassuming form, unknown to your innocence. Your destiny is written. Of this, we are now certain. You will do great things, child. Or dare I say … you already have.”

  Eliza has heard enough. She drives her knee into the Proctor’s chin and then runs into the kitchen. Met by one of the dark visitors, she upends the table and catches the knife, cracking
him with the hilt before sending the blade flying into the chest of another. Both guards drop to the floor. Wrapping her son with one arm, she dashes up the living room stairs.

  “Must we play this game, Eliza?” The Proctor gathers himself from the floor and orders some of his men after her.

  Eliza bursts into her bedroom and hides her son. “We’re going to be okay,” she whispers, placing him under the bed. “Wait here.” She creeps out into the hall toward a small closet housing a circuit breaker. With a sharp click, she kills the lights. The intruders, apprehensive in their steps, prepare their pistols with silencers and head up the stairs. Broken light filters in and glistens off the chiseled steel of their firearms. Eliza carefully counts their footsteps, waiting just beyond the staircase. She quickly whips around the corner, capturing the arm of one of the men as he approaches. Using him as a shield, she grabs his gun and empties his clip at the three other advancing henchmen in a silent flurry that immobilizes them. She then kicks him to the bottom of the stairwell. The Proctor furiously shoves his remaining two men up the steps. Eliza runs back into the bedroom and fixes the door with a wooden chair.

  “What are you hoping will come of this, Eliza?” the Proctor calls.

  She calms her son as she begins chain-knotting bedsheets.

  “There’s nowhere you can run, nowhere you can hide—no time you can escape to that we will not find you! I will turn this rotating rock upon its head and shake you from its grasp! Mark my words, Eliza!” The walls between them shiver as the Proctor pounds the bedroom door.

  Eliza ties one end of the chain of sheets around the bedpost and tosses the remainder out of her bedroom window. She then takes a can of gasoline from her closet and begins soaking the room. She’s played this scenario a thousand times in her mind. The contingency plan of a high-value target. Burn and run. Burn and run. She lifts her son on her back and climbs out of the window, starting her way down the improvised rope.

  The Proctor kicks the door in and stomps after her, catching her by the arm. “You’re mine!”

  Eliza sinks her teeth into the flesh of his hand, forcing him to release his grip in agony. With her son latched around her, she slides down the knotted sheets. Once on the ground, she flicks open her lighter and ignites the threads. The flame chases its way up the thin sheets and into the house, setting it ablaze. Eliza runs for her vehicle. The Proctor and his two remaining henchmen fall through the front door. As Eliza and her son reach the car, a bullet shatters the driver-side window.

  “No!” The Proctor stops his men from firing another shot. “You’ll hit the child.”

  Eliza nervously fumbles with her keys.

  “Where do you plan to go, Eliza?” The Proctor limps toward the car. “What ends will you go to that we will not?”

  The ignition turns. The Proctor smashes his cane against the windshield as Eliza slams in reverse. The tires squeal as she glues the pedal to the floor and screeches off, the windows of her home spilling flames in the rearview. The trouble Eliza now faces will not be evaded or dismissed. This is the night she’s long feared, when far isn’t far enough away to escape the buried secrets of the past. Visibility becomes scarce as a rainstorm pours from the sky. Perfect, she thinks, looking through her glassless driver-side window with an annoyed sigh. She speeds down the roadway, never lifting her foot off the gas. A full moon looms above. Eliza is no stranger to the sort of cold-blooded repo men that let themselves into her home. During her time at Holifax, these rigid, dark-attired types frequented the facility. Always withdrawn and peripheral. She always had the feeling that their job description included the dirty work around the lab, the kind of things that needed to be done but not seen. The laboratory was host to a wide range of top-secret projects, none more infamous than the Abeona experiments. The “cleanup crew” she is now running from couldn’t care less about the closed dossiers she took it upon herself to declassify. They’re after something else. After she became pregnant with her son, she resigned from her position at the facility. His birth changed everything.

  A close friend warned her of these events. Eliza was there when they came for him. During their final encounter, he gave her a piece of paper containing the details of a secret location. There, she can hide—and do what needs to be done.

  The old engine clanks and whines as Eliza eats up the roadway, with her son in the passenger seat and a choke hold on the steering wheel. She periodically brushes the soft curls of his hair with her fingertips. “Almost there,” she says with a thin smile. Glancing in the rearview mirror, she discovers an unmarked black SUV right on her tail with no headlights. The unmarked vehicle speeds to within feet of her rear bumper. Without pause, Eliza mashes the brakes and skids into a hard right turn. The SUV guns it behind her. Switching on its high beams, it repeatedly rams into the back of her car.

  Eliza aggressively weaves around a few oncoming cars as the night flashes with storm. The SUV eliminates anything in its path, steamrolling its way to her. The unmarked vigilantes pull up beside her and crash into her car to force her off the road. The two vehicles fishtail through the pounding rain, wedged together in a momentum struggle. Suddenly, the passenger-side window of the SUV slowly rolls down. Eliza looks up and sees the scarred face of the Proctor staring down at her. He winks and tips his hat as the relentless tank rears up for another crippling blow. Just as it swerves in, Eliza throws her arm across her son and hits the brakes. The SUV misses wide and loses traction, tumbling end over end into the front of a gas station building in a mangled ball of fire. Just down the road lies a dirt path with a sign that reads “Arc Dome Wilderness.” Eliza turns off on the muddy trail, digging in the sludge and mowing down a chain-link fence labeled “Keep Out.”

  Farther into the mountainous region, beyond several impossibly sharp turns, Eliza sees an outcropping that matches an image sketched onto the crumpled piece of paper—a series of rock formations around what looks to be an entrance. After a mud-flinging stop, she grabs her son, who is now unconscious, and heads out in the downpour. As they get closer to the area, two large doors built directly into the rigid face of the mountain, with a black monitor above, reveal themselves. This is the place. Eliza places her eye in the scanner off to the right, as the paper instructs, and looks eagerly for a response. No answer. She smacks the door repeatedly and waits, wondering if they’ve come this far for nothing. The beating rain clouds her vision. Then, a face appears on the monitor above. A woman, aged only by the thin creases of her frown, peers down with burrowing eyes, her long silver hair half-bundled and half-free.

  “May we help you?” she asks in an impatient tone.

  “Please! My name is Eliza Carrefour. I’m—”

  “I know who you are,” the woman says. “How is it that you know this place?”

  “A dear friend once told me that when the night-dressed men came looking for me, I would need your help. He said you would know what to do.”

  The woman glances down at Eliza’s son. “I’m sorry; we cannot help you.” She reaches up to cut the visual.

  “No, wait—please!” Eliza holds her son up to the screen.

  The shocked woman jerks forward. The color is stolen from her face once she sees his eyes—glowing like the moon, though he remains in a nonresponsive state. “I … don’t believe it.” She cuts the monitor feed immediately and releases the doors.

  Eliza jumps inside. Her T-shirt and jeans are drenched and weighted.

  The woman, a wool blanket over her shoulder, runs down a long corridor to meet her. “My apologies for the delay, but I had to be sure. Were you followed?”

  “Sort of,” Eliza replies, ringing the rainwater from her shirt.

  The striking woman’s silver hair lies over a royal-blue pelisse that drapes her medium build. “My name is Reinour Delarune. My familiars call me Nour, and you may do the same.” She quickly covers Eliza’s son with the blanket, lost in his eyes. “How long have they
been like this?”

  “Just now—at the door.”

  “You have no idea how long we have waited for this moment. Are you prepared for what we must do?”

  “No … But as long as he is here, he will never be safe. I know that now.” Puddles form beneath Eliza’s emerald eyes. But there’s no time.

  “We must hurry,” Nour insists.

  Through the corridor and a down a winding flight of stairs, they race to a room lit by short pulses of light coming from a large gyrating machine. Its function is one Eliza knows very well. Transposition. The cobwebbed memories return as she shudders at the foot of the temporal wave generator. A time machine. The full weight of her circumstances chokes her all at once.

  “I-I can’t do this,” she confesses, keeping her son close, his eyes still in a lucent trance.

  “I do not pretend to understand the exquisite suffering of the grief you must feel. But I too have had to give up what I loved for a cause greater than myself—even when I did not understand why. The child you hold in your arms is a very special one. He aspires to a greatness that goes far beyond ourselves. He will inspire the end of wars—in this time and in others. I know you love him more than anything in this world. I am not asking you to give up that love; I am asking you to empower it. It will be all that guides him.” Nour stares into the boy’s smoldering eyes. “They burn with longing, yearning to return to the place where it all began. I once knew an intriguing visitor whose eyes burned as bright when the moon was in full eclipse.”

  It’s the time Eliza spent at the Holifax facility that gives her insight into the “place” that Nour speaks of: the Lost Aeon. “How do we know he’ll make it?”

  “He is connected, pulled by his destination. The eclipse calls him near.”

  “But there is no eclipse.”

  “That’s because it isn’t happening here, my dear.”