Chapter 17
Sep. 29th, 2013 05:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
a_time_slipA glass tablet showed a pink haired Lynn, who stood in front of Nina with folded arms. She clearly wasn’t listening to whatever it is Nina was saying, though Janie hoped that it was about changing her hair back to its normal color.
“You should not watch them.” Her Grandmother said. “They have a life now.”
“I know that, Ori.” Janie said quietly, as Lynn and Nina began to smile. “I don’t want to forget who they are, what they look like. They were my-”
“We are family, child. We share the same blood. Those two are not.”
“They’re better off without me.” She said, as Ori swept the tablet to the floor, just as her daughter’s hair changed back to its normal brown color. “I’m not there to destroy their lives. I can’t even destroy my own here.”
Ori looked pleased, and took a seat. The walls of the room were blindingly white, just as they had been on the time machine. The ceiling and floor were both glossy and white as well, and so were the tables and chairs.
Her outfit was white and gauzy, just like Ori’s, and Janie realized that she hated that color. She stayed, because Ori helped her fix the world. The two of them went back to nearly every point in time that Cyrus changed, and reversed what he had done. Some things were not reversable, and that’s what Phoenix and The Agency took care of.
She didn’t want anyone talking her out of her decision, so she chose not to say goodbye. All she’d left was instructions, which they followed. The dinosaurs were now off world, the city was slowly coming to life again, and the supposed time machine hoax was now only mentioned on a few internet forums and small tabloid articles.
The world was going to be okay. Janie was going to be okay. She lived in the white building with Ori, and had all of her memories back.
“I was the first.” Ori began “Many years ago, in the bush. I ran from children, and I found a different time. I ran from there, and found different time once more. I married a simple man, and we became gods.”
Janie had learned not to roll her eyes when Ori spoke, especially when she claimed to be a god, or a witch, or a saint. This day was no different.
“Your mother and your aunt were my children, and only your mother was granted the ability. Your aunt was too simple, and we let her live with others since she was not one of us. It’s my blood that gives us this. The children of your aunt have tainted the Earth with time travel, and I knew that it had to be stopped. I found them all, and they are now dead.”
“We’re not.” Janie pointed out, but didn’t dare mention Lynn. The older woman seemed to think that the little girl was adopted, and Janie didn’t want to correct her.
“It will die with us, and if we do not die, it will stay in this white building.”
“You are supposed to be dead.” Janie pointed out, closing her eyes for a moment. “And so am I.”
“We will die soon.” Ori said, reassuringly. “Then this world will be free of time travel. Our genetics will not exist anymore.”
She didn’t know why Ori hated who and what they were so much, but by now she’d learned that it wasn’t worth it to argue with her. She didn’t seem to know about other time travelers, or that the genetic line had not been killed off.
“My life was going nowhere” Janie said to Ori “I worked at this store, okay it was a little grocery store run by an Italian family and I’ve been a cashier there for years. And, right before I went with Cyrus I got passed up for a promotion, again. I’m always getting passed up there, or written up for being late, or daydreaming. I’m just not cut out for that.”
“Why are you so often late?” Asked Ori “That is something that you never explained.”
“Time travel” Janie closed her eyes for a moment, and smiled “I’d go to so many wonderful times and spaces, and sometimes they weren’t so wonderful. I can’t control it very well, so I’d sit down for lunch, and end up in a different place or time. Sometimes I got back by the end of lunch, but most of the time it was a completely different day, or I’d get back at the end of lunch four days ago.”
“I did not have those problems”
“No, that’s because you were born knowing how to time travel perfectly.” Janie said, without thinking “Nobody is better at it than you, right?”
“Excuse me? You do not talk to me that way!”
“Sorry.” Janie rolled her eyes and folded her arms before speaking again. “Time travel. And something was really messing with my memory, I still haven’t figured out that one yet. Unless it was you. Nina seemed really worried when I told her about you.”
“No one could ever understand why we needed to meet.”
“She takes better care of Lynn than I do, anyway. It doesn’t matter.”
“Do you have your memory back now?”
“Most of it. There’s still pieces and bits missing but it can’t be anything that important.”
Janie couldn’t keep her mind off of Phoenix. He was an alien, but so very handsome, and he’d always been nice to her. He respected her, and never seemed to treat her like a kid. She knew that she had too much pride at times, but he did not point that out.
In all the years she’d known him, they were friends first, and then best friends. He’d gotten her through the worst part of her life- he’d even saved it a few times. She went to him when she got hurt, and the two of them talked. They talked, went on picnics, and were the best of friends.
Then, came Dakinor, where their friendship turned into something more. Janie ran then, and the two barely talked.
But she loved him. When she slept, she dreamed about Phoenix, and when her mind drifted during one of Ori’s endless speeches, it drifted to one of their many adventures together. He was who she wanted to be with until everything ended. She wanted to be with him when it did. She wanted him there now.
“It will never be.” Ori said, interrupting her thoughts.
“What, are you reading my mind now?” Janie asked, before looking at the picture in her hands “Oh. I’m staring at his- um. Did you need something? Another white chair? Is a speck of dust showing somewhere?”
“It will consume everything about you.” Ori said “Until the both of you are nothing but shells of who you were, and destruction will follow in-”
“Don’t even mention him. You don’t get that, okay? I gave it all up, you’ve got me, and you’ve got no more time travel. You have won, do you understand? Leave me with my memories! Don’t you dare take him from me!”
“You will never see that thing again.” Ori said, as her voice dripped with venom. “This is your home now and I have taken nothing from you. Your own choices led you here, and away from your vagrant friends.”
“I know that I can’t be with him.” Janie said, sadly. “But I want my memories. I didn’t have them for so long and right now they are all that I have. If I can’t be with him, what’s the use of going back? I’ll be even unhappier than I am now.”
“You will learn to be happy with me.” Ori said, proudly “I am all that you have in the universe.”
She was often left alone for short stretches of time, usually for chores, but sometimes she was left to practice one of the few games they played together. Today, she stared at a chess board and tried to come up with more ways to lose. Her opponent was a very sore loser.
“You can return if you would like” Ori said when she returned a short while later. “There will be questions, and your place is not certain.”
Janie looked up at her Grandmother, and thought about what she’d left behind. Nina had a way with Lynn, and somehow the two didn’t seem very dysfunctional together. With Janie, there’d always been arguments. Lynn stormed off a lot and slammed a lot of doors. Nina was always trying to talk Janie out of bad ideas and constantly seemed frustrated with her.
Ori had helped her see that. She helped her see how Janie tended to inspire others to destroy everything around her. How her life was a big waste. She worked a job that was rarely respected, and that almost anyone could do. She didn’t have many friends, or that big of a footprint.
The only people who’d miss her were Nina and Lynn, and they seemed to be doing fine. And Phoenix, but just thinking about that broke her heart.
“I’m not going back. You’re right, it’s better off without time travel.” Janie gathered her thoughts for a moment before she spoke again. “I had a- well, there was a man, and he was a great scientist. The best. Do you know what The Lorentz- of course you don’t. But there’s this saying that if a butterfly flaps its wings that a typhoon starts in Egypt. Or, okay, it’s not quite that but my mind is really jumbled right now. It’s a theory, chaos theory. And I’m chaotic. I’m that butterfly that changes everything by flapping my wings. And I don’t want to do that anymore. I don’t want to be- a butterfly. I’m not, but I am kind of? But it’s not fair, to any of them. And I know that they’re all safe. It’s because I didn’t make an impact these last few years. I was nobody. This means that they’ll miss nobody. Because I didn’t do anything and I saved the world but no one will remember because we fixed it. Everything will go just as it should without me around to flap my wings all Willy-nilly and causing chaos.”
Except, she had to try really hard to convince herself that she meant nothing to anyone.
“You will always be nobody.” Ori said “Until the end of time.”
Janie was never sure how much time passed, since everything in her new home was so sterile. It even smelled like a giant box of bandages, the sterile smell that she associated with hospitals. Even time was sterile, as in, it never changed. There wasn’t any sun or moon that she could think of, and the stars were just a pleasant memory.
Memories were all she had, and soon, she realized that she wasn’t nobody. But now that she was stuck in white land, it didn’t matter anymore.
Soon, she spent her time tuning out her Grandmother and remembering. The more she tried to remember, the more old and obscure things that came to mind. She even remembered things that she didn’t write down.
It soon became clear that she was being held there, and that Ori lied to her. She wanted to escape, but her memories also reminded her of just what would happen if she ‘betrayed’ Ori.
The old woman would stop at nothing to destroy what she had in life, and what she’d done in the past. She considered time travel evil, and wanted every trace of it wiped from the globe. It didn’t matter that it meant destroying her entire family.
If Ori knew that Lynn was Janie’s daughter- well, it wouldn’t end well, and Janie had to protect her child.
“You should not watch them.” Her Grandmother said. “They have a life now.”
“I know that, Ori.” Janie said quietly, as Lynn and Nina began to smile. “I don’t want to forget who they are, what they look like. They were my-”
“We are family, child. We share the same blood. Those two are not.”
“They’re better off without me.” She said, as Ori swept the tablet to the floor, just as her daughter’s hair changed back to its normal brown color. “I’m not there to destroy their lives. I can’t even destroy my own here.”
Ori looked pleased, and took a seat. The walls of the room were blindingly white, just as they had been on the time machine. The ceiling and floor were both glossy and white as well, and so were the tables and chairs.
Her outfit was white and gauzy, just like Ori’s, and Janie realized that she hated that color. She stayed, because Ori helped her fix the world. The two of them went back to nearly every point in time that Cyrus changed, and reversed what he had done. Some things were not reversable, and that’s what Phoenix and The Agency took care of.
She didn’t want anyone talking her out of her decision, so she chose not to say goodbye. All she’d left was instructions, which they followed. The dinosaurs were now off world, the city was slowly coming to life again, and the supposed time machine hoax was now only mentioned on a few internet forums and small tabloid articles.
The world was going to be okay. Janie was going to be okay. She lived in the white building with Ori, and had all of her memories back.
“I was the first.” Ori began “Many years ago, in the bush. I ran from children, and I found a different time. I ran from there, and found different time once more. I married a simple man, and we became gods.”
Janie had learned not to roll her eyes when Ori spoke, especially when she claimed to be a god, or a witch, or a saint. This day was no different.
“Your mother and your aunt were my children, and only your mother was granted the ability. Your aunt was too simple, and we let her live with others since she was not one of us. It’s my blood that gives us this. The children of your aunt have tainted the Earth with time travel, and I knew that it had to be stopped. I found them all, and they are now dead.”
“We’re not.” Janie pointed out, but didn’t dare mention Lynn. The older woman seemed to think that the little girl was adopted, and Janie didn’t want to correct her.
“It will die with us, and if we do not die, it will stay in this white building.”
“You are supposed to be dead.” Janie pointed out, closing her eyes for a moment. “And so am I.”
“We will die soon.” Ori said, reassuringly. “Then this world will be free of time travel. Our genetics will not exist anymore.”
She didn’t know why Ori hated who and what they were so much, but by now she’d learned that it wasn’t worth it to argue with her. She didn’t seem to know about other time travelers, or that the genetic line had not been killed off.
“My life was going nowhere” Janie said to Ori “I worked at this store, okay it was a little grocery store run by an Italian family and I’ve been a cashier there for years. And, right before I went with Cyrus I got passed up for a promotion, again. I’m always getting passed up there, or written up for being late, or daydreaming. I’m just not cut out for that.”
“Why are you so often late?” Asked Ori “That is something that you never explained.”
“Time travel” Janie closed her eyes for a moment, and smiled “I’d go to so many wonderful times and spaces, and sometimes they weren’t so wonderful. I can’t control it very well, so I’d sit down for lunch, and end up in a different place or time. Sometimes I got back by the end of lunch, but most of the time it was a completely different day, or I’d get back at the end of lunch four days ago.”
“I did not have those problems”
“No, that’s because you were born knowing how to time travel perfectly.” Janie said, without thinking “Nobody is better at it than you, right?”
“Excuse me? You do not talk to me that way!”
“Sorry.” Janie rolled her eyes and folded her arms before speaking again. “Time travel. And something was really messing with my memory, I still haven’t figured out that one yet. Unless it was you. Nina seemed really worried when I told her about you.”
“No one could ever understand why we needed to meet.”
“She takes better care of Lynn than I do, anyway. It doesn’t matter.”
“Do you have your memory back now?”
“Most of it. There’s still pieces and bits missing but it can’t be anything that important.”
Janie couldn’t keep her mind off of Phoenix. He was an alien, but so very handsome, and he’d always been nice to her. He respected her, and never seemed to treat her like a kid. She knew that she had too much pride at times, but he did not point that out.
In all the years she’d known him, they were friends first, and then best friends. He’d gotten her through the worst part of her life- he’d even saved it a few times. She went to him when she got hurt, and the two of them talked. They talked, went on picnics, and were the best of friends.
Then, came Dakinor, where their friendship turned into something more. Janie ran then, and the two barely talked.
But she loved him. When she slept, she dreamed about Phoenix, and when her mind drifted during one of Ori’s endless speeches, it drifted to one of their many adventures together. He was who she wanted to be with until everything ended. She wanted to be with him when it did. She wanted him there now.
“It will never be.” Ori said, interrupting her thoughts.
“What, are you reading my mind now?” Janie asked, before looking at the picture in her hands “Oh. I’m staring at his- um. Did you need something? Another white chair? Is a speck of dust showing somewhere?”
“It will consume everything about you.” Ori said “Until the both of you are nothing but shells of who you were, and destruction will follow in-”
“Don’t even mention him. You don’t get that, okay? I gave it all up, you’ve got me, and you’ve got no more time travel. You have won, do you understand? Leave me with my memories! Don’t you dare take him from me!”
“You will never see that thing again.” Ori said, as her voice dripped with venom. “This is your home now and I have taken nothing from you. Your own choices led you here, and away from your vagrant friends.”
“I know that I can’t be with him.” Janie said, sadly. “But I want my memories. I didn’t have them for so long and right now they are all that I have. If I can’t be with him, what’s the use of going back? I’ll be even unhappier than I am now.”
“You will learn to be happy with me.” Ori said, proudly “I am all that you have in the universe.”
She was often left alone for short stretches of time, usually for chores, but sometimes she was left to practice one of the few games they played together. Today, she stared at a chess board and tried to come up with more ways to lose. Her opponent was a very sore loser.
“You can return if you would like” Ori said when she returned a short while later. “There will be questions, and your place is not certain.”
Janie looked up at her Grandmother, and thought about what she’d left behind. Nina had a way with Lynn, and somehow the two didn’t seem very dysfunctional together. With Janie, there’d always been arguments. Lynn stormed off a lot and slammed a lot of doors. Nina was always trying to talk Janie out of bad ideas and constantly seemed frustrated with her.
Ori had helped her see that. She helped her see how Janie tended to inspire others to destroy everything around her. How her life was a big waste. She worked a job that was rarely respected, and that almost anyone could do. She didn’t have many friends, or that big of a footprint.
The only people who’d miss her were Nina and Lynn, and they seemed to be doing fine. And Phoenix, but just thinking about that broke her heart.
“I’m not going back. You’re right, it’s better off without time travel.” Janie gathered her thoughts for a moment before she spoke again. “I had a- well, there was a man, and he was a great scientist. The best. Do you know what The Lorentz- of course you don’t. But there’s this saying that if a butterfly flaps its wings that a typhoon starts in Egypt. Or, okay, it’s not quite that but my mind is really jumbled right now. It’s a theory, chaos theory. And I’m chaotic. I’m that butterfly that changes everything by flapping my wings. And I don’t want to do that anymore. I don’t want to be- a butterfly. I’m not, but I am kind of? But it’s not fair, to any of them. And I know that they’re all safe. It’s because I didn’t make an impact these last few years. I was nobody. This means that they’ll miss nobody. Because I didn’t do anything and I saved the world but no one will remember because we fixed it. Everything will go just as it should without me around to flap my wings all Willy-nilly and causing chaos.”
Except, she had to try really hard to convince herself that she meant nothing to anyone.
“You will always be nobody.” Ori said “Until the end of time.”
Janie was never sure how much time passed, since everything in her new home was so sterile. It even smelled like a giant box of bandages, the sterile smell that she associated with hospitals. Even time was sterile, as in, it never changed. There wasn’t any sun or moon that she could think of, and the stars were just a pleasant memory.
Memories were all she had, and soon, she realized that she wasn’t nobody. But now that she was stuck in white land, it didn’t matter anymore.
Soon, she spent her time tuning out her Grandmother and remembering. The more she tried to remember, the more old and obscure things that came to mind. She even remembered things that she didn’t write down.
It soon became clear that she was being held there, and that Ori lied to her. She wanted to escape, but her memories also reminded her of just what would happen if she ‘betrayed’ Ori.
The old woman would stop at nothing to destroy what she had in life, and what she’d done in the past. She considered time travel evil, and wanted every trace of it wiped from the globe. It didn’t matter that it meant destroying her entire family.
If Ori knew that Lynn was Janie’s daughter- well, it wouldn’t end well, and Janie had to protect her child.