[We pick up here after Ronnie and the twins have gotten to know each other a bit. They've visited Carnaval Midway together. Ronnie and Ellis have something in common: they're not uber geniuses like Ellen. They're not even smart. Ronnie is seeing suspicious events pile up right and left. Ellen and Ellis, meantime, can't seem to get Ronnie to understand that Ellen's technological breakthrough, the tuner, is showing her another world, another Lincoln. A world and Lincoln they created.
In this chapter, they all get more than they bargained for .]
For this next adventure in the Tuner Room, I grabbed one of the stools for myself. Positioned near the door, I figured I could better keep an eye on what they were doing.
Rather, what they would do after they got done arguing. About Lincoln.
“I’m just saying…” Ellis turned to me for help. I shrugged, maybe I missed the first part of the discussion.
“In 1833,” Ellis went on, “Abraham Lincoln was a storekeeper in Illinois. All I’m saying is we don’t really have to go back to there, exactly.”
“Do you mean there, or then?” I asked. “I really don’t know, sport. It’s her tuner.”
That didn’t help, of course.
“It’s been like this since the beginning,” Ellen said. “He wants to rescue Lincoln. In 1864.”
“I see.”
Because, I didn’t. I had no ammunition to fight this fight with.
“One of the appeals here was we could set this carnival pattern right here, in old Mexico, with nothing around,” Ellen said. “There were no Missions, no settlements, just desert. So when it all goes back again, no one would notice.”
“We should just do the whole park pattern, if no one’s going to notice,” Ellis said sullenly.
“Fine,” Ellen said, touching the tuner. “Carnaval Midway in 1833 California. You got it.” No one had plugged in the TV, so Ellen barked at her brother to do it.
The screen went on. Ellis was getting up from the outlet when we saw it.
Oh. Wow.
It was the whole Midway, this time, and not in some old time version. It was brightly lit, with modern lighting. And all of Carnaval Midway surrounding it.
“Satisfied?” Ellen said. “You’ve got all of it. And – nothing else out there but desert.”
“And him,” Ellis said.
And him.
Lincoln again. Carrying some stuff around. If he was troubled that Carnaval Midway was there, with all its modern lights and stuff, I couldn’t tell. He didn’t look exactly happy. More like someone trying to make the best of something.
This was going to be great. I leaned back on the stool, my back on the wall. And –
Out of the corner of my eye someone zipped by the door.
Which…was now open.
The door that only Ellis could open the door quickly.
What?
I stepped into the hallway, which seemed awfully reckless.
There was definitely someone in the tunnels. Taking the stairs up. Fast, but not that fast.
Crazy. I looked back at the room. Ellen and Ellis were still fiddling with something.
Someone was sitting in my stool.
Turning in the direction of less scary, I just skipped over looking there, at the stool, and ran there, after whoever was going up the stairs.
The hallway was off. It had tilted without moving. Part of me said this is totally what you expected, this is what you knew would happen. A very stupid and slow part paused – without looking toward the stool – and marveled that the twins hadn’t noticed the door was wide open!
Whoever was running had stopped. Not enough steps…had he stopped to come back down?
I ran the other way. Forget the other guy, forget the Tuner Room.
Take a deep breath and pass out. Not really, but kinda felt like I should. The air was different, wrong, not my air. No…again, that wasn’t it. It was sweet air, like that breath you take when you were underwater too long and you need a breath. Sweet air, super dry, and clean.
It was too much. Officially. I ran past the Tuner Room door which, of course, was now closed. Up the stairs, then, beg whoever it was for help.
Okay…there was only one flight of concrete stairs. So he hadn’t stopped to come get me, like a monster from a dream. He must’ve gone out, through the green building door.
Which I couldn’t open, right?
Actually, that wasn’t going to be a problem.
Because the entire green building was gone. The top of the steps led to the Midway.
I ran at top speed before something else disappeared. I slammed right into somebody and fell over.
“Oh God, I’m so sorry,” I babbled. “Sorry –”
The guy pulled me up.
I shrieked. It was him. He was right there.
Lincoln!
Abraham Lincoln, still the young version, smiled at me. He was just like on the TV, holding what I could now confirm were books from the gift shop.
My scrambled little head couldn’t do better than noticing one of them was about mines.
“Oh, no.” I said in a tiny voice. Nothing else came out.
He bent down. Like I was a little kid.
“Well,” he said. “I see my appearance has startled you.” He smiled a little, like the joke was on him. “I am grateful that you speak English, little lady. I am somewhere I should not be.”
My mind was on tilt.
Lincoln. Clutching gift store crap, and looking at me like I could help him find his way.
The world was ending.
“Ronnie!” It was Ellis.
Thank God. The maintenance building was back.
Lincoln stepped back, shocked.
But I could see it in his face: he was afraid this might be a threat to me.
Ellis ran up to me, picked me up, and practically tossed me to Ellen, who was waiting inside the green building door. She looked as freaked out as I felt.
“Hurry!” she said to Ellis.
Ellis was staring at Lincoln. And vice versa. There was something being communicated between them. No words. Just eyes.
Lincoln moved first, stepping toward Ellis, holding out the books.
“I shouldn’t have these, should I?”
Ellis spoke like he couldn’t stop himself.
“No – sir, please. Please keep them. No one can use them better than you.”
Lincoln looked puzzled.
“Sir…” Ellis sounded like he was in pain. “Don’t make the mistakes our world did.”
“What –” Lincoln said.
The word didn’t trail off. Just…ceased. The sentence wasn’t there anymore.
I was on the stool in the Tuner Room. Lincoln was on the TV.
The room – everything – tilted.
The door was still there, firmly closed. Something appeared on the screen. Bright lights. It was the entire Carnaval Midway park, planted in the middle of nowhere. And a man – Lincoln. Unmistakably.
I knew this already.
All this was pouring through my head next to and, now, alongside separate memories.
We heard running. We saw me appear on the screen. My hair tied up, like it was now, but flopping around behind me. I was in a hurry.
I ran right into Lincoln. On the TV.
So, while I was still looking, and with the door still in place (why wouldn’t it be?), Ellis jumped up and practically tried to tear it off its frame. That did no good. Ellen shoved him aside, grunted, and opened it – more effort than he needed, but she got it open.
I had no idea she was that strong. And it was like I was realizing it twice.
But it was all coming in at once. I stayed on the stool, too terrified to move. I saw Ellis run out there and rescue me. He talked to Lincoln.
At the same time, Ellen was running me down here. Down two flights of concrete stairs. Not just one.
She led me in here. Here. The Tuner Room.
It was like I forgot to put something back in the right place. My head was full…no, dizzy. Like I’d been underwater too long.
I heard Ellis say my name, but it was like through a wall.
I ran out of the room. I stayed in the room. I saw myself on the TV. Then: both things right there in my head like they’d always been there.
No choice between them. No “real” one. Just both.
I was breathing really slow. Things were still sorting out, but I felt not okay, but getting better quickly.
The twins – I wasn’t sure. They looked a bit worse. Ellis’s eyes were closed. Their breathing was slow, too.
Then Ellis just fell down, landing right on his knees without a sound. Ellen was staring. I didn’t have to look to know those pupils of hers were going nuts.
“Hey,” I said. “Hey, guys. It’s all right. All right, okay?”
Ellen nodded. Opened her mouth, but didn’t say anything. Ellis stayed on his knees.
He reached for his crucifix. Held it between his fingers.
“I’m all right,” he said finally.
I looked up at the TV. It was dark but it wasn’t off. If you looked closely, you could see stars in the distance. But no bright lights. No lights at all.
Wherever that was – Carnaval Midway was now gone.