Time of Fate (Wealth of Time Series #6) by Andre Gonzalez (e book reader online txt) 📗

Much to his surprise—he didn’t think Martin would come so soon—he entered Martin’s mind to find him in a car, headed toward Angle Inlet, Minnesota, with a beautiful young woman driving the vehicle. The act of entering Martin’s mind had drained Chris, knocking him on his ass for five minutes after returning to his own conscience. Once he regained some strength, Chris dashed outside to confirm the slots in his cabin walls had unobstructed views to all surrounding angles. He returned inside where he further prepared for the impending encounter, placing boxes of ammunition in different positions, leaving him free to reload his guns wherever he ended up within the confined space.

Chris debated trying different tactics available to him as the Keeper, but didn’t want to lose what little energy he had left in the tank. It was a double-edged sword. Should he decide to fight Martin as a mere mortal man, he’d have better endurance and would only have to wear Martin out. He didn’t know which direction Martin would come from—he was still too far to tell—and he didn’t want to waste energy moving from wall to wall until his old friend arrived. So he gambled and settled in the cabin’s southeast corner, also convenient as that is where the bed was, providing a soft seat for Chris while he waited. He figured Martin would either enter the woods from the airport or the town. The airport would require him to backtrack, while the town was the first option when driving in.

The lack of communication to the outside world drove Chris crazy. He wanted to know how the riots around the continent were going, and if they had changed anything. Clearly the Road Runners didn’t care since Martin was still on his way, but the fact that he was coming with only one other person suggested resources were thin. He knew the odds were lined up for time to be frozen, something even the Keeper of Time had no way of controlling should someone else authorize the act. He could try freezing time first, but that action required an amount of energy from Chris that could kill him.

After racking his brain for the past half hour, he decided on a crafty maneuver that he hadn’t used in years. Always focused on big picture decisions, and not so much with the happenings of individual time travelers, Chris had long lost the need he hoped would now serve as a final resort in throwing Martin off his game.

The plan was to re-enter Martin’s mind, knowing the cost would again drain him of the ability to move for a few minutes. He wasn’t returning to see where his enemy was—it had already become clear where he was headed—but to play with his emotions and thoughts. Chris could extract memories from one’s mind and tinker with them to the point of driving his victims mad. For Martin, he knew he could make the voices of his mother, daughter, wife, and even Sonya, play within his skull. With a little extra push, he could create a visual hallucination of them, something that would surely drive Martin to madness.

Having just been in Martin’s head, Chris had a better sense for what to expect as far as the toll these actions would take on his body. It fortunately didn’t require much more than his first dip into the waters. Once inside someone’s mind, it became like roaming an open-world setting and deciding what to do. The biggest gamble was deciding the best time to re-enter Martin’s mind, knowing if he went too soon, his actions could fall wasted if Martin was merely sitting in a car. And if he waited too long, Martin would arrive to the cabin before Chris had an opportunity to sway him. He needed to leave Martin flustered upon his arrival to the woods, completely frazzled by the time he reached the cabin.

Chris had no familiarity with the roads driving into Angle Inlet, but he could tell Martin was within at least thirty miles, judging by the glimpse of surrounding trees he had caught. That had been an hour ago, and if Martin hadn’t yet arrived to the cabin, then he either had to be walking through the woods, or sitting at their outer edge, regardless of the direction he decided to enter from.

“No time like the present, as they say,” Chris said to his empty room. He lay on the bed, folding his hands over his stomach as he closed his eyes and prepared his mind for the grueling task of re-entering Martin’s conscience. The process was similar to an intense meditation session, Chris assuring his mind was clear, aligned with his breathing as he maneuvered to get it all in perfect harmony.

Chris drew a long, deep breath, the stuffy cabin air filling his lungs that had aged fifty years in the past day. He cleared his mind, sifting through and pushing away the thoughts of war, the chaos around the continent, and narrowing the entirety of his concentration on his target, Martin Briar. He started down the hallways of his subconscious, knocking upon all the doors that served as portals into the minds of those lives he had welcomed to the wonderful world of time travel. Millions of them. But the hallway knew his greatest desires, and wouldn’t make him run down the thousands of miles of doors decorating each side. It would know to bring Martin’s door to the front.

And it did, right after tempting Chris with the opportunity to take a peek into Duane’s mind and see what his old friend was up to at this exact moment. He shook his head. “No time, I’m afraid.”

The doors were labeled with each person’s name in simple gold lettering. After ten steps he found the one belonging to Martin Briar and wasted no time turning the shiny knob and entering, the sensation a free fall until he crash-landed in Martin’s brain, watching the world through his eyes.

“Oh, yes,”