BACKTRACKER by Milo Fowler (books to read in your 30s TXT) 📗

and his BackTracker fiddling with events in the past, creating a realitythat never would have existed otherwise!"

Muldoon nodded. "So when I saw you disappear, you werecrossing over to that other...reality?"

"Yes!" Horton clapped his hands and grinned. "ByJove, I think he's—"

"And that's possible?"

"Of course it is." Horton reached into his coat.

Muldoon's hand went for his holster.

"Hey now, trigger-happy much?" Horton retrieved a silver cigarettelighter and chucked it in his palm. "Carefor a smoke?"

"I've got enough charges against me for one night,thanks."

Horton shrugged. "Perfectly legal in the world I hail from.Along with a whole lot of other debaucheries, I'm afraid."

"The Way's not as popular over there?"

"Most true believers have been driven Underground—by choiceor necessity. There are still a few Way-followers around on the surface, but they in no way havegarnered the respect yours have here, despite their humanitarian efforts."

"In this reality."

"Your reality. This version of NewCity, where Joseph Reevesis merely the mayor."

Muldoon raised an eyebrow.

"Where I'm from, he's the governor." Horton cursed."A real fascist son-of-a-bitch, I must say."

Muldoon recalled his recent interaction with the bumbling mayor atThe Pearl. Hard to imagine him as a dictator. "Somehow I can't seeit."

"We've got a whole different world over there, Harry."The old man's eyes glistened. "It's really bad, and it's not getting anybetter." He squeezed the lighter, flipped off the cap, and the flamesprang upward. "Want to see for yourself?" He stared into the flamefor a moment before returning his gaze to Muldoon.

"Got some kind of portal nearby?" he scoffed. But thenhe remembered something from that footage, when the old man had disappeared:the air rippling like water in front of him.

"Right here." Horton raised the lighter. "Theenergy I've managed to harness inside this device is enough to trigger breachesin the membrane between worlds. Open 'em up, and walk on through to the other side!"

"You're out of your mind." The analogy of the cord, thestrands of reality, made sense in a way—hypothetically. Muldoon could wrap whatremained of his mind around a scientific theory. But this? A cigarette lighterthat could take him to a parallel world?

"You don't believe it? Fine. See for yourself."

"Not interested."

Those monks had stashed the boy somewhere. Muldoon had a feelingthe kid's time was running out. Find him, reunite him with his father.But wasn't this the boy's father?

"What have you got to lose?" Horton stood, kneesknocking against Muldoon's. "Just look into the light, and in a momentwe'll find ourselves in another world!"

Muldoon reached for the door. He'd had enough.

"What are you doing?" Horton frowned behind theflickering flame.

"Leaving." He shoved the door open and stepped into thefoul, humid darkness of the living room.

"Harry, I'm trying to help you." Horton scurried to follow. The light in the bathroom switched off automatically, butthe flicker of the lighter cast an eerie glow about them. "You've got thecops after you, there's nowhere you can go—you told me that yourself. Why nottake a little trip with me and see? It's all true, everything I've toldyou!"

Once upon a time, a manila envelope had held a wristwatch and acopy of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland with letters circled seemingly atrandom. Weird. Really weird. But the letters formed words, which coalesced intosentences and paragraphs in an operation manual of sorts. In a few hours' time,Muldoon had learned all he needed in order to use that terribledevice packaged innocuously in black plastic. The BackTracker.

The memories were fleeting and fuzzy, but they were there,ensconced in part of his mind. That package had been sent to him by CyrusHorton. This old man—or one like him, if what he said about other worlds wastrue. The wristwatch had worked. Of that much he was certain. It's what hadturned his mind inside out, made him the messed-up wreck he wastoday.

Is this any different? A cigarette lighterable to transport you to a different reality? Muldoon stopped in the middle of the livingroom. Who am I to be skeptical? Me, of all people?

Authoritative voices and loud, thumping footfalls echoed outsidein the hall. Muldoon turned back to Horton, the crags of his face lit up inbright relief against the lighter's flame.

"You can't let them take you, Harry. If they do, he'll haveyou. It's you he wants!"

Muldoon frowned. What was he babbling about now? "Who?"

"Lennox.He's got one of these already." Horton lickedhis lips and blinked as he waved the lighter around. "I don't know how thehell he got his hands on it, I haven't been able to piece that together yet.Maybe you can help me? You're—you were a detective, after all. And adamn good one. He's got two NewCities to plunder now, and all he needs is theBackTracker to make himself a god among humankind!"

"What's that got to do with me?"

"We can't let him have it, Harry. Lennox is apower-hungry psycho, and God only knows what he'll do to change the past. He'llstart the mess all over again, don't you see? Unraveling the timeline andcreating new realities all over the place! Who knows what things might followhim through a breach? You don't know about the freaks we have Underground—youdon't have them here, thank God. They're just one example, from a reality wherehuman society degenerated into chaos. Theyfollowed me through a breach, dozens of them,before I managed to collapse their world. Can you imagine what other monstersmay be out there? What a man like Lennox could do to screw us over royally?Creating realities that should never exist?"

A knock pounded against the door. "Open up. Police."

Muldoon bumped into a frail figure in the dark. The little girl.She didn't make a sound. He crouched down to her eye level and looked into herpale face, basked in the faint glow of Horton's lighter.

"You need to open this door," he told her. "Theywon't hurt you."

An unconscious groan, low and guttural, came from the couch. Thegirl's mother. Eyes vacant, mouth gaping open. Horton cursed at the sight.

"Do you understand?" Muldoon gazed into the girl's eyes,uncertain whether she was aware of his presence. "They have to see you.You have to let them in."

"What are you doing, Harry?" Horton whispered.

"I can't leave her like this." Alone.

"You think they'll help her? Cops?" the old