Quinn exchanged a troubled look with Colin, as they crouched by the fence, peering through the palings at Michael Mallory rapping on the front door of the house he owned.
First his lack of recognition, then the taxi, now this? If Quinn didn’t know any better, he’d think he was looking at a double of his father.
The pieces slowly started to connect in his mind as he watched Amanda Mallory open the door and look at Michael with trepidation.
“Are you…”
“I’m not your husband, no.”
Colin glanced back at Quinn with wide eyes.
“Why are you here?” Amanda asked, accusing.
“I just wanted to apologise for the way I spoke to you the other day,” said Michael. “I’m returning home in an hour, and I didn’t want to leave on a sour note.”
“I see…”
“When you said he’d passed away, I couldn’t believe it,” he said, emotional. “I’d thought by sending him here he’d be safe, but… I took my failure out on you, and I’m sorry.”
Quinn felt the blood draining from his face.
It can’t be, surely? No way.
He grabbed Colin’s hand tightly, barely realising he was doing it.
Missus Mallory gave Michael a tight smile.
“Well, I’m sorry we couldn’t protect him. We were devastated too…”
Colin leaned in towards Quinn, and whispered: “Young you is alive, and hiding in the basement.”
That seemed to confirm it: this was Earth Prime, and he was living in his own personal history. He suddenly felt quite unwell, as he realised the implications.
I’ve surely altered all kinds of stuff already…
The grip he had on Colin’s hand tightened.
Then it hit him, like a brick: a vague, long forgotten memory from childhood, seeing a man through the basement window, calling himself ‘Skip.’ A man that looked just like…
Oh boy.
He was so lost in this thought that he hadn’t realised the conversation at the door had concluded, the front door had closed, and Michael Mallory was already opening the front gate.
Not knowing what else to do, he stood from his crouching position and looked into the face of his birth father.
“H-hello again,” he said, with a half-hearted wave.
He sensed Colin staring up at him in alarm.
Michael looked at the two of them, one guy who’d clearly followed him from downtown, and the other who had just been caught eavesdropping.
And Michael merely served them an expression of disbelief, before turning to hurry away from the pair.
“Wait!” Quinn cried, grappling for some piece of information that would get him to turn around. “I need to talk to you about the Kromaggs!”
That most certainly did the trick. Michael stopped in his tracks, and spun around, with an alarmed look.
“What did you just say?”
Quinn sighed with relief. “You know, ugly guys with pointy teeth, like to eat human eyes, for some disgusting reason?”
Michael stepped forward, frantic. “Who are you?”
Quinn tugged on Colin’s arm, and he stood.
“We’re your sons.”
He felt Colin’s eyes burning into him, but he kept his gaze trained on his father.
Michael’s eyes narrowed. “That isn’t funny. I just found out both my sons are dead. Tell me who you really are.”
Quinn walked carefully towards him, as he explained:
“My name is Quinn Mallory, and this is my brother, Colin. Two years ago, you left your sons on two different worlds while your people were fighting a war. When you came back, mine told you I was dead, right? That’s what that conversation was about…”
Michael took a few steps back as Quinn closed in on him. Quinn stopped walking, giving him some space. He held up his hands.
“It’s complicated, but no, I wasn’t dead, and neither was Colin.”
“Please don’t go yet,” said Colin, looking at Michael with shining eyes. “We’ve spent so long looking for you.”
He flicked a glance at Quinn, before looking back. “And we may actually be in need of your help.”
Quinn reached into his jacket, pulling out the timer he’d thankfully brought with him to show to the Professor earlier.
“If you overstay your slide, we’ve got a timer with twelve days left on it… just needs a few tweaks and you can be back home by then. I already have the coordinates… I think.”
Michael stared at the timer with surprise.
“You’re a slider…”
“Apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, right?” He grinned.
Michael narrowed his eyes. “How did you get the coordinates?”
Quinn flipped open a small compartment in the timer that he’d installed during one of the more quiet slides a while back, and two microdots fell out into his hand; the chips left for the brothers to learn of their heritage.
Finally, Michael closed the distance between them, and picked up one of the chips, studying it.
“My God.” He looked into Quinn’s eyes, searching. “It’s really you?”
Quinn gave him a bittersweet smile.
“Hey, Dad.”
* * *
Rembrandt closed his eyes as he took in the sun. The air was chilly, but the sun gave a penetrating warmth that counter-acted it. In his inebriated state, it felt wonderful.
He was lying, face-up, on the grass of Golden Gate Park, next to Maggie, who was similarly enjoying the early afternoon sun. She was licking a popsicle.
“The last time I was in San Francisco, I almost died, didn’t I?” she said without warning.
Rembrandt turned to look at her, unable to suppress his smile at the fact she was remembering things from his Maggie’s past. She was staring up towards the clouds, her eyebrows low over her eyes.
“Yeah, that’s right. When you went to Earth Prime with Q-ball for the first time, you couldn’t breathe.”
“That was weird…” she said, and chuckled a little. “The pollution’s way worse in 1978, but I’m okay this time…”
“This probably isn’t Earth Prime, but even if it was, Q-ball said your lungs adapted or something…” he said, trying to use what little explanation Quinn had given him back then.
“Doesn’t matter now,” she said, brushing off the issue. “Just wish I hadn’t ruined Quinn’s reunion with his Mom by choking like that.”
Remy was surprised at the depth of her recall on this memory. He wondered if the Maggie he knew was slowly starting to take control. Despite himself, he felt some comfort in the idea that his Maggie might be the dominant one.
“Do you remember when we first met?” he pressed, against his best judgement.
He watched her squint her eyes, struggling to access the memory. Then she looked at him with a raised eyebrow.
“Did you and Quinn lock me in the trunk of a car?”
Remy laughed. “I think it was Quinn and Wade that did that, but I was there, sure.”
“Wade… I mentioned her before, didn’t I?”
“You don’t remember her?”
“When I try to think of her, all I see is an angry girl giving me the stink eye,” Maggie said, with an amused snort. “She hated me, didn’t she?”
“Yeah, I guess she wasn’t real fond of you,” Rembrandt agreed. “I think she was head over heels for Quinn, and she saw you as competition.”
Suddenly, Maggie burst out with laughter.
“I literally married Quinn in a bubble universe, grew old with him, and it still wasn’t enough for him to pursue a relationship with me!”
Rembrandt’s eyes widened as he realised just how much of his Maggie’s life she was now recalling. He glanced at her, and she looked troubled, despite laughing mere seconds earlier.
She was quiet for a moment, then she spoke: “My head is killing me.”
Taking the cue, he scrambled to his feet, and helped her up.
“Let’s get you back to the hotel,” he told her. She nodded in reply, before rubbing her temples.