12:00… 11:59… 11:58…
Viktor let out a strange, childlike giggle. “Oh my, that was a misstep. Please don’t do that again.”
The minutes belonged to him.
He’s not afraid because he’s already dying.
10:40… 10:39… 10:38… 10:37…
The first thought came to her swiftly, followed by the answers.Viktor had lured her to Kairos years ago to keep her under his watchful eye. But then he had found out he had terminal cancer last year. Detected long after the jaundice set in, it had already spread from his pancreas. His impending death made him accelerate his plans. He sent Raina to New York to have a tighter grip on Mikhail. Then he put his final experiment into play. He even— She stopped.
“My God,” she whispered. “You killed Marcel too.” Theo’s breath caught. She closed her eyes, and as if her mind was a camera, a shutter clicked and opened up the past. Images of Viktor’s life flowed through her like an electric current.
“How fascinating.” Viktor leaned forward, understanding written on his face. “You can see the past as well? Well, well, this is a surprise.”
Semele could only stare at him, her mind convulsing with what she now knew. “You’re Nettie’s…” She couldn’t say the words, couldn’t vocalize what she had seen.
“Her son?” His voice rang out in the room. “Yes. Very good.” Viktor clapped. “Very good! Brava! This is so much more than what I had hoped for. You have retrocognition as well.”
Semele didn’t understand what that meant. She only knew what she saw.
“You are correct,” he said. “Nettie was my mother. A part of my father’s great experiment. He impregnated her in the hope that his child would inherit her abilities.”
Semele closed her eyes, revolted, unable to look at him.
Viktor drew on the oxygen again and coughed. “Much to my father’s disappointment, it turned out that Nettie’s gift was carried by the X chromosome. I could never have what you have. My inability infuriated him and he despised me.” He shook his head sadly. “My father died an old man with so much rage he didn’t know where to put it.”
Semele tried to process what she had seen of Viktor’s life. In the Soviet Union, when Stalin died, paranormal studies came into the mainstream once more and research institutes cropped up all over the country. Viktor worked at an institution in Leningrad, funded by the arm of the Kremlin, studying everything from mind control and electromagnetism to telepathy and ESP. Like his father, Viktor believed reality could be controlled by psi energy. Before perestroika and the dissolution of the USSR, Viktor led some of the most ambitious psychic warfare experiments ever conducted—experiments that were still ongoing. The USSR may have dissolved, but the institutions had not. Like the race to put a man on the moon, Russian scientists were working toward being the first to control psi energy, and Viktor was at the helm. He even married a Russian medium, Natalia Burinko, to try and harness her power.
“Raina,” Semele muttered, still in shock.
“My daughter. Your cousin.” Viktor nodded.
5:49… 5:48… 5:47…
He gave her a smile. “She doesn’t know about you. I withheld my knowledge of your existence and the parameters for this experiment—even from my colleagues—in case I failed. My daughter only knew there was a very special manuscript I needed for one last study before I retire. She was most upset with me over your friend’s death.” He waved his hand in the air as if it was not a concern. “You can console each other when I take you to Moscow. I’m afraid there is laboratory work to be done—but first we must survive today.”
He motioned to her mother. “I’ve never risked my life for my work. But what is that silly American saying of yours? ‘Go big or go home’? Now you have five minutes to live.”
Semele looked at the timer, unable to focus. She knelt down, spreading her hands on the ground in defeat.
Theo took several steps forward, trying to reason with Viktor. “You don’t have to be like your father. Let us go.”
“You know I can’t do that, Theo.” Viktor wagged a finger at him. “We must make sense of her power. Harness and control it. Nettie was my father’s legacy never fulfilled because the war stood in his way. Semele will be mine.”
Viktor paused to draw from his oxygen.
“Through her”—he gestured to Semele—“we can learn how the sixth sense functions on the quantum level. We can decipher time, and then one day transcend it—imagine that.” He closed his eyes in exhaustion.
Theo saw his chance and hurried to kneel beside Semele, raising her up. “Semele. Look at me.” He held her face in his hands. “You can do this. Focus on my voice.”
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, blinded by tears. “Go. Don’t stay here.”
“I’m not going anywhere. Nettie believed in you. Ionna believed in you.I believe in you.Look at me, dammit!”
She raised her head and tried to focus on him.
“Now breathe with me,” he ordered her, taking deep breaths and forcing her to do the same. He was willing all his strength to her with every breath he took.
