"Harlie Anwyn Davies!"
If I hadn't been expecting this exact moment, I would have winced at the hard tone and how loud it came over our new intercom system that hooked up the silo to the various houses and outbuildings on what we started calling "The Farm." Lacy was with me, though, and she was not expecting it, nor was she used to it, and she winced and ducked her head. This world was still so new to her. Well... no time like the present to see what happens when Jamyson and I go toe-to-toe.
I pushed the chair back from the table in the library we had set up on the second floor just as the mental communication echoed the intercom, "Harlie... get over here NOW."
Good thing he couldn't see my eyes rolling from all these acres away as I answered in kind, "On my way, Jamyson."
With an exaggerated sigh as I braced for what was bound to be quite the show for Sam and Lacey, I motioned for her to follow me down the steps of the beautiful new house James and I called home. It still felt like a dream to have this and to now be Harlie Davies instead of Harlie Berryman. Nicole Jones was two lifetimes ago, and though this timeline allowed me to blend her old life with mine, she remained a ghost - even if I smiled at her dream of living back in this part of the US and on a ranch just like our neighbors actually happening. The thought kept me distracted enough as James started his usual probing to give himself a heads up on what he was going to face. Good luck, husband, I had the mental shield firmly in place. He'd have to fight me to get this one down.
As we hopped onto the four-wheeler and headed to the silo, the pressure on my shield increased. He really wanted in, wanted to see why I was keeping this intel from him. Why I had hoped it would be another few weeks before he learned what I'd found. Really, it was because I didn't want to go there, not just yet... please not yet... but also because his anger at me was just the start of what would be an explosion outward when he put the pieces together. We weren't even at the door when I felt him grab hold of the shield to try to yank it down. That irritated me, and it showed as I hurriedly went through the doorway and around the protective glass.
"I don't think so, Jamyson Davies. Crossing a line there. Breathe." My voice was stern. He'd been prone to this knee-jerking since arriving, and I was getting far too used to it. While he had snapped out of most of the issues, and our honeymoon and settling back into our life here had been fairly smooth, I knew all it would take was... well what was on the screen.
The pressure and grip on my shield stopped as he looked between me, Sam, and Rick then closed the gap and grabbed my arm. The shockwave hit the second he did. I did not see nor sense that coming and winced at the instant onslaught. My response? Rank or not, spouse or not, I punched him in the jaw in front of everyone! Lacey gasped, only having a basic understanding of our mental abilities and never seeing it like this. The whole room felt full of electricity and tension.
"Enough!" Rick's voice came out strong and without the stutter. "S-Sit. Explain."
I rubbed my arm and then my temples. Grand, here came the instant-headache. There'd been so many of them still. Going to the main computer system, and its multiple antiquated monitors, I looked over what had made James so angry. Glancing mentally at Rick, he seemed more concerned. I could tell he was already putting pieces together, and he was not liking the picture it made.
"Really, after all this time and ups and downs, and your first instinct was it had to be me hiding this from you? I had to have slipped up this critically, or I had to have somehow felt the enemy contacts we are coercing needed to know that particular location? Did you bother to backtrack? Or how about thinking through the dozens of others around long before me who would have done this?" I started pulling up maps and data feeds. They were incomplete - I really did need a few more weeks of intel gathering- but this should be enough. "In all the places we've been. In all the spec op groups over the lifetime of this organization. Of all those who... went before us." There was the key I hoped James and Rick picked up on, "You never considered that hardwiring from training could twist?"
By then, I had every screen pulled up with a different piece of information I'd found. This was bad, it was very very bad. Our timeline may have had an amazing jumpstart and big success upfront, but what I was presenting was one of the worst scenarios. I hoped... prayed I was wrong. Maybe those who she told didn't fully believe her. Maybe she gave them two truths and a lie. Maybe she wasn't a turncoat... But what if she was?
There was silence. Lacey and Sam were seeing something was off but could not understand without that knowledge only Travelers had. First, Rick swore, followed by James. I remained completely still as their disbelief and then anger washed over me. Soon, it became too strong, and I gripped the desk and winced. It got Rick's attention and he reigned in, but James took longer. I couldn't blame him.
All the evidence pointed to one thing - the First. The initial person who was sent through to the various promising timelines, that of the first generation of Travelers, back when it was fatal to make the journey, had betrayed us. Information on two very key locations the enemy should not know of had clear signs of Universum activity. These were fixed points for nearly all of our timelines, and there they were, decades before vital moments should be happening, setting up shop.
We had been betrayed.
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