After we settled down, Sarah changed the subject, asking Oz where his observation would take him tomorrow.

“Pearl Harbor,” he replied. “I’m looking forward to it, I suppose.”

I hadn’t been to Pearl Harbor, but I’d seen the holo-files. Only Oz would look forward to watching a bunch of people blown to smithereens.

“Yeah, that should be interesting,” I mocked.

Oz grunted his response, missing or ignoring my sarcasm, and Sarah patted his arm. She leaned over to press a kiss to her boyfriend’s freckled cheek, her fingers teasing the black hair at the nape of his neck. “Leave him alone, Kaia. You know Oz will be happy when his traveling days are over and he can hide out in the Archives all day.”

I loved the Archives at the Academy, too, but not as much as being present at the events. It helped me understand, to pick up on the mood of a thing and not simply the actions. But Oz was … shy, maybe? Focused? Snobby? Either way, he wasn’t big on interacting. He preferred to be alone in the Archives, reflecting on our recordings until his brains slid out of his ears.

“How many rules did you break today, Kaia?” Sarah’s mischievous gaze sparkled. “Should we bust out the Guide when we get back to the room, take bets on your sanction?”

Oz’s serious gaze fell heavy on my face as it burned. Analeigh and Sarah kept giggling, snorting that if Caesar hadn’t been able to hold my attention, who would.

“Seriously, I think she might have missed him altogether,” Sarah gasped.

“Ohhh, and he could have been her father-in-law!” Analeigh hooted. “He doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who would have approved of a girl like you, Kaia.”

It was weird to think of the man we saw murdered yesterday in a different context. My True mourned him. His father. Something shifted in my gut, an uncomfortable twinge. “Can it, you guys. It’s not even a serious infraction to mess up an observation as an apprentice, and you know it.”

“You would know. I’m sure you have that page dog-eared.”

Most of my Guide to Sanction Determination was in fact dog-eared. It outlined potential infractions, and according to their severity, intent, frequency, and a host of other factors, suggested appropriate sanctions. I liked to be prepared.

Analeigh sighed, sobering as she returned to her typically grave self. “Seriously, Kaia, I don’t understand why you can’t just do what you’re told.”

Oz’s silent, judgy stare started to unnerve me, even though it wasn’t uncommon coming from him. He and Analeigh both followed every rule to the letter, never setting a toe out of line. Maybe they had the right idea. Sometimes, in the present, I convinced myself to be more like them.

The past, though, never failed to make me waver.

The moments we captured, the special ones … people never saw them coming, never understood the impact of the seconds as they ticked past. The Historians did good work, and being a part of this Academy made me proud. I loved my parents and had watched my brother break their hearts, and I knew that Analeigh was right, that I should follow all the rules, not just the ones that didn’t interfere with my selfish desires.

But I wanted to live moments, not just record them.

Max sent over four strawberry cupcakes—he must have pulled my favorite from my bio-tat info—and the flickering candle and off-key rendition of “Happy Birthday” by my friends made me forget about my family and my brother and following the rules, anchoring me here and now.

But as I blew out the pink candle and licked away the creamy frosting, I wondered what he had looked like. Caesarion. What he’d liked to eat, whether he had ever fallen in love, what kind of mother Cleopatra had been … and I couldn’t help the little seed of sadness that took root in my heart at the realization that he could have died before he could celebrate his own seventeenth birthday.

Before he’d really gotten to live at all.

Chapter Four

The Archives were my favorite place inside the Academy, the spot that, more often than not, really made me feel at home. Long hallways sprouted from the massive main chamber and led to private viewing rooms, utilized by advanced reflectors who preferred seclusion. All of the rooms were typically quiet, even if several Historians were present at once. When we returned from trips, we analyzed and critiqued our recordings in here, individually and in group sessions. Reflection was a huge part of our jobs as Historians because without it, all we had were holo-files—essentially the same as reading history texts on Earth Before, but probably way more cool.

Anyone could watch history. We trained to interpret and apply.

There were fifteen eight-by-eight table comps surrounded by stools in the main room, where the walls were made of a hazy glass polymer. History, via recordings, twisted across the terrain of Earth Before on every one of them. On one wall, we watched the building of the Great Wall of China. On another, the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. A third displayed the prisoners breaking free of the Bastille in Paris, but the images constantly changed. Regardless of what events played at any given time, it reminded me how much life has been lived up to now. The Archives brought humanity’s previous home alive even here, millions of miles and hundreds of years away.

Colored dots spattered the thick glass floor, each representing a Historian. We were color-coded by year—fifth year was red. Certified Historians were gray and Elders were black. Some of us were out observing and recording; if I stepped on someone’s dot it would display his or her name, bio data, and current location.

It comforted me to know that long after my time is complete, this room will still exist. In a way, so will I. Maybe one day there will be Historians traveling back to watch me.

If I ever did anything worth recording.

Normally, I’d be in here to study holo-files and expound on how they had, in my estimation, affected the eventual outcome of humanity. This wasn’t my scheduled period, though. I was supposed to be in Research figuring out what clothing we’d need for our upcoming observation—the trip to 1911 New York City was in a few days—but Analeigh had agreed to cover for me. She pretended to believe that I wanted to check on my Caesar recordings, to see how much trouble waited at my end-of-the-month evaluation, but she must have known it was about him.

Caesarion.

Not knowing anything substantial about my True deposited a feeling of disloyalty under my skin that wouldn’t dislodge. Ancient Egypt had never called to me as a specialization, and the Academy required only a passing knowledge of major influential events. Now I wanted to know more.

Like, everything.

Something in the way Oz looked at me after hearing the name of my True made me wonder if there was something to know, but I doubted anyone had ever chosen Caesarion for a complete documentation. Even seventy years of regulated time travel hadn’t allowed us to catalog everything. The first Historians began with the most impactful moments. The people whose influence was easily visible in the events that shaped our collective destiny—for better or for worse—we started with those. For posterity.

Reflection completed our triangle of duty. It required studying to stitch together the quilt of history to understand where exactly we went right or wrong—mostly wrong—and to ensure that in another two thousand years, we wouldn’t have to abandon a broken Genesis the same way.

Mistakes could not be repeated.

Once a consensus was reached that an event or decision had led directly to the downfall of society, it went into a document known as the Hope Chest. Nothing could be deleted from that file. As we observed and recorded more specific memories and traced their influence forward, the Historians came closer and closer to ensuring a future free from the shackles of the past. It sounded cheesy, but I believed in it. We all did. Genesis was good, it was working. The last thing we needed was to start screwing it up.