The two voices were oddly similar, almost as if one person was speaking to themself. The pitch wasn’t high enough to clearly indicate women, nor low enough to ensure men.

“You’re lying. This is all about the Hive Project.”

“What makes you say that?”

“I’ve done research. I know who you are—or rather aren’t.”

A chuckle. “Then why did you come?”

“I came to find out why—why me?”

“You don’t know anything—or you never would have come here…alone.”

“What do you mean?” The voice was less confident.

“You see, I asked you here to get you to help me.”

“That’s not going to happen.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

A pause, then. “What are you doing?”

Ellis felt the hair on his arms rise. The words were spoken in fear.

“This is also part of the future.”

The screams that followed were the worst sounds Ellis had ever heard. High-pitched and horrible, they went from cries of fear to shrieks of terror, and littered in the middle were desperate pleas for it to stop. Only it didn’t stop. Ellis heard sounds of a struggle, grunts, and the thump of something falling.

Ellis wasn’t a hero. For the most part he preferred to steer clear of trouble. About the closest he ever got was stopping to help people with disabled cars. Peggy used to warn him that he would get shot by some lunatic, but he couldn’t just drive by.

After hearing the screams on the other side of the wall, his first instinct was to call 911. His hand actually moved to his phone before he realized his stupidity. Maybe it was the gun on his hip, or perhaps the chilling effect of the screams, but it certainly wasn’t a conscious thought that sent Ellis running to find the gate.

The screaming had stopped before Ellis reached the entrance, which was unattended. He navigated around a big oak tree and trotted past a pretty clapboard farmhouse with a split-rail fence and a prairie-style weather vane. Already Ellis’s lungs were giving out. He could feel the crackle, like breathing through broken glass. He slowed down, dropping back to a walk, realizing he’d overextended himself. The all-night hike, the heat, and finally the sprint was too much. He wanted to fall where he was, but he forced himself to keep going. When he cleared the house, he could see the inside length of the wall. His blurring eyes caught movement—two people on the ground. Only one was moving.

Ellis didn’t find what he had expected. The voices had sounded youthful. He had imagined teens with leather jackets, chains, spiked hair, nose piercings, tattoos, and drooping pants. Dated images, he knew, but he had no idea what else he would find. What he did see wasn’t on the list.

They were both naked.

Neither wore so much as a bandanna, and both were bald—not just bald, hairless. Such a sight would normally have been the focus of Ellis’s attention if not for the blood. Blood had a way of making anything else trivial—and there was a lot of blood. Both were covered, sprayed and splashed with rivulets dripping. One was crouched over the other, who lay prone, twitching. The one on top worked intently with a blade on the other’s shoulder, cutting it apart, butchering the meat with both hands. The knife wielder grinned, then stood up.

Their eyes met.

Ellis, working to fill his shattered lungs, reached for the handle of his gun but didn’t pull it. The naked, hairless, blood-covered butcher made no move. They peered at each other for an instant. Ellis still couldn’t tell the person’s sex. The killer had no genitalia—no breasts, no obvious curves. Slender and willowy, a perfectly androgynous figure like a prepubescent boy or a 1970s supermodel, except that the face was dripping in gore. Their expressions were a mirror of shock and puzzlement. Without a word, the murderer reached out and picked something up off the grass. Ellis spotted only three fingers. He thought of all those alien movies where extraterrestrials groped with three bulbous digits, but then noticed the two stubs where the pinky and ring fingers ought to have been. A spark of light appeared beside the figure like the flash of a camera, making Ellis blink. Then the murderer stepped through a hole in the air and both the killer and the hole disappeared with a snap.

Ellis was stunned for a second and just stared, wondering what he’d seen. Then movement on the ground caught his attention. The one on the grass continued to twitch. Cuts and puncture wounds were visible along the torso, and a vicious slice had cut away a large section of the victim’s shoulder. Ellis couldn’t tell if this one was male or female either, being as indistinct anatomically as a Ken doll. More than that, Ellis was surprised to notice that aside from being wrenched in pain, this person could have been the twin of the killer.

Ellis dropped to his knees beside the victim and searched for a pulse. He didn’t find one, and there was no chest movement, no sound of breathing beyond Ellis’s own labored efforts, which were desperate enough. Ellis needed oxygen but couldn’t pull in a deep breath. Efforts to draw in more air threatened a cough, and he knew he couldn’t afford that. He was already dizzy, the world blurry, and a strange darkness gathered at the sides of his vision. Ellis planted his palms on the grass and lowered his head between his knees. He struggled to block out the blood and the body beside him and focused only on sucking in air.

Relax, goddammit!

In and out, he felt like he was trying to inflate a new pair of balloons and growing light-headed with the effort. He squeezed his eyes tight and realized he was rocking slightly. His whole body was in the fight, struggling to bring oxygen to his brain. Maybe this was it—respiratory failure had won. What an odd moment to go.

“Everyone just stay back.”

“Darwin—has to be.”

“Anyone see the attack?”

“No. I was the one who reported it—who requested help. We didn’t see it, though. They were like that when we found them.”

“And you’re part of the same group?”

“Gale University—I’m leading a class in ancient history. We were on a field trip.”

“All right, you can do us a favor and just continue with that. Stay clear of this side of the park, okay?”

“Is it really a Darwin?”

“We don’t know what we’re dealing with yet, so please give us room.”

Ellis opened his eyes and found the blue sky, now decorated with pretty balls of white cotton. The light was different, the sun having moved well to the west so that the trees and farmhouse were casting long shadows. His chest was better. He could breathe again, yet everything else felt sore.

“Pax—open eyes here.”

“Okay, everyone just relax.” The person speaking was the closest of those around him, but still about thirty feet away.

A dozen people had gathered near the old farmhouse, two standing closer than the rest and all looking identical. Each shared the same soft face with big, dark eyes, short noses, and tan-brown skin as if some Middle Eastern mother had popped out an Irish Catholic-sized brood of identical duodecaplets.

They were all dressed oddly, with several not dressed at all. Some just wore hats, or scarves, or coats. One was dressed all in bright yellow. Another had a full ensemble of red and white stripes—right down to shoes, which made Ellis think of Dr. Seuss. None of them had a single strand of hair, and just like the first pair of androgynous manikins, these new visitors also appeared to have been made by Mattel.

Ellis wondered if he was having a dream of The Wizard of Ozvariety. Everyone looked vaguely like a bald version of the lady doctor who had told him he was going to die. Maybe he had never time traveled at all. Any minute he could wake up surrounded by Warren, Peggy, and the doctor so he could say, “ And you were there, and you, and you.”