Page 61 of Never a Hero

It was morning here, and colder than it had been outside the seal. The sun shone weakly through streaks of cloud.

Other than the pale light, the place looked the same as it had from the outside: a stripped-back diner under renovation. Bare booths lined the walls, one for each window. To the east, the view was the back alley: black-windowed modern flats. To the west, the main street was unnervingly empty of people. A second ago, it had been packed with hurrying commuters and window-shopping tourists.

Joan turned and had the bizarre view of Ruth holding an empty frame in the middle of the room. From this side, the barrier was invisible, but the point where the sun changed directions was a distinct line. As Nick stepped across, the others craned their necks, trying to get a view through the frame. The Ali barrier was a one-way view, Joan realised. She could see Ruth, Jamie, and Tom outside the seal, but it seemed they could only see her through the frame’s eye.

‘Well, that’s disorienting,’ Nick said, staring at the main street. ‘Are these Portelli windows, or did we travel in time?’

‘I’m not sure,’ Joan said. ‘This place feels … cut off from the world.’ The Ali family has the ability to lock away places and times so that no one can access them, Tom had said. The last time Joan had had this feeling, she’d been at the Monster Court—a place detached from time entirely. ‘Feels like we’re in the middle of nothing,’ she said.

A groan behind them. Tom had followed Nick through. Now, he clapped a hand over his mouth, as if he’d smelled something foul, his freckles stark against his blanching face. ‘Oh, what is that?’ he mumbled.

‘What’s what?’ Nick said.

Joan still felt nauseated too. Nick, though, didn’t seem affected at all.

‘There’s something in here,’ Tom said. ‘Something wrong.’

‘What do you mean?’ Nick said.

Jamie’s reaction was even stronger than Tom’s. He gasped as he breached the frame, bending double to retch. Tom moved fast—Joan was always surprised how quickly that giant body could move. Within a second, he had an arm around Jamie’s slim waist. Frankie trotted over and barked at Jamie questioningly, looking as concerned in her squashed-face way as Tom. Like Nick, though, Frankie herself didn’t seem ill.

‘Everyone okay?’ Ruth sounded worried.

‘We’re okay!’ Joan assured her. ‘How’re you doing with that portal?’

Ruth’s long pause made Joan uneasy, but she said, ‘Fine. I can manage it.’

Tom helped Jamie straighten up, one big hand splayed protectively across Jamie’s back. ‘Let’s get you out of here,’ he murmured to Jamie. ‘Just a few steps.’ He started to guide Jamie back to Ruth, but Jamie stopped him.

‘No, I want to see,’ Jamie managed. There was a sheen of sweat on his forehead. ‘I want to know what’s in here.’

‘I’ll figure it out,’ Tom said. ‘Just let me get you out of here.’

‘Tom,’ Jamie said. It was just one word, but Tom pushed out a breath as if Jamie had offered a full rebuttal. ‘I’m safe,’ Jamie whispered. He covered Tom’s hand where it was still pressed to Jamie’s chest. ‘I’m here with you.’ This seemed to be part of an argument they’d had before.

Joan saw a flash of something raw on Tom’s face, an echo of how he’d looked last time, when Jamie had told him to stop searching for him; to search for the hero instead. Joan looked away, feeling now—as she had then—that she was eavesdropping on something private.

Tom had said there was something in here … Joan closed her eyes. She had a vague sense of an off-key note at the very edge of her hearing. No, not a sound. A feeling. Something dissonant.

‘Joan?’ A warm hand on her shoulder. ‘Joan?’ It was Nick’s voice—sounding, oddly, as worried as Tom had. ‘You don’t look well.’

‘We should all leave,’ Tom said shakily. He scooped Frankie up. ‘We shouldn’t have come in here. We shouldn’t have broken that seal. Someone made it for a reason.’

‘If you say so,’ Nick said. ‘But … it just seems like an empty café. Just tables and chairs.’

Joan tried to sense the source of the dissonance. She turned, letting the feeling guide her. She found herself looking right at the booth where she’d sat with Nick.

She walked toward it, distantly aware of the others calling to her as she retraced her own steps from the other timeline. It looked like there was nothing here. Everything had been stripped out of the room except for the bolted-down tables and booth chairs.

And then Joan rounded the back of the last booth, and she saw it.

It was a gaping wound in the world, its edges jagged and ruined. A hole. It hovered, half sunk into the table. Joan recoiled, stumbling back.

The thing had the visceral horror of a flesh wound; it went against the laws of nature. Joan knew just looking at it that it shouldn’t exist. And she knew, too, that this was what Gran had been investigating. This was what had been sealed off from the world.

Footsteps behind her and then a retching sound. Tom had a hand over his mouth again, and as Joan turned, his chest heaved in another retch. Behind him, Jamie’s knees collapsed.

‘Jamie,’ Tom gasped, reaching to help him. Jamie was sipping breaths, short and sharp. Fingers shaking and barely able to focus, Tom managed to undo the top button of Jamie’s green cardigan and loosen his collar, his big fingers very gentle.

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