By Julia V Ashley

The afternoon sun pricked my skin, leaving a sheen of sweat over my arms like polished ebony. Color Cultists flowed around me in their garish robes. I stepped away from them and into the shadow of the time kiosk to wait for my ticket. This slip would cost me the remainder of my credits for the month, plus some.

But it could be your ticket out, Zhe, I told myself. The sepia-toned ticket rolled out with my name printed across a hologram of my face. The sepia signaled my strata, the second lowest. The only lower was the Cult of Color.

Fearing KaLana would beat me to my compartment, I grabbed the slip ticket and rushed back to the tenement buildings. The Time Broker’s Temple towered behind me as I left. Its crystalline metal walls threw shards of light over the kiosks and across the Cult’s brilliantly colored banners. The sharp scent of spice and smoke wafted out of their tiled shops and burned my nose. I averted my eyes, embarrassed by their shameless display of color and by the desperation that drove me to the kiosks. The spiced air clung to me like guilt.

You cannot meet an Elite smelling of spice and sweat, Zhe.

KaLana, my Elite patron, abhorred the stench of the lower strata. As much as she favored me, she would leave me in real time before letting her Elite entourage get a whiff of my low standing. I’d have to change before slipping time, but time was running out.  

Maybe Milton didn’t care about ascending to the Elite, but I did. I’d reach my majority soon, and KaLana promised my ascension to the Elite strata. I kept the prize in mind as I weaved through the streams of cultists and tried to keep from brushing against their robes. Shrieks of laughter followed me.

Were they laughing at me?

A wave of annoyance followed by a wave of sympathy swept over me. Living at in the bottom strata must drive them all to madness. Although the Cult of Color lived outside the official caste structure, they still occupied the lowest stratum. Their tiled shops, with homes on top, squatted at the bottom, just outside the entrance to the Time Brokers’ temple.

I picked up my pace. The bag containing my new Buteé heels bounced against the side of my leg. KaLana invited me to join her on tonight’s slip to introduce me to her Elite. Their acceptance, along with her patronage, was my only hope of escaping the social strata of my birth.

A pack of children trailed after me along the old streetways, like multicolored tails to a kite. I glared over my shoulder. They huddled together and laughed behind dirty hands. I tried to keep my steps steady. No reason to fear a gaggle of giggling cult children, I told myself. If all goes well tonight, I’ll never have to use a kiosk again.

Milton was the only person I knew—other than the cultists—that didn’t long to be lifted to the Elite Strata. My twin Milton lived in a single compartment adjacent to mine. He and I had nothing more in common than the time of our births, but I had adored him as a child. His skin was as pale as the moonlight while mine was as black as a midnight sky. He was as fearless as I was full of fear. He believed all strata were equal. I knew they were not.

Milton didn’t envy the Elite, not like I did, but he did envy the cultists for their time. “Wasted,” he’d say as he passed them on his way to the kiosks. The cultists never used their time credits. They did not slip time. They held some superstition against messing with the flow of time.

Maybe that’s why they draped themselves in color, to pretend they lived in the future. I couldn’t help but pity them. They didn’t know any better.

Another shriek from the children caused me to skip a step. Unable to help myself, I took off at a trot. Milton would have chided me mercilessly.

Sweat ran down my neck, streaking my shirt before the tiled shops of the cult ended and the tenement buildings began. The massive concrete blocks formed a relentless grid. I ran up the three flights of stairs to my compartment, hoping the cool air inside would dry the sweat off my skin. It didn’t.

KaLana stood at my door, arms crossed. She wrinkled her nose when I bent to unlock the door.

“Sorry, I had to get a ticket for tonight.” I keyed in my lock code and pushed the door open against rusted hinges. The stale odor of the space hit me as I entered. KaLana followed, coughing the air of our lower strata from her lungs. Don’t fret, I told myself. She’s given you patronage all quarter. She won’t drop you this close to reaching majority.

“I thought you’d saved up,” she said, picking her way around the clutter in the small compartment. The gray L-shaped space housed the entirety of my possessions. A single boost light ringed the perimeter of the ceiling to illuminate the windowless room. The shorter leg of the “L” served as a closet dedicated to my wardrobe, which currently spilled into the longer leg and across the pallet where I slept.

“I had a far-future ticket, but when I checked my vouchers this morning, there were only two tickets to tomorrow.” I didn’t know what had happened to the future tickets, although Milton was the obvious answer.

“Two tickets to tomorrow?” She sat on the pallet and sifted through the clothes I’d pulled out for her approval.

I casually dumped my new Buteé heels onto the floor hoping she’d notice. She didn’t. I slipped out of my real time flats and tried on the heels. I balanced on the first while slipping my foot into the second. The strap snapped. I swallowed a curse and tossed them to the back of the closet as if I didn’t care, as if I hadn’t saved for weeks to buy them. I grabbed a pair of fish scale boots, put them on, and zipped them up.

“Hot as the Tambooli Club in 3017,” I told my image reflected in the liquid glass floating the frame beside my pallet.

KaLana scoffed. “Maybe 2317. Zhe, if that’s all you have, you may not make it past tomorrow.” She picked the points of her Safrano fro out another two inches. How much did she pay to slide back far enough to get that hair? KaLana, born an Elite, could go where she wanted, buy what she wanted, and slip time when she wanted. I pushed my envy aside and twirled on the heels of my boots.

“Been there. I first went to tomorrow when I was seventeen. Nothing to it then, ain’t gonna be nothing to it now. Luckily, I’ll be out of here before it comes in real time.” I stopped chattering when I realized KaLana wasn’t paying attention.

“What are you going to do with two tickets to tomorrow?” KaLana stopped fussing with her hair and met my eyes in the mirror.

I shrugged. “Maybe use them to sleep off the hangdown from tonight’s trip.”

She looked suspicious. “Milton’s not planning on coming with us, is he?” KaLana did not get along with my brother. He treated her like a lower stratum--a striking offense. Up to this point, KaLana’d let him get away with it. I didn’t know how long that would last.

“He might scrounge up enough credits.” I tried to sound indifferent. “If he does, he’ll be feeling the timelag, hard. He’s slipped so many times this quarter the wardens won’t let him go again for at another thirty days.”

“Milton caught in real time for a month! I’d like to see that.”

“Milton, or no Milton, tonight we’re going to the Tambooli. Tomorrow I’ll worry about saving up time. Hopefully, I can convince Milton to timelapse and sleep on the memories.” I smiled in anticipation of the future memories.

“Milton can’t save time. He just spends it. His and yours. Don’t count on him timelapsing with you.” KaLana said. She picked up my yellow shimmer shirt and tossed it to me.

I held it against my chest. In the mirror, it made a striking contrast to my ebony skin. All natural, I thought. Nobody in today had skin like mine. It was a genetic fluke. Everyone was jealous—everyone but KaLana. She detested anything natural no matter how rare. The mirror caught the green opalescent sheen of KaLana’s skin. That grade of skin stain cost more credits than I earned in a whole year.

Slipping into the shimmer shirt, I asked, “You don’t think Milton would go to the Time Brokers’ Temple, do you?” Chills ran across my skin at the thought, causing the shirt to ripple in the light. Being stuck in real time could wreck your reputation, but the Time Brokers ran a dangerous business. If you couldn’t afford the credits for slip tickets at a kiosk you had to go to the Time Brokers in the Temple.

Not answering, KaLana discarded a spider silk jumper and a pair of caterpillar culottes, looking for something suitable to go with the shimmer shirt.

“If he doesn’t save up, he’ll have to sell soul.” I tried not to sound frightened as I held up a laser green mini for KaLana’s approval. She wrinkled her nose.

“Doubt he has much left.” KaLana handed me a pair of purple, elk hide leggings. I was about to ask her what made her think Milton had already sold soul, when he appeared in the doorway, shoving a pile of scarves aside with his foot.

“Zhe, you ready to go?” He asked me and ignored KaLana.

“You found the credits?” I asked. KaLana studies us both.

Milton shrugged and stirred the accessories in the trinket bowl I kept on a table next to the door. He picked up a jeweled brow pin, rolled it between his thumb and forefinger, flicked it back in the bowl, and chose another. Twice, his hand slipped into his jacket pocket.

I knew Milton had taken the far-future ticket. I just didn’t want to admit it to myself, or to KaLana. He had been my childhood hero--until we began slipping time.

I turned back to KaLana who continued to pick through my clothes while Milton picked through my jewelry. She could afford to be picky. She’d buy a single outfit for what I spent on my entire wardrobe. Milton couldn’t even afford to slip without my credits.

Why do I keep paying his way? I asked myself. Supporting his habit could cost my ascension. I kept bringing him along on slips despite knowing KaLana despised him. If she dropped my patronage, I would never escape the lower strata. When I reached majority in a month, I would be moved into the labor force never to slip again. Unless the wardens needed a time slip to areas too risky for an Elite to go.

“Milton,” I called over my shoulder. “How much time you have for tonight?”

“Enough,” he answered, sliding his hand out of his pocket.

“If you want to sit this one out, KaLana and I could make it a girls’ night.” I winked at her. She looked away. “I’m going into lagtime tonight. We could save up for a long slip at the end of the month.” Milton didn’t answer. I whipped around to see if he was listening and the seam in my leggings ripped. I spit out a curse. “Now, we’ll have to start over.”

“No time. The mini will have to do.” KaLana grabbed her bag and headed for the door. I wiggled out of the leggings and into the skirt. KaLana stopped at the door. Milton straightened up and put both hands in his pockets.

“Got enough trinkets to buy yourself some color? You’re looking a little pale.” She asked, then stepped around him and out the door. The clack of her Miyana heels echoed down the hall.

“You enjoy being that glamgirl’s pet?” he asked me as he watched her leave.

“She’s my patron,” I reminded him. He gave me a skeptical look as I took his arm and led him out the door.

~

Milton convinced me to start time slipping. Adults, other than Elite, only time slipped with consent forms issued by the Time Brokers and only for designated jobs. The Time Wardens strictly monitored the slip decks. Few in the lower strata slipped time after reaching majority.

Youth, however, were allowed to slip through time to designated clubs, although, we were not allowed to interact with the worlds outside the club’s enclosures. Future slipping caused a euphoria, and the clubs dispensed crystal hallucinogens which were illegal in real time. Many became addicted before reaching their majority. Milton showed signs of becoming a slip junky.    

I pictured the bold, young man Milton had been prior to time slipping. One morning I remembered in particular. We were only fifteen, Milton’s bright, mischievous eyes had landed on an Elite who’d come to tour the lower strata. They were encouraged to visit lower strata periodically to remind themselves of their station and how far they had to fall. Most didn’t. They knew the freedoms and privileges they had to lose, and they feared association with lower strata might leave a sort of residue on them.

That crisp spring morning, the Elite walked among us, and everyone on the walks lowered their eyes—everyone except Milton. I watched, mesmerized by his audacity. He’d sauntered up to the fidgety Elite, put a hand on his shoulder, and asked if he needed a tour guide. The Elite stood paralyzed, probably trying to calculate the stigma he would incur from physical contact with a lower stratum. Milton gave him a look of pity.

“You are lost,” Milton said and walked away.

The Elite fell back to the upper strata’s default reaction of anger. He brushed his shoulder off while cursing and threatening Milton with assault charges and indiscretion of rank. Milton just strolled away with a self-satisfied smirk. He truly did not care. Or he hadn’t cared. That was before he and I reached the approved age for time slipping.

Slipping time gave added social prestige along with the euphoria. I craved the prestige—everyone was equal in future time. While there, I could escape my strata and move among the Elite where fashion flowed like water, and no one had power over me.

Milton craved the euphoria.

While I concentrated on climbing through the strata, Milton free fell into the haze of time slipping. He ran through his credits and bartered with friends and strangers for more. The practice wasn’t technically allowed, but it wasn’t monitored either. I knew he couldn’t get all the credits through legal means, but I didn’t ask how he did it. He was willing to slip time with me, wherever and whenever I wanted to go, and that had been enough. Slipping time with Milton allowed me to pretend I didn’t care about our strata.

But I did care.

Slowly Milton’s confidence slipped with his time. I didn’t notice at first. His bold careless manner became calculating and secretive. The old Milton faded with each slip leaving an angry, gaunt stranger. I chose to ignore the change. I wanted to live the intoxicating life of an Elite, and Milton never passed up a slip. 

~ 

The sun faded and the algae infused Lumi-crete walks began to glow, leading to the slip decks. The Time Wardens only allowed slipping from designated platforms to assure everyone landed in approved safe zones.

Much of future time held dried ocean beds, left when the waters evaporated. Creatures roamed the dried seas, creatures that could snap a leg off and swallow it whole, boot and all. And these boots cost way too much for that, I thought, trying to squelch the fear. At the very least, the inhabitants of the dried oceans could transmit a rash that left your skin scale-scarred. No one’s reputation could recover from that, not even KaLana’s.

I smirked at the thought of KaLana’s manicured skin with the texture of an alligron, or alligatron. I couldn’t remember what the ancient reptiles had been called before they chose extinction. Only their texture remained to imprint the skin of anyone who dared to test the wardens’ restrictions and initiate a time slip outside the slip decks.

The group of Elite walked ahead, separated from us by several feet. They laughed with KaLana who entertained them with stories of past future trips to the Tambooli. Once, KaLana allowed me to walk beside her on the way to the slip decks, but not with Milton.

One day I’ll walk with the Elite, I told myself. And leave Milton behind? The question plagued me, but I shook it off.

KaLana picked at her Safrano fro as her fellow Elites took turns telling their Tambooli stories and took no notice of us trailing along behind her.

“How far back do you think KaLana had to slip for that hair?” I asked Milton.

He shrugged. “I only do future. No reason to go to past time unless you have to.”

“Why would anyone have to?”

“Time correcting? Doesn’t matter. It just brings you down. No high to it.” He scanned the surrounding crowd, looking anywhere but at the Elites.

“I have two tickets to tomorrow if you need one when we get back.”

“Why would I want a ticket to tomorrow? Nothing’s happening there.”

“I thought it might help with hangdown. You’ve been slipping non-stop for the past two weeks. You’ll have a serious hang after all that, plus the slip tonight.” I picked up my pace while we talked to lessen the gap between KaLana and us. Milton noticed and grunted, but he kept up with me.

“Hangdown doesn’t bother me anymore.”

I studied him. His skin had worn to near transparent. The veins mapped dark blue inscriptions across his temple. I had begun to wonder if the residue left behind when slipping thinned a person--if a bit of yourself was left behind each time. In the beginning, the gaunt, pale faces of time slippers had seemed exotic, another part of the fashion statement. But watching Milton slowly fade, I’d begun to wonder.

I couldn’t ask KaLana, whose skin stain changed week to week, even day to day at times. KaLana would only see pale, thin skin as a lack of money to fix it. My envy of KaLana’s position grew into something close to loathing, even as I tried to emulate her. I wished I could shrug the allure of the Elite off like Milton did, but I couldn’t see any way out of the dank tenant houses except ascension to their strata.

At the slip decks, sinuous lines divided the social strata. Here, the social Elite congregated in a fantastic array of color, the only place in real time it could be seen. In real time, all the time slippers, which was anyone worth knowing anything about, wore drab grays and browns. But they came out in full color to slip time.

The drab wardrobe of real time showed everyone you were slipping--just not right now. In future time everything was in exaggerated color, no place to rest the eye. So, the mind needed a rest when it came back. Drab became the unspoken uniform to let those around you know that you were only here in real time recouping for your next slip.

KaLana lined up with the other Elite, and Milton followed. I caught his arm and made a hasty survey of the crowd to make sure no one had witnessed his transgression. He laughed--an ugly laugh--as I towed him over to our line.

“Glamgirl’s decked out like a cultist,” Milton muttered.

I usually got a thrill when Milton made snide comments about KaLana. Maybe that’s why I didn’t stop him from tagging along. His derision of KaLana kept me from feeling so out-stationed. He acted as if his stratum were his choice.

Tonight, I just wanted him to stay out of the way. KaLana offered to introduce me to a group of open-minded Elite, with a tolerance for lower stratum. If Milton came with his attitude, they might change their minds and close ranks.

Why did I bring him? I asked myself again as I watched KaLana slip from real time. 

~

The Tambooli in 3017 greeted each guest with a glass dish filled with crystalline powder to cup in their palm. The crystal inhalants increased your perception of the visible color spectrum to the point of near insanity. I’d only been to the Tambooli once before. It took me a month and a half to recover afterward. This time I booked one month of lagtime, hoping I’d built up resistance. Plus, I wasn’t sure I could convince Milton to stay in real time longer.

I waited in line watching as KaLana and her Elite crew passed through the portal, took dishes, and inhaled. Each, in turn, looked up to the lights pulsing through the club. Their eyes reflected the dazzling display.

Milton stood to the side, seemingly disinterested as he repositioned himself in front of me in line. He slouched into a new position, close to the person in front of him, and slowly worked his way up three places. The group ahead of us was too absorbed in posing for one another to notice his progression. I wriggled through, excusing myself until I reached his side.

The greeter handed a dish to Milton. He accepted it without looking down, turned his back to me, and lifted the crystal to his nose. When he turned back, his eyes were alight. Colors reflected off his corneas. A smile relaxed across his face. For an instant, the Milton from our youth stood before me, the boy who eagerly pulled me from one slip deck to the next. His eyes filled with the glee of a child seeing his first live animatron of the creatures that once swam oceans of water. For that instant, he appeared confident and alive, then the veil of hunger slid back into place, and he began the hunt for more time.

I weaved through the press of bodies, all high on the inhalation of crystal and color. KaLana and her crew perched on a platform at the back of the club. A slow smile curled her lips as she traced Milton’s progression. He made the circuit, finding who could offer him what. Slips. Credits. Crystal. Time-for-time trades that he’d never pay back.

KaLana’s gaze slipped off Milton and crossed the crowd to land on me. My skin prickled with a rush of adrenaline. The impulse to turn and flee engulfed me. My instincts told me to turn and go back to real time, to leave Milton to his begging and KaLana to her Elites. Then it began.

Sound pulsed through the Tambooli, and the bodies pressing against me began to undulate. The rush of color from the crystals hit, throwing me off balance. I caught myself and made my way onto the platform with KaLana.

“What was that?” KaLana asked as the other Elite made room for me.

We are all one in future time, I reminded myself.

“What do you mean?” I asked KaLana.

“Looked like you were about to pass out.”

“The crystal hits harder than I remembered. It caught me by surprise.” I searched the crowd for Milton. If I could keep him in my line of sight, maybe I could keep him away from the trouble he sought. Watching out for Milton gave me a purpose beyond chasing the Elite. He needed me. They didn’t.

“This your new pet, KaL?” a tall, sinewy boy in a cobalt-blue jumpsuit asked. KaLana laughed and stroked my arm. I pulled back.

“Only teasing, right KaL?” he asked. KaLana winked at him and pinched me.

“Don’t be so touchy. You know we’re all Elite at the Tambooli,” she said and took a saucer from the boy. They inhaled simultaneously. KaLana leaned in a little further, taking the majority of the crystal for herself. The boy pulled back letting her have it.

“Dance?” she asked looking between the boy and me.

“Which?” I pointed at myself then the blue jumpsuit.

“Either, both?”

“I’m in.” The boy took KaLana’s hand and led her off the platform and into the sea of color, color that would have appalled them back in real time. I remained on the platform as they blended into the crowd.

Milton dropped into the chair beside me, took the crystalline powder from my hand, and inhaled. His eyes glazed over for a moment then he shook his head and used the empty dish to gesture toward the dance floor.

“Can’t you see them, Zhe?” he asked. I had to lean in to hear him over the sound pulses, too rapid to talk between. “The Elite, they’re nothing—just thin veils of color stretched over empty shells. They didn’t earn their strata. We gave it to them, and don’t expect them to answer for the crimes they commit to keep it.” He studied the brilliant color of the crowd and shook his head.

“Tomorrow I’m slipping so far they’ll never find me,” he muttered, more to himself than to me.

“Tomorrow, we’re timelapsing,” I reminded him.

He shook his head, gave me a sloppy kiss on the temple, and launched back into the crush of people on the Tambooli dance floor. He’d be back soon to hustle me for more crystal if he didn’t find fresh prey first.

The mob moved as one, pulsing with the sound and the color, on and on as I watched. I chose not to join the dance tonight. Something felt different. Something had shifted—not in the Tambooli—in me. KaLana eventually broke free and slid back in beside me, refilled my crystals, then raised an eyebrow.

“Had enough?” KaLana said it more as a challenge than concern, and I didn’t dare admit I already needed to get home to crash. Show weakness to KaLana and she would dump you in real time and forget you existed--which would end my climb up the strata. KaLana could take you straight to the top of the social Elite, but lose her favor and you could hit bottom never to rise again.

“No,” I answered. “Besides, Milton keeps sharing my crystal. So, I haven’t had much.” I regretted the excuse as soon as I said it. KaLana already believed Milton was just a time slip junky. She ignored my comment and began to stroke the back of my hand sending a chill up my arm. I wondered again if KaLana was ever jealous of my natural skin. If KaLana can’t own it, then she doesn’t want it, I reminded myself.

“We’re two hours past our limit even with all the tickets Milton’s borrowed. We should probably go. It’ll take me more than a month to make up that kind of overage,” I said, pulling my hand back and lifting KaLana’s crystals to my nose.

“Milton’s not leaving until we drag him out.” KaLana leaned in to share the inhale. Her pupils dilated. She threw her head back and smiled, taking in the color. “He’d stay in future time on the run if he thought he could get away with it.”

I shuddered, remembering what he’d said. I’d heard of people who tried running time. They didn’t survive long. Only desperate people ran. KaLana’s comment about Milton selling soul still nagged at me. Did Milton sell soul to keep slipping? It was the only way to get more time without bartering or stealing. The offense for stealing was worse than selling a part of your soul, but not by much. At least you could buy soul back--eventually.

“Forget about Milt. Come dance.” KaLana returned to the floor where Elites immediately engulfed her.

Through the crystal haze, I began to see what Milton had described. Skeletal forms undulated beneath the stained skins of the Elite. Eye sockets gaped above protruding jaws and sunken cheeks. How had I not seen it before? The frantic light sent an array of colors over the skin stretched tight across writhing frames. They jerked in harsh motions in time with the sound pulses. Loose joints threatened to fail, to send the frail figures crashing to the floor.

The crystal, I thought, shutting my eyes to the perverse sight. It’s been too long. I’ll adjust. I stilled myself and opened my eyes, trying to see the people beneath the crystal color. This is what I want. What everyone wants, I reminded myself.

I searched again for Milton. He lurked in a far corner beyond the lights, alone, scanning the crowd like a predator. When had he grown so needy--so thinned? The Milton I grew up with had shown brighter than any Elite. Now, amidst all the light and color, he looked small, gray, and lost.

KaLana writhed on the dance floor with the cobalt boy caught in her wake. Her gaping eyes turned to focus on me. Her boney jaw cracked a toothy grin. I felt small and lost, too. I wanted to stop time--to escape back to real time.

The feeling came and went as two glittering Elites dragged me off the platform and onto the dance floor. The crystal and color took hold and any thoughts of real time were lost in the haze. This was my real time.  

~ 

After hours lost, I found myself back in the concrete tenement building. The liquid mirror in my apartment reflected the fresh bruise swelling on my left cheek. Milton, high on crystal and color, had struck me as KaLana and I dragged him out of the Tambooli.

“This is the last time I drag his pathetic carcass home.” KaLana dropped her half of Milton onto the clothes, still strewn across the floor. He slumped, pulling me to my knees.

“Help me roll him onto the pallet?” I asked her. “He’s too weak to take the tickets to tomorrow. He’ll just have to endure the hangdown until tomorrow gets here in real time.” I shoved him half onto the pallet before looking up. KaLana was already on her way out the door.

“I don’t have the time to spend on a slip junky like him. If you come to your senses tomorrow and throw him out, look me up.”

“Tomorrow we’re timelapsing to save up. I’ll see you when I come out, for ascension, right?”

“Not with him,” KaLana flipped a hand in the direction of Milton’s unconscious body and left without bothering to close the door.

Milton was my brother, my other half, my twin. I couldn’t throw him out. I struggled to get him onto the pallet then covered him with a thermal. If he was lucky, he wouldn’t come to consciousness before going into timelapse, and wouldn’t have to experience the pain of a serious hangdown.

I shut the door, rolled out a second thermal, wrapped myself in it, and set both to one month and one day from tonight. If we were lucky, we’d both sleep through his detox.

I tore my eyes from his face. Watching him won’t help, I told myself. I shoved the two tickets to tomorrow into my pocket unused and pressed my head back to enter timelapse a day early. 

~

When the thermal shut down, I woke to an empty room. Clothes were strewn about from the night of the Tambooli, but Milton was gone. He’d slipped. I knew it. A month of timelapse had not been enough to make up for his overages, much less earned him enough credits to slip again. Yet the residue of his slip hung fresh in the air. I coughed to clear my lungs of it.

How dare he leave from here. I’d have to prove to the Time Wardens that the residue wasn’t mine.

Terrified that he might have slipped with no plan to return, I put on a gray, shapeless sweater over putty colored leggings and headed back to the only stratum lower than mine.

The streets in the lowest strata blared color from every corner. The air reeked of the cultists’ sweat and their colored spices. I could feel the color staining my reputation. To live down here was to not living at all.

Milton came here when he was desperate for a slip ticket. The cultists had them but didn’t share them. That didn’t stop him from begging or issuing threats. He didn’t envy the Elite, but he did envy the cultists for their unused time credits. 

They were known as the Cult of Color because of the garish robes they wore and the brilliant banners they left fluttering in the breeze outside their shops. They didn’t call themselves cultists, but everyone else did.

“What a waste,” Milton muttered every time he passed through the lowest strata to the time kiosks.

“Every religion is a cult until it has enough followers to make it legit,” Milton told me on one of these trips. “But people have time slipped enough to see religion’s just another fad like textured skin and neuro implants, so the Cult of Color remains a cult.”

I spent the morning dodging their banners left flapping across the walkways and asking cultists if anyone looking like Milton had come through begging slip credits. They shook their heads with pity in their eyes. I wasn’t sure if it was for Milton or for me, and I didn’t ask. I reached the end of the strata where the Time Brokers’ temple stood. Shards of light reflected off the crystallized metal walls and cut my eyes.

If Milton had sold soul, I couldn’t afford to buy it back for him. No one had that kind of money, except maybe KaLana, and she wouldn’t spend it on Milton. Luckily, I had the two unused tomorrow tickets from before we went into timelapse. If I exchanged them for a past slip, I could go back and stop him.

To turn back a ticket, you have to go directly to the Time Brokers instead of one of their kiosk. And if you had to come to them, they knew you were desperate. Counting the bribes, the Time Brokers charged a sickening amount for a time slip. The tomorrow tickets were a month past due. Turning back a past future ticket to a present past ticket was expensive, but still significantly cheaper than buying one from real time to the past. To do that, I’d have to pay with a piece of my own soul.

The cultists’ eyes followed me down the alley leading to the Temple doors. They bunched up around the veiled entrance to the Time Brokers, adding guilt to the procession, shaming the people who needed more time than they were allotted. Selfish, I thought as I passed through veils of color and mist--both real and imagined. The passage reminded me of the sensations created by the Tambooli crystals, but this much color in real time felt vulgar.

I stumbled up to the statues guarding the Time Brokers’ temple and paid them bribes to allow my passage. In the dim vaulted entry of the temple, crystals hung from the ceiling contained in copper mesh baskets. The light of a sold soul colored each crystal. I recognized the deep purple color of one, Milton’s--it reflected the color of my own.

I looked down at the worn slate floor hoping to find relief from all the color, but the light from the crystals made pitiful puddles of color on the floor. I searched for a spot where I didn’t have to look directly at the soul light. In the center of the floor, a beam of sunlight from the opening in the dome dissolved the colors into a circle of white light. I focused on the circle and tried to steady my breathing.

Trading soul for time—How could anyone be desperate enough to do that? I shuddered. Before today, I couldn’t have imagined going to past time either, but here I was, waiting for the chance. I didn’t understand how selling soul for time worked. I didn’t understand the mechanics of basic time slipping either. The authorities no longer demanded you take a seminar before allowing you to slip. Everyone did it, and no one really knew how. No one but the Time Brokers and they were a breed even stranger than the cultists.

The circle of light from the skylight pulsed a bruised blue, and a metallic voice called my name.

I paid a heavy price to turn the tickets back. Milton’s cost would be heavier still, but at least he wouldn’t be lost to time. The Time Brokers turned my past future tickets to a future past ticket. I used it to slip back and warn the Time Wardens of Milton’s plan to slip and never return. It was the only way, short of physical force, that I could think of to stop him from running time, and the bruise on my cheek from the night at the Tambooli told me physical force wouldn’t work.  

~ 

After slipping back and alerting Time Wardens, they pledged to watch over Milton as he woke from timelapse. Hopefully, it would buy me time to talk sense into him.

The slip back again to real time left me dazed. I struggled to scrape away the fog of past time and adjust to the present. My nerves sparked with the numbness of electricity. My head pounded. I tried to stand, but my legs refused to support the weight. I fell back to my knees on the pallet where I’d left Milton. He wasn’t there.

A scuffle on the far side of the room drew my attention. There Milton stood with his elbow crooked around KaLana’s neck. The Elite looked terrified.

“KaLana?” I said trying to understand why she was there, and why Milton had a choke hold on the Elite.

“The Time Wardens came?” I asked, my words muddled from the crushing effect of a past time slip. “They promised to come—to stop you from running.”

“They came,” he said, and I exhaled in relief. His face twisted with a scowl. I stood, bracing one leg at a time to steady myself.

“Milton, you are my other half. I cannot lose you.” I gave him a half smile. It was true. Elite or no Elite, Milton was part of me. He had always been the lens through which I filtered the world. His anger did not wane. His breaths came short and fast, rage building. He didn’t understand that I’d alerted the Time Wardens to save him.

“We can handle this together. I’ll stay with you in real time. You can timelapse the worst of the detox. You’ll be able to slip again.”

“You had no right,” he said. “You can’t keep me trapped in today, Zhe. I’m taking KaLana and her Elite vouchers and slipping into forever.” He jerked his arm tight around KaLana’s throat, and she stumbled. Her eyes glazed with tears. She must have come to check on me and found Milton crazed with anger.

“Let KaLana go. If you need a slip so bad, I’ll get you one. I’ll have time in a week or two. You’ve already sold soul. I saw it caged in the Temple. You won’t get it back if you leave.” He averted his eyes, and I realized my mistake. “Your soul is already forfeit.”

“Souls are for cultist.” He met my eyes again. Past rage, I could see hunger and pain.

“You just can’t understand can you?” he demanded. “You never could. You think KaLana cares about you? She just likes being seen with a pretty specimen of a lower stratum. She’s not like you. I’m not like you. I’m taking KaLana as far as I can before dumping her and losing time. You don’t have to worry about poor Milton anymore. And stop lying to yourself about this glamgirl. You’re on the bottom, Zhe. You will waste away there. She would never have saved you. She would have cut you out of time as soon as she got bored.”

KaLana shook her head, just a minute movement, but Milton must have felt it. He slammed a fist into KaLana’s ear, splitting the lobe. A bead of blood welled up and fell to her collar.  

He’s gone mad, I thought. He struck an Elite!

A low, merciless laugh bubbled up out of KaLana. Her eyes sparkled with glee--free of fake tears. Milton’s grip loosened, and he stepped back as he realized what he had done.

“Wardens,” KaLana called out, and they flooded through the door. They must have been waiting for her command. She knew how Milton would react, better than me. She came here knowing and had brought the wardens with her. Maybe even the same wardens who had come to stop him from slipping.

“Silly, stupid creature. You dare to strike an Elite. I will have you drained of all time and leave you a husk for the rest of your kind to clean up.”

The wardens forced my brother, my twin, to the floor and cuffed his wrists and ankles. Terror rose in me. Were they going to drain him here, now, without a trial?

“KaLana, no. I will go back, again. I will stop him.”

“Zhe,” she said, shaking her head, a sour smile on her face. “Milton has only ever held you back. You heard him. He doesn’t want your help. Come with me. We will apply for your ascension today.” She glided past Milton who struggled and cursed the guards who held him. She put an arm around me and attempted to guide me out the door. I pulled back.

“No,” I told her amazed that she believed I could ignore my brother’s fate. “Milton, don’t fight. I will fix this. I will go back again. This time I will get it right.”

“Think carefully, Zhe. Do you want to spend the rest of your life cleaning up after this junky? He is not worth it. Come join the Elite and be free of all this.” She waved a hand to encompass the whole of my compartment and its contents, including my brother.

I took a deep breath, trying to grasp the enormity of what she said. Unable to find the words to let go of the only dream I had ever had, I simply shook my head at her. I ran to pull Milton from the wardens’ grasp and met a warden’s fist slamming into my stomach, sending me back to the floor. I curled around the pain and wept.

“Fool, stay down,” KaLana said. “You lost.” She left and the wardens followed carrying Milton between them. 

~

I made my second trip directly to the Time Brokers, keeping my eyes on the street. Asphalt, that’s what they called the roads back when automotives needed hard surfaces to maneuver, I thought. The gray crumbling material covered miles of the old streetways. Staring at the broken surface of the ancient road allowed me to avoid noticing the flamboyant real time color surrounding me, and to avoid thinking of the horror behind me.

I pulled my gray sweater tight around me, shrinking into it. My drab attire no longer felt like an unspoken nod to future color at the denial of today’s. It felt drab amongst the bright, billowing robes of the cultist.

A dark-skinned cultist inclined his head and smiled as I passed. Why did they insist on smiling? Did they remember my last trip to the temple with my two pitiful tickets to a tomorrow that was long gone? Did my desperation amuse them?

A swarm of children parted around me. My ebony skin felt thin and pale in the midst of their ruddy faces. The children turned curious, bright eyes up as they flowed past. The light touch of tiny fingers brushed my arms.

What did they want from me? They held all the time they could ever need, and I had none. I owed time for the trip to the Tambooli, what I had used and what I’d lent to Milton, plus the credits for turning the past future tickets back.

The sharp sun pricked the skin on my arms. Did the sun shine brighter on the Cult? I wondered as I walked. Laughter floated in the air along with the tinkling of bell chains hanging from the tips of wooden rafters. Distracted by all the sensations, I stumbled. An elderly woman reached out a callused hand to steady me. She paused to offer me a smile before continuing down the street. She looked flush and happy.

How could she be happy here? Why did they all smile? I wanted to know. How could the cultists appear so flush while Milton and KaLana had appeared so emaciated?

Milton--obsessed with future time--had seemed sick and hollow as the Time Wardens dragged him away. KaLana’s manicured skin looked to be stretched too tightly against the skull beneath. They were thinning. The residue left behind after a slip had to come from somewhere. If Milton had escaped to runtime, what would’ve become of him? And if he’d left KaLana stranded in time, would they both simply have faded away?

Would the Time Brokers grant me another slip back? If they did, would I be able to correct the mistakes made by me--by Milton and KaLana--in the concrete compartment I had called home? Could I save Milton from himself? Could I stop KaLana and her wardens?

I had no credits, and my debt had hit its limit permit. I had nothing left to barter. Nothing but soul.

~ 

After another slip back to time correct my mistakes and Milton’s--to warn him of KaLana’s plan and her waiting wardens--I re-entered real time in my compartment. This time, Milton lay next to me. Relief flooded through me. He was there, asleep and safe. In time, he would understand. I would nurse him through the hunger—stay with him in real time until he could slip again. That was all we needed, time, and I had bought it at a steep price.

I reached to wake him and stopped. This was not my twin. It was a dried husk. A desiccated mummy--with Milton’s face--lay across the clothes I had never bothered to put away, the clothes that seemed so important before the Tambooli. I touched the dry skin that stretched across the cheekbones. The eye sockets formed deep pits edged with lashes.

“Oh Milton, what have you done?” Hot tears burned my eyes and blurred my vision. I’d failed again. I’d sold a piece of my soul to save him, and now he was gone.

A wail stuck in my throat, cut short by a voice in the compartment with me. “He put up a nasty fight this time. The wardens had no choice but to drain him.”

My attention jerked from Milton’s remains to KaLana standing in the doorway. I hadn’t noticed the Elite until she spoke. She marched across the room wearing my fish scale boots and prodded Milton’s head with a pointed toe.

No. Something was wrong with her story.

“Why would the wardens do this, KaLana? He hasn’t had a chance to run. He hasn’t struck you. They do not act without cause,” I said watching her warily. “Time Wardens did not do this?”

“They didn’t? Pfft, I suppose you are right.” She shrugged. “I guess you should thank me then for cutting him out of time for you.” She smiled. “You’re welcome.”

“Why?” was all I could manage to say. KaLana twirled a purple crystal in her fingers, a deep bruised-blue, the color of my bartered soul.

“I get what I want, Zhe. And I want you.”

“You would lift me to the Elite strata now, after all this, and you think I would accept?”

“Oh, no. Milton was right about that. You were never going to be an Elite, but it was a fun game to play for a while, wasn’t it? And I won’t leave my favorite pet here alone.” KaLana crooked her pointer finger at me and backed up to the door, beckoning for me to follow. “Come with me, my pretty little pet,” she crooned.

I shook my head.

“Poor Zhe. What choice do you have? The Time Wardens will come asking questions. How will you explain away a dead slip junky on your floor? Sweet Zhe, come with me?” KaLana dangled the crystal between two fingers threatening to drop it. “There’s no way, but my way,” she sang.

Time froze.

I couldn’t take my eyes from the piece of my soul trapped in KaLana’s grasp. I’d been tricked. Milton had been tricked. KaLana knew—if she left me with no other choice--I would sell soul to save Milton from his addiction. She just had to make sure I had no choice left.

KaLana had drained Milton out of spite and had trapped me out of greed. With Milton gone, I had nothing and no one. My credit and soul were spent, locking me in real time. Milton had warned me. KaLana had only wanted me as a pet, and KaLana gets whatever KaLana wants.

“No way, but my way.” KaLana sang, again. “Poor thing. We both know you can’t stay here. Hard labor is too dangerous for you. You wouldn’t last a year. I would make sure you didn’t.”

Missing a piece of my soul, the piece KaLana held, I was forever anchored in real time. I could not even serve in a high ranking labor position that required slipping. KaLana was right. She would make sure I suffered if I remained in my strata instead of coming with her.

I am so sorry Milton. I could not save you from yourself. I tried. My eyes ran across his grey, empty shell laid over the garish color of my time slip attire, and an idea occurred to me.

“There is another way,” I whispered and met KaLana’s confident glaze.

“No, my pet, there is not.”

I exhaled the stagnant air of my compartment and tried to slow the beating of my heart. There was another way out of this dank, concrete tomb. There was an escape from the stratum that I had believed to be solid as concrete. I had found a crack.

“Goodbye KaL,” I said.

“Zhe, come play with me. It’ll be fun.”

“Goodbye,” I repeated. KaLana’s eyes hardened.

“You are on the bottom, Zhe, and I will grind you under my boot heel.” She turned to leave and tossed my soul crystal over her shoulder. A jolt ran through me as the crystal shattered against the wall, throwing a spray of shards across the floor and releasing a purple mist into the air. With that move, she had locked me in real time. I listened as the clack of my boots—hers now—faded from hearing.

“Goodbye,” I whispered to Milton and bent to cover his withered body with a thermal. “You are finally free of time.” I touched his cheek and kissed the temple of his colorless face. Here on the floor of this cold, concrete compartment, lay the ruin of Milton, my brother, my twin, and the ruin of my dream of becoming an Elite.

I stood and walked through the purple mist of my soul and inhaled deeply. A smile crossed my lips. I plucked a multicolored veil from the floor, draped it across my shoulders, and exited the compartment. I closed the door—leaving behind a strata system built on pain and despair—on my way to join the Cult of Color.