“Seems the wrong word there, ‘breed’,” said Hannah. “You’re sayin’ it’s recessive.”
“No,” said Alfric. “Or not quite. It doesn’t skip generations like some recessive traits do. If you have any non-chrononauts in your family tree, you don’t have the power.”
“How’d the first chrononaut get born then?” asked Mizuki.
“Unclear,” said Alfric. “Legend goes that seven hundred years ago in Tarbin, three large families either chanced into it or somehow earned it from one of the gods, and careful marriages saved the line from going out. Those careful marriages aren’t as necessary today, because there are so many of us, but they’re still practiced to make sure there’s another generation.”
“But you didn’t want to marry her,” said Isra. “Or have her children.”
“It’s complicated,” said Alfric. “But no.”
“She seemed a little intense,” said Mizuki. “A little frightening.”
“She was always like that,” said Alfric. “And she was always cavalier about using her power, much more than we’re supposed to be.” He hesitated. “She’s an alienist.”
“A potent combination,” said Hannah. “If things go wrong with how she tries to bind, she undoes and tries again, ay?” Alienists were scary, mostly because the binding needed to be done with utmost care, and if it wasn’t, then people could die. Flaws in the binding could also crop up later on, resulting in self-immolation, or decapitation, or worse. It was something people didn’t go into unless they had both the natural aptitude and tolerance for risk, but for a chrononaut, at least some of the problems could be swept to the side.
“The extent of the risks she’s taken,” said Alfric, “the things she’s done and then undone… there’s no way of knowing. Entads don’t work with our power. The most you could do is comb through her memories, but if there’s a method of involuntary memory combing, I haven’t heard of it. There were suspicions though. Things she knew that she shouldn’t have known. Metaphors she’d drop that… weren’t the kind of metaphors someone would make unless there were certain things they’d done and seen. She admitted a few things to me, mostly petty crimes and social transgressions, but there was often the hint of something more. She said that she’d stabbed someone once, but she never revealed who because we got in a fight about it.”
“Is there a chance she killed me?” asked Mizuki, eyes wide.
Alfric’s lips went thin. “It’s not clear if she’s ever killed anyone. I don’t want to slander her. It’s all rumors, and I know how rumors that you can’t possibly refute can be. I… would think it likely that she’d spoken with you before but unlikely that she tried to hurt you.” If it had come to that, an alienist against a sorcerer… well, Hannah didn’t know enough to say, but her money was on Mizuki unless it was a surprise attack. The problem was that it very probably would be a surprise attack.
“She sounds horrible,” said Isra. She had her arms folded and was watching carefully.
“She wasn’t,” said Alfric. “I mean… you have to understand how it is for us. We live through days that we know aren’t going to matter. She came into her ability early, around ten, and I think at that age, she felt more of a need to push the boundaries. And then after that, when we were older, she knew exactly how far the boundaries could be pushed, how easy it could be to steal things, how people would react if she said something obscene, and—all of that would have been fine, maybe, bad things that got undone, but I never played those games with her, and she didn’t like that.”
“You never did any of that stuff?” asked Mizuki. “You never once insulted someone who you knew wouldn’t have any memory of it?”
“When I was younger I wasn’t perfect.” He took a breath. “I went into dungeons,” said Alfric. “Alone.”
Mizuki gaped at him. “City dungeons?” she asked.
“Ones on the city outskirts,” said Alfric. “Using a key that I stole from my parents. I just… wanted to see what they were like. I never made it out alive. Six times total. It was something Lola and I bonded over, though we probably shouldn’t have.”
“And then later on you had a fight and went your separate paths, ay?” asked Hannah.
“Not quite. I had plans,” said Alfric. “I was a part of the Junior Adventurers’ League, training, getting ready, recruiting a team, training with a team. I had maps and plans,” he turned to Mizuki, “and yes, I know, that’s very funny.”
She frowned. “Not in this context, no.”
“We were a week, a week away from heading out,” said Alfric. “We were just waiting for our last member to turn seventeen. Then, very suddenly, I was out of the party, and it was her party instead. I don’t know how long she had been working on it, but she pulled the rug out from under me.”
“And that’s why you have us,” said Isra.
“No,” said Alfric. “No, she was going to undo it, if I bowed to her will. If I was going to be her… partner in crime, I suppose, on those undone days. There were arguments that nearly swayed me. I wouldn’t have any memories of the transgressions. But I said no, and that was that. I undid the day, trying to get to them, to talk to them, but she’d laid all the groundwork. It was like a trap that had been waiting there, hidden, and the only way to get her not to use it would be to convince her, which I failed at. I don’t even think she wants to be a dungeoneer. So the reason that I’m here, with this party, is because I didn’t want to bend for her. I didn’t want to be that kind of person, even if I wasn’t going to remember it.”
“And her turnin’ up here is no coincidence,” said Hannah, nodding. “Seems a thorny situation we find ourselves in.” She was very careful to include that ‘we’. Alfric needed help, that was clear enough, and it was better to reinforce that they were a team. It would probably also do to say it out loud.
“No coincidence?” asked Mizuki, looking at Hannah. “Meaning that she followed Alfric here?”
“It seems likely,” said Alfric. He let out a groan and slumped against the couch. “All I want is to be left alone.”
“Like Verity does,” said Isra. She still had her arms folded and a cool expression on her face.
“Point taken,” said Alfric. “I’m hoping she’s more upset about keeping the secret than she is about the ability, because if it’s about the ability, there’s nothing much that I can do.” He sighed, then stood up. “Are there any other questions that I need to answer before I take a bath and then sleep the sleep of the dead?”
“Are we in danger here?” asked Mizuki.
“No,” said Alfric. “Absolutely not. Lola isn’t what I would consider a good person, but she’s not going to assault anyone, even in an undone day.” In Hannah’s opinion, his conviction was just slightly lacking. “And if anything happens to any of you, from Lola or anyone or anything else, I’ll undo it and protect you.”
“Well,” said Mizuki, who seemed somewhat warmed by that. She looked at the door to the room. “Is Verity just going to sleep in my room?” asked Mizuki. “Because that’s the one with the big bed, and I was going to share it with someone, but I don’t just want to go in and say that’s what we’re doing. I should have arranged it over the channel, sorry.”
“I’ll see if she wants me to sleep next to her,” said Isra. “We shared a room last night.”