Ten Thousand Skies Above You Read Free Page A

our progress with the Firebirds. Their CEO, Wyatt Conley himself, is deeply involved in this—orchestrating it, even—in both worlds. To this end, he altered my daughter Marguerite’s dimensional resonance so that she can travel more effectively than anyone else in this world.”
    Mom’s eyes flashed with anger as she cut in. “The procedure only works once in a dimension. By choosing our daughter, putting her in this dangerous position, Conley thought he could control us.”
    â€œConley also hoped to blackmail Marguerite into working for him, operating as his spy in countless dimensions. That’s why I was kidnapped into an alternate universe in the first place,” Dad said.
    A silence followed. Everyone in the room just kept staring at us, this sea of huge eyes behind thick glasses. I wondered, Do they think my parents have finally lost their minds? The events Mom and Dad had just talked about sounded prettyfantastical, but every physicist in this department (and probably the world) knew that my parents were on the verge of a breakthrough—that dimensional travel was going to become a reality.
    Then Theo held up his hands in the time-out signal. “Uh, we probably ought to back this up. Turns out the Firebirds work! Dimensional travel is possible! I guess technically Dr. Caine went first, then Paul, and then Marguerite—but the point is, we’ve tested the devices. The Firebird is a success. Yeah, we should’ve led with that.”
    â€œNot that,” Paul said, expression grim.
    I realized what he was getting at, and my eyes went wide. Uh-oh.
    Paul stepped forward and said, as formally as if he were defending his dissertation, “We should have first informed you that Dr. Caine is alive.”
    â€œOh!” Dad said, as Mom put her hand to her mouth. “Right! Thought that was sort of obvious—but ought to have gone over it anyway. I’m not dead! Body not lost at sea or in the river, wherever it was supposed to be. I’d been kidnapped into another dimension instead. Left out that important detail, didn’t we?”
    â€œAlso, most of you will have heard that I killed Dr. Caine, when in fact I was framed for the crime. I am not guilty,” Paul continued. Then, with a glance at my dad, he finished, “Obviously.”
    â€œBecause I’m alive.” Dad clapped his hands together, amused and embarrassed at the same time. “Of course. Nowonder you’re all startled, since to you it’s like I just rose from the grave! Can’t say I blame you. We ought to have phoned a few people when I got back last night, but we got a bit carried away there, with the reunion and all. But no, I’m not dead. I’m absolutely fine. Never better.” The professors in front of us remained still, and I realized several of them were pale with shock. My father broke the awkward silence. “So, how are all of you? Ah, Terry! Changed your hair, I see. Looking good.”
    That was when someone fainted.
    Believe it or not, that has to count as a positive reaction. For years, the scientific community wrote off my parents as lunatics; a lot of people would like to do that again. Their colleagues finally accepted that cross-dimensional travel might be possible—but spies from other worlds? Wyatt Conley, inventor and entrepreneur, the mastermind behind a mysterious plot? Triad makes the most advanced personal electronics in the world, and sells them in stores you can find in any shopping center. Their cheery ads and emerald-green signs don’t seem like they’d belong to the front company for a James Bond–esque supervillain. And what was Conley supposed to have done to me? “Changed” me? “Blackmailed” me? Why would a powerful billionaire ever need to blackmail an average eighteen-year-old girl?
    Or so the thinking goes.
    After the paramedics revived Professor Xavier, my parents, Theo, and Paul had to