François pinched the aquiline pale bridge of his nose. "Oh, dear. Perhaps telling you now was an error. Sometimes I do not take the time to contemplate my words before speaking. Actually, now I remember, I wasn't supposed to mention this. Oh well, you cannot unring a gong."

"Huh? Oh, you mean 'bell.' You can't unring a bell." Even under duress, Andie still reacted to crimes against the English language. Sometimes being right about a small thing makes you feel better about all your fuck-ups.

Andie had a lot of those.

"I'm afraid you're more in gong territory than bell." François extended his hand to help her up from the floor. While falling, she had knocked over her almost-full teacup, resulting in a sore and wet behind. Kind of like when she landed in François's presence on the Starship Magnificent. I But one could hardly blame her for literally falling out of her seat when learning the news that her baby was a time traveler!

No, no, no! "You're totally right. Gong it is."

François cleared his throat and his perfect posture became even more erect. "Would it be possible for me to use your facilities?" he said, obviously trying to give her a moment to recover. Andie pointed him toward the powder room.

She wished she had time to assess, categorize, and digest this newfound information about her offspring. Contemplate the effects a time-traveling child would have on parenting. Or merely curl up in a ball and cry. But she needed to pack, and there wasn't a minute to spare. Many people could be after already. People (and aliens) who wouldn't be sending her 'Wishing you all the best with your little bundle of joy' cards from Hallmark. People at The First Bank of Hollywood, the Feds, the police in at least two jurisdictions, alien hunters, anyone at the Star Enquirer, her landlord, and probably others she couldn't even remember at the moment. Luckily, her 'front of the line' enemies, Cyra, and Talia, would not be a problem today, Cyra due to brain issues and Talia because of lion issues.

Andie waddled to her bedroom (waddling due to the back of her robe being wet and NOT because she was hugely pregnant!) and shut the door.

Hands on hips, ignoring the wet stain on her bum, she surveyed the meager contents of her bedroom. Luckily, it made sense to travel light. She'd buy whatever she needed when she got to Bhutan. So only the essentials. She brought down the heavy brown leather vintage audit bag from the shelf on the top of her closet. The bag had belonged to her dad and was one item she couldn't part with, even when she thought he was a reprehensible felon. It came down in a shower of dust. Wiping it clean, she discovered that the bag, with its worn handle and scratched, faded leather, was beautiful, not in spite of its imperfections, but because of them. Andie sneezed.

"Bless you," Bad Andie said.

"Thanks."

"So, a time-traveler, huh? Wow! Does put things into perspective. Seems so quaint, those days where our biggest worry was being zapped by an alien baby during a diaper change. That's the thing about life. Just when you think there can be nothing worse, there is."

"Thanks for the pep talk."

"Glad to help. Oooh! I keep spinning out scenarios of having a time-traveling kid! You pack, I'll talk. Scenario one: imagine a daughter. Let's call her 'Brittanie,' has been gone for four hours, and you text her (because of course you have inter-time-dimensional texting) and the conversation goes ...

Mom: Britt, when are you?

Britt: The 70s

Mom: I told you not to go to the 1970s! Why do you insist on defying me? It's dangerous there! All those striped bell-bottoms, granny dresses, and platform heels. You could trip over the hem! Not to mention the terrible music. Come home now!

Britt: Don't worry mom, I'm in the 2070s. Oops! Gotta go. My new android boyfriend is teaching me how to skitch* onto the bumper of a flying car while balancing on a hoverboard. He says it's totally safe. Don't wait up!"

Andie rolled her eyes and tossed three pairs of clean underwear into the bag. "Please, no scenario two. It makes it hard to focus. Also, just so we're clear, I will not name my child Brittanie." She retrieved her passport and wallet from atop the box she'd been using as a bedside table and added them to the bag.

"We'll see. Anyway, to cope, you could always join a self-help group for parents of children with TTS."

"TTS?"

"Yes, Time Travel Syndrome."

"You just made that up."

"I did, but it has a nice ring."

"Is this supposed to be helping?"

"Yes. We're discussing a support group here! Stop being so morose. Our life is about to get even more interesting! I may give up romance novels for good."

Andie sighed. "I really miss my boring accountant life."

"Those days are long gone, my glowy pregnant counterpart."

Next into the bag went the two white envelopes with the instructions for Chris, her laptop, charger, and toiletries. She contemplated stuffing the Chewbacca robe in too, but it was wet, and it was time to move on from such childish obsessions. She disrobed and changed into black jeans and a black Sterling hand-me-down pleather jacket over Oliver's Planet-B t-shirt. Every so often, her heart lurched when she caught the scent of cinnamon drifting off of the shirt.

Still, the audit bag, shirt, and jacket comforted her. They were like armor—a protection spell woven from love. She wasn't alone, and that was a strength, not a weakness.

"All right. I'm ready," Andie said, striding back into the great room.

François raised one chalk eyebrow at her. "You're wearing that?"

"I am." Andie pressed her mouth into a hard line.

François grinned. "At least let me fix your hair."

"Yes, please!"

François rubbed his Gripple along Andie's hair. After about twenty seconds, he took a step back. Smiled. "Much better." Tucking in her chin, she peered down. Her hair hung in lustrous soft waves almost to her elbows. She ought to have opened a hair salon for François along with the Zut restaurant, although explaining the Gripple to humankind might be hard. Still, she filed away the idea for later. "Thanks! Let's go. I'll meet you and the Zuts at the restaurant in half an hour. Here's the address." She handed him a slip of paper.

"I shall see you there," François said, disappearing in a cloud of lavender smoke.

Andie headed to the door and paused, finger on the light switch, to take a last look at her former life. All boxed up, labeled, and neatly stacked, ready for another ordinary installment that would never happen. Her existence was taking the weirdest left turn in the history of humankind. She patted her belly. "Our lives will never be boring," she promised the baby, not sure if it was a promise or a lament.

Yoda and Darth eyed her from their shelf across the room. Shaking her head, she strode toward them and scooped all the figurines into the audit bag. Maybe it was premature to stop her Star Wars obsession.

She flipped off the light and opened the door just as a flash of lightning lit up the room, followed by the distant rumble of thunder. The palm tree walloped the window so hard, it shattered. Frigid, wet, howling air blew into the room. Sheets of rain instantly soaked the cardboard boxes. This would not amuse the landlord.

Closing the door behind her, she did not look back.

As she exited the building, the wind nearly blew her to the Land of Oz itself. Frozen rain, like little needles of ice, pelted her cheeks, and in less than a heartbeat, Andie's hair hung heavy on her shoulders, wet ropy tentacles, erasing François' efforts. The deafening bellow of the wind and pounding rain was disorienting. The sky, the asphalt, the sidewalk, the buildings—everything the same blur of gray and wet. She shivered, her teeth chattering like some cheap Halloween toy.

When she'd gone out to buy the pregnancy test, she had the foresight to gas up the car and leave it parked in front of the building. The windshield was covered in soggy parking tickets. Old law-abiding Andie would've had a heart attack seeing them. But new criminal Andie merely pulled off the lumps of soggy paper.

After a bitter skirmish with the wind, Andie opened the car door long enough to throw the audit bag on to the passenger seat, the parking tickets onto the floor, and slip inside. The door slammed after her, almost taking off her left leg. The noise lessened slightly. This was no ordinary storm.

The street was empty. No cars. No people. No birds, bugs, dogs or any other living being capable of locomotion. Majestic palm trees bent in the wind, supplicants yielding to a higher power.

The storm of the millennium is what Anderson Cooper called it. What was she thinking?

Her stomach roiled as the truth sunk in. The first West Coast hurricane in almost a hundred years had to happen on the one night Andie became a fugitive from justice. There would be no planes taking off in this weather. She wasn't even sure her car would make it the 15 miles to the beachside café. But she had to try. And then she had to make for the Mexican border.

Speeding toward the beach, Andie battled the storm for control. The wind threatened to push her off course, sending the car careening toward street signs, parked cars, an iron fence, and several storefronts. Through sheer stubbornness, she avoided them all—some by only a whisper.

After what seemed an eternity, heart pounding, sweat and rainwater dripping down her neck, the beckoning yellow light shone from inside the old Kate's café. For the time-being, Los Angeles could keep its electrical grid functional. In the palm tree rimmed parking lot, her tires crunched over the gravel. She ground to a halt as close to the front door as possible. Beyond the café, the windsock on the lifeguard station snapped in the gale. Monstrous waves churned and pounded the squat blue building.

Hopefully, the real estate agent had gotten to the café in the storm and followed through on her promises to unlock the front door and leave the paperwork and keys. Andie removed the envelopes and tucked them inside the jacket to protect them from the storm. If she had to make a quick getaway, she didn't want to worry about retrieving the audit bag.

Outside the car, the storm whipped her hair into a frenzy. She tried the knob. Flakes of rust came off in her hand, but once she jiggled it a few times, the door flew open, and she darted inside, fighting the wind to close it behind her. Her muscles burned with the effort.

"Damn storm!" Andie raged. If she didn't have the strength to perform even this small task, how did she expect to execute the rest of her plan? "Ugh!" she grunted as a silver space-suited arm reached over her head and closed it with a slam.

"Oliver?" Andie spun, heart racing.

"Hello, Andromeda," said Emerson, backed by a half dozen supermodel guards, all of them pointing blasters at her.