Angela stared at the baby, then swung her gaze back around to Jordan, trying to figure out if she'd heard him correctly. Had he just said that the baby Linda was holding was the kid version of Second? Second Chance, a.k.a. Sam Chase, a.k.a. the man who'd sabotaged the time agency's first official mission of sending kids back in time?

Or wait… maybe this version of him hadn't actually done all that. She tried to wrap her mind around everything Jordan had just said. It sounded like the baby had been another version of Second, the teenager who Jordan, Jonah, and Katherine had apparently found injured at the airport. The adult version had been the one to mess up time and play with everyone's minds and get JB stuck in the sixteen hundreds for five years.

And then… sacrifice himself to restore JB's sanity?

"Why would Second risk his life to help JB?" Katherine asked. "He and JB are enemies."

"Yeah," agreed Jonah. "And Second's way too smart to allow himself to get killed." He squinted at Jordan. "You said it was a hologram you were talking to?"

Jordan nodded. "You were talking to it too. The one from the lab and the time hollow, who made us believe he'd turned Mr. Rathbone into a baby—that wasn't really Second. Just a really believable, futuristic hologram."

"I'm sure it was," said Jonah. "Second's done stuff like that before, programmed pre-recorded messages to make it seem like we're talking to an actual person when we're really just talking to a computer. Or, well, an Elucidator, or something. But making you think he cured JB and then got murdered? He's just trying to manipulate you into doing what he wants. Whatever that is."

"Besides, we already know the time agency cured JB," added Katherine. She turned to JB. "Didn't you say Hadley re-aged you and brought you to a time hollow to explain everything?"

JB still looked shaken. "I… I did say that," he admitted. "But I was just talking to Hadley on my Elucidator right now, and he said the last time he talked to me was at the hospital. The hospital where Jonah and Gavin were recovering from 1918. That's where I was before Charles Lindbergh kidnapped you, before Angela and I turned into kids and met up with Jonah." He shook his head, peering down distrustfully at the Elucidator he was still holding. "I did wonder why Hadley wasn't able to re-age me in transit, and why he couldn't come to the time hollow to explain things in person. If that was all really Second… it does fit."

"But it doesn't make sense that Second would let himself die!" insisted Katherine, frustrated. She waved her arms in the direction of the baby. "Or get turned into a baby, because what can you do as a baby? You have no control over anything!"

"As I said, his plans got messed up," Jordan reminded her. "Mr. Rathbone knew Second knew the secret to re-aging adults, so his plan was to trick the teenage Second into getting turned into a baby, so he could raise Second and be in on all his secrets. He killed the adult Second because he didn't want him interfering."

"I find it… unlikely that Second could be tricked by a man like Curtis Rathbone," JB said, rubbing his forehead. "That being said, given how much we were already manipulated throughout this whole fiasco, I still don't know what to believe. Did you learn all of this from the hologram of Second?"

"The hologram and the Elucidator," Jordan answered. "And, I guess, a little bit from the files Doreen found on the computer in the lab…"

"Which Elucidator?" JB wanted to know.

"The one you accidentally-on-purpose dropped on me in the hospital, when you thought I was Jonah," Jordan answered. "That other kid I was with—the one Cira knocked out when he was threatening to snap my neck—that was Kevin. Kid Second."

Threatening to snap his neck? thought Angela. Yeesh. And when had Jordan and JB had time to meet each other in a hospital?

JB's brow furrowed. "That was you? You gave me the warning that all of the Missing were in danger?"

"Not all of the Missing," Jordan contradicted. "I meant my family. But you thought I meant the Missing, and then Kevin escaped and I didn't have time to correct you…"

JB's face was growing pale again. "But that was—that was before I even knew you existed! It was because of your warning that I went to the twenty-first century and met up with Angela, and then everything happened that led to the splitting of the dimensions, and…" He shook his head, horrified, then seemed to steel himself. "You did the right thing, playing along and letting me believe you were Jonah. Where did you go afterward with that Elucidator?"

"To a time hollow," Jordan replied. "I told it to take me somewhere I could make a difference, and that's where it brought me. It showed me where Mom and Dad and Jonah and Katherine all were, stuck in suspended animation."

"Hold on," Chip cut in. "I thought it was just your parents who were in suspended animation."

"Second put Jonah and me there at a later time," Katherine explained. "After the kid version of him stole the Elucidator Mr. Rathbone gave us, and after Markiel and the others brought us back to the lab. He turned Mr. Rathbone into a baby—" she shot a questioning glance at Jordan. "Right?"

Jordan shook his head. "According to Mr. Rathbone, that was just a hologram."

"Okay, okay," JB waved his hands in the air. "You can explain the rest of that later. Right now I only want to know specifically what you learned from the Elucidator I gave you at the hospital, because I know that one was issued by the time agency."

"Right," said Jordan. "It showed me what you guys did after I disappeared. Then it showed me you and Angela driving together in a car and being turned into kids, and then driving the rest of the way to my house. It showed you meeting up with Jonah and time traveling to a bunch of different places, and then you and Angela living in the past for a little while. Then it showed how Second cured you once you'd returned to the twenty-first century."

"So that really did happen," JB murmured. "Then what?"

"Then Second appeared. The hologram of him. He told me all the stuff I already explained, and then he—or someone—brought Kevin to the time hollow. And Kevin and I watched everything that happened with all the missing children from the plane, and then mine and Jonah's and Katherine's whole childhoods. Then he told me to hold the Elucidator up to his mouth so he could whisper the secret into it, the one that would re-age Mom and Dad and everyone else. I told the Elucidator not to listen to anything extra, but as soon as he told it the secret, it brought us back here and turned Kevin into a baby on the way."

"So it was that Elucidator, then, that killed Mr. Rathbone, and that you subsequently destroyed?" JB asked, still frowning. "My official time agency Elucidator?"

"I already told you, I did it so no one could ever find out the secret," said Jordan.

JB's frown deepened further, but he didn't seem angry with Jordan. Just deep in thought. "Second would have been able to predict my passcodes," he muttered to himself. "And I'm sure he could've figured out a way to hack my Elucidator remotely and pre-program all those commands…" He looked back up at Jordan, presumably to ask another question, but was interrupted by a knock at the door. He pulled the Elucidator out of his pocket, consulted it, then said, "Come in."

The door opened and four people filed in to the already-crowded room, dressed in official-looking white uniforms with blue-and-red insignia. Time agents, Angela realized. Kylin, Shen, Ariti.

And Hadley.