by John Scalzi
“I wouldn’t have put it that way, but yes,” Dahl said.
“What about this atom thing?” Paulson said. “I thought this was a problem.”
“If it was Hester here and your son there, then it would be,” Weinstein said. “But if it’s definitely Hester there, then it will definitely be your son here, and all their atoms will be where they should be.” He turned to Dahl. “Right?”
“That’s the idea,” Dahl said.
“I like this plan,” Weinstein said.
“And we’re sure this will work,” Paulson said.
“No, we’re not,” Hester said. Everyone looked at him. “What?” he said. “We don’t know if it will work. We could be wrong about this. In which case, Mister Paulson, your son will still die.”
“But then you will die, too,” Paulson said. “You don’t have to die.”
“Mister Paulson, the fact of the matter is that if your son hadn’t gone into his coma, you would have eventually killed me off as soon as he got bored being an actor,” Hester said, and then pointed at Weinstein. “Well, he would kill me off. Probably by being eaten by a space badger or something else completely asinine. Your son is in a coma now, so it’s possible I’ll live, but then again one day I might be on deck six when the Intrepid gets into a space battle, in which case I’ll be just some anonymous bastard sucked into space. Either way, I would have died pointlessly.”
He looked around the table. “I figure this way, if I die, I die trying to do something useful—saving your son,” he said, looking back at Paulson. “My life will actually be good for something, which it’s avoiding being so far. And if this works, then both your son and I get to live, which wasn’t going to happen before. Either way I figure I’m better off than I was before.”
Paulson got up, crossed the room to where Hester was sitting and collapsed into him, sobbing. Hester, not quite knowing what to do with him, patted him on the back gingerly.
“I don’t know how I can make this up to you,” Paulson said to Hester, when he finally disengaged. He looked over to the rest of the crew. “How I’m going to make it up to all of you.”
“As it happens,” Dahl said, “I have some suggestions on that.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The taxi turned off North Occidental Boulevard onto Easterly Terrace and slowed to a stop in front of a yellow bungalow.
“Your stop,” the taxi driver said.
“Would you mind waiting?” Dahl asked. “I’m only going to be a few minutes.”
“I have to run the meter,” the driver said.
“That’s fine,” Dahl said. He got out of the car and walked up the brick walkway to the house door and knocked.
After a moment a woman came to the door. “I don’t need any more copies of The Watchtower,” she said.
“Pardon?” Dahl said.
“Or the Book of Mormon,” she said. “I mean, thank you. I appreciate the thought. But I’m good.”
“I do have something to deliver, but it’s neither of those things,” Dahl said. “But first, tell me if you’re Samantha Martinez.”
“Yes,” she said.
“My name is Andy Dahl,” Dahl said. “You could say that you and I almost have a friend in common.” He held out a small box to her.
She didn’t take it. “What is it?” she said.
“Open it,” Dahl suggested.
“I’m sorry, Mister Dahl, but I am a little suspicious of strange men coming to my door on a Saturday morning, asking my name and bearing mysterious packages,” Martinez said.
Dahl smiled at this. “Fair enough,” he said. He opened the package, revealing a small black hemisphere that Dahl recognized as a holographic image projector. He activated it; the image of someone who looked like Samantha Martinez appeared and hovered in the air over the projector. She was in a wedding dress, smiling, standing next to a man who looked like a clean-shaven version of Jenkins. Dahl held it out for her to see.
Martinez looked at the image quietly for a minute. “I don’t understand,” she said.
“It’s complicated,” Dahl admitted.
“Did you Photoshop my face into this picture?” she asked. “And how are you doing this?” She motioned to the floating projection. “Is this some new Apple thing?”
“If you’re asking if I’ve altered the image, the answer is no,” Dahl said. “And as for the projector, it’s probably best to say it’s something like a prototype.” He touched the surface of the projector and the image shifted, to another picture of Jenkins and Martinez’s double, looking happily at each other. After a few seconds the picture changed to another.
“I don’t understand,” Martinez said again.
“You’re an actress,” Dahl said.
“Was an actress,” Martinez said. “I did it for a couple of years and didn’t get anywhere. I’m a teacher now.”
“When you were an actress, you had a small role on Chronicles of the Intrepid,” Dahl said. “Do you remember?”
“Yes,” Martinez said. “My character got shot. I was in the episode for about a minute.”
“This is that character,” Dahl said. “Her name was Margaret. The man in the picture is her husband.” He held the projector out to Martinez. She took it, looked at it again and then set it down on a small table on the other side of the door. She turned back to Dahl.
“Is this some kind of a joke?” she said.
“No joke,” Dahl said. “I’m not trying to trick you or sell you anything. After today, you won’t see me again. All I’m doing is delivering this to you.”
“I don’t understand,” Martinez said again. “I don’t understand how you have all these pictures of me, with someone I don’t even know.”
“They’re not my pictures, they’re his,” Dahl said, and held out the box the projector came in to Martinez. “Here. There’s a note in the box from him. It’ll explain things better than I can, I think.”
Martinez took the box and took out a folded sheet, dense with writing. “This is from him,” she said.
“Yes,” Dahl said.
“Why isn’t he here?” Martinez asked. “Why didn’t he deliver it himself?”
“It’s complicated,” Dahl repeated. “But even if he could have been, I think he would have been afraid to. And I think seeing you might have broken his heart.”
“Because of her,” Martinez said.
“Yes,” Dahl said.
“Does he want to meet me?” Martinez asked. “Is this his way of introducing himself?”
“I think it’s his way of introducing himself, yes,” Dahl said. “But I’m afraid he can’t meet you.”
“Why?” Martinez asked.
“He has to be somewhere else,” Dahl said. “That’s the easiest way to put it. Maybe his letter will explain it better.”
“I’m sorry I keep saying this, but I still don’t understand,” Martinez said. “You show up at my door with pictures of someone who looks just like me, who you say is the person I played for a minute in a television show, who is dead and who has a husband who sends me gifts. You know how crazy that sounds?”
“I do,” Dahl said.
“Why would he do this?” Martinez said. “What’s the point of it?”
“Are you asking my opinion?” Dahl asked.
“I am,” Martinez said.
“Because he misses his wife,” Dahl said. “He misses his wife so much that it’s turned his life inside out. In a way that’s hard to explain, you being here and being alive means that in some way his wife’s life continues. So he’s sending her to you. He wants to give you the part of her life he had with her.”
“But why?” Martinez said.
“Because it’s his way of letting her go,” Dahl said. “He’s giving her to you so he can get on with the rest of his life.”
“He said this to you,” Martinez said.
“No,” Dahl said. “But I think that’s why he did it.”
Martinez stepped away from the door, quickly. Wh
en she came back a minute later, she had a tissue in her hand, with which she had dried her eyes. She looked up at Dahl and smiled weakly.
“This is definitely the strangest Saturday morning I’ve had in a while,” she said.
“Sorry about that,” Dahl said.
“No, it’s fine,” Martinez said. “I still don’t understand. But I guess I’m helping your friend, aren’t I?”
“I think you are,” Dahl said. “Thank you for that.”
“I’m sorry,” Martinez said, and stepped aside slightly. “Would you like to come in for a minute?”
“I would love to, but I can’t,” Dahl said. “I have a taxi running its meter, and I have people waiting for me.”
“Going back to your mysterious, complicated place,” Martinez said.
“Yes,” Dahl said. “Which reminds me. That projector and that letter will probably disappear in a couple of days.”
“Like, vaporize?” Martinez said. “As in ‘this letter will self-destruct in five seconds’?”
“Pretty much,” Dahl said.
“Are you a spy or something?” Martinez said, smiling.
“It’s complicated,” Dahl said once more. “In any event, I suggest making copies of everything. You can probably just project the pictures against a white wall and take pictures of them, and scan the letter.”
“I’ll do that,” Martinez said. “Thanks for telling me.”
“You’re welcome,” Dahl said, and turned to go.
“Wait a second,” Martinez said. “Your friend. Are you going to see him when you get back?”
“Yes,” Dahl said.
Martinez stepped out of the doorway to Dahl and gave him a small kiss on the cheek. “Give him that for me,” she said. “And tell him that I said thank you. And that I’ll take good care of Margaret for him.”
“I will,” Dahl said. “I promise.”
“Thank you.” She leaned up and gave him a peck on the other cheek. “That’s for you.”
Dahl smiled. “Thanks.”
Martinez grinned and went back into the bungalow.
* * *
“So, you’re ready for this,” Dahl asked Hester, in the shuttle.
“Of course not,” Hester said. “If everything goes according to plan, then the moment you guys go back to our universe, I’ll be transported from this perfectly functioning body to one that has severe physical and brain damage, at which point all I can hope for is that we’re not wrong about twenty-fifth-century medicine being able to cure me. If everything doesn’t go according to plan, then in forty-eight hours all my atoms go pop. I want to ask you how you think one gets ready for either scenario.”
“Good point,” Dahl said.
“I want to know how you talked me into this,” Hester said.
“I’m apparently very persuasive,” Dahl said.
“Then again, I’m the guy who got talked into holding Finn’s drugs for him because he convinced me they were candy,” Hester said.
“If I recall correctly, there were candied,” Dahl said.
“I’m gullible and weak-willed, is what I’m saying,” Hester said.
“I disagree with that assessment,” Dahl said.
“Well, you would say that,” Hester said, “now that you’ve talked me into your ridiculous plan.”
The two of them stood over the body of Matthew Paulson, whose stretcher was surrounded by mobile life support apparatus. Duvall was checking the equipment and the comatose body it was attached to.
“How is he?” Dahl asked.
“He’s stable,” Duvall said. “The machines are doing the hard work for the moment, and the shuttle has adapters I could use, so we don’t have to worry about depleting any batteries. As long as he doesn’t have any major medical emergencies between now and when we make the transition back, we should be fine.”
“And if he does?” Hester asked.
Duvall looked at him. “Then I’ll do my best with the training I have,” she said. She reached over and slapped his shoulder. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to let you down.”
“Guys, it’s time to go,” Kerensky said, from the pilot seat of the shuttle. “Our trip over from Griffith Park did not go unnoticed, and I’ve got at least three aircraft coming our way. We’ve got another couple of minutes before things get messy.”
“Got it,” Dahl said, and looked back to Hester. “So, you’re ready for this,” he said.
“Yes,” Hester said. The two of them walked outside, into the lawn of Charles Paulson’s Malibu estate. Charles and his family were there, waiting for Hester. Hanson, who had been keeping them company, broke off and joined Dahl. Hester walked over to join Paulson’s family.
“When will we know?” Paulson asked Dahl.
“We’re taking the engines to maximum capacity to the black hole we’re using,” Dahl said. “It will be within the day. I suppose you’ll know when your son starts acting like your son again.”
“If it works,” Paulson said.
“If it works,” Dahl agreed. “Let’s work on the assumption it will.”
“Yes, let’s,” Hester said.
“Now,” Dahl said, to Paulson. “We’re agreed on everything.”
“Yes,” Paulson said. “None of your characters will be killed off going forward. The show will stop randomly killing off extras. And the show itself will wrap up next season and we won’t make any new shows in the universe within a hundred years of your timeline.”
“And this episode?” Dahl said. “The one where everything we planned happens.”
“Nick messaged me about it just a few minutes ago,” Paulson said. “He says he’s almost got a rough version done. As soon as it’s done he and I will work on a polish, and then we’ll get it into production as soon as … well, as soon as we know whether or not your plan worked.”
“It’ll work,” Dahl said.
“It’s going to make hell with our production schedule,” Paulson said. “I’m going to end up having to pay for this episode out of my own pocket.”
“It’ll be worth it,” Dahl said.
“I know,” Paulson said. “If everything works, it’ll be a hell of a show for you.”
“Of course,” Dahl said. Hester rolled his eyes a little.
“I hear helicopters,” Hanson said. From the shuttle came the sound of engines primed to move. Dahl looked at Hester.
“Good luck,” Hester said.
“See you soon,” Dahl said, and made his way to the shuttle.
They were gone before the helicopters could get to them.
* * *
“It’s time,” Kerensky said, as they approached the black hole. “Everyone get ready for the transition. Dahl, come take the co-pilot seat.”
“I can’t fly a shuttle,” Dahl said.
“I don’t need you to fly it,” Kerensky said. “I need you to hit the automatic homing and landing sequence in case that asshole writer has something explode and knock me out.”
Dahl got up and looked over to Duvall. “Hester doing okay?” he asked.
“He’s fine, everything’s fine,” Duvall said. “He’s not Hester yet, though.”
“Call him Hester anyway,” Dahl said. “Maybe it’ll matter.”
“You’re the boss,” Duvall said.
Dahl sat down in the co-pilot seat. “You remember how to do this,” he said to Kerensky.
“Aim for the gap between the accretion disk and the Schwartzchild radius and boost engines to one hundred ten percent,” Kerensky said, testily. “I’ve got it. Although it might have been helpful for me to observe the last time we did it. But no, you had me in a crate. Without my pants.”
“Sorry about that,” Dahl said.
“Not that it matters anyway,” Kerensky said. “I’m your good-luck charm, remember? We’ll make it through this part just fine.”
“Hopefully the rest of it, too,” Dahl said.
“If this plan of yours works,” Kerensky said. “How will we know that it’s worked?�
��
“When we revive Hester, and he’s Hester,” Dahl said.
A sensor beeped. “Transition in ten seconds,” Kerensky said. “So we won’t know until we’re back on the Intrepid.”
“Probably,” Dahl said.
“Probably?” Kerensky said.
“I thought of one way we might know if the transfer didn’t take,” Dahl said.
“How?” Kerensky asked.
The shuttle jammed itself into the ragged edge between the accretion disk and the Schwartzchild radius and transitioned instantly.
In the view screen the planet Forshan loomed large, and above it a dozen ships, including the Intrepid, were locked in battle.
Every single sensor on the shuttle flashed to red and began to blare.
One of the nearby starships sparkled, sending a clutch of missiles toward the shuttle.
“When we come through, it might look like this,” Dahl said.
Kerensky screamed, and Dahl then felt ill as Kerensky plunged the shuttle into evasive maneuvers.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“Five missiles coming,” Dahl said, fighting the sickness in his stomach from the shuttle’s dive to read the co-pilot’s panel.
“I know,” Kerensky said.
“Engines minimal,” Dahl said. “We burned them coming through.”
“I know,” Kerensky said.
“Defense options?” Dahl asked.
“It’s a shuttle,” Kerensky said. “I’m doing them.” He corkscrewed the shuttle violently. The missiles changed course to follow, spreading out from their original configuration.
A message popped up on Dahl’s screen. “Three missiles locked,” he said. “Impact in six seconds.”
Kerensky looked up, as if toward the heavens. “Goddamn it, I’m a featured character! Do something!”
A beam of light lanced from the Intrepid, vaporizing the nearest missile. Kerensky yanked the shuttle over to avoid the explosion and debris. The Intrepid’s pulse beam touched the four other missiles, turning them into atoms.
“Holy shit, that worked,” Kerensky said.
“If only you knew before, right?” Dahl said, amazed himself.
The shuttle’s phone activated. “Kerensky, come in,” it said. It was Abernathy on the other end.
