by Dan Alatorre
“Uh, no sir.”
“It’s damned embarrassing, is what it is! I’m a doctor. I’m supposed to cure migraines, not get them.”
I made my way to the Coke machine. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the hushed argument the others were having about our contrived story – and our inability to remember it.
But no matter. We were free and clear. Riff would get observed for twenty-four hours, and the rest of us could go home for some much needed sleep.
After we dropped our new toy off at Barry’s.
* * * * *
It only took a few minutes for Roger and Barry to haul the machine up the stairs and nestle it next to the coffee table in Barry’s living room. Then we said our goodnights and everybody left.
My dorm room was a short walk from Barry’s place, but Melissa insisted on driving me. Her eyes looked tired. I shifted on the seat. “Long day. You okay?”
“Yeah. I’m just sleepy.”
“Me, too.”
We arrived at my dorm. Melissa turned and smiled. “Want me to walk you to the door?”
“No, thanks. I got it.” I was achy and didn’t really want to move. I put my hand on the door handle. “Good night. See you bright and early at Barry’s tomorrow.”
“Okay. Goodnight.” Then she leaned over. “Peeky…”
I glanced at her.
“Thanks for not saying anything back at the mine. About me and Roger. And the swimming… I’m sure you could see things from the ATVs.” She let out a nervous laugh. “It was bad enough we were breaking safety protocols by going off on our own, much less for… you know.”
I lowered my head. “A gentleman doesn’t notice such things... or comment on them if he accidentally did notice.”
She glanced downward, pursing her lips. “Thanks. You’re a good friend, Tomàs Pequant.”
“I try.”
“If it had been anybody else, I’d have died.”
I pulled the handle and popped open the car door, embarrassed. Was she using a politician’s trick, pretending I’d met a standard I’d obviously failed to meet? Slyly shaming me by stressing her pride in me, and making it so that I’d rather die than fail her again?
It would be a long night alone in my dorm room to think about it.
Other graduate students wouldn’t lower themselves to living in a freshman dorm, but as an exchange student, I was happy to have a place to stay at all. My family didn’t have money like Barry’s or Melissa’s. We were middle class, but that had a different meaning in India than it did here. We didn’t have a TV when I was growing up. We had a car, but if you looked down, you could see the road going by through the holes in the floor. My trip here was meant to change all that, and I sacrificed a lot to make sure that it did.
I checked the time. Once again, it was too late to Skype anyone back home. They’d be at work. I started some tea to help me relax.
What things I’d seen today from this team! How lucky I was to be a part of it. I was proud of them, how they sprang into action to save Riff. Nobody hesitated for a minute.
Melissa surprised me. She really took charge. Smart, beautiful and brave, she jumped right in with the resuscitation. She probably saved his life.
A moment before, she had been soaking wet and nearly naked, frolicking in the water—while I shamefully hid behind the ATVs and watched. Another wave of embarrassment burned my cheeks.
Put that out of your head. She is your friend.
I readied my cup and spoon, but my thoughts returned to the mine. And Roger, running in naked to save the day. I chuckled. He showed real composure, though. He was a naturally gifted athlete, and his strength paid off today.
My teapot whistled for me. Meanwhile, a few blocks away, I knew Barry would still be up, studying the machine.
* * * * *
He had been fascinated with its sleek, lightweight frame, and its many knobs and gauges. But tonight, by design, Barry had the machine all to himself, and he meant to make the most of it.
He stared at it for hours, standing silently in his living room. He occasionally circled it like a shark, observing every detail, taking it all into memory, only pausing to crack open a new can of Diet Coke or to use the bathroom to get rid of the prior one. Then he was back at it, mesmerized by it, and absorbing every aspect of it as if it might suddenly disappear and never return.
Its metal surface was smooth and free of corrosion of any kind—odd, for such an old machine. The piping work that made up most of its egg-shaped frame was bronze in color but completely without rust. Its underside was mostly a simple sled, just two rails, really. There were no visible nuts or bolts, or even any obvious welds. It appeared almost polished just sitting there, after getting the dirt knocked off by yesterday’s rains on the drive home.
As he looked it over, he tried to decipher its many unusual features. It seemed to have some kind of self-contained, "closed" powering system, because it had no obvious opening to insert or pour a fuel of any kind. There were countless rows of metal tubing that ran under the seat. They also appeared on the surface of the large cylinder at the sled’s rear, to take something very important—or dangerous—from here to there, and back again.
It had two large levers attached on each side, and a flat panel of mysterious dials that sat in front of a lone, hard metal seat. It would fit just one lucky passenger at a time. Behind him or her rested a very large and very intimidating wheel, like a turbine fan, with a hundred rectangular blades all waiting. It was probably three feet across, but located just inches from the back of the seat. The mud from the mine had held the big fan in place, but now it moved freely at the slightest touch.
The whole rig was deceptively light. At the mine, it had been laden with dirt. Now, un-muddied, two people could easily move it.
It was either very old technology, or very advanced. There was no way to tell. Glass has been around for thousands of years. Metals, form making, fans… nothing new there. The tubes along the underside were small and sleek, but things like that had been around for hundreds of years.
Barry was a scholar, and not just of paleontology. The fact that the machine’s innovative construction gave it a futuristic aura—but that was always the leap to make when faced with something that had never been seen before. Titanium had rarely been used as a strong, lightweight support before the 1980’s. By the 90’s, manufacturers used it in every golf club shaft and bike frame.
The lack of numbers or letters indicated that the designer had a universal appeal in mind. Whoever used it wouldn’t need to know the builder’s native language to make it work, but didn’t the ancient Egyptians do the same thing with their hieroglyphics? And the Mayans? Doesn’t a kids’ iPad game use the same approach, letting you learn as you go, never needing an instruction manual?
The dots on the dials got larger as they moved from left to right, like the volume knob on a car radio.
There were no easy answers. Every argument for one conclusion could create an equally compelling argument in the other direction.
In the end, it didn’t matter.
Using the machine might have killed its inventors or allowed them to enjoy riches and a life of comfort until they died of old age. No one could know for sure.
Sometime before the morning sun peeked over his window sill, he allowed himself to shower, finally shedding all the mud he’d acquired the day before at the mine. But the questions persisted. Multiplied.
Ancient civilizations had simple electric batteries, too, and skilled metal workers, choosing to work in soft gold to praise their kings, or to use copper chisels to carve their pyramid stones. If they had focused on something else, or if they had succeeded in creating a genius work like this, and didn’t tell anyone their secret, those things would just be waiting somewhere out in the sand.
* * * * *
When Roger opened the door for Melissa and me at Barry’s apartment the next morning, having arrived just minutes before us, he had just one thing to say.
&n
bsp; “He thinks he knows what it is.”
Chapter Six
“Come on,” I teased as we entered Barry’s apartment. “We’re all supposed to be out doing paleo stuff, not tinkering with strange machines. We should be digging up important things in the Florida mud.”
“But digging up an important thing in the mud is exactly what we did.” Barry beamed. “This machine is significant. I’m convinced of that.” He stood next to the strange bronze-colored contraption, arms folded across his chest.
Barry followed Melissa to the kitchen and grabbed a donut as she placed the box on the counter. “You’re in a good mood, Missy.”
“Dad’s staying ahead in the polls. Looks like smooth sailing for the next few weeks.”
“Nice. Daughter of the mayor. It has a ring to it. Will we have to call you ‘your highness’ or the First Daughter or something?”
She blushed a little. “I don’t know.”
“Well,” Barry turned with a flourish. “I’ve been inspecting our new toy all night. It’s not of our period.”
“What do you mean?”
“Look at it.” Barry gestured at the machine. “There are no circuits or computer chips, not even vacuum tube bulbs! It has all these valves, like a steam engine, or some other sort of pressure system. It’s amazing. It’s either from very long ago or…”
I eyed the big bronze egg. “Or what?”
Barry shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s advanced. I’ve never seen anything like this.”
“We’re stone cutters.” Roger leaned on the wall and stared at the machine. “How would we know anyway?”
Barry took a bite of his donut. “I’m telling you, I look at this thing and I know.” He chewed for a moment. “That’s why I had Findlay check it.”
“What!” Roger jumped up. “Chris Findlay? The computer geek? What’s he getting involved for?”
“Why not?” Barry shrugged. “What’s to fear?”
“It’s our discovery, Barry!” Roger’s face turned red. “You—you had no right to!”
“To what?” Barry cocked his head. “To get help? To seek an opinion from somebody who might know something? A minute ago you implied that very thing!”
Melissa waved her hand. “Slow down, boys. Barry’s right. We need expert eyes on this thing. People who’d know more about machines than us. Despite what Peeky saw at the mine yesterday…” She glanced at me out of the corner of her eye. “…of the machine, it’s not just an old washer-dryer or bicycle built for two. But,” she turned back to Barry “you should have consulted us before getting anybody else involved. It’s not your toy, it’s our toy.”
Eyes cast downward, Barry nodded. “Point taken.”
She let him stew for a moment. “So? What did Findlay say?”
He grinned. “It blew his little computer geek mind. He’s never seen anything like it, either.”
I forced down my excitement. “How did you even get him here to look at it? It was after midnight when we left you.”
“I checked to see who might be up playing Warcraft. Those computer guys never sleep. He was online, so I called him.”
“And he dropped everything in the middle of the night to rush over?”
Barry nodded, munching on his donut. “Pretty much.”
“What did he think it was?”
“After checking over it with me for a few hours, Findlay and I are of the same opinion.” Barry wiped some sugar from the corner of his mouth and folded his arms, leaning back on his kitchen counter.
I stared at him. “Which is?”
“Well,” Barry seemed to enjoy the suspense but also appeared not quite sure how to tell us. “It appears that what we have here… is some sort of machine for moving through what Einstein referred to as the blanket of the time space continuum.”
“Oh, for…” Roger ran his hand over his face. “What the hell does that mean?”
“That means it’s a time machine.” Melissa gazed at the machine, her voice a whisper.
Barry nodded.
There was a long silence as we sat there, perplexed and amazed, looking at the odd, oval machine in Barry’s living room.
“Geez, what bullshit!” Roger laughed. “You had me going there for a second!”
Melissa didn’t blink. “Does it work?”
“Of course it doesn’t work.” Roger grabbed his head. “There’s no such thing as time travel. Even Einstein argued against it. This is some grad student’s attempt at stupidity, or a prank, or -”
He went on, but I could see she wasn’t listening. She was completely focused on Barry and his calm lack of an answer.
Against the backdrop of Roger’s protests, she asked Barry again. “Does it work?”
“Maybe.” A smile tugged at Barry’s lips.
That stopped Roger. “What?”
“Findlay is coming over again after class today.” Barry slid a hand along the oval frame. “I spent all night going over this thing, putting a reason behind every piece of technology I could see in front of me. Why these gauges, why that many knobs." He circled the machine. "The pieces started to come together in a strange pattern that I couldn’t recognize. Like the four blind monks who each felt a different part of the elephant, you know?” He sat down on the edge of his desk. “I needed somebody to look at the pieces and tell me what it said to them, in their area of expertise. So I started with Findlay.”
I didn’t understand. “A computer science whiz?”
“Findlay’s a computer engineer. He builds the things that drive the computers. I started with him, intending to go right down the line: computer science, engineering, physics, mathematics. But I got lucky. He and I started asking the same questions about what we were seeing, and after a while, there were only so many possible answers.”
Melissa stood and went over to the machine, placing her hand on its bronze skin.
Barry drummed his fingers on his thighs. “It’s really an amazing discovery.”
“Were you both smoking crack?” Roger walked up to Barry. “A time machine? Even if it does turn out to be real, the computer geeks will steal the whole thing out from under us. Their department has all the funding, too. They’ll make it their property and we’ll never see it again!”
Melissa appeared unconcerned. Her eyes never left Barry’s. “Do you think it will work?”
The smile crept back onto his face. “I do. So does Findlay.”
“Then you’re both crazy, Barry.” Roger paced around the room. “Or high.”
Melissa waved at him. “Roger, shut up for a second. Barry, give me your word: if we make this thing work, even with Findlay’s help, we keep it in our department. Paleontology.”
Barry folded his arms and eyed the machine. “I think Findlay’s too eager to understand the technology to consider pissing us off and never seeing it again. He’ll do whatever we ask.”
She nodded slowly. “Okay, then.” Melissa turned and dangled her car keys. “I’ve gotta get to class. We’ll look at it tonight – all of us – and make a decision.”
“About what?” I asked.
Barry answered for her, grinning. “About whether to go public with our findings, of course.”
Chapter Seven
“Go public!” Roger’s face turned red. He pointed at the TV in the corner. “You mean, go embarrass ourselves on television and in the press?”
Melissa tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “It’s a good idea. It would mean headlines. National attention. On our program for a change. That could equate to some big funding.”
“Fame! Fortune!” Barry laughed.
“I don’t know about this.” Roger ran his hands through his hair and stared out the window. “Maybe.”
“Publicity.” Barry leaned on the couch. “What’s wrong with that?”
I couldn’t tell if Barry was playing with us or not. I certainly wasn’t going to ask. Keeping my mouth shut and my excitement under control was my best bet.
Roger walked over to
him. “What’s wrong with publicity? Plenty. I know how your mind works. If you thought you could generate some buzz with a stunt, you’d do it. But something like this, so crazy sounding… it could blow up in our faces, man. Then we’re embarrassed on the national stage and lose the little funding we have.”
“Unless it’s a real time machine that actually works,” Melissa said. “Then, it’s a different story.”
Roger’s mouth hung open.
“Which is why we need to test it first.” Barry glanced around at us. “And to keep Findlay in the circle.”
“Geez.” Roger shook his head. “You mean keep him quiet.”
“Exactly.”
The scowl on Roger’s face grew larger. “He never should have been in the circle in the first place. That guy Findlay is a wild card.”
“Yeah.” Melissa sighed. “Why didn’t you call someone like Bill Cicero? Bill’s discreet.”
Barry’s mouth opened but he didn’t speak. He glanced at Melissa. “Cicero?” Then he recouped, shaking it off. “He’s… not taking classes this summer.”
“Then he’s just back home in Miami.” Roger threw his hands up. “That's a three hour drive. He would've come over here for something like this.”
Barry glared at him. “I made the decision.”
“It wasn’t your call to make!”
“Why not?” Barry said. “It’s my discovery.”
“What!” Roger’s eyes widened. “We were all there!”
“Were we?” Barry narrowed his eyes. “I found it. I’m the one who studied the topography and determined the dig site. Riff helped me dig it up. What did you do, Roger? I mean, besides get naked and try to get some with your ex?”
Roger would have punched him but Melissa beat him to it. She slapped Barry hard across the face. It sounded like a gunshot. Barry was caught off guard and fell back on his desk before he could catch himself.
Hell, it practically made my ears ring. I stepped between them. “Okay, okay, that’s enough.”
She stood, teeth gritted, cheeks turning red. I put my hand on her arm. “Melissa...”
Still glaring at Barry, she pulled her arm away and turned in a huff, storming off toward the kitchen.
