We will call him X. The letter X is similar to the first letter of the Greek word Chronos, or TIME. X is fitting. He is unmarried, with few family ties.
It has been a difficult process recruiting him, on many levels. First, there is the language barrier. He is French, and let’s just say that his fluency in English lies somewhere between crippling and tragic. (His credentials, though, are off the charts.) The money, predictably, secured his attention, but it took considerable persuasion to convince him who we were, and WHEN we were from (and rightly so).
Larry took what I call the “Biblical” route—using prophecy to confirm veracity. We selected certain events that are not really predictable in the ordinary sense, and then told him the outcome ahead of time.
Ken’s internal sports encyclopedia really helped once again. Last Saturday, on November 9th, it was the famous football “Game of the Century” between Army and Notre Dame at Yankee Stadium. The game, in a rare event, ended in a tie: zero, zero. Ken wrote it all down, on Friday, the night before. X was very impressed, but still, we sensed, needed more.
My geological index sealed the deal. I told him last Thursday that there would be a devastating earthquake, over a 7.0 in Chile, killing well over a thousand people on Sunday. Sporting events might be able to be predicted, since you know there will be a game, and the relative strengths and weaknesses of the two teams, but precisely predicting a geological event, in 1946, that is well-nigh irrefutable.
News travels a bit slow, but by late yesterday, reports of the destruction in South America started coming in. X was convinced. And if he ever needs more, we will be more than ready. Winners of political races, discoveries, tragedies…all at our disposal. Our problem is not in proving that we are from the future, our problem is enabling X to help us get back there before anyone discovers us or betrays us. We can’t be naive; he will have to be monitored continuously. Many corporations in the world would offer millions, and some governments even billions of dollars for access to our knowledge.
It is a paradox. We have to trust him with our futures, yet we can’t trust him—period.
We are leaving tomorrow to head back to Normal, now as a group of four. The plan is for X to live at my house, at least for now. He can’t really interact with the people of the town, so I will take care of him, and he can start “setting up shop” in my garage.
Larry has already been attempting to give X our limited knowledge of time-jump-phenomena, mainly the lightning part. It’s hard to understand what he says, but we think it is something about studying the issue of why NOW? Why 1946? Why not earlier or later? Eventually we will have to answer the other big question: WHY NORMAL?
Of course, there could be Jumpers elsewhere. Who knows? Well, time to stop writing and time to start packing for the train ride home. Goodbye, Washington, D.C. (And no, I did NOT get a chance to see or meet President “Give ‘em-Hell Harry” Truman. That would have been amazing.) He might be in Florida at the Little White House anyway. I know he liked (likes) to spend winters there.
CHAPTER 22
He had seen her act like this before, so he shouldn’t have been surprised.
But it was quite obvious that Shep still didn’t like it.
In the big scheme of things, it didn’t really matter. Denver was just the latest toy in Ellen’s toy box. The newness would fade.
Shep joined Stonecroft and Papineau as they gathered near the doorway to gauge the newcomer’s reaction.
Denver crossed the threshold into a surreal environment, not quite Wonderland, but definitely a room to make one wonder.
He stepped out onto a suspended metal mesh transom about four feet wide and roughly fifteen feet long. He peered up and around. The room was almost spherical, about twenty feet in diameter, and white. Very white. Interesting…a reflective coating of some sort. He felt like he was inside a huge, hollow ping pong ball.
Ellen hung back, arms folded, and called out, “What do you think of our little baby?” She motioned toward the far end of the metal walkway.
The contraption was elegantly simple, triangular in shape, and roughly seven feet high. The sides were composed of three shiny metal tubes, each a little wider than a baseball bat, with thin fins spaced along their lengths, not unlike a large radiator. Thick, insulated wires branched out of each of the three vertices and disappeared into the curved walls. Denver eased up near it, but not too close.
“It won’t hurt you,” Ellen yelled, making him flinch. She stated the obvious. “It’s not on right now.”
Denver waved. “Uh, thanks.” With childlike curiosity he traced a finger along the fins. He wasn’t sure why he did it, but he stabbed his arm timidly through the open air in the center of it. Nothing.
In his concentration, he didn’t sense Ellen walking up right behind him and she whispered into his ear. “What did it feel like?”
This time he was pretty sure both of his feet left the floor. “Lemme guess,” he said. “You double majored in college. First, in Physics, and then in the Psychology of Human Surprise?”
She feigned a cute, coy look. “You read my resume!”
“You shouldn’t have wasted your money on your second degree. Trust me. You’re a natural.”
“Well, you might be right about the second one, but you’re definitely wrong about the first one. Nurse. I have my RN.”
He rolled his eyes. “Great. With your natural talent you will probably give me a heart attack, and with your education you can…revive me.”
“Hey, a girl’s got to have a hobby. Especially a girl trapped over ten years in the past.”
He glanced down at her badge. 1968. She moved past him and caressed the fins herself. “I liked Custer.”
Now that was an odd statement. Denver stared. “Come again? The Little Big Horn guy?”
“Custer. Somehow no one thought that the name Continuously Sustainable Temporal Rift had any endearing or memorable qualities. It kinda spells Custer. CSTR, so we just call it our Jump Portal.”
Denver thought for a moment and smiled. “It was probably for the best. I mean, who wants to step into a machine whose name is synonymous with meeting your doom?”
Ellen rolled her eyes at his morbid humor.
He stepped back and raised his arms in admiration. “It's like something from a fantasy, or, or science fiction.”
“In this subterranean ward,” boomed an approaching Doc Stonecroft, “magic and science are essentially synonymous. With each successive iteration we employ, our result approaches a more stable rift. You will see, Mr. Collins, that the term fantasy is merely the temporary placeholder for immature technology.”
Ellen nodded in agreement. “Once we dial this thing in, once we work out all the problems, and we have a stable wormhole, we should be able to just jump right in.”
Denver glanced at her, then at the contraption. He muttered to himself.
”Just call me Alice.”
CHAPTER 23
It wasn’t all that uncommon on a Friday, but it was much earlier than usual for Betty Larson to shut down the office of the Normal Journal. As she dropped the last set of blinds, two shirtless little boys chased a wayward puppy, dragging its leash, past the front windows. She paused for a brief moment and grinned at the fool’s errand as it unfolded. Normal was a small town, but Meandering Mutt Dodges Detention was not too high on her list for an upcoming headline.
Not that she hadn’t written and used some catchy but worthless alliterations over the past three years, but there are limits, even for a reporter. One can only stomach for so long all the various combinations of Perplexed Police, or Big Business Breakup, or, her personal favorite, Female Fescue Farmer Finds Famous Photos. But every newspaper editor knows that the first rule of reporting on a slow day is: “news is what you make it.”
Drumming up credible stories hadn’t been her only challenge since she took the editor’s position three summers ago. Just being credible at all had been a daily, uphill, and often, losing battle. All else being
equal, she started her role with two strikes against her from day one. First, she was fairly new to the area and outsiders in Normal are on an unspoken scale somewhere between Greedy Lawyers and Horse Thieves, and secondly, well, she was a she. The Second World War had begun to erase some of the stigma surrounding professional women, but in the Midwest, gender bias was often elevated to an art form.
She caught her own reflection in the glass just before the blinds went down. Her black hair was pulled back, making it look shorter than it actually was. She turned gracefully side to side, considering her appearance. She didn’t look masculine, and she had no desire to be treated just like a man, but in 1956, maybe a little less like a woman.
The blinds finally dropped and she slapped her hand across a wall switch, extinguishing the foyer and front counter lights. As Betty moved towards the back, she stopped and examined a few invoices and tickets at the counter.
I probably should work on these.
But after a few seconds of trying to drum up desire, she just filed it all away loosely in a small box below the register. She wasn’t a procrastinator, for sure, but neither her head nor her heart were within fifty miles of accounting paperwork this day.
She moved down the short hallway and turned left into her office sanctuary, heading straight toward a large oil painting of a desert sunset on the far wall. It was a leftover relic from the previous editor, and as far as she could determine, from two or three editors before that. The only thing Betty had changed was the frame a year ago. She stopped mere inches in front of it and grabbed the artwork like a steering wheel. With a modicum of effort she lifted it up and over and gently set it down against the wall at her feet.
She wasn’t thrilled with the canvas painting, but it made an adequate cover for her small office safe embedded in the wall. Betty spun through the first three numbers in quick succession, but had to pause on the final one.
Oh, yes, 31. Click.
She turned the handle, and the thick metal door slowly swung outward. She retrieved a cigar box-sized wooden chest, and transported it to her cluttered, yet functional desk. A small key from her top desk drawer released the tiny padlock adorning the front.
She set the lock down and cracked the lid with all the anticipation of Christmas morning. She peered down at a random collection of mysterious objects that no person from that era could ever be expected to fully understand. It was, perhaps, the most unique assortment of items in the world, bar none. Betty had spent hours playing out scenarios and deducing potential explanations for them individually, and for the collection as a whole.
All the common question words, including Who, What, Where, and Why, were probed, over and over. But a new investigative word was gaining momentum in her mind—When.
Her latest acquisition may have held the key to that very issue. She popped her purse open and withdrew Denver’s hastily tipped and torn five dollar bill. She scanned it for the date once again…2013.
2013. Nearly sixty years into the future.
Is that what all this is about: the future?
The olive-drab phone on her desk started ringing and it jolted Betty back from her reporter’s thirst for that next big story. She looked over at the phone with no intent of answering.
She lowered the money, or whatever it was, down into the box and locked the lid back in place. In that moment, all of the private struggles and public hardships she had endured over the past three years were, at least for now, worth it after all.
That five dollar bill didn’t just represent buying power: it could very well represent power itself.
CHAPTER 24
Denver squinted and bit his bottom lip. “This is all so incredible. But, how are you funded? This stuff must cost a fortune. I doubt you could sell enough windows to pay for all of this. Do you guys cook meth down here?”
Shep glanced over at Doc. “Uh, cooking?”
“Narcotics, Mr. Sheppard,” Doc clarified as he looked up from his work. “Drugs.”
Shep got it. “Oh...oh, no, no. We use a method a lot more fun,” Shep explained, “a lot less dangerous, and only slightly more legal.” He leaned in, and Denver matched his move. “We gamble.”
Denver was almost disappointed. He had expected a more mysterious or exciting source for cash flow. Gambling? Roulette wheels, blackjack, and slot machines? Denver vented his misgivings, “But, how? Everyone knows that in the long run, the house always wins. It’s called gambling for a reason. It’s based on uncertainty.”
Shep raised his eyebrows and raised a wagging finger. “Correction, the house always wins; unless, of course, the house is being cheated.”
“Well, tell me, Danny Ocean, what's your method—stacked cards, rigged dice, loaded roulette balls?”
Shep grinned and lowered his voice. “Nope. Sports scores.”
The rest of the crew seemed to be waiting for the inevitable moment that the light bulb would come on in Denver’s mind. It took a few moments, but it did.
“Because you know the future, you know—”
“We know the final scores of big ball games,” Shep replied. “Winners, losers, sometimes even total points. You name it. In the old days, it was horse races. But now, we send a couple of guys out to Las Vegas whenever our funds get low. We win big, but not too big, we keep it under the radar, and we switch up who we send each time.” He slapped Denver on the shoulder. “Who knows, maybe you can go with us next time. Lights, girls, lots of action. Did I mention girls?”
Ellen Finegan grabbed a clipboard. “I'm sorry to break into your delightful discussion of dancing girls, dancing lights, and boatloads of easy cash, but we have fixed our power problem and are about ready to begin the next phase of our test. You can stay for the show, if you’d like.”
Shep jumped up, and Denver was left in the dust as a sudden flurry of activity and tension developed in the chamber. Dr. Papineau muttered with indecipherable diatribes, and Doc Stonecroft and Ellen intermittently conferred with each other and adjusted equipment.
Denver caught Ellen between duties and followed her around. “So what's going on?”
She slowed down moderately to bring him up to speed. “We're testing our synchronized capacitor relays. It would've been finished earlier, but we had a little power outage issue.” She messed with a large dial and looked at her clipboard.
“Anyway, within the next several minutes our reactor will complete its current charging cycle. Here, you’re gonna need these.” She snatched a pair of dark goggles and dropped them in his hands.
“What happens after that, charging, capacitor, sync thing?” he asked.
She stopped moving and turned to face him. “Lightning, Mr. Collins. Beautiful, powerful, predictable—lightning.”
He didn’t even know how to respond, but before he could, Dr. Papineau began making wild motions.
“Viens ici, maintenant!”
Ellen and Doc rushed over to him, concentrating on the meter he was pointing at. Denver only knew three words in French, but the terror in the eyes of the scientist required no interpretation.
Even Doc’s confident and positive appearance collapsed as Ellen hurried over to another device and made several adjustments. Denver was sure he saw the remaining color drain out of Ellen’s already fair skin.
Papineau shook his head violently. Just above Ellen, a red light flashed, and a warning alarm’s piercing wail added to the confusion.
Shep scrambled over to Ellen. “What's wrong?”
Her eyes darted around a console. ”There's been a failure in the primary reactor cooling system. Doc! Doc! Engage the backup!”
Stonecroft flipped a small lid and depressed a button. He glanced up at the warning light. It continued flashing, and the alarm increased in intensity.
Denver had to yell to be heard. “Just how bad is it?”
“Well, Mr. Collins,“ Doc offered, “to put this potential catastrophe into perspective, consider a nuclear meltdown that, if gone critical, would puncture a gaping hole into the
very crust of the earth, poisoning the water table, and perhaps unleashing enough magma to inundate the area with several meters of lava and ash!”
Denver backed toward the exit, trying to stay out of the way of the emergency response. He came close to colliding with Chief McCloud who was bounding down the stairs and burst into the room. “The alarm, what's wrong?”
“We are in the late stages of a Level Three Emergency,” Doc called out over his shoulder.
“Should I evacuate the town?” McCloud demanded.
“It would be an exercise in futility, Chief McCloud. If this goes critical, everyone within a few miles radius is, well…” Doc hesitated and adjusted his spectacles.
“To put it bluntly, my friend, everyone is dead already!”
Journal entry number 129
Tuesday, December 24, 1946
I am about to spend my fourth major holiday in Normal. It is Christmas Eve. The undeniable fact that three outsiders like us have stepped through time, almost miraculously, brings the essential tenets of Christmas into the arena of discussion. The idea that the ultimate outsider, God, has stepped into time, miraculously, well, Ken is highly uncomfortable with that prospect.
Larry largely avoids any theological or philosophical implications of our plight, but Ken and I, especially of late, seem to approach these topics regularly, and with passionate and mostly polite differences.
The tradition of gift giving, of a selfless act to benefit others, has made me evaluate our situation here. Our accumulating financial successes and our potential time-travel successes which may grow as well—are unintentionally creating an environment of temptation.
Paradigm Rift: Book One of the Back to Normal Series Page 10
