Coin #2 - Quantum Coin

by E. C. Myers

  He'd convinced Jena to leave the dance floor with him and Zoe before they attracted any more attention. The limo was the most private place he could think of on short notice. But he hadn't planned on having an audience; after what they'd seen, there was no way to ditch the Morales sisters and Nathan. With Nathan's camera recording the proceedings, the whole thing felt like Ephraim on Trial.

  Shelley nodded. “Who the hell is this and why was Ephraim kissing her?” she asked.

  “And why does she look like Jena?” Mary asked.

  Ephraim took a deep breath. He didn't know where to start explaining. He turned around first to make sure the divider was up and that the driver couldn't hear them.

  “Her name's Zoe,” Jena said. “Zoe Kim. She's me. In a parallel universe.”

  Mary snorted. “Yeah, right. Who is she really, Jena?”

  Shelley frowned, staring at Zoe.

  Zoe looked at Jena in surprise. “He told you?” Zoe asked.

  Jena fingered the silver chain of her necklace thoughtfully. “He told me the day I saw him pop from thin air into my backyard. But on some level, I didn't completely believe him. I guess I do now.”

  “I told her everything,” Ephraim said.

  “Not quite everything,” Jena said. “I would like to know why you were kissing Zoe.”

  “I'm sorry you saw that,” he said.

  Jena narrowed her eyes. “You're sorry it happened, or you're sorry I saw it?”

  “Both?” Ephraim glanced at Zoe apologetically. “Look, I didn't have any reason not to assume she was you. I thought all that was over.”

  He wiped his sweaty hands on the knees of his pants. They slid across the smooth synthetic fabric. He couldn't get a grip. “I'm sorry I made a mistake,” he said.

  “A mistake,” Zoe said softly. She turned to Jena. “It was a mistake. I kissed Ephraim. But I wish I hadn't.”

  Ephraim bunched his eyebrows together.

  “I didn't know you two were together, Jena,” Zoe said. “I should have expected it, I guess. It's been a year. It's my fault for not stopping to think about it. So if you're angry, be angry at me.”

  “Oh, I'm plenty pissed at both of you,” Jena said. “He should have realized sooner.”

  “He isn't the most observant guy sometimes,” Zoe said.

  “Most of the time,” Jena said.

  “True,” Zoe said.

  “But still,” Jena said. “That's not really an excuse.”

  “No, it isn't,” Zoe said.

  “This is so screwed up,” Ephraim said. While dating twins might be one of Nathan's dreams, this was more of a nightmare. “Give me a tiny break. Your hair was much longer last summer, Zoe, but now it's as short as Jena's. Exactly like Jena's. I mean, how many people can tell Mary and Shelley apart?”

  “I can,” Jena said.

  “Me too,” Nathan said. He ducked back behind his camcorder.

  “Yup,” Zoe said. “And I just met them.”

  Thanks for the help, Zoe.

  But Ephraim had to admit he could tell the Morales twins apart too, even when they weren't color-coded like tonight in their matching lavender and rose mini dresses. It had taken a while, but once you got to know them, it was easy to distinguish between them. Mary's knees were touching, her legs tucked back at an angle, but Shelley's long legs were extended and crossed at the ankles. It was the little details.

  That was the problem. He should have known it was Zoe, but somehow he'd missed the clues. Or ignored them.

  “At least I can tell the difference in a blind taste test,” he muttered.

  Nathan chuckled. Zoe smiled for a second before regaining her stern composure.

  Despite the circumstances, it was good to see her again. It had taken months for him to stop being reminded of Zoe every time he looked at Jena.

  “Will someone please tell us what's going on? This…” Mary waved her hand at Jena and Zoe. “This is just—”

  “Freaky,” Shelley said.

  Ephraim sighed. “Jena was telling the truth. Zoe is kind of a doppelganger, what we call an analog of her: a double from another reality. They're twins like you, sort of like quantum sisters.”

  “So they're the same person?” Shelley asked.

  “You actually buy this?” Mary asked.

  Shelley shushed her. Mary looked surprised.

  “Biologically, yes, they're the same person,” Ephraim said. “They might even have the same fingerprints. But they're as much unique individuals as you and Mary are.”

  Shelley smiled.

  “I know you and Jena read a lot of fantasy, but I prefer fact over fiction, Ephraim,” Mary said.

  “It isn't fantasy. It's science,” Shelley said.

  Mary rolled her eyes. “You're so gullible, sis.”

  “Am not,” Shelley said. “He's talking about the multiverse.”

  “The multiverse,” Mary said. “What?”

  “Nathan's been loaning me his comic books.” Shelley blushed. “The alternate reality stories are my favorites. The multiverse is what they call a collection of multiple universes.”

  Ephraim and Jena exchanged incredulous glances.

  “It's kind of cool,” Shelley said. “I like the idea of all you poor singletons having twins somewhere out there. Or right here, as it turns out.” She smiled.

  “You've been spending time with Geekazoid?” Mary asked. She shot a scornful look at Nathan.

  “We started talking about comics at Ephraim's birthday party last August. I mentioned the only ones I read were the little strips in Mama's Sunday Journal News. Then a comic book he'd recommended appeared in my locker with Post-It notes on the pages, explaining the backstory with cute little drawings.” She smiled. “After I finished reading it, I slipped it into his locker.”

  “And I left another one for her,” Nathan said. Apparently Ephraim wasn't the only one keeping secrets.

  “We've been exchanging them every day for a few months.” Shelley's face was bright pink now.

  “You whore,” Mary said.

  Zoe stretched her legs out. “Listen, long story short: there are many parallel universes where lots of things are pretty much the same, but some little things are really different. And vice versa. Most of them have alternate versions of all of us, doubles that we call ‘analogs.’ For instance, in one universe, analogs of Shelley and Nathan are swapping more than just comic books.”

  “Awesome,” Nathan said.

  “Ew,” Mary said.

  “And in another universe, Nathan is dead,” Zoe said, looking at her nails casually.

  “Not awesome,” Nathan said. He glanced at Ephraim. “You never mentioned any of this to me.” His expression showed how hurt he was.

  “Can you blame me? It's hard to explain,” Ephraim said.

  “But you told Jena.”

  “That's different. She saw me arrive in this universe. She saw Zoe leave. I had to tell her what was going on. Would you have believed me?”

  “Probably not,” Nathan said. “But I would have tried, if you had trusted me.”

  “It's not that I didn't trust you,” Ephraim lied. He glanced at Zoe. No help there. “It's complicated.”

  “The multiverse is just theoretical though,” Shelley said softly, almost defensively.

  “Do I look theoretical to you?” Zoe said.

  Shelley studied her and Jena. “It shouldn't be possible to move between parallel universes.”

  “And yet here I am,” Zoe said.

  “About that,” Ephraim said. “You were supposed to destroy the controller.”

  “I did.” Zoe pulled the controller from her pocket. “Mostly. I dismantled it after you left, but I kept the parts. I thought that would be enough.” She shrugged. “Nathaniel said we might need it again someday. And today's that day.”

  “Nathaniel?” Nathan asked. “Is he one of my, uh, ‘analogs’?”

  “He's you from a universe twenty-five years ahead of ours,” Ephraim said. It felt good t
o be sharing all of this with his friend finally. It would have been better if the situation hadn't forced him into it, though if Zoe hadn't returned, he probably never would have initiated this conversation.

  “He's a time traveler, too?” Nathan asked.

  “Sort of. His universe's timeline is different from ours.” In that universe, scientists had figured out how to travel to parallel dimensions. Nathaniel and another Ephraim had visited and cataloged other universes, until Nathaniel had gotten stuck in Zoe's universe without his partner.

  Ephraim reached over and took the controller from Zoe. The small device had caused a lot of trouble for them. People had died because of it. It should have been destroyed.

  “That's a cell phone,” Mary said.

  “Looks can be deceiving,” Zoe said.

  “This is a controller,” Ephraim said. “It records coordinates of different universes and lets you program in the one you want to go to.”

  The controller resembled a standard flip phone, with a hinged case, numeric keypad, and a digital display. But it was far more sophisticated than that, perhaps more sophisticated than anything else in the world. This world.

  The controller's blue metal case was scuffed and cracked, and secured in places with duct tape and superglue. He shook it, and something loose rattled inside.

  “I'm pretty sure you've voided the warranty,” he said.

  “I misplaced one of the screws,” Zoe said. “And I couldn't figure out where every little piece fit.”

  Ephraim unfolded it, and the hinge clicked and wobbled. The screen on the top half stayed dark. He rotated his finger around the round depression in the lower half, just above the keypad, where a quarter-sized disc could just fit.

  “Is it broken?” Nathan asked, pointing the camera at it.

  Ephraim handed the controller to Nathan, and the screen blinked on. Nathan nearly dropped it.

  “Whoa,” he said. “How'd I do that?”

  “It only responds to certain people. You and Zoe. And all your analogs from other universes, of course.”

  Ephraim glanced at Jena, realizing that her biometrics could activate it too.

  “Is it radioactive?” Nathan asked.

  “Maybe. Probably,” Ephraim said. “I don't really know what's inside it.”

  Nathan handed it back to him carefully and rubbed his hand on the plush seat. The screen flickered and went out as soon as Nathan's skin lost contact with it. Ephraim passed the controller to Zoe. Their fingers brushed against each other. The hairs on the back of his hand tingled.

  “That's how you got here?” Mary asked. “That thing can travel between dimensions?”

  “There's another piece,” Jena said. She lifted the chain around her neck and drew a silver disc from her cleavage. It dangled in front of her chest, spinning slowly with light glinting dully from its smooth sides.

  Zoe shot Ephraim a look that was both questioning and accusatory.

  The coin had brought Ephraim and Jena together, in a way, and he'd wanted to show her he was firmly committed to her and their universe. He'd thought it little more than a souvenir, with its power drained and the controller gone, and it had felt right to let it go—especially tonight.

  “Your pendant?” Mary asked.

  Jena pulled the necklace over her head and lowered it into Ephraim's palm.

  The metal was warm in his hand, not from weird quantum energy but from prolonged contact with Jena's skin. He got distracted for a moment, thinking about where the coin had just been.

  “Ephraim,” Zoe said.

  He popped the coin out of its bezel, glad he hadn't drilled a hole in it like he'd originally considered doing. He handed the chain back to Jena and held the coin up between forefinger and thumb.

  “This is the coin,” he said.

  “It doesn't look like a coin,” Mary said.

  Zoe flipped open the controller and held it out. Ephraim slotted the blank disc into the round groove in the controller. She pressed a button, and George Washington's head slowly shimmered onto the face of the coin. Ephraim knew the reverse side would now show the island of Puerto Rico.

  “Nice magic trick,” Mary said.

  “It isn't magic or a trick,” Ephraim said. “This coin serves as the guidance system for the controller, a kind of gyro. Combined, they form a portable coheron drive. Or ‘Charon’ for short.”

  “‘Charon’?” Shelley asked.

  “It's a corruption of ‘coherence,’ the quantum effect that forms new universes,” Zoe said.

  “And, of course, a reference to the Greek ferryman who takes dead souls across the river Styx for the price of a coin,” Jena said.

  “And people make fun of our names,” Mary and Shelley said simultaneously.

  “Just like only analogs of me and Nathan can use the controller, only Ephraim and his analogs can handle the coin,” Zoe said.

  Mary and Shelley considered Ephraim. Their matching expressions said, Why him? He'd wondered that himself often enough.

  “Uh. Anyway, the coin draws its power from the controller,” Ephraim said. “It's blank when it's drained, but it's recharging now.”

  “But why does it look like a quarter?” Mary asked. “Why does the controller look like a cell phone?”

  “Nathaniel said my analog carried around the quarter his whole life. I don't know why,” Ephraim said.

  “It's camouflage. Another security feature,” Shelley said. “Just like the restricted users and the complementary components. So if anyone finds one of the pieces, they won't know what they have.”

  Zoe nodded. “That's what my Ephraim thought too.”

  “The controller is used to program dimensional coordinates for a specific universe, but it needs the coin to get there,” Ephraim said. “Either piece of the device can be used independently, in a limited way. I can use the coin alone if I flip it, but it takes me to a universe pretty much randomly. The controller can home in on the coin though and shift to the same universe.”

  “Whoever invented the Charon device was paranoid,” Shelley said.

  “Wouldn't you be if you developed something this powerful?” Zoe asked.

  “It just seems too dangerous to use at all,” Shelley said.

  “I agree,” Ephraim said. “In any case, you wouldn't want to use the coin by itself if you could help it. Without contact with the controller, I switch places with my analog when I shift to his universe,” Ephraim said.

  Shelley shuddered. “Creepy…”

  “I don't switch bodies,” Ephraim said. “We just exchange quantum positions. Clothes and everything go with you.”

  “So you could use the coin to displace your analog on purpose?” Nathan asked. “Like, to take over his life?”

  Ephraim exchanged a worried look with Zoe. “Who would want to do something like that, Nathan?”

  “You got me. I'm just saying, that's messed up,” Nathan said.

  Ephraim relaxed. Nathan's analog Nate hadn't had any reservations about doing whatever he wanted, and he had done a lot worse than switch lives with his analogs.

  “Can I come?” Shelley asked. Mary pinched her hard on the forearm. “Ow! I mean, can you take anyone with you?”

  “As long as we're physically touching, sure,” Ephraim said.

  “Don't humor them, sis.” Mary pulled her long brown hair behind her neck. “No,” she said. As if rejecting the notion would reassert her idea of how the world was supposed to work. “There's some other explanation for all of this.”

  “Like what, Mary? You're always so stubborn.” Shelley said. “Ephraim, how did you get mixed up in this?”

  Ephraim quickly explained how he'd discovered the coin a year ago: how a duplicate Ephraim from a parallel universe had brought the coin to their universe and died. Zoe closed her eyes while he related the accident. That duplicate had been her universe's Ephraim. Her boyfriend.

  Ephraim told them about Nathaniel's analog Nate, who had been abusing the technology to steal money, to ho
ard stuff from parallel universes—and to hurt people. Ephraim and Zoe had eventually gotten the controller away from Nate and stranded him in a universe where he couldn't cause any more trouble.

  Ephraim and Zoe had decided that they each belonged in their own universe and that the technology was too dangerous to keep. So they parted ways. Zoe had destroyed the controller, and Ephraim's coin had run out of power.

  “Or at least I thought she'd destroyed the controller,” Ephraim said.

  “Yes. Why did you reassemble it, Zoe?” Jena asked.

  Zoe pursed her lips. “Nathaniel said I had to.”

  “That's my analog from the future?” Nathan asked. “I thought you were from different universes.”

  “We are,” Zoe said.

  “So how did he get in touch with you?” Ephraim asked.

  “Ham radio,” she said.

  Ephraim and Nathan laughed.

  “Really,” Zoe said.

  “Come on,” Jena said.

  “That's the part of this you don't believe?” Mary asked.

  Ephraim stared at Zoe. “You have a radio that can contact other universes? How does that even work?”

  “I made some modifications to boost the sensitivity.”

  “With what?”

  “Pieces from the controller. But it's all modular,” she said. “Nathaniel and I agreed on a schedule. Once a week I scan all the radio bands, listening for him. Most of the time I can't get through, but every couple of months I find the right frequency, and we can talk for a little while.”

  “Why did you two set this up?” Ephraim really meant, Why did you exclude me?

  “It was supposed to be an emergency channel. Just in case.”

  “In case of what?” Ephraim asked.

  “In case he needs us.” Zoe shrugged.

  “‘Us’ as in you and Ephraim?” Jena asked. “For what?”

  “I don't know. But it might have something to do with how I got here.”

  “You didn't track the coin's coordinates with the controller?” Ephraim asked.

  Zoe shook her head. “I tried. But I couldn't lock onto it.”

  “The coin was dead,” Jena said. “So how did you get here?”

  “I don't know. As soon as I got Nathaniel's message, I put the controller back together and turned it on. When I couldn't find a signal from the coin, I got worried. I hoped that even if the coin were drained, it still might retain a latent charge. Most electronics do. If I was close enough to its spatial location in your universe, I might be able to track it.