by E. C. Myers
Jena loved the past, largely because of her father's job as a historian at the Paley Center for Media in New York. She'd grown up watching old television programs like Leave It to Beaver, The Donna Reed Show, The Patty Duke Show, and The Twilight Zone. And now she was practically in one of her favorite shows.
They explored the campus. Ephraim felt like he was on the set of a period film. Every man they saw walking around the campus wore a suit, many of them sporting stylish fedoras. They all looked at Ephraim, Nathaniel, and Jena curiously—especially Jena. Some of them looked annoyed.
“They act like they've never seen a girl,” Jena said.
“It's more likely they've never seen a camcorder,” Ephraim said.
“Oh.” She checked the screen one last time, then switched it off, stowing it in her purse. “No phantoms, by the way.”
They continued down the walkway.
“They're still staring at me,” she said through tight lips. “I know women weren't admitted here until ’61, but still.”
Nathaniel cleared his throat. “Asian women were considered a bit…exotic in this time period.”
She glared at him.
A man in a gray suit and a loosened, skinny tie was headed down the path toward them. As he brushed past Jena, he mumbled something under his breath that made her stop in her tracks. She looked as if she had just been slapped.
“What's wrong?” Ephraim asked. She didn't say anything. “Jena?” he asked softly.
Jena's face flushed. “That…” She swallowed. “He called me a…” She choked back a breath and her lower lip quivered.
“What?” Ephraim asked.
Jena lowered her head and balled her fists. Tears dripped from her eyes. “And he told me to go home to China.” She spat the words out.
Ephraim took a step after the man, but Nathaniel grabbed the back of his shirt.
“Let go! Whatever he said to Jena he can say to me,” Ephraim said.
“No,” Jena said. She drew in a rattling breath and wiped her eyes dry with a sleeve, smearing mascara on the inside of her arm. She stared at the black streak on the thin white fabric. “I don't want to hear it again.”
“But—” Ephraim said.
“It's a different era, Eph,” Nathaniel said. Ephraim glowered at him.
“Of course that's no excuse,” Nathaniel said quickly. “But we aren't here to open their eyes and alter society. We have a mission.”
“Nathaniel's right,” Jena said. “Let it go. Kids used to call me names like that. Worse. Usually I don't pay any attention; people like that are just ignorant. I was just shocked to hear it here.” She looked up. “It isn't like it is on TV. Not that you saw Asians on TV back then.”
“You okay?” Nathaniel asked.
“Let's just get on with this,” Jena said. “All right?” She looked at Ephraim.
“If you say so,” Ephraim said. He adjusted the stretched collar of his shirt.
If Ephraim hadn't taken after his mother's Scottish blood more than his father's Puerto Rican roots, he might have had to deal with that kind of behavior growing up, too. He didn't see how Jena could brush it off so easily. Maybe not so easily, looking at her now.
Nathaniel looked around. “We have to find out what year we're in. Perhaps we can find a campus newspaper.”
There was another young man on the lawn, standing around and reading a book but sneaking curious glances at Jena.
“What?” Jena yelled at him, hands on her hips.
The man snapped out of it and dropped his thick book to the grass. Ephraim grinned. He sympathized completely—Jena had that effect on a lot of guys.
“What are you looking at?” Jena asked.
His eyes widened behind his wire-frame spectacles. “M-me?” he asked.
“Yeah, you,” Jena said.
“I, ah.” His shoulders hunched. “I'm sorry about that. I didn't mean to stare, but I've never seen a woman more beautiful than you. I've never seen a—”
“Stop there,” Ephraim advised.
The young man had a soft voice and a British accent. He crouched to pick up his textbook. He fumbled it, and it spilled open facedown on the ground. Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics. He grabbed it by its spine and shook it out.
Jena opened her mouth, but words didn't come out.
“Come on,” Ephraim muttered.
Jena smiled. “Can you tell us what day it is?” she asked.
The man stood with a perplexed expression. “Why, it's Sunday.”
“No, today's date,” Jena said.
He gave them all a peculiar look. “You must be pulling my leg. Today's the twenty-seventh of May.”
Jena sighed. “For goodness' sake. What's the bloody year?”
“Fifty-four, of course.” He took a step in their direction, but Jena turned away from him, and his stride faltered.
“1954,” Ephraim said.
“Everett started in the fall of ’53. He has to be here,” Jena said.
The student finally moved away, discouraged, reading as he walked. His eyes found Jena one more time, and he tripped over his own feet.
“Jena, you can't just do that,” Nathaniel said.
“Talk to strangers?” she asked. “Sorry, Dad.”
“You're attracting way too much attention,” Nathaniel said.
“That isn't my fault,” she said. “Direct seemed like the best approach. The sooner we get back with Hugh Everett, the sooner we can all get back to our normal lives.”
“It's better to keep a slightly lower profile when you're traveling in time,” Nathaniel said.
“This isn't our past. We aren't going to change our own futures. We won't even change this universe's future, because it hasn't happened yet. Nothing we do here matters.”
“We don't know what impact, if any, our presence will have on this timeline.”
“I don't really care about this timeline,” she said. “Not compared to every other timeline out there—yours and mine. Even Zoe's. Besides, kidnapping Hugh Everett is going to have a significant impact on this world, so I don't think asking a simple question about the day is going to ruin the rest of that young man's life.”
A horn blared, tires screeched, and they heard a sickening thump just outside the Princeton gates. A woman screamed.
The blood drained from Jena's face.
Ephraim darted toward the street and saw a body crumpled by the curb near a stopped Ford Oldsmobile, its engine still running. A nervous little bald man in a pinstripe suit was standing by the driver's side door, staring down at the body in shock. A woman on the other side of the street hurried away without a second glance, hands pressed to her face to cover her sobs.
Ephraim crouched next to the injured man—it was the guy Jena had spoken to only moments before. His textbook was trapped under the car's rear tire, torn to shreds.
Ephraim looked up as Jena slowly approached and saw horror creep over her face as she realized what had happened.
“Is that…?” she said. She lowered herself heavily to her knees on the other side of the body. “Is he…?”
Ephraim fumbled around on the man's wrist, trying to recall the CPR lessons he'd taken at school. He repositioned his fingers and finally found a weak pulse.
“He's alive.” He looked up at the motionless driver. “He needs an ambulance,” he shouted. “Call 911!”
“911 doesn't exist yet,” Jena said softly. She pulled out the cell phone Dr. Kim had given her and stared at it stupidly. “Neither do cell phones.”
“Call for help!” Ephraim shouted. He pointed at the flustered driver and stood up. “You. Get help now.”
The man's mouth opened and closed silently like a fish gasping for air. He jumped back into his car and tore off down the street.
“What the hell?” Ephraim said. “Did you get his plate number?”
“He has to find a payphone,” Nathaniel said. He was breathing heavily from running down the avenue to the street. He leaned over and p
icked something up. A pair of wire-frame spectacles, bent out of shape, one lens with a Y-shaped crack. He squinted an eye and looked at Ephraim with the other through the broken glass.
“There should be a hospital nearby,” Jena said.
She shuddered and flexed her fingers, eyes bright with welling tears. “I did this. If I hadn't yelled at him…”
Nathaniel knelt beside her. “You don't know that. It's just like you said: You haven't changed anything, because none of this has happened before.”
She shook her head. “I talked to him. Distracted him. He would have been safe where he was, or if he'd left sooner he might have crossed the street in time.”
“Or maybe he got in the path of a different car. The dumb kid was reading a book and walking. It was only a matter of time before something happened to him. And when it's your time, it's your time,” Nathaniel said.
“I read while walking,” Jena said.
“Not anymore,” Ephraim said.
Nathaniel gently turned the man's body over, scrutinized his face, then reached into the victim's jacket pocket. He pulled out a brown leather wallet.
“What are you doing?” Ephraim hissed. “We probably aren't supposed to move him. And we definitely aren't supposed to rob him.”
Nathaniel ignored him and thumbed through the cards in the wallet.
Ephraim studied the young man's face. He had a nasty gash on his forehead over the right temple, matted with a fringe of black hair. His skin was turning gray, and his eyelids fluttered rapidly. He was still breathing, though, and he didn't seem to have any broken bones that Ephraim could see. But you couldn't see internal damage.
“It isn't Everett,” Jena said. A moment later, Nathaniel sighed with relief.
“Clifford Marlowe,” he read from the young man's driver's license. He slipped the billfold back where he'd found it. “Good. Now let's get out of here.”
Ephraim stared at him. “You want to leave him bleeding in the road?”
“Help's on the way. The hospital isn't far. We can't do anything for him, and we don't have much time. If the police start asking questions we'll be in trouble. The fake IDs we made are for ’77.”
“I don't know,” Ephraim said.
Ephraim's analog had been hit by a bus. He'd likely died alone, thinking about Zoe. Maybe wishing he had a chance to tell her how much he loved her.
“Someone should be here if he wakes up,” Ephraim said.
“I'll stay,” Jena said. “You two go on. I'll catch up.”
“No,” Nathaniel said. “We're not splitting up. That's never a good idea.”
“I'll just make sure he gets to a hospital,” Jena said. “Besides, you'll have an easier time finding Everett without me attracting unwanted attention.”
Ephraim put his hand over Jena's on the unconscious man's chest, which was rising ever so slightly with his breaths.
“We wouldn't have made it this far without you,” Ephraim said.
Jena glanced down at the injured student. “I have to do this, Eph. You understand?”
He squeezed her hand.
“But since you're so helpless without me, here's something that might come in handy,” she said.
Jena reached into the back pocket of her pants and pulled out the tiny eReader. “Here. I loaded it up with campus maps of Princeton from 1950 through 2030. If this is 1954, it'll be Everett's first year here, which should narrow things down a bit. I'd check the Graduate College first.”
They heard a distinctive siren in the distance. The driver had come through after all.
“See? He'll be okay now,” Ephraim said. “Come with us.”
“We'll meet in front of FitzRandolph Gate in three hours, all right?” She pointed the gates out. “That should give you boys enough time to find Everett. We'll make the hourly window back to Nathaniel's universe.”
Nathaniel offered her the controller. “Take this. Just in case.”
“In case of what?” she asked.
“Take it. If we have to shift out of here quickly with the coin, you can use it to follow us,” Ephraim said. He knew how difficult it was for Nathaniel to give up the controller.
“What could happen?” Jena asked. “The most dangerous thing in 1954 is—”
“The H-Bomb?” Nathaniel said.
“Right,” Jena said. “I don't think anyone's going to bomb Princeton.”
But she dropped the controller in her purse and offered him the camcorder. “Trade you?”
Nathaniel hung the camera strap around his neck and tucked it discreetly inside his sports coat.
“Be careful,” he said.
“We'll meet at the gate in three hours,” Jena reminded them.
Ephraim studied the surroundings. They were on Nassau Street, in front of a small side gate to the left of the larger, closed gates to the campus. It would be hard to miss the ornate wrought-iron entrance, crowned by the Princeton crest and flanked by stone eagles on massive columns.
He leaned over and kissed Jena on the cheek.
Nathaniel pulled Ephraim to his feet and propelled him quickly through the side gate back onto campus.
“Stupid, sentimental girl,” Nathaniel said.
“I like that about her, actually.”
Nathaniel gave him a sidelong look. “You would. I just meant it doesn't make sense to invest so much on one person when so many other lives are at stake.”
“I don't agree with that,” Ephraim said.
“You'll understand one day.”
“When I'm older? I don't think I'll ever want to see anyone die needlessly.”
Nathaniel grunted noncommittally. “So where are we headed?” he asked.
Ephraim consulted the 1954 map of Princeton Jena had pulled up and oriented himself. The 3-D display made the page float in front of his eyes. It also gave him a headache. He pointed west, toward a fancy Gothic bell tower that was unfortunately situated on the outskirts of campus. They had a bit of a hike ahead of them.
Nathaniel lowered himself wearily onto the base of a large bronze statue of a man in a chair. The man was named Andrew Fleming West, according to the plaque Nathaniel slumped against. He draped his jacket over one knee and rolled up the cuff on his left sleeve, then his right. The half-mile walk from the main campus had turned out to be too much for him.
“I wish we could have brought the car,” Nathaniel panted. He wiped sweat from his forehead. “So where are we, navigator?”
“This is Thomson College,” Ephraim said, checking the map. “Where the graduate students supposedly live.”
They stood inside an enclosed courtyard with a large tree at their backs. Behind them to the right loomed Cleveland Tower, and the shorter Pyne Tower was behind them on the left.
Ephraim's stomach twisted, and he doubled over in pain. Cold sweat beaded on his forehead. He clenched his fists and waited for the wave of nausea to pass. He looked up and through a damp fringe of bangs he saw Nathaniel lean back against the statue, his face incredibly pale. He had one hand pressed to his left shoulder.
“You okay?” Ephraim asked. He straightened and took a hesitant step forward, unsure of his balance.
Nathaniel groaned. He opened his eyes.
“Did I just have a heart attack?” Nathaniel asked. “Am I dead?”
“It was just quantum reflux,” Ephraim said.
“Nice,” Nathaniel said. He checked his watch. “It's five o'clock. Right on schedule,” he said.
“The LCD was just switched off?” Ephraim asked. “How could we feel it here?”
“Everything's entangled on the quantum level. Our presence must have linked the two universes,” Nathaniel said.
He turned on the camera and panned it over the grounds. Despite himself, Ephraim smiled because he was suddenly reminded of his best friend doing the same thing only yesterday at prom.
“Picking anything up?” Ephraim asked.
“A couple of phantoms, but it doesn't look too—” Nathaniel suddenly jerked the ca
mera to his left and up, pointed over Ephraim's shoulder.
“What?” Ephraim asked.
“I spoke too soon. Look at this.”
Ephraim moved beside Nathaniel and watched the camera's screen. The picture crackled as he came near and then became even clearer. He saw the faint outline of a tower in the distance, back the way they'd come. It was translucent in the evening sunlight, but it looked just like Cleveland Tower, the building immediately to their right.
“That's back on the main campus, where we just came from,” Ephraim said. “What's it doing there?”
“It must be bleeding through from a parallel universe,” Nathaniel said. “Not good.”
“Well, that would have saved us the walk.”
As they watched, the tower faded away and Ephraim felt a tightness release in his body that he hadn't known was there. The time on his watch clicked over to 5:02.
“She's supposed to keep the window open for just thirty seconds,” Nathaniel said. “I guess she kept it open longer to give us a chance to get back.”
“Or Zoe did,” Ephraim said.
“We really can't linger here any longer than necessary. Three hours, with that happening every hour, might be pushing our luck.” Nathaniel closed the camera and slowly pulled himself to his feet. “Every time they switch off the LCD, this universe is vulnerable.”
“The Charon device will protect us, won't it?”
Nathaniel shook his head. “The coin and controller are separated right now. Maybe that's affecting things too. This is all guesswork until we find Dr. Everett. Speaking of which…”
Ephraim looked around the courtyard. There were more than a dozen entryways to the buildings around them.
“Any idea where Everett's room is?” Nathaniel asked.
Ephraim paged through Jena's notes. “The records aren't that detailed,” he said. “If rooms were randomly assigned, Everett could have occupied any of them in different universes.”
“Is he behind door number one? Door number two? Or door number three?”
Ephraim located the first entryway on the map and pointed it out. “We may as well start at one,” he said. “I'm hoping for fabulous prizes.”
