The Nick of Time

by Mike Parker

  Nick sat alone with his thoughts in the stairwell until half past two in the morning when he was stirred from his doziness by the sound of footsteps climbing the stairs. The men were attempting to walk softly and the few words they spoke were in whispers. Nonetheless, the slightest of sounds echoed up the stairwell to Nick’s ears. As they approached he inched back slightly to ensure he was not spotted. He watched several men slip through the doorway and onto the sixth floor.

  Once the door was closed, Nick exited to the seventh floor and rode the elevator down to the lobby. He found a security guard standing near the front desk and approached him timidly.

  “Can I help you, sir,” the guard asked.

  “Um, yes,” Nick began. “I don’t know if this is important but I noticed one of the doors in from the parking garage had a piece of tape over the latching part, so anyone could open it, even without a key.”

  “Yes sir,” the guard replied politely. “I noticed that earlier and I removed the tape. The building is secure now.”

  “Really?” the time traveler asked, slightly confused. “What time was that?”

  “Around midnight or so.”

  “Hmm, well I just came in that way and it was taped up again. You might want to take a second look.”

  A concerned look swept over the guard’s face. “I will do that right away sir.”

  “Great,” Nick said and turned to walk away. Then, turning back to the guard he added, “Oh, I don’t if this is anything either, but I just passed like half a dozen suspicious looking guys in the stairwell.”

  “Whereabouts?”

  “I think they got out at the sixth floor.”

  “Did you say the sixth floor? That entire floor should be locked down!”

  “Yeah, I’m pretty sure it was the sixth. I was on five and they took the exit right above me.”

  “Thank you, sir,” the guard said moving briskly to the stairwell. “Maureen,” he called back to the lady working the front desk, “Call the police and let them know we might have an intruder in the DNC offices!”

  Nick took the opportunity to slip out of the hotel before anyone else started asking him questions. He made his way back down Virginia Avenue pondering the significance of what he had just done every step of the way. He was so deeply lost in thought that he almost stepped out in front of a taxi. Fortunately for him, the cab was traveling slowly at the time or he would have ended up plastered on the pavement.

  The close call with the cab woke Nick up a bit and he paid more attention to where he was going from then on, but his thoughts still ran deep as he wondered what repercussions might come from a simple sixty-second conversation with a security guard in a hotel lobby. It certainly gave him an increased awareness of the importance of being careful with everything he did while in a foreign time. Even the slightest action or word could have an enormous effect on time either making things better or just as easily worse.

  Nick turned into the State Plaza Hotel on E Street and booked a room for what was left of the night. He needed someplace to stay for the next several hours and a good night’s sleep wouldn’t hurt either. The next morning he would need to get to work on phase two of his mission, which he anticipated being a little more complicated than sitting in a stairwell.

  – 14 –

  Use Your

  Batman Voice

  By the time Nick woke up the next morning the sun was already shining brightly through the window. The first thing he did was turn on the television to look for any news of last night’s activities. After a few moments of searching for the remote, he realized he would have to actually get out of bed and walk over to the tv and turn it on by hand. He turned the channel dial until he found a station reporting on the break-in.

  “A very bold and brazen robbery was attempted in the early morning hours last night at the Watergate Hotel. These five men were apprehended attempting to steal documents from the DNC offices. Police sources say the men also had wire taping electronics and other listening devices that authorities believe were destined to be planted in the offices of the party’s headquarters,” the reporter explained. “The would-be robbers were apprehended by police thanks to the sharpness of hotel security guard, Frank Wills.”

  “Yeah, I noticed a door had been taped to ensure that anyone could open it, even without a key,” the guard Nick had spoken to described. “I removed the tape, but when I went back later that night the door had been taped again. I immediately began a search of the building. That’s when I noticed those fellas rooting around on the sixth floor. I came back down to the lobby and called the police right away.”

  “Huh, you’re welcome Frank,” Nick scoffed. In truth, he was just as happy to be left out of the story. It meant no one would be looking for him which was good because he had work to do today.

  After a quick shower, Nick got dressed and gathered up his stuff. The last thing he did before leaving the hotel room was scan through the phone book to find the number for the Washington Post. Heading down the stairs to the lobby, he stopped short, just around the corner from the front desk. He stood in the hallway peering around the corner watching closely as two uniformed officers questioned the front desk attendant.

  “We’re looking for this man,” one officer said handing her a piece of paper with a man’s face sketched on it.

  “We think he might have been involved with the funny business down at the Watergate last night,” the second officer explained.

  “I don’t recognize him,” the receptionist replied. “But I just came on shift an hour ago.”

  “Do you know if anyone happened to stop in here last night after two?”

  “Let me see,” the receptionist said, flipping through a log book. “It looks like we had someone check in around three a.m. A fellow named Martin McFly.”

  “Is he still here? What room is he in?” the officer’s asked unholstering their weapons.

  “219.”

  By this time Nick was already down at the far end of the hall, about to exit the rear door of the hotel. Apparently, although security guard Frank and been happy to take all the credit for foiling last night’s crime, he was equally happy to give the police a full description of Nick. He would need to be extra cautious today if the cops were on the lookout for him.

  As he reached the sidewalk a group of protesters happened to be walking by. The crowd seemed like a good cover to aid his get away from the area of the hotel. Nick joined the protesters who continued to chant, “Make love, not war!” over and over again. From the various signs and banners carried by the group, Nick deduced the protest was against US involvement in the Vietnam war. He had read all about this in his history classes, but the intensity and passion of these protesters were unlike anything Nick had ever experience first hand.

  The protest march seemed to be headed toward the Grant Memorial, which would work out perfectly for Nick. He could just stay hidden in the crowd until they reached the Memorial and then slip across the bridge and back to Rosslyn. However, that plan was altered as he caught sight and sound of a number of police cars, lights flashing and sirens blaring, blocking the road ahead. When he overheard someone say that the police were in riot gear he knew it was time to make his exit.

  Nick ducked out of the protest and scooted over to the next block and hailed a cab. “I need to get to Rosslyn, but there’s a protest march blocking off access to the Arlington Bridge. Can you get me across the Theodore Roosevelt?” he asked the cab driver. The driver agreed and sped away from the protest with Nick hunched down in the back seat. “Just drop me off at that convenience store over there,” Nick requested once they had crossed the bridge. This was partly to keep his final destination secret even from a random cabbie, but more so because he was running low on cash and he still had a few things he needed to do.

  “What am I supposed to do for money?” he recalled asking Ainsley a few days ago.

  “I have a good friend at the bank,” the reporter replied. “We went to school together. I t
hink she's willing to pick out some bills for us printed prior to 1972, but I’m not sure how many she’ll be able to get her hands on, especially in only a couple days. So, you may need to be rather frugal.”

  Since he had not counted on paying for a cab ride across the river, frugality might mean today’s meals came out of the cooler at the gas station. Nick wandered the aisles of the convenience store picking up two chocolate bars, one soda in a glass bottle, a small flashlight and a pack of batteries.

  Outside the store was a public pay phone. Nick inserted a dime and dialed the number he had copied out of the hotel phone book.

  “Thank you for calling the Washington Post. How may I direct your call?” the voice on the other end of the line greeted him.

  “Yes,” Nick replied. “Can I speak to, umm, Bob Woodward?”

  “Please hold one moment.”

  A few seconds later a man’s voice picked up, “Washington Post, Woodward speaking.”

  Nick was about to speak and then thought, “Maybe I should disguise my voice. After all, he was pretending to be someone Woodward supposedly already knew. Better use your Batman voice, Jones,” he coached himself. “Yeah, Bob, this is you know who,” Nick spoke in a deep gravely voice.

  “Who?” the reporter questioned.

  “Umm,” Nick scrambled for a response, “I’d rather not give my name out on this line, but what I can tell you is W.M.F. That’s all I can say right now.”

  “Okay,” Woodward answered, “Go ahead.”

  “I have some info for you on that Watergate thing, if you’re interested.”

  “Of course, I’m interested!”

  “Meet me tonight in the parking garage near Key Bridge at 9 PM,” Nick instructed. He pulled out his

  phone and quickly glanced at the photo he had taken the previous night. “I’ll be in section G-3. Come alone.”

  “Okay, I’ll be there,” the reporter promised excitedly.

  Nick hung up the phone and breathed a huge sigh of relief. That had been far more nerve-wracking than he had expected. That’s when the thought hit him: if the phone call was stressful, imagine what the face to face would be like 10 hours from now. Although he had plenty of time to kill, Nick knew he could not afford to go around site-seeing. He could not afford it, literally or metaphorically.

  The time traveler gathered his supplies from the store and made his way to the parking garage. He found a nice concealed corner in section G-3 and hunkered down there for the rest of the afternoon. He wished he could just call back to the lab to report his progress, but sadly that wasn’t an option. It also occurred to him that even if he could call the present, due to the changes he had already made to the timeline, the folks he would be talking to likely wouldn’t even remember what mission he had been sent on. So instead he played numerous rounds of Candy Crush until his phone battery dipped below forty percent and he figured he should conserve the rest, just in case. Having emptied the bottle of soda and polished off the second candy bar, there was nothing left for Nick to do but sit and wait for nine o’clock to roll around.

  – 15 –

  What About Bob?

  As nine o’clock slowly arrived, Nick wondered if perhaps he shouldn’t have said eight instead. Not only would that have spared him an hour of waiting, but it if it turned out that the reporter was late showing up, which technically he already was, there would be more than 60 minutes remaining before Nick was whisked away back to the lab in modern times.

  Thankfully, Nick hadn’t even finished fully obsessing over that thought before a large sedan pulled into his area of the parking garage. Nick watched closely as the car parked and a solitary figure got out. The man looked around the garage scanning the dim light for some sign or signal. Nick pulled out the convenience store flashlight and gave it a couple quick flicks of the switch, making the light blink on and off twice in the darkness of his concealed corner.

  The man walked towards the light cautiously, but unafraid. When he got near to the column Nick was hiding behind, the time traveler spoke out in the same deep and gravely voice he had used on the phone, “That’s far enough.”

  “Mark, is that you?” Woodward asked.

  “I’d rather not say, Bob,” Nick replied still hiding in the shadows. “You’re not recording me, are you?”

  “No, of course not,” the reporter answered. “You know I don’t record sources without permission. What’s got you so spooked?”

  “This Watergate thing is a big deal, Bob, a BIG deal. You have no idea who big this thing is, or how high up it goes.”

  “Are you talking about this sixth guy the cops are trying to locate?”

  “No,” Nick responded more anxiously than he had intended. “No, that guy is a red herring. Don’t worry about him. He’s got nothing to do with this.”

  “Okay,” Woodward said sounding a little confused. “So, what is going on here? What can you tell me?”

  “Everything you need to know is in this file,” Nick stated reaching around the pillar and handing the folder from the future to the reporter. “Don’t print it all at once. That will draw too much attention. Do your own homework on this one, Bob, but this will keep you headed in the right direction.”

  “I think I’d like to bring Carl Bernstein on this one, too.”

  “That’s fine, I like Carl, but play things close to your vest here. There are going to be a lot of people who aren’t going to like where this is going to take you.”

  “Thanks, Mar…” Woodward stopped himself midsentence and reset, “Thanks, Mr. Deep Throated Voice Guy.”

  “Just keep my name out of the press will ya?”

  “Sure thing,” the reporter promised and then returned swiftly to his car as Nick slunk further back into the shadows of the corner. Now all he had to do was not get spotted here for another twenty minutes or so and he would be on his way back home.

  “Hey, wait a minute,” Ainsley called out. “It’s happening again!”

  “What?” Carl asked sounding deeply concerned. “What is it? What’s happening again?”

  “Do either of you remember what mission we sent Nick on yesterday?” the reporter asked.

  “Sure,” Dr. Stevens replied. “We sent him to… wait a second. I knew it just a minute ago.”

  “I am also drawing a blank on destination and goal of Mr. Jones’ most recent voyage,” Carl admitted.

  “This is exactly what happened to us last time, right before...”

  “The B.I.R.D. is powering up for return leap,” Carl interrupted.

  “…that happened,” his sister finished her sentence.

  “Welcome back,” Dr. Stevens greeted opening the chamber door.

  “Thanks, Doc,” Nick replied cheerfully.

  “What are you wearing?” Carl gasped.

  “I’m going to say early 70’s vintage?” the doctor guessed.

  “You should know. You picked them out,” the traveler informed. “Is that pizza?”

  “Help yourself,” Ainsley invited handing over the box.

  “Here, I’ll trade you,” Nick replied pulling the history drive out of his pocket. “I ended up on a slim diet back there, so I’m starving!”

  “By all means,” Carl said happily, “But do tell us, where you were?”

  “What do you guys remember about Richard Nixon?” the traveler asked stuffing his mouth with a slice of thin crust.

  “Tricky Dicky?” the doctor responded. “One of the most crooked Presidents we’ve ever had.

  “Hmm, maybe nothing changed,” Nick said, discouragingly putting down the pizza box.

  “Until they impeached him of course,” Carl added.

  “They impeached him?” Nick laughed.

  “Sure, and then he resigned,” the physicist explained. “Ford took over and got trounced by Jimmy Carter in the next election.”

  “Who’s Jimmy Carter?” the time traveler wondered aloud.

  “Jimmy Carter was the Democratic president that followed Ford and Nixon,”
Ainsley stated. “He was a great guy. Even after he left White House, he spent most his time building houses for low-income families.”

  “So, Nixon and Ford didn’t get two full terms each?”

  “Not a chance,” Dr. Stevens laughed. “Carter beat out Ford and then it was eight years of Reagan.”

  “Ronald Reagan? That actor in all those old cowboy movies?” Nick asked in disbelief.

  “Ronald Reagan,” the doctor affirmed.

  “Followed by four years of Bush, eight years of Clinton and eight more years of Bush Jr.,” doc added.

  “Okay, those guys I remember,” the traveler laughed.

  “What exactly did you do?” Ainsley asked curiously.

  “Have you heard of the Watergate Hotel and Woodward and Bernstein?”

  “No way!” she exclaimed. “You’re Deep Throat?”

  “Let’s just say I do a pretty good impersonation!” Nick chuckled, although he knew better than to tell his friends who he had been attempting to impersonate. He would never hear the end of it if word got out about that.

  “Let’s compare the data on the history drive to our file here in the lab and see what other changes you may have made along the way,” Carl suggested sitting down at the computer terminal.

  While Carl ran his algorithm to compare the two data files, Nick recounted his experiences of the past 24 hours. The team then went back and forth as they compared the similarities and differences of the two timelines based on their own memories of how history had unfolded.

  After some time, the computer had finished running its program. It automatically printed off several pages listing any significant alterations to the timeline that had occurred thanks to Nick’s actions in 1972.

  “As far as I can tell,” Carl began scanning the pages, “There was no major negative consequence related to your involvement, and clearly some very positive ones.”