After an hour making our way through the forest, we arrived at a clearing bordered by small pond that resembled the one fifty yards behind our barn in Maryland. We could hear chirping cicadas and the caws of flying crows, rustling leaves from the breeze blowing through the deep green trees. But nothing more. No houses, no barns, no sheds, no people. And then I knew. We were here. Home. And our farm was gone. My brothers, my sisters, my beloved family, were no longer alive.
The blackness closed in before I could scream.
* * *
Maryland—not any more
“She’s coming around.” Whose voice? John’s? John. John was back with me. But, the others? The others…
“Yes, I am observing tears,” Spud’s voice said, “upon her zygomatic arches.” I heard dripping water. “Give her a few sips.”
I opened my eyes, blinking to clear the mist, and held out my palm. “I’m fine. Don’t need it.” I sat up, supporting my head with my hands, still feeling lightheaded.
“Take it slow.” John’s gentleness warmed my chilled heart.
“Really, I’m fine.” I stood up to face my brother. Were those tear tracks on his cheeks as well. “Thanks.” And then I remembered. “I am so sorry.”
John attempted to soothe me, “We don’t know…”
I shook my head. “You were right. We needed to know. And now we know.” I didn’t—couldn’t--look at Spud.
I was grateful Spud didn’t say “I told you so”. He kept his eyes on his CD and his voice even as he urged us to return to the train station. “The south train will pass through in an hour and it will be the last one for the day.”
I nodded, and still a bit unsteady on my feet, leaned against John for the first few steps down towards the path from which we’d come. I didn’t look back at the pond where I’d waded and splashed as a child. Without my siblings, it wasn’t my pond any more.
We arrived back in Nea Athina by sunset. “There is an inn,” Spud advised us, “several blocks away. I suggest we rest for the night and rise early on the morrow to locate the elusive Mister Moore.”
We didn’t argue. Sleep would be a blessing—I prayed the Sandman wouldn’t betray me this time and shrink in horror from my guilt-stained door.
Chapter 15
Less is More
Nea Athina—alternate present day
I did manage to fall asleep sometime before midnight. Mr. Sandman toyed with me, after all, as my dreams—nightmares--were of my missing family and our no-longer-existent Maryland home. Waking up at dawn was a relief. I could consciously choose to think of something else, if only for a moment.
After eating a quick breakfast of steamed vegetables wrapped in a corn tortilla, we set off for the train that would lead us to the environs of the mysterious Mr. Moore.
Our stop was in an unassuming section of town, where the crumbling one-storey structures were built of brick rather than precious stones. I somehow expected to see trash on the streets and graffiti on the walls, but the neighborhood did have an air of neatness in its privation.
We walked for about thirty minutes as we had been directed. Spud studied his disc periodically, reassuring us that we were on course, before stopping and signaling us to follow him down a deserted alley between two three-storey ramshackle apartment buildings and down a short flight of stairs to a rotting wood door. The Intercourse lady was right—this sure wasn’t the ‘high rent district’.
The doorbell didn’t seem to function, so Spud knocked several times. No answer. There were no windows near the door or on the ground level, so we had no choice but to wait and knock again.
An old woman stuck her head out of a neighboring window, looked us up and down with an expression of distaste, then ducked back into her house, slamming the glass shut on the sill. Friendly folk, here.
We were almost ready to give up when we heard a creak. Then another. Then another. The door had opened just enough so that, standing sideways, we could slide inside. We did.
The hall we entered was dim and narrow. A faint scent of urine wafted from the walls, as a rat (definitely not of Chidurian ethnicity) scurried across our path. Awesome. We didn’t see any humans. We kept walking.
Another door at the end of the hall opened as we arrived. We entered a smaller room, the size of a closet, and jumped as the door slammed shut behind us.
“If we end up in Earth Core…” I half-joked, seconds before the elevator closet began to move. Only this lift didn’t drop down at stomach sickening speeds. It moved slowly up about a hundred feet, enough so that we should have been hovering over the neighborhood in thin air.
A side wall dissolved to reveal another hallway, and the smell of barbecued meat reached our nostrils. We followed the corridor, though I did worry about what type of meat was being roasted in this vegetarian society, and hoped it wasn’t human.
This hallway was brightly lit and curved. As we rounded the non-corner, we saw before us a sunlit patio framed in colorful flowers. A landscaped pool, fed by a small fountain, trickled clear water next to, yes, an actual barbecue, complete with sizzling burgers and spiraling smoke. Flipping the burgers, his back to us, was a medium-sized, middle-aged, slightly chubby man with dark and grey curly hair covering the striped collar under his patched-sleeve olive sweater.
“Welcome, Visitors,” he said in English. American English. “Lunch’ll be ready in a few minutes. There’s beer and wine in the fridge at the bar, for those that enjoy those beverages.” There was a strong hint of New York in his accent, and of academician in his mien.
John grinned as broadly as I’d seen him since his rescue and dove into the refrigerator for a cold beer. He offered a bottle to Spud who declined with a sour expression. Spud shook his head at the Riesling John pulled out, too. “I prefer my wine red, at room temperature, and French,” was his only comment.
“I’ll take a beer,” I offered, and caught the bottle John tossed me. At eighteen, I was well above the Zygan drinking age, and possibly the local one, too. Hadn’t seen any alcohol anywhere in this USA, so it was a good bet the party laws here were either draconian or spirits—the liquid kind—were non-existent.
Our host transferred the well-done hamburgers onto a platter of buns with his spatula and turned to face us, holding out the tray. From the front, his receding curly hairline was framed by more salt and pepper hair, and his twinkling, intelligent eyes peeked out from behind his black tortoise-shell glasses. His broad grin was bookended by the weirdest sideburns I’d ever seen; bushy, they extended all the way to his jawline and made him look like a cross between a professor and an 18th century sea captain.
“Muttonchops,” Spud informed me, catching me staring. To our host: Lester Samuel Moore, I presume.”
“Half right. Yes, call me Les, and no, they’re genuinely beefy,” our host said, winking at me and Spud. Was he joking about the sideburns or the meat? He set the platter on a wooden table behind us that offered ketchup and mustard, plates, cups, and bowls of potato salad and cole slaw; and waved for us to join him. “Buns on the table, buns on the bench!”
We sat. I wished I hadn’t seen the musical Sweeney Todd, Demon Barber of Fleet Street the last time I was in London, in which a vengeful stylist murders his clients and provides his landlady with their ground meat as the “essence” of her tasty meat pies. I still couldn’t get rid of the fear that we’d be Mr. Moore’s next course.
John didn’t bother with polite reticence. “I don’t care if it’s beef or mutton. I am so hungry,” he enthused, building a triple burger and taking a bite. “Even my dreams are carnivorous.”
My own appetite, however, was dampened by my waves of sadness. Since I’d learned about the effects of my Somalderis ‘loan’ on my world and my family, my own dreams had dined voraciously on my conscience and my heart. My momentary hope that the effects wouldn’t be so dire had been dashed after our excursion yesterday. I could only pray that we cou
ld find a way to return things back to the way they were—even if it meant a long sentence in Omega Archon stir.
“So where’s the beef…from?” John swallowed the bite he’d stuffed into his mouth. “Didn’t see any cows along the way here.”
“Of course not,” Moore said as he helped himself to potato salad. “Do you know how much methane dairy farms spew into the atmosphere?” Before Spud could answer, he leaned towards me with eyes twinkling and patted my hand, “Don’t worry, dear, I don’t bite without permission.” To Spud: “I see no reason not to use a synthesizer.”
Spud’s eyebrows betrayed his surprise. “You have a synthesizer? Didn’t see anything about synthesizers in the historical records of this USA.”
Moore chuckled. “The Utopians weren’t driven to develop one. They found a different solution. Planetary symbiosis. A balanced, self-sustaining system. Works for them. A little too restrictive for me.” He patted his pot belly.
John whistled. “Whoa. Lot of stuff you just threw at us there.” He wiped some coleslaw off his chin with a napkin. “So, you’re an alien.”
“Alienist, actually,” Moore returned. “I research a breadth of civilizations and their evolution. Or regression. The universe is an infinite laboratory for us scientists of life, as my buddy Mel used to say, as long as we can maintain our grant funding.”
“Mel!” I gagged. “You don’t mean Plegma Mel?” I looked at Spud, who was equally astonished.
“The Plegma? So that’s where he went off to,” said Moore, finishing his burger. “Personally, I find the Synephs too stuffy for my taste. No sense of humor.”
Nephil Stratum had a sense—
“Okay,” John raised a hand, “you’re telling us you’re from,” he hesitated, “somewhere more than Earth. Like the Zygan Federation. And if it’s the Zygan Federation, and you’re using their technology,” he waved a hand around the patio, “how come our Ergals don’t work?”
“No, not the Zygan Federation, exactly.” Moore responded cryptically. He shrugged, “If I had to guess why they’re not working, I’d say interference. Each Zygan Ergal is tuned to its owner. Your Ergal,” Moore pointed first to John, then to me, “became her Ergal when you hopped over to Limbo Land for your buddy Benedict. Now with you both here, the two tunes could be canceling each other out.”
“Then why wouldn’t his be working?” John nodded at Spud.
“How do you know so much about us?” Spud interjected, his voice louder than usual.
“The answer to both questions is actually the same. I’m assuming you don’t want the technical details to disrupt your lunch. How about I show you the big picture after dessert.” Moore opened a small refrigerator by his feet and pulled out an ice bucket. “Ice cream, anyone?”
* * *
Lester Samuel Moore’s home—alternate present day
His gait verging on a waddle, Moore led his satiated guests into his small cottage beyond the patio where we’d enjoyed our hearty lunch. Once inside, the cottage had somehow transformed itself into an enormous hall, filled with monitoring equipment. “Um, why didn’t we see all this from the outside?” I asked, scanning the vast array of holo screens before us. The room’s size almost made Zygint Central Communications Center look like a closet, and extended far beyond, and above, the boundaries of the dumpy three-storey building we had entered. “Shouldn’t we be hovering somewhere all the way over by the train station by now?”
Moore put his chubby arm over my shoulders and flashed me a voracious smile. “Time and space are not constants, my dear, as we know from our uploads.”
I managed to extricate myself and sidle over towards John.
“You are a catascope,” Spud deduced, his voice untypically tentative.
Moore laughed, “Hardly. Come, I’ll demonstrate.”
We walked through, literally through, a maze of holoscreens and stopped next to a small screen that was displaying—us. Yesterday. In Maryland, in shock.
“You needed to see your reality for yourself,” Moore whispered as we saw a 3D holo replay of our visit to what used to be my family’s farm. “I gave you a day to do so.”
“You’re a Helianthos!” boomed John. “Damn!”
More laughter. “Interesting juxtaposition there if I were, Rush, but no.” He raised up both ringless hands and wagged them. “Look, Ma, no sunflowers.”
Sunflowers? The penny dropped. Hard. Of course, the sunflower people! Like the soldiers that’d told us John was missing, like the old Keeper of the Temple of Eshmoun, like Wart. The masters of meta, always popping in to guide our way. Our guardian angels. All of them had sported sunflowers. And the Hellenic word for sunflowers was Helianthi. Damn.
Chapter 16
Roundabout
John was bursting with questions for Lester Samuel Moore. Spud for once opted to withdraw and study Moore and his holos through narrowed eyes. As for me, I didn’t much care who Moore was, or how he got his “powers”. All I wanted to know was, could he help us get our family back?
“Cigar?” Moore extended a colorful box. Its torn seal was stamped with Greek lettering reading TAINO.
John reached in and pulled out a stogie. Spud didn’t resist for long either, mumbling something about “nicotine withdrawal”.
I took Spud’s place off in the corner of the room as the three men smoked. Never could stand the smell of tobacco, and cigars were the absolute worst.
Moore puffed and pontificated like a proverbial professor with a rapt audience of students. Pondering Spud’s query, he suggested that Spud’s non-functioning Ergal could be due to the absence of Zygan Federation activity in this sector of the galaxy; there was no reason to sync up Ergals around a non-Zygan planet like Earth. “They sail through here once in a while, but this planet of pacifists really has nothing to offer the Empire—I mean Federation—until they develop hyperdrive.”
“Then why are you here?” John returned.
“I am not only a scientist, but a man of means. One might even say I’m a philosopher,” Moore said after considering the question. “This stream presents some interesting currents for exploration.”
“Stream as in string?” asked Spud.
“String theory and multiple branes,” elaborated John unnecessarily.
“Imaginative, but inaccurate,” Moore chuckled. “Personally, I prefer Ptolemy’s idea that the Earth is the center of the universe and the stars are holes in the sky letting through the lights of heaven.”
I could see John getting irritated. “Look, we’re just trying to find some solutions to our problems here. If you’ve got them, don’t yank our chains.”
Moore raised a bushy eyebrow. “Over my years of study, I have come up with some answers, but my years of wisdom have taught me to hope I never ever have them all.” He gazed directly at my brother and smiled. “Something for you to consider.”
John looked ready to erupt, so I interrupted, “Mr. Moore?”
“Les.”
“Les. You know my family’s g-gone.” I took a deep breath. “Is there anything I can do to bring them back?”
His expression softened; I saw a hint of tenderness. “The time-space continuum is a misnomer,” he began. “It’s really a time-space circumference.”
Waving the hand holding his smoking cigar, he drew our attention to another holo screen on his left. On display was a children’s playground, with swing, slides, and a simple merry-go-round inhabited by running, jumping, and giggling kids. The children’s laughter was contagious; even Spud allowed himself a smile. “Wish I could ride them at my age,” Moore sighed, patting his prominent belly again. “Not as fit as I used to be.”
With another wave, the view shifted to show the carousel from above, as a spinning platter. Moore pointed a finger at the disk, then began tagging multiple spots on the display. At each point, a duplicate spinning disk appeared, filling the screen with randomly scattered spinni
ng merry-go-rounds.
Moore turned to face us. “You can now abandon the ‘string theory’ for the ‘merry-go-round reality’. A metaverse of universes, all spinning in one direction for the riders. Time moves forward.”
He took a puff of his cigar. “But for travelers, voyagers can hop from one disk to another. Land on any portion of the disk, and appear in that universe at any time, past, present, or future.”
“Note the points I am marking with my cigar tip.” Moore charred one edge of each disk so that we could track the rotations.
He rested his thick finger on one charred spot and followed it around the disk. “Traveling back in time is impossible on each individual merry-go-round, each universe, with just a Somalderis because it can’t fight the force of time moving forward.”
John and I nodded. Spud’s squinting had magnified, his eyes mere slits.
“But, if you jump over to the adjacent merry-go-round at the right time,” Moore demonstrated by moving his finger over to the charred spot on the next disk, “you can land anywhere, and at any time in the neighboring universe.”
Moore bounced his finger randomly from disk to disk on the display, finally returning to the first “merry-go-round”—but at a different point, one behind the one he’d left. “Ta da. You’re now in the past.”
“Which isn’t another string, but another circle,” I offered.
“Exactly.” Moore nodded. “The metaverse is remarkably parsimonious. Spinning orbs are effective at all sizes, no need to reinvent the wheel.” He chuckled. “So to speak.”
John groaned appreciatively, but I was nursing an idea, a hope. I probed, “Les, could I go back, you know, use my Somalderis to hop from one merry-go-round to another, then return it to Yeshua so the timeline doesn’t change?” I didn’t need to say out loud, ‘and my family would be alive’.
Moore took a deep toke of his stogie, blew out the smoke, and watched it curl towards the hall’s high ceiling. A sigh. “Theoretically, assuming you had the means and methods, such as an Ergal, to implement those universe ‘leaps’, yes.”