Deceive the Paradox

  Ammon squinted at Jim. “So, are you saying that I’ve already time traveled? If so, why don’t I remember it?”

  “That’s not what I’m saying – there’s not enough data to make sense of it yet.” Jim stared at the read-out, then looked at Ammon. “What about the past? Can you send the carbon backwards in time?”

  Before Ammon could answer, the device pad shimmered, and a second lump of carbon appeared.

  “Apparently so,” Ammon said. “I only sent it forward once – so this one must be from the future. Sent, of course, by me.”

  Jim looked at the screen again. “Yes, yes, I think you’re right,” he said. “It has the same form of radiation, but the signature’s inverted. I’m no expert, but it follows that if the first lump came from the past, this one came from the future.”

  “You’re correct,” said Ammon. “I just need to make sure and send it back in a few minutes.”

  “You already did. Or will,” said Jim. “This is confusing.”

  Ammon smiled. “Never mind the confusion. I’m going to get my wife back.”

  #

  Over the next week, Ammon ran a series of additional experiments, including several tests on live subjects – a pair of lab rats Jim brought him from upstairs.

  As soon as he felt ready, he decided to go ahead and take the next step: to travel himself. But to avoid Jim trying to talk him out of it, he jumped into it without telling him.

  Ammon set the coordinates and stepped onto the chronoporter pad.

  He initiated the temporal translocation sequence, closed his eyes, and held his breath.

  In his head, he counted down the seconds to activation.

  Three…two…one.

  Searing pain in his head. The unfathomable sensation of every sensory input in the universe flooding into his mind. An eternity transpiring in a millisecond.

  Ammon opened his eyes, and found himself on the phone, about to step out of his car in downtown Salt Lake City.

  He heard the voice of his friend, Dr. Jim Mayne.

  “You’ve traveled?”

  The dizzying, disorienting effect of re-experiencing his own life struck Ammon between the eyes.

  “No, no – it’s not ready for that,” he responded – though he knew this was all wrong. Hadn’t he just…done something? No. That wasn’t right, either. “There’s one more, um, one more equation to fix. And then it should be all set to run some serious tests. I’m just trying to lock down the destination coordinates.”

  Ammon checked his watch. It was running backwards.

  His head spun and he felt sick. Something was definitely not right. Although he wanted to get out of his car, he felt drawn like a magnet into his seat.

  “Jim, I gotta go – I’m meeting Emma and Esther for lunch. Uh – can you stop by tonight? I think there’s something really weird happening – I think it’s somehow linked to the chronoporter.”

  “Okay, Ammon. I’m excited to see your latest breakthrough in person.”

  Ammon hung up without saying goodbye. He looked at his wife, and then at his daughter – who each stood at opposite corners, ready to cross the busy streets and meet up with Ammon.

  Ammon felt a wave of déjà vu as he heard the angry honking of horns.

  He didn’t look toward the commotion – he instinctively knew what was happening

  Time slowed to a crawl.

  The speeding red truck swerved toward both his beloved women.

  Adrenaline raced through Ammon’s veins and his hair stood on end.

  In a moment of sudden clarity, Ammon understood what he had to do.

  He had to save them both.

  He stepped on the accelerator and the Smart car emerged from the parking space in front of the truck. With a bone-crunching smash, the truck ploughed through the car, t-boning the passenger side and crumpling the body like tin foil.

  The airbags deployed.

  Ammon could hear nothing but a ringing in his ears as he climbed out of the car, which was now lying on its side in the intersection. The red truck sped away up State Street as if the accident had not even slowed it down.

  Ammon looked around for his family.

  His stomach sank as he looked down and saw both Emma and Esther pinned under the destroyed Smart car, still and lifeless.

  “No!” he screamed, dropping to his knees.

  The world spun, and everything turned black.

  #

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Ammon awoke with swollen red eyes and a sore throat. His head pounded, and the rest of his body felt like he’d just run a marathon.

  He looked up to see Jim Mayne.

  “Hello, Ammon. Can you hear me?”

  “Yes. What – what happened?

  “There was an accident, Ammon. Your car was hit. But you’re okay – miraculously you didn’t sustain any major injuries.”

  “Emma. And Esther. Where are they?”

  “Ammon, I don’t know how to say this. Your wife, and your daughter – they both died at the scene.”

  Ammon’s mind returned to the street, and the bloody mess that he’d seen under his vehicle. He began to sob uncontrollably.

  “Ammon. There’s something else. Although you were not injured, you’re here in this special U of U isolation unit because your brain is emitting a mysterious energy that affects technology with any kind of time element – which, as you know, is basically every computer – and even my watch. Look.”

  Ammon wiped the tears from his eyes and looked at the watch on Jim’s wrist. “It’s running backwards.”

  “Yes. Ammon, have you been running experiments on yourself – you know, with the temporal shifter?”

  “No, of course not,” Ammon said. Somehow, he knew it was a lie. But he wasn’t sure why.

  “Until we figure out why this is happening,” said Jim, “we’re going to have to keep you here. We can’t risk taking you through the hospital and damaging the equipment. You’re safe for humans, but not for technology.”

  Ammon put his head in his hands. His brain felt like it was on fire. He felt like his life – his whole universe – was falling apart. “Jim, I need my equipment. Go to my lab; bring me all of my work. I’m close to making it work. I could go back and change this – make it so my family doesn’t die.”

  “Okay, Ammon – I’ll bring you everything. But you should get some rest.” He stood up and reached into the pocket of his lab coat. “Here, take this pill. I designed it myself to provide peaceful, dreamless sleep.”

  He held out his hand to Ammon, the little gray pill in the center of his palm looking extremely familiar.

  “No, thanks,” Ammon said, shaking his head. “I don’t think so.”

  “Come on,” said Jim, “when have I ever steered you wrong? Just take this pill, relax, and the next thing you know you’ll be working on your project and changing history.”

  Ammon nodded, took the pill, and popped it in his mouth. He laid back on the bed, closed his eyes, and reality disappeared.

  #

  Ammon found himself floating in a void. One by one, gray pills started to appear, like stars coming out at dusk.

  Then a rain shower of paper notes fluttered down all around him. He grabbed one. It was slippery, like trying to hold onto an ice cube. Before it slipped through his fingers, he read the words: DON’T TRUST HIM.

  The paper dropped, and he watched it float downward into the abyss.

  Then he heard the honking of horns and the screeching of tires.

  Ammon awoke breathing heavily.

  At his side was his trusty friend, Jim Mayne. “Ammon, are you okay? You were moaning in your sleep.”

  “Uh, yeah. I – I don’t know. No. No, I’m not okay. Everything is completely screwed up, Jim.”

  Ammon’s mind flashed on his dead wife and daughter, again and again – each vision striking his heart like a hot poker. He took a ragged breath and struggled with all his might to clear his mind – just for a moment – to achieve a tiny
bit of clarity and cling to his sanity.

  He closed his eyes and said a silent prayer – begging God to help him get a hold of himself and make sense of what was happening to him. All he could think of, the only answer that came into his mind, was that he had the power to change it.

  “Jim, did you get my stuff? Did you bring me all of my equipment – the whole chronoporter set up?”

  “Yes, in fact, it’s all set up in the next room.”

  “Jim, I believe I can fix this. I can change it. I must change it! I will go back and I will save them both.”

  Jim nodded. “All right, my friend. Come on, your equipment is waiting for you.”

  Jim led Ammon to the next room. The moment Ammon entered, his head spun, and he felt a little dizzy for a second.

  “Are you okay?” asked Jim, steadying his friend.

  “Yeah. I just had a – I dunno, a déjà vu or something. Like I’ve done this exact same thing before.”

  “Maybe you need to lie down some more.”

  “No! What I need to do is get to work. Thank you for your help. Now, if you don’t mind, I work best with no distractions.”

  “Fair enough,” said Jim. “I can take a hint. I’ll see you later.”

  Jim left, and Ammon got to work at his computer.

  But as he worked, he kept having vivid flashes of déjà vu. And the flashes started getting longer, and longer, until he felt like he could almost predict what was going to happen next. It was uncanny.

  He also started having flashes of jamais vu, the feeling that something is completely unfamiliar. Only it wasn’t that his present circumstance was strange – that part felt eerily familiar – it was that he kept flashing on alternate memories – distinct recollections of things that had not happened.

  At least, he thought they had not happened.

  In these alternate memories, he was at the intersection in Salt Lake City. The red truck came around the corner with screeching tires. And then –

  Then Esther died.

  No, then Emma died.

  No, then they both died.

  Three versions of the same exact event – the same experience with three different outcomes – all of them bad.

  And then – and then he’d be back in here, in this room, trying to undo each of those three versions.

  And then it hit him.

  He had been here before, doing this – only in different timestreams.

  And he was starting to retain his memories of the other timestreams better and better each time, because he was retreading the same course of events repeatedly, strengthening the neural imprints with each repetition.

  Suddenly, he had an epiphany.

  Ammon realized that he was trapped in a twisted paradox of eternal do-overs. Yet each time it was a little different – though one thing remained the same, as a common theme that ran through each thread of this time tapestry: every iteration of the event has the same basic result – one or both of the two women he loved most died.

  And the worst part? They had to die.

  In order to drive Ammon’s grief, providing the impetus to make his device function; in order to inspire Ammon with the answer to his technical conundrums; there had to be the tragedy. The name of either Emma or Esther had to be coursing through his broken heart and mind, in order to make the breakthrough required. The birth of the chronoporter depended causally on the death of Esther, Emma, or both.

  Ammon dropped to his knees.

  How could he escape this paradox? How could he perfect the chronoporter and save his wife and daughter?

  Again, he prayed desperately for an answer to his dilemma.

  After several minutes – perhaps it was an hour, he again felt inspiration.

  Perhaps it didn’t have to be that way. Perhaps he could somehow find a way to feel the grief that drives him to overcome the obstacles of developing his invention, yet not really lose his loved ones. Perhaps the grief alone – rather than the actual death – could satisfy the equation.

  But how?

  He thought back on his last dream – the one with all the pills.

  And then it hit him.

  He pulled up the web and started studying every source he could find on psychosis – particularly on split personalities, mental compartmentalization, and vivid hallucination.

  Then he called for Jim.

  “Can it be done, Jim? Is it possible to hide one part of your mind from the other? Can a man’s mind exist in two realities?”

  “Well, yes,” said Jim, “that kind of thing happens all the time, to varying degrees, from self-justification and rationalization among mentally healthy individuals, to more extreme cases such as murderers who live a dual life, where one personality is scarcely aware that the other even exists. And the brain can do amazing feats of gymnastics to deal with trauma.”

  “Yes, trauma, perfect! This is what I’m talking about. Is it possible, Jim, to trick one part of the brain into believing something that you rationally know is false?”

  “Of course. Happens all the time – both in nature and in experimentally defined conditions. For example, a recent study on perceptual illusion showed that using visual stimuli and patterned action, the mind can be fooled – willingly or unwillingly – into believing that it could sense touch in a third arm that is not even attached as an actual prosthesis.”

  “That’s good, but it’s not exactly what I mean. Could you, Jim, perhaps develop a custom pill that somehow retains reality in a mental vault while temporarily creating an alternate reality that the person truly, vividly believes is real? A hallucination so convincing, you can actually fool yourself – even though you knowingly took the pill?”

  Jim frowned in concentration. “I believe so. I’ve done a lot of work with pharmaco-dreams. It would not be much different – just more lucid, and longer lasting. But it would have to also include that ‘vault’ component you mentioned, so that the person could eventually return to reality, and not simply be driven mad.”

  “So, you can do it?”

  “I think so, yes. The psychiatric biochemistry would be complex, and it would need to be customized perfectly for interaction with a specific individual. But, yes. May I ask – to what end?”

  “To save my family, of course.”

  “How?”

  “I will save them both. But I will also believe that one of them died.”

  #

  CHAPTER SIX

  Ammon used his solidifying memories to quickly perfect his chronoporter yet again.

  This time, it was not the hardware or the software that would be the challenge. It would be the wetware – his own thinking.

  He would have to split his mind. He would have to break his brain.

  He would have to go mad.

  Ammon braced himself inside. The idea of going back and experiencing that tragedy once more twisted his guts into knots. He truly feared this solution, because viewing their deaths repeatedly was already starting to drive him a little mad. He didn’t know if he could handle much more of this.

  With the device ready, all that was left was the pill.

  He was about to call Jim, when his eye caught something on the chronoporter pad that wasn’t there before.

  A pill.

  And a note.

  He read it, then read it again.

  It blew his mind.

  Written in his own hand, the note was from himself – dated six months in the future:

  Ammon, it’s me, Ammon. That is, you.

  Please pay close attention to this message – everything depends on it.

  Around six months ago (that is, in your present) we developed a pill with Jim. It was designed to allow the splitting of our mind – but it did not work as intended. It caused another split in our memories and nearly destroyed our psyche. The pill you have in your hand – you must take that one. It is a new one that we developed, that will cure you of the illusion that you are currently under, and return you to reality. Yes, that’s right ??
? I know it’s hard to believe, but you are actually currently under the influence of the failed first pill. You’re stuck in a psychological loop created by that first drug. The new drug, the pill in your hand, will fix that. You must take that pill, then use the chronoporter to go back and save both Emma and Esther. Do it now.

  -Ammon (you)

  It was the weirdest thing he’d ever read.

  A “note to self” of the most absurd kind.

  Ammon wasn’t even sure if he could trust it. He was certain that it was from himself – it was absolutely in his own handwriting – but he simply didn’t know if he could trust himself.

  Which future self had written the note? Was it the sane one who knew the truth, or the mad one who’d taken the mind-altering drug – the one he was trying to manipulate into believing a false reality of tragedy that would inspire him to complete the chronoporter, even though, unknown to him, both women would end up living, according to the plan?

  Had he really already taken that first pill? He didn’t remember it – but then, that was one of the key effects of the pill, by design.

  Ammon grasped at his scalp with both hands and pulled at his hair in frustration and misery.

  As far as he knew, he had not taken any pill yet, but he was already losing his grip.

  If he did take the pill – or if he took this one, which he couldn’t trust – would he wind up forever lost in madness, questioning reality?

  Now he simply did not know what to believe, having entered into the intricate labyrinth of self-deception. He wondered if this was what it was like for drug addicts who lost their minds. Ammon had never taken drugs – he had not even partaken of alcohol – so he was unaccustomed to the feeling of not being able to control his own mind and not being able to perceive reality with certainty.

  Was he being manipulated by his own self? If so, was it the sane one or the mad one pulling the strings? Or had he already time traveled again, taken the pill, and was now laboring under an illusion and a false reality?

  Was this real? Or was none of it real?

  He paced the room, trying to latch onto some kind of anchor, some clue as to what was real, what was right.

  Then it hit him: his future self was the one to trust, because that self had more knowledge, by virtue of existing in the future. Although not foolproof, his odds were better if he trusted that self, instead of his present muddled mind.