Coin #2 - Quantum Coin (10 page)

“Depressing,” Jena said.

“It's 3:31,” Zoe said. She retrieved the controller and held it out to Ephraim. He slid the coin into its slot, and she set the coordinates. “Ready,” she said.

Ephraim thought the hovering coin was tilted at the same angle it had been when they'd been communicating with Dr. Kim through the radio. Jena linked arms with Ephraim, then took Zoe's hand. Jena looked at their clasped hands with barely suppressed revulsion.

“This feels weird,” Jena said.

Zoe positioned herself at the other point of their little triangle, where Ephraim could easily reach the coin with his right hand.

“3:32 and fifty seconds,” Zoe said.

“Ready,” he said. “Steady…go!”

He scooped the coin from the controller and squeezed Jena's hand.

The earth dropped away and quickly lurched back up to meet his feet. His stomach heaved, and he shut his eyes against a sudden, intense brightness. He sneezed.

He slowly cracked his eyes open. As they adjusted to the change in lighting, he saw Zoe and Jena blinking at him, hands shading their eyes. They were indoors, with bright spotlights shining down at them.

Jena groaned. Despite the pained expression on her ashen face, she didn't seem to be in imminent danger of throwing up again.

Zoe looked woozy too. “Was that a rougher trip than usual?”

Jena wiped sweat from her forehead. She glanced around them in awe.

“Holy crap,” Jena said. “Where are we?”

“The Everett Institute for Many-Worlds, uh, Research Something Something,” Ephraim said.

“Relativity Waves and, uh, Mechanical Probability?” Zoe said.

“Usually ‘Crossroads’ for short.” Ephraim grinned.

Jena gaped at the gleaming silver statue of Atlas in the center of the enclosed courtyard. Nearly a story tall, it stood exactly where its smaller, bronze version existed in other universes at the center of the Memorial Fountain.

Atlas's muscular shoulders supported a fixed, vertical brass ring about five feet in diameter, which framed three inner concentric circles: two more brass rings and a round, flat gyrocompass in the center. The golden surface of the giant disc reflected the yellow spotlights and shone down on them like a small sun.

“What is
that?”
Jena asked.

“The Coheron Drive,” Ephraim said. “The big brother to the Charon device.”

“You mean it's like the coin and controller?” She looked from him to Zoe.

“So I'm told,” Ephraim said. He shielded his eyes against the light and studied the large-scale version of the portable device he and Zoe used. A logo was stamped in its center: a figure eight with the letters
E
in the left loop and
I
in the right.

He'd never seen the machine in action. The last time he and Zoe had been here, they'd only stayed for a few minutes—just long enough to drop off Nathaniel and say their good-byes.

Ephraim peered at the skylight ten stories above their heads. At noon, the sunlight must fall directly on the disc, but right now the square window was pitch-black.

Jena followed his gaze. “No windows,” she murmured.

The interior walls of the courtyard were covered in large steel plates. He saw four surveillance cameras trained on the plaza below. He wouldn't have been surprised if there were also laser cannons. Maybe they were hidden inside the walls. One of the cameras rotated to stare directly at him.

“Very welcoming,” he said.

Machinery clicked and whirred behind him. Ephraim turned just as a thick metal door in the wall whooshed up, revealing a long, lit corridor. Zoe stood beside the door with her hand on a shiny black panel with the outline of a hand on it.

“How'd you do that?” Jena asked. She walked to the door and peered inside curiously without crossing the threshold. Ephraim joined her. A difference in air pressure drew air from the enclosed courtyard into the building. Jena's hair wafted in the gentle breeze at their backs.

“I just put my hand there,” Zoe said. “Nathaniel did it last time.”

She stepped aside, and Jena placed her hand on the panel. The door slammed shut, inches in front of Ephraim. He felt it whiz by his face as he stumbled backward.

“Jeez,” he said. His heart pounded.

Jena looked at her hand and wiggled her fingers. “Nifty.”

“It must be programmed for us,” Zoe said. “Just like the Charon device. If it were reading our handprints, it would know we aren't Dr. Kim.”

“You try it, Eph,” Jena said.

Ephraim placed his hand against the panel. The door didn't respond. He looked around the courtyard. There were three other doors like the one in front of them. He assumed at least one of them must lead outside into Greystone Park, or whatever was on that property in this time.

A high-pitched alarm suddenly went off, reverberating in the enclosed space.

“Not again,” Zoe shouted, hands clamped over her ears.

“Turn it off!” Jena said.

“I didn't turn it on,” Ephraim said. The panel was flashing white and red under his hand. He slapped his palm against it again, but nothing happened. He pressed harder. Was it a general intruder alert, or had it been set specifically to respond to his touch?

A door on their right slid open, and a man hurried out. He turned to the panel beside the door he'd emerged from and drew his forefinger clockwise in a circle on it. A digital keypad lit up on the screen. He tapped in a sequence, and the alarm stopped. After the echo died down, Ephraim still heard a faint ringing in his ears.

The man drew a counterclockwise circle, and the panel darkened, then he placed his hand on the screen, and the door closed. He turned around and walked slowly out of the shadows toward them with a familiar gait.

He was a forty-two-year-old man with short dirty-blond hair, in a white button-down shirt and dark jeans—an older version of Ephraim's best friend, Nathan Mackenzie. And he had a wide grin on his face.

“Hey, old man,” Ephraim said.

“Hey, kid,” Nathaniel said. “Causing trouble already, I see.”

“Isn't that why we're here?”

Ephraim reached out to shake Nathaniel's hand. Instead, the man gathered him into a bear hug. Ephraim patted him on the back.

Nathaniel let him go and scrutinized him.

“Looking snazzy.” Nathaniel straightened Ephraim's bowtie. “Didn't the RSVP say casual attire?”

“You caught us at prom,” Ephraim said.

Nathaniel glanced at Jena. “Sorry about that.”

“Yeah,” Ephraim said.

“I'm glad to see you again, though I really hoped this day wouldn't come.” He turned to Jena. “And I finally get to meet your lady friend.”

Jena blinked up at him. The spotlights made a gentle halo of Nathaniel's light hair. “Hi. I'm Jena Kim.”

“Of course you are,” he said.

“I've heard a lot about you,” Jena said.

He shook her hand. “If you're anything like your analogs, you'll be a big help.”

She smiled at that. Finally, Nathaniel turned to Zoe.

“Hey, Z,” he said.

She embraced him in a fierce hug.

“I missed you,” she murmured.

“Me too,” Nathaniel said. He folded her in his arms.

Ephraim looked away. When had those two gotten so close? She couldn't have feelings for him, could she? He couldn't imagine her and Nathan Mackenzie getting together in any universe, especially a version of him more than twice her age.

Nathaniel pulled away and stared at Zoe. “You're packing?” he asked.

She rolled her eyes. “Not you, too. I know how to handle a gun.”

“That isn't the point. You don't need a weapon here.” Nathaniel held his hand out, palm up.

“Really?” Zoe asked.

“Come on, Z,” Nathaniel said. “If you're armed, you can't come in.”

Zoe sighed, but she reached under her hoodie and pulled out the compact pistol. She handed it to Nathaniel.

He examined the gun carefully. It looked much smaller in his hands. Ephraim felt a shiver run down his spine.

“Safety's on,” Zoe said.

Nathaniel pressed a button, and the magazine dropped out of the short handle. He pocketed it and squinted at the gun.

“Smith and Wesson Bodyguard 380,” Nathaniel murmured. “The gun that shot me. I'm surprised at you, Zoe. I'll hold this in my office until after school.”

He put the gun in his pocket and shook his head. “But that reminds me. How's M.S. doing?”

“She's finishing her senior year in Spain. But she won't be back any time soon. Her parents didn't want her getting drafted,” Zoe said. “Their family has a house in the country. I considered going with her, but…I didn't want to leave Summerside, in case you needed me.” She glanced at Ephraim.

Ephraim cut in. “Speaking of Mary Shelley, we've seen some really screwed up things tonight. It's great to catch up and all, but we were hoping you and Dr. Kim could explain what the hell is going on.”

“It felt strange shifting here this time,” Zoe said. “And we couldn't get through at all before, like there was some kind of resistance.”

“Doc set up a quantum barrier around our universe. Like a firewall on a computer network.” Nathaniel slapped his forehead. “And I almost forgot to turn it back on. I'll be right back. You guys stand far away from the LCD.”

“LCD?” Jena asked.

“The Large Coheron Drive.” He pointed at the mechanism in the center of the courtyard and hurried back to the room he'd appeared from. He pressed his hand to the security panel and ducked inside, leaving the door open. The squeal of machinery filled the atrium, and the Large Coheron Drive shuddered into motion.

The central disc, like a giant version of Ephraim's coin, slowly tilted to a horizontal position and remained level, while the two rings around it began spinning—one of them horizontally, the other vertically. They picked up speed until it looked like the disc was surrounded by a shimmering transparent orb, generating a strong air current that pulled at their hair and clothes.

The air around it rippled like heat waves, and in fact, the air was definitely warmer.

Nathaniel emerged from the room and slapped the panel on his way back to them, closing the door behind him. “Now nothing gets in or out of this universe,” he shouted over the roar of the machinery.

Ephraim placed a hand over his breast pocket, feeling the coin inside. It was useless until they switched off its larger counterpart. He was basically trapped in this universe, and he didn't like it.

“Come on,” Nathaniel said. “The Doc will meet us up in the lab.”

Nathaniel opened the door and ushered them inside. Zoe hurried along beside him, telling him about everything that had happened that day. Ephraim noticed she omitted any mention of their kiss.

Ephraim glanced behind him. He glimpsed Atlas straining under the weight of the spinning gyroscope before the door slammed shut, cutting off the light from the courtyard.

Jena slipped her hand in his and squeezed lightly as they followed Nathaniel and Zoe down the long, dark corridor.

So far, the interior of the Everett Institute resembled Summerside High School, with speckled gray floor tiles, pale-yellow walls, and a long corridor with unmarked doors that could have led to classrooms, for all Ephraim knew. This was supposed to be the future, but it was fairly indistinguishable from his time, let alone the previous century.

“This place is huge,” Zoe said.

“Ten years ago, we had more than a hundred physicists and nearly a thousand engineers, data analysts, mathematicians, materials scientists, machinists, chefs—you name it. You never had to leave the place because it had everything you needed.” Nathaniel sighed. “Today we have barely, maybe, five percent of the staff.” He glanced at her. “But we're actively recruiting.”

“What happened to everyone?” Jena asked.

“We couldn't afford to keep them on after we lost our government grants,” Nathaniel said. “Fortunately for them, most of them were already being offered jobs elsewhere.”

The hall ended at a pair of large elevator doors, and Nathaniel pressed the button. The doors dinged open, and the group piled into the expansive elevator. It easily could have fit twenty people. Nathaniel jabbed the top button.

The doors slid shut. If the green numbers above the door hadn't been increasing, Ephraim wouldn't have known they were rising at all.

“Was it because you disappeared?” Zoe asked.

“I'm flattered you think I'm that important.” Nathaniel scratched the back of his neck. “But that
was
related. The big issue was that we promised results that we could no longer deliver without the coin and controller. And the government was only interested in funding us when they thought we were building a weapon. A small private investor is keeping us operational, but they could back out any day if we don't show them we're making progress. And this is the worst possible time for us to be shut down.”

“Is it really bad?” Zoe said.

“Let me put it this way. If we'd had the coin and someone to use it, I would have seriously considered robbing banks in other universes. And it may still come to that.” He glanced at Ephraim.

“Why didn't the Institute just make another Charon device?” Ephraim asked. “Or at least try to retrieve you?”