Coin #2 - Quantum Coin (19 page)

“He was telling the truth,” Ephraim said. “We're from the future.”

“The future,” Hugh said. “Time travel is impossible, according to Einstein.” He glanced at Ephraim. “That's Albert Einstein. He's a genius.”

“I know who he is,” Ephraim said. “He's famous where we come from.”
Unlike you
, he almost added.

“It wasn't time travel, exactly,” Nathaniel said. “We're from two possible futures, two different universes. Ephraim and Jena are from one where it's 2012. I'm from 2037.”

Hugh's face didn't show even a glimmer of recognition. “How interesting.” Hugh drained his glass. “I'll need more sherry,” he said.

“You haven't heard of the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics?” Ephraim asked.

“No, but I know what Mr. Mackenzie suggests is ludicrous. According to Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg's Copenhagen spirit of quantum theory.”

“You haven't heard of it because you haven't come up with it yet,” Jena said. She pushed off from the door and handed Hugh the eReader. “Here.”

“Jena,” Nathaniel said.

“We don't have time for this,” she said.

Ephraim checked his watch. They had ten minutes before the next window opened.

“She's right,” Ephraim said.

“What is this?” Hugh turned over the eReader and examined it from every angle.

“Just read it,” Jena said. “You can turn the pages by waving a finger at the top of the screen.”

He gazed at her for a long moment, then turned his attention to the device.

“You aren't showing him his autobiographies, are you?” Ephraim asked in a low voice while Hugh turned pages.

“That would be cruel,” she said gently. “I pulled up a scan of his original paper on many worlds, which he won't start writing for around another year.”

Hugh's hand was shaking. “These notes are in my handwriting,” he said.

“Bingo,” Jena said.

Hugh looked up at them, his face pale and his eyes very bright. “The man who wrote this is either mad or a genius.”

“Modest, isn't he?” Ephraim muttered.

“Shh,” Jena said.

“I should have figured this out myself,” Hugh said.

“You would have,” Jena said.

“May I see?” Cliff asked.

“You'd never be able to understand this.” Hugh sneered.

“And he's kind, too,” Ephraim said. “Can this guy help us if he hasn't even come up with this theory on his own?”

“He gets it though,” Jena said. “Look. It usually takes people years just to wrap their brains around it, but not him. He got it right away. His mind came up with it, and that makes him most capable to understand what's going wrong.”

“This isn't all, is it?” Hugh asked.

Jena smiled. She slipped the eReader from Hugh's hand. He snatched at it, but she tucked it close against her chest and folded her arms.

“There's more where that came from, back home. Think of it: the accumulated knowledge of the next eighty-three years.”

Hugh frowned. “In the future, in some alternative universe?”

Jena nodded.

“It's hard to believe, even after reading the theory. I'd have to check the calculations—”

“That'll have to wait,” Ephraim said. “We have to go. Now.” He pointed at his watch, and Nathaniel moved toward them.

Jena leaned forward. “Come with us,
Dr.
Everett,” she murmured. “You're needed.”

“Anywhere you like, Miss Kim,” Hugh said. He looked slightly dazed.

“It's Jena,” she said. “Call me Jena.”

“Jena,” he said gently. “And I'm Hugh.”

“I know exactly who you are,” she said.

“It's time,” Nathaniel said. “Coming, Everett?”

Jena pulled out the controller and flipped it open. Ephraim slipped the coin into it, and she set it spinning. Hugh stared at the floating coin.

“I'm with you,” Hugh said.

“You're leaving with them?” Cliff asked. “You're going to…another world?”

“The paper this young woman showed me,
The Relative State Formulation of Quantum Mechanics
, is far more enticing than the military game theory I'd been planning to work on this summer. Do I win the Nobel?” he asked Jena.

“That would be telling,” Jena said.

“Should I pack anything?” Hugh asked.

“I think you'll find we have everything you need,” Nathaniel said.

Hugh smiled at Jena. “Indeed.”

Ephraim clenched his teeth. He didn't like Hugh's fixation on Jena, but they had to do whatever it took to bring him back to their universe. And it was a good thing she knew how to play Hugh to get him to join them.

Ephraim wondered if she had ever used her wiles to manipulate
him?

Definitely.

He also hoped she was only acting with Hugh.

“Excuse me,” Cliff said. He glanced at each of them. “But, if this is all real…if it isn't a dream, and I'm actually lying on some table in hospital somewhere, then this isn't my life, is it? Can you switch me back? Can you send me home?”

Ephraim stiffened. He looked down at the floor.

“We can't,” Jena said softly.

“I'm sorry,” Nathaniel said. “We don't know where you came from and unfortunately, we don't have the time to help you.”

Ephraim looked up. “Cliff, what happened to you…it's happening to a lot of people. You probably wouldn't have known the difference if we hadn't told you.”

“But I do know,” Cliff said. “I don't belong here.”

“Oh, it's all the same, Cliff,” Hugh said sharply.

“No, it
isn't
,” Ephraim said. “Cliff, if we succeed in fixing things, if I can, I'll come back here and get you home. I promise.”

Cliff looked at him intently. He nodded.

“Now how does this gadget work?” Hugh asked. He drew closer to the Charon device. “Theory is one thing, but nothing in my research or our understanding of physics should allow for interdimensional travel.”

There was a prolonged silence as Hugh looked at their awkward expressions.

Nathaniel cleared his throat. “Actually, we were hoping you could tell us.”

“Me?” Hugh said. “I've only just seen this contraption for the first time.”

“One of your counterparts invented it. We understand how to use the technology, but we need you to explain the deeper concepts,” Nathaniel said. “Specifically, what side effects it might have on the multiverse.”

“Multiverse?”

“The continuum of other worlds,” Jena said. “Multiple universes. Multiverse.”

“Catchy. But why don't you just ask the me of one your futures for assistance?”

“It's complicated,” Nathaniel said.

“Naturally. If we can use this device to actually visit other dimensions…this changes
everything
,” Hugh said.

“That's kind of the problem,” Ephraim said. “The controller there, Jena uses that to set the dimensional coordinates. And then all I have to do is grab that little disc when it stops spinning and it transports all of us in the blink of an eye.”

“So that disc is the key component of this device?” Hugh asked. “It must serve as some sort of gyrocompass.”

“Exactly,” Ephraim said. He had to hand it to Everett, he was a quick study. He might be able to solve this problem after all.

“And without the…controller, did you call it? The disc would work at random, I imagine. According to its orientation?”

“Yes,” Ephraim said, surprised. How long had it taken Ephraim to grasp the concept, even after he'd been using the coin for a while?

Hugh nodded as though he was confirming some private thought.

“Cliff, don't rent my room out,” Hugh said. “This shouldn't take more than a couple of days. Then I'm coming back here to claim my destiny.”

Cliff stifled a laugh.

“You have the coordinates, Jena?” Nathaniel asked.

“Yup,” she said.

The coin slowed and stopped. Hugh peered at it curiously.

“Why, that's a quarter,” he said. “But it's odd. Why does it have the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico on it? It's not made out of silver, either.”

Ephraim shrugged.

“Okay, everyone link hands,” Nathaniel said, eyes on his watch. “The window's about to open.”

Hugh grabbed Jena's free hand immediately.

“What makes the coin levitate in that fashion? A quantum field? The Meissner effect? That hasn't even been tested yet…” Hugh reached for the coin with his free hand. Ephraim felt a twinge of panic.

“Grab them!” Nathaniel rushed toward Jena and Hugh, reaching for the controller—just as they vanished with a soft pop of air. Something thudded to the hardwood floor.

Ephraim's stomach twisted, and he collapsed forward onto his knees. Nathaniel made it to the couch and slumped sideways with his head on the armrest. They waited out the now-familiar quantum reflux. It seemed to go on forever.

When it was over, Ephraim crawled to where Jena and Hugh had just been standing and picked up Jena's eReader. The screen was cracked down the middle.

Ephraim heard a strangled whimper and realized it was coming from him.

“What…where did they…?” he asked.

“Back to my universe,” Nathaniel said. “Without us.”

“Are you blokes all right?” Cliff asked. “That was stunning. This is all really happening, isn't it?”

“I wish it weren't,” Ephraim said.

“Damn it,” Nathaniel said. “Why'd you let him touch the coin?”

“I didn't know he could use it,” Ephraim said. It came out sounding whiny.

“He
invented
it,” Nathaniel said.

“Yeah.” Ephraim leaned back against the couch, his breath coming in gasps. “It's my fault. I should have stopped him when I saw him reaching for it, but I froze.”

“No, I'm sorry. I should have warned you.”

Ephraim stared at the broken eReader. Hugh Everett's bisected face peered up at him, smirking. Ephraim switched it off. Half of the screen blanked, but the other half still showed a faint image of Everett.

“It's broken,” he said.

“Everything's broken.” Nathaniel sighed.

“They'll come back for us, won't they?” Ephraim asked.

Nathaniel checked the time. “The window's closed.”

“In an hour, then.”

“Maybe. But if Jena's smart, and I know she is, she'll take Everett straight back to Crossroads. They can't waste any more time on retrieving us, especially if they can't be sure we're still here. Without the coin or the controller, we're completely vulnerable here.”

“Maybe she'll call them and tell them what happened. Dr. Kim could shut down the LCD—”

“The Doc won't do that. Every time they turn it off, the multiverse breaks down a little more and risks further decoherence. Now that she has what she needs…” Nathaniel bit his lip and fell quiet.

“I thought we were important to the mission,” Ephraim said.

“They have Everett now. He
was
the mission. And he can use the coin too, so…”

Ephraim's shoulders slumped. “They don't need me anymore.”

Cliff sat on the coffee table to face Ephraim and Nathaniel on the couch. He handed each of them half-full glasses of sherry. Nathaniel took Ephraim's glass from him and gave it back to Cliff.

“I've never seen anything like that,” Cliff said. He lit a cigarette and puffed on it. “But you seem pretty calm for someone who was just abandoned in another universe.”

“It's happened to me before,” Nathaniel said.

“What are we going to do?” Ephraim asked.

He stood and paced around the living room. He felt like a caged animal. If they weren't retrieved, they could be wiped out the next time the multiverse threw one of its tantrums.

“We can't stay here,” Ephraim said.

“It seems I have a room available,” Cliff said.

“Thanks, but we won't be staying,” Nathaniel said. He put down his empty glass and pulled a cell phone from his coat pocket.

“You can't call Crossroads with that,” Ephraim said.

Nathaniel smiled cryptically.

“That isn't a cell phone,” Ephraim said. He hurried over and took the small device from the older man. “It's another controller. You had a backup this whole time?”

“After spending ten years in your universe, did you think I would ever risk being stuck again?”

“You devil,” Cliff said. “I'm impressed.” He held his glass up to toast Nathaniel and took a sip.

“You've been holding out on us, old man. I thought you didn't have the resources to build another one of these.” Ephraim returned it to Nathaniel.

“I didn't. This one was the prototype, I guess. Everett—the first one, I mean—gave it to me to reverse engineer and improve on the LCD years ago. I got it out of the archive and finished reassembling it yesterday, using Zoe's controller as a guide.”

“If you had this on you in the dining hall an hour ago, why didn't it anchor you with me?”

“It was switched off,” Nathaniel said. “I was worried it would interfere with the other controller.”

“So we can use this to get back? Can it lock onto the coin?”

“I hardwired a connection to the LCD so I could always get back there. There's just one small problem. If Jena called the Doc as soon as they arrived, the Doc knows that Hugh is there, and that's all she ever wanted. They aren't going to try to retrieve us. I don't think Dr. Kim is going to open another window for us.”