In some ways, the two men had little in common. Jacob Kelley was outgoing, athletic, and charming, while Ryan Oronzi was awkward both physically and socially. In the world of high-energy physics, however, their interests collided. They could talk for hours about Lorentz invariance and whether a tachyonic anti-telephone could practically be built. But the real reason for their friendship was a mutual commitment to keeping the events of the Other Future, as they had taken to calling it, from ever coming true.
Jacob had, in fact, discovered a method to enhance and sustain the probability field that kept Alex and Sandra separate and kept the varcolac from interacting in the material world. Ryan insisted on getting Jacob a security clearance, and once it came through, Jacob spent more and more time at Ryan’s lab, the two of them eventually succeeding in cutting the ties to the baby universe and setting it adrift in the quantum froth. The CIA never released the recordings of the Other Future, but they did increase funding to the NJSC’s High Energy Lab to “investigate and protect against the possibility of anti-timeward weapons systems.”
Of course, Sandra had also seen the feed, though she was not strictly cleared for it. Ryan and Jacob sneaked her past security one day, using Alex’s credentials. When she returned after six hours, she wrapped Alex in a hug and wouldn’t let go.
That left only one person who had played a significant part in the Other Future but didn’t know it. Sandra decided it would be too much—and too awkward—to tell him all at once. It would imply a relationship that they didn’t actually have, making it hard to actually get to know him in real life. She was working a six-days-on, three-days-off cycle on patrol, but her days off happened to coincide with a robotics conference in Philadelphia. She checked the scheduled participants and bought herself a ticket.
When the synchronized quadcopter demonstration was over, Sandra walked up to the young, stocky, Hispanic man who had led the presentation. It was strange; he only looked familiar in a vague way, from seeing him on the feed. He wasn’t very much to look at, though apparently they had become good friends in the Other Future. It seemed odd to use the past tense about something that would have happened in the future and now wouldn’t, but, in a way, it was also in the past from her perspective. The Other Future was a cause that was producing effects in her life. In a very real sense, those events had actually happened, albeit in a kind of timeline loop that ended where it began. The past tense would do as well as any other.
She made a show of reading his nametag and held out her hand. “Angel Gutierrez?” she said.
He gave her a dazzling smile. “You pronounced it right,” he said. “Most of you gringos are hopeless at Mexican names.”
She smiled back. “I once knew someone named Angel.”
“Well, nice to meet you”—he glanced at her nametag—“Sandra.”
“Nice to meet you, too. I just wanted to tell you that your demonstration was remarkable. Those copters are pretty versatile, working together like that.”
“Thanks. We think they have a lot of promise.”
The moment stalled. Sandra didn’t want to leave, but she didn’t know what else to say.
“Well, it was good to meet you,” she managed, hating herself.
“Bye,” Angel said. He turned to go.
“Angel!” she called. He turned back. “Could we… that is… would you like to have a drink?”
“A drink? Right now?” It was eleven in the morning.
“No, I mean… sometime. Just…” This was ridiculous. “I’m sorry. It was a stupid idea.” She turned and walked away, her cheeks burning.
He came after her. “Wait.” He touched her shoulder, and she turned around. “I don’t have any plans for lunch.”
She let out the breath she was holding. “Neither do I.”
He was obviously confused—she was pretty sure he wasn’t accustomed to strange girls asking him out—but he took it in stride. “The hotel’s restaurant is pretty awful, but they do serve food,” he said. “I have to clear my stuff out for the next demo. Meet you there at noon?”
She thought about offering to help him gather his things, but she thought that would be pushing it. “Noon it is.”
She was tempted not to tell him. It would have been easier to enjoy the lunch, to ask him questions about his work and completely avoid the inevitable awkwardness of telling him what she knew. But the longer she delayed, the more it would seem like she’d been deceiving him, and the more difficult it would be. Best to get it over with.
She took a deep breath. “Actually,” she said, “this isn’t the first time I’ve seen you.”
“I knew it,” Angel said. “You’ve been stalking me. Pretty girls do that all the time.” He sighed theatrically. “Am I going to have to call security?”
She grinned. He was just like he seemed on the feed from the Other Future, never embarrassed, always making her feel at ease. “I’ve got something to tell you. It will be hard to believe—I didn’t believe it at first.”
She was expecting another joke, but he was quiet now, looking at her curiously. There was nothing for it. She sent his eyejack system the first clip she had decided on—that of Angel himself flying his quadcopters at the wreckage of the baseball stadium. It was unquestionably him, complete with quadcopters and quirky sense of humor. It was also just as clearly at a disaster that had never occurred, in a scene that had never existed. She watched him watch it with growing astonishment.
Finally, his eyes refocused on hers. He was pale. His lips moved, but it took a few moments for him to say, “What is this? CGI?” But of course, it wasn’t, and he knew it. No program, no matter how talented its designer, could capture a person so completely.
“It’s from the future,” Sandra told him.
Over dinner, Alex sat with her father and Ryan and listened to them talk about how they had finally disconnected their universe from the wormhole.
“But, the varcolac is still out there, isn’t it?” she said.
“I’m sure it is,” her father said. “I can’t imagine how it could be killed. It must be distributed through the particles of a thousand worlds. Nothing we could do would be likely to harm it in any existential way.”
“But we’ve destroyed the technology that would give it access,” Ryan said. “The baby universe is gone, and my notes for how to create it are destroyed. There are only a few people who even know such a thing is possible.”
“The thing about science,” Alex said, “is that if something can be done, someone will eventually discover how to do it. You can’t just put a lid on it and make it go away. Somebody will eventually do it again.”
Her father nodded gravely and wrapped his arm around her. “Let’s just hope that it doesn’t happen any time soon.”
A knock on the door interrupted them. Alex was suddenly reminded of a knock on that same door that had started everything fifteen years ago, when Brian Vanderhall had come in out of the snow, babbling about an intelligent quantum creature.
Her father opened the door. Sandra stood there, smiling, drawing a young man in by the hand. He was short, Hispanic, a little pudgy, with dark glasses. She recognized him at once.
“Angel,” she said. “Welcome.”
He came in nervously and shook hands all around. “You must be Alex. Dr. Kelley. And Dr. Oronzi, a pleasure.” He gave an awkward smile. “This is a bit strange, I must tell you.”
“I’ve shown him the highlights and summarized the rest,” Sandra said. “He was supposed to be on a panel at the conference in the afternoon, but he skipped it. We’ve been talking pretty much nonstop since lunch.”