Relativity Synchronization:
The Fourth Cause

2044: Brave New World

As Chris stepped out of the hospital and into the downpour outside, he closed his eyes and turned his face towards the heavens. Cool rain gently washed down his cheeks and he felt some of the tension he had built up over the last half hour evaporate as his muscles relaxed.

Opening his eyes, he noticed the GeoCorp guard behind him in the reflection of the massive glass windows. Standing halfway down the hallway, the man watched Chris while gripping his gun. Smiling inwardly, Chris walked away, turning up his collar against the chill. Some people will always be small-minded. Hmm. The world may have changed but humans will always be human. Directions.… Where do I go? Chris looked at his surroundings. The light from the afternoon sun lost itself in the mammoth maze of buildings.

Around him, at ground level, it looked like an abandoned war zone. All he saw were rusting hulks of cars in the damp shadows. Its mid-afternoon … around him the steady rhythm of water pounded on rusted metal and cracked concrete. And the streets are empty. What is wrong with this city?

The streets were not, however, silent for long. At the edges of his hearing Chris became aware of a humming echo reverberating through the concrete canyons, a dull rush above the spattering of the rain. Chris swallowed. Of course. Far, far above, he could see a line of gray sky between the glowing neon spires of the skyscrapers around him. Below, in between the buildings, rushed hundreds, thousands of small, flying vehicles.

Chris looked again at the rusting hulks of vehicles around him. They’re up there now. No one seemed to use ground level anymore. He could see advertisements projected on walls promoting everything from cosmetic cybernetics to hand grenades. Most were flashing the GeoCorp or PolCorp Securities logos on them.

“Hey, no loitering. Get lost loser.” The rotund guard stood in the door of the hospital glaring at Chris with his assault rifle leveled at him. “PolCorp hates doing cleanup jobs on ground level. Believe me, you don’t want to make ‘em come down here to take care of this. Now leave and I won’t even fine you.”

Chris flipped the man off as he headed down the street. Malicious little pig. The guard kept his gun trained on Chris for a minute before turning back inside, once Chris had walked far enough away.

A deep rumble came from above Chris like an earthquake. He looked up in time to see a train rumble along tracks five stories above his head. The gridworks suspending the tracks were integrated into the sides of the buildings and appeared to wind through and connect to all of the buildings in sight.

Despite the grand arches that jumped from building to building, the entire thing looked run down and shabby. That train must be what the poor people take. He looked at the remnants of cars around him. Either that or the people of this time are frightened of the streets.…

“Got ten bucks, buddy?” The gritty voice came from his left, slurred and bone weary. From the alley next to him a gnarled figure staggered out toward him until he shadowed in the mouth of the alley. “So how about it? Help a guy down on his luck?”

Chris thought for a moment. He had no idea how far the money Dr. Jameson had given him would go, but he needed some information. Besides, what’s ten bucks out of two hundred and fifty thousand? He studied the figure in front of him for a moment. “I’ll tell you what; I’ll give you a fifty if you can answer a few questions for me.”

The man grinned a gap-toothed smile as he emerged from the alley. “What ya wanna know?” He wore ripped jeans and a plastic bag as a poncho, and his question degenerated into a hacking, phlegm-filled cough.

As he studied the man’s face, Chris realized with a start that while the man looked like he was in his sixties, he probably wasn’t even thirty. Chris couldn’t tell where the five o’clock shadow ended and the dirt began on his face. “All right,” He fished a fifty out of his pocket but kept it held in his hand. “For starters, what’s the date today? Do you know that?”

The man smiled again. This was going to be the easiest fifty he had ever gotten. “Monday, October sixth, or close to it.”

Ok. Fall. So I was put into the coma in summer.

“Good enough. Now, where am I?”

“You’re on Greensborough Avenue—right down the street from GeoCorp Central Facility.”

Well, that means absolutely nothing to me. “Sorry, I meant what city are we in right now?”

“Are you serious, man?” The vagabond peered into Chris’s face suspecting some sort of trick, but unable to figure out what it might be.

“I’m serious.”

“Denver North, man. Old Thornton Corporate District. Where the hell do you think you are?”

“Thanks.” Chris handed the man a fifty.

“Shit, man, for another fifty bucks more I can take you wherever it is you need to go. You want a guide?”

Chris thought about it. This is too easy. What if this guy is a GeoCorp plant? Jameson said to watch out for the company. “I’ll compromise. I’ll give you another twenty if you can tell me which way is south.”

“Aw, hell man, south is that way, but you don’t want to go down there. That way is a bad scene, man.”

“Thanks again.” Chris turned his back on the old man and peeled through his bills for a twenty, but he couldn’t find anything less than a fifty. What the Hell. They wouldn’t have let me go just to track me through a homeless guy. “On second thought, maybe I’ll take you up on that offer.”

The man grinned his toothless grin again. Easy money. “Where do you want to go?”

“Good question.” Chris took out the card for Little Paris. “Can you bring me to a hotel near this place?”

His guide peered at the card and handed it back to Chris. “Well … the thing is, I don’t see so good. I, uh …”

“The Address is sixteen fifty-five north Cherry Lane.” Chris felt embarrassed for the guy. “It’s called the Little Paris Coffee Shop.”

“Aw, hell, I know where that is, but there ain’t no hotels near there. It’s in a mall, about five miles south of here. But don’t worry, it ain’t getting into the combat zone for about another twelve miles.”

Chris sighed “Just my luck. We’ll have to opt for second-best. Can you take me to the nearest hotel, then?”

“Nearest to here or there, Boss?”

“Nearest to the coffee shop,” Chris carefully explained, “if you know of one that’s a straight shot down a street from the shop so that I don’t get lost trying to find my way there.”

“Sure thing, boss.”

“Here,” Chris handed him the second fifty. “And let’s stop on the way for food. I’ll buy you lunch, besides—I haven’t eaten in a very, very long time.”

“Lunch it is. It’ll be about a thirty minute walk till we get anywhere that’ll let me into their place.” The old man laughed, doubled over in a fit of vicious coughing, spit on the ground, and said, “I always love a man that pays in advance. I’m going to enjoy working for you.”

They walked in silence for a while. At first Chris was wary of the man and kept an eye on the shadows, half-suspecting a trap. But as time ticked by to the steady rhythm of their footfalls and the steady rain, he allowed his guard to drop. The man would only grin when Chris looked at him, and nod his head to indicate a change of course.

“What’s your name?” Chris asked as they walked under a huge purple neon arch into what looked like some sort of shopping center. The décor may have been nice once, but steady traffic from the city’s destitute had turned it into a den of dirty stalls and shouting shopkeepers, each trying to attract notice to the shoddy wares that they were displaying.

“Clive is what my name is, but most people call me Rat. How about you?” Rat asked as they turned once again and left their shortcut through the mall.

There were people now, and the streets were no longer shrouded in shadow. All around them people bustled, bathed in multi-colored neon light, some hurrying through the rain in search of shelter, but most moved about unconcerned. Wet trash smell filled the air, but a more pungent, flowery smell was pushing the offending odor away. Chris had no clue where it was coming from. There were PolCorp officers milling with the crowd, carrying riot shields and assault rifles like the one the guard at the hospital had. They eyed the milling throng with arrogance, but ignored Chris and Rat who were sticking to the shadows on the sides of the street.

“I’m Chris. Chris Nost.” He looked around. “What is this place? Why are there people all around when everywhere else has been deserted at ground level?”

Rat moved on, a gleam in his eyes. “You ever want any action, this is the place to come. Heh.” He trailed off into another coughing fit. “This is a Ped Mall. Special parts of the city are turned into these places and patrolled by PolCorp so that the upper levels can come down and slum.”

Chris stopped for a second, taken aback at seeing Rat’s eyes, then picked his pace back up. Now that they were in decent light he could see that Rat’s eyes were yellow. “I see. Action. Do you mean prostitution?”

“You got it, boss. Of course, there’s plenty of action in South, but there’s plenty of the wrong kind of action down there, too, if you know what I mean.”

“So I’ve heard,” he smiled at Rat. “I was warned that PolCorp doesn’t even patrol down there anymore.”

“It ain’t PolCorp not patrolling that’s bad. In my opinion that’s actually a plus.”

Chris eyed the crowed with curiosity, filing away the tidbit about PolCorp, but focused on the streets around them. There were no obvious sex shops or hookers or girls behind glass. “So where’s the action you were talking about? I don’t see anything.”

“Oh, well officially GeoCorp has outlawed all that, but trust me, you can get some ass in almost any one of these places. Shit, man, they can make more of a profit on it if it’s illegal. Then when shop keepers don’t pay the squeeze, they fine the piss out of them.”

Chris saw mostly clothing boutiques, but there were also a few clubs advertising that they were open ‘twenty-four-seven’, and two gun stores. “What about the gun stores? They seem kind of out of place.”

“Shit, man, trust me—they got the finest ass on the block. All the weapons they carry are a front for having really high-end security to protect the image of the Corpies that don’t want their faces seen. They still sell, of course, but this way there’s a good reason for them to be loaded up on the firepower.”

“Interesting. Do they let just anyone buy a gun?”

Rat stopped walking and looked Chris in the eye. “For fuck’s sake, man, where the hell you been? Yeah, anyone can buy a gun. As long as you got your papers. Shit, you want one; we can go right now.…”

“No, no. That won’t be necessary. My apologies. I … I’ve been in a coma for quite some time. I just got released from the hospital and I’m having to learn everything as we go along. Please be patient with my questions.”

Rat looked at Chris again, laughed, and shook his head. “Shit, boss. Are you serious? Sorry about that. You look pretty good for a guy who just got out of a coma. Hey, it’s time to eat—follow me.” He led Chris into an unmarked door in the side of a building, where a few derelicts like Rat sat around bowls of steaming, unidentifiable gruel.

“I told you not to come in here, Rat,” the lady behind the bar said as she reached for something under the counter.

“It’s okay, Roberta,” Rat croaked. “I got cash today. Meet my new friend, Chris.” He gestured toward his guest.

“Yeah?” Roberta reached for a different spot under the counter and pulled out two bowls, ladling some of the stew from a hot pot behind her. “Looks like he’s got cash. Where did you pick him up?”

“The hospital,” Rat smirked. “He just got out of a coma.”

“Yeah, whatever. It’ll be a hundred bucks, high roller.”

Chris paid. “What is this stuff, anyway?” he asked her, eyeing it suspiciously. It was gray and chunky, and he couldn’t smell any discernable odor. He ladled up a spoonful. The taste surprised him. Everything in this future seemed like it was faded and broken, lifeless. But the stew exploded over his tongue. It was slightly spicy with rich flavors twining together. It was the most delicious thing he had ever tasted.

She leaned close to him, over the bar. “Between you and me, honey, you don’t want to know what’s in it.”

Rat and Chris ate in silence after that.

As they left the restaurant, Rat took a side street out of the market and led Chris through a maze of garbage and rubble. Occasionally they had to step over small groups of sleeping people, huddled together for the shared body warmth. Massive pipes ran up the sides of the buildings, turning the rain to steam with a sizzle where it fell on them.

“We’re almost there,” he said to Chris over his shoulder as he climbed a pile of greasy cardboard made soft by the rain, which had diminished into a fine drizzle. He slipped and tumbled down the far side, out of Chris’s view. Chris heard a string of cursing through the rattling, wet cough. He clambered up and over the pile in time to see Rat climb sluggishly to his feet and make a feeble attempt at brushing the mud from his plastic garbage bag.

“Here you are, boss!” Rat did a little dance, like a pageant queen presenting a prize on a game show, as he gestured down the street he had tumbled into.

Halfway down the block Chris saw it, “The Rangley Hotel.” The buildings were lower here, and Chris saw a few people milling around. They had a distinctly different look to them than the ‘Ped Mall’ crowd. These people were less glitzy and glamorous. The way they kept their heads down spoke of locals trying to get on with their business, rather than flashy kids out looking for a good time.

There were even a few trees growing on the corners of the intersections on either side, though only sparse brown leaves still clung to the stunted branches. Another thing that spoke of the urban instead of the high-rise corporate world was that there were no abandoned cars in the street. Though the few cars parked on the street did not look like they were in particularly good repair, they did look operational.

Rat pointed down the street the other direction. “See that big, pointy tower?”

Chris saw it: a massive silver spike, about a mile down the street, which rose what looked to be hundreds of stories high. Chris was awed. That isn’t possible. That building must stand near a mile high. Someone must have engineered high impact, low weight building materials while I slept.

The street they stood on ran toward the obelisk, and seemed to be a thoroughfare for the aerial cars that zoomed a few hundred feet overhead. The way they swerved and moved, passing both above and below, Chris imagined that there must be some sort of advanced artificial intelligence driving them. Either that or humanity’s reflexes had improved quite a bit in the past forty years.

“This is Cherry Lane. Go that way—the shop you’re looking for is on this street right under that spike.”

“What’s the spike?” Chris had trouble keeping the awe out of his voice. “It’s huge.”

“That, boss, is the GeoCorp District Administration Building. The D.A.B.” Rat stopped the mock bravado and moved in close, his eyes shifting about. “Don’t trust them.”

“Why not?” Chris asked, suspicion surging through him. Who is this guy? Maybe he really is someone sent to spy on me. But why would anyone want to keep tabs on me?

“Because they’re assholes, that’s why.” Rat coughed and spit something black onto the trunk of one of the wretched trees. “They got all these ads floatin’ around that they’re gonna bring a better tomorrow. Well, fuck them. They ain’t gonna help me with this shit—” Rat thumped his chest “—cause I ain’t worth shit to them. I don’t have money, so they’re gonna watch me die and send in a cleaning crew to burn my corpse. I’m only twenty-five and I’ll be dead in under five years—all because GeoCorp won’t employ anyone who had family in the government. So with me the Kennedy family dies out because my grandfather had the wrong job.”

Rat leaned towards Chris and lowered his voice to conspiratorial whisper. “Hell, most of the street people you saw are in the same position that I am. The really old guy asleep back there at the mouth of the alley is Tod Morrison. He’s the famous mathematician who came up with the new Mathematical Optimization Model that solved the food shortages for the population growth. People considered him one of the world’s greatest philanthropists—even won a bunch of prizes. But he worked for the government and now he sleeps on a concrete bed.”

Chris’s suspicion ebbed, but he didn’t know what to say, so he looked back at the spire. “Thanks. I never would have found the place without you.”

“Shit, it ain’t nothin’ for a hundred bucks. You need anything, you find me. Just ask for Rat—I’ll be around.”

“I may take you up on that.” Chris fished through his wad till he found a five hundred dollar bill. “Take this. Consider it a retainer to stay in the area so I can find you if I need you.”

Rat nodded to Chris with a grin as he took the bill. “You take care, Chris Nost. This is a dangerous world—but you’re different. And I like you.” Then he headed back the way they had come. Chris could hear his wet, hacking cough long after his head disappeared behind the heaps of rubbish.

Squat and run-down Hotel Rangely’s dingy exterior had seen years of abuse and disrepair. A couple despondent souls lounged by the front door, using the hotel’s canopy as a shelter from the light rain and drinking whisky out of an unmarked bottle that Chris could smell ten feet away. He nodded to them as he walked by, trying to be friendly in his nervousness, but neither responded with as much as a grunt.

Inside, the lobby was mostly clean, if worn, with a few dusty chairs and tables. In the far corner sat an overweight cleaning woman watching a black and white television even older than Chris. The anchorwoman spoke about widespread natural disaster in Asia, and the images on the flickering screen depicted piles of bodies bloated by flood and burned by fire.

Chris approached the desk. “I need a room,” he said to a newspaper held erect by two stumpy, hairy hands. The headline read:

Mount Fuji Blows Again,

Remnants of Japan Sink

“How long?” The paper lowered to reveal a scabby bald man with a face that looked like it came from the same family as a pit-bull.

“Actually, I have no idea. I need a place while I look for a job.” Chris realized his mistake as the words came out of his mouth.

“Sorry, bub. ‘No idea’ isn’t an amount of time I rent for.” He brought the paper back up, hiding his face from Chris. “Besides, we don’t rent to people who ain’t registered Corp Employees.”

“Wait. How about a week?” He realized that this would be an expensive fix. “I’ll have my papers by Thursday. After my hiring negotiations.”

The clerked gave Chris a long, calculating look. His small piggy eyes lit up with the prospect of a good profit. “Three-thousand. Cash only.”

Chris smiled. “Can I get a receipt? I’ll need to turn in my expense account to the Company, after all. I will be getting partial reimbursement for the move until I find a more permanent place to live.” He hadn’t liked the way the guy had looked him over, and given what little he knew of the times, it seemed a safe thing to say.

Sure enough the man scowled and said, “Eighteen hundred and no receipt. That’s the best price I can give you.”

Chris counted off some bills. “Here’s fifteen hundred. No receipt, but a good room.”

The man thought for a moment and pulled down some keys from the pegboard behind him and tossed them to Chris. “Deal.”

Chris took the keys and slid another three hundred across the counter. “Tip.” He said simply. It seemed the best course of action to make sure that he had the man’s friendship in the future.

The clerk smiled. “Wait up a minute.”

He took down another set of keys and flipped them to Chris, and motioned for Chris to toss back the others. “A good room. Like you asked for. Anything else I can get you?”

“Can you tell me where a drugstore is?” Chris thought about the basic necessities he would need.

“What kind of drugstore?” The clerk raised an eyebrow. “Slab, smack, net drugs, contraceptives, antivirals … what you looking for?

“You know, toiletries, that sort of thing? Toothbrush and stuff.” Chris raised his empty hands to indicate his lack of luggage.

“Sure, bub. By the way, the name’s Charlie.” He reached into a drawer and pulled out a map of Denver, pointing out a few malls and intersections with convenience stores. The tourist map had only the main streets and little pictures of all the places worth seeing in the area. In large letters along the top it stated: NORTH DENVER—TWO MILE HIGH CITY.

“You got no luggage?” The clerk seemed to have a hidden meaning in his question, but Chris had no idea what it was.

Chris shrugged. “I arrived a little unexpectedly.”

“Shit, man. Sounds like being born. Hey, let me know if there’s anything else I can do for you, Mr. …?”

“Call me Nost. Chris Nost.”

“Righty-o, Chris Nost. Call down to the desk if there’s anything you need. Dial star one-one. I’m here nine to nine every day, and most nights, besides. Enjoy your stay.”

The room surprised him, given the outward appearance of the Rangely Hotel. The bed was large and not obnoxiously lumpy, and the little table lamp lit the room with a bright yellow glow. Chris shut off the lamp and opened the brown, flower-patterned curtains, letting the distilled gray afternoon light wash over him and into the room. It had stopped raining, but a low fog had rolled in, hiding the silver spire of the D.A.B. and obscuring the view from his room. The Rangely was the highest building on the block, and Chris wondered what the scenery would be like once the weather cleared. His trip through the streets with Rat had disorientated him and he was no longer sure which way downtown was.

Chris stripped and walked into the bathroom, wondering whether or not he would find some technological wonder. Luckily in the bathroom he found only a sort of refreshing disappointment—familiarity. Shower. Tub. Toilet. Sink. Starched hotel towels with the GeoCorp logo on them. They were the only signs in the hotel room that he had been asleep for forty-one years. He took them off the rack and laid them, unfolded and facedown, on the floor. He muttered his thanks that the embroidered “G” in a triangle was only on one side. Less than a day in this world, but he already knew he didn’t like GeoCorp, turned the hot water all the way on, laid down on the towels, and let the steam wash over him.

He waited until the bathroom was filled with steam, turned off the shower and climbed into the tub, letting the heated ceramic warm the chill he hadn’t noticed was there. Tension started to drain from his muscles and a warm glow seeped through his body, filling the void left by the tension.

Chris attempted to let his mind drift into oblivion, but there were too many questions running rampant through his thoughts. Who did I murder? Why? How is it possible that I am here, now? He thought of Dr. Jameson and felt a growing irritation. How could the man profess he cared anything about Chris when the only advice he could give was to find a job? I know he was on the clock, but three days is a long time to wait for answers. With newfound resolve he buried that portion of the discordance in his thoughts by resolving to find a way to research his past before meeting with Jameson. He smiled as he felt a small portion of the weight of his troubles lift from his shoulders.

Chris couldn’t fathom searching for a job in this dark world of neon lights and cardboard dreams. If his suspicions were founded in reality, then everything he knew as a scientist was outdated and no longer relevant. It seemed impossible that the technology level had advanced so far in just over forty years; he assumed there had been some major breakthroughs since his time.

That line of thinking brought more questions. He had no specific memories from ‘his time’ at all—only a series of thoughts and impressions. He didn’t even know what sort of person he was before about six hours ago. He didn’t feel like he was capable of murder, but then he thought back to Rat.

The surge of paranoia he felt when Rat told him about the D.A.B. was more than cautiousness at unfamiliar surroundings. He had something ingrained in that reaction. Paranoia seemed to be a part of him, which meant that the hostility and anger he had been feeling were part of his personality. But something about that didn’t resonate within him. His internal vision of himself didn’t match the shape that left in him. God damn it … Personality reconstruction is a painful experience. I want to know who the hell I am.…

As the absolute reality of the situation struck him, Chris snickered and then his control snapped and it turned into a deep belly laugh as tears turned into streams. The release felt good but a small part of him remained, an inner self, retaining control, which wished this were all a delusion. That he was back in ‘his’ time, penned up in some asylum, out of touch with reality.

He tried to make the image stick, but it slipped and faded into nothing. This is real, he told himself over and over as he lay in the bathtub absorbing the ambient heat in the room. This is real. This is real. This is real. And I am trapped here.

He lay there for a long time, until he started to get cold. Then he stood up and showered, rekindling the warmth in his bones. The more he thought about it, the more he realized that, without memories, he would be just as out of place in ‘his’ time. It was all the same when you had nothing to base it on. I guess, he thought¸ if there’s anyone who can handle the world after sleeping for forty-one years, it would be someone who couldn’t remember what it was like before. Chris laughed again. Unless, of course, I really am crazy.

He got out of the shower, opened the bathroom door to release the steam, and toweled off the mirror. “I’m seventy-four years old,” he said to the mirror, but it sounded absurd as he looked at himself. Shoulder length, dark brown hair, shiny with moisture, sat atop a scruffy face with a strong jaw line and hard, gray eyes. For some reason they reminded him of Dr. Jameson’s eyes—cold and void of emotion.

Chris scratched his chin. I guess I woke up before they could give me my daily shave. He still had three days before he met the doctor at Little Paris. Might as well make myself presentable, he thought as he dressed himself in his only set of clothing, still damp from the rain.

He could tell from the darkening of the gray light outside that night had fallen and he looked at the clock—a regular digital buzzer alarm clock with red numbers. Six oh-five. He considered waiting until morning to run his errands—the city seemed dangerous enough during the day, but he felt unconcerned. He had an inexplicable feeling of … waiting in his stomach. He didn’t know what he waited for, but he felt a weird certainty that until it happened, nothing could possibly happen to him. Anyway, he was restless.

“I guess forty-one years of sleep will do that,” he said to no one as he locked his room door behind him. “Anyway, how bad could it be?”

2873: James Garret’s Laboratory

Garret put down the stolen file and rubbed his eyes, trying in vain to blink back the exhaustion. He caught a ragged breath. They had sent his wife single handedly up against the greatest paradox in history and expected her to win. In a lot of ways, it was murder.

Expecting one person to be able to tip the balance of historical imperative by that much was beyond sheer stupidity. It bordered on willful blindness. James had a nagging suspicion that Director Warren, predecessor to the current Director Arbu, had known what he was doing. At least he had lost his job over it. But the trivial price that had been exacted was far from enough.

Still, something about this did not add up correctly. The math worked well enough, but not perfectly. It was almost as though.… He scratched out the formulas on his relative paradox theory, inputting the data from Wanda’s file. And there it was. He could not build the relativity frame correctly for the information contained in the file. So, something was missing, something about the time frame she had been operating in.

Regardless of that, the math said that she could not have survived, which meant someone in headquarters wanted her dead. Or possibly both. Garret couldn’t shake the belief that Ex-Director Warren had wanted Wanda dead. Perhaps the motive and the missing information were linked.

He ran the math yet again, to be sure. Simple math showed that no single person could affect the catalyst actions needed to counterbalance a paradox above a class three magnitude. The computers could not have missed that little piece of this mission.

Bloody thoughts of vengeance filled Garret’s head. Visions of storming into Warren’s house and killing him … but he shook those thoughts out, instead focusing on the more productive lines of how to save his wife’s life. Chief amongst those thoughts was how to create a secondary paradox that resulted in his wife’s survival without crashing the time stream.

It was fairly obvious to him that walking in and trying to avert the events which led to her death would have much the same results as Wanda’s mission had ten years previously. Starting to see a path that would result in getting Wanda back, he got to work on the mathematics, cranking out possible solutions with temporal physics.

Shadows grew longer and the air chilled as the sun made its journey over the horizon. Hours and hours of math had not yet revealed a simple solution to him, nor did he feel one would be found in the math alone. An elegant solution sat somewhere in this problem, he could sense that much—but where was it?

Starting from scratch he listed out his tools. ‘Up’ nanos allowed access to the past. ‘Down’ nanos allowed him to stretch and manipulate the time flow. HUD contact lenses allowed him faster computational power than anyone in the world, except his dead wife—who would be active in the time frame. Any non-anachronistic appearing technology would be usable as well.

But there were so many variables in accessing the paradox nexus and changing the outcome. Frustrated, he walked out of his laboratory and into the living room to attempt relaxing on the couch. And there, on the History Channel, came the solution. It took him a moment of watching the show about historical wars for it to click in his mind, but it finally did.

If you spun a smaller paradox to brush the larger one, instead of amplification you would create a small shift in the large paradox’s spin. A smile spread across his face as he formulated the plan.

Time: Classified

Operation: Classified

Lucille Frost shifted through the paperwork on her desk. There were a hell of a lot of good points about this era, but paperwork was definitely not one of them. She missed the future, where you never needed to see paper unless you wanted to. Instead of these ungainly heaps spread across her desk, everything would be centrally filed and easily accessible through her data pad—anywhere in the world. The global net had effectively put an end to the need for desks, replacing paper with desktops.

On top of that was the scientific level of this century. Talk about mind numbing. Reviewing archaic technology had to be the most boring assignment she had ever been given. She sighed again and sifted listlessly through her pile of documents.

Finally, she surrendered to the advancing lines of infantry paperwork. They were almost successful in managing to storm the chasm at the edge of her desk and she did not have the patience for this. So, to hell with it. The best combat specialist in the twenty-ninth century should not be stuck behind a desk so far as she was concerned. Organizing her desk into piles of random paper she got up and left the office, stealthily moving through the hallway towards the elevator.

Just as freedom was at hand, someone cleared his throat behind her. She nearly jumped out of her skin, but managed to retain control of her reflexive reaction. Squaring her shoulders she took a deep breath and waited for the verbal attack to begin. She knew she had been cut off, but it had yet to be seen if she would be routed.

“Hey there, Lucy. Where are you sneaking off to?” The voice belonged to Christopher Nost, the primary reason she was stuck in this outhouse of a century behind a boring desk with nothing of real importance to do.

She turned around and sweetly smiled. “Why Chris, I was heading to grab a cup of coffee. I finished reviewing your paper on the nano drive and I wanted to try to digest some of the science in it. It seems to me that it will have a particular weakness to neutrino decay, so I figured I missed something.” For good measure she took a deep breath, making sure her breasts were straining at the blouse she wore. Best to use every weapon at hand when trying to escape the office.

Chris blanched. He was a typical male, insofar as liking beautiful women. And Lucille Frost was indeed a beauty. As she pulled in that breath, he found he had trouble staying focused on her project comments. He went for the gambit, “Hmm … You know, it never even crossed my mind. Mind if I come with you and discuss some of this?”

Lucille nodded in assent. Internally, she danced with joy. She had escaped the office! Freedom was at hand! “Of course. I’ll wait for you in the lot.” She celebrated another type of victory as she realized what he was coming to discuss with her. How easy that had been.

Two months of casual conversation and a touch of tactical flirtation unlocked a mission that should have taken upwards of ten months to break through the initial phase. Never underestimate the power of being a tease in a tactical situation, she reflected. Heading into the parking lot, she had high hopes of knocking out an easy mission fast. And she had no idea just how wrong she was.

1997 A.D.: Colorado Springs, Colorado

Alex tipped his hat forward, blocking the sun from his eyes, and watched the scene playing out in the coffee shop across the street. Lucy and Chris were talking, and it seemed to be pretty heated, with a lot of disagreement expressed in curt motions of the hands and jerks of their heads. But the way he leaned forward and the way she faced him and stroked her hair as they talked …

It definitely seemed that a romantic bond was forming. So, a commando from the twenty-ninth century and a brilliant physicist from the twentieth … Interesting mix. Hell, interesting breach of Time Corp’s policies and procedures. But who was he to say what was right and what wasn’t, he thought wryly.

With a slight flexing of his will, he hopped forward in time by half a second to test to see if Lucy would note the travel in this proximity. He knew from personal experience, and one memorable night, that she was more than skilled. She was one of the best travelers out there. But she also seemed distracted at the moment.

He was only fifty meters from Lucy Frost, but she didn’t notice the time skip at all. Alex rubbed his chin. Interesting. If she was this enamored of her scientist, it might make his job a hell of a lot easier. He spun an ancient Roman coin, one of Judas’s thirty pieces of silver, across his knuckles as he thought.

His introspection snapped as the couple got up and left the shop across the street. Alex settled up on his bill, dropping a fifty to cover his cup of coffee, and then got up to discreetly follow them. He was pretty sure that using time travel for anything greater than a micro hop would alert Lucy to his presence, so instead he used the good old cloak and dagger method of staying a few cars back and tailing them C-Twenty style.

It took about half an hour for Lucy to drive Chris home. During the drive, Alex decided on his approach to dealing with Lucy. This time he would go with absolute honesty. Well, he admitted to himself, he would be mostly honest, anyway. After she dropped Chris off, he went ahead and pulled up next to her on the road, motioning for her to pull over into a random lot.

He saw her do a double take as recognition hit her, then she glared at him. With a sigh, he pulled behind her car. His decision had been made; he would try to reason with her. Failing that, he’d have to figure out how to take her down. Though, that would not be easy, as he well knew. He genuinely hoped that reason would work, and not for her sake. As she pulled off into the parking lot, he followed her in, then got out of his car. When he leaned forward to shut the door something hit him from behind and slammed his head into the frame of the car, leaving a dent over the door. Blackness erupted behind his eyes and he slumped forward.

On pure reflex, in the confusion of pain, he hopped forward in time. He found himself still in the C-Twenty parking garage with Lucy Frost standing triumphantly above him. He looked up and chuckled, still dazed. “I’m not sure I actually deserved that, Lucy.”

She looked down at him as he spoke. With a brief shrug, dismissing what he had said, she returned fire. “That was too easy for the infamous Alexander Zarth. I cannot believe you are the same man that bested me back in Salem, lover boy. So what have you got hidden up your sleeve?”

With a grunt he scythed her legs out from under her and counter blocked her slipstream. Glancing over to her he made eye contact. “Easy. I came here to talk with you. Mind if I take a second to get rid of this headache?”

She shakily stood up and nodded. “Go ahead. You’ve proven your point well enough I suppose, so I’ll listen. But I’m warning you—if I don’t like what you have to say I will do my damndest to take you down, traveler. And it better be extremely convincing after the way you gave me the run around then dumped me back in Salem. I still haven’t forgiven you for that little incident.”

Alex laughed. “I would expect no less. Especially after the situation I left you in during the witch trials. I can still hear the cries of ‘witch!’ as you proved them right and vanished into thin air. Boy, the whole clergy was in an uproar for months about that. Though in all fairness you owe me a right beating for that one, and I know I’ve got it coming.” He winked as he reached into his glove box and grabbed some aspirin.

Lucy let herself smile, just a little. “For an arch-nemesis you sure are being pleasant. Particularly after sleeping with me, then framing me as a witch and leaving me to be hanged.”

Alex massaged his temples. “Well, would it be too harsh of me to point out that you were there to kill me?”

Lucy raised an eyebrow. “Alex, I know. It was just a job, though. Now talk. Why have you come here to talk to me? Why aren’t you finishing the job of trying to kill me in return? Or am I wrong—do you harbor no ill will towards me?”

With a sigh, Alex leaned back against his car and looked Lucy in the eyes. “No ill will, Lucy. I really did mean everything I said that night. But it’s also true that we are from different worlds. So, as to why I am here—simple. I’m here to try to avert the greatest paradox in history, and it centers on the man you are here to distract from his discovery of a drive that will break the light speed barrier. Lucy—you are at the center of this, so I have to talk to you. It’s not a matter of want to. The last thing I want to do is hurt you again. But he is going to die soon, and it’s my job to save his life. And to do that I need your help, though it is a course that will most likely kill us both.”

Lucy reached into a pocket, pulling out a cigarette and lighter. She lit up and pulled a couple drags while putting her thoughts into order. “Alright. Somehow you know my mission. And you know about a paradox that can’t be calculated with the mathematics of your time. So something is going on here beyond what you’ve said so far. Talk to me, you’ve definitely got my attention.”

Brain still throbbing, Alex settled down to tell Lucy Frost a story that would hopefully make her betray the Time Corp. They didn’t part company until after dawn.