The screech of steel on steel echoing through the tunnel was the first sign. After years of silence, the tracks had only recently started to complain as the train rounded the curve into the area under the Zone. Then the lights flickered, and the train seemed to shudder. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath and forced herself to relax into her seat. When she opened them, she gasped involuntarily.
The wispy apparition of a young man had again appeared in the aisle in front of her, walking along the train car, clearly searching for something or someone. She stood up and ignored the curious stares of the other passengers as she waved and tried to get his attention. He did not respond, so she gave up, stood still and let her inner scientist study him. He appeared to be in his mid-twenties, with dark hair and twinkly brown eyes. He wore a colony ship uniform, but the regulation boots were different. Suddenly, he vanished!
Abruptly left staring at her reflection in the window, she turned away, only to face a train car full of people staring at her. Clearly, they had not seen the boy. Self-conscious, she half smiled, half grimaced and quickly sat down, landing squarely in the lap of a sleepy old mine worker.
“Mmmm.” He roused. “Hello?”
“I’m so sorry!” She tried to get off and almost fell. Smiling, he steadied her then slid aside to make room for her on the seat.
“Are you all right?” he asked, genuinely concerned, then jokingly added, “You look like you’ve seen a ghost!”
Her cheeks flushed as she blurted, “Actually … I think I may have.”
To her amazement, the old miner’s smile widened. “Ah, well, you’re one of the lucky few then. That’d be Curly’s ghost. Few are those that can see him, and lucky are those that do.” As she looked at him in bewildered amazement, he winked. “Parents never told you that one, did they?”
“No,” she admitted. “Can you tell me more?”
“Second Chance Mines,” the PA announced as the train slowed.
“This is my stop,” the miner said, his voice apologetic as he stood. “But you should talk to old Curly, the station master at First Landing. He’ll be happy to tell you the story.”
“I will, thank you!” she said as he headed to the door.
“Oh, don’t thank me, and don’t let the old bugger scare you,” the miner cautioned. “He’ll likely be a bit touchy about it.”
“Why?” she called after him as the doors slid open.
“Nobody’s seen the ghost in years!” He winked at her as he stepped off the train.
—— «» ——
Sarah smiled, pleased that none of her inner turmoil showed. The elevator glass reflected a calm and composed woman. She had ignored the stares the rest of the train ride to the spaceport, but she had felt every one of them. She knew that she’d seen the ghost boy, but couldn’t understand why nobody else did.
Her glasses darkened as the elevator broke the surface and began its crawl up the tower base. Morning sunlight glared across the unfinished spaceport, glinting off the structures that protruded from the ground. Her view slipped away as the elevator entered the bottom of the control tower.
The doors slid open to the astro lab. She heaved a deep sigh and strode into the lion’s den.
“Good morning, Sarah.” Her mother smiled, looking up from her console. Her father glanced at his watch.
“Hi Mom, hi Dad,” she chirped as she headed over to her own desk. It was strewn with an assortment of sample containers.
“You finished collecting those samples last week. Why are you still coming in late?” her father asked pointedly.
“Don’t bother her, dear,” her mother interjected. “Maybe she met a nice boy and is finally thinking about settling down!”
“Mom!”
“We live in hope my dear,” her mother said unapologetically. “We all have to do our part to grow the colony.”
“Hrumpfff,” her father said. “I’m sure she hasn’t miraculously discovered ‘Mr. Right.’” He made air quotes around the words.
“As it happens,” Sarah said, “I did see a very handsome someone today. Someone that I would love to meet.”
“Where’s he work?” her father asked.
“I don’t know, Dad!” She was beginning to regret saying anything.
“What does he look like?”
“Mom!”
“Where did you meet him?”
“On the train.”
“Is that why you’re late again?” He kept the questions coming. “What do you know about him?”
“He has nice eyes,” she offered.
“That’s what you know?” her mom asked.
“I haven’t got him to notice me yet.”
“Why not? Is he blind?”
“Dad!”
“What? You’re an attractive young woman. What’s wrong with him?” His eyes narrowed. “Is he married?”
“What?” She shook her head in disbelief.
“Is this really why you’re coming in late?”
“Yes, Mom! Well, no. It’s … not like that!” She was exasperated. “I’m just sick of you guys trying to pair me off.”
Her dad seemed like he was going to back off, but suddenly asked, “So, is there a guy, or not?”
“Well…” She looked at them carefully. “Sort of.” She hesitated. “I think he’s a ghost.”
“What!” her mom screeched.
“An old miner on the train said he might be Curly’s ghost. Do you know who that is?”
“It’s just an old tale told to scare kids out of the tunnels under the Zone,” said her dad.
Her mother stayed silent.
“You shouldn’t go around talking about it.” Her dad seemed quite concerned.
“Why not?”
He clammed up and turned back to his console, but her mother had more to say. “We lost thousands of souls that day.”
“And our connection to Earth.” Her dad spun around to face her again. “Curly’s ghost is a cruel reminder of the Crisis. A bad joke.”
Her mother interjected. “Not according to Curly.”
Her dad scowled and turned back to his work. The conversation was over.
“Well then, I’ll just go ask Curly,” Sarah blurted out.
“You will do no such thing,” her dad insisted.
“Why not?”
“Curly was on the train when it happened. He’s … damaged.”
“What do you mean?”
“Bad radiation scarring,” her mom explained.
“And his brain is messed up,” her dad added.
“George!” her mom chastised.
“Well, it is. He cooked up that whole ghost story, and he keeps trying to funnel colony resources to mount a search for it. You just stay away from him! He’s dangerous.”
Her mother shook her head, warning Sarah to let it go.
“Fine,” Sarah said, and started sorting the samples she’d previously collected, labeling them according to their Patreon concentration.
—— «» ——
Curly, the station master, lived deep in the train tunnels under First Landing. At the back of a poorly lit side tunnel, an old stripped-down train car sat beside a knocked-together platform. The awning and rocking chair on the platform made it look like it might be a residence, so she climbed up the steps and knocked.
“Hello?” a grizzly voice growled from inside.
“Hi,” she responded. “Are you Curly?”
A shuffling noise, footsteps and then the door opened. He stayed in the shadows.
“Yes.”
“They said maybe you could help me.”
“Let me guess?” he said. “You’re doing a term paper on why colony ships establish railways as the primary transportation grid, and you want some quotes and pictures?”
“Well, actually—” she started, but he launched into a speech he had obviously given many times before.
“Interstellar colonization requires that almost everything be brought from home, and since the ships hold thousands, there’s a lot of people and things to move about when we get there, er, here. By designing components of the ship to be converted into train cars after arrival, well let’s just say that it is by far the most economical use of weight, space and materials possible. Can you imagine if we had to bring individual vehicles for everyone like they use at home? The ships would have to be twice the size.”
He paused, so she jumped in. “Thank you, that’s great to know, but not why I’m here.”
“Why did they send you to me then?” he said suspiciously. “Hey, you’re not here to try and take my house again, are you?”
“I — no. What?”
“Ever since they’ve been working on the line to New Hope they send people around every once in a while, to try and put my house back into train service.”
“No. Definitely not,” she said.
“Well then?”
She didn’t know how to start.
“Why’d they send you to me?” he asked again.
“He said you might know what’s going on.”
Curly leaned into the light. A radiation burned face is not a pretty sight, but Sarah didn’t flinch.
“Who said?”
“A miner I met on the train.”
He slowly withdrew, turning back into the shadows.
“I keep seeing a boy on the train,” she blurted out. “But — he’s not really there.”
Curly spun around and glared at her. “Who put you up to this?”
“Nobody!” she said. “Nobody else can see him. I don’t know what to do.”
“Get out,” he said quietly.
She didn’t move.
“I said GET OUT!”
She turned and ran.
—— «» ——
“How are you honey?” her mom asked when they sat down for dinner that evening.
“Not too good,” she admitted. “I went to see Curly this afternoon, and he yelled me out of the place.”
“What?” Her dad was instantly angry. “I wasn’t kidding. You can’t go see that crazy fool! I never thought you would actually go there. You stay away from him! Nobody talks to Curly … and Curly talks to nobody. Ever.”
The door chimed for access.
“System?” her mother asked.
“Curly Adams, station master, to see Miss Sarah.”
Her mom and dad just looked at each other, shocked.
“Admit him,” Sarah instructed. “I’ll be right there.”
—— «» ——
Sarah brought Curly into the living room and invited him to sit.
“I’m very sorry … Sarah, is it?” he apologized. “I’m sorry for my behavior earlier. See, nobody has mentioned seeing him on the train for…”
“At least ten years,” her dad finished as he joined them. “Curly.”
“George.” He looked at Sarah again. “I apologize for startling your daughter, but I thought I was being pranked again.”
Her dad started to say something but Curly held up his hand. “Then I realized nobody remembers that stuff. There’s no way it could be a prank.”
“The ghost hasn’t been seen for so long,” her mother said gently as she came in and sat down beside Sarah.
“Well Marion, the old car is back in service again,” Curly said, as if that explained it. “They need every car now that the train is running all the way to New Hope.”
“Who is he, Curly?” Sarah asked.
“A ghost,” he said sadly. “From the Crisis.”
“I don’t see what good it does bringing this all up again,” her dad said.
“But she’s the one that saw him!” Curly said, a bit defensively.
Her mom looked worried, so Sarah added, “I don’t see him all the time.”
Curly was shocked. “You’ve seen him more than once?”
“Uh, a few times, yes.”
“That’s incredible.”
“Curly.” Her mom used that firm voice that meant she was going to get what she wanted. “It’s really good to see you again, but I think it’s time for you to go.”
Curly looked down, acquiesced, and stood up to leave.
“Thank you,” he said to her parents. “Sarah, I’m very sorry I startled you today, but I’d appreciate it if you would let me know if anything further develops.”
—— «» ——
Sarah sat on one of the chairs on the platform, lost in thought about what she should do differently if she saw him again today.
“Miss Templeton?” Curly was standing right in front of her.
“Curly,” she said evenly. “What can I do for you?”
“Nothing, but maybe I can help you,” he said. “The boy on the train, he doesn’t know you’re there, does he?”
Now how did he know that? “No,” she admitted. “I’ve even tried jumping up and waving my arms, and nothing.”
Curly sat down beside her. Reaching into a small equipment bag slung over his shoulder, he pulled out an odd-looking wrist-rack device. “This should help him to see you. Just strap it on your wrist and touch this button to turn it on.”
“What does it do?” she asked.
He hesitated, so she cocked her head, pursed her lips and awaited his answer.
“It’s a Matreon particle emitter.”
“What good will that do?” she asked. “Matreon particles are everywhere. That’s why we colonized this planet.”
“Well you know your history,” Curly said. “This emitter concentrates the particles and focuses them into Matreonic Waves.”
“And you just happen to have a Matreon emitter in your bag?” she asked wryly.
Curly laughed. “You don’t beat around the bush, do you?”
“I’m a scientist. It’s not in my nature.”
“Well … good. Then you will understand that this is a prototype and that I need you to test it to see if my theory is sound. I need to determine if it will attract his attention…” Seeing she was waiting for more, he added, “…to you.”
Sarah looked quizzically at Curly.
“Years ago,” he continued, “I started tracking the ‘ghost’ from the Crisis and I’ve been refining my theory ever since. Now that he has reappeared, I can take the next step.”
“That sounds reasonable,” Sarah said as she strapped the device to her arm. “Now I just have to find him.”
“Car 47,” Curly said. “He’ll always be in Car 47.”
She nodded, and Curly stood to leave.
“And Sarah?”
“Yes?”
“Not everybody can see him.”
“Don’t I know it,” she said wryly.
—— «» ——
Sarah hopped the next train, but Car 47 was not attached. A couple of trains later she found the car. A few trips and a couple hours later she was ready to give up. Then she heard a familiar squeal of steel on steel as they entered the Zone. The lights flickered, and seconds later the boy appeared and began his walk along the car. When he was in front of her, she tapped the button.
The ghost stopped, backed up a step, and began waving his arms frantically. Behind her a passenger screamed. She ignored the scream and waved back. Sarah moved closer to the boy and they locked eyes. His face was a mix of shock and relief as tears welled and rolled down his cheeks. Then he vanished.
The car was abuzz. “What the hell was that?” “It’s that damn ghost story come to life.” “Did you see that?”
Sarah sat down and sighed. He was real, very real. She wiped her face and discovered her own tears.
—— «» ——
“You’re sure he could see you?” Curly said.
“Absolutely,” she replied.
Curly looked deep in thought, as if he were wrestling with something.
“Okay,” he said, and took a deep breath. “Shall we try phase two?”
“What’s that?”
“Getting an image of him,” he said. “I need proof. The council has doubted me for twenty-five years and I need to prove he actually exists.”
“Okay,” she said. “How do I take a picture of him?”
Curly smiled and grabbed his equipment bag. He handed her a standard looking digital capture device. “I’ve added a Matreon emitter.”
“That’s it?”
“Yes,” he said, as he adjusted the emitter and handed it to her.
“Tomorrow morning then,” she said. “Will you be there?”
“No. I need to work on a few things.”
“What could be more important than this?”
He looked at her and smiled happily. “Phase three.”
—— «» ——
The next day Sarah boarded the mid-morning train intent on capturing an image of the boy on the train. She entered Car 47, oblivious to the other passengers and to her parents who had surreptitiously taken a seat at the back of the car.
Her parents’ whispered discussion about why they should and shouldn’t be spying on their daughter was interrupted when Sarah jumped up and quickly moved to the center of the train car. They watched, open mouthed, as Sarah tapped the device on her arm, then as the boy appeared and came directly over to her. She snapped his picture, and they smiled at each other. She extended her hand to see if they could touch and he copied her. Before their fingers met, the lights flickered, and he was gone.
Sarah sighed, then turned to see her parents standing at the back of the train car.
“We saw him.” Her mom wiped a tear from her eye. “Sarah, we saw him!”
—— «» ——
“Who is he?” her dad asked Curly as they crowded into his cluttered home.
A fuzzy image, displayed on Curly’s monitor, was being systematically enhanced, and it quickly came into focus.
“It’s … my twin brother Raymond,” Curly said, his voice cracking. “He’s looking a bit older than when I last saw him.” Curly choked back a sob. “We were sixteen at the time of the Second Landing Crisis. The second wave colony lightship was about to land at the spaceport, and our family was on the train going to meet it. I was one car back, chasing Raymond through the cars. Suddenly, there was a flash of light, and the train slammed to a halt. The front half of the train, the tunnel, tracks, everything in front of Car 47 vanished as if it had never existed. The car I was in and everything behind it was fine. Car 47, the car in the middle, the one that Raymond and the rest of my family had been in, was still there, but … empty. Everyone was gone.”
Sarah knew what she’d been taught about the Second Landing Crisis. The ship’s light drive had exploded. Everything and everyone near the ship, whether on the surface or underground, had disappeared. Starling City, Second Chance Mines, the spaceport — all gone. Vanished as if they’d never existed. All communication equipment had been lost and no lightships had arrived since. The surface for hundreds of kilometers was still desolated, and that had been twenty-five years ago.
“How come he looks so young?” Sarah asked.
Curly shrugged. “Perhaps he’s trapped in some sort of anomaly. Nobody really knows what happened when the explosion occurred.”
“Maybe that’s why he looks like he’s standing in a bubble.” Her dad pointed to the background of the picture. The fuzzy background did look like the reflection of a bubble.
“How were we able to see Raymond today?” her mom asked.
“Patreon particles. From the ship’s exploded light drive,” Curly said. “For the last ten years I’ve been collecting them on the surface and augmenting them with the planet’s natural Matreon particles. That’s what’s in the emitter Sarah has.”
“But that makes a Faster-Than-Light drive!” her dad said. “You put an FTL drive on my daughter’s arm?”
“Dad, it would need a lot more to be an FTL drive,” she said.
“Sarah’s right,” Curly said. “The emitter simply exposes the particles to each other, and the resultant excitation makes things visible to Raymond. We’ll need a much bigger event to bring him back.”
“Bring him back?” her dad asked incredulously.
“Phase three.” Curly smiled happily at Sarah. “Bring my brother home.”
—— «» ——
Sarah’s parents had always been stubborn, ‘go with the flow’ types, so they amazed her when they agreed to support Curly in his efforts to bring back his brother. They petitioned the council for assistance, citing Curly’s years of data collection, the recent photo of Raymond, and Sarah’s experience of finding the boy on the train.
The council shocked them when all but two of the councilors voted to let them attempt proper communication with Raymond and cleared the way for them to use the train under the Zone for up to one hour at a time, as necessary.
The two naysayers on the council rode along on the first few trips where Curly and Sarah used whiteboards to schedule times with Raymond for communications. As soon as they saw the boy on the train was real and communicating back, the council vote became unanimous.
—— «» ——
“Why did they have to announce what we’re doing?” Curly grumbled as they pushed their way through the crowd to the train a few weeks later.
“It’s in the constitution,” Sarah reminded him. “Unanimous votes have to be publicized.”
“Bah! They’ll look good if they help bring someone from the Crisis back,” Curly said. “That’s all they care about.”
Sarah shrugged. “Either way, they’re letting you do it.”
“Us,” he said. “This couldn’t have happened without you — and your parents.”
She smiled as they boarded the train. It wasn’t long until Raymond was reading the whiteboard that explained their thoughts on the anomaly he was trapped in. He shook his head, and put his hands one over the other, as if there was an invisible ball between them, and rotated the ball 180 degrees.
“What’s he trying to say?” Curly asked.
“I don’t know,” Sarah said. “Something is turned around?”
Raymond began writing a complex formula on his own whiteboard. He vanished before he could complete it.
Back at the lab, they studied a video of the exchange.
“It’s impossible to tell what he thinks is turned around,” her dad said. “This is the first time you showed him our thoughts on the anomaly?”
“Yes,” Sarah said. “We wanted to give him context for what we are doing.”
“Speaking of what we are doing,” Curly said, changing the subject, “we haven’t discussed how we are going to get enough Patreon particles to make this work.”
Sarah smiled. Her mother got up and opened the frosted glass door of the cabinet that housed Sarah’s samples. “Sarah’s Interstellar Comm Array experiment had her collecting samples with high Patreon concentrations for months,” she told Curly. “Based on your calculations, we should have far more than we need.”
Curly looked at Sarah, then at the samples, then back again. “When did you start to see Raymond?”
“When I started to come in later in the mornings,” she said. “I needed to collect the samples in daylight.”
“That’s why you could see him when no one else could.” Curly slapped his forehead. “You were saturated with Patreon particles!” He looked down at the plans laid out in front of him. “This really is going to work!”
“This confirms your ‘phase three’ theory?” asked Sarah.
Curly nodded. “Now we just have to build it.”
—— «» ——
Over the next two months Curly, Sarah and her parents worked tirelessly to develop and build the phase three device.
Time passed quickly and before long the day that the council had decided to call Re-Union Day had arrived.
“It looks like everyone in the colony is here,” Sarah said as they made their way through the throngs gathered outside the First Landing Station.
“It stands to be a rather significant day,” her dad said.
“Let us hope so,” her mother added.
“Bloody crowds,” Curly muttered. But he was smiling.
Accompanied by the encouraging cheers of the crowd they eventually pushed their way through to the train, which had been reserved especially for the entire day. Selected Council officials, a medical team and the colony news crew were already on board. The news crew had set up remote cameras in Car 47, ready to livestream the event to the entire colony.
“What a circus!” Curly said as the door closed behind him.
“Let’s get to work,” Sarah said as she rolled forward the emitter array. It consisted of three circular metal hoops with pods for the Patreon packs, Matreon exciters and a separate EM ring for focusing the energy.
“Five minutes,” her mother called out.
“All ready,” her father said as he checked the console.
“Power on!” Curly instructed.
The indicators glowed and the emitters began to hum as they came up to temperature. The needles on the dials jumped up, wavered and then settled down to normal.
“Okay.”
Sarah caught Curly’s eye and gave him an encouraging smile. Her mother gave the signal, and the train started moving. “Here we go,” she said.
They rode in silence as they approached the Zone. Sarah tensed as she heard the squeal of steel on steel. It was time. “Ready…”
The lights flickered. “Patreon injection … now!” Curly hit the switch.
Space within the emitter array seemed to distort, shimmer, and settle into a flat field as Raymond appeared on the other side. There was no time for contemplation. Careful to avoid touching the field, Sarah extended a handwritten note toward and then into the shimmering field. Raymond reached forward as it emerged on his side … and took it from her!
“It works!” Sarah cried, surprise and delight in her voice.
Smiling, Raymond pushed the note that he had prepared into the portal. But, as the edges of his note touched the field, it disintegrated and vanished!
“What happened?” Curly said.
“I don’t know—” Sarah began hopelessly.
Sparks flew from the emitters, and the train shuddered, just enough to throw Sarah off balance. Instinctively she reached out to steady herself, but her hand went straight into the field. Her mother screamed as Raymond lunged forward, grabbed Sarah’s hand before she could pull it back and — pulled her through the portal.
The lights flickered and they were both gone.
—— «» ——
“What have you done?” Sarah yelled as Raymond caught her and steadied her from falling.
“I couldn’t let you pull back,” he apologized. “That would have cost you an arm, or more.”
“But where…” she trailed off as she looked around. The moving train car they were in looked nothing like Car 47. It had the shape of the train car, but it had been outfitted like a lab, and they were standing inside a sphere of glowing emitters right in the middle of it all.
“Where are we?” he finished for her. “Can I let go?”
She realized she was still hanging on to him and nodded. “We were supposed to bring you back.”
“Please don’t move!” he cautioned, letting her go. Moments later the lights on the emitters clicked off and the train car began to slow.
“It’s safe now,” he said. “Come and see.”
He moved to a control panel and clicked a couple of buttons. She took in the racks of equipment as the train car began moving again, this time in the opposite direction. From behind her, a shaft of sunlight lit up the interior as the window shutters retracted.
She spun and looked out over the most beautiful sight she had ever seen. Crystal lakes dotted lush greenery. People strolled along paths that connected lakeside villas. The paths led to a sprawling, modern city off in the distance. It seemed like they must be in a crater, as the city rose up from the lush floor and climbed up the walls to where tall stone spires seemed woven between the tallest buildings. Off in the distance, one spire was much too symmetrical to be stone. She gasped as she recognized the forward cone of a colony lightship!
“Welcome to First Landing,” he said.
“What?”
He pointed out the window. “This … is First Landing.” He watched her intently.
Her mind reeled.
“But. I live in First Landing.”
“Yes, you do,” Raymond said. “I’m Ray.”
“Sarah,” she said. “Pleased to meet you … in person. You’re Curly’s twin brother.”
“Hmm,” he said. The train slowly came to a halt. A sensor dinged and the train door automatically opened. “Come with me.”
They left the train and instead of a train station, they emerged into a series of labs. As they walked by each lab, people stopped what they were doing and stared at them, at her. He ignored them all, leading her to a glassed-in café, then out the door onto a patio where they could look back at the facility.
He pointed along the crater wall. A long thin building attached to the lab circled the crater wall for about a fifth of its circumference.
“The train line?” Sarah asked.
“Yes,” he said. “Let me try and explain. Maybe we should sit?”
“This can’t be First Landing.”
“Well,” he started carefully, “many years ago, the second lightship to arrive had a drive failure on landing and exploded directly over First Landing, which created the crater we are in now.”
“The Crisis, yes … but First Landing is fine,” Sarah protested. “And the ship was to land at the new spaceport, not First Landing.”
“True. But it ended up here, where it exploded. First Landing was vaporized … or so we thought.”
“But—”
“Maybe its best I get through this all, then you can ask questions after?”
“All right,” she said.
“Everything was gone right up to the train tunnel and part of the train. The tunnel and remaining train were found in the crater wall here. As it was being rebuilt, people started seeing what they called ‘ghosts’ of their missing relatives in one train car. Everyone dismissed it, except one person, who realized that you were seeing us as well.”
“You?” Sarah said.
“No,” he said. “But I’ll get to that. For years it was assumed to be a ghost story, but after a while, the appearances became regular, almost scheduled. We think it was just luck that the train times coincided. Eventually it was thought that you were all trapped in an anomaly and an effort was mounted to coordinate an attempt to bring you back.
“Just as things were getting started on that effort, part of the crater wall collapsed, taking out a portion of the tunnel as well. It took about twenty-five years to rally the effort and expense of trying to rebuild the line. Eventually this facility was built and the track restored. But, although we could see you, people from your side couldn’t see us any longer. Until you came along.” He smiled.
“I was exposed to Patreon particles that came from the exploded light drive,” she said. “Curly said that’s why you could see me.”
“That makes perfect sense,” he said. “That’s the missing piece!”
He smiled happily, but then looked at her apprehensively.
“There’s more?” she asked.
“Yes.” He smiled again. “My name is Ray. Raymond is my grandfather.”
“Impossible!” Sarah scoffed. “Curly is only forty-one years old.”
“How long since the Explosion?” he asked her.
“Twenty-five years, of course,” she said.
“Sixty years. By our measure,” he explained. “We noticed the effect even before the crater collapsed. The timing difference was measurable. It may even be why the crater wall collapsed. That’s why the train was separated from the mainline and put in a controlled environment. It’s why we have the dilation bubble set up in the train car.”
“And that’s why we couldn’t see anything behind you in our Car 47,” she said. “Because of the dilation bubble.”
“And why we couldn’t build a portal from this side,” he said. “Until now.”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Your exposure to the Patreon radiation and the fact that we, um, safely moved you through the portal. We’ll need a bit more time, but we have everything we need to build a portal that will work both ways now.”
“I can go home!” she said, happy tears spilling down her cheeks.
“Or,” he smiled, brushing her tears away, “you can come home. And you can bring everyone home with you.”
—— « o » ——
Neil Enock has been called a modern day renaissance man. He is an author, actor, director, artist, singer, songwriter, screenwriter, filmmaker, inventor, and media presenter. He created and hosts “Train Talk TV” on iTunes, which has over a million viewers/listeners, and just completed his first televison pilot, SomeWhen – which Neil both wrote and produced. In addition to his many talents, Neil has a vast knowledge of trains (real, toy and imaginary) and a passion for storytelling.