Short Story Collection - Michael Burstein

1. A Reality Check 2. Broken Symmetry 3. Cosmic Corkscrew 4. Sentimental Value

Reality Check Michael A. Burstein “Reality Check” first appeared in the November 1999 issue.

Life wasnt exciting, perhaps, but for the moment it was very secure, and David Strock preferred it that way. He stood up at his desk and stretched, enjoying the comfort of the late morning sunlight coming through the window of his spacious office. He looked around, taking in once more the size of the room, the beautiful chairs, the overflowing bookcases, and the view of Boston outside. Not bad for someone not even in his thirties yet.

He sat down again and hummed to himself as he shuffled the papers on his desk. This one, another paper for peer review. That one, a proposal he was writing with his experimental colleagues. Really, he thought, at some point I need to get back to doing real physics. It had been at least a week since he had grappled with a problem.

Just as the clock read noon, there was an expected knock on at the door. “Come in!”

The door opened, and in walked Judith Pell. David smiled as she carefully closed the door behind her, but left it slightly ajar. “Hello, David. What do we have today?”

David got up and began walking over to the small refrigerator he kept in his office, with a microwave oven on the shelf above. Since Judith and he were the only ones nearby who kept kosher, David tended to bring lunch for both of them every day. But their schedules meant that they usually only ate together on Mondays and Wednesdays. “Sanbusaks. From Zaatars Oven.”

“Mmm.” Judith cut in front of David, opened the refrigerator door, and pulled out the white paper bag which contained their lunch. “What kind did you get me?”

“Your favorite. The mushrooms and shallots with cashkavel cheese. And an Israeli salad.”

“Good, Im starving.” Judith put the sanbusaks into the microwave and turned it on. “Lets eat.”

They went out to the separate bathrooms for the ritual washing of the hands. The mens room was slightly closer, so David waited for Judith to return before reciting the blessing over bread. They nibbled a little of the sanbusaks afterwards, to complete the ritual, but then munched away on their salads, using the plastic forks provided by the restaurant.

“Did you have a good shabbat?” Judith asked in between swallows of food.

“Yeah. Sarahs still tired from caring for Yitzhak, so I made dinner.”

“Hes what, four months old now?”

“Five months.” David took another forkful of salad. “How was your shabbat?”

“Oh, pretty good. Seth and I stayed at home, hid under the bed.” She smiled.

David nodded. “Ive had weeks like that.”

“So what are you working on?” Judith asked.

“Nothing much,” David said, immediately followed by, “Well, this is interesting.” He picked a reprint from a stack on his desk and passed it over to Judith. “Just got these today from Physical Review Letters. I did the work about nine months ago, but the paper just got published. Help yourself to one.”

Judith put her fork down on the paper plate and read the title and author of the paper aloud. “High-Energy Consequences of the Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics. By David R. Strock, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.” She rolled her eyes at David. “Oh, yes, real interesting.”

David smiled back. “OK, I admit, its probably not going to shake the world outside of my field. And I know it has no applications to your work on carcarbo”

“Carbosilane dendrimers.” Judith smiled. It got a lot easier to pronounce the name of a material when you worked with it all the time.

David smiled back. “Right. Come to think of it, it has no applications at all from what I can tell. But it was fun to do.”

“Fun. Well, thats why we got into science in the first place, isnt it,” Judith said, more as a flat statement than a question. She put the paper back on his desk and continued eating.

“Well, yeah, fun,” David murmured. He took a good, long look at his friend. “Judith, is something on your mind?”

She put her fork down and stared at her food. “I dont know. Its just thatI dont seem to be getting anywhere. Four years of grad school and my project seems no nearer to completion than it did at the beginning. Dennis is talking about lining up a job for me after I get my Ph.D., but then he has me working on stuff for his projects, not for my own. The equipment he has me working on is outmoded, and breaks down half the time, and when I point this out to him, all he tells me to do is fix it. I just feel like Im treading water, going nowhere.” She looked up at him and smiled weakly. “Im sorry to dump on you like this.”

“No, its OK, thats why I asked.” David thought for a moment. “I wish I could help. Do you want me to talk to Dennis?”

“No! I mean, better I should handle it myself. I dont want him to think Ive been talking to other professors about this.”

But you are, David thought, then retracted it. Judith wasnt complaining to another professor, she was confiding in a friend. “Its not like were in the same department. I dont think hed mind.”

“I know, but still …” She trailed off.

David nodded. “I understand. Still, if theres anything I can do for you”

“Youll be the first to know.”

They finished eating their lunch in silence.

*

David got most of his paperwork finished by the middle of the afternoon, and decided to leave early. Still ruminating over what he might do to help out Judith, he sighed audibly. Physics problems were so much easier to solve than real ones. What was that quotation from his high school physics teacher, Mr. Borten? Ah, yes. “Physics is easy. Life is hard.”

Just as he was gathering up his papers and getting ready to go, the phone rang. David stuffed the papers into his backpack and picked up the phone.

“Hello?”

“Hello,” said a womans voice. “Is this David Strock?”

“Speaking.”

“Dr. Strock, my name is Kristin Anderson. Im a physicist working at the SSC.”

The Superconducting Supercollider. David knew a few people who worked on projects there, of course, but he didnt know anyone who worked there full time. “Yes?”

The physicist on the other end of the line paused for a moment, then said, “Wed like to invite you to come down to Waxahachie. We have a position we think you might be interested in.”

“Me?” David asked, puzzled. “Im a theorist, not an experimentalist.”

“We do have theoretical physicists on staff.”

“Butbut Im not working on anything relevant to the SSC, as far as I know.” Most of his work dealt with interactions that took place at far lower energies than that of the SSC.

“Actually, you are. Some of us here have become quite impressed with the work youre doing, and we want to meet you.”

“Well, if thats all, why not come up here to Boston?”

Another pause. “Isnt there any way you can come down forfor a week or so?”

“Im really not interested in leaving MIT. Whats this all about, anyway?”

“I cant tell you over the phone.”

“You cant tell me over the phone? Is this some sort of joke?”

“No, its not a joke,” she said quickly. “Im serious. Were working on something confidential here, and we could really use your help.”

David thought for a moment. “I dont have anything to do with weapons.”

“Neither do we. Were not Los Alamos, were the SSC.”

“Youre not Fermilab, either.”

“What?”

“I said youre not Fermilab.”

“I understood that, I just didnt know what you meant.”

“What I meant is that I already have an affiliation with one government lab, Fermilab. And Im content with those connections. Not to put too fine a point on it, but when I do have to go visit a lab Id rather have to go to a large city like Chicago than a small town like Waxahachie.” Easier to find kosher food, he thought. “I know a lot of physicists would jump at the chance to work on the SSC,” he continued aloud, “but frankly, Im not one of them.”

“I think you might jump at this.”

“Thats your opinion, not mine. But Im really not interested in doing any work with the SSC. Im sorry.”

David thought that might end the phone call, but Dr. Anderson was still persistent.

“Doctor Strocktrust me. This is big. And were not asking for any sort of commitment yet. We just want you to see something that we think will interest you. That we know will interest you.”

The sincerity in her voice finally grabbed him. All things considered, David wouldnt mind seeing the SSC anyway, at least for a quick visit. After all, it was the pinnacle of experimental apparatus in his field.

“No commitment?”

“None. Just come down and see what we have to show you.”

David could live with that. “All right, look.” David checked the calendar on his wall; it was Monday, and he had a class to teach tomorrow and on Thursday. But he could probably get someone to cover the second lecture. “I can fly down Wednesday, but I have to get back to Boston well before sundown on Friday.”

“That shouldnt be a problem. Well make arrangements for your tickets and call you tomorrow.”

*

That night, David had a minor argument with his wife, Sarah. He had held off mentioning the phone call until after they had eaten dinner and Yitzhak was asleep in his crib. They sat down on the sofa and turned the television onto cable news, as usual. Then he told her that hed be going to Texas for a few days, the day after tomorrow.

“Texas? They want you to go to Texas?”

“Its only for a few days,” he said.

“Whats in Texas?”

“The Superconducting Supercollider. You know, the SSC.”

Sarah sighed. “David, its bad enough that you go out to Chicago every few weeks. Whats this Texas trip all about?”

“Im not sure. They may want to offer me a job.” He shrugged. “I wouldnt take it, of course.”

“I hope not. Were not doing another Los Alamos.”

“Hey, Los Alamos was a nice town.”

“But”

“Its OK, Sarah. I remember.”

When David and Sarah had first been married, they had spent half a year in Los Alamos, New Mexico, because that had been the only place David had managed to get an appointment. He had worked for one of the theory groups at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. But the Jewish life had been practically nonexistent, with one tiny Jewish Center hidden between a copse of trees and a canyon, and expensive kosher meat only available by way of Albuquerque. David and Sarahs presence had been such a novelty in the town that the weekly newspaper, the Los Alamos Monitor, had done a front page article on them when they celebrated Passover.

Thank God for the appointment to MIT.

“I remember,” David repeated. “I wouldnt want us to go through that again. Especially”

“Especially now that we have Yitzhak,” Sarah finished. “Im surprised you would even agree to go for a few days.”

“I did arrange to come back in time for shabbat.”

“Thats supposed to make it better? I really dont want you going.”

“You know, Sarah, I dont remember the ketubah I signed at our wedding prohibiting me from going to Texas.”

“Its just thatDavid, its already hard on me, having to stay home and take care of Yitzhak. I feel so isolated during the day. I dont want you abandoning me.”

“Abandoning you? What in the world brought that on?”

“Im afraid of losing you.”

“Losing me? Losing me to what?”

Sarah sighed. “To your work. I see the look you get in your eyes sometimes, when were at home, and you run off to write something down on another scrap of paper. Sometimes its as if youre not completely here. What if the reason they want you at the SSC is so big that youyou never come back?”

David took his wifes hand. “Sarah, you know that youre the most important thing in the world to me.”

“Am I? Sometimes I dont feel it.”

“Yes, you are,” David said, looking into her eyes. “What can I do to reassure you?”

“Hold me, David. And promise me that you wont take whatever they offer you.”

“OK, OK, I promise.”

He took her in his arms and carried her off to their bedroom. They finished the evening making quiet love.

*

On Wednesday afternoon, David flew into the Dallas/Forth Worth airport. He managed to get a direct flight, but the airline had screwed up his kosher meal, so when they landed he felt slightly hungry and annoyed.

Adding to his annoyance, the plane was full and Davids seat was close to the back; he waited for the people in front of him to exit before he could go himself.

Fortunately, David had thought ahead and only brought an overnight bag with him, so he didnt have to wait at the carousel for his luggage. He passed quickly through the jetway corridor which connected the plane to the terminal and walked past the metal detectors. The voices of other passengers filled his ears, but the long, drawn-out sounds of their vowels definitely made this place feel different from Logan. David even stopped in surprise when he saw two men in suits actually wearing ten-gallon hats. The men greeted one of the other passengers with raucous laughter and went on their way. Amused, David smiled to himself and kept walking until he spotted his ride.

A short blond man wearing a T-shirt that displayed Maxwells four equations of electromagnetism stood at the end of the corridor that led into the main terminal. He held up a sign with Davids name on it. David walked up to him and introduced himself as other travelers jostled around them. “Hello, Im David Strock.”

The man put down the sign, gave David a warm smile, and shook his hand. “Im Jim Bicking. Im a technician with the SSC. Are you ready to go? Do you want to use the bathroom first?”

“Im ready,” David said. “Lead the way.”

Jim led David out of the terminal to the parking lot. As soon as he left the air-conditioning of the buildings, a hot wind chafed his face. The air tasted different from that in Boston, somewhat drier. It brought back memories of the time he spent in New Mexico.

As they walked, more and more people walked around them, and the busy feeling of the airport parking lot unsettled David. His hand flew to his head at one point and he adjusted his yarmulke. Normally, he never gave it a second thought, but being in Texas made him feel very self-conscious about his appearance. He suspected hed be the only Orthodox Jew in Waxahachie. The dry heat also continued to make him feel very uncomfortable; just because he remembered it from Los Alamos didnt mean that he was used to it.

Finally, they arrived at a small white car. Bicking helped David put his bag in the trunk, and then he drove the two of them to the SSC. During the ride, the technician made small talk about life in Texas. He had his own perspective on it, as Bicking was a Caltech graduate who grew up in the Pacific Northwest. Texas felt hot and dry to him too, but he was used to the openness and the car culture. David nodded politely at his comments, but didnt really contribute much to the conversation. He kept looking out the window, taking in the suburban area he saw surrounding the roads outside the city.

In under an hour, they arrived at an administration building, in the town of Waxahachie rather than anywhere near the ring. The collider ring, of course, ran underground in an area which surrounded the town, as it was far too big to fit in the town itself. David racked his brain for the full dimensions of the collider, but couldnt remember them.

The tech parked in an adjoining lot and escorted David to the office of his contact. When the office door opened and a woman emerged, Bicking nodded a quick goodbye and trotted away.

“Dr. Strock? Im Kristin Anderson.” She extended her hand, and he shook it after barely hesitating. The laws of negia did say that one shouldnt touch a member of the opposite sex, but there were dispensations for politeness and other such things. But it was still ingrained enough in David to cause the hesitation.

“Please, call me David.”

“And Im Kristin. Well, Im really Julia, but I prefer my middle name.”

She smiled at him, and he smiled back. She was a small woman, with dark hair and large glasses that seemed to hide her face. She seemed to be the sort of person who would get along with anybody. Or at least try to.

He noticed that she was staring at him with more than a usual intensity. “Is something wrong?”

“No, its just that you look familiar, but I cant place you.”

David smiled. “I have that kind of face.”

“I suppose so,” she said, but with a trace of uncertainty in her voice. “It doesnt really matter.”

The two of them sat down, and David started in. “Well, Kristin,” he said, “youve brought me all the way here from Boston to see the SSC. Can you tell me now what this is all about, or do I still have to guess?”

She clasped her hands together. “I notice that most of your work is in the field of lower energy interactions.”

So she wasnt planning to get directly to the point. “Thats right.”

“May I ask why?”

“You know, Im really not here for a job interview.”

She unclasped her hands. “Its not an interview, Im just curious.”

David shrugged. “I find lower energies more interesting.”

“Why?”

“Because the theories are actually verifiable by experiment, if you want to know the truth. A lot of my colleagues have their heads lost in the clouds, working on things like supersymmetry and string theory. Its already past the point of technological impossibility. We would need an accelerator running around the equator of the Moon to test some of their ideas.” David paused. “Theres also the anonymity problem.”

“Anonymity?”

“Look around you,” David said, sweeping his arm around. “High energy physics has gotten bigger and bigger over the years. It used to be that a group consisted of just a few scientists, all getting equal credit for the work done. Now theres no way many of our theories can be verified without huge experiments, requiring hundreds of scientists. How many co-authors did you have on your last paper? Fifty? One hundred?”

Kristin looked over his shoulder. “Im not really sure.”

“My point exactly. I dont want my name among a string of et. al.s.”

Kristin seemed to consider that for a moment. “Pardon me for saying this, but you dont seem like the kind of person who needs to get so much recognition for his work.”

“Oh, Im not an egotist. Its just that when I work on theories in lower energies, I know that theyre wholly mine. And when Im working with my experimental colleagues, I know that they can actually verify or disprove my work. If I were working in higher energies, either Id have to arrange for time on the SSC, or else wait for an even larger collider to be built.” David knew that his comments might sound confrontational, but he didnt care. “I dont see the point, frankly.”

Kristins only reaction was to smile. “Ironic, given what we brought you down here for.”

Finally, an opening. “Now that you mention it, would you finally tell me what all this is about?”

Kristin nodded, and looked David directly in the eyes. “Your recent paper was brought to my attention.”

“Which paper?”

Kristin opened a desk drawer, and pulled out a copy of “High-Energy Consequences of the Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics.” She placed it gently on the desk, facing up for David.

David looked at the paper and resisted the temptation to laugh. “This is what all this is about? My parallel universe paper?”

“It was all your own work, wasnt it?”

He leaned back. “Sure, sure it was. But its a lark, nothing else. Completely theoretical. Just like string theory and time travel using wormholes.”

Kristin gazed into the distance, then looked right into Davids eyes. “Teleportation seemed like a lark when Bennett and company published their findings back in 1993.”

“Yes, and as far as Im concerned, its still a lark, despite the experimental inroads. Its only application is quantum computing, anyway.”

“Were drifting from the point.”

“And that point is?”

“The point is why we brought you here. If I understood your paper correctly, you imply that when high enough energies exist, it could prove the existence of other universes.”

“Other Didnt you hear what I just said? The paper was a throwaway piece of theory, one of those things that cant be proven. Its only significance is in theoretical cosmology.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course Im sure! The energy levels I describe in my paper are those of the Big Bang. My theory might imply a way to test the different interpretations of quantum mechanics, perhaps see if Many-Worlds has greater validity than the rest. But thats all. And it still doesnt explain why you dragged me to Texas.”

“It doesnt?”

David sighed. “No, it doesnt. My paper has nothing to do with the SSC. The only reason I could see that you would want me here is if the high energies of the SSC created a wormhole to another universe. But thats patently absurd.”

Kristin removed her glasses and stared at him. The seconds passed, noted by the ticking of the wall clock.

“No,” David said, finally breaking the silence. He laughed. “No, no, no! You cant possibly be serious!”

“I am,” Kristin said, putting her glasses back on. “Weve had a connection to another universe for about three years now.”

“Thats ridiculous. Why havent I heard anything about this?”

“We are a government laboratory, DoctorDavid. Were pretty good at keeping secrets.”

“This would be one of the biggest, if it were true.” A thought occurred to him. “I dont remember getting any sort of security clearance.”

Kristin nodded. “Its been taken care of.”

“Its been taken care of. Do you have any idea how much a security clearance costs?”

“Yes.” She let the word hang in the air, so its implications could sink in.

“Hm. I still dont believe you.”

“I didnt think you would.” Kristin stood up. “You want proof, right?”

“If you dont mind.”

“Then lets head out to the ring.”

Kristin led David to her car in the parking lot, a small gold Saturn. They got in and she began driving them to the edge of the town.

“Where are we going, exactly?”

“Building G. Its situated on the ring, about half an hour from here.”

“Does the G stand for anything? Or is it just a convenient label, like the letters they give buildings at all government laboratories?”

“Or the numbered buildings at MIT?” Kristin replied.

David smiled. “Touché.”

“G stands for Gate, as in the Gate between universes. We call this division the Gate project. Over in number Two, they use the same names.”

“Two?”

“Sorry. Universe Two, thats what we call it. After all, were Universe One.”

“I suppose they call themselves One and us Two,” David said, a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

“No,” Kristin said, apparently missing his tone. “Alpha and Beta. Were Beta.”

“Um.”

During the rest of the drive, David managed to make small talk with Kristin. Mostly, they talked about physics and funding, keeping the conversation on a professional level.

One thing they specifically did not talk about was parallel universes. David still couldnt believe she was serious. He kept thinking that this had to be a joke of some sort. And yet, they had paid to fly him down to Waxahachie, and Kristin seemed very serious about the whole thing. If this was a joke, it certainly was a very expensive one.

And if it wasnt …

David surmised hed find out soon enough. Might as well enjoy the ride.

*

Just as Kristin had said, they arrived at Building G within half an hour.

“Doesnt look like a G,” David said after they got out of the car. In fact, it was a squat cubical building.

“Did you expect it to?” Kristin asked.

They entered the small cubical building through a pair of glass doors. David was hit by a blast of refreshing cool air, a nice contrast from the dry heat of the late afternoon. It was even more comfortable here than it had been in Kristins office.

He followed Kristin down a few winding white-walled corridors, until they came to a nondescript door with a metal handle. “This is it,” she said. She removed a passkey card from her purse.

“Tight security, huh?”

“Ever sincewell, we try.” She reached out her hand to open the door, then stopped. “Are you sure youre ready?”

“Yeah, yeah, Im sure.” David rolled his eyes, still unbelieving.

“OK, then,” Kristin said. She slid her passkey through the reader and the door opened with a click.

David was hit by a blast of sound, a mix of thunder and crashing waves, which emanated from the center of the room. Its source was a giant globe of what appeared to be pure electricity, hovering at least a meter above the ground. It sparkled continuously with white and blue flashes, as if they had somehow managed to trap the fires of creation.

David had never really bothered with the Jewish blessings of witnessing and experiencing, but from somewhere in the the back of his mind came the words “Baruch atah adonoy, elohaynu melech haolom, sheosoh li nays bamakom hazeh”the blessing one said when personally experiencing a miracle. Given the fact that David had always considered himself a rationalist scientist, in a world where he always easily managed to keep his religious beliefs separate from his scientific work, it was the last blessing David had ever thought he would say.

He recited it, with wonder and eagerness filling his soul.

Kristin shut the door, returning the hallway to blissful silence. “Well, what do you think?” she asked.

David cleared his throat. “Um. I have one question.”

“Shoot.”

“Where am I going to get kosher food in Waxahachie?”

Kristin smiled. “Ive already done your homework. Theres a Jewish community in Dallas, less than an hour away.”

*

“Here are the problems,” Kristin said once they were finally back at her office. She ticked them off on her fingers. “One, wed like to make the Gate more stable.”

“More stable. Got it.” David took notes in his little black binder.

“Two, we have no idea why were connected to this one particular universe.”

David nodded. “That is odd, yes. If what were seeing is an application of the Many-Worlds interpretation, there should be an infinite number of universes out there. With more being created every second. Say!”

“What?”

“Maybe that would explain the lack of stability. Perhaps the Gate is trying to connect to other universes. The stability may be the fluke.”

“That would be a shame,” Kristin replied. “Three. Wed like to be able to pass objects through the Gate without threat.”

“Threat? What sort of threat?”

“Stability, mostly, and not just to the Gate. We have passed objects through before, in both directions. And weve monitored them closely.”

She paused, as if waiting for David to prompt her, so he did. “So what happens to them?”

“They disappear.”

“Disappear.”

“Thats right.”

“You mean, likevanish?”

“Yes.”

“How does that happen? I mean, what do you see?”

“I can show you a notebook log later on. But basically, the object seems fine at first, then vanishes for a short period of time. The longer it stays in our universe, the more frequently it vanishes, and the longer it vanishes, until finally, it disappears entirely, never to return.”

“How long does that take?”

“A few days, usually. Smaller objects last for a week. The time is inversely proportional to the mass.”

“The larger the mass, the quicker its gone?”

“Thats right.”

David wrote that down in his notebook as an equation:

t = k/m

“Do you have any explanation for the disappearing?”

Kristin nodded. “We think that objects from one universe have a certain resonance with that universe. So that when theyre taken out of their own universe, they try to return.”

David looked into the distance, turning equations and concepts over in his mind. “That makes sense, of course. The question isnt, why do the objects disappear, but why do they hang around for so long in the first place?” He looked back at Kristin. “Do these objects ever reappear in the other universe?”

She shook her head. “Not as far as weve been able to determine.”

“Then conservation of mass is being violated.”

“We doubt it. We think that the mass is transforming into energy, and that the energy is being absorbed by the Gate. We still need to make more accurate measurements to verify this, though.”

“And also,” David added, “the law might have to be expanded to take into account our connection to another universe. After all, our universe isnt a closed, isolated system anymore. Hmm.”

“What?”

“Youd better be careful. If too much energy gets transferred between universes, and we lose the Gate, that could affect the balance of energy in our own universe. It might even have implications for the final fate of the universe.”

“Cosmological implications?” Kristin asked, puzzled.

“Sure. We still dont know what the current balance in the universe is. If we let in too much energy, we might actually cause the Big Crunch. And if we lose too much energy, we might avert that by accident.”

Kristins reply was slow in coming. “I doubt our actions could have such significance.”

“Are you a cosmologist?” David asked.

She shook her head. “Experimental particle physics was my only field, until the Gate happened.”

David nodded. “Im not one either, but Ive studied it. Do you know how balanced our universe is between collapsing back on itself and expanding forever? Its a razor edge of difference.”

“Right. Could we get back to the immediate problem?”

“Sorry. I sometimes get carried away.” David checked his notes. “Stability, right?”

Kristin smiled blandly and nodded. “Right. Now, do you understand why we called you in? Your paper is the first real theoretical breakthrough weve seen in over a year. And its not like we dont have our own people already working on it.”

“I understand. That paper must have been a red flag.”

“Most definitely,” she replied. “So …”

“So?”

“You still havent answered my question explicitly. Will you take the job?”

David stood up, and walked over to the window. He thought of Sarah. “Why cant I just assist you from MIT?” he asked. “Im a theorist. I dont need to be near the machine, I just need pen, paper, and access to a computer.”

Kristin shook her head. “For one thing, we want you here so you can work in concert with all the other people studying this problem. And some of them are on the other side of the Gate.”

David raised an eyebrow. “Oh.”

“For another thing, all our work is classified. We cant have you playing around with our data at an unsecured facility. Any theoretical work you do on the Gate has to be done here.”

David thought. He thought about Sarah, he thought about his work, he thought about the Gate. He thought about the history of science, and he thought about his place in it.

“Well?” Kristin finally asked.

David nodded. “Yes. Ill take the job.”

*

David returned to MIT to tie up things for the semester. He was able to get a leave of absence to cover him for a few months work at the SSC, with the understanding that hed return by the Fall. At first, the Institute had not been too pleased with Davids leaving, but after a few phone calls back and forth with the SSC, they had worked it all out. A graduate student, coincidentally a friend of Judith Pells, was put in charge of the remainder of Davids classes. David was so busy getting ready to leave that he didnt really have time to check in with Judith, to find out how she was doing, so he asked the graduate student to pass on his greetings.

Davids other problem was leaving behind his wife and his community for the time being.

“You promised,” was the first thing Sarah said to him when he explained that hed be gone for a few months. She held Yitzhak in her arms and nursed him as they argued in their usual, quiet manner. “You said you wouldnt take any job they offered you.”

David shifted his weight back and forth between his feet. “Its only for a few months.”

“Los Alamos was only supposed to be for a few months as well. What am I going to do in Waxahachie? All my friends are here. I dont want to go to Texas.”

“Well, um, I agree. It wouldnt be good to drag Yitzhak away, either. I was figuring” David couldnt bring himself to say it.

Sarah completed his thought for him. “You were thinking Id stay behind in Boston, werent you?”

David shrugged. He averted his eyes from Sarahs and stared down at their baby, who suckled contentedly with his eyes closed. “Well, yes,” he said. “After all, this isnt a permanent move. Im not leaving MIT for good, just for a while.”

“David, did it ever occur to you that I hardly get a chance to see you now as it is? Did you even listen to what I said before you left for Texas on Wednesday?”

“I listened,” David said weakly.

“It certainly doesnt seem like it.”

David didnt reply; he couldnt think of anything to say.

Sarah broke the silence. “So whats so important about this job, anyway? Why cant you stay here in Boston and do whatever it is they want you to do?”

David hesitated. This was the worst part. Because of security, he couldnt tell Sarah anything about the Gate project. Finally he blurted out, “Help. They need my help.”

“For what?”

In his heart, David begged Sarah for forgiveness, and then gave her the standard cover story that Kristin had told him to use. “Theres this new procedure that may allow them to reach even higher energies than the SSC was designed for, and they think I can help them with it.”

Yitzhak finished nursing and began gurgling happily. Sarah put him over her shoulder and burped him before replying. “David, I may not be a physicist, but Im also not stupid. This isnt the sort of work you usually do. Youre a low-energy theorist, not a high-energy experimentalist.”

David shrugged. “Thats what it is,” he said, hating himself with every word.

Sarah looked him straight in the eyes. “Its classified, isnt it? You cant tell me what youre really working on, can you?”

David nodded, feeling somewhat relieved. “No, I cant. Im sorry.”

Sarah sighed. “Its Los Alamos all over again. I just hope its worth it to you, whatever it is.”

“I hope so, too.”

*

The lab set David up with a small apartment in Waxahachie, in a building used specifically as transitory housing for visiting scientists and technicians. He had one large room to himself with two full-sized beds, and a small kitchen which he managed to render mostly kosher. The oven needed to be cleaned up and brought to an extremely high temperature, and the microwave had to cleaned out as well. By pure luck, the kitchen sink was stainless steel, not porcelain, so cleaning that up as well made it useable.

The apartment also came with dishes, cookware, and silverware, but David knew none of it could be trusted. He simply went out and bought cheap stuff which he figured he could abandon later. Or maybe convince the lab to put into storage for the next Orthodox Jew to work here.

David got into the rhythm of working for the Gate project. His office was in Building G, a room off the same corridor as the Gate, so he could be close to it as he worked. Every morning, before he left his apartment, he would put on his phylacteries and recite the traditional morning prayers. But now he had to get used to an additional morning ritual. After he removed his phylacteries, he would put on the purple badge they forced him to wear, showing that he had the security clearance to be in Building G. It felt odd to him. The last time he had been required to wear a badge was when he worked at Los Alamos, and back then his badge had been red, since hed had no security clearance at all.

The weirdest part of working on the Gate project, however, had nothing to do with the badges or the government security. The weirdest part was collaborating with scientists in another universe.

The technicians showed David how they used radio signals to communicate with their counterparts over in Universe Two. Most of the time, they simply used Morse code sent over a telegraph machine. David could leave a message for someone in Universe Two in the “radio room,” next door to the room with the Gate. The message would be sent over by some technician while David was occupied elsewhere. Later on, David would stop by the room, and pick up a reply.

The technicians also showed David another way they could communicate with the other universe. They had a device similar to a videophone, which allowed for a realtime conversation between the two universes. But due to the cost, it was a method rarely used, and David never got to see it in action. He felt curious about it, but even more curious about the fact that the date and time were the same on both sides of the Gate.

For the most part, David found himself collaborating with a physicist named Harold Volin, whom he only knew through the fellows equations. It was the most bizarre collaboration he had ever participated in, precisely because of the lack of any personal contact. Although he obviously could never meet Harold, he had a good idea of what sort of man Harold was through his jokes. Besides swapping equations back and forth, Harold would also relay mock arguments over how they could co-publish a paper and share the credit across universes.

The last part of his routine that David had to arrange was what to do every Friday night and Saturday, for shabbat. There were no synagogues in Waxahachie, not even a Reform temple. David would spend his shabbats in North Dallas, which had a Chabad center on Forrest Lane, organized by the Lubavitch chassidim. David had always felt uncomfortable seeing them on street corners in their black hats and long coats, encouraging every nonobservant Jew who passed by to recite a few prayers. Now, he welcomed their presence, for they were the only people around who understood his need for religious and spiritual refreshment at the end of the week. Every Friday afternoon, a different family would take him in for the holy day, and every Saturday night he would take his leave and drive back to Waxahachie, ready for a new week of research.

But for David, the most important part of shabbat was that he would call Sarah every Friday, a few hours before sundown arrived in Massachusetts. Shabbat was a time for renewal, and his weekly phone calls to Sarah were an important part of that. Although she still sounded upset at his absence, after a few minutes of conversation she always seemed to cheer up. Which, in turn, cheered David up as well.

And so things progressed, for about a month, until a chance encounter at a group party.

*

David hated group parties. Even though he enjoyed interacting with the members of his scientific teamsotherwise, he wouldnt have gone into science in the first placethere was something about these parties that always struck him as artificial. They spent so much time together at work; why force them to socialize?

There was also the problem of food. People rarely took into account Davids need to keep kosher, and so there was usually little or nothing he could eat. Someone had provided a bowl of carrots, so David did have something to munch on; but there were no guarantees as far as the onion dip was concerned.

David wandered around the conference room, making small talk with various other members of the Gate project. After half an hour had passed, he was already considering making his excuses when the door opened and admitted a woman he had not met before.

She was a pretty woman, with long blond hair, and she wore a red floral-pattern dress. She looked to David like a typical midwesterner. At least, David acknowledged, she looked like his image of a typical midwesterner, which was perhaps not the same thing. As he walked past her, intent on the door, he gave her a small nod, which he expected her merely to return in kind.

That made her reaction even more surprising. She stopped dead in her tracks and stared at him, which caused David to come to a stop as well. She pulled what looked like a photograph out of her purse, studied it, and walked right up to him.

“Daniel?” she asked.

“No, the names David. Commonly mixed up, though.”

“Oh. But I thoughtI mean”

“Whats this?” David asked, taking the photograph from her hand. It was a picture of him, taken a few years ago, before he had grown his beard. “Thats funny,” he said. “I didnt realize that theoretical physicists had fans.” He took a closer look at the picture, and realized that he wasnt wearing a yarmulke in the photograph. Nor did he recognize the background.

He looked up at the woman. “Where did you get this?”

“Umits a long story.”

David shrugged. His curiosity was piqued, and he had to admit, he would have more fun chatting with this woman than sitting at home. “This is a party. Apparently, I have the time to hear it.”

*

Her name was Paula Eisen, and she had the strangest connection to the Gate project of anyone David had met. She was a math teacher at the local high school, and last year she had gotten involved in the Gate project in a rather bizarre fashion.

“His name was Jack. Jack Levinson.” She cocked her head at David. “That name doesnt mean anything to you, does it?”

David shook his head. “Should it?”

“Jack would say so. You see, he came over from the other universe and I got to meet him.”

David was stunned at the casual way she said that. “He crossed over?”

“Yes.”

“Butbut no ones supposed to do that. No one has, as far as I know, since the first encounter.

“It was somewhat irregular,” she said, munching on a carrot stick. “From what Ive been told, they keep it out of the briefings.”

“How can they keep it out of the briefings?”

“I think Dr. Anderson doesnt want anyone else getting any weird ideas.”

“That doesnt make sense. Itsoh!”

“What?”

“There is a record of a seventy-kilogram object that was sent from Universe Two into here for a few days, and then returned, apparently unharmed. Thats the largest on record.”

Paula nodded. “That must have been Jack.”

“Um.” David idly wondered for a moment what blessing one would say when passing through the Gate into another universe. None came to mind. “So whats the deal with this guy?”

“Welltheres no real easy way to say this.”

“Just say it.”

Paula looked around the room for a moment, at all the other people talking and eating. Finally, she looked back at David and said, “OK. Jack came over here to find you.”

“Me?”

“Yes. You see, youre his best friend, and youre dead.”

David shook his head quickly, then leaned forward. “Excuse me?”

“Im sorry, this isnt easy to explain. Your counterpart Danielwas Jacks best friend. Until he died.”

“Counterpart?”

“Yes. The person in the other universe who is you. But hes dead.”

“Dead? Youre trying to tell me that theres another version of me, through the Gate, and that hes dead?”

Paula nodded.

David put up his hands and shook his head. “You have got to be kidding.”

Paula glared at him, and David realized that she was most assuredly not kidding.

“Let me get this straight. This is a little too much to take at once. I have a counterpart in the other universe?”

“Had. And yes, you did. You saw the photograph.”

David whistled. “This changes quite a lot. I never realized that we hadI guess copies is the wordin the other universe.”

“Not all of us do, apparently. But some of us” She cut off as she noticed David staring into space. “Hello?” She waved her hand in front of his face.

“Oh, sorry. I was just trying to see how thisthis symmetry, I guess, between our universes works. It might be significant.”

Paula nodded. “Look, theres a lot more to this story, and I dont think this is the place to discuss it. Theres an Italian restaurant I like in Dallas; would you like to go out to dinner?”

David shook his head. “I wouldnt be able to eat anything there. I keep kosher.”

“Oh, right, sorry,” Paula said, glancing at the top of his head. Then, softly: “Perhaps you could come over to my place, instead.”

That gave David pause. He quickly glanced at his wedding ring, not for too long, but just long enough so Paula would notice it. Then he looked back up at her.

“Does this restaurant serve salad?” he asked.

*

The restaurant made David feel uncomfortable. It wasnt the ambience, although it did seem to be a strange mix of Texas casual and Northeast formal, what with the red plastic tablecloths and the finished wood furniture. It was just that the restaurant was not a kosher one, and David stayed out of such establishments. Even just reading the menu made him queasy, with its listings of veal parmigiana and a lasagna that clearly combined both meat and cheese. David kept looking at the door and out the large windows, worried that one of the Jews he had stayed with in Dallas would see him and think he was eating treif. Oddly enough, Paula also kept looking at the door, as if she expected someone else to walk in at any moment.

In the end, David only ordered a glass of water, figuring he would eat later, when he got home. Paula gave him a sad glance, but ordered a chicken parmigiana for herself.

“I hope you dont mind,” she said as the waiter took their menus away, “but Im rather hungry.”

“Its fine,” he said.

She nodded. “I thought you were going to have a salad.”

“Changed my mind,” David said abruptly. “Can we get down to business?”

“Certainly. Let me tell you about Jack.”

David shook his head. “Can we start somewhere else? Im more interested in hearing about this other version of me. Its a little disconcerting to think that there was another David Strock around.”

“Daniel,” she corrected. “And actually, all I know of Daniel I heard from Jack.”

David nodded. “OK, so tell me the story from the beginning.”

“Well, lets see. It actually begins a few years ago, before I ever got involved. You see, the first events that told the other universe of our existence were a series of explosions in their ring. Apparently, the antimatter beams from our working SSC leaked over into the other universe, and boom!”

“I know all that.”

“Oh? Do you know that one of the explosions killed Daniel?”

David looked at his water. “No,” he said quietly. “I didnt know that.”

“Thats how Jack got involved. Daniel and he were biking along the path of the ring when an explosion killed Daniel. Jack was there, and he saw the whole thing.” She sighed. “It really tore him up with survivor guilt. After the scientists in the other universe established contact with us, Jack got the idea into his head that he needed to find Daniel here. He wanted to talk to him, and perhaps resolve his guilt. But the scientists at the lab wouldnt help.”

“So he took matters into his own hands.”

“Exactly. One night last year he snuck through the Gate”

David interrupted. “How? Dont they have any security? We do.”

“They do have security, but Jack is known to them, because ofof what happened to Daniel. They even invited him to be present the first time contact was made between our universes.” She paused. “Also, the Gate isnt a big secret in the other universe.”

David nodded. “Pretty hard to cover up the explosions, I would imagine.”

“It wasnt just that,” Paula said, shaking her head. “From what Jack told me, it made a lot of news when they started using their SSC. After all, it had been abandoned for quite a few years.”

“Interesting,” David said. “Ive been thinking about the science of parallel universes, and yet theres history to be considered as well.” He sipped his water. “How different is this other universe from ours, in that respect?”

Paula shrugged. “I dont know. When Jack was here, we talked about it. Most of it seemed similar, except for minor things. Other than their decision to abandon the SSC, of course. Why the sudden interest?”

David took another sip of water and looked away for a moment. “My family lost relatives in the Holocaust. It would be nice to think that the other universe missed out on it.”

“Um,” Paula said. She looked uncomfortable, David noticed as she awkwardly changed the subject back to the events of last year. “Well, Jack came to Waxahachie High School to look for Daniel or someone who might know him, and thats how I met him. I found him near my desk in the Math department office. He seemed to know something about the school, but his knowledge was off, andwell, I was intrigued. I took him out to dinner and listened to his story. I didnt believe him, of course, until he started to disappear.”

“Disappear? You mean, he would vanish for a short period of time?”

“Yes. I brought him back to my apartment because it was rather disconcerting. I didnt want anyone else to notice, and besides, there was a manhunt going on.”

“For Jack?”

“For Jack. The scientists were worried that he might vanish forever, and they werent sure of the effect his crossing over would have on the Gate.”

“They couldnt have told the town they were searching for a refugee from another universe,” David noted.

“Right you are,” Paula said, smiling. “They simply called him a dangerous trespasser.”

“I take it you didnt turn him in right away.”

Paula shrugged. “I like to live dangerously. Speaking of which, after Jack vanished and reappeared a few more times, I pointed out to him how incredibly dangerous it would be for him to stay here. So I offered to help him out with his search for Daniel, since no one else would, and I helped him turn himself in to the scientists at the lab. Dr. Anderson saw him safely back through the Gate to Universe Two, and I took on the task of finding Daniels counterpart.”

“And now, you have,” David said.

Paula nodded. “And solely by a pure stroke of luck. Until today, its been incredibly frustrating. I mean, I knew that it was possible Daniels name was different here, but it never occurred to me it would be so close.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, apparently, I look like an old friend of Jacks in the other universe named Rachel Larsen. Our names are totally different, but were analogues of each other. But sometimes the names are similar: the director of the SSC in the other universe is named Roy Schwitters, from what Ive heard.”

David nodded. “That does sound similar to our Ray Shwartz.”

“Anyway,” Paula continued, “Ive been looking for someone named Daniel Strock or something close to that in our universe. Ive also been looking for people who did the same things Daniel did, such as go to the same college or take a job teaching high school math.”

“I guess that makes a certain amount of sense.”

“Yeah, well until today, it didnt work. And even in this case, it seems to have simply been a bizarre coincidence.”

“Unless theres a deeper connection were both missing,” David said. “Tell me, did you ever think of tackling this problem from the other point of view?”

“What do you mean?” Paula asked.

“Instead of looking for our worlds Daniel Strock, did you ever search for this worlds Jack Levinson?”

Paula looked stunned. She opened her mouth, as if she was about to say something, but closed it a moment later.

“I mean,” David continued, smiling, “if I am this universes Daniel Strockmy, that feels weird to saythen shouldnt one of my friends be an analogue to Jack Levinson?”

Paula shook her head. “I never thought of that.”

“Neither did Jack, apparently, from what you told me. It might have made his search easier.”

The waiter arrived with Paulas dinner, and in deference to his stomach rumblings, David ordered a can of Coke. The waiter brought it with a straw, and David opened it and sipped it as Paula ate.

“You wouldnt have a picture of Jack, would you?” he asked between sips. “It might help me identify his analogue, if I know him.”

Paula shook her head. “Silly, isnt it? I never thought I would need a picture of him, so I dont have one. StillI think they must have one at the lab. They ran a picture of him on the news when they were searching for him.”

“Hm. Well, maybe Ill look for it when I get back.” David paused. “Now that I know all about Jack, what can you tell me about Daniel?”

“Um. Well, theres not much I can really tell. I never met him, and I really only got to know him through Jack.”

“So what did Jack say about him?”

“Well, Jack tended to describe Daniel in reference to himself. Jacks a solid, steady kind of guy”

David interrupted. “That doesnt sound like the kind of person who jumps between universes.”

“Normally he wouldnt. But I think he was trying to be more like Daniel. Jack described him as more impulsive, more fun-loving. He was poking fun at Jack during their last bike ride just before the explosion.”

“Hm. I take it neither of them were particularly, um, religious?” David tried to make the question sound casual, but he didnt think he succeeded.

“Not as far as I know,” Paula answered. “Anyway, now that you know the story, tomorrow you should talk to Dr. Anderson, and then re-establish contact with Jack. Hell be happy to hear from you.”

David frowned; Paulas use of the word “re-establish” troubled him. “Hold on a second. What makes you think I want to talk to Jack Levinson?”

“Becausewellyoure the one.”

David leaned back for a moment, and slowly shook his head. “I dont think you understand, really. Youre accepting the same fallacy that Jack did. Im not Daniel. Im David.”

Paula remained silent, and David continued. “I have a life here, my own life, thats nothing like the one Daniel led. I dont think I know anyone who closely resembles this Jack Levinson, and I certainly have nothing in common with his Daniel Strock.”

“But stillfor Jack”

David sighed. “Well, look. I suppose I could relay a message through Harold.”

“Who?”

“Harold Volin, my collaborator in Universe Two. He can probably look Jack up in their phone book and give him a call. Let him know Ive been found, so to speak.”

Paula shook her head. “Its going to take a little more than that.”

“Why?”

She chewed on her lower lip. “I havent actually been in contact with Jack for almost a year now. You see, shortly after he went home, he decided to go to New York City.”

It took David a moment to realize that she meant the New York City in Universe Two, not the one here.

“Whats he doing there?”

“Finding himself, I think.”

David nodded. He hated that expression; people who needed to “find themselves” always seemed to act as if getting “lost” in the first place wasnt their own fault, but some accident caused by the world around them.

Choosing his words carefully, he said, “It sounds as if hes forgotten about Daniel.”

“Oh, Im sure that isnt it,” Paula replied easily. “I mean, he may have finally gotten his life back together, but Im sure hed still want to meet you.”

David shook his head. “Its one thing for me to ask Harold to pass a message along to someone else in Waxahachie Two. But its quite another thing to ask him to track down someone whos a few thousand miles away.”

Paula leaned back. “Look, David. Youre not the only one whos allowed to contact the other universe. I can always ask Dr. Anderson to contact her counterpart.”

“So why dont you?”

“Because if youre not planning to talk to Jack after I let him know about you, what would be the point?”

David didnt say anything, so Paula continued. “Will you at least consider it?”

David thought for a moment, and finally, he nodded. “Ill think about it. But let me point out one thing. If Jack has really gotten his life back together, do you really want to start taking it apart again?”

“I dont understand.”

“How will he react when he discovers that youve found me, and that Im nothing like his deceased friend?”

Paula looked thoughtful for a moment. “Its better to know than to be left hanging, isnt it?”

“You may be right,” David said. “But sometimes, its better not to know.”

*

Paula had drifted away from regular contact with the Gate project once Jack had gone to New York, but now that she knew of Davids existence, she insisted on being kept more in the loop. She wanted to know every scrap of progress they were making to stabilize the Gate between universes.

Unfortunately, it wasnt much. Davids research simply was leading nowhere, and the Gate itself was starting to suffer signs of instability. From time to time the Gate would fade or the radio connection between universes would weaken. When that happened, they would run very carefully controlled beams through the SSC ring to restabilize the Gate, but everyone on both sides knew that there had to be a better way, and that it was only a matter of time before the Gate disappeared.

Davids work was so intense during this time that Paula stopped bothering him about Jack. But in the back of his mind, David knew that that was the only reason Paula was so interested in their progress.

Summer finally came, and David left the dry heat of Waxahachie for the humidity of Boston. The first day he was back he planned to spend at home recuperating from his trip, and catching up with Sarah and Yitzhak. He made it home by the late afternoon, and opened the door calling out Sarahs name.

She emerged from the kitchen, wiping her hands on an apron. The smells emanating from that room indicated that Sarah had been making a stew. “So,” she said. “Youre finally back.”

David dropped his bag and walked over to hug her. She accepted it perfunctorily, and without enthusiasm.

David released her, and was about to ask Sarah what the matter was when he realized that that might not be the best thing for him to do. She knew he was coming home that day; obviously, despite all the good phone conversations they had shared every week, she was still upset with him for having gone to Texas.

So instead of saying anything confrontational, he merely replied, “Yes, Im back,” as plainly as he could. When Sarah didnt respond, he followed that with, “Im going to go upstairs to unpack my bag.”

Sarah nodded. “So then what do you want to do? Are you planning to head over to MIT?”

“No,” he said slowly, dragging the word out as he picked up his bag. “No, I was planning to do that tomorrow. Tonight I just wanted to stay at home and relax.”

They heard crying from the other room, and Sarah immediately quickstepped towards Yitzhaks crib. David dropped his bag and followed close behind, and when they got to the crib he peered over Sarahs shoulder at the baby. What he saw astonished him. “Mywow! Look how big hes gotten.”

Sarah took the baby in her arms and glared at David. “Did you expect me to send you pictures while you were in Texas?”

“No, but”

“Did you think that Yitzhak would stop growing just for you? That the world around here would stop while you did your research?”

“No, no, I didnt. I just wasnt thinking, thats all.”

Sarah bounced Yitzhak up and down and murmured comforting words in his ear, trying to calm him down. David remained quiet.

In a minute, Yitzhak was gurgling happily. Sarah placed him gently back into the crib, and turned to David. “So how has Yitzhak been?” he asked her.

She shrugged. “Fine, I suppose. I told you on the phone that the doctor said he was fine.”

“Yes, you did,” he said quietly. “Listen, Sarah. I didnt think the world here had stopped just because I was gone. I was just pleased to be back, to see how big Yitzhak has grown.” He paused, then asked the question on his mind. “Sarah, arent you glad that Im here? I know Im glad to see you, to be back.”

Sarah stared at him, then turned around and led him away from the babys room. David once again followed her, this time to the kitchen, where Sarah checked the pot with the stew and began stirring it with a red plastic spoon.

David remained quiet again, until finally Sarah spoke. “Yes, Im glad,” she said curtly, looking away from David and into the pot. “Im glad youre back. But I didnt want you to be gone in the first place, remember?”

David nodded. “Im sorry about that.”

“Me too,” she replied.

Sarah and he didnt talk much after that. David stayed at home, as he had planned. They ate dinner, watched the news on television, and went to sleep.

*

The next morning, David headed out to his office at MIT, as he knew that he would have a lot of paperwork to take care of. After last nights tension, he was relieved and pleased to note that his office in Building 6 looked exactly the same as he had left it.

Around noon, Judith Pell came to his office to join him for lunch. David hadnt really had a chance to sit down and talk with her since the whole Gate business began, which was already about three or four months now. Once again, they ate sanbusaks, and once again, Judith was distraught over her research.

“Its still not getting anywhere,” Judith complained. “Half a years gone by and Im at a standstill.”

“How is that possible?”

“I had this idea for an experiment I wanted to try, and Dennis didnt think it would lead anywhere. So instead, Im still working on the experiment he insisted I do, and guess what? Thats not leading anywhere, either.”

“Hm. What was your idea?”

Judith paused, her fork halfway to her mouth. “You really want to hear about it?”

“Sure.” It might distract me from my own troubles.

“OK.” Judith proceeded to explain her work on carbosilane dendrimers, and although David tried to keep up, his thoughts drifted back to his own problems. In the back of his mind, he assimilated the information Judith was sharing, but it barely made an impact on the forefront of his consciousness.

Judith must have noticed, because she tied up her discussion quickly and then asked, “What about your work?”

“There isnt really anything I can tell you.” David smiled. “You know that.”

“I know, but just in general, hows it going?”

David frowned. “About as well as your work. I have ideas, but Im not getting anywhere.”

Judith nodded. “That bad. Well, maybe both our projects will work out.”

*

That night, during dinner, Davids thoughts were elsewhere. Sarah had put Yitzhak to bed early so she and David could catch up in person, but during the meal David picked at his food and spoke in one-word sentences.

Finally, Sarah said, “David, somethings bothering you, and its not me. What is it?”

David looked down at his plate. “I really cant say.”

“Are you sure, David?”

He nodded. “You know I cant talk about the work.”

She sighed, and leaned towards him. “David, David. Who am I going to tell?”

David looked up at her face, and saw his wife, his companion, the mother of his child, and the woman he loved. But most of all, he saw his best friend, the one person with whom he could share everything. And the one person with whom he ought to share everything.

It all came pouring out of him.

David told her everything about the Gate project, from the beginning. He glossed over the scientific details, since they werent relevant, but told her of the frustration and the bizarreness inherent in being a part of the Gate project. Then, with only the slightest hesitation, he told her about Paula Eisen, Jack Levinson, and his analogue named Daniel in Universe Two.

And Sarah, bless her heart, believed every word of his incredible story.

When he finished, he said, “Im sorry.”

She smiled and shook her head. “Theres no need to be sorry. In fact, Im sorry, David.”

“What?”

She sighed, then repeated, “Im sorry. I know Ive been acting very cold about the fact that you went off to Texas to do this project. But now I understand why it was so important to you.”

“Oh.”

“And theres something even more important than that, something important to me.” She leaned closer. “This conversation is what Ive been hoping for, David. Ive been hoping youd share your problems with me.”

David smiled weakly. “So what can I do?”

“Well, I cant exactly help you with the science, you know that.” Sarah had studied English literature in college. “But I can help you with one thing.”

“Tell me.”

“This Jack Levinson you mentioned?”

“Yes?”

“You really ought to contact him.”

David was surprised; this was the last thing he expected Sarah to say.

“I really dont think thats the issue.”

“It isnt?”

“No, it isnt. Its everything. Its the research, the stupid secrecy, the pressure”

She interrupted him. “David. I know you better than that. I noticed how much more emotional you became when you mentioned Jack Levinson. I can tell that thats what bothering you the most.”

He wrung his hands. “Perhaps.”

“So tell me. What is it? What bothers you about this Jack Levinson?”

David thought for a moment. “I dont want to find myself shoehorned into some artificial friendship, simply for the sake of a guy Ive never met.”

Sarah smiled. “Why would you have to be friends with him? Once he talks to you, hell come to realize youre not his friend Daniel.”

David tensed up.

“Thats it, isnt it,” Sarah said. It was a question stated as a fact.

David nodded. “Im disturbed by this other version of me.”

“Why?”

David took a moment to consider the best way to put this. “All my life Ive assumed that my decisions mattered, that they counted, because I was the only me there was. But nowif its true that there are parallel versions of usI dont want to think that my decisions never mattered. What happens to free will, to morality, if any and every universe possible actually comes to pass? What happens to” He cut himself off, and it was left for Sarah to finish his thought.

“What happens to God?”

David nodded, sadly. “Yes.” He gestured to their bookshelves where they kept the Judaica. He stared at the volumes of the Torah and the Talmud, the laws of his religion which he had studied as intently as he had studied the laws of science. The laws which he grew up believing and following, not just out of faith, but also out of rational deduction.

“If every possible universe can happendoes happenthen theres no reason to assume that anything we do can be for the glory of God. Its all meaningless,” David concluded.

“Why is it meaningless? I never get to experience these other universes. No one does.”

“But now that we have proof”

“Some proof. Sounds to me like you only know of one other world which is different from ours, and youre having a hard enough time holding onto it as it is.”

“But I know it exists. And if it exists, so do others.”

“Are you sure?”

Was he? The theory the group worked with assumed that the Many-Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics led to the alternate universe. This implied other universes, infinitely many, since every time a decision had to be made the universe would have to split into two. And if there were an infinite number of universes, then every universe had to be possible.

But what guarantee did he have that this was the correct theory? Sure, it seemed to work, but if it was correct, wouldnt they have contacted other universes by now?

“No,” David said. “I guess Im not sure.”

“Then dont be so ready to jump to conclusions.” Sarah came closer and squeezed Davids hand. “David, you know I cant answer those questions. I dont think anyone can answer them for you. You have to answer them for yourself. But I can tell you one thing. I know you, David. And I know that you have always acted as if these things matter. And I know that you would want to continue acting as if these things matter, even in your moments of doubt.”

“Youre saying I should get in contact with Jack.”

Sarah nodded. “Wherever Jack is from, hes a human being in need of comfort, comfort which only you can provide. And perhaps talking with him about this Daniel person can convince you of your own individuality.”

“Youre too good for me, you know that?”

Sarah shrugged. “If youre going to be there anyway, you might as well do some good in the world.”

David laughed. “Tikkun olam. Repairing the world. Or maybe that should be olamim? Repairing the worlds.”

“Perhaps this is why you got called to Texas in the first place.”

David stood up. “Sarah, I think I have a phone call to make.”

She nodded.

David went to the other room, picked up the phone and dialed Paulas number in Texas. After two rings, she answered.

“Hello?”

“Hello, Paula. This is David Strock.” Pause. “Im going to give a message to Harold for Jack.”

*

David returned to Waxahachie the very next week. This time, Sarah was slightly more encouraging, although she insisted that he return home as quickly as possible. Just because she thought he had an important thing to do there didnt mean she wanted him gone for much longer.

Through Harold Volin, David got a message through to Jack, who indeed was living in New York. He had taken a position teaching mathematics at the Berkeley-Carroll School, a private school in Brooklyn, but since summer vacation had started, he was free to return to Waxahachie.

Just a few days later, David found himself in the Building G radio room, awaiting a transmission on the video phone from Universe Two. Two technicians worked to boost the signal, so as to increase throughput, and Paula Eisen sat next to him, darting her head around anxiously.

“When he shows up,” David told Paula, “let me do the talking.”

“Id like to say hello. I havent spoken to him in over a year.”

“Look, its hard enough for me to just do this. Let me handle it my way, OK?”

Paula started to say something else, but then merely nodded.

After a few minutes of fiddling with the controls, one of the technicians approached David. “Dr. Strock?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Hes ready for you now.” She pointed at the controls. “Just flip that switch there.”

David did, and was immediately face to face with someone he had never seen before, but whom he assumed had to be Jack Levinson. David studied the mans features closely. He didnt know anyone in his life who even remotely resembled him. The guy was thin and of average height, with brown hair, brown eyes, and a round face. David searched his memories of friends from high school, college, and other places, but nothing clicked.

That wasnt the case the other way around, however. After a few seconds, Jacks face lit up with obvious joy. “My God. You look just like him.” Which prompted David to think: But Im not. Remember that.

“Hello, Jack,” Paula said. “Told you Id find him.”

David glared at her as Jack said, “That you did. Thank you.”

David turned back to Jack. “So?”

“So.” He leaned back and sighed. “Its really good to see youI mean, its a pleasure to meet you.”

It sounded to David as though Jack had been about to say that it was good to see him again.

“Its, um, nice to meet you too.” Pause. “Paulas told me a lot about you.”

“I wish I could say the same. First Ive heard of your existence was a few days ago, when Dr. Volin got a message to me. I met him when Danielwhen all this began.”

David nodded. “I understand.”

Jack looked uncomfortable. “So, um, I hope you didnt find this too weird.”

“No, not really,” David said, wishing to spare Jack his real feelings. “But there are a few things I thought you needed to know.” David tilted his head, making his yarmulke clearly visible.

“Yeah,” Jack said, and chuckled. “You can relax. I know youre not really him. I cant imagine Daniel ever being a physicist. Still, I wanted to come back here, to talk to you.”

“Why?” David said. He tried to make it sound like simple curiosity.

“Thats a good question. Im not really sure myself. Part of it”

The video phone suddenly went blank. Jacks voice and face were replaced by static and snow.

“Jack?” David called out. “Jack!”

Just as suddenly, the picture was restored.

“What happened?” Jack asked. “We lost the signal for a moment there.” Behind him, people were running back and forth.

“Im not sure,” David said. He turned to one of the technicians. “Why did we lose the signal?”

“Im checking,” he said. “But the video phone seems fine.”

“Well, if it wasnt the phone”

Suddenly, Kristin walked in. “David, we have a problem.”

David nodded. “Whats happening to the Gate?”

Kristin looked around for a moment, then said, “Its degrading. Well probably lose the connection within a week, unless we can figure something out.”

“I see.” He looked back at Jack. “Jack, would you excuse me? Perhaps you can chat with Paula for a while.” He turned to Paula. “Maybe,” David continued, “you could tell him about me.” She nodded.

“OK,” Jack said. “I understand. You need to get to work. Well talk later.”

Unless the Gates gone, David thought. “Yeah, later.”

*

David and Kristin worked the rest of the day and into the night, separately and together, to come up with some idea, any idea, that might work. They sent messages to Harold Volin, who was working with Dr. Anita Zahn, the head of the Gate project in Universe Two.

In the end, it was Volin who figured out an approach. He relayed the idea to David, who brought it to Kristin.

“Harold thinks we should pump lasers into the Gates at the exact same time, while slowly increasing the strength of the magnetic containment field.”

“Weve already tried a stronger magnetic field, and it didnt seem to have any effect.”

David shook his head. “Its not the strength of the field that Harold thinks would helpits the change in flux.”

It took Kristin a moment, then she got it. “Faradays Law.”

“Exactly.” Faradays Law, developed by Michael Faraday in the nineteenth century, showed that a changing magnetic flux could induce a voltage in a wire. “Harold says that if we can induce a higher voltage directly, it may strengthen the Gate.”

“And the lasers?”

“To freeze the stability in place. Were talking about cooling lasers, the kind that trap and hold atoms. Harold thinks they could trap the Gates in the same way.”

“So they remain rock-steady.”

“Something like that.”

“Where did he come up with this idea?”

“Youre not going to believe this,” David said, grinning. “It looks like the Gates are simply obeying Paulis Exclusion Principle.”

“Paulis Exclusion Principle?” This was something taught in high school chemistry, a principle that stated that two associated particles called fermions could not share the same quantum state at the same time.

“Yes. Imagine the Gate here and the one there as being two large elementary particles.”

Kristin immediately objected. “But theyre not elementary particles. Theyretheyre wormholes. Theyre openings in spacetime. What does that have to do with Paulis Exclusion Principle?”

David shrugged. “I didnt say they actually were elementary particles, they just seem to be acting like it. Harolds still trying to figure out why. But he was able to establish that the Gates shouldnt ever have the exact same properties, since otherwise theyd be in the same quantum state, and then they would repel each other.”

“This is purely theoretical, I take it?”

David grinned again. “Nope. Its for real. We checked the properties both when the Gates are stable and when they are unstable, and it looks like we need to freeze the Gates so their spins are opposite. Thats whats been causing the instability, a spin problem.”

A spin problem. The phrase echoed in Davids mind. Something about spins, and being able to hold a steady spin in a particle … he had heard something like that recently …

His thoughts faded as Kristin said, “Well, unless we have a better idea?”

The thought was gone. “Nothing else comes to mind.”

“We cant afford to wait any longer. Lets contact Universe Two and arrange the test for tomorrow.”

*

The busy activity of the Gate room thrilled David, in the way that experiments always thrilled him. Theory was his specialty, and he wouldnt have traded it for anything, but nothing beat the buzz of an experiment. After all, no matter how beautiful or elegant a theory was, it was never until an experiment had been performed that you absolutely knew the truth about the laws of the universe.

Even Richard Feynman, one of the greatest theorists of science, had pointed out the absolute necessity of experiment. David remembered a story a professor told him in graduate school, about a time when a bunch of theorists were arguing over the waves being produced by a fountain in a hotel lobby. Feynman overheard their conversation, and decided to answer their question by stepping into the fountain and creating the waves they were discussing.

A technician bumped into David, interrupting his reverie. “Excuse me.”

“Its all right.” David watched as the technicians passed back and forth, checking digital displays and making adjustments. The Gate was still active, of course; but they had managed to bring the noise down to a low hum so people could talk while readying the experiment. The air still smelled of metal and ozone, however.

On either side of the Gate stood the two Nuclear Magnetic Resonance, or NMR, machines, which would create the multiTesla fields necessary for stabilizing the Gate. David remembered how quickly NMR got changed to MRI, or Magnetic Resonance Imaging, by the medical profession when it became an important diagnostic tool; doctors had been afraid that patients would be frightened by the word “nuclear.” Of course, there was no such nonsense hereand they werent even going to be imaging anything. so calling it MRI made no sense.

Facing the Gate sat a powerful dye laser, which looked like a bulky metal box with a lens on one end. The other laser for the experiment sat in the other universe, of course, and they were aligned so the beams would meet exactly in the “middle,” wherever that might be.

Kristin walked in from the radio room, where she had been coordinating the final steps with the scientists in Universe Two. David turned to face her. “Are they set?” he asked.

Kristin nodded. “Yes.” She pointed at the digital clock on the wall, which displayed hours, minutes, and seconds. 11:58:03 AM, Central Daylight Time. “Were synchronized perfectly.”

“You know, thats still one of the mysteries of this whole thing we have yet to solvethe fact that time seems to flow the same in both universes.”

“Worry about it later. Right now weve got something more important to worry about.” She backed into a corner of the room. “Excuse me? Could I have everyones attention please?”

The murmuring quieted down, and she continued. “Were almost ready to start the experiment, so could everyone who no longer needs to be here please leave the room? And everyone else, check your pockets one last time for anything metalthat field will be strong enough to rip your keys right out of your pants.”

Most of the technicians shuffled out of the room; a few of them said a quick “Good luck!” to David and Kristin as they exited. Only three technicians stayed behind to monitor the equipment.

“Well,” David said.

“Well,” echoed Kristin.

There was nothing left to do in the last minute but wait.

The instant the clock hit 12:00:00, the NMR machines and the laser turned on simultaneously. The technicians verified this by checking the digital displays, but, of course, there was nothing else to see. Magnetic fields are invisible, and the laser light was so coherent that the only way to tell a beam existed would be to scatter dust into it.

Their combined effect, however, was clearly evident. The Gate began churning, and what looked like spherical layers started spinning in different directions. After a few seconds, the spinning seemed to get faster.

Kristin turned to David. “This doesnt look like increased stability.”

“No, it doesnt.” He walked to the technician at the laser. “Can we pump more energy into the Gate?”

The technician nodded and slowly turned a dial.

Suddenly, a huge popping sound filled the room, and the Gate began to make a crackling sound. “Turn it down!” David shouted, and the technician complied.

But the Gate continued to crackle and spin, and the noise got louder and louder. Kristin jumped over to the board which controlled the magnetic field and began turning the dials frantically. “We have to turn up the magnetic field! It may stabilize the spins!” The other two technicians began to help.

It didnt work. Suddenly, the spinning spherical shells of white light fractured into white and blue sparks which sizzled and popped, and began flying around each other at faster and faster speeds. The noise in the room got even louder, prompting everyone to cover their ears.

Then, as David watched in horror, the Gate began to implode. The sphere of the Gate began to shrink, and as it got smaller and smaller, the rate of shrinking got faster and faster. The diameter was now eight meters, now four, now two, now one

With a loud shlurping sound, the Gate finally swallowed itself and was gone.

An overbearing silence filled the room, finally broken by Kristin. “David. My office. Now.”

*

A few minutes later, David sat on the other side of Kristins desk, waiting for her to get off the phone with the scientists in the Gate room.

“Uh-huh. I see. Thank you very much.” She hung up, a dejected look on her face.

“Whats the story?” David asked.

Kristin shook her head. “We cant get back the other universe. Everything we try fails.” She sighed. “Its gone.”

“Cant we just run more beams in the collider? Thats how this whole thing got started in the first place.”

Kristin glared at him. “Have you forgotten the inherent dangers? Especially now that there are people working on the other side?”

David felt sheepish. “Sorry.”

She nodded her acceptance of his apology. “Anyway, building the Gate required coordinating with our counterparts in the first place. We seem to have lost all communication, not just the Gate. Without their help, all we could do would be to create more explosions along their ring.”

David suddenly snapped his fingers. “Something occurs to me. Theyre not going to have much more to work on unless we can get back in contact. Perhaps if we just wait long enough, we can safely assume that the ring is safe again, and then we can start running the high energy beams.”

“The DoE isnt willing to take that chance,” Kristin said. “Theyve been walking on eggshells throughout the entire project.” She hit her desk hard with her fist. “Damn! Weve come so close.”

Startled by her quick emotional outburst, David changed tactics. “Look, Harold and I have been working on theories involving magnetism and spin. But arent there any other theories that we could use? I mean, were not the only ones working on the problem. Isnt there any other way to reinstitute stability?”

Kristin closed her eyes and shook her head, all the while rubbing her hand. “The only other theory we had been developing dealt with wormholes and exotic matter, butwell, such a thing would be years in the future, if ever.”

David nodded. He knew about exotic matter, of coursea theoretical form of matter posited by Kip Thorne and other relativists, needed to keep the throat of a wormhole open. Such a wormhole could lead to elsewhere in our universe, or even to another universe, but the throat would close up very quickly if not held open by some superdense material. The Gate could not have been a traditional wormhole, or they never could have opened it in the first place.

There had to be another way. If only they had managed to keep the spins opposite each other for just a little bit longer.

Spins. Something, something was tugging at the back of his mind

Carbosilane dendrimers.

So much had happened in the past few months that David hadnt really found the time to think about his friend Judith Pell, and her graduate school problems. Suddenly, he saw a solution to both of their problems.

“Excuse me, Kristin,” he said, jumping up, “but I have to go make a phone call.”

David practically ran to his office and dialed Judiths lab at MIT.

*

“Can you explain that again? Remember, Im a math teacher, not a physicist.”

“This is more chemistry than physics, actually.”

Paula glared at him. She and David were sitting in his office, as he was trying to explain the breakthrough they had made. At that very moment, Judith and a team of technicians were working to implement the idea that she and David had developed together.

“OK, let me try again. My friend Judith works with carbosilane dendrimers.”

“Which means nothing to me.”

“All you need to know is that a dendrimer is a polymer with many branches. And each branch can have a different quantum spin.”

“Which is?”

“Its a property of subatomic particles. You can think of it this way. A particle can either spin clockwise or counterclockwise. If clockwise, we call that spin down, or if counterclockwise, we call that spin up.”

“Why?”

“Look at your right hand. If you make a fist with the thumb extended, the fingers curl counterclockwise, and the thumb points up. But if you turn your hand upside-down”

“The fingers curl clockwise and my thumb points down!”

David nodded. “Exactly. Now heres the problem. We can sort of think of the Gates as having two different spins, which is why they can coexist. Our Gate is spinning one way, say up, and their Gate is spinning the other way, say down. But if the Gates try to spin in the same direction, they begin to lose their connectivity.

“Now, if we surround the Gates on both sides with a carbosilane dendrimer ring, and align the spins to be antiparallel by using magnetic fields in both universes, we should induce stability.”

“Hm. Doesnt that require the folks in Universe Two to be doing the same thing?”

“It might,” admitted Daniel. “Then again, we were leaking beams into their universe long before we built the Gate. If we can just manage to reproduce those energy levels, we may be able to use a SQUID to contact them by radio. Then we can let them know what weve discovered.”

“A squid?”

“Sorrya Superconducting Quantum Interference Device. Harold Volin used one to contact our universe, before the Gate existed. We could do the same thing.”

“Oh. Well, Im still not sure what youre talking about, but if it gets us back in contact with Jack, thats fine.”

“Paula, theres one other thing.” David paused. “Ive hesitated to tell Kristin or the others, because it sounds so outlandish that Im not sure I believe it myself. But I need to tell someone, so …”

She nodded. “What is it?”

“Ive been doing some calculations, and I think I have another partial explanation for the instabilities. Once were ready to start the Gate again, it occurs to me that although the space axis might be invariant, that would not necessarily be true of the time axis.”

“Are you using invariant to mean”

“I mean, when we finally get the Gate to work again, we may be able to select the Gate to open up at any point in time for the other universe.”

Paula was silent for a moment.

“Any point in time?” Paula finally asked.

“Yes,” David said with a nod. “Any point in time. We could open up the Gate in the middle of their yesterday or their tomorrow. We could study the history of their universe, from the beginning. We could finally verify the truth of the Big Bang. We might even be able to get clues to how our universe might end, given what happens to theirs in the far future.” He grinned at her. “What do you think?”

“We could save Daniel,” Paula said softly.

David stopped grinning. He leaned back and didnt reply right away. When he finally spoke, the words came slowly. “I hadnt thought of that. I dont think that would be such a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“Because its already happened.”

“But if the Gate allows you to travel in time”

“It doesnt.”

“But you said”

“I said we could focus the Gate on any point of time in the other universe. I was thinking of observation, not intervention.”

Paula looked puzzled. “But its a Gate, not a window. Doesnt that mean we could open up the Gate to a time just before the explosions started, and pass through? Then we could warn Jack and Daniel not to go bicycling on that day, and save Daniels life! Isnt that possible?”

“Theoretically, yes, but”

“Then why not do it, God damn it!”

“Paula, youre talking about altering the timeline, irrevocably changing what has already happened, and not just for one universe, but for two. The consequences could be disastrous.”

“So?”

“Do you have any idea what the risks are?”

“Do you have any idea what it is to lose a friend?”

“Damn it, Im losing one right now!” The anger in his voice shocked David more than it surprised Paula.

“What are you talking about?” she asked softly.

David rubbed his eyes. “Its Sarah.”

“Sarah?”

“My wife. Every night, we talk on the phone. She pleads with me to come home. She hates the fact that Im working here. She says Ive been seducedby my work.” David looked away.

“Im sorry,” Paula said. “I had no idea.”

“Of course you didnt,” he said, a touch of sarcasm in his voice. “You dont see me when you look at meyou see this friend of Jacks he told you about. The bicycle-riding, impulsive, happy-go-lucky math teacher. Well, get it through your headIm not him!”

“I said I was sorry.”

David wiped his eyes. “Its OK. Im sorry too. I didnt mean to shout.”

“David?”

“Hm?”

“Why cant we help Jack? I dont understand the problem.”

David took a deep breath and let it out. Paula was loyal, he granted that, but sometimes her stubbornness was just too much.

He decided to explain the problem calmly and rationally.

“Look, Paula. You can figure it out for yourself. What is it youre thinking of doing?”

Paula looked puzzled for a moment. “If, as you say, the Gate can be opened up at any time in their past, we can open it up during one of their bike rides, go through, and warn them.”

“Uh-huh. Will they listen?”

“What?”

“Will they listen?” David repeated. “From what I know, Jack is a relatively straightforward person, and Daniel was spontaneous to the point of recklessness. If a stranger magically appears in front of them to warn them off the path, will either of them really pay any attention?”

“Um.” Paula bit her lower lip.

“It gets worse. If we show up before that first meeting between universes, then what happens to the Gate project? What happens to the lives of the people on both sides of the Gate? Think of the history youve lived over the past few years. You would never even get to know Jack. Are you willing to take the chance that the world we create for himand for uswould be better?”

Paula looked away for a moment. “Im willing to take that risk, yes.”

He considered her anew. “You must really like him.”

“Yes. Yes, I do.”

David nodded. “But, Paula, realize that its not just you taking the risk. Its every single human being, on both sides, whos been affected by the Gate project over the past few years. Can you honestly ask them to take that risk as well, on the chance it may bring one friend back to life?”

And what about other changes? David thought to himself. What about wiping out the plagues, the wars, the Holocaust? Do any of us have the right to do that?

The seconds went by painfully slowly. “So what happens next?” Paula finally asked.

David walked over to the window, looked out at the dry grassland that surrounded them, and then turned back to Paula. “We get back to work. And we hope theyre doing the same.”

--------------------------------------------------------------------

BROKEN SYMMETRY by Michael A. Burstein Copyright Š 1997 by Michael A. Burstein. All rights reserved. First appearance in Analog, February 1997.

Prologue: Spin Down No one saw the first four explosions. Only two people witnessed the fifth explosion, and it killed one of them. Jack Levinson and Daniel Strock, fellow math teachers at the local high school in Waxahachie, Texas, always spent their Sunday afternoons bicycling along the path of the old, abandoned Superconducting Supercollider main ring. Its sixty mile circumference surrounded the town, a greater distance than either of the two friends ever bicycled on any given day. Instead, they liked to drive to the spot on the ring where they had last left off their biking, pedal for a few miles, and then return to their car. In bits and pieces, they had made a habit of completely finishing the path of the accelerator every few months. Not that they could see the old collider ring, of course, since, like most particle accelerators, it had been built underground. Nor did a track actually run above the buried ring. They bicycled upon dry grass that looked the same everywhere around, so that unless you knew the collider was beneath your feet, nothing in the way the ground appeared would tell you otherwise. On this particular October afternoon, shortly after starting their ride, they stopped for a moment to relieve their thirst. They remained straddled on their bicycles. Jack reached down for his canteen, and poured the cool water down his parched throat. He offered it to Daniel, who shook his head. “I’m busy,” he said, checking his compass against a map. “Come on,” Jack said, “you’d better take a sip if you don’t want to end up dehydrated.” Daniel smiled. “Nah, I can take it.” “You say that each and every time, and last week I almost had to carry you back to the car. Here.” Jack thrust the canteen at his friend, who took a sip and tossed it back. Jack looked around. “Which way now?” “Well,” Daniel said, turning the map around and squinting into the sun, “I think we go — this way!” As he spoke the last two words, he jumped his feet back onto the pedals and sped away from Jack. Jack shook his fist, and almost lost his balance getting back onto the bicycle. Daniel was already thirty feet ahead. Laughing, Jack shouted, “Damn you! You always try to turn this into a race —” A large explosion interrupted him, a loud boom accompanied by a blinding flash of light. He hit the dirt instantly, his body remembering the air raid drills from elementary school. Duck and cover, that’s what they always said to do. In a moment, the boom turned into the echo of a distant rumble, and Jack looked up. The explosion had left a gaping hole in the ground, right where Daniel had been pedaling. Smoke drifted lazily out of the hole. Daniel and his bike lay off to the side, thrown by the force of the explosion. Jack jumped off his bike and ran over to his friend. “Daniel!” he screamed, and what he saw shocked him. Daniel’s body was bruised and bleeding all over, and covered with metal fragments. He didn’t react to Jack’s scream. Jack regained control and gently shook Daniel on the shoulder. It was scorching hot, and Jack pulled his hand away in searing pain. As he did, pieces of Daniel’s shirt and flesh came with it. Jack spit on his hand in disgust, and took another look at Daniel. His friend’s head lolled off to one side, and he looked as limp as a rag doll. He was dead. Jack assimilated this information as best as he could, and passed out.

“Sheriff, Mr. Levinson has been in a major accident, and I don’t want you getting him all worked up.” “Don’t worry, Doc,” said Sheriff Bob Kingsley in his natural drawl. He fixed his eyes in a squint and looked at the two Ellis County deputies, who nodded in agreement. The three made a strange picture, standing in the antiseptic white hospital hallway in uniform. Kingsley wore a ten gallon hat over his dark, curly hair, the one affectation he allowed himself. “We just want to ask him a few questions.” Dr. Korn shook his head. “Only one of you. I don’t want him to get too excited.”

Kingsley shrugged and followed the doctor into the hospital room. He emerged a few minutes later and headed over to the nurses’ station, his deputies in tow. Waiting at the station was Sam Stratton, of the F.B.I. “Well?” he asked Kingsley, in a clipped voice. “Well,” echoed the sheriff. “Mr. Levinson saw another hole form.” “That makes five, now. And the first direct evidence that the ring is dangerous. It was an explosion, right?” “Yep, and a pretty nasty one from what Levinson said. He’s still shaken up over the death of his friend.” Stratton dismissed Kingsley’s concern with a wave of his hand. “OK, Sheriff, thanks for your time. I’ll take over the investigation from here and call in my people.” He reached for the phone, but Kingsley interceded by grabbing his arm. “Begging your pardon, Mr. Stratton, but this is still Ellis County, and the area of the collider is still under my jurisdiction.” Stratton glared at him. “We have jurisdiction over federal land.” Kingsley smiled. “Ah, but it ain’t federal land anymore, is it? Hasn’t been for quite some time now.” Stratton pulled his hand out of Kingsley’s grip, and brushed it off on his pants. “Very well, Sheriff. So what do you plan to do?” “First thing I’m going to do is set up police barricades and declare the ground above the ring off limits. It won’t keep out everyone, but it should give us a few days of leeway before the press catches wind of it.” “That’s exactly what I was planning to do. I don’t see why I shouldn’t be the one to supervise.” “They won’t respect your barriers as much as they’ll respect mine, Mr. Stratton. Most of these people have an idea of who I am, and trust the Sheriff’s Office. You’re just the guy they sent in from Austin.” Stratton squinted at Kingsley. “I can bring in the army, if necessary.” Kingsley shot up his eyebrows and frowned. “The army? You don’t really want to antagonize the townfolk unnecessarily, do you? People don’t usually go out to the collider anyway. What’s the point of attracting all that attention?” Stratton glared at him. “I still need to call in some people. Scientists.” Kingsley shook his head and smiled. “Call in your scientists if you want, Mr. Stratton, but I’m going to call in mine. Probably just as good.” “Yours?” Stratton asked, with the slightest hint of a sneer. “Yep, mine. I’m going to call in the guy who knows all there is to know about this accelerator. Got to know him a little over ten years ago, when he first came to direct the project. He’s back at Harvard now. If anyone knows what caused this thing to start burping over the past month, he would.” Kingsley turned to his deputies, and in an even voice, said, “Get me Roy Schwitters.”

1. Spin Up The Superconducting Supercollider had been up and running for over a year now, and Ray Shwartz still couldn’t figure out why they weren’t able to get any data. He squatted in an underground access corridor, next to the main ring, and inspected the wall separating the two. The fluorescent light and white walls made it easy to see, and what Ray found annoyed him. There was nothing wrong with the wall. It was completely whole. Footsteps echoed from behind and interrupted him. He stood up, pulled down the knot of his tie and mopped his bald head with a handkerchief; despite the air conditioning system and its infernal hum, Ray still felt hot from the Texas climate. He was more used to the climate of Boston, or Seattle. “Yes?” he asked, turning around. Dr. Julia Kristin Anderson came around the corner. “Hello, Professor Shwartz — I mean, Ray,” she said, and smiled. Ray smiled back at her. Kristin had her Ph.D. for a year now; they were more colleagues than teacher and student. And yet she still couldn’t break her old habits of calling him “Professor.” “It’s OK, Kristin. At least you didn’t call me ‘Director.’ What’s up?” She squatted down next to the wall that Ray had just examined, and checked it herself. “Completely intact.” “I thought we might have had a resurgence of the fire ants,” Ray said, “but I doubt even they could chew through that.” They laughed for a moment as Kristin stood up, and then Ray continued. “So what news do you have for me? It’s obviously not a problem with the ring.” Kristin’s face settled into a more somber expression. “I wanted to tell you this personally.” She paused. “Yes?” “Apparently, there’s nothing wrong with either the scintillators or the computers. The particle detectors should be working perfectly.” Ray closed his eyes and sighed. “Damn. That’s what I was afraid of. How many beams have we run since the collider became operational? Almost a hundred, right?” “Ninety-three, if we include the beams at the beginning that did yield data.” “It wasn’t enough.” Ray pulled a sheet of paper out of his pocket. “Damn it, Kristin, I wish I could figure this out. The SSC was my major goal in life. I know this may sound silly, but it was to be the grand culmination of the years I had spent doing physics. By now, we were supposed to have found the Higgs boson and verified the theory of Grand Unification. Instead, we’re getting nothing.” He passed the sheet over to her. “I mean, look at that. Everything points to the collider running smoothly.” He ticked points off on his fingers. “We’re having no problem generating proton beams and antiproton beams in the containment rings; you and I have just ascertained that the ring walls are unharmed; and now you’re telling me that the detectors are fully functional as well.” She studied the sheet and nodded. “True.” “Well, then, Dr. Anderson, tell me, what piece of equipment is malfunctioning? Because I certainly can’t figure it out!” She glanced around the room. “I don’t think anything is malfunctioning at all.” “Nothing at all.” “That’s right.” “Then why aren’t we getting any data?” “Professor — Ray, are you willing to entertain a — well, listen to a hunch?” “I’ll accept anything at this point.” She smiled. “I hope you’re telling the truth, because what I’m about to suggest sounds totally ludicrous. You ever read any Sherlock Holmes?” Ray nodded. “A long time ago.” “My husband just turned me onto the stories, and they’re fascinating. Anyway, in one of the Sherlock Holmes stories, he says, ‘When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.’” “Yes, I remember that quote. Someone had it hanging in his office back at Harvard.” Kristin shifted uncomfortably. “Well, I was reading that story and had our problem in the back of my mind when something clicked. Assuming all our equipment is functioning properly, what do our results tell us?” “They tell us that Congress will cut our funding next year.” “Seriously.” “Sorry.” He sighed. “Although I am serious. If we don’t show positive results, Congress will take its ten billion dollar loss and leave Waxahachie with a big hole in the ground.” “I know. I remember the budget fights of the nineties; I almost had to leave graduate school because of it. But that’s not my point.” “OK. You want to know what it means if all our equipment is functioning properly.” “Yes.” “Fine.” Ray stood up and walked over to the wall opposite the one the corridor shared with the ring. An old map of the SSC hung there, at eye level, with a red X next to the words, “YOU ARE HERE.” The overall picture looked like two small circles on top of a larger circle, reminiscent of Mickey Mouse’s head. “Here,” Ray said, pointing to the two small circles, “we’re generating protons and antiprotons.” “Right.” “Then we inject them into the main collider.” Ray pointed to the larger circle. “Right.” Finally, Ray pointed to a rectangle that bordered the circle on the bottom. “And here, the detector should see a shower of subatomic particles when the two beams collide. But we don’t get that, except for those first few runs.” “No, we don’t.” “And you claim that the equipment isn’t at fault. So what do you think is happening?” Kristin glanced around the room again, like she wanted to avoid eye contact. “Ray, I think the beams are just disappearing somehow.” “Disappearing,” he echoed. “That’s right. It would explain why the equipment checks out, and why we’re not seeing any collisions. Before the beams have a chance to collide in the detector, they — they go away.” “You’re joking, right?” he asked, staring straight at her and frowning. She glanced away, and quietly said, “No. I’m not.” Ray sat down again. “Kristin, the only reason I’m not laughing in your face is because I respect your work too much to dismiss your ideas immediately. But you have to admit that this is a ridiculous thing to suggest.” “I know. I already said that.” “True, you did.” He smiled. “And, in point of fact, your idea does seem to fit the data. Perhaps we ought to investigate it, just so we can eliminate it as absurd. It’s not as if we’ve got anything else to work on here.” Kristin stood up to leave. “Thanks, Ray. With your permission, I’ll go have people start moving detectors around the ring. Maybe we’ll be able to localize exactly where those beams are when they vanish.” “Fine, I’ll authorize it. Just one thing before you go.” She stopped. “Yes?” “If those beams are disappearing, where are they going?” She shook her head. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

1. Spin Down Roy Schwitters looked out over the site of the latest explosion. With his handkerchief, he mopped his bald head and rubbed the perspiration out of his beard. The hot sun beat down on him and Sheriff Kingsley, making Roy wish he could return to his air-conditioned office at Harvard. The flat grassland, which stretched all around for many miles, had been torn up in this one spot. Dirt and metal fragments mixed together, scattered about in a nearly perfect circle, twenty meters in diameter. Roy studied the area for a few minutes. He walked around the circumference of the debris, occasionally squatting down to pick up a piece of metal or a handful of sand. When he finished, he brushed off his pants, positioned himself so the sun shone behind him, and turned towards Kingsley. “You’re right,” he said. He spoke, as always, in a soft unaccented tenor monotone. “It does look like there was an explosion inside the old SSC tunnel.” “That’s what we figured when we found the first four holes, but we weren’t quite sure,” said Sheriff Kingsley. “Jack Levinson’s story confirmed it.” “I see only one problem,” Roy said. “There’s nothing we did that would cause explosions to emanate from the tunnel. We never even had a chance to run one beam.” He gazed wistfully around him. “We know,” said Kingsley, “but this was the fifth explosion, and they’ve all only happened only around the ring where you scientists were going to do your experiments. That’s why I called you, Dr. Schwitters; frankly, I was a little surprised that you were willing to come back, after all that happened. But I am grateful.” Roy winced at the memories triggered by the sheriff’s comments, but he let them pass. “Yes, I’m willing to come back, anytime. I’ve already told you that it can’t be the Supercollider doing this; we never even had a chance to turn the accelerator on.” He walked around the debris again, and said, “Perhaps someone is setting off bombs, but I can’t think of any rationale for blowing up the tunnel. The project’s been long dead for these past ten years; it’s not like anyone should want to sabotage it now. You’ve probably just got some nut whose hobbies include blowing up outmoded scientific equipment. Maybe another Unabomber. I can’t help you there.” “Begging your pardon,” Kingsley said, “but aren’t you forgetting something? Forensics tells us that they can’t find any remnants of a bomb. No chemicals, no timer, nothing. And the explosions are definitely originating from inside the tunnel.” “So?” “Well, I don’t pretend to be a physicist or anything like that, but I grew up here in Waxahachie and I remember all the hoopla when we got the SSC. I wasn’t always happy about it, but I stayed interested, and kept reading up about it, even after they decided not to use the facility for anything else, like they were saying they would. One thing I remember very well was that they sealed off the tunnel after Congress killed it. So how does this mad bomber set up his bombs?” Roy thought a moment. “He probably found a hole somewhere and crawled in.” “You mean he goes inside? We did a thorough drive around the main ring after the first explosion. Besides the holes that were actually caused by explosions — all of which we resealed immediately — there aren’t any other openings. So even if he’s as hardy as I am, Dr. Schwitters, I ask you again — how does he get inside?” Roy had absolutely no idea what to say. He regarded the sheriff for a moment, then, without saying a word, he walked back to the car.

1. Spin Up Kristin ran through the calculations for a fifth time. It couldn’t be right, she kept telling herself. There was no way that this could be right. And yet… She rubbed her bleary eyes and picked up the phone to call Ray. He answered curtly. “Hello?” “Ray, it’s Kristin. I think —” He interrupted her. “Kristin, I don’t have time at the moment. Why don’t you —”

Ray cut himself off, and Kristin heard voices in the background. A moment later he got back on the line. “On second thought, why don’t you come to my office?” Click. That was abrupt of him, Kristin thought. Something big must be going down. She cradled the receiver, and nervously ambled over to Ray’s office. Her footsteps echoed as she walked down the empty corridor and around the corner. She opened the door. Inside, Ray was talking with a dark haired man in a two piece suit. Kristin’s entrance had interrupted them in what looked like heated conversation; Ray’s cheeks were flushed and the man looked distinctly uncomfortable. “Kristin,” Ray said, “I’d like you to meet Louis Reichen, of the Department of Energy.” Kristin closed the door behind her and approached Reichen. He was a small man, about the same height as Kristin, with a tiny mustache that looked like a chocolate stain, even up close. Kristin sensed trouble. Most people from the DOE showed up in plaid shirts and jeans, scientists interested in getting down to work on some project. This fellow looked like a businessman. He shook her hand firmly, then turned back to Ray, who sat behind his desk. “As I was saying, Dr. Shwartz, the people back in Washington are getting restless, and they’ve sent me to look into things here.” Ray looked at Kristin. “Dr. Anderson, would you please tell Mr. Reichen the current status of the SSC?” Caught off guard, Kristin mumbled, “Uh, yeah,” and then filled Reichen in on their problems in getting data. “But I think I’ve —” “Thank you, Doctor,” Ray interrupted. “Now, Mr. Reichen. I know this seems bad, but we’ve only been running it for about a year now. There’s bound to be problems until the accelerator has gone through a shakedown phase.” “‘Shakedown phase,’” Reichen echoed. “You’ve had ten years to build this thing, Dr. Shwartz. Any problems you might have had during a ‘shakedown phase’ must surely have been foreseen.” “Not necessarily,” Ray said. “When you’re dealing with an experiment as large as this, there are bound to be certain unknown factors — until you actually run the experiment, that is — that can’t be predicted beforehand.” In fact,” Kristin said, “that’s exactly how some of the greatest discoveries in science got made. X-rays. Vulcanized rubber. The —” “Yes,” interrupted Reichen, “but none of those things cost as much as this contraption. Dr. Shwartz, do you know what they’re calling this — this fiasco in Congress? ‘The Ten Billion Dollar Hole in the Ground’ is the least of it. I wouldn’t want to tell you what I’ve heard them call it in back room discussions.” Reichen picked up his briefcase. “Don’t get me wrong. I’m DOE; I support the collider, and want to see it working. But my hands are tied. If you can’t show me positive results, and demonstrate to Congress that this thing is more than just a big failure — well, I’ll have to tell them so, and they’ll kill it.” Ray looked at the top of his desk. “What if I could show you those ‘positive results’ you want?” “Well…” “Look.” Ray consulted a small calendar at the top of his desk, then glared at Kristin. He said, “It just so happens that we have a run scheduled for tomorrow. Why don’t you come watch, and you can judge for yourself. I promise you that we’ll get ‘positive results,’ as you put it.” Reichen nodded slowly. “That would be acceptable. I’ll leave the number of my hotel with the project secretary. I just hope you do have something to show me.”

They watched Reichen leave the room, and as soon as the door closed behind him Kristin glared back at Ray. “There is no run scheduled for tomorrow.” “There is now.” Kristin sat down. “How are you going to ensure positive results?” “I’ll go out to the collider and tell it that Congress has ordered it to work smoothly tomorrow.” They laughed. Ray continued, “Hey, it worked for the space program once. One model of rocket kept failing on the launchpad until someone from Washington told the chief engineer that it simply had to work the next time they launched it. The engineer went out to the rocket and ordered it to work. And it did.” Ray leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes for a moment. “You had something you wanted to talk to me about?” he finally asked. “Oh! As a matter of fact, I do.” She smiled. “And come to think of it, I do need another run of the accelerator to test my idea.” “Which is?” Ray prompted. “Ah, yes. My idea. Ray, I know what I’m about to propose will sound even more far-fetched than the idea of the beams just disappearing, but I think I know where they’re going. And, more than that, I think I can predict when they’ll vanish.” She looked around for a moment, flustered. “I left my calculations in my office.” “We’ll get them later. What’s the idea?” Kristin took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Do you recall Hugh Everett’s many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics?” Ray looked surprised. “Yes, I do. Whenever a decision has to be made, the universe splits into two separate universes. Avoids the thorny problem of the observer’s role, even if it’s not as elegant. Although I tend to feel that Everett’s interpretation was rendered moot by John Cramer and Shu-Yuan Chu, in their transactional interpretation.” “Moot doesn’t mean invalid. Everett’s interpretation could still be considered a valid one.” “Oh, sure,” Ray said, smiling, “assuming you could prove it over all others. People have been trying to assert one view of quantum mechanics over all others since the Copenhagen interpretation. But that’s the one people seem to accept the most.” “Yeah. Well. The thing is, I’ve always been uncomfortable with that one. I mean, it’s one thing to say that, for a subatomic particle we can’t see with the naked eye anyway, its spin is undetermined until an observer looks at it and it chooses to be either spin up or spin down.” Ray nodded. “Wavefunction collapse.” “Yes. But it’s quite another thing on a macroscopic scale. Look at Schrdinger’s cat. Does it really make sense to say that cat isn’t alive or dead until you open the box? I think Everett’s interpretation works a lot better. Schrdinger’s cat ends up alive in one universe and dead in another.” “So what does Hugh Everett’s thesis have to do with the SSC?” Kristin laughed. “Sounds like a riddle. Well, it’s like this. I’ve always been into studying the different interpretations of quantum mechanics, ever since that first course I took with Doug Strauss. And I must admit that I’ve always been fond of Everett’s idea — can’t you imagine what it would be like if every possible universe that ever could have been was really out there, somewhere?” She waved her hands in the air as if to demonstrate. Ray shook his head. “I’ve tried to stay firmly planted in this universe.” “Your loss. Anyway, it always bothered me that Everett’s interpretation allowed for parallel universes, but ones that were inaccessible from ours. I mean, what’s the point of saying an alternate universe exists if you can’t get to it? It might as well not exist.” “My point exactly.” “Then something occured to me. I read Everett’s original Princeton thesis, and noticed that he failed to take into account high energy interactions. I mean, extremely high energy interactions, on the order of a TeV.” She paused. “Kristin, I’m not sure I see where this is leading. That is, I think I do, but — what exactly are you getting at?” “I’m getting at the fact that at high energies, Everett’s theory predicts that a quantum mechanical ‘gate’ opens up, similar to an Einstein-Rosen bridge. For a split second, the barrier between different universes might be traversed. But we’ve never been able to create interactions of that magnitude until —” “Until we built the SSC,” Ray finished for her. “Yes.” “Kristin, that’s utterly impossible.” She felt her face flush. “So was splitting the atom,” she retorted. Ray laughed. “So it was.” “And look where it led us to today. Listen, Ray. You said that we have to do a run of the accelerator tomorrow anyway, to satisfy Reichen. Let me calibrate the detectors to verify my theory. In the meantime, you can go over my math and see if I missed anything.”

1. Spin Down “I’ve gone over your math, and can’t find anything wrong with it,” Roy Schwitters said. “As much as it galls me to admit it, you’re right.” Harold Volin grinned sheepishly, the grin of a small boy caught with his hands in the cookie jar. Six weeks ago, Roy had called him in to help figure out the problem of the SSC explosions. Now, they sat in a first floor office of the old SSC Administration building, studying the equations Volin had written out on a chalkboard. The building, along with many others, had been taken over by the county when the Department of Energy had pulled out, as there was no sense in letting good office buildings and state of the art computer equipment go to waste. Sheriff Kingsley had somehow managed to arrange this office for Roy, nowhere near as luxurious as the office he had occupied when he had been Director, but “good enough for government work,” as the sheriff had told him. Roy considered Harold for a moment before continuing. Harold was a theoretician, a good physicist, but with a quirky personality that made him look for solutions to problems from the strangest angles. His red hair, thick beard, and incongruously high voice fit his personality perfectly. But it was exactly because of Harold’s odd way of looking at the world that Ray had called him in. And now, here was Harold’s solution, too off-the-wall to be considered seriously, but the only one that fit the data. So far. Roy spoke slowly, unsure of his words. “Your calculations do seem to indicate that someone’s running the collider.” Harold nodded eagerly, still smiling. He tended to speak quickly, with one word running into another. “The first clue you gave me was the symmetric nature of the explosions. It was exactly what you’d get if an antimatter beam went off course — zing! — and hit the walls of the ring. And given that the magnets only work at a few degrees Kelvin, any beam sent through at the moment would naturally run off course. After all, the magnets aren’t operational at the moment.” Roy gave his friend an incredulous look. “You’re missing the point, Harold. None of it is operational. Not the magnets, not the detectors — and most of all, not the injectors! The SSC was never turned on. The project was killed long before we even got to the stage where we could generate one proton-antiproton beam, let alone five! I admit that your calculations indicate that the SSC has been turned on, but how? If there are in fact antiprotons in the ring, where are they coming from?” Harold eyes twinkled. “That is the big question, isn’t it? Not, ‘Who’s running the collider?’ but ‘Where are the beams coming from?’” “I don’t understand.” Harold’s voice took an a sober tone. “Look, Roy, I know as well as you do that the SSC isn’t operational. There is no way that those beams are being generated by our SSC. But maybe — just maybe — they’re being generated by some other SSC.” “Some other SSC?” “In another universe.”

It took all night, but Harold finally convinced Roy of the logic of his theory. It had been difficult, at first, as Roy was a strong supporter of the standard Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics. But the equations were incontrovertible. “At least it gets rid of all those bizarre paradoxes,” Roy said. Harold blinked. “Understated, as usual.” “What do you mean?” “You don’t seem to appreciate the magnitude of what I’ve proven here, Roy. Ever since the theory of quantum mechanics was developed, no one has been able to settle on one interpretation.” “That’s because all were equally valid. Everything we observed fit any interpretation, from wavefunction collapse to Bohm’s hidden variables.” “But not any more! Don’t you see? This discovery is so important, it’ll shake the foundations of philosophy as well as physics.” Roy harrumphed and shook his head. “And it’s all due to a killed experiment. Don’t get me wrong, Harold, I am happy for you —” “For us, you mean. It would be indecent not to list you as co-author.” “All right, for us, then. But it still doesn’t change one annoying, undeniable fact. I was hoping that what we found would indicate a working collider.” “Well, it does, in a sense,” Harold said. “It indicates a working SSC in some other universe. If it hadn’t been killed, it’s now about the time when we would have started running the machine. Think of it.” Think of it. A universe where the SSC was never canceled. A universe where science never lost its way, where the government and the lay people understood the importance of this project, appreciated the need for basic research. Perhaps in that universe, the other projects, like SETI and the human genome project, were also going strong. Perhaps in that universe, the space program hadn’t stopped at the moon, but was even now moving humanity towards the stars. Perhaps… “Harold,” Roy said softly, “can we use your theory to travel to that other universe?” Harold looked wistful, and shook his head. “I’m afraid that’s unlikely. The energies are just too much. You’d have to be in the path of the beam, and that would probably kill you. Of course, we could get a resonance effect going, but I’m not sure how.” Roy bit his lower lip and nodded. “It was worth asking. Too bad we can’t use your theory to our advantage.” The two men sat in silence for a moment, and then Harold’s eyes glinted. “Actually, we can!” “How?” “Look,” Harold said, “What’s the most expensive part of the SSC?” “The ring, of course,” Roy replied. Harold nodded, excitement in his eyes. “Yes, the ring. The detectors and even the computers are cheap compared to that. But don’t you see? We don’t have to worry about funding the ring anymore!” “You mean to say —” Roy began. “I mean to say that someone else in another universe is paying to run the beams. We can just set up detectors and piggyback on their experiments, like when we do experiments on synchrotron radiation. We just have to wait for a crossover, and I believe I can calculate when those will occur. And when a beam comes through — zing! — and collides with the protons in the surrounding dirt, we take data.” Roy pressed his fingers together and leaned back in his chair. “We could restart the SSC at a fraction of the original cost,” he said, “because the scientists in the other universe have already built it.” “My point exactly.” Roy picked up the phone to call the Department of Energy.

1. Spin Up The Reichen run, as Kristin called it, was six weeks in the past. It was also the only run of the collider that had actually gone perfectly, ever since Reichen threatened to shut them down. Perhaps, Kristin had told Ray jokingly, there had been something to the idea of ordering the collider to behave itself. Since then, they had run the accelerator many more times, and as always, the beams kept disappearing. Kristin and Ray stood on the hot grassy plain, studying the detector that should have picked up the beam they had run earlier today. After half an hour of examining the huge boxes filled with plastic scintillator, she turned to Ray and said, “Now do you believe my theory?” Slowly, Ray said, “It does seem to be the only possible answer.” “Only answer, you mean. Ray, you’ve checked my calculations. You know that I’ve predicted every single beam disappearance since the Reichen run. Either I’m the victim of the most improbable set of coincidences, or —” She shrugged. “Or I’m right. And I must be. The data proves it.” Ray nodded. “I guess you’re right. Too bad.” “Too bad?” Kristin felt stunned. “What do you mean, too bad? We’ve just demonstrated something that will shake the theoretical foundations of physics as much as relativity did!” Ray smiled, bitterly. “Come on, let’s walk back to the car.” In the car driving back to Waxahachie, he continued. “Kristin, I didn’t mean to belittle your accomplishment. Your theory will make a major impact, and you should be proud of that. But your theory also means that we’re going to have stop running the collider immediately.” “What? Why?” “Because if the beams are being diverted into another universe, who knows what damage they’re doing there? We’re sending antimatter beams into the unknown. If they’re interacting with the matter of an alternate Earth…” He trailed off. Kristin swallowed hard. “I see what you’re saying, but I don’t think we have to worry too much about that.” “Why not? You don’t care if we’re causing matter-antimatter explosions in another universe?” “No! It’s not that at all. We don’t have to worry about the explosions hurting anyone, because for this phenomenon to be happening, our SSC would probably have to resonate with another SSC in the other universe. It’s inherent in my calculations.” Ray nodded. “I see. If that’s the case, then our beams would be traversing the barrier between universes simply to go from our tunnel into theirs.” “Exactly. The beams may be going into another universe, but only if there’s an SSC ring there.” She paused. “An abandoned one, actually.” “Abandoned? How do you know that?” “Because otherwise the energies of their beam would cause positive feedback with ours, and — and I don’t want to think about what that would do to our universes. It might bring them together, or blow them apart.” Ray sighed. “An abandoned ring. How ironic.” “Ironic?” He was silent as they took a curve. “Louis Reichen called today, from Washington.” “Oh. It’s not good news, is it.” It was a statement, not a question. “No, it’s not.” “That’s why you brought up the idea of shutting down the SSC back there. To soften the blow.” “Yes. After all, if we’re going to have to shut it down anyway, I would rather there be a good reason behind it. And if it was harming people in another universe, that would be a good reason. But this — this is just stalled budget talks and political infighting. And we’re the ones getting the axe for it.” Kristin didn’t want to ask the next question, but needed to know. “How soon?” “They’re giving us half a year to wrap up any experiments that we might still be running. I got them to grant us that much.” “And then?” “Unless we can think of some way to get those beams back, that will be the end of the SSC.” They rode the rest of the way back in silence.

1. Spin Down Roy couldn’t believe his luck. In only four weeks, they had convinced the DOE to reopen the SSC facility. He and Harold stood on the ground above the underground ring, watching the last of the scintillator detectors from Fermilab being installed. “Are you sure about this, Harold?” His eyes twinkled. “Very sure, as always. According to my calculations, this is the third most probable spot for the crossovers to occur. And anyway, the evidence is already all around us.” He swept his arm around to indicate the various holes in the ground, formed by fresh explosions during the last month. The current detector was being set up on a piece of the ground that was, as yet, unscarred. “True,” Roy said, “although —” A far away boom interrupted Roy. Everyone jumped, including the people setting up the new detector. They continued when the echoes died down. “Harold?” “Sounds like it came from detector one. A little early, but let’s go check it out.” The two men drove along the circumference of the ring until they found the fresh hole, smoke lazily drifting out of it. They parked a safe distance away and approached on foot. “Look,” Harold said, and whistled. The hole was right in the center of the surrounding detector, which was unharmed. A blue light indicated that the detector had successfully taken data, which at this very moment the computers back in Waxahachie would be analyzing. “I can’t believe our luck,” Roy said.

Over the next few months, Roy, Harold, and other physicists gathered in Waxahachie, and pored over the accumulated data from the SSC. Once again, Harold and Roy found themselves in Roy’s office, discussing the experiments. “It looks good,” Harold told Roy. “We seem to be close to confirming the existence of the Higgs boson.” The two scientists tossed the physics back and forth for a while. The Higgs boson, a particle formed only at extremely high energies, was the key particle in the Grand Unification Theory. Discovery of the particle would indicate that three of the four fundamental forces — the strong, weak, and electromagnetic forces — were actually aspects of one overall superforce. “That still omits gravity,” Roy pointed out. “Who cares? If we can get just one more run out of the other universe’s accelerator, we’ll have gotten closer than anyone has before. Even Einstein.” Roy nodded. Einstein had spent the last years of his life trying to unite gravity with electromagnetism. If only he had known that gravity would be the hardest force to unite of them all. “The next step would be an accelerator of even higher energies. Probably have to build it around the moon.” Roy sighed, and smiled. “Too bad we won’t be around to see it.” Harold chuckled. “Roy, God Himself could appear in front of you with the one ultimate equation that explains all of physics, and you would shrug and think about how it would put all of us out of work. Forget about it! We’ve accomplished what we set out to do. Many-worlds and Grand Unification in one year, when just a few years ago we thought the SSC was dead.” Roy laughed. “It’s been a long, hard project, Harold. I’m just as happy as you are, but I’m exhausted from all the political stuff as well as the physics.” “Well, relax. Just one more run of the accelerator, and you, my friend, will be on stage in Stockholm getting your Nobel Prize.”

1. Spin Up “That’s even more preposterous than your original theory,” Ray said. He and Kristin were eating lunch in the cafeteria. The mood around them was somber, and yet people were still joking here and there. Kristin nodded. “I don’t care. We’ve got less than a month before they close us down forever. I think I have a right to request these runs.” “What possible good could it do?” “What possible harm?” “Look, Kristin, I’m busy with a lot of other things. There’s paperwork to do, there are reporters to talk to —” “Why won’t you let me try this experiment?” Ray put down his sandwich and looked straight at his former student. “Because the truth is, I don’t believe you, Kristin. I’ve been humoring you about this alternate universe stuff. And we’ve got more important things to do in the final few days of the SSC than test your theory!” A few people’s heads turned at the sound of Ray’s voice, but then they quickly went back to their own conversations. Ray’s shouting stung Kristin, but not nearly as much as his words did. It took her a moment to find her voice, and when she did, she spoke softly. “You — you don’t believe me?” Ray sighed. “I’m sorry for shouting. Look, Kristin, it’s not that I don’t think you’re doing excellent science. And I wasn’t about to kick you off the program because of your strange ideas. I had a friend once who had some very weird ideas on Grand Unified Field Theory, but he did top-notch science otherwise, so — It’s just that we don’t have time.” Finding her courage, Kristin said, “Let me run it by you one more time, Ray.” Ray turned around to look at the clock on the wall behind him, then looked back at Kristin. “OK, one more time.” She took a deep breath. “Fine. Let’s assume, for the moment, that I’m wrong, that I’m talking through my hat. Then you have two choices, either do the runs I suggest or do what’s scheduled. If you do my experiment, then yes, I admit, we lose out on whatever data we would have had otherwise. You’d be playing it safe, assuming that the data we’d be getting in these last few weeks would have any value at all. “But now let’s assume that I’m right. Let’s assume that there is another universe, and that our current data does indicate feedback from there along an Einstein-Rosen bridge. In that case, whoever is in that other universe has been affecting the beams by taking data. Which can only mean one thing. “They’re doing the experiments that we’re supposed to be doing.” “So why do you want to signal them?” “Well, for one thing, it would be nice to let them know that their days of doing science on the cheap are over, wouldn’t it?” Ray shook his head. “I still don’t see the point.” “It’s obvious, Ray! If we can get a message through to them, they can get one through to us. If they’ve gotten good results, they can share them with us! We can present those results to Reichen and maybe, just maybe, Congress won’t shut us down!” “But if you’re wrong, then it would be a complete waste of time.” “It’s Pascal’s wager,” Kristin said suddenly. “What?” “Blaise Pascal, French mathematician —” “I know who Pascal is.” “Right. Anyway, he once asked himself if it was worth his time to follow the church, and he set it up as a bet. If God doesn’t exist, and you follow the church, you end up wasting a little bit of your time here on Earth. But if God does exist, and you ignore the church, the payoff is eternal damnation.” “Those are…interesting odds.” “So what’s it going to be, Ray? Are we going to take the safe and easy path, and get some last trickle of data which may be worthless? Or will we take the risk that we might be wasting our time, but with a possible payoff that would keep the SSC running?” Ray looked around him for a moment. All these people, the scientists, technicians, and support staff, about to be put out of work because of a short sighted Congress. Unless… “What do you want to do?” Kristin smiled.

1. Spin Down Harold handed the sheet of paper to Roy, who leaned back in his office chair. “The beams haven’t been regular anymore,” he said, as Roy studied the data. “We’re not getting ‘Zing! Zing!’ now, but rather, ‘Pop! Pop!’” Harold demonstrated with his hands his interpretation of zinging and popping, and Roy found himself unable to keep from laughing. But this was a serious matter. “Without proper beams, we can’t finish the experiment,” he lamented. “You’re telling me?” asked Harold. “We’re so close, so very close, and all we can do is hope that they send us what we need. I have to tell you, it’s got me real worried, Roy.” The last time Roy had seen his friend so visibly distraught was when the proton decay experiments of the 1980’s had failed to confirm Volin’s personal Grand Unification Theory, called SU(5). Its name had turned out to be as unimportant as the theory, since it had ended up disproved. Oddly enough, it was that same disproving of the theory that had led to the necessity of the SSC. “Could the shorter beams be due to anything specific?” Roy asked. “If so, it’s got me stumped. The beams aren’t cutting off the way my equations predict. It’s almost like they’re doing it deliberately. But why?” Roy studied the data again, a listing of the different beam lengths. The shorter beam times did seem fairly self-consistent, as did the longer ones that were interspersed. But what could it all mean? He thought for a moment. “Harold, let’s think this through. If the beams have been coming here, then what’s been happening in that other universe?” Harold’s brow furrowed. “Trick question, right? If the beams are coming here, then they’re leaving there.” “Which means that they haven’t been able to take any data. No beams.” A shocked look appeared on Harold’s face. “That means that their experiment, as far as they know, is a failure. And - -” “And their government is probably just as unlikely to fund a failing experiment as our is,” Roy concluded for both of them. They were silent for a moment, then Harold said, “They can’t. They can’t shut down their collider. We’re so close.” “Well, that just may be what they’re doing. Unless —” “Unless what?” “For the past few months, I’ve been trying to imagine what it would be like for me to live in that universe. What if I had gotten my collider, and then, just as it seems to be working, the beams keep vanishing? What would I do?” “What you did in this universe. Keep fighting until the bitter end.” “Right. But what if we were the ones losing beams? I would have called you in to examine the data, and what would you have found?” It took Harold a few seconds. “The physics of the bridge is the same in either universe. I could probably have developed this theory in the other universe as well.” Roy smiled. “Which means?” Harold’s eyes lit up. “Which means that they know about us! So if their collider is in danger of being shut down, they would try to let us know about it!” He snatched the paper out of Roy’s hands, studied it for a moment, and whistled. “It’s Morse code. See here, where the data begins to get loopy? It’s an S.O.S.!”

“So what does the rest of the message say?” “Give me a minute. It’ll be easier if we use the computer to graph the pulse length versus time…” It was more like ten minutes until Harold had completely translated the message. Most of the message confirmed their ideas about the other universe. But it ended on a very ominous note. Harold read, “‘Shutdown scheduled in few weeks. Must present data. Do you have any?’” He looked up at Roy, who rubbed his eyes. “Well, yeah, we do,” Roy said, “but how do we share it with them?” Harold got that twinkle in his eye again. “You mean, how do we signal them back when we don’t have a beam?” “Yes.” Harold laughed. “Easy. Same way they signaled us, but in reverse. We set up the detectors to turn on and off very rapidly in Morse code, so when they send a beam over to us, they get a staggered disappearance instead of the usual ‘zing!’ kind. Our communication does depend on their sending us a beam, but we can still communicate. It’s a simple application of Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle and Bell’s Theorem. We’ll just need a SQUID.” A Superconducting Quantum Interference Device. A tiny integrated circuit cell made with superconductors, about the size of a transistor. Roy nodded. That made sense. They needed to interfere with the quantum mechanical nature of the beams, and both ideas Harold had cited involved quantum interactions. Bell’s Theorem, in particular, involved the quantum nature of information transfer. “If you can figure it out —” “I can.” “Then let’s do it.”

1. Spin Up “I don’t believe it, sorry,” Louis Reichen said. Kristin jumped up and hit Ray’s desk with her fist. “Damn it, Reichen, look at it! We’ve contacted them! They’re sharing their data! All we’ve got to do is keep the SSC running!” “Kristin,” Ray said quietly. This was not the way to convince Reichen, Kristin realized. She mumbled an apology and resumed her seat. “Thank you,” Reichen said icily. “Now, as I was saying, I do not believe this.” “So what do you think?” Ray asked. “Frankly? I think that you and Dr. Anderson are grasping at straws, trying to come up with anything to save your pet project.” “You’re accusing me of making this up, aren’t you?” Kristin asked. Reichen turned to look at her. “Not in so many words, no.” “But you think I’m lying.” Reichen sighed. “Dr. Anderson, let’s say that I do think you’re lying. Most likely, I would say that, in desperation, you have come up with some scheme for convincing me to keep the collider running. But I’d much rather not have to put such a thing in my report, if you catch my drift. It wouldn’t exactly be to your benefit, and I do have some sympathy for your situation.” He turned back to Ray. “I’m here to supervise the shutdown of the SSC. I have an order here from the DOE that you are to stop running your experiments immediately.” He took a paper out of his jacket pocket and handed it to Ray. Ray took it without comment. Reichen stood up. “We’ll be seeing a lot of each other over the next few weeks. I’ll try to make the shutdown go as smoothly as possible.” With that, Reichen stormed out the door. “He threatened me. He actually threatened me.” “I noticed.” “You believe me, don’t you, Ray?” “I believe you now.” “So what do we do?” “What do we do?” Ray opened one of his desk drawers and pulled out a piece of paper, which he passed over to Kristin. She read it and whistled. “Are you serious?” she asked. “I am.” She waved the paper in Ray’s face. “Why didn’t you show me this before?” “I just worked out the physics a few days ago. Besides, I didn’t think it would come to this. I thought that once Reichen saw what we had, he’d naturally let us continue.” “But he doesn’t believe in the people of the other universe.” “No, so he doesn’t believe that they’re sharing data with us.” Ray took the paper from Kristin and ran his eyes over it. “I think this may be our only option. We just have to convince our counterparts in the other universe to cooperate.” “Ray, maybe we shouldn’t attempt this. It sounds too dangerous. Maybe you were right — maybe it’s time to end things, here and now.” Ray’s eyebrows shot up. He stood up, turned around, and walked to the window behind him. He stared outside, with his back to Kristin. When he next spoke, it seemed to Kristin that he spoke as much to himself as to her. “You know, back when they were about to test the first atomic bomb, Enrico Fermi started taking bets on what the bomb would do. There was a small possibility, they said, that the bomb might ignite the atmosphere, and destroy the world completely. If I remember the story correctly, Fermi took the other side of the bet, figuring that if he lost he wouldn’t have to worry about paying up.” “I thought he took the side that the atmosphere would ignite, and that he was relieved that he had to pay up.” Ray turned to look at Kristin. “Either way, there comes a time when you have to do the experiment, because — because you just have to.” He walked back to his desk, bent over to write a message, and handed it to Kristin. “Here. Send this to them. We’ll schedule it for tomorrow afternoon. Make sure Reichen finds out in time to show up. But not in time to stop it.” Kristin took the message and hurried out.

1. Spin Down Roy Schwitters looked at the group of people he had assembled here on this empty plain, for what he hoped would be a historic first. Harold Volin, of course, who had figured everything out, down to the last millisecond; they stood at T minus ten minutes. There were some of the other scientists recruited to work on the SSC as well, gathered around the makeshift cryonic chamber, half the height of a man, which they had managed to construct to contain the SQUID. They had barely an inkling of what was about to transpire. And finally, mostly recovered but still seeming a bit weak, was Jack Levinson, one of the two teachers who had been witness to the explosion that had first dragged Roy back to the SSC. Levinson kept darting his head around, as if he expected to see another explosion any moment. Or, perhaps, he expected to see his deceased friend Daniel Strock bicycling over, revealing his death to be a practical joke. Roy shook his head at the depressing thought, and looked away. He didn’t mean for today to make up for what Levinson had gone through, but he felt that the man had just as much right to be present as Roy himself did. Just then, Harold tapped Roy on the shoulder. “Look,” he said, pointing in the direction of the afternoon sun, and away from the scientists gathered around the SQUID. Two figures could be seen emerging from a car, a good distance away. They began to approach the small group of scientists. “I was afraid this might happen,” Roy said. “Let’s see what they want.” In less than a minute, the two men stopped in front of Roy and Harold. Roy recognized Sheriff Kingsley, who nodded his head by way of greeting. He looked distinctly uncomfortable, odd for a man who always made himself fit in anywhere.

“Hello, Sheriff,” Roy said. “I don’t think I remember your friend’s name.” It was the F.B.I. agent who had tried to coordinate everything at the beginning; Roy had ignored him in favor of Kingsley, which he was now just beginning to think might have been a politically bad move. “Sam Stratton,” the agent said by way of reintroduction. “The sheriff told me you would be here.” Stratton pointed at Kingsley, who looked at Roy as if pleading for forgiveness. “What can I do for you, Mr. Stratton?” Stratton pulled a paper out of the pocket of his blazer and handed it to Roy. “You can pick up and leave. I’m ordering all of you out of this area immediately.” Roy took the paper, smiled, and thrust it back at Stratton without reading it. “Sorry, no can do.” Kingsley cleared his throat and spoke up. “Doc Schwitters, be reasonable. I told this fellow that you would.” Roy shook his head. “Sheriff, we’re about to witness something very important here. We can’t go just yet.” “Listen to me,” Stratton said. “Is it true what Sheriff Kingsley told me? Have you predicted another explosion for this piece of the ring, in just a few minutes?” “Not an explosion. A beam.” “Same difference, if I understand what’s been going on. You’re endangering yourself and everyone else here! I’m ordering all of you to move to a safe distance.” He waved the paper in Roy’s face. Roy frowned. “Mr. Stratton, I —” “Roy!” Harold interrupted. “What is it?” “I think my calculations were a little off.” He pointed behind Stratton and Kingsley. “Look at the SQUID.” Roy turned towards the metal cryonic cannister, which held the SQUID inside. “My God.” “It’s a trick,” Stratton said. Kingsley turned around, and whistled. “No, it’s not.” Slowly, Stratton turned his head around. The air ten feet away from them radiated with thousands of tiny sparks, as if a thousand tiny thunderstorms filled the area with lightning. The scenery behind the area wobbled, as if it was no longer the real three dimensional world, but a painting done upon a canvas of rubber, stretching in all directions, back and forth. A soft warbling noise slowly increased in volume. But what made it most frightening was that the other scientists were part of the scenery. Their bodies appeared to stretch, as if they were made of water, with waves passing through them, causing distortions in their shape. Waves that were heading towards Roy and the others. Stratton’s jaw dropped, and he let the paper fall to his feet. “What in God’s name is that?” Stratton exclaimed. Harold looked at Stratton and smiled impishly. “Wavefunction collapse.”

1. Spin Up “They told me you would be here,” Reichen said, the sweat moistening his mustache. “I demand to know what’s going on.” “Whatever do you mean?” asked Ray. “I mean, here I have been told that you’re running one more beam, against orders, and you’re waiting here for it to pass underneath your feet.” “That’s right, Mr. Reichen,” Kristin interjected. Reichen swivelled around to face her. “You realize what kind of trouble you’re in, doctor? You’ll never get another penny from the DOE. Your career in high energy physics is over.” Kristin shrugged. “How melodramatic of you. It was going to be over, anyway, once you killed the SSC.” “But it’s not over, Mr. Reichen. And you’re right where we wanted you.” Reichen looked around nervously. There were a few other scientists, but they were gathered at a spot a few yards away, chatting among themselves. “Now what’s that supposed to mean?” “It means,” Kristin said, “since you showed us that Mohammed wouldn’t come to the mountain —” A loud rumble began to shake the earth under their feet, and a sudden wind gusted up. Reichen looked frightened. Kristin smiled. “We figured we’d bring the mountain to Mohammed,” she finished. The din got louder. “What the hell’s going on?” Reichen roared. “You didn’t believe that the other universe existed,” Ray said, as the air around them filled up with sparks of light and the scenery began to wobble. “I thought you might want to tell them that yourself.”

1. Spin Sideways The two universes only coexisted in a small volume, with a radius of about ten meters from where the SQUID sat. The rippling, hazy effect continued, making everyone in the area appear to be submerged in lazily moving water. Roy Schwitters, Harold Volin, Sam Stratton, and Bob Kingsley found themselves almost overlapping with Ray Shwartz, Kristin Anderson, and Louis Reichen. Everyone in the two groups backed off slowly from each other, and regarded each other for a moment. To the people in one group, the people in the other group looked like phantoms, fading in and out of insubstantiality. When the first person spoke, from Spin Up, her voice sounded distorted to the people from Spin Down. But they barely noticed, as someone from Spin Down spoke at exactly the same time, and said exactly the same words. “It’s you!” Kristin said to Ray, pointing at Roy. “It’s you!” Harold said to Roy, pointing at Ray. The two directors approached each other, cautiously. Through hand gestures, the one from Spin Up deferred to the one from Spin Down. “I’m Roy Schwitters, director of the SSC.” “That’s funny. I’m Ray Shwartz, director of the SSC. In my universe, I mean.” They smiled, and attempted to shake hands. Their hands passed right through each other. Ray looked over his shoulder, back at Reichen, who stood goggle-eyed in shock. “I think we may have proven our point.” Harold and Kristin approached each other with similar caution, and introduced themselves. Harold laughed, and Roy turned to him. “What’s so funny?” he asked. “Talk about your Grand Unification Theories,” Harold said, and then the universes separated.

Epilogue: Spin Down Jack Levinson dismounted from his bicycle and removed his helmet. He wiped the sweat from his brow, reached for his thermos, and took a long drink of cool water. It was still the dry grassland, and it was still the SSC ring buried underneath, but it was no longer the same. According to the Morse code communications, Ray Shwartz and the scientists in the other universe had gotten the go-ahead to continue running the SSC. As Roy Schwitters and the scientists in this universe gathered data, they would continue to share it with the other universe. Meanwhile, both Harold Volin and Kristin Anderson were working on the possibility of creating a stable bridge between the universes. But none of it mattered much to Jack. His friend Daniel had died. It ended up not having been in vain, but still, it was all over for him. Like it had been all over for the SSC, just a few years ago. But, Jack noted, with the discovery of the other universe, possibilities had opened up. There was another SSC, another Schwitters, another — Perhaps there was another Jack in that universe. Or perhaps…perhaps there was another Daniel in that universe, or in another one… His heart feeling a little lighter, Jack got back onto his bicycle and headed home. END

Cosmic Corkscrew        by  Michael A. Burstein

1998

Stasis felt unreal.        Dr. Scheihagen had warned me about that when I volunteered for this        mission. "Remember, we don't know what it'll be like for you inside," he        said in his German accent. "We've never sent a human so far back before."        Scheihagen himself had been the volunteer for the first few        experiments, but he had only gone back in time on the scale of hours, not        years. So he was little equipped to prepare me for my experience.        Even now, I can't describe it. How does one describe the passage of        imaginary time in a box of Stasis, of timelessness? I felt frozen in time,        while events passed around me in a blur of color. Throughout, I worried        that I might get trapped in Stasis, and never emerge into normal time        again. But I had been willing to take the risk for this literary mission        of the utmost importance.        Finally, after an eternity of nothing, the Chronobox and I materialized        in a small, isolated alleyway. I jumped out of the Chronobox, gulped down        a few breaths of air, and closed the door. The sunlight passed through the        glass cubicle, rendering it almost invisible. Only once I felt safely back        in normal time did I check my wrist chronometer.        Its digital display of the date read 06:20:38. Monday, June 20, 1938.        Afternoon.        Perfect. I had managed to reprogram the Chronobox right under        Scheihagen's nose.                              Scheihagen had warned me about it when he set up the controls.        "Remember our agreement," he had said to me. "I'm sending you back on        June 23, when the story has already been rejected, so there's no chance of        interference with the main event. You make one copy of the story, then get        back into the Chronobox and come home. Do not interact with anyone, most        of all, with him. Ist das klar?"        I nodded my agreement, not bothering to point out to Scheihagen that        one of our subject's own short stories showed a timeline changing over        just such a mission, even after the original work in question had been        rejected. After all, the last thing I wanted to do was give Scheihagen a        reason to suspect me.        Then, while his back was turned and he fiddled with the last few        controls, I used the wrist chronometer—which was much more than a        simple watch—to reprogram the date of arrival. I had to time this        perfectly, making the change before Scheihagen sent me back, but not early        enough in the launch sequence for him to notice.        Why did I do this? Because, despite Scheihagen's warnings, I wanted to        make contact with the subject. When he was alive, whenever I had met him,        I had always been a fan; by the time I had made a name for myself in his        field, he was long gone. I wanted to meet him right at the start of his        career, and as far as I was concerned, that beginning was right after he        finished writing his first story.        I looked back at the Chronobox, then checked my clothing and patted my        pockets. I was dressed in a jacket, tie, and overcoat, perfect to blend in        with the natives of this era. In my pockets I had my scanner and my        disorienter. The scanner was vital to my mission; the disorienter was for        repairing the past in case I made a mistake. Feeling confident, I turned        around the corner and walked to my destination: the candy store at 174        Windsor Place in the Park Slope section of Brooklyn.        I had memorized the route in the future, and here in the past I found        my way quite easily. The candy store stood in the middle of the block. A        newspaper rack sat outside, with the day's papers and more popular        magazines of the era prominently displayed. I pushed the door open and        went in.        The details of this store were important to me, and I wanted to take in        everything I saw as perfectly as possible, so I could remember it once I        had left. The first thing I noticed was that the store was broader than it        was deep. To the left, near the wall, I saw a cigar counter and a cash        register. Behind the register were vertical slots against the walls,        crammed with cigarette packets. At right angles to the cigar counter was a        candy counter, with three rows of penny candies (penny!) and one row of        nickel candies. The sweet smell of the cigars wafted through the store,        permeating it with a pleasant, musty odor.        On the right side of the store was a soda fountain, and right along        with it a refrigerator, containers of syrup, electric stirrers, faucets        for carbonated water, and a sink. Four stools sat below it, currently        empty. I was the only customer in the store.        On the right wall was a magazine stand. Next to it, a rotary telephone,        and a table with four chairs. And then, coming around to the right side of        the door, an ice container.        And back behind the cigarette counter stood a young man, only 18 years        old, wearing glasses and showing an impossible grin. He looked at me, and        with an unmistakable Brooklyn accent, said, "May I help you?"        I was in the right place, the right time. Standing behind the counter        was the young Isaac Asimov.                              I told him I was just looking, which seemed to strike him as odd; I        guess most people in this era came into a candy store intent on one or two        particular items. But he seemed to relax when I headed to the magazine        stand and began studying the titles.        I had to take a few deep breaths just to calm myself down. Part of me        was worried that at any moment, Scheihagen might appear to drag me back to        the future, or perhaps the universe might collapse around me for having        already violated his protocols by slightly altering the timeline with my        brief contact. But most of me was feeling simple awe at being in the        presence of one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century.        I considered my next move. I really wanted a chance to talk more with        the young Asimov, and it seemed to me that I no longer had to worry about        disrupting the timeline. After all, I had already made contact, and I was        still here. I convinced myself that it meant that my actions were        harmless.        But that still left one question: how could I get him to talk to me?        What could I do to get him to want to strike up a conversation with just        another anonymous customer?        And then my eyes, wandering over the titles of the magazines, fell upon        the current issue—that is, June 1938—of Astounding        Science-Fiction. It was perfect; the obvious way to hit it off with        the young Isaac Asimov. I studied it for a moment as I gathered my        resolve. The cover illustration was a painting of Mars as if seen from        Deimos. Quite good, given the fact that no one in 1938 had set foot on the        Moon, much less on Mars. Of course, even in my time, the three human        figures standing on the Martian moon's surface and their silver cigar-shaped spacecraft were still the province of science fiction, not of        science fact.        I grabbed a copy and brought it over to the counter. Asimov had been        staring into space; now he came out of his reverie and prepared to take        money from me.        He looked down at the magazine, then gave me a quizzical glance.        "Pardon my asking," he said, "but you read science fiction?"        I nodded; I felt a lump in my throat and it took me a moment to find my        voice. My ploy had worked. "Yes. Why?"        He looked around for a moment; we were still the only two in the store.        "I do too. And I haven't met too many other readers of science fiction."        I thought for a moment; at this point in his life, Asimov was writing        letters to the magazines, but he hadn't yet hooked up with the Futurians.        "Well," I replied with a smile, "I've been reading Analog - -"        oops "-- I mean Astounding—for a while now."        "Really? What's your name? What do you do?"        "Um --" I didn't want to give him my real name. "Schwartz," I said        after a moment of thought. "Joseph Schwartz. I'm a—a teacher."        "I'm Isaac Asimov. My family owns this store, but I'm a chemist." We        shook hands.        "Dr. Asimov --" I began.        He laughed. "Doctor? Call me Isaac! I'm nowhere near to a Ph.D. yet."        I felt sheepish; I had just addressed him as I always had, whenever I        had met him in his later life.        "Sorry. Isaac," I said, which felt strange. "Tell me, um, have you read        this issue yet?"        "Have I!" He turned the issue around so the cover was right side up for        him. "I finished this one a few days ago." His fingers traced the banner        at the top of the cover which proudly boasted "THE LEGION OF TIME by Jack        Williamson." His eyes were filled with enthusiasm. "I've been enjoying the        Williamson serial. How do you suppose he's going to end it?"        "Um," I said. I had never read it. "I'm really not sure."        "Well, I think…" Asimov began, and he launched into a detailed plot,        based on his own extrapolation of what he felt would come next.        When he finished, I said, "You know, that sounds pretty good. Have you        ever thought of writing the stuff yourself?"        He looked away for a moment, then said, "Actually, I have."        I knew that, of course. "Really?"        He hesitated. "Yes. I just finished a story yesterday. My first."        "What's the title?" I asked.        "'Cosmic Corkscrew.'"        This was the pivotal moment. "May I see it?"        He got a wary look on his face. "What do you teach?"        "Physics," I said.        His look changed to one of relief. "As long as it's not writing."        Isaac reached under the counter, and pulled out a sheaf of papers. With        a slight tremble in his hand, he handed the manuscript over to me. I        flipped through it eagerly. Years later, in his autobiography, Isaac        himself had admitted that the story must have been utterly impossible.        And yet, as far as I and many others were concerned, it was the most        valuable thing in the world.        "It's a time travel story," Isaac said as I flipped through it. "You        see, I call it 'Cosmic Corkscrew' because --"        "-- time is a helix," I murmured to myself, but a little too loudly.        "Oh, you saw that part already? I decided to use the neutrino as the        explanation for time travel, since they haven't been discovered yet, only        theorized."        I nodded my head, remembering comments he had made about this story in        his autobiography. And then I made a blunder, but I couldn't help myself.        "You know, you got it wrong," I said.        "What?"        "That isn't how time travel really works," I said, and then I clamped        my mouth shut.        "What are you talking about?"        In for a penny, in for a pound, as they say. I had already started to        tell him the truth; I might as well finish it. "Isaac, if there's anyone        in 1938 who can believe my story, you can."        "What story?"        "I'm a time traveler. I've come back from the future for this." I        lifted the manuscript.        Isaac looked around for a moment, then looked back at me. "This is a        joke, right? Someone put you up to this?"        I sighed, and put the manuscript onto the counter. "It's not a joke.        You've been thinking about how to deliver this story to Astounding, and        you're planning to talk with your father about it."        "How --"        "Tomorrow you're going to take the subway to the offices of        Astounding, and meet with John W. Campbell, Jr. for the first time.        He's going to take your manuscript, read it, and reject it. But you'll        begin a working relationship with him that will change the face of science        fiction." I didn't want to stop now. "'Cosmic        Corkscrew' will disappear, Isaac. You'll let it get lost, and you'll        bemoan the fact in a collection of your early works. You'll write about        how many fans of yours regret its loss, and how you do too. You'll point        out that there was no way you could have known how much people might        wanted to have read the story in the future.        "But I'm from the future, and we know, Isaac. We want the story."        I gave him a moment to assimilate everything I had said. Then he shook        his head. "I don't believe this."        "It's true. How could I know so much about your story, or what you're        planning to do with it?"        "It's no secret that I read science fiction, or that I might want to        write it. You could have guessed some of what you said, and made up the        rest. I'm a scientist. You'll have to offer better proof if you want me to        believe your story."        "Fair enough." I pulled back my left sleeve and showed him my wrist        chronometer.        He studied the digital display intently, and lightly touched the molded        metal and plastic of the device. I knew what he was thinking: could this        device be a product of 1938 technology?        And the answer had to be no.        Finally, he looked up at me, his face slightly pale. "My word," he        said. "You're telling the truth. You really are from the future."        I nodded. "Yes, I am."        "And I—I become a famous writer?"        "Yes, you do."        "And you've come back for—for me?"        I shook my head. "Not for you. For your manuscript." I pointed to where        it lay on the counter "The future wants it."        He shook his head. "I don't believe it. I mean, I do, but I don't."        I nodded. "I understand. But it is true. I'm here, and I need your        manuscript." I pointed at it.        He picked it up quickly. "I can't let you have it. It's my only copy."        "Oh, don't worry about that. I'm not going to take that particular        copy. I've come prepared." From under my coat I pulled out my scanner, a        thin rod just about nine inches long.        "What is that?"        "It's --" I paused. They didn't have photocopy machines in 1938, did        they? Or xerography? "It's like carbon paper. Watch."        As I ran the scanner over each sheet of manuscript, it spit out an        identical copy. I suppose I didn't have to bother with the hard copy, as        the scanner stored a copy of anything it scanned in its memory, but I        wanted to feel the manuscript in my own hands as I brought it to the        future. When I was done, I had a pile of papers that matched Isaac's        manuscript almost perfectly.        He whistled. "A device like that could change the world."        "It will. And it's because of people like you that such devices will be        made."                              I couldn't help myself. I really couldn't. I told Isaac all about how        he would go to meet John W. Campbell, the editor of Astounding, at        the offices of Street &amp; Smith tomorrow. I told him how his friendship        with Campbell would lead to a career as a full-time writer. I told him        that his first published story, "Marooned Off Vesta," would appear in        Amazing next March, and that his first sale to Campbell, a story he        would call "Ad Astra" but which Campbell would change to "Trends," would        appear in the July 1939 Astounding.        We talked, of space, and galaxies, and tesseracts, and time travel, and        rockets to the Moon, and of all the dreams that were yet to be. I wanted        to stay forever, but every millisecond I stayed increased the possibility        of disrupting the timeline. Isaac noticed me glancing at my watch every so        often, and after a while he got the idea.        "You need to leave, don't you?"        I nodded. "This is it, Isaac. I have to go now."        Isaac smiled at me. Then he got a worried look on his face. "What        happens now? Do you erase my memory?"        "No," I lied. "Just—do me a favor. When you write your autobiography

--"

"I'll leave you out of it, I promise."        "Good."        But he got a twinkle in his eye. "Although—you know, that gives me        an idea for a story. What if I put something in print here in the past        that can only be recognized in the future?"        I thought for moment. "It does sound like a good idea for a story, but        don't start it until late 1953."        A second later, Isaac laughed. "I guess I do use the idea, then."        "Yes, but don't do it before then. Otherwise it'll be the end of—of        everything."        He nodded, letting me know that he was aware of the dangers of        disrupting the timeline. "Thanks for telling me about my future. It's nice        to know that I'll succeed."        "You're welcome," I said sadly. "Farewell."        As I walked to the door to leave, I turned back to look at him one last        time. He was already looking away, staring into space. I wanted both of us        to be able to treasure this conversation forever, but I knew that I        couldn't let that happen, despite his assurances. So I pulled the        disorienter out of my pocket and fired it at him. It made no noise,        displayed no light, but I knew it had worked. His face took on an air of        bewilderment and confusion, and then readjusted to normal. I dashed out        before he could notice me, and left him to dream the daydreams of the idle        shopkeeper.                              I headed back to the alleyway where I had left the Chronobox, clutching        the manuscript in my hands as I walked. I shook with fear over the        possibility that I might have disrupted the timeline; but no, I was still        here, meaning that my interference had been negligible.        The Chronobox was undisturbed, and the alleyway was as empty as before.        All that I needed to do was enter the Chronobox, set the date for the        present, and return home.        But I hesitated.        I wanted to stay here, in 1938. I knew what was about to happen: the        golden age of science fiction. I could hang around, watch the greatest        writers of the genre come of age. I could attend the first Worldcon, read        the stories and novels as they first appeared, and own a collection of        works to rival that of anyone. Living in the United States through World        War II would be a small price to pay, as far as I was concerned.        I could be a part of it all. I would just have to make sure that I        remained a small, insignificant member of science fiction fandom, so as        not to disturb the future in which I would eventually be born.        I looked at the copy of "Cosmic Corkscrew" I held in my hand, and I        looked at the Chronobox. I owed something to the future, I knew that, but        I wanted something that was only available to me here in the past.        I knew what I had to do.        I gently placed the manuscript inside the Chronobox, closed the door,        hit the button on my chronometer and punctured Stasis. Immediately, the        manuscript disappeared and the Chronobox appeared empty. A moment later,        the Chronobox itself vanished.        I turned on my heel and left the alleyway, readier than any other man        in 1938 to face the future.        Except, perhaps, for Isaac Asimov.              —for my father Joel David Burstein (1929-1990)

Sentimental Value   by  Michael A Burstein

I barged into Stan's office, pushing off Ian and        Scott as they tried to hold me back. As I slammed the door behind me, I        heard muffled shouts of "Stan, watch out!" coming from the two of them.        Stan looked up. He was sitting at his desk, a pile of slush perched        precariously on top, all the way up to his chin. He blinked, rubbed his        head, tugged at his beard, and smiled. His eyes twinkled.        "Michael!" Stan got up, allowing the manuscripts to fall over and onto        the floor; it turned out that his chin had been holding them in place. He        walked over to me and shook my hand warmly. "It's a pleasure to see you.        Glad you finally made that first sale, eh? Wish I could've been there when        you heard the news. I've always wanted to see the joy in my writers' faces        when they find out."        I stared at him for a second, goggle-eyed. Of course, he didn't realize        yet that the jig was up. "Knock it off, Stan!" I exclaimed. "I know as        well as you do that you practically were there."        Stan pulled back from me, a nervous look on his face. His brow began to        sweat. He pulled a white silk handkerchief from his pocket and mopped his        forehead furiously. "What do you mean?" he whispered.        "I know all about the camera. I want to see my picture."        Stan put away the handkerchief and retreated behind his desk. "What        camera?" he asked.        Now I smiled. "The camera that Sydney told me about. You        remember, you ran into her at a convention. A fellow Clarionite. She told        me about the magic camera you use to photograph new writers when they make        their first sale to you. I want to see my picture."        "Shhh!" Stan looked around, nervously. "Don't use that word!"        "What word? Picture?"        "No!" He looked around again, leaned close to my ear, and whispered,        "Magic. As the editor of Analog, the bastion of hard science        fiction, I could lose my credibility if it was found that I was using        magic to serve my ends, and not good old hard-science-with-rivets. And if        I lost my credibility, so," he intoned solemnly, "would the magazine."        I shuddered; if that happened, I knew that my career as a hard science        fiction writer would be over as quickly as it began. All the other writers        would point at me and say, "Ha ha! You don't really write hard SF! Not        even soft SF! Your editor uses magic!" I would be forced to turn to        fantasy for a living, and as I noted once when a story of mine was trashed        in a workshop, for me fantasy is a lot harder to write than science        fiction. The only way I'd survive would be by writing ten-volume        trilogies about cute elves, since that was all I could handle in the        genre. Surely a fate worse than death, or even chairing a Worldcon.        "Your point is well taken," I replied quietly. "I will not spread the        word about the camera, not even until the stars grow old and our Sun grows        cold. However," I continued, "I still want to see my picture."        Stan nodded and pushed a button on his desk. A dark hole with fuzzy        boundaries opened up in mid-air, obviously a product of advanced science        or—well, let's just invoke Clarke's Third Law and leave it at that.        Stan reached in and pulled out an old style accordion camera, along with a        thick manila envelope.        "It works by pushing this button," he said, "and then a photograph        magically—I mean, scientifically—appears out of this slot. Similar        to a Polaroid. The camera reaches through time and space and finds the        correct rays of light to imprint onto the photograph. But it only works if        I click the button after the writer has found out. One can't predict the        future, you know, that would be a violation of --"        I took the envelope from Stan as he began to spout equations of general        relativity and quantum field theory. There was a whole slew of pictures,        in chronological order. I recognized some of the other authors, excited        looks on their faces, appearing younger than I remembered. That made        sense, naturally, because they were younger when they made their first        sales. Out of curiosity, I pulled out Ian's picture; his maniacal grin was        unmistakable.        Finally, I reached my picture. There I was, jumping into the air, with        the telephone in my hand and a big smile on my face. The perfect souvenir        of my first sale; after all, I couldn't have the check and cash it, too.        "I want the photograph," I said.        Stan stopped his lecture and pulled the picture out of my hands.        Frowning, he said, "I can't give it to you, Michael. I keep them for        myself. It reminds me of why I went into editing in the first place."        "Just this one, Stan? You won't miss it, and it means a lot to me." It        did, too; my fiancee wasn't around when I heard the news, and this would        be the best way to share the moment with her.        "Well…" Stan said, "you'll have to give me something in return."        "I don't have much money. I'm only a writer."        Stan laughed. "Oh, I wasn't thinking of money! Actually, all I'd want        in return is another story from you. We've got a hole in the magazine for        next month, and I need to fill it with something. The picture could be        your payment."        My ears perked up. In exchange for the picture, Stan was going to        publish another story of mine? "Sure! What kind of story would you        like?"        "Could you give me a 'Probability Zero'? It's only a small hole, and        anyway, you can make one of those short enough to be the right price."        I was confused. "What do you mean? The right price? What do you        consider to be the right price for the photograph?"        "Oh," he said, with his ubiquitous smile and twinkle in his eyes, "I        figure the picture is worth…about a thousand words."        I hit him with a Hugo rocket on my way out. It felt good.

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