Stepping into the Future

                                                                It's in the Water

 

It was six night now in Santiago, six nights that included a continual series of deep hypnotic imaginings of some sort.  Where did they come from and what was the purpose?  Michael suspected some sort of drug. People just don't share dreams without some kind of prompt, some kind of mechanism. It was all so odd.  He'd hash it out with Laura and Schechter over dinner.

"Where's it coming from Sol?",  Michael wanted to know. Schechter saw this coming and didn't really want to talk about it. He had enough nightmares of his own. "I wish I knew Michael. I have no idea. It could be coming from you, or Laura, something in your past, a place you visited. It could be jet lag. I don't know."  Schechter looked troubled by the whole subject.  "Michael insists that someone's drugged us. He says you can't ordinarily hypnotize people otherwise".  Laura  prodded despite Schechter's reluctance to  discuss it. "Couldn't we get back to the research?", Schechter pleaded. "I assure you there's nothing in the water and the food's kosher" , he added with a smile.

Michael couldn't shrug it off so easily of course. Too much had happened. He  looked out the courtyard up at the sky. Lights on the fountain distracted his view somewhat. It felt  strange to be down here now.  He wondered if Schechter felt this way about Chile. He wondered about people and what comfort and security were. Where was home really, especially now?  Was it him or was it the world? Was it the research and how far it had stretched the imagination? Were they really standing at a crossroads in time, or was this all a dream brought on by some kind of extended  jet lag?

It would have been just a fleeting thought except for the facts of Exit 51. It was as real as his home back in Philly. He knew the place, the people, the times, the food, the news, the details. It was all that detail. Mark Green was just as much him as Michael Gornstein, possibly more.

He wrestled with the conflicting viewpoints. He wasn't being forced into the future against his will. This was important. He had a choice. Stay here and finish his research, or regroup across a quantum leap through time.

Michael looked at the photographs on the white translucent glass that Schechter had laid out in his study. He looked at the area where the anomaly appeared and wondered. His mind drifted to the problem of this month's thru-put at the exit. He smiled at the thought of Mohammad's grimace at the news of their upgrade. He smelled the red dust of Oklahoma blowing up from the ground after the rain had dried. He could see Lauren's pretty smile as she tilted her head toward him. "We belong at the exit", he said resolutely. Lauren liked his certainty when he made decisions. He watched the blue and green lights on the fountain fade with the night. He watched as the observation room became more and more solid around him with Lauren now there and by his side. It was like landing on a runway when the wheels touched down and you were there and no longer in the air. They both watched the data run by through the white glass of the observation trackers. They were 300 years into the future and they were there to stay.

Coming Home

                    

        

                                              Lost  in Time

 

"We're half in the future and half back here"  Michael said and looked deeply into Laura's eyes for any sign of recognition. "How do you know?" Laura looked right back at him. "I see it. I see it happening. I almost see why!"  Michael turned as he spoke  and continued in an angry voice, "and I don't like it. I don't like being someone's toy, pushed into a place and time I have no choice about, no understanding. It  makes me feel weak and helpless and I've decided to stop it.". "How", Laura asked as if they were planning an evening's observation schedule. "I can get us out. I've thought it out carefully. You know what happens in these dreams? He waited for her reply. "What?" "They take us forward in time and to a different place, but the transit is vulnerable. I noticed it last time and I remembered it and I remembered it because I made a large number of associations for when we were back here that would remind me, and I remembered. The orientation changes". Laura was listening intently. It was as if they were French underground conspiring against the Nazis. Michael went on. "Ordinarily, now, my whole life,  usually, I relate most of my experience to my youth, school, growing up, my first telescope, you know". Laura nodded. "When we're in transit, there's none of that, just Chile, just here at the observatory or at Schechter's, or on the road, or somewhere around here. The job." They called their current research "the job". "And I noticed it. Every time I notice it." Laura started to make coffee as Michael continued excitedly. "I know how we can break out. I'm sure of it. All we have to do is know when we're in transit and then talk about it and we'll wake up!" He just about smiled the way he did when he'd solved a math puzzle. He looked at her for her view of all this. She handed him a cup of coffee . "It makes me want to smoke a cigarette and I never smoke." She laughed and so did Michael. "I don't know. Break out? What do you mean?" "Just wake up out of it, force ourselves to wake up!" "How in heaven are we supposed to do that?" Michael smiled at the question. "Exactly" he answered. "All we do is rehearse a few lines until we recognize where we are and come to." He smiled like a contented cat.

Four hours and as many cups of coffee later they were still sitting at the kitchen table going over their lines. "Then I say, "are you ready Laura?" "And you say.." and Laura broke in. "I sure am." Michael smiled. "That's all there is to it". He saw how tired she looked. "It'll be alright". That was Michael, she thought. He gets a plan and follows it. She hoped he was right. He usually was, but who knew what to expect anymore.

That night Laura actually feared falling asleep. She tried to keep her mind occupied with their research and the next day's programs. In what seemed like the instant she dozed off, she woke suddenly in the windowless room, same bed, same ceiling, and the same strange feeling of being in a place that seemed like a solidified dream.  "Michael!" she called out. "I'm here" he answered. "Let's get out of here right now". He was awake already and aware of where they were. It was time to jump on this. "Change of plans?" Laura asked. "Yeah - we're actually home I think, but we can't see it" Michael was trying to understand what was going on and couldn't quite bracket the situation. "See if you can reach out and touch the lamp on your night table - you know - the guy on the horse." The silver toreador?" she asked. "Yeah, that guy  - it's just a hunch." Laura had no idea what to do. "You mean imagine it?" "No do it", he shouted. "Do it - I'm in the next room - I'm here in the next room", he insisted. She reached out and somehow managed to touch a lamp - a lamp that wasn't visibly in the room. She could almost hear a warning. "You'll get in trouble. You'll get lost!"...Suddenly, like a tornado touching down. it seemed like everything that existed was moving, spinning with hardly any pattern to focus on except a downward winding inner funnel that seemed darker than the gray and pale light of the confusion. The sound was deafening, as loud as close thunder and all the worse for loud, frozen, high pitched shrieking. Laura, herself, seemed to come apart in the twisting forces tearing at her body and all the spaces around her. "It's a total chaos",  she thought. "There's no ordered space or time between the present and the future. It's chaotic". She heard a familiar voice and the noise and confusion subsided. "Laura, we made it!" Michael looked down at her on the bed. She was breathing hard, sweating profusely, and clutching the lamp so tightly that her hand was shaking and her knuckles were white. "We're back home". She turned and looked up at his face. "Good grief, that was like a train wreck"!