Story Circle

About Time
By: Miki Yamuri and Liljennie

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There were once two young women, Michelle Danwoo and her very best girlfriend, Jennie Kent, who lived in a several thousand acre river valley. For generations one side of Painter’s Valley had belonged to Michelle’s family, and the other had belonged to Jennie’s for the same length of time, more or less.

They had both inherited the land holding young in life, since their parents had been killed in a tragic severe downdraft incident while a rescue was being attempted near Hell’s Butte when their Helochopper was blown into the side of the cliff face and exploded.

Both girls came together and made a mutual agreement for usage of the huge valley. They were best friends, and the tragic loss of their parents had only forged a tighter relationship.

On one of their many overnight adventures, they had actually found a large vein of silver and across the lake one of gold. The huge coal vein they refused to mine due to the open pit the excavation companies insisted on using, which would destroy the valley’s ecology.

Between the two of them, they managed to scavenge enough gold and silver ore to make it worthwhile to maintain a small methane-fired smelter for processing the ore. Neither girl had to work overly hard to maintain enough funding to purchase pretty much anything they wanted and pay all the other bills.

One morning, while they were out exploring and the sun was just peeking over the crest of the valley, Jennie happened to notice what appeared to be a focused beam of sunlight. It illuminated what looked for the world to be a carved square opening high up on one of the vertical rock cliffs.

When Jennie came to Michelle and pointed out the opening, Michelle said, “Now, there's something I’ve never seen before. I know it’s nothing more than a cave, but from down here, it looks like it was carved.”

Jennie replied as she walked back to the ATV, “It does. Good thing I just purchased that piton canon and devices for climbing.” She removed the box of pitons, a large box of coiled nylon climbing rope, and something that looked like an overbuilt sniper rifle. “I’m going to see what’s in that cave. Because of how high up it is and the sheer rock face, I doubt we’ll find anything of real interest.”

“Never know until we look,” said Michelle, tying a piton onto one end of the rope and pushing the long back end of the piton into the slot in the front of the piton cannon. She put a charge in the cylinder, closed the breech, took aim, and BOOM!

A long coil of rope flashed out from the box as the piton struck just above the opening. Once the dust had settled, she grabbed the rope and tugged hard several times, but it didn’t move. The piton was firmly embedded in the rock.

Michelle began climbing up the side of the cliff with Jennie scrambling to follow. “Hey, wait for me! I want to see what’s up there too.”

Michelle replied as she climbed, “I’m not stopping you. Come on, slowpoke.”

In the thirty minutes it took for them to climb the several hundred feet of sheer cliff face to the ledge in front of the opening, they had begun to regret making the climb. From the ground, it didn’t appear to be so arduous, in practice ... it was.

Jennie stood on the small ledge first and ran her hand along the perfectly smooth edges of the opening, which had to have been carved, because it was exactly square to the best they could tell. Michelle turned on her climber’s torch and shone the bright beam around the interior.

It appeared to be something like 40 feet by 40 feet by 8 feet tall carved perfectly from living rock. In the dead center of the room was a blazingly sparkling crystal of some sort on an elegantly carved obsidian pedestal, illuminated from above by a single beam of very bright light that came from an unseen source in a way the girls couldn’t fathom.

Michelle said softly, “Now, that … isn’t something I expected to see.”

Jennie looked over the edge of the narrow ledge. It was a long way down to the bottom, where the ATV was parked. She replied, “I can vouch for that. Now, being as we are several hundred feet up a vertical cliff, have you any bright ideas about how we can get it back to the ATV without damaging anything?"

Michelle said, “Aren’t you getting a bit ahead of yourself? We don’t even know what this is or why it’s here.”

Jennie replied, “I’d rather have it in the workshop than here. At least there we have some kind of tools.”

Michelle began removing her climbing harness. “Seems the best thing for us to do is for one of us go back down, and I’ll use my harness to wrap everything in. I can lower it with the rope if I take it slow and careful.”

Jennie agreed to go back down, and Michelle wrapped the crystal and its pedestal tightly with her climbing harness. As she slowly lowered it, swinging and twisting on the rope, Jennie carefully caught it and steadied it until it was on the ground, as uneven as it was.

“You tied this harness really tight!” Jennie shouted up at Michelle as she tried to unfasten the straps from around their mysterious cargo.

“What?” Michelle shouted down. They could barely hear each other.

“You tied it too tight oh never mind I got it!” Jennie shouted back up, finally getting it loose. Once it was free of the harness, Jennie steadied the pedestal and crystal while Michelle pulled her harness back up, then used it to climb back down.

The two of them managed to get the crystal and its pedestal to the ATV, strapped it to the rear cargo rack, and carefully drove to the makeshift foundry where they processed their ore. It was there where their workshop, such as it was, was located.

“So,” said Jennie, looking at the ornate pedestal and its sparkling ornament, “here it is. But … what is it?”

Michelle was looking at the intricate carvings on the pedestal with a magnifier. “I mean, it’s a crystal of some kind. But maybe some of these carvings can tell us something about it – at least, if we can recognize the style, it might tell us something about who made it. Does it look anything like the style of the Native Americans of this region?”

“I’ve seen some of the old artifacts in the museum,” Jennie said, “and they look nothing like this. Of course, the ones living here today are no relation to the groups who lived here before the Europeans came, thanks to the US government forcing them to move around again and again. I wonder what the crystal’s made of.”

“Well,” said Michelle, “we can weigh it and use water displacement to get its volume, then just divide to get its density, and that should tell us something.” But after they did this, the number they came up with told them exactly nothing.

“I don’t get it,” said Jennie. “This crystal’s less dense than pure lithium. Most of the weight we had to deal with was the pedestal. But it’s hard stuff – it can scratch glass. This isn’t any material that’s listed in the mineral literature.”

“Size of a basketball but light as a ping-pong ball,” said Michelle. “But it’s at least as hard as quartz. We’ve got something nobody’s ever heard of here.”

Michelle said, “We don’t have the right type of equipment to do a proper analysis.”

Jennie twirled one of the long strands of her red hair in thought. She knew the crystal would cut glass the same as diamond … or quartz. They had no real way to take a sample to independently analyze it, and the pedestal was made out of a solid piece of obsidian that was meticulously carved. The crystal itself appeared to be one beautifully faceted crystal of an entirely different type of crystalized rock. But … what type?

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After spending most of the night looking for some type of data on what type of crystal they had found, they drove the search AI almost to a hallucinatory glitch looking for some reference to the strange markings on the pedestal. After much disappointment, both women had gravitated to their small lab. It didn’t have that much analytical gear, only that which they needed to process the silver and gold ore they found.

Michelle discovered quickly that the crystal was totally impervious to the acids and reagents they used to identify and isolate precious metals. The only other thing they had were the LIBS devices, which stood for Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy; they used them for analyzing rock samples. Basically they used a laser to vaporize tiny amounts of material into a plasma that could then be spectrographically analyzed to determine its chemical composition. NASA’s Curiosity rover had an onboard LIBS device for testing rocks on Mars.

Michelle and Jennie had small handheld devices for use in the field, and they had a more elaborate laboratory scanner device that provided immediate results; they used them for mineral exploration and ore sorting. They hoped the lab’s LIBS device would give them some clue about the crystal.

Michelle placed the crystal into one of the table clamps and fastened the retaining arms so the crystal couldn't move. She chose a small space in the valley of one of the facets that would be hidden once the crystal was placed back on the obsidian stand. She moved the small device over to the staging area and focused the targeting beam. She turned on the scanner and typed in duration and frequency.

Michelle brought out her jeweler’s optical, placed it in her dominant eye, and began examining the large crystal as closely as if it were diamond – though, given its low density, that was impossible. About that time, the LIBS had fully charged its capacitors and emitted a beep, indicating that it was discharging several nanosecond-long pulses of infrared laser light exactly where Michelle had targeted.

Just as Michelle started to take a spectrographic reading of the plasma that was supposed to be emanating from the target area, Jennie walked in and asked, “Find anything …?”

As if on cue, the crystal flashed with a single brilliant pulse of red light. Jennie and Michelle were astounded to instantaneously find themselves in completely different surroundings. Both women looked around at the trackless wilderness surrounding them. Then, moments later, they found themselves back in the lab. The LIBS scan duration timer had expired, shutting down the laser pulses.

Unflappably, Michelle said, “Yes, Jennie, I think I discovered something. Wouldn't you say?” and looked at Jennie with one of those expressions that she knew quite well.

“What,” said Jennie, then repeated, “What? Was that?” She looked around as if she might catch another glimpse of the thickly wooded area she had been in moments before. “M-michelle. What happened? You saw that too, right?”

Michelle was checking every device in reach. “Please tell me something recorded something about that … OK, this infrared camera was pointed at the sample location, at least … let’s roll that back …”

They both looked at the monitor screen as Michelle played back the video … the camera mostly showed the laser illuminating the indicated spot on the crystal’s surface with pulses of light, visible only because this camera was sensitive to infrared. Then there was that bright flash from within the crystal … and that was it. “No, no, wait,” said Michelle, rolling it back again. “Look here, in the corner of the image, there’s the sleeve of my lab coat.” Again, the laser beam lit up the crystal, then the flash from within … and the triangle of white in the corner from Michelle’s sleeve was gone. A few seconds later, the laser pulses shut off, and the white triangle that was all of Michelle that had been recorded by the camera was back again. “Interesting,” she said. “Also, the FIBS got no results whatsoever.”

“That’s what you call no results?” Jennie asked. “I … I saw … no, wait. Let’s do this scientifically. Each of us should write down a description of what we saw, then we should compare, so we don’t influence each other’s memories.”

“I meant that the FIBS wasn’t able to get a reading from the crystal,” said Michelle, “but you’re right, we should write down our impressions while our memories of events are still fresh.” She handed Jennie a notebook with some lined paper and a pen, and picked up one of each herself. For the next few minutes, both of them wrote in silence.

When they were done, they both found that they were describing much the same scene: a primordial wilderness with no sign of human habitation, apparently dense forest. There had been daylight. The temperature was cool, clearly not the same as that day’s outdoor temperature. They had both written about hearing some kind of running water in the distance as well as the calls of a few birds.

“Sounds like it wasn’t a hallucination,” Jennie said. “There are too many details that are the same.”

“Yes,” replied Michelle, “and no LIBS results means not enough of the crystal’s material was converted to plasma for the device to carry out its spectroanalysis.”

“Darn,” Jennie said. “That must mean its binding energy is pretty high. Maybe try a higher frequency? Higher energy photons?”

“We can try one of the upper harmonics,” agreed Michelle. “Let’s get the safety goggles.” Both of them put on the anti-green safety goggles, because the harmonic they were going to try was in the green part of the visible spectrum. Everything looked amber through the lenses. Jennie got her cell phone out to record anything that happened.

“Charging,” said Michelle, setting the FIBS device to the higher frequency and starting the capacitors charging. “Test in 5 … 4 … 3 … 2 … 1 …”

This time, instead of being invisible to the unaided human eye, the incredibly quick laser pulses were barely visible, rapid flashes of green in the darkened lab. Michelle and Jennie couldn’t see them, of course, with their goggles filtering the light out, but both of them had cameras that detected the pulses. But Jennie’s phone was in her hands, while Michelle was relying on the camera on the test rig, which she had ensured was recording before starting the test.

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Without warning, a bright green flash from the crystal, and Jennie and Michelle found themselves in a really strange place. They both knew they weren’t even in their universe after seeing some of the really weird looking critters dashing about and what looked like 2 moons over head.

A large flower was nearby. Michelle quickly ran to the plant and snipped the flower. A loud shrill scream pierced the air, just before the duration timer expired and the laser pulses stopped, returning both women to the workshop.

Michelle looked at the flower in her hand. As incredible as it seemed, where the stalk had been severed, there was a fluid that appeared to be … something that very much resembled blood, and nothing like any kind of sap she was familiar with. A cold chill ran down Michelle’s spine as she had a thought that this might have been a sentient life form, and she had just killed it.

Jennie came up beside Michelle and said, “That’s a large flower. “ She took a deep breath. “It’s aroma is so alien ... but nice at the same time.”

Michelle replied softly, “I think that by cutting this flower … I might have killed a sentient being. When I cut the flower just before we returned, I thought I heard a scream.”

By this time, Jennie had taken a sample of the liquid leaking from the cut stem. “Ya know? Seems I might have too.” She held up her phone, which had come with her, and replayed the video she’d taken of the last few minutes, including the scream, before it had been cut off by their return. She looked at the test tube with the sap in it. “And this looks a lot more like blood than sap.”

Jennie took the test tube over to the workbench next to the spectrometer. “It almost has the right color, too. I’m going to use the spectrometer and see if I can get some type of composition.”

By this time, Michelle had made a few decisions. It would be expensive, and they would need to enlarge the workshop to accomodate it, but Michelle was going to gather as much silver and gold ore as she could and start buying the very expensive components for a multi-crystal state laser test array.

Jennie picked up her phone and said, “I’m going to call Dr. Blake at the Helios Research Station and ask for help. We need better equipment than we have. We aren’t an analytical research lab. All we have are the necessary tools and equipment to process ore.”

Michelle said over her shoulder as she set up the next LIBS test, “Maybe we need to call Dr. Felding. He’s one of the best linguists I’ve ever seen. If this is a language, maybe he can decipher it.” Michelle used her phone to take pictures of the carvings on the obsidian stand. She then sent a text to Dr. Felding with all the pictures she had taken of the pedestal.

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“On the one hand,” said Dr. Blake, “no wonder your LIBS device came up with no data – the harder the material, the less material you can vaporize off its surface, and that crystal you say you’ve found may be harder than you think. You’re trying to get the crystal to absorb enough of the laser’s energy that it vaporizes some of the material – but what if the crystal simply transmits the beam right through? It’ll never absorb enough to heat it up. So what you might want is just a good old fashioned transmission spectrometer. Send broad-spectrum light through it and measure what gets absorbed.”

They hadn’t brought the crystal with them, nor had they told him about the strange phenomena they’d observed each time they’d tried the LIBS device. But Jennie asked, “Could there be any … side effects of doing that?”

“I can’t imagine there would be,” said Dr. Blake. “You said it’s a clear, transparent crystal. That means broad-spectrum light is passing through it all the time. You said there was light shining on it when you found it. That’s probably the safest test I can imagine. I doubt there’s anything this could do to damage the crystal. The next thing I’d suggest is XRD, x-ray diffraction, but that could cause damage to a unique sample, considering we don’t know what it is.”

“Yes,” said Michelle, “damage. Definitely want to avoid that.” She doubted at this point that there was anything on Earth that could damage the crystal, outside of being at ground zero of a nuclear explosion. Maybe.

“Here, let me show you this,” Dr. Blake went on, leading them to a corner of the lab where there was a closed test chamber. “We’ve got a broad-spectrum light source right here, and we’re using it on this glass. We’re doing this for a client who’s trying to develop an ultrapure type of glass. This isn’t their glass; it’s standard window glass from a home store, which we’re using as a test. You can see that it has iron impurities … here.” He flipped some switches and accessed the computer next to the chamber, and a graph appeared on the screen. “We’d see just a horizontal line if there were nothing blocking the light at all. But you see, it dips here and here. That’s the iron.”

“But it’s a crystal, with a lot of facets,” Jennie said. “What happens if the light’s refracted? It won’t go straight through, as it does through a glass plate.”

“We’ll just have to find an angle at which we can send the light straight through,” replied Dr. Blake. “It’s just a matter of carefully measuring it. If it is a crystal, it’s got a regular structure, so all we have to find are two antipodal facets, facets that are parallel to each other on opposite sides of the crystal. We’ll just put our detector behind the facet where the light comes out.”

“Sounds good,” said Michelle. “We’ll bring it in tomorrow.” Jennie nodded at her.

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“Where on Earth did you find these inscriptions?” asked Dr. Felding’s voice on Michelle’s phone. “They’re like nothing I’ve ever seen before. Granted, I’ve only looked at them for a short time, but at this point I can’t even say for certain that it’s a language at all. But it only appears somewhat regular, and it doesn’t seem as if it’s a depiction of something. I don’t think it’s a geometric design, because it doesn’t repeat.”

“We found the object in a cave on our property,” Michelle told him. “It appears to be made of obsidian or some similar black glass or glass-like substance.”

“Well, the images you sent are quite high in resolution,” Dr. Felding said, “but it might help if I could see the artifact myself.”

“Well, we might be able to arrange that in a few days,” said Michelle. “In the meantime, can you see what you can find out?”

“Certainly,” he said. “I love a good riddle. I’ll let you know if I learn anything.”

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Holding the crystal in white synthetic rubber gloves, Dr. Blake said, “Fascinating. I just want to say right now that I’ve never seen or felt anything like this before. I’ve never felt a solid object this size that was this light. It’s like holding a soap bubble. If I didn’t know it was solid, I’d swear it was hollow.” He carefully rotated it in his hands and added, “I don’t think we’ll have any trouble finding a pair of antipodal facets. It’s quite regular.”

He opened the test chamber and set the crystal on the stand, then adjusted the upper end so it held the crystal fixed in place. This allowed him to rotate it in a controlled fashion so the beam of light shone straight through. He adjusted the detector’s position so it was right behind the nearest facet. “There, this should allow light from the source to travel straight through the crystal’s material, where the detector will pick it up. After that, it goes through a diffraction grating and is spread out into its spectrum, so the detectors can turn it into data.”

He closed the chamber. “The good thing about this is that it’s very low-tech. No lasers, no particle beams, just a carefully calibrated composite light source and a spectrograph.” He flipped the switches and activated the computer. The graph appeared on the screen. It was a straight horizontal line.

“What?” he said, looking at it. He turned the light off, put a filter in front of the detector, got a different pattern, removed the filter, and got a horizontal line again.

“Something wrong?” asked Jennie.

“This is … unusual,” he said. “I’m not going to use the word ‘impossible.’ It’s happening right here, and therefore it’s possible. But the crystal simply doesn’t absorb any light at any visible frequency. I can see that it refracts light, but it absorbs none of it. It’s got to absorb something, but it’s absorbing so little light that I can’t even measure it. What in the world is this substance? It almost … isn’t there.”

“So there’s nothing you can tell us about what it’s made of?” Jennie asked.

“I’d like very much to know,” Dr. Blake said. “This substance scratches industrial corundum, yet it’s less dense than lithium and 100 percent transmissive of visible light. I wonder about infrared and ultraviolet, but this rig doesn’t test those. Visible light usually tells us a lot, but … not in this case. Can I test something else?”

“Sure,” Jennie said, “as long as it doesn’t involve … pulsed lasers.”

“Oh, nothing like that.” Dr. Blake opened the test chamber and carefully took the crystal to another table. “I just wanted to … follow a hunch. Here.” He fastened the crystal to a metal pan attached to the table by a pair of springs. “This inertial balance can test its inertial mass.” He pressed the pan holding the crystal to one side and released it, causing it to wobble back and forth. A computer registered the frequency of the oscillatory motion and came up with a reading for the crystal’s inertial mass, 25.98 kilograms.

“Oh, you want to make sure its inertial and gravitational mass are the same,” realized Jennie, “which they should be, for every known mass in the universe. And they …” Jennie’s voice trailed off, and she looked at Michelle.

“Now, this is darn peculiar,” Dr. Blake said, having calibrated a scale and placed the crystal on it. They could all see that the scale said it had a gravitational mass of some 524 grams, which was obviously less than its inertial mass. “This is supposed to be impossible. But clearly it isn’t, because there it is. It’s so strange, though, that I’m going to measure it again.” He repeated both measurements, with the same results. Scratching his head, he looked at the crystal as it sat on the scale and just simply refused to obey gravity.

“You two have found something here,” said Dr. Blake. “I wish I could tell you what exactly that something is. Some really basic tests have already led to some truly anomalous readings. I shudder to think what might happen if we tried XRD. We can try that, if you like. Basically we just rotate it in front of a tight beam of X-rays and take pictures of the pattern photons make when they scatter off the atoms in it.”

“You know, it’s getting kind of late,” said Jennie. “Why don’t we bring it back tomorrow?” Michelle nodded at her. Neither of them knew what strange phenomena might be caused by an X-ray beam. They wanted to think about it first.

“Well, all right, if you insist,” Dr. Blake said. “If you write a paper on this, might I humbly ask that I be included?”

“I’m not sure anyone’s going to believe this,” Jennie said. “Are you sure you want your name attached to this?”

“Well, either you’re somehow pulling the wool over my eyes, or this is the greatest discovery in the history of physics,” said Dr. Blake. “Inertial and gravitation mass decoupled by so much … what could even explain that? It’s as if a significant fraction of its matter is sort of … hiding from the universe. There’s only one other kind of mass, and it’s very hard to measure, the amount by which it distorts spacetime … I must take some notes …”

“Well, thank you, Dr. Blake,” said Jennie, “we’ll be in touch …”

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Back at their workshop, Michelle began pricing the cost of the equipment she thought they might need to look further into this strange crystal. She couldn’t believe the cost of some of it until she stumbled onto a number. Basically, a research facility offered their scrap for minimal to no cost. Michelle jumped on their clean-up offer. It wasn’t ready-made, but from what she could make out what they had for sale, she could cobble together what they needed.

Jennie came up behind Michelle as she hung up the phone and clapped her hands. Jennie said, “Well, girl, looks like you’re in a good mood.”

Michelle swiveled around and said, “Darn right, I just found a way for us to get the equipment we want.”

Jennie asked sarcastically, “How? Steal it … rob a bank?”

Michelle waved her hand and made a face, “Nothing stupid. I got in touch with Nano/Gen Research and made a deal.”

Jennie looked quizzically, “A deal? What kind of deal?”

Michelle replied “A deal where we clean up their scrap, and as payment we get to keep everything we clean up.”

Jennie looked slightly upset, “Scrap? Just what are we going to do with …”

Michelle cut her off, “By scrap, I mean all the equipment and material associated with the terminated experiment, regardless of condition.” Michelle spun slightly in her chair and took a page from the printer tray. “Look at what belongs to us now.” She handed it to Jennie, whose eyes grew large in surprise.

Jennie said, "There's got to be some mistake. Some of this laser equipment costs millions.”

Michelle said, “Nope, no mistake,” as she put on her boots and grabbed the keys to the SUV. “We might have to rent a truck.”

Jennie was in a complete state of shocked disbelief until several of the laser test apparatus had been loaded. When the women got back in the cab, Jennie said, “Damn, we have a whole R&D section here.”

Michelle cranked the vehicle and started to drive off. “Yeah, and a whole lot more waiting. From the best I could tell, what isn’t functional is that way only because it was disassembled."

The girls talked excitedly as they drove back to the valley. By the time they had arrived, both women already knew they would have to enlarge their workshop and build a section specifically for researching the crystal.

Michelle and Jennie got out of the large SUV and walked off an area next to their workshop.

Jennie asked, “Is there one of those 3-D printer robots I see at some of those industrial sites available? One of those could print a building.”

Michelle replied, “Not a bad idea. I’ve read in Scientific World Magazine where they are using those with a small modification.”

Jennie asked, “What kind of mod?”

Michelle replied, “They use the dirt and regolith at the building site and make the necessary building material after mixing it with something to make a slurry. According to what I’ve read, they should have the outer shell completed in about four hours at fractions of the cost and construction time of a similar structure built the normal way.”

Jennie said, “Good job for you. You sound like the expert. Remember, though, we have no clue where we went or what happened. With this new stuff there’s no telling what might happen.”

Michelle was already on her cell as she said, “You worry over the small stuff too much …” It obviously stopped ringing, and someone answered, because Michelle continued, “Yeah, I was wondering if that industrial printing bot you showed in …”

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Dr. Felding diligently scoured the photos of the markings on the obsidian base. He realized he had seen one set of markings before. They looked like Egyptian and were embedded in a cartouche. It only took a minute of reference work to transliterate it to “Mtelezi wa Wakati which meant "Time Traveler". But this phrase was very antiquated Egyptian and barely came close enough for anything resembling a translation. The rest of the inscription wasn’t Egyptian.

That was when he noticed something in one of the closer photos Michelle had sent him. It looked as if some of the geometric-seeming markings, seemingly simple curves and polygons, had a finer structure. Could they be composed of smaller markings? He picked up his phone to call Michelle back …

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“Time Traveler?” Michelle asked. “What does that mean? Traveling through time is a nice concept for a science fiction story, but everything we know about physics says it’s impossible. Sure, I’d be willing to let you borrow the pedestal to take some even higher resolution images. How does tomorrow at 10 a.m. sound? OK, fine.”

Jennie asked, “Is Dr. Felding getting somewhere?”

“Not very far with just the photos I sent him,” replied Michelle. “He said there was an Egyptian inscription among everything else that said ‘Time Traveler.’ But …”

“Maybe that’s where we went,” Jennie said. “As you said, it’s supposed to be impossible, but then so is an object with an inertial mass that doesn’t match its gravitational mass. And Dr. Blake has another idea, to measure its active vs. passive gravitational mass.”

“What’s that mean?” Michelle asked.

“Well, general relativity says that matter tells space how to curve, and space tells matter how to move,” said Jennie. “Or rather, active mass tells space how to curve, and space tells passive masses how to move. Passive mass is how much gravity seems to pull on something, and active mass is how much gravity something seems to generate. They’re supposed to be the same, but if inertial mass can be different from passive mass, who’s to say that active and passive mass can’t differ too?”

“The crystal’s a pretty light object to measure the gravitational pull of, isn’t it?” asked Michelle.

“Yes, but there are some very sensitive devices that have been used to measure the gravitational constant,” Jennie replied. “Dr. Blake wants to set one up in his lab and try to measure the crystal’s gravitational pull.”

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Michelle was with Dr. Felding, taking some very high resolution images of the pedestal’s inscriptions. Meanwhile, Jennie was with Dr. Blake, who had set up an apparatus hanging from the ceiling of his lab that looked like two bowling balls at the ends of a steel rod. “The Cavendish experiment was used to measure the gravitational attraction between two objects,” he said. “But here, we only want to measure the attraction of one object, your crystal there. So I’m going to place it in this rig, which will hold it firmly in place, and I’ve already measured the attraction of the empty rig, so don’t worry about that. We’re going to see how much it deflects the dangling lead spheres.”

“As long as there are no lasers,” laughed Jennie.

“There were, for calibration, when I set this up, but they’re not needed anymore,” said Dr. Blake. “Why are you so concerned about lasers?”

“It’s just a … worry I have,” Jennie said nervously. “So by holding it fixed in place, you’re going to eliminate the crystal’s passive mass from the equation.”

“Correct, as we’ve measured its passive mass by other means. We need to know its active mass. It should theoretically be 524 grams, the same as its passive mass, but … when its inertial mass is over 50 times that, we don’t know anything anymore. Now, this thing is a torsion balance – the more it’s deflected from its equilibrium position, the stronger the restoring force, and I’ve calibrated it with several ordinary known masses.” There was an arm perpendicular to the rod holding the spheres that ended in a pointer, which pointed at a hand-drawn arc with several gradations written on it, such as 100 kilograms, 90 kilograms, 80 kilograms, and so forth.

Jennie helped Dr. Blake clamp the crystal into the holding rig, and they left the room, so their own masses wouldn’t disturb the experiment. There was a camera aimed at the pointer and the calibration card. They watched as the pointer slowly wobbled back and forth, eventually settling down between 25 and 30 kilograms.

“This is unprecedented!” said Dr. Blake. “How can the same object put forth an active gravitational attraction over 50 times the passive gravitational effect that other masses have on it? It absorbs no detectable amount of incident light, either. What on Earth is this substance even made of? It’s as if a vast majority of its matter … isn’t even here. I have to think about this. I’m going to take a break.” He flipped a switch and turned off the lights in the lab.

And just for a fraction of a second, the crystal shone as brightly as those lights had been, before going dark as well. “Wait,” said Jennie, “do that again.”

“I can’t turn the lights off again,” said Dr. Blake. “They’re already off. Oh, you mean turn them on and then off again. All right.”

“Watch the crystal through the window,” said Jennie. Dr. Blake turned the lights on, and then off again. The crystal remained lit for just a moment longer.

“Remarkable,” Dr. Blake said. “It’s … as if … You said not to use lasers, but what about a flashlight? We did direct ordinary white light through it earlier, inside a closed chamber, with no ill effect.” He found a narrow-beam flashlight.

After pointing the flashlight at the crystal and observing the beam refracting through the crystal and emerging a short time later, Dr. Blake announced, “I’m going to have to measure this too, but I estimate that it’s taking about a tenth of a second for light to travel through the crystal, which is another unusual feature. In a tenth of a second, light travels 18,600 miles.”

As Jennie watched, Dr. Blake examined the geometry of the crystal’s refraction and finally determined that the beam deflection couldn’t adequately be explained by the angles of the facets. “But what it is consistent with is a circuitous path through the interior of the crystal,” he said. “At this point I have to hypothesize that any light entering the crystal is traveling in a nearly circular path around its center, circulating many times before finally exiting.”

“How many times?” asked Jennie. “Wait. To travel almost 19,000 miles through an object this size, that would have to be what, about half a million times?”

“Approximately, depending on how close to the center it travels,” said Dr. Blake. “And what happens if the light actually impinges upon the center? Light on opposite sides of the center would travel in opposite directions, interfering with the light on the opposite path – of course, with white light the effect is completely chaotic, and interference all cancels out, but I see why you may be concerned about laser light. You’d get a ring laser.”

“Aren’t those used as gyroscopes?” asked Jennie.

“Yes, ordinarily,” said the physicist. “You can split a laser beam and reflect the two split beams at each other so they interfere, and measure how the pattern of interference changes when the apparatus is rotated.”

“Did we find some kind of … ancient gyroscope?” Jennie wondered to herself.

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“Look at this,” said Jennie, pointing at her laptop’s screen. She’d brought the crystal back to their lab in the valley, where it was now inside a darkened box, because Jennie worried about what could happen if the wrong frequency of light traveled through it. “This article by a physicist says that a really powerful ring laser could cause relativistic frame dragging of the sort that happens near black holes, allowing time travel to happen. Something inside the crystal causes a protracted bending of photon pathways, which probably has something to do with how its passive mass is so low compared to its inertial and active masses.”

“Whoa, you’ve found out a lot,” said Michelle. “But just wait until you hear what I found out from Dr. Felding. Those geometric patterns are made of lines of tiny symbols. He’s magnified them and is trying to decipher them now, but there are a lot of them. He says they look kind of like equations.”

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Dr. Felding stood wide-eyed and stared at the data that his analysis of the smaller depictions on the pedestal had produced. According to the final readouts, there appeared to be four distinct groups of symbols that made references to lines in the other three at various places. He still had no idea what language most of it was in; he had used cross-references and algorithms to infer meanings in what had turned out to be quite an extensive corpus of text, given the minuscule symbols.

According to the data, the larger of the four groupings referred to energy intensities, frequency ranges, and, most amazingly, to some type of high-intensity narrow beam of focused energy. He was a linguist, not a physicist, but he knew what a laser was. This quite obviously referred to a laser, and although he didn’t know what they meant, it was clear that much of the data was a sequence of equations that built upon themselves, like a textbook. Dr. Felding shook his head slowly and said to himself, “Just what in tarnation was that thing that rested on this pedestal meant to do?”

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Back at the workshop, Michelle and Jennie stood by while a large flatbed truck offloaded the large carefully-packed apparatus. Once it was uncrated, a robot emerged shaped like a spider with a long nose. It walked off the loading dock as if it were nothing and quickly went to the place where they wanted to build the new lab.

The driver of the truck came up to Michelle and said with a good old Texas drawl, “‘Scuse me, Ma’am. But’re you, ummmm …” He glanced down at the stack of papers on the clipboard in front of him. “... Miz Michelle?”

Michelle smiled as she replied, “Why, shore am. Y’all come to robotize a buldin’ fer us?”

The man blinked at Michelle for an instant before replying, “Good, ‘cuz I need tha basic plan and for you’uns ta putcher Lady Hancock on that there line.”

Michelle signed the verification of receipt and the building permit. She walked a few steps to a small table with several rolled-up pages sitting on top and grabbed the middle one. She returned to the man and handed it to him. “If’n y’all look, we done made it simple. Issa forty-foot diameter split 3-floor dome. Leave the south wall open so tha bot can leave.”

The man walked to the bot and opened a panel. He unrolled one edge of the scroll and slowly fed it into the bot’s internal high-resolution scanner. In a very few minutes, the man had the plans back in his hands, and the bot was in motion, digging the foundations and making slagcrete.

It didn’t take but a couple of hours before Michelle and Jennie were standing inside the shell of their large new printed laboratory. The three level mezzanines were located perfectly. Jennie found the floor vents and the panel to operate them. The theory in their design was of course that heat rises, cold falls. Pop the ground vents, and since the ground here stayed almost a constant 69 degrees all year round, air would circulate constantly through the interior. According to their design, once the vents in the floor and roof were opened, air would circulate throughout the dome every 25 or 30 minutes.

The electricians and plumbers came and went in a flash. Even the fiber optic guy showed up on time to install the internet. By the time they had power to their new lab and most of the equipment properly set up, this really did look like a high-class research facility, not something cobbled up next to a small metals foundry. They christened the new facility “Ghost Hill Laboratory,” after the name given to the location by Native Americans long ago.

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The next day, Michelle hung up her cell as she approached Jennie. “I just got off the phone with Dr. Felding.”

Jennie asked, “He find anything useful?”

Michelle replied, “I think so. From what he tells me, the four sides of the pedestal represent four data tables, each with its set of equations, the largest one showing energy and frequency ranges.”

Jennie replied, nodding her head. “That would sort of stand to reason, based on what happened with the laser.”

Michelle picked up the basketball-sized crystal from the stand they’d been keeping it on. She was still amazed at how light it was, even though it had the heft of something with more weight. She carried it to the target platform and locked it in place so it wouldn’t move. Next, she set the duration timer on her newest contraption to 45 seconds. She hoped no kind of trouble would befall them in that time.

Michelle said loudly, so she could be heard over the vacuum pumps, “Goggles on, firing 15 watt 45 second burst. All recording devices are active and operating.”

Jennie came up beside Michelle and put on her goggles as well, saying, “Go for it. Let’s see where we wind up.”

Michelle said softly, “3 … 2 … 1 … energizing.” She pushed the cycle start button enabling the powerful laser. The crystal flashed a bright red … and according to the cameras, the girls vanished from the area. The cameras they wore on their bodies, however, told a different story, as their surroundings suddenly changed.

Jennie and Michelle were totally mind blown when they appeared. Michelle said into her recorder, “We appear to be on a forest-covered hill overlooking a small … wait a minute. This place looks ... familiar.”

Michelle and Jennie said at the same time, “This is our …” The duration timer then expired, and Michelle and Jennie reappeared in the lab. “... Valley!” they completed.

Jennie said, “That was in the past. Somewhere around my house I actually have a picture that looks almost exactly like that place. It was painted by an artist who visited the valley before it was settled. When my ancestors bought our share of the land, they found out he’d done the painting and bought it from his gallery. They had it framed under glass and everything.”

Michelle raised an eyebrow. “Really? I’d love to see it.”

“Be back in a flash. You’ll see what I mean.” She quickly left.

Michelle had just enough time to shut everything down and transfer all the recorded data to the main computer. Just as Jennie came in, there on the large screen were the two of them, and then there was a bright red flash, and they were gone. The two women watched the screen until the duration timer expired. Lo and behold, the both of them reappeared in the image.

Jennie held up the large framed picture. There was no doubt that it depicted the same place. According to the date on the back of the picture, it was painted 178 years earlier. Michelle knew that the place didn’t look anything like that now. There was a huge lake that had formed when a landslide had blocked the stream’s exit until it had filled the basin enough that the water had found another way out. “So just imagine it without the lake there,” Michelle said, “and that is definitely this valley. That must have been painted from that hill right over there!” Michelle pointed to the northeast, where both of them knew there was a hill that gave a beautiful vantage point. “Wait, is that why it’s called Painter’s Hill?”

“Probably?” Jennie replied. “At least, that’s why I always assumed it was called that.”

“I’ll be darned,” said Michelle. “So yes, the precise frequency and intensity are recorded, so presumably, if we repeated that experiment, we’d go to the same time.”

“With enough experimentation and study,” Jennie added, “we could go anywhere. Any time, I mean. This crystal is a time machine. But I have a question.”

“I’ll bet I know what,” Michelle replied. “Why does it only affect us? Why doesn’t the apparatus come with us? Why doesn’t the crystal itself come with us?”

“You got it,” said Jennie. “Why didn’t that chair come with it? It was closer to the crystal than we were.” She pointed at a metal folding chair that was pushed under the table next to the bench holding the crystal and laser. “Come to think of it, how long was the crystal in that cave? Could we … use the crystal to find out? Could we use it to figure out when it was placed there?”

“We need some more baseline measurements,” Michelle suggested. “When exactly was the moment in time we just saw? Exactly how much of a time shift does that particular combination of frequency and intensity cause? And if we vary one or the other, how much difference does it make?”

“If we can manage to appear on a clear night,” suggested Jennie, “we might be able to gauge the date by the positions of the stars, planets, and Moon, and the phase of the Moon, if it’s visible. All we have to do is take a clear enough picture of the sky, and the computers can analyze it for us.”

And that was what they did that day. They first used the exact same intensity and frequency to ascertain by the movement of the Sun in the sky that time was passing in the earlier time at the same rate at which it passed in the present. 15 minutes’ wait between trials resulted in 15 minutes’ worth of solar motion in the sky. Finally, the Sun set behind the western hills, and the stars came out – in the other time, that is. They brought a camera on a tripod, which Jennie carried with her, hastily set up, took a few sky photos, and then picked up again before the timer shut off the laser and sent them home. The computers were able to narrow the time period down to a few dates, several years apart.

Over the next few days Jennie did the same thing. However, in between, Michelle tried modifying the laser frequency and intensity, and the time between the pulses. She worked out a basic equation that linked these variables to the target time based on where the Sun appeared in the sky, but she tried to be very careful about sending them to precisely the same time, because she didn’t know what would happen if they met themselves – especially if they were in anything resembling the same positions in space.

“Yes, the computer’s got it!” said Jennie on the fourth day. “Those astronomical photos finally gave the computer enough data to precisely fix our destination time. It’s 202 years and 78 days in the past. Well, 202 years and 81 days, the first time.”

“Awesome!” said Michelle. “With that, I can fix some of the constants in my equations. And then maybe we can figure out something about the inscription translations Dr. Felding has given us.”

Jennie replied, “Right, if you’ve got equations, maybe the inscriptions have the same equations, only in some foreign symbol system.”

“And now we might be able to try various jumps to see whether the crystal’s in the cave,” said Michelle. “The fastest way to find that out might be to send up a camera drone to look into the cave and come back. It would have to all happen quickly, before the laser stops and brings us back, or we won’t be here to pick the drone up.”

“We could give the drone a pre-programmed path,” said Jennie. “We could test it here, now, before trying the crystal.” So that was what Jennie did: she programmed a camera drone to fly to the cave. She turned off its GPS navigation, knowing there would be no satellites broadcasting GPS signals, and she got it to navigate solely via measuring the Earth’s magnetic field with its magnetometers. “Just have to remember to reprogram its direction sense based on estimates of where magnetic north was 202 years ago,” she said, “but right now, it’s able to fly close to the cave and back, recording video all the while. We don’t dare fly it too close to those rock formations, or it might run into them and get damaged, but we should be able to see into the cave from the air.”

They made a few observations, as far back as 500 years into the past according to Michelle’s equations, but in each of them the crystal was in the cave.

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Dr. Felding wasn’t a physicist, but he wasn’t exactly unwashed and did recognise the large group of symbols connected to what he now knew meant a frequency as depicting some type of high energy beam of differing frequency. In frustration. Dr. Felding had contacted the Nano/Gen research department and talked to one of his friends.

“Well, Dr. Felding, been a few days since we last spoke. Found anything interesting?”

Dr. Felding replied, “I sure have, Dr. Anton. A pair of young women over in Ghost Valley came up with an interesting artifact they found in a cave. I need you to look at some of these symbols and tell me what you think.”

“Whoa, whoa, slow down Dr. Felding, I’m a physicist, not a linguist.” said Dr. Anton.

Dr. Felding replied, “The only language I’m wanting you to read is what appears to be an energy table.”

Dr. Anton replied, “Put on a pot of that excellent coffee you always brew. I’ll be there in about 45 minutes.” The line went dead.

45 minutes later, a medium-sized SUV with the world-famous Nano/Gen logo on the side pulled into the parking lot of the university’s languages building. Dr. Anton got out and hurried inside. He was eager to see what had gotten his friend so excited. This sort of thing didn’t happen often. The receptionist was already waiting for him and had an escort ready.

Dr. Anton entered the linguistics department. He looked around for a minute before he saw his friend and went up to him. He took Dr. Felding’s offered hand and shook it warmly. “Now. tell me my old friend, just what bee has gotten into your bonnet?”

Dr. Felding smirked as he motioned for Dr. Anton to follow him. Dr. Anton stopped dead in his tracks when he entered Dr. Felding’s office. On four of the large screens was an image of the markings on the obsidian pedestal. The first image that caught his eye was the cartouche with the ancient Egyptian words “Mtelezi wa Wakati,” which meant "Time Traveler.” Dr. Anton didn’t read ancient Egyptian, but Dr. Felding’s translations were on the screen just under the originals.

The next images to catch his attention were what appeared to be some kind of energy and frequency settings for several different high energy beams. The other two markings were beautiful and flowery, but Dr. Felding had no clue as to their meanings, let alone Dr. Anton.

Dr. Anton said as he pointed to the image that looked like an energy table, “This looks like a specific setting for several high-energy beams of different frequencies. You’ve translated one as ruby red, another as emerald green, and the others seem to be untranslated."

Dr. Felding typed on a console for a minute, and the image of the energy beams appeared on the larger screen. “It appears there is something like a laser in use, from the best I can tell.”

Dr. Anton looked more closely at another depiction, this one seeming to be of mixed frequencies. “This is some other type of energy beam, not a laser per se, but a high energy beam of some sort. Where did you say this came from?”

Dr. Felding replied, “Two young women who jointly own Ghost Canyon found it in a cliff cave on their property. They’re doing their best to figure out what it is.”

Dr. Anton nodded slowly as he said, “I’m going to contact someone I know who would likely be able to help.” He brought out his cell and punched several buttons.

“This is Dr. Blake at the Helios Research Station, how may I be of service today?”

“‘Sup, old man? Anton here. Have something for you to see. I believe you’ll love it. It has to do with an artifact some women found in Ghost Valley.”

Dr. Blake replied, “OK, brat, when can I see this fantasy? Oh, so you know, I already have seen and done preliminary research on one of the artifacts, the strange crystal.”

Dr. Anton said, “Oh, you know of this? Makes sense they’d have contacted you already. This is supposed to be the pedestal it sits on. Made of a piece of perfectly carved obsidian. I’m currently at the linguistics department at the university. Come and take a look. I’m sure you won’t believe it any more than I do.”

“Felding’s office? Be right there.” The phone went dead.

Dr. Blake didn’t waste any time getting to the Linguistics Institute. He didn’t drive fast; he flew low.

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Jennie and Michelle had managed to figure a few things out. “So,” Michelle said, holding up a notebook, “this is currently my best equation linking the laser parameters with the destination time, which appears to be relative to the current time.”

Jennie nodded. “And by ‘current time’ you mean the time at the location of the crystal itself,” she added. “We’ve pretty well pinpointed our destination times, and we’ve also proven that the crystal has been in that cave for at least the past 630 years – well before the arrival of Columbus. Though not before Leif Erikson landed in Newfoundland … so far. We haven’t yet found a time when the crystal wasn’t there. But Newfoundland is a long way from here.”

“So it’s very unlikely that this crystal had anything to do with the Europeans,” added Michelle. “But did it have anything to do with any of the various groups of native people who have lived in this area at any time?”

“That’s really hard to say,” replied Jennie, “since they weren’t keeping detailed records – and at least some of the native peoples of this region seemed to avoid the place. There are recorded stories about the valley being haunted, which is why this site is called Ghost Hill. I’m starting to wonder whether our explorations might not be the reason for that.”

“Strange voices, lights, and sounds that are there one moment and gone the next?” remarked Michelle. “I suppose it’s not too farfetched.”

“But think of it,” said Jennie, “we could be more covert about it and take more measurements, giving us a more detailed glimpse back into the history of this valley. We could learn more about who’s lived here in the past. If we’re less obtrusive, maybe we won’t scare people away.”

“We might have already shaped the history of the valley to some degree,” said Michelle. “We might want to be more careful about that, or who knows what kind of paradoxes we might create?”

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Jennie and Michelle had finally gotten their research building set up and moved in the way they wanted it. In the very center of the dome, hung a delicate framework that firmly held the crystal. On the two mezzanine levels, were varying wattages and variable frequency lasers. There was one oddball device that they’d gotten from the laboratory; according to the documentation came with it, it was an experimental X-Ray laser.

Jennie asked as she set the timer and frequency range on the X-ray laser, “You think this might be what the blank space represents? X-rays?”

Michelle replied with a shrug as she inserted several printed circuit boards into the control panel, “I have no idea, but we already know it can’t be standard incoherent full-spectrum white light. The crystal has null reaction to it.”

She added as she put the final cables in place, “I think we should build some type of probe and enable this remotely. At least then, we can get pictures and some basic scans of the location this thing sent it without endangering us if the environment isn’t compatible."

Jennie nodded as she shook a finger at Michelle, saying, “That’s a darn good point there, Sister. We’ve been more than lucky so far. Then again, we are using a 15-watt ruby laser tuned to 694 nm. I know we varied the frequency a bit and by doing that changed the time we appeared in … various points in the past.”

Michelle pressed the power button on the console. The many lights and buttons came on. At first, all the lights were red, then one by one or in groups they turned green. The many video screens lit up or stopped their snow – some of the lab-surplus ones were old-fashioned CRT monitors, so their raster lines went up the screen as they flipped a few times – then the system diagnostics showed that everything had come online properly.

Jennie asked sheepishly, “I just had a thought."

Michelle looked around, “Well? Spit it out.”

“It would seem to me we’re conducting extremely high energy experiments with top-of-the-line laser equipment,” answered Jennie.

Michelle stood up at that point and replied, “I had thought about it. I think I know what you’re about to say. We just might need licensing and certifications to do this.”

Jennie grinned one of her mischievous grins. “Or, we can have those men we know from the other research facilities come and do it for us. I mean, it isn’t like they aren’t champing at the bit.”

Michelle already had her cell in her hand. “Hello, this is Michelle Danwoo. is it possible for me to speak with Dr. Blake? It’s rather important, and I’m sure he wants to talk. Oh, he’s already on his way over? OK, thanks.” She turned off her cell. “Looks like we have a candidate already on his way.”

Michelle went to a large storage bin and opened it. She removed from it a small six-wheeled vehicle that had multiple mounted cameras, a satellite dish, and several other sensors. She placed it in what the women had called the temporal zone … the place where the energy disruption caused by the crystal's flash was defined.

Michelle took Jennie by the arm and tugged her off to another large and well-shielded room. Neither girl knew if this shielding would help, but they were about to find out. Jennie flipped the remote power on. The X-ray laser system came online. Michelle set it to 110 kVp for a 10-minute duration. Jennie hit the enable button.

A hugely bright white flash illuminated the laboratory, and the probe was gone. In the shielded room, the two friends paced nervously as the timer counted down. At exactly the 10-minute mark, the laser equipment shut down, and there was another bright white flash. The probe was back. It was covered with snow and ice.

Michelle approached the probe, but stopped way short. The intense cold it gave off was such she couldn’t approach any closer without hurting herself. Jennie and Michelle watched as the snow and ice turned to some type of mist.

Jennie was on top of it and captured as large a sample of the mist as she could in a large sealed plastic jar before it all sublimated away and vanished.

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“Well, fortunately for us,” said Jennie as she tested the contents of the jar, “that was frozen carbon dioxide – dry ice. Good thing it wasn’t anything toxic.”

As Dr. Blake knocked on the door, the probe was still steaming as water vapor from the air continued to condense around it and freeze on its surface.

Michelle let him in. “Dr. Blake, welcome to Ghost Hill Lab, as we’ve called it.”

He entered. “Evocative name. Hello, Michelle, hello Jennifer, and – what in the world do you have here?” He approached the six-wheeled probe and stopped short, as he could feel the cold air surrounding it.

“Well, that probe appears to have been somewhere very cold,” Jennifer said. “Dry ice precipitated onto its surface, and although it’s mostly evaporated, we’re waiting for it to get closer to room temperature before we attempt to touch it or retrieve its data.”

“I hope it recorded some good video before the dry ice covered its lenses,” Michelle said.

“I hope the lenses didn’t crack, considering how cold it must have been,” added Jennie. “We didn’t expect that kind of extreme cold.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” said Dr. Blake. “How could it have gone anywhere? This is a closed room.”

As they waited for the probe to warm up, Michelle and Jennifer showed Dr. Blake some of the video they had taken, and Michelle showed Dr. Blake her equation. “Ah yes,” said the physicist, “a picture may be worth a thousand words, but an equation is worth a thousand pictures. So … your data suggests that you can use this peculiar crystal to make excursions backwards in time … I hope you’re being extraordinarily careful …”

“Well, considering we didn’t know anything at all would happen at first …” Jennie began.

Dr. Blake interrupted, “So this suggests that the higher the energy of the photons, meaning the smaller the wavelengths, the farther you can reach back, relative to the present moment, and you’re predicting it fairly accurately, given that you can target a nighttime arrival and take photos of the night sky and its features.”

“That’s right,” said Michelle, “although I’d like to see what kind of data this thing just recorded.” She pointed toward the probe, still steaming. “It looks as if its systems are still operating; I see some lights under the condensation that’s frozen over them. I’ll see if we can contact it wirelessly.” She moved a cart with a computer on it over next to the probe and started attempting to connect.

“You said … frozen CO2?” asked Dr. Blake. “My word. I have no idea what period of Earth’s past would have been that cold. What frequency did you use?”

“Well, we have this X-ray laser we got as lab surplus,” said Jennie.

Dr. Blake did a double-take as he looked at it. “An … X-ray laser?” he asked. “That would require a particle accelerator, or at least a … what is that?”

“Something experimental,” Michelle replied. “That’s a compact free-electron laser. Normally one that can generate an X-ray beam is a hundred meters long. This can do it in 20 meters – still kind of long, but at least it fits in the lab.”

“Are you telling me you used an X-ray laser on that crystal?” asked Dr. Blake. “At least tell me you took some scattering data.”

“We tried,” said Jennie. “You can probably guess what we got.”

“It didn’t scatter at all?” Dr. Blake asked. “I’d hoped to get some insight into what that thing is made of. But you’re saying that even a coherent X-ray beam passed through it as if it wasn’t even there?”
“Well, yes, after spending about a tenth of a second rotating around the center in opposite directions,” Michelle replied. “Here we go, here’s some data. This is from the upward-facing camera.” Video showed a night sky until it was obscured by blowing carbon dioxide snow. “The computer’s already analyzing the sky photo. And here are the panoramic cameras.” Four monitors lit up with a horizon unlike anything they’d ever seen. The light was dim and purple. Sheets of white surrounded the probe, curving upward into ridges in the distance.

“That’s … our valley,” said Jennie. “But … CO2 freezes at -78.5°C …”

“I’m not a geologist, but I don’t think there’s ever been a temperature like that at this latitude,” Dr. Blake said. “I mean, I’ve heard about the Cryogenian Period some 700 million years ago, but even back in ‘Snowball Earth’ times, I don’t think it got cold enough for dry ice to form. Unless perhaps it did, in some isolated places.”

“Wasn’t the place that’s now this valley pretty far south back then?” asked Michelle.

“Again, I’m not a geologist,” said Dr. Blake, “but even if it were, wouldn’t that mean that your form of time travel follows the geological formations of the region rather than the position relative to the poles? Come to think of it, why does it follow Earth at all? Why doesn’t it deposit you in outer space at a moment when there’s no planet there?”

“That’s a very good question,” said Jennie. “What if it does follow geological formations? But why would it do that?”
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Due to the nature of the artifacts the girls had found, they had made excellent corporate ties with Nano/Gen’s Dr. Anton and Dr. Blake at the Helios Research Station. Both men and their research departments aided tremendously in helping the girls get the proper licenses and permits to operate the high energy beam analytical equipment they had gotten from Nano/Gen scrap program.

The other extremely important thing the two PhDs helped with was setting up the entire facility to the point that it looked exactly like any other high-energy research facility. All the equipment functioned properly, and even the old equipment was in like-new condition. Even the items that had come in large crates and looked like trash worked properly once the girls, with the aid of the two research scientists, had reassembled it.

With Dr. Blake’s tireless help, and the many suggestions made by several members of the Nano/Gen R&D section, Dr. Blake had managed to piece together several large blocks of the varying symbols. The ones they were able to almost get a handle on were the high energy beams produced by what they determined was a red ruby laser.

Once the raw data had been arranged in tables that seemed to show which symbols represented what type of data, the rest fell in place. Jennie was the first to realize what she was looking at. It was a settings table for the beam intensity and duration to achieve a desired destination specified by the beam’s oscillation frequencies.

Michelle noticed many strange gaps in the table that seemed to indicate what the final destination was to be. She pointed at the regularly appearing blank spots and said, “I’m not real sure what we missed, but there is a huge chunk of these tables we can’t translate as of yet.”

Jennie looked around at their makeshift ground probe. As best they could tell, it had been subject to temperatures well into hundreds below zero. “I know what you’re saying. “What would happen if we appeared in the location our probe had. It wasn’t there more than a few minutes. What we got back took 48 hours to fully come back to room temperature. I did get some really good samples of the CO2 as it sublimated. Another issue is that the isotope levels are somehow wrong."

Michelle turned around with one eyebrow raised and asked, “Are you telling me our probe might not have actually been where we thought?”

Jennie replied, “As far as the samples are concerned, they are carbon dioxide, but the carbon isotopes indicate that it’s … just not … the best I can say is, not of this Earth?”

Michelle sat back in her chair as she pulled on her lower lip in thought. “Our valley – just not our universe.”

Jennie said with a tinge of excitement, “You mean like … a parallel timeline?”

Michelle replied, “Yeeeaaaa, sort of. I was thinking this world, just not this current dimensional space/time.”

Jennie nodded, “Actually, that would make a lot of …“

She never got to finish her statement as a large blue sphere of energy flash-formed between them, then vanished. When the girls could see again, a humanoid individual in some sort of suit that looked like it had sections made from crystal stood in its place.

Jennie and Michelle both backed away, Michelle being slower and not as awestruck as she looked the arrival over carefully.

Michelle took hold of Jennie and stopped her from moving further. “Wait. I can almost tell you why he’s here, and it isn't belligerence."

Jennie was very antsy but stopped and listened. “OK, smarty,” she replied, “I guess I can accept that if he wanted to attack us, he already would have, so … why?”

Michelle pointed to their laser testing array, “Because we are doing something wrong, and they are here to find out what we are up to … and quite possibly to render suggestions so we too can use this tech. Another issue, we really have no idea how to control this well enough to think it’s safe.”

“You’re darn right we don’t think it’s safe,” Jennie replied, “which is exactly why we started using our probe. So … how do we find out what he … or she … or they … want?” She gestured at the humanoid newcomer.

“Well,” said Michelle, turning toward the being, who had remained standing where they had appeared, “first we’d have to establish some kind of communication baseline, I suppose … they’re humanoid, so maybe they also communicate via sound waves, or at least have something like eyes that can perceive some band in the electromagnetic spectrum …”

Then a voice came from the being’s head – either transmitted through or produced by a crystalline speaker-like device on the front of their helmet. “Yes – Sound – waves – please – speak – more – must – adapt –”

“OK,” said Jennie, facing the entity. “Hello, I’m Jennie, and you’re very interesting. I apologize, but I admit to being a bit afraid still. I hope you’re not putting yourself at any risk coming here. Are you OK?”

The being’s voice said, “OK – what – is – meaning –”

Michelle said, “Functioning within or above normal parameters?”

“Function – normal – yes – I – am – OK –” said the strange visitor.

Jennie asked, “Are you … a life form? Or are you a robot? Or a probe?”

The humanoid replied, “I – am – alive – wearing – protective – suit – for – safety – while – computer – analyzes – environment –”

“Well, I admit, that makes a lot of sense,” said Michelle. “If I was going somewhere and didn’t know if the temperature, pressure, chemical composition, radiation levels, and whatnot, were going to be survivable, I’d want to wear a protective suit too. Is that your voice we’re hearing or a computer translating?”

“Is – computer – because – can – learn – language – and – translate – faster –” the visitor’s computer’s voice said. “Please – continue – it – will – improve – with – more – communication –”

“So … this is our laboratory,” Jennie said, looking for something to talk about and not wanting to just pepper the newcomer with questions. “This is our ground probe,” she went on, walking and gesturing toward the six-wheeled vehicle. “We used this instead of experimenting ourselves, because we got lucky during our first few experiments and didn’t want to press our luck.”

“So – your – first – expeditions – were – in – person –?” said the entity, its computer voice rising at the end to sound as if it were trying to ask a question.

“Well … yes …” said Michelle hesitantly. “But the very first one was a complete accident.”

“Must – stop you – there – because – you must know – before you – continue –” said the being, “I – am – time – police –”

“Police?” asked Jennie. “There are time police? And time laws? Why didn’t anybody tell us about those?”

“I am – telling you – now –” said the time officer. “It is required – for me – to inform you – now that – I have – words to explain –”

“Oh …” Michelle said, thinking back to what had happened during her first accidental excursion. Should she mention it? Ask about it? Not bring it up? Wait for them to mention it?

The entity went on, “There was – an incident – you injured a semi – sentient creature –”

“I – I’m – it was –” spluttered Michelle, one of the only times Jennie could remember Michelle being flustered.

“All evidence – indicates that it was – accidental – and the creature – healed from its injury – with medical attention – that is not why I am here –”

Michelle looked visibly relieved. Jennie asked, “So … why are you here, then?”

“There is – a series of failsafes – you can install –” the time officer replied, “to minimize – the danger – you might cause to yourselves and others – I have come to show you how to prevent harm –”

“Oh!” Michelle replied. “That would be great! I really am grateful that you’ve come, then. What do we need to do?”

“I must examine your equipment and schematics – so my computer can understand your technical symbols –”

“Oh, I know!” said Jennie. “If it’s a computer, and if you have some kind of electromagnetic vision, maybe your computer can read our books!” She quickly found a book on basic electronics. “And I’ll bet it can read really quickly!” She laid it down on a table, opened it, and started flipping pages. The newcomer leaned over the table to get a good look.

“This is – basic electronics text –” said the being.

“Yes,” Jennie said.

“Good – faster –” Jennie started turning pages faster. “Faster –” She went faster yet and was soon done with that book. “Computer says – basic electronics symbol system registered –”

Michelle and Jennie were able to catch the officer’s computer up on human math and electronics symbols in a short time. “Computer states – environment safe temperature and pressure – no threatening microbes – can remove protective suit – but must keep helmet on – for atmosphere – oxygen levels too high –”

“Of course, of course,” Jennie said. There was a click, and the officer’s crystalline suit just sort of opened up, seams appearing in the fronts of the arms, legs, and torso. Out stepped a figure in white, clearly humanoid, wearing a white jumpsuit, but their hands and neck were exposed; they had bright blue skin beneath. The open suit closed behind them, standing there motionless and helmetless.

“Good to see you,” said Michelle, “or more of you, anyway.”

“Pleased to make your acquaintance –” said the computer voice from the front of their helmet. “My name is Ghimar –”

“Now this is the schematic of our apparatus,” said Jennie, “although of course the central part of it is the crystal, which we found and don’t fully understand …”

“We suspected something of the sort – we are not permitted to explain more to you – but can provide suggestions for the safety of yourselves and others – for example a module that will prevent you from interfering with yourselves and creating causality loops –”

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Jennie and Michelle were totally amazed at the schematics the officer laid on their work bench. Jennie said, “We don’t even have a proper device. All we have is a patchwork garbage pile type of device that happened to work well enough that we didn’t get killed.”

Michelle unrolled and laid another page of schematics on the bench. She said, “From what this says, we were more than lucky we didn’t materialize in a hazardous location. Best I can tell, the X-ray laser transmitted the probe to an ice planet we’ve provisionally named Toluth. The probe arrived on a warm day. According to the probe’s recorded temperature, it was well below minus 300 degrees Fahrenheit when it arrived. Best I can tell, there’s some type of installation there. Can’t tell too much; the CO2 blizzard made visibility almost naught.” She pointed to the page on the bench. “From what this shows, an emerald laser would take us to a tropical paradise."

Jennie looked over the complicated diagram, then said, “We still don’t have a proper projector to create any of the high-energy beams. By lucky accident, we do have many of the various colors of laser producing devices, and we did our X-ray laser using a free-electron laser, but we have yet to make that thing more flexible. Though, if we could do that, we’d be a lot better off.”

By the time Jennie had turned around, Michelle was well into dismantling several of the extra ruby laser devices. She said, “You know what? I’m going to do just that. I’m going to take our free-electron X-ray laser and all the other ones we aren’t using right now, and see if I can’t build something less junky and more useable.”

Jennie walked over, picked up an electric wrench, snapped an appropriate socket on the tip, then began helping disassemble. In a very few minutes, the girls had a huge pile of electronics scattered along the floor.

The officer entered the lab and stopped. It was obvious that he was looking over the huge pile of disassembled equipment. He asked, in a much improved way, “Why have you scrapped all this equipment? Aren’t you going to need it so you can modify it properly for safety?”

Michelle replied, “This isn’t a scrap … it’s a redesign. I’ve taken all of this apart, and I’m going to use the components to build a proper emitter with the safeguards you gave us built in.”

The officer nodded. “Technically, I am not supposed to help you design a time emitter. However, since you are already traveling and doing so in the worst and most unsafe way, I will be more than happy to aid you in construction. I do need to tell you, all this is going to be a destination specific to ruby lasers.” One of the items he carried was a large pouch. When he opened it and removed a really strange device that looked something like a gun, the girls were totally amazed at how many functions it could perform.

It took about three days for the three of them to disassemble, modify, then build. Again, the girls were totally awestruck at the many things the one tool could do. It acted like a socket wrench, a screwdriver, a jigsaw or circle saw, and even a spot welder.

When they had finished building the core device, the officer brought the crystal over, placed it in the location made just for it, and locked it in place.

Michelle looked over the device’s control panel. It had the ability to select frequencies, duration times, and intensities, and even had a provision for extra dimensional cross quantum-mechanical spin … and neither girl even knew what that was. “But what I do know is that this is now a free-electron laser capable of any frequency from microwaves to X-rays,” she said, pointing to one end of the device, “and this section can modify that beam in any number of ways before it reaches the crystal, with an eye to safety that our new friend Ghimar has granted us.”

Ghimar added, “I have barely helped you at all, and yet you have made great strides. I no longer fear that you will destroy yourselves, or wipe out any civilizations, including your own – or mine. At the risk of helping you too much, I ask you this question: do you think it’s possible to observe a target destination nondestructively?”

Jennie and Michelle stopped and looked at each other. “Right now we can only ever go to a particular destination in time, space, and dimension once,” said Jennie. “If we tried to repeat a destination, we’d run into ourselves and cause a problem, and now we can’t do that because of the safeguards. But if we could do that – nondestructively observe – we’d never have to worry about that again.”

“Well, not for collecting data, anyway,” Michelle rebutted.

“Right, right,” said Jennie, “we’d still be limited if we were traveling anywhere, but if we wanted to look before we leap? Nondestructive observation would be ideal. But is it possible?”

“Well, let me think about that,” Michelle said. “We could observe by absorbing some photons from a destination onto a detector, generating a picture, but that would be destructive observation.”

“Right, but what if we supplied the photons?” asked Jennie.

Michelle replied, “Well, if we could somehow only bounce those photons off surfaces in the destination area, that wouldn’t take anything from the site, but it would be like a flash photo, so it would still interfere.”

“Is there a way to take a snapshot of the quantum fields?” Jennie wondered. “I’m not super expert at that, but we know some people who are.”

And it turned out that as long as they were only trying to measure the destination macroscopically, it was easy to measure the locations of classical objects in a destination environment. They could simply send a flash of photons, then reabsorb those same photons and nothing else, to measure how the local electromagnetic field affected them. And even if they wanted to measure quantum effects, there were clever tricks they could employ in many cases without disturbing particles at the destination or even without collapsing any wavefunctions. They began to add this functionality over the next few weeks. Officer Ghimar departed and returned multiple times during this period, reporting back to their supervisors and obtaining new instructions.

“All right, let’s try a very simple test,” said Jennie. “I’m going to take a bird’s-eye view of the valley. Destination coordinates: 10,000 feet above us. Dimension: This one. Time: Right now.” She entered this into the system. The resulting laser pulses were invisible to the human eye – without attempting to breach the barriers of time or dimension, the energy required was very low. Quick pulses of red, green, and blue visible light were sent through for just an instant, and reabsorbed by the CCD of a digital camera. It took a fraction of a second, and on a large monitor was an image of the valley as if seen from an aircraft flying above it, the Ghost Hill Laboratory right at the center.

“Wow, look at this,” Michelle said. “There we are. There’s the lake, there’s the stream, there are all its branches … there’s your house and my house … there are all the roads … what’s this? Why are all these vehicles turning off the county road and coming down the gravel road into our valley?”

“What?” Jennie asked. She zoomed the image in. “That’s an awful lot of company coming our way.”

Ghimar stated, “It is possible that you have garnered unwanted attention from some entity, perhaps governmental or corporate in nature.”

“Oh great,” said Michelle, “in about 12 minutes we’re going to have a bunch of suits breathing down our necks. I don’t want that. I’m moving us.”

“To where?” asked Jennie. “Or to when? Are you sure we need to?”

“What if they’re from the military?” Michelle asked. “I’m not letting them swoop in and take the crystal at gunpoint, the only object like it that’s ever been discovered. I think they should at least call first. I’ve got an idea, though. What if we use our new snapshot system and take photos of dimensions where none of this is happening?”

“Where do we get power from?” asked Jennie. “A dimension where this lab doesn’t already exist won’t have power connections … if the site’s inhabited at all.”

“What if we jump … a year into the future?” Michelle asked.

“But if we do that and then come back, we’ll have a problem in a year,” Jennie said.

“Yes, we’ll run into ourselves,” said Michelle. “We need a secondary base of operations.”

Jennie started taking snapshots, one after another, with slightly different parameters. “That dimension … or that one … or that one …” She had the system store the coordinates of every destination that seemed likely.

“Are you allowed to help us?” Michelle asked Ghimar.

“In fact, I am only disallowed from directly gifting you with advanced time-space-dimensional travel technology,” said Ghimar. “Also, I have no desire to be interviewed by governmental authorities or hired corporate mercenaries. If you travel to an alternate dimensional location without power, I can assist in powering a return trip.”

“They’re here,” said Jennie as they saw what looked like military vehicles turning down their driveway. “I’ve got best candidate coordinates. I’m going to have to do something we’ve never done before – take the entire lab with us. We won’t be coming back the moment the laser stops. We’ll be staying there, at least until we can power up for another jump.”

“Hit it,” said Michelle.

Jennie activated the device, and pulses of cyan light suffused the entire lab building.

Just as the troops, whoever they were, stepped out of their vehicles with their weapons, the entire building was gone.

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“OK, Jennie,” said Michelle, “where have you sent us to, and can we get back?”

“We’re in what looks like a parallel version of our valley,” said Jennie, “in a world where, at least as far as I’ve been able to tell, intelligent life never evolved.”

“We may want to verify that,” Michelle said.

“We currently have no power,” Jennie said. “The wires that ran to the lab have been sheared off as if by ultra-sharp knives. The plumbing pipes too, actually. Ghimar, you said you can get us power?”

“My suit has a reactor intended to last it for one hundred of your years,” Ghimar replied. “Until you have managed a replacement, you may use its output.”

After a bit of jury-rigging, Michelle and Jennifer were able to power up the equipment again. They had the ability to take images of their former location. Water spilled onto the ground from the cut supply pipes as a man in a suit talked on a phone, looking sheepish – perhaps he was being yelled at. “Doesn’t look safe to go back yet,” Michelle said. “What about some kind of alternative power source?”

“Well, we could’ve gotten ourselves some batteries,” Jennie said, “so at least we’d have some recourse. Or … we could set up solar panels. Or batteries charged by solar panels.”

“We’ve got those,” said Michelle. “All of that. We got them from the lab surplus. We just aren’t using them. They’re in the storage building.”

“Which is … not here,” Jennie said. “Hmm. Well, you know …” Jennifer tuned the time parameter forward and took more images. After a few hours most of the vehicles left their original lab site, but they left a security detail there, probably in case they came back. She kept going. A day later the security detail went away too, but Jennie looked around the valley; there were vehicles at the road turnoffs. She went forward another day, and they were gone too. “There! That’s a great time to come back!”

“Not so fast,” said Michelle. “They can probably watch via satellite. Wait for a cloudy day.” So Jennie moved her coordinates a day further into the future, and the weather was in fact cloudy. Michelle agreed that that was a perfect destination.

The lab returned exactly to its original spot in the early morning of the third day after its disappearance – but from Jennie, Michelle and Ghimar’s point of view it had only been a few minutes. “OK, we can’t exactly order a bunch of battery packs and charging circuitry and wait around for delivery,” Michelle said, “and what’s more, we want to turn off the water so it stops running up our water bill.”

“And we should probably let Dr. Felding and Dr. Blake know we’re OK,” Jennie added.

“Pardon me for suggesting it,” said Ghimar, “but how certain are you that your friends are not the ones responsible for the recent paramilitary visit?”

Jennie gasped. “I don’t think either of them would do that,” she said. “But … what if they unwittingly said something to someone who would?” She called Dr. Blake.

“Ms. Kent?” asked Dr. Blake. “Are you all right? I’d heard through the grapevine that something had happened, and I’d tried to visit your site to make sure you were OK, but … it was gone …”

“Yeah, we had to get out of here in a hurry, because we got some unwanted visitors,” said Jennie. “We still don’t know who they were, but we’ve got photos of them. They knew we had something, and they were here to take it at gunpoint. We can’t stay long.”

“Who could they be?” asked Dr. Blake. “Oh … what if they’re from Antigen Security? They’re Nano/Gen’s primary competitor, you know. They might have been spying on Dr. Anton’s communications.”

Jennie replied, “If that’s true, maybe we have a chance to keep them away. Anything they planned to do would have been illegal – but if they’d gotten away with it, the crystal would be gone to who knows where, and we’d never have seen it again.”

“Oh dear,” Dr. Blake said. “What a loss to science!”

“Help me get the equipment in here,” Michelle said.

“Oh, right,” said Jennie. “I’ve got to go, Dr. Blake. I’ll try to keep in touch.”

The girls got a solar charging system working on the lab’s roof, and they used mains power to charge the batteries to full capacity. But they didn’t like the implications of what had happened.

“We won’t be able to sleep the night in our home dimension again at this rate,” said Jennie. “They’ll surprise us in our sleep and steal the crystal!”

“Assuming they know about the crystal,” said Michelle, “but yeah, they’ll break into the lab, ransack everything, and probably take the crystal along with everything else, even if they don’t know what it is.”

“And we could call the police, but they’d just pay lawyers to keep the case in courts forever,” said Jennie, “and meanwhile they’d have everything and we’d have nothing. So we can’t stay here anymore. They’ve chased us out of our home.”

“Not yet,” said Michelle, “but I agree that we can’t stay here for long until this problem is solved.”

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What Jennie and Michelle didn’t know was that their intruders had actually been military. In an exclusive office suite in a particularly recognisable building in Washington D.C., a very angry man sat behind a desk and yelled angrily at the six men in uniform that were standing in front of the desk, “What in the mating of camels did you say? An entire high energy research facility did what?”

One of the men with Colonel wings on his shoulder replied, “It’s as I told you, the whole place just vanished in a flash of light. We took pictures and as many readings as we could. We found nothing that was out of the ordinary.”

The man behind the desk picked up a very thick manila folder and thumbed through several of the photos in it. What they showed was a huge divot in the ground with all the water pipes severed cleanly as if cut by a high speed precision saw. The water spewed from the open pipes. The electrical supply appeared the same way, as the cables lay on the ground fully energised, but appearing as if clipped by a giant pair of shears.

The man behind the desk snarled, “How did you get the whole section to go along with this scam?”

One of the other men replied back with temper in his voice, “It isn’t a scam. Those photos were taken by the sky-cam satellite. You can verify those photos by logging in and checking the historical records.

The man behind the desk softened a bit, “You mean, the rumor we heard has …”

The colonel finished, "Confidence is 100%. We have the entire surveillance and recovery team as witnesses.”

The man behind the desk replied, “If they have discovered teleportation of macro objects, that’s a tech we must procure for national security.”

The colonel snapped a sharp salute. “Yes, Sir, our team is on it now.”

The men turned as if on parade, complete with the heel click, then left the room in an orderly fashion. The man behind the desk picked up the photos of the foundation divot and the water spewing from the open ends.

He said to himself, “If this is for real, they cannot be allowed to keep the technology without government oversight. I don’t care if it’s legal. We must get it before our enemies do."

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The lab now sat upon Ghost Hill in the alternate dimension they’d visited earlier, so Michelle and Jennie could work uninterrupted by … whoever those agents had been. They had installed the solar panels and the battery array. Now, as they considered their next moves, the alternate dimension’s sun charged their batteries.

Jennie began to think about Ghimar’s suit. She came to Michelle and asked, “Have you figured a way so we can stay in the projected target zone without the transfer device being on and timed?” Jennie walked over to the suit and examined the large crystalline arm section.

Michelle replied, “I haven’t come up with a way to do that.” She looked at the suit as well. “But I believe our visitor has a suit that performs that job rather well.”

As she somehow managed to get it to open, Jennie replied, “I know the only way we can stay in a current target location is like we just did with our workshop.” She held the arm of the suit up. “I believe that this is made out of whatever the crystal is.”

Ghimar stood nearby observing, but didn’t interfere. “Please feel free to examine my suit as much as you wish,” they said. “But please do not damage or dismantle anything.”

“Understood,” said Jennie. “I’m just examining right now.”

“It wouldn’t make sense to dismantle it anyway,” said Michelle. “It’s obvious that if we want the kind of transfer persistence we’re seeing Ghimar exhibit, we’ll need to somehow obtain or manufacture more of the substance the crystal is made of.”

“That’s hard to do when we don’t really know exactly what it is,” said Jennie.

“Well, wait,” Michelle said. “Didn’t Dr. Blake say its inertial mass density was …”

Jennie picked up on what Michelle was saying. “... identical to that of diamond,” she finished. “What if it is diamond … but modified so its passive gravitational mass is lower?”
Michelle thought for a moment. “The problem is how to do that, of course,” she said, her forehead wrinkling a bit.

“I know that expression!” said Jennie, pointing at Michelle. “You already have an idea and you’re working out the details. And I bet you’re right, too!”

“We’ll see,” said Michelle with a smile. “We might be able to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps.”

“Use the crystal to make more crystal?”

“To start with, we need to find more diamond,” Michelle said, nodding. “It doesn’t have to be diamond, I suppose, but it would be the most durable.”

“We’ve got all manner of dimensions we can search for diamond in,” said Jennie. “I wonder if …”

Jennie started programming the passive detection system. It would search for large quantities of diamond and compile a set of coordinates for likely locations while they worked on other things. “There. Running program.” She hit a key, and the laser started humming. Micropulses to pass photons through and reabsorb them didn’t take a lot of energy. And the computer started taking data.

“Now, while we wait for that,” said Michelle, “let’s think about something else. We need to find a way to discourage those military guys, or paramilitary or whatever they are. Who do we think they are? My opinion is that they’re probably military. That would let them skirt the laws just enough to let them barge onto private property and confiscate our stuff.”

“They might also be corporate,” added Jennie. “They could have deep enough pockets to bribe or litigate their way around the law.”

“But either way,” Michelle said, “they certainly saw what we did and want the technology. And right now they can’t have it, because we’re not there. But sooner or later we’ll have to go home.”

“So how do we make sure they don’t swoop in and steal our stuff as soon as we do?” Jennie asked.

“Plan A: Decoy,” said Michelle. “We build a duplicate lab, transfer it in, and let them loot that, while we keep the real lab safe somewhere else. The problem is that they’d eventually figure it out.”

Jennie typed this, and it appeared on one of the monitors. “Plan B,” she said, “Collaborate. We give them what they want – once we have the ability to build more than one apparatus.” This appeared on the screen as well. “The problem is that it would destabilize the global military balance of power. I don’t want to start a world war.”

“Plan C,” said Michelle, “Fortify. We turn the lab into a fortress. We don’t go back until we can withstand anything they throw at us. The problem is that we’d be under continuous attack, and they’d keep trying.”

“Plan D,” Jennie added, typing all of this onto the monitor, “Confuse. We go home, but we never return to the same place twice, and we never stay in any place for long. Maybe we even change the appearance of the lab each time. The problem is that they’d get better at finding us with time.”

“Plan E,” Michelle added, “Disappear. We never go back. If we need supplies, we go to other dimensions. The problem is that we’d have to keep dealing with different dimensions and whatever issues we run into.”

“Plan F,” said Jennie, “Undermine. We plant evidence that makes it look as if whatever they saw was fake. We can even plant evidence in the past or future for them to find. The problem is, that’s complicated.”

“Whoa,” said Michelle. “Then, Plan D-Prime: Confuse, with time travel. We go home, never to the same place twice, but we go into the past or future. Since they don’t have this technology, they can’t get better at finding us. The problem is, it’s got all the complications of time travel.”

Ghimar remarked, “However, you now have the various safeguard devices I have given you schematics for, built right into your system. You cannot create paradoxes, nor can you materialize inside other matter.”

“I think it’s Plan D-Prime,” said Jennie. “We’ll just program the computers to plan out our next several destination locations and times ahead of time, and scan them before we go. We can make sure they’re always cloudy days so the satellites can’t see us. And maybe we can equip the exterior of the lab to change appearance somehow – movable panels, perhaps color-changing materials.”

Ghimar added, “Again, that is not technology that I have been forbidden to give you. Fabrication technology and color-changing materials are relatively simple. My organization would also prefer that your civilization not have dimension travel technology on a large scale.”

The computer pinged. “It’s done,” said Michelle. “Let’s see.” It had come up with several sets of coordinates of dimensions with large diamond deposits near the lab site.

“This one doesn’t seem to have any intelligent life around,” said Jennie, pointing to one set of scan results. “We can scan further.”

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Michelle and Jennie, with the blessings of Nano/Gen and the head of their R&D department, Dr. Blake, the girls had recruited six of the top research and fabrication scientists. It was easy to get most of the R&D department to volunteer once Dr. Blake explained about their inter- and intra-dimensional travels. They had been warned that the military was actively searching for them, so they communicated via indirect and encrypted channels so as not to give away the current location of Ghost Hill Lab.

When the R&D scientists learned that Michelle and Jennie had removed their research facility from their home dimension to an alternate and back, they went nuts. They were out and about and were sampling and taking notes as fast as they could. They arranged a rendezvous time and place and picked them up, along with supplies and plans to make the lab more self-sufficient in terms of food and water.

Jennie commented to Michelle, “These guys are totally in 7th heaven.”

Michelle replied, “I know. All it took was for Dr. Blake to explain what we wanted to do, and the whole department volunteered.”

Jennie said, “I’m very grateful for the excavator that was donated. It’ll help with the digging for diamonds.”

One of the young scientists had come into the computer room with a folder in hand. “Miss Danwoo,” he said, laying the folder on the table and opening it to the first page, “as you can see here, we have mapped the lava tube from the dormant volcano. Best estimate: it’s got almost 200 billion tons of raw crystal. We’ve been working on duplicating the crystal you have, but it’s so weird. It’s like the exterior of the crystal is a normal diamond, while the core is something far different.”

Michelle turned the page. What the next page detailed was the indication that high-frequency coherent light was collected in some manner and circled the inner core of the crystal to form a ring laser. “So it has been determined that the energy gets captured somehow …”

“Yes, and circles the core many times. It acts like a ring laser, but it’s hard to tell,” said the scientist.

Jennie had taken an interest in the folder, “What makes it so hard to tell?”

The scientist replied, “First off, normal white light passes through the outer layers and circles the core numerous times before it exits. The almost impossible thing is that, according to our tests, the light interacts with none of the crystal’s core except to somehow be captured by it. We have yet to determine how the light beam manages to escape the core, but it does.”

Another of the scientists came into the office and announced, “We’ve discovered something. Don’t ask how – we’re doing our best to figure it out – but the core of your crystal shows evidence that it’s existing in several superpositions at the same time.

Jennie commented thoughtfully, “If that’s the case, that means the core of this crystal is a real honest Time Crystal. How they managed to get just the core of the crystal to act in that way is beyond us.”

The second scientist replied, “That’s the thing. As far as our science is concerned, a time crystal exists in a quantum state and not in a solid form. This crystal, as far as our science is concerned, is impossible to make.”

Jennie and Michelle looked at each other. Michelle said, “I don’t think it’s impossible. We have a working crystal right here.”

“That’s just what Dr. Blake would say,” said Jennie. “It must be possible, because here it is.” Jennie looked over their mineral surveys. “First thing I’m going to do is use that D9 loader and dig us some raw diamonds.”

Michelle commented with concern in her voice, “Don’t get too excited over it. Any damage we do will have to be fixed before we leave. Maybe there’s no intelligent life in this dimension right now, but there might be someday.”

Jennie replied, “Agreed.” She stood and left the office, headed for the added-on maintenance shop where they were keeping the loader. After she left, the scientist with the folder showed Michelle more of the data they had managed to come up with.

The scientist said excitedly as he showed the data to Michelle, “The alien scientists, whoever they were, successfully designed a realistic photonic time crystal – exotic materials capable of exponentially amplifying light. This is a fantastic realization of photonic time crystals, propelling them into practical applications apparently for intra-dimensional and time travel.”

“But … how in the world do we turn diamond … into that?” asked Michelle, pointing at the crystal across the room.

“I’m not fully sure,” he said, “but I’ve got some ideas. You’ve already suggested using the existing crystal to turn diamonds into more crystals like it, and Jennie’s out getting raw materials as we speak. What if … we … wait, no, that’s insane.”

“Hey, we’re brainstorming here,” said Michelle. “Any idea’s a good idea. Maybe it’s got the seed of something we can use.”

“I was going to say maybe we take a diamond and use the crystal to move it through time along a fixed, regular path, with stops at regular intervals,” the scientist said. “But … it would take millions of years. And if the crystal was made that way, it would have a limited lifespan and would certainly use as much of it as the crystal it created would gain. At best we’d end up with a new crystal and a used-up old crystal, assuming that’s how it was done.”

“Hmm, perhaps,” said Michelle. “But what about …”

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Jennie had harvested hundreds of pounds of diamonds, and she’d selected for pure and flawless samples. Michelle and the scientists had come up with a plan, one that Jennie almost understood. “This sounds insane,” was Jennie’s opinion, “but … if it’s how you think they made the crystal, it’s got to work.”

“True, the makers of the crystal have certainly got some kind of superior theory of how the universe works,” Michelle said, “But we’re triple-checking our survey data and all going over the math. Unless somebody comes up with a flaw or an error, it has to work.”

“We’re risking the original crystal to make it, though,” said Jennie. “If it doesn’t come back … then we’re all stuck here in this alternate dimension with no intelligent life except for ourselves.”

“That’s why there’s a failsafe plan,” said Michelle. “Don’t worry.”

“Well, let’s do it, then,” Jennie said. “Who wants to live forever?”

Dr. Blake came up to Michelle and Jennie. “Everyone’s redone the calculations a third time. And a fourth. Nobody’s found any flaws. The data’s been triple-checked. There’s no reason to believe that it won’t work. I’d like to have access to a supercomputer, but we don’t have one. Still, you’ve got some pretty good computing power here. Certainly better than a Pentium.”

“Everyone ready?” asked Michelle. There were no objections. “Then let’s go!” The crystal and a similarly-sized diamond were attached to a miniature computer-controlled laser array with a power source suggested by one of the scientists. Everything had been designed for longevity, which it would need. Michelle ran the program, and the entire apparatus vanished.

“Uh-oh,” said Michelle after a few seconds.

“What?” asked Jennie.

“It was supposed to be back by now,” Michelle said.

“Maybe it’s j –” Jennie began, then the whole thing reappeared. The two girls looked at each other. The scientists looked at each other.

“Test the results!” said Dr. Blake. He got a pair of rubberized tongs and picked up the diamond. It was obviously different from what it had looked like before – it had been a raw uncut diamond, and now it had all the facets that the original crystal did.

“It certainly looks the part,” said Jennie, “but how will it test?”

Dr. Blake put the crystal through its paces, specifically measuring its light transmissivity and delay and its three mass readings. “Amazing,” he said. “Our theory appears to have been … sound.”

“Failsafe in three … two … one …” said Jennie, and then the lab was in another place – on their original Earth, but somewhere in the Australian desert.

Hastily placing the crystal back into its apparatus and setting the computer, Michelle said, “First thing the crystal did was go forward in time half an hour and take the lab back to our original dimension, in case the rest of the program destroyed it. That didn’t happen, but there was no way to know whether it would or not. This way we wouldn’t have been stuck in case things had failed in the worst possible way.” She engaged the free-electron laser, and with a burst of cyan laser light the lab was back in the dimension where they’d mined the diamonds, one second after they’d left it.

“So … let me get this straight,” said Jennie. “After ensuring that we’d make it home, the tiny little computer took the crystal and the diamond to the vicinity of a quantum black hole, which we found by dimension-searching. Oh, and those are possible, by the way, at least in some dimensions. Then it took it through the process you talked about, sending it forward in time by small increments again and again, billions of times.”

“Trillions of times,” Michelle corrected. “Hundreds of trillions, actually. It took thousands of years. But … time travel. When it was done, it came back to the here and now. Pretty accurate, really – off by a few seconds in a thousand years.”

“And because of the black hole’s gravitational gradient,” Jennie went on, trying to understand what had just happened by explaining it to herself, “the diamond experienced an amount of time far longer than the age of the universe, while the crystal only experienced thousands of years. So the diamond’s now a time crystal too, with a lifespan of hundreds of billions of years, while the crystal’s just used up a few thousand years of its hundreds-of-billions lifespan. And the new crystal’s all polished and shiny because of all the abrasion it got over its hundreds of trillions of years being scoured by dust due to being held near a black hole by carefully-balanced laser pulses.”

“That’s basically it,” said Michelle. “We had to carefully calculate the laser frequency, pulse duration, and period based on the gravitational data we’d measured multiple times, but it looks like we did it.”

“Well, we haven’t tested the thing yet,” said Jennie, “but we can do that. And then, if it works …”

Michelle completed the sentence, “... then we can make as much of this crystal as we want. And we can test it in other applications besides just transporting the lab around.”

“And we can probably find ways to replace the diamond we’ve mined pretty soon, actually,” Jennie added. “With what we’ve got in mind, we’ll be able to make a protective suit of this stuff and use it to mine some space diamonds, where there’s guaranteed to be no intelligent life.”

“Right,” said Michelle, “and with multiple crystals, we can have some of them making yet more crystals while others are running diamond-mining machines to asteroids in some appropriate-looking spot, while others are running dimension searches for other materials we need. We’re scaling up.”

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Back at the Pentagon, the director of Black Ops Special Investigations laid his head down on his arms and sighed. The reports his operatives and the strike and recovery team's many body cam photos proved that whatever tech those women had come up with was beyond current knowledge.

He really couldn’t get past the short video of the team’s attempt to assault the facility. He saw the men as they approached the outer perimeter fence. Then, without warning, a huge colored flash of light surrounded the entire grounds within the perimeter fence, and everything simply vanished. The hot, live electrical and other wires lay on the ground as if they had been sheared off. Until they found the main supply valve and shut it off, water spewed from the pipes, which also appeared to have been sheard off cleanly.

The director knew that he was going to be in severe trouble if his team couldn’t get a handle on this. They had enough data they had gleaned from a major hack into Nano/Gen’s database. The operatives were very good to have gotten as far as they did, but anti-intrusion software had discovered them.

Nano/Gen had top-of-the-line industrial anti-intrusion hardware, and the detection had happened as soon as the team had managed to enter one of the minor memory storage nodes. All they had managed to get was that it was a major enough technological find that they realized it couldn’t be allowed out in the wild for any reason. The military man agreed. It must also be recovered and stored for safety so no ne’er-do-well rogues could get their hands on it.

But before the hacking team could access any significant details, they had been booted from the system and instantly had 36 of 39 of their nodes identified. The hackers had immediately severed the connection at that point before the last nodes could be traced. It had been a near thing, but they had enough data to convince the higher-ups of the necessity to seek out this strange technology and retrieve it regardless of circumstance … but now, the whole place was gone, and all that was left was a divot in the ground.

Constant surveillance of the spot seemed pointless – assuming the girls hadn’t vaporized their entire lab with the technology but had instead traveled somewhere, there was no indication where that somewhere might be, and a continued military presence on the spot would attract unwanted attention. The best they could do was surveil the place from space with military spy satellites, and of course those had a problem on cloudy days. They’d risked a few flyovers with spy planes but hadn’t seen anything so far.

There was an urgent knock on the door. “Yes?” he called out. The door opened quickly, and an officer with a folder in his hand saluted and briskly strode up to his desk, laying it down.

“Sir, your orders were to notify you if any of our flyovers produced anything at all,” said the officer.

He opened the folder and examined the data and photo within. “It’s difficult to see, but … is the building back?”

“It’s possible, but when we scrambled ground units to the location, it wasn’t there.”

He thought. The chances of the young women’s demise had just decreased – not to zero, but … “Our search area just expanded,” he said. “You are now authorized to pull in whatever resources you need – more computers, AI or whatever that stuff is, to look at all spy satellite images anywhere on Earth. They can instantly transport their building. That lab could now be anywhere. Find that building.”

“I’ll make sure of it, Sir.” The officer saluted and left the office, closing the door.

He put his head in his hands. After a moment he turned to his computer keyboard and resolutely started typing this up into a report. The general wouldn’t like this.

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Ghimar had been coming and going, reporting to their superiors, or so they said. But they were back now. They inspected the suits the girls had designed and built after generating more time crystals. “This is impressive,” they said. “There aren’t many more steps you can take. And you’re properly incorporating the safeguards.”

“Thanks!” said Jennie. “With these we can personally travel to any time, place, or dimension we like. We’re still working on the user interface technology. But even if it’s in outer space, or on a planet without a breathable atmosphere, we’ll be protected.”

Michelle added, “And since we can scan before we leave, we can avoid jumping to somewhere with an environment too hostile for the suits, like a lake of molten lava or the inside of a star.”

“The question now becomes,” Jennie went on, “what we do with them. We still don’t want the military or whoever getting them. That’ll just lead to an arms race as other countries race to get the technology. So whatever we do, we have to be careful.”

“I notice you have added a failsafe return,” Ghimar pointed out.

“Yes,” replied Michelle, “so if we are caught by the military or whoever, we can just hit that switch and return home. Same thing happens if the wearer is unconscious.”

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Ghimar smiled a satisfied smile as they looked over the quality of the suit the humans had come up with. They had devised a way to make crystalline plates. They were about 1/16th of an inch thick, long ovoids about 6 inches long and maybe 2 or 3 inches wide.

This was the first time Ghimar had ever seen a species recreate the technology almost precisely. It was true their system and suit was a great deal more primitive than most of the Time Coalition, but since this was their first attempt and they were such a small group, this was quite impressive. Ghimar suspected a time loop, but if that was the case, there was nothing to be done about it, and it would be a very closed, precise one, not risking the continuum.

The really amazing thing was the new thread the Earthlings had come up with. It was somehow entangled interphased diamond. Michelle and Jennie had woven their suit out of this type of material and actually created an upgraded model to the suit. It may have been primitive in other ways by Ghimar’s standards, but the cloth was far and away better and more durable protection … not to mention being able to aid in the chronal crossflow, making any transitions more predictable.

Ghimar took great pains to insure that no security cameras or any other thing of the sort were monitoring. They carefully waited until Jennie and Michelle had left the operations lab before they removed a section of the back of their suit and set it on the table next to the humans’ suit. Ghimar smiled as they sparkled back to whatever their destination was.

Jennie and Michelle came back into the lab in discussion about their suit. That was when they noticed Ghimar had left again, although this time, they had left a rather large item that looked like a backpack.

Michelle opened the top and looked in. Her eyes grew large at what she saw. The pack was stuffed with advanced electronics and manuals telling how it worked and how to build it.

Jennie said in confusion, “Isn’t this the thing Ghimar told us he wasn’t allowed to do?”

Michelle nodded. “It … looks like it, or I guess so. He must have had a very good reason to leave this stuff. This technology alone is way beyond us.”

Jennie noticed an empty spot on the workbench. “Michelle, that huge wooden spool of diamond time thread is missing.”

Michelle smiled and said, “It’s a fair trade, I would think,” as she picked up one of the super advanced pieces, “I mean, we have miles of the thread, but we have none of this.”

Jennie said, “I did something else too. I made another suit. One for me and one or you. Both have all the safeguards built in and give us the ability to come and go at will and leave our lab in a safe place.”

“Oh, you made yourself one?” Michelle asked. “I thought I was gonna be the guinea pig,” she said with a grin.

“No way do you get to have all the fun!” said Jennie. “But … come on, what are some of the things in there?”

Holding up a module the size of a button, Michelle replied, “For one thing, this is a free-electron laser, replacing that thing up there.” She pointed at the rather large apparatus on the lab bench, almost as big as the entire bench itself. “Still requires a lot of power, but it’s far more efficient … and so small and light. And speaking of power …” She held up an object that looked for all the world like a credit card. “This is a battery. It can store more energy than all the batteries we have in our power system. Suppose we each had a backpack full of these? We could go for months without recharging.”

“If they were all charged to start with,” said Jennie.

“Good point,” admitted Michelle, “but then look at this.” She held up a silver box the size of a mini desktop computer. “This is a power supply. I don’t know what powers it even, but this little thing can put out as much as 10 nuclear reactors, maybe more.”

“Ah, wait,” said Jennie, “none of this is actually dimension-travel technology. Ghimar’s not going to get in trouble for this because this isn’t what they were forbidden to give us.”

“I mean, we kind of have the time and dimension travel thing worked out,” Michelle said. “These are all just support systems. But what support systems they are!”

The Nano/Gen scientists and Dr. Blake had gone home some time ago; Michelle and Jennie had briefly materialized the lab on top of a Nano/Gen research building – it had a very flat roof, and the scientists had calculated the structure’s load capacity, being among the people who had designed it. They’d provided Jennie and Michelle with anonymous phones so they could communicate when they returned to their home universe without alerting the military.

“Well, time for travel suit test number one,” said Michelle, suiting up.

“No fair, I wanna go too!” said Jennie.

“You have to observe the readings, and rescue me if things go wrong.”

Jennie pouted. “That’s true,” she replied.

“You can go next time.”

“You promise?”

“Absolutely.” Michelle attached her helmet. Only her eyes were clearly visible. “Now, I’m staying in the same dimension, but here’s how we’ll know the test worked. I’m going 30 seconds into the past, and I’m going to this dimension’s version of Painter’s Hill. Then I’ll walk in the d – oops gotta go!” Michelle pressed the activator button on the back of her left hand with her right hand and vanished in an invisible flash of infrared, just as she entered the lab. “Sorry! I think maybe 30 seconds back isn’t far enough!”

“I, uh, didn’t have a chance to even look at the readings,” said Jennie.

“Well, this is why we test,” Michelle said.

“At least you didn’t get zapped into outer space or something,” Jennie remarked. “Hey, this way we can pop into Dr. Blake’s lab and surprise him.”

“As long as we don’t do that too often,” replied Michelle. “Those military guys might have the place watched, if they know he’s our friend. We shouldn’t visit the same place twice – plan D-prime, remember.”

“What’re we gonna do about those naughty boys, anyway?” Jennie wondered.

“We need a plan,” agreed Michelle.

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A sleek super advanced spy plane flew over its assigned grid. The scanner showed the distant landscape in many wavelengths. An acquisition alarm sounded, and on the video screen, concentric lines identified the target on the roof of a building in one of Nano/Gen’s research complexes, where it had been detected three times before. “Niner-Tango-Three to Bravo-Seven, target acquired in grid 112 by 776, over,” the pilot reported on the radio.

Immediately, four rapid attack choppers were deployed, with rocket packs, scatter bombs, flamethrowers, and two 16-barrel miniguns. The twin cannon mounts above the side stabilizers topped off the formidable weapons. Each helicopter had the ability to fold back its main rotor and enable two specialty methane rocket engines. This meant that the squads of combat troops would have boots on the ground within a few short minutes.

“Bravo-seven to Gold Squadron,” said the base to the helicopters via radio, “repeat: mission is to capture technology undamaged and return to base. Precision fire only against personnel, unless there is strong opposition. Over.”

“Roger that, Bravo-seven, we’re going in, over and out.” The choppers approached the building and its wide, flat roof, with the smaller dome-shaped lab building sitting on top, looking just like what every member of this black ops group had been shown in the training videos. The helos split up to view the building from four directions.

“No targets yet; they may be inside,” said the squad leader. “Insert and approach.” The choppers hovered over the corners of the roof, and the troops jumped out, approaching the dome-shaped lab and surrounding its single entrance door. Once they were in place, the leader counted three and kicked the door in, and the troops rushed inside, crowding through the narrow doorway.

It wasn’t until almost everyone had gone through the door that the squad leader realized that something was wrong. “Back! Back! Come out!” he ordered. But only two of his troops remained, the ones who hadn’t gone inside just yet. Through the open door they saw only an empty dome. “What the …?” said the squad leader for a moment, then he shouted, “Abort! Abort mission! Heavy losses … somehow! Return to helos!” The dome vanished in a sparkling flash of ruby red light.

“Bravo-seven to Gold Leader, we’ve got a … signal,” came a voice on the radio as the leader and his two remaining troops boarded the choppers. “Patching you through.”

Then another voice came through on the leader’s headset. “Squad leader, this is Gold-three-alpha, over,” came a voice.

“Gold-three-alpha, what is your location? Over!” demanded the leader as the helicopters took off to return to base, the mission’s personnel almost completely depleted.

“GPS says … we’re in a cornfield in Kansas, Sir, over.”

“How in the name of all that is holy are you in Kansas? Over!”

“Unknown, Sir,” replied the soldier. “But we are in a cornfield, and GPS says we’re in Kansas. All personnel accounted for with the exception of yourself, Martins, and Hernandez. Over.”

“Martins and Hernandez are with me, Gold-three-alpha,” said the squad leader. “We are returning to base to report. Base will be in communication with you … as soon as they figure out what the Sam Hill just happened here. Over.”

The helicopters returned to where they had come from.

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Michelle walked around the duplicate of their lab’s shell, inspecting it for damage, in case any of the troops had decided to take any potshots at it during the confusion. “The scanner and fabricator that Ghimar gave us are just amazing,” she said.

Jennie said, “I have a question … since it turns out a time crystal doesn’t have to be very large and can be nearly any shape, what exactly are the limitations of the original one, which is pretty darn big and very nearly spherical? And I know we’ve been making bigger ones, but is there any point in that?”

Michelle stopped and thought. “You know … you might be right. We should do some calculations, but off the top of my head, I think that big, round original crystal might be able to transport a planet … or maybe even an entire star. With enough power, I mean. The things we’ve been using it for are very small potatoes compared to its potential.”

“I had another thought,” Jennie added. “We’ve been making time crystals with a lifespan of many times the age of the universe. What if we made some with very limited lifespans? Precisely limited ones?”

“What are you thinking?”

“Time crystals that revert to diamonds right after we use them,” Jennie said. “No need to risk them falling into the wrong hands. They’d just have a diamond, not a time crystal anymore. They’d be easier to make, and they’d be one use.”

“Hmm,” said Michelle, “they could be made from fabricated diamonds, since they don’t have to be that large, and they could be made quickly and easily, compared to the other ones. Interesting thought.”

“Well, anyway, now that it happened,” said Jennie, “we can just make sure this video gets into the right hands, showing footage of them assaulting our lab’s original location, surveilling it with spy planes, and finally assaulting a private company’s facility with full military weaponry.”

“They’re going to claim it’s faked,” Michelle remarked.

“So they’ll have experts analyze it,” Jennie said. “They’ll be able to see that it isn’t computer generated and hasn’t been doctored. And the fact that they won’t be able to tell how it was filmed will say something to our black ops pals: we can see anything they do, anywhere, anytime. If we only knew where the decisions were being made, we could watch that too.”

“Can’t listen, though,” Michelle said.

“Unfortunately true,” said Jennie, nodding ruefully. “But wait. I think I know how we can find where the decisions are being made. All we have to do is watch the right people.”

Later, Jennie turned on their original laser and crystal in observation mode, setting it to the coordinates of the attack on their false base. She focused on the squad leader, then ran time backwards, following the leader’s helicopter ride back to the base where the choppers had taken off. Still running backwards, she watched him get out of the helicopter, walk backwards into the base, and so forth. But …

“Aww, he got his orders over the phone,” Jennie said, disappointed. “But he must have met with them in person at some point.” She kept running time backwards, skimming over the mundane details of his life and travels, until finally she saw him running toward the Pentagon backwards … he wasn’t actually running; Jennie was moving quickly and wanted to see who he met with. Finally he opened a door and entered an office. She ran it backward until he left it again, which of course was the moment when he had actually entered the office. Then she played the scene forward.

“OK, he’s meeting with somebody with higher rank … is that a colonel?” Jennie asked Michelle, who was standing behind her, watching the screen.

“Yeah, he’s got an eagle on his shoulders,” Michelle said.

“OK, this guy gives the orders … we’ll just take some snapshots of his face, the nameplate on his door, and the one on his desk … Colonel Hiram Gaines … and now we’ll follow him around.” Jennie was able to run things forward and backwards and find several instances where Col. Gaines went into meetings with multiple other officers or gave orders to his subordinates and took snapshots whenever something readable appeared on a screen or piece of paper. “I wish we could figure out how to hear sound this way,” she said while looking at a meeting in which Col. Gaines was silently speaking, “but it’s kind of amazing we can see anything without affecting the timeline.”

“There might be a way,” said Michelle, “but there’d probably be a lot of noise. Let’s find out what we can just from looking, for now. We can still take photos of a lot of top secret documents. Another reason they don’t want us to have this. Imagine if governments couldn’t keep secrets anymore!”

“Well, we still can’t read something if it’s in a computer file that nobody opens, or if it’s closed in a file cabinet,” Jennie said. “It has to be visible.”

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The men from the black ops attack and recovery unit that had been displaced to Kansas had been recovered and reunited with the rest of their team. The team was not having a good day as they stood in front of the general’s desk and received a sound rebuking.

Captain Clay, leader of Group Three, also known as Gold-Three-Alpha in the mission that had just wrapped up, spoke up, “But, Sir, we have the body cam video to prove it. We just went through the door and were in a field in Kansas. Don’t know how or why.”

Another captain plugged a memory card into the small slot in the general’s computer and hit play. The large flat screen on the wall that held an image of the flag went black for a second or so, then came the images of the team in a tight helo bay prepping for the mission.

The squad leader was seen standing up and shouted, “Ten Hut!!”

All the men unfastened their flight harnesses and stood at attention.

The squad leader shouted, “Ready arms!!”

All the men held their weapons to their chest after pulling the slide back and opening the breach.

The squad leader shouted, “Lock and load … deploy!!”

Each man slapped a 100 round mag into the receiver and charged their weapons before jumping from the chopper in an orderly but well rehearsed manner. The picture showed them as they approached the dome target, entered via the door, and then … with a flash of light, the images changed to that of a large stand of young, green cornstalks stretching almost as far as the camera could photograph.

Captain Clay said, “See? It’s just as I told you. All we know is we entered the door, then we were in a cornfield in Kansas.”

The general stared at the clip as he slowly played it through once again. A look of sheer wide-eyed astonishment was on the general’s face as he watched this seemingly impossible thing happen. The general banged his fist loudly on his desk as he stood and said sternly, “We cannot allow this tech to remain in the wild. It is far too dangerous and poses one of the most severe threats to national security to date.”

Colonel Gaines stood at attention and popped a smart salute, “Yes, Sir. Am contacting the SatServ division to get a network of satellites to watch. Only issue: we have no means to get to whatever location they happen to pop into in any kind of instant time frame.”

The general scowled at the Colonel. “You had better figure out a way to find them. Think of it, a nuclear weapon suddenly just appears out of thin air and explodes.”

An expression of real concern came across the faces of the entire squadron, “Trust me, Sir,” said the colonel, “I understand perfectly.”

“So do I, Sir,” said Captain Clay. “Remember – I went from a rooftop to a cornfield in Kansas. I do understand.”

The men all saluted sharply and started to leave the office. The general watched the clip again with incredulity. He didn’t realize the time aspect, but he did perfectly understand that macroscopic matter teleportation was taking place.

“Sir! Sir!” came a voice from the hallway as rapidly approaching footsteps could be heard. “General!”

“What is it, Lieutenant Hewison?” asked the general in his booming voice from behind his desk. The squadron parted to let the lieutenant through.

“It’s this, Sir –” He laid a newspaper on the general’s desk. The front page article’s headline was, “Military Repeatedly Assaults Private Citizens with Deadly Force” – “All Branches Deny Involvement.” A sidebar asked the question, “What Is the Pentagon Doing Behind Our Backs?”

“What?” thundered the general. “What paper is this?”

“All of them, Sir,” said Lieutenant Hewison. “It’s all over the TV news, the Internet, everywhere!” He held up his laptop, showing video after video of talking heads that had nothing to discuss but this.

Colonel Gaines turned to the general and said, “Those two girls – they must’ve had cameras watching our every move, Sir!”

The general said, “New orders, Colonel. Incognito. You’re in hiding until further notice. We’ll see if this blows over. Until then, you’re in deep … cover.”

The colonel scowled but said, “Yes, Sir. Troops – with me. Fall in.” He left the office immediately.

There was no one left in the office but the general and Lt. Hewison. “Lieutenant, Public Affairs is to go right on denying that anyone knows anything about this. The nation’s very security rests on it. Do not let this go any further. Is that clear?”

“Yes, Sir!” said Hewison.

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Ghimar looked at the news reports from Jennie and Michelle’s home dimension alongside the two young women. “I suppose it speaks well of your people – that your military is so bad at lying to you.”

“Yeah, they’re not fooling anyone, and they know it,” said Jennie. “Claiming no knowledge … denying any involvement … experts say videos not doctored … vehicles and weaponry accurate …”

Michelle added, “And of course their next move will be to distract, which means our next move must be to distract from their distraction. Which is what these are for.” She pointed to a screen showing photos of top secret documents they’d managed to zero in on in observation mode.

“Meanwhile,” said Jennie, pointing to the video of the general meeting with the entire squad in his office, “we know the exact best time to meet with Dr. Blake and our Nano/Gen friends. Whenever we’re ready.”

So, after the girls suited up, they transported themselves using their new suits, not to the roof of a building, not to any outdoor location at all, but to the interior of an unremarkable laboratory building, one of many owned by the research corporation, at the same exact moment in time that Col. Gaines’ project was gathered in that general’s office, the one time that black ops division had everything to think about other than Michelle and Jennie’s technology.

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Due to the fact that Dr. Blake was the head of Helios Research Station, a high-energy laser research facility, which was also a sister to the world famous Nano/Gen, it meant he could pick and choose his research team.

He chose Dr. Felding due to the fact he was one of the best linguists on the planet, and the fact he was one of the first to begin this project. Dr. Felding’s title on this team was Artifact Linguistic Consultant, which raised a few eyebrows, but due to the actual nature of the women’s find, Nano/Gen became complicit in supplying equipment and expertise.

This, of course, put them in the crosshairs of a certain military black ops group, which couldn’t do anything overt because of its secrecy, but this wasn’t exactly Nano/Gen and its researchers’ first rodeo in this department.

As usual, Dr. Felding was bent over a large picture of one of the crystal’s ebony stand’s legs. He was so close, too; from the best he could tell only minor variations in frequency would allow greater control of the shift.

Dr. Blake was bent over his workbench, assembling some new tunable laser device. He was positive this would allow point-to-point exact relocation if he could just figure out how to make the transition phase transfer location more precise.

Without warning, there was a sparkle of red light, and two individuals were standing in the lab. They wore suits that appeared to be partially made of some type of crystal, down to the very weave of the cloth. They had on helmets, so neither professor could tell who it might be or if they were in danger.

The individuals removed their helmets. The two PhDs were astounded, it was Jennie and Michelle.

Michelle waved, “Hi, Doc. The rumor of our demise was greatly exaggerated."

Dr. Blake said with total astonishment, “You have discovered point-to-point matter relocation. And … with what device? That’s … incredible.”

Dr. Fielding said, “Based on my most recent collaboration with Dr. Blake, I’ve discovered a potential use for the large crystal.”

Jennie and Michelle asked at the same time, “What could something with those capabilities have been used for?”

Dr. Felding motioned the girls over and pointed to a particular diagram. “What this is showing, best I can tell, is that the use of a ruby laser set to this energy output and harmonic has the potential to move a planet.” He slid another blown-up picture over and pointed to another series of glyphs. “If you’ll notice, these glyphs are different and appear to be more pictograms. Based on what I can tell from looking at them …” He looked up at the girls, then continued, “The moon isn’t a planetoid as we think of them, but is some type of ship, and the diamond and its stand are the engine.”

The girls looked at each other with raised eyebrows.

Michelle said, “Something to add to our prodigious to-do list. Right at this moment we have another rather serious issue. The military is after us with shoot to kill on sight orders.“

Jennie said, “Yea, so there aren’t any witnesses to the theft of our equipment. Except … we’ve got a witness. Wherever we go.”

Michelle said, “I think I’m going to pay a certain military individual a visit and perhaps … take him on a vacation of a lifetime.”

Jennie laughed, “I can think of a few choice places to take him.”

Michelle said with a wink at Jennie as she picked her helmet back up, “So can I, and a few I’m sure he will wet his pants over.”

Dr. Blake replied, “I’ve had no experience with such things before now, but several of my Nano/Gen colleagues have had to deal with these covert organizations. There’s always some excuse about ‘national security’ or some such rot.”

“Oh, really?” asked Jennie. “That sounds awfully familiar right now. How do they deal with it?”

“The way they’ve handled it in the past owes a lot to the fact that Nano/Gen is such a large and globe-spanning corporation,” Dr. Blake explained. “They just had the technology transferred to a branch in some other country, where these US soldiers can’t go without it being an act of war. It does make it more difficult for my colleagues to work with their discoveries, but they can still do so, with a long enough airline flight.”

“Hmm,” said Michelle, “we don’t exactly have branches in every nation, but it’s true that we can get anywhere without a long flight.”

“Oh!” said Jennie. “Oh oh oh!”

“I think Jennie just had an idea,” Michelle said.

“We know how to give them what they want without giving them what they want!” Jennie said quickly.

“Oh!” Michelle also said, realizing what Jennie meant.

“Would anyone care to explain?” asked Dr. Felding.

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Col. Gaines and his troops had flown, in military planes at taxpayer expense, to one of their project’s more out-of-the-way bases. The goal was to avoid the public eye until the scandal blew over. This base, however, happened to be in the Louisiana swamps. Situated on a series of metal platforms, the base’s various buildings were separated by precarious bridges, and the occasional alligator was visible gliding by in the murky waters below. Col. Gains did not enjoy his post, even though he had a building to himself on a platform of his own. It was still extraordinarily warm and humid, and there was no air conditioning.

Gains sat at his desk, sweated, and looked at the latest reports on his military-sanctioned laptop computer. No reports of those girls’ activity had been received, although of course he’d never been able to requisition the satellite time he’d wanted to get before his group had had to go off grid. But he still knew that those two girls had somehow stumbled upon one of the most important discoveries in human history. They had to get the technology away from them before they discovered what they really had.

Suddenly, after a bright red sparkle, there was a figure in his office wearing some kind of crystalline space suit. He reached for the alarm button ...

Amazingly, instead of being able to hit the alarm, he was on top of a mountain. He fumbled for his sidearm instead as he began to realize that he was dressed for hot weather and it was now well below zero and extremely windy.

“Oh, never mind the gun, Colonel,” said a woman’s voice from inside the space suit, apparently amplified electronically. “I’m here to give you want you want, so you’ll leave us alone. And by the way, if you don’t behave, I’ll just leave you here, to freeze in the death zone.”

He stopped trying to get his gun and shivered as he replied, “G-give me what I w-want?”

“Yes,” said the young woman, doubtless one of the two his group had been trying to find for weeks now. “Here. This is for you.” In her space suit’s gauntleted hand was a large crystal, the size of a softball. “Have fun.” She held it out before his face. There it was, the object they had all been searching for … probably. He had no idea except that it was supposed to be a large round crystal.

He took it and continued to shiver. He was quickly losing body temperature, and the air pressure was extremely low making it extremely difficult to breath with the severe cold exacerbating the problem.

“I should put you back before you turn into an icicle,” she said. “But remember, be quick.”

And then he was back in the sweltering heat of his office. After the chill mountain wind, it felt even hotter.

And then she was gone. It could all have been a heat-induced hallucination, he thought to himself.

He collapsed into his chair and lay his hands down on his desk limply. Something clattered against his laptop computer, rolling out of his hands.

It was a huge, softball-sized, beautifully faceted crystal.

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Michelle reappeared and began removing her suit. She came up to Jennie and saw what was on her screen. She’d used the observation mode and was looking at images of herself with her mother and father. Tears were in her eyes.

The twin realizations that they could look at their parents in the past but never actually be with them again suddenly hit Michelle like a ton of bricks. “Oh,” said Michelle, gasping for a moment at the rush of emotion. “I …”

Jennifer quickly turned off the observer. The monitor went dark. Jennifer sniffled and blinked her tears away. “Did you do it?” she asked Michelle.

Michelle swallowed. “Yes,” she said, recovering. “I took him to the summit of Gasherbrum I,” Michelle replied. “Gave him the crystal we made special, just for him.”

“Seven days,” Jennie replied. “Why that mountain?”

“It’s juuuuust in the death zone,” Michelle replied. “And also it doesn’t have a super narrow peak that he could’ve fallen off. Or dropped the crystal off. I didn’t want him to be too comfortable, but I also wanted him to get my message and live to tell about it. It’s important they know that we can do this to them at any time.”

“I’ve gotten started on our new bases,” Jennie said. “Nice and subterranean. Financed with diamonds, all begun years ago and hidden, vacant until today. Remember when our parents had to deal with those squatters who were after the gold on our property?”

“Yeah.”

“I looked back at that earlier. For inspiration.”

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Col. Gaines sat at his desk in total unbelieving incredulity. The metal parts of his unform were still so cold that they had begun to collect a sheen of frost from the high humidity. He examined the beautifully faceted crystal for a few more minutes before he got on his comm and called one of his physics troopers to his office. While he waited, he did everything he could think of to warm it up. The crystal was extremely cold to the touch.

A young blond woman bounded into the colonel’s office, stood at attention, popped a precision salute with a smart heel click, and said, “Captain Cynthia Curtsie at your service.”

The colonel was still trying to warm up the crystal as he said, “At ease, Captain. We finally got the item we’ve been so diligently searching for.”

The captain’s eyes grew large with amazement, “Sir, if that stone happens to be a diamond, it’s worth more than our helo. It’s larger than the Hope before it was cut several times.”

The colonel smiled as he held the crystal out to the captain, still wrapped in a face towel, saying, “I think this particular stone has more intrinsic value than just as a diamond.”

The captain took the jewel, towel and all. She could feel the intense cold still radiating from the stone, “I’ve never seen a refrigerator diamond before.”

The colonel replied, “You wouldn’t believe how I got that crystal if I told you. I will tell you this: for the three or four minutes I was there, it was colder than the North Side of … “ His comm beeped, interrupting. “Col. Gaines.”

The tinny voice replied, “This is Staff Sergeant Rolot. We are in those women’s valley, exploring to see if we can find anything.”

The colonel replied, “Just be stealthy, we don’t need any more publicity.”

The sergeant replied, “Yes, Sir. We found what looks like a carved door high up in a cliff wall. We have several rappelling teams scaling the cliff. We’re gonna inspect whatever is inside that door.”

The colonel asked, “Why would you call it a door on the side of a cliff face? I’d think it’d be more of a cave.”

The sergeant replied, “In my entire life I have never seen a cave of any type with a perfectly rectangular opening that looks as if some kind of high energy beam cut it in the stone. From what the rappelling team leader just told me, they entered the door, and the room was carved out of the solid living rock by means we cannot identify. The room is forty feet by forty feet. The ceiling is eight feet.”

The colonel sat forward in his chair. “Did you find anything in the room by chance?”

The sergeant replied, “The room was perfectly clean. No dirt, no cobwebs, no animal spoor. An interesting thing we’re still looking into is a bright beam of light in the dead center of the room. We’re all stumped as to what’s making it. There’s no direct path to any natural light source."

By this time the captain was obviously fidgeting with so much excitement that she was about to wet her panties. As it was, it was a good thing she had on a panty liner, or her uniform trousers would have had a rather interesting wet spot between her legs.

The captain asked, “With permission, is it possible for me to see that place and bring a team with me?”

The colonel lowered his comm and replied, “I would love to send a team and all the equipment. The issue is, we already screwed the pooch because of the attack our unit attempted to do on a building we had intel on saying all the items we were searching for were in there. When the team arrived, all but three were suddenly in a cornfield in Kansas. We have the com recording as proof – unfortunately, so do the media and every internet blog. This has generated a tremendous amount of backlash and a few lawsuits.”

The captain replied in a whiney voice, “Pllleeaaasssssseee can I go? From the intel I have been given, what those women found is a technology well beyond our understanding. I want to see if I can find anything else.”

The colonel looked up and smiled, “On one condition – this is mandatory – all the teams and all your equipment must arrive at that location in total secrecy. We cannot have any more incidents. The general’s orders. If anyone other than him finds out we still exist, we really won’t anymore. Not until this blows over." He didn’t tell her the rest – that whatever the technology was they were trying to prevent those girls from developing, they had already developed it, and at an alarming rate.

“Yes, Sir!” said Captain Curtsie. “Nobody will know. It’ll be the quietest infiltration ever seen.”

And it was pretty good. Cars and trucks converged on the valley’s single road entrance seemingly by coincidence, coming from different directions and starting at different times, arriving at the same time. No air travel – planes couldn’t land in the valley, and helicopters made too much noise.

The captain and her team came in two SUVs that had left from two different nondescript motels in two different towns, different distances away. The equipment came on an unmarked flatbed truck, covered in canvas, from a military supply depot in the middle of nowhere. But all arrived at the same moment. They didn’t know it, but they were being watched from another place, time, and dimension.

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“That’s our valley!” said Jennie, incensed. “They’re trespassing! They can’t just waltz in there and mess things up! It’s belonged to our families for generations!”

“I know it,” replied Michelle as the two of them watched on the monitor, recording everything for the eventual lawsuit that they suspected they were probably filing at this very moment, from the future. “The question is, what are we going to do about it?”

“It looks like that captain there is in charge,” Jennie said. “Want to grab her, put her somewhere else? That’ll cause confusion.”

Michelle replied, “I have a suspicion that she knows something about what she’s doing. She may look small and cute, but I think she’s the brains of the operation. Underestimating her would be like … well, underestimating us.”

“Pity she’s on the wrong side,” said Jennie. “Let’s see what they’re doing. Probably found that light in that cave – we still don’t know what that’s all about.”

“Hm, maybe they’ll learn something,” Michelle said. “You could try using the audio technique you’ve been experimenting with.”

“It’s still really noisy,” Jennie said. “I’m trying to use algorithms to clean it up, but it’s still pretty rough.”

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“Now then,” said the captain, “the scissor lift will make it child’s play to get up to that cave, so let’s get that transported into place and securely leveled.”

“Yes Ma’am,” said two engineers and got to it as other team members cleared underbrush, basically making a rough road from the existing dirt road to the cave entrance. It wasn’t long before they were slowly towing the scissor lift there with one of the SUVs, which actually was a utility vehicle disguised as a consumer product. And while they were doing that, Captain Curtsie had set up a mobile lab not far from the lift. She packed a backpack full of test kits and equipment and took it with her, the first team to go up the lift.

In the cave, the captain and the others met some of the rappelling team that had been there earlier; they were still here, keeping the cave secure, or so they thought.

“Good evening, Sergeant,” said the captain. “Anything to report?”

“Nothing happening here, Ma’am,” the sergeant replied, lowering his salute. “This place is … very quiet. Oddly quiet, I’d say. It’s the perfect place for birds to roost or even climbing animals to make a den in, and …” He looked around. “That’s just never happened. Ever. There’s dust in the back of the cave that looks like it’s been undisturbed for centuries – well, that’s a wild guess. There are no animal tracks in it, no insects, nothing. Something keeps everything away from here.” It was true, the only markings in the dust that got thicker as the cave went back were the footprints of the troops … and two other sets.

“It might be this light,” said the captain, walking around the peculiar column of light, shining at a square dustless patch of nearly smooth stone. “It might prevent animals from sleeping properly in here. But I doubt that would do it alone. There might be something else, which is why I want to take some samples.” She took samples of the dust at different distances from the entrance, she knocked loose some rock from the cave walls, floor, and ceiling; all went into labeled vials for later testing.

“Then there are other kinds of samples,” she said. She set up a spectrometer and carefully measured the spectrum of the light, storing that in data files in her laptop computer. Then she set up an array of instruments on a tripod, including several different microphones. “These are ambient mics, so they’ll pick up any sound at all, on a wide range of frequencies, some of them too high or low for us to hear. For that reason, I’d like everyone to leave the cave for this test, myself included. I’ll start it recording before we leave, then come back and stop it. I want to know if there are any sonic vibrations that might be scaring away the wildlife.”

Everyone started leaving via the scissor lift, but it took a few trips for everyone to get to the ground. The rappellers used their ropes, which were already in place. Once they were all out of the cave, the captain waved them all some distance away, then motioned for total silence with a finger to her lips. For several minutes there was no sound but the breeze through the trees and the chirping of some distant birds.

“OK,” said the captain, “that should do it. Time to go back and fetch my laptop. Sergeant, come with me. Brockelman, Harris, you too.” This group ascended the scissor lift. As they ascended above the level of the cave’s floor, the captain gasped.

Her equipment was gone. Her instruments, her laptop, vanished. She saw a sheet of paper, and as soon as she could, she hopped out of the lift and ran to pick it up. There was a handwritten note that said, “This is OUR VALLEY. Work WITH us and not AGAINST us, or you will get NOTHING.” It was signed, “M & J.”

“PS: Hurry up with that crystal!” read Captain Curtsie. “What? That must be Michelle Danwoo and Jennie Kent, but … how did they even … there aren’t even any new footprints … and what do they mean, hurry up with the crystal? I mean, that diamond is in a lab being tested, and all we’ve figured out are discrepancies between its inertial and passive gravitational mass …”

The sergeant swore. “Ma’am, it’s the colonel. You’d better hear this.” He put his phone on speaker.

“Captain, I don’t know how, but we’re already being sued – again,” said the colonel’s voice. “The lawyers have footage of you on their property.”

“What, already?” asked the captain.

“Yes, timestamped just hours ago,” the colonel replied. “I saw your plan – very stealthy – but it looks like it wasn’t good enough, somehow. The lawsuit describes trespassing, destruction of underbrush, setting up a scissor lift, and taking rock samples without permission.”

“It’s not like the financial damages of any of that are very great …” the captain said.

“That’s not the point!” shouted the colonel. “You were to be undetected! You were not! The general’s already heard about this, and we are this close to being shut down. The whole world is asking why the US military is harassing two young ladies and invading their private property, which their families have owned for centuries.”

“Wow,” said the captain, “Now I don’t feel like we should be here either. Nobody told me that.”

“Regardless, they have some kind of technology that can’t be allowed to be in the hands of just anyone!” said the colonel. “Have you found anything? Anything that might justify this fiasco?”

“I have … dust and rock samples,” said the captain. “They got the rest.”

“What do you mean, they got the rest?”

“They … got it. Somehow. My laptop, with all my data. All my spectrographic data, my magnetometers, my seismometers, my mic array, everything. It was just gone.”

“I suppose we could countersue that they’ve stolen from the Defense Department,” said the colonel, “except that would be admitting we were there, on their private property, without their permission, just as they’re accusing us of doing. And we’d have to somehow prove it was them.”

“They did leave a note,” the captain said.

“What’s it say?” The captain read it to him.

“Not very good evidence,” said the colonel. “The lawyers would just ask who M and J are, and ask for any evidence to prove that they took your gear. The note doesn’t even claim they did. What’s this about the crystal?”

“I don’t know, Sir,” said the captain. “It’s being studied at the lab.”

“Well, for now, here are my orders. Clear out of there, all of you. Get whatever you can – I don’t care if it’s cell phone photos or leaves from trees, just get anything that might tell you anything, and get out of there now. Get off their property before the reporters get there and start asking you questions. And get to the lab and get to work with that crystal.”

“What should I do with it, Sir?” asked the captain, as the others began hurriedly packing up and stowing gear.

“How should I know?” the colonel replied. “Do your science stuff. All I know is that’s the second time they’ve said to hurry up with it, so that must mean something. Sounds like some kind of time limit, so get to it!”

“Yes, Sir!” said Captain Curtsie, taking several photos with her own phone while handing the sergeant’s phone back to him. She got back onto the scissor lift and headed down. The lift was soon packed back onto the flatbed truck and gone with everything and everyone else.

“How did they do it?” the captain asked the lieutenant next to her in the SUV as they traveled toward the lab, a trip that would take hours. “They somehow took my gear and left a note, silently, without leaving a trace.”

“I’ve got no idea, Ma’am,” replied the lieutenant. “You’re the science expert around here. I’m an engineer, and I can’t think of how it was done. Unless they have some kind of secret door in the cave that we didn’t see. But that would have made a noise, wouldn’t it? We were all being completely silent for several minutes.”

“Yeah … but you know, they were really insistent that we hurry up with the crystal. What if it’s got something to do with that? The colonel said we had what we needed … did they give it to him? Why was it so cold? And why does it have different inertial and gravitational masses? That’s supposed to be impossible!”

The lieutenant replied, “The same thing having two different masses? Yeah, that’s … that doesn’t even make sense. Matter just doesn’t do that.”

Captain Curtsie pinched her lower lip between her fingers, which she did when she was thinking hard. “Unless …”

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The captain had arrived back at the base and was seated in front of her research computer, having just typed up what had happened in the valley and submitted it as a report as part of the typical military devotion to structure and bureaucracy.

In her mind, she had a crazy idea, but at the same time she knew that according to currently known quantum physics, what she was thinking only existed in a quantum state among entangled particles and not as a solid crystal.

The other thing that bothered her was the fact that this “small” softball-sized crystal – she tried not to think of it as a diamond that would by itself be worth untold millions of dollars, scientific value aside – reacted so oddly to normal broad-spectrum light. The amount of time passage before the beam managed to exit the crystal on an antipodal facet was ridiculous. Its effective index of refraction was so abnormal that only its facets kept the thing’s sheer oddness from being immediately obvious to the eye.

Best she could tell, the light beam had somehow been captured by the mysterious core and forced to circle it. She knew that at about 186 thousand miles a second … the beam was going nowhere extremely fast until somehow it was released and exited to be collected on the target. That appeared as a straight line. The captain’s eyes opened wide – that would mean that whatever happened within the crystal, the light and it did not interact, but some extremely powerful force, or something akin to a force, had captured and modified the photons’ travel path.

She looked around. They had one of the newest high-powered X-ray lasers already set up for high energy research. She shrugged, took the crystal over to the test stage, and locked it into place, hoping to get some kind of reading on its internal crystal structure. She was very fortunate not to have been standing within the splash range of the crystal when she pushed the activation button – nobody wanted to stand uninsulated in front of a high-energy X-ray source, so the controls were a distance away behind a lead shield.

Many objects vanished in a bright flash, only to return once she turned off the power, coated thickly with some form of super cold ice that slowly began to sublimate, producing thick clouds of white mist that gathered along the floor.

As quickly as she could, the captain, with the aid of several lab assistants, took as many samples of the sublimating mist as they safely could. According to the measurements with the temperature control equipment, those particular items had been exposed to temperatures in excess of 387 degrees Fahrenheit below zero. She was shocked. How had things just disappeared, and exactly where had they disappeared to where the temperature was that low? And just what was this crystal?

The captain went to the laser stage and opened the safety door. As soon as her eyes fell on the crystal, she knew something had drastically changed. The stone was a beautifully faceted crystle that sparkled brightly, although some kind of … she wasn’t sure, inner light? Was now missing.

It didn’t take her long to discover that she now had a softball sized diamond. She couldn’t believe it. A stone this size had to cost several fortunes, but it now felt heavy in her hand … just as she would have expected it to. She knew that the process had somehow transmuted the stone back into what it had originally been.

The captain narrowed her eyes as she thought, “So … now I know that somehow, someone has figured out how to create a solid time crystal.” Then she started reading several online articles about time crystals until she knew what she had just said was accurate … and theoretically impossible. But she now held in her hand a crystal that had a high probability of still having a solid time crystal for a heart. That was shocking.

“Those two young women … Danwoo and Kent … did they do this?” she wondered to herself. “Did they make that mysterious neverending sourceless light in that cave? But how, and why? Or did they find something in that cave, and if so, what?” Her curiosity was piqued, but for the moment she was stymied, because the crystal was now an ordinary diamond. “And did they make this crystal to work once somehow and give it to the colonel? And why?”

“Well, there’s only one thing to do now,” said Captain Curtsie, and started recording all the data from the experiment she’d just done, entering the exact frequency setting of the laser in the lab report, along with the pulse time, precise positioning and orientation of the crystal mount with respect to the source, and the temperature measurement of the ice samples. The lab report already had the refractive index and mass measurements of the crystal before the laser test. She repeated these measurements on the crystal now. Then she busied herself with determining the precise chemical composition of the ice. “We traded the crystal for this data,” she said to herself, “so I’m taking as much of it as I can.”

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“The crystal’s WHAT?” asked the colonel next time he asked the captain for a status report.

“It’s all there in the report, Sir,” Captain Curtsie replied. “It’s an ordinary diamond now. Mass and light throughput measurements suggest that it retained a small time crystal core after the laser test, but that core shrunk to nothing as time passed, and now it’s gone. But that test, Sir …”

“It says the test coated a large portion of the lab in 97% dry ice, 2.1% water ice, and various other frozen gases,” the colonel said.

“More than that, Sir. It … sent the objects in the lab somewhere, and brought them back. They went somewhere that was very cold, where those materials precipitated onto the equipment. It brought those materials back with the lab equipment. And according to all the latest planetary probe data, there’s nowhere in this solar system where that precise combination of ices can be found.”

“Nowhere in … are you saying that it sent the lab equipment to somewhere out in space?” the colonel asked.

“That seems a reasonable hypothesis, Sir,” Captain Curtsie replied, “but the evidence is based on only one incident. I can hardly call it conclusive. Still, the ice came from somewhere. Its existence is incontrovertible.”

“And it burned out the crystal somehow,” said the colonel.

“I’ve got no definite conclusions,” said the captain, taking off her glasses thoughtfully as she held the phone with her other hand, “but some preliminary equations are telling me that the crystal had a limited lifespan, and this was going to happen to it anyway. The experiment merely hastened the inevitable.”

“Well,” said the colonel, “if you’ve got a theory, does it tell you what you’d have to do in order to make another crystal?”

“Make one?” the captain asked. “Well, first I’d need a diamond – but of course I’ve got one right here – and then I’d need to … hmm …” She scribbled on a sheet of paper with a pencil. “If we … then if I substitute this term … then solve for … OK. Sir, according to my theory, each time crystal has a lifespan, a duration. You can use a time crystal to make another time crystal, but it uses up the lifespan of the first one to make the second one, which is always shorter than the first one. Except … the higher the lifespan of the first one, the closer the second one’s lifespan gets to the first one’s … and there’s a threshold when the product has an equal lifespan. Then, past that, the product crystal’s lifespan is longer. That means that if you have a crystal with a lifespan above the threshold, you can make as many as you want.”

“And what is that threshold?” the colonel asked.

“According to the admittedly very sparse data I’ve got,” replied Captain Curtsie, “somewhere around the current age of the universe.”

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“Yep, Captain Curtsie is very smart,” said Jennie. “She’s got a good start on the whole theory of solid time crystals.”

“But will it work?” asked Michelle. “That’s the question. I mean, will it get them to leave us alone?”

“I’m not sure,” Jennie said. “But I can tell you one thing for certain …”

“What’s that?”

Jennie focused the image of the observation system on the paper where the captain had been writing her equations. “Those equations 100% tell her that the time crystals allow time and dimension travel. She has to know it. But she didn’t mention it at all in her lab report, and she didn’t mention it to her boss. The audio may still be staticky, but I could tell that much.”

“Is that because she knows we might be watching?” asked Michelle.

“Maybe,” said Jennie, “but most likely? I think she thinks time travel and going to other dimensions are supposed to be something out of science fiction, bad movies. Extraordinary claims requiring extraordinary evidence, that kind of thing. And she just doesn’t have the evidence. Either she’s dismissing the idea out of hand, or she’s refusing to make the claim until she can substantiate it.”

Ghimar had also been watching. “My people and I are watching,” they said, their translation computer sounding believably human now, though with an unusual accent, “and if they do not use proper precautions as you have, we will be forced to take action. It was a risk, giving them a crystal, even one with a limited lifespan.”

“Well, right now they don’t have a crystal anymore, and they can’t make one,” Michelle replied.

“Yes,” Ghimar replied, “right now.”

Jennie adjusted the observation system. “Meanwhile, the last of the reporters has left our valley,” she said. “They’ve all seen the video we sent them. They’ve all scoured the area and proven that it really happened – too many tire tracks and cleared underbrush exactly where it happened in the video.”

“We’ve still got Captain Curtsie’s gear,” Michelle reminded her.

“Yeah, and maybe we should give it back to her,” Jennie said, “after making sure we leave her only with data we think is safe to leave her with … and maybe a message from us to her.”

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Captain Curtsie sat at her research station and banged her fist in frustration. She knew for a fact the system worked, but there was some variable she was missing. She’d been attempting to model her idea on the new quantum MMX system. She was determined to put this overpriced calculator through its paces as she entered her ideas.

After pounding on her keyboard like she was at war, the captain's solution involved combining photonic time crystals with an additional spatial structure. Her idea created “photonic space-time crystals” by integrating photonic time crystals made of silicon spheres that could “trap” and hold light longer than had previously been possible. The light then reacted much better to periodic changes in material properties.

She said into her voice recorder, “What my equations are pointing to are resonances that intensify the interactions between light and matter. In such optimally tuned systems, the bandgap extends across nearly the entire momentum space, which means light can be amplified regardless of its direction of propagation. This could be the crucial missing step on the way toward practical use of such novel optical materials in the manner I’m attempting. However, to achieve such an entangled state at the required spins and frequencies would be impossible on a human time scale.”

Just as the captain sat back in her chair, put her hands on top of her head, and sighed loudly, a rather large, bright red flash happened behind her back. The captain spun around in her chair and stood in alarm. “Wh …. Who are you?” The captain pointed and asked, “How did you do that?”

There were three individuals standing in the middle of her lab in some type of elaborate space suit made from what looked like some type of crystal. Two were obviously female, while the other was taller, but more difficult to pin down.

The voice of a female said, “Please do not be afraid; we mean you no harm.”

The other female said, “We are going to take you someplace and … educate you a bit.”

The tall one said in a strangely accented voice, “And hopefully keep you from damaging yourself.”

The captain perceived a sort of bright flash, then she was aware she was now in a very large research / construction area behind a very thick explosion-proof viewing window. Much of the equipment her eyes fell on she was amazed to even see. Most of it was well beyond cutting edge.

“What – where –”

The two women removed their helmets. “Welcome to our lab, Captain Curtsie,” said one of them.

“Wait … I’ve seen your photos … you’re Jennifer Kent … and you’re Michelle Danwoo,” said the captain.

“Please, call me Jennie,” said the redhead.

“And I am Ghimar,” said the third. “Pardon if I do not remove my helmet. I am … not human.”

“Oh … so you gave this technology to them. I get it now.”

“Negative,” replied Ghimar. “The crystal was their discovery, as was their discovery of using it for … transference purposes. However, I am here to ensure that no widespread harm occurs due to their use of the technology. I am not permitted to give them additional technology along those lines.”

Michelle said, “To be honest, Ghimar did help us out with some other technology that wasn’t forbidden. Full disclosure. Their 3D printing tech is so amazing.”

“Err, well then, please call me Cynthia,” she said. “You … do realize that I’m with the Army?”

“Are you?” Jennie asked, her head tilted. “I was under the impression that you worked for a clandestine Defense Department black-ops group not affiliated with any specific armed service.”

Cynthia replied, “Err, well, that’s supposed to be classified …”

“Oh, it is,” replied Michelle, “but trust me, we know everything. We know what you were working on before you learned about our find. We know exactly who leaked it to you. Let’s just say that some of the scientists at Nano/Gen can be trusted … and some can’t.”

“Umm, so … why have you brought me here?” Cynthia asked as she looked around at the amazingly advance equipment. “Wherever here is.”

“Oh, we’re on Earth,” Jennie replied. “I mean, under the Earth, but on Earth.”

“I suppose that’s why you’re hard to find with satellites and planes,” Cynthia said, nodding now that it made sense.

“Sure, let’s go with that. There’s no way in or out of here except by our means. ” said Michelle. “But as Ghimar will tell you shortly, there’s a problem with you having the technology, one that makes it OK for us to have it.”

Ghimar interjected, “I cannot quite tell her yet.”

“Fine, I’ll tell her now,” said Jennie. “The problem is time travel.”

“Also dimensional travel,” Michelle added.

“For real?” Cynthia replied. “I mean, my equations said those things were possible given the theory I came up with based on the crystal’s measurements, but I dismissed them as ridiculous. Those things have no evidence to prove they exist. But you’re telling me …?”

“All right, there, now I can say it,” Ghimar said. “Time travel exists, it can be done in the precise way your equations state, and it is dangerous. If few have the technology, it can be monitored. If many have it, it becomes more problematic.”

“Problematic why?” Cynthia asked.

“Any device you build must contain certain safeguards that I will show you,” said Ghimar. “If it does not, there is the possibility that you will induce a causality violation and create a paradox that could reverberate throughout all of space and time, potentially destroying or at least damaging every universe in existence.”

Cynthia gulped. “Uhh, no one wants that,” she said faintly. “Wait, is that what the dissonant singularity wave solution to the equations are predicting …?”

“Precisely,” Ghimar replied. “We cannot allow unregulated use of coherent ring laser time crystal technology. It is risky to your universe, to my people, and to all universes.”

“Meaning that we can’t let other governments have it!” Cynthia said. “But we need it, if we’re going to protect the world from –”

“You don’t understand,” Jennie said, getting close to Cynthia’s face. “That is more people getting it. Just us, they can keep track of. Just you too, maybe. But if the US military starts mass-producing time and dimension travel units that any soldier can use, and sending them out into combat in some way, that’s putting them at risk.”
Michelle added, “And you know some rogue nation’s going to get one, disable its safeguards, and try to use it to go back in time and try to wipe out their enemies before they exist. And boom, there goes the universe.”

“Or, worse than that,” said Jennie, “some terrorist group gets it and threatens to destroy the universe that way unless the world gives in to their demands.”

“Or some maniac gets it who just wants the world to burn,” added Michelle.

“And that assumes that every nation in your fractious world does not do the same,” said Ghimar. “Too many variables. The risk must be minimized.”

“Ghimar doesn’t want to say it,” said Jennie, “what they mean is … if this technology becomes worldwide … well … their people are going to have to destroy the Earth.”

“To save the rest of our universe, and all the other universes too,” added Michelle. “We found something on our property a while ago … and it’s inadvertently made us the custodians of a thing that can’t fall into the wrong hands.”

Ghimar said, “I … did not want to bring that up so soon.”

“No, wait, I see,” said Cynthia. “You folks, you gotta be monitoring all the different universes there must be, looking for any sign of paradox-inducing time travel. You have to keep it under control. Maybe you’ve even seen what happens when you don’t.”

“We have,” Ghimar replied. “It is … apocalyptic tragedy beyond comprehension.”

Cynthia paused for a moment and turned pale. “Oh jeez … whole universes full of inhabited planets … whole histories wiped out of existence … you’re right, you’d have to destroy the Earth or it would be destroyed anyway, along with so, so many others …”

“We gave Col. Gainer a limited crystal in hopes he’d hand it to someone who had a scientific background to work on it,” Jennie said. “We were hoping they’d be someone we could explain this to. If it didn’t work … the crystal turns inert after a while, and nothing happens, we hoped.”

Michelle added, “We’d really like to just live in our valley and not be harassed. Our families have lived there for generations. Maybe someday have families of our own to pass it down to.”

“It’s not our fault we can’t share this,” Jennie said. “But we also can’t just hide the crystal somewhere. We’ve got to safeguard it. Fortunately, we’ve learned how to use it, so it gives us abilities that others don’t have, meaning we’re better at safeguarding it than just the average owner of a huge diamond.”

“I … I don’t know what to do with this information,” Cynthia said. “The colonel … and the general too … they’re going to want some kind of … results. I can report everything you’ve said, but they’re not going to believe the word of two unaccredited scientists – it wouldn’t matter if you both had PhDs – and an alien from another dimension. For all they know, you’re all actors, paid by one of our enemy nations, to keep the technology away from the US.”

“Show them the wave cascade that your equations predict,” said Ghimar. “Have others check your work.”

“Or have a team dig at these coordinates,” said Michelle, handing Cynthia a slip of paper. “They will find a list, engraved in stone, of the names of everyone involved in your secret project … a list that we buried there in AD 1000. We’ve had the spot checked out. Nothing disturbs that spot. No paradoxes. The failsafes wouldn’t have let us plant it there if there were any.”

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Captain Curtsie sat at her research cubicle in total mind blown incredulity. The finding of the large well sealed crystal box right where those women had said sort of raised an eyebrow. The huge shocker came when she opened the box. The promised engraved stone tablets with the complete list of names, rank, and organizational affiliation were neatly stacked. There were other artifacts within the sealed crystal box, such as an etch photo of Michelle and Jennie, engraved on mahogany wood, which afforded them a perfect way to date the interior of the box – along with other items that could also be dated.

The captain stared at her computer screen as the carbon and electron scatter dating came in. According to the results, the items in the crystal box were, give or take about 100 years, exactly the right age the women had told her. Close enough that there was no doubt that those women did in fact have the means to travel in time. She was looking at the incredible proof.

She turned to her other computer and opened her research file. To her total and complete astonishment, all her research on time/dimensional crystals were gone. A bit of advanced hacking showed it was the general himself that had deleted the many files based on the time the files were deleted and the time stamp on his access code. As nasty as the general was over not finding or being able to understand the tech he claimed he so desperately wanted, she was sort of nonplussed that it was he who had deleted it.

She smiled. It was a very good thing that she kept a backup archive file on her laptop, or this would have been a major disaster. Now the captain began having more than sympathetic thoughts about Michelle and Jennie after what they had said – and that other individual who had claimed to be not from Earth.

She began to wonder if there were a way she could join their research team and leave this circus of losers. She would have to ask.

She picked up her phone and dialed the number engraved on the etch plate. It rang twice, and a familiar female voice answered, “Hello Captain. I’m not really sure if we would want to delete that part of time where you joined your clandestine organization. All the many interactions connected with every movement we do makes that move very complicated. Besides, the safeguards prevent paradoxes, so it probably wouldn’t work anyway.”

Once again, the captain’s eyebrows rose, “Who is this, and how did you know what I was calling about?”

The person on the other end laughed, “This is Jennie. I see you retrieved the box. Are you satisfied we can do what we’re claiming?"

The captain smiled. “I have this funny feeling you already know. I want to …”

“Yes, I know, “ replied Jennie, “Find a way to lose the organization you were foolish enough to join.”

The captain asked, “Is there a way? Black Ops has a very long reach, and has a tendency of being where you least expect.”

Jennie laughed. “That may normally be true. The only issue is that none of them … or even you, know who and what you’re dealing with or understand the consequences of one simple error. Something as stupid as tossing a bottlecap onto the street. A passing car runs over it, slashes a tire, and has a major accident, killing many people. But one of the children that got killed is the one person who saves the entire planet from nuclear holocaust in the near future of this event. Now, he’s not there … no one to stop the disaster."

Captain Curtsie’s eyes grew large in horror as the importance of what Jennie had just said sank in and made an impression, “Is there a …”

She never got to finish what she was asking, because almost faster than she could realize, there was a bright red flash, and someone in some kind of suit appeared? Another flash, and she was once again in the dream place full of highly advanced electronics.

“Hi, Cynthia,” said Michelle, taking her helmet off. “We can talk here. But let me get out of this suit. It’s still kind of bulky.” She went behind a screen and continued. “Jennie will be right here – she’s setting up a scan program to run. But the point is, you haven’t made any decisions yet that you can’t undo. We can put you right back in the exact place and time we brought you here from, so it’ll be like you never left. Nothing’s irrevocable yet.”

“OK,” said Cynthia, “so you know what’s happened. They took my research. Not that I don’t have backup copies they don’t know about, especially after you took my stuff earlier …”

“Yeah, sorry about that,” said Jennie, entering the room. “But you know what we want – we just want to be able to live our lives in our valley, unbothered by whoever and whatever.”

“If I agree to work with you, do I get my stuff back?”

“Oh – sure!” said Michelle. “We packed it up in the storage room. We didn’t wipe your hard drive or anything like that. All your measuring gear is there too.”

“Actually the thing is …” said Jennie, “the light in that cave. It comes from nowhere. We … actually still don’t know why.”

“Yeah,” said Michelle, “that’s a mystery we still haven’t solved. I mean, you learned that you can shine a beam of light into one of these solid time crystals and it comes out about a tenth of a second later, but that can’t explain it – there’s no crystal in that cave anymore, and the light’s been there for much longer than a tenth of a second. And it’s kind of weirdly ambient.”

“That’s right,” Cynthia replied. “You can’t really tell where it’s coming from. It’s like it’s coming from all directions. Light just doesn’t behave like that.”

Jennie said, “Anyway, what I was getting at was, if you join us, we’ll give you your gear back, and maybe you can share your data with us about that light.”

“Well, before I answer,” said Cynthia, “I understand what you want. I really do. There are things I’ve learned working for this project that I wish I’d never known, and I’d like to go back. But I can’t. From the sound of things, not even time travel can make that happen.”

“Right,” said Michelle, “we can’t change the past. And I’m not even talking about not saving the child who grows up to save the world here – I’m talking about paradox. We go back in time to prevent you from ever joining the project – which means you never meet us, so we never go back in time to prevent you from joining the project, so you do join the project – and meet us, and then we go back in time to prevent you from joining the project. You both did and didn’t join the project, and we both did and didn’t go back in time. It’s an infinite loop, and according to Ghimar that’s going to crack the universe in half and shatter it, and several nearby universes too.”

“I mean, we’ve done the equations for that,” said Jennie, “and as far as I can tell, Ghimar’s right. The only solution to the time equations with those initial conditions is catastrophic. It blows up right away and gets worse. The disruption expands outwards in all dimensions and only stops when it runs out of chronal momentum.”

“Right, so Ghimar and their … time cops or whatever … have to come stop whoever does it before it happens,” Cynthia said. “I get it. But you see, the general and the colonel have my notes. They know what I’ve discovered. There’s no stopping them … except for the fact that they don’t have a time crystal.”

“Well, there are still … options,” Michelle said.

“You’re not …” began Cynthia.

“Thinking of killing the general and the colonel?” Jennie cut in. “I mean, those aren’t great options, but they are options. It would solve the problem, but I don’t want to murder anybody. That’d be … horrible. I don’t know if I could live with myself. But here’s the thing – sure, they stole your research, but we know exactly where it is, and we can just delete their copy anytime we want. Then they have nothing at all.”

“But they still know about it,” Cynthia objected.
“If they’re determined, I suppose they could describe it to another scientist who could try to recreate it,” Michelle mused, “but it’d be back to nearly square one, and we’d keep interfering. Sooner or later another issue would show up that would take priority over this line of research that was producing zero results, especially if we engineered one. And if all else fails …”

“You’re not gonna suggest murder, are you?”

“Noooo,” said Michelle. “But we can throw bigger and bigger monkey wrenches into the works. We can teleport them to another universe. One where Earth has civilization, don’t worry, but one where they have no positions of power or authority.”

Jennie added, “We’re thinking about this because if we don’t do something, Ghimar’s people will.”

“Why didn’t they just … kill you?” asked Cynthia.

“Good question,” replied Michelle, “and I think it’s because we listened when Ghimar told us about the safeguards we needed to add, and we immediately worked them into the hardware and software. We were willing to work with them. Actually, if the general developed the technology, and Ghimar’s people showed up, and the project did the same thing we did … they’d probably be fine. But something tells me that’s not how they’d react.”

“No,” Cynthia said. “They’d say it’s their responsibility to protect the US by any means necessary and nobody can tell them how to do that, blah blah blah. I’ve heard it before. But – the US is better protected by them not having this! One paradox and there goes the Earth – and the universe – and more – and Ghimar and their people would destroy the Earth before that would happen anyway, so there’s that. Argh! It’s terrible! How do you sleep?”
“Pretty well, considering we can take action before it happens,” said Jennie. “For example, I already deleted the copy of your data that the general stole. Right after he stole it, actually. He doesn’t know it yet. Oh, and I know where your backup copy is. And the other one. And … the other one, but that one’s with you right now, of course.”

“What?” asked Cynthia as Jennie gave her a flash drive and another storage device. One had been in her safety deposit box in her bank, and the other had been in a storage unit she’d rented. “How?”

“We have to show you observation mode,” said Michelle. “Jennie invented it originally, but I’m sure Ghimar and his people have it too, and probably better.”

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Captain Curtsie had been returned to her research station a fraction of a second after Michelle had originally retrieved her, but due to the highly suspicious nature of the organization she worked for, there were many microcams invisibly located through out the lab that had imaged the space between when Michelle had arrived and taken her, and when she’d returned her.

Cynthia had just enough time to sit at her research computer before several armed guards entered and stood behind her. The master sergeant came to attention and saluted. “Captain, the general has ordered us to take you to his conference room. You need to bring any data you might feel is necessary.”

The captain looked at the sergeant with a raised eyebrow. “Several questions. One, why didn’t he just use the intercom? Two, why an armed escort? Three, what data about what?”

The sergeant replied, “With all due respect, captain, I wasn’t told what you were to bring, just that you are to bring all necessary data with you. I’m sorry about the other two, I really don’t know why.”

The captain stood and looked over her workspace. There were a few memory sticks that had data about the diamond on them, but the general had already taken all the truly important data – or so he thought. Perhaps, given what Jennie and Michelle had told her, he’d discovered that he didn’t really have it.

She gathered the memory sticks up, placed them in the safety storage box, and said, “Very well, then, lead on, Sergeant – let’s us go see the general.”

The four soldiers stood on the left and right at attention and saluted as the captain walked from her lab and was escorted to the general’s conference room. Two of the four men opened the double doors and allowed the captain to walk in. Those two followed her in and took positions to either side of the door as the other two had outside.

Three sets of tables stood in the conference room, one to her left, one to her right, and the one in front where the general was sitting. The other tables each held six ranking colonels. Cynthia recognised an inquiry board instantly, although she couldn't for the life of her figure out what she could have done to warrant court martial.

The captain stood at her place and said, “I demand a legal counsel. You have no authority otherwise. It’s a violation of military law.”

The general smirked, “I thought you would throw that out. Read this, and sit down and shut up. I’m asking the questions.” He tossed a manilla folder across the way to where it landed on the table where the Captain was going to sit.

Captain Curtsie sat and opened the folder. Her eyes almost popped out of her head as she saw the series of pictures in which Michelle had come, however it had been accomplished, and taken her. Several of the pictures, all timestamped so the order sequence couldn’t be confused, depicted the empty time between collecting and returning. From the time stamps, it had only been a fraction of a second. And the general had prepared this folder within a few seconds after that.

The general growled, “I’ve already confiscated the other data you were hiding about that crystal.”

The captain said angrily, “I didn’t hide anything. You broke into my lab and stole all my research.”

One of the colonels spoke up, “If you weren’t hiding it, Captain, why did you hide it behind a security wall?”

The captain snapped back, “If you care to read the Security of Sensitive Materials protocols, it is required.”

The colonel shut his mouth and sat back in his seat. Another colonel spoke up, “That may be the case, Captain, but Subsection 4, Paragraph 3, Section A clearly states that your commanding officer is required to have the security access key in case you are not available.”

The captain replied, “He did have the code. I see it didn’t take anything for him to come into my lab and take all the data. I know it was him; it was his secure login code that proves it. If he denies it, he must be placed in custody immediately according to military law, until such time as a proper military court of law can be assembled. His code is his; no one has access unless there has been a breach.”

The general said angrily, “I’m only concerned about you being in collusion with the enemy.”

The captain looked at the photos of when Michelle had come and taken her and when she had returned her. It was quite obvious that she was in a bit of trouble. But she replied, “What enemy would that be, Sir?”

“In case you haven’t noticed, we have photos right there of you being taken from a secure facility, and returned, by an unknown individual in an unknown uniform,” the general said, his voice growing louder as he went. “You do not seem to have gone unwillingly, and you were returned unharmed in … record time.”

“And you seem to have set this up in advance and printed those photos in record time as well, Sir,” said the captain. “Is it true that you were lying in wait to entrap me?”

“This is a military facility under my command,” the general said, “and if I believe the possibility of a security breach exists, I have every right to take any action I see fit to prevent it or, failing that, to put a stop to any further breaches. So I repeat: I am accusing you of being in collusion with the enemy.”

The captain thought for a moment. Michelle had in fact trespassed on a secure military facility, which was a serious breach of federal law … and that was when she noticed something happening on the large monitor screen on the wall behind the general, which had been showing a stationary American flag graphic. The screen switched to showing random noise, which shifted a few times and then locked up. There had clearly been some kind of technical glitch … and soon some of the colonels saw it too. And then there was a very soft sound like grains of sand being sprinkled on paper, coming from the photos in front of her, which suddenly vanished. The manila folder sat on the desk before her, open and empty.

The general noticed the missing photos, then saw the colonels looking at the screen behind him, then turned to look at it too. “No,” he said. He looked at the folders on the desk in front of him, which were also now empty. “No! That’s …” He got up and ran to the nearest colonel’s stack of folders, finding them empty too.

Cynthia was pretty sure she knew what was going on, but she hadn’t received any communication, so she just took it one step at a time. “Clearly … something strange is going on, Sir,” she said.

“The enemy,” he said. “They are trying to erase all evidence of their crimes, their invasion of a US military facility.”

“I’m going to have to ask you again who you think this enemy is, Sir,” said Cynthia. “If you’re talking about Jennifer Kent and Michelle Danwoo, they are US citizens whose wholly owned property we’ve been trespassing on and whose civil rights we’ve been trampling on wholesale. Are you seriously trying to tell me that they’re now somehow enemy combatants? For what government, Sir?”

“You sound like you’re taking their side, Captain,” said the general. “I … have to admit that they aren’t declared enemy combatants – yet – but that’s only because we can’t go through the proper channels to have that declared, since this project isn’t officially supposed to exist anymore. But they are in possession of a technology that this project has been pursuing since it first got an inkling of its existence – over 50 years ago.”

“50 … years …?” asked Captain Curtsie. She thought. Had they found something back then? Why hadn’t she been told? Had Michelle and Jennie left something for them to find? Would they? Come to think of it, would she join them and maybe leave it there and then herself? At any rate, there might no longer be any physical or digital evidence of anything at this point, but of course there were the memories of the general and the colonels in this room.

“That’s right, Captain, 50 years of pursuing a very vague hint that some sort of instantaneous transference of matter was possible,” said the general, “and although it seems the Soviet Union collapsed before they found it, this country has always had its enemies, and that will seemingly never change. If there’s a chance that any of them will obtain it before we do, it will be the end for this country.”

“Well, Sir, if you would permit me to make a bit of a presentation,” said Cynthia, “it might be the end of considerably more than just this or any one other country, or this planet.”

“What’s this?” asked one of the colonels. “More than … the planet?”

“You are colluding with the enemy, Captain!” the general shouted.

“With all due respect, Sir, a threat to the entire Earth is in fact a threat to the United States,” the colonel responded. “We have a duty to hear what the captain means about that.”

“Oh, very well,” the general said.

“You wouldn’t have a whiteboard, would you?” she asked.

One whiteboard and several neatly written equations later, Cynthia concluded, “And so, these equations have only two solutions. One of them, here, allows for instantaneous travel through space, time and dimension. And the other, here, is a massive paradox leading to a singularity that ripples outward at the speed of light, destroying the fabric of space and time as it goes, starting with the Earth and not ending until it has reached the farthest corners of this universe and proceeded into several others.”

“Jiminy Christmas,” said the general. “So it’s as we thought. Time travel is possible … and extremely dangerous.”

“Without the proper safeguards, Sir,” Cynthia replied.

The general nodded gravely. “Yes, you mentioned those. But they can be disabled … by someone with nihilistic or world-blackmailing intentions.”

Cynthia nodded grimly as well. “This is why we can’t allow this technology to exist without these safeguards. This is why we can’t allow it to be mass-manufactured.”

“And why we can’t allow Danwoo and Kent to be running around with it,” the general replied. “Who knows what kind of lax safeguards they’ve slapped together?”

“You saw the etched wooden tablets, Sir,” said Cynthia. “They’re proof that their safeguards are basically ironclad.” She turned the whiteboard over and wrote down some new equations. “Only with very precise targeting could they have done that, and only very fine-tuned safeguards could have allowed for that. What I’m saying, Sir, is that these two have the answers we need … and they’re the only ones who have them. And for some reason we’ve been antagonizing them.”
One of the colonels finally got an email. “And they apparently have the ability to very precisely target information in our databases,” he said. “Or … information we thought we had in our databases that turns out never to have been written to them because it was intercepted before it happened.”
“Sir,” Cynthia said to the general, “please keep in mind that at any point they could have transported any of us in this room to the surface of the Moon or deep space and left us there, if they wanted to. And yet they didn’t.”

“They transported me to an extremely cold mountaintop,” said Colonel Gaines, “but, to be fair, they brought me back, too.”

The general sighed. “All right, since they’re probably somehow watching, what are your terms?”

There was a flash of indigo light, and a sheet of paper fluttered down through the air onto the general’s table. He picked it up and read it. “This is … this was clearly prepared by a military lawyer. It’s … right, I’ll have to have our lawyers look at it. It’s very convoluted. From what I can tell, if we go along with this, they’ll be the sole providers of the technology, we have to request to use it, at a fee, and they have the right to refuse.”

“Am I court-martialed, Sir?” asked the captain.

“That’s a negative, Captain,” said the general. “For the moment. You may be about to become scientific liaison to … a unique military contractor.” He didn’t look happy. He looked resigned to his fate.

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One of the older colonels had picked up his empty evidence pouch. None of the many incriminating photos nor any of the many pages of analysis were there. He reached over and picked up the pouches on both sides and examined them as well. They too were empty. He requested the file he knew was stored on a secure hard drive only to find that all data pertaining to the crystal or any of the photos or data sheets were missing from the file. Gigabytes of data were just … gone.

The colonel said, “With all due respect, General, it is the considered opinion of the inquiry board that all charges be dropped immediately and further actions be terminated due to the fact that we – apparently – have no evidence to support our charges but our mouths, and under current situational conditions, that isn’t acceptable.”

The general flopped back in his chair. He was in no way happy, but under current circumstances, no solid evidence, no case. He picked up his silver mallet and dinged the golden bell on the table in front of him three times, “It is the judgement of this inquiry that all charges and punitive actions be dropped due to the lack of any corroborating evidence. That doesn’t mean the board will not immediately reconvene if some data supporting our claims can be located.” The general leaned forward on his knuckles and looked right at the captain, “And it also means we are going to watch you so closely you won’t be able to sneeze and we won’t know. Sentry, please escort the captain back to her laboratory. This proceeding is closed.” He sent an email to his adjutant to set up a most unusual meeting.

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Jennie sat back from a highly advanced holo-screen with perfect images of the proceedings. There had been voices too – as staticky and gravelly as they were, it had been clear enough to tell who was speaking. “Well, now. That isn’t a perfect solution, and I’m sure it will only satisfy them temporarily until they find some other stupid thing.”

Michelle had a strange look on her face as she said, “I think the captain needs to buy a new bikini.”

Jennie snorted a laugh. “Going to send her to that tropical island place? Yeah, she might like that. There’s plenty of wild fruits, clean water, and it’s only about 75 Fahrenheit all the time.”

Michelle replied, “Only thing now, tell her in advance, or spring it on her suddenly?”

“I’d rather tell her in advance. Make some huge spectacle for the general to witness. And show him a major warning he can’t ignore. Oh, wait – the general’s doing something else. What’s this? He wants to set up a meeting with us, and poor Cynthia’s the only point of contact he knows of, so he’s going to send that adjutant of his to go bug her to try to get in touch with us.”

Michelle raised an eyebrow. “Oh really? Can you inject an email into his system?”

“Not exactly,” said Jennie, but a sheet of paper soon emerged from the laser printer, which she then placed on the small object transport platform. A few keystrokes, and the paper was fluttering onto the general’s table.

“What’s this?” came the general’s voice. He looked at the page. “We’ll meet you at a time of your choosing,” he read aloud, though the sound was still quite distorted due to the inaccuracy of the sound wave estimations. “We’ll pick the place. Let us know when you’re ready – J&M.” He looked around. “PS: Wear your sunscreen.”

“Oooh, they won’t be able to track him if we take him to that island place – which isn’t even in the same dimension,” said Michelle.

“Exactly my thought,” said Jennie. “I mean, we’ll send him back within the same second he departed, so nobody will be looking for him, but anything he brings to tell him where or when he is won’t work.” She typed on a keyboard. “OK, the AI will watch him until he’s ready for us.”

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“All right, then,” said General Prescott, “we’re ready to go.” He was surrounded by armed guards, and Captain Curtsie stood by his side, armed with a knapsack full of tracking devices, laptops and memory sticks.

And one second later, the general and the captain stood on a beach. They looked around. “Well, this is better than when Colonel Gaines was on a frozen mountaintop,” the general said. The sound of sea birds came from overhead as the rush of the surf gently kissed the bright white sands.

The light from their transfer was entirely drowned out by the bright tropical sun, but two figures in crystalline suits suddenly appeared nearby. The general reflexively drew his sidearm, then put it away, as they weren’t advancing and didn’t seem armed.

“Well, hello, General,” said one of them. It was hard to tell who was in the suits, but the voice sounded like a woman’s. “Let’s have a seat in the shade.” They pointed to an area that the general and the captain hadn’t noticed yet, shaded by dense palm trees, where several beach chairs had already been set up including a small table with fruits and drinks. They walked slowly toward the comfortable-looking spot.

“As I’m sure you know,” said the other suited figure, “I’m Jennie Kent, and that’s Michelle Danwoo. We’re still working on the suits, so nametags are a detail we haven’t yet gotten to.”

“Charmed,” the general said tensely, sitting down. He turned toward Cynthia. “Captain?”

“No readings, Sir,” she said, as she had already sat down and taken out her instruments. “No GPS satellites, military or civilian, and no signals of any kind – other than those emitted by my own equipment right here. Some interesting readings from the sky, but those are probably just cosmic background noise, similar to what we’d get back home.”

“Back home?” the general asked.

“Yes, Sir, back home. We’re not on Earth.”

“Well, not our Earth,” said Michelle. “This is a parallel Earth where life has evolved that’s quite similar to what we’ve got, but intelligent life has never arisen.”
“Right, then, so neutral territory,” the general replied. “At any rate, I’m sure we all know why we’re here.”

“Down to business, then,” said Jennie. “You’ve seen our terms. I assume you’ve had your lawyers look at them.”

“Yes, and I assume you know that there’s no piece of paper I won’t tear up if the security of the US is at risk,” General Prescott replied.

“Well, we’re here to convince you that we’re not risks,” Michelle said. “We’re proud Americans too, and we don’t plan on giving what we’ve got to any of the USA’s enemies – or allies, for that matter.”

“But you would allow us to have limited access,” said the general. Captain Curtsie had set up a small video camera, which was recording the proceedings.

“Under the terms of the agreement,” replied Jennie. “You have to understand, General. The security of the United States isn’t all that’s at risk. The technology has to be used under the proper safeguards, or else it risks the universe as a whole. We see ourselves as protecting the nation – and the entire space-time continuum while we’re at it. Are we in agreement that the utter annihilation of everything we’ve ever known is something to be avoided?”

The general replied, “Well, yes, but your word is all I’ve got – still, you’re right, just a moment’s thought tells me that a temporal paradox isn’t a good thing. Can’t go back in time and alter the circumstances behind your trip back in time itself or you end up both going back and not going. It’s not hard to imagine that wouldn’t be a good thing. Just out of curiosity, how careful do your safeguards have to be?”

“Good question,” Michelle responded. “You don’t have to watch out for stepping on every butterfly, microbe, or inanimate speck of dust, especially the farther back you go. Major trends tend to correct for minor variations. You should avoid stepping on a butterfly that has a crucial mutation that the next generation will need to survive – but here’s the thing: the safeguards won’t even allow you to travel to an event point with that much causal sensitivity within its light cone.”

The general looked at the captain, who explained, “She means, Sir, that if you try to get to a place and time where a paradox could be caused, the equipment simply won’t let you go there and then. It must have some kind of potential paradox detection? I haven’t the first idea how that would work.”

“The device sends a quantum mechanical pilot wave and detects the interference,” Jennie replied. “A paradox pattern is quite distinct. But that’s not the real issue – the issue is that the paradox-prevention system isn’t part and parcel of the transfer method. It can be disabled. And it mustn’t be.”

“Or we risk paradox,” said the general, nodding. “I think I understand now. Paradox prevention outweighs all other uses of the technology. So you’re saying that you’re only going to let us use the system if the paradox preventer switch is always on. Figure of speech. There isn’t a switch. I get it.”

“This is technology that can’t just be given out in great quantities,” said Michelle. “It has to be carefully monitored. A soldier in the field who has it could be killed by an enemy and the equipment looted, dismantled, reverse-engineered, and now the enemy has it, with no guarantees that they’ve installed the paradox prevention part. Of course, we’re not too worried about most enemies – they want to live too and don’t want to destroy the universe – but some are fanatical or otherwise insane.”

The general nodded. “You’ve got the same concerns we do, then,” he said. “I’m coming to understand that you’ve thought this through a lot better than I’d imagined. I’ve read your backgrounds – because of course the DOD had dossiers made up for both of you – and there’s no history of any anti-government activities or extremist sympathies.”

“I mean, I’ve protested wars and injustice,” Jennie said. “And I’m friends with a lot of people whom some might consider pretty radical.”

“I’m aware of all of that, believe me,” the general replied. “And that’s not what’s meant by anti-government activities or extremist sympathies. You haven’t tried to actually take down the government of the United States, nor are you allied with anyone who truly intends to try that. That’s all it really means. Being opposed to government policy is one thing. Having unusual opinions is one thing. Planning revolution is another thing. The whole point of democracy is that government policy can be changed without a literal, violent revolution.”

“Although in this time of social media, large groups of people can be convinced that violent revolution is the only way they’re ever going to get what they want, and lots of domestic and foreign interests are constantly trying to do just that,” said Jennie quickly, “but yes, I think we see eye to eye there.” She turned to Michelle. “I like this guy. He knows what’s what and what isn’t.”

“That said,” said Michelle, “do you have any opinions about our terms?”

“You have a viable introductory agreement,” the general said, taking an envelope from an inner pocket of his uniform. “The clause stating that renegotiation is possible after an initial experimental period convinced the lawyers that this is a good, cautious way forward.”

“And you agree to stop hounding us to the ends of the Earth?” asked Jennifer. “Because the Earth doesn’t actually have ends,” she added, hoping he got her implication that unless something changed, they’d be at this forever.

The general removed the agreement from the envelope and unfolded it, showing his witnessed signature upon it. “We do,” he said. “What’s the next step?”

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Michelle replied, “It would seem to me that both our agreement copies should be documented.” Amid a sudden flash of crimson, Michelle grabbed a large manilla envelope seemingly from the midst of the flash and began to open it.

The general sat up from his semi-reclined position and said with incredulity, “You … you’re magic. That was incredible.”

Michelle removed several dozen pages from the package and handed them to him, saying, “Aww. shoot. I just knew the exact place and instant ... because I sent it.”

The general took the papers and examined them. They were exact copies, down to the official seal. He knew beyond any doubt what those two young women had said was more than true, and it was more than obvious that he had no choice but to make the agreement if he had any hope of ever being truly exposed to the technology. His signatory on the bottom made it official: his black ops project had officially gone into partnership with a universally Important company named “It’s About Time.”

Of course, one of the major stipulations was that Captain Cynthia Curtsie was no longer part of the black ops project, nor was she to be harassed by, any member of the project or other contracted personnel. That clause tickled Cynthia to her bones. She would be part of Jennie and Michelle’s team from now on, and she’d learn more about the mysterious time crystals.

The United States, or so the general said anyway, had severe issues with the fact that the actual technology would not be in their hands or under their control, but it was unavoidable. Any time the project’s personnel used a travel device of any kind, one of the About Time team would accompany them. Should anything at all happen to that member, the whole team would instantly be transported to a prepared safe zone where, if possible, aid could be rendered.

All in all, however, the majority of the leaders thought the terms of this preliminary contract were acceptable for now. The renegotiation clause tickled them pink, although they didn’t yet realize that any nefarious activities would be seen, and would be immediately dealt with, no exceptions.

Legal notarized copies of all documents and their time stamps and signatories were filed in the nitrogen sealed storage boxes to ensure no degradation. Something this severely important needed to be protected.

Finally it came time to return the general and captain back to their innocuous-looking facility somewhere in the heartland. The general found himself in his office, less than a second after he’d left, with Captain Curtsie right beside him.

But she’d taken a bit of a scenic route to get there. Back on the tropical island, the general vanished in a flash, but Cynthia stayed. She looked around and saw Michelle and Jennie but not the general.

The two girls removed their helmets. “What’s going on?” asked Cynthia.

“Well, you saw it,” said Jennie. “You’re one of us now.”

“Yeah, I know I’m now the liaison between your new company and the project,” Cynthia said, “but I’m still confused.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll send you back to the same moment the general returned to,” said Michelle. “But we wanted to give you a few things first.”

“First of all, this is for you,” Jennie said, giving her a device that looked like a ballpoint pen. It even had the It’s About Time company logo on it, a winged hourglass within a faceted jewel. “Since you’re not going to spend all your time at our lab, being a liaison and all that, you’ll need one of these. It’ll take you back to the lab. Well, back to one of its locations within multi-dimensional space-time. If the lab isn’t there at the moment, relays will take you to where it is at the time you’re using it. Try it out! You turn the barrel clockwise, like that.” She gestured.

“Um … OK,” she said, trying that, and vanished herself. Michelle and Jennie nodded at each other, put their helmets back on, and vanished too. The chairs and refreshments vanished with them, leaving nothing on the island but footprints in the sand that would fade with the wind and rain.

The three of them appeared on the lab floor, surrounded by the usual high-tech equipment in various stages of development. “Welcome back!” said Michelle to Cynthia. “This room over here’s going to be your office. We don’t know how you want it furnished or laid out yet. But …” Michelle led her over to a side room with a door and a large window that looked out onto the lab area. Visible on the wall was something shiny and refractive. Michelle opened the door and showed Cynthia what it was.

Hanging on a special pair of hooks on the segment of wall between the door and the large window was Cynthia’s own crystal suit. It even had an attached nametag, saying “C. Curtsie,” where the lapel would be if it had any pockets at all. “We made you your own suit,” Jennie said. “We’ll have to show you how to use it, but …”

Cynthia couldn’t help gasping in excitement, then blushing at her reaction. The two others giggled. “Yes, you really are part of the team now,” said Michelle. “As much as you want to be. We don’t just need your help … we want it. If you agree.”

“Oh gosh!” said Cynthia. “This means … I’ll be discovering things no human’s ever discovered …”

“I know what you mean,” Jennie said, nodding. “I’ve invented some stuff, and so has Michelle, but … we’re not physicists. The closest to science we come is geology. We know some engineering, but … that’s kind of why we need your help. We got some help from some others, but we couldn’t ask them to put themselves in more danger. But you … well, you’re already in the thick of it.”

Michelle added, “The suits are really very difficult to damage, by the way; boiling hot or freezing cold temperatures don’t even affect you in there. And you can basically set your coordinates at the speed of thought. We’ve been building some computers here that can do all the calculations.”

“For now, you should probably head back, but remember that homing pen,” said Jennie. “Oh, and it writes too. So nobody will get suspicious.” She walked over to one of the main transport arrays; the laser pointed down onto a heptagonal floor pad from above. “So you zero in on where you want to go with the monitor and controls …” She demonstrated this on the screen near the pad, homing in on the instant where and when the general appeared in his office next to the armed guards who hadn’t come to the meeting. Time and space coordinates lit up on the displays. “Align which direction you want to be facing … and then you just press the big red button.”

“Wow,” said Cynthia. “I’ll be back soon! I do have to get some business straightened out. But wow!” She checked the coordinates, grinned at Michelle and Jennie, and pressed the button. In a flash of cyan laser light she was gone, appearing at the same moment the general did, less than a second after they’d left.

“She seems really excited!” said Jennie.

“Wouldn’t you be?” Michelle asked.

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Cynthia shared all the data she had collected in the cave. As Michelle and Jennie stared at the screen, the images showed waveforms and energy outputs that were unexpected.

Jennie turned to Michelle and said, “I’m not totally sure about this, but aren’t those the same energy patterns our transfers give off?”

Michelle looked close and made several calculations of her own, “From what I see, and if my calculations are correct, it would appear to me that light beam is a part, not the whole.”

“A … part?” Cynthia asked. “A part of the whole! Do you have readings of … wait! We can just take some readings ourselves now!” She grabbed her sensor array. “With the same equipment!” She got the cameras and detectors pointed at one of the transport areas and said, “All we have to do is … go some place and time. Or send something. It doesn’t matter.”

“I’ll go visit our valley!” said Jennie. “I miss it so much!” She went to the console and adjusted the time and place. “This lab is actually on our Earth, just underground. So it doesn’t use a huge amount of energy to travel to somewhere else on Earth, same time.” She got the spot correct, right outside her house’s front door.

“OK, are you ready?” Jennie asked Cynthia.

“Almost … running a test collection for a baseline … OK!” Cynthia replied. “Recording live.”

Jennie nodded and stood on the transport pad, pressing the button. She appeared on the screen. It was night there. She unlocked her house’s front door. She went into her kitchen, realized the dishwasher was full of clean dishes and started putting them away. She got herself a glass of water. Meanwhile, Cynthia’s equipment was taking readings.

Jennie then must have decided it had been long enough and used her return device, which wasn’t shaped like a pen but rather like a watch on her wrist, and reappeared on the transport pad. She looked expectantly at Cynthia, who in turn was looking expectantly at her computer screen.

Cynthia tapped a key. “OK, done!” she said. “We should have readings of your departure, the time between, and your return. I’ll just run my analysis algorithm on them, and …” She disconnected the laptop computer from the sensor array and returned to her office, setting it on her desk and sitting down.

“OK,” said Cynthia once the software was done crunching the numbers. A graph appeared on the large monitor behind her on the wall, a spectrum from ultraviolet to infrared with distinct plateaus, voids, and spikes. “That’s the reading from the light in the cave again. And this …” Another curve appeared, this one superimposed in red. “This one is from your departure. This one’s from your arrival.” A third curve appeared, this one superimposed in blue.

“These are very low level compared to that one,” said Michelle.

“Yes,” said Cynthia, “and that suggests that they’re much lower energy. Whatever the light is, it’s at a much higher level. And it’s broad-spectrum for some reason. That’s not supposed to set off a time crystal. But let’s apply a scale factor to the two latest data sets.” The red and blue curves grew until they overlapped the original black line exactly. “OK, we’ve got the scale factor,” she said. “A huge scale factor. About 10 to the 21st power. The light … is a side effect of an enormous transfer. 21 orders of magnitude larger than a human.”

“But … that means somebody transported something very big,” Jennie said. “Or very far.”

“And the echoes of that transference are still resounding,” added Michelle.

“It means it was even brighter in the past,” said Cynthia. “Have you tried looking in on it in the past?”

“Yes, actually,” said Jennie. “It looked pretty much the same. We’ve looked back … three centuries?”

“Then it’s not fading quickly at all,” said Cynthia. “That suggests it was huge and far in the past. How far, I wonder?”

“Could it be … in the future?” asked Michelle. “Does the residual flash go both ways?”

“Good question!” said Cynthia. “Maybe we should test it!”

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One thing the three girls were more than interested in: Dr. Felding had left them a message. He’d deciphered a large section of pictograms on the obsidian pedestal that seemed to show that the large crystal and its pedestal were what appeared to be the core of some type of drive unit.

Even more amazing, it seemed to show that Earth’s moon was not an ordinary planetoid, but a planetoid ship. The molten core readings scientists kept getting were actually from the super hot plasma generated by whatever power unit was still operating, and the observed radiated heat was the cooling system circulating the hot plasma, which in turn appeared to circle a huge cavernous interior.

Cynthia asked Michelle, “This is … unbelievable. You think it would cause any major catastrophes if we went and checked if this is real?”

Michelle replied, “I don’t think it would cause any major paradoxes if we went there in the present, and I’m sure the safety protocols in the suits wouldn’t allow one.”

Jennie spoke up, “We could even check it out in observation mode first. But I think a field trip would be fun. There’s no telling what we could find. Our suits should protect us from even the molten core if we misjudge the coordinates.”

The three women donned their crystalline travel suits and made sure their spatial and temporal coordinates were in sync. They checked observation mode and found a decent landing spot in the destination area. After a few more systems checks, all three gave a thumbs up, then they vanished in a maroon colored flash.

But what they hadn’t checked was their own local space weather. A major CME from the Sun was currently impacting the atmosphere, supercharging the ionosphere with highly energetic plasma ... and things went a little bit off course.

The three women appeared in some kind of military bunker. Many high-ranking officials from the black ops community were present and watched in complete incredulity as the helmeted figures appeared wearing their bright and sparkly outfits.

Almost as quickly as they had appeared, they vanished, leaving the men in total shock.

“What … was that?” asked one officer.

“You all saw that, right?” another asked. They all agreed that they’d seen more or less the same apparitions.

Another replied, “Then either we all just witnessed something incredible, or we all just had a hallucination – and the same one, at that.” The hallucination theory was dismissed almost immediately as the men began to discuss what it was they had seen … or thought they had, at least.

The girls appeared back in the lab where they had started. Immediately, Michelle had her helmet off and her suit tied into the diagnostic equipment. From what the data was saying, the suit and its chronal targeting array were working properly. Michelle’s mouth fell open in shock when she saw the deviation from their assigned target and final disposition.

It was the emergency failsafe that had returned them to their point of origin. The mis-destination had been 50 years in the past. There was no way to tell what the repercussions of this might be, but one thing it made perfectly clear … this was why the black ops division had been searching for them for 50 years.

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Fifty Years in the Past


In a huge military auditorium, many high-ranking officers of the top-secret black-ops group talked quietly among themselves until Major Prescott came to the podium. Silence reigned as he opened a large binder he had laid on the podium. All could plainly see the large red band and the words: EYES ONLY - TOP SECRET written in large block letters.

The major took a small sip of water and said, “I have gathered the top officials in charge of our entire operation here this morning to reveal something straight out of science fiction.”

A young captain stood up and said, “With all due respect, Major, I do hope this has a bit of substantiating evidence. That last bug hunt, well, it almost got us disbanded.”

A twitter of laughter rounded the room for a minute as the major stood and smirked.

He finally replied, "Unfortunately, the only evidence I have is the helmet cam tapes we had with us the day of the exercise.”

He fumbled with something on a lower shelf that was out of everyone's view for a few seconds, then the huge rear-projection monitor on the wall behind the major lit up and showed about one minute’s worth of video … but what an amazing video.

In the video, it showed the clandestine team in gear in the area's bunkers awaiting the order to deploy, when suddenly, the video splattered brightly with a maroon colored light. When the camera could once again film, perhaps a split second later, there were three individuals standing there in sparkling suits made of what looked like some type of crystal … then, just as suddenly there was another maroon flash and they were gone. The auditorium erupted with everyone talking at once.

The major banged his gavel. Silence filled the large area. “Sorry,” he said, “but I have no answers to any questions. This is the reason I brought all of you here instead of directly informing the White House. I’m not sure if what we saw was a prelude to an alien invasion, or if it was something closer to home – perhaps an experiment by the Soviets, maybe something by a civilian corporation, perhaps even something from another dark organization within our own government. I simply have no information.”

About that time, a senior airman rapidly entered the room and walked to the podium. He handed the major several items and could be heard saying quietly, “We do have a positive reading on the weird energies. Our satellites report residual effects are present in several locations around the world.”

A colonel in the rear spoke up. “Forgive my interruption, but is there any specific area we might be able to localize and track?”

The major replied, “We have found trace readings, although a specific map coordinate we have as yet been unable to ascertain." He pushed a button, and the image on the screen changed to that of a map of the state. There were several concentric red rings circling several thousand miles of land area. “This is the best we’ve been able to do so far. We have managed to requisition several of the choppers with specialty equipment tuned to scan for this energy frequency.”

Before the colonel sat, he said, “I think I can send some men and equipment in on this mission. If that tech is home grown, we cannot allow it to remain loose in the wild. It would pose a security risk beyond our worst nightmares.”

The major replied, “Exactly my thoughts, and this is why I have mobilized our alien incursion team to try to track it.”

The colonel said, “I hope you made a decent excuse for the use of the division.”

The major smiled, “Yessir, Colonel, according to DOD, certain of the skillsets must be exercised a minimum of six times a year and evaluated on performance. I used that as the excuse. Not only will they be getting the required utilization, everything will be live and not in test mode.”

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A sparkling flash announced the appearance of Ghimar, in their crystalline suit. “That was close,” they said, “but instruments detect no paradox. This was an event that had already been known to have happened. There is no contradiction and no change. You have merely explained why this military project was so well prepared to come after you: it has been searching for answers to that phenomenon for many Earth years now.”

Cynthia said, “Now I understand! I didn’t have full clearance, but there were references I was allowed to see that mentioned a mysterious incident 50 years ago.”

“But Ghimar!” said Jennie. “We just found out that Earth’s moon is a huge spaceship! How it got here I don’t know, and how the time crystal that was used to drive it got into our valley I don’t know either.”

“Interesting,” Ghimar said. “Such massive vessels are rarely seen. Perhaps you can discover what happened to it in the past.”

Michelle added, “Who flew it? What happened to them? Why haven’t they come back for it over all this time? So many questions!”

“But the light in the cave,” said Cynthia. “It’s probably a side effect of whatever happened – billions of years ago!”

“Recommend against attempting to travel back billions of years into the same timeline,” Ghimar said, “but merely observing should be harmless.”

“We were about to examine the interior,” said Jennie. “Want to come?”

“There would be no harm if I only watched,” said Ghimar. “I am not here from a point later in this same timeline, but from another timeline altogether. Can you share the spatio-temporal coordinates?”

They did, and after Michelle compensated for the atmosphere’s adverse ionized conditions, they appeared in a vast, dark chamber. Their eyes gradually adjusted to the conditions, and they started to be able to see.

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Cynthia brought out her bright aviator's lamp and turned it on, not that it made a huge amount of difference, because the chamber was so huge. Gravity was nearly nonexistent, so they had to use their suits to transport themselves to different points within the enormous void until they found something resembling an edge. The chamber proved it was obviously far more than an empty chamber. They discovered an area where there were gravity couches, sitting undisturbed for years, judging by the accumulation of dust by gradual electrostatic attraction.

There were control panels, all but two were powered down. The only light in the chamber was the flashlight, other than the soft glow of the panels. The girls moved over to one of the panels and examined it closely, hoping they might accidently discover what it controlled.

Michelle said, “OK, girls, looks like it’s true. Our moon is more than just a small planetoid.”

Jennie said as she judiciously pushed a green button, “A big question I have, is why did whoever need a ship this size?” Immediately, every panel in the area lit up. The many control panels began to flicker to life, and some weird kind of squiggly squirmy symbols began slowly scrolling. All of the panels that had labels were all in the same squiggly squirmy symbols that had now started slowly scrolling on many of the now operating screens.

All four of the explorers found themselves settling to the floor as some kind of artificial gravity system gradually came on, and their suits’ environmental readings soon indicated that they were surrounded by breathable atmosphere, so they took off their helmets, except for Ghimar, who simply observed silently.

Cynthia said, “What did you do?”

Jennie replied sheepishly, “I pressed that green button. It was the only one flashing, so …” she shrugged. “Someone clearly meant for it to be pushed, once there was someone around to push it.”

Michelle said calmly, “No harm done. I do think Dr. Felding would be tickled pink to be here. Not only would he actually be on the Moon, or in it, but he’d have a language puzzle to play with.”

Jennie said, “OK, since he already knows about our discoveries, I’m going to ask him if he would like to have a bit of adventure.” With that, Jennie put her helmet back on, touched the controls on her suit’s armband, then vanished in a bright maroon flash of light.

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Dr. Felding was doing what he currently enjoyed doing most, looking over the enlarged images from the pedestal Michelle and Jennie had found. It had amazed him to no end when he realized that, in addition to the descriptions of light frequencies and other strange energies, the pictograms indicated that the Moon was more than just a natural satellite.

Now, he began to wonder if the high energy light data that was also carved delicately into the stone wasn’t basic operating instructions for what the pictograms seemed to refer to as the engine.

A bright maroon flash of light caused him to turn, startled, “What … the … “ He never got to finish.

Jennie removed her helmet and said, cheerily, “Hi Doc! Sorry to startle you, but I have a serious question to ask you.”

Dr. Felding stood in amazed shock for an instant or two, “Oh! Miss Kent! My goodness. Yes … quite so. I’m sorry. It’s one thing to have you tell me about this … but quite another to actually see it. What’s the question?”

Jennie smiled as a glint came to her eye. “We have some more … symbols we need deciphered. We have no basis, no foundations or roots for the language, but there’s lots of it. I don’t think it’s the same script that’s on the pedestal, but I’m not sure; I’m not the expert here. And …. there's something else.”

Dr. Felding raised an eyebrow, “Something else? What else?”

Jennie smirked, “How would you like to go to space and actually walk on the Moon? Well … within the Moon. Under its surface.”

Dr. Felding had enough time to glance at the large photo of the pictogram on his workbench showing that the moon might be a spaceship before he found himself in a very large, well lit room. Two things were immediately obvious: first, this room had been undisturbed for many years, as the thick dust everywhere proved. Second, this was some type of control center, although he had no idea for what.

Cynthia and Michelle were bent over one of the modules as Jennie walked up to a screen and held out her hand. “Is there any possibility you might be able to decipher some of these squiggles?” Some sort of small robots emerged from openings and started to clear up the dust, as everyone present stared. “Oh, hello little guys,” Jennie said.

That was when it dawned on him. He wasn’t on Earth, this had a good chance of being the lunar installation that Jennie had mentioned – and lo and behold it had artificial gravity. It was more than normal surface lunar gravity, and less than Earth’s, but not by much.

Dr. Felding knew he didn’t really have any hope of figuring out the language until he’d looked it over better. After a short time he realized something. “I know this language,” he said.

“What?” asked Jennie. “You do?”

Michelle asked, “From the look on your face, this means something?”

Dr. Felding replied, “Yes, this is Proto-Assyrian. A language dead for almost 25 thousand years.” He sat down on one of the gravity couches that one of the robots had dusted and where he could see the screens.

Cynthia and Jennie gathered around as Cynthia asked, “Can you decipher it?”

Dr. Felding replied, “Decipher it? I can read this. From what it’s saying, this moon is a defense station designed to ward off attacks from the planet … I’m sounding this word out … Bretaka.”

Jennie asked, “Where is that supposed to be? Do we have any star charts?”

Dr. Felding looked around, “No need. The planet was reduced to a rubble pile. You know, the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.”

The girls gasped. Michelle asked in shock, “You mean, they wiped out the whole planet?”

Dr. Felding nodded his head, “It was the same time Bretaka had attacked Earth. Apparently the devastation was such it created a global ice age on Earth while the rest of the solar system re-stabilized due to the spreading out of a planetary mass. The system had to rebalance its orbits. From the time stamps on this data on the screen, it has been several million years since anyone has boarded here. Now, a really good question would be, why would a language used millions of years ago show up in Assyria after so much time when it didn’t originate there? Or perhaps my assumptions are incorrect?” He started reading more and more of the text, trying to understand.

Jennie, Michelle, and Cynthia talked amongst themselves about who might have built this installation and why. “Do you think the Moon was already here, and they built this inside it?” asked Jennie.

“Possible,” said Cynthia, “or barely so. It would be a gargantuan task to hollow out all this space in the Moon’s core. The task of building this giant core and then making a cover around it that looked like a natural satellite would have been orders of magnitude easier, yet still humongous.”

“What if they built the core, but over time all the rest built up around it?” asked Michelle.

“Maybe,” replied Cynthia, “but for that to be the case, it would have to have happened while the solar system was still doing a lot of accretion – meaning billions of years ago, not millions.”

“What’s this got to do with the crystal in our valley?” Jennie wondered.

“Now that,” said Cynthia, “is a very good question. That light …” She thought to herself for a while.

“Why didn’t I think of this before?” Jennie asked. “Oh right, because I’ve had the computer scanning the black ops project. Be right back.” She put her helmet back on and vanished – and was almost instantly back, taking it off again. “I just set up the computer to run an observation or two. When they’re done, it’ll report back what it finds.”

“Oh yes, look at this,” said Dr. Felding. “Whoever left the Moon here, they wanted it to be found. They wanted these messages to be read. That’s why they’re all translated into a language of … for them … modern Earth. But the last time the computer scanned Earth was about 25,000 years ago. In another few thousand years, the system was programmed to scan Earth and translate all the text into a current language again. Let me see …” He manipulated the controls, and the symbols all started to shift and change. Within a few minutes it was all in English.

“You know the military’s gonna want to know what kind of weapons systems this thing has,” Cynthia said.

“We could … just not tell them for a little while,” Michelle said, looking at one of the screens, which was now in English. “It’s not as if anyone can get in here who isn’t using some kind of transference technology … and clearly nobody’s been able to do that for a very long time.”

“And the computer’s done,” said Jennie, reappearing before anyone had noticed her leave. “Short answer: yes, this facility’s been here for billions of years, it crashed into the Earth and picked up a lot of material and was then bombarded by a lot of meteorites, and in the process its time crystal got left behind, only to be thrown to the surface by a later upheaval, and it was found by the civilization that was living in this part of the solar system a few million years ago and used to defend Earth against Bretaka.”

“Wow,” said Cynthia, “and to think some people once called the theoretical planet that could’ve formed there Lucifer. Who built this?”

“Still working on that,” Jennie replied. “They looked humanoid, but had sort of a red tint to their skin, and what I’d call … crystals instead of hair? But I have no idea where they came from.”

“Wait,” said Ghimar, the first time they’d spoken since arriving, “did you just say red skin with crystalline hair? And did you say this vessel had a time crystal? The time crystal you found?”

“Yes, that pretty accurately summarizes it,” said Jennie.

“This … might solve one of the oldest mysteries my organization has on file,” said Ghimar.

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The entire Spatio-Temporal Research Division of the planet Tulusian was in full uproar. It had only been one Tulusian year since they had detected the first known true paradox in a neighboring universe. An unwise inventor had attempted to travel backward in his own timeline to reverse the circumstances that had led to the unfortunate death of his wife in that universe.

The repercussions had destroyed his own universe and two others nearby, and done serious damage to still others. There was now a huge region in part of Tulusian’s sky, fortunately far from their galaxy, that simply … didn’t exist anymore. Space was twisted into a chaotic knot there; light from objects beyond it came through scrambled and warped. It had become known as the Bramble Patch.

But now there was already another panic. “Any sign of any repercussions yet?” asked Agent Hralfa, jogging down the hallway to keep up with Director Mhoro.

“Not as far as I’ve been told,” said the director, “but the disappearance of an entire planetoid-sized spatio-temporal vessel? Only 0.3 centiplanes from us? Why are we still alive? Why aren’t we even seeing a second Bramble Patch?”

“Yet all indications showed that the intended destination was in the past of the same universe … timeline-crossing,” said Hralfa. They reached the command center, a huge multi-leveled room full of rows of monitors and control panels, each with an agent operating observation equipment.

“Director,” said an agent, running up to Mhoro with a report, “we’ve detected a vibration … but nothing like what we feared.”

“Any analysis yet?”

“Nothing complete, Sir, but … the most likely scenarios, according to the Theory Division, are that some sort of mishap saved us. The destination was clear from the emanations, but … that wasn’t where they ended up.”

“So something blew them off course, and that’s the only reason we’re not dead,” said the director.

“Or so they think so far, Sir.”

“We can’t keep on like this,” Hralfa said. “Too many nearby universes are discovering time crystal transference technology without applying proper safeguards.”

“We have got to form a new division,” Director Mhoro said, “one to prevent this from happening. We have to step in before disaster strikes.”

“I’ll start writing the proposal, Sir,” said Agent Hralfa.

“But where did they go?” the director wondered.

“No word on that, Sir,” said the other agent. “The mis-destination was chaotic … unpredictable. Enough to cause ripples, but … then they just died away. We may never find out where the vessel went.”

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Cynthia said, “The Moon was supposedly ejected when a huge object the size of Mars hit the proto-planet that would become Earth while it was still forming. They called it Theia, the thing that hit the Earth. The resulting blob split into the Earth and the Moon. Or that’s one theory.”

“The computer’s still taking observations to see how this thing survived,” said Jennie, “and how the crystal got separated from it.”

Ghimar added, “From my readings, the chamber whose inner surface we stand upon is about what you would call two miles in diameter – but it may have had a much larger superstructure that was destroyed on impact, protecting this place. This was no doubt the command and control center. There was probably more material in the space that is now empty – its remains are probably the dust which the robotic drones have been clearing.”

“How is this area not pulverized?” Michelle asked.

Jennie vanished and returned again. “OK,” she said, “I’ve got video from the computer, but I have no idea how to show it on these screens. The point is: the operators were killed on impact. The damage was severe. There was a huge infrastructure for the crystal – computers and electronics the likes of which we’ve never seen, with the crystal at its center – but they ran into some kind of mishap that sent them off course and caused the crystal to eject. It punched a hole through everything, computers, walls, and even the thick wall of this central chamber, but that damage was dwarfed by the damage of the collision that happened right afterward.”

Cynthia gasped and said, “It wasn’t an object the size of Mars … but it was an object with the kinetic energy of a Mars-sized object. And it ended up inside a huge blob of molten rock that then separated to form the Moon.”

“How, I repeat,” asked Michelle, “did this area, with its screens and nice chairs, manage to stay intact?”

“The video evidence says … it didn’t,” said Jennie. “But there were self-repair systems. They had billions of years to work. They didn’t need life support, so they shut that off, and they used their energy to put things back together as best they could. They were autonomous enough that just a few robots were able to rebuild more robots, control computers that could organize them better, the rest of the computer system, and even reload the programming and data from what backups they could find intact.”

“And then,” said Dr. Felding, “I presume it sat inert for quite some time, until it was discovered by a now-unknown Earth civilization that found itself in hostilities with the planet Bretaka that I’m seeing mentioned here. I’m not clear on how the crystal’s pedestal came to be, with its variety of forms of writing.”

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It didn’t take long to get the system to do a language update to English for all files and data banks, after the screens and interfaces had changed over. Dr. Felding was totally engrossed in his research as he slowly paced through the huge archive of data. The new evidence on physics was a real eye opener once he realized what the data was showing.

He was totally spellbound at the fact that gravity could be thought of as a cosmic stylus, with light being the write head and the fabric of space/time substrate was the display window. He came to a section that was locked. It requested the Administrator's password.

Dr. Felding was desperate. He was so close … this file was the largest data store in the system, which had to mean something. Out of sheer frustration he entered the word Muda, which was Swahili for time. The screen cleared. The words “Administrative Access Unlocked” appeared with an itemized listing of the massive database.

Dr. Felding turned slightly and said, “Jennie, you and Michelle might want to take a look at this. I got lucky and found a word that worked.”

Cynthia walked over and sat in the gravity couch next to Dr. Felding and watched the new data feed unfold. “What?” she asked, leaning forward. “According to this … the impactor was originally larger than Earth. Theia … would have completely disrupted the development of Earth, knocked the proto-planet out of orbit entirely. And then …”

“And then in came this facility here,” said Jennie, looking over her shoulder, “much smaller but still quite large, and moving with incredible relative speed. Looks like my computer-driven observation was partly accurate, but not completely.”

“This facility struck Theia and fractured it, sending most of it out into deep space,” said Michelle. “but the rest of it was still huge and was still heading toward the blob of molten liquid that would one day become Earth.”

“This facility hit Earth along with the remains of Theia,” said Dr. Felding. “The combined material split into two objects, with this facility at the heart of the smaller blob. It was denser than the rest, so it sunk to the center before the proto-Moon cooled.”

“Still damaged this facility really badly,” Jennie said, “and the time-space mishap that brought the thing to this universe still caused the time crystal to emerge and embed itself into the Earth.”

“Over the next billion years,” Cynthia said, reading as the data passed by on the screen, “many tons of debris accreted to its exterior, creating what we now know as the lunar surface.”

“Looks like the rest of Theia was knocked into an orbit between Mars and Jupiter,” said Michelle. “That must have become the planet this system calls Bretaka. Then we get to about a million years ago …”

Dr. Felding picked it up from here. “The system has been recording the goings-on on Earth all this time. It says that the various peoples of Earth at that time were not primitive proto-humans as many of us think, but were highly advanced, capable of space flight. Fascinating. They explored the Moon and discovered cracks that led to the center, to this chamber we’re inside. They mounted an expedition to see what, if anything, could be salvaged. Just as we have, they learned its past … and they learned of Theia and its remnant, which now had inhabitants of its own, who had named it Bretaka.”

“And for some reason … they were hostile,” Jennie added. “It doesn’t say here how that happened, but the inhabitants of Earth had repaired this place as best they could, and they used it in the battle. They even retrieved the time crystal. But … they used some kind of graviton weapon?”

“Looks like It didn’t go so well for either side,” said Cynthia. “The massive graviton weapon hit Bretaka and broke it up, but that destabilized the Moon’s orbit too, and in turn the Earth’s, and their civilization fell. The last survivors removed the time crystal again and returned it to the cave where they’d found it, putting it on a pedestal under the light caused by the catastrophic entry of the Moon into this universe.”

Dr. Felding said, “It says they carved the pedestal with information about what it could do, but also a warning about what not to do. The computer system here informed them of what to carve for future generations … it used languages from what it had seen on Earth and could predict in the future. That explains why it’s got fragments of different ancient languages we know while mostly being in some language we’ve never seen before. Or it sort of explains it, anyway. I didn’t think the time crystals could go into the future …”

“Not the future future, anyway,” said Michelle. “If you’ve gone back into the past, you can return to your starting point, which I guess would technically be a trip into the future. But if you try to go forward from now … you kind of get lost among the possibilities. You’ll see a future, but is it the future that will really be or just a maybe-future?”
“So the system managed to stabilize the Earth and Moon over time,” said Jennie. “Looks like it took the machines several centuries. They tidally locked the Moon with the Earth again for maximum stability. And over time meteor impacts wrecked the structures and equipment they’d left on the surface and collapsed all known entrances.”

“And tales of time travel were forgotten and relegated to myths and legends,” said Dr. Felding. “The species of hominids that lived back then went extinct with their civilization, it says here. There were other species of hominid around the world, living primitive existences, and they became our ancestors over the following million years or so.”

“So now we know how all this got here,” Cynthia said. “But what should we do now? Is there even a place to insert the time crystal anymore? We were up there earlier, in the space above our heads, and it was empty. I guess the robotic repair systems didn’t rebuild it because there was no time crystal to put there? Or did the people of a million years ago install it somewhere else?”

“They installed it somewhere else,” said Michelle, looking at a screen. “Look at this map. Here we are, and over here is the time crystal drive system. It’s not in the center of the space; it was reconstructed off to one side.”

“Are we … talking about putting the time crystal in there and take the Moon for a spin, or something?” Jennie asked. “Wouldn’t people kind of notice if the Moon disappeared? It would disrupt the Earth’s orbit, not to mention the tides.”

“Yeah, probably not the best idea,” Michelle said, “but think of it … we know how to make the Moon disappear.”
“OMG,” said Cynthia, realizing the enormity of that notion. “But we’re totally not going to do that. It would be catastrophic.”

“No, we are not doing that,” said Jennie. “It’s tempting, but no. But we do know where the time crystal came from now. Continental drift and the making of mountains and valleys moved the cave around over time, and it ended up on our family’s land without anyone ever knowing, except maybe a few Native American legends that they probably didn’t even believe.”

“It is pretty unbelievable,” said Dr. Felding. “I don’t really know how I would even go about presenting a paper about this to the scientific community. Something else I’ll have to keep secret, for now at least. I suppose I can share it with Dr. Blake’s group.”

“I don’t know how either,” said Cynthia. “But for now, maybe we should get back to Earth. I wonder if the general and the colonel have been trying to reach us. I think we’re pretty far out of cell phone range here.”

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The entire Spatio-Temporal Research Division of the planet Tulusian had created a charter and and an organization they had named Chronal Enforcers. Once their local group had been ratified and accepted, Tulusian sent representatives to all of the currently known species and informed them of the severity of the time crystal issue and gathered many recruits. A Time Coalition started to form.

The organization was massively funded by many civilizations from many dimensions. In very short order, they had invented an energy viewer that allowed them to look into other times and dimensions. They also created protocols that were monitored 24/7 and constantly scoured the infinitely large multiverse looking for the energy patterns of time crystals.

This wasn’t as impossible as it might seem at first blush. The energy disruptions created by chronal displacements showed up like a flashlight in a pitch-black room, making them much easier to locate, especially when the scanners were operated by banks of carefully-optimized computers.

However, the multiverse was infinite, but not so the Enforcers, so now and again something slipped past. So far, they had been lucky. They couldn’t always find every anomaly before it happened, but so far only minor paradoxes had slipped by, and nothing universally devastating had happened since the cataclysm that had led to the Time Coalition’s founding. From an objective point of view, the Coalition had now been in existence for thousands of years, to use a unit of time familiar to the people of Earth.

In a huge council chamber there were many tiers of seats circling the room, filled with people from many worlds, times, and dimensions. The soft buzz in the room became silent as a woman dressed in what looked like a crystal came to the podium.

“Good chronal cycles to all,” she said, with many mutual responses. “My name is Leona Gronts, and I am a captan in the Chronal Enforcers. We need to discuss the possibility of a new organizational member, or possibly three members.”

A man dressed in stunningly bright white robes stood and asked, “Didn’t we already contact all known species, past and future, and recruit them? Is this a newly-eligible civilization?"

Leona replied, “The operative word is ‘known.’ We learned of this species by accident when we detected chronal activity in a sector we had never visited. Officer Ghimar was dispatched to evaluate the situation and determine appropriate actions.”

The man asked, “What did the officer discover?”

Leona replied, “Two very intelligent women who had discovered an anomalously large time crystal and were more than interested in keeping the technology from getting out of hand. They even started a company. They call it ‘About Time’ – evidently some sort of idiomatic reference in their language. Currently they are basically performing our organizational duties, so it stands to reason they should be admitted. There is another matter – the crystal they found may in fact have originated in the long-lost Chronal Ship, which may finally have been located after all these time cycles. Ghimar was present to observe and sent this recording.”
A loud murmur rounded the room for a few minutes as Leona placed a projection device on the podium. When all retuned to silence, Leona energised it. What it showed was the pictorial record Ghimar had made while the four of them explored the central area inside Earth’s moon.

There was a pause while a humanoid being that apparently had beams of light emanating from its eyes and mouth explained the past mystery of the vanished Chronal Ship, which had originated from its own dimension and world. “The resulting tremor shook the continuum of our universe and several nearby,” said the being, whose name was Delegate H-99, “but because the proto-planet would have been struck by the large impactor in any case, the timeline was not paradoxed. However, until just now, all we knew was that the Chronal Ship had vanished, and its crew were never heard from again. Analysis of Ghimar’s recording indicates …”

It went on to tell the rest of the story, then there was debate on whether the remains of the Chronal Ship should be returned to its world of origin, but even Delegate H-99’s opinion was that it was merely a historical curiosity, a missing ship case that could now be closed. Delegate H-99 would not say no to a visit by some of its people’s scientists someday, to document the find. The consensus was that attempting to remove Earth’s moon from its current place would be too disruptive to Earth and its people, not to mention potentially destabilizing to that dimension’s timeline.

Leona moved on. “Now, then, as to the matter of the ‘humans,’ as they call themselves, named Michelle Danwoo, Jennifer Kent, and Cynthia Curtsie, and the company they have formed, known as ‘About Time.’ They do not represent their species, nor do they claim to. In fact, they are currently endeavoring to control the rest of their world’s access to space-time-dimension technology, as their nation’s military has been trespassing on their private property and attempting to intimidate them and steal the time crystal, something that became quite a bit more difficult once they discovered how to use it – which is what attracted our attention to the situation. The floor is open for debate.”

There was considerable debate, in fact. After much questioning about the facts of the situation, Delegate Un-zen announced, “I propose that the organization called ‘About Time’ be admitted to the Coalition as a Non-Species-Representative Corporate Entity under section 6, paragraph 113 of the Charter.” It was a rarely-used clause, but it had been invoked a few times before; it was not without precedent.

Several other proposals were forwarded, including sending a diplomatic emissary to the humans as a whole, denying the entire proposal, and removing access to the technology from all humans, including “About Time.” But Delegate Un-zen’s proposal came to have the most support. When it came to a vote, it won out handily.

“The proposal of Delegate Un-zen is adopted, then,” said Leona. “As the officer handling the case, Officer Ghimar is to be summoned and briefed about the new status and what goes with it.”

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“Good thing we formalized our corporate structure, such as it is,” said Jennie when Ghimar appeared and told them the news. They were back on Earth, and for now, at least, their lab was back on Ghost Hill in Painter’s Valley. They’d even fabricated a sign that stood outside: “Ghost Hill Laboratory – A Facility of About Time, Inc. – No Trespassing.”

“What does this change … entail?” asked Michelle.

Ghimar explained, “On the good side, it means that you are an official entity of the Time Coalition – so far, the only one on your planet. If you are threatened and the security of your time-space-dimension technology is at risk, Chronal Enforcement can and will come to your aid. There is no longer an embargo against our assisting you with any technology.”

“And on the bad side?” asked Jennie.

“There is … paperwork,” Ghimar said, their computer-translated voice somehow coming across with trepidation, which made the two young women giggle. “With any organization comes bureaucracy. You will be required to send a delegate to scheduled meetings. Of course, as this is an organization of time travelers, there is never any need to be late to meetings – simply set your coordinates to the meeting’s start time.”

“That’s a plus, at least,” Michelle remarked.

“You no longer need to abide by this set of regulations,” said Ghimar, pointing at one folder on their holographic screen. “You will have to abide by this set.” They pointed to a different folder. “You would probably want to read that. It has been translated into English and transmitted to your computer system.”

“And there it is,” said Jennie, pointing to the folder on the computer’s monitor. “OK, we’ll read that carefully. We’ll get Cynthia to read that too, when she gets back.”

“I notice that you never asked us whether we had a choice in the matter,” Michelle commented.

“That is true,” said Ghimar. “Technically, this is an offer. You can refuse, if you choose. Knowing you from observation, however, I did not think you would.”

“No, you’re right about that,” said Jennie.

“It’s only logical,” Michelle said. “We’re basically doing your Chronal Enforcer job for you already – now we have backup if we need it.”

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True to their word, they did in fact read the regulations and fill out the appropriate forms, and they got Cynthia to do the same. Shortly thereafter, though, came their first request from their “partners” in General Prescott’s black-ops military operation, which was known only as Project Seldom.

They requested a video chat, and when the meeting time came the three of them were gathered in Cynthia’s office, around her big video screen. General Prescott and Colonel Gaines appeared in two windows.

“Greetings, General, Colonel,” said Michelle. “How can we help you today?”

“Well, as stipulated in the contract,” the general began, “we are to be trained in the operation of the time-travel equipment. We’ve decided that as the two highest ranking members of the project, we should be first, so we can act as leaders when the time comes to train the rank and file.”

“Quite so, General,” said Cynthia. “That’s in the contract. We’ve gotten your measurements and made you suits. You’ll like them. They’re very impressive looking. They’ve got US flags on them.”

“So the equipment is ready,” said the colonel. “Is there any reason why we can’t be trained right now?”

The three women looked at each other. “I don’t see why not,” said Jennie. “Do you?”

“I mean, I hadn’t planned on that for today,” Michelle answered, “but are we a time travel company or not?”

“All right then,” said Cynthia. “We’ll come to you, in … how about Conference Room B? It has that wide-open space in the center.”

“Fine,” replied the general. “We’ll meet you there right away.” They vanished from the screen.

After Jennie had closed the meeting, she said, “We’re sure the suits are ready?”

“Yes,” Michelle said. “No dimension-travel controls, only time and space. If they ask about the dimension travel component, we tell them it’s for training purposes. If they don’t ask, we don’t tell.”

“Right,” said Cynthia, “the suits are in the back room. Maybe we should fabricate some stands? Do we have time for that?”

“We always have time,” said Jennie.

General Prescott and Colonel Gaines had only been in Conference Room B for a few seconds when there was a ruby-red flash, and the three figures of Jennie, Michelle, and Cynthia appeared, wearing their crystalline suits, and on two stands in front of them were two similar suits labeled “Prescott” and “Gaines,” along with small American flags.

“General,” said Michelle with proper respect. “Colonel.”

“So we’ve tailor-made these for you,” said Cynthia, “to your measurements, which you sent us, but you’ll have to let us know if they’re uncomfortable at all. Up to now, Michelle and Jennifer have only made them for women, you see.”

“I guess we suit up, Sir,” said the colonel.

“The suits don’t work too well if you’re outside them,” Jennie remarked as the two men removed their uniform blazers and began struggling into the suits, which closed automatically as if by magic. They helped each other with the helmets.

Once they were fully suited, Cynthia began the spiel. “Now, as you can see, the control pad is on the left arm. First things first: the suits have built-in life support that switches on automatically if they detect that you’re in a hostile environment, but if they don’t auto-detect, the proper sequence is …” She went on to describe all the various control functions.

When she was done, Michelle suggested, “Now I propose we go on a training excursion. I’ve got some coordinates prepared, because I want to show you one of the important features of the travel system. So if you’ll just enter what I enter …”

Together, the five of them appeared in a swampy area. There was the sound of some sort of rock and roll music coming from a transistor radio somewhere nearby, and they looked in that direction to see a campsite. The battery-powered radio was playing, but they didn’t see anybody around. “Whoever this belongs to must be away for now,” said Jennie. “The system has two important failsafes, both of which we’ve just seen in operation – any idea what I’m talking about, sirs?”

“I noticed that we all put in the same coordinates, but we didn’t end up in exactly the same position,” said Colonel Gaines, “which would have probably been pretty much lethal, I imagine.”

“Correct, Colonel!” said Jennie. “It offset us by a small amount so we didn’t overlap. The same goes for matter that’s in the vicinity of the destination – we’re shifted in the nearest direction so as to be clear of solid objects and safe on solid ground.”

“The second failsafe’s why we’ve ended up in a place with nobody here,” said Cynthia. “We aren’t in a place where we might do something to cause a paradox.”

“The camper’s out fishing or something,” replied the general.

“Precisely,” said Michelle. “Paradox is something we absolutely can’t have. It disrupts the space-time continuum and has a very real risk of destroying the entire universe. So the system has a built-in failsafe against it.”

The radio crackled and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, we have just received a news bulletin.” The man’s voice sounded Australian. “The President of the United States, John Kennedy, has been shot by a gunman. Attempts are being made to save Mr. Kennedy’s life, and the American police are looking for the shooter.” There was a pause. “Crikey, ladies and gents. This is no joke. I’ve got no idea what to say. Hold on, there’s another bulletin …”

“What? We’re in … 1963?” asked the colonel.

“If only we could do something to save President Kennedy,” said the general.

“No,” said Jennie, “we can’t think like that. We can’t even start thinking like that. Because if we do … that way lies madness. We just … we just can’t.” Tears were in her eyes.

“Are you … all right, Jennie?” asked Cynthia.

Michelle replied, “It’s … well, I know exactly how she feels. Our parents died. All of them, in the same helicopter crash. If only one thing had gone differently … we might still have them today. But we can’t do that. We can’t change the past. Paradox. Everybody dies. Everything you’ve ever known, gone in an instant like it was never there.”

“My god,” the colonel replied.

“I’m sorry, Miss Kent, Miss Danwoo,” said the general awkwardly. “I didn’t mean to suggest … it was only a wish that it weren’t so. I imagine … that you wish the same.”

“You have no idea,” said Jennie, regaining her composure. “We might want to return before the camper does. But even if they saw us, one person seeing something weird while on a fishing trip doesn’t pose a huge risk.”

“His buddies will just say he was drinking a bit too much of the good stuff while he was fishing,” said Cynthia. “And … they might not be wrong.” There were some empty bottles around the campsite. “He’s not likely to be believed. But it’s better if we don’t give him a story to tell at all.”

“Right,” said Michelle. “The system saves our point of departure, so we can return to it by …” She explained the control procedure to do so. They vanished in five flashes of emerald green light.

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They had materialized in the conference room, and the three women had returned to Ghost Hill Lab, leaving the general’s and the colonel’s suits back at the base. But no sooner had they removed their helmets than Cynthia immediately turned to Jennie and Michelle and said, “I don’t trust the general. We just used saving Kennedy as the paradox example. You don’t know about his daughter.”

“His daughter?” asked Jennie. “I didn’t know he had a daughter.”

Cynthia replied hesitantly, “She’s … estranged. A decade ago she went out with a bunch of her friends, had a bit too much to drink, then fell asleep in the back of the group’s van. For reasons unknown, while she slept, the rest stopped at a convenience store and tried to rob it. Unfortunately for them, a sheriff’s deputy pulled in and went into the store, and several of the group and the attendant at the store got shot up fairly badly. They arrested her too, and convicted her of aiding and abetting murder. She got 40 years. The reason the penalty was so severe was, the attendant that night happened to be the mayor’s son, and his injuries were too severe for him to recover. The mayor’s son getting shot and killed by some group of teens? It didn’t sit well with the mayor, or the rest of the small town’s population.”

Jennie rushed to the observation screen, looked in on the general, and saw him in his private office, playing with the suit’s transfer controls. She replied to Cynthia, “You think he’d be stupid enough to attempt …?“

“The suits have the paradox-prevention circuitry,” said Michelle. “It’s not even in the programming; it’s in the wiring. There are no override codes. He’d have to bridge the circuit boards. And that takes know-how and effort, not to mention time.”

Cynthia reminded her, “But they’ve got a loophole a mile wide. You could save Kennedy by transferring to the book depository one hour before Oswald ever showed up, then taking the suit off. Sure, the suit would disappear once it entered paradox territory, but you wouldn’t be in it. Sure, you’d be stuck in 1963, but you could save the President. And … doom the timeline.”

“And we just gave him the idea of transferring to a paradox-free point just before paradox time,” said Jennie, rushing to the observation screen and tuning in on the general. There he was, alone in his office, with the suit on, manipulating the controls. “No! He can’t …”

Jennie never got to finish as a bright emerald green flash marked the general’s departure. Immediately the women’s emergency paradox alarm went off, indicating if the flagged action wasn’t prevented in a hurry, the resulting chronal tsunami would wipe out this universe and parts of a few others. All three of their hearts started beating rapidly.

Jennie didn’t hesitate and jammed her helmet back on. “The override protocols!” she said. The suits they had made for the general and the colonel had special override protocols because the women didn’t trust the black-ops Project Seldom, though they claimed they were for training purposes. They gave About Time control over the usage of the suits.

“We have to be in proximity of the general to take admin control,” said Michelle. “But they won’t work if he takes the suit off. We’ll control the suit, but he won’t be in it.”

“We can track him easily,” said Cynthia. “The Chronal Enforcers gave us that tech as soon as we joined up. Here’s his destination.”

It was a calm summer night. A rural gas station’s bright lights created a pool of light amid the surrounding darkness. Nothing could be heard but the chirping of insects and the distant violence occurring inside the building. A van sat quietly parked next to a gas pump. Nearby, outside the puddle of light, came a green flash.

The general had managed to appear out of anyone’s sight. Loud paradox alarms were going off in his helmet, but he just took it off, along with the suit, which vanished unnoticed moments after it hit the ground. He went to the back of the van, reached for the handle, and suddenly there was another flash of green light behind him and he was in a very swampy humid and wet place with another individual in a crystal suit and some kind of gun-shaped device.

Jennie said angrily, “So, you didn’t believe us and decided it was better to destroy the universe, your daughter included, than for her to go to jail. Well, too bad for you. I’m leaving you here.” She pointed off into the swampland and told him, “You’ll find a rather well-built slagcrete dome facility about a mile in that direction. Be careful. No humanoid life forms, but the local critters might think you’re part of their food chain.”

With this, she vanished in a bright emerald green flash, and the general found himself alone in the middle of the smelly swamp. He looked around, but there was no sign of the suit that had brought him here … well, not here.

Prescott didn’t panic, although he felt the seriousness of his situation as he began to trudge through the green, thick, slimy swamp in the direction where Jennie had said was some type of shelter. There was some kind of shrill shriek in the distance … answered by another from almost exactly the opposite direction. He trudged faster.

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“Section 13, Paragraph frickin’ 1,” said Cynthia, slapping a copy of the signed contract down on Colonel Gaines’ desk. “The party of the first part, namely About Time, Inc., reserves the right to take any appropriate action should any use by the party of the second part, namely Project Seldom, risk temporal paradox and therefore the existence of the universe itself. You demand to know where General Prescott is – he’s somewhere where he poses no threat to the existence of you, me, the United States, the planet Earth, the solar system, the Milky Way Galaxy, and the entire universe. Which he apparently did.”

“Now look here, Ms. Curtsie,” the colonel began.

“Dr. Curtsie!” Cynthia snapped back. “I’m a civilian now, so you’re not my CO. We’ve got his suit, his destination space-time coordinates, and enough knowledge about his past to know exactly what he was doing. And you know too.”

Colonel Gaines took a breath. “He was taking an action that, if completed, would have made his trip unnecessary, so he wouldn’t have taken it, and that would have made it necessary, so he would’ve ended up both traveling and not traveling.”

“And that would’ve caused a cascade of destruction that makes a supernova look like a walk in the park,” said Cynthia. “It’s something we simply can’t risk.”
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Prescott trudged along more or less in the direction Jennie had indicated, as much as the terrain allowed. He heard many throaty shrieks, and many deep bass growls and snarls, and was very glad they weren’t near … although he had no illusions about the likely outcome if he encountered one of this place’s nastier predators.

He came to a small stream that slowly meandered off. Prescott was fully able to live off the land, and wherever this was, it wasn’t too unlike where he’d trained. He started looking for something that might pass as a weapon. His eyes fell on a very healthy stand of river cane, and he got an idea.

The only real weapon he had on him was his survival knife, which he brought wherever he went. He took it from its sheath and cut a small bundle of the bamboo-like plant. He whacked an angled chunk from the ends of each stalk of cane, making a very sharp point. Maybe each one was only good for one shot, but now he had several shots.

Now he needed a throwing stick. As he trudged onward, he stayed vigilant, both for the dangerous critters he heard all around, and for something to make the thrower. His eyes fell on the perfect limb with an offshoot limb not only in the right direction, but on the heavy end.

By the time Prescott managed to stumble his way through the swamp to the dome, the sun had begun to set. Not only did those critters sound less far off, it sounded like he was being stalked. He sighed as he leaned against the steel door and heard the internal click of the set closing.

When he turned around, his mouth fell open, and his eyes bugged out. The equipment he saw was advanced beyond anything he could imagine. The only equipment he couldn’t find was the time travel apparatus. Then again, most of this was so highly advanced that he could be looking right at it and he wouldn’t know the difference.

There were enough basic items like binding cord and metal that could be hammered, and yes, even hammers. After an hour or so, Prescott had pounded himself out metal heads for his darts. He had also been gathering assorted feathers as he wandered through the swamp and tied them on the proximal ends of his darts with the binding cord. By the time he was done, he had a formidable weapon any aborigine would love to own.

Next thing on the agenda: was there food and water, or would he have to find it? Water was easy, and from what he had heard, meat seemed to be plentiful.

The dome was huge and had multiple walls and rooms. He started exploring, since apparently he had been abandoned here. He discovered quickly that the dome had electricity and running hot and cold water. Perhaps his existence wouldn’t be as primitive as he’d assumed.

He found the kitchen area after about 45 minutes of exploration. He opened what looked like a chest freezer. It was well stocked with frozen foods – though, like any supply, it was finite. The same was true of the walk-in pantry. OK, food and water were no issue, at least for the moment. Now, just where in this reality was he … and was there any possibility of getting back?

He found a complex-looking device that looked like a huge flat-screen monitor with a keyboard and a lot of complicated controls attached. He sat down in a padded chair in front of it to examine it. He pressed what looked like a power button to turn it on … and almost wet his shorts when the face of Michelle appeared.

“General, this is a recording,” Michelle said. “You probably know by now that the place you’re in is pretty wild, and you’re the only human in it. You might be wondering where you are. Well, you’re actually in our universe, though you’re on a planet that orbits a double star that can’t be seen from Earth. We found it by accident. Be glad we didn’t send you to the one with the dry ice blizzards.”

She paused. “Look, I get it. Jennie and I wish we could go back and save our parents from the helicopter crash that killed them all, all at once. Since we found out about time travel, it’s all we’ve been able to think about, when we had a chance, what with your project trying to kill us and take our stuff. But it didn’t take us long to find out that paradox is no trifling matter. It hurts that we can’t undo the past. All we can do when we go back is kind of wiggle around in the cracks left where no one was looking.”

“Cynthia told us what she knew about your daughter,” Michelle went on. “What happened to her was a travesty of justice, a damn shame. But you can’t fix it with time travel. Fix it another way. At least she’s alive, even if she’s in prison. Our parents are never coming back. She’s got a dad.”

“And that brings me to why you’re here,” Michelle went on. “This is what the contract called ‘taking appropriate action.’ We’re allowed to prevent you from having contact with time travel technology while you’re a danger to the universe. That includes Earth, the planet you’re on now, and countless others, some of which have intelligent life and have never heard of you, and yet you were willing to kill them and their entire civilization, not to mention your daughter and yourself, just because you didn’t believe us when we said it was dangerous.”

“Well, that’s about it,” concluded Michelle. “There are some supplies, and a lot of tools, but no time travel technology. Your way home is to show us that you’re not a danger to the entire universe. How you do that is up to you. Good luck, General.”

The screen went dark. Prescott could see how to replay the message, and there were data files about various different types of technology, presumably things that were in this dome. How had they had time to build all of this? If they built it in the past, didn’t that cause a paradox – if it didn’t exist already in the present, and they went back to build it, didn’t that constitute a paradox? Maybe not, if the planet was so far from Earth that nothing anyone did here would ever affect anything there.

Well, for now, he appeared to be well barricaded from the local fauna inside this structure. He looked for and found a bedroom and got some rest; he’d need it.

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“... and so it’s imperative that you all read the contract with About Time, most importantly Section 13, paragraph 1,” said Col. Gaines, addressing all remaining personnel of Project Seldom. “The general chose to misuse this tech for personal reasons, and it’s only because of About Time’s intervention that we’re all alive right now. Do I know for a fact that paradoxing the timeline will destroy it? Well, have I seen the universe’s destruction with my own eyes? No, because I’m standing here today, and so are you. What we do know is that the About Time people are the experts, and we are contracting their services. Therefore, we will not be violating that contract. Is that understood?”

“Yes, Sir,” said the troops and officers.

“I said, is that understood?” asked Gaines with more intensity.

“SIr! Yes, Sir!” they all said with more conviction.

“Good. The tech we’re working with here is not to be trifled with and has many safeguards, but there are ways around them. Do not find ways around them. They are there to protect everything you know and love. Now, Captain Clay, Lieutenant Hernandez, and Lieutenant Martins, come with me. I have had several training sessions with the gear. Now it’s your turn. The rest of you are dismissed.”

“Well said, Colonel,” said Cynthia as he entered the training room with Clay, Hernandez, and Martins, where there were crystalline suits hanging on frames labeled with their names.

“Any word on the general?” Gaines asked.

Cynthia replied, “He’s doing fine, and it’s not like we tried to kill him or anything, which is more than I can say for what he tried to do. The US has no laws for that, but we do have a contract, and he broke it and almost killed us all. We just want to make sure that we’re safe from him.”

The captain and the two lieutenants looked at each other nervously, but Gaines turned to them and said, “These are training suits made for us by About Time. They have limited capabilities but have been provided to show us how to use the tech. Our mission as regards this tech is to gain whatever tactical advantage we can from time travel in matters of national defense – but that cannot extend to altering the past in any material way. When used properly the gear will not allow us to do that. Valuable intel can be gained from recon missions into the past, however. Travel into the future is possible, and I use that word deliberately, because travel is into a possible future, not the definite future; we will not know what the true future will be until we arrive there the regular way. Now, suit up, and the training mission will begin.”

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The men had all suited up with Cynthia inspecting each trooper to insure it was done properly.

Cynthia returned to the front of the men and said as she typed on the control surface built into the arm of her suit, “I am going to take you gentlemen several places. Don’t be alarmed at where you appear or what you see. The suits are safeguarded to insure your safety. Now, class begins. I have overridden all your suits’ positional circuits. The only circuit in operation contains the emergency protocols. Brace yourselves, here it comes with no sweeteners.” Cynthia pressed the enable button on her controls.

The only thing the men noticed was the seeming change in gravity and the total whipping whiteout surrounding them. The men didn’t panic, but that didn’t mean they weren’t afraid. In another instant, they were surrounded by molten iron falling as rain. Massive billowing clouds of carbon dioxide sublimated instantly away in the great heat. As soon as the rapidly dissipating cloud had vanished, as far as they could see was a molten hellscape, then the scene changed once again.

This time they appeared in what was obviously a rather advanced research laboratory. Gaines saw one of the general’s personal items sitting on a workbench. He now knew exactly where the General had gone. They were there now.

Cynthia said, “You had asked me what the General's disposition was.” She waved her arm around the super advanced area. “We sent him here. If you would like, I’ll let you talk to him and try to explain things. If you manage in a reasonable way, we’ll return him with you. Otherwise, he stays here.”

Gaines said in a strange tone, “I would like to try. Don’t know what good it will do. I think a mule having a tantrum is more reasonable than him on a normal day. And I hope he didn’t just hear me say that.”

Cynthia laughed as the other men stifled theirs. She said with an obvious giggle, “You’re welcome to try. I must warn you, however, any deception on his or even your parts under contract may result in banishment to places you might really not wanna go.”

Gaines turned slightly toward Cynthia and asked, “That’s what those first two stops were about, wasn’t it? The empirical can't be denied proof. You wouldn’t … really send someone there, would you?”

Cynthia replied sternly, “If we did, the needs of all creation would outweigh the needs of something as insignificant as one individual.”

Gaines had no rebuttals as he gathered the small team and discussed how they were going to handle the general. All of them knew his attitude and temper. None looked forward to telling him no … that just wasn’t something any of them looked forward to.

After about twenty or thirty minutes, the door to the dome swung open. In walked the general with a rather large dead animal across his shoulders. He was dressed in an outfit made entirely from animal skins, but it was also made to look like regular pants and jeans. He had even made himself a rather impressive pair of rawhide boots. Around his waist was a beautifully crafted rawhide quiver with several dozen finely-fletched cane arrows with razor sharp metal heads. In his hand was a finely crafted wooden longbow.

Immediately, the general dropped his quarry and nocked an arrow. “You come back to finish the job?” he snarled.

That was when Gaines walked toward the general. “Yes, Sir,” he said. “We have come to finish the job, actually. You and we need to have a discussion that perhaps is the most important one you will ever have.”

General Prescott kept his bow aimed at Gaines. “Important how?” he asked. “You are aware that I have been stranded here for 10 years, with no human contact other than recordings?”

Cynthia interrupted, “General, you’ve been here for two weeks.”

“Look, that doesn’t matter, Sir,” said the colonel. “You’re here to protect the universe from your selfish impulses. We’ve all got to resist the temptation to try to undo the misfortunes of the past. Not one of us doesn’t have something we wish could’ve gone differently – usually several things.”

“And you want to know whether I’ve learned my lesson?” replied Prescott. “I’ve seen not one shred of evidence that the universe would be affected one iota by any paradox that might arise from changing the past. All we’ve got are About Time’s word for it.”

“Well, that would be because we can’t demonstrate without destroying multiple universes and condemning untold numbers of sentient beings to their doom,” Cynthia replied. “But I can do something else.” She went over to the console and linked it with the controls on her suit.

The lights went out in the dome, and the console began projecting a hologram – they were clearly on an alien world. Strangely shaped near-humanoid beings walked around on flat, elephantine feet as others glided by in hovering vehicles. The architecture nearby was clearly not that of Earth but was definitely metallic and crystalline; it was a technological civilization.

“What is this?” demanded the general.

“This is the world where the first known paradox occurred,” Cynthia replied. And just like that, there was a deep violet flash, and another alien appeared out of thin air, wearing a backpack-like device. “His wife is about to suffer an untimely death. He loved her so much that he labored to invent time travel to go back and save her. We are watching this incident unfold as it happened.”

Just then another one of the beings stepped out into the street, for want of a better term, just as a large delivery vehicle was barreling down on them. The time traveler was running and jumped at the unfortunate pedestrian, shoving them out of the way; one of his legs was sliced to the bone by the delivery platform going full speed. Oddly, the time traveler’s personal appearance was growing fainter, indistinct, as if half the light that struck him was passing through him instead of reflecting.

And then there was a shimmer in the air. The ground began to shake visibly, though the observers didn’t feel anything, since this was a recording. Cracks appeared in the ground, and buildings began to collapse. Then everything simply went black.The stars and sunlight were still present, but Cynthia, Prescott, Gaines, and the others were seemingly floating in space, though they didn’t feel any gravitational difference, because this was only a projection. “That’s right,” said Cynthia, “the paradox we’ve just witnessed has destroyed this universe. The wave of annihilation has begun here but won’t reach the sun for about 8 minutes. Let me shift our vantage point.”

She touched her controls, and they were now in space, seeing an expanding black sphere where they assumed the planet had once been. Not only was it devouring all light-scattering debris, it was obscuring the light from stars and galaxies that lay behind it from their point of view. They looked on in horror; the entire planet was already gone, but it wasn’t stopping there. In minutes the sun was swallowed, and other planets began to follow suit.

Cynthia moved them outward. Slowly, inexorably, the universe was being swallowed, and it was accelerating. The nearest stars went in a few more minutes. The vantage point shifted to the entire galaxy that had once contained this world, now with a huge black sphere growing within its disc. Soon the galaxy was no more, and the sphere continued to spread. “There might have been other planets with intelligent life on them in that galaxy,” said Cynthia. “But not anymore.”

“No …” said Hernandez. “Can anything stop it?”

“Nothing known,” Cynthia replied. “It will keep expanding and accelerating until the coronal wave loses distinction and this universe is consumed. And what’s more …”

She changed some settings. “There are other universes, and just a hair’s breadth between them. This is the moment the paradox occurred, on a planet in a nearby universe.” They were looking at a blue-green-white planet much like Earth that suddenly vanished into a growing black sphere that also devoured this system’s sun as well.

“Good Lord,” said the general.

She changed some more settings. “This is another planet harboring intelligent life elsewhere in this universe. It’s taken the wave years to get here, and the people of this planet have conjectured about why a small black void appeared years ago, one that now fills half their sky.” They were looking at another blue-green-white planet … and then there was nothing. They were inside the void. Nothing.

“Now I can’t actually show you what’s inside the void, because it’s outside any universe,” said Cynthia. “I can only show you what can be recorded – which is nothing.” She shifted vantage point from one planet to another, showing them that the same thing happened to each of them – a black void expanded to fill half their sky, then the planet winked out of existence, taking all of its billions of sentient inhabitants with it. Again and again. And again … and again.

“I can do this all day,” Cynthia said, with a catch in her voice, “except I can’t.” She stopped the playback and turned off the projector. The lights came back on within the dome.

“This happened 3,624 years ago,” said Cynthia, “as we measure time. Fortunately, as parallel universes go, it was quite far away from our universe, so it didn’t affect us directly. Were we not as lucky, the same would have happened to Earth – and it still could, if someone on some other planet somewhere in our universe, or a nearby one, makes a terrible mistake.”

The men all looked pale and ill, their mouths hanging open. “W-what do we do?” asked Lieutenant Martins.

Cynthia replied, “Well, first of all, we don’t make that mistake.” Everyone looked at General Prescott.

He was as pale as the rest. “All … all right, I’ll believe it – for now,” he said. “It could all still be some kind of … CGI, a clever fake, but … I can’t see what you’d have to gain from going to all the trouble and expense of creating it. But I have another question.”

“What’s that?” asked Cynthia.

“Why are we still alive?” asked the general. “Why hasn’t someone in all of the uncountable billions of civilizations in our universe and neighboring ones made that mistake? I don’t buy that we’ve just been lucky. Who’s preventing that from happening?”

Cynthia replied vaguely, “I believe I may know the answer, but I will need some time to arrange a proper presentation on that topic. This is still a training mission, combined with this side trip to see if you’re ready to follow the terms of the contract.”

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Cynthia and the small group of men she had on the training mission did their level best to persuade the general that his reckless course of action would result in massive cosmic destruction beyond mankind's wildest imaginations of apocalypse.

His basic argument was that all the clips and simulations Cynthia had presented had a good possibility of being AI created. No evidence presented moved the general in any way.

In the middle of a heated discussion about destructive cosmic tsunamis that had the potential of washing through all of reality and totally removing it from existence, there was a large flash of crimson light, and a group of suited individuals stood.

Cynthia was worried; she knew who this particular group of people were and really hoped they had leeway in what the ultimate disposition of their arrival was.

Cynthia said, “Can we negotiate this some? I mean, we have him isolated, and he has no means of instantaneous travel, along any axis.”

One of the suited individuals replied in the electronic translator voice, “In your own contract, Section 14, Paragraph 7, it clearly states that any individual who insists on ignoring the strict rules mandatorily dictated by this technology is to be handed over to our disposition organisation to be dealt with accordingly so they will no longer present a danger to reality.”

The general and the others stared. “Who are these people?” demanded Prescott. “You have other contracts? Ulterior motives? How do they have authority here?”

Colonel Gaines recovered and said, “It … would be unreasonable to take punitive action under current circumstances. I mean, he’s stranded here, and all time and travel equipment has been removed; he has no ability to wreak havoc or create any kind of anomaly."

The first individual replied, “How do we know this? You claim to have him isolated but how can we insure that he is isolated from all time streams?”

Cynthia said, “We put him here and insured all time crystal technology was removed. We left resources for him to survive. And since we are the only ones with this tech, the only travel tech currently here is you and us. As far as the general, he has no means to even create the technology, even if he had the plans. Certain mandatory materials are totally missing from this world.”

The first individual replied, “I do notice the total absence of the proper type of crystals to make the foundation. The crystals here are fractured and would shatter in processing. The issue would be if some individual managed to arrive here and set the subject free.”

Gaines pointed at Cynthia and said, “She has insured no one but their company has any access to travel equipment.”

The first Enforcer pointed at Cynthia and said, “It seems all of you have access. I can see that you are wearing your version of chronosuits.”

Gaines replied as he pointed at Cynthia, “No disrespect, Sir, but the only one with the chronal tech is her. These suits look like a full chronosuit, but they have no time travel ability without her master suit. And as much as we would like to have the full suit, we do not; only About Time Inc. has it.”

Cynthia added, “Also, those are made with limited crystals that go inert in 48 hours.”

“What?” asked Hernandez.

The Enforcer said, “I see. That does change matters. I accept, then, that you and we are the only ones with full access. It is already in your contract that you are to manage your world’s access to this technology. But it remains true that this man has attempted to take action leading to a paradox, despite warnings against it, and that even presented with more information, he has remained resistant.”

“Yes,” Cynthia admitted. “Even though my colleagues in About Time lost their parents and haven’t done anything to attempt to change the timeline to bring them back, which should tell the general here something, he remains unconvinced.”

“Then we shall show him,” replied the first Enforcer.

“What?” Cynthia asked. “You mean …”

“Yes,” interrupted the Enforcer. “If he is convinced, we will bring him back. If not, he remains a threat, and thus we must ensure that his ability to destroy your universe and others is neutralized.” The Enforcer pointed a rodlike device at the general, who was suddenly wearing a crystalline suit and helmet.

“What –” began the general, but then he and the Enforcers were gone in a flash of red-orange coherent light.

Colonel Gaines asked, “Were … were they what your presentation was going to be about?”

“Yes,” replied Cynthia, “the Chronal Enforcers. If we, and by we I mean every human on Earth, don’t obey their dictates, they take away the time travel technology entirely. But I agree with them, or I wouldn’t have signed them. I read everything and fully understand it. Everything I’ve told you follows from the equations – if the paradox thing isn’t correct, then time travel and all of that doesn’t work. It’s like … you know, if the world is flat, your phone doesn’t work.”

“You said dictates,” said Clay. “Are they … dictators? Fascists?”

“No, their only mission is to detect potential paradoxes in the making and prevent them, without creating paradoxes in the process,” Cynthia explained. “The only way to do that is to detect them in the present and act immediately, which is why they haven’t got any patience. If Jennie hadn’t stopped the general, there are only two possibilities: either our universe would be well on the way to nonexistence, or the Enforcers would’ve grabbed him right away instead.”

“Have they … prevented a lot of paradoxes?” asked Martins haltingly.

Cynthia replied, “There haven’t been any big ones since they started – in the aftermath of the event I played the recording of. There have been minor incidents, near-paradoxes, that they haven’t managed to stop.”

“Near-paradoxes?” asked Hernandez.

“Yes,” answered Cynthia. “If they can grab the person who causes it in time, they can stop the paradox from reaching a critical point. Only single planets are destroyed, not entire universes.”

And suddenly the general and the Enforcers were back, and the Enforcers removed the suit from the general with their rod. He was soaked in sweat and looked pale. The Enforcers disappeared again.

Cynthia looked at him and said, “I assume they showed you enough?”

“It was … I saw …” began Prescott. “What you showed me, only in person. They whisked me out of harm’s way just in time. Again and again. Another planet full of intelligent beings … unexisted. One after another. They showed me other universes, just a little farther away. Spheres of boiling chaos the size of galactic clusters that tear apart anything that enters … and that’s in universes that get lucky. They showed me near-paradox universes … where the planet where it happens is wiped out … it saves the rest of the universe but not that world …”

“Do you understand now?” asked Cynthia. “Are you ready to stop abusing your authority to try to save your daughter from going to prison? Remember, she’s still alive. Maybe you can use your authority in other ways to get her a new trial, and why haven’t you done that yet, anyway? You do know that there are ways to rescue her without causing any kind of paradox? Meanwhile, Jennie and Michelle’s parents aren’t coming back.”

“I’m … I’m ready,” said the general. “Look, I can’t pretend I don’t want my daughter out of jail. I’ve tried. Those judges there … they’re just unreasonable. I can’t touch them without truly abusing my authority. Higher courts are just afraid of appealing because they know I’m her father and don’t want an appearance of conflict of interest.”

“But maybe there’s something we can do,” Cynthia said. “Without paradox. Maybe not strictly legal, but also not strictly illegal.”

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Michelle, Jennie, and Cynthia got together and began looking over the evidential documents of the General’s daughter’s case. It was proven beyond any doubt the girl was present in the van at the time of the crime. From the best the girls could tell, the only thing that would have caused severe issues would have been association, other than that, everything was mostly supposition.

Jennie said, “They really had it in for the girl. I realize the person killed was the town mayor’s son, but they got the one that did the shooting, and according to this, they found the girl still sleeping in the back of the van. She had no clue what was going on and they had to tell her.”

Cynthia said, “In small rural places like that, they can get away with things like this. They should at most given probation or 30 days just because she was there. The sentence they gave her was nonsense."

Michelle said, “Hey, girls, take a look at this.” She typed on her laptop for a minute and images came up on the screen. “According to this, several of the witnesses’ bank accounts received substantial deposits the day after they all testified."

“It might be time to use these things again,” said Jennie, picking up the jar of sand-grain-sized, limited-lifespan time crystals with similarly-sized lasers and processors attached; one of them could easily transport itself back to the lab along with a small object like a folder.

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CURRENT TIME LATER THAT NIGHT

In a semi-darkened office there was a bright red flash. On the desk of the chief editor for FAUX News appeared all the data proving the witness payoffs. The only one who noticed anything was a security guard, who thought he’d seen something move. He entered the chief editor’s office and swept the room with his flashlight. A manila folder on the desk was hardly unusual, so he passed right over it. After wandering around for a few minutes and finding nothing out of the ordinary, he went on about his rounds and forgot the whole thing.

At approximately the same instant, copies of the same folder appeared on desks in every news outlet, and on the desks of a number of independent journalists as well. “OK, that’s the last of them,” said Jennie, wiping her brow with a towel. “That’s a lot. They can’t all be in on it, and the ones who aren’t will be falling over themselves to scoop each other.”
Of course, what happened the next morning was drastic and immediate. The FBI and state law enforcement went to the town mayor’s house, basically kicked the door in, and dragged him out wearing nothing but cuffs and his undies.

This same incident happened in several other locations. The judge who answered his door and was suddenly physically manhandled, put in cuffs, and shoved into a van with several others and taken to the police headquarters was more than incredulous.

The general was in a real funk when his phone rang. He answered on the second ring, “General Prescott …”

“H … hello? Poppa? This is Zoe,” came a voice softly over the line.

The general literally dropped his cup of hot coffee. “Zoe? How…?”

She replied, “I’m free, Poppa. I’ll be there in your office in an hour.” The phone went dead.

The general looked at his phone with incredulity on his face until the carrier signal changed to busy when he hung up. Immediately he said to himself, “They did it. I’ve no idea how, but they did it.” He started making arrangements for his daughter’s arrival. the whole time wondering how they’d pulled it off without creating a paradox.

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Cynthia, Jennie, and Michelle were in General Prescott’s office later. “So that’s how you freed her,” he said. “That’s amazing.”

“Hey, Jennie and Michelle came up with a lot of innovative applications of the technology,” replied Cynthia. “Mostly because we drove them to it,” she added, a bit less cheerfully. “You remember all those folders of evidence disappearing off the tables. Making folders disappear from evidence lockers and file cabinets where they’d been buried for over a decade was relatively easy.”

“And no paradoxes, because we did everything in the present time,” said Michelle. “We couldn’t go back and give your daughter those years back, but we could get her set free now.”

“It was also easy to disappear evidence from incinerators where they’d been consigned to the ash heap,” added Jennie. “No paradoxes there, because nobody’s going to look for anything that was supposed to have been destroyed. Same as if it had been literally buried and found later. We just transport back a pile of blank paper that’s about the right size, it burns up instead, and nobody suspects a thing. History doesn’t change.” Jennie got a funny look in her eye at that point, but she didn’t say anything else.

“And to think … all those lawyers I hired, searching for evidence that was suppressed or even destroyed by corrupt cops, prosecutors, and judges,” the general mused. “Well, I’ll be hiring lawyers for something else now … suing the pants off them all. They’re going to compensate my daughter and our family for all the anguish they’ve put us through.”

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Michelle, Cynthia, and Jennie were all sitting at a computer terminal in an adjacent part of the general’s office when a pretty young woman of about 35 entered. She was wearing a light blue T-top, a pair of denim jeans, and a pair of tennis shoes. Her long brown hair was tied into a slightly off-centered ponytail high on her head.

Michelle poked Cynthia and pointed at the woman and General Prescott. “Now, I hope we have enough tissue. I think this is going to be a real tear-jerking reunion."

Jennie was already dabbing her eyes with a tissue. “Yeah, and to think the travesty of justice we corrected. We used time, but not in a way that created destructive anomalies."

The general sat in wide-eyed, open-mouthed shock to see his daughter walk into his office … a free woman.

He stood from his desk and rounded it quickly, taking the woman in his arms and giving her a hug, which she returned in earnest. “They told me how they got you freed,” said Prescott. “I had given up all hope. Nothing I tried uncovered any of the evidence About Time found and gave to the proper places.”

The woman had tears in her eyes. “Poppa, I’m just so glad you found a way to get me out of that awful place.”

“These ladies are the ones responsible,” he said, gesturing. “Zoe, these are Michelle, Jennie, and Cynthia, also known as About Time, Inc. Ladies, of course you know my daughter Zoe, but thanks to you, here she is in person. I’m … overwhelmed.” He reached for a tissue.

Cynthia spoke up and said, “Trust us Zoe. We all are overjoyed we managed to get you out of there – and the people responsible for the travesty are now on their way to prison for a great many years.”

“But … how did you do it?” Zoe asked. “They told me all the evidence was destroyed or buried.”

“Well … that’s kind of a long story,” said General Prescott.

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Another dimension, another world, in a place advanced beyond the imaginations of humankind, many individuals of different species sat around a huge round dais, all wearing the same uniforms with many rank insignias and decorations. Several conversations were going on, creating a soft buzz of voices.

One individual came to the raised podium as spotlights illuminated it, and silence instantly fell. He said, “Welcome to the Chronal Enforcers’ Conclave. My name is Mazik Leshemlot. For those who don’t know, I am the Chronal Master.” There was a round of quiet buzz before silence ruled once again. “I have gathered all of you here this day to discuss a matter of minor concern, although we still have some worrisome moments.”

A woman stood and said, “We have no dissent on the vote. About Time has proven their abilities.”

A voice from the far back of the crowd stated, “One concern would be the fact they have a contract with their dimension's military. Choronal histories have shown many times that this ends in disaster."

Ghimar stood then. Their face was a dark blue, with black hair gathered into many small tufts by an intricate electronic net, and their eyes were a luminous green. The atmosphere in this room was such that they didn’t require a helmet, just a small rebreather unit over their mouth and nose. They said, “Forgive the untimely intrusion, but I have seen those individuals in action. They are every bit as competent as we and even stopped a major paradox before it happened.”

The voice from the back said in a snide tone, “Yes, and indeed, it was they who caused the problem in the first place.”

Ghimar responded, “Maybe so, but they responded quickly and had the problem nearly resolved before your department so much as got off its lazy complacencies and did something.”

The chamber erupted in loud raucous laughter for a few minutes. Mazik managed to collect himself and banged his gavel. “Order, please. So all know, I agree. From the reports I have received on them, they act with great restraint and wisdom. I see here that they even managed to resolve the basic issue that almost caused the paradox in the first place, by approaching it from another perspective. It worked, the woman is free, and no paradoxes.”

“They put in the legwork,” Ghimar replied. “They ensured that hidden documentation was copied and returned undetected, and they ensured that destroyed documentation was rescued and replaced with an equal volume of equivalent matter to be destroyed in its place. And they did so without crossing light cones with any consequent events.”

“Paradox Detection, did you sense anything during those events?” the Chronal Master asked the voice from the back of the room.

Grudgingly, the reply came. “No. I have to admit that there wasn’t even a tremor. They did choose the plan we would have recommended – had they gone through proper channels.”

“All of this indicates that they have good instincts,” said Mazik. “Then we should call the matter to a vote. All in favor?” Bright points of light appeared above the heads of all present. “All opposed?” Not one black circle appeared above anyone’s position. “Then the resolution is carried. Ghimar, would you do us the honor of informing About Time of the results?”

“With pleasure,” Ghimar replied with a slight bow.

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“Welcome to Ghost Hill Lab,” said Jennie, opening the door.

“Cool name,” Zoe replied.

“The place has been called Ghost Hill by the local native groups for centuries,” Michelle said. “When we built a lab here, we decided, well, it’s already called that, so let’s just go with it.”

Cynthia said to Zoe, “We thought you might want to see where all the magic happens, so to speak.”

Looking around, Zoe saw multiple levels of equipment – in various states of organization. Some areas were very clean and precise, while in other spots there were tables covered with piles of scribbled paper notes. “Whoa,” she said. “And you all understand all of this?”

“Yes,” said Cynthia.

“Most of it,” said Jennie at the same time.

“To varying degrees,” said Michelle at the same time as the others. They all laughed.

“There’s a lot,” Cynthia added.

Zoe said, “So you can … look through time and see anything?”

“Well, yeah,” said Jennie, “and sometimes I’ve seen things I didn’t really want to see, but we’ve made a pledge not to use anything for blackmail.”

“Ethics are important,” said Michelle.

“Gotta stay professional,” Cynthia added.

“Who’s that?” Zoe asked. They all turned to look where Zoe was pointing – Ghimar had just arrived, in their usual crystalline suit with the Chronal Enforcers insignia and markings in a language not of Earth origin.

Jennie stepped up. “Ghimar! It’s good to see you. I should introduce Zoe Prescott, whom we’ve recently helped rescue from a travesty of justice. Zoe, this is Ghimar, a Chronal Enforcer who helped us get started and showed us how not to destroy the universe.”

“Um, honored to meet you,” Zoe said. “Whoa, a real alien?”

“We were just giving her a tour of the lab,” Cynthia added.

“Welcome, Zoe Prescott,” said Ghimar via their computer translator. “I have come with an announcement on behalf of the Chronal Enforcers. They commend you on your handling of the situation of Zoe Prescott and your prevention of the paradox nearly caused by their parent unit.”

“Oh!” said Michelle. “Wow, that’s an honor. It was a lot of work. But we were kind of motivated, though, by wanting to keep the universe in one piece.”

“A motivation all too familiar to me,” Ghimar said. “When I was a child, little did I realize that one day I would join the Chronal Enforcers. I wanted to be a Nexial interceptor test pilot.”

Zoe replied, “I don’t know what that is, but it sounds awesome!”

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Ghimar removed from the large case he was carrying 3 boxes made of some type of black shiny onyx colored material. He handed Jennie, Michelle, and Cynthia each a box. He opened the box he had given to Jennie and removed a large ribboned medallion-type medal. On it was the official emblem of the Chronal Enforcers and the inscription “Proven over Time.” After putting the medal around Jennie’s neck, Ghimar proceeded to do the same for Cynthia and Michelle.

After he had done, he said, “I would personally like to commend you on your highly professional and timely action in quelling the Zoe Paradox, as it has been titled. Entire universes took notice of the fact that About Time reacted and removed the paradox-causing action before the team responsible for resolving those issues had even started to act.”

Jennie replied, “This is a great honor, Ghimar, but we didn’t do anything other than stop him from doing what he had intended.”

Ghimar replied, “That may be; however, you identified the major issue and had Enforcers on site before anyone who was supposed to oversee such things did. Trust me when I say that it has made a huge impression on … many realities you aren’t even aware of.”

Cynthia held her medal in her palm. It was heavy, a lot heavier than she thought it should be, “What material is this made of? It … looks like gold but feels a lot heavier.”

Ghimar replied, “It is an alloy of several precious metals. The foundational metal is, of course, gold. The other three I can name if you wish, but your solar system has no deposits of them, so they are unknown on your planet.”

Michelle said with glee obvious in her tone, “I don’t care if it’s made of gold or tinfoil; this medal means About Time is legitimate in many places, many of which we don’t even know exist.”

Ghimar fumbled around in the large pack he had brought with him and removed a square object about three and a half feet square and about 3 inches deep. They slowly unwrapped the sparkling cloth that was wrapped around it. Ghimar then held it up so all could see; it read, “About Time – Chronal Enforcement Division – Paradox Eradication Section.” He walked to the front of the lab, where it would be noticed immediately upon entering the dome.

Ghimar turned and said, “I want all of you to know, you have far and away exceeded the best estimates of your company's value to the Enforcers. I’m not exactly sure how it started, but somehow a rumor that has been proven false was circulating about the incompetence and ignorance of your world. After direct personal observation, my thoughts are that someone must have met certain individuals who were poor examples. You members of About Time excel above many respected civilizations who have been long-time members of the Enforcers.” They turned and looked at Zoe. “It has also been decided, based on direct observations, that you should also be given the opportunity to explore time and dimensions.”

“What, me?” asked Zoe, as a sparkly crystalline time suit appeared.

Ghimar replied, “Yes, as the probabilities show that you will be important. But a word of warning: This suit will avoid paradoxes even more assiduously than most. If you attempt to force one, as your parental unit did, the suit will self-destruct and take you with it.” Ghimar vanished in a bright crimson flash, leaving the very ornate crystalline chronosuit hanging on a rack.

“Whaaaat?” asked Jennie, looking at astonished Cynthia and Michelle. To Zoe she said, “You get to join us? That’s so awesome!”

“But … should we vote, or …?” asked Michelle.

“I can see the logic of it,” said Cynthia, “but I’m not sure Ghimar is the one to decide that …”

“Well, let’s vote on it, then!” Jennie suggested. “I formally make the motion to admit Zoe Prescott to About Time as a provisional member.”

“I second!” said Cynthia.

“All in favor!” Jennie immediately called. It was a unanimous “Aye,” and all three of them shook Zoe’s hand and hugged her.

“Welcome aboard,” said Michelle.

Cynthia said, “I wonder what their probabilities showed them? But welcome!”

“Yessss!” said Jennie.

Zoe was overwhelmed. “What do I … where do I …”

“Well, let’s do a little fabricator programming to set you up with a space, and then let’s show you how to use one of these suits,” Michelle said, going over to one of the computers.

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With a blue-green flash, the four of them returned to the lab. “So that’s it,” said Michelle, taking her helmet off, “that’s how you travel to another universe.”

Zoe removed her helmet as well. “I … I have to say something. I’m not much for fancy words. It’s just that … for the past 10 years or so I’ve had basically no choice where I could go. Bars, walls, I was closed in. But now … to not even be confined by the walls of the entire universe … wow. Thank you for this incredible chance. I promise you now, I won’t waste it. But I know I’ve got a lot to learn.”

Jennie put a hand on Zoe’s shoulder. “And you’re gonna learn it. We’ll show you all you want to know. If you wanna know the math, ask Cynthia. But this is just the tip of the iceberg so far. I just have one piece of advice. Never take off the suit, not until you’re home. You don’t know what you’re going to find, and the suit will keep you from causing paradoxes.”

“I thought Ghimar said it self-destructed,” said Zoe.

Michelle explained, “We’ve gone over it. It has the same safeguards ours do. It just won’t let you travel to a point where you can cause a paradox. If you do something like travel to someplace an hour before you’d cause a paradox and then wait there, it’ll send you home before it happens. But if you persist? If you do something like jam the controls so it can’t auto-return, or if you take the suit off? Yeah, that’s where the self-destruct thing happens.”

“So keep it on and no boom, and I get sent home instead,” said Zoe. “Got it.”

“Exactly,” Cynthia added. “I think it’s likely that the self-destruct would take out a large chunk of whatever planet you’re on. Not ideal, but if it prevents an entire universe from being wiped out …”

“So your suits don’t do that?” Zoe asked.

“Not … that,” said Jennie. “But we built ours. Ours are good old fashioned Earth technology … well, OK, not really. Ghimar showed us a lot of things, and we incorporated them. But we did build them ourselves. They don’t self-destruct if we try to subvert the anti-paradox measures, but after what your dad tried to do, they’ve got an emergency scram measure.”

“Even if they’re not worn, they can locate us and transport us as directly away from the paradox point as possible, through time, space, and dimension,” Michelle added. “We’re not guaranteed to survive that if we’re outside the suit, since it could be into a star, into the vacuum of space, to someplace where the atmosphere is methane, to someplace freezing cold, under the sea …”

“Or under a sea of frozen methane,” said Cynthia. “Which we could survive in the suits, but not without them, obviously.”

“Wow, so if my dad tried something now like what he tried before …” Zoe said.

“Yeah, it wouldn’t have been a potential paradox, because even though he took his suit off, it would’ve zapped him somewhere else, not necessarily a good place to be,” Jennie replied. “Instead we had to go get him and take him somewhere else by hand.”

“Well, I’m glad you sent him somewhere safe,” said Zoe.

“Er, well,” replied Michelle, “it wasn’t that safe. There were some nearby large predators.”
“With his survival training, though, we figured he’d do fine, and he did,” said Cynthia.

“OK, moving on, so I’ve got some leftover tacos in the freezer; who wants some?” Jennie asked.

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In a small and dark galaxy far removed from the usual placements, a laboratory flourished . The scientists had made a remarkable breakthrough, and they were just about to test it. If the device worked according to theory, this could revolutionize travel – not to mention their fundamental understanding about the nature of space and time.

A very large ruby laser was slowly and carefully being adjusted by the operator at the control panel. Its target, fixed to a disc of low-gloss sapphire, was a tiny but radiant crystal the size of a grain of sand.

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The girls had just finished a chunky meaty-sauced spaghetti when loud alarms began going off. Cynthia was so startled she dropped her plate, making a huge mess. She jumped up and dashed toward the transfer room, shouting in urgency, “That’s the emergency alarm! From what I remember from what they showed us, that alarm means we have mere minutes to locate and stop whatever the action is before it causes … what do they call it? A Time Tsunami?”

By this time Jennie and Michelle had started putting on their time suits. Michelle said as she wiggled into hers, “I did manage to get a ping on locational coordinates. The issue is, the tracking system says this is a place well outside any reasonable location.”

“Should I … come too, or …?” asked Zoe, not knowing what to do. She’d just been enjoying lunch, not expecting there to be an emergency.

“It can’t hurt,” Jennie replied as she snagged her helmet. "Let's hope chronal drift isn't too bad. I would hate to aim for a specific point and wind up in an entirely different continuum.”

Zoe activated her suit, which, unlike the suits made by the Earth women, was able to fully open so Zoe could stand inside it and have it close around her.

“Let’s hope,” said Michelle, putting her helmet on and handing her three companions each a small pad with the coordinates, which they all punched into their control pads on their left arms.

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In a well-stocked modern laboratory, dozens of beings in long white labcoats and special ruby-lensed goggles stood around a control panel as one of the operators entered frequency and time duration figures.

He never got to hit the enable button, because there was suddenly a very bright ruby-red flash, and four individuals were standing in the lab dressed in suits that looked as if they were made of some kind of sparkling rocks. The next instant, every last one of the beings found themselves in another laboratory that was far and away more advanced than theirs.

One of the scientist looked around in shock and asked,”Wh … where are we? How … did we get here? And, who the hell are you?”

It was fortunate that the four Earth women had translation circuits in their suits, or it would have rapidly turned even more awkward.

Cynthia replied, although the translator still made them sound like robots, “Relax. We just saved you and several other continuums from your experiment.”

The scientist replied with obvious incredulity, “Saved us … others saved? Our experiment wasn’t destructive, according to our calculations.”

Jennie brought out a small tablet computer that had the equations the group were familiar with. The computer had been analyzing the equations on the alien scientists’ glassboards, and had worked out their mathematical notation. She then showed them the continuation of their calculations, which showed that the arrow of time had inertia and that the temporal substrate they called reality was in fact something similar to a plasma display.

“Wait …” said the lead scientist. “If this is true, that which travels at the universal maximum speed would be classified as the write head and in fact can occupy many places at the same time, with as many as 24 axes of freedom. Yet we only account for three in our current technology, maybe four.”

“Do you see?” asked another. “This means that gravity is not inherent but a by-product of quantum entanglement.”

“We knew that our experiments were already toppling our model of the universe, requiring new physics,” said a third, “but this … this shows us that we’re massively wrong about so much more than we had thought.”

“We’re with the Chronal Enforcers,” said Michelle.

“Enforcers?” the head scientist asked. “You’re here to stop us?”

“No no,” Michelle continued. “We would normally not wish to interfere. But what we want to show you is for your welfare and the good of all in your continuum. You see, look at what happens if you were to create a paradox, even inadvertently.” She showed them the mathematics, and as one they gasped in horror as they saw.

“But that … that wave of instability accelerates beyond the maximum speed thought allowable!”

“Because it is not a physical object with mass,” said another, understanding. “It is not even an object at all, as we understand it.”

“And it obliterates the very fabric of space and time as it goes!” another said.

Cynthia said, “But there are ways to prevent this and still make use of your discovery, and that is what we’re here to show you. There are merely precautions you must take.”

“So I hope you can understand why we had to stop you for a moment,” said Jennie. “You were about to cause great harm.”

“And you are from … elsewhere in our space-time continuum,” said one of the scientists, “and knew that if we continued, you would also be destroyed?”

“In this case that’s correct,” Michelle replied. “But it’s in no one’s best interest to allow such a paradox to occur. It can even affect other universes.”

The Earth travelers explained the Chronal Enforcers and their mission, and they showed them the recordings of the disaster that had once occurred, which they wanted to prevent a repeat of.

“Horrifying,” said one of the scientists.

“Attempts have been made to investigate the region left behind,” Cynthia said, “but they’ve only proved one thing – there’s no energy, no gravity, no dust, no plasma, not even space or time ... the best that any exploration has ever discovered is that where there were once a few adjacent continua, there’s now literally nothing there. And even neighboring continua that still exist aren’t unaffected; they suffer consequences as well.”

This boggled their minds. “A place where ... reality doesn’t exist,” said the lead scientist.

“Concrete, measurable nonexistence,” another said. “Not something we would wish upon even our worst enemies … not the least because it would inevitably happen to us too.”

“Yet we wish to continue our experiments,” the lead scientist stated, “with proper precautions, of course. How can we prevent this … consequence?”

“Allow us to return you to your laboratory, and we’ll show you,” said Jennie.

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When the four women from Earth returned home, Zoe was mind-blown. “We were on … another planet,” she said. “It was in our universe but so far away from Earth that we’ll never see any light from its star.”

“That’s right,” Cynthia said.

“I’m just … still trying to explain it to myself,” said Zoe. “It’s just … so much to take in.”

“I know the feeling,” said Jennie.

“And yet it’s real,” Zoe said. “It’s obviously real. I saw it. With my eyes. That was not Earth. Those were aliens. They were black and white speckled. They had five eyes.”

“And yet their scientists also wear white lab coats,” Michelle replied. “That was interesting. Maybe it’s something to do with the utilitarian nature of such a thing.”

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It was then that a large flash of ruby red light filled the lab. The four women turned in complete surprise to see about 24 individuals, dressed in the highest-ranking Chronosuits the Enforcers had. Of course, the women looked at each other with a slightly worried expression.

The one who appeared to be the leader stepped forward and said in their computer translated voice, “Have no fear, we are here on the best of missions.”

Jennie, Michelle, and Cynthia flashed each other a side glance. Zoe was so nervous she was about to wet her panties.

Michelle, being almost unflappable, stepped forward and asked, “Forgive our … surprise, but it isn't everyday that the ruling Chrono Enforcer Council in its entirety pops in for a casual visit.”

From the strange noises coming from the translators, the women were fairly sure that the council thought the statement was amusing. The leader walked to a nearby table, hoisted up a huge object that looked like a steamer trunk made into the shape of a briefcase, and opened it.

He withdrew several large objects and placed them side by side on the table. He seemed to look up and said, “We saw and recorded the actions of About Time and its three Enforcers, including a raw recruit, and how they professionally handled a major oncoming paradoxical event, that according to the equations, would have enough arrow of time inertia to obliterate most of the Xulu quadrant and about 12 other dimensional realms.”

He turned the first device on. A misty cloud seemed to form, then, in the center, an image as clean and clear as if they were looking through a window appeared. What the women were watching was a tachyon-induced chronoton window through time to the exact event. They watched themselves once again stop a major catastrophe before it happened.

The being opened the other large object and withdrew several large framed items. Again, he appeared to look up and said, “It is with the greatest pleasure that we, have all agreed.” He indicated the other 23.

Cynthia asked this time, “Agreed? Agreed on what, if I may ask?”

The being held up the object so the girls could read it. It said, in a number of written languages including English, “In honor of one of the universe’s most heroic saves and diplomatic resolutions.”

Zoe gasped as she finally felt a small warmth in her panties at the news. She asked, “Does … this include me?”

The being turned towards Zoe and asked, “Should it not?” They pointed to the images in the time window. “Is this not you there during this successful negotiation?”

Zoe started to reply, “Yes, it’s me, but …”

The being made a strange noise. To the girls it basically sounded like a laugh. “No buts. It is either you, or it isn’t. The mere fact it is you, means this applies to you as well.”

“But, we just did for the people of the planet Yuringa what Ghimar did for us,” replied Jennie.

“Indeed,” the leader stated. “You prevented a paradox, and did so in a very diplomatic way. That cannot be discounted. The diplomatic resolution is perhaps the most important part, because it changes the minds of those who might otherwise turn right around and do the same thing again.”

“I … don’t think I did anything,” Zoe said again.

“You do not understand,” said the leader, “and yet you are wise. There are times when simply being present and not overstating one’s presence is the perfect choice. They saw that there was a fourth Enforcer. One who said nothing but clearly agreed with the other three. Perhaps you were their trainee … or perhaps you were their supervisor. Or simply an observer.”

Jennie added, “Or maybe she was there to blow their planet up if they didn’t clean up their act, for all they knew.”

“There are many things that they could potentially have thought,” the leader said. “Regardless, you let them believe what they wanted, and that contributed to the outcome, which our predictions agree was the best possible result. None of the future timelines we have viewed lead to paradox from that source. It is likely that in their future, members of their species will join us in protecting the integrity of time.”

“Well … I guess …” said Zoe. “But … since you’re all here … I’ve got just one question that’s been bothering me about all this.”

“A troubling question?” the leader asked. “Please, go ahead.”

“This paradox thing, this thing that destroys whole universes,” Zoe began, “what if there’s a way to use it as a weapon? I mean, you can go back in time and change something in another universe, and that works fine. It doesn’t mess up how you came to go back in time to make the change. But what if someone really wants to destroy another universe, one they’re not from? So they just pick up some rock in that universe, take it back in time, make it interfere with how it got there, and boom, instant paradox. They might get caught up in the consequences, but what if they’re really smart? Or what if they don’t care?”

Cynthia, Jennie, and Michelle were staring agog at Zoe as if they’d never considered anyone being so psychopathic or insane as to do such a thing, but several of the suited Enforcers were nodding at each other seriously. “This is indeed something we have seen certain beings attempt,” the leader said. “It is a very serious possibility, and we have had to step in to prevent such attempts more than once. Nihilistic individuals exist, as well as those so bent on vengeance that they cannot think clearly.”

“But what if they wanted to take revenge … on the Chronal Enforcers?” Zoe asked.

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In a continuum far along an unexplored axis existed an excessively removed and lonely galaxy whose lone inhabited star system had never seen a glimmer of another inhabited planet's image or photonic signature. All they had ever been able to see were the local system objects, of which there had been a plethora.

This particular place was buried so deep in the infinite void known as space-time that “remote” takes on a new depth and a far more graphic meaning.

A dozen highly-trained and extremely knowledgeable individuals sat and brooded over recent history. “It is intolerable!” shouted one, slamming their fist on the table (translated into English for our readers). “We cannot even take righteous revenge on the world that has wronged us now that these self-styled Chronal Enforcers have stolen our equipment!”

“Imagine!” said another. “The arrogance that would lead someone to think they had the right to dictate what others can and cannot do with technology invented by ourselves.”

This had enraged the group, and their anger showed in their many scars and other outward disfigurements. None of them could believe how far out of hand a simple thing had gotten due to simple misinformation. “And revenge was ours to take!” said one, “After all, it wasn’t we who caused the global plague; we’d been desperately trying to find a cure before everyone in the world succumbed.”

Another agreed. “But the brainless mob raided and destroyed our entire research facility! Only then did they discover the truth … but by then, out of hundreds, only a dozen of us survived, by the skin of our chins, beaten and severely abused. And our familial groups weren’t spared, either!”

It was true that the governments of their planetary system had set the individuals back up in research, with the added bonus of guaranteed annual allocations in amounts that were considered being excessively high value in their current monetary system. The ceremony and the written apology had been kind of last minute and appeared, even to those who watched the proceedings, exactly that, an annoying afterthought.

Another of the grotesquely scarred and disfigured individuals said, “Yes, and then when we tried to take our revenge, the Chronal Enforcers stopped us, whoever they think they are. I called this meeting because I’ve made a remarkable discovery.” The others looked at him with that look so many hopeless people get. “I know how to shield us from these Enforcers’ chronal spy contraption. All we have to do is take something with as …”. He continued to explain his idea and how the scanning chronal tachyon field could be blocked.

The engineers went to work quickly. The sphere-shaped ship they would require could easily be explained, and many documents could be shown as a proof of need, although it was a ploy to get funding, but the ruling authority didn’t need to know that.

The ship was assembled rapidly in orbit. The dozen insured that special accommodations were designed into the interior to accomodate all of their needs.

None of the group had asked nor requisitioned it, but apparently one or more of the leaders felt it necessary to equip their ship with some of the most powerful weapons known to them. All of the group agreed that they would only aid in the eventual outcome.

The day before the announcement and inaugural proceedings for the new ship, most of the perimeter guards to the transfer station had been given a break in their strenuous duties for about an hour.

This gave them time to eat and quite possibly take a BMT shower. The unexpected thing it gave time for was the infiltration of the command center for the transfer station by the dozen researchers.

The plan had been devised over many months and even had special provisions for certain handicaps. The twelve of them all arrived on the transfer platform just as the last of the guard were transferring from the station to the transfer platform.

In a bright blue-white flash, the twelve vanished as 24 well-dressed color guard appeared on the transfer platform.

The twelve wasted no time as they rapidly moved to the ship’s bridge. The more mobile and least physically damaged of the researchers dashed from the lift to the main engineering console and energised the ship’s custom-made shields. Like a wisp of fog on a heated summer morning, the large sphere faded away.

The being sitting in the command couch laughed to himself, “Chronal Enforcers, are you? Not you, nor anything else is going to dissuade us from total annihilation of those responsible for what happened to us, and now you Chronal Enforcers and anybody else we can take with us are now on our list.”

The humanoids in orbital space dock went totally insane as the very large spherical ship not only vanished from visuals, but also disappeared from all scans without a trace.

One of the beings turned and said with trepidation, “That ship has chronal engines and intra-dimentional transfer technology.”

The other being sitting at the next console replied as they made a very important call, “Don’t you think I know that? It also has gravitic and substrate weaponry. Technically, that is the most powerful ship our world has ever built.” His expression changed, “Sir, this is Orbital Control – we have a serious problem. No, Sir, not that kind of issue … the ship we have been building just vanished. No visuals or any other scans, not even the new quantum radar, can pick up any field distortions.”

“No!” shouted the Coordinator. “I even told them – these people should not be allowed to design or build any such thing. And now … who knows what they’ll try to do.”

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The Chronal Enforcers’ council of leaders had returned to their headquarters, but Jennie and Zoe were in the lab’s “observation deck,” which Zoe had nicknamed the area with the observation equipment. “What you said got me worried,” said Jennie. “Luckily we can observe any place, time, or dimension with this.”

“What’s that line for?” asked Zoe, pointing to a blue line on the timeline chart that was used to target the observation beam.

“We’ve tuned into the Chronal Enforcers’ home dimension,” Jennie replied. “That represents the world that houses their headquarters.”

“Ah, yes, the planet Cynox,” said Ghimar, walking up behind them. “I congratulate you on your honor, by the way.”

“Oh, thank you, Ghimar,” said Jennie, “but it was a cooperative effort.”

Zoe asked, “How good are the Chronal Enforcers’ defenses?”

“There are full multi-axial shield generators within the structure,” replied Ghimar, “and its reactors support a full spread of stasis disruptor beams.”

“Uh, that sounds pretty powerful,” said Zoe uncertainly. “Not that I know what any of that is.”

“Neither do I,” whispered Jennie to her.

“What are these lines here?” Zoe added, pointing to a crisscross of white lines scattered all over the chart of the planet Cynox.

“They’re the traces of people coming and going through space, time and dimension,” Jennie replied. “As you might imagine, there’s a lot of that going on around the Enforcers’ HQ.”

“Oh, yeah, probably,” replied Zoe.

“Do you suspect something?” asked Ghimar.

“Not really,” said Jennifer. “But Zoe said something, and it made me think. Has anyone ever attacked the Chronal Enforcers themselves?”

“At times,” Ghimar replied. Turning to Zoe, he added, “Your parent was not the first to disbelieve our paradox warnings nor the first to be hostile to an attempt to interfere.”

“Right, but what about actually attacking the Enforcers HQ?” asked Zoe.

“That … has happened only once,” said Ghimar, “and is the reason behind all the defenses.”

“What if someone attempts a paradox attack?” Jennifer asked.

“A paradox … attack?” Ghimar replied. “What would that even look like?”

“Couldn’t it look like anything?” asked Zoe. “Somebody uses one of those beams to grab something from the future, moves it to the past, interferes with itself … you know.”

“Something from the future …” said Jennie. “What’s this?”

“That’s in a far future branch,” Ghimar said, looking at a white mark among a number of branches of the blue line. “I won’t worry about that, though. A paradox involving a still multi-branched future is no danger. It’s only a timeline whose pathways have collapsed into one that can cause a paradox.”

“I see a travel line,” said Jennie, “but …” She focused in on it with the observation gear. “I don’t see anything there.”

Ghimar brought out a much more advanced and sensitive tachyon viewer, and it too tracked a seeming travel line, but could detect nothing at the destination, not even residual energies normally left by ships currently able to make those kinds of transitions.

Ghimar said, and the urgency in his tone could be heard even through the translator, “From the best I can tell, we have a severe problem.”

Jennie asked, “What kind? I don’t see any alerts or indications …”

Ghimar pointed to the empty destination and said, “It is impossible to have the energy frequencies and disruptions created through travel as depicted, and have nothing at the destination. We all know the arrow of time builds inertia as it travels through the entangled substrate. We should at least see some residuals if not the ship that traveled."

“But it has a subjective time, right?” asked Cynthia, coming up behind Ghimar to look at the screen curiously. “You should be able to follow the line forward and backward.”

Trying that, Jennie scanned backward along the travel line. “Nothing … nothing …” she said. “Energy traces come from … this dimension here.” The timeline display shifted to show another dimension, with one very isolated world.

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While Ghimar explained the severity of not being able to see an interdimensional/time capable vehicle, Cynthia, Jennie, and Michelle crouched over their work computers as they shared data and went over every scrap of information they had and every tidbit of news.

Cynthia banged her fist on the desk in frustration. “I can see where and when they passed from one dimension to another, but other than that, I’ve got no idea where or when they went. I can’t even pick up energy fluxes in the quantum interfaces. It’s like they passed through like a neutrino and didn’t interact.”

Jennie sat back in her chair and twirled a strand of her long red hair thoughtfully, “OK,” she began softly, “if we assume an empty region of space-time whose virtual particles are quantum entangled with something, and then something uses Time Crystals to transfer into or out of it, shouldn’t the transfer leave behind eddy currents in the entangled fields?”

Michelle asked, “You’re postulating entanglement eddy currents? Can their existence be tested with an experiment? I mean everyone knows the first law of logic …“

“Yeah,” said Cynthia, “The rule most scientific people forget: Nothing Unreal Exists."

While they debated this, Zoe went up to Ghimar. “Forget for a moment about how to track an invisible traveler,” she said. “What I gotta wonder is why. Whoever it was … why would they make a sneaky trip, especially to the universe of the Chronal Enforcers, unless they’re up to no good?” She pointed at the trace on the screen. “They either went to or came from that universe right there. What’s important about that one?”
Ghimar looked at it. “I am not certain,” they said. They took out a handheld tablet-style computer. “Allow me to consult my copy of the Chronal Enforcers’ archives. Perhaps there is some sort of record. The coordinates are …” They examined the readout and entered the coordinates on their tablet, beginning to search.

Jennie had gone to a lower mezzanine level in the lab. She sat down at another type of machine, but this one wasn’t necessarily designed or meant to be used for surveillance; it was just used for measuring the parameters of space and time. She focused the scanning lasers and brought the results to the screen.

What they depicted looked like the wake of a passing boat across the surface of water, only it was actually a wake of quantum eddies in the fabric of space and time. At the collector end of this demonstration appeared to be something that was entangled to the point that it could almost be classified as a micro-singularity.

Jennie said, “Come here and look at this, you two.” They hurried over, pulling up chairs. “From what I see, if a chronal or interdimensional traveler emits these null waves as they go, it will hide it from observation, but instead it will create a tidal disruption in the foundational substrate, just like a fish swimming in water.”

Cynthia commented, “That’s basically how our observation system works, right? Not measuring the actual object, measuring the entanglement effect of the object on the space around it. There are no wave functions we can detect directly without affecting the target, so we use entanglement instead.”

Michelle turned with a smile on her face, “Cynthia, I see what she’s getting at. That’s how our system normally works, but here, their null waves prevent us from picking up any readings. This idea, however, tracks the substrate disruptions of the passage of a null vector through space-time.”

Cynthia nodded as understanding came to her mind. Jennie, on the other hand, was way ahead and had started gathering parts and disassembling spare equipment. Before Michelle or Cynthia could even get to Jennie’s workbench, she had already begun assembling some type of device. She had already made several dozen rough sketches that lay around the rest of the parts on the bench.

“But I have a question,” Cynthia said. “What if they aren’t moving? What if they’re just sitting there still in space? Oh wait, I just answered my own question; we choose a frame of reference for the detector that’s moving relative to them. There’s no such thing as still in space. I should’ve known that.”

“I found it,” interrupted Ghimar. “The universe was listed in the database. The problem is that there has only been one contact with that universe, so data is sparse. On a planet that has not discovered any other inhabited systems in their universe yet, a group of disgruntled scientists discovered Time Crystal technology and tried to use it to take revenge on those who had wronged them. We intervened and took their technology to prevent them from making a universe-destroying error.”

“What?” asked Zoe. “But they were already so obsessed with revenge that they wanted to destroy their whole universe! Now they’re obviously obsessed with revenge against the Chronal Enforcers!”

“That is not necessarily true,” Ghimar replied. “They did want vengeance, yes, but they planned to obtain it by altering the past. According to the documentation, they were unaware of the consequences of paradox.”

“They. Are. Now,” Zoe pressed.

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Jennie had completed her device. Everyone looked at it. Cynthia asked, “I see no way to enter a search parameter, nor do I see a way to see the results.”

Jennie picked up the small box and replied, “It’s because we haven’t installed it on a suit and hooked up the supporting equipment.”

Ghimar cocked his helmeted head slightly to one side, “How will you find them if they power down? Then it would become like a hole.”

Jennie replied, “If they power down completely, their null wave stops. And remember that there’s no way for them to stop moving – there’s no such thing as stationary. More to the point, it would become an extreme abundance of something appearing to be entangled. It would give off anomalous readings, such as appearing to be a black hole, maybe even a thick dust cloud torus, but no other reading will show as a black hole.”

Zoe pointed to one of the screens that depicted the Enforcers’ system. About half an astronomical unit from one of their outer observation satellites, the very thing became visible, at a time coordinate some time in the past. “Would it look anything like this?”

Ghimar was already on his suit communicator issuing a major paradox alert of the highest order. The unit the girls had set up to monitor the emergency frequencies went off. They all knew this was more than serious. No one had any idea of how this was going to play out if they couldn’t clear up their tracking.

They could find a general time/space/dimensional coordinate, but the exact point might be a great distance away using the new tracking technique. Attempting to use the normal targeting array within the suit failed due to how dissimilar the two devices did what they did.

Michelle said, “Here’s a thought, their ability to transfer depends on a null tachyon field … right?”

Jennie replied, “Well, the high energy and frequency ranges of the internal lasers used on the time crystal makes a difference too.”

Michelle brought out her tablet and typed for a few minutes before she showed Jennie. She explained, “The best I can tell from the math and what Ghimar showed us is, the core of this crystal captures the laser and causes it to circle the center, which is somehow able to direct it, and from the best I can tell the frictional coefficient produces the null tachyon wave along with null particles."

Cynthia asked, “What’s a null particle? Oh, I see, you’re calling those entanglement eddies null particles. Hmm, wait. What if they actually are particles? That would imply that entanglement vorticity itself forms some sort of field …”

Zoe said, “I’m gonna let the eggheads figure this out, but what if they picked something up in the future and are trying to drop it off in the past?”

Ghimar replied, “They are trying to paradox the entire universe that contains the Chronal Enforcers – this will destroy not just the Enforcers now and in the future; it’ll paradox everything we have ever done, including every universe we have ever intervened in to prevent paradoxes!”

Jennie swore uncharacteristically. “We need more time!” she shouted. “Wait – we’re time travelers!” She leapt to the controls and madly entered data, then activated the main laser. The lab vanished in a flash of indigo light.

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Ghost Hill Lab materialized on a hill amid a vast prairie of tall green grass and weeds. Looking at this out the windows, Zoe said, “Um, where did you set us down?”

“A rather nice planet, at a spot near the future site of the Chronal Enforcers’ HQ,” said Jennie, “but they won’t get there for about a hundred thousand years. That oughtta be enough time for us to figure out what to do.”

Michelle said, “All right. If they’re trying to cause a paradox, they must have interacted with the timeline in the future, and now they plan to go somewhere in the past of that point to … cause a paradox somehow? But they haven’t been part of the timeline up to then.”

Ghimar replied, “All they have to do is interact with someone or something, then go back in time and interfere such that that person or object can’t have been there then. They could just pick up a rock, go back in time, and take that rock before they pick it up later. Instant paradox: the rock is both there and not there. The good news: that won’t erase the Enforcers in the past, just in the future.”

“But the bad news is their plan still works,” said Cynthia.

“Can we find out exactly who or what they picked up?” Zoe asked.

“Maybe we can now,” said Jennie. “We’ve got a better way to zero in on where and when they entered this dimension in the future.” She ignored her questionable verb tenses and set to work with the observation equipment and the new device she’d put together.

“Maybe we can prevent them from finding the rock in the past,” said Michelle. “Their past. Currently our future.”

“Uh-oh,” said Jennie. “I can’t get a complete picture, but … they didn’t grab a rock; they grabbed a person. Somebody in a Chronal Enforcers suit. Not sure how.”

“Our suits are impervious to many threats,” said Ghimar, “but it is still possible to take us by surprise, and immobilize us. Restraints are still effective.”

Zoe said, “Then I have an idea.”

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Zoe didn’t explain her idea, but this didn’t bother the others as Jennie and Michelle assembled the new device and integrated it into their suits.

Ghimar walked over to Michelle, who was elbow deep in the advanced crystalline circuitry of her suit. He asked, “I understand how the Chronal Viewer works, as we have it, and you developed it independently of us, so yours works in the same basic way. It detects the quantum entanglement of particles with the particles around them, and a computer processes the data into a video we can see. As best our scientists have been able to determine, there is no way to positively track this presumed vessel, as it is somehow shielded. How can you track such a thing?”

Jennie walked over and said, “They found some way to block the direct detection of entanglement, but as long as they’re moving relative to the detector, we can detect a wake of eddies in the entanglement field. We can’t create such a pretty picture, and we may not be able to exactly locate the craft, but we can get close enough that normal sensors would be able to locate it – electromagnetically.”

Ghimar asked, “Would it be possible for that technology to be shared with the Coalition?”

Michelle placed the last closing plate on her suit. She stood up and wiped her hands. “As soon as we do a test run on it. We have explored its equations, but this will be the first operational test.”

Jennie handed Ghimar a thick binder. “Here is the theory, the parts list, and a schematic on how it all goes together.”

And as soon as they’d modified Zoe’s suit with the new detector, she put it on. And vanished.

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At a nearby location in the same dimension but at a point far in the future, a planetoid-sized sphere lay hidden within a very deep asteroid belt. The belt was obviously a plane, as most of the large debris and liquids were still more or less in more or less a sphere. In a few million years, the debris would all accrete and might basically become an attempt at a planet.

The obviously damaged and disabled individuals within the sphere sat at the briefing table and discussed what they were going to do. Of course, this was a revenge fantasy, so they came up with many fancy and elegant ways to create an anomaly to take out this annoying arrogant group calling themselves the Chronal Enforcers. They were determined to rid themselves of anyone who could stand in their way, but especially anyone who had crossed them in the past. On a holographic screen, an image of an Enforcer wearing one of their signature crystalline suits slowly rotated.

One of the individuals said, “I know how much you want to knock out this crew, but I think creating a planet-destroying is easier than all that complicated action.”

One of others who had a lot more damage and scars than the others said, “All right, and just what do you propose?"

He snorted a laugh, “It’s simple. We take something from these Enforcers’ present, and move it somewhere in the past, where we interfere with the timeline leading to it.”

Another said, “That’s …. not possible. We can’t take an object from one …”

The severely handicapped one interrupted, “That’s why it’s called a paradox. We cannot find something to take to the past that we have already ensured is not there. It forces the fabric to display an object that is there and not there at the same time.”

“But what should we take?” asked the first person, when suddenly the proximity alarms went off. “What? We’re discovered?”

They activated the external scanners, and on the screen they saw, drifting in space among the asteroids, a figure in one of those hated crystalline suits, vanishing from one spot and reappearing in another, getting closer to their position. “Not yet, but we soon will be! How have they pierced our non-detection field?”

“Wait,” said the severely-injured individual. “This is perfect. Let them find us. We’ll take them prisoner, then find them in the past – or their ancestor – and prevent them from being here at this point for us to encounter.”

It wasn’t long before the figure was within direct visual range of the sphere. The Enforcer had obviously seen them. That was when a fleet of small, swift drone ships controlled by their computer attacked, their energy weapons bouncing harmlessly off the suit. However, they then quickly filled the space around the individual with a mist that swiftly coalesced and hardened into a white solid substance that immobilized the Enforcer. They then towed the cocoon-like pod back to the sphere and brought it inside.

“Jennie, Michelle, Cynthia,” said Zoe, sounding apprehensive but determined, “I hope you can hear me. I’m in.”

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“And she’s vanished from the observation device,” said Jennie. “They must have brought her aboard whatever shielded enclosure or vehicle they’re using. I’m worried.”

On the good side, the computer was using the data to calibrate its detection system for observation cloaking, but the About Time crew wasn’t concerned about that.

Michelle added, “It might have been nice if she’d told us what her plan was.”

Cynthia said, “Yes, but think about it: they wanted to capture an Enforcer and go back in time to paradox the capture event that just happened. Their plan won’t work now – they won’t find her, her ancestors, or even her constituent molecules at any prior time in the Chronal Enforcers’ history.”

“She has never been to our headquarters,” Ghimar confirmed.

“But once they find that out, what will they do to her then?” wondered Jennie.

She should perhaps have wondered what Zoe would do to her captors long before then.

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Zoe had several emotions running through her at the same time as the alien scientists brought her foam-encased body into their sphere and placed it in a work area of sorts. Zoe felt elated that the first part of her plan had worked out as well as it had. She marveled at the neurological link the suit had. All she had to do was think something.

However, she had also discovered that some things weren’t as simple as just a thought, and she understood why – so in the heat of the moment things wouldn’t just happen. That was a good thing; otherwise, the anger she felt for these individuals might have caused such an accident.

Zoe relaxed and passed the time by allowing the suit’s neural system to do a complete operational diagnostic. Everything came back operating above design parameters. Her next thought was about the foam; the response from the neural network came before she had even formed the question coherently. Analysis showed that the foam was designed to dissolve in time, which was probably why they had that framework over there that looked like some kind of restraint system. The suit’s systems got to work analyzing that next.

The new force weapons that Ghimar had instructed her on the use of, could be both stunning and lethal. She seriously hoped the lethal part wasn’t necessary, but some of the translated discussions began to make her wonder.

Now, Zoe had been sent to prison for crimes she hadn’t committed just because she’d been asleep in the van while her friends committed them. But she had aged to maturity in prison, and although she hadn’t suffered any of the obviously horridly painful and life-altering ordeals these aliens had, they still didn’t have the right to destroy not only themselves, but untold numbers of others.

From what Cynthia had told her, the only thing that could stop the time tsunami caused by an emergent paradox was the arrow of time simply running out of inertial momentum. Unless it never got started in the first place.

The scientist sitting at the navigation console said, “We have a rather serious paradox here.”

The very handicapped and scarred one replied, “Really? Geee, and I wonder why we came here.”

The navigator snapped back, “Don’t be a jerk! I mean we, and I’m not talking about that kind of paradox. According to the chronal display, we can’t find one instance of this officer in the preselected timeline.”

Zoe had heard enough. She didn’t know everything about how her suit worked, but she knew enough. She just willed her suit to transfer itself to what she could see was a clear spot a few meters away, outside the solidified foam. She knew that as soon as she did that, they’d notice, so she had to have her next move planned.

One of the scientists had enough presence of mind to hit the emergency alarm on the wall by where he was standing before he and several others dove for cover to avoid the shots she immediately fired their way. But not all of them avoided them; the aliens in the work area she could see were hit by Chronal Enforcer special transfer projectiles and vanished immediately.

Zoe’s emotions were a mixture of anger and curiosity as she raised her arm. “Look here,” she said, translated by her suit’s computer, “I’m not really sure what your current intentions are, but let me tell you this: I’m not here to play.” A bright blue beam flashed from her outstretched gloved hand, and her suit’s energy disruptor vaporized the console the scientists had taken cover behind, resulting in a huge explosion. When the smoke and debris cleared, the scientists were revealed, cowering without any cover left.

Zoe smiled to herself within her helmet and went on, “Are there any questions? If not, I suggest you take me to the bridge. We need to get something clear, especially since future events don’t necessarily have to include you in any meaningful way.”

“We won’t just give up and do anything you –” one of them began. Zoe hit that one with another transfer projectile – he simply vanished like the others had earlier. The remaining scientists visibly flinched, and one of them raised his hands and opened a door. The others followed his lead.

The sphere wasn’t actually all that large – it was probably smaller than Ghost Hill Lab, taken in its entirety. At the end of the passageway, a door opened, and Zoe and the rest of the scientists could all hear, “– only trace the computer’s found of this one makes no sense. It’s over a hundred thousand years ago. And it’s so brief it could be just a glitch.”

“It’s all we’ve got, so let’s go. Set coordinates. We’ll be lucky if we can get there before they escape –”

That was when Zoe opened fire. She hit the ones still in the corridor with transfer projectiles first, but that gave the ones in the control room time to set coordinates and activate their transfer – and Zoe saw everything around her flash in bright violet.

Just before she shot the other two.

Now, Ghimar had explained to her that the transfer gun fired projectiles that were each a one-shot transfer system, each one keyed to a particular cell in a Chronal Enforcer holding area in some dimension or another. Her suit had that information, but she didn’t need it just now. All she knew was that the miscreants were alive, and each in a separate cell somewhere. It even transferred all data collected on each individual to the holding facility. Zoe wasn’t a murderer – but she also knew that the gun she was firing was specifically designed not to be lethal.

Zoe also knew, by looking at the monitors, that she was in space near a planet. And she was pretty sure she knew what planet that was. That was the planet she’d just left not too long ago, the one that would one day be the home of Chronal Enforcer HQ, the one where Ghost Hill Lab had set down. She knew because it was the only place in this dimension’s past where her molecules were to be found.

And right now, if the aliens’ computer was accurate, the earlier version of herself was down there.

“No no no,” said Zoe, “I’m pretty sure it would be bad to meet myself. It would probably be bad if they even notice that I’m up here. They probably aren’t scanning space. I don’t remember them scanning space?” She looked around at the sphere’s unfamiliar control systems.

She noticed that some numbers were changing rapidly … or they were probably numbers. They weren’t numbers she recognized. “Oh no,” Zoe said. “I’m not in orbit. I’m plummeting like a stone.” The image of the planet on the screen was slowly but inexorably growing larger. “If they haven’t noticed me, they’re gonna notice pretty soon!”

Zoe looked around; she didn’t recognize any of the controls or any of the labels on them. Panicking, she shouted to no one, “Uhhhhhh, what do I do?” Then she had a realization. “It’s only a paradox if I’m on board! I just have to be somewhere else!” And she vanished in a flash of ruby red light.

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In Ghost Hill Lab, all heads turned her way as she flashed into view on one of the transport pads. The others could tell it was her by her suit’s markings. “Zoe!” shouted Cynthia.

Zoe took her helmet off. “Are you all right?” Jennie asked. “What happened?”

“Absolutely fine,” Zoe replied. “I was a bit worried for a minute there, but it’s OK. The sphere is gonna burn up in the planet’s atmosphere pretty soon, I bet.”

“And … detected,” said Michelle, leaning over an observation system showing the sphere on the screen, one side of it now glowing red with atmospheric entry. “Still can’t detect the thing itself, but its atmospheric effects aren’t being shielded at all.”

“Could affect the planet if it’s allowed to impact on land,” Cynthia remarked.

“OK,” said Jennie, “downloading the coordinates for where Zoe transferred to from her suit,” said Jennie. “Add the duration before she came back here … add a few hours for good measure … and go!” Jennie set a metallic device down on the transport pad and pressed the button. The equipment package vanished. And so did the reddening sphere on Michelle’s screen.

“So it went … back to where it was?” asked Zoe. “And when?”

“About an hour or two after it left that point,” Michelle said. “It’s in the asteroid belt near Chronal Enforcers HQ, and we have its coordinates. If we give those to the Enforcers, they’ll be able to find it. A bit singed, but perfectly intact otherwise.”

“Yes,” said Ghimar. “And the individuals who were aboard are now, I assume, in various holding cells?”

“Got ‘em with the transfer gun,” said Zoe. “Didn’t see any signs of life left before I came back here.”

“I will brief the Enforcers, then,” Ghimar said. “I will return.” They vanished.

There was a pause.

“Zoe, I think you just saved the Chronal Enforcers,” said Michelle.

“I what?” said Zoe. “No, those guys were up to no good. They were probably gonna get us, and Earth too.”

“It’s true,” said Jennie, “they probably didn’t care who else they hurt in their insane quest for … revenge or whatever, maybe even themselves and their own planet. So yeah, you saved Earth too. And a bunch of other planets we haven’t even discovered yet.”

Cynthia added, “So you get to join the Saved the Earth club now.”

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The girls had all removed their crystalline Choronosuits and were in more comfortable attire eating a snack of strawberries and blueberries. As they lounged around, Ghimar returned in a flash of maroon light.

He said as he unrolled some type of parchment, “The four of you have been summoned by the Choronal Enforcer ruling council to appear before them. Apparently there was a class-X paradox event and you are the ones they wish to talk to.”

Cynthia, Jennie, and Michelle all looked at Zoe at the same time. She had an expression of complete bewilderment.

Zoe said sheepishly, “I have no clue what I might have done to create a paradox of any kind. I do hope no one was killed.”

Ghimar replied, “I cannot answer to that. All I can say is your attendance is mandatory, or someone probably will be dispatched to retrieve you.”

He handed the parchment to Cynthia, who read it over, “It is an official summons by the Choronal Enforcer Ruling Council, all right; here’s their official seal.”

Michelle said as she waved her arms towards their paradox detector, “Just where, and when, did this paradox happen? According to our equipment, no such event happened."

Ghimar replied, “That notwithstanding, you have been officially summoned. Attendance is mandatory."

Cynthia said as she stood and walked toward the back lab, “I’m going to put on my suit and see what this is all about.”

Michelle and Jennie followed, with Zoe slowly following with trepidation obvious in every footfall.

The four girls joined Ghimar after they suited up in the middle of the atrium. With a bright flash of maroon light intermixed with ruby red, the atrium was empty.

The five of them appeared on the transfer pad just outside the entrance to the council chambers. Several individuals in what appeared to be advanced powered combat suits opened the large chamber doors. The girls gaped. The interior was filled with more individuals that they would have thought possible.

One individual dressed in a bright sparkly Chronosuit stood and said, “Welcome. Come to the white starburst in front of the bench.”

Ghimar escorted the women to the bright white starburst pattern in the dark blue of the wall to wall carpet. As soon as Ghimar bowed and left the starburst ... every being in the room stood and began cheering and clapping.

The individual in the bright sparkly Chronosuit said, “My name is Notsert Volum. I am the currently elected leader of the Chronal Enforcers. It has come to my attention that a class-X paradox event was recently averted, under the standard Missiclin-Prendax definition of ‘recently.’ We are here today to thank and praise you with the highest honor we can bestow. Notsert looked at Zoe and said, “Young woman, I and countless others in dimensions you have no knowledge of, have all voted. The result of the vote is, you have achieved a position no other chronal officer ever has. You averted a class-X paradox that would have destroyed not only us ... but most of the known space-time continuum.”

Zoe replied, “I … I’m speechless. I just … I could tell what they were trying to do. They needed to capture a Chronal Enforcer. I was the only one of us who has a Chronal Enforcer-style suit. It’s true; the other three have About Time-style suits. And they were gonna go back in time and cause a paradox that would wipe out the Chronal Enforcers and probably everyone who ever had any contact with them. You. Us. That would mean a lot of dimensions. There just wasn’t any other choice for what to do. Who were those guys, anyway?”

“Your transfer rounds transported them to holding cells, where they were questioned,” said Notsert. “According to what we’ve been able to get from them …” Volum explained the alien scientists’ history and apparent intentions.

“Dang, that’s rough,” said Zoe, “but yeah, of course you had to take away their gear to keep them from destroying their whole universe. I know how rough it is. I spent a decade in prison for a crime I didn’t commit, and my dad was gonna cause a paradox to try to undo it, not that I knew any of that was happening. But to take blind revenge that would basically what, destroy every known universe that has intelligent life in it, including their own? That makes no sense.”

“They let their lust for vengeance consume their considerable intellect,” Notsert replied. “That in itself is a tragedy, but it pales next to the one they attempted to perpetrate. At any rate, we wish to honor you in the only way we know, with this commendation of extraordinary merit.” Notsert gestured, and an assistant brought a shiny black ceremonial case, which they opened to reveal a shining starburst symbol not unlike the one imprinted in the carpet, the emblem of the Chronal Enforcers. Notsert picked it up and applied it to the chest of Zoe’s Chronosuit, just below her name, and it now appeared to be part of the suit, where it permanently glowed.

“Zoe Prescott of Earth and About Time, you have demonstrated courage, wisdom, and strength in the most dire possible circumstance. For this we grant you the Chronal Enforcers’ greatest award of merit, the Silver Starburst. Few of our agents have earned it, and you now join their ranks. Please continue to vigilantly guard the tapestry of time against those who would unravel it.” Notsert stepped back and applauded Zoe, and soon everyone in the chamber was applauding too, after the fashion of each species. Michelle, Jennie, and Cynthia were applauding too.

“Looks like it was a good idea to get her out of jail,” Michelle whispered to Jennie, who smiled.

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

Ghost Hill Laboratory stood atop Ghost Hill once more. Some time had passed, from its owners’ point of view, and the four of them had made several innovations.

Cynthia appeared in a flash of ruby-red light to join the rest, who were taking a break outside, enjoying the scenic view of the valley around them. She wasn’t in a Chronosuit; instead, she was using a crystalline bracelet covered with control buttons. “Well, the latest class of project trainees just passed muster,” she said. “They’re rated on their suits – we’ll just have to keep an eye on what they do with them, like all the rest.”

Michelle was relaxing in a chair with a cool drink. “I’m cautiously optimistic,” she said. The entire valley was now under a defensive field of her own design; potential intruders were automatically shunted to faraway points in space and dimension if they attempted to breach the perimeter by any means. She and Jennifer were able to enjoy their valley once more. They could even sleep in their own beds in their own homes.

Jennie was puzzling over an unusual type of time crystal she’d accidentally created, trying to see whether there was any application for it. “It’s good to have you back – I might need your help with this,” she said.

Just then a warning tone sounded. All of them looked up at nearby monitors. Jennie had improved their paradox detectors’ sensitivity and accuracy both, installing a network of them inside the Moon’s central chamber, where they could sit undisturbed by the constant chaos of Earth.

“Paradox alert,” said Zoe, calling upon her Chronosuit with a deliberate effort of will, and piece by piece it materialized around her, the components flawlessly locking together as they flashed into being. “Interesting coordinates. Do we know that planet? Actually, no, we don’t. Cool! New planet!” The others were suiting up the slow way.

“Well, never a dull moment around here,” said Michelle as they stood on the transfer pads and vanished.

~~ THE END ? ~~