A Timeless Journey (27 page)

35

I recalled the first moment we saw each other and the weird experience we’d had with the mind scrambler later that day. According to the story I had written, I knew what I was going to do next. It was the moment when I was supposed to ask Luna about the mind scrambler. At the time I felt drained and decided to skip the conversation.

I already knew the outcome of that conversation from reading the novel and sufficed by evoking in my mind how the conversation would have occurred if I didn’t read the novel and that we were not aware if the mind scrambler worked between timelines. I closed my eyes and imagined a conversation we should have had at some parallel reality and yet never had in the same time.

“Luna, I have an idea. I remember you saying the mind scrambler would work from anywhere in the planet. What if I take one ring with me, maybe we will be able to communicate through time as well?”

“Only you could think of that.”

“I am desperate, that’s why.”

“I don’t know if it works. It has never been tried before in between realities, but I guess it’s worth trying. Take one of the rings with you and don’t forget to hide it. I can always buy another one to replace this one.”

“What happens if it works? Would the scrambler have all the features as in this reality, or would there be restrictions due to the time gap? I want to know if we can communicate freely with each other.”

“It’s a device that connects two minds in this reality, no matter the distance. I don’t think it will be compatible to use between different timelines, but if it does work even as a voice device will be good. If you don’t make it back here, at least we would be able to communicate and stay in touch.”

“If it works, I think we might have a technical problem with powering it. How am I going to charge the scrambler without a wireless charger from this world?”

“It is powered by your body’s positive energy and it can go on forever. My PBM will activate both rings in case you are stuck in the past for a long time. Your PBM might not work after a certain time and you won’t be able to activate the ring without my help. All you have to do is be positive as only positive energy from your mind will be able to produce the extra adrenaline and charge the scrambler.”

“There is also the issue of timing. I will use the scrambler at ten o’clock every night and if you do the same, we might find out if it works. I might not be able to use it before I return home to Ripon because I won’t be alone until I travel back home, but you must keep trying every night from ten.”

“I will,” Luna promised.

After recalling our conversation from what I had read in the novel, I decided to skip the conversation and simply ask Luna for one of the rings, before I took my old reality clothes out of the wardrobe. There was no point going through the conversation again when we both knew how it went.

“This is the time when you give me one of the mind scrambler rings.” I reminded Luna.

“I thought we were going to discuss about it first, but I guess we both know what we’re supposed to say.”

“Yeah, I thought to spare the unnecessary talk and go straight to the point.”

Luna pointed the Link to her personal drawer and after it opened, she took one of the rings and gave it to me.

“Here, and don’t forget the time difference between England and Laguna city when you go back.”

By this Luna meant what I had written on the book about our failure to communicate through the device for months due to forgetting to calculate the time difference between Dominican Republic and England and also thanks to the stressful time I was supposedly to go through upon my return. 

“Yeah, about messing up time difference! You do realise what will happen if I wrote the story differently when I go back this time around? It would change the way we read it and maybe it would change our future 560 years from the moment I will write the novel. What if I wrote it exactly as it was supposed to happen before I learned out about our time difference misfortune in the book?”

“Can you resist not talking to me for the next two months knowing in advance that you will make a mistake in calculating the time difference?”

“Of course I am not going to wait two months. I just have to write the exact content as it’s in the book I read here. It doesn’t matter if it’s the original story. Hang on! This is the part where I get confused. I return to the 21
st
century and, at some point, I will write what happened to me while in the future. 560 years later, the novel is there for me and you to read before our future happen. Are you following me so far?”

“Not sure where you going with this, but continue.”

“I want to know, if I travelled back from the year 2574 to the same year I disappeared in 2012 and wrote the book beyond these two years I spent here, how was I able to read it before I wrote it and most importantly, now that I have read it, do I have to write the events differently as it is happening this time or do I stick to the original story? If I did write this novel differently this time around, what happens then?”

“You will write what you have experienced so far and nothing less.”

“I am not convinced. If we changed the future and communicated without waiting for two months, the novel has to tell a different story and
if
it is already written differently from the way I read it this time around, does it mean what is happening now can be changed, or even have different outcomes?”

“I have no idea Scott!”

“For instance, this conversation now is not in the book. However, it might as well be if I decide to write these events when I go back and in 560 years from the time I will write the novel, there might be a different version of the book and so on for the other version of me in 560 years’ time. I feel like being in a timeless loop here and I got the feeling that every time I will write this novel some events are going to continually change.”

Luna lifted her shoulders and shook her head.

“My head hurts. I cannot answer that and neither can you. This very moment is the present point and when you go back to write your story, that will be the future for us. Whatever you have already written in the novel the last time around, has to be the same story you will write when you return to your old reality this time, I think.”

Luna’s answer confused me even more.

“Excuse my confusion Luna. In the story we have already read, I don’t talk with you for weeks and also we didn’t know if the ring would have worked, but now we do know. In my new story, which I am going to write on my return, I will talk of these events including this exact conversation and these events are different from the story we have read. How does this work?”

Luna threw her hands in the air in despair.

“I don’t know! I think is impossible to follow each possibility in every likely parallel reality as you will end in an infinite time loop, just like you said. My guess is when you go back you have to write your experiences exactly as they occurred this time around.”

“This is why I am worried. As time will pass by in my old reality, the year 2574 will arrive in about 560 years from now and I, or another version of me, will be reading a different story from the one I read. What happens then?”

“Let’s hope what you saying will be in a different parallel reality and our future will not be affected by those changes.”

“Selfish thinking to dismiss other possibilities, but it is good enough for me. I think this conversation has become too confusing for my mind to continue. All I wanted was a logical reason to stay here without affecting you and Sky.”

My answer made her smile, but I knew it was more a smile of relief for ending a conversation that no one had a clear idea about or even a logical explanation.

It was time to put on the old clothes I had when I arrived. Luna kept staring at me with a melancholic look on her face.

“It was in these clothes when I first saw you. I couldn’t stop thinking how strange you looked in this outfit.”

“Yeah, I remember the stare. I promise that I will do anything to return back to you and Sky, even if it takes all the years I have left to live.”

“The fact that you haven’t written anything else except this novel, it means you will return back to us. Otherwise if you had stayed there, you would have written more books, since this novel has become successful.”

“Your theory it has crossed my mind, but there is one little fact that scares me.”

“What is it?”

“When I was in the IEF in front of the panel, they showed me some information from 21
st
century and there was proof I was still there at the age of fifty.”

Luna put her hand on my shoulder and tried to assure me.

“There are so many parallel realities. Who knows, the information they had might be from an alternate reality.”

“Debatable, if it was from an alternate reality. Why these records would appear in this timeline and why would they lie to me? I thought you don’t lie in this reality, at least not officially.”

Luna knew I had a point. The government system and its employees never lied in the 26
th
century. Not knowing how to answer my last question, after a small pause, Luna tried to put my mind at ease.

“I have great hopes that you will return to us one day. Please do not stress over it! You never know what the future may bring.” She said and handed me over one of the rings.

I put the mind scrambler ring and my personal Link bracelet in one of my shorts’ side pockets and wondered about the time. Link telepathically confirmed it was eight minutes to two in the morning. I was only eight minutes away from the anomaly appearing again. The time in the 26
th
century was running out fast for me.

I took out of the back pocket my old android phone and tried to switch it on, but the battery had gone flat. Luna took my phone and put it over a square flat surface near the Holo device in the living space. It was the wireless energy supplier which fed all other electrical units in the apartment. This device, or ‘WES’ as it was randomly called, passed on the electricity from the building’s main wireless supplier, which was inside the facilities core, to every corner of the building.

The electricity that generated from the Zero-Point Energy technology deep underground inside the facilities core, fed the main wireless supplier. In the future they had a technology to transfer electricity wirelessly throughout the apartment. It supplied cost-free energy for the illuminous pixilated walls, for all the gadgets in the personal needs room, the Holo and anything else which needed the use of electric power. Everyone could use as much energy as they needed, as long as they paid a symbolic charge with the rent to cover the maintenance work on the ZPE generator.

It took only a few seconds for the battery sign to appear on the touch screen. The green bar filled up showing the phone fully charged. Since my phone was an ancient device, only direct contact with WES was able to charge the battery.

I turned my old phone on and although it showed no network signal, the time on it showed six minutes to two and the date 18/06/2012. I was unable to explain how it was possible to show the right time and same date when I left. I had no time to waste and I turned towards Luna with a serious look.

“Are you coming down to the anomaly with me?”

With her eyes ready to burst into tears she declined.

“I am sorry, I can’t watch you disappear in front of me, you have to go alone.”

I looked at Luna and knowing she was right, I held her in my arms and gave her a last kiss. She started to cry. Watching her made me shake from the strong emotions I experienced. After holding Luna in my arms for a few seconds, I went to the floating cot in the corner of the rest room and kissed Sky goodbye before leaving the apartment in a rush.

Once inside the cube I realised what I had left behind. I had just run away from the two people I loved the most. Sadness poured down my face in the form of tears, as I made my way out of the building for one last time.

Dragging my feet on the warm sand, I walked towards the beach near the point where I arrived. I looked left and right for the anomaly, but there was no sign of it yet. I tried to pinpoint the exact place where I had landed when I arrived and stopped near the shore. Then I faced the skyscrapers the same way as I had done two years ago. For one last time, I looked up and tried to catch a glimpse of Luna waving at me, but where we lived was so high that it was impossible to spot the Holo projection of a single person.

I would have given anything in that moment to see their faces one more time. While I desperately tried to get a last glimpse of Luna, the anomaly appeared to my left, only a few feet away from where I stood.

My chest tightened and I didn’t know what to do anymore. I didn’t want to go through the anomaly, but if I stayed, the novel would have never been written, Luna would never read it and, as a result, we would have never met. Everything that had happened so far could become undone. If I went, there were no guarantees if I was going to return. The decision to return home became harder by the second and although I was willing to stay with Luna, I wasn’t prepared to lose Sky by creating a paradox. The safest option for me was to walk through to the other side and hope one day I would return.