Moonliner: No Stone Unturned (2 page)

              “Are those the sunglasses I gave you?” Nikki asks Cedric.

              “They are,” he replies; “I’m really starting to like them.  Not only are the audio and video very clear but undetectable if you’re not wearing them.”

              “I’m glad you like them,” she says.  “Now what about your big news?”

              “I sent a message back in time today,” Cedric says.

              “How did you do it?” Nikki asks.

              “It has to do with all the work I’ve been doing on my thesis,” Cedric answers.  “It was this afternoon, just before I sent you the message.  I had spent two hours trying to no avail to transmit a message back in time.  Although I had given up, I had also forgotten to shut down both my transmitter and receiver.  That’s when I got a message from the future.”

              “Didn’t you just say you sent a message back in time?” Nikki asks.

              “I did, so to speak, since the message I got was from me in the future,” Cedric responds. 

              “How far into the future?” Nikki asks.

              “Just a few seconds,” Cedric answers; “maybe twenty to twenty-five.”

              “So what did the message say?” Nikki asks.
              “It was just the microphone of my transmitter running, picking up the sounds around us several seconds before they actually occurred.  It was mind boggling.  We heard the same sequence of events; crows, a dog, a man yelling, pause, then my phone all come over the receiver.  We could even hear our own voices.”

              “Who’s ‘we’?” Nikki asks.

              “Just Phaedra and me,” Cedric replies.

              “You know she isn’t real,” Nikki points out; “she’s just a machine.”

              “I do know that, yes,” Cedric answers. “Anyway, seconds later, the exact same sequence of events occurred; the crows, the dog, the man yelling, my phone, only this time not over the receiver, but actually occurring around us in real life. I didn’t answer the call the same way the second time, so I altered the space-time continuum.”

              “How so?  How did you answer the call?” Nikki asks.

              “I waited until the second tone this time and didn’t say anything until after taking the call,” Cedric answers.

              “This is amazing,” Nikki says; “we should do a story on this.”

              “I don’t want to,” Cedric quickly replies.  “The closer I get to this discovery, the less I want anyone to know about it.” 

              “Why do you think it worked this time?  Do you think you’ll be able to do it again?”

              “The rain,” Cedric answers.  “It worked because of the rain.”

              “The rain?” Nikki asks.

              “Occasionally, especially during damp, misty, steamy conditions, laser-com lines can be eclipsed by low-lying clouds, fog, or vapor in the air.  When this happens, all communications linked to that line shift into satellite override, lengthening the signal significantly.”

              “So it’s really distance you need, not simply rain,” Nikki says.

              “Exactly,” Cedric responds.  “It worked today, I believe, because the signal had been lengthened by the rain shifting the grid into laser override.”

              “So with a longer signal, how far back in time do you think you could send a message?” Nikki goes on to ask.

              “I really don’t know,” Cedric answers.  “That’s why I need another successful test to compare results.  I need a second data point.  Until then, my data is inconclusive.”

              “You must have some calculated guess at it,” Nikki says.  “Come on, I won’t quote you on it.  What are we talking here, months, years?”

              “Microseconds, minutes, days, or years, I really don’t know,” Cedric responds; “the laser signal breaks a time barrier, then splits both forward and backward from the present, bending time into an exponential curve that quickly goes off my charts.  The T-line goes parabolic.  At that point, time becomes the conduit, or message’s medium, and the message is literally traveling through time.  The greater the distance of the signal, the greater the bend in the temporal plane.  There’s just no way of postulating how far time can bend without a second successful test to correlate results.”

              “So with a little distance you might be able to send a message way back in time,” Nikki says in awe of Cedric’s finding.

              “With a little distance, I might be bouncing signals off the ears of dinosaurs for all I know,” Cedric replies.

              “What about your recorded message?” Nikki asks.  “What do you ask people to do who might get your message, especially if you don’t know when they’ll get it?”

              “I ask them to activate their message reflectors so that I can compare time stamps for a difference,” Cedric answers; “I don’t know what else to do.”

              “What if someone gets your message before the invention of laserlink?” She asks.  “What should they do?”

              “That’s a good question.  I suppose that’s possible in theory,” Cedric tells her.  “I should think of something.  If I don’t exhaust all potentials, questions will remain.”

              “That’s right, leave no stone unturned,” Nikki adds with her distinctive way of making the complex seem so simple.

They sit in silence, watching the sun set behind pink clouds over a golden bay.  If there ever was a moment for Cedric it is now, dating a rising star in the local media, closing in on a PhD, and now not only theorizing it can be done but sending messages through time.  If only we could set a restore point in life to which we could return as our default moment, that moment would be now for Cedric.

Nikki, meanwhile, has been hanging on to some really big news of her own, waiting for the perfect moment to spring it on Cedric, who is too wound up in his own news to pay attention to her.  The time has come, however, for her to bring it up.

              “What if your message were transmitted from the moon?” Nikki asks.

              “That’s clever,” Cedric answers; “all I’d need to do is link into Moondock’s relay.  Lennox could do it, but I don’t think he’s going back for a little while.”

              “What if I sent the message for you?” Nikki asks.

              “What do you mean?” Cedric asks in return.

              “The station wants me to cover the Apollo 11 Centennial,” she says.

              “On the moon?” Cedric asks, a bit shocked by the news.

              “Yes, on the moon,” she answers.

              “I can’t believe it,” Cedric says in dismay; “you’re going to the moon.”

              “Actually,” Nikki says; “I don’t think I’m going to accept the assignment.”

              “What are you talking about?” Cedric asks her; “why wouldn’t you go to the moon?  It’s a chance of a lifetime.”

              “I always thought we’d go together someday,” she softly answers.

              “We will,” Cedric tells her; “someday, when I’ve got my doctorate and we’re more established, but that might take some time.  In the meantime, this is a real opportunity for you.  Think of it as going for both of us.  Besides, you can show me around when we do finally go together.”

              “I’m afraid,” Nikki says.

              “That I understand,” Cedric tells her; “I don’t want to make you do anything you’re really afraid of doing but remember lunar tourism has a perfect safety record over its decade of service.”

              “What about the two guys who died when Moondock was under construction?” Nikki asks.

              “That was a construction mishap that happened under hazardous conditions,” Cedric responds.  “People have died throughout history working on great structures.  Moondock is no different.”

It has really always been Cedric who wanted to go to the moon.  Nikki knows this and in many ways wishes they could switch places.  They’re opposite in so many ways.  Cedric has a logo-centric mind, always siding with reason and paying no heed to visceral feelings.  For him, our greatest survival mechanism is our brain, our intelligence, our rational thought. 

Nikki, though rational, has a somewhat mythos-oriented mind and at times follows her gut instincts.  She thinks it’s as important to feel your way as to think your way through life.  Cedric understands this about her and often encourages her to follow her feelings.  This time, however, he isn’t about to dissuade her from accepting a trip to the moon.  For Cedric, turning down a trip to the moon over a visceral feeling would simply be irrational.

They sit in silence for a long moment.

              “I’ll go,” Nikki finally says.  “I think I’ll take the assignment.” 

The sky turns orange as the sun drops below the horizon.  A few cyclists and skaters are still rolling around the seawall, harvesting the day’s remaining light.  The air is warm and the bay is serene.  It’s the perfect cap to a perfect day.

Moonliner
1:3

              “It came through,” Lennox says holding his putter up to his line of vision.  His ball’s a good twenty feet from the pin, barely on, and the green breaks both right and left between the ball and the hole. 

              “What?” Cedric asks, thinking Lennox doesn’t have the slightest chance of making the putt.

              “My divorce,” he answers; “I’m officially single again.”

              “Congratulations then, I guess,” Cedric replies.  “That didn’t seem to take long.”

              “It would have been a lot worse if we’d had kids,” Lennox replies.

“How do you feel?” Cedric asks.

              “Indifferent,” Lennox answers, now with his head just above the grass line trying to gage the green’s surface for breaks. 

              “The longer a guy takes lining up a putt, the higher the expectation,” Cedric says; “I’m expecting you to make this,” he adds sarcastically.

Lennox takes the long awaited putt, leaving the ball within a centimeter of the hole after its lengthy, seemingly endless roll. 

              “Impressive,” Cedric says with exceeded expectations.

The two make their way to the next tee and have a seat in some late afternoon shade.  The sweltering summer of sixty-nine is back on.  In fact, the previous day’s fleeting rainstorm seems already forgotten, as if it had never occurred.

The transmission through time, however, has Cedric’s mind flowing on a higher plateau.  He can’t stop thinking about it.  Lennox, being his longest friend, can easily sense Cedric has a lot on his mind.  Curiously, he delves into the matter.

              “So what was up yesterday when I called?” Lennox asks.

              “What do you mean?” Cedric asks in return, knowing what Lennox means but looking for a little confirmation before divulging anything.

              “When I called,” he says; “you were acting so strangely.”