Chapter 31

  SNAP

  The fluorescent lights suddenly illuminated the garage. The digital wall clock jumped back two hours from the time Deke had engaged the field. “Interesting,” he said out loud. “The field state toggle must be instantaneous. I didn’t even notice a blink. Well, at least this time I didn’t end up in an operating room. How did the lights get turned on?“

  “Welcome back, Dr. Kelton”.

  Kelton, startled, jerked his head towards the voice and jumped out of the chair. “Beta, you scared the daylights out of me!” He put his hand to his chest and tried to control his breathing.

  “I’ve never seen anyone get out of one of those chairs so fast!” Beta laughed, then wrinkled their nose, “You are a mess! You look like you haven’t slept, showered, or shaved in days! And…You are a little ripe smelling.”

  Kelton told Beta about the marathon construction session. Beta laughed when Deke described the free meal at the diner because the waitress thought he looked homeless.

  “How did you get here?” Kelton asked.

  “You told me how to get here.”

  “I did? When did I do that?”

  “After the explosion.”

  “Explosion? What explosion?”

  Beta's face clouded, they tried to talk, choked, and started to cry. “Oh, Dr. Kelton! I can’t… I never thought… “. Beta’s stifled sobs turned into wails of distress. “There was an explosion! Your wife is dead! Alex is dead! Chaz is dead! I thought you would know. I can’t be the one to tell you. I’ll do it all wrong! I just can’t”

  “Gillian’s dead?” Deke staggered and fell backward into the chair. “How did that happen?” It felt to Kelton like a veil had darkened the room.

  Over the next 15 minutes, Kelton was able to piece together the story between occasional episodes of his own and Beta’s racking sobs. The reality of Gillian’s death hit him like a stack of stone blocks to his chest. New blocks piled on from minute to minute threatened to suffocate him. He wanted a rewind and a replay. He despaired as the sun set on his hope. The strength left his body. The realization distilled in his heart that his way of life, his family, and his plans for the future were now forever out of his reach. He paced around the garage, walking in and out of the box’s framework, hoping to find a position that would offer him some relief from the pain. There was no relief. He tried to put his arms around Beta. The pain was magnified for both by the awkwardness of the gesture. Kelton wanted to comfort Beta; he needed contact to comfort himself. Beta didn’t like to be touched. They cried together from opposite sides of the garage.

  “I’m sorry! I’m not the one who should be doing this,” Beta whimpered.

  The spikes of grief in Kelton’s chest eased as Kelton noticed the depth of Beta’s pain and frustration. This was very hard for Beta, too. Beta wasn’t good at emotion.

  Kelton took a deep, cleansing breath and tried to change the subject, “Beta, thanks for being here. Something must have gone wrong with the Box. It seems I have been in the Box longer than I planned. How long have I been in the Box?”

  “Almost 3 months now. Nobody knew what happened to you. There were rumors that you had killed yourself. I’m glad you didn’t.”

  “Three months? I had the timer set for 24 hours!”

  Beta said, “You told me that the year selector on the timer got set for next year.”

  Kelton looked at the computer screen. “How did I miss that? Beta, when did I tell you? I don’t remember telling you that.”

  “It was right after the explosion when you told me, but it was more than 12 weeks before I remembered. I jumped in my car and drove here as soon as I could walk. I still have a headache from the memories coming back.”

  A sad thought occurred to Kelton, “I missed the funerals?”

  “Yeah. They had the funerals for Alex, Chaz, and Gillian just a week after the explosion. I missed them, too. I was still in the hospital. I was laid up for more than a week.”

  “Let's get back. I need to go home.” They turned off the lights in the garage, locked the door behind them, and stepped out. Beta climbed in the Toyota and watched while Kelton got in his snow-covered Nova. He brushed off the snow, opened the door, and tried to start it. The battery was dead.

  “Beta, can you give me a ride home?”

  “I would like to.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “ I think your house has already been rented to someone else. I heard your mother-in-law put all of your stuff in storage. You may not have a home to go to.”

  Kelton sighed and settled into the passenger seat nonplussed. “Now what, Beta? What do I do? Where do I go?”

  “Maybe, you can stay with me? Until get your feet on the ground again,” Beta offered. “I’ll take you to my place, it’s near the University.”

  Kelton started to argue, then realized he had no money, no prospects, and nowhere else to go. “Thanks, Beta.”

  As they drove toward home, Kelton borrowed Beta’s phone and dialed his mother-in-law. “Maji?”

  “Who is this”

  “It’s me, Deke”

  “Oh, Deke! Allah Akbar! Where have you been? What happened to you?”

  “It’s a long story, Maji. I will tell you all about it someday. The short version is I got caught in a lab accident. Don’t worry, I’m perfectly OK now. I was trapped for 3 months and couldn’t communicate.”

  “ Are you working for the CIA?”

  “No, Maji, at least not yet. I was unconscious. I was unconscious for more than 3 months. ”

  Gillian's Mother broke down in tears. “I was so afraid you were dead, too. Oh! My! Do you know about Gillian?

  “Yes.”

  Kelton burst into tears and cried with his mother-in-law.

  “She loved you so much! She was so worried about you!” she told him. “She was with me the night before she died. She was trying so hard to find you. I am so glad to hear your voice. Do you know anything about the explosion? Who was responsible? Some are saying that you were angry and upset and you planted the bomb.”

  “No, Maji, that wasn’t me. Beta says it was Chaz.”

  “Who are those people?”

  “My lab assistants.”

  “Your lab assistant blew up my daughter? How did you let that happen?”

  “I’m very sorry, Maji.” They talked and cried together for another 30 minutes. She told Deke that she had packed up all of their belongings and put it in a storage unit. “I still had hope you would come back, and you did. I am so happy!”

  “Maji! I am very sorry to ask. I have no money. Can you help me?”

  “You have money. Gillian had a life insurance plan since she was a small girl. I deposited a check for $10,000 into your checking account a month ago. You see? I was counting on your coming back.”

  “Thank you, Maji. So much has happened. It’s going to take a while to get back on my feet again. I have some things to take care of at the University then I will come to see you.”

  He hung up and wiped his eyes.

  As they drove the next hour Beta filled Kelton in about what was taking place at the university.

  “Dr. Tilly has assumed complete control over the Box research. He calls it the Tilly Effect research. I am afraid I went along with it. I had no memory of the days prior to the explosion until this afternoon. I smelled a sparkler burning and the memories hit me like a wrecking ball.”

  “Yeah, I know how that feels,” Kelton said.

  “Tilly had told me that you were working in collaboration with him to develop experiments to confirm his theories. We have been trying to rebuild the Box under Dr. Tilly’s constant supervision. He’s been a jerk. He has locked down all the lab notes. We can’t access them, every morning, he shouts some vague instructions at us based on his reading of the lab notes. Every day, we try to do what he said. The next day he shouts contradictory orders.”

  “My memories have been a little hazy since the explosion, but they are as sharp as 4k now. Tilly put me on the project because I was the only one who had any experience with the construction of the Box. We haven’t had any success re-establishing the Tilly Effect” Beta blew a raspberry, “I mean the Kelton Field. Every day, Dr. Tilly gets more and more worked up and threatens us with our jobs. I can’t wait to see you go in and take over the project again. I have only been able to put up with his craziness, because I wanted to be in on developing the technology.”

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  They talked on and off throughout the rest of the ride. Deke said, “I am glad you can confirm my experiences in the box. It doesn’t actually replicate the experiment. I think your experience was more of a near-death experience. It’s hard to explain away the result; You found the cabin and turned off the Box because I told you to. I don’t remember telling you. For that matter, I don’t have any memory of anything that happened the last 3 months. It feels like I just got in the Box a few hours ago. ”

  “What’s going to happen when you download those memories? Retrieving a few minutes of memories just about knocked me out.”

  Deke shuddered at the memory of the pain of the first download. The second hadn’t been as bad but he had spent a lot of time in the Box. What happens if it’s accumulative? Three months of memories might be excruciating. ”Maybe your experience is different than mine. Maybe you were just hit with traumatic memories. Either way, I hope it gets easier,” he said.

  “I saw my grandmother; she sent me back here. Oh, I saw Alex and Gillian there, too.”

  “You did? What did they say?”

  “They were in a surprisingly good mood, considering that they had just been killed. Alex was positively giddy. He was making jokes just like always. He can’t even take his own death seriously. He was going on and on about the colors I couldn’t see and the music I couldn’t hear. He was almost dancing when he saw his brother again. Gillian looked happy. It was so… incongruous… how happy she looked standing there in the middle of the destruction and fire sprinklers raining on us, er through us. Oh, and there was a man who was happy to see Gillian”

  “Probably my father-in-law. I don’t know how that makes me feel that Gillian was there. I am relieved and sad and angry and, I don’t know what-all.”

  “It’s making me rethink everything I ever thought about what happens after death. I‘m not sure, but I imagine I feel their support. Is it my imagination or wishful thinking? Are they here with us?”

  “I think there is a lot going on that we don’t see. We have new worlds to explore. There are a lot of questions we are going to be able to answer that no one has been able to answer before. Well, at least not answer them scientifically.” Changing the subject, Deke said, “Beta, it’s nearly 7 PM. I need to confront Tilly tonight while I am still riled up. Can we go to his office before we go to your house?”

  “He’s in the Dean’s office now. He’s the Dean. He has been working late these last few weeks. He’s probably still there. We can give it a try.”

  They climbed the stairs. Kelton had flashbacks of his first memory download as he pushed open the door labeled Milton Cohen Physical Sciences Building. They made their way to the elevator and pushed the button for the 6th floor. The doors opened on the 6th floor. There were drop cloths on the floor, ladders, and scaffolds that highlighted the near completion of a recent construction project.

  Beta shuddered and put their hand to their nose. “The last time I was here was the day of the hearing and the explosion. I think I can still smell the smoke.” Beta winced and blinked. “Dr. Kelton, I’m sorry, but I can’t stay with you.”

  Kelton made his way alone down the dark hallway. The Dean's office was at the far end of the corridor. Occasional splashes of light coming from the windows of the administrative offices lining the hallway dimly lit his path. The Dean's office at the end of the hall was brightly lit. The obscure glass on either side of the office's double doors spilled light across the floor in front of him.

  Kelton picked up his walking pace the last 20 feet of the corridor and, without knocking, pushed open the doors.

  Tilly sat at his desk, dictating to his computer. He glanced up momentarily and, in a comic doubletake, jumped to his feet, throwing his notes in the air.

  “Dr. Kelton!” Tilly’s voice squeaked. He cleared his throat and tried again, more loudly this time,” Dr. Kelton. What are you doing here?” He reached for his phone and pushed a single button. “Security? I need a security team in the Dean’s office right now.”

  Kelton said, “There’s no need for security. We just need to talk.”

  Tilly shuffled to the left to keep his desk between himself and Dr. Kelton, “We have nothing to talk about. There is a restraining order barring you from the campus. You need to leave immediately.”

  “I have to disagree with you on two points, Tilly.”

  “Dean Tilly,” Tilly corrected.

  “Point one, we have a lot to talk about, IP theft, malfeasance, plagiarism, and my work. Point 2, I haven’t been served with a restraining order. I don’t need to leave.”

  “You are wasting your time here, Dr. Kelton.”

  “It’s my time to waste,” Kelton said quietly.

  “You only have minutes; Security will be here shortly to show you out. ” Tilly sniffed,“ You are a mess. You stink. You look like you have been sleeping in your clothes, you obviously haven’t shaved in days. I can smell you from here. I’ll have no trouble convincing security you don’t belong here.”

  Kelton looked down at himself. He realized that he was wearing the same clothes that he had worn during his marathon construction binge – what three months ago? He felt his face. He had 5 days of stubble on his face. He imagined how the security team would react to his appearance. He was going to have to make his point quickly.

  “Before they get here, let me tell you, if you think you can steal my work, take credit for my work, you are due for a wake-up call. I will drag you through every court you can imagine. The collegiate disciplinary council is going to hear from me. You will be exposed in every scientific journal - everything about you, from the lifts in your shoes to your video chats with BikerBabe1999. She’s right, you have been a slimy worm of a man.“

  Tilly blinked.

  Kelton wondered, where did that come from? BikerBabe1999? He exhaled. An image was forming in his head. He drew in his breath, and the inhale went on for seconds, like a dropped baby who grasps for air, then shatters the pause with an ear-splitting scream. His lungs could hold no more air. The office was silent except for the ticking of the desk clock. Tic…Tic…

  Every instant of the last three months hit him like a city bus. A grunt of surprise pounded the air from his lungs. The images and experiences swept his consciousness from Tilly’s office. Every frame, every face, every conversation, every city, every thought from his time in the box landed in his skull simultaneously with hyper clarity, as though he had been nearsighted his entire life and was suddenly seeing through corrective lenses for the first time. The details of the memories were more real than anything he could sense with his eyes, ears, hands, or nose. It was like he had been listening his entire life to a tinny wind-up gramophone that had abruptly changed to a symphonic orchestra. The strength left his legs. He collapsed to the floor, half sitting, half kneeling. He flailed with his arms for support and caught the side of an armchair.

  Tilly pounced, “Dr. Kelton, you have clearly been drinking or using drugs. Leave my office at once.” He walked to Kelton flailing helplessly on the floor. “You have disgraced the university, you have disgraced yourself. You are not worthy. You don’t deserve any kind of recognition. You would never have made any progress without the tools and support that the university provided, that I provided. The Tilly Effect will change the face of science, of space exploration, interstate commerce, food production, travel…everything. I will make sure of it.”

  Kelton’s mind raced with the indelible images. He remembered Gillian. How happy and beautiful she was. Getting blown up hadn’t slowed her down a bit. She was better than ever. With the thought of Gillian, there was an instantaneous change in his body and soul, from a state of depression and misery to one of thrill and ecstasy. Gillian was still alive, and his heart cheered. He would be with her again. She wasn’t lost. As soon as he thought about her, he realized she was here, with him now.

  Tilly was encouraged by Kelton’s blank stare. He continued with increased venom. “You have no cards to play. You have been censured by the committee. The minutes show that the last thing they decided before your assistant blew up the lab was that you were to be fired from your position, stripped of any intellectual properties you may have developed while you were associated with the University, and a restraining order issued against you. I was the sole survivor; The record stands as I reported it.”

  Kelton leaned against the chair and tried to catch his breath. Vivid, vibrant, crystalline images, too real to be called memories, electrified his body as though he had touched a live wire. “I received volumes of information, theories, and diagrams from Milton Cohen in a single gestalt,” he thought. “I communicated perfectly with Gillian, with everyone; every nuance, every thought and feeling in the tick of a clock. There is infinite room for differences of opinion, even deliberate deception, but misunderstanding feels impossible. I can talk to the greatest minds that ever lived. I can learn what they learned. I can share their experiences. Why would anyone want to be confined to a body?”

  “Dr. Kelton, it is apparent to everyone that matters that you were angry about the disciplinary meeting, your personal life was in tatters, your wife left you, you were penniless, you were about to be disgraced. We wonder, did you play a role in the explosion? Did you coerce young Chaz to build and plant the bomb? Campus security will investigate. Will we find evidence that you killed your wife and the board? It seems likely to me. Why else wouldn’t you attend the hearing? Why didn’t you want to defend yourself against the accusations? You weren’t here because you knew what was going to happen. You knew your wife was going to die, you knew the council was going to die. Unfortunately for you, I survived. I will make sure you are prosecuted!”

  Kelton’s body ached, feelings of nausea fought with every other impulse. My body smells, it hurts. I am so tired. It has to sleep whether I want to or not. It’s weird. I am thinking of my body in the third person.

  He was immediately contradicted by his own thoughts; he remembered how Cohen was frustrated by not being able to conduct experiments. He was pelted with image upon image; His own disappointment when he was unable to throw his arms around Gillian, the unsatisfactory, unfulfilled anger he struggled with when he tried to punch Jacob. It had been hard to identify emotions without the pounding heart, the muscle contractions, the blush of anger, or the tightening of the fists or stomach. He realized how much he had missed having a body while he was out of his body. He thought, “My body frees me and confines me. I am unique. I can be freed and confined whenever I want. I am the only one who can research this. The Box has opened a two-way door for me.”

  Tilly continued, “Whether you are guilty or not, it makes no difference to me. If you are found guilty, you will go to prison, and out of my concern. If you are not guilty, the taint of scandal will ensure that you never work at another university. Either way, it works for me. You will never again have access to the resources you will need to duplicate the Tilly Effect. You are dead in the water. Your career is over.”

  Kelton didn’t hear Tilly. “I travel at the speed of thought; I can be anywhere, I can see anything. There is nothing that I can’t see. No one that I can’t find. No mystery that I can’t solve. I can be with Gillian whenever I want. We will explore the world. Before we are done, we will explore the universe.”

  Kelton imagined Alex laughing, ‘Boldly going where no man… in the last 5 hours has gone.’ He wondered, “Was that really you, Alex?”

  Kelton’s nausea faded and his pulse raced. Excitement grabbed him like an anaconda. He thought, “This is research only I can do. People used to say no one has come back, no one can come back, to tell us what happens. Well, I’m back! I have feet in both worlds. I have only scratched the surface. I have insights into understanding the greatest mysteries known to man. I can dig deeper and go farther. It doesn’t matter what Tilly does. I won. I don’t need the university. I have the Box. I can go anywhere. I can see anything! I don’t have the limitation of a single lifetime. My body doesn’t age in the box. I have hundreds of lifetimes available. I can skip into the future like a pebble across the lake while Tilly implodes. I can…”

  Two security guards lifted Kelton to his feet. Tilly waved his hands dismissively, “Take him to the police and have him charged with trespass.” They started to move towards the door.

  “Hold a minute,” Tilly said. Tilly moved forward until his face was inches away from Kelton. His eyes burned with delight, “Dr. Kelton. You have no options,” he gloated. “I hold all the trump cards. You have violated your employment agreement. The university now has full control of your Intellectual Properties and any and all resulting technology.”

  Kelton imagined Alex dancing in glee behind Tilly. “I just gave him a spiritual wedgy!” An amused smile came to his face as he wondered what a spiritual wedgy might look like.

  Tilly droned on, “I have been in contact with the Department of Defense. By tomorrow, the technology will be declared classified and crucial to national security. It will be treason to publish or continue your research. Only I, and by extension the university, will have authorization to conduct research. Maybe in a few years, we will begin to explore the Tilly Effect’s commercial applications, until then, the research dollars will roll in like an avalanche. You are left out in the cold. You are left with nothing. You can do nothing. The Tilly Effect will change the world, but not your world. You have lost, and I have won. ” Tilly’s lips tightened into a fierce smile. “What do you think of that?”

  Kelton’s amused smile faded. He tilted his head back in deep thought, breathed deeply, exhaled, and then focused his attention on Tilly. “I almost forgot you were in the room,” he said. “ What were you saying? You may have to repeat yourself. I’m afraid my mind was somewhere else.”