Chapter 7
by Dan Kirk
“So how was your weekend?” I asked Sean as he climbed into the Secret Service car. Sean shot me an exasperated look as he buckled his seatbelt. As soon as he was buckled in, the car left the driveway and headed towards the high school.
“I’d almost forgotten how shitty it was with my family.” Sean muttered darkly, giving me the evil eye as I gave him a warning glance and pointed my finger at the driver, who was Tom today. Sure, they’d keep a lot of secrets, but some things were better just not spoken.
“Well you missed some excitement.” I told him and quickly began to give him the basics of my new foster-brother. His eyes grew wide as I told him of some of the things my father had said and he just shook his head.
“Davey, while you were making your father into a better person, didn’t you think to do the same with mine?” Sean whispered as we pulled into the school’s parking lot.
“I would if I could.” I said with a shrug and he just grimaced before getting out of the car.
“You two have a good day.” Tom said as we got out.
“Try not to get too bored.” I told the agent as Sean followed me towards the gym. The sun wasn’t peeking over the horizon yet, which was a good thing. We were running a little early, just as planned.
“At least this time we don’t have your whole gay thing to worry about.” Sean said with a wry grin as we neared the gym.
“Nor do we have to worry about you getting caught jacking off.” I shot back and he frowned before smiling slightly.
“Yeah, so far things aren’t too fucked up this time around.” Sean said. “I know that other shoe is out there though. Maybe if we’re lucky it’ll just take a few years to drop.”
“I hope so too.” I said as we entered the doors to the gym. No sooner had we entered the gym than we were both grabbed by very strong hands. I twisted around just in time for a pair of warm lips to fall on mine, and the moment of surprise I had turned into another kind of excitement as Brian held me close to him and reclaimed my mouth with his. Sounds from behind me told me that Brandon was doing the same to Sean, but as Brian’s tongue entered my mouth, I didn’t care anymore. My entire body tingled with the contact I’d been craving for days now, and hadn’t gotten thanks to my father’s little surprise yesterday.
“It took you long enough to get here.” Brian moaned as we moved slightly, rubbing our erections against each other through our jeans. Despite the comment, he was smiling.
“I’ve missed you.” Brandon’s voice was soft behind me, and I could hear a whimper from Sean. This had to be hard on him. Just a few days ago, he’d seen the older version of Brandon die inside the departure chamber of the Chinese time machine.
“Dad wanted to talk before he flew back to Washington.” I explained to Brian who just nodded before moving in for another kiss. For several minutes I didn’t care about time travel, or about my father, or my new foster-brother. All that mattered was the feeling of Brian’s mouth on mine, his hands rubbing my butt and pulling me tight against him, the feel of his hard cock against mine through our jeans, and the tingling sensations running all through my body.
“I hate it when you’re not around.” Brian muttered as I broke the kiss this time. We had to raise the flag in a few minutes, so we couldn’t continue this despite our desire to do so. Master Chief Cole trusted us to get the flag up on time, and so he didn’t bother being here, and that gave us a little bit of privacy each and every morning.
“What’s the matter?” Brandon asked Sean and I turned to look. Sean had glistening eyes as he stared up at Brandon and ran a hand along Brandon’s jaw line.
“We’ll talk about it after school.” Sean said softly. At least I’d had time to tell him about the planned discussion with our friends after school when he’d called this morning to confirm what time we’d be leaving.
“Okay.” Brandon said with a shrug of his shoulders, as Brian demanded my attention again by nibbling at my neck.
“Stop that.” I chided Brian who just smirked at me before stepping away. It felt cold without him close to me and I regretted my words. We went to get the flag, still holding hands, and as I always did with him nearby, I knew everything was right with the world.
The flag was hoisted at the appropriate time, and we went across the street to a small convenience store. The breakfast we got was typical junk food and as usual I felt a pang of guilt at the relatively unhealthy breakfast. Sure, I worked out a lot every day but I still worried that one day I’d end up putting on too much weight again. Trevor showed up after his father dropped him off and we headed back to the school, chatting lightly about the upcoming tests. This was finals week, and all of us were a little bit worried about the upcoming tests.
“Hi Davey.” Ronna said as we entered the school’s main entrance. She’d grown into a much prettier young woman over the last two years and was now the captain of the volleyball team. Ronna had lost most of the pudginess she’d had during junior high, and was currently dating one of the guys from the football team. Jeanette, with her curly brown locks growing down past the middle of her back now was next to her and nodded to us.
“What’s up?” I asked Ronna and she just let out a sigh.
“We hate finals.” Jeanette said softly as the two girls walked on, and my friends and I headed down the central corridor to our lockers.
“Don’t we all.” Brian muttered and Sean giggled softly. I wondered what was so funny and suddenly remembered that Sean’s memory was probably crystal clear and he shouldn’t have too many problems passing his courses.
Especially since the timeline was similar enough that the tests were probably exactly the same.
“Catch ya later.” Trevor said to Brian and I as he pulled some books out of his locker and headed off to his first class.
“You have a good day.” Brian said to me softly as we closed our own lockers, which were right next to each other, and went off to our first classes.
“I hate high school.” Sean muttered before he headed off with Brandon.
For a moment, everything was just normal, one of those perfect little moments and I felt that old shoe hanging over my head, ready to drop at a second’s notice.
Classes all day were quite boring, really. Nothing but reviews for the tests we’d be taking the last three days of the week. Tired teachers, as ready for the holiday breaks as their students, did their best to remind bored teenagers of everything the teachers tried to cram in our brains for the last three and a half months. Bored teenagers either worried about every last detail, or pretended not to care at all, and I fretted over the discussion we’d have later today.
I don’t know why, I’d told my friends about me before, and they’d accepted me easily. Brian had been the hardest that first time, mostly because of Uncle Rich. The last time had been hard on everyone after they’d nearly been killed by the Chinese, but this time was different. Uncle Rich was very much alive, no one had been killed, and no one would be killed. All the dangers of time travel from the past two timelines was gone, there’d be no more time machines, and while my father and grandfather knew about me, no one else knew I still had my memories, and no one but Papa [DOR37] and us would know about Sean.
Still, as the day ended, and low clouds threatened rain sometime before the sun set, we all gathered in the dugout of the main baseball field in the back of the school. Tom had just nodded when I told him we were going to be meeting there, and had driven the sedan around back so he could keep an eye on things from the side of the road. We all arrived as a group, having come from P.E. where the ‘final’ was a series of physical fitness tests that had already started. Of course that meant that we’d finish those early, and the last few days of the week would be ‘early outs’ for those of us fortunate to have PE at the end of the day.
“This better be worth missing our workout.” Trevor muttered as we gathered in the dug out. Brian, Brandon, and Trevor were all sitting on the bench while Sean and I sat on the cement foundation for the railing that we’d lean on while watching whoever was at bat during a game.
“What’s been going on with you two?” Brandon asked as he sat in the middle between the others.
“Oh, it’s worth it, I promise.” Sean said with a strong tone of irony from my right. I looked over at him and he shook his head. “It all starts with you, dude.”
“Actually, it starts with you.” I reminded him and he frowned slightly.
“I was just the lab assistant; you were the one who went back first.” Sean countered and I felt an old pang of anger at the memory those words called up.
“Would you two just shut up and explain!” Brian growled and I turned back to face them. They were the reason why we were here, after all. There was something stuck in my throat and I had to clear it before speaking.
“So what do you think about time travel?” I told them glibly, and they took it as a joke, which I knew I’d kind of been hoping.
“Oh god, you two are so dead!” Trevor growled as he started to stand back up.
“Sit back down.” Sean’s voice was low, and there was no humor in it as he stood up and looked at me with an angry expression. “David Ray Jones, I can understand why you might want to sabotage this, but they’re your friends and they deserve to know the truth.”
“They’re your friends, too, Sean.” I countered.
“Only because you helped make them so that second time.” Sean muttered darkly and I gave him a long, appraising look as Trevor sat back down with a look of surprise on his face. I don’t think the Sean he knew had ever spoken so sharply to anyone before. “Lord knows everything’s gone to hell every damn time we’ve gone back and I still say it’s only a matter of time before the shoe drops.”
“Believe me, I feel that damn fucking shoe every day.” I muttered, looking back over at the baseball diamond for a moment.
“You guys are making no fucking sense.” Brandon growled.
[We could probably speak in four different languages and make just as much sense to him.] Sean said in flawless German.
[Yes, or we could always just dump it on them all at once.] I said in near-perfect French. [You do remember some of them are studying these languages?]
[I remember that well.] Sean said in decent Russian, causing Trevor to start.
“Okay, that was German at first, but I only caught one or two words.” Brandon said.
“I caught some French, but didn’t really get more than ‘yes’.” Brian said.
[Do you want to tell them how you grew up speaking Russian, my friend, or do you want me to explain it to them in English?] I asked Trevor in my perfect Russian. He shook his head once or twice as the other two stared at him.
“What language was that?” Brian asked Trevor and then looked at me.
“It was Russian.” I answered Brian’s question directly while Trevor stared at me with wide eyes. The similarity of how I’d used that knowledge during my first Do Over to ‘come out’ to him and Brandon on the field at La Loma struck me, and I had to resist an urge to laugh nervously.
“You know Russian?” Brian asked me with wide eyes, and then he looked at Trevor. “You know Russian?”
“Yes.” Trevor croaked, and he stared at me. “It’s supposed to be secret.”
“Then why does your father have books by great Russian poets, in Russian, on his bookshelves?” I asked Trevor and he glared at me.
[You’ve never been in my father’s library.] He said in Russian, with an accusing tone.
“Not in this lifetime, I haven’t.” I said switching back to English.
“Will you just stick to ENGLISH?” Brandon practically roared. “Stop playing with us and just fucking tell us what the hell is going on!”
“Sorry.” I told them as I hung my head in shame. “I’m not playing with you, or at least I’m not trying to play with you. It’s just… I’m nervous about this and so I’m not doing it well.”
“I’d almost ask what was new, but I’ve known you for over forty years now, Davey Jones.” Sean’s voice was definitely bitter now.
“For how long?” Brian asked sharply.
“Over forty years.” I answered and he shook his head. I raised up my hand, palm outward and spoke quickly. “Hold on before you say it’s impossible. When I asked about time travel, I wasn’t making fun of you.”
“Explain.” Brandon said simply, but with a fine edge in his voice. His eyes were locked on Sean and he was glaring. Sean let out a sigh.
“Since Davey’s just beating around the bush here, I’ll do it.” Sean said with an air of being put upon. “Depending on how you view quantum physics, and chaos theory, either twenty years and eleven months from now, or at space-time point equivalent to the year 2004 in another space-time dimension, a scientist will, or has, invented a machine that will scan the memories of a human being, record them onto a computer, and then transmit them back through time into the younger body of that person, completely overwriting the brain and re-writing it with the perfectly recorded memories of the original person.”
“Huh?” Trevor said with a blank look, while Brian started shaking his head and Brandon just stared at Sean.
“At that point, the person awakes in his younger body and is able to make changes to the time-stream, or as Davey puts it so quaintly, the timeline.” Sean continued mercilessly, probably taking some pleasure in their confused looks. “As the time-stream gets changed more and more by that person, or persons as the case has been far too often, the time-line will deviate from the original to varying degrees. The future where the time machine was created ceases to exist until another time machine is invented and time travelers go back again, changing things. Davey and I are two of them.”
“The only two of them still alive.” I added and Sean nodded.
“Two of what?” Brandon said in a hoarse whisper to Trevor and Brian, who were just staring at us like we were crazy.
“Time travelers.” Sean said with a snotty tone. “Haven’t you been listening?”
“Sean, back off.” I said with a firm tone. He glared at me for a moment but subsided and I turned to face my friends, and my boyfriend who were looking at me with wide eyes.
“What did he just say?” Brian asked me with a worried expression.
“What he was trying to say is that Sean and I are time travelers.” I stated succinctly and all three of them shook their heads like they were trying to clear out their ears. “This method of time travel, unlike what you might expect from movies and television shows, transmits the memories of a person back in time, to their younger bodies.”
“Is this for real?” Brian asked in a strained voice while Sean gave me a look like I was being stupid.
“Yes, it’s for real.” Sean said darkly. “Believe me, I wish it was otherwise. I took the damn job for the money, not thinking it’d really work. The guy who invented it, he was half-crazy.”
“If this is for real, how old are you?” Trevor asked softly. “Who was the guy who invented it?”
I’m fifteen years old.” I answered Trevor who looked at me like I was lying.
“If you really came back in time you couldn’t be fifteen.” Brian said accusingly.
“The body is fifteen years old, so he’s not lying.” Sean explained. “On the other hand, we both have the memories of living other lives, so in terms of our memory, we’re older.”
“How old?” Brandon asked Sean weakly.
“I’ve got nearly seventy years worth of memories.” Sean said with a shrug. “Davey’s getting close to a hundred by now.”
“Shut up.” I said softly and Sean just grinned at me.
“You’re older than my grandfather!” Brandon spat in surprise.
“I’m fifteen.” I stated firmly. “I just happen to remember more than your average teenager.”
“How… how long have you been back in this body?” Brian asked with a pale face.
“I’ve been in this timeline since 1976.” I told him and he slumped back a little in relief and I let myself relax a little. “Everything between us, it’s been for real, it’s been me, and it’s been you.”
“You’ve been lying to me.” Brian said softly with a look of pain on his face.
“I haven’t been telling you everything, so yes it’s been a lie of omission.” I answered him honestly, hoping he’d accept that.
“Why didn’t you tell me before? Why did you wait to tell me now?” Brian asked.
“There were… things that had to be done.” I told him. “I had to make certain changes, and to do that, I had to let certain people know about me. My father was one of them, my grandfather figured some things out in 1976 and again back in 1981 so I had to tell him, and I had to tell the President.”
“Why?” Trevor asked softly.
“The last two timelines have been hell.” I said softly and Sean snorted.
“Three timelines.” He corrected me.
“Yeah, you’re right.” I said with a shake of my head. “I don’t remember that one because I died in it.”
“That’s right, and I had to come back to fix your mistakes.” Sean said with a snort. “If you’d been better at this I wouldn’t have had to keep coming back and living my fucked up teenage years over again.”
“You’re the one who picked me.” I reminded him and he got an angry look on his face.
“Don’t remind me!” He said with a snap in his tone. “I wish I hadn’t some times.”
“Believe me, there’s times I wish you hadn’t either.” I told him as a surge of anger came up in me with a remembered conversation from the last time. “The thought that you picked me just because you thought I’d die like that other test subject still pisses me off.”
“How did you know that?” Sean said as our three friends gasped.
“You told me in my last timeline.” I said and then felt sorry I’d revealed that bit of information at all. He looked hurt, and ashamed. “I forgave you though, so it was wrong of me to bring it up. I’m sorry.”
“No, I’m sorry.” Sean said softly, and when he looked up at me there were tears in his eyes. “If I hadn’t picked you, well, none of the shitty things in the last few timelines would have happened to you and you wouldn’t have had to carry the fate of the world on your shoulders for all these years.”
“Sean, the more I think about it, the more I think I wouldn’t have wanted anyone else to have gone through this.” I told him.
“Wait, you’re confusing us again.” Trevor said softly, drawing our attention back to them.
“Start at the beginning.” Brian said just as softly, but his eyes met mine, and it was on them that I focused as I began the tale.
“In the first timeline, my original life, things were very different.” I began slowly, deciding he was right. This needed to be told in full. “I moved away from Modesto back in November of this year. I’d known all of you briefly from the football team. We hadn’t really been friends before that, and when I moved away, we weren’t really friends again.”
“Davey and I were friends at La Loma.” Sean said softly. “Then when he joined the football team our freshman year, we drifted apart. To make things worse… well, you know my parents. Unlike Davey’s, they aren’t much different than they were in that time-stream, and during my freshman year, they caught me jacking off to gay porn.”
“Ouch.” Brandon winced. “I bet they didn’t take that well.”
“No.” Sean agreed flatly. “Word got out at school, and some people made my life a living hell.”
“Who?” Trevor asked almost as if he was afraid of the answer.
“All four of you were a lot different.” Sean answered and they all winced with guilty looks on their faces.
“Anyway, my parents split up a year after I moved away.” I continued, and debated quickly whether to tell them why.
“Why?” Brian asked.
“My sister told my mother that my father had been sexually molesting her for years.” I answered.
“Impossible!” Trevor snorted. “I know your father; he’d never do anything like that.”
“My father as he is now would never do something like that.” I said softly but firmly. No matter how hard I tried, that one little nagging bit of doubt still had not disappeared. That would be something I’d never probably lose. “My father in that timeline did do that. When I moved back here, well you guys had moved on with your lives and I wanted you to pick up our friendship right were things left off, and when things were different, even though on looking back I realized you were being friendly, I didn’t see it like that and I quit high school.”
“Where was Sean?” Brandon asked with a worried look on his face.
“In Utah being taught by psychiatric wackos to pretend I was straight.” Sean answered sourly and they all winced. Thanks to my father’s fight with some of those so-called psychiatrists, we were all quite aware of what crap they did to young people.
“I joined the Navy before you guys even graduated from high school.” I took back the story softly, before anyone could dwell on Sean’s statement. “After fighting in two small wars I came back to the states and spent the next decade drifting from job to job. My mother died in 1999, my father six months later. Jenny died a few years after that with her kids and I lost it totally.”
“Until he applied to be a test-subject in a mad science project.” Sean picked up the story when my voice grew too weak to continue. “I was working on my doctorate in physics when I ran out of money, and this scientist hired me to be an assistant on something I thought was totally crazy. He paid good money though, and it turns out his theories worked. When I saw Davey’s name on the list of subjects, I moved him to the top.”
“Because you thought he’d die?” Brandon said with a tremor in his voice and Sean hung his head.
“I remembered him helping stuff me in a garbage can while you guys laughed about it.” Sean said with a hint of hurt in his voice. “It was a stupid thing to do, hoping he’d die because he’d done something like that, but I hated him for it because he’d been my friend in junior high and then stuffed me in a garbage can so his new friends could laugh at me.”
“I was wrong to do that.” I said softly. “You’ve proven since then that you really are a good person, and a good friend. You’ve saved my life several times.”
“Thanks.” Sean said softly, and now there was no longer any hurt in his eyes, just a sad smile on his lips and peace in his eyes.
“So…” Brian pushed and I took the thread back up.
“After going to sleep from the drugs that are part of the process, I woke up in August, 1981.” I continued softly. “They told me it was only going to be for twenty minutes, and that I’d go back to the future after that, but days and weeks passed before I accepted I was really stuck in the past.”
“It was a lie the doctor told the subjects to stall the person from making any serious changes.” Sean added softly and I nodded at him. “Our targeting scanner on that machine wasn’t the best, and it sent Davey back several years earlier than we had thought it would. The scientist went back next, and the scanner worked correctly that time, sending him to 1984, not 1981. Then Shevardnadze went back.”
“Who?” Trevor asked with wide eyes.
“The son of Eduard Shevardnadze.” I explained.
“The Foreign Minister of the Soviet Union!” Trevor gasped out in a near-shriek and both Sean and I nodded. “How could you let a Soviet near a working time machine?”
“Probably because he financed the whole thing, and in 2004 there is no Soviet Union.” Sean explained and all three of them looked at us with open mouths and wide eyes.
“The Soviet Union collapses by the end of 1991, guys.” I said softly. “By the early 2000’s, they aren’t quite our friends, but they’re not our enemies either.”
“Oh.” Trevor said softly. His eyes were still wide.
“Or at least it is supposed to collapse in 1991.” Sean pointed out. “Alexei Shevardnadze wanted to change that. He funded the time machine project to go back in time and change history, to make the Soviet Union correct its mistakes and to help it win the Cold War.”
“But the two of you stopped him.” Brian said pointedly and I shook my head.
“Only kind of.” I said softly. “That first trip back in time, I didn’t know he was coming back too, so I didn’t say anything to the government. I pretended to be a normal kid.”
“You didn’t change anything?” Trevor asked with some surprise.
“Yes, he did.” Sean said with a small laugh. “He bumped into Brian on the way to school in the seventh grade and became friends with the three of you.”
“That’s what happened this time!” Brian exclaimed excitedly. “Except, wait, I didn’t bump into him, I bumped into you!”
“You did?” Sean said with surprise before looking at me with a wry smile. “That must have given you a scare, Davey.”
“Actually, I got pissed.” I admitted. “Brian thought I was pissed at him, but really I was pissed because I thought he might end up with you for a moment.”
“I bet.” Sean’s smile was genuine at that moment. “Believe me, after the way the two of you acted as a married couple, I doubt anything could keep you two apart.”
“It’s why I came back this last time.” I admitted and Brian looked at me with what was almost wonder on his face.
“You’re saying you came back again because of me, because of us?” Brian asked hoarsely.
“Yes.” I answered him honestly. “That second timeline, the first trip back for me, in 1984 I found out about the other time travelers and worked with the government to counter the changes they were making. I was partially successful, but instead of the Soviet Union collapsing, they started a real shooting war in 1987.”
“A war you died in.” Sean pointed out and I nodded. “Davey by that time was made an officer in the Navy and was onboard a ship fighting in the Indian Ocean. The ship was sunk, with Davey and all the crew onboard. That loss, along with all their escorting ships essentially ended the war in the Soviet Union’s favor. The Brian of that timeline, he sought to rebuild the time machine with Trevor’s father, but they failed. He made journal logs on a computer network.”
“Wait, how do you know all this?” Trevor asked with a dazed expression.
“When the time machine sends someone back, it creates a quantum bubble that exists outside of time and space.” Sean stated. “Basically, we can see the changed timeline, but whoever is inside the bubble is unchanged. At that point, it was just me. I read those online journals of that Brian. He loved Davey a lot, and the journals convinced me to go back in time myself. They left me there because someone had to send them back, and the way the machine worked it was supposed to be impossible for one person to do it alone. I figured out a way to do it by jury-rigging the start switch with a time delay circuit. There wasn’t enough power, and the timeline outside was being blown up by an all-out nuclear war in that 2004, so when I arrived in that 1987, there were problems.”
“What kind of problems?” Brandon asked.
“For one thing, the machine didn’t completely overwrite the memories I had of the differing timeline between 1981, when Davey went back, and 1987” Sean explained. “I was in a lot of pain, but I remembered enough to get the right messages to the right people. Then, I went into a coma for a long time. When I woke up, the memories, it was almost like there was two of me in my head, well the memories of the first timeline faded for a bit. They came back eventually, and I kind of merged the two sets of memories to make one whole person. It’s too bad, really, because that was what enabled another time machine to be built.”
“Because of the information Sean gave the government, we knew the attack was going to happen.” I explained, switching us back to the point of the story I was telling. “It wasn’t quite in time because my ship was hit by a missile and most of the command officers were killed. That left me in command, and I ordered a nuclear depth-charge fired at the enemy subs. The nuke ended the war in 1987, and Shevardnadze was executed by the Soviets before they surrendered.”
“So what happened then?” Brandon asked.
“Let’s see, Davey got the Medal of Honor.” Sean said with a hint of a chuckle in his voice. “He was already out of the closet thanks to the lot of you sticking up for me in our freshman year, so gays got admitted into the Navy thanks to him. Then, he got the laws changed so gays could marry, and Brian, you had this big huge wedding ceremony with him. I think there were three US Presidents in attendance, along with half of Hollywood. He wore his uniform and it was broadcast live on all the news channels.”
“You’re kidding.” Brian said with a slightly pale face. His cheeks held a hint of a blush though, and he had a twinkle in his eyes.
“Nope, you two were the ‘First Couple’ of gay America.” Sean said with a snort. “Every year there was at least one magazine article about your latest exploits.”
“What about you?” Brandon asked in a weak voice and I smiled.
“The two of you snuck off to Vegas for a wedding the day after Brian and I were married.” I told him and Sean slapped my arm.
“You weren’t supposed to tell him that.” Sean snarled in a mock-angry tone. Brandon smiled as he let out a sigh of relief.
“Gee, talk about being a fifth wheel.” Trevor snorted and I gave him a sharp look.
“Don’t worry, she’s a very beautiful woman and Brian can stand as your best man.” I assured him and he just chuckled.
“One of us has to have kids.” Trevor said with a shrug as Brian and Brandon looked at him. Sean let out a groan, and I felt that maybe, just maybe things were going to be okay.
“So what happened to this perfect little world?” Brian asked and I let out a long breath.
“The Chinese.” I stated flatly. “Beginning in the 1990’s, they developed excellent intelligence operations inside the United States. That’s been the same in every single damn timeline.”
“In 2004 of that timeline, they started a war with Taiwan.” Sean continued. “Davey was the Admiral in command of a battle group there and they wanted to kill him. They’d secretly gotten their hands on the designs of a time machine that I’d done for the US government when my memories had fully returned and merged. I gave them to the government just in case someone else came up with the idea of how to do time travel, but the Chinese used them to build their own time machine. When it was nearly ready, they kidnapped me to make sure they’d gotten it right. Then they started the war, an entire fucking war, just to kill Davey and to make sure no one noticed I was missing.”
“What about me?” Brandon asked. “I can’t believe I wouldn’t notice you were gone if we were married.”
“They took you to use as leverage to make sure I’d be honest with them.” Sean explained. “The machine was on a nuclear power plant, and could conceivably have enough power to maintain a quantum bubble for decades. Certainly long enough to live our lives out inside of the thing.”
“You sold out the United States just for that?” Brandon asked with horror and Sean shook his head.
“They had the machine done perfect.” Sean told him and I relaxed slightly. “It would have worked the day they brought me there, while the war was still going on. I fooled them though. I convinced them they had to make some changes. They were smart, so I couldn’t get them to make changes that would break the machine, but I fooled them into changing minor things. It ended up making the machine more efficient, better actually, but that didn’t matter.”
“Why not?” Brian asked.
“Because the time it took them to make those changes was long enough for me to kick their asses back across the Strait of Taiwan.” I said with more pride than I should have. “By that time, we noticed Sean and Brandon were missing. I rushed from there to a special military flight with a team of Special Forces. We raided the facility and managed to get inside before they sent their first time traveler back.”
“Oh.” Brian said with a sigh.
“I knew Davey Jones well enough that there wasn’t an officer on the ocean that could beat him when it came to fighting a war.” Sean explained. “With that in mind, I knew I just had to delay them long enough for him to notice we were gone.”
“So then you came back here to this time to stop the Chinese guy?” Trevor asked and I shook my head.
“No, I came back to another timeline to do that.” I said softly. “We failed in finding the Chinese, and they managed to warn the Russians in time to save Shevardnadze. During the raid, I went back after killing what I thought was every Chinese person there. I lost my entire team in the process, and was wounded, but Sean sent me back.”
“We didn’t know they’d brought that time’s Brandon and Brian as prisoners to the facility already.” Sean said softly. “The guards came in with them right after Davey went back and the officer forced me to send him back to warn the Chinese that Davey was back in that time. That Brandon and Brian fought the guards just as they were trying to kill all of us. They died saving me so I could go back and warn Davey.”
“Oh.” Brandon said softly. Both he and Brian were pale.
“This is almost too much to handle.” Trevor said softly.
“There’s not much more.” I assured him. “Basically, Sean here doesn’t remember the timeline that followed.”
“Why not?” Brandon asked.
“It’s a little complicated.” I said and he smiled.
“What isn’t complicated about this?” Brian asked.
“Nothing.” I said softly. “In that timeline, the Chinese and Russians weren’t killed in time, and they struck at us in Modesto, except I wasn’t there. They got my grandparents, and several of my other relatives. They almost got you guys and your families. You were all brought out to where I was in rural Nevada. Let’s just say you weren’t happy, and it took time for us to become friends.”
“Did we…?” Brian asked softly and I frowned, wondering how truthful to be. This was Brian though, and he deserved the truth.
“You blamed me for a lot of things, not the least of which was Dad B getting injured by the Chinese who tried to kill you.” I admitted. “You also blamed me because I came back in time and knew about AIDS.”
“What does that have to do with this?” Brian asked with a confused look.
“Brian, this is the only timeline I know of where Uncle Rich didn’t die in 1981 from AIDS.” I told him and he gasped.
“Oh my god.” Sean said softly, looking at me with wide-open eyes. “You’ve really managed to stop it?”
“No, but Brian’s uncle is still alive because of the changes I did make.” I said quietly.
“Thank you.” Brian said with tears trickling down his face. “I… I don’t know if I can really accept all this, but if he’d… if I’d lost him… I don’t know what I’d do.”
“You’re welcome, love.” I said softly, trying to ignore the way he flinched as I said the last word. “In that last timeline for me, you were upset because he did die. We… fought at first, and eventually became friends. In the last days of that timeline, you and I… we kissed and were looking forward to exploring… something romantic.”
“What happened to stop that?” Brian asked as he wiped the tears from his face with a handkerchief that Trevor had offered him.
“A communist sniper shot and killed you as he was trying to kill me on the first day of World War III.” I said in a flat voice and all four of them gasped in horror. Sean hadn’t heard that yet, and I could see the look of remembered horror as he likely relived the memory of Brandon being shot and killed in front of him. For him that had only been a few days ago, but for me the death of that Brian had been the better part of a decade ago.
“How bad was that war?” Brandon asked.
“Most of the earth was destroyed by the time we got the time machine operational.” I said softly.
“Oh.” Trevor asked with a stunned expression. “It really happened.”
“That time, it did.” I said. “The Soviets knew we were about to send someone back, so they attacked the base with nukes, and that made the machine malfunction a bit. Instead of going back to 1980, I went back to 1976.”
“Why do you keep going back earlier?” Brandon asked.
“The process won’t overwrite a mind that’s already been overwritten once.” Sean explained quickly. “That’s why if you’re sending someone back a second time, you have to send them back at least a day before the last transfer, to a time where their mind was not overwritten before.”
“Um, okay.” Brandon said weakly.
“It’s confusing, I know.” I said with a smile. “So, anyway, I ended up in 1976 and the brain at that age isn’t built to handle this. I had time to set my father on a path that would lead him to meeting Reagan, and would hopefully give me access to him when my memories returned. Then, I wrote a bunch a letters that would start the investigation into AIDS nearly three years earlier than it had ever been found before, and that was enough to save Uncle Rich. I’m sure you all know the story of me going into a coma right before my father’s first election in 1976. That was when I lost my memories.”
“But you have them back now?” Brian asked.
“Yes, in 1981 they came back thanks to a letter and my brain growing more mature.” I answered him. “It was a few days before the inauguration, and I know I’ve told you about being in the White House. I used that to get a meeting with the President along with my father, and I gave him the letters, along with some very personal information to prove I was for real.”
“What was it?” Trevor asked and I frowned at him.
“I’ll never tell.” I told him simply and he gave me a long look before nodding in acceptance of that statement. “Anyway, before going down to the meeting, I took two of Mom’s pain pills. They made me dizzy, and I even passed out, convincing my father and the President that I’d ‘lost’ the memories again. That, and what I said in the letters convinced the President to arrange a series of ‘accidents’ and some brutal murders by ‘deranged psychos’ who coincidentally enough had terminal cancer. All the other time travelers are dead now.”
“The scientist, that was the one who my dad saw die in the accident.” Trevor stated and I nodded, confirming it for him. He just blinked at that. “You had a man killed!”
“Davey’s killed a lot of people.” Sean said in a tone that was neither judgmental nor sympathetic.
“I have.” I said with a sigh, trying to ignore the way Brian’s eyes were worried as they looked at me.
“How many?” Brian asked.
“I don’t know.” I answered honestly. “Several thousand in combat, both on the seas and with a rifle. Millions, no billions, if you count the nuclear war of the last time line as being ‘at my hands’. Four time travelers died in this timeline because of my words. If I have my way, I’ll never have to kill again.”
“So you faked losing your memories, met Brian on the way to school, and are just going to live happily ever after?” Trevor asked and I shrugged.
“I hope so.” I answered honestly.
“What about you, Sean?” Trevor asked and a sense of dread filled me suddenly. Somewhere, a shoe was dropping. “What have you done to change this timeline?”
“Nothing.” Sean said softly, a distant look in his eyes. “The Sean of Davey’s last time-stream chose not to come back again, so it’s hard to explain exactly, but because he didn’t come back, I’m the Sean who came back to warn Davey about the second Chinese traveler. I have no memory of helping Davey build another time machine. That Sean is gone. I haven’t been back long enough to really change anything.”
“How long have you been back?” Brandon asked in a weak voice and I had to close my eyes. The tears leaked out anyway.
“I came back on Friday night.” Sean stated flatly, and the silence that followed was deafening.
“What happened to the Sean, to the memories of the last few years?” Brandon’s voice was strangled.
“He’s gone.” I said in a choked voice with my eyes still closed.
“That’s why you picked him to go to Disneyland!” Brian’s voice was an accusation.
“Yes.” I answered softly, around the sob forming in my throat. “I knew… I wanted him to have something he’d always wanted, a trip to Disneyland. I wanted the day to be perfect for him.”
“You bastard.” Brandon’s voice was low, and I didn’t open my eyes so I wouldn’t see the punch he was going to throw. It never came though, and only the receding steps of an angry young man could be heard. I opened my eyes to find Trevor staring at me with a look of horror on his face. He shook his head when my eyes met his, and took off after Brandon who was already halfway across the field. My gaze turned to Brian, whose eyes were glinting in anger, and his hands were balled into fists as he stood up.
“Don’t even open your mouth, Davey Jones.” Brian seethed angrily. His hand shot up and a finger pointed at me like an accusation. “You could have told us before! You could have let us say goodbye to our friend, but you took that decision out of our hands. You fucking let him die without us being able to say goodbye when you knew! It’s obvious you trust us enough to tell us, but you didn’t do it when we still had time to say goodbye!”
“Brian, I’m…”
“Don’t!” Brian shouted as he whirled away from me and began to go in the same direction that Trevor and Brandon had gone. His voice drifted over his shoulder. “Don’t try to call. Just give us time.”
“Davey, sometimes I wonder what good all these years have done you.” Sean said in a small voice. I was surprised at the trace of sympathy I heard in it. “Sometimes, you don’t give people enough credit for being able to handle things.”
“I think you’re right.” I said softly as part of me felt ripped open, torn apart, at the sight of Brian’s hunched, angry shoulders and his back fading away as he walked off, further and further from me every second. “Maybe I should…”
“No, that’s Brian.” Sean said softly. “And that’s Trevor, and that’s Brandon. Give them some time. Let’s go home.”
“Okay Sean.” I said softly, trusting his words, and trusting in my friends.
As I should have done before last week.
| Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 Chapter 3 April Fool |
Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 |
| Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 |
| Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 |
