All My Tomorrows (19 page)

While suckling at Jordan's breasts, Maggie slipped her fingers inside Jordan's heated core. Almost immediately, Jordan climaxed, lifting both herself and Maggie off the bed with her spasms. The convulsions became so intense at one point that Jordan physically removed Maggie's hand and gathered her into her arms, holding her close as her body continued to endure the orgasmic waves running through it. After a time, the tremors faded, leaving her feeling fulfilled and complete. She kissed Maggie on the head.

"I love you, Maggie. I always will… across all space and time."

"The offer is still open, you know," Maggie said.

"Offer?"

"My proposal. Will you marry me, Jordan?"

CHAPTER 21

Jordan awoke the next morning with a heavy weight on her stomach. She looked down and saw a tangle of red hair sprawled across her chest. Maggie lay partially on top of her; her head on her stomach and her right arm thrown over her thighs. Her left arm was tucked securely under her own torso while their legs were braided. A rush of love, as well as a renewal of desire, invaded her being as she recalled their lovemaking from the night before.

"I love you, Maggie," Jordan whispered, "Yes, I will marry you," she added, having been delinquent with her response the night before.

Jordan gently rolled her body to the right and watched as Maggie slowly slid off and lay on her back beside her. She carefully inched her way to the edge of bed so as to not disturb Maggie, then stood and stretched. Before leaving the room, she pulled the sheet over Maggie then slipped her flannel button-up shirt on in the event Gina and Sam were still home when she went to use the bathroom. The tails of the shirt conveniently extended to mid-thigh. She opened the bedroom door and stepped into the hall, closing it behind her. The first thing she encountered was the aroma of fresh brewed coffee.

"Oh my God, I'm in heaven," she said out loud.

Gina poked her head out of the kitchen and looked down the hall. "What was that?" she asked.

"Coffee. The aroma is orgasmic," Jordan said; her hand on the bathroom door knob.

"Well, judging from the sounds coming from the guest room last night, you would certainly know," Gina teased.

Jordan covered her face with her hands. "Sheesh, Gina. Did you have to say that?"

Gina chuckled. "Go to the bathroom. I'll make you a cup of coffee while you're in there."

Jordan accepted the cup Gina handed to her when she entered the kitchen. "Thank you," she said.

Gina grinned. "So, I take it you and Maggie made up last night."

"You could say that." Jordan looked around. "Where's Sam?"

"She's already gone to the market. She has a produce delivery coming in this morning and she needed to be there when it arrived."

"What time is it?"

"Seven-twenty," Gina said. "I need to get out of here in the next ten minutes myself."

"So you mentioned something on the phone yesterday about a plan to deal with my identity problem," Jordan said.

"Yeah. Sam, Maggie and I wracked our brains trying to come up with some ideas about how to make you legal. Our biggest concern is that you'll go to this meeting you have with the spinal institute and they'll assume you're an illegal alien and have you arrested."

"I know. I've been worried about that possibility myself. Did you come up with anything?"

"We had lots of ideas, but nothing legal. I hate to say it, but we just might have to resort to something illegal to get it done. It all comes down to how much risk we're willing to take."

"Well, no one is taking any risk except me," Jordan said adamantly. "I won't be having you or Sam… or Maggie for that matter, on the wrong side of the law just to protect my ass."

Gina refilled her travel mug and snapped the lid on. "Well, we can talk about it more this afternoon when Sam and I get home."

She picked up her keys and headed toward the front door. "Help yourself to anything you'd like to eat," she called over her shoulder on the way out.

"Have a great day, Gina," Jordan said.

Jordan rummaged through the cabinets looking for the spices and finally found the jar of cinnamon. She had already gathered a loaf of bread, four eggs, the container of milk and maple syrup from the refrigerator as well as frozen sausages from the freezer. She cooked two servings of French toast with sausage and brewed another coffee for herself and one for Maggie. After rinsing her cooking utensils and putting them into the dishwasher, she arranged their breakfast on a cookie sheet and carried it to the bedroom. When she opened the door, she found Maggie awake. She was lying on her back and looking at the ceiling.

"Good morning," Jordan said as she approached the bed. "Scoot up," she said.

Maggie complied and pushed herself into a seated position with her back against the headboard. "Wow, this looks wonderful," she said.

"I hope you're hungry."

Jordan placed the entire cookie sheet on Maggie's lap. "Hold on to this for a sec while I climb in," she said then settled herself on the bed beside Maggie.

Maggie smiled. "Thank you for breakfast, love."

Jordan kissed her. "You're welcome. Eat up while it's hot."

"How did you sleep last night?" Maggie asked around a bite of French toast.

"Better than I have in the past several days. Having you beside me makes all the difference. I missed you, Maggie."

Maggie looked down at her plate, a remorseful look on her face. "I missed you too. I'm sorry, I put you through that."

"Sweetheart, look at me. You did nothing wrong. I don't blame you for being afraid. It's not everyday someone tells you they're from the future. I'm just happy you've allowed me back into your life."

"What's it like in the future, Jordan?"

"The farm isn't much different. The bunkhouse is gone, and the wall between your bedroom and the adjoining guest room is gone. Oh, and Kale and I remodeled the kitchen, but other than normal paint and repairs on the house, the rest is pretty much the same."

"The barn is still standing too?"

"Yes. In fact, a few months before we started transporting me here, the spinal institute came in and retrofit one end of the barn with an on-site lab so we could finish the implant testing while I was recuperating from the implant surgery."

"What is the world like?"

"Technology has advanced at a remarkable pace. This implant is a good example of that. This wouldn't be possible today without the developments in hardware and software that we've realized over the last fifty years. The political atmosphere played a big part in that."

"What do you mean?"

"Today, in 2019, so many medical advances have been stymied because of the religious beliefs of our lawmakers. Stem cell research has received very limited funding, so the development of cures for some catastrophic illnesses and injuries has been slow and in some cases, non-existent. During the next few years, there will be a shift in the political climate in this country and the scientists who have been waiting in the wings will emerge and progress will happen pretty quickly. It is my hope that I can start that escalation sooner."

"Can you do that single-handedly?"

"Single-handedly? No, but I have something that doesn't exist in 2019. I have the implant and the knowledge of how it was developed and how it works. If I can convince someone to fund a research and development project for me, we can advanced the science of SCI regeneration nearly a hundred years sooner than it would normally happen."

"SCI?"

"I'm sorry. It stands for Spinal Cord Injury."

Maggie fell silent for a moment. "I am seeing a side of you I didn't know existed, Jordan. I mean, I knew you were smart, and I knew you had some medical knowledge, but I never dreamed you were a medical research scientist."

"It's that advanced research knowledge that allowed me to be here today, Maggie. Kale developed the time machine, but both Andi and I helped Kale to fine-tune the quantum physics behind it in order for it to actually work."

Maggie finished her breakfast and put her plate on the cookie sheet near the foot of the bed. She grabbed her coffee cup she had placed on the nightstand earlier and took a sip. "Tell me about the time travel, Jordan. What was it like?"

"Well, the machine Kale built had a series of concentric rings that when rotating in opposite directions, actually created a synthetic black hole in the center of it."

"Ah, aren't black holes kind of dangerous?" Maggie asked. "Doesn't it like, suck things into it?"

"Generally yes, but we discovered that in order to contain the black hole, we needed to add an outer set of rings, rotating in the opposite direction. Anyway, it took forever to finally progress far enough for Kale to let me try a transfer. Prior to that, we sent inanimate objects, and a monkey through time."

"So you just put this object into the machine and poof, it was gone? Were you able to get it back?"

"Yes, but it took dozens of adjustments to the software before we were able to control when to retrieve an object so it came back in relatively the same condition it was when we sent it."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, for example, the first thing Kale sent through time was an old boot, but when he retrieved it, it came back brand new. You see, he retrieved it years too early. Can you imagine what might have happened if he sent me through time and when he retrieved me, I came back as an infant?" Jordan chuckled.

Maggie frowned. "You mean he had to wait years to retrieve it? I'm confused."

"No, he actually retrieved it minutes after he sent it, but the significant digits in the software program were off by a couple of nanoseconds, which accumulated over the exact time period we were trying to transcend. Those cumulative seconds all added together, resulted in many years relative to the age of the boot."

"This is too complicated for me to absorb."

"Just know that with a few tweaks to the software, we were able to retrieve the boot relatively unchanged compared to the condition it was in when we sent it. We verified that with a newspaper as well."

"You said you sent a monkey through time?" Maggie asked.

"Yes we did. We actually retrofit the monkey with a vest that had a small camera mounted to it, so we were able to record the transfer process. We retrieved the monkey after only about ten minutes, but the two-hour disk on the camera was full."

"What was on the disk?"

"Some of the most amazing images I have ever seen. When the transfer first began, the recording showed streaks of light, bright colors racing toward them. The speed and direction of the light streaks gave the impression that they were moving down a thin tube at high speed… a tube filled with a million twinkling Christmas lights. To our amazement, the camera continued to work throughout the entire transfer process, including after the monkey landed. There were pictures of the barn… and even a quick shot of you."

"Whoa. Stop right there. You transported the monkey into my barn?" Maggie asked.

"Yes. You see, we transported the monkey from the barn in the year 2105, so it landed in the same spot it was transferred from."

"Oh, my God. You are really freaking me out now, Jordan."

"I'm sorry, Maggie. You asked me to tell you what it was like. I'm telling you the truth."

"So, does that means, when you transported, you also landed in the barn?"

"Yes. In fact, that's how I was there in time to save you from the winch that fell from the ceiling."

"Well, that explains how you appeared out of nowhere. Oh, but the way, did you know that John actually witnessed that particular transfer?"

"He did? He never mentioned it to me."

"Well apparently, you made an immediate impression on him during the winch incident and he quickly concluded that you were
good people
, as he put it and saw no reason to be alarmed that you appeared out of thin air."

"Thank God for John."

"So, what was it like?"

"The transfer? Well, it started out with me sitting on the platform in the middle of the rings—"

"Wait a minute. You intentionally put yourself in the middle of a black hole? Are you insane?" Maggie exclaimed.

"Keep in mind, we had already sent the monkey and he came back just fine. Anyway, when the rings neared critical velocity, I began to float then I felt this huge force on my body that pressed so hard against me that is was nearly impossible to breathe. I was completely paralyzed. I couldn't even move my fingers. What came next was this incredible tingling through my entire body, kind of like when the feeling returns after you sit on the toilet too long and your legs fall asleep."

Maggie sat beside Jordan, totally captivated by her words.

Jordan continued. "Everything was dark at first. No light. No sound. It was a total void. It felt like I was suspended and motionless. It was really quite terrifying the first time, and just when I was convinced I would die of fear alone, the space around me exploded into a multi-colored light show with the colors moving in and around each other like a giant kaleidoscope.

“I felt myself being drawn toward the hole in the center of this light show. Interestingly enough, the fear I was feeling simply evaporated. The colors were amazing. I found myself experiencing the colors in ways I didn't know were possible. I could not only see them, but I could
feel, smell
and
taste
them as well. Red was warm. Yellow was soft and silky. Green was tart, and blue felt like a gentle breeze. Lavender smelled like the air after a rainstorm. It was very stimulating.

“As I approached the end of this tunnel, everything became calm and peaceful. My heart and mind were filled with a sense of tranquility. At one point, it was so peaceful, I actually wondered if I had died during the transfer, but then suddenly, everything changed and I landed with a thud on the floor of the barn. It took me a minute or two to regain my bearings, but there I was, sitting in your barn behind the hay bales."