Prologue (20 page)

“But we could have won in Indo-China?” Paul asked.

Ginter snickered.
“Absolutely.
America
was the strongest power in the world. We would have clobbered a bunch of guerilla fighters in
Vietnam
.”

“So exactly what happened over there?”
Paul asked.

“It was quick and brutal,” Amanda said. “In November of 1963 Kennedy decided to pull out. Evacuation was complete in ’64. By the end of ’64 the country’s under Ho.
Mass retribution everywhere, thousands of arrests and summary executions of suspected sympathizers and French collaborators, a bloodbath.
Kennedy washed his hands of the whole thing and got reelected.”

The waitress arrived with the three replacements. Paul paid her in cash. When she had left Lewis spoke up. “O.K., I’ll buy it. We can find a wormhole that will fit.”

Paul and Lewis each hoisted their own glasses but Amanda left hers untouched. Lewis studied her over his whiskey glass before slowly setting it down. He shot a glance at Paul.

“What’s the matter, Professor, doubting your own theory?” Ginter asked.

She sighed. “No, it’s not the theory, not the history. It’s more the ethics, or maybe the collateral consequences.”

“Such as?”
Paul asked.

She turned to him. “When you first told me about this, you mentioned different theories. What happens if we go back and change history but we change something so that our parents never meet and so we are never born? Then there is no one to go back and change things so does the old history come back again? And what happens to the people who are alive today but who are never born because we change things? Have we in essence killed them?”

“Love birds,” Lewis announced as Nigel and Natasha sidled back to the table, hand in hand. Paul noted that Nigel seemed more intent on keeping Natasha’s hand than Natasha seemed interested in being led.

“Shall we join you?” Nigel asked cheerfully. He looked down at the table. “Say, with a birthday isn’t there usually cake?”

“Diet,” Amanda announced.

Paul was desperately hunting for an excuse for why Nigel couldn’t join them when Natasha saved him.

“Come on, Nigel,” she pleaded, squeezing his hand. “I want to dance some more.” She leaned in and whispered something in his ear. Nigel laughed and the pair moved off again.

“I wonder what she sees in
him?
” Paul asked.

“I wonder why she didn’t press him on joining
us?
” Lewis asked.

“Well, if you’re right,” Amanda added breezily, “she can’t think that we’d say anything in front of her.
So, what about my ethical quandary?”

Lewis turned back and shrugged.
“The Theory of Merger.
David theorized that all life forces might be static, almost pre-programmed. Sort of like programming on your computer that’s not yet installed. It’s still there and at certain points in time the person will be born, the installation will occur. Changing historical events only changes the history, not the people, not the life forces which remain constant. Under his theory, if you come back through a return wormhole, but have changed things so that you never would have left, then the returning life force will merge with the one that never left and the memory of the returning life force will dominate.”

“So, you’ll remember your old life while resuming a new one,” Amanda mused.

Paul shrugged and took another sip. “But it’s all just a theory.”

“Do you believe it?” Amanda asked.

“No, I don’t,” Lewis answered. “It conflicts with what we know about genetics. But if life forces can have other genetic make-ups well, then maybe.”

“Maybe you’ll be white,” Paul added.

“Or a party member,” Lewis retorted.
“Or a guy who hates cars.”

The three laughed.

“In any event,” Paul said, “if we change something and come back, our reality would indeed be permanently changed. That doesn’t prevent there from being an infinite number of realities; there is always that theory.
And the two kind of tie in.”

Amanda nodded soberly. “Where Lee won at
Gettysburg
.”

“And Hitler got nukular weapons,” Lewis added. “Like that neo-Soviet civil administrator in Tex-Arkana would have said.”

The three laughed again, but softer this time.

After a moment, Paul asked quietly, “How did it all happen?”

Lewis looked at him quizzically. “How did what happen?”

Paul gestured around the room. “This.
All this.
How did the Reds take over?

“You know the history,” Lewis answered in a bewildered tone. “Weren’t you just listening to Dr. Hutch here?”

Paul shook his head. “I don’t mean the military history. I know about Ché Guevara and the Malay Peninsular. Even with all that how the hell did we allow them to not only take over, but actually be supported? Tell me why people in
Kansas
or
Missouri
or
Ohio
for Christ sakes support the Reds?”

“Fear,” Amanda answered without hesitation. The pair turned to her.

“People are afraid,” she continued simply. “They are afraid of war, and of being attacked. Fear is history’s great motivator for inaction. People who are afraid will trade their liberties, their freedoms,
their
basic political essence for not being afraid again, for what they perceive as security. And evil forces are always ready to take advantage of that. That’s how Hitler came to power. And after what happened to China, the chemical weapons here, and that dirty bomb in St. Louis, when what, 3,300 people died, Americans were too willing to trade their freedom, their liberties, hell, their very way of life as Americans, in order to feel safe again. The Reds promised that. And on some level, they have delivered it.”

The table grew quiet again.

After a while Amanda asked softly, “So, we’ll be ready in a few weeks?”

Paul shifted uncomfortably. “We do have a slight funding issue. We need more money to get fuel to conduct a few more tests. We have some fuel but not enough to run more experiments on animals, and then test it on one volunteer, and then send us all back. We don’t have enough for all that.”

“Is the department that short funded?” Amanda asked.

The two men looked at each other for a moment before Paul answered slowly.

“It’s not exactly department funding. There is no way we could justify that amount of money. We are being
funded,
we’re getting our money from…contributors. And right now they are in the dark and money has been cut off unless they are brought in.”

There was a pause before anyone spoke. Finally, Amanda broke the silence.

“This isn’t good,” she said.

“No,” Paul agreed. “It isn’t good at all.”

Saturday, July 25, 2026
12:30 a.m.

In front of the red brick apartment house in Dorchester Natasha Nikitin ducked out of Nigel’s BMW. “Thanks for a great evening,” she said, casting a quick smile through the open passenger door.

Nigel hesitated, disappointment etched across his face.

“It’s still early,” he tried.

Natasha glanced at her watch and laughed. “Nigel,
it’s
twelve thirty
.” She pouted and cocked her head sideways. “I’m really tired, maybe some other time, though?”

“I say, are you sure I shouldn’t at least walk you in?” He glanced around the street. “This isn’t the greatest neighborhood.”

“The door is right here. I’m fine. I’m just tired after some really great dancing. Promise you’ll call me tomorrow?”

Nigel brightened. “Sure, I’ll wake you up!”

Natasha threw him another smile, slammed the door shut and walked up the sidewalk without looking back. As she fished through her pocketbook she listened for the sound of either the car being shut off or accelerating away. She smiled to herself when she heard neither. What a gentleman! She let herself into the foyer and closed the door behind her. She stood waiting in the darkness until she heard the BMW pull away from the curb. She looked out the foyer’s side window, and watched the car’s brake lights come on at the corner and the car turn left. She gave it a few more seconds and then let herself back out the front door. She turned right in the direction in which Nigel had just driven off and began walking briskly.

It was a little over six blocks to the
Dorchester
post office. Nigel was right, it wasn’t a great neighborhood but Natasha had little concern for her safety as she hurried along. She checked her watch again. Main post offices were supposed to be open for full service all night – an improvement from the Soviet system-but she knew that the
Dorchester
service window might not be manned after
1:00
. She reached the building before one. As she swung open the front glass door she was relieved to see a clerk reading a newspaper. He started when she entered but quickly relaxed upon seeing her. She read his nameplate: Sean Murphy.

“Can I help you?” he asked, folding the Herald.

Natasha swung her pocketbook off her shoulder and onto the counter. She reached inside and removed a thick yellow envelope heavily sealed with tape.

“I want to send this P.C.,” she said, rummaging inside her pocketbook.

“I’m sorry ma’am, but I’ll have to see some…Oh, I’m sorry, yes of course, Agent Nikitin,” Murphy said as he saw the ID badge Natasha was now holding in front of him. “We can send this out ‘Priority-Confidential’ right away. It should be there by Monday.” Murphy reached under the counter, opened a drawer, and removed a stamp. He rolled “Priority-Confidential” in red across the front and back of the envelope and then turned and gently laid it in a bin behind him.