Samantha Smart

by Maxwell Puggle

  Of course, Jason had meant well. He couldn’t have known about Jordan Anderson, even if her mom had tried to relate her truly unbelievable story to the man. Samantha decided that she would thank him more properly later on.

  She wasn’t at all sure what to do with the tickets, though. If she went to the show, would Jordan just be his unaltered pop-singer self, oblivious as the next person to the wicked role he had played in the alternate timeline, or was he some sort of trans-temporal entity, plotting even now to somehow alter history again? It was, of course, unknowable, as even if she did go to the show she probably wouldn’t get anywhere near him. Samantha frowned and picked up the phone, dialing Brianna’s number.

  She wasn’t at home. She had, according to her mother, gone to school, which wasn’t that odd seeing as she and Samantha’s other friends had only been gone for an evening, whereas she had been gone for several days. She sighed and sat on her bed. She felt sad, though she wasn’t sure why. Perhaps she was disappointed that her exciting career as a time-traveling investigator had come abruptly to a halt, though she was happy to be at home and in her proper timeline. Well, she thought, I suppose there’s still forensic science.

  Her bedroom door edged open and Polly shuffled in, dragging her leash with her. She started wiggling and Samantha scratched her back, causing her to begin sproinging around, obviously desiring a walk.

  “Okay, Polly,” Samantha giggled. “Let’s go for a walk.” She picked up the leash and clipped it to Polly’s collar, leading her back out into the living room/kitchen area. “Polly needs a walk, Mom,” she said.

  “Oh, well, of course!” Cindy Smart offered cheerfully. “We’ll, uh, we’ll come with you, honey. Right guys?”

  “Um, sure,” Jason intoned pleasantly. Todd groaned.

  Samantha endured the moment as the “family” hastily cleaned up their dishes and suited up for a walk in the park. Her mother had been very insistent that she was to no longer walk alone anywhere, and Samantha accepted the new situation grudgingly, hoping that the rules would relax in a couple of weeks. Apparently The Professor had (thankfully) made up some story about her having volunteered for some extended experiment of his, and had reassured Cindy that she had been safe the entire time and apologized profusely for not having contacted her, believing that Samantha had had her full knowledge and permission. Cindy bought this reluctantly, she having even gone looking for Samantha in the museum’s basements to no avail. It seemed that Professor Smythe, as well, had been missing during their period of existence in altered time, and was now himself busy making up stories for his colleagues and superiors.

  The group bundled up and headed outdoors, Polly in the lead and Todd unenthusiastically bringing up the rear. They locked the brownstone and walked up Twelfth Street and into the park, everyone shivering slightly. It was, of course, November now, a proper November with bleak, gray skies and a real nip to the Brooklyn air. Todd could be heard grumbling away about how he was being “deprived of his education” by missing a day of school, though everyone just sort of snickered at that as they all knew school ranked about as high as root canal on his list of preferred activities.

  Polly, in contrast, was quite perky and pulled Samantha along on the leash in erratic jerks and spasms when another dog came into view or a brave squirrel dared to enter the periphery of her scent range. They walked along a path that led down into the basin that was Prospect Park; really, it was quite a beautiful place as parks went. Once you made it down into the athletic fields it was like you weren’t in the city at all; the lower ground was surrounded by thick rows of trees that mostly obscured the tall buildings beyond them, though their leaves were mostly gone now and you could see some dark outlines through them as a result. Still, it was as ‘in-the-wild’ as you could get in New York City, and was also a place that held many fine memories for Samantha.

  “Heads up!” Jason yelled; he had brought a football and began an impromptu game of catch with Todd, who despite his generally non-athletic nature seemed up for some activity other than walking. Their mother watched, smiling, then turned to Samantha.

  “Jason’s pretty okay, don’t you think?” she asked honestly.

  “Yeah Mom,” Samantha smiled genuinely. “He seems pretty cool.”

  “He, um, he really was good to me when you were... gone, you know. I was a wreck, Samantha–and he stuck it out.”

  “I’m sorry you were so worried, Mom. I wanted to call you, really, I was just, well, I couldn’t stop what I was doing... ”

  “It’s okay, baby,” Cindy Smart smiled, hugging her daughter. “You’re home now. And I gave that Professor Smythe a piece of my mind,” she scowled.

  “It wasn’t his fault, Mom; he was in it too, he... he sort of gets caught up in his mind and can’t get out sometimes.”

  “Hmmmph,” her mother huffed. “Well, he damn near aged me five years with how much I worried about you... ”

  “Okay, okay!” Samantha giggled, “I’ll get a paper route to help pay for your face lift!” It looked for a moment that Cindy Smart was about to smack her upside the head, but instead she burst out laughing and the two of them had a mother-daughter bonding moment. It was kind of sickening in a sweet way, but was just salty enough to feel good and right to her anyway. They walked along some more, following Polly’s lead while the males of the clan gradually migrated their game of catch along with them.

  “So, what, you don’t like Heatwavvve anymore?” Cindy asked with a look of true shock.

  “No, I mean, I–well, I think so. I’m just not sure,” Samantha replied, fumbling.

  “Is there some other group that you like more now?”

  “No, no it’s not that. And I really did appreciate the tickets. Brianna will be pretty psyched.”

  “Well, it’s at Irving Plaza Saturday night. Jason and I are coming with you–”

  “Aaaawww, Mom! Why?”

  “Because, young lady, you are still too young to be going to things like that by yourself. But don’t worry, we’ll give you your space.”

  Samantha pouted but wasn’t really upset. She was, in fact, more nervous about going to the show at all. They walked along the path and her thoughts wandered to Jordan Anderson and his obviously suspect character.

  *

  Brianna was extremely talkative on the phone that evening. She had sat through school the entire day fidgeting nervously and thinking about their experience in the alternate timeline. She and the others, Brianna related, had kept the entire thing to themselves, sticking with a story that they had, in fact, gone to the Heatwavvve show. When Samantha mentioned the tickets, the line went silent.

  “So... Brianna?” Samantha spoke.

  “Yeah–yeah, I’m sorry.” her friend responded. “I mean–jeez! What, are we gonna go, Samantha?”

  “I, um, I don’t know, Bree,” Samantha said, unsure.

  “Maybe we should ask The Professor what to do.”

  “That’s a good idea. I’ll call him tomorrow if I can do it without my mom noticing–she’s kind of down on him since, well, because I was gone for so long.”

  “Okay, Samantha. Are you going to school tomorrow?”

  “Um... I don’t know. I’ll call you like, after school’s out either way, okay?”

  “Okay. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

  Samantha hung up the phone and almost instantly, it rang again. It was Suki, and Samantha essentially repeated her conversation that she’d had with Brianna. Marvin, of course, was next to ring her up, and she did her best to make a coherent plan with all her friends.

  “Samantha,” her mother called. “Who keeps calling?”

  “It’s just my friends, Mom. Brianna, Suki and Marvin. They, um, just wanted to know where I’ve been.”

  “Oh, okay. Do you want to get some ice cream with Jason and I? Come on, I know you love mint chocolate chip.”

  This sounded suspiciously like another one of her mother’s newly contrived ‘family’ activities, but Samantha had nothing
better to do and decided that she would indeed like some mint chocolate chip ice cream, so she agreed to the outing. Todd declined to come, as his alter-ego of ‘cyber commando’ had reached some as yet unencountered level of the video game world and he was exceptionally absorbed in the virtual reality of lightning-speed combat. Samantha put Polly on the leash and followed her lovestruck mother and her new boyfriend out the door.

  They walked down Twelfth Street to Seventh Avenue, where most of the stores were, and up a couple blocks to Tenth Street where the ice cream place was. Samantha stayed outside with Polly while the two adults went in for the goods. Silly, she thought to herself, shivering, who eats ice cream in November?

  “Samantha?” a small, thin voice called her name from out of nowhere. She looked around, saw no one close by, then heard it again.

  “Samantha?” Polly was nuzzling her hand and it sounded for a moment as if it was she that had spoken, as though the voice were coming from her dog. Then she remembered–her wrist-communicator! She had totally forgotten it was there; her mind had sort of filed it away with the rest of the whole alternate timeline experience as if it were part of an almost entirely faded dream. But there it was.

  “Professor?” She whispered into it after tapping the talk button.

  “Samantha!” It responded cheerfully. “There you are! I’ve been trying to contact you!”

  “Sorry,” Samantha spoke quietly. “I left it turned off–I must’ve turned it back on by accident somehow–” She eyed Polly’s nuzzling nose.

  “It doesn’t matter,” The Professor continued. “I really must speak with you. It’s a matter of the utmost importance!”

  “Um, all right.” Samantha looked nervously over her shoulder into the ice cream shop. The lovebirds were returning. “But not now. I have to go–I promise I’ll call you on this thing later, okay? Bye!”

  “But–” she shut off the device, just as Jason and her mother returned with ice cream cones. “Here ya go, Samantha,” Jason handed her a cone, smiling.

  “Thanks,” she smiled, taking it and licking it.

  “Samantha, were you talking to someone out here?” her mother asked, slightly suspicious.

  “Hmmm? Oh, um, no Mom,” she waffled. “Just Polly. Mmmmmm this is good ice cream!” she quickly changed the subject. “Thanks, Jason!”

  “No problem,” Jason smiled. “Cheers!” He lifted his cone in a mock toast. “Here’s to Cindy Smart, beautiful woman and awesome mom.” Samantha lifted her cone, smiling, and her mother blushed, thoroughly forgetting any suspicions she might have had a moment earlier.

  “Aaaawwww... shucks,” she shrugged, looking coy.

  They walked back home, licking as they went, and discussed the virtues of many ice cream flavors such as butter pecan, rocky road, cookie dough, chocolate and cherry and even bubble gum, though Samantha remained deeply committed to the delicious combination of mint and chocolate chips. Polly trotted along, somewhat disappointed in the fact that due to the cold weather, no delicious droppings melted off to fall on the ground within her reach as they usually did in the summer.

  Home was pretty much the same as they had left it, though Todd was now completely bug-eyed and sitting tensely on the edge of his seat, thumbs moving frantically on his video game controller.

  “Todd, shut that awful thing off!” their mother demanded. “It’s driving me crazy and you look like some freakin’ zombie!”

  “No, Mom, wait, you don’t understand,” he stammered.

  “Oh, yes I do! Now, Todd!”

  “But Mom, this is It! This is the final battle with Mechanor, the leader of the cyborg army!”

  “Todd, you have ten seconds to turn that thing off or I’ll turn it off for you!”

  “Okay!” Todd pressed pause, but continued his arguments.

  Samantha slipped off to her room after finishing her ice cream cone and closed the door. She put on her pajamas even though it was still early and crawled into her bed. She pulled the covers up around her and tapped the talk button on her wrist-communicator.

  “Professor, are you there?” she spoke quietly into it. “Professor?”

  “Ah, there you are, Samantha. I’m sorry about that whole mess with your mother, you know; I had to come up with some kind of story... ”

  “It’s okay,” Samantha forgave him. “What’s up? Are we in the clear?”

  “I’m afraid not,” Smythe replied, sounding worried. “I’ve been doing some research on our friend Jordan, pop icon and time traveler extraordinaire. I’ve found out some very interesting things I’d like you to read. I’ve sent the information to an email account I set up in your name at hotmail.com. To access it you’ll need to type in your username, which is timetraveler11@hotmail.com, And your password.”

  “What’s the password?” Samantha asked excitedly. She had an email account already but was quite happy to have a secret agent one as well.

  “Polly, of course,” The Professor chuckled. “Well, Polly11 actually. It’s good to throw a few numbers in there for extra security. Please read the contents in complete privacy as soon as you get a chance and get back to me tomorrow morning if you’re able, all right?”

  “Samantha?” Her mother was knocking on the door.

  “Okay, Professor! Gotta go–Smart out!” She turned off the device, then answered her mother in a voice that pretended to be sleepy. “Mmmmm... what, Mom?”

  “Oh, okay, just checking on you. Can I come in?”

  “Yeah, sure,” she snuggled up under her blankets. Her mother opened the door, walked over to her bed and plopped Polly down next to Samantha.

  “Thought you might want your sleeping buddy,” she smiled, sitting down on the edge of the bed. “Tired?”

  “Mmmm,” Samantha nodded, smiling a contented smile.

  “Well, you’ve had a bit of a crazy week. I think you should probably go to school tomorrow, though–what do you think?”

  “Yeah, definitely,” she responded, rolling over and opening her eyes. “Yeah, I want to go to school tomorrow.”

  “Everything’s still going well at school, then? There’s nothing there that’s bothering you?”

  “No, Mom. Look–no matter what you think, I didn’t run away. I like school; I mostly like home just fine too, I was just–doing something really interesting and really wanted to–to be a part of it. Really.”

  “I understand, honey,” her mother smiled warmly. “I know you’re very smart–probably smarter than me even, and my name’s Cindy Smart! Just promise me if you ever do anything like that again that you’ll let me know about it beforehand, okay?”

  “Okay, Mom, I will. I promise.”

  “Good. I love you, Samantha. I’ll wake you up and we’ll ride the train together tomorrow, okay?”

  “Okay. I love you too, Mom.”

  Her mother kissed her on the forehead and tucked her in good, smiled and got up to exit.

  “Good night, Polly,” she said as she closed the door and shut off the light.

  *

  As soon as she had determined that everyone was asleep, Samantha snuck out to the living room and switched on the family computer. She waited nervously for it to boot up and turned the volume knob down so that it wouldn’t make any sounds. When it was ready, she clicked the Internet icon and the browser opened. She navigated to the Hotmail website and typed in the I.D. information The Professor had told her to, smiling as she spelled out the word “Polly.”

  There it was: An email from A. Edgar Smythe, with the subject heading “Jordan Slane.” Samantha wondered momentarily at The Professor’s middle name, which she hadn’t known, but then shrugged and opened the email. This is what she saw:

  To: Samantha Smart

  Re: Jordan Slane, a.k.a. Jordan Anderson.

  Jordan Slane was born an only child to Vassily Slane and an unknown mother in June of 1986. No more specific birth date is known.

  Vassily Slane is known as a powerful, mysterious Wall Street investor of whom not a single
photograph exists in the public domain. Doing business largely over the computer or through numerous subordinates, Slane has amassed a considerable fortune primarily in the energy, pharmaceutical and forest products markets, and has also financed his son Jordan’s efforts to (quite successfully) popularize his singing group, Heatwavvve. Vassily is of unknown age and unknown origin, but does apparently have a social security number and pays taxes. He wields great political influence and is a large contributor to several conservative candidates’ political campaigns though he also supports medical, geological and biological science research to a very generous degree.

  In short, Vassily Slane is a nearly-invisible, non-existent person who nonetheless has done a bang-up job at existing, and is someone we need to know more about. I fear, Samantha, that this is someone capable of great, vast manipulations of the world, and his connection to Jordan makes me almost positive that he is involved in, if not the primary force behind these glitches in time.

  Please let me know when we can meet or chat via wrist-communicator to discuss this development further.

  Yours,

  A.E. Smythe

  Samantha stared at the computer screen for a moment and then snapped out of her daze. She hurriedly shut the thing down and crept back to her bedroom where Polly was waiting, her nose sticking out of the door in canine curiosity. Getting back into bed, Samantha pulled the covers up around her neck and lie there, her mind spinning. Jordan Slane? Wall Street fortunes? An invisible enemy? All these thoughts made the cogs of her mind turn round and round, and the main gist of her thought process kept coming around to one question: Why?

  Why Jordan Anderson? Why a powerful, reclusive investor father? Why alter time? That was the real question. Why would anyone want to alter time, rich, powerful investor, pop music idol or otherwise? What possible benefit could it have for these people? Not fame, Samantha decided. Heatwavvve was far more successful, popular and well-known in this timeline than the altered one, where hardly anyone knew their name. Money? She supposed that a powerful investor could make a fortune in stocks, if they had invested in something like taxi-boats, artificial trees or floating plastic sidewalks, but Vassily Slane seemed to have money in none of these things. “Forest products” was a somewhat suspicious investment, as Samantha imagined that anything made of wood might become rare and sought after, though she failed to see any huge future in anything that basic that would totally cease to exist. No, it had to be something else, something more substantial, perhaps a personal stake in seeing global warming succeed. But what could it possibly be?