Gator

by Robert J. Sawyer

  The green light shimmered before his eyes.

  It grew brighter.

  And then—and then—an outline started to appear.

  Something big.

  Reptilian.

  Three meters long, with a horizontally held back, and a stiff tail sticking out to the rear.

  Ludlam could see through it—see right through it to the slick wall beyond.

  Growing more solid now...

  The chest was smooth. The thing lacked arms, just as Kowalski had said. But that wasn't what startled Ludlam most.

  The head was definitely tyrannosaurid—loaf-shaped, with ridges of bone above the eyes. But the top of the head rose up in a high dome.

  Tyrannosaurs hadn't just lost their arms over tens of millions of years of additional evolution. They'd apparently also become more intelligent. The domed skull could have housed a sizable brain.

  The creature looked at Ludlam with round pupils. Ludlam's flashlight was shaking violently in his hand, causing mad shadows to dance behind the dinosaur.

  The dinosaur had faded in.

  What if the dinosaurs hadn't become extinct? It was a question Ludlam had pondered for years. Yes, in this reality, they had succumbed to—to something, no one knew exactly what. But in another reality—in another timeline—perhaps they hadn't.

  And here, in the sewers of New York, piezoelectric discharges were causing the timelines to merge.

  The creature began moving. It was clearly solid now, clearly here. Its footfalls sent up great splashes of water.

  Ludlam froze. His head wanted to move forward, to approach the creature. His heart wanted to run as fast as he possibly could in the other direction.

  His head won.

  The dinosaur's mouth hung open, showing white conical teeth. There were some gaps—this might indeed have been the same individual that attacked Kowalski. But Kowalski had been a fool—doubtless he'd tried to run, or to ward off the approaching beast.

  Ludlam walked slowly toward the dinosaur. The creature tilted its head to one side, as if puzzled. It could have decapitated Ludlam with a single bite, but for the moment it seemed merely curious. Ludlam reached up gently, placing his flat palm softly against the beast's rough, warm hide.

  The dinosaur's chest puffed out, and it let loose a great roar. The sound started long and loud, but soon it was attenuating, growing fainter—

  —as was the beast itself.

  Ludlam felt a tingling over his entire body, and then pain shooting up into his brain, and then a shiver that ran down his spine as though a cold hand were touching each vertebra in turn, and then he was completely blind, and then there was a flash of absolutely pure, white light, and then—

  —and then, he was there.

  On the other side.

  In the other timeline.

  Ludlam had been in physical contact with the dinosaur as it had returned home, and he'd been swept back to the other side with it.

  It had been nighttime in New York, and, of course, it was nighttime here. But the sky was crystal clear, with, just as it had been back in the other timeline, the moon perfectly full. Ludlam saw stars twinkling overhead—in precisely the patterns he was used to seeing whenever he got away from the city's lights.

  This was the present day, and it was Manhattan Island—but devoid of skyscrapers, devoid of streets. They were at the bank of a river—a river long ago buried in the other timeline as part of New York's sanitation system.

  The tyrannosaur was standing next to Ludlam. It looked disoriented, and was rocking back and forth on its two legs, its stiff tail almost touching the ground at the end of each arc.

  The creature eyed Ludlam.

  It had no arms; therefore, it had no technology. But Ludlam felt sure there must be a large brain beneath that domed skull. Surely it would recognize that Ludlam meant it no harm—and that his scrawny frame would hardly constitute a decent meal.

  The dinosaur stood motionless. Ludlam opened his mouth in a wide, toothy grin—

  —and the great beast did the same thing—

  —and Ludlam realized his mistake—

  A territorial challenge.

  He ran as fast as he could.

  Thank God for arms. He managed to clamber up a tree, out of reach of the tyrannosaur's snapping jaws.

  He looked up. A pterosaur with giant furry wings moved across the face of the moon. Glorious.

  He would have to be careful here.

  But he couldn't imagine any place he'd rather be.

  Sixty-five million years of additional evolution! And not the boring, base evolution of mice and moles and monkeys. No, this was dinosaurian evolution. The ruling reptiles, the terrible lizards—the greatest creatures the Earth had ever known, their tenure uninterrupted. The way the story of life was really meant to unfold. Ludlam's heart was pounding, but with excitement, not fear, as he looked down from his branch at the tyrannosaur-like being, its lean, muscled form stark in the moonlight.

  He'd wait till morning, and then he'd try again to make friends with the dinosaur.

  But—hot damn!—he was so pleased to be here, it was going to be a real struggle to keep from grinning.

  * * *

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