by Anthology
She nodded. “Okay.”
“Now imagine what would happen if at a particular rung, I discovered that by fiddling with it I could cause a whole second ladder to emerge. So that I can create a choice of which ladder I climb.”
“That’s an odd image, but I’ll accept it.”
“It gets odder. Now imagine that I have some sort of switch on that rung. With the switch in its original position, I can climb up the original ladder. But if I flip the switch, the new ladder appears and the old one vanishes. And thus I can only climb the second ladder.”
“Okay.”
“But here’s my point, Miss Weber. I already came down the first ladder. If I’m forced to climb the second ladder, I have no idea where I’ll end up.”
Adele pondered the image for a moment. “Let me see if I grasp your point clearly. You are saying that if you were to prevent this disaster, you would create a change in your own history.”
“That’s correct.”
“I still do not see what is so wrong with that.”
Schmidt sighed. “If I were to change the past, that would also force a change upon the future. And I come from the future, Miss Weber.”
“I still don’t see your objection.”
“Let me summarize it by what is called the Grandfather Paradox. What would happen to me if I came back in time and killed my own grandfather while he was still a baby in his crib?”
“Ah,” Adele said, with sudden understanding. “You would cease to exist. But then you wouldn’t exist to kill your grandfather, so he should live.”
Schmidt nodded. “Precisely. And if he lives, then I would be born, allowing me to go back in time and kill him. A paradox.”
“So if you were to stop this horrible disaster, the future you came from would cease to exist, and by extension, so would you.”
“Exactly. Again, a paradox.”
“Well, how is this paradox resolved?”
He gave Adele a firm look. “By not changing the past.”
“But then what happens to free will? Are you not here now, and able to make decisions?”
“Well, yes. But my decisions are not ones that will disrupt the future, so no problem emerges.”
Adele shook her head. “I’m sorry, Mr. Schmidt, I can’t accept that. If history is as fragile as you claim, then doesn’t your presence here already disrupt the future?”
Schmidt bit his lip in thought. “Well, yes and no. Some changes are more important, more vital, than others. There’s a Law of Conservation of Reality that sometimes kicks in.”
“A Law of Conservation of Reality?”
Schmidt stared into the distance for a moment, then said, “Let me give you an example out of history that has already happened. Suppose you went back in time and killed Napoleon in his crib. What do you think would happen?”
Adele laughed. “Many things.”
“Name one.”
She shrugged. “The French would never have had their empire.”
He nodded. “So you say. And yet, why was it Napoleon who was responsible for the empire? Weren’t there other forces, other things, at play in history? Might not someone else have stepped in and taken on Napoleon’s role?”
Adele thought for a moment, then said, “I am not much of a historian, Mr. Schmidt. I suppose it’s possible, but these questions rarely come to my mind.”
“Forgive me, Miss Weber. I am not trying to make you feel ignorant. Rather, I am trying to point out that while parts of history are fragile, other parts are much more resilient. If I were to kill Napoleon, the Law might cause some other Frenchman to form a similar empire, and by 1904 the broad outline of history would be back on track.”
“So why not attempt to save my community? Isn’t history resilient enough for that?”
He sighed. “History might be resilient enough, but I’m not.”
“What do you mean?”
“That Law of Conservation of Reality I mentioned before? Sometimes the Law kicks in by killing the time traveler, so changes don’t happen that have to be corrected. If I were to try to change history, history might try to kill me to prevent it.”
She sniffed. “That seems to me a selfish reason not to help. Do not forget that my father gave his life to rescue others.”
“And you lived to regret it, did you not? Or so you said at Coney Island.”
Adele glared at him. “That was different.”
Schmidt shrugged. “Perhaps. Miss Weber, please understand. From my point of view, all this—” he waved an arm around “—is already past. My presence here doesn’t change it, as my own place is in your future. As far as I am concerned, the General Slocum tragedy is already a part of history.”
Adele tapped her foot in annoyance. “So what’s the point of your being here, Mr. Schmidt? If you’re not planning to save my community, my friends, my family—me—then why are you here?”
Schmidt wrung his hands. “To save something. A remnant of memory. Have you heard of Thomas Alva Edison, the inventor?”
“Of course. Who hasn’t?”
“Sorry. I’m still adjusting to what people might know in 1904. If you’ve heard of Edison, then you’ve probably heard of the motion picture.”
She rolled her eyes. “Motion pictures such as The Life of an American Fireman or The Great Train Robbery?”
Schmidt looked puzzled. “I’ve heard of the second, but not the first.”
“I saw both last year at the Kinetoscope Parlor.”
“The Kinetoscope Parlor?”
“On Broadway between Twenty-Sixth and Twenty-Seventh Street? It’s been there since I was a child.”
“I see. Well, then, this may be easier to explain than I thought. I’ve come back in time to make a record of the tragedy.”
“You have your very own motion picture camera? You plan to preserve images of the disaster on film?”
“More than that,” he said. “Much more.” He stood up, walked over to his bureau, and opened the top drawer. From it he removed an odd-looking helmet with the word MEMVOX printed across the brow.
“Here,” he said, handing it over.
Adele placed the book on the table. She took the helmet and turned it around in her hands, studying it. Many small metal disks were affixed to the inside.
“What do I do with this?”
“Place it over your head.”
She laughed. “Are we about to engage in battle?”
He smiled. “Not unless you want to.”
She carefully placed the helmet onto her head so as not to disturb her hair.
“How does that feel?” Schmidt asked, his voice sounding thick through the helmet.
“Heavy.” She sniffed the air. “And it smells of oil.”
“That will only last for a moment.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small molded metal box, with knobs and buttons, which he held near her head.
“Miss Weber, are you ready?”
“For what?”
Schmidt chuckled. “I guess I’d call it an immersion into another world. It’s like watching a movie, but you experience it from the inside.”
Adele shrugged. “It sounds intriguing. I’m ready.”
Schmidt nodded. He pushed a button on the box—
—and suddenly the room vanished. Adele found herself strapped into a leather chair in a strange room. Dials and displays of numbers danced before her face. Directly ahead and to both sides, windows showed clear blue sky and clouds, with some sort of pavement underneath.
She felt a sudden jerk of movement, and a high-pitched whine filled her ears. The room she sat in started moving forward, faster and faster. The view through the window showed faraway buildings and trees, moving past her more and more quickly, faster than she had ever gone before—
—and then suddenly the room lifted into the air.
Adele realized now that she had to be in some sort of vehicle, a flying machine. She now noticed some sort of pole, probably a steering mechanism, sticking out o
f the floor.
“Will wonders never cease?” she said aloud, although as far as she could tell there was no one around to hear her.
Very carefully, she took hold of the pole and pulled it towards her. The flying machine began to climb at an even steeper angle, and she felt herself pushed slightly into her seat. She pushed the pole forward and let it go, and the flying machine seemed to settle into a horizontal position.
“Hm,” she said.
She sat and looked out the window as the flying machine took her on a journey, sometimes ascending, sometimes descending. The experience was rather similar to that of being on a roller coaster, she decided, although a lot smoother.
Until the end.
Looking out the front window, she saw huge buildings of glass and metal, towering over the ground below. The machine brought her closer and closer to the buildings, when suddenly, just when she thought she would die in a crash, the machine banked upwards. She felt herself being pushed into her seat as the vehicle climbed. The weight of her body increased, making it harder for her to breathe. She waited for relief, but the vehicle just continued to accelerate, almost straight upwards—
—when suddenly it stalled, and she found herself, and the machine, falling.
She screamed as intense fear filled her entire being. The air seemed to get thicker and hotter. The urge to get away, to flee, to survive, overwhelmed her, and she suddenly remembered that this was all unreal. She tore the helmet from her head—
—and found herself back in Mr. Schmidt’s chambers.
“Merciful God,” she croaked. Her heart beat so quickly she felt afraid it might burst out of her chest.
Schmidt immediately jumped to her side, and placed his hands upon her shoulders. Normally, she would have rejected the indignity, but she had no strength. “Miss Weber!” he said, his face a picture of concern. “Come, lie down upon the bed.”
Gently, she made her way from the chair to the bed, gripping Schmidt’s arm firmly so she wouldn’t fall onto the floor. The dizziness from the experience lingered. She collapsed onto the bed, breathing heavily, and she stifled an urge to vomit.
“Adele, I’m sorry. I truly am. I forgot how vivid virtual reality can be. I didn’t realize the effect that would have on you. I suppose it’s as removed from motion pictures as—as I am from 1904.”
“What—what in the name of our Lord was that?”
“It’s called—well, it doesn’t matter what it’s called. The point is that you were flying.”
She glared at him. “I know I was flying, you idiot. Or at least it felt like it. Was that real?”
He nodded. “Oh, yes. Quite real.”
“I still want to know what it was called.”
“The flying machine is called an airplane.”
“An airplane,” Adele repeated, as she got her breath back. “And it hasn’t been invented yet. That I know for a fact.”
Schmidt cleared his throat. “Actually, two brothers flew one just last December, if I remember my history.”
“Last December?”
“Yes.”
She shook her head. “Impossible. I would have known.”
Schmidt shrugged. “Well, it’s not as important as the device you just had on your head. It’s called a memory player.”
“A memory player,” she echoed.
“Yes. It can replay the memories of one person into another person’s mind.”
“So that was a memory? Of someone flying an airplane?”
“Well, not quite. That was more of a training scenario. If it had been a real memory, you wouldn’t have been able to interact with it.”
Adele took a moment to assimilate this information, then said, “It’s more intense than watching a movie, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it is,” Schmidt replied. “But I guess you learned that already.”
Adele feared she knew the answer to the next question, but felt compelled to ask it anyway. “How does this device tie in with the St. Mark’s excursion?”
“Well,” Mr. Schmidt said. He looked around the room, never looking at Adele’s face.
“Well,” he said again.
“I’m waiting,” Adele said.
“I’m implanting memory recorder nanobots into the minds of as many people in Little Germany as I can. Especially the women and children, as they will be the majority of the people on the steamboat.”
“What was that word?”
“Um.” Schmidt ran his hand through his hair, as if searching for his thoughts. “You mean nanobots?”
“Yes.”
“That’s a little hard to explain. It’s like the lens of the camera. It would be as if the film of the camera were kept in a separate container.” He lifted the little box again. “All the memories will end up in here, and then I can bring them with me back to the future.”
“But how can the memories reach from people’s minds into your little box?”
“Um,” Schmidt said again. “That’s hard to explain. I’d have to use a lot of scientific terminology that hasn’t been invented yet. Could you explain to a medieval monk how a motion picture works?”
“Do not talk to me as if I were a small child,” she said coldly. “I have a mind, you know.” As the words came out of her mouth, a sudden, chilling thought occurred to her. “Mr. Schmidt. Did you implant one of those—those nanobots in my head?”
“Yours was one of the first,” he replied.
She glared at him. “That is a severe invasion of my privacy. You are the absolute worst sort of voyeur.”
“I would beg your pardon, Miss Weber, but that would be dishonest of me. You have to remember that from my perspective, all the members of this community are long gone. Where I come from, you’re already a vic—I mean, you’ve already passed on.” He paused. “Besides, the other side to this invasion of your privacy is the historical record. I would imagine that your people would want a record of the tragedy.”
She picked the book off of the table again. “Isn’t this proof that there will be a record?”
“Sort of. May I show you something?” Gently, he took the book from her hands. He flipped through the pages until he found a page close to the end of the book, and he handed the book back to her. “Read this,” he said.
The page displayed three simple words on two lines: “Part Four” in smaller type, with the word “Forgetting” underneath in larger type. A picture of the steamboat’s wheel appeared underneath.
Adele looked up. “Forgetting?” she asked.
“The tragedy is not remembered.”
“At all?”
He cleared his throat. “It is remembered a bit, but not as much as other tragedies, some with fewer lives lost, but also ones with much, much more devastation.”
“More devastation?” Adele couldn’t fathom such a thing. She closed the book and checked the number on the front cover. “More than the one thousand the book claims perished?”
“One thousand twenty-one,” Schmidt said.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
Schmidt got a far away look in his eyes. “The answer is yes. There are other disasters, much worse, in this city’s history.”
“Worse?”
He nodded, and gestured with his hands as if trying to create a picture for her. “Buildings set aflame. People jumping out of windows. Great unimaginable towers crashing down. Diseases running rampant in the streets.” He shuddered.
“Do you have any of those in your memory player?”
He nodded. “As regular recordings, yes. I have a few.”
“I see.” She paused. “Do not show me any of those. Ever.”
“I would never inflict those images on anyone who didn’t need to see them,” he replied.
Adele glanced at the book. “Even with other disasters, how could people forget this one?”
“That’s hard to explain without going into more detail about the future, but let me see.” He paused in thought for a moment. “Many years ago—or ma
ny years in the future, from your perspective—when I was a student, I took a course in history at Columbia University from Professor James Patrick Shenton. He taught me two truisms about this city. The first was that New Yorkers never let principle take precedence over profit.”
“And the second?”
“New Yorkers also never let memory be a hindrance.”
“Explain,” Adele said.
“New Yorkers have never been much for preserving the past. If a building stood in the way of progress, no matter how historic, it would be torn down.”
“People’s lives are not buildings, Mr. Schmidt.”
“True,” he replied. “But to some people those lives are valued even less.” He lifted the book. “It’s all in here. The Slocum disaster was the greatest tragedy this city had ever known, and within one hundred years, it had been completely forgotten. I want people to remember again. I want them to know the tragedy that struck.”
“But it hasn’t happened yet,” Adele said. “Why force them to know the tragedy? Why not erase it before it ever comes to pass?”
“I’ve already told you. The timeline is not that resilient.”
“Surely it would be resilient enough to spare the lives of my thousand countrymen! After all, if the disaster is mostly forgotten, how could preventing it possibly affect history?”
“It would affect my personal history, Miss Weber. There are ancestors of mine who will die on the General Slocum.”
Adele had not expected that. “Really? Who? Do I know them?”
Schmidt shook his head. “I’ve said too much already. But it’s because of my family history that I’m one of the people who remember the tragedy.”
“I see. I’m sorry.” Even as she spoke the words, Adele felt the absurdity of consoling Mr. Schmidt on the deaths of ancestors who hadn’t even died yet. Nevertheless, it seemed to her the proper thing to say.
“Thank you,” he said.
“Mr. Schmidt, why did you tell me all this?”
“You—you discovered the book. I had no choice.”
She smiled at him. “Do not take me for a fool. If, as you say, there are inherent dangers in changing history, surely your showing me something of the future is a danger.”