Second Lives

by Scott K. Andrews

  'Well,' he started. 'Time follows rules, like any physical effect or state, but the rules it follows are those of quantum rather than Newtonian physics. Time is part of the quantum structure of the universe. As such, of course, its laws all relate to the observation of its passing. You are familiar with Schrodinger's Cat?'

  Kaz shook his head and then stopped, embarrassed, when he found both Dora and Jana looking at him as if he were stupid.

  'What?' he asked defensively.

  'Seriously?' said Jana. 'What did they teach you in school in the twenty-first century?'

  'I moved around a lot,' said Kaz grumpily. 'My education was a bit of a mess.'

  Kairos gestured theatrically as he spoke, as if the enthusiasm he contained needed to find physical expression. He cleared his throat.

  'Let me explain, then,' he said kindly. 'A subatomic particle exists in both positive and negative states until it is observed, upon which it fixes in either positive or negative. The act of looking at a subatomic particle forces it to, in effect, choose whether it is negative or positive. When it is both, when it is unobserved, it is what we call a superposition of both states, a quantum effect - both positive and negative at once until the superposition collapses upon observation.

  'So if you were to put a cat in a box - and I don't envy anyone trying this experiment in reality because, and I can only speak from experience, my cat scratches the blue blazes out of me when I try to put it in the carrier to take it to the vet - and in the box you put a subatomic particle and a machine that measures whether the particle is negative or positive and is set to release cyanide and kill the cat upon that measurement being made, then close the box, the cat exists in a superposition. It is both alive and dead at the same time, until you open the box and observe it, upon which you either have to deal with a really, really angry cat or you find a dead moggy and then, shortly thereafter, are dead yourself, gasping for breath as you realise that opening boxes full of cyanide gas without some sort of breathing apparatus is a stupid mistake and why oh why didn't you think of this before but you were so excited by your experiment that you totally forgot to order a gas mask.'

  Kairos stopped to giggle at his little joke.

  'And this is relevant to us how?' asked Kaz, impatient with being talked at.

  Kairos sighed. 'I can see I shall have to break this down for you,' he said. 'Well, because time is quantum, it is a product of perception. Hours, minutes, seconds - these are human creations that have no objective reality. Animals do not measure time in days or weeks, they have no conception of past or future, they live in a constant now. And so did our distant ancestors, our animal forebears on the African plains. Because time is quantum, and because it was unobserved, we have no idea what kind of superposition it adopted.

  'How did time behave before we became conscious of its passing? Did it flow backwards? Did it skip randomly from one moment to next week and then back to yesterday? Did it flow sideways in some fashion? We can never know. All we can know is that one day a neuron sparked in an ape brain, the ape stepped out of the endless now and thought "I'll do it later." At that instant, time was observed, the superposition collapsed and it began to flow in a linear fashion. One moment began to follow another in a nice, orderly procession. It relates, quite neatly, to the Quantum Zeno Effect—'

  This is all very interesting,' interrupted Dora before the professor's explanation could go off on another tangent. 'But it is theoretical, Professor. How does this relate to time travel?'

  'As I explained,' he said, rising from his chair and beginning to pace up and down, 'it all comes down to observation. You are probably familiar with the idea of the grandfather paradox.'

  'Assume I'm not,' said Kaz, folding his arms.

  'Well. It is the question of what would happen if you travelled back in time and killed your grandfather before he fathered children,' explained Kairos. 'If you were to do this, then one of your parents would never be born, which means you couldn't exist, and so couldn't have travelled back in time to kill him. This is a paradox. An impossibility. So, what would happen if you were to try this? There have been many theories.'

  Kaz didn't think he'd ever listened so carefully to an abstruse scientific explanation in his life.

  'First,' said Kairos, 'there is the theory that the killer would, by killing his or her grandfather, create an alternate timeline parallel to their original one. They would not be born in this new timeline but that wouldn't matter. If they were then to travel back into the future, they would travel forward along the new branch of time that their actions had created, unable to return to the branch whence they sprang. They would have, so to speak, jumped a time track. No paradox.

  'Second, there is Novikov's self-consistency principle, which holds that the killing is literally impossible and every attempt to kill the grandfather would be foiled in some way, by chance. In this model, time is a self-correcting system, almost intelligent.

  'Thirdly, there is the possibility that a paradox would be created and that the entire fabric of space and time would unravel, like pulling on a dangling thread from a woolly jumper. The end of everything. Of the universe itself. Boom. This applies to any attempt to change recorded history. Killing Hitler, preventing the assassination of JFK, grounding the planes on 9/11. Any attempt to change the established flow of history would result in one of those three outcomes.

  'We could test these hypotheses, establish for certain which of these three models is the correct one. But such an experiment would be wholly reckless for, in the worst case scenario . . . well, as I said, boom.'

  He fell silent and Kaz, Jana and Dora sat there mulling over his words.

  'So basically, you're telling us to be really, really careful,' said Jana.

  'Time travel is the most horrendously dangerous thing,' said Kairos, nodding. 'Without meaning to, any one of you could accidentally destroy everything. But!' He shouted this word triumphantly, making Kaz jump involuntarily. 'According to my calculations there is a loophole! Time is, as I said, quantum. Its behaviour is governed by the observer. Let me pick an example.' He pointed at Kaz.

  'Kaz,' he said gently, 'I believe your mother died as the result of a car bomb explosion.'

  Kaz nodded mutely, both uncomfortable and kind of angry at where Kairos's monologue was heading.

  'Well,' he continued, 'if you were to travel back in time and stop the bomb going off, you would know you were changing history, and thus would create a paradox. You would observe the change, time would be forced to react and so, possibly, boom. But, you could change the outcome of events if those events still conformed to your memories.'

  'I don't . . .' began Kaz.

  'Did you ever see her body?' asked Kairos.

  That was too much for Kaz. He stood up angrily. 'Who the hell do you think you are?' he shouted, and then felt the electric tingle of Jana's hand on his arm.

  'Think about it, Kaz,' she said calmly. 'Did you see your mother's body?'

  'No,' he said shortly, addressing Jana rather than Kairos. 'It was a closed casket funeral. She was . . . very close to the bomb.'

  Jana continued. 'So what I think he's saying - correct me if I'm wrong, Professor - is that since you never saw her body, it would be possible for you to go back in time and ensure that she survived the explosion. As long as your younger self still experiences that day exactly as you remember it.'

  'That is correct,' said Kairos. 'Intervention in one's own personal history is possible, but extraordinarily risky because one remembers what happened. Intervention in a period of history about which the time traveller knows nothing, on the other hand, can be achieved with little or no risk at all.'

  'You think,' said Dora.

  'Yes, I think,' affirmed the professor.

  Kaz's anger was not subsiding. 'My mother's murder is not just some story you can use to explain a damn theory,' he said. 'It's a real thing, that really happened. To me.'

  Kairos looked uncomfortable. 'I am sorry,' he said. 'I m
eant no disrespect. I was just trying to use an example that you would understand.'

  'How the hell do you know so much about me, anyway?' spat Kaz.

  'Um, I'm under strict instructions not to tell you,' said Kairos apologetically.

  cThen to hell with you,' said Kaz, turning to Dora and Jana. 'I don't know about you, but I'm getting out of here. This whole thing stinks.'

  He screwed his eyes shut and willed himself away from there, into the future, feeling the room fade away . . . . . . only to find it fading right back again.

  After a brief moment's disorientation, he realised he had somehow been prevented from jumping into time and was still standing in the conference room underneath Sweetclover Hall.

  He drew his gun and pointed it at Kairos's head as Dora and Jana rose from their seats.

  T couldn't jump away, we're stuck here,' said Kaz. 'It's a trap!'

  Kairos threw up his hands in alarm. 'No, no,' he shouted, 'you don't understand! Please don't shoot me!'

  Dora's sword was at Kairos's throat before he finished speaking.

  'Then explain,' she said curtly.

  'The quantum bubble forms a barrier,' he said breathlessly. 'Travel into the future beyond this point is impossible.'

  'Which would explain why Steve told us we just had to jump into the future,' said Jana, directing her comments at Kaz, trying to calm him down. He did not appreciate it.

  'That is correct,' said Kairos, starting to nod and then thinking better of it as the sword's blade nicked his Adam's apple. 'Anyone who tries to travel beyond this point in time will find themselves pulled into the bubble. It is like, um, a temporal whirlpool.'

  Kaz thought for a second, then said, 'Dora, jump back a day and then forward again. Let's see if he's telling the truth.'

  Dora nodded and withdrew her sword. Kaz stepped forward so his gun was pointed right between Kairos's eyes as Dora flared into nothingness and then, a moment later, reappeared.

  'He's telling the truth,' she said.

  Kaz lowered his gun slowly and Kairos let out a long sigh of relief.

  'Thank you,' he said.

  No sooner had Kaz holstered the gun then he felt a hard punch on his upper arm and turned to see Jana looking up at him furiously.

  'Don't you dare run out on me,' she hissed. 'You promised.'

  Kaz's anger began to subside and he nodded. 'I did, sorry,' he said. He turned back to Kairos. 'But I don't like this. What is it you want from us, Professor?'

  Kairos, white as a sheet, drained his coffee and took a moment to compose himself.

  'I want you to go to Mars,' he said. 'And prevent a terrible tragedy that occurred two days ago, on April fifth 2158. Thousands upon thousands of people died when—' he stopped himself.

  'When what?' asked Jana.

  'I can't tell you,' said the professor. 'It would be too dangerous for you to know exactly what happened.'

  'Why?' asked Dora.

  'Because if you know all the details, you'll be unable to stop it from happening without risking a paradox,' said the professor.

  'You want us to . . .'

  'Yes, Kaz,' said the professor. 'I want you to change history.'

  An hour later, after Kairos had pitched his plan to them and they had asked him to leave them alone to consider, the three time travellers stood beneath the frozen explosion, staring up at it, each lost in their own thoughts.

  Kaz couldn't stop obsessing over Kairos's first example of altering the past - was it really possible, he wondered, to save his mother from the car bomb that had killed her?

  'Oh!' Jana exclaimed suddenly. 'I forgot!'

  As Kaz and Dora turned to her in surprise, Jana hurried away to the farthest corner of the undercroft and began examining the wall. Kaz and Dora exchanged confused glances and walked over to join her.

  'What did you forget?' asked Kaz.

  'The cavern,' she said, still examining brickwork that, to Kaz's eyes, looked identical to the rest of the walls. 'There was an elevator here, in 1645. I took it down - really, a long way down - and there was a cavern. The one we arrived in after 2014.'

  'The one with all the pods?' asked Kaz, remembering the huge cave lined with rows of glass cocoons holding frozen figures where they had stopped to gather their wits before jumping back to 1645.

  'Yeah,' said Jana. 'It's directly underneath us. Or it was, back then. There were cold fusion generators running the suspended animation apparatus. It was an army. Quil's army.'

  'You think they could still be down there?' asked Dora.

  Jana stepped back from the wall, frustrated. 'I guess. There's no sign of the elevator shaft at all now. Must have been bricked up centuries ago. Probably nobody in this time period even knows they're down there.'

  'If they are,' said Dora. 'They could have woken up and left years ago for all we know.'

  Jana shook her head. 'No, they must still be down there,' she said. 'This is the year of Quil's war and I think they're her ace in the hole.'

  'Literally,' said Kaz.

  'You think that's her plan?' said Dora, her detached mask dropping for a moment as she became excited by this new understanding. 'That she's working her way through history, heading back to this time period, gathering the things she needs to win her war?'

  'Makes sense,' said Kaz. 'It's a good plan, if you think about it.'

  Jana turned back to point at the timebomb that hung menacingly above them. 'There was a rock,' she said, her voice low with awe. 'A weird glowing rock right at the centre of the cavern.'

  Kaz and Dora followed her gaze. 'You think . . .'

  Jana nodded slowly. 'Maybe,' she said. 'When it detonates, the timebomb warhead might blow itself back through time. Maybe it even created the cavern sometime in . . . who knows how far back in time the explosion reaches?'

  'Loops within loops,' said Dora. 'It's all connected, isn't it.'

  That observation made Kaz uneasy. There was something about the way time worked that was making him feel trapped, as if no matter what he did he was just going through the motions, fulfilling some kind of plan. He didn't want to be time's puppet, especially when he couldn't be sure that Quil wasn't pulling the strings.

  'I want to save my mum,' he blurted out, almost without thinking.

  Jana and Dora turned to him, surprised at his outburst.

  'What?' asked Jana.

  'My mum,' he said again. 'If Kairos is right, if we can change history, then I want to save my mum.'

  Dora whistled. 'Kaz, he used that as an example of how difficult it would be,' she said.

  'Yeah, but possible,' he said firmly. 'If we were careful. If we planned it properly, meticulously.'

  There was a long pause, and Kaz could tell they were trying to think of tactful ways to talk him out of it.

  'What about Mars?' said Dora. 'Kairos said thousands of people died. If we can prevent that—'

  'But Quil said she met us on Mars, remember?' said Kaz. 'She said it was our fault that everything went wrong. On her computer we saw photographs of ourselves in a war zone underneath a very different sky. It seems to me that Mars is absolutely the very last place we should ever go.'

  'You don't need to tell me,' replied Jana patiently. 'I visited it, remember? Future me wasn't in very good shape at the time.'

  'Steve told us what to do,' said Kaz angrily. 'Kairos is telling us what to do. Time itself is telling us what to do. And nobody is telling us why. I'm sick of it. I've been given this power, I didn't ask for it, but I've got it and I'm not going to let anybody else tell me what to do with it. If there is even a chance that I can save my mum, then I'm going to take it.'

  'Even if you risk destroying the world?' said Dora, rising to anger herself.

  'Yes!' said Kaz.

  'You are being completely irresponsible,' said Dora, putting her hands on her hips and leaning towards him.

  'Whoa there,' said Jana, stepping in between them. 'Time out.'

  Kaz stepped back and walked away. Twenty minutes l
ater Jana tracked him down to the cell-like room he had retreated to, and sat down on the hard bed next to him.

  'I understand,' she said gently. T really do.'

  Kaz grunted, non-committal. He did not feel like being generous or peaceable; neither did he feel like being reassured.

  'I've talked to Dora, and to Kairos,' she continued, undeterred by his silence. 'I think we should jump back to Io Scientific 2014 and put a bullet in Quil's head. Dora thinks Kairos is right and we should go straight to Mars and try and prevent this mysterious disaster that set her against us in the first place.'

  'I don't care about Quil,' said Kaz. 'I don't care about any of it.'

  'No reason you should,' said Jana, her tone carefully neutral. 'Apart from the bit where she kidnapped, tortured and tried to kill you.'

  Kaz sulked. He knew he was being childish, but he was too far gone to care.

  'I proposed a compromise,' said Jana. 'Dora's in, if you are. Do you want to hear it?'

  Kaz grunted again. 'S'pose so.'

  'Dora and I will come with you to Beirut and help you save your mom - preferably without destroying the world,' she said drily. 'It can be like a rehearsal for Mars, testing whether we can really change history and get away with it.'

  Kaz considered her words with mixed feelings. On one hand, the girls were willing to help him, and that increased the chances of success significantly. On the other . . .

  'Saving my mum's life isn't a rehearsal for anything,' he said coldly, angry at the way the most important thing in his life was being relegated to some kind of dry run for a more important task.

  'Of course,' said Jana, looking sheepish. 'Sorry.'

  'It's OK,' said Kaz, easing off slightly. 'I know what you mean. Just remember this is my life we're messing with.'

  'Understood. But if we help you and we manage to pull it off, then you have to come with us to Mars afterwards,5 said Jana firmly. 'And if Mars doesn't work out, you and Dora are going to join me in putting Quil down in whatever time period we can get to her. Deal?'

  Kaz didn't even have to think about it. 'Deal,' he said.

  Jana nodded and stood to leave.