Every crystal seemed to glow with a power and beauty all its own.
It was the most spectacularly beautiful place she could ever imagine.
And it seemed to go on into the mountain as far as she could see.
The crystal cavern the four of them had talked about for two months was real.
That meant going to alternate universes was real.
She could feel her mind spinning and she forced herself to take a few deep breaths.
She took hold of Ryan’s arm with her free hand to steady herself. She wasn’t sure if her legs would hold her. And she couldn’t imagine being in here without him at her side.
She just kept taking deep breaths and staring at the fantastic beauty around her.
It was impossible.
Just impossible.
“Oh, my,” Ryan whispered beside her.
“It’s really something, isn’t it?” Madison asked. “Makes me gasp every time I walk in here.
“Me too,” Dawn said.
As far as April was concerned, nothing would ever describe this cavern of crystals. She just kept staring around her, trying to grasp the incredible beauty of millions and millions and millions of crystals seeming to shine with a light and power all their own. Some of them were about the size of a tiny bump, others were huge and fairly long and seeming thousands of other smaller crystals spread out around the larger ones.
“Where and when are you two headed this time?” Duster asked, moving over beside Steven and Janice.
“1895,” Steven said. “Trying to hit May so we aren’t snowed in up here for too long.”
“We’re going to run a general store again,” Janice said. “A great way to get to know people.”
“Got enough money and all that?” Duster asked like a dad asking a kid if he was all right before going out on a date.
“More than enough,” Steven said, patting the saddlebag over his shoulder and the pocket of his suit coat. “We’ll make more while there.”
Duster nodded. “See you in a few minutes.”
Steven did something to the blocky-looking machine on the wooden table.
Then Steven glanced over at April and Ryan. “Just keep breathing. What you are about to see is very real. Honest. I didn’t believe it either the first time I saw it.”
“I damned near fainted,” Janice said, laughing.
Then smiling, both he and Janice put one hand on the machine and Steven connected another wire to the back of the machine and they both vanished from the room without a sound.
One moment they were there, the next they just weren’t there.
The machine sat there on the wooden table.
Duster and Bonnie and Dawn and Madison were all looking at her and Ryan.
“I’ve got to sit down,” April said.
“Me too,” Ryan said.
Both she and Ryan sank to the dirt floor and held each other’s hand and sort of leaned against each other.
“What exactly just happened?” Ryan asked as Bonnie walked over and handed April a bottle of water.
April managed to nod thank you, but at the moment that was all she could do.
She took a drink as Duster explained.
“Each crystal you see in this cavern, and off into infinity, is a physical representation of an alternate reality. Every time someone makes a decision, another crystal is formed.”
“The math is almost impossible to calculate,” Madison said, “as to how many alternate realities there are in just this area of humanity we can see from here.”
He pointed down the huge cavern where it seemed to go off into the distance.
“When you two decided to come with us up here today,” Bonnie said, indicating that April should take another drink, “you made that decision in millions of realities. And in millions and millions of other realities, you didn’t come up here. Or only one of you did.”
“See the wires leading from this machine over to this crystal?” Duster said, pointing to a crystal on the wall about head high that had two wires attached to it.
April nodded and took another drink and then handed the bottle to Ryan who took a drink as well.
April was slowly feeling better. Her mind was starting to process the room and the disappearance of Janice and Steven. It could have just been a trick, and part of her wanted to hang onto that theory. But she couldn’t.
This was real.
Not any real she could have ever imagined before this moment. But it was real.
“Janice and Steven have gone back into that alternate reality,” Duster said. He again pointed at the crystal on the wall. “If you look closely you’ll see all kinds of side crystals growing around the one they attached to as they make decisions that influence that timeline while they are there in the past.”
April felt good enough to stand and she and Ryan stood up and moved over toward the wall, still holding hands. She felt stronger with him touching her.
She could see crystals forming, some growing, some absorbing into the larger crystal.
“Never touch a crystal with your bare hands,” Duster said. “The energy flowing through them is really amazing.”
“How long will they be back there?” April asked, her voice sounding a little dry.
Duster shrugged. “As long as they want. If they unplug the wire from the machine in the year they are in, they will return here. If they die in that timeline, they will return here alive and well.”
“In just two minutes?” Ryan asked.
“Two minutes and fifteen seconds,” Dawn said. “Which means they will be back in just under one minute and there’s something that I need to tell you all.”
Now Duster and Bonnie and Madison all turned to Dawn, clearly puzzled.
Dawn looked at her watch again, then smiled. “In just over forty seconds Janice and Steven will return.”
All three of them nodded. April had no idea what was happening. She just stood there with Ryan watching.
“For the last year,” Dawn said, “I’ve been keeping one of the hardest secrets I’ve ever kept.”
“You are starting to worry me,” Madison said.
Dawn just patted his shoulder. “You won’t remember. You were dead.”
April had about a thousand questions from that one statement alone, but she kept silent.
Dawn turned to Bonnie. “Remember I was with the two shopkeepers from Roosevelt when we visited you in the hospital in Caldwell when I was on the way back here on that first trip Madison and I took?”
Bonnie sort of nodded, slowly. Then April could see the realization come over her eyes and the shock and disbelief. April had no idea what was about to happen, but it had stunned one of the great math brains on the planet.
“Someone want to tell me what’s going on?” Duster asked, clearly not liking being out of the loop.
Dawn glanced at her watch and then turned to the table as Steven and Janice just sort of appeared.
Both April and Ryan took a step back and April was afraid she was going to break Ryan’s hand she was gripping it so hard.
Steven took the wire off the machine and then both of them stepped back from the machine and turned to Dawn with huge grins on their faces.
Dawn ran to them and gave them the biggest hug April had ever seen anyone give another person, as if she hadn’t just seen them two minutes before.
Then she turned to everyone.
“I’ll be go to hell,” Bonnie said, shaking her head.
“Madison, Duster, Bonnie,” Dawn said, the grin on her face as wide as anything April had ever seen. “I’m sure you remember Craig and Susan from the Roosevelt General Store.”
April suddenly remembered that Dawn had said the general store foundations that they could see under the water at the lake was a very special general store.
“That’s not possible,” Duster said, looking at the wall and then the machine.
“I’ll be go to hell,” Bonnie said once again.
Madison just stoo
d there staring at them, his mouth open.
Then Dawn turned to Janice and Steven and said simply, “I’ve been wanting to thank you personally for over a year, for making that winter possible for me to survive with my sanity. Now that we are all on the same page, in the same time, finally, I can. So thank you.”
The three of them hugged again and April glanced at Ryan, who looked just as confused as she felt.
April could only hope that maybe someone would explain what had just happened.
And why Duster was pacing back and forth between the wall and the machine, swearing to himself.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
July 19, 2015
RYAN HAD NO PLAN of letting go of April’s hand any time soon. Something totally strange had just happened that actually had Duster upset and Bonnie swearing lightly under her breath.
Finally, Steven turned and said to Duster. “I’ll explain it all after Janice and I have a shower to get the trail dust off.”
“How long were you back there?” April asked.
“Early summer of 1885 to early summer of 1903,” Janice said. “So only eight years. We cut it short to help Dawn.”
Again Dawn just smiled and hugged her.
“Sorry,” Dawn said. “I’ve been wanting to do that for a year now.”
Ryan was so confused, he just shook his head. He had no idea, none, what had just happened.
“We’ll explain it all after showers,” Steven said. “But you two really should take a little jump to see Silver City in its prime.”
Duster stopped his pacing and stared at Steven and Janice. “Full explanation on what you did? And how you did it?”
“Promise,” Steven said.
“Go,” Duster said.
Steven and Janice and Dawn all headed out of the room together, smiling and laughing.
Then Duster turned to Ryan and April. “Even if you never decide to go to another alternate reality again, let me show you what one is like.”
“Safe?” April asked.
“It is,” Duster said and Bonnie nodded.
“The principles of the conservation of energy and matter and time are what caused this room in the first place,” Bonnie said. “No matter what happens to you in another timeline, you end up back as you left in this timeline, two minutes and fifteen seconds later.”
“It’s physics,” Duster said. “Can’t be any other way. We can explain it all in a lot more depth later if you want.”
Ryan wanted to ask why the odd time, but decided he could do that later as well.
Duster put on gloves and walked over to the wall. He unhooked from the crystal there, seeming to make a note of where it was at, then moved about ten paces away with the long cord and hooked it up to a crystal there.
Then he came back to the machine and set it for May 1887.
“Why 1887?” Ryan asked.
“We did all this construction and protections on this place in 1881,” Duster said. “We go back to 1887 because it’s a good time and this mine has been closed down for years at that point and forgotten by the local residents of the area.”
Ryan flat didn’t understand. Some of the thousand questions he could ask later.
“If you are touching the machine, you will remember the trip. And you have to touch it to have the machine send you.”
Duster put one hand on the machine indicated that Ryan and April should touch the machine in the open area beside his.
April hesitated.
“You’ll understand a lot more about what we are talking about if you spend the next two minutes doing this,” Bonnie said.
“I trust them,” Ryan said, looking at April. “And I would rather have you beside me, holding my hand on this.”
He looked into her worried eyes and finally saw her nod.
“Together,” she said, trying to smile.
“Together,” he said, nodding and squeezing her hand.
“Want to come along?” Duster asked Madison and Bonnie.
“I will,” Bonnie said, coming over and putting her hand beside Ryan’s and Duster’s and April’s on the machine. “April will need help with a dress.”
“Oh, yeah, good point,” Duster said.
“I’ll start digging out stuff for dinner,” Madison said. “This dinner could really be interesting. Hope everyone likes steaks.”
Madison smiled and said, “Have fun.” Then he turned around to head toward the door and just vanished.
Duster and Bonnie stepped back from the machine and a moment later Ryan and April did the same. Ryan had no idea why or what had gone wrong.
“Where did he go?” April asked a half second before Ryan could.
“He didn’t go anywhere,” Bonnie said. “We did.”
“Welcome to 1887,” Duster said, smiling.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
May 1887
APRIL FOLLOWED DUSTER to the big door leading out of the cavern. It was now closed and he had to open it.
As they went into the natural cave on the other side, the lights came up automatically.
April was about to ask where everyone had gone, then realized that if Duster and Bonnie were telling the truth, the other four were in this cavern in another timeline in 2015.
Her mind wouldn’t let herself believe any of this was possible, even though every detail was being proven to her.
One detail at a time.
Bonnie helped her into a 1800s-style dress over her jeans and blouse. They seemed to have racks and racks of clothing stocked in the big cavern. Duster helped Ryan into a jacket and cowboy hat.
“No need to button this up,” Bonnie said as she also pulled on a dress and put a bonnet on her head. “We’re only going out on to the mine tailings.”
“So this is in case someone sees us?” April asked.
“It is,” Bonnie nodded. “We’ll just look like two couples out for a walk.”
They headed back down the mine tunnel, with Duster showing them some of the alarm systems.
At the big metal door at the entrance, Duster showed them a view port that allowed them to look in all directions around the mine, including above it, for anyone outside.
From what April could tell, the coast was clear.
She took Ryan’s hand and he squeezed hers. There was no way in the world she could have gone through this without him at her side.
Duster showed them the big open button for the door and hit it.
The small chamber around them went dark, then the big door slid open.
They were hit with a blast of cold air that took April’s breath away.
It was light, but barely and light snow was blowing on the wind and the ground was covered in a dusting of snow.
They stepped out onto the mine tailings.
The old mining cabin still had a door and windows and a drift of snow was piled up against one side of it.
“Cars will be over there in the future in another timeline,” Duster said.
He pointed across an open hillside. There were no trees now and no cars. Just snow.
“We really are in the past,” Ryan said, his voice soft and almost whipped away by the blowing snow.
“The past of another timeline, but one so similar to our own as to be indistinguishable,” Duster said. “Maybe in this one the only difference is that someone took a job and in ours they didn’t.”
“Take a look,” Bonnie said and eased April and Ryan over to the edge of the mine tailings.
Below, through the light blowing snow, she could see a town with hundreds and hundreds of buildings and smoke coming from the fireplaces of about half the buildings in town.
“Silver City after its first gold and silver rush boom was starting to fade,” Duster said. “It had a few more boom periods before it finally became what you saw earlier.”
“We are really in 1887?” Ryan asked, his grip on her hand firm and hard.
“Looks like early May,” Duster said, nodding.
“Now, can we go back inside bef
ore I freeze?” Bonnie asked.
April wasn’t sure that she was ready to go back in yet, even though she was freezing as well.
She needed a few minutes for this to sink in.
“Another minute,” Ryan said before she could.
“Tell you what,” Duster said to Bonnie, “Go on in and unplug us in about ten minutes.”
“Will do,” Bonnie said and went back inside, letting the big rock slide closed over the fake mine entrance.
“Sit down,” Duster said.
He sat down on one side of April and Ryan on the other, staring out over the impossible site of Silver City, Idaho in 1887.
“So, now you see why we wanted plans for that lodge?” Duster asked.
“You’re going to build it, aren’t you?” Ryan asked.
Duster nodded. “A number of times in a bunch of timelines. Your theory about the dust was spot on. There are millions and millions of us in different timelines who have decided to go back and build the lodge. And we all bring in dust from each timeline. That’s how the echo rumors of the lodge got into so many timelines.”
“Because you go back and build it?” April asked.
“Because we do,” Duster said, nodding. “In a million timelines at the same time. And all four of us hope you two would come back and help us build and furnish it.”
“I’m still trying to grasp that,” Ryan said, pointing down at the city just waking up to a snowy morning in May.
“Me too,” April said.
But now something had finally snapped over in her mind and she really, really believed this. That’s how the four historians inside could write such fantastic books. They had years of time and firsthand research.
They had all the time in all the alternate realities to do so.
“So,” April said, “We could live in that city from now, 1887 now that is, for how long?”
“Until you die of old age,” Duster said. “And you end up right back where you started inside there, two minutes and fifteen seconds later.”
“How many times have you died in another timeline?” Ryan asked.
“Too damn many,” Duster said. “Dying in the past is never a pleasant experience and I would try to avoid it at all costs, even though you end up back here just fine.”
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