This seemed to be a character from a nightmare: its reptilian face loomed over him. Scott immediately believed it to be hostile. But the moment he began to feel that biochemical response of fear, the creature changed to something more benign; this more human face had superimposed on the original until becoming opaquely dominant.
Scott was still recumbent on the ship’s couch, the interface array gone. Instead this now very human-looking being peered over at him.
The being spoke to him. ‘Do you know how long you have been in transit?’ The voice was soft and devoid any distinguishing accent, which somehow fitted the androgynous features.
‘No,’ Scott replied, vaguely.
‘Sixty-two of your Earth years.’
‘Then I’m too late.’
‘That would be a moot term at this moment. Your gravitenetic shield was about to collapse. If it had done so you would have been erased from this continuum.’
‘Graviten.... I don't understand,’ he admitted.
‘This is our technology, it is how we detected your craft.’ The being then told him about the temporal eradication wave. ‘You are currently three thousand nine hundred and seventy light years from your home planet,’ the being explained. ‘We cannot return you home, since the council ruled we are forbidden from that sector.’
‘It doesn't matter anyway. There would be nothing for me, nothing I care about.’
‘There is, however, an alternative that will not break the rules of the temporal Directive. But it would mean sacrificing your memory.’
‘Give it to me.’
Within two hours Scott was once more connected to the ship's interface. It wasn't strictly necessary since the computer was already programmed to lower its now rejuvenated shield for the sixteen picoseconds required – or rather estimated – to expose Scott to the temporal eradication wave. At least in this interface he'd know exactly when the time arrived. Somehow he alone would be affected enough to be returned, leaving the ship to be reclaimed by the alien (who insisted it was their rightful property).
As the countdown reached one minute, the doubt popped up in Scott's mind and seemed to intensify with each passing second: was this just a ruse to get him to vacate the ship? Did this alien really care, let alone know what would be the correct timing? Surely they need to have experimented first, and the cost of failure too much to risk it. And so he may simply be erased from all existence. Never to have been. But would he be remembered? Yes, he assured himself, his life had already happened; that can never change.
Ten seconds.
Five.
Two.
He wobbled, then the bike toppled over. He hit the ground hard, feeling ridiculous. Why did I suddenly stop? There were no obstacles, just this most peculiar thought that he had followed this exact same path before – to the millimetre. An absurd thought, he reasoned.
When Scott got back on the bike he wanted to tell someone, so strong was this sense of deja vu, but he imagined his friends would laugh, his mum may well consider he needed to see a counsellor
No. No one should know about this.
Scott continued his ride, and forced himself to think about his latest architecture degree project. This was his first year, and it was not going well. He was an artist really. Art college had been his place of endless possibility, in contrast to the constraining parameters of university. And in college was that beautiful girl who always seemed to make the class more appealing. Not that he had ever the courage to engage her in conversation, at least no more than a few words relating to the course work. And she never approached him. Deanna was popular: here natives were cool, exotic certainly to him, even though her ancestry was from this country. Since Scott had only been in Canada for the last four years of his life, her differentness made her seem all the more desirable. All the more unobtainable.
Scott continued on, still with that strange feeling of deja vu, when something happened he was not expecting. He very nearly fell off his bike once again. The man had instantly appeared right in front of him, looking incongruous in a white suit jacket.
The man said, ‘Please do not be alarmed, I am here to help you.’ He put out his palm and then put it to his mouth in a strangely ominous gesture. He added: ‘There has been a mistake; you should not be here.’
Scott started to back away from the weirdo; except that became awkward, with his bike held by its handlebars. The man put out his hand again. ‘No, wait. You don’t understand. Any divergent actions can have a serious consequence.’
‘Who are you? What do you want from me?’
‘I am someone who monitors temporal displacements. One of my … people was responsible for sending you here, in this time – an error in a calculation.’
‘I don’t remember---’
‘You wouldn’t. And normally that would not be a problem: you’d simply relive your past, completely unaware of having come from the future. Except the process for an individual isn’t perfect – there are feed-throughs, echoes of your memories that aren’t governed by the effects of mass.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Scott said, still wanting to get away and yet strangely compelled. ‘I don’t understand what you’re telling me – that I’m in the wrong time?’
‘It is not as simple as being in the wrong time. You have been in the right time in all the other instances. And from then you lived through your life, making all the same choices, until finally ...’ The man sighed, then added: ‘You get to the same point. But they continue to get their calculations wrong.’
‘Then if they got their calculations right what time would I be sent back to?’
‘That isn’t important for now. What matters is that this time line is not corrupted. But since the feed-through has become reinforced those proto-memories will need to be removed.’
‘But surely messing about with my brain would itself corrupt the time line. And besides, it seems you’ve already corrupted the time line.’
‘We can be very precise in removing any memories. It is our role to protect the integrity of history.’
‘Seriously. I will not breathe a word, if you just let me be on my way. I don’t believe anything you’ve said in any case.’
‘I don’t believe you are telling the truth.’ The man produced a small grey hand-held device and pointed it at Scott.
The world went blank.
***