Deep inside an underground bunker in a secluded location in the Rocky Mountains, a dozen of the world’s leading scientists worked through the latest trans-dimensional calculations.

One gentleman stood in the back of the room, slovenly dressed in a shirt that hadn’t been changed in days and sporting a face that hadn’t seen a razor in weeks.

He ignored the rest of the team, not that he didn’t have anything to contribute most of what they were arguing over were his calculations. Punching some numbers on a handheld computer, he ran several scenarios with several different results. None of the scenarios were acceptable except for the one that included all of his original calculations. Some of the other scenarios would prove to be disastrous.

“Are we actually here to open a trans-dimensional gateway, or are we just screwing around?”

The room got suddenly quiet; all eyes turned to the man in the back of the room. As a two-time Noble Prize winner in mathematical physics, what came out of his mouth was usually considered gospel.

Most claimed him to be the true heir to Einstein; the rest claimed that he was a combination of Einstein and Hawking. What disappointed most was that he was no longer the vivacious young scientist like a rock star that turned the world on its head eight years ago.

With breakthroughs in quantum energy and trans-dimensional dynamics, there was talk among the community of harnessing the energy between worlds. Such energy, if harnessed correctly, would bring the world out of the dark ages of oil and gas. Harnessed correctly, the power would take this world to the stars.

The scientist spoke before packed rooms made up of mostly young people, about space travel beyond our Solar System and even travel between dimensions. They would become the Columbus or Magellan of a new age.

This was all before the man’s wife was taken away by drug-resistant cancer. In less than a year, the woman who was a picture of grace and beauty wasted away. He never left her side. When she could no longer walk, he carried her. When she could no longer eat by herself, he fed her. When she could no longer move, he sat by her side and cared for her every need. When she died, he almost joined her. He would have followed her willingly to the grave, but those around him would not let him.

“Jack, you’re scaring the children.” Rose Hawthorne, another Noble Prize winner in mathematical physics, took a seat by her old friend and lover Jack Leigh.

They had dated for a while in college most of the time they ignored the Titanic jokes, but the relationship wasn’t meant to last. He was one of her closest friends, but she had always wished for something more.

She had tried to be jealous of his wife, Maggie, but they were such a good fit. If there was any truth to soul-mates, they were the poster children. She was ecstatic that he had finally joined the team to build the first trans-dimensional gateway. Of course, without him, they would likely not have been funded by any of the dozen or so nations that were paying the bills.

“Them young whipper-snappers.” Jack gave a half-smile as he ran through the calculations for the sixth time. She giggled; Jack was ten or more years junior to most everyone in the room.

“This is bullshit, Rose, where did they get those calculations? Did you see the ones covering the thermal flux? Did they ask some preschoolers to write to them?” He typed in one of the calculations, ran the scenario, and thrust it in her face. “Boom!”

She looked down at his computer. He was right, of course; in fact, he was usually right when it came to trans-dimensional physics. It was as he was working on a different level than everyone else. It scared her sometimes. Mostly it made his colleges jealous. “You’re right, I’ll recommend to the team that we don’t use those calculations.”

“Damn straight, we won’t. Nicki Ioannou had some good ideas on Rift management. Why don’t we have her on the team?”

Rose nodded, the brilliant Greek scientist would have been a valuable member of the team; unfortunately, politics kept her away.

“Greece is bankrupt; they could never afford to buy into this technology. Plus, she made some enemies at the last European physics symposium.”

“It’s only because her theories stepped on too many people’s ideas on how the world should work.” He rolled his eyes and mumbled something about the idiocy of politics. He didn’t mention to Rose that he helped Nicki with that presentation. “When this latest test fails, and it will; I’ll go before the board and demand she is put on my team, or I am going to walk. Enough of the politics, I am doing this for everyone’s future, not so that Americans can run their air conditioners cheaper. Hell, if they push me, I’ll do it myself. I can get enough corporate backing, plenty of Angel investors out there with more cash than most countries.”

Rose looked at him with interest. This was the old Jack, the Jack that burned with new ideas. He never allowed anyone to stand in the way of his goal. She had a sudden terrifying thought of being left out. “You would still allow me to be on your team, wouldn’t you?” She asked, almost in a little girl’s voice. It was as if she was asking to be on his team for dodgeball in school.

He looked at her with his bright blue eyes. God, she loved them. “Of course, don’t be silly; I love your calculations on quantum disbursement. Crazy how much energy we need to bleed off, nothing we have now can handle that much output. Frankly, I think we should lock ourselves in a room for six months, maybe get another Nobel Prize out of the deal.”

Rose squirmed at the thought of being locked in a room with him. She cursed her unprofessionalism, but before she stood the Jack, she had once loved. The mathematician reached over and took his hand, “Jack.”

He reacted poorly, throwing his hand up and immediately knew that he did. “I’m sorry, Rose, I can’t not yet.”

Rose nodded sadly. Jack was missing a part of himself, and she knew deep down; it was something that she would be unable to fill.

“Can I still be on your team?”

He looked at her and smiled, reaching out his with knuckles. “Of course, best friends?”

She nodded, giving him a knuckle bump.

Most of the team sat half a mile deep in the bunker with the tools of their trade surrounding them. In a small chamber, another mile beneath the room sat the equipment that would change the world forever. Wires and metals in an almost spider-like design thrummed with the initial subatomic energy.

“If we were smart, we would be doing this experiment on the moon.” Haruki Ito, an engineer from Japan, commented.

Stephen Carver grunted.” It would have been cost-prohibitive.” A professor from Cambridge and the senior researcher in the current experiment, he was proud that his team wrote most of the latest calculations out of Cambridge.

He still resented the fact that Jack Leigh was brought in to oversee the project. They should have left him on his ranch to rot. If they needed him, there was always email. What bothered him was a rumor that Jack was going to pull himself from the project and get corporate backing.

A small side of the Cambridge professor, a side he kept well hidden, was in awe of the American physicist. The calculations he tossed out were difficult; it was almost impossible to understand how they were produced. Dr. Carver ignored the thought and brought up the calculations for the most recent test; they looked good enough.

“Dr. Leigh, we are ready to start.”

“Try not to blow up the planet, Stephen.” Rose joked. The rest of the room gave a nervous laugh.

The experiment, as Jack predicted, failed miserably. Stephen growled in frustration and looked up as Jack gave Rose Hawthorne a knowing smile. Then it came to him; the bastard knew it was going to fail. He, of course, ignored the fact that Jack had been telling them all week to change the experiment.

“Doctor Leigh, I would like to try it again but with some new calculations. We have run them through the simulator with varying results.”

Jack shrugged. “It’s your dime, Stephen.”

A half an hour later, the new calculations were loaded, and the experiment resets to run again.

“Make it so.” Jack laughed as the rest of the room just rolled their eyes.

All hell immediately broke loose. Energy displacement went off the chart, and all of the internal radiation counters popped around the room. “Settle down, folks, we are still Ok, but I recommend that all non-essential personnel move themselves to the upper floors.”

Jack leaned over and calmly spoke to the team leader for the group that would need to start the decontamination process of anyone who exited the lab.

“Jack.” Rose motioned to two of her monitors, then started to tremble.

Stephen Carver stood up and pulled his computer screen with him. The hologram screen flickered in and out a couple of times because of the radiation. “That shouldn’t have happened.” He dragged it towards Doctor Leigh, who watched his own monitors.

“Should have, would have, Stephen.” He turned to one of the engineers. “Get ready to dump the entire thing if necessary.”

“You can’t, Jack, it will cost us months of work,” Stephen exclaimed.

The Nobel scientist looked at Stephen with disgust, then reached over and started to type out some calculations on the fly. The Cambridge professor stood in awe.

“Well, we shouldn’t have to worry about months of lost work, Stephen. We have a living gateway, congratulations.”

At that point, secondary radiation counters popped, and alarms began to go off throughout the compound.

“The planet, on the other hand, is going to be toast, actually maybe even this Solar System.”

Several people about the room started to cry. They had doomed the entire planet. The trans-dimensional reaction had gone out of control.

“OK, folks, not that it’s going to matter, but everyone evacuates.” Jack broke a small glass plate on the wall next to him then punched a large red button.

Sirens began to go off. Inside the control room, he pushed people into the emergency elevators. It would be like a rocket ride to the surface.

“Get as far as you can away from the mountain. I’ll see what I can do; I still have the original calculations that I can work with.”
Stephen looked around; he was ready to bolt. “How is that going to help? You cannot exactly run upstairs to your office.”

Jack laughed. “They are in my head.”

“Impossible.” Stephen then took off, leaving the others behind.

“You’re not leaving, are you?” Rose walked over to him and slipped her hands around his chest. “I’ll stay, too.”

Without a word, Jack picked her up and walked her to the nearest elevator, the last one leaving the surface. He gave her a quick kiss then threw the shocked woman inside. “I’ll tell Maggie you said hi.”

With four screens opened up before him, Jack’s hands flew over the keyboard, he had run at least two different scenarios, and all of them were bad. Rubbing his hands over his face, he was positive that the upcoming explosion was going to kill him way before the radiation.

“So, I wonder if you’re going to figure it out.”

He turned from his work and spied a young blonde girl sitting in a chair, spinning around in front of one of the control terminals. She wore one of those neo-Victorian outfits that were such a rage ten years ago. This wasn’t a weird reaction from radiation; perhaps it was something from the rift.

“Figure what out.”

“How to stop what is going on down below our feet.”

“I’m working on it.” He ran one more scenario; although it decreased the explosion by twenty-five percent, it wasn’t going to help.

“Boom right, you said that before. So Jack, how big a boom?” The young girl giggled.

“What’s with the gothic Lolita look? You know that’s a bit out of date. If you’re a hallucination, at least, I thought I would have better taste.” He turned around. If he was going to hallucinate, he wished it was Maggie standing next to him.

“Better taste?”

“Oh, don’t take it the wrong way, you’re definitely cute I’m just ten years too old for you.”

She laughed and then got serious. “How large, Jack?”

“Nova to low-level Super Nova, I am guessing.”

“You’re guessing.”

He shrugged. “I might be off ten to fifteen percent but close enough when you are talking about wiping out planets light-years away.”

She moved next to him to watch the screens. “You know if you’re going to stand there, at least help.” For some reason, he thought the little girl could actually help. He wasn’t positive anymore that she was a hallucination, much less a little girl.

“Not permitted, sorry.”

“Figures.” The Nobel Prize scientist closed three of the computer screens.

The scenario endings were all depressing. He found himself concentrating now on only one screen. His fingers began to type. She kept watching him then smiled when a bright spark went off in the back of his eyes. Jack began to make calculations on the fly within the program itself. It should not have been possible.

Theoretically, it took at the minimum thirty minutes to reload the calculations when the system was down. And they were never loaded by hand.

Jack did it anyway, all from memory, and then he began to adjust the calculations. For a moment before the world went black, he understood everything.

--0—

Jack sat on the edge of a moon crater watching the earth in all of its glory. He smiled; it was a great spot to watch the earth rise.

“So, no boom, kind of disappointing.”

He turned to the blonde-haired girl who stood next to him.“Sorry to disappoint, I kind of like the earth, how it is not scattered across the cosmos.”

“Oh no, don’t get me wrong, I’m glad you did it. Good for you. See, I had a bet with the powers that be in this Universe and won.”

He didn’t believe in the powers that be in any universe but then again. “So, what would have happened if you lost?”

“The earth and most of the surrounding stars would be nothing more than expanding gas, and you would be placed at the bottom of a galactic black hole and left there for all eternity.”

“That’s good; I’m glad you won. So as the winner of this cosmic bet, what do you get?” He was pretty positive he wouldn’t like where this was going.

“I get you, of course. Jack, you scare the bejesus out of the powers that run this universe. No mortal should understand the inner workings of things. Your head should have exploded, but no, you went on your merry way, creating havoc.”

“Sorry.”

“Oh, don’t be, it was a lot of fun. Now what to do about you? First of all, you have a reward coming.”

“A reward, I wasn’t thinking of one. I mean, the earth is still around; that pretty much works for me.”

“I figured that would be your response. So who is Maggie?” She smiled like she didn’t already know.

Jack began from the beginning, it was cathartic, an outpouring of his entire life with his wife. She was his only real existence for a living.

“So, Jack, would you like to meet her again?”

“You mean reborn, do that reincarnation thing? I’m not a spiritual person, so I’m not sure how that works.” He understood that in the strictest sense, she wasn’t an Angel, just something different.

“Oh no, you’re persona non grata in this Universe, my friend. Another dimension, I think.” She smiled when he didn’t blink. It was so nice to work with someone who understood how things worked, but she could see real hope in his eyes, a yearning for something missing.

“See, I’m actually here, not because of you. I am a Spiritual Detective working out the wrinkles in the multiverse. There is another Maggie without a ‘you, ’ and it’s causing issues.”

“Oh, that makes sense.” He then began to explain how that would cause problems within the overly complex systems regarding space-time. She began to jump up and down and clap her hands excitedly, which was quite the feat as the two of them stood on the moon.

“You have some growing up to do little girl, but after that, you’re coming to work for me.” She grabbed his hand. “Jack, my friend, I believe this is going to be the start of a beautiful friendship.”

“What, girl?” He never got out the rest as he felt stretched.

--0--

Jack felt someone poking his side, this constant irritating poking. One only person did that to him. “Stop that, why do you insist on doing that every morning.”

He opened his eyes, that voice wasn’t his but that of a young girl. He looked up and saw Maggie, but it wasn’t Maggie standing over him. She couldn’t be more than ten years old.

“Nadine, you silly goose, you’re going to be late for school.”

“Maggie?” it suddenly all came back to him, she was her sister. No, it was more than that. They were twins. Growing up on the outskirts of Paris, they lived with their mother and father under the reign of Prince Jean-Christophe Napoleon.

Napoleon had not marched into Russia; there was no Waterloo. World War I and World War II also didn’t happen. It was a very different world, but it was the world in which Maggie and Nadine were born. He took one look at his former wife, his now twin, and began to cry.

Maggie immediately leaped to her side laughing. “Why are you crying, I didn’t hurt you?”

“I had a nightmare, you had died, and I was all alone.” Great sobs wracked her body. Jack had never actually cried before, but as Nadine, she let it all out. Maggie soon joined her, the two twins feeding off one another. Finally, they both calmed down.

“I’m not going anyplace.” Maggie wiped the tears from her face and then from her sister’s.

“I love you, Maggie.” Nadine smiled, joy filling her heart completeness she thought she had lost.

“I love you too, Nadine.” She reached over and held her sister close. “Always and forever.”

“Always and forever.”

Chapter 2

Hidden away in an empty freshman classroom in the Université de Paris, a high school student busied herself in front of a chalkboard. She had just completed most of her calculations based upon Friedmann’s equations that covered the expansion of space in homogeneous and isotropic models of the universe.

The basis of the equations came from Einstein’s theory of relativity. The mathematician was also hailed as a genius in this world. The calculations were nothing earth-shattering of course, but not something one would expect to find a sixteen-year-old girl writing.

Another girl of the same age stood by the entrance into the classroom, keeping an eye on the hallway. “Nadine, you’re taking way too long this time.”

An odd pair, although they looked almost alike but dressed very differently. Both wore their soft-black hair up in matching hair clips, but that is where the similarities ended.

The oldest, Maggie by thirty seconds, wore clothes more attuned to the fashions of girls her age. A little more risqué than her mother might approve but nothing distasteful. Her sister, Nadine’s outfit, came right out of the latest in Parisian fashion. Although quite appropriate for a girl her age, it would be more in fashion for a girl a few years older.

Nadine smiled as she tossed the remains of another piece of chalk into the air. These broken pieces of chalk were like her calling cards. Mostly she complained it was because the University was too cheap to get decent chalk.

These little episodes of academic graffiti, called ‘Hunting trips’ by Nadine had been taking place on and off for the last two years since their father was hired as a Professor in International Finance.

Maggie noted that her sister always scribbled some sort of mathematical calculations in and around their home though, for some reason Nadine insisted that their parents should not know. Maggie understood that it was a compulsion and when she became lost in those calculations, there was a sparkle in her eyes.

She never understood why Nadine did it, but it was something she would always support. Not saying it wasn’t fun. Confusing parents and teachers was something every teenager enjoyed. Then again, the young teenage girl was bored and really wanted to roam the halls with her sister and check out some of the new University freshman boys.

Before she could yell again, Nadine jumped off the stool, brushed her hands off, and gave her sister a kiss on the cheek. “Thanks, that was fun.” She then gave one of her famous mad scientist laughs, which echoed, about the empty room.

Maggie rolled her eyes. “You have the oddest ideas of fun.”

“But you love me anyway.”

“Well, of course, that’s a given.”

Later that evening, the two sisters, now dressed in silk pajamas, lounged around the living room as they prepared for bed. Their parents were away for the evening, attending a first of the year dinner for all Professors.

As Maggie sat above Nadine, brushing her long black hair, her eyes were full of concern. Something was troubling her sister. As twins, for the most part they knew each other better than themselves. They did the twin speak, and at times their conversations bordered on the psychic, however Nadine had always been able to keep a secret part to herself.

“So what did you think of Christophe? Good looking as always.”

“Who?”

“Christophe Lefebvre, the whole reason why we went looking for new freshman.”

Christophe Lefebvre had as of last year attended their high school, now he was a freshman at the University. As the captain of the football team, he was very popular, and Maggie thought he would be happy to see a familiar face, mainly her face.

The girls were only a couple of years younger than Christophe and somewhat available. Maggie was wrong thinking Christophe would be happy to see her because the stupid boy couldn’t keep his eyes off Nadine. OK, maybe she was jealous, but something was going on with her sister, and she was beginning to get worried.

“No, the whole reason why you wanted to go search through halls, I was too busy hunting.” Nadine motioned her hand in a scribbling fashion. “Anyway I thought you had Marcel.” She said with a sneer.

Maggie had had enough; she turned her sister around and pushed her down on top of the carpeted floor. Sitting on her chest, she yelled. “What is wrong with you, why are you always a bitch around my boyfriends.” She grabbed both of her hands. Maggie could see tears forming in Nadine’s eyes, and it wasn’t because she was hurt.

“I’m not.”

“You are; even Mama commented on it. “ Their mother never liked to get in between the two girls, but she mentioned it the other day to their Papa. Mother, of course, used different words to describe her daughter’s actions. ”You’ve been like this since Sebastian.”

“Sebastian, we were in écoles élémentaire, that’s like five years ago.” Nadine rolled her eyes.

“And you were a bitch to him then. So why, what was he was doing that was so bad.”

“He tried to kiss you,” Nadine yelled back.

Maggie sat back, stunned. She then leaned forward. “I‘ve done more with Marcel you know. A lot more” Nadine began to squirm.

“Remember when you were at your piano recital a couple of weeks ago. I missed it because I was sick; well I was faking it, I had Marcel come over.”

“No, you didn’t,” Nadine whispered tears pouring down her face.

“I did, and I dragged him up to our bedroom stripped him of all of his clothes, and we did, well, you know. He has such broad shoulders and such a nice…”

Nadine now had her eyes closed. “Liar.”

“Yes, I know.”

She looked up at her sister, puzzled. “Why did you say that then?”

Maggie got off her sister’s chest and sat on the floor. “I want to have a husband, someday Nadine. I want to have children.” She reached over and rubbed the tears from her sister’s face. “Please don’t make me decide between you and a family.” The two sat in silence for a moment.

“So, what else is going on?” Maggie reached over and poked her sister in the ribs. To most people, Nadine could be hard to read. She hid her feelings when she wanted to, really well. Maggie was the only person who could take one look at her sister and know something was troubling her. “Is it our parents?”

“No, nothing’s wrong.”

“Liar, is it school? Can’t be, you make such stupid scary grades.”

“What your grades are as good as mine.”

“Hardly, so is it a boy?”

Nadine made a face.

“Or is it a girl, or tell me, Nadine, do you like girls?”

That took Nadine completely off guard. She stared at her sister in astonishment. Standing up, she brushed herself off and went into the kitchen returning with two bottles of soda.

Giving one to her sister, she plopped herself in their Papa’s chair, opened the bottle and took one long sip. She stared at the bottle for a moment then nodded. “Yes, how did you know?”

“Oh please, the way you and that Josephine girl were looking at one another. You completely ignored poor Christophe” Josephine was a classmate of Andrew that they met in the hall. “I wanted to scream for the two of you to go get a room.”

“You so did not.” Nadine blushed, hiding her head behind the bottle of soda.

Maggie squealed and bounced over to her sister, crushing her against the arm of the chair. Maggie was so excited her sister was actually acting as if she was interested in someone. She had been worried. Maybe if Nadine found a nice girl she wouldn’t be so alone when Maggie found a husband. Sure, their dating conversations from now on were going to be a little strange, but who cares.

“Do what did you like about her? She did dress well. She had nice shoes. I bet you weren’t looking at her shoes.”

Nadine looked at her sister straight in the eye. “You don’t find me sickening or weird?”

Maggie shook her head, taking a sip of her soda. “Oh no, you’re the weirdest person I know. Sometimes I find it hard to believe we’re twins. But, boy, girl whatever; I don’t care who you like. I won’t love you any less.”

Nadine smiled, tears forming in her eyes. “Cool.”

“Plus, sister of mine, I now don’t have to worry about you stealing any of my boyfriends.” She laughed and grabbed her by the arm. “So, who else do you like?”

After the parents came home, the two girls lay in their respective beds. Plans were going to have to be made to tell them about what’s going on with Nadine. Mama was getting a bit concerned.

Both girls were very pretty, but it was Nadine who the boys fawned over all the time, and she just ignored them. She had a reputation for being a bit of an Ice Queen. Maybe that’s why she was so popular, Maggie mused.

Her mother didn’t understand why such a cute sixteen-year-old girl wasn’t interested in dating any of them. To Maggie it all now made perfect sense. Nadine wasn’t really an Ice Queen, she just wasn’t the type of person to fake it. If she wasn’t interested she wasn’t interested.

Maggie also surmised that this was going to be a difficult time for Nadine, but at least she wasn’t going to be alone. It was still going to be a shock, there would probably be a bit of crying, but overall their parents would be accepting. Nadine said she didn’t care either way. She wasn’t looking for anyone’s approval. There was only one person that she cared what they thought, and that was Maggie.

“Nadine, when I get married and have a bunch of kids, what are you going to do?”

“Spoil your children, sugar them up and send them back home.” Nadine then gave one of her very best mad scientist maniacal laughs.

With autumn in full swing, the Augereau family found themselves at one of the many harvest fairs that seemed to pop up around the edge of Paris during this time of year. All kinds of apples, cheese, and bottles of Calvados were passed amongst the vendors to their customers. Artists, performers, and many other types seemed to flock to the festivals, so overall, the fairs were pretty interesting.

Nadine always loved these festivals. When she was Jack at this age, her parents would never allow him to do something so mundane. Once they found out that he was a genius at math all that was important was studying, practice for this, and that, all in the name of excellence.

There was no way that her old parents would go and have a simple fun day like the one they had today. She slipped her arm inside Maggie’s. Not that everything was all rainbows and unicorns, but things seemed to be working themselves out. Rainbows and Unicorns, she had to laugh like that thought would have ever entered her head as Jack. A girl in a dark blue gothic Lolita dress brought her to an immediate stop.

Her parents and sister jumped when she squealed. Nadine never squealed and watched in shock as she jumped over a small wall to throw herself on the small blonde girl.

Nadine’s mom turned to Maggie. “Do you know that girl?”

“No, I would have remembered someone dressed like that. Where in the world did she get such an outfit? Nadine should be having a fit about that girl’s clothes, she is such a fanatic when it comes to proper dress.”

“That’s your mama’s fault.” Her dad said with a chuckle.

Maggie’s mother ignored her husband’s comment, then asked nervously. “Do you think?”

They already had the ‘discussion’ with their parents about Nadine’s sexual orientation.

“Mama, do you question the same thing when I walk up to a boy.”

Her mother looked down with a smile on her lips. “Of course I do, I’m just curious. Oh, see she is coming back, Nadine is practically dragging the girl, poor thing.”

“Everyone, this is my friend Alice.” The blonde-haired girl gave Nadine an amused glance.

After the introductions, the family and Nadine’s friend all spent a nice afternoon walking amongst the booths of the fair. Her parents asked the girl the usual things, where did they meet and where did she live. Alice must have told them but if asked no one could remember.

Nadine and Alice walked through the center of the University campus towards one of the less mathématiques buildings. It was late, getting towards midnight; if the darkness bothered either of the girls, they made no sign. “I hadn’t really expected you to see me, but looking back I am not surprised.”

“You kind of stick out in that dress, if you like I can give you some pointers in proper attire.”

“I like my outfits, don’t you know?” Alice huffed, then the two giggled as they approached one of the side entrances. “We can go anyplace in the universe, any dimension, and you want to have this discussion in some abandoned schoolroom?” She reached over and opened the locked door.

“Useful trick, it’s not abandoned, just not used very often. Anyway, I like the chalkboard here. I wish I had my old H92 handheld, but this world is still at least a half a century behind technology-wise from my old home.”

“Why do you think?” The Spiritual Detective asked as the pair walked down the hallway towards the large empty classroom.

“Lack of two World Wars, there was a huge technology boost at the cost of something like 100 million lives. I’ll take the technology hit over the lives lost. Still, Imperial China just put up another satellite into space, which was exciting. I wasn’t born with the first space race, and I get to see this one from its infancy, very cool.”

“Other than me calling you Nadine, how are you doing?” The pair entered the large room, Nadine pulling up a chair in front of the large blackboard.

“I’ve been Nadine for over six years, I am pretty much Nadine now. I don’t really think of myself as Jack anymore. “She made a face. “Well, not true, I began to have real panic attacks when my sister started going out with boys. I felt betrayed.”

“I’m sorry…” Alice began, but Nadine waved her hand.

“I realized that my Maggie was not betraying me, and my sister just wanted to go on dates. Really, how selfish am I to make her choose.” She shook her head.

“Not your Maggie?”

Nadine smiled. “Jack’s wife, who he held until she took her last breath and wished to God at that point he could have joined her. Maggie, my sister is not that woman who Jack buried. She is my sister, my twin, and I love her as such. Still I think I am allowed a little jealousy when I see some creepy guy getting too close.”

The Spiritual Detective looked down. “I feel that I have wronged you, Nadine.”

“Not at all, look, Jack died. I have accepted that otherwise, I wouldn’t have been able to move on or kept my sanity.” She whispered the last part. “You have given me a second chance, a rebirth. So besides coming to see me, which I am glad as I missed you, let's discuss why you are here.”

“You missed me?”

“Sure, why not? We only met for a little while, but I think we made a good team. Plus didn’t you say we were going to have a ‘beautiful’ friendship.”

Alice laughed. “I did say that I’m surprised you remembered.”

“So tell me about this creature of Entropy.” Nadine pulled out a piece of chalk.

“We don’t know where they come from. Maybe when the multiverse was born, perhaps they were created. I’ve never encountered one before, but one has appeared.” Alice frowned. “They don’t make ripples but tears creating havoc in those dimensions they touch.”

“And sentient beings actually make pacts with them? What do they get in return?”

The Spiritual Detective smiled, Nadine didn’t say just humans. Humans just played a part in the puzzle. “Power influence whatever the creature can provide. They are also terribly difficult to kill once they become one with the beast. You can see how certain individuals might be willing to allow themselves to be hosts to such creatures.”

Nadine started to work on the chalkboard; impossible complex calculations covering space and time soon filled the board. She removed part of an equation to fill the board with a new equation that could indeed cancel out the first.

Alice nodded, “Close.” She pulled out her own piece of chalk, and the two begin to work in earnest. Hours later, with a field of chalk bits at their feet the satisfied pair stepped back.

Nadine took one look and turned to her friend. “So it’s reducing the state of order within the section of the multiverse, and it can move from one location to another once it’s absorbed its host.”

“Yes.”

“So the beast does enough damage perhaps not even noticed until enough harm is caused that a system-wide catastrophic failure will occur with little effort.” Nadine took a seat.

A whole section of the multiverse could vanish in a blink of an eye. Sitting for a few minutes Nadine stood up and wiped part of the equation off the board what she had named the Devourer.

“Second law of thermodynamics,” Nadine said simply. “We need to isolate it, place it in its own system without outside resources.”

“A pocket universe?”

“Perhaps a Mobius loop, but yes, not that I believe in pocket universes.” She grinned.

Alice laughed.

“You will need to get it in there somehow. I would suggest a wormhole and then retreat before it could follow. Close the bastard up and seal it away forever.”

“Can you do it, create one?” Alice asked. “Would you know how?”

Nadine flipped the chalkboard over, closed her eyes, and reached for a piece of chalk. Alice watched for a moment then closed her hands over Nadine’s. “So, how long?”

“It’s coming to me in bits and pieces now. The larger part of the puzzle is complete. When Jack died, he knew it all, but then it scattered. I’m almost but not quite at that point.” Nadine spoke softly.

She has been both horrified and overjoyed at the further understanding of how things work. If she concentrated, she could almost see the process with her own eyes.

“So you will not experiment without my permission. I wouldn’t want my protégé being harmed.”

“Your protégé?” Nadine smiled. She liked that a lot.

“Come let’s get you home, it’s late, and you have school in the morning.”

Nadine laughed and took Alice by the arm. “Here, let me.” And the two vanished as the sixteen-year-old girl folded space.

What the pair forgot were the remains of many other calculations left on the other side of the chalkboard.