The Last Rational Man Read online

large buildings that were partly underground, since the particle beam itself was underground. So we trooped down short staircases into a technology freak's paradise.

  One of the labs had a piece of plastic pipe hanging in the staircase, with a sign taped on it that read: 'danger, PI Meson beam'. The pipe was hanging loosely on a couple of chains, and was obviously put there as a joke. There was no way in the world that a particle beam would pass through a staircase. Certainly not with only a dangling plastic pipe protecting innocent tourists. True, those particular particles were especially harmless, and would go through just about anything without any effect, but there was no way they would let people walk through a beam of any sort.

  Everybody ducked to get under that 'beam'. Everybody but me. I never found out whether there was a real particle beam going through that pipe. I knocked the pipe out of my way, and walked right through the 'PI Meson beam'.

  I found myself in front of a mirror, a liquid shiny mirror. I could see myself in it, a wavy image that quivered in the mercurial surface. I touched the surface. It gave a little, and concentric circles of waves spread out from my finger. When I pulled my finger back, the mirror stuck to the finger like soft chewing gum. It pulled back with my finger, and it took some effort to pull back far enough so that the string of mirror material finally snapped back. The snapping quicksilver sent a new series of ripples across the mirror. These interfered with the waves bouncing back from the edges of the mirror, distorting my image.

  I should have been afraid. What was going on? Where was Fermilab? Where were my classmates? But none of that was of concern to me. I had landed in some kind of alternate universe, or maybe was just having a hallucination. Either way, my curiosity overrode my natural sense of caution.

  I touched the mirror again. This time I pushed as hard as I could. My finger sunk into the surface. I saw my mirror image doing the same. But where was my finger? Both my digit and my image's had sunk into the surface, so the tips of our fingers had disappeared under the surface.

  I pressed harder, sinking my entire forearm into the surface. My image did the same, our arms meeting at the elbow. Only I this point did I realize that even though my image was following my motions exactly, we were not dressed alike. The elbow of my sweater touched that of his tweed jacket.

  I raised my eyes to look into his, and recognized myself, myself as a stranger. I reached out with my second hand, and he reached out with his. It was like a game mimes play, one imitating the other, playing the role of a mirror. Here, though, there was a mirror, and my image/second self was following too closely for it to be a game.

  I wondered what could have caused this hallucination. Did that particle beam do something to my brain? I didn't have much experience with hallucinations -recreational drugs never interested me much.

  I decided to test the hallucination. I let my head drop down to touch the mirror, and pushed with my legs as hard as I could. At first the surface resisted, but I slowly managed to push my way through. The surface stretched to accommodate me, and then suddenly burst. I was through!

  I was standing in front of a mirror, looking at myself. This time, though, I was really looking at myself, my original self, the one wearing the sweater. The mirror no longer had that liquid mercurial look. I was sweating like a horse. My brain may have been calmly considering the situation, but my body had completely panicked. Well, it was over now, and I could relax. Or so I thought.

  My image in the mirror faded away. All that was left was a blank sheet of silver with a heavy wooden frame. Heavy wooden frame? I reached out to touch the unfamiliar mirror. My hand extended from my tweed jacket. My finger reached out to the frame. I froze. My tweed jacket? I was wearing a sweater!

  There was a sink under the mirror, an old fashioned heavy thing that sat on a pedestal. I turned around. I was in a washing area, just outside the men's room. The washroom sign said 'men', and had a classic drawing of a man wearing a hat, just to make sure that the illiterate could figure out which room it was. It was a bit silly, after all, since hats like that had been out of fashion for half a century. Still, it went well with the general décor.

  I guessed that I was in the restroom of a theme restaurant. I wasn't too far off. I pushed open another door, this one with frosted glass in a wooden frame, and found myself in a small Italian place, all done in a thirties style, down to the mechanical cash register – its typical 'ding' as the owner made change caught my attention. How did he handle credit cards? Having a thirties theme was OK, but business was business.

  Coats were hung up on a wooden coat rack near the entrance. Hats sat on a small shelf nearby. Hats just like the one in the bathroom. The customers, in fact, all seemed dressed to fit in with the décor. Some of the men had tweed jackets of the same odd cut that I had. A few wore double breasted suits, the kind that I associated with gangsters. The women were wearing long dresses or skirts and little hats. Most had white gloves laid on the table next to them. I had walked onto the set of 'The Sting'! A theme restaurant where the customers played along with the theme, a muted Rocky Horror Picture Show.

  I wasn't quite sure that this was reality. Hallucination seemed like the most likely explanation, though I had no recollection of smoking, sniffing or injecting anything. Everything sure seemed real enough. I glanced out the window and caught my breath. It wasn't just the restaurant. The entire street was ancient. Hand painted signs on stores, cars with long hoods that must have escaped from museums. And everybody, I mean everybody, who was walking around outside was dressed like extra for a movie.

  Only at this point did I seriously consider the possibility that I had actually traveled in time.

  A woman waved at me from one of the tables. Confused, I walked over to her.

  "Are you OK, honey?"

  "Um, yes. I think so."

  "You look confused. Come on, sit down."

  I sat down. What else could I do?

  She sat there, drinking coffee out of a dainty china cup, gabbing away like I was her best friend in the world. She worked as a clerk in a store, and from the sounds of it had about thirty very close friends there. I could hardly follow the narrative, which was complicated by the fact that the friends all seemed to have similar names. I did manage to catch her name. Rebecca.

  Rebecca was happy, exuberantly so. She didn't mind her simple boring job. She was happy just telling this complete stranger all about her day.

  She was dainty, with brown hair cut short, and dark eyes. Her gloves lay on the table next to her, and her fine small hands waved rapidly as she spoke. They only slowed down for a second when she took a break to sip at the coffee.

  I stared at her hands as she drank. There was no doubt – that was a wedding ring. This happy girl, jabbering away, her bright eyes flirting, undoubtedly flirting with me, was married!

  I didn't know what to make of it. She kept calling me by my name, though I had never identified myself. I thought of explaining to her that no matter what she thought, we had never met, we were complete strangers. I didn't have the heart. She was so happy. Happy to be with me, as far as I could tell.

  Finally she was done. I obviously was expected to pay for the coffee and whatever meal she had had. I wasn't wearing my own clothing, and doubted that I had any cash. Still, I reached into my pocket, and found a wallet with money in it. I could tell that it was American money, but I didn't recognize the bills. There was a bit of a misunderstanding at the cash register, when I tried to pay far more than expected. The meal, whatever it had included, cost a grand total of seventy five cents!

  At this point I had to admit to myself that impossible as it seemed, I had managed to travel back in time. Not only that, but I had fallen into some other fellow's shoes. If only I could get back to my own time! It would make my academic career! But I had no idea of how I had managed to time-travel.

  It likely had something to do with that particle beam, but even if I could figure out the mechanism, particle accelerators hadn't been invented yet. Well,
Cockcroft and Walton had put one together in 1932, but it was a primitive low powered thing, and wouldn't be much help to me.

  I walked with my new friend, who insisted on taking my arm. I half hoped and half feared that she was going to take me home, to her house. She did. She lived in a fourth floor apartment in a large building. We climbed up the stairs, and waited by the door. After an uncomfortable pause, I reached into my pocket, and sure enough, there was the key.

  As soon as we were inside, Rebecca gave a big kiss, and dragged my off to the bedroom to make love. Something inside me cringed when I realized what was happening, but as far as she was concerned, I was her husband, and a fairly new acquisition on her part, as far as I could tell. Her real husband must have been the fellow who I had seen in the mirror before. Had he swapped places with me? Possibly, but unless I got back to my time I would never know.

  The next morning Rebecca woke me up. She was dressed for work, and my work clothes were laid out for me. I shaved, miraculously managing to sue the straight blade without nicking myself. I worried for a moment about getting AIDS from my alter ego's blade, but quickly realized that if I had really time-traveled, then AIDS didn't exist yet. On the other hand, if I was hallucinating, or had landed in some alternate universe,