STORY NOTES: Accomplished science fiction author John Wyndham wrote a novel "Day of the Triffids," which has spawned at least one successful movie. He also wrote a short story called "Random Quest" in 1954. It was published in his 1961 anthology "Consider her Ways and others." The story was filmed as the 1971 movie "Quest for Love" starring Tom Bell, Joan Collins, Laurence Naismith and Denholm Elliott.

The movie left me wanting more, particularly an epilogue in which many things were explained to characters affected by them. So here is my sequel.

For clarity purposes, I will call the earth where the physicist Colin Trafford was born earth-A, and the earth where the author Colin Trafford was born earth-B.

If you haven't seen the movie or read the story, Colin's explanation to Tracy in the first few paragraphs will recap the essential plotline for you. (Consider it a spoiler though).

Colin Trafford handed the bouquet of flowers to Tracy Fletcher, who sat up in her hospital bed on earth-A. Her friend Jennifer had just whispered in her ear to explain who Colin was. The man, for reasons only known to him, had somehow incredibly known that Tracy was not just passing out frequently from exhaustion. She was in fact suffering from a heart condition. Colin had fought his way through the protection mentality of an uncooperative sneering airport official, in order to learn Tracy's address, so that he could notify her of her condition and arrange urgent medical treatment.

"How did you know I needed the operation?" asked Tracy.

"That would be hard enough for you to believe," said Colin, "Are you sure you want your friend to hear this?"

"It would give you someone else to trust," said Tracy.

"Well my best friend, a science correspondent, was ready to dismiss this as my having had a dream," said Colin, "However I can assure you that I physically felt and experienced everything I'm about to tell you. And there's no other explanation for my knowing your medical condition. Several weeks ago, I was demonstrating a particle accelerator at IPI, with a number of people present, including scientist Sir Henry Larnstein and science journalist Tom Lewis, who lost an arm in the war. The accelerator's effects were both uncontained and unpredictable, and I stood at ground zero, operating the machine. Suddenly I found myself in a different room, wearing different clothes, passed out on the floor. Little by little, I worked out that I had gone to a parallel universe, exchanging places with my counterpart. He came to this world, which I'll call earth-A, and remained in a coma for the whole time I was in the other world earth-B. There I found that my counterpart, a visually identical Colin Trafford, had become a famous author who committed adultery with a number of unattractive homewreckers, while married to your exact double named Ottilie Harsham. On earth-B, she was named Ottilie rather than Tracy, was never orphaned, and loved the unfaithful Colin Trafford. Believing I was him, she was cold and understandably unforgiving until I introduced her to Sir Henry Larnstein-B, who believed my story and helped me to convince her."

"Wouldn't it have been adultery of a sort, even stepping into your double's shoes?" asked Jennifer.

"I was so confused by all the scientific ramifications that I hadn't stopped to think of the moral ones," said Colin, "But Colin-B had already broken his marriage covenant several times. Thinking I was him, Ottilie told me she was going to divorce me for it. So she was free to leave HIM and remarry. Some churches may not recognise this, and there's debate on how to translate some of the Bible's passages on divorce. Some ministers believe that a victim divorcee is free to remarry without it constituting adultery. It makes sense to me. One night my shirt came loose, and Ottilie saw that I had no scar on my shoulder. Colin-B had a permanent scar from his schooldays. Ottilie was then fully convinced, and we had only a few weeks left. Just when I'd finally won her over, Tom Lewis-B told me that she was dying from a heart condition (like yours). I told the medical experts of earth-B about the operation that would fix it, but they'd never heard of it. Nobody had the knowledge. Although it was equally 1971 in that world, a number of developments here hadn't happened there. Kennedy was never shot. The Vietnam War had never happened. Inflation was slower, as I discovered when I paid for drinks and taxi fare. Medicine hadn't advanced as far. Ottilie died in my arms saying, 'Promise me that you'll find the other me in your world. I know I'm there.' I'm not sure what happened next. Maybe I passed out from emotional trauma. Maybe the accelerator's effects wore off. All I knew for sure is that I awoke back here on earth-A in the hospital bed, where Colin-B had slept in a coma, having been mistaken for me. Now he's presumably back on earth-B, unconcerned about the death of a wife he never cared for, and continuing his affair with the latest starlet of his plays."

"So how did you find me? I've never been called Ottilie," said Tracy.

"It wasn't easy. To make it worse, I wasted time before it occurred to me that you could have the same heart condition, in a world where it could be treated medically, but didn't know it. I had to start working through adoption records, and it lead to your colleague at the airport making things hard to follow up…." said Colin.

"Don't worry. I called him and explained what you'd done," said Jennifer, "He thinks your story was way out, but it did lead to saving Tracy's life, and he said he doesn't understand but is happy to dismiss it as a beneficial phenomenon. At any rate, he won't press any charges."

"When I passed myself off as Tracy…" said Jennifer, "I'm sorry to both of you. I thought I was keeping her safe."

"For one davastating minute or two, I thought that Ottilie's counterpart here was the baby who died in the accident I heard about during my search for Tracy, and hence that you were the surviving child, Jennifer. Then I got to the street and saw your flower delivery man arrive with the exact flowers that Ottilie had described. That's why I saw through your deception and burst in."

"I'm glad you did," said Tracy.

"I'll keep your secrets," said Jennifer.

"Could you use your accelerator to take me to the other world?" asked Tracy, "I'd really love to go there, and explore the place where it happened. And think of your friends' counterparts in that world. They should know the truth."

"I can't do that," said Colin, "When I swapped places with Colin Trafford-B, I ended up in the exact place where he was, right down to being inside the clothes he was wearing at the time I fired up the accelerator. Ottilie is dead, either buried or cremated. Even if I could guarantee a successful use of the accelerator for that purpose, you could end up underground in a coffin with no oxygen, or worse."

"Could we at least go and see the Larnstein here?" asked Tracy, "You should tell him the story you've just told us."

"I never thought of that," said Colin, "To him, the theory of time divided into two parallel worlds is still just a mathematical concept. My Tom Lewis from this world wants to meet you too, as he has a scientific curiosity."

"While yours is a romantic one?" said Tracy.

"I said my motives were selfish," said Colin, "When you're up and about from here, we'll go and see Sir Henry. You could come too, Jennifer."

"I wouldn't miss it."