Sullivan County, 16 August 1969

Kate holds on to Jeffrey tighter. She squeezes her eyes closed and repeats a little mantra in her head: this didn't just happen; this didn't just happen.

Jeffrey struggles out of Kate's embrace and pushes her away.

"Oh, Jeff, I'm so sorry."

"Why? Why did you do that?"

"It was an accident. I'm sorry."

"Sure you are."

He grabs the omni and gives Kate a push. She falls down on her ass in the muddy field. Jeffrey opens the omni and sets the dials for New York 1989. He presses the trigger button.

Nothing happens. He tries again.

"And this worthless piece of junk doesn't work anymore either." He throws the omni on the ground.

"Hey! Careful with that." Kate dives for the omni. "If it had fallen on its trigger button we would have been stuck here!"

"I've just been pushing the trigger button. It doesn't work."

"You've tried to leave me here?" Kate asks in a quieter voice.

"I ..." Jeffrey looks at her. Yes, that's what he tried to do. He shakes his head. "I'm sorry. It's just ... my folks ... I wanted to get back to them."

Kate nods.

Jeffrey rubs a hand through his hair. "Where are we now?"

Kate opens the omni. The dials have reset themselves.

"New York State, August 16, 1969."

"Woodstock." Jeffrey drops himself to the ground and buries his face in his hands.

Kate closes the omni, obscuring the red light it is showing.

This can't be happening. This is not real. He must be dreaming. He did not just voyage. He's still lying on the couch in his folks' apartment, asleep, dreaming. He should pinch himself to verify. Jeffrey quietly pinches himself. That hurts. So he's awake now. He slowly opens his eyes. Either his mom redecorated while he took a nap or he's sitting in a field of something green and purple. He's afraid it's the latter. From the corner of his eyes he sees someone sitting on her knees. He turns his head.

"I was hoping it was all a dream."

"Me too," Kate replies softly.

"Does the omni still work?"

"Parts of it at least."

"Which parts?"

"Red light."

Great. "Can you take me back to 1989?"

"I don't know. You said you tried." Kate looks down at the omni. "But with the red light here, it could mean the 1989 from here is different from the 1989 we just left. It's relativity theory." She gives Jeffrey a wry smile. "Don't ask me to explain further; I only understand very little of it."

"You're saying that meeting my parents was some kind of Alternative History? That it was a fluke their son had gone missing?"

"Well. It was. You know that."

"I hoped it was something different. I guess I knew it was too good to be true. We landed in an alternate history. And you wanted to leave me behind there."

"You wanted to stay there."

"What would have happened to me if someone had ironed out the ripple from which the alternate history came?"

"I don't know." Kate shrugs.

Jeffrey doesn't know either, but, all the same, he would have preferred to take his chances in the alternate history. "What do we do now?"

"I don't know. Fix the red light? August 16, 1969. Any thoughts?"

Jeffrey snorts. Another generation of Bogg relying on him to drum up the answers. He should have brought the guidebook -- he would at least have had the satisfaction of throwing it at her -- but his mom would have thought it weird if he had brought a book to go shopping.

"You don't know much, do you? You've said I don't know three times in the space of five minutes."

"This particular situation doesn't call for the kind of knowledge I have."

"And what kind of knowledge is that?"

"I know all about cataloging books. I know a few languages, and pretty much the entire history of Earth between 1750 and 1950 Common Era, and the high lights of all the other times."

"I guess you're right: not much use for cataloging books in this field."

"What about your knowledge? You haven't said anything about what could be wrong here."

"I did. Woodstock was held on the 16th of August. Maybe in this alternate history it wasn't held."

"How do we find out if it wasn't?"

"We start walking." Jeffrey gets up and makes his action follow his words.

Kate quickly scrambles up and follows him.

"Maybe we're in the wrong field," Kate suggests. "Maybe they're all a little further ahead."

"There were 500,000 people at Woodstock. We would notice them if they were anywhere near. My parents were here, you know, at the Woodstock Festival. They told me about it. The music, the people, the 20 miles traffic jam, the muddy field and the friendly owner who made it all possible." Jeffrey points at a man approaching them through the field.

"What are you doing in my alfalfa?" he asks them when they meet.

"Alfalfa? Is that what this is? I was already wondering what kind of grass this was." Kate bends to pick some up.

"It's not a grass."

"We're looking for the Woodstock Festival. It's supposed to be here."

"Woodstock Festival? Woodstock is about 50 miles north. There's no festival here."

"Alfalfa, is that something you eat?"

"It's for the cows."

"Do you know some people by the names of Michael Lang and Joel Rosenman?"

"Never heard of them. Now, get out of my field." He shows them the way.

"So, we're in the wrong place for the Woodstock Festival." Kate twirls a sprig of alfalfa between her fingers.

"Woodstock wasn't held at Woodstock. This is Bethel, isn't it, mister?"

The man in front turns around. "The two of you don't even know where you are?"

"Well, it's hard to tell. All alfalfa fields look a like."

The farmer squints his eyes at him. "This is Bethel. This is my field and you're trespassing. Keep walking." He turns back and increases his pace occasionally looking over his shoulder to check whether the two people behind him are keeping up.

"Woodstock was held at Bethel," Jeffrey explains to Kate with a smirk.

"But now it isn't."

"We're gonna make the concert happen. Fix history."

"We could do that, or we could voyage as much as possible, so they can get us home. Fixing history gets in the way of our voyaging time."

"That's true." Jeffrey thinks about it. The sooner they get back to the Island the sooner the Council can get him back to his parents. That is, if they allow him to get back to that alternate history. He can see where that might be problematic for them.

"On the other hand," Kate continues. "What if they're watching, or something, and see that we're constantly leaving red light times, without trying to fix things?"

"That could get us home sooner," Jeffrey suggest. "They will want to give you a stern talking to for not doing your job as a Voyager properly."

"Haha. If they wanted to give me a stern talking to they would have already gotten us home."

"Maybe they are working on their speech."

"I think Joseph can do them at the drop of a hat."

"And maybe they just want us to give history a push here and there."

"Doubtful. I'm not even allowed near an omni without two senior Voyagers supervising."

Jeffrey thinks Kate is joking, but her grim face tells him otherwise. "Why not?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

They reach the road. The farmer tells them to stay off his field in the future, turns around and walks away.

"C'mon. If you did anything that makes the Council not want us back at the Island I want to know about it."

"When I was fourteen I took an omni and nearly caused time to implode."

Jeffrey is stunned. He didn't know such a thing was possible. "How -- how did you do that?"

"I tried to change my own history." She shrugs her shoulders. "You can't change your own history. It's a Catch-22 sort of thing. You can only get situation A if you're in situation B, but if you're in B you don't want A."

Jeffrey gives her a puzzled look.

"I told you that mom died when I was thirteen."

"Yeah."

"I took an omni because I wanted to save her life, but I only wanted to save her life because she had died."

"Makes sense. I would do the same if I had the chance."

"No, you wouldn't, because you're a lot smarter than I am. You see, if I had saved her life, then she wouldn't have been dead at the moment I decided to go back in time to save her, meaning that at that moment I would not go back in time to save her and she would be dead. Then I would want to save her, she would be alive, I wouldn't want to save her, and she would be dead, meaning that I would want to save her ..."

"Please, stop talking. You're making me dizzy."

"Time would get dizzy too, and implode. At least that's what they told me."

"But what about ..." Jeffrey knits his brow. "My history ... I mean, my folks' history was changed. Wouldn't that also lead to time to implode?"

"It doesn't seem to. Council said that you can't change your own history. That doesn't mean someone else can't change your history. I don't believe much in that theory anyway. It's just an old wives' tale. It's Voyagers' job when they encounter a red light to go back in time and give history a push. Doesn't that mean they have just changed their own history? I mean, the wrong history is part of their history, but the wrong history doesn't exist anymore."

"Can't this be explained by Voyagers existing outside Earth time so events on Earth don't affect them?"

Kate squints at him. "That's pretty much also Joseph's argument. I'm not convinced, 'cause how does that combine with the theory of not being able to change your own history?"

"I'm the wrong guy to ask." Jeffrey holds up his hands in surrender. "All I know about time travel is what Bogg told me seven years ago. All I know is: if there's a red light we go and fix it."

"You want to do that now?"

Jeffrey shrugs. "Might as well. If we can't get back to '89, let's go back in time and work that ol' magic."

"Magic?"

"Magic." Jeffrey flexes his brows. "Don't you think voyaging is kinda like magic?"

"No."

"I guess because you grew up with it?"

"That, and because any well-established technology is indistinguishable from magic. I can still distinguish the technology." Kate takes the omni from her belt. "Where do we go from here?"

"Miami, Florida, about a year earlier."

"Your wish is my command."

"Now, let me just rub the magic lamp."

-oOo-

Florida, 200 miles north of Miami, 1968

"It got the year right; that's something."

"And the place just a little bit off," Jeffrey says. "We're a fraction of an inch too far north."

Kate gives him a little push. "We're there."

"I think you just pushed me north. Now we're even further from Miami."

"Sorry. Wanna try the omni again or walk?"

"Or hitchhike." Jeffrey puts up his thumb. A car rushes past them without even slowing down. "In principle."

"Never mind. We're young; the walk will do us good."

"You really don't know much about geography."

"I know a fraction of an inch is about 200 miles. I was just trying to keep our spirits up."

"I rather keep my thumb up." Jeffrey puts up his thumb for the next vehicle approaching them.

A pink van stops a little further ahead. It features peace symbols, a rainbow, several birds and the word love. Kate and Jeffrey run toward it.

"Where are you two heading?"

"Miami."

"Very good. So are we. You are welcome to join us."

"Beats walking."

Jeffrey pulls open the sliding door of the van. The potent air that wafts from the back of the van makes him step back. Kate doesn't seem to be bothered by it and climbs into the van. Jeffrey follows.

"These are Ems and Johnno, my wife Rainbow, and I am Jethro."

"Kate. Jeffrey."

"All right. And we're on our way again."

The van pulls up. Most of its passengers tumble over one another. Kate lands on top of Johnno.

"I'm sorry about that," she says, scrambling up to sit down.

"Don't worry about it. We're all among friends here."

Apart from the front seat there are no seats in the van. There is some carpet on the floor, and some colorful drapes hang on the walls of the van. A number of duffel bags and suitcases is stowed in the back. The passengers make themselves comfortable in the little room that is left.

"It's a good thing we picked you up. It's long walk from here to Miami," Jethro shouts over his shoulder. "How did you two get in the middle of nowhere, anyway?"

"We hitched a bad ride from Tallahassee," Jeffrey replies.

"Tallahassee. I like that word. Tallahassee." Kate nudges Johnno. "First I learned alfalfa, and now Tallahassee. Do you like alfalfa?"

"I've never had any alfalfa."

"Not to eat. It's for cows. But as a word. It's so beautiful. Only tree letters and then they make that word: alfalfa. And than alfalfa itself, have you seen it? It is so, so, ugly."

Ems rolls over in a fit of laughter. Johnno takes the joint she is holding from her hand, he takes a draw and passes it to Kate.

"Uh, Kate." Jeffrey shakes his head at her. Perhaps they should have waited for another ride; Bogg's not going to like if he returns his daughter to him and she's become a druggie.

"I better not. I already feel a little lightheaded." She passes it to Rainbow, who doesn't mind she is already lightheaded, takes a draw and cuddles up against Jeffrey. He looks a little helplessly at Kate. She smiles back at him.

"You wanted to go to Miami."

"Mmmiammmiii." Ems picks herself up. "You can't go to Miami dressed like that."

"What's wrong with the way I dress?"

"Well, it's so, The System. Not for travelers like us."

"Yeah, didn't have travel in mind when I picked this out."

"Good thing we ran into you. We can help you." Ems falls back down. "But you have to wait till we stand still. Things are moving too fast."

"I can wait."

-oOo-

At their next rest stop Ems starts rummaging through her bags and comes up with a long purple dress for Kate, dark brown flairs, a wide white shirt and a vest for Jeffrey. He protests but she insists he wears it.

"Great, now I look just like your dad," he complains to Kate.

Kate looks him over. "My dad never wore a headband."

"Can I braid your hair?" Rainbow asks. She pulls Kate down to sit on the van floor and sits down next to her. "You have beautiful hear. You should let it grow."

"A minor detail," Jeffrey says. He tries to pull the vest straight. He makes an uncomfortable face.

"Yeah, well, I'm not in a garment of my personal choosing either. You want to swap? I take the vest and you take this purple ... tent?"

"Purple is not really my color."

"Nice. Have you come up with an idea yet of what we shall be doing in Miami?"

"Find Michael Lang."

"Yes. How? And what do we say to him?"

"I don't know. I'll think of something when we see him."

"It's not just the way you dress that makes you look like my dad. He also always went in without a plan."

"But it got the job done."

"Not even my dad is using himself as a positive example. Now you stand over there and start thinking of how we will find Michael Lang."

"You're bossy when you're angry."

"What makes you think I'm angry?"

"You look angry."

"Purple isn't my color either."

"Finished," Rainbow says. "Now your other side." They switch sides. "Michael Lang is organizing a concert in Miami. That's where we're going. Join us."

"Sounds good," Jeffrey says. "Some times you got to trust a little in lady luck. " He turns around and leans against the van. "History is all about the right people meeting at the right place and the right time. Voyagers are no different."

"Very philosophical."

"Thanks. I've had five years to think about this."

"Come on everybody, back in the van." Jethro claps his hands. "We still have quite some distance to cover till we get to Miami."

They all get back in the van. Jethro climbs behind the wheel and pulls up. Kate falls over Johnno again.

"Sorry, again. Wait a moment while I untangle myself in this dress."

"Don't worry, take your time, make yourself comfortable."

"That sounds very lovely. I do hope this dress will co-operate with that." Kate pushes herself up, untangles herself from the dress, folds her legs in lotus position and tucks the dress down underneath. "Like this."

The van makes a sudden movement and Kate falls into Johnno's arms.

"Sorry, pothole," Jethro shouts.

"I'm giving up. I can I lie like this for a while?"

"Sure." Johnno pulls her closer. "You comfortable this way?"

"As comfortable as I can be in a van."

"Why are you going to Miami?"

"We heard there was an interesting concert." Johnno starts to laugh. "What's funny about that?"

"It's just the things you say. Tallahassee, alfalfa, interesting concert. No one says concerts are interesting. Except my parents perhaps. You're quite new to this world, aren't you?"

"It's the first time I'm off the Island where I was born, if that's what you mean."

"You're delightful." Johnno rocks Kate from side to side. "On an island, oblivious to the world. This is wonderful."

"Why is that wonderful?"

"You can start completely anew. You must shed your past. Forget everything you learned on that island. What you learned there is not the world you want. You must come along with us; we can teach you what your new world is like."

"I can already see some of that." Kate nods towards Jeffrey and Rainbow. Rainbow tries to kiss Jeffrey; Jeffrey tries to hold her off.

"Jeff, why don't you come sit with us." Johnno beckons him.

Jeffrey says to Rainbow he has to go, pushes her of him and crawls over to Johnno and Kate. Rainbow finds comfort for her loss by putting her head in Ems's lap.

"Johnno thinks I should forget everything I've learned in the past, everything about the life I've had up to now."

"I'd like to forget about the life I've had."

"That's what I want to hear. You must start forgetting now."

"I wish I could. I think it is going to stay with me for the rest of my life."

"Everything can be forgotten. What is so bad that you think it will stay with you forever?"

"I used to be a slave," Jeffrey answers.

"We all used to be slaves. Most people still are. Slaves to their jobs, to their bosses, to their wives, to their neighbors. Slaves to the money they have, slaves to the money they don't have. Takes us, we are not slaves to anyone; we go where we want to go; we follow our dreams."

"So you're slaves to your dreams." Kate concludes.

"Haha. You must be a student of philosophy. The first thing they do is always pick holes in other people's argumentation."

"I've only dabbled a little in philosophy. What are you a student of?"

"I'm a student of history. I just finished a masters in contemporary history."

"Isn't that quite the opposite of what you are professing, to shed my past. You have been completely submerged in it."

"That's how I know we must shed our past. First I thought we should know our past so we could learn from it. But all I learned is that we, mankind that is, keep repeating the same mistakes. What we really need is to get out of this visual circle, shed our past and start a new."

"But how would we, mankind that is, prevent making the same mistakes if we don't even know what they were anymore?"

"There's that philosopher in you again. Part of the reason we keep making the same mistakes is because history is holding us hostage. We are slaves to our past. We want the same things we've always wanted. To keep from making the same mistakes, we must set ourselves new goals. If we follow new dreams, we cannot repeat what we did in the past. We can set history straight this way."

"An interesting theory. Setting history straight."

"We are the children of the future. We can set history straight by not repeating the mistakes of the past."

"Teach history a lesson?"

"Yeah, you're getting the idea."

"I'm also getting an idea about what kind of talk this is." Kate pushes herself up. "It's ridiculous. History can only learn at the moment it is happening. Not after the fact."

"You're not setting you mind free." Johnno sits up as well. "You're still clinging to the past. You must let go of it, Kate." Johnno grabs her by her arms and shakes her lightly. "Let go of it. The past will not make you happy. I know, I've studied the past."

"Have you studied my past?"

"Well, not you personally. But your past is the same as that of millions of young people here in this country, here in this world, forced to pay for the mistakes our parents made, forced to repeat their mistakes. We must break this circle."

"You're getting a bit to intense for me," Kate says.

Johnno doesn't listen, he grips her arms even tighter.

"We must break the circle. Shed the shackles of the past. Follow our dreams. Don't you see it?"

"Right," Jeffrey says. "We must make our own mistakes."

Johnno and Kate look at Jeffrey. He looks back at them openly. Kate chuckles.

"Can you guarantee that, Johnno, that no more mistakes are made if we follow new routes?"

"Uh, I guess there is always the possibility of new mistakes. But that's not a problem. The problem is that we keep repeating the same mistakes. We are stuck in the mud, but we keep stepping on the gas, 'cause that's the only thing that we know how to do. That is just getting us deeper and deeper into the mud. What I'm saying is that we must try new things."

"Like get out and push?" Jeffrey asks

"Yeah. That may also not work to full satisfaction. We could push the car free, but fall over in the mud ourselves."

"That would be a new mistake."

"Yes. But it got things moving again. That's what I mean, we must not repeat the same old things and just keep the wheels spinning. We must do new things, follow new dreams. Get away from the mud."

"I guess you have a point there." Kate admits. "It's new to me, so I have no dreams yet. Tell me about yours. How you found that learning history will help you not make mistakes; what dreams are you going to follow to make new mistakes?"

"I am going to be a singer/song-writer. I've already written a few songs. I can sing them for you."

"Please."

Johnno starts to sing for them. The women join in. Kate is enjoying herself, but Jeffrey starts to look worried.

Johnno's repertoire is only small, and just as they start the second song for the third time, Jethro stops the van, turns off the engine, turns his head and shouts to the people in back: "We're here."

"We're here."

Rainbow pushes open the sliding door and they all spill out of the van. They're on the beach. The evening has fallen. A bright moon helps them see.

"I thought we'd camp out here tonight," Jethro says.

"Is that allowed?" Kate asks.

"You really must start to shed off what you have learned." Johnno tells her.

"What's that?" Kate pointed at the waves rolling in on the beach.

"That's the ocean. Have you never seen one? I thought you said you were born on an island?"

"It's not an island in an ocean."

"Kate. Can I talk to you for a moment?" Jeffrey pulls Kate by her arm away from the others.

"Quite impressive, such an ocean." Kate walks over to the waterline. She lets the water roll over her feet. "This is nice. What do you want to talk about. I saw you look worried."

"I think Johnno and Ems are my parents."

"Uh, Jeff, not every time we meet two people they are your parents."

"Of course not. But they really are. Johnno and Ems? John and Emma."

"A coincidence."

"C'mon. You can see how much Ems looks like me? Same hair, same nose."

"I wasn't really paying attention to that."

"I was, but it didn't hit me until Johnno started to sing. I grew up listening to those songs. They are my folks."

"If you say so." Kate shrugs. "Well, don't do anything that makes them rethink having children."

"And you, stop flirting with my dad."

"I wasn't flirting."

"You're a Bogg. You flirt."

"Do not."

"Do to. Just like Bogg. I couldn't turn my back or he had found himself another girl to kiss."

"I'm not kissing anyone."

"Yet." Jeffrey flexes his brows.

Kate wrinkles up her nose. "They've changed, your parents. They're no at all like the people we met in New York."

"I've never heard my dad talk like that. We must forget about our history? He became professor of modern history."

"Perhaps he changed his mind. Or the pott clouds cleared and he could think clearly again."

"Nothing like an anti-drug use lesson seeing how uncool it makes your own folks."

"Disappointed?"

"No, it's a valuable lesson." Jeffrey gives Kate a wry smile. "We should go back to them. That Rainbow knows Micheal Lang; she could help us get to him. Or do you want to stay here, look some more at the ocean?"

"It's interesting, isn't it, water coming and going." Kate kicks some water to Jeffrey. "Water is a wonderful thing."

"Yes, it is. I'm going now. They're making a nice warm camp fire." He walks away. Kate hitches up her dress and runs after him.

"Kate, Jeffrey, good that you're back. We must symbolically burn your past," Ems says. She picks up two small bundles of clothing and throws them in the fire.

"No!" Kate shouts. She jumps forward to rescue her cloths from the fire. Johnno grabs her around the waist to stop her.

"They're just clothes, Kate. You are still too much attached to the past."

He lets go of her. Kate shuffles back to Jeffrey who's standing by thumbs hanging loosely in the pockets of his pants. It amuses him to think his dad is now burning his own clothes.

"The omni," Kate whispers to Jeffrey. "I don't think it's fireproof."

"That's all right. I have it." Jeffrey shows her the omni hanging on his waistband.

Kate lets out a sigh of relief. "You really are the smartest." She throws her arms around him and leans her head against his shoulder.

"Are you all right?" he asks a little uncomfortable.

"For a moment it flashed through my mind: we're stuck here. As long as we have the omni there's a way out, but without it ..."

"I know the feeling. But we've got the omni; no need to worry. For now."

Kate looks up and smiles at him.

"Let's sit down."

The evening is spend around the camp fire. Johnno sings his songs again, this time while playing the guitar and Ems accompanying him on bongo. A few other people join them, bringing their own instruments and songs. Jeffrey and Kate fall asleep on the beach.

-oOo-

The next morning Jeffrey wakes up with sand in his mouth. It takes him a moment before he remembers where he is. This is the third time in as many days he wakes up in a strange place. There's a purple sack lying next to him. It takes a moment before he remembers who that is. He softly shakes her to wake her up. Her first instinct is to hit the disturbance.

"Kate," Jeffrey whispers. Kate opens her eyes.

"What's the matter? Have you solved the problem?"

"No."

"Then what are you waking me up for?"

"I thought we might have a quick brainstorm together."

"My brain doesn't storm on an empty stomach. So get me some breakfast first, then we talk." Kate pulls her dress back down over her feet. "The nice thing about a tent this big, is that you can use it as a sleeping bag." She closes her eyes again. "Doesn't really matter what you get me for breakfast."

"Quite the morning mood you have."

"I hate it to be woken up before I wake up."

"Right." Jeffrey gets up. "I'll get some breakfast then." He puts his hand in his pocket. He's still got the money his mom gave him to buy clothes. He steps over a few sleeping bodies and starts making his way to the boulevard along the beach.

-oOo-

When he returns Kate is standing on the flood line again letting the water wash over her feet.

"I got you breakfast." He hands her a paper bag.

"I just found out they also burned my shoes," Kate says as she looks into the bag. "Thanks."

"You're welcome. I wouldn't worry about the shoes: lots of hippies walked around barefooted. You'll get used to it."

"I don't mind the walking on my bare feet, for now. It's just that I might like them for our next voyage."

"Before that, we need to think of a way to get a green light here."

"Hmm. Say, do you know a man named Micheal Lang?" Kate asks a man that has just joined them in the flood line.

"Sure. He owns a head shop in town."

"I doubt we can find him there. He's probably busy organizing that concert." Jeffrey shakes his head.

"You mean the Miami Pop Festival? That was two weeks ago."

"You sure? Does that lot know?" Kate points her thumb over her shoulder to the people around the ashes of the camp fire. "Rainbow said they were here for that concert."

"Rainbow's probably not your most reliable source of information."

"That's probably true."

"How reliable are you? Do you know where this head shop is?" Jeffrey asks.

"Sure. I can take you there."

"Good. Lead the way, we'll follow."

The man turns around and starts walking. Kate and Jeffrey follow.

"What's a head shop?" Jeffrey asks.

Kate shrugs. "I grew up on a remote island. I don't know much about the world."

-oOo-

"So that's a head shop," Jeffrey says as they stand in front of the shop. "I could have known this if I hadn't spent the last seven years else where."

"Probably."

"Here you are. That one sitting on the floor is Michael Lang."

"Do you know him?" Kate asks

"Only by reputation. Why did you want to see him? Obviously not for something he is selling here. I bet this is all very new to you."

"I was told yesterday that I should start having new dreams."

"Do you even know what kind of dreams you can get here?"

"Uh." Kate has no answer to that.

"Where not here for ourselves," Jeffrey says. "We're here for our friend Johnno. He's a singer-song writer. Or he's gonna be. His songs are very good. We heard Michael Lang is in music, does management for musicians, that sort of thing. We thought he could be manager for our friend."

"So, why don't you go in?"

"It seemed like a good idea when we were all just sitting around the camp fire singing along."

"Suit yourself. Mind if I pick up on this idea?"

Without waiting for an answer the man enters the shop. Kate and Jeffrey look at one another. Kate pushes open the door. They just missed the start of the introduction.

"... I'm with a rock group called Train. We really could be going places, but for that we need the proper management."

"Wait." Jeffrey takes the omni of his waistband and opens it. "We have a green light."

"We do?" Kate is surprised. "You mean we just gave history a push? Wow. I've got shivers. I imagined it would be harder." She smiles from ear to ear.

"It usually is. Sometimes all you need is a little luck."

"I guess so. And what was our bit of luck?"

"That man is with a group called Train. In December of this year Michael Lang will go to New York to sign up this group for a record deal."

"How did you know that? The man never introduced himself to us."

"I didn't know that. I just remembered that my dad told me that Micheal Lang was a manager of a rock group. I just told it here to give us a reason for being here. And he picked up on that. It was luck."

"Whatever it was. It's my first green light. I feel proud."

"Yeah, it feels good." Jeffrey can't help but smiles from ear to ear too. Part of him thinks it's great to be on the road again.

"What happens next?"

"Well, Lang goes to New York, where he meets all the other people with whom he organizes Woodstock Festival. The rest is history as they say."

"I meant with us. What happens next with us?" Kate pulls on one of her pig tails. "What shall we do now? Do you want to go back to the beach"?

"Better not," Jeffrey says after a moments hesitation. "We have a green light now. I don't want to mess that up.

Let's try if we can get to 1989 now."

"Sounds good."

Jeffrey sets the omni. "Ready?" Kate grabs his arm and nods. "Here goes nothing." He pushes the trigger button.

They look at each other. Kate bites her lip.

"Let's go somewhere else," Jeffrey says. "I heard there was this interesting concert, about 50 miles south of Woodstock."

Kate squeezes his arm in reply. Jeffrey sets the dials to August 16, 1969.

-oOo-

"Back in the alfalfa field," Kate says to Jeffrey. "It looked a lot better last time we were here."

"That's what happens when 500,000 people plow through a field."

A blond girl puts her arms around Jeffrey. "I love you." Then she gives Kate the same treatment. "Peace." She moves on to other people.

"Was that Rainbow?"

"Could be. I see another familiar face over there."

"Hey, Jeffrey, Kate." Johnno waves at them. "Imagine meeting again here, among all these people." He gives them both a hug. "Where did you go so suddenly? We really missed you in Miami."

"We had some things to do that couldn't wait."

"How have you been? Still telling people to let go of their past?"

Johnno grins sheepishly. "Actually, no, Kate. I've gone back to the past. I have a position now at Columbia University."

"You've gone all responsible."

"Worse even. I got married. Ems is expecting our first."

"Congratulations."

"Jeffrey is a very good name for a boy."

Kate nudges Jeffrey in his side in a reflex.

"Thanks, I'll remember that. I should get back to Ems. You wanna come along?"

"No, we should get back to our own group." Jeffrey makes a vague gesture in another direction.

"Well, it was good seeing you again." Johnno greats them and walks away.

"Jeff, you can't suggest a name for yourself to your parents."

"As it happens I was named after one of my grandfathers. His name was Geoffrey."

"Okay," Kate says thoughtfully, carefully eyeing Jeffrey. "I'll except that."