Chapter 22
In a West End town, a dead end world
The East End boys and West End girls
A West End town, a dead end world
East End Boys, West End girls
West End girls
West End girls
West End girls
(How far have you been?)
– Pet Shop Boys (West End Girls)
=/\=
In 2192, Rick knew nothing of what had transpired just over nine hundred years later. He had enough to worry about.
He walked out of the house and back toward the two headstones. He put his hand on top of Doug's. "So, Gramps," he said, "ya got any idea what the hell is going on?"
At that moment, something turned, and the change apparently, finally, caught up with him.
From inside Joss and Jia's house, they looked out the window at the back. "Who is that guy?" Norri asked, referring to Rick, who was now an utter stranger to her.
"I'm sure I don't know," Melissa replied, "and I don't like him standing over there by Doug's stone and touching it like that. It's disrespectful."
Jia went into the living room and picked up little Jay. "I wish Joss was home," she said.
Malcolm touched a pocket. For some reason, he was armed. He had no idea that he had used that same hand phaser, only a few hours previously, to carve a mock headstone with an inscription referencing one Richard M. Daniels – or that the M. stood for Malcolm. He took the phaser out and told the women, "Stay in here. I shall handle this."
He walked over to Rick, who looked at him and said, "I can't figure out what's going on."
"I'll tell you what's bloody well going on," Malcolm said, a bit angrily, taking out the hand phaser, "You're trespassing. And you are bothering my family. I suggest you leave at once."
"Malcolm, what's gotten into you?"
"What? How'd you know?"
Lili came out, despite Malcolm's earlier warning. "What's going on? Who are you?" she asked Rick.
"You don't remember me?" Rick asked, more than a little hurt by that.
"I've never seen you before. Ever," she said.
"You and I, uh, you started working on the NX-01 after I had left. I had been a steward there," Rick said, figuring that would be more familiar than going into a full-blown description of his years as a time traveler.
"That's not helping," Lili said absently, and then she noticed Malcolm holding the hand phaser, "It's, I think it's all right, love. This man was just leaving, right?"
"I know you're Lili O'Day," Rick said, "I know the names of your kids, and I know how you and your first husband met," Rick said, and then told them.
Norri and Melissa came out to join them. "What's going on?" Melissa asked.
"I, I know that you have a bunch of sisters, and the names all start with the letter M," Rick said to her, "and I know you're somewhere in the middle of the birth order. And you," he said to Norri, "you're, uh, you have a doctorate. And you're in the middle of writing a book about the first human settlers in this system."
He felt in his shirt for his jewelry, figuring it would be his trump card in explaining things. He pulled out the chain that hung around his neck, fully expecting to find the dull grey skeleton key charm that was the same as the one Lili always wore. Instead, all he found was an engraved Xindi initiation medal, engraved with the initials, RMD. He began to fumble around, more fully panicking.
"What's the matter?" Norri asked.
"I – oh God – I've gotta take my ship," thankfully, the Wells was still parked near the Reed house, and it seemed to be intact, "and, and I need to head back to 3110, and, and figure out where the divergence occurred."
"Divergence?" Lili asked.
"It looks an awful lot like, in the current, alternate reality – and this is an alternate, even if none of you see it that way – that I've never been born."
=/\=
In 3110, Bryce Unger heard all sorts of alarms going off, just as he heard a Communications chime informing him of the presence of a new, written PADD message.
It was the red alert klaxon. Somewhere, within the vast network of offices that made up the interior of the USS Adrenaline, a phaser or a disruptor had been fired.
He ran through a fast security protocol. The shot had been in one of the offices in the Human Unit, on the side facing away from the galactic core. Only the most junior of that unit's employees would have offices there – Dan Beauchaine, Polly Porter or HD Avery.
It had already been a lousy day, and that was a gross, insensitive understatement. Yarin and Castillo were dead. Time had been restored, probably, although, so far, it didn't seem like it was all back. He was beginning to suspect most of them and he hated that. He did not want to get into hot water with the Federation. It was bad enough that there had been an affair with a resultant murder-suicide. But he and the Department would be able to weather that particular storm if not too much else happened that was truly scandalous. And now a phaser blast! Would this day from hell never end?
=/\=
In 2192, Tom was blindfolded and brought to an encampment. They removed his blindfold and he saw around him the same few people who had initially grabbed him – Jennifer Crossman, Tripp Tucker, Beth Cutler Tucker, Chip Masterson and Lucy Stone Masterson.
But now they were in a cave, and there were a few more people – two younger people of part-Asian extraction, a man and a woman. Plus there was a guy, probably the son of the Mastersons, and a pair of younger folk who were probably the offspring of the Tuckers. And a male Calafan, probably about fifty or so, with mature coppery calloo that was patterned a bit like an old-fashioned printed circuit diagram.
"I'm Takara," said the part-Asian woman, "and this is my brother, Takeo. Over there is my husband, Charlie Tucker. His sister, Betsy, and her husband, Ken Masterson, are over there. Treve here," she indicated the Calafan, "is Jennifer's husband."
Takeo got up. "You'll help us against the Empress?"
"Yeah," Tom said, "but my primary goal is to get a time ship back, preferably with the guy who nabbed it, but he can be dead or alive, I reckon."
"Got it," Takara said, "and what are you gonna do about our dear old mother?"
"Mother?" Tom asked.
"We're the third and fourth of the Empress's five," Takeo explained. "The first two are Kira and Arashi and last one's Izo."
"What about Jun?" Tom asked.
"Jun?" Takara asked, "We don't have any brother with that name." And Tom knew that, somehow, Rick Daniels had been wiped from history.
=/\=
Girls
East End boys
And West End girls
And West End girls
(... forever)
And West End girls
(How far have you been?)
East End boys
The West End girls
The West End boys
And West End girls
The West End girls
The West End boys
The West End girls,/em
– Pet Shop Boys (West End Girls)
Next (and finale): He Stays a Stranger