Colin’s
facial expression and body language had Ryan freaking. Colin never let anything
bother him. “Colin, you’re scaring me a little. What’s going on?”
Colin
practically threw a beacon at him. “We need you to come back. The timeline’s
all over the place. Thank God no paradoxes. It’s a good thing the building is
protected by the chronometric cocoon. Liam thinks it might be because you’re
here in the past.”
“I
can’t go back. The Tribunal will reinstate the death penalty.” Ryan stated
matter-of-factly.
“Duncan
said he’d handle the Tribunal.” He turned to face Ethan. “I’m really sorry man.
I know this sucks in a major way. We’ll figure something out so that the two of
you can be together.” With that he reached over and pushed the button on the
beacon that Ryan was holding, then his own.
As
soon as they materialized the paradox alarm sounded. Duncan, who was monitoring
the wildly fluctuating timeline, hit the emergency reverse button, sending Ryan
and Colin back to the past. Ryan turned to Colin just as Ethan threw himself
into his arms, his joy in seeing Ryan again very much in evidence. “What the
hell just happened?”
“The
hell if I know. Let me go back by myself and see what happens.” Colin dematerialized
then rematerialized a couple of minutes later. “No paradox alarm, but the
timeline is still all over the place.” Each man is silent as they tried to
figure out what was going wrong. Suddenly Colin spoke up, “Let’s try something.
Let’s bring Ethan forward with you. Since he’s already been to the future,
maybe everything will straighten out.”
“Sounds
good to me.” Ryan replied, wrapping his arms around Ethan and hitting the
button on his beacon. The results were the same. Upon returning to Ethan’s
house, the two men started pacing, each trying to come up with a solution to
their problem.
Colin
was the first to speak up as the same idea occurred to both men. “If I remember
correctly, the last time this happened was because the two of you came forward
without Chris.” He turned to Ethan. “We should try to bring the two of you
forward at the same time. Where’s Chris?”
Ethan
gave his watch a quick glance before answering. “He’s at work. He should be
home in an hour.”
Ryan
shot Ethan a lascivious look. “I know how we can spend the next hour.” Ethan
responded to that statement with a huge, shit-eating grin and waggled his
eyebrows.
Colin
rolled his eyes. “Get a room, you two.”
Ethan
shot him a smirk. “We have one,” he replied as he grabbed Ryan’s hand and
pulled him upstairs. A little under an hour they came back downstairs freshly
showered with satisfied looks on their faces.
Just
as Chris was walking in the door Colin blurted out, “Could you two be any
louder?”
Chris
walked up to Colin, extending his hand, which Colin shook. “It’s good to see
you, Colin. Could who be any louder?” He asked, pretty sure he already knew the
answer.
Colin
rolled his eyes towards the stairs. “Oh yeah, baby, just like that. Harder!
Fuck me harder!” He mocked, just as Ryan and Ethan came down the stairs.
Ethan
smirked at him and said, “The devil didn’t
make me do it, I chose to!” That statement made everyone laugh until everyone
turned serious. Chris was quickly brought up to speed on what had happened and
how they proposed to fix it.”
Chris hesitated and rightfully so,
considering what happened to make them return to the past. “What if we get sick
again? I don’t know if I can go through that again. I don’t want to, and I know
Ethan would rather not go through that again.” Ethan nodded his agreement, his
facial expression clearly indicating that the possibility of getting deathly ill
again never occurred to him.
“We’ve got that covered,” Colin
assured them. “Apparently the two of you lack some kind of antibody to the
allergen that made you both so ill. I understand it’s something that developed
naturally in our bodies after the fourth world war. The two of you, coming
straight from the past, wouldn’t have them. Anyway, Doctor Korotas has
injections ready for you once we get back.
“Yes!”
Ryan exclaimed, pumping his fist in the air. “I knew he’d figure it out. Let’s go!” Colin passed out beacons to
everyone and within seconds they were all standing in the travellator control
room, silence all around them as they listened for the sound of the paradox
alarm. Nothing. After a few seconds the computer chirped and announced, “Timeline
restoration complete.”
Complete pandemonium broke out in
the control room as everyone was laughing and hugging each other. Even Doctor
Korotas joined in after injecting Ethan and Chris with the antibodies they
would need to live in the future. Duncan joined them shortly with a couple of bottles
of champagne. Finally, life was back on track for everyone.
Or was it?
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