Paradox

Jumpmaster Press

Birmingham, Alabama

Copyright Notice

PARADOX, a novel by E.G. Rowley

Copyright ©2018 all rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of Jumpmaster Press and E.G. Rowley, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, alive or dead, is entirely coincidental. Registered trademarks and service marks are the property of their respective owners.

Cover Art by Sébastien Decoret

Library Cataloging Data

Names: Rowley, E. G. (Eugene George Rowley) 1970-

Title: PARADOX / E. G. Rowley

5.5 in. × 8.5 in. (13.97 cm × 21.59 cm)

Description: Jumpmaster Press digital eBook edition | Jumpmaster Press Trade paperback edition | Alabama: Jumpmaster Press, 2018. P.O Box 1774 Alabaster, AL 35007 info@jumpmasterpress.com

Summary: Jonathan Messer creates a time machine. The moment he activates it, a series of tragic events and an incredible, universe-spanning adventure begins.

Identifiers: ePCN: 2017959951 | ISBN-13: 978-1-949184-99-0 (ebk.) | 978-0-692-96668-6 (POD) | 978-1-949184-00-6 (trade) | 978-1-949184-01-3 (hardcover)

1. Science Fiction 2. Time Travel 3. Universe 4. Paradox Theory 5. Adventure 6. Many-Worlds Interpretation 7. Physics

For more information on E.G. Rowley

www.egrowley.com

Table of Contents

PARADOX

Copyright Notice

Acknowledgments

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Epilogue

Excerpt from Anna: a Paradox Story

Coming Next from E.G. Rowley

Also by E.G. Rowley

About the Author

Acknowledgments

I want to thank my parents, Dr. Eugene Rowley Sr. and Lee Miller, two of the most creative, humorous and driven people I know. Never giving up is part of my DNA.

This work would not be possible without the steadfast love and support of Mandy Rowley, my wife, who stands by me every time I come up with another crazy idea; or without my three wonderful daughters, Amanda, Samantha and Jessica - my muses.

I want to salute R. Kyle Hannah, for his service to our country, for his inspiration to keep me writing and for his unwavering friendship. Airborne, sir!

My dear friends, Hallee and Gregg Bridgeman. This page is not long enough to acknowledge the impact you have had on my life, my family, my children or my relationship with God. Thank you for constant friendship, guidance in this writing journey and your love in Christ.

Finally, thank you to my fellow time travelers and fans of Science Fiction across the entire multi-universe!

Prologue

Jonathan Messer created a universe with

the flip of a 67¢ Radio Shack switch.

"T hat is why you must die!" the dark figure said, removing a black handgun from inside his coat.

But I... Jonathan began to say, his words abruptly silenced by the man who stood over him.

No! the man said in monotone through clenched teeth, You can’t be allowed to do this. I have to finish this. It’s the only way.

Jon knelt before him. Cold dew soaked through his pants and bit at his knees. Suddenly, Jon’s eyes were drawn past the dark figure, through the open wooden gate. He thought he saw the shimmering silhouette of another man moving in their direction. The figure appeared, vanished in the shadows, only to instantly return, closer to them. The apparition moved with incomprehensible speed but didn’t make a sound, so quick and nimble that Jon wondered for a split second if it were real.

The dark, dirty figure in front of him remorsefully lifted Jon’s face to his own and looked deeply into his eyes. With dreadful finality he said, I’m sorry, Jon. I’m so, so sorry. This must end. This paradox is the only way. The voice sounded familiar.

Jon looked into his would-be killer’s face. In shock, he thought, Older? Not much, if any. Haggard? Yes. Weary? Perhaps. How can this be?

Deep creases of stress and anguish slashed across the man’s forehead. Behind the thin black hair of his left eyebrow, a familiar faint scar peeked out. A tiny, telltale pink discoloration between white, unmolested skin—something only visible after seeing it the mirror for as long as one could remember. The man’s grimy black hair sprawled in all directions, cut to just above the ears—how Jon cut his hair. His mouth, downturned at the edges as though saddened by these events yet determined to finish the gruesome ordeal.

Jon knelt frozen in the man’s eyes - familiar eyes. They screamed of his torment, of his overwhelming anguish and pain. They bore into Jon, through him, as though searching for something...something familiar, but lost.

Finding a bit of courage, Jon said, You’re the guy stalking me, the homeless man across the street. You were in my house last...

My house! the man roared, cutting him off. He raised the huge weapon, barely holding it steady. I’ve been through so much, Jon. It has to end. The gun shook in his hand as though a shred of doubt had entered his mind, or because he hadn’t slept in... Days? Years? How many universes ago did he last sleep?

Jon didn’t recognize the shape of the firearm. It did not look like any gun he had seen before, but even in the placid morning light, he could readily make out the giant barrel as it moved past his face, over his pleading eyes to rest against his forehead. The cool metal tickled his skin. Jon closed his eyes and thought, this is how I am going to die.

Without warning, something knocked them both backward. Jon felt the gun rip away from his forehead as he sprawled in the darkness. A deafening crash blasted next to his head as the gun fired, the bullet ripping just passed his ear. He grabbed his head and rolled away screaming, but what he heard came as a muffled wail drowned by the piercing ringing in his skull.

He righted himself. In the darkness, he saw two men clenched together both struggling for the weapon. They stumbled toward the side door of the house grunting and clawing each other. The gun fired again, in a flash, and dirt flew at him as he struggled to his feet. Dazed and reeling from the explosion next to his head, he tried to get to his feet but crumpled to the wet grass as though his legs had lost their will to stand. The two men fought in the dark, crashing through the side door into the garage. Jon tried to stand again, this time more steadfast. He heard shouting from the garage and clamored forward as a brilliant flash tore through the windows, forcing him to turn his head. The intense burst accompanied a quiet pop like someone setting off an Indian Reservation firecracker, underwater. Another gunshot? he thought. The smell of pre-thunderstorm air drifted passed him.

As rapidly as it had begun, it ended and from what Jon heard, the flash from the garage did not accompany a scream. From the side door, one of the men emerged. Jon lurched backward and tried to escape. The man marched straight for him. Jon took a wobbly step backward and almost fell again. The man placed a strong, steady hand on his shoulder as Jon looked up and saw his own smiling face reflected back.

You’re safe, my friend, the stranger announced.

For the second time that night, Jon looked at his own features. Right down to the little scar in his eyebrow.

Chapter 1

A few days ago

"J on, you’re an absolute genius!" Kyle shouted. He shouted, mainly in awe, but partly because of the intense noise filling the room. He stood, cautiously, in front of The Machine, as Jon called it. He didn’t much care for technical, overly scientific stuff, but he loved Jon’s inventions nevertheless. The ones that worked, that is. He even used some of them in his house. His wife, Trisha, raved about the magic trashcan Jon had made for her. However, Kyle didn’t know what to make of Jon’s latest contraption.

Kyle, a relatively short man with dark blonde hair and too much forehead, as Jon often joked, took good care of himself and loved the gym. He stayed in good shape for thirty-eight and, apart from his gradually receding hairline, spent his share of time chiding Jon about his own appearance. Regardless, Jon and Kyle had been friends for as long as either of them could remember. They worked together at Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, AL. Jon worked as a Senior Mechanical Engineer specializing in advanced avionics systems, while Kyle served as the Logistics Personnel Department Manager.

From behind the control console, Jon smiled. He stood tall, dark-haired and lean for his forty-one years. He stayed in shape due mostly to his love of the outdoors. When he didn’t spend his time working or inventing, Jon loved backpacking or rock climbing.

The machine rattled, popped and hummed so loudly that it sounded to Kyle, like a jackhammer. Metal parts clanged together, shaking violently, and it looked as if at any moment the whole thing could fly apart into a thousand pieces of shrapnel, killing them both. It sat mounted on a shabby wooden table made from old shipping pallets Jon had scavenged from behind the Walmart. Kyle thought, somewhere tonight a homeless guy is missing a wall to his shanty.

During Jon’s clean getaway from the Walmart loading dock, some of the pallets had been smashed while others remained usably intact. Jon had brought them back to his garage and nailed them together without any regard for visual appeal, or for that matter, structural integrity. On top of this shoddy base, he had attached a scrap piece of plywood leftover from the mending job they did on the front porch roof, of which Kyle distinctly remembered doing most of the work. The machine itself sat on a square, white plastic base, two inches thick and eighteen inches on a side. A concave indentation, had been carved from the center, similar to the result of a bowl of hot water being set on a block of ice. To Kyle it appeared perfectly smooth, but with the machine running and clanging away, he dared not move closer for a proper inspection. Circling the central indentation, or the cup, as Jon called it, an inch deep, inch wide groove had been cut from the plastic. Jon referred to this as, the channel. According to the cursory explanation Jon gave him, while the machine remained off, twenty-seven steel balls sat in the cup and twenty-seven more sat in the channel. After activating the machine, the spheres in the cup formed nine rotating sets of three, while the balls in the channel formed a perfect circle around them.

Jon’s theory postulated that, once energized, the rapidly changing magnetic influences of the spheres would create the desired effect in the center of the device. He once tried to explain this desired effect to his wife, Mary.

See, of the four fundamental forces, gravity is the weakest while electromagnetism is actually the second strongest. What I hope to accomplish is to have magnetism fold in on itself by changing the magnetic properties of the steel balls billions of times a second, outside of gravity’s relatively weak pull. Because the space in the center of the device will exist in almost constant and instantaneous flux, it should warp space-time around it, without the required mass.

Mary’s extensive education consisted of music and business administration and, as usual, Jon had picked the worst time to try and explain complex physics theories to her. Mhmm, she remarked absently from across the table amid Vrooms and Choo-choos while trying to coax the baby to eat.

Jon continued, undeterred. "The Germans built something similar during World War II, using counter-rotating streams of a purple mercury-like substance. Die Glocke, they called it. From what I could find about it online, the principle seemed sound, but they lacked the technology to focus it. Today, we can very accurately control the harmonic resonance. According to conspiracy theorists, it disappeared into time during one of its tests, actually creating a stable wormhole and taking an Army officer along with it."

Here comes the train into the station. Choo-Choo! That’s all very interesting, honey, Mary had said absently.

Today however, his invention actually did what he intended it to do. After the initial sparks and smoke cleared, Kyle watched the metal spheres as they revolved around the plastic base. The inner bearings, in sets of three, spun at almost imperceptible speed, each set spinning clockwise while the collective group rotated in the opposite direction. The outer ring oscillated chaotically and much slower. All the spheres shook violently and smashed against one another. In the center of this noise and chaos though, Kyle saw stillness, like the shimmering reflection off the surface of a pond.

Does it actually work, or does it just make that god-awful racket? Kyle yelled over the metallic clanging of steel bearings.

We’ll know in a week or so, but all my instruments say that it is running just fine, Jon yelled from behind the controls. You see, I have to keep it activated for the effect to work. It only works from the moment you turn it on. Theoretically, I should be able to come in here tomorrow and send myself a message yesterday... well, today. He chuckled. It all gets a bit confusing.

Right, so you turn it on now and anytime in the future, you can return to this point? Kyle yelled.

This point or any point during, as long as the machine keeps running. Theoretically, if I left it running for ten years, I could send myself a message ten years back in time, or three days, or five minutes.

Kyle bent over to look under the crashing silver-colored balls. How do you determine when in the past stuff comes back? I mean, how do you know when to send something? He examined the makeshift base, which appeared solid and immobile despite the cacophony of motion, energy and sound inches above it.

On the controls over here, Jon shouted. The timer measures how long the device is running, and then I set an exact time when I want stuff to come through.

How exact? Kyle challenged.

The timer measures milliseconds, but I only need to set it to the nearest second. The time at the destination is irrelevant because I am working from the machine’s timer, not a clock at the destination, Jon explained.

Oh, like you send something back to five minutes after the device started, or five years, because the timer keeps counting.

Correct. It’s a simple way to measure non-linear time linearly, especially when you know the exact starting point. The Mayans used a similar counting system. It is how they kept such accurate calendars. I can set it for any time I want, one day later or fifteen million days later.

Amazing! Kyle declared and shook his head. Absolutely amazing! He moved to join Jon at the controls. What are all these other settings for?

Jon pointed at various flashing lights, dials, and buttons. These control the precise frequency of the magnetic field. Because the alternating frequency needs to be balanced so accurately, I built it into the control station. I can adjust the frequency if I ever need too. Although, I’ll be honest, now that it’s running, I don’t know if I’ll ever need too.

What are you going to do with it, and how long do you think you’ll leave it on? Kyle asked. And why is it so loud?

I don’t know how long I’ll leave it on, Jon shouted in reply. As long as possible, I’d imagine. As for its use, only the future can tell. If something tragic happens, I send myself a message and supposedly change the outcome. Maybe I’ll bet on horse races or baseball games, but I didn’t build it for that. I built it for scientific discovery. As far as the noise... He smiled and shrugged his shoulders.

Kyle turned to face his friend. Horse races, huh? Now there’s an idea I can endorse. If this thing works, you’re going to be known as the greatest inventor in history! He clapped Jon on the shoulder and stepped away from the noisy machine. Seriously, though, you need to do something about how loud the thing is. Both men laughed as they moved into the kitchen and shut the garage door, muffling the overpowering noise.

During dinner, they talked about what they would do if Jon’s time machine actually worked, everything from gambling to changing world events. They mused about ending hunger and sending back valuable future technology. The talk soon turned back to how the machine worked, something Kyle swore he would never understand.

Look, Jon said, think about this. If I put a bowling ball in the middle of a mattress, what would happen to the surface of the mattress?

It would sink down a little, Kyle acknowledged.

Right, so what would happen if I rolled a softball past the bowling ball on the mattress? Jon quizzed, leading his friend.

It would curve a bit. I saw something like that on the Discovery channel. Something about Einstein.

Yes! Jon affirmed hastily and laughed a bit. The mass of the bowling ball warps the surface of the mattress, causing the softball to change its path, to arc around it and speed up a little. Einstein suggested this is indeed what happens to space, around every object with mass. Matter changes the geometry of space itself. My theory is that events do almost the same thing, even though the common perception is that events have no mass. Applying Einstein’s theory to mine and continuing to use mass we can theorize that relatively minor events have less mass and events that we consider major, would affect space-time around them more significantly.

So, the stuff we do and events that happen to us changes the space around us? Kyle asked.

Basically, yes. To truly grasp the concept, you have to break the rules a little bit and assign a numeric value to events, like the bowling ball’s mass. With events, use a probability factor instead of a mass value.

Kyle nodded, Okay.

Jon continued, Think about this, if you put an empty gun to your head and pulled the trigger, what would happen?

Nothing, Kyle answered.

Right. I call this a ‘non-real’ event in space or time because there is only one outcome. It’s a sure thing. Its probability is both zero and one hundred percent, depending on your point of view. Kyle looked confused. In other words, there is a one hundred percent probability that the gun will not go off and zero probability that it would.

Kyle’s expression changed, and he nodded. Now, if we put a loaded gun to your head, knowing there’s a bullet in the chamber, and pulled the trigger, what would happen then?

I would blow my brains out, Kyle replied and made a splattering sound with his mouth.

Jon smiled, Or? He waved a finger in the air to stretch the question out.

Or the gun would misfire, Kyle said.

Right! Jon announced and pumped his fist in the air. In that case, there are two possible outcomes, each with some degree of probability. The higher probability is that the gun would fire, and you would shoot yourself. The smaller probability is that the gun would not fire, and you’d be fine. Stay with me now, here’s where I blow your mind, no pun intended. He smiled and leaned forward. In space-time, at the quantum level, both events actually occur.

After a few seconds trying to process, Kyle let out a sigh, I don’t get it.

Since the event itself exists in space-time, then the outcome must also exist in space-time. Therefore, if there are two possible outcomes, both outcomes must also exist, regardless of their probabilities.

You’re saying that the gun went off in one space-time reality and not in another? Kyle asked.

Right.

So, in some other dimension or something, I would be dead? Kyle mused.

Not another dimension, but another universe.

Another universe? Now we’re talking about parallel universes?

Other universes yes, but not parallel at all. Jon poked his hands in the air, pointing randomly. What happens is that for every event in space-time, other universes are created based on the possible outcomes. Our lives, or what some call consciousness, usually follows the path of highest probability. We just can’t perceive the shifting paths of our consciousness, that’s all. Sometimes we exist in the universe of the less likely outcome. We typically call that luck. Other times when we follow a universal path with an extremely small probability, we call it a fluke or something like that. In each case, another completely distinct, completely real universe is created. We just don’t know it because we can only see one universe at a time, or at least I believe we only experience one universe at a time. However, sometimes…

Kyle cut him off and glanced up from his plate. How many universes are there?

Infinite, Jon replied. Think about it. Every decision by every person that ever lived spawned a wholly new universe, sometimes several. Trying to figure out how many exist could cause a guy to go nuts. It gets crazier when multi-verse theorists start to talk about these universes colliding and interacting. That’s when things get fun, Jon said and finished off the last of his beer.

So, these multiple universes can touch and collide? What happens when they do? You always see on TV that if two identical things touch, the universe implodes, or explodes or something like that.

"Well, nobody knows for certain. It’s not like Star Trek or Doctor Who or something. Some scientists think that it messes with the law of cause and effect. You want another?" Jon asked and held up his glass.

Yeah, thanks. Kyle downed the last of his beer and held out his glass. Jon grabbed it on the way to the kitchen. Kyle raised his voice after him, Cause and effect? He cleared his throat. Like every action is followed by an equal and opposite reaction, right?

Jon walked back into the dining room and put Kyle’s fresh beer down in front of him. Sort of like that. What you actually quoted is Newton’s Third Law of Motion, but it’s a close approximation. Cause and effect is more like what we talked about earlier, event and outcome. The actual Law of Cause and Effect" states that every human thought, word, and deed is a cause that sets off a wave of energy throughout the universe which in turn creates the effect, whether desirable or undesirable.

Every thought?

Yeah, every thought. It gets a little weird, but we know that every cause has an effect and every effect becomes the cause of something else, an unseen chain of events. Jon took a sip from his refreshed glass. And it gets even stranger, he continued. If I don’t pinch you, can you feel the pain from it?

No, because the pinch never happened.

"Have you ever