Hannah and I ended up at the office after lunch today. We had a chance to talk a little before going separately into the field for… that measuring/talking/looking stuff we do.
Her dream, everyone decided, was probably one of those metaphysical connections—and if so, our first glimpse at the time-travelers who ended up in 1984. That would be the Emma shifted from 2024 and the Merritt, Hannah, and Kent shifted from 1880.
“So,” Hannah said, “it was the doctor version of me… The UT Knoxville version of you, the Pinkerton agent version of Kent, and Emma, who had left Vicksburg on the way to Memphis.”
“Agreed,” I said.
The other Hannah and I had gone through all of the NY SysCo files from 1984 and found where Hannah and Merritt had been hired, but nothing indicated they ever got a paycheck. It seemed like they had declined the jobs after most of the paperwork was already done.
Hannah went on. “There’s a big gap between the shift days and October. What are they doing? Where are they? And how did they get there?”
“Kent pointed out based on the shifts we know for sure that his 1984 had been in the Bronx and ended up in Memphis, so the Pinkerton Kent would have ended up in the Bronx. Doctor Hannah would have ended up in Syracuse. Merritt took my place… from a train to the car…”
Hannah shook her head. “Seems he didn’t die in a car crash…”
I reviewed what she had remembered from the dream. “Trainees… coming there to the wilderness…”
“I’m going with Kent’s idea,” Hannah replied. “What could people from 1880 be training people to do in 1984?”
I nodded. “Roughing it… Living off the land… how to make a fire. How to live without electricity… Basic first aid…”
“It’s a good guess,” Hannah added. “And Emma is helping them learn the ropes of a new century.”
I nodded again. “We don’t have much, but at least we know they… are doing something… somewhere…”
Hannah nodded. “It’s not much… But it’s something.”
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