Thrice up on a Time by James P. Hogan

Author:James P. Hogan [Hogan, James P.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction
Published: 2011-03-27T00:00:00+00:00

"Ooh...That was simply awful," she moaned. She leaned back and watched despairingly while Murdoch tossed the cushion back onto the sofa, then said, "Try being serious instead. What's the latest news with your grandfather's machine? I've been hoping you'd have something exciting to tell me."

"There is"' Murdoch told her. "I was saving it until after dinner." Anne pulled herself up into a more attentive position and raised her eyebrows expectantly. Murdoch hunched forward in the chair to prop his elbows on his knees, and paused for a moment to collect his thoughts.

Although the machine was not, strictly speaking, secret, there was an unvoiced agreement among the members of the team that the time was not yet ripe for outsiders to be aware of the nature of the experiments. But Anne, being Anne, had been naturally curious about the work Murdoch was involved with, and as time went by he had found himself letting slip odd hints that he hoped might suffice as answers to her questions without giving too much away. In no time, however, she had fitted the pieces together for herself, and bit by bit led him to fill in the rest of the story.

At first she had thought the whole thing to be an elaborate joke on Murdoch's part.

However, as it became clear that he was being absolutely serious, her incredulity had given way to a rational, though astounded, acceptance of the whole thing.

Although Charles had taken well to Anne, Murdoch had not as yet mentioned anything to him about how much she knew of what was happening at Storbannon. Although Murdoch himself had no qualms about Anne's discretion, he did have mild apprehensions regarding Charles's possible reaction. Later, Murdoch was sure, when Charles had had a chance to get to know her even better, would be a more suitable time. It was one of those things that would always sound better tomorrow.

"We think we've more or less got the model figured out," Murdoch said. "Qualitatively, at least...A rigorous, quantitative theory will probably take years to come together. The model is dynamic in the way that we figured it had to be, but the latest indications are that it's far more stable than we'd expected."

"How do you mean, stable?" Anne asked.

"The particle threads that are woven together to form the timeline are not static,"

Murdoch replied. "They vibrate within limits defined by quantum uncertainty. In fact we're beginning to suspect that the Uncertainty Principle of classical physics might be nothing more than a manifestation of the fluctuations in threads passing through a particular universe."

"Yes, I remember that," Anne said. "What we call chance events have their roots down at that level. That was how it was possible for the timeloops not to be permanent fixtures."

"Right. Sometimes a quantum-level event can have effects at the macroscopic level. When that happens, the timeline can reconfigure itself spontaneously such that the part of the total pattern affected by the event can alter itself macroscopically all the way through from that point on.

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