Dallas 1963 -Discontinued(Maybe...)

Chapter 27

WE WALKED INTO an Irish restaurant and hid
around the door. "Well, there I am," Five said. I
looked over to an old man sitting at the bar. He was
writing something down, the briefcase resting at
his feet.

"Why don't we just grab the briefcase and
run?" Luther asked. I snorted. "Luther, I would
never let that happen. We're trained to guard those
briefcases with our lives."

"Right," Luther realized. "Plus, it's the inherent
paradox where this gets tricky. I'm endangering my
existence just being in the room with myself," Five
stated. "Huh- What do you mean?" Luther asked. I
hit him lightly.

"Luther, try to keep up. If this plan
somehow goes to shit and we screw up, he could
end up not traveling back to 2019 like he's
supposed to. It would completely unravel
evervthing we've done to get back to our world would cease to exist. Got it?"

"I get you," Luther replied, though I could hear the
hesitation in his voice. "So our best chance is to
talk with him, to reason with him," Five told us.

"Ah."

"He'll understand," Five said, still looking very
nervous.

"Trust me. I know myself better than,
uh...better than I know myself," he continued,
scratching his neck.

"You just itched your neck!" Luther exclaimed, stating my thoughts. "That's
stage two of paradox psychosis."

"No, I didn't. I didn't itch my neck," Five denied.
"Stage one, denial," I chimed in.

"I am fine, okay? Let's stay on task, shall we?"

"Wait," Luther said, holding out his hands to stop
Five.

"What?"

"Maybe we should first," Luther said, gesturing to
the both of us. "Why?" Five asked. "Well, you'll
freak him out. Bumping into your own tiny
doppelgänger? He will lose his shit. Just let us
break the ice." Luther and Five both looked at me.
Luther, for backup. We could both tell Five was
experiencing the stages."Okay," he agreed.

"Okay."

Luther moved to go over to past Five.

                                         ~•~

A FEW MINUTES LATER, we ended up sitting
down. Luther and I awkwardly sat in the silence
while both Fives glared at each other from across
the table.

Luther sighed. "Well...this is nice, isn't it?
The four of us, together like this," he said, trying to
break the thick tension.

"No."

"Somebody explain to me how it is I'm having a
pint of Guinness with my younger self," Old Five
said. "Older, actually. I'm you, just 14 days older,
Current Five replied, glaring. "I have pubic hair
smarter than you. How's that possible?"

"I can explain," Current Five began.

"You see, one hour from now, on the grassy knoll, before the president is killed, you break your contract with the Commission," he continued, leaning forward.

"I already know you're thinking about it. All those
years in the apocalypse, we never stopped worrying
about our family. Well, today, you are going to do
something about it.

Today, you are going to you are going to screw up the jump and end up in this twip of a body, trapped, forever, small pubescent body."

"Okay. Even if I was to believe you, what
am I supposed to do about it, not jump?" Old Five
asked.
"No, no. You have to jump. If you don't jump, this
version of you ceases to exist," I protested. Old Five
nodded at me. He was surprised to see me, but
weirdly not shocked at my appearance.