Adventures into the Future

Part 3: Up, Up and Away

Cambridge, 9:15 AM, Saturday, 22nd September, 2019.

Joe switched on the coffee maker and then went to his dining room to check everything was ready. Four places were set, each with a folder, stationery and bottles of mineral water. The room looked purposeful, business-like and completely different to the normal mess of paints, toys and scalextric track. The only thing that looked out of place were the big sheets suspended from the ceiling, hiding what he would shortly reveal. Joe glanced at the clock on the mantel piece for the hundredth time that morning.

Five long minutes later, the doorbell rang, and Joe felt his stomach flip. He walked slowly towards the door, rehearsing in his mind what he would later present. He turned the lock and tugged at the door.

"Hello, stranger," said Susan Patterson, staring up at him from the bottom step.

"Sue." Joe beamed, grabbing her hand and pulling her into a friendly embrace. "It's so good to see you again. Please come in."

Joe led his old colleague to the kitchen, and she perched on a tall stool at the kitchen bench as he fixed her a coffee.

"Sugar?" he asked with a grin.

"I'll have you know that I can quite happily not take sugar, but just this once I'll take two spoons."

"Yeah, just this once," he goaded his friend.

For the next few minutes they swapped pleasantries, enquiring after each other's families. Joe and Sue had known each other for years, ever since she'd started on the graduate program at the same multinational company where Joe had cut his teeth. With a Master's degree in aerospace engineering, there were few people who knew as much as she did about blade design. Originally, she had planned to enter the aeronautical industry, but had ended up in wind-based renewables.

Sue took a sip of her coffee and replaced the cup on the saucer. "So what's all this about, Joe?"

The doorbell rang, momentarily saving Joe.

"Hey, hey, hey. Any room for a little one?"

Joe looked at his friend, Steve Turner, and laughed. The man was standing three steps down from the doorstep, and yet he was almost at eye level with Joe. At 6ft 6ins and with the build of a rugby Prop, Steve was anything but a little one. Joe and Steve had studied engineering at university together. After Joe left and went out into the 'real world', Steve had stayed on for another four years and gotten himself a second degree in Software Engineering. He would probably have done another course straight after, but crippling student debt put an end to that.

"Just about. Come on into the kitchen. Sue, an old colleague of mine, is here already. I'm sure you met her at my New Year's party a few years back. "

Steve wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

"No, not that Sue. In fact I've never heard from that Sue again, thanks to you."

Steve shrugged his shoulders and squeezed passed Joe, who was about to close the door but stopped as he saw a taxi pull up.

"Good morning, Raj," he called out, as his friend paid the driver.

"Good morning to you, too," Raj said, offering his hand to Joe. "I must say I am more than a little intrigued as to why you've had me wake up so bloody early on a Saturday morning."

"Well, come inside, and I'll fill you in."

Joe closed the front door behind him and joined his friends in the kitchen as they made their introductions to each other.