Falling in the Garden

Chapter Seventeen - Sarah

Chapter Seventeen

Sarah

>>From: xxxxxx@xxxxxxxxx.xxx

>>To: starlight99@blueworld5.net

>>Subject:

I should not be contacting you again, but I feel you deserve some sort of explanation. I can’t imagine how you must feel right now, but please don’t think too terrible of us. We intended the Einstein-OPTIcom Doorway we sent as a gift to you both. The cost of accomplishing this was staggering, but necessary. We have diminished the timeline index to an acceptable number. Complete repair is now in sight.

There is a very high probability that you have discovered the radiation bunker. I feel safe that I can now go ahead and explain this. The reason you were originally able to speak to each other is because of the radioisotopes that were buried in a grid around and beneath the bunker. By complete accident, although we now understand the mechanism, a field was created allowing limited communication via a weak disruption of space-time. Ashley’s father was the only person who knew of the radiation at that time. He was under orders to offer himself and his family up as part of the experiment. Would such radiation cause a typical family harm, or would the shielded bunker adequately protect them in case of nuclear catastrophe? We now know the horrible answer. I’m sorry to tell you that Ashley passed away that night, not long after your trip through the Doorway. Her mother died a month later. Both were in the final stages of radiation sickness while their father spent his time traveling and returned for only brief visits. He, too, was an essential part of the experiment. The coward chose to be the one participant who had only limited exposure to the radiation. Ashley was sworn to secrecy by her own father not to tell anyone where or how they lived. My own father was an incredibly wealthy man who gave a lot of his money to the government; he was also a friend of Ashley’s father. All I knew as a child was that my best friend lived in an underground house.

We simply cannot go back and alter the deadly experiment on Ashley’s family. If it weren’t for the information gathered about the behavior of that radiation field and the temporal manifestation it created, the technology we’re currently utilizing would never have existed. If our multiple timelines became stacked causality loops, this massive repair mission would never have even begun. Simply getting this message to you is a heavy burden on our systems with only a low probability of success. In my last correspondence, I told you not to bother trying to find me. The reason is this: Although I’m from your own timeline, I exist on the first stable fracture that we created. The sealed notes you received above the bunker were sent from a Representative on a different fracture and utilized a variant of the technology used to send this e-mail. Again, you’d only be wasting your time tracking us down. We’re not there. There is more I’d like to explain, but cannot.

Remember Ashley, Michael. Remember her for the wonderful young woman she was. When I left Monroe so many years ago, she wrote to me. In her few letters, she spoke only of you. She truly loved you. I wish I still had those letters so I could share them with you.

Our mission is not yet complete, but I don’t want to bring you into this any further. Although I cannot elaborate, you have already done a great deal to help our cause. I leave you with much respect and gratitude.

Kindly,

Sarah