Mark Jenkins

Excerpt from Chapter 3

“Okay,” said his grandfather, interrupting him. “Counting up all your mountaineering trips, have you summited every time?”

“No, of course not,” said René. “No one does!”

“What stops you?” asked Tom. “You’re alive. Why do you turn around and come back down? You’ve done it quite a few times.”

“Don’t mess with me, Grandpa.”

“Why? Why turn around?”

“You know why!” said René. “Smart choices. There’s avalanche risk, weather risk, terrain risk.”

“So the mountain controls the outcome.”

“No!” said René. “I do. I decide based on what I see and what I know. My decisions drive the outcome.”

“Nonsense! You can’t predict every hazard. Rockfall, sudden storms, hidden crevasses, and suck-ass terrain are all forces beyond your control. You can’t see into the future, now, can you?”

“Of course not — no one can!” retorted René. “But I still choose. Whatever the mountain throws at me, it’s my decision to go farther, chose a new path, or turn around.” This is getting old, he thought. Tom’s lessons on life always began this way, but René wanted to get to the point, since they’d had this conversation before. He refused to yield. “It’s my free will.”

“René, I worry that some of that vinyl you listen to is stuck in the same groove,” said Tom and stood. “You don’t get to pick your fate. It’s already written.”

“I don’t believe that.”

Excerpt from Act II, Chapter 25

He needed help with the reports, and Conrad was the only one he could trust. It will be tricky, though. Conrad didn’t know the science like Proteus did, and he certainly didn’t know the future. But if Proteus was careful, he could present topics to Conrad and explain that some of them were secrets, and not to be discussed.

Proteus decided the simplest approach was to give Conrad a written list of words, and let him ask any questions he wished, which Proteus would answer directly or indirectly. There was a good chance the questions wouldn’t involve enough depth to risk Proteus inadvertently revealing the future, or trapping him in a circular web of lies.

His mind made up, he spent fifteen minutes composing the list of words and phrases, and then summoned Conrad — who’d returned from Cambridge last week — into his office. After he’d finished explaining, he asked Conrad if he had any questions.

Excerpt from the Novelette, Heavywater

A concussive wave blasted through Archimedes and jarred him awake. He was underwater. Desperately kicking upwards, lungs screaming for air, he burst through the surface, and heaved and choked in the dark.

The warm water pushed him gently downstream. Where the hell am I? What happened?

His brain replayed everything as he tried to understand why he was still alive. Or perhaps he wasn’t, and these were the last moments of an anoxic, dying brain, imagining a miraculous rescue in warm water, beaches, white sand, sun, and drinks with little umbrellas. Maybe my brain is supplying me with soothing images as my neurons die. Bye-bye.