Copyright © 2008 Jason Carter. All rights reserved. 

Professor Michael Denning, head of the philosophy department of NGU, leaned back in the straight-backed brown leather chair in his office, staring at the visitor across his desk.

Hunter – yes, that was the young man’s name; Edwin Hunter. Denning had read some of Hunter’s papers on the advice of his markers and had been impressed. Was it Philosophy 401 the boy was enrolled in, or the more difficult Philosophy 421? He couldn’t recollect.

He tried to read something in the boy’s face. Desperation? No, that was too strong. Intensity! Yes, that was the word. He could see it in the deep-set, dark eyes that stared back at him. He was nothing more than a wisp of a lad, with hair short and parted neatly down the middle; it hung, limply, along both sides of his face.

For some reason, Denning thought of his own graduate days; of the times when he too had shown such fire in his eyes. Was he getting old? Perhaps. At the age of sixty-four with a full head of grey hair he could often convince himself that he was still relatively young, but he knew otherwise. His time was measured.

"Why me?" He asked the young man, politely.

Hunter was embarrassed; it was visible in his flushed face. After a while, he responded. "Philosophy," he said, carefully. "I think a philosophy expert would understand better."

Denning picked up the word ‘expert’ and let it hang in his mind. A term of praise? No, he didn’t think so. The boy seemed sincere and somehow, in spite of his manner, self-assured.

"I see. Perhaps you could give me a more detailed explanation of this theory of yours." He said quietly. He felt, strangely, that he had to be careful with his words; that, somehow, the boy might disappear at any moment – he seemed so extraordinarily frail.

The lad smiled. "Yes, of course," he said. "I began with the accumulated historical data of ghost sightings and combined my research of that material with claims of alien encounters."

"Flying saucers and crop circles."

"If you will."

"You realize that there is no scientific proof for such phenomena."

Already, Denning was ready to dismiss Hunter’s theory, whatever it might be. If it was founded on such ephemeral ground it couldn’t possibly amount to much.

"Science has based its beliefs, historically, on that which is known and that which can be made subject to physical proof." Hunter stated simply. "Within any given vision of scientific fact, we are restricted to rules which prevent the perception of any knowledge beyond that which is known. It is a self-defeating structure which, historically, has hindered the advance of science. For instance: modern science spends a great deal of money to send signals into space with the hope of some alien response. The one fact that is never considered in these efforts is the strong possibility that the medium and the message may be entirely foreign to any potential contact. Our ideas of communication have their foundation in an enclosed world of traditional usage, acceptable to the world’s scientific community. There is no room for ideas of anything beyond common practise."

Denning considered this statement. It held some truth. Whatever the young man had latched on to had been carefully thought out.

"And what you have, your…experiments, are beyond this framework," he offered.

"In some ways." Hunter responded carefully. "To understand my experiments, as you call them, it has to be presumed that we have not tapped every force of the universe."

"A reasonable presumption." Denning acquiesced.

"I thought you might be ready to accept that premise," the young man noted, "but, unfortunately, I have no way to define the force I have encountered. I found it by the merest chance. For want of a name, I have called it ‘Time-sliding’."

"Time-sliding?"

"The ability to slip into other times, both forwards and backwards."

The idea was preposterous! But Denning was fascinated by the young man’s quiet demeanour.

"You used the term ‘encountered’." He stated.

Hunter looked uncomfortable. "I can’t be sure," he admitted, "but I have had results."

Denning waited.

"I think I have sent things; where, I don’t know." The young man offered. "You see, sir, I developed my electronic device, surprisingly simple as it turned out, based on magnetic impulses, and tested it at certain sites where there was some history of sightings of either ghosts or alien visitation. In each case, the object I was experimenting with disappeared."

"What kind of object?"

"Oh, different things; a toy teddy bear, a rubber ball and a bath towel. The fact is, they all disappeared."

"Assuming what you say is true, and, understand me, this whole business is very hard for me to accept, did you take into account Lerpov’s theory of time-change?"

"Oh, yes, sir. I realized that physical objects sent into the past or future, if it could be done, might change historical development, but I felt sure, according to my calculations, that any object I sent would not become a part of the environment to which it was directed. It would just be there, on a separate plane."

"How did you come to this conclusion?"

Hunter looked guarded. "I can’t tell you that," he said. "You will have to take my word."

"And the experiments?"

"Those too. You have to understand that I’m not ready to share them with anybody just yet."

Denning eased back in his chair. "I see," he said.

"It’s just that…I wanted to test my theories with someone who might understand." Hunter explained.

"Without proof," Denning told him, "I can’t really bring myself to accept this situation you describe."

"So you will need proof; scientific proof."

Was there disdain in the young man’s voice?

"I am afraid so."

"But you are a philosopher."

There was a silence between them.

It was Hunter who broke it.

"Then I’ll give you your proof," he vowed. "I’m going myself, next time, and I promise I will send you proof."

Denning was stunned!

"But, if what you say is true, then you will have no interaction with the time-period you visit and you have no way of getting back."

"I can move from time to time," the young man said. "Think of the research value, if I can pass it on!"

Denning thought about the whole scenario for a moment.

A human spirit adrift in time for eternity; a living observer of what had been and what was to come, with, hopefully, the ability to report his findings. He pulled himself together. The whole idea was ridiculous!

Hunter could read Denning’s response in his face. He had failed to find a sympathetic ear. He rose out of his chair.

"I’m sorry to have wasted your time, sir." He apologized.

Denning wanted desperately to say something – anything, to give the young man some sense of encouragement. He could think of nothing. There was no way he could accept any truth in what Hunter had told him.

The young man paused at the door. "If I can," he promised, "I’ll contact you."

Then he was gone.

The semester came to a close and Denning gave some consideration to his course results. Overall, they were satisfactory. The required number of students had passed and an acceptable number had failed. On an impulse, he checked for Hunter’s name. He couldn’t find it on any of his lists.

"How advanced is this equipment, John?"

"State of the art, Michael, and completely government funded."

Denning smiled. His friend, Professor John Kersey, had it made! He only wished that he could get such government support for his own work.

"Can you explain just how you send out your ‘space-probes’, as you call them."

"Of course. Using a high-level radio signal, we direct our beam towards likely areas of habitation in space. Our signal blips contain a compact package of scientific symbols and greetings in twenty of the known world languages. We don’t leave anything to chance."

"But, so far - no answers."

"We can only hope, Michael. That is all we can do. If we hit something, it’ll make the whole experiment worthwhile. What you have to understand is the fact that there are a considerable number of pitfalls in this business."

"Pitfalls?"

"Oh, yes. We have the finest cryptologists and researchers on this project. Every day we get reports of possible contact. What we have to do is separate the wheat from the chaff, as it were. There are duplicative signals, echoes and pulsars which modify their signal on the Doppler shift. We need to be certain. So we analyse every signal carefully. In each case, we judge the A2 mathematical posit."

"I don’t follow you."

"It may be a determinate that you are unfamiliar with, but it is carefully worked into our calculations. I am sure you have heard somewhere of the correlation of Lincoln’s date of death with other significant historical dates and numbers."

"Ye…s, I think I have heard of something like that."

"Well, the fact is that human history is subject, under certain circumstances, to logical and mathematical correlation. The statement of Nostradamus, for instance, that a figure close to the spelling of ‘Hitler’ would rise to terrorise the world. Modern analysts have judged Nostradamus a visionary. Mystics rely on such correlations. In point of fact, such predictions have no foundation in truth. You must understand that a certain amount of coincidence will, without question, enter into any field of scientific study. For instance: we had a response situation from one of our junior members only yesterday. The young man was tasked with the observation of the Orion group. He made a report that he had documented certain light pulses from a given area in the region and determined that they were irregular. This, of course, is a point of interest to us. On investigation, we found no abnormality, given the nature of the star cluster."

"What was it the young man observed?"

"I hesitate to tell you, as it was something that made absolute sense and then no sense."

"What do you mean?"

"Using his knowledge of the International Morse code, the young man determined that the pulsations from the area spelled out a name. You must understand that there was no proof of his observations and that subsequent study of the region provided no further indication of what he had claimed. Clearly, under certain extreme circumstances of extended study, almost any correlation of elements might be perceived and misinterpreted by the observer. We learn to ignore these false messages."

"Yes, I understand. Tell me something. Would you, if the signal were one you judged as valid, be able to respond to something of this nature?"

"You must be kidding me! It is one thing to pick up such a signal on an accidental basis, but to reply would require calculations that are beyond our means. First of all, the possibility of pinpointing a precise direction of response, given the span of an entire galaxy, would be beyond configuration. Secondly, I really couldn’t conceive of any effective medium that might be used. Light is out of the question; we don’t have that kind of power. Radio might be a possibility, at first thought, but what frequency? There are literally tens of thousands we could use. And the natural, duplicative echo of any selected frequency at higher levels would tend to defeat our efforts by scattering the signal. Trust me; it would be impossible to answer a contact of this kind."

"And the name the young man presumed?"

"Strangely enough, it suited his area of study - Orion. He claimed the name of ‘Hunter’ was repeated over and over."