The Meridians(98)

Kevin chuckles, though the sound is devoid of happiness. It is the chuckle of a man who has had to make too many harsh decisions for one lifetime. "I don't travel through time. I travel through the dimensions of space and matter. Time doesn't alter its flow. I couldn't just zap ahead and find a way to save you...I had to follow time's normal movements until a moment when I could move to save you by simply changing the positions of certain material objects in your universe."

"You mean switching me and Mr. Gray."

Kevin nods. He puts a hand into his pocket and withdraws something. Two very old, faded, red foam rubber balls. "These were some of the first things I ever moved as a child, discovering my talents. The first thing was a bullet, which I reached out and grabbed while still in the womb. Moving people is harder, but still doable."

"And what about Mr. Gray?" asks Scott, returning to his original question. "How was he able to do what he did...disappear and reappear? And what about his aging?"

Kevin frowns. Another world winks by as he does so. In this world, Scott is a quadriplegic. Shot in the chest and arm. History seeks to reassert itself. "Mr. Gray was an accident," says Kevin. "His name's Adrian, actually. He was a hitman, as you've figured out already. But I tried - will try, as far as I perceive it - to save you." Kevin grimaces again. "Something will go wrong. Apparently I die, and Adrian - Mr. Gray - will be pulled into my timeflow. He'll be catapulted to the moment of my birth, and exist backward for sixty two years."

Scott feels confusion welling inside, replacing the anger he felt before. "But, if Mr. Gray is sent to your time, then why is there a Mr. Gray here and now?"

Kevin chuckles again. "Plays with the mind, don't it. Remember: my dimension is the same as yours, only in reverse. So there's a Mr. Gray there as well. Who is catapulted to your dimension at the time of your Kevin's death. He resides here, living backwards in time, for sixty-two years living - if you can call it that - as a ghost. Existing, aging, but unable to touch anything."

"That's why he grows younger and younger."

Kevin nods. "And why his wounds disappear. Because to him, they haven't happened."

"But if he can't touch anything, how did he try to kill us?"

"Remember how earlier he would just appear? Then as time moved on for you he grew younger and more powerful?" Scott nods. "Best I can figure is that he grows in power when he's close to the nexus himself, especially when near to Kevin. So he gears up for a huge attack - his first, which you perceive as what happened tonight. Then, after tonight, he's blown his power, and has less and less ability. He can appear, but can't remain solid. He can write a note, but can't interact with you. He can knock over a glass of water, but can't touch Lynette's husband. Weaker and weaker, until he finally fizzles out and disappears forever."

"But he's dead now. How can that be undone?"

"He's not dead. He survives this night. Just like he survived the car crash, the board across the face, all the other things. Something about being catapulted through the dimensions has changed him. But he gets weaker and weaker after this. So what you perceived as his first cautious attacks were really his last gasps, his final attempts at destroying you, me, and my mother. He's a meridian, too. Just that he's an artificial one. By his actions and interventions over the years, he's made a loop of events, a sort of nowhere that he can exist in. It only overlaps you for a few years, and that's when he tries to kill you as something like a ghost. Other than that, Mr. Gray doesn't exist anymore."

Scott feels his head furrow in confusion. "Don't think of it too hard," says Kevin. "It's confusing as hell, and I barely understand it myself."

"It all comes down to that, doesn't it," says Scott. "You. What's your role in all of this?"

Kevin laughs quietly. "I'm the man who figures out how to travel between dimensions. It happens about twenty-five years from now, as you perceive things. Tina solves the problem of my autism, and it turns that autistics in our two worlds are special."

"Special how?"

"We perceive more than we should. It's why we're autistic. We withdraw because of too much information. We live in a constant state of bombardment."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that autistics perceive more than their own dimension. They perceive all of them. It scares the hell out of them, so by the time they're about three years old they have to withdraw from reality...or go nuts."

Scott snaps his fingers. "Lynette told me when Kevin made the magic trick go wrong, all the autistics got angry, started screaming."

Kevin nods. He looks at the ratty foam balls in his hand. "I reached across a small hole in the dimensions to take these, and the other kids, well, they sensed something wrong had just happened. Made them quite upset."

"Can you still perceive the dimensions?" says Scott.

Kevin nods. "After Tina brings me out of my autism, it turns out I've been figuring out a few things. First thing I do is disappear. Go on a bit of a trip between some of the alternate dimensions."

"So that's why you're so important? Because you can do that?"

"Because I'm the only one that can do it," says Kevin, nodding. "Other autistics can sense or even see the other dimensions, but I'm the only one who can move between them. No one else, just me."