“It is my pleasure to announce that the winner of the 2030 Greatest Invention of the Last Decade is....” he paused for maximum effect, before continuing, “...Roscoe Hadstock – for P2E.”

Lisa patted me on the back and I kissed her before standing up to thunderous applause – my receiving this award was clearly a popular choice – and I walked down the aisle with a huge smile on my face and up onto the stage to shake hands with the host and he handed over the giant cheque made out to my company, P2E, for $1 million. I looked at it, kissed it as if it was the Championship trophy and held it over my head in celebration – just as I had seen my football heroes do – causing the crescendo to increase in volume.

“So, what is the first thing you'll do to celebrate your success in winning this award?” The host held the microphone near my mouth as he shouted over the noise, and I waited for the applause to subside a little.

“Could you direct the spotlight onto Lisa, please?” I had pre-arranged this with the organisers, in the event that I won the award, but kept it a secret from my girlfriend.

I could see the giant screens around the hall switch their focus from me to Lisa and I could see her face, framed by her shiny long hair and fringe, looking beautiful, shiny, happy, but also confused – although I suspect she knew what was going to happen.

I went down on one knee on the stage. “Lisa, will you marry me?”

Ten years earlier in the boy's toilets at high school.

“Come on, Geoff, you're not really trying. It's only 3.1 volts.” Barry was trying to encourage him, but it was not working. I could see he was struggling to force out his pee, and having difficulty hitting the target – the centre of the collector vessel attached to my gadget. The large voltmeter was almost hanging off the printed circuit board as I carefully held the hand-made test unit together. I made a note of his best reading.

“Hurry up, Geoff, I'm bursting!” Barry was kneading his groin and shuffling from side to side, obviously desperate to take his turn.

“Okay, no more.” Geoff sounded sad and stepped aside. Barry quickly unzipped his trousers and aimed a strong jet at the centre of my collector.

“Wonderful, Barry!” I was delighted by the quantity. “7.8, 7.9...8... very good.”

He sighed at the relief and smiled at me. “It's normally around 8 volts, isn't it?”

“Yes, Lisa has been helping me with the girls and the average result from all you guys over the last couple of weeks has been around 8 volts. The record, though, was Shanice with 14.2 volts!”

Barry finished and zipped himself up. He managed 8.1 volts and I made a note.

Geoff wondered out loud, “So what's the point of all this?”

Barry was the tallest and cleverest of the three of us. He seemed to know everything. “Roscoe wants to take Lisa on a date and she refused unless he achieved something. She said she couldn't go out with a toilet cleaner.”

“I'm a sewage engineer!” I protested.

“Yes, toilet cleaner, as I said. She challenged you to win the school science fair at the end of term and then she would go out with you, didn't she?”

I nodded sadly. Lisa was the cleverest and most beautiful girl in class. She was only a few hours younger than me and our mothers had met in the maternity ward, when we were being born, and stayed in touch. They discovered that we lived in the same block and we grew up together, playing together and being best of friends, as we had no siblings, being both “only children”. It seemed natural to me that we would end up together – but not to Lisa, she was aiming for a boyfriend higher than me. My father worked hard, but was only a foreman in a manufacturing company, my mother was a housewife. Lisa's parents were wealthy and owned the manufacturing company where my dad worked. They were friendly, but stand-offish and claerly wouldn't approve of Lisa and I having anything more than a friendship, but I wanted more than that. Eventually, I had plucked up courage to ask her out, during the brief time she was single, and she had smiled and challenged me to make something more of my life than my parents – and she suggested winning the science fair at the end of term. She usually won it and my science marks were only a little above average, so there didn't seem much chance, but I accepted the challenge.

I had a part-time job as a cleaner and it was while I was cleaning the toilets that I had the idea of collecting pee and doing something useful with it. After significant amounts of research on-line, I had developed something to make electricity from the pee, made a prototype and, with Lisa's help for collecting and testing the girls' pee, we were making progress – to charge my phone from the electricity generated from the pee.

“You should spend more time in class, rather than wasting all your time in toilets collecting pee!” Barry had also been my friend for many years, and was trying to encourage me to follow the conventional route, as he was planning.

“You'll never pass your exams and get into university if you waste your time with these toys!” He waved his hand at my fragile prototype, which I was cradling carefully as if it was my baby.

“If I'm successful, I won't have to go to university – besides, what's the point of learning about how rivers form, or the history of 19th century medicine? How is that going to be of use in the real world?” I was cynical about the stuff we were learning at school.

“Your toys are no more useful! You need to learn this stuff to get a good grade, to get into the best university. That's what I'm aiming for.”

“Then what? I want to make useful products to change the world. That means thinking unconventionally and creatively. School teaches everyone the same thing in the same way and expect the same answer from everyone – what chance is there to be creative? None!” We had had this argument many times, but Barry was convinced that the majority of people agreed with him and would follow the same path.

“The best university leads to the best jobs. Then, you might have a chance of dating Lisa.” Ouch, that hurt! He knew that was what I wanted more than anything, but my chances seemed remote at the moment. She was dating the best athlete in the school and they seemed to be very much in love. My chances of winning the science prize and then dating Lisa seemed even more remote than ever.

The bell went, and we left the toilets. Outside the next class I joined the queue and could see Lisa and Grant were together, as usual, with their arms wrapped around each other and kissing and giggling. They stopped as I approached.

“How's the pee collection?” Lisa smiled at me, but took on a serious look, showing genuine concern for our joint experiments.

“Barry and Geoff helped – but only 8.1 volts tops – Shanice is still the record-holder.” I smiled at her interest.

“So what's next? Where do we go from here?”

“With your help I think we've collected enough pee to charge the battery. After school, if you've time, we can meet up and connect to a phone to try and make a call?”

Lisa looked at Grant and he nodded. “I've got athletics practice immediately after school. I'll be free to meet up after dinner. You can play with Roscoe's toys until then, if you wish?” He clearly looked down scornfully at my experiments, and he was taller than me.

“Okay, sure. We can walk home together. My parents won't be home, so I'm free. We can do homework together, as well.”

I groaned. “I'd rather discuss the development of P2E.”

“I know.” She smiled that intoxicating smile, which she knew would persuade me to do whatever she wanted. “But you need to complete the homework as well as develop P2E – just incase it's not successful.” She winked at me and the teacher opened the door and we went into the class for another pointless recitation of English literature. I yawned and went to sit at the back, where I could sleep without being noticed by the teacher.

After school, Lisa was waiting by the exit with Grant and they kissed and waved goodbye as I approached. Grant clearly didn't feel any threat from me being with his girlfriend. Lisa and I left together for the short walk back to my apartment.

Opening the door, Mum greeted us as if we were both her kids. She treated Lisa like one of the family – and since Lisa's parents were hardly ever around after school, Lisa had effectively grown up in my house, with Mum caring for her more than her own parents did. I knew she really liked Lisa and hoped she would become my girlfriend. She had been really helpful in advising me on how to handle the constant rejection, and playing hard-to-get by Lisa. Mum was very supportive. I could wait.

“Juice and sandwiches are in the shed, waiting for you. I know you want to continue working on P2E.”

“Thanks Mum.” I gave her a hug and Lisa and I entered our spare room, which we referred to as 'the shed', as if we had a garden, where the shed would have been located.

“So what's next, boss?” Lisa smiled at me and dropped her schoolbag on the floor and pulled up a chair next to my work-bench.

I gingerly opened the carry case and took out my prototype, full of pee, and placed it on the workbench. “Have you got an old phone, I asked you to bring? We can try it?”

Lisa opened her schoolbag and took out an old phone and handed it to me. I recognised it as one of her first phones. Her family were wealthy and she changed her phone every year regardless. I only changed my phone when it died, and always for the cheapest and simplest model. She teased me and called me a 'dinosaur', stuck in the past.

I found the right cable form my stack and connected it to the socket in the side of the prototype and paused. “Okay, this is it!” We'd been collecting pee for two weeks now and charging the battery inbetween, without any success. We had checked and rechecked the calculations as to the amount of pee needed to reach the transformer activation threshold in order to provide sufficient current to charge the phone, to make a call and surely this time, it would be enough?

I reached over to turn on the converter – there was a flash and a huge bang making us jump as the phone blew up in front of us.

“Oh shit!”

Lisa wasn't phased at this set-back and recovered first. “No worries, I have plenty more old phones. What do you think went wrong?”

Mum came running in at that moment. “What happened? Are you okay?” She was clearly concerned by the loud bang.

“Don't worry, Mum, first attempt failed, that's all!” She shook her head and retreated mumbling something that sounded like “Kids!”

I grabbed my test probes and disconnected the smouldering phone and threw it in the bin. I probed around the circuit and checked the readings in my mind against what I expected, following the magnified circuit diagram displayed on the wall.

“That's strange, this capacitor has the wrong voltage...Oh, no, I've used the wrong one – it's maximum voltage is too low. Hang on a sec...” I switched off the prototype and turned it upside down on the workbench. I picked up my pliers and with my left-hand tightened them on one of the legs of the capacitor, then picked up the soldering iron with my right hand, briefly touched the hot nozzel on the pad, loosened the solder and pulled out first one leg and then the other and removed the capacitor. I replaced the soldering iron in the stand and rummaged in my small storage drawers for a higher-rated capacitor, found one and bent the legs so they fitted into the holes on the PCB and bent them over, to hold them in place, turned the board over and asked Lisa to hold the board, as she had done many times before, while I soldered the pads.

“Okay, let's try again. Have you got another old phone?”

“Sure. One of my friend's phones.” She reached into her schoolbag and pulled out a bright pink phone with rabbit ears.

“Cute!” I said and she smiled and handed it to me. I laid it carefully on my workbench, connected the cables and said, “Okay, fingers in your ears for another big bang?”

“Don't be so pessimistic! We're getting closer! Look on the bright side, there was enough energy to cause the bang, so we must be close.”

Lisa was always optimistic, supportive and encouraging. Some of the many aspects of her personality that I admired. Sometimes, I wondered why she was so supportive, but she was clearly genuinely trying to motivate me. I smiled, and reached over to check everything was securely connected, moved some tools aside to clear a space, took a deep breath and turned the switch on...no bang!

“Well, that was different.” Lisa leaned forwards to study the phone.

“It's charging – look!” She pointed at the small battery indicator flashing on the phone's screen – we've done it!” She jumped up and so did I and we hugged to celebrate. I looked in her eyes that were so close to mine and the feel of her hair on my face was so soft, I turned her face and tried to kiss her, but she turned away.

“No, don't,” she whispered. “You know I'm dating Grant. Don't spoil our friendship by trying to kiss me. Please?” I nodded. I knew that she would say that, but I was so happy to be able to celebrate our success with her, it seemed the natural thing to do.

We sat down in silence and watched the phone battery charging light flashing, as if smiling at us. She broke the silence first.

“So, what's next, boss? Where do we go from here?”

I cleared my throat and turned to face her, and became more business-like, regaining control over my feelings. “Dad said that if I could demonstrate the prototype worked and successfully charged something, I could supply them with the drawings and he would pass them to the design and development team to productionise it. They would make an initial batch of ten, which we could try out in different locations and with different electronic devices. If they were successful, then he would present it to your parents at the next product design meeting to see if they would take over the production.”

3 months later – School Science Fair

It was the end of term school science fair and my P2E had been productionised by the design team at our parents' company. It looked smartly packaged, smooth edges and light-weight. Much more rugged and easy to use than the prototype I had hand-assembled in my shed. The company were circulating samples around many overseas charities, who were interested in supplying it to third world countries, where sewage and sanitary facilities were rudimenary and electricity supplies intermittent and sparsely provided, but none of them had placed any orders yet.

I arrived early in the school hall with my photographic display backboard, samples and technical details and was directed to my location by the competition organiser, Ms Kelleway. She was the senior science teacher, and surprised that I had entered for the first time, and looked down her nose at me while checking her list.

“So, what exactly does P2E mean, then, Hadstock?” She barely remembered my name as my contribution in her classes had been little to non-existent. She clearly didn't believe I had absorbed enough science knowledge to answer any of her questions, let alone make a meaningful entry in the science fair.

“P2E is a way for generating electricity from urine, Ms Kelleway. Pee to Electricity. P2E for short. Clever, isn't it?” I smiled at her and she just snorted in disbelief at how anyone that had never contributed to her lessons could make anything useful and just directed me to my spot and walked away. I began assembling the display. Other contestants were already in place and the hall was slowly filling up.

“Hi Ross, need a hand?” It was Barry, he had come early as I had requested of all of the team who had helped me by providing urine.

“Sure, grab the end of the board, we can stand it up against the wall.” Barry did as I asked and we moved things into place. It looked like the others were going to be too late to help set up. Oh well, I thought, it's not essential, but it would have been great to have their support.

With two of us, it didn't take long to complete the stall set up, and Barry wandered off to look around the other displays, as the hall was nearly full now. I heard some loud voices and looked across to the source of the sounds. Lisa and Grant were shouting at each, clearly having an argument. I couldn't hear the words, but the sound was angry. As I watched, Grant looked like he was about to hit Lisa and she flinched and held up her hands. He stopped himself and hesitated then stormed out of the hall and slammed the door loudly. Lisa looked upset and I went over to her. She turned as if to leave, but when she saw me she reached out to hug me and was sobbing slightly into my shoulder.

“What happened to you two? Grant looked really angry at something.”

Inbetween sobs, she explained. “He's dumped me. He was jealous of the amount of time I was spending working with you on P2E. He doesn't see the point and was constantly reminding me how useless you and the idea were. I believe in P2E – I think it's got great possibilities, and he got angry when I defended the project. He thinks we are more than friends and doesn't trust me.” She sobbed and hugged me tighter. “I explained that we have known each other forever, and that we're just very good and close friends and that I would never cheat on anyone. He's very simple-minded. In his view – if a boy spends time with a girl, alone, for long periods, they MUST be boyfriend and girlfriend. He cannot see any other possibility. Very narrow-minded. Sorry to pour out my problems, but you've always been my best friend and always been there for me.”

“No need to say sorry! Of course, I am here for you!” I hugged her tighter, enjoying the opportunity, but feeling sad for her being upset over the break up.

“But the final straw was that he's accepted a place at an Athletics College on the west coast. We'd discussed going to the same university near here, and he's decided now that he wants to focus on sports not a career. I asked how he thought we could stay together and he said that athletics was more important to him than our relationship! Then I said some rude things and he got angry and nearly hit me – that was it for me – no way could I be with anyone who wanted to hit me!”

“Oh dear! Heh, don't worry – if I win the science fair you promised to go out with me, so I'm sorry it ended that way, but I'm glad you're free now.” I tried to cheer her up, and it seemed to work as a weak smile crossed her face.

“Thanks Ross, you're a great friend! Of course I'll go out with you - if you win the science fair!”

We hugged again and I looked into her eyes, smiling back at me. She was so beautiful, I wanted to try and kiss her, but was interrupted by the sound of the bell and Ms Kelleway announcing the opening of the competition and the judges had arrived to view the exhibits.

“Where's Shanice? I was expecting her by now? She promised to be here.” I whispered to Lisa. Lisa turned towards me and shook her head.

“Shanice has dropped out of school.” She shook her head in disapproval.

“Why, what happened?”

“She's pregnant. It's too late to get an abortion. In this area the time limit is six weeks and now it is 4 months. If she had known earlier, then perhaps she could have done so, but she didn't realise in time. She's been forced to drop out of school until after the baby is born.”

“Oh no! Poor Shanice. She should have told us earlier.” Then a thought crossed my mind.

“Heh, do you remember her high voltage reading on P2E? Maybe that was an early indicator of pregnancy! Wouldn't it be amazing if we could use P2E as a pregnancy tester as well as to generate electricity?”

Lisa looked amazed and had cheered up quickly – getting over the break up with Grant was clearly not troubling her as much as I'd expected – I was pleased, as it would not be a cloud over our possibly starting a relationship – if she wanted more than just friendship – finally!

“Yes – I wonder if it's true – maybe we should test some other possible pregnant women and see what happens. Dad said he is testing all the staff at work, just to get more details on the average voltage ranges and he said there were some wide differences – I'll have to ask him if any of them turned out to be pregnant – by the way, he's invited you over for dinner this evening, I forgot to mention it earlier. I hope that's okay?”

Wow, I thought, my first EVER invitation to dinner with Lisa's parents – things were looking up! Even if we didn't win the science fair, this was going to be my best ever day!

I didn't have a chance to reply as at that moment the three judges came up to our stand and introduced themselves and we shook hands.

“So, generating electricity from urine – interesting – please explain to us how it works?”

I showed them a break-down model of the insides of the P2E kit and explained the various parts and the process.

“This is the urine collector – the person pees in here, then this is the catalyst, we have tried different chemicals to maximise the electricity generated. This is the sensor, the key part of generating the elctricity and this is the battery.” I completed my guided tour of the various components.

“We believe that it would be very useful in areas where electricity is intermittent or unreliable – mainly third world countries, for example. It also serves a secondary purpose of collecting and processing urine, thereby helping in areas where there are no toilets as well.” Lisa wanted to chip in and add something, so I paused.

“And, we believe that the voltage reading from the urine samples may also be an early indicator of other medical conditions.” The judges looked up in amazement.

“Do you have any evidence for that outrageous assertion?” they clearly thought we were making it up, just to oversell the P2E.

“Well, the average voltage reading is around 8, but during testing, we discovered that one of our testers had a particularly high reading – around 14 volts – and we have now discovered that she is pregnant, so a high reading may indicate early stage pregnancy.” The judges were making notes as Lisa spoke.

“So it may have further roles in predicting other illnesses – of course it needs significantly more testing on both healthy and unhealthy volunteers to fully calibrate the device, but these early tests indicate huge promise for the future.”

The judges made some notes and then moved on to the next exhibit. Many other people were circulating and answering questions of both Lisa and I, so we were not left alone at all, and soon the judges were ready to announce the results.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, “Ms Kelleway shouted over the noise and waited for the hubbub to subside before continuing. “I welcome Ms Stanford to speak on behalf of the judges.” People applauded and she passed the microphone to Ms Stanford.

“Thank you everyone. Thanks should go to all the competitiors for a very high standard of entries this year.” She stopped to applaud and everyone joined in.

“But, of course, there can only be one winner. As always, it's a very difficult task to select the best among so many good entries, but we also like to consider the commercial possibilities of the exhibits, not just their novelty or the complexity or the effort put in by the contestants.” She paused as some chattering had interrupted her and Ms Kelleway waved her hands to try and calm people down, for Ms Stanford to announce the result.

“So we unanimously believed that one of today's exhibits has particularly enormous marketing potential, and would be of specific benefit in the third world, where the need would be greatest...” she paused for maximum effect, but I knew we had won from the introduction and put my arm round Lisa and grabbed her hand and we held our breath.

“...for making electricity from urine, the winner is P2E.”

We jumped up and down and Lisa pushed me forwards to collect the prize, but I wouldn't let go of her hand and pulled her with me. She tried to push it away, but the crowd had parted to make room for us and she stopped fighting and decided to allow herself to be dragged forwards to jointly receive the prize. Now I finally had the chance to hold her hand I was not going to let go!

We walked to the front and Ms Stanford handed me the prize and then we shook hands with all the judges. Even Ms Kelleway shook my hand and said “Well done, Roscoe, I didn't realise you had it in you!”

The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur as so many people wanted to talk to us and congratulate us, but eventually the Science Fair ended. I turned to Lisa, feeling nervous about what I was going to do next.

“Lisa...”

“Yes, Ross. What is it? We need to pack this stuff away.”

I hesitated. I could see in her eyes the playful, teasing look, as she knew what I was going to ask, but was not going to make it easy for me by saying anything.

“Now that we have won the Science Fair and...” I swallowed hard, what if she had only been teasing me?

“...and you said if we won the Science Fair, you...” She was smiling, and enjoying making me squirm and struggle.

“And what, silly?”

“Will you go out with me?” I finally said it. Lisa paused to extend the stress of the moment. Then she threw her arms around me and whispered in my ear.

“Of course! I always keep my promises!” I hugged her tightly. At last! I was beaming and Barry tapped us on the shoulders and we parted to look at him.

“What happened? You've won already? Delayed celebration?”

“No, silly, I'm just very happy – Lisa said she'll go out with me!”

“Congrats, you two – it's been a long time happening! FINALLY, you crazy two get together, at last!”

Barry then helped us to pack everything and walked back to my house with the things.

“Thanks, Barry. Thanks for everything.” He still looked sad.

“Congrats on winning – I had a look around and the judges were right, P2E has the best potential for marketing. The other entries may have been more complicated, but not of as much use as P2E. Well done.” He shook our hands again.

“Are you alright?”

I'm in shock! I just called Geoff to see where he was – he's not usually unreliable – his parents answered, they are in hospital – Geoff...” he hesitated and choked back a sob, “Geoff's seriously ill. He's got testicular cancer. It's too advanced and inoperable. Apparently the doctors said that if it had been caught 3-4 months ago, they could have removed the tumour and he would have had a good chance of a full recovery. But you know Geoff, he never complains about pain or sickness or anything...” Barry couldn't continue and started sobbing. Lisa went to hug him.

“Terrible news. Poor Geoff. We should try and visit him tomorrow.” I nodded in agreement, but then had another thought.

“Heh, wait a minute! Geoff's scores were always the lowest. We used to tease him about the poor voltage-generation of his pee, but I wonder, maybe, it was related to the cancer? If we had known that a low voltage reading indicated early-stage cancer then maybe we could have warned him – if only we had known?”

“Barry, Do you want to stop for a juice?”

“No, thanks. I'm off to the hospital to see Geoff. We can meet next week, now that the holidays have started.”

“Okay, sure – please give him our best wishes. We'll try and visit on Saturday or Sunday.”

“Okay, I'll tell him. And congrats you two for finally getting together! You really make a great couple!” We looked at each other and smiled and Barry walked away.

I opened the door and started moving things inside. Mum was waiting there.

“How did you get on?”

“We won!” Mum came over and wrapped her arms around both of us and beamed in delight.

“I knew you would! It's a great product. I've talked to your dad about it many times and the company is delighted with the early marketing reports. You're going over to Lisa's parents for dinner, aren't you? I think they want to talk about P2E.” Mum stopped as she could see my ear-splitting grin indicated something else.

“Heh, what is it, Ross, I've not seen you with such a huge smile before? Is there something else you want to tell me?”

I looked at Lisa and put my arm around her and pulled her closer. I didn't have to say anything, Mum guessed.

“AT LAST!!! I wondered when the two of you would realise that you should be together, you've grown up together and got on so well, you make the perfect couple! Double congratulations!” And she gave another huge three-way hug, crushing us.

Eventually I broke away. “I'll just leave the stuff in the shed, then we can walk over to Lisa's house.”

“Okay. Have fun!” Mum was beaming at us both as we walked out of the door and closed it behind us and walked the short distance to Lisa's house in silence and disbelief at winning the Science Fair and Lisa agreeing to be my girlfriend.

Reaching Lisa's house, she unlocked the door and we went in. It was my first time in her house and I looked around in surprise at how much larger it was than my house, and the furnishings and displays looked extremely expensive. Was I really going to be accepted by her rich parents as a suitable boyfriend for their only daughter?

Lisa led me into the dining room where her parents were waiting and they stood up as we entered.

“Roscoe! A pleasure to meet you!” Her father held out his hand for a warm handshake. Her mother followed and I shook her hand and they indicated I should sit between Lisa and her father at the table. I sat down and her father indicated to the butler to commence serving dinner – they even had a butler! Lisa hadn't mentioned that before. I had a lot to ask her later.

“So tell me about your ideas for P2E?” her father offered me a glass of juice, which I took gratefully.

“Well...” I hesitated. He was a successful business man and my dad's boss, as well as being Lisa's dad. I felt doubly intimidated. He could see I was nervous and tried to help.

“Don't be nervous, Ross, you're among friends here. Lisa has talked a great deal about you over the years, so we feel we already know you, even though we have never met.”

“Thank you, sir.” I swallowed.

“No need to call me sir! Makes me feel old. Just call me Henry.”

“Thank you, er, Henry.” I felt more relaxed and started my now standard P2E introduction speech, but he interrupted me.

“No need for all of that – I know the background. Your father works for me, remember, he introduced P2E to us some months ago and we have been testing our staff and have some interesting results to share with you, but I wanted to hear your plans first.”

“Okay. Thanks. Yes, the early test results indicated that with sufficient pee we could generate usable amounts of electricity – to charge a phone for example – without too much difficulty.” Henry was watching me closely and listening intently, so I continued:

“But, just today, we discovered that a high reading – 14 volts – indicated that one of our friends was pregnant – and a low reading – around 3 volts – indicated that sadly one of our friends had testicular cancer. If this can be repeated in other tests and verified across a number of symptoms, then it may be possible as a predictor for other medical conditions. So, in addition to generating electricity in remote and inaccessible areas, the medical condition detector may be another possible benefit of P2E.” I let out a deep breath as I finished and looked at Henry for a response. I was pleased to see he was smiling and nodding.

“Yes, your results have been confirmed by our early-stage testing on staff, family and friends. We have tested over one thousand people over the last few months and discovered possible connections with other cancers, as well as other conditions. In all cases, the person was unaware of their medical condition at the time of the urine test, but we asked all of them to notify us of any medical conditions they subsequently developed. We discovered one person was using heroin, and another was inebriated. We now have some voltage test readings for all of these conditions. Three of our staff were also pregnant!” He smiled back. He paused as the main meal was served by his butler, and then continued.

“So, we would like to offer you a job in the research and development team. If P2E is as successful as we expect, then we would like to set up a separate division to focus on exploiting the possible opportunities for P2E in the future, with you at the head. And, maybe, in the future, we could spin off P2E as a separate company, but that's a long way in the future. So, what do you say? Would you like to work for us? Or would you rather go to university? Or would you like some time to think about it?”

“I don't need any time to think, Henry, I would be delighted to accept your kind offer!” I turned to face him and shook his hand, with a big beaming smile on my face. I was very happy. Lisa patted me on the back as well and I turned to eat some food, knowing there was something else I needed to ask. After a few mouthfuls, I plucked up my courage and turned to face him again and cleared my throat and swallowed.

“Henry, there is something else I need to ask.” He put down his fork and turned to face me. I reached for Lisa's hand and squeezed. She squeezed it back.

“With your permission, I would like the honour of Lisa being my girlfriend.” There, I had said it. He looked at me with a surprised look on his face and then smiled.

“I wondered what had taken you so long to ask. You two have been friends forever. I wondered when you would finally get together. Of course we approve! He took his wife's hand to emphasise that it was a joint decision. Welcome to our family!”

We toasted to the new business and personal relationships and I felt very happy and squeezed Lisa's hand again. At last. All my dreams were coming true!

Back to 2030

Lisa didn't hesitate for long. She had been half-expecting this question, since she had teased me and said after P2E had been nominated, she said that if I win the award for the greatest invention of the decade that her parents would finally allow her to marry me.

“Yes, Ross, of course I'll marry you!”

...”And the panel's decision for the first Crosser from our universe to the parallel universe is...”

I could sense Lisa Southerly alongside me also holding her breath in anticipation. Five year's of training, research and experiments, plus testing dozens of highly qualified applicants from within the premier space exploration organisation came down to this moment – who would it be? Lisa was more experienced in space exploration than me, but her personality was more abrasive and unfriendly. More than one team member had made informal complaints about her. In any case, travelling to a parallel universe was more about first contact than about exploring space. Who would we meet? How friendly would they be? I glanced at Lisa, feeling that familiar rush of blood to my face at the sight of her, which even after repeated rejections, I couldn't resist.

She noticed my glance and glared at me angrily and I tried to focus on the lead panelist and control my feelings for Lisa, in anticipation of the pending announcement.

“...Roscoe Hadstock!”

The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur of media interviews, handshakes, congratulations and celebratory backslaps, before I finally got back to my office just before home-time. Lisa was noisily packing up in her neighbouring office and looked up as I returned.

“So, who did you sleep with to get the nomination? I could see the way that the female panellists were making eyes at you.”

I shook my head and ignored the tone of her voice.”A simple congratulations would suffice. We still need to work together to prepare for first contact tomorrow, and afterwards. You're still expected to be the second Crosser.” I held out my hand, but she ignored it and turned away mumbling under her breath.

“Nobody remembers the second person to do anything. Edmund Hillary was the first person to ascend Mount Everest and return. Who was the second?”

I looked blankly and she continued.

“Yuri Gagarin was the first person in space, who was the second? Neil Armstrong was the first person to step onto the moon, who cares about the second? Nobody.” She answered her own question. I couldn't think of anything to say. She was right about how it would be remembered by history. I tried to console her again.

“Well, I value your support and you've pushed me all the way through training to try harder. I couldn't have achieved this without your competition.”

Her eyes looked even darker than usual. “I don't want your fake sympathy, thank you! I intend to complete this mission and I'll do my job, but don't expect any congratulations from me.” She grabbed her bag and stormed out of the office, slamming the door behind her, nearly trapping Geoff's hand as he entered as she was leaving.

He smiled at me. We had been good friends for many years.” I see Lisa's not happy about you being chosen ahead of her.” He was laughing as he spoke. We had often discussed our colleague during our free time away from the office. He came over to shake my hand.

“Congrats, hero!” He was smiling broadly now. “Can I have your autograph on our graduation photo. It'll be worth millions for our grandchildren!”

I laughed and picked up my briefcase. “Let's go. I'll buy you a coffee, if you agree to stop teasing me.”

Sleep was difficult that night, wondering about the trip into the unknown. Would I meet myself and how would we react? What about the risk of cross-contamination, or the disruption to the space-time continuum? Some experts predicted that the parallel universe would be made of anti-matter, and hence any contact between matter and anti-matter would destroy one or both universes. There had been some protests outside the labs by groups opposed to any exploration of the parallel universe, but most of the public seemed fascinated by the developments.

Those thoughts were mixed with romantic images of Lisa being disrupted by her shouting and screaming at me. Followed by conversations with Geoff reminding me to forget about her, to find someone better. Telling me to stop torturing myself by waiting for Lisa and to let him introduce me to one of his many ex-girlfriends, followed by my explaining that 'quality is more important than quantity', and I was waiting for one special lady for a long-term relationship, not a series of short-term flings like Geoff. There were plenty of nicer women. I had been single for far too long and in order to realise my dream of a family I needed to find someone else – someone who was a more supportive woman, but my mind kept drifting back to Lisa.

I arrived at the lab early the next morning. Geoff was already at the console with a cup of capuccino heavily coated in my favourite chocolate dust, and hot croissants.

“Heh, hero, your obedient slave has prepared your favourite breakfast!”

I couldn't help but smile. His exuberance was infectious, overcoming the empty feeling in my stomach. The tension in the lab was palpable, and Geoff was a key member of the team, helping to ease the atmosphere.

I sat on the preparation bench and took a bite of the croissant, while the other team members began attaching various probes, sensors and other health monitoring equipment to my body.

“You know, this trip could be dangerous. Then you'll be glad you only helped with the preparation!”

“Maybe, but if you meet the parallel version of me, I bet he won't be so helpful!”

“T-minus 30 minutes.” The computerised voice interrupted our conversations, followed by Hadleigh Summerly, the mission controller, striding purposefully across the open-plan area towards me with his hand outstretched. I stood up shakily, as I had numerous devices hanging off me, and the lab technicians were putting the final touches and checks to the equipment.

“Roscoe! Let me wish you the best of luck!” We shook hands firmly.

“Thank you, Sir. I will do my best. We've been planning this long enough to be as prepared as we can be for whatever I might encounter.”

He nodded, and stroked his beard thoughtfully. “Yes, but you are crossing a new frontier in scientific exploration – where no man has gone before etc. You need to be prepared for the unexpected.

“As do you – the LLRoscoe may also be dangerous. You need to take precautions, as well.”

“He could be nicer than you, too!” Geoff joined in, to deflate my expectations.”He might like hanging out in bars and nightclubs and be more fun than you – have one night stands and get drunk occasionally, perhaps!”

I laughed at Geoff's preferred weekend routine.”I'll be sure to ask his colleagues, and maybe I'll stay in their world so you can enjoy the LLRoscoe instead, if he sounds more fun than me!”

“Joking aside,”Hadleigh became serious,”Remember the limited time. You've got an alarm set for 2h50. You must be back in 3 hours. Any longer becomes unpredictable. The calculations show that this close encounter between our universes only happens once every seven years, and after the window closes, we may not be able to boost the confinement beam sufficiently to re-establish the link after the three hours and 7 minutes is up. While the increase in power after that period is still within our capabilities, it will exceed our maximum generation at 3h 21, and you would be stuck there for 7 years 3 months and a few days, so don't get stuck in an elevator!” The last point was accompanied by his infectious grin. Hadleigh didn't make jokes often, and it betrayed his nervousness. If anything went wrong, his neck was on the line not mine, as he was the mission controller – the buck stopped with him.

I nodded. “Yes, Sir. I won't hang around for the capuccino if there's a long queue. I'll be sure to return for another of Geoff's specials before tea-break this afternoon.” I winked at Geoff, and he smiled back.

“T-minus five minutes.” I stepped into my Hazmat suit and zipped it up to my neck.

Hadleigh shook my hand again. “Back to the controls. See you in three hours.”

The technicians moved away back to their controls, to check the remote links were established, although it wasn't expected that there would be anyway to communicate with the LLuniverse, but in any case the data would be stored locally until I returned.

I took a deep breath and walked slowly towards the link chamber. Geoff followed me, somewhat more serious now that Crossover was approaching. Reaching the chamber door, I stopped and turned round.

“Here, take this – for good luck!” Geoff handed me a rabbit's foot. “It's got a location beacon and emergency transmitter built in.”

“Thanks.” I shook his hand and accepted the gift, and placed it carefully in my pocket. “I'll be back for my capuccino at tea break this afternoon.”

“Don't worry, I have one prepared for LLRoscoe – he may need one as soon as he arrives in a few minutes.” Geoff tried to smile, but his concern was clearly etched on his face. I shook his hand again and opened the door to the Crossover chamber, stepped inside and closed the door.

“10-9-8” the final countdown started and I could hear the sounds of generators whirring, lights flashing and a white mist-like gas filling the chamber. I glanced across at the row of technicians monitoring my vital signs, and the last image was of Lisa's look of jealousy, anger and bitterness as the mist clouded my view and I felt the shaking and vibrating of the chamber wall and held on as a dizzy feeling and headache started building. I tried to move forward towards the other door, but my legs felt like jelly, trapped in treacle and my movements felt like they were controlled by someone else not by my mind. The chamber was only three metres long, but it seemed to take an absolute age for my disoriented joints to cover the short distance, holding on tightly to the guide-rails and fumbling through the mist that completely filled the chamber now. I had a vague sense that there was someone else in the chamber with me, but my mind couldn't focus as I struggled to the far end.

I finally reached the other door and the smoke began to clear, as did my head and the headache receded. Before I could reach for the door-release, it opened suddenly and I almost fell through the opening and two people in full Hazmat suits grabbed me and held me upright. The smoke cleared and I could see a room very similar to the one I had just left – rows of technicians sitting behind controls, except everyone was in full hazmat suits, and there was a thick transparent barrier between us. Only the two technicians – one on either side of me – were on my side of the barrier, and they led me carefully into a de-contamination area, where we were all subjected to a high pressure liquid spray, washing us from top to bottom. After a few minutes, we emerged and the technicians picked up some kind of hand-held detector and closely checked all over my body, hesitating by my pocket and indicating for me to remove whatever was in there – I produced Geoff's lucky rabbit foot and they carefully took it from me and opened a nearby solid-looking black box and dropped it in and closed the lid.

“He's clear of explosives, weapons or any dangerous devices, only monitoring sensors.” An electronic voice was clearly audible over the speakers.

“No detectable viruses or other unknown organisms.” Another electronic voice – presumably the other technician – could be heard.

“Bring him to the ante-room, we'll welcome him there.” The voice did not sound as friendly as the words, but I dismissed the thought and followed the two technicians to a door to one side of the barrier. One of the technicians typed a code number onto the keypad and the door silently slid open and I followed them in. The door closed behind them and they then unzipped their Hazmat suits and I copied their actions, stepped out of the suit and followed them in hanging them up. They then turned and pointed guns at me. “Geoff! Lisa!” I recognised the familiar-but-not-quite faces and held out my hand to welcome them.

Geoff looked at my outstretched hand as if it was contaminated dog faeces – a look that I had never seen on his face before, and I had known him for more than ten years.

I turned to Lisa, and was surprised by her look as after hesitating for a short while, she took my hand and shook it warmly and she smiled at me – something that the Lisa from my universe hadn't done since our very first meeting some years earlier.

“Welcome to our universe, Hadstock! How was the trip?” I had to rapidly adjust to the new personalities of my old friends and acquaintances – I had been prepared for the possibility that they could have significanty different characteristics in the LLuniverse, but it was still taking time for me to adjust my expectations after working with them closely for so many years.

“A little dizziness, disorientation and the feeling of losing control of my limbs – like walking through treacle under somebody else's control.”

Lisa nodded. “Consistent with our best guesses. We'll download your medical data and crosscheck your vital signs – assuming your similar to our Hadstock – and then Mr Summerly – our Mission Controller – would like to interview you, are you ready, or would you like some time to recover, or a capuccino, perhaps, with heavy chocolate dusting?”

I had to smile at the thought that in this universe it was Lisa, and not Geoff, who knew my favourite beverage.

“A capuccino with heavy chocolate dusting would be ideal – I can see that your Roscoe and I have similar tastes!” I smiled at Lisa, and was pleasantly surprised by the extended eye-contact and the warmth in her eyes, and the fact that she was still holding onto my hand.She indicated the cup on the table and and I sipped on my favourite drink.

“Enough!” Geoff shattered the friendly atmosphere, and I let go of Lisa's hand as if it had suddenly become red-hot. “Remember your training, Southerly, he could still be extremely dangerous even though we haven't found any explosive devices. We cannot trust him, yet. Handcuff him.”

Lisa put her gun back in her belt holster and withdrew a pair of handcuffs. I held out my hands and she cuffed me.

“Sit down, Hadstock.” Geoff's stentorian and unfriendly tone jarred on my warm memories of our numerous cheerful conversations, and I reluctantly obeyed. Geoff moved behind me and pulled my cuffed hands behind the chair and to a hidden fixing point. He kneeled down and fixed some kind of leg-irons aorund my ankles, to hold me in place.

I had to say something, this was more serious than I had expected. “Why the precautions? I come in peace.”

“Yeah, right!” Geoff was sneering in his cynicism. “We've heard that before. You expect us to believe that you're simply an explorer pushing back the frontiers of science?”

“Well...” I swallowed, “It's true!”

“Nonsense! You could be hiding an explosive device, or maybe it's even you as some kind of biocontamination, or even biobomb.”

I shook my head in disbelief.”I've no idea what you're talking about! You've scanned me yourself – you can see I've not got anything to hide.”

“You had that rabbit's foot with some kind of tracking device and communication link inside – highly suspicious.”

“It was part of our experiments to determine whether we could communicate across the parallel universe boundaries – I doubted it would even work. Geoff – the Geoff in my universe – believed we could bounce a signal off the chamber doorway, through a repeater-amplifier, and that there might be a range of frequencies that could cross the universe-boundaries.”

“He's correct – it can be done. That's how we communicate with our Hadstock in your universe.”

His words made me curious. “So, our universe is not the first time you've encountered parallel universes?” Geoff didn't answer, but his glance at Lisa told me more than words.

“So, how many other universes have you crossed over into? What happened? What did you discover?” My curiosity made me forget the strange circumstances and my restraints for a moment.

They didn't intend to answer, it was clear, and the silence was deafening – broken by the lock shifting and the door opened – Hadleigh stepped in, accompanied by two heavily armed officers pointing their weapons at me. Lisa and Geoff immediately stood up and saluted.

“At ease.” Hadleigh was the consummate general – in full military uniform – not the formal suit I was used to. “Sit down.” Lisa and Geoff resumed their seats and Hadleigh sat at the opposite end of the table from me.

Hadleigh looked at me, clearly appraising the possible risks. “You appear to have crossed over without any health consequences. You must have some questions before I tell you what's going to happen to you.” His words and the half-smile had a definitely dubious implication.

“Yes, of course. Like, why am I being restrained like a prisoner? I am a scientist and explorer, not some kind of invader or robot-explosive. Your scans and investigations must have confirmed this?”

Hadleigh nodded. ”It doesn't matter that we haven't discovered anything, yet. We don't believe your story. The restraints are a precaution.” The pause before the word 'yet' was deeply disturbing and sinister.

“So, how many other universes have you crossed over to?”

“Yours is the seventh.”

I was fascinated by the possibilities. “Are you still in touch with them? What happened? What did you discover? How many re-crossings? What did you do with them?” My questions poured out and I leaned forward, pulling against the restraints as if I could get nearer to the answers by doing so.

“We are a public-private partnership – controlled by the government - but exploiting other universes for financial rewards....”

“What do you mean - 'exploiting other universes'?” I didn't like the tone of his voice, or the direction this conversation was heading. A shiver ran up my spine.

He half-smiled – the same sinister half-smile I noticed before. “We convert the matter in the parallel universes into energy, which we use to power our universe – free, unlimited and easily controllable.”

I was shocked by the implication. “You mean, you destroy other universes for profit?That's despicable – barbaric!” I ran out of words in disbelief.

The half-smile reappeared. “Such a small word – profit. We are simply the more successful businesses exploiting the less successful ones – simply market forces.”

“So, you're planning to repeat this approach with my universe?” The implication was too extreme for me to comprehend.

Hadleigh nodded. “Of course. Your little universe is just above the minimum level of energy supply for conversion – we've given it the nickname of the 'Puniverse'” He laughed at his own joke, and Geoff joined in heartily, but Lisa just looked away. “As we speak, our Hadstock is planting several matter-energy converters inside your laboratory, around the space-time continuum crossover control system. Shortly after he returns, we shall remotely detonate them and....” he moved his hands in a mushroom cloud shape...”Boom – and your universe becomes our next five years energy source. Simply the 'big-bang' in reverse.” The look of satisfaction on his face, deeply troubled me.

My instinct was sending me negative signals. “So, why are you telling me this?”

Hadleigh made eye contact and leaned forwards. “Because, my dear Hadstock, you are not returning to your universe.”

“But what will happen if two of me are in the same universe? Our calculations show that cannot happen – we have to simultaneously crossover, otherwise...” I couldn't finish the sentence, but Hadleigh finished it for me.

“...one of them immediately ceases to exist. Yes – the LL version...” he pointed at me. “You. As soon as our Hadstock returns, you instantly disappear. Simple laws of physics, isn't it? No messy murdering or body to dispose of or anything.” He stood up, as did Lisa and Geoff. “Enough! You will remain here until Crossover.” He glanced at his watch. “38 minutes, to be exact. Would you like another capuccino?” He turned and left, followed by the two guards.

I just sat there in stunned silence, staring at the closed door in complete and utter bafflement and disbelief at what I'd just heard. The idea of the complete absorption, conversion and use of my 'puniverse' into the LLuniverse's energy supply system was too sudden and too huge for me to comprehend. “Yes, please can I have another capuccino.” The words were said on automatic, as if my brain could not function on the macro level, only able to make microdecisions, such as ordering a cup of coffee.

Geoff stood up, almost becoming the Geoff I knew. “Okay, I'll be right back.” He left and locked the door behind him, leaving Lisa and I alone together. I turned to look at her, but before I could say anything, she was on her knees next to me, undoing my leg-irons.

I watched her shiny long hair swaying from side to side, her lips were moist from licking them and her face had a shine from the perspiration, just inches away. I couldn't resist any longer. Three years of obsession and rejection and frustration was too much for me and I leaned forwards to kiss her as she leaned over me to undo my cuffs.

She hesitated and leaned into the kiss for a moment, and as my hands came free I went to wrap my arms around her, but she snapped back to reality and gently pushed me away. “No time for that now – we have to save your universe.”

“Saving the universe can wait, just kiss me again.” I leaned forwards, but she stood up and grabbed my hands, pulling me to my feet. I wanted to hug her, but she shook her head.

“We've only got a few minutes before Geoff returns. The capuccino will be poisoned – some kind of sleeping drug – the first one also, but you didn't drink enough.” I wondered why I felt a little dizzy and not reacting seriously to the dangerous nature of the situation.

“Quick, put on the Hazmat suit – then nobody will recognise you.” I slowly followed her lead, realising the logic of her approach. I had barely zipped up the last zip when the door opened and Geoff re-entered and the door locked behind him. Geoff looked at us hesitated, and put the capuccino on the table. He looked up to see that Lisa was pointing her gun at him and he froze in surprise. “Lisa, no!” and she shot him, 2-3 times – a silent laser burst erupted from the nozzle and he fell backwards against the wall and slid down onto the floor.

Lisa looked at my shocked face, and smiled. “Don't worry, he's only stunned. He'll be unconscious for about an hour – long enough for us to escape.”

“But why are you helping me? You've been part of the system here for many years, surely you support what they are doing?”

Lisa shook her head. “It's a job, but no – I don't agree with the morality of what they're doing, but I decided to stay – as even if I quit, somebody else would simply replace me and maybe strongly support what they are doing. I just kept my mouth shut and got on with the job, waiting for a chance to stop them – your arrival is exactly the opportunity I've been waiting for.”

“So, how can I disable the matter-energy converters before they destroy my universe? Or can you prevent them from being activated from here?”

“No, too many people here. I wouldn't get very far. I need to Crossover with you and locate and deactivate them myself.”

I looked shocked at the idea. “But you'd immediately disappear, because you'd be the foreign Lisa.”

“Unless your Lisa simultaneously crossed over. Tell me about your Lisa – is it likely? Our Hadstock is the supreme womaniser – he's slept with most of the women on the team, including the three on the selection panel – that's how he was chosen ahead of me for the Crossover.”

A thought crossed my mind. “Including you?”

She looked down at her feet and nodded. “Yes, just once. He's the master of one-night stands, but I didn't know that. It was love at first sight when I arrived, and I wanted a long term relationship, family etc, but I didn't want to believe his reputation. I thought I could change him.” She drifted off, looking wistful. I became momentarily envious of the other Roscoe.

“Well, the Lisa in my universe turned me down many times. She's dedicated to the task, cold-hearted, short-tempered and bitter to have lost out to me in the selection for first Crossover. Yes, I think she would be intrigued by your Roscoe. Her personality is incompatible with our team – you'd like our Geoff – he's my best friend, funny, a little wild, but totally loyal and makes a great capuccino. Yes – I think this could work. Could you communicate with your Roscoe to confirm the double-switch?”

“Dangerous – it might tip him off to the double-cross – I think he would be willing to take the risk – he doesn't have anything to lose, as your Lisa would simply disappear immediately if I didn't simultaneously Crossover. He wouldn't explain the genuine consequences to her, he'd lie about it to persuade her.”

“If I could rescue my rabbit foot, then I could send a coded message to my Geoff to encourage Lisa to Crossover – we'd all be glad to get rid of her!” I smiled at the thought.

Lisa was considering my suggestion. “Yes, that could work. But your communication device is primitive – it looked only capable of binary messages.” She shook her head at the idea.

I smiled.”Primitive, yes. We are not as experienced as you at Crossover. Yet. But it works by morse code. I could send a simple message, if you can retrieve it.”

“We won't have much time, between recovering the rabbit foot, sending the message and Crossover.”

“I'll only need a minute. Geoff will understand the urgency. Presumably, they are having the same kind of discussion over there as we are.”

“What about the matter-energy converters. How long before they are activated?”

“We'll have around five minutes, based on our pre-mission discussions. There are three devices located at specific locations around your lab. I have the map. But we wouldn't have time to locate and deactivate them. It would take too long.” Lisa scratched her head in frustration.

“What about the Crossover corridor repeater-amplifier device? Geoff said something about using it to communicate with your Roscoe. Is that how you'll send the remote command to activate?”

”Yes. Yes, if we destroy that before leaving the Crossover chamber, then the activation signal won't reach the devices. We should have enough time to deactivate the devices before they realise what has happened and they replace the amplifier.”

I had another idea. “Could we somehow reverse the effect and destroy this universe instead – to stop them simply repeating the absorption with another universe elsewhere?”

Lisa looked sad, and wistful. Then she shook her head. “No, I can't help with that. While I don't approve of what they're doing, I couldn't take revenge on them in that manner, even if it was possible, no. Two wrongs don't make a right. I've got too many friends and memories here. I'm sorry, I won't go that far.”

I thought for a moment, then had another idea.

“Why don't I go back early. Then your Roscoe would suddenly disappear. I could then encourage our Lisa to Crossover at the agreed time.”

Lisa shook her head. “You don't know how Lisa would think. She'll only Crossover to be with Roscoe, not simply to escape your world. In any case, I don't want to kill our Roscoe, just to get away from him. No, we need to simultaneously crossover together for this to work.

My alarm sounded, and I cancelled it quickly. “Ten minutes to go.”

“Okay. Let's go.” Lisa bent over Geoff's body and removed his ID card and clipped it on my shoulder. “This will activate the doors for you. By the time they realise you're not Geoff, we will be in the beam.”

“But Hadleigh said I was to stay here and surely they aren't expecting anyone to Crossover. Why would they allow the two of us to go?”

Lisa stopped for a moment. “Good point. I hadn't thought of that.”

“Could you access the mission logs and submit new commands to the team, purporting to be Hadleigh? By the time he realised what was happening it would be too late.”

Lisa sat at the console and began accessing the system. “I would need Hadleigh's access code to do that, and I don't know it. “

I smiled. “I do – assuming he used the same codes as my Hadleigh – his son's name, Devereux.”

Lisa looked up at me surprised for a moment, then turned back to the keyboard and continued typing. “Your code worked, I'm in!” She quickly retyped the new mission logs, indicating two people would Crossover shortly, and received team acknowledgements.

“Okay, done. Now to get your rabbit's foot.” She stood up and walked to the door and paused while her ID code was scanned and the door slid open. We both stepped through and the guards saluted. We saluted back and I followed her through the main doors into the Lab area. She went to the storebox where my rabbit's foot had been placed, typed the passcode, opened the lid and reached inside to retrieve the comms device and handed it to me. I turned with my back to the transparent barrier and quickly typed a morsecode message to indicate two people for Crossover and to encourage Geoff to allow Lisa to Crossover as the second person. Lisa turned her back as well and carefully picked up a hammer lying on the workbench and folded her arms to obscure its view.

“T-minus one minute” - the electronic voice prompted Lisa to pull me towards the Crossover chamber and opened the door. We entered and it silently closed behind us.

“10, 9, 8...” smoke started filling the chamber and the feeling of being outside my body and losing control took over as we slowly inched along the chamber towards the other door. Around half-way, I was aware of Lisa moving in slow-motion, raising her arm and hitting a grey flashing box with the hammer, trying to destroy it, but she was not strong enough. Any moment now and the door to my universe would open and it would be too late. I shook my head, to try and focus and grabbed the hammer from Lisa and used all my strength to fight the disembodied feeling and smash the amplifier, finally succeeding on the third hit, and grabbed the wreckage and pulled it off as the door to my universe slid open and we fell out onto the floor.

I was relieved to see that Lisa was lying alongside me and slowly trying to pull herself up and hadn't disappeared. Geoff and Hadleigh joined us to help us to our feet and to unzip our face vizors and helmets and the first thing I saw was Geoff's smiling face. “Welcome home, hero!” and he held out his hand, which I gratefully took with both of mine and shook strongly.

“It's good to see you, too, Geoff, my old friend.”

“So, the other Geoff wasn't as friendly as me, then, old friend?”

Lisa removed her helmet and shook her head, swinging her long hair loosely around her face. “No. definitely not. I had to shoot him!” Geoff looked surprised.

“Sounds like your trip report is going to make interesting reading.” Hadleigh added.

“No time for that. We've got less than five minutes to find and deactivate three explosive devices that LLRoscoe planted around the lab.” Lisa reached into her pocket and produced a map.

Hadleigh and Geoff exchanged glances and nodded at one another.

“LLRoscoe explained they were an improved design of controller for our systems, based on their greater experience. He said it was a gift from the LLuniverse for us, but we were suspicious, so immediately isolated and disconnected them after he left. Looks like we were right.”

Hadleigh turned to Lisa and held out his hand. “Welcome to our friendly team, I hope you will enjoy working with us.” Lisa shook hands warmly and tears were running down her face. I put my arm round her to comfort her and squeezed.

“Now we've saved the universe, can I have another kiss?”

The End

...”And the panel's decision for the first Crosser from our universe to the parallel universe is...”

I could sense Lisa Southerly alongside me also holding her breath in anticipation. Five year's of training, research and experiments, plus testing dozens of highly qualified applicants from within the premier space exploration organisation came down to this moment – who would it be? Lisa was more experienced in space exploration than me, but her personality was more abrasive and unfriendly. More than one team member had made informal complaints about her. In any case, travelling to a parallel universe was more about first contact than about exploring space. Who would we meet? How friendly would they be? I glanced at Lisa, feeling that familiar rush of blood to my face at the sight of her, which even after repeated rejections, I couldn't resist.

She noticed my glance and glared at me angrily and I tried to focus on the lead panelist and control my feelings for Lisa, in anticipation of the pending announcement.

“...Roscoe Hadstock!”

The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur of media interviews, handshakes, congratulations and celebratory backslaps, before I finally got back to my office just before home-time. Lisa was noisily packing up in her neighbouring office and looked up as I returned.

“So, who did you sleep with to get the nomination? I could see the way that the female panellists were making eyes at you.”

I shook my head and ignored the tone of her voice.”A simple congratulations would suffice. We still need to work together to prepare for first contact tomorrow, and afterwards. You're still expected to be the second Crosser.” I held out my hand, but she ignored it and turned away mumbling under her breath.

“Nobody remembers the second person to do anything. Edmund Hillary was the first person to ascend Mount Everest and return. Who was the second?”

I looked blankly and she continued.

“Yuri Gagarin was the first person in space, who was the second? Neil Armstrong was the first person to step onto the moon, who cares about the second? Nobody.” She answered her own question. I couldn't think of anything to say. She was right about how it would be remembered by history. I tried to console her again.

“Well, I value your support and you've pushed me all the way through training to try harder. I couldn't have achieved this without your competition.”

Her eyes looked even darker than usual. “I don't want your fake sympathy, thank you! I intend to complete this mission and I'll do my job, but don't expect any congratulations from me.” She grabbed her bag and stormed out of the office, slamming the door behind her, nearly trapping Geoff's hand as he entered as she was leaving.

He smiled at me. We had been good friends for many years.” I see Lisa's not happy about you being chosen ahead of her.” He was laughing as he spoke. We had often discussed our colleague during our free time away from the office. He came over to shake my hand.

“Congrats, hero!” He was smiling broadly now. “Can I have your autograph on our graduation photo. It'll be worth millions for our grandchildren!”

I laughed and picked up my briefcase. “Let's go. I'll buy you a coffee, if you agree to stop teasing me.”

Sleep was difficult that night, wondering about the trip into the unknown. Would I meet myself and how would we react? What about the risk of cross-contamination, or the disruption to the space-time continuum? Some experts predicted that the parallel universe would be made of anti-matter, and hence any contact between matter and anti-matter would destroy one or both universes. There had been some protests outside the labs by groups opposed to any exploration of the parallel universe, but most of the public seemed fascinated by the developments.

Those thoughts were mixed with romantic images of Lisa being disrupted by her shouting and screaming at me. Followed by conversations with Geoff reminding me to forget about her, to find someone better. Telling me to stop torturing myself by waiting for Lisa and to let him introduce me to one of his many ex-girlfriends, followed by my explaining that 'quality is more important than quantity', and I was waiting for one special lady for a long-term relationship, not a series of short-term flings like Geoff. There were plenty of nicer women. I had been single for far too long and in order to realise my dream of a family I needed to find someone else – someone who was a more supportive woman, but my mind kept drifting back to Lisa.

I arrived at the lab early the next morning. Geoff was already at the console with a cup of capuccino heavily coated in my favourite chocolate dust, and hot croissants.

“Heh, hero, your obedient slave has prepared your favourite breakfast!”

I couldn't help but smile. His exuberance was infectious, overcoming the empty feeling in my stomach. The tension in the lab was palpable, and Geoff was a key member of the team, helping to ease the atmosphere.

I sat on the preparation bench and took a bite of the croissant, while the other team members began attaching various probes, sensors and other health monitoring equipment to my body.

“You know, this trip could be dangerous. Then you'll be glad you only helped with the preparation!”

“Maybe, but if you meet the parallel version of me, I bet he won't be so helpful!”

“T-minus 30 minutes.” The computerised voice interrupted our conversations, followed by Hadleigh Summerly, the mission controller, striding purposefully across the open-plan area towards me with his hand outstretched. I stood up shakily, as I had numerous devices hanging off me, and the lab technicians were putting the final touches and checks to the equipment.

“Roscoe! Let me wish you the best of luck!” We shook hands firmly.

“Thank you, Sir. I will do my best. We've been planning this long enough to be as prepared as we can be for whatever I might encounter.”

He nodded, and stroked his beard thoughtfully. “Yes, but you are crossing a new frontier in scientific exploration – where no man has gone before etc. You need to be prepared for the unexpected.

“As do you – the LLRoscoe may also be dangerous. You need to take precautions, as well.”

“He could be nicer than you, too!” Geoff joined in, to deflate my expectations.”He might like hanging out in bars and nightclubs and be more fun than you – have one night stands and get drunk occasionally, perhaps!”

I laughed at Geoff's preferred weekend routine.”I'll be sure to ask his colleagues, and maybe I'll stay in their world so you can enjoy the LLRoscoe instead, if he sounds more fun than me!”

“Joking aside,”Hadleigh became serious,”Remember the limited time. You've got an alarm set for 2h50. You must be back in 3 hours. Any longer becomes unpredictable. The calculations show that this close encounter between our universes only happens once every seven years, and after the window closes, we may not be able to boost the confinement beam sufficiently to re-establish the link after the three hours and 7 minutes is up. While the increase in power after that period is still within our capabilities, it will exceed our maximum generation at 3h 21, and you would be stuck there for 7 years 3 months and a few days, so don't get stuck in an elevator!” The last point was accompanied by his infectious grin. Hadleigh didn't make jokes often, and it betrayed his nervousness. If anything went wrong, his neck was on the line not mine, as he was the mission controller – the buck stopped with him.

I nodded. “Yes, Sir. I won't hang around for the capuccino if there's a long queue. I'll be sure to return for another of Geoff's specials before tea-break this afternoon.” I winked at Geoff, and he smiled back.

“T-minus five minutes.” I stepped into my Hazmat suit and zipped it up to my neck.

Hadleigh shook my hand again. “Back to the controls. See you in three hours.”

The technicians moved away back to their controls, to check the remote links were established, although it wasn't expected that there would be anyway to communicate with the LLuniverse, but in any case the data would be stored locally until I returned.

I took a deep breath and walked slowly towards the link chamber. Geoff followed me, somewhat more serious now that Crossover was approaching. Reaching the chamber door, I stopped and turned round.

“Here, take this – for good luck!” Geoff handed me a rabbit's foot. “It's got a location beacon and emergency transmitter built in.”

“Thanks.” I shook his hand and accepted the gift, and placed it carefully in my pocket. “I'll be back for my capuccino at tea break this afternoon.”

“Don't worry, I have one prepared for LLRoscoe – he may need one as soon as he arrives in a few minutes.” Geoff tried to smile, but his concern was clearly etched on his face. I shook his hand again and opened the door to the Crossover chamber, stepped inside and closed the door.

“10-9-8” the final countdown started and I could hear the sounds of generators whirring, lights flashing and a white mist-like gas filling the chamber. I glanced across at the row of technicians monitoring my vital signs, and the last image was of Lisa's look of jealousy, anger and bitterness as the mist clouded my view and I felt the shaking and vibrating of the chamber wall and held on as a dizzy feeling and headache started building. I tried to move forward towards the other door, but my legs felt like jelly, trapped in treacle and my movements felt like they were controlled by someone else not by my mind. The chamber was only three metres long, but it seemed to take an absolute age for my disoriented joints to cover the short distance, holding on tightly to the guide-rails and fumbling through the mist that completely filled the chamber now. I had a vague sense that there was someone else in the chamber with me, but my mind couldn't focus as I struggled to the far end.

I finally reached the other door and the smoke began to clear, as did my head and the headache receded. Before I could reach for the door-release, it opened suddenly and I almost fell through the opening and two people in full Hazmat suits grabbed me and held me upright. The smoke cleared and I could see a room very similar to the one I had just left – rows of technicians sitting behind controls, except everyone was in full hazmat suits, and there was a thick transparent barrier between us. Only the two technicians – one on either side of me – were on my side of the barrier, and they led me carefully into a de-contamination area, where we were all subjected to a high pressure liquid spray, washing us from top to bottom. After a few minutes, we emerged and the technicians picked up some kind of hand-held detector and closely checked all over my body, hesitating by my pocket and indicating for me to remove whatever was in there – I produced Geoff's lucky rabbit foot and they carefully took it from me and opened a nearby solid-looking black box and dropped it in and closed the lid.

“He's clear of explosives, weapons or any dangerous devices, only monitoring sensors.” An electronic voice was clearly audible over the speakers.

“No detectable viruses or other unknown organisms.” Another electronic voice – presumably the other technician – could be heard.

“Bring him to the ante-room, we'll welcome him there.” The voice did not sound as friendly as the words, but I dismissed the thought and followed the two technicians to a door to one side of the barrier. One of the technicians typed a code number onto the keypad and the door silently slid open and I followed them in. The door closed behind them and they then unzipped their Hazmat suits and I copied their actions, stepped out of the suit and followed them in hanging them up. They then turned and pointed guns at me. “Geoff! Lisa!” I recognised the familiar-but-not-quite faces and held out my hand to welcome them.

Geoff looked at my outstretched hand as if it was contaminated dog faeces – a look that I had never seen on his face before, and I had known him for more than ten years.

I turned to Lisa, and was surprised by her look as after hesitating for a short while, she took my hand and shook it warmly and she smiled at me – something that the Lisa from my universe hadn't done since our very first meeting some years earlier.

“Welcome to our universe, Hadstock! How was the trip?” I had to rapidly adjust to the new personalities of my old friends and acquaintances – I had been prepared for the possibility that they could have significanty different characteristics in the LLuniverse, but it was still taking time for me to adjust my expectations after working with them closely for so many years.

“A little dizziness, disorientation and the feeling of losing control of my limbs – like walking through treacle under somebody else's control.”

Lisa nodded. “Consistent with our best guesses. We'll download your medical data and crosscheck your vital signs – assuming your similar to our Hadstock – and then Mr Summerly – our Mission Controller – would like to interview you, are you ready, or would you like some time to recover, or a capuccino, perhaps, with heavy chocolate dusting?”

I had to smile at the thought that in this universe it was Lisa, and not Geoff, who knew my favourite beverage.

“A capuccino with heavy chocolate dusting would be ideal – I can see that your Roscoe and I have similar tastes!” I smiled at Lisa, and was pleasantly surprised by the extended eye-contact and the warmth in her eyes, and the fact that she was still holding onto my hand.She indicated the cup on the table and and I sipped on my favourite drink.

“Enough!” Geoff shattered the friendly atmosphere, and I let go of Lisa's hand as if it had suddenly become red-hot. “Remember your training, Southerly, he could still be extremely dangerous even though we haven't found any explosive devices. We cannot trust him, yet. Handcuff him.”

Lisa put her gun back in her belt holster and withdrew a pair of handcuffs. I held out my hands and she cuffed me.

“Sit down, Hadstock.” Geoff's stentorian and unfriendly tone jarred on my warm memories of our numerous cheerful conversations, and I reluctantly obeyed. Geoff moved behind me and pulled my cuffed hands behind the chair and to a hidden fixing point. He kneeled down and fixed some kind of leg-irons aorund my ankles, to hold me in place.

I had to say something, this was more serious than I had expected. “Why the precautions? I come in peace.”

“Yeah, right!” Geoff was sneering in his cynicism. “We've heard that before. You expect us to believe that you're simply an explorer pushing back the frontiers of science?”

“Well...” I swallowed, “It's true!”

“Nonsense! You could be hiding an explosive device, or maybe it's even you as some kind of biocontamination, or even biobomb.”

I shook my head in disbelief.”I've no idea what you're talking about! You've scanned me yourself – you can see I've not got anything to hide.”

“You had that rabbit's foot with some kind of tracking device and communication link inside – highly suspicious.”

“It was part of our experiments to determine whether we could communicate across the parallel universe boundaries – I doubted it would even work. Geoff – the Geoff in my universe – believed we could bounce a signal off the chamber doorway, through a repeater-amplifier, and that there might be a range of frequencies that could cross the universe-boundaries.”

“He's correct – it can be done. That's how we communicate with our Hadstock in your universe.”

His words made me curious. “So, our universe is not the first time you've encountered parallel universes?” Geoff didn't answer, but his glance at Lisa told me more than words.

“So, how many other universes have you crossed over into? What happened? What did you discover?” My curiosity made me forget the strange circumstances and my restraints for a moment.

They didn't intend to answer, it was clear, and the silence was deafening – broken by the lock shifting and the door opened – Hadleigh stepped in, accompanied by two heavily armed officers pointing their weapons at me. Lisa and Geoff immediately stood up and saluted.

“At ease.” Hadleigh was the consummate general – in full military uniform – not the formal suit I was used to. “Sit down.” Lisa and Geoff resumed their seats and Hadleigh sat at the opposite end of the table from me.

Hadleigh looked at me, clearly appraising the possible risks. “You appear to have crossed over without any health consequences. You must have some questions before I tell you what's going to happen to you.” His words and the half-smile had a definitely dubious implication.

“Yes, of course. Like, why am I being restrained like a prisoner? I am a scientist and explorer, not some kind of invader or robot-explosive. Your scans and investigations must have confirmed this?”

Hadleigh nodded. ”It doesn't matter that we haven't discovered anything, yet. We don't believe your story. The restraints are a precaution.” The pause before the word 'yet' was deeply disturbing and sinister.

“So, how many other universes have you crossed over to?”

“Yours is the seventh.”

I was fascinated by the possibilities. “Are you still in touch with them? What happened? What did you discover? How many re-crossings? What did you do with them?” My questions poured out and I leaned forward, pulling against the restraints as if I could get nearer to the answers by doing so.

“We are a public-private partnership – controlled by the government - but exploiting other universes for financial rewards....”

“What do you mean - 'exploiting other universes'?” I didn't like the tone of his voice, or the direction this conversation was heading. A shiver ran up my spine.

He half-smiled – the same sinister half-smile I noticed before. “We convert the matter in the parallel universes into energy, which we use to power our universe – free, unlimited and easily controllable.”

I was shocked by the implication. “You mean, you destroy other universes for profit?That's despicable – barbaric!” I ran out of words in disbelief.

The half-smile reappeared. “Such a small word – profit. We are simply the more successful businesses exploiting the less successful ones – simply market forces.”

“So, you're planning to repeat this approach with my universe?” The implication was too extreme for me to comprehend.

Hadleigh nodded. “Of course. Your little universe is just above the minimum level of energy supply for conversion – we've given it the nickname of the 'Puniverse'” He laughed at his own joke, and Geoff joined in heartily, but Lisa just looked away. “As we speak, our Hadstock is planting several matter-energy converters inside your laboratory, around the space-time continuum crossover control system. Shortly after he returns, we shall remotely detonate them and....” he moved his hands in a mushroom cloud shape...”Boom – and your universe becomes our next five years energy source. Simply the 'big-bang' in reverse.” The look of satisfaction on his face, deeply troubled me.

My instinct was sending me negative signals. “So, why are you telling me this?”

Hadleigh made eye contact and leaned forwards. “Because, my dear Hadstock, you are not returning to your universe.”

“But what will happen if two of me are in the same universe? Our calculations show that cannot happen – we have to simultaneously crossover, otherwise...” I couldn't finish the sentence, but Hadleigh finished it for me.

“...one of them immediately ceases to exist. Yes – the LL version...” he pointed at me. “You. As soon as our Hadstock returns, you instantly disappear. Simple laws of physics, isn't it? No messy murdering or body to dispose of or anything.” He stood up, as did Lisa and Geoff. “Enough! You will remain here until Crossover.” He glanced at his watch. “38 minutes, to be exact. Would you like another capuccino?” He turned and left, followed by the two guards.

I just sat there in stunned silence, staring at the closed door in complete and utter bafflement and disbelief at what I'd just heard. The idea of the complete absorption, conversion and use of my 'puniverse' into the LLuniverse's energy supply system was too sudden and too huge for me to comprehend. “Yes, please can I have another capuccino.” The words were said on automatic, as if my brain could not function on the macro level, only able to make microdecisions, such as ordering a cup of coffee.

Geoff stood up, almost becoming the Geoff I knew. “Okay, I'll be right back.” He left and locked the door behind him, leaving Lisa and I alone together. I turned to look at her, but before I could say anything, she was on her knees next to me, undoing my leg-irons.

I watched her shiny long hair swaying from side to side, her lips were moist from licking them and her face had a shine from the perspiration, just inches away. I couldn't resist any longer. Three years of obsession and rejection and frustration was too much for me and I leaned forwards to kiss her as she leaned over me to undo my cuffs.

She hesitated and leaned into the kiss for a moment, and as my hands came free I went to wrap my arms around her, but she snapped back to reality and gently pushed me away. “No time for that now – we have to save your universe.”

“Saving the universe can wait, just kiss me again.” I leaned forwards, but she stood up and grabbed my hands, pulling me to my feet. I wanted to hug her, but she shook her head.

“We've only got a few minutes before Geoff returns. The capuccino will be poisoned – some kind of sleeping drug – the first one also, but you didn't drink enough.” I wondered why I felt a little dizzy and not reacting seriously to the dangerous nature of the situation.

“Quick, put on the Hazmat suit – then nobody will recognise you.” I slowly followed her lead, realising the logic of her approach. I had barely zipped up the last zip when the door opened and Geoff re-entered and the door locked behind him. Geoff looked at us hesitated, and put the capuccino on the table. He looked up to see that Lisa was pointing her gun at him and he froze in surprise. “Lisa, no!” and she shot him, 2-3 times – a silent laser burst erupted from the nozzle and he fell backwards against the wall and slid down onto the floor.

Lisa looked at my shocked face, and smiled. “Don't worry, he's only stunned. He'll be unconscious for about an hour – long enough for us to escape.”

“But why are you helping me? You've been part of the system here for many years, surely you support what they are doing?”

Lisa shook her head. “It's a job, but no – I don't agree with the morality of what they're doing, but I decided to stay – as even if I quit, somebody else would simply replace me and maybe strongly support what they are doing. I just kept my mouth shut and got on with the job, waiting for a chance to stop them – your arrival is exactly the opportunity I've been waiting for.”

“So, how can I disable the matter-energy converters before they destroy my universe? Or can you prevent them from being activated from here?”

“No, too many people here. I wouldn't get very far. I need to Crossover with you and locate and deactivate them myself.”

I looked shocked at the idea. “But you'd immediately disappear, because you'd be the foreign Lisa.”

“Unless your Lisa simultaneously crossed over. Tell me about your Lisa – is it likely? Our Hadstock is the supreme womaniser – he's slept with most of the women on the team, including the three on the selection panel – that's how he was chosen ahead of me for the Crossover.”

A thought crossed my mind. “Including you?”

She looked down at her feet and nodded. “Yes, just once. He's the master of one-night stands, but I didn't know that. It was love at first sight when I arrived, and I wanted a long term relationship, family etc, but I didn't want to believe his reputation. I thought I could change him.” She drifted off, looking wistful. I became momentarily envious of the other Roscoe.

“Well, the Lisa in my universe turned me down many times. She's dedicated to the task, cold-hearted, short-tempered and bitter to have lost out to me in the selection for first Crossover. Yes, I think she would be intrigued by your Roscoe. Her personality is incompatible with our team – you'd like our Geoff – he's my best friend, funny, a little wild, but totally loyal and makes a great capuccino. Yes – I think this could work. Could you communicate with your Roscoe to confirm the double-switch?”

“Dangerous – it might tip him off to the double-cross – I think he would be willing to take the risk – he doesn't have anything to lose, as your Lisa would simply disappear immediately if I didn't simultaneously Crossover. He wouldn't explain the genuine consequences to her, he'd lie about it to persuade her.”

“If I could rescue my rabbit foot, then I could send a coded message to my Geoff to encourage Lisa to Crossover – we'd all be glad to get rid of her!” I smiled at the thought.

Lisa was considering my suggestion. “Yes, that could work. But your communication device is primitive – it looked only capable of binary messages.” She shook her head at the idea.

I smiled.”Primitive, yes. We are not as experienced as you at Crossover. Yet. But it works by morse code. I could send a simple message, if you can retrieve it.”

“We won't have much time, between recovering the rabbit foot, sending the message and Crossover.”

“I'll only need a minute. Geoff will understand the urgency. Presumably, they are having the same kind of discussion over there as we are.”

“What about the matter-energy converters. How long before they are activated?”

“We'll have around five minutes, based on our pre-mission discussions. There are three devices located at specific locations around your lab. I have the map. But we wouldn't have time to locate and deactivate them. It would take too long.” Lisa scratched her head in frustration.

“What about the Crossover corridor repeater-amplifier device? Geoff said something about using it to communicate with your Roscoe. Is that how you'll send the remote command to activate?”

”Yes. Yes, if we destroy that before leaving the Crossover chamber, then the activation signal won't reach the devices. We should have enough time to deactivate the devices before they realise what has happened and they replace the amplifier.”

I had another idea. “Could we somehow reverse the effect and destroy this universe instead – to stop them simply repeating the absorption with another universe elsewhere?”

Lisa looked sad, and wistful. Then she shook her head. “No, I can't help with that. While I don't approve of what they're doing, I couldn't take revenge on them in that manner, even if it was possible, no. Two wrongs don't make a right. I've got too many friends and memories here. I'm sorry, I won't go that far.”

I thought for a moment, then had another idea.

“Why don't I go back early. Then your Roscoe would suddenly disappear. I could then encourage our Lisa to Crossover at the agreed time.”

Lisa shook her head. “You don't know how Lisa would think. She'll only Crossover to be with Roscoe, not simply to escape your world. In any case, I don't want to kill our Roscoe, just to get away from him. No, we need to simultaneously crossover together for this to work.

My alarm sounded, and I cancelled it quickly. “Ten minutes to go.”

“Okay. Let's go.” Lisa bent over Geoff's body and removed his ID card and clipped it on my shoulder. “This will activate the doors for you. By the time they realise you're not Geoff, we will be in the beam.”

“But Hadleigh said I was to stay here and surely they aren't expecting anyone to Crossover. Why would they allow the two of us to go?”

Lisa stopped for a moment. “Good point. I hadn't thought of that.”

“Could you access the mission logs and submit new commands to the team, purporting to be Hadleigh? By the time he realised what was happening it would be too late.”

Lisa sat at the console and began accessing the system. “I would need Hadleigh's access code to do that, and I don't know it. “

I smiled. “I do – assuming he used the same codes as my Hadleigh – his son's name, Devereux.”

Lisa looked up at me surprised for a moment, then turned back to the keyboard and continued typing. “Your code worked, I'm in!” She quickly retyped the new mission logs, indicating two people would Crossover shortly, and received team acknowledgements.

“Okay, done. Now to get your rabbit's foot.” She stood up and walked to the door and paused while her ID code was scanned and the door slid open. We both stepped through and the guards saluted. We saluted back and I followed her through the main doors into the Lab area. She went to the storebox where my rabbit's foot had been placed, typed the passcode, opened the lid and reached inside to retrieve the comms device and handed it to me. I turned with my back to the transparent barrier and quickly typed a morsecode message to indicate two people for Crossover and to encourage Geoff to allow Lisa to Crossover as the second person. Lisa turned her back as well and carefully picked up a hammer lying on the workbench and folded her arms to obscure its view.

“T-minus one minute” - the electronic voice prompted Lisa to pull me towards the Crossover chamber and opened the door. We entered and it silently closed behind us.

“10, 9, 8...” smoke started filling the chamber and the feeling of being outside my body and losing control took over as we slowly inched along the chamber towards the other door. Around half-way, I was aware of Lisa moving in slow-motion, raising her arm and hitting a grey flashing box with the hammer, trying to destroy it, but she was not strong enough. Any moment now and the door to my universe would open and it would be too late. I shook my head, to try and focus and grabbed the hammer from Lisa and used all my strength to fight the disembodied feeling and smash the amplifier, finally succeeding on the third hit, and grabbed the wreckage and pulled it off as the door to my universe slid open and we fell out onto the floor.

I was relieved to see that Lisa was lying alongside me and slowly trying to pull herself up and hadn't disappeared. Geoff and Hadleigh joined us to help us to our feet and to unzip our face vizors and helmets and the first thing I saw was Geoff's smiling face. “Welcome home, hero!” and he held out his hand, which I gratefully took with both of mine and shook strongly.

“It's good to see you, too, Geoff, my old friend.”

“So, the other Geoff wasn't as friendly as me, then, old friend?”

Lisa removed her helmet and shook her head, swinging her long hair loosely around her face. “No. definitely not. I had to shoot him!” Geoff looked surprised.

“Sounds like your trip report is going to make interesting reading.” Hadleigh added.

“No time for that. We've got less than five minutes to find and deactivate three explosive devices that LLRoscoe planted around the lab.” Lisa reached into her pocket and produced a map.

Hadleigh and Geoff exchanged glances and nodded at one another.

“LLRoscoe explained they were an improved design of controller for our systems, based on their greater experience. He said it was a gift from the LLuniverse for us, but we were suspicious, so immediately isolated and disconnected them after he left. Looks like we were right.”

Hadleigh turned to Lisa and held out his hand. “Welcome to our friendly team, I hope you will enjoy working with us.” Lisa shook hands warmly and tears were running down her face. I put my arm round her to comfort her and squeezed.

“Now we've saved the universe, can I have another kiss?”

The End

The Lluniverse Words 5540

...”And the panel's decision for the first Crosser from our universe to the parallel universe is...”

I could sense Lisa Southerly alongside me also holding her breath in anticipation. Five year's of training, research and experiments, plus testing dozens of highly qualified applicants from within the premier space exploration organisation came down to this moment – who would it be? Lisa was more experienced in space exploration than me, but her personality was more abrasive and unfriendly. More than one team member had made informal complaints about her. In any case, travelling to a parallel universe was more about first contact than about exploring space. Who would we meet? How friendly would they be? I glanced at Lisa, feeling that familiar rush of blood to my face at the sight of her, which even after repeated rejections, I couldn't resist.

She noticed my glance and glared at me angrily and I tried to focus on the lead panelist and control my feelings for Lisa, in anticipation of the pending announcement.

“...Roscoe Hadstock!”

The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur of media interviews, handshakes, congratulations and celebratory backslaps, before I finally got back to my office just before home-time. Lisa was noisily packing up in her neighbouring office and looked up as I returned.

“So, who did you sleep with to get the nomination? I could see the way that the female panellists were making eyes at you.”

I shook my head and ignored the tone of her voice.”A simple congratulations would suffice. We still need to work together to prepare for first contact tomorrow, and afterwards. You're still expected to be the second Crosser.” I held out my hand, but she ignored it and turned away mumbling under her breath.

“Nobody remembers the second person to do anything. Edmund Hillary was the first person to ascend Mount Everest and return. Who was the second?”

I looked blankly and she continued.

“Yuri Gagarin was the first person in space, who was the second? Neil Armstrong was the first person to step onto the moon, who cares about the second? Nobody.” She answered her own question. I couldn't think of anything to say. She was right about how it would be remembered by history. I tried to console her again.

“Well, I value your support and you've pushed me all the way through training to try harder. I couldn't have achieved this without your competition.”

Her eyes looked even darker than usual. “I don't want your fake sympathy, thank you! I intend to complete this mission and I'll do my job, but don't expect any congratulations from me.” She grabbed her bag and stormed out of the office, slamming the door behind her, nearly trapping Geoff's hand as he entered as she was leaving.

He smiled at me. We had been good friends for many years.” I see Lisa's not happy about you being chosen ahead of her.” He was laughing as he spoke. We had often discussed our colleague during our free time away from the office. He came over to shake my hand.

“Congrats, hero!” He was smiling broadly now. “Can I have your autograph on our graduation photo. It'll be worth millions for our grandchildren!”

I laughed and picked up my briefcase. “Let's go. I'll buy you a coffee, if you agree to stop teasing me.”

Sleep was difficult that night, wondering about the trip into the unknown. Would I meet myself and how would we react? What about the risk of cross-contamination, or the disruption to the space-time continuum? Some experts predicted that the parallel universe would be made of anti-matter, and hence any contact between matter and anti-matter would destroy one or both universes. There had been some protests outside the labs by groups opposed to any exploration of the parallel universe, but most of the public seemed fascinated by the developments.

Those thoughts were mixed with romantic images of Lisa being disrupted by her shouting and screaming at me. Followed by conversations with Geoff reminding me to forget about her, to find someone better. Telling me to stop torturing myself by waiting for Lisa and to let him introduce me to one of his many ex-girlfriends, followed by my explaining that 'quality is more important than quantity', and I was waiting for one special lady for a long-term relationship, not a series of short-term flings like Geoff. There were plenty of nicer women. I had been single for far too long and in order to realise my dream of a family I needed to find someone else – someone who was a more supportive woman, but my mind kept drifting back to Lisa.

I arrived at the lab early the next morning. Geoff was already at the console with a cup of capuccino heavily coated in my favourite chocolate dust, and hot croissants.

“Heh, hero, your obedient slave has prepared your favourite breakfast!”

I couldn't help but smile. His exuberance was infectious, overcoming the empty feeling in my stomach. The tension in the lab was palpable, and Geoff was a key member of the team, helping to ease the atmosphere.

I sat on the preparation bench and took a bite of the croissant, while the other team members began attaching various probes, sensors and other health monitoring equipment to my body.

“You know, this trip could be dangerous. Then you'll be glad you only helped with the preparation!”

“Maybe, but if you meet the parallel version of me, I bet he won't be so helpful!”

“T-minus 30 minutes.” The computerised voice interrupted our conversations, followed by Hadleigh Summerly, the mission controller, striding purposefully across the open-plan area towards me with his hand outstretched. I stood up shakily, as I had numerous devices hanging off me, and the lab technicians were putting the final touches and checks to the equipment.

“Roscoe! Let me wish you the best of luck!” We shook hands firmly.

“Thank you, Sir. I will do my best. We've been planning this long enough to be as prepared as we can be for whatever I might encounter.”

He nodded, and stroked his beard thoughtfully. “Yes, but you are crossing a new frontier in scientific exploration – where no man has gone before etc. You need to be prepared for the unexpected.

“As do you – the LLRoscoe may also be dangerous. You need to take precautions, as well.”

“He could be nicer than you, too!” Geoff joined in, to deflate my expectations.”He might like hanging out in bars and nightclubs and be more fun than you – have one night stands and get drunk occasionally, perhaps!”

I laughed at Geoff's preferred weekend routine.”I'll be sure to ask his colleagues, and maybe I'll stay in their world so you can enjoy the LLRoscoe instead, if he sounds more fun than me!”

“Joking aside,”Hadleigh became serious,”Remember the limited time. You've got an alarm set for 2h50. You must be back in 3 hours. Any longer becomes unpredictable. The calculations show that this close encounter between our universes only happens once every seven years, and after the window closes, we may not be able to boost the confinement beam sufficiently to re-establish the link after the three hours and 7 minutes is up. While the increase in power after that period is still within our capabilities, it will exceed our maximum generation at 3h 21, and you would be stuck there for 7 years 3 months and a few days, so don't get stuck in an elevator!” The last point was accompanied by his infectious grin. Hadleigh didn't make jokes often, and it betrayed his nervousness. If anything went wrong, his neck was on the line not mine, as he was the mission controller – the buck stopped with him.

I nodded. “Yes, Sir. I won't hang around for the capuccino if there's a long queue. I'll be sure to return for another of Geoff's specials before tea-break this afternoon.” I winked at Geoff, and he smiled back.

“T-minus five minutes.” I stepped into my Hazmat suit and zipped it up to my neck.

Hadleigh shook my hand again. “Back to the controls. See you in three hours.”

The technicians moved away back to their controls, to check the remote links were established, although it wasn't expected that there would be anyway to communicate with the LLuniverse, but in any case the data would be stored locally until I returned.

I took a deep breath and walked slowly towards the link chamber. Geoff followed me, somewhat more serious now that Crossover was approaching. Reaching the chamber door, I stopped and turned round.

“Here, take this – for good luck!” Geoff handed me a rabbit's foot. “It's got a location beacon and emergency transmitter built in.”

“Thanks.” I shook his hand and accepted the gift, and placed it carefully in my pocket. “I'll be back for my capuccino at tea break this afternoon.”

“Don't worry, I have one prepared for LLRoscoe – he may need one as soon as he arrives in a few minutes.” Geoff tried to smile, but his concern was clearly etched on his face. I shook his hand again and opened the door to the Crossover chamber, stepped inside and closed the door.

“10-9-8” the final countdown started and I could hear the sounds of generators whirring, lights flashing and a white mist-like gas filling the chamber. I glanced across at the row of technicians monitoring my vital signs, and the last image was of Lisa's look of jealousy, anger and bitterness as the mist clouded my view and I felt the shaking and vibrating of the chamber wall and held on as a dizzy feeling and headache started building. I tried to move forward towards the other door, but my legs felt like jelly, trapped in treacle and my movements felt like they were controlled by someone else not by my mind. The chamber was only three metres long, but it seemed to take an absolute age for my disoriented joints to cover the short distance, holding on tightly to the guide-rails and fumbling through the mist that completely filled the chamber now. I had a vague sense that there was someone else in the chamber with me, but my mind couldn't focus as I struggled to the far end.

I finally reached the other door and the smoke began to clear, as did my head and the headache receded. Before I could reach for the door-release, it opened suddenly and I almost fell through the opening and two people in full Hazmat suits grabbed me and held me upright. The smoke cleared and I could see a room very similar to the one I had just left – rows of technicians sitting behind controls, except everyone was in full hazmat suits, and there was a thick transparent barrier between us. Only the two technicians – one on either side of me – were on my side of the barrier, and they led me carefully into a de-contamination area, where we were all subjected to a high pressure liquid spray, washing us from top to bottom. After a few minutes, we emerged and the technicians picked up some kind of hand-held detector and closely checked all over my body, hesitating by my pocket and indicating for me to remove whatever was in there – I produced Geoff's lucky rabbit foot and they carefully took it from me and opened a nearby solid-looking black box and dropped it in and closed the lid.

“He's clear of explosives, weapons or any dangerous devices, only monitoring sensors.” An electronic voice was clearly audible over the speakers.

“No detectable viruses or other unknown organisms.” Another electronic voice – presumably the other technician – could be heard.

“Bring him to the ante-room, we'll welcome him there.” The voice did not sound as friendly as the words, but I dismissed the thought and followed the two technicians to a door to one side of the barrier. One of the technicians typed a code number onto the keypad and the door silently slid open and I followed them in. The door closed behind them and they then unzipped their Hazmat suits and I copied their actions, stepped out of the suit and followed them in hanging them up. They then turned and pointed guns at me. “Geoff! Lisa!” I recognised the familiar-but-not-quite faces and held out my hand to welcome them.

Geoff looked at my outstretched hand as if it was contaminated dog faeces – a look that I had never seen on his face before, and I had known him for more than ten years.

I turned to Lisa, and was surprised by her look as after hesitating for a short while, she took my hand and shook it warmly and she smiled at me – something that the Lisa from my universe hadn't done since our very first meeting some years earlier.

“Welcome to our universe, Hadstock! How was the trip?” I had to rapidly adjust to the new personalities of my old friends and acquaintances – I had been prepared for the possibility that they could have significanty different characteristics in the LLuniverse, but it was still taking time for me to adjust my expectations after working with them closely for so many years.

“A little dizziness, disorientation and the feeling of losing control of my limbs – like walking through treacle under somebody else's control.”

Lisa nodded. “Consistent with our best guesses. We'll download your medical data and crosscheck your vital signs – assuming your similar to our Hadstock – and then Mr Thorpeless – our Mission Controller – would like to interview you, are you ready, or would you like some time to recover, or a capuccino, perhaps, with heavy chocolate dusting?”

I had to smile at the thought that in this universe it was Lisa, and not Geoff, who knew my favourite beverage.

“A capuccino with heavy chocolate dusting would be ideal – I can see that your Roscoe and I have similar tastes!” I smiled at Lisa, and was pleasantly surprised by the extended eye-contact and the warmth in her eyes, and the fact that she was still holding onto my hand.She indicated the cup on the table and and I sipped on my favourite drink.

“Enough!” Geoff shattered the friendly atmosphere, and I let go of Lisa's hand as if it had suddenly become red-hot. “Remember your training, Southerly, he could still be extremely dangerous even though we haven't found any explosive devices. We cannot trust him, yet. Handcuff him.”

Lisa put her gun back in her belt holster and withdrew a pair of handcuffs. I held out my hands and she cuffed me.

“Sit down, Hadstock.” Geoff's stentorian and unfriendly tone jarred on my warm memories of our numerous cheerful conversations, and I reluctantly obeyed. Geoff moved behind me and pulled my cuffed hands behind the chair and to a hidden fixing point. He kneeled down and fixed some kind of leg-irons aorund my ankles, to hold me in place.

I had to say something, this was more serious than I had expected. “Why the precautions? I come in peace.”

“Yeah, right!” Geoff was sneering in his cynicism. “We've heard that before. You expect us to believe that you're simply an explorer pushing back the frontiers of science?”

“Well...” I swallowed, “It's true!”

“Nonsense! You could be hiding an explosive device, or maybe it's even you as some kind of biocontamination, or even biobomb.”

I shook my head in disbelief.”I've no idea what you're talking about! You've scanned me yourself – you can see I've not got anything to hide.”

“You had that rabbit's foot with some kind of tracking device and communication link inside – highly suspicious.”

“It was part of our experiments to determine whether we could communicate across the parallel universe boundaries – I doubted it would even work. Geoff – the Geoff in my universe – believed we could bounce a signal off the chamber doorway, through a repeater-amplifier, and that there might be a range of frequencies that could cross the universe-boundaries.”

“He's correct – it can be done. That's how we communicate with our Hadstock in your universe.”

His words made me curious. “So, our universe is not the first time you've encountered parallel universes?” Geoff didn't answer, but his glance at Lisa told me more than words.

“So, how many other universes have you crossed over into? What happened? What did you discover?” My curiosity made me forget the strange circumstances and my restraints for a moment.

They didn't intend to answer, it was clear, and the silence was deafening – broken by the lock shifting and the door opened – Hadleigh stepped in, accompanied by two heavily armed officers pointing their weapons at me. Lisa and Geoff immediately stood up and saluted.

“At ease.” Hadleigh was the consummate general – in full military uniform – not the formal suit I was used to. “Sit down.” Lisa and Geoff resumed their seats and Hadleigh sat at the opposite end of the table from me.

Hadleigh looked at me, clearly appraising the possible risks. “You appear to have crossed over without any health consequences. You must have some questions before I tell you what's going to happen to you.” His words and the half-smile had a definitely dubious implication.

“Yes, of course. Like, why am I being restrained like a prisoner? I am a scientist and explorer, not some kind of invader or robot-explosive. Your scans and investigations must have confirmed this?”

Hadleigh nodded. ”It doesn't matter that we haven't discovered anything, yet. We don't believe your story. The restraints are a precaution.” The pause before the word 'yet' was deeply disturbing and sinister.

“So, how many other universes have you crossed over to?”

“Yours is the seventh.”

I was fascinated by the possibilities. “Are you still in touch with them? What happened? What did you discover? How many re-crossings? What did you do with them?” My questions poured out and I leaned forward, pulling against the restraints as if I could get nearer to the answers by doing so.

“We are a public-private partnership – controlled by the government - but exploiting other universes for financial rewards....”

“What do you mean - 'exploiting other universes'?” I didn't like the tone of his voice, or the direction this conversation was heading. A shiver ran up my spine.

He half-smiled – the same sinister half-smile I noticed before. “We convert the matter in the parallel universes into energy, which we use to power our universe – free, unlimited and easily controllable.”

I was shocked by the implication. “You mean, you destroy other universes for profit?That's despicable – barbaric!” I ran out of words in disbelief.

The half-smile reappeared. “Such a small word – profit. We are simply the more successful businesses exploiting the less successful ones – simply market forces.”

“So, you're planning to repeat this approach with my universe?” The implication was too extreme for me to comprehend.

Hadleigh nodded. “Of course. Your little universe is just above the minimum level of energy supply for conversion – we've given it the nickname of the 'Puniverse'” He laughed at his own joke, and Geoff joined in heartily, but Lisa just looked away. “As we speak, our Hadstock is planting several matter-energy converters inside your laboratory, around the space-time continuum crossover control system. Shortly after he returns, we shall remotely detonate them and....” he moved his hands in a mushroom cloud shape...”Boom – and your universe becomes our next five years energy source. Simply the 'big-bang' in reverse.” The look of satisfaction on his face, deeply troubled me.

My instinct was sending me negative signals. “So, why are you telling me this?”

Hadleigh made eye contact and leaned forwards. “Because, my dear Hadstock, you are not returning to your universe.”

“But what will happen if two of me are in the same universe? Our calculations show that cannot happen – we have to simultaneously crossover, otherwise...” I couldn't finish the sentence, but Hadleigh finished it for me.

“...one of them immediately ceases to exist. Yes – the LL version...” he pointed at me. “You. As soon as our Hadstock returns, you instantly disappear. Simple laws of physics, isn't it? No messy murdering or body to dispose of or anything.” He stood up, as did Lisa and Geoff. “Enough! You will remain here until Crossover.” He glanced at his watch. “38 minutes, to be exact. Would you like another capuccino?” He turned and left, followed by the two guards.

I just sat there in stunned silence, staring at the closed door in complete and utter bafflement and disbelief at what I'd just heard. The idea of the complete absorption, conversion and use of my 'puniverse' into the LLuniverse's energy supply system was too sudden and too huge for me to comprehend. “Yes, please can I have another capuccino.” The words were said on automatic, as if my brain could not function on the macro level, only able to make microdecisions, such as ordering a cup of coffee.

Geoff stood up, almost becoming the Geoff I knew. “Okay, I'll be right back.” He left and locked the door behind him, leaving Lisa and I alone together. I turned to look at her, but before I could say anything, she was on her knees next to me, undoing my leg-irons.

I watched her shiny long hair swaying from side to side, her lips were moist from licking them and her face had a shine from the perspiration, just inches away. I couldn't resist any longer. Three years of obsession and rejection and frustration was too much for me and I leaned forwards to kiss her as she leaned over me to undo my cuffs.

She hesitated and leaned into the kiss for a moment, and as my hands came free I went to wrap my arms around her, but she snapped back to reality and gently pushed me away. “No time for that now – we have to save your universe.”

“Saving the universe can wait, just kiss me again.” I leaned forwards, but she stood up and grabbed my hands, pulling me to my feet. I wanted to hug her, but she shook her head.

“We've only got a few minutes before Geoff returns. The capuccino will be poisoned – some kind of sleeping drug – the first one also, but you didn't drink enough.” I wondered why I felt a little dizzy and not reacting seriously to the dangerous nature of the situation.

“Quick, put on the Hazmat suit – then nobody will recognise you.” I slowly followed her lead, realising the logic of her approach. I had barely zipped up the last zip when the door opened and Geoff re-entered and the door locked behind him. Geoff looked at us hesitated, and put the capuccino on the table. He looked up to see that Lisa was pointing her gun at him and he froze in surprise. “Lisa, no!” and she shot him, 2-3 times – a silent laser burst erupted from the nozzle and he fell backwards against the wall and slid down onto the floor.

Lisa looked at my shocked face, and smiled. “Don't worry, he's only stunned. He'll be unconscious for about an hour – long enough for us to escape.”

“But why are you helping me? You've been part of the system here for many years, surely you support what they are doing?”

Lisa shook her head. “It's a job, but no – I don't agree with the morality of what they're doing, but I decided to stay – as even if I quit, somebody else would simply replace me and maybe strongly support what they are doing. I just kept my mouth shut and got on with the job, waiting for a chance to stop them – your arrival is exactly the opportunity I've been waiting for.”

“So, how can I disable the matter-energy converters before they destroy my universe? Or can you prevent them from being activated from here?”

“No, too many people here. I wouldn't get very far. I need to Crossover with you and locate and deactivate them myself.”

I looked shocked at the idea. “But you'd immediately disappear, because you'd be the foreign Lisa.”

“Unless your Lisa simultaneously crossed over. Tell me about your Lisa – is it likely? Our Hadstock is the supreme womaniser – he's slept with most of the women on the team, including the three on the selection panel – that's how he was chosen ahead of me for the Crossover.”

A thought crossed my mind. “Including you?”

She looked down at her feet and nodded. “Yes, just once. He's the master of one-night stands, but I didn't know that. It was love at first sight when I arrived, and I wanted a long term relationship, family etc, but I didn't want to believe his reputation. I thought I could change him.” She drifted off, looking wistful. I became momentarily envious of the other Roscoe.

“Well, the Lisa in my universe turned me down many times. She's dedicated to the task, cold-hearted, short-tempered and bitter to have lost out to me in the selection for first Crossover. Yes, I think she would be intrigued by your Roscoe. Her personality is incompatible with our team – you'd like our Geoff – he's my best friend, funny, a little wild, but totally loyal and makes a great capuccino. Yes – I think this could work. Could you communicate with your Roscoe to confirm the double-switch?”

“Dangerous – it might tip him off to the double-cross – I think he would be willing to take the risk – he doesn't have anything to lose, as your Lisa would simply disappear immediately if I didn't simultaneously Crossover. He wouldn't explain the genuine consequences to her, he'd lie about it to persuade her.”

“If I could rescue my rabbit foot, then I could send a coded message to my Geoff to encourage Lisa to Crossover – we'd all be glad to get rid of her!” I smiled at the thought.

Lisa was considering my suggestion. “Yes, that could work. But your communication device is primitive – it looked only capable of binary messages.” She shook her head at the idea.

I smiled.”Primitive, yes. We are not as experienced as you at Crossover. Yet. But it works by morse code. I could send a simple message, if you can retrieve it.”

“We won't have much time, between recovering the rabbit foot, sending the message and Crossover.”

“I'll only need a minute. Geoff will understand the urgency. Presumably, they are having the same kind of discussion over there as we are.”

“What about the matter-energy converters. How long before they are activated?”

“We'll have around five minutes, based on our pre-mission discussions. There are three devices located at specific locations around your lab. I have the map. But we wouldn't have time to locate and deactivate them. It would take too long.” Lisa scratched her head in frustration.

“What about the Crossover corridor repeater-amplifier device? Geoff said something about using it to communicate with your Roscoe. Is that how you'll send the remote command to activate?”

”Yes. Yes, if we destroy that before leaving the Crossover chamber, then the activation signal won't reach the devices. We should have enough time to deactivate the devices before they realise what has happened and they replace the amplifier.”

I had another idea. “Could we somehow reverse the effect and destroy this universe instead – to stop them simply repeating the absorption with another universe elsewhere?”

Lisa looked sad, and wistful. Then she shook her head. “No, I can't help with that. While I don't approve of what they're doing, I couldn't take revenge on them in that manner, even if it was possible, no. Two wrongs don't make a right. I've got too many friends and memories here. I'm sorry, I won't go that far.”

I thought for a moment, then had another idea.

“Why don't I go back early. Then your Roscoe would suddenly disappear. I could then encourage our Lisa to Crossover at the agreed time.”

Lisa shook her head. “You don't know how Lisa would think. She'll only Crossover to be with Roscoe, not simply to escape your world. In any case, I don't want to kill our Roscoe, just to get away from him. No, we need to simultaneously crossover together for this to work.

My alarm sounded, and I cancelled it quickly. “Ten minutes to go.”

“Okay. Let's go.” Lisa bent over Geoff's body and removed his ID card and clipped it on my shoulder. “This will activate the doors for you. By the time they realise you're not Geoff, we will be in the beam.”

“But Hadleigh said I was to stay here and surely they aren't expecting anyone to Crossover. Why would they allow the two of us to go?”

Lisa stopped for a moment. “Good point. I hadn't thought of that.”

“Could you access the mission logs and submit new commands to the team, purporting to be Hadleigh? By the time he realised what was happeneing it would be too late.”

Lisa sat at the console and began accessing the system. “I would need Hadleigh's access code to do that, and I don't know it. “

I smiled. “I do – assuming he used the same codes as my Hadleigh – his son's name, Devereux.”

Lisa looked up at me surprised for a moment, then turned back to the keyboard and continued typing. “Your code worked, I'm in!” She quickly retyped the new mission logs, indicating two people would Crossover shortly, and received team acknowledgements.

“Okay, done. Now to get your rabbit's foot.” She stood up and walked to the door and paused while her ID code was scanned and the door slid open. We both stepped through and the guards saluted. We saluted back and I followed her through the main doors into the Lab area. She went to the storebox where my rabbit's foot had been placed, typed the passcode, opened the lid and reached inside to retrieve the comms device and handed it to me. I turned with my back to the transparent barrier and quickly typed a morsecode message to indicate two people for Crossover and to encourage Geoff to allow Lisa to Crossover as the second person. Lisa turned her back as well and carefully picked up a hammer lying on the workbench and folded her arms to obscure its view.

“T-minus one minute” - the electronic voice prompted Lisa to pull me towards the Crossover chamber and opened the door. We entered and it silently closed behind us.

“10, 9, 8...” smoke started filling the chamber and the feeling of being outside my body and losing control took over as we slowly inched along the chamber towards the other door. Around half-way, I was aware of Lisa moving in slow-motion, raising her arm and hitting a grey flashing box with the hammer, trying to destroy it, but she was not strong enough. Any moment now and the door to my universe would open and it would be too late. I shook my head, to try and focus and grabbed the hammer from Lisa and used all my strength to fight the disembodied feeling and smash the amplifier, finally succeeding on the third hit, and grabbed the wreckage and pulled it off as the door to my universe slid open and we fell out onto the floor.

I was relieved to see that Lisa was lying alongside me and slowly trying to pull herself up and hadn';t disappeared. Geoff and Hadleigh joined us to help us to our feet and to unzip our face vizors and helmets and the first thing I saw was Geoff's smiling face. “Welcome home, hero!” and he held out his hand, which I gratefully took with both of mine and shook strongly.

“It's good to see you, too, Geoff, my old friend.”

“So, the other Geoff wasn't as friendly as me, then, old friend?”

Lisa removed her helmet and shook her head, swinging her long hair loosely around her face. “No. definitely not. I had to shoot him!” Geoff looked surprised.

“Sounds like your trip report is going to make interesting reading.” Hadleigh added.

“No time for that. We've got less than five minutes to find and deactivate three explosive devices that LLRoscoe planted around the lab.” Lisa reached into her pocket and produced a map.

Hadleigh and Geoff exchanged glances and nodded at one another.

“LLRoscoe explained they were an improved design of controller for our systems, based on their greater experience. He said it was a gift from the LLuniverse for us, but we were suspicious, so immediately isolated and disconnected them after he left. Looks like we were right.”

Hadleigh turned to Lisa and held out his hand. “Welcome to our friendly team, I hope you will enjoy working with us.” Lisa shook hands warmly and tears were running down her face. I put my arm round her to comfort her and squeezed.

“Now we've saved the universe, can I have another kiss?”

The End

“...And the headline again – today's the day when all you owners of fully automatic self-driving cars can use them ANYWHERE!” The news anchor's cheery voice on the breakfast show emphasised the last word – the massive change from the previous carefully selected routes and smart motorways.

I shut my laptop and cut off the voice in mid sentence.

“Julie!” I shouted into my car remote voice-control as I opened the front door. The artificial engine sound of my Tesla fully electric ASD drove to meet me, and the rear doors opened.

“Good morning, Roscoe.” Julie's soft and gentle surroundsound audio greeted me and I got into the back seat and the doors automatically closed behind me.

“Where would you like to go today, Roscoe?”

“Court house. Take the route with the least traffic. I need a smooth journey, I've got to work on the way.” I settled into the back seat, plugged in the charger for my laptop and opened it, ready to work on my latest case during the half hour journey. Automatic cars meant that chauffeurs were obsolete.

“Yes, Roscoe. I estimate 34 minutes. Is the temperature to your liking?” The fake concern in Julie's voice was beginning to annoy me.

“Yes, it's fine. Just drive.” I tried to concentrate.

“Would you like some soothing background music, Roscoe?”

“No thank you. Just drive.” I could feel the anger rising in me, as a result of the continual interruptions. I had an urgent case to prepare for, and needed to focus.

Julie stopped asking questions about the environment and simply drove towards the ring road, when she suddenly braked hard, followed by the sound of a thump and the car jolted violently.

“What was that?”

“A large pothole. Would you like me to report its location to the local council for you, Roscoe?”

“Yes, whatever.” The automatic position location system was linked to the messaging system, so Julie could contact people on my behalf. The sound of a ringing phone could be heard over the audio system.

“I am sorry, all lines are busy, please try later.” The local council's automatic answering messaging system couldn't cope.

“Just message them, Julie. No need to call.”

“Yes, Roscoe.” Julie's ever-accommodating voice showed no additional frustration with the difficulty of simply reporting a pothole.

I turned back to my laptop screen and tried to resume my research and sighed.

A few minutes of silent progress followed. Then something hit the side of the car, causing me to look up startled. “What was that?”

“A cyclist rode off the pavement when she shouldn't have done and straight into the side of the car.”

“Is she okay? Why didn't you anticipate she might do that?”

“I had priority. The lights were green for me and red for her. She should have waited. I am not programmed to cope with people breaking the rules.” I might have imagined it, but I could swear that Julie's normally calm voice had a trace of anger in it.

I turned round and looked out of the rear window. A woman was sitting on the ground waving an angry fist at us, as we drove away. I shook my head in disbelief and looked at my screen again.

Shortly afterwards, we stopped at a red light. Alongside us was a bright red Ferrari, with its top down. I couldn't help but stare at the sun glinting off the shiny red bonnet. The lights changed to green, but we continued to wait.

“Julie – are you okay? We should be moving.”

There was a pause, then a breathless Julie replied, “Sorry, Roscoe. I just had a quick fling with the Ferrari. We married, had six kids and just got divorced. I'm free again now.” She drove off tunring left, the Ferrari turned right and soon disappeared from sight.

I shook my head in disbelief and tried to remember what I should research next for my court case, as Julie speeded up along the ring road.

A few minutes later, and another emergency stop, followed by the squeal of the tyes and a thump as we hit something. I looked up and an enormous lorry had hit us and an angry lorry driver was preparing to get out of his damaged cab to come and argue with us.

“What happened this time, Julie?” I was getting exasperated at the number of interruptions on this journey.

“He signalled left and turned right! I am not programmed to cope with idiots!” She was definitely shouting now. The angry lorry driver was stumbling towards us. Julie turned on the windscreen wipers and a jet of soapy water shot out at the lorry driver temporarily blinding him.

“Let's get out of here!” I shouted at Julie, and she quickly reversed and spun round and headed in the opposite direction. Once again, I looked behind at the angry lorry-driver waving his fist at me.

“You'd better send a report to the Police traffic line, with the last thrity seconds of video.”

“Yes, Roscoe.” Julie sounded like she was talking through gritted teeth, if that was possible for a computerised voice. I settled down to my legal research, but almost immediately Julie started swerving from side to side and then ran over the kerb and into a tree.

“Now what?” I looked up in surprise as Julie didn't reply. I looked at the viewscreen and could see that there was a blue screen. The system had crashed.

I turned off the car, waited a few seconds as I had been told by the tech experts, and then turned the key to restart the system. The 'please wait'message appeared on the screen, folllowed by '”system automatically updating to the latest version, please wait...”

I looked at my watch and cursed silently. I was going to be late.

Finally, the welcome prompt appeared on the screen and I pressed the 'Run' key and Julie's welcome voice returned. “Good morning, Roscoe. Where would you like to go today.” She had regained her composure.

“The court house, please.” I didn't know if being polite made a difference, but I emphasised the word, please, just in case, but also to make it clear I was in a hurry.

Julie didn't notice the change in my tone. “Of course, Roscoe. Previous settings have been selected, is this okay?”

“Yes, Julie, just drive.

“Yes, of course, Roscoe.” Julie reversed the car back onto the road without another word, and proceeded to drive very slowly along the ring-road.

“Why are you driving at 10mph, Julie? The speed limit here is 60mph.”

“I have just been updated with the latest roadcrash video information, and I am trying to anticipate all possible crashes and avoid them.” Julie's voice sounded scared.

I shook my head in disbelief again. “Just drive as fast as you can. I'm going to be late.” Julie accelerated a little, but then slowed again.

“Now what, Julie?” I could feel the tension rising and a glance at my watch told me that I was going to be in trouble with the judge if we didn't get moving faster.

“It's started raining a little and I can't decide which setting of the windscreen wipers to use, as the rain is inconsistent.” The wipers were going fast, then slow, then stopping. The lights started flashing on and off, as well. It was really annoying me. I had had enough and shut my laptop, threw it on the back seat alongside me in disgust and went to climb through the gap between the front seats to take over manual control, but Julie anticipated my move and suddenly accelerated, throwing me back wards onto the rear seat and I banged my head on my laptop, and the seatbelt snapped shut trapping me in the seat. “Ow, why did you do that, Julie?” I rubbed the bruise on the side of my head.

“I'm sorry, Roscoe, I cannot allow you to resume control. Just sit back and enjoy the ride.”

THE END?

Thanks for the wonderful Prosers who have left positive comments for me - it makes a wonderful change from the negative/standard letters from the publishers/scifi mags!

Keep supporting each other in the cold and largely unfriendly and anonymous world of trying to get published!

Thanks again!

Ian

Cancel culture is negative and destructive.

Trying to "protect" people from ideas that they might be offended by.

I am offended by the idea of cancel culture.

Whatever happened to logical debate, rational argument and discussion?

These are all labelled as politically incorrect, or "mansplaining", IF they disagree with the 'accepted' (ie current) point of view

Reminds me of the witch-hunts from the middle ages.

The obvious answer - cancel culture should be cancelled!

“Welcome, Lisa, this is your desk. My office is through there...” My new boss, Ursula, shook my hand and then pointed through the glass partition to a small office. I hung my coat on the back of the chair and sat down. The computer was already switched on and logged into the mail program.

Ursula moved round the desk to stand next to me, and began to instruct me in the intricacies of being a publishing agent's assistant.

She clicked on the inbox. “You have access to all the submissions from new authors. Existing authors, and people who have already published are given a private, separate email address, to bypass the slush pile – your job is to work through the manuscripts from budding, unpublished first-timers – looking for the diamond in the rough – the 'one-in-a-million' – the special, unique and incredible first-timer.”

“So, what am I looking for?” I was keen to read all these unpublished masterpieces, from people like me, I imagined, fresh out of uni with an English Language degree, specialising in creative fiction and numerous diplomas related to special writing courses, taken to enhance the probability of being a successful writer.

“Your job is to get rid of the dross – most of it is dross. You're looking for reasons to reject as quickly as possible. Let me show you...” She clicked on the oldest document in the inbox, dated 6 months earlier. The email subject was “Vampire Vixens by John Woodberry 125,000 words Scifi/horror/fantasy/Adult/humour.”

“Okay – so this one is easy to reject – too many words – a maximum of 120,000, plus too many genres – if the author doesn't know which genre it is meant to be, then our readers would also be confused, so we send a standard rejection email – polite, non-committal and meaningless, but it makes them happy – we've worked on the politeness and sympathy – I like the first line - “Thank you for submitting “Vampire Vixens” but it doesn't sound like the sort of story that we could successfully market.” We use the phrase 'sounds like' – of course, it implies we haven't even read the story yet, but the submitter won't realise that...” She clicked on the auto-reject option and the email program sent the message and removed the email from the inbox.

“There you go... only 174 more to consider.” Another one arrived as we were speaking, and the total increased to 175.

“But, I thought I could read these manuscripts, after all the effort they have invested in creating their baby, surely we should, at least, read some of it?”

Ursula made a sound like she was choking her laughter. “Come on! We haven't got time to do that! We need to get rid of as many as possible, get it down to a manageable level, otherwise we would never have time for lunch with the publishers and the successful authors! When you've got rid of all the obvious failures – too many genres, word counts outside the 80-120k range, anything described as 'good for children', any spelling mistakes in the title, anything to do with wizards, anyone who doesn't follow our guidelines on submission rules – separate attachments for cover letter, synopsis and the manuscript – plus if they don't put their name, contact details and a brief bio – that should get rid of 90%. You can read the rest. But if they are not in Ariel or Times Roman 12 point double spaced and justified, with an indent and double speechmarks for text, you can reject immediately. Plus, if they have more than one typo per page – reject, understood?”

I nodded and started to look at the next item in my inbox, as Ursula left me. “Just find the best five by the end of today and we can discuss them at 4pm.” She went to her office - “A tale of three dogs by Joanna Johnson 95k words, children/YA/Adult family/romance.”

“Okay, reject – mentioned children.” I mumbled to myself. I felt sorry for all the effort Ms Johnson must have exerted to write something of 95k words, but I knew I had to develop a thick skin and not to worry about these anonymous people, if I was ever to make a success of being a publishing agent's assistant.

On to the next story entitled “Publishing is murder!” by C R L Killer, 85k words murder/ mystery/thriller/adult. Sounds interesting. So I clicked on the attachment to open it, but before I could start reading it, I paused as I could hear Ursula talking loudly on her phone, as she hadn't closed the door to her office. “...Geoff's dead?! What happened?...sudden murder?...break-in? He's the third publishing agent this week...yes, I know, the Police are contacting all the agents, I have a meeting with them shortly...Okay, stay safe...” I looked up as she put down the phone. Two policemen in uniform were approaching through the open-plan office. Ursula saw me watching and indicated for me to join her. I got up and walked round to the entrance to her office as the two policewomen arrived.

“I am Sergeant Lashkey, this is my assistant PC Brickhill.” We shook hands and I introduced them to my boss, Ursula. She waved a hand towards the seats by her desk and we all sat down.

Sgt Lashkey cleared her throat. “As you know, we are here to talk about a possible serial killer who may be targeting publishing agents who have rejected his story. We have had three agents murdered in the last six weeks...” Ursula nodded and interrupted.

“Yes, I've been talking to other people I know in the industry, they are all really worried. But we reject dozens of stories every day – it's going to be difficult to identify which one isn't it?”

“Yes, of course, so we will ask for details of all the stories you've rejected in the last four months – and compare that to the list from the victims' computers, to see if you are also at risk, but also to identify the actual manuscript that triggered the revenge killing, if that was the reason, but we are working on that presumption at the moment.”

“Do you have any idea at the moment, which story it might be?”

Sgt Lashkey referred to her notes. “One story we are actively considering, at present, is by CRL Killer, “Publishing is murder' – can you remember seeing it?”

Ursula shook her head. I haven't looked at any of the submissions for many weeks, I've been too busy. I've just taken on an assistant, Lisa...” she waved her hand in my direction. “...to take over that aspect of my job. She only started this morning, which is why I invited her to join us.”

Sgt Lashkey stood up. “Okay, we won't trouble you any longer, as you've not rejected any stories in the last few months, but please send a list to me at the end of every week, ok?” She handed over her business card and Ursula took it and nodded. We all shook hands and they left.

Ursula sat down again, looking pale and shaken by the conversation with the Police. “Okay, Lisa, keep a record of all the rejected manuscripts and send it to the Police every week. Maybe you could check through the computer to see when we last rejected submissions before you arrived, as we always use your computer for that specific purpose.” She handed me Sgt Lashkey's card. I nodded and returned to my desk.

The previous document was still open on my screen and I started reading the opening line: “Welcome, Lisa, this is your desk. My office is through there...”

The morning passed quickly, and I rapidly filtered and rejected dozens of stories. By lunchtime I had only found four that passed all of Ursula's filtering techniques.

“Time for lunch.” Ursula was standing by my desk. “I'm meeting Chris Appling, one of the publishing agents whose colleague was murdered this week. Would you like to join us?”

I shook my head. “Sorry, too much work to do. I am not even half-way through the inbox, and it keeps growing – new submissions are arriving every hour.”

Ursula looked pleased that I was working so hard. “Okay, but do take at least a fifteen minute coffee break – it'll do you good.”

I nodded and Ursula left me to my work. I continued for a while, and then decided to look back through the send log. I wondered who had been rejecting manuscripts before I started that morning, so looked for previous rejection emails. Ursula was correct. Before I started, the previous rejection email was more than six months earlier – well before the serial killer started his campaign.

I looked up as Ursula arrived back from lunch around 2:30pm, but didn't speak to me, only nodded and returned to her office. She looked even paler than when the police visited earlier.

At 4pm, she called me into her office. “Have you selected the best five yet, Lisa?”

I nodded and smiled. “I am probably not as ruthless as you, yet, I have found eight that passed your tests out of the 107 I have looked at so far.”

Ursula waved for me to sit down. “It takes practice, but you'll soon find other reasons to reject, besides the ones I gave you this morning.”

I wondered if I should comment on Ursula's nervousness. “Are you okay? You look upset about something.” She looked at me, wondering, perhaps, if she could trust me.

“Well, Chris shared some disturbing details about his colleague's murder with me over lunch. We were trying to compare what we knew about the other murder victims.” She took a drink of water and leaned back in her chair, and made eye contact with me while pondering how to summarize.

“All the victims were working late in the office on their own at the time of the murder. There didn't seem to be any evidence of a break-in, so the murderer must have simply walked in the main entrance. All the Agencies are in big office blocks, and have no more than four or five agents. They were all stabbed many times, while they sat at their desks. Very strange.”

“Anyone else in the office hear anything?”

Ursula shook her head. “Doesn't appear anyone heard or saw anything. The victims seemed to have been alone at the time.” She shook her head and shivered. “Okay, let's have a look at the eight stories you have selected.”

I had printed out the first three pages of each story and handed them to Ursula who leaned forwards to put them on her desk, and took the first one. “Alien-Nation.” She read the title. “Good title. Okay, let me read the prologue...”

I opened my notepad and wrote 'Alien-Nation' and then began doodling while she was reading. She looked up after a few minutes. “Okay. Intriguing story – a mixture of legal drama and family strife, main character is a dad of 5 – all good, but the use of 'alien' in the title is misleading, as very little about aliens.”

“I thought as a crossover genre it might appeal to a broader audience?”

“Not with Scifi. The customers are too narrow-minded. It must be pure scifi or non-scifi, any crossover will get rejected by both audiences. Okay?” She threw the print-out into the bin and picked up the next one.

I made some notes about rejecting crossovers involving Scifi and we moved onto the next one.

By the time we got to the last story, we were the only two left in the office.

Ursula picked up the last one. “Publishing is Murder! Good title. It's true, being a publisher kills your free time and is really stressful. So, why did you like this one...besides the title?”

I smiled and looked at my notes. “Well, it's about the publishing industry, so I thought that made it interesting. It's about a serial murderer preying on publishing agents who reject his story, so I thought that was a coincedence. It's well written, good mystery build up and character development. It seemed very realistic, created real tension and atmosphere, particularly when describing the interaction between the murderer and the next victim...”

“Okay, sounds intriguing. Let me read the first few pages...”

Ursula started reading. I took out an apple from my bag and started peeling it with a knife.

After a few minutes she carefully placed the papers back on her desk and looked at me, nervously.

“So, what do you think?” I was eating pieces of apple off the end of the knife.

Ursula took a drink of water before answering. “I think it's got great promise. The plot is rather simple and predictable. I think there needed to be more characters involved as possible murderers. Limiting the number of people involved makes it too simple to solve the mystery.”

“So, do you think it's worth writing to the author with suggestions, or should it be rejected?” I was slowly picking pieces of apple out of my teeth using the knife as she was speaking, and watching her face as we spoke.

Before she could answer, her phone rang, so I picked it up and answered it.

“It's Chris Appling for you...” I passed the phone to Ursula, who stopped reading and took the phone.

“Yes...Lisa is with me now...” I looked up as she mentioned my name, and was surprised to see her face grow paler as I watched. “...Really? First week?...working late...reviewing submissions... Okay, I'll be careful.” She ended the call, still looking at me nervously.

“Apparently...all the victims had just taken on a new assistant before they were killed, and...” She swallowed, “The assistant immediately disappeared after the murder.”

I realized what she was implying and stood up suddently and stabbed the knife into the remaining part of the apple, making Ursula jump even more. “You don't mean...you think I could be the killer? That's ridiculous!”

She sat back further into her seat, as if trying to hide from me. “Lisa...please...sit down. You're scaring me!”

“Sorry. It's just you got me angry, believing that I could hurt anyone.” I sat down slowly and picked up my notepad, trying to calm myself down. “Do you think it's the author of that story, that might be the killer?”

Ursula's hands were shaking as she picked up the story again and pretended to read, but she clearly couldn't concentrate. “I think this is a rejection. Send him the standard email.”

“Are you sure? “ I put down my notepad and pulled the knife out of the apple and started slowly cutting some more pieces of the apple while making eye-contact.

Ursula glanced between my face and the knife while trying to make up her mind what to do. “Maybe we should leave a decision on this one until the morning, it's getting late.”

“This is the last one. Why don't you make a decision on this one now. I am sure the author is dyingto know the outcome.” My emphasis on the word 'dying' seemed to make her flinch.

“N-n-no need.” She was stuttering now in her nervousness. “Aren't you hungry for dinner – it's d-d-dinner-time?”

“Well, I could killfor a pizza, but it will only take a few minutes to finish off these author emails. Then tomorrow we can start with a clean slate.”

“I'm really not sure whether to r-r-reject this one, so best to leave it until tomorrow.”

“Are you dead-certain? I thought you had already decided to make the author really angryby sending him a standard rejection, rather than making helpful suggestions for things to cut?” I picked up some cut apple pieces and put them slowly in my mouth, all the time watching Ursula shaking in her seat.

“M-m-aybe we ought to ask him for the whole manuscript to read. Then make a decision after reading the complete story.”

I leaned back in my seat having finished the apple and the phone rang. I picked it up.“Hi Lisa, I have a Mr Killer in reception wondering if you have read his manuscript yet?”

The past has happened and cannot be changed. Too many people get stuck in the past, worrying about what they did or didn't do, what they should have done or not done. So many regrets. Don't be like them!

The future hasn't happened yet - you can make it whatever you want it to be. So many people live in the future, 'As soon as I get that degree/job/girlfriend/ etc, then I will be happy." No, you won't. Don't be like them!

The only reality is now. This is happening, this is the present. It is a present from God.

Enjoy the moment, it will never come back again.