Free Joe by Jacqueline Druga

everyone he loved. Future Joe wanted to as well, so they both decided they would both write emails.”
    Robbie smiled.
    “What?”
    “The emails. Some were simple. Some were deep.”
    “Past Joe, future Joe. Anyhow, I was standing outside the office with Future Joe. He was in an invisible suit. We were laughing because Joe was getting bombarded with phone calls and was getting frustrated. I had set the timer, there wasn’t much time. And we had no idea whatsoever, Jason sent that message.”
     
    “Ok,” Joe spoke, his words being picked up by Roy. “Send him in.”
    Future Joe in the suit made his way into the office.
    Roy waited. It was a matter of time. He listened to the exchange of words between the Joes. And the door opened. Present Day Joe, wearing the suit, emerged and walked to Roy.
    “All set. Fifteen minutes.”
    They stayed and waited to make sure there were no problems. But at four minutes and counting, Future Joe got a phone call.
    “Robbie, what … in my office. Why?”
     
    Robbie paused Roy’s story. “I made a call to try to find my dad.”
    Roy nodded, then continued.
     
    “Why is Robbie calling, why do you sound so upset?” Roy asked.
    “I don’t know … Jesus Christ.”
    “What?”
    “Frank.”
    From over the hill, full speed, like only he could run, Frank raced toward the office.
    “Goddamn it he’s going in there.” Joe rushed to remove the suit.
    “Frank!” Roy called out.
    Frank was focused, he ran into the office.
    “Son of a bitch.” Stripped out of the suit, Joe ran with everything he had to the office.
    “Dad, just making sure you’re all right,” Frank said out of breath,
    “Frank.” Future Joe stood. “Get out of here.”
    “Are you all right?” Frank asked.
    One minute.
    “Frank!” Future Joe blasted. “Get out.”
    The door blasted open and Present Joe raced in. “Frank, get out. Get out now.” He reached for him.
    Frank looked at Both Joe’s. “What’s going on?”
    Boom.
     
    Robbie blinked slowly. “Hence Fort knowing about Frank dying.”
    “Yes. Yes. When I came back through to fix it, he followed me to Beginnings.”
    “Wow, how fucked up did things get over that one?”
    “Bad.” Roy whistled. “See, Hal became President. Hal is much like your father, so much so they made the exact same decision. Of course many leaders said they would have. What made it worse was, when I returned, I had no lab, nothing. Only the HG Wells. Thank goodness I secured the proof ahead of time.”
    “What happened to you?”
    “My mistake. See, my fingerprints were found on the explosive. So, Dean was pegged as the murderer. Without Frank to be his biggest ally, he was found guilty and someone murdered him. They believe it was Johnny Slagel.”
    Robbie exhaled. “So you had so much to fix.”
    “Oh, yes. I then went back in time. I knew of Dean’s chip. I knew they could track him, so I had to do something silly to make them want to track Dean. I could handle my fingerprint situation by having Joe build the bomb. But I couldn’t fix if someone saw me.”
    “So you began the mutilator attacks.”
    “Yes, and it worked. They started tracking Dean. I had to get him and Henry in one night to pull that off. It was tough.”
    “Ok.” Robbie held up his hand. “If my Dad, or both died in that explosion, how did you fix it?”
    “Only one way. I had to go back to the day I brought Future Joe back with me. See, when I originally went back with Future Joe it was the 19 th . History never told me about Frank’s wedding, so Future Joe and myself had to wait out in the trailer for two days. I distinctly remember a meeting the three of us had at the trailer.”
    “Wait. Wait.” Robbie stopped him. “Jason’s message?”
    “Ah, yes. The trip that got me stuck. Had I not made that trip, I would have been able to return. See. I went to the day Jason got the message. I couldn’t find when or where he sent himself that message to stop him, so the only thing I