Free Outland (World-Lines Book 1) by Dennis Taylor Page A

Kind of intense, if you know what I mean, but not creepy. Bit of a temper. You might get along fine with him, or you might kill each other.”
    They both laughed at that. Monica’s relationships had always tended towards the volatile end of the spectrum.
    “Bill’s cute, and nice in a geeky sort of way. According to Matt though, he has a case of referencitis that would put you to shame.”
    “Well, then, he must die,” Monica replied with an exaggerated dramatic tone. “There can be only one.” Then more seriously, “Also, it’ll be nice to finally meet this new boyfriend of yours.”
    Erin smiled. “Yes, well, take it easy. I don’t need you scaring Matt off. We’ll be meeting them all tomorrow night at their secret lair. Ordered yet?”
    Monica shook her head, and they got down to the serious business of choosing lunch.

What's the Date
    July 1                            Omni
    Richard and Kevin met at the warehouse well after dark. Kevin had brought along his pride and joy, a Meade 10” telescope with computerized equatorial mount. This piece of equipment packed more power into a two-foot-long package than any pre-20 th -century astronomer had ever had access to.
    “First thing we need to do is get the gate positioned above the telescope, so I can see the night sky on the other side,” Kevin said. “About three feet above the table will do. Angled down. No, facing in that direction.” Kevin motioned with his hands. Richard was using a combination scissors-lift and universal ball-mount to place the three-foot gate per Kevin’s requirements. “Great, now turn the lights off. Use a penlight to see with. Use this one with a red filter.”
    “Why a red filter?” Richard asked.
    “Red light doesn’t wreck your night vision.”
    Once Richard had completed all the setup, he switched on the portal generator and picked up the tablet. After a few seconds of poking at dialogs, the gate faded into focus, showing a starry night. Kevin made sure his telescope pointed properly through the gate, then looked through the eyepiece. He made a couple of small adjustments and asked Richard to move the gate a little to one side. When Kevin was satisfied, he started concentrating on the view through the telescope, with occasional breaks to make notations in a book. True to his instructions, he wrote his notes by the red light of a filtered flashlight.
    After about ten minutes, Kevin said, “Okay, I’m done. Gate off and lights on, please.”
    Richard complied, and came back to find Kevin consulting a magazine and his notes.
    Looking up from his work, Kevin turned to Richard and said, “No question. The other Earth isn’t the past. It’s present-day Earth. I compared the position of the Galilean satellites to the published positions in this month’s Sky and Telescope . Perfect match. Plus, Jupiter is in the same place in the sky, as is the moon. No way that specific configuration is going to duplicate itself, at least not since dinosaurs ruled the Earth.”
    “Fine,” Richard said. “So where are all the people?”
    “There were no people on Greenhouse Earth, either.”
    “Yeah, two hundred degree temps will do that. So what’s the excuse here?”
    “Who knows?” Kevin began packing up his telescope. “So many things could have gone wrong. Or right, depending. What we know is that Lincoln doesn’t exist on that side, there’s no pollution, and the flora and fauna look like what you’d imagine it must have been like before people.”
    “Why was this so important to you?” Richard asked.
    Kevin stopped packing and turned to Richard. “I trust my models. Really. But funny, at the back of my mind I had this worry that maybe this wild planet was the past and Greenhouse Earth was the future. That would be bad.” Kevin tilted his head sideways in dismissal. “But that’s not the case, so we’re not heading for an inevitable runaway greenhouse effect.”
    Richard considered for a few