"But my wife — my widow… I need to know who she is."

"Why? I don't know who I'll be married to in twenty-one years; why should you know?"

"She might have a clue as to why I was killed."

"Well, I guess. Maybe. But I've done all I can for you."

"But you saw the name! You know the name!"

"Like I said, I don't remember it. I'm sorry."

"Please — I'll pay you."

"Seriously, man, I don't remember. But, look, if it comes to me, I'll get back in touch. But that's all I can do."

Theo forced himself not to protest again. He pursed his lips, then nodded solemnly. "All right. Thank you. Thanks for your time. Can I just get your name, though, for my records?"

"Sorry, man. Like I said, if anything else occurs to me, I'll call you."

And the phone went dead.

Michiko returned that night from Tokyo. She seemed if not at peace at least no longer about to go to pieces.

Lloyd, who had spent the afternoon going over a new round of computer simulations, picked Michiko up at Geneva airport, and drove the dozen kilometers to his apartment in St. Genis, and then—

And then they made love, for the first time in the five days since the Flashforward. It was early evening; the lights in the room were off, but there was plenty of illumination seeping in around the blinds from outside. Lloyd had always been more adventurous than her, although she was coming up to speed nicely. Perhaps his tastes had been a little too wild, a little too Western, for her liking initially, but she had warmed to his suggestions as time went by, and he always tried to be an attentive lover. But today it had been perfunctory; the missionary position, nothing more. The sheets were usually damp with sweat when they were done, but this time they were mostly dry. They were even still tucked in along one side.

Lloyd lay on his back, looking up at the dark ceiling. Michiko lay next to him, a pale arm draped across his naked, hairy chest. They were quiet for a long time, each alone with their thoughts.

At last, Michiko said, "I saw you on CNN when I was in Tokyo. You really believe we have no free will?"

Lloyd was surprised. "Well," he said at last, "we think we have it, which amounts to the same thing. I guess. But inevitability is a constant in lots of belief systems. Look at the Last Supper. Jesus told Peter — Peter, mind you, the rock he'd said he would build his church on — Jesus told Peter that Peter would renounce him three times. Peter protested that there was no way that would ever happen, but, of course, he did it. And Judas Iscariot — a tragic figure, I always thought — was fated to turn Christ in to the authorities, whether he wanted to or not. The concept of having a role to play, a destiny to fulfill, is much older than the concept of free will." A pause. "Yes, I really believe the future is as fixed as the past. And surely the Flashforward bears that out; if the future wasn't fixed, how could everyone be having visions of a coherent tomorrow? Wouldn't everyone's vision be different — or, indeed, wouldn't it be impossible for anyone to have any visions at all?"

Michiko frowned. "I don't know. I'm not sure. I mean, what's the point of going on if it's all already fixed?"

"What's the point of reading a novel whose ending has already been written?"

She chewed her lower lip.

"The block universe concept is the only thing that makes sense in a relativistic universe," said Lloyd. "Indeed, it's really just relativity writ large: relativity says no point in space is more important than any other; there is no fixed frame of reference against which to measure other positions. Well, the block universe says no time is more important than any other — 'now' is utterly and completely an illusion, and if there's no such thing as a universal now, if the future is already written, then free will is obviously an illusion, too."

"I'm not as certain as you are," said Michiko. "It seems as if I've got free will."

"Even after this?" said Lloyd. His voice was growing a little sharp. "Even after the Flashforward?"

"There are other explanations for the coherent version of the future," said Michiko.

"Oh? Like what?"

"Like it's only one possible future, one roll of the dice. If the Flashforward were to be reproduced, we might see a completely different future."

Lloyd shook his head, his hair rustling against the pillow. "No," he said. "No, there's only one future, just as there's only one past. No other interpretation makes sense."

"But to live without free will… "

"That's the way it is, all right?" snapped Lloyd. "No free will. No choices."

"But — "

"No buts."

Michiko fell silent. Lloyd's chest was rising and falling rapidly, and doubtless she could feel his heart pounding. There was quiet between them for a long time, and then, at last, Michiko said, "Ah."

Lloyd raised his eyebrows even though Michiko couldn't see his expression. But she must have registered somehow that his facial muscles were moving.

"I get it," she said.

Lloyd was irritated, and he let his voice show it. "What?"

"I get why you're adamant about the immutable future. Why you believe there's no such thing as free will."

"And why is that?"

"Because of what happened. Because of all the people who died, and all the other people who were hurt." She paused, as if waiting for him to fill in the rest. When he didn't, she went on. "If we have free will, you'd have to blame yourself for what happened; you'd have to take responsibility. All that blood would be on your hands. But if we don't — if we don't, then it's not your fault. Que sera est. Whatever will be already is. You pushed the button that started the experiment because you always had and always will push that button; it's as frozen in time as any other moment."

Lloyd said nothing. There was nothing to say. She was right, of course. He felt his cheeks growing flush.

Was he that shallow? That desperate?

There was nothing in any physical theory that could possibly have predicted the Flashforward. He wasn't some M.D. who had failed to keep up to date on side effects; this wasn't physics malpractice. No one — not Newton, not Einstein, not Hawking — could have predicted the outcome of the LHC experiment.

He'd done nothing wrong.

Nothing.

And yet—

And yet he'd give anything to change what had happened. Anything.

And he knew that if he allowed for even one second the possibility that it could have been changed, that it could have gone down differently, that he could have avoided all those car crashes and plane crashes and botched operations and falls down stairs, that he could have prevented little Tamiko from losing her life, then he'd spend the rest of his life being crushed by guilt over what had happened. Minkowski absolved him of that.

And he needed that absolution. He needed it if he were to go on, if he were to follow his light path up through the cube without being tortured.

Those who wished to believe that the visions didn't portray the actual future had hoped that, taken collectively, they would be inconsistent: that in one person's vision, a Democrat would be president of the United States, while in another's a Republican would be in the Oval Office. In one, flying cars would be everywhere; in another, all personal vehicles would have been banned in favor of public transit. In one, perhaps aliens had come to visit Earth; in another, we'd found that we really are alone.

But Michiko's Mosaic Project was a huge success, with over a hundred thousand postings a day, and it all combined together to portray a consistent, coherent, plausible 2030, each reported vision a tile in the greater whole.

In 2017, at the age of ninety-one, Elizabeth II, Queen of England, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Canada, the Bahamas, and countless other places, died. Charles, her son, at that time sixty-nine, was mad as a loon, and, with some prodding from his advisors, chose not to ascend to the throne. William, Charles's eldest son, next in line, shocked the world by renouncing the throne, leading Parliament to declare the Monarchy dissolved.