When you travel backward in time, you’re creating that second universe at an earlier moment. It will develop in exactly the same way as the universe you just left, unless you act to alter that development.

That the process is perceived as time travel is only an illusion, because the process is subjective. But because it’s subjective, it really doesn’t make any difference, does it? It’s just as good as the real thing. Better, even; because nothing is permanent; nothing is irrevocable.

The past is the future. The future is the past. There’s no difference between the two and either can be changed. I’m flashing across a series of alternate worlds, creating and destroying a new one every time I bounce.

The universe is infinite.

And so are the possibilities of my life.

I am Dan. And I am Don.

And sometimes I am Dean, and Dino, and Dion, and Dana. And more…

There’s a poker game going on in my apartment. It starts on June 24, 1975. I don’t know when it ends. Every time one of me gets tired, there’s another one showing up to take his place. The game is a twenty-fourhour marathon. I know it lasts at least a week; on July 2,1 peeked in and saw several versions of myself — some in their mid-twenties — still grimly playing.

Okay. So I like poker.

Every time I’m in the mood, I know where there’s an empty chair. And when. Congenial people too. I know they’ll never cheat.

I may have to get a larger apartment though. Five rooms is not enough. (I need more room for the pool table.)

Strange things keep happening — no, not strange things, things that I’ve learned not to question. For instance, once I saw Uncle Jim — he looked surprised and vanished almost immediately. It startled me too. I was just getting used to the idea of his death. I hadn’t realized that he would have been using the timebelt too. (But why not? It was his before it was mine.)

Another time I heard strange noises from the bedroom. When I peeked in, there was Don in bed with — well, whoever it was, she was covered by a blanket; I couldn’t see. He just looked at me with a silly expression, not the slightest bit embarrassed, so I shrugged and closed the door. And the noises began again.

I’m not questioning it at all. I’ll find out. Eventually.

Mostly I’ve been concentrating on making money. Don and I (and later, Danny and I) have made a number of excursions into the past, as well as the future. Some of our investments go back as far as 1850 (railroads, coal, steel). 1875 (Bell Telephone). 1905 (automobiles, rubber, oil, motion pictures). 1910 (airlines, heavy industry, steel again). 1920 (radio, insurance companies, chemicals, drugs). 1929 (I picked up some real bargains here. More steel. Business machines. More radio, more airlines. More automobiles). 1940 (companies that would someday be involved in computers, television, and the aerospace industry). 1950 (Polaroid and Xerox and Disney). 1960 (More Boeing stock, some land in Florida — especially around Orlando). Turned out that 1975 was a good year for bargains too. It was a little too early to buy stock in something called Apple, but I could buy IBM and Sony and MCA shares. Oh, and Don said I should also pick up some stock in 20th Century Fox. There was a nifty little movie coming up in 1977 that would make a bit of money.

Down through the decades, I bought a little here, a little there — not enough to change the shape of the world, but enough to supply me with a comfortable lifelong fortune. It was a little tricky setting up an investment firm to manage it, but it was worth the effort. When I got back to 1975, I found I was worth—

—one hundred and forty-three million dollars.

Hmm.

Actually, the number was meaningless. I was worth a hell of a lot more. It turned out I owned an investment monopoly worth several billion dollars, or let’s say I controlled it. What I owned was the holding company that held the holding companies. By the numbers, its value was only one hundred and forty-three million, but I could put my hands on a lot more than that if I wanted.

What it meant was that I had unlimited credit.

Hell! If I wanted to, I could own the country! The world!

Believe it or not, I didn’t want to.

I’d lost interest in the money. It was just so much numbers. Useless except as a tool to manipulate my environment, and I had a much better tool for that.

Those frequent trips to the past had whetted my appetite. I had seen New York grow — like a living creature, the city had swelled and soared; her cast-iron facades had become concrete; her marble towers gave way to glass-sided slabs and soaring monoliths. And beyond that, she became something enchanted: a fantasy of light and color. Oh, the someday beauty of her!

I became intrigued with history—

I went back to see the burning of the Hindenburg. I was there when the great zeppelin shriveled in flame and an excited announcer babbled into his microphone.

I was there when Lindbergh took off and I was there again when he landed. The little airplane seemed so frail.

I was there when another airplane smacked into the • Empire State Building, shattering glass and concrete and tumbling to the horrified street below. It was unreal.

I saw the Wright brothers’ first flight. That was unreal too.

And I know what happened to Judge Crater.

I saw the blastoff of Apollo II. It was the loudest sound I’ve ever heard.

And I witnessed the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. It wasn’t dramatic at all; it was sad and clumsy.

I was there (via timeskim) at Custer s last stand.

I witnessed the completion of the first transcontinental railroad. (The guy who was supposed to pound in the gold spike slipped and fell in the mud.)

I’ve seen the Chicago fire and the San Francisco earthquake.

I was at the signing of the Declaration of Independence. (How far we have come since then… )

I saw the burning of Atlanta.

And I’ve seen the original uncut versions of D. W. Griffith’s Intolerance and Merian C. Cooper’s King Kong and 2001: A Space Odyssey.

I was there the day the Liberty Bell cracked.

And I saw the fall of the Alamo.

I witnessed the battle of the Monitor and the Merrimack.

I attended a band concert conducted by John Philip Sousa.

I heard Lincoln deliver his Gettysburg Address. I recorded it on tape.

I’ve seen Paul Revere’s midnight ride and the Boston Tea Party.

I’ve met George Washington and Thomas Jefferson.

And I watched Columbus come ashore.

I saw Ben Franklin flying a kite on a rainy day.

I was there when Bell tested his first telephone. “Mr. Watson, come here. I want you.”

I witnessed Galileo’s experiment — when he dropped two lead balls of different weights from the tower of Pisa.

I have seen performances of plays by William Shakespeare. At the Globe Theater in London.

I watched Leonardo da Vinci as he painted La Jaconde, the Mona Lisa. (I will not tell you why she smiles.) And I watched as his rival, Michelangelo, painted the Sistine Chapel.

I’ve heard Strauss waltzes, conducted by Strauss himself.

I saw the disastrous premiere of Stravinsky’s Rites of Spring. And Ravel’s Bolero too.

I’ve heard Beethoven’s symphonies — as conducted by Beethoven himself.

And Mozart. And Bach. (I’ve seen the Beatles too.)

And the beheading of Ann Boleyn and Thomas More.

I’ve seen the signing of the Magna Carta.

I have visited Imperial Rome. Nero and Tiberius and Julius Caesar himself. Cleopatra was ugly.

And ancient Greece. The sacking of Troy was more than a myth.

I have witnessed performances of plays by Sophocles and watched as Plato taught Aristotle and Aristotle taught Alexander. I saw Socrates drink the cup of hemlock.