Chapter 35 - All the stuff from way back when that's coming up don't self destruct.

19 Prairial Year CCXXXI, Potat, South Windland, Libertalia - Amazonia

It was in his second month on Amazonia that Oliver started to worry he had accomplished nothing. On the one hand, he had significantly boosted his contacts and support network, and he had a good lead on nanotechnology. On the other hand, what had he learned? Thinking about what to put in his report, he was sure his team back on Earth would not be impressed by songs about recycling and the latest footwear fashions by those who lived in the land down under.

Oliver found himself on the floor of his stepmother’s living room on a sunny afternoon scribbling ideas on a large piece of paper. Shamu kept watch close by, and soon the man started to lose himself drawing. He had started drawing a picture of the globe, then a tiny Oliver in space holding a massive “Shrink Gun”. Zig-zag rays were raining down and hitting tall people on the planet’s surface. To the side Oliver had scribbled some pros and cons.

Pros: Doable (Max Distance? / Atmosphere?)

Cons: Would also shrink the smalls?

Oliver soon found himself casually filling in more and more of the drawing. Distracted, he did not notice his new stepmother had entered the room and was casually watching him draw. After a couple minutes, the presence of being watched came to Oliver and he looked up across the cavernous thirty feet to the woman who had taken up a spot on the couch.

“You don’t have to be here. It’s your day off, right? Like if you want to go to the store or the spa,” Oliver offered.

“Do you want to go to the store, Oliver?” Victoria’s voice was calm, and almost rhetorical in the question. She was playing a game with him.

“No, I was just offering. You know I’m actually an adult right, I can watch the house, and with your sister out with Ben, dad, this has to be like your first time all by yourself,” Oliver nearly fumbled the transition to dad. He did not want to hint he wanted his new mother out of the house. He had some phone calls he wanted to make, and maybe he could get out for an hour or two to run an errand, get a lay of the terrain, even set up some surveillance and monitoring. Victoria was not making his job easy.

“You’re a very considerate boy, what I want is to just watch you. I want to enjoy watching you be happy,” her hands were in her lap, she leaned back slightly, and a strong smile came across her face.

Oliver slammed his notebook, slipped the pen between the pages, and scrambled up. He walked closer to the couch, “Can I ask you a question?”

She nodded, holding in a ‘you just did’ adults would often use to taunt children.

“What do you see when you look at me? Like, how old?” Oliver smirked as he asked, he had clearly not learned the lesson from when he asked Ben the question.

“A man in his middle thirties pretending to be a small child,” She was quick in the response, and still flat and happy in her reply.

“Wait, really?” Oliver approached the couch, rounding a three-foot-tall wooden coffee table, before getting within a foot of the furniture.

“Of course, silly, you’re not a baby. You’re not even one of the natives. You’re from Earth, right?” Oliver’s face took a confused look, and he resisted the urge to scratch his head. Instead, with some difficulty, he propped himself up on the couch.

“You’re the first person in like a month, besides myself, who sees me as something other than six. So, wait, not to get too egotistical. I’m clearly something you’ve never encountered before, a man who has traveled and seen other worlds and cultures and people. You know that, and even if you did see me as small or childlike, this is an amazing opportunity to talk to me or ask me about the grand mysteries of the universe. If things were reversed, I’d take the time to listen to anyone, no matter how small, about their travels. And you’re just, I don’t know, just sitting there.” Oliver went off on her in his confused rant. It was not trying to be rude; it was an attempt to elevate her curiosity, the chastisement as nothing more than an encouragement for her imagination.

“Tell me, Oliver, you traveler of other worlds. Tell me of the See-beams off of Tannhäuser gate,” she said sweetly but sarcastically. Oliver was not sure how to answer that.

“My parents were dimension explorers. I know all about visiting other worlds and living under different suns. They’d go out, find a world filled with littles, with their tiny cars and tiny trains, all their weird foods and ways of talking. Not like here, those are littles who went their whole lives without the slightest hint of being babies. I know about the good and the bad, your governments, your art, and your wars. I just don’t really care all that much. It is not where my interests lie.”

“Is that how they, um,” Oliver started but struggled with the exact phrasing.

“Oh, no, not at all. Car crash. Also, no more phone books for you, I got you a car seat.” Oliver nodded, at least that part of her history was similar to her counterpart.

“Oliver, here you go on about what I should be doing, and you know next to nothing about me.”

Oliver tried to defend himself, “That’s not true. You teach at the local university, and I met your family,” He left out the part where he had seen her naked on Earth, that he knew she could not cook, and that she would laugh like a deranged chihuahua at a bad Adam Sandler movie.

“What do I teach?” How is it that the bigs always had a plan, and always knew the answer to every question before they asked it? Oliver scrunched his face and decided to be magnanimous in defeat.

“You’re right, I’m sorry, today is a great opportunity for us to bond and talk and get to know each other. You deserve more of my attention, and it was rude of me to go off and start working today without focusing on what mattered. Please accept my apology, I’d love to know about your work and what your research is on.”

Her mouth beamed like a shark moving in for a kill, “My research is technically in pediatric psychology, but I don’t really study people under the age of eighteen. Sometimes for comparison or environmental purpose, but I study adults who happen to look like children.”

“Uh… I think I get it, so um, like depression and anxiety, and how our brains develop?”

“My focus is more on how to develop brains, make behavioral changes and reinforcement. My department works with building better hypnotics. We also study new drugs to improve happiness and help you guys realize your true potential,” Victoria had pride in her work, she had no shame at what she did.

Oliver scooched a bit on the couch away from the woman. Victoria on Earth was, what, a school councilor? He had not followed up on her after their brief time together fifteen years ago. Her counterpart here was much more successful, having worked on such prestigious projects like ‘Naomi and Oliver’ and ‘Carpet Mice.’

Oliver’s eyes lingered around the room, looking at her impressive bookshelf towards the middle adjacent to the living room’s inner walls. The first few times through the house, he had not seen it, but now sitting on the couch he could barely make out the top shelf, several large textbooks on psychology, the most prominent, -Applied Regression Analysis – by Doctor Montgomery was right on the end and fifteen feet off the ground – beyond Oliver’s reach. The entire wealth of Amazonian knowledge on mind control, and it was just beyond his grasp.

“Well, I’m sure that’s an in-demand skill. What… what were you working on, like, what would you be working on if I was not here,” Oliver tried to stay cool in the face of the danger. Victoria seemed like she was not planning on doing anything to him.

“Kondratiev Waves,” she said, as if that should mean something to Oliver.

“Sorry?”

She grabbed the notebook he had brought over and flipped it open. Oliver’s drawing of shrinking the planet was in prominent view, she paused on it a second before going to an empty page. She began drawing a sinusoidal wave, tight at first, but the frequency kept getting further apart. She drew a line straight through the middle and labeled it ‘Age’, then another boxed in the graph labeled “Cute.”

“As you know, babies are cute or not cute. One minute you’re a cute one year old, the next you’re in your terrible twos, and what was cute one day is annoying and trying the next,” her finger was going along the wave, the amplitude was maximized at one and far negative at two.

“One of the things Kondratiev identified was that as babies age their cuteness waves get longer and longer. We want to target an age where the child is stable, maximally cute rather than maximally uncute. This is difficult when so much of what we do involves ratchets, and often in our frustration a new parent will just slam the child back to newborn. That’s not ideal. Newborns are cute, but they get very uncute very fast, and that’s too erratic. We want something just slightly older. My research was trying to estimate where these sweet spots will be and how to dial into the exact spots we want to hit on the curve. We know, for example, boys and girls have slightly different curves, but we don’t quite know if each individual has their own cuteness wave.”

“Oh, so where do um, thirty-six-year-old boys fall on this chart.” Oliver asked with the same sarcastic tone she had given him earlier.

“Very not cute. Six-year-olds as well, in case you wanted to try that. See, you’re learning things already, Oliver. If you had studied your Kondratiev, you’d know you picked a very bad age to pretend to be.”

“I can be,” Oliver stopped himself from saying it, “hmm, well, I’m sorry I disrupted your research. It sounds important.” Everything she had said sounded like a nightmare. He hoped she did not expect him to put on outfits to see how cute he looked. His new mommy did not need to know he looked handsome with daks and jandals. He had gone out his way today to wear long khakis and a heavy polo blue shirt, just to keep himself from feeling too small.

She threw her arm around Oliver, dragging him back closer, “It’s OK, you’re very considerate Oliver, meeting you has pushed me in a new direction anyways.” She winced slightly from pulling the smaller man closer.

“Are you OK?” Oliver was legitimately concerned; it sounded like she sprained something in the move.

“Just pain,” Victoria started rubbing her chest, “I’m sure it’ll go away. The headache is pretty bad though, not sure which hurts more.”

“Do we need to get to a doctor, did you break something on your trip with dad?” Oliver had given Ben his portal gun while he was off on his honeymoon, along with directions to an Earth that was uninhabited. He wanted Ben to check out the Galapagos. He knew they had spent a day hiking the island, but otherwise it sounded uneventful. Ben did not even mention the finches when he came back.

“Oh no, nothing like that. I’m just heavy up top. We, um, I’ve weaned Jennifer off, but my body is still producing.”

Oliver put it together. It had been a month since he had had it, but a part of him still wanted it. He was cautious in showing interest, “You gave your sister, milk?”

“Of course, she’s a little, she needed it, I’m not any different than Mom. Now that she’s getting older, we’re going to try weaning her off those things.”

An image flashed in Oliver’s mind, Jennifer sucking on her sister’s tits. He bit his lip and shuffled his legs. His pull-up got uncomfortably tighter.

“They’ve been heavy, and the leaking is the worst, I’ve stained a couple bras,” Victoria seemed at a loss.

“I um, maybe, um,” Oliver was not going to say it. He could still remember the taste from Grace’s dinner.

“Oliver, we’re not close. You might be my new son, but you’re also a complete stranger,” Victoria reminded him.

“You’re right, I’m sorry…” he was losing control. He had just apologized for not sucking her tits.

Victoria pulled him closer, almost hugging, “Do you want to be the type of person that wants to be closer to me? Do you want me to be the type of person that is closer to you?”

That shook the boy, he stared directly ahead across the long living room and thought of it. There was only one polite answer. It seemed horrible to tell your new stepparent you did not want to take an opportunity to be a better son. Pressured, Oliver finally nodded.

“Good, I want us to be closer too.” Victoria affirmed, she shifted slightly on the couch and her breasts seemed to jiggle a bit, drawing Oliver’s eyes.

“You know what that stuff does, right?” Oliver was not entirely sure. The research project had only just started when he left.

“Hmm, oh we know,” She smiled, she began removing her shirt.

“Dad’s going to be OK with this? Like, we’re best buds I don’t want him upset I’m…”

“Daddy is perfectly fine with this. He wants you to be closer to me, he wants me to be closer to you.” Her arm brought Oliver up on her legs, carefully resting the boy on her right thigh. She pulled the bra fabric on her right breast down and under to let it snap under her breast. The heavy weight jiggled. Oliver’s eyes locked on the nipple, two thirds an inch long and an inch in diameter, with a three-inch areola surrounding it. It sprung like a basketball hoop from Victoria’s preparations.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Oliver needed to get out of this. This was going too fast. She should have gone with a sippy cup, or a bottle, first. Some intermediate step?

“It would hurt me more if you didn’t,” her voice was practically singing.

“I don’t know what to do,” Oliver hung his head in shame.

“It’s OK, just do what feels right, your body remembers even if your mind does not,” Victoria started turning him, and placed her hands against the back of his head. She easily began to lift him up, one hand supporting his neck and shoulders. “Yawn,” she commanded him.

This is fine, it is just milk, it is just what people do here, Oliver tried to soothe himself, his head came back slightly, and his nose was aligned with her nipple. There was nothing to see, just the window behind the couch and waves of flesh, and a small amount of heat was coming off her body. He opened his mouth wide and then felt himself pressing into the areola. Victoria’s other arm came down held up her breast firmly under Oliver’s chin. He could feel the flesh squeezing in, past his teeth and resting gently towards the back of his mouth. Oliver’s nose squished against the orb, he could smell her sweat and perfume, and this close it was relaxing.

The milk was like a wave, warm, slow ambrosia barely touching his tongue and filling his senses. In an instant his mind wandered. The wave was not just in his mouth, it was past him, gently rippling across the walls, through his new mother’s body and then through him. Oliver’s eyes caught the strange shift of the light and understood the odd occurrence too late. His mind pulled back in memory to something Eskender had mentioned once.

A Mandela wave.

It was too late for Oliver, and his body and mind found themselves lost in time.

* * *

January 19^th, 1991, Davenport, Iowa, Earth

“A hero’s welcome awaits the Bee fifty twos from the Three Hundred Seventh Bomb Wing here in Barksdale. These bombers have just completed a non-stop flight from Louisiana to Iraq and back and had the privilege of firing the opening shots of the war. The fourteen-thousand-mile mission, at thirty-five hours, is the longest bombing raid ever completed in history, and an impressive display of America’s global reach and capabilities.”

“Bee fifty twos!” Oliver jumped, watching the b-roll footage of a jet plane coming down for a landing. The room was dark, the lighting a smudgy yellow color, and the television was an old boxy kind. He turned his head to get a grip of his surroundings. He was not sucking milk, and he was not on Amazonia.

There was an old blue couch with flowers, and an ugly brown lounge chair next to it. Below his feet was a small rug, littered with various toys, blocks, action figures, and a stuffed turtle. Even his clothes were different. This morning, he had gone with a simple blue tee shirt and jean pants. Now he was wearing soft blue, nearly white jean overalls, and a red undershirt. His movements caused a stray bang to fall in his eyes, and he blew a gust of air at the light blond hair to get out of his vision. He felt a soft cool dampness in the air and could hear the stomping of feet on the floor above him.

Everything was big. Like Amazonia. He recognized the couch. This had to be his old house, from before his parents moved.

“I’m freaking out. It’s the milk. Some weird hallucination, or a trip. Like eLl eSs Dee? EMm Dee eMm Aye?” Oliver looked down at his hands, they were tiny. He did not notice when a giant entered the room. The television turned off and Oliver directed his attention to it, watching the light on it fade to a line and then a dot. He turned his head and saw her.

She was taller than him now. Last time he saw her he had a few inches on her, but now she was twice his height. Her hair was short, but also layered, almost shaggy, while voluminous and choppy. The color was natural and strong, a mix of gold, red, and yellow. She wore a heavy sweater that hid many of her features.

“Hey mom,” Oliver was even more confused. This was not what he was expecting.

“Your show’s over, no more television,” she started, before reaching down and picking the boy up. He came up under her arm and found himself staring directly in her face. He could feel her warmth, even smell her. He missed this smell.

“This is freaking me out right now,” Oliver tried, his eyes and head darting back around the room.

Her face wrinkled and she touched his head with her other hand, “Oliver, are you sick? What’s wrong?”

“I might have taken something I shouldn’t have. I’m back in the past. My mind is all the way back to nineteen ninety-one, our old house in Iowa. Why am I here? I’m all tiny, and everything is big.”

Her hand came up and touched his forehead, “You don’t have a fever,”

“There are only two possibilities. I’m still on the couch in twenty twenty-three, or I’ve gone back in time for real. Oh, I know how to solve this. Mom,” Oliver spoke it trying to get her attention.

“Are you telling a story, Oliver? Something you saw on Tee Vee?”

“Mom, answer this. If I’m actually in the past, you can prove I’m here by telling me something you’d never tell me.”

She frowned, Oliver was especially coherent for a four-year-old, but also nothing he was saying made sense, “What are you talking about?”

“My brain can’t make up something I don’t know, so if you tell me something you’d never tell me that means this is real, but since you can’t that means it’s all in my head. Good, that’s fine, this will all be fine in a bit.” Oliver began to relax in her arms.

“You’re silly my little Nostradamus. If you want to pretend you’re from the future go ahead and tell me tomorrow’s lottery numbers. Hmm?” She smiled again, enjoying his game.

Oliver held up his small hand and went through the fingers one by one, “Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google. Though all those companies were bad in the nineties, in fact, most don’t exist yet. I never knew why Microsoft isn’t in that group though. Microsoft is doing very good.”

“Excuse me?”

“Ha, this is great, remember in, um two thousand, I had that class in middle school, we had to pick five stocks and track them. I put everything into tech stocks, like pets dot com. I was riding high and then by April the bubble popped and I was dead last. The teacher had me stand in front of the class and give a report to save my grade. ‘You’re no Charles Schwab, Oliver.’ I had to give a report on index funds for extra credit. I think he just liked taking the smarty pants kid down a peg, use me as a lesson for the others. Do you remember that teacher’s name? He had a bald spot right here, and that mustache.”

Oliver’s mother stopped and just stared at her son, confused. He had become possessed by a demon. She kept quiet.

Oliver ignored his mother’s silence and kept talking, “This is before Terra shows up. That was the Gulf War on Tee Vee, and then Terra comes after Christmas ninety-one, just after the Soviet Union collapses. What a banger year, this is just before everything changes. There are weeks of history where decades happen.”

“Anyway, um, I don’t remember this house, was there a bathroom in the basement? Man, this is a weird dream, I’m even feeling I need to go. I hope I’m not losing it in the real world.” Oliver stopped talking and started looking at his hands. They seemed to waver a bit in and out of focus as he waved his tiny fingers.

That was enough for her, her grip tightened, and she pulled him into her chest. Oliver’s mother bonded with him up the stairs and to the nearest bathroom. His overalls were flipped off as they ran, she pulled them down and exposed his bottom. With a swift movement a lid was up, and Oliver was sitting on a comfortable seat. The boy kept his balance on the chair by gripping one side with his hand. His mother took a few steps back and smiled, waiting for Oliver.

The boy closed his eyes, trying to ignore the presence of another person in the room, he muttered to himself, “None of this is real. You’re in your head. You’ll wake up shortly.” He began to tinkle, a small stream of droplets falling into a large bowl. He took a moment to shake, and when he was satisfied, slowly pushed himself off the chair.

“You did it Oliver!” She got closer to him and started helping him put the clothing back on.

“You know mom, I always wondered, why’d you guys only have one kid?” Oliver was asking the shadow of his memory. There was not much point, the shadow would only know what Oliver knew.

“I don’t know, do you want a sibling?” She tried turning the question back. Oliver shrugged, of course his memory would not know the answer to that, he did not know it. He thought for a bit and then tried again. There was only one reason for his mind to bring himself here, and that was to assuage his guilt.

“I figured it out. I’m pretty sure the reason I’ve chosen to think of you here and now is because you’re my mom, and what we have here is special and important to me. You’re my real mom, and I can’t replace that.”

Oliver sighed slightly, “I just met this woman, and not everything is great, but she wants me to start calling her mommy. She wants to baby me, feed me, dress me up, and treat me in certain ways. Um, mom, I need to know, if I call her mommy does that undermine what we have? Like this? Like, this moment, this thing we shared, this is what I cherish. I need to be able to have this woman in my life too, and I want to make sure I’m not hurting what we have here.”

She lifted her son up and helped him with the soap, listening to his rant. When he finished washing, she got in close behind him and answered, “Of course not sweetie, your dad calls me mommy and he still loves grandma.”

Every part of Oliver’s body grew stiff, his hands were cold and wet, not just from the washing, but from a layer of sweat starting to build.

“Cloth by the way,” She snuggled closer, his breathing intensified for a few breaths before slowly calming down from the hug from his mother.

There was only one explanation, his mind was bleeding his experiences in the diaper dimension into his memories of the past. He calmed down, the trip would be over soon, might as well have fun with it.

“Is that so? If you’re his mommy, doesn’t that mean you should decide things like, is he eating healthy enough, or getting enough exercise.”

“We haven’t gone that far, but now that you mention it.,” A bemusing smile came to her face.

“He has something naughty in his sock drawer. He hides them in the ugly Christmas socks. Surely his mommy can think of a few nicer things to go in his mouth than those,” Oliver tried bringing his hands up.

She nodded and then brought him in close before kissing him on the top of his head. Every part of his body felt warmth and love, and it filled him from his fingertips to his toes to his forehead. The waves came quicker this time, and he was ready.

Oliver closed his eyes and felt flesh pull out of his mouth. The trip into his memories ended.

19 Prairial Year CCXXXI, Potat, South Windland, Libertalia – Amazonia

“There’s my baby boy. You’re hungry today aren’t you,” she pulled Oliver off the breast and started to shake him a bit up and down. Oliver brought his hand up to his mouth and rubbed drippings off his lips. The fingers were still fading in and out, the world was not coming into focus. Looking up he saw doubles of Victoria that seemed to warble in the bright afternoon sunlight. A sharp buzz floated past his temples, only mellowing after Oliver forced up a burp and a hiccup.

“Woah, momma.” Victoria seemed pleased by his statement, even if Oliver had not intended it towards her.

“Oliver, that was wonderful, but before we get to the next step, I thought I’d take a moment to just see how you’re feeling. I will ask you a few questions. Mommy to baby, there is no barrier between us, and no secrets. When we share like we just did, we’re one, nothing will be between us.” Victoria’s words had an echo to them, like Oliver was hearing them from another room or down the hall.

“I was all tiny, and everything is big now,” Oliver tried to comprehend where his mind had gone. The dream felt real, the real now feels like a dream.

“Let’s start with an easy one. What do you want to be Oliver, when you grow up? Like what occupation do you think best fits you.” Victoria liked asking this question of littles. It always took them off kilter, unsure how to answer. Do you admit you still dreamed you could grow up more, to become an adult and get the fantasy job you always wanted?

The milk was a truth serum, not just a relaxing nutritious snack. That side effect he had pleasantly ignored, hoping it would not come up, in his desire to feel the smooth liquid again. Oliver regretted his decision to drink it. His mouth betrayed him.

“Spy. I am a spy. From Earth.” Oliver was unable to stop himself, if there was one person who did not need to know about his secret mission, it was his new mommy.

“Oh, oh no that won’t do at all. Spy is too dangerous,” She corrected him, like he said he wanted to get a motorcycle or join the circus. “What’s something nice you can do?”

Oliver thought for a bit, his head was mush, concepts smeared together.

Spy; James Bond; Sean Connery; Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Indiana was kind of like a James Bond, but he took secrets from the past.

“Archy all oh gist,” his mouth had a goopy feeling, his tongue wanted to do its own thing now, and only with difficulty could he maneuver to hit all sounds.

“Archaeologist! Oh honey,” she maneuvered him a bit in her arms, bringing him up and then back down, as if in celebration, “Daddy’s going to be all excited, you want to be just like him!”

“I want… I wanna, find ancient treasure and fight mummies and disarm traps.”

Victoria’s attitude took a sharp turn, her tone was melodic but disappointed, and with a smile she gave him new directions, “No, no, no, field work is too dangerous. You’re too little for that. But you can still be a big important archaeologist. What if you had an office at the university and a team of people under you who would go out and do field work for you.”

Oliver imagined himself at a desk, sending out e-mails, and attending meetings that went over budgets and discoveries. It was familiar, and all too easy to visualize.

“And they’ll bring back all sorts of neat things and you’ll catalogue it all and write up what you think, and you’ll submit your reports, and if people like them maybe you’ll get them published.”

Wait a second! This was just his old job.

“The most dangerous thing you’ll ever do is fly to another museum and look at their stuff, and then you’ll quickly come back home to mommy and daddy.”

No! I wanted to be a spy.

The blocks were moving, if not in his own head, then in his new parents’. They would nudge him, encourage him, and help him build this new cover identity.

Victoria’s face twisted with a grin. She was satisfied with the outcome of the question; Oliver was ready for a real interrogation. “Let play a quick game. You’re going to tell me two secrets, and I have to guess if it’s a big secret or a little secret.”

“Secrets?” Oliver could not hold in his debit PIN if she asked for it. He quickly spurt out the first thing to come to his mind, and hoped it was not too important, “I like Jennifer. I’m going to marry her.”

Oliver did not like hearing that, sure Jennifer was attractive and fun to be with, but marriage? Did he even like her? His mind was completely milk soaked.

“Oh, that’s so sweet. You too are so cute together, are you going to elope?” Victoria teased him.

“Sure,” Elope, Antelope, Oliver was not sure what he was saying.

“Can I come to the wedding?”

“Sure,” Oliver agreed without thinking.

“Well, that’s not much of a secret wedding then. Now you have to give a big secret. How about something about Earth. Like, if I wanted to visit sometime, what sort of defenses does Earth have? Just the first thing that comes to your mind about Earth.”

Now’s the time James Bond Junior, Goldfinger’s strapped you to the table, and a laser’s coming at your face. Choose your next words carefully.

“Vicky, I’m sorry, after Ben died, I tried to make it work. I really did, but you had needs, and I couldn’t meet them, or maybe I wasn’t ready to meet them. I think I was just too guilty about having survived or maybe wrapped up in my own head and goals. It was not just me though, you were too demanding, and weird. You made sex too weird. I know I should have spoken up more, but by the time I figured out what was wrong with us, it was past the point of repairing things. We never could have made it work. I’m glad you found Ben again, he’s, just the most amazing perfect person for you in every way and I’m so happy you are happy with him.”

Victoria was well aware of the properties of milk, but this was something she never experienced before, she tried to get Oliver back on track, “Oliver, what’s this got to do with Earth?”

“Do you remember our song, Vicky?” Oliver started to move his head back and forth, lost to a melody only he could hear.

“No, Earth to Oliver.”

“Doors and windows break, but not this melody,” Oliver had no sense of tone, he dragged out melody like a slinky. “These not-so-subtle signs, this house can’t make us stay.”

“Oliver please don’t sing,” Victoria tried waving in front of him.

“Remember that house, that ugly thing, oh man, we thought we got a steal after the housing bubble popped. What were we thinking?” His singing resumed, “Sometimes these things just fall apart!”

Victoria started elevating Oliver back up. She was not certain if he had gotten too much milk or too little, but he needed to be shut up. She started moving the other bra under her breast.

“I’m just glad you didn’t play it at the wedding Victoria, it means a lot to me you’ve been keeping it cool since Ben came back. I haven’t told him we had a thing, and I don’t know if how he’d handle it.”

Oliver’s eyes got bigger, “Oh hey boobie.”

There was another wave that crest over both.

Breast feeding is a wonderous biological phenomenon. It is not just about the delivery of food to an infant; it is a source of communication between the mother’s body and the child’s. Whatever the baby needs, the mother’s body will provide. Oliver’s body sent strange new signals through Victoria. Something to let his new mommy know just what he needed.

* * *

1 Fructidor Year CCXXXVIII, Potat, South Windland, Libertalia – Amazonia

“The surprise assault by Yamatoan forces easily pushed back the limited resistance offered up by the Sing-a-lings. The Yamatoan fleet, led by the imperial warship ‘eye whY Aye’ Nippon, overpowered through pitched defenses. Just after four this morning imperial soldiers forced their way into the capital building and captured the last holdouts of the civilian government. The unprovoked attack on the once free port has driven strong outcry from the international community. The Freewindian Prime Mini…” Screech.

The source of the sound, a radio in another room, stopped mid-sentence. Victoria looked down, she did not recognize the long white dress she was wearing, or the kitchen she was in. The table she sat at the head of was a long wooden piece and led to a door to a back porch overlooking a large yard. Her eyes wandered the room, fruit was in baskets. A wooden fan dark in color whirled above her, and on the plate below her was a quarter of a banana and a third of a muffin. She turned her head about the unknown room and saw another person.

A woman.

No, this was a child. Five years old? Ten years old? She had not seen an actual child in a while. She had Victoria’s hair, and the child had let it hang down. The girl’s attention was to a set of paper and books in front of her, which she tapped annoyingly at with her pencil. She was dressed in khakis and white shirt school uniforms Victoria recognized as belonging to an elementary school in the city.

“Where am I?” Victoria started to ask, her voice quaking slightly out of concern. The child stopped and turned her head to address the giant.

“Are you,” she did not continue the question, interrupted by another entering the room, “Hey bro! Looking snazzy.”

Oliver entered the room with confidence, he was wearing a blue suit, and a tie just like the vice rector. He looked to Victoria like a boss baby. He came up to the gal at the end of the table, and looked at her homework, and he then he wrapped a short arm around her. The girl had a couple inches height on Oliver.

“You’re getting too big, you know that? Pretty soon I’ll be the little brother,” Oliver commented, Victoria watched the siblings share a tender moment, it was everything she wanted as a mother.

“Today’s a big day for you, are you nervous?” the girl asked, concerned.

“I’ve faced far worse dangers than a bunch of college freshmen. Thank you though. How about you, how’s the new school year going?”

“This new math class has me beat. They won’t let us use calculators. How am I supposed to figure out any of this?” She emoted her frustration with a look of concern over her homework. Victoria turned her head slightly and saw what looked like a question about a triangle.

Oliver held up a finger and then reached into his suit jacket. Out came a long piece of plastic from his inner pocket. “This is what I used on Terra when the computers didn’t work. Have you ever seen a slide rule?”

The Amazon child reached out and grabbed the flat stick and held it up to her mother. “A gift, um… what is it?”

Oliver gave a small laugh and replied, “I’ll go over the basics in the car.”

Victoria finally found the courage to speak up, “Um, Oliver, where’s Benjamin? Where’s Jennifer?”

The girl started responding, “At the obst…”

Oliver interrupted her, “Dad took her to the doctor; she has an appointment,” the boy shifted topics, “We’re still on for our lunch, right? I have something important to tell you.”

Before Victoria had time to respond, another wave came over the world, shifting, warping, and stretching. Everything was paused in movement and sounds lingered without shifting in tone or pitch. Lights and colors smeared and then morphed back into shapes. Victoria wanted to vomit but held it in.

“The one thing about campus food, only the chicken is good,” Oliver’s voice came to her. She took a deep long breath, and it helped the world shift into focus. Victoria easily placed these smells and sounds; it was lunch time at the student recreation center, they were in the cafeteria. She did not eat here often. Below her was a bowl of salad, and across from her Oliver had a plate with a single slice of pizza.

“Why’d you get the pizza then?” Victoria inquired.

“The pizza is ready right now. Besides, you know me, I’ll eat bad pizza any day of the décade,” Oliver smiled.

Victoria was not sure what was going on, one moment she was on a couch, the next she was in a strange dining room, and the next she was on campus. Not once in her years of nursing Jennifer had anything this strange ever happen. She must have fallen into a lucid dream, exhaustion from the wedding combined with the new feelings of her new son on her chest leading to this strange reality. She forked up her lettuce and brought it to her mouth, the salad tasted slightly old, and flat. She picked at a single banana pepper and chewed it slowly; the strong acid coated her tongue, and she swallowed the piece.

“How was your first day back? Same old same old?” Her small son was showing her curiosity and attention.

She had no answer to that, she mumbled, “Fine.”

“I thought today would be weird. That the students would be distracted or even have to fight someone off, but they were just bored. That’s fine. I can deal with that. I was way too overprepared, but I think they learned something. Even had someone come up after class saying he thought dad was supposed to be teaching, but I think he is still excited for what my class will offer him.”

Victoria kept quiet, what a strange idea, Oliver teaching a class of Amazons.

“I need to tell you something. It’s a secret,” Oliver gave a wicked grin, “Remember how we used to play big secret little secret. Let’s do that again. I’ll say the secret and you have to guess if it’s big or not.” Victoria perked up, finally, maybe he would tell her what she wanted to hear about Earth.

“Telemachus.” Oliver put his hands on the table flat, as if the word should mean something.

“Odysseus’s son?” Her mind flashed to a book by Fénelon that Benjamin had in his office. Amazonian memory was sharp, a face, a name, or a word could be recalled years later with ease. Here though the reference was lost to her.

“I was thinking to keep with the theme, for, ’Aunt Penelope.’ Cousin too, I guess. Which takes preference, the mom or the dad?” Oliver looked down at his plate, and then up at Victoria, smiling.

“Jennifer’s pregnant?” Her sister and Oliver? She put the fork down, “I’m not ready for this, Oliver. This is too big.”

“Oh, that’s the small secret. Point for me. Here’s number two, ‘Collins.’” Oliver was enjoying his game, Victoria’s mind wandered, then shrugged. Benjamin’s old student. This was a distraction. Oliver had just told her she was going to be a grandmother. Today was her first day with her new son and now she could see the edges of the arc, the long goal of him growing up. It was scaring her. She wanted her baby forever.

Victoria did not know why the word popped in her head, “Twins? Oliver, what’s going on, this is, we were having a nice moment, mother to son and now everything has moved too fast.”

“Nope, still the small secret. Two for two.” He looked sadly at his pizza, poking at it slightly with a fork. “Jennifer wants to raise them on Earth. With all that’s going on, she is not sure it will be safe here for them.”

Her baby was leaving? Jennifer was leaving? “What about your job, Oliver? What about your family?”

“I have family on Earth, too. Plus, with what I’ve learned here, I would be a rock star on Earth. A real Jane Goodall. Come see the boy who lived with the giants for ten years. Just being able to talk about how dad and I helped you guys discover evolution and the impact here would be incredible,” Oliver shrugged, like he could not even convince himself, “I don’t know, I’ve still got a lot to do here, and we’ve got time to change her mind.”

“You can’t leave, I need my baby boy,” Victoria was adamant. Her first real day as a mommy and now she was living a nightmare, one day her boy would grow up and start his own family and move on.

Oliver nodded in acknowledgement, “Mom, I understand, but maybe this might change your mind. Here’s the actual big one. Dad doesn’t even know about this. I was working on a set of documents from the Atlantis era and came across something important. Are you aware of the lysine contingency?”

Victoria was starting to get upset with her dream, she was a grandmother. She was an aunt. Lysine? Maybe she was having a stroke? Could Oliver have done something on the couch, maybe he was hurting her?

“It was something Michael Crichton invented for Jurassic Park, the dinosaurs had a genetic flaw introduced, so if they ever escaped the island, they would not be able to process food and would die,” Oliver started explaining, “The Nitz did something similar when they altered your species’ code. Not, lysine, it’s, um. It’s related to the fecundity issue. We small ones produce certain chemicals, and your bodies respond. Sync up if you will.”

“Oliver, I’m not following.”

“It was so your bodies would be ready to produce what we need. It’s to make sure there will be a second generation of servants ready for the littles, and your population is kept in check for us to manage.”

Servants? Changes? She looked down at her body, everything was out of focus and shifting, but everything seemed the same.

“This is a fanciful story for a boy with a grand imagination,” Victoria tried to be authoritative, to regain some control of the dream.

Oliver ignored her, “You and Jennifer are synced up. When she got pregnant, your body picked up those hormones and started making some changes, and you and dad have been uh. Well, how do I say this.”

No. The secret was too big. She should not know how this worked. Oliver was manipulating her, tricking her. She would punish the boy just as soon as they were back on the couch. The sounds and tones of the lunch cafeteria started to become one long tone. Her eyes could no longer focus, just blurs of colors, as ripples cascaded through the walls, floors, and tables. Her salad became a sandwich. Oliver’s pizza became mac and cheese.

“Mom, I’m sorry, but I think you’re preg…”

She was back in her house. Her real house. A strong tugging sensation was coming from her left breast. It was pleasant, fun, almost relaxing. She looked down at Oliver in his red shirt and long overalls. Her baby boy! He was never going to grow up and move away. She would do anything to keep that nightmare future from coming about.

She would just have to convince Benjamin that Oliver wanted to be a little boy, that the boy needed a bit more love and attention. She would just have to find a way to work his goals with Oliver in with what she wanted. Her mind started to work on a plan.

Oliver was unaware of this. Victoria’s mind may have gone to the future, but it is all physics. One body moves forward, the other moves backward.

* * *

March 12th, 2004, Council Bluffs, Iowa, Earth

Oliver looked down at the paper he had been holding. He had parked his car in his parents’ drive and had been sitting there for a few minutes. He remembered when he wrote this, the handwritten paper with a list of arguments for why joining the air force academy was a great idea. The paper had several bullet points, and possible counter arguments from his parents.

“Ghost of Christmas Past! How dare you show me this day!” He shouted.

Oliver did not want to relive this. He remembered coming home from school early. His dad’s health had been declining, and Oliver had braved his darkened room. It was one of the last times he had been with him. Oliver could feel the pressure building behind and under his eyes, as he thought back on that smile on his father’s face and his weak attempts to voice approval. The last time Oliver was here, he did not even need to go down the list.

The boy tightened his hand into a painful fist and then folded the paper in half and pocketed it. Whatever reason his mind was drawing him here; he would fight it. He would face his inner demons and become stronger for it. Oliver’s took a long breath of air, and he pushed himself out of the car to his old family house.

He entered the front hall quietly. He did not want to wake his dad prematurely. The smells of his parents’ house caused the fuzzy edges of the vision to come into focus. As he removed his shoes carefully Oliver noticed something was off. His ears were picking up a loud continuous thumping and whirring of a motor in the basement.

Curious he started slowly down the steps, rather than directing himself to his parents’ room. There should not be anyone else home. The thumping stopped as Oliver came to the last stair.

His dad was not in bed. He was not tied to a machine. He was breathing hard, and he looked lithe, but his whole body had a light tan, and his face and hair were wet. Oliver watched as he chugged a long gulp from a sports bottle. He was clean shaven, like Oliver’s early memories of the man, and wore just a simple white t-shirt. Oliver’s dad did not notice his son enter the family room; his attention was on the television.

“Don’t get up. Cyberchase is coming up next,” Oliver heard from the television as he approached. Whatever shadow of the past his mind was dragging up, it bore no bearing to anything Oliver remembered. He did not even remember this television, which looked like a plasma display, or this bright white couch. Oliver came over the stiff back side and tapped his father on the shoulder.

The man jumped, not expecting another person to be in the house. He scrambled his body up and reached quickly to his side. In a smooth motion a pillow came over on his lap. Oliver was not paying attention as his father’s face was turning a bright red, his eyes were drawn to the treadmill his father had just finished using. The basement was cluttered with furniture Oliver had never seen before, white couches, a darkly painted wooden electronics council, and tall bookcases in the corner.

Oliver turned back to his dad, “I um, need to tell you something.”

Oliver’s dad regained his posture, “I wasn’t watching, just,” he fumbled with the remote to turn off the cartoon. “Why are you here Oliver? Shouldn’t you be in school?”

Oliver started coming around the couch and then found a spot next to his father, “Just a partial day today. Sorry if I worried you. I um, made a decision about where I want to go to school, and” Oliver was not sure why he was nervous. His dad had given him his blessing, he was proud his son knew what he wanted to do with his life, “Dad, I’m going to the Air Force Academy.”

“Like flying planes?”

“I, yes, they have the planes,” Oliver was not sure he needed to tell his dad what he really did. His job was to push the button.

“Oh…” Oliver’s father’s face turned to a frown.

“I, um, yeah, I know what I want to do and where I want to be, and it’ll be great. Got my whole life ahead of me, and it’ll be great.”

“Oliver, I’m not sure. It doesn’t seem like a good fit for you.”

Wait. His dad was supposed to tell him he was proud of him and that he would be happy whatever he did. Oliver fumbled towards his pocket to find the list of talking points. His hand came up empty. He had dropped it when he had gotten down to untie his shoes.

“Oliver, you know your mom is, well, I get we have been keeping this a bit of a secret we didn’t want it to go to your head, but you don’t have to join the military. You can go anywhere you want, and she’ll pay for it. You can even stay here for a few years if you want some more time to find yourself. Maybe go on a trip to Europe or Asia?”

Oliver kept quiet, unsure of how to fight this.

“If you could go anywhere, where would you go Oliver? Anywhere on Earth.”

“The Air Force. I need, I’m supposed to join, and then, I fly the Bee fifty twos. I go to Terra…”

“Oh… that’s what this is about. You want to go off world. Oliver, remember a couple years ago I said I needed to quit my job due to health issues.”

Oliver nodded.

“Well, that was just something mom and I thought would make it easier for family and friends to accept, but really, mom just wants me to stay at home and be happy. Oliver, you can aim higher, I want you to be the best you can be. What about Georgetown, you can join their eye-aRe department, get an internship at State. Whatever you want to do, whatever will make you happy.”

It was tempting, something was wrong though. This was not how it had happened. His dad had been sick, his mom had struggled, and he needed to move on and out. Now he was being offered an alternative, a better past, one where everything he had ever dreamed of was available to him. Oliver looked at his hands confused; everything was out of focus again.

The room darkened to pitch black. There was just the couch and himself. His dad was gone.

“Oliver,” it was a girl’s voice. Oliver turned and saw her sitting on the couch to his right, opposite where his dad had been. The girl in the white dress was of about five years of age and had soft Asian features. Her eyes were big and curious, and green, the hair a soft auburn which was long, a fourth the way down her back. Oliver did not want to say all Asian women looked a like, but her face and chin reminded him of Grace.

“You’re being offered a choice. A chance to go back and live the life you always wanted. To get everything you always desired,” the star child spoke.

“Someone else would push the button,” Oliver tried to justify his decision.

“Someone else would fill your roll, but no one else will do Collin’s job. If you do not join the Air Force, Necessary Evil will crash over Nevada. The bomber does not get through.”

“You don’t… Why am I being shown this?”

“You’re still on the couch. The dimension is fighting you. It’s afraid of you. Space and time are offering you a chance to live in a world where you will have everything you ever want.”

Oliver looked around the void, “Who are you?”

“I can’t go much farther back; I can only reach you here because you’re still anchored to twenty twenty-three. This is a critical moment. If you go down this other path, the time of monsters will come. A hundred thousand worlds will burn.”

It was too much. The fate of the world should not rest on the decision of one person, choosing to act selfishly. Oliver should be allowed to be happy. A man should be allowed to hold petty grudges, to pursue petty desires, even if the fate of billions rested on them.

History had taught him otherwise. History was not shaped by great men doing great things, but by weak men in the right place and time allowed to be themselves at their worst.

Oliver nodded. He knew what he had to do, the colors and sounds of the late winter morning in Iowa returned.

“Dad, I get it. I’m your and mom’s baby, but I’m all grown up now and I need to start making my own decisions, and my own mistakes. If this is wrong, then well, I’ll come crawling back, but please, just let me have this one thing. I need to make it for myself out in the world, find my soul mate, and I know you know it too. I want you to be proud of me, but I want to earn it. I want you to have pride in me for what I do and for becoming the great person you raised up.”

“I don’t want you to go,” Oliver’s dad was struggling to hold his emotions in. Oliver moved in closer and held his arms out, his dad came in for a hug. Oliver could feel the padded cloth stuffed through his father’s workout shorts and could smell the soft hint of powder.

Oliver understood finally. The dimension was trying its hardest to attack him, but it could only do so through its own biases. This was not how he remembered his dad; this was his dad as a baby – a baby brother upset his older brother was going away. Oliver suppressed his anger at the violation of his memories. This is not his dad. This is not his father. He had to let go.

“I know, I know. You don’t want your big son to move away, but you’ll still have mom, and she’ll need you to be a big man for her when I’m gone.”

“But Oliver,” he could not complete his argument. The man could feel a sharp pain down below, his face turned white and pale, “No… no. I need to.”

Oliver’s grip grew tighter, “It’s OK, you are mommy’s baby now. I know you’ll be able to fill in for me. I still love you, but it’s time for me to move on, make my own decisions, and run my own life. Maybe I’ll even find my own mommy.”

Oliver’s father struggled slightly and then relaxed, a soft fart came out his rear. He closed his eyes, and they rolled upwards in his skull as his bowels emptied into his soft bottom. He could feel it lingering in the crack, and he tried to shift slightly to get it out. Oliver’s grip was too tight, his son was stronger and taller than him now. This would be the first time he had done it in front of his son, and his emotions alternated between shock and humiliation. Tears started to come to his eyes.

“Look at the two dorks being dorks,” Oliver thought Grace’s star baby had faded away. That was a rude thing to say. He had decided to embrace his destiny, and she was mocking him. He let go of his father and turned to see the intruder at the staircase. It was not the girl from before. This young lady had short hair that was a mix of gold, red, and yellow.

She was a foot smaller than Oliver and wore a tight-fitting red T-shirt and blue jeans. She had started to form out enough to need a training bra. It had been a while since Oliver had seen one of these, a tween girl. She came up to Oliver and his father, pausing a foot from the couch above them.

“Ewe, I smelly a stinky boy, was it you Oliver?” Her face took devious delight in her discovery.

“No. You can go away now,” Oliver tried. This was starting to get weird. The girl sniffed and then put her hands down on Oliver’s father’s shoulders.

“How sweet, you and dad were having a tender moment,” She held up the paper Oliver had dropped, “Air Force, huh? Well, I’m going to miss you bro.”

Oliver’s eyes narrowed, “Since when have I had a sister?”

Her response became a distant ring of garbled speech, Oliver could see the warping of reality, he could feel the flesh in his mouth. He tried to hang onto the memory, tried to hold onto the world and timeline he could have had, but it warped back into Victoria’s fleshy orb. Oliver pushed off slightly from the breast, the nipple dribbled a few drops of white, and he looked up at Victoria.

“There’s my baby boy again. You keep falling asleep. Why don’t I get you up to your bed?”

“Momma… dahdah,” Oliver’s words were slurred like a drunkard. His trip to the past had exhausted him, and he closed his eyes, leaning into the warm pillows in front of him.

Victoria stripped Oliver of his overalls and carefully folded them on the desk, leaving Oliver with just pull-ups and a green shirt as she tucked him into his bed. The guest room bed dwarfed her boy, and his breathing was small and light. A small dribble of milk escaped his mouth on his oversized pillow. He looked cute enough to eat. She gently kissed his head and turned off the lights, leaving the room illuminated from just soft sunlight that came beyond the shaded windows. This room had been her office a month ago, and Oliver had taken up her entire world.

Benjamin was going to be so happy about Oliver’s progress. Archaeologist! That is just a historian with extra steps. She would take credit; she needed Ben’s cooperation for the rest of her plans. She would do whatever was necessary to keep her baby boy from running away.

Victoria entered the master bedroom and started looking through her drawers, quietly pulling out a lacy bra and panties from her dresser. The garments were black and thin, and from her short time on the honeymoon, she knew exactly what buttons to push with Ben to get him riled up.