Chapter 11 – Piece Eleven – Ghosts in the Dyary
Be careful what you wish for. Wishes occasionally come true. I know. I’ve had several come true.
Lately I’d been wishing I had more interesting things to write about than my current life, of attending Q & A sessions, labs, viewing lectures, researching and writing papers while spending hours studying in the library with only a daily bike ride and several hours each day to eat and hang out with friends.
It seems my wish was granted. I've something more than the commonplace to write about. But it’s something on the quantum edge of where the occult and theoretical physics seem to merge. I hesitate even to set it down since I promised Ali I'd tell no one. But no one will read this, and with no definite ending, it just hangs fire like so many things in life. Fits right into the rambling nature of this work.
A Monday Evening in Mid-November
I caught sight of the time on my watson, past ten and we'd not taken our break. Usually I'm bugging Ali not long after nine. Must be getting the hang of this studying thing.
I texted Ali, 'hot cocoa?'
She was sitting beside me in the next study cube over, but I'd long since learned that if I reached over to tap her on the shoulder she'd start and maybe yelp as well. Texting her was safer.
She didn't look up but held up two fingers.
Good enough. I turned back to my desk's cube enclosure to pack my watson and input-slate in my knapsack and waited for her to finish her work. I pushed my chair back and looked around the college library. Every book in the building was accessible digitally via our watsons, but I had to admit that the physical presence of the rows and rows of books provided a quiet, studious ambience and very few distractions...
We're regulars now, these two study desks are recognized by our fellow regulars as ours. Only the occasional “casual” would dare to take our places on weekday evenings. Using the watson's pico projector, I'd been viewing a recorded extra-curricular mathematics lecture and its associated Q & A session projected on the white wall of my cubical enclosure, listening with my earphones and taking notes and analysing the formulas on my input-slate.
Allie introduced me to a wonderful app called “FormulaFlowLogic”. It takes any mathematical formula and constructs a flow chart graphically detailing each logical step in words and diagrams in the formula. Standard physics formulas are already programmed in, but new factors, variables, constants and such can be described and introduced to its mathematical vocabulary if needed. I've found it a great way to understand the underlying logic behind the maths by plugging each formula I run across into the app and studying the flow chart it generates – each element can be clicked on to expand the explanation and the chart provides a wealth of visual clues as to how the elements worked together. I find this very helpful since it speaks to me as a programmer. Ali said I should just use it as an aid, but I use it as a translator, having no great hope, or truth be told, any great desire to think purely mathematically. These days I use it constantly when I'm reading in my field, inputting each formula as I come across it and find it makes understanding far easier for me. It also means that I don't have to bug Ali for explanations (as much). It doesn't, however, make you mathematically articulate, and seeing that mathematics is the language of physics, it is still a crutch that I will have to fling off, sooner or later. Maybe.
Ali packed her gear and we headed out of the library into the cool, black autumn night. She seemed even more preoccupied than usual, so I just tagged along silently. I thought we were going to the Old Kitchen Bar for our usual cup of hot cocoa, but instead I found myself following her to the steps of a familiar staircase.
‘Are you forgetting I’m here?’ I asked her.
She turned to me ‘No. I want...’ almost inaudibly and then trailing off into silence. She stood indecisively at the steps. Very much, unlike her.
I waited, watching her in the dim light with growing apprehension. ‘Is everything okay?’
She shook her head ‘no’, but said, ‘I don’t know. I want to show you something. This is just between you and me. No one else must know...’
‘Of course, anything I can do...’
‘Oh, just come up and I’m make hot cocoa. It’s nothing important, really...’
We went up the stairs to her room. She unlocked the door and turned on a light. I followed her into her familiar college quarters. She absently took off her coat and made a vague gesture that I was to make myself at home. I swung my knapsack into the corner by the door, unbuttoned my jacket and settling on the arm of the chair, watched her go about the process of making hot cocoa, filling the electric kettle from the bathroom faucet, selecting two mugs from the top of the bookshelf and measuring the cocoa mix from the canister into each. For all the attention she paid me, it seemed that she’d completely forgotten me, save the two mugs. I didn’t know what to make of this, or of her. Ali, despite her rather woolly abstracted air, is usually the most level-headed person I know. She seemed quite distracted.
As the water heated in the electric kettle she turned to me. ‘This is just between us.’
‘Yes, you told me that already.’
‘I want your promise, Giz. Everyone thinks I’m strange as it is. I don’t want this bandied about...’
‘Everybody doesn’t think you’re strange, Ali. All of us reading physics know you’re the most brilliant scholar in our class and all our friends like and accept you – I’ve never heard a catty word about you. And you can trust me, I owe you so much.’
She gave me as sharp a glance as she could through her thick glasses and snapped, ‘I want your word. And don’t think I didn’t catch that ‘everybody doesn’t’ hedge either. Promise to say nothing about what I'm about to show you. Not to anyone. Not to Omar or Foggy. Do you understand? No one.’
‘I promise. My lips are sealed,’ I said throwing up my arms. 'So what is it?'
She gave me another hard look and turned away to watch the kettle on the bookshelf.
Well, talk is cheap, and I could tell she was really upset, so I stood up, stepped behind her and wrapped my arms around her, pulling her close.
‘I don’t know what’s wrong, Ali,’ I said quietly. ‘But you can count on me to do everything I can to help.’
She said nothing, but neither did she start or struggle to get away, so I just held her.
After a while, she said quietly, ‘Sorry about the drama. Either I’m losing my mind, seeing things or I’ve come across something very strange. In any case, I don’t want it bandied about. I realize people already see me as a strange bird, but at least they take my work seriously. The last thing I need is for it to get about that I’m some sort of kook who sees ghosts...’
‘Oh’ I breathed out and held her tighter. I’ll admit there’s a wee vein of superstition running through me. Blame it on my Irish ancestors. Her mention of seeing ghosts should have brought out a relieved ‘Ha!’ instead of that ‘Oh.’
‘Oh, Giz, don’t get so freaked.’
‘I’m not,’ I lied.
‘Besides, I didn’t actually see the ghosts. They just appeared in my dyary record. I’ll show you as soon as the water comes to a boil.’
I took a breath to relax. ‘Well, that I can deal with, I think. But I have to remind you that a watched kettle never boils.’
‘Fine. Let me go and I’ll set up my watson,’ she said and I let her go.
The water came to boil as she was setting up her watson to project on the wall so I filled the mugs and brought them over to the small sofa next to the coffee table she had the watson resting on. I sat down beside her and handed her a mug.
‘Oh! Thanks, Giz. Well, here's what's driving me crazy,' she said after taking a sip of the steaming cocoa. 'Last night I was reviewing some of my dyary videos from this past summer. I was checking out scenes from my walks in Galloway which I’d bookmarked with the idea that I might use the scenes for some watercolours,’ she began. ‘In one of the bookmarked sections I cam
e across a recording with two people walking towards me. Two people I'm absolutely certain were never there.
'I remember that day and would have remembered them if I'd seen them. And according to my dyary recordings, I couldn't have missed seeing them. And then, the strangest thing of all is that they disappeared into thin air right in the middle of the recording... It seems I'm either not seeing things I should see, or seeing things that I shouldn't. So I want you to tell me what you see...
‘I’ve queued up the recording to a point just before the people should appear. At this point in my walk I’m just taking in the scenery with the idea of using it for my paintings...’ She touched the slate and a rural scene sprang to life on the opposite wall.
She was on a single lane road looking downhill to a bend that took the road out of sight behind the line of a hedge and trees. On her right, was a ragged hedge and fence line, beyond which lay fields falling to a loch at the foot of a tumble of purple hills in the distance. She was panning around the scenery, moving her head slowly to take in the complete scene, occasionally framing a vista with her hands like a film director. Her view drifted to the road in front of her and she paused the dyary.
‘Do you see them Giz? There, down the hill, just coming around the bend in the road,’ she stopped the recording and pointed. 'Two people. A couple.'
‘Yes, of course I see them. Plain as day.’ They were small in the distance, but clearly a couple walking along the road, perhaps a hundred metres away.
Ali, next to me, sighed and slumped a little.
‘You alright?’
‘Yes. I’m just grand. Well, at least I’m not totally off my trolley and seeing things in the dyary that aren't there.’
'Now watch,' she said and started the recording again and I watched as the couple, in animated conversation, walked up the lane towards Ali. She, clearly unaware of the couple, was still considering the scene, slowly looking this way and that, so that the couple slipped in and out of the video frame as she moved her head around. At no point did she appear to focus on the couple, which, given the apparent isolation of the road, seemed odd.
‘Didn’t you see them walking towards you?’
‘I have no recollection of them at all. And yet how could I have not seen them? They're as plain as day in the dyary recording.’
She froze the recording when the couple was less than twenty metres away. ‘Now look closely at them, Giz.’
The couple appeared to be about our age, the man tall and having a fair amount of whiskers – the woman was softly pretty. They were dressed very peculiarly. Overdressed. The woman in an ankle length dress, jacket and hat, the man in a tweedy suit and hat. Styles of dress come and go and come again and not everyone conforms, so that while the pair had the air of people out of a history book, they could almost have been, well almost, contemporary but very eccentric dressers. But really, they looked like costumed characters out of a period movie. As for the image, well, their colours seemed a bit faded or washed out or perhaps just dull, somehow off slightly but it’d be hard to notice this at a glance. Frozen in place they seemed subtly wrong.
‘Weird. They look out of place...’
‘Out of time, more likely. They’re dressed in Victorian era walking outfits. Now watch...’
She restarted the recording. The pair unfroze and resumed their walk and conversation as they slowly drifted to the left of the frame as Ali moved her head. We were looking at the countryside again, and then the image swung once again to the left, to the side of the road, the couple was almost abreast of Ali on the other side of the narrow lane. And then they simply faded away. They were gone before the dyary frame swept away from them. Ali kept the scene running, she seemed to have been staring at the spot where the couple vanished and back down the lane, but there was no sight of them. Then the view swept around again as Ali looked behind her, up the empty road showing a glimpse of a whitewashed cottage behind the hedge, but no couple. She looked back and we were looking down the empty road again. Ali reached over to the watson and stopped the recording.
'Did you see how the couple on the lane that just seemed to vanish?' she asked softly.
'Yes,' I said.
'As far as I know, I never saw them. I certainly never saw them vanish into thin air. And yet, here they are on my dyary recording. What did we just see, Giz? You’re the expert on dyaries. What’s going on here?’
‘I haven’t a clue.’
'But you did see them, the couple in the funny clothes?' she asked earnestly, pale and worn. ‘You’re not just humouring me?'
'Yes, of course, as plain as day,' I assured her. 'But I can't explain what happened.'
‘Could my dyary have picked up part of some sort of historical drama being broadcast on the telly? Something playing in the cottage – wirelessly – and mixed it in with my recording?'
'Never heard of that happening. And I can't begin to imagine how any stray recording could fit so seamlessly into the scene you were recording.'
'Could the people be relics or artefacts from a file on my watson that wasn’t completely erased before being overwritten by my dyary. Work with me, Giz. Give me a technological explanation which I can live with. I’m not all that tech savvy, so just come up with something plausible so I can sleep tonight,’ she said earnestly.
‘You and me both. Let me see your watson, Ali,’ I said.
I first went over the metadata of the file to see if it had been somehow altered. Any sort of alteration would automatically create a second copy of the file to preserve the authenticity of the original dyary recording, but we were viewing the unaltered original.
With the watson on my lap we went over the clip, zooming in on the couple, slowing it down to a crawl – over and over – looking for some clue as to what was going on in the dyary recording.
‘They seem solid, and yet...' I muttered. 'sometimes there seems a hint of the background through them... Can you say if the light is striking them correctly...? Yes, I know it was rather overcast, but still, are the shadows right? You’re an artist, you should know...'
'Look, you can see that some of the background sometimes doesn't quite match,' Ali said, stopping the recording. 'Here and here, it sort of fades in and out of the real one.'
It was hard to tell, since the landscape hadn't changed much, it was mostly different in colours, though the trees and bushes were not the same, but because they faded in and out it was hard to see their shape as distinct from the present day.
We went back over the clip for an hour. In the end, we decided that we were looking through some sort of window – though its edges were not sharp or constant, they seemed to fade into a mixture of old and new changing, almost like a curtain, blowing in the breeze.
'Did the dyary pick up any of their conversation?' I asked. Dyaries automatically dampen wind noise, so that the recording was all but silent. 'Have you cranked up the volume to see if it picked up anything?'
Ali shook her head no, so we cranked up the sound to the max, but only picked up the muffled distortion of the wind and Ali's breathing, with the occasional call of a bird.
'Their image only,' I said. 'Have you looked through the whole day's file? Find anything else out of the ordinary?’
Ali shook her head. 'I stopped and viewed a few bookmarked spots, but otherwise just skipped ahead. I suppose I should go through the whole day, but that takes time, even at double or quad speed... And well, I'm not sure I'm ready to do that, yet.'
'Yah. I was just curious if this was confined to this specific time and location, or whether it was a more wide-ranging phenomena, something to do with the weather or something...' Lord knows what.
'I, well I don't really want to spend a great deal of time on this now, I need to be studying...' she said, not quite meeting my gaze. She was clearly too close to this to be looking on it merely as an interesting problem. In time, I'm sure, she'd come around to seeing it as such, but there seemed no need to be in a hurry.
I sighed, p
ushed my glasses up and rubbed my eyes. ‘Well, all that can wait. I don't think it would make a difference anyway, since I doubt more data would lead us to a rational explanation for this phenomena. Indeed, the most rational explanation is that someone somehow altered the file. But who'd have had access to your watson? And why? And even if we ignore those two big questions, I'd have to say that inserting the figures and background consistent with the countryside into that dyary record in such a way that they consistently appear to be realistically “in place” even as you were moving your head about would be a very demanding video editing feat. And adding in the fact that the file’s security tags shows we're viewing the original, unmodified version, I don’t see how it could've been done by anyone who wasn't very technically adept. And then there's the Why?
'In short, I don’t think there is, well, a simple Newtonian explanation. It's some sort of quantum event, Ali. Sorry...’
She just shrugged. 'Great.'
‘I’ll tell you what I'll do. If I can make a copy of that section, I’ll go over it tomorrow and see if I can discover something we’ve missed. But you shouldn't hold out much hope. We’ll just have to put it down to experimental error, I guess,’ I said, trying to sound more casual than I was feeling.
‘Thanks Giz. I didn’t really think there was going to be an easy, satisfactory explanation. I just wanted to know I was still sane. But you can see why I don’t want this getting out. I want to be a physicist, not a paranormal investigator.’
‘Technically you didn’t actually see the ghosts – your dyary did. But mum’s the word. I don’t need that reputation either. I guess it’s too late for more studying, so I'd best be on my way,’ I said.
I gathered my gear and headed for the door. As I opened it, I remembered that it was night out and that I had to walk to my bike and then ride home in the dark. And I suppose I hesitated.
‘Do you want me to walk out with you to your bike, Giz?’ Ali said from behind me.
I considered her offer. ‘Oh, I’ll be fine, but would you feel safer if I spent the night here with you?’
She gave me a shove in the back and shut the door behind me.
I made it home safely.
Tuesday Evening
Ali was sitting on the library steps waiting for me as I wheeled my bike up to the rack. She watched me approach with as much intensity as her thick glasses would let out.
‘Evening Ali,’ I said as I got close.
‘Good evening, Giz,’ she replied though her entire manner asked, ‘Well?’
‘I've an idea. Do you want to wait until our break, or hear it now?’
‘Let’s find a place to talk,’ she replied, climbing to her feet.
‘Here’s the deal. I went over that file every which way I could think of and I just can’t for the life of me see how the dyary recorded those people. I did the internet search on ghosts caught by CCTVs, as I’m sure you did too...’
She nodded. ‘For all the good it did.’
‘Right. We’re not dealing with strange lights and such. If these people did not strike you as queerly dressed or completely out of place, if you didn’t actually see these people vanish into thin air, you’d never know that you were looking at something inexplicable.
‘It occurred to me that I’ll be seeing my boss, Brad McCullum, one of the owners of Surveillance Security Consultants Thursday afternoon to conduct a design and estimating interview with me at a facility of a potential client here in Oxford. He wants to show me how to do it on my own. McCullum has been in the business of security and surveillance for over thirty years and has doubtlessly spent days and days going through CCTV records over the years. If there's such a thing as people showing up on surveillance records that shouldn’t be there, he’s as likely to have run across them or at least heard of it happening as anyone you could find.
‘I’d like to show him your dyary record. I can keep your name out of it and swear him to secrecy. I'm certain we can trust him. Keeping secrets is what his business is all about. I don’t know if he’d be able to tell us what's going on, but I think he may be able to give us an idea if this sort of thing happens, or if it's a one-off occurrence. I don’t know about you, but I’d feel more comfortable knowing this sort of thing was a known mystery rather than a completely unknown one,' I said earnestly.
'What do you think? It’s your decision. How bad do you want to know? Right now our only option is to try to forget it just as soon as we can... Speaking of which, do you want to drop in at the Old Kitchen Bar and begin that process?’
‘We’ve work to do tonight,’ she said automatically, absently, as she considered my other request. Then with a shrug, ‘Show it to your boss. Really, what have we to lose? Just keep my name out of it.’
‘I understand. But, I don’t think you have to worry about that. It struck me this morning that what makes your clip weird is that it comes unaltered from your dyary. Really, anyone with a little video editing expertise and actors dressed for the part could put together a clip like that. It's inserting it into your watson's dyary record and making it look like an authentic, unaltered recording that makes it weird. That's what we have to worry about – that people will think you did it.'
'But I didn't...'
‘Of course, Ali. But someone who doesn't know you might believe the record is a simple hoax. The real threat to your reputation would not be that you're seeing ghosts, but pretending to see them...’
She gave me a startled look. ‘I never considered that. Oh, Giz, you’re right! That would be terrible! You know I didn’t do that? You believe me, don’t you?”
‘Of course I do, Ali. You don't seek attention or notoriety. Plus, I doubt you’ve the skills to do the video editing, and faking the security tags. I’m convinced I’m seeing an authentic dyary recording. Believe me, I wouldn't offer to show it to my boss if I'd any doubts as to its authenticity. But if word did get around outside our circle of friends, it could prove very damaging to both of our reputations – if only because some might suspect I've the technical skills needed to fake the dyary metadata, which I don't, by the way, but that would suggest the possibility of a hoax.’
‘Maybe it’s best just to let it go – I’ll erase it and be done with it.’
‘I'm curious as to what he'll say, and I'm certain we can trust him. I’ll only show him the clip and testify to its authenticity. As far as destroying it, well, it’s your clip and your call. I’ll only say that as a scientist, I’d like to push the investigation just a little further. Then, after we, or I, if you'd rather not be involved, hear what McCullum has to say, you can decide what to do with it.’
‘As scientist... oh well, I guess I need to be as brave as any other scientist in pursuing the truth, so go ahead and show your Mr McCullum the clip. Let’s see what he has to say.’
Wednesday Evening
I met Ali as usual on the library steps.
'Well?'
'Good evening to you too,' I replied.
'Did you talk to him? What did he say?' she asked, glaring at me, as best she could through her thick glasses.
'Mr McCullum said that, assuming it's not fake, and I assured him it wasn't, it was a phenomenon that is extremely rare, but not unheard of...'
'What's its source, its cause?'
'Give me a minute, Ali,' I pleaded. 'He said that he's seen some twenty-three examples of the appearance of something, usually a figure or figures, but not always, in a surveillance record that defies any explanation. He has come across two examples on his own and has seen the others that his friends in the security, police and special branches have collected and shown to him. Apparently there's a small informal group that shares these videos strictly amongst themselves, since, like you, they're concerned that being associated with anything that can be considered the occult and could damage their reputations in their fields. He'd be able to share his two examples, but not the others for this reason, unless you wanted to join their little society.
'He sugg
ested that I invite you along for supper after our meeting tomorrow afternoon and we could discuss your dyary ghosts over the meal,' I continued. 'He said to tell you that there's no strings attached, you'd not even have to tell him your name. He'd be happy to discuss what theories there are to explain them and would be able to show you his examples, which might make you feel more comfortable. And if you wanted, you could join their little group, a scientist is always welcomed and as I said, they don't make their discoveries public, so you needn't fear about that, they all fear it...'
I paused as she considered her options.
'I've known Mr McCullum for five years now, and I believe we can trust him to keep his word. I can talk with him and relay the information to you, so you needn't appear at all, if you choose. But I think you can meet with him without any concern.'
'Oh, alright. I suppose I need to know more. I shouldn't be afraid of the unknown, should I?'
'Great. I'm sure you'll feel much better afterwards, Brad's a good guy and it sounds like the other people are very respectable people, too, so I'm sure you're risking nothing. And well, I want to find out what's going on myself...'
Early evening, Thursday
'I'm very glad you decided to join us, Miss Chambers,' said McCullum as I introduced them outside the Chinese restaurant on the Broad we'd chosen. 'I assure you our conversations will be strictly between the three of us unless you decide otherwise. All of us try to avoid the limelight for the same reasons – we've careers and reputations to protect.'
'I'd appreciate that,' said Ali.
'I'm also very glad you decided to let me have a look at your dyary record. It's always an eerie delight to see another sample of what we in the trade refer to as enigmatic recorded events, or ERE's. I only wish I could promise you an explanation, but at best I can only offer some theories... But let's go on in and order. We can talk over supper.'
Brad McCullum is a large, easy to talk to fellow who started out in the police force and then decided to get into the security surveillance business, or rather the anti-surveillance business. Being a good salesperson, he quickly put Ali at ease with his small talk and stories while we waited for our meal. We were early and the restaurant was mostly empty, so we had a table where we could talk without being overheard.
'You realize that though we live in a very surveillance orientated society the vast majority of these records are never actually viewed. It's only when a particular incident of interest, criminal, security, or commercial occurs that they end up being viewed. Plus, many of those searches are automated, using computers to search for programmed faces and or actions. So we really don't know how often EREs appear in the surveillance records,' McCullum began, after we were served.
'Most, but not all the people in our little ERE club are the people who actually search surveillance records for very specific things as part of their job. There are half a dozen police inspectors, some people whose exact position in HM government is not publicly defined, and some private security people like myself. But we also have several scientist friends who are, for one reason or another, curious about the phenomena. I believe you'd be familiar with one of them. So if you should decide to join our group, you'd not find yourself alone. That's entirely up to you. This meeting may be all you need to answer at least some of your questions.'
'Thank you,' said Ali. 'I really don't know what to think or what to do. It's entirely out of my sphere of experiences and of expertise, so I'm at a complete loss.'
'I understand. I'll briefly outline what I know about the phenomena. Feel free to interrupt me for any clarifications or questions.'
Ali nodded. 'Please, I am curious as to how my dyary could see two people, I've no memory of seeing.'
McCullum took a sip of his tea and leaned forward, 'First of all, I've seen only twenty-three such EREs' not counting yours, from over a dozen different people who spent years going over surveillance footage. So you can see authentic EREs are quite rare. Or more precisely, they are very rarely identified. EREs may well be a daily occurrence, but because so little of the footage is ever viewed, we can't say how often it happens. And even when viewed, an ERE would likely go unnoticed unless the viewer is familiar enough with the locale to know when something is not right.
'Who's to say how many photo or videos people take every day and have, on later viewing seen something or someone that the photographer doesn't remember being in the scene? Unless the ERE is too out of place, most people will just scratch their heads and move on. Someday, once people go back and look at their old dyary recordings, these unexplained events may become common enough, if EREs are actually pervasive, to become a widely known phenomena. But until then, we're keeping our heads down,' he added with a laugh.
'Now, take for example, bank lobby footage I'm going to show you. It's only the fact that in the ERE event, the man in question is dressed like he doesn't belong, which calls our attention to him. If he wasn't dressed so out of place, I may have never noticed him at all. So you see, only the most extraordinary EREs are likely noticed and identified as such. It's possible, EREs happen every day and are viewed by everyone, but because they fall within the normal range of expectations, they aren't noticed.'
'But that's all speculation, let me show you my little gem of an ERE that is similar to yours,' he said, pulling out his watson. He cued up the clip and handed it across the table to Ali. I pulled my chair around to watch as well.
'This was taken from a CCTV looking down on a London bank lobby, one of the old bank buildings. Once you press play, in about five seconds a gentleman will appear on the right side of the screen. You'll recognize him by his clothes, and I'll say no more until after you've seen the clip.'
I leaned closer to Ali and watched as she started the clip. It showed a lobby viewed from above with four lines of people standing, waiting before the teller windows, their backs to us. Then, as McCullum said, a man in a tall top hat and a black suit cut in a fashion of a hundred years ago or more, hurries into the frame. He stops and looks around. A contemporary person passes close by him as he lifts his hat and runs his fingers through his pale hair, before continuing on his way. The line on the left hand side of the frame was longer than the others, so that the top hatted man, appears to walk right into the woman at the end of the line. And then, having walked through her, he quickly fades away. The clip ended. We looked across to McCullum.
'Go ahead, rewind it and play it in slow motion as many times as you like,' he said. 'Note that our gentleman in question appears to be solid on the footage. And as in your recording Ali, his colour is somewhat more muted and perhaps off a bit. Notice, too, how close the man who walks by him is to him as he stands there. Unless that man's a pickpocket, he would have violated the personal space of our top hatted gentleman, assuming he'd actually seen him standing there. And. of course, most curious of all, note that when he seems to pass right through the lady at the end of the line, she seems not to react, to flinch or shiver...'
As we watched it again, McCullum added, 'I noticed in viewing your record Ali, that from the movement of your head, it almost seemed as if you were searching for something when the couple was next to you. Previously, you were looking about the countryside, but as they neared you and then faded away, you seemed to be searching the road for something. Do you recall anything like that?'
'I've no recollection of doing that or thinking anything amiss,' said Ali. 'But, yes, from the recording it did seem that way since my dyary camera was in my glasses and followed my head movement.'
'Right. Well now that you've seen my clip, and how close it is to your experience, why don't you tell me your story, Ali. I'm very curious to know if you recall feeling anything at the time. I've never had a chance to talk to anyone who was actually present when the ERE event occurred. It's always been remote cameras.'
She shook her head, ‘I'm going to disappoint you, I'm afraid. I've gone over that day, that walk, a hundred times in my mind, but I can't find any distinct memory of it, beyo
nd knowing I did it. It was, after all, several months ago now, and nothing seemed to strike me – either then or now – strange enough to remember. I am rather preoccupied at times...'
I laughed. 'All the time...'
'Well just tell me about the day anyway. Maybe we can dislodge a memory by talking out loud about it,' McCullum said.
Ali told her story and McCullum asked several questions, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary, so he continued, ‘No matter, just curious. I'll show you my second clip, hit the next button. It's not as dramatic, though in a way even more strange. It's taken outside a loading dock in Glasgow just as the skies are beginning to lighten on a misty summer's morning. Look at the buildings beyond the yard gate and street as the first light touches them,' he said, adding. 'Just watch for a while and take in the architecture, and then, around the thirty second point, you'll have to decide if that was that a horse drawn dray which passes in front of our alleyway. It seems like it, but with the mist and the quality of the recording, it's hard to say for certain. And it's also not completely impossible that it was a present day horse drawn dray... But then, look again at the buildings. These are the buildings across the street as they stand today, but are they the ones we saw in first light?'
We watched the clip again, there were two lorries parked beneath the camera that pointed outwards to a gate and a high brick wall. The gate was closed, but we could see over it to the buildings that lined the street beyond. The light was dim and coming from behind, so that the yard was in deep shadow. The mist softened the image of the buildings beyond the wall, but as the gathering light touched them you could make out their shape and window patterns, a ragged row of buildings perhaps four stories high. At the thirty second mark, a shadowed form appeared from behind the wall at the left and crossed the space where the lower gates allowed a glimpse of the road beyond. It was a fairly murky shape, still in shadow, and half hidden behind the gates, but it did appear to be the top of a horse pulling an open dray with a driver sitting high on the seat forward. The mist seemed to thicken after that, and when it brightened, the buildings beyond the wall were noticeably taller, more uniform, and definitely far more modern.
'Have you ever gone back to past recordings or ahead to see if these EREs reoccur?' I asked. 'Might they not occur in some sort of pattern?'
McCullum laughed. 'A good point, Hugh. And one we've discussed. The problem is twofold – we don't have the time or resources needed to devote to monitoring a locale for a repeat ERE. It could be years or decades between appearances. Essentially, we're little more than curiosity collectors. And secondly, we often don't own the records or equipment – we just come across them when we're called in to find something else. But it is a good idea... Someday maybe we'll have an opportunity to do it.'
'I'm sure Ali could show you the spot where her ERE occurred. Since she was in the road at the time, you'd have to put a camera in the hedge somewhere, but still... with software tailored to pick out a repeat event...' I suggested.
'A possibility, but we're not even certain that the ERE could be recorded from any other than the original viewpoint – it might well be a very narrow window or opening...' he replied. 'We simply don't know.'
'So how do you explain them?' asked Ali. 'You must have come up with many ideas...'
He leaned back. 'Oh, we've many ideas, but not one we all agree on, if only because we are dealing with such a small sample, and a variety of phenomena that a single one doesn't seem to exactly fit every ERE. The one I go with involves parallel worlds or multiverses, as they're called now. I'm sure that if I start talking about multiverses, I'll be hauling coal to Newcastle with you folk, so I won't go into details, though it is, as I understand it, a contentious topic in your community as well.'
'Aye,' I admitted. 'I haven't give the various theories much credence, but after seeing these, well, I'm rather open to some sort of explanation along those lines.'
'Well briefly – you can fill in the details from your own far greater understanding of multiverses – the idea is multiverses arise out of options. A nearly infinite number of options creates a nearly infinite number of multiverses, and that the further away in whatever direction or dimension you go, the less these multiverses have in common from your starting point because of the accumulating number of options that are different from the starting point. The theory that our physicist uses for his suggestions, postulates that multiverses arising out of each other share common attributes – one tiny change might create a new multiverse, but it would still share most of the other attributes of the one that it arose from. However, with each of these micro steps, the universes diverge and become less and less similar, sharing less and less attributes from the starting point.
'Now, if you take into account quantum randomness, then you might be able to imagine that the gradient between these receding multiverses need not be completely uniform. There could be, well, flaws in the succession of these multiverses, which might cause parts of the more remote and otherwise unavailable multiverses to partially be detectable. It is these flaws, these bright spots in what would otherwise be invisible multiverses that the sensors in our digital cameras are detecting.
'They seem to be seeing, with their sensors and perhaps processing chips, a spot of a multiverse that either our human eye can't detect, or that the inner working of our brains beneath a conscious level, edit out as a matter of routine to make sense of what our eyes see.
'Now, because we're dealing with billions of years’ worth of multiverses, small variances in time might cause some of these quantum flaws to have a noticeable temporal difference, which might explain the time-slip aspect seen in some of the EREs we have identified,' he paused and looked around the table.
'In short, the theory is that we actually overlap billions of these multiverses without noticing it. When we do occasionally notice one of these flaws, one of these bright spots, we might experience a rare sense of deja vu and nothing more. It's only when a camera image sensor or microchip picks up data from one of these quantum flaws that an image from an otherwise out of range multiverse becomes viewable, and because it is something so out of tune from the normal range of overlapping multiverses, that we notice it and register it as an ERE.
'Now, I'm certain you know far more about these things than I do, and I can assure you that my scientific friend who offers this theory can just as easily punch holes in it as well. But, until a better explanation comes along, one that does not involve even more unknown unknowns, that's pretty much the theory I go with. There are, of course, other theories floating about too...' McCullum said and went on to outline several more.
Well, I suppose I'd best just say that between time loops, worm holes and the like, there are plenty of opportunities for a science fiction writer to come up with an explanation for the people in Ali's dyary record, but if you want answers, you are going to be disappointed. As I said at the beginning, I've no satisfactory end to this piece.
As for Ali, she took some comfort in the fact that her experience was not unique, save that she actually was present when the EREs were recorded by her dyary. The fact that she recalls nothing out of the ordinary is, in its self, a little piece of the puzzle that Brad McCullum and his friends did not have before. Ali decided not to join the club right now, though she did give McCullum permission to share her dyary record with the other members anonymously and allowed him to go over the original recording on her watson so that he could verify that it was not modified in anyway – a requirement of the group to keep their collection above reproach.
'If you should change your mind about joining our little group, be sure and let me know. You'd be welcomed,' said McCullum as we parted.
'Thank you. I'll not rule it out, but my studies require nearly all my attention at present. Perhaps in the future...' replied Ali.
'Well, good night then, and thanks again for your clip. It will be, I'm sure, very much appreciated and studied. If we have any questions, I'll get in touch with Hugh, s
o that you needn't fear being drawn in.'
'Thank you for all your information and for helping me come to terms with, well, this rather strange event in my life. I do feel much better knowing, well, that people take what I discovered seriously...'
'What do you think? Have you seen a multiverse?' I asked as we walked towards the library.
'I don't know. Multiverses are fine and useful for mathematical calculations to get things to come out the way you want, but I'm not certain I like them real – real enough to see. But then, Giz, you're not into string theory and multiverses. Has this changed your mind?'
'No, not at all. Oh, I think we're dealing with a flaw, but I think the flaw's in the code, in the script that describes the universe. That's why I was wondering if the EREs repeated. You'd think it might just be looping around... But what do I know?' I replied. My grand theory is little more than a gut feeling. There are dozens of them to pick and choose from. I was only beginning to pick and choose, and design my own, however unwelcomed another one would be... 'anyway, I hope you're feeling a little more comfortable.'
'Yes, much more so. Just talking about it, making it a part of everyday conversation helped a lot. However, Giz Gallagher, I never want you to even mention it again. I'm serious about this, if you want to continue to be my friend, you'll never say a word, never hint to anyone – got that – anyone about this. Am I making myself clear?'
I glanced aside. Ali B Chambers was not her usual vague self. She was watching me with a level of intensity that she kept well hidden. 'I shall never intentionally say anything about it again unless you bring it up,' I said trying to buy me some margin of error.
'If you ever say anything, intentionally or unintentionally, I will never forgive you. I advise you to begin erasing it from your memory starting now,' she replied.
I almost believe her. I'm certainly going to operate on that assumption, anyway.
'Right. What were we talking about?' I replied, and to change the subject asked, ‘Are we going to study tonight?'
'Of course we are. Why, it's not even 8:00 yet,' she replied.
'Right,' I sighed. The world spins on, the planets follow their orbits, and the multiverse, well, who knows? And we study week nights until sometime after 11.00 pm.
Chapter 12 – Piece 12 – December