Peter and I were standing in front of a large brick building located on the outskirts of a medium sized city, Chinda and Roger were back in the City of Magic. I looked at the small nondescript sign next to the large glass entrance doors.
New Jersey Institute of Science.
I grabbed the door handle and pulled, we were soon walking through beautifully decorated halls with floors of amber colored hardwood.
Everywhere I looked I saw beautiful desks placed in semi-private offices, the decor was a mix of very old and very modern. Here a seventeenth century painting, there an ultra modern flat screen monitor showing a promotional video.
Everyone was either dressed and groomed impeccably or wore ill-fitting clothes and had bizarre haircuts.
I suspected the badly dressed people were the academics.
We were soon standing in front of a door to what looked like a small amphitheater. There were about thirty seats, there was a large wooden lectern on the small stage behind which was a large curving flat screen display about fifteen feet wide attached to the wall.
Someone had rolled in a small portable whiteboard in front of the large display, there were strange looking symbols and equations written on it.
I saw Widdle behind the lectern, he was holding onto it the way a foot soldier clutches his shield. There was a large lantern jawed man in front of the lectern arguing with him.
"This stuff is horseshit," the lantern jawed man said pointing to the whiteboard.
"How would you know? You're not a physicist Morgan... as far as I can tell you can't even read."
"Funny stuff Brian."
The lantern jawed man made a vaguely threatening move toward Widde causing him to flinch slightly. Then he laughed derisively turned and started walking away.
"You can't fool everybody with this shit Widdle... at some point you're gonna need results... what are the little twine thingy's made of huh... hemp?"
"Ya... well... that book you wrote Morgan... you shoulda called it moronic science... ya... moronic."
Morgan rolled his eyes as he walked, when he passed me his gaze jerked suddenly and he stared directly at my face, I saw a small flicker of surprise in his eyes as if he recognized me somehow.
"Who are you two," Widdle said when he noticed us.
"Peter Plotski... this is my wife Kem," Peter said.
"Who was that," I asked as I pointed behind me with my thumb.
"Just a hack... stupid journalist works for some rag... Nurture Magazine," Widdle said dismissively.
"Isn't Nurture... like... one of the most pre-eminent science journals," I asked.
"Not since they hired that asshole... look what do you two want, I'm a busy man," he said, not even looking up, he was flipping though a large red notebook.
I surreptitiously walked over to the lectern and peeked into his notebook. Widdle's head snapped up when he felt my presence and he slammed the notebook shut.
"What the hell..." he said angrily.
"You couldn't decide could you... I had an apprentice like you... she still has the same worn out old spell book," I said.
"What... what are you talking about..." Widdle's face had gone as white as a sheet.
"How to do your magic."
"Magic... what... that's... um... prepos... who are you?" Widdle said, panic in his voice.
I saw him start to reach into his pocket slowly, no doubt he had some sort of magical weapon in it for emergencies.
"Don't you recognize me... there is a statue of me at the City of Magic."
Widdle's face had a brief expression of confusion, then a small epiphany appeared.
"Kem-amun-it," he said in badly accented ancient Egyptian, "you look different though... you're from another reality I'll bet, someone brought you from the past."
"Actually the other Kem was from the different reality, and it's Amon... not Amun... no matter, we have much to discuss, there is a place we can speak privately."