originally published in Black Sheep: Unique Tales of Terror and Wonder No. 7
1
The steel hatch opened and Leonard stepped out of the cylinder and into the bright white nothingness, then immediately tripped over a leather satchel and face-planted. His glasses skidded across the clean, white floor. A sweet-smelling mist wafted around as he laid there, causing him to cough and rub his eyes.
“17!” said a male voice, through the mist. Leonard grabbed his glasses and got up quickly, waving his hand around to break up some of the mist, then sneezed twice. Loudly.
“Bless you!” said another male voice, a bit older sounding. Leonard rubbed his nose with his arm, blinked twice, then looked around. The lights were blindingly bright, yet he couldn’t quite see where they were coming from. There were no lights overhead that he could see, nor any mounted on the walls. Light even seemed to come directly up from the floor, somehow.
He rested his hand on his hip and ran his other hand through his dark, unkempt hair. He was confused. “Excuse me?” he said, looking around, trying to get his bearings as the mist dissipated. He glanced behind him and could see the cylinder: a large, bronze, pneumatic tube-style one roughly two meters tall and maybe one and a half meter wide, poking out from the mist. It was the kind you’d see in pictures of old banks and mailrooms, just preposterously oversized. It was still stuck in the ground, leaning back at roughly a sixty degree angle just like in the lab, with no visible means of support or anchoring to the floor.
The hatch closed automatically, somehow. He heard motion all around him and could hear hushed murmurings. Leonard took off his glasses and attempted to clean the lenses on his sleeve. He was not successful.
“You’re 17.” said the voice.
“Use your pen!” said another.
“What?” said Leonard, adjusting his tie.
“The pen. The one in your shirt pocket. It’s running out of ink but will still work for now.” said yet another voice.
Leonard absentmindedly reached over and felt his left shirt pocket. There was, indeed, a pen in there. He remembered he had stuck it in there earlier, when he put down the clipboard, before stepping into the cylinder. He took the pen out and looked at it. It was blue, and said Department of Biochemical Engineering on one side and Pan-Eurasian Technological Institute on the other.
“17!” said the first voice. “Write ‘17’ on your shirt!”
“What?” said Leonard to the bright nothingness. “Um …no. Why would I do that? This is a good dress shirt. I don’t know if ballpoint pen will come out. I mean, I suppose I could maybe dry clean it…”
“It’ll be fine,” said the older voice, cutting him off.
“It’s not like it’s a Sharpie or something. Just do it.” said another. That one sounded a bit irritated, he thought. Murmurs and mutterings about Sharpies being permanent erupted from several voices, then died down.
“It’s just ballpoint.” said another.
“Ballpoint totally comes out.” said another.
“What, in the wash?” said Leonard. “Or, would I need to spray it first?”
“Spray it and soak it in cold water overnight before washing. It’ll be fine.” said the first voice.
Leonard thought about it some more, then paused. “I’m not writing on my shirt.” he shouted, to no one / everyone. “How ‘bout I just put ‘17’ on my hand?”
“I tried that. It wears off.” said another voice. “Now I don’t remember if I’m ‘5’ or ‘6’ cuz it’s all smudged on my hand.”
From the back of the room, Leonard heard someone say something about them being ‘5’, so he assumed the other person must therefore be ‘6’.
“The ink isn’t the only thing that’ll wear off.” said the first voice. “Your short-term memory will go, too. Better put that 17 on your shirt now, while you still remember it. Trust me. The only thing I remember now is how much I’ve already forgotten.”
Leonard clicked the pen and was about to write ‘17’ on his shirt pocket, then paused and looked up. “Wait, why should I listen to any of you? I don’t even know you.”
“Yes, you do.” said the first voice. The mist cleared and Leonard could see a group of people standing around him now. All wore the same wrinkle-resistant, ‘business casual’ pants, the same nearly new dress shirt he bought on sale last week, the same glasses, the same worn loafers, and the same crappy tie.
More importantly, all were him.
He was standing in a room full of Leonards.
Some of the Leonards were maybe a little heavier than him, while others were clearly a bit thinner. One looked really quite fit, he thought, noting to himself that he really did need to start using that gym membership. Most Leonards had slightly different hairstyles, some longer, some shorter, though at least two seemed to match his exactly – right down to his preferred sideburn length (in line with bottom of the earlobe). At least one appeared to be going bald, he thought, or maybe he just shaved his head. Some had the same style of facial hair he did, some did not. Several had their arms crossed. One Leonard kept checking his holo-wristwatch, which didn’t seem to be working. A few were having fairly animated conversations among themselves, barely noticing anyone else around. One was sleeping over in the corner, though the room didn’t really have any corners. Some looked bored, like they were waiting at a garage to get a tire repaired. Even more looked annoyed.
One of them stepped forward and extended his hand. He had the number ‘3’ scrawled in ballpoint pen on his shirt pocket. “Welcome to the club, 17.” he said, before noticing that Leonard motioned for him to stop.
“Hi. Um, sorry. Y’know. Germs and all.” He pulled out a small bottle of hand sanitizer and quickly rubbed some on his hands. “I just got over a cold and don’t want to catch anything.”
“Oh, right. Of course!” Leonard-3 paused and was soon joined by Leonard-8, Leonard-9, and Leonard-14. Each made a half-hearted wave at Leonard-17, also preferring not to make physical contact. Leonards 8 & 14 pulled out their own small bottles of hand sanitizer, mumbled something about colds, and rubbed some on their hands.
Leonard-3 looked exactly like Leonard-17, right down to the cheap holo-wristwatch. He noticed Leonard-3 was missing a button on his nearly-new shirt, then glanced down at his own and noticed that he, too, was missing the same button. Did it come off during the faceplant? That won’t do at all, he thought. He remembered that the shirt had one of those extra buttons sewn-in on the inside – which was one of the reasons why he bought it – but still wanted the original. What if, he thought, he lost another button? It didn’t come with two extras. That would be a disaster. He would start looking for it just as soon as he cleared up this whole situation.
He looked over at Leonard 8, also missing that same button, who had just put back his hand sanitizer. He admired his thin beard and the earring in his left ear. More than once, Leonard-17 thought about getting his left ear pierced but always chickened out in the end. He made a note to again think about getting it done, now that he saw how cool and manly it actually looked. Maybe, he thought, if he got his ear pierced that new teaching assistant from Physics would finally notice him. What was her name? Seo-Jun?
Leonard-9 was the one with the (likely) shaved head. No earrings on him but he did like the goatee. When he got back, Leonard-17 thought, he was definitely going to shave his own beard that way. The goatee and the earring. Definitely rugged. Absolutely manly. Can’t lose if I do both, he thought, smiling slightly.
Leonard-14, who seemed a bit paler and paunchier than the others, stepped forward and addressed Leonard-3. “Why are we wasting time with this clown?!” he said, motioning at Leonard-17. “None of the new ones know anything more than we do. He can’t help us.”
“None of the new ones??” said Leonard-3. “Doesn’t that include you? I mean, you’re 14 and he’s 17. That’s not too far off.”
Leonard-14 jabbed a finger at Leonard-3. “Don’t give me that! There hasn’t been a new one in weeks. I’ve been here over a month now! I think…”
Leonard-9 stepped between the two. “Look, no one really knows how long we’ve all been here. It feels like I’ve only been here a couple of days, and I’m 9. Time passes differently here. We all know that. None of us can say for certain if we’ve been here days, weeks, or months. We don’t even know if it’s night or day, what with the lights.”
“And no windows.” said Leonard-8, cutting him off.
“Right, no windows, either” said Leonard-9, nodding in agreement.
“Wait, ‘days, weeks, months’??” asked Leonard-17. “Why hasn’t anyone starved yet? Or at least died of thirst?”
“Good question.” said Leonard-9.
“Honestly, we don’t know.” added Leonard-3. “None of us have been hungry, or even thirsty, for whatever reason.”
“I’d like a beer!” said another Leonard, from somewhere in back.
“Me, too!” said another.
“Yes, we’d all like a beer – we know!” shouted Leonards-3 & 8, rolling their eyes.
Leonard-3 turned back to Leonard-17. “We’d all like a beer. We’d all like some pretzels, maybe those honey mustard kind.” Two of the other Leonards nodded in agreement. “But we don’t need them. We don’t seem to actually need food or water here.”
“Well, what if …what if I have to pee?”
“No one has to pee here.” said Leonard-3, trying (and failing) to clean his glasses on his shirt sleeve. “We assume it must be like the food or water thing: nothing goes in and nothing comes out, if you catch my meaning.”
Leonard-17 nodded slowly, agreeing at least in principle that he did not need to pee – at least not yet. He was honestly not even sure he could if he tried. However, he reserved judgment on the overall veracity of the statement until he had been there longer.
‘Now…” Leonard-3 motioned at Leonard-17’s shirt pocket, “go ahead and write your number before you forget it. Because you will.”
Leonard-17 quickly did so, taking care to visualize how to write ‘17’ upside down. It was close enough, he thought. He then clicked the pen and handed it to Leonard-3, who didn’t take it.
“I, um, I have mine.” he said, pulling his identical pen out of his own shirt pocket.
“Oh. Yes, right.” Leonard-17 put his pen back in his own pocket. Then he paused, ran his hand up though his hair, and looked around frantically. “Wait, what exactly is going on here?! What is this place? Why the hell are we even talking about pens?! Are you me??” he said, pointing to any of the nearby Leonards. Two more walked past them, deeply engaged in their own conversation. One looked up at Leonard-17 disapprovingly then moved on.
“We are all you.” Leonard-3 motioned to the group. “You are us. We are Leonard.” He crossed his arms and stood silently. Many of the other Leonards did the same.
“But how..? Why..? I-I just…” stammered Leonard-17, looking around for answers. “I couldn’t find him,” he said, to no one in particular. “Professor Hembree had been gone for days. His wife reported him missing. The campus police couldn’t find anything.” Leonards 3, 8, and 9 nodded sympathetically.
Leonard-14 scowled. “None of us could. We didn’t know where he went, but we knew where he had gone. In there.” he motioned to the cylinder. “We all helped him with his research. We all knew this day would come.”
“When he’d step into the cylinder…” Leonard-3 said.
“The abyss, really.” said Leonard-8, correcting him.
“So, wait…” said Leonard-17, pacing. “I went in there to find him. I was trying to be helpful. His wife. She was so worried. I went in there – and, and it looks like we all did, I guess – but where is he? Is he here?? And where exactly is ‘here’? What is this place?!”
“Hell’s waiting room.” said Leonard-14, dryly.
“It’s not Hell’s waiting room,” snapped Leonard-3, glaring at Leonard-14. He turned back to Leonard-17. “We don’t really know what this place is. We think it’s a glitch of some sort – that something went wrong.”
“Oh, you think something went wrong? Really?!” said Leonard-14.
“This place,” said Leonard-3, “isn’t supposed to be here. It doesn’t seem to actually exist anywhere. I mean, we’re all here, clearly, but there is no ‘here’ as far as we can tell. We just keep piling up, slowly but steadily.”
In the background, mist started pouring out of the cylinder again. A small crowd of Leonards gathered near the hatch. One of the Leonards ran up and repositioned the satchel, quickly followed by a second. They seemed to argue about the exact position of the satchel. The first one appeared to relent and threw up his hands, watching the other carefully adjust it. Both then ran back into the mist. The hatch handle turned. The hatch slowly opened. Out came another Leonard, who promptly tripped over the satchel and face-planted on the ground. His glasses skidded across the floor, as did one button. Someone from the back clapped and then, when realizing he was the only one doing so and that it was probably in poor taste, stopped.
“Well, that’s new.” griped Leonard-14, his voice heavy with sarcasm.
“18!” said one of the Leonards.
The new Leonard scrambled to find his glasses then sneezed twice, loudly.
“Bless you!” said another Leonard.
Leonard-17 looked back at Leonard-3 and the other nearby ones. “How often does this happen?” he said, motioning toward the cylinder.
“Not this often.” said Leonard-3. “We’ve never had two come out back-to-back like that before. But, time does pass differently here. What seemed like a few minutes could’ve actually been a few days for all we know.”
Leonard-17 walked back over to the cylinder and picked up the satchel. It was intentionally retro-looking, like something from the 20th or maybe 21st century: brown, leather (well, a modern reproduction of what leather probably looked and felt like), with a heavy brass clasp on one side. On the top were the initials DAH. Leonard-17 looked back at Leonard-3. In the background, other Leonards were busy with their orientation for Leonard-18 (who looked terribly confused). “DAH? Derrick Alan Hembree, right? This is his satchel – I’ve seen it before.”
“Yes, we know. It’s definitely his, though in my world his name is Bartholomew.”
“Interesting. So, if this satchel made it here, then where is he? Why isn’t he here – wherever ‘here’ is – with the rest of us?”
“We don’t know. This is all we found.”
Leonard-17 looked at the satchel again, puzzled, then put it down and looked back at the others. “So, why do you reposition it each time so the next one trips over it?”
“Boredom.” said Leonard-14, crossing his arms.
“It’s kind of funny, really. Maybe.” added Leonard-9, who immediately regretted saying that.
“Well, that, and each one of us has tripped over it coming out of the cylinder.” said Leonard-3. “We figured it might make sense that each person has identical experiences, what with us all being identical.”
“Where’s 1 & 2?” asked Leonard-17, looking around.
“2 is over there,” motioned Leonard-3, pointing at the Leonard sleeping in the corner-like area of the room. “And 1, well…” he pointed to another corner-like area.
At that point, Leonard-17 was truly surprised. It was not that he hadn’t already been surprised multiple times by now, what with him being in a room full of bright nothingness surrounded by himself (or is it ‘himselves’?). In fact, it had been a day full of surprises. He started off the morning with a flat tire on his bike, so he had to walk to University. Then, his favorite coffee mug – the one with the kitten that said ‘Hang in There’ – was missing from the graduate assistant lounge. He had to use the only remaining one available, which said “I survived another meeting that should have been an email.” It was fine, but he felt it was more reserved for someone of a higher stature than his, institutionally speaking. Then, he couldn’t find his keys and realized he left them back at his tiny, studio apartment. Then, he shared an elevator with Seo-Jun from Physics. He didn’t know what to say to her, so he nodded politely and pretended to examine the papers in his clipboard. He even randomly circled parts of one page with the very same pen he used to write ‘17’ on his shirt pocket. He had hoped to work up the nerve to actually speak with her – to show her he was a hip, easy-going, man of the world. Yet, all he could do was mumble something about the weather to her before he stepped out. It was pathetic, of course. Yet, she smiled at him when he left. A day full of surprises, really.
And now he was here.
Staring at a baby.
2
“Let me introduce you to Leonard-1.” said Leonard-3.
The two walked over and knelt by the boy, who was wearing nothing but a white undershirt, a diaper (Huggies ‘Stay-Dry’, size 8), and some socks. Leonard-17 wasn’t entirely sure the baby was real – that he wasn’t simply imagining a baby right now among all the oddities in this room-yet-not-a-room area – so he went over and knelt down next to it.
The baby reached out and playfully grabbed at Leonard-17’s nose. He brushed away the little hand, then took it in his own. The baby grabbed onto his index finger and smiled. Leonard-17 leaned in, just inches away from the baby’s head, then sniffed. The baby smelled like bananas, as all real babies do, he thought. He shook free from his grip, leaned back, and took further stock of the little tyke. It tugged on one of its socks. It drooled a bit, clearly teething. It yawned. It giggled at nothing in particular. It must be real, he thought.
Leonard-1 was more a toddler than a baby, really. He alternated between taking a few tentative steps and crawling. He seemed content enough, if not outright happy. He looked up at the two other Leonards, smiled that dimpled smile that only babies can do, then crawled away. Leonard-17 paused, staring at the spot where the baby used to be, then looked up at Leonard-3.
“Was that me …I mean, us?”
“Yes. Well, we believe so. I mean, there’s really no way to tell definitively given his age, but he seems to look more like us than not. One of us seems to feel otherwise.” he said, motioning back to Leonard-14 with an eye roll.
“Really? Well if he doesn’t think the baby is one of us, who does he think it is?”
“He believes it could be Professor Hembree.”
“What?! No… I don’t think. No. Maybe?”
“The consensus is that the boy’s complexion is too different from Hembree’s.”
“True, but that could just be attributed to the alcoholism, right?” said Leonard-17. Professor Hembree was a well-known lush, particularly when it came to rum. Or margaritas. Or pina coladas. Or, any of those and really any other drink that might possibly involve one of those tiny little cocktail umbrellas. Hembree was often brilliant, often drunk, and often both.
“That, and the hair is clearly a different color.” said Leonard-3, absentmindedly applying more hand sanitizer.
“True. However, I had lighter hair when I was a boy. Maybe Hembree did, too?”
“It’s possible but unlikely. We believe the boy is us. Leonard-2 believes much the same, which is why he labeled himself as ‘2’ and not ‘1’, and the next one as ‘3’ and not ‘2’.” said Leonard-3. In the background, they could hear the other Leonards shouting “19!” excitedly. They turned and saw the others once again gathering around the cylinder, hurriedly repositioning the satchel. Shouts of “20!” and “21!” immediately followed.
“This is easily the oddest day of my life.” said Leonard-17.
“Well, yes, I suppose…” said Leonard-3, somewhat dismissively.
“What? You don’t think so? You’ve experienced the exact same thing I have, right? I mean, haven’t we all?”
“Mostly, yes, with some variations.”
“Such as?”
“The girl. The one from work.”
“The TA from Physics? Seo-Jun, right? What about her?”
“In my world, she’s a research assistant from Photochemical Sciences, and her name is Ji-Jun”
“Wait – how do we know we’re even talking about the same person? It’s not like there’s only one woman in the building or anything.”
“Um, is she the one with…” asked Leonard-3.
“Yes.”
“And…” he asked, leaning in as he spoke.
“Ok. Yes. I see what you mean.” he said, nervously fishing around his pocket for his bottle of hand sanitizer. “What other variations are there? I mean, beyond different hairstyles and gym memberships. We all grew up the same, right? We all have the same adoptive parents?”
“Arthur and Judy, yes.”
“Ok, my mother never would’ve tolerated ‘Judy’ – she always insisted on ‘Judith’, but that’s minor, I suppose. What else? We all work at Pan-Tech, right? We all assist Hembree? We are all nearly done with the state-sponsored hazing known as a doctorate?”
Leonard-3 nodded yes again, then sat down next to him.
“So, we are all basically the same, yes?
“There are some slight differences. Leonard-11 apparently earned a C- in Contemporary Metaphysical Engineering and now has to retake it, whereas I passed that course with a B-.”
“I had to retake it, too.” said Leonard-17.
“Yes. Things like that. However,” said Leonard-3, looking down, “I believe I am the only one to have actually killed one of us.”
“You what?!”
Leonard-3 took off his glasses and began methodically cleaning them on his shirt sleeve. He avoided eye contact with Leonard-17. Until he didn’t. “I didn’t mean to. It happened before I came here. Much like you, I was looking for Hembree. His wife, you know, she was so distraught…”
“Yes. Distraught. Definitely.”
“It had really gotten to the point where it was…”
“Irritating?” said Leonard-17, raising his eyebrows slightly.
“Yes – clearly! So, I was trying to help but also trying to get this poor, sobbing woman off my back. I went to Hembree’s lab since I was one of the only people with the passcode. I had already been in there the week prior, when he was first reported missing. I wasn’t looking for him then. I was just doing my usual grunt work assistantship.” Leonard-17 nodded knowingly. “But this time seemed different – more urgent, I suppose. She wouldn’t stop calling me on the holophone. I told her the authorities had already interviewed me. I told her there was nothing more I could possibly add, but she wouldn’t…”
“…she wouldn’t stop crying, I know.” added Leonard-17. “It was the same with me.”
“Exactly! So I felt obligated to do something, anything, even if it was just an empty gesture. I just wanted her to leave me be.” The baby crawled by in the background as Leonard-3 spoke, stopped to look at the two, burped, and kept crawling. “So, I went in and I see the cylinder, Hembree’s instrumentation, his notes, some empty bottles (Fireball, I think) and… then the dam handle on the hatch starts turning.”
“What? What happened? Was it Hembree?”
“I couldn’t see at first. That sickly sweet mist poured out of the hatch as it opened.”
“It was him, right? Drunk again, I suppose!”
“No, it was me. Well, I mean, it was us.” he said, motioning to the two of them and to all of the others. Leonards 14 & 9 noticed this and started to head over toward them.
“It was one of us, but different, crazed. He looked like something out of a punk rock show. His hair was really… unusual. He had a bunch of piercings, but the same shirt and tie we have on now. He also wasn’t wearing pants, for some reason and instead wore what appeared to be a large, well… a large diaper.”
“You can’t be serious!” said Leonard-17, as the other two came forward. He looked at them. Judging by their expressions, he thought, they’ve heard this one before. “Why on Earth was the man wearing that?”
“I am serious, but I didn’t have time to ask him. He had this really off-putting look about him. He staggered out of the cylinder, coughing, retching, saw me, then immediately lunged and attacked. He knocked me over Hembree’s desk and had me pinned down on the floor, both hands around my throat. He was screaming, cursing at me, calling me terrible things. The look in his eyes was terrifying, awful – mainly because it was still my eyes, our eyes.” he motioned again at any nearby Leonards.
“Tell him what happened next.” said Leonard-14. Leonards 9 & 17 stood silently, waiting.
“He was clearly trying to kill me. I yelled for him to stop, to calm down, but he was beyond being reached. He kept squeezing. I… I could feel that I was blacking out, so I reached for anything at hand and found…”
“A broken Fireball bottle.” said Leonard-9, cutting him off. Leonard-17 looked at Leonard-9 and then back at Leonard-3.
“Yes.” Leonard-3 paused, trying to collect himself. “I didn’t realize what I was doing. I didn’t realize what was going on, that he was one of us. Well, that he was us, I mean.” Leonard-3 sat very still. “I didn’t understand.”
“So, he plunges the broken bottle into the maniac’s neck and scrambles out from under him as he starts to bleed out.” said Leonard-9, continuing for Leonard-3. “Then what does he do? Does he scream for help? Does he call campus police, or the authorities? Does he even stop to examine the body for some sort of clues?”
“No, he didn’t.” said Leonard-14. “Did you?”
“I did not.” said Leonard-3, running his fingers through his hair. “I didn’t know what to do. It all happened so fast. So, I… I…”
“So, he runs into the cylinder, closes the hatch, and comes out here.” said Leonard-9, disgusted.
“Wait, was he one of us? I mean, did he have a number on his shirt?” asked Leonard-17.
“I don’t know, really. Once I scrambled out from under him, there was blood. Everywhere. Most of his shirt was covered.”
“That body might’ve had some clues about this place. It could’ve been our only chance at finding out how to get back. If Leonard-fucking-crazypants can get back, I sure as hell think we can, too!” said Leonard-9.
“This… is a lot to process.” said Leonard-17. Behind them, three more Leonards appeared from the cylinder in quick succession. The first tripped and face-planted over the carefully positioned satchel; the second tripped and face-planted over the first. The third staggered out, paused right before tripping over the first two, looked around, then feigned tripping over them anyway and tossed his own glasses across the floor. Shouts of “22!”, “23!”, and “24!” could be heard from the growing crowd. “So, does that mean there’s now a dead Leonard back in each lab, in each of our ‘worlds’ or whatever it is we’re calling?”
Leonards 3, 19, & 14 all stopped and looked at him.
“No, of course not.” said Leonard-3.
“I believe you meant to say, ‘Of course not, you idiot!’” said Leonard-14, rolling his eyes. The other two Leonards shook their heads in disbelief.
“It …shouldn’t work that way.” said Leonard-3. “The one I killed appeared to be roughly our age, and it happened outside of the cylinder and whatever this palace is. So, if or when we all somehow manage to escape, I should be the only one going back to that situation.”
“That’s what you think – it doesn’t mean it’s true!” bellowed a voice from behind them.
3
The growing sea of Leonards parted, and one figure approached them through the remaining mist. He was clearly older than all of them, and wore completely different clothes: dark sweatpants and a black hoodie.
“Oh God, don’t listen to that motherfucker!” groaned Leonard-14. Leonards 3 & 9 both waved the old man off, dismissively.
“No one wants to hear this again!” said Leonard-9.
“No one!” said Leonard-14.
“Look, we’ve talked about this…” said Leonard-3.
The older man ignored them and strode confidently over to Leonard-17. Leonard-3 was about to say something else, but the older man quickly turned and glared at him. Pouting, Leonard-3 turned away.
The older man was clearly a Leonard but had no number anywhere visible, on his clothes, his hands, or anywhere else. His gray, shoulder-length hair sported three braids on one side with some sort of beads woven into them. Much like that cool Leonard from earlier, he, too, sported an earring. It was more of the dangly kind than the one the other wore, but it still made him look cool, Leonard-17 thought.
“Who the hell are you?” asked Leonard-17.
“I am your father.”
A sigh erupted among the nearby Leonards, causing a wave of synchronized head-shaking, eyerolls, and dismissive hand gestures.
“Don’t listen to him,” said Leonard-14, “he’s deluded.”
“I don’t think he’s deluded. I think he’s another glitch in an already glitchy system.” said Leonard-3.
“Say what you want, children,” said the older man. “It doesn’t change the fact that I am here, that I exist. I am my own father and your father, and each of you is your own father.”
Leonard-9 glanced over to Leonard-17 and made the cuckoo sign. The others turned their backs to the older man. Yet, Leonard-17 was curious. What on Earth could this strange man mean? He was clearly one of us, he thought. While admittedly odd, he rather liked the look. It was a part “tenured professor close to retirement who has zero fucks to give,” part “padded cell with a view,” and part “ladies, I am available” – all rolled into one. If he looked like that when he was that age and exuded that same level of mysterious confidence, he thought, that would be pretty cool. Rugged. Manly.
“I’m sorry, what exactly do you mean when you say you are your own father? How would that even be possible?” asked Leonard-17.
“It’s possible because I lived it.”
“How, specifically?”
“Much like you,” he said, motioning to the cylinder, “I came from there. Much like all of you, I was looking for that fool Hembree.”
“Wait, were you our age? Was this when Hembree was missing, like it was for us, but in your reality?”
“I stepped into the cylinder, thinking that would lead me to him, so I could give his wife some sort of answers. She was so sad, so… irritatingly sad. I was only trying to help. But when I activated the cylinder and stepped back out, I did not step out into this room. I stepped back into the past.”
“The past!” said Leonard-17.
“Yes, but it was still in Hembree’s lab. The cylinder cannot change geographical locations – only temporal. I stepped out into what would eventually become Hembree’s lab, only it was an empty storage room then. Hembree, as I found out later, had only just started the year prior as a new assistant professor.”
“I doubt Hembree was ever a lowly assistant professor,” said Leonard-14, dryly. “That bastard was born with tenure.”
The older Leonard glared at him and turned his attention back to Leonard-17. “Hembree was new back then. He was floundering. His research was erratic, lacking focus. He had few grants. His student evaluations were poor. He had just started drinking, due to all the stress.”
“What happened then?”
“I stepped out into this empty room – empty except for the cylinder, which had apparently not been there before. But, I was trapped. Locked-in. I pounded on the door but no one came. I fell asleep there that night, alone on the cold floor. The following morning, I heard footsteps walking down the hallway. I yelled and pounded on the door again. I heard someone fumbling with keys, and then the door opened. It was Hembree. He had apparently left his satchel in one of the classrooms the night before, went back to retrieve it, but found the classroom door locked. He borrowed the keys from a custodian and was on his way back to return them when he heard me.”
“Wait, are you saying…” said Leonard-17.
“Here’s where it goes off the rails…” whispered Leonard-14, to Leonard-3.
“I am saying that Hembree did not invent the cylinder, contrary to what he told the scientific community.”
“But, but that’s his life’s work! All his research, all his instrumentation, his papers – everything is based on that cylinder. You’re honestly suggesting he didn’t build it?!”
“Hembree barely understood how it worked. He’s a complete fraud. Prior to my appearing in that storage room with the cylinder, he was on his last legs. They weren’t going to renew his contract.”
Leonard-17 shook his head. “No, no… I don’t believe a word of that. Hembree had his flaws, certainly, but he was a brilliant man. Christ, the man invented the very holo-watch I’m wearing,” he said, motioning to his wristwatch. “The very holo-watch we are all wearing! He made the cover of Time & Space in ‘42! He may well earn the Jupiter Prize this year, if we can ever find him.”
“Complete. Fraud.”
“What evidence do you have?”
“I’m here, aren’t I? I’m you, but older, and I… know things.”
“Wait, what does any of this have to do with you saying you’re my father, our father, your own father?”
“When Hembree freed me from the storage room, I ran. I was dazed. I didn’t understand where I was – when I was. Everything looked the same, but different. I must’ve dropped my watch at some point, likely somewhere in that same room. Hembree – that thieving bastard – must’ve taken my watch and painstakingly reverse-engineered it over the next few years. Each new ‘discovery’ he made from that watch, he patented. He then licensed those patents to Sony and other companies as needed. That, in turn, funded his so-called ‘research’ into the cylinder. All the different apparatus he purchased to examine it, all the different grants he earned to further his research of it, was all a mirage. The cylinder has kept its secrets this whole time. Hembree is no closer to unraveling its mysteries than he was when he first set me free.”
“But, you said you were your own father..?”
“I was trapped some thirty years in the past, but with some knowledge of the future. I was smart enough to make a life for myself, to build a career for myself. I had a shop. I repaired small appliances, and had my own space in the back to tinker. I met someone. She made me happy, truly happy, for the first time I could remember. She was a schoolteacher. Neither of us had any family, but that didn’t matter. We were married. We had a dog. We had a…”
“Here it comes!” shouted Leonard-14.
“We had a baby. I forgot all about Hembree, about the cylinder. Until that cover of Time & Space. It just made my blood boil. He was a complete fraud in every possible sense. I knew he was. Yet, I was the only one who was aware of it – the only one who could prove it. So, I snuck back into his potemkin ‘lab’ to find that evidence. Hembree wasn’t there (a good thing for him!) but I did find his satchel. I stuffed it full of his notes, his diagrams that showed he reverse-engineered the watch, anything else I could find that I thought might be useful in exposing him. Then, the campus police came. Hembree had apparently installed a series of silent alarms in the room, in between the time he originally freed me and when I returned. Can’t say I blame him, really. The whole key to his success, to making him seem absolutely indispensable to the university, required such secrecy.”
“What happened then? Did they contact the authorities?”
“I could hear them coming closer, calling the state police on their radios. There was nowhere else to go – no convenient window I could climb out of. It was a damn storage room, after all, or at least it used to be! He built the lab around the cylinder because it was immovable. I could see them turning the doorknob. So, I did the only thing I could think of at the time: I entered the cylinder and closed the hatch behind me. And here I am.”
“So, how does that make.. wait! What was the name of your baby?!” Leonard-17 shouted.
“What do you think his name was?”
“It was a boy?!”
“I named him after myself. I didn’t want to do it, thought it was egotistic, but Julie insisted. She said it was cute. My poor, beautiful wife who I will probably never see again insisted.”
“What was his name?!”
“Leonard.”
Hearing the name caused all the nearby Leonards to scatter. Some put their hands over their ears. Some just shook their heads. Leonards 9 & 14 just walked away, mumbling something about not listening, and this whole thing being bullshit. Leonard-3 walked back to the cylinder and sat down, leaning on it. Leonard-17 crossed his arms, rocking slowly back and forth.
“So…” Leonard-17.
“So. We know we are all adopted. We know our birth mother died in a car accident when we were infants. We know our birth father apparently abandoned us, or otherwise disappeared. We also know I am you, yet a generation older.”
“But…”
“But nothing. I went searching for Hembree when I was 29 years old, stepped out into the past, fell in love, and sired myself. That is: each of you. I am my own father. I am your father.”
“But that would mean…”
“I told you he was a motherfucker! Did you listen?! No!!” yelled Leonard-14, from across the room.
“It’s true: I am a motherfucker, depending on how you define the term. Just remember that she was my wife before she was your mother — our mother.”
“But still…”
“Each of you has either already done the same or will eventually do the same. This place,” he waved his arms around the room, “this place erases our collective memories. It’s a loop, or a series of loops. The more of us that come out the cylinder, the more of us are still back looking for Hembree, or killing one of us in his lab, or siring ourselves. What was it Twain said? Something about history not repeating itself but rhyming? That’s this place. That’s us. Today, we are all motherfuckers.” He bent down and put his hand on Leonard-17’s shoulder.
Just when Leonard-17 thought this day couldn’t get any weirder, any worse, it did. It was bad enough that he failed at finding Hembree. It was bad enough that he was trapped in Hell’s Waiting Room with an ever-expanding number of other Leonards, at least one of which is a self-confessed murderer. It was bad enough that some crazy old man is probably both himself and his father. But now, on top of all this, he is implying that everyone in this room will eventually – inevitably – sleep with their own mother which, in turn, will result in their own conception. This was too simply too much to handle. Particularly for a Tuesday.
“24!” “25!” “26!!” shouted more Leonards, over by the cylinder. This time, the mist really piled up. “27!” shouted another. There wasn’t even time for them to stage the satchel before Leonard-28 came staggering through the hatch. He was immediately followed by Leonards 29-36, which caused a wave of glasses to go skidding across the floor as they fell over each other. The missing buttons were now officially another trip / slip hazard, perhaps even more so than the satchel since they didn’t require any set-up.
The other Leonards grew visibly alarmed at the growing crowd. “This isn’t right!” shouted Leonard-12. Four more Leonards spilled out of the cylinder. “We’ve got to do something!” yelled Leonard-7. Two more Leonards flopped out. “Somebody, think of something!!” screamed Leonard-23, as three more new Leonards came out of the hatch.
“17!” shouted Leonard-3. “17, what should we do?!”
“I… I don’t know. Um, maybe, should we try all going back in?”
“All of us? Back into the cylinder? At the same time?” asked the older Leonard. A few other Leonards overheard this and came closer, motioning for others to do the same.
“How?” asked Leonard-14.
“The hatch is locked.” said Leonard-8.
“Well…” thought Leonard-17. “Given how often new ones are coming through, what if we all wait by the hatch, ready to go, then bolt inside once the newest one opens the handle from the inside, to step out? He’ll be so dazed he won’t know what’s going on, regardless. What’s one more bit of strangeness, at this point?”
“It’ll never work.” yelled one of the Leonards from the back.
“We can’t fit!” yelled another.
“We couldn’t in the first place, yet here we are!” said Leonard-17.
The older Leonard looked at him, deeply, then turned to face the others. “It could work!” he said. “It’s worth a try, right? What have we got to lose? I want to see my wife again!” From somewhere deep in the back, a slow but steady chorus of “17!” started. Soon, everyone was saying it. The chorus grew louder, with many Leonards pumping their fists in the air while they shouted. Some arbitrarily stomped their feet and clapped, seemingly to the tune of We Will Rock You. Leonard-3 ran over and, along with Leonards 7, 9, 12, and 14, hoisted Leonard-17 into the air, triumphantly.
As he rose up above everyone, his tie flapping over his face, Leonard-17 didn’t know what to think. He felt like a hero, but hadn’t done anything heroic. Heck, he didn’t even think this idea would work, at least not really. He just didn’t know what else to suggest, and everyone was staring at him. He held onto his glasses, worried briefly about possibly losing another button, and then…
Then the mist started again.
All of the other Leonards nodded in grim determination, with the possible exception of some of the most recent ones, who still didn’t really have a clue as to what was going on here. Most of the Leonards tucked their glasses in the shirt pockets, not wanting to lose or possibly damage them in the coming stampede. Some rolled up their sleeves and cracked their knuckles. Many had their ties wrapped around their foreheads. Older Leonard held Baby Leonard / Leonard-1. Both had their game faces on.
Then they all waited for the hatch to open again.
And waited.
And waited some more.
At last, they could all see more of the mist forming around the edges of the hatch. They could smell that too-sweet stench. The mist started billowing around the hatch as the handle turned. Slowly, the hatch opened. Leonard-3 looked at Leonard-17, who nodded back.
“This is it!” yelled Leonard-9.
“Let’s do this!!” screamed Leonard-8.
“Let’s go, motherfuckers!!” shouted Leonard-14 to the crowd.
One of the Leonards grabbed the satchel off the floor and wedged it in between the hatch and the cylinder. The hatch, perhaps recognizing it had been propped, groaned as it tried and failed to shut, bending the satchel back. At this rate, the satchel wouldn’t hold long.
“This is all… just really crazy.” said Leonard-17 to no one in particular. He didn’t like this plan at all and wondered whose idea it had been, but admitted he didn’t have a better idea. His brain was getting… foggy. Which Leonard was he again? Lemming-like, he reluctantly followed the herd of Leonards as it stampeded back into the cylinder. A new Leonard, attempting in vain to stagger out of the cylinder, was tossed into the air and eventually body-surfed back in with the others. Someone in the crowd yelled “42!” before they all disappeared into the cylinder. The hatch slammed shut behind them, causing the satchel to somersault into the air. It landed with the thud, upright, in the exact same spot by the hatch where it had been placed so many times before.
A blinding flash of pure white light ensured, followed by a loud thunderclap and a blast of the mist. Spare buttons flew everywhere, along with the satchel. Sparkles of color and light erupted through the mist. Somewhere, far off, a tuba played (or was it a sousaphone?) A seemingly endless line of purple ducks paraded out through the mist, each quacking in unison, but the quacks sounded more like donkeys braying, for some reason. A single, yellow biplane flew overhead, through the mist. The pilot yelled something and shook his fist, circled around, then flew off. A small dog barked from somewhere, followed by a sudden shower of pens which bounced everywhere as they landed on the bright, white floor. As quickly as the rain of pens started, it stopped and was replaced by a hail of hand sanitizer bottles, bouncing and bursting onto the floor and building to a downpour. The downpour increased but was soon replaced by buttons. Soon, it became a biblical deluge of buttons raining down everywhere, blotting out all sound, all light, all sense of direction.
Then it stopped. One last button dropped from above onto the floor, bounced twice, then spun around and fell flat. A hand reached down to pick it up. It was his. Leonard’s. Leonard-17’s. Only, he wasn’t really Leonard-17 anymore, was he? Was he just Leonard again? Or, maybe Leonard ‘Prime’?
He held the button in his left hand and looked around the room. The mist was still everywhere but was quickly dissipating. He was… alone. Completely alone. Just him and the cylinder, with the hatch closed.
He felt different, somehow. He stared at his hands. They were his alright. His holo-watch was missing, though. Must’ve come off in all the chaos, he thought. He felt his face. Also his. But wait – something was new! He felt that the left side of his face had a mustache but no beard, while the right side had a beard but no mustache. Then he felt his ears. Both earlobes were pierced, with several studs and dangly earrings in each, including some that felt like they could’ve belonged to that early 21st century entertainer, Mr. T. Then he felt his hair. It was… odd. It was long, very long around the sides and back. There were braids? Three braids? And beads? But, the top of his head felt different than the rest. He rubbed his palm across it. Shaved? A shaved head but with long hair and braids all around the sides and back?! This is not a look – not a look at all.
He put the spare button into his shirt pocket, then noticed the pen marks on the front of it. The number ‘17’ was gone, or at least might’ve been. Instead, there were also sorts of numbers written one on top of the other. It was impossible to even read them. The pen was still there, at least.
But, why were his legs so cold?
He looked down.
He was not wearing pants.
Instead, he wore a diaper. An almost cartoonishly large diaper. On the waistband, it said ‘Huggies Stay-Dry – size 17’. He did still have his socks on, and his worn loafers.
“Heh.” he stifled a laugh. “Heh-heh! Ha-ha-ha!!” Tears streamed down his face as he laughed again, loudly, then screamed, then laughed again. His whole body shook as he alternated between laughing, crying, and screaming. He clenched his fists. He clenched his sphincter. The hatch opened behind him and Leonard / Leonard-17 / Leonard Prime, not knowing what else to do at that point, still laughing, crying, and screaming, gently stepped into the cylinder, taking care not to trip.
***
The hatch creaked and the handle turned, as a fresh dose of the sickly sweet mist trickled out from around the edges. Prof. Hembree stuck his head out tentatively, then stepped out of the cylinder. He held a to-go cup of coffee in his right hand. He glanced down at the significantly higher-end holo-watch on his left wrist, seemingly annoyed, then tapped it a few times. As the mist cleared, he spotted his satchel, grabbed it, muttered something about annual reviews for grad assistants, then quickly stepped back into the cylinder. The hatch slammed shut behind him, causing soft billows of the mist to curl around the cylinder and drift upward into the bright white nothingness, then fade away.
— Paul Cesarini is a Professor & Dean at Loyola University New Orleans. He has been published in numerous venues over the years, including 365 Tomorrows, Antipodean SF, the Creepy Podcast, Aphelion, Sci-Fi Shorts, and Black Sheep, with stories in-press at Savage Planets and Mobius Blvd. In his spare time, he serves as the editor / curator of Mobile Tech Weekly, at: https://flipboard.com/@pcesari/mobile-tech-weekly-lh2560e4y. He is a big fan of science fiction from the 1930s – 1950s. He is not a fan of wax beans. Beans are supposed to be green, not yellow.