Making History

White fog wafted about the floor of an expanse as far as the eye could see. The fog was barely discernable from the rest of the whiteness about. The light was bland. There was no smell or sound. Only the floor had any sort of texture, like standing on a magnetic force. The complete silence broke. Into this space appeared a machine hovering ten feet from the ambiguous surface enveloped by a wavering blue bubble. The young adolescent boy piloting the machine looked about in confusion. He checked the time indicator on the third screen, but it was blank. Clearly this was a problem. He looked to the cloudy surface and carefully piloted his vehicle downward. The brass covering most of the machine would have glinted had there been any direct light. The boy powered the machine down and the bubble vanished.

"Hey!" He shouted into the ether. It was all the same all around. "What is this place? I can't even tell when I am, bloody machine." He hopped in the seat again and scrutinized the screens. He tried entering his own time again, but a message came across that he was already there. "Argh, this makes no sense." As the boy contemplated flying about this bizarre place, a voice came from the foggy floor.

"Who's shouting?" He leapt off the machine. His eyes darted about.

"Yes? Who's there?"

"Nobody.  Just let us be."  It was an older, gravelly voice.

"Tell me what's going on and I'll get out of here!" The man sat up. The boy could make out white hair, a white shirt, suspenders, and what looked like brown pants.

"My name's Gene." He groaned as he stood. "Welcome to Hell."

"What?" Other people began to rise from the fog. They were of all races and time periods. Some appeared to be from as far back as the early 1900's. A few wore fashions he guessed could only have come from several years from his own time. The boy jumped back against the machine, glancing wildly about. "Who are you people?" Gene tried to calm him down but didn't seem too sincere.

"Jus' calm yo'self, son, and tell us who you killed," the black man from probably the 70's, said.

Someone from farther back quietly said, "Not a kid. That ain't right."

"But I didn't – "

"Must have been someone, or you wouldn't be here, squid." A young woman in a leather flared skirt said. The clothing was obviously from different times, but it all appeared to be aged.

"I's cool, chico, jus' relax." A Mexican from . . . he couldn't tell, approached him. "Look, eet does not matter who you keeled. They was in yo' bloodline. An ancestor, comprendes?" The boy backed away, shaking his head. "I tried to stop a family feud. Mi family and another fought for generations. I thought I could stop it, but . . ." He trailed off.

"Female slavery in Asia." The young woman from the apparent future said. "About the 2070's, white female slavery blasted through the top, squid. So, I carefully went back and dusted the four early traders. I suspected something like this might happen. I made my choice and I wouldn't take it back." She stood looking about the emptiness.

"I feel a bit bad about it, but I had to stop my own people." The black man spoke up. "I love my country, but the people got too hungry for power." Ren's head cocked in total confusion. "They shouldn't o' made that bomb."

"You're screwed, kid." Gene said. "You went back. Tried to do something good. Killed someone. Wound up here. Enjoy the rest of eternity."

The kid couldn't accept it just like that. The flight function of the machine still worked and he flew it all over his strange new home. There was no sun and no moon. Time must have passed, but he couldn't feel it. Ren desperately pushed his machine as high, as far, and as fast as he could, but to no avail. There was no undoing what was done. After giving up that route he tracked down his original landing point by the same people still standing and talking. Heads turned up and watched him descend. Gene's voice came up from the fog.

"Have a good trip?" The woman from the future gave him a dirty look.

"Mute it, Gene."

"Como te llamas?" The kid shook his head. A look of panic crept up to his face.

"Whas yo name, son?" The older black gentleman asked.

"Oh . . . uh, Ren. I go by Ren." He started calming.

"Have a seat." The black man smiled a disarming smile.

Ren sat down in the fog. The others joined him.

"My name's Joseph. This is Vail and Jorge." Ren nodded, his face still a melting pot of confused expressions. The three with Ren exchanged glances, both worried and sad.

"So tell us your story, squid. We've all got one." Ren opened his mouth before Gene cut him off.

"What does it matter? Not like there's any way out." The men tried to ignore him, but the young woman couldn't.

"He's just a kid, Gene. This isn't gonna be easy for him. Besides, most of us are always ready for another story . . . when it's all you've got left." Joseph touched her arm. "I'm sorry." She made a motion as if to speak again, but buried her head in her hands.

"Is cool, chico. Go ahead."

"I never really thought I could change the world, but I had to go back." Ren shook his head. "I don't even know where to start." Gene spoke up again.

"You could start with your time machine that woke me up from a sound eternity."

"Oh . . . sorry. Well, my dad made it when I was a kid. I was six when he told me about it."

* * * * * *

"Now Warren," Ren's father told him, "never touch the machine unless I've given you express permission," with much emphasis on 'express'.

"But Dad," he replied, eyeing the switches, buttons, dials, tubes and screens, "this is amazing." He, an adult in a six-year-old body, put his hands on his hips, cocked his head and looked at his father. "Does it really go through time?" The corners of his father's lips drew back in a wide fatherly smile, exposing teeth a little yellow from neglect, sleepless nights in the shop. Rather than answer the question, he withdrew a coin from his shirt pocket. A slightly greasy rough hand tossed it to Ren. He turned it over in his small hands. "I don't get it."

"Look closer." Ren sounded out the Latin on the silver coin.

"That's Washington, right, Dad?" His father nodded. Ren examined the back of the coin. Despite hours and dollars spent on video games, he never really looked at one before. The back was too confusing, too detailed. He turned it face forward again and noticed the date. "It says," he read aloud, "2045." Ren's eyebrows narrowed and he looked inquisitively. "Does that really mean the year 2045?"

"That's right, son." Ren looked back to the coin.

"Wow. So that's," Ren's eyes absently looked to the corner of the shop's ceiling. They looked down to the dust-covered floor with bits of wire and metal strewn about. Ren held a hand open and curled his fingers one at a time. His lips pronounced quietly the numbers. "Forty . . . forty-two years from now?"

"Very good." Ren's father patted him on the shoulder. "Just remember. Never touch the," then he stopped, paused, and started over, "never come into the shop without my permission, okay?" Ren, meanwhile was looking over the time machine again. A quarter moon in the crossbar window sent a glint of light off a brass handle.

"But Dad, this is way too cool." His father whipped a dirty rag from the back of his belt and began rubbing the round lenses of his glasses.

"Well, some day," his wrinkled eyes looked up from under his eyebrows to his son, "when it's time, and after I've experimented enough with it," he sighed and put the Ben Franklin glasses back on, "I'll teach you how to use it." Ren looked at the coin, at the machine, then to his father.

"Okay." He nodded.

* * * * * *

"And now for the holy quest." Gene spoke from the fog.

"Don't make me shut your mouth for you, Gene." Vail was ready to kick Gene across the ether. Jorge tried to turn the conversation back on Ren.

"Your father must have been a smart guy, chico, to build a time machine by himself like that." Ren looked over at the machine. He never quite appreciated the genius of it before.

"And I blew it. He spent so much time on his machine and I get lost somewhere outside time. I couldn't even change anything." Ren started sobbing into his hands. They had all been there: Gene, Vail, Joseph, Jorge, the others who eventually lay back into the fog. Some still cried. Those who had been there long, like Gene, hardened into bitterness and quiet desperation. Ren was only fourteen, though. He broke their hearts, a kid stuck in this place with no hope. Jorge tried to think of something to turn Ren's mind back to the story. He noticed something protruding from the machine next to the seat.

"Chico, what's that next to the seat on your machine?" Ren sniffed and looked where Jorge pointed.

"Oh, that's a dagger from Rome. My dad found it for me for my birthday." The others nodded. Vail stood and took the dagger from the machine. She turned it over in her hands and wielded it well.

"Before my plan that led me here, I collected period weapons." She pulled a throwing star from her sock. She tossed it to Ren. "Check this out, squid. It's a real Chinese throwing star from before China opened its doors to the world. I still have a Native American hatchet around here somewhere, but . . . I guess I forgot about it." Ren looked from her to the star.

"Dad used to find me all kinds of stuff."

* * * * * *

For Ren's tenth birthday, his father gave him a real crossbow from the Victorian era. For his eleventh birthday, Ren received a pirate flag from Spain. When Ren turned twelve, his father managed to bring back a wheel from a Model T Ford. Ren's interest in the time machine may have faded if his father simply never let him see it again, but these gifts and others, like an ancient Egyptian tapestry for Ren's mother on their anniversary fueled Ren's interest at a strong blaze. The catalyst for Ren's breaking with the rule would not come until his freshman year in high school, the time when ethics, morals, vanity, haste, and impetuousness run high.

He arrived home at about three o'clock in the afternoon, his Fridays being short days. "Hey, I'm home!" Ren called as he entered the house. He tossed his backpack on a loveseat and collapsed next to it.

"Turn on the news, would you?" His mother called from the kitchen.

"Yeah, sure. I'm your slave." Ren smiled and grabbed the clicker off the coffee table. She walked in as Ren turned the television on and sat in one of the large plush armchairs. "I forgot you had the day off today."

"You're just like your dad. He said the same thing this morning." A few commercials passed as they talked. "How was school?" Ren sighed.

"Eh, it was all right." His mother smiled.

"Okay, what happened." Ren suddenly stood up and walked toward the kitchen.

"Can I make a sandwich? I didn't eat much for lunch today." His mother half frowned. She said he could.

"There ought to be some shaved ham yet." She called after him. "So what happened?" Ren opened the fridge and started removing items for a ham sandwich.

"Well." Ren paused, holding a jar of mayonnaise. "A kid in my class used the phrase 'white guilt' today." Ren's mother leaned against the doorway and laughed lightly.

"What class was this?"

"Oh, my honors English class." She nodded knowingly. Since she was the literature guru as opposed to her husband the history buff/scientist, she recognized that white teenage angst one acquires upon first readings of To Kill a Mockingbird, Huckleberry Finn, and Invisible Man. "We just started Ellison's Invisible Man." Again she smiled to herself. Ren fought a bit with a twist-tie and reached behind a heel of bread for two good slices.

"Turns out he's not actually invisible, eh?" His mother quipped.

"No, he's just humiliated and brutalized all his life by ignorant southern bastards." In Ren's mind, Ellison's nameless narrator swallowed blood to the point of sickness as he attempted to deliver his "social responsibility" graduation speech to a group of ignorant, chatty white men. His mother sighed a motherly concerned sigh.

"That's a part of life, son."

"Well it shouldn't be!" His mother couldn't answer. The ladder on the ceiling of the hallway swung down to the floor and the trap door opened.

"What's all the shouting down there?" Ren's father climbed down the ladder. "You weren't planning on letting Ren have any of that chicken, were you, dear?"  Ren's mother rolled her eyes and smiled.

"You always say it's the best chicken west of Georgia." His father smiled, wiping his hands on his rag. Ren swallowed and cleared his voice.

"I was shouting about us." Ren's father tucked his rag back in his back pocket and straightened his glasses.

"About us?" Ren's mother turned to him.

"About . . ." He searched for words, about the floor then to his parents' faces. "Well, race, I mean." He gave up, not finding the right way to speak. "I don't know if people will ever get along. But it's not just that." Ren's brows furrowed again. "It's like there's this dark ugly veil between me and every colored person, you know?"

"A veil, eh?" His mother smiled.

"Oh you know what I mean." Ren took a bite from his sandwich and sat at the small kitchen table.

* * * * * *

Gene started laughing and sat up. "Slavery? You were going to go back and stop slavery? By how? Suggesting the thirteenth amendment to Jefferson and his personal harem?" Ren looked ashamed on top of his other emotions.

"I figured they'd be reasonable. I was gonna fly to Massachusetts and go back in time to 1776. I knew I couldn't stop it around the world myself." He added with a hint of bitterness. "But my dad surprised me when I left. I put in the wrong date and ended up later than I expected." Joseph smiled, feeling a similar connection to Ren for wanting to redirect his people's history. Vail only sat silent and jittered slightly, anger washing over her stolid face.

"So what? You went back and decided to just knock off a plantation owner?" Gene laughed again.

"It wasn't like that!" Ren jumped to his feet. "I've never killed anyone before! I just couldn't stand to see them in the fields. Then there were the men with whips. The owner was going through his fields when I got there and . . . I was so angry!" Jorge patted Ren's shoulder and tried to calm him down.

"You didn't know your house was where a plantation used to be?" Ren shook his head and sniffed deep. A few other people lying about sat up and groaned at the shouting. Gene rolled back and laughed again.

"So you freak out, kill a plantation owner who happens to be your great great great great great granddaddy, run back to your machine, and pop up here?" He laughed, wiping a tear from his eye. Vail couldn't take any more.

"Well I have killed before and I could do it again." She spoke through clenched teeth and pulled the star from her sock. Gene jumped to his feet as did Vail right after.

"Do it!" He yelled. "Come on! Get it over with!" Gene jutted his chin forward, exposing his neck. "Finish it! I'm tired of waiting to die!" Vail gripped the star in her fist and reached back, ready to slice his neck open.

"Stop!" Ren yelled, then covered his ears, rocking back and forth. "I don't want to see any more blood!" Gene and Vail stood for a moment, breathing heavy and staring at each other.

"Relax. Everybody, just calm ya selves down and relax." Joseph's deep voice reverberated off their hearts. Gene sat down again.

"So what if she kills me? I'd finally be able to rest." He sighed and looked away. Vail was still standing. Her fist lowered.

"The kid shouldn't see any more fightin' now. Besides, you don't want your life on Vail's head for her eternity, do you?" Gene looked sidelong up to her and smirked. She rolled her eyes and sat down again.

"Sorry, squid."

"It's okay."

A long silence followed. Gene lay back down in the fog followed by Jorge then Joseph. In that space, Ren figured out a few things. No amount of thinking or figuring would get him back home. Rewriting one's own bloodline concretely alters time. He made a mental note of the silence. "If I take this space of time and multiply them infinitely, I'll know what life is like now." Realization washed over him. He lay down, staring into the bland white light from under the fog.

"Gene?"

"Yeah, kid?"

"You've been here a long time, haven't you?"

"Yeah, kid."

"Were you my age?"

"Yeah, kid."

"Maybe we should tell more stories. Talk with the other people around here. They're probably pretty interesting." Nobody said anything. "Maybe ride around on my machine."

"Yeah, maybe." Gene said. Joseph sat up. He paused before speaking.

"Show me your machine, son. I want to see it." Vail smiled and swallowed hard. She sat up.

"Me too, squid."