The screen went blank. The overhead lights came on. The Silvers all winced in adjustment.
“Today we know enough about temporic energy to fill a library,” Quint declared. “And yet it’ll take a dozen more generations to get a true grasp of its nature. Simply put, the Danes had it right. Temporis is yet another governing force of the universe, the quantum building blocks of what we perceive as time. Though the cost was great, the Cataclysm triggered a scientific revolution like none other. We’ve acquired the means to bend time like a prism bends light. More than bend it, we can stretch it, harden it, even reverse it. Through temporis, we’ve accessed the watchworks of existence itself.”
Quint could see from his guests’ fidgety stances that he was flustering them. He swallowed the rest of his spiel and took the shortcut back to their concerns.
“For the last few weeks, you’ve wondered if you’re unique in your abilities. The answer is both yes and no. With the exception of one of you, all the amazing things you can do have been done countless times before by others, myself included. The difference between you and us, what truly makes you special, is your innate ability to wield temporis.”
He gestured at the showcase of gadgets behind him. “The rest of us need machines.”
Quint moved to the left side of the room and opened the door of a boxy white appliance that looked like a quarter-scale clothes dryer. He retrieved a banana from inside and tossed it at Zack.
“Before I demonstrate the first device, would you do me a favor and age that?”
“Uh, okay.”
Though the act of reversing had become as simple as third-grade math, Zack had a trickier time sending objects the other way. He grimaced with effort. Soon the banana turned spotted, then brown, then pungently rotten. Quint directed him to put it back in the machine.
As Zack returned to his seat, Theo drank him in with saucer eyes. “Jesus Christ.”
“I know. Trippy, isn’t it?”
Quint closed the door, then pressed a few buttons on the contraption’s keypad. The box quietly whirred.
“This machine is known as a rejuvenator or, informally, a juve. The technology was invented in 1975 but didn’t reach the consumer market until 1980. At first there were certain issues with tooping, which we can talk about another day.”
The juve let out a high ding. Quint popped the door, then brandished a perfect yellow banana to his audience.
“As you see, the device matches Zack’s talents by creating a localized field that reverses the flow of time. It can restore anything that fits inside it, though it does irreparable damage to electronic circuits and batteries. Its primary function is exactly what was demonstrated: the restoration of food. Today you’ll rarely find a kitchen without one.”
Zack wasn’t sure how to react. From the moment he gained control of his weirdness, he’d felt like a borderline superhero. Now he realized he was only as skilled as a common household appliance. He was as impressive as the hero who could turn bread into toast.
“Can it also advance an object’s timeline?” David asked.
“Yes. That feature’s used for accelerated defrosting and marinating.”
Amanda thought about the coffin-size device she’d noticed in the ambulance on her traumatic first day. “What about people? Couldn’t that same technology be used to heal?”
“Good question. There is indeed a device that works on the same principles. It’s called a reviver. They’re expensive and highly regulated. You need a special medical license to operate them.”
Zack snapped out of his dolor. “Wait a minute. If you guys have the technology to undo all the bad things that happen to people, wouldn’t that eliminate the nagging problem of, you know, death?”
Amanda nodded. “That’s what I was wondering.”
“Unfortunately, no,” Quint replied. “As human beings are far more complex than your average food product, there are risks in using temporis to revert people to a prior state—neurological issues, vascular problems, infertility. The further you bend the clock, the greater the chance of adverse effects. As a result, revivers are mostly limited to life-or-death situations, and usually for traumas that are less than twelve hours old. It’s certainly not a tool for fighting something like cancer.”
Mia raised her hand until Quint acknowledged her. “What about the recently deceased? I mean if someone died six hours ago and you reverse them seven hours . . .”
“Revivers can indeed restore the spark of life to a dead body, but not a dead brain. The temporis turns a corpse into a living vegetable, and even that typically lasts a couple of hours until death comes again. The technology gets more sophisticated each year, so who knows how long these limits will remain? I can say that revivers are much safer on animals. Veterinarians use them to extend the life of household pets.”