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[a_sport]

There were always classes going on somewhere in the schoolhouse, but if you knew the schedule, it wasn't hard to find a bit of quiet space to get some work done. Calvin was sitting in the classroom he secretly thought of his own with a pile of papers in front of him and a pen cap in his mouth. Grading papers. It was astonishing how many

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[transluminary]

With Poly's excellent instructions, finding the schoolhouse was no problem at all. Figuring out what to do once he got there, on the other hand, was not so easy. Adam eased open yet another classroom door and peered inside. Almost empty. He couldn't be sure that the young man grading papers was the future Dr. O'Keefe, but as far as fitting expectations went, it looked promising.

He knocked on the door frame. "Hello?" he ventured, stepping into the room, "Are you Calvin O'Keefe?"

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Calvin glanced up at the guy in the doorway. A guy about his age; he didn't recognize him, but that was hardly unusual for Cal as of late. People came and people went, and he was getting better but most of it was still passing him by. But it was alright. Todays were often better than yesterdays.

"That would be me." He set the pen down and straightened up. "You interested in classes? I can help you get set up with that."

[transluminary]

"Oh, that's not what I'm-- Although actually, that would be-- No, wait." Adam shook his head. "Let me try that again." He walked over and half-sat on one of the student desks across from Calvin's, suppressing the urge to say 'sir'.

"I'm Adam Eddington. I guess I'm... from your future. About twenty years or so. One day I'll intern for you." And get your daughter kidnapped. Sir. "It's-- Poly told me I could find you here."

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"Oh. Oh, wow." He stood up from his chair and then impulsively, nervously, rubbed his hand over his neck. He can feel himself starting to go red.

It wasn't as though this was the first time hearing about how he ended up. He'd heard from Polly. Successful scientist on an island with dozens of babies. But heretofore he'd been focused on the babies part and not the science part. Calvin was suddenly and acutely aware that he didn't have a degree to his name.

"Well, hello." After a moment of recovery, Calvin held his hand out. "Nice to meet you. I hadn't heard you were here."

[transluminary]

Adam laughed, a bit embarrassed, and straightened to shake Calvin's hand. "That's not surprising since I only arrived recently. It's nice to meet you too." Sir.

The differences and (especially) the similarities between the young man before him now and the scientist he remembered were almost comfortingly surreal. The same gangling height, the same blue eyes, but literally years younger.

Adam caught himself staring and laughed again, apologizing. "Sorry. This is-- I don't think I've ever believed in nonlinear time so strongly before. This is terrific." For science.

[a_sport]

It was hard not to grin in the face of Adam's obvious delight. Terrific wasn't how he'd describe the island most days, but the timestream business was as neat as it was eerie. "Right? Just imagine what sort of havoc and discovery evidence of this place could wreak upon physicists and philosophers, to say nothing of biology and ecologists."

It was awkward to be behind the desk like he was some sort of professor, so Calvin came around the front and leaned against it. "So you know Polly then, obviously, and before the island too?"

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"Yeah. We met when I went to work for you. She was only twelve years old then, though, so seeing her is nearly as strange as seeing you. I might not even have recognized her except for her hair," Adam joked.

In fact, seeing Poly was even stranger than seeing Calvin. With Poly, Adam had to keep readjusting to keep from just extrapolating from his memories and making assumptions, but with Calvin it more like getting to know someone entirely new who still happened to be a bit familiar.

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"What a couple years will do, huh?" Calvin said in bemusement. "When the twins- when Meg's two brothers were here, they were five years older than when we knew them. It's hard to get used to people you knew as young are so abruptly adult-sized."

He looked at Adam for a moment then shook his head in some kind of wonder. "So we worked together?"

[transluminary]

"Yah, on starfish research. It was a real honour for me. I was mostly just caring for the tanks and keeping the daily logs, but I..." Adam hesitated. "Well. I did learn a lot." And he didn't just mean in marine biology.

With more care: "How much do you know about the... about your future?" And how much would you want to know? Had Poly told him? Had he asked?

To know the future as though it were set in stone seemed a violation of free will. Also entirely fascinating. Calvin had met Poly already. And the twins he had mentioned. And now Adam. How did he see it?

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"Starfish? I have a couple starfish in a tank in the lab that I've been observing for a while." He was about to ask more- just what had his expert scientist self been looking at with the starfish, but Adam's question distracted him.

"I, well- I know what it looks like in broad strokes?" That sounded inadequate, especially when said to someone who knew him when he was all grown and wise, so Calvin tried again.

"Everyone I've known or who has known me has come from later down the timestream, even Meg, but with her it was just a few months. I know roughly the shape my life will or would have or has played out at least as far as having a 17-year-old daughter and roughly three and a half dozen kids. But the knowledge of it without the experience is pretty queer, honestly."

[transluminary]

Adam would be more than delighted to discuss starfish with any iteration of Calvin O'Keefe, grown and wise or otherwise. Some time very soon, if he could help it.

"Wow, that's... It must have been a lot to take in." He shook his head, momentarily derailed from his tell-or-don't-tell concerns as he tried and failed to imagine the consequences of that kind of experience. "I guess it wouldn't feel right to reject knowledge, especially since Poly is here and everything, but... wow. I can hardly picture it. How did you cope?"