The ELI Event B007R5LTNS

back into Grochonski’s waiting arms.
    “You son of a bitch,” Grochonski said as Pettis woozily tried to stand on his own. “I can’t believe you. You were gonna kill this kid, not to mention millions of other people, all for that goddamn data!”
    Pettis painfully moved his jaw and tried to focus on Grochonski, but couldn’t make it happen. Grochonski looked at his own arm, bleeding down his uniform sleeve. “And on top of that, you shot me! You shot me!”
    Pettis regained a tiny bit of composure; the hard, superior look began to return as he struggled to stay upright, weaving unsteadily before Grochonski. Grochonski shook his head in disbelief. “Somebody ought to belt you in the mouth. But I won’t.” He glared at Pettis. “I won’t.” Turning, he took a breath, gritted his teeth, then suddenly spun back around. “ The hell I won’t! ”
    The blow sent Pettis across the room like a rocket. Steve and Kelly jumped out of the way as he flew past them, crashed into a file cabinet, and slumped to the floor, unconscious.
    “I’m sorry about all this, folks,” Grochonski said as he collected Pettis’s limp body and slung it over his shoulder like a sack of beans. “I never knew what he was capable of until today. I’ll contact our CO and turn us both in, I promise.” Like a weary firefighter, Grochonski turned and lugged his burden toward the stairs to street level.
    Numbly, Kelly accompanied Grochonski down the hall. At the top of the stairs she opened the outer doors for him and they stepped onto the sidewalk. Grochonski propped the groggy Pettis against the building and got out his cell phone.
    As she turned to go back inside, Kelly noticed the bank building across the street, the one she had passed every day for months. She looked up, up to the top, many floors distant, and then back down, taking in the other buildings in the block. Nothing special, just ordinary buildings, concrete and steel and glass, standing there like always, windows glinting in the morning sun.
    She smiled.

Twenty-Eight
    Arty had Aurora up and in a chair when Kelly returned. “It’s just a bruise,” she said, touching her cheek. As she did, she noticed her arm unit had come back to life. “Oh, look,” she cried happily, “my callback unit is functional again!”
    “Then things must have already changed for the better,” Arty observed. “You may find a very different world when you get home, Aurora.”
    “Yes, I expect my friends will be alive and well, as will my dear husband, Borok.”
    “And maybe even Denes,” Arty suggested gently.
    Aurora brightened. “Yes, perhaps even poor Denes! But,” she added wistfully, “I’ll be the only one who knows what happened.”
    “Can you tell them?” Wheeler wondered. “I mean, is it allowed?”
    “Oh, yes,” she replied. “Yes, I’ll have to tell them all about it. It will make quite the dinner story.” She chuckled. “Believe me, there will be no end of questions from Pan-Li!”
    Kelly asked, “Will they bring you home on their own, then?”
    “No, no, they can’t. They don’t know where I am, nor when. Oh, dear, I just had a thought. They may not even know they’ve sent me anywhere! But it’s all right; I can return with this.” She smiled and pointed to the callback unit’s red emergency return button.
    “Oh yeah, we’ve already seen a demonstration of that handy little item this morning,” Wheeler said, “thanks to the Robins.” They laughed.
    “Speaking of returning,” Aurora said, standing, “there’s no reason to delay. I really should get back to my new home, in whatever shape it may be.” She stood and looked at Arty. “Besides, you can’t go home until I do.”
    “What, I can’t just press my return button too?”
    “You could, but that would just take you to my time.”
    “Sounds great,” Arty said enthusiastically. “I’d love to see it! You could show me around, introduce me to the wonders of the twenty-fourth century!”
    Aurora laughed gently. “Oh, Arty, I think not. You belong in your own time—we’ve changed history enough for one day. Besides, unless I miss my guess, I expect that you have some great things to accomplish.”
    “I guess we’ll see,” Arty smiled.
    Aurora nodded. “I’ll make sure they get you back safely to 2034.”
    Arty hugged Aurora gently. “Thank you,” he said. They felt another pair of arms around them as Robin joined the hug. “For everything,” Arty added quietly.
    Aurora