TOC Part 21 EPILOGUE
In a dimly lit corner of a quiet room, a woman sat, curled up in a windowseat, leaning against a bookcase. Gently, tenderly, but with a hint of reluctance, she closed the battered and dusty old journal. There was more, but she told herself firmly that she'd read enough for one night. Carefully, she tucked it away on a shelf in a place of honor. The unassuming notebook seemed out of place, leaning as it was against an aged (though, oddly, not
too aged) signed first edition of "The Time Machine" (a book which, truth to tell, had gone unread for nearly as long as the journal), but she knew better than to judge the proverbial book by its cover.
Walking across the room, past the little reading cubbies with their wooden desks and built-in computer terminals, she made her way to the antique wooden conference table at the center of the room. She ran her hands lightly over the initials carved into the center. P.M. Everybody in the building knew what those stood for. The famous Phillip Manning, first director of their little organization. But now the others seemed just as familiar to her. D.N., A.V., I.V., K.T., B.B., A.M., E.H., and, of course, T.G. There were others, too, spiraling out from the middle. Someday, although she'd never admit it to anyone, she hoped to earn the right to add her own. Then again, the same was probably true of all her coworkers.
Her fingers paused over Tommy's initials, feeling the connection to the past. She shook her head. Phillip's early accounts, now mostly relegated to obscurity, had left a great deal to be desired. So much had been lost. She'd had no idea, when curiosity had sent her down below the archive stacks in the basement, just what she'd find. She'd been surprised to discover the unobtrusive little hatchway leading down to a forgotten level below the R-Z floor.
The place had been set up as a museum once, one open to a very small number of people. The ancient monitor set-up, ancestor of the current monitor room, had been carefully preserved behind a stasis field. Much of the rest, however, had been allowed to gather dust. She'd felt almost like an archeologist when she'd discovered the faded old bowl with the name "Socrates" painted on the side. Awe and excitement budding in her heart, she'd explored the rest of the little underground complex.
She'd found the journal buried under the debris of a collapsed shelf in one of the bedrooms. She'd skimmed the first few pages until the import of what she was seeing had settled in. Almost shaking with the shock of that realization, she'd clutched the treasure to her chest and headed back up to the new archive room in the back of the second floor.
There she'd sat, enthralled, soaking in the details of a long-lost secret history. Wells, it seemed, really
had been there from the beginning. That dangerous overprotective streak had been there nearly as long, too. She wondered again about The Baker Street Irregulars, who had come to be known as The Bakers. Was it just a coincidence, or...? She shook her head. It was a mystery which would have to wait. She had more to read, and much to share.
She turned back, looking longingly at the shelf in the back of the room, but then forced herself to turn away. Tomorrow promised to be a long day, she reminded herself as she started the long walk to the door. She sighed, annoyed with her own virtue. Practicality was just too deeply ingrained. She stopped suddenly, realizing that she'd been walking with the dejected stride of a child deprived of her favorite sweet. She laughed at herself, quietly. Perhaps not so deeply ingrained as all that.
Feeling inexplicably better, she made it to the door, which hadn't been as far as it'd seemed. Turning off the lights and closing the door behind her, Madge smiled. The journal had reconnected her with the past, something she and all of the Peacekeepers prized greatly, and the discovery of it held promise for a very exciting future.
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