The nausea isn't as all-consuming as usual when I crawl in my underwear across the air-conditioned lock-up to lie gasping and perspiring at its edge. I must be acclimating to time jumps.

Coherent thought's a luxury in these first few minutes so I simply wait for my breathing to steady and the shivering to kick in as the chequer plate metal floor absorbs whatever residual heat I possess. That way, at least I know I'm alive.

As the mind fog lifts and the hum of the cobalt fluorescent light replaces it, I haul myself to sit against one featureless wall of the empty box, hugging my legs for warmth. I try to focus, sluggish at first before restructuring neurons race, overtaking my ability to process them. Where had everything gone wrong? When was the skewpoint? Today? Last week? Am I losing my mind? Are the more frequent memory gaps a by-product of the jumps? Or do I just need sleep?

I rub my eyes. Dare to stand, slithering up the wall for support until the need to hurl subsides. Lunge for my drawstring bag and gracelessly dress, tugging the jeans and T-shirt over the boxers I'd jumped in; too hot for anything more.

Leaving the bag, I head for the exit, catching sight of myself in the CCTV screen adjacent to the door release. I glance up at the camera in the corner, run my hand through the sandy mop of hair, tug my Converse baseball cap on, then palm the large button and wait for the roller door to rattle up enough to duck beneath.

I know what needs to happen. No idea how to do it, but it has to be fixed.

When all I'd been doing was making money it had been easy. Just me tangled in my own quantum web. But I'd got sloppy. Complacent. And now lives were at stake. One in particular. The blunders I made yesterday or last month or… whenever, would collide again tonight unless something radical changes.

Visions flash through my head. The street. The knife. The pain etched on her face. The blood, so much blood. I shiver.

My many jumps to correct events or figure where I'd screwed up had ended in vain. Nothing ever changed, besides me looking like I'd gone three rounds with Thor's hammer.

As I tap the lock code, slam the button on the control panel outside StrongBox#158 and the gears grind to seal the room shut, I know options are running out.

It all starts and ends with her.

Talia.

~oOo~

I know where she'll be. Dante's Italian off Carlisle Road. Prescience is like that.

Out of sight from across the road, I watch her enter, take a window seat, sweep those auburn locks behind her ears, and lean over the table to scan the menu. So radiant. Smart. And a sexual firecracker. No wonder I'd fallen for her so hard in such a short space of time.

Space.

Time.

Nobody knew, including her. The lie about my sizeable lottery win was almost true. It's just the lottery happened to be the stock market, and I happened to know which stocks to short for the biggest gains. Without detection.

Or so I thought.

Figured opening multiple accounts was smart to spread the risk, using various addresses: work, home, my parents. Ensured I bet modestly. No windfalls, but enough to gradually amass a small fortune. Enough that I could refine the physics while Professor Barnes and I penned the paper that would make us household names, and I secretly built a better machine in the university basement. No cameras. No prying eyes. No observation, and that was crucial.

Despite the improvements, I still had no way of knowing exactly when I'd land, but that's the nature of quantum theory. If you know speed, you can't accurately predict position. If you know time you can't predict energy usage. But none of that mattered. The principles mattered.

All I needed was somewhere big and metal, so the margin of error was good enough I didn't end up fused with a wall or, in the case of my first jump, sprawled on the floor of the ladies' toilets at a 1986 university disco. Mercifully, the girls who found me thought my incoherence and vomiting were because I'd had a skinful.

So I rented the lock-up. Tested it with smaller jumpfields. Ventured into the recent past with baseball cap pulled low to reduce risks of being photographed. To further minimise traces of my presence, I used a public computer at the library to place a few trades based on stock fluctuation photos I'd taken on my phone, then returned to the lock-up and collapsed the experiment.

I allow myself a smile. For all its uncertainty, quantum physics could be so damn predictable.

Across the street I watch the bubbly waitress carry the coffee pot over. Charlene's new, and I swear AI. Nobody could be that cheerful in real life. Talia accepts milk and glances over her shoulder as the Venetian blinds on the door clang, probably to check if it's me. Or Victor, her possessive ex.

If only he knew the half of it. How Talia and I'd started chatting in Maestro's over the thumping beats. How we danced and flirted as the lasers swirled and the alcohol flowed, gradually drifting closer until we were almost touching, the rest of the clubbers melting away. How she made my insides fizz when I drew her to my body and brushed my lips to her neck, her ear, whispering how magnetic I found her. How she dragged me from the club and we didn't even make it to the taxi rank before slamming into a secluded shop doorway, lips fastened, hands clutching over and under clothes.

Her scent was intoxicating. Skin feminine and warm as I dug my hands into her panties beneath the floral sundress and gripped her bottom, lifting her against the wall and marking her neck with my teeth alongside the spaghetti straps. I'd scraped my forearms on the brick but barely noticed as she reached beneath herself and unbuckled me. Slid her hot hands over my engorged shaft, tugged her panties aside and guided me breathlessly to her wet entrance.

It was frenzied. Intimate. Dangerous and stupid given how many laws it broke. But neither of us could stop. With legs locked around me, she clawed my back and rode hard, rocking, grinding and bouncing between my buried length and the wall until she tensed and shuddered. Her stifled gasps in my ear triggered my climax deep inside her clenching heat.

We'd drifted, buzzing for goodness knows how long before disentangling to make ourselves presentable. Fled. Grabbed a cab to hers. Shed clothes up two flights of stairs en route to bed, then explored one another well into the early hours, and almost daily since. Boundaries fell as we experimented. Fingers, teeth, ice, rope, toys; everything in pursuit of pleasure. The one-night stand that hadn't yet ended.

Victor found out a few weeks later. Went apeshit. Threatened to get me kicked off campus because his uncle was Dean of Applied Sciences. Good luck with that, asshole. My thesis'll pay his wages for years. And there's not much semester left anyway.

Someone hurries past me and it takes a moment to snap into action.

"Hey!"

My previous self turns and gawps. Takes a step closer. "Jesus. This can't be good news. You look like shit."

My voice sounds odd outside my own head. Less bassy. Like a recording. He… I, identical besides his hoodie and the cap I'm wearing, steps away from the kerb out of sight of the restaurant.

I stiffen my jaw. Glance up the street at some kids hoverskating to impress a group of girls. "I have to fix something. Change plans with Talia."

My doppelganger furrows his brow. "Victor, right? The email yesterday?"

I piece the timeline a moment. Merely nod.

"Can I help?"

I puff my cheeks. "Probably safer if there's only one of us today. Could you hole up somewhere? Don't talk to anyone. I'll be gone by," I check my watch, somewhat redundantly, "half-eleven, all being well."

Meeting myself's not as weird as I expect. Neither of us go into shock like in Back To The Future, but I guess if you know you're messing around with time travel already, the impact's lessened.

He nods. "Why don't you go back? I'll change our plans."

"Maybe. But I've seen the wreckage, you haven't. And nothing so far has worked. No point retreading old ground."

I let that sink in.

"Okay. Sure you know what you're doing?"

I scratch my stubble. "Nope."

"Figures. Well, if you need a hand, call m… wait, we share a mobile number. How's the network gonna-"

"Got you covered." I wave my phone. "Burner SIM."

"Clever."

I smile, peeking around the corner at Talia. "I better… y'know. Can't keep the lady waiting."

"Yeah, course. I'd say see you around but that's..." He tails off.

"I know, right. Keep your head down."

I hand myself the baseball cap, round the corner without looking back, jog across the sun-kissed road and enter the restaurant. Slide into the moulded plastic seat across from her.

She doesn't have to say anything for me to know what she's thinking. I shrug. "Didn't get much sleep."

The laminated menu catches the sunlight and I glance down. "Let's order. Lemme guess." Pressing long fingertips to my temples, I shut my eyes and make a low, "Hmmmm," sound. "Linguini, right?"

When I snap my eyes open I can tell she's impressed. Her cheeks lift. The same way they did when she giggled after I walked my kisses down her body and feasted on her pretty, bare pussy. I remembered my first true taste of her like it was yesterday, but it was probably four months ago. Maybe longer.

We'd been rolling and swapping places on the three-quarter bed in the loft room of her student digs, battling for control in a tangle of limbs and play bites when I'd managed to pin her down, both of us breathing heavily. The skylight sun cast her freckles in a golden hue, the ensuing kiss tasting of mint and raw intent.

"You're mine now."

"Only if you can keep me here."

"Is that a challenge?"

She beamed and I sat up, clamping her torso between my thighs. Grabbed the hem of her T-shirt and tugged it up towards the pillow. She wriggled. Her left arm was last to exit the garment so I held it, spun the material like a lasso over the edge of the bed and looped it around her wrist, tying it off. Heaved the free end up and hooked the collar over the brass headboard finial.

"There. You struggle, you rip it. And I bet you like that top."

Her eyes flashed, desire raging. Reaching for the hem of my own T-shirt, I yanked it off and did the same with her other wrist as she mock protested while eyeing my chest hungrily.

"Miss Talia Petrenko," I trailed my fingertips down the soft inner flesh of her arm, goosebumps forming, "prepare to be ruined."

She laughed. A contagious lilt that made her breasts shake in the lacy bra. I brushed their sides on my way down to unsnap her jeans, button by button, inching myself back with each one and lowering my face towards the mauve material until the heat from beneath registered against my lips.

My eyes never left hers as I kissed the moistening fabric. Then slender tummy. Twitching thighs. Sensitive toes. I took my time. Made her squirm. There's something magical about watching a woman gradually lose complete focus. Lose her sense of place in the world and become swept up in the moment. To give in to need. To beg.

Peeling off her underwear, my tongue and teeth took over. I adored the way Talia begged. She did so with her entire being, malachite-tinted irises widening as I nibbled my way across her skin to end millimetres from her clit, skimming it with only my breath. Her legs gripped and released my head. The sinew in her arms tensed against the bonds. Belly muscles tightened with each twist. And the thirst… that thirst burned behind her eyes.

Fuck, her scent was amazing. Rich and aromatic with a tequila tang that swirled as I lapped her slit. Her essence coated my lips when I French kissed her pussy and let it fill my senses, my tongue probing her core, drinking every juicy atom she surrendered.

When I introduced my fingers, she growled. When I curled them up, she moaned, opaque cream oozing into my palm. I devoured her zest. It drove me on, possessed me, as did her escalating cries and the way her curvaceous upper lip trembled when I wrapped her clit with my mouth and sucked her quivering jewel.

I didn't hold back, and neither did she, drenching my chin and the sheets as she giggled. I'd never felt so alive.

"Matt? Matthew?"

I focus. Realise Charlene's hovering with her tablet. "Sorry. One linguini. And I'll take the calzone, please."

She taps. Chirps, "Our pleasure," before scuttling off. Definitely AI.

Talia cocks her head. "What is it? You seem… preoccupied." Her inflection gives away her Ukrainian roots. So damn sexy.

"Nothing. Just…"

I want to tell her not to go out with me tonight. To avoid the movie so we won't run into Victor who'd somehow unearthed what I was doing. Vindictive bastard had demanded cash for his silence. A lot of cash I wasn't going to yield.

Tonight, he'd find me. Give chase. And in the ensuing tussle, Talia will be stabbed. My gut wrenches at the memories of stroking the damp hair plastered to her face, her breaths shortening as she slipped away in my lap. The gaping chasm it tore inside me. I can’t let that happen to the girl I want to spend my life with. Won't.

I'd tried covering my tracks better. Jumping twice, sneaking back after I'd left the library and erasing browser data. Other days I sat and watched Victor watching me, to figure out how he latched onto my scheme. Followed him. Found nothing.

Direct intervention's an option, but I have no idea how to go about it. I'm not a killer. Muscle can be bought from the small ads of disreputable publications, but that has far more potential to backfire. Not least police entrapment.

Treading gingerly's frustrating. Intercepting myself was my last real hope. I have to make it count.

I reach across the striped red tablecloth and stroke the back of her hand. "We should stay in tonight."

"And miss the last showing?"

"I know, but…" I should have prepared a reason. "We could… play?" Leaning in, I whisper: "Wanna blindfold you. Make you twitch and scream under my wandering tongue."

She smiles. "We could if it helps you relax. Is it your research?"

I nod.

"So tell me. What's up?"

"You wouldn't believe me." I sigh.

"Tell me anyway. I like to hear you talk."

She flashes me that impish smile. The one that makes my heart flutter. The one that fleetingly crosses her face before she dies.

"God, Talia. It's all gone wrong. I'm sorry."

I can't tell her. But owe her an explanation on some level. Perhaps there is no changing fate. Perhaps events always find a way to re-stitch my timeline. If so, short of jumping every day and risking further side effects and health deterioration, it might be my last afternoon with her.

That thought cyclones through my head. I swipe at my eye before the tear forms fully. Take a breath. "Okay. You want the short or long version?"

"Dinner's not yet here." She grins.

I withdraw my hand and tap the table with a fingertip. "I've… stumbled on a way to wind back time."

She leans forward, accentuating cleavage, and hushes her voice. "Really? You have a DeLorean outside? Let's go!"

It's my turn to smile. "Not as sexy."

"How then?"

"You really wanna know? It's heavy Physics."

"Please! My English knowledge is better than yours. You might be surprised."

That's true. She's full of surprises, in and out of the bedroom.

"Okay. Physicists have been trying for decades to break the light barrier, and cheat time. Nobody figured that going waaaay slower would work."

She blinks.

"I figured it out, along with my tutor. The theory was sound, even though Barnes and I couldn't prove it. She wanted to publish a paper. I wanted funding to try it first. We met in the middle. Made a gravity capsule from parts begged and scraped together from other labs. And it worked." I stroke my stubble. "We sent a grapefruit back. No idea where, or when, it ended up. Hopefully in someone's fruit bowl and not the motorway."

Charlene brings the meals over and we begin. The calzone is fiery. Delicious.

"Anyway, we started to write the paper. Barnes doesn't know I scaled up in the meantime. And tried it out. Just once. Then twice. Then… more."

I watch Talia chewing. Find myself focusing on her lips. The things she'd done with them. My cock stirs beneath the table at the recollection of her naked on her knees, gazing up at me, hands behind her back. That trust. That energy crackling between us as I eased into her mouth, watching her adjust to the invasion. What a rush.

After a few tries she controlled her reflexes and took me into her throat. My god. So beautiful, wide eyes watering, spluttering cheeks around my girth, her expression demonstrating the need to watch me lose control. To wield that power over me from such a subservient position.

We went at her pace, slow, gentle, slithering out all the way until only webs of saliva connected us. I stroked her cheek, brushed strands of hair from her temple, gripped her ponytail and guided in again, deeper. Held her there, delicious wet, gurgling sounds bouncing around the bedroom as she engulfed me. Choked. I loved how she'd nod and take more when I granted her breath and asked if she was my girl. My slut.

Being used made her drip. I could smell her arousal. Craved to devour her after I'd finished fucking her mouth with strong, measured strokes. Our eyes never unlocked for more than a split second until I groaned, yanking free and gripping my cock as I fired white-hot stripes across her outstretched tongue, her eyes blazing.

She truly was a dirty livewire.

I shake my head, load a forkful of pizza. Damn focus is everywhere.

Talia eyes me. "So how does it work?"

"You heard of Young's slits experiment?"

"No. Sounds rude."

I place the salt, pepper and sugar containers in a line with a finger's width between each. "Turns out light does crazy things when slowed down and nobody's looking. Here's a question: if I fired one single light particle at the slits, which one would it go through?"

Talia shrugs and wordlessly points between the salt and pepper pots.

"Yep." She beams at getting it right. "But based on cutting edge probability theory and results from Young's experiment, science's best guess is that each light particle actually goes through both slits at once. Greedy buggers can't choose."

She stops eating to process it. Twirls her fork in the air. "How?"

"Nobody knows. What's crazier is that if you try and detect for sure which slit a particle went through, they panic and pick one. The act of looking forces them to decide."

"That's ridiculous."

"Mental. But that's not important. The concept is. See, if nobody looks here, and here," I indicate her side of the slits, "then anything fired from this side appears in two places at once."

"Like, a clone?"

"Yeah. So if I sit in a dark room and use some expensive kit to fire a projection of me at my side of the slits, I appear twice on your side of the slits. Me, plus a copy."

Talia stares wide-eyed at me. "That's seriously cool."

I become more animated. "It gets cooler. On its own, that's not super useful. Who needs two of me, right?" I chuckle. "But if I create some huge, localized gravitational field behind one of the slits, space-time bends in proportion to the size of the gravity."

"What?! So you appear here," she points between the salt and pepper pots, "and you appear here," she points between the pepper pot and sugar, "but… somewhere else?"

"Precisely. Somewhere else in space-time. The size of the field controls how far away my copy materialises, in distance and time."

"Jesus. And it works?"

I put down my cutlery and wave my hands up and down in front of myself, grinning.

Talia recoils, scraping her chair across the floor and causing everyone to momentarily look our way. "No!"

I say nothing as she cautiously reaches out and brushes my skin. "So, this isn't," she whispers the last word, "you?"

"It's me alright. But the me you fucked this morning is at home. And me," I point at my skull, "is in a chair, mildly sedated in the basement of the uni, next Thursday."

She carries on eyeing me and pulls her chair in closer to the table. Not all the way. "Fuuuuck. So how do you… get back?"

"That bit's easy. The act of observing the experiment forces light to choose a slit, and I disappear from here instantly. I signal the lab from my phone, which wakes me. Look at the slits, boom, I'm gone."

Talia stares. "Wow. But..."

I laugh. "Yeah. Dangerous. I built a failsafe. A timer that turns the sedation off and the lights on."

Finishing the calzone, I put my knife and fork together.

"My God, Matt, you're crazy." She finishes her last mouthful. "So why are you here?"

My eyes find hers. Fuck it.

I signal Charlene for the bill. "For that, you'll need to trust me."

~oOo~

She takes news of my stock scam and her impending death fairly well. Suspect her tendency to thrive on risk helps. I answer a few of her questions:

What if I die here? No idea.

Can I take stuff back? Only thoughts.

What are we going to do about Victor?

We discuss that one hand-in-hand in the leafy park as joggers and dog walkers make circuits. She ultimately talks me into going through with it: "He'll catch up with us sometime. Might as well be today because we know how it's going to happen, so we can control it."

She has a point, but given my failed attempts so far, I don't share her optimism.

As twilight approaches, she returns home to change. I while away the time on a park bench, thinking, worrying, skimming stones across the pond and watching the ripples fan and mingle in chaotic patterns.

Talia returns in skinny jeans, tight T-shirt, and ankle boots. Svelte and stunning. We don't see much of the movie from the back row. She pops the button on my jeans, snakes her hand in to fondle me to hardness, gently scratching her nails up and down the sides of my cock. Slides lower to stroke the sensitive skin of my balls. I try to unsnap her jeans, but she stops me, whispering, "My treat."

She keeps me on edge for almost an hour, building, teasing, pausing, stroking until I stiffen and come in her palm, stifling my groans during a noisy action scene. She laps up my seed and we kiss again, sharing the saltiness. When the movie ends, I pray this isn't the end of ours.

It's raining when we leave the cinema. I grip her hand tight and we cross the road, weaving between traffic.

No Victor.

We stride beyond where he'd accosted us before. Way past the spot where Talia died, and a spark of hope lights inside me. Maybe the act of sharing the future has finally altered it. A tiny ripple that disrupts the timeline. We speed up, until:

"Got my money?"

Victor. All muscle in a faded Pendulum T-shirt and khakis.

I shuffle between him and Talia. "Look, Victor, I think you've misunderstood. I don't have-"

"Don't play dumb. My ol' man runs the company you defrauded with your little scheme. Thought you'd been clever spreading options, but you fucked up. Shorted us twice."

He must see the colour draining or cogs turning in my head. Sneers, "What, you don't think trades are tracked? I checked. And who should show up every day at the library? You."

"Victor…" I start to back away.

"Dunno how you're doing it, science boy, but I want our money back, plus twenty-five percent or you're going away for a long time."

Talia slips her hand in mine. Tugs imperceptibly. Time seems to pause, elongating like a coiled spring under load, then snaps when she whispers, "Run," and sprints off back the way we came. I follow.

Victor gives chase.

Darting between indignant pedestrians and street furniture, we tear up Ingram Street, splashing through puddles. Talia's way fitter than me but I keep up. Beyond the cinema, past Ling's on the corner, she ducks into an alley that makes my heart tank.

A dead end.

"Fuck!"

We whirl and Victor's there, advancing. He reaches into his pocket and flicks the blade. It glints in the sole light at the mouth of the alley.

"Money."

Talia squirms from my grasp and rounds me. "Drop it, Vic!" Her voice bounces off the brickwork and metal bins.

They square against one another. He takes another step.

She makes the tiniest movement. I yell, "Talia, no!" but before I can stop her, she launches herself at Victor, fists flailing. He's clearly surprised. Doesn't stop the sickening crunch of the knife entering her abdomen. Nor her stumbling back to sink between us.

I race to her side, blood oozing past the painted fingertips that clutch her stomach. Her face is contorted and she grimaces, staring hard at the open-mouthed Victor. "Run, asshole," she spits. "Or you're going away for a long time."

He dithers only momentarily. Runs when she slumps into my lap, her breathing shallow.

I stroke her cheek, "Fuck, Talia. What was that for?"

A fat tear splashes to her neck. She flinches. Cracks open an eye. Grins. "Has he gone?"

"Jesus! You little…" My heart thumps.

She pulls a hardback from her waistband, a burst red sachet taped around it, and sits up. "Knowing the future's handy."

I exhale and run a hand through my damp hair, relief flooding. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Hopping up and dragging me to the far corner of the alley beneath an overhanging brick canopy, she laughs, "And miss out on this?"

Back to the wall, she kisses me, wrapping her arms around my waist. Immediate need rockets between us. In the shadows, I slide my hands up to cup her breasts, squeezing and pinching. Talia gasps into the kiss and trails her fingertips to stroke my cock through my jeans. I harden as she unbuckles me, slithering the belt free of the loops while I journey to grasp her neck and tilt up her chin, placing tiny bites across her throat. My lips vibrate with her groans.

I spin her to face the wall, her palms slapping the wet brickwork. Roving my hands to her waistband, I unsnap her jeans, tugging them and her panties to mid-thigh.

In her ear I growl, "You're mine."

Crouching, I shower her glorious rain-dappled bottom in kisses, delivering playful slaps and nibbles as she moans.

When I stand, she surprises me once more, gazing intently, offering my belt end that she's looped around her neck, pulled taut. I suck in frigid night air, cock surging as my eyes find hers in the gloom, sparkling with want. Taking the belt, our fingertips brushing, electricity sparking, I tug it a fraction. Her sharp inhalation rings out.

"Yesss. Fuck me, Matt. Like there's no tomorrow."

I grab her hips, tilt them towards me. Bend to her ear and hiss. "You want it hard?" She nods. "You want it-" I spank her bum, swipe my rigid shaft between her thighs and nudge her dripping slit. "Rough?"

My cock sinks home and she gasps. I draw out, slam back into her, setting a furious pace, clutching her hips and sporadically yanking the belt tight around her throat as she rasps, "More."

Talia uses the wall as leverage to repeatedly shove back into me, wet slaps of flesh on flesh echoing beneath desperate breaths. She snarls to be used. Fucked, coaxing me to fill your filthy little slut. I hammer inside. Spank her ass, the rose glow even detectable within the sodium shadows cast down the alleyway.

God, she's too much. I surge. Groan. Dig nails into her hips and claim her buttery walls while she gurgles constricted appreciation into the night.

The belt goes limp, dangling as we catch our breath in the rain. Spunk drips into her panties when I withdraw. Twisting her jaw to me, we laugh into the kiss before I crouch to tongue our sexy mess and pull her clothes up.

Redressing myself in front of her watchful gaze, I take the lead, hauling us from the alley. We hold hands at its mouth, sharing a final salty kiss as I gradually back away from her grasp. "Until tomorrow."

"Tomorrow."

As I turn and race to the lock-up I have no idea what the future holds. Lie low, I guess. Graduate. Settle with Talia somewhere.

There's one remaining dilemma, largely ethical: destroy evidence of the working device and downplay the findings, or fully finish the thesis and pray the world is better prepared for time travel than me.

I signal from the cobalt blue box. Stare up at the camera, decision made, and vanish.