An instant after DTH Jon and DTH Karyn disappeared on their first hop the current DTH Jon and DTH Karyn reappeared in the same place.
"Where are we?" Karyn asked
"Back at the start point in my room. We've just left to go back up the timeline."
"It seems like a long time ago." she said. She took a look around the room. The stone was there and the piece of paper with the description of the DTH.
"I need time to think." Jon sat on the bed.
"Think about what?" Karyn asked as she sat down beside him.
"I know how to operate the DTH but we're left too unprepared to deal with the consequences. We could easily have been wiped out of existance in that dream reality."
"I suppose it's just a risk we have to take. Bad things sometimes happen. We don't control that, even in one reality."
"I know but we can take some reasonable precautions. The divergences can be predictable but the non-sequiturs aren't."
"Well the DTH shows you the non-sequiturs, so it's not a problem."
Jon sighed. "Not always"
"What?"
"That dream dimension showed up as a normal divergence. Remember flower petal divergence? It was created by a DTH, so if it wasn't for the pattern we wouldn't know about it either. I'm out of my depth Karyn, there is stuff I need to know."
"You could always," she paused, "use a wish."
"No! The stone is too powerful, there must be another option. Devices created by wishes are much more reliable like the DTH, or that cloning machine or the..." Jon became lost in his thoughts.
"Or the what?"
"It's obvious. The solution is the ARD!"
Jon grabbed his pad and began writing.
