Nick decided that it would be a good time to end this. She emerged from the restroom to see Mike standing there waiting for her. "Look, I have to go," she said. "I'll give you a call if I can't get a room, okay?"
"But I was going to go with you to-- fine."
As soon as Nick was out of sight of Mike, he concentrated on returning home. Nothing happened except for a strange dizziness. The amulet didn't work! Could it be because he had changed the past? Would it ever start working again? There was no way to tell, and in the meantime, he was stuck in the past as Nikki.
He tried to remember exactly what time period he was in. This was around three years ago, when Mike had disappeared. It was shortly after he had gotten his first professional job and shortly before he had met Megan. Of course, the whole plan of changing the past relied on that anyway. If he had met Megan already, Mike (being his best friend) would have soon met her, or at least seen a picture of her--and then his reaction to Nikki wouldn't be "hey, a pretty girl", it would be "hey, isn't that Megan?"
Only now, what could he do? With Mike alive, in a few days the Nick of this time would probably introduce Mike to the Megan of this time--which would cause some really awkward questions.
Nick considered the possibilities. Play along with being a woman named "Nikki" for a while and run away later sounded like the best choice. After all, if he waits for later he could use the Medallion of Zulo to turn into someone other than Megan, opening more possibilities. Nikki went to an airport restaurant, sat down, waited for what seemed to be a long enough time, and called Mike on his cell phone--no, as long as he was claiming to be Nikki, her cell phone. Nick wasn't sure of all the technology behind cell phones, but it had looked like it was working, despite the time period, when the crooks got ahold of it.
"Hello?" said Mike.
"Hello," said Nikki. "I'm taking you up on your offer. You said you had gotten two beds but you promised not to do anything funny. I'll get to the hotel as soon as I can, I think there are a few more free cabs right now. You did finally manage to get one, right?"
"Yeah, I did, Nikki. But I need to ask you... why are you calling from Nick's cell phone?"
"I..." Now Nikki was at a loss for words. She had messed up. How could she possibly explain this?
