The Difference Between You And Me {Petekey}

Chapter seventeen

Maybe that was why not knowing the future made Mikey so distressed. Because he was in the past, he usually could know roughly what would happen next, because he had lived through the consequences of that event. Now, there was absolutely no knowing. Was this how people navigated the progression of time before Travelling through it was not only proved possible, but capitalized upon to the point where most citizens had seen the past in some capacity?

It was such an odd thing, too- people had always wondered what it would be like to go and visit the past again. They wrote stories about aliens and humans alike who had the power to visit the past or future, even when the most trusted physicists had 'proven' it could never be a reality. 

Maybe that was human nature - everyone wanted to know about alternate realities (which they likely did not believe in) where people they could relate to themselves could do things that seemed extraordinary and completely genius. 

As he pondered this, Mikey lay in his tent, listening to the soothing rhythm of Gerard breathing. If Gerard found out he was from the future, how would he handle it? Mikey wanted to think he would just adapt to it and accept it, but he had a feeling that these people just weren't ready for their entire worldview to change so drastically. Maybe the reason humans didn't discover that they could time travel until a few years before Mikey was born was that they just wouldn't be able to handle it. Or maybe that was just Mikey pretending he was somehow superior to the people living in this time. 

They definitely knew their way around better than he did, probably a result of living there their entire lives, but for some reason Mikey wanted so badly to be better than them, to have the upper hand in some way. These people were nothing different from the types of people he encountered in 2143, but the aura that surrounded them always seemed to be more intimidating.

Mikey shook his head at that thought. What was he doing? None of that made sense. Although, neither should his presence in 1943, maybe he was just trying to make something make sense. 

The rhetorical thinking passed the time well, though. It was an easy thing to do while he waited for Gerard to start talking to him again, as he waited for Pete to find him, as he waited for June to come, when he would be sent off to fight in the war. 

He got off of his mattress, where he was sitting, to go to the recreation hall, where he could play chess. It would at least keep him from trying to be fake poetic, at least. He got there agonizingly slow, it seemed, he didn't usually take that long to get to the place. He finally arrived, but when he looked up, all he could see was a tent. Frank's old tent, now inhabited by somebody else. He stood there for a minute, asking himself why he was there and why he let himself go there, when someone poked their head out of the tent.

"What do you want?" A man asked, clearly annoyed. His hair was dark and he looked at least a few years younger than Mikey. He wouldn't doubt that he had lied about his age. He was new, probably Frank's replacement, yet he already was talking to Mikey, who was older and more experienced, with no fear at all. Maybe he had relatives in the military. 

"Sorry, I- I just saw an interesting bird. Up in the tree," Mikey muttered, pointing weakly at the tree. The younger guy snorted.

"Can you do that away from my tent? I'm trying to sleep and you're creeping me the fuck out."

"Yeah," Mikey said, moving away, hands in his pockets. "Sorry."

The guy ducked back into the tent, rolling his eyes. Mikey walked to the rec hall, making sure that was where he was going. How the hell did he end up going to Frank's tent? He wasn't thinking of him at all, he was just thinking of clearing his mind with a game of chess, none of which had to do with Frank.