“Bastards.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me: Bastards! Need me to say it again?”
“No, no. Who?”
“Did you see this article? Well, did you?”
“Which one?”
“Which one do you think? The one about the posthumous Nobel Prize given to Dr. Juarez for the ‘revolutionary discovery’ of Z-space. Bastards.”
“Ah. Yes. I meant to hide that.”
“Don’t patronize me; I don’t need your pity. I know the world is all agog at the promise of it. Oh, and blasted sainted Dr. Juarez. Oh, yes, let’s all worship him.”
“Look, I know that it’s a sore spot…”
“Sore spot? Damn right. At least the bastard is probably dead. Very painfully dead.”
“There was the Planet of the Oiled Slave Girls theory…”
“Hardly credible. Juarez was Canadian, after all.”
“Oh. Right.”
“But now it’s all about Z-space, and how wonderful Z-space is, and how we should all look to the future of Z-space. Bah!”
“Well, look. Past rivalries aside, it does look promising.”
“And my theories? So much refuse, is that it?”
“No, no, not at all. I didn’t mean that.”
“I was the one who came up with the original multi-dimensional transfer theories! I worked out the Unequally Infinite Universes equations!”
“Yes, yes…”
“I built, right there, out in the bunker, the Dimensional Transfer device!”
“Yes, of course…”
“I codified the theories; I solved the convoluted equations; I built the test device; I proved it! Proved it!”
“Professor, I think you need to have some tea. Some nice, minty tea?”
“I was the first human to test faster-than-light travel! Me! And what do I get?”
“With honey?”
“I got nothing! A little article in Discover!”
“Lemon?”
“No parades for me, oh, no. No Nobel Prize. No supermodels fighting for my attention!”
“Er…Professor, to be fair, Dr. Juarez didn’t get to enjoy his fame, either.”
“That’s entirely beside the point! He’s a goddamn saint, and look at me: reduced to a footnote.”
“Not to a footnote…”
“Don’t be funny.”
“Sorry.”
“After all I went through. All the work, all the late nights in the lab, all the suffering. And now this cruel confinement.”
“Oh, now, Professor, honestly. It could be worse. Look, you did an amazing thing! Your theories are sound. It’s simply that the Dimensional Transfer processes isn’t…uh…”
“What? Say it! Useful? Good? Worth a damn?”
“No, no. I was going to say…uh…’practical.’”
“It’s Science! ‘Practical’ has nothing to do with it!”
“I’m sorry, Professor. But I think that if you channeled your energies into something more positive. With your first-hand…er, in-depth experience and overall knowledge, you could become the leading expert on Z-space travel.”
“You’d have me sell out, wouldn’t you?”
“It’s not selling out. No, not at all. It’s merely changing your path to a new heading…er, sorry. I mean, simply adapting yourself to the course of the future, as it were.”
“Bah. I’ve seen the future. I’m intimately goddamn connected to the future, as you put it.”
“Yes, of course. And so you’re in a, um, unique position. If we meet aliens, for instance…”
“If? IF? I’ve met ‘em!”
“Professor, I didn’t mean…”
“How do you think I came to this, huh? You think I did this myself? Like those bastards in the so-called ‘Scientific Community’? Those sniveling, blinkered, nay-saying, monkey-paddling fools?”
“Monkey…?”
“Why don’t you explain it, then?”
“No, Professor, I didn’t mean it. Of course, no one disputes you. It’s just that, well, no one’s too keen on investigating, uh…”
“Aliens who send you back as a head in a jar? Is that it?”
“Well, yes. I mean, of course, everyone’s glad that they did. And, honestly, you couldn’t have known about the, um, smallish size of that particular transit universe. We really were cheering for the success of your theories.”
“Oh, thank you very much.”
“But, Professor, you can see why the whole Dimensional Transfer technology didn’t take off. Well, for human travel.”
“Oh, so I should be happy of what I’ve done for the noble science of package delivery, is that it?”
“Well, the patents have made you a very rich man, Professor. And mail delivery has never been as speedy, or as reliable. For fairly small packages, anyway…”
“Do you know what it’s like to be an extremely wealthy head in a jar?”
“Um.”
“Bastards, the lot of you.”
“I’m sure that Juarez died an extremely painful death, Professor. Hard vacuum and all.”
“Damn straight he did.”