“Wake up Tyler. Wake upppp.” John was whispering in Tyler's ear. They were in seventh period. The second to last period of the school day. School had just about started for everyone. The beginning of October was the time when every kid was still getting to know their classes better and then beginning to hate the freshmen. John and Tyler were friends since the second grade. They were practically brothers. They would help each other out anytime, anywhere. Even if it was as simple as waking the other one up during a lecture. “Look if you don't wake up Bri will gently glance over here with her soft brown eyes, and she will see you….drooling all over your desk. That's one way to win a girl….I guess.”

“I'm up! I'm up. Don't worry, I never drool when I'm sleeping.” Tyler said in a whisper. “Ok, maybe just a little.” Tyler wiped the saliva off of his lip, and acted like he was writing with his head down.

The school bell rang like it did every day. Tyler hated routine and that was his life, a giant routine. He woke up in the morning, got ready for school, ate breakfast, got picked on by his older brother, and then went to school where he spent the whole day with the same classes and the same people. Tyler wanted more excitement in his life.

John stood up and gathered his things. “Alright well it's time for history. You can sleep there, we are watching a video about World War I today.”

Class was over and all the kids scrambled out of the classroom, while the teacher yelled to the class about an upcoming test.

John and Tyler walked through the halls heading for their lockers. Their lockers were right next to each other, which was a plus for them. They had just about the same classes, so they spent just about every day together. After school they would go over each other's house and do homework or play video games. The same routine, just about every day.

As they arrived at their lockers, Tyler wanted to see if John felt the same way about their boring life.

“John, do you ever feel like you are doing the same thing every day?”

John laughed, “Aw man did you start talking to Mr. G? The guy thinks he is in another world. He says after school he switches universes to see what happens if he doesn't eat a banana or something like that. If you ask me that guy shouldn't be teaching. Then he has that stupid coin tha-.”

Tyler closed his locker. “No no no, I'm talking about the excitement.”

“What excitement?” John asked while shoving books into his locker.

“Exactly! There isn't any! I wake in the morning and I do the same thing every single day. Maybe I'll have a different bowl of cereal in the morning. But, I feel like we need to do something different, go somewhere.”

John starts to laugh again. “You want to have an adventure? Man, did you watch Springbreakers last night? Cause let me tell you, that movie is-.”

“This isn't a joke John. You are always trying to be funny aren't you? I'm serious here man.” They began to walk to their history class.

“After school we need to do something. Something exciting. It's Friday man, no one stays home on a Friday!” Tyler never did anything on the weekend. He hated it. He was the one that stayed home on Fridays while everyone he knew went to the mall or someplace else.

“Fine, after school we will go to the skating rink. On Fridays, girls go there like like its a Austin Mahone concert.”

Tyler was pleased that they would finally do something other than play video games.

As they were walking down their school hallway Tyler saw something fall on the ground. It fell out of a student's pocket. Tyler tried to figure out who the student was, but he couldn't figure it out. He has actually never saw this guy before, however there were thousands of kids in the school. The kid was bald, and he was wearing all black. To Tyler's knowledge, no one in the school was bald. Except for Mr. Fredrick, but he was balding so that didn't count. Maybe he was one of the freshman.

“Did you see that Tyler?” John asked. “Something fell out of that kid's pocket.”

John ran to the object. “Hey kid! Bald dude! You dropped something!”

John picked up the silver object.

“What do you think it is?” Tyler asked.

It was a coin. None like they had ever seen before. It was bright and silver like a nickel. However, this wasn't a nickel. It had two heads and no tail side. The front and back of the coin were almost the same. The picture on the coin wasn't a president or anything. It was a big city. Just skyscrapers and other buildings on it. The other side had the same city except, that side wasn't a dark silver, it was a dirty silver. The buildings had holes in them and what looked like smoke and fire was rising to the sky. A year was written on the very bottom of the coin, under the buildings on both sides. It said ‘2020' on the bright side and ‘Alt. 2020' on the dark side. There were words on the coin where the sky was above the buildings. It read, ‘Same Beginning Different Ending.'

“Same Beginning Different Ending. what do you think it means? Is it a warning!?” John said twirling the coin through his fingers.

“Let me see that.” John handed Tyler the coin. Tyler looked at both sides of the coin. "Well they look the same. The cities I mean. It's just this one is being destroyed."

“So what kind of coin is it?

“John, I have no idea but I do know that if we don't get to class, Ms. Clark will literally murder us.”

The boys looked up and noticed that no one was in the hall besides them. They sprinted down the hall hoping they would make it on time.

After history class Tyler and John stuck to their plan and went skating. Tyler was on the skating ring waiting for John to come back.

“Why are we still here?” Tyler thought to himself. "We've been here for at least two hours. I can't believe I came here in the first place, I can't even skate! Well I wanted to do something different right?"

John came skating toward Tyler, and he looked confused. He was holding the mysterious coin still twirling it through his fingers.

“So, I went to go use this coin we found earlier. Guess what happened.”

“I'm guessing he didn't take it?” Tyler said to him.

“It's worthless! The guy laughed at me and asked me if it was a joke. “I almost got kicked out cause I wasn't joking.”

“Alright well I'll take it home I think my dad might know what it is.”

Tyler's dad was a scientist. He loved space, time, and atoms, and everything about them. He loved the idea of Quantum Mechanics. The study of space, time, matter, and energy and how they relate to each other. The main idea Tyler's dad likes to follow is “Quantum Universes”. Teenagers and fiction novels like to call them alternate universes. He also collects many types of coins.

“Well man, I'm going to go check out that chick over there in the red shirt. She's been looking at me for a while.”

Tyler laughed, “Alright, I'll be here when you get turned away.”

John skated off towards the girls. Tyler, still looking at the coin, wanted more answers. He hoped it would be something cool, and not something lame like a fake 3D printed coin or something.

2

“Son it's a fake coin. Someone must have made it in a 3D printer or something.”0

That was the answer Tyler was afraid of. “It has to be something more than that. Some strange kid in my school dropped it. We don't even have a 3D printer at school! You're a scientist there must be something you can do!”

“Son, everyone in your school is weird. How could you just pick that one kid out that you don't know and then call him strange? He could have been a new student. School just started, he could be one of the freshman. There are thousands of kids in your school. And just because I'm a scientist doesn't mean I know everything. I study time, matter, space and such. I can't tell you where a coin came from. But, it sure looks cool. Don't lose it.”

“Well if he doesn't know than I guess it must be nothing.” Tyler thought to himself. “This sucks, I wanted something new and interesting to happen in my life.”

Tyler jammed the coin into his jean pocket. He left the living room where his dad was watching T.V. and went upstairs. When he got into his room he felt his pocket vibrate. The pocket where he put the coin. It was vibrating vigorously and felt like he was getting a thigh massage. He reached into his pocket to get the coin. When he grabbed it, he noticed it was definitely the coin vibrating, and he wasn't having a spaz attack. The coin shook in his hand. He was very confused, he didn't know why it was shaking. Now, he knew that this coin had something else to it. He looked up and glanced around the room once. Something caught his attention in that quick glance. Something was wrong with his Avengers poster.

There was a giant black hole swirling inside of it. Not making a single noise. It was just spinning while the coin was shaking. Tyler didn't know how to react. He didn't want to tell his dad or his mom. He didn't want to go near it either.

“I guess this….is the adventure I was looking for….” He thought to himself.

He walked slowly towards the poster which was over his twin sized bed. He always watched movies and he would yell, “DON'T DO IT YOU IDIOT!” To the characters in the movie. Well this was one of those situations in the movies and he was doing exactly what they did.

He got closer and closer to the weird hole and he started to feel like it was a bad idea. It was too late now, he was inched away from the portal. He put his head in first to be different from the people in the movies who put their hand in first. He was immediately pulled into the portal. His room was empty and the hole in the poster disappeared.

4

Tyler woke up laying on the side of a building in a back alleyway. He got up and looked around.

“Where am I?”

Tyler walked out of the alleyway dazed and confused. He was in New York. The black hole had transported him to New York. However, this New York was different. It wasn't like the New York he knew. He used to hear cars beeping everywhere and taxi cabs driving around. He did hear cars and taxis but, he heard something else. Coming from the people that passed him on the sidewalk. They weren't speaking English. They weren't speaking Spanish. They were speaking German. One of his friends would talk to him on Xbox, and when his mom came in the room he would speak German to her. So, that's how Tyler could tell that they were speaking German.

Nonetheless, why was everyone speaking German? It wasn't just a few people, it was everyone that passed him. He walked down the sidewalk a little bit. He was in Times Square. The big Toy's R' Us was written in German. He couldn't understand the letters but, he spotted the giraffe.

Signs everywhere were written in German. Big TV screens on top of the stores had videos running like usual, but they were speaking German in the videos!

This was all too weird for Tyler. He didn't know what to do. He didn't know where he was. He didn't know why he was seeing this. He didn't even know if this was real. A crumbled up paper flew by his foot and got stuck like it was trying to tell him something.

“I swear I am in a movie.” He said out loud.

It was the front page of the newspaper. Tyler expected to see The New York Times written on the top of the paper. No, it read something in German. He looked for numbers. In the top left corner it said “Montag 17. Februar 2014”. Tyler knew it was February seventeenth before he was sucked into the weird portal.

Tyler didn't just wanted to go home. “So, I'm in the same day. But, everything is in German. I'm not in Germany though. I'm in New York. WHY IS EVERYTHING IN GERMAN?”

A man heard Tyler's yelling and understood him. He walked up behind Tyler and put his hand on his shoulder. Tyler was startled by this mysterious man.

The man was a white male who was dressed in a suit. A plain black suit jacket with a white shirt and a bright red tie. His hair stood up and the top curled to the left. He had glasses on and he looked confused.

“What are you yelling about son?”

Tyler was surprised he spoke English clearly. “Why is everyone speaking German?” Tyler said in a hurried tone.

The man looked even more confused. “Because we are under the control of Edmund Hitler.”

“Edmund Hitler?” Tyler said in a muddled tone.

“Where have you been kid? You seem like you came from a different world. Yes, Edmund Hitler son of Adolf Hitler. We are under his dictatorship. Hence all the swastikas. Where have you been living?”

Tyler looked around and noticed that there were swastikas everywhere.

“Wait a second, you don't seem like you are coming from the military school. Why are you out here? I should report you to the authorities. I could get in trouble for just talking to you.”

“What are you talking about? What military school?”

The man turned around and looked around for someone or something. Then something caught his attention behind Tyler. Tyler turned around and saw men in what must have been the police. They had batons out and they were getting closer and closer.

Tyler knew this was his time to start running. He began sprinting toward the alleyway he emerged from. He looked behind him as he was running, and the men were faster than him. They were getting closer. He turned sharply immediately into the alleyway.

Four more police men were running from the other end of the dirty alleyway. Tyler searched and searched for the coin. He couldn't find it. Then, he felt the coin vibrate in his left pocket. He grabbed it and looked around he didn't see any black hole on the walls. He looked down at the ground and saw a wet poster of what must have been Edmund Hitler with some German words below it that Tyler couldn't understand.

No matter. Tyler looked to his right and a German police officer was about to grab him. Tyler took a step forward and fell into the poster. Landing on a hard floor. His floor was a red carpet, so Tyler knew he didn't land in his room. He just hoped he wasn't still in German New York. He stood up and looked around. He was in a science lab. There were test tubes and beakers on tables and posters of equations and a universe poster. The room was relatively small and had papers everywhere scattered on top of the tables. The room was a mess.

A voice scared Tyler. “Wh-ho-where did you c-c-come from?”

Tyler turned to his right, and looked at the women in the white lab coat sitting down at a desk. He looked behind him and noticed he was standing in front of a wall with another poster that had a picture of the universe on it, with words written on it in English.

The woman was a brunette with brown eyes. She had glasses on that sat on her nose. Tyler began to walk over to her.

“Lady I was hoping you could tell me. I just came from a German America.” Tyler was spinning the coin between his fingers.

“Well as-…” The lady cut herself off. She stared straight at Tyler's coin as he was walking.

“What is that you got there kid.” She said to him.

“Oh it's a coin. Actually it's the coin that brought me here. It's has two cities on it and says-…”

The woman interrupted him “Same Beginning Different Ending”

Tyler stopped at the front of the woman's desk. “Yea… How did you know it said that?”

“That's the quantum coin.”

“Quantum coin?” Tyler questioned.

She stood up. “Yes, the coin that bring you to different world, alternate universes. It vibrates anytime you get close to a poster right?”

Tyler nodded his head.

“Alternate universes or different time lines. That's what I am studying. I have been looking for that coin for years now.”

“Why did you call it the Quantum coin?” Tyler asked.

The lady walked over to Tyler and examined the coin. “Quantum refers to quantum mechanics which is the study of energy and matter and their relative state. The coin is basically a gate way to other universes.”

Tyler looked at the coin again and wondered how any of this was possible. “I never even knew they existed. I mean I would always wonder if there were alternate universes.”

“Oh they are real kid. When you do an action you create numerous worlds where you hadn't done such action or a world where something went wrong with what you did. I could go on with many different outcomes. For example, say you were deciding that you wanted to go out to the store. Then you walked out the house. Right then and there you have created tons of different universes. The universe splits to accommodate the different outcomes of your trip to the store. There could be a universe where you decide that you don't want to go to the store. Or, a universe where you take a different route and you do something different than just going to the store. However, in these universes there is only one you. You cannot see an alternate version of yourself. That would ruin all of space and time.”

Tyler chuckled, “Well if this is true than I just saw what happened if we had lost World War one and it doesn't look good at all.”

“This is not a joke kid.” The woman said in a stern tone. “Now I have been looking for that coin for a long time. I had it and I lost it. I've been stuck in this universe. Now we need to use it to get you home and to get me home.”

“Whoa whoa what's the rush. What goes on in this universe?” Tyler backed away from the woman who still hadn't explained who she was.

“Go look for yourself.” She said. Tyler turned back to where he came from and made his way towards the window. When he got to the covered window he hesitated to uncover the window. He was afraid of what he was going to see.

“Well nothing could be worse than Nazi America right?” he asked himself.

“Tyler grabbed the wooded bored that laid on the window. Then he saw something that was indeed worse than Nazi America. He wasn't in America. He wasn't even on land. The building they were standing in was underwater. There were many other buildings in closed in chambers. The only problem was that there were men running through the chambers. They had guns and robotic suits on.

“We have to leave now kid!” The scientist screamed in a frantic voice.

“Who are you?! Why should I trust you?!” Tyler asked in a scared tone.

“Because I'm your only way out” The scientist answered.

They both headed straight for the steel door. It opened once they got close to the door. Tyler was amazed. He always dreamed about technology like this but never thought it would come true.

Once the door opened a man in a suit stood in the way. He looked familiar but Tyler couldn't quite remember him.

“You think you can come in here and steal our confidential files? Then you think you can get away with this-….” He paused and looked at Tyler. He glared deeply at Tyler.

“This is the kid. Arrest both of them.” Two androids walked into the room and grabbed the scientist and Tyler by the hands. They held on tight and put their hands in this bulb shaped container. Tyler dropped the coin on the ground. The robots and the man proceeded forward out of the room. Tyler was stuck in a time line that wasn't his own.