Praeger, Donahue and Davison investigate after the body of an elderly woman is found in the basement of a soon-to-be demolished apartment building. The mystery surrounding the corpse's appearance grows when Davison concludes that the woman, who's wearing "futuristic" apparel, died of massive injuries sustained after a long fall. Despite the fact that the basement ceiling is only eight feet high, the floor under the woman has buckled from the impact.
The next day, a second body is found in the building. This time it is that of a man wearing old-fashioned clothing dating back to the 1860s. In his pockets are coins from that time and an antique trimming knife. His corpse is full of shards of broken glass. Miles later determines that the glass is made of a substance that is used by NASA but is not yet commercially available.
Praeger and Donner visit Valerie Wells, the architect of the new building to be erected on the site. Although Wells can offer no clues as to what's going on, Praeger has an uneasy feeling that he has seen her before. Wells is anxious that their investigation conclude so she can get on with the construction of the new building. At Donner's request, Wells provides a diagram of the area in the 1800s. Apparently, the current building used to be a tannery.
Praeger and Axon re-examine the room where the woman's body was found. Suddenly, the doorway into the room turns into a solid brick wall and thick dust overtakes them. Gasping for air, they are about to break a window when the doorway clears and they are able to escape.
Axon and Miles meet with the OSIR team and present their theory as to what is going on in the building, namely, the Palimpsest Effect. Miles explains that palimpsest refers to text on parchment that has been erased. After the parchment is reused, some of the original text bleeds through. In this case, says Axon, the building site would be the parchment and the architecture would be the text. In other words, pieces of the past still exist in the present building.
Since palimpsest is sometimes readable through the use of ultraviolet light, Axon decides to conduct an experiment aiming an ultraviolet beam at the building in an attempt to recreate the circumstances under which the two bodies appeared. Axon's test is overly successful as a third person, this time very much alive, suddenly appears in the building. He, too, is from the 1860s. His name is Wallace Nelsan, a Union Army deserter. Sentenced to death, he had escaped from jail and was hiding out in the tannery when he was suddenly whisked away.
Praeger calls in remote viewer Kate Azzopardi who, in a session with Nelsan, "sees" not only the past but also the future, actually visiting Wells' yet-to-be-built office tower. Leaving the OSIR lab, Praeger and Azzopardi have a chance encounter with Wells. Like Praeger before, Azzopardi recognizes her and again "sees" the tower, where she finds an elderly woman??he same woman who died in the basement. She notices a strong resemblance between the woman and Wells, and suggests that Hendricks perform a psychological examination of Wells. He discovers that Wells possesses latent but exceptionally strong psycho-kinetic abilities that could affect time. The stress of trying to finish her new building before an incurable eye ailment leaves her blind may have triggered this ability and opened the time portal through which Nelsan and the others passed.
In an attempt to close the portal and hopefully return everyone to their proper place in history (or the future), Hendricks takes Wells to the morgue to see the body of the elderly woman. Gazing upon her, Wells realizes that she is indeed looking at herself. Shaken, she collapses. As Hendricks helps her to her feet they notice that the body of the woman has vanished as has the nearby body of the other man. Nelsan too suddenly vanishes, apparently returning to his proper place in time and to a date with the executioner. |
