Can you go back in time and kill your own grandfather as a boy? Sure. Then someone else will spawn your genes. You will remember that person just as fondly as "grand-pere." Of course, all the details of your life will change, everything you know to be true will change, you yourself will change, and everything else will fit around these new facts. That is the operative theory of the travelers known as "Jongleurs du Temps," the Time Jugglers, the far-future masters of time's ever-branching river. On a Search mission from the 11th millennium, and posing as a little girl, Jongleur Merola Tsverin hunts for genetic samples among the varied populations of 21st century San Francisco. Along the way, Tsverin retrieves an artifact for a collector: a home-run baseball from 1998. Her theft sets off a chain of consequences which threaten the very shape of life on Earth. Merola finds herself trapped in the 21st century and seeks a way forward to her own "reference now." And when she fails to report in, her friend and mentor, Jongleur Chief Coel Rydin, works backward to find Merola, correct her mistake, and set the world right. This novel of science fantasy spans 360 million years in a thrilling ride through intricacies of metaphysics, evolution, retribution ... and baseball."