As if it was on my behalf, Zoe did a double-take, gaping first at Al, then at me, then back to Al again.
I would’ve done likewise if I weren’t frozen with shock.

Zoe took over speaking duties.
“Seeing as he’s an iceberg now, I’ll ask: why did you do that, Al?”

Al spoke while still staring at me with those strange, unblinking eyes of his.
“Because the You that I know from 1.5 millenia from Now needed me to.”

I heard Al say this, but Zoe still had to speak for me. “So…Future Him got you to not only make a Past Him, but a parallel universe version of a Past Him, tell this Him nothing about the parallel universes that I assume you wound up telling those other Hims about?”
After struggling through all that, Zoe exhaled heavily in exasperation at the mind-twisting/time-twisting logic.

“Correct,” said Al.

“And why did Future Him get you to make those Hims do that to Present Him,” Zoe asked.

Ka…

“Because he could not know that he would be placed in a universe that was not his own.”

BOOM!