Authors: Allen Steele
Tags: #General, #Science Fiction, #Fiction, #Cultural Heritage, #Pueblo Indians, #Time Travel
“But . . .” David Murphy gaped at them in
astonishment. “This is 1998. You’re from 2314. You don’t have a clue where you’re going to go, what you’re going to . . .”
“Sure they do.” Zack Murphy turned toward him. “I’m staying with them.”
“You’re . . . what?”
Zack smiled. “What else am I supposed to do? Come home with you, claim I’m your long-lost uncle?” He shook his head. “No, I’m going where they’re going, wherever that is. This may not be my 1998, but it’s close enough. So far, we haven’t done too badly. The currency’s a little out of date, but we managed to buy some clothes, rent a car . . .” He frowned, then gave David a wry smile. “We’re running a little low on cash, though. Think you could spare a few bucks?”
David hesitated, then reached into his back pocket, pulled out his wallet. A ten, three fives, and two ones. “That’ll do for a start,” Zack said as he took the money and folded it into his pocket. “Thanks. If Donna asks where you’ve been, tell her the car died and you had to call for a tow.”
“And what about the ship? You’re going to have trouble hiding something this big.”
Vasili looked uncomfortable. He cleared his throat. “We’re not going to hide it,” he said. “We’re going to destroy it.”
Again, David’s mouth fell open in surprise. “Do you know what you’re saying? You’re going to maroon yourselves here.”
“I’m afraid so.” Franc appeared no less discomfited by the notion. “But again, we’ve got no other choice. As you just pointed out, we’d have trouble concealing it. Its chameleon requires a constant energy input, and once the batteries drained below a certain level it would become visible once more. There’s virtually no place on Earth where it could remain hidden without chance of discovery. Having someone stumble upon an operational timeship is far
too great a risk for us to take. So destroying
Oberon
is the only option.”
“I’ve already programmed the AI to fly it out of the atmosphere.” Metz’s eyes were sad, his voice bleak. “The chameleon will remain operational until it’s achieved orbit. After
Oberon
reaches space, it’ll open a wormhole that will take it straight into the Sun.”
“Once it’s destroyed,” Franc continued, “for all intents and purposes, it will have never existed.” He gazed at the pilot. “I’m sorry, Vasili,” he added quietly, “but it has to be done.”
Metz nodded, but said nothing. Franc turned back to David Murphy. “Which brings us to a final question. Besides us, you’re the only person who knows anything about this . . .”
“Are you asking if I can keep a secret?” He shrugged. “Who would believe me?”
“Someone probably would,” Zack said. “In fact, there’s a lot of people out there who would be only too willing to suspend their disbelief, if they had any in the first place. You may be tempted to write a book about all this. Maybe you’d get lucky and it would become a best-seller. In any case, you could stand to make a few bucks.”
Temptation stole across David Murphy’s face. Zack noticed it; he frowned and shook his head. “Don’t do it,” he said quietly. “I beg of you, please don’t. You don’t know the things I’ve seen, but if you did, you’d never contemplate such a thing.”
“All right, so I won’t,” David said, reluctantly. “I promise. Mum’s the word. But you know, and I know, that the idea of time travel is already out there. Destroying this ship won’t make any difference if someone is already trying to figure out how to build something like this.”
“Which is another reason why we’re staying here,” Zack replied. “To make sure that no one does.” He smiled grimly. “Remember, I’ve already been through all this. I know what to look for.” Then he raised a finger and shook
it at David. “And don’t think for an instant we’re going to forget about you. I know where you live.”
David didn’t reply. Franc studied him for a moment, then turned to the others. “I think that covers everything. Lea, is everything in the car?” She nodded, and he stood up. “Then it’s time to go.”
T
he storm had let up while they were in the timeship. Although the sky was still overcast, the only snow that fell was a few crystalline flakes the wind blew away from
Oberon
’s fuselage. Lea shuddered within her 1930s-style overcoat as she marched through the drifts away from the timeship. “I’m going to have to get used to this,” she murmured to Franc through chattering teeth, then she looked at Zack. “Is it always this way, this time of year?”
“Usually. Sorry.” He took off his baseball cap, gave it to her. “We can always head south. Florida’s pretty nice in January.”
David Murphy trailed behind them, reluctant to leave the timeship behind. As they approached the road, he stopped and turned around. Vasili Metz had just climbed down the ladder and was jogging away from the
Oberon.
He was the only one who didn’t have a coat, and he wrapped his arms around himself in a futile effort to stay warm. On sudden impulse, Murphy pulled off his parka, offered it to him as he approached. Metz regarded it with surprise, then gratefully accepted it with mumbled thanks.
They trudged through the snow to the cars. “Mind if I
borrow your brush?” Zack asked David, then he opened the left rear door of the Escort and found the long-handled ice scraper. He had just finished clearing the front and rear windows of the rental Chevy when they heard a low hum from somewhere behind him.
Murphy turned just in time to see the
Oberon
lift off. The hemispheres beneath its hull gleamed against the white pasture as the timeship slowly rose, the negmass drive whisking away sheets of snow from the ground below. The flanges folded up against the bottom of the saucer, and for a few seconds it seemed to David as if he were watching a scene from one of the fifties science fiction movies he had relished as a kid.
Then the
Oberon
faded from sight. The last impression they had of its passage from Earth was a vague shadow slightly darker than the sky, quickly disappearing into the night.
“Well . . . okay. Let’s go before we freeze to death.” Zack opened the Chevy’s rear passenger door, turned to help Lea inside. She stared at the place where the
Oberon
had once stood, then she allowed herself to be guided into the backseat.
Metz started to follow her, then he stopped. “I think this is yours,” he said to David, and began to pull off the parka.
“Keep it,” Murphy said. “You need it more than I do.” The former timeship pilot nodded, then climbed in behind Lea.
Zack shut the door behind him. “That’s awfully nice of you,” he said, “but wasn’t that a Christmas gift from Donna? Two years ago?”
“Umm . . . no, I bought it myself, at the outlet mall. Donna gave me a watch.” He grinned at Zack. “Maybe the convergences aren’t as close as we think.”
“I hope not.” He returned the smile, then handed the brush back to him, along with the keys to his own car. “Thanks, pal,” he said, extending his hand. “We’ll be in touch.”
Murphy hesitated, then shook hands with himself. “Take it easy, friend. Give me a call sometime.”
Neither of them seemed to know what to say next, so they left it at that. Zack turned and walked away.
Franc stood near the open front passenger door, still gazing into the sky. Murphy realized that he was looking upon a man lost in time, as homeless as any individual in history has ever been. When Franc lowered his face, Murphy noticed a faint wetness around his eyes. Franc saw him; he nodded once, distantly, then ducked his head and climbed into the car.
Murphy walked back to his own car, used the brush to clear the snow away from the windows. While his back was still turned, he heard Zack start the engine. The taillights flashed an amber glow across the windshield, then the tires crunched against the icepack as the car moved away, heading down the road out of the park.
Murphy resisted the impulse to watch them leave. Somehow, it seemed better that he not know which direction they were taking.
He was about to climb into his car when he detected a flash of light out of the corner of his eye. He turned around, saw an orb of light in the snow-covered pasture where the
Oberon
had rested. It remained for a moment, just long enough for him to realize what it was, then collapsed in upon itself like a mirage out of spacetime, finally disappearing with a faint thunderclap.
Murphy waited another moment, then he opened the car door and settled in behind the wheel. It had been a long Monday, and now it was time to go home.
For their assistance in the development of this novel, I’m grateful to the following individuals: Mark W. Tiedemann, Gregory Benford, Stanley Schmidt, Jim Young, Matt Visser, Scott Crawford, Ken Moore, Beth Gwinn, Judith Klein-Dial, my father-in-law Frank Jacobs, and my sister Rachel Steele.
As always, my wife Linda deserves special credit as my research assistant.
I also wish to thank my editor, Ginjer Buchanan, and my literary agent, Martha Millard.
—December, 1996–March, 1997;
St. Louis, Missouri; Sanibel, Florida December, 1998–June, 1999;
Whately, Massachusetts; Frankfurt, Germany
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