“You still don’t understand, do you? Diving takes energy, plenty of it. And rest. When can you get either, when every freeman, every ConFed, is chasing you?”
The doctor raised her eyebrows. Despite the dimness of the starlight, the gesture was clear.
“Look. The ConFeds fired my house, killed my father. Every gentry house from Inequital to beyond the damps has been destroyed, either by the Enemy or by the ConFeds or someone else. The Enemy and the looters destroyed most of the crops.” I could tell she still didn’t understand.
“What would you have done? A student, one set of clothes, no money, no valuables, no food, no friends … you know that a single word is enough to show you’re gentry. No skills to speak of and no family.
“I needed someplace to learn, to be fed, and to stop running.” I shook my head in exasperation. “Let’s go …”
“Where?”
“Back to your quarters.”
Chicchichhii
…
I smiled at the grossjay, then grabbed her hands, and dived. Grossjays never called at night.
“The woman …”
For an instant I had all I could do to force us under the now, but then the doctor relaxed just enough. Shadows converged on where we had stood, but not quickly enough. The troopers, ConFeds not under Colonel-General Odin Thor’s command, for I would have known their postings, were after either me or the doctor … the woman. But why?
With the blurriness of the view and my own lightheadedness, I had all I could do to concentrate on getting us back to the doctor’s quarters at the base.
On breakout, I released her hands, sat down, and took a long gulp of water from the goblet I had set on the table just minutes before.
“You are rather amazing, Sammis.”
I ignored the comment. I was still thinking about the strange ConFeds.
“Would you like something to eat, or do you have time?”
“Yes. There’s still a little time before I should go.”
As she turned, I studied her. Certainly her figure was youthful, far more youthful than her age—like my mother. Her face was unlined, also like my mother. Was that for whom the troops had been waiting? But why? Was she still alive, or did someone just think so?
I took the last mouthful of water from the heavy goblet, tilting it back to get the last drops. The incipient headache began to fade.
“Will these help?” She offered a tray of biscuits.
“Perfect.” I ate two at a single bite while she refilled the goblet. Another gulp, and another pair of biscuits, and another slow mouthful of water, and I began to feel normal.
“You ought to practice diving,” I told her.
She reseated herself on the edge of the other chair, after setting the tray on the front center of the table. “I still can’t see.”
“Can you tell red and blue, black and gold?”
“Yes, but nothing outside the undertime.”
“I couldn’t at first, either. It takes practice.”
“Yes. Perhaps we’ll have time to discuss that. Later.”
Her voice bore a faint huskiness, a trace of an accent or strangeness that seemed to come and go.
I still didn’t know what she had been doing—except that her project had something to do with using the diving ability to visit other planets—even planets in other stellar systems. Why was Odin Thor interested? And what were the other ConFeds doing?
“You’ve been hiding your ability.” Her tone was back to businesslike.
“Wouldn’t you?”
“Under the circumstances, it’s understandable. But I may be able to help you.”
“Oh?”
“What if I tested for the ability? The colonel-general wants to use mental travel to rebuild Westron.”
“How?” To say I was skeptical would have been an understatement. “It’s hard enough to carry yourself from point to point.”
“He doesn’t know, but he’s the type to grab for a useful tool even when he doesn’t know how it could be helpful.”
“Would you test all the ConFeds?”
“Why not? It might help remove some of the stigma. And I might find a few others.”
That was a thought worth pursuing … if diving could be sanctified by science …
“Oh … time for me to go.”
“Good-bye.” That was all she said, as if someone dropping by from nowhere and disappearing back into nowhere were the most commonplace of occurrences.
Good-bye. All my questions—almost all of them—remained unanswered.
“SAMMIS?”
At the time, I was trying to persuade an antique lathe to shave the tiniest edge of metal from one side of an unused generator casing in order to use it as a replacement for the original, which had shattered because Rarden had knocked a sledge into it. Some of the old metal was so brittle that it took scarcely more than a sharp blow to fragment it.
So much of the equipment Weldin had retrieved from the sealed
underground bunkers was in that state. Some of it had to have been predisaster—perhaps two millennia old.
“Sammis!”
“Just a moment.” I finally got the guide set the way I wanted and edged the casing into place. For someone who knew how to handle machinery, the adjustments would have been simple. I didn’t, and they weren’t.
One more pass, and the casing would fit the larger rotor shaft with adequate clearance, probably more than adequate clearance.
Rrrrrrrr … .
I cut the power to the lathe and turned. Weldin was standing there.
“Yes, sir.”
“After you get that fitted, get washed up, put on a clean uniform, and report to Janth.”
“Janth?” Nothing I did had anything to do with the assistant armorer.
“All of you rankers are being tested by that doctor who used to run the base. The colonel-general has ordered it.”
“Yes, sir.”
I must not have looked too happy.
Weldin added, “Don’t worry. If the doctor selects you, it will probably mean easier duty.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Just finish up, and do it, Sammis. Colonel-General’s orders.”
There I was, being rescued from the ConFeds, and acting as though I were being thrown to the Secos.
The modified generator casing fit, not that I had had any doubt. All that remained was for me to drill out another hole where it joined the base plate. Then I fastened the new casing over the rotors and windings and all the other parts I didn’t understand and fastened it in place. That gave us a functioning partial backup generator for the existing backup unit.
Next, I told Selioman before I left, to let him start out the testing.
“Why?”
“To be tested by that doctor … for something …”
Selioman shook his head. “Good luck. Whatever that is. I couldn’t tell what she was testing for.”
I shrugged.
Janth was pacing by the time I got to the armory. With him were Eltar and two men I’d seen, but didn’t know.
“Let’s go.” Janth didn’t even look at me as he paced out and down the corridor.
“Why so late?” Eltar’s voice was pleasant, not probing.
“Caught me in the middle of repairing a generator.”
Eltar nodded. He knew I was one of the few younger ConFeds who had any understanding of things mechanical or technical in nature. I didn’t, of course. I just understood plans and prints and could read manuals.
Outside the barracks waited an antique open-benched steamer. The driver was a junior Seco.
A breeze ruffled the tattered pennant on the front quarter panel, and a dull rumble of thunder echoed from the direction of Mount Persnol. The overhead clouds promised rain, but not for a while.
Janth sat beside the driver on the padded bench seat. He took off his beret after a gust of wind threatened to blow it off. Eltar and I took the third bench, the last one in the back, without any upholstery.
Wheeep … Thud!
The steamer lurched forward.
Eltar cracked his elbow on the sideboard. I merely put splinters into my palm by grabbing the top of the sideboard on my side.
“Damned Secos … .” muttered the man in front of me.
Eltar muttered something less polite … and less audible.
“Shut it down,” grumbled Janth. “All of you.”
The junior Seco’s shoulders slumped momentarily, as with a sigh. No Seco could have possibly have wanted to be isolated with a group of ConFeds. Although, as I thought about it, I had not seen any Secos except those attached to Dr. Relorn since the Enemy attacks had destroyed Westron.
Had they all been in Inequital when the Enemy had flattened it?
Some of the hills to the south were lit by a patch of sunlight pouring through an opening in the mostly cloudy sky. That one open space almost glittered, bright bluegreen. The clouds around it seethed, white and fluffy at the top and dirty dark gray at the bottom. Even as I watched, the clouds closed in and the distant sunlight began to fade.
The steam-wagon lurched uphill toward the laboratory complex.
“What’s this all about?”
“You’ll find out soon enough,” grumbled Janth.
The steamer continued to whistle and lurch its way up the gentle incline, scarcely any faster than we could have marched.
In front of the main entry, off another stone-paved and circular drive, waited a pair of Secos, each armed with a riot gun. They stepped back as we scrambled out, adjusting their grasp on their weapons.
“Line up.” Janth’s voice was calm.
Without another word, we marched in through the entry door, Janth leading the way. He’d obviously been through the drill.
We marched down the center corridor, all the way to the back of the laboratory, then turned left, along the corridor I had walked myself with the doctor, until we reached the laboratory.
There were no guards outside the open door, and Janth barely hesitated before leading us inside and toward the platform in the center of the room.
Directional lights suspended from the ceiling outlined the platform. Where we lined up waiting to go up the wooden steps to the platform was half-lit by the scattering of the platform lights.
Dr. Relorn, wearing some sort of golden-brown tunic, sat before that screen, her sandy hair glinting in the reflected light. From where I stood, she looked much younger than the subforcer behind her, and almost like a girl compared to the height of the burly head ConFed.
Colonel-General Odin Thor stood beside her with a bored look, his face mostly in shadows. I was standing behind Eltar, wondering how the doctor would use the array of equipment to determine who might be a timediver.
“Next.”
Janth nodded to Eltar, who stepped up on the platform.
Hmmmmmmm …
Bzzzzzzz
…
More from force of habit than for any other reason, I glanced at Eltar, first with my eyes, then with my thoughts, the way I did to dive under the now. None of the energy that surrounded me, or even Dr. Relorn, swirled around Eltar. He was just a quiet goldish blob.
Then I looked at the doctor—and the light swirls of gold and black eddied around her.
Another set of currents tugged at my mind, and I tried to scan the laboratory as well as I could without seeming too obvious.
Colonel-General Odin Thor! The head ConFed Marine himself was throwing off black and gold sparks in an undertime display that mirrored the doctor’s.
I managed to catch my dropping jaw and turn the movement into a yawn.
Only the doctor saw it, and she frowned but briefly while ostensibly studying her instruments.
We had never talked about undertime sight, and I wondered if the doctor saw what I did, or whether I was some sort of freak in being able to see the time energies.
But I needed to tell her about the colonel-general—or was that how he had found her to begin with? What was their relationship? In our brief discussion, we hadn’t talked about that either.
Right now, they were ignoring each other, but that didn’t necessarily mean anything. Were they lovers? Or had the whole thing been coincidence?
Why did it matter? The doctor’s private life was hers. So was the head ConFed’s, and they both moved in orbits far above my present status.
“Next … next!”
“Sammis.” Janth’s bored voice turned exasperated. “Where’s your mind, Trooper? Step up there.”
Everyone in the laboratory turned to look at me.
“Sorry, sir.” I stepped onto the platform.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm … cling, cling, cling!
Now, everyone was really looking at me. My nose itched, although the room couldn’t possibly have been dusty.
“Some potential here, Colonel-General.”
Odin Thor nodded calmly. “Doesn’t surprise me. Always looked like witch-spawn. Do you want him?”
“We’ll need some more tests …”
“He’s yours, on loan, as long as you need him.”
I tried to look puzzled, glancing from the colonel-general to Janth and back again. I opened my mouth, then closed it.
“Report to the doctor with your gear as soon as possible,” Odin Thor ordered me, before turning to Janth. “Armorer, list him as support services to the Far Travel Lab.”
“Off the platform, Trooper. Wait outside with the others who are done.”
I shook my head slowly, as I took the three steps down to the stone floor of the laboratory. I wanted to tell Dr. Relorn about Odin Thor, if only to get her reaction. But I couldn’t blurt out my discovery in front of everyone.
“Next …”
Outside, Eltar shook his head. “You going to be some sort of experimental type?”
“I don’t know. Odin Thor looked happy enough to be rid of me. Rarden will certainly be pleased.”
“What about you?”
“I don’t know.”
Janth came out of the laboratory.
“Sammis. Head back and clean out your gear. Be ready to go when the rest unload.”
That was it. Period. I was detailed to the Far Travel Lab and Dr. Relorn.