“Why do you ask?” Ariston said.
“There is a tiny subatomic particle which Earth scientists call the neutrino,” Wolff answered. “It’s an uncharged particle with zero rest mass. Do you know what I’m talking about?”
All shook their heads. Luvah said, “You know we were all exceedingly well educated at one time, Jadawin. But it has been thousands of years since we took any interest in science except to use the devices we had at hand for our purposes.”
“You are indeed a bunch of ignorant gods,” Wolff said. “The most poweerful beings of the cosmos, yet barbaric, illiterate divinities.”
“What has that got to do with our present situation?” Enion said. “And why do you insult us? You yourself said we must quit these insults if we are to survive.”
“Forgive me,” Wolff said. “It’s just that I am sometimes overwhelmed at the discrepancy … never mind. Anyway, the neutrino behaves rather peculiarly. In such a manner, in fact, that it might be said to go backward in time.”
“It really does?” Palamabron said.
“I doubt it. But it’s behavior can be described in time-travel terms, whether the neutrino actually does go into reverse chronological gear or not.”
“I believe the same applies to those beasts out there. Maybe they can go forward or backwards in time. Perhaps Urizen had the power to create such animals. I doubt it. He may have found them in some universe we don’t know about and imported them.”
“Whatever their origin, they do have an ability which makes them seem to hop around in time. Within a three-second limit, I’d say.”
He drew a circle in the dirt with the end of his stick. “This represents the single animal we first saw.”
He drew a line from it and described another circle at its end. “This represents the disappearance of it, its nonexistence in our time. It was going forward in time, or seemed to.”
“I’ll swear it was not gone for three seconds when it first disappeared,” Vala said.
Wolff extended a line from the second circle and made a third circle at its end. Then he scratched a line at right angles to it, and bent it back to a position opposite the second circle.
It leaped forward into time, or can be described as doing so. Then it went back to the time-slot it did not occupy when it made the first jump. Thus, we saw a beast for six seconds but did not know that it had gone forward and backward.
“Then the animal—let’s call it a tempusfudger—jumped forward again to the time at which its first—avatar—had come out of the first jump.
“Now we have two. The same animal, fissioned by time-travel.”
“One jumped the three seconds forward again, and we did not see it during that time. The other did not jump but ran about. It jumped when tempusfudger No. 2 reappeared.
“Only No. 1 also jumped back just as No. 2 came out of the time-hop. So we have two again.”
“But all of a sudden there were five?” Rintrah said.
“Let’s see. We had two. Now No. 1 had made a jump, and he was one of the five. He jumped back to be one of the previous two. Then he jumped forward again to become No. 3 of the five.”
“No. 2 had jumped, when there was only one tempusfudger, to become No. 2 of the five. No. 1 and No. 2 jumped forward and then back to also become No. 4 and 5 of the five.”
“No. 4 and 5 then jumped ahead to the period when there were only two. Meanwhile, No. 1 had leaped over three seconds, No. 4 didn’t leap, and No. 5 did. So there were only two at that instant.”
He grinned at their lax faces. “Now do you understand?”
“That’s impossible,” Tharmas said. “Time-travel! You know it’s impossible!”
“Sure, I know. But if these animals aren’t time-traveling, what are they doing? You don’t know any more than I do. So, if I can describe their behavior as chronosaltation, and the description helps us catch them, why object?”
“Why don’t you use your beamer?” Rintrah said. “We’re all very hungry. I’m weak after chasing those flickering on-again-off-again things.”
Wolff shrugged and arose and walked towards the fudgers. They continued eating but kept watching him. When he was within thirty yards, they hopped away. He followed them until they were getting close to the blind wall of the canyon. They scattered. He put the beamer on half-power and aimed at one.
Perhaps the tempusfudger was startled by the raising of the weapon. It disappeared just as he fired, and the beam’s energy was absorbed by a boulder beyond it.
He cursed, flicked off the power, and aimed at another. This leaped to one side and avoided the first shot. He kept the power on and swung the beam to catch it. The animal jumped again, narrowly escaping the ray. Wolff twisted his wrist to bring the fudger within touch of the beam. The animal disappeared.
Quickly, he swung the weapon back towards the others. A fudger sprang across his field of vision, and he brought the white ray upon it.
It disappeared at the same time. There was a shout behind him. He turned to see the Lords pointing at a dead animal a few yards to his left. It lay in a heap, its fur scorched.
He blinked. Vala came running and said, “It dropped out of the air; it was dead and cooked when it hit the ground.”
“But I didn’t hit anything except just now,” he said. “And the animal I hit hasn’t reappeared yet.”
“That fudger was dead on arrival three seconds ago, maybe a little more,” she said. “Three seconds before you hit the other.”
She stopped, grinned, and said, “What do I mean … other? It’s the same one you hit. Killed before you hit it. Or just as you hit it. Only it jumped back.”
Wolff said, slowly, “You’re telling me I killed it first, then shot it.”
“No, not really. But it looked that way. Oh, I don’t know. I’m confused.”
“Anyway, we have something to eat,” he said. “But not much. There’s not enough meat there to satisfy us.”
He whirled and brought the beam around to describe a horizontal arc. It struck some rocks, then came to a fudger. And the beam went out.
He continued to aim the beamer steadily at the fudger, which stood poised upon its hind legs, its big eyes blinking.
“The power’s gone,” he said. He ejected the power pack and stuck the beamer into his belt. It was useless now, but he had no intention of throwing it away. The time might come when he would get his hands on some fresh packs.
He wanted to continue the hunt with sticks. The others vetoed him. Weak and hungry, they needed food at once. Although the meat was half-charred, they devoured it greedily. Their bellies quit rumbling a little. They rested a moment, then got to their feet and went after the tempusfudgers again.
Their plan was to spread out in a wide circle which would contract to bring all the animals within reach of the clubs. The fudgers began hopping wildly and flickering in and out of existence … or time. At one moment, there were none, when all must have simultaneously decided to jump forward or to jump backward. It was difficult to tell what was going on during the hunt.
Wolff made no effort at the beginning to keep count. There were six, then zero, and then six, then three, then six, then one, then seven.
Back and forth, in and out, while the Lords ran around and howled like wolves and swung their sticks, hoping to connect with a fudger just as it came out of the chronoleap. Suddenly, Tharmas’ club thudded against the side of the head of one of the animals as it materialized. It collapsed, jerked several times, and died.
Eight had dropped out of the air. One had stayed behind as a carcass while the others became invisible. There should have been seven the next time, but there were eight again. Three seconds later, there were three. Another three seconds, nine. Zero. Nine. Two. Eleven. Seven. Two.
Eleven, and Wolff threw his stick and caught one in the back. It pitched forward on its face. Vala was on it with her stick and beat it to death before it could recover from its stunned condition.
There were fifteen, quickly c
ut to thirteen when Rintrah and Theotormon each killed one. Then, zero.
Within a minute, the tempusfudgers seemed to go riot. Terrified, they hurled themselves back and forth and became twenty-eight, zero, twenty-eight, zero, and fifty-six, or so Wolff roughly estimated it. It was, of course, impossible to make an accurate count. A little later, he was sure, only because his arithmetic assured him it should be so, that the doubling had resulted in 1,792.
There had been no more casualties among the fudgers to reduce the number. The Lords had been unable to kill any. They were being buffeted by the ever-increasing horde, knocked down by hoppers appearing in front of them, behind them, and beside them, stepped upon, scratched, kicked, and hammered.
Suddenly, the little animals stampeded towards the exit of the canyon. They hurtled over the floor and should have jammed into the narrow pass, but somehow formed an orderly arrangement and were gone.
Slowly, sore and shaken, the Lords arose. They looked at the four dead animals and shook their heads. Out of almost eighteen hundred that had been at hand, easy prey—in theory—these pitiful four were left.
“Half a fudger will make one good meal for each of us,” Vala said. “That’s better than none. But what will we do tomorrow?”
The others did not answer. They began collecting wood for the cooking fires. Wolff borrowed Theotormon’s knife and started the skinning.
In the morning, they ate the scraps left over from the evening’s feast. Wolff led them on up. The canyon remained as silent as before, except for the river’s murmuring. The walls kept on pressing in. The sky burned yellow far above. Fudgers appeared at a distance. Wolff tried throwing rocks at them. He almost struck one, only to see it disappear as if it had slipped around a corner of air. It came into sight again, three seconds later, twenty feet away and hopping as if it had an important engagement it had suddenly recalled.
Two days after they had last eaten, the Lords were almost ready to try the berries. Palamabron argued that the repulsive odor of the berries did not necessarily mean that they had a disagreeable taste. Even if they did, they were not necessarily poisonous. They were going to die, anyway, so why not test the berries?”
“Go ahead,” Vala said. “It’s your theory and your desire. Eat some!”
She was smiling peculiarly at him, as if she were enjoying the conflict between his hunger and fear.
“No,” Palamabron said. “I will not be your guinea pig. Why should I sacrifice myself for all of you? I will eat the berries only if all eat at the same time.”
“So you can die in good company,” Wolff said. “Come on, Palamabron. Put up or shut up—old Earth proverb. You’re wasting our time arguing. Either do it yourself or forget about it.”
Palamabron sniffed at the berry he was holding, made a face, and let the berry fall on the rocky floor. Wolff started to walk away, and the Lords followed. About an hour later, he saw another side-canyon. On the way into it, he picked up a round stone which was just the right size and weight for throwing. If only he could sneak up close enough to a fudger and throw the rock while it was looking the other way.
The canyon was a little smaller than that in which the Lords had made their first hunt. At its far end was a single tempusfudger, eating the berries. Wolff got down on his hands and knees and began the slow crawl towards it. He took advantage of every rock for covering and managed to get halfway across the canyon before the animal noticed anything. It suddenly quit moving its jaws, sat up, and looked around, its nose wiggling, its ears vibrating like a TV antenna in a strong wind.
Wolff hugged the ground and did not move at all. He was sweating with the effort and tension, since the starvation diet had weakened him considerably. He wanted to jump up and run at the fudger and hurl himself upon it, tear it apart, eat it raw. He could have devoured the entire animal from the tips of its ears down to the tip of its tail and then broken the bones open to suck out the marrow.
He forced himself to stay motionless. The animal must get over its suspiciousness soon, after which Wolff could resume his turtle-like approach.
Then, from behind a rock near the fudger, another beast appeared. It was gray except for red wolflike ears, had a long pointed face, a bushy tail, and was about midway in size between a fox and a coyote. It sprang at the tempusfudger, coming up from behind it just as it was looking the other way.
Its teeth closed on air. The fudger had disappeared, escaping the jaws by a fraction of an inch.
The predator also disappeared, vanishing before it struck the ground.
Three animals appeared, two fudgers and one predator. Wolff, who liked to tag unknown things, at once called it a chronowolf. For the first time, he was seeing the creature that nature—or Urizen—had placed here to keep the fudger from overpopulating this world.
Wolff now had time to figure out what was happening with the leapers. There had been two. Then there were none. Then, three. So the original fudger and the chronowolf had jumped ahead. But the fudger had stayed only a microsecond and leaped back also. So that he had reproduced himself and now there were two for the wolf to chase.
Again, the animals vanished. They reappeared, four in number. Two fudgers, two chronowolves. The chase was on, not only in space but in the strange gray corridors of backwards-forwards time.
Another simultaneous jump into the tempolimbo. Wolff ran towards a boulder around which grew a number of bushes. He hurled himself down and then peered between the bushes.
Seven again. This time a wolf had come out of wherever he had been just behind his quarry. He hurled himself forward, and his jaws closed around the neck of the fudger. There was a loud crack; the fudger dropped, dead.
Seven living, and one dead. A fudger had gone back and then forward again.
The living vanished. Evidently the wolf did not intend to stay behind and eat his kill.
Then six were jumping around the plain. Savagely, a wolf bit another wolf on the neck, and the attacked crumpled in death.
Nothing for three seconds. Wolff ran out and threw himself down on the ground. Although not hidden behind anything this time, he hoped that his motionlessness, combined with the terror of the fudgers and the bloodlust of the wolves, would make them not notice him.
Another wolf had been born out of time’s womb. Parthenogenesis of chronoviators.
The wolves launched themselves at each other, while the third watched them, and the fudgers hopped around in apparent confusion.
The observer predator became participant, not in the struggle between his fellows, but in the hunt. He caught a fudger by the throat as it hurtled by him in its blind panic.
A fudger and a wolf died.
The living flickered out again. When they came back into his sight, a wolf gripped a fudger’s neck and cracked it.
Wolff slowly rose to his feet. At the exact moment that one of the wolves died, he hurled his stone at the winner. It must have caught the motion out of the corner of its eyes, since it vanished just before the stone would have struck. And when it shot out of the chute of time, it was going as swiftly as its four legs would take it towards the exit.
“I’m sorry to deprive you of the spoils of victory,” Wolff called out after it. “But you can resume the hunt elsewhere.”
He went to call the other Lords and to tell them that their luck had changed. Six animals would fill their bellies and furnish a little over for the next day.
There came the time again when the Lords had been without food for three days. They were gaunt, their cheeks hollow, their eyes crouched within dark and deep caves, their bellies advancing towards their spines. That day Wolff sent them out in pairs to hunt. He had intended to go alone but Vala insisted that he take Luvah with him. She would hunt by herself. Wolff asked her why she wanted it that way, and she replied that she did not care to be accompanied by only one man.
“You think you might become the victim of a cannibal?” Wolff said.
“Exactly,” she said. “You know that if we continue to go hun
gry, it’s inevitable that we’ll start eating one another. It may even have been planned by Urizen. He would very much enjoy seeing us kill one another and stuff our bellies with our own flesh and blood.”
“Have it your own way,” Wolff said. He left with Luvah to explore a series of side-canyons. The two sighted a number of fudgers eating from bushes and began the patient, hours-long creeping upon them. They came within an inch of success. The stone, thrown by Wolff, went past the head of his intended victim. After that, all was lost. The fudgers did not even bother to take refuge in time but leaped away and were lost in another canyon.
Wolff and Luvah continued to look until near the time for the moon to bring another night of hunger-torn sleeplessness. When they got back to the meeting-place, they found the others, looking very perturbed. Palamabron and his hunting-companion, Enion, were missing.
“I don’t know about the rest of you,” Tharmas said, “but I’m too exhausted to go looking for the damn fools.”
“Maybe we should,” Vala said. “They might have had some luck and even now be stuffing themselves with good meat, instead of sharing it with us.”
Tharmas cursed. However, he refused to search for them. If they had had luck, he said, he would know it when he next saw their faces. They would not be able to hide their satisfaction from him. And he would kill them for their selfishness and greed.
“They wouldn’t be doing anything you wouldn’t if you had their chance,” Wolff said. “What’s all the uproar about? We don’t know that they’ve caught anything. After all, it was only a suggestion by Vala. There’s no proof, not the slightest.”
They grumbled and cursed but soon were asleep with utter weariness.
Wolff slept, too, but awoke in the middle of the night. He thought he had heard a cry in the distance. He sat up and looked at the others. They were all there, except for Palamabron and Enion.
The World of Tiers Volume One: The Maker of Universes, the Gates of Creation, and a Private Cosmos Page 32
