by Allen Steele
“No, I doubt it.” Wincing from the bruises on his stomach, Murphy stood up from the bumper. “We might check the island again, just to be safe, but you’re probably right.”
He let Ogilvy open the Hummer’s passenger door, and waited in the shotgun seat until the colonel walked away to see whether the soldiers had discovered anything. When he was finally alone, he pulled a crumpled sheet of paper out of his pocket.
The paper had come from the stranger’s inside coat pocket, in that half instant when Murphy had grabbed at him during their fight and torn it. Murphy had only the vaguest recollection of the other man whispering something as he knelt over him; the two dimes and the nickel were missing when he regained consciousness, but this single sheet of paper was still clenched in his fist, along with a shred of dark fabric.
Murphy gently uncrumpled the paper and studied it under the dim glow of the dashboard. At the top of the page was a stylized dirigible flanked by olive branches; a scroll beneath the airship declared it to be the LZ-129 Hindenburg.
Below the picture of the airship was a list of names: a passenger manifest. Halfway down the list, two names caught his eye: Mr. and Mrs. John and Emma Pannes, of Manhasset, Long Island.
Murphy looked up, saw the colonel walking back to the vehicle, followed by the two soldiers. He had just tucked the paper into an inner pocket when Ogilvy opened the right rear passenger door.
“We’re not going to find anything,” Ogilvy muttered as he settled into the backseat. “No need to rush, though. We’ve got until morning till we have to be out of here.”
“Yeah. No need to hurry.” Murphy turned his head to gaze out the window. The clouds were beginning to dissipate; for the first time tonight, he could make out a few stars. “ ‘Fools rush in . . .’ ”
One of the Rangers opened the driver’s door to climb behind the wheel. “Pardon me, sir?” the soldier asked. “Did you say something?”
“Hmm? Oh, nothing.” Murphy smiled at his half reflection in the window. “Just thinking.”
P A R T 3
Free Will
Tues, Oct 16, 2314—0600Z
Against the darkness of space, from literally out of nowhere, there was the brilliant flash of defocused light as, for the barest fraction of a second, a tunnel opened within spacetime: a wormhole momentarily stabilized by exotic matter formed from vacuum fluctuations. In that sliver of an instant, the Oberon plunged out of chronospace.
The last tremors of the timeship’s passage had barely subsided when Franc heard the warble of the master alarm. Dazed, his eyes shut as he gripped the armrests of his acceleration couch, at first he thought the sound was imagined. Then he was thrown against his harness as the Oberon suddenly rolled to starboard, and it was at that moment he realized they were in trouble.
“Franc! What . . . ?”
His eyes snapped open as Lea screamed, and the first thing he saw was the wallscreen. Earth lay several hundred kilometers below; sunlight reflecting off the tops of dense white clouds hid the ground from sight. Even without checking the chronometer, he knew that they were no longer in 1998, for the last things he had seen before Metz activated the wormhole generators were the nighttime lights of North America. Yet that wasn’t what he noticed.
Far above Earth, a vast gray wall stretched across space.
Terrifyingly enormous, apparently solid yet somehow oddly granular, it curved around the planet until it disappeared beyond the horizon, casting a broad shadow across the cloud tops. Somehow, it looked like . . .
“That’s impossible.” Lea’s voice was no more than an awestruck whisper, barely audible beneath the alarm. She stared at the screen, her mouth agape. “Please tell me it isn’t there.”
“It’s there. I see it, too.” Franc fumbled at his seat harness, finally locating the buckles and releasing them. His body started to float upward; he hastily grabbed the armrest to keep himself in his seat. With his free hand, he slapped the lobe of his headset. “Vasili!” he shouted. “Give us some gravity! And kill the alarm!”
The pilot didn’t respond, but the alarm abruptly went silent. Franc let out his breath, then glanced to his right. Tom Hoffman’s body was still securely strapped in the third couch, his corpse wrapped in a blanket. At least the sudden maneuvers hadn’t dislodged him, and so long as Oberon itself was still in good condition . . .
Franc turned his head to check the status panel next to the wallscreen. The bar graphs for all the major systems were still in the green, and there were no red warning lights. So what triggered the master alarm? He was about to shout for Metz again when his gaze fell on the real-time chronometer.
The readout was 16.10.2314/0601:06.06.
The Oberon had returned from the past. In fact, it had reliably emerged from chronospace less than a second into the future after its relative time of entry, with the remaining sixty-six seconds accounted for by the events of the past minute and few seconds. Indeed, they should be directly above the same point on Earth where the timeship had opened its wormhole to May 2, 1937. Therefore, if they were back in their own time, nothing should be different.
Suddenly gaining weight, his body fell back into the couch. The ship’s localized gravity field had been restored. A moment later, he heard Vasili’s voice in his headset.
“You guys better get up here,” he said. “Something’s wrong.”
Franc nearly laughed out of loud. “Something’s . . . ?” He pointed at the gray shape on the wallscreen. “Do you see that?” he demanded, forgetting that the pilot wasn’t in the same compartment. “That’s a ring! That’s a goddamn planet ring!”
“I know.” Vasili’s voice was subdued. “We almost collided with it when we came out of chronospace. We got lucky . . . when the AI detected it, it went into autopilot mode and put us into lower orbit.” There was a pause. “Never mind that now. Just get up here. That’s not the worst of it.”
Lea was already unbuckling her harness. She hesitated as her eyes met Franc’s, then she prodded her headset. “What aren’t you telling us? Have you tried to raise Chronos?”
Another pause. “Chronos isn’t there. Nothing’s there. The orbitals, the Lagrange colonies . . . they’re all gone.”
“What do you mean, gone?” Franc snapped. “They’re not responding?”
“No, I mean they’re gone. They’re simply not there.”
“What about Tycho?” Lea demanded. “Can you raise Tycho? Someone there should . . .”
“Lea,” Vasili said, ever so quietly, “the Moon is gone, too.”
Saturday, January 17, 1998: 2:30 A.M.
The Gulfstream II was still parked in front of a hangar at Sewert Air Force Base, right where Zack Murphy had last seen it only this morning . . . yesterday morning, he reminded himself, although it was difficult to remember that fact. In the predawn darkness, a brittle wind whipped across the airfield, tugging at the hood of his parka as he marched toward the waiting aircraft.
The Ranger team was still breaking camp at Center Hill Lake when Colonel Ogilvy began gathering the OPS team for the helicopter ride back to Sewert. Meredith Cynthia Luna had refused to leave, though; stubbornly insistent that the spacecraft belonged to alien emissaries, she wanted to remain behind for a little while longer, to “gather residual psychic impressions” from the crash site. Although Murphy secretly believed that she simply didn’t want to share company with him and Ogilvy, he wasn’t about to argue to the contrary. Much to his surprise, though, Ogilvy agreed to let her stay with the troops, so long as she caught a commercial flight back to Washington within the next twenty-four hours. Perhaps he was trying to appease OPS, or maybe he was just as sick of her as everyone else was; whatever the reason, after Ogilvy placed her in the care of Lieutenant Crawford—who didn’t seem thrilled by the prospect of baby-sitting the psychic—he herded Murphy and Ray Sanchez aboard the Blackhawk.
So now they were back where they had started. Chilled to the bone, exhausted beyond all meaning of the word, Murphy pulled his parka a littl
e more tightly around himself as he shuffled toward the jet. With any luck, he might be able to grab a few winks before the plane landed at Dulles. The flight would take about two hours; factoring in the one-hour time difference, that meant they’d arrive in Virginia at about 5:30 A.M. An hour or so after that, and he’d be walking through his front door. Donna would still be asleep, but Steven would probably be up already, watching cartoons in the living room. Murphy absently patted the jacket pocket where he had tucked the little Darth Vader action figure he had found on the island beach. When he got a chance, he’d rinse the sand off it in the airplane’s washroom and give it to his son as a travelling present . . . and then he’d take the phone off the hook, climb into bed next to his wife, and sleep until well into the afternoon.
And after that?
Although he was too tired to think straight, Murphy knew that nothing would ever be the same again. After all, he had just met a time traveller. You don’t go to Disneyland after something like this . . .
Forget it, he told himself. Figure it out later.
Just ahead of him, a pair of Air Force officers in flight gear were standing next to the Gulfstream’s lowered stairway. Murphy assumed that they were the aircraft’s pilots. Ogilvy and Sanchez had stopped to speak with them; the four men were huddled together tightly, their shoulders hunched against the wind. As Murphy approached, they fell silent.
Murphy halted next to the stairs. “Anything wrong?” he asked. “Is there something I can do?”
He caught a sullen glare from Sanchez, but the FBI agent said nothing as he turned away. Ogilvy mustered an easy smile. “Don’t worry about it,” he said, then cocked a thumb toward the plane. “Go ahead, get aboard. I’ll tell you about it later.”
In that instant, Murphy had the premonition that he wasn’t going to get any sleep during the flight back to Washington. Yet there wasn’t much he could do about it now, so he trotted up the stairs and found a seat in the back of the plane. When he took off his parka, he made sure that he kept it folded in his lap, where he could keep his hands on it at all times. Through the window, he could see Ogilvy and Sanchez still talking to the pilots. As he watched, they turned and headed toward the stairs. A moment later, the pilots emerged through the hatch, followed by the colonel and the FBI agent. The pilots walked into the cockpit and shut the door behind them as Ogilvy and Sanchez took their seats near the front of the plane. Ogilvy propped his feet upon a vacant seat and lay his head back, while Sanchez placed his laptop computer on a table and opened it. Neither of them looked his way; after a few moments, Murphy cranked back his seat, pulled his coat up around his shoulders, and closed his eyes.
The Gulfstream had been airborne for a little less than fifteen minutes, just enough time for Murphy to doze off, when he heard someone settle into the seat next to him. “Zack?” Ogilvy said, insistent but not unkindly. “Wake up, son. We need to talk.”
Reluctantly, Murphy opened his eyes. The colonel had brought two foam cups of black coffee from the galley. “Do me a favor and fold down the table, will you?” he asked, nodding toward the seatback in front of him. “My hands are full.”
“Hmm . . . ? Oh, sure.” Murphy reached out from beneath the parka, pulled down the tray table. “None for me, thanks,” he said as Ogilvy gently set down the coffee. “I’d like to get some sleep sometime before we land.”
“Sure. We’ve all had a hard day.” The colonel shook his head apologetically. “But I can’t let you do that just yet. We’ve got some loose ends to tie up first.” Picking up his coffee, he looked toward the front of the plane. “Agent Sanchez, would you like to join us?”
As if waiting for his cue, Sanchez moved down the aisle. Instead of taking the vacant seat on the other side of the aisle, though, he rested his elbows on the seatback. He gazed down at Murphy with cool dark eyes, but didn’t say anything.
“Is this about the nondisclosure agreement?” Murphy picked up the other coffee, took a tentative sip. Caffeinated or not, its warmth was welcome after the chill of the night. “I said I’d sign whatever you want me to, if that’s what’s bothering you.”
“Glad to hear it, Dr. Murphy. I’m pleased to know that you’re willing to cooperate with us. But that’s not what I . . . what we want to discuss with you.” Turning half-around in his seat, Ogilvy folded his hands together on the armrest. “Let’s cut to the chase, shall we? What happened to you on the road just before we found you?”
Oh, hell . . . “Nothing happened,” he said, looking the colonel straight in the eye. “I took a walk up the road, that’s all. Just catching some air. And when I got to the top of the hill, some guy came out of the woods, asked me what time it was . . .”
“You said earlier that he asked you for spare change.”
“Well . . . yeah, I mean, he asked me for some change, and then he . . .”
“Roughed you up, right. That’s what you said.” Ogilvy reached up the ceiling panel above Murphy’s seat, clicked on the reading lamp. The sudden glare made him wince. “Y’know, for someone who’s been punched around,” Ogilvy said as he peered closely at Murphy, “you look like you’re in pretty good shape.”
“I got a good punch in the face. After that he hit me in the gut, then he threw me down and . . .”
“Threw you down on the road?” Ogilvy asked, and Murphy nodded. “The road was paved, so you should have some asphalt burns on your hands, maybe some scrapes on your coat.” He studied Murphy’s hands, then the back of his parka. “I don’t see any marks.”
“I didn’t . . . I mean, I didn’t hit the ground all that hard.”
“C’mon, Zack. I didn’t buy it back then, so why would I buy it now?” Ogilvy frowned, shook his head. “Something else happened up there. I know it, and you know it, so why don’t you just make things easier and come clean?”
“I really don’t know what you’re talking about,” Murphy said quietly.
Baird Ogilvy regarded him silently for a few moments, then slowly let out his breath as an exasperated sigh. “Agent Sanchez, you want to help me out here, please?”
“Dr. Murphy,” Sanchez said, “right now this plane is circling above the Kentucky state line, its pilots awaiting my instructions as to its next destination. If you don’t agree to render us your full cooperation, the plane will divert to Fort Campbell, where a military escort will meet us at the airfield. They will then drive you to the federal penitentiary in Marion, Illinois, where you’ll be placed in their custody under maximum . . .”
“What?”
“You will placed in their custody under maximum security conditions until appropriate federal charges can be levied against you.” Sanchez’s voice never rose, his eyes never blinking once. “During this time, you will not be permitted to have any contact with the outside world. You will not be allowed to contact an attorney, or speak with your family, or . . .”
“You can’t do that!” Livid with anger, Murphy began to rise from his seat. “That’s illegal! You can’t . . . !”
The .45 automatic appeared so fast, he barely saw Sanchez’s hands move.
Murphy froze. From somewhere many miles away, he felt the liquid warmth of spilled coffee seeping through his right knee of his trousers.
“Please sit down, Dr. Murphy,” Sanchez said, his voice remaining even. “Any further action on your part will be considered a threat to . . .”
“Relax, please. Both of you.” Ogilvy placed a hand on Murphy’s shoulder, easing him back down. “Calm down, Zack. No one’s going to prison today.” Then he looked up at Sanchez. “Ray, please lower your weapon. That’s not necessary.”
The FBI agent hesitated, then withdrew his finger from the trigger and returned the .45 to the belt holster behind his back. Murphy’s heart galloped as he fell back into his seat. No one had ever pointed a gun at him in his entire life. For as long as he lived, he hoped it would never happen again.
“You . . .” he started, and realized his mouth was too dry to speak. He swallowed a hard lump in his
throat. “You’re serious. You’d do this, wouldn’t you?”
“I’m sorry, but . . . yes, I would.” In the heat of the moment, Murphy hadn’t noticed that he had knocked over Ogilvy’s coffee as well. The colonel set the empty cup upright, then pulled a handkerchief from his shirt pocket and used it to sponge up the coffee. “Try to look at this my way,” he continued. “An alien spacecraft . . . or at least what appears to be an alien spacecraft . . . crash-lands in a rural lake after an encounter with two military jets, one of which is forced down for unknown reasons. After being surrounded by army troops and remaining silent for over half a day, the craft inexplicably takes off again, becoming radar-invisible within moments of departure. I don’t know about you, but anything that demonstrates that sort of capability scares the cookies out of me.”
Ogilvy wadded up the wet handkerchief and dropped in the vacant seat on the other side of the aisle. “Then the senior OPS consultant charged with investigating this event is found on a nearby road. He claims to have been mugged . . . in the middle of the night, out in the middle of nowhere . . . but all evidence points to the contrary. Kind of suspicious, don’t you think?”
“I think. . .” Murphy hesitated, then looked away. “Nothing. I’ve got nothing to say.”
Ogilvy shook his head in disappointment. “Dr. Murphy, believe me, this isn’t a bluff. You’re hiding facts regarding a possible threat to national security. I know you’re in this way out of your depth, and I’m sorry that it has to be this way, because you seem to be a nice guy. But I’m telling you right now, if you don’t start talking, you’re going to be seeing the inside of a prison cell before the sun comes up.”
