One Thousand Years

by Randolph Beck

  Blanding appeared surprised. “We weren't told it belonged to the Navy.”

  “I sure hope you didn't believe the crazy Negro who stole it,” said Harrington, now grinning.

  “He's a lot smarter than you would think,” said the man beside him.

  “That, I don't doubt,” said Blanding. “He had me completely fooled.” Blanding could see Harrington's grin transform into the smile of a salesman, strangely reminding him of a movie character. They both reminded him of movie characters. The crispness of their uniforms just added to the odd manner about the men.

  “You see, we need to recover this experimental aircraft. We also need to find the thief. He's carrying classified documents, you understand. Time is of the essence. Do you know where he could be found?”

  “Better than that. I can take you right to him.” And with that, Blanding reached for his own flare gun.

  *

  McHenry and Donaldson both saw the flares at once. First one, and another an instant later. Then more from slightly different locations from the direction of the C-47 flight line.

  “Trouble,” McHenry murmured.

  “I counted five. Colonel Blanding and the men.” Donaldson turned the wheel sharp, making a three-point-turn, and headed off in the opposite direction. “They're sending us a warning.”

  “Your colonel is a good man.”

  “That he is,” said Donaldson. He made a sharp right turn at the next corner.

  “Where are you going?”

  “I saw a bomber on the flight schedule when I was at the tower. It's going to California. I'm getting us on it.” Then, after another second, “What do you think will happen to them?”

  “Can't be sure,” McHenry replied. “If not for history already changing, they would put a high priority on keeping things as they were. That would mean keeping everyone alive — except for me, that is. As it stands now, I can't guess what their plans would be.”

  “I hate to say this, but whatever you intended to keep secret from me, they'll get it if you think they can make Blanding talk.”

  McHenry didn't understand.

  “It was when you wanted to speak to Blanding in private.”

  “Oh that. I know. I was counting on it.”

  It took Donaldson a few seconds to catch on. “It's a ruse? Will it work?”

  “I haven't the slightest idea,” McHenry conceded.

  They pulled into the lot behind the bomber hangars, one of which had its floodlights on. The first lights of dawn were showing in the east.

  *

  At two kilometers up, Vinson and Dale could watch the recaptured Tiger depart. Its unterkarbon net quickly unfurled, and the Tiger disappeared from view entirely once high enough to avoid ground refraction.

  “That was the easy part,” Vinson sighed.

  Looking down at her side-panel, Dale pretended not to hear what he was implying. “I'm transferring a flight plan to your system. There isn't much time. We need to handle this as soon as we have Sam back.”

  “Back? You mean you are not killing him?” asked Vinson.

  “Hell no!” she said adamantly. “I don't see that we have to.”

  Relieved, Vinson left that issue aside and studied the chart. He shook his head. “I don't understand. These are for the French province. I thought the mission was to recover Sam, remove any traces of his interactions, and then return to the Göring. What does Europe have to do with that?”

  He studied her eyes, which revealed nothing.

  “I hope I am not stepping out of line.”

  “It's not that,” she said. “We don't yet know what changes he made to the future. He may not have done anything yet of consequence. But whatever he does to our future is insignificant. We'll cover up his tracks if we have time, but we have something more important to do as soon as we're done here.”

  “Insignificant? Compared to what? Saving our future is the top priority!” Vinson kept his eyes on her, pleading.

  “Okay,” she said. “You need to know the truth. It's worse than most crew members are aware.”

  “What could be worse than altering our timeline? It affects our home.”

  She paused again. This time, Vinson remained quiet while she pondered, peering up at the forward dome.

  “I'm afraid that history has already changed,” she said. Finally, she turned back to him. “It was only fairly recently that we discovered this. Nothing major — yet. But I don't need to tell you, even a small change can become a major change over the following centuries.”

  He was stunned.

  “The change was not by us,” she added.

  “Changed by the Grauen?”

  She nodded.

  “So, the Grauen have time travel,” he reflected, still distraught but now also flustered. “How can that happen now? We're in the past. They would have destroyed our own timeline before we were even born.”

  “It would have, if they had changed history here in our own solar system. But not if they changed their own history. It probably happened at the Grauen homeworld eight-thousand light-years away. Ships from their new timeline came into ours while we were here, or perhaps while we were at the transit point where we went back in time.”

  Vinson looked her blankly. She knew that he didn't understand.

  “Changes in the timeline ripple back at the speed of light,” she said.

  “The SS had to keep that a secret, too?” Vinson stammered.

  “That's not strictly an SS secret. The Luftwaffe is aware of this, but it's out of your clearance. It was out of mine, too, until recently.”

  “When you were off flight status,” he concluded. “And that's also why Otto Barr was quarantined.”

  “Yes. We suspected that the Grauen ship that Barr saw was from the other timeline. We decided that should be kept secret for now.”

  His mind raced through the implications. Educated in astrophysics since he was a child, and with the training of an interstellar-flight-qualified Luftwaffe pilot, he was still flummoxed. Faster-than-light starships would outrun timeline changes, he realized, assuming one could know it was coming. “It doesn't make sense,” he said. “The geometry doesn't work out.”

  He remained deep in thought until the rechner alerted. He didn't even think to ask how the SS could know where the Grauen homeworld was.

  *

  Carrying two boxes, Donaldson approached the jeep and tossed one of the boxes to McHenry.

  “What's this?”

  “It's your box lunch for the flight.” Donaldson grinned. “We're in luck. That B-24 is going back to the States this morning. They'll take two more passengers. A friend of mine is flying co-pilot. He's quietly slipping us on the manifest as a favor to me as long as we don't make any waves. They never check whether passengers have orders.”

  Feeling more at ease at last, McHenry laughed, jumping out of the jeep. “He doesn't think we're on the lam, does he? I don't want him calling the M.P.'s.”

  “I did have to assure him we're not AWOL. I didn't have to lie. I do have Blanding's authorization.”

  They made their way around the hangar, and toward the distant aircraft on the tarmac. The mechanics were making their way back inside, pulling a cart behind them. The sun hadn't risen yet, but it was lighter now. It was a slightly foggy morning.

  “We've had mornings exactly like this in Italy.”

  “I haven't seen fog like this since I was in the States,” said Donaldson.

  McHenry stopped. “Hold on. I wonder if this is natural.”

  “It's unusual here on the island but I don't know that it's impossible. You really think your Nazis can create fog?”

  “You know we can create fog right now. We're talking about people who can manipulate gravity.”

  “That doesn't mean they brought a fog-making machine down with them.”

  “Good point. Just the same, it's suspicious.” McHenry remained there, looking at the lights around the aircraft two hundred feet ahead, and then to the hangar behind
him, still visible, but indistinct. There was an awful lot of fog.

  Donaldson looked to McHenry, seeing the concern on his face. “This flight is still our only good option.”

  “Ward,” McHenry said, still hesitating. “It might be a good idea if we split up here.”

  “Why? My best use to you is helping you get to Washington. I'm not quitting now. I want to win this war.”

  “I'm not asking you to quit. My best use for you now is that you survive.” He was speaking more quickly now, certain that he was running out of time. “You're part of the plan. I need for you to survive. This is a longer term strategy than just the next few weeks. The war is much bigger than against Hitler. I need for you to continue even if the President, or the next one, chooses to give up.”

  “What are you saying? How am I supposed to do that?”

  “I don't mean by setting off bombs. Someone has to be able to pick up the pieces, keep the country strong, hold back the waves of defeatism, and resist the return to appeasement. If we do lose here, which I think likely, the rest of the country is going to weaken, and maybe turn on itself.”

  “I'm just a lieutenant, Sam. You need to tell this to people in Washington.”

  “You're a lieutenant today. You'll be something else in ten years, and something else again in twenty. You may have the rest of the century to make a difference. The difference. Maybe you'll get into politics, or maybe you'll invent or discover something that keeps America on top. This is not only one war. It's this war, and the one after that. Most of all, it's the wars the country is not going to fight, but should, just like the way we didn't get into this one until Hitler took half of Europe. Hitler could have lost everything when he retook the Rhineland in ‘36 — if only the British and French had threatened war right then. We could have avoided war in Europe entirely, if only we'd been the strong ones. And now we're going right back to appeasement again, here and in the rest of the world. Fascist movements will rise on every continent until they all join the Reich. You have to stop them every chance you get or it's Führers all the way from here on in.”

  McHenry opened the emergency kit and pulled out a small cartridge. “I know you're just one man, Ward. Maybe this will help.”

  Donaldson looked the device over. The legend was written in German.

  “It's advanced technology,” McHenry explained. “Translate the label. You've got years, decades even, to figure out how it works. Heck, you can probably learn something critical just by figuring out what the container is made from.”

  “Okay, Sam,” Donaldson said. He put the device in with the box lunch and held it tight. “But at least let me see you on board that plane. I can't promise to fight the next war without continuing to fight this one.” He held out his hand, and the two men shook.

  “It's a deal.”

  They looked toward the B-24, now very hazy in the morning fog, and then back to the hangar. The fog was now so thick that the hangar was no longer visible at all, but they could see two mechanics walking in their direction. Then the B-24 fogged over, too.

  “You're right, something's wrong here,” said Donaldson.

  A form appeared above them out of the mist. McHenry recognized the unterkarbon layers around a Tiger. Donaldson pulled his .45 and fired at the craft.

  “No!” McHenry shouted. “It's too late. Get out of here!”

  Donaldson emptied the magazine of his pistol, but it was indeed too late. The two mechanics reached them. One grabbed Donaldson's hand, deftly removed the weapon, and then held him in place. The other grabbed McHenry. Both now immobilized, Donaldson was shocked and angry at these men, but McHenry understood what they were. He remembered the name for them.

  “You two are Fallschirmjäger, aren't you?” he asked. “Robots?”

  They said nothing. The Tiger's hatch opened suddenly and a figure stepped out of the mist dressed in a black SS uniform, towering over all of them. It was Dale. She smiled down at McHenry, then coolly to Donaldson, seeming to enjoy the look of shock on his face.

  “Whatever he told you about us, you can now see that it's true,” she taunted. Then turning to McHenry, she said, “you really shouldn't have done this.”

  “You know that I had to,” McHenry responded.

  “Yes, I do. If there is one thing we all agree on, it is duty.”

  “I know that your future was shot before I left.”

  “So, you've figured that out,” she said, sadly. “But the timeline will be repaired.” She stepped down the ladder but was still much taller than either of them. “Anyway, this is bigger than our one future.”

  Donaldson began struggling visibly. The robot held him tight. “Why does she speak with an American accent?” he blurted out.

  Dale stepped beside him and looked down at his eyes. “Because I was born in Chicago.” Her gleeful smile returned. “You look like an Aryan version of Sam here. It's a pity we can't bring you back with us. But you need to live your life. And, really, one American soldier is more than enough trouble. Now you've seen too much. Sleep.”

  Before Donaldson could utter another word, he was unconscious, slumped in the robot's arms.

  She looked to McHenry, then to the robot holding him. “Him, too.”

  *

  McHenry didn't recognize where he was when she and Vinson woke him. He guessed correctly that he must be in the Tiger's storage rack. Sensing gravity he guessed, correctly again, that they hadn't yet left orbit.

  “Welcome back, my friend,” said Vinson.

  “Thanks.” McHenry tried to sit up but his hands and feet were bound.

  “I'm sorry, Sam,” said Dale. “You need to be restrained for the procedure.”

  He nodded understanding. “That was a neat trick with the fog.”

  “I didn't know we had it,” said Dale. “Adolf thought of it.”

  Vinson smiled proudly. “Vent heat in the right direction, and a Tiger can even make it rain a little. Coordinate several Tigers underwater and we can change the weather.”

  “I hadn't yet read that far in the Tiger's manuals.”

  “You have to be working with these engines for a while. Many things like that are possible. When we return to Berlin, you will see the weather is always perfectly controlled.”

  “What's happening to Donaldson?”

  “It's still morning,” said Dale. “He probably just woke up in his bed. Same as his colonel. The memories of the men who were already awake are harder to manage. We didn't have enough time but we did the best we could.”

  When McHenry didn't react, Dale continued, “That's right. To some extent, we can suppress their memories.”

  “You can make them forget this happened?”

  “Not completely. It's too late for that. The last few hours will be less clear. They will remember but they won't be as certain about it. It will be like memories that are decades old, the way you might remember your early childhood.”

  “What happens when they compare stories?”

  “We'll have to hope it won't matter. We have to make compromises. Any more than that, we damage their minds, and that changes their futures in another way. This isn't perfect by a long shot but it may be enough. We only need that they go on with their lives. You already have people believing crazy things. The war's not even over, and there are people saying that Roosevelt knew Pearl Harbor was going to be attacked. And, naturally, the Jews will say America should have kept fighting this senseless war. A few more Americans with a crazy conspiracy theory won't defeat the Reich downstream.”

  “The Jews again?” prodded McHenry.

  “I'm sorry, Sam,” she said quietly. It seemed to McHenry that she was reflecting for a moment, genuinely regretful. “It's the way we're brought up. And for that, I am truly sorry.”

  She paused for only a moment longer, then shifted back, looked into his eyes and said, “This won't hurt.”

  But it did hurt. It hurt his pride.

  His eyes stopped seeing. His ears stopped hearing. His body
stopped feeling. He forgot that he ever had arms and legs. He only saw a blank formless image, reminding him of the Traumsehen device in Göring's infirmary that found the image of the alien ship from his mind. He was awake enough to fear the disclosures that would be ripped from his mind. And he was awake enough to see the image changed by the very fear that he felt.

  He never saw anything clearly. But he felt memories of Blanding and Donaldson with him in the Tiger. He remembered wanting to laugh at Blanding's confusion over the presence of women aboard the ship. And he remembered the rifle pointing at him after the initial scuffle with Donaldson. The private's rifle had been pointing at his face, strangely like the feeling when ground gunners were trying to shoot his plane apart, missing the vitals, and then he remembered the bird.

  The image changed shape and color, forcing him to break the thought. He felt Blanding's and Donaldson's comfortable presence again. He remembered handing Donaldson the tool from the emergency kit. For a split second, it felt good. That was part of his long-term plan to aid men like Blanding and Donaldson to defeat the Nazis generations hence. Then he remembered where he was, and he wondered how he could have forgotten. He thought again of the ground gunners shooting at him. That was a safe thing to think about. And then he forgot where he was.

  *

  Chapter 22

  “Our landings in the Cherbourg-Harve area have failed to gain a satisfactory foothold and I have withdrawn the troops. My decision to attack at this time and place was based upon the best information available. The troops, the air and the Navy did all that bravery and devotion to duty could do. If any blame or fault attaches to the attempt it is mine alone.”

  — General Dwight D. Eisenhower, (message prepared in the event that D-Day failed)

  Wednesday, June 7, 1944

  “He is awake.”

  McHenry recognized Dr. Evers' voice before he opened his eyes. From lighting, and the sterile quality of the air, he knew he was in the infirmary again. When he did look around, he could see Dale and Vinson there, too. “I was expecting you to execute me,” he said.