Time Scout

by Robert Asprin

  Tourists gaped and pointed. For most, it was only the second time in their lives they'd seen a temporal gate up-close and personal-their first, of course, being Primary on the down-time trip to Shangri-la. Conversation, which had begun to pick up again in the wake of the first shimmer, died off sharply. Baggage handlers finished tying off their loads. Last-minute transactions led to more money changing hands. More than one guide gulped down the last scalding coffee they'd taste in two weeks.

  The spot on the wall dilated, spreading outward like a growth of bread mold viewed on high-speed film. In the center of the darkness, as though viewed through the wrong end of a telescope, Malcolm made out the shape of dim shelves and tiny amphorae stacked neatly in rows at the back of a long, deep room. Then light flared like a twinkling star as someone on the other side lit a lamp.

  Tourists on the floor exclaimed, then laughed in nervous delight as a man dressed as a Roman slave, but moving with the purpose and authority of a Time Tours organizer, stepped through. He rushed at them like a hurled baseball, growing in apparent height from a few inches to full size in the blink of an eyelash, then calmly stepped through onto the metal grating. He landed barking orders.

  Tourists, some looking dazed and ill, others talking animatedly, all of them visibly tired, spilled through the open gate onto the catwalk and down the ramp. Most clutched souvenirs. Some clutched each other. Guides had to remind most of them to slide credit-card-sized Timecards through the encoder at the bottom of the ramp. Malcolm grinned again. The ritual never varied. The ones who remembered to "clock out" of Porta Romae were experienced temporal travelers. The ones clutching each other had discovered a deep-seated, unexpected fear of temporal travel, either because it was too dirty and violent for their taste or because they'd spent the trip terrified of making a mistake the guides couldn't fix.

  The ones that looked dazed and ill either hadn't enjoyed the gladiatorial games as much as they'd thought or were still attempting to overcome the effects of too much boozing and not enough attention to proper diet and rest. Malcolms clients never returned up time looking like they needed the nearest hospital bed. Of course, people with the sense to hire a private guide, even for a package deal like Time Tours offered, rarely had the poor judgment to get hung over after a two-week-long binge on lead-laced Roman wine.

  Not for the first time, Malcolm permitted himself a moment's bitter resentment of Time Tours and their whole slick, money-milling operation. If not for their shady, underhanded tricks ...

  "Penny for 'em," someone said at Malcolm's elbow.

  He started and glanced around to find Ann Vinh Mulhaney gazing up at him. He relaxed with a smile. She must have come straight from the weapons range when the klaxon sounded. She hadn't bothered to unholster the pistols at her belt or loosen her hair from its confining elastic tie. At five feet, five inches, Ann was a little shorter than Malcolm, but evenly matched with Sven Bailey, who strolled up behind her. He, too, was dressed for the weapons range.

  They must've just released a new class, probably the one scheduled for London. Sven, who out massed dainty little Ann by at least two to one despite their matched heights, nodded politely toward Malcolm, then watched the departing tourists with a despairing shake of his head.

  "What a miserable bunch they were," he commented to no one in particular. "Stupid, too, if you're still here." He glanced briefly toward Malcolm.

  He shrugged, acknowledging the well-meant compliment, and answered Ann's question. "I'm just watching the fun, same as everyone. How are you two?"

  Sven, TT-86s recognized master of bladed weapons, grunted once and didn't deign to answer. Ann laughed. She was one of the few residents who felt comfortable laughing at Sven Bailey. She tossed her ponytail and rested slim hands on her hips. "He lost his last bet. Five shots out of six, loser picks up the tab at Down Time."

  Malcolm smiled. "Sven, haven't you learned yet not to shoot against her?"

  Sven Bailey regarded his fingernails studiously. "Yep." Then he glance up with a sardonic twist of the lips. "Trouble is, the students keep trying to lose their money. What's a guy to do?"

  Malcolm grinned. "The way I hear it, you two split the take."

  Sven only looked hurt. Ann laughed aloud. "What a horrid rumor." She winked. "Care to join us? We're heading over to the Down Time to cool out and grab a bite to eat."

  Malcolm was well beyond the stage of flushing with embarrassment every time he had to turn down an invitation from lack of funds. "Thanks, but no. I think I'll see the departure through, then head up toward Primary and try to line up some prospects from the new arrivals. And I've got to fix this blasted sandal again. It keeps coming loose at the sole."

  Sven nodded, accepting his face-saving excuses without comment. Ann started to protest, then glanced at Sven. She sighed. "If you change your mind, I'll spot you for a drink. Or better yet Sven can pick up the tab from my winnings." She winked at Malcolm. Sven just crossed his arms and snorted, reminding Malcolm of a burly bulldog humoring an upstart chickadee. "By the way," she smiled, "Kevin and I were thinking about inviting some people over for dinner tomorrow night. If you're free at, oh, say about sixish, stop by. The kids love it when you visit."

  "Sure," he said, without really meaning it. "Thanks."

  Fortunately, they moved off before noticing the dull flush that crept up Malcolm's neck into his cheeks. If Ann Vinh Mulhaney had pre-planned a dinner party for tomorrow night, he'd eat his sandal, broken strap and all. Her gesture warmed him, though, even as he rubbed the back of his neck and muttered, "I've got to get a fulltime job with someone." But not with Time Tours.

  Never with Time Tours.

  He'd starve first.

  Tourists over at Gate Six had started to climb the ramp, each one in turn presenting his or her Timecard to have the departure logged properly. Excited women could be heard clear across the Commons, shrieking and giggling as they plucked up the nerve to step through the open portal. That ritual never varied, either. Scuttlebutt had it, Time Tours had sound-proofed the exits on the other side of all their gates, rather than hush the tourists. He had to chuckle. He couldn't really blame them. Stepping through that first time was an unnerving experience.

  Inevitably-this time about three quarters of the way through the departure–someone fumbled a load of poorly tied baggage. Parcels scattered across the catwalk, creating a major hitch in the traffic flow. Three separate guides, glancing wildly at the overhead chronometer, converged on the mess and snatched up baggage willy nilly. A fourth guide all but shoved the remaining tourists through the open gate. The edges of the gate had begun to shrink slowly back toward the center.

  Malcolm shook his head. With years of experience behind them, Time Tours really ought to manage better than that. He grunted aloud. That's what comes of exploiting stranded down-timers to haul baggage. Somebody really should do something about the poor souls who wandered in through open gates and found themselves lost in an alien world. His old outfit had never used them as grunt labor.

  Of course, his old outfit had quietly gone bankrupt, too.

  The guides who'd snatched up the spilled parcels lunged through and vanished. Moments later, Gate Six winked closed for another two weeks. Malcolm sighed and turned his attention to Primary. He checked the chronometer and swore under his breath. He just had time, if he hustled. He left Urbs Romae behind and half jogged through Frontier Town, with its saloons and strolling "cowboys," then picked up speed through Victoria Station's "cobbled" streets, lined with shops whose windows boasted graceful Victorian gowns and masculine deerstalkers. The klaxon sounded, an earsplitting noise that caused Malcolm to swear under his breath.

  "Your attention, please. Gate One is due to open in two minutes. All departures, be advised that if you have not cleared Station Medical, you will not be permitted to pass Primary. Please have your baggage ready for customs..."

  Malcolm cut across one edge of Edo Castletown, with its extraordinary gardens, sixteenth-century Japanese architectu
re, and swaggering tourists dressed as samurai warriors. He jogged past the Neo Edo Hotel, skirting a group of kimono-clad women who had paused to admire the mural inside the lobby. The desk clerk grinned and waved as he shot past.

  Primary, less than a hundred feet beyond the farthest edge of Castletown, consisted of an imposing set of barriers, armed guards, ramps, fences, metal detectors, and X-ray equipment, plus dual medical stations, all clustered at the bottom of a broad ramp that led fifteen feet into thin air then simply stopped. Malcolm had once wondered why the station hadn't simply been constructed so that the floor was dead-level even with Gate One, or Primary, as everyone in residence called it.

  Upon subsequent interaction with officials from the Bureau of Access Time Functions, Malcolm had decided ATF must have insisted on the arrangement for its unsettling psychological impact. Montgomery Wilkes, inspecting everything like a prowling leopard, stood out simply by the sweating hush which followed his rounds.

  Malcolm found a good vantage point and leaned his shoulder against the station wall, extremely glad he didn't work for the ATF agent. He glanced at the nearest chronometer and sighed. Whew ...Seconds to spare. The line of returning tourists and businessmen had already formed, snaking past Malcolm's position through a series of roped-off switchbacks. Customs agents were rubbing metaphorical hands in anticipation.

  Malcolm's skull bones warned him moments before the main gate into Shangri-la dilated open. Then up-timers streamed through the open portal into the terminal, while departures cleared customs in the usual inefficient dribble. New arrivals stopped at the medical station set up on the inbound side of the gate to have their medical records checked, logged, and mass-scanned into TT-86's medical database. The usual clusters of wide-eyed tourists, grey-suited business types, liveried tour guides, and uniformed government officials-including TT 86's up-time postman with the usual load of letters, laser disks, and parcels -edged clear of Medical and entered the controlled chaos of La-La Land.

  "Okay," Malcolm muttered, "let's see what Father Christmas brought us this time." Once a time-guide, always a time-guide. The occupation was addictive.

  He double-checked the big chronometer board. The next departure was set for three days hence, London. Denver followed that by twelve hours and Edo a day after that. One of the quarterly departures to twelfth century Mongolia would be leaving in six days. He shook his head. Mongolia was out of the question. None of that incoming group looked hardy enough for three months in deadly country inhabited by even deadlier people.

  Gate Five didn't get much traffic, even when it was open.

  He eyed the inbound crowd. London, Denver, or ancient Tokyo ...Most of the tourists to Edo were Japanese businessmen. They tended to stick with Japanese tour guides. The only time Malcolm had been to sixteenth-century Edo had been on a scheduled tour for his old company and he'd been in heavy disguise The Tokugawa shoguns had developed a nasty habit of executing any gaijin unfortunate enough even to be shipwrecked on Japanese shores. After that first visit, Malcolm had firmly decided he'd acquired a good knowledge of sixteenth-century Japanese, Portuguese, and Dutch for nothing.

  London or Denver, then...He'd have three days, minimum, to work on a client. His gaze rested on a likely-looking prospect, a middle-aged woman who had paused to gape in open confusion while the three small children clustered at her side shoved fists into their mouths and clutched luggage covered with Cowboys and Indians. The smallest boy wore a plastic ten-gallon hat and a toy six-gun rig. Mom glanced from side to side, up and down, stared at the chronometer, and appeared ready to burst into tears.

  "Bingo." Tourist in need of help.

  He hadn't taken more than three steps, however, when a redheaded gamine clad in a black leather miniskirt, black stretch-lace body suit, and black thigh-high leather boots, hauling a compact suitcase that looked like it weighed as much as she did, bore down on him with the apparent homing instinct of a striking hawk: "Hi! I'm looking for Kit Carson-any idea where I might find him?"

  "Uh..." Malcolm said intelligently as every drop of blood in his brain transmuted instantaneously to the nether regions of his anatomy. Not only did Malcolm have no idea where the retired time scout might be lurking this time of day ...

  God ...It ought to be illegal to look like that!

  Clearly, it'd been far too long since Malcolm had

  He gave himself an irritable mental kick. Just where might she find Kit? He probably wasn't at his hotel, not this late in the morning; but it was a little early for drinking. Of course, he enjoyed watching departures as much as any other 'eighty-sixer.

  The delightful little minx who'd accosted him was tapping one leather-clad foot in an excess of energy. With her short auburn hair, freckles, and clear green eyes, she gave the impression of an Irish alleycat, intent on her own business and impatient with anything that got in her way. She was the darned cutest thing Malcolm had seen come through Primary in months. He kept his gaze on her face with studied care.

  "Try the Down Time Bar and Grill. If anyone knows, the regulars there might. Or you could..."

  He trailed off. She was already gone, like a bullet from the barrel of a smoking gun. That damned leather miniskirt did evil things to Malcolm's breath control.

  "Well." He rested hands on hips. "If that doesn't ..." He couldn't imagine why a girl that age-and in a tearing hurry, besides-would be looking for Kit Carson of all people. "Huh:" He tried to put her out of his mind and turned to find his bewildered tourist with the cute kids. He needed a job worse than he needed a mystery.

  "Oh, bloody hell..." Skeeter Jackson, the louse, had already collared the scared family and was hard at work playing with the youngest kid. Mom was beaming. God help them.

  He considered warning her, then glanced down at his artistically filthy tunic and swore again. Compared with Skeeter Jackson's groomed appearance, he didn't stand a chance. Maybe he could get her aside later and explain the difference between reliable guides and the Skeeter Jacksons of this world. Malcolm sighed. The way his luck had been running lately, she'd slap him for maligning that "nice young man."

  He decided maybe it wouldn't hurt to take up Ann's offer, after all. Malcolm strolled down the Commons on a reverse course through Castletown, Victoria Station, and Frontier Town. He entered Urbs Romae just as the klaxon for closure of Primary sounded, warning everyone that TT-86 was about to be sealed in again for another couple of days, at least. Up ahead, the pert little up-timer looking for Kit sailed straight past the Down Time without spotting it. He grinned and decided to see how long it took her to holler for help.

  Just what did she want with Kit Carson?

  Whatever it was, Malcolm had a feeling the next few days were going to prove most entertaining.

  Margo thumped down the long, cluttered concourse, berating herself as she went. "Honestly," she fumed, "the first person you ask is a guy in a Roman tunic and slave collar? He's probably some poor down-timer who wandered through an unstable gate, like the articles warned about. Stupid, greenhorn idiot..."

  Margo did not enjoy looking like a fool.

  "No wonder he took so long answering. Probably had to translate everything I said first. At least he spoke some English. And I've got the right station, that's something to celebrate," she added under her breath, glancing in restrained awe at the sprawling complex which stretched away in a maze of catwalks, shops, waiting areas, and cross-corridors that led only God knew where. The care she'd taken to research a time terminal's layout didn't begin to convey the reality of the place. It was enormous, bewildering. And none of the information she'd found described the private sections of a terminal, visible in tantalizing glimpses off the Commons. She found herself wanting to explore ...

  "First," she told herself sternly, "I find Kit Carson. Everything else is secondary. That Roman guy said he might be at some bar, so all I have to do now is find him. I can talk anybody into anything. All I have to do is find him ...."

  Unfortunately, she didn't find the "Down Time"
on the main concourse or any of the balconies connected to it. Margo set down her heavy suitcase, panting slightly, and scowled at an empty set of chairs clustered around a closed gate.

  "What Down Time Bar and Grill?"

  Grimly, Margo picked up her case again, regretting the decision to stuff everything into one piece of luggage. She looked for a terminal directory, something like she'd always found at ordinary shopping malls, but saw nothing remotely resembling one. She didn't want to betray complete ignorance by asking someone. Margo was desperate to give the impression that she was worldly, well-traveled, able to take care of herself.

  But the Down Time Bar & Grill was apparently close kin to the Flying Dutchman, because it didn't appear to exist Maybe it was down time? Don't be ridiculous. Nobody'd put a bar on the other side of a time gate. Finally she started hunting down the maze of cross linked, interconnecting corridors that formed the private portion of TT-86. Stairways led to corridors on other levels, some of them brightly lit, others dim and deserted. Within minutes, she was hopelessly lost and fuming.

  She set the case down again and rubbed her aching palm. Margo glared at a receding stretch of corridor broken occasionally by more corridors and locked doors. "Don't these people believe in posting a directory somewhere?"

  "May I help you?"

  The voice was polite, male, and almost directly behind her.

  She spun around.

  The guy in the tunic. Oh, shit.... Ever since New York she'd been so careful-and this was a down-timer, God knew what he'd try to pull

  "Are you following me?" she demanded, furious that her voice came out breathy and scared instead of calm and assured.

  He scratched the back of his neck under the thick bronze collar: "Well, I couldn't help but notice you passed the Down Time, then took a really wrong turn off the Commons. It's easy to get lost, back here."

  Margo's heart pounded so hard her chest hurt. She backed away a step. "I ought to warn you," she said in a tone meant to be forbidding, "I know martial arts."