Time Loves a Hero

by Allen Steele

  “I’m on it.” Lea was already out of her couch; shoulders hunched slightly, she staggered to the hatch, opened it, and exited the compartment. In the monitor room, she would be able to access historical star charts from the library and match them against the real-time positions of visible constellations.

  Although Hoffman had unbuckled his restraints, the younger man still lay in his couch; his face pale as he stared up at the ceiling. “Are you all right?” Franc asked quietly, and Tom gave him a weak nod. “Good. Take it easy for a minute, but then we’ve got work to do.”

  “Yeah … okay, sure.” Tom took a deep breath, let out a rattling sigh. “It’s … different from the simulator, isn’t it?”

  “It’s always different in the simulator.” He swatted Hoffman’s knee. “Cleanup detail is yours. When you’re done with that, you can help Lea and me get ready for insertion.”

  Tom nodded again. Franc walked to the hatch, then silently waited another few moments to see if Hoffman could get up without any further coaxing. When Tom finally stirred, he opened the hatch and headed for the control room.

  “Hoffman got sick, didn’t he?” Vasili had left his chair; he stood in front of the main engineering panel, running a check on the main systems. “I told Paolo I wanted a more experienced mission specialist for this trip.”

  “First time for everyone.” So far as he understood the Oberon’s major control systems, everything looked as it should. “He’s a little shaky, but he’s getting over it. How’s the ship?”

  “Fine. Made it through without a problem.” Metz turned away from the engineering panel. “Soon as Lea confirms our position, I’ll raise the Miranda, tell her we’re in position.”

  “Okay.” Franc hesitated. “Need any help in here?”

  “None, thank you.” Metz shot him a dark look as he returned to his seat. “When I need a copilot, Dr. Lu, I’ll ask for one.”

  “Sure.” Rebuffed, Franc stepped away. “Pardon me for asking …”

  “You’re pardoned.” Metz inched his seat a little closer to the console, began typing commands into the keypad. “If you want to help, you can go see what’s taking Lea so long. I should have received those readings five minutes ago.”

  There were a few choice words Franc had for the pilot, but he resisted the urge to voice them. Indeed, there wasn’t much point in saying anything. Leaving Metz to his work, he turned and left the control room. Once in the passageway, he took a few moments to slowly count to ten, then turned and headed for the monitor room.

  The screen dominating the far wall of the monitor room displayed a stellar chart, overlaid across a real-time view of the starscape outside the timeship. Lea stood before the pedestal in the center of the compartment; although her hands rested upon its touch pad, she seemed to be intently listening to something through her headset. She didn’t notice Franc’s presence until he touched her shoulder, and even then she barely looked up at him.

  “Metz wants to know …”

  “We’re here,” she said, distractedly nodding toward the wallscreen. “We’re where we’re supposed to be. Hold on a sec …” Lea impatiently ran her fingers across the touch pad, relaying the data to Metz’s console. “You’ve got to hear this.”

  The compartment was suddenly filled with a strident, somewhat high-pitched male voice. Apparently coming from a ground-based radio source, it was distorted by static. The language was clearly German, though, and the voice steadily rose with intensity.

  “I don’t have a clear fix, but it seems to originating from Berlin. I’ll feed it through the interpreter.” Lea tapped another command into the pedestal, and the screen changed to display upward-scrolling bars of text:

  I, too, am a child of the people. I do not trace my line from any castle. I come from the workshop. Neither was I a general. I was simply a solider as were millions of others. It is something wonderful that amongst us an unknown from an army of millions of the German people—of workers and soldiers—could rise to be head of the Reich and nation.

  “You know who that is?” she whispered. “You know who we were listening to?”

  Franc slowly nodded. Almost 377 years in the past, he was hearing the voice of one of the worst figures ever to emerge from human history.

  Somewhere down there, speaking into a radio microphone, was the hate-filled monster known as Adolf Hitler.

  Monday, January 14, 1998: 5:06 P.M.

  It wasn’t until he heard people in the corridor that Murphy realized that the workday had come to an end. Raising his head from the paperwork in which he had deliberately absorbed himself, he watched as a couple of secretaries marched past the half-open door of his office, pulling on their overcoats as they chatted about a Billy Joel concert they were attending later that evening. Outside the window, night had fallen without his noticing.

  Murphy slipped some files into his briefcase, then straightened his desk and switched off the computer. He exchanged his loafers for snow boots, then stood up and gathered his parka. All the while, his gaze kept falling on the phone. For the past several hours, as much as he had tried to distract himself, he had kept expecting it to ring. Yet it never did, not even once, until the prolonged silence became unnerving.

  “Cut it out,” he said to himself, under his breath. “There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

  Oh, yeah? a small voice in the back of his mind asked. Then why are you scared to go home?

  No. He wasn’t scared to go home. It was leaving the office that bothered him. For the dozenth time this afternoon, he considered calling Donna and asking her to drive into the city to pick him up at the office. Perhaps he could sweeten the deal by suggesting that they go out to dinner. But that would mean she would have to battle rush-hour traffic on the Beltway, and she was undoubtedly already making dinner, and Steven wouldn’t get his homework done, and …

  Nuts. He was taking public transportation, wasn’t he? There would be dozens of subway riders around him at all times. He’d never be alone for a minute. And what was he expecting anyway? A couple of guys in trench coats? That was like something from a Robert Ludlum novel. The pseudo-Benford? Okay, if he saw him again, he’d find a pay phone and call the cops. Or maybe the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America …

  Murphy chuckled as he switched off the lights. No, there was nothing to worry about. He was just spooking himself. Hell, for all he knew, this might be an elaborate practical joke someone was playing on him. Whatever it was, he’d get it straightened out eventually …

  The snow had continued to fall all afternoon, leaving the sidewalks covered with a layer of fresh white powder, the wind whisking it past streetlights and passing automobiles, giving it the appearance of fairy dust. A yellow snowplow grumbled up E Street, its blade grinding against icy asphalt as it shoved the drifts out of the way. Burying his face within his scarf, Murphy fell in with office workers trudging their way toward L’Enfant Plaza; he paused at the top of the subway escalator to buy the late edition of the Washington Times, then descended into the welcome warmth of the Metro station.

  Murphy had become spoiled by having a reserved space in the NASA garage. In all the years he had lived in the D.C. area, he had seldom ridden the subway to and from work, preferring to use it on the weekends as a means of taking Steven to ball games at Kennedy Stadium or for Sunday shopping trips at Eastern Market. So the ride to the Virginia ’burbs took longer than he expected; the train was packed, with every seat taken and people standing in the aisles, gamely clinging to posts and ceiling rails as the car gently swayed back and forth. It was too crowded to open his newspaper, so after glancing at the headlines—the Times, in its usual self-righteous indignation, was making the most of the Paula Jones scandal—he tucked it beneath his briefcase and stared straight ahead, silently observing everyone while making eye contact with no one, the customary behavior of straphangers everywhere.

  As the train emerged from beneath the Potomac, the crowd began to gradually thin out with each stop. Pentagon, Pen
tagon City, Crystal City, National Airport, Braddock Road, King Street … as the stations went by in turn, a few more people got on while even more got off, until by the time the Yellow Line reached Eisenhower Avenue there was no one left standing and there were empty seats here and there. When the old pensioner who had shared his seat got off at Eisenhower, Murphy was finally able to open his newspaper, yet he didn’t bother to do so. The next stop was Huntington, where he had parked his car this morning. Why bother to read when he was getting off soon?

  Fatigued, idly hoping that Donna had fixed meat loaf and mashed potatoes for dinner and that Steven wasn’t going to be too demanding tonight, he absently gazed around the half-empty train. Across the aisle, a businessman read a John Grisham thriller. A little farther away, a couple of Latino teenagers in hooded sweatshirts muttered to each other in Spanish, loudly laughing every now and then. A middle-aged black woman stared listlessly out the window. A pretty girl with long red hair flowing from beneath her black beret caught his eye; she was easy to look at, and he found himself studying her until she noticed him. She regarded him coolly, her hard eyes challenging his intrusion, and he quickly glanced away, self-consciously shifting his attention to the window beside him.

  Murphy might not have noticed the old man sitting in the rear of the train, had he not looked at the window at just that moment. Captured in its dark reflection, three rows back on the other side of the aisle, was a tall, gaunt man. Long brown hair turning gray, white beard covering his face, he wore an Army-surplus parka, its collar zipped up to his neck, a blue Mets baseball cap pulled low over his eyes. Another one of Washington’s countless derelicts, easily ignored until they try to beg change from you …

  Yet, in the instant Murphy spotted him, the bum was staring straight at him. Watching him.

  Murphy instinctively glanced away. Then, uneasily, he turned his eyes toward the window once more. The man in the back of the train was still watching him, apparently unaware that he himself was being surreptitiously observed.

  No, it wasn’t the pseudo-Benford; this guy was a bit shorter, his build less solid. A complete stranger … and yet, in some unfathomable way, his face seemed vaguely familiar. If you shaved off the beard, perhaps gave him a haircut …

  The train lurched, began to slow down. Streetlights swept into view, distorting the window reflection. They were coming into the next station. “Huntington,” the recorded voice said from the ceiling speakers. “Doors opening on the right.”

  The businessman put away his paperback, picked up his briefcase. The black lady sighed wearily, shifted her feet as if getting ready to stand. The Latino kids sullenly watched Murphy as he nervously moved his briefcase into his lap. The reflection disappeared behind the jaundiced glare of sodium-vapor streetlights as the train rushed into the elevated station. Through the window, Murphy could see a dozen or so people waiting on the platform, but no sign of a transit cop.

  Faking a sudden cough, Murphy raised a hand to his mouth, then stole a glance behind him. The old man hastily looked away, yet he had one foot already in the aisle. Yes, he was planning to get off here.

  For an instant, Murphy had an impulse to stay seated. Yet this was where he had parked his car. Unless he wanted to ride the Metro all the way to the end of the line, then buy another farecard and double back again, he had to get off here.

  It’s only some wino, he told himself. Some poor homeless bastard. Maybe a little crazy. Likes to watch people on the train, that’s all.…

  The train trundled to a stop. The businessman and the black lady stood up, moved toward the door. Murphy hesitated a moment longer, then as the doors slid open, he quickly rose from his seat, rushed down the aisle. The black lady stared at him in mute surprise as he pushed past her, and the businessman muttered an obscenity at his back when their shoulders briefly collided. Then he was off the train, walking as fast as he could for the platform exit.

  At the top of the stairs, he stopped briefly to peer over his shoulder. He couldn’t see the bum, yet the crowd was so dense, it was impossible to tell for certain. Holding on to the handrail, Murphy turned and began jogging down the stairs.

  Just beyond the turnstiles, past the gated steel-mesh fence, lay the parking lot.

  Sonntag, Mai 2, 1937—2147 CET

  At first the city could not be seen, its environs hidden by a dense blanket of rain-swollen clouds, then the Oberon penetrated the overcast and suddenly Frankfurt appeared as a sprawl of urban light, its luminescence divided into unequal halves by the serpentine trail of the River Main. The infrared scopes picked out the most prominent landmarks: the high Gothic spire of St. Batholomäus Dom, the banks and office buildings of the central financial district, the immense shell of the Hauptbahnhof train station.

  “Over there.” Standing next to Metz in the control room, Franc pointed to a small, irregular blotch of darkness just northwest of the Cityring, the narrow greenway that surrounded the oldest part of the city. “Near the Alte Oper … see it? That’s the Rothschild estate. Put us down there.”

  The pilot peered at the screen. “No way. Too small, and way too close.” He pointed to a larger park several kilometers farther away, at the edge of the city just north of the Goethe-Universität. “I’d rather set down there. Less chance of being spotted.”

  “That’s the botanical garden. You know how far we’d have to hike to get from there to the Frankfurter Hof?” Franc shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. So long as we’re in chameleon mode, no one’s going to see us. The streets are nearly vacant this time of night.”

  “So you take a long walk.” Metz remained unconvinced. “An old man like you needs the exercise.”

  Franc scowled. He was still getting used to his changed appearance. Now the apparent age of sixty, he had thinning gray hair and a slight paunch around the middle, along with an unaccustomed set of wrinkles around his eyes and mouth. Although his nanoskin disguise wasn’t uncomfortable—it was his own epidermis, after all, reshaped at the microscopic level to provide a living mask—the period outfit he wore was nearly unbearable: a stiff black tuxedo with archaic tails over a cotton dress shirt and white tie. The sort of thing a gentleman would wear to the Sunday night opera in a European city. For all intents and purposes, he now resembled John Pannes, the American businessman whose place he would soon take aboard the Hindenburg.

  “The farther we have to walk, the more likely we are to get into trouble. Just put us down there, all right?”

  “Well, but …” Metz shrugged. “Whatever you say.”

  “Good.” Despite his anxiety, he found himself eager to leave the Oberon. He was getting tired of quarreling with the pilot. “Give us about ten minutes. I’ll go check on Lea.”

  He left the flight deck, walked down the passageway to the monitor room. The hatch was shut; he slid it open, and was immediately greeted by an outraged scream:.

  “Franc! Knock first, for God’s sake!”

  “Entschuldigen,” he murmured, grinning despite himself. Lea had apparently just emerged from the replication cell. The cylinder rested on one side of the compartment, steam rising from its open hood. “Didn’t mean to intrude.”

  “Sorry. I just don’t … like the way I look, that’s all.”

  No wonder Lea was embarrassed; although he had seen her nude many times, as the forty-five-year-old Emma Pannes she looked completely different. The replication cell had added about ten kilos of artificial flesh to her body, giving her larger breasts, broader hips, a little more roundness to her tummy and thighs. Emma Pannes wasn’t an unpleasant-looking woman, but she certainly didn’t possess Lea’s svelte figure.

  “You better get used to this,” he added as he gallantly turned his back. “We’re an old married couple from Long Island, remember?”

  “Never mind.” Behind him, he heard the rustle of fabric as she began to get dressed. “Have we made contact with the Miranda?”

  “Vasili spoke with Hans about ten minutes ago.” Although Franc kept his back to her,
from the corner of his eye he could see her figure half-reflected on the wallscreen, like a ghost superimposed above the nightscape of Frankfurt-Am-Main. “The advance team picked up the Pannes about an hour and half ago, shortly after they left the Frankfurter Hof on their way to the opera. They were alone, and nobody saw them. They’re at the safe house in Griesheim, and Hans will pick them up outside town tomorrow night after the Hindenburg departs from the aerodrome.”

  “And our bags?”

  “They’re on the way right now. Oh, and one more thing …” He reached to the high collar of his shirt, pressed his thumb and forefingers against his throat to activate the subcutaneous mimics implanted within his vocal cords. When he spoke again, his voice was gravelly and lower-pitched, with a distinct American accent. “We’ve received the voice patterns from the extraction team,” he said, and watched when she jerked her head in surprise. “I’ve already downloaded mine from the AI. Remember to get yours.”

  “I won’t forget.” She let out her breath with relief. If one of the most risky parts of the mission had been the extrication of John and Emma Pannes from the city, then successfully obtaining their vocal patterns had been one of the most delicate. “So where’s Vasili going to put us down?”

  “He wanted to put us down in the Botanischer Garten, but I held out for the Rothschild estate.” When the German members of the Rothschild family fled the country earlier this year, the grounds of their Frankfurt home had been claimed by the Nazi government; already it had been turned into a public park. “It’s much smaller, but we shouldn’t have any trouble.”

  “No radar, and this side of the city isn’t known for its night life.” An irritated sigh. “Button me up, will you? I can’t reach behind me.”

  She was wearing an ankle-length white evening gown of the late-1930s style. Artifacts Division had done their usual thorough job of researching contemporary fashions and tailoring authentic replicas, but he hoped that this style was close to what Emma Pannes had worn when she and her husband had left the Frankfurter Hof earlier this evening. Franc buttoned up the back of her dress, and she turned around to face him.