Jim Baen's Universe Volume 1 Number 3 October 2006

by Baen Publishing

  With a soundless but dazzling wink the time machine vanished, taking itself and the manual nine months into the future.

  Robbins let out the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. His heart was beating fast, very fast, adrenaline mixing with the beginnings of reaction to the crimes he had committed. He'd always been careful and reflexively law-abiding: the closest he had ever come to illegality was a few speeding tickets. Now in one day he had lied, murdered, stolen, blown up a house, obtained an illegal cell phone and used a time machine. The stress was building inside of him; he wasn't going to be good for much for very much longer.

  But there remained one last task. Hands shaking, he removed the camera card and placed it and the cell phone chips in a small pile on the concrete floor. Next he stripped off the acetate coverings on his fingertips and dropped them on to the stack. Then he melted the lot of it to slag with a butane torch, keeping his face turned away from the acrid fumes.

  ****

  The next day Chuck was smiling.

  "You did it!" he said cheerfully as they sat on their benches in the park, the biting wind ensuring that it was deserted except for a few desperate squirrels. "Trail wiped away, machine delivered to the correct time and spot." He looked at Robbins with a knowing air. "How do you feel?"

  "Slept like crap," Robbins muttered. "Had the damn shakes half the night. Couldn't get Welken out of my head." Reading the newspaper that morning hadn't helped; the story and photographs had brought on a fresh bout of trembling. Though at least Welken didn't appear to have any living relatives; Robbins wasn't sure he could have handled anguished quotes from a grieving widow or son.

  "You'll get over it," Chuck said reassuringly. "That was the worst it gets. That's why I rushed you through it, so we wouldn't have too much time to think about it. I don't want to be hamstrung by post-traumatic stress."

  "How long does it take?" Robbins asked numbly.

  "To get over it?" Chuck cocked his head. "About six months. But it gets better gradually. Every day, a little bit easier. You'll be sleeping like a baby in no time."

  "Fabulous." The words came out flat, emotionless. Robbins raised his head and gazed around at the vacant fields. "So what happens next?"

  Chuck grinned. "Next, we pull the job. Come." He stood, inclining his head toward the distant houses. "Walk with me."

  Robbins grabbed his camera bag and followed, maintaining a respectful distance. It was difficult sometimes to be heard above the wind, but he wasn't going to chance running into Chuck if his future self stopped suddenly.

  "Do you remember the timeline?" Chuck asked as they trudged along the path.

  "Of course. Nine months from now I find the time machine again. Three months after that I launch the operation. I spend the next five years setting everything up. Then we do the job."

  Chuck nodded and looked sharply at Robbins, his clear green eyes gazing into their identical twins. "Good. Just one small change, from your point of view." He favored Robbins with a small smile. "We do the job tomorrow."

  Robbins gaped at him. "What? Why?"

  But he knew. Or at least, he knew the motivation, if not the actual rationale. That small smile said it all. Robbins had always enjoyed being clever. And clearly, this was a clever moment.

  "Because if we pull off the heist two days after you steal the time machine, nobody in your continuum will have had time to put two and two together," Chuck said. "In addition, if we succeed, that will guarantee you rediscover the time machine nine months from now, since you're still in your native continuum."

  Robbins frowned. "I don't think it works like that . . ." he began, and stopped. Fact is, neither of them really knew how it worked.

  Chuck's smile broadened. "According to the histories in my time, it does work like that. Because the heist is never solved and the theft of the time machine is never discovered. So I'm confident that in my continuum, in another six months I will step into the time machine, come here tomorrow to pull off the heist, and return a very rich man."

  This sort of talk always made Robbins' head hurt. But he had to trust him; Chuck knew a lot more about it, besides having the advantage of 20/20 hindsight.

  "Okay," Robbins said, throwing up his hands. "I'm the boss. What's the job?"

  "In good time," Chuck said. "The others will be waiting for us. I only want to explain it once."

  Robbins halted in his tracks. "The others are here? We're going to meet them?"

  Chuck nodded, that small smile back on his face.

  "But . . ." Robbins cast about for the right words. "Is that . . . safe?"

  Chuck laughed. "Wait and see. It'll be fine."

  "Because you remember it."

  He laughed again. "Exactly."

  They walked the rest of the way in silence. A few minutes later they left the park, crossed the street and stopped in front of a large gray-stuccoed four-square.

  Robbins had bought the place several months ago at Chuck's behest, but had never been inside. Now Chuck produced a key, mounted the steps, unlocked the door and pushed it open. "C'mon," he said over his shoulder as he stepped through.

  Robbins followed and found himself in a small foyer, a wide stairway in front, dining room to the right, living room to the left. Wide baseboards stained a rich deep brown shone warmly in the light from the tall oval windows. There wasn't a scrap of furniture in sight.

  "I like what we've done with the place," Robbins said as Chuck led the way along a short hallway to the back of the house, where another set of stairs led to the basement. Chuck didn't answer, just flipped on a light and headed down.

  It was a full basement, recently refurbished, though in a way not designed to enhance resale value. Wires covered the bare concrete walls, connecting four flat-panel televisions hung in a semi-circle. They all faced the back wall, where a huge projector threw bright white light onto a screen that was easily seven feet square. Extension cords and cables ran here and there across the floor, plugged almost randomly into wall sockets and power strips.

  "What . . ." Robbins began, but Chuck waved it away. "Not now," he said. "We've got work to do." He pointed to a corner. "There's a laptop over there. Get it booted up and hooked into the projector."

  This, at least, made sense. The vast energy in Chuck's spacetime bubble sometimes had unpredictable effects on sensitive electronics. TVs were fine, but not computers. So for a few minutes Robbins played A/V nerd, pulling the laptop out of its box and getting it set up.

  Chuck, meanwhile, was pulling papers out of his pocket and stacking them on his lap. Robbins knew what that meant, so when he finished with the laptop he unpacked his camera and photographed the pages. Then he transferred the images to the laptop and began arranging them for display on the projector screen.

  He glanced at Chuck as he worked. "So what's going on here? We're teleconferencing?"

  Chuck smiled approvingly. "Sort of. Four-bedroom house, four others. Each gets his own room, equipped with a two-way video connection. Didn't want to risk cramming us all into the same room."

  "Except for you and me, of course. Thanks."

  "Couldn't be helped. Believe me."

  Robbins hooked a thumb at the screen behind him. "They're not going to try to photograph this stuff through the TV, are they?"

  "They'll be taking notes."

  Robbins nodded, still vaguely uneasy but unable to see a flaw in the plan. He'd always had a streak of overconfidence, but in Chuck the streak seemed magnified, almost cherished. Robbins hoped he wasn't simply seeing himself the way others saw him, because what he saw wasn't all that attractive. It wasn't just Chuck's easy way with Welken's murder, as if they were discussing a bad bout of acne. Chuck was, to put it bluntly, a smug little know-it-all. Robbins just hoped his planning justified the smugness.

  Without warning the house above them rang with activity: the distant sound of feet on hardwood and other, less identifiable noises. Then, one by one, the flat-panels flickered to life.

  Sitting next t
o the projector, Robbins suddenly found himself at the center of a disconcerting circle of attention, four versions of himself staring expectantly at him from the TV screens. It was like looking at one of those artificially aged photos on missing-children fliers, except he got to see a progression: youngest on the left, each successive screen adding a year of objective age and somewhat more subjective. Time wound forward as his eyes moved around the circle, finally coming to rest on Chuck, the oldest, as he stepped in front of Robbins and into the limelight.

  "Welcome, everyone," Chuck said grandly, spreading his hands before him. "For most of you"—he inclined his head slightly toward the screens on the right—"this won't be anything new, other than copying down different information than before. For the newer attendees, get used to it. You have no idea how odd it is to carry around six separate memories of this moment."

  Behind him, Robbins watched the screens with fascination. He quickly decided, in the interest of preserving his sanity, to name the youngest version Chuck1, followed by Chuck2 and so on until he reached Chuck5, the only version he had had dealings with up until now.

  "When I first found the time machine," Chuck5 went on, "I had no idea what to do with it. I couldn't sell it. I couldn't bring back extra mass. And I couldn't recruit any helpers because they'd probably just kill me for the device itself."

  At the word "kill" the Chucks on the right nodded in placid agreement, while Chuck1 winced slightly and Chuck2 stared stonily ahead. Apparently it would take more than six months to get over Welken's murder.

  "I tried the stock tips route, but somehow the immutability of time streams kept kicking in. I hadn't been rich before, so I couldn't suddenly become fabulously rich now based on any sort of steady accumulation of assets. Either my past self wouldn't believe me, or was prevented from completing the purchase, or sudden expenses cropped up that wiped out the profits."

  Four Chucks nodded sagely in almost comical unison. Robbins stared at Chuck5's back in surprise. He'd never mentioned that particular effect before.

  "I finally concluded that any wealth would have to accumulate after my use of the time machine in my native continuum. That, in turn, suggested the method of obtaining that wealth.

  "But I still needed helpers. And I couldn't trust anyone with my secret. I couldn't see a way around that.

  "Until one day I realized that I could make a gang out of myself."

  He bowed toward the screens, that little "aren't I clever?" smirk on his face. The Chucks all looked slightly bored.

  "So here we are," Chuck5 concluded. He turned and gave Robbins a bow this time. "Let's get started."

  Robbins flicked on the projector and called up the first page. On four screens four heads bent over pads of paper, scribbling rapidly.

  Robbins watched Chuck5. He paced the room, answering the occasional question in a confident voice. Once, their eyes met. The look of almost manic glee on Chuck5's face sent shivers down Robbins' spine and made him sleep even worse that night than he had the previous one.

  ****

  The following evening Robbins climbed into his car and drove southeast, out of the city and into the industrial suburbs along the river. A light snow had fallen that morning, and the remnants sparkled and glittered in his headlights as he pulled off the main highway onto a county road lined with gravel pits and wetlands.

  He turned into a long, winding entrance road. It cut through a screen of trees and frozen ponds before opening up on to the parking lot of a warehouse. Robbins drove around to the loading docks and parked near a back gate, the service road beyond wending off into the darkness along the river.

  He took a pair of bolt cutters to the chain holding the gate shut, unlatched it, and redraped the chain loosely around the center posts. From a distance it should look securely locked, but it would open easily if he had to leave in a hurry.

  Tossing the bolt cutters back into the car, Robbins headed across the darkened asphalt to the warehouse and mounted the stairs to the service entrance. As he reached the top step the door swung open, revealing a grim-looking Chuck1.

  When you have a time machine that will deliver you to any coordinates you choose, locked doors and perimeter alarms don't mean a whole lot.

  "Everything all right?" Robbins asked, frowning.

  "Yes. I just—" Chuck1 stopped. "Well, you'll see."

  He backed out of the way, and Robbins stepped through into light and noise.

  The warehouse was big. Endless rows of shelving rose forty feet to the ceiling and stretched away into the distance, boxes of all shapes and sizes crowding every available inch. Robotic forklifts glided in and out of the aisles, invisible orders directing them to retrieve packages and deliver them to a conveyor belt that ran down the wall to the left. Windowed offices lined another wall, doors shut, their interiors dark and empty.

  Except one. With a nod to Chuck1, Robbins crossed the floor to the foreman's office, dodging forklifts as he went.

  The office was square and sparsely furnished, just a desk and a couple of chairs. One wall held some personal mementos while a large oil painting of a sailfish covered another. The desk's telephone, monitor and keyboard had been shoved unceremoniously to one side, clearing a large spread of desktop—a spread currently occupied by Chuck5's backside.

  He looked up as Robbins came in, his face splitting into that broad and increasingly disturbing grin. "You made it. Everything go okay?"

  Robbins nodded, glancing around. "Everyone accounted for?"

  Chuck5's grin widened, eyes glittering. "Like clockwork. Chuck1 watching the back door. Warehouse crew locked in the sorting room, handcuffed, gagged and blindfolded, guarded by Chuck2. Chuck3 watching the front. Chuck4 monitoring the security cameras. You and me in here. Ready?"

  "Sure." Robbins tried and failed to sound enthusiastic. The more time he spent around Chuck4 and Chuck5, the more they creeped him out. There was something about both of them that just felt wrong.

  Chuck either sensed or remembered the hesitation, because the grin faded and his voice grew brusque. "Let's get it done, then. The sooner we finish, the sooner we can go home." He hooked a finger at the oil painting. "Get that down, then help me."

  Obediently, Robbins stepped to the wall and carefully lifted down the massive picture, revealing the rectangular safe behind it. There was no keyhole, keypad or combination dial—just a handle recessed into the dark metal next to an inch-square button, in the center of which a red light blinked serenely.

  Robbins stared at it. "What's that? Alarm?"

  "An alarm is hooked into it, but no," Chuck5 said behind him, sounding like he was exerting himself. "Biometric lock. Fingerprints."

  Robbins turned around. "Then how—"

  He stopped, mouth open. Chuck5 had shoved the desk chair aside and was hunkered down, hauling someone out of the legspace: a short, obese man with a gag over his mouth and his hands bound in front of him. Both measures seemed pretty unnecessary, since the man was clearly unconscious.

  Robbins forced his jaw to start moving again. "Who . . . ?"

  Chuck5, breathing hard, finished freeing his burden from under the desk and paused, looking up. "The owner of the company," he said, jerking his head to indicate the warehouse they were standing in. Robbins looked vacant; Chuck5's expression turned exasperated. "The guy we're robbing?"

  Robbins shook his head. "I know. What's he doing here?"

  Chuck5's grin was positively feral this time. "Biometric lock. We need his fingerprint." He gave a flick of his wrist, and suddenly he was holding a nasty-looking knife, the blade clean and razor-sharp.

  "Are you out of your mind?" Robbins blurted out. "What are you doing?"

  A look of mild disgust crossed Chuck5's face. "I can't believe I used to be such a wuss," he muttered. He took a deep breath, exuding long-suffering patience. "Look, I know what you're thinking, so I'll save you the long back and forth. We need this finger"—he held up the unconscious man's right hand, tapping the index finger with his knife—"up
there." He pointed the knife at the safe, which was a good six feet off the floor. "We can either try to lift him up, or we can take the finger. I've thought about it, and I chose Plan B."

  He pulled a small white towel out of his pocket and laid it on the floor. Then he placed the man's hand on the towel and carefully extended the finger.

  "Wait!" Robbins took an involuntary step forward.

  Chuck5 looked up at him again, knife resting just above the third joint. "It'll take both of us to lift him up," he said patiently, as if addressing a particularly poor student. "You want to risk us touching just to save this guy's finger? Because I don't."

  "But. . . ." Robbins didn't know what he wanted, but he didn't need another blotch on his soul so soon after killing Welken.

  Chuck5 eyed him for a few seconds, then shook his head wonderingly. "Oh, for God's sake! Get out of here." He raised his wrist to check his watch. "Go check on the others. I'll take care of this. Come back in ten minutes."

  Robbins edged toward the door. As he reached it Chuck5 called out, "Wait!"

  Robbins paused, looked back.

  "Don't forget to bring one of those forklifts with you."

  Robbins nodded dumbly and backed through the door, slowing only to grab a cell-phone sized chunk of plastic off the desk.

  That piece of plastic was the only reason Robbins was along for the actual heist. It would have been much safer for the job to be pulled off entirely by time travellers, leaving Robbins with a perfect alibi. But the remote controls for the forklifts fell into the category of "sensitive electronics," and they needed him—that is, someone not surrounded by a hydrogen bomb's worth of potential energy—to operate them.

  The biometrics would open the safe. The forklift would lift out the contents, leaving no physical evidence of their presence. It was really nothing more than a high-tech smash-and-grab, but then Robbins was a freelance writer, not a criminal mastermind.