Timelines

by Bob Blink

  This was sobering news. Even if we had prepared to leave a long time ago, I’d been watching the clock and thought we’d have a little time before going outside to face the angry and frustrated people we had held off for so long. It wasn’t going to be fun for a while. I took a quick look around. Everyone was in the complex. Most of the men left were those who had worked so tirelessly for Mike for so long. Only one would be coming out with us. Six of them would return home with Thomas to the 1870’s from when they had come. He still planned to stay there, and promised to finish the business of tracking down the alien. He would leave a note at the agreed location explaining his success or failure. Four would head back to joint Dave in the Roman era. They had come from there. That just left five of us. Naiya, Carol, Al and his assistant Clint, and myself.

  With our thanks and best wishes, they made their way out the respective tunnels. Now the only people left were the soldiers that were being watched by Naiya, and ourselves. She had Carol’s rifle rather than one of the alien devices. We didn’t want to kill anyone we didn’t have to no matter what we said.

  “Let’s get it done,” I said. There was no point in waiting. Naiya open the tunnel and urged the soldiers to pass through. After they had all left, she stood back out of a direct line through the tunnel, but where she could guard the entrance. We gave it a couple of minutes so our messages could be passed.

  “Naiya, why don’t you and Clint help Al outside. Carol and I will start the timers. I’ll take the one upstairs. Wait to open the tunnel until we are in position and then go.”

  They had started towards the tunnel when we heard and felt the contact outside the station. They were here! “Go’” I urged unnecessarily.

  I ran up the stairs. “Ready,” I yelled to Carol down below. I could see through the floor that Naiya was on her way through the tunnel to home.

  “It’s done,” she yelled. I had triggered mine as well. I wondered which would be first. Just so long as one of them worked.

  I hurried down the ramp, jumping off the side part way down. I looked, but Carol had already made her exit. Good. I would be the last out. I made my way toward the tunnel. I hadn’t heard the door opening upstairs yet. So far we were ahead of them. Hopefully it will take them a couple more minutes. Then it wouldn’t matter. I really didn’t think they would find the bomb even if they came in now. It was tucked back in the corner. The aliens would be looking for humans, hopefully until it was too late.

  I hit the tunnel at a run, and made my way through to the far side. I ran well away from the entrance to ensure the key in my communicator wouldn’t hold it open. As the tunnel closed I noted that a standoff existed. Naiya was crouched behind a large rock on the side of the hill. Carol’s rifle was pointed at the men gathered outside fifty feet further on. They held guns of their own, but no one seemed anxious to initiate a confrontation. I ran to her side and turned and watched the tunnel close. I could see Al and Clint off to the side. I wondered where Carol had gone.

  “Where’s Carol?” I asked.

  Naiya shook her head. I noticed tears forming in her eyes. “She’s not coming,” she said. “I expected this.”

  I started to get up, but there was no time. I sat down heavily. “Uptime?” I asked.

  Naiya nodded.

  We stayed like that for ten minutes. There were no explosions or flashes of light. Just silence. Finally I walked back toward the cave entrance. All signs of the newly created entrance were gone. For the first time since I had discovered the time complex so long ago, nothing happened. The tunnel didn’t appear. Clearly we had done significant damage, but only time would tell how much we had really accomplished.

  I made my way back to Naiya. She handed me the rifle and slipped into my arms. I pointed the rifle skywards and pulled the trigger several times. It didn’t take long. There were only two weak charges remaining. They wouldn’t be able to do much with the empty rifle. I helped Naiya stand and we walked over where they took us into custody.

  Chapter 63

  Epilogue-2017

  It’s been more than a decade now. We seem to still be here. I guess that means we succeeded? Or would it only seem that way until history gets adjusted? But we lost so many doing so. I’ve chosen to view the results in a positive light, but we are still working to ensure the events surrounding the alien’s project don’t get lost in history. Mankind must remain aware and vigilant.

  Naiya and I are Australian citizens now. We like it here and have been adopted by our new country. I write and lecture at the University of Sydney. Sometimes I dabble in industry when a particularly interesting little project is offered. Mostly we enjoy our life together. We don’t need money. There was so much of that even after we made sure everyone associated with the project was taken care of. I even still have my original key. I kept it secret for a while, but not any more. People like to see it. I had hidden it away when things started getting tense after the government was brought into the project. I recovered it a couple years after we destroyed the complex. The government had taken all of the other keys by then.

  It wasn’t fun for a while. When we first exited the time tunnel and were taken into custody a lot of people had plans for us, none of which were particularly appealing. Naiya and I weren’t allowed to see each other for a week. Then they started realizing the magnitude of the problem they faced. News disclosing the whole story was suddenly available world-wide. No details were left unsaid. John and his team had been ready to put everything out on the internet. Verification of proof was offered to any government that was interested in examining the facts. We even had kept one of the alien bodies for medical examination. This wasn’t going to be made into another fantastic tale, told by a bunch of odd-balls. The stories we released even detailed the extent the U.S. government had gone to in their attempts to take over the facility. The problem with the bombs was told and how our team had been helped by General Wilson to retrieve a couple of the new, secretly developed nuclear bombs that the U.S. had lost when they had deployed them with full intent to use in the terrorist war. That cost them heavily in world opinion. It bought us some leverage as well because other countries wanted to talk with us. The U.S. couldn’t refuse given the magnitude of world interest.

  It didn’t take long for them to learn the technology was lost in other time eras. They couldn’t recover it. We couldn’t activate the system anymore. They took us there and we convinced both ourselves and them the complex was no longer operational. It wasn’t hard for them to discover how little we knew about the technology we had been using. We had learned how to use it, not how it was constructed or how to duplicate it. We had been more than overwhelmed with the former. Even the information we did possess, which we shared freely, was essentially useless without the technology to take advantage of it. It was a little like giving a modern calculator to Albert Einstein. He might fully appreciate what it did, and even have some thoughts about how. But he would have no ability to investigate the workings of the device, and even less of trying to duplicate it. Interesting, but not useful. In this case, they didn’t even have the devices. The only items they have recovered include Carol’s fully discharged rifle, a couple of tunnel keys, one non-functioning communicator, and a handful of artifacts that Kurt had gathered over the years. Nothing else.

  We had another very powerful weapon. Just as I had told one of the colonels, information that is secret today is often readily available in the future. No government or politician is without secrets that they can afford known by the general public. They would be voted out of office, if not arrested if some things became known. We had it all. John had spent several days uptime gathering all the data we would ever need. They could never find where we had it stored, but the little bits we gave them resulted in an immediate change in attitude toward our people. We had some private meetings with some very senior people; the President included. We told them a few things we knew. When they finally understood what having a time machine meant and what detail we really must have s
tored away, agreements were made. Our people were left alone after that. It made sense anyway. We really had very little they could use. We also sent a few things to our hosts in Israel. Things that would help them in their negotiations with the U.S. We are popular over there.

  Our group in Canada exists even today. Ed still manages it. It is smaller now as people have drifted away to other opportunities. They still release the most recent information they are able to extract from the translated alien files we installed on the computers there. They have none of the uptime computers, of course, nor any of the alien gear. A little of that still exists, but only Naiya and I know where. It won’t be found, and we have never visited there or given any hint of its existence. The items were kept as a fallback, in case things didn’t work out. Enough was saved to form the kernel of a new organization. We’ll let it decay away.

  Doc was furious with me for more than five years. That actually worked for us in the beginning. That kind of anger can’t be faked. It probably did as much as anything to convince the authorities what we had been telling them all along. We had left the technology they sought behind where it could not be retrieved no matter what they did to us. He’s calmed down a bit now, but the relationship is still strained. I tricked him, you see. When he moved out and shipped his stuff to the Vancouver facility, I arranged for a number of items to be left behind. Doc had been the one person who had really had a chance to dig into the technology and learn a bit about how things worked. To actually work with the uptime medications required some fairly sophisticated hardware that hasn’t been invented yet. We had all of the required equipment at the base, courtesy of Carol. It’s still there. I made sure none of it made it into the 21st century when his stuff was shipped. By the time he realized what I had done, the tunnels were closed forever. It had to be this way. If he were allowed to manufacture and release the advance medications now, it would mean a massive change to existing history. That couldn’t be allowed. We need the history to remain what we knew. I don’t know what would happen if reality were changed by something like this. Could we undo all of our accomplishments? We had relied on the existing uptime reality very strongly. Besides, Carol is up there. I won’t do anything that would jeopardize her existence.

  Doc’s a smart guy. He knows what has to be done. He could develop everything he needs to start over. It would only take four or five hundred years. There is a long time left to him, but not that long. He’ll get things started. Who knows? Maybe this is how the meds were developed in the first place.

  Most of the others are doing well. John is the CEO of his own computer company. He has some products just coming out now that reflect some significant changes in computer design. I know the new designs reflect ideas that are derived from the uptime machines and the alien devices, but not in a direct way. It’s as if working with the advanced machines got him thinking in a new direction. It’s not as if he is copying the technology. He had remarked to me on a number of occasions in the complex that he couldn’t tell how they had made the various components in the machines Carol had provided. The alien machines were even more obscure.

  Jeff and his boss the general have officially ceased to exist. They are both in Israel. Jeff has a new name. He has lots of family there and last time we talked is extremely happy with how things turned out for him. The general is on the staff of the senior military advisor to their president. He isn’t seen, but he has made some significant contributions to the war on terror there. He doesn’t mind the change either. He had become fed up with the political aspects of the job he had here a long time before he got involved with us.

  Thomas did what he promised. It took him six months, but he found and finished the alien. It wasn’t that hard in the end. They had managed to wound the creature, and it was dying anyway. Thomas made sure. He eventually dumped all of the alien weapons where they would never be found. He was killed back in the thirties in a plane crash.

  Dave and his people did a remarkable job. It took them over one hundred and fifty years, and they left us a great summary of what they found. They provided indexed references to key material so we can cross check in our own copies. It explains a lot of the mysteries we wondered about over the years. Briefly, it appears the aliens come from a race that had developed a remarkable technology. They explored vast regions of space. More explorer than fighter, they never focused on developing extreme weapons. Of course they developed some, and picked up others along the way. Still, given their technology it was a neglected area for them. Eventually they started finding indications of an advanced warrior race that was making it’s way across the galaxy, absorbing other civilizations as it moved. They marked the boundaries, and watched the advance. It became clear the race was headed their way. They would be powerless to resist. By now their scouts had seen enough to know they were no match for these relentless invaders. A couple of centuries was the time available to them their experts predicted.

  Someone suggested a new technology they had stumbled upon not too many years before. Time travel. If they could find the home planet of these invaders, perhaps they could manipulate their history. Halt their advance before it began. But impossible. Who knew which of the countless worlds was the origin for these beings? Besides, even if they knew, it wouldn’t be possible to work unobserved for the decades required to build and calibrate the time device. Sadly, it had to be within the gravity well of the world they wished to explore. A dead end it seemed.

  Then another idea surfaced. There were many worlds between the invaders and the alien’s home world. Some had species that hadn’t evolved far. Others were ripe for life, but none had developed. Perhaps they could influence the path of the species on these worlds. Seed life on others. If they could direct the course of their development, spurring them on, and correcting false turns, they could cause the evolution of multiple races. If their technology could become advanced enough, with a tendency towards war and fighting, perhaps they could be a barrier between themselves and the invaders. None of the worlds really strong enough to become a threat in their own right, but hundreds of worlds who would fight and wear down the invaders. Perhaps it would be enough. Maybe they would change direction. Go where the worlds were less resistant. Maybe the continued conflict would bring the invaders’ civilization down, or slow their advance for centuries. It was worth a try. They had nothing to lose. Of course, the idea wasn’t universally accepted. Enough support was won to support the fantastic effort required to travel to so many stars and build the many complex time devices. It took more than a century to get the system up and running. However it appeared to be working.

  A number of worlds developed as they had hoped. Others needed more watching. A few never developed at all for some reason, and still others were constant problem cases. The documentation indicated that some were abandoned to develop on their own as time started running out. There wouldn’t be time to correct the problems. Others they continued to monitor and tweak. They appeared to have almost given up on our world. Our destruction of the time device would have been enough to end their interest in us. Dave wasn’t able to find anything explicit, but bits and pieces had led him to believe ours was one of the worlds they seeded in the beginning. He included references that led him to this conclusion. Ed and his people were still cross checking the materials. After all, Dave had had 150 years. They had only ten so far.

  Mike is a mystery. No-one knows what happened to him. He jumped out of the plane a minute before Jeff. He has never been found. We have looked, but to no avail.

  The hardest for Naiya and me to accept is Carol. While Naiya half expected Carol to slip away, I was caught totally off guard. It explains things I hadn’t understood over the last few months. We still have the note she had given to Al. He hadn’t known what it was, and had remembered it only after it had been returned with his belongings. I read it often the first year. Now we have it safely put away. I remember it word for word.

  My Dearest Friends

  This is the hardest thing I
have ever written. I have gone back uptime for the last time, before the tunnels are lost forever. Naiya will understand and perhaps not even be that surprised. Ask her Jim; she will help you understand.

  I have struggled with this decision for some time. I was so reluctant to agree to the destruction of the complex because I knew it would force this decision upon me. Oh, how I have vacillated back and forth. You are my family, and more. How can I survive without seeing you ever again? And the baby! Yes I know about that. How I would love to be the godmother.

  If we succeed, really succeed, the complex will be destroyed and the enemy will not return. If we fail, then perhaps all of this will disappear or will never have happened. But I think we will win. I think we really did it! Congrats to us. Jim, did you really think we had a chance back in the beginning?

  And uptime? I have my life, but also my lover. Naiya knows about him as well. It happened gradually, the last year or so, but he offers me what you two share. I know he would come back downtime with me if I asked. But he dreams of the stars. Here, the technology and opportunity exists. There, in your time he would lose his dream, only to wither and die broken. I can’t do that to him. So I must choose. I know how the first star colonies turn out, they will be a fabulous success. I was born after they happened, remember. But I won’t spoil the adventure for him. We will share in the future of man together.

  So, good-by my friends. You will always be in my heart. Never forget!

  Carol

  Naiya had met Carol’s love. She approved heartily. It had been hard on Carol. The last six months she had been forced to choose and be away so often. It had strained the relationship to the breaking point. Several times she had thought it would end. But it survived. When she and Naiya went uptime together that last time it was stronger than ever. That’s why Naiya suspected Carol would go uptime. Carol hadn’t wanted her to say anything. We were in the middle of a crisis. So she had kept her best friend’s secret. I know she misses her even more than I do.