by Anthology
She held the watch up. “Two minutes.”
“He didn’t want to come. Said that the doubt would be better than knowing for certain.” Homer chewed his lip and handed her the opera glasses. “What happens to him, Miss Jackson?”
Louise sighed and remembered all the things she’d read about Wilbur Wright before coming here. “He dies of typhoid when he’s forty-seven. I do wish I hadn’t said a thing about the future.”
Homer shook his head. “I’m glad you told me. I’ll—”
And he was gone.
The tall grass of Hoffman Prairie was replaced by a crisply mown lawn of chemical green. Where the weathered hangar had been stood a bright, white replica. Neither the hangar nor the lawn seemed as real as the past. Louise sighed. The air burned her nostrils, smelling of carbon and rubber. The homing beacon in her handbag should bring them to her soon enough.
She leaned back against the barn to wait. A paper rustled behind her. She pulled away, afraid that she’d see a big “wet paint” sign but it was an envelope.
An envelope with her name on it.
She spun around as quickly as she could but there wasn’t a soul in sight. Breath fighting with her corset, Louise pulled the envelope off the wall. She opened it carefully and found a single sheet of paper. A shaky hand covered the surface.
Dear Louise,
You will have just returned from your first time travel mission and meeting me, so this offers the first opportunity to introduce myself to you in your present. I wish I could be there, but that would mean living for another forty years, which task I fear would require Olympian blood. You have been such a friend to me and my family and so I wanted you to know two things.
1. Telling me the truth was the best thing you could have done for me. Thank you.
2. We are (or will be by the time you read this) major shareholders in the Time Travel Society. It ensures that your future trips to my past are without incident, and also will let my children know precisely when your first trip takes place in your present. I hope you don’t mind that I took the liberty of asking my children to purchase shares for you as well. I wish we could have presented them to you sooner.
Be well, my friend. And happy travels.
Sincerely yours, Homer Van Loon
At the bottom of the sheet was a bank account number and then a list of addresses and phone numbers arranged in order of date.
Her eyes misted over at the gift he’d given her—not the account, but the knowledge that she had not harmed him by telling the truth.
In the parking lot, the Time Travel Society’s minivan pulled in, barely stopping before Mr. Barnes and the rest of the team jumped out. “How was the trip?” he shouted across the field, jogging toward her.
Louise smiled and held out the opera glasses. “I think you’ll like the footage I got for you.”
“May I?” He stopped in front of her as long and lanky as she imagined Homer being when he was grown up.
“Of course. That’s why you sent me, isn’t it?”
He took the opera glasses from her and rewound. Holding it to his eyes as the rest of the team gathered around, Mr. Barnes became utterly still. “Miss Jackson . . . Miss Jackson, how did you get the camera on the plane?”
Dr. Connelly gasped. “On the Wright Flyer?”
“Yes, ma’am. I watched from the ground with the hatcam while Wilbur was flying. I’m quite curious to hear the audio that goes with it. We could hear him whooping from the ground.”
“But how did you . . .” Dr. Connelly shook her head.
“I told him the truth.” Louise sighed, remembering the naked look on his face at the moment when he believed her. “He took the camera because he understood the historical context.”
FLAME FOR THE FUTURE
William P. McGivern
The Leader had a purpose: he was waging war to found a super-race. Why not ask that race to help . . .?
The tense whispering in the great hall faded suddenly. The huge double doors of the Council Room swung back and, as one man, the entire assemblage of high ranking soldiers come to their feet, hands outstretched in the traditional salute carried over from the days of the First Leader.
The Leader strode through their ranks. He was a tall man with heavy broad shoulders and thin, expressionless face. He turned and faced the room. Blue eyes, cold and unmoving, stared impassively over the expectant audience. Light hair, close cropped and straight, pressed tight about his skull like a bronze helmet.
“Soldiers,” he began without preliminaries. “I have called you here from all ends of the land and sea to announce that victory, complete and final, will soon be ours. For fifty years the enemy has fought stubbornly and desperately against our strength and might. But now, in the year 1990, they are doomed to the inevitable destruction which is the end of all enemies of our State. For thirty years we have been forced to fight delaying actions in some sectors of the World because we did not have sufficient man power to wage a decisive attack. Now that difficulty has been solved.
“In a very short time we will hurl onto the field of combat thousands, millions of troops vastly superior to any which the world has known. Troops so skilled and ruthless and perfect that even our own excellent divisions could not expect to stand against them.”
There was an incredulous gasp from the large room and the Leader smiled without humor.
“However these new and powerful additions to our forces will be fighting the stubborn enemy and not us, which is fortunate.”
A gray-haired Field Marshal rose to his feet and raised his arm in salute.
“My Leader,” he said, “how can this be? There are not such troops as you describe in the entire World. With the decrease of the population we will soon be without troops of any sort to wage our just and noble struggle. The enemy is in the same predicament. We are killing each other off faster than we can breed new soldiers.”
The Leader leaned forward slightly.
“I have called this meeting to explain exactly how we will solve that very problem. We have dedicated ourselves to the task of creating a super race. There can be no doubt that we will succeed. Think! Centuries from now the glorious civilization which we intend to create will dominate the earth. Our descendants will rule the earth, rule its wealth, rule its people. That is why we are fighting today. For the creation of the super race which will one day be all-powerful, all-conquering, all-mighty.
“Today I am going to explain to you the greatest scientific triumph of my regime. It is something which I have dreamed and planned for years. But first I want to say this to you. You know that in our State we do not allow slackers and shirkers to live. We put them to death the instant we discover them, for we know that all must fight and give their utmost in the crusade we are waging. Now if we are doing that, giving our last drop of blood and sweat to crush our enemies, why should those who will enjoy the benefits of our heroic labors be permitted to shirk their duty?”
For an instant there was dead silence in the room. A silence broken only by the sharp intake of breath as the assembled Chieftains caught the import of the Leader’s words.
“They have as much at stake,” the Leader continued, “more, in fact, than we ourselves have. Those who will follow us, the super race which will result from the completion of our struggle, they must be made to do their share in the winnings of that struggle. Therefore I have called you here to tell you of my plan.”
He made a slight gesture to an orderly standing next to a square object beside him. The orderly stepped forward and with one gesture whipped the enveloping cover from the object, revealing it as a glistening metal cage, shimmering and strangely unreal.
The gathering of Chieftains moved forward for a better view of this strange creation. It was made roughly like a small cage with two metal seats in the interior and a mass of gadgets and equipment on a dial board before them.
The leader drew himself to his full height and stared truimphantly over the bewildered throng.
&n
bsp; “The object before you is a Time Machine,” he said with repressed pride. “The result of our Ingenuity and skill. With it we will draw new support to our Cause. Two of my most trusted Lieutenants are to travel into the future to enlist the aid of the races which will be created by us. When they are told of our need of them, they will swoop back through the boundless reaches of Time to throw their great skill and power into the fray. With our glorious descendants fighting by the millions alongside us we will not, cannot, fail.”
There was a buzzing murmur of excited voices sweeping through the room and then shouts of praise and joy pouring from their throats. The Leader stood before them, smiling quietly at the fanatical demonstration. At last he raised his hand for silence.
“The Time Machine leaves now!” he announced. At a gesture from him two stalwart, uniformed young men stepped to the machine. “Lieutenant Schmidt and Lieutenant Wolf,” he cried fervently, “are doing their Race and their Country and their Cause great and glorious service. They have invented this machine and are prepared to take it into the glorious future which we are creating now. The mighty race which will spring from us will welcome them and honor them and return with them by the thousands to fight with their ancestors.”
The two young men saluted, stepped into the machine. A thunderous roar of commendation broke from the audience, crashing between the walls with reverberating echoes.
Once more the Leader raised his hand.
“We salute you Lieutenant Schmidt and Lieutenant Wolf,” he said impressively. “Our hearts and our hopes travel with you, wishing for you and for us and for the glorious races we will bring to Earth, success; mighty, magnificent success!”
He dropped his hand and one of the young men in the Time Machine moved a lever slowly to the right. The other, moved an indicator along a row of buttons stamped with units of time. Then he pressed a button. To the accompaniment of roar upon roar of triumph and hysterical encouragement the Time Machine shimmered and twisted slowly. As it turned it gradually disappeared. Bedlam broke loose; even the normally august figure of the Leader pranced in an uncontrolled ecstasy of glee.
“We have arrived, Lieutenant Schmidt,” Lieutenant Wolf, the smaller of the two men, sat quietly. “We are five hundred years into the future. It is our third stop. We tried two centuries, three centuries, four centuries and now five.”
“And every time is the same,” Lieutenant Schmidt answered dully. “Let us climb out. It can’t be any worse.”
The two men climbed out of the machine and stared despairingly about at the black and blasted surface of the earth.
“The only people we have seen,” Schmidt said bitterly, “were those starving barbarians we saw two hundred years ago. Is it the end of the world? Is this what we are fighting for? To produce this?”
“Watch your tongue,” Wolf snapped. “That is treason.”
“Treason,” Schmidt muttered disgustedly.
Their Time Machine had landed in a slight depression, surrounded on three sides by rough, craggy boulders and blasted rocks. Wolf, staring at one of the slight hills, suddenly grabbed his companion by the arm.
“I saw something move up there,” he whispered tensely. He loosened his gun in its holster. “Let us investigate.”
Schmidt shrugged and followed him, climbing over the rough brambles and crags that littered the side of the slope.
Kogar and Merena crouched behind the big black boulder and silently watched the two strange creatures moving across the scarred terrain.
Sharply Kogar drew in his breath and turned his shaggy head to his mate. He licked his lips.
“These creatures live, my Merena.”
His small eyes beneath his thick brows went back to their burning contemplation of the figures approaching.
Merena was not quite so coarse featured as Kogar. She had long, tangled black hair that fell almost to her waist. Her nose was not so flat as Kogar’s, her lips not so thick. But her black eyes gleamed with the same furious intensity, the same fierce gnawing hunger, as her mate’s.
For three star-skies it had been this way. No food. No raw flesh to fill the belly. There had been a small winged sky creature, that last time. Kogar had brought it down with a stone well aimed. But it had been small, too small to satisfy completely the burning hunger that gripped them both. And there had been scant blood to drink.
Merena found it hard to remember that there had once been a few four-footed animals to feast on. They were gone now, along with the last, of the winged sky creatures. She swallowed hungrily.
Kogar picked up the sharpened stone by his side. In his great paw he held it ready, his eyes estimating the distance from their boulder to the creatures moving toward them. Too far yet.
It didn’t occur to Kogar that these creatures might be even as himself and Merena. Their bodies were covered by strange trappings, their legs encased in odd sheaths. Truly these were not of their kind. Kogar’s thick left paw gently stroked the bulging muscle beneath the thick mat of hair on his right arm. No, they were not as Merena and Kogar.
Kogar knew that there were no others such as himself and Merena. Once there had been. But they were gone now—along with the four-footed animals and the sky creatures. They had been few enough to begin with, and their numbers decreased until there were finally but himself and his mate. The others had not been cunning enough to keep their bellies filled, their thirsts quenched.
Still watching the approach of the strange creatures, Kogar thought back to that day in the compounds when the feeble old Chief lay dying. All around them, that day, women and children had lain white and sick and bloated. They were dying too. Kogar had gone to Merena. He had slipped from the compounds with her that night.
“We will leave these weaklings, and go forth to find meat for ourselves,” he had told her.
And they had. Scouring far and wide, farther even than the old tribal laws had permitted. Kogar took his mate in search of flesh to sustain life. That had been countless star-skies ago. Kogar could not remember how long. He knew, of course, that the others were dead by now. They had been foolish, and weak.
“See, Kogar,” Merena whispered, “the strange creatures halt!”
Kogar, jolted from his musings, turned his attention back to the strange creatures. They had stopped, several hundred paces away, and were making sounds at each other. They looked like animals quarreling.
For an instant, Kogar looked at the sharpened stone in his big hand. He lifted it once or twice doubtfully. A throw might bring one of them down. But if he missed, it would frighten them away. He wet his thick lips.
Merena put her hand on his arm.
“Wait,” she breathed, “do not frighten them.”
Kogar nodded. For an instant he considered moving out from behind his hiding place and chasing down after them. He was fleet of foot. He had trapped the last of the four-footed animals that way. But Kogar realized that he was weaker now and not so swift. Besides, he wasn’t certain how swift these strange creatures were in their own right. They might even be like the sky creatures, able to swoop up and away if frightened. Although he saw no signs of wings Kogar couldn’t be sure.
Merena touched his arm again.
“They move,” she whispered.
The creatures were indeed, moving toward them once more. Kogar wondered if there might not be a watering place nearby, unknown to him, to which they were going. He had found many such watering places by following the animals.
Kogar had a sudden idea. He turned to Merena.
“By that other great rock, over there,” he pointed a few hundred feet away to a boulder lying just behind the strange creatures, “you take your place.”
Merena looked uncomprehending Kogar picked up the second of his sharpened stones. He handed it to her. He had taught Merena to hurl the sharpened stones with a fair amount of skill and cunning. From short distances—if the targets moved slowly as these did—she was deadly.
“Behind that great rock,” Kogar repeated, “you t
ake a place!”
Merena nodded, understanding. She smiled at her mate in open admiration of his superior cunning. Kogar was infinitely pleased by the implied compliment. Merena took the stone and flattened herself out on the ground, preparing to inch along to the other boulder.
“After I throw,” Kogar reminded her. “Wait until then.”
Stealthily, with the ability of long practice[*] Merena moved away toward the position her mate had indicated. Kogar watched her progress, aware at the same time that the strange creatures had given them additional advantage by halting again and making angry sounds at each other.
Almost at the same time that the strange creatures resumed their movement toward his boulder, Kogar saw Merena gain the shelter of the other great rock a hundred feet behind them.
One of the strange creatures as it moved closer, brought forth a stick from its chest and put it in its mouth. Kogar frowned bewilderedly at this. Then the same strange creature produced a glittering thing and held it up to the stick.
The glittering thing puffed a tiny spurt of orange, then the stick smoked odd blue clouds. The tiny spurt of orange had disappeared now, and the creature put the glittering thing away. But the stick still made small blue clouds. And the blue clouds issued from the mouth of the creature as well.
Kogar shook his head, bewildered. Indeed these were oddly different animals.
Suddenly the creatures were close enough for Kogar to hear the sounds they made. Weird, unintelligible sounds.
“I’m for going back, Wolf!” one creature said. Or, at least that was the way the strange noises sounded to Kogar. His thick brows knit uncomprehendingly at these strange noises. They were communicating, of course, just as dogs communicate by whining, or birds by chirping. Nevertheless, it made Kogar uneasy.
Kogar growled softly in his throat. They were close enough now.
His eyes measuring the distance with deadly certainty, Kogar lifted the sharpened stone again, bringing it back behind his head, his muscles tightening like steel webbing.
