by Anthology
File mused on the similarity of the ministers’ conclusions to his own thoughts of only a few minutes before.
‘Europe suffers from compression,’ Standon continued. ‘Everything is so pressurised, energies and processes abut so solidly on one another, that the whole system has massed together in a solid plenum. Politically speaking, there just isn’t room to move around. Consequently, we are unable to apprehend the course of events either by computation or by common sense, and we are unable to say what will result from any given action. In short, we are in complete ignorance of the future, whether we participate in it or not.’
File looked up and down the table. Most of the ministers still gazed passively at their notepads. One or two, with Strasser and Standon, were looking at him expectantly.
‘I had been coming to the same conclusion myself,’ he said. ‘But you must have decided upon something.’
‘No,’ said Standon forcefully. ‘This is the essence of the matter. If things were that clear-cut there would not be this problem—we should simply choose a side. But there are not two factions—there are three or four, with others in the background. The very idea of what is best loses meaning when we do not know what is going to happen. Logically, destruction of the community is the only criterion of what is undesirable, but even then, who knows? Perhaps we have grown so monstrous that there is no possibility of our further existence. There are no ideals to guide us. And in any case, there is no longer deliberate direction as far as Europe is concerned.’
Standon took his eyes off File and seemed to withdraw for a moment. ‘I might add,’ he said, ‘that after having had several weeks to think about it, we are of the opinion that this has always been the case in political affairs: only the fact that there was space to move around in gave the statesmen of the past the illusion that they were free to determine events. Now there is no empty space, the illusion has vanished, and we are aware of our helplessness. At the same time, everything is much more frightening.’
He shrugged. ‘For instance, Europe, because of its massiveness, could absorb a large number of nuclear fusion explosions and still keep functioning. I need hardly add that at the present time such weapons are available to any large-scale corporation. We even think there are some small-yield bombs in the hands of minority groups.’
File reflected as calmly as he could. Suddenly the crisis had slid over the edge of practical considerations into the realm of philosophy. It sounded absurd, but there was no denying the fact.
He appreciated the caution of these very self-composed men. Like them, he had a fear of tyranny, but history provided many warnings against hasty preventive measures. It was to avert tyranny that the conspirators murdered Caesar, yet within hours the consequences of their foolish deed had plunged the state into a reign of terror even worse than anything they had imagined. The ministers were right; there was no such thing as free will, and a state was manageable only if it was uncomplicated enough not to go off the rails in any case.
He said, ‘I presume everything has been done to try to analyse events? Cybernetics . . .?’
Standon gave him a tolerant smile. ‘Everything has been done.’
As if this were a cue, a third man spoke. Appeltoft, whose special province was science and technology, was younger than the others and somewhat more emotional. He looked up to address File:
‘Our only hope lies in discovering how events are organised in time—this might sound highly speculative for such a serious and practical matter, but this is what things have come to. In order to take effective action in the present, we must first know the future. This is the mission we have in mind for you. The Research Complex at Geneva has found a way to deposit a man some years in the future and bring him back. You will be sent ten years forward to find out what will happen and how it will come about. You will then return, report your findings to us, and we will use this information to guide our actions, and also—scientifically—to analyse the laws governing the sequence of time. This is how we hope to formulate a method of human government for use by future ages, and, perhaps, remove the random element from human affairs.’
File was impressed by the striking, unconventional method the Cabinet had adopted to resolve its dilemma.
‘You leave immediately,’ Appeltoft told him, breaking in on his thoughts. ‘After this conference, you and I will fly to Geneva where the technicians have the apparatus in readiness.’ A hint of bitterness came into his voice. ‘I had wished to go myself, but . . . ’ He shrugged and made a vague, disgusted gesture which took in the rest of the Cabinet.
‘That’s a point,’ File said. ‘Why have you chosen me?’
The ministers looked at one another shiftily. Strasser spoke up.
‘The reason lies in your education, Max,’ he said diffidently. ‘The difficulties facing us now were beginning to show themselves over a generation ago. The government of the time decided to bring up a small number of children according to a new system of education. The idea was to develop people capable of comprehending in detail the massiveness of modern civilisation, by means of forced learning in every subject. The experiment failed. All your schoolfellows lost their sanity. You survived, but did not turn into the product we had hoped for. To prevent any later derangement of your mind, a large part of the information which had been pressured into it was removed by hypnotic means. The result is yourself as you are—a super-dilettante, with an intense curiosity and a gift for management. We gave you the post you now hold and forgot about you. Now you are ideal for our purpose.’
Inwardly, File underwent a jolt—even more so because the account agreed well with his own suspicions concerning his origins. He pulled himself together before he could become introspective.
‘I was the only one to make it, eh? I wonder why.’
Standon regarded File steadily in the dim light. Once again that strange layer of emotion seemed to stir in him, lying somewhere below his features but not affecting the muscles or skin.
‘Because of your determination, Mr. File. Because whatever happens, somehow, you have the capacity to find a way out.’
File left the building even more aware of his speculations than before. Appeltoft came with him, and the car whined smoothly towards the nearest air centre.
He had a peg to hang his thoughts on now. The sequence of time . . . Yes, there was no doubt that the explanation of the titanic phenomena through which he was being driven lay in the sequence of time.
Looking around him, he saw how literally true were the statements just given him by the ministers.
After the formation of the Economic Community, into which all the European countries were finally joined, the continent’s capacity had accelerated fantastically. Economic development had soared so high that eventually it became necessary to buttress up the whole structure from underneath. Stage by stage, the buttresses had become more massive, until the Community was tied to the ground, a rigid unchangeable monster, humming and roaring with energy.
Even the airy architectural promise of the previous century had not materialised. The constructions wheeling past the car had an appearance of Wagnerian heaviness, blocking out the sunlight.
He turned to Appeltoft. ‘So in an hour I’ll be ten years in the future. Ridiculous statement!’
Appeltoft laughed, as though to show he appreciated the paradox.
‘But tell me,’ File continued, ‘are you really so ignorant about time’s nature, and yet you can effect travel in it?’
‘We are not so ignorant about its nature, as about its structure and organisation,’ Appeltoft told him. ‘The equations which enable us to transmit through time give no clue to that—in fact they say that time has no sequence at all, which can hardly be possible.’
Appeltoft paused. His manner towards File gave the latter cause to think that the scientist still resented not being allowed to be the first time traveller, though he was trying to hide it. File didn’t blame him. When a man has worked fanatically for something, it must
be a blow to see a complete stranger take over the fruits of it.
‘There are two theories extant,’ Appeltoft eventually went on. ‘The first, and the one I favour, is the common-sense view—past, present, future, proceeding in an unending line and each even having a definite position on the line. Unfortunately the idea has not lent itself to any mathematical formulation.
‘The other idea, which some of my co-workers hold, goes like this: that time isn’t really a forward-moving flow at all. It exists as a constant: all things are actually happening at once, but human beings haven’t got the built-in perceptions to see it as such. Imagine a circular stage with a sequence of events going on round it, representing, say, periods in one man’s life. In that case they would be played by different actors, but in the actuality of time the same man plays all parts. According to this, an alteration in one scene has an effect on all subsequent scenes all the way round back to the beginning.’
‘So that time is cyclic—what you do in the future may influence your future past, as it were?’
‘If the theory is correct. Some formulations have been derived, but they don’t work very well. All we really know, is that we can deposit you into the future and probably bring you back.’
‘Probably! You’ve had failures?’
‘Thirty-three per cent of our test animals don’t return,’ Appeltoft said blithely.
Once they were at the air centre, it took them less than an hour to reach the Geneva Research Complex. From the air receptor on the roof, Appeltoft conducted him nearly half a mile down to the underground laboratories. Finally, he pulled an old-fashioned key chain from the pocket, attached to which was a little radio key. As he pressed the stud a door swung open a few yards ahead.
They entered a blue-painted chamber whose walls were lined with what looked like computer-program inlets. A number of white-robed technicians sat about, waiting.
Occupying the centre of the room was a chair, mounted on a pedestal. A swivel arm held a small box with instrument dials on the external surfaces; but the most notable feature was the three translucent rods which seemed to ray out from just behind the chair, one going straight up and the other two at right angles, one on either side.
The floor was covered with trestles supporting a network of helices and semiconductor electron channels, radiating out from the chair like a spider’s web. File found himself trying to interpret the set-up in the pseudoscientific jargon which was his way of understanding contemporary technology. Electrons . . . indeterminacy . . . what would the three rods be for?
‘This is the time-transmission apparatus,’ Appeltoft told him without preamble. ‘The actual apparatus itself will remain here in the present time. Only that chair, with you sitting in it, will make the time transference itself.’
‘So you will control everything from here?’
‘Not exactly. It will be a “powered flight”, so to speak, and you will carry the controls. But the power unit will remain here. We might be able to do something if the mission goes wrong—perhaps not. We probably won’t even know.
‘The three rods accompanying the chair represent the three spatial dimensions. As these rotate out of true space, time-motion will begin.’
Stepping carefully across the trestles, they walked nearer to the chair. Appeltoft explained the controls and instruments. ‘This is your speed gauge—you’ve no way of controlling that, it’s all automatic. This switch here is Stop and Start—it’s marked, you’ll notice. And this one gives the point in time you occupy, in years, days, hours and seconds. Everything else is programmed for you. As you see, it reads Nil now. When you arrive, it will read Ten Years.’
‘Point in time, eh?’ File mused. ‘That could have two meanings according to what you’ve just told me.’
Appeltoft nodded. ‘You’re astute. Pragmatically, my own view of straight-line time is closest to the operation of the time transmitter. It’s the easiest to grasp, anyway.’
File studied the apparatus for nearly a minute without speaking. The silence dragged on. Though he wasn’t aware of it, strain was growing.
‘Well, don’t just stand there,’ Appeltoft snapped with sudden ferocity. ‘Get on the damned thing! We haven’t got all day!’
File gave him a look of surprised reproof.
Appeltoft sagged. ‘Sorry. If you know—how jealous I am of you. To be the first man with a chance to discover the secret of time! It’s the secret to the universe itself!’
Well, File thought to himself, as he watched the young minister’s lean, intense face, if I had his determination I might have been a scientist and made discoveries for myself, instead of being a jacked-up dilettante. ‘A dilettante,’ he muttered aloud.
‘Eh?’ Appeltoft said. ‘Well, come on, let’s get it done.’
File climbed into the seat built into the back of the chair. Camera lenses peered over his shoulders. ‘You know what to look for?’ Appeltoft asked finally.
‘As much as anybody. Besides—I want to go as much as you do.’
‘All right then. Capacity’s built up. Press the switch to Start. It will automatically revert to Stop at the end of the journey.’
File obeyed. At first, nothing happened. Then he got the impression that the translucent rods, which he could see out of the corners of his eyes, were rotating clockwise, though they didn’t seem to change their positions. At the same time, the room appeared to spin in the opposite direction—again, it was movement without change of position.
The effect was entirely like having drunk too much, and File felt dizzy. He pulled his eyes to the speed gauge. One minute per minute-marking time! One and a half, two . . .
With a weird flickering effect the laboratory vanished. He was in a neutral grey fog, left only with sensation.
The first sensation was that he was taking part in the rotating movement—being steadily canted to the left. As his angle to the vertical increased, the second sensation increased: a rushing momentum, a gathering speed towards a nameless destination.
000001.146.15.0073—the numbers slipped into place, swiftly towards the right-hand side, slowly towards the left. 000002 . . . 3 . . . 4 . . . 5 . . . 6 . . . 7 . . .
Then the nausea returned, the feeling of being spun round—the other way, now. Light dazzled his eyes.
000010.000.00.0000.
When he grew used to it, the light was really dim. He was still in the laboratory, but it was deserted, illuminated by emergency lights glowing weakly in the ceiling. It was not in ruins, and there was no sign of violence, but the place had obviously been empty for some time.
Climbing down from the chair, he went to the door, used the radio key which Appeltoft had given him, went through, and closed it behind him. He walked along the corridor and through the other departments.
The whole complex shouldn’t be deserted after only ten years. Something drastic must have happened.
He frowned, annoyed at himself. Of course it had. That was why he was here.
The high-level streets of Geneva were equally deserted. He could see the tops of mountains in the distance, poking between metallic roadways. The drone of the city was missing. There was some noise to be heard, but it was muted and irregular.
As he mounted an interlevel ramp he saw one or two figures, mostly alone. He had never seen so few people. Perhaps the quickest way to find out what was going on would be to locate the library and read up some recent history. It might give a clue, anyway.
He reached the building which pushed up through several layers of deserted street. A huge black sign hung over the main entrance.
It said: MEN ONLY.
Puzzled, File entered the cool half-light and approached the wary young man at the inquiry desk.
‘Excuse me,’ he said, and jumped as the man produced a squat gun from under the counter and levelled it at him.
‘What do you want?’
‘I’ve come to consult recent texts dealing with the development of Europe in the last ten years,’ File said.
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The young man grinned with his thin lips. The gun held steady, he said, ‘Development?’
‘I’m a serious student—all I want to do is look up some information.’
The young man put away the gun and with one hand pressed the buttons of an index system. He took two cards out and handed them to File.
‘Fifth floor, room 543. Here’s the key. Lock the door behind you. Last week a gang of women broke through the barricades and tried to burn us down. They like their meat pre-cooked, eh?’
File frowned at him but said nothing. He went to the elevator. The young man called, ‘For a student you don’t know much about this library. That elevator hasn’t worked for four years. The women control all the main power sources these days.’
Still in a quandary, File walked up to the fifth floor, found the room he wanted, unlocked the door, entered, and locked it behind him.
Seating himself before the viewer, he pressed the appropriate buttons on the panel before him, and the pages started to appear on the screen.
Hmmm . . . Let’s see . . . Investigations of Dalmeny Foundation Members.
Paper VII: partial results of the Bavarian Experiment . . .
—Civil war imminent, the Council temporarily averted it by promising that thorough research would be made into every claim for a solution to the problems of over-compression. This, as we know now, was a stonewalling action since they later admitted they had been incapable of predicting the outcome of any trend. The faction, one of the most powerful headed by the late Stefan Untermeyer, demanded that they be allowed to conduct a controlled experiment.
—Unable to stall any longer, the Council reluctantly agreed, and a large part of Bavaria was set aside so that the plans of the Untermeyer faction could be implemented. This plan necessitated sexual segregation. Men and women were separated and each given an intensive psycho conditioning to hate the opposite sex. Next, acts were passed making contact with the opposite sex punishable by death. This act had to be enforced frequently, although not as frequently as originally had been thought. Ironically, Untermeyer was one of the first to be punished under the act.
