by Simon Hawke
“No,” said Lucas. “That’s the last thing he’d do. Even if the attacking force sustains heavy casualties, it’s better than a warp grenade strike. We’ve got to try and take as many of Drakov’s people alive as possible, so they can be conditioned to forget what happened and returned to their own times. Each one of them constitutes a potential disruption in the timestream.”
“I don’t see how you can avoid killing a lot of them,” said Martingale. “Stunners don’t have the same range as lasers do and they’ll be shooting at your people. You’re going to have to take a good number of them out, any way you look at it.”
“I know,” said Lucas. “We can only hope the show of force will intimidate most of them into surrendering. All we can do is hope that temporal inertia compensates.”
“If their having been taken from their own time periods hasn’t caused any disruptions, then killing them all might-”
“We don’t know that,” Lucas said. “A surgical strike would be nice and clean, even if it did take all of us with it, but it would be taking too much of a chance. Forrester will know he doesn’t have that option. For all we know, their having been taken from their own time periods has caused disruptions. Maybe not, if we’re very lucky. There have already been disruptions, thanks to Drakov’s actions. Temporal inertia will only compensate for so much. It might be irreversible already. All we can do is hope.”
“You’ll lose a lot of people,” Martingale said.
“It can’t be helped,” said Finn.
“You’ll have to clock out to signal the attack at the proper time,” said Lucas.
Martingale frowned. “Why me?”
“Because Drakov will be expecting us to try something like that,” said Lucas. “You’ll have the best chance of getting out without being missed.”
“I wouldn’t count on that,” said Martingale.
“We’ll try to work that out,” said Lucas. “I can show you how to program a fugue sequence on your disc. That way you’ll be able to clock out and clock back in almost at the same time.”
“But if Drakov is going to send you back to Forrester with his demands anyway, why not let him? He won’t know you have the location of the base and you’ll be able to clock back in-”
“No, I told you, the attack has to occur while we’re still there,” said Lucas. “For one thing, I don’t trust him. For another, even if we could do that, it would leave only you behind at the base. We have to make absolutely certain Drakov doesn’t have a chance to fire the missiles or escape on the sub. And someone has to protect Verne and Land, as well.”
“Okay, I see your point.”
“We’re going to have to-”
“Lucas-” Andre said, squeezing his arm suddenly.
He glanced at her, then quickly looked in the direction she was staring. Martingale turned and looked as well, then relaxed and expelled his breath audibly. “It’s about damn time,” he said.
A man was standing by the fireplace. He was tall and slender, with dark, unruly hair and a neatly trimmed moustache. He was gaunt-looking, with deeply set, piercing eyes and a sharp, prominent nose. He was dressed, incongruously, in tweeds-a Norfolk jacket and stovepipe trousers with a matching vest, a button-down white shirt and a necktie with a regimental stripe. He wore a watch chain and a tweed driving cap pulled low over his eyes. In his right hand, he held a heavy, knobbed walking stick carved out of dark wood. For a moment, he appeared to be transparent, then he abruptly solidified, though not completely. Various portions of his body seemed to become substantial, then ghostly once again. When he spoke, his voice was rich and vaguely Continental.
“I am Robert Darkness,” he said. “I perceive we are alone. Do we have time to talk or are we likely to be interrupted at any moment?”
“We should have some time,” said Martingale. “If any of the servants should come in-”
“Yes, yes, I know,” said Darkness, impatiently. “We mustn’t frighten the help. Let’s get on with it. Have you managed to learn anything of significance?”
“I’ve figured out the location of the base,” said Martingale. “It’s-”
“I already know where the base is,” Darkness said. Martingale looked both surprised and disappointed. “How did you find out?”
“Really, Martingale, if I had to count on you for everything, this affair would have dragged on endlessly. When you told me it was inside an extinct volcano, that narrowed it down considerably. The underground canal meant it had to be an island, the blacks being used as ersatz cannibals to scare off possible landing parties also gave me a clue and it meant it couldn’t have been a very modern period or a pre-exploratory one. It was a simple matter of elimination. It merely took some time.”
“Have you notified the Temporal Corps?” said Finn.
“No, I’ve kept it to myself,” said Darkness. “Of course I’ve notified them. I’ll be happy to get this out of the way finally. I have a great deal of work to do and these constant distractions are annoying.”
“You call Drakov and his group a distraction?” Finn said.
“Everything that happens on this silly planet is a distraction,” Darkness said. “That’s why I moved. I find people to be generally bothersome. The more I deal with people, the better I like dogs. Unfortunately, it becomes necessary to deal with people from time to time.”“I wonder how you stand it,” Finn said.
“I do my best to allow for their stupidity,” said Darkness. “Playing deus ex machina for you is mildly amusing, but it does tend to rob one of time.”
“Well, I’m glad you could spare a minute from your busy schedule,” said Finn.
“Delaney, I wouldn’t push it,” Martingale said softly. “Doesn’t the potential of a timestream split disturb you?” Andre said.
Darkness gave her an annoyed look. “Very little disturbs me,” he said. “I think a timestream split would be quite interesting. It would make a good opportunity for study. However, I’m in no great hurry to conduct that sort of research at the moment. I’m still working on perfecting my teleportation process. Oh, and speaking of perfecting things, I think I’ve finally ironed out the bugs in the disruptors.”
“You think?” said Finn.
Darkness fixed him with a baleful glare. “You are starting to irritate me, young man. If you were better at doing your job, I wouldn’t have to waste my valuable time with this nonsense. Come here.”
“Don’t get too close,” Martingale whispered.
“Are you serious?” said Finn. “This guy looks about as dangerous as my Aunt Martha.”
He approached Darkness, who stood motionless by the fireplace. The moment he was within reach, Darkness swung his walking stick and it connected with the side of Finn’s head with a sharp crack.
“That’s for your impertinence,” he said.
“You son of a-” Finn swung a hard right at his jaw and almost lost his balance when his fist passed right through him. “What the…?”
“I warned you,” Martingale said.
“Here, take this,” said Darkness, disregarding the attempted punch. He handed Finn a weapon. Gingerly, Delaney reached out and took it. It was solid. He looked totally confused.
The weapon looked like a small flamethrower without a fuel pack attached. It had a knurled metal pistol grip and a peculiar-looking barrel.
“Its method of operation should be simple enough even for a mind like yours to grasp,” said Darkness. “The rest of you come here and watch; I’m not going to repeat this.”
They gathered around and Darkness pointed out the features of the disruptor.
“It’s activated by this control,” he said, pointing. “Activating the disruptor allows a small portion of a very powerful magnetic field tapped through an ERG to enter the weapon. The magnetic field forms a sort of invisible cone around the muzzle of the disruptor, shaping the energy flow. It allows you to fire either a stream of neutrons on a tight beam or a spray of neutrons on a wide sweep. It’s really quite uncomplicated. You
turn the field adjuster, here, to select the firing mode. Turn it to the left and you get a tight beam about one inch in diameter. Turn it to the right and you have a spray. There isn’t any recoil, naturally. It’s just like holding a water hose, only there isn’t any sensation of pressure. Try it out.”
“On what?” said Finn, still dazed.
“God in heaven, man, you needed a weapon, I designed you a weapon. Now you want me to tell you what to shoot with it? What in hell do I care? Try it on yourself, that ought to be amusing.”
Finn walked over to an open window and sighted at a palm tree. He turned the magnetic field adjuster to spray and carefully squeezed the trigger. There was a brief flash of barely discernible blue mist, Cerenkov Radiation, and the palm tree disappeared as if it had never been there in the first place.
“Shit,” said Finn.
“Such eloquence,” said Darkness. “Now give it back, please.”
Finn carefully handed the warp gun back to him.
“You think you can remember how it works?” said Darkness, dryly.
“I’ll manage,” Finn said.
“Good. They will be delivered to you at the proper time.”
“When?”
Darkness sighed. “When the signal for attack is given. All the soldiers of the First Division have been recalled and they are on standby alert, awaiting your signal. Try not to screw it up. Now, are there any more foolish questions? No? Fine. Good-bye.”
Suddenly, he simply wasn’t there anymore.
“How does he do that?” Andre said. “He was solid one second and then when Finn tried to hit him…”
“Tachyons,” said Lucas. “Amazing. He’s faster than the speed of light. Or can be when he wants to.”
“Is he always like that?” Andre said.
“No,” said Martingale. “Sometimes he can be pretty abrasive.”
“If he ever perfects that process,” Finn said, “the warp disc will be as obsolete as an electric train.”
“That’s if he ever gives it to anyone,” said Martingale.
“Why wouldn’t he?” said Lucas.
Martingale shrugged. “Why should he? He’s got an ego bigger than the whole damn planet and he really doesn’t care all that much about what happens here. He lives somewhere on the other side of the galaxy and only drops in when he feels like it or when he needs something. He’s a very hard man to figure out. If I were you, I wouldn’t even bother trying.”
11
It was all they could do to get to sleep that night, knowing that in the morning they would be leaving Barataria for Drakov’s island base. There were still unanswered questions and the frustration they had been feeling at being unable to do anything, combined with the anticipation of it all coming to a head at last, made it impossible to relax.
Verne didn’t make things any easier when he returned from his night out on the town. They had been given rooms upstairs in Lafitte’s house. Verne and Land shared one, Finn and Lucas shared another and Andre had been given a room of her own. Land had still not put in an appearance, so Verne, lacking for company, ensconced himself in Finn and Lucas’s room and talked endlessly about his trip to New Orleans with Drakov and Lafitte. Paris nightlife, he had thought, would have prepared him for anything, but he was not ready for New Orleans. He had resolved early on to drink very sparingly, so he could remain sober and observe with his writer’s eye, but that went the way of so many resolutions and he came back roaring drunk. Unfortunately, while he was quite a pleasant drunk, he was one of those who cannot shut up and even feigning sleep was not enough to put him off. Finn, miraculously, finally managed to fall asleep, but Lucas remained wide awake, his eyes closed, breathing heavily, hoping Verne would notice that his audience had departed for the realm of Morpheus and take the trip himself.
Frustrated, Lucas finally was reduced to timing Verne’s sentences, which kept getting longer and longer, though they remained perfectly grammatical. To his astonishment, Verne, his accent growing thicker, launched into an extensive mono-logical sentence which went on for forty-five minutes without a break, ending finally, incongruously, in a question. Verne actually paused at that point, awaiting an answer. None was forthcoming. Please, thought Lucas, for God’s sake don’t start up again! The silence became lengthy and finally broken by a window-rattling snore from Finn, and Verne belatedly became aware of the soporific effect of his conversation.
“Oh, well, never mind,” he said, and fell asleep the very next instant, slumping forward in his chair, chin on his chest.
“That’s one for the books,” Lucas mumbled to himself. He was just starting to drift off when there came a faint knock at the door and it creaked open slightly.
“Lucas? Finn?”
It was Land.
“Oh, no,” said Lucas.
“Are you awake?” said Land.
“Ned, whatever it is, can’t it wait till morning?”
“No, no, I must tell you now,” said Land. “I will not be here in the morning.”
Lucas came fully awake. “What are you talking about?” The others slept on, both snoring loudly.
“I am leaving,” Land said. “Tonight. Within the hour.”
“What do you mean, you’re leaving? Where?”
“I’m going with Marie,” said Land. “We are running away together.”
Lucas sat up in bed. “I thought she didn’t want to leave Lafitte,” he said.
“That was before,” said Land. “All that is changed now. I love her. And she loves me.”
“Ned, she’s young enough to be your daughter.”
“She doesn’t think me old,” said Land. “And she’s no child, believe me. She knows her mind.”
“Perhaps, but it does seem changeable,” said Lucas. “You realize this is very foolish, don’t you?”
“I know what you’re going to say,” said Land. “There’s no point in running off. Lafitte was willing to make me a present of her before, why not just ask if he still stands by his offer? No. I will not have any man make a present of a woman as if she were a horse.”
“So you’ll steal her as if you were a horse thief,” Lucas said. “Ned, don’t be an ass. Where would you go?”
“She knows her way through the bayous,” Land said. “She’s getting some things together. She’ll meet me on the back side of the island in a pirogue and we’ll paddle to New Orleans. Then we’ll make our way to Boston. I can get work as a harpooner. I’ll buy a house and we will marry. She’s very light, no one would think she was a Negro. We can have a family.”
“Ned, has it occurred to you that you don’t belong in this time? It’s 1812. You haven’t even been born yet.”
“What does that matter? I don’t care. I’m leaving, I tell you and nothing you can say will change my mind. I only came to say good-bye. You will say good-bye to Finn and Andre for me, won’t you? And to Jules.”
“Well, if you’ve made up your mind…”
“You can’t talk me out of it. There’s no use trying.”
Lucas got out of bed. “All right, Ned, I won’t. I wish you the best of luck. I hope you won’t regret this.”
He offered Land his hand and the harpooner took it. “I will have nothing to regret, I promise you.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” said Lucas and, still holding onto Land’s hand, he gave him a savage kick in the balls.
Land wheezed and doubled over and Lucas nailed him with an uppercut to the jaw. The harpooner dropped to the floor, unconscious. Verne and Delaney kept up their steady cadence of snoring.
“Marie’s going to have a long wait by the boat,” said Lucas. “And by the time morning comes around, I don’t think she’ll love you quite so much.”
He pulled down the curtain cord and proceeded to tie up the unconscious Ned.
Lucas woke up with someone shaking his shoulder gently. He opened his eyes to see Finn bending over him.
“Is it morning already?”
“Rise and shine, Major,” Finn said.
“Time to get ready to hit the boats and weigh anchor.”
“It feels like I just closed my eyes,” said Lucas.
“What happened here last night?” said Finn.
“Huh?” Lucas sat up in bed, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.
Finn pointed.
Verne had fallen off the chair onto the floor, where he was curled up in a fetal position, dead to the world. Beside him, struggling against his bonds, glaring ferociously and growling into his gag, was Land. The door opened and Andre walked in.
“I must have missed a hell of a party,” she said.
“Verne passed out and Ned was going to run off with Marie and set up light housekeeping in Boston,” Lucas said, getting out of bed. “I tried to talk him out of it, but he wasn’t very reasonable.”
“He’s liable to be a lot less reasonable when you untie him,” Finn said.
“You’re probably right,” said Lucas. “Let’s not untie him.”
Land thrashed on the floor.
Andre stood over him, hands on her hips. “You cad,” she said. “The minute my back is turned, you’re playing around with another woman. You’re a heartless brute.”
Land rolled his eyes.
“Never trust a sailor,” Finn said.
“He was just going to go off and leave us in the lurch,” said Lucas. “Here we are, needing all the help we can get, and he’s sneaking off to hide under some woman’s skirts.”
“Ned Land, the great harpooner, running away from a fight,” said Andre. “I should have known he was all bluster.”
“The hell with him,” said Finn. “Let him go. Who needs a friend like him? We’ll just have to handle Drakov by ourselves.”
Land stopped struggling.
They looked at each other.
“You think maybe he’s ready to be untied now?” said Andre.
“I think so,” said Finn.
