by Mel Odom
“I don’t understand.”
“Of course you don’t. That is why you are here now: so that you may understand in time.”
In time? Juhg wondered how those two words were used. Was it meant that given time he would soon find some kind of understanding (though, personally, given present circumstance he very much doubted that)? Or did the creature mean that he was there to understand in time so that he could prevent some horrible occurrence (like the building basement flooding and drowning them all)?
He didn’t know.
“I need to go back with my friends,” Juhg said. “I can’t just leave them. They’re in a lot of trouble.”
“Yes. But there will be time for that. That’s what this is all about, isn’t it? Time?”
“Can you send me back?”
“When I am ready. And I won’t be ready until you are ready.”
“I am ready.” With the water rushing down the hallway, he had to be ready. He couldn’t leave his friends to die.
“You are not,” the praying mantis insisted.
“When will I be ready?”
“Once you understand some of what you came here to understand. You can’t understand it all at once because your mind will only stretch so far. You’re—too much a part of organized time. You lack the vision and skill it would take to absorb everything I could give you now. If I tried, the burden would destroy your mind.”
“My friends will still be there when I get back?”
“No time is passing there now for you,” the creature said. “You’re standing outside of Time. You could watch time go by here if you wanted to, but I perceive that you wish to rejoin with your friends at the same moment that you left.”
“Yes.”
The creature shook its round head. “You may die.”
Juhg thought about that. Things certainly did look bad back when he’d … when he’d … whatever it was he’d done to stand back in that room. “I can’t leave them.”
“I could save you.”
“Can you save them?”
“Perhaps, but the effects of my intervention would cause ripples that could offer dire consequences at this juncture. It would be better to save them later.”
“How can you save them later if they’re dead?” Juhg felt frustration and anger building up. He didn’t understand what was taking place.
“Your perceptions of time impair you, Librarian. For now accept that such a task is not beyond my ken.”
Accept? Juhg couldn’t do that. He struggled with understanding what was going on with him now. “Is this real? Or am I hallucinating from some side effect of those two gems?”
“This is real.”
“You brought me here?”
“No. The Book of Time brought you here.”
“You mean the two blue gems?”
“Yes. That is the portion of The Book of Time that Lord Kharrion left in the keeping of the Baron of Seadevil’s Roost all those years ago.”
“I can’t get those two gems,” Juhg said. “They keep slipping through my fingers.”
“That’s because you lack proper understanding. That’s why you were brought here.”
“Why wasn’t Raisho brought? He touched the gems.”
“He didn’t see the resonance within the gems that you did. His mind only grasped the physical aspect represented by The Book of Time. You reached for the possibilities. In that instant, The Book of Time chose you. You are the one that was chosen, the one that is chosen, and the one that will be chosen. Always.”
“Because I felt the pulsing of the gems?”
“Because your mind was open. As it was and is and will be.”
Unable to grasp the meaning of what the praying mantis was talking about, Juhg decided to concentrate on easier to digest facts. “Who are you?”
“Your guide, as I have told you.”
“Why do I need a guide?”
“Because, at this point, you don’t know how to guide yourself. There is much that you don’t know.”
Juhg was growing frustrated and scared. Maybe he was lying under an ocean of water—at least a bay, he argued—drowning, and the discussion he was having with the giant praying mantis was only a distraction to spare him from the pain of death.
“You are not dead, Librarian Juhg.”
“I know. You keep telling me that.”
“What do you know about the nature of Time, Librarian Juhg?” the creature asked.
“It marks the passage of the day into night, of the night into day, and divides the seasons of the year.”
The praying mantis thing frowned—which was a hard thing to do when there were so few facial features to work with, but Juhg clearly understood that it wasn’t pleased. “Those are the artifices that those who live in your world choose in an attempt to make sense of the passage of Time. Do you know what Time is?”
“No,” Juhg said, interested in spite of the dire circumstances he found himself in at both places where he was.
“Time is limitless, Librarian Juhg. Everyone works to hard to quantify it and pay special attention to the passage of it. Like Time is going somewhere.” The creature laughed, and it was a very odd sound. “Time is as limitless as space. Also like space, it has no beginning and no end. It has always been, and it will always be.”
“I knew that,” Juhg said. “Herrah Snez wrote in his discourse on Time, ‘Time can never be wasted nor saved. So approach each moment with an eye toward making it be the best moment you can.’”
“An excellent thought,” the creature said, “but, sadly, incorrect. In true Time, there are no moments. All divisions made of Time were wrought by those of limited perception.”
“Time passes,” Juhg said. “Something that happens … an … an action—” He waved his hand. “—has a place in time. It’s marked. It’s finite.”
“Is it?” The mantis smiled.
“Time passes,” a voice said to Juhg’s left.
He turned his head, wondering how yet another person had come upon the mountain without him knowing it, and he saw himself dressed in Librarian’s robes.
“Something that happens … an … an action—” His other self waved his hand. “—has a place in time. It’s marked. It’s finite.”
In disbelief, Juhg reached out to touch his other self. He felt the warmth of flesh and blood brush against his fingertips. Then his other self turned to face him, his face filled with surprise and a little fear.
A heartbeat later, someone touched Juhg’s face. He whipped his head around and stared into the face of yet another self.
“This doesn’t make sense,” the self to his left said. And that was only a heartbeat before he heard those same words coming from him. Even then, he realized that another self was suddenly to the right of the self to his right, and the reaction to being touched by the self beyond him was taking place.
Suddenly, the mountain trail seemed filled with Juhgs all in a row. They were all touching and being touched, all of them just as surprised as he had been.
“I don’t understand,” his left self said, and Juhg agreed with himself only a moment later.
The mantis waved. All of Juhg’s other selves vanished, leaving him standing on the trail facing the creature. Juhg touched his own chest, wanting to make certain that he was real. He felt his own heart beating frantically.
“Time simply is,” the mantis said. “Like space, time has no limits. No beginning, no end.”
“We don’t know that.”
“You have looked up into the sky at night and wondered what was out there,” the mantis said. “Do you think that all that emptiness can actually be contained? And once contained, what of the space outside it?”
Juhg had no answer. The question had fascinated him at times, but it was simply too large to properly address. He walked away for a time, trying to assemble his thoughts. “There have been a number of scholars who have addressed that question. I’ve read several books in the Vault of All Known Knowledge.”
“
Have you found any solace in their teachings?”
Juhg knew he had not. Everything he’d read had only led to further understanding that when it came to what lay outside the world, he didn’t know. Nor did anyone else.
“Some of those scholars have insisted that space is an organic thing,” the mantis said. “They say that space grows a little each day, like a plant in a forest, or a pool of water that swells with the rain. But a plant takes nutrients from other sources to put on new foliage, and the rain fills the pool. So where, then, does this new space come from?”
“I don’t know.”
“How far can it grow? Or is it like a plant or a pool, governed by its own nature or constrained by space?”
Juhg could only shake his head.
“Then how can Time be constrained? Can you just lop off moments like you would pieces of a carrot for a stew?”
“A candle burns,” Juhg said, “and is gone.”
“A burning candle gives off heat and light and smoke,” the mantis said. “If you could gather those things, you could reconstruct the candle, and then burn it yet again. Over and over.”
“I don’t know what you’re trying to tell me,” Juhg admitted.
“Time,” the mantis said, “was invented for the beings of your world, so that everything didn’t happen at once. They spilled out of this world into that one a long time ago.”
“You’re saying that everyone in my world came from this place?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
The mantis was silent for a moment. Then it folded its upper legs behind its back and started up the mountain. “Walk with me for a while, Librarian Juhg.”
“A while,” Juhg echoed. “You acknowledge a division of time?”
The mantis smiled. “I talk so that you may understand.”
“Well,” Juhg said, “I don’t. I don’t understand at all.” Then he realized he was being left behind and hurried to catch up.
“There is another here like myself,” the mantis said as they walked.
“Another mantis?”
The mantis looked at Juhg. Bright speculation showed in those deep black eyes. “You see me as a mantis?”
“Are you not?”
“Of course I’m not.” The mantis broke into laughter that pealed over the mountainside. “A mantis. Indeed!”
Juhg felt a little embarrassed, but he was angry, too. “You look like a mantis.”
“That’s because your perception sees me as one.” The mantis rubbed its chin with one of its forelegs as if in deep thought. “A number of your cultures believe insects to be immortal on your world. Beetles. Grasshoppers. Other crawling things.”
“And trees,” Juhg added. “As well as rocks.”
“Neither of those things could have walked up this mountain with you. But to return to my story, there is another here like me.”
“Where is he?”
“Who said the other person was male?”
“No one.” Juhg reined in his curiosity. He was leaping to conclusions. The Grandmagister had trained him better than that. “Is the other person female?”
“The other person, like myself, is neither. Perhaps that is another reason why you see me as an insect. Many of them do not immediately reveal their gender. Tell me—” The mantis stopped walking and held its forelegs out. “—am I clothed?”
“No. You’re a mantis. Why would you need clothing?”
“If I were a mantis, I wouldn’t need clothing. In fact I don’t need clothing anyway.” The mantis resumed walking. “You’re not clothed either.”
Juhg felt a sudden intense rush of embarrassment and slowed his gait so that he walked a few steps behind the mantis. He looked down at himself. I am clothed. I am wearing the robe of a First Level Librarian. At the same moment, he knew there was no way that robe could be there.
“A joke, Librarian Juhg. Nothing more.” The mantis laughed and the sound was harsh. “One thing your kind has invented that I have rather enjoyed is humor. It took me quite a while to get the knack of it, though. Humor is a very delicate thing.”
“Humor is out of place,” Juhg said sternly. “Laughing at your jokes while my friends face death is … is … wrong.”
“Pity. I thought it was rather funny. The look on your face, I mean. But that’s quite all right. Most humor is intended for personal consumption anyway, it seems.”
Not caring whether the mantis saw him clothed or unclothed anymore, Juhg ran in front of the creature and blocked its path. “I don’t have time for this.”
The mantis stopped and stared at him with those oily black eyes. “That is one of the things you will have to come to accept, Librarian Juhg. Here in this place, you have all of Time. You never need fear being late. Not even to go back and chance death with your friends in that rapidly filling basement beneath the sea.”
“Send me back.”
“There are things that I must tell you first.”
“An order of events?” Juhg riposted. “Here in a place where Time doesn’t matter?”
“Don’t be facetious. It’s unbecoming.” The mantis stepped around Juhg effortlessly, as if Juhg was standing still, which he was.
Juhg hurried to keep up.
“There have always been two of us here,” the mantis said. “At least, that’s the way we remember it, know that it is, understand that it will be. Sometimes we have been friends and sometimes we have been strangers. There are many things to experience here.” The creature was silent for a moment. “Sometimes we have been, are, and will be enemies. During a period of enmity that was, is, or will be, we fought. Only in this place, neither of us could win. Or we both won. Or it was a draw.”
Struggling to accept that, Juhg kept his peace. He couldn’t help thinking about Craugh and the others at the mercy of the waters rapidly filling the basement. What if the creature was lying and they were already dead? He couldn’t bear that thought.
“In our frustration, I agreed, agree, will agree—”
“Stop doing that,” Juhg said.
“What?”
“Talking in that fashion. Stick with the past tense. That’s how I can best understand it.”
The mantis reflected for a moment. “I will honor your request, since in your world these events have already passed.”
“Thank you.” Juhg’s head hurt with trying to absorb everything. The nature of space had always plagued him, and even the Grandmagister offered no real understanding of it.
“We … opened Time and your world was born, as limitless as this place here, but with different rules. We made Time flow linearly. Like a river. And we put beings there that had been in this place. They became the humans, dwarves, elves, goblins, and other creatures. Birds, fish, insects, and everything else.” The mantis shook its head. “So much more than we expected. But what we had done, are doing, will—” The creature stopped itself. “Well, it quickly got out of hand.”
“Why did you do that?” Juhg asked. “Put all the beings and the creatures into that place?”
“So that we could enjoy our enmity,” the mantis replied. “So that the wars that we fought with these beings could end and there could be a winner declared.”
“A game? You created our world as a game?”
The mantis shrugged. They kept walking along the mountain trail but Juhg hardly paid attention now. “It was unique. Nothing like it had ever existed before.”
“But the beings you put there existed.”
“Yes.”
“Where did they come from?”
“They were always here.”
“Then what made you different from them?” Juhg asked.
“That.”
“That what?”
“The difference, of course. If we had not always been different, there would have been no difference, would there?”
Juhg didn’t know how to argue with that but he felt compelled to. He made himself table the subject for the moment. “What am I doing here?”
“The Book of Time, you mean?”
“Yes. You see, when we opened ourselves to that other world so that we could enjoy our enmity, we left this place open to invasion from the other side. Until it happened, is happening, and will happen, we had never before thought anything could disrupt this place. We were wrong.”
The wind along the mountain suddenly seemed colder and wetter. Juhg blinked against the precipitation, starting to feel as cold and as chilled as he had back in the building basement in his sodden clothing.
“Men,” the mantis said as if the term were despicable, “found a means to invade this place. They came into this place and stole The Book of Time, returning to their world before we could get them.”
Craugh, Juhg thought, but he kept the name to himself. “You didn’t know this was going to happen?”
The mantis frowned. “I … do not like admitting something I don’t know. It is … uncomfortable.”
“It’s also,” Juhg said, “often the first step in gaining knowledge.”
“The concept of learning something that I don’t know is … well, beyond description, I’m afraid. I have always known everything.”
“What am I doing here?” Juhg asked.
The mantis stopped and looked at him. “You have been chosen to find The Book of Time and bring it back to this place. People search for it there. Your Grandmagister Edgewick Lamplighter was close to acquiring it, but the fourth section of The Book of Time is difficult to acquire. And his enemies struck more swiftly and with more knowledge than he had guessed. Still, he sent you to complete the task, and I will depend on you to accomplish that task as well.”
“Why don’t you get it?”
“Because I can’t enter your world,” the mantis said. “I can observe it endlessly, and do. But I can never put a foot in that place. Or a tentacle.”
“Tentacle?”
The mantis smiled a little. “Another joke, I’m afraid. They’ve become somewhat addictive. Of course, I can’t remember a time when humor did not exist here. Once something enters this place, it tends to fill it up and become eternal. In all directions of time.”
“Does that mean that I—”
