Time Travel Omnibus, page 877
He looked around the cell. “How long have I been here?”
The aliens exchanged a glance. “On your scale, about a month.”
“So I haven’t been gone long enough to be missed. But you can’t keep me here much longer.”
“They will assume your mission has failed. Besides, soon it will not matter.”
Aaron tensed up. “What do you mean, it won’t matter?”
The two aliens remained silent, and Aaron felt cold. “Does this mean—you’re not planning to destroy the Earth, are you?”
The aliens made a noise that Aaron couldn’t understand, but it felt like laughter. “No, we do not destroy the incompatible emerging races. We simply lock them away.”
“Lock them away?”
“The wormhole boundary becomes a barrier. Any living creature that enters it on one side of the solar system finds itself emerging on the other side of the solar system. A cosmic loop.”
“A torus,” Aaron said, drawing on memory of long-ago mathematics courses. “A four-dimensional donut.”
“Exactly. We will lock your solar system into a toroidal shape, so you can never emerge to threaten the galaxy.”
Aaron shook his head, and clasped his hands together to keep them from trembling. Still, he shivered. “If you lock us away, when the Sun dies, so will my entire race.”
“But that is billions of years in your future. You personally will be long gone by then. It will not matter to you.”
Aaron glared at it. “You haven’t really learned much about humanity, have you?”
“We have learned enough. What we do may be regrettable, but it is necessary. Your race is too paranoid and violent to allow into the galaxy. You would threaten our alliance.”
“We wouldn’t,” Aaron said softly. “On the contrary, we’re not that paranoid.”
The larger alien took over the conversation. “You cannot deny the paranoia that is inherent to your species. Your own people did lock you up when you returned before you had left.”
Aaron felt a sudden need to respond to the alien’s stupidity with his fists. But he knew that wouldn’t help, and in fact, would just make things worse. He took a few deep breaths and then spoke in measured tones. “You know, it’s really unfair for you to use a scenario that you yourself created to judge my species.”
“Ah, but we did not actually create the scenario in its entirety, Commander Eliassen. We merely initiated it. Your own subconscious mind elaborated it, fleshed it out, and gave it reality. As we said before, we merely allowed the scenario to play out from the starting point. It was our way of learning more about your species, so we could judge you accordingly. And in the reality that you created for yourself, your own people locked you away.”
“So they locked me away. Big deal. It was only because they were faced with something unexpected, something they had never seen before.”
The aliens just stared silently at Aaron as the seconds passed. After a moment, he realized the implications of his comment, and he sighed. “Okay. I get it.”
“Then we shall commence reshaping the space occupied by your solar system.”
“Wait!” Aaron’s mind raced with desperation. He knew he had to find an argument to ensure the future of the human race, and he reached for the only one that came to mind. “What if I offered you an alternative?”
The aliens gave him a quizzical glance. “Explain.”
“Instead of locking us away forever, why not give us more time? Recreate your wormhole boundary twice as far away.”
“What would that accomplish?”
“It would give us more time to develop, to mature.” Aaron smiled. “The next human who comes this far might be years away. By then, we’ll be less violent, less paranoid.”
The alien gave him what appeared to be a sad look. “You cannot guarantee that.”
“No,” Aaron admitted. “I can’t. But I can tell you this. We may be violent, but we aren’t looking to enter space to conquer intelligent life. We’re looking to befriend intelligent life, to work together in harmony.” He resisted an impulse to fall to the floor and beg. Instead, he pulled himself a little taller and stared directly into the eyes of the larger alien. “I know you have the power to look into my mind. Do it again. Now. But look at everything it means to be human, not just the violent stuff that you’re assuming is all there is.”
“What do you expect us to find?”
“You’ll see images of paranoia and fear, but also those of joy and hope. You’ll see humans hurting each other, but you’ll also see us helping each other. You’ll see that we have the capacity for a higher morality.”
“But why should we recreate the wormhole twice as far away? What is the point of delaying the inevitable?”
Aaron fought to stay calm. “That’s just my point. It’s not inevitable. We’ll grow in that many years. And if we don’t, so what? If we’re still not acceptable to you, lock us off then. But give us more time, give us a chance. Please.”
The aliens looked at each other. “Let us look into your mind, as you have offered.”
Aaron nodded, and felt a sudden intrusion into his thoughts. His guts told him to resist, but his mind told him to let them see his life, his experiences, and his world.
Suddenly, Aaron no longer found himself with the aliens. He looked out into a bright light, and realized that he was watching the world from his own eyes at the moment of his birth. The world around him looked hazy, and people moved slowly around him. Then the world sped up, and Aaron became a detached observer in his own life. From a hidden corner of his mind, accompanied by the alien presences, he watched his life unfold. Elementary school, high school, college, the Air Force, his first kiss, the first time making love, the first time he flew solo, all the tragedies of his life, all the hopes, all his desires, all his dreams . . .
He blinked, and once more stood in the room with the aliens. They stared at him in silence. The seconds passed, and Aaron continued to wait while they continued staring. Finally, just when he thought he couldn’t bear it any longer, the larger alien spoke. “Your proposal is acceptable.”
Aaron breathed a sigh of relief. “Good.” He paused. “So, I know you’re giving the human race a second chance, but what happens to me now?”
“We will send you back, of course, after wiping your memory of our existence.”
Aaron nodded. “I understand,” he said. But, he thought, he would fight to keep his memory as intact as possible.
“Houston, this is Deep Space Shuttle One. Please reply. Over.”
Gabe’s voice came over the radio. “DSS One, this is Houston. How’re you doing, Aaron?”
Aaron breathed a sigh of relief. “Much better, now that the lightspeed lag is gone. It’s good to be back home. Over.”
“Well, you’re not quite home yet,” came the amused reply. “We’ll get you out of orbit as soon as we can.” Gabe paused. “One thing, Aaron. Weather’s a little stormy in Florida, so we’ll need you to land at Edwards. Hope that’s not a problem.”
“No, not at—” Aaron began, and then something nagged at the back of Aaron’s mind. “Um, Houston?”
“Yes?”
“What’s today’s date?”
“The date?” Gabe laughed. “It’s October tenth. You’ve arrived home right on schedule.”
“Good.”
“Why, what did you expect? Relativity kicking in and bringing you far, far into the future? You never went fast enough for that.”
“No, not that. I expected—” Aaron thought for a moment, but nothing came to mind. “I don’t know what I expected.”
“Well, you should expect a parade, at least. You’ll be a genuine hero when you return. Just like Neil Armstrong.”
Aaron leaned back and smiled. What does a hero do? He promotes causes, of course. And Aaron knew that it would be vitally important for him to use his new status to speak out against fear, against hate, against violence and wars. He couldn’t say why. He just knew it had to be that way.
Their current job completed, the beings Aaron had called George and Gracie studied the naked bodies of thousands of other primitive aliens suspended in separate plasma baths, which kept them alive as they lived out their illusions.
The Younger asked the Elder, “Have you ever done such a thing before?”
“Never,” the Elder replied. “Never in the history of our existence.”
“Will you not get in trouble?”
“No. It is my decision to make, as it will be yours to make when I am gone.”
“But to make such a promise to a primitive, violent alien, and then to carry it out.”
The Elder’s countenance took on the equivalent of a smile. “That very promise is the reason for our jobs. Have you never wondered why we do not just lock up every other solar system with the potential for intelligent life? Why are we here, to intercept each race as they emerge from their shells? What is our function?” He paused. “Do you now understand what you are being trained to do?”
The Younger thought for a moment. “I think I almost understand. Please make it clear for me.”
“The humans,” the Elder said. “They were the first to discover the secret.”
“Which is what?”
“That it is not a race’s capacity for violence that condemns us, but rather, the decisions that we choose to make. This human, Aaron Eliassen, made the right decision.” The Elder swept his arm around, indicating all the aliens floating in their plasma baths. “Every other alien representative that we have encountered has always reacted the same way, claiming that they will conquer the Universe, and along with it, us. We had no choice but to lock their races away forever. But this human chose wisely. This was the first representative that expressed a different hope, that his race would one day be more acceptable to us, rather than requiring us to be more acceptable to them.”
“I understand.”
“Perhaps one day, they will be partners with us. For now, though—”
An ultraviolet light blinked on, and at the same time, a high-frequency whine began.
The Elder turned to the Younger. “Another race has emerged from its shell. Let us attend to it.”
The Younger closed the door of the chamber behind it, pausing only briefly to study the hundreds of aliens suspended in their plasma baths. He recalled how many in turn had threatened the Elder with violence, and had claimed that their race alone would own the Universe. He had reached the beginning of understanding, and sorrow filled his being.
He turned to the Elder. “It is good that we could decide as we did for the human. But what a pity that we could not decide otherwise for the rest.”
“They decided for themselves, young friend. We do not judge them; they chose their own verdicts.”
THE DRAGON WORE TROUSERS
Bob Buckley
There are at least two sides to every story . . .
It was a hot and sultry afternoon, a normal day, a perfect day. The ancient city should have been filled with the noisy clamor of everyday life, but its wide streets and majestically fluted stone towers and sweeping sky bridges were all hushed and deserted, an unnatural emptiness that shouted at the nerves. No clash of iron-bound wheels or scaled feet or talons tapping at worn cobbles half a millennium old came through the narrow windows of the cluttered workroom. There was only the soft chiming of thecalitor as Maker-Of-Wonders gave the inner channels of the light guide one final polish.
“There! Are you not beautiful?” he exclaimed proudly, holding the intricately shaped mass of gleaming quartz to the bars of sunlight streaming down from the arched ceiling. Prismatic rainbows danced on the water-clear curves, throwing colored highlights across the chiseled planes of his scaly face. Large, thoughtful eyes glowed from shadowed brow ridges. And truly, the glass sang. Light entering the strange turnings seemed to become confused, to twist frantically, growing ever brighter in agitation. Finally satisfied with his labors, Maker upended the light guide over a circular stone well set into the floor and gave it a shake. With a despairing cry, the tremulous wisp of sun glow slid from the maze of mirrored channels into the shaft and was consumed by velvety darkness.
Hissing contentedly through the gap of a broken tooth as wide and as long as a man’s hand, Maker whirled grandly, his huge tail making the humid air hum with its passage, as he approached his latest, and perhaps final, creation.
As transparent as air, taller than She-Who-Speaks-Law, his revered mate, the Thing-That-Rearranges-Now-And-When was not something that could be easily seen. The transport cavity at its crystalline heart was so cramped that it could hold but one, and then only uncomfortably. But no matter, there was no one left to use it but Maker. Their feisty offspring were now encamped with their mother at the cold forests at the bottom of the world where darkness dwelled half the year. And the populace of the city, woeful fools, had scattered in a thousand directions to deluded safety: all the hunt masters, stone shapers, hide tanners, heavy haulers, meat strippers, keepers of herds, and, sadly, even the wisest of the preservers guild, all fled because of warnings from the great glass eye atop Thorntree mountain. The news had been dire, true, suggesting that all life would perish, even here, half a world away in fiery turmoil from the sky. If any survived, it would be at the distant southern climes. But the odds of salvation even there seemed dubious, doubtful enough to prompt Maker to try another way, a theoretical leap, sidewise, through time itself.
Maker did not miss the crowds. In his view, the city was vastly improved by its emptiness. And now, wrought in haste, through much trial and error, his curious device based on the latest discoveries in hard physics, and honed by just a pinch of black arts, was finally ready.
Bony hand trembling, Maker slid the light guide into its recess. Happily, it clicked into place perfectly within the base of the device. Immediately a harsh light began to pulsate. Now, the crystal could do much more than sing. Indeed, it hummed with power as its innermost facets began to glow.
Maker scurried frantically about the room, darting from table to table, the loose, tubular panels of the lab apron flapping against his muscular thighs. This handy utility garment was a sea of pockets which he stuffed full of gadgets and tools, anything that might conceivably prove useful during his exile. Then, something went SQUEAK! Startled by all the activity and disturbing of things long left untouched, a creature small and furry with a naked twist of pink tail sprang off the table to the floor. Maker hissed in annoyance. The hairy little pests were everywhere, it seemed, in the walls, under the floor, scurrying about in trees. Angrily, he trod on the squirming thing as it darted between his feet. Then, for just a moment, Maker paused, overcome by sudden sentimentality for his doomed world. He stood in silent reflection, drinking in the scents of the cypress and pines that surrounded the garden, admiring the play of light on clumps of shiny green cycadales, enjoying one last time the caress of the warm wind off the island-studded sea.
This quiet moment was interrupted as a handful of small meteors streamed green fire across the sky. Thunder chased their wake. Maker’s huge mouth parted in an angry roar at the injustice of it all, a world, his whole civilization, slaughtered by a rock from the sky! It was simply not fair!
The meteors were warning enough. It was time to depart. Nostalgia was pure foolishness, an unprofitable emotion. Groaning, Maker folded himself into the heart of his device, forcing long legs and stiff tail into postures they were never designed for. His huge, crested head went up into the sensory receptacle. At once, his mind took control of the crystal. Energies were focused, contained in countless convoluted chambers, poised to loose pent-up strength. But to where? The past? He had already lived that, it seemed a waste to revisit old arguments. The appeal of the unknown beckoned. Forming no specific date in his mind as a specific destination, he simply abstracted the notion of fleeing forward into the future in a mental gestalt the device could understand.
Far to the west, glimpsed through tall windows, something huge and bright parted the sky.
GO, he thought. JUST GO!
The Thing-That-Rearranges-Now-And-When folded sideways upon itself and was gone. The light of its transition was blinding, but even that was lost in the terrible glare that followed. The workroom’s thick granite walls whirled away like brittle parchment. The heat was terrible.
Maker sneezed and shivered involuntarily. Wherever he was, it was dark and damp and cold. His scales itched. He reached around to free his bent tail, pushed hard, and was ejected from the transport cavity. He thumped down onto a slick stone floor and found himself sitting in a puddle of icy water. His shout of displeasure came back at him in a profusion of deafening echoes.
Stiff and cranky, he got to his feet and felt at his apron for the pocket with the gas torch. The device roared into life at a touch, its bright yellow flame banishing the darkness. The shimmer behind him he identified as the time device, now glowing faintly as it rebuilt its energies.
A quick scan of his surroundings showed that he was in a large cavern. Here and there in the stone trapped sea shells glistened, prompting him to guess that the city’s high promontory had been plunged beneath the sea and then slowly raised back up as mountains. The dripping rock walls were hung with shadows, and from one such opening a cold breeze blew. Luck was with him, an exit.
Much relieved to be out of the damp, Maker stepped out into a starry night. A sliver of moon was hung above a strange forest of trees, very unlike the tropical vegetation he was acquainted with. Everything smelled strange. Before him was a road, unpaved dirt rutted with cart tracks. Primitive, yes, but just seeing the cart tracks made him give a long, satisfied rumble of relief. It proved that someone had survived the disaster. No doubt descendants of the southern refugees, many generations removed. Would they remember their long-lost great-grandfather after all this time?
Bending low, he studied the tracks scattered in profusion across the soft dirt: odd curved indentations, curious half circles lacking claw marks. Doubt nibbled at his confidence as he realized that these shapes were very unlike his own feet. “What strange beast could make marks like this?” He wondered aloud in bafflement.
