Crucible of Time

by Jeffrey A. Carver

  Li-Jared protested. “They need to hear this, as well.”

  The Ocellet waited until Akura and Sheeawn were out of the room, before she answered with a glare, “I will say if they may hear it. Now tell me exactly what you know of our defenses, and how you know!” Her eyes glinted dangerously. “And what you have told the Uduon.”

  Li-Jared suddenly realized how close he’d come to divulging the critical secret before he had gained their trust. Stupid. The secret had to be shared, but not yet. “My apologies.”

  Koro snorted. Quin gestured for Li-Jared to continue.

  With a grimace, he did. “We know of your temporal displacement field, of course. We observed it diverting an asteroid, and for that matter, we have passed through it ourselves, in our ship. We have not told the Uduon about it. But we know what it does. It is an impressive device. The problem is not the protection it gives you, but its dangerous side effects.”

  “Which you keep saying. But what are they?” Quin asked tightly, with a glance at her science adviser. Aylen was focused wholly on Li-Jared’s words. Good, he thought. He had their attention.

  Li-Jared gestured to Bandicut, who pushed their own holo unit to the center of the table. Then, as images sprang up to display the same illustrations that Jeaves had used, back on Shipworld, he told them.

  ***

  “. . . and so, the result is that your defensive shield is, unfortunately, attracting the Mindaru directly toward you.”

  Li-Jared let out his breath slowly. “I am sure you have questions.”

  They most certainly did.

  ***

  Li-Jared insisted that the Uduon should be brought back in, with his promise not to describe the planetary defenses. “But you’ll have to tell them soon, because the only way to stop more Mindaru from coming is to turn off your shield.”

  Koro was adamantly negative. “We know the danger from these asteroids. We have only your word about the other.”

  Li-Jared closed his eyes and reached somewhere within himself for patience. “Listen to me,” he said. “We know Karellia is under attack, yes. The Uduon feel under attack, too. But the universe is a big place—” he gestured with outstretched arms “—and there are terrible things out there, and what you are doing is causing them to threaten us—all of us—not just Karellia and Uduon, but many other worlds, as well. We are here representing a much greater civilization. And the message is, you are going to have to shut down your defensive shield, and soon, or it will be shut down for you. There will be no room for discussion.”

  Koro froze. “That sounds like a threat.”

  “It is not a threat. It is a statement of reality.”

  “Are you making the same statement of reality to Uduon?”

  “We are, and we have,” Li-Jared said, and that seemed to startle Koro. “They will stop throwing rocks, or they will be stopped. You are both at risk from a common enemy, and you need to put an end to this senseless war.”

  Akura and Sheeawn were brought back into the room. With Bandicut’s help, Li-Jared was able to provide more information. The Uduon did not pretend to be happy—they knew crucial pieces were being withheld from them—but they listened to what Li-Jared and Bandicut had to say about the thing called the starstream, and of time distortions that passed down it, opening a door to danger. Everyone seemed suitably alarmed, but as soon as the conversation cycled back to the question of ending the interplanetary conflict, it all came back to pent-up rage and mistrust between them.

  Finally Quin called a halt for the day. They had been at it for many hours, tempers were frayed, and it was time to break for food, and sleep.

  The visitors were shown to guest quarters one floor up, where they were served a light dinner and shown to sleeping rooms. Everyone was tired, and there was little talk.

  Bandicut was pulled away from a conversation with Li-Jared by a communication from Jeaves, waiting on the landing craft. “What is it?” Bandicut said, moving to a private corner so he could talk without disturbing the others. “Is everything okay on The Long View?”

  “Quite okay,” Jeaves said. “But you need to speed things along. Ruall says a long-range scan from a probe at the edge of the star system has picked up a contact moving this way. There is a chance it is the Mindaru we fought in the starstream.”

  Bandicut felt a bone-deep chill. “Hell! How fast?”

  “Fast enough. It’s probably reconnoitering. But Ruall says you need to wrap up quickly.”

  “Can you give us one more day?”

  “Just that. No more.”

  By the time Bandicut went looking for Li-Jared to share the information, he found the Karellian sound asleep. He must be exhausted, Bandicut thought. Best to let him rest. Instead of waking him, Bandicut stretched out on a cot, closed his eyes, and focused inward to consult sadly with his memories of Charli, hoping that some quarxly wisdom would emerge from his grieving subconscious. It was in the midst of this imagined conversation that he finally fell asleep.

  ***

  The following morning, Bandicut filled in Li-Jared, but neither was certain how they should proceed. The meeting began with a prickly debate about getting the military forces of two worlds to talk to each other. Bandicut listened to this for about five minutes before the memory of Charli, or maybe the stones, nudged him wordlessly and he suddenly made a decision.

  He stood abruptly, cutting off Koro in the middle of a sentence, and waved his hands for attention.

  He got their attention all right. The guards snapped to alert and leveled their weapons at him.

  As Quin gestured to the guards to stand down, Bandicut gathered strength in his voice and said, “Look, I’m sorry for interrupting. But may I make a suggestion?” He paused for a beat. “Why don’t we stop trying to sort this out here, and instead just come up to our ship, so you can see for yourselves? If you go into space with us, we can take you out beyond the radiation belt, even to the Heart of Fire! Then we can show you what’s possible—and that this isn’t just talk! You asked for proof of our extraordinary claims. I’m offering it!”

  This was jumping the gun on their original plan, which was to invite the Karellians to the ship only after some consensus had been hammered out. But time for that was dwindling. Perhaps if they stood together on the bridge of The Long View and saw some of these things, the truth would start to seem less abstract and more real.

  His proposal was met with stunned silence.

  “I know this may seem out of left—well, I mean it’s unexpected. But I’m utterly serious. Our ship is in orbit, under the watch of your patrol ships. It’ll take less than an hour to get there in our landing craft. It’ll take a little longer to get you beyond your radiation belt. And don’t worry, you’ll be shielded from the radiation.” He turned and looked out the bay window and up into a cloudless sky. Did he see the faint, distant curtain of a fiery nebula in the sky?

  He turned back to find Ocellet Kim Quin staring at him, her eyes lit by a sharp band of green.

  “This is not a frivolous offer, Ocellet Quin. We are trying to describe things you need to see for yourself. Let us show you the stars, the galaxy, the starstream. Let us show you what lies beyond that nebula! And if it comes to that, let us show you the Mindaru!” He exchanged glances with Li-Jared. Was it too soon to tell them about the sighting?

  “You patronize us,” Koro said, drumming his fingers on the table. “Because we have not traveled as you have, among the . . . stars . . . you think our science is not—”

  “Your science—our science—is excellent!” Li-Jared exclaimed, rising to stand beside Bandicut. “As far as it goes. At least it was, when I was last here.” He paused; no one spoke. “But the universe outside is hidden from view! You can’t know about the things you can’t see!”

  “Exactly,” said Bandicut, deciding. “And here’s the thing. Our ship just hours ago detected a possible Mindaru presence out at the edge of your solar system! We don’t know how soon it might be here, but quite likely, it
’ll be fast.”

  The Karellians’ faces were unreadable to Bandicut. Quin looked to Koro and Aylen for their silent reactions, before answering. “Suppose you speak the truth. Maybe you are! But we are at war now with people we cannot see! Given my responsibilities to protect my people, this seems an unusual risk. We could become hostages.”

  Or casualties, Bandicut thought. He turned his palms up. “We understand that, and we will guarantee your safety as much as humanly—” he cleared his throat “—as much as it can be guaranteed. Could something happen to you out there? It’s possible. The situation is dangerous for all of us. That’s why we’re here.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Please.” Bandicut gestured toward Akura, whose expression was contorted in what he took to be frustration and anger. “Look—Watcher Akura made the trip from Uduon with us, at similar risk. She is a leader of great importance to her people. Are you not, Watcher?” Akura tilted her head toward Sheeawn for the translation, then tapped her chest softly in modest affirmation. Bandicut continued, “We came to her just a few days ago—as strangers—just as we are to you, Ocellet Quin. But presented with these warnings, she agreed to travel with us to an utterly unknown world—a world that she believed had been attacking her own for years—to trust us—for the sake of the safety of her people. This is all we ask of you.”

  Quin hesitated a moment, then gestured to her aides, as if to say, Comments?

  Aylen spoke at once. “How can there be any question? I am willing to go right now, if you permit it. A chance to see what’s out there—to understand the situation better—to see the truth for ourselves?”

  “I’m sure,” Koro said dryly, “that this would be a wonderful opportunity for you to pursue science. But we’re deciding matters of planetary security here.”

  “Which is why we need the facts, Commander. Aren’t we agreed that if what they are telling us is true, then this is the biggest thing in our planet’s history?”

  “Perhaps,” Koro allowed.

  “Yes, I am agreed,” said Quin. “We did ask for proof, did we not?”

  Koro hesitated, and then flicked his fingers in a shrug. “Yes, we asked.”

  Quin intertwined her fingers. “We are going to take a break now, while I consider your proposal. How many people are you offering to take on your ship?”

  Bandicut and Li-Jared looked at each other. “Two Uduon,” Li-Jared said. “Two Karellians?” Bandicut agreed.

  “Two of us,” Quin said. “We will consider it.”

  “Ocellet—” Koro began.

  “Commander, this is a policy decision. Of course I will want your advice. But I am going to call a recess—even though we just started—while I consult the rest of the leadership council.” To the others, she said, “The guards will accompany you back to the guest quarters.”

  “But—” Akura began.

  “We will speak again shortly.” And then Quin turned and strode from the room.

  ***

  Li-Jared thought he would go crazy if he had to wait much longer for Ocellet Quin to come back. Which was ironic, because the staff had put out a stunning buffet of real Karellian food for them. Savory vegetable tarts! A rich, bubbling stew! Fragrant herbal bread! Some were recognizable; others were altogether new. He longed to immerse himself in the sensory experience of being back on Karellia. But he was too wound up to enjoy it much. He paced, bonging softly to himself.

  Akura and Sheeawn were watching him warily, no doubt wondering why they had come all this way, only to be ignored by their antagonistic hosts and given little opportunity to make their case. John was trying to talk to them as they nibbled the servings. Li-Jared wasn’t sure that they didn’t still see him primarily as an alien. But maybe he could persuade them that taking the meeting into space would help to move things along. Li-Jared himself thought it had been a shrewd stroke on Bandie’s part. Let us get to neutral ground, and maybe we can start listening to each other.

  Right now, he needed a way to calm himself down.

  A comm trilled. One of the guards spoke into a patch on his upper arm, listened, and then approached Li-Jared. His voice was carefully deferential. “Ocellet Quin wishes to speak with you privately.”

  Progress. He hoped.

  ***

  Quin stood gazing out a window, a cup of a hot herbal drink in her hands. She gestured to Li-Jared to sit. They were in a smaller version of the meeting room, with a beverage counter on one side and a bay window on another. Armchairs carved from dark, polished hardwood were arranged in the center around a small, matching table. He stood behind one and said, “Do you mind if I stand? I’m feeling a little—”

  She waved off his explanation and remained standing herself. “Would you like a cup of jorrel tea?”

  “Moon and stars, yes!” Accepting the mug, Li-Jared inhaled the fragrant vapors curling from the tea. He hadn’t smelled anything this good in almost three centuries. That was how long it had been here; sometimes, it felt that long to him in his own time.

  “Are you pleased to be back home?” Quin asked. There was a wry note of excitement in her voice, reminding him that this was an extraordinary event for all of them: to have a relic from the past drop out of the sky, with alien traveling companions, no less.

  “More pleased than I can say. But it is strange,” Li-Jared said. He took a sip of the fragrant brew and was instantly transported back to long days spent in his study, working on the mathematics of temporal physics. He blinked and dragged himself back to the present. “It seems a lot has changed.”

  “Wars and upheavals, in the century after you left,” Quin said. “Much was lost, I’m afraid. But we gained a peace that has lasted, mostly—until this war with Uduon.”

  They stood in silence a moment longer, taking each other’s measure. “Tell me something,” she said. “How is it that you seem only a few years older than when you left—under extremely mysterious circumstances—almost three hundred years ago by our calendar?”

  Li-Jared opened his mouth to protest that these were details that could wait. But as he met her gaze, he realized that he was going to have to explain some of the mysteries, if he wanted to gain their trust. He repositioned the nearest chair and sat, and she did the same. “Do you know what happens when something travels close to the speed of light?”

  “Ah,” Quin said. “The time-slowdown. Of course. We’ve measured it rather precisely in particles speeding through the radiation belts.” She waved overhead to indicate the sky. “And we’re using some of the same principles—” she hesitated, then backtracked with “—well, never mind that now.”

  Li-Jared hmm’d to himself. Was relativistic time dilation involved in the defensive shield? It seemed plausible enough, though how was a mystery to him. They’d just begun exploring time dilation as a theoretical possibility when he’d been working on it. If they were bending time around the planet now, they clearly understood a lot more about time’s malleability than he and his contemporaries had. “Well,” he said, returning to her original question, “that’s similar to what happened to me—time dilation—when I was transported away from here, far far beyond the radiation and dust clouds, far beyond our star system. I traveled a long way, but the time was short. Only a few years have passed for me.”

  Quin’s eyes met his. “You have seen much in those few years, I guess.”

  “Yes.” Li-Jared set his mug down and sat forward facing her. “Ocellet—”

  “Tell me something, Li-Jared,” she said, interrupting. “When you were a professor of mathematical physics at Holdhope Academy, what was your area of expertise?”

  He inclined his head. “I was studying the nature of time, actually. Also, the behavior of certain high-energy particles.”

  “And did you have a family?”

  “No. I lived by myself.”

  “Connected family?”

  He rubbed his fingertips together, concentrating. “My greater birth family had other children. I had cousins.” Whom h
e had not thought of in a long while, he was chagrined to realize.

  “Names?” asked Quin.

  He let his breath sigh out. “A female named Sari, who was perhaps six years younger than I was. And two males, named—”

  “Ra-Teen—”

  “Yes! Ra-Teen—and Larp! Stunned by the memory, he touched his chest. “You know of them?”

  “Only what I’ve read in the records,” Quin said. “But Sari . . .” She paused and hissed a little chuckle. “Sari was my seventh-generation grandmother.”

  Bong. “Your grandmother?”

  Her eyes gleamed. “That’s right. It would seem, Li-Jared of Holdhope, that you and I are cousins, removed by many years.” She watched him react for a moment, her eyes bright. “I’ve had my staff researching ancient records, and they found this picture.” She handed him a small, plasticized square.

  He glanced down, and his chest tightened with a sudden sharp ache of memory. It was an image of him as a student at the Institute, standing in front of a stone-faced building with several other university students, and an older Karellian. He found his breath again, recalling the moment. Sari had taken the picture, when he was just beginning his appointment at the academy. She had teased him about his serious expression. Perhaps he really had taken everything too seriously. As he turned the image in his hand, he felt an inexpressible sadness. Sari was gone. He would never see her again. Or his academy mentor or his fellow teachers. He was no longer of their era, nor were they of his.

  “Our defense detachments might not have recognized your place in history,” Quin said, “but in the written records of my family, the disappearing cousin Li-Jared was apparently something of a legend!”

  Li-Jared sat stone still, his hearts out of sync with amazement. Legend? “I see,” he managed finally. “I’m glad to know we are related—” and he hesitated before adding, “—cousin Quin. Do I dare ask, was that . . . legend . . . a good one or a bad one?”