by Jimmy Guieu
Streiler held her in his arms. Their lips joined in a tender kiss and they stayed a long time like that, embracing each other. Glanya shook free, swiftly wiping away a tear. She took three steps back and with one final sob pleaded psychically, “Now Kurt, please…”
Streiler slowly lifted the disintegrator rifle. In his teary-eyed vision he saw his love’s slender form dancing. Bracing himself with courage he gritted his teeth, closed his eyes and fired. When he dared to open them again he saw nothing but the bare wall and the dark, empty hallway.
With his nerves shot, Streiler could not get to sleep after the busy night. He left his room and went to smoke a cigarette in the hallway lined with doors. His friends must have been sleeping in their beds… which their ghosts had been in an hour before.
And Glanya? The real one, she whom he had not killed? She was sleeping or…
He had to see her!
Leaning on the frame of the bay window Glanya was contemplating the starry sky. Overwhelmed by his emotions, Streiler went straight to her, a little like a robot but trembling and full of anxiety. When she noticed him she threw herself in his arms and wept.
“Oh, Kurt! It was awful! I had a nightmare… we were forced to separate and you killed me.”
“It was just a nightmare, dear. We’ll never separate. I’ll take you with me to the Atomic Age.”
When he woke up after the night bursting with emotions, Kariven rushed to Leyla’s room.
The Grand Instructor welcomed him with pleasure but was surprised by his excitement. He covered her face with kisses before he left, singing, overflowing with joy at having found her whom the monster had killed!
The light of his life was born again from the Past.
Bewildered, Leyla shook her blonde hair wondering why Kariven seemed so happy. Wasn’t this a day like any other?
The Bimkamian giant had just handed out the fresh meat to the cyclops in their cages. Commander Taylor, Harrington and Streiler were watching on, wary and worried, as Kariven held Leyla around the waist 15 feet away from the cages where the one-eyed monsters were growling.
Torka, the Military Operations Chief, was surprised to notice that all the Earthlings were nervously fingering the grips of their Colts, ready to unholster them. He saw that their eyes were all focused on the cyclops.
At the moment when the guard passed by in reach, one of the red-haired monsters suddenly shot out its arm trying to steal the metal lance. The Bimkamian giant jumped to the side, barely dodging the monster’s claws.
The four Colts fired simultaneously. The monster collapsed, shot dead.
Torka was taken aback by this action that he considered unnecessary. “Why did you kill this monster?” he criticized the Earthlings. “He certainly tried to get the guard’s lance but… he didn’t get it.”
“I know,” Kariven replied calmly, discretely caressing Leyla’s hand, “but another would have and killed one of us. Now let’s get away from these cages.”
Torka shook his head, pondering and puzzled. “These Earthlings must have some sixth sense for the future,” he mused.
The time explorers got ready to board the Retro-timeship. Torka shook their hands warmly and wished great happiness to Glanya and Streiler. Leyla, with tears in her eyes, was troubled to see that he whom she loved was smiling cheerfully at this moment when he was about to leave her.
He walked up, wrapped his arms around her and kissed her passionately. Then, still smiling, he looked at Leyla and asked, “Why are you crying my dear Leyla, since you’re coming with me?”
Leyla stopped crying, stared at Kariven and then looked at her twin sister, who was hugging Streiler tenderly. She almost choked saying, “You know very well that I can’t come with you, Kariven. My duty lies here with my subjects…”
“The Lemurians and the Bimkamians stationed on Earth are not your subjects.”
A giant Bimkamian ran up and interrupted this conversation that was particularly amusing to Kariven’s friends. They who knew the future also knew that the young French scientist had the right to speak like this.
The giant saluted Torka and Leyla before declaring by telepathy, “The Eternal Wisdom that reigns over the Galactic Empire just appointed a new Grand Instructor by the name of Myln’ha to preside over the evolution of Earth. The ship is expected. There’s one thing I don’t understand at all in this odd situation: the operator of the intragalactic viewer said that this nomination had been made after the announcement of Leyla’s death! But here she is.”
The news, as weird as it was wonderful, threw Leyla in the greatest confusion. “But… I’m dead!” she was outraged.
“Thank God!” Kariven replied, hugging her. “Now you’re free, my dear Leyla. Nothing is holding you back in Shâmali anymore. Do you want to go with me and be my wife… in 45 million years?”
As an answer she put her cheek against his and let tears of happiness flow without even trying to understand the fabric of all these mysterious events.
The Retro-timeship took off.
Torka faded away into the astrodome of Shâmali. The white city, which was the base of the Dragons of Wisdom, who came from infinity to educate the Earthlings, disappeared.
In the heart of the fourth dimension the planet Earth started to oscillate. The grayness of the Time Spiral took the place of the daylight in the Tertiary Period and the return voyage started.
“Head for the Atomic Age!” Professor Harrington called out cheerfully.
“OK,” Commander Taylor sighed, imagining all the wedding presents he would have to buy for his friends and GIs, the time explorers.
Kariven and Streiler were watching Leyla and Glanya. The two, gorgeous twins, strangely identical, cast their gentle eyes upon their Knights from the Future.
Kariven held Leyla’s hands and winked at Streiler, joking, “I hope that we don’t get our wives mixed up, brother-in-law.”
Notes
1 Black Coat Press has previously discussed Editions Fleuve Noir in its translations of other Fleuve Noir authors such as G.-J. Arnaud, Richard Bessière, André Caroff, P.-J. Herault, Gérard Klein, Maurice Limat, Pierre Pelot and Kurt Steiner. Fleuve Noir, one of the leading publishers of French SF and horror, published over 2000 titles until the 1990s.
2 A big model with a sedan body, like the mixed “Canadian” Jeep. (Author’s Note)
3 California Institute of Technology, the famous American research center. (Author’s Note)
4 This point in space is imaginary. When the sun and its planets have reached the present area of Vega, this star will also have moved and be shining in another area of space just as far away. The Apex will remain; it is only a direction, a point that a new star will occupy later. The direction diametrically opposed to the Apex (called the Antopex) is a “point” next to the stars Phact and Markeb in the Columba constellation. (Author’s Note)
5 Absolutely correct. Dr. Vasiliev, the Russian physiologist, had got encouraging results on the transparency of bodies (animals and men), bathed in a special liquid. His recent death put an end to his experiments. Similar work is being today in various laboratories in France and abroad. (Author’s Note) This refers to L.L. Vasiliev (1891-1966), parapsychologist and professor of physiology at the University of Leningrad, who also conducted dubious experiments in telepathy.
6 The French explorer Robert de Joly pioneered the use of ever-lighter rope ladders until developing the Elektron Ladder, a light wire ladder with aluminum rungs.
7 According to Darwinism, a creature who served as the intermediate step between money and man, since both man and the anthropoids share common ancestors. The monkey is, therefore, not our “father,” but rather a “cousin.” (Author’s Note)
8 Hereditary elements contained in the nucleus of a cell that determine the morphological and physiological characteristics transmitted to the progeny. (Author’s Note)
9 Expression summing up one of the principles of Darwinism. (Author’s Note)
10 This is, in fact, the late
st theory proposed by geophysicians. What follows about the origin of the world is likewise based on this hypothesis. (Author’s Note) The age of the Earth is now estimated at 4.5 billion years. Rocks returned from the Moon have been dated at a maximum of around 4.4 and 4.5 billion years old. Martian meteorites that have landed upon Earth have also been dated to around 4.5 billion years old by lead-lead dating.
11 According to current scientific understanding, at 10-43 seconds, the Universe’s temperature was 1032 K. At one second after the Big Bang, its temperature had already cooled to 1010 K.
12 Hardly! In Linde’s chaotic inflation model, inflation starts at the Planck time (10-43 seconds) and truly begins at 10-35 seconds after the Big Bang.
13 The current leading theory of the origins of the Moon is that, at the time Earth was formed, 4.5 billion years ago, other smaller planetary bodies were also growing. One of these hit the Earth late in its growth process, blowing out rocky debris. A fraction of that debris went into orbit around the Earth and aggregated into the Moon.
14 Hypothesis recently put forward and well supported by American Professor Georges Gamow. (Author’s Note) Gamow (18904-1968) was interested in the early history of the Solar System. In 1945, he co-authored a paper supporting work by German theoretical physicist Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker on planetary formation in the early Solar System.
15 These “occult” beliefs and traditions are not accepted by offivcial science, which refuses to admit—for current lack of proof—the existence of said vanished races. (Author’s Note)
16 See Nous, les Martiens [We, Martians] by the same author. (Author’s Note) A 1954 novel in which Kariven discovers that Humanity is descended from Ancient Martian colonists, whose homeworld was threatened by a comet.
17 See Nous les Martiens (q.v.) and Le Monde oublié [The Forgotten World]. (Author’s Note) The Forgotten World is another 1954 novel in which Kariven discovers a lost valley in Antarctica, which is inhabited by descendents from Atlantis. Bizarrely, The Forgotten World was published just after The Time Spiral, which must have confused readers.
18 Guieu means our Milky Way Galaxy, not the Universe itself, which is estimated at 93 billion light years in diameter.
FRENCH SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY COLLECTION
105 Adolphe Ahaiza. Cybele
102 Alphonse Allais. The Adventures of Captain Cap
02 Henri Allorge. The Great Cataclysm
14 G.-J. Arnaud. The Ice Company
152 André Arnyvelde. The Ark
153 André Arnyvelde. The Mutilated Bacchus
61 Charles Asselineau. The Double Life
118 Henri Austruy. The Eupantophone
119 Henri Austry. The Petitpaon Era
120 Henri Austry. The Olotelepan
130 Barillet-Lagargousse. The Final War
180 Honoré de Balzac. The Last Fay
103 S. Henry Berthoud. Martyrs of Science
23 Richard Bessière. The Gardens of the Apocalypse
121 Richard Bessière. The Masters of Silence
148 Béthune (Chevalier de). The World of Mercury
26 Albert Bleunard. Ever Smaller
06 Félix Bodin. The Novel of the Future
173 Pierre Boitard. Journey to the Sun
92 Louis Boussenard. Monsieur Synthesis
39 Alphonse Brown. City of Glass
89 Alphonse Brown. The Conquest of the Air
98 Emile Calvet. In A Thousand Years
40 Félicien Champsaur. The Human Arrow
81 Félicien Champsaur. Ouha, King of the Apes
91. Félicien Champsaur. The Pharaoh’s Wife
133 Félicien Champsaur. Homo-Deus
143 Félicien Champsaur. Nora, The Ape-Woman
03 Didier de Chousy. Ignis
166 Jacques Collin de Plancy. Voyage to the Center of the Earth
97 Michel Corday. The Eternal Flame
113 André Couvreur. The Necessary Evil
114 André Couvreur. Caresco, Superman
115 André Couvreur. The Exploits of Professor Tornada (Vol. 1)
116 André Couvreur. The Exploits of Professor Tornada (Vol. 2)
117 André Couvreur. The Exploits of Professor Tornada (Vol. 3)
67 Captain Danrit. Undersea Odyssey
149 Camille Debans. The Misfortunes of John Bull
17 C. I. Defontenay. Star (Psi Cassiopeia)
05 Charles Derennes. The People of the Pole
68 Georges T. Dodds. The Missing Link and Other Tales of Ape-Men
125 Charles Dodeman. The Silent Bomb
49 Alfred Driou. The Adventures of a Parisian Aeronaut
144 Odette Dulac. The War of the Sexes
145 Renée Dunan. The Ultimate Pleasure
10 Henri Duvernois. The Man Who Found Himself
08 Achille Eyraud. Voyage to Venus
01 Henri Falk. The Age of Lead
51 Charles de Fieux. Lamékis
108 Louis Forest. Someone Is Stealing Children In Paris
31 Arnould Galopin. Doctor Omega
70 Arnould Galopin. Doctor Omega & The Shadowmen
112 H. Gayar. The Marvelous Adventures of Serge Myrandhal on Mars
88 Judith Gautier. Isoline and the Serpent-Flower
163 Raoul Gineste. The Second Life of Dr. Albin
136 Delphine de Girardin. Balzac’s Cane
146 Jules Gros. The Fossil Man
174 Jimmy Guieu. The Polarian-Denebian War 1
175 Jimmy Guieu. The Polarian-Denebian War 2
176 Jimmy Guieu. The Polarian-Denebian War 3
177 Jimmy Guieu. The Polarian-Denebian War 4
178 Jimmy Guieu. The Polarian-Denebian War 5
179 Jimmy Guieu. The Polarian-Denebian War 6
57 Edmond Haraucourt. Illusions of Immortality
134 Edmond Haraucourt. Daah, the First Human
24 Nathalie Henneberg. The Green Gods
131 Eugene Hennebert. The Enchanted City
137 P.-J. Hérault. The Clone Rebellion
150 Jules Hoche. The Maker of Men and his Formula
140 P. d’Ivoi & H. Chabrillat. Around the World on Five Sous
107 Jules Janin. The Magnetized Corpse
29 Michel Jeury. Chronolysis [NO LONGER AVAILABLE]
55 Gustave Kahn. The Tale of Gold and Silence
30 Gérard Klein. The Mote in Time’s Eye
90 Fernand Kolney. Love in 5000 Years
87 Louis-Guillaume de La Follie. The Unpretentious Philosopher
101 Jean de La Hire. The Fiery Wheel
50 André Laurie. Spiridon
52 Gabriel de Lautrec. The Vengeance of the Oval Portrait
82 Alain Le Drimeur. The Future City
27-28 Georges Le Faure & Henri de Graffigny. The Extraordinary Adventures of a Russian Scientist Across the Solar System (2 vols.)
07 Jules Lermina. Mysteryville
25 Jules Lermina. Panic in Paris
32 Jules Lermina. The Secret of Zippelius
66 Jules Lermina. To-Ho and the Gold Destroyers
127 Jules Lermina. The Battle of Strasbourg
15 Gustave Le Rouge. The Vampires of Mars
73 Gustave Le Rouge. The Plutocratic Plot
74 Gustave Le Rouge. The Transatlantic Threat
75 Gustave Le Rouge. The Psychic Spies
76 Gustave Le Rouge. The Victims Victorious
109-110-111 Gustave Le Rouge. The Mysterious Doctor Cornelius
96 André Lichtenberger. The Centaurs
99 André Lichtenberger. The Children of the Crab
135 Listonai. The Philosophical Voyager
157 Ch. Lomon & P.-B. Gheusi. The Last Days of Atlantis
167 Camille Mauclair. The Virgin Orient
72 Xavier Mauméjean. The League of Heroes
78 Joseph Méry. The Tower of Destiny
77 Hippolyte Mettais. The Year 5865
128 Hyppolite Mettais. Paris Before the Deluge
83 Louise Michel. The Human Microbes
84 L
ouise Michel. The New World
93 Tony Moilin. Paris in the Year 2000
11 José Moselli. Illa’s End
38 John-Antoine Nau. Enemy Force
156 Charles Nodier. Trilby * The Crumb Fairy
04 Henri de Parville. An Inhabitant of the Planet Mars
21 Gaston de Pawlowski. Journey to the Land of the Fourth Dimension
56 Georges Pellerin. The World in 2000 Years
79 Pierre Pelot. The Child Who Walked On The Sky
85 Ernest Perochon. The Frenetic People
161 Jean Petithuguenin. An International Mission to the Moon
141. Georges Price. The Missing Men of the Sirius
165 René Pujol. The Chimerical Quest
100 Edgar Quinet. Ahasuerus
123 Edgar Quinet. The Enchanter Merlin
60 Henri de Régnier. A Surfeit of Mirrors
33 Maurice Renard. The Blue Peril
34 Maurice Renard. Doctor Lerne
35 Maurice Renard. The Doctored Man
36 Maurice Renard. A Man Among the Microbes
37 Maurice Renard. The Master of Light
169 Restif de la Bretonne: The Discovery of the Austral Continent by a Flying Man
170 Restif de la Bretonne: Posthumous Correspondence 1
171 Restif de la Bretonne: Posthumous Correspondence 2
172 Restif de la Bretonne: Posthumous Correspondence 3
41 Jean Richepin. The Wing
12 Albert Robida. The Clock of the Centuries
62 Albert Robida. Chalet in the Sky
69 Albert Robida. The Adventures of Saturnin Farandoul
95 Albert Robida. The Electric Life
151 Albert Robida. Engineer Von Satanas
46 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. The Givreuse Enigma
45 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. The Mysterious Force
43 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. The Navigators of Space
48 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. Vamireh
44 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. The World of the Variants
47 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. The Young Vampire