by Roger Ley
“Why do I feel like a specimen on a microscope slide?” he asked.
“Sorry Doctor, may I call you Martin or would you prefer Dr Riley?”
“Martin will do. There are so many questions I want to ask.”
“Start with whatever is uppermost in your mind.”
“I’ve been worrying about reverberations affecting the future since I discovered Temporal Messaging. Surely you’re concerned as well, your whole civilization could disappear like a burst soap bubble, if a short-sighted politician made a sufficiently radical alteration to your past.”
“Very good Martin, substitute the word ‘scientist’ for ‘politician’ and you’re getting close to the purpose of our journey. I can see why they want a copy of you.”
“A copy of me?” he was puzzled.
Farina changed the subject. “What sort of outlook would you like as we travel downstream?” she asked. “How about, ‘Martian desert?’” The surface of the globe transformed, and they appeared to be travelling over the sands of the Red planet. “Or there’s, ‘Underwater exploration.’ ” The scene became clear water with many types of colorful marine life disporting around them. “Or, ‘Centre of the Galaxy,’ as a physicist, this one might appeal to you.”
“Bollocks to your screen savers, what do you mean by ‘a copy’ of me?” He’d half risen from his seat but he felt the field increase and he sat back down.
“We’re getting ahead of ourselves, Tolland will explain the details, but we need to make a copy of your brain state, and store it.”
“That’s a weird idea,” he said, and thought about it for a few seconds. “Will it be conscious?”
“Only if we activate it.”
“Can you communicate with these things, I mean, how detailed are they?”
“They’re very detailed, if you want to put it that way, but it would be better if you wait and let Tolland explain more. I was only tasked to extract you. Your indoctrination will be a lengthy process; you must be patient.”
“Who’s this Tolland?”
“He is your Advocate, your representative with the Council. Like me, he has studied your language and culture, although unlike me he has no practical experience of your era, so he may sometimes appear gauche to you.”
“So, how do you manipulate wormholes and send matter through them? We could only send information?”
“I cannot answer your questions about the technicalities Martin. Please try to relax, we will arrive shortly.”
Riley sat back; their vehicle appeared to be moving through the cosmos at a leisurely pace. He watched the swirls of gaseous nebulas, stars, galaxies and dust clouds which surrounded them.
“Okay,” he said, breathing deeply and lowering his shoulders, as Estella had taught him to. “Have you contacted any extra-terrestrials yet?” he joked.
“We’ve made contact, yes, but they are light years away and communications take decades to exchange, so we won’t be meeting up in a hurry.”
“What have you said to each other?”
“Not much more than ‘Hello,’ we’re not sure of their intentions, so we keep our cards close to our chests.”
“How far into the future are we going?”
“To about two thousand years PC.”
“PC?”
“Post Collision.”
“Okay, so what collision?”
“Well, about two hundred years after your ‘accident,’ a large asteroid hit the Earth, it was big, not just a ‘city killer.’ Fortunately, it was a glancing blow. It pulverized several thousand square kilometers of North America, and continued on its journey into the deeps, with a cloud of debris trailing behind it. Some of the debris fell into orbit, Earth has rings now, just like Saturn. The impact triggered a series of volcanic events that nearly ended life on Earth. Ah, we’ve arrived.”
Riley had more questions, but the star fields vanished, as did the insubstantial boundary of the sphere. They were in the center of a large cylindrical space. The circular ceiling was twenty meters above them, the walls were about fifty meters away. Farina stood up, took his hand and led him several paces. He was unsteady on his feet, it was like coming ashore after a long boat trip. Their seats melted into the floor and disappeared, like chocolate in a warm saucepan. He looked up, and saw what he assumed were ducts and cabling snaking across the ceiling and down the walls. They appeared more organic than industrial. There was a bluish actinic light, with no obvious source.
“The whole place looks as if it’s been grown rather than built, so many curves, so few straight lines.”
“Yes Martin, parts of the Tower are organic.”
“Are the surfaces bioluminescent?”
“Yes, gene splicing Martin, it was used in your time on a small scale.”
The floor was spongy under his feet and they were moving across it at walking pace. He looked down but could see no mechanism.
“Is this surface a liquid, or are we floating just above it?” he asked.
“It’s what you might call a traction gel. I am controlling it with my implants.” Farina tapped the side of her head. They moved across the hangar and stopped near the wall, Farina pointed and, looking up he saw a hole five meters across in the ceiling. He could see similar holes in the floors above, their alignment shifting slightly at each floor
“Let me guess, no elevator?” he said.
“Antigravity Martin, didn’t you read Dan Dare or Jeff Hawke when you were a child?”
They lifted into the air, and moved upwards several levels. Looking downwards Riley panicked and grabbed hold of a branch of ducting. He was sweating, his legs began to feel hollow again. He couldn’t let go. Suddenly he was calm and relaxed, he released his hold, leaned backwards and turned a slow somersault.
“You’ve switched the field on again, haven’t you?” he recognized the slight feeling of disassociation again.
“This is a lot for you to cope with unaided Martin.”
“Yes, it’s not easy being a Neanderthal among Cro-Magnons,” he laughed.
They rose rapidly through several hundreds of meters and dozens of floors, following a curve around the inner wall of the cylinder.
“I’m taking you to your quarters; you can rest and freshen up before you meet Tolland.”
They stepped out onto the next level and walked along a corridor. The floor was still spongy, cables and ducting “grew” over the walls and ceiling, he felt as if he was on a film set. Farina stopped in front of a door, it slid into the wall, she took him into what appeared to be an ordinary twenty-first century apartment, carpeted and equipped with standard appliances from his time.
“We arranged this specially for you Martin,” she said as she showed him around. “There is food in the refrigerator, the microwave oven works.” She put a dish of food in it and shut the door. “Eat something, try to relax. I’ve set the bed to Deepsleep you for two hours, I advise you to use it. Please make yourself at home. If you need anything, call my name, I can be back here in a few moments.” She left him.
Riley walked around the apartment and noted the sofa, the armchairs, the large flat screen TV. There were bookshelves with paperbacks, DVDs, vases of real flowers in the lounge. He went into the kitchen; the cupboards and worktops wouldn’t have been out of place in the homes of any of his friends. There was an indefinable mismatching of colors, light fittings, and fabric patterns. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but there was an element of foreignness in the design.
In the lounge he looked out of the window at the cityscape below, and wondered if it was real.
“Underwater exploration,” he said loudly, and instantly the submarine view appeared. The apartment’s entrance door was featureless and didn’t respond to his voice. He wasn’t surprised. The food was hot and savory, but he couldn’t tell what it was, probably pasta. The Talisker whisky tasted authentic, he felt he deserved to be generous with himself. Eventually, he lay on the bed and fell asleep at once.
Farina returned, she wa
lked through to the bedroom and stood looking down at him. In her hand was a silvery flexible mesh which she carefully arranged over his head. She went back to the lounge, sat in an armchair and closed her eyes. After ten minutes, she stood up, went back to the bedroom, and removed the mesh. The entrance door opened at her approach, and she left the apartment.
Outside in the corridor, she sub-vocalized to an unseen observer.
“The copy is intact and verified, but dormant. I have transferred it to Tower Memory.”
There was a pause.
“I agree, it only becomes illegal if we activate it. We can gain his permission at a later date, when he will be better able to make an informed decision. I have my orders; his mind is unique, we cannot risk losing it.”
After two hours, Riley heard a quiet, genderless voice he didn’t recognize.
“Please wake up Dr Riley, Farina requests entry.”
“Come in,” he called as he sat up rubbing his face, aware of the covering of stubble. He felt more relaxed than he had in months.
Farina came into the apartment. She was wearing clothing that continually morphed in style, color and pattern. One moment she appeared to be in flames, the next she was monk-like in black, briefly she was naked, the sequence never repeated. He found it disconcerting but very interesting, he was looking forward to seeing her naked again, perhaps that was the point. Was this how all the women of the future dressed. He hoped so.
“Love the frock,” he said.
She ignored the comment, but the “frock” stabilized as a simple dark trouser suit.
“Time to meet Tolland,” she said.
Chapter Twenty
Kenya the 4400s
Farina led Riley out of the apartment and they walked together along the corridor. They entered an impressively large room, with floor to ceiling curved windows making up one wall. She guided him over towards them and, looking out, he saw that they were hundreds of meters above the ground. The landscape was agricultural, with large irregular fields laid out below them. Riley couldn’t guess at the scale. A man was standing gazing out of the windows, his hands clasped behind his back. He turned, smiling, and approached. He was tall and well built, with swept back red hair, wearing a conservative business suit; he appeared to be in his early fifties. He shook hands with Riley, who noticed that he wasn’t very good at it, the shake up and down was too emphatic, and he didn’t seem to know when to let go.
“Welcome Doctor Martin Riley, my name is Tolland; I have waited a long time to meet you. You are our honored guest.”
“Thank you for saving my life, Mr Tolland. I am indebted to you.”
The three sat in armchairs around a low circular table.
“May I offer you refreshments? Whisky, tea, milk, biscuits, all are available. Perhaps you would prefer cake, or French fries.”
“No thanks, I’m quite comfortable, and please call me Martin.”
“And you should call me Tolland, we have no titles here.”
Riley sat back and looked around, “Well Tolland, you have the advantage of me.”
“I must tell you that this meeting is being watched by many interested parties, we have chosen this simple format to avoid intimidating you. I assume that you have questions you would like to ask?”
“Yes, rather a lot. First, where are we?”
“We are in Metrotower 3, sited in an area that was once called Kenya.” A three-dimensional image of the Earth, complete with clouds and oceans, appeared in the air above the table. Riley could see that several towers projected from different parts of the equator, the one sited in Africa had a marker which pulsed red. There were other towers on other land masses. Above the towers, in near Earth orbit and still in the equatorial plane, a train of incomplete, white, ragged spherical constructions formed a broken necklace encircling the planet. They appeared to be a work in progress. Further out were a series of flat rings, like those around Saturn. Both the necklace and the rings of debris were rotating relative to the Earth.
“The model is not to scale. If it was, you wouldn’t be able to see the Towers or the String units, the white spheres,” said Tolland, “they’d be too small.” He pointed to the hologram, “We are sweeping up ring fragments to use as raw material for the new String structure. Eventually it will encircle our blue planet, like a string of pearls around the neck of a beautiful woman.” He smiled.
“What will you use it for, accommodation?” asked Riley peering closely at the display.
“We are expanding Tower Memory and moving it up to the String, where it will have almost infinite capacity. The ‘Corporeals,’ that is normal physical people will continue to inhabit the Towers, while the ‘Incorporeals,’ the brain state copies, will inhabit the String units, as digital entities.” The 3D model disappeared.
“ ‘Digital entities,’ you mean they’re dead?” asked Riley.
“They are usually no longer active in the physical world, although there are exceptions, but we need not concern ourselves with the fine details,” said Tolland. He pointed, “The three equatorial Towers incorporate space elevators, the others were built in centers of population as the Fightback from the Collision progressed.”
Riley watched as the model continued to rotate. The world, the String of white spheres and the rings were all rotating at different speeds, suddenly the hologram disappeared, he returned his attention to Tolland.
“I have so many questions Tolland, I’m not sure where to start. It will take me a long time to catch up on the history and scientific advances you’ve made since my century, but my first question has to be, why am I here?”
Tolland smiled, “Does the phrase ‘a fly in the ointment’ mean anything to you Martin? I believe the saying is cotemporaneous with your period.” He continued without waiting for an answer. “We discovered you and your assistant Peter Abrahams by accident; you appear to be anomalies in the Timestream. The results of your actions, your, er, Temporal Adjustments, were initially detected by Farina. She found a section of history that did not match our expectations, although the religious beliefs of a particular tribal leader, on a small island, in the twenty-first century, would generally be of little interest to us.”
Riley was puzzled by the reference but let it pass.
“Mankind should not discover how to manipulate Time until far into your future. Your achievements impress us, believe me, but your activities have pushed the Timestream away from its original path.”
“Yes, I’ve worried about that since I first started the TM project.”
“The Timestream has a certain temporal inertia,” said Tolland. “Like a river, it isn’t easy to make it change course, but if an event does, then the results can be catastrophic for people downstream, as it finds another route. Most of your alterations came to nothing, because of the Collision. It has been our greatest protection from you, because it brought human history to a full stop and then it had to restart. Even so, we are well aware that we need to protect our history. As you said to Farina, even a small change to the past could cause our civilization to disappear, like a burst soap bubble. The reason you are here is to make sure that events proceed as we expect them to, as our history predicts. You could think of the Timestream as a guitar string being pulled to one side, as your Temporal Adjustments distort it. It will stretch so far, and then either break or spring back. In our Timeline, it sprang back, we call this the ‘Realignment.’ It realigned when your team made a Retrospective Temporal Adjustment in 2051, to reverse your first significant intervention in 1997. It is most important that this happens, and we need you to make it so.
“Surely the fact that we’re here proves that it has already happened?” said Riley.
“I wish it was that simple Martin, your grasp of the theory does not include the loops, twists, spurs and discontinuities that we know are possible in the Timestream. We guard our past most carefully.”
“Farina said that you wanted a copy of me.”
“Your abduction was also motivated b
y curiosity on our part, Martin. We were amazed to find that you and Peter Abrahams had made such progress with the tools and techniques that were available to you. Almost as surprising as if the Ancient |Greeks had somehow placed a man on the Moon. Your approach to the problem of time travel was different from ours, so you may have discovered things we have not, things we need to understand. When the Timestream corrects itself, that knowledge will disappear. In the new reality Abrahams will die in a motorcycle accident when he is nineteen. You will fail to gain government funding for your project, and so will not invent Temporal Messaging. If we are to save your knowledge, we must extract a copy of Abrahams before the moment of correction. We need to send you back to do this.”
“Why not just abduct him, as you have me?”
“We could abduct you without causing temporal ripples because you were about to die Martin. We cannot abduct Dr Abrahams because that would be a Retroactive Temporal Adjustment for us, and, as you well know, the effect on our present would be completely unpredictable. We could make a copy of Doctor Abrahams now, but we wish to make the copy as close to his disappearance as possible. Just before the Realignment of the Timestream, and your inevitable disappearances in fact.”
Riley didn’t like the sound of this but decided to stick to the main issue.
“If we let the Timestream correct itself, then all the terrible events we have prevented through our Temporal Adjustments will happen. The destruction of the Twin Towers in New York, for instance, and the meltdown of the Sizewell B nuclear reactor. I couldn’t be involved in allowing such atrocities. I quit Langley because of the Government’s callous attitude to human life, and now I find the same attitude here.”
“There is no hurry Doctor, we will give you time to understand the issues. We prefer that you help us from a sense of conviction. Farina will be your guide while you are here.”
Riley looked at Farina, she returned his stare, without expression.
“Tell me more about the copies.”
“We have copies of the brain states of various people who might one day be useful to us. They inhabit Tower Memory. Most of them are scientists and intellectuals but we also have politicians and artists.”