John Norman

by Time Slave

  She recalled the frantic flight through the bush, the headlights of the Land Rover, the searchlight on its side, the sting of the anesthetic bullet.

  “You were not difficult to take,” said Gunther. “But the hunt was enjoyable.”

  “I’m pleased,” she said, acidly, “that I gave you sport.”

  “It is pleasant,” said Gunther, “to hunt women.”

  She recalled falling in the bush, crawling, being unable to crawl further, then being captured,. her wrists dragged behind her, their being locked in Gunther’s cuffs.

  She recalled being lifted, thrown, secured, over his shoulder, and being carried to the Land Rover. She had then lost consciousness.

  “And, doubtless,” she said, “it is pleasant, after bringing your catch home, to make them slaves.”

  “Yes,” said Gunther, “doubtless that would be pleasant.”

  “You are a beast, Gunther,” she said.

  He smiled. He shrugged. “I am a man,” he said.

  “Finish your coffee, Doctor Hamilton,” suggested Herjellsen.

  Hamilton finished the small cup of bitter, black fluid.

  Brandy was brought for the men. Herjellsen, and William and Gunther, lit cigars.

  “Would you like a liqueur?” asked Herjellsen.

  “Yes,” said Hamilton.

  It was brought. It was thick, heavily syruped, flavored with peach.

  Hamilton sipped it.

  “The escape phase of the experiment,” said Herjellsen, “permitted us to test your cunning and your initiative. Both proved themselves satisfactory.”

  “Thank you,” said Hamilton.

  “In the bush itself, of course, as we expected,” said Herjeljsen, “you behaved like a frightened, ignorant woman.”

  “I suppose,” said Hamilton, sipping the liqueur, “that my `training’ was also enhanced in some way by my escape attempt?”

  “Yes,” said Herjellsen. “We regarded it as important to give you the experience of being a fleeing, hunted, then captured woman.”

  “It is a very helpless, frightened feeling,” said Hamilton.

  “We wished you to have it,” said Herjellsen.

  “The most important lesson of the escape phase, or perhaps I should say, the `failure-to-escape’ phase,” said Gunther, smiling, “was to imprint, and imprint deeply, in your consciousness the incontrovertible recognition that you had not escaped-that you had been caught-and were once again, and more securely than ever, the prisoner of men.”

  10

  Hamilton recalled the misery with which she had understood this.

  She had been, thereafter, their experiment finished, shackled during the day, handcuffed to the cot at night. They had needed no more data. She was held, perfectly.

  And Brenda Hamilton knew, deeply within her, that her futile escape attempt, summarily punished by a brief humiliating beating, stinging, trivial, a woman’s beating, had never been realistic. She would have left a trail. To a practiced eye it could have been followed. She knew then that, even if the Land Rover had not been used, she could have been retaken, and almost at their leisure. How female she had felt, how helpless. She was angry. And how swiftly, in a matter of days, the short rations, the bread and water, had brought her to her knees before them, promising compliance.

  She had come to understand, as it had been intended that she should, that men were dominant, and, if they chose, women were at their mercy.

  The room seemed dark at the edges.

  She sipped again the liqueur.

  She had failed to escape. She remained the captive of men.

  “We had difficulty, as you may recall,” said Herjellsen, “in transmitting the leopard.”

  “Yes,” said Hamilton, shaking her head.

  “It is interesting,” said Herjellsen, “but I met resistance.”

  “How is that?” she asked.

  “I felt it,” said Herjellsen. “Earlier we had failed to transmit the beast when it was unconscious. When you observed, it was conscious-but resisting.”

  Hamilton recalled the animal, twisting, growling.

  “It could know nothing, of course, of what was occurring,” said Herjellsen, “but still it was distressed, angry, displeased, resistant.”

  “You failed to transmit it?” said Hamilton.

  “Later, when it was partially anesthetized, we managed to transmit it,” said Herjellsen, “when the resistance was lowered.”

  Hamilton steadied herself with a hand on the tablecloth.

  “Interesting that a beast could resist,” said Herjellsen. “Fascinating.”

  “I will resist you!” suddenly cried Hamilton. “I will resist you!”

  The room seemed to be growing darker.

  “It seems unlikely,” said Herjellsen.

  “I do not feel well,” said Hamilton.

  Herjellsen appeared concerned. He glanced at William. “It is a temporary effect,” said William.

  “When is your experiment to take place?” asked Hamilton.

  “Tonight,” said Herjellsen. “Now.”

  She shook her head.

  “Strip her,” said Herjellsen.

  She felt Gunther removing the pearls from the back of her neck.

  She could not resist.

  “The liqueur has been drugged,” explained Heriellsen. “You will not resist.” Then he spoke to Gunther and William. “Remove her clothing and clean her,” he said, “and then place her in the translation cubicle.”

  “Please,” wept Brenda Hamilton. “Please!”

  She felt Gunther remove the earrings from her ears.

  Brenda Hamilton, raw, lay on her stomach in the translation cubicle.

  She heard the men outside.

  “No,” she wept. She struggled, weakly, to her hands and knees, her head down, hair falling forward. She tried to lift her head.

  “Raise the power,” she heard Herjellsen say, the voice seemingly far away, on the other side of the plastic.

  “No,” she wept, and again sank to her stomach. She lay on the cool, smooth plastic, almost unable to move her body. She tried to close her hand into a fist. It was difficult to do so. She only wanted to lie still, to rest, helpless, on the plastic.

  “It is beginning,” she heard William say.

  She opened her eyes. To her horror she saw, at one corner of the cubicle, a tracery of light, darting, swift.

  Herjellsen sat before his apparatus, his head beneath the hood, his fists clenched.

  Slowly, muscle by muscle, she moved her body, raising herself again to her hands and knees. She tried to lift her head.

  She saw a tendril of light appear now to her right.

  She lifted her head. She looked out through the plastic. It was heavy. She saw that it had been, on the outside, reinforced with metal piping.

  She rose to her feet. Light played about her ankles. “No,” she whispered. She could not feel the light. She was conscious only of a tiny coolness.

  A set of beads of light darted from one side to the other of the cubicle.

  She stumbled against the plastic wall and, weakly, tried

  to beat on it with her fists. “Please!” she wept. “Let me out! Let me out!”

  Tears streamed down her face.

  She saw Gunther and William, impassive, on the other side of the plastic.

  “Gunther!” she wept. “William! William!”

  Suddenly it seemed a tendril of light moved about her leg. She kicked wildly at it. She tried to thrust the light from her body. She could not see the floor of the cubicle now, though she felt it, as firm and cool and solid as before, beneath her bare feet.

  “Let me out!” she wept.

  It seemed to her suddenly that she was a little girl in a closet, crying to be let out, pounding on the wood in the darkness. The voice that seemed to cry within her was that of a child.

  Then she saw again William and Gunther outside, and Herjellsen, under the hood.

  She shook her head, wildly, having
sensed the dissociation which as a psychological concomitant, occasionally accompanied the presence of the Herjellsen phenomenon.

  She must resist, she knew. She must resist!

  Her body, her will, was weakened, but she would fight. She could fight, and would!

  She stood in the center of the cubicle, bent over, fists clenched, hair wild. “No!” she cried. “No! No! No! No!”

  It seemed that light, wildly, swirled about her; for an instant she feared she might drown in light, but then she realized that there was no impediment to her breathing, indeed, that the very phenomenon of light itself depended on some reaction with oxygen in the cubicle.

  “No!” she said.

  Then she felt herself, as though being buffeted, reel in the cubicle. But she knew that no blows were struck upon her body. Yet it seemed she was struck, as though by sound that could not be heard, but felt.

  She felt herself weakening, and fell to her knees at the plastic wall, almost lost in light. She piteously scratched at the plastic, trying to find a crevice, a flaw, that might admit of her access, secure her release.

  Outside she saw Gunther and William.. Their faces wore no emotion.

  She shook her head, and fell half backward from the wall and rolled to the center of the cubicle. Then she could see nothing, nothing but the light, which like a brilliant, luminous, sparkling golden fog almost blinded her. She shut her eyes. “No!” she said. “No!” She rose again to her knees. She clenched her fists, now tightly. “No!” she cried.

  When she opened her eyes again, to her astonishment, her relief, the light was gone.

  She was alone in the cubicle.

  Outside she saw Herjellsen, no longer beneath the hood. He was standing outside, looking at her. Gunther and William stood to one side.

  “You have failed!” she cried.

  Her heart bounded with elation. They had been unable to transmit her. They had failed.

  “I have resisted you!” she cried. “I have resisted you!” She laughed. “You have failed!” She looked at Gunther. “You will have to sell me, Gunther!” she cried. “You will have to sell me!”

  Herjellsen, she saw, picked up a small microphone from the table, near the hood.

  “Can you hear me?” he asked.

  She nodded. She heard his voice, quite clearly. The speaker was fixed in the ceiling of the cubicle.

  “Turn their eyes,” he said, “to the stars.”

  She looked at him, puzzled.

  Then she said, “You have been unable to transmit me. My will was too strong for you. You have failed.”

  “Turn their eyes,” said Herjellsen, “to the stars.”

  “It will not be necessary to dispose of me in the bush, Professor Herjellsen,” she said. “There is an alternative. I realize you cannot simply release me. But there is an alternative, an excellent one, to consider. I have discussed this with Gunther, and he informs me it is practical.” She drew a deep breath. “I can be sold,” she said. “Please, Professor Herjellsen,” she said, “do not kill me.” She looked at him. “Instead let me be sold.”

  “We have no intention of killing you, my dear,” said Herjellsen, “nor, indeed, of having you sold.”

  “I-I do not understand,” she said.

  “Retrieval of living material, once transmitted,” said Herjellen, “is apparently impossible. Retrieval was attempted with the leopard. We received only certain fragments of bone. These have been identified as those of a contemporary species of leopard, but the dating has fixed the acquisition at better than twenty-eight thousand years ago.”

  “I do not understand what you are saying,” said Hamilton.

  “I am saying,” said Herjellsen, “that it seems that retrieval is impossible.”

  “Retrieval?” she asked.

  “Yes,” said Herjellsen.

  “What has this to do with me?” she whispered.

  “Surely you must understand,” said Herjellsen, “that the chamber is now open.”

  She looked about herself, in terror. Everything seemed the same.

  “Don’t kill me,” she said. “Sell me!”

  “It will be necessary neither to kill you nor sell you, my dear,” said Herjellsen.

  “I don’t understand,” she said.

  “The chamber is now open,” he said.

  “You are mad, mad!” she screamed.

  “Turn their eyes,” said Herjellsen, “to the stars.”

  Hamilton threw back her head, and threw her hands to the side of her head, and screamed.

  11

  Brenda Hamilton knelt, head thrown back, hands pressed to the sides of her head, screaming, in cold, wet grass, in the half darkness.

  “No, no, no!” she wept.

  She threw herself to her stomach in the cold grass, and clawed at it, and pressed the side of her cheek against it. She felt her fingers dig into the wet mud at the roots of the grass. “No,” she wept. “No!”

  A light rain was falling. “Herjellsen,” she wept. “No!” She felt cold. “Please, no!” she wept.

  She rose to her knees, shaking her bead. She felt the cold, wet grass, flat and cutting, on her legs and thighs. She was cold. “No,” she wept. The sky was dark, except for a rim of cold, gray light to her left. “No!” she cried.

  She rose to her feet, unsteadily, cold, in the half darkness. She felt mud with her right foot.

  The rain, slight, cold, drizzling, fell upon her. She cried out with misery.

  “Herjellsen!” she cried. “William! Gunther! Take me back! Take me back! Do not send me away! Please!”

  She screamed to the dark, gray, raining sky, standing in the wind, the cold rain.

  “Take me back!” she cried. “Do not send me away! Please! Please!”

  She knelt down and seized the grass with her hands. “I’m here!” she cried. “I’m here! Take me back! Please!” Then suddenly she screamed, and fled stumbling from the place. “It seems retrieval is not possible,” had said Herjellsen. All that had been recovered of the leopard had been crumbled bone, indexed by carbon dating to a remote era, more than twenty-eight thousand years ago.

  She looked at the place, in the early, cold light, where she had lain and knelt.

  It seemed no different than other places she could make out, except that the grass had bent beneath her weight, wet, crushed.

  She crept back to it, and put her band timidly to the grass. Suddenly there was a stroke of lightning, broad and wild, cracking in the sky, and she screamed and fled away, falling and getting up.

  In that stroke of lightning she had seen illuminated what seemed to be an open field, of uncomprehended breadth.

  Thunder then swept about her, a pounding drum of sound, a stroke, rolling, of great depth and might, and suddenly the rain, wild with wind, following the turbulence in the sky, lashed about her.

  She looked up, crying.

  Again and again lightning split the darkness. She stood alone. Thunder smashed the world, pounding about her. Rain lashed her body.

  “Herjellsen,” she cried, “I am here!”

  Then she threw herself down on the grass, naked, terrified of the lightning, whipped by the rain, covered her head with her hands, and wept.

  In a few moments the storm had abated, and there was again only a light drizzle of rain. It was lighter now, and there was, all about her, the gentle, cool, gray of dawn. She could see the field extending away from her, on all sides.

  The light was substantially to her left, which direction she surmised was East.

  She stood up, in the drizzling, cold dawn, and looked about.

  She tried to find where she had first knelt, but could not do so.

  She was hungry.

  She took grass and sucked rain from it. The grass had a sweet taste. The drops of water were cold.

  She looked up into the sky. The clouds were vast, the sky was vast. The rain had almost stopped falling now.

  “I am here, Herjellsen,” she whispered.

  Then she
remembered that in the human reality, in time as it could only be understood by humans, Herjellsen, and Gunther and William could not hear her.

  They had not yet been born.

  She kept the sun on her left and began to walk, generally south.

  12

  Tree’s nostrils flared.

  He smelled female. And it was not one of the group. The other men did not notice. Several were sleeping. One was working a peeled, slender shaft, holding the wood over a small fire, softening it, and then inserting it through one of the holes in the drilled board, then bending the shaft carefully, straightening it.

  Tree looked about the camp. It was a trail camp, a day’s trek from the flint lode, two days’ trek back to-the shelters, a half day’s march from the salt. Tree had found the salt, following antelope. But Spear had said he had found the salt. Spear was first in camp.

  Tree rose to his feet, and stretched.

  It was not an attack, for a female would not come in the attack.

  The attack would not come from upwind.

  It was not the Ugly People. The smell was not the Ugly People.

  An ugly girl was in camp, who had been captured when Spear and two others had killed her group. She was short, and stooped and had large bones. Her head did not sit on her shoulders as did that of the Men; it leaned forward, looking at the ground; it was hard for her to lift her head; she had a squat body; her knees were slightly bent. The Ugly People, though, were good hunters. They could follow a trail for days, by smell, loping, heads down, like hunting dogs, on the scent. But Tree was a greater hunter. He did not envy the Ugly People. They were not of the Men. In the camp, only Runner could outdistance Tree, and Runner was slight, but heavy chested. Tree was stronger, and could throw further. Tree was strongest in camp, except Spear, who was first.

  Tree did not count as we would, nor was there need for him to do so. We would have found that there were forty-seven individuals in the camp. If Tree had spoken of this, and he might have, for he had a language, the language of the Men, he would have told us that there were two hands in camp, for there were ten men, and it was these that were counted. But he would have grasped the concept of counting beyond this, if it had seemed important. If there had been eleven men in camp, he would have said there were two hands and one finger in camp, for that would be eleven individuals. Further, if one had asked him, if all in the camp were men, how many men would there be, he would have thought and said, then there would be nine bands and two fingers, or forty-seven individuals, only, of course, that there were really only two hands, for there were only ten men. If Tree’s group had dogs, or goats, for example it would not have occurred to him either to count those, but he might have done so, if asked. For example if each dog was also a man, then how many men would there be, and so on. But Tree’s group did not have dogs, or goats. They did have, though, like other groups, children and females.