Debt of Ages

by Steve White

  “It wasn’t comfortable knowledge, I can tell you! But Tylar helped me to become reconciled to it, to realize that all I had done hadn’t been in vain or worse.” Artorius smiled again. “I understand you tried to do the same for Kai. Good old Kai! That’s something else I meant to thank you for.”

  “Well,” Sarnac said uncomfortably, “he was a friend. It was the least I could do. I imagine I broke some rules,” he added with a glance at Tylar, “but it didn’t matter. I doubt if he understood a word I was saying.”

  “That’s usually the way it is,” Tylar acknowledged. “He took the parts he did grasp back to Britain with him, and they entered into the legend as was intended. That, too, is usually the way it is. However, I’m glad you’ve raised the point, because it’s closely related to the reason I’ve brought you here again and restored your memories.”

  “Oh, yeah; I’d almost forgotten, in all this…” Sarnac waved vaguely in Artorius’ direction. “So tell me about this ‘obligation’ or ‘debt’ of mine.”

  “Well, it’s rather complicated…”

  “Things generally are, with you,” Sarnac interjected drily.

  “… so let me begin at the beginning. You recall my little lecture to you and Tiraena on my people’s experiences with time travel and the various theories we’d developed and then discarded concerning the nature of reality and the potential effect of time travelers upon it?” Sarnac nodded, and Tylar resumed, clearly uncomfortable. “Well, it turns out that our most recent theory still needs some fine-tuning.”

  *

  An awkward moment passed as Sarnac waited for an explanation of that statement, so fraught with disturbing implications. When none was forthcoming, he broke the silence. “You mean that time travelers can’t affect history at certain critical times after all? But Tylar, that would invalidate the whole rationale for your people’s policing of the past…”

  “Oh, no,” the time traveler cut in emphatically, seeming to look around for something to mop his brow with as he waved away Sarnac’s near-obscene suggestion. “Absolutely not! That’s not what I mean. That aspect of the theory is still good. As I explained to you and Tiraena, throughout most of history reality possesses a very strong ‘fabric,’ impervious to being ‘torn’ even by seemingly brutal applications of force.” He shifted into discursive mode. “Remember I mentioned that we have research tools beyond your understanding, whereby we can extrapolate the outcomes of theoretical interventions in history? Well, we used these methods to plot out one of the favorite daydreams of early time-travel theorists: going back and killing Adolf Hitler in his cradle. You’d be surprised how little would have changed. The Germans of the post-World War I era would have found somebody else like him. Likewise, doing the same to the infant Christopher Columbus would accomplish little except to satisfy certain American Indian revanchists. The European discovery of America around that time was inevitable. Oh, some unimportant things would have been different; the Spanish language might have become less widespread, Portuguese and Dutch perhaps more so. But the Native American societies were doomed.”

  “At the same time,” Sarnac said, in an effort to get Tylar back on track, “you told us that at certain points history has a weak, frayed ‘fabric’ that can be torn with minimum effort. You indicated that Artorius’ Gallic campaign that we were mixed up in was one of those points in history.”

  “Indeed it was. History was at a turning point, and its momentum could have been deflected by the lightest touch and sent careening off onto a whole new course.”

  “But it wasn’t” Sarnac stated. “Your policing operation was a complete success, wasn’t it? You told us as much. So what’s the big deal?”

  “Well, it seems that some areas of ‘weak fabric’ in the historical tapestry are even weaker than others, and that your conversation with Artorius in Bourges represented a moment of extraordinary—perhaps unique—weakness. Our theorists don’t understand why—there’s so much we don’t understand!—but evidently reality can only tolerate that degree of instability for the briefest instant; it only lasted a few seconds after you spoke to Artorius, while he wavered. But for that moment in time, the future teetered on a knife-edge!”

  “Scary,” Sarnac admitted. “But, again, so what? The moment passed, Artorius decided as history said he did, and that was that ‘God’s in his heaven, alls right with the world.’”

  “Well… yes and no. You see, the discovery of that area of unprecedented weak ‘fabric’ led us to the realization that our theories held the flaw to which I alluded earlier.” He seemed to gather himself. “Remember my mentioning that ‘branches of time’ are fantasy, and that any given act can have but one outcome?”

  “Yeah. Too bad; no ‘parallel universes’ with ‘alternate histories.’ I’ve always been a science-fiction fan—the classic stuff from the twentieth century—and they used to dream up some…” His voice came to a horrified halt. “Wait a minute, Tylar! Are you about to tell me that…”

  “Oh, the theory is still good—under almost all circumstances. But it turns out that truly extreme weakness in the ‘fabric’ of reality does, after all, allow the same event to have multiple outcomes, all of equal mathematical validity. We’d never had occasion to become aware of this feet because we’d never encountered such conditions before. That moment with you and Artorius in Bourges may have been unique. I devoutly hope so.” This time Tylar did mop his brow, using his sleeve.

  “So you’re saying,” Sarnac continued faintly, “that there’s an alternate reality in which Artorius decided, at that moment, not to deploy his forces into Berry? And that… ?”

  “Yes.” Tylar nodded. “And the resulting changes in history were at least as momentous as I had speculated.”

  “But,” Sarnac continued, head spinning, “in that case there must be alternate versions of me and Tiraena! Or were, in the fifth century of this alternate universe, with God knows what happening to them!”

  “By no means. The two of you, and I, ceased to exist in the alternate universe at the instant it branched off from our own. For in that universe, my people can never come into existence; the history that culminates in us is stillborn. Hence, there are no Raehaniv; we weren’t there, thirty thousand years before your time, to plant their ancestors on Raehan.”

  “I imagine,” Artorius put in, “the alternate Artorius wondered what had become of you.”

  Sarnac’s head was starting to ache. “But, Tylar, how can you be sure of all this? How can you know about this alternate universe?”

  “Because,” Tylar answered gravely, “we’ve received a visitor from it. Or we will, that is, in the twenty-ninth century. He will come from the twenty-ninth century of his universe seeking help—for, to repeat, my fears concerning the consequences of a victory by our friend here turn out to have erred on the conservative side.”

  “Seeking help? You mean… ?” Sarnac didn’t finish the question because he didn’t really want to hear the answer. Tylar supplied it anyway.

  “Yes. The Korvaasha. Remember, in the alternate universe there are no Raehaniv. Hence no Varien hle’Morna—and no technologically advanced civilization on twenty-first century Earth for him to have found even if he had existed.”

  Sarnac’s head felt as though someone was driving a railroad spike upward between his left eyeball and the frontal bone. “Tylar, I think I can see where this is heading. You’re going to say that I’m responsible for the existence of this alternate reality because I shot off my mouth to Artorius…”

  “Not altogether. Not even primarily. As I admitted earlier, the principal fault is mine. If not for me, you wouldn’t have been there in the fifth century at all. Nevertheless, to a certain extent you share my responsibility. Therefore,” he continued, the inexplicable look of self-satisfaction back at full force, “instead of simply proceeding on my own— with Artorius’ help, of course—to set things right, I came to this era first, to make you aware of your debt and enable you to pay it.”

 
Sarnac wasn’t even fully aware of his headache as he groped for a handhold on reality. “Uh, Tylar, let me make sure I’m clear on the situation. Our own history, in our own universe, came out okay, right?”

  “Oh, certainly! As I explained…”

  “Then,” Sarnac pressed on, “whatever has happened, or is happening, or will happen in this alternate universe isn’t real from our standpoint, is it? So, why should you or I feel this moral obligation? I mean, so what?”

  The time traveler spoke in the puzzled tones of a man encountering unexpected difficulties in explaining the obvious. “You don’t seem to understand, my dear fellow. In the context of its own metrical frame, the alternate universe is as ‘real’—however one chooses to define the term—as our own. The historical development it has followed is an… abomination. A wrongness. The ethical responsibility borne by those who—however unwittingly— called it into being is, of course, intuitively clear to anyone of moral sensibility, regardless of cultural background.” Artorius gave Sarnac a covert wink of commiseration. “So surely,” Tylar continued, “you can see… can’t you?” He seemed to deflate. “Well, perhaps it isn’t as self-evident as I supposed. But surely you can at least see that the people of the alternate universe are as human as you or I, as capable of feeling pain. Surely you can grasp the reality of their tragedy. If nothing else, the one who has visited us should make their common humanity obvious.”

  “Oh, yeah,” Sarnac temporized. “This visitor you mentioned. How can it be possible for him to be in our reality?”

  “Why don’t we let him explain that?” Tylar beamed.

  “Huh? You mean he’s here now?”

  “Quite. I thought a little preparation would be in order before letting you meet him, so I asked him to wait.” He drained his wineglass and rose to his feet. “Shall we go?”

  Chapter Three

  Andreas Ducas was thirtyish, olive-complexioned, regular-featured, solidly built, clad in a utilitarian one-piece garment on loan from Tylar. As he rose to greet them in the lakeside pavilion, Sarnac couldn’t avoid the irrational feeling that someone from the future of an alternate timeline ought to have something just a little bit out of the ordinary in his appearance. But Andreas didn’t.

  Nor was there anything remarkable about the fact that he had been born on Alpha Centauri A III. “We’ve known for some time that there was a planet with water and free oxygen at Alpha Centauri,” Sarnac explained to him after the introductions were complete. “But since there’s no displacement point there… uh, are you familiar with displacement points?”

  Andreas nodded—up and down for affirmation, Sarnac noted with relief; he’d once tried to communicate with a Bulgarian. “Yes, Tylar has explained the concept to me.” He spoke in the fifth-century military Latin that was the only language they had in common. He had acquired it courtesy of the same kind of implant which had, fifteen years before, conferred it on Sarnac. Tylar had decided against cluttering his mind with unnecessary languages like Standard International English. “It accounted for what happened almost three centuries before my time. But continue, Admiral Sarnac.”

  ” ‘Robert,’ please. Well, until fifteen years ago that was the only means of interstellar travel available to us. Then we acquired the continuous-displacement drive from the Raehaniv… uh…”

  “Yes,” Andreas smiled encouragingly. “Tylar explained about them too. And about the drive.”

  “Then you know it freed us from dependence on displacement points. There’s now a thriving infant colony on your planet… or what is, or will be, your planet in your reality.” Sarnac’s head was starting to throb again.

  “Yes,” Tylar put in. “It will be quite an important place by the twenty-ninth century. We’ll have a kind of listening post in the outer system, and it will…” He stopped and shook his head in annoyance. “Latin is even more impossible for discussions of time travel than Standard International English, you know—the same lack of several requisite tenses, including ‘subjective-past,’ which is what I should be using now. I’ll have to use past tense. Better still, I’ll let you use it, Andreas. Why don’t you explain matters to Robert, starring with an overview of your history?”

  “I’ll try, but as you know I’m no historian.” Andreas frowned with concentration as he organized his thoughts. ‘Tylar has described your history to me, so I know that by the twenty-first century your Earth was engaged in interplanetary exploration. We were only up to steam pumps and black powder firearms at that time—sixteen centuries after the Restorer.”

  “The Restorer?” Sarnac glanced at Artorius, who gave a rueful nod. “So, Tylar, you were right after all…”

  “Yes. Instead of messy but technologically fruitful political disunity, Europe got a reunited and expanded Roman Empire which imposed a kind of… Byzantine Mandarinism is as good a term as any. It was as deadly to innovation as the restored Chinese Empire in the same era of both timelines. The result was as Andreas has described. Naturally, none of this affected the Korvaash Unity in any way—except that there were no Raehaniv for it to encounter, and no Raehaniv navigational data for it to capture. So its expansion in Earth’s direction was somewhat slower in the years before the great realignment of the displacement network. Pardon me, Andreas—do continue.”

  “Of course we knew nothing of these events beyond the solar system. But in the subsequent five centuries, we mastered the scientific method and began to forge ahead technologically.” His voice held a kind of forlorn, defensive pride. Sarnac belatedly understood that he was looking at a man who had been cast, all alone, among strangers whose kindliness only underlined the fact that they wielded powers beyond the dreams of gods. “By the twenty-sixth century,” he continued, “we were ready to launch our first interstellar expedition, toward Alpha Centauri.”

  Tylars face took on the abstracted expression that, Sarnac had come to realize, meant he was in whatever unimaginable linkage he maintained with his sentient machines. The image of a space vessel appeared in midair above the table around which they sat, although there was no apparent holo projection equipment nor anyplace for it to be concealed Sarnac couldn’t worry about that as he stared in fascination.

  It was like what Jules Verne might have visualized had the notion of an STL interstellar snip ever occurred to him.

  Tylar seemed to read his thoughts. “Yes. The technology of the alternate Earth developed in ways that were idiosyncratic to say the least, from your standpoint or mine. Those divergences make a fascinating story in themselves.”

  “It looks big,” was all Sarnac could say, even though he had no familiar objects to give a sense of scale.

  “Indeed,” Tylar affirmed. “It had to be, for it was what those science fiction writers of whom you’re so fond called a ‘generation ship.’ It required a century to reach Alpha Centauri, and one of the things of which its builders were ignorant was cryogenic suspension. Given those builders’ capabilities, it was really a technological tour de force, and like all such was incredibly expensive. I gather it was at least in part a symbol, carrying with it the prestige of the Empire—which included the Americas and large parts of Africa and Russia as well as all of Europe and the Near East, and was locked in rivalry with its Chinese counterpart.”

  “Sort of like the mid-twentieth-century space programs,” Sarnac opined.

  “It was expensive,” Andreas acknowledged. “But it turned out to be a better investment than its builders imagined, for it put a small portion of the human race out of reach of what happened twenty-five years into its voyage. That was when the Korvaash ships inexplicably appeared in the outer Solar System and descended on Earth.”

  “The Realm of Tarzhgul?” Sarnac made it as much a statement as a question.

  Tylar nodded. “Remember, the displacement network is the same in both universes. And the Realm arose in the same manner after the disruption of that network put an end to the Unity.”

  “Yeah,” Sarnac grinned crookedly. “Founded by a Korvaash
dissident who thought the Unity’s problem was that it was being run by a bunch of bleeding-heart liberals. After the displacement points went blooey and his planet found itself cut off from its higher-ups, he and his disciples were in a position to step into the power vacuum. They may have heard, in our universe, the news that something funny was going on at Raehan; but that had nothing important to do with their takeover. It would have happened anyway.”

  “Precisely,” Tylar affirmed. “Later, with no Solar Union to oppose diem, the Korvaasha of the Realm expanded slowly along the displacement chains, taking until the twenty-sixth century to reach an Earth that could not hope to resist them.”

  “The generation ship’s occupants could only listen in horror to the broadcasts from Sol,” Andreas resumed. ‘They continued on their predetermined course to Alpha Centauri, constantly expecting the Korvaasha to pursue them using whatever mysterious space drive had brought them to Sol. After all, the Korvaasha must have learned about the expedition after occupying Earth, where it was common knowledge. But even after the ship arrived at Alpha Centauri seventy-five years later, nothing happened.”

  “Naturally,” Tylar interjected. “As in our universe, Alpha Centauri has no displacement points in the current epoch. Clearly, the alternate Realm of Tarzhgul had not discovered the continuous-displacement drive in the twenty-sixth century, and still has not in the twenty-ninth.

  “But,” he continued somberly, “that is no guarantee for the future. The continuous-displacement drive is merely an application of the same gravitic technology that allows displacement-point transit No matter how uninventive the Korvaasha of Tarzhgul are, they’ll stumble onto it eventually. And they’ll remember the hitherto-inaccessible human colony at Alpha Centauri.”

  “Even if they never discover it,” Artorius interjected, “don’t forget the other Korvaash successor-state that’s come to light in Roberts era. It must also exist in the alternate universe. And those Korvaasha are more inventive than they’re supposed to be! I may as well tell you, Robert, that they don’t have the drive in your time. But with no Pan-Human League to run up against, they’re bound to discover it eventually. For all we know, they’ve already discovered it by Andreas’ lifetime and are gradually expanding toward an inevitable meeting with the Realm of Tarzhgul. Whether that meeting results in amalgamation or war makes no difference to Andreas’ people. They’re living on borrowed time.”