Armageddon Blues

by Daniel Keys Moran

  The stare did not bother Jalian; she was used to it. When you wore a white jumpsuit, and a white tailor-cut silk business coat, when your skin was the color of milk and your hair the color of ice and your eyes were silver; when all these were as they were, people stared.

  Mostly it was the men who stared, and them Jalian simply ignored. They were, after all, men.

  Leaving the confines of the Porsche was a relief. She drove because she had no choice, but she did not like it; she would never like it. She slammed the door to the car, wondering whether Georges appreciated the things she put up with. Cars, indeed. She left the door unlocked, hoping that somebody would steal the machine while she was gone. Her eyes, beneath the brown eyebrows that were all that remained of the color her hair had been in the days before she ran the Big Road, shut briefly just before she entered the building. When they opened again the pupils had expanded to twice their previous diameter.

  There was a secretary working in the outer office, a young, dark-haired, rather pretty woman in a modest black dress. If she found Jalian's appearance odd, she did not show it. "Ms. d'Arsennette?" she inquired.

  Jalian smiled at her, and got a startled flash of a smile back in response. "Yes," she said. Her voice was so liquid that for a moment the secretary—her nameplate read Theresa—seemed unsure that Jalian had actually spoken a complete word.

  Theresa blinked after a moment, and then touched a finger to the intercom. She did not take her eyes from Jalian. "Mr. Ellis? Your guest is here."

  The voice that answered was abrupt, and very male; Jalian frowned. "Good. Send her in." Theresa removed her thumb from the intercom, and started to rise from her chair. Jalian stopped her with a gesture.

  "I can follow directions, I think."

  The girl looked flustered. "Well, down the hall. Third door on the left. His name is on it."

  Jalian inclined her head slightly. "Thank you, Theresa.” She pronounced the name with a soft th. Theresa was looking up at her, unblinking, and Jalian smiled softly. The girl looked away suddenly, blushing furiously, and Jalian left her without saying anything further.

  Henry Ellis glanced up at the opening of his door. He shifted the toothpick in his mouth from the right corner to the left. "Dear, did anybody ever teach you how to knock?"

  The door still swinging slowly away from her, Jalian paused, and studied Henry. "Actually, no… No," she said after a moment, "I don't think so. Why do you ask?" She seated herself in the right-most visitor's chair, close to the door.

  Henry studied her curiously. She was strange; stark.

  She spoke in a harsh, clipped manner, as though she wished to destroy the beauty of her voice. "You're from the Department of Defense?"

  Jalian ignored his question. "I have come here to ask your opinion, as the second-best physicist at our disposal. The information I require concerns the theory of multiple time tracks that you and Nigao Loos published several months ago." She withdrew a creamy-white envelope from the inside pocket of her dress jacket, and laid it on Henry's blotter.

  Henry picked it up, and tore it open with a wooden letter opener that sat next to his out box. He scanned it briefly. Its contents were fairly normal; answer questions, don't ask questions, don't talk about whatever questions she asks. It was signed by his superiors in DoD. (Both he and Nigao held reserve commissions in Aerospace; it was the price they had been forced to pay for the applications technology for ENCELIS.)

  He handed the letter back to Jalian. "Okay. What do you want to know?"

  Jalian put the letter away and sat up straighter in her chair. What she told Henry Ellis then, only two others had ever heard before, and only one of those was certain he believed her. The first was Jeremy Carson, a theoretical physicist and Undersecretary of Defense to President Kennedy the Third; Georges was the other.

  "I will," she said, choosing her words carefully, "have you listen to a hypothetical situation. There is a question that arises from this situation, and you will answer that question."

  Henry Ellis was scratching on a blank pad of paper with a pencil. He wasn't looking at the pad of paper, though, he was looking at Jalian. At her eyes. At the silver in her eyes.

  "Stop that!" Jalian snapped irritably, with sudden sharpness, and Henry whipped his eyes away from hers.

  He froze for a moment, and then said, "Excuse me. That was rude."

  Jalian shrugged. "It does not matter. Are you listening?"

  "I'm listening." The words came hard; Henry felt, for the first time since childhood, the breath of the old unknown, like a wind on the back of his neck. Since his early days in college he had dedicated himself to the study of the new unknown; but now this lovely elven specter sat before him, with those erotic silver eyes… Henry forced himself to meet her gaze, and said roughly, "Go ahead."

  Jalian spoke with amusement, her words were little more than a whisper, and Henry had to strain to listen. "The hypothetical situation that I relate to you is as follows. In the year 2007 there is a nuclear war which destroys civilization. In the centuries following that war, humanity barely survives. Eventually, a primitive social order is reestablished by—" she used the silverspeech words—"ken Selvren, a group of people who call themselves ken Selvren. Near the beginning of the twenty-eighth century of your Gregorian calendar, these people learn to travel from one alternate timeline to another, in search of resources that were depleted by those who tried to destroy their world."

  Henry leaned forward slightly, hooked. "Go ... on. Please."

  Jalian watched him quizzically. "The daughter of the Eld—of the leader of the people I speak of… this daughter knew more about the outtime technology than any of the rest of her people. For reasons of her own, this daughter stole a portable Gate, and set the Gate to access what is known as a negative-entropy timeline. This is a timeline where time—"

  "...runs backwards. An anti-matter timeline," Henry Ellis finished. "How can you know about that? Nigao hasn't even published that section of theor—"

  "This woman," said Jalian grimly, "entered a negative timeline…"

  The point of the pencil that Henry was holding snapped. "You can't have done that," he said simply. "You're talking about an anti-matter timeline. You'd blow…" He took a deep breath, and exploded, "Christ, you can't even for a minute expect me to believe—"

  Jalian d'Arsennette, the daughter of Ralesh who was the daughter of Morine, whose ancestors had ruled Silvereyes for more than five centuries, plucked a knife out of nowhere and used it to pin Henry Ellis' tie to his desktop. She slapped him twice, removed the knife from the tie, and made it vanish. Without particular heat, she said, "Do not interrupt me again." She watched, as the stunned, uncomprehending look on the engineer's face gave way to beginning fury. She laid one knife, and another, and then a third, in a parallel row on Henry's side of the desk. "You may attempt to pick up one of these when you choose… I was saying to you, this woman of ken Selvren enters a negative-entropy timeline; her ratio of entry is extremely high, approximately fourteen million to one. Her actual interaction with the timeline is minimal; a duration of some two hours. She survives the experience, and reappears on the timeline that she exited in the days before the nuclear war. The year is that which you call 1962, and there are forty-five years until Armageddon."

  Henry waited until he was entirely sure she was finished speaking. The light from the overhead fluorescents was shining off the blades on his desktop. His eyes did not waver from hers. "What is your question?"

  She showed the first emotion he had seen in her; a deep, quivering breath. It seemed to him that he could almost hear /after all these years, the answer…/ She was holding the edge of his desk.

  "Is it possible to prevent Armageddon?"

  Sweat was trickling down the back of Henry's neck. He was thinking, This isn't happening, while something deep inside him assured him, Yes, it is too happening. "May God help you, whoever the hell you are. I can't. I just don't know. Even Nigao could not answer that question, given your ass
umed parameters. Our field is very young. It only dates to 1962, when we first started detecting chronons." He looked up swiftly. "Your… hypothetical person… time-traveled to 1962." He stumbled getting the words out. "In 1969 the chronon event threshold jumped by a factor of eight and mystics all over the fucking planet went off the deep end and we don't have even the beginnings of a theory to account for it. What happened?"

  Jalian was sitting back in her chair, eyes closed. She wasn't sure what her reaction was, relief or despair; only that it was strong. He had not said yes, but he had not said no. She could still hope.

  Henry Ellis said fiercely, "What happened in '69?"

  Jalian shook her head briefly, and looked at him. "There was a battle. Eight timelines melted together."

  The toothpick that had rested securely in Henry's mouth throughout the interview dropped in two pieces to the blotter. "What?"

  Jalian stood abruptly. Henry noticed that the steel was no longer on his blotter: He could not remember when it had vanished. "That is what Georges tells me," she said simply. "He may be lying, of course."

  Henry said stupidly, "Who?"

  "Georges. And he should know. It happened inside of him."

  She turned to leave, and Henry said, "Miss d'Arsennette? Where are you going?"

  Jalian pivoted slowly, and smiled at him. Henry felt his perception of everything in the world but those silver eyes fade away, and was thinking with a cool, rational detachment that silver was the most erotic color that he knew, when Jalian said, "I am going to save the world." Her eyelids dropped sleepily, half covered the silver irises. "Good-bye."

  The door seemed to close itself behind her.

  Henry Ellis stared at the door, in silence, for a long time.

  It was 1981, and there were twenty-six years left until Armageddon.

  DATELINE 1985 GREGORIAN: DECEMBER.

  Moscow, Russia.

  The winter wind was a senseless thing; as cold and meaningless as anything Gregor Pahvernuch knew of outside the works of man.

  Pahvernuch shook his head in disgust. He had just hung up the phone, and stood now looking out his window at the drifting snow, blowing down in random gusts across the streets. When he had calmed himself he turned to survey the three officers standing stiffly before his desk. He was a heavyset man, with an unlit cigar set between lips that were too red and fat. He was still wearing the dark overcoat he'd had on when he'd entered the hastily-set-up joint KGB/Militia Headquarters and gone charging into the Operations Room.

  "You there," Pahvernuch said with disdain, as though the words were offal that his lips were too delicate to touch, "you are the best the Committee for State Security can recruit, these days." He glanced at the man sitting in the chair by the door, under the wavering fluorescent lights. "And what of you," he asked with a sudden burst of chill fury, "what have you been doing this last hour?"

  Karien Karchovsky grinned widely, showing his teeth. "I, Comrade Pahvernuch? Watching this American is not my assignment." He uncrossed his legs, and stood. He walked with a measured pace around the three junior KGB agents. They were afraid; it showed in the way they stood and the way they stared straight ahead without meeting their superior's eyes.

  Fear was something they were all very good with. Karien stopped, and put an arm around one of the men. "Now, Comrade Shenderev here was, I believe, in charge of the group assigned to watch this, ah, 'Jill Darsay,' I think her name is."

  Pahvernuch sighed. "I do not think that scaring these children is going to help us in resolving this annoyance, Karien. We must find the woman." He pulled off his over coat, and dropped it on top of the desk. "You." He pointed at one of the KGB operatives. "Go find Colonel Djarska. If he's not at home he will probably be at the hotel; the Central Committee isn't meeting until tomorrow, but he'll probably be there early." The boy stood there a moment too long, and Pahvernuch screamed at the top of his lungs, "Go!" He glared at the junior agent, and the man fairly fled the room.

  Karien missed most of it; he had turned Nikolai Shento face him. "Why, Nikolai, you're trembling."

  "No, comrade," the boy protested, and then immediately said, "Yes, comrade."

  Karien looked down at him; he was several centimeters taller. "Well, we are not such monsters as all that. Listen, you lost the woman you were to watch." He shrugged expansively. "These things happen. We will find her again; she may simply have stepped out to take dinner." Behind them, Gregor Pahvernuch snorted loudly. "No, no, I mean that," said Karien kindly. "Take Corporal Deteche and his troops and go screen people at the hotel. I'll be down in an hour or so."

  Nikolai left without protest; the third junior agent went with him, no doubt glad to get out of Pahvernuch's office with his ass in one piece.

  Karien Karchovsky watched them leave with a cold and detached expression.

  Gregor Pahvernuch said after a moment, "Are you quite through kissing that pretty boy's nuts?"

  "The pretty boy's uncle sits on the Politburo, Gregor," said Karien bluntly.

  The news threw Pahvernuch visibly. "Oh?" He bit down hard on the cigar. "Oh. I did not know that."

  "I didn't think so." Karien picked up his overcoat from the chair on which he'd been sitting. "Well, I assume you've got things to do." He smiled without humor. "Certainly I do. If you see Ilya before the morning, send him to the hotel. That's where I'll be."

  Gregor said softly, "With the boychick, eh?"

  Karien lifted an eyebrow. "You could hurt my feelings, friend. No, I am simply going to see whether the American woman returns to her room, probably with a perfectly reasonable explanation as to where she has been, as I expect her to."

  "You believe, then, that she is just a tourist." Pahvernuch's tone was questioning.

  Karien shrugged into his overcoat. "Who can say? If she is not, she has certainly done a convincing imitation. That she chose to vanish on the eve of the Central Committee's meeting is suspicious only if she has not returned to her hotel by a reasonable hour. It is not yet ten o'clock," he pointed out.

  Gregor stared at him. "Karien, you are one of my best friends, I tell you truly. But you play things too tight. Someday they're going to shoot you for it. And your protégé, too."

  Karien grinned. "Probably. But at least I don't threaten the careers of nephews of members of the Politburo. You were thinking about it."

  "I was not," denied Pahvernuch. A bead of sweat glistened on his upper lip.

  "No?" Karien seemed to consider. "Perhaps not. Perhaps you were merely indulging your temper, and it got out of hand—who can say? Fortunately," he added on his way out the door, "it is not one of my concerns. I'll be back."

  After he was gone, Gregor Pahvernuch grunted, "I'll bet you will be, you flashy son of a bitch." He got back on the phone, and had to yell at the operator for a dial tone.

  At the hotel where the woman who had identified herself as Jill Darsay was staying—a hotel conveniently near the buildings where the Politburo was temporarily meeting—Karchovsky checked with the hotel management to see whether or not Miss Darsay had returned to her room. She had not, they informed him. The lobby held three KGB agents whom Karien recognized, trying to be conspicuous. They were succeeding quite well; after all, he thought cynically, what was the point of being a member of the Committee for State Security if one had to obscure the fact?

  As far as he could tell, none of them recognized him. They were too busy watching a pair of pretty East German women who were sitting together at the hotel bar, and being overcharged for the privilege. Karien could not for the life of him imagine why East Germans would want to vacation in Moscow. They did, though, with regularity.

  He met Nikolai as he was leaving the elevators on the third floor. The American was in room 328; Nikolai had his soldiers, regular militia, rummaging through her possessions. "Sir!" said Nikolai. "I was just going downstairs to call you." He relaxed slightly, and said, "I tried calling from the hotel room, but the switchboard has gone home, and the phones are useless."

&n
bsp; Karien nodded. "Have you found anything in the room?"

  Nikolai shook his head. "No, comrade. Nothing of note." He led Karien inside; Karien looked around with some curiosity. He'd never been inside one of the fancy foreign hotel rooms before. It was surprisingly similar to the hotels he was used to. One would think that for the extortionate prices the foreigners were paying they could get something a cut above this.

  The room was clean, with a large single bed, and sparkling white porcelain in the bathroom. There was a perfunctory wet bar, vodka and mixers, against the wall facing the bed. A balcony overlooked Moscow; Karien went into the freezing night air, and looked out over the city. He had been outside Russia many times, but the CCCP proper or once, to West Germany, and he still remembered the sight of West Berlin, lit up at night; by comparison, Moscow was a dull city after dark. Even the Kremlin was dark—from where he stood, he could see the ruins where the explosion had brought down the eastern sections. Construction was going on from sunrise to sunset.

  Despite the fact that the government had already executed four persons for the terrorist attack, it was an open secret in high ranks that the truly guilty parties had not been found.

  What was worst about it was that all evidence pointed inward. This was not an act of foreign terrorism instigated by the West; it was the work of Russians.

  Karien turned, and went back inside. "Nikolai, send your shitkicker soldiers home. We have KGB at the entrance, and you and I will wait here for her. If she is not found by morning we will alert the general militia."

  Nikolai looked at him. "We are just going to wait?"

  "Unless you wish to search all of Moscow in a night.”

  Wash a pig as much as you want, it will still go back to the mud.”

  —Russian Proverb

  At 2:00, Jalian d'Arsennette returned to her hotel room. She had spent the night on the hotel roof, watching the stars, and listening with other senses to the Moscow night. It was an evening well spent, with the colored lenses she had been wearing to disguise her eye color removed; her eyes felt normal for the first time in weeks.