A chorus of ‘nos’ echoed around him.
“Pilot?”
“My job was to follow the countdown and bring the ship into the center of the loop. Those were my only orders. Perhaps, as you say, it’s just that the object was black. Besides, it’s reasonable to think that it was invisible to everyone….”
“Wait a minute!” burst out Helias. “Whether it was black or not, who was it who prepared this counterpart, or ‘ballast’, as you called it? What an idiot I was not to think of it before! It can’t have been prepared over there, on Thaýma, and then sent back in time, like us. It must have departed from here and appeared over there later. Not the other way round. But who can have done it? Who, here, could have known, three years before?”
A short hum of murmured comments. Then silence. As if they were waiting for an answer. The professor, craftily, smiled.
Helias smiled too. “Us! We’re here, three years before. But what can we do? How…? Professor?”
The smile still on his lips, the professor whispered “We’ll see…. We have plenty of time. Now we have other things to do. We’ll see….”
They flew over Alkenia. And had something to eat. There were still hours to go before the rendezvous. The pilot recommended a little dose of sleep spray and a nice nap.
Then a station again. Triangulations. And another collision that didn’t happen with a little spaceship, this time coming from Mars.
And there was Mars, reddish. And the station. More or less as he remembered it. Binoculars. A little walk around, a tour of inspection so that Helias could recognize the places he had seen with his parents years before. They had a map, which they had studied before the last ‘jolt’. Better, though, to have somebody who already knew his way around the station, much better. So a walk around would help refresh his memory.
Their ‘counterpart’ was docking now, or in other words was casting off from the Martian station. Approach. Zoom in with the binoculars. Someone moves quickly, backwards, along the short narrow passage that leads to the docked ship. Others follow. Two people, maybe more. It is hard to count them and see who they are through the small portholes along the passage. Nobody now. Further on, though, after that curve, there’s a large glassed-in area where they might appear in a moment. Maximum zoom. There they are! Too fast to make them out clearly. One, two, three. Then a fourth. Who stops for a second. Turns around, long hair bouncing. Then disappears, like the others. And the light goes out.
They were all struck speechless. Especially Kathia. Whom everyone had recognized.
A light a little farther on. A big window giving a view of an apartment. A handful of people enter backwards, maybe the same ones as before. They are far from the window, and can be seen only from the chest downwards. A woman comes in, back first, but from another door. She turns and embraces a man, who then leans toward the floor, where something that appears to be a body stretched full length can be made out. As can Kathia’s blonde head, next to someone else. A man comes and goes from the door where the woman ‘entered’. Then Kathia, too, bends over the body on the floor. She puts something in a backpack, rises and, backwards, goes out the door, preceded by two people. A man and a woman remain next to the inert body. Then they rise too and go through the same door, leaving the room empty.
This time it was Helias who was dumbstruck. That woman who had now disappeared beyond the door, and who the man—who he!—had embraced, was his mother. No sign of his father. But it was likely that the half-concealed body sprawled on the floor was his.
Then the lights went back on in the corridor, and once again there seemed to be movement in the narrow passage leading to the ship, followed by the appearance—showcased, almost, in the large glass pane—of a portly gentleman who was trying not over-gracefully to hasten down the corridor, and whom they all thought they recognized.
This was when the professor intervened. The professor on the shuttle.
“I suggest we stop this. Stop staying here and spying on ourselves, I mean. Aside from the fact that watching these people go back and forth backwards is giving me a headache, I’d say it’s psychically healthier to stop viewing this. Otherwise, what kind of mental confusion is going to overcome us when we find ourselves there, going through these gestures again? And I hardly think it’s a good thing, in general, to be spectators of our own selves.”
“I agree.” said Kathia. Helias nodded too.
In reality, Helias had been about to ask if it was possible to turn down the filter effect so that they could try to see what was going on in the adjacent rooms, on the other side of the door they had all disappeared through. But he quickly backtracked upon hearing the professor’s words, and decided to say nothing.
First to speak was ‘Scarface’ (so Helias had nicknamed him, privately, since he didn’t remember what he was called; the other heavy was ‘Skullet’). It was perhaps the first time he had heard his voice.
“I agree too. Particularly because, seeing as we’re already there, that means we’d better get a move on, wouldn’t you say?”
He couldn’t wait to have a chance to kick a little ass, evidently.
The professor looked him up and down, condescendingly. As if he was seeing him for the first time; as if to say, ‘And you would have been better off keeping your mouth shut, wouldn’t you say?’. Then he gave a sigh and, eyeing him steadily from under his brows, answered slowly and deliberately, almost spelling out the words.
“First: if we’re already there, what need is there for us to get a move on? What’s the hurry? Second: the more we hurry, the less time we’ll have, since now our time is running backwards, remember? Instead, if we take our time now, before our inversion, I mean, we’ll go further back in the past, and so then we’ll have more time to return here now. Don’t you think? Do you understand, now?”
Sullenly, Scarface clammed back up.
And so they went towards Earth, not hurrying.
The time inversion station was in orbit around the Moon, camouflaged as an ordinary space lab.
They were almost at the limit of their range. By now, they had to invert, so they could take on supplies.
Kathia explained to Helias that the opposite time inversion was a more delicate matter. The lab consisted of matter going in the time direction opposite to theirs, unlike in the previous inversion. When they had inverted on Alkenia, there hadn’t been any problems in communicating: both they and the lab came from the same past, and so the inversion process could be triggered because they were there, in the same past as the inversion. Now it was different. They were in the lab’s future, in the inversion process’s future. And so they couldn’t announce, in the normal way, that they were present and ready to be inverted. The station knew nothing, couldn’t know anything, and would know only when it was all over. Suddenly, out of the void, the two components would have appeared, both visible and existing only in the inversion’s future, whence no signal could have been received.
Unless there were an antimatter device that, belonging to the same arrow of time, would have no trouble detecting their presence in its past. So that the inversion process could be started.
At a certain point the pilot said, “We’re ready, do you want to proceed?”.
The professor gestured toward Kathia, saying, “Please, you do it, your pronunciation is better than mine.”.
Kathia took off her helmet and approached the cockpit. She picked up a sort of microphone and looked for the switch, asking the pilot for confirmation. Then, in a language Helias didn’t recognize, she said a few words.
At the end of the phrase, a two hundred and forty second countdown began. Kathia handed back the microphone and returned to her seat.
“Helmets and seat belts.” said the pilot.
“What language was that? What did you say?” asked Helias.
“It’s Ancient Greek, like the word ‘Thaýma’, remember? I said ‘Ἥκομεν γάρ ἐκ τοῦ πλανήτου Θαύμα.’, which means ‘We come from Thaýma’
, more or less. It’s our password. To trigger the inversion process.”
They approached the space lab, toward the big hatch on the right.
A ship appeared from behind the station, on their left, going rigorously backward.
“There we are.” said the professor. “We’re going to take on supplies, on the other side of the station.”
Slowly, the hatches began to open. And the two ships moved in, all according to plan. As before, a semicircular track, in a broad transparent tube. Beyond the big glass panes at the end, a few people, surprised by the arrival, waved their arms in greeting. Helias, euphoric, waved as well, now toward the windows, now toward the other shuttle, where another Helias waved back. And another professor, one who hadn’t had his lunch yet, made faces at him. Both Kathias smiled. Scarface and Skullet, not to be outdone, sketched a handwave of sorts.
And then the acceleration. Ka-Boom. And the roles had inverted.
Inversion. Still a few waves, here and there. And then away, for supplies.
© Springer International Publishing AG 2017
Massimo VillataThe Dark Arrow of TimeScience and Fictionhttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-67486-5_9
9. As They Came Closer to Mars
Massimo Villata1
(1)Osservatorio Astrofisico di Torino, INAF, Pino Torinese (TO), Italy
Massimo Villata
Email: [email protected]
As they came closer to Mars, Helias got tenser and tenser. And more withdrawn. One of the great events in his life was about to happen. And, like Mars, it was coming ever closer. He had stopped talking. Kathia watched him, gently stroking his arm. As if to keep his courage up, but without intruding, without distracting him from his thoughts, his musings.
Kathia followed his meandering thoughts. Painful, crowded thoughts. But hopeful ones too. Full of hope that, bit by bit, bloomed into optimism, almost euphoric. Kathia slid her hand toward Helias’s, ending palm to palm.
“Professor. We’re about there.” she whispered from inside her helmet.
The professor pulled out his pocket computer and handed Helias a small oval object.
“Keep it in the palm of your hand, please.”
Helias turned questioningly to Kathia.
“What is it?”
“Don’t worry. I’ll explain later.” interjected the professor.
Then, looking at the computer, he added “Intense. Between eight and nine. With regular interference beats.”.
Helias let it rest there, and went back to his thoughts.
They had almost arrived. Mars was looming over them on the left, and he thought he could already make out the station straight ahead. The shuttle slowed, and the pilot announced that they would be docking in a few minutes.
With practiced hands, Scarface and Skullet loaded and inspected their weapons, a bit bigger but probably the same type as the ones Helias and the others had. Maybe they emitted more powerful and more accurate paralyzing beams.
A flyover with the lights off, binoculars trained on the station. To see what, if anything, was going on.
The station seemed strangely deserted. Three ships of varying sizes were docked at the boarding bridges. Two of the bridges gave onto the main corridor. The third ship was the one they’d already seen, and that they would be leaving on later.
They already knew where they had to go. The problem was getting there. The lights were on in the room in question, but the windows were opaque.
They approached the bridges on the main corridor. Through the windows they could see several people, stationed as if to control the entrances. They were armed.
Helias remembered a secondary entrance. A little boarding bridge that led directly to a lab, and used for unloading materials for it.
They docked and went into the lab. Deserted. Maybe all the workers at the station had been rounded up and locked away somewhere, prisoners.
In silence, they threaded their way down the narrow passage that led to the main corridor.
They kept careful watch on the guards, moving about a few dozen meters farther down. At a certain point only one man remained in view, his back to them. They took advantage of it to sneak across the main corridor and into the smaller hallway that went to Helias’s parents’ lab and living quarters. Skullet led the way and Scarface brought up the rear of their little line. Once in front of the lab, they heard voices from beyond the door, which was ajar. There were two men. One was busy at the main computer console, the other was talking on his cell, probably with the guards.
“No. He wouldn’t cooperate. Not at all. We had to neutralize him, in fact. Yes…. No…. We’re not getting anywhere yet…. He’s trying…. No, stay where you are. And double the guard on the other prisoners, there might be other hotheads. No…. Here everything’s under control, but we’re not getting anywhere. We need reinforcements, specialists. Experts in this kind of operation. It’s all more complicated than expected…. Yes, do that. Make contact from the ship…. Yes. Over and out.”
They had listened to everything with attention. Skullet looked at the pilot and jerked his head toward the door. The pilot nodded. Skullet and Scarface stood on each side of the door, locking eyes. Without warning, they burst through the door and, one on his feet and the other on the ground, opened fire. The two men, hit in the arms and legs, crumpled and collapsed. They were dragged into a corner and bound and gagged with tape. It was all over in a question of seconds.
Skullet picked up the cell that had started to ring and clamped it to his ear. He answered, trying to imitate its owner’s voice.
“Yeah…. Okay…. We’re trying another approach. We need to concentrate. Call only if necessary. Yes…. Fine…. Over and out.”
Kathia, who had been the first to enter the lab, was at her most serious, furrowing her brows.
The professor had gone to the console and was looking at the screen.
The pilot, turning to their two defenders, had said “You two keep an eye on the corridor.”.
Helias had headed immediately to the door at the far end, the door to the living quarters. Kathia had followed him after a few moments.
Helias’s mother was in tears, kneeling next to her husband’s prostrate body. She was trying to stanch his wounds with anything, everything, that came to hand.
“Mama!”
“Helias!?”
“Yes, it’s me, but there’s no time to explain.” he said, holding her hand in his and looking her in the eye.
“But it’s not really you.” she said, stroking his hair. “You’ve come from the future? How?”
“Yes, mama. In a sense you called us yourself.”
She didn’t understand. In the meantime Kathia and Helias had bent over the supine body.
“Damn them! They used invasive weapons. He’s losing blood. From the leg and head.” said Helias as he took his father’s hand, which remained limp.
Kathia was feeling his neck for a pulse and raising his eyelids.
“Bradycardia. Fixed dilated pupil. Homolateral mydriasis. We have to stop the hemorrhage in the leg.”
She had taken off the backpack she had brought from the shuttle. She took a flask, a scalpel, a bandage and a tourniquet from it.
“Ma’am, while we’re dealing with the rest, free your husband’s leg and tie this above the wound. Then I’ll have a look.”
The woman did as she was told, while Kathia drew a strange sheet from its case and, at the same time, inspected the injury to the head, above the ear.
“Done.”
Kathia put on special goggles and leaned over the leg.
“Good. The bone is intact. Take this bottle and spray the area abundantly and wrap it with this, not too tight. Then remove the tourniquet.”
Still wearing the goggles, she turned toward the wound on the head. With a few rapid movements she shaved the hair all around and cleaned the wound. Then she inspected it carefully.
“Comminuted skull fracture. Probable meningeal and cortical injuries. When
did it happen?”
“I don’t know. I think I’ve lost all sense of time. I’d say twenty minutes ago, half an hour at most. Is it serious?”
“Yes, but we can save him, if we hurry. The worst symptom is the fact that the midbrain is involved, probably compressed by a cerebral herniation. Now we’ll have a better look. And while I’m working, tell me how it happened.”
Kathia sprayed the wound, unfolded the sheet—a thin membrane—and sprayed a part of it too. Then she placed it on the man’s head and cut a hole for the nose and mouth. With gentle pats, Kathia made the membrane adhere to the head and face, almost like a second skin. Kathia handed a pair of goggles to Helias, who put them on and began to see through the membrane and the skin. Kathia told him to move his eyebrows down and up, to penetrate the different layers of tissue.
Meanwhile the woman related how those men had invaded and occupied the lab, trying to convince them, and then force them, to hand over the compiler. They had refused, obviously, and the men escalated their threats. When they had pointed a weapon at the woman, the man went ballistic, throwing himself against the aggressors. First they shot him in the leg. But that wasn’t enough to stop him, and so they toppled him with a crushing blow to the skull. When they threatened to finish her husband off if she didn’t talk, the woman, as her only way out, pretended to faint. Then they had dragged them both into the living quarters and locked them in.
“Animals!” Helias had burst out.
His mother was looking a little less distraught now. She had someone to share responsibility with. She had her son. Miraculously come to their aid. And there was an expert physician with her husband, and maybe she would be able to save him.
Helias was practically shell-shocked. By the fact that his mother was there, looking at him now with gratitude. His father was there, unconscious, in a congealing pool of blood. But alive! And so was his mother! Now he had to do everything he could so that they would keep on living. And then there was the amazement for this new version of Kathia. Kathia the skilled physician, whose precise gestures and professional concentration he was admiring. And who was saving his father’s life. He finally managed to stammer, “You, you’re a doctor?”.
The Dark Arrow of Time Page 13