THE TIDES OF TIME

by John Brunner

  Table of Contents

  PROLOGUE

  PART ONE

  PART TWO

  PART THREE

  PART FOUR

  PART FIVE

  PART SIX

  PART SEVEN

  PART EIGHT

  PART NINE

  PART TEN

  PART ELEVEN

  PART TWELVE

  EPILOGUE

  THE TIDES OF TIME

  John Brunner

  PROLOGUE

  The night when it was over was the longest of the year… and by far the longest of his life. He carried his burden of sorrow to the forepeak of the island, where those who had come to hold a wake with him dug a fire pit after the ancient manner, sprinkling on seawater and adding fragrant herbs before they covered it and lit the wood.

  They whiled away the darkest hours with songs and tales. He did not know how to join in, nor was he invited to.

  The eastern sky grew pale. They broached a wineskin and with ceremony circulated it to all save him. It made no odds; he was in no mood to drink. Then silence fell, and all eyes turned to the horizon.

  When once again they’d watched the oldest miracle, the death and rebirth of the light, they ritually shared the meal, but offered nothing to the widower. Him they left solitary with his grief—the powerless, the unfulfilled, the man whose life was incomplete, still at the mercy of more suffering.

  Thus it had been in olden days. Thus it would have to be again next year.

  On whatsoever planet of the cosmos.

  PART ONE

  THE EXHIBIT

  is huge and hollow, made of metal, pitted and scarred.

  It has been to somewhere that cannot exist

  THE MONTH

  is April

  THE NAME

  is Suleyman

  After weeks of travel to strange and unfamiliar places—but they were adapted to that, better than anybody, better than everybody—on a spring evening when the air was turning from warm to chill and the sea from blue to gray thanks to the shadow of a thunderstorm, they came to an island which had nearly the shape of a sphinx. Brownish, flecked with sparse vegetation but innocent of trees, it reared broad haunches high above the water, with beaches on its eastern and western flanks and another, the smallest, between two rocky outcrops that modeled forelimbs underneath its south-turned chin.

  Perhaps it had a name. Boat could not inform them if so; like most maps, hers were out of date or incomplete, and they had forbidden her to interrogate any satellites.

  For a long while Gene surveyed it frowning from her bow, stretching each of his lean dark limbs in turn.

  At length he said, “I don’t much like the look of it.”

  But that was hardly surprising. He distrusted islands. He was in the habit of insisting that his ancestors on both sides had been of continental stock—though how he, an orphan, could be certain was a mystery—and had bequeathed him the subconscious conviction that the whole universe was, or ought to be, a single landmass which a tribe could walk across. Supposedly this was what accounted for…

  But they had a tacit bargain not to speak of such matters. Besides, Stacy’s attitude was opposite to his, which meant one theory or the other must be wrong.

  For the moment she was disinclined to pursue the matter, anyway. She contented herself with saying, “I think it might be advisable to land. Water’s all very well while it’s calm, but when the storm breaks…”

  “I guess you’re right,” sighed Gene, and instructed Boat to make for shore.

  Programmed to avoid habitation so far as possible, she chose the beach between the sphinx’s paws, for there were traces of human activity on both the others: abandoned shacks, a caïque moored to a post now lower than its bow, in the restive water anchored nets that had trapped empty barrels, mostly of plastic but a few of wood.

  And this third one was not devoid of people’s leavings, either. As they drew closer, Gene and Stacy made out concrete beams, square, grayish white, patched with red and brown smears. Some still composed an archway extending the mouth of a cave in the living rock; many more were askew, their foundations eroded by the rise in water level; some lay partly buried by encroaching sand, and a few were completely submerged.

  Neither of them spoke again until Boat touched bottom and extended her forward gangplank. Then, tense and nervous as ever, Gene strode to its end. He stared about him first, then upward at the overhang of the sphinx’s jaw, and stood irresolute.

  Following more slowly, but more composed, Stacy passed him and set foot on the nearest of the fallen columns. Its concrete was dissolving under the onslaught of salt water, assisted by borer worms and tenacious weed. Halting, she studied those of its counterparts which were still erect enough to be regarded as pillars and lintels.

  Eventually she said, “It’s a temple of Ares.”

  “Who?”

  “God of war.”

  “Ridiculous! This is far too—”

  She cut him short impatiently. “Not classical, naturally! But he’s always with us… Boat!”

  The vessel responded more readily to her than him; that had been a source of friction during their journey. “Yes, Anastasia?” she answered in her clear light voice.

  “What is this place? It looks like a twentieth century strongpoint—more likely World War II than I.”

  “The chances are that you’re correct, but I have no data on its origin.”

  “So much forgotten and so much to know…” murmured Stacy.

  But she was forever saying things of that kind, and Gene paid no heed. Eyeing the impending storm, he reminded her, “You suggested we ought to take shelter.”

  She turned slowly through half a circle. Above her the jutting chin of the sphinx was bearded with drying rootlets hung in air: plants which had contrived to establish themselves in cracks and crevices were falling from their own excessive growth. To either side, the oblong relics of an ancient conflict recalled an age when humanity too seemed to face no greater threat to its survival than those entailed by competition with itself. The little headlands were stark and bare; the shore was narrow and much scarred with rocks; but near the entrance of the concrete archway tufts of saltgrass grew and the yellow-gray of sand changed to the brown of fertile earth.

  She said at last, “You can’t deny we’d be better off ashore during a gale. Indeed, this may perhaps…”

  Her last words trailed away. Impatient, he prompted her.

  “Perhaps what?”

  “Be the right place.” She straightened abruptly, smiling as she shook back her long hair. They had discarded clothing as soon as the climate permitted. It seemed improper to be clad on this shared journey into the unknown inasmuch as they had been obliged to set out naked on those they had undertaken separately. Now she was tanned overall, as though attempting to share his blackness. Yet they had never touched each other save by unintention…

  Her mention of “the right place” signified nothing to him, except that she claimed to feel at home among these archipelagoes. Well, this was more her heritage than his, and for tonight he could pretend to himself that they were on the seashore of a proper landmass… insofar as any such remained. He said gruffly, “Boat, give us what we need to put up here.”

  The craft did not react at once. Instead, her scanners swiveled back and forth, and the air tautened with the barely sensed hum of ultrasonics. Also there was bubbling near her stern as water was sucked in for sampling.

  Meantime Stacy wandered off to examine the rusty smears on the other concrete columns. Watching her, Gene did not at first register how long the delay was growing.

  Then, with a start, he saw that Boat was emitting items he would never have expected: first, digging tools and a great roll of net;
then something in bags—fertilizer!

  Dismayed, he realized his order had been much too general, and countermanded it. She stopped work at once.

  “What’s wrong?” Stacy called, glancing toward the storm. It was already close enough for them to see how it was shattering the water into jagged fragments.

  Fuming, Gene forced out, “This damned boat—!”

  “She’s a splendid boat, and I won’t hear otherwise!” Stacy cut in, striding back. The pattern made by her nipples, moving in counterpoint with her hips, registered on Gene’s awareness as the graph of a hugely subtle equation. Sometimes he thought there must be something dreadfully wrong with him. Other times he was certain there must be something utterly, even terrifyingly, right, and with her too, in view of what had happened to them both… but he had never quite managed to work out what.

  “Look!” he challenged her. “Just look!” And pointed out the way Boat’s resources were being wasted on an overnight campsite.

  After a thoughtful pause, however, all Stacy said was—and not to him—“Amend! Supplies for supper and breakfast, beds and toilet gear will be enough.”

  Boat withdrew the fertilizer, tools and nets at once, to be recycled, but she was tired, and the light she depended on to run her was fading fast. Besides, the sun was dimmer than it had been when she was built. By the time she had delivered hotbeds, food, and the rest of what Stacy had reduced the order to, the rain came sprinkling down and both of them were running with wet before they managed to take refuge under the ancient archway. Access to the cave beyond proved to be blocked by a fallen boulder, but there was plenty of shelter for them and their belongings. The beds were badly underpowered, owing to Boat’s depleted energy level, but fortunately Stacy’s reference to “toilet gear” had been old-fashioned enough to imply towels, and two had been produced from store in sealed bags.

  As well as other necessaries, Boat had supplied a coldlight, being programmed not to overlook how much human beings prize their oldest luxury, the theft of extra waking hours from darkness. Looking for a ledge to stand it on, Gene caught sight of something brightly colored on the ground, and picked it up. Torn and stained, it proved to be an advertising leaflet for a travel agency, replete with pictures of vanished beaches and holidaymakers now long dead. He sighed and let it fall—then retrieved it, thinking it might come in handy if he had to light a fire.

  By the lamp’s pale glow he was examining without enthusiasm what had been issued to them as suitable provisions—mainly, a self-heating pack containing a stew of forced vegetables with rice, though at least there was also a self-chilling bottle of white wine—when Stacy said unexpectedly, “Gene, I’m not used to this, and my arms are getting tired. Could you finish drying my hair, please?”

  He reacted with astonishment, for she had never asked a personal favor of him before, let alone admitted physical weakness. But he gave a shrug and complied, kneeling behind her as she tilted back her head.

  Outside, the first lightning struck, and thunder rolled. It was not truly cold in their artificial cave, yet age-old instinct decreed it should have been; Gene felt a shiver tremble down his spine.

  There was a certain satisfaction in rubbing the long tresses of Stacy’s hair between the doubled layers of the towel. The cloth bore an aroma which no doubt was factory-implanted, yet touched another chord of memory and made him think of linen wind-dried in a garden fragrant with flowers and herbs. He fought away from the association because it was personal and superficial, inasmuch as those of his ancestors whom he chose to identify with had not been rich enough to waste ground on plants they couldn’t eat or wear. Nor, come to that, would they have known flax.

  Yet, though he had done his best to disown them, some of his progenitors must have been European, and they at least could have been acquainted with such things…

  He reapplied himself to his task with vigor, and shortly Stacy pronounced herself satisfied and they turned to their meal. Meantime Boat, keeping station just offshore, tight-beamed them music of a kind she judged appropriate. In view of the region they had come to, it consisted of long and wailing lines with no fixed scale Gene could discern, although—like the scent on the towels—it gave him the annoying impression that he should have known much more about its origins. Stacy, at least, seemed to appreciate what was offered, food and sound alike.

  Three hours after nightfall the storm attained such a pitch that Boat felt obliged to retreat to open water, and her music faded. They lay down in the artificial twilight, separated by the remnants of their repast, together but alone, with nothing to listen to save the rain as it pelted on the roof and traced its way toward the ground and then the sea.

  It was time for Stacy to ask the inevitable question. She postponed it until he dared to hope that for once she might repress it altogether. No such luck; out it came.

  “Do you think they know where we are tonight?”

  The sigh he greeted the words with was near a groan, but he controlled himself.

  “Sure they do. We’re on a long leash, that’s all.”

  “But in weather like this—!” She was pleading for reassurance. “Not even the newest satellites can see through storm clouds!”

  “I’m convinced they still have a trace on Boat.”

  “We’ve searched her stem to stern and disabled everything we could find!…” But her voice trailed away. She had said that before, and every time he had simply echoed her last four words. There was too much truth in that repetition for either of them to consider arguing about it anymore. Once more she lay quiet, while Gene, lulled by the pattering rain, drifted to the edge of sleep.

  Then, unprecedentedly, Stacy spoke anew.

  “I can’t stop thinking about poor Suleyman, you know. Why don’t you tell me what became of him?”

  Gene rose on one elbow and blinked at her, uncomprehending. After a pause he said, “I don’t know what you mean. How could anybody do that?”

  “No, no!” She too sat up, brushing aside her hair. “I want to be told—I suppose I want to be told… Oh, never mind. Sorry.” And lay down again.

  But he was fully reawakened now, thanks to mention of that name. He said obstinately, “What did you mean?”

  “I—I don’t know. And yet I think… Put out the light, will you? Otherwise I’ll never get to sleep.”

  Shrugging, he made a long arm and obeyed. She spoke next time in total darkness.

  “Tell me what would have been right to happen to him.”

  Abruptly it dawned on him what she was driving at. Nonetheless for a while longer he lay confused, sorting ideas in his mind like a meteor sweeper hunting through a thousand kilometers of tangled nets in search of a profitable catch. The rain beat down harder yet; the rushing of water grew to a crescendo, as though the universe were again about to dissolve around them. But he could accept, at this time, in this place, that it would not.

  Moreover, in a sense, he had shared ancestors with Suleyman; at any rate, his and his forebears might well have been cousins in Islam, albeit their descendants had followed different paths. Therefore, to his own surprise, he found words forming patterns, which he uttered. He said, “Oh yes! I know the proper way to end his story.

  “There was a time when he got where he was meant to go. You never met him, any more than I did, but I’m sure you know as much about him as I do. Am I not right to view him as a person caught in conflict?”

  For a second he was tempted to include, “Like you and me!”—but overcame the impulse.

  “Rejecting the religion his family raised him in, with its resignation to the will of God, he must have been a most unhappy man, despite what we were told about his brilliance with computers. For anybody who’s been accustomed to certainty, then robbed of it, must it not be a cruel doom to have to reinvent the destiny of mind?”

  She murmured something, possibly agreement. Encouraged, he went on.

  “At the end of his long journey, he found a world of quiet halls and even lights. It
had no name, the place he came to, for it wasn’t necessary, and there were no people either, for fragile flesh and blood were obsolete. There was still air, however, and it vibrated ceaselessly with the music of machines which, in total dedication to the principles of logic, were attempting to deduce the nature and purpose of the universe.

  “As a result of Suleyman’s intrusion, flaws appeared. How could a man from our discordant planet match such rhythm, such subtle harmony, elaborated over countless centuries? For some considerable while he wished he could run away, being afraid of how he jarred, how his mere presence broke the even tenor of this place.

  “But the grave and wise machines he fell among—had they been human, I could see them tall and robed and sometimes bearded—they were aware of the existence of external worlds… and of the past. They gave him food, and it was good to eat, though they themselves absorbed raw energy. Speech, too, had long been unnecessary to them, yet they addressed him in courteous experimental phrases deduced from their inspection of him and their knowledge of the cosmos, and very soon he grew acquainted with the fashion of things there. His manners came to match the world he fell on; his questions no longer betrayed his shameful ignorance. He learned, and in the learning found fulfillment. There was after all no grand divide between the way a flawless mechanism worked, and the reality which had so often disappointed him. There couldn’t be, if these machines had set themselves the same task as humanity and believed they stood a better chance of arriving at their goal.”

  He paused, pondering what to say next because he was so taken aback by his own insight, and she exclaimed, “Go on! Go on for pity’s sake!”

  Mustering the shreds of his imagination, he continued.

  “If it could be said, it would be said that such a place was too perfect for anybody who was—old?—enough to recall a flawed world like our own. The end of Suleyman’s tale has to be both tragic and triumphant.”